Which reminds me of ME

The following quiz, most of you avid Alexander Narkiewicz fans out there will have already taken - so don't feel the need to take it again unless you, like me, feel that your life situation has changed and that your outlook and possibly the more maleable aspects of your personality may also have changed.

Basically, the result below indicates to me that I may have become lazier, more obstinate and more content to be wrapped up in my own artistic affairs than in helping the world to turn. Actually, I was Fig before so the being wrapped up in my own artistic affairs might be the only bit that hasn't changed. But I've definitely become more arrogant and lazy.Bring it on!

Oh well, at least this quiz actually vaguely meant something to me. I'm sod all like Superman. Seriously, I think it's like The Young Ones - every person I knew at university, every guy at least, could be seperated into one of the four character groups - though some fit better than others. Here's my vague stab at that:

Vyvyan - Tom, Baz, Ralf, Steve

Rick - Paul, Adam, Alex

Neil - Sam, Andy

Mike - Ben, Martin

Means nothing to you, Vienna? Try it with your own friends!

Then tell them all to take my quiz because it's still the best quiz on the internet and I want it to get up to the 500 mark.

I'm off to an agency. Or at least to write a haiku.

Which demon are you?

You are most like Thub. You are a lazy so and so but not a ne'er do well as such, just the sort of person who complains about the smallest tasks and prefers their own company and the four walls of their own domain to any silly adventures. You are artistically gifted but don't brag about it or shove it in people's faces. People don't notice it at first but you are actually extremely physically beautiful. You are grumpy and emotionally shallow and you have a knack of getting your own way by sheer obstinance and feigned idiocy. However you usually have a dumb smile for those around you, even if you aren't exactly pleased to see them.
Take this quiz!

Grab Code

I did this personality test to help me find out what sort of job I should get and

You are Superman

Superman 75% Supergirl 75% Spider-Man 70% Hulk 70% Iron Man 70% Wonder Woman 60% Robin 60% The Flash 60% Catwoman 55% Green Lantern 50% Batman 40%

You are mild-mannered, good, strong and you love to help others. it didn't help at all.

My first Akira The Don gig and other stories by Alexander Narkiewicz

What passes for noteworthy

"Mate, what's the worst thing that could happen to you right now?" said Ben.

"AIDS," I replied, because I'm that fast.

Ben had an armful of Gin & Tonics from the uberexpensive Madame JoJo's bar and was looking gorgeous in his new black collared coat with anchors on the buttons if you look closely. Onstage Akira The Don - who is still, perhaps even more that ever, the brother I know and love in this incarnation - was about half way through Hypocrite. Paul and Ralf were up on the sofa looking poker-faced and Rachel and Jo and her boyfriend Graham were digging the vibes or whatever it is people do at gigs when they're not exactly dancing but not exactly standing still and aren't on drugs either. Somewhere in the corner that incredibly hot girl from the NME was sitting next to the photographer dude who might be her boyfriend, but what does it matter anyway because I wasn't going to talk to her because I really couldn't be bothered.

"No, mate," said Ben, "I just forgot your pin number four times and I think they've cancelled your card."

This shone a new light on proceedings. But of course, it wasn't for me to complain about this (not to say I didn't complain - of course I complained) because it meant Ben had bought these four gin and tonics as well as the last four, which spoke of unbridled generosity in a place as bewilderingly pricey as Madame JoJos, where I had paid a quid earlier for a couple of clicks of hairspray and the right to wash my hands without feeling incredibly guilty. The fact that my pin number only had two digits in it and one of them only appeared once and they were arranged in what I thought was an entirely memorable formation is neither here nor there, or indeed a solitary fact. Obviously this was my fault - never send Ben to do Alex's job. It was my round after all and I had been unashamedly taking advantage of Ben's good nature by encouraging him to go to the bar for me, even though I could have gone perfectly well myself, and Hypocrite is my least favourite Akira The Don song on the new album (not that I dislike it, but everybody has a least favourite amongst other people's babies).

Other notable facts

Support act 1:
3/5
"Pretty good rap bloke I feel unqualified to review properly."

Support act 2:
1/5
"The Cat Empire off drugs / King Prawn in rehab: Whatever."

Akira The Don:
4/5
"Performed with more coherency and as much enthusiasm as expected."

That homeless guy called Steve who didn't really help us find Trash but tried anyway:
4/5
"Very pleasant chap. Felt bad I only had 80p left."

Trash (club):
3/5
"Sweaty, expensive, full of people who wished they were me."

Damien(Adam's friend)'s imparted wisdom concerning the possibility of maintaining platonic friendships with females (spoken shortly after bemoaning the shallowness of London people):
2/5
"'Bang her tits off, or someone else will' - bizarre advice."

Luke's Jacket that everyone says he looks like a Nazi in:
5/5
"There's only one thing worse than being talked about: AIDS."

A story

Man walks into a bank, says:

"'Mate, what's the worst thing that could happen to you right now?' said Ben."

Five minutes later, after not batting an eyelid, the bank guy's all like, "Yeah, mate, your card still works. There's totally nothing wrong with it.

Man walks into a supermarket - buys a sandwich.

~insert laughter here~

The punchline

Am I postmodern yet? Oh, please say I am. I've been wearing fake fur for days.

Epilogue

Tomorrow I will go to an agency and look for work as a writer. Wait, that was the punchline. I knew I'd have trouble with the ordering if I didn't number these chapters...

I have had thoughts, I have had feelings, and sometimes I have confused the two

Pimlico or Victoria (depending on your point of view) is a hive/dam/lair of activity this morning as I sit at Ralf's computer and listen to my ballboy podcasts. They are very nice.

I thought I may as well give you a brief yet comprehensive (we'll see how that works out) overview of my London adventures so far. As the people who own the Oystercards know exactly where I've been you may as well know too. Maybe you can trace my journey on this map, maybe you can't.

Thursday

You know about that already, right? Stepney Green, Marek Narkiewicz, massive ham sandwich, King's Cross, Scala, Amon Amarth, canner beer.

Friday

You know about that already, right? Planned visit to docklands abandoned due to confusion about zone 2/3 boundaries, New Cross tube, walked to Deptford and bought a belt because my trousers were falling down. Walked to Canada Water and Southwark Park and jumped on a bus full of school kids until eventually I was asked to leave the bus by a helpful Bulgarian (yes, I can identify any race of person at the blink of an eye). This brought me to Russell Square, near Holborne - inadvertently landing me in the centre of the publishing industry (or something), Bloomsbury.

I got a coffee, which the pigeons tried to share, and called Ben in his office in Soho.

I went to see Ben and chatted with his boss, who's name I forget, (or forgot, depending on your sense of timing), about copywriting work. I may be working with graphic designer Luke (of Cornwall fame) on a web-site about wine. I can't tell you any more than that now because of how commendably brief an overview of my London visit this is.

I met Paul at Victoria. Don't ever meet anyone at Victoria. We drank in a Sam Smith's pub - technically, on the pavement outside it - with Paul's friend Ross who was also visiting, and the world turned, and the world turned.

We ate at Nandos, which is a chicken-based restaurant and Daniel bought me dinner cos I'm poor - isn't that great? He's just like what the government SHOULD be. At some point I updated my blog, which I shouldn't do when I'm drunk (or possibly, ever).

Saturday

We lazed around in their Pimlico/Victoria flat for a bit and got breakfast in a Polish diner. At least I think that's what it was. Late afternoon took us to Covent Garden (not literally, of course - that was a train) and I found that the West Cornwall Pasty place there is as good as Paul Davies said it was and that street entertainment is bearable when it's happening to other people who are some distance away. I think I would happily have married about three of the barmaids at the drop of a hat if perchance they needed a way of gaining citizenship, which they might have done for all I know.

It's lucky I don't believe in coincidences, otherwise I might not have been surprised to see Tom Harper who I lived with at university in the exact same pub in London. It was good to see Tom.

A side-note on coincidences - I personally consider such occurrences are nothing more than mathematical improbabilities which happen according to rules governed by mathematical probabilities - i.e. I haven't met Tom in every other pub I've been in for 2 years, so the fact that I met him in the Covent Garden Pasty Whatsit IS a surprise (because you never expect the unexpected no matter how many times you're warned) but is NOT a coincidence, because in some ways (and I am not talking about destiny or anything like that) it was bound to happen. Surely if you believe in the notion of coincidence you are never surprised? Actually, I rarely am... hang on...

A side-note on missing people - I recall a conversation with Oliver Sutherland in Cornwall not long ago where I think I was claiming I never missed people and he was annoyed/perplexed by that. I ended up conceding that I do think of absent friends in a fond and nostalgic way and sometimes wish they were no longer absent - Oliver informed me that this is what is known as 'missing people' - maybe I suffer from a similar inability to cope with 'coincidence'? Which reminds me of

A side-note on selfishness/egocentrism - I also recall really upsetting my then best friend at sixth form by maintaining that, if he died, any possible sadness I might suffer would be purely selfish and that this fact meant I didn't care about him at all. Again, with hindsight, I think this illustrates perfectly my ability to think something into being / to be a pedantic arse-hole. I really should get a job as a sub-editor (insert my grammar/punctuation mistakes here).

I did write a poem about this when I was approaching my 21st birthday but I can't remember it all cos it's huge. Suffice to say it's probably the best poem I or anybody else have or has ever written.

Oh yeah, then I went to Brixton with Ralf to go to Jo's birthday party where I spent a lot of money in a crap cocktail bar and didn't really talk to many people. John Widdop of Cardiff fame was there, though, so it was worth it. At some point I vacated to find Ben who I had hilariously misdirected and I ran into 3 scally 14 year olds and had a bit of a chat with them. I found myself a lot more interested in/by them than most of the friends of friends in the bar who at least half of (here's a fun game - guess which half you're in!?) would fall under the 'posh wanker' category in my species identification terminology book (forthcoming? No). Possibly the same category I was put in by said 14 year old scallies.

Anyway, we went back to Jo's eventually and people started throwing wine up walls and ashing on carpets and, in the worst cases, just having really rubbish faces, so she had to ask (almost) everyone to leave her own party - which was hilarious and definitely something I'd pay to see again. After we'd rid ourselves of these superficial, immature individuals we stuffed pillows up our tops and played a kind of sumo-wrestling/dancing game and drew fake moustaches on ourselves.

Alex, Ben, Millhouse, being deep, thoughtful and mature

Sunday

Back to Victoria and then up to Old Street, which remains my least favourite tube station. We went to a fine pub on the border of Shoreditch (possibly in a rogue borough of only 124 inhabitants whose culture is strikingly different to those around them) then Ralf bought me dinner in an American diner. I should probably be honest at this point and say that nothing about the rest of the day was noteworthy - even AS noteworthy as the previously noted irrelevancies. I don't know? How does one control quality control? Gordon MacIntyre (ballboy) says "quality control is a bad thing". So, actual cabbage posing as wax cabbage, anyone? Description of typical Shoreditch pub anyone? Report of Phil Ogley's new website, complete with dueling banjo's soundtrack, anyone?

Well what DO you want then?

I could have been out doing interesting and noteworthy things while I've been spewing all this garbage for the sake of posterity. Sod it, what must I do to get your attention? Start a fight with the Turkish bloke over the road? Go on a date with a minor celebrity from the BBC news team? Get mugged?

Comprehensive? Not at all. Brief? No!

Maybe I'll just go and look for some novelty postcards.

Coming soon: Akira the Don, gig review!

etc.

P.S. Due to a lack of commitment on both of our parts I will no longer be sending turkey sandwiches to people who are kind enough to point out my typos. If they are particularly funny, (not the sandwiches, obviously), assume they were deliberate and/or send them to Private Eye.

P.P.S. This does not necessarily mean that I won't be pointing out typos in other people's blogs. God I'm great.

P.P.P.S. In the words of Paul Simon, I'm going to Duckland. It's like Docklands but... well, work it out.

Krobb = Erator:

Krog:

I will not be allowed A full update because Ralf and Daniel are watching over me. They will veto my less gay remarks. Never mind. I have been in London for Roughly 156474958668 seconds. It has been Ave. 54.21. Remeber you can not get pregnant from kissing.

Deptford is marginally less romantic than one would assume from Mouse-related novels. I will not go into too much detail about the stargate I encountered at Stepney(?) green(?) when on my way to see marek - basically the police asked me:

1) Do you have anything you shouldn't have?

- No - I don't think so

2) What is your name?

- Alex

3) What is your last name?

- Narkiewicz

4) How many Gorillas died to make your coat?

- 0

etc.

Similar things occurred throughout my trips







DESPITe


I DID see AMON AMARTH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

what?

With M.A.N.

and...

If ever I saw AN man enjoy his/her(his)


job:

then it was:

JOHAN (INSERT NAME OF SINGER OF amonamarthhere).com

due
to
lack
of
solitude
I
shalt
not
further
comment
here
now
right?
KROK
XXXX

Emotion pulls you like a horse-drawn cart

Having finally reached the coveted 200 (and five) page mark in my novel (a.k.a. 77k words) I feel the need to take a 'working holiday'.

It's all going well; people have started dying, I've got to grips with my voice - it sounds deeper than it really is to me, just like in real life - and I've circled a bunch of agents in my new copy of The Writers' and Artists' yearbook.

Given that none of you bastards out there want to give me a job, one of you will have to publish my book, even if I have to kill/marry you.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

With the above in mind I am heading off to London tomorrow to begin my 'working holiday' which will involve looking for a job - usually whilst drunk, sometimes whilst at gigs/parties - in London, which is, I'm told, like a cigar - big and smoky.

What London has offered me in the past has been little more than
a) scallies stealing my fags,
b) people leaving me in strage rooms at crap parties, and
c) other (possibly the same) people encouraging me to spend vast wads of cash on travelling short distances which are easily navigable if one possesses a map.

As a precautionary precaution I will be
a) taking a map with me,
b) taking no fags with me, and
c) going to no crap parties (unless Jo's party is crap - in which case I will stay out of any strange rooms she may be harbouring). Not necessarily in that order.

While in London, I will be watching
a) Amon Amarth (you must have seen this by now),
b) Akira the Don (yes, my brother, ditto this), and most of all,
c) my pockets.

The working holiday should end on approx. December the 3rd, by which time I will have come back home via Falmouth, and possibly Exeter, and will certainly have none of my dole money left.

I should, if all goes to plan, be sleeping on no less than 6 people's floors and, if I continue in this manner, be splitting most of my sentences - either by commas, parenthases or dashes - into at least three parts.

By the time this is done I will probably look something like the above.

I think you will find the correct pronunciation is "scone"

Explorers of the New Century
by Magnus Mills
4/5

There is such a wonderful absurtity in reading a number of characters with names and staple quirks so interchangeably quaint arguing over the pronunciation of a word that appears (obviously) identical to the reader no matter which of them is saying it. There's nothing like a joke that only works in print.

Such is the manner of Mills' writing (for those of you, my luscious readers who are not familliar with it,) that he consistently manages to entertain with the mundane; with characters even less three-dimensional than real people: with banalities rarely seen since Robinson Crusoe's infamous chapter 'We make another canoe' passing for plot points: with narratives that appear at a glance to have no real reason for their beginning or end points.

In Explorers..., we follow two teams of Victorianesque gung-ho blokes through their tribulations and neuroses (in the non-Victorian sense) as they travel through a landscape which seems entirely familliar, until we realise we've no idea at all where they are. Or indeed where they're from, either. Our expectations are often thwarted with Mills' novels and this is no exception. Reading through the reviews of this book from when it came out last year I was initially surprised to find people complaining about its twists, (as though this habit of Mills' is a bad thing); some said that 2/3rds of the way through the book it loses all its subtlety and ceases to be bitingly satirical or cuttingly allegorical and all that shite. Whatever. No it doesn't. What Explorers... does do is to reinforce (pretty majorly) how perception (in all human experience, not only reading) is everything, and how what is not mentioned is often more powerful and significant than what is mentioned.

Should we really celebrate this though? Apparently it took James Joyce 7 million years to write Ulysses and if civiliZation quit and burnt down tomorrow - one copy of Ulysses and some pixie dust would be enough to rebuild it all brick-for-brick. It's entirely possible that Mills wrote this book between the afternoon and evening showings of Neighbours on the same day last year. Yet oddly, both authors share the same knack for dark, subtle humour and humanistic tenderness. Whether or not Mills knew where he was going when he started this novel (he probably did) and whether or not he got bored 2/3rds of the way through and went off on one (he probably didn't) are irrelevant to me: this book's great. Read it. Oh, and to clarify, that's an order, not a statement about the past.

It says nothing to me about my life

Hostel - directed by Eli Roth
1/5
Or rather, not directed by Quentin Tarantino. Eyebrows aside, the biggest question raised by this film is 'Why did Tarantino allow his name to be plastered all over it like a big, fuck-off, red sticker saying 40% more blood for your money'?

Story
Not really, no. Two American personality-bypass patients are backpacking round Europe, and contrary to what is deserved by anyone who ever does that as a verb, are not both killed.

Oh, and they have a friend, whose Icelandic nationality is uncharacterised and unexplored, which shows nothing if not how difficult it is to stereotype an Icelandic person; his entire character is contained within his self-applied nickname 'king of the swing' which makes him 400% more interesting than the two main characters.

Well okay there is at least a premise, if not a plot as such; the two Johnny wankers from wherever-US want to pork someone who doesn't have an American accent (like most people who have ears) so they believe this Dutch fuck who tells them to go to Slovakia. They go there and take a fuck of a long time not to all die.

Upshot
Basically there's loads of breasts on show and some bloodletting, all of which is/are fine but none of which is fresh and/or original. The only palpable development of anything is that we find out people would pay to be violent, which is no surprise given that the cast of the film is entirely human (what, no talking bats?).

Ultimately, this is to a point, a scene-for-scene rip-off of EuroTrip (post Amsterdam) with the comedy dregs siphoned out, the scenes unravelled to the point of veritable unsnappiness, yet still left devoid of tension.

Apparently the film explores the ignorance of the American internationalist outlook. No, actually it just caricatures eastern (central) Europe and the horror genre itself in a vague and clumsy manner, leaving Americans looking just as vacuous and self-righteous as they usually are. The only saving grace is a couple of brushes with some nasty street 'children' (of the/a/some corn, most likely).

Fact
It was filmed in the Czech Republic not Slovakia.

It cost over 4 million dollars to make.

During a gratuitous bonking scene they play 'Willow's song' from The Wicker Man - misguidedly reminding you how dull the film you are watching is.

There's going to be a sequel. Avoid this shite like if you were riding a bike.


Kidulthood - directed by Menhaj Huda
4/5

Story
Some girl hangs herself, possibly because she's sick of listening to The Streets, or possibly because of something else, thus altruistically bestowing upon her scally peer group a day off. So they go about the usually business of prostitution, drug trafficking, mugging, humping and pondering the eternal question of 'to abort or not to abort'.

Upshot
Emotionally hard-hitting from scene one, (I think, I can't actually remember the very first scene but I'm pretty sure that...) this is a film that pulls no punches in its gritty depiction of urban

Only joking! Or am I? No. Whatever, it's only if you really dissect it that this film seems in any way simplistic or contrived or hackneyed (with a small 'h') or insubstantial. Ultimately, the experience of watching it is that you don't feel the need to step back at any point because the characters are intriguing enough and the pace quick enough to polly-fill the gaps like the chewing gum that holds together the paving stones of Asphodel.

Yes. Is it better than Kids, though? I don't know, I can't remember Kids that well. Shit, my train of thought has been derailed by an unfortunate incident involving Katie Melua covering a The Cure song.

Basically it was good; comic and tragic enough to completely engulf one's brain for an hour and a half, which is what we ask for. I'd like to see it on stage, possibly as a musical, possibly written by Plan B, possibly by Andrew Lloyd Webber. I look forward to more of Noel Clarke's writings.


Fact
It's English.

It cost less than the above film. Even though I have no proof.

If you give a shit about things like Torchwood - Noel Clarke is in and helped write that too.

Un-embalming of the ould inhabitants of the lonely throne of Thrake, part five: rotten bandages fall like apple blossom from your flaking corpse

So what's going on in your life?

Really?

Lame.

Anyway, as to me, I'm going to see the JobcentrePLUS(tm) tomorrow to tell them I applied for 2 jobs which I probably won't get and I'm going to see my Dad for a day or so - and to look for jobs too otherwise it'll count as a holiday.

I am listening to 3 Nick Cave albums in one go. (Henry's Dream, Let Love in, Murder Ballads).

Last night I stayed up until 4 playing Civilization 4. The treacherous Spaniards and weasely Aztecs crushed my once great empire. And all I wanted was peace, was that too much to ask?

Millions of you have been clamouring to read my new My Chemical Romance album review, so, begrudgingly, here it is: Here it is.

It's almost as good as John Widdop's.

Last week I wrote a poem about a dog but as everyone (both people) who reads(-s) this blog moan about that sort of thing you'll all have to wait until my book gets published. Now you know how I feel!

How does Alex feel?
	Empowered
	Embittered
	Employed
	Embedded
	Emperoric
	Emmental
	All of the above
	None of the below
Free polls from Pollhost.com

Correct guesses win prizes, as always.

Pax.

Beholding the might

In an unashamed rip-off of Paul, (and because I have nothing to say, like ever other bastard with the internet,) I have decided to make Friday music video day, starting today, Thursday.