i’m staring out of the window, clean sets roll in on the south bay, the computer makes that clicking noise as it works, so busy with itself i’m unable to do anything else but wait for it, i dream of an automate button that knows instinctively what i want it to do while i go for a few waves between writing giant pdf’s. illustrator grinds to a halt time and time again, two days of waiting for computers, yesterday i drew the bridge in brown pen, today i’m writing this blog-post.

the cross section of society that pass the office window or the bridge is amazing. there’s a man right now who walks his dog regularly who looks like jarvis cocker, on the bridge the daily gaggle of alcoholics are lighting cigarettes, i wonder where they’re going. people pass going down the hill, complaining that it’s too steep. people pass going up the hill, complaining that it’s too steep. huge groups of foreign teenagers traipse past, i love hearing a foreign language in scarborough, it’s far too british. old people chariots fly across the bridge, aren’t they supposed to ride on the road now? couples stop the police, are they reporting some hoodie crime? no they just want a photo in front of the grand hotel. a pigeon just walked past, probably complaining about how steep the hill is. soon the bridge is going to be closed for repairs, i think it might increase the amount of people that walk directly in front of the office, people stare at us, i guess it looks kind of weird, they think we’ll just be a normal shop and there we are sat at desks drinking coffee, staring back.

observation is fun.

the electric angel gallery changed over from malcolm macdonald’s realist oil paintings, which have been exhibiting over summer, to graham rhodes’ bridge project, consisting of 16 photographic images of the spa bridge right outside our front door.

graham is a local jack-of-all-trades, scriptwriter, author, poet, painter, photographer, speaker, etc. etc. the list is endless. he’s also knowledgable on virtually anything and particularly interesting when talking about captain beefheart and his eclectic musical tastes (with relevant accompanying stories!) graham also has a small gallery of his own on the harbour where you can speak to the man himself and view his artwork permanently.

i’m hoping i can exhibit in the gallery myself soon, so i guess is should put some thought into what i might exhibit.

as there is usually a theme at our openings, or a theme drink at least, this time we were on the moscow mules with accompanying sweets – shrimps, bananas, jelly babies – all the sickly classics! me and small, nice tasting alcoholic drinks usually leads to me drinking a lot, so when the party was over i was pretty well oiled by the time i’d got home with a curry. i’m not sure if it was the combination of hunger, excitement at the prospect of my first take-away curry in my new home or i could’ve been just drunk, but the lamb bhuna i had was so good i did spend more time staring at it than actually eating it. i’ve gone out on an unproveable limb and declared it the best curry i’ve ever had, and on an even further unproveable limb as one of the best meals i’ve ever had.

it’s funny how meals can taste different or better depending on their setting and company. like some key meals i can remember in my life are:

a can of heinz soup and crusty bread me and jen had after we’d finsihed climbing helvellyn and it had begun to snow outside our tent

some bacon and sausages and a cup of tea for breakfast, again with crusty bread, again in a tent, in northumberland

a lamb bhuna i had on friday!!!!!

if you want to try it, it’s at tikka tikka .

people are saying i love food too much and that i’ll be 40 stone when i’m older.

someone on my flickr left a comment on the above picture leading me to a 26 page document on why the tigers at this temple are poorly treated and abused by the monks who are supposedly looking after them. this is what i replied:

” probably true – however that report doesn’t say they are drugged, just that they might be and doesn’t say it isn’t a real temple, just that the monks don’t seem to perform daily rituals. you’d be stupid if you had looked around the place and not thought it was cruel, but at the same time those tigers could be out in the wild being hunted. 6 and 2 three’s really. there’s an endless list of bad stuff that happens, especially in asia. maybe the problem is less the cruelty towards the tigers and more the pressure put on them by the tourist industry. not just here but throughout tourist hotspots. “

as i said, you would have to be stupid if you wandered around and thought a load of tigers you can stroke and sit on are kept in perfect conditions, especially in asia, and i think the problem is probably the fault of myself and all the other tourists, probably more so lonely planet, and the tourist industry in thailand and asia.

when travelling we went to loads of heritage sites and protected areas and i began to realise that the financial incentive of something being a designated heritage site, place of beauty or UNESCO area is almost the downfall of many places. many of these places were abused and disrespected by the tourists that had paid to see them. you can’t exactly blame anyone, people want to see certain things and it is their right to do so; other people own or live amongst things that people want to see and should be able to capitalise on tourists and governments know that the tourist industry is an endless gold mine worthy of promoting and encouraging.

the glaringly obvious thing is that sensitivity to the very thing you are there for is sadly lacking, particularly amongst certain sets of modern travellers and tourist companies. some people’s style of travelling is reminiscent of the days of british imperialism, some kind of global territorial pissing, with some teeth showing and snarling to confirm you’re from a far more advanced race of people.

clearly there are conflicting interests which can’t live together harmoniously without one elements interest being neglected. in this case there are tigers interests, monks interests, tourists interests, government interests, tourisms interests – a huge list of people who want something out of the whole venture, regrettably the tigers probably lose and i’ll admit i’m part of that chain. i don’t think there is a right answer to this, there is the answer that everyone should have more respect for the places they go, not only in global tourism, in local tourism too…

…particularly when coming from miles away to surf in scarborough! (that’s a different, much longer blog post i’m never going to write though!)

just a post to illustrate an interesting palindrome i read recently

a man, a plan, a canal, panama!

simples!

we spent this weekend moving. ..up four flights of stairs. it wasn’t that hard. we’ve managed to furnish the whole place without paying for anything except 2 giant 2 seater sofa’s which cost us the princely sum of £20. most excitingly there is loads of space for my ever growing collection of herbs and edible plants. actually most excitingly is its less than a minute to the sea, but edible plants are very high on my excitement list. so far i have chives, chilli, oregano, basil, mint and coriander with the intention of a further crop of spinach and some little dwarf beans.

this week at electric angel, we’ve been drawing in moleskins, sent to us by the culture vulture in association with Round Foundry Media Centre, Leeds.

here’s mine. our subject was “things that make you go ‘ooh’ “

see adrian’s at electric angel

our poster for the ‘crazy, damn right i’m crazy’ exhibition at hull’s ferens art gallery is so striking and cool it even crops up on tv! here it is in the background of the secret millionaire on channel 4. fluorescent orange paid off!

terror, alarm, anxiety, awe, consternation, dismay, dread, fearfulness, fright, horror, intimidation, panic, shock, trepidation, trepidity, anxiety, apprehension, cold feet, dismay, distress, nervousness, scare, strain, stress, tension, terror, unease, uneasiness…these are all the things the thesaurus told me i should be feeling in the wake off the swine flu epidemic upon returning to the uk.

my first feeling upon landing in manchester boiled down to this ‘wow, rain, a massive queue at immigration, and why is everyone so orange?’ yep, everyone in the uk is sporting the varnished look accompanied by velour tracksuits, crocs and tiny adidas shorts. i’m no fashionisto (it’s kind of similar to fascist that word isn’t it?) but even i know making your skin orange is best left to hasselhoff and garden fences.

on a side note i just read this great quote ‘Hollywood romantic comedies have become the Primark dresses of cinema’

so into the point of this post – i think it’s just to re-aquaint myself with this blogging process, plug some pictures on flickr and make it easier to write the next post which will be focused and perfectly edited.

i’ve been in south-east asia for 5 months missioning around with my girlfriend, lazing on beaches and in jungles while she learns thai. i learnt quite a bit too. it’s ace for surprising scarborough’s thai population! i’m sure i’ll gradually include our activities in other countries amongst other posts, it’s a bit epic to describe 5 months in one go.

here’s a website i’ve found today that i like:

http://awfullibrarybooks.wordpress.com/

and one that sent us ‘the travelling moleskin’:

http://theculturevulture.co.uk

some piccies from the national marine park. the water was a bit murky so not great snorkelling but the place was amazing nevertheless. off to bangkok now for a couple of days.