But my most favourite song at the moment is Zombie, by the Nigerian Fela Kuti, released 1976. I’ve always dug a bit of Afrobeat every now and then but this is 100% infectious. It manages that rare double box-tick of being really catchy (ie I dare you to not want to dance to it) and also highly political—about the draconian military regime in Nigeria at the time. The Zombie album was so successful that it caused riots, and the military came around to the Kuti house and ended up killing Fela’s mum after throwing her out a window! Man, Nigeria’s always been a ruff town but also definitely the music capital of Africa, if you ask me.

This is it – the full 12min version—and it’s not some boring long jam song – it’s good the whole way through.

It was the school sports festival last week. It was good partly because it made it a light work-week for me but also because it was good to watch some of the departments going head to head. I don’t know who won overall but the Emergency Medical Technicians seemed pretty strong, as was Physical Therapy. I suppose it’s all the battering and pounding of chests they do. There seems to be a lot more ‘school spirit’ at this place compared to the last place I worked—and a lot less drinking. All up I’m still thanking my lucky stars for the myriad of little things that’ve improved between last year and this.

In addition to his hand in creating such historic Beastie Boys albums as Paul’s Boutique, Check Your Head, Ill Communication, Hello Nasty and more, Yauch was a founder of the Milarepa Fund, a non-profit organization dedicated to promoting awareness and activism regarding the injustices perpetrated on native Tibetans by Chinese occupational government and military forces. In 1996, Milarepa produced the first Tibetan Freedom Concert in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park, which was attended by 100,000 people, making it the biggest benefit concert on U.S. soil since 1985’s Live Aid. The Tibetan Freedom Concert series would continue to stage some of the most significant benefit shows in the world for nearly a decade following in New York City, Washington DC, Tokyo, Sydney, Amsterdam, Taipei and other cities.

Check out just down and to the right of the cursor sitting on the subway icon.

We went on a mission to go strolling around the area to see if we could see what it was all about but went slightly the wrong way and ended up walking up a track where some light construction or terraforming was going on. It seemed that this is one of the areas where some of the land-slides happened last rainy season, so the govt is putting in some water drains. Re the plane, there is some army headquarters in that area of the city’s south, so my guess is that the plane’s got something to do with that. Maybe they practice high-jacker situations with it. At least the old style ‘70s high-jacker style where the terrorists kept the plane at the airport and waved their guns out the pilot’s window.

I went to the city’s large guitar & musical instrument emporium with my associate A—-, who is crazy about ukuleles. My obsession with guitars comes and goes, but he plays and thinks about ukuleles all the time. And, as I am told, electric ukuleles in the style of a solid-bodied electric guitar are as scarce as hens teeth. Apparently, occasionally a person with luthier skills here or there makes one but they all have an odd look to them.

One of the few Korean guitar companies in Korea that still makes their stuff in Korea had a crack at it and branded them as Tomo. They use a specially made single coil pick-up, and the thin four strings from a normal electric guitar, although, it seems that the tuning still stays in the standard uke tuning. A—- was attempting to tune it to D,G,B,E but trying to get to the G felt like it was going to break the string. It might’ve got there if he’d forced it but who knows with such a short length of wire. Some of the bodies were made with alder and some with mahogany.

They had a tele style, a strat style and a Gibson body-shape style. The pick-guards on the fender styles were apparently quite cheap-looking and maybe would benefit from a reseating and some filing of the edges. This was part of the reason why A—- finally went with the Gibson-style uke. It was a yellow colour that’s a bit brighter than the normal gibson ‘TV yellow’. Cash price W400 000. We’re sure these would sell bigtime if they were in N.America, especially considering how the hipster demographic has started to latch on to the ukulele.

There’s a rusty old petrol station over the street down below me and attached to it is a hand-job car wash. When I’m feeling a bit down or flat I look out there and think Well at least I’m not working at the Car Wash. Although I’m sure that it’s possible to work there and be happy with a beat kind of simple lifestyle too. It made me think of the disco song, Car Wash by Rose Royce. I do have it amongst my voluminous music files but not the version that was in my mind’s ear. There was another version on yootoob and thereupon I discovered that it was also connected to a 1970s LA movie.

I watched the movie. Nothing earth-shattering – just depicting life in the 70s being a black person working at the car wash. There was no real main character, it had about 15 characters it’d switch between. It made it a little difficult to connect with. Richard Pryor does a cameo as do the Pointer Sisters.

Point Blank (1967)

An action film starring Lee Marvin. Good quality action films, when you can find them or be recommended them, are really worht the time. The action genre got dragged down badly in the late 80s but when it’s good it can be one of the purest forms of film in that it emphasises action over dialogue. (sideways: interdesting article on action films here)

There was some unusual editing and cinematography in it and it alludes to The Man but calls it The Organisation. I might have to check out what else Lee Marvin did after seeing this and Violent Saturday.

The Seven Year Itch (1955)

is one that J-e wanted to watch, I think because she’d read this was the movie that has Marilyn Monroe in the famous scene where she’s standing on top of a subway air vent. I didn’t think it’d be my cup of tea but I was surprised with how modern the writing was considering the year it was from. It’s called farce style, with the main guy alongside Marilyn imagining all kinds of absurd daydreamings. Very Ally McBeal. And Monroe is one person whose image really does live up to the hype.

The real tradge is I let myself get bothered by it. Does this kind of crap happen to Lewis Hamilton or Yao Ming? I bet it doesn’t. I know life is no picnic for them either. Yao shoots 200 baskets a day, and sometimes up to 1000. I don’t know how many baskets Lewis shoots, but I do know that a co-worker of his, Mark Webber suffers the frustration of not being able to drive on the roads in China, and that the assigned local divers are often, reportedly, terrible at their job.

It’s been a while since I wrote here and as is often the case when that happens, it’s because very little has been happening. We got curtains. I thought about making an entry here titled “It’s Curtains For You (Me, Us)” but I didn’t. It’s amazing went went for so long – a month or so – with no curtains, but I guess that’s part of having a north facing window and sleeping in the top corner of the room.

Curtains.

Also, I wonder if anyone else has thought about how the ‘80s New Wave song, ‘Warm Leatherette’ by The Normal seems to foretell the untimely demise of Princess Diana.

I was out at the airport on Friday to pick up the g/f from her bidness trip to china. She brought back a load of pickles. There was heaps of coppers and security dudes at the airport. Apparently there is some big do on in the city during the next couple of days.

I have to say the change from last year’s job to this one is a step up. It sounds crazy but I’m only working two days a week. Even I, with my advanced abilities to handle slackerdom, am unsure if this is the right time of life for me to be ascending to the two-day working week/5 day weekend. I mean, once you go there, it’s hard to go back. Admittedly, the two days are long days. I have morning classes and I have night classes so I’m stuck down there all day with large chunks of waiting around. The best parts are that the students are pretty easy to get along with. I am a little surprised that their level of English isn’t that much higher than the last place but their willingness to fall in line and stay there is much better, and that lowers the all-round stress levels. Also, the boy students don’t smoke in the toilets! This is unheard of in tertiary institutions in this country, as far as I know. And students in general are friendlier – they say hello in the halls even when they don’t know you.

I’m liking angry birds’ latest iteration, angry birds in space. It’s quite involved getting those orbital trajectories right.

There’s a little nugget of wisdom from the eastern mind. Although what it fails to consider is the anti-carb lobby that has been waging a propaganda war against the potato for some time now, in the west at least. I tell ya though, what the west does take for granted is the price of potatoes. Damn expensive here. I don’t really know why either. The carbohydrate-food lobby needs to get together with the gluten-food lobby and form a united front the way red meat & eggs have, in the west at least. People love gluten here. You can buy star-shaped gluten treats at Dunkin Donuts.