If you’ve ever seen Buffalo 66 then this might make you laugh . . . I stumbled on the website of artist, film-maker and sometime musician Vincent Gallo the other day and saw that he had a section where he lists the things that he would like to buy.

Like I said, if you’ve seen Buffalo 66, and remember the particular – not to say bizarre – phrasing of his character Billy Brown, then it might just make you laugh. I dunno, maybe it won’t at all. To people with no idea of who Vincent Gallo is, then I’m sorry, this post is pretty pointless to you. But Vincent Gallo is the closest thing I have to a hero so i’m posting it anyway.

I love his threat never to direct another film if anyone wastes his time. Loon, but a damn cool one.

The poet Vernon Scannell, who died last week, was an interesting chap. He twice deserted from the army, saw action in Normandy, and later became a boxer. He was also institutionalised, apparently after telling his court martial that he was a poet. Luckily the Captain running the institution was an enlightened fellow and made sure Scannell was soon released, telling him: “This is the last place to get well.”

I came across this poem, one of his last, while leafing through The Guardian on Saturday afternoon. The bar I was in was quiet; the only sounds those of the barman replenishing his fridges, and the few other customers turning the pages of their newspapers. It’s been a long time since a poem has moved me the way Missing Things did. The sense of reminiscence it evoked was extremely powerful, and not a little painful.

I felt the thread of my own life more keenly than I have for a long time. . . the sensations of careering through sand dunes, first kisses, pub gardens in late summer. Long-buried, impressionistic memories unspooled in my mind, reeling me in until the feeling of submersion was complete.

Missing things

I’m very old and breathless, tired and lame,
and soon I’ll be no more to anyone
than the slowly fading trochee of my name
and shadow of my presence: I’ll be gone.
Already I begin to miss the things
I’ll leave behind, like this calm evening sun
which seems to smile at how the blackbird sings.

There’s something valedictory in the way
my books gaze down on me from where they stand
in disciplined disorder and display
the same goodwill that well-wishers on land
convey to troops who sail away to where
great danger waits. These books will miss the hand
that turned the pages with devoted care.

And there are also places that I miss:
those Paris streets and bars I can’t forget,
the scent of caporal and wine and piss;
the pubs in Soho where the poets met;
the Yorkshire moors and Dorset’s pebbly coast,
black Leeds, where I was taught love’s alphabet,
and this small house that I shall miss the most.

I’ve lived here for so long it seems to be
a part of what I am, yet I’m aware
that when I’ve gone it won’t remember me
and I, of course, will neither know nor care
since, like the stone of which the house is made,
I’ll feel no more than it does light and air.
Then why so sad? And just a bit afraid?

I think, if I had my way, things would be far simpler.

There would be less intent, fewer consequences. . . less of almost everything. There would be only what was required, and the sound of snow falling on snow, rain on the sea, bicycle wheels . . . and the pad of a cat’s paws on polished, hardwood floors.

(More about this music)

A couple of things coming up you might be interested in . . .

Pecha Kucha is a designers’ presentation forum with a difference. Each presenter – usually a designer, architect, photographer or whatever – gets 20 slides with which to demonstrate their work. The only stipulation is that the presenter only has 20 seconds to decribe each slide. According to Wikipedia, Pecha Kucha started in Japan and has spread to dozens of cities across the globe. The words translate as ‘the sound of conversation’. The second Copenhagen event takes place next Wednesday, and more information is available here.

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My friend Russell’s DJ career is burgeoning. He’s a regular at Apparatet, he recently played at Salonen, and this Friday he plays Kalaset. If you haven’t heard him before, and have any kind of interest in independent music, then you should come!

Thanks to my friend Mark who posted a comment below pointing me in the direction of this beautiful beard cap from Icelandic dude Vik Prjonsdottir. Maybe that’s his name, maybe it’s Icelandic for ‘Only fools buy my products.’

I just wish I had use for it right now.

(Via Swissmiss, via Kitsune Noir.) 

Found these cool guerilla skate ads from Quiksilver over at Rubbishcorp.

The campaign, which is running in Denmark, is from the Copenhagen Saatchi & Saatchi office. The same people who bought you dynamite surfing in Copenhagen lakes >

Lost a glove? You’re not alone.

View Larger Map

If you find any lost and lonely gloves, feel free to mail a picture to me at azbateman (at) gmail dot com. Don’t forget to tell me the location!

Sometimes things happen. Bad things. We don’t mean for them to happen but they do anyway.
Why just today, lying in bed with a wretched stomach, I decided I wanted to do something productive. Anything that didn’t involve lying in a pit with the stench of my own unwashed body assaulting my nostrils. I decided to trim my beard.

This is always a delicate operation, but when your motor functions are severely impaired through exhaustion and lack of food, it takes on mystifyingly unfathomable proportions. Not thinking straight, I switched on the trimmer and proceeded to cut an ugly swathe through my facial hair, far, far too close to the skin. I looked at the settings that I had so idiotically forgotten to look at moments before and saw that the trimmer was set to 1. I’d mutilated myself, and ruined the hard work of the previous two months.

I went back to bed, half-bearded, depressed and agitated. Sometimes things just happen, I realised. Especially when you don’t check the settings.

Britain is seeking a motto.

It was Gordon Brown’s idea apparently, which tells you a lot about the kind of dynamic, radical thinking he is bringing to the table.

I can see the Cabinet meeting in my mind’s eye.

A spin doctor:

‘Things are getting desperate, chaps. The great unwashed are getting uppity. The latest polls are back and it seems that most people consider Britain to be a desperate hellhole populated solely by massively obese, pig-ignorant thugs. What we gonna do about it?’

Gordon Brown:

‘Ummm, a motto?’

The article above has some good suggestions from readers. I particularly like ‘Drinking continues until morale improves.’

I don’t quite know what to make of this. Part of me thinks it’s a genuine sociological investigation, exploring the intimate relationship between people and the stuff we carry around with us. But another part of me thinks it’s a poncy load of wank.

Face your pockets.