Sunglasses at Night
And so, just when you think normality is returning to your city, the two minute silence comes around to mark one week since the explosions. At the request of officials - quite an odd request, I thought - those marking the silence were to stand outside, in the street at noon. It was a weird spectacle, possibly even more so than how the street looked on 7/7; all the office towers disgorged their workers at once and the street was absolutely packed. There were thousands of us and, except for the hum of air conditioning machinery, there was no sound or movement at all.
A little while later, I wandered down to a coffee shop near London Bridge and met my dad. We did some general catching up on family matters, our 7/7 experiences, etc. and made plans for this coming weekend, when I’ll be staying over at the family homestead for a couple of nights with Y. My grandmother’s feeling better now, although she still has mood swings and stuff as the hospital ween her off the medication she was on following the heart attack. She’s not all that mobile for now, and is probably getting fed up with not being able to leave the house.
In the evening, I’d planned to leave the office on time, rush home and get changed before the gig but a huge pile of work on my desk said otherwise and I was forced to stay in London and keep myself amused - mainly with finishing off office tasks and writing six hundred more words of my novel - until eight, when I met with random_goth, Mary and ms_fashtali at The Intrepid Fox. I bumped into my old friend Richard W there as well, who’d come up into central London to be in Trafalgar Square for the two minute silence and speeches. He told me that the whole thing had turned into a bit of a circus though, with pointless celebrities clamouring to get in front of a TV camera and condemn the bombings in media-friendly soundbites, so perhaps it’s just as well I missed all that. Y later joined us and we all headed on to Madame JoJo’s for the gig.
The compere announced that one of the bands, Brainhole, would not be appearing because the singer looked a bit like Osama Bin Laden and had been arrested earlier that evening by anti-terror police. We weren’t sure whether that was a joke or not, but Kreuzdammer - or “Christ-rammer,” as I think I heard them introduced - came on stage first and we all rushed to the front to show our support. I wore my Robospex™, as per the pact I made with Dave C last weekend, but Y had forgotten to bring hers and I was dismayed to see Dave turn up in front of the mike without his either, leaving me to look like an utter berk. Apparently Graham (the bassist and a former member of Cubanate) had vetoed the idea because he was afraid they’d make the band look silly. I persisted with wearing them, in the hope that Dave would change his mind, but alas, onlookers probably thought I weas wearing them because I had a medical problem with being near strobe lights or something.
I continued to get drunk as the evening wore on, met and chatted with devalmont for the first time and learned that the members of Brainhole had indeed been detained under the Terrorism Act, apparently because they were spotted driving into London in a white Transit van filled with cases of equipment and all had long, black beards. Do I launch into a tirade now about the mentality of our country and its authorities at this moment in time?* (shrug)
Rico began their set quite late and we had to leave at about midnight, having not heard him play any songs which I actually recognised from the Sanctuary Medicines album. He was quite good, but more guitar-based than I’d been expecting and I suppose I’d really been in the mood for hearing more bleepy stuff. We arrived home at about half past one and I’m sitting here at work now with an ominous can of Red Bull upon my desk. Oh well, it was worth it.
Finally: Oh my God, I've just noticed that this is my 300th post. My life must be so pathetic. Sobering words from CNN.com
* On the other hand, they could have made that story up to sound interesting, when in reality they just had a flat tyre or something. I suppose I'll never know.
A little while later, I wandered down to a coffee shop near London Bridge and met my dad. We did some general catching up on family matters, our 7/7 experiences, etc. and made plans for this coming weekend, when I’ll be staying over at the family homestead for a couple of nights with Y. My grandmother’s feeling better now, although she still has mood swings and stuff as the hospital ween her off the medication she was on following the heart attack. She’s not all that mobile for now, and is probably getting fed up with not being able to leave the house.
In the evening, I’d planned to leave the office on time, rush home and get changed before the gig but a huge pile of work on my desk said otherwise and I was forced to stay in London and keep myself amused - mainly with finishing off office tasks and writing six hundred more words of my novel - until eight, when I met with random_goth, Mary and ms_fashtali at The Intrepid Fox. I bumped into my old friend Richard W there as well, who’d come up into central London to be in Trafalgar Square for the two minute silence and speeches. He told me that the whole thing had turned into a bit of a circus though, with pointless celebrities clamouring to get in front of a TV camera and condemn the bombings in media-friendly soundbites, so perhaps it’s just as well I missed all that. Y later joined us and we all headed on to Madame JoJo’s for the gig.
The compere announced that one of the bands, Brainhole, would not be appearing because the singer looked a bit like Osama Bin Laden and had been arrested earlier that evening by anti-terror police. We weren’t sure whether that was a joke or not, but Kreuzdammer - or “Christ-rammer,” as I think I heard them introduced - came on stage first and we all rushed to the front to show our support. I wore my Robospex™, as per the pact I made with Dave C last weekend, but Y had forgotten to bring hers and I was dismayed to see Dave turn up in front of the mike without his either, leaving me to look like an utter berk. Apparently Graham (the bassist and a former member of Cubanate) had vetoed the idea because he was afraid they’d make the band look silly. I persisted with wearing them, in the hope that Dave would change his mind, but alas, onlookers probably thought I weas wearing them because I had a medical problem with being near strobe lights or something.
I continued to get drunk as the evening wore on, met and chatted with devalmont for the first time and learned that the members of Brainhole had indeed been detained under the Terrorism Act, apparently because they were spotted driving into London in a white Transit van filled with cases of equipment and all had long, black beards. Do I launch into a tirade now about the mentality of our country and its authorities at this moment in time?* (shrug)
Rico began their set quite late and we had to leave at about midnight, having not heard him play any songs which I actually recognised from the Sanctuary Medicines album. He was quite good, but more guitar-based than I’d been expecting and I suppose I’d really been in the mood for hearing more bleepy stuff. We arrived home at about half past one and I’m sitting here at work now with an ominous can of Red Bull upon my desk. Oh well, it was worth it.
Finally: Oh my God, I've just noticed that this is my 300th post. My life must be so pathetic. Sobering words from CNN.com
* On the other hand, they could have made that story up to sound interesting, when in reality they just had a flat tyre or something. I suppose I'll never know.