Half a percent

Pub (Hoose) on Friday with AJ, Nicky et multiple al. Drank and talked too much, resulting in me hearing this familiar voice burbling on and telling myself "Shut up, Graham. Nobody's interested, nobody agrees and you're not even making sense." But I wouldn't listen. Ah well.

Out at Bitch last night (good club - recommended. I heard some things I'm not sure I've ever heard played out before) and it occurred to me while watching somebody's antics on the dancefloor that it must be a very hard life if you're both an utterly sad exhibitionist and also completely crap. Matt was there, and Alex was back from Spitzbergen and talking about avoiding bears. Various of the usual suspects were in attendance, and those I talked to (hi!) seemed to be enjoying themselves. I sat it out, through being still a little ill, but it was still fun.

Following a discusion Somewhere Else I went out and bought a copy of The Hitcher yesterday, and because there was a three-for-two deal I got Near Dark and 24-Hour Party People too. On watching The Hitcher it struck me that it looked quite similar to ND, and then of course realised that Eric Red (alive, conscious and making films again, apparently) had written both of them. According to IMDB a few other people were involved in both too. A good film, and one I've not seen for about six or seven years. Apparently there's a sequel out, and it looks awful. And a remake in the works. What are people thinking?

While on the subject of horror films, I went looking for copies of Dust Devil. Apparently the only version you can get is the 87-minute butchered cut, but Channel 4 and its derivatives seem to have the 103-minute version and show it occasionally. Every year or so. And the last time was . . . Tuesday. Shit.

Fireworks this evening.

original_aj came round last night and we went over to the Hoose to try the pub quiz and the Skullsplitter. Success was mixed.

As he arrived the phone went and I leapt for it in case it was Ed. It wasn't. It was a recorded marketing call - something about a holiday in Florida, I think - so I did what I generally do in such cases. I put it down and left it talking to nobody for a while in the hope that the marketers pay for the call by the microsecond. After finding and putting my boots and jacket on, I checked the phone and it was still going. In fact, I realised that it had looped. I wasn't quite sure whether to put it down, and said so to AJ. The evil grin on his face persuaded me - I left it talking and we went to the pub.

When we arrived, we found that the Skullsplitter was still lurking unconnected, so we had Thrappledouser instead. It was an entirely acceptable alternative. The Whisky Angels invited us to join their (quite large) team and we went on to beat everybody except - crucially - the bar staff.

Back at the house, we were saddened to find that sometime in the several hours I'd been out, the telemarketing machine had given up and rung off. Still, at least I wasn't left with the same decision to make this morning, or even this evening. Would I eventually have ended up getting a second phone line just because I couldn't bear to stop wasting their resources?

It's possible. A lucky escape, I think.

Addendum: More irrelevance - Arcosanti. Yes, I did use to play a lot of SimCity, actually.