Severe Jam Damage

Is bad for your health.
Oh dearie me, how am I expected to get any work done when I just HAVE to keep checking back to see who’s updated what now?

Very, very bad.

So my flickr site is enjoying a bit of fame these days. Currently one of my photos is being used in an article about Dublin for Schmap and one of my self portraits is used in an article about the 365days project in NowPublic.

This morning I logged on to find a request from someone doing publicity for a Sadies gig in San Francisco. They want to use my shot of Travis Good on the fliers.

Well, I think its kinda cool.

WORST IRISH ACCENTS EVER.

That is all.

@ Whelans the Village.

The email was terse as usual. It was an order, not a request.

‘Mick Harvey @ Whelans tonight.
The Barfly is back!’

It had been a while since I’d seen the oul souse, so I agreed to meet him at the bar. He was propped up in the window leering at the passersby.
‘Get down outta that, or the manager will be over to bar us for scaring off his customers.’
As it happened it didn’t much matter, the place was empty - a building site actually. The gig was moved next door to the Village.
‘Sure we’ve plenty of time, lets have another beer.’

I needed beer, the last time I was in the Village I’d been to see Warren Ellis - another of the Bad Seeds - with the Gurrier and his troops. The venue still held bad memories for me, images of the Gin Lady mixing cocktails, and that thing hidden in the Bastard Kesey’s trousers. I shuddered and kept drinking.

By the time we managed to crawl upstairs it was standing room only.
‘Ya fuck.’

I got more beers in and the Barfly disappeared into the dark shadows. Fucker was always doing that, leaving me standing with two pints. A familiar shape loomed in front of me. Blather and his missus, figured they’d be here. It was exactly the sort of seedy shithole they liked.
Blather was babbling, I couldn’t make out what he was saying. Snatches of sound from his lips ‘Fortean…’ then ‘Apocalypse’ and finally ‘Paddy Casey’. This last with tears in his eyes.
‘What about Paddy Casey?’ I ventured.
‘He gives me a pain in the bollix.’
‘Ahhh, Um.’
I turned away for a bit, waiting for him to leave of his own accord - grown men shouldn’t cry over half-rate singers. On stage there was a girl with a guitar.
‘Christ, not another one.’
But then she started singing and we all fell in love with her a little bit.
‘Fuck me’ said the Barfly who had appeared at my shoulder.
‘No thanks’ I replied.
‘No, I mean her, she’s fucking AMAAAAAZING.’ His eyes were twisting in their sockets, rolling like a galleon on the high seas.
‘What’ve you taken?’
‘Nothing, I’m in loooooooooooove.’
I’d seen him like this before and in the past it had never turned out well. I bought more beer, in an attempt to get him so blind drunk that he’d be unable to storm backstage and accost the poor girl.
‘Want More’ chanted the Barfly.
‘Shuddafuckup, Micks coming on stage.’

Half an hour into his set I was singing and dancing around. The Barfly was in a strop.
‘Want the girl’
‘What have I told you before? You can’t HAVE the girl.’
‘Not fa-eeeeeeeeeh!’ as he stumbled across the floor and fell crashing to the ground. Behind him the Goth stood in an old ratty coat.
‘Answer your goddamn phone!’ he shouted. ‘I’ve been sat next door for the guts of an hour.’
The Barfly grunted, pulled himself up extracted a shard of glass from his hand. He was covered in beer and broken glass.
‘What’s that on your face?’ I asked, trying to quell the impending violence.
‘What?’ said the Goth pulling at his cheeks.
‘That… thing? Is it… fuck me… is that a smile?’
‘Uh yeah. It’s new do you like it?’
‘Eh, I’ve seen better.’

An hour and numerous pints later the band finished up.
‘That was great!’
‘It was very samey, not enough Bad Seeds’ said the Barfly.
I was too drunk to get into a fight with him about it.
‘Going home now.’ I said and stumbled down the stairs.
Behind me the Goth and the Barfly were making plans to sneak backstage and kidnap the girl. I left them to it.

Outside Mulligans this afternoon. Enjoying the sunshine and trying to cure an awful hangover.
C and P this one’s for you.

…
Blast.
I don’t know why the template won’t work properly with the pic.

I’ve changed it.
No, I don’t know if I like it.

So yes, a few things to clear up. I’m still here, just not here if ya get me.

Besides the normal things like breathing, sleeping, eating and working I’ve been busy with other stuff, some of it net-based, some of it not.

In the ‘real-world’ category I went to London about a month ago for a few days, where I met up with Mr. Birdbath and Miss Rabbit. I’ve also been getting to grips with my new camera (a Nikon D80) and I’ve just bought myself a gorillapod. The weather here has been shite so there have only been a few evenings in beer gardens, but they’ve been bad enough to knock me out for a couple of days afterward.

Online stuff…
I’m still doing the 365 thing on flickr although I’m missing out days here and there more and more often. The Friday flickr fiction which some of you may remember ignoring here on SJD, has now been moved to a dedicated site on ning.com - We are now all over here if you want to continue to read my attempts at flash fiction. I’ve also gotten myself an account at Warren Ellis’ Club of Mars, but I really really don’t know what to put there, so its a bit dead at the moment.

I’m going to post here when I can and when I actually have something to say. Right now I’m up to my uxters completing this project and can’t wait to see the back of it. Only a couple more weeks… hopefully.

Georgie-Porgy and APEC are causing ructions down in Sydney. They’ve walled off half the city to protect against terrorists and demonstrators.
Priscilla is living down there at the moment and has a flickr set of photos of the protests…
Hope he doesn’t mind me linking to them here.