Raw Pomp

Regard this, reader, as a warcry — admittedly forged from laziness and worry, but fixed and full-throated nonetheless. Today I fly the flag of careless halves in the face of considered wholes. And to illustrate I tumble upwards to 3am, piling piece on piece and pomp on pomp, and leaving the job of sorting the resulting jumble not to the reader — I would never impose such a fruitless task upon those kind and loyal and peculiar enough to scan beneath the title — but to the universe. To hell with craft, he cries, thumping a weak paw on the contrived disorder of his desk; then, reciting the thinnest excuse of all, Life itself is a mess! Is it my/our job to sort existence and regurgitate it into a more intelligible — not to mention palatable — form, for those most afflicted by it, or am I simply to reflect it, to effectively say, Well, I don't know any more than you do, but it's a remarkable likeness, no?

My cry is a pose, of course, but a mess does have its virtues, even when the spectre of a tidier version casts its gloom. Time spent refining could be time spent making more messes. And it is certainly easier this way, if only for the smallest party. But stifled potential does emit a uniquely foul stench, and it can be hard to focus when you discern the need for a few more drafts. Too often the Good gets lost in the What Could Be.

The Art Should Be Fun contingent are ready with the desperate-sounding but grain-of-truth-holding excuse that any ambition to create order out of what we might loosely term 'All this' is itself a fallacy; at least we — or they — are honest about that. Accompanying this view is the contention that art (no doubt refined to 'true art' in the face of contradiction) is not merely an argument told funny, nor is it a soft essay for those especially allergic to academic propositions. The delicate of disposition might well prefer such an alternative, but Art, they argue (adding the capital as they move in for the clincher), transcends. Ask of an essay what could be; ask of art what is. But calling upon the verb 'Transcend' is Patron 101 for escaping the threat of close inspection; in a critical context 'Transcend' becomes little more than a fancy substitute for "It's good, but I can't quite tell you why", but it's spongey enough to scare off would-be contrarians. The better defence, that of questioning the approach and relevance of the study of the arts, is forgotten in the haze.

It is noble, I believe, to curtail the excess of displaced theory, but noble it is not to contemn study for style — style in surface, that is, not service: suspended like a conjurer's tart and sporting an impeccable sheen, but about as transcendent as the same magic trick explained in diagram (TR is for Trope, but let me slip here). It is a funny fact of life that the effort in waxing in one corner roughly equates to the effort in working in the other, and the truly great proponents spin both plates indivisibly, putting the former most to shame. But the question of capacity does enter the picture. Do those who stick to chroming know their limitations, or are they merely too afraid to discover them? Most, I'm sure, would rather not answer that.

The ASBF camp has returned, this time with "Art is respite; life is for rubbing your nose in it." But the unfortunate truth is that this formulation is itself the formulation of those who have never had their noses rubbed in anything. Just as you have to have money before you can have contempt for it, you have to have had a truly wet beak before you can claim art exists elsewhere, and even then too many exemptions will loose the proverbial tin of bait. A suitable tome might be entitled 'Whither Frivolity?', and divide post-Auschwitz authors into cowards and noble failures. But then a suitable tome might also be 'Life From Above', where the silliest sit atop the pantheon and the soft essayists scowl indignant — and untranscedent.

What are we left with? Not enough to justify the question mark, that's for surtain. The H in Auden ain't exactly up to defending this stance by example. But if we can't counter the stinging print on its own terms — and we can't —, we can at least call on our youth, where it remains, and tell 'em to fold it five ways and put it where the moon don't shine.

Ben Ben B-Ben Ben Ben...

I'm afraid this time I'm out of jumpers. Up an' Adam, on the Eve of Ben, is now and henceforth fantasy; all I can do, short of gun-point, is make sure my own bucket's filled — and so be it if I molest his memory in the process. Just as there are seven basic stories — nine, if you count more — there are but two basic stunts, both of which have been pulled to completion, and neither of which worked all that well in the first place. The ever-capitalised He, therefore, shall exist only in quotes and misquotes; the horse's mouth is shut, froze by petulant peanut-butter. Sure, his Equus asinus part may be as proud and full-assed as ever, but where himspun wisdom is concerned, you've only my word.

I'll begin with some character references, this one from a thumbing rambler he once shared an onion sandwich with: "Friendly, in a blank sort of way, but not much of a sandwich-maker." His ex, meanwhile, was a little less kind, saying that while he possessed a formidable nubility, the effect of which a malleable woman could not rightly deny, he was also a scurrilous hug-monger with a penchant for loose discharge. "Apparently he found someone smaller than he is," gossiped a crouching snoop. "She's tiny." Ignoring him, I approached his second-best friend, Ollie, with whom he is second-best friends: "He's not a bad sort, really. Well, not always."

Being as this signifies a new approach, I've decided that, rather than quote the man anew, I should start by retrieving some favourites from the archive, a sort of accustoming exercise.
"Sometimes even existence itself is a bore, and on such occasions I find worming cherished pets the perfect antidote."
From Drills In Liquid, 2006.
"All right, girls, there's boffing in the offing!"
From Dicky Darwin, 2005.
"If there's one thing to be said for man, I haven't heard it."
From Pieces Of Other People, 2007.
And unless the man in question reinstates his pen, there shall be more of this.

Frog Light

Led by the dim glow of eggs on a post-it, I foot forward into the ink. What I outlined, by necessity, was the stage of divers moments, any of which would sink me by contrast were some oaf to flick the lights on. And somehow I'd rather sacrifice a toe or two. (For the books, I was twice stubbed, each foot, slight elation on the second.) I twisted the cold. The accompanying rush rang instantly familiar — I had not anticipated that. Second only to being there, I saw the figure hushed up against the sink, softly splashing while I washed my face in the doorway. One moment I was at I'm All Right, the next, I was beneath the water and the room was swathed in green. I prayed for a kind soul to press repeat.

Sally-Anne mislit her cigarette for the fourth time. Her face was everything strangers wanted: soft, sexy, lit. And she spoke with confidence, never doubling back. I followed her gazey features down her chest and feigned a smile. The lighter stuck somewhere in the bushes.
"Got a match?"
"Not this time," I said. Ha.
I began throwing bits of serviette at the back of her head as she nattered with a passing girlfriend. Most dropped short, but I got a couple of pleasing hits in. Whenever she turned to glare at me, I would simply start throwing them directly at her face. Best of all, I didn't even enjoy it. I used to, but then I used to enjoy hiding her marbles, too.

Next I sat backwards on my chair, peering over the brim like a child would. Each male passer-by I marked as my successor and glowered at. But I harboured not a thing; I only kept and held onto. Where weeping my gratitude was concerned, I was far from finished. Sally-Anne called my name sharply and I swung around. For once, she seemed to be looking at me for what I was. I had seen that look before — this time I encouraged it. Feeling the heat, I shifted. I was wearing the wrong T-shirt for this kind of weather, but it was the worst I could find.

The Decline and Fall of a Showman's Empire

In diminishing paragraphs.

Some, no doubt, have already taken to grand proclamations of the "Death of—" ilk, emerging pale and preying from the shadows of no-talent; Ergo the failure³³ of this petty revolt³⁴ — for that is what History³⁵ shall prove it to be — to achieve any of its initiatives³⁶ is indicative of a greater— This, however, fails to take into account the inherent— until we're quite ready to spit ourselves clean of the matter and have those unfortunate words as the last ones. Aft. all, who's to dispute? Participants put-out, principle players played-out, and profusion off fanning itself in the shade. Add the pissed-off passers-by and you haven't a recipe for much success;— the revolution, my friend(s), is D-E-A-D (long live the revolution), and I suppose I shall have to bear the bulk of the brunt. (Lest you wonder, I suppose because my lofty predictions and assorted nonsenses are freely viewable, and shall remain so.)

Trope: from the past there is no reprieve. Right; why dwell, when something far worthier lowers itself into a late-night bath? Nonetheless, there may be remnants worth salvaging, one of which, also an R-E concept, I'm myself keen to keep in place, if less outwardly than before. (The image has proved more than a distraction; someone must have sculpted that thing!) If we, whomever that now entails, are to justify any of our idealistic exertions, we'd best hope to learn from our failings — and by that I do not mean 'know our boundaries'; boundaries should not and never be known. I mean, rather, that we should fuel future successes on past mistakes. Sure, a first-year might leave it out, focusing only on the direct lead-up to that great thing we'll do, but a third could not afford its omission, and would incur copious red pen were he-her to do so.

Even if no one has my back, even if I tumble down alone, I will tumble. (This thing ain't a ship, incidentally; it's a hill.) Grass cuts and cowards above me, I shall meet the new halfway and tumble again, bypassing once and foil the embarrassment of accidents. Stay, if you will, but I'm pressin' on. For the towel-headed harpies and clot-headed he-men. Momentum'll get me through if nothing else.

First-Hand, Kodak, Plump

How to tell— Crumbling revolts, denied permissions, margarine flowers (wilting in a champagne glass, as posy would have it); mouths of black dogs, two losses —the latter street-cred — and deadly dead-night silliness. Quite the mouthful and quite the emergence. One must ask: where oh where is that slender confectionery known most as Ben? The heart is so bloody fond by now it could fuck the chrome off him without even pausing to consider its sexual orientation. Ah, but what a wangless wonder here left in his place! An alien filling those trousers? I know, I know, but it's strewth; my own eyes and all that, spied from a bush, even double-took (I dare any eye to fall upon that form and not). And though presently to fry an old dinner, it shall occupy me, as it has, in every grubby fibre, spilling out here as elation, there as idio-horizoneering, in odd beat, hoping the grease will distract the silly thing with the threat of attack. Such is such!

Milked in, I pondered this and concluded — the benefit of being milked in is that you have ample time in which to ponder —, subsquintly to lavish my gratitude on the maker of these moments, the maker of moments; a thank you whichever way forward. The parted menace, incidentally, whose name may or may not begin with a letter that may or may not sit second in the alphabet, remains departed, a whole paragraph on, no matter the reports of his presence. "Sweet me soon" was his last recorded remark, ATTOW. Prophetic? Not really. (And I did, I should point out, see him at a distance on Saturday, walking tenderly to a rotund friend across the way.) It's perhaps unfair of me to impose examination on his circumstance, but I feel the zeit has a right to know, and know now, ATTOR. At any rate, they know now.

Probably the most interesting development, in terms of literary potential, was the August encounter I had with a colleague outside my office. Weathered, possibly a little drunk, he was attempting to nail a Pogo to my door, mistaking it for his.
"You do of course realise—"
"—Yes."
Wasn't the most treasured development, granted — the clicks were firmly elsewhere, however elusive their subject — but there you have it. I have since decided that prudence can go to hell; what's the point, when one day you could wake to find someone drunkenly nailing Pogos to your office door? No snaps, either.

Blues is King

Sadness and pistachios, at the worst of times. Need I, when knowing, turn off the smile, the stereo and brood, refusing (p)leisure, that is, the self, in aid of empathy? Should, moreover, a good person, a real good one, be physically incapable of merrymaking, in any guise, when there's woe afoot? Surely the thought would never even cross his (oo er) honest-to-goodness mind! Under this brand of reasoning, sound though it may be, the mere existence of temptation could well be enough to forsake you, oh my darling, regardless of give-ins or misgivings, resistance or succumbference. But, drat! Who, I ask you (other than a rival toy company), could remain poed and poffaced at Lands on my bed and sings her tune/to the light of the shining moon?

One's room, that organic collage of purchase and collection, can, in times of trouble (from without), be a positive whorehouse of temptation, damnation ground zero — the guilt of reaching for a Fantagraphics favourite! And let's not mention— Such things betray a light heart, too light, perhaps, to listen. But how can I abstain?— why should I abstain? It must be something altogether deeper, something weak and wheezing at the bottom of my soul, nearing death by distraction. And I don't hear it no more. I hear, rather, the backup singer, strolling up and down the melody, and cringing for future reference.

My eyes are suitably red, my posture slumped, my words appropriate, but that's sleep, habit and politeness, respectively. Not sick enough to forgo the gesture, but not right enough to mean it. And now I'm on the other end, all but pissing out problems, and the scarce words I've got felt as hollow as mine, tear or no. Relieved, I suppose, but unhelped — those words I knew not to seek anyhow. I await, instead, a flying fat thing with a spasmodic diaphragm and a penchant for song, rendered in her harmony. And a stronger man than I—

Something Fresh

Turns out, after all, the reason for the delay, in as much as one can account (being educated, I can account), and with everything — everything relevant, that is — considered, in context, and weighed, is that although, in the first instance, it may strike the average perceptor as a case of lax, nothing more, or perhaps, dare I mention, the dreaded block (hefted to the desk by Calvin himself, no doubt), it is, in honest, an issue of self-suppression, of editing, which, while not exactly quality control, at least not in the way some might hope (vückas), is a welcoming as well as worrying sign, one which may, fingers crossed, lead to a tangible upping in output, worthy output, and maybe even extend our little revolt a finger further. Fingers crossed.

In the next, that is, second, this sort of excusal, which inescapably reeks of I, sir, am never at fault (accused by compatriot, no less!), is rather hard to pull-off, no matter how true it turns out (after all, in as much as one can account) to be, and I rather think I'm under the shovel even mentioning it. Still, it's words, i'n' it? And I dare risk the backlash — for truth. But if you — my accuser (rattling blogspot, if not face-to-face in the rain) — insist on persisting, let me first concede that this is not actually an excuse, Percy; I am not intending, or attempting, to exonerate myself in any washäpperfoam of this unfortunate lapse; an unfortunate lapse it is, and although there are factors which contributed to its being so (yah), detailing them, as I have half-done, is purely an explanatory exercise; the buck stops with me. Hum.

I dare risk, but dare I continue? I will dare. Forgive my haste, my rush; blame my everything. Here's the deal, yo—: this isn't quite my favourite waste of time. That honour, for it is an honour, goes to another trivial pursuit — Sweet is the so-hard-to-come-by melody. And it belongs to the man who so stylishly severed an umbilical cord with a bullet. I'd sit back and wait, only there are few guarantees, may as well swing in with whatever's rattling around in there and fire it repeatedly at the wall, so repeatedly it need not matter whether it actually sticks or not. Bedsides — it wouldn't be me if I didn't.

On the Level

The horrified boy in the shower, on the side of his bed, locked in the toilet, fearing, more than anything else, the Sensible Thing To Do. Tense, heavy-hearted, restless, I crawled and stumbled through a few long days before I did the sensible thing. Thenceforth it had its own momentum, and I was at least spared of plotting my own course of action.
"Shall I take a look at it, then?"
"I'd rather you didn't."
I could just make out a smile forming somewhere inside his greying beard. Sighing, I climbed the patronising steps to the bed and dutifully, though hesitantly, lowered the elastic.
"The right one, just there."
"Hm."
His fingers were cold, clinical; I was numb. He rose, frowning, and I hurriedly shoved everything back into place. My family waited.
"We'll definitely need to do some tests."

The boy moved in the huddle of his family as if a ghost, suddenly detached from the present. The news had put him on autopilot and he could do little but gaze blankly at things. Everything bounced off. The murmur of the engine was the sole point of comfort; reassuring words irritated more than reassured. When it was finally black, I was still too hyped to contemplate a theoretical death with anything other than idle fascination. That hyperbolic fear didn't much weigh upon my mind in the intervening time, nor, in fact, did the more realistic fear; everything seemed to sit second to curiosity, even excitement. Consequently, I wasn't exactly sure how to feel when I received the news that the bugger was benign. Still, at least I got a consolation operation.

"I'm going under the knife tomorrow."
"Really? What for?"
I realised my mistake and stalled. Tom honed in, shattering my affected coyness. The school uniforms didn't much help matters.
"It's my knee." I pointed, vaguely. We moved for the bus.

All in all, a nice week or so of attention. I was sad to see him go.

Cause Infâme

Friends, onlookers, cherished detractors, it is time. Here, in all its gory, is the long-delayed, much-hubbubed, ever-mysterious piece which the cats upstairs, in all their 'wisdom', refused to print. Weeks in the making, months in the gestating, twenty-two sodden-earth years in the coming. And it's here, at bloody. So why the wait, why the ballyhoo? Well, to quote the felines in question: Even without all the cunts, cocks and fucks which you have so unaesthetically strewn about the place, seemingly at random, this would be one of your least distinguished efforts, and considering that you are the person who once used, or rather misused, four-hundred semi-colons in a single paragraph, merely by accident of style, that's really saying something. We have no choice, sir, but to revoke your fingers for five full days and forbid you from ever reproducing any of the words you used in that piece in any context. Even the conjunctions. Good day.

A work like that, why you wouldn't give it the time of day. We don't tolerate filth for filth's sake, not even the funny stuff. A man must have scruples. I've written a poem. Would you like to hear it?

Sea of blue,
Tree of green.
One plus two
Equals threen.

Sometimes I dream my father's return. Standing at the door, barely able to hold himself up, he'd look just like me, only with ripped clothes and a fatherly moustache. He'd regale mother and I with stories of conspiracy and high adventure, how he simply had to leave us, he had no choice, otherwise the government would have gotten to us. A goodbye, even a farewell, was simply impossible, I'm sure you understand. The cuts and bruises and all round weariness would confirm the story, and we'd prepare him the first good meal he'd had since he left. Later we'd all cry around the fire, begging him never to leave again, and he'd promise he would do everything in his power to make sure we— But of course a dream it remains. As I think of it, the filth in front of me, obscured by futile corrections, winds its way back into my consciousness, most unwelcomely. Enraged, I eat it, piece by piece, and, aided by my right index, retch every half-digested morsel of it out the window. All things considered, it was quite an improvement.

Pandora's Book

They look at my eyes — gorgeous, protuberant things skirted by junkie red — and wonder. I usually have my motorbike and leathers, would, in fact, have them now, only there was a slight laundering mix up, nothing serious, soon be sorted, but it means, for The Time(s), I must go without. Oh, this? Just something I threw together, no thought, didn't even catch a mirror — hardly representative, indeed not representative, probably not even mine. Hm? No, no, no. My flat burned down, bad toaster, it's a crisp, can't even go there. Just boarding at the folks' in the mean. Nice chaps, not my scene, but what can you do? Should spare me visits for a while — We never see you, sprog; I'm busy, you know, still look the same, got a life and all. But the eyes are the truth, these deep windows, not what you deduce, not what I reveal. That stuff's nothing in the scheme.

Here? Oh, sorry. No, I knew that. Just been on a sabbatical, you know — had to, would have had a bloody heart-attack. Plus, you know, don't want to completely ruin the novelty. Not there either? Christ, I am rusty. No, no, it's a good thing. Keeps me on my toes. That's— Ooh. Um, yes, a little too much build-up, probably shouldn't have taken that extra week. Guess I am human after all, ha ha, yeah, inevitable, you don't mind, of course? I— A wh—? Oh, er, I'm giving quitting a go, actually. Just for kicks. Probably won't last, need something to do with my hands. Here, generally, they smile, furrow, and try to drink it all in, reconcile the facts with the eyes. You can even see the doubts niggling their way to the mouth, which flattens into something of a paternal purse to suit. I'm at the window, something in my eye. Christ, I wish I had my wheels. But what can you do? You couldn't spare me a— Oh, you're the best, cheers. 50% interest, I promise. No, I won't hear it. As soon as I'm off leave, I'll— You're sure? Well, all right, but you must let me— No, that's fine. But at least—

Legs are open, carefree, arms behind head, weary eyes, weary mouth, pitch-perfect but for the invisible details. And, perhaps, the cold. I, uh— Well, I was clean out of tissues, you see, and I had to take something. A last resort, really, I'll burn the thing after I— (Almost genuinely weary here.) You know, people think that, but actually it's just that I tend to slouch a lot, and— I turn, affecting repressed passion and close my eyes, tired. And I stay turned. A rushing suburb, a bleak sky, white scratches on the window, suspicious smudge. 5-4-3-2-1-0-0-0-0. A slow turn, but a good one. Powerful, cinematic. No words, no details, we're all human here. Look: too weary for tears, and strong, but with a definite sadness, like windows, deep, longing, eyebally. Look.

The Usual Thing

I don't bother with it, myself. And I'd advise you, whomevr, to forget about it as soon as. Yes, ye-, that sounds like some dreary hangover of Addle Essence™ — so says you, I'm off (you'll see) —, but, and this is whilst, yes, accepting that as an unavoidable Factor (I'm nothing if not naked), there's much to be said for being a little normless here and there — within reason; much to be said for slumping to the floor with another, hearing I'd walk on my hands through the jungle. Not being pricked by pressing logistic or looming troubls, or little engagements — that's what I'm meaning. Clumping about with no aim or destiny, just steps, not even steady. Howver: don't mistake me for suggesting you go all McGoohan and dash about in liberal triumph, subsisting only by virtue of your indulgence — not 'nless you're similarly prisoned, that is. Nor do I suggest we're caged by institution (ergh). I have the firmest respect for sizzleisation, truly I do. But living in it is no more phlosophical than taking care of bees-knees, you dig? It need not obscure your view. Besides, no law 'gainst slumping. It's too high to get over (yeah yeah), too low to get under (yeah yeah).

And I looked: hair attractively framing face, a small one. And like clockwork I screwed up my mouth, achingly. Then away, appearing to concentrate on something intangible. Complete conceit, mind. Even added a Thinker fist. (This is an example, by the, not a whim.) And gazing backwards to every other face that had stuck, and combing my hair with my fingers and yawning often. Catch me now: coat casually open, cap poised (still wearing it? Yes, you know, till my hair grows and that. Plus winter, you know), that look. Nothing so unusual. Nothing that'd tear open the fabric of sosososososo— sorry, can't say it. So plain, in fact, that the above conjecture seems more a foil for something far less, shall we say, romantic, something, gape, vulnebubble. That's partially the point of the example; I don't mean to deny my namesakemanity — not even to make a point. Well: my grandmother was face down in her breakfast again. I called the nurse. She smiled somehow. Mopping my grandmother's face, she even contributed to a blossoming discussion about that Canadian folk duo. I wondered what was worse: having to wipe someone else's arse, or having to have your arse wiped by someone else? She frowned at my candour, then considered. Good God, she said, realising, I hope I don't get to compare those first-hand. Laughing, I wondered if my grandmother had been dead all these weeks. It hardly seemed to make a difference. You're a vegetable (you're a vegetable). You're a vegetable.

Twosome: falling pointlessly against walls, lying in company, walking nowhere: that's where you think about it all with the right gravity, not to mention lightness. No 'free spirit' troping or blind hedoning; rather, feeling like a good dream, to no detriment to sosososososo— Not taking for granted the ability to eat a good breakfast. No? (Yeah yeah.)

Cross My Heart

Train station, bullied by elements — the wind seemed genuinely intent on dislodging my delicately poised cap — I set my mind the task of solving that great imponderable. Content-wise, it's chiefly the concern of homosexual women, having hitherto been untackled, but I, with the luxury of a missed train, aim to set the record straight. It takes, after all, balls to confront this issue, particularly whilst wearing a rather ridiculous cap on a rather ridiculously windy day.* (By the way, I've moved to the sheltered part, having decided to risk the inevitable hobo stench; giggling girls, thinking it unoccupied, spy my well-sculpted head in the window and make new plans — martyr spared 'em the funk.) Some chilly minutes pass unassumingly and, despite having my formidable gaze obstructed by unaesthetic beige, I manage to score a few good thoughts. (I have now moved out of the shelter, almost to board.)

The next station is Dennis. No one's sat on me yet. Shame. As the train rumbles back to motion (not strictly true — I was too slow in writing that sentence) I find myself making some progress on my self-imposed problem. I was far from a good answer, indeed very far, but I move in obsessions; don't be surprised if I have the thing firmly wrapped by week's end. Plus, I'm a whiz at suffering obstacles. My biological mother once told me that when you hit a wall, whatever its context, go hang at Tabby's and come back tomorrow with fresh eyes. (Tabby was a childhood flame from four to fifteen: a yeasty tomboy with scarlet locks and peppered skin, she now maintains an unpleasant trans-Pacific accent somewhere in Canada, with my poor adolescent heart tucked in a shoebox beneath her bed. "Hoeniger asked about my first love. I said 'Pale, mercurial and devilish; had two loves' — how's that?", a line from her letter, May 24. That's her handwriting; that's the way she writes.) Not having Tabby at hand, I decided instead to have a particularly restful night's sleep when I got home.

Now we're forward some three hours (my errand kept me from chronicling the intervening). My roomy black notebook has given way to a squat yellow pocketbook. I'm already halfway down the page. I should mention that this marks a second journey, having returned home for approximately ten minutes before a gate-crashing opportunity presented itself and ushered me back out into the Cruel. These piling mundanities run the risk of overshadowing my ponderings, but I added a few useful observations along the way, most afforded by lulls. A brief glimpse from a fellow passenger (merely by proximity) and I'm back outside myself, noting, for no particular reason, the onlooker's green caffeinated drink. Now we pause at the neon ferris wheel, Ernst & Young high-rise to my right. I look at my watch: fifteen minutes to Crown. The evening disappears in a swamp-green haze of inferior remakes and sulky companions. Tabby infests my dreams.

*Suffering for fashion, as always.

Rhapsody

All right, now this one is a little exaggerated — forgive me. The time: nearing ten-thirty. The place: here. The persons: whatshisname (Ben?), Tom and myself. With a gourmet meal — thawed fish and chips, decanted by yours truly — settling in our I Guess This'll Do bellies, we organised ourselves for a debate of sorts, filmed from the corner for posterity.
"Never until the mankind making, bird, beast and flower," I began, overflowing with righteous poesy.
Ben smirked and countered: "We are hollow men. We are stuffed men."
Before I could rebuke, Tom strode in between us.
"Drift close to me, and sideway bending, whisper delicious words," he said, punctuating with curt glances and taut fists.
"No," I cried, eyes welling with passion. "Praise that the spring time is all—"
"April is the cruelest month," interrupted Ben, calmly. "Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing memory and desire, stirring dull roots with spring rain."
I considered. "Here in the spring, stars float along the void." Come back from that!, my smile said.

"They say that the Dead die not, but remain, near the rich heirs of their grief and mirth."
We both turned to Tom, puzzled at his addition.
"Now tread the far South, or lift rounds of snow up the white moon's hidden loveliness," he continued. Either he was drawing a very long bow or—
"After the torchlight red on sweaty faces [not unlike Ben's as he spoke], after the frosty silence in the gardens, after the agony in stony places. The shouting and the crying." Curses. I was behind. How could I miss the connection?
"O make me a mask and a wall to shut from your spies," I wailed desperately. They pounced.
Tom: "Oh! Death will find me, long before I tire of watching you, and swing me suddenly into the shade and loneliness and mire of the last land!"
Ben: "The withered root of knot of hair, slitted below and gashed with eyes; this oval O cropped out with teeth, the sickle motion from the thighs."
I could do this. "Twenty-four years remind the tears of my eyes. I advance for as long as forever is." A pause. Yes. Then:
"And so I never feared to see you wander down the street, or come across the fields to me on ordinary feet." Here Tom lighted on my lap, devilishly testing my liberalism. "For what they'd never told me of, and what I never knew; it was that all the time, my love, Love would be merely you." I shook him off.
"Not from this anger — anticlimax after refusal struck her loin and lame flower bent like a beast to lap the singular flood," I scoffed, composing myself.
"Along the reaches of the street," said Ben, determined, "held in a lunar synthesis, whispering lunar incantations."
"Creeps in half wanton, half asleep, one with a fat wide hairless face."
"And freely he goes lost in the unknown, famous light of great and fabulous, dear God."
"Which the leopards reject. The Lady is withdrawn in a white gown, to contemplation, in a white gown." Ben's repetition was powerful. We steadied ourselves.

"In the beginning was the three-pointed star," I announced. "One smile of light across the empty face."
"And the dark woods grew darker still. And birds were hushed. And peace was growing. And quietness crept up the hill." Tom had lost some of his fury.
"The host with someone indistinct converses at the door apart." (For the record, I was still in the room when Ben said this — metaphor, perhaps?)
"When I see you, who were so wise and cool, gazing with silly sickness on that fool you've given your love to, your— Shit, I've got to go. It's nearly eleven." Saying this, Tom retrieved his jacket and thanked me for the evening. A premature end (Ben left, too), but a memorable evening. The issue would have to remain unresolved for the moment. For once, I did not mind.

Trite and True

While on occasion I find it fit to, shall we say, contort some of the more insignificant facts of the otherwise Honest To God pieces I put before you (for the record, I always put You before any of the pieces; they are but disposable oddities, dissipating daily in a huff of ill-assembled ones and zeros; you are living, breathing, panting organisms, with like eight arms), I am always, without exception*, completely cock-in-pants faithful to the Heart Of The Matter — like all true loggers. Not for me the petty twisting of important details; not for me the sandbox realms of pure fiction; and not for me the hazy middle ground of — oog, I feel sick — ambiguity. Like all people who think they're artists, I stand for truth: the truth of experience. It's all very well and good to wave statistics and graphs and pictures of people reading controversial 20th century novels, but that does not pierce the capital-T, my plums; to do that, you need sapient fingers and bad eyes.

Case in point: my sister, Ointment (vindictive nickname rather than vindictive parents), two years my junior, wandered listlessly into the kitchen, curling her hair around a brush that for all intents and purposes was an extension of her hand. Ever the adolescent, she grimaced at me through hoary black lips and bee-lined for the coffee-grinder. For someone with such a vulgar personality, she always looked very doable first thing in the morning, before she'd had a chance to suffocate her better features beneath tragic black leather and obscene buckles. Such a waste. I wondered idly when that godawful phase would end and crossed my legs.
"Where's the milk?" she asked accusingly.
"At the shop." I relished the moment, having earlier been overly liberal in dousing my cereal, and took a sip of very white coffee. She cursed me — Brothers! or something — and I watched her leave, turning back to my paper when the door clicked.

Around lunch Tom popped round, cheerily bearing a bag of jersey caramels (our favourite). We shot down a few hours talking about sex and watching my sister sleep (no correlation; we were bored) before Tom trudged off home again and I headed to the smoke. After a successful journey, I returned and fixed a homely tuna casserole, the ingredients for which I had collected along the way. I caught the wrong train, though, so it was a little late in appearing. Still, hit the spot. I think a walk would have capped the night off perfectly but Harry had an early start. Ah well. Gives me a chance to catch up on those wacky Petries.

Beau Deadly

It was Sunday; rather unlike today, which is Wednesday. We sat apart, neatly, with the mid-afternoon sun proving no match for the room's frostiness. I stole glances intermittently, she not at all. The eager faces at the window: mid-afternoon mothers. I took four requisite breaths and began.
"My mother and your mother—"
"Yes," she said, nodding wearily.
Silence. I picked up my guitar; silence. I put it down again.
"Still fits," I mumbled, trying to recover from what must have seemed rather pathetic. "So I'm Hugh, by the way."
She looked, briefly.
"Congratulations."
Ouch.
"Goals?" (A strange jump, granted, but bets were off.)
"No. You?"
"No," I lied. "No use for 'em. I would like to write a big-themed novel, though."
She nodded absently, as if dead. Evidently she had no desire to know what my big-theme was. That was a joke, too. Despite her manner, I felt a strange surge of confidence (or carelessness), which I used to position myself next to her on the bed. She was pretty, certainly, but a little severe up close. She'd probably tear me apart if she wasn't so sad.

A while passed. I was restless. Summoning up dumb courage, I closed my eyes and motioned my face to hers.
"What the hell are you doing?" she snapped, recoiling.
I flushed. "I was, uh... I was wondering what your face would feel like... if I stuck mine against it." Worst excuse yet.
"With our parents watching? What the fuck's wrong with you?"
(For the record, mine was making encouraging gestures the whole time.)
"Nothing they haven't seen before," I said. (Ergh.)
Suddenly a knock from the front door. I knew it must be Ben and said as much.
"Who?"
"Ben."
"Who's Ben?"
"He's... Ben."
"Hi, I'm Ben," said Ben, a little later in the narrative. "But you can call me..." He pretended to trail off, then added, "My number is—"
She glared.
"o-4— get about it!" He laughed to a snort. "I'm just playing wi' ja." He turned to me. "Who's the big, fat slice of All Right?"
Dazed, I said: "This is my partner, Millie."
"I'm not your partner!" she screamed, standing up. "And what's more, my name's not Millie!"
"I didn't mean it like that," I stammered.
"Oh yes? Well what did you mean by 'partner'?"
"Business partner?" I offered weakly.
"More like getting-down-to-business partner," interjected Ben.
Fuming she made for the door, then stopped, turning back.
"You're small people, you know that?"
"That's not fair."
"And that's not true," said Ben.
She surveyed us again, curling her lip. "I'll have you know I don't suffer fools gladly."
"Me either," I said, unsure whether to nod or shake. "But I quite like morons."
"You don't get it, do you?" she continued. "You're not... You've got this fixed image of the world, this small-framed way of seeing things. It's all base desires, nothing more. As if humans exist only now, you know? Lurching from one encounter to another. Love and poetry may as well be foreign languages to you."
"That's not true," I protested. "I love poetry — really. Love it."
"I very much doubt it."
"No, I swear. Look, I'll quote you one."
"Go on," she said, peering skeptically.
I had the grand total of one poem memorised — highly inappropriate but at this point suiting my mood.
"It's an old one, this, from 1704. Chap named William Byrd II, a most underrated poet in my opinion." Both looked at me curiously. I cleared my throat and began, somehow not giggling.

"Gentlest blast of ill concoction,
Reverse the high-ascending belch:
Th' only stink abhorr'd by statesmen,
Belov'd and practic'd by the Welch.

Softest notes of inward griping
Your reverences' finest part,
So fine it needs no pain of wiping
Except it prove a brewer's fart.

Swiftest ease of cholic pain,
Vapour from a secret stench,
Is rattled out by the th'unbred swain,
But whisper'd by the bashful wench."

"Called 'Upon A Fart'," I said. "Good, eh?"
"Hilarious. Good bye." She left.
Ben snickered.
"She wasn't bad," he wheezed, almost foaming.
"Diabolical," I muttered.
The sun had gone by now. Ben began to fidget.
"This has got me a bit... riled-up," he said, without his former confidence. "You don't mind if I—?"
"No, go ahead."
"And you're not, uh—"
"Nah. I think I'll just read or something over here."
Ben nodded.
"Well," he said, standing.
"Yep." I looked up at him. "Uncut?"
"Yeah."
"Good. Keep it in."
He nodded again.
"Actually, I don't feel like reading. You don't mind if I sing?"
Ben frowned. "With guitar?"
"No, a cappella."
"Hm."
"What?"
"Nothing, it's just—"
"What?"
"Well, no offence, but... I've never really been all that fond of your voice."
"Really?" I blinked. "How come?"
"Well... You can't sing."
"Oh."
"Sorry, I didn't mean—"
"No, no, it's all right. I understand."
"I knew you would."
"And it'd put you off, would it?"
"It would a bit, yes."
"Fair enough. I guess I will read after all."
"Sorry."
"Nah, you're right. I've been meaning to read."
"OK. Wish me luck."
"Will do."
I opened my book.*

*Literally. (See right.)

Draft Dodging

Belly-up one morning (this one morning), breakfasted stoutly on oats & apricots, thoughts and feelin's swimming, still half-asleep, short two mouthfuls, even leaving a gulp at mug's bottom (to make a rim). Rose, rinsed, showered, scrubbed, caught glimpse, winced. Nosed in cautiously, cursed hairdresser, pulled up socks, galloped, peered again, lost in eyes, furrowed, cleared throat, spoke, monologued, singing. Lost. Smoked clean cotton-bud, loosing it smoothly from its packet. Gazed at window right, then wall left. Alarm. Rose, rinsed, breakfasted. Cracked knuckles, smoothing the page. Waited.

Lunch, lounging. Sang with great gusto and clunky plonking, the latter in tune, neither in time. Shampoo, very thorough. Perfectly dry, cracked window. Needled my way to bed, shut off the light, pulling the covers and fondling the pillow. Light flooded. Alarm. Repositioned pillow, rolled out, palming eyes. Stretched, stumbled, showered. Studied fridge. Methodically ground beans. Pleasing gurgle from stove, shook milk vainly. Black. Hovered fingers. Gazed at window right, looked deeply into the ceiling, not at. Pushed off socks. Fell. Telephone. Speaking? Did you say feelings? No, I don't have any; sorry. Replaced.

The gaggle hollering somewhere inside, I waited, eventually to knock. Hug, hug, hug, like three bullets. Escaped. Hawthorn, eating. Rose-tinted glasses framed the night (that portion of it). Water beating down, not quite warm enough. Two strangers smiled, seemingly genuine. Key shivering towards the lock, missing a third time. Sliding off shoes, suspenders. Porcelain, a brush, needled back to bed. Knuckles cracking, alarm blaring, sneezed alphabetti spaghetti triptych, conked, Michael Caine, across the page. Escaped. Soap to armpits, singing. Grimaced, winced, laughed. Propped pillow across the table, chatted (mostly me). Stood back, considered. Unsatisfied. Finished.

Ms. Rose Arrives

Overcast. The Um stood soulfully on a sloshed bluff, gazing down at the cold, bleak plain as if it were a microcosm of all human endeavour. Wind-blasted bastard. Next to him, snapping a distant cliff, sat Mr. Brooke, a pale, bijou urbanite under a dense web of tan pig tails. Clicking a further two times, he slid his delicate rims back onto his nose and frowned. Not the right angle? I didn't much mind. A few yards across, Pub Sneer wandered in two-piece rag and bum-glove, looking lost and impotent. He winced at me weakly, seemingly trying to smile. I looked at him as one looks at a three-week-dead mouse circa lunchtime and continued narrating. (Myself, I hasten, clad in Brobdingnagian pants befitting his heightsake, amphibian features, capped, coated, restless; boyish.)

For the moment, that was it: a less-than-formidable four. We entertained plans of rafting to France to find our fifth, but that had more than a whiff of pipe about it, particularly in the mire of our present. I paced self-consciously, imagining the passage in a future history book. It scarcely seemed worthy of a footnote, let alone a passionate treatise. As if to illustrate my point, Sneer dry-retched himself into a ditch behind me, capping it off charmingly with an audibly exhaled orifice. A moment later, the distinct, lackadaisical scent of marijuana drifted up from the hole, ruining the carefully narrated atmosphere — the clot. The sky dimmed slightly. Then thunder. Panning across the Hm, Is It Raining?, I pretended to sigh. This was not the stuff of legend. This was not even the stuff of blogging. I slumped back on my deck chair, sighing for real. It began to rain proper. Amidst the downpour, what started as an almost imperceptible rhythm rose to a hoofed clatter, drawing intriguingly nearer until its source could (just) be made out. By this point, the non-pot-addled among us had gathered on the far side of the camp, peering attentively into the distant sheets. Obscured by rain and fog, it looked rather like a waddling town house.

The cart rolled to a stop. One of the horses snorted — sneezed? — and grumpily toyed with the mud at its feet. Silence. (Except the rain.) The purple carriage shook for a moment. A door, also purple, thudded open. After an excruciating delay, a leg stepped out, followed by a body, another leg, two arms and a head. The fetching whole was somehow even purpler than the carriage. Approaching swiftly, she smiled away the cold. In—
"Wait," she said.
Yes? I wondered.
"'Smiled away the cold'?"
Well, I—
"What am I supposed to be, a princess?"
I considered this.
"Yes," I said, quoting for emphasis. "Prince-ess. Princess! 'Prince' as in Prince, 'ess' as in... I dunno, 'dress' or something. Perfect."
"You're not calling me Princess."
"All right, how about... Ess?"
"Better."
— her hand she held one of those crass Melbourne Renaissance A4s I had sticky-taped to Flinders Street. The ink was running; I didn't blame it. Still, at least it wasn't Comic Sans or Skia. She kick-started a lantern and held it to her face.
"Hello," she beamed. She looked a little taken aback at our less-than-heroic shapes, but did a serviceable job of suppressing it.
We exchanged the same glance.

Cavity

The blinds were still up, letting the dark in. This was deliberate. I lay there, watching the blue flame lick the kettle in the next room, humming, singing, sometimes shifting to favour the other ear. The stereo was telling me repeatedly to Hold it. Being so enticingly put together, I would have done just that, had I anything to hold. (Initially, I thought the insistent, harmonised command signalled a halt of sorts; only later did I discover it was a determined plea.) Gathering my thoughts into a neat, alphabetised pile, I said (to myself), Here I am, in the bounds of Experience; and though it is mine alone [still in quotes, mind you], it shall soon be the newest addition to that great communal work, What We Know (vol. MMMMCMXCIX or something). Altered, of course [still quoting...]; not merely a retelling, or this-then-this account; a bold new shape, almost irrecognisable, but unmistakably borne from Experience. [End quote.] I paused, suddenly becoming self-conscious. Did I just say that? Did I just say that out loud? The kettle bubbled. I walked over to it in something of a daze, recalling my strange outburst like a drunk recalls some hideous deed. Irrecognisable?

So no one told you that was gonna be this way... [clap, clap, clap, clap]. I frowned, my timing just right. How depressing. The blinds were still up but the effort was beyond me. I fidgeted, like a suspect. Next week's assignment is to have dinner together e-every night and see what changes in your life. I left the room to inspect my bookcase. Standing a half-metre back, not feeling the floor, I watched as titles and authors raced by, sometimes splashing me with recognition, sometimes hurling a crunched can of the altogether unfamiliar. They were eating all 52 of my bookmarks. Suddenly feeling ill, I woozed my way outside, wading through small, hyperactive dogs until I reached an aged bench in the middle of the garden. I half fell onto it, recovering only with some effort. The stars were out, of course. I couldn't resist a peek. As usual, they had nothing important to tell me, but they sure looked pretty. One even seemed to wink at me. I winked back, just in case. Feeling unaccountably motivated, I pulled my weakening body up again and pushed further outside, towards a park. I was careless; the littler dog followed me. Fearing an escape, I swiftly whisked her off her little paws and brought her to my chest. In the soft moonlight we had a moment, and I think it answered my question. She wriggled out of my hands and scurried off (back to the garden, thankfully). I laughed cornily and followed her, a little more grounded. Oo oo oo oo-oo oo oo-oo oo, said the television. Falling back on the couch, I suddenly wished I was drunk.

I slept instead.

Slight Return

When one — in this case this one — poises the ol' digits over a certain old digital board, he must, as a matter (of course), come to firm grips with what's been writ hitherthen, not only by the self but by the entire conglomerate of grubby fingers out there, and if then he's not sufficiently put-off by the prospect of justifying the spotlight, he must still bear down and come through with the goods, knuckles down, eyes locked. And it was with such hubris — deeply considered hubris, but hubris nonetheless — that I tapped (surprise, surprise) Ben in the shoulder region and steered his formidable gangle my way.

Yes?" he said, glaring as per.
"Nothing," I shrugged. "I just thought, you know, we could get to having an amusing* conversation or something — like old times."
Ben sighed (also as per).
"Must we?"
"Well, I sort of promised I'd do something today, and—"
"But why me?"
"What?"
"Why not one of your other readers?"
We laughed for several minutes before Ben clarified.
"No really, why not The Other, for instance?"
"The Other?" I looked puzzled. (I was puzzled.)
"Yes, The Other."
"Oh yes," I said, puzzled no more, "The Reluctant Revolutionary."
"I prefer Pop."
"Not Pops?"
"No. Just Pop."
"I prefer... Cynthia Rose — or just Cyn."
"Um... What?"
Ben posed a handsome puzzler, all right.
"You know — Starfish And Coffee."
"No."
"Well, it's—"
"I don't care," he said, sneezing. And with that he grabbed onto the side of a van and whizzed off.

Typical. Now I had no one to have amusing* conversations with. Scowling at my shoelaces, I returned home, free from any foreseeable deadlines but burdened by a lack of Ben. I washed dishes — The Gold Experience. Sometime later I remembered. Racing back to wherever that street was, I found the conjured and subsequently abandoned Ms. Rose standing near a bakery, dramatically soaked by a recent shower. She peered down at me angrily.
"Next time," I said, and raced off.

*Adjective does not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of The Times or any of its affiliates.

Vacant — See?

At this stage, I feel it might be worth pointing out that there shall be a slight stifling of activity between now and next, owing to some necessary, albeit half-cooked, preparations I must complete before then. Jourth, a title somewhat less punnable than Maith (Jourth By Jourth-West? Jourthie Girl?), is thusly what I recommend setting your watch for (aside from general time-keeping, that is). It shall signify a positive plateau of opportunity (or potential, if you wish to alliterate), with no competitive mounds or alternative avenues to distract from the task at hands. Wait a minute, say you, you can't exactly halt the revolution for a week — what of the looming lackaday threat? Surely it will not lay down and wait? Well, I have no intention of halting the revolution, only the tenor of my presence therein. That is why I leave you in the capable hands of Chanties himself, Johnny The Stirrer Beehive, who today is a burden lighter, and the Bedium Medium. I shall also even mention ol' Halfway, although one will need a finger crossed. Nevertheless, a daily visit won't hurt and I, for one, shall be doing so. For the moment, then, the revolution is in their hands.

Perhaps you are wondering as to the nature of my non-revolutionary preparations. While not giving too much I way, I will tell you that I am intending to visiting my erstwhile sister, Alice Evens (not Evans) on the coast, to attend a matter of relocation. It's sure to involve excitingly sealed envelopes and strange moustaches. And it does, in certain ways, involve the revolution, although being personal, it will not directly aid the cause. Still, it can't be avoided, and it shall be nice to see the somewhat equivocal but always delightful Ms. Evens once more. Our last meeting was soured my considerable tension and I am hoping my task will leave room to mend our manners while I am there. So that's that. Please do not cease your letters of support. If there's one reliable thing in this entire rickety operation, it's our postal service. Ooroo.

Lotophaging

A cake is sliding layer by layer off the table as a I tap. Two spindly sisters and one gangly activist are splayed unconsciously across a mound of discarded food stuffs and spent party poppers, snoring somehow. I wait for the kettle. This is going to be quite the cleanup. Not only does the host have to contend with an array of spilt food and drink, but the vomited and dribbled product of the same, which abounds gracelessly around fallen bodies. In addition to this, "Viva la revolucion!" has been crudely sprayed on nearly every visible surface, betraying Ben's presence, not to mention the room's once-loyal stylist. Most of all, though, there's the smell. A mixture of bad weed (thanks, Harry), bad alcohol (thanks, Harry) and suffocated armpits. That boy's one step away from a twelve-step.

Mingling for three weeks has more than taken its toll; I feel like sawdust. But I've fared far better than most, possibly even all. I'm awake, for starters, and quite close to sobriety. And I'm already reflecting. Somewhere along the line our common cause was blurred by beer, song and myriad other sybaritic pursuits, and I fear the extended recovery period will prove a thorn. Ben and that tall Portuguese woman (great slacks) will each need at least a week's worth of showering, I'd wager, and Johnny The Stirrer (a recent and inevitable christening) will be out of action till he finds all his fingers. But while it's a less than ideal opening*, its symbolic function, independent, as it is, from the actual goings on of the event, will be strong enough to mark this admitted indulgence as something of a success. That's a hard thing to say with the smell of purged stomachs and badly mixed liquor, but I'm optimistic. Whatever the outcome, I think we'll each emerge slightly different(ly). It certainly put whatever remained of my abstinence to the test. And I'll cease to look at Harry as a benign innocent. Still didn't get me to dance, though.

There's something wonderfully superior about surviving this, particularly with a pot of tea to rest on. If I wasn't so sober I might even murmur "spiritual". Potential hasn't been squandered, merely delayed. And that's nice. After this I'll sit outside with the rest of my tea and wait for the morning to start looking like it's supposed to.

*This will not be made a joke of.

Q. Anni

To continue with this somewhat belated celebration, I shall, for one time only, answer some of the more interesting questions I've received from commenteers and e-mailers of late. But be warned: this shan't become a habit.

Dreary45 said...
When people ask my favourite colour, I always say you're my favourite Hugh.

Thank you. You may come to the picnic.

Flower said...
Do you ever consider the trail of human ruin your schoolboy provocations leave behind? To my mind, your desperate pursuit of infamy seems to stem from a deeply ingrained sense of insecurity pushing against an equally ingrained hunger for recognition. A hunger for recognition is, of course, the subtext of blogging, but you seem to aim higher and mightier, as if expecting distinction from outside the community — a Pulitzer, perhaps? Yet at the same time you seem highly self-conscious about coming across that way, and possibly even the notion itself, hence the knee-jerk callowness. What do you make of the argument that art is fundamentally an indulgence of its creator? Or that pretensions are prerequisites for all conscious art? Do you believe, as I do, that hyperselfconsciousness inhibits the creation of art?

Sometimes I look in the mirror and cry.

Petre said...
You're strange. But don't change.

I've nothing else to wear.

Jill Blomb said...
The strong erotic undercurrent in almost everything you write seems to me to be a manifestation of a repressed sexual condition. Are you impotent or just not getting any?

No, I'm just very liberated.

Kathryn said...
Does the word "apparently" carry any more weight than "allegedly"?

I think "allegedly" is the more skeptical of the two, so in terms of the speaker's belief, I'd say "apparently" would carry more weight, yes.

Big Boy said....
Best and worst post, stat.

Best: apologies, but I scrolled dutifully through the backlog (a rather dispiriting experience) and was unable to find a sole post that would warrant such a distinction. No false modesty — obviously I love myself deeply. But if you insist on pressing a gun to my head, I'd probably yelp a few of the better ones atop my head — Martha's Day, Milkhill Puppy, Herring George (on a good day), We're Not At Home To The Broke Of Heart, As Black As That, perhaps. Maybe even the sheer terribleness of the restored Things In Chairs, or the whorey clunk of The Fleshy Mexican Crowd-Pleaser. None would particularly leap out upon inspection, and my gun-totting antagonist would no doubt be disappointed, but them's the ones I dislike least.

Worst: tough one. Certainly I'd include the worst offenders of the Everyone Has An Opinion series: everyone's pretentious; boo to you, God; art rots, photos shoul' be real, film oh film et al; and, especially, It Was So Much Better Way Back When. Sickening, embarrassing, ugly jejune sludge, the lot of it. The mid-2005 one on blogging was particularly rank. If I had to pick one, though, I'd still say the first of the only two topical posts I ever did (the second is nearly as bad). Utterly detestable stab at, I dunno — irony? The sort of thing you'd paste in a very sane suicide note by way of explanation. In fact, I'm going to go back on my word and delete the two fuckers right now. No principle can sustain their existence.
And they're gone.

Roderick Summer said...
Your self-indulgence astounds me. Do you ever stop talking about yourself?

I pray the day will come, but right now it's the only subject I'm sufficiently versed in. I disguise it well, no?

Roderick Summer said...
No.

Oh.

BarBRA said...
Why is it that all the females in your posts are either prostitutes or elusive one-dimensional objects?

What can I say? I write what I don't know.

Wilbert Peach said...
What keeps you going?

The frightening realisation that I still haven't mastered punctuation.

Anni Get Your Versary

In the natural course of things, one is occasionally offered the luxury of retrospect, which, depending on the circumstance — curious pride and the throes of disillusionment, respectively as follows —, will either lead to a renewed vigour in present tasks or a stultifying nostalgia for past ones. On such occasions it is important to maintain a veneer of abject objectivity, if one is to benefit from the activity, and it was with this in mind that I took to the archives to assess the journey thus far, something which, I hoped, would act as much-needed adrenalin for Phase Two.

What struck me most prominently during the delve was not, as might be expected, the sediment (the dirty stuff) or similar such juvenelia, but the sentiment. Not the wellreadiment (the qwerty stuff), not the whathesaidiment (the flirty stuff), not even the dropdeadiment (the shirty stuff). No — the sentiment. The véritable; the Dear reader, hear my heart...; the tap, tap, tap of my tears; the hhonest to ghod; the All That is Good and Proper. The point, some might say. Now, I'm not one to shoo or shy from sentiment on principle, nor do I mind, on occasion, exposing the ugly underneath, but I have found that sentiment, when expressed rawly, can sometimes bind a piece so firmly to a place and a time and a feeling that divorcing it from its context and appreciating what it has to offer is nigh on impossible, particularly as its impetus and audience drift further apart. Moreover, it often erodes ration, although admittedly that isn't always a bad thing. Take the following, from August 8th, 2006:

Tuesday. Big day. I hate people.

What are we to make of that? Nothing. It's perfunctory to the point where only its author could ever find anything of value in it, and even then he'd have to squint. It adds nothing, it gives nothing, you get nothing. It's an event horizon of callow vanity, the kind of treacle that gives literacy a bad name. Now compare it to this slight retraction posted two days later:

Errsday. I made the mistake of gibletting my ego, ergo my soul. Now I just hate myself.

While we still have the unfortunate voicing of an unfortunate sentiment, we now have a sense of craft, even humour, to fall back on, ensuring that audience pleasure is at least a possibility, if only a slight one. But it was to be a while yet before I reached the level of this decidedly unsentimental nugget from February 23rd, 2007 (the day ain't even mentioned!):

Blustered down from generation to generation in bold, steady bumps, Valentino fascism, as I've dubbed it, has inherited from the old world a certain, or rather uncertain, capricious nature which initially seems at odds with the very notion of lineage tradition, but is in fact a reflection of the underlying instability inherent in all forms of fascism, indeed the very thing which accounts for its formidable, and frankly frightening, adaptability. It almost put me off my cereal, I'll tell you.

From then on the road began to smooth out. I eased into a rhythm and found my feet, dancing steadily ever since. But those glaring stains continued (and continue) to haunt me. What could I do — delete them? No. This is a document. The assets of this medium are its rawness and immediacy — process laid bare. I considered erecting stern condemnation notices on the offending posts, but again that would be betraying the form. After all, this is not the place for discipline, or at any rate it doesn't have to be. The flaws are but facets of the whole, and often the whole is the better for it. Let us not bemoan sinking standards or, God help us, lapses of talent: they are the wasted posts, writ with a hand on the keyboard and an eye on the mirror. Let us instead bound ungracefully forward, arse-first but not looking back, and plant our fallible faces on history's asphalt. Not for the press, not for the prestige, not for the presence, but for the sheer oxen pleasure of articulation itself. It may prove the promulgation of nothing in particular, but that nothing in particular will be our nothing in particular; nay, that nothing in particular will be us.

No. It's less than that. But it sure as hell beats WoW.

Remaithance Man

An intestinal horn wailed pathetically across the just-about-night, scattering the odd bird and irritating the odd bat. The scuffing of paws followed and we began to see ominous red and white flashes through the trees. Stan stuck his fist into his mouth and prayed. I kept still, looking intense. Suddenly a dirty great hound burst through the clearing and shook vast webs of saliva in furious, putrid arcs. Being a dedicated reactionist, Johnny was the first of us to load his musket and bring it up to his eye. But before he could add an inch of steel to the foaming beast, its heavily armed employers appeared from the foliage and surrounded us. Stan covered his eyes. I kept still, looking intense.

"See? What did I tell you? The dog never fails," said one of the shorter soldiers. "And you said we'd never find 'em."
The recipient shrugged.
"Well? Don't you have something to say?"
The recipient shook his head.
"Go on."
The recipient sighed.
"I'm glad we dragged the guillotine all this way," he said, rolling his eyes.
"There. That wasn't so hard, was it?"
Johnny Beehive raised his musket defiantly.
"Vous ne nous ramènent alors que nous sommes vivants !" he cried, accidentally firing a shot in the air and killing a displaced pigeon.
"Well, of course not," said the short solider. "What the hell did you think the guillotine was for?"
Just then the unwieldy wooden structure rose into view from behind the trees, and with it three very tired looking men and a tangle of shipping rope.
"Lambinent," said Stan.
"C'est l'extrémité, garçons," I sighed. "Nous avons eu une bonne course."

Suddenly a phlegmy baritone thundered out of the darkness.
"Unhand esas comadrejas, sucios aristócratas!"
The guards turned, waving their muskets uncertainly in the diminishing light.
"Los lobos ciego no ve el travieso búho," came the voice again.
The guards began firing randomly into the trees, scattering all manner of odd birds and bats.
"No golpearás la blanco si no tienes los vidrios apropiados."
Desperately, they tore apart the foliage, scraping and scratching and musketting. Then, flashing dramatically across the moonlight, a tall, gangly silhouette swung squarely into frame and posed a bit. It was Ben, wielding six steel posts and a fetching brown vest. After distributing three of the posts to Johnny, Stan and myself, he briefly attempted to take on the guards with the remaining three, but only began to do so successfully after the awkwardness of the his methods forced him to drop two of them first. Soon, however, we realised our posts were no match for the reloaded muskets and legged it. Led by the jungle-literate Ben, we escaped our captors in no time and wound up by a secluded river with breath to spare.

"Remercier la baise de Ben !"
We raised invisible glasses.
"El ano del mono nunca se lame enteramente. No ha terminado."
We looked at our saviour and nodded sagely.
"Néanmoins," said Stan, "Nous avons léché cette soirée. Buvons loin et caressons la nuit."
And, putting our hands to our lips, we did just that.

Manifesto

"Maith, such as I conceive of it, asserts our complete nonconformism clearly enough so that there can be no question of translating it, at the trial of the real world, as evidence for the defence."

1. Let no lesser scribes participate -- Maith must be meritocratic if it is to truly lead the way.

2. Let no one say anymore that they have nothing to write about - any (s)crap can be turned into a post at no cost.

3. Let no fictitious elements infiltrate your posts -- all ideas and opinions expressed must be real.

4. Let no standard of logging be created by critics -- a post inadvertently obscured by an error is equal to a post drawn explicitly by a genius.

5. Let no meals of the day, under any circumstances, be mentioned, particularly breakfast.

6. Let no detail be denied to Maith -- prolificacy is the chief objective.

7. Let no relativist ideals affect your judgement -- justification must not come from within. Posts must be valued objectively by those qualified to do so.

8. Let no considerations of truth or fact define your posts -- imagination is our greatest weapon; truth, our greatest hindrance.

9. Let no worthless banality be published. Posts must significantly add to the stockpile of human knowledge.

10. Most of all, let Maith be open to everyone, for logging must be popular art.

The Dawn of Legs

Times have been good and bad to me. I'm not sure whether that makes them simply indifferent, but the balance is pleasing nonetheless. The good manifested itself most recently in the form of a relative stranger, who sat rather near me on a train. Now, I'm not one to start conversations with strangers for no good reason, but here, I thought, I had one.
"Why wake?" I asked suddenly. (One of those rare occasions where the brain tricks the mouth into speaking without properly presenting its case first.)
"Excuse me?" The gaze was indignant. He had funny eyes.
"Just, you know — why?"
"Why?"
"Yes — why?"
"I'm getting off soon," he said, turning away.
I shrugged. The next stop passed and we were both still there.

"Do you have girlfriends or what?"
He glared at me. I tried to look as genuine as I thought I was being.
"No," he enunciated coldly, still glaring.
"See that's what I mean."
After seemingly wishing me dead, he turned away again.
"Actually, you've probably got more of an advantage when it comes to meeting people," I continued.
"That's ridiculous," he snapped back.
"I'm not shitting you, man. That heart-string appeal really flips the birds. You should be up to your neck in pussy."
"Well, I'm not," he said, welling.
I made my eyebrows an arch of sympathy and started again.

"Look, I ain't messing with you. I'm just curious." I put my hand on his shoulder. He shrugged it off.
"It's not all about sex," he said sourly.
"No, of course not," I agreed. "Walking along a beach with a loved one on a starry night: that's what it's about, man. Frolicking in the fields, rolling in the greens, wandering aimlessly. All that shit."
The train stopped.
"Since when was life about walking?" he called out as he wheeled off onto the platform and disappeared.
"Frolicking," I said to myself. "Life's about frolicking."
I suppose he could roll into a meadow and tip himself over, but it wouldn't be quite the same. Still, he'd made this wholly functioning man cherish his blessings, and that's got to be worth something.

Tempted though I was, I did not frolic on the way home, nor did I navigate through any sort of field or meadow. I did, however, fix myself one bitching cup of black coffee. Standing by the sink and enjoying every lick, I conceded that this pleasure was open to him, too. And that's worth something. Probably wouldn't get the view, though.

Times Are Bound

I'm proud to announce that a special hardback collection of the first three years of The Times is now available from Fantagraphics Books for $62.95. With beautifully etched illustrations by E. H. Shepard and a glowing foreword by Clive James, this limited edition anthology has been lovingly hand-bound and includes bonus cut-out moustache and beret. Dig:

"Now it exists in the real world. God help us all."
-Inga Clendinnen.

"Compelling, worthwhile and readable: three things this book is..."
-Kathy Hunt.

"Rampant obscurantism done as artistic achievement. Kid needs a life."
-Bob Christgau.

It looks pretty good on a bookshelf, too. And for all those value-mongers out there, I have written fourteen new articles specifically for the book which will not be available on this website. All that in addition to a thirty-page introduction detailing the conception and development of The Times. That's 379 fully annotated pages, not including the substantial foreword, introduction and afterword sections.

I shall field as many questions as I can predict. Firstly, have I redrafted any of it? In short, no. I want this to be a living record, documenting every half-cock, soggy grouse and wheezing sentence. Obviously I've not the balls to let the weaker pages slip by without severe footnotes, but all the text has been reproduced in its entirety, punctuation and all. Secondly, why pay $62.95 for a glorified print-out of a freely accessible and frankly mediocre website supplemented with additional material I could probably exhaust in a single browse in a bookshop? Well... Good point. But if you're looking for a gift obscure enough to delay the inevitable disappointment and allow you a swift getaway, look no further. Make sure you get a guide-dog or something first, though.

A Pause for Sunday

The warm glow of Maithteenth has all but faded, and with it the innocent air of possibility that surrounds the early days of revolution. Henceforth, it will be hard work and dedication, marked by the occasional guillotining and student lock-up. The momentum of the moment will not take care of the labour necessary to keep this train afloat — not now that the wooze of the night is behind us. No; it is time to clamber out of that stranger's bed, smiling wanly on the way, and salvage the remaining waking hours chiseling your renaissance prose. Maithteenth celebrations may have clogged your head somewhat, but if we are to really earn our page in history, we can not afford to underwhelm the expectant. Again.

For some among us, preparation takes an especially carnal form — in stark, quivering contrast to that of dedicated sportsmen. Not subscribing to this ritual myself, I can not, entirely, sympathise. Indeed I was more than a little irked when a breathy Ben phoned me immediately after one of these 'inspiration sessions' to talk shop, something which rapidly became an impossibility in the face of his then-pet's incessant interjections. But next to Stan, who cracks his knuckles via a room full of Scarlet Ladies and generally requires at least a week to recover, these indiscretions were small kittens indeed. Personally I think that we should forgo such distractions until this thing really gets off the tracks. That way, if it is destined never to be, it will not be for lack of effort or dedication.

I shall conclude by detailing my own set-up that others may be inspired and follow. In accordance with my lot, I am nestled among a native garden in a small, homely studio. Bookshelves line three of the four walls, with the remaining housing my desk. The typewriter on which these words were writ is suitably antiquated, and complimented by the oven-brown paper I insist on baking. Staring back at me is an etch of Voltaire or someone, inspiring and writerly. Non-glossed paper. Next to him is a nude of George Eliot I drew from a dream, and next to her one of Thackeray I drew in anticipation of sexism allegations. Manuscript paper has been deliberately strewn around the room and there is no radio. The walls are white, after Forster's metaphor. And I wear plaid. Suitable beginnings for this cultural revolution, no?

Rising Thumb

It seems a shame that the bulk of communication enacted by the young & coming takes place in increasingly impersonal domains, where anonymity and illiteracy have supplanted intimacy and empathy as the new perks of interaction. Newspapers, magazines and other printed text (you know, books and shit) have been around for yonks, but they were always tempered by the rigours of editing and public demand, and were never in themselves enough to do away with the old face-to-face. Certainly letters appear to be the forerunner, but they too were kept in check by the limitations of the postage service and its relative non-immediacy compared to the modern equivalents. Thus, for the first time in our history, art, journalism and social skills will cease to be the necessities of a prosperous world. No, civilisation hasn't quite slipped into the sea yet, but with the flaky cocksores of the SMS generation poised to take over at the click of the nursing home door, how far away can it be?

I fondly recall the days when the strength of an opponent's argument was directly proportional to the amount of spit that was on your face at the end of his speech. In those days, you really had to have balls; weak arguments would simply collapse in the face of a grimacing adversary. Consequently, a decent standard was maintained and all parties were the better for it. Comparable situations today don't have this benefit. Spared of having to stare directly into the eyes of their audience, people are free to let any thought that pops into their ugly, misshapen heads out into the world. No more can the inherent humanity of a mano-a-mano or womano-a-womano or mano-a-womano change your mind about spurting off on some vitriolic rant. Now the enemy is faceless, and any impulse can be instantly gratified.

We are in for a dismal future, my Bens. A time when published opinion no longer has to comply to editorial standards of journalistic excellence, where even the numbest what-I-had-for-breakfast loggers are legitimate. It will see the crumbling of the barrier between author and audience. Criticism will be supplanted by competition. The artist, the author, will no longer be revered. Onloggers, in their peculiarly mundane way, are bringing about the destruction of a cultural system that has been in place since we split off from the other apes; that of art as sacred; that of the artist as enlightened; that of the semi-colon. With their dangerous prorogation of DIY, they will undo culture itself and level out civilisation into a meaningless, communist spread of accessibility. I call an end to them all! But what can you do when the problem is compounded by market-savvy giants like Google™ offering a wide variety of services free of charge and allowing any fucker with a pair of fingers to prattle on endlessly about his horrible life, or lack thereof? The biggest of business thriving on the smallest of people. Today, Yesterday, Tomorrow — Guess what?, So I was doing this cheek, right?, Heeeeyyyyy. Oh, I can't look.

One Stop Stop

Ah, now here's a blip. With my dual miseries out of the way — the fuckers kept me till four — I am free to drip, drip, drip into the hours rejoice. What's that — thirty? Well, thirty-three. Well, thirty-five. Stop me if you've— The point being that the previous marked day, in May, was, by all accounts, severely lacking in the whelm department. In fagged, it was so piddlesome that some thought it the end of the matter, rather than what it actually was: the beginning. But thisteenth is where we really begin the begin. Ing. I'd do the dance, but I'm too into lacteal — though in a non-arrogant, 'stud in student' kind of way.

Now, I know what you're all thinking. You're thinking, 'He doesn't know what I'm thinking. He has no idea. He's just pretending to know what I'm thinking.' Well, in a way, you'd be half-right. The wording, I'm sure, would differ quite substantially. But I am a medium of substance. Like literature. I concern myself not with triffles of style or steed. I aim for the bones of the matter. The philistines can toy with the meat. Worth, then, is that peculiar substance which hones in on the skeleton, as if a dribbling, mutant X-ray. As if, hurt by the ways of the world, it shuts off its senses and drowns in the toilet bowl, a tragedy heightened by low-angle viewings and improved by vigorous editing.

Oh goody. This is not, this is not! a trumble (9ah!) or anything of that ilk, creed or ilk. It is butter deeply dodgy clutch of powder which the faintest of breezes could scatter. I thus suggest you keep your facial orifices in check, or wait for the cold to conclude if you have one. Summer, then. When the winds are low. Plus, it'll look better with the sun beating all over it and grey summer skirts nearby. Rabbits, gardenias, ugly small people. The distraction helps, believe me. Hm? Oh good, it's over. I hope you realise how much this hurts.

The 365th Postman

Well here I am. Please accept the fact that this is the 365th post and I won't have anything particularly enteresting to say (also accept the fact that yesterday I breakfasted on peach and oats, mm yum). Anyway, hello — and, well, goodbye. I think I'll break a bottle on something to celebrate the occasion.

Placeholder #2

Not even a yeah yet? Farg.

Placeholder #1

May 15th.

A Matter of Maith

Fear not, my flock. While my performance on the day in question admittedly left more than a little to be desired (I was away for most it), I feel the main issue here is one of profound misinterpretation. This is not an event that, in the words of a certain beehived contemporary, draws to a close. Rather, it is a drastic shift in practice that shall continue for as long as its exponents can sustain it. Maith, then, was merely to signify the beginning of the renaissance, not the whole of it. Renaissances are seldom confined to twenty-four little hours.

Nevertheless, my pitiful eighteen words could, with the addition of an extra letter, have spelt disaster if it were not for the efforts of a certain beehived contemporary, who gallantly stepped up to the plate in the absence of the promised one and bunted the fury of expectant fans. This semi-Herculean feat has since earned the lion-faced Limey a certain prized place on my altogether uncertain ladder, and with it the infamous platter of dubious merit. While not yet a second home, as it is with Bodo Yodo, it is, at the least, a favoured hotel, whose staff now know him exclusively as Oh, him again. Congratulations think sorry I are in order. Sorry, I think congratulations are in order.

But it will take more than just a few cursory nods to the eighth to bring about this cultural revolution. It will take persistence, hard work and perseverance. And it will require absolute vision — or, failing that, competent dictation software. Your propheteering narrator will not let you down. Again. Well, he may.

Umma Bathos

This is a small blip to reconcile the anniversary issue. The big blip will follow. Well, it may.

5808

The mushing of clouds, the flashing of lavs, the bubbling of brooks will mark the coming of something truly truly. No, not quite the Second, but something to do in the meanwhile. It promises to be as underwhelming as all the prior attempts, so you've no excuse not to hop on board. Pack now. The Beehive, the Medium, the Pervert, the Standard and yours truly truly. Real heads on blocks stuff. Renaissance, then a month of nothing much. To celebrate, to cheer, a third full year. And by full I mean negligible. Quick, quick, the train arrives late and leaves soon. Bah bah bah.

And after the inevitable throw-off near the equator (tuned, if memory serves, to G flat), we shall shrug our collective selves and unpack the picnic we'd packed in case it proved as underwhelming as all the prior attempts. That was the fun of it, we knew that. In fact we all half-secretly hoped for it not to eventuate. What fun is that work, that standard? How could it ever compete with friends, a picnic and non-oppressive desert heat? Sure, posterity may wish otherwise, but posterity can wait. For now, there is you, there is — oh wait.

Oh the anguish of effort! What worth is it? We kid — we kid week out — with the notion that we are selflessly achieving an end over the Moment; that we are sacrificing the joys of experience for the benefit of personkind; that we are, God help us, sculpting the nothingness into something tangible so as John and Jane Doe can live better, fuller lives. But we (they!) know it is not a grave weight, nor is it altruistic. That explanation, or excuse, only continues because many people do get pleasure from it. Really? says cavemonet, I thought I was the only one. But I digress: Onwards! Let us fail and rejoice in Ecuador. Pack a desert luncheon; it is pleasure in spite, not because, of the fall. 4.U.C. the failures of life are but failures of expectation. Which is not to say you should dispense with yours. It shall be the weight of 5808 that makes it — er — good. Am I right, girls?

Leapin' Limpet

Twice in as many I shall indulge in shameless promotion. This time, as last, a former lower-ladder-dweller is suddenly promoted to top-dog, for reasons, primarily, of relevance. It helps, too, that it's a positive revamp — new address and all. But I should at least apologise for the severe untimeliness of this update. Just goes to prove the old adage: news is only news once. Crux to follow.

I thought a film well worth a watch, but the cashier would only accept legal tender. By which I mean the thing you should take from this experience — that of chewing down a two of blubby paragraphs — is that Mr. Mystery is back, however temporarily, on the increasingly redundant radar which I, in my finite fickledom, maintain. Those questioning his morals should keep in mind his defense:

"I didn't break it, it was already broken."

Johnny Beehive

Tradition has once again reared its horribly disfigured head and plonked that once-bronze, always-bronge man back atop the increasingly unprestigious ladder to your right, booting its rightful owner to the hole that is Silver and once more allowing me to churn out a particularly pointless account thereof. Is this time any different? No — that long quote is still as apt as ever. But it does see the return of the fabled and long-overdue Bard, albeit with no mention of the notorious hotel incident. Nevertheless, here is a review of sorts of the latest instalment. Well, not here exactly, but the next paragraph.

Subtitled Sweet Jesus and The Missing Alternative Dance Troupe, the latest exploits of Detective Ainsley continues Tom's famously dyslexic use of capital letters and SMS-level punctuation in a distressingly sadistic tale of murder, lust and sexual violence. Compelling like only the most gruesome car crashes can be, Tom has topped himself yet again, although he appears to have subsequently come back to life and begun planning the next instalment. Overall it's hard to know what to make of it, but when it includes genius exchanges such as,
"I could murder a curry."
"OK, let's kill the next one who walks past."
I think there's a bright future for the little blood-nut yet.

Unlikely though it is, I'm a bit convinced this recent flourish of Tom's will lead to a resurgence of activity. It won't, but I am now.

Back in Your Life

A rough approximate of a recent event, worth logging (if the wider community's anything to go by): As per formula, I was ignoring my business in a run-down recreation centre, just off the main street, when things happened. Dig: the duke-box was playing a honky-tonk song, and, perhaps inspired by its lull, I followed a stray whim to an overfamiliar presence being pressed beneath half a pound of steel and almost failing to respirate. He spotted me, and subsequently I him, and a hazy sort of conversation began. It was stunted, somewhat, by what I sensed to be a reluctance on his part to participate, owing, one presumed, to the myriad of prior occasions in which we had featured, but his reticence wasn't such that mutual conversation was impossible, and a satisfactory degree of communicative force was eventually achieved.

"How's it?" I began, somewhat cautiously.
He peered at me with vicious indifference and milked the pause between question and answer in a most uncomfortable manner.
"Mm," he eventually shrugged.
"Ah."
Another manufactured pause.
"Er, how's Nicole?"
A glint of pain flickered across his mask.
"I don't know," he said. I pressed the matter no further.
After failing to think of a suitable topic, I was eventually spared of social suicide when he reintroduced the very matter I'd vowed not to press [see above — edward.].
Something like, "Abandonment of hope equals pure sexual magnetism."
I nodded for lack of words.
"Of course," he continued, "when I had her, the hope returned, and she simply left."
"I'm sorry to hear that."
"Are you?"
"A bit," I said, rather too ambivalently. He seemed temporarily pleased at my honesty.
"And yourself?" he half-asked.
"Oh, the usual."
"You mean this garbage?"
"Yeah." I turned my eyes groundward and we spent a wistful moment listening to each other breathe.

"Perhaps it's time you retired," he said finally.
"Oh, I don't know," I shrugged, "I still kind of enjoy it."
"Well, at least you don't have to put it up."
"Hey, fuck you."
"Touché."
"Don't fucking say that. It makes you sound like a wanker — well, more of one."
"Coming from you, or should I say here, that's quite the insult. Congratulations."
"Hey, fuck you."
"No, you've done that one."
I attempted to insult him via a mock laugh.
"Don't laugh at that, it wasn't funny."
The fucker.
"I... I... It's not like you're any better!"
"Oh?"
"You and your nigh-emo outpourings of... withdrawn... er, pessimism! 'Here's another parable about why my life sucks.'"
It was a weak attack and he knew it.
"Well, we can't all be clot-headed obscurantists, can we? Some of us favour relative plainspeak over labyrinthine thesaurus-wanking, particularly the people who read the things. And, you know, actually coming out with it, no matter what 'it' is, is certainly preferable to burying it under an impenetrable layer of ironic detachment, don't you think? The nature of my jottings is beside the point. The only salient feature is that it's true to me. Can you say the same thing?"

I fumed intensely, feeling the age of enlightenment slide away from beneath me. This was going to be messy. Then I remembered my trump card.
"It doesn't matter what happened before, nor what will happen after," I said, unable to fully conceal my smirk.
"I'm sorry?" He looked genuinely puzzled.
"Hm? Oh, nothing." It was working. I suppressed a giggle and continued. "For now, there is you, there is me."
"What do you mean?" he said, visibly irritated.
"Only that for the moment I am here, and you are here with me."
"What the fuck are you talking about?"
"Our reason to be," I said, lingering perversely on the last syllable.
"Is this supposed to be funny?"
At this point, I wasn't quite sure if he had noticed the several bullets I'd carefully lodged in his chest, but he was certainly rattled enough to strain a look of icy indifference. I readied my flame and moved in.
"I feel it all," I said, "and you feel what I am doing to you."
"You've really outdone yourself this time," he dead-panned. "Am I supposed to slap you now or something?"
"There is strength in the tenderness we give to each other," I answered, drawing out grammatically nonexistent pauses.
"No, actually, I'll just leave. Bye."
Desperately, I fumbled for the words I'd seen so long ago.
"The pressure!" I called out. "Oh, the pressure!"
He looked back at me briefly as he pushed the door open and his eyes said more than words ever could. But since words are all we're dealing with here, something like "You're a cunt" probably wasn't far off.

To this day, I still do not know whether my somewhat pathetic japes actually registered in the way I'd intended. By tomorrow, however, the answer was clear. A handsomely decorated poster bearing the words "Fuck. You." (I've preserved the dramatic punctuation) had been affixed to my door, and there was no doubt who by. Peeling it off, as I was wont to do, I noticed a viciously rendered cliché scrawled on the back: "Truth is beauty". Trust him to make an old hat new again, or should I say true again. And it worked. For those few minutes, I felt like the most wretched aesthete who ever lived. My school-boy sneerings at words of passion only served to discredit my own lacking emotional intelligence. But Fuck, he started it.

Later that week, the phone rang, with him on the other end of it.
"I read it," he said.
"Oh."
"..."
"And?"
"Surely, if you're that bored, your time could be better spent thinking up something original?"
"But you see my plan worked. This is the only way people will pay attention."
"People will never pay attention."
"Yes but they'll at least notice him and smile once in a while."
"Smile? With these jokes?"
"OK, cringe then."

Despite its obvious shortcomings, the above incident at least parlayed the tedium of a particularly uneventful patch in my life, wherein my weekly highlights consisted of ritually watching two sitcoms I loathed (what was Elvis Costello thinking?) and not getting excess droplets on my trousers after urinating. Fortunately, in addition to an inexplicably felled tree in my garden, the following year introduced all sorts of astronaughty adventures and dog-bonding, and I was even glad for having the contrast. It pays to wait, after all.