One Man's Junk

I have been watching a program called "Dumped" in which a certain number of people agreed to take on an undefined ecological challenge which, laughably, many at first just assumed to involve lounging about on some tropical island. But that wouldn't be much of a challenge, now would it? Instead, they have been asked to live for three weeks on a landfill site, living off only what they salvage from the dump, a basic supply of fresh food, and hot water.

I would so much love to try out this challenge. As a child it's the sort of thing I always dreamed of. I don't mean the smell or the rats or the dust, which are just disadvantages where any situation would have its pros and cons. What I mean is the chance to live by one's wits, making big bits from little bits, scavenging with an eye shaped with ingenuity and adventure in mind. I don't mean I'd like to live in poverty either - I want a good bed to go back to at night. It's just, I was always the child making tents out of blankets and chairs, dry grass and palm fronds into cool garden lairs. There's something magical about the art of learning to use what is around you for more than what is immediately evident.

And so, the challenge attempts to transform these wasteful British brats into people aware of the cost, ecologically as well as quite literally financially, of what they simply throw away. As is the way with these things, a lot of them seem to be selfish whiners. There's a woman who is asserting her right to build abstract art sculptures, squandering resources in the process, instead of helping people to build their settlement. There's another who uses all his underpants and socks as disposables: use once, throw away. There's the bitch clique, who sit in the shade complaining of how they have been sidelined only to ignore a suggestion by another participant so they may continue to be the undervalued minority, bitching at leisure. Then there's this man:

Program Advisor: So, you've all been quite lucky so far, because you have a steady supply of hot water. We will not take that away, but I think it will be a good challenge to see if you are able to harness the power of the sun to heat your own water.

Participant: Why is that lucky?

Program Advisor: One billion people on this planet have no clean water at all.

Participant: So? That's not lucky. I live in Britain. It's a developed country, so when you live there, there are certain things you expect, like hot water. I don't see why that makes me lucky.

Program Advisor: You really are a smarmy bastard, aren't you? I wish I could slap you, except that would get this pulled off air.

Participant: You're right, I'm sorry. "If you're not part of the solution..." eh? I vow to change my ways.


I may have made up either the first or last part of that dialogue, but not both.

Phone Photos

I am preparing to get a new mobile phone, and it is only with a reluctant neccessity that I do. You see, I am very much in fear of the possibility that to get a new bells-and-whistles type means to spend time being owned rather than owning. There are many other reasons I could choke out through my spittle, declaring my waxing hatred of phones, such as friends with other friends who spend time texting yet more friends instead of just enjoying the company of those actually present, blah blah. I shall however, for my sake and yours, refrain. My brick has served me very well. It contains photos spanning five years, and the O.A.P. that it is, the only way I can get them off my phone is to text them (at the last minute and at great expense) to my email account. This means I was selective, and rescued only those that remind me of the fondest times.

Just like the time I met that rockstar (unnamed) I wasn't supposed to take a photo of, but did anyway.



Or that time I sat in the Notre Dame of tents with a good friend of mine, constructing a face out of used midnight picnic goods.



Or that time our cat jumped in a roll of my mother's unfixed pastel drawings, and we had to bath her for fear that she'd lick the pastel off her and get ill.




Or that time I painted a guy in UV paints in a car park in Bath for his band.

Beware of Skidding

Some things will never cease to piss me off.

Coconut Verde

When your Friday night has ground to a bit of a halt, what more a restorative thing can you do than to hack open a green coconut and attempt to consume the fluids it contains? Mine was from Costa Rica.

Yes, well, I'm told it makes a popular drink in coconut-rich regions, and I am always eager to experience new things. So, after about ten minutes of huffing and puffing and molestation with a bread knife, I was granted access to the centre of coconut water and sipped at it delicately. Imagine if feta cheese was actually some kind of nougat, but not so sweet and without the pink bits, and then you drank the watery bit it came in... that's what it tasted like. Or, more literally, like one part coconut milk to two parts water. Yes. It was educational for the fingers and brain too, enabling me to guess well at how coconuts grow inside their pods.

Two thirds of the length of the coconut drained, and I started to encounter a texture in the drink more akin to mucus, and decided my education would be more suited to understanding how the nut (which is not a nut) responded to impacts, and with that, dropped it from the second floor window* onto the concrete step in the garden below. When I approached it I found not so much as a single honourary dent in its stubborn hide. I hurled it with all my might at the steps, whereupon it ran, with all the indignant fervour it could manage, to the opposite side of the garden. Concealed by darkness and shrubbery, I cannot help but think it would be licking its wounds right now, had it a tongue. And so, I believe it has earned a place in the garden. I shall call it... Estonia.

In other news, I have long thought my geography of countries fairly comprehensive until today I sought to test myself with this internet quiz. While I am still a long way more enlightened than the sort who think of Africa as a country, it is quite sobering to be unable to locate dozens of proud nations, many with land mass enough to easily eclipse that of my own.

I remain rather proud, however, of my ability to name some more obscure countries (not wanting to insult my non-existent international audience, I just mean, let's say, those out of the public eye) such as:
East Timor (because part of Splinter Cell:Pandora Tomorrow takes place there)
Bolivia (because it's where Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid go)
Swaziland (because I simply have no excuse not to know where it is)
Chad (because megalomania and a lack of good international policy led me to decide to bomb there when I was about six)

* - In this respect I agree utterly with Americans. To enter a house at ground level means you have just entered the first floor. How could the floor above that be the first when if you go to it, it is actually the second level you have come across?

Early Learning Centre

Yesterday I went to the Early Learning Centre. I played with a "food set" where you have to use a plastic knife to cut wooden food (cleaved to with velcro) apart as some form of preparation. I made my friend a "sandwich". It was the most genuine fun I have had in ages.

Good Day Sunshine

A while ago I turned on late night TV to find a quiz show airing, all about distinguishing truth from lies. In a particular section:

"Clouds were once removed from the sky so that Paul McCartney could perform Good Day Sunshine in concert."

Oh dear god, I have been so desperately hoping this was true. They said it was. I looked it up this morning, as far as the lethargy-encouraging power that is Google would allow and it came up with... nothing. I am sad. It would have been so, so awesome.

But nevermind, eh? And so I played Good Day Sunshine, watched that beautiful stuff streaming into the kitchen, and carried on.

Three Black, Two White

A riddle for you:

A dying king decided to appoint his successor from one of three wise men, and to decide between them he placed them in a room, one each on three chairs, all facing the same direction such that the man on the chair at the back could see the two occupants before him, as the man in the middle could see the occupant before him and the man in the front could see nobody. No man could see the top of his own head.

The king brought out five hats - three black, two white. He randomly placed three of these on the heads of the wise men. He told them they had half an hour, without moving and in silence, to work out what colour hat they sported. At the end of the half hour if any man was able to identify their hat correctly, and with sound reason, he would be appointed the next king. If not, all three would be executed.

The king returned when the time had expired, and at last the man at the front stood up, saying "I have a black hat, and I refuse to explain my reasoning." All three were duly executed. So, the question is: What the hell did he do that for?

Oh, and also, I have decided I am highly amused, to the point of obsession, with the new Optimus Prime Voice Changer Helmet, available RRP £30 from all good stores. I intend, however, never to procure one.

Here, then, is another riddle:

A dying king, in choosing a successor of his three wisest men, places three chairs in a row, all facing one direction. He seats one wise man in each, and brings into the room five Optimus Prime Voice Changer Helmets, three functional, two broken. The helmets are assigned randomly, and each hat is "operated" once. But, the questions are: Who gets to be king? Who gets to be Optimus Prime? Are the broken helmets irreparable?