"Would ya like to see Britannia rule again?"…../ "Fee Fi Fo Fum"
sheffield auedience
Hey kitties….It’s day four of the "World in a backpack" tour. I’m on a train traveling from the madness of the Interzone-like Brixton, London to go to Sheffield, (in the North country of England) for my second showing (at a bar called "Bukowski's".
promoter john.
If no one vomits on my shoes, I’m going to be disappointed and call them poseurs) . It was pretty fortuitous that I called the promoter ahead last night to confirm, I thought the showing was tomorrow night, it was moved to tonight and I forgot that I had received an e-mail to that effect.
So I made the mad dash this morning to get to the train on time, walked ten blocks with my heavy backpack and ended up sweaty and at the wrong train station! Fortunately the correct one was only a block away, and I made it, just in time to buy the outrageously priced ticket (44 pounds, about 70 dollars, for a two-hour ride).
The train station itself was a trip, a huge dome-covered place that was probably an airline hanger in WWII, with trains sitting on the tracks, belching out so much diesel smoke, for 20, 30 minutes each to the point where it made me nauseated.
I think one has to have hardy constitution to be British.
The train is pretty nice, which is good, because I’m going to be on a lot of them. Of course it left late (one Londoner predicted that, he said "They won’t be on time until you get to Germany. It’s a cliché because it’s true, the only good Hitler did was making the trains run on time.")
I can’t think of an American equivalent to the British rail experience, unless maybe you’ve ever taken the commuter train from San Francisco to San Jose. It’s kinda like that. But with free coffee carts like on an airplane.
I’m typing at a table while idyllic countryside streams by my periphery. Everything here looks like a Pink Floyd record cover to me, every place name reminds me of a song or record by a British artist. That’s my limited world view as an American, I suppose. Across the table from me is an Benny Hill lookalike in a drab suit, drinking ale and coffee ("poor man’s speedball" in my world—probably "businessman’s lunch" here) while fiddling with his digital camera. Mine’s better, but fuck it. I ain’t pulling it out.
Always sit by businessmen on the train. The Russian thugs will rob them before they rob me.
I’ve got headphones on and I’m listening to "88 Lines About 44 Women" by the Nails. Jesus, I love this song.
The train is stopped now. There clearing a sheep from the tracks.
The guy from the Horse Hospital had a fright yesterday. A box of four copies of "$30 Film School" showed up for me, shipped last week by my publisher. It was addressed to him, and the return address was Boston, but it didn’t say America. He assumed Boston, Ireland. And the Horse Hospital just happens to have an exhibit of IRA art going on this month (Look closely at the banner out front in the photo I sent the other day). A box of four 520-page books is pretty fucking heavy. He thought it was a bomb. And when he opened it (I don’t think I would have opened it) the packing material was a shiny metallic-looking blob of hard foam that looks, he said, "Pretty much like what a kilo of Plastique would look like."
I said, "Don’t you have an assistant for tasks like that—opening possible bombs?" (keep that comment in mind if you’re one of my interns!). He said, "Yeah, but she’s got the week off".
I’m flying to Ireland next week. Should be interesting. Funny…Rasta Jamaicans in England have accents that are influenced by Ireland. They do say "ting" for "thing". My Londoner hostess said that that, combined with the fact that the beer bottle was Nigerian Guinness (who woulda thunk it) almost guarantees that he was Jamaican. Ironic…he was yelling at me for being in his country and it wasn’t even his country!
Fuck nationalism. It’s a cloak for the weak.
I am a citizen of the planet earth. It sounds hippie but it’s fucking true. I do enjoy the colorful differences in cultures and races; the beauty of all, but fuck borders. The more I travel the more I resent arbitrary lines in the dirt and the lies rich men tell us poor to make us care.
-------=
My sick and twisted take on bridging the gaps of national boundaries is this: One of my goals this trip is to make love to a woman who does not speak English in a house that is at least 500 years old. I haven’t done that in over ten years.
cool high rez nuke photo out the train. makes excellent wallpaper.
------------------------=