28 May 2006

"Is it right to break the heart of one that adores you?"

So read D.B.C. Pierre at his talk on Friday evening, from a piece of fan mail from a besotted Bengali man. Or something like that.

23 May 2006

Er, and then there's this.

http://society.guardian.co.uk/socialcare/news/0,,1781360,00.html

Oh Shahbaz.

I like BB this year.

That footballer's wife wannabe girl is a real cutie and speaks like a cross between my friend Jemma and Michael "Phantom of the Opera" Crawford in Some Mother's Do 'Ave 'Em.

And what's not to like about well-endowed Tourette's sufferers such as Brighton's own Pete?

And last night after the whole house spurned the annoying Shahzan (the "Pakie Pouf"), he snuck into the kitchen while everyone slept and stole all the food, muttering typical villain threats for the cameras: "I'll make them fucking talk to me. Let's see how they think now. Oh, the satisfaction!" Straight panto.

22 May 2006

Speaking of Huevos


Rancheros deluxe.

Eggman


Though I'm eating mine scrambled in the microwave these days.

18 May 2006

Brighton Festival Rundown

If I were a more diligent and anal person, I would have written a review for each of the Brighton Festival events that, together, have kept me out nearly most nights over the last two weeks. Instead, I'll just list the things I can remember seeing, and you can ask me if you want a review or recommendation. Seth, does this count as a step in the right direction towards anti-ephemerism? Probably not.

*Live Soundtrack to Film: local bands play soundtracks to locally-themed films by local filmmakers
*Various open houses: snoopers' paradise
*Lost and Found Orchestra: Stomp boys' 2nd
*Papa Mas: carnival and community groups
*Paradise Lost: Milton schmilton
*Ten Thousand Several Doors: Duchess of Malfi and the mafia. Patron Steven Berkhoff.
*Children's Parade: theme=food, plus "City By the Sea" beach sing-along
*La Clique: Spiegeltent cabaret of strip-magic, acrobatics, music, etc
*The Nose: Shostakovich opera featuring giant renegade nose
*Big Iron: cowboy tales at the Prince Albert "saloon"
*Group F-The Light Players: fireworks and French weirdness in Preston Park. Thank you, VIP list.
*Streets of Brighton: where these novelties were to be seen:























Still to do and see:

*Dr John: tonight
*Howe Gelb and the Handsome Family
*The Haunt: MP3-guided performance walk
*Caligraphy Double: my former student's exhibition of caligraphy art
*SpyMonkey-Cooped: acclaimed theatre
*DBC Pierre: the author
*Park Play (at St. Ann's Wells gardens)
*No Obvious Trauma: surreality at a mental institution?
*Red Sea Social Club at the Spiegeltent
*Walk the Line Americana Music Fest
*Allsorts Open House: mental health art
*Origami Workshop at Embassy Court
*Haunted Hove Walk
*An Evening With Nightingales: nature walk

David Bowie...



... is very disappointed in you.

03 May 2006

Oysters=Poison; Taussig Talk

I'd been all geared up to write a restaurant review or two, since we had couple of interesting meals out recently, one at Casalingo in Preston Street and the other at the newly opened Okini in East Street. Alas, I got food food poisoning at the latter. It was my own fault. I ordered oysters, a lovely dish of them stir-fried "Malaysian" style with bacon. I was aware that oysters and me don't always agree, but I thought this was more to do with uncooked oysters, as I seem to be ok with deep fried ones when I'm home in the US South. Suffice to say, this isn't the case, and I've obviously got some kind of allergy to them. I was violently ill on Monday night; I did wonder if I might possibly be dying, feeling as did that someone had stuck a knife in my guts, severing most of my nerves, but also splitting important internal tubing into little pieces so that lethal toxins were set free into the rest of my body, leaving my in a state of shivering near-paralysis. But it passed. Given my still-slightly-queaesy state, though, the food reviews will have to wait.

I am off to London today for a talk by Michael Taussig. He's desribed it as follows:

"I want to give a 'color-reading' of Malinowski's Argonauts of the Western Pacific, understanding color as a living force taking you into the object of study. This is part of a book I am working on called 'What is the Color of the Sacred?' The title comes from surrealist-ethnographer Michel Leiris and my jumping off point come from Goethe's 1810 book on color where he states that people of refinement are averse to vivid colors whereas 'man in astate of nature,' kids, the women of southern Italy, love them. Seeing modern world history as the struggle between chromophobes and chromophilliacs, I side with Walter Benjamin, William Burroughs, and Marcel Proust is seeing color as something alive, like an animal, akin to what I call 'magical polymorphous substance.'"