I bumped into a 300lb Polish woman in lingerie the other day. Not literally, fortunately, a swift detour – like a truck maneuvering its way at the last minute round a particularly large roundabout – avoided a potentially quite unpleasant collision. We have a lift in our apartment, but I often take the stairs instead of waiting for it, and there she was, hanging around with her friend at the top of the stairwell, showing far too much flesh under a whole host of mesh. And I mean a host. My short-term memory hasn’t been quite the same since.
The fact that badly dressed Eastern Europeans are not only worthy of a mention, but an opening paragraph probably gives a good indication of how thrilling the past week has been. A combination of having to be tighter than an insects rear passage due to our upcoming trip to India (the cost of a return ticket on the LUAS in Dublin will cover a day in India, so worth it in the long run) and Helena heading down to Galway for a party that I had no particular desire to attend (must be getting old) means I didn’t get up to much more than sitting around in whatever I fell out of bed in and knocking together a huge number of articles.
Aside from the obese Pole, the other highlight of this week was probably lunch in ‘Café En Seine’ with my Russian student. There can’t be many cafes around that are this beautiful – it’s an old wooden building with glass roof, huge bronze statues and a jazz soundtrack. Very classy, and no more expensive than Starbucks; love it.
On Tuesday I interviewed Jason from the Von Bondies in Dublin. They’re one of those bands who’ve always been on the peripheral of my musical interest: I like them, but I wouldn’t go out of my way to get hold of albums or see them live. Refreshingly, Jason doesn’t seem to care very much. He made no attempt to self promote, and seemed as interested in me as I was in him. Long live ego-free rock and roll!
I’m developing a bit of an Internet addiction. I’m endlessly curious who reads my assorted blog ramblings, though my attempts to find out seem to have failed spectacularly. GetJealous isn’t particularly flexible as a web format, but my other (freelance writing) blog enables applications to be posted, and has had visitors from The Phillipines, Argentina and Israel amongst other places in the last week or so. I guess the numbers reading this are going up through sheer word count. This entry will probably get visitors running search for overweight Polish women with bronze highlights and classy egos. The words bed and ‘rear passage’ are in there too. Just the kind of visitors I need!
In all seriousness though, the dynamics of the Internet is something that’s probably worthy of a serious bit of study, and I’m ever more fascinated by it, especially when I’m so dependent on it for my income (in finding both writing and teaching jobs). I’ve even added Google advertising to my other blog (subtly, I’m much more interested in the layout then the ‘income’ ). It’s made me 2cents so far. Result. In all seriousness though, it’s hard not to check your emails pretty much constantly when the possibility of having a major writing contract come through is there. Not that it will be gone if I leave it an hour, but you know, it’s exciting! Oh dear, I’ve got the word contract in here as well now. This is really asking for it.
So my Easter truly was t’rilling. Speaking of which, I happened to be walking next to a truly hilarious Irish stereotype on the way back from of my classes today. She was on her way to meet her friend so she was. She’d just finished work so she had. She was on her way out so she was. That was very funny so it was. But it would quickly irritate so it would.
I really need to do more with my life… a month and a day ‘til India!
This weeks articles are on the Korean music scene, as well as a review of the latest (though still slightly out of date at this stage) Radiohead album, both for a Canadian music website called PureGrainAudio.
Love ya…. Now don’t go trying those searches!
J x