sure time

3 hours 25 minutes to my 28th birthday...

While I'm firmly on home soil for this one, 2 years ago I was on the piste in Italy. Last year, for the big 2-7, I found myself at Angkor Watt in Cambodia and I challenge anyone to find a grander, more humbling backdrop for a birthday! The measly year I'd aged was dwarfed by the immensity of Angkor's history, all 3000-odd years of it. I read a quote at an exhibition once:

"To comtemplate ruins is not to make a voyage into history but to experience time, sure time" (Marc Auge, Les Temps des Ruines)

Although I couldn't articulate it so well, I think I experienced that same revelation on my 27th birthday. I turned a corner, having completed a lap of the inner perimeter of a particularly overgrown, jungle-encroached temple. I found myself somewhat overcome by a feeling of dizzying immensity, of epoch spanning grandieur. I perched on a rock, itself having tumbled at some unknown point from a previously lofty position atop the wall of the ancient temple. There I sat, staring and distant, my mind trying to somehow process the page of this 3D history book that presented itself to me. Trees engulfed parts of the temple, clutching doorways and walls in their roots. The temple must have been ancient and deserted long before trees were allowed to take root in its brickwork, and these trees were staggeringly old. The temple itself, then, was profoundly ancient. I was 27 years old, inconsequentially youthful. I will be utterly forgotten when travellers of the distant future comtemplate that same temple and encounter that same sense of humbling antiquity.

Well, Marc Auge said it all really. Sure time.

The irony is that, depsite the feeling of comparative youth, it was the first birthday I've had when I've felt like an adult.

post 6: 500 words in 31 minutes re. 1 subject

I don't like sport. That probably sounds as ridiculous to some people as "I don't like music" sounds to me, but that's the way it is.

I've always thought that the main reason for my dislike of sport is my lack of competitiveness, in terms of physical prowess or dexterity, anyway. (Challenge me to a game of chess, however, and you'll see my competitive side spew forth...) I don't care whether or not I can run faster than the next man, or kick a ball more accurately, so I don't get anything out of playing sport. So to be competitive on the behalf of other people (as in supporting a team or casually watching sport) is something I just can't get my head around. If I wouldn't care If I won, I certainly don't care if someone else does!

Emotional and intellectual dedication to the arbritrary success of others seems a hugely abstract concept to me. I get that sporting ability can be a joy to behold, that it can be dramatic, inspiring, entertaining and enthralling. But, beyond respect for such acheivements, I don't get what it matters if someone or some team 'wins' or not. Surely winning is a personal achievement (or a group achievement for a team). Deciding you support Man U doesn't make you jointly victorious when they score. Unless you decide it does, I suppose. In which case it's like faith - those without faith just can't get it.

The other day I caught some of the Commonwealth Games on TV and realised another level of my disdain for sport. As I watched, within the space of 30-odd seconds, there must have been about a dozen numbers pop up on-screen. The commentator babbled forth more numbers. So much of sport is about numbers! How boring! "Mr. Swimmer is representing his country for the 3rd time in this, the 50th games. He came 2nd in leg 1 and 1st in leg 2 with a joint time of 2 minutes 30 seconds. That's twice as fast as the previous record time, making him seeded 4th in the world...." AGGGHHH! enough numbers! I suppose it's the same in many things - if you like statistics and charts and so on, there's plenty to indulge in. Music charts, for instance. (I don't care about them either, incidentally).

One last observation concerning sport - why is it, out of all the many passtimes that our society indulges in, that sport is the only one that merits mention in every single news program and publication? Is it that important, that it deserves as much attention as war and murder? Is it really so much more relevant and valid than art and music? I suppose it is in that, for many people, whether conciously or not, it represents tribal affiliation. And that's pretty deeply ingrained - its based on personal and clan survival and is unavoidably aggressive at times - so yes, it will be more prevailant than the coverage of the arts.

good music...

...is what you get when the music feels like it matters, that you shouldn't not be listening to it.

tune in, dream on, and, er, do your accounts...

I am going to start each post with a geeky mention of what I'm listening to at the moment of writing. So:

Dandy Warhols - 'Holding me up' (from 'Odditorium, or Warlords of Mars'). Rolling jangly guitar pop. Dandy's site.

I am hoping to start a dream diary of sorts in these pages, but, uncharacteristically for me, I can't remember any dreams from last night. Recently my dreams have been mainly set in large, unfamiliar structures - mazes, stations, houses, schools, etc - and I am missioning it about, not knowing quite where I am, with some elusive goal in mind. I'm not sure what I have to do, but I'm sure I should be doing it. This leads to quite an angsty dream state. I'm usually operating mostly alone, but with aquaintences at hand should I need them (which usually I don't). It's rare that people I know well or love are present. There's also a strange proliferation of transport in my dreams, usually boats (the sea features heavily, on and off) but also trains and planes. The transport never, ever reaches it's destination. Either I'm on the wrong one, it breaks down or crashes, or things just change and suddenly I'm somewhere else.

I remember one sea/boat dream I had where I escaped, with 3 others, from a prison camp in Cambodia. We'd somehow aquired crudely drawn plans of the compound, and realised we could make a break for it and escape to sea on jetski's. So off we went! At some point, once out to sea, we rendezvoused with some fellow jetskiers near a vast field of pylons way, way out to sea. They just stood there, sticking up a bit like a wind farm from the water, which was flat and waveless. It was dark - navy/purple being the colour. The pylons were picked out in a matt greyish tone and dissapeared into the hazy distance. It was a strange, stark scene, kind of like the video to Radioheads 'Pyramid Song'. We hovered there, discussed our prison break, made some kind of plan which seemed conspiratorial and important and then...... I don't remember.


Finally got round to sorting out my books today. As in finances, not alphabetising my fiction collection. The backlog stretches back to last August. After a good bout of befuddlement regarding how best to go about it, I realised it wasn't actually as hard as I was expecting. Still dull though. Henry said he thought it sounded like fun, but that's because he'd have spent 3 hours making a totally waterproof Excel spreadsheet which worked everything out for him and presented the data in neat, pastel-shaded boxes. Even if I saw fit to do that, howver, it would double the dullness for me rather than make the task fun, I fear.

Spreadsheets! tsk.

a brief spell of rampant productivity, and...

...another bout of non-work is justified.

This self employment lark is a funny one. The benefits are many - lie-ins and days off whenever I want, the ability to choose who I work for and when I work, the practicality of working from home, not having to watch my back if I'm slacking (like now). The drawbacks are also there - not knowing when the next cheque's coming in and the endless pursuit of new work being the main worries.

I suppose the perks are pretty much all I talk about in relation to my working day, though. This is because I find work a boring subject, unless someone does a really unusual, interesting or worthy job. Most people have pretty dull jobs and go to work because they have to. Myself included. Stuff you have to do doesn't make for interesting conversation, generally. You wouldn't tell someone the ins and outs of when you last changed your sheets, for instance.

So, if I talk about my weekday, 9-5 existence, it's usually about the bits of fun or self indulgence that I decided to undertake. Who wants to know about the chore of plying for new business or debugging HTML code?

The thing is, this seems to have given some people the impression that I'm lazy or idle, that I waste away my time in bed all day and don't do anything of worth. Which bothers me because that's not who I am, or the reality of my self employment. The mental stress of being solely responsible for your own income and wellbeing is considerable. Learning from scratch how to run a business is an enormous learning curve. It's not an easy way out of the world of work, its a tweak of the system.

I think these impressions come from the largely invisible indoctrination to a 9-5 lifestyle that we have in the West. We are brainwashed into thinking work (as in being in employment in order to make money with which to buy things) is something you have to do to be a whole person. You must get up early, you must work hard at whatever is presented to you whether you give a rats arse about it or not, you mustn't stop until the late afternoon. I still sometimes struggle with guilt if I'm not working for 90% of the hours between 9am and 5pm. Even the most anti-capitalist free spirits seem to be thus indoctrinated without fully realising it.

This is utter, utter bullshit. Choosing to work enough to get by and nurture your creative side the rest of the time doesn't make you a less valid member of society. Choosing to sleep in the morning and assign other hours during the day to earning your bread and butter does not mean you are lazy or idle. Choosing to communicate the parts of your day that were creatively productive, self indulgent or just plain fun does not mean you're a work shy layabout, free from the stress of the 'real world'.

I'd recommend my lifestyle to anyone and I will continue to talk about those bits of it that make me happy. Not to rub it in, but because that's who I am and what I'm doing. It seems strange to be judged on who I am and what I do in a way that justifies a system that those who are doing the judging often voice disdain for.

The Story of Hatsoff Dave

Way back in the crazy, hazy summer of '05, I attended the Glade Festival. I'd recently returned from a trip around the bottom-right corner of the globe, and I was still riding that high. The festival was a gloriously sunny orgy of hedonism, with umpteen thousand loonies running around on drugs, dancing to loud, excellent, repetitive music. A wonderful reintroduction to my homeland!

I'd gone to the festival with no-one inparticular but knowing several gangs/posses/crews in attendance. One of these gangs contained my friend Tommy - a tall, fabulously moustachioed gentleman with a whimsical air, photos of whom lurk somewhere here. I bumped into him during Aphex Twin's set (as far as anyone can bump into a figure who looms hairly above at all times) and so ensued my aqauintence with his lovely friends and the wasting away of sunday's wee hours until home time.

Whilst time had become something of an abstract, I estimate the first mention of hats occured at around 4am. It was high summer, and sunrise was imminent. The night had been chilly, so a beanie was a must. Beanies, as festy-goers are testimony to, are also essential to contain ones head when under the influence, for fear of it floating away. So anyway, on this particular day, the approaching sunrise meant the night chill being replaced by that rare thing - scorching English summer sunshine! Glory be. As such, the beanie had to go.

"Ooh, it's nearly hats off time!" said I, perhaps with an air of mystery and suspense I didn't fully intend.

"What happens at hats off time?" Asked Erica, looking at me with the perplexed confoundment that comes only with a complicated postmodern narrative or healthy dose of hallucinogenics. The others seemed equally interested, and I wished my response could be slightly more inspiring than:

"er, I take my hat off..."

Now, the reason this event merited mention was that, at a festival, especially a sunny one, the hats off window is a relatively short one. Think about it. Night time = cold, hence beanie. Daytime = sunny, hence sunhat. I'd say the hats off window at your average summer festival is approximately 3-4 hours post sunrise, tops. As the sun tentitively tests the water with its first few rays, it's warm enough to allow a naked head, so off comes the beanie. After that, when the sun's decided for the billion-millionth time, "enough dilly dallying, it's time for me to do my thang", the heat and light become too hardcore and the real world too bizarre to leave your addled cranium uncovered, so on with the sunhat. Add to that the shock of removing the safety barrier of a toasty comfort-beanie, and you'll perhaps see why hats off time was an issue.

Of course, before 4am on that sunday, I hadn't actually thought through of any of that. It was only Erica's questioning that led me to consider why I'd seen it necessary to draw attention to my hat doffing, which upon utterance was merely a statement of immintent intent. I deem it an act of impressive mental cohesion that I got anywhere beyond "uhhh.... what?" in response to her enquiry.

Well, after a good old laugh and an elaboration of the joint phenomena of hatson and hatsoff time, I forgot all about it. Hat-time would no doubt come lumbering back into the excuse for my concious next festival, but for now it was gone. Luckily, my new found friends remained present in my life after the Glade. I saw them in the following weeks and even met some more of their gang.

"Hi, I'm Dave, nice to meet you". That's generally how I introduce myself to new people.

"Hi, I'm X, how do you do", might be the response.

In the case of Tommy's mates, the response was more like:

"Dave? Hatsoff Dave? HATSOFF DAAAAAVE!", proceeded by hugs, and shouts for other people to witness the spectacle of a now somewhat bemused 'Hatsoff Dave'. It appeared I had attained absent infamy through the simple act of removing a hat. Which was great, and very amusing! I don't consider myself especially memorable or forgettable, so to have my reputation proceed me like that, especially amongst such a lovely bunch of people, brought a smile to the face and made me feel welcome.

So there you have it. Hatsoff, incidentally, is also the most original nickname i've ever been assigned, most others being puns on my surname. (House, if you're interested. Message me with an original House pun and win a prize).

God help you all, I've created a blog.

Infact, thinking about it, god help me. The last thing I need is another excuse not to work. I've no idea what I'll put here, it just seems like the done thing these days. I predict, however, that it shall mainly cover the following key areas, in keeping with the rest of my life:

• musings about stuff. Lots of stuff.
  
• regular geek-outs about music and music technology.
• Rants about stuff. Lots of stuff.
• links 'n' shit. (is one allowed to swear on ones blog? One would fucking hope so).
• Swearing.
• updates on my various creative pursuits (them being music and graphic design, mainly).
  

Incidentally, I wanted the title of this blog to be simply 'hatsoff.blogspot.com', but thats been blagged already, seemingly by some kind of robot who speaks unintelligable machine code: c4urslf

Now the rather plain introductory type post is over I shall hot things up with an all singing, all dancing account of how I became Hatsoff Dave...