the moment in Margaret Thatcher's life which bequeathed her most terror and the running away from which terror shaped an entire political geist

In the back of her head, she constantly kept reminding herself: I need to be busy. I need to be busy.
In the office, the refrain was even louder. It became accusative: You need to be busy. You need to be busy.
She was a model of efficiency. Every email was logged, every report read and commented upon, notes made from meetings, she was an office paragon.
Yet still the voice kept chipping away at her. Every moment of down time, it chirruped away.
One day, she'd got everything under control as usual. The voice crept in as ususal. She looked around. She tried to think of something to do. The anxiety of not knowing how to assuage the Busy god was breaking her into pieces.
She sat back at her desk. Looked around. Realised there was nothing for her to do.
There was no busy for her to be.
She felt like she was in earthquake.
The ground shuddered and a great split in the shape of the world was rendered.
The whole thing had been no more than an artful construction.
The Busy god was just an opiate, like all the rest.
She wasn't busy; there was no reason why she should be; there was no reason she should ever seek to attain that state of mind again.

half notes from missing post

The Young Turk was dubious. She didn't like the drift of the fat sage's argument. It was too broad brushed. The fat sage switched tack. He explained the student should not investigate the aims but the methood of the driving experience. An experience which forced the driver to look directly ahead. Which decreed participation in the environment as dangerous. Looking backwards was done looking forwards through the rear view mirror. The driver was wedded to his or her individualistic journey, failing to see that the destination was less important ( the microcosm of each journey) than the process, the actual experience of driving, they were exposed to, an experience they took for granted, never knowing how it might be shaping their souls.

This was nature's subtlety. Humanity thought it had harnessed nature. But it did so in such a fashion that nature had sowed the seeds of its come-uppance within the very practice of this supposed 'harnessing'.

The Young Turk remained sceptical, in particular when the fat sage wound up the seminar with disrsive remarks on how this car-culture world view had lead to depair and disaster; and generated a vast amout of mundane art. The fat sage admired the young turk's scepticism. He told her that the individual qualities she expoused, the need to substantiate theories with a personal conviction, was a fine thing. This was not what his critique was aimed at. His critique was aimed at the way the brief culture of the car had excercise these qualities she possessed within its own society. The destination prized so far ahead of the journey, the loneliness that individuals failed to apreciate they were embracing in their driving, the cost to their phsyche, and that of the world. Fortunately nature had employed its covert tactics; the car culture had perished, the world had learnt to look sideways.

After the fat sage left, the young turk gazed out of the window at the dawn of the second sun (A little later than usual) and had a moment of hankering to get into her own automobile, chart a course between the two, and drive and drive and drive. But as she stared, some genetic memory was triggered, and a shudder of loneliness and absolute despair possessed her.

She left the thought palace There was nothing more for her to do that day. She took the suntram, which glided above the earth's crust, taking her home, to her community.

unfinished post (partially recovered after techno-blip)

Indeed, my young Turk, the fat sage sighed, that was a curious blip in human history. The petroleum era.

The young Turk, in the second year of her research program, mined the fat sage for all he had to offer. The fat sage had devised volume upon volume of entertainment on this very subject. Few knew more about oil than the fat sage.

There are several curious things about that epoch, the sage continued. It demonstrated the curious hold the natural world exerts over the structures of society, in ways society never anticipated.

How so, fat sage?

Oil, as you, know, is a dark, viscous material, which, by and large, dwells far below the surface of the soil. Already you'll begin to deduce my first point?

I think I can, but elucidate, fat sage.

The easiest parallel to oil in our common usage is bile. A malvolent fluid with few redeeming features which lurks in the body; needs to be drawn now and again, but when it is, is always a sign of sickness.

The Young Turk frowned. The fat sage was disappointing her. She had heard this line before and she found it both too literal and too ephemeral. The fat sage saw her frown and smiled. He asked if she disappoved of this analysis. The young Turk was embarrased to know her thoughts could be so easily read, and she asked the fat sage to go on.

Well, he said, perhaps put out by the attractive student's reaction. There is another more beautiful way of seeing the point I am making. I have outlined the what, but the how is perhaps more enlightening. What was the key to the oil revolution, the point of no return.

The Model-T Ford.

The sage smiled. Indeed. The development of the individual automobile, also known as a car. I shall talk to you about the car for a while, and its relationship to that culture.

The car was a great success for nearly a hundred and fifty years. It had a great effect on the thinking of vast, priviledged swathes of the culture. It was a success for several reasons. Firstly, people lived in the constant belief that they had places to go. The car was, to this end, a serviceable and effective means of achieving this. Yet, what the drivers failed to realise, was that every car journey ever taken was part of a demolition of social fabric. The

aspect of a world, in pursuit of logic

So, the anteater said to the spaniel, there must be a reason why you are better at Latin than me.
So, the spaniel said to the car, there must be a reason why you are better at Monopoly than me.
So, the car said to the tennis racket, there must be a reason why you have better legs than me.
So the racket said to the desert, there must be a reason why your arias are more tuneful than mine.
So, the desert said to the Atom bomb, there must be a reason your shoelaces tie better than mine.
So the bomb said to the worm, there must be a reason you can hold your breath twice as long as me.
So, the worm said to the wok, there must be a reason you were on Countdown and I wasn't.
So the wok said to the burglar, tell me why you like raspberry ripple and I like coconut cream.
So, the burglar said to Tehran, what's the reason you beat me at squash?
So Tehran said to God, there must be a reason why I still can't make my mind up whether you exist or not.
So, God said to the phone, tell me the reason you're successful and I'm not.
So, the phone asked the lion tamer, what's the reason for despair?
So, the lion tamer asked the daffodil, what's the reason the world is shaped like a christmas pudding?
So, the daffodil asked the seagull, what's the reason for lies?
So, the seagull asked the confetti, what's the reason for tomatoes?
So the tomato asked the neurotic, there must be a reason we share the same taste in soft rock.
So the neurotic said to the clock, explain the reason why you keep on chiming.
So, the clock said to General de Gaulle, what's the reason for cheese on toast.
So, the General said to the angel, what's the reason for not committing suicide?
So, the angel said to the tube station, what's the reason for your lack of basic competence.
So, the tube station said to itself, what's the reason for my lack of basic competence.

Many concluded there was no reason.
Some concluded there was no such thing as reason.
Some scratched their heads, walked away, and decided to think again tomorrow.

nngh

The weather forecast in the background of the photo your gaunt mother sent via hook or crook across the Atlantique shows today as sunny, tomorrow con chiparrones, and the day after somewhat blurry. You seem out of it in that photo, fair enough; in the one mit dem vater, you have one eye open, as though to ascertain what exactly it is everyone's smiling about. Though maybe that is an infant method of smiling back. The old one-eye. In Winchester there was much excitement and champagne drank in your honour, although some uncertainty of how your name is spelt. An enigmatic opening. Your grandmother cooked a lamb stew which didn't look like enough but sufficed. Orange melon balls balanced green melon balls on white plates. A man called Scooter caused a fuss by being indicted. The trees resolutely remain green, refuse to submit to Autumn yellow.

of a morning

A long-haired filmaker sits in a Shoreditch 'editing suite' watching his project put together.
A man in Finchley cleans his blinds.
An artist ponders the truth that every woman likes lazy Sunday mornings and Murakami.
A film-maker in the North deals with what the day has to throw at him.
An actress keeps an eye on him.
A woman in Bethnal Green smiles at her secret.
A woman in Peckham wonders what to do next.
An agent in the West smiles at the idea of Perestroika.
An artist has to face another trip to the hospital.
A director explores his late friend's legacy.
A woman in the North enters a silver slug and it makes her smile.
A historian wracks his brains.
A man in Italy is glad to have got Brixton out of his system.
King Creosote sings I was always hoping that I might just get by.
A woman from the South in the North sits in a meeting and a memory cuts across the face of her mind.
A man in Vauxhall thinks that his sister's fate and his own were not so far apart.
Saws wail in stereo.
A man and a woman in Sao Paulo are awoken by a low flying helicopter.
A teacher is tickled by the vaguaries of his wife's countrymen.
A man and a woman contemplate living in a 5th Avenue bathroom.
A market researcher cannot believe the beauty and trouble of twins.
An actress hopes she'll find a new house.
Another actress re-aquaints herself with her own.
A child less than one week old learns the meaning of the word cold.
His mother and father keep him warm.
A shopkeeper laughs again.
The Portuguese shout at one another.
An actor rehearses.
Another has a lie-in.
Another thinks ahead to football.
No-one is crying.
Everyone has thoughts in the back of their head they are not aware of.

thomas bernhard

It's the middle of a meeting. The usual things are being discussed. ROI. Contact Rates. Percentages. He spots something on the shelf. It's the boss's office. There are various books there. Technical boredom. A Miles Davis biography. Some Amis. Dostoyevsky. In amongst the spines there's one that catches his eye. It's a book called Extinction. It's not just that he recognises the writer. He knows this book. It's calling him. He can't help himself. He gets up and walks over to the shelf. Picks the book up. He's done this before. Opens it up. There's a handwritten note inside. Addressed to him.

He looks at the boss. This book is part of his history. Someone gave it to him. He gave it to someone else. They gave it to...

Someone turns around and asks him what he thinks about the possibilities of increasing Direct Debit take ups. He says something. He goes and sits down. He doesn't let go of the book.

miso soup

Ingredients include:

• fermented soya beans
• water
• sea salt
• koji
• onions
• scallions
• wakame seaweed

Reality Aversion!

New Hollywood Fantaschtiscal

Budget: between £20 and £billion. Depending on how much change you possess on the night. And the generosity of friends.

Location: A Place where Time passes quickly.

Starring: Not You!

Featuring: A Cast of a Thousand Cigarettes!

Who: Don't sing or dance.

And: Are not there at the end of the night when you go home: Convinced You've Lost your Keys!

Credits: This film has no credit.

+++

The Critics Say:

Passed me by.

Promising.

More fun being savaged by a rabid pelican.

I raised one eyebrow.

Too much hair.

Once more unto die Brucke, Horatio.

Sordid!!

Thought-provoking.

Streched credulity like a rubber spider.

Don't ever darken my door again.

So good I lost my keys.

So what's wrong with happy endings all of a sudden?

Gave me a headache.

Lacked clarity.

I couldn't work out which audience the film was aimed at.

Reckon!!!!!!!

I understood less when I came out than I did before I went in.

nngh back

Ignore extraneous noises that bother you. They will soon move on and bother someone else. (Such as a dust cart). On wet days, don’t take the bike. On bright days, don’t be too lazy not to. Keep your own council; trust your heart; think feelingly; feel with thought. Whatever that means. The day after you were born, your mother said that in your sleep you were reliving your difficult birth. You muttered to yourself, something impossible to make out. What were you muttering? The world will never know. You have already survived an indirect bump on the head by a wayward light fitting; falling over on a Canadian tube station to be greeted by a maniac clapping; a nameless birth. All this, not a three days old, still smiling. On the phone, you made a tiny sound, just a nngh sound, something like that. You had been home half an hour; finally getting to know how it feels like on the outside.

strategy

The plumber is not the plumber. He's the plumber's ear. He sits in the office and plays chess with pieces shaped like plumbers.

The plumber who is not the plumber is affable. He mates me. He's always willing to help.

He explains that the plumber who is the plumber is elusive. You can fax his van but fax is a one-way street.

It's the plumber who is a plumber's job to order the part that he claimed when he visited was nothing special. The plumber who's not a plumber can only chase the plumber who is one.

Which he says he's doing. Time after time. Affably. So that I start to wonder if he doesn't have customer pieces on his chess board as well.

The plumber who isn't a plumber answers the phone, keeps it affable, moves a piece, chuckles to himself, sends a fax with no way back, moves another piece.

We are but pawns in the game of a plumber of who is not even a plumber.

ignorant haunting

The ghost doesn’t recognise you. The ghost doesn’t know
How much you know. Doesn’t have a clue. It takes a
While to realise. Little things give it away.
The movement of eyeballs. Hand gestures. A belt.
Then it’s clear as day. Hardly a surprise. Only one
Of many ghosts. Stumbling around, waiting to be found
Without their knowing. You look at the ghost and it scares you:
How much you know; remember; will never be allowed to forget.

monday morning

Seven am. A foreign city. Dark outside. More
Muddled sleep flecked with slippery dream.
The hotel shower clothes a body in mist.
Dewdrops gleam. Water masks water. Lean
Against tiles. Capture time. Emerge no
Newer than before. Shrouded before dawn.

a naum gabo sculpture

At first sight it looks like bits of cardboard,
Glued together. Stretching out into the world.
On second sight it's a new vision of form. It
Could be a woman or a dog. Or anything. Who
Cares? It’s the past’s statement of what
Future’s possible might have been.

east/west

I can recall lying awake in a foreign bed,
Inhabited by a vague dread of the other
Side of the wall. The end of that world.
Night sounds boxed into new shapes by a
Subtle claustrophobia. The other day, we
Strode across the boundary, leapt the
Hemispheric divide. Only the traffic lights
Signal a trace of the lost divide. Still.
Beyond the Mexican joints, the empty
Checkpoint, the liberated bars; beyond
Marketing and architecture;
The East remains the East. The West’s
Antipode. The weight of time might elapse
Unto collapse, but this will still hold true.

nach weberwiese

An avenue as broad as the Mississippi.
Fronted by mock classical, sub-palatial
Apartments. Splendour of the democratic
Republic. Humans off the scale. Not a
Foot soldier in sight. In a Teuton bower,
Beneath fake plastic trees, two souls grapple
Within the utopian shadow. Fending off
Mushrooms. Trying to find sense in atoms,
Veins, bricks and brains whose composition
Seems unalterable, and yet… the world
Shimmies round such constants. The avenue’s
Semiotics are skewed. Its very name, Karl-
Marx Allee, takes on a meaning never
Conceived as foundation stones were laid.
Alteration lies not in mass, but in velocity; the
Night air. The changes charged as history.

treptower park

History appeared to belong to the victors.
A landscaped park. At one end, twin slabs of
Anvilar stone framing a plaque on which
The dates 1941 - 1944 are written.
Facing this plaque, a giant holds child and
Sword, crushing a swastika underfoot.
A dozen matching stone plinths guard the
Perimeter. On each is inscribed a quote from
Josef Stalin. Carved German tanks fall eternal
To heroes of the Soviet Republic. Beyond these
Po-faced guards lurk trees, weeping faded
Leaves through Autumn’s maelstrom.

tiete

The last evening I spent out of this country was a night such as this only more so. The rain lashed down. Mr Cowley, who was giving me a lift, said as we slalomed through the twelve lanes of traffic to get into position to take the airport road, that there was a good chance the Tiete would have flooded. No doubt he was just trying to wind me up. The idea of that excuse for a river surging out of its concrete banks to wash us away seemed unlikely at first. But the more the rain cascaded from the sky, the more the trucks skidded across the tarmac, the more likely it became. Despite the advertised Japanese support in controlling the 'inundaciones'. We made it to the airport. The air was warm. Macarena helped me choose a caipirinha masher, with head of toucan. It would be another year before I saw them again, at The Wheatsheaf, another year before I left the country.

the film

Slowly you start to tease out the associations of the day or the moment. The time when you weren't there because you were picking up filters in the new forest. The time you had to sit down and play peacemaker with the DOP. The things the actors told you about scenes. Thinking about what to cook for 20 people that night.

Bit by bit, as you watch it, those things begin to melt away. You come back to the story you wrote on paper a long time ago. You start to see the connections between the scenes. You remember what it might be all about, and discover more things which it is about but you didn't realise at the time of writing.

Only a beginning. There will be more to forget, remember and discover before the thing is done, the process finished.

the beggar

I saw the crow last night, the drunk said. The crow was there. Crows, they look for gold and silver, that's what they say. Now the crow's there and it's come with the plague. There's nothing you can do. What the fuck can you do? What can you do about the crow? There's nothing you can do about it. I saw the crow last night. It was looking at me.

(mais) butoh

The noise of cicadas grows to tinnital levels. The lights collapse into gloom. The grimacing dancer eats her own arm.

+++

Afterwards she explains: When you can no longer see, you can no longer hear, you have lost faith in the existence of your self; then to discover your arm is to re-discover your self. You will taste it. You will bite it. The bite will cause pain, but that pain is a good thing. The pain proves you are alive. It has become a pleasure.

night bus

A Kiwi buys a travelcard from an Ecuadorean. You buy one too. The Kiwi sits down in front of you. You chat to him. He's just back from Italy. Naples Florence Sicily other places he cannot remember. He's been in London a week. Stopped off in Sydney and Hong Kong. You tell him about the Duke of E, as he lives down the road. He asks what's going on there tonight and before you get off the bus you're forced to remind him of our liscensing laws.

He takes you back to what it's like to travel. When, should you meet someone amicable, you talk. You talk, because it's good to communicate when you don't know where you are. You hope you're going to meet someone who'll help you on your journey. Not in a cynical way, because there's not too much scope for cynicism as a backpacker. You hope they'll help by being someone you'll pass some time with. On the way. Boundaries are less important when you travel. You're crossing them all the time.

war zone (hypothetical)

At approximately a quarter past one of a Friday morning, fifteen minutes or so after Ricardo had put his book down, whilst he was thinking of ways of improving his book, not far, perhaps, from sleep, Ricardo was disturbed in those thoughts by a gunshot.

For a while he lay in bed. Then, cautiously, he got dressed, tiptoed out of the bed, and peeked through the window. Not a soul stirred in the back garden. Moving to the sitting room, he cautiously (oncemore) created a chink in the Venetian blind and looked out. A red car was parked facing the wrong way in the one way street. After three minutes, a man got into the car and drove away.

Ricardo went back to bed. Every noise counted triple. Distant sirens were not unwelcome. How could he be sure it was a gunshot? He could not. He'd heard gunshots: in movies; as a child when he'd had shooting practice; in a play. The noise had possessed a volume and a violence which had made him think it was a gunshot, but it could have been something else.

Then again, in the barrio of South London he inhabited, a gunshot was not altogether unlikely. He thought about what it would mean were the sound to become a common sound, as it is in certain cities in the world. It would certainly make it harder to sleep, something he was not a master of at the best of times.

sock box

At a certain point you just give up. The socks become impenetratible. You get lost in the forest. No matter how many you drag from the box, hundreds and thousands, you can never find so much as a single matching pair.

recurrence

The CD grows and grows on me. It plays fine for the first 4 or 5 tracks. Then it gets to one, which starts beautifully. I can listen to the opening for an age, and I do. For the CD sticks about 90 seconds in, it snags like a loose bit of thread. The following line recurs again and again: of a secret is hard to keep. Unlike most songs where the CD jumps, this track is so beautiful that it almost sounds right, like a round, a sound which makes you sigh and sigh, never knowing how the song should end.

the sun

Was promised today. There's no sign of it. The rain's still chuckling it down. Left with but the memory of sun. The sun which smiles, but also scars. Scars panda flesh, bleaches out the colour, steals it to light up the world around. The sun will be back, with its convivial instincts. But this morning the world remains the domain of the dancing rain.

the rain

Comes at long last. It shrieks discomfort to foolhardy cyclists, legs clammy with corduroy, eyes lacking wipers. It's laughing, at anyone who doubts the world will end in flood; at washerwomen; at babies who think they are the font of all upset. Rain does it in shiny style, makes hazards out of highways, reminds us we began with gills.

the wind

Is getting up. The trees are being shaken. It veers this way and that way across the park. Like it has something to tell us, if only we knew how to listen.

copper

Skipping a red light, as you do, outside Liverpool Street, Ricardo is pulled over by the traffic police. Who demand that he dismount from his mule. They ask if he knows what he's done wrong, and Ricardo confesses to his crime. The traffic police are lenient. They tell him ordinarily he'd be liable for a thrity pound fine or a suspended jail term, but if he can prove his identity they'll let him off with a caution. He says he's not too sure about his identity. They look at him as though he might have something to hide. He says it's not a question of concealment, he just believes it might have been misplaced, perhaps even yesterday when he threw out the old Sight and Sounds. They ask if he's a filmmaker. He says it may have been one of his incarnations. He's not sure. If he hadn't lost his identity he'd be able to tell them. They get quite Sherlock Holmes about the process. They deduce he might be an actor in a film he doesn't know is being made. In which case he is granted artistic license. Just this once. They write down a detailed description of his person, apparel, and mule. They ask if he'd like a copy, and he says it cannot do any harm. They tell him this kind of paperwork takes up more and more of their time. More and more of the souls they apprehend possess unstable identities. It's one of those services performed by the traffic police which no one appreciates. They send him on his way and wish him well.

arabic name game

Names and translations are mixed up. Put them in the right order.

a] Gamal - 1] Happy
b] Musad - 2] Coming back for shelter
c] Jumah - 3] Dear/ rare
d] Nadir - 4] Camel
e] Saeed - 5] Unfettered camel
f] Wail - 6] Born on Friday

crescendo

At some stage this week, the students should hand over the first draft of their ten minute plays. Some of them. Maybe full of glee, maybe reluctantly. It will be their teacher's task to inform that, no matter how satisfied they are with their work, it will only be work in progress. Even if what they have written is perfect, it will only be perfection in progress.

thames

When the duckboat drives past, the passengers cannot resist the urge to wave at the man standing on the beach. The wave is an instinct which goes with excursionary travel. The voyagers want to share their pleasure. They want to participate. They want to reach out. Doing so they stretch out their hand, a movement which turns into a wave. The man waves back. It makes them smile.

The Thames is at low tide. A slippery beach has evolved. Mud and pebble entwined. The water trickles back through the pebbles to its home. The sun slants across it. The beach sparkles. A forest of dappled light. The man takes a step forward into the light. His foot sinks up to the ankle in rivermud.

snippet(s)

Later she remembered all the hours of the afternoon as happy - one of those uneventful times that seem at the moment only a link between past and future pleasure but turn out to have been the pleasure itself.

***

R watched N pressing upon her mother a yellow evening bag...saying, "I think things ought to belong to the people that like them" and then sweeping into it all the yellow articles she could find, a pencil, a lipstick, a little notebook, "because they all go together."

bra

There's a bra on the table when I get back from Mr B's carrying a bagful of CDs. I think to myself, that's odd, did I put that there? Then I put it in the laundry basket and think no more of it. It's only the next day that I find out how the bra crawled out of the bedroom, dragged itself across the hall floorboards and scaled the heights of the kitchen table. A most adventurous bra.

weaver's fields

An old man wearing a white african hat carries his barefoot grandchild to a bench. They sit together for five minutes. Talking Somali. Then the old man seems bored. He carries the child away.

Another old man, wearing a blue anarok, calls out to an old woman. She has a bag of shopping. He says it has to be done. She pulls some wrapped meat out of the basket. A package of flesh and bone. She tells him she's going to make a lovely stew.

snippet

R felt that this swim would become the typical one of her life, the one that would always pop up in her memory at the mention of swimming.

trip

On a whim you take the tube. It's hot down there, but you can get your book read, now you've found something you want to read.

As you get up to change at Oxford Circus for the linea centrale, you trip over a large, ugly, plimsolled foot.

For less than a second you have no control over your feet. You totter, bend, weep like a willow. Saved by a yellow pole colliding with an outstretched limb.

The foot grunts some kind of an apology. You turn and catch sight of it, inclined to frown.

In your heart, you are grateful. The ugly foot offered you a moment. A loss of control. For a second there you nearly crashed; you nearly flew.

yellow fever

You can leave the pages behind, but it don't mean to say you've got rid of the fever.

on stage

Suddenly a Japanese punk runs on stage, who has no business being there, and starts spraying the dancers with his smoke machine. Later he turns up again wielding an electric guitar. When he's on stage he pulls attention. Which only heightens what the performer has achieved. Converting herself into a human mutant.