05.05.2008 :
reasons for my jetlag are many, and they got me wondering why there's never discussion of it
in time travel literature. it must be a nightmare for the irregular traveller. unless
you offset your physical jump with a temporal jump, there's an idea. but then that's something that's never discussed either,
if i go back in time an hour i'll be dropped 67000 miles behind the earth. and that's only relative to
the sun, which makes no sense either. i guess relativity messes it up so much it's just not worth talking about.
anyway, not to get distracted. after the shenanigans of mayday we were up nice and early to drive
to fyn (we could have just gone forward in time five minutes, relative to the centre of the earth of course),
which is the next island along after sjaelland (where we live, for the non-danish among you).
we had been invited to a family party and everything that goes along with it. turn out it's a gorgeous place.
we ate and we walked and we ate again and we walked again. then we played trivial pursuit and poker
late into the night. the morning came much too quickly, which is not what i wanted since i was to start
work 16 hours later, but it felt good washing in an unknown shower.
and that explains a lot.
i often have this dream where i'm drinking endless bottles of water. my mouth is parched, it's like sand paper,
and my throat is a cardboard tube. but nothing helps, the water goes straight down without touching the sides.
it's horrible, but it's kind of how i feel right now.
04.05.2008 :
the city of 6am differs drastically depending on your frame of reference.
if you're the person on their way to work, for whom this is a brand new day, the couple lying together on the
hard marble of the main shopping street are nothing but reckless drunks. you empathise with the street cleaners,
who just ignore them like they'd suck them up into their vacuums if only they could. but if you're the person on their way home,
the one who has survived the night, the couple are entwined in joy. in beautiful and reckless celebration of the new
and glorious morning. it's a great moment, both beginning and end collapsed as one.
and then i go and crash my bike into a trash can, too busy trying to avoid greenlanders and looking around to make
sure there are no cars. this is why coaster brakes are dangerous, because when your feet are in the wrong position
all you can do is accelerate before braking. but no bones broken.
i'd spent the night at studenterhuset, earning myself a membership card that will bring me free coffee and a reduction
in drink prices. and i figured some bar experience would do me good. i was even looking forward to it, right up until
i saw the throng of people smoking outside. dread rising.
the student house has never been so busy, the bar was rammed and i had no
idea what i was doing. since it was so crazy the guy who was training me could only afford to give me a five minute
crash course. it was going to be misery until 5am. luckily the manager had mercy and gave us the
much easier job of manning the cloak room. so for four we ran back and forth, stashing and retrieving coats and bags.
free beer and cake and numbers, what could be more fun?
i guess it'd be less fun if we sticked to the rules (dealing with people who have lost their ticket, have a missing
scarf, want to put way too many items on one peg, etc), but what do you expect for free labour? although we probably shouldn't
have let people climb up the scaffolding and come through the window, dodging the rather excessive 60kr entrance fee,
but nevermind. hus forbi, etc. the scaffolding was cool anyway, because it meant i got to piss on the roof whilst
watching the sun rise. i also could have used it to make my escape to avoid helping with the cleaning up, not because
i'm lazy but because of the obligatory extra shot and pint. honestly, as if people collecting their coats hadn't left
us enough beer already. and even some tips.
at some point i got yoghurt all down the back and sides of my trousers. then i got caught playing the piano i didn't
even know they had, but the manager just laughed and told me to continue. needless to say i didn't take part in the keg
lifting competition.
a million other stories i tried my hardest not to forget.
i got myself virtual jetlag. occupational haphazard.
02.05.2008 :
it's brightened up now, but i think we've had the worst may day weather in the last 122 years.
which is just what i didn't need, but nevermind that. the march continues.
i think most people worry more about the rain watering down their beer than making them wet.
although i imagine rain makes paintbombing and graffiting harder. but that was at a minimal,
with a new ungdomshuset somewhere on the horizon everyone was being very well behaved.
securing a new building is more important than making mayday a threat to the system.
atari teenage riot across the bridge and pulling danish flags from their poles.
we even get a ticker tape parade courtesy of people in top floor apartments along the route.
and why is it that all the people dressed up for a black bloc (although not actually having any
kind of coherence, just running around on their own looking badass and graffiting walls etc, and
they're easy to spot because covering your face is illegal and no one else is doing it) wear northface jackets?
i just thought it was a bit weird. i mean, aren't they rather expensive and not particularly expendable?
now i have 'pretty green' in my head.
we left when the march arrived at the park, as it joined all the other demonstrations and everyone got down to
the dirty business of getting drunk (really this had started hours earlier, it's great to be back in a country
where it's not illegal to drink in the street). we had to pick up louise from the station and i had to sleep.
after a couple of hours we took off back into the city, vaguely heading back to the park, but it began to rain
again as soon as we got there. we sat under a bus shelter for a couple of beers and waited for someone to make
a decision. all the bars were super packed and we ended walking even further up into norrebro.
the festivities ended in a smokey bar with a nice but angry manager who shouted at me for having my feet on the
pool table. this is all pretty inconsequential, and for that i apologise. i am very tired and a little lost.
28.04.2008 :
me and kenneth have been playing some music. it's been metal. and we're getting it down .
the riffs and beats are starting to make some sense. it's exciting. we played for two hours
today and my fingers no longer hurt.
my calves though, i've been good and they're taking punishment. i've been running every day, actually keeping it up.
sure i only run about a mile and a half, but it's a good start. this is my current
route , it's nice and variable. and the lake is great,
but it's drying up and summer hasn't even started yet. there's a good few meters of junk between the water line and the bank,
it's a shame, but then maybe it's keeping the flies at bay. and i hate swallowing flies. worse up your nose.
hanging out in amager:
most everything else is america's funniest home videos.
27.04.2008 :
it's been a pleasant weekend. spring in full swing.
perfect weather for sitting in christiania drinking hot chocolate.
and finally we can eat dinner out in the courtyard, and all our neighbours say "velbekommen".
hoodies at dawn.
saturday we were in town buying shit (no, it's funny because it's true). we were up by where ungdomshuset
used to be, watching a drunk guy who could barely stand and he kept crossing the road. you know you should do something,
but he's just drunk. he just needs to find a place to sit down and pass out. then he almost falls into the road.
but he'll be alright. then he starts to cross with the cars still coming and a bus only just manages to stop before
hitting him. it was one of those slow motion moments where your heart curls up ready to die, because you saw exactly
what was about to happen and could have stopped it. some guy came and took care of him, sitting him down against
a traffic light, but then he just fell into the cycle lane. we left when the ambulance arrived.
then we grabbed some beers and sat in the park for a while. sun, beer, and the feeling of solid earth beneath you. i love grass.
i spent the night in a bar that played some exceptionally good indie (not exclusively). one of those
bars where the best djs are women. i drank enough to get shockingly drunk (i managed to get paint all over my
hands on the way home) and only spent 30kr. friends in low places.
today we cycled out to dyrehavn. it was forest day or something, but i'm not sure what was really going on.
there were guys in old military outfits firing guns. there were also medieval nights. and people cooking hotdogs
on a fire. and a huge chainsaw. etc. i tried to catch up with some sleep on a bench, like a proper bum, but it didn't
work. then we went to the theme park and made the same mistake as last time, buying
chips from the same place. two years later and they still put on way too much mayonnaise. she just kept on
pumping it, unbelievable. and we went on the ghost train, which was as good as you'd expect. the whole thing was
quite impressive though, that i got up so soon after going to bed and cycled all the way out there.
i got saddle sore so bad you don't even want to know.
anyway, the
starving dog is an interesting issue. i've seen a lot of criticism, but no actual statement
from the artist. and no discussion about why he did it. i suppose most people figure that's unimportant
and aren't willing to entertain the idea that it had worth (i'm not saying it did, i'm just
reserving judgement). i 'like' the idea that anyone there could have helped the dog, but no one did.
either way this is all irrelevant, because believe it or not there are groups that investigate
animal welfare issues and they do their job . although they condemn using animals for art,
they admitted that reports of the installation were incorrect and misleading.
"other than a three-hour period during which the dog was on display as part of Vargas' exhibit,
the gallery alleges the dog was not tied up, and was fed with food brought in by Vargas himself."
infact, the gallery goes as far to claim the dog escaped. whether that's true or not, claims that the dog was tied up
for several days are clearly wrong.
it's not nathalia edenmont, who i will defend, and it's not skinning a cat alive, which i wont defend.
but still, if you criticise it and you're not a vegan, you're just scum.
24.04.2008 :
i've been absent, but mostly not really. i've just been busy with other areas of the site
(namely the freegan stuff ). also i've been
out of action due to an influx of chronic viral nasopharyngitis. that accounts for the last two
days at least, during which i finished frankenstein (i blame its musty pages for my infection, i hate old
book smell, sorry) and the latest jasper fforde book, a copy from the library with all the missing footnotes
nicely glued in.
sunday was the 100 year celebration of danish women getting the vote. it was also hitler's birthday,
but since less people were celebrating that we joined the women's march (nothing to do with our political
beliefs or anything, or course) where we ate a lot of fortune cookies. we also liberated some of our bike from
the basement. fun, but i do dislike coaster brakes.
anyway, just to let you know i'm alive and all that. and that you should read
what the elle? , an
article concerning the elle article on fbi informant anna. or you could just read the
post on crimethinc ,
but judging by the inane comments it requires an extra special ability to understand biting sacrcasm.
and finally, to sabam (the belgian society of authors, composers and publishers),
we say fuck you .
"Atomium claims to own the copyright on all photographs of this building and their collection
agency will sue you if you show them to anyone. Even if they are just your holiday pictures, you will still be sued.
Even if they are for educational use, you will still be sued."
brussels atomium photo
"the website says that under no circumstances should you take pictures of the Atomium."
stupid belgians.