One thing that I have really noticed from my visits to Glasgow is that the people there root out pretense, and will rip the crap out of it when given the opportunity.
That is one reason that I am always given a reason to smile whenever I've gone by the Wellington Statue in front of the Museum of Modern Art.
The statue has been in the city since 1844, but the traffic cone placement is said to have started in the early 1980's, if not sooner. It's become a rather iconic image of the city and it gives the world a glimpse of the city's humor. It's not a negative image, and far from a depressing one.
Yesterday, the city council tried to obtain funds to make a larger plinth for the statue, that would have made it more difficult to place the cone on the head. The city claims that it costs 100 pounds to take the cones off the head, and that it happens about 100 times a year.
My question why is even do that?
By making it more difficult to put the cone on, you're really encouraging those who put it there. Not the smartest move by the council.
Social media went all a-twitter, the Wellington Cone set up his own account, there were petitions started and #savethecone hashtags spouted up. It reminded me of the Hurricane Bawbag event a couple of years back. Another D.I.Y. and viral protest was happening.
By the end of the day Tuesday, the people had spoken, and they city council plans to withdraw their request to have the plinth raised.
Some mofo cut me off on I-70 as I was going onto to 315 this morning. I had to stop short to avoid hitting the idiot and I got rear ended. My son was in the car too. The back door of the wagon is shot. Bumper is messed up. Again, no one was hurt - and it's why I drive a Volvo. You should see the car that hit me, had to be towed. The Volvo is still drive-able.
Now I'm dealing with the insurance companies and wondering how much I'll be inconvenienced by an idiot who was not paying attention on the highway.
I'm sure there will be more on this later. Got a good poetic rant about it at least.
Again, the important thing is that no one, not my son, me, or the driver of the car that hit me, was hurt.
It was not a teachable moment. Perhaps it was a lesson. At the very least it was a very stern lecture in the form of a rant.
Let it not detract from what was an awesome evening of poetry at Writers' Block's Poetry Slam last night.
Open mic was solid. Patrick did a new poem that had me gasping for air. To heck with zombies, that guy is your Poet Laureate of all things apocalypse.
The slam, which was the final IWPS qualifier, had nine poets competing. I drew second, got on stage and was doing well with a new poem when it happened.
Someone's cell phone went off.
I even asked Rachel, who was hosting, to mention to people to turn their cell phones off. This person was even in the room when she make the announcement.
It was not a short ring either. It was one of those ringtones that never end. It was quite loud, and went two maybe three times for fifteen to twenty seconds. I was told the person just sat there, not realizing that it was, in fact, their phone that had gone off.
Have to admit it messed with my flow. Would have been less distracted if people had thrown some of the tomatoes Joel brought at me.
Managed to finish the piece, and muttered more than a few obscenities as I left the stage. The points do not matter, but I managed to finish sixth in the round.
There was still another round to go and I abandoned what I was going to do in order to use a poem for just this type of occasion.
Earlier this year, I wrote a poem about cell phones going off during poetry readings thanks to being next to one that started blaring Rod Stewart's "Do You Think I'm Sexy" (really, Tyrone? Really?) in the middle of someone's poem.
It's a three minute poem I took most of the end of round one to edit down to two minutes.
I still was not entirely sure whose cell phone had gone off, but once I started reading I found the culprit, and made them cower. Read quite a bit of the piece, looking directly at the evil doer. It's a rather nasty poem, but not one that wishes the person to die in a fire or develop brain tumors.
Poetic revenge? You bet your sweet ass it was. As my wife said, I took slam lemons and made slamonade out of them. Ended up finishing in fifth. Made my point.
It was one of those McLuhan in the movie line moments.
But life is not like this, is it? Simply the right poem at the right time.
At the end of the night the offender reached out and apologized. I accepted, and said to not let it happen again. You know how poets are.
Congratulations to Scott Woods, who won. Rose Smith came in second and Dain Michael Down came in third. A new poet named Gus did very well in his first WB slam. I think he's from the Atlanta slam scene and he's going to college up at Ohio Wesleylan. Hope he comes down frequently.
I'm not entirely sure I'm in next week's Grand Slam but I'm leaning toward yes.
A short rant to start. The Polaris Fashion Place, shopping mall or whatever it calls itself is the most car-centric area in the state of Ohio, perhaps the country. It is also the most convoluted in its design and traffic flow. The roads in and out are inadequate, the parking is not friendly to cars or pedestrians. I wish no harm to the businesses or employees (who must go through Dante's nine circles to commute to work) who work in this location. However, I would like to see them relocated to calmer and more reasonable shopping areas. Then, I would like to see the developers of this monstrosity forced to live in the buildings they created and have a sudden bomb fall on them, turning the place into what City Center is now.
Ok after soup and whisky at Claddagh, also writing here - I feel better.
I've been on a thrift store kick recently. Revamping my trousers due to wear and, full disclosure, a weight gain. I've found an Adidas Columbus Crew sweatshirt for fifty cents and am still searching for the right ironic t-shirt. Today we went to the Goodwill store in Powell, in search of designer cast offs at the right price. I did find a cool shirt, but was so put off by an idiot bluetoother talking to someone like he was on the surface on the moon. After he left there was a father talking to his baby in a carriage as if he was Curly from the Three Stooges. Which would have been fine and cute, if daddy was capable of using an indoor voice. The store is quite small, and everyone in the place was blasted by the baby daddy talk.
The good thing is that I was looking through my Scottish Wife's cds before the mini road trip and found this one.
I had not listened to it yet and a very amused and impressed by what I heard. Melvin by The Belles is worth the price of admission. It's a knockoff of Gloria, and yes, they spell it out!
My Scottish Wife is a music geek who has many, many girl group compilations in her collection. Including this one, which is a sound I've been hearing in my head for years.
In other good news, it was great to get up early today and watch Everton beat up on Manchester United. I went a bit crazy when Rodwell scored the third goal.
Kid's only eighteen and scored his first Premiership goal against Man. U., how awesome is that? Now Sir Gasbag is going to be sniffing at him all summer and offer Moyes all kinds of money for him. Everton creates stars while other teams can only purchase them.
The skies cleared and the weather held up for the poetry slam at the Upper Arlington Arts Festival yesterday.
It was more an exhibition than a competitive slam, there were five of us competing for the honor Gina won last year.
I got there a bit early and walked around. I saw a lot of people holding brooms and remembered that Joanna mentioned seeing them last year. Could not find where they were being sold so I asked at the info tent and was essentially told to look behind me, where a large amount of people had gathered as if they were in line for Jeni's Ice Cream. But, they were watching an Amish man and his family make brooms. I went over, checked the prices and plunked down ten bucks for a broom to the owner who smiled broadly and said thank you.
Got some lemonade and while I was doing that I overheard this snippet of life in America from the couple working the kettle korn station.
She: People really seem to like those brooms.
He: Don't know why, you can get them cheaper at Wal-Mart.
Sure, you can do that, but where is the intrinsic value of seeing the man make your broom, to interact with his family. to eliminate the middle man?
People do not get pure capitalism anymore.
Ended up going second in the slam, did Everywhere at Once and came in second for the round. In round two I did Nobody's Poet, and got another good reaction from the sparse crown under the tent.
Then it was Gina's turn.
She did Obama's Desk, which as you can guess has some political overtones. As she was reading a woman walking by suddenly stopped behind her, then her jaw dropped and the mouth breathing took over. With her gaze locked on Gina she went around the side of the tent to where she could see the poet's face then pointed and started yelling.
We really could not hear what she said, something about Obama not needing a desk because he was on vacation. She never went into the tent or seating area. I was a bit worried that she would approach Gina and try to grab the mic from her, luckily that did not happen. She kept going on incoherently while Gina shot her a look and continued with the poem. I was told the woman tried to get her father's attention while she wandered off, continuing to point at Gina all the while.
I have to say I've been part of poetry events in which people were ticked off by a poem and said something about it. However I have never been part of an event in which a poet was reading in a public setting and a person who was not a part of the audience came in and started protesting. Gina used the Great Wrench of Poetry on the wingnut and brought it to the mic. It was awesome. She pissed off a complete stranger. With a poem.
The final standings were irrelevant after that even though I won, Joanna came in second, Gina third, Rachel fourth and Beverly fifth. We got to see art cause a visceral reaction, and we got to carry on.
And kudos to Louise who was capable and charming as she hosted her first poetry slam.
