i really havent
i love to walk around and see things and take photos and go online and look at websites and click on links and take screenshots i love to surf and i love to browse
a version of this existed for a few months last year but it was static. it was HTML with writing and pictures and videos and sounds. i had this feeling that the code should be as important as the content, that structurally each piece in relation to each other piece shouldn't change, that the mazelike quality should emerge from me intricately arranging paths through it. like classic hypertext
somewhere between instagram and chatgpt
i got bored though because i knew all of the different arrangements of it. i probably needed to stick at it longer to get it dense enough to feel navigable in a way that was engaging to me
so i or you can author smaller fragments that get arranged
Thank you, Jack
My inability to confront the old racist failed actor is distracting me. I decide not to tell her about it.
A procession forms behind the French Raj and his fireworks bearer as they head out the door. I've lost my Korean colleague / fresh meat in the chaos. I'm sure he'll be able to fend for himself. They have mandatory military service in Korea.
The old failed actor genuinely believed this girl was of a lesser race. He believed she shouldn't be talking with me, shouldn't be here at this party, shouldn't be here in this country. He wanted a white England. I didn't really challenge him on it. Sometimes I justify it with thoughts like I was drunk, or baffled, or it isn't an argument I'll win, or he can't hear me anyway, or whatever. I didn't argue with him. I just cut off his rant and left with a pathetic "In a bit."
As we're stood there I notice a middle-aged woman staring at us across the room. I'm trying to catch her gaze, but its kind of vacant. I guess she sees me looking and considers it to be an invitation. She floats over to us in this strange dazed way, and on the approach I realise she's staring at (through?) my Korean colleague / fresh meat. She's saying wow, wow, wow. She seems genuinely so delighted, so shocked, so elated.
There is a pretty persistent ambient hate in England, a lot of people say vile shit about Muslims or immigrants or whatever, but in my experience most people aren't actual white supremacists. They have a black friend who they get a beer with. One of the good ones. Etc.
Her English is poor but she manages a brief introduction before getting to the point. She asks if she can touch his face. She's already reaching out and gesturing at it. Koreans are way too polite, he's just laughing awkwardly. I put my hand kind of between them and wave it to try and indicate no to her. I'm still in fucking mime mode. I say no, but it's not really to her, or to him, just no, in general. This is all too weird. Dejected, she departs with a comment about having never seen someone like him before.
Maybe, Jack, I'm doing this because I'm English?
And thank you for telling me that the manner in which the narrator consistently fails to act morally is really compelling. Fuck you.
A roll of 50s is one of the items he dumps onto my table during the search. Of course it is. He asks if I'm a delivery boy or a setter or this or that diamond related job. I keep saying no, I'm enjoying hearing all of these new words. Eventually I tell him that I work in film, which is kind of true. He asks where I'm filming. I'm not filming. He tells me that I can't be that good at it then. He then tells me that he made a film once, in the 80s. It was called Pimlico Rats.
Another Frenchman pushes through the crowd to join him. He's an events organiser who I'd met earlier, and he's holding a large box wrapped in a bin bag. They're the fireworks he'd smuggled in from France the night before. They're Industrial Grade, whatever that means for fireworks.
We look out over the river to a block of luxury flats built on the site of some old docks. It would be nice to live right there. Yes. The conversation drifts to the pleasantness of warm lighting and whether anyone needs a smart home. I interrupt her to make a joke about the French Raj as he runs up the causeway. We stand there laughing. The fireworks go off behind him.
Thank you, Jack, for telling me I'm just as bad as the characters (actually they're people, if that means anything to you) that I'm writing about.
i really havent