Tuesday, June 17, 2008
No more leaky holes in your brain, and no false starts

You can also photograph yourself doing this, to the loud amusement of the attendant deros.
Thom Yorke out of Radiohead put out an album a couple of years ago. It's called Eraser. I really really like it, although -- notoriously (want a better link? Try Google) -- not all Radiohead fans feel as I do. Atoms For Peace is one of my favourite tracks from the album.
Thom Yorke - Atoms For Peace (3.58 MB mp3: right-click and Save As to download; play using the handy little embedded player below)
How come the sun's too bright to live
The cell-phone camera really didn't do the business, though -- it's really quite shit in the dark:

When I got home I set about taking some photos with my digital camera -- improvised tripod (stack of books on the window-ledge, anyone?) and all. This is looking west with a 5-second exposure at f2.8:

It's not a completely accurate representation of the scene, but it's as close as I could get. I tried to stop the shutter down but the field depth was too great and the resultant image not as effective.
One thing which alarmed me somewhat was that the flashing red lights on the cranes at the new hospital building site were completely invisible in the fog -- to the naked eye, anyway. "So," I thought, "let's try burning-in a loooooooong exposure to see if the camera can pick them up". This is a 30 second exposure looking north, using f2.8 again -- this time to get as much light as possible:

"Hells bells," thinks I -- "not a smidgeon of a trace of the warning lights. What happens if a plane comes flying down the valley and smacks right into the cranes, or worse still -- one of the hospital buildings!? It'd be like a re-enactment of the bloody Erebus disaster in my back yard!"
I zoomed in to 3x optical (Carl Zeiss lens, thanks for asking) and tried another 30 second exposure:

Wait a minute... did you see that?

Ho ho ho etc. Actually, of course the reason that the warning lights on the cranes were not visible is that construction of the super-structure of the new hospital is complete and the cranes were taken down some weeks ago.
Phew.
Labels: cat photos, lol, mai new house, photos
Friday, June 13, 2008
I understand that you now are surprised
If it were up to me, I would have a karaoke room painted in the blackest black, with a rock-band lighting rig, and blacklights, and minimalist black vinyl and chrome accoutrements, and a karaoke machine stuffed full of my best and favourite music. Like Iggy's The Endless Sea, which I have been walking around singing at the top of my lungs for days now.
Iggy Pop - The Endless Sea (3.29 MB mp3: right-click and Save As to download; play using the handy little embedded player below)
The Endless Sea is off New Values, which I wrote about the other day. What a song. Sometimes I even sing the backing vocals as well as Iggy's main part. And what is up with that keyboard part? Not the tweetily-synths (which are super-awesome in their own right), but the comping: it sounds like a Fender Rhodes run through a laptop running some sort of glitchtronica granulation software -- none of which AFAIK was available in 1979 (aside from the Rhodes). And who would ever have thought that baritone saxes doing an "oompah" part in the bridge would be so powerful.
I'll let you know if I ever get my karaoke room built, 'k?
I keep finding graffiti around Newtown that I myself must -- but without any recollection of doing so -- have executed.

That is the only feasible explanation, right? No two people can actually come up with the same ideas at the same time completely independently, can they?
Can they really?
Hmm....
Nope, didn't think so ;)
Labels: mai new house, music, photos
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
Above us is a dirty sky full of youths and liquors

This raises the issue of whether or not the infected vexed local Love Field Deviations should've been administered with inoculations and vaccinations against said virus -- or an alien so viral... living spaceapes creatures covered smothered in writhing tentacles stimulate your audio nerve directly... no-one conflicts with me... hallucinating senses individually insiduously or in any combination rhythmically shifting gears focusing intensity... no-one conflicts with me... mind starts slipping from familiar tracks bending warping interfering with the facts sensory language leaves us with no habit for lying... we are hostile aliens immune from dying...
Kode9 - Victims (feat. The Spaceape) (2.63 MB mp3: right-click and Save As to download; play using the handy little embedded player below)Victims is another track from Kode9 and the Spaceape's amazing Memories of the Future album.
Labels: aliens are in our midst, mai new house, music, photos
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
He loved him madly

It looks a lot less lovely when it is covered in big green leaves, and the air is not perfectly still, crisp and there's still a surprising amount of warmth in the sunlight even though there's snow on the mountains just over there. And the lure of the persimmon is so great that it turns the eighty-yr old woman next door into a kleptomaniac; under cover of darkness, their number is regularly diminished. The only trace of human activity is a set of mobility-scooter tracks leading up the neighbour's driveway.
Labels: photos
Thursday, June 05, 2008
Expansionism FAIL

Evidently the Strathmore 44 aren't aware of at least one of the two World's Worst FAILblunders -- never get involved in a turf war in South Wellington [citation required].
Notice the real estate sign on top of Leo's "Superb Seafood"? I wonder if that means the building is being sold/scheduled for demolition/otherwise gonna disappear? Hope so. That way I won't have to write a really nasty post about how fucken awful their fare is.
Labels: mai new house, photos
Wednesday, June 04, 2008
How could some sexy-ass bitches walk around ride-free

In case you can't read the slogan on the licence plate, it says
Now, I've not seen anyone driving the pictured automobile, but rest assured that if I do catch a bitch in or in the vicinity of the red Toyota Celica, I will try to determine the voracity of their alleged sexiness. In the interests of science. And art.
Smog - I Was A Stranger (from Red Apple Falls) (3.89 MB mp3: right-click and Save As to download; play using the handy little embedded player below)Reportback is pending.
Labels: mai new house, music, photos
Sunday, June 01, 2008
I'm a bad man, you're a penis, and your whole crew stink like faeces
You can often get a really accurate idea of if I'm having a little period of out-of-control moodswings by whether or not I post little rants here which are barely coherent and generally come across quite poorly. So, to try to answer all the comments and questions received by emails and so on:[1] I like Newtown. There are crazy people who wander around and they often have amusing slogans on their clothes. So do I. So am I, for that matter. I'm right at home!
[2] I wish that a lot of them were being taken better care of than I suspect they are. I also wish I took better care of myself, as well.
[3] I Am A Soldier In Christ's Army is, well, a pretty full-on thing to be walking around proclaiming, especially to anyone who's read some of the more obscure, extreme passages in the bible.
[4] Some other interesting slogans to wear on one's shirt might be :
- I Am A Soldier In Allah's (or Muhammed's) Army: this could potentially cause the wearer to be the target of everything from fear to disgust and even attract the attention of people like police and airport security.
- I Wish I Was A Stormtrooper In Hitler's Elite Schutzstaffel Units: you see these guys around occasionally. Usually they look like the sort of knuckle-draggers that would've been gang-raped and then killed by the real SS. And why do they shave their heads? They should grow it out, dye it flaxen-blonde and style it into really sharp haircuts using brylcreem or something.
- I Am A Veteran Of The New Zealand Army's Presence in Vietnam 1967-75: quite a topical one.
- I Am A Slave In the Nike Army: you see this sort of thing a lot, though not so much the slogan, just the icon. Also, for Nike substitute any sweat-shop child-labour exploiting global clothing franchise.
Labels: mai new house, misanthropy, photos
Thursday, May 29, 2008
You should be more like Merlin and walk everywhere
Many years ago now, when a friend moved to Newtown, she remarked that it "must be on the Mental Health Ley-Lines". This was because* of the high incidence of seemingly-crazy people who wandered the streets of our venerable suburb at all hours of the day and night. Presumably they follow the mysterious "crazy-" forces associated with points along the aforesaid Mental Health Ley-Lines, or something.* (It is probably much more likely to have been something to do with the destructive health policies of the fucken National government 1990 - 1999, but that's beside the point.)
Years and years later, she's still there, and the crazies are still there too, picking up the force-fields with their built-in "crazy-o-meters" and wandering endlessly from point to point. Of course they are. Who ever wins votes by throwing money at improving community-based mental health care? Subsequently I find myself sharing a bus with this guy a lot more often than you'd expect to if you hadn't studied the statistics of chance.
If you can't read it, the writing on the back of his jumper says:
I didn't actually know Christ had an army. Depending on whether or not he's actually dead, I suppose they could be the "Army of the Dead" out of Army of Darkness, or The Lord Of The Rings. Or not. Perhaps he's just advertising the Salvation Army. I wonder if he's armed? At least he's not a soldier in Allah's army, I guess.
Anyhow, go him. He also wears a Placemakers beanie, and smells like a damp old couch that a large dog has slept on for about ten years.
If you're reading this and thinking to yourself "Fuck me, drinks-after-worker, that's a bit on the nose -- leave the old fullah alone" then fair enough, I take your point. But I've already pretty-much made mine; imagine the reinstatement of decent, comprehensive community-based mental health care. Wouldn't that be a bloody miracle, then?
Labels: mai new house, photos
Birthday cakes

* Actually, you can probably see that that is a pan of chocolate brownie, rather than cake, but this is a minor detail best left from the narrative for fear of obfuscating the essence of the passage.
This photograph was taken at the best possible moment -- festooned with 34 lit candles, seconds later the candles started to melt as one and a layer of hot, coloured wax was deposited on the cake. You may have thought that this would be an impediment to the consumption of the cake, but it was not; the cake was served hot and almost-cooked, with a large amount of fresh whipped cream. It was paired by our sommelier with a stunningly-good 2006 Johannesdorf gewürtztraminer.
Later on the cake was unfairly targeted by a vicious smear campaign, as one's tummy complained long and hard about the ingestion of this confused mixture of substances.
Some time later, it came to pass that a second cake was proposed, and the birthday promptly moved upon the kitchen bench and made it so. And the birthday saw that the cake was good:

You probably won't recognise the cake as the classic "Ghost" design, with a sheet of marzipan 'draped' over a conical sponge cake, but veritably that is what it is. It's also not the most moist number ever; it is due to be introduced to a bottle of marsala, or possibly tripel sec, in the very near future.
Severed Heads - We Have Come To Bless This House (5.38 MB mp3: right-click and Save As to download; play using the handy little embedded player below)
You possibly should never expect the worst.
Labels: miscellany, photos
Monday, May 26, 2008
The horse, the man, and his son?


Especially the accidental pseudo-religious effect produced by my phone camera when trying to deal with the blow-out from the from-above lighting. Sorry about the crappy photos.
Tilahun Gessesse with the Walias Band - Untitled wailing Ethio-funk classic (14.4 MB mp3: right-click and Save As to download; play using the handy little embedded player below)
Awesome Tapes from Africa is not exactly my Favourite New Blog; more like a perennial favourite for a long time now. If I had time I'd possibly start one in kind: "Awesome Tapes from Newtown", or something.
Labels: favourite new blog, mai new house, photos
Friday, May 16, 2008
Misandry FAIL
Thursday, May 15, 2008
Be like, "Warriors! Come out and playiyay!"

Evidence of expansionism by the Eastern Suburbs' Strathmore 44 gang?
Labels: mai new house, photos
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
Fake plastic sushi

* Unverified.
Labels: photos
What did they do to chill the joy away?

Thank you to the person who posted this sticker and performed this valuable public service. I'll keep well away from this tree-protector cage thingummy, cos god knows I can do without a deviation in my love field.
I'm enchanted with the possibility that the sticker is is somehow a reference to the form of the tree-protector cage thingummy, which is more than a little reminiscent of classic diagrams of di-polar (electro)magnetic field-lines in (for example) geo-physics:
But I expect that it is more likely a promotional tool for an exhibition of the same name by Wellington painter REMO (Roger Morris), held earlier this year.
Labels: mai new house, photos
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
I was happy in the haze of a drunken hour

I'm hoping to get along to have a bit of a perve.
Labels: mai new house, photos
Thursday, May 01, 2008
That's me in the background, losing my hearing
Evidence of the first Stumps excursion into the northern lands (aka Auckland, NZ). People seemed to like the show. Girls danced. It was certainly the most intense 50 min of furious noise-rock carnage that we have yet exacted upon a paying audience. Later on, that monitor at front stage right started smoking and we had to stop. Gig: Saturday night.. hearing returned to normal: Tuesday arvo.
Picture by Robyn. There's a WHOLE bunch more here.
Tuesday, April 15, 2008
Der Hund ist ein eifriger Anhänger von Yoga

I said "Now greet the sun" and he growled at me.
Labels: mai new house, photos
Friday, April 11, 2008
Der Hund liegt auf dem Beton

It's some kind of husky/Samoyed dog, possibly a cross. Doesn't he have bewdiful eyes!?
Labels: mai new house, photos
Friday, February 29, 2008
S.U.V. wheelcover & Tasmanian Devil misanthropy

Ah well, it's gotta be better than the standard Tazzie Devil ones, right?
Labels: misanthropy, photos
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Mai xmas tree, let me show you it
Here you have the loveliness of the sprucelet, nestled there on the breakfast bar, all green and non-pine-smelling. You can clearly see the Xmas baby sock-monkey angel, in situ this time, and the smattering of gifts. You can see one of the somewhat-oversized fake wooden (and befeathered) doves, in which Harry shows only vague interest -- mainly in scenting them, he hasn't yet tried to eat one. I may also have forgotten to mention the silver decoration that more-than-slightly resembles razor-wire.
Here's Harry, reclining in his bed under the tree and showing only vague interest in the fake wooden doves:

Labels: bling, cat photos, photos
Wednesday, December 05, 2007
A fetishist?

Labels: miscellany, photos
Monday, December 03, 2007
Mystery Monday: g* ***k ******f

Apparenty Tom wasn't joking when he suggested it was a prototype for a new kind of seat:

Myself, I can't see how it would work unless there is a structural element -- the name of which I don't know -- going deep into the ground under the left-hand side, as viewed in this picture. And I trust they have tested its safety by loading up the "seat" part with at least half a tonne of weight. Because umm... yeah.
...
As usual, prizes will be awarded if you can tell me what/who this track is...
And if you are a maker of mysteries and would like to contribute to this feature, contact me offline to organise stuff.
Labels: music, Mystery Monday, photos
Friday, October 19, 2007
Is has communizm

Usually I look a lot more handsome, though, when I go to parties and stuff.
Labels: miscellany, photos
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
Multifaceted

One Moment Caller has speculated that it's the base of a sculpture, and made a purty wire-frame representation of it....
Another installment by The Commonsense Nihilist to his graphic novel....
A song:
The Legend! - Melt The Guns (2.33 MB mp3: right-click and Save As to download; play using player below)From the 1987 Creation Records compilation WOW Wild Summer.
Labels: art, comix, miscellany, music, photos
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Happy September 11th

As it happens, it wasn't very long at all.
It was a beautiful spring day just like today -- and a Tuesday, too -- that six years ago I wandered down Aurora Tce and into the Terrace post office to post some LPs to the USA, and had to get the increasingly incredulous (!) shop-assistant to spell out why there would be unforeseen delays in getting the parcels to their destination. And then hurried home again, to spend the next few hours watching people jumping out of tall buildings; and so on.
And believe it or not, it was an utter coincidence that yesterday I posted some song-lyrics containing the following:
They wanna have a war to keep us on our knees
They wanna have a war to keep their factories
They wanna have a war to stop us buying Japanese
They wanna have a war to stop industrial disease
They're pointing out the enemy to keep you deaf and blind
They wanna sap your energy incarcerate your mind
... which frankly I find quite uncanny.
Labels: freedom-hating, miscellany, photos
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
lunareclipse_28aug2007

Above image by TELPortfolio. There is a Flickr group setup for images of the eclipsing moon, but there are plenty of other pics on there which are not part of the group (tag "lunareclipse_28aug2007"). A favourite page is this one, which just kinda fell together out of TELPortfolio's tagged "lunareclipse":

Frankly, that's fucking erotic.
Labels: miscellany, photos
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Oh, I almost forgot (wallpaper)...
Wants.
...
Following the David Bowies a couple of months ago, my new BFF neglected stairways has uploaded the 8-track version of Captain Beefheart's Strictly Personal.On the left's a picture of The Captain; click it to be magically transported to a comprehensively fast and bulbous website all about the same.
Labels: heroes, miscellany, music, photos
From Levin to Jerusalem (or vice versa)
Billy Bragg - Jerusalem (2.33 MB mp3: right-click and Save As to download; play using player below)I think that'll about do it now.
...
Was in the mighty Horowhenua for several days. While the actual place wasn't as bad as it had been made out to be, never have I seen such a bunch of downtrodden people as I witnessed in the streets and malls and coffee shops and Warehouse of Levin. It was truly startling to my poor sheltered, cosseted self, and I had to put the camera away (not to worry, though I did take some pics of other stuff).
I saw a plate which reminded me of a Six Organs of Admittance album cover (click
for closer look):
It's a valuable piece, by a ceramicist of note, whose name of course I can't remember.
Also scored this magnificent golliwog, to add to the ol' vintage knitted toy collection:

And finally, to aid in my ongoing investigation into the nature of offensiveness, at SaveMart I found possibly the best t-shirt ever:

...not to mention some hideous ceramics, to add to the ol' collection of hideous ceramics.
I also got to go to the Tender Centre. On the main street of Levin, I assumed that this was a sorta drop-in place where you can go and get hugs, and compliments, but I was wrong. It's a kind-of 2nd-hand store where nothing has a price and you make offers for goods -- rather like a single-shot offline auction.
So all-in-all the weekend was a raging success.
Labels: Friday farce, music, photos
Tuesday, August 14, 2007
John Campbell vs. the back-end of a bus
For their benefit, and for the benefit of anyone else who may be wondering, it was (mostly) satire. And in an homage to Monty Python, here's the previous sentence in visual form:
Yes. Mostly satire. I mean, some aspects are for real -- I feel bad for John having an ostensibly-objective rendering of his features distort in such an unfortunate manner, but I don't believe it was deliberate.
Nor was it I who distorted the image. The light waves bouncing off the back of the bus were detected by the photo-sensitive cells in my phone's camera, encoded and compressed as a JPG-format file in its flash-memory file-system, transferred using the Universal Serial Bus protocol to my computer, cropped and composed using Adobe Photoshop CS2, and saved and uploaded to my website. No tampering of any form was undertaken.
Nor is this a Campbell Live (CampbellLive?) publicity-stunt, at least not that I know of.
There are several other buses of differing makes and models driving around which have much less distorted John Campbells on their back-ends, so the answer is actually that a stock-standard image/decal for the campaign is effected by an unfortunate distortion on one particular model of bus.
Of course, if he was a parliamentarian, he could bring charges -- or at least sue.
Labels: miscellany, photos
Monday, August 13, 2007
If I was John Campbell...
Now. Having had some experience in the design and postering and graphics bizzo, can I just say that THIS DOESN'T HAPPEN BY ACCIDENT. (Not that I can remember what this phenomenon is called, so let's just make something up on the spot... ok... what about "sheet foreshortening"?)
Exhibit A: image on the left. They couldn't have picked more precisely the region of his face which, when subjected to "sheet-foreshortening" because of having to lay over 3D protuberances on the back of a bus, would distort in the vertical dimension and render poor JC more-or-less as a rodent. (Region of face delineated by blue arrows in image on right).
In fact, to make him look any more like a cute little mousie, they would have had to actually vandalise the image Perez Hilton style (ok, not really -- there's no fake-jizz or writing or cocaine boogers -- but you get the idea), as per Exhibit B: image on the right.
I know I've banged on about this to all and sundry recently, but, really. Disgraceful.
(click on pics for closer looks)
Labels: miscellany, photos
Thursday, July 26, 2007
The secret valley of lost cheezburgas

Labels: cat photos, lol, photos
Let me show u mai twig

Labels: cat photos, lol, photos
Tuesday, July 03, 2007
O hai, can we has sum m0re cheezburgaz?

This morning there were official requests for cheezburgaz at 5.30 am, 6.45 am and 7.55 am, in addition to a couple of unofficial entreaties around midnight and 1am.
And then to top it all off, there were rumours of a breach of security at the bucket storage facility:

Fortunately, Harry was able to see off the purloiners quickly and effectively, earning himself a cheezburga and a commendation for bravery.
Labels: cat photos, lol, photos
Tuesday, June 26, 2007
It's getting cold
Earlier at Happy, whilst sound-checking with Black Boned Angel, Sunken and The Bad Statistics, I found evidence of a Serious Artist in the gents':
Fueled by gin, tequila and beer, we made quite a night of it watching sport and telling tall tales. Go Rodders! Make that 50m break which leads to the try which is the turning point in the match. Go!
And even later, in town, it was a delight to discover a bar from whence one can still obtain a nice beer or two at the relatively late-ish hour of 0430.
Sunday was spent in the embrace of sleep, delicious sleep.
...
Speaking of Black Boned Angel (Myspace), Philip Matthews has written an interesting feature on metal in this week's NZ Listener, including an interview with Black Boned Angel's founder, my mate Campbell Kneale.
...
At the railway station this morning, a deputation of sparrows was dispatched to inquire about the availability of muffin crumbs:
...
NP: Anthony Braxton - - Dortmund (Quartet) 1976 (Church number 9)most of you will probably have it already. those who don't: get it now!! this would be my first choice for an introduction to braxton, especially for those who are sceptical - who think ab's music is too cerebral, too dry, too humourless etc etc - it annihilates all those objections (braxton and george lewis even blow each other kisses with their mouthpieces at one point!). the all-round playing is fantastic, and as for the horn solos... hey, no less an authority than graham lock regards this album as a highpoint in braxton's recording career, the only question is therefore WHY it has been allowed ONCE AGAIN to lapse out of print... but the comedy prices being quoted by the few retailers who still have it make it clear that's the case.Thanks..
Labels: black boned angel, music, photos
Wednesday, June 20, 2007
Cheezburgaz shortage continues to be a world-wide problem

Link: ICANHASCHEEZBURGER?
Labels: cat photos, lol, photos
Tuesday, June 19, 2007
Alien landscape

Someone said we could be on Venus.
Labels: photos
Thursday, June 07, 2007
Three-thirty burstitus
..and a great hulking brute like Jerry Collins (pictured)
can come up with a wonderful metaphor like this (from today's Dom Post):
"Last week they were like a bloke in a lion's cage who is blindfolded and has a plastic baton. This time he has a gun and knows what the lion looks like."
in relation to this.
Re: cupcakes -- Ms. K has really outdone herself with these, this time, I feel. FYI she takes orders. (I mean, she accepts requests vis-a-vis the exchange of currency for baked goods; not, she allows herself to be bossed around. That she most certainly does not.)
...
It's not even remotely cool to actually celebrate anyone's death, but obstetrician and prominent anti-abortion campaigner Diana Mason has died, aged 84.In the universe where I am god, this would of course mean that the Society for the Protection of the Unborn Child, and the pro-life lobby in general, will be struck a mortal blow from which it will never recover.
...
Wondering what burstitis is? Wonder no more...
...
NP: the sound of the phone, not ringing. Sweet, blessed relief (helluva day, don't ask).
Labels: miscellany, photos
Tuesday, June 05, 2007
Petone is also full of aliens
Petone is well known for being full of jelly; yesterday, wandering around the foreshore, I found evidence of aliens. |
I also found a jetty which seemed to stretch all the way to Oriental Bay (nice idea, though, eh) and some oystercatchers. We asked them to catch us a quick half-dozen for dinner, but they politely declined. |
Labels: miscellany, photos
Thursday, April 12, 2007
Dead C postscript
You should click on the image for a much closer look.
Thursday, March 15, 2007
Comets on Fire and Birchville Cat Motel
Birchville Cat Motel opened, and was fantastic too. People danced, which is not normal. I mean, it's not not-normal to dance, but it is at a BCM show. Here's a bunch of pics. (Click on the images to view a much larger version which opens in another tab/window):




















Also, here's a couple of shots of Comets on Fire, taken from behind the soundboard (the sound was much better there):


These are from the end, when Campbell Kneale (BCM) was jamming with them -- you can see him over on the far-left of the stage (our right).
No, you are correct -- there weren't very many people there. This surprised me a lot.
Ginga bullshit
Labels: misanthropy, photos
Monday, March 05, 2007
Thursday night: Noise/drone/rock extravaganza
8.30 PM, Thursday 8th March, Valve bar and grill, Vivian St. Wgtn NZ...
Labels: gigs, music, photos, promotions






















Petone is
I also found a jetty which seemed to stretch all the way to Oriental Bay (nice idea, though, eh) and some oystercatchers. We asked them to catch us a quick half-dozen for dinner, but they politely declined.



