Street smart
29 June 2005. Inspired by .
Hurting my brain this week: Julian Beever's anamorphic 3d illusion pavement art. Lovely.
(from Mind Hacks)
Seeing red
28 June 2005. Inspired by .
The ever-perceptive and newly married Yoz discusses the history of red symbols, communication and saving lives.
Getting kaned
24 June 2005. Inspired by .
The post-dated arrival of a commissioning form tells me that my piece on the BBC's alternative reality game Jamie Kane was in yesterday's Guardian. Read here, then go play here when it starts. Is fun, promise (even though the beta locked me out twice).
Hard a Porto
24 June 2005. Inspired by .
More metronomic chirruping, this time because someone was hitting me repeatedly on the head with a plastic squeaking hammer. The all-night party of São João (which has been commented on before in the next-door parish) was last night, and the thudding of my head today isn't just due to the hammers.
The festival is chaotic, global in various guises and celebrated in Iberia outside the capitals. Rather than a national holiday, it's only Barcelona, Valencia and the islands in Spain, and Porto and northwards in Portugal, that get today off in recompense for a midsummer night of pagan carnivalesque.
Porto in particular has the most customs of any festival I've ever been to, many of which I enjoyed last night as the honoured guest of Mr Vargas:
* big fresh sardines, to be bbq'd and scoffed with friends and with your hands
* green peppers, also from the bbq
* huge paper balloons, launched into the sky with candles underneath
* the aforementioned plastic hammers (great history of the thing here; scroll to the bottom for the hammerheads)
* jumping over a fire to rid yourself of the demons (we didn't find any, which could explain the head throbbing)
* waving an enormous six-foot smelly garlic stem/flower in someone's face
* organised and less-official fireworks (of course)
* a small shrub in your house that only lives for a few weeks, and has a nice smell when you rub your hands in it
* a small collection of mantlepiece figurines based on the popular saints
* pushing heather under people's noses (to combat the garlic)
* staying up all night and then walking to the beach
And if you have time for all that by sunrise, you're clearly not drinking enough.
I was dead good
22 June 2005. Inspired by .
I'm afraid my obit talk, reported on here and here wasn't recorded by the organisers for posterity, and I didn't even use Powerpoint, so there's no slides for you to ogle.
The links are up over here though, and make worthy clicking for all those interested in where the net is taking the genre.
New Mexico next year, anyone?
Do you accept Monopoly money?
22 June 2005. Inspired by .
"The purpose of Monopoly Live: Create a property portfolio that will get lots of London cabs driving past the locations that you own. Set up only takes a few minutes, so see how much money you can make in 24 hours.
We have equipped 18 taxis with GPS devices, so we know exactly where they are at any moment. Select one to be your playing piece travelling around London. Five others will be assigned to your game as opponents when you start."
Great idea, and most impressive to me is that they've got the official licence. Though I wish they'd make the cabbies wear top hats, ships, thimbles and small dogs.
(Via the ever-lovely, currently nomenclature-happy Alice)
The story so far
21 June 2005. Inspired by .
This morning I woke up with an irritating fast dance beat in my head. When consciousness slowly came into focus, I realised why: birdsong. Quick, metronomic, unchanging birdsong. I walked out, a copy of the Economist in hand, patted the two bouncy licky waggy dogs, and sat by the pool at my friend's house on the other side of the river in Lisbon. A plunge, a splash, dogs running around, chasing me on dry land as I do slow inelegant laps.
Following a fresh prawn lunch in the sun next to a bar with some really rather pretty Portuguese girls supping and taking in the view of the river and bridge, now I'm at the office in the old town, with plenty of work to do but Test Match Special to keep me company. Tonight we're off to a Brazilian night at a local outdoor restaurant.
None of this is for you, it's for future personal reference, to be filed under 'the way things should be'.
I'm sorry, what was the question again?
21 June 2005. Inspired by .
From The Today Programme, today:
Interviewer: So today, do Sartre's ideas still have influence? Or have they been forgotten?
French philosopher: Well, Sartre's main preoccupation was consciousness, and as you know, Sartre said that consciousness was based on nothingness, so in forgetting Sartre, we are in fact remembering him.
And they say that Sat(i)re is dead.
My new family motto
15 June 2005. Inspired by .
Carved in wood in the cigar bar at Hotel Kamp:
"Trust everybody but cut the cards"
Free beer!
11 June 2005. Inspired by .
Free as in Creative Commons beer, as supped at its launch on a bench in Copenhagen.
Oot and a boot
10 June 2005. Inspired by .
Not much to be said, mostly because I'm on the move for the next few weeks. There's also some rebuilding going on in the background - the mangled template design may even change one day. Oh yes it might.
In the meantime, those keen Andrew spotters can tick off the remaining locations on their list at the following locations:
* Reboot in Copenhagen till Sunday
* The first ever Twenty20 Ashes game in Southampton
* The international obituary association conference in Bath (at which I somehow seem to be speaking)
* The San Juan Festival in Porto
And possibly Helsinki and London in between, if you're lucky. If you're passing by my flat, water the plants would you?