I think it is exactly because there are tens of millions of people in New York that it is such a lonely place. Last time I visited I was overwhelmed by the skyscraper canyons and the lack of a horizon. This time I have found my trip here much more enjoyable. There is plenty of life here. I enjoyed my walks through the different parts of town. I learned about shea butter (every other street vendor sells it) and discovered foul smells never before experienced. I blind man would have no troubles in this city. Rotten fish flesh? Hmm. I must be on East Broadway next to Dim’s. Bizarre smell of mouldy almonds? One more block to midtown. It is incredible the variety and consistency of smells as you wander through this town. Every block has its own unpleasant bouquet which is constant.

The one major thing that would stop my move there would be the loneliness. You come across thousands and thousands of people daily but there is little but polite contact. It seems it would be hard to really get to know someone in such a busy and anonymous town.

I always assumed that if I ever had to fight in war. I would be the one who would get shot taking a crap behind a bush or a accidental self inflicted wound to the groin or some other undignified end or just the guy that breaks down crying just when the mortar shells start falling and the platoon is depending on me to call in the air support. You see I am ungainly, accident prone, and a tad absent minded. On top of that I am also a bit of a Chicken Little. The world is indeed always falling. The other night proved different. There is always noise from the street dribbling into the basement flat in which I live. This noise wasn’t quite right. When the light in the kitchen came on it became obvious that the noise was someone breaking in. Immediately, I jump into action as if beneath my pyjamas where blue tights and a shirt with a big S. “Get on the phone and dial triple nine” I whispered the order as I moved toward the door. Behind me she was already talking to the dispatcher when I opened the door to confront the enemy. Two men with shaved heads and the gaunt look of addiction were there. They froze like woodland creatures meeting man for the first time. “All right guys. Get out of here.” They stay still for a heart beat or two and then do as they are told. The tone of authority in my voice surprised even me. I close the window, draw the curtains, and wait the hour it takes for the police to arrive. It wasn’t until two days later that the what-ifs and worse case scenarios returned me to my natural Chicken Little state.

I tend to wander. Sundays are for getting lost. I explore this city without direction. I meander along its cracked pavements and follow ancient walls. I have said before how much I am enchanted with cities and this one in particular. I love the grime. The well worn buildings and detritus are comfortable to me. The tired warehouses near the shore seemed to be a refuge. My dream is to live in one and it would have a huge garage door which I could leave open and watch the weekend stillness of the warehouse district where only gulls mill about upon the roofs.

Another thing I love about the city is graffiti. Not the ciphers of the street artists. The pieces where the person’s name is displayed in their hidden language of intertwined letters. I can appreciate these but I do not understand them. They are not written for me. Nor am I a fan of the quickly scrawled tags. I can see why a young person who walks through a wealthy man’s city wants to, with the flick of the pen, say ‘This is mine. That is mine’. This being so, I still watch the various names appear at night and disappear by pressure wash by day. Cert X is one of my favourites his art has more wit than most. In the park, he stencilled silver snails leaving silver spray paint trails. There is another name S.H.E.I.L.D. Around town someone writes this acronym. It is written in chalk or pen on walls, adverts, everything. He usually accompanies his tag with another word. Usually, FRONT or BACK. He is well travelled I have seen his mark at the furthermost ends of the city. What these designations of FRONT or BACK mean. I have never come to know. There are others who leave their noise upon the walls as well but without claiming ownership. Random splashes of art wheat pasted over the legal graffiti selling unneeded crap. (I always wonder why people abide huge ugly billboards of nonsense which mar the cityscape but complain when some when paints a tiny stencil right beside it.) Yesterday, my travels rewarded me with seeing someone had written, “Looting takes the waiting out of wanting.” I love my Sunday walks.

I bought a compass yesterday. Except it does not point towards the north. It points to Mecca. I am not Muslim. nor Christian or Buddhist or miscellaneous. I have only cursory understanding of Islam and the significance of Mecca. I do know that the city is important enough to ensure the devout need the ability to divine its location no matter where in the world he or she my reside.
I was attracted to the idea that this compass points to a city. a city built by humans and occupied by humans. Knowing where this abstraction North is has only a utilitarian attraction. No one uses a compass to go to the North. They use it to find some other place which may or may not lie in the North.
For everyone of us I am sure there is a geographical location that we think wistfully about. It would be nice if we could focus that longing by facing in the direction of that spot and know that if I walked in that direction I would arrive at that city or that place which holds watch over my most cherished memories. I am lucky enough to have several places to care take various wonderful memories of my life. Having my memories scattered about the planet makes it difficult to focus one's reflections. So, I have gathered each of them carefully. I have found a nice safe corner of a city to the east to which I have never been and stored them. To locate them I have this compass. A compass covered in a script written in wisps of smoke. A secret incantation to bring all my wonderful memories back to my thoughts. All I need to do is follow the compass' needle and look over the horizon to retrieve them.

I have shut myself into the flat, and bunkered with a pile of rented DVDs, leaving only to return and renew the collection and stock up on cheap groceries from the German grocery chain across the street. The viewing programme consists largely with old classics. In particular it has been a steady diet of Alfred Hitchcock films (hence the previous entry). I have the obsession with which at times distracts from the main characters in the centre of the frame. I love looking at the peripheral details from these old films. It's a glimpse into the past. Simple things which have ceased to exist. The style of light switches, advertisements, wallpaper. In addition to that I think about the extras. We all know what happened to the stars. Big deal. Being in a film was the job. But, what about the guy whose sole job as to walk behind the starlet as she tells the leading man not to leave her.  Was he an aspiring actor, or in the right place at the right time to pick up a little extra cash. Did he brag to his friends about being so close to those famous people? But, what I mostly think is, 'Did everything turn out alright for him?' These films are sufficiently old that there is a good chance that the people alive upon the screen are dead or have lived the vast majority of their lives and have but only to reflect on it. I want to hear that despite how terrible fate can be, it is worth the effort. I want to see a subtle wink and the OKAY hand gesture just before he goes off camera comforting me that even the extras of the world do alright.

Alfred Hitchcock's favourite joke.

A boy and a girl are sitting next to one another. The girl is very shy. The boy asks, "What's your name?" The girl blushes and coyly says, "My name is the same as something that sticks on the wall." The boy looks confused and asks, "Shit!?!" The girl exclaims, "No! Ivy!"

Good morning everyone.

As I walk these streets filled with sameness. Same business guy a thousand times over with only a change in tie. Same scowled faced teenagers. Grouped by fashion. Sulky scowls in black go over there. Miscreant sulky teenagers in trainers and track suits over there. Occasionally, I witness something or someone unique.

A little girl who is sitting on her father's shoulders. She exageratedly swings her arms and makes stomping noises like a giant rampaging the city. Amen. A little rampage keeps the soul clean.

The ever present wind tickles the scarf of a petite young asian girl. Her shiny black hair dances about and the ends of her white scarf billow behind her like angel wings. It's nice she chose to walk amongst us mortals rather than fly safely above us.

The cliché "Some things must be seen to be believed" is very true when
speaking of the Eurovision song contest. It is surrealism at its European
finest. The opening act had a woman singing and gyrating with a Caesarean
section scar painted with glitter. This could be interpreted as a refreshing
change from the Americans obsession with absolute physical perfection for any
performer. But, lack of beauty or disfigurements is not the only deficiency that
was witnessed. What's worse than pop music? Now I know. Bad pop music with
operatic singing thrown in just because she can sing opera. Remember, I am just
talking about the first act which was last year's winner. If it wasn't for the
million dollar production, and the twenty-somethings gyrating their
bronze-in-a-can bodies covered only by glittery skimpy undies, I would have
thought this was a grammar school's talent show. On top of this, the
English-speaking commentator spends the whole night mocking each horrid act and
laughing out loud at the sheer crapness of it all. At one point, they try to
communicate with journalists covering Eurovision parties all over Europe. Each
time it was this awkward exchange befuddled by satellite delay and communication
conducted in neither party's mother tongue. It culminated in trying to talk to
the correspondent in Spain. An older bottle blonde woman with skin the colour of
shoe leather. Something went wrong. She didn't know she was on and ten seconds
were spent watching this woman try to clear her nostrils of something. The
British commentator enjoyed that moment thoroughly. Also, when the two
presenters rather than saying 'time to start the show', tried to warm up the
crowd with a little sing a long of "Ohh laa day. Ohh. Ohh. Ohh." To which the
commentator suggested, I wish they would have just said,  'time to start
the show'. Finally, at the very end, Europe votes for their favorite. Each
country cannot vote for themselves. So, What do they do? Vote for their
neighbours. Greeks would rather vote for Turkey than any Scandinavian country!
It becomes farcical. You can actually guess who a country will vote for. Unified
Europe! Ha! They can't even get the parochialism out of voting for crap pop
bands! Fuck trying to get a coherent and pan-European economic policy. I hope
everyone at some point in their life can see the absurdist masterpiece that is
the Eurovision song contest. Where else are you going to see a bald lady dancing
on stilts?

Politics. I've tried to be political. It's not in my nature but in the past year or so the inertia of external forces has urged me towards action. Unfortunately, I am not a team player and the political organizations I have attempted to join turned out to be more of a pretense for socializing. Frankly, I don’t need police harassment as part of my social calendar. Also, most people I met just parrot propaganda they have heard. Ironically, this does not impede their mocking of those who just happen to get their propaganda from the other side of the fence as mindless drones.
Most of the characters whose blogs are listed on this page are politically minded. This is one of the reasons I admire those individuals. This admiration is not simply because they are political but because they are well versed and articulate in the language of politics. I am interested in politics but am quickly overwhelmed by the futility which is so pervasive. Someone famous and most likely dead said, ‘History is made by unreasonable people’.1 I think there is sense in that. Reasonable people find a way to abide whatever political injustice blows their way. It’s those folks who call bullshit and do something about it that get things changed.
I grew up knowing a Nazi. That’s right kids. Uncle Jarred once knew a real live Nazi. Not the goofy back-wood ones that you occasionally find on daytime television, but a genuine man from the third Reich. Fortunately, He was also not of the unrepentant jew-killer bogeymen that appear in films on occasion. He was just fourteen at the time and after the allies bombed his home in Dresden. Whoever was in charge handed him a gun and pointed towards the east and told him to kill a commie for mommy. He and several others immediately stepped into the forest and ran west. They knew being captured by the Americans or British was a far better deal than what the boys with the red stars had planned. Beating all odds, he was captured by the French and that was just the beginning of this remarkable man’s life. I am glad I had the pleasure to know such a person. He called me “dummkopf” which is German for “best friend”. But, before all that he was a Nazi like everybody else in the neighborhood. Church on Sunday. Hitler youth after school. It seemed perfectly sensible for a person to ‘hail Hitler’ when one purchased a loaf a bread or crossed paths in the street. I bet most of the soldiers who even had the task of sealing the doors or dropping the little cyanide tablets into the holes in the roofs were reasonable men. It is frightening to think it is only circumstance that has saved most of us from having to make that dreadful decision or even worse being conditioned to think there was no decision to make. Thank god for unreasonable people.

---

1. Most likely he also said “ reasonable men”. Dead guys are usually pretty chauvinistic.

This is my favorite picture when I googled my own name. This was on "meet the employees" page for a machinist company website.

So English means "The people who form Aisles (Queues, Lines, Whatever). You see it comes from the old german "Angles" As in the Anglo-Saxons who were the first to invade this island. Really they were second or third but whos counting. Although Angles was eventually corrupted to English and England, "The land of the Aisle people", the word 'Aisle' has the same lingistic root but has not suffered the same corruption. So, it is that reason that the sacred practice of form queues still exists upon these aisles.

It's true. I just made it up. Scots on the other hand, I believe means "ones who vacates their bladders upon the streets". I'm not sure. I could be wrong.

I went to the hills to watch the Pagan Summer Festival. This is were a few pagans and a whole lot of hippies run around naked and painted different colors. Seriously, it was actually a beautiful ceremony. A man was dressed as the green man escorted the May queen to four circles. At each of the circles they preformed a ceramony. I went with the usual scepticism but it was very nice to watch. The only problem was that a lot of people just used it as an excuse to get drunk. So during this ceremony people were shouting and belching. Shame really.

My new entertainment as I stroll to and from work is to wave enthuisatically to strangers on the other side of the street. Usually, they sheepishly wave back with their faces mixed between confusion, deep thought as they try to remember my face, and the friendly greeting one gives when the fool waving to you is actually known by you. Most people indulge me by waving. Maybe its the suit. Maybe we all hope to have friends that excited to spot you from across the street. Once they wave I stop, smile, and continue on my way.

P.S. Random notes on people's cars are nice too. Leave things like "You have pretty hair". Regardless of whether you have seen that person. Or important notes meant for other people. like, "Please don't invade Poland".

As I was passing two men chatting to each other in front of a coffee shop, I over heard onf of them say "It would be heaven on earth If there wasn't any chinese poison gas". Wow! That is much better than the conversations I usually have. I must have a cup of coffee there one day.

Today is sun shiny and warm. My spring insomnia is back because the days are so long my circadian rhythms are out of whack. It happens every year, and it takes about a week of sleepless nights before my head resets its clock. I stay up really late. I read. drink herbal teas and warm milk. toss and turn. lay down get. I do a lot of button clicking and read random people's blogs. I read an entry of a girl whose best friend committed suicide. The details were scarce. The entries seem directed at those already aware of the exact happenings and circumstances. It mainly expressed the normal confusion and standard reminiscences of a teenager, a child, who has met with what mortality actually entails. It happened to me when I was near her age. A friend died because of the same teenage foolishness that all teenagers practice but mostly avoid the repercussions due to luck and naivety. A car accident that left her dead, another passenger in a comma from which she would return with brain damage, and a driver with a monstrous amount of guilt and shame. I was out of town when it happen but returned before the funeral. It was the first funeral. I didn't want to go. I am a coward when it comes to anything which reminds me of mortality. I went. I didn't view the body. I had no desire to add to my few visual memories of her with that image. The tears didn't come when the family and friends gave their speeches through unsuppressible and stuttering sobs. They came when I saw the coffin lowered into the ground only then did it seem that person was gone and removed from us. I left with speaking to anyone. I wrote down everything I needed to say. In different words but they expressed the same confusion and reminiscences that I read in that anonymous girl's journal entry one thousand miles and several years removed from my experience. I anonymously left those pages upon the grave. I wanted someone else to read those words but I wanted no connection to them. I needed to express those very private thoughts but not be recognized as their source.

"Subvert the dominant paradigm." In my electronic wanderings the other day, I came across this website. It is a website devoted to public toilet literature. It was inaugurated by the author of the site with the phrase he saw on a stall wall. "Subvert the dominant paradigm." I too saw this exact phrase in the location he mentioned. Except I saw it years earlier with the addition, "What if that is the dominant paradigm?". Now, I doubt the janitor would only erase the riposte. So that means, the original author rewrote his toilet graffiti years later.

Maybe it was the janitor who was the author. He was an ex-philosophy student and one night while his mind was addled with bong inspiration he thought of his revolutionary quip. His one clever thought. Since academic journals require a 5000 word minimum, his only publishing opportunity is the toilet walls of his alma mater. Occasionally, his work is defaced by some insolent fool answering natures call. This requires him to clear the slate and reiterate his phrase. "Subvert the dominant paradigm."

---

Okay. That is too many entries about toilets. I will stop lest I get a reputation.

Once again two years late. I discovered blogging. At first I was apprehesive and even dismissive. I now understand the attraction. Writing your own blog is a tenth of the experience. It's almost like paying your dues. I started because I wanted to have a diary which I can access and ammend from anywhere. The real joy is the reading and the exchanges. The internet's version of 'hi. how you doin'?' as strangers pass in the street. The comments left on each other's page. BTW, I would like to have comments or a tagboard but I haven't found a reliable one with out pop ups. Any suggestions? Email me please.

Our secretary is an interesting woman. and by interesting I mean insane. Entering her office is a game of roulette. Sometimes the ball drops on 'enthusiastic extremely helpful joy upon the earth'. Other times all bets are lost and you get the devil. The woman spits fire and sulphur at any request you make.

"Can I get my payslip?"

"Why didn't you get it this morning like everyone else?"

"I... I..." I stutter, not really having an answer for her.

"The pile is over there. Get yourself." A crooked talon points past my shoulder.

"Thanks." I sheepishly offer to gain atonement for my transgression.

"Don't thank me." She snaps and returns to typing with ferocious speed.

I have developed a strategy to better my odds with this secretary. I will initiate the conversation while pretending to walk towards the copier. I start with a just a smile and a split second's worth of eye contact. This will earn me a warning in the form of tighten lips, thin red line like a paper cut and pure hate from mascara-ed lids. Or. I get a chatty greeting. Birds chirping and beams of light burning through the dissipating clouds. I then carefully submit my request which I carefully weave into friendly conversation from in front of the copier. I constantly gauge the barometer that may signal any sudden turn of weather. In her chattier moods she is an unrepentant gossip. It is almost vulgar the way she trades in inter-office politics and romances. Almost, because I too revel in this cattiness. Yes. dear readers, it is one of my vices. I am a terrible gossip. I am a nosy shit. It is not out of maliciousness that I enjoy these torrid tales of stolen kisses in the supply closet (Sadly this cliché is alive and well). I am just plain nosey. Yet, the brash way she dispenses these tid-bids of information simultaneously give me the sensation of revulsion and titillation. like licking a 9 volt.

Scene 34:

Our hero, secretary, and man from room 5.03 are in an office. Secretary is sitting at a desk in front of which are the other two actors. At the beginning of the scene man from room 5.03 enters.

Our hero:<<to man from room 5.03>> "Looking sharp today. The ladies will be chasing you."

Polite smiles all around. Man states his business to the secretary and leaves. Immediately, after the secretary turns to our hero and says in a conspiratorial tone.

Secretary: You know he's gay.

<end scene>

This is what I mean. There was no call for that. It made no difference to me. As if he was offended by my stupid joke mistakenly suggestion he would be interested in women chasing him. It was purely for the purpose of giving me that bit of gossip. When she said it I immediately thought, 'You, gossipy shit.', but I didn't complain. I quietly added that bit to my gossip scrapbook and went about my business. It's not as if I can use these tidbits as tender at the usual tea break gossip sessions. I avoid socialising at work as much as possible. I can't explain why exaclt I have an interest in second hand information concerning the same people from whom I avoid getting first hand auto-biographical information. Maybe those bytes of serendipitous information that says the most about a person. I'm not sure. I think the only acurate explanations is I too am a gossipy shit. Oh well.

"Beware the clean line.

Do not trust right angles or glossy paper.

Perfect is death. The lipless god knows this.

Perfection cannot change. It cannot grow.

Therefore, it can only be dead.

This is what they sell you in their empty cathedrals of mass consumption.
Spotless teens singing tunes written by paedophilic three piece suits.

Know them by the whites of their typesetting.

The only thing that belongs in shop windows is a brick and anger.

Go forth young ones and bury this death they vend and and let its rotting
perfection fecundate the off-centred, the home-made, the natural."

-Unknown

I have reproduced these words from the walls of a public toilet stall. It was
written in the most flowing calligraphic black ink. A healthy bowel movement has
been known to inspire a small amount of serenity in myself but nothing compared
to the epiphany this man experienced.

I lived on the streets for a brief time. I was young enough for it to be more
adventure than the fearful time it should have been. The horror of seeing a
woman cut repeatedly on her arms as they fended off the boyfriend whose head had
been filled with dark chemical whispers did not fully bring its weight for me to
bear until years later when I could afford the luxury of reflection. I am still
not convinced I saw the wax-figure face of an overdose bundled like an Eskimo
baby in sheets and a sleeping bag. Even those terrible memories which tend to
haunt me between the time of closing my eyes and sleeping are not enough to
regret the life I've led. It is that life that fortifies me against taking the
pedestrian troubles of my current life too seriously. People at my office curse
the gods and their mother for the daily cruelties they must endure. These
afflictions include the adulterous boyfriend who is already abusing his second
chance or car payments that total more than their rent. perspective my dear
watson. perspective.

These people need suffering. Maybe suffering is too harsh. Maybe all it takes
is struggle. It's what gives us our humanity, no? Maybe that is why my
co-workers fabricate adversity to make themselves human again. To taste that
bitter but sustaining herb. Yet, it is an artificial struggle they have created
for themselves and is ultimately unsatisfying. nothing is satiated and
another difficulty must be fabricated. credit card debt? maybe. prescription
addiction? possibly. I keep to myself. nod when forced to listen to these
confessions pretending to be conversation. tattle to this computer.

Things I saw this week that made me smile.

A statue of Wellington whose bronze boots and been painted to look like
rubber Wellingtons. Cute.

A woman with no teeth smoking.

At a flea market stall the radio was playing a song in which some young girl
was singing a syrupy sweet song about a boy and a woman in her seventies sang
along as she sorted her used book stall. Across from her a huge bald man in a
football strip sang along too.

An odd shaped boy with all his school folders covered in black and white
copies of NASA pictures of constellations.