The last LAFF
Last night, while I was otherwise engaged, our legendary macquis of midnight mischief makers were embarking on what I presume was their last ever piece of comedy sabotage. Yes, forget about rearranging furniture or putting up posters - last night the girls surpassed themselves.

I know who they are now. I met them all merrily rejoicing by the pond, took a photo of them, and have a acquired a couple of their own.

What had they done this time?

Well, they'd managed to climb through a landing window onto the balcony above reception and then from the balcony get into the locked dining hall through a tiny window they'd opened at dinner time. In the dining hall they had once more arranged the furniture, though in a considerate nod towards the tutors who were bound to get the blame, had left a chair by the window to show how they'd got out.

That's not all, though.

No, that would just have been clever. True panache was shown in how they left their calling card.

An enormous sheet was turned into a banner, painted with the LAFF logo, with stones sewn into pockets so that the sheet would drape properly without being blown out of the position. This banner was then modified with strings and extra stones by the girls as they crept about the balcony, and draped over the balcony itself, so that anybody coming into the building would be met by an enormous banner hanging over reception, defiantly bearing LAFF's logo and its raison d'etre.

I couldn't help but laugh as they told me what they'd done. This was, to be fair, the first time they'd actually broken any rules - by going onto the roof - and since they would all be leaving halls within 36 hours, what could be done?

What's more, the girls assured me that if there was any trouble at all, they would come and own up. You couldn't say fairer than that.

And anyway, it was funny. I've enjoyed leaking the girls' names to the delighted reception staff today, who are still amazed that they didn't know until now. In a bid to conceal their identities from the wider public, I've blurred out their faces in my photos.*

Meanwhile on my own patch...
Grinning to myself, after taking the group shot in front of reception, I strolled back to my own block to find that I'd been evicted.

Yep, my students, or more precisely the usual suspects in Flat C, had taken advantage of their excess to packing tape to seal up my door in a web of brown tape, and to criss cross the corridor with the same stuff. Something like this had happened to a student last year, but I had never expected it to happen to me.

I exploded in laughter. I couldn't help myself. This was obviously the night for pranks. I reckoned the only thing for it was to take a photo myself and show it to the others. As I raised my camera, Toby appeared with a camera of his own to take a shot of me. Lydia, Kevin, and Catherine gathered round too, the last C residents, all delighted that I'd taken it so well.

I crept under the corridor-spanning tape and joined them in their kitchen for a jolly beer before barging my way through the tape - it took several charges - into my room. I was only glad I hadn't left my door unlocked, as if I had I have no doubt that the shower head would have been unscrewed and filled with tea-bags. A classic maneouvre, that.

It was only later today that I realised that there had been one further prank last night. Somebody had gone about the block with a screwdriver, switching all the address plates on the landings so that any visitor would have been confused...

That's to be fixed, I feel.
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*One of the girls in the shot hadn't actually taken part in this LAFF operation, since she'd been out at a party where the Rubber Monkeys were playing - nevertheless, she was back in time to crowbar herself into the picture.
posted by Greg at 11:37 PM

 
Yesterday's garden party was eventful, to put it mildly. Most of the staff seem to think it may have been the hall's best one ever - it was certainly the best in at least twelve years, they insist.

Having a committed committee (boom boom!) clearly makes a difference, especially when they're talented, inspired, not short of cash, and have a fortnight off between the end of exams and the party itself.

I was pressganged into helping for a little beforehand, and after showering and changing joined the troops for strawberries and cream and a bottle of beer. I was delighted on meeting Ben to be told that Helen was here so wound up bringing strawberries over to Cathy and herself. It was nice to have her up; it's been too long since her delightful self has adorned our lawn.

While Julie's dream of having a hook-a-duck competition in the pond wasn't realised, I was glad to see that Jenny and herself managed to get a bouncy castle - I avoided it for most of the day, but when I finally decided to have a go the thing was about to be deflated. Drat.

Strawberries and cream weren't just accompanied by beer, of course. Scones were there for the taking, with jam and clotted cream, while there was an abundance of Pimms and of punch. That was all followed by a barbecue, with which I think even our resident food critics were pleased.

Our munching took place against the gentle background of some soft reggae music - I was half-surprised that the girls weren't handing out spliffs with the Pimms. By the end of the evening I wished they had been - some people might have been a bit more chilled. Mentioning that to a few people was of course my cue to resuscitate that old faithful gag, 'How does Bob Marley like his doughnuts?' 'Wi' jam in.'

Sorry.

Instead Sarah was giving out the new hall yearbook, notable for the marvellous play report by this handsome fellow. For the gist of it, of course, you need look no further than here. Aside from that cracking shot, I reckon the best thing about the yearbook was the students' own comments - Ellie's best memory of the year stands out, since she loved 'LAFF's cunning reorganisation of the draconian table arrangements.'

Several of my pictures were also featured, ranging from one of Oscar the cat, accompanying Anne=Marie's cat report, to an evil duck, to one of the hall in the snow.

Burgers, sausages, and chicken all devoured, people gradually drifted to the main lawn, where the marvellous Bizarre Rubber Monkey Band were about to delight us once more. They were as good as ever, and the place took on the air of a festival, with clusters of students risking life and limb on the bouncy castle, some gently kicking a ball about, others playing Twister or Giant Jenga, and plenty more just sitting and chatting, enjoying a friendly drink.

Some got a bit carried away, and one group managed to get onto the roof - rather than causing a big scene I took a photo so they'd have a trophy and then signalled to them to go in. They happily did so, and now all have a little memento of having broken the rules together.

The band finished up in typically Latin style, with Luciano belting out Bamboleo as about twenty girls cavorted in front of them - a couple doing so rather memorably. As the last strains of Bamboleo faded half a dozen of the girls came forward and kowtowed to the bad.

Now that's a conclusion to be proud of.

The next hour was spent just chilling on the lawn, sitting and jabbering about all sorts of things. Some students just fell asleep - I have a photo of a prone Bev beside a half-eaten pizza and a glass of wine but reckon it's probably best not to post it here. Call it a hint of discretion, if you like.

If things had ended there, the day would have been perfect.

An ugly epilogue to a marvellous day
Unfortunately, shortly after Luciano had to stop a few guys - dreadlocked friends of Aiden, the postgrad treasurer - from playing frisbee, a fight broke out. The first I knew about it when was two blokes crashed to the ground wrestling beside me. I assumed they were messing at first, until I saw Gagan's face, distorted in rage. A few postgrads dived in to separate the guys. I went to reception to get security and on the way noticed Adina coming with Martin and Jim from the band. Thinking it handy to have two policemen there, I pointed to the scrap and they eventually made their way over.

Apparently what had happened, I later heard, was that this Nigerian bloke, a friend of a friend of Nea's, had been groping at Chloe, Steve's girlfriend. She'd moved away, and he'd poured his beer down her trousers. Somehow a fight had broken out and Gagan had got involved.

Anyway, I came back outside, to find that yer man had cursed at Adina and tried to hit her. Jim, Martin, and a couple of security guys took him away.

This is where things start to get complicated. Take a look at my little aerial photograph. I know it's shabby, but bear with me. The three red dots are on the main lawn, with the Warden's House to the left of them. the entire right side of the shot is occupied by the main hall, notably the dining hall. My blocks - there are three of them - line the bottom of the shot. The blue dot marks where the old hall and the new blocks meet.

Does that make sense?

Right, so, the Nigerian geezer is gently persuaded to move over to the blue dot. 'Come over here, dear chap. There's a blue spot I'd like you to take a look at.' Over there he went absolutely spare, tearing his t-shirt apart, throwing his head back and screaming, while balling his fists, shouting how he had been in the Nigerian army and had more training than any of those attempting to restrain him.

Well, after a bit Luciano asked whether I could go over to the main lawn and attempt to quieten people down a bit, as it was somehow aggravating our Nigerian friend.

I worked my way from group to group, explaining to Hugo, Caroline, Jo and various others what was happening, and asking them to keep it down a little more, as we had a potential lunatic on the far side of the lawn. And then I got to Aiden and his mates, the dreadlocked frisbee throwers. (This was at the topmost red dot)

They didn't take my request kindly, and started shouting at me, demanding to know why I hadn't told anybody else to be quiet. I tried to explain why I asking them to be quiet, but they kept shouting abuse at me, so I asked whose guests they were. Aiden's. Again I asked them to be quiet, and this time one stopped swigging from his wine bottle to snarlmand ask what I'd do if they didn't. I'd have to ask them to leave. And if they didn't do that? I'd have to call security.

'You dick!' he snarled, you fucking dick! You're a fucking dick! Fuck you!' And then he spat at me.
'Aiden, get your friends off the premises,' I said, walking away.
As I left, I could hear one of them telling Aiden that it wasn't his job.

I walked over to Adina to tell her what had happened. She went to get security immediately, but while she was off with them Aiden led his friends out the main driveway. A security man came over to me and asked which way they'd gone, so we started walking in the direction of the drive, hoping that I'd be able to point them out.

Unfortunately (at the red dot to the left) as we were just passing the warden's house, the lads came back with Aiden, and immediately began shouting at me, calling me a 'fucking racist', and a 'white bastard', claiming that I'd called them 'niggers', and told them to 'get back to Africa'. They said they knew my face now, and where I lived, and that they'd get me, and would put a bullet in my stomach.

The security guard just stood there, watching. Luciano, and Adina, and Anne-Marie had gathered around by this point, all waiting to take their lead from the security guard.

The wineswigger approached me then, brandishing his now empty bottle, snarling how I thought I was the big hero now with the security guard there. The tallest of the dreadlock boys told him not to bother, that I wasn't worth it.

That didn't do any good. He started striding towards me, brandishing the wine bottle snarling at how I thought I was the big man, really brave with all these people around, and I kept backing away, wondering what to do...

Eventually, just as I was backed up by the central lawn - the red spot to the right on my map - he rushed at me. Luckily Justin, the postgrad senior student, saw what was happening and charged over, grabbing my assailant and pinning his arms in place. The security guy got me to go inside...

And I obliged.

The lads eventually left, and various security guards spoke to me and Aiden. Aiden said that the lads were indeed his friends, and that two were students, but refused to say any more, claiming that he was too drunk - 'absolutely hammered' - to say any more. It wouldn't be fair, apparently. The warden came along, and he wouldn't say any more to her, and eventually the police were called, but again he'd say nothing.

And I just clammed up. It hadn't been a nice end to the evening.

The latest news as of today is that he's refusing to say anything at all, and is denying that he knew the lads at all, despite having said that he did the previous evening, and their saying that they were with him, despite his leading them out and bringing them back, and despite him having rang them later that night to confirm that they were indeed gone.

This morning he spoke to me and claimed that he was sorry, but he obviously isn't. He'd cooperate if he were.

Ah well.
posted by Greg at 8:14 PM

 
We'd a formal dinner this evening, the oddly named 'Going-Down' dinner. No jokes please. Afterwards a group of us sat chatting in the Senior Common Room, and the topic of Ronald Reagan came up. Adina said that she'd never liked him, and I expressed surprise, since she was surely one of the countless hordes of Eastern Europeans who adored him, we're told, for having freed them.

No, she said, she didn't like him. Her favourite president was Clinton. Why? They share a birthday.

'Well, I'm glad you've picked him for a rational reason,' said John, the warden's husband.
'That's a fine reason,' I remarked, 'It's exactly why I like JFK. We have the same birthday as well. G.K. Chesterton, Boh Hope, and Scary Spice too.'
'I'd keep quiet about the Chesterton thing, if I were you. He was a fascist.'

Funny, that was something I'd never heard about GK, despite having read upwards of fourty books by him and at least half a dozen about him. Chesterton was deeply democratic, and his democratic beliefs were ultimately religious ones - with all men being fallible through the taint of Original Sin, so any sort of oligarchy should be resisted, but with all men being made in God's image, so they had the dignity and the right to govern themselves.

For all that, he felt representative democracy as deeply unrepresentative, and regarded Britain's parliamentary system as deeply corrupt, with power in the hands of a plutocratic elite. Furthermore, he was not entirely unsympathethic to certain elements of Fascism in Italy, and would surely have supported Franco in the Spanish Civil War, as many Catholics did, horrified by the Church-burning, priest-killing, and nun-raping of many Republican troops.

But does this make him a Fascist? Well, to quote the man: 'the Totalitarian State, with its one badge, its one bench, and its one part, is not a cure for the old evils of the English party system. It is much too Totalitarian a State already. Its apparent party divisions were merely a popular sport, like the Boat Race; which is also the one and only example I know of shirts, ties, and badges being differentiated only by two shades of the same colour.'

Well, he was certainly an anti-semite, John charged.

Well... this was trickier to deny, but I felt obliged to anyway. It's not true after all. Granted, there are a few unsavoury lines in some of his many books - notably The Flying Inn - but in general the charge doesn't stick.

Aside from having had many Jewish friends, admiring the Jewish faith, and being a leading advocate of there being a Jewish homeland(he seems to have influenced Balfour in this regard), he was an outspoken critic of the Nazis and racism, and towards the end of his own life declared ' I am quite ready to believe now that Belloc and I will die defending the last Jew in Europe".

The Wiener Library in London, the UK's leading centre for research into the Holocaust and Anti-Semitism, has gone on the record that Chesterton 'was not an enemy [of Jews], and when the real testing time came along he showed what side he was on'
posted by Greg at 10:27 PM

 
At times I feel my research technique needs refinement. All too often I read things, think 'Hmmm. Interesting...' and fail to make a note of it. Several months later I realise that 'interesting' point was actually important, and have to embark on an epic quest to find it again.

This morning I finally tracked down something about the 'Combat of Thirty' fought in Britanny in 1351. I knew I'd read about a medieval variant on the 'Battle of Champions' somewhere. Having looked everywhere else, I finally found it described in Barbara Tuchman's A Distant Mirror. Thanks, Babs.

In fact, looking for a reference to it online, I found one quoting Tuchman, but also references to similar combats in Scotland and the Isle of Man.

In other news...
Um, maintaining the military theme, I was delighted to find yesterday that there are a couple of reviews up on Amazon's American page for my book. Very favourable too. And short. Thanks, whoever you are.

On an totally unrelated note, Neil Gaiman has linked to a fascinating map of the United States, which each county coloured to indicate whether its residents call soft drinks 'soda', 'pop', or 'coke'. It must be really hard to sell Pepsi in the south; hell, it must be hard to sell any soft drinks bar coke there - I once met a guy from Arkansas whose favourite drink was 'orange coke'. Hmmm.

I wonder is there any overlap with, say, voting patterns... looking at this map, it seems that Democrats drink soda.

Continuing this staccato approach to blogging... courtesy of Crooked Timber, here's a fine essay on wabbing*, which is itself a perfect example of such behaviour.

Cathy sent me this disturbing link to an advert for the NBP. I hoped it was a joke, but apparently it's for real. Curiously the BNP don't seem to realise that most of Ireland has been independent of Britain for over seventy years. That's far from the most offensive thing about the ad, mind...

And finally, here's an amusing 'interview' with the great Donnie Rumsfeld.

Y'all take care now!
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*wabbing n. unnecessary activity undertaken to avoid necessary activity, generally involving menial tasks. ORIGIN: from W.A.B. 'work avoidance behaviour'
posted by Greg at 10:34 PM

 
Today being the sixtieth anniversary of D-Day, I got to pondering how we commemorate these big events in fiction.

Saving Private Ryan is without a doubt this generation's The Longest Day, and its opening twenty minutes are indeed astonishing, following in the footsteps of Seven Samurai, The Wild Bunch, and Ran, to give us what is almost certainly the most convincing battle scene in cinematic history.

The rest of the film is standard 'Men on a Mission' stuff, exciting and enjoyable enough, but ultimately rather silly. Its absurdity renders the film bereft of any integrity whatsoever, betraying the horror of the opening scene at Omaha Beach.

I still can't figure out whether Spielberg wanted to film a horrific battle scene, and merely tagged a silly story on to it, or whether he wanted to film a silly story and decided to lend it a veneer of reality by preceding it with a sequence of pure carnage. And I'm not sure which would be worse.

I've often thought you'd be better off watching the first twenty minutes and then walking out rather than sitting through the whole thing. Or you could come in after twenty minutes, free to watch a wartime fantasy. If you like it you should check out Where Eagles Dare. It's wayyyy better.

Fantasy? Yeah, I know it seems harsh, but the film bears hardly any relation to reality. Leaving aside the idea of a handful of men being able to find a single American needle in a Norman haystack the size of County Kildare* - because the drop zone was enormous, and heavy cloud cover meant some troops were dropped 40 kilometres off target - it seems oblivious to the fact that the Americans weren't the only allied troops in the Normandy Landings. In fact, the Brits and Canadians made up the bulk of the manpower in Normandy for the first month after the landings.

The film's sole nod towards there being anybody fighting against the Nazis bar the Americans is a snide comment about Montgomery being an overrated general. Insufferably arrogant he may have been, but the success of the D-Day landings was largely down to his command of detail.

Just think about that. The British are merely noted with a sneer, while the Canadians, New Zealanders, Australians, and God alone knows how many troops from elsewhere in the British Empire are completely ignored, as are the Free French and Free Poles. (Eddie Izzard has made this point too, far more amusingly.)

Lest we think the war was called a World War for nothing, the film alludes to American actions elsewhere in the world - Tunisia, Italy, and New Guinea, I think. I guess it's really about how America saved the world. That's presumably why it opens and closes with shots of the American flag.

Is it bad taste to point out that the vast bulk of the Wehrmacht was pinned down on the Eastern Front, trying to hold back the Red Army? Yep, them. And it wasn't a cakewalk for the Russians either. 26 million or more Soviets were killed by the Germans in the war, yet you'd think that nothing was happening outside Normandy.

Well, so what? After all, the film's about American soldiers. Surely it should reflect their view of the world. They wouldn't have necessarily been aware of how their top brass had turned down numerous offers of British specialist armour for the landings, or how the American planes that were meant to have softened up the German defences at Omaha completely missed their target. And anyway, it's just a film.

What would Gilbert say?
Earlier today I was glancing through As I was Saying, a collection of essays by the great GKC, published in 1936, the year of his death. One, entitled 'About the Films' seemed strikingly apt in the light of what I'd been thinking. If I may quote the man:

'...one need not be Puritanical to insist on a somewhat stricter responsibility in all sorts of play-acting than in the looser and less graphic matter of literature. If a man is repelled by one book, he can shut it and open another; but he cannot shut up a theatre in which he finds a show repulsive, nor instantly order one of a thousand other theatres to suit his taste. There are a limited number of theatres; and even to cinemas there is some limit. Hence there is a real danger of historical falsehood being popularized through the film, because there is not the normal chance of one film being corrected by another film. When a book appears displaying a doubtful portrait of Queen Elizabeth, it will generally be found that about six other historical students are moved to publish about six other versions of Queen Elizabeth at the same moment. We can buy Mr. Belloc's book on Cromwell, and then Mr. Buchan's book on Cromwell; and pay our money and take our choice. But few of us are in a position to pay the money required to stage a complete and elaborately presented alternative film-version of Disraeli. The fiction on the film, the partisan version in the movie-play, will go uncontradicted and even uncriticized, in a way in which few provocative books can really go uncontradicted and uncriticized. There will be no opportunity of meeting it on its own large battlefield of expansive scenario and multitudinous repitition. And most of those who are affected by it will know or care very little about its being brought to book by other critics and critical methods. The very phrase I have casually used, 'brought to book', illustrates the point. A false film might be refuted in a hundred books, without affecting the million dupes who had never read the books but only seen the film. The protest is worth making, because provincial prejudice of this kind is frightfully dangerous in the present international problem of the hour. It is perfectly natural for nations to have a patriotic art, and even within reason a patriotic education. It naturally teaches people, especially young people, to be proud of the great heroes of their great history; and to conceive their own past in a sort of poetic way like legends. But this is exactly where we may test the difference between a legend and a lie. The outlines of a real hero, like Nelson and Sarsfield, are not altered when the figure is filled up, in maturer stages of knowledge, by the facts about failure or weakness or limitation. The hero remains a hero; though the child, being now grown up, knows that a hero is a man. But the figure of the fictitious Beaconsfield will not support the intrusion of the real Disraeli. It would be destroyed by all that was most interesting in Disraeli; even by all that was most genuine in Disraeli. A dummy of that sort does no good to national credit or glory; all foreigners laugh at it, knowing more about it than we do; and we ourselves can only preserve our solemnity by not going near enough to laugh.'

A bit wordy perhaps, and annoyingly lacking in paragraph breaks, but valid nonetheless, and timely too. Peculiar to read Chesterton expressing these kind of concerns almost seventy years ago. Mind you, he was definitely a man not merely of his time, but of all times.

Yes, but so what?
Chesterton's concern was that films make such a big impression, that through telling stories based on half-truths they can foster dangerous national myths. I could babble here about how U-571 told a sort-of true story, though by replacing the British as heroes with Americans, it insulted those British soldiers by denying them the respect they'd earned; but I guess it's sufficient to just point at Saving Private Ryan and its TV sibling Band of Brothers to show how constantly harping on about America's 'greatest generation' has left people totally unprepared to deal with recent events in Iraq.

Iraq? But what's that got to do with this? Weren't the abuses at Abu Ghraib anomalies, the work of a few bad apples?

Well, no, because first of all, do some trawling online and see not how the prisoners were treated in Abu Ghraib, but how they wound up there in the first place. And remember how British officers had expressed concerns ages ago about American soldiers treating the Iraqis as untermenschen.

So it looks like the problem is much more widespread than a handful of scumbags in Abu Ghraib. Big deal. What's that got to do with what we hear about the 'greatest generation'? Well, did you ever wonder why some French have long harboured mixed feelings about the allied landings? Kevin Myers is forthcoming on this point:

'Nor were casualties in any way confined to military personnel. At least 20,000 Norman civilians were killed and over 100,000 injured by Allied bombing. Thousands died in the course of a single night raid by the RAF on Le Havre, and thousands more in a comparable attack by the USAAF on St Lo during market day. About 120,000 buildings in Normandy, including vast numbers of precious medieval structures, were totally destroyed during the invasion, and many towns and villages rendered uninhabitable for years. War caused a vast army of refugees to flee across France, and when they returned, their homes were gone. Moreover, rape by Allied soldiers was rather more common than is comfortable to admit. Young men at war can be dangerous creatures, no matter how honourable their cause. So Normandy did not savour liberation so much as pay an almost unbearable price for it, one that left the region deeply traumatised for decades to come.'

That point about rape being common is pretty chilling, isn't it? That's something I'd never heard of until recently. Sure, we've all heard about mass rapes by Japanese troops and Russians, but America's greatest generation? Surely not?

I've recently read a couple of articles by Joanna Bourke, author of the excellent An Intimate History of Killing, one in the Guardian, and one in The Tablet. She makes some chilling observations on military rape during the Second World War.

'...British and American soldires also have a history of sexual abuse in wartime. After the Allied forces landed in Normandy, French women found themselves at risk of being raped. According to the official history of the Office of the Judge Advocate General for the European Theatre of Operations, "the number of violent sex crimes enormously increased with the arrival of our troops in France... the use of firearms was common in perpetuating the offence."

The extent of the problem was made clear in April 1945 when the Judge Advocate revealed that he had to deal with around 500 rape cases involving American soldiers each week. In the words of one American intelligence officer who witnessed the occupation of the German city of Krefeld, "the behaviour of our troops, I regret to say, was nothing to brag about, particularly after they came upon cases of cognac and barrels of wine... there is a tendency among the naive or the malicious to think that only Russians loot and rape." He continued, observing that "the warriors of Democracy were no more virtous than the troops of Communism were reported to be."'

None of this should take away from the honour due to those who fought honourably to liberate France, but we put that whole generation, and indeed their modern descendants, on a fragile pedestal when we see them as infallible. War requires men to behave as demons, slaughtering each other, and it can be hard to banish those demons. Perhaps if we had recognised that, we'd have realised that the abuse of prisoners by 'civilised' soldiers at Abu Ghraib was to be expected.

Would people have been so dismissive of the need for America to sign up to the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court had they not believed in the infallibility of America's armed forces? Would they have been so trusting that their troops would behave impeccably if they conquered Iraq?

What's that about battling not with monsters lest you become a monster?
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*Though not as big as County Wexford, where the film was shot. Yep, those are Irish soldiers in the film. I've a funny story about that, but I'll leave it for now. Today's was a serious post.
posted by Greg at 11:03 PM

 
I know, I've been silent of late. I was at home; I'd a wedding to attend, and babies to see, and people to meet, and trains to catch, and I only got back here at half two yesterday morning, and I'm still knackered. So I hope you'll forgive me.

I headed off on Sunday evening, a few hours after mass; Curtis had been baptised and then he was confirmed along with four others. Afterwards he told Naomi and me that when he was anointed some of the oil ran into his eye; Father Paul must have been rather disturbed to watch the just-confirmed Curtil winking frantically at him.

Anyway, Monday morning saw me being collected at Dublin port by my Dad, who did fine taxi service this trip, shortly afterwards taking me to the registry office for Ed and Yun Yun's wedding. The ceremony itself was lovely, and then we headed off to the hotel for what was to be a long day. The other half was still in England, and Dave was off doing a driving test, so I spent the first few hours at the reception sitting chatting with Ed's three comedy uncles - Tony, Teddy, and Gene - about the merits of different bricklaying techniques. It was surprisingly enjoyable. Strange but true.

And as the night wore on, I danced. It was fun at the time, but in retrospect probably a tactical error. The auld knees have yet to forgive me.

I rather overslept on Tuesday, but eventually made it into town to meet Rachel; she helped me pick presents for the two babies I was due to visit, and after we had gone for coffee I set out to meet Alison and then head off to Daron and Cally's to see their five-week old daughter Kate. Kate's an incredibly long baby; I was amazed at the length of her arms and legs, and Daron proudly told me that she's apparently in the top 3% of babies in terms of height.

On Wednesday I made my familiar old journey out to UCD, where I was due to be meeting up with Vic Connerty for lunch. Vic's retiring soon, which is a terrible shame. Sic transit gloria mundi and all that malarkey. Apparently Ryan Tubridy had been lamenting Vic's imminent departure on 2FM that morning.

Back into town then, for a mad rush to Heuston Station so I could get the train out to see Diarmait and Sandra. I don't know if you remember me telling you about them - Diarmait's probably my oldest friend, and Holly accompanied me to their wedding last year. They had a baby boy, Lorcan, just six weeks ago, so I wanted to go out and see the little fella. Unlike Kate, he was suitably tiny. I hardly knew what to say when I saw him, or when I held him. There really was something awe-inspiring about doing so.

Royston Brady and Our Lady
After dinner, Diarmait and I slipped out to the pub beside the railway station, where we talked about growing up, having children, the German economy, the smoking ban, and Royston Brady.

Royston is Dublin's Lord Mayor, currently running for an EU seat without having any platform whatsoever. Nobody knows what he believes in, or what he stands for, since he has refused all requests for interviews. His website bears the claim 'I want to represent your Dublin and my Dublin in Europe, to emulate our past success, and to speak out strongly on every issue of concern to Dubliners', but that doesn't really help.

Despite this, it looks like he's guaranteed to become an MEP in just a few days' time. Recent opinion polls indicate that he'll probably get the second-highest number of first-preference votes in Dublin. Of course, with far more people annoyed with him than impressed by him, that might not be enough to get him to Strasbourg.

If he gets elected then the people of Dublin will never again be able to complain of anything with even a shred of credibility; they'll have got the representative they deserve.

Oh, yes, but anyway, I was on about Royston. It looks like the only reason people have for voting for him is that his face is everywhere to be seen. The city's festooned with his face, each poster bearing words like 'Energy', 'Commitment', or Drive, rather than, for example 'Ignorance', 'Opportunism', and 'Ambition'. Making it worse, is the fact that his oafish visage is given a backdrop which has a distinct resonance in a country which even now is predominantly Catholic, at least on paper. Yes, Royston's face sits proudly against the European Flag, though only six of the twelve stars are visible. Ever so slightly like the Mother of God in her guise as Queen of Heaven. Lord Mayor of Dublin he might be, but Queen of Heaven? Not yet, Royston, not yet...*

Anyway, Diarmait and I talked about everything under the sun, and then I headed back into Dublin, grabbed a bus home, and slept. The following day I pottered about the house, and was on the boat by half five the following evening. I felt a little bad about that, seeing as the next day was the centenary of Bloomsday, and it might have been nice to spend the day in Dublin, but I consoled myself with the thought that the shortest way to Tara was via Holyhead.

Shortest way my foot. The boat was held up leaving, there were problems with the connecting train, and then the replacement bus was rather tardy in appearing, slow to leave Crewe, and slower again to arrive in Manchester. I'm still wrecked.
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*Mind you, if there's a hint of light in the elections at home, it's that Patricia McKenna, 'green' whiner extraordinaire, looks almost certain to lose her seat. The Irish Green party are a joke, constantly fighting Ireland's participation in the European Union, despite that fact that were we not members of the Union our country would be a dumping ground by now; virtally every piece of environmental legislation in force in Ireland was initiated in Brussels.
posted by Greg at 11:12 PM

 
Pentecost
Pentecost has always been my favourite festival in the Church calendar, despite it being only the third most important date in the Church year. I guess for me it's because of its Arthurian significance - even during my agnostic teenage years I retained a fondness for Pentecost.

According to virtually every version of the legend, Arthur was actually crowned on Pentecost, and a year later took Guenevere to wife on that same day, with the round table being established that day. Arthur made it his custom not to eat at Pentecost without a adventure having befallen, or without somebody coming to court with a strange tale or request for help. So it was that it was on Pentecost that Sir Gareth first came to court, that Tristan came there disguised as a travelling minstrel, and that the Galahad filled the Siege Perilous, and the Quest for the Holy Grail began.

Er, and then the real reason...
Of course, that's not why Pentecost really matters to me now. I've long been fascinated by the day itself, and what happened in the upper room in Jerusalem that day.

Pentecost is one of those things that people who argue against Christianity tend to bypass. It poses too many problems. The apostles had supposedly been terrified prior to it, yet became fearless advocates of the Faith after being filled with the Spirit. If the bible account isn't true, why were the apostles so enthused that day? What gave them such courage? This isn't something which can be simply explained away. Either the apostles were victims of a mass hallucination, or the Biblical accounts are clear lies, or else this really happened.

I guess this is putting Pentecost through the 'mad, bad, or God' wringer, but it seems to work.

If the apostles had merely suffered a mass hallucination - and let's be honest, how many people do you know who've suffered such a thing? Are they really more common than miracles? - then how did they receive the gift of tongues which allowed them to speak to peoples of all nations in their own languages?

I suspect this may have implications for studying and identifying the authorship of Biblical books too; after all, if the apostles could speak in other languages - or at least be heard and understood by speakers of other languages, then it's useless to say that Peter or Matthew, for example, couldn't have written certain things as they didn't know Greek, instead speaking the Aramaic of first century Palestine.

In Luke's account of Pentecost there's a curious bit where it says that Peter was standing with the eleven (tois endeka). That strikingly sets him apart from them, and I'd think deals a fairly heavy blow to those who argue that Peter's preeminence among the apostles was merely one of honour. As the Bible had always spoken of Jesus and the twelve, it's notable that it should speak of Peter and the eleven.

There's far more to be said on all these points, but I need to rush off now. Mass is in half an hour, and Curtis and a few others are due to be confirmed today.
posted by Greg at 4:29 PM

 
My encroaching antiquity troubles me. Last year I was standing at a bar waiting to be served at the moment I turned 28. This year, on the other hand, I was in a church hall.

Yes, I turned 29 at the stroke of midnight on 29 May at the St Augustine's Summer Ball. Somehow Father Chris had managed to get Plato to be DJ for the evening, and Plato had come equipped with a bright old-style red phone, the kind of thing Commissioner Gordon would stress down to the Caped Crusader.

There was some Abba action at one stage, where I was troubled to realise that while I'm slightly younger than 'Waterloo', I'm not quite as old as 'Dancing Queen'. There was some alarming air guitar activity at another stage.

Sandra filled in the DJ about my Magic Birthday kicking in, and he had the troops all sing 'Happy Birthday'. To me, as it happens.

Nobody followed up by singing 'Hip Hip Replacement', thank God.

Mein Zaubergeburtstag
Today saw me being showered with exotic gifts, with Jo and Vicky giving me an insanely bright and snazzy torch, Jenny giving me a Venus Flytrap, and the other half bestowing a multitude of delights upon me - a cushion, a CD, a book, and The Godfather collection on DVD. Many cards were received too, and a chocolate cake!

With my Laser Quest plan having been derailed due to them screwing up the booking, I spent a good chunk of the afternoon wandering round Castlefields and Deansgate with Jenny, Vicky, and Jo, before going for dinner in the big Chinese Buffet in town. We went for drinks in Henry's, by the Bridgewater Hall, afterwards, where Sandra K told a story which I love yet feel too raunchy for this site. I'll pass it on in person if you like!

Later in the night the DJ played the song that was number one when I was born; to my horror it turned out to be Tammy Wynette's 'Stand By Your Man'. Troubling, but not so troubling as what happened later; I was chatting to the other half with my hand on her leg, which I squeezed gently a couple of times before looking down and gasping with shock as I realised it was Vikkie's leg instead.

Oops.
posted by Greg at 11:57 PM

 
Not sure what was up with me yesterday, but I was sick from the moment I got up; it really wasn't a fun day. Ah well, I lived. Still a bit shaky, but so it goes. Just a bug, I guess.

Macacos Bizarros de Borracha
Anyhow, last night I dragged myself out for the Brazilian Night in Jabez Clegg. Not normally my kind of thing, but the lads were playing. Yes, the legendary Bizarre Rubber Monkey Band were once again taking the stage.

Yes, Adina's clients, the Bizarre Rubber Monkeys, were about to treat us to a marvellous night of delights... No longer consisting simply of James 'The Constable' Wakely, Dave 'The Doctor' Tellam, and Luciano 'The Enforcer' Gerber, they had a new recruit in Martin, a.k.a. 'P.C. Bass'. A line-up to be proud of.

I like the bass. A lot. I also reckon it'd be the only instrument I could ever stand a chance of playing properly, having square hands like shovels and the chunkiest fingers to be seen outside of a Jack Kirby comic. Apparently Sting has similar hands. He got them from his dad, Ernie, the fastest milkman in the north.

Anyway, Martin's a hell of an addition to the team; it's not just that having a bass is good, having a bass player who's brilliant is marvellous. I'm looking forward to the garden party in a couple of weeks... it's looking like we'll have a string quartet, followed by the Anne-Maries who'll warm the crowds up for the Monkeys. Cracking.

The handful of Brazilians who were there seemed to enjoy themselves anyway, though I'm not sure of how they felt about Luciano wrapping things up with his now typical rendition of Bamboleo.

Anyway, I'd best ready myself for action. It's the Summer Ball in our Church Hall this evening, and then within a few hours I'll be hitting the grand old age of 29. Yup, tomorrow is my magic birthday, as Shaw would put it. 29 on the 29th.

Update: Um, I had a piece here about how Manchester's Brazilians are not the only tribe here who know how to enjoy themselves, and directing you to a dubious site, including even more dubious photos from the Manchester medics' bash earlier in the week. Having been petitioned by wiser heads than mine, I have decided to remove it. It seemed best, I feel.
posted by Greg at 8:26 PM

 
One of the great blogging cliches is that people do blogs about their cats. I don't have a cat, though someday I'd like to have the honour of being occasionally accompanied by a warm grey cat named Sebastian. An odd fancy, I know, but one I've harboured for several years.

Our hall, however, is honoured by a distinctively feline presence in Oscar, formerly known as 'fat cat'. He's slimmed down a lot of late, which is a good thing, as he used to be immense, barely capable of breaking into a trot. He also had an annoying tendency to laze under cars, but being so large always slunk out smeared with oil.

Unfortunately he tends to look rather baggy nowadays, like a size ten cat wearing a size sixteen skin. I guess that's what happens when you lose a lot of weight suddenly.

Furthermore, despite having lost so much weight, he hasn't learned to change his habits. He still eats too much, and is astoundingly lazy, though perhaps not quite so much as Posy Simmonds's Famous Fred* appeared to be. There's something odd about the way he doesn't chase birds, instead sitting idly by while a magpie inches away noses around in his bowl. Perhaps he has a strange double life.

Whatever the truth my be, I should like to dedicate today's post to Oscar, a legend among cats.
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* Surely far more famous than these famous freds!
posted by Greg at 11:59 PM

 
It's said you learn something new every day. Well, I learned something new last night. And had the point driven home today. Repetition, evidently, is the essence of teaching.

Tonsorial terror
Have you seen 'Cutting It', by any chance? A BBC drama, it's a fascinating insight into the lives of Manchester's hairdressing community.

It's complicated stuff. Allie, who runs the salon the show's built around, is married to a bloke called Finn, but really loves her old husband Gavin. In fact, she's recently had his child, named Ralfie! Unfortunately, Gavin's now in love with Ruby, Allie's daughter by Finn from a teenage relationship, and is the father of her child. I think.

Well, Tuesday's episode saw the dramatic return of Mia, the nuttiest of Finn's ex-wives. She begged forgiveness of everyone, forgave them all, and then managed to almost drown Finn and steal Ralfie, threatening to leap of a tall building - URBIS, I think - with the child.

I had no idea that hairdressers led such exciting lives. I wonder what next week will bring.

Butchering barbers
Still dazzled by this discovery of the hidden thrills of hairdressing, which surely rivals archaeology in its deadliness, I went along to the Lowry in Salford Quays to see Sondheim's Sweeney Todd with the other half. Having heard but a few of the songs from the show before, I was absolutely stunned. The performance was absolutely magnificent, and the show itself was thrilling, by turns terrifying, poignant, and hilarious.

My man in Berlin is due to be sending me a copy of the show on CD. I hope he gets his skates on soon.

In the meantime, I'm not allowing a scissors near my mane.

As an afterthought...
Returning from the Lowry earlier I dropped in on Stuart, who excitedly showed me today's Guardian, gleefully pointing out this piece, written by his old crony Anna. Nice one.
posted by Greg at 10:14 PM

 
Today I was overcome with a wave of jealousy, as I read an article in the New York Times about Cretan food; Heinrich is there even now, doubtless smiling away to himself with a full stomach, packing away some Cretan brown.

Greek food has an undeservedly bad reputation; in fact, provided you're not in a tourist trap it tends to be varied, nutritious, and delicious. Cretan food in particular is marvellous; having dined in Chania, Rethymno, Vrises, Knossos, Iraklion, Sitia, Agios Nikolaus, and a marvellous little Franco-Greek taberna somewhere in the Lasithi plateau, I can testify to its excellence; in Iraklion the stewed goat and the bougatsa are particularly good, but try not to eat in AgNik; that may be the only place in Crete where they can't cook khtapodi!

Um, if anyone with even the vaguest knowledge of Greece reads this, what on earth are 'plungings'? I saw them advertised, along with bread and drinks, outside a shop in the Argolid. I don't mind telling you, I was a bit concerned.

Fumbling towards Armageddon
The world appears to be coming to an end; at any rate that would seem to be the case in Bradford, if a distressed old comrade in arms is to be believed. 'First there was a mega fight between the mental guy who lives in the room next to me and the Chinese guy down the hall,"' she wrote, '"then a mad woman has come down the road yelling at everyone "You're gonna burn...."'

Is the world really heading that way? If it is, George is hardly doing anything to help. Have a read of his speech from the Army War College earlier today. It's probably best if you read it rather than watch the video, as if you watch it you'll almost certainly be distracted by George's mangled attempts to pronounce Abu Ghraib. What is it, George? Abu Gar Rib? Abu Gar Rab? Out with it, man. Surely you have people to help you with the big words. Like 'marmelade'.

I see George is still babbling about how Iraq is the central front on the 'War on Terror'. He harped on about this last September; it's as ridiculous a notion now as it was then. It's intriguing though to see that he has begun to give his Iraqi enemies a hint of respect. A few months back, when he gave his State of the Union rant he sneered at them as 'men who ran away from our troops in battle', but now he admits that they hardly ran away like cowards: Instead of being killed or captured on the battlefield, some of Saddam's elite guards shed their uniforms and melted into the civilian population. These elements of Saddam's repressive regime and secret police have reorganized, rearmed, and adopted sophisticated terrorist tactics.'

Well, it's good that George is starting to realise that he shouldn't underestimate his enemies or assume that they play by the same rules as he, in theory, does, but odd that he seems to have taken so long to realise that this was what they'd do. In fact, when we were sitting in Liverpool, watching the war, as you do, on the telly back in March last year, Liam and I got talking about how the Iraqis didn't have a chance in open combat, being completely outgunned; their only hope would be to simply 'disappear' or surrender after hiding their guns, taking them up again after the American guard had dropped. And if we could see that, surely George and the boys could too? No?

Sorry, I shouldn't be so scathing. This is, after all, the man that some Americans chose to be their President a few years ago. And he's a big believer in stability and peace; in fact, his immediate aim, he says is to ensure that the Iraqi people have full sovereignty by the end of June. Granted, they won't be allowed to prosecute any American or British soldiers for crimes committed in Iraq, but they'll have full soverignty.

As Paxman would say.... mmmm... yessssss.

If we're on Apocalypse Highway, who's the chimp driving the bus?
'"Speed" is about human evolution, right? It's so obvious. The bus represents the world. Watch it again -- they've got every nationality on there. Not only that but it's being driven to disaster by this guy who's either made up to look cro-magnon or chosen because he looks that way. He's our brutal, evolutionary heritage, driving the world to Armageddon while everybody argues. The whole thing's symbolic.

Just look at the number of times you see the number "23". It's in scene after scene. That's not coincidence. The whole thing's a coded message.

And finally, after the whole tantric love trip on the subway train at the end, they burst out into the street in front of a cinema showing "2001: Space Odyssey"...'

Which is all about human evolution. Mason, you need help.'

From The Invisibles, by Grant Morrison.

Procrastination Update
Finally, Rebecca, who clearly has too much time on her hands,* has sent me this freakish puzzle. The maximum score is 20,000, and with me having managed but a feeble 7,800, she sent me the solution. I can't see why it's right, but it is. If you're good I'll post it in a few days.
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* I probably shouldn't be so snide about Becca. She is, after all, destined for greatness, if her birthdate is any indication; she shares a birthday with such luminaries as G.K. Chesterton, T.H. White, John F. Kennedy, Bob Hope, um, Scary Spice, and me.
posted by Greg at 11:22 PM