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31 Jul 2006: Bi For Now



Bi-monthly. With all of my writing energies being devoted to the crafting of fiction, the time has come to shake it up baby. From this moment henceforth, the Home site will be updated on a bi-monthly basis. The number of visitors to this site has declined and there seems less reason to keep this going on such a regular basis, especially since I returned from Japan. If, of course, you're a regular lurker to this site and you feel that you are unable to reduce your dose of Joel the G to every 60 days, then let me know. Because, damn you, if I don't get a mail saying "I luv u site, v funny ha ha" then I think I don't have an audience except for the search engines and the image ripping sites.

In the last few weeks I've e-bumped into Japan friends more times than I can count (this is because I cannot count higher than the number two). David Crouch finally got round to dropping me a line after telling me he would give me a call tomorrow seven years ago. Punit Mittal dropped a line to indicate that he's moving on from BGI and I was also aghast to discover that the fellow has got himself a website.

Ken Momma, who used to be part of Wilco Tokyo, can be seen in this picture as the guy who is just sticking his head out, fifth face from the left. Anyway, I got an internal instant message from him in JPMC. Apparently he works there now. Small freakin' world is the financial goldfish bowl.

Oh by the way, we're off to Italy at the end of August. Expect some pictures in September.

Movie Corner

Now Brick is an odd film. Full of speedy, specialised dialogue that is difficult to understand and marred with slightly clunky pacing, it does possess a whole lot of weird. I liked it a lot. Some of the scenes were very cool, sharp and effective. You've not seen a film like it. Surprised no-one has mentioned the bird motif in the film; am I the only one who noticed that?

Also went to the Barbican Centre to watch a Japanese film from the 1970s called Ai no Borei, which is given the English title of Empire of Passion (this is not a translation; the Japanese name sounds like Ghost of Love). This is also an odd film, which is a mix of a love affair and a ghost story. It's chock full of sex scenes. But Joel likes oddness and it has it in spades. The director, Nagisa Oshima, went on to direct the well-known Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence.

Thumbs up for the Barbican Centre. Cheap tickets. Comfortable venue. No adverts. Sit down, the film starts. Coooool!

Hammerport Corner

The senator’s wife smiled at the advisor to put him at ease, which did nothing but put him at unease. He had often thought of the senator and his wife as escaped mental patients, detached from reality and joyful in the bliss of the fall, the roaring wind in their hair, the ground looming. The wife leaned forward and said, “We’re the ones who called you here for this conversation. Don’t you know why you’re here? My husband has told you that you are a good man. Don’t you know why you are here?”

The story of Paragon's Prologue continues. I also entered a non-Hammerport short story called How Not to Write into an online competition, but I didn't win. No big deal. Humourous sci-fi short Weldon was also thrown into a blog carnival on the same site.

Bonus Pictures

A sliver of pictures on the Japanese web log.