RANDOM ECHOES 10/10/05

Countdown - day 4 (four days to go)

12 hours solid driving on the road, coincidentally commemorating the publication of Ginsberg's Howl somewhere near Aylesbury (on the radio an article states that perhaps a new Beat Generation is called for in the current world climate, an artistic renaissance of dissent, but I believe it will never be allowed to happen because artists are no longer encouraged to define themselves as outsiders, as observers and commentators, challenging the status quo, instead they are accumulated and assimilated through offers of celebrity, made safer that way) - being chased by demon adminstrators and puckering landlords - ascending the Wolds into the low cloud moisture and fog, screaming rain all the way back into London only to turn around and repeat it all again the next day - though the autumn sun accompanies us this time, a car full of plants and shrubs and CDs and shoes and boots - and presents for neices who shine with beauty and joy and lighten the travelling load for an hour or two - then descending Fish Hill with the Vale of Evesham lying out there beyond, vast - after the car has reached her destination and is left there now until we return, the typically English phenomena of works on the railway line puts us out onto a bus route in the middle of the Black Country for Sunday evening, past Longbridge ghost factory, past Bourneville and Cadbury World, in the shadow of strange chrome pyramids which may or may not be connecting the Illuminati so they can keep an eye; scoffing tomatoes and sucking limes to cleanse the pallate, on the back seat - unemployed ghouls and bike riding joy riders standing around in car parks and street corners - my eyes fill up with groggy sleep and now permanently red-rimmed, I get dizzy spells and that odd floating feeling on terra firma when my balance system kids itself its still in the car driving, carrying that motion on - at one point I am told I've turned grey, blending in with the facia of the bus - singing songs from 'Oh What A Lovely War' and discussing pantomime dames - what works and what doesn't when a man gets up in drag?