some unrelated things

( ...)


oh, i was just looking for advice on reducing cassette noise but now i realise that was actually an embodied metaphor for my life

st malo

cheap leather suitcase made in Korea makes me feel like Graham Greene

(this is complete projection, I don't even know Graham Greene that well)

secrets from the pre-drafting

new favourite hobby: stalking authors online to track down pre-final versions of their work, for that elusive glimpse behind the magician's cloth - just like back in A-level English.

Amazon Read-Inside gives you the first 7 pages of Shared Patio, the opening story in No One Belongs Here More Than You, by Miranda July.

To be honest, I don't really know who she is any more than happening to catch something on arte, a kind of docu-date with David Shrigley, in Paris, with both seeming as kind of awkward in the situation as you would imagine they would be, though Miranda maybe less so.

After Amazon leaves you tantalisingly before the crux, you can find the rest here... play spot the changes, if you're that way inclined.

She does that kind of sunnily misfit over an awkward, almost anal, introverteness -type of kooky american indie, and you might have heard of her from directing Me and You and Everyone We Know, which is another one to add to the list of films I haven't seen.

and she has a couple of cute ideas for websites.

(today is also a day for gratuitous hyperlinking)

New Favourite Magazine

I think The Believer might be a bit like daytrotter for literature. Well, not at all really. Not in terms of custom graphics, or writing mostly on the up-and-coming, or inviting the featured artists to come and make something in-house each time. It's just reviews and interviews. But in the sense I wanted to mean it, which is looking at great stuff from a kinda-indie aesthetic, from a kinda left-of-sideways point of view leading to long riffs taking the personal as universally metaphorical, like this musing on John Updike by John Freeman. (I don't know who either John is right now, but I might go check them out)

I came across via The Guardian recommending this interview with David Simon of The Wire, interviewed by Nick Hornby. And David Simon knows who Nick Hornby is, and everything. (Of course he knows Nick Hornby! He still reads books, doesn't he? But if you, at 15, were so stoked to 'discover' High Fidelity, sometimes it's just some kinda strange that other people like David Simon can be familiar enough to casually drop in references ("three chords and the right guitar solo..." - I'm pretty sure that's just lifted right out) as well)
More importantly, anyways, it includes a quick guide to recognising Dickensian/Shakespearean/Ancient Greek literary styles, and their respective influences on some pop culture elements.
I learnt stuff, and that.