My favourite* Colombo street address

Horton Place

Now, I'm no mathematician; but isn't that just No. 18?

--
* There is also a '00B' on Barnes Place, just one road behind - though, in fairness, someone has evidently stolen the '1'.

Lock up your children: 2

Seriously.

Friendly advice

"Just come out. Forget about your fucking novel."

- My mate Jack on the phone just now.

Smoking - 2

Further (im)ponderable:

I recently heard a Ryanair stewardess trying to flog 'smoke-free cigarettes'. Question is, do I still have to hide in the loo to 'smoke' them?

Pulling a leech out of a hat

I just wasted my entire morning at the doctors (really, this time was the biggest waste of time of all time, and I have had more time wasted by more quacks over the past twelve years than anyone on Planet Earth). As I sat reading in the waiting room, surrounded my schweinfluenza victims in shellsuits, my attention was grabbed by the noticeboard directly in front of me. In amongst the usual government posters advertising chlamydia and telling you how to catch a sneeze (information people actually need, judging by even the shortest experience aboard public transport) there was a giant poster that read:

The Friends of [this medical centre] invite you to

A TABLE MAGIC SHOW

Friday, 23rd October, 7:30pm

Nice to see they've got their priorities straight.

The prince of tides

I had the good fortune last week to be serenaded at midnight on my birthday by my mates Dent May and his band.

Unfortunately, my camera battery had died and our efforts to record the moment for posterity fell as flat as the damn battery.

However, for a little taster of my joy, you could do a lot worse than check out THIS VERY SPECIAL FOOTAGE of Dent and the boys serenading the lovers and beach bathers on the French Riviera.

By contrast, my serenade went down in Brixton. You can't have everything, I s'pose.

Seen in Smarden

CAUTION
MUD

Countryside, innit.

Fair warning

Try and make it to

HOLLOW LOG 2009

I hope to be there.

Overheard in the coffee shop

A pair of aging/aged rockers, sipping Coca-Cola, munching on goats cheese salad baguettes. Says one rocker to the other rocker (in a perfect Ozzy Osbourne/Nigel Tuffnel accent):

"Oh, man, I haven't had sex in six months."

Overheard at the Salem Public Library, Vol. 3

1. "I'm not sure if you're the person to ask, but I'm interested in how someone would perform an exorcism..."

2. Man on phone: "What are your hours today?" Me: "10am to 5pm" Man on phone: "Ok...and you're open?"

3. Crazy man to me: "Do you like working here? Do you like ALL the books? I bet you don't like novels. Doris Day!"

Patron Names of the Weekend: Twinkle Yumasi & Yu Hu

(Courtesy of Mrs. Dee Dee "Suck on my pencil" Cusack.)

I don't mean to quibble...

Travel advisory

For rockers:

India UPDATE

From my (newly-wed) pal Dr. Björn Öldbean:

"India is always interesting. Out on the street just now I heard lots of drums being beaten, and when I looked a tightrope had been set up and a kid was walking across it with a water jar on her head."

Overheard at the Salem Public Library, Vol. 2

1. Five-year-old boy to other child's grandmother: "So, what kind of car do YOU drive?"

2. Confused little girl to mother: "Happy Thanksgiving!"

3. "I'm looking for a boy, his name is Benjamin, I call him Ben WHERE IS HE?!"

4. Crazy Obese Lady wearing a crop top and plastic bags on her hands: "Has my copy of House Beautiful arrived yet?"

Patron Names of the Week: Marisa Flomp & Randy Paradise

(Courtesy of Mrs. Dee Dee Cusack.)

Of divers colours

London's fashionistas show us how it's done.

The post-Blur blur

WE'RE MOVING

Amnesiac Review offices, SE24

Overheard at the Salem Public Library, Vol. 1

1. Old lady, looking at a copy of "A Time To Kill" by John Grisham: "Oh that's nice, you never seem to be able to plan hacking someone to pieces, it just sort of...happens."

2. "Excuse me, could you help me find a book? I don't know the title. It's by a female author from the South who may or may not be dead. She writes stories. Have you read it?"

3. "I'm pretty sure Flannery O'Connor is a dude."

4. "And that's why the Goddess gave us boobs."

(Courtesy of Mrs. Dee Dee Cusack, sexy cardigan-wearing pencil-chewing seductress extraordinaire.)

Why we do what we do

I spent most of this evening at a book-launch, drinking with a bunch of ex-IRA types in a room that also contained Peter Mandelson, David Trimble and Henry Kelly.

Journalistic result? One music story, about a Jewish USArmy tutor who married an SS POW.