the new emotional blackmailer's handbook

Thursday, July 16, 2009

tumbling cherries and orbiting planets

a few weeks ago, in a small village high in the sierra de gredos, as i walked along the street looking for the little shop that sold affordable beer, i passed the entrance to a narrow alley that came down from some houses above the road.

there were no steps, but a steep smooth concrete ramp and, as i passed, a very small boy with plump rosy cheeks and huge bright eyes, a face enlivened with laughter, and with chubby dimpled knees above rolled down socks, came running down towards the top of this ramp

as he reached the edge he crouched, and stopping, held out his hands with palms up

in the centre of each palm there rested a bright dark cherry

as he stopped, so the cherries rolled forward over his outstretched pudgy fingers and dropped on to the ramp, and accelerated down it

was he a born gambler, merely curious to know which cherry would be favoured by the laws of chance to roll the farthest ?

or was he an infant scientist ? ... perhaps a kind of reincarnation of galileo, or maybe of richard feynman ?

richard who ? ... click on the link

http://research.microsoft.com/apps/tools/tuva/index.html#data=5%7C0%7C%7C6b89dded-3eb8-4fa4-bbcd-7c69fe78ed0c%7C%7C

made me laugh, made me cry

Wednesday, July 15, 2009

3BT

Whilst the first colours lighting the sky today were the deepest blues, and the streets were still dark, and as the night bus sped down Putney Hill towards another day’s work, so the illuminated poster frame at the side of a distant bus shelter was an even more intense patch of that same rich azure. And as it came in to focus, so did two silhouettes; young slender lovers were standing before it in profile, their hands on each others' waists, their foreheads meeting in balanced repose.

As midday approached, in "Jane Austen Country", and as a heavy shower ran away from the sunshine, an exultantly glittering oak dominated the middle of a passing field which was strangely bejewelled with thousands of cornflowers. The oak's low canopy was wide enough to make a deep shadow for some young beef cattle, every one glossy black, and their ears clearly profiled against the bright distant landscape whenever their heads turned to watch me.

The radio in the cab of my truck was playing an interview with Ray Davis, a gentle man who was describing with some tenderness how Kirsty MacColl had recorded his song, which begins, "Thank You For The Days", and as he puts it, “Made it her own”. And then, just as she began again to sing that unforgettable first line, so my truck was swooping past a huge shining cornfield that undulated along a low hillside whilst the shadow of one tiny cloud went dancing off like a ghost over the waving corn towards the distant wooded hills.

Friday, July 10, 2009

the joy of temperance on clapham common

the shady dog, as it turned out, had an owner ...

he lay in the sun with a group of seven or eight other alcoholics ...

i hadn't noticed them until he began to shout ...

he wanted me to erase the picture, or pay him five pounds for the privilege of taking it ...

you can probably guess how widely i smiled

Thursday, July 9, 2009

least said, soonest mended ... part one

least said, soonest mended ... part two

blimey! here's one i'd forgotten ...

a friend just showed me this little photo of a forgotten painting ... ten years ago, a posh theatrical costume designer in brighton, a wonderful woman named fay, had asked me to design a business card, but i was in such a state of mental prostration that i never got past this sketchy stage of visualising it as a linear painting ... sorry fay !