Till It's Finished

We were asked to play some songs to some people in a pub, an interesting pub, a stinking crisis arena where men go to perch on stools and bark at each other and wait impatiently for death or a fight or the guy who sells stolen meat to come in and sell some stolen meat. We couldn't say no and we didn't. They put us upstairs and moved the pool table over so there'd be room to waltz and heckle. We soundchecked and were fucking okay. Our friends arrived and the men began slurring with delight. We drank and played some songs. A dance-off erupted. We ran out of songs. We were thanked. We attempted to get the equipment back home in a taxi. The taxi informed us it long ago stopped picking people up from this particular pub. The non-payment. The abuse. The fluids. We waited a minute and booked the taxi from the nearby supermarket the guy who steals meat steals meat from. Everything was fine.

A Whole Portion

What've you got that's local?
Nowt.
That's weird for a country pub.
For you maybe. For me it gets a bit less weird every day. And it wasn't that weird to begin with.
It's not right.
Most things are from somewhere else.
I thought you were supposed to support your local breweries.
There aren't any.
There's one in Hawkshead.
That's too far to be local. Go and stick your tongue in the lake.
Er no thanks.
It's surprising what you can get used to.
Is the food local?
It's prepared locally.
Where are you from?
I got here via Preston. Are you having a drink?
I want a local ale.
Howabout one that tastes nice?
What would you recommend?
None of these. They all taste like shoes.
With a real ale you've got to have a full pint or two to really know what they taste like.
Last time I did that I vomited into a cattle grid.
You weren't doing it right.
I never do.
It's a bit quiet in here.
It's the modern world. They eat and leave.
It might be the music.
Public Enemy are the people's champions.
It's a bit irritating.
There's nothing I can do about it

Two Books

I read this one about a man who had a bad time and it was quite good, the characters were nails and the author twatted them on the head repeatedly until he'd got his point across. Some of the words were in a funny order which was delightful and there was a lot of repetition. The front and back covers were wider than the pages they were covering but folded over to create inside flaps for the adulation to go on, so you could use the front cover-flap as a bookmark during the first half of the book and then when you arrived in the second half you could use the back cover-flap in the same way until you reached the end.

While I was reading that I was also reading this autobiography of a woman who knew a woman. It was written by the woman herself but from the perspective of the woman who knew her. The woman herself had asked the woman who knew her to write her own autobiography but the woman who knew her wasn't ready so the woman herself wrote it and then died. She arranged words in a way that made people flip their wigs. The front cover was a photo of the woman and the other woman but it didn't say which was which but eventually it became obvious that one couldn't possibly have been the other.

Granville Surprise

An Amethyst Unicorn in the Aquarium. Not in one of the tanks, in its own alcove. The only sign relating to it is the one on its back. It says "Please Keep Off The Unicorn".
Most of the Aquarium is not an Aquarium. About two thirds of the space is taken up by oddities. It's as if, after buying the two large sea lions in the outdoor tank, there was no money left for fish, and the owner filled the unused space with freakish ornaments. Angel shrines made of mussels. Oyster shells like trays. Clams the size of coffee tables. There's a series of rooms full of these things, each more baffling and brilliant than the last. A volcano made of molluscs that lights up every twenty seconds. A man made entirely of whelks. A twisting, climbing corridor connects the rooms and the route it takes is disorientating. The exit signs keep changing direction. Eventually some stairs take you down directly into the gift shop, which makes no mention of the weirdness and very little mention of the fish. Mostly it's postcards and pencils.
Back outside the sea lions take a break from swimming the circumference of their tank to be fed. A girl appears with a large silver bowl of fish. The largest sea lion, Hector, is already waiting, stood up nine feet tall at the opposite side of the tank, battling seagulls. The girl throws the fish directly down his throat. The smaller, Sally, stays in the tank and pokes her mouth just out of the water for the fish to flop into. They make very little noise. When the girl shows them the bowl is empty they resume their circling. They only ever go anti-clockwise.