:: 'Ice Ice Baby' In a Red T-Shirt ::

Busy, busy, busy... Although I got to work earlier than yesterday (i.e. on time), this morning was still a little frenetic. I've begun to realise that I'm crap at dealing with the clocks going forward. The alarm goes off at 7:00 BST and my body just complains that it's too early and that I should stay in bed a few minutes longer; when I next look at the clock it's 7:45 and I should have had a shower already, ready to leave at 8:00. This situation is not improved by the fact that I have programmed my cd player to serenade me approximately 5 minutes after the alarm with Boards of Canada's finest. Sadly this has the effect of making me want to remain drifting in and out of consciousness for hours. For anyone who may be interested, this marvellous album is called Hi Scores and is the first one they ever did (in 1996). It was re-pressed only a couple of months ago, and appears to have sold out already. Now I'll just have to gloat - it looks like this and you can't have it:

Might just have to revert to the tactics of my college days when I used to have the Radio 1 Breakfast Show to wake me up. the sound of then presenter Zoë Ball's voice was usually irritating enough to get me scurrying from my bed.

Enough of this ill-minded gloaterie and on with the write up from last night's bAsTaRd... After a fruitless search for a decent Arabic-English dictionary (don't ask), Tigger and I got ripped off in Bar Chocolate, a formerly noteworthy Soho haunt where we expected to pick up a decent bite to eat. No such luck - the "large bowl of tuna salad" turned up in a small pudding basin and couldn't fail to disappoint, despite being quite tasty. Disgruntled, Tigger suddenly remembered the bargain sarnie joint she went to last month, just round the corner from the Asylum (bAsTaRd venue), where rolls are half-price after 6. So we headed there then back to the club where the Cartel were setting up.

The evening could be summarised in the following terms:
Music - excellent
Entertainment - uproarious
Prospects - good to middling
Results - negligible

I should start by saying that last month's bAsTaRd was a gross disappointment, because the guest DJ (Si Begg, if you must know) didn't play the right kind of music - despite his reputation as a "living legend". It was all too techno and hi-NRG influenced for my liking and on no occasion did he play a record sampling any of the following: Rhinestone Cowboy, Michael Jackson's 80s hits, Hip-Hop in any form, current pop dirges... you get the picture. He didn't, frankly, and was faced by a motionless crowd who stared blankly in hope of a whiff of Vanilla Ice.
Last night was an enormous improvement, mainly due to the presence of McSleazy, whose carefully crafted tracks have become some of the trademarks of the bootleg sound (along with London's very own Osymyso and antipodean track-splice wizard Dsico).
Also in attendence (and painfully absent last month), were the lovely Barba Rei, a pair of performance artistes extraordinaire. Previous happenings have included a raffle (for charity shop tat), "medical treatments" (surgical masks all round), "criminal investigations" (mug-shots, hair nets and badges revealing criminal records) as well as the infamous bread-throwing incident when a projectile loaf-end knocked the needle off a record and killed the music. These antics lived up to their predecessors as a large cardboard ship called "The Dolphin" was marched in and posters started to go up, advertising the vacancies of Polish Waitress and Chef. Warnings about not vomiting into the wind and not eating the mussel kebab were posted by the ship. The assembled throng was then dressed in a series of chef's hats and aprons, waitress pinnies and lifejackets and the dancing recommenced.
Now we get to the interesting bit. Tigger and I have had mixed luck with the love-interest at bAsTaRd outings. This was no exception: with a discernable lack of talent early on, the arrival of a glut of fit boys (and the generosity of gin measures) made us dash for the "dance-floor" (previous visitors to the Asylum will know what an oxymoron this is). And suddenly it became apparent that one of Tigger's prospects (from Christmas and other more recent outings) had reappeared, with that rancid heffalump-whore who always seems to cling to him like a rash. He seemed happy enough to dance with us, but his clinger-on's behavious became increasingly wearing (culminating in a failed piggy-back attempt). However, one of his friends was a quite diminutive guy in a red t-shirt, not unattractive who was also rather a good dancer. The revelation came when the music turned, as it should on these occasions to a certain Vanilla Ice. The boy in red knew all the words to Ice Ice Baby. It would be unfair to say that i was smitten. I couldn't even be sure of his sexual predilection (Tigger was sure he liked me, whereas I know from bitter experience that gay boys and rap (ha!) music usually don't mix). But with a quick bat of the eyelids and the immortal words, "If there was a problem, Yo! I'll solve it / Check out the hook while my DJ revolves it", I knew that something was going on.
The sad truth is that we left 10 minutes later hardly, stopping to say goodbye - and certainly phone-numberless. With the pressures of work today etc, bedtime loomed and at only 11:30 Tigger and I went our separate ways, unfulfilled. We'll just have to hope that next month our beaux will again be shaking their booties to the bootleg sounds at the Asylum. I'd better get down that gym after all...

And finally... my favourite b3ta post of the last 24 hours or so: