Leaving do

for a dear dear friend tonight. Four (or was it five?) pints of Staropramen, potato wedges and very good company. Pizza soon, then bed.

Synopsis

Boris Mikhailov

The images of Mr Yeltsin in the late 1980’s on the BBC today led me back to looking at Mikhailov’s photos that document the Soviet Union from the 1970’s to the collapse – he is still active to day, capturing the modern Ukraine, but his earlier works sought to depict the reality behind the facade of the Brezhnev and Gorbachev periods. Unlike many photo-realist artists, however, he did not resort to the use of black and white film stock – all of the photos I’ve seen are in glorious 1970’s style technicolor (no mean feat, given how difficult it must have been to obtain the film and get it processed). And all of his photos gloriously skew the norms of Soviet iconography and propaganda – farmhands sitting on the toilet, the nomenklatura holidaying in the Crimea with Marx and Engels on the wall, and so on. However, he never seems as knowing as other late-Soviet artists – the photos also frequently depict the most banal moments in Soviet life – as above, as well as the homeless, alcoholics, drug addicts.

RIP Boris

1991

Another Diego

For Werder Bremen against Alemania Aachen…

Herbie

This snuck up on me on my Ipod on the walk home through Ealing. Nice.

Wow, it is amazing

just how disgusting cleaning an oven hood, fan and filter can be. This is the first time I’ve done it in a couple of years. I am not entirely convinced that anyone had cleaned it previously – the kitchen has been here since the flats were built 20-odd years ago. All of it was caked in the slightly worrying sticky oily deposit – it reminds me of the industrial strength glue my father used to use to fix things at home. Only with that, of course, you had a couple of minutes until it became tacky. This stuff is like flypaper (do they still sell that? I haven’t seen it for years, and even then I think it was on a family holiday to Scotland, although I may be conflating the memory with an episode in “The Broons“). I have washed my hands at least six times since starting – every time I go to touch something (anything) else, I have to do it. In other exciting developments today, I have also rearranged the glasses and cups in the kitchen cupboards, been food shopping and done the washing.

That is all.

Mr Messi

Scored a rather delightful goal last night against Getafe – this clip, running it in parallel with Maradona’s non-hand-related-and-entirely-wonderful goal against Ingerland in 1986 is bliss.

April 2007

A weekend off and and influx of new CDs, including all the Sly Stone remasters (finally – I have been begging for these for years – all the previous issues were early CD masters from the days before they managed to make them sound anything like the music should – scratchy treble and odd sounding bass – but all that is fixed), as well as some unusual Hungarian and Turkish folk-funk from the 1970’s, has inspired me already! No reggae at all (Hooray! cry(s?) everyone). I’ll send the 2 CDs out as a double header… Here is the listing – you can print your own covers…
Back and Front

9 F00-65036 ROYAL AUCLAIR 10-11-01

Joe Tizzard Paul Nicholls
Second to Hedgehunter under a big weight in 2005. Same owner as Cheltenham Gold Cup winner Kauto Star. Will relish the likely fast ground.
Rating: 7/10 Odds: 40-1

No chance of me winning the sweepstake at work this year, then. This is the first year I actually feel like having a bet on the Grand National – 4 years working at a famous bookmakers put me off gambling in general, but as Point Barrow is so clearly going to win this year’s race, and at 9/1 at present, it must be worth a punt.

The news here is full of the end of Prince William’s break-up – suicide bombers in Morocco have been relegated to second place, and the issues the anti-Putinists in both the UK and Russia are experiencing are way down the list.

And this little story filled me with an immense amount of hope and joy, especially taken alongside my current reading material.