Unidentifiable stinky things

The Loose-the-Beer-Gut programme is back on track after a few days of non activity (but plenty of beer drinking!), now you may say, in order to loose the beer gut - stop drinking beer! OUT OF THE QUESTION! I now have, as one of my students, the owner of a micro-brewery that produces 3 types of fine quality lagers, all according to the German Purity Law of 1516, no commercial crap. Every week I pick up a 2 litre jug (called a siphon) every Thursday and drop it back, empty, on Tuesday.

I run from my home, down to the riverside and along the river, there and back about 5.6 miles (9kms), it's not the best route, I have to cross a busy road 4 times, I prefer quiet shady parks in leafy suburbs, but ain't got that around about where I live now. On part of the route, the city council made a good job, "parkifying" what used to be a favella along a stretch of the riverside, but it's now neglected and dumbfuck people go there to dump stinking trash. In fact the whole rivershore is choked up with crap and muck and unidentifiable stinky things.

What the fuck?! It's 2008 tomorrow, where did the year go?

Open the friggin' pod bay doors Hal!!

I know it's a cinematographic masterpiece and I'd delayed watching it for years, Stanley did a fantastic job of course, but while watching it, this very night for the first time, on dvd and 29" colour, I couldn't help keeping getting the urge to press the ff button on the remote. I think I could've watched the whole blasted film at 16x speed and I still understood the plot very well. I'm talking about 2001 A Space Odyssey of course. When it finished I realised I should've watched it 20 years ago with a huge roll-up of Morocco's finest weed like I did with Koyaanisqatsi, then I would've appreciated it more.

Oh yeah, by the way, Christmas was the usual.

And I didn't pass the master's degree selection test. Bloody Hal's fault, the way he malfunctions and all that crap.

Blast me for a fried banana if I shouldn'nt've chosen a 4.5mile slog AND a cold beer afterwuds.
(see below for this to make sense)

Drink Beer and Get Fit at the same time.

With my Loose-the-Beer-Gut programme well under way - bought a new pair of trainers and went a-runnin', Monday,Tuesday and Wednesday; Thursday came around and I took a break with the intention of whizzing out again on Friday (today, NOW!); Friday afternoon came around and with a cancelled class at 6pm I was faced with - go out in the 30c heat for the 4.5mile slog OR a cold beer. I chose:

A COLD BEER!!!

And several more after that.

Thank you m'am.
And good night.

HELL

is a shopping centre three days before Christmas.

Got a Dream boy!

As blogger posts everything in last things first order, read THIS first.

Everyone's leaving the city and Ben encounters an old friend:

(friend): There's two kinds in the world Ben, people who move, people who stay, ain't that true?
(Ben): No that ain't.
(friend): Then what's true?
(Ben): Well there's two kinds of people, them going somewhere and them going nowhere, and that's what's true.
(friend): I don't agree Ben.
(Ben): That's 'cos you don't know what the hell I'm talking about.

Got a Song!

The Preacher addressing a group of drunks:

"Ye Godless Jaspers!! Who are yer? Free Masons? Rosecrusiens? Heathen emissaries from the dens of Babylon?! (pause while he considers what they are)

Boozers! Gluttons! Gamblers! Harlots! FORNICATORS!"

(1st drunk): "What's a fornicator?"

(2nd drunk): "I don't know, I ain't a religious man".

Paint your Wagon and come along!

One of my all-time favourite films is a musical comedy with Lee Marvin and Clint Eastwood - "Paint Your Wagon". I hadn't seen it for years when a friend made a dvd copy for me and I've spent the previous two nights in fits of laughter watching it. There are some wonderfully witty and hilarious lines and well worth reproducing here.
Ben Rumson's (Lee Marvin) thoughts on people and civilization in a song:

God made the mountains, God made the sky,
God made the people,
God knows why!

He fixed up the planet as best as he could,
then in come the people and fucked it up good! (he actually sings "gummed it up", but I know he really wanted to say fucked but the censors wouldn't allow it)
The first thing you know.

They civilize the foothills and everywhere He put-hills, mountains and valleys bellow,
They come along and take 'em and civilize and make 'em a place where no civilized person would go!
The first thing you know.

They civilize what's pretty by putting up a city where nothing that's pretty can grow,
They muddy up the winter and civilize it in'ta a place too uncivilized, even for snow!
The first thing you know.

They civilize left, they civilize right, 'till nothing is left! 'till nothing is right!
They civilize freedom 'till no-one is free,
no-one except, by coincidence, me!
The first thing you know.

The boozers in prison and the criminaly - isn' and only the rascals have gold
When I see a parson I gotta put my arse-on a wagon that follows the tail of a crow!

The first thing you know - I pick up and blow!

FART PROUDLY!

Mr Maurice Fox has been banned from his local sports and social club just for providing a little light entertainment. The entertainment consisted of farting loudly, harmless and fun! Apparently his fellow members didn't think so, they were "disgusted" by his actions. "I'm a loud farter, but there is no smell." said Mr Fox. Benjamin Franklin wrote an essay proposing that scientists should spend their time developing a drug that would render the fart smell-less or indeed perfume the fart with a delicate scent, perhaps rose or lavender. Imagine the hours of fun you could have trumpeting away and appreciating the scented air!

Funny Stupid People

Some things are just so ludicrous. Now this is not about the pure religion of Islam which I respect and have nothing against (and I also don't wish for a thunderous jihad to be brought upon my head). I'm talking about certain arseholes and idiots of that religion, they would be pathetically hilarious if they weren't so dangerous.
So there's this lady who's been charged by the Islamic courts in Sudan for breaking an Islamic law. What did she do? She named a Teddy Bear, Mohammed! Now get this: "...Sudan's top clerics (...) labelled her actions part of a western plot against Islam." FOR NAMING A TEDDY BEAR MOHAMMED FOR FUCK'S SAKE!!!! YOU PEOPLE ARE SO FUCKING STUPID, GET THAT?! Sad thing is she faces six months jail, 40 lashes or a fine.
There are some very interesting comments here, supporting the lady, many of them from Muslims, (and yes there are one or two arseholes too, as they are everywhere)

Lord of the Things

As an experiment and as an extension of last week's experience, I'm trying another alcohol-free night. I'm completely recovered from the cold but I have taken this decision because I heard it would actually be beneficial and very good for my 'elf; that would be Arnalrond Slimbow who lives in the sage bush; and also my financial 'elf, Alfiluiul Countindosh, who has a small office in the rhododendrons.

It's 21:55 and I'm feeling fine. Very very very thirsty, but fine. I wonder how Arnalrond and Alfiluiul are getting on, feeling much better I hope, if my experiment is working.

I just know that I'm not an alky, because at this moment I'm not thinking "GAAAARRGH! I REALLY NEED A BEER!!", I'm just thinking, "Hmmm, a cold beer right now would be mighty fine", you see, I'm not even thinking it in capital letters with an exclamation mark.

22:05, still fine. Maybe I should try drinking water.

Well I'm off for a huff 'n' puff with a long meerschaum and a serious talk with my toadstools, they've been misbehaving lately.

Something Wyrd this way Comes

In the wee hours (that's the time I have to get up to take a wee, prostrate stuff you know) I was awoken by the strangest of noises, it sounded like several people were hooting on those football fan hooter things all at the same time, one would trail off while another would continue, only it couldn't have been people because each was very prolonged, no-one has that much wind in 'em, or perhaps I could describe it as several extremely loud low hums. It occurred to me that it sounded exactly like a squadron of UFOs passing overhead. When it was over, I think 2 or 3 minutes or maybe much less, maybe just a minute or so, but I don't know how long it had been going on before I woke up (I'm a very light sleeper so I guess just a matter of seconds), there was complete silence, none of the usual dogs barking, no night time car in the street. The silence lasted for another three minutes then I heard two more distinct hums but coming from further off in the distance. I was definitely awake and not dreaming because I thought "What the fuck is that?", a most certain thought that one does not have if dreaming or in a half sleep/half awake mode. About half hour later I summoned up enough energy to get up to take a looksee, what I saw was a huge fire on the hill opposite, it looked like a couple of houses on fire I reckoned. Not sure if the noises had anything to do with the fire, probably the UFOs had photon-torpedoed the favela on the hill.

22nd November 2007

Second Alcohol-Free night in a row. But jiggins if I'm not thinking a bottle of fermented grape would go down mighty fine right now.

Well Bugger my .... well maybe not.

I suddenly find myself with hours of free time, MOST of Monday afternoon, MOST of Tuesday afternoon and MOST of Thursday afternoon, I'm sat at home wondering what to do. Writing on this blog doesn't seem to be making me any money. I need more work!
I'm in the Grip of a Gripe (rhymes with yippee! not tripe, my Portuguese speaking readers will know what I'm talking about), I'm dosing myself up with the hot lemon, garlic and honey mix, still nothing stronger to add though unfortunately.
A long period of nothing to do this afternoon induced me into a spot of naked sunbathing on my terrace, I burn very easily so I didn't spend too long out there, can't be done to have burnt privates, or generals for that matter. The warm sun over the entire body sure beats the feeling of clingy material in the hot weather.
The summers of childhood in Aberbachgenbach.
All the boyos from the pit would scrub their faces white, revealing the pock marks (from learning to eat with a fork), we'd get on the charabanc early Saturday morning to spend the day down the seaside town of Llancunty.
Llancunty, town of a Thousand Soles.



A couple hundred haddock.



And a halibut named Jeremy.

Time to spend a little time with Mary Ann Evans.

Well Squeeze my Lemons if I'm not running out of daft ejaculations (OOOEERR!)

TONIGHT is my first alcohol free night for weeks, I think the last time was when I forgot to pop into the super-duper on the way home and couldn't be arsed to go out again once ensconced at my abode. Tonight, I suspect due to the onset of a cold, I didn't get that really-looking-forward-to-a-cold-beer-when-I-get-home feeling (I hesitate to use 'craving' for fear of sounding like an alky). My usually remedy is to squeeze a lemon into a mug, add hot water, honey, garlic and top up with brandy, however my brandy optic's empty (the Good Lady has a penchant), hence I had to do with the non-alcoholic version. Thus the alcohol-free night.

Well Smash my Pumkins if THIS doesn't need a title as well

Here's a story about Brazilian immigrants in Japan, this caught my eye:


But rows over things like loud music, parking spaces and rubbish are daily causes of friction. "Their culture and customs are different," says Ms Murakami. "Japan has various rules and they don't know the rules, so this leads to tensions."

The Japanese probably have the same kind of discipline as the Anglo-Saxons when it comes to parking, i.e. park in neat STRAIGHT rows, BETWEEN and equidistant from each of the delimiting lines, as opposed to the leave-your-car-where-it-stops attitude of a lot of Brazilians, thus effectively limiting the
adjacent space or even using up two spaces. I think us Celts have been so dominated by the Saeson over the few hundred years that we've adopted the same attitudes, at least I can never remember seeing a wonkily parked car in Aberbachgenbach.

I'm finding Middlemarch a pleasant read; like most Victorian novels it's chugging along at a steady rate, family matters, is young Miss Pumplewinkie suitable to marry Mr. Shlartinfrump, etcetera, etcetera, with sex and drugs and rock and roll just under the surface.

[Mr. Ladislaw] was not excessively fond of wine, but he had several times taken too much, simply as an experiment in that form of ecstasy (...) he had made himself ill with doses of opium.

Mr. Ladislaw should also try BEER as a form of ecstasy and perhaps smoke some weeed instead of that opium crap. Yes, Helô, I know, wine works just as fine, but you can't beat beer with a big stick when it comes to hot summer days.

As I have now seen The Secret, I just know I'm going to have LOADSA DOSH! During the summer months. As a consequence of this totally expected, but I don't know the fuck
how, sudden immense wealth, I and the good lady shall be jetting off to a secluded Carribbean isle. Or perhaps we'll go camping somewhere in the hills near PoA. Maybe Colina do Sol.

SEE what happens
when you start buggering about with the font size??


This Post Needs a Title

Jolly Spiffin! Another holiday tomorrow. Well it would be Jolly Spiffin if I could still get the same dosh, being self-employed however, I don't have that privilege. Still, it's nice to have a lie-in and to be able to Psht! (sound of gas escaping rapidly whilst bottle cap is removed), and say "Bar's Open!" at around 11.15 am. I miss the old beach sometimes, it was Psht! Bar's Open! at around 9 am when at the beach.

Despite the lack of study in the field of poetry fuck up, I still hold a faint hope of being called for the Master's selection interview, optimistic creeture that I am. My question now is, what am I going to concentrate on for a dissertation? I thought about something on Dylan Thomas, I love Under Milk Wood (Get THAT on yer list Helô!). Whatever, now I'm free of obligatory reading, I'm getting around to other stuff and I'm starting with Middlemarch and Kant's Critique of Pure Reason (actually, A Commentary on... ), the former because it's been in my collection staring at me for years and yearning to be read and the latter because I'm doing a long-term accompanied translation (meaning accompanied by the author himself, er...not Kant) of an essay on the subject. Mightily interesting stuff but blastidely complicated.


Horrocks, I've drunk a litre of vile red wine and I'm off to bed.

HA ! The master's degree selection test was a DOODLE! HO! could've dun it with eyes closed, would've been a mess though, heckish swiggly writing.

Okay okay, it wasn't so freaking easy of course, blast me for a pumpkin if I didn't miss one whole question - compare poems of Manuel Bandeira, Cecilia Meireles and João Cabral de Melo Neto. and I know funkins about those three (should've read up yeah!). First two questions not too bad though, hope my written Portuguese holds up. Third question, I bullshronkled a lot about Oedipus, just wrote and wrote about all the stuff that was in my final paper. Not sure if it really answered the question though.

A dear friend of mine has a blog and a blog and a blog and a blog. Please read, it's far more interesting than my crap.

Amongst the oddities that I found while browsing the BBC site is a man who, after being on a trip to Sri Lanka and being sucked by leeches, was so weak he "could only eat corned beef and lettuce for months", I find that bizarrely amusing , I mean why corned beef for freaks sake? It's a good job this didn't happen in the early 80s when Argentinean corned beef was boycotted because of the Falklands business.
Not an oddity but something that makes me exceedingly annoyed is that one Chief Superintendent Geraint Anwyl Williams (I wonder if he's Welsh?) wants to ban motorbikes from the national parks after an accident which killed two bikers in Gwynedd, my question is, if there were an accident involving cars in which people were killed, would he call for the banning of cars? Of course not, he's an obvious arsehole.
Back in the suburb of Cristal in the Gaúcho city of Porto Alegre, mosquito season has arrived judging from the sudden itchy zitchy feeling I'm getting on my legs right now. It's 2030 hrs, on my left, as I look out beyond the terrace, the sun has already sunk below the horizon and there's a dark orangy glow, fading upwards into a microsoft blue and Venus is conspicuous by her absence, gubbins if I know where the blasted thing should be at this time of year, it's usually just right over there somewhere.

Venus, Venus
The size of my
Heart.

HWYL FAWR!

Friggin test is the day after the day after tomorrow.
WHO is the new leader of China?

Who? HA!

BRWWARRRWOTTHEFFUCKBOLLOCKS.
There be another great HOO HA about learning Welsh, and bugger me for a pumpkin if I can't find the link right now, but it's something about a growing pressure to learn Welsh in Wales creating division and resentment, and this coming from Welsh speakers. Apparently there's a greater push for learning all over the land and especially a search for cultural identity coming from the historically traditional English speaking south-east industrialized valleys, HURRAH ! I say; your humble servant himself being born in the mining village of Aberbachgenbach, then bred up not speaking a word of our Mother Tongue from the Land of My Fathers. Resentment and division, bollocks, speak Welsh yer turds, you're Welsh aren't you?

One of the feelings of resentment comes from the fact that some Welsh speaking public sector workers feel they are favoured over mono-lingual colleagues merely because of the language, well dam fuck right they should be, they're in WALES! If you were in Estonia and were a candidate for a job for which there was one other candidate who spoke Estonian and you couldn't, WHO DO YOU THINK WOULD GET THE JOB? RIGHT, you're in Estonia, speak Estonian. Check THIS out, the Russians in Estonia are apparently having the same problem as English speakers in Wales.

Wales is a separate nation and should by now shake off the shackles or shack off the shakeles or shack the shockles or shag the shirkles or whatever... of the Saxon oppressor!

Okay, I'm off to bed, yes I've had a few FBA's.

Ah here it is. Maybe you'd also like to read this or this.

Gunfight at the OK Butuí

Just when things were beginning to get boring around here. 9.08 pm. Tuesday 16 October, there I was quietly watching the latest dvd pirated episodes of Heroes when all crap hits the air conditioning outside, or rather several stray bullets here and there. Yes a fine gun battle in the street, probably the best yet since I've been here, I was tempted to take a look out the window but didn't fancy a hole in the head. Must've been about 20 odd shots fired from both sides, I wonder who's killing who.

Crap.

I'd better get something written before my millions of fans worldwide begin to complain.

The Masters degree selection test is in just 3 weeks and I'm still supposed to have read all the theory books by then. Truth is I won't have time, in fact I won't even HAVE the books to read, except one which I've already started, but suspended for the time being in order to finish Erico Verissimo's Incidente em Antares, which I'm finding quite amusing. After Incidente I will have read all of the novels: Eça de Queirós, A Capital!, (NOT to be confused with Groucho Marx's work, The Principal City of the Country!!); Lúcio Cardoso, Crônica de uma Casa Assasinada, and Paul Auster, New York Trilogy. I've also yet to read Hamlet, and on the list is Oedipus the King, which I read about a zillion times when I was doing my final paper, so I may just skim over that one. Then there's the 3 poets. I'll just read up some stuff of theirs on internet. So without the theory, when it comes to the test I'll have to waffle my way through the questions, trying to remember what I learned in the basic first 6 years of the course. Wish me luck.


Over the past few weekends I've been slipping off to Ian the Oz's place for the rugby, it's been fun, we've drunk huge quantities of beer as I mentioned in the previous post. And yelled a lot. Just next weekend and it'll be over. England and South Africa in the final YARG! If anyone's wondering - I'm supporting the Springboks!

Life in the Great Metropolis of Porto Alegre continues very much the same, there have been no incidents (perhaps in Antares but not at my apartment), for quite some time and I'm hoping it's going to stay that way. Well my bedroom balcony has effectively been turned into a cage, so no-one's getting in there any more. This afternoon I've been summoned to the police station "to be heard as a victim", what that's all about, I shall find out in an hour, can't imagine what it is as they've already had a full statement from me. Unless they've recovered my dvd, in which case I shall have two dvd players. We've had some pretty lousy weekends so no great barbies have been up and coming. In fact it's been pizzing down a lot.

Do not go Gentle

Due to an increasing pressure from thousands of my readers from all corners of the globe, I have been compelled into returning to the blogosphere and getting some crap written. Truth is, I've been busy in all manner of ways, hot sex for hours on end not being the least.

Ah well, Wales are out. As an ex-rugby player me-self (Aberbachgenbach Comprehensive, Wednesday's P.T. lesson, 1976 - 1979), I can say that we played pretty well against the Might of the South Pacific. Certainly two of the best tries I've seen during this Cup. Mind you I haven't been watching a lot of games, haven't got the right tv channel for it, so off I pops down Ian the Oz's place, where we drink large quantities of FBA and eat immense bowls of salty munchie things while yelling at the fifteen and the blind ref. The Wales v. Fiji game was shown only yesterday, Sunday, the day after the actual match so I had to try and avoid seeing or hearing the result on Saturday. I failed miserably after a short time when I double clicked on the wee Mozilla Firefox icon and realized too late that I had forgot to change my default site - BBC news, and there it was in huge glaring headlines, FIJI SEND WALES HOME!! With the score beneath. When I got to Ian the Oz's I had to confess to him that I had already seen the result but that I would not reveal it to him (or the result WHAAA!) . I grinned a lot and he thought that Wales had won, only discovering the truth in the last few minutes of the match, yes it was THAT close!

I'm still highly pissed off with Brazilian drivers. Yesterday I was at a traffic light in the left lane, indicating and waiting to turn left (for all my millions of readers in Britain and Japan, don't forget, here we drive on the wrong side), when a taxi driver pulled up on my right. When the light changed he also came around me to turn left (also without indicating) , when I passed him later I gave a traditional Celtic Warcry of "ARSESHOLE!" and an appropriate two fingered gesture reminding him that Welsh longbowmen were never captured at the Battle of Agincourt.

That's it, I'm off for some Hot Sex.

It's unbelievable how many CRAP drivers are here, I've been here 16 years and it still gets on my FUCKING NERVES, here's a message to Porto Alegre drivers incase you didn't quite understand the heavy irony here:

USE YOUR FRIKKIN' INDICATOR FOR FREAKS SAKE!! IT LETS OTHER DRIVERS KNOW OF YOUR INTENTIONS! You know, it's that little lever thing at the side of the steering wheel? And when someone IS indicating to come in - LET THEM IN FOR FUCK'S SAKE! It means they want to or NEED to come in, it DOES NOT mean that you have to accelerate in order NOT for them to come in!

Use seu sinalizador!! Isso avisa outros motoristas das suas intenções, sabia?! E, quando alguem está usando a pisca-pisca, significa que querem ou precisam entrar!! Não significa que você tem que acelerar para não deixar eles entram!! Fuck! E sei que meu português escrito não está o melhor, mas isso não causa acidentes de trânsito!

WHingING GRinGOS

Gringos always whinge about Brazilian stuff. I have a good whinge once in a while (quite frequently infact) which prompts the Good Lady to say, "So what the fuck are you doing here? Why don't you get the fuck back to Aberbachgenbach and get a job THERE?". Can't, Maggie closed the mine down over twenty year ago. She has a point though (the Good Lady, I mean, not the Iron Lady), 15 years and I'm still complaining about the driving. Point of the matter is, the Brazilians don't know how to make: Good Beer, Good Cheese, Good Tea, Good Sliced Bread (bread rolls and stuff are very good, but sliced white bread, forget it). That's not quite fair, there are some good local beers and cheese but a lot more expensive. Tea - not a chance. It's some kind of acceptable brew that one can drink with a dash of milk and sugar but it doesn't taste quite like tea somehow. As for the commercial beers, YURGLE! The Brazilians like the beer ice cold - it kills the taste.
Mind you, I expect the Gaúchos in Cardiff will be saying, "Bloody Welsh, don't have decent meat for barbies", now that's the GOOD stuff - Barbies, the meat is lovely and cheap, that's two adjectives not an adverb and an adjective.

Lots of lovely coloured writing

I SEE thousands of millions of people worldwide are voting in the Welsh Blog Awards, I've got 2 ! (uhm, that's TWO, not TWO thousand million) votes, there's a huge possibility that I could be the winner of this. Fame, fortune and naked wimmin will surely follow.

Amongst the blurb on the BBC site there is the following to make us wonder what a weird/crap/stupid world we have:

(BBC) The ancient Silk Road route city of Samarkand "celebrating" it's 2750th anniversary with fireworks and dance. " ... Uzbek President Karimov invited 400 officials, diplomats and UNESCO representatives, however, "... the PUBLIC WAS BANNED FROM ATTENDING THE CELEBRATIONS, with security police lining Registan for the occasion" (my caps and red)

"When we say Samarkand we imagine a beautiful and great city which enchants the soul of any person ... this is a city which you see once and dream to see again," said the president.

Let's all go to Samarkand for our Summer Holidays. NOT!

(BBC). BALLS with Allah, have sparked protests.

Jolly Spiffin'! I'm being voted for in the Welsh Blog Awards! TWO wonderful people out there somewhere have voted for ME! Ithankyousomuch. Annie'll probably run away with the votes, she's in most of the categories too.

Can't think of any more crap to write. Hope ye's all keeping up with the Best Alternative Places to Drink Beer, suggestions please, I'm not going to do this all one my ownses, nobody so far has nominated The Prancing Pony in Bree, yer buggers! Guess I'll have to do it meself.

Come on - votes votes votes!

Uhm... what do I win if I get voted Best (personal) Welsh Blog?

Long Haired Freaky People Need Apply ..... NOT!

The Date is Set. After 4th of September I shall no longer be able to produce offspring. Should I really go through with this? Yes! After a fun experience yesterday, me and the Good Lady in one room, the kids in another room and the rubber things in yet another room.

I watched Borat. How can a 'humour specialist, public speaking coach' explain what he calls a 'not joke'? For starty farties it's not a joke as such. And the way he tried to explain it was appalling. "Let's say your suit is not grey but blue, then I say "Your suit is blue ..... NOT!". What the fuck? Borat's handling of the crap was great. The so called 'not joke' (that's NOT a joke - or maybe, that's a joke ... NOT!) , perhaps developed as a way of shoving irony in the face of people who don't understand it much (i.e. Americans, Ooohh that should scrungle a few ronkles).

Shite, I've run out of beer. Well I guess I drink too much anyway.








NOT.

Chicken: "book book book booooook", Frog:"read it read it read it"

SO MUCH stuff to read, so little time. I picked up a copy of Don Quixote in English at the Best Bookshop in PoA, however an Argentinean friend of mine insists I MUST read it in the original Spanish. Second hand bookshops seem to exert a strong gravitational pull on me, I was sucked into one the other day and had to buy 2 books, the first of which I liked the title, "O Último Tapir", The Last Tapir. The second, an old (strangely enough there is no publishing date, the publishers are Random House, it looks about 1960's ish) copy of "Plutarch's Lives". Can't read anything I choose yet though until I finish the Master's Degree selection test list, 3 novels (I'm on the third, Crônica da Casa Assassinada), 5 literature theory books and 2 poetry collections by Brazilian poets.

What is the collective noun for Hermits?

bleepings

"What I thought was unreal, now, for me, seems in some ways to be more real than what I think to be real which seems now more to be unreal" .
Fred Alan Wolf

"I can't roll the fucking thing down" - "Try it the other way"(fumblefumble)- "Nope, still doesn't work, FUCK, I'm not going to buy THESE ones again"

After experimenting with injectable chemicals which produced disastrous results (see the paragraph headed ON A PERSONAL NOTE in THIS post) and after years of experience with yucky, stinky rubber things that sometimes don't roll down (is it ME??!!), and after much deliberation.

STOP PRESS STOP PRESS!!
Gunshots outside, first time in ages!

Ahem...much deliberation from me and the misses, ("I'm not sticking one of THOSE things inside me", but dearest... "I'm not going to bugger around with my hormones again"), I've decided to get The Snip.


I have a student who is a gynecologist I just asked her how I'd go about it through the public health system, i.e. for free. However, the public health system here is pretty much like how I described the public roads in an earlier post: patched up with black crumbly stuff that gets smashed to bits when used too much. Anyway she said she'd pull some strings to get me through a 3 year waiting list in just a few months. Now these few months have come to an end and I'm at the front of the queue! She phoned yesterday, she'd put me onto her male counterpart the urologist, which, if you add 'ne' becomes almost a brain doctor, well they do say that when the one part gets to working the other part quits. And that's it, I'll be snipped in a few short weeks! Too late for second thoughts and all that bumph.

Now I want one of those ties, that I remember from the 80s, "I Only Fire Blanks" or I.O.F.B.
(Fuck, I never wear ties)

My only real concern is, will it still squirt as much and as far.

Best Alternative Places to Drink Beer - Updatable.

I've seen loadsa lists of "10 best places in the world to drink beer", Bars in Munich, the Czech Republic, Dublin etc etc. But I'd love to see an "alternative" list, this one gets my vote to begin with. Any other suggestions? (my terrace at sunset in January for example). Pavlo's on the Greek / Turkish Famagusta border in Cyprus is another of my votes, if it still exists (those 1980s blues again).

So here's the beginnings of a list, these are my contributions, other suggestions are welcome:

Kamal Van Damme's bar, Berber mountains, Algeria;
Pavlo's, Greek / Turkish Famagusta border, Cyprus;
The Broken (or Mended) Drum, The Shades, Ankh-Morpork, Discworld;
The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, The End of the Universe. (actually this one's not so much for beer, but I have it on good authority that it's the best place for Pan Galactic Gargleblasters)
The Poison Apple, A Kingdom Far Far Away.

Beer at 50p a Pint!

I've learned a most useful phrase, Ga'i beint o gwrw os gwelwch yn dda? Yes, better than slow, unbearable pigs.

Cost of living table:

The Brazilian Real, R$, is worth about 25p. So 1 Brit Quid (that's Pound Sterling for my international readers / sorry, I don't have a pound sign on my keyboard) is about R$4. I'm self-employed so I rely on my students sticking around and on a very good month (between April and November) I earn about R$4,000 - 5,000. On a very bad month (December to March, everybody buggers off to the beach), I earn about R$1,000 - 2,000; 3,000 if I'm very lucky with extra translating work, BUT I still have the same expenses and unfortunately I haven't been able to even things out by saving during the bumper months, there's always too much beer to drink and too many barbies to eat.

So let's see if I'm filffy rich or rag-arse poor compared to back-'ome-how-green-was-my-cynon-valley standard:

Well as I live alone, I don't to mega supermarket runs once a week to fill the pantry and fridge, I just live day by day, except at weekends when I fill the fridge with beer and chunks of prime beef for the barbies, so lets start with that (supermarket prices and I'm not going to repeat 'about' every time, so take it as given):

A 600ml bottle (a wee bit over a pint) of lager beer: R$2.
Brazilian brewed bitter or ale 350ml (they don't do bigger): R$4 - 6
Imported can of bitter or Guinness: R$11
Pint of Guinness in the Shamrock (okay I deviated a bit from the supermarket): $R12

Prime beef steak for barbie, per 2.2 pounds (= 1 kilo, I can't be arsed to convert): R$15 (so about R$7 / lb?).
Beef ribs: R$5 / kilo

Other stuff, washing powder, yup I wash my clothes: R$1 / kilo.

Other other stuff, rent. I live in a pretty slummy neighbourhood, though my flat's pretty decent (2 bedrooms, garage, terrace): R$500 / month (any other neighbourhood, I'd pay up to R$1,000), water and rates included.
Electric bill: R$50 - 60 / month
Gas - one bottle (you know those big iron thingies), I use about one every 3 months (just for the cooker) - R$40.

Eating out: Posh restaurant for 2, drinks included: $R80 +
Joe's Greasy burger for two + beer R$20.
Decent lunch with salad and meats as-much-as-you-want-buffet: R$10

I could go on.

How does that compare to living in Aberbachgenbach? Divide everything by four.

Shit, I'll never become a published writer if I repeat pretty as an adverb twice in the same sentence

Mochyn Annioddefol

Took a quick experiment with an internet language course in Welsh and in just a few short minutes, I learned Mae'r mochyn yn araf, now what I really need are some of these useful phrases.

Perfect Biking Roads

The roads here seem to be made of some crappy black stuff which becomes crumbly in rain and gets pounded to hell by the passing traffic thus creating immense pot-holes. After a few weeks a truck goes round and fills the pot-holes with big gravel (i.e. small stones) this in turn gets pounded around and spread all over the roads once again exposing the hole, another few weeks pass before another truck comes round and fills the hole with the same sticky black stuff that crumbled in the first place. Most of the roads look like black patch-work.
A heaven for bikers.

NOT!

When I wuz cruizing the roads of Britain on my Kawasaki ZL1000 (SIGH! them we'r' t days, que saudades!) we used to complain about the roads THERE! Never again shall I complain (if that is, I am ever cruizing the roads of Britain again at some future time). WAAAAAAY back in the 80s. I've just been moping over my collection of back issues of Back Street Heroes from 1987, TWENTY years ago JEEEEZ! I think that was the year I went to the Kent Show and the Bulldog Bash. I never could make it to the Dragon Rally (lying barstud, couldn't be arsed more like, middle of Winter in a tent in North Wales? No cojones mate).

I'm in the running for "Best Personal Blog" in the Welsh Blog Awards 2007, which means I'll have to write something ..... uhm ... er...oh BOLLOCKS!

Here's an update on my current situation anyway. Since the incident with the Personage on the Balcony, which occurred six weeks after the Personage on the Terrace incident and three weeks after the Personage IN the Apartment incident - most probably it is the same personage - I'm a trifle nervous whilst sleeping, or NOT sleeping as is the case. Despite strengthening bars being welded onto the terrace and a cage being welded onto the baclony, I still don't sleep tranquilly. I constantly awake during the night, tense and half expecting to see the silhouette of the barsturd THERE. I sleep (or not, etc, etc,) with a hammer beside the bed, yes, I know, I know, but I don't have a baseball bat. My flat-in-front neighbour offered to lend me his gun, I was sorely tempted. I'm actually half hoping this slimebag will return to the balcony in order to give me a chance to reach through the cage and shove him off and be done with. A three storey fall should break a few bones and perhaps dissuade him from further exploits. In my transmogrified HULK state when he appeared, I would have shoved him off if I had caught him. I have warned the neighbours above that as I now also have a caged balcony (the first floor is a garage with bars, the second floor is a caged balcony, so this is effectively a ladder straight up), he may continue his climb to there.

As I am apparently connected to 62,759,867 people through 19 Orkut "friends", so too am I connected to several of the people who perished on the ill-fated Porto Alegre - São Paulo TAM flight through three of my students. My coração goes out to the families.

IF THAT FUCKER COMES AGAIN, I'VE GOT MY WAR BAND READY

My bedroom is a cube, one wall of which is a glass sliding door opening to a balcony (3rd floor). My bed is adjacent to this glass door, if I reach out my arm I touch it.

Imagine then my surprise when I awoke from a doze at 11pm to see A PERSON standing there on the balcony. What Larks. See below posts for the history of invasions.
My rage overcame my fear and I believe I momentarily transmogrified into the HULK. Starkering Nekkid, I leapt out of bed screaming Celtic War cries. The person, I guess completely taken by surprise at my reaction, deftly lept over the bars and monkeyed down, jumping the last couple of metres and ran off with my curses heating his arse. Curious neighbours soon appeared, I still naked, "Hi, uhm yes just some guy on my balcony you know, everything okay now". Now before I sleep I shall paint myself blue for the full effect if it should happen again.

As I type there is a small team of workmen soldering bars to the balcony effectively imprisoning me.

HIGH TECH ALARM failure

Just days after I had posted the HIGH TECH alarm, I had a break in. The HT Alarm was on the floor unbroken, whether it actually worked or not I shall never know, perhaps the guy detected the line and placed it on the floor, or maybe it fell, didn't break and the guy continued his vile crime. Anyway, I arrived home at 9.30 pm to find the bars twisted open and the window smashed. Missing: excellent JVC dvd, crappy radio cd and a couple of sweatshirts. Anger level high.
I may be obliged to move.

High Tech Alarm


My terrace has been invaded three times on occassions that I know about, missing items - a beach chair and barbecue spits - evidencing these incursions, and maybe other occassions that I don't know about. The last occured at 5am a few weeks ago, when I saw through the curtians of the French windows, the silhouette of a person trying to get through the bars which separate the terrace from the balcony, my furious shout of GET THE FUCK OUT!! surprised him enough to, indeed, get the fuck out. When I reported this to the owner of the aparment he just offered to reinforce the bars, but I don't want the bastards to get on to the terrace in the first place. Electric fencing the terrace will cost me R$620, a movement detection alarm, R$680. So I've rigged up a sophisticated high-tech alarm system myself. A large one litre beer bottle, I had to drink the beer first of course, twelve metres of fine nylon fishing line. I've placed the bottle attached to the line on a wall and secured the other end to the far wall, the line is about a metre from the ground and invisible at night. Two of these, one covering the terrace length and the other covering the width where a possible invasion may occur. A smashing beer bottle at night will wake me instantly, what I do then, I'm not exactly sure, hopefully the invader will be shocked enough just to bugger off there and then. What I would really like of course is to have the bottles filled with explosives and nasty pointy things.

Exactly now as I'm writing this, (21:45, June 20) I can hear the noise around the city, the roar of a zillion fireworks going off at the same time, the kick-off of the Grêmio v Boca Juniors match, the final for the Libertadores for the Tokyo Cup, in other words it will decide who's going to go to Tokyo for the World Clubs' Championship. Last year was won by the other PoA team, Internacional, Grêmio's city rival. The city's been gearing up for it for days (weeks in fact since the championship began). When I passed the stadium on Sunday morning there were crowds there already queueing for tickets, there were riots and mounted police were sent in when the tickets sold out.

Now all is silent, I think the match has started. I'll be alerted to a goal when I hear another roar. Trouble is I won't know who's scored, as the Internacional supporters will be supporting Boca Jnr. I guess the roar will be louder if Grêmio score. For the first match last week I really thought Grêmio had won because of the racket (three times), turned out it was Boca's win.

Grêmio need FOUR clear goals to win. Even if they win 3 - 0, they don't go to Tokyo.

Hate football meself, buggers up the traffic, keeps me awake with the blasted fireworks. Not beautiful colours and lights, just constant BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG all frinkin' night.


Being now a zillion or so miles away from Y Cap Goch and The Temple (see my last post), my local, which is not very local, is The Shamrock. Is it possible that every city in the world now has an Irish Pub? Here in PoA there are in fact now four: The Shamrock, Mulligan's, Dublin and The Cherry Blue (WOT?! An Irish pub called The Cherry Blue??). Mulligan's, Dublin and The Cherry Blue (WOT?! Etc, etc.) are in a poshe district of PoA where you have to have at least a BMW or Mercedes and dress in Armandi before people will talk to you. Mulligan's is a Hollywood replica of an Irish pub, too clean and plasticky, I went there once and asked if they have any Irish music, "We've got U2" replied the barman. Dublin just promotes live music (not Irish) and cheape(er) beer. The Cherry is a piano wine bar that, about 5 years ago, heard of the global phenomenon that was "Irish Pub" and decided to call themselves an Irish Pub, but... well, you can imagine, I mean... The Cherry Blue??
That leaves us with The Shamrock, which could be considered genuingly an Irish Pub as the owner, Simon, is Irish. It's not exactly the kind of place that you'd get a jam session with a bodhrán, fiddle, Uilleann pipes and tin whistle on a Friday night though, I don't think we can scrape together those musicians in PoA. I did try an experiment with Simon a couple of times, "Here Simon, put these cd's on" (The Chieftains, Planxty, Altan, etc.), he went for a few tracks then wouldn't have it, "scare's the customers away". Irish pub...?

Yes, I have thought about "Y Ddraig Goch Inn" here in PoA, but when I see the hours and work that Simon puts in, not to mention the Bunken Drums that he has to put up with most nights... nah, I prefer to be a customer (one of those Bunken Drums!). Oh, he does have draught Guinness, a crackin' St. Patrick's Day Party and the Joycian Society's Bloomsday meeting every 16th June.

People always ask me what I miss most about Britain. Without hesitation: PUBS and decent beer. Oh and summer festivals.
My local in Brynsadler, whenever I visited my folks, used to be The Ivor Arms, my old man would be down there without fail at 12 midday every Sunday, he was going there for nigh on 30 year, but now apparently it's "Y Draenog" posh pub /restaurant and the old man refuses to go in, don't know why, never been there meself.
My last abode in Wales was Abercwmboi, infamously known for it's Phernicite (bugger me if I can find that word in the diksh, phurni? ferni? pherni? furni?), which would spew out sulphur laden yellow smoke in the process of cleaning up our coal so that it wouldn't pollute, sweet eh? In Abercwmboi was Y Cap Goch which was decent enough, but just up the road in Cwmaman was / is the Temple Bar which looked like yer old Granny's front living room, infact I'm pretty sure it WAS yer old Granny's front living room 'cept with a bar and a few pumps of good real ale. The old dear there was about 80 something and served yer pint with a trembling hand that spilled half of it before you'd get your mits on, but no-one had the heart to protest. There were two waddling fat dogs that the old dear used to constantly feed chocolate to, hence waddling and fat.
Oh, must dash, something's just come up (OOOOEEERR!)

In the wet, it's just about as wet as it can get


I feel like I'm back home in the Land of My Fathers (and Mothers and Brothers and Sisters) again - it's been raining for over a week!

Now it's raining cats and dogs
and I can't stand croaking frogs
oh Brother it's wet!

(I got fungus growing on me dungarees,
got fungus on me dungas and there's water on me knees,
it's a mad crazy country in the wet!)

That's one of Rolf Harris's not mine as a matter of fact.

The house is also not mine. Not Rolf Harris's either. Someone's house in Oxford, England.

Welsh OR British, NOT English

A point I would like to make regarding National Identity and as a comment on THIS BLOG, or more specifically the sub-heading, top right, "Welsh not British".

As soon as I utter a syllable in Portuguese, my Gringo accent announces, "Yes, I'm not from here, go ahead, ask me all the usual questions, 'Where are you from?What are you doing here?Do you like Brazil?What football team do you support?'". I'm delighted when people respond with, "Wales is in Britain isn't it?" and Pissed Off if someone says "Wales is in England isn't it?". So I patiently explain and say, you can call me Welsh or British, BUT NOT ENGLISH!!

Okay, why British or Welsh? The name Britain is derived from the Romano-Greek "Pretanni", which Russel Crowe and Kirk Douglas (oh no sorry, he wasn't Greek, he was Spartan I believe) pronounced as "Britannia", denoting the peoples there at the time (erm...at the time of the Romans you know, and maybe a little before... i.e. The Greeks). Sooooo, who were the people there at the time? And who were the English? It's a long story but basically the Romans were refering to the inhabitants of the land BEFORE the Angles, Saxons (Saesneg) and Jutes came and and formed ENGLAND (= ANGLE LAND) . These inhabitants (though not the original natives of the land) went on to become the Welsh and Cornish (I think they all turned into Pixies). So you see you can call me Welsh or British.

Oh yeah, all this happened about a thousand six hundred years ago.

Here's a photo of Sunset through a Glass of Fine Brazilian Ale


Nice eh?

Odds Bonkin's if it's not IOM TT time again. 20 something year ago 'twas since I were there. Must've been 85 or 87 or both, I did go twice in fact. First time I fell in with a bunch of Jolly Irish Bikers and they dragged me into their hotel and forced large quantities of Bushy's down my throat. Next morn, early, they were hammering on my door wanting to go see the racing. Our form of transport? A VW kombi, no seats in the back, where I got stuck, and was soon vomming out the side door much to the chagrin of the bikes following us. Had Kawasaki Z1100R at the time and I wandered around the circuit on it a few times when not drunk.

Second time I fell in with a bunch of Jolly Danish Bikers, THEY dragged me to their campsite and forced large quantities of Bushy's down my throat. Spent the week drunk and looking at girls' tits in wet t-shirt competitions. This time round I had a Kawasaki ZL1000 Eliminator. I met Dumpy from Dumpy's Rusty Nuts and Someone Famous from The Groundhogs but I was too drunk to know it was someone famous.


Well Shiver me Timberlakes, Justin (who he?), it's been many a moon since the last News from a Welshman in Brazil. May has passed without great incident, the Annual Barbie was, once again a Huge Success. Amongst other distinguished guests, in attendance this year, fewer by number, the German Fella, Ian and his Good Lady and, Arriving Late in Time to Save a Drowning Witch, Sergio, the Musical Porteño, we embraced but refrained from kissing. Highlight of the evening was a superb (though I must add, very drunken) rendition of Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody, particularly striking, the GALILEO galileo GALILEO galileo GALILEO figaro magnifico co co co. and on a personal note, I rather liked also the scaramouche scaramouche, will you do the fandango. Very impressive indeed. Thunder Bolts and Lightening, etc., etc.

A big HURRAH for Mrs Jean Richards and an almighty HISSABOO for the Australian stadium officials. Mrs Jean, may Belenus bless her, was chucked out of the stadium during a Wales / Australia test match (rugby, me little fried noodles, not creqwuet) for leaving her seat and dancing with a Wallabee. When I went to see Wales/Argentina a few years ago (with Sergio the Musical Porteño, see above) in Good Airs, I was sorely tempted to dance with a puma but thought better of me actions and settled for Shouting a Lot and quaffing vast quantities of Guinness in The Druid Inn that night with few hundred other Welsh fans. Very memorable (actually, can't remember much of it at all).


They told me Brazil was a tropical country! Bloody Freezing today! 3 degrees C, brass bloody monkeys etc. Problem is, the hardy Gaúchos don't bother with central heating when they build houses and flats, they still think it's a tropical country.

From being abjectly poor in Jan and Feb, I find myself with Loadsadosh right now in the middle of the year, I've bought me a TV and DVD and spend weekends watching Hollywood's Latest Crap, mind to Jelly? Well not really, I'm being selective. Any suggestions for Welsh Films? Probably impossible to get in the rental shops here however.

And as a preventative of Mind to Jelly, I'm reading the best in Portuguese / Brazilian literature. I have a list of books, novels, plays, poetry and theoretical stuff, to read up for the Master's degree selection test in October. Eça de Queroz is highly recommendable, not sure if there are any English translations available. Also on the list is Hamlet and Oedipus Rex, which is a good thing as I can read Ham in English and I read Oed about a zillion times when I was researching for my final paper. With those two on the list guaranteed one of the questions will be "What's the difference between Shakespearian Tragedy and Greek Tragedy?". I KNOW, I KNOW, I KNOW! Please Miss, ask me!

JIGGERY POKERY and HUMBUG !
Those Capitalist Pigish Monopolizing capitalist pigs! Just because I didn't pay my bill from February they doggon cut me off from internet.
Okay they had every right to I suppose. But what pissed me off was when I DID pay, they said it would take "up to 72 hours to get re-connected" so I waited. After 72 hours had passed, no signal on my modem, so I phoned THEN they said they'd have to send the technician round to reconnect me. So THAT took another 2 days before I could be at home for a guy (two guys as it turned out) to come round and click on their home page, enter a code and get reconnected. Weird thing was, even the guys that came round were baffled as to WHY they had to come round.

UPDATING (seeing as I've been off air for a few days)
The Evan Evans show was...erm. interesting. Didn't see many Welsh people there. In fact didn't see ANY Welsh people there. And the band didn't even have Y Ddraig Goch.
What struck me were two things: Black t-shirts: not unusual, had a vast collection of black t-shirts meesel way back when. YOUNG people: kids infact. Girls, teenage girls. Loads of 'em. Mobile phones: in my day we held up ciggy lighters, this bunch held up mobile phones. Not to look beautiful, thousands of waving faint blue lights around the stadium. Nah, it was just to film and take photos.

Okay that's THREE things.

Does "pigish" have one g or two?

Welsh Rock Band : Evan Evans


In the 80s I went to a lot of rock shows, I'm a veteran of Castle Donnington Monsters of Rock, don't do it so much nowadays though mainly because GOOD bands don't come round too often to PoA. My step daughter is a great fan of Evan Evans, she says, must be a new Welsh rock band methinks. Evan Evans are HERE in PoA tonight, and coz she's only 13 and Must be Accompanied by Adult, I'm going! Should I take along my Y Ddaig Goch flag?





Look at these pictures of bulls and dogs.















Now look at that there Red Dragon. THERE. Up the top, on the left.
Isn't there something missing?

I'm not crazy about sport.
Playing; for fun, I used to a long time ago and I would now if I had the time and / or oportunity, I mean to meet up with a bunch of people once or twice a week to have a kick around or whack a volleyball back and forth, then go for a few beers afterwards, but when it gets competitive, play against other teams from the neighbourhood for some kind of championship or whatnot, nah. Watching; only rugby. However, 1. I don't have a tv. and 2. if I did have, can never get rugby on any channel here anyway, 'cept for some satellite channel maybe then it would cost me megabucks. If I did watch any sport I would probably nevereverever watch CRICKET.
ANYWAY, despite all of the above, I was quite surprised and pleased to hear that Ireland have won the cricket world cup, no doubt beating giants (from what I gather) such as India, Pakistan, Australia, West Indies and ...erm Wales?
Well done Ireland!

I have a student who I suppose by his fellow school persons, would be called a "nerd". Compulsory piano lessons, zitty, skinny and thick glasses. In the first class I thought he would be a pain in the arse as he answered almost every question with "depends", I couldn't draw him out, he seemed uninterested in learning English, especially as it was an obligatory class - his folks make him, like the piano. In an initial interview his dad was present and answered all the questions for him, when I directed a question at the boy, the dad jumped in with an answer.
In the class without the parental influence, however, get him talking about history and the kid's away! He's one smart dude and now one of my fave students. He told me today that the battle of Agincourt wasn't won by the Welsh Longbow men at all, well it was but they apparently waded in with farm implements when the French were all a-Higgledy Piggledy in the mud and advancing into a bottleneck. He reads Bernard Cornwell and knows the entire history of Star Wars from BEFORE Episode I to AFTER Episode VI. I give him "research" homework, a word, name of something or person and he finds out as much as possible through internet, reads up then tells me all about it next class. Last week it was Edward I, this week it's Owain Glyndwr. Nerds are great dudes!

A Word or Two on Celtic Peoples

Some of my Foreign Readers may have been led to believe that the persons in the photograph published in the previous post were in fact Welsh Men in Kilts. This is not so, point of fact is they are Cornish Men in Kilts at an annual "Tossing the Pixie" tournament held annually every, erm, year, in the wee Cornish town of Dunfermline, pronounced "Moussel".
Welsh Men do not drink Carlsberg (which is probably the best Lager in the World) and have much bigger sporrans.

Having only visited Britain twice in the past 15 years of living in Brazil, I haven't really got a sense of what's going on on the street (on on? I assure you, correct grammatically be it), from all accounts (well okay then, from the accounts of my old man and occasional e-mails from people) PC is going beyond the pale face with people being awarded thousands for "hurt feelings". An advantage of living here is still a kind of freedom to say what you will and, yes, to TOUCH PEOPLE! Brazilians are very touchy, not sensitive touchy, but touchy touchy, they like to touch. It's fun, try it. Or maybe not, in Britain you'd get done up for "sexual harassment" I guess. Of course there's touching and there's touching and sometimes that goes on too and appropriate action is taken. However, Brazilian girls (or guys for that matter) don't mind being touched casually on the shoulder, they don't scream RAPE! at an occasional informal friendly touch. And consequently guys aren't afraid of being accused just because of a touch, so things are much more relaxed in, perhaps, an office environment.

In their homes of course people are touching all the time. OOOOOOOO! S'luvly so'tiz.

I hear in Iran they don't wear ties because it "contributes to the spread of western culture", so why do they bother with suits? Aren't suits culturally western? I don't have much poke with suits or ties anyway.

From one silly culture dictated by fools* (at great risk of calling down a jihad upon my turnip, now that would HURT) to another. A reporter from the bbc from a US aircraft carrier upon hearing the roar of a F somethingorother taking off, hears this from a crewmember: "Listen to that, that's the sound of FREEDOM!" OH PLEEEEEEASE! C'mon dongo! That's the sound of an asshole, sorry, an arsehole. Who DO these people think they are?

*I believe that the Iranian culture must be wonderfully rich, diverse and splendid indeed, with regards to arts, music, history and ...well CULTURE. But I cannot truck with stupid rules, LAWS even, that say, you cannot do such and such because it corrupts your mind or it's too "westernlike" whatever, what the fuck! So "a culture dictated by fools" here just refers to THAT aspect of the culture, an aspect that perhaps the people themselves find slightly irritating. Do we NOT eat Arabic food 'coz it's too "Easternlike"? Borrucks. (Do they have fish 'n' chip shops in Tehran?) Actually that's given me an idea..I'm calling all you Welshmen out there, at home and expats, to BOYCOTT fish 'n' chips 'coz it's too ENGLISHY! Boycott everything English as a matter of fact. What about clothes, aren't the clothes we wear very English? Let's go naked, or wear Welsh wooly tweedy things, don't we have a Welsh kilt? C'mon lads, get yer kilts on, just the thing for a hot summer's day to air yer ballocks.
Carsberg is, apparently, probably the best lager in the world.



That's it I think.

My life's getting back to normal (what normal life for me is though, I'm still not quite sure) after the recession I went through from January to March, my folks being here didn't help even though they paid a lot for outings etc. I still had to fork out for more than I usually do during this period. Galloping Shrumkin's! but I don't want to go through that again and I'm looking for counter measures for next year and I'll have to haul my ass together and get my Welsh Folks tales written in Portuguese, hopefully to get published and make quantrillions here. My major problem is not so much translating but conveying the humour, or perhaps the writing itself. The kind of thing that flows from me (and I'm not talking about after a night of Biriani and 8 pints of Old Farty Bum Best Ale) in English just does not flow from me in Portuguese, though writing in Portuguese is not difficult for me writing in Portuguese is. The above parenthesis is an example, that just does not come out of me naturally in Portuguese and thus it takes a lot longer to write.

Spent yesterday NOT eating fish as tradition and religion dictate, but eating, yes my fave, barbecued red meat, chicken hearts and pork ribs. Being of pagan ilk I refuse to follow the "Good Friday" society rule of having to eat fish, at least here in Brazil that be the case, somebody tell me, is it the same in Wales? "Good Friday", I shall from now on call, Not So Bad Friday, or Crap Friday or Amazingly Brilliant Friday, according to what happens on the day.

Amazingly Brilliant Friday yesterday, we took a day trip to "Grandpa Rangel's Enchanted Forest". Unfortunately Grandpa Rangel's Enchanted Lake had shrunk somewhat, apparently due to Global Warming according to Grandma Rangel, and we could only dip up t'knees in luke warm murky waters while I had been looking forward to a full body spullunge off Grandpa Rangel's Floating Peir. Not to be wet blanketted however, I placed a few pieces of dead animal over hot coals and quaffed flagons of Grandpa Rangel's Fine Ale. Point of fact was we were obliged to quaff Grandpa Rangel's Fine Ale ("NovoSchin", crap Brazilian lager) as Grandma Rangel wouldn't allow us to take our own in order for her to make large proffits from inflated bar prices. I did however manage to sneak in a few cans of FBA in the cool box and Grandma Rangel didn't notice.

PHEW! I can breath the sigh of proverbial relief (or is that....? Oh never mind) My pa and step mum and niece have gorn after a tense two week stay. To say that my old man is a difficult person would be quite an understatement, he doesn't continually WHINGE in a whingey whiney way, he continually COMPLAINS and everyone has to know about it. Here's an example: night at Simon's, after being served: "I don't like the way they pile up the plates (...) a lot goes to waste."; the following day, we went to another bar for lunch: "They don't serve much on the plates here do they." And so on ad infinitum, ad nauseum.
Also a great number of his conversational phrases start with, "When I was in the Gulf..." (in the 50's).
On the other hand my niece was a wonder, 13 years of energy and naughtyness. I learned some new English vocab which I shall be passing onto my students, such as:
"Wowoza?" normally (but not necesserally) followed by another word such as "noise".
e.g. "Wowoza noise?"
to which a possible reply could be "Dunno, probably a car back-firing"

On the day WALES BEAT ENGLAND, please to be assured I'm talking about RUGBY, can't get TV coverage here so we followed the progress through the BBC internet site, I had to click the update button every two minutes.

We had already arranged to go to a gaucho touristy barbie restaurant, not having any alternative celebratory venue. Ate lots of big drippin' chunks of dead bulls and watched a guy doing an impressive show swinging his bolas around at a very high rate of knots.

Took 'em to the airport this morning
(my folks, not the guy's bolas!), must confess, despite being a might fucking difficult fella, he's me ol' da, and I love him, I felt sad to see them go, don't know when I'll see him again, 2 years, 3, 4, 5, maybe never.
Time for bed now.
Nighty night.

There She Blows!

I've started a discussion group at Book Tribes - spotting porn in classic literature. Apart from that fella, D.H. , Charles wasn't so bad himself, I posted up these ones a last year sometime, well worth bringing up again now. Then of course there's Moby Dick that I'm reading right now which has "Freud explains" overtones which I commented a coupla weeks ago. In fact, if one looks at literature from a Freudian point of view, porn is everywhere - if it's longer than it is wide, it's phallic. Hills and dark damp caves, wossat 'en?

Jiggin's! My folks are coming a-visiting tomorrow. It's not often they come and see me, this is the third time in 15 years in fact, and the first time since my divorce. The last time they came I lived in a large house with a swimming pool, lots of space and bedrooms, they had they're own suite downstairs, with a patio and barbie-area, and we had a maid who cooked and cleaned every day.
This time I'm in a two-bedroom flat, one bedroom is full of boxes and junk, I can touch the walls of the kitchen with outstretched arms, no maid. I've already warned them about this, but still it may come as a bit of a shock. Got the terrace though, they can sit out there under the blazing sun if the flat gets too cramped.
Coming with them is my niece. My step mum, who is in fact English from Brat'fud, many a year ago, had the sense to send her daughter, my halfsis, to a Welsh speaking school, and at the same time went to night classes to learn Welsh, luckily my halfsis continued the tradition and my niece is a native Welsh speaker. Blast me if I can only say "Shwmae, su't y'chi?" and "Bore Da!" every morning!

Tonight as I quaff a few pints of FBA and eat a raw leek or three I shall remember How Green my Valley was, and as I close my eyes I will be able to hear the Aberbachgenbach Male Voice singing "My Fanny", the FBA will become a full creamy pint of Feelin' Fowl Double Dragon, I'll be transposed to the backroom of the Mochyn Digywilydd Arms where Eli Jenkins, sitting at HIS table is smoking tea bags in his pipe and Dai is stood at the bar extrapolating in a loud voice, Llancunty's chances of winning the match on Sunday what with his brother-in-law being their new loose-head. In walks the man with the basket of cockles and muscles alive-alive-o, after him, the next sober person is Sally Army selling All Along the Watchtower (or was that Jimmy?). The boys from the Bryn are getting pissed again, there'll be trouble soon enough. Is there going to be a lock-in? There's always a lock-in at the Mochyn.
DYDD GWYL DEWI HAPUS!
What's the smell of parsley?

TWENTY SEVEN years ago I was covered in zits and going through a selection process that would determine my future career: Morse code at higher and higher speeds until I was bombarded with 30wpm. And the ALAT, Army Language Aptitude Test which, according to the result obtained, would demonstrate if the candidate had a natural ability in learning a foreign language. Army Intelligence (which, as we say, is a contradictory term) at the time of the Cold War needed Russian "linguists" (in fact, after having studied linguistics for 6 years at university, I'd now say "Speakers of Russian as a Foreign Language, for, as I learned, a linguist is much more than just a bilingual). I got along fine with the morse. The ALAT I failed miserably, showing that I would be a total dumbo at learning any foreign language.

I now speak fluent Portuguese. A result of having lived in Brazil for over 15 years. So you see Army Intelligence got it all wrong, if they wanted Speakers of Russian as a Foreign Language, they should have sent the candidates to Russia for 15 years.

A FEW YEARS BEFORE twenty seven years ago, I was at Y PANT Comprehensive School, Pontyclun. Y Pant, like many schools in Wales at the time, had German, French and WELSH, as languages to learn. Only it wasn't compulsory after 14 years of age. And at 14 years of age, I was in no mood to learn another language, not even my own mother tongue! Dam and Blast, I'm a Welshman living in Brazil who speaks English and Portuguese. There are colonies of Welsh living in Patagonia, a couple of thousand miles south of where I live, that speak Welsh and Spanish and have names like Juan Evans and Dai Gonzalez. I'd love to be able to pop down for a visit and have a good conversation in Welsh. Get learning then butty! (but my ALAT results...)

Does Leek make my Breath Pong?

Next week I'll have to search the supermarket veggie section for that Welshest of vegetables, The Leek! Known here as "Alho Porro", alho is in fact garlick, nobody could supply me with the meaning of porro, so let's just say a leek is a Porro Garlick. The Humble Leek, not a favoured veg in Brazil, but can be found alongside the rocket amongst the greenest of edible plants in the supermarket. Am I to be the only person in PoA to be eating Raw Leek on Thursday? I'm considering wearing one in my hat or maybe sticking one in my button-hole. Point of fact is I don't wear hats and I don't have clothes with button holes, besides which I can't be bothered to explain to every passer by who asks, "Why have you got a porro garlick stuck on your head?"
The PoA Welsh community was once myself and a surfer lass called Kim from Swansea, Kim went back to the Land of Her Fathers (and mine too) and I'm left alone to wave the Red Dragon when we play football against Brazil, which is not very often to be sure.

Did you know that Pelé's first World Cup goal was against Wales?

Don't like football meself.

DYDD GWYL DEWI HAPUS!

Nantucket Sleigh Ride

A good decision to switch to Herman. A very humorously written first few chapters so far. Literary critisism analysts of the Freudian school doubtless have fun over this book, aside from the overtness of sleeping with the Indian Queequeg, it's full of symbolism: Queequeg and his harpoon, The Spouter Inn, hmmm...

"Landlord! I've changed my mind about that harpooner, I shan't sleep with him."! I can quite categorically say that I would also refuse to sleep with a male six foot ten Amer-Indian harpooner who spends most of the night selling shrunken heads. However, the only other choice being a draughty hard wooden bench, poor Ishmael ends up in bed with the harpooner, "Upon waking next morning about daylight, I found Queequeg's arm thrown over me in the most loving and affectionate manner." YOINKS! What passed during the night, Ishmael does not tell. These sailor boys...

HUMBUG

Call me Ishmael. STUFF Dickens and STUFF Little Dorrit. I'm not going on to the end to see if Arthur Clennam does in fact do that.
I've turned my literary focus to the wide open oceans of Herman Melville, no more Charles' smoggy London.

Don't know how much the world hears about news from Brazil, violent crime is regular in the big cities. The latest atrocity: an armed gang of 5 teenagers between16 and 21 hi-jacked a car from a couple and their 6 year old boy. The mother tried to release the boy from the seat belt but couldn't manage, the boy was tangled in the seat belt OUTSIDE THE CAR AND WAS DRAGGED FOR 7 KILOMETRES before they stopped and abandoned the car. The little boy died. The gang knew that the boy was there and were joking about it they confessed when most of them were captured later.

I believe in an eye for an eye and some. An appropriate punishment? Drag these little fucking scabby low life shits behind a car for 20 or so k's. Their lives are worth FUCK, why should they be allowed to live after what they did to an innocent little kid of 6 years old.

I feel as a father of two great kids, a 10 year old boy and a girl of 15 and I'm PISSED OFF.

What's got me up, either the caffeine content of the chimarrão I drank at around 6pm or the fact that it's one of those blasted summer nights where the heat and the insects conspire to keep one awake. As well as the highly irritating whine of the mosquitoes, so much for the matinset device that's supposed to drive the buggers away, there's the 120 decibel buzzing hiss, or maybe it's a hissing buzz white noise of the cicadas in the trees outside, no use telling them to shut the fuck up, they don't listen.
It could be a combination of all these things, fact is I'm WIDE HOO HA AWAKE at freeking 1am.

A possible solution is to read Dickens. I've tried, again, to read "Little Dorrit". I now have to admit that Dickens is so excruciatingly boring in most of his books, that he could send me to sleep. I found "David Copperfield" and "Great Expectations" a little heavy going at times but they held me to the end at which point I thought "good books" (okay I'm not the best literary critic). "Martin Chuzzlewit" I struggled through but finished only with extreme persistence. "Our Mutual Friend" and "A Tale of Two Cities" I gave up after 30 or so pages, I have it on good authority of a friend of mine that "Hard Times" follows the same trend. I almost made it to the end of "Pickwick Papers" but kind of petered out with just 70 or pages to go. As I was reading "Dorrit" my friend was reading "Times", we both met up and asked ourselves and each other, "Why are we torturing ourselves like this?". Consequently I've given up on "Dorrit" again for the time being, I may get back to her later only if I suffer an extreme literary drought, not entirely infrequent, not sure yet of my friend's decision on "Times".

While doing research for my magnificent octopus, which I am currently working on, I came across this site and found it well worth perusing through. I found six gods of literature, strangely five Chinese and one Japanese. Wot no Western gods of literature? I could perhaps burn my Dickens books as offerings to the Eastern gods. One, in a hope that Dickens may become INTERESTING for me, but then again I won't have any of the books left, and two, that perhaps the gods will help me with my magnificent octopus, maybe I should write it in Mandarin.

RIGHT I'm off to bed.

KAMA WASIKILIZA SANA UTAWEZA KUSIKIA KIFARU KUFANYA KELELE!

I CADGED from me old dad some years ago, as an Item of Interest, a small book, first printed 1936, this edition (14th) 1958, entitled, "Up-country Swahili", (Jinkin's knows where my pops got it from and WHY for that matter). The author, in his intro, says: "To the ordinary up-country native, Swahili is a foreign language, of which he possesses only a very limited knowledge. This book aims at teaching, in a simple way, just that degree of Swahili that is understood and talked by the average intelligent up-country native."

It's laid out in such a manner of the classic language learning style, i.e. sections of grammar and vocabulary followed by translation excercises.

This is where the funny part starts. Again, like traditional language learning, it's pure translation. Lists of separate "useful" phrases with no apparent connection between them. So what phrases can be useful for the "settler, miner, businessman, or wife" (read, "oppressive, tyranical, domineering colonizer"), in colonial East Africa in the 30s to 50s?

Washenzi weusi. - The savages are black.
Ninakupiga. - I am hitting you.
Safisha viatu yangu mara moja! - Clean my boots at once!
Mimi naogopa nyoka, funga milango. - I am afraid of snakes, fasten the door.
Huyu mchawi, ona chura katika kifuko yake! - That man is a witch-doctor, see the frog in his pocket! (I JEST NOT LADIES AND GENTS!)
BOY! tengeneza bafu yangu, na hapana kutia maji ya moto tele sawasawa ulifanya jana, napenda moto, lakini hapana moto sana. - BOY! Get my bath ready, and don't put in as much hot water as you did yesterday, I like it hot, but not too hot.
Mpishi anapiga muchawi. - The cook is beating the witch-doctor.
Napiga mulevi na miti. - I am hitting the drunkard with a stick. (PLEASE! I AM NOT JOKING!)
Choo inajaa ya kiroboto. - The latrine is full of fleas. (NO! PLEASE ENOUGH! ENOUGH!)

Perhaps more later?

A plot thicker than Mad Thick McThick, winner of last year's Mr. Thick competition (yes I know, plagiarised from Black Adder), what 'mI talking about? Charles Palliser's "The Quincunx". I'm now reading it for the THIRD time (minimum necessary), to use another of Edmund 's phrases: the plot twists and turns like a twisty turny thing. The BASIC story is thus:

John Melamphy / Huffam / Clothier and his mother are victims of devious scheming involving several families and an Estate. The scheming involves a codicil which, according to who holds it, and the state of the last heir (John), i.e. dead or alive, determines the definitive owners of the estate.

Smelly Pre-Victorian London is where John and his mother find themselves, manipulated from all sides as EVERYONE involved around them seems to be firstly their friend with offers of help then it turns out that they have different motives and in fact are deadly enemies.

This book EVERYONE must read, at least 3 times like I said, give it a year or so between readings. Read and make notes, who is who, who does what, and you'll begin to discover and understand lots of other clues and sub-plots that the author slips in.

riverrun, past Eve and Adam's, from swerve of shore to bend of bay, brings us by a commodius vicus of recirculation back to Howth Castle and Environs.


PORTO ALEGRE has slipped gently into Summer with the normal cyclic weather of warm, to hot, to intense blacksmith forge to mutha of a rain storm, to cooling down and starting over. When I say "warm" that is relative, I'm talking 30c plus.
Today we're on a cooling down period, it's actually cooled from about 39c yesterday to 33c today! Don't think it's going to get much lower.

Normal for Summer, EVERYONE'S gone to the beach, except me. Can't afford it and haven't got a place to go anyway since my divorce. As a consequence of everyone having gone to the beach, I've got very little work during the week (= very little dosh) and I find myself at home trying to write, mostly failing and spending hours on internet crap, or reading. At the moment, and for the second time, I'm reading "The Quincunx" by Charles Palliser. This book is probably the best Charles Dickens book ever written, not by Charles Dickens. Palliser out Dickenses Dickens, er, I think, so to speak. "A literary classic...blah blah", just so. "Literary classic" usually means you have to read it two or three times to understand it. With JJ's "Ulysses" make that perhaps, four or five times, and with his "Finegan's", forget about reading it, just have it on your bookshelf to appear intellectual. Or try drinking 12 pints of Guinness THEN reading it, it works and everything makes complete sense.

End here. Us then. Finn, again! Take. Bussoftlhee, mememormee! Till thousendsthee. Lps. The keys to. Given! A way a lone a last a loved a long the

BLWYDDYN NEWYDD DDA

First post of the year this. Porto Alegre is baking, my apartment is baking. The only solution is drink large quatities of iced FBAs.

LAST NIGHT. I opted to be alone. Towards midnight sleep was impossible of course because of the Brazilians' love for fireworks. I drifted in and out but the partying went on 'till the wee hours so I got up later, around 10am.

I'm puting together a blog about Porto Alegre for travellers, visit it here. If anyone's travelling through or if you're a newcomer to live here a while, you'll find stuff about what to do, where to go on a Sunday morning. How to avoid getting ripped off when when dring beers, and lots of other stuff. It's an informal thing with my own points of view, I add bits and pieces almost every day so it's increasing a lot.