Finally the move ends. I can now reveal that, contrary to the delusions of The Lovely Jo's work colleague (fule!), there is no more space inside a VW Passat than there is inside a Fiat Punto. It's not even a bloody hatchback. So we ended up getting a taxi-van to move the mattress anyway, and pointlessly nursing an office pool car for the weekend. If by some miracle you end up reading this, office-person (and you know who you are), I hereby dub you a tool of the first water.
Yet all was done by 3pm today, as planned (although I think we'd envisaged getting all the stuff out sooner and having longer to do the cleaning). What follows now is a few busy weekends in March, and the Long Unpacking wherein we try to find places to put all the stuff that's currently still in boxes. The attic springs immediately to mind.
Most brilliant, brilliant thing seen this weekend:
Look, filmmaker Michel Gondry (director of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and, imminently, his own The Science of Sleep) can solve a Rubik's Cube with his feet!
Confused? Here's how he did it.
Disappointed? Don't be - because now he'll solve a Rubik's Cube with his nose!
Sunday, February 25, 2007
Thursday, February 22, 2007
About Time
The Lovely Jo's default comfort reading (pulled off the shelf during, for example, upheavals of the moving flat variety) is epic fantasy by the likes of Gemmell and Eddings. Mine seems to be reference books, particularly about Doctor Who - I've certainly browsed a few lately.
I've just this month started on what looks to be the ultimate Who reference work – About Time (Miles and Wood, Mad Norwegian Press, six volumes with five currently out and vol 6 to cover 1985-89 plus TV movie, due later this year). In their wisdom, the authors have written the volumes in the order 3, 4, 5, 1, 2, and imminently 6. I started with vol 3, it being the slimmest/cheapest/most immediately available from *m*z*n, but have now acquired vol 1 (reading) and vol 2 (waiting on the shelf).
It's indescribably addictive. It’s like the two or three perfunctory lines of "Roots" for each story in The Discontinuity Guide expanded to page after page of informative essay. I've never before seen a programme guide that analysed Who stories in terms of the political atmosphere at the time, what major events were happening, what the nation's mindset was, etc. It comes across as nothing less than an attempt to document all of British culture using Who as a pretext. Typical allotment per story in yer average programme guide – about a page and a half, and that includes half a page of production notes. Typical allotment per story here – about ten pages. I may never need another programme guide again.
Reading the first volume of this epic work (1963-66, 300-ish pages – woof), I've been struck by a realisation. Who fans, in the main, tend to use the word "classic" (by which we here mean "typical") to refer to stories with a Monster-Of-The-Week, running up and down corridors, capture/recapture (not an issue with the new, faster Who) and the Doctor solving everything by being heroic and/or a know-all. Tom Baker's stories particularly tend to do this, and so I shall dub this the Tom Baker Model. Yet as the very detailed analysis of About Time makes clear, the show was originally meant to be (and was, for a few years at least) experimental, character-driven and as unlike anything else on TV as possible, and not straightforward Monster-Of-The-Week action at all (early indications are that Terry "Daleks" Nation is mostly to blame for the later shift in emphasis). And this sheds light on why I like the Who stories that I like (mostly those thought of as "oddball") and couldn’t give a monkey's about boring old Genesis of the Daleks, which keeps topping fan polls. I've somehow latched onto this idea of experimental, different TV and somehow haven't been seduced by the simple pleasures of the monster runabout. It turns out I'm watching "classic" Who after all, but it's this other kind of "classic" Who – the Experimental Model rather than the Tom Baker Model.
I mean, don't get me wrong, I like a bit of Tom Baker Model as well, but it has to have something else to recommend it (favourites include The Robots of Death, which has beautiful design and surprisingly good sets and model work; The Talons of Weng-Chiang, which has a living ventriloquist's doll and comedy double-acts; and The Sea Devils, which has the most extraordinary incidental music of any Who story). But the majority of my Who favourites have no monster at all or a decidedly unconventional monster (The Mind Robber, Warriors' Gate, Kinda, The Greatest Show in the Galaxy) or have monsters that were admittedly (and obviously) added in despite the story, because the producer thought the show needed monsters (Inferno, Ghost Light).
And this sheds light on my preferences in the new series as well. Father's Day is clearly Experimental Model (character-driven, monsters added in just to satisfy perceived need for a monster). The Girl in the Fireplace is Experimental Model with very big knobs on. School Reunion doesn't quite do it for me because underneath the nice script it's a conventional runaround with monsters and corridors, and - probably the most Tom Baker Model thing any Who story could ever have - the guest appearance of Sarah Jane Smith. Mark Gatiss' stories are actually wilfully trying to be Tom Baker Model, because that's what Mark Gatiss thinks "classic" Who is. He tried to mask it in The Idiot's Lantern with a stolen bit of Sapphire & Steel imagery, but the graft wasn't entirely successful. Love & Monsters is Experimental Model, but so unlike not only other TV but all other DW as well, that many fans either love it or hate it. I liked Bad Wolf (Experimental, and parodies other TV to boot) slightly more than The Parting of the Ways (moderately Tom Baker, but crucially turns Experimental when the Doctor sends his companion home just before the gripping finale, so that she can sit in a greasy-spoon caff and agonise about missing the gripping finale before using a tow truck to make her return).
What it comes down to, I think, is how easy or difficult the story is to explain. City of Death is hard to explain – it's a kind of romantic, light-hearted French detective film with time travel and an urbane villain who also happens to be an alien who exists in several historical periods at once. The Happiness Patrol is hard to explain – it's an allegory of some sort in which emotional states are elevated to the level of political ideology and enforced by a leader with a pastel-coloured death squad and a chief executioner made out of sweets. Genesis of the Daleks is very easy to explain – it's a Dalek story. It's a war-in-space good-vs-evil story with Daleks in it. There are many such, and they're rarely very complex.
Disclaimer: The above is an over-simplification. I don't automatically like all Experimental Model stories – it's possible for experimental stories to be crap on their own terms (Paradise Towers springs to mind, and I wouldn't want to watch The Web Planet again while sober). The above also doesn't stop Tom Baker from being technically – technically – the best old-series Doctor.
I've just this month started on what looks to be the ultimate Who reference work – About Time (Miles and Wood, Mad Norwegian Press, six volumes with five currently out and vol 6 to cover 1985-89 plus TV movie, due later this year). In their wisdom, the authors have written the volumes in the order 3, 4, 5, 1, 2, and imminently 6. I started with vol 3, it being the slimmest/cheapest/most immediately available from *m*z*n, but have now acquired vol 1 (reading) and vol 2 (waiting on the shelf).
It's indescribably addictive. It’s like the two or three perfunctory lines of "Roots" for each story in The Discontinuity Guide expanded to page after page of informative essay. I've never before seen a programme guide that analysed Who stories in terms of the political atmosphere at the time, what major events were happening, what the nation's mindset was, etc. It comes across as nothing less than an attempt to document all of British culture using Who as a pretext. Typical allotment per story in yer average programme guide – about a page and a half, and that includes half a page of production notes. Typical allotment per story here – about ten pages. I may never need another programme guide again.
Reading the first volume of this epic work (1963-66, 300-ish pages – woof), I've been struck by a realisation. Who fans, in the main, tend to use the word "classic" (by which we here mean "typical") to refer to stories with a Monster-Of-The-Week, running up and down corridors, capture/recapture (not an issue with the new, faster Who) and the Doctor solving everything by being heroic and/or a know-all. Tom Baker's stories particularly tend to do this, and so I shall dub this the Tom Baker Model. Yet as the very detailed analysis of About Time makes clear, the show was originally meant to be (and was, for a few years at least) experimental, character-driven and as unlike anything else on TV as possible, and not straightforward Monster-Of-The-Week action at all (early indications are that Terry "Daleks" Nation is mostly to blame for the later shift in emphasis). And this sheds light on why I like the Who stories that I like (mostly those thought of as "oddball") and couldn’t give a monkey's about boring old Genesis of the Daleks, which keeps topping fan polls. I've somehow latched onto this idea of experimental, different TV and somehow haven't been seduced by the simple pleasures of the monster runabout. It turns out I'm watching "classic" Who after all, but it's this other kind of "classic" Who – the Experimental Model rather than the Tom Baker Model.
I mean, don't get me wrong, I like a bit of Tom Baker Model as well, but it has to have something else to recommend it (favourites include The Robots of Death, which has beautiful design and surprisingly good sets and model work; The Talons of Weng-Chiang, which has a living ventriloquist's doll and comedy double-acts; and The Sea Devils, which has the most extraordinary incidental music of any Who story). But the majority of my Who favourites have no monster at all or a decidedly unconventional monster (The Mind Robber, Warriors' Gate, Kinda, The Greatest Show in the Galaxy) or have monsters that were admittedly (and obviously) added in despite the story, because the producer thought the show needed monsters (Inferno, Ghost Light).
And this sheds light on my preferences in the new series as well. Father's Day is clearly Experimental Model (character-driven, monsters added in just to satisfy perceived need for a monster). The Girl in the Fireplace is Experimental Model with very big knobs on. School Reunion doesn't quite do it for me because underneath the nice script it's a conventional runaround with monsters and corridors, and - probably the most Tom Baker Model thing any Who story could ever have - the guest appearance of Sarah Jane Smith. Mark Gatiss' stories are actually wilfully trying to be Tom Baker Model, because that's what Mark Gatiss thinks "classic" Who is. He tried to mask it in The Idiot's Lantern with a stolen bit of Sapphire & Steel imagery, but the graft wasn't entirely successful. Love & Monsters is Experimental Model, but so unlike not only other TV but all other DW as well, that many fans either love it or hate it. I liked Bad Wolf (Experimental, and parodies other TV to boot) slightly more than The Parting of the Ways (moderately Tom Baker, but crucially turns Experimental when the Doctor sends his companion home just before the gripping finale, so that she can sit in a greasy-spoon caff and agonise about missing the gripping finale before using a tow truck to make her return).
What it comes down to, I think, is how easy or difficult the story is to explain. City of Death is hard to explain – it's a kind of romantic, light-hearted French detective film with time travel and an urbane villain who also happens to be an alien who exists in several historical periods at once. The Happiness Patrol is hard to explain – it's an allegory of some sort in which emotional states are elevated to the level of political ideology and enforced by a leader with a pastel-coloured death squad and a chief executioner made out of sweets. Genesis of the Daleks is very easy to explain – it's a Dalek story. It's a war-in-space good-vs-evil story with Daleks in it. There are many such, and they're rarely very complex.
Disclaimer: The above is an over-simplification. I don't automatically like all Experimental Model stories – it's possible for experimental stories to be crap on their own terms (Paradise Towers springs to mind, and I wouldn't want to watch The Web Planet again while sober). The above also doesn't stop Tom Baker from being technically – technically – the best old-series Doctor.
The Move Continues... And Continues...
I love my Fiat Punto – it's the Little Car That Could. It transported the double bed (dismantled). It transported two chests of drawers (whole). It transported our six bookcases of various sizes, in various states of dismantlement. In fact, there's only one thing it hasn't been able to carry from our old flat to our new flat – the mattress. You just can't get a double mattress into a Punto. And so it is that we kip on the fold-out futon, hoping that tomorrow we will get the use of an office pool car big enough to shift the mattress across. We're in trouble if we don't.
Pretty much everything else has been taken care of now – there's just a final sort-through of odd bits, a cleaning session, and by next week we should be done with the old flat pending some new tenants moving in. Not much sign of movement from the estate agents there. By overlapping the rent and spreading the move out like this, we have, as planned, managed to move flat without taking the week off work or suspending our social life. All of this is good, but slightly offset by the cost of renting two flats at once. It's still probably less stressful than the previous method of trying to do everything in one day, though.
And so, in the name of having a social life while moving flat, we've seen Hot Fuzz, a film which was so excellent that I can't think of anything to say about it. Apart from it being excellent, of course.
Pretty much everything else has been taken care of now – there's just a final sort-through of odd bits, a cleaning session, and by next week we should be done with the old flat pending some new tenants moving in. Not much sign of movement from the estate agents there. By overlapping the rent and spreading the move out like this, we have, as planned, managed to move flat without taking the week off work or suspending our social life. All of this is good, but slightly offset by the cost of renting two flats at once. It's still probably less stressful than the previous method of trying to do everything in one day, though.
And so, in the name of having a social life while moving flat, we've seen Hot Fuzz, a film which was so excellent that I can't think of anything to say about it. Apart from it being excellent, of course.
Sunday, February 11, 2007
The Move Has Begun
This is, in fact, the last hurrah of broadband at the old flat, since they're meant to be turning it off tomorrow. No broadband at the new flat until Friday - yikes! It'll be a bit of a giveaway if I blog again between now and then that I'm sneaking it in at the office...
1. Moving is like metamorphosis. We always seem to leave some part of our worldly presence behind us, and no, I'm not talking about poetic, metaphysical, slightly pretentious stuff here, I'm talking about genuine physical detritus. It does feel a bit like shedding a skin or a cocoon to leave some familiar thing behind in a move. I'm still not 100% certain that we left anything behind in the first Bristol flat, but without a stepladder that day we could easily have missed something in the attic.
The second flat saw a lengthy period of consolidation, i.e. More Stuff, so in the mad panic of trying to get everything out and clean that flat before the estate agent's office closed we left quite a few things behind (in our generosity) for the benefit of future tenants, not least Jo's old stereo. But it was a very old stereo, and we have a nicer one now - that's my excuse. It was one of those items that just wouldn't fit into the car, which at 5.30pm that day was stuffed like an automotive Mr Creosote.
By then we'd also gained three bookcases, including a Very Big Bookcase. Alas, the Very Big Bookcase has fallen in this move - mould claimed the back panel somehow, possibly during the last move, and was starting to take one of the side planks. Amazingly lucky for us that it a) hadn't broken through to the books, and b) hadn't crossed to the wall behind. So with none of the due ceremony, the Very Big Bookcase was jumped on by me until broken into manageable lengths, and thrown onto the tip. Eh well. Very Big Bookcases are all well and good, but a bugger to move between flats in a small car. This weekend therefore also saw a visit to...
2. Ikea. Dante's Mall. I don't think I've ever seen a plain, simple catalogue for Ikea - do they exist? As I wander around the seventh circle of show "rooms", I find myself jotting down not only the warehouse references for the bookcases I see, but brief field notes too, so that if something similar should catch my eye later on I won't have to go all the way back again to compare. It doesn't work, of course.
(It's turning into a bit of a guilty pleasure, though. The obvious good reason for using Ikea is that you, muggins, take the flat-packed goodies away yourself, whereas with Argos et al you have to agree to be indoors all day when they claim they'll deliver your big, heavy bookcase. Will they, my arse. The less obvious, less good reason is that now I've done it more than once, it's becoming more familiar - I'm starting to build a rapport with the building. The first visit was complete sensory overload, and I think I spent ten minutes just staring at a twenty-foot-high wall with sofas bolted onto it all the way up, muttering to myself. Today was a much more clinical affair.)
And then, of course, "Bargain Corner". The torture here being that all the discounted items (or what Ikea laughingly call "discounted") are already built, so unless you're an opportunist with a van already waiting in the car park, I don't imagine they'll be of much use to you. I still wander by to laugh at the prices. Ha, paid that for my new bookcase. Wait a minute - is my bookcase rubbish, or was that bookcase overpriced...?
(Fresh horror creeping in now as I realise I'm a fanzine writer blogging about Ikea. Oh, dammit. The virus is catching.)
3. Oops, I did it again, I got up at six, to watch Doctor Who, etc etc. This would have been the antepenultimate hurrah of broadband at the old flat. This week's obscenely early viewing was another Pertwee that I hadn't seen before but wanted to, and this time it wasn't one that was already available for hire on DVD. It was...
The Mind of Evil. Very good - I'd give that a High Good, in fact, just on the border of the DVD wishlist. Slightly marred by the nonsensical ending, in which the threat of a nuclear-powered missile with a nerve gas warhead is neutralised by... blowing it up. Plus the very, very ending - "Oh, Doctor? Phone call for you. It's the Master. He says, 'Ha ha ha'." All in all, though, good solid fare.
(And hey, the Master does listen to King Crimson! Sadly, one of the dull and indistinguishable bits from their second or third album (I think), neither of which I have any more on account of them being dull and indistinguishable. I was really hoping for "Easy Money", perhaps while the Master cruised along in his limo and chomped a fat cigar, but the story was two years too early for that one.)
On balance, though, I'm not sure any TV show really deserves to get me out of bed at the weekend as early as 6am - certainly not a weekend as busy as this one - so I may not oops, do it again. But we'll see.
4. Primeval. Well, that wasn't too bad, despite the early reports. Admittedly I was shredding old bank statements during most of the first half, and so may have missed vital gaffes, but it didn't look at all bad. Fairly transparently a knock-off of Torchwood, even down to the directing (as The Lovely Jo was quick to point out), but without endless gratuitous shootin' 'n' shaggin' this felt better than Torchwood. In fact, what with this and Dancing on Ice we spent most of Saturday evening watching ITV. Shocker. That must be the first time that's happened. I think we know which channel we'll be watching when the Who starts up again, though.
1. Moving is like metamorphosis. We always seem to leave some part of our worldly presence behind us, and no, I'm not talking about poetic, metaphysical, slightly pretentious stuff here, I'm talking about genuine physical detritus. It does feel a bit like shedding a skin or a cocoon to leave some familiar thing behind in a move. I'm still not 100% certain that we left anything behind in the first Bristol flat, but without a stepladder that day we could easily have missed something in the attic.
The second flat saw a lengthy period of consolidation, i.e. More Stuff, so in the mad panic of trying to get everything out and clean that flat before the estate agent's office closed we left quite a few things behind (in our generosity) for the benefit of future tenants, not least Jo's old stereo. But it was a very old stereo, and we have a nicer one now - that's my excuse. It was one of those items that just wouldn't fit into the car, which at 5.30pm that day was stuffed like an automotive Mr Creosote.
By then we'd also gained three bookcases, including a Very Big Bookcase. Alas, the Very Big Bookcase has fallen in this move - mould claimed the back panel somehow, possibly during the last move, and was starting to take one of the side planks. Amazingly lucky for us that it a) hadn't broken through to the books, and b) hadn't crossed to the wall behind. So with none of the due ceremony, the Very Big Bookcase was jumped on by me until broken into manageable lengths, and thrown onto the tip. Eh well. Very Big Bookcases are all well and good, but a bugger to move between flats in a small car. This weekend therefore also saw a visit to...
2. Ikea. Dante's Mall. I don't think I've ever seen a plain, simple catalogue for Ikea - do they exist? As I wander around the seventh circle of show "rooms", I find myself jotting down not only the warehouse references for the bookcases I see, but brief field notes too, so that if something similar should catch my eye later on I won't have to go all the way back again to compare. It doesn't work, of course.
(It's turning into a bit of a guilty pleasure, though. The obvious good reason for using Ikea is that you, muggins, take the flat-packed goodies away yourself, whereas with Argos et al you have to agree to be indoors all day when they claim they'll deliver your big, heavy bookcase. Will they, my arse. The less obvious, less good reason is that now I've done it more than once, it's becoming more familiar - I'm starting to build a rapport with the building. The first visit was complete sensory overload, and I think I spent ten minutes just staring at a twenty-foot-high wall with sofas bolted onto it all the way up, muttering to myself. Today was a much more clinical affair.)
And then, of course, "Bargain Corner". The torture here being that all the discounted items (or what Ikea laughingly call "discounted") are already built, so unless you're an opportunist with a van already waiting in the car park, I don't imagine they'll be of much use to you. I still wander by to laugh at the prices. Ha, paid that for my new bookcase. Wait a minute - is my bookcase rubbish, or was that bookcase overpriced...?
(Fresh horror creeping in now as I realise I'm a fanzine writer blogging about Ikea. Oh, dammit. The virus is catching.)
3. Oops, I did it again, I got up at six, to watch Doctor Who, etc etc. This would have been the antepenultimate hurrah of broadband at the old flat. This week's obscenely early viewing was another Pertwee that I hadn't seen before but wanted to, and this time it wasn't one that was already available for hire on DVD. It was...
The Mind of Evil. Very good - I'd give that a High Good, in fact, just on the border of the DVD wishlist. Slightly marred by the nonsensical ending, in which the threat of a nuclear-powered missile with a nerve gas warhead is neutralised by... blowing it up. Plus the very, very ending - "Oh, Doctor? Phone call for you. It's the Master. He says, 'Ha ha ha'." All in all, though, good solid fare.
(And hey, the Master does listen to King Crimson! Sadly, one of the dull and indistinguishable bits from their second or third album (I think), neither of which I have any more on account of them being dull and indistinguishable. I was really hoping for "Easy Money", perhaps while the Master cruised along in his limo and chomped a fat cigar, but the story was two years too early for that one.)
On balance, though, I'm not sure any TV show really deserves to get me out of bed at the weekend as early as 6am - certainly not a weekend as busy as this one - so I may not oops, do it again. But we'll see.
4. Primeval. Well, that wasn't too bad, despite the early reports. Admittedly I was shredding old bank statements during most of the first half, and so may have missed vital gaffes, but it didn't look at all bad. Fairly transparently a knock-off of Torchwood, even down to the directing (as The Lovely Jo was quick to point out), but without endless gratuitous shootin' 'n' shaggin' this felt better than Torchwood. In fact, what with this and Dancing on Ice we spent most of Saturday evening watching ITV. Shocker. That must be the first time that's happened. I think we know which channel we'll be watching when the Who starts up again, though.
Friday, February 09, 2007
Urbs Ubiquis
Keen students of cryptopolitology will know of the so-called "Fast Cities", places like fluvial Ambulatia and Velocester, which currently holds the urban speed record. But the fastest city ever to have existed is Urbs Ubiquis.
It began as New Exeter, founded on America's east coast by a breakaway group of Mayflower Pilgrims in 1621. The schism between the main, Puritan colonial party and the more liberal splinter group was a bitter one, and out of shame and resentment the governor of New Plymouth later claimed that the New Exonians had never left, but died from an outbreak of scurvy in the colony's first winter.
As for the New Exonians, their anticipation at leaving England behind, compounded by their desire to get away from their fellow Pilgrims, was so strong that the city itself began to migrate towards the north-west. The movement was at first measured in inches, but the city accelerated at what appears from surviving records to have been an exponential rate. This uncanny movement exacerbated the rift between the citizens and their superstitious countrymen, but doesn't seem to have bothered the Native Americans, who were happy to trade with the "running city". Over the course of three years or so, the citizens took on food crops, livestock and fresh citizenry from their neighbours, initially the Wampanoag and later the Pequot. In 1624 New Exeter's population topped 1,000. By this time its speed was such that it could only be approached on horseback, or head-on, although the head-on approach was considered inadvisable.
The city's exact route after this time is unknown, as it sped out of Pequot territory and into America's unoccupied heartland. Many small towns today claim that their valley, or that strip where the grass just won't grow, was scorched by the city as it blazed its trail north-west, but after more than 300 years of colonisation, civil war, expansion and development it's impossible to be certain. What is known is that before it reached the foothills of the Rocky Mountains (and who knows which might have done more damage to the other?), New Exeter's speed went right off the scale, and it hurtled out of topological reality altogether.
It was after this time that the citizens renamed New Exeter "Urbs Ubiquis", as they came to understand that their city was now... everywhere. (Most recently, the younger generation have taken to calling it "Zen".) Spread so thinly, however, Urbs Ubiquis and its inhabitants are not quite as solid as they once were.
Ubiquis's towers and minarets can be seen out of the corner of your eye, in some fortuitous juxtaposition of your own city's buildings perhaps, or by some trick of the light shining off glass or metal. When you glimpse for a second a human face in the fire, or in the pattern of your wallpaper, or in the branches of the tree outside your window, you glimpse the people of Ubiquis about their daily business. It is possible to love an Ubiquinian, or to be loved by one, in the half-felt breath of a warm breeze on your neck, the half-felt caress of your clothes pressing against your ribs. It is possible to hear their voices breaking through on talk radio. It may be that Dali's "Spain", "Invisible Man" and other similar portraits were occasioned by visits from Ubiquinians.
It began as New Exeter, founded on America's east coast by a breakaway group of Mayflower Pilgrims in 1621. The schism between the main, Puritan colonial party and the more liberal splinter group was a bitter one, and out of shame and resentment the governor of New Plymouth later claimed that the New Exonians had never left, but died from an outbreak of scurvy in the colony's first winter.
As for the New Exonians, their anticipation at leaving England behind, compounded by their desire to get away from their fellow Pilgrims, was so strong that the city itself began to migrate towards the north-west. The movement was at first measured in inches, but the city accelerated at what appears from surviving records to have been an exponential rate. This uncanny movement exacerbated the rift between the citizens and their superstitious countrymen, but doesn't seem to have bothered the Native Americans, who were happy to trade with the "running city". Over the course of three years or so, the citizens took on food crops, livestock and fresh citizenry from their neighbours, initially the Wampanoag and later the Pequot. In 1624 New Exeter's population topped 1,000. By this time its speed was such that it could only be approached on horseback, or head-on, although the head-on approach was considered inadvisable.
The city's exact route after this time is unknown, as it sped out of Pequot territory and into America's unoccupied heartland. Many small towns today claim that their valley, or that strip where the grass just won't grow, was scorched by the city as it blazed its trail north-west, but after more than 300 years of colonisation, civil war, expansion and development it's impossible to be certain. What is known is that before it reached the foothills of the Rocky Mountains (and who knows which might have done more damage to the other?), New Exeter's speed went right off the scale, and it hurtled out of topological reality altogether.
It was after this time that the citizens renamed New Exeter "Urbs Ubiquis", as they came to understand that their city was now... everywhere. (Most recently, the younger generation have taken to calling it "Zen".) Spread so thinly, however, Urbs Ubiquis and its inhabitants are not quite as solid as they once were.
Ubiquis's towers and minarets can be seen out of the corner of your eye, in some fortuitous juxtaposition of your own city's buildings perhaps, or by some trick of the light shining off glass or metal. When you glimpse for a second a human face in the fire, or in the pattern of your wallpaper, or in the branches of the tree outside your window, you glimpse the people of Ubiquis about their daily business. It is possible to love an Ubiquinian, or to be loved by one, in the half-felt breath of a warm breeze on your neck, the half-felt caress of your clothes pressing against your ribs. It is possible to hear their voices breaking through on talk radio. It may be that Dali's "Spain", "Invisible Man" and other similar portraits were occasioned by visits from Ubiquinians.
Muango
Three days with a parang and a native guide got me into the wild heartland of Gabon, in east central Africa. There I found ancient, jungle-clad Muango. Like Angkor-Wat and Teotihuacan, its cyclopean, millenia-old stones bear witness to a once-great civilisation of craftsmen, architects and astronomers. Unlike those other cities, Muango is populated, although its denizens have forgotten all but the legend-echoes of what their ancestors knew.
Like the Dogon people of Mali, who knew of the binary nature of Sirius long before the telescopes were invented that could prove it, the citizens of Muango – the Chimuango – have scientific knowledge woven into the fabric of their religion that was only recently uncovered by Western scientists. The name of their city is, in their language, the word for "door", and it is their belief that Muango was founded on "the door of the world" – the gateway that leads into and out of our universe.
I have seen this gateway with my own eyes, although only the outside may viewed thus. (I speak of "the outside", when I suppose I really mean to say "the inside" – the side that faces into our world. But one may go mad dwelling on such philosophical conundra.) No one, not even from among the Chimuango themselves, is permitted to cross the gateway's threshold and look within. The gateway is a box, a cube perhaps three metres on each side, hewn from stone and covered (or should I say lined?) in gold. The gold is but a veneer, however, for the plating itself is solid lead, moulded with the most astonishing bas-reliefs. Previous visitors to the city hoping to map out what lay beyond the gateway by X-ray came away frustrated, even before the Chimuango got wise to them.
The Chimuango priests say that the Creator-God made the gateway, first arranging the floor, ceiling and three walls around the vast lid that forms the fourth wall. Pulling in the box's edges towards himself, he thus formed a lip upon which the lid would rest, and this done he pushed the lid into place and sealed the world in. The box is, of course, inside-out and so it is that we are all on the inside, the twenty-seven cubic metres enclosed by the box being outside our universe.
Here is the uncanny science at the heart of Muango: not the gateway that the Chimuango guard, but their insistence that no one must look inside it. For Chimuango lore states that the Creator-God and his own world exist in many forms, and that to observe him would force him to restrict himself to one form, a transformation from divine to mundane, an act of deicide. In effect, the ancient religion of Muango anticipates quantum theory, particularly Schrodinger's famous thought experiment. In an age when man has observed the farthest corners of the universe and the innermost recesses of his own small planet, what the Chimuango protect with their black-market Kalashnikovs and their very lives is not a mere stone box, but the last unscrutinised twenty-seven cubic metres in existence.
Like the Dogon people of Mali, who knew of the binary nature of Sirius long before the telescopes were invented that could prove it, the citizens of Muango – the Chimuango – have scientific knowledge woven into the fabric of their religion that was only recently uncovered by Western scientists. The name of their city is, in their language, the word for "door", and it is their belief that Muango was founded on "the door of the world" – the gateway that leads into and out of our universe.
I have seen this gateway with my own eyes, although only the outside may viewed thus. (I speak of "the outside", when I suppose I really mean to say "the inside" – the side that faces into our world. But one may go mad dwelling on such philosophical conundra.) No one, not even from among the Chimuango themselves, is permitted to cross the gateway's threshold and look within. The gateway is a box, a cube perhaps three metres on each side, hewn from stone and covered (or should I say lined?) in gold. The gold is but a veneer, however, for the plating itself is solid lead, moulded with the most astonishing bas-reliefs. Previous visitors to the city hoping to map out what lay beyond the gateway by X-ray came away frustrated, even before the Chimuango got wise to them.
The Chimuango priests say that the Creator-God made the gateway, first arranging the floor, ceiling and three walls around the vast lid that forms the fourth wall. Pulling in the box's edges towards himself, he thus formed a lip upon which the lid would rest, and this done he pushed the lid into place and sealed the world in. The box is, of course, inside-out and so it is that we are all on the inside, the twenty-seven cubic metres enclosed by the box being outside our universe.
Here is the uncanny science at the heart of Muango: not the gateway that the Chimuango guard, but their insistence that no one must look inside it. For Chimuango lore states that the Creator-God and his own world exist in many forms, and that to observe him would force him to restrict himself to one form, a transformation from divine to mundane, an act of deicide. In effect, the ancient religion of Muango anticipates quantum theory, particularly Schrodinger's famous thought experiment. In an age when man has observed the farthest corners of the universe and the innermost recesses of his own small planet, what the Chimuango protect with their black-market Kalashnikovs and their very lives is not a mere stone box, but the last unscrutinised twenty-seven cubic metres in existence.
Cotheca
Cotheca is a city of fanatical collectors. Its citizens are united in the cause of building the ultimate Collection, an exhibition without parallel. It is their aim to preserve for posterity everything human – all human life, all human artefacts, everything made or touched by humans. They envision the world as a museum, and themselves as its curators.
The people of Cotheca are the most pacifist in the world. Since the Collection, encompassing all human life on Earth, must for completeness' sake include the Earth itself (and since no smaller territory would suffice to display all its contents), the Cothecans' ultimate ambition is, admittedly, world domination. Yet they have no intention of taking it by force – they don't want to damage any of the exhibits. And they don't want the exhibits damaging each other, either. Wars, to them, are acts of unimaginable vandalism. Injecting you with embalming fluids is nothing less than a Cothecan's duty as a curator of the Collection, but overpowering and restraining you in order to do it would be like roughing up a Ming vase.
It's therefore very easy to capture any Cothecans who leave the city (but check them carefully for syringes!), and although no tourist has ever returned from Cotheca we know quite a lot about their society. (Cothecans are very happy to discuss their ways with outsiders, hoping no doubt to recruit others to their cause.) They prize individuality highly, since it is each person's uniqueness that justifies his or her inclusion in the Collection. Identical siblings are taboo, and after the firstborn twin or triplet is delivered, the "duplicates" are discarded, unnecessary. There is no question of swapping with hypothetical rival Collections – the Cothecans will not countenance rivals, since this would threaten the Collection's own uniqueness. It is an article of faith that once completed, the human Collection will itself be collected by the curators of some vast interplanetary museum. This at least answers the question of who the Cothecans plan to display their Collection to.
Each Cothecan is expected to live a responsibly healthy life, breed the next generation of curators, perform such curating duties as they can and finally surrender their bodies for cataloguing and archiving. This generally happens in late middle age, while they are still in reasonably good condition. They have enough specimens of old age among the tourists and explorers they've collected. Violent criminals, rare as they are in Cothecan society, are subject to summary preservation and are displayed publically alongside informative descriptions of their acts. When all other specimens have been archived in the Collection, the curators will archive each other – writing up their lives on display cards, assuming dignified postures and being pumped full of embalming fluids. Finally, her work done, the last curator will write out her own card, take a last wistful look at the perfection around her, and commit an act of self-preservation.
The people of Cotheca are the most pacifist in the world. Since the Collection, encompassing all human life on Earth, must for completeness' sake include the Earth itself (and since no smaller territory would suffice to display all its contents), the Cothecans' ultimate ambition is, admittedly, world domination. Yet they have no intention of taking it by force – they don't want to damage any of the exhibits. And they don't want the exhibits damaging each other, either. Wars, to them, are acts of unimaginable vandalism. Injecting you with embalming fluids is nothing less than a Cothecan's duty as a curator of the Collection, but overpowering and restraining you in order to do it would be like roughing up a Ming vase.
It's therefore very easy to capture any Cothecans who leave the city (but check them carefully for syringes!), and although no tourist has ever returned from Cotheca we know quite a lot about their society. (Cothecans are very happy to discuss their ways with outsiders, hoping no doubt to recruit others to their cause.) They prize individuality highly, since it is each person's uniqueness that justifies his or her inclusion in the Collection. Identical siblings are taboo, and after the firstborn twin or triplet is delivered, the "duplicates" are discarded, unnecessary. There is no question of swapping with hypothetical rival Collections – the Cothecans will not countenance rivals, since this would threaten the Collection's own uniqueness. It is an article of faith that once completed, the human Collection will itself be collected by the curators of some vast interplanetary museum. This at least answers the question of who the Cothecans plan to display their Collection to.
Each Cothecan is expected to live a responsibly healthy life, breed the next generation of curators, perform such curating duties as they can and finally surrender their bodies for cataloguing and archiving. This generally happens in late middle age, while they are still in reasonably good condition. They have enough specimens of old age among the tourists and explorers they've collected. Violent criminals, rare as they are in Cothecan society, are subject to summary preservation and are displayed publically alongside informative descriptions of their acts. When all other specimens have been archived in the Collection, the curators will archive each other – writing up their lives on display cards, assuming dignified postures and being pumped full of embalming fluids. Finally, her work done, the last curator will write out her own card, take a last wistful look at the perfection around her, and commit an act of self-preservation.
Invisible Cities
Here's fun! I've stumbled across Blind Atlas, a collection of sketches of odd cities and other places. The next three posts are my bid at getting cities of my own included.
Saturday, February 03, 2007
The Geordie Moths of Interpretative Mime
Well, now Ulrika-ka-ka-ka's been dropped from Dancing on Ice, I don't know who any of the contestants are. That's three out of three for the celebrities I actually recognise being voted off. Anyway.
Come back, Doctor Who!!
The latest DVD rental is black-and-white DW adventure The Web Planet. I had actually had second thoughts about even renting this one after seeing quite a long clip somewhere (probably in a documentary on another DW DVD), but what the hell?
I think approaching this story while slightly drunk and looking for laughs was probably the right decision. Billy Hartnell certainly thought so, if his "happy pills" performance in the first episode is anything to go by. Also starring: the Welsh/Geordie Moths of Interpretative Mime (their accents keep changing, but I think I've got them pinned down to those two), the Zarbi, alien ants who look large, fake and plastic (Jo: "They should have called them the Barbi"), and a race of underground woodlouse-people whose leader speaks with the voice of Ray Ellington. Well, on balance it's better than I expected - I was expecting it to be near unwatchable. It's actually a pretty fair Mid Average, with allowance for low budget. We particularly admired the painted backdrop. Might be jumping the gun a bit, though, as we've only made it through four episodes so far, and the full splendour of Martin Jarvis' moth performance is yet to come.
(Edit: no, it held up well, although the sixth episode is actually an episode of the Tellytubbies in monochrome. I stand by it: The Web Planet was better than Carnival of Monsters. Wotta shocker.)
Also recently rented: Earthshock, yet another '80s Who that really does look better with the CGI effects switched on. I don't know why they should only work with the '80s stories. Perhaps the production crew at the time were trying too hard (and failing) to make the show look like a big-budget film instead of a cosy TV show. Figging awful dialogue though. "It is a word like any other. As is 'destruction'. Which is what we are going to do to that planet." Oh for fig's sake, Saward, just resign now and let Pip and Jane Baker write it!
But wait, yet more Who! For the first time ever I intentionally watched one of UKTV Gold's stupidly early repeats! (Having previously caught the last hour of psychedelic Pertwee escapade The Mutants unexpectedly while kipping at a friend's house in London some years ago.) I'd like to fill in more of the gaps in my Who awareness, but y'know, waking up at 6am at the weekend just doesn't seem right. But what the hell? The really terrible thing is, it's one that I could've rented on DVD if I'd been a little more patient - but it's on the TV, we've got the magic set-top box, it seems a shame not to use it once at least. It was...
Carnival of Monsters. Low Average. Touched by the curse of the Completely Inexpressive Floppy Full-Face Rubber Mask (a curse that has touched at least one other Pertwee story I've seen) - I speak of course of the Functionaries. Not sure why they and their political oppression were included at all (one gets shot for daring to climb some stairs) when the Doctor didn't even notice them, and so their oppression continues. A little bit of world-building, undoubtedly, but wasted on a world solely represented by one plaza, when the main action of the story is happening elsewhere. Lucky they didn't overspend on the masks, then. The Drashigs were pretty good though - as giant screaming flesh-eating sock-puppet caterpillars go, they came across well.
It has been said by others that Katy Manning's acting can curdle milk, and this was beyond all competition her most milk-curdling performance that I've seen - easily on a par with the worst of Bonnie Langford. Most likely thing to deter me from ever watching this story again. My other gripe is that so many Who fans who criticise anything post-Tom Baker claim that the '80s stories are just set pieces cobbled together, yet Carnival of Monsters strikes me as a prime example of just that.
The funny thing is, my opinion of the story was bad at the time of watching, but improved afterwards. I know a lot of Who fans rate it very highly, so there's kind of a sense that I ought to like it (but then I could say the same about Genesis of the Daleks, lord and master of the overrated stories). I chuckled at the first cliffhanger, where a giant hand reaches down and plucks up an obvious model TARDIS, all badly superimposed over the main shot, yet on reflection this became a tremendous post-modern coup in my mind. Actually having someone reach in and adjust the model shots while the Doctor stares aghast - that beats Vengeance on Varos' cliffhanger into a cocked hat! On yet more reflection I'm not sure what to think of it. The Who Fan Code demands that I not laugh at the effects and look at what the story's trying to say - which seems to be "Zoos are bad", and that's about it. No real substance underneath. That's why I've left it at Low Average.
(Edit: Well, there is also the self-referentiality of the Doctor being stuck inside a kind of futuristic telly for the entertainment of naive punters. It's also been pointed out that the outlandish showpeople who own the Miniscope nicely parallel the Doctor and his companion. All of this, I agree, should make me love this story. And yet. I'm used to seeing referential bits like this turn up as bonus moments in DW, but I'm not entirely used to seeing them carry the entire story on their own. Vengeance on Varos offers a critique of the "video nasty" furore, and more broadly of the media's influence on politics and vice versa - it's not just self-referential. Carnival of Monsters looks like it might be nothing but. I'll have to keep trying at it, I think.)
News that actually relates to the real world - the flat move looms on the horizon, and is due to take place over most of the rest of February, starting next weekend.
Funeral of The Lovely Jo's great-grandmother last week. The two surprising things I learned about her: her first name was Marguerita (which initially made me think of Bulgakov, although the second thing I thought of was the alcoholic drink), and she was name-checked in one of Kenneth Horne's sketches. The third surprising thing, which I had already heard from Jo, was that her earliest memory was of being taken up onto the roof to watch the Kaiser's Zeppelins gliding overhead. Beats my donkey ride.
Come back, Doctor Who!!
The latest DVD rental is black-and-white DW adventure The Web Planet. I had actually had second thoughts about even renting this one after seeing quite a long clip somewhere (probably in a documentary on another DW DVD), but what the hell?
I think approaching this story while slightly drunk and looking for laughs was probably the right decision. Billy Hartnell certainly thought so, if his "happy pills" performance in the first episode is anything to go by. Also starring: the Welsh/Geordie Moths of Interpretative Mime (their accents keep changing, but I think I've got them pinned down to those two), the Zarbi, alien ants who look large, fake and plastic (Jo: "They should have called them the Barbi"), and a race of underground woodlouse-people whose leader speaks with the voice of Ray Ellington. Well, on balance it's better than I expected - I was expecting it to be near unwatchable. It's actually a pretty fair Mid Average, with allowance for low budget. We particularly admired the painted backdrop. Might be jumping the gun a bit, though, as we've only made it through four episodes so far, and the full splendour of Martin Jarvis' moth performance is yet to come.
(Edit: no, it held up well, although the sixth episode is actually an episode of the Tellytubbies in monochrome. I stand by it: The Web Planet was better than Carnival of Monsters. Wotta shocker.)
Also recently rented: Earthshock, yet another '80s Who that really does look better with the CGI effects switched on. I don't know why they should only work with the '80s stories. Perhaps the production crew at the time were trying too hard (and failing) to make the show look like a big-budget film instead of a cosy TV show. Figging awful dialogue though. "It is a word like any other. As is 'destruction'. Which is what we are going to do to that planet." Oh for fig's sake, Saward, just resign now and let Pip and Jane Baker write it!
But wait, yet more Who! For the first time ever I intentionally watched one of UKTV Gold's stupidly early repeats! (Having previously caught the last hour of psychedelic Pertwee escapade The Mutants unexpectedly while kipping at a friend's house in London some years ago.) I'd like to fill in more of the gaps in my Who awareness, but y'know, waking up at 6am at the weekend just doesn't seem right. But what the hell? The really terrible thing is, it's one that I could've rented on DVD if I'd been a little more patient - but it's on the TV, we've got the magic set-top box, it seems a shame not to use it once at least. It was...
Carnival of Monsters. Low Average. Touched by the curse of the Completely Inexpressive Floppy Full-Face Rubber Mask (a curse that has touched at least one other Pertwee story I've seen) - I speak of course of the Functionaries. Not sure why they and their political oppression were included at all (one gets shot for daring to climb some stairs) when the Doctor didn't even notice them, and so their oppression continues. A little bit of world-building, undoubtedly, but wasted on a world solely represented by one plaza, when the main action of the story is happening elsewhere. Lucky they didn't overspend on the masks, then. The Drashigs were pretty good though - as giant screaming flesh-eating sock-puppet caterpillars go, they came across well.
It has been said by others that Katy Manning's acting can curdle milk, and this was beyond all competition her most milk-curdling performance that I've seen - easily on a par with the worst of Bonnie Langford. Most likely thing to deter me from ever watching this story again. My other gripe is that so many Who fans who criticise anything post-Tom Baker claim that the '80s stories are just set pieces cobbled together, yet Carnival of Monsters strikes me as a prime example of just that.
The funny thing is, my opinion of the story was bad at the time of watching, but improved afterwards. I know a lot of Who fans rate it very highly, so there's kind of a sense that I ought to like it (but then I could say the same about Genesis of the Daleks, lord and master of the overrated stories). I chuckled at the first cliffhanger, where a giant hand reaches down and plucks up an obvious model TARDIS, all badly superimposed over the main shot, yet on reflection this became a tremendous post-modern coup in my mind. Actually having someone reach in and adjust the model shots while the Doctor stares aghast - that beats Vengeance on Varos' cliffhanger into a cocked hat! On yet more reflection I'm not sure what to think of it. The Who Fan Code demands that I not laugh at the effects and look at what the story's trying to say - which seems to be "Zoos are bad", and that's about it. No real substance underneath. That's why I've left it at Low Average.
(Edit: Well, there is also the self-referentiality of the Doctor being stuck inside a kind of futuristic telly for the entertainment of naive punters. It's also been pointed out that the outlandish showpeople who own the Miniscope nicely parallel the Doctor and his companion. All of this, I agree, should make me love this story. And yet. I'm used to seeing referential bits like this turn up as bonus moments in DW, but I'm not entirely used to seeing them carry the entire story on their own. Vengeance on Varos offers a critique of the "video nasty" furore, and more broadly of the media's influence on politics and vice versa - it's not just self-referential. Carnival of Monsters looks like it might be nothing but. I'll have to keep trying at it, I think.)
News that actually relates to the real world - the flat move looms on the horizon, and is due to take place over most of the rest of February, starting next weekend.
Funeral of The Lovely Jo's great-grandmother last week. The two surprising things I learned about her: her first name was Marguerita (which initially made me think of Bulgakov, although the second thing I thought of was the alcoholic drink), and she was name-checked in one of Kenneth Horne's sketches. The third surprising thing, which I had already heard from Jo, was that her earliest memory was of being taken up onto the roof to watch the Kaiser's Zeppelins gliding overhead. Beats my donkey ride.
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