The Old Three Country Weekend

So I found out why I couldn't get a room in Basel. It was ArtBasel weekend. The world's biggest art fair. Basically like rocking up to Edinburgh in August and expecting to be able to get accommodation. Still not 100% sure what ArtBasel - or indeed an art fair - is; whether it's a South by Southwest or a Glastonbury. Or some kind of highbrow mutant of the two. Either way, I saw a lot of art.

It started in the morning with Parcours, a cheeky offshoot of the main ArtBasel project which put some of that there bonafide concept art in and around Munsterplatz, the historic core of the city.This was ace as it forced me into crannies and nooks into which I otherwise wouldn't have ventured. Had what I'm fairly sure is my first edible art experience chewing on art flavoured ice cream, which was, erm, flavoured.

Had an afternoon break from ArtBasel in order to see some art galleries, the pick of which was the Museum Tinguely with it's ubertrendy architecture and mechanised bobbins.

Evening was ArtBasel proper. Thought I'd smashed it in an hour and a half - you're not so big, biggest artfair in the world - only to find I was less than a third of the way through and had only seen those bits that were too big for the main hall.

Have you flown into Basel before? Turns out the airport's in France and is known as the Three Countries Euroairport.  When I couldn't find accommodation in Switzerland I snuck across the border into Germany and slept in Lorrach.  From the map it looked like it was just a Basel suburb but turns out it was a fairly substantial place in its own right - famous for Milka chocolate, apparently.    

In more UK based news, I saw Jenny Collier do some comedy. It was ace.

In even more local news I see that Elan Lounge is changing its name again. It'll be Backtrack from next week, never did get to go to Indigo, oh well, fairly sure it wasn't all that different from at least one of its five previous incarnations.

Dick Turpin and Other Essex Boys

Did a treasure hunt the other day it took in three Essex villages, which (unimpressively, as a local someone who likes an explore) I knew barely anything about.

It started in Thaxted, a village that I know mainly from driving through. Didn't know Holst lived there though. I feel like that's something I should know. Even more than  that, I definitely should have known that Dick Turpin came from Hempstead - that made me Wikipedia (is that a verb? It is now) - turns out he used to run with The Essex Gang. Guessing that they didn't have to worry too much about originality of gang names in those days - it's no Baseball Furies.

The adventure finished in Finchingfield. You've probably heard how pretty Finchingfield is. That's all anyone knows about it. Turns out the rumours are true. It oozes prettiness.

The treasure hunt itself is a bit of a weird one - doing it has made me approximately forty per cent more observant - but a mate had bought it off the internet. Now don't get me wrong, I am not belittling the treasure hunt itself - I had a thoroughly pleasant day - it's just that someone managed to get paid for doing something that was probably kinda fun. Wandering round making up clues is the kind of thing I'd do in my spare time, just because (or at least it would be if I wasn't so lazy). I tell you what Internet, if I'm feeling frivolous I might do you a treasure hunt. I won't even charge you.

Just been to the Barbican to see Sun Kil Moon. Not the kind of gig I normally frequent but that Kozelek fellow has a voice on him.

On a complete tangent, it was pointed out to me at the weekend that us Brits put in unnecessary Rs all over the show. And it turna out they were right. I say drawring rather than drawing. I've been trying out draw-wing in my head and it sounds all kinds of wrong. My reality feels a bit brittle.

Wrestling Elephants

Aah, theatre that I understand. Either I've got clevererer or I've dumbed down my theatre choice. I figure it's the latter.

First up a little wrestling and drag based comedy. Everyone loves wrestling. Everyone loves drag. Everyone loves comedy. What's not to love? This one was called As You Like It. Which, off the top of my head means I've now seen every Shakespeare play that I know a quote from. Is that something to be proud of? I am a bit, regardless.

Just seen Bradley Cooper in The Elephant Man: a play about a freakshow, with a pretty boy doing a pretty good job of being ugly. Not exactly high brow. Enjoyed it, mind.

I seem to be stuck in a confused-media rut. That was a play that seemed like a film. I've just read the new Nick Hornby novel (his best thing since About a Boy since you ask), which seemed like a play, and am currently watching The 100, a long form TV show which seems like a YA novel. So whilst I am understanding things in themselves now that it is summet, I don't seem to be able to distinguish between things. Which is a bit worrying.

Gadding Again

I didn't understand Carmen Disturbed at all. I got the impression that there were a load of references that went over my head. Maybe it was because I've not seen Carmen, or maybe it's just that I'm not clever enough. This not understanding malarkey does seem to be happening a lot lately. When out of the last four plays you've seen the only one you actually understood was the Shakespeare, I reckon it might be time to watch less pretentious theatre.

I'm not wholly sure that I understood the Essex Young Farmers' Show either. Don't get me wrong, it was a great day out but it was ultimately a field full of people looking at wellies and getting sunburnt.

I did understand Literary Death Match. Comedians judging writers in a pop-up dance hall, culminating in a classic-literature based quiz - what's not to get?

Keep the Masses from Majority

First gig in six years. You play the hits, right? Hermann Loves Pauline? God Show Me Magic?  Play It Cool? Or maybe you play some of the crowd pleasers - the smaller songs that you jump up and down to: The Teacher? Calimero? Guacamole?

Of course not. You've got to love a band that fills the middle of its set with five of the slower tracks from a deleted-for-fifteen-years Welsh language album. Fair to say the thirty-something Brixton crowd didn't seem to know what to make of most of the set.

Somewhat Side-swiped

So normally I write about the inside of my cosseted middle-class bubble, chatting about plays or travels and generally being dismissive of things other people rate. As a rule I find that I rarely write about things that matter. Is this because of my stiff upper lip Britishness? Is it because sneering at things is far more fun to right about? Probably a mixture of the two. I am gonna have to take a step away from my British stereotypicality for a bit, so if you want one of my standard posts you may want to jump to the last paragraph, otherwise you may find yourself knee deep in a mawkish quagmire.

You see, I've had a couple of lumps on my neck. My doctor didn't know what they were so referred me to ENT, who also didn't know what they were.  They appeared; they were big enough to be noticeable; big enough to be worrying, but didn't seem to change or grow.

This week I got unlumped (I believe that that is the technical term for it, or maybe it's delumped). Which meant I spent most of Tuesday slowly dehydrating at the NHS's convenience.

Some observations:

1. All you can think about is the fact that you're not allowed to eat or drink. You try reading but you find yourself skipping to descriptions of food. You try listening to music, all you hear is running water. I'm not sure how people manage to work during Ramadan. They must have about 80% more will power than me. Or maybe the average Muslim is just a whole heap less gluttonous than I am.

2. Anaesthetists seem a lot more human than surgeons. Fairly sure this has been said before (Quite Ugly One Morning maybe?), I'm guessing that this is because anaesthetists are keeping you alive and out of pain whilst everyone else is Rubik's cubing your innards.

3. I've hit mawkishness in this post, may as well do politics too. I struggle to see how anyone who has had an operation is against immigration. An uninformed, still-hazy-after-a-general-anaesthetic guess reckons that about 40% of the people who prodded me on Tuesday fell into the bracket that UKIP would want rid of. I can't think of an end to this paragraph that isn't wildly patronising, so I'm going to let you finish it yourself.

So yeah, the unlumping went alright. I now have a knifefight scar (which is kinda cool) but even less coordination in my left arm, especially when raised (less cool) and have to turn my whole body rather than just my head (also inconvenient). I didn't get to keep the lumps, apparently they need to test them to find out if it's something more nefarious than common-or-garden lumpiness, which I guess means that this may not be the only dull / cloying post. Here's hoping it is.

Whilst we are being uncharacteristically sentimental let's do it properly. All things being equal, whilst not the most fun week I've had, I do fully appreciate that things could be a whole heap worse: I've not lost everything I own and my family aren't missing. Syangbo, Debendra, Greg: here's hoping your weeks get much better really quickly.

And fade the sentimentality out.

I didn't get American Buffalo, even with the very shiny cast (John Goodman! I didn't even realise he was still alive). Nothing happens. I'm not sure what I make of plays where nothing happens.

And on the Sixth Day...

Three years. Sorry I didn't see you for so long. I didn't mean to, it just sort of happened I was doing my thing and you were doing yours and, well, three years went past.

Three years. And nothing has really changed, yet so many things are just slightly different. There are more hipster burger bars in the Northern Quarter and The Cedar Tree has gone - the gentrification has just about hit Ancoats. There didn't seem to be any Fingland buses on the Oxford Road. Cornerhouse is closed. Urbis is now a football-museum-cum-man-creche. All the restaurants on the Curry Mile have changed their names. A fair chunk of my friends there have had babies. And there's a too zany by half announcement in the Pendolino toilet. There's a time and a place for zany announcements; a train toilet is pretty far from it.

I appear to be trampling mawkish nostalgia into the carpet. I'll try not to leave it so long next time.