Still around the morning after

In the future, we’ll not even have to look to TV or newspaper even the internet, for our up-to-the-minute news reports. We can just depend on people with mobile phones that can do the whole text messaging shebang to relay reports back to us. Oh, you may laugh now, my friends, but trust me; I’ve seen the future and it works. My friend (and occasional diarylander) Mich is currently at the Leeds Festival, enjoying the likes of Primal Scream, Elliott Smith and the Super Furry Animals (not to mention all the many other bands I’d love to have seen...), and then occasionally text messaging me one line reports of what’s been happening. So far I know that she hates camping and tents (which she told me at 7 in the morning, which was nice of her. Especially considering I was asleep before the message came, and awake afterwards), missed “Big Brother”, and that she thought Super Furry Animals were “BAD”. I’m telling you, in years to come, all news will be like this.

Yes, I’m in miscellany mood again.

***

My dreams last night were very strange, involving an old schoolfriend who I haven’t seen for years, amongst other old friends that have since disappeared from my life. I was walking around Aberdeen, trying to find someone, when I was seen by this old schoolfriend and co-opted into a demonstration of this new board game he’d invented. Amongst the audience of this demonstration were lots of people who’ve taught me in schools and art schools throughout the years, and as the schoolfriend did some kind of hard sell to them, I was taken to a chair and a table, and given a copy of the boardgame and some colouring pens. “What am I supposed to do?” I asked, and the schoolfriend turned, all showman flourish, and said “Do whatever comes NATURALLY, my friend! But, I have to warn you... If you do it WRONG, then we’ll KILL you!” And everyone else in the room laughed, as the door was locked behind me...

***

I was reading a newspaper article today about how e-mail is ruining good manners and tradition when it come to letterwriting. Normally, when I see these type of stories, I get all cynical and sarcastic about the whole idea, thinking that they’ve been written by technophobes who can’t deal with this new “information super-world-wide-highway thing”. But this particular piece gave examples of the way that e-mail has apparently bastardised the art of communication, and I was guilty of every single one of them. I never start an e-mail “Dear...” whoever; I occasionally forget to put things in capital letters; I sometimes run words together; I never end an e-mail with either “Yours sincerly” or “Yours faithfully”... The list goes on and on. What can I say? I’m so ashamed.

***

Last night, enjoying the wild and crazy social life of Glasgow’s glittering West End, I danced the night away thanks to the DJ apparently becoming telepathic and knowing just what I wanted to hear next; lots of jazzy hammond organ tunes? He could do that. “Let the Sunshine In” by Brian Auger, Julie Driscoll and the Trinity, followed by “I Can’t Explain” by the Who, and “Taxman” by the Beatles? Okay with him. “California Soul”, then “Think”? Sly and the Family Stone coming after Stevie Wonder? All of that, and more. I danced for about three hours solid, and, yes, I DO feel the effects now, thanks very much. I can barely move my neck.

But one of the students that I teach was at the club last night, which is always a depressing experience; you think you’re still young and hip and everything, and then you realise that someone you teach is old enough to legally get into nightclubs. And when they see you, there’s an expression of “YOU still come to CLUBS?” and you just come away convinced that you should spend your nights in a rocking chair, quietly listening to the crackle of the logfire beside you and looking out the window at the stars.

...Which actually does kind of sound attractive, now I come to mention it...

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Copyright © Grim, 2002