Welcome to the Autumn Equinox! From here through to mid-December, the nights get longer.
Being an ambitious kind of guy, I got a head start on the season and had a weekend’s worth of long — and craptacular — nights. After those, Fall’s going to be a cakewalk.
The Law of Averages (math pedants: I know, I know…) says that I’m not due for another weekend like that one for a long time. Good.
From the Seattle Times (thanks to FARK for the link):
Update: here’s the story behind the costume. Thanks, Anita!
Nobody says “things happen for a reason” to people when good things happen to them.
As if the evening weren’t going badly enough (and unbloggably, I’m afraid), I got robbed last night.
I was busking outside Amato’s Pizza, trying to push away the less-than-fun events that took place earlier that evening. I was a little distracted, so my form was terrible. I was missing notes that I normally never missed, screwing up solos that I can play in my sleep and forgetting lyrics that I can remember even after many pints of beer. Still, getting outside and doing something even vaguely productive helps take the edge off. In spite of my terrible playing, I was still making money — I had about thirty or thrity-five bucks in loonies and toonies in my cap.
A couple of weeks ago, B., a street kid who got thrown out of her house for swearing and listing to Marilyn Manson CDs, had warned me about a guy who’d been going around Queen Street West stealing money from buskers and panhandlers. His modus operandi was simple enough: he’d run down the sidewalk towards a busker, slow down just enough to be able to grab his hat or guitar case, and then escape around the nearest corner. Buskers were probably very easy marks; they’re too busy trying to entertain their crowd, and it’s difficult to chase someone while you’ve got an instrument strapped on.
I was in the middle of fumbling my way through Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap when he appeared. A scruffy guy in a blue denim jacket and black jeans pushed through the crowd of exiting club-goers that typically gathered around the pizza place. B., who was there, yelled “Look out! It’s him!” He ran by me and In one smooth motion, he stooped and scooped the baseball cap that held all the change I’d made. There was no way I’d be able to catch up with him with my accordion strapped on. I barely had time to reach for my unopened bottle of Diet Coke at throw it at his head. It winged his ear, but since the bottle was plastic, it didn’t slow him down a bit. A couple of guys who were watching me put down their pizza slices and chased him, but they were too late.
One of the people who saw it happen gave me a fiver out of sympathy. Thank you, whoever you are.
I played a little longer, after which I packed up my accordion and joined some friends from Thirsty People of Toronto, who were going to check out a house party down the street. As I left, I tossed a toonie in B.’s hat.
“After what happened, you don’t really have to,” she said.
Not true. Craptacular as the night was, I was still going to sleep in a king-size bed with a roof over my head. She was going to crash in a sleeping bag in the park on a night when it might rain.
“I need the karma,” I replied. “I’m trying to end the evening on an up note.”
Jeremiah, a fellow GTABlogger and Filipino dude over at Triple Double You has a list of 101 things he’s promised to do in the next 1001 days. You might want to consider making a list like his for yourself. The process of even trying to think of 101 things you must do could be life-changing.
If I speak in generalities, I can cut the size of my own list down to these items:
1. Use my powers for good, not evil.
2. Fall in love.
3. Live interestingly, well, happily and with a purpose. Or, as the soul of Billy Idol now living in Philippe the otter would say, “Exist as a mixture of sexiness and danger”.
4. Finally learn to play Nirvana’s Smells Like Teen Spirit and that really difficult organ riff from The Doors’ Light My Fire (warning: cheesy MIDI file) on accordion.
Everything else is gravy.
Global Pop Conspiracy is having a bonus social this Saturday night at the Rotors club (593a Bloor Street West). Be there or be square!
…must be hellish, if you take the club reviews of Moscow’s alternative newspaper, the eXile, at their word. Written with a cynicism probably fuelled by a toxic mixture of homesickness, culture shock and the fact that Communists (even recovering ones) have a Vaseline-slippery grasp on the basic concepts of “customer service” and “fun”, these reviews might make you see your cheesy Coors Light-postered local Friday-after-work “meet market” (or for that matter, San Francsico, a victim of its own war on nightlife) in a new light.
Each review is accompanied by charming “international airport style” graphics that denote ratings for important features of the club, including:
Beer prices…
…thug factor…
…the likeliness of your picking up…
…and this special mark. The eXile folks say “This isn’t a rating factor, folks. Every club, bar, politician, and yes, newspaper, remains on the verge of collapse. When you see this stamped over a bar, it means ‘game over.'”
Here’s a snippet from the review for a bar called Alibi:
As if Alibi sucking dog dick wasn’t enough, they have a violently aggressive barman who overcharges because he’s bitter about the tvorog discharge his girlfriend emits every time she gets turned on. We could say more, but that would be like carpet-bombing a clan of cave-dwelling barbarians into oblivion and then taking any survivors prisoner and force feeding them Froot Loops until the roofs of their mouths are so raw and chapped from the granulated sugar and Yellow #5 that they have no choice but to become fags, just for the slight relief that a mouthful of hot manlove provides.
If you hadn’t noticed, it would appear that theeXile was written by former fratboys who’d probably be late-shift baristas or bitter night managers at Kinko’s if they weren’t living the genteel bohemian life in Moscow.
From a review for a place called “Doug and Marty’s”:
…Toward the end of a recent post-production Wednesday night binge, Krazy Kevin was approached by seemingly the only working girl in the place, and boned her free of charge. Apparently, standing around scowling disdainfully is still a valid pickup method in some circles…
…More or less affordable drinks and more or less affordable girls make this place the late-night establishment of choice for many a sauced man, woman, and child…
Jeers: Since 9/11, non-working-girl density seems to have dropped to near-zero levels. Cut-rate whores of very imaginable human and non-human fauna reminiscent of the Creature Cantina scene in Star Wars. Whores don’t give discounts, even in times of national crises. Dirty old whoring ex-pats provide a glimpse into your future…On weekends, some of those working girls have significantly inflated expectations as to their street value.
Readers who’ve never travelled outside North America (or who weren’t paying attention during Full Metal Jacket) may not know this fact: where there are American expatriates, there are hookers. It’s a sensible business move: your typical expat’s monthly car payment probably exceeds your typical Eastern Euro’s monthly paychque, and hooking is one of those businesses that you can get into using simple tools you probably have lying around at home.
The reviews tend to lead one to believe that many Moscow clubs lack those things that don’t even qualify as “the niceties”. For instance, from this review for Alibi:
THE place for anyone looking for an empty club with furniture bought wholesale from a fascist warehouse’s discount rack!
Here’s one from the review for Hungry Duck:
Toxic BO cloud remains even when the club is empty
Kitaisky Lyotchik could probably do with a new sound system:
Sound quality on par with a Brezhnev-era Elektronika 8-track.
And finally, this odd one, whic was on the list of the previous bar’s positive qualities:
Young waitresses with very few visible sores or bruises.
A quick read through the eXile should be enough warning that you should take its reviews with a grain of salt; they make no claim to or show any pretense of journalistic integrity, but damn, are they funny!