Slightly Intrepid

09 November 2014

Guy Fawkes 2014

Photos of last night's Guy Fawkes fireworks display in Wellington harbour, taken from Queens Wharf. It was a perfect night for the display: mild, with no wind.

08 November 2014

Two-thirds of the distance to the Moon

Lyall Bay, 8 November 2014

During my recent long weekend drive to Hawke's Bay my own little exemplar of vintage motoring had a significant birthday. Not content with merely passing 20 years on the road this year, my 1994 Ford Laser GL wagon (KE model) also passed 250,000km. I've had the Laser slightly more than three years, and in that time have added only 18,000km to the odometer, so it's hardly been a challenging workout. It's been a good reliable runabout, particularly good at long-distance drives. And it's nice to think that it was actually made in New Zealand too, having been turned out by the Ford factory in Wiri before that was closed down in 1997.

07 November 2014

Something For The Weekend

Commemorating the 44th birthday of Northern Irish singer-songwriter Neil Hannon today, here is the first charting single of his band The Divine Comedy, which climbed to number 14 in the UK charts in June 1996. This was the first of a run of 12 UK top 40 singles for the band over a period of eight years. Something For The Weekend, if memory serves, was written for Kate Beckinsale - note the repeated lyrical references to Cold Comfort Farm - and features her giggling at the opening and during the bridge. The track was from the band's breakthrough album Casanova, which also contains two songs that were originally written as potential themes for the classic sitcom Father Ted. The video, shot in and around Venice's St Mark's Square, features the typically dapper Hannon and a model (not Beckinsale). Aside from 10 Divine Comedy albums, Hannon has also gone on to make two appealingly eccentric concept albums about cricket with collaborator Thomas Walsh of the band Pugwash, under the name The Duckworth Lewis Method.

06 November 2014

How to do good sentences

Why sentences? Well, that question answers itself, really. Look at it: “Why sentences?” There’s something missing, isn’t there? I’ll tell you: yes. What’s missing is the rest of the words. And it’s shoddy. It’s shoddy and lazy. It’s shoddy and lazy and frustrating, sticking out there like a bad piece of junk. I’m disappointed on both our behalves. It could have read:

Why is sentences good?
Why are we be using sentences?
Why sentences appropriate?
Why should I do sentences?

All of the above is correct. Give yourself a clap if you knew that. You’re well on your way to being really good at this!

- James Thomas, 'How to write a sentence', New Yorker, 24 October 2014

04 November 2014

Nature's fury caused 'by atheist excretions'

‘The immediate reason for last year’s floods in this region may have been excessive rain,’ [India's] water resources minister Uma Bharti told a committee meeting of the Himalayan Institute of Glaciology and Forest Research in Dehradun (northern India), ‘but I know the real cause. The underlying reason was defecation and urination by atheists near to the shrine of Kedarnath. Human excretory activities have been forbidden within the area around the shrine since 1882, and for a century all was well. But in recent years, non-believers started coming here for business purposes, and they used the area as a toilet. This angered the Gods and resulted in nature’s fury at Kedarnath in 2013’.

Despite protestations that her comments defied scientific logic, Bharti explained that ‘I am here to discuss the reconstruction of the Kedarnath shrine. I intend to restore the status of no-man’s land around the shrine, and have already reinstated the ban on human excretion. And as you can see, the Saraswati river has since reduced to a mere trickle’.

- Hindustan Times, 16 September 2014, spotted by Tim Poston & quoted in Private Eye 1377, 17-30 October 2014

03 November 2014

Bill Bailey

Bailey gets one up on Mamma Mia

Bill Bailey – Limboland

Michael Fowler Centre

Wellington

2 November 2014

In last night’s Wellington performance, English comedian Bill Bailey showed the advantages of knitting together a comedy set with good-natured tangential rambling, strong energy and physical humour, and by not dumbing down a routine for international audiences – for example, leaving in a Wildean reference to a seemingly ageless David Cameron ‘having a portrait in his attic’.

Commencing with an introductory conversation about the recent New Zealand election, Bailey showed that he’d done more research than just scanning that morning’s newspaper, but fortunately he swiftly moved on to more interesting fare, issuing a mild but entertaining rant about the underwhelming world of British politics. (On Labour leader Ed Miliband: ‘The man looks like he’s just caught the bouquet at a funeral’).

Satire soon merged into Bailey’s traditional mix of musical comedy and observational whimsy, both of which still work admirably on stage with Bailey having honed his performance skills over many years. Tales of run-ins with wounded geese, Buckingham Palace security, the perils of taking your elderly in-laws dog-sledding to see the Northern Lights, intimidating catchphrase-quoting Estonian airport security, and the marvellously British phrase used to appraise weekends: ‘Not too bad really, all things considered’, all attracted Bailey’s deft mock outrage and bewilderment.

The musical aspects of Bailey’s act still provide many of the most memorable highlights, including his justifiable scorn for the jelly-legged performing chimps in boyband One Direction, the strident Teutonic joys of rendering pop songs in German as if they were performed by Kraftwerk or Rammstein, and an updated foray into dub reggae for his reimagining of the Downton Abbey theme, replete with ironic dialogue clips (‘a bouillon spoon!’). He also made a daring venture into impersonating the New Zealand accent (emerging largely unscathed) for his spiel on inappropriate accents for metal bands - ‘Sux Sux Sux, number of the Beast’.

Bill Bailey might be a pricey night out in New Zealand, but with his years of experience and well-honed affable stage presence he’s still worth every penny.