Plenty times in stab city and my nerves are getting frayed. I think I’m going native. A one legged man was arrested a few weeks ago walking down the street with an Ak47 on his way to get the guy who had shot off his leg at the knee. It was just over the road. These are the heroes of this town. If you smell the air here you’ll taste bitterness and ignorance and like the dumb child mocked too often it’s well capable of blind rages. Violence is how they get their respect here and I guess I was born on the wrong side of paranoid, so when I enter a bar these days I scan it for enemies before I sit down. It was trouble of a different kind haunting me last night however. In Mickey Martin’s zumbar says to me “Is that ballygowan woman over there?”

This is a girl I went out with for a while about six months ago. We called her ballygowan woman because she had long curly red hair that made her look like one of the girls used in the less imaginative adds for generic Irish products. I wasn’t sure at first but as she sat at the next table pretending not to recognize me I realized it was. The reason she had attempted to erase all memory of yours truly was because it had ended quite badly one night when I came back to her house loaded on tequila and umm…. misbehaved. As headfucks go it wasn’t too bad but it was a flavour of the night to come. That night entailed a trip to the soul clinic to see DJ Dexter, him from the Avalanches. I’m sure you are all aware the Avalanches’ class and if you don’t already have it I recommend you download their Breezeblock for the best mix you’re ever likely to hear. How we’d all do it if only we could.

So we made it in at twelve and hit the whiskeys while I was staring at the pretty gurls now that I’d a taste of freedom again. The night before I’d let down a girl that I’d being seeing for a couple of weeks real easy. I was thinking if you’re feeling smothered after two weeks things are unlikely to get better. So I told her and she said alright and left peacefully. I was thinking that was the most painless break up ever, real classy-like. She knew I was going to the clinic but never in my right mind did I think she’d come down and entreat me to take her back. Innocent am I in the ways of woman. I was up at the bar trying to get a round when she ambushed me. Half an hour I’d to listen to guff about getting to know the real her and it’d just take a little time. I was thinking I’m not really interested in getting to know the real her and I got other things I could be doing with my time but I was still in diplomatic mode so I listened and nodded politely while wondering if I was ever going to get a drink. After eventually negotiating my release I got the round and headed back to the boys. Zumbar was telling me she was wife material and I was saying ‘you marry her’ when Dexter came on. He was a small stubby guy who was either wearing a big hat or had a very weird haircut. He started playing hip hop and dance with a little rock and roll thrown in. The place was brimming now and me and Chezza started dancing with our fists up to umm… make a point. I was looking at the lovely gurls again and thinking if any of them asks me what I do I’m going to say ‘an astronaut.’ Being on the dole doesn’t get you laid my friends.

The music started to get really intense, I think “Windowlicker’ was on, and I found myself reverting to rave mode. It’s like a physical language everyone used to know about four or five years ago - you face the speaker and dance on the spot to it and try and concentrate on the music so hard you forget you exist. Back then clubs used to look like the heathens version of the Nuremburg rally - every one in lines marching on the spot. I broke out of it when I was realized I was it’s only speaker, a different language is being spoken now. The language of lust, it’s an old one. So my head went back to pretty gurls and I was thinking ‘no-one’s going to fall for an astronaut, alright so I’ll tell ‘em I’m a rocket scientist’ at least I was returning to earth, a little anyway. And then who’s two yards in front of me shifting some guy but little miss ‘lets-get-to-know-the-real-me.’ I think I am, babe. All these forget-me-nots hanging off me made me think fuck it I’m never going to score tonight so it was back to Dj Dexter. With all the whiskey that was flowing through me I can’t remember what the hell he played for the rest of the night except that he finished up with Snoop Doggy Dogg, I remember think if I wasn’t so blonde I’d love to be a gangsta. The lights went up and everyone starts cheering for an encore. I was thinking that’s quite a friendly, warm thing to do but the prick comes back and puts on a jokey novelty song and starts laughing at us. I was shouting “We’re not fucking stupid” but I guess he thought we were. Next who arrives back pleading for my love but little miss ‘just-give-me-a-chance.’ Can you believe this shit? I was telling she’d already made her fucking point jabbing my thumb over my shoulder at where she shifted the other guy and she starts denying it. “I haven’t been over that side of the club all night.” It’s times like this I start thinking I got off on the wrong planet altogether. Nothing to do now except make a run for it. So me and Zumbar make a break for it and get outside the club. Out the street I’m thinking ‘thank God I’m away from that lunatic’ when she arrives arrives out the door. She says “John” but I’m already stomping up the street at full pelt. As I turn a corner I see them about twenty yards behind with Zumbar’s arm around her shoulder as he attempts to “comfort” his “wife material.” An hour or two later back at the ranch with Naz and Chezza and Zumbar still hasn’t come home. Where could he be, friends? What could he be up to? This morning he’s all sheepish looking and has issued a vague denial. I figure since I love the guy and don’t give a shit about her I’m not going huffy or puffy or attempt to sate my thirst for vengeance in any way whatsoever. Except, of course, to expose the fucking bastard on the internet. Sometimes it pays to be paranoid.

Dude, he isn’t moving!!!! College instructs students not to choke the shit out of each other to get high. I had this inflicted on me once while buzzing, I think it felt great but it’s a little hazy.

Link via oscar @ Napsterites.

Police tips for people who live in Washington DC:

Walk in a zigzag pattern!
Keep moving!
Stick to dark areas!

But for gods sake don’t panic! (giggle)

I’d been looking forward to Interpol’s gig in the High Stool all week. I’d been listening to Turn on the Bright Lights pretty much every evening and I’m coming to regard it as one of the best albums this year. Joy Division meets Bowie meets Godspeed you Black Emperor! if that makes any sense, just go download the fucking thing and find out for yourself. It sounds too good to be true, one of the top new American rock acts playing a wee rock pub in the Midwest of Ireland. Of course, it turned out to be too good to be true; we get up to the venue and there’s a sign saying they had cancelled due to illness. Darren Emerson pulled exactly the same stroke on me the last time I went out and I’m starting to get sick of it. I’ve got a ticket for Fugazi on the 25th that I’m suddenly feeling nervous about.

But no matter, it was early in the evening and I had some money for the first time in ages. Zumbar says Woodstar are playing in Dolan’s, we decide to head to that. Jack’s very drunk at the stage and starts heckling the first support act, Niall Quinn. He wears a funny hat. He has a song about Coventry Football Club. He’s coming right at us. The second act, Belfast lads called Layer or Lair were very good, to be honest they kinda upstaged the headliners. Woodstar were playing to mark the release of their debut e.p the last sad verse of a dumb punk song and had a great turn out. To me they sound like they are hitting the same vein as Mercury Rev. They were high on technical accomplishment, but on this third time I had seen them live none of the tunes really reached out and made me pay drunken attention to it. I would have prefered Interpol.