Autumn Beauty

I drive through town from my new home to work on the other side of town.

Mornings are cool and beautiful, air is crisp and Soundset Plavi radio show hosts are making me laugh out loud in my car as I travel to work. I make my rounds, talk and pack and ship and negotiate and I leave for home tired and smiling.

I pick up my offspringess from school and she says: "Home, sweet home." as we enter our flat.

I cook dinner and she tells me about her day. We analyze and we plan ahead. We receive guests and play with friends. Often we share dinner with loved ones and we whine and motivate and preach.

In the evening we watch Star Trek or Mythbusters or Bleach or Lie to me or Life and we talk as I knit.

Later still I carry offspringess from my bed to hers and enjoy streching out some.

I hope I will never ever forget how I missed these simple pleasures of life.

Japandroids @Purgeraj 08Sep2012

I took some time off here, at the end of summer, and I was on vacation last two weeks after working the summer away. In this time information bombshell fell at the office and I was called home for consult on something every #*%$#* day... So opportunity for some R&R presented itself in a form of Japandroids concert that was announced at new Zagreb venue, NKC Park, and I went there to check up the place and soak up some noisy emotion-provoking goodness.

As is happens, my camera-phone fell into tub of water earlier that day and I was so pleased it was still working after some drying and tinkering with I naturally assumed it would serve me well at concert site...

... but it was so hot there, at small hall in Purgeraj, that the remaining water in the phone condensed on inner side of the lens and all my Be Forest pictures turned out like this.

Soft-edged, dreamy, retro-feel grainy. I love them. Just as I instantly loved Be Forest and their somnambulate, nostalgic sound of times passed, evocative and sweet, sensual yet performed by people so young and fairly attractive it was a paradox in itself to let oneself enjoy it fully. And I loooved them.

I mingled a bit and poked my nose around the venue and I enjoyed the company of friends as crowd gathered for the main event. Concert was sold out which did not surprise me but I was a bit surprised by multitude of people and compactness of space at Purgeraj. Small hall was jam-packed with people and it was difficult to see and difficult to breathe for me as I am not much of a people's person and I like my personal space unpopulated with people I'm not intimate with - so I squirmed out of the concert hall and back into the bar and there I noticed, with no small surprise and happiness, that there are screens in the bar space and in the outer terrace space showing camera feed from the stage!!!

I have heard and read oodles of silly remarks during past few days on how "this is not the same as watching the concert from first rows" and that "you can watch the concert like that from the comfort of your own living room" but I say: "Don't be daft!".

If I had wanted to watch the concert from first row I would get there in time to experience it like that. If I had wanted to press against people in the hot oven I'd do just that. In addition, you are forgeting that there are people that do not feel the inclination to jump into mosh pit but they still like being out with their friends that do. There are people that are just very short, or maybe disabled - having medical conditions like MS or are in a wheelchair that would very much appreciate having such a great opportunity to watch the show from few meters away but still to be sheltered and have full comfort of motion.

So I poked around some more and I mingled and I spoke with super-friendly bartenders and waiters and drank blueberry juice from ice-packed glasses with lovely giant straws and I still enjoyed the show very much. I had unparallel opportunity to observe friends and acquintances engulfed in wild extasy of singalongs, stagedivers, unknown secret lovers AND I still had enough time and space to take some more awful pictures of stars of the evening with my dried-out phone. Japandroids made for a great, energy-filled flying carpet of happiness and their showmanship and communication with the audience, both before and during the show was endearing.

This was one great night out, rapturous and multilayered, remedial for body and soul.

Plum Strudel

I somehow find myself in the habit of making desserts on Sunday mornings that later on in the day travel with me to various social gatherings. I like this state of affairs because I love baking but I hate throwing food and I don't eat that many sweets that this would fare well if I baked just for us at home. As an added bonus I get lots of practice in this craft and that is what I love the most.

So today I opened the fridge and there were some perfectly ripe plums waiting for me there.

I cleaned the plums (there was about 300 g pitted plums), diced them and added a pinch of salt, two tbsp vanilla sugar, 4 tbsp fine crushed oat flakes and 1 tsp cinnamon. I mixed it all together and set aside.

I rolled out three sheets of store-bought filo pastry, brushed them with 1 tsp olive oil each and sprinkled them with 1 tbsp water each and then rolled one third of prepared plum filling in each sheet and arranged them into lightly oiled ovenproof glass dish.

It looked like this before baking:

And then I put it into preheated oven on 180°C for 20 minutes and 5 minutes more I turned on the oven fan so it will get more golden on top (total 25 minutes with fan, I suspect it would be about 30 minutes total without fan) and now it looks like this:

When it was out of the oven I sprayed it with a little more water and wrapped it tightly in aluminum foil so the steam from the plums will soften the strudel.

At noon it will travel with me to friend's place for lunch and I plan to serve it plain, dusted with some confectioners sugar, but it would also go well with scoop of vanilla ice cream per portion.

Have a lovely Sunday!

Praying Mantis

In my new home I especially like the fact that I can sleep and sit by opened window and that there is so much nature and so many interesting creatures so close by.

Few days ago we had a visitor; wonderful, 15 cm long (plus tentacles) praying mantis in prime condition, green and well hydrated, bright-eyed and responsive. I took lots of pictures and have looked her over well without damaging her and in the end I have showed her out.

She flew magnificently and watching her fly I remembered when I first played Fallout 2. There were swarms of mantis there in the beggining of the game, when I was still weak and my weapons pitiful. It is nice to have so precise memories even though it took an arm and a leg to force myself to store data differently, so not to succumb to rosy retrospection. I still remember silent despair and constant re-loading. Sense of urgency with heartbeat drumbeats in my ears.

Sometimes I wake up in the dark of night and wish for magical simplicity of resolving issues with spiked knuckles or pickpocketed porn magazine. In the morning wishes wane and all that is left is sweet soothing warmth of intimately knowing one's self.

Parenthood

In the eve before Assumption day mother calls and asks if I will join them for lunch tomorrow ("as you are spending far too much time alone in that apartment"). I say I will think about it and we say our goodbyes.

I bring a cake.

We set the table together, I cut tomatoes as she puts down plates and father finishes mashed potatoes. Everything smells great and is piping hot. We sit down to eat.

During soup I make my announcement:

"In this time since we last saw each other I managed to get back together with I."

Father smirks happily into his plate, knowing that only I will notice his grin.

Mother puts down the spoon, lets out giant sigh of relief and says:

"I'm glad."

Usually, she knows better than to ask anything personal about my life. In usual circumstances I would never have her appraise my business. It's always just sour grapes with her. But this is important to me and I do not want silences, omissions and lies cloud how much this is important to me. So I volunteer the information.

But her reaction surprises and startles me:

"What do you mean: "I'm glad."?!

"I'm glad. I don't like you being alone. It is nice to have someone to talk to and share your life with."

"You're a real parent.", I say, half in wonder; moved and surprised.

She says: "I am. I want you to be happy."

We continue to eat in silence, munchin' away happily from our plates.

Argies @KSET 01Aug2012

I went to see Argies play at KSET on Wednesday. I did not listen to them before but I was intrigued with the description of their music as "combat street rock" and I did my homework going through their stuff on youtube and investigating online so I was prepared. I also wanted to get a taste of what Monteparadisians were gonna get this year, to satiate my newly discovered desire to plan endeavor of going to a festival next year.

When I came to KSET, around nine-ish, an hour later than KSET homepage prophesied for door to be open (to my wild disbelief), club was still not open, and after it opened there was not any live music until about hour and 20 later. I see the wisdom (or should I say profit) in getting the people clubbed and spending money hours before gig they paid to see but it ticks me off beastly nevertheless. Oh well, cest la vie. Very hot vie also, because KSET was melting down from accumulated heat, and no cold beverage in the world could put a dent on that heat.

First I got to see No More Idols...

... and they were very, very dissapointed by low turnout but once they started to play they were great. Added bonus was that familiar crowd made NMI play very playfully and unrestricted, like they were alone, somewhere on a practice session, communicating with friends. I felt bad at one point not being so familiar with the scene as blondie there (far left on the photo there) sang one song with NMI and I could not place him. Blondie surely belongs to another band becouse he without doubt has mad performing skillz and I'm sure this will all be revealed in due time.

40-ish minutes later, Argies climbed the stage - and they were a different class altogether.

They started with a few chords from London Calling, just to get our attention and they continued on to play fiery mix of their own songs and covers - I forgot half of them but I remember we heard Nicaragua Sandinista, I fought the law, La Bamba, Psychokiller, Guantanemera. They were beautifully set up and I can't remember I ever heard drums in KSET being set up so explosive and loud but it worked wonderfully, not overpowering other instruments and giving whole performance one nice old-school big-space sound.

One other thing I noticed is how they are very clean, exquisitely well prepared warderobe-wise (wearing clothes that look great on stage and also can go through all daily errands including travel and high-end dinners), sensibly chosen shoes and it all looked deliberate and planned ahead. I liked that very much as I keep good dress code and travel-packing at very high regard. Last but not least, their bass player is so damn hot he deserves richly to be spoken of separately from on-stage performance.

I also decided to include one more photo, 'cause Argies were such good sports and they let the stage to be overtaken by home team a bit more:

We all had a good laugh and it was great, great night out.

Green Bean Stew

Green beans are in season and I'm enjoying the fact I can now make light and quick stews having new place with great kitchen and all. This is one incredibly simple yet satisfying dish and I'm posting this quick recipe here to remember to use it many, many more times.

Serves 3-4:

small pack of fresh green beans (cca 300 grams)
1 onion, roughly chopped
2 large carrots, cleaned and cut to smaller chunks
2 potatoes, diced
1 tsp ground sweet paprika
1 tsp salt
pinch black pepper
small sausages, frankfurters or wieners

Fry onion in small skillet on medium temperature until it is translucent, add paprika and stir until it is nice and fragnant. Add carrots and green beans and enough water to cover. Cook half-covered on medium flame for 10 minues. Add diced potatoes. Turn heat on low, add salt and cook for 10 minutes. Add sausages of your choice (whole or cut into smaller chunks) and cook for 10 minutes more. Taste. Adjust seasonings. This quick stew tastes great both hot and cooled down (if chosen sausages aren't too fatty) , keeps well in the fridge for two-three days.

Meszecsinka @Močvara 27Jul2012

Začarana Močvara (Enchanted Swamp) is low-key project of Močvara club and it hosts world music or indie  bands with artsy proclivity. Friday night we had an oportunity to see three bands - number that I usually consider too big for a live show but it turns out the program was well pieced together.

First ones on were Amarchord, if I understand correctly promo materials for the evening, project that only got together after they were invited to perform at this show. Their singer is magnifficent rubenesque creature of unearthly, etheric beauty and even greater voice and for the next show I'd put spotlight more on her than current  band lead. I hope he was just very very nervous and that he really is not a person that always divulges point of a joke before telling the joke itself. Musically they werent bad but I think they should strive for a bit more coherent act.

Second act was a surprise to me and I was so taken with auditory affluence of their voices I got goose bumps all over.

Trio Vuge are singing fairies, part of Etno Udruge Vuge (Ethno Association Vuge) and they sing, sometimes accompanied by old instruments music, bunch of beautiful traditional songs from Croatia, Macedonia, Kosovo, Romania,... They were dressed up and adorned by flower garlands and they sang wonderfully. I did not understand half of what they were singing about but I immensely enjoyed their playful voices - cornucopia of sound - spilling over audience, makin' us forget all except the music. Fairies, I tell you! Wonderful stuff!

And then there were Meszecsinka - stars of the evening...

... band from Hungary consisting of three middleaged guys and very sensual girl singer. They played bunch of Balcan-sounding ethno songs and many Spanish ones. You can sample their work on their bandcamp (link above) or soundcloud pages - they do not offer same selection of songs. They played fine and had good connection with people but what I liked the most in their act (beside Annamaria's wonderfuly skittish voice) is their body language: very relaxed, joyful, at ease and notably gender-defined. Annamaria is so abundantly feminine and guys so masculine and protective that it oozes from ther act and makes this one extra-special crossover experience. It's a bit sad they are visiting here in the height of summer, when it is too moist and too hot for meaningful loving because this would make glorious first date, one after which everyone would most certanly get lucky.

I love how live music experiences never are just music.

Graf Orlock @Attack! 25Jul2012

Last night's Graf Orlock gig at Attack! made stunning entrance into top 5 of my favorite concerts of all time.

Allthough it started over an hour after announced time it was well worth the wait. Guys from the band were talkative and friendly, they set up stage in front of the stage close to an audience and they were so well played in and rehearsed it was raptutous to watch them play. Sound was set up loud, real loud, and there were few objectioners in the audience but in my opinion it was not over the top. Also, albeit loud, sound was crystalline clear - ringing clear - with a warm ting that was very distinctive and pleasurable to listen to.

Cinematic grindcore sounded like an interesting concept while I was browsing through their work on Last.fm and I am very pleased I went to see and hear that because I feel that Graf Orlock have successfully wed two of my great loves - punk and movies. I especially liked the fact that there were no visual cues to this parade. As opposed to recent Meniscus gig in same venue, which had a lot of visual material to accompany the music making it a crossover experience modality-wise, this gig and its auditory directiveness was refreshing and vivacious, grabbing attention from the very start and making this experience intense and personal. In fact, it was so personal that I stood there grinning and taking pictures and tapping and hopping and enjoying the moment so much it resembled the  experience of "being churched" (you can read about that on this great Virtual Church of The Blind Chihuahua: What is Church, Anyway? page or if in need of more scientific explanation here are some notes on limbic resonance).

Which brings me to next logical point - Why do I go to "real" punk concerts anyway? I do not listen to that much grindcore or hardcore or any kind of punk exclusively. I dabble in indie and enjoy piano driven Japanese nu-jazz  post-rock. WTF?

Well, no indie Japanese post-jazz gives me the feeling of joie de vivre and absolute invigor'ation punk gives. When I stand there and listen to punk musicians, as good as those four were last night, play, my consciousness is wiped clean of everything except pure joy. All I feel is happiness, destructive wonderful happiness, sexually arousing exculpating happiness, violent and deafening happiness pure as the blood that runs through all our veins. No white, black or yellow, no straight or queer, no vegan or kosher, no inprisoned or free. It does not cross boundaries, it negates them. There is no "do". Only "be".

It is such a wonderful and liberating feeling, hologramic, wholesome,.. like being a cell and Consciousness Embodied simultaneously.

Here you can sample some of Graf Orlock work and by all means do support artists by buying their stuff.

The Descendants (2011)

Picture/Poster property of Fox Searchlight 2011.

I watched The Descendants yesterday.

I liked it.

It takes a  few minutes, especially during his voice-over beginning of the movie, for me to overcome waiting to see if this is going to be another one of George Clooney's beauty movies. In this movie his beauty does not carry the plot. I kinda like that kind of movies because he really is beautiful and it seems to me that because he has been like that for such a long, long time he somehow looks "more natural" in roles powered by his charm and good looks. But this is not that kind of movie.

The Descendants is real life drama. I have not seen real drama, good drama, made for a longest time. Filmmakers somehow went overboard with dramas lately, traversing hyperrealism and serving us with unnecessary private details without any meaning, l'art pour l'art-isticly and stupidly treading across any real emotion that could come out of movie experience for a viewer. But this movie is not like that.

The story keeps description to a minimum - sharing only details that life would serve us in a similar situation. Feelings are shown as they are; discreet, muffled, difficult to understand from both ends - to a protagonist and spectator both. There are no tractates on both sides of a story just fragments of truths, half-truths and blatant lies. To watch it gives an impression of watching real life play out in front of you.

George Clooney's acting is exquisite. He actually makes us believe this could be his life. "...backup parent.  The understudy." he says in one voice-over and it FEELS GENUINE. Fervor in his realestate lawyer worktasks, silent despair in parenting tasks, anger smothered by decades of good manners - all this becomes him so oddly yet it rings so true. "Paradise can go fuck itself." resonates with living loss.

Shailene Woodley and Amara Miller both did a great job in their roles, more so by being so similar in their demeanor, expressiveness and non-verbal mood indicators as to make beliavable King family; sanguine yet composed, emotional yet deliberate - as royal family descendants ought to be.

Lastly, it is a movie of identification and comfort, movie that therapeutically shows us our own flaws and short comings and makes ways of resolving them not merely ostensible but real, true, authentic.