thisdarcy (![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} thisdarcy) wrote,@ 2005-11-04 19:57:00 |
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this boys life among the electrical lights
i can hear the muffled pops in clusters like a crunching in the sky. its guy fox night, or somewhere around there, so for the rest of the weekend fireworks will gather together all the town's folk in parks and empty lots, rooftops and bedroom windows to catch a glimpse and feel the rapture of explosions in the sky.
where have i been? what have i been doing? it's grotto's eve! that should tell you something. or maybe not.
i've left the theatre and am no longer an usher. i traded in my waistecoat for a pin striped suit and am, as of three weeks ago, a manager at harrods department store. specifically, i'm one of the managers responsible for this year's christmas grotto. think of your typical santa in the mall event and multiply it by ten thousand. there is a 6 hour long queue that lasts from morning until night in order to get inside the grotto and spend 2 minutes with father christmas, get your child's photo taken and be ushered off towards the tills where you can pay £9.95 for a print. we have 4 father christmas's (christmi?) in four seperate rooms and, on opening day, tomorrow, over 30 'hosts' to manage the queue, work the rooms and hand out treats and refreshments. it all begs the question: what have i gotten myself into?
but apart from the more insane aspects of my new job, i do enjoy working more sociable hours. also, i work with rosie, which is great. and having more responsibilty as well as independence in the workplace is really satisfying.
my new flat has been great. matthew and i have been getting along really well, and its nice to be living around friends. bob often has me over for dinner, and i've cooked a few meals for friends here at home as well. and on the subject of my new flat, cooking, and friends, i'm having a mexican-themed housewarming next saturday where i'll be serving up some delicious mexican food and brandishing a home-made pinata of my own construction! its the talk of the town.
halloween's come and gone. i didn't dress up, unless you count wearing a suit as dressing up, which for me you very well could, but i did give out treats. ok, so the bell rang twice, but at least one of the two was for two of the cutest little girls ever. matthew and i went to the door together and fawned over them as we handed out the treats. later matthew pointed out that our neighbors probably now think we're gay.
last night was amazing. rosie and i went to 93 feet east and saw the new pornographers!! i can officially scratch that one off my list of dreams that have yet to come true. but it was a real close one as we almost didn't even get in. having bought our tickets over the phone through an agency, we were told all we needed to bring was our reference number. the girl at the ticket collection table had no idea what we were talking about, and we weren't on the list anywhere. after ten minutes of checking and rechecking she asked if we wanted to see the manager of the venue. when we said we'd love to i think we passed her test and proved we weren't just trying to scam our way in, as she then said she'd let us have two of the many comps she was sure wouldn't end up being claimed, stamped our hands and explained that she likes gin and tonic. minutes later she was drinking a gin and tonic and we were rocking out to the immaculate machine, who were very catchy and attractively intricate. as they left the stage the crowd thickened towards the front and we all took our places for the rest of the evening, rosie and i each topped up with a fresh bottle of sole, primed and ready for the coming 90 minutes of joy. the new pornographers were incredible. while they were minus dan bejar, which was a bit of a let-down, i wasn't entirely surprised, and they compensated nicely. they even belted out one of his, a testement to youth in verse, and floored us all with their cascading vocal and instrumental devotion to the bells ringing no in the last half of the song - at one point all the lights exploded into pure white and spilled down from behind them and into the crowd and the band were all impossibly reduced to sihllouettes, the effect of which was crushing. there was no time to think, it was all about absorbtion as they cranked their way through number after number. suddenly, in a lull between songs, i cried out 'where's dan??' and another voice not far behind me did the same. a.c. went into a brief monologue about how dan breaks their hearts on a regular basis, and for a time we were caught up in a bantar about it. then on with the show and man is neko case stunning: stunning to look at and stunning to hear. 'all for swinging you around' and 'letter from an occupant' were rendered with brilliance. a.c. gave us 'the fake headlines' and i sang along with part of the crowd throughout the bravely self-conscious intro. there was more, and more, and even more still, and then from nowhere it was over. we all rejoiced and exclaimed our elation, and the sound of that eventually carried the band back out onto the stage where a.c. claimed they had never done an encore before. they took in a slew of requests and settled on 'from blown speakers' only to discover that a.c.'s amp had actually just blown itself, so they did it without his axe's involvement. i waited for just the right moment between the ending of the song and the quieting of the cheering crowd to shout out 'jackie dressed in cobras,' another dan track, to which a.c. replied 'i think we know that one, just let me confer with the band for a moment' and after a moment's confirmation they blasted into it and with that ended the night on as high a note as i possibly could have asked for. that done, rosie and i retired to the attached lounge bar for a drink to come down from it all. that beer done, we headed back into the stage area to collect our things from coat check and i found neko on stage putting away her gear. i went over and talked to her for a bit about the set and being from canada and such, shook her hand and asked her to give my love to dan. the bus ride home was all about reflection.
home seems so very foreign to me now, and that's the strangest thought that's ever made sense to me.
i can hear the muffled pops in clusters like a crunching in the sky. its guy fox night, or somewhere around there, so for the rest of the weekend fireworks will gather together all the town's folk in parks and empty lots, rooftops and bedroom windows to catch a glimpse and feel the rapture of explosions in the sky.
where have i been? what have i been doing? it's grotto's eve! that should tell you something. or maybe not.
i've left the theatre and am no longer an usher. i traded in my waistecoat for a pin striped suit and am, as of three weeks ago, a manager at harrods department store. specifically, i'm one of the managers responsible for this year's christmas grotto. think of your typical santa in the mall event and multiply it by ten thousand. there is a 6 hour long queue that lasts from morning until night in order to get inside the grotto and spend 2 minutes with father christmas, get your child's photo taken and be ushered off towards the tills where you can pay £9.95 for a print. we have 4 father christmas's (christmi?) in four seperate rooms and, on opening day, tomorrow, over 30 'hosts' to manage the queue, work the rooms and hand out treats and refreshments. it all begs the question: what have i gotten myself into?
but apart from the more insane aspects of my new job, i do enjoy working more sociable hours. also, i work with rosie, which is great. and having more responsibilty as well as independence in the workplace is really satisfying.
my new flat has been great. matthew and i have been getting along really well, and its nice to be living around friends. bob often has me over for dinner, and i've cooked a few meals for friends here at home as well. and on the subject of my new flat, cooking, and friends, i'm having a mexican-themed housewarming next saturday where i'll be serving up some delicious mexican food and brandishing a home-made pinata of my own construction! its the talk of the town.
halloween's come and gone. i didn't dress up, unless you count wearing a suit as dressing up, which for me you very well could, but i did give out treats. ok, so the bell rang twice, but at least one of the two was for two of the cutest little girls ever. matthew and i went to the door together and fawned over them as we handed out the treats. later matthew pointed out that our neighbors probably now think we're gay.
last night was amazing. rosie and i went to 93 feet east and saw the new pornographers!! i can officially scratch that one off my list of dreams that have yet to come true. but it was a real close one as we almost didn't even get in. having bought our tickets over the phone through an agency, we were told all we needed to bring was our reference number. the girl at the ticket collection table had no idea what we were talking about, and we weren't on the list anywhere. after ten minutes of checking and rechecking she asked if we wanted to see the manager of the venue. when we said we'd love to i think we passed her test and proved we weren't just trying to scam our way in, as she then said she'd let us have two of the many comps she was sure wouldn't end up being claimed, stamped our hands and explained that she likes gin and tonic. minutes later she was drinking a gin and tonic and we were rocking out to the immaculate machine, who were very catchy and attractively intricate. as they left the stage the crowd thickened towards the front and we all took our places for the rest of the evening, rosie and i each topped up with a fresh bottle of sole, primed and ready for the coming 90 minutes of joy. the new pornographers were incredible. while they were minus dan bejar, which was a bit of a let-down, i wasn't entirely surprised, and they compensated nicely. they even belted out one of his, a testement to youth in verse, and floored us all with their cascading vocal and instrumental devotion to the bells ringing no in the last half of the song - at one point all the lights exploded into pure white and spilled down from behind them and into the crowd and the band were all impossibly reduced to sihllouettes, the effect of which was crushing. there was no time to think, it was all about absorbtion as they cranked their way through number after number. suddenly, in a lull between songs, i cried out 'where's dan??' and another voice not far behind me did the same. a.c. went into a brief monologue about how dan breaks their hearts on a regular basis, and for a time we were caught up in a bantar about it. then on with the show and man is neko case stunning: stunning to look at and stunning to hear. 'all for swinging you around' and 'letter from an occupant' were rendered with brilliance. a.c. gave us 'the fake headlines' and i sang along with part of the crowd throughout the bravely self-conscious intro. there was more, and more, and even more still, and then from nowhere it was over. we all rejoiced and exclaimed our elation, and the sound of that eventually carried the band back out onto the stage where a.c. claimed they had never done an encore before. they took in a slew of requests and settled on 'from blown speakers' only to discover that a.c.'s amp had actually just blown itself, so they did it without his axe's involvement. i waited for just the right moment between the ending of the song and the quieting of the cheering crowd to shout out 'jackie dressed in cobras,' another dan track, to which a.c. replied 'i think we know that one, just let me confer with the band for a moment' and after a moment's confirmation they blasted into it and with that ended the night on as high a note as i possibly could have asked for. that done, rosie and i retired to the attached lounge bar for a drink to come down from it all. that beer done, we headed back into the stage area to collect our things from coat check and i found neko on stage putting away her gear. i went over and talked to her for a bit about the set and being from canada and such, shook her hand and asked her to give my love to dan. the bus ride home was all about reflection.
home seems so very foreign to me now, and that's the strangest thought that's ever made sense to me.
