Some good conversations with people on Twitter this week, especially on the subject of Iran, when everything went green in solidarity with the protestors. I am putting my Iran tweets in a separate post; here’s the rest:
Definitions
- Ireland: a functional society trapped in a dysfunctional state
- Globalization: Angelus bell rings in distance while WNYC News plays in kitchen and messages from Iran stack up in office.
- Happiness: kids in bed and cricket on television. (sentimental alternate: playing cricket with kids)
Ireland
- Violent pogroms against Romanian Immigrants in Belfast are linked to Sectarianism: in a divided society, where children are educated apart and never encounter people of other creeds and ways of life, any ‘other’ can seem a threat.
- New pipeline in Mayo may be good or bad–but Shell’s record in Nigeria shows that we need to be sceptical of their intentions
- Could Archbishop Martin of Dublin be the Gorbachev of the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland?
A Nicer Film Title
- Fort Apache The Hamptons
A Pop Song Anti-Climax
- Dust Around the Clock (We’re going to dust, dust, dust…)
Outputs
- Redrafting a play on the Dylan Principle: “You do what you must do and you do it well”
Inputs
- Hope Humph would be pleased: I’m Sorry I Haven’t a Clue is back on BBC Radio 4 with guest chairs, starting with Stephen “No Better Man” Fry.
- Watching “Dancing Skeletons” (Disney, 1934) with the kids. Walt does German Expressionism: David Lynch couldn’t top it.
- Watching “Star War IV” (Lucas, 1977) with the kids. The film now seems a product of post-postwar angst. Consider the central conflict of a death-giving and bureaucratic Military-Industrial Empire versus the ragtag band of a Blonde Superman-child. In the end “Pop USA” wins the day.
- Watching Vincent Browne’s political talk show on TV3 is like watching the party scene in “The Plough and the Stars” (and, as it happens, the country is in a state of chassis).
- Chatshows on RTE since Gay Byrne retired often fail because they are “genre-driven”. The opening segments of, say, The Late Late Show or Saturday Night with Miriam will be ‘light’ come what may–while later segments will be ‘heavy’, again come what may: there is no room for spontaneous evolution of a discusion e.g a political commentator may be determined to be flippant or a pop singer may turn out to be unexpectedly articulate: good hosts adapt and let the conversation grow accordingly, but RTE’s current crop seem unable to ‘trust to the moment’.
Decline of Western Civilization, Ch. CXLVII
- At the bookshop. Assistant: “How do you spell Proust?”
- Probably the rot set in when fishmongers started calling themselves “seafood delicatessens”
At the Dinnertable
- Missus and I agreed over dinner that Herb Caen would have loved Twitter.
Proofs
- A parrot wrangler in Vegas once assured me crows were by far the smartest birds. Here is the proof.
Image by Zooomabooma on Flickr
fascinating when you read them all together like this. Tells us a lot about the world doesn’t it?
Thanks for the comment, Jane. I
Using Tweets as the building materials for a weblog is really working for me–with the added benefit, as you say, that you catch the flavour of the times that are in it as you go…
I had been considering listing my tweets once a week but they’re not as relevant as yours!
I’d have to argue that point with you, Jane. Not every blog has to be topical, does it? My more political material is only there to spare my TV and radio from having old boots thrown at them several times a day!
Try a weekly round-up of your Twitter thoughts, rounding them out so that you feel you’re making your point as fully as you can, and you might find you’re surprised at the results.
mmmmm well maybe… I’ll give it a go I have to say though that I don’t really have twitter ‘thoughts’ they are more like ‘inarticulate reactions’. Much more primative!
Re. the TV and radio. I’ve found that giving up on RTE almost entirely helped me a lot.