Lockdown reading: Take 10

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This should be the final instalment of this ridiculous reading project. Just this, and a subsequent review on 21^st June when lockdown restrictions are lifted. The theory is, after that, we’re fully out of lockdown.

I don’t buy it myself. Johnson shouldn’t be setting dates for such things- instead he should be watching the vaccine rollout and making adjustments based on that- to wait til x amount of people are fully vaccinated, or wait until there are only x amount of cases, or suchlike. Not, as he always has, ‘let’s lift restrictions on this particular arbitrary date.’

It could all be so simple, as Lauren Hill once sang. Whatever. Point is, I now want to read as much as I can, let’s say to get up to date with favourite author Chuck Palahniuk, before the 21^st next month. (Tell All, Invention of Sound and Consider This are the last 3 books to read. I’m currently on Adjustment Day.) I’ll also see what records I can beat at the gym.

Lockdown Reading: Take 9. Results

A little over a month ago, lockdown restrictions were eased. The gyms opened, and I started tapping away at personal bests. The casinos and clubs were on hold, so meanwhile… you guessed it. I read books. As of today, pubs, bars and restaurants can serve indoors and indoor classes return to the gym. Hence, an update on books.

The 48 Laws of Power

I reviewed this psychology-based book here.

Bait: Off-Colour Stories for You to Colour

Chuck Palahniuk returns to the colouring-book format with Bait, a compilation of short stories, interspersed with line-drawing illustrations that you can colour if you like. Tales of sinister goldfish, celebrity faecal mishaps and terminally embarrassing parents will shock, amuse and generally haunt you for a few days after reading- like any good Palahniuk story should. Publishers Dark Horse, known for their hit comics, drew on a stable of 10 illustrators, whose previous work included art for comics Batman, Jay & Silent Bob, Daredevil, and designs for Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign.

Some illustrations merely accompany the details in the prose, others help to push the narrative forward, revealing twists, saying more than even Palahniuk’s words can. A great inclusion to the canon.

Fight Club 3

Chuck Palahniuk again teams of with illustrator Cameron Stewart for a second graphic novel sequel to Fight Club. This time, The Narrator- now fairly regularly going by the name ‘Balthazaar’- cheats on Marla with a Stephanie from ‘Die-Off Endeavours,’ a company presumably developed from the original novel’s anarchic movement, Project Mayhem. Meanwhile, Marla’s pregnant with Tyler’s abortion-proof baby, a picture-frame portal brings together a load of historical figures in an (accidental, I reckon) homage to Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, The Narrator gets surgery to look ‘more like’ Tyler, which is as confusing as it sounds... oh, and Tyler creates a virus that spreads across the world.

Fight Club 3, released the start of 2019, is a weighty (hardcover), generous book, twice the size of Fight Club 2, but also twice as confusing. We learn more about key characters like Marla and Chloe, but I don’t feel like we learn what they are doing, what their roles are in this inclusion to the saga. Visual metaphors and huge leaps in space and time leave us looking for clues to the writer’s intent, but… the explanations, the resolutions- like so many supporting characters- are eventually exported to another dimension.

The Corrections

In the last 6 years, I’ve made several attempts to chug through this sprawling, infinitesimally detailed novel about a family not doing anything notable. The grandad Alfred develops Alzheimer’s. The grandmother Enid struggles to cope with his rapid deterioration. Their adult children, Gary, Chip and Denise go about their frankly boring lives. Chip is wheeling and dealing. Denise is having an affair, and tries to befriend her lover’s wife, ending in an affair with her too. Alfred’s bizarre Parkinson’s-induced hallucinating and ranting ramps up concern among all family members. Meanwhile, Enid tries to bring the family together for one last Christmas. The plot occasionally rise above mediocrity (Chip ends up in over his head with some very dodgy characters in Eastern Europe), but it’s largely standard soap opera stuff.

Beautifully written, but incorrigibly dull.

So, what about the gym? What did I manage?

I’ve started recording box jump records, literally jumping on top of boxes. I’m at 80cm at the moment. The next increment is a big one. Not sure I’ll ever attain it. I’ve also started extra-wide chin-ups, holding onto 2 forward-jutting handles about a metre apart. I’m at 4 so far. Another new movement is quad extension, coming in at 70kg.

Everything else, I’m kind of stuck where I was. There are further plans to release restrictions on 21^st June, so I plan to beat a few more PBs, get even more massive and read even more books before that date. That said, with the Indian Variant running rampage, who knows what could happen between now and then.

An Oldham Blitz Story

“In 1944 the Nazis’ rocket-bomb attacks on London suddenly escalated. Over 2000 V-1 flying bombs fell on the city, killing more 5000 people and wounding many more. Somehow, the Germans consistently missed their targets. Bombs that were intended for Tower Bridge, or Piccadilly, would fall well short of the city, landing in less populated suburbs. This was because, in fixing their targets, the Germans relied on secret agents they had planted in England. They did not know that these agents had been discovered, and that in their place, English-controlled agents were feeding them subtly-deceptive information.”

-The 48 Laws of Power, Robert Greene

Today marks 80 years since the end of The Blitz, the German bombing campaign over the UK. After 8 months, 40,000 civilians killed and 2 million houses damaged or destroyed, Hitler switched his efforts to the east and attacked the USSR instead. Luftwaffe High Command recorded the loss of 2,265 aircraft over the British Isles, a quarter of them fighters and one third bombers.

Back in about 1991, when I was maybe 8 or 9 years old, I remember my teacher Mrs Barrass recounting her war stories in class. She’d grown up local. Oldham has always been a poor mill town (despite it having more millionaires per square mile that anywhere in the world at the turn of the 20^th century- usually mill owners). Many of the houses were terraced, usually built to accommodate all the mill workers and their families.

During the Blitz, there were numerous night raids on Oldham. We had a huge output for war resources, including a heavy rollout of Lancaster Bombers, so we were a prime target for the Luftwaffe. The bombs frequently missed their marks, though, and there were many civilian casualties in Oldham.

Mrs Barrass told us that when the Blitz was at its deepest, she was about our age. Her house, like her whole street, had blackout on the windows. One night, early on before they’d gone to bed, an ordinance landed in her street, wrecking the road and sending cobbles into the air. One such cobble- solid brick-shaped stones that made up the surface of the road- was flung with such force that it plunged straight through the roof of her house, through the ceiling, and onto her brother’s bed, landing with a bounce. If he’d have been in bed, it’d have killed him.

4 years later, Britain won the war, thanks in part to another Oldhamer (his first constituency at least)- Prime Minister Winston Churchill.

The 48 Laws of Power

 

Power (noun)

1) ability to do or act; capability of doing or accomplishing something.

2) political or national strength

-Dictionary.com

What individual could be so bold as to write a book called The 48 Laws of Power? What authority could claim to be the person on which you can rely to tell you everything you need to know about power, how to gain it, and how to keep it?

Well, historian Robert Greene assuredly takes that mantle. His aforementioned debut book, released in 1998, identifies the 48 rules through which people in history have attained their power. Drawing from extensive historical knowledge (5 millennia worth), he then details instances that exemplify these laws, one law at a time.

Each chapter contains a judgement- a brief description, a transgression- where the law wasn’t observed and what went wrong subsequently, an interpretation- how the law applies in the example, an observance- how someone followed the law and how it benefited them, an interpretation- what exactly happened, and how the law is relevant, the keys to power- how to use that law properly to benefit yourself, image: a short metaphor illustrating the law, authority: a historical figure’s relevant quote, and a reversal- advice on how, sometimes, it may be appropriate to act in opposition to that particular law.

48 Laws is a weighty, thorough book- one I expect at least one of my previous managers have read, now I think about it- with vital information hindered by an awkward, 2-column layout. The smaller column of text, featuring quotes, parables and such, could have been displayed as page breaks rather than requiring us to flit back and forth.

Other questionable facets include bible verses and serious references to mythology like they were historical fact. I very much doubt that Moses- a guy who allegedly lived to 500 years old and nearly murdered his son because of voices- was ‘the first practitioner of Law 15: Crush your Enemy Totally.’ (Everyone knows it was Conan the Barbarian… right?)

(Turns out it was Genghis Khan.) 

Furthermore, Law 26: ‘Keep your hands clean,’ contains a serious reference to Oedipus, the mythical Greek king, and a suggestion that an act of incest caused a plague. (Wait- weren’t The Queen and Prince Philip third cousins? And how many COVID deaths has the UK had...?)

Only pages after this, Greene celebrates Jewish inbreeding under the guise of ‘concentrating forces.’ Mixed messages much?

Despite these misgivings, The 48 Laws of Power is well worth spending the time chugging through. The research is expansive, the lessons vital.

New York, 2000

 21 years ago this weekend I took a family holiday to New York. 

New York Central Library

Chrysler Building

Grand Central Station

Battery Park and the Financial District, seen from the Staten Island Ferry

Times Square

Brooklyn Bridge and Manhattan Bridge, seen from the ferry

Statue of Liberty

Experimental picture, showing our reflection in the door of the ferry. I'm pointing at the Financial District, Downtown Manhattan

World Trade Center, looking up from floor 1. 'Worm's eye view.' Would have benefitted from SLR.

Sculpture on Floor 1, World Trade Center.

Brooklyn Bridge, Manhattan Bridge, The Borough of Brooklyn, as seen from the observatory of World Trade Center.

Downstairs downtown: the streets of Manhattan from 107 floors

Empire State Building, taken from The world Trade Center. I remember the cloud rolling back and the shaft of light revealing more of Manhattan. I took the picture just after it cleared Empire State.

Chinatown. Had my first cup of tea.

Policeman on a horse, outside an Italian restaurant. Andrea Bocelli's Time to Say Goodbye played over the speaker in the background.

Not sure what street this was but the Flatiron is right down in the distance.No zoom on the camera.

Grace building. Iconic concave front. Taken at dawn. My body clock hadn't adjusted, so Dad and I had a wander around.

Empire State Lobby. Trying hard to channel my inner Andy Garcia. SLR would have made me dead centre under the mural.

Chrysler from the Empire State observatory

New Jersey, across The Hudson River, seen from Empire State

Downtown Manhattan, seen from the Empire State

Upper Manhattan with Central Park in the B/G, seen from Empire State

Dakota Building. John Lennon's murder site

The roads being steamed

An exhibition in the Guggenheim. Many CRT TVs on their backs. Was more impressive at the time.

Guggenheim's spiralling staircase

The family in Central Park. Empire State's spire peeking through the skyscrapers.

Baseball in Central Park

Washington Memorial Arch, Greenwich Village

Tic and Tac, two acrobats performing in Greenwich Village

Manhattan from across Brooklyn Bridge, dusk. We timed it perfectly, having got the subway to Brooklyn. As we walked back accross the footbridge over the traffic, the sun set behind the Financial District. Magic.

17-year-old me showing off where I threw up the plane food on the first night. I had to leg it across the lobby to get out in time

Trump Tower, Donald Trump's vanity project that left him in debt

Atlas, outside The Rockefeller Center.

The plane, ready to take us back from JFK

 

Incredible holiday. I recommend, if you're going to go, wearing a peaked cap as everything you'll want to see is above you, so it means looking into the sun a bit. Wear comfortable shoes, and take more pictures than I did.

The weekend that we went, Lennox Lewis defended his belt against Michael Grant at Madison Square Gardens. We happened to be outside at the time of the fight. I was not successful in blagging entry. On the plane, we had an actor from Emmerdale, a heavy-set mixed-race guy of whom nobody can remember the name. Him and his mates got steaming on the flight over there, made loads of noise including dodgy Ali G impressions, shouting 'ridee da punani,' spilled his drinks over everyone and got bollocked by passengers and crew alike. On the return flight they were put at the back of the plane, but word has it they slept the whole way.

A Knee to the Neck

Well, Derek Chauvin is guilty. It wasn’t the drugs that killed George Floyd. It was Chauvin’s knee.

I know what it’s like to have someone kneel on your neck. Back in school I was one of the smallest people in the year. That plus memory difficulties and a somewhat erratic personality all made me, it’s safe to say, a target. I think I was in maybe 4^th year, trying to mix in with people, and I approached this group of lads. Some of them were in a few classes I had. The biggest of the group (and one of the biggest in the school, now I think about it), we’ll call him DJ, he was in a few of my classes. He had special needs of some kind- he wasn’t the brightest and his behaviour was somewhat odd. He didn’t speak often and when he did it was a hodge-podge of comedic insults and film quotes (sound familiar?!). We both got extra time on exams, and occasionally the odd differentiated paper.

I remember one particular lunchtime, for no reason at all, he threw me to the floor and kneeled on my neck. I must have been on my side, as it wasn’t my windpipe he was crushing: it was the jugular. I could feel myself going faint, sound fading out, seeing stars. He got off eventually and I walked off.

You’d think I’d go straight to the headteacher and say ‘someone just tried to kill me.’ But I didn’t. By that time, my experience of grassing people up was that teachers found reasons to blame the victim, and turn it around to make me the troublemaker. When you’ve got memory difficulties, recounting exactly what happened is a challenge, and usually has minimal payoff. It’s not so easy to defend yourself verbally or physically.

Maybe around 10 years ago, I added DJ on Facebook. He was big into his weightlifting. I remember doing weight training with him in PE. He could lift a lot at 14. His Facebook, well, his statuses were characteristically weird. He had a girlfriend, but he’d write what appeared to be sexual comments about the comic book character Bane, who was addicted to steroids. I think I unsubscribed from him not long after adding him. I don’t think we spoke.

Last November, I saw a post on a school group on Facebook telling us he’d passed away in his sleep. No other details known.

As for Derek Chauvin, he kneeled on George Floyd’s neck for a lot longer than DJ did on mine. We do know the details of Floyd’s death: asphyxiation.

I don’t want to sound like a hypocrite- I’ve quite vocally condemned the Black Lives Matter protests in the UK, just like I’ve condemned every protest that has occurred since March last year. I don’t believe anyone should gather in large numbers for anything during a pandemic and a lockdown. I also fail to see what protesting in the UK is going to do to change American attitudes and behaviours. They have a huge gun problem. We banned our guns after one school shooting. Surely that legislature was a thousand times more powerful than any number of protests. Bear in mind the only black person killed by British police in recent years was Mark Duggan, and he was walking the streets with an automatic handgun. He had it coming. But let’s not digress.

I watched the Chauvin trial. By the end of it, the only person who thought he would get away with it was Chauvin himself. His darting eyes, more noticeable above a white facemask, gave away the moment he realised he was wrong. The moment the custody officer leant him forward and applied the handcuffs.

900K hits

Somehow, this strange blog obsessing over inane celebrity gossip garnered over social media has received over 900 thousand page views. As you can see, the last 100K came in the last 12 months.

I guess people staying in more meant more surfing of the net. It’s hardly the likelihood that people suddenly got into short book reviews and 1960s beermats. But what do I know?

This week: a tweet off Belle de Jour’s Brooke Magnanti connecting Tony Blair to Vigo off Ghostbusters II. Other than that, I’ve just been reading.