Rupert Brooke-Based Vignette... Type-Thing.

At a recent writers group meeting, a member read out this opening line from “The Hill”, a poem by Rupert Brooke.

“Breathless, we flung us on the windy hill.”

We were then given fifteen minutes to free-write with this as our opening line. Here's my piece:

Breathless, we flung us on the windy hill. Each step felt weighted, like I was being forced back by a thousand tiny hands. I leaned into the incline, climbing on. On a still day, I would have landed nose-first into the grass; my heels didn't touch the ground as I trudged on. The horizon was getting closer, and the wind continued to prop me upright.

The plastic map case around my neck flapped crazily, like a panicked animal. Every ten seconds it would flip upwards and slap me on the nose. My temper was flaring. I wanted to throw it into the wind and watch it fly like debris into the valley, but I couldn't- I wouldn't know where I was if I lost the map.

Every time I thought I'd reached the summit, another clump of land appeared, higher, further, behind it.

My walking partner was largely silent. He kept close to me, saying nothing. I could hear his breathing, heavy and constant.

And then the land dropped away infront of us, presenting a sprawling vista of hills , and a distant town in the haze.

“We made it,” I panted.

He looked at me, tired, saying nothing. He sat in the grass, breathing heavily.

I put one hand on his shoulder. “Here. Got something for you.”

I opened my bag and found the bottle of water. I took a huge gulp. He didn't complain that I served myself first. Then I pulled out his dog bowl and filled it up. He lapped eagerly, tail wagging.

Rustica Manchester

“I'm too serious to be a dilettante and too much a dabbler to be a professional.”
-Steiner (Alan Cuny), La Dolce Vita

On the corner of Market Street, next to the glassy and iconic apartment block No1 Deansgate, lies Rustica, an authentic Italian restaurant. I dropped in for lunch with the family recently on a Friday afternoon, when the small-but-cosy venue was reasonably quiet. The music and the staff fit the theme, as you'd expect, the service quick and the food was was great. Mum liked her chicken Caesar salad and Dad assured us his pasta dish was good too. My pizza- Chicken pollo I think- also got the thumbs up.

What made Rustica stand out was the décor: aside from the traditional bare-brick walls and Italian music, the venue was adourned with posters of classic Italian movies like Federico Fellini's La Dolce Vita. I ate next to a giant image of the film's pinup, Anita Ekberg.

If you're into European cinema, you'll appreciate the talking points while waiting for your meal. And if you're into Italian food, I doubt you'll have any complaints.

Have you visited Rustica? What did you think?

http://www.viewmanchester.co.uk/restaurants/rustica-userreview-55673.html

July Moments

“I ran. I ran until my muscles burned and my veins pumped battery acid. Then I ran some more.”
Narrator (Edward Norton), Fight Club

Holiday aside, here's what went down this month.

As my old New Balance trainers were falling apart and were being described, quite accurately, as “dogshit” by my friends, I figured it was time to get some new ones. When I was about 14 I was using Saucony running shoes for running and for PE in school. Nobody had heard of this brand, despite the fact that they are the best running shoes in any shoe shop in Britain. I got ripped for wearing them, suffice to say.

http://www.saucony.co.uk/

Today, still nobody has heard of them as Saucony advertises discreetly. You'll probably only see poster ads in running magazines, and TV ads in America or on Youtube. I found a pair of Saucony Grid Ignition in TK Maxx at a bargain price. (It's a store always worth a look in for discount brand names.) And yes, I'm STILL getting ripped for wearing Saucony. I've decided only to wear sportswear for sports from now on. I ran back from a party in them a few weeks ago at about 3am. My Saucony gave me exceptional comfort and cushioning. I was steaming, having drank the majority of a bottle of Jack Daniels (which was still in my hand as I ran) but my trainers didn't let me down. My shocking cardio did, though. It was a very stop-start run. The party was on the other side of a giant hill, and the road had no streetlights. So I ran under the starlight and past barren fields, the odd cow, sheep and horse watching me suspiciously in the dark.

Moving on. I went to Stalybridge with a load of mates last night for my birthday. We got there too late to see Angie Brown's live PA, which I was certifiably gutted about. Here's one of her most-known songs:

Rififi plays R'n'B on the ground floor and House upstairs. I took over a podium in the House room and, well, started busting moves. After a few hours, half cut from loads of Southern Comfort and champagne, I was still breaking it down. A fire exit door opened next to me. A young woman in a suit waved me over to her. She took me into the office. She told me she was the assistant manager and asked me if I was a trained dancer (nope) and would I consider dancing, as a job, in the club?!

Well, yeah, I said. I'd give it a shot.

So she's got my details...

Went to a mate's flat in Uppermill afterwards, didn't have a clue where the taxi rank was, so after a few hours I ran home (3.7 miles) in the pissing rain as the sun came up. Well. It's all character-building, yes? I didn't have my Saucony on this time, though.

One last highlight: my blog is now listed in The Manchizzle, a Manchester-based, blog-based blog. The site includes info for bloggers, and a list of said blogs. Check it out here:

http://manchizzle.blogspot.com/

Well, I gotta run. Speak later.

A Letter to Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook CEO

Dear Mark Zuckerberg and co,

I admit- I have a problem with Facebook. As a regular amateur writer I spend a lot of time on the computer, tapping out wordage and researching. While using the net to find info, and with the speed of broadband, Facebook is only ever a click away. The draw of seeing what my friends are doing is still strong, even though I know everyone's doing pretty much the same thing (“My Friday's are gettin so boring.....lol.x”; “the bodyguard and ben & jerrys...”; “Lookin forward to havin a night out tomoz for abbies birthday!! best dig out my dancin shoes! haha x”; “i am now watching the game beer in hand bosh”; “Session Weekend with the Irish boys”... ad infinitum.

Facebook still needs tweaking, however, just so that it's a) easier to use and b) even more addictive and takes up even more of my precious time.

Facebook Chat has been making communication easier since its introduction about a year ago. It's a shame it rarely works, and people seem to disappear offline when they are apparently still tapping away (according to the little three-dot typing icon at the bottom of the screen). Also, I'm sure I'm not the only person to say that, when someone sends you a chat message, the little “pop” noise you hear isn't loud enough. Lets have a nice big “BING” noise, ala MSN Messenger.

Your rival social network site MySpace (remember this site? No?) has a series of chatrooms available 24/7, based on location and hobbies. Facebook had one room for a short while, but it was removed. Why?

Another of your competitors, Twitter, allows users to “retweet”- to repost updates from other users so that it can be shared between more people. Facebook only seems to allow us to do this with links like Youtube videos, as far as I can see. The function of reposting status updates could be handy for people and for businesses, who may want to share info- “Betty's Bakery is opening an hour earlier next Monday!”- a mundane but fitting example.

I suppose the next step would be to incorporate webcams, taking the name “Facebook” to a more literal level and taking on webcam-based sites like http://camfrog.com/. Why not let us sit and watch each other, not just read about our e-friends?

Chew it over, Mr. Zuckerberg. I'm quite sure you'll take over the world soon, and not just the html world either. Please give me credit for these ideas when your dictatorship is complete.

Thanks,
Matt Tuckey
Social Media Pimp Extrodinaire

Blog readers- is there anything else you'd like me to add to this letter? Any other changes you'd like to make to Facebook?

Fight Ikon 2

“Until mankind is peaceful enough not to have violence on the news, there's no point taking it out of shows that need it for entertainment value!”
-Cher Horowitz (Alicia Silverstone), Clueless

14th March 2010.

Old Skool hip-hop blasts out of the speakers as I walk into Ikon, Bolton's biggest club. It's sparsely populated at the moment, but that's because it's 3pm and today's event, Fight Ikon 2, has only just opened to the public. This afternoon I'll be watching 15 Mixed Martial Arts fights, and despite training for two years, it is the first time I've been to see this sport.

The bouts will take place in the octagonal cage that has been assembled in the middle of the dancefloor. A film crew from P4TV Sports Network is setting up their equipment around the cage. They are feeding footage to the overhead projector, which plays to two large screens on one wall of the club. There's a rumour in the growing crowd that Sky TV are broadcasting the event nationwide. A cameraman is stood on a small platform secured to a cage corner post, the belt around his waist latching him to the padded beam. He reaches down to take the camera from his colleague; the camera is already rolling and the projected images on the walls shake erratically before we see a high-angle shot of the cage's padded vinyl floor.

All thirty fighters line up, wearing board shorts and 8oz fingerless padded gloves, and enter through the cage door. Like in boxing, fighters are paired by weight category, and the men bring a range of weights to the fight card. They stand in rows, like a school photograph- only the subjects are older, and a lot meaner. The photographers are in the cage with them, snapping away.

A dance troupe of ring girls pose with the fighters, all bleach blonde and silicone but damned good-looking. The girls' fishnet tights match the pattern of the wire mesh making up the cage walls. The event organiser, suited and booted and mic in hand, welcomes us to Fight Ikon 2 and promises some spectacular fights. The show, he tells us, will be broadcast soon on LA Muscle TV - Channel 281 on SKY TV. Before the fights begin, though, he has entertainment of a different kind. After the fighters leave the cage, the troupe dance to Missy Elliot's Get Your Freak On. I'm not exactly sure what this has to do with MMA, but I'm not complaining.

It's my first attempt at “sports reporting”. As the event begins, the first thing I notice is that I shouldn't have brought a gummed notebook. I'm scribbling stuff down and tearing it off, stuffing A7 sheets into pockets in no discernable order. I note down to buy spiral-bound from now on. The second thing I notice- once the fights start- is that there's two areas I don't have enough experience of. I have a pretty good knowledge of the sport after 2 +1/2 years of training, but that isn't enough to produce an accurate write-up on an MMA bout. The second thing is this- I'm a blogger. I'm not a sports journalist. I'm not trained extensively to jot down facts quickly; I can't write in shorthand. Writers for publications like MMA Unlimited and Fighters Only probably have a journalism degree under their belt. It's probably a colored belt of some kind, as well- one that goes around a martial arts gi- knowledge of writing AND knowledge of a specialist subject would pretty much guarantee you work in niche journalism.

By the end of the first fight, I've given up trying to record fight details. (Searching online later, I find the info. The opening match was between featherweights Shay Walsh and Eamonn McNabb, Walsh winning the fight by TKO from Punches in 0:55 of Round 1. TKO is a Technical Knockout. If a fighter is TKO'd, he might still be pretty much conscious. Someone- a judge or referee- has stepped in and decided it isn't safe for the fighter to continue.)

As with some boxing events, the fights are broken into 5 rounds of five minutes each. The fighters start standing, they touch (8oz fingerless) gloves, then trade blows. For those who don't know, MMA is a blend of boxing, Muay Thai, Judo, Jujitsu, Brazilian Jujitsu and a range of wrestling styles- Greco-Roman, Pro, Submission and more. It isn't long before the fighters are on the ground, locking each other up in a variety of holds and occasionally breaking out to strike to the head or body. Where the opponents are allowed to land strikes depends on the rules, and the type of match they are fighting in. http://www.mmauniverse.com describes the rules thus:

“Professional MMA
This term is used to described a Mixed Martial Arts fight where striking to the head is permitted both whilst standing and on the floor.

Japanese Hybrid MMA
This term is used to described a Mixed Martial Arts fight where striking to the head is permitted but only with an open palm rather than with a closed fist. This term most commonly relates to fights from established Japanese promotions such as Pancrase™ and Rings™ in their early fights.

Semi-Professional MMA
This term is used to described a Mixed Martial Arts fight where striking to the head is permitted whilst standing, but strikes to the head are not permitted whilst on the floor.

Amateur MMA
This term is used to described a Mixed Martial Arts fight where striking to the head is not permitted, neither whilst standing nor on the floor (i.e. only body shots are permitted).”

My instructor is coaching Marcus Grosse, a heavyweight from Germany who has flown over for the event. After an impressive opening, his fight takes a turn for the worse when he's on the floor. He's caught with some heavy shots to the head and body, and the fight is stopped 4 minutes into the first round. His opponent, Bernat Pados from Denmark, wins by TKO (Ground n Pound).

Sam Hodgin, from Salford MMA, beats Nathan Dunne by unanimous decision. Hodgin is part of a team of fighters from Salford who came to my gym, Quannum Fitness, to spar with our team a week or so before the fight. Bravo, Sam.

Around half way through the night, my instructor's brother's fiance spots me from the other side of the club- she's in VIP as Ian (said brother) is commentating for P4TV. Simone (said fiance) gets me a wristband and I get to see the remainder of the show from some of the best seats in the house. Winner!

The event's official details page, featuring results of the fight, is here:
http://www.mmauniverse.com/eventarchive/SS13937

And the venue's page:
http://www.ikonbolton.com/bolton

P4TV's page:
http://www.p4tv.com/

When I leave the club, I've got to sift through my pockets- I wrote down where I parked somewhere... So yeah, spiral-bound notebooks are the way forward. And so, obviously, is MMA.

Published: Alarmed

Fluffy Oakes sits at the side of the enclosure, the glass screen separating him and Pablo, the zoo's koala. Pablo is opening his soul.

Fluffy asks, “have you heard back yet?”

“Nope. Don't know what they're playing at.”

“Sometimes it can take a while, y'know, to process results.”

“Hmm. That guy still interviewing you?”

“Matt Tuckey, yep. Going well. He's actually just had another story accepted in the States. A magazine called The Fabulist picked up something he did. 'Alarmed', it's called. Check it out."

Fluffy brings up the story on the webpage through his phone and presses the screen against the glass.

http://the-fabulist.org/yarns/2010/08/alarmed/

The two sit in silence as Pablo reads, sitting in the crook of a cut-off tree branch, and mulls the story over.

“Hmm... weird story. Good magazine, though. I like it.”

“Anything else on your mind, Pablo?”

“Well, I've done a bit of scribbling myself actually. Would you like to see my haiku?”

Pablo reaches to the back of his enclosure, grabs a scrap of paper and presses it against the window.

THE CLINIC

Burning sensation

“Don't look so nervous,” nurse says,

Handing me the pot

“Very evocative, Pablo. Just be careful who you show it to. If you know what I mean. I know it happens a lot with koalas, but still, no point making things hard for yourself.”

Pablo sits in silence. Fluffy taps the rubber tip of his pencil against his notepad...

Selected Magaluf Moments

You want to look like an American
American, American,
But listen to me, who's asking you to?
You want to be fashionable,
But if you drink whisky and soda,
Then you feel queasy!

-Translation of the lyrics to We No Speak Americano by Yolanda Be Cool Featuring D-Cup, a dance song that was played on repeat all week in Magaluf.

Here it is...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CR8logunPzQ

Hmm. Here's what I can afford to tell you about my week on the Majorcan resort. The seven days in July were my first lads' holiday.

*

Wellsy boarded the plane dressed as a knight. Just for fun. Metallic fabric covered him head-to-toe, a three-lions emblem covered the chest area, and he carried a very thin tin-foil sword. Amazingly, he made it through the detectors and onto the plane.

*

Destination: Hotel Don Juan.

http://www.alpharooms.com/don_juan_in_magalluf_%28magaluf%29.aspx?r=g&ph=PS8327&_$ja=kw:hotel+don+juan+magaluf|cgn:Majorca+-+Magalluf+%28Magaluf%29+-+Don+Juan|cgid:1316772134|tsid:8741|cn:Spain+-+Majorca+Hotels|cid:40176224|lid:968767316|mt:Exact|nw:search|crid:3186972584

We had found it online at a bargain price. I recommend the hotel. For what we paid, the rooms were fine and the food was really good.

We went out every night for a week solid. The first thing that hits you is the heat- night and day, it's warm enough to go out in a t-shirt and you still feel like you're in a central-heated room. Albeit a room with loads of women not wearing a great deal.

On the first night, I had a dance-off with a load of black guys, and whupped all their asses.

Wellsy gave me a trilby that he'd bought off one of hundreds of African salesmen, all touting fashion accessories, battery-operated dancing cows, flashing plastic jewellery and other assorted tat. I'm not saying much about women on this blog, but chicks love a man in a trilby. That's one thing I learned.

*

A rumour began to circulate on the main bar strip. Apparently, Cheryl Cole had died of cancer.

*

Two of us were stumbling back to the hotel after losing everyone else in the array of bars on the strip. A young lad walked past us in a very bizzarre outfit.

“That's the biggest bow tie I've ever seen,” said Gaz.

“Thanks,” said the lad. “I robbed it off a clown.”

Gaz and I were both floored, laughing our arses off.

*

One of the team got stuck between two parked cars when trying to cross the road.

*

On the way to a bar we passed a black dreadlocked midget using a public telephone. He looked dangerous.

*

We decided a Speedo Day would be a good laugh. We hit the shops of Magaluf looking for the snidiest, crappest little swimming trunks possible. We found some matching pastel-styled, multicoloured atocities, and then rocked out by the pool at midday when it was busiest, with rolled towels under our arms. After causing a scene poolside (streching, star-jumping and backstroke), we went to the beach to do it all again- including some Top Gun-style volleyball in the sea.

*

We nearly missed the plane on the way back, due to Palma Airport screwing up the screen information. We then had to leg it down the airport corridor for, I dunno, a mile maybe. I still had half a KFC zinger wrap jammed in my mouth during the sprint.

*

On the plane back, a dude sitting across from me tells us that the Cheryl Cole rumour was started by a DJ in a bar. Cole is still alive.

*

I'd love to tell you more, but some of you really don't want to know the rest. Believe me. Were you there? Were you part of the Don Juan Massive? I've shared enough of my memories. Feel free to share your own.