North Korea: Longford with nukes?

It's been a while. There was always the danger I'd slip into blog apathy once I found my feet here & dug out a groove in the locality. Better stuff to be at than sitting in front of a computer screen I guess, though in ways perhaps i should've assumed a permanent hermitage. I've been busy. Living y'know. Acquainting self with surrounds. It's been a bit of a mad time of it, if I keep going at this rate I could well be smoking cigars with Kim Jong Un at his inauguration ceremony. Very few things would surprise me. Where to begin. Think structure. Chronology. Or not.

I don't go looking for trouble, but it has an uncanny knack of finding me of its own accord. It's a strange one. Maybe a moral conscience would be a positive thing to acquire. I'll head down to the market and see if I can pick one up on the cheap during the week. Considering the other random stuff they flog down there I assume they'll have an entire street dedicated to all things morality. On the upside, it's been good craic, which is what it's all about. The glint is back in the eye & the bouldness makes me laugh. Better that than leading a quiet life in the country, which has its perks but isn't the natural environment for my penchant for divilment and talking shite. Strange feeling to censor the self, it isn't exactly what i'm noted for traditionally but 'tis as well to do so. A biteen shook today after the antics of last night, a one man crusade to Hongdae that took a turn for the better after starting out meeting 2 of the greatest tossers i've ever had the pleasure of sharing a beer with. I should've known it wasn't gonna' be the best of company once the english bloke announced his dad was from county londonderry. May the fleas of a thousand afghan camels crawl up his arse & procreate. I've always maintained that some of the best people I know are English, but I hold around the same amount of respect for brits as I do for cauliflower. I used them as a catalyst to locate other people and took it from there. Good night by all accounts!

I seem to have a mental block of what happened prior to the weekend, just cause the weekend itself was eventful. it's amazing how much stuff gets packed into the space of a couple of days, especially when ya sleep throughout the day parts. I've always come alive at night but this is especially the case when only waking up around 6pm, not good, best sort that out. Sure it's all the one, what with this new-fangled 'electricity' racket that's all the rage. it's like the day never ends. Times are quiet in the school house, well fairly quiet anyway, aside from the matter of the principle duking off to hospital tomorrow for an operation to attempt to get rid of cancer. it worries me, i like him, the feeling's mutual, he seems to treat me as the son he doesn't have and has helped make the settling in period that much easier by sorting out stuff i've needed sorting. I tend not to pass too much heed to the work itself, it's a job, pays the way etc. When I start living to work, I hope someone will have the good manners to give me a solid beating.

I've been back playing football again and attempting to get fit, between the debauched episodes, which are many and frequent. The two don't mix that well, there's a mind/body conflict ongoing where the body is aggrieved by the mind's penchant for lunacy. Normally after running for 2 hours I feel like someone's ripped out my lungs & fashioned a grill outta' them. Might try behaving myself for a few weeks now, see how that works out, i say that but already the mind is hmmming at it coming to pass. Life finds its own balance, and it happens that the boredom of the working week lends itself nicely to seeking a bit of madness on the weekend. Society has long such functioned in such a manner. perhaps just as well that the weekend is the shorter of the pairing, though a 3:4 ratio would still work better in my mind.

I was tempted to run through a check list of stuff for folk intending on busting a groove out here at some point, have it bearing some resemblance to a travel blog etc, but I can't be arsed. The only thing I would say is that if you find yourself here thinking that you've got a fair idea of the place and its goings on, it may well be a sign that you're developing dementia. Try not to trip over folk sleeping in the street, be polite to the 70 year old women collecting the rubbish at 5am & remember that you'll be dead long enough, live it while it's there to be lived.

I'm aware that at no point have I attempted to answer the question in the title. Sure ya'll have that.

Spoiler alert: general ranting follows.

'To choose doubt as a philosophy of life is akin to choosing immobility as a means of transportation.' - Yann Martel, Life of Pi


I've been thinking of late, as usual, about ideas surrounding the human condition etc. The religion complex, but specifically the idea of the atheist movement. I try not to draw conclusions of any sort as it's like shutting a chapter that will never end, knowledge breeds change. The self-certain atheists piss me off. They roll around in mainstream culture these days throwing out the 'there is no god' lines to all & sundry. The theory goes that the idea of this elusive god creature cannot be proved so is thus bunk. Some scattered ideas about evolution etc, but even allowing for the obvious evolution of all creatures, it still leaves a gaping hole in the argument that remains unanswered by their certainty. I can't stomach the idea that there isn't a greater force at work. Maybe I'm insane, but to me it's as crazy and narrow minded as suggesting that the earth is the only planet where life exists, in a universe of such infinite proportions that we can never wrap our head around its scale, to make such categorical assumptions is showing base level intellect. Not to say that God is some bearded chap or any of that nonsense, to personify the divine is to give a credit to humanity that our history shows is undeserved. I was skulking around the bookshop the other day and couldn't help noticing the shelves dedicated to Richard Dawkins, the prototype atheist for the sensationalist generation. I've read 'The God Delusion', it's cack. The way i see it, it's very easy to disprove the idea of a man made god, y'know the whole man-made construction thing, but if you wanna' see the divine, go find some flowers & wrap your head around the intricacy that it took for them to form. Or better again, go & stand on Slieve League & appreciate man's anonymity in the grand scheme of things. The trouble with religion isn't religion itself, but the usual crux of humanity; the control and manipulation inflicted upon it, man made dogmas that have nothing to do with the bigger picture. I could go on, but already the feeling that it's a rant i shouldn't have embarked on is gnawing somewhere at the ego I'm learning to transcend. Heaven is a state of mind.

So much going on lately without a whole lot going on. A lot of reading, always a good thing. A lot of music listening, though perhaps my relationship with Thom Yorke's genius is bordering on obsessive. It's not my fault. Some bonefide legend has whacked up loads of live gigs online, each better than the next, if music be the food of love then it's the equivalent of all you can eat for months on end. I've started to feel apologetic about how much I love Radiohead, recognizing as y'do that others mightn't share quite the same passion for these matters. Folk I speak to still throw out the allegations of Pink Floyd being a better band. Now that I no longer smoke weed and have the power of a conscious mind at my disposal, I can say with certainty that Floyd have bored me to tears. It's not a popular sentiment, but it's true nonetheless, maybe college overkill back in the day or whatever, but I can barely listen to them anymore. To be honest it was all downhill from when Syd lost the plot. Waters & Gilmore were walking cliches of the prog rock movement. No doubting their abilities etc but yeah, I look back over the years & realise I've either evolved or just changed, hopefully both.

Bumped into some people the other day, y'know it's a good conversation when the 'what's your favourite radiohead album?' question comes up. People working off the same level. Great people, ended up getting fairly drunk with them til 5 or 6 on a schoolnight. I don't work til half 2 anyway so it's all good but just really cool to meet good people. I answered with 'Hail to the Thief', in my mind one of the most under-rated albums of all time. I remember the day it was released, cruising down to Chivago in Galway with all the giddy anticipation of a kid waiting for Santa. It didn't disappoint. it took me a while to grasp the transition that Radiohead made post-Ok Computer, by a while I mean a second, maybe third listen to Kid A, but the evolution of the band is something that I really can't see anywhere else in the industry. People speak about bands like Kings of Leon, Arcade Fire etc as being this great thing and in parts their albums are exceptional for what they are, but they seem stuck in what they're doing, regurgitating the same ol' same ol' that they know people know and love. There's nothing wrong with that, but it's not for me.

Here's what's going on; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-_aijDvN7A&feature=related
Atoms for Peace, some seriously sweet & funky collaborative between Thom, Flea & folk. I'm away into Seoul to hit the market. I heard word that they sell monkeys there, I gotta' see it to believe it, and I've no intention of getting a monkey, unless it comes pre-trained in how to make a decent cuppa' tea, but I have notions about being offered the chance to buy one if I wish, just for the surrealism factor.

Email from Dog to Man

Hey man, how you doin'?

I was chewin' on your shoe 
But gettin' pretty bored
So I thought I'd write to show you
How much that you're adored
I was gonna' use a pen
To be like Beckett, Joyce or Donne
'Til suddenly it struck me
That I don't have any thumbs

I hope it doesn't scare you
That I've taught myself to type
I learnt how to read
Through the blogs people write
Please try to forgive me
If my grammar is shite
But I've no preconceptions
About what's wrong or what's right

See, I've known you a long time; I've analysed you closely
This life that you've been living is a parasitic parody
That feeds upon the blood of self-fulfilling tragedy
Where days & weeks meet months & years with vague familiarity
But never are your boundaries pushed to be the best the self can be.
Don't turn around in years from now and say that you remember me
When all you've ever seen me as is lucid domesticity
And only in your darkest moments looked to find the light in me

Look, I'm not trying to sound harsh, I'm just speaking my mind

I'd be everything you are if i knew how to lie
Your world is my life, man, if you asked me to die
I'd push back my ears and politely comply

But I have watched
And loved
Watched
And hated
Watched
And integrated
Hate with love as easily as
Innocence is obliterated
I have heard you screaming out the names
Whose overdose in pleasure brought you pain

And I have listened

As patiently as the wives of war
Victims pacing hospital corridors
Listened
To the horrors
That man
Brings upon
Man

Yet still you rather the cat
'Cause he looks after himself
Steals ham from the table
And cheese off the shelf
There's no co-dependence
It's each to their own
If your world fell apart
He'd just lick his own hole

I just think you should know
He's been plottin’ your death
Ever since that last ill-fated
Trip to the vet
Though looks are deceiving
He's completely insane
He's got no sense of reason
And he's numbered your days

But you see, sometimes, I wish I could talk
Or bring you for a walk
On a lead so you could see how it feels
To be me
'Cause if I could talk I too would blame astrology
Or clinical psychology, religious ideologies
Or pharmaceutical dichotomies
For everything that's wrong with me
When in reality
I am an animal
Who was born and who will die
Happy in the knowledge that I have lived and loved my time

So if you get this
And I hope that you do
I just want you to know
That, well, I'm sorry about your shoe
But don't be worried about me
There's no need to reply
Just talk a bit louder
I'll be here by your side.

The Harvest

My paradigm has shifted
From left to centre
Entered dimensions where the
false pretensions of time and space
have vanished without trace-


Where the words flow
Like the blood in the hands to the fingertips
To the tips of the pen
& then, my thoughts skip
to the sands of the flood
Where the low birds skim the burst banks
Hunting for worms on the fertile plains
Fronting concerns that are all in vain-


I
Am a germ
A particle wave
A slave to the continuity
Of consciousness
A fly
To the light at night.


I will dance with you
When the sun sets over Eden
Even if it is in silence
but for the rhythm of our breathing.


*


We can be the forgotten
sentences of punch-drunk
innocence.


The empty matter
of energy's resonance.


The cosmic cavalcade
Of synapses; collapses;
Co-incidents


Entering reality
As choice; finding god
in silence


When our plate is full

There will be no hunger.

sm '10

Here's a piece I felt the need to throw out there, some class of flippancy or other, there's a lot of really strong points to this, even though I've probably failed to get them across in the words of the piece itself, something in my head tells me that this is along the right track of what I should be writing. The structure is fragmented. Deliberately so, I'm sick of structural limits. Sick of a linear narrative that needs to tell the story like it's a picture book for kids. Y'know each to their own but it's not me, and as such, given that not-meity, I don't care. Follow your own path etc. i care for people, respect people, love people and everything else that goes with the human condition, but the last thing I ever intend on doing is to follow another's interests as a result of respecting them. if anything it's psychological plagiarism.

The idea centres around the quest to end dualism. A search for the unity/divine whatever one may call it. I've felt it before, the next time I experience it I feel I'll be in a more mature place to appreciate it.