Sinister: Jingles! Cabaret! Merseybeat!

[ian nicolson]

(The early parts of this post have tendencies toward
both sentimentality and wankiness.  So quick! avert
your eyes, children, it'll soon be over!)

Earlier this week I climbed a hill overlooking
Edinburgh called Arthur's Seat, which, despite having
lived here all my life, is something I'd never managed
before.  This can mainly be put down to laziness and
my eventual conquest has probably more to do with
boredom than much else.  From the top you can see the
entire town, and although Edinburgh is a small city,
it's still an impressive view.  Leaning on the
Ordanance Survey pillar at the top, in a valiant but
doomed attempt to regain my breath *and* smoke a
cigarette, surrounded by Scandanavians and Americans,
I looked down over the town and it was like seeing my
life so far spread out in front of me.  As far as I
can tell life is a collection of little stories of
experiences and suchlike and everywhere I looked 
there was some kind of story or memory.  Some parts of
town reminded me of individual experiences, while
others were more connected with certain periods of
time.  I thought of the people I'd known, who, despite
promising not to, I'd lost contact with and who may,
or may not, still be down in the city somewhere.  And
I thought of the people I still know and how important
it is that I don't lose touch with them, however
difficult that might seem.  Most of all I thought of
how I'd reached a juncture in my life and how it had
seemingly ground to a halt since leaving university
earlier in the summer.  I realised that I have to do
something to get it started again, to actually make
the big decisions for the first time in my life,
although I've no idea what those decisions are.  But
the only way in which I can see this happening is for
me to finally leave Edinburgh, however much I love it.
 
Nick, the Polyester Groom said:
> Ive entitled the summer of 2000 "The Summer of
> Endings"
This is maybe true for me too, but I'd like to think
it could be a summer of beginnnings as well.

OK, you can look back at your screens now. But be
warned! there may be further spells of wankiness
ahead.  Sorry for the shameless self-indulgence - I'll
have to stop giving myself away like that.

Anyways, Liz Daplyn pondered:
> At what point in one’s life does one really really
> have to grow up?
On her twenty second birthday earlier this year, a
friend of mine told me that she was worried that she
might have to buy a handbag cause she might be grown
up now.  Which was intreguing.  Is buying a handbag a
recognised sign of growing up?  Is there a set age at
which one (ladies, mainly) should buy a handbag?  I
think we should be told!
I went to see Alasdair Gray (not a handbag carrier, as
far as I'm aware) at the Edinburgh Book Festival on
Friday, and despite being sixty-five and incredibly
intelligent and knowledgable I think it would be fair
to say that there are a lot of ways in which he hasn't
grown up.  And Edwin Morgan, who I saw reading poems
at the same place the week before, seems to be, at
eighty, getting younger.  So the answer is probably
never, Liz. Not really really grow up. But I'm just a
young sprig of a boy, what do I know?!  By the way,
these are two people who you *should read*, kids. 
Ransack your libraries post haste!

Sometime this week Paula Cullen yelled:
> "I QUITE LIKE COCK ACTUALLY"
Which you can hardly argue with, as well as:

> the conversation came around to what was The Best
> Curseword In The World.........Ever.  naturally,
> "Cunt" was streets ahead of the rest, what with it
> being the Most Offensive Word In The English
Language
> and all.

You would have thought so, wouldn't you Paula? I
certaily did, but apparently it's not.  At least not
in Britain.  The one thing that they told me at
university that I still remember, and therefore must
have seemed to me at the time to be of greatest use,
is that according to the British film classification
people "motherfucker" is badder than "cunt".  Which is
fair enough, I guess.  But only if it's your own
mother.  And "twat" is worse than "arse".  Who'd have
thought it?

I seem to have written more gibberish than usual
tonight.
Shut up, Ian.
OK

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