Snapshot: Wanton vandalism…

Official statement: I can only say that I am shocked, appalled and disappointed with the purile, immature and depraved activities of certain anonymous friends of mine, who take pleasure in destroying the purity of freshly fallen snow. Residents of this street must have been quite confused as well… because that doesn’t look anything like a certain famous soul singer…

He was not wrong…

Five or ten minutes after we had placed our order, the proprietor of the Mont Royal Binerie brought Ulli and me our heaving plates of breakfast, and then returned a few minutes later with two small side dishes. These he had filled with beans from a dish kept piping hot behind the counter. He put them down and slipped from French into English (perhaps to make absolutely sure we appreciated the gravity of his words) to say “And here are the best beans in the world.” He was not wrong.

Last night was Montréal’s annual Nuit Blanche, during which art galleries, cinemas, and public events were open all night long. Ulli, Mélisse, Laura and I caught a few exhibitions early on before retiring to the plateau for a birthday party with friends. In a fit of purile and immature selfishness, I made a good attempt at polishing off a case of twelve beers all on my own. I regret to confess that this was possibly brought about by a sensation of anguish at having paid for the entire case, and then not wanting to share them. So, my apologies are due to everyone who was at the party last night for my selfishness, and to my liver for the stupidity.

Ulli rang me at about midday to invite me to breakfast. I had been woken much much much earlier by the cats, who were perhaps meewing loudly because of the strange post-boozing parps that were disturbing the Sunday morning peace from under my duvet. Or perhaps they were just having difficulty beathing. Initially I turned down Ulli’s invitation, although this foolishness only presided for about three minutes.

It is a sad truth that alcohol will not, despite many claimes to the contrary, take the pain away. It will simply defer it to the next morning. Once it’s returned, the only way to deal with it is to have a big breakfast. So I rang back and said I’d be there in fifteen minutes.

The Mont Royal Binerie is on avenue du Mont Royal Est, just west of St. Denis. It is not a presuming little café: just an honest functional diner with a long counter and a few small tables at the back. Like all good diners, there was a cup of hot coffee in front of me before I’d even had a chance to look at the menu. Ulli arrived and we ordered a number two from the breakfast menu. Mélisse showed up a little later, having had a similar pair of phone calls with Ulli just after me. After initially turning down the idea of breakfast, it took only a few minutes for her to change her mind as well. The vast quantities of salt, sugar, saturated fats and caffeine were soon coarsing through our veins. It was a very good feeling.

You can barely see the mend…

I remember now why I have always bought laptops instead of desktop computers. It’s Saturday afternoon, and I’m lying on my bed with Caca and Toast purring beside me. It pains me to suggest that I have favourites, but this week Toast has been the light of my life and the warmth in my bed. She usually comes up to nuzzle, snif and lick my face just before I turn the lights out at night, and then curls up in the folds of the duvet beside me, close enough for me to tickle and stroke her tummy until I fall asleep.

Last night Ryan and Jonathan made tacos, and they were very good (the tacos that is, although Ryan and Johnathan were well behaved in case you were afraid they might have been turning into scoundrels). We talked about this and that, including getting shoes and jackets repaired. I mentioned having to leave my winter coat in at a little seamstress and dry cleaning place on Mont Royal. The flap of the left hand pocket had torn along the seam… it wasn’t a vital repair but it was exposing the nice downy insides of my coat, and would get worse every time I thrust my hands in my pockets. As you can imagine, one thrust ones hands into ones pockets a lot in Montréal in the winter.

Ryan reminded me of an interesting observation. In this consumerist throw-away society, the cost of most goods and products has now fallen (and the prevalence of designed-obsalesence has at the same time risen) to the point that some people will buy a $50 pair of shoes, and then just throw them away when part of them tears or falls apart. But as Ryan put it “I only paid $50 for them, so I can pay $15 for a repair and I’m still paying less than I might have done on a more expensive pair…” Why don’t more people think like that, instead of just tossing aside something that was badly made to begin with?

My jacket has, incidentally, been repaired superbly, and it cost me $13. Money well spent.

Snapshot James & Ulli at Café Utopik

Posing for Mélisse with camomile tea and wine we found on the table…

It’s not cold, but I am…

On our stereo tonight was a string of albums by Belle and Sebastian. Why? Because after work today I managed to buy two of the last four tickets for their show in Montréal on Sunday night, neatly side stepping the eee-jit on craigslist who said they’d sold out and that he would sell his to the highest bidder (I believed him and bid over $50 … thankfully the venue still had ‘em at $36 hehehe…)

I first heard Belle and Sebastian’s music towards the end of 1996, when I arrived at Winchester College. The Art School, where I am inclined to believe I spent most of my happiest moments at the school, was fitted with a rather basic sound system - namely a hi-fi with a very long cable between the two speakers. If I recall correctly (although it could be the other way round) the left speaker was in the wing of the building with the printing workshop and the right speaker was across the bridge in the other wing, in the painting studio. Tracks recorded in stereo were a problem, since depending on which half of the building you were in, you would only get half the lyrics or music.

Through this selective filter, I managed to listen to a badly copied cassette tape of Belle and Sebastian’s second album If You’re Feeling Sinister. The size of the cassette collection in the art school was limited, so I heard it a lot, and like virtually every other GCSE and A-level art student at Winchester College, I formed a very strong emotional tie with B+S. The band’s history includes this opening paragraph:

“Belle and Sebastian were formed in an all-night café in Glasgow, January 1996. Stuart Murdoch (singer/songwriter) and Stuart David (bass guitar) met on a government-training scheme and recorded some demos, which were picked up by a Jeepster scout who was taking part in the Stow College Music Business Course. The course, run by ex-Associate Alan Rankine, produces and releases one record every year on the college label Electric Honey Records, usually a single. However in the case of Belle and Sebastian they had enough songs to record a whole album, and so the elusive Tigermilk was born. Recorded in three days and one thousand copies released on vinyl only, it now changes hands for up to £400 per copy.”

So I’ve listened to B+S for almost ten years. Through thick and thin, their music has stuck with me, and many tracks carry many memories that were not included in the original packaging. Thinking about it, I don’t think I have such a connection with any other artist or group, not even the delicious Beth Orton (who, incidentally, we’re seeing here in April). So Sunday will be a fun night, and a toast will be made with an overpriced plastic cup of warm beer to Arthur Morgan. If you know who he is, you’ll understand why.