pure morning

I have flu and can't sleep. it has taken a lifetime to get through the night. I wish I had sleeping pills.

thank god for the p800

daylight save me from this endless night

the order of the boot

we have been debating women's boots today. although this wasn't a mass debate (in the durant sense, for those RBSers amongst you) it has come close because the principle features of Riga are (in no particular order) :-
- churches
- kinky boots
- women's bottoms
the crux of the debate has been why there are quite so many women wearing knee+ high boots of all different varieties. Compared to (say) London, or even Rome. These are our conclusions. Since all of their bottoms are perfect (or as close as makes no difference), bottom perfection alone is clearly no discriminator. Also it gets pretty cold around here in winter, so a long boot is both practical in keeping the legs warm and looks damn good too. Evolutionary theory would predict the non-survival of the lesser traits, so explaining the dominance of the boot-wearing, perfect-bottomed nymphomaniac*

(*) i have assumed the latter trait as a natural future discriminator now that almost all are wearing kinky boots

We assume that the women of Riga most probably have the strongest ankles in the world, since it looks pretty damn hard to walk on the cobbles in those things and maintain the elegance that is most definitely in evidence. So we are taking great care not to air these opinions in public for fear of a fatal kick to the privates

venus and serener

saturday night at venus nightclub. dj played tracy chapman's 'fast car' twice inside an hour. i've never understood how that record became a dancefloor anthem.
sleepy sunday meandering and drinking coffee. sunshine and a nice breeze. this place would be great to sit in a cafe with a laptop and write a book; nicely relaxed. we've reached the point where there's no more touristing to do; it's just nice to soak up the place.
tomorrow monday - coach to riga; no accomodation yet. oops.

give my regards to brodvejus

i'm probably going to regret this.

my leg is bad (pulled ligaments last week) and i have a limp; i am stone cold sober. i've been touristing it up all day. and I haven't made any new friends today; the hostel just doesn't quite work that well in that regard - these things are always a bit hit and miss. so it's with a little uncertainty i am about to follow advice that wednesday night at 'hollywood' is not to be missed.

the guide book offers little comfort.

the club reputedly will offer you hire of shoes if you have the temerity (it uses that word) to arrive in trainers. well, i am travelling lite. only the trainers. hummmm. the last place where they offered such a service was ... well lets just say that baker and benvens know where it is!

it's funny how the baltic capitals (in my experience so far) have oh-so-generic british club names. i'm expecting to see ritzy's any minute. the title of this post is reference to the broadway club in vilnius which i recall not being able to find on the map. why? because the lithuanians had accepted the english-language phonetics. brodvejus is the lithuanian spelling that will generate such a sound :)

nagemisini. wish me luck.

home from home

in a bar/club called cafe amigo, in the basement of the tall and ugly viru hotel tower block. and mid sentence i stopped.
"i know this tune", i said to adrian.
"oh?" said adrian, listening to the weird russian pop that was orchestrating tall waifs and shorter heavyset brooding guys around the dancefloor
"in the russian pub i was telling you about, the one i used to live opposite on the kingsland road. ... no idea what the record is called though"

'dooba dooba yey' is the best i can come up with. you have to have heard it i guess.

adrian the friendly british businessman who runs his own company here and has lived here for 5 years was a pretty handy guy to meet on the flight into tallinn. by rights it was only 9.30pm when the flight got in, though the locals insisted on it being 11.30pm for some reason to do with the earth and the sun, but my body knew better. so it came to pass that adrian showed me a couple of interesting pubs and his recommended restaurants.

walking towards the cafe amigo, we were passed by two russian ladies asking whether either of us needed any company. declining and averting my gaze, i noticed that on the other side of the road was tallinn's only curry house, and i just thought 'commercial street'

the melty man cometh

I've been watching a few of the latest Coupling episodes recently. No Jeff. Bad.

Anyway, a reprise of some of the finer moments:

Jeff on Breasts: "I need breasts with brains. I don’t mean individual brains, obviously... I mean, not a brain each. You know, I like intelligent women, but you’ve got to draw the line somewhere... I think breast brains would be over-egging the woman pudding."

Jeff on The Melty Man: "All of us in our time are visited by the Melty Man... Don’t say his name, Patrick. Don’t even think his name, or he will rise from the shadow dimensions to do his evil work inside your terrified pants."

Steve on Men: "We are men. We are different. We have only one word for soap. We do not own candles. We have never seen anything of any value in a craft shop. We do not own magazines full of photographs of celebrities with their clothes on."

tony blair is a tightarse

It turns out that if your council tax account is in credit when you close it, they send you a statement telling you so. How nice. I'm sure the cheque will come any day now.

Time passes. Maybe I'll call them and find out when it will be here. Now I'm unemploy... freelance.. I need all the cash I can get.

"Sorry sir, I can't just send you a cheque. You have to write in and request that we pay you it back"

tony, you're a genius

Mindmap

Last week, someone asked me what I missed about living in London. I guess for the sake of brevity, but really for no reason I can put my finger on, I replied ‘Coffee Shops’. The apparent vacuousity (is that a word?) of my answer raised an eyebrow. But I didn’t explain. It would have taken too long, and anyway it’s hard to talk in mindmaps. Ascii is not much better but here’s my attempt:

								

Summer <-> Hot Dresses <-> Love/Lust --- Hate/Disgust <-> Jessica Alba’s Boyfriend

                                      |

   Music                       People Watching     Hangover <---------------------

     |                                |               |                          |

  Relaxing <-> Comfy Chairs <-> Coffee Shops <-> Lazy Sundays <-> Friends        |

     |                                |               |                          |

  Thinking                          Coffee         Markets                       |

     |                                |               |                          |

  Dreaming                     Double Tall Latte   Shopping <-> Shopped out <-> Beer*

     |                                |               

  Sleeping                   Caffeine Overdose

     |                                |

     ----------------------------> Wake Up        

Eraserhead

Last night I watched Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, a very Phillip K Dick-like screenplay from Charlie Kaufman (Being John Malkovich). It’s really good and very understated – more like Memento than Minority Report in the way it handles the Dick-style themes: what is real and what is not, memory, perception.

(*spoilers ahead*)

For me though, by far the best concept was that once the warring couple have their memories of each other erased, they meet again and discover each other all over again. And eventually grow tired of each other again. And so it goes, until the next time. Fated to be together, and (in a sense) fated to be apart. A very Dick-ian projection of Romeo & Juliet (“Two star-crossed lovers...”). And while his mind is being erased, Jim Carrey’s character searches for a place in his mind to hide a single thought of Clementine so that he might remember something of her. And she does the same, and their future rendez-vous is sealed. A metaphor for love that goes beyond just memories?