Echoes of Flavio's Ghost Dreaming

Too early to be up. 6:00 am should definitely be banned, one should only ever be coming back home from something at this time, not getting up.

Not too early, though, to say Happy Birthday to Mr kynon, Miss tar0r and Miss gigib!!

Off to Eddie’s gig with ‘Cybercyde’ at the Purple Turtle, then probably to V-Movie. No fancy dress for the latter other than going as Flavio. Odd that. I bought Jefferson Airplane’s ‘Crown of Creation’ when it came out, watched the Woodstock fest movie 14 times when it came out. But of course if I had kept samples of my attire of the time they would be ten sizes too small, or something. And they probably would be four thousand miles away, anyway.

... Whaddya mean, ‘it’s not morning’? Don’t get technical at me....:P

... it might be because it will be...

I’ve had a couple of days of something like saudade, of a longing brought about by Facebook, in which friends from long ago from two very different times in my life have brought up pictures in which I stand, younger, with impossibly ridiculous windscreen glasses, jeans and in some cases 70’s moustache and even beard. Somewhere in the Andes with my music student friends in 1980, or elsewhere lost in the middle of Venezuela, or in the middle of a mad, mad party at Blake’s in Watford, with redd_foxx. sometime in the 90’s . In all these cases I can read my mind at the time: thinking that my life was so dull and nothing interesting ever happened in it. And yet, looking back...

... today includes mr. strangepixel! Hope you have an excellent day!

Went to Opium Den and it was good but it was rather quiet, it deserved a larger attendance. Pity we had to leave early and missed the Stillhouse Orchestra, but I’m sure there’ll be many opportunities to see them in action in the future.

Had got hold of the 10 episodes for series 4 of ‘Battlestar Galactica’ and watched them in two sittings. This is a very bad idea, it becomes very difficult for me to shake off the fictional world of the series.

Through Facebook I ran into or was found by a couple of friends from another life (or lives) many many years ago in CCS. That was good if a little bit poignant. One was my sister’s best friend and a lovely person with a heart of gold, the other an ex-girlfriend who was one of the most beautiful, intelligent and sensitive women I’ve ever met. And I let her go... truly the past is a strange country..

There are no plans for today as a) I have a visitor, lfreia is staying over and b) I’m skint again. I’m wondering whether I can make Infest. I would like to.

Reading Kerouac’s ‘On the Road’ and, curiously, getting what can only be a false memory of having read it before, many years ago, in Spanish translation in my old house in Catia, when the world was young and the nomadic life he describes still was possible. And, what a contrast with the necessarily sedentary life of one who, on the one hand, earns his living teaching music and therefore must be settled in one place but, also, one who always regarded the outside world with curiosity and desire but also with a certain amount of fear and mistrust. The shy boy from Catia ended up in London as a citizen of the world but still regards the world as a strange, alien and hostile entity, if sometimes also full of wonder. That tale of crossing the American plains on a truck platform under the bright stars resonates in me and evokes other stories, the glow of marine phosphorescence surrounding us in a cargo ship on another night under many stars long, so long ago, at some point where the Caribbean becomes the Atlantic, leaving behind a trail of bright foam under the moonlight as the ship broke through the waves on its way to this England that would become my home...

Quite busy today -if all goes well and there are no cancellations. Five lessons, four of them visits, which is rather a lot, it means rather more than five hours' work. It is not a bad thing, actually, to be busy, but I do wish I could get my Sundays back. Maybe one day.

Yesterday was not bad at all. Apart from two lessons fallen through. In the afternoon joined the masses going to Trojka in Primrose Hill for mark13's birthday meal. This was good and I recommend the place. In the evening went to the Rochester for the birthday drinks for mark13, _abby_ and sevensomething. This, again, was very good, but it did mean I did not go to either Invocation or the Slime, in spite of silkyfish's exhortations. I could have perhaps gone to either but was a bit skint and not feeling too good, having had a low-level toothache for a couple of days (yes, i'll be dealing with it and going to the dentist, yes).

Happy Sunday to all..

... and a few days late, RIP, Karlheinz Stockhausen...


Another one of the greats, gone. I had just got a (vinyl) copy of 'Kreuzspiel' with a young Stockhausen on the cover, from somewhere in Notting Hill and it reminded me... he's been part of the soundtrack of my life since I was studying music in a conservatoire in far, far away Venezuela in the 70s, a bright beacon in the distance..

Last night I went to the Bolivar Hall of the Venezuelan Embassy in London to see a concert by Luis Quintero, or Lucho as we used to know him, astounding Venezuelan classical guitarist who was giving a concert at the Bolly Hall as part of the celebrations for Vz's Independence Day, the 5th of July. It was very good to see Lucho after twenty years, although it was also a very odd feeling to see that the child prodigy (and so much younger than me) in our guitar class at the Conservatoire where I studied was a man of forty-something with more white hair than I have.

Then I headed off to Stoke Newington to make a brief cameo appearance at the birthday dinner for badusernametag at YumYum's. I didn't partake in the dinner as I arrived so late (I also had less than fifteen quid in my pocket so it would have been a bit difficult anyway) but I wanted to come say happy birthday in person. I also followed Marie Antoinette's precept for struggling artists plebs like myself, and so ate cake.

Photos of both events will follow.

As for the jury summons... I received a lot of advice about that last night. We'll see. Until I hand the form back and get to know what's happening, I just won't know; the jury's out on that one... aarggh...