andcurve.weblog - The weblog of Kevin Teljeur. Somewhere within all the noise, there is a note you need to hear.

A big, very happy twenty-fourth birthday shout out to Aideen (did I spell that right?) who turned twenty-four on Saturday. Aideen is very clever, articulate, can do hand-writing analysis, and can figure out her position in the Zaytoon kebab queue like few other people I’ve randomly come across on a night out. Sadly, although she does read books and has a remarkable grasp of the mechanics of rain creation (What’s that ‘p’ word again?), she doesn’t know much about cloud structures.

I actually can’t remember from where I learnt about cloud types; I know we still have the book, and I would have been about ten or so, but… Ah well. Also, it’s amazing how much you can deduce from people through a few brief moments of contact. I really do need to get out more.

Altostratus. They just don’t make them like they used to.

As Bernard Sumner of New Order might say; “Ooooooh ooooh, I like you, you run away, there’s a wall between us, the sun comes up, people everywhere, Oh, you’ve got hairy legs, you’ve got hairy legs, you’ve got hairyyyyy legs, and I’m too short, oooooh, oooooh, oh! Oh!”, and I think we all know what he meant by that. I’ve been listening far too much to the same 5 songs by New Order recently, but you’d probably guessed that already. It’s been a while since I’ve written anything here and in fact the biggest contributors have been you, the people reading this site. Happily commenting away. You could sign up, and even write posts yourself! Why didn’t you do that? You could have added something meaningful, post some photos, maybe start a small community, or some pod-growing scheme to revitalise the economy of Longford, perhaps. But you didn’t. You waited.

You could have read back over some of the old posts, because I suspect you missed some of the more controversial statements altogether, buried within layers of articulate but verbose ruminations on this idea, that activity, the other place. And you can still go back and check, if you like. Why didn’t you do that? There were some great photos. Comment below, if you can find the controversial statements.

I have a set of notes on what I was going to write about, but… I don’t know where they are. I’ll have to find them. In the meantime, you might enjoy these:
Michael, Liam, Caroline and John just after we arrived at the church for Michelle and George’s wedding. Hellraising joyride against the clock to get there. But we survived. Click image to view larger version
Michelle and George exchange vows and agree to dedicate themselves to each other. This was after a fantastic stand-up routine by the priest, where he told the most inappropriate jokes possible. Comic genius. Click image to view larger version
Michelle and George signing the register, for what must have been the fifth time, for the cameras. That chap does a great wedding, I’ll have to remember him for mine. The priest was good too. Click image to view larger version
John, Caroline, Liam and Michael just after the main show, waiting for something to happen. There were in fact no major dramatics, which was good and yet slightly disappointing. Nicole! Click image to view larger version
Michelle and George, the happy couple, outside and telling everyone how happy they are. They even got the sun, which was an unexpected bonus. Click image to view larger version
The Conway entourage (Michelle’s family) after the main group photo. I have no idea where they were headed to. Click image to view larger version
Michelle and George cutting cake. It took them long enough, with all the theatrics and photography. Click image to view larger version
Michelle and Caroline, with Geesa in the background. Wedding dress aside, it’s just like good old days. Click image to view larger version
James, George and Michelle, wittily entertaining each other after dinner. Click image to view larger version
Me giving the camera-man the finger. I don’t know who the camera-man was, but shortly afterwards the tiredness got me and I went home, via some interesting shenanigans involving taxis. Click image to view larger version

Yes, my friend Michelle finally married George (it was his idea apparently, but I’m not so sure) and it was a great day, not least for them and we were all very, very happy for both of them. No-one hit anyone else, no-one tried to ‘nicole’ the proceedings, and even the weather which was predicted to be brutal, behaved itself when it was required to do so. A good day had by all, and we wish them all the best for the future.

Now, I had a look for my notes while you were marvelling at the wonderfully turgid wedding photos (I’m a turgid photographer, by and large), but I’ve lost them along with my driving licence so not only do you not get to read the great things which I had sketched out laboriously one morning while feeling particularly bitter about the way my life is going at the moment (in a nutshell, professionally things are great; I’m at the top of my game there. But personally it’s starting to become a bit of a shambles, and I’m considering pharmacutical assistance to get that extra eighth day out of the week), I also can’t drive in the car I don’t own. The purchase of a car is planned, because now I have enough money to buy anything I damn well want, but if the licence really is gone then I’m sort of fucked on that front too. Since I’m working up to ten or twelve hours a day I’m not really thinking about anything else these days.

It’s not looking good. Other people keep it together under far tougher circumstances, and I’m really just being weak and self-indulgent here; take a look at what’s happening in Lebanon for example. One day you’re minding your own business, the next day the shitheads next door come over and try to wipe you off the face of the Earth. If you’re passing an Isreali embassy any time soon, throw stones at it. You’d have been right to do it to German embassies in the 1940′s and Isreal is cut from the same cloth (it’s not even ironic). One of these days that state will get what’s coming to it, and I will shed no tears for it’s supporters.

So I’ll keep looking for those notes, and then I’ll get the 60 or so turgid photos I have here on my hard drive up as a post. If I have time. I don’t have much of that any more. I’m going to get back on the cross now, and get back down later when there’s more to say.

(Edit 3rd August ’06: You’re in trouble now, whoever you are. I have the bitter notes. And the turgid photos. The all-whinging, all-moaning spectacular is in production right now. Corrected some bad grammar too.)

Yes, it is true. Like the tide inevitably rolling in and dumping used tampons on the beach, I became a year older today. I am thirty three today. It’s ridiculous, isn’t it? I can’t possibly be that old. This means I am in my mid-thirties, I’m starting to weigh up my pension options, buy sweaters and generally hang around the house with DIY tools looking for something to fix. Because then I won’t have to change the nappies on my fourth and most recent offspring.

Some interesting arbitrary and disturbingly vague statistics: The vast majority of this year’s well-wishers were (as usual) women – utilising that vaunted multi-tasking ability to simultaneously remember 358 birthdays while failing to buy the correct type of lightbulb – and I’m not sure if I should include Neil in that – at least a third were Romanian, a lot of them were Jennifer (spread over several days, at that, though she got it right eventually) and it all involved a lot of beer. Which actually isn’t a statistic at all, but it was certainly true.

More on this when I get my head around it. Right now though, age has caught up with me, and I need another nap.

La Multi Ani!

Happy New Year! Best wishes for 2006 to all my readers and everyone else generally, I hope you achieve your desires for the year and that you have good health and happiness. That title is ‘Happy New Year’ (or something equivalent) in Romanian. Yes, last year’s phrase was in Czech and this year’s is Romanian, so who knows what next year’s will be. That is one thing I’ve already decided this year, which is that next year I’ll celebrate New Year’s in a country I haven’t been to yet. You heard it here first (unless I drunkenly blurted it out to you last night).

I spent New Year’s with Vlad and Diana and several of their friends (Aude, Bonsa and Alina, with our genial, camper-than-Liberace host ‘Cusin’ and his housemate), and it was a good night. Certainly a change from last year’s well intended but ultimately traumatic snot-fest in the darkest reaches of the Czech Republic, in a willage somewhere with Pavel, Tanya and some friends of Pavel’s. I had a bad cold which was just that night reaching a crescendo of personal humiliation, but luckily it didn’t set a trend for the year. Actually, I tell a lie because a few weeks later I got a moderately serious infection, which convinced me of the security of fulltime employment.

I stayed in Vlad and Diana’s place, which was very entertaining the day after.

I promised a round-up of 2005, a set of photos and I also want to use this blog to do my annual ‘mission statement‘ (sort of a collection of life-improvement resolutions, which I usually package with some sort of catchy and dynamic-sounding phrase. It’s personal marketing.), but it can wait a day I suspect. It’s nothing urgent.

Well, I better not be a complete scrooge, and do the right thing:

Merry Christmas everyone!

*sigh* Hope you all got something you wanted. I know I will. A few days of peace and quiet, and a few minutes to reflect. Have good holidays.