VITAL STATISTICS 2
Format courtesy of The Independent Magazine
I drive…
A T-reg (2000) Fiat Punto
&
an M-reg (1995) Volvo 850 estate
If I have time to myself…
I sit on the sofa & stare into the middle distance idly pondering what I might usefully do during the time ahead. When the period of time has passed, I take a deep breath, rise, stretch & pick up where I left off.
You wouldn’t know it but I’m very good at…
· Ironing.
· Predicting weather from minimal data.
· General knowledge quizzes.
· Identifying records from the first 8 bars.
· Listening carefully to people in distress.
I’m no good at…
- Finding my way. I have absolutely no sense of direction. I can identify routes by the presence of individual landmarks, but I can’t link them together into a pattern. This is as disabling a condition on my home turf as it is in unfamiliar territory.
- Waiting in queues. If I have to wait longer than 5 minutes, I begin to shape-shift into a species of creature that roamed the earth before the dawn of humankind.
- Pretending to agree with/believe in/feel respect or regard for that which offends me, be it person, principle or practice. I cannot manage the shit-eater’s smile where tact or good sense might be advisable. Whilst far from being a naturally courageous or confrontational individual, this has got me into trouble on occasion.
- Logic, patience or calm when dealing with difficult day-to-day operations in the material world. I am unshakably convinced that all inanimate objects, regardless of nature or scale, are in conspiracy against me. I share with Basil Fawlty a policy that, if a delinquent object – a chair, a vacuum cleaner, a drawer, a motor vehicle – fails to respond to reasoned argument, it must be destroyed.
A book that changed me…
Mutual Aid by Peter Kropotkin
&
The Collected Poems of Wilfred Owen
&
On the Road by Jack Kerouac
&
On Having No Head by Douglas Harding
&
The Sea, The Sea by Iris Murdoch
& & &…
Movie heaven…
If, directed by Lindsay Anderson
&
Brief Encounter, directed by David Lean.&
The Wild Bunch, directed by Sam Peckinpah
&
The Seventh Seal, directed by Ingmar Bergman
&
The Grapes of Wrath, directed by John Ford
&
Dead Man Walking, directed by Tim Robbins
&
Prospero’s Books, directed by Peter Greenaway
&&&…
Comfort eating…
Sesame seed biscuits & houmus.
The Covent Garden Soup Company’s haddock chowder.
When I was a child, I wanted to be…
A farmer, a writer, a journalist, an engine driver.
All my (spare) money goes on…
Books. I have thousands. By the time I reach fourscore years & ten, I shall have thousands more. Collecting books is not a hobby, it’s a condition.
At night I dream of…
Corridors, stairwells, crowded rooms, many storeys, fast-moving groups of people…
My favourite building…
47 Norbiton Avenue, Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey
&
Altair, Rue des Tambourinaires, Barbigoua, La Croix-Valmer, Var, France
&
The Tate Gallery, St Ives, Cornwall
&
St Mary’s Church, Ashwell, Bedfordshire
My biggest regret…
I’m not given to regrets, but I wish sometimes that I had pursued more doggedly a career in music. Equally, a career in theatre &/or film direction.
If I wasn’t me I’d like to be…
Another guy, several stone lighter, free of the need for glasses, with a full head of hair, able to vault without hesitation gate of modest height.
My favourite work of art…
(at this precise moment)
Experiment with an Air Pump by Joseph Wright of Derby
&
Portrait of Jeanne Hebertune by Amadeo Modigliani
&
Anything by Lucien Freud, Stanley Spencer, Marc Chagall, Rebecca Horn, Bernard Leech, Alberto Giacometti, Henri Cartier-Bresson…
The soundtrack to my life…
Currently Vaughan-Williams, Benjamin Britten, Maurice Ravel, J.S.Bach, Penguin Café Orchestra, Steve Reich, pre-war blues, Howling Wolf, Brian Eno, Harold Budd, Kate Bush, Marta Sebastyen, Georges Brassens, Jim Moray, Kathryn Tickell, Martin Carthy.
The best invention ever…
The thin-nibbed Bic biro
&
Doc Marten boots
&
the Dyson vacuum cleaner
&
the blogosphere..!
10:24:10 PM 
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