Since Friday I have been reading Sina Queyras book Expressway (Coach House). I am curious about the role interruption plays in the text and poems. I have arrived at the section titled Crash concurrently.
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I have been meaning to read this book for a while, in part I admit because of my interest in road building. So far, for no explicable reason, it feels like the Expressway is in Calgary. That’s where I imagine it. Curiously though, I have never been to Calgary, so have no idea what Calgary looks like. Therefore, the Calgary place I imagine is an invention in response to what I read. As is the it, of the Expressway, which may not be an it at all.
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A headline I caught sight of a few hours ago continues to see-saw in my head.
Jobless Icecream Man was contained in it.
The story went on to describe the individual as an unemployed ice cream delivery man.
The specificity of it. But when I re-examine the headline I wonder what an icecream man is. A man who eats icecreams. A man who is made of icecream. A man who defining characteristic is icecream. It is a loose thread that the reader can lift and weave whichever way this hour, or the next hour their brain may choose.
10.57pm At this moment I see the man walking along Baggot Street 7.30am eating an icecream in the heart of winter. It is snowing.
Tense snowmen
Tenses are keeping me very busy.
I have just invented a new tense called the “every tense”. It’s the Sangria of grammar.
In ongoing facial blindness: I just mistook a line of grown men in white and red gowns and an Abott outside an Abbey, for a long line of snowmen wearing red scarves. I was impressed with the chilly labour until I read the caption underneath and looked again.
I am pleased to announce a massive achievement involving dexterity, shoulders and sweat. I have just made a shoulder-high shelf for three pairs of Wellington boots, who were begging to be housed in a significant position. I have given them an eye line on the world.
Undoubtably the press will be demanding pictures of them, so I must quickly make a cup of tea before the rush begins and tidy myself up to match the boots presentable state and standard.
Today I was perplexed as to why a man abandoning his car on the road in Lancashire, England due to snowfall had any relevance to the 12 noon news on CBC Vancouver.
Again, this weather via transport and only “private” transport qualifies (planes and cars) befuddles me. I wouldn’t mind if there was some pertinence to a shortage of food deliveries or fuel, but no, the news story centred on peoples inability to go shopping in a completely different timezone!
Euro command
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0JeZ4mNPzw8&fs=1&hl=en_US]
Portugal’s Eurovision Song entry 1969. Simone de Oliveira. (complete with green wings)
The sound quality deteriorated by 1971 in this Netherlands example, complete with authentic Euro feedback. Monochrome fashion appreciated. What are those plates behind them? Norway’s entry had a weather theme that year, singer holds an umbrella.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZVgp2Ly6Dg0&fs=1&hl=en_US]
Yesterday VANOC informed us, amongst other guffola, that the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics were the greenest ever. Indeed all that snow that had to be flown in. Judging by the non-stop helicopters circling outside my window — absolutely! They only need a little scoop of margarine to be airborne. Many of us knew of people working on it, thus we’ve no need to fester in these delusions.
Green? Would that be gangrene?
It’s impossible not to notice how all the reportage around the bad weather, currently revisiting the West, North West of Ireland, focuses entirely on roads and cars and travel.
Does nobody in journalism/media/government or wellington boots consider the people who might freeze or suffer circumstances much more inconvenient and detrimental than not being able to get in their car and drive smoothly along the road ?!
There are bound to be many without a water supply for starters. I happen to be acquainted with one!