Diary of an up and coming sociopath

After work yesterday, Nikki and I went up to Camden to try and find a place to eat, and the barfly. After wandering around Camden for a bit, we decided to consult a map and eventually located where we were supposed to be going, and the Nandos that was practically on top of it. Rather than go to a pub where the meals were re-heated and probably full of weed, given the area, we instead took one more step to our free whole chicken on the nandos card. I was quite enamoured with what I saw of camden. I haven’t been there for literally years, and I’ve never been properly so I’ll have to go back some time. It’s quite different from the bits of London I’m more used to, and I look forward to checking out some more of it, especially since Josh reckons there’s an excellent comic shop there I should be attending.

After food, we still had some time to kill so I insisted we go find a newsagent so that I could buy an icecream. Secretly, I was hoping to find a mint crisp, though in retrospect it wasn’t that secret because I did say “if we’re in luck, maybe i’ll find a mint crisp”, but anyway. It was actually proving hard enough to find a newsagent, and we walked pretty much all the way back from where we’d come until we found one. But, most gross success, Nikki found a mint crisp in the freezer, so I ate it and the whole planet’s better off for it. I also bought a Flake dipped, which I later ate, and discovered that my suspicions it was just a twirl with a different name were more than confirmed, and so great was my disgust for the concept I gave the remainder of the bar to Nikki.

After this, we started queuing and met up with Eri. As we got through the doors, we were given the usual re-entry stamp, except instead of being a small UV mark like the Zodiac, it was this (apologies for blurriness):

Now, call me cynical, but isn’t this just free advertising? Especially given how hard the ink is to remove. I did not pay to be a walking billboard and I resent the fact that this simple stamping procedure has hijacked me for the purpose. You know who else hijacks things? Terrorists. I have enough problems with Virgin (Mobile) anyway, without this. Even more annoying is how the guy stamping was getting everyone’s hand, and when I put mine out he kind of swung in my general direction and tagged me halfway up the arm. Well thanks man!

Upstairs at the gig, we first got to see some guy whose name I foget, which is lucky for him because I didn’t think he was very good. He actually had a similar thing to Ford going on, in that he had a guitar, a self-deprecating style and a harmonica, but he was clearly less experienced and I fucking loathe harmonicas, so the less said about him the better. Mr David Ford, on the other hand, did a far better gig. I haven’t seen him perform his solo material very often, but this was an exceptionally good performance in spite of (possibly, because of) his raging flu, which left me amazed he could talk sometimes, let alone sing. During State of the Union there was an odd kind of art-jam thing going on where the song was accompanied by live painting. Definitely original, but between that, the video projector images and the spoken word sections in Go to Hell, he’s slicing close to the bone with pretentiousness. In fairness, he does keep it just about under control, so it’s quite enjoyable to see something a little different from the standard acts, because if nothing else you can feel the enthusiasm that’s going into performing, as opposed to what normal bands give you, which is the enthusiasm of being adored by a legionous crowd. I bought a genuine Frances hand-made “miserable fuck” t-shirt, but it remains to be seen whether I’ll actually fit into it or not. I also bought Nikki a t-shirt since some 4 years ago or so we went to an early easyworld gig, didn’t buy the t-shirts and regretted it ever since, so from now on, there’ll be no holding back.

I know this t-shirt purchasing directly contradicts my previous “less band t-shirts” agenda, but anyone who knows me that for a hundred, if not a thousand reasons, it makes sense for me to own. If it doesn’t fit I’ll have to put it on eBay or something, so if you’re sitting there wishing you had one, now’s the time to think about it.

After Ford was done, we finally got to see Fiction Plane. Sting’s son is in the band, and he’s apparantly a chip off the old block, because I had trouble listening to three songs before wishing it was over. Luckily, Eri texted us about three songs in to say she was downstairs, so with no reason to continue pretending to care about the headline act (synonym: farce), we followed precedent and went downstairs too. The ride home was smooth and sleep followed.

I spent about 80% of today coding, leaving me almost complete with Dad’s Invoice thing that I’ve been doing for him in return for some debt relief. I have good momentum and at this point I can say I’m more finished than not, which makes a change because I think the last time I finished anything of this sort was my dissertation, if you can consider that “finished.” Nikki kept me updated with all the latest Live8 news, and phoned me during Snoop Dogg’s set to play the Next Episode at me, so i watched the rest of the set on the internet. I also caught a little of REM (impression: Michael Stipe can’t dance) Kofi Annan (impression: Succint) and Miss Dynamite (impresson: christ, she’s put on weight since I last saw her like 3 years ago) and Pink Floyd (impression: I wonder if Dad’s watching this.) And, along with being bemused at how the information and layout of the live 8 wikipedia page had changed every time I went to check out the lineup, that was the extent of my involvement. Unlike the many attendees, I was not able to make any poverty history today. Well, not directly anyway, though I like to think I’ve been contributing to the fall of western capitalism by downloading things instead of paying for them. Take that, establishment.

The concert overran, so with Ian navigating I took the car for the first (and possibly last) drive into central london to pick up Nikki. It was a frantic and often confused affair, when we discovered roads turned out to be different roads and that maps weren’t very good at representing the city centre, not to mention roads that had been closed off. We made it to Victoria though, and back, with an average speed of about 20 miles an hour, which is strange because I distinctly remember going about 40 down most of the roads. We were often held up by people running up to the cars in front to ask for directions, and by the end of the journey I was beginning to understand why people in london don’t drive. It’s because there are more morons per cubic feet, both on and off the road, than any other place. An adventure to be sure, but not one i’m anxious to repeat any time soon.