The Piano Tuner Of Earthquakes

As seen in Trieste on November 27th, 2005







The fact that i took pictures while viewing probably counts as a rather positive review.
(more here)

Geopolitics at the post office

While i was next in the post office queue last friday, a little girl skipped right in front of me and went straight to the counter. I didn't say a word because i already knew her: palestinian, no more than 15 years old, a mix of shyness and enthusiasm coming from beneath her black chador. Also because i was the only one in the queue, anyway.
She produced a letter with an address in both arabic and beautifully hand-written latin alphabet, and said to the lady behind the counter "Per la Palestina, per favore".
The lady took the envelope and turned towards the large pricebook behind her. She looked up the country at the letter P, but said "...non esiste..."
A colleague came up and half-whispered "Israele" to her.
"Ah!" she replied, and promptly produced a stamp.

Biting political commentary, i thought as i helped the girl find the right size of coin from her tiny purse.

...awkwaaaard...

(Yes, i also think it's disgusting)

Critical Commentary

In conversation with my dad:

Him: "Oh, we went to the pictures last night"
Me: "That's nice, what did you see?"
Him: "March of the penguins. Stupid beasts."

Useful, for future reference.

fred: ...And then i had a tsingtao beer...
me: pfffff.
fred: what's so funny?
me: Tsingtao beer. It's not good. It's not bad. It just makes you laugh like hell.

The Great Sunday Traffic Jam of 2005

So since i've been asked to post more pictures of Duino, i've decided to release into the wild these images of what was probably the biggest event to have occurred here this year: The Great Sunday Twelve O'Clock Traffic Jam of October the Twenty-Third, in the year of Two Thousand and Five.

For i can say that i was there, that i saw it, and even better: i was in the eye of the storm! For i was (gasp!) a passenger in one of the vehicles involved, and thus had a chance to step outside and take these historical pictures!
(All images open in a new window because i finally figured out how to make them do that.)


Above: Three buses! On a sunday! Notice the cars illegally parked on the sidewalk, at left in the picture.


Above: Our car (actually Pino's Skoda) as it wondered how, if ever, it was to get out of this mess.
Below: Passengers of the car behind us, other participants of that day's expedition to Slovenia, visibly excited with their priviledged place in history being written. Notice the approving thumbs.



Epilogue: The Great Sunday Traffic Jam of Sezana, October 23rd 2005, after lunch.

A much tidier affair.

Separated at birth?

Mu-Tron Bi-Phase Phaser Effect Processor, as played by Kraftwerk(among others) in the '70s,


And

Combinaison Spaciale EP, as published by Pizzicato Five in 1996.

I'd never noticed the similarity until today, as i browsed a gallery of equipment used by Kraftwerk in the seventies which i'd downloaded off someone on Soulseek (the gallery, not the instruments). Which isn't very bright 'cause there are pictures of the machine in the cd booklet and i'd never noticed those either.

Another thing i didn't know is that Florian Schneider apparently continued playing synth-flute on stage even during their tours in the eighties, but that's something i'm not really 100% certain about(this picture sure looks mid-seventies to me, but who am i to argue with how some guy on the internet archives his shared image folders?), and hope to eventually find some proof.



I also wonder what that washing machine is doing behind him.

Outdaleked

Last friday,while i was busy getting all excited about getting free stuff in the mail from my favourite band, little did i know that in london, in those very same moments my best friend was personally experiencing one of my greatest childhood dreams:

She saw a Dalek.



A real live Dalek. Hiding in a corner of her academy for reasons yet undiscovered.
Although a bit startled by this -and reasonably so- she managed to take a picture and send me it, at risk of extermination.

This proves that no matter how cool your day may be, somebody somewhere is having a cooler one. And fate will do its best to make you green with envy as soon as you get to know about it.

Holy Free Samples, Batman!

Oh my god, i'm a mod.

Wow.

Just got back from the increasingly unappropriately named Science+Fiction festival in Trieste.
What i saw:
Premiere italian screening of The Piano Tuner Of Earthquakes, by The Brothers Quay and produced by Gilliam.
Premiere italian screening of Mirrormask, by Dave McKean (written by Neil Gaiman)
Rare english-language screening of The HitchHiker's Guide To The Galaxy (which i'd already seen but not at the cinema)

I just have to get this out of my system:
Mirrormask.
Wow.
I still can't believe how beautiful that movie was.
I mean, really.
The music, the visuals, everything. Perfect.
I mean.
Wow.

I guess this counts as speechless.

Blogging will resume as soon as i recover verbal articulation.

Another one which i'm probably the only one to find funny.

When i wake up in the morning the girls downstairs are playing their stereo really loud, all i hear is the bassline and only sometimes i can make out what exactly they're listening to (yesterday, aerosmith). So my first urge in the morning is to put some music on - LOUD - so i don't have to live with that. The stereo in my room is constantly on, and when i stop the music before going to bed, lately around two or three AM, all i hear is buzzes: the buzz from the heating system, the mute hum from my stereo that changes pitch if i move the free external cord around the room or tap it lightly with my fingers, the tank in the toilet next door suddenly and for no apparent reason deciding to change its water, the same toilet's ventilation system going on and off, thermostats clicking.
If i pause my stereo during the daytime all these sounds i listed can be heard ever so faintly, and my mind starts to make out little strands of melodies that dissolve a half-second later.

Sometimes i feel like i'm Terry Riley's next door neighbour(thumping against his wall and screaming "Will you turn that BLOODY ONLY FAINTLY AUDIBLE ULTRAMINIMALIST AMBIENT MUSIC DOWN???").

The past couple weeks described in one brief exchange

me: "Sorry i'm late, i couldn't find my left shoe."
her: "Robin, that's your right shoe."
me: "DAMN!"

ErrorMessage of the week

Masha Qrella

Had the chance to see Masha Qrella perform live in Trieste's Teatro Miela this friday. I'll post more about the night itself when Ceci sends me the pictures (i didn't bother taking any myself since i had a professional photographer sitting next to me), but in the meantime i want you all to go over to Morr Music's website and listen to her latest album, Unsolved Remained.



I can't give you a direct link to the songs due to the nature of the website, but what i can do is help you get there once you're on the homepage:

1.Click on "Enter"
2.Say hello to Barbapapa
3.Click on "Releases"
4.Click on "mm052 masha qrella unsolved remained cd/lp"
5.You wait, time passes. (sorry, couldn't help it)
6.Click on "listen!"
7.Click on any song title, music will magically come out from your computer and you will have to fight the urge to open it up and see the little people playing their little instruments.

Conan Vs. Bear

I used to think i knew what Art is about.
Until i saw This Site.

lost post

Came home in a good mood a couple of weeks ago, and wrote this post. Then i realized i had no access to my ftp space, so i couldn't upload the song. So i just saved the draft for a rainy day.
Today i got my access back and it's also raining. So today i finally posted it. Things just work out sometimes.
And i added this little post you're reading just so the other one wouldn't go unnoticed.

Could this be the return of the Weekend Downloads?

Darkness, Pain and Charlie Brown

"When I was young I used to howl at the moon every night
I was wild and ignorant in those days
I had a lot of fun, though
Now I don't have any fun and I'm still ignorant."

-Snoopy, 27.11.58

from the photo backlog

Just to show you how scandalously red the tree in front of my house was just two weeks ago:

Sad to say, it is now almost completely bare.

Bibliographical References

This is not a Zappa bibliography.

Robert Smithson - A Heap Of Language

Pencil drawing, 1966
6 1/2 x 22 inches
Collection: Museum Overholland , Niewersluis

from RobertSmithson.com

Here's one we made earlier

I must've gone completely stupid, because even though i'm busy working on my final exam i found the time to make this site, which ends up being my fourth blog. Four! The very though is a staggering testament to my irresponsibility. Luckily, this time it's not completely mine. The main idea (blatantly nicked from KillUglyRadio -hats off to Barry and his crew!) was mine, the dirty work (setup, template, neat animated gif on top) was done by Pelodia and Gnapppo will be helping along every now and then, as will others yet to be announced.

So what's it about? It's about my favourite italian band (yes A., the one i keep promising to make you a cd of), Elio e le Storie Tese. It collects any news and stuff about the band from around the web and puts it all in one comfortable place. It will also contain rantings about the band which didn't really fit in our respective personal blogs, the kind where we go on and on about completely insignificant details, technical or otherwise. Many a time i felt like posting something or other about them here, but it just didn't feel right. That, and every time i had interesting news before anybody else i would either put it here, which was useless for non-english speakers, or just keep it for myself and feel really really clever and occasionally start giggling in crowded places with a mysterious gleam in my eye.

Just in case, and since i still haven't linked them on the sidebar, here's a list of the blogs i'm currently in charge of:

Cat Walking On A Keyboard - Occasional musings from a certain oft-photographed feline
El Blog De Fidel - PoMoBlog which is a result of the axioms: a) Blogs are people writing about stuff for hours which nobody really reads, and b) Fidel Castro is a person who makes hour-long speeches which are humanly impossible to follow completely.
I Ragazzi Della Via Gluteo - The one this post is about, named after a song which has never been published and with a really neat animated gif on top.
Won't Go Down - this blog, which is something like life in its way of not really having a meaning but attempting to at least be amusing every now and then.

And let me say it one last time: That animated gif is really, really neat. I keep staring at the screen for hours waiting for it to change. Then i get distracted and have to start over.

This Year's Latin American Movie Festival in Trieste

...will not be counting on my participation.
Because i'm just too busy, that's all.

Dindi

Music by Antonio Carlos Jobim.
Portuguese Lyrics by Aloysio De Oliveira:

Céu, tão grande é o céu
E bandos de nuvens que passam ligeiras
Prá onde elas vão
Ah! eu não sei, não sei
E o vento que fala nas folhas
Contando as histórias
Que são de ninguém
Mas que são minhas
E de você também
Ah! Dindi
Se soubesses do bem que eu te quero
O mundo seria, Dindi, tudo, Dindi
Lindo Dindi
Ah! Dindi
Se um dia você for embora me leva contigo, Dindi
Fica, Dindi, olha Dindi
E as águas deste rio aonde vão eu não sei
A minha vida inteira esperei, esperei
Por você, Dindi
Que é a coisa mais linda que existe
Você não existe, Dindi
Olha, Dindi
Adivinha, Dindi
Deixa, Dindi
Que eu te adore, Dindi.


English Lyric by Ray Gilbert:

Sky, so vast is the sky
With faraway clouds just wandering by
Where do they go
Oh! I don't know, don't know...
Wind that speaks to the leaves
Telling stories that no one believes
Stories of love
Belong to you and me

Oh! Dindi
If I only had words I would say all the beautiful things that I see when you're with me
Oh, my Dindi
Oh, Dindi
Like the song of the wind in the trees that's how my heart is singing, Dindi
Happy, Dindi, when you're with me
I love you more each day, yes I do, yes I do
I'd let you go away if you'd take me with you
Don't you know, Dindi
I'd be running and searching for you like a river that can't find the sea
That would be me
Without you, my Dindi.

Lisa Ono with Quarteto Em Cy - Dindi (192kps Mp3, 5.23Mb)

Some songs are impossible to ruin.

It may be good for you

It's been a while since i've last linked to good comics here. One that i've been appreciating recently(i.e.:gone through the archives for a whole day, instead of studying) is Reprographics, a photocomic by sculptor, artist and photocopy guy Chris Yates. Reading this strip actually made me miss the not-too-distant times when i worked as an underpaid but (let's be honest) only occasionally overworked photocopy lackey.



Go there and enjoy. It's one of those cases where i see something and say "it's just how i would have done it". Which probably means that anybody else will say "this makes no sense whatsoever".
Whatever, i like it.

(click here to read the particular strip i criminally cut-and-pasted to illustrate this post, thus removing all traces of humor)

3% of people had this result.

You are Animal.
You are completely nuts, but fun to be around.

SPECIAL TALENTS:
Drums, Women, Food.
HOBBIES:
Drums, Women, Food.

FAVORITE EXPRESSIONS:
"Louder!", "Food now!" and
"Want Woman!"

LAST BOOK EATEN:
"The Musicians' Guide to Drums, Women &
Food"

NEVER LEAVES HOME WITHOUT:
An appetite.


What Muppet are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

883 other people got this result!
This quiz has been taken 32502 times.
3% of people had this result.

Asked some friends if it was a realistic description. They said "well, so and so". Then they saw the picture and said "actually, the picture is just right".

I suppose this makes me something of a Ricky Lancelotti. (Beware: Obscure Zappa-related jokes here lurk)

Good news makes me happy.

Unexpected knowledge

So i was putting things together for a post yesterday afternoon when The Cat came along insisting to play. And insisting. And insisting. And insisting some more.
Until he eventually got sick of my ignoring him and in a surprising feat of coordination went and pulled the plug out of my computer.


The Cat, a couple of weeks before yesterday's accomplishments

Which is even more surprising if you consider that in order to plug my pc out, a small red button on a nailed-to-the-wall plug rack is to be pushed. So my theory is that after some fourteen years living with us the little yellow guy has finally developed opposable thumbs and of consequence we are doomed, all doomed.

Another cool thing is that when i looked under the table to punctually gawp in astonishment at what he'd just done (as he just sat there looking at me as if he'd done the most ordinary thing in the world) i noticed that at his feet was the little audio-to-audio cable i'd been looking for for the past weeks, so now i can finally convert some of my tapes into digital files. I might post a couple of results here when i finally have ftp access again.

(DSL update - long story short: our former operator and the new one are currently too busy arguing over which one of them hates us the most to actually hook us off or onto any of their lines)

Moral of the whole story: i proceeded to play with The Cat for the following half-hour. He'd just gone a step up in evolution just to prove a point, so he certainly deserved it.

At this rate he'll be going out and buying a mac (the following step in evolution) any day now.

Street vendor, Iquique, July/August 2005

Iquique bus terminal, July/August 2005

No Title Today.

So the cold or flu or whatever it was seems to have almost completely gone away, thus allowing me to pop my head out into the wilderness again a couple of times this weekend, and even to finally(!) shave after a week of scruffyness. Because for some reason if i shave while i'm ill, i get worse. Is this just me? Or is there a little-mentioned law of thermodynamics according to which less facial hair=temperature going up? However it may be, i now tread this world without a constantly itching face and no longer looking like The Master.


Roger Delgado, a.k.a. The Master. Don't know who he is? Shame on you. Get into a timewarp and watch some seventies british tv.

(Speaking of which, i have a great story about how Roger Delgado accidentally ended up in a Beatles studio recording, but i'll keep that for another day)

The second problem, however, seems not yet to have been fixed. I'm still on a very temporary, very firewalled connection which does not allow me to upload all those picture galleries that i've been telling people to have been ready for over a week when they're all actually still in the realm of undiscarded ideas. I plan to call up my new provider today to see what's up. If at all. I'm also unable to download stuff, which is also bad because i keep reading about cool bands i should check out(last week's Alias had a two-pager on The Free Design, and i'm hurting to find some of their music online). So in the meantime i can only hotlink to other people's pictures or upload the odd one-picture-at-a-time with HelloBloggerbot.
All this gives me a great excuse for being so lazy with my blog.

Ah, i also really, really need to update the sidebar. The books and cds bit is now a year old. And i have some nice new blogs to add to the links. Blogs by people who actually know me. Unusual.

The sporadical gift of saying the right thing at the right time

Meanwhile last night i was once again on one of my thankfully rare (free booze) visits to never-should-have-been land.
The context is of no importance, the scene you and i have seen at least a million times. Outside a residence, she comes towards me with tears in her eyes. "They'll never talk to me again", she says.
"That's not true and you know it", i answer.
"Then why aren't they here?" she reasonably replies.
"Because they're back there in the garden hiding the bottles", i point out. "Now go there and don't be stupid" i continue as i walk off in the opposite direction.
"And you?" she asks while following my stern orders.
"I'm going to pee."

As i mind my own business i hear a very loud and wet "I'm Sorry!" come from the other side of the bushes. I return to them, now hugging, and speak the words:
"So are we going to have to go through any more of this nonsense or can we carry on drinking?"
Sadly, nobody paid attention. Ah, for a drum roll.

(On the Winamp: Gilberto Gil & Caetano Veloso - Live in Umbria)

P.S. My Norton Autoprotect just expired, so i am now internetting without a safety net. The thrill!

Teaser re: 7.10.05

Guess the moustache!

Teaser re: 6.10.05

Spot the webmaster!

(Hint: the other visible male)
Via: RetecivicaTrieste

Obligatory quick update post

Justification for a week's absence. Unlike previous absences (i.e. most of september), this time i wasn't posting because of simply too much stuff going on, namely:

a) the rockingest weekend in quite some time(pictures coming soon), and
b) my catching a cold and being stuck at home. But also
c) a very temporary internet connection while we change providers.

So in the meantime here's a picture of my new hat being worn by a ventilator.

Enjoy!

Giant Bunny Of The Day

Missed this one when it happened: a Giant Pink Bunny was erected two weeks ago by art collective Gelatin on one side of the very evocatively named Colletto Fava close to the village of Artesina, Piemonte, Italy and will stay there until 2025. At which point i assume it will get up, shake some dirt off and go back to its giant pink nest. Or eat Tokyo.

(Link via the great Drawn.ca website whose existence i had somehow forgotten until yesterday, when memory of it suddenly came back to my mind. I had probably at some point been brainwashed by baddies.)

qwerty adventures

The origin of the qwerty keyboard, explained in a webcomic.
I'd always been very curious about this story, as i'd heard many different versions of it (some concerning demonic, sionistic or otherwise supernatural secret plots) and never knew which one to believe. But this one's in a comic, so it just has to be true.
The comic proceeds to convince the reader to switch to the effectively more functional Dvorak keyboard, which i'm tempted to try out at some point if only to make it impossible for other people to use my keyboard. And also impossible for me to use other people's, which i suppose is the downside.

Kahimi online

It's only been brought to my attention recently: Kahimi Karie finally has an official website online, and with an english section no less! Sadly, no audio clips for me to convince people that this is a good thing. But the site is nice.

On a partially related note (i.e.: things that only i get excited about), Maki Nomiya(ex-Pizzicato Five) will be publishing a new album this october and among the many guest stars will be none other than Wolfgang Flür(ex-Kraftwerk)! I have reason to believe that this is the much-rumoured about unreleased collaboration from 2000 which Flür mentions in the conclusion to his autobiography, Ich War Ein Roboter. Now how's that for useless trivia?
(via Chipple.net)

Upcoming event

Yours Truly just made the happy surrogate-of-a-person dance around the room upon discovering that Paula Morelenbaum is playing in Udine this december!
That's all, just wanted to share this groundbreaking development with the rest of the world.

(And while we're at it, what *is* the relationship between Paula Morelenbaum and Jacques Morelenbaum? Oh, the hours i've spent discussing the matter with friends! Husband and wife? Brothers? Bizarre coincidence? Do even they know the answer to this one? I've had a chance to speak with both more than a couple times over the years, but never had the nerve to ask such a delicate question.)

It all depends on how you shake the packet.

Two food anecdotes. Well, "food".

1 - A Recipe

Instructions: empty two portions of Philadelphia cream cheese into a bowl, accidentally bump your elbow into a spice rack, watch in helpless despair as your nice white bowl of cheese fills with red, red paprika.
Reassure all present with the phrase "Don't Worry, I'll Think Of Something."
Mix bowl.
Later, when the guests at the tea party enquire about the contents of aforementioned bowl, just nonchalantly answer "Oh that? It's that new paprika-flavored Philadelphia cheese they've been advertising recently."
Observe its disappearance in seconds flat.


2 - Easily distracted by flashing lights and noisy objects

So this webmaster goes to the kitchen to fix himself some lunch. Feeling adventurous, he decides to try his luck on some deep-freezed ginger orange technicolored chicken cordon bleus of dubious (read: the big discount store) origin.
He pulls the box out of the freezer, and gives a snicker. He turns it around to read the approximate cooking suggestions, and laughs a little. He turns it upside down and laughs some more.
Some minutes later he could be found rolling on the floor laughing while shaking the box to and fro. When questioned, the only answer to all this mirth he could produce was "if i move the box, it makes a noise like rain."

(Aftermath: the contents turned out to be very colorful and absolutely uneatable)

Freaky If You Got This Far

There are many great traditions in recorded popular music. Two of them go parallel: the contractual obligation album and the anti-music industry impresario song.
Three examples of the latter are Cocaine Decisions by Frank Zappa, Van Morrison's Bigtime Operators and, coming back to italian land, Elio E Le Storie Tese's Sos Epidos. That same band had to release a contractual obligation album in 1990, titled The Los Sri Lanka Parakramabahu Brothers (a.k.a. Il Disco Pacco Di Natale), to be released from Epic/CBS Records. It is, to fans, critics and band members themselves, the lowest point of their recording career.
Frank Zappa's "contractual obligation" for Warner Brothers consisted in the repackaging of his monumental quadruple LP project titled Läther into the three infamous "ugly cover" albums -Studio Tan, Sleep Dirt and Orchestral Favourites- released in 1978/79 (more info about those at Zappa Patio and here).

Ah, and Van Morrison's contractual obligation album. Which is the reason i'm telling you all this.
In 1967 the young Van Morrison was in the early stages of his solo career. He was signed to Bang Records, a company owned and administrated by Mr. Bert Berns, also author of the odd pop song lyric himself. Berns was certainly not the most honest of entrepreneurs if we consider his behaviour towards Van The Man: both albums from this period were released while the artist was on tour, without him being informed. And heavily overproduced, without the artist's consent. So of course Van wanted out from Bang Records.

What changed things was Berns' sudden death on December 30th, 1967. Warner Brothers Records was already interested in Van working for them, so an agreement was reached that the next ten songs he recorded would belong to Bang Records, after which he was free to go happily on his merry way.

So what happened next? Bert Berns' widow Eileen, quoted in Steve Turner's Van Morrison biography, tells us this:
"He then turned over a tape that he must have spent ten minutes making.(...) It consisted of ten bursts of nonsense music that weren't even songs. You could never have copyrighted them. There was something about ringworms and then he sang something about 'I gotta go in and cut this stupid song for this stupid lady' and so on"
"To cut a long story short, I had two small babies, one of them born three weeks before Bert's death, and I just wanted to get on with my life, and didn't bother to take him to court and sue him over the songs I didn't get. So I just let it go."
(From: S. Turner, It's Too Late To Stop Now, Bloomsbury, London, 1993)

Those sessions are now available online, and are absolutely hilarious.

Even if you don't feel like right-clicking "save file as" some 31 times, at least go here and read the improvised-in-the-studio lyrics. And don't tell me all this wasn't worth it.

(Moral: In 1968 Van Morrison recorded Astral Weeks for WB Records, which is still considered one of the five greatest albums in the history of rock. Outtakes from it were never published, and are presumed lost. But these Bang Records masters are freely available on cheap compilations and now even online. All things considered, i wonder who got the last laugh.)

(Via KillUglyRadio)

Avventure di un evaristico in Coneglianoland.

The press conference was scheduled for 4 o'clock in the afternoon, in Sala Giunta of Conegliano Town Hall. Myself+2 enter the place ten minutes early, following a random journalist who would remain partially unaware of us for the rest of the proceedings.
We reach the small early eighteenth century, lavishly decorated conference room and stand waiting, unsure whether to sit or not on the few available chairs. Few seconds pass and the journalist, a dark-haired lady early in her thirties, starts mumbling into her cellphone and eventually says out quite loudly "they decided to move it to the piazza downstairs, since it's such a nice day", in a manner which sounded too much like a personal reflection for us to accept it as her admitting our existence.
We go back down two flights of stairs where a very polite public relations lackey stops us all from exiting the building, and asks us for identification.

A small parenthesis. We had entered the town hall building unauthorized and uninvited so we could attend a press conference. The press conference was moved to the outside Piazza, an open, public space. This man was blocking us from leaving the place we weren't supposed to be in, demanding a justification for our inexplicable desire to simply walk out of a door, albeit in a pleasantly polite manner.
What makes me wonder now (i didn't really give the matter much thought at the time) is this: what would have happened if we didn't make it past him? Would we have been condemned to remain inside the eighteenth century construction for the rest of our lives, or until somebody actually realized we had nothing to do with the place? Or would we have been automatically whisked off to some otherworldly, extradimensional limbo? We'll never find out, i suppose, but the matter still troubles me.

Back to the events. The journalist in front of us says "i'm a journalist from Messaggero Veneto, and this is my press i.d.", flashing a card from her wallet. The man, unimpressed, lets her out.
He then turns to us: "e voi?" ("and you?")
"They're with me" i answer, pointing at my companions. "I'm from a website."
"Really? That's great!" said the surprised doorperson, his face suddenly lit up. He gives us a big smile and allows our exit.

On our way to the center of the piazza, where the chairs were already set, the personalities were already taking place and the waiters from the local Festa Dell'Uva were already opening complimentary wine bottles, Fabrizio, the friend who had invited me to the town in the first place, asks: "What if he'd asked you the name of the website?" I think this thoroughtly and sort of mutter out that yes, that would have been something of a problem. After twenty seconds of further reflection, i say out loud "Hey wait! I really do have a website!"

Therefore, my posting this account here retroactively justifies our presence there yesterday.

(A few disapproving eyes turned towards us, but it was too late for their owners to kick us out.)

Art Craziest Nation

The Walker Art Gallery of Liverpool is exposing a mini-exhibition of modern art masterpieces. their creators, and reknowned art patrons. In lego.

(Above: Joseph Beuys - The Pack, 1969. Recreated by The Little Artists.)

The exhibit was created by John Cake and Darren Neave a.k.a. The Little Artists, below pictured while jumping on Tracey Emin's Bed.




Whilst perusing the online gallery section, links below the works may provide a valuable who's who for the world of People Who Do Stuff.

Art Craziest Nation, Walker Art Gallery Liverpool, 20 August 2005 - 29 January 2006.
Disclaimer: Please note that Art Craziest Nation is a single exhibit. It is not a Lego exhibition.

And i'm still wondering what that means.

Good company.

Albums i took to chile with me:

Cornelius - Point
Pizzicato Five - the fifth release from MATADOR
Antonio Carlos Jobim - Composer:the Warner Archives
Elio e le Storie Tese - Grazie per la splendida serata vol.1 live in treviso 2.7.05
Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band - Trout Mask Replica
Giuliano Palma And The Bluebeaters - The Album ft. Gino Paoli
Elio e le Storie Tese - Ho fatto 2 etti e 1/2 lascio? Rolling Stone Edition
Frank Zappa/Ensemble Modern - The Yellow Shark

Albums i took to chile but eventually never listened to:
Arto Lindsay - Salt
Van Morrison - Astral Weeks

Plus of course a flurry of tapes.

Voilà le chat!

In response to a billionth of a billion requests, here's a picture of the cat, visibly unscathed by the weeks we were away. We left a sibling behind to attend all its wishes and desires, which usually revolved around the general ideas of eating and sleeping. In the picture, he is doing neither.

Chromosomes

So X tells me to say hello to Y. Y is X's former girlfriend.
Of course i will, i tell him.
But as he leaves i realize how familiar this scenario is: if i tell Y that X says hello, she will say "oh, that bastard. Tell him that next time he wants to say hello, he could at least pick up a phone and do it himself". And if then X asks what Y said, i will have to answer the truth and he will think or say out loud "why do i even bother?".
Otherwise i can just keep quiet about it in the first place. Never tell Y that X says hello. Problem temporarily solved.
Temporarily.
But what if then X asks me what she answered? Can i say "oh sorry i didn't tell her"? Of course not! So i can choose between telling him that she says hi back, or telling him oh-that-bastard-etc. anyway.
Both these last two options would bring disaster: X would either decide to call Y inspired by a fictitious good response, or continue carrying a grudge due to her fictitious-but-realistic (because as i said earlier, i know how these things go) response.
So i have two options, each with two possible solutions. And all four of these solutions would be disaster.

Current opinion: not telling Y that X says hello. Unless of course conversations with her get particularly boring.
Because after all, why do i even bother?

Wow.

Remember(no, of course you don't) in february, when i told of Daniele Luttazzi's show in Udine, which he concluded with a stunning performance of the Jerry Lewis Invisible Typewriter Sketch? Remember when i said that the Leroy Anderson composition that acted as background to that was oh-so-deserving of a konishi remix?
Well, guess what. Konishi went ahead and remixed it.

Um. Wierd.

What Chile needs so badly at the moment

Is a large amount of proofreaders.
Lots of them.
Lots and lots of them.
This is my main conclusion after going through the first 5% of the published documentation i collected in july. But i'd noticed the problem before, typos aren't just in art magazines and essays: they're everywhere. On newspapers. In books. Even in those big ads in the underground.
Hear my plea: if you're somewhat literate in spoken and written spanish or castellano, please move to chile, learn the slang and find employment as a proofreader at some big influential art book and magazine publisher. So next time i have to write a thesis on a chilean artist(god forbid) my brain doesn't have to endure my eyes hopping around from typographical error to typographical error, not being able to concentrate on whatever text remains underneath.

Go look!

Online gallery of Santiago Stencil and Sticker Art, Photographed by evaristo on 13 and 15 august 2005.

...Which us why i was so eager to learn how to make photo galleries...

Pictures taken in Lastarria, Bellas Artes and(the last four, taken on the 15th) Barrio Brasil areas. Generally overlooked by more "formal" artists and scorned as too aristocratic (or artsy-fartsy) by traditional graffitists, sticker art and stencil art are mostly ignored in Chile despite their omnipresence in the very heart of Santiago. Still in its budding phases, this form of expression is naturally enticing to the creative everyman thanks to the obvious simplicity of its technique, particularly so in places that until only some fifteen years earlier would every morning be painted white by the Carabineros to cancel all visible signs of political dissent.
It will be interesting to observe the evolution of this art form over the next few years. And to eventually use it as material for something rather different, but let's not get carried away here.

Good news, friends!

Brothers Grimm finally came out in the U.S. this friday! European premiere at the Venice Film Festival next week! Further info on the relentlessly updated Dreams website.

Also, i updated the Fidel Blog. Pictures of my cat -who is viciously attacking my sandals as i type- are to be expected here and on his even-more-procrastinated blog, since some of you have been enquiring as to his how-and whereabouts.

(Yes, as you might have guessed and most of you already knew, i'm back in italy. And not very happy about it either.)

No.

Actually, i'm not in the mood for blogging today.

inevitably

With the digital camera comes me learning to make web albums. So as a test i took my entire images folder and splonked it online. You can see it here, if you're so inclined, and appreciate the irrational and oddly autobiographical randomness of it all. Existence in general, but the album too.

(actually it's quite boring, i wouldn't bother going if i was you)

Only two images were removed before uploading, one portraying future yet-to-be-revealed projects and the other that i don't know how it got there, officer.

3 pictures

Airport, Iquique
August 2005

Dog on roof, Tacna
August 2005

Portrait of my uncle, 2005








Yes, i bought a digital camera. So you may or may not be seeing pictures taken by me here once in a while. Putting one's own pictures online is so immodest, as if they were actually worth being seen by the rest of the world. Which in my case they certainly aren't, but i won't let all this technology go to waste so here they are anyway.

Damned if you do, damned if you don't

Which movie is the worst you could possibly be shown while travelling through the andes by bus for over 6 hours? This one or this one?
And before you ask: yes, these both really happened to me. The first one even happened twice.

linky-link

My aunt has a blog. There's no more religion.

Distorting reality for fun & leisure

In San Pedro de Atacama:

Her: So, how's the Carrete in italy?
Me: well, it depends if you're in a small town or a large one. Small towns have people going out more on weekends, while large ones are full of university students who usually come from out of town, so parties and nights out are concentrated on weekdays.
Her: So...you told me you live in a small town...
Me: Uh-huh.
Her: ...and used to stay in a large one on weekdays.
Me: Uh-huh.
Her: So basically you would party seven days a week??
Me: I took mondays off.


The things we say for free drinks. Or thanks to free drinks. But seriously, San Pedro's night life is one of the best i've found in the past month. Much better than Santiago. Which doesn't look good for Santiago if you consider San Pedro is mostly a little conglomeration of huts in the middle of the desert.

Also

Went for a walk in the market today, there was a stall where guys in large Barney and Winnie The Pooh costumes would charge for having their picture taken with people's children.

Barney.

Purple bugger scares the living shits out of me now, thank god he wasn't around when i was a kid.

Le Avventure Di Un Robinese In Chile

(Title ©Ai 2005, from an sms received the night before leaving Italy)

So the day after algarrobo we leave for Arica. I decide to lighten my luggage (thus defeating its meaning, ethimologically) by leaving some tapes and pullovers in santiago so i can pick them up on the way back. We spend two days in Arica and decide to hit Iquique. Just for a couple of days.
So i decide to lighten my luggage by leaving some tapes in Arica, and leave for Iquique with only one pair of trousers and a couple of T-shirts. It's only two days anyway.
While we're there we decide to split roads and visit some more places, transforming the original two days into about seven. Once again i leave tapes in iquique, and to solve the t-shirt problem i buy emergency ones.
So by now it's the last week of august and i've left a trail of tapes throughout the southern continent, i'm walking around alone in the middle of the desert somewhere north of the tropic of capricorn wearing a white t-shirt and holding a large red plastic carrier-bag full of audiotapes, looking like Jules and Vincent after The Wolf solves their problem.

Just to allow you to somehow picture my appearance in those moments.
I would also like to mention the fact that all the events hereto described provoked in me a considerable sense of fun and excitement.

(What i was doing in the middle of the desert -and what i found there- are none of your business, thank you.)

Algarrobo

Main reason i haven't updated much in the past weeks: Stuff has finally started to happen. Now that it's apparently over, i can waste some more time writing useless stuff on the internet.

Small anecdote: Went to Algarrobo, a seaside resort 1 hour away from Santiago, a couple of weeks ago. When i awoke the following morning my brain was too distracted by the Vainas i'd drunk the previous night fighting it away in my stomach to allow me to remember where i'd ended up.
So i manage to half-climb out of bed to peek out of the window, and what i see is a wide green field with bunnies hopping around.
"Oh great, i'm in bloody teletubby land" i tell myself, and go back to sleep.

Whoops (2)

Also overlooked having a blog for the last ten days or so. Will make up for it, eventually. Don't despair, i'm still around.
No, make that: Despair, i'm still around.

Whoops

Overlooked by everyone especially myself, this blog turned two years old last thursday. Happy birthday to it.

Bìo Bìo

Yesterday an old man in the street offered to sell me a katana sword.

This meant i could only be in Bìo Bìo, one of the world's most amazing flea markets. It occurs every sunday in the Franklin area of santiago, and the things you can find, see or eat there are impossible to enumerate. Among the things i saw for sale, on exposition or walking about yesterday were antique stoves, "ger-man" brand tools, a litfiba cd, an assortment of nintendos, 1930s german currency (i.e. fünf millionen mark), a cosplayer, saxophones made out of bamboo sticks, authentic horse saddles, spurs and leather whips, puppies and a life-sized cardboard cutout of Raffaella Carrà.

For the record, Pablo Neruda once found the masthead of a seventeenth century french armada ship here, which he purchased for close to nothing and is now exposed in the poet's Isla Negra historical home/museum.

The prices are of course often quite good, arbitrarily chosen and obligatorily negotiable. For example, my parents purchased what to an early identification seems to be a 1920s-built mandolin for 30.000 pesos, roughly around 42-43 euros. Original cds, often still factory sealed (which is what i tend to hunt for when in the neighbourhood) go for something between 3000 and 5000.

I also saw some nice cd/mp3 players. "New" cd players usually go for around 10.000 pesos, so i asked the salesman for prices. In these cases, my tactic is to fake interest for a similar object, and then pretend to be resorting to the one i actually wanted as a slight disappointment, so the theatrical discussions involved usually bring the price down a bit. This time, it was not the case:
Me(pointing at newish-looking cd player): "how much for that?"
Salesman: "30 thousand."
Me(pointing at visibly older and scraggier-looking cd player): "and for that one?"
Salesman: "40 thousand."
Me(finally pointing at the mp3/cd player i was originally interested in): "what about that one?"
Salesman: "I don't want to have business with you. Go away."
Me: "Ok." (Exits)

Was fun.

Meanwhile, two or three months ago...

Me: I love tea. You know another thing that's great about tea? When it's reeeeally hot and reality sort of starts to fade around the top of it.
Her: Robin, that's not reality, it's-
Me: It's not reality? COOL!
Her: Ro...(sighs) Oh, forget it.

A cool thing about chile is the weather report. You get reports for Antartica and easter island. Antartica had -4/-6 degrees celsius this morning, so now you know. Thought it would be colder. Actually, i suspect it's wrong.
It's also getting colder around here. The first week we always had nice weather, yesterday it rained and the temperature went down. Right now i'm wearing my coat and my fingers are freezing.

There, that covers the first question people always ask me since i got here. The other one is: what time is it here?
Answer: half past one.

Movies watched since reaching Chile 7 days ago:

Goodbye Lenin
New York Stories
Brazil
Sideways
Madagascar
Twelve Monkeys
Cortàzar

If i'm not forgetting anything.
I also saw a spanish movie on the plane, despite large amounts of overweight people blocking my view by standing in the aisle. I forget the title. It had Carmen Maura in it (don't they all?) and wasn't very good anyway.
Oh, and Six Days Seven Nights on cable some mornings ago, just because Harrison Ford was in it and i didn't feel like leaving the house not to mention the bed. You don't want to see that.

Passing by.

Day three in santiago, i wake up at five o'clock in the morning. I turn the tv on and find that the movie Brazil is just starting, so i watch it all. Couldn't have been more poignant, the day after the london bombings. The rest of the day feels like that movie.
I'm in Chile.
Afternoon, after lunchtime. I'm in Plaza Brasil, where the Antonio Carlos Jobim monument is and all the students hang out after school or between classes. I've just bought myself a beer and am looking for a bench to sit down and enjoy it. A large green Carabineros truck is patrolling the park, making sure these youngsters don't try anything antisocial. It blocks my path and i nervously make myself aside. The truck stops, the young police officer driving it smiles at me signalling me to go ahead, i surprise myself smiling back.
I reach a comfortable bench, start drinking. Halfway through i realize i'm right in front of the Victor Jara Foundation building.
I finish my beer, walk towards the used bookstores one block down. Some teenage schoolgirls are blowing bubbles on the corner of the street, and seeing them makes me smile for the first time since i'm here.

Landing on Santiago

Airplane, nighttime.
Guy to my left, window seat, nice guy. Argentinian, on his way back to Mendoza.

-Oh, you can see civilization already!
-No, that's Chile.

Guy to my right, across the aisle. Chilean. Complete moron.

Him: What's that?
Outside the window, a city is clearly visible from above, its bright red and orange lights glimmering in the dark.
Me: Oh, that? It's a volcano.
Him: Cool!

Addendum: during take-off and landing, use of electronic equipment is forbidden. So no listening to tapes. Instead, excruciatingly mediocre covers of pop classics(Close To Me by The Cure, Bob Marley's Is This Love, Bowie's China Girl, etc.) are inflicted on poor defenceless travellers. The perpetrators: a band going by the name of "popchill". What to do: Go back in time, track down parents, kill them.

In a day of general grumpiness, here's what actually managed to make me laugh.
(From: Madrox #1, David and Raimondi, Marvel Comics 2005)

Proof of time spent productively

Since i passed my second-to-final exam last monday i've just been busy. So busy. Oh how busy.
I also got a new minesweeper high score:


There, now you can see exactly how busy i've been.

Testing.

Hello. This is me checking how blogger's image upload option works. And therefore uploading totally random images from my hard disk. Pretend this didn't happen. Everything is ok. Nothing to be seen here. The town is in no immediate danger.

There's no pleasing some people...

I got an email this morning telling me that my webspace had been temporarily closed. It also explained why: not enough uploads.
This means the provider actually wants people to upload stuff.
So i guess i might as well share some more music.

Georgie Fame - Mercy, mercy,mercy/Vanlose Stairway.mp3

This medley will probably make most people happy. Taken from a Van Morrison tribute compilation.

by the way

This webmaster will be in chile from the 5th of july to the 15th of august. He would like you all to know that missing one of the best summer concert seasons friuli venezia giulia has ever offered upsets him to no end. He hopes to make something useful of his absence, too. And will probably have time to update more often, so you'll be getting the same pointless banter albeit from a presumably better-fed person.
In preparation, here's a nice guide to chile i'm enjoying. Some parts i obviously disagree with, others are my thoughts entirely, as they say in the trade.

Kalimba

Update: Link was down for 24hrs, now it works again.

I was going to just post the link to this mp3, say something like "pretty tune" and leave it at that. But there's far more to be said.

Inti Illimani - kalimba (live, ft.Angel Parra Trio).mp3

You all know what a kalimba is, don't you? Small finger-piano thing. Caribbean. Metal bits plucked, nut base resonates. Beautiful little instrument, i've got a couple of them lying around which on occasion i pull out and enjoy playing, if nobody's around. But that's not what we'll be talking about today.

This particular Kalimba is played by Efren Viera, Inti Illimani's resident percussionist, saxophone player and of course Kalimba guy. The saxophone you will hear at one point in the track is also of course played by him.
I remember when i first met him, i was at Santiago airport waiting to board my plane, and recognized him in the opposite crew. Wasn't hard to recognize, mind you: a large, dark-skinned cuban among dozens of short and pale chileans kind of strikes out. A television crew was on hand, covering a handball team that was also leaving for Italy, like mr. Viera and myself. I found it amusing that while sthletes were interviewed, chilean music lovers would have seen one of their best resident musicians standing in a queue for a boarding pass.
Seems he was off to catch up with the rest of the band in Italy, to start that year's italian tour. During the long, boring flight i gathered some courage and went over to say hello.

And interrupted his game of tetris.

He was terribly kind about it, we chatted a bit and i made it a point to congratulate him on the other day's recital - i had seen him perform live with the rest of the band at an open air free concert in one of Santiago's main public gardens, an event to promote clean air consciousness (highlights: the girl next to me continually asking me song titles of what was going on onstage, continuous woodstock-style chants between sets which culminated in a drunkard behind me shouting "WASN'T SANTANA SUPPOSED TO PLAY TOO???" once the event was over). He also told me they would be playing in Trieste some days later (Inti Illimani, not Santana), which put me in the uniquely cool situation of having seen the same band perform twice in the same week in two different continents.
So anyway. We chatted, autographs were signed, greetings and even an invitation backstage popped up. Then i went back to my seat and he continued playing tetris on his little gameboy clone.

Plays tetris. Funny guy, i thought.

Then at the Trieste concert some days later(which was actually in Prosecco, but don't let that be a distraction) he whips out the Kalimba for the same-titled song, and plinks dreamily, beautifully away. And it was then that i understood: tetris wasn't a diversion, it was professional practice.

Although i do have a tape of that event somewhere, the performance i'm sharing today is far more relevant. Recorded live in Santiago on the 31st of march of 2001, it represents the first ever incursion of electric instruments in Inti Illimani's thirty-year wholly acoustic career, thanks to guest artists Angel Parra Trio.

Technicalities:
Kalimba (Horacio Salinas, 1996)
Musicians - Inti Illimani
Horacio Salinas, Jorge Coulon, Horacio Duràn, Josè Seves, Marcelo Coulon, Efren Viera, Daniel Cantillana.
Musicians - Angel Parra Trio
Angel Parra, Roberto Lindl, Moncho Perez, Camilo Salinas, Raùl Morales. (Yes, there's five of 'em. Long story. Cope with it.)

Ok, now forget about all this rubbish i just wrote. Turn the lights down and listen to the song. All i wanted to do was share something intrinsically beautiful for once.

in general

One of those mornings: woke up with my hands full of cuts and a funny hairstyle. And it's sad that this is the best thing that's happened to me recently.
In other news: my stereo broke down.

Partial list of albums my stereo will no longer play:
Van Morrison - Astral Weeks
Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band - Trout Mask Replica
Los Amigos Invisibles - Arepa 3000
Paco De Lucia - The Collection
Elio e le Storie Tese - Ho fatto tre etti e mezzo, lascio? Vol.3 (live in padova)
(list to be updated throughout the next days)

Common reactions to stereo not working: Thumping on cd player, thumping on table, thuming ground with feet, abandoning into despair, getting really really angry, ripping shirt, turning green and becoming incredible hulk, smashing manhattan.
In that order.

The good news: going to see eelst for the first time this year next saturday in Treviso. Setlist here. (ooh look! alfieri!)

Cross-cultural reference overflow

Funny how much Patrick McDonnell painted by Gary Baseman looks like Frank Zappa painted by Cal Schenkel.

Image from Arflovers, a highly recommended series of books dealing with "The Unholy Marriage of Art and Comics" (link and definition ripped straight out of drawn.ca), which i absolutely need to get my hands on now that i know it exists.

Also: Bluegrass tribute to Air. (tnx to Gnapppo)

Afternoon musings

If Beethoven were alive today, his look and hairstyle would be seen as terribly outdated.

New and exciting adventures in apathy

The scene: Bedroom, daytime. The webmaster is sitting at his computer, playing Microsoft Spider.
The phone rings, we do not hear the voice of the person on the other side of the line.

Robin: "Hey Fred. Yeah. No, no problem."
(while speaking, he continues playing cards on the computer screen)
Phone: "..." (inaudible)
Robin: "Tonight? I'd love to go, but i haven't studied all day, i-"
Phone: "..."
Robin: "Yeah, tomorrow would be better. We can take the six twenty bus so when we get to the osmizza there's still sunlight."
Phone: "..."
Robin: "I really couldn't today, i was hoping to start studying now actually"
Phone: "..."
Robin: "Oh yeah, that would be cool. Five, five thirty tomorrow afternoon then. Yeah, sounds good."
Phone: "..."
Robin: "Ok."
Phone: "..."
Robin: "yeah, thanks, i'll do my best. Bye." (Puts the phone down)

He continues to play Microsoft Spider.
Image fades out.

(Based on a true story.)

Pictures of fridges

The day has finally come when the refrigerator has become a status symbol. And when posting pictures of your fridge on the internet has become a trend.

(Plus, i'd never realized that it's possible to take pictures from inside your fridge while it's closed. And i'm ashamed of not having thought of this first.)

hay fever is killing me

Him: So, what do you do in your spare time?
Me: Oh, i blow my nose a lot.

Chain Thing.

Oh dear. I seem to have been called in for one of those blog chain things. Hoped the day would never come.
So anyway, deep breath and let's try this thing out.

I) Volume totale di file musicali sul tuo hard disk:
Translation: Total amount of audio files on your hard disk.

The premises are imprecise. You will have noticed the italian text said "music files". Not everything i listen to can exactly be considered music, but i listen to it anyway. The distinction is subtle, but it's there.
Well, whatever. Total audio files: 34.660Mb. Yes, almost 35 gigas. And proud of it.
For the record: as of writing, i have 17511 tracks loaded in my winamp playlist. Do the math. Actually don't, it's irrelevant. Go do something useful. Turn that damn computer off. Go out and have fun.

II) Ultimo CD che ho comprato:
Transl: Latest CD bought.

I consider a "bought cd" as something you go to a shop, give some money for, and then hold in your hands and play on your stereo when you get home. So buying some audio files online wouldn't really count to me, even though it apparently would to Pelodia. Back to the answer.
More or less at the same time, if you consider two of them were bought online(i.e. sent the money, waited some time, got two nice brown packages, found cds and other neat stuff inside):
Jun Miyake - Innocent Bossa In The Mirror (Prod. Arto Lindsay, ft. Vinicius Cantuaria)
Pizzicato Five - ça et la du japon
Trio Bobo - Self-titled debut album.
I used to update the sidebar on the left with this stuff. Hope to start doing that again soon, never really got around to it since 2004.

III) Cosa stai ascoltando mentre scrivi:
Transl: What you're listening to while typing.

Van Morrison - Ballerina (Live at Point Theatre, 1995)
Van Morrison's Astral Weeks is still one of the most beautiful albums ever published, and i've found myself moving back towards it in the past months.

IV) Cinque canzoni che ascolto spesso:
Transl: Five songs i listen to often.

Let's see. Assuming the word "recently" was included somewhere in that question:
Belle and Sebastian - Step Into My Office, Baby. (Actually, the whole Dear Catastrophe Waitress album, over and over, lying on the bed, singing the backing vocals out loud, not doing anything else all day)

YMCK - Yellow, Magenta, Cyan and Black (YMCK no THEME). Someday i'll actually understand what they're saying in that song. I could start by finding out if it's english or japanese.

The Flaming Lips - Yoshimi Battles The Space Robots. Just because.

Spanky & Our Gang - Like To Get To Know You. The work of Konishi Yasuharu succeeded in showing me how great west coast easy '70s pop can be. Another thing i would never have expected

Frank Zappa - Cletus Awreetus-Awrightus. Who couldn't fall in love with this tune? And with the amazing vocals at the end?

V) Persone cui passo il testimone:
Transl: Next blogs in the chain.

Blood Shot Adult Commitment
Frattempi
Yudhisthira
Gnap is the colour
Pino - So he finally starts writing again.
(it didn't say anywhere that these were supposed to be five blogs, they just happened to be.)

Notes: hadn't checked this page in a few days, so didn't seen people's comments. Should have answered most of them, scroll down and check.
Also, my recently-born Audioscrobbler page helped me answer question IV. Shows it's actually useful for something (Useful for something useless, but never mind).

Well, this chain thing seems to have awakened some of that narcissistic attitude inherent to the whole idea of blogging. Let's see how (and if) the others respond.

Sith Aftermath

First thoughts walking out of the cinema after seeing the new Star Wars movie:
"Wow, can't wait for it to be 1977 so i can find out what happens next!"

First reaction upon getting home: changing the default windows critical error beep with a soundclip of Chewbacca roaring.

Monday Night Plans

Me: I'm going to slovenia with my brother tonight...
Her: Cool!
Me: ...To see Star Wars.
Her: Oh.

Mon Dieu.

Mooon Dieu.



Zappa Plays Zappa - TOUR DE FRANK

Thursday October 27, 2005 - Milan Forum, Milan (Italy)
Ticket prices and further details TBC

Friday October 28, 2005 - Palalottomatica, Rome (Italy)
Ticket prices and further details TBC

I am so already there.

And they're even announcing the release of Trance-Fusion. Scaaary.

One more from the lady, after which i shut up about her for everybody's sake

‘Artists constitute, ...an ‘ethnic group’.
‘We too are exhibited as touristic curiosities on Monday, extolled as culture on Tuesday, denounced as immoral on Wednesday, reinstated for scientific study Thursday, feasted for some extremely stylish reason Friday, forgotten Saturday, revisited as picturesque Sunday’.

-Maya Deren, from a 1953 statement.

Must agree, i've also had my fair share of forgotten Saturdays myself.

Update: Barry posted a picture here which relates perfectly with the above. Once again proving the fact that great minds stumble into wierd stuff alike.

Academic doubts.

So last night i came home around two and started researching about a surrealist filmmaker named Maya Deren (as you may see from my last post). I carried on until around four o'clock in the morning, but found scarce results on the web and eventually just dwindled off to sleep.
I continued research in my sleep: i dreamt i went to ask one of my university teachers about the artist, he gave me some useful information among which was, for example, that all her works were originally in color but are now seen in black and white due to deterioration of materials.
I now have a dilemma. Is it perhaps unprofessional to include facts you learnt while dreaming into your thesis' bibliography? And if not, which criteria should be used for annotation?
Suggestions welcome.
(No, the fact that most or all facts learned during aforementioned dream had no connection whatsoever with reality doesn't bother me in the slightest, but thanks for asking anyway)

I had no idea!

Apparently Maya Deren worked on a biopic about me, in 1944.
Imagine that!

When in doubt, post a Steinberg cartoon.

Saul Steinberg
Untitled, 1983
ink, pen and watercolor on paper
14-1/2" x 23" (36.8 cm x 58.4 cm)
© The Saul Steinberg Foundation/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York


Pure genius.

(Via.)

Early results of Arto Lindsay/Cornelius cooperation sneakily creep up behind webmaster's back.

Well i'll be damned.

Cosa Rimiri Mio Bel Partigiano

I Gufi - Cosa Rimiri Mio Bel Partigiano (128Kps mp3, 3.81Mb)

25 April 2005 - 60th anniversary of the italian liberation from NaziFascism.

Tokyo Ska Paradise Orchestra - Let's Stay Together

(yes, it's a weekend download! Makes up for the senseless banter i posted this morning)

A recent event for which here is not the place to discuss brought me to wonder: what is the music you would like to have in your head while you're dying? Discuss.
In the meantime, here's my own answer: Tokyo Ska Paradise's version of Al Green's classic, Let's Stay Together(128kps 5.48Mb Mp3)
Because it's nice and relaxing. Because you can't go wrong with Al Green. And because no matter what goes in and out of fashion, dying with a tune from Pulp Fiction in your head will always be stylish.

Hairy anecdotes

While i was looking for the odd something-or-other on my desk, i came across a note i got once in high school.
Hold it, not a note. *The* note i got in high school.
You see, other guys would constantly pass each other notes in class. They would constantly get things saying "X likes you" or "wanna go out tonight?" or whatever. And girls would pass their own notes around, and giggle. Or recieve notes from boys, pass them around to the other girls, and giggle.
During my whole five years in high shool, i only got a note from a classmate once.
What that note said, after extended discussions and pointing in my direction on behalf of the entire female classroom population, was simply this:

"Staresti bene con i capelli a spazzoletta"

Now. i've been living in italy for over 20 years now, but i still haven't the foggiest idea what capelli a spazzoletta are. (Actually, from the handwriting it looked more like "spazzollta", but i digress) To this day, i still wonder what that meant. Of course i went to the girls afterwards and asked, but they were incapable of defining what this expression meant. They did insist i would look good in it, though, which was probably the closest they ever managed to get to giving me a compliment (or estabilishing eye contact in the first place, come to think of it).

So i still wonder why they wrote that note, and what it means. But more importantly, i wonder why i kept that while moving out of the old house, but so many notes from uni courses i didn't.

(...) -large portion of post removed for reasons bordering between quality control and self-censorship, but mainly because i still can't believe i could have written something so damn stupid.

Nowadays, i pay no attention whatsoever to all this hair stuff, and the answer to the question of whether i will ever cut them again lies somewhere between the realms of Notmyproblem and Mindyourownbusiness.

Present Pastimes

So what does a young man in his prime do on a saturday morning for his own fun and leisure? Well, update Fidel Castro's Blog, of course!
One post today i even entered by hand. No, really. (see if you can guess which one)
It's funny that this officially makes fidel's blog be more updated than mine. Why, he even had Hugo Chavez as a guest-blogger in december!
I don't really know why i do these things. Nobody will ever read them. Heck, even I don't read them while i copy-paste them(although i do occasionally read a passage or two and smirk a little)! But i still find the whole idea hilarious as hell.

More content on this blog forthcoming.

comparison

him: "...and then we usually take the ferry to Helsinki."
me: "Oh! What's Helsinki like?"
him: "It's like Monfalcone, only bigger."
me: "I see."

The Writer At Work

The writer at work: a series of 7 pages from Cabanon Press. Including my namesake.

Also, The Library Cats Map. An essential resource.

(tnx to Dorothy, whose strip made me laugh out loud this week)