Archive for the ‘'Life Style'’ Category

Pass Cards

Wednesday, May 12th, 2010

12-05-10_1139Of all the things that are better about mac since its rebuild the one I have been enjoying most since we have been here setting up for Tuning Out With Radio Z is the pass cards. No more trudging around for hours looking for duty managers or technicians to come and let you into the theatre. No nagging anxiety that some crucial door will be left unlocked and all your stuff nicked. No complicated negotiations about which member of the company will hold the dressing room key and take it home with them by mistake that night.

The only upgrade from here would be elasticated lanyards guarding against card-swiper’s back.

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Cutting Edge

Monday, April 26th, 2010

My Mimaki

Anyone who suggests the main purpose of Stan’s Cafe is to allow certain boys to play with certain toys is clearly way off the mark. The fact that preparing for Market Steps has required me to spend a day or so with my sleek MacBook hooked up to a beautiful Mimaki CG-60SL vinyl cutter is a matter of complete indifference to me. The magical choreography of rollers spinning back and forth combining with cutting blade flying side to side to create sweeping arcs, snails, birds, butterflies, footprints, handprints and text bubbles has barely registered with me. I wasn’t at all sad when I returned it to its box and waved it (and Graeme) off to Wandsworth to meet up with Simon, the machine’s first true love.

A brief shout out has to go to Craig whose remote telephone troubleshooting prevented me growing irate and hating this selfsame kit.

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And You May Find Yourself

Thursday, April 22nd, 2010

is it windows or mac

And you may find yourself looking at Microsoft Windows XP running on your MacBook
And you may say to yourself “My God, what have I done?”

And what you have probably done is found that the VJ software you need for your new show only runs on Windows XP.
And you have found out that you can now run the two operating systems on one computer.

However, like many things in life:
just because it is possible does not mean that it is not wrong.
Same as it ever was.

James

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Posted in 'Life Style', Tuning Out With Radio Z | 1 Comment »

Loving the Burdock Root.

Monday, March 8th, 2010

Site visits are useful in many ways. On Tuesday we were able to meet all the key people at the Satagya Public Theatre and from the municipality (you may find this more helpful) who will be promoting Of All The People In All The World In September. We checked the gallery, talked through logistics and visited the venue for workshops. I also learnt to be careful when attempting to be humorous.

On the way to a restaurant our hosts were fretting about how Charlotte’s vegetarian diet would be catered for. They asked if she liked burdock root, obviously she’s never tried it in her life, so naturally I jumped in “Oh yes! Charlotte loves burdock root, she’s always eating it, you can’t move in the Stan’s Cafe office for burdock root”. Which doesn’t sound funny in the re-telling and was taken in full earnestness by our wonderful hosts. Charlotte was left fielding eager questions about which is her favourite cooking method.

For the record burdock root is delicious, as is lotus root, fermented bean curd and bitter cucumber; all four kinds of sea-weed we had; and grilled, smoked and raw fish.

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Extra Luxury

Sunday, January 24th, 2010

Some of you may have thought this impossible, but for our revered patrons luxury has been cranked up a further notch @ A E Harris. Further cast-off sofas have arrived. I recommend coming to try them out at the British Dance Edition in a couple of weeks time.

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Jagermeister: Christmas Eve

Sunday, December 27th, 2009

jagermeister
Christmas Eve ran into Christmas Day with nostalgic retelling of old touring stories, prompted by Nick Walker’s very excellent retro-journaling. A range of exotic spirits were summoned to sustain the atmosphere of conviviality and a further design classic was revealed amongst them.

Jägermeister, for various reasons, including being German, was deemed the most Christmassy Drink. The bottle is a great and distinctive shape obviously but the label is even better – that ridiculously Gothic script and at terrifying pagan/orthodox stag crucifix device – what a winner.

I’m not so sure about Jägermeister cocktail promotions on the reverse though. Surely the stuff has to be drunk without augmentation or dilution.

James

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Rooibos Tea – The End Begins.

Wednesday, December 23rd, 2009

Tick Tock Tea

I’ve become a convert to rooibos tea. It is clearly the beginning of the end for Stan’s Cafe, the decline and fall has started. I only confess to this rooibos buiness in the knowledge that Stan, who would be apoplectic at the news, will never make it on-line.

The conversion has been a while coming. The seed was sown a couple of years ago, reading Simon Barnes’ book The Meaning of Sport. Early on (pg 47) there is a passage in which he describes how he nests in a cell like room overlooking the Athens Olympic complex, ready to cover the games as chief sports writer for The Times. This passage described a fantasy for me in many ways, but oddly the sentence that stuck with me was: “I had brought a small immersion heater, a mug and a box of rooibos teabags”. Suddenly rooibos tea took on a new status. This man has to write text under considerable pressure at inhumane times of the day/night, if this crazy tea works for him, hell, maybe it could work for me as well.

Of course the final commitment was made much easier on discovering that one of my long standing favourite pieces of commercial design is for a brand of rooibos tea. Now, in the words of Yo Gabba Gabba: “I’ve tried it and I like it”.

James

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Party.

Saturday, December 12th, 2009

3am is probably an acceptable time to wind up a Christmas Party. I finally managed to clear the dance floor for good with a triple whammy of:
Jah Wobble To Crotan
Pharoh Saunders The Creator Has A Master Plan
and Wim Mertens Whisper Me
There was a good turn out. Most people seemed to enjoy themselves. I’m sorry that there are, as yet, no photos of the Extreme Bouncy Castle action (amazingly there are also no injuries to report).

Plus Happy Birthday to Jack AND Graeme.

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The New Faces of Fierce

Monday, November 9th, 2009

Laura and Harun have just moved to Birmingham as the new faces of Fierce. This afternoon I introduced them to the endearing idiosyncrasies of Angels Cafe on Warstone Lane which I am slightly devoted to and they introduced me to their current thinking on what Fierce may be like under their guidance.

Obviously it’s early days and their plans are still forming, but it was exciting to hear their fresh thinking. Their outsider’s perspective helped me see bits of Birmingham’s arts scene afresh. I was pitching them the idea of doing some gigs as The Commentators in partnership and they were clearly keen to find out who’s who and what’s what around the city.

Now seems like a good time for people wanting to collaborate with Fierce to get over to their Office and introduce themselves. The slate is clean, get scribbling.

James

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Hubris Free Zone

Friday, September 18th, 2009

A few weeks ago I appeared in the Birmingham Post’s Power 50 billed as “the 39th most influential person in the City” (or similar). Two days ago Friends of the Earth emailed to ask if, as the 39th most influential person in the City, I could set an example on 22nd September by cycling to work, I said I already did. Yesterday a schoolboy shouted “retard!” at me as I pedaled past. There’s no place for hubris in Birmingham.

James

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