Banning Editors

Raking blogs, newspapers, mags, websites and more for grammatical atrocities is an exhausting task. I cannot quite believe that there are people who spend months doing this so that they can then publish books with their findings. The books are nice enough in general, but I just cannot imagine the amount of scribbled papers that such research must yield. Every day I find at least ten examples of grammatical atrocities and, guys, I am not even looking for them. Perhaps I should just stop reading anything written past 1990.

Take this email I received from Borders today, Borders of the books, yes. It is about banned books.

'One of the most disturbingly violent books of recent years, American Psycho caused controversy before it was even published, with it's original publishers dropping it and the New York Times urging people not to buy it.'

Oh my God people, a bookstore that sends out a marketing email with it's in place of its. If this isn't worthy of slitting one's wrists I don't know what is. And they do not do it just once, they do it twice:

'Since it's publication The Color Purple has won acclaim and inspired controversy.'

Oh and let's forget about punctuation as well while we are at it... I think they must have banned editors at Borders and you know what the funny (or sad, depending on whether your glass is half-full or half-empty, as usual) thing is? If I were to apply for an editing job at Borders they wouldn't even look at me because of my currently predominant corporate background. They would be right in thinking that corporate people are usually sloppy in grammar and spelling but, jeepers creepers, their own editors and copywriters are no match.

Still, if you can gliss over this disgraceful state of affairs, do read American Psycho. It really is excellent (especially from a Lacanian psychoanalysis perspective) and the movie isn't bad either, especially because Christian Bale is in it, naked. And while the obvious thing to do would be to grace these pages with such hotness, I'm afraid I prefer him clothed, especially when he looks like an Armani model. So there.

Oats So Not Simple

I often say that 'I am in two minds about this' where this could be anything from a book to a movie to a bag. One thing I've never been in two minds about is this:



To the uninitiated amongst you (the non-British ones) this will probably look like a mug full of vomit. Well it's not. The white stuff is porridge with a drizzle of maple syrup. I know that porridge is good for you and to a person that regularly snacks on rice crackers, eats tofu and drinks soya, the sole idea of porridge is more than appealing. Yet, I keep forcing myself and every time I prepare it, I think of one thing. I think of vomit, even though, to be fair to porridge, it doesn't taste of anything at all and is certainly not stinging rancid either.

Even a vat of maple syrup makes for something as tasteless as tap water but because I am on a health-kick following a full week's binge on chocolate (hey, it was my birthday, yes, all week), it seemed like a good idea to start a new, healthy routine made up of porridge and one hour on the exercise bike, seeing that all the darn horses I could ride (or ride with) are currently broken. While Strauss's waltzers are blasting through the speakers as I am starting the day and I feel happy and uplifted and serene, I only have to turn on the stove, get the box with the reassuringly half-naked, rippling Scottish athlete in a kilt from the cupboard and... and it all goes wrong.

Perhaps it will grow on me, perhaps it's one of those acquired tastes, as people call them, even though I am always a little weary of acquired tastes. I always think that whatever is an acquired taste perhaps is not meant to be eaten at all.

Peace

Peace as in at peace, peace as in peaceful. Like this:



To think that less than six weeks ago he was half-dead, a couple of foreign objects lodged in his stomach out of greed (and perhaps a touch of stupidity also) is incredible. He is doing great in every way and currently enjoys the heat coming from the freshly turned on radiator. And now I can go on holiday in peace.

On Fire

My creativity is on fire and there is no way to put it with humility. After many years of (occasional) tear-jerking attempts at coming up with an all-encompassing title for my PhD, I cracked it today. I knew I didn't want any of that sanctimonious crap that self-righteous, pompuous academic gits (or restaurant critics) use, something like: 'Allons enfants de la patrie: a diachronic dissection of the Foucauldian hibrity of French religious poetry in identity, discourse and subversive contingency'. No, I never wanted a title that would have scrunched up Derrida's brow into the the proverbial what the fuck, I wanted one that would subtly hint at the defense and celebration of the vampire, while self-referencing post-modernism. Now I've got it.

Slaughter is the best medicine: the pop-culture legacy of the post-modern vampire.

The Best Times

I did nothing today because something great happened. The latest Vogue fell through the door and, as I mentioned in the past, it is the best thing to happen every month. I've been known not to answer the phone and to retire in seclusion with Vogue until I am satisfied that I got well acquainted with the latest musings. Many people often think that Vogue is all pics and all ads and that there is nothing to read. These are the sort of people that usually write off sci-fi without ever having read any sci-fi text. Don't mind them. British Vogue is above all other Vogues out there (yes, Anna Freak Wintour, much better than the one you edit) for variety, intent and depth of its features, even though they are addicted to the fact that. But hey, you can't have everything (or you could have had, if only John Milton had written about fashion).

Recovering A Sense Of Integrity

Today it was pouring rain like it hasn't poured in a while. It wasn't just pouring rain, it was pouring cats and dogs and horses and frogs. Sounds good to me, especially when I am free to have a five-hour lunch with a friend of mine. Gosh, I never knew that not going to an office Monday to Friday could be this much fun. I am planning never to have to go again. She brought me a lovely book about the creative process, The Artist's Way. Together with The Creative Habit, this one too is one of the most respected texts about the artist and the challenges associated with art, no matter the type.

When I returned home, I plunged in as I often do when I have a new book, intoxicated with a sense of expectation and newness that only a new pair of shoes ever gives me. You know when you find that, at your darkest hour, you really weren't alone at all, because many others, hundreds, perhaps millions of people have gone through your same feelings? I was both flabbergasted and elated to read this in relation to discovering your artistic integrity:

'Shifts in taste and perception frequently accompany shifts in identity. One of the clearest signals that something healthy is afoot is the impulse to weed out, sort through, and discard old clothes, papers, and belongings. [...] By tossing out the old and unworkable, we make way for the new and suitable. A closet stuffed with ratty old clothes does not invite new ones. A house overflowing with odds and ends and tidbits you've held on to for someday has no space for the things that might truly enhance today.

When the search-and-discard impulse seizes you, two crosscurrents are at work: the old you is leaving and grieving, while the new you celebrates and grows strong. As with any rapture, there is both tension and relief. [...]

Be prepared for bursts of tears and of laughter. A certain giddiness may accompany sudden stabs of loss. Think of yourself as an accident victim walking away from the crash: your old life has crashed and burned; your new life isn't apparent yet. You may feel yourself to be temporarily without a vehicle. Just keep walking.'

You'd be excused to think that this is perhaps a book about surviving loss and re-finding yourself after a period of upheaval. Yes it is, if you think about yourself as a repressed artist that has fought long to reach something as elusive as a sense of identity, both as a person and as an artist. It is a good idea to look at the issue from a perspective other than one's own; The Artist's Way does just that.

When Is A Gift Not A Gift?

Because I subscribe to Vogue, Condé Nast thinks it’s a good idea to blast me with subscription offers for their entire catalogue. I have received letters about how fantastic it would be to bring my house up to The World Of Interiors standard, I’ve been told that GQ will endlessly enrich my reading with cultural and lifestyle issues and that Glamour is the UK’s first monthly mag for women, what am I waiting for? I’ll tell you what puts me off, this does:



Don't know what you're looking at? Well, have you ever heard of ‘an unmarried bachelor’? I didn’t think so. Of course, you never heard of it because all bachelors are, by implicit definition of bachelor, unmarried. Now I ask you, when is a gift not a gift my friends? Why do these people (and we can throw cosmetics’ companies in too, offering free gifts with purchase of two pots of something or other) feel the need to offer a free gift? Obviously, the Moleskin notebook is either a gift, and I don’t have to pay for it, which means it's free, or I pay for it, and therefore is not a gift anymore. Calling it a free gift is nonsensical propaganda, it is marketing for the illiterate. Gifts are always free; if they are not, they are not gifts.

This dis-engagement of our brains runs rampant across the way we speak and write. I think that, should I single out one such irritating misuse of intelligence, I think I would pick ‘moving forward’, a favourite of business people everywhere. I have clear (and ghastly) recollections of numerous meetings whereby we were going to do something ‘moving forward’ or we would ‘move forward’ thanks to a particular set of actions. How stupid did it always sound to my sensitive (and sensible) ears.

I ask you, have you ever seen anything ‘moving backwards’ save, perhaps a crab? Even so, a crab moves sideways, not backwards. Not even cars move backwards, they reverse. While I am aware that sometimes businesses know of a backward motion, they do so not because they are moving backwards, but because they are falling backwards. The problem is that any preposition tagged along moving, does not make any good, explicative sense. You can move up, but it doesn’t make very graceful writing or speaking; you rise, you gain stature or whatever applies to your context. You can move down, but then you may be dropping, sliding, leaving. You could move forward but moving forward really means proceeding, so why not using this word? I don’t know, I don’t have the answer.

I don’t know why we are kept into a blindfolded celebration of mediocrity taken as linguistic fact. I do not expect these offers for free gifts to stop coming through the letterbox any time soon, even though I’ve started to think that, perhaps, the Moleskin is not really free if I have to buy a subscription anyway and if it is not free... it cannot be a gift still. The problem remains. And you see, these writers, these appalling copywriters, do not see that. But you know what they say... beware of gits bearing gifts.

Light

You know how people sometimes worry that the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel may be a train careering towards them? I call crap to that. Light is always light in my book and when I hear the above expression I always think of a simple, calm light, like this one:



Today was my last working day, the day when, after almost eight years of agony playing someone I am not, after almost eight years of trying to fit a square peg into a round hole (or a round peg into a square hole? I can never remember), I called it quits and walked out a free woman. Just as expected, it was the best day, probably the best day ever. And just as I always suspected, deep down, the light was a gentle speck of hope in the distance, not a catastrophe falling out of the dark sky. Light is always good. This is not just the end of that chapter, it is the end of that story. Writing something else is going to be really exciting.

No Ordinary Pea Risotto

The weather is positively autumn-like, which is a great thing as far as this Virgo is concerned, but somehow today peas were calling me. And there is nothing that screams SPRING as much as a pea risotto. But this one is a different breed of pea risotto my friends; this one is mantecato with mascarpone and makes for a fab early autumn treat.



You'll need:

200g of risotto rice
100g petits pois (frozen, but better if fresh, as usual)
1 tbsp mascarpone
half an onion
one egg yolk
a couple of tbsps of olive oil
1 lt vegetable stock
greated Parmesan

Serves 2 (or indeed 1 under the right circumstances)

Chop the onion in really small pieces (use a mezzaluna if available) and drop into a heavy-based saucepan on high heat with a couple of tablespoons of olive oil. Let it sizzle, stir away and watch it until it starts going gold. At this stage, add the peas and the dry rice and stir well and quickly. Now begin to add the vegetable stock. Continue to stir until the rice will have absorbed the stock, by which stage you will add some more.

You may wish to lower to heat to high medium at this stage, but know your rice before you do this. Some risotto rice (canaroli or arborio) softens really quickly (no good unfortunately) and having too much stock on a too low heath will give you a watery mess that is not risotto at all. So bear this in mind as you work. Continue to add the stock as soon as the rice has absorbed it until you have some liquid left in the pan.

Now crack your egg, get the egg yolk in a small bowl and beat in the mascarpone. Add a couple of tablespoons of Parmesan and then drop into the pan of risotto (this is the mantecatura, no English equivalent for this word). Stir well in order to incorporate and serve immediately, not forgetting generous Parmesan on top.

The Happiest Birthday

There is something so compelling about my birthday, I can barely put it into a coherent sentence. Somehow, despite my built-in love for all things pretty and, yes, even classy, when the first day of September strikes, I am all for cheap, tacky and junk. So here is my cake.



I didn't bake it after all, I bought it, and, as per usual, I could not resist the slightly camp HAPPY BIRTHDAY candles. Beats buying multiple packs in order to stab the cake with my actual age. I think I stopped doing that a handful of years back, when I was 26 or so. Mind you, I loved the cake ablaze with so many lights but I equally love one that spells the message too.

Back to the junk. Yes, birthday junk. I love to have a birthday lunch at the Old Orleans, a faux-Creole place, much like Pizza Express is faux Italian and Wagamama is faux Japanese. Still, the low lights, the fake musical instruments and the placca-like decorations strewn across the place make me happy happy happy and, for some unfathomable reasons, only ever come to mind as my birthday approaches. Today I had lunch there (an unremarkable bean chilli, as most food is in faux-places, remarkably unremarkable) and then went to The Dark Knight at the IMAX, which made for really good revision now that I am ready (and free) to tackle my research full-time. And did I mention that I really love the soundtrack? Plus, listening to it in the movie theatre is much better than playing it ad lib in the car. For one, listening to it within its natural context does not make me feel like driving off a cliff and calling it a day. Batman is not called the Dark Knight for nothing.

Yes, now I am free. I am free to be who I am. And you know something, I am ridiculously happy for it. I knew this was going to be a seminal birthday tagged towards the end of a seminal year and, blow me, it really was. Cheers!