Category: Uncategorized

london adventure day 6 (sun. 07.04.2002)

Originally written 07.04.2002. This might show up in ‘zine form in the near future if I have a chance to put it together when I get back to Edinburgh.

went searching for the slam city skates skate shop/rough trade record store (note: they sponsor the rota event mentioned yesterday) and found a bunch of other cool stuff in neal’s yard, the cool little alley where the skate shop is located. there’s the salon, tatoo, and piercing place that specializes in bizarre hair styles and neal’s yard salad bar (www.nealsyardsaladbar.co.uk), a pleasant veg*n vafe that has a number of salads, entres, and pastries to eat in or take away. the chocolate muffin was mighty tasty at #1 – chewy, moist, and overly rich. rockin. the skate shop was inexplicably closed, but the number of kids waiting outside suggests that the place is worth a visit for your skate needs.

in general, the covent gardens area seems bougie and overpriced, but the commerce is at least eclectic and the pedestrianized brick streets, street performers, and tabling activists provide for a pleasant afternoon and excellent people watching. case in point, i just saw an elderly lady collapse on the street. she was ok, thankfully, but i had to resist the urge to photograph the scene.

one note: lots of tourists = lots of tramps. so, prepare to be accosted. i got stopped by a guy who introduced himself as patrick o’connor and proclaimed that he was “homeless by choice”. i tried to get some info on low-cost, or rahter no-cost, living in london, but he was pretty uninformative save for saying that most eating establishments like starbucks will hook you up after closing time. the tramps in london are pretty charming and agressive and the “i don’t want $, just buy me a meal” line seems pretty common. i think they expect people to just give them cash to be rid of them, but if you’ve got the chash, i’d take them up on the offer and buy them a meal. you’ll know your cash is going towards a good cause and you’ll get an interesting story out of the affair.

i’ve decided that i really don’t have a problem with panhandlers. decent work is often genuinely hard to come by and spending all day asking strangers for change isn’t exactly a cushy lifestyle. as patrick noted, most government programs are less about offering opportunities for the homeless, and more about whitewashing the streets for the tourists. it seems like many homeless people prefer the freedom of the streets over dealing with the inhumanity of social programs that treat them like a cancer. unfortunately for patrick, being nearly broke myself and already indebted to the parental units, i didn’t have even a coin to spare. he asked, “just one for luck”. I replied, “sometimes you have to make your own luck”.

went back to the skate shop and it was quite good. a large selection of decks and clothing (particularly uk brands), and staffed by a mob of locals. the record store downstairs was pretty good and had a large selection of (mainly electronic) vinyl and cds with an emphasis on uk artists. it also sold ‘zines and the walls provided info on a number of local musical events.

ate lunch at country life which got rave reviews from the vegan website that served as the guide to most of my eating this trip. though the tables are stocked with ridiculous christian propaghanda, and the place isn’t as exciting as the thai place, the 10p per 10g (or #6 for all you can fit on a plate) buffet of fresh veg., salads, and hot dishes gave me a chance to fuel up on an eclectic and healthy meal. definitely a good spot for cheap eats, and a since it’s only a short walk from picadilly circus at 3-4 warwick st., it’s also convenient. be warned, the hours suck as its only open until 4 pm on sunday through friday and closed saturdays. it is open a bit later on thursday evenings.

to kill some time, went to the national gallery, another free art museum which overlooks trafalger square. it was a very nice collection of european paintings from 1240-1900. i especially enjoyed the impressive impressionist collection. i ran into a tour given by a lady who was so exhuberant about the art that it was almost comical. when discussing cezanne’s bathers, she exclaimed, “have you ever been to a nudist colony? i’m sure you haven’t, but i have,” and then continued on about cezanne’s interpretation of the female form.

went to the imperial war museum, a short walk from the lambeth north tube stop on the bakerloo line. this is one of the neatest museums i’ve ever been to, and despite its grim subject matter, as a kid, i would have gone crazy over the collection of planes, jeeps, tanks, arms, and other military artifacts. i came kind of late in the day, os i only had time to scope the “secret war” exhibit, which featured real-life spy gear from brittain’s m15, m16, and special ops forces. after reading stephenson’s cryptonomicon, i had wondered what a german enigma machine looked like. now i know, the museum has one.

by the time i made it back to bayswater, i realized i was exhausted. i trudged to sainsburry’s for some cheap food, and put off any plans for a night skate in favor of browsing time out and a little light revision. the revision proved to be futile, and i soon turned off the lights.

london adventure day 5 (sat. 06.04.2002)

Originally written 06.04.2002.

so the original plan was to skate playstation, but as erin so eloquently put it when i talked with her on the phone, “why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free?” indubitably, she meant it in some kind of lwed connotation, but her query is as pertinent to skate spots as it is to frivilous sexual encounters. in a city that has so many good street spots and public skate parks, why drop valuable bank to skate? as i got off at the westbourne park station on the hammersmith and city line, i was distracted by the flying forms that could only be skaters. I had somehow stumbled upon meanwhile gardens, which is, thus far in my short stay, my favorite place to skate in london. this park is beutifully seated in this community garden and its quite neat to skate under the blossoming branches of nearby trees. the park consists of 3 bowls of smoothly poured concrete with some of nicest coping you’ll ever skate. the bowls increase in size and depth from a u-shaped mini-ramp bowl to a deep circular one with a hump in the middle. the locals are this awesome mix of older thrashers and little kids. there is definitely a big brother feel to the place (in the good fraternal way, not the orwellian or reality tv way), with the older skaters hooking up the younger ones with their used decks and not minding the inevitable near-collision in the crowded bowls. there were even 2 female skaters. in a day and age when you see 10 year old girls stressing over makeup, boys and even diets, it was cool to see a young girl chomping on crisps and egg mayonaise and ripping the bowls like she owned them. right on! the older girl had this awesome all-pink setup. she had even cut hearts into the grip tape and painted “tampons are for girls” on the grip tape. awesome. the park is a joy to skate, and though its intimidating to see the locals dominate the place with their huge airs over the hips or long tailslides along the coping of the bowl. the bowls are covered in sweet graffiti to boot. this place is what al concrete parks should be, heck, what all parks in general should be. if you skate one spot in london, skate meanwhile.

i originally pictured this silly little anectdotal project as a punk rock getaway guide to london. however, i’ve had just enough cash to avoid sleeping outdoors and the utter lack of suburbia and the masses of people who look like they need the gifts of the dumpster gods far more than i have kept me out of dumpsters in favor of cheap thai food. also, personal objections to shoplifting (despite the cctv cameras, it looks like most of the uk is easy picking) means that this trip wasn’t going to be evasion uk. in fact, there’s very little that is punk rock about going to museums and doing touristy stuff other than that said activities provide a certain sense of adventure and fun.

today, i did get to check out a few aspects of the local punk scene. i went to rota*, which is this weekly free event that happens every saturday from 4-8 pm at the notting hill arts club*. the arts club seems like a holdover from the notting hill neighborhood’s, which is now really gentrified (see julia roberts movie of the same name for evidence), hipper days. the club is like a bar, an art space, and a d.i.y. show space rolled into one. by the time the doors opened, the queue was all the way down the block, and the space only holds 200, so i was glad i arrived early.

this week’s rota lineup featured a screening of some old dc punk scene footage (e.g. minor threat, teen idols, bad brains, chalk circle, bikini kill, rights of spring, etc.) by mark andersen and mark jenkins who wrote the recent book dance of days about the dc punk scene. the screening was followed by mark and mark doing a q&a about the film and punk culture in general. andersen had a bit of that arrogance that seems common among activists who gain some notoriety, but that seems reasonable since activism is so often thankless. despite his often rambling, circuitous, comments, you did get an idea of how important punk was for this guy. the big “lesson” that he got through in the end is that punk is unique in that it blurs the line between audience and artist and makes kids think, “i could do that”, not only in terms of music, but in terms of other aspects of life as well. though punk culture isn’t a panacea,i agree with mark that it is incredibly empowering to youth and provides a certain spark which serves as a catalyst for lifelong creativity and the struggle for a better world.

the event also featured performance by london locals econoline who were token, but good, emo and dead inside who played brutal hardcore. it was rocking and a definite good time.

on the subject of punk rock, do you know what’s punk rock? playing two shows two hours apart is punk rock. throwing caution to the wind, i followed dead inside across town to see them rock with locals soon the darkness (whose vocalist apparently takes his cues from that of national acrobat), german art-core unit metrophob and of the same ilk, the usa’s song of zarathustra. the last in particular was awesomely brutal. just layers and layers of noise mixing together to create a single sonic hammer.

the crowd was a mix of scenesters that i recognized from the earlier notting hill gig, and older punks who seemed to be their only because their neighborhood dive was having a free show. there was this one guy with an amazing mullet and a maiden t-shirt who kept yelling “louder, louder”. the crowd seemed older in general, than the crowd at most us hxc shows, and i wonder if the uk has the same sort of teenage diy influence. my impression is that the scene in the uk is more heavily dependent on club-type venues rather than basement shows or diy spaces, which may exclude some of the u18s.

the show let out at 1:30 which meant the subways had stopped running and that it woud be a bit of an adventure getting back to my hostel. passing certain skyline landmarks on the way to the show, i had an idea of how far away i was, and this dashed any hopes i had that i would be able to walk back in a worst case scenario. waiting at the lonely bus stop, i prepared myself for the worst, given erin’s epic lost in london tale*.

if riding the tube makes you feel clever, negotiating the city’s night busses will make you feel downright local. unlike the tube, you have to figure out the right direction, flag the bus down, and signal the driver when you want to stop. since it was a saturday night, there were still a lot of people out, even in the part of town where i was, so i fealt pretty safe. also, the night busses are pretty consistent so i didn’t have much worry about getting stranded. still, i was glad that i had the bus map and a rudimentary knowledge of the city’s layout as i ventured back to the hostel. busses take a long time. first you have to wait for them and then there’s the numerous stops and traffic patterns to contend with, even late at night. it’s quite amazing to see how many people are out and about. there was even a huge queue outside westminster hall to see the queen mother lying in state at 2:30 am!

the night busses are certainly more colorful than the subways. as an example, i was looking out the window (the long routes provide a cool, albeit unguided, tour of london) when i heard a splashing sound. i thought, initially, that someone had spilled their drink. not so. the foreign kid had chundered everywhere. i avoided the spary, but the kid was directly behind the bus driver, who, if he didn’t have to clean it up, at least had to smell the shit for the rest of the night. have some consideration! if you’re going to spew, do it before you get on the bus, or at least bring a bag to contain the vomit. sheesh. reason 1 million and upteen to be sxe: making life easier on bus drivers who have a hard enough job as it is.

* www.roughtrade.com, rota@roughtrade.com

* 21 notting hill gate, london w11 3jq (one block from notting hill gate tube)

* getting groped up on the last subway home, she jumped off and hiked around london alone in the middle of the night before getting in an unmarked cab and luckily making it back to her hotel unscathed.

london adventure day 4 (fri. 05.04.2002)

Originally written 05.04.2002. This might show up in ‘zine form in the near future if I have a chance to put it together when I get back to Edinburgh.

running low on funds, i decided to check out some of london’s free museums. i scoped out the tate brittain which houses an impressive collection of brittish art from the elizabethan era to the contemporary. one of the best art museums i’ve been to, the free guided tours and the thoughtful gallery layout give a good idea of the relationship between pieces and the evolution of british art. especially cool were the placards by various artisits, writers, and musicians (including one of the members of blur) which give a more personal view on why certain pieces are significant. for me, the highlights were the famous “ophelia drowning”, blake’s dreamy wierdness, and francis bacon’s powerfully grotesque figures.

i spent way too much money on dinner at a place called mildred’s (45 lexington street, not far from picadilly circus) which was your typical boughie veg*n joint. the food was good, but seemed more like a place to take your date than an everyday spot. my advice, skip the meal and go straight for the awesome vegan chocolate pudding which is more of the cake variety and not the jello.

the last couple of days, i had skated concrete parks, so i decided to hit up the shell centre. turn right out of waterloo station and you’re there. a 3-set, a 6-set, some gnarly double sets and fast marble ledges made for some fun skating. while there, i had the disconcerting experience of being passed by some security guard-looking guys w/ radios w/o even a glance. that’s it. i’m moving to the uk if only for the lack of skate harrassment.

i headed for another tate museum, the tate modern (just follow the signs from the southwark tube stop), which stays open until 22:00 on friday and saturday. this place is in a disused factory or industrial building of some sort and it’s really impressive. it’s also the world’s largest modern art museum. it has the same thoughtful layout as the tate brittain and is quite a fun art museum to browse. at night, it also provides a beautiful view of the thames.

leaving the tate modern, i walked across the millenium bridge and ran straight into

st. paul’s cathedral

. the pedestrian walkway before the beautiful building has steps, steps, and more steps, making for a rad street spot. beware, as the spot is in the city of london which has laws which prohibit skateboarding, though i’ve heard the cops are generally cool.

london adventure day 3 (thurs. 04.04.2002) part 1

Originally written 04.04.2002. This might show up in ‘zine form in the near future if I have a chance to put it together when I get back to Edinburgh.

i’m writing this in the middle of trafalger square which is a short walk from the soho square and the amazing vegan thai place where i just finished gorging myself. the square is stunning at night. the lighting makes the fountains sparkle and glow while the looming edifice of the national gallery overlooks the entire scene. the giant lions at the corner of the monument are quiet & majestic in a way that i don’t think that they would be in the daytime. beside me, two roller skaters, the proper 4-wheel kind and not the inline kind, do their thing, dancing a wheeled fandango to some unheard score. above me, couples sit on the monument, huddled close together, & i wish very much that erin was with me.

earlier in the day, i had the thought that a city like london is a nice place to visit, but that i could never live there. it just seems too crowded, too dirty, too hectic. but by night, as i walk through the cafe, club & theater lined streets of the west end, the crowds make the city feel vibrant and alive. the weather has been beautiful and unseasonably warm this week, and it’s even pleasant at night, so i just sit back against the cool stone & soak in the ebb & flow of the city.

earlier this evening, i made my way to brixton to do some skating. brixton is in south london and is perhaps one of the dodgier parts of town*. certainly, the number of tourists on the tube slowly disappeared the further south i went until i was pretty sure i was the only non-local on the train. the easiest way to get the the brixton park is to take the victoria line to the brixton stop. coming out of the tube station, go right (north) on brixton until you see stockwell road on your left. follow stockwell road until you see the park. it is surrounded by a low wall w/ lots of great grafitti. there should be a mob of skaters and bike riders so the place is hard to miss. the famed london rock show venue, brixton academy, is in the area as well on stockwell road.

if you asked me why some british skaters, like rowley, have such a hardcore, aggressive style, i’d hazard that it’s because they grew up skating spots like brixton. this place is the epitome of gnar. this place is a typical 70s era poured concrete park w/ all the hips, banks, and bowls one would expect from such a space. Of particular interest is the big bowl that you can do wall rides out of, and this cool tabletop that has stairs down one side that seem too short to grind, but were treated as a cool little gap by one of the skaters who did a fat f/s ollie over them. there’s also a small grind rail & the obligatory plywood junk, but they hardly seem relevant amidst all the concrete.

the place is frequented by mostly old-school skaters, and for the first time in a long while, i think i was the youngest person there. when was the last time you heard someone say “can you teach me how to do that b/s boneless?” yeah, that’s what i thought. a word of caution, there are some pretty monster cracks in the surface, so big wheels are the order of the day.

even earlier in the day, i checked out the tower of london, which i would argue is the definitive spot in london, and judging by the throngs of tourists the definitive tourist attraction as well. i bought my ticket at the tube stop & avoided the atrocious queue at the gate. to get to the tower, take the tube to the tower hill stop which drops you by the stop where the more common criminals were executed (the more illustrious ones were actually executed inside the tower walls).

when i thought tower of london, given my cultural naievity, i expected a single, phallic structure. to imagine the tower of london, instead think castle, w/ 2 surrounding walls & a mout encompassing a number of towers and other structures. initially, i was a bit put off by the high (#8.75 for student) ticket price to see the tower, but there is enough to see inside to fill most of a day and to justify the ticket cost. the free guided tour is definitely worth checking out. it is lead by a beefeater, an actual british military member in full traditional garb. my guide was charismatic & informative, although quite often more than a little mysogynistic. The frequency of his comments about women shopping and being imprisoned w/ one’s wife (as was sometimes the case w/ prisoners at the tower) being torture, was amusing, but also quite disturbing. still, the guide provided the low-down on the evolution of the tower of london as well as some stories of the many imprisoned, and executed, within the tower’s walls. there are also a number of other, less general, free tours that are available throughout the day, which I didn’t partake in, but are probably also worthwhile. also in the white tower, are some really cool displays of arms and armor, and in another building, the crown jewels. these are incredible. the royals rock so much ice it makes rap videos look pathetic. if you ever wanted a visual for oppulance, this would be it. i wouldn’t say that 1000s of diamonds and carets of gold is cool, but it is interesting. it is definitely, for better or for worse, a potent symbol of the british empire’s former power. finally, the tower has a bunch of smaller exhibits, living history performers, and offers, from the tower walls, some cool views of the thames & the pretty cool tower bridge.

after visiting the tower, i headed across the thames on the aforementioned bridge and back to see the less impressive london bridge. local lore has it that some dumb americans from arizona bought the original london bridge thinking that they were getting the tower bridge. suckas!

london adventure day 3 (thurs. 04.04.2002) part 2

Originally written 04.04.2002 This might show up in ‘zine form in the near future if I have a chance to put it together when I get back to Edinburgh.

now i’m leaving trafalger square and i’m heading towards picadilly circus. The place reminds me of times square in nyc, both in terms of the massive amount of neon, and the huge number of tourists. the scene is gaudy and aphixiating, and i’ve had my fill. i just start walking randomly. i’m lost now, but i have my maps in my daypack, so its kind of fun to just take random turns around the city. i’m now at what must be leichster square where there are more tourists, street performers, and vendors hawking henna tatoos. a few more turns, and i’m in chinatown, full of stately restaurant proprieters greeting their diners, and the unmistakable aroma of roast duck hanging grotesquely in the storefronts. I keep walking and i’m back towards the theatres and nightclubs and then back to the tube.

the tube is crowded as it’s getting late and the theatres have recently let out. i see young girls, awkwardly clad in dresses and high heels, happily clutching souveneir programs, and little children looking exhausted, but fulfilled, after a days adventure. The whole scene gives a sort of finality to the day that is really nice. maybe i could live here after all …

when i get back to my hostell, the other inhabitants of my room are already back. at first, i mistake them for a family, b/c they are engaged in conversation, but that’s just part of the social nature of the hostel. they’re just lone travelers like me. there’s the older south african man, the woman from australia on holiday, and the young-looking, college student from chicago. we talk about our individual experiences thus far in london, and the topic somehow switches to personal safety. the other american and i comment on how striking the apparent lack of gun culture is, and the australian remarks that back at home. she can leaver her doors unlocked. the south african talks of the need, in his home nation, for high walls and armed gaurds before entering into a rant about nigerian immigrants. it always catches me off gaurd when i hear someone, who i perceive as a minority, express an anti-minority sentiment towards another group. but, i guess that i, like many in the ‘states, stikk hold onto some notion of africa as a homogenous culture.

i shower, finally washing away the layers of grime that have accumulated on my skin from falls at the skatepark. when i get back to the room, the others are asleep. i turn out the lights and join them.

* as i’m transcribing this, i’m watching some news program on street crime and youth victimization and they flash up some shots of the skatepark and the surrounding estates, complete with ominous music.

haiku for a crowded subway platform

Originally written 04.04.2002

little girl, face flushed

clinging to your father’s arm

crowded subway stop

london adventure day 2 (wed. 04.03.2002)

originally written 04.03.2002This might show up in ‘zine form in the near future if I have a chance to put it together when I get back to Edinburgh.

despite the odd fealing of sleeping in a strange room shared by strangers, i apparently slept deeply and long enough to remember my dream. i dreamt that erin had become a stoner and lied about that fact to me. i remember being really upset because i fealt obligated to break up with her even though part of me didn’t want to. for the sake of my hostel dorm room’s coinhabitants, i hope i didn’t wake up screaming “Nooooooo!”, but i definitely recall having that “thank goodness it’s only a dream” feeling.

i’ve found the Tottenham Court Road tube stop to be supremely useful. for starters, there are a couple of veg*n restaurants in the area: the thai buffet I mentioned yesterday, Govinda’s, a krishna-run indian buffet which one will encounter on the way to the Thai place, and, one block over from Govinda’s, on Dean Street, there is a veg*n fast food place called Red Veg. This place is like a veg*n, marxist, version of macdonalds with menu items such as veggie burgers, nuggets, falafel, and a variety of fried vegetables. the food’s not anything special, but it’s inexpensive, convenient, and worth checking out if only for the novelty. not all menu items are vegan, but they can be made so. everything’s GM free to boot.

also, a few steps away from the Tottenham Court Road tube stop is Muji, a shop that will sort you on your reasonable, but not inexpensive, travel needs. i got some sandals for the hostel showers for only 5#s. the clever customizable raincoate (tear on the serated lines) looked promising as well at around 10#s. the place was like Urban Outfitters but Japan-style. whatever. a little farther down the road is Easy Everything, a massive internet cafe that tends to be less expensive than most competitors. they have a crazy variable pricing strategy that is cheaper when the demand is lighter, so go during off peak hours to get the most bang for your buck, err, pound. also, next to Easy Everything is a Sainsburry’s Central for groceries. many hostels have kitchens, so you can save some cash by cooking instead of eating out. furthermore, rock venue, london astoria, is also just down the road from the tube stop.

by far the coolest thing, however, that one get get to from the aforementioned tube stop is The British Museum. from the tube stop, go one block N. on Tottenham Court Road and then turn East (right) on Great Russell Street & you’re there faster than you can say “imperialism = rape of culture”.

the museum is enormous & there is really too much to see in one trip. i was pretty exhausted after my day at the museum. i concentrated on the ancient greek & egyptian collections b/c they were so strong. i saw the elgin marbles which are marble sculptures and friezes taken from the parthenon in athens. despite being somewhat incomplete and damaged due to various catastrophies throughout the ages, they are beautiful and impressive. they are also, however, controversial, as the greeks very much want the marbles returned to their native home. i saw an interview on the bbc & the british officials seemed quite indignant about keeping the marbles in london. i suppose having the marbles in london does make them more accessible to the world. still, it’s not really the brits’ choice about where to keep them. the unwillingness to try to make any sort of compromising arrangement is quite stupid.

in many ways, i find the uk to be far more progressive than the states, but i also find remnents of the old imperialist hubris. a few days ago, i watched some programming on the bbc commemerating the conflict in the falklan islands. the loss of life, which i think was like 200+, seems totally stupid to maintain control over such a small outpost of the british empire off the coast of argentina.

the british museum also has free guided tours of the various galleries throughout the day. i went along on two of them, and found them to be quite good. they gave a cohesive picture of the collections which would otherwise have neem missed in the shadow of the glitzier displays.

in addition to the mummies and the marbles, i got to see a very cool exhibit of illustrations of joyce’s ulysses which were not only clever and original, but also displayed a number of cool print making techniques. finally, i saw a completely amazing exhibit of modern chinese caligraphy. caligraphy has always been my favorite art form of the far east and it was really cool to see how the modern artists reinterpreted the ancient tradition. it was enough to make me reconsider that chinese character tatoo.

today, i skated a really cool old park called meanwhile II. to get there, take the hammersmith & city line to the royal oak stop. you should see a big overpass (i think they call them flyovers in the uk). follow the overpass for a little while and you’ll see the park underneath. this park is on the way to the big london park, playstation, so there were tons of skaters on the tube. while i’ve heard that playstation can get crowded, meanwhile II was deserted. this small park has a long, poured concrete mini-ramp type structure w/o coping, but with a waxed lip on one side. it’s gnarly and unforgiving, but really fun. next to the mini-ramp thing is a small street area w/ a long grind rail and a manual pad w/ a metal edge for grinding/sliding. also, there were the omnipresent bread crates. give the british kids enough crates, & scrap wood & they could build you a skatepark. it’s cool to see kids being resourceful instead of bitching about the quality of their town’s spots.

i’ve talked before about the whole “brotherhood of skateboarding” thing, before, & i’ve had another cool experience along those lines. on the way to meanwhile II, another skater aproached me on the tube platform & asked me if i was going to playstation. i said that i was going to meanwhile II. he asked if he could come along, and i said of course. he was this 27 year old, old-timer surfer from up north, & we just had a fun little session, riding and slamming on the concrete in the fading light of dusk. we talked a bit, bit mainly skated. that’s the cool thing about skating. go anywhere in the world, find the local spot, and you’ve instantly found kids who have at least one thing in common w/ you. i think that fact that skaters were somewhat persecuted for so long & the fact that it takes some passion to keep skating creates a certain bond between skaters.

jonesi & i skated until we were to broken & exhausted to safely continue. as we parted at paddington station, he gave me his mobile digits in case i wanted to skate later in the week. i rode back to bayswater, feeling ill after chugging a liter of o.j., but totally stoked on skating.

diagnosis excelent

Originally written 03/22/2002

I know this kid in one of my classes. He’s an American as well, and we sit together in lecture and talk shit. The other day he asked me if I found myself watching more TV since I moved to the UK. “I guess so,” was my reply.

That was an understatement bordering on an outright lie. I am glued to the idiot box. The halcyon days without network television back at the Sweet Life seem a distant memory. Now, I couldn’t tell you what the headlines are back in the states, but I can tell you what’s going on in Neighbours, Eastenders, and Hollyoaks. Together, the boys of flat 29/5 watch Top of the Pops, Ready Steady Cook, and German music television. We watch bad reality TV. We watch quiz shows. We yell at the screen and discuss team formations while watching football. With five so different personalities, the common addiction to television is one thing that we have in common. It brings us together. We are TV addicts. Only now, all of us certifiable adults, there is no mother to occasionally walk in front of the screen and urge us not to sit so close to the set.

My classmate asked me if I found myself watching shows that I would never watch back home. “Like what?” I asked. He paused for a moment and then guiltily replied, “Diagnosis Murder.”

I can’t believe I never watched this show back in the states. It’s amazing. I even find myself rushing late to class just so I can catch the thrilling climax of each episode. For those of you who have never experienced the magic that is “Diagnosis Murder”, let me provide a brief synopsis, in the hopes that my humble description can do justice to this masterpiece of syndicated television. Dick Van Dyke plays the dashingly handsome and always charming Dr. Mark Sloan, a doctor and medical advisor to the local police department. Van Dyke’s real-life son plays Mark Sloan’s son who is a hard-nosed detective on the police force. The regular cast of characters also includes the upbeat and affable young physician Jesse and the strong and smart medical examiner/token minority. Together this crew finds themselves involved in crazy adventures of lies, deception, intrigue, and yes, murder. It’s like the Hardy boys as each episode brings a new murder and a new adventure which is all wrapped up in the course of an hour (except for those excruciatingly blissful times when the viewer is treated to the thrilling “to be continued …” at the end of the episode). If only my life was filled with that kind of excitement, not to mention that kind of quick resolution. Oh and to be able to just put a pause on things, with only a “to be continued …” any time things got too hot to handle.

The show is like Matlock without the creepiness of an aging Andy Griffith. Van Dyke isn’t your spooky grandfather who you want to pack up back to the nursing home, he’s the hip great-uncle that all the women fawn over at the family reunion. Van Dyke’s Jay-Z makes Griffith’s Matlock look like Dr. Dre. Respectable once, but now all washed up. In fact, one almost forgets that Dr. Sloan is a senior citizen at all. I look at him as just another one of his thirty-something gang of slueths. Still, not wanting to leave anybody out of the magic, producer Van Dyke even had a two part storyline that included a guest appearance by, get this, none other than Ben Matlock himself!

But “Diagnosis Murder” isn’t just muderous fun. It’s also serious social commentary. While you’re watching something like that awful Angela Lansburry show, you just want that nosy old hag to shut up and stick her damn typewriter where the sun don’t shine. Not so with “Diagnosis Murder”. You’re lauding Van Dyke for his vision and astute sense of cultural relevence. “Diagnosis Murder” knows what’s up. It captures life in these modern times. It knows about our polarized media, our obsession with celebrity, the superficiality of the body politic. When Dr. Sloan stares condescendingly down at the cornered murderer, he’s not just condeming the murderer, he’s condeming us.

Is “Diagnosis Murder” a guilty pleasure? No way! It’s all pleasure and no guilt, baby.

miscilleny 3

Originally written 03/22/2002

I left the movie at 11. I had just gone, alone, to see The Royal Tannenbaums which I found to be a completely satisfying movie. Funny, yes, but something more than that as well. It reminded me slightly of Franny and Zooey which might be why I liked it so much. I was still laughing to myself about the kid who grimmaced, muttered “oh fuck”, and then scampered, like a bat out of hell, to the back of the theatre when a cadre of drunk middle aged women shoved their way into the row where we were seated.

I took the long way back to the flat. On sunny days, I like to walk through the Meadows, this big green park space in the middle of the city, but on dreary nights, I prefer to avoid it. It’s not that it’s dangerous, though the place is reputed to be a homosexual pick-up spot, drug bizarre, and general den of iniquity after dark (though I haven’t seen any of those things), it’s just too quiet and lonely. So quiet that you can’t really think. Your thoughts just echo around in your head, plinking around like that bouncing-ball sound in that one Aphex Twin song. So, I back-tracked towards Lothian road, turning at the brightly lit Bank of Scotland building. I passed the couple kissing in the doorway, ooblivious of the soft rain that was beginning to fall. I walked up the avenue, past the art college, and past the girl who was walked quickly past me in the way that someone walks away from an evening where something has gone very, very wrong. Cars and taxis rolled smoothly past, but the sidewalk was empty. The colorful storefronts of the daytime now stood muted in the quiet half-light of the lampposts.

I walked past the school where I sometimes pass the massses of uniform clad teenagers on their lunch break. When I was in school, I think I would have hated to have to wear a uniform, and would have raised quite a fuss about it and spouted rhethoric about how imposing restrictions on attire was a violation of our right to free speech (which I guess it is, albeit too often speech about classism and consumerism masquerading as gap logos). Now, though, I’m jealous. I lament my un-uniformed school days. The uniform just seems simple, elegant, innocent. I envision school days with happily homogenous pupils working studiously away at maths assignments or discussing schoolyard philosophy. I envision walking through the hallways of the school and seeing groups of students, cliques even, but without the rigid, self-imposed dress codes. Airy acoustic guitar music is playing in the background, maybe Nick Drake. The kids are smiling, everyone is getting along. No one is complaining about how hard the assignment was or how the upcomming exam fucks up their social calendar. It’s a perfect world. But then I snap out of it. Their school experience probably has all the cliques, the banality, the ugliness that defines high school for so many kids. If they seem to get on better, it’s probably just because they’re all rich enough to go to a school that has uniforms and at least have that in common. Still, the possibility that maybe they have things better than I had is bittersweet. I can’t decide if I want to smile sweetly at the schoolkids or grimace menacingly.

miscelleny 2

Originally written 03/22/2002

The last time I went skateboarding, before the glorious spring sunshine turned back to winter’s grey clouds and rain, I noticed this old lady walk into Bristo square as I noseslid one of the ledges. She looked like a normal old woman; well dressed, hair not disheveled, and not smelling of urine, but she still seemed detached, vacant. As she passed me, I noticed a can in her coat pocket. It was one of the big cans, not the shorter ones that contain Coke or Tango, but thr tall ones that usually hold beer or malt liquour. I remember walking down the beer aisle in the Tesco the other day and wondering how I’d make up my mind if I actually drank. Would I buy the pilsner? Or maybe the stout? But maybe the lager’s nice? It’s a complication I can do without. The woman sat down in a corner, removed the can from her pocket and slowly started to consume the beverages contents. She sat there for at least an hour, blending into the scenery, as insignificant as any other ungrindable static object amongst the wizzing melee of skaters. I skated. She drank. Totally alone. Surrounded by youth moving past her as though to represent the astonishing passing of her own years. I skated alone, but not really so. I never really talk to anybody, but there’s still that unspoken sense of acceptence-that common bond that is shared for the love of 7 layers of plywood and four urethane wheels. Earlier that day there was a little stair session. Just 4 stairs, but the takeoff was really sketch. All the little kids lined up to watch the show, and as I waited my turn I realized that, for the first time in a long time, I had that same feeling that I did furtively skating the stairs near the Dickenson College dorms, or behind the Sprint complex in Carlisle. At what point does one completely loose touch with life? When does it become completely impossible to once again taste those blissful morsels of youth? Was that why the woman had come to the square? The woman sat there, eyes glazed and unmoving as I left the square and headed back to my flat, back to assignments, exams, career plans, and taxes, back to adulthood, back to the clock slowly ticking towards irrelevence.