Who needs sleep anyway...

So. It's been another week, and I've been a bit slow on the posting front due to various distractions such as writing essays about Gertrude Stein (so if I start endlessly repeating myself you might know why) eating a lot of food and being very tired. However, I promised I'd get some photos up tonight, so you'll get some rather tired and rambling commentary to go with them. A number of random events have occured during the last seven days, the most exciting and least exciting of which were probably Regina Spektor and Staten Island respectively. Well, there have probably been some less exciting things than Staten Island, but it really was pretty dull. We (being Ed, Roshni and I who are such a cool trio we should probably have a collective title) decided to go on a random trip out there this weekend and it turns out that of an evening, there really aint much to do apart from ride the free ferry and look back atManhattan. We did go into (but not eat at) a Taco Bell, and I personally discovered a really bizzare open gallery playing dodgy Jazz with some photos that looked like they'd been half heartedly distorted on Photoshop. The rest of the time was spent riding a bus from one end of the island to the other, and then going home. Regina however, was absolutely spectacular - as expected. She played almost all of my favourite songs, including 'poor little rich boy', which involves her playing a chair with a drumstick with one hand and the piano with the other, awesome. She really is even better live, which I wasn't expecting - I can't wait to go see her again sometime.

Hanging out in central park, ho ho. By the way, I made all those jokes about getting fat out here while eating American sized portions – look at that roll of flab dangling out the back of my pants! Shocking, I might actually have to start walking around places and not eating pizza every single day. Bleugh.


I love Central Park. I love Roshni. I love the fact that its October and its still HOT here. Seriously guys, mid 20s today and humid, I was walking around in a vest top. Crazy. Although now it's chucking it down, London stylee.

"I said WAIT! When I say WAIT, YOU WAIT!" (In dodgy accent)

The stage at our local (well Chealsea which is pretty much local) free comedy club - The Upright Citizens Brigade - on a Sunday night, where we get to see lots of improv from comedians I'm reliably informed are from really famous stuff like Saturday Night Live. All I know is it's damned funny.

Italian street fair thing. Largely composed of stalls selling food, alcohol or dodgy t-shirts, but still a nice enough distraction.

Pretty sure Dad and Billie came back from New York with a photo of this place. It's not that big a town after all...

I asked for it. Really, I did.


OK so it’s late, we’ve just arrived in DC after a 5 hour coach journey and we’ve got a pretty long walk to our hotel. And then we get attacked by a giant mutant puppy! Well, it turned out to just be a poster, but still, pretty damn scary if you ask me.


Sitting by the reflecting pool in DC getting trying to figure out how best to be touristy, when I was suddenly attacked by a breeze with comic timing.

Ooooh. Pretty flowers.

The terrible triumvirate take on DC. We're a bit like our own UN I think. But cooler.

Monuments. Lots of em.


So many, in fact, that a bit of creative photography was called for.

OK, prepare yourselves for a rant. This WWII memorial really pissed me off. Maybe I'm missing something. Maybe I'm part of a generation so far removed from actual war and the genuine threat upon my own way of life that I just can't understand this. But this kind of thing really angers me. Memorials should be about remembering the dead and honouring the people who chose to give their lives - which is something I am prepared to do. I am not, on the other hand, prepared to accept a statement like this. If you can't read the photo, it goes like this: "We are determined the before the sun sets on this terrible struggle our flag will be recognized throughout the world as a symbol of freedom on the one hand and of overwhelming force on the other." Surely the point was not to become known as an "overwhelming force", and the reference to the American flag as a "symbol of freedom" is so loaded with irony now it's practically a joke. There are signs all over the US announcing support for the American troops (or even "God bless our troops" which really messes with my head) and maybe it's a British thing, but I just wouldn't feel comfortable with it at home. And another point, all the dates on this war memorial are 1941 - 1945. I'm sorry, but the fact that the Yanks were late does not alter the date on which the Second World War started. Sort it out. Rant over.

Pretty memorials that I do not currently feel the need to rant about. Ahem.

Subways in DC are nice. Roomy, air-conditioned, with funky tunnels and great lighting. Doesn’t mean I love the Tube any less of course. Interestingly, I’ve discovered that I don’t actually say Tube. I say Tchube. Funny the things you notice when trying to explain pronunciation to Americans. Less funny: the fact that every American’s imitation of a British accent sounds like Dick Van Dyke in Mary Poppins. Seriously.

Roshni and I spent a good 15 minutes in hysterics after watching rubbish TV in our hotel room – nothing was on but bloody Oprah. When we asked Ed why she was on 24 hrs a day, he replied “There are only 24 hrs. If there were 28 she’d be on that many too”. Maybe you had to be there, but we laughed until I was in serious pain.

A squirrel we befriended. He took a piece of cookie right out of my hand. I don’t care what anyone says, squirrels are damned cute. Foamy might get mad at that though.
http://www.illwillpress.com/ I really do love Foamy.

So Dad, here’s one for you. Jim Lambie has been quietly stalking you and I for some years now, and I realised this while at the Hirshhorn gallery in DC. Which was very nice by the way. So you may remember we watched a documentary about him making his crazy stripey floors, and then putting sculptures on top of spray cans – was he a Turner Prize entry or something? Any way, he had a stripey floor sculpture thing on in DC and while glancing through the associated leaflet I realised we’d seen his stuff before – way back when at the Oxford Modern Art, he did the long black and white striped floor that made us go all dizzy, and the blue painted mattress throw up on the wall. Well yeah, there you go. He’s definitely stalking us. Well, me anyway. I felt all cultured actually recognising an artist, although I did initially claim it was a woman - there goes all my looking knowledgeable.

Ed being a cool dude. He then proceeded to skid about the floor of gallery in his sandals. Hetti is hiding in the background. Travelling with a rubber chicked certainly makes life more interesting.

A really lovely park in DC, which would have had an amazing view of Capitol Hill and the monuments had that rather ugly apartment block not got in the way.

Well that's all for just now folks. It's 2:58 am and I've got my ever thrilling linguistics class at 9:45. For an advanced linguistics class, its pretty basic. There was a 20 minute discussion last week about whether everywhere and nowhere were synonyms or antonyms. Which sounds intersting, but try discussing it for 20 minutes - after 5, it's very difficult to care. Especially when the next 20 minute discussion is on the defining characteristics of a chair. Really, it just isn't that exciting. Pragmatism, on the other hand, is easily my favourite class even if writing essays on Gertrude Stein is rather painful. This week we're reading Sherwood Anderson's 'Winesburg, Ohio' and it actually looks like fun after 'Melanctha'. Enough nonsensical ramblings - more from me soon, I've got a 5 day weekend coming up and Jen of Alaska is coming to stay, woohoo!

P.S. All photos were shamelessly stolen from the camera of Edward Alonzo, which is why the photography is remarkably better than usual. Ta very much Ed.