plumbing the shallows

Late evening and I was absently listening to the BBC World Service when the US Presidential debate (round 2?) came on.

I wasn't intending to listen but kind of got sucked into the vortex. Careful citizen questions and bland answers. I was genuinely surprised that even compared with the UK's foray into similar formats, this took the biscuit for not saying anything.

Or rather, what crumbs it did provide were so non-specific that it was actually quite difficult to get a taste of anything tangible. Romney, in particular, just described revisionist views of his past and tokenist views of how things could be.

Kind of: "I'll make sure the sky is blue and the sun shines, except when we need the rain. It'll all be fine."

It was keyword politics. Find a keyword in the question and play back the nearest mp3 response. Not the whole track, just the requisite verse.

An exhibition of the classic three Ms of media, money and marketing driving outcome, playing to candidate like-ability with a mere hint of domestic (let alone international) agenda.

In fairness, I thought Obama unloaded a little more content, but maybe they should just introduce some judges and an X-factor style red X over the candidates to guide them toward more (excuse the deliberate X-factor word) "relevance".

Aside from the presumed electorate fatigue after 18 months of television, I can't understand how this superficial debate determines leadership of a world power.

gunpowder in the supermarket

Simple enough, I was leaving the supermarket, having just bought some milk. The doors to the colder outside were open when I caught a tangy chemical smell.

Not damp, more sharp and something that pinged back to childhood. A mix of cold air and something else. Black powder nitrates. The smell from the inside of a sparkler packet.

Strontium, barium maybe copper. Flashback to scarves and improvised displays.

Different nowadays, with most fireworks organised.

Then I spotted the locked freezer-like box in the entrance to the supermarket. Almost stealthily, November 5th is approaching.

the music in that guinness cloud advert is

My supply of emergency posts has pretty much run out.

Blog trade secrets, I know, but I usually keep a few posts that could fill in a gap when I'm particularly busy and occasionally I pre-schedule them if I'm on the road or something that would otherwise create a long gap.

The usual problem is that they go out of date or get superseded by something else.

I'll make an exception with this post-dated post, which is about the recent Guinness advert on telly. I enjoy an occasional pint of the black stuff and recognise that they have some good adverts.

The advery above uses a Danny Elfman music track, which I think is called Ice Dance but most people would recognise as from the Edward Scissorhands movie soundtrack.

A good excuse to post an excerpt from one of Tim Burton's finest as well...

wombled without mudguards

I awoke today to what looked almost like frost on the grass. It was certainly a very dense dew. My original plan had been to join a cycling event but from quite early it started to unpick.

The phone rang and I received a plaintive request to make a special trip to Wimbledon to hand-deliver some forgotten tickets. It was one of those comedy sketch things where I drove to Wimbledon (as instructed), only to be told it was actually Wimbledon Common where I was expected.

They are only a mile or two apart, but it was enough in busy traffic to create a time penalty. And then more comedy as I tried to find the spot on the vast common without an address or road name or anything. Just a vague description that it's opposite 'the tent'.

Several phone calls later the tickets were delivered and I could head back for home through the now busy traffic of south-west London. Not a Womble in sight, although I have just heard that they may have been singing in the tent.

I think the round trip took the suspicious part of two hours scuppering my original plans.

Instead I took out the bike I'm preparing for winter use. All the main bits are working and I clocked around 20 miles. I think the orange colour will be suitably autumnal. A useful spin and it's helped me remember that I still need some mudguards. That'll be a small project during the week.

preparing the stochastic Dirichlet Chinese restaurant method randomiser

The phenomenon of that dancing competition programme affected us all at the end of last week. I'm trying to remember if we were eating a Chinese takeaway when it was on. I'm pretty sure we were drinking some red wine.

The thing is, I somehow got roped into generating a sweepstake linked to whoever will win the competition, which is on BBC television for the next few weeks.

It's probably the last of the not blatantly commercialised shows and seems to be more about positive re-inforcement rather than the negativity inspired concoctions of the Svengali shows.

We had the usual problem of too many people wanting to enter compared with the number of competitor names available, but a simple randomised draw soon fixed the problem.

It was one of those occasions where we could have used a fancy algorithm ensure the sequence had a uniform bound on the compressibility of its initial segments. Instead we used a few strips of paper cut up and placed in a sparkly hat which seemed to do just as well.

I gather the first knockout from the competition is tomorrow. I have - er - Lisa Riley from Emmerdale Farm as my entrant. Go Lisa.

drinking machu picchu coffee can't fully explain the speed of this week

This week has been zinging by. I've only had local travel and even had some reschedules, so I'm not quite sure why its going by so fast.

I'm wondering if its the coffee I've been drinking. I chanced upon a stash of Peruvian Machu Picchu a few days ago - on unexplained special offer in a local supermarket.

The real deal, French-style roasted beans waiting to be ground. Mysteriously on special offer, so I gave them a try.

One of those moments when you know they are going to be brilliant. Like Pacific oysters bursting with wild sea from Elliott's in Seattle, or vintage Champagne from Castellane in Epernay, you just know it's going to be great.

A handful of the beans gives an aroma of high mountain slopes, mist and rain. You can just sense the terrain of the Incas.

Then as it's ground there's a further aroma like chocolate, but still underpinned with a kind of wild damp mountainside.

Of course, you have to actually make it into coffee and drink it.

A fabulous simple pleasure.

Maybe that's why my week has been spinning past so quickly?

mycurtainsareclosedbecauseistartedworksoearly

I'm back in London this week, after my travels of the last week and a half. Actually, I only arrived back on Sunday afternoon and then spent time unpacking bags and sorting out laundry.

This morning I was up before the lark and started working without even opening the curtains or blinds.

But I gather that not opening the blinds is now frowned upon, according to our Chancellor on talk radio this morning.

In fact, the subsequent #mycurtainsareclosedbecause hashtag on twitter could have been stopped me from working if I'd been following the aftermath.

Update: Kate has storified a few of the tweets from various people here

Michelle Shocked at the Cluny

Baltic gallery in the morning, followed by a bit of a pub crawl yesterday afternoon, then along to the Cluny to see the original skate-board-punk-rocker Michelle Shocked.

Michelle was on fine form and played a selection of well-know songs as well as some brand new ones. A brilliant performer and it was great to see the engagement of the audience throughout.

Michelle takes such a positive approach to life and adapts the set and storytelling to the location. We had bits of 'Blaydon Races' at the start of the set, with Michelle and Peter O'Toole jamming the chords whilst the audience self-selected the song.

Michelle explained she is still on her five year tour (this is year three).

Politics and freedoms mixed with the songs, some receiving quite broad adaptations to keep them current. Already looking forward to whenever the next time we see her.

We had a blast.

Keep on rockin' girl.

a casual vacancy

As well as some further work today on my difficult second novel, I've encountered a couple of other fresh books.

The first one is so new it hasn't been published yet. It's at that "A4 sized sheets that are freshly bound" stage. It looks neat but is waiting for the first few reviewer readers. I can safely say it has a great first sentence.

The other one is That Book, the one that everyone is buying at the moment and having opinions about. I got my copy from a proper bookshop and paid an almost full retail price for it. Fifteen minutes later I saw the same title on sale in Tescos for £9, which is less than half price.

I've only just started it. There's an okay but not great first sentence but actually the dust jacket gives away that the subject of the opening isn't going to make it alive to the end of the first chapter. An. Aneurysm.

I used that 'don't pass go' device in The Triangle, where in my case I think of it as the James Bond beginning (i.e. something lively that doesn't have a lot to do with the main story).

In the red covered novel's case it is used to set the motivation for what happens in the next few chapters.

I haven't really read enough to have fully formed views yet, but I can see already that JK Rowling writes a good line in teenagers and it is quite interesting to see how she develops inhabitants of varied housing estates in a manner similar to the Muggle parts of the early Harry Potters.

I can understand the title of the novel based upon the thoughtfully added definition in the front of the book, but I suppose it is also about that way of living - a kind of casual vacancy of mind that people have in many situations. I'm assuming that will be a theme of some kind as I get further into it.

Others have said the story telling is kind of standard, but I suppose JK Rowling has been a plot-meister in the other series of books. It will be interesting to see whether this one branches into new territory and how much Rowling-esque back story will feature.

technique for use of megastructures to inform the creative process

The background threat of my continued work on the second novel continues. In between bits of work this week I decided to review the progress and try to unscramble to plot line.

I'll admit that the rush of words from NaNoWriMo can be good but also created a few spurious scenes which I'm in the process of deleting. The scene set outside a football ground in Reading is a case in point. I think I was stuck in a nearby traffic jam when I visualised that particular and superfluous moment.

And a few characters can be combined. It's obvious to me that there's too many, possibly a factor of the storyline being put together in bursts.

So I wandered outdoors with the laptop, found a nearby beautiful mega-structure where I could sit in relative peace with a cup of coffee and started the editing process.

It's working surprisingly well and I think the change of scene is good for inspiration. Today at the performance space and maybe tomorrow at the adjacent gallery.

Suggestion for caption: Windowcleaners or spacemen?

inside the butterfly cabinet

Tonight we were at the wonderful Butterfly Cabinet for some blues. We needed a table this evening so timed the arrival for just after the neon 'OPEN' sign was switched on.

Well, not quite, actually. We arrived early enough to have some starters in the nearby sky apple cafe, ahead of the switching of the neon.

The venue was hosting the Monkey Junk Blues Club and in the short period from 7.45 until 8 filled from the front room, through the corridor bit to the back room with animated folk ready of an evening of the blues.

A foot stompin' and hot smokin' evening. A short video extract below.

down the empty streets we'll disappear until the dawn

Sometimes an evening sat around a table just chatting is the best way to go.

We'd talked about watching a television show but instead our little group assembled around a circular table (the best kind) with a few glasses of jazz-backed wine and a fine home-made supper.

We pretty much talked from before a rainy sun had set until beyond the witching hour.

Sometimes it needs the time to let conversation develop like a stream becomes a river.

The bridge across the misty waters outside our door surely helped create the atmosphere.