yesterday's cycling session broke me, perhaps not so much
the cycling as having cycled to the former village of
Wennington: oh **** me... this is sad...
it's not like wild fires on the news in California or
in Spain or Greece... this is right on my doorstep -
well... i felt pity: not guilt... i don't own a car...
it's pointless owning a car in London...
the public transport network is just too good
and owning a car is too expensive...
plus i can go anywhere on a bicycle... i can skip
traffic... i: don't have to pay insurance...
i don't have to pay road tax... i don't have to pay
for an m.o.t. and i don't have to worry about breaking
down... just flat tyres from time to time:
and the odd crash... touch wood...
i only had one... but it was all my fault... i was drunk
and lost control of the bicycle while trying to avoid
a pothole...
but it was still a great experience... falling
over the handlebars must have looked something
of a Francis Bacon painting... smudges of movement...
a black eye... a massive wound on the forehead
and on the cheek... a skid bruise on the forearm
and a massive bruise on the right leg with a mount
of an incision: a garden of lavender and plus around
it of dead blood...
spectacular, absolutely spectacular:
crashing like that on a bicycle...
at work there's this girl: Harini - the law student...
the one who kept on nagging me
about how there are too many white judges...
too many white judges... in England? or was she talking
about barristers? either way... i tell her:
as long as a system of meritocracy is in place...
then what has race got to do with it?
equity, right? the equality of opportunity not
the equality of outcome, no?
a variation of natural selection - the most naturally
gifted at X ought to do X...
anyway she once rode those electric scooters...
but fell off... and she never went back on riding it...
*****... literally... how do these people live any life
worth contentment?
would i give up my passion for cycling
just because of one crash?
fat chance... sure...
the first time after the crash i was shaky...
shaky ******* Stevens...
at one point a pain came back to all the areas mentioned:
and a headache too...
then again... as the saying goes...
drunks have the GPS implants of birds...
and they also fall like sacks of potatoes,
meaning: they hardly break anything...
two examples...
1) the GPS of drunks...
i unexpectedly booked a flight to Athens...
don't ask... i was having one of those psychotic episodes...
which is sort of like a panic attack
but a psychotic attack is a panic attack
in reverse... you crave adrenaline to suppress it...
and unlike a panic attack which is localised on the spot
and in the moment... a psychotic attacks takes you places
and can last for days as you build up more
and more adrenaline from doing something very
unfamiliar... i flew to Athens... i spent the night
crying in Hyde Park (what the **** am i doing?
i don't know what i am doing) - then went to Gatwick
Airport in the morning... took a shower in the airport
bought new clothes in fat-face and ****** off...
arrived in Athens... found a ****** hostel in the worst
part of Athens: one Diogenes of Sinope after another...
(bums, homeless philosophers)...
opened that bottle of absinthe and sat down on
the street... i remember... with my left hand i covered
my eyes and with my right hand i was pointing
at something... and laughing my socks off...
magpie-type cackling... maybe it was the absinthe
or maybe i was seeing something:
proud Greek with their expensive-pension
economies... ha...
****... what year must it have been?
i was supposed to be working on the Olympic village
for the 2012 Olympics.... i'm guessing 2010 or 2011...
just before the Greek financial crisis emerged on
the global scale of being known about...
second day? i go into this market square and sit in a cafe
and start chatting to strangers...
turns out i'm going to join them in going to a *******...
mind you: i'm still in psychotic mode...
this could go either way... bad for me... or bad for them...
if they're lying, that is...
complete strangers... just met them...
hmm... when in Greece you never really know if you're
talking to someone who's Greek...
some are pale in complexion while others look like
Syrians, Arabs... then again: this was my first time in
Greece so i shouldn't have expected to know what
the average Greek looks like: complexion and all...
so we get into the car... just outside the Parliament
and we drive acres and acres out of the city centre...
it must have been at least 30 minutes...
i had drank some of my absinthe prior: left over from
the night... we enter the *******...
oh man... my first time... i've been to brothels before...
strip clubs... a strange aura...
completely different... more teasing...
drinks... yep... immediately a girl walks up to me
and places a green plastic circle next to my glass...
what's this? well: now i do know: "green light"...
for a private dance / something more...
at least i knew that i was broke... i was broke...
i had about £30 in my bank account (funny... now i have
an emergency £3000)
but i'm like: i'm sort of enjoying the
show that's already costing me £5 a drink...
but she sticks around, we start chatting...
then another older stripper gets involved...
blah blah this blah blah that...
i catch the eye of a third: the look she gave?
i will remember for the rest of my life...
it was not a scornful look, nor angry...
i was already burying my face in the older strippers
chest with her giggling: two on my arms
and a third looking on...
one of the guys that came in me kept
nagging me for money for drinks:
i said i have none...
until it hit me... i reached point £0...
my card was denied...
credit card? me? me and a credit card
only met once... once upon a time...
when i was a kid and had my bank account set up...
credit cards are so ******* annoying: at least
that's what i found...
you pay for something...
and then... wait for a month to get the bill...
sure... credit in the form of a mortgage i can understand...
it's just credit cards i don't understand...
i only work with debit...
i spend what i have rather than have what
i shouldn't have spent money on...
so anyway... this bouncer escorts me to the nearest
cash machine...
as i tell him: to get some cash out...
i get the ******* escort and all (i said that already,
i know) to a hotel... he ***** off to talk to the concierge
while i fiddle a bit at the cash machine...
then... i start ******* myself...
ah... the sort of "sobering" ******...
i look where the bouncer is and... leg it...
literally speedy Gonzales it out of there... or did i just
sneak out? memory: fuzzy... perfect when it
comes to a-b-s-o-l-u-t-e truths like 2 + 2 and spelling
but memory from experience? fuzzy... fiddly...
anyway... first time in Athens... no map...
nothing... zilch... i don't know how i managed
to get back to the hostel with the already disgraceful
fact that i ****** myself...
i was thinking: oh... ****... this bouncer is going
to bring me into an alley and beat the **** out of me:
wrong... working on a debit system means you
can't overstep the mark... i didn't own anyone
in the ******* any money: i was bad-money free...
but that's the point a drunk has a GPS like birds
have when migrating...
that's why i won't stop drinking...
it's too good for my brain... and the liver i can box
around with... but how the hell did i manage
to find my way back to the hostel when the car trip
was like 30 minutes long... we must have been doing
(on average) around 40 km/h that's 20km (circa)...
in the end i stayed one more night in Athens...
no... i didn't visit the Acropolis... i had it in plain sight...
i liked the fact that it remained on the hill
and i was down below: some things are best kept
forbidden... but i did manage to write some poetry
in the hostel...
i then emailed my uncle and asked him for enough
money for a bus ticket... from Athens... via coach
to Katowice... through Macedonia, Serbia...
Hungary... Czech Republic...
and then to my grandparent's house...
where: finally the psychotic attack was soothed
by reading a book or two and talking with my grandfather...
2) drunks fall like sacks of potatoes...
my godmother had this anecdote... she was sitting
on the balcony of her flat... she heard
a whizz of air and a thump on the ground...
apparently one drunk was locked out of his house
by his wife... he tried to get in through the balcony
having climbed the roof and descending
from the 10th floor to the 7th... well: when there's
an "oops" like that... he fell... 7 floors...
what's that? 30 metres?
he fell like a sack of potatoes...
like that Salman Rushdie opening where Satan
is falling head first and careless... while Gabriel
is falling trying to invent wings flapping and crazy...
probably feet first trying to be: SUPER-CAT...
catch a rhythm of the flapping hope to land on all 4s?
it gets me every time i replay that memory in my head...
the way she dropped the punch-line:
i like my godmother... i don't see her frequently /
not at all... but she's a heavy drinker too...
intelligence... it burdens the mind sometimes...
we need to slow down...
she's a doctor i'm a poo-et...
anyway... so she hears this whizz in the air
and a thumb... the ****** landed
about 10cm from a metal pike... in some bushes...
7 ******* floors... he gets up and utters the words
'o kurva' (i.e. oh ****)... and walks off...
that's a bit like me and my cycling "accident"...
a guy got out of his car and ran up to me
bandaged my head while i was figuring out
why my hands were red (from touching my forehead):
two old women screaming...
i was asked if they should call the ambulance...
gladly they mistook my drunk-state for a state-of-shock...
i was like: no no.... but thank you...
i walked off... came home and took the best
medical advice available: self-prescribed (of course)
i.e. sleep...
i sometimes wonder why i'm not your stereotypical drunk...
i drink to hyper-focus on something...
i never get angry... well... i get angry at things:
because they're so ignoble... then again:
defining what a "thing" is hard when dealing
with a well-crafted table or a chair...
i don't actually know how to define "things"...
even "nothing" is a "thing"...
the supposed "nothing" is a gateway to antimatter...
i suppose the closest "thing" to a THING
is what's an abstraction in the distance...
something you pass at speed that you: don't necessarily
ignore but don't take a concentrated account of:
you don't focus on it... ah! i know the best
example of what a "thing" is...
esp. in a gallery... looking at a painting hanging
on a wall... that's perfect... the wall is a THING...
because you're actually looking at a painting...
mind you... i appreciate all the classical paintings
of the Renaissance... but... you can't see any brush-strokes...
i like paintings where brush strokes are
visible: it's painting then: it's not geometry riddling...
painting by way of insinuating the idiosyncracy
of the hand by leaving several if not dozens of "accents"...
that's why i compared my cycling crash
to Francis Bacon's paintings...
well, sure: because the theme of the macabre
also helps... as did his ****-erotica...
and the drinking...
thank **** i'm not a loser drunk that needs
to drink to pronounce some averse trait of masculinity...
better for me being this loved up fool
with a GPS of birds migrating in my head
and a body that behaves like a sack of potatoes
when any harm should come to its bones...
i fall like a cube... a sack of potatoes...
anyway...
can i imagine living a life that...
like this coworker suggested: oh no, no no...
one fall... i'm not getting back on the electric scooter...
*****...
then again: cycling is my passion:
i hate runners... those arithmetic arthritis wonders
of the world: jelly-knees i call them:
if you're going to run! run on grass!
and mind you: if the "mob" should ever come for me...
they better not be driving cars...
cars make no sense in London...
too expensive...
now... the pivot... i have an 8am appointment
with my hairdresser tomorrow...
i needed to start drinking early so i could write
this and go to bed by 12am...
i'm coming to the ****** and i don't want
to come to the ******...
the heat-wave is over... i can finally breathe...
ah... i think that's how you write...
or begin writing...
all those very important people
and all their very important "autobiographies":
let's face it... ghost-written while still alive...
i guess biographies make more sense...
i think fame, in the truest sense is a testimony
of post-mortem...
i don't believe in fame in one's own lifetime...
i think fame is something akin to
what's most temporal: what can be passed on...
what employs being passed on for so long
that the name most associated with...
for example...
who invented Champagne? Dom Perignon...
ha ha... back in Poland we were taught
the French song:
frèe jacques:
frère Jacques
frère Jacques
dormez vous?
dormez vous?
sonnez les matines
sonnez les matines
ding ding ****
ding ding ****
it's a burning memory... like watching
Cartoon Network... when it was... good...
i don't believe in a fame of the living...
the dead are proper dealers in this concept...
fame... how people strive for fame...
whether through good or through ill done against
others... because fame doesn't escape
the muddling of good & evil...
the fame and the infamy...
i was broken yesterday... i know how much i ****
off women's football but i still ended up watching
England play... who did they play?
never mind... they won...
i was going to watch the Sweden vs. Belgium match...
but i thought... if i had a hairdresser appointment
at 8am tomorrow... i need to be asleep by 12am...
go get up at 7am and shower and blah blah...
then i have to go to the Turk to get my beard
and moustache trimmed...
but i'm still not watching football...
i'm watching Tom-Boys with long socks
and hair dangling pretend something...
sure... there's some green of a football pitch...
but i'm not watching the football...
weird... when i watch female athletics or female
tennis i'm watching athletics and tennis...
for whatever my opinions i have:
i'll watch... what the hell...
at least it's more interesting than some ******
Hollywood movie based on a comic...
or an overtly existential meditation that came
too many years too late: since we covered the outpouring
of Bergman...
now...
there's the thief... the burglar and the opportunist....
there's this Slavic motto:
znaleziony nie skradziony...
found not stolen...
i operate this maxim...
when it comes to money...
i have found a £20 banknote on the street one...
i have £10 banknotes once or twice...
i've found pounds... i've also found pennies...
would i be stupid enough to find such devaluating /
evaluating / re-evaluating "things"
(money, that's another "thing" in my gallery
of "things" that i can't place... justly...
Nietzsche was attempting to write
his magnum opus: the trans-valuation
of values before going south of cuckoos...
money is one "thing": am actual "thing" is another...
i find a £20 banknote? i'm keeping it...
found / lost ergo not stolen...
the principle of luck...
i could have spared the man the agony of
crafting ideas about a simple answer to his question
about trans-valuation... money! no ditto!)
i've been a thief before... i managed to steal a compact
disk record from a shop...
Queens of the Stone Age's song for the deaf...
i was sly... but this was different...
i was tired from cycling... i bought a bottle of whiskey
and a bottle of Lukozade... berry: ******* merry...
at the self-service outlet... ooh... what's this?
someone left the newest version of
either a Samsung or an Apple smartphone...
is it at 10.3 or whatever the hell it is at?
lucky me... i need a new phone...
so i grabbed it... it was just lying there...
packed my rucksack...
well... i didn't steal it! it was just lying there!
but i don't need a new smartphone...
i just don't want the one i own to **** up on me...
i honestly don't remember the last time i topped up...
i have £0.75 on my account and i'm still using it...
each peddling started to weigh down on me:
if it was money i wouldn't have cared...
if i found money: like i sometimes found money
i wouldn't give two fivers-worth-of-***** for
anyone who lost them: the idea behind money
is that it's transactional...
they taught us the wrong lessons in school,
e.g.: what would you do if you found a briefcase
of money on a street? was it bribery money?
was it ransom money? it's ******* money...
might as well be leaves of a tree come autumn...
money? i'm ******* keeping it..
no morals... no: no nien niet nie!
but here i am with this... £1000+ smartphone...
i ****** it... start cycling home....
i get this numbing headache without an ache...
i remember the time a former "fwend" of mine went to court over
a stolen phone...
how i helped him but he didn't help himself
therefore didn't help me...
what prompted me?
the phone started ringing...
who was calling? "mommy"...
hell... if it read "mom" i'd be like... *******... ******...
so much for your spontaneous lapse into
pretend Alzheimer's... imitation amnesia...
but the calling card: "mommy" got to me...
i actually don't want a new phone...
i don't actually need a new phone...
i just need the one i have to work...
mind you... money never talks:
money always listens...
i have no scrupules over money:
money lies on the streets all the time:
sure... most of the time they're pennies...
but sometimes... if you're humble to pick but one...
lottery-luck... you might find a pound...
or a tenner... or a twenty...
but... "mummy" is calling...
i was like: if it read: "mum"... i'd be like... lazy ***...
leaving his / her phone on the self-service station...
my gain... your loss...
"mummy"... "mommy" kept ringing...
i was already at the end of Oakland Avenue
trying to figure out how to turn off the phone
and get the SIM card out so i wouldn't be tracked...
i don't need this... however much i was tempted...
i was tempted...
but then the dawn of something akin to reason
came to the lightness of my mind...
better i return this find...
it's not gold...
and "mommy" is calling... so... it wasn't an idiot
that just left this £1000+ item in a supermarket...
as the sayings go:
myśl dobrze mów dobrze rób dobrze (a) będzie dobrze..
on Oaklands Avenue i had that "moment":
after seeing the person calling me on a found /
not a stolen phone... "mummy" is calling me...
if it simply read as "mum"... i'd be like:
well, too bad... Alzheimer prone:
spontaneous memory idiot...
this phone is mine...
i didn't steal it: i just found it... but then something
kicked in... a headache without a headache...
I'M NOT GOING TO DO THE FOLLOWING
BECAUSE IT'S RIGHT... some absolute GOOD vs. EVIL...
i'm going to do this because i want to FEEL...
goooooooooooooooooooooooooooooood...
like glue mixed up with goo...
because that's the focus of reality...
Abel's revenge...
on the vegetarian: moral-posturing Cain...
i can't put a kid through this... the parents will probably
grill... it turns out she was 7 years old...
her for losing her phone / a mini-computer
on a self-service counter in a supermarket...
i had second thoughts: i like second thoughts...
thought that read: not because it's RIGHT...
something selfish... animating the ancient strives...
i want to feel good...
like the mantra already stated:
myśl dobrze mów dobrze rób dobrze (a) będzie dobrze...
(think good speak good do good and
maybe all will turn out good)
as i was turning the lost property in... i already received
several phone-calls from "mommy" / "mummy"...
i think that stealing this phone would have felt
much more thrilling than simply finding it...
so me and this police-officer start talking...
found this phone... yeah... 10 minutes ago...
where is the phone / where is the "mummy"? she's on
her way...
any details? so she can say thank you?
you think i got a thank you?
i received no thank you... oh: glory to the inhibited
nature of man concerning what's good in this world...
i didn't want to be thanked: thankfully i wasn't thanked...
i could have easily ****** off with the phone:
insurance probably paid for such circumstanes...
but this is why Cain slaughtered Abel...
people are naive... i'm thinkiing:
the gods were probably just as naive: if not more...
i think the gods were naive:
me? i just tested being exceptional...
but if it was money? oh: like ****...
no chance... money is money...
money is both stone, both tree,
both a heart-transplant...
i find money... i'm keeping it...
i have no morality concerning money...
but when a...
what sort of parent... gives authority of ownership...
of something worth over £1000 to a prepubescent
girl?! and expects not to "forget" once in a while?
is that authority and worthiness building works?
you need, strangers, to ask themselves moral
questions!
i didn't have to ask the said moral questions:
i could have profited outright from
this scenario!
but i asked them: regardless!
because? i wanted to feel good rather than feel lucky:
lucky on the basis of "theft"...
it's highly uneconomic to mix fizzy drinks with whiskey
coming from a plastic bottle than coming from
a can...
better, better still?
leave the already opened bottle of pepsi in
the sun... and each time you unscrew it...
after filling up... shake the bottle up...
to keep the fizziness in it...
i wish i were more evil that my inherent ontology
disavows me from being...
then again... burp... ****... 30 minutes down the lines...
i do visit strip clubs and brothels...
so... i'm sort of like...
i'm already what's best reserved
and at the same time: what's best kept hidden...
what's to be explored:
by those not willing to explore to begin with.
