Computer Frustration

Exeter Arts and Culture Channel Launched

Princesshay Urban Camping

I've spent the last few days camping - for money - in the new Princesshay development. A guy called Guy from Taunton payed me £350 to keepa place inthe queue for him. One of many bizzare jobs I have done.

The photo is me with Terry Griffin, the notorious Express and echo letter writer.

I am playing a gig at the surreal salon tonight, which will eventually be posted on my exeter arts and culture streaming tv channel:

http://www.kyte.tv/exeter_arts_and_culture

Thinking about ageing...

Sat in the Angel, oposite Exeter Central Station, looking at patterns in the walls, a strange parrot-headed man being bitten by innumerable eels. Just listened to "Aqualung" by Jethro Tull.

Animation and Short Film Screenings

So, I am back in Exeter, staying with friends while I decide the next step forward. I have some work this week acting as a technician for an animation workshop for a couple of days in Newton Abbot, and the usual Mac fixing stuff. Must remember to put in my applications for the Phoenix Media Bursaries. Some of the short films were excellent, others could be improved slightly, particularly the sound quality and balance.

Glad to be back in familiar places and familiar faces.

Another ringtone..

This one is of Diggnation's Alex Albrecht saying "I'd take it up the ass", it'll be interesting to see if anyone downloads it,well it's free anyway! so get it below:

Money for Nothing?

Well, not really. I have just signed up to Blogvertise, and hopefully it is a way of increasing my online income as well as selling affirmation ringtones and linking video clips from revver etc.

Blogvertise seems to be the only site doing this and all you need is a blog, a paypal account, and the skills necessary to link to a third-party website three times in a 60 - 100 word posting. How difficult can that be? as someone really interested in how online marketing works (see the link above to Directory of Light, my online marketing consultancy for artists) I am keen to see how much income can be generated by blogging about peoples websites, although I guess the trick is to increase the ranking of the site on google etc by creating a network of blogs which link to the site. I pretty much recommend this kind of idea to my online marketing customers, but now that I know about the existence of Blogvertise I'll recommend their services to all the artists and musicians that I work with.


Be good if my combined online income generates enough income for a reasonable standard of living! I guess this is also a form of creativity, if somewhat enslaved to Mammon, but then isn't all creativity for profit similarly enslaved? I know that with my biomusic and other creative works which I have submitted to the internet archive under a creative commons licence I am free of the yoke of creating something saleable, I could just do whatever i wished. However I have made no income from those creative activities, and man cannot live by creative commons licences alone!


Click Here to Advertise on My Blog

Breda not Brenda

Well,

I started to walk from Amsterdam towards Utrecht, heading for the Amsterdam-Rhine Canal, and got fairly lost. One woman I asked for directions simply said "Save yourself, the wind is coming!"I had no idea what she was on about until later in the day. I finally found the right canal, with the help of the nice receptionist at a tulip hotel near Weeps (probably spelled that wrong). I then asked a youth-on-a-bike if indeed you could get to Utrecht along the canal; his answer was "No, it ends at Abercoude" He was right, but he could have mentioned that going the other way I could've got to Utrecht.


Convinced that I knew better than him, I pressed on to Abercoude, getting incredibly wet and nearly blown over in the worst weather ever in Dutch living history. At Abercoude I decided to get a train. So I bought a ticket to Utrecht and went to the platform. Two trains came and the returned the way they had come. Asking if they were going to Utrecht the only answer I recieved was "They are going nowhere". After a while the platform was deserted except for myself and one other gent. I asked him when the next train to Utrecht would be and he answered "Maybe tomorrow, because of the weather". His name was William, a lawyer working in Abercoude. We had a good chat about public transport, football and the care of the homeless and mentally ill in our respective countries.After about two hours I went into the village for a much needed coffee and to change into dry clothes. The roads were clogged with traffic and pedestrians as people tried to make thier way home. The motorway was flooded so everyone was taking the back roads.


On my return the station was mostly empty, a few people still loitering at the enterance waiting for someone to give them a lift.I recieved a text from Em, a couchsurfing friend I had arranged to spend a night with, saying that the Red Cross were helping people at train stations. Sadly, this was not the case at Abercoude, a small rural railway staion scheduled for demolition as soon as the new station nearby was completed.


On the platform I rejoined William and we joined in word-for-word with the station announcements "Dammen and Herren...by order of the police all train services have been cancelled across the country. The situation will not change in the hours that follow"


After a while Williams wife called him and he arranged a lift for us to Utrecht. His friends arrived at about 9pm, and using Sat Nav took us on a guided tour of every small village between Abercoude and Utrecht, as the motorway was still flooded.They generously gave me food and coffee, and drove for over an hour to Em and Paulus's place in Utrecht.There I was made welcome, despite Paulus and Em both needing to be at work for 6am the following day.

The next morning I spent lazing around with one of their cats Peter, and listening to the sounds of nature outside. I also finished reading Kurt Vonnegut's Jailbird, an interesting take on Capitalism.

My kind hosts agreed to let me stay another day and also provided me with internet access, maps, advice and food.

The next morning I set out for Gorichem.Despite good directions I got a bit lost, and with bad weather closing in I spent the night in a very windy bus stop in Meerkerk. The dawn came, and aching from sleeping in such cramped,cold and wet conditions i began to walk again towards Gorichem.

South of Arkel was a small Protestant chapel. I could hear the service taking place inside, and managed to locate a tap to refill my water bottle, which I had finished early the night before.My feet felt full of blisters as i stumbled the last four km into Gorinchem. I was desperate to find some food, but everywhere was closed, as it was Sunday. After wandering around for a while in a daze I found an internet cafe, checked my email and stocked up on chocolate and crisps for energy.A quick chat to the owner revealed nowhere to stay in town, and with my couchsurfing contact not in touch I decided to get the train to Breda (not Brenda, as I kept calling it).


The Dutch trains were clean, functional and cheap, despite being privatised recently.I hoobled from the station at Breda and into a cheap but elegant hotel, less than 100 yards away, to soak and pop my blisters, handwash pants and socks and watch crap tv from all over europe.