Have been reading Mickey Spillane today. Not a very rewarding task. At times, not even his characters understand the nonsensical noir-speak in which they converse with one another. Take this example (from The Big Kill):

"I don't have any blood left," I told him. The dame grinned and rubbed herself against my knees some more.
    "I bet you got plenty of everything for me."
    "Yeah, but what I got you ain't getting because you probably got more than me."
    "What?"
    "Forget it."

Plus, we have a new toy!

Duncan.

I had a peculiar dream last night. My old Director of Studies from Cambridge (to whom I apologize, if she ever happens on this blog) was explaining to me that she had found conclusive evidence proving that wacky German critical theorist Walter Benjamin had had an affair with children's author Beatrix Potter. Apologies are due because even in the dream it occurred to me that the former DoS could have been the fruit of such a union...

Alan Attack

St.-Albans-based beer advocacy group CAMRA appear to be acknowledging their Partridge tendencies. I recently received a letter from them giving their address as 230 Hatfield Road, St. Alans (on their headed notepaper, no less -- they'll have to have it pulped!)

Another Duncan!

Duncan

Amazon emails to tell me about the "Rock & Roll Hall of Fame: Definitive 200: The National Association of Recording Merchandisers (NARM) and the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame have put together a list of 200 albums that should be in every music collection."

Spirit of the Tin should be pleased with this selection, which contains not only the Grease soundtrack, but the soundtrack from Footloose. On the other hand, this is a list to make the blood of old AOR fans like me boil. Not only does No Jacket Required by Phil Collins appear above anything by Neil Young, but Radiohead, David Bowie and Steely Dan are all relegated to places below (go on, guess) Breathless by Kenny G! I suppose some might say it's poetic justice or something.

Tired and thinking cold

Tragedy strikes.

CSI Miami - Endless Caruso One Liners

He looks like Duncan. He looks a bit like Paul. I'm kind of obsessed with his show. Now you can watch seven whole minutes of David Caruso doing those one-liners from the start of CSI: Miami!

Articles from Godey's Lady's Book (1852)

"FANCIES OF A WHIMSICAL MAN. By the author of 'Musings of an Invalid.'"

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"Crazy Mary; or, The Determination to Marry for Wealth"

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"ALABAMA.—A SONNET"

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Actually, "Alabama.—A Sonnet" is worth reproducing in its entirety:

FROM her Olympian and Castalian home,
My muse to Alabama's clime doth roam;
Where Helicon?—no—Chunneenuggee soars,
And, for Ilissus, Chixeenoxee pours!

To Locheepoko turkey sportsmen go,
And where magnolias cheer Escambia's flow;
Where Coosa under giant pines bears trade,
And swoll'n Tombigby rolls in live-oak shade.

Towards Tennessee ride hunters of the fawn;
They leave Wedowee with the opening dawn:
Red men from Talladega there are gone.

How hushed, betwixt Tuscumbia and Mobile,
The savage warwhoop! while the Saxon's wheel
And Lybia's banjo ring their merry peal!

Well worth rescuing from oblivion, I'm sure you'll agree.

Canadee-i-o

You know I've been meaning to post this for ages and ages. It's a tab of Nic Jones's version of "Canadee-I-O" I did before Christmas.

Gowan and MacGowan

I tried to make Osso Bucco last night. The meat was a bit gristly. Not a huge success, perhaps due in part to my choosing the recipe where it says you cook the meat for half an hour, not the one where it says you cook it for two hours. However, we cut off all the gristle, put the sauce, rice and leftover meat in the fridge for leftovers. At lunchtime today a lightbulb went on above my head. Sauce. Rice. Little pieces of meat. And what's this? Some leftover tortillas? Time for a Osso Bucco burrito! I am a cooking genius!

In other news, have just had a very fun week with Richard, who was here for an international relations conference. Visiting the Russian churches in Wicker Park, we got pressed into going to Vespers at the Ukranian Catholic Cathedral by an earnest young deacon ("The church is very beautiful to look at, but to understand the true beauty of the Ukranian church, you must experience the music"). It was very beautiful, although we blasphemously nipped out after fifteen minutes or so to keep our dinner reservation. Also we discovered the name of the kind of music we used to listen to at Corpus.

Will be seeing The Pogues this evening, which is quite exciting, as long as Shane MacGowan doesn't fall down drunk after one song, which he does quite a lot I believe.