unaccustomed as i am

TARARTRAT has posted an audio clip from John Chris Jones' talk about the Internet and Everyone at café ck on 2 October, with a brief introduction by me. John Chris is poised, self-possessed, articulate; I, on the other hand, seem to have entered the 2-minute 'you know I mean' babble competition. (Just how many times is it possible to say 'you know' in a single sentence? Hard to say, but I think Caroline Kennedy's record has been beaten handily.)

So this is, of course, horribly embarrassing - I need to take lessons, clearly, from the pro - but John Chris is worth hearing.

long days

Went to an amazing event in TARARTRAT's apartment last night. Vattenfall has cut off the electricity so it was lit with 200 candles. Arrived too late to catch Susanna Berivan but was in time for a great set by Laura Bean (playing with Charles Booth of the Cowboy Killers) and another in which a guy called Mike (whose surname I have on a piece of paper somewhere) read poetry with and without banjo accompaniment by another guy whose name I don't even have on a piece of paper. Tod Wodicka's two-year-old son Louis threw his plastic turtle. [According to Paul this was a plastic ninja turtle; I never got close enough to the actual object to make that kind of identification.] Tod: When he starts throwing the turtle it's all over.

TARARTRAT is the blogger responsible for my starting a blog, which in turn was responsible for my discovering just how many people are WRONG on the INTERNET. (Fatal. Fatal.) I have moved into an apartment with no phone and no Internet connection for 5 months so I can get some work done. I told Tod and he said he too had moved into a place with no Internet connection.

Aloha no!

TAR ART RAT talks back to our next Prez. (Luckily I was not on this mailing list.)

borderliner

TAR ART RAT describes ordeal at hands of Polish police for reckless drunken stationary use of a bicycle, here.

we want umlauts

Bewteen games ish hab gefragt: "Woher kommst du eigentlich?"
"Ish? Ish bin Türker. Komm' aus Istanbul. Dub bis Amerikaner?"
"Ursprunglish, ja- Kalifornien.- aber ish hab schon lange Zeit in Deutschland gelebt."
"akso, und was machst du hier? Erasmus?"
"nee- bin kein student mehr- also, beruflich bin ish journalist-"
"aksooo, journalismus- große zeitung- ? New York Times??"
"nööööö, das wäre sau toll, aber nee- nix so wie New York TImes"

the one and only TARARTRAT, the rest here

Berlin sublet

A rare opportunity has come up to sublet a room from one of Berlin's GRRRRRRRRREAT bloggers, TARARTRAT. TARARTRAT lives in Graefekiez, a part of Kreuzberg to which I would move at the drop of a hat; he describes the deal as follows:


The largest room in my apartment on Schönleinstraße in Kreuzberg is currently free and will be available until the very end of May. I am asking €235 a month, which is a good price considering the size and location. There is a large 3-panel bay widow looking out on a tree and the street below, high ceilings and antique double-doors. Apartment is fairly nice part of Kreuzberg* on the edge of the Graefe Kiez, an area full of great cafes and restaurants. Wireless internet is available for an extra €15/mo, and there is currently a daybed to sleep on as well as a hammock (hangematte) in the bay window (can be easily taken down) and a small table. The kitchen is large with plenty of storage space and the living room has a table, chairs, recliner an television with DVD player but I don't get any channels. The apartment is about 30 seconds walk from the Schönleistraße U-Bahn stop, which will get you to Mitte via the U8 in a matter of minutes, so that is very convenient.

I am an American Journalist, male in my late 20s, fairly laid-back, enjoy culture and music and whatnot- I stay out late on weekends, but am fairly calm during the week due to my work schedule. I would prefer someone who wants to stay for at least several weeks, but if you are only in town for a little while then we can discuss that as well. Smoking is permitted in the apartment to an extent (i.e. please no hotboxing the place with chain smoke) - I prefer that people keep it to the kitchen or at least open windows. There will be a subletter arriving on June 1, so the room must be vacant by then. That's all that I can think of at the moment, so if this sounds good hit me up and I will send you a foto of the room and we can talk. Animals ok.

*[editor's note, NO, this is a GREAT part of Kreuzberg, NB nearby Cafe Zitron includes the Guardian among its free papers, as I learned a few months back from Justin Smith of 3 Quarks Daily]

So if you're in London, paying 400 quid a month for a bedsit in the wilds of Cockfosters, this is a great chance to take Ryanair over to Berlin with a great place to stay lined up. You can contact TAR ART RAT here.

[Update, 24.04: a subletter has been found...]

I know I know I know

The "blog which is an art project which is disguised as a blog"
and which has, literally,  changed names a couple hundred times
but which has always been some arrangement of either:
"Post-Google" by TAR ART RAT http://tarartrat.blogspot.com/
just had its thousandth post this morning.

It is like one of those stupid effing truck commercials where they ask
"where were you when you hit 100,000 miles?!"
Well, Iäm/was at work, and thought: "whoa, shit. -crrrazy. I could've
written a book or
done something which aspired to be truly great with all that time and
effort-but instead...
I did THAT-"

Nevertheless, 1,000 is a LOT of loading adn linking and reading adn
writing and haphazard
researching and cheesy reminiscing and venting venom  and mispelling things
- a lot of time and effort ...and I could have done sooo many
other things with all that time and effort (which I will never get back)
BUT-
- well, "but" nothing, blogging just happens to be the perfect
platform for a lifelong
journal-writer / image and news/info junkie - especially when trapped
behind a computer full-time, weird things happen, what can I say-? and
that IS the blog, that's it, that's all really, just something that
happened.