I go between being fucking pissed off we'll be here for more than another year, and thinking, shit, that ain't long - and the second especially when I encourage myself to carpe diem, and love Belgium for the things that are lovable about it, despite the iniquities and the gross. One thing I love about Belgium arrived in my account within the last few days, and that's that workers in my bracket or classification or what have you get 14 months salary, one of the extra months payable at the end of May - just cuz. Aside from any company bonuses, which we also get.
It's awesome. The Claeys formula, the indexed salaries, the unlimited sick days, the five weeks holiday, the nom-dom taxation status - my savings have never been so happy and sometimes I need to go through those things and remind myself I wasn't an absolute assbrain when I decided to move to this puddle. The money and the benefits don't even bear comparison to Canada. I don't think I'll look back in ten years and ask myself what I was thinking over these years. But we'll see. A lot of it depends on what sort of weather rolls out over the next 14 months, to be quite honest with you.
The further consequence of the shit, that ain't long line of thinking is how some of that money - a proportion I try to keep small, so I can walk away with most of it - will go to travelling over the next little while. Four of my five weeks of vacation are happening this summer and I'm trying to soak every work excursion I can out of the rest of the year. A great deal of this summer, however, is repeats - I'll be heading home for a couple of weeks, and back to Portugal (although a different part of it than the last two times) - so here's list of the places I haven't been yet that I dearly want to see within the next year or so:
- Croatian coast (already scheduled)
- Turkish coast (already scheduled)
- Alhambra and Madrid, Spain
- Rif Mountains, Morocco
- Egypt, desert and old thngs
- Copenhagen
- Greek islands, in the non-vomitous-limey season
And some returns:
- Vienna, for cheese strudel (already scheduled)
- Yorkshire, to spend some more time with family
- Florence, for tattoo pattern
- Calabria, to spend some more time with family
- Finland, for kayaking
- Barcelona, just because I really want to
The list is long but not impossible. If I don't get the transfer I want when I give notice, we can take a couple of months after I stop working to knock any incompletes off the list. Scandinavia, and that includes Yorkshire, we can do all in one two or three week go after the F-word finishes school next year, and benefit from some 24 hour days. Something we'll have to start planning now or it will be prohibitively expensive. Calabria we can get in with Greece - Rif Mountains and Spain . . . it will take juggling but we can do it. I'm hoping to get a day or two stopover in for Florence on my way to Vienna - it's just a matter of going up to San Miniato and eating some chocolate ice cream in Fiesole; not to sound like a philistine, but I was in Florence for about a year and it's not really fair for me to keep on taking up space in the Uffizi or what have you when so many others need a turn.
giovedì, maggio 28, 2009
mercoledì, maggio 27, 2009
The Red Dragon has a closed mind re. covers
Nick Cave has spent the last thirty years exploring how us emotional retards get to enjoy life too and there are few songs better at it in my strange-o book than the Bad Seeds' 'Loverman'. That is a fucking horny song. It's one of my favourite songs, definitely. The lyrics go from very silly ("I am what I am what I am what I am") to fucking gold ("With a trembling heart, he's coming through your door with his straining sex in his jumping paw; there's a devil crawling along your floor") without ever sounding inconsistent - a general feature of Nick Cave's lyrics I find irresistable. It's a gem of a song and I love it. I can't really comprehend a reality in which I wouldn't love it.
And yet I've always promised myself that I'll studiously avoid listening to the Metallica cover. The idea makes me want to retch. There are emotional areas of my brains I'm happy to have prodded at in Nick Cave's voice where James Hetfield's voice has no place, even if it's dressed up in Nick Cave's words. Frankly, eww. The guy from Depeche Mode covered it too and that sounds about as appealing. More eww.
Another awfully horny song, in my book, is "Use Me", from Bill Withers. I've gone on about him before, so I won't repeat myself too much. When his songs are good, they're wonders of lyrical and melodic seemingly simple perfection, and he was only ruined by all of those damnable keyboards and synthesizers. And the voice! It's a lovely voice. A proper man's voice. A sexy, comfy duvet of a voice. "Use Me" is a marvellous example of his marvellousness and playing it is the easiest way to explain and understand fun and nasty love, and that voice is singing to its best effect in it; as far as I'm concerned only Bill Withers could pull off that mumbling at the end and still make it count when he sings "it ain't too bad the way you're using me because I sure am using you to do the things you do."
And another cover I'll studiously avoid is Mick Jagger's 1993 cover of "Use Me". Don't get me wrong. Mick Jagger was horny once upon a time too, and "Let's Spend the Night Together" has got me wet played over the loudspeakers in charity shops. But his is not the voice I want to hear singing "Use Me" to me. A fucking middle class limey knight? Don't we have better things to use?
And yet I've always promised myself that I'll studiously avoid listening to the Metallica cover. The idea makes me want to retch. There are emotional areas of my brains I'm happy to have prodded at in Nick Cave's voice where James Hetfield's voice has no place, even if it's dressed up in Nick Cave's words. Frankly, eww. The guy from Depeche Mode covered it too and that sounds about as appealing. More eww.
Another awfully horny song, in my book, is "Use Me", from Bill Withers. I've gone on about him before, so I won't repeat myself too much. When his songs are good, they're wonders of lyrical and melodic seemingly simple perfection, and he was only ruined by all of those damnable keyboards and synthesizers. And the voice! It's a lovely voice. A proper man's voice. A sexy, comfy duvet of a voice. "Use Me" is a marvellous example of his marvellousness and playing it is the easiest way to explain and understand fun and nasty love, and that voice is singing to its best effect in it; as far as I'm concerned only Bill Withers could pull off that mumbling at the end and still make it count when he sings "it ain't too bad the way you're using me because I sure am using you to do the things you do."
And another cover I'll studiously avoid is Mick Jagger's 1993 cover of "Use Me". Don't get me wrong. Mick Jagger was horny once upon a time too, and "Let's Spend the Night Together" has got me wet played over the loudspeakers in charity shops. But his is not the voice I want to hear singing "Use Me" to me. A fucking middle class limey knight? Don't we have better things to use?
martedì, maggio 26, 2009
The Red Dragon Will Devour Your Heart
So even though I've got nothing against seals and even though there are few things of which I'm more certain than that monarchy, even constitutional monarchy, even the representatives of a constitutional monarchy who aren't chosen by the monarchy itself, is a slap in the face of human dignity, I have to say this story warmed the cockles of my heart.
It pisses me off when Europeans, who'd rather drown in empty plastic bottles (or ship'em off to China for incineration in power plants) than drink from their taps, who can't even keep their fucking urban songbirds alive, who all seem to be convinced that conservation is something that ought to happen elsewhere (in one of the fucking colonies they're mostly done despoiling now, for instance) rather than right fucking here, where nature is already highly degraded and they're in a fucking race with themselves to fuck up what's left, and whose continental cuisine is largely based on what kind of sausage they process slaughtered pigs into - anyways, it pisses me off when they think they have a goddamn thing to say about who kills and eats what in Canada.
When these disgusting post-colonial troglodytes eat snails, frog legs, baby cows, foie gras, octopus, horse, and any of the remaining wild animals left scrounging around this fucking ecological wreck of a continent that they can get their hands on in the million-weight, I have no patience with the assholes going 'ooh-la-la' because our ceremonial head of state guts an animal whose conservation status is non-threatened, cuts off a piece of its heart, and eats it, in the tradition of a people who have been gutting seals and eating their hearts since before Europeans figured out how to wipe their own asses.
As repellent as I find it that Canada isn't yet a republic, and continues to put a portrait of that daughter of armed banditti on our coinage, her representative Michaelle Jean is the head of our nation in a sense, and that makes her the head of the Inuit as well, and if she's off visiting the Inuit and they hand her a knife and a fresh seal carcass, it is the fucking essence of class that the woman slits it open and eats its heart. I can understand why Europeans are incapable of recognizing class when they see it, though; not only are they too busy finding their way around the wealth of turds on sidewalks dog owners here are too cool to pick up, but European leaders these days seem incapable of anything classier than paying Germans to scrap perfectly good cars, fucking teenagers, and marrying washed-up supermodels or television presenters. And as for any sort of representation of minorities's interests, symbolic or otherwise . . . wrong fucking continent.
Also, I'm on the rag and haven't had a bit of meat in weeks, so the idea of gutting a polar marine mammal and eating its heart sounds really awesome right now.
It pisses me off when Europeans, who'd rather drown in empty plastic bottles (or ship'em off to China for incineration in power plants) than drink from their taps, who can't even keep their fucking urban songbirds alive, who all seem to be convinced that conservation is something that ought to happen elsewhere (in one of the fucking colonies they're mostly done despoiling now, for instance) rather than right fucking here, where nature is already highly degraded and they're in a fucking race with themselves to fuck up what's left, and whose continental cuisine is largely based on what kind of sausage they process slaughtered pigs into - anyways, it pisses me off when they think they have a goddamn thing to say about who kills and eats what in Canada.
When these disgusting post-colonial troglodytes eat snails, frog legs, baby cows, foie gras, octopus, horse, and any of the remaining wild animals left scrounging around this fucking ecological wreck of a continent that they can get their hands on in the million-weight, I have no patience with the assholes going 'ooh-la-la' because our ceremonial head of state guts an animal whose conservation status is non-threatened, cuts off a piece of its heart, and eats it, in the tradition of a people who have been gutting seals and eating their hearts since before Europeans figured out how to wipe their own asses.
As repellent as I find it that Canada isn't yet a republic, and continues to put a portrait of that daughter of armed banditti on our coinage, her representative Michaelle Jean is the head of our nation in a sense, and that makes her the head of the Inuit as well, and if she's off visiting the Inuit and they hand her a knife and a fresh seal carcass, it is the fucking essence of class that the woman slits it open and eats its heart. I can understand why Europeans are incapable of recognizing class when they see it, though; not only are they too busy finding their way around the wealth of turds on sidewalks dog owners here are too cool to pick up, but European leaders these days seem incapable of anything classier than paying Germans to scrap perfectly good cars, fucking teenagers, and marrying washed-up supermodels or television presenters. And as for any sort of representation of minorities's interests, symbolic or otherwise . . . wrong fucking continent.
Also, I'm on the rag and haven't had a bit of meat in weeks, so the idea of gutting a polar marine mammal and eating its heart sounds really awesome right now.
lunedì, maggio 25, 2009
Psychic masturbation and the end of the world
I skipped a meeting for the organic food co-op last night in favour of relaxing, making granola, and not subjecting myself to hours of Walloon inanities and conversational black holes. The first part of that phrase looks so deeply . . . what's the word? White? Granola? Birkenstock-and-socks? But homemade granola is magically delicious, and it's the only kind I can have, due to not being able to eat almonds and hazelnuts and such things - which rules out most decent pre-made granolas. And it's part of our household's eating philosophy that the closer you buy ingredients to their raw form, the fewer opportunities there are for vendors to adulterate them with some shit or other. It may sound paranoid to you, but we're Italian, so really it's just common sense for us. I'm also working on the assumption it's best to practice making things from scratch now so that when we have children, I can go on autopilot and hopefully not waste much time or energy putting things together. Anyways, here's the recipe:
4 cups whole grains - I suggest a mix but oats should probably make up around half
1 + 1/2 cup coconut flakes
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons flax seeds and/or 2 tablespoons sesame seeds (grind the flax seeds briefly)
Cinnamon and/or ginger and/or cacao and/or powdered clove to taste
Raw, diced starchy fruit, like apple or pear, if wanted
3 tablespoons olive oil
3 tablespoons honey (or to taste)
Raisins, currants or other dried fruit to taste
Preheat the oven to gas mark 3. Stir together the first group of ingredients, and then stir in the oil and the honey. Mix until the moisture is evenly distributed. Spread the mixture thinly and evenly over a lightly greased cookie tray and leave in the oven for seven minute bursts; every seven minutes stir the mixture on the tray, turning it over to let a new part of it brown. Keep cooking it until it reaches the sort of light golden colour that looks pleasing - probably a little less than half an hour. Once out of the oven, add raisins or currants or whatever you've chosen. Let it cool, and then gently break it up if it has formed biggish chunks. Keep it in an airtight jar. For greater crispiness, greater honey + time.
It was delicious and much more fun to make than to listen to a room full of people be arses. And of course it doesn't take very much time so I could keep reading The Making of the English Working Class, finally getting to the chapter where he calls Methodism a ritualized form of psychic masturbation - three seperate people had told me he was going to do that and it was still shockingly well placed. Great book, greatly written, but more about it when I'm done.
It was so luxurious to not go to the meeting that I'm really thinking of dropping out. Switching to locally grown organic would be nice but I'm already trying to make other difficult lifestyle changes, like green tea instead of lattes in the morning (horrid) and sleeping on my back instead of in the fetal position (odd but better dreams), and I'm not sure I need the extra expense and the stress of dealing with 25 Wallonian families on top of that. So I went to bed mightily relaxed, and woke up to a mighty storm around three in the morning. At least I think it was a mighty storm, I didn't really go check it out. I just lay there with the strobe lights going off and listening to these big brooding rolls of thunder, wondering if that was what the end of the world would sound like, and if it was the end of the world, what I'd do. Cuddle, I imagine.
4 cups whole grains - I suggest a mix but oats should probably make up around half
1 + 1/2 cup coconut flakes
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons flax seeds and/or 2 tablespoons sesame seeds (grind the flax seeds briefly)
Cinnamon and/or ginger and/or cacao and/or powdered clove to taste
Raw, diced starchy fruit, like apple or pear, if wanted
3 tablespoons olive oil
3 tablespoons honey (or to taste)
Raisins, currants or other dried fruit to taste
Preheat the oven to gas mark 3. Stir together the first group of ingredients, and then stir in the oil and the honey. Mix until the moisture is evenly distributed. Spread the mixture thinly and evenly over a lightly greased cookie tray and leave in the oven for seven minute bursts; every seven minutes stir the mixture on the tray, turning it over to let a new part of it brown. Keep cooking it until it reaches the sort of light golden colour that looks pleasing - probably a little less than half an hour. Once out of the oven, add raisins or currants or whatever you've chosen. Let it cool, and then gently break it up if it has formed biggish chunks. Keep it in an airtight jar. For greater crispiness, greater honey + time.
It was delicious and much more fun to make than to listen to a room full of people be arses. And of course it doesn't take very much time so I could keep reading The Making of the English Working Class, finally getting to the chapter where he calls Methodism a ritualized form of psychic masturbation - three seperate people had told me he was going to do that and it was still shockingly well placed. Great book, greatly written, but more about it when I'm done.
It was so luxurious to not go to the meeting that I'm really thinking of dropping out. Switching to locally grown organic would be nice but I'm already trying to make other difficult lifestyle changes, like green tea instead of lattes in the morning (horrid) and sleeping on my back instead of in the fetal position (odd but better dreams), and I'm not sure I need the extra expense and the stress of dealing with 25 Wallonian families on top of that. So I went to bed mightily relaxed, and woke up to a mighty storm around three in the morning. At least I think it was a mighty storm, I didn't really go check it out. I just lay there with the strobe lights going off and listening to these big brooding rolls of thunder, wondering if that was what the end of the world would sound like, and if it was the end of the world, what I'd do. Cuddle, I imagine.
domenica, maggio 24, 2009
Jolly jolly jolliness
What a weekend. I got a sunburn and, I believe, a cure for hay fever (a combination of prayer, probiotics, and stinging nettle supplements). Yesterday we rode our bikes down the Rhine to a set of allotments - and German allotments rock, by the way, they're not just gardens; they have huts and roses and barbecues - they're right Lebensraum. Okay, I've got to stop writing things like that. For this morning at least. Anyways, we rode our bikes along the Rhine, and the trees were fucking like bunnies. There was so much pollen in the air that it looked like a flurry. I'm not exaggerating at all. It looked like a big flurry and it was all actually going up my nose, and I was basically okay. Thank god, because there were lots of lovely things to drink, making antihistamines quite out of the question.
Oh, and yeah. Back to Mistress La Spliffe again. I'm just not a one to not get high. Especially when my reason for not getting high is to punish myself for not joining the epically polluting car-driving class fast enough, on a continent where nobody needs a car unless they have children, and even then it's debatable. I'll push myself, of course, but it was already a moral compromise to start using one of those beastly (if fun) things, and I'm not going to not get high for a moral compromise. Particularly when I really, really want to get high.
Back to the money factory.
Oh, and yeah. Back to Mistress La Spliffe again. I'm just not a one to not get high. Especially when my reason for not getting high is to punish myself for not joining the epically polluting car-driving class fast enough, on a continent where nobody needs a car unless they have children, and even then it's debatable. I'll push myself, of course, but it was already a moral compromise to start using one of those beastly (if fun) things, and I'm not going to not get high for a moral compromise. Particularly when I really, really want to get high.
Back to the money factory.
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