Canned bums.

Tristan calls.

He says to my answering machine: 'Hey Jannie, that film featuring my bum is going to be shown at Cannes. I've been invited to go over there. Never thought my bum would make it in the movies.

Nurse Caz (who had a role in the film) said my bum was too thin and scrawny but I reckon it will appeal to the effete French sensibilities.

I need a holiday, haven't had one for years. It is also an opportunity to meet up with some people I've yet to meet. Talk soon.'

Bukowski, ice hockey and nobility.

He said:

Your aspirations are noble but irrelevant.

that shut me up.

For a while at least

Then I realised he'd been watching ice hockey all night

sucking on beers the way Bukowski liked to talk

noble but irrelevant

I felt good.

Noble even.

Scared dog in the alley.

No muse.

Yet I sense a muse creeping up on me. I can feel her breath on the back of my neck.

Hackles rise.

I am a scared dog in an alley

Overjoyed by the fear I sniff on piss stained things

Glad to tear open a binbag of creativity

and then worms

With the muse

etc etc etc

Stats

The guys here are talking basketball stats.

I never thought I would ever write that.

But stats is stats and stats never lie.

I'm writing about stats and that is a stat.

Slam dunk.

Hugo and IS

Sitting at home dealing with stuff that needs to be dealt with.

A professor in Massachusetts reminds me of how it is as an artist... 43 years ago in his kitchen I saw a burnt toad in the hole hanging on the wall above a door. That was when I first realised that art could be anything you wanted it to be. I have been burning sausages ever since.

I remember he was a schoolboy then and then he wasn't and then he was in a band to die for and then he wasn't and now he is a professor in America and what is the future tense of wasn't?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFU_1h7io0Y

Isn't I know is present; Isn't is in the building.

But what happens after isn't

Isn't has left the building... Ladies and gentlemen I give you... IS

Marycigarettes.

Dinner last night with Marycigarettes: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oMIQ2tFPqKA

He is a star.

salt on chinese food.

Why has no one done this before.

Eating my sad bloke meal for one from a local supermarket (I will not advertise); chicken chow mein if you must know. I thought there was something missing, something that soy sauce could not provide.

I sprinkled on a little salt.

My last remaining taste bud exploded in a cacophony of exultant delight. I was gobsmacked.

Tomorrow I shall try tomato ketchup with spring rolls.

This must be what they call 'fusion'.

A bag lady's murder attempt (in your dreams), Papal bull and show business.

A busy month looms.

I am putting on another event in May at the Tabernacle in Notting Hill; again a mix of spoken word/poetry/music. Details will follow soon.

I find the whole process of putting on a show quite exhausting but exhilarating. Well worth the effort though.

Tristan phoned yesterday to tell me that he had dreamt of the performance; while he was on stage Moll the bag lady stepped out of the audience and attempted to stab him with a kitchen Knife. She was disarmed by security staff and dragged away cackling.

'If I'd died' He said 'It might have made me a star'.

I told him that there is a Papal Bull which states that no man may be martyred as a result of a woman's actions. Whatever she may have done to you you will never be considered a saint.

'That I do know'. He replied.

Rusty, bones and repercussions.

This morning I visited Rusty in his garret for a coffee and donuts.

He ushered me in, showed me the coffee pot then sat down at his kitchen table which was strewn with what appeared to be human bones. He started whittling one of them.

'They look very much like human bones Rusty' I said. 'What are you doing?'

'Yup' He replied. 'They sure is. I was going through the family closet and found em there. I'm making a marimba'.

'What on earth for?'

'Well Jan, I've been writing a family history for some time and it recently occurred to me to put it to music seein as musicals are all the rage these days... And then I thought what better instrument to accompany the story than a marimba made from skeletons found in the closet'.

'Scary'. I said.

'Not as scary as the story'. He replied as I poured the coffee into black and white mugs.

Messy

St Patricks night at the cow... 1,300 pints of guinness sold.

Another sad day.

My ex father in law and grandfather to my daughter died today... RIP John.

What makes the day doubly sad is that it is my grandsons 6th birthday. I often amazed at lifes grim coincidences. This is the second this year.

Advice

You know when I want somebody to not do something, you are my guy.

Money

I am sitting here with a man who earns $5oo,ooo a year, he is the unhappiest man I know yet I do not know how to respond to his unhappiness.

You cannot buy that kind of unhappiness. It buys you. It pays you a salary with expenses. It fills your phone with vacuous numbers. It surrounds you in the bars you trawl. It courriers over your hangover regular as clockwork. It greets you with the words 'good bye'.

I've said 'Do the math. How long can you live on a beach for?'

He said Is that with Russian whores or without?

I got up, walked down to the edge of the water and stared out over the horizon.

Not a ship in sight.