I heart Indo

I





Time Out London says...

This narrow pub is a splendid, if slightly affected, mishmash. There's all manner of clutter behind the bar, changing art on the walls (on our visit, a painting declared 'Will have sex for fish'), smart floor tiles and a wonderful aquatic mosaic out back. The most coveted spot is at the front, on scruffy sofas under a gorgeous arched window, where stained glass sets off a railway clock. Among requisitioned cinema seats and faded chessboard tables, Indo runs an espresso machine alongside an eccentric beer selection (Mort Subite beside Bombardier on draught) and a troupe of high-end spirits. You'll usually encounter grizzled barflies, young bohos and slightly adventurous City types, nodding to alt-folk or soul-jazz.


Tiger says...

IN-DON'TS

IN-DO's

Two Whitechapel Kids celebrate birthday in Whitechapel

Happy Birthday Posy and Julie and Tiger.


xxx

Things that you can do in le chapel blanc...part 1

Dance on a bar!

Photo Retard Lesson 2

exposure.  something to do with iso (amount of light / detail captured or let in), shutter speed (fast = clean, slow = bluuuuuuuer) and f-stop (which I fucking don't get. its like the amount of 'depth' in a shot, how far back the camera is focusing - i think you want a low f-stop for shooting far away ducks in a pond)

SO - using these new found skills I used high iso in dark pub, slow shutter speed and a bit of intentional hand wobble to make my friend ed look like a zombie. good eh? ed also takes nice pictures - see here 

this lesson happened at the Little White Lies birthday party where we ate cake 

Joining the 'HIVES' crew

Just thought id follow up on Tigers allergic reaction report: I boarded a plane in San Francisco, when i arrived in London I looked like this. By the morning it was gone, Doctor said, 'yeah its Hives, could of been anything, and could come back anytime'. NICE

(hope no one was eating when viewing)

camera school

i have a new camera. it's a powershot G9. i am a camera retard so for me its pretty exciting. i imagine thats a bit like an aussie discovering brick lane, but for now, for me, it's rad.

so i'm learning.

1.this is loooooooong exposure. in soho. opposite denmark street (one of the greatest streets in the world)

New York for New Years = distinct possibility

Pictures explain things better...

More of this nonsense on my own blog...
New I Hearts

Allergic Reaction to Whitechapel

A week or so ago me and Donna went to A&E as my lips had swollen up.
I was a MAJOR in A&E and they sent me to Londis to get Benadryl.

Whitechapel A&E is a definate place to visit in Whitechapel. Especially if you start to look like the elephant man.

More news on Allergic reactions soon...

If you suffer from Hives and Swallon Lips please get in touch with us here at Le Chapel Blanc towers.

Grass doesn't grow on busy places

Being bald you notice the weather more. I briefly left my cosy flat to buy some groceries from Tesco and the wind chill factor on my head was at least 10 (what on earth is a wind chill factor? why don't they just say it's fucking cold don't leave the house?).

My head doesn't fair much better during the summer months - though luckily living in London the sun rarely shines.

I'm not sure why I have recently decided to embrace my baldness...I have for a while been donning various hats in an attempt to disguise the lack of follicles. The hats have become a bit of a trade mark, for a time it was wearing sunglasses. In the sun, in the rain, in the day, at night, whilst awake, whilst asleep...my Bono moment. With the hats I think I was having an Edge moment, I have seen one picture of him in the last 10 years not wearing a hat. He even got married in that black beanie. Now my current "trademark" is a pair of fake glasses...inspired by Michael Stipe. My rock star pretensions again. Though I am thinking it's a bit David Hockney as well (which is good) - unfortunately with out that shock of blond hair he was sporting throughout the sixties and seventies.

One of the more interesting quips i have heard about baldness is that it is "the solar panel for a sex machine." Which may in fact be quite close to the truth...one theory as to why men go bald is that excess testosterone in puberty does something or other, see here for the science behind it. So to go bald at 23 I must have been one randy teenager. Though I don't recall my teenage years being anything like Skins. A frustrated teenager might be a better description.

A friend of mine, Richard, once said to me on failing to pull in a nightclub, completely deadpan "well, its because i reached my sexual peak at 14". He was obviously doing a lot better than me.

This might all be adding up to bad news - men reach there sexual peak at 22...so it looks like Richard and I are fucked (or not!).

My mum's comment on baldness is the title of this post, "grass doesn't grow on busy places", something I think she got from my grandma or granddad. I don't recall which. I think what she means by this is that grass doesn't grow in cities, airports, motorways - busy places. This got me thinking though...could be extended to other parts of the human body...par example, when "with" a girl for the first time if downstairs is all neat and in order does this mean she might be a bit "busy"?! Conversely if she is a bit "wild" down there does that mean you might be going somewhere no one has gone for a while?

It's an interesting question.

terrapins and people

so here be the results of the Gentle Friendly NPIP EP release at the Old Blue... kindly put on by This Is Music...

music was followed by crap dj's, bad jumpers, a man that looks like a terrapin and a terrapin

Gentle Friendly @ Old Blue Last Tonight

I manage bands and put on nights and DJ. I am rad.

All of these things will be happening at the Old Blue Last tonight.

Whitechapel Art Gallery

When is it going to look like this again?

Sell, sell, sell...

I was thinking last night what else it might be possible to sell through this blog. Tiger and Posie: a room and a very reasonable price it is too. Dayo will be promoting his Jam (when he has made it), though i am still of the opinion that he should focus his efforts on a mango chutney (according to a wise man / alcoholic in INDO, Brick Lane is where to find the best mangos in London), as it is more in keeping with our community.

I have already tried my hand at a spot of self promotion. I might even throw my CV up here and make if available as a PDF download. For those of you who don't know how to write a CV, or you just want a few tips, mine is a damn good CV (though you will have to ask yourself whether you would want careeers advice from the unemployed). Anyway i thought today we might have a crack at entering the murky world of internet dating.

I have had first hand experience of the world of internet dating, or what might best be described perhaps as a brief dalliance. The end result being i didn't have sex with a girl from Haywards Heath (or somewhere equally nowhere), though she did send me some rather risque photos she had taken on her mobile (though a few of them you had to look at a few times to get the "angles right"). She was also a little over enthusiastic with her sexy emails and texts and took to ringing me sometimes three times in an evening, even when i made my excuses she continued to get in touch...almost stalkerish. This probably confirms most peoples prejudices on internet dating. It confirmed mine. You also get robbed by Sarah "if i can do houses i reckon i can probably do relationships" Beeney. I think she owes me about forty quid, even if you meet someone that is an expensive shag. I'm sure in the less sulubrious areas of Kings Cross (are there any salubrious parts of Kings Cross?) you could recieve quite alot for forty quid.

At the moment, when at Dayo's flat, I am partial to reading a chapter from Dawn Porter's Dairies of an Internet Lover, it is what one might call "Bookdope" or "Litsmack". You know it is wrong - but you cant help it.

I used to like Dawn Porter, I think what I mean is fancy. Anyone who lists there interests as sushi and sex is alright in my book, but then I began reading. Ahh...its fucking diabolical, so poorly written, "jokey", irritating and patronising. Though it does contain passages where she describes six hour "wankathons", which does make up a little for the rest of it. Though it is a bit like Lady Chatterley's Lover where you skip most of the book to find the dirty bits. Diaries... is I think supposed to be a bit naughty, which it might be but it is everything but sexy. It is hardly a feminist manifesto...though there are a lot of men in it. Who again, on the most, confirm all theories on those who date via the internet.

So i am going to have a go at flogging (I said flogging) myself off - plus I am, after I have written this, off to sell myself to ANOTHER recruitment agent, so this is good practice.

So it reads a bit like this...unemployed, gauche, caring, intelligent, opinionated, frustrated writer, angry, loving, over emotional ex PR man...the list could go on.

Tempted? I thought not but if you are, then like my busty friend from Haywards Heath please send a photo (preferably not wearing much) to the address below.

Actually on second thoughts don't. You nutters!

The lost art of writing a letter

Stephen Bayley is the second cleverest man in England, thus he is someone worth listening to. I think it is important to quote in full:

"Thus the psychology of sending letters is significant. To write a letter is to show you have spent money, spent time and made an effort. I discovered very early on the power of the letter, a powerful tool in teenage courtship - more powerful still now that the majority of the post is garbage and any clown can generate something exquisite in Helvetica 14 point. The price of decent writing paper and a first-class stamp is one of the great bargains. A letter is an opportunity to write an advertisement for yourself."

As I am at the moment in the process of "selling myself", whoring myself around, these words are important.

I have in my 23 years written a lot of letters. I think it started when, as part of learning German in year 8 we had to have "pen friends", which is a horrible phrase. It almost sounds like something Ann Summers might sell (i went there once...but i will save that for another time). The idea was that we in England would practice our German and in turn the Germans would practice their English...it never quite worked out that way and we just ended up communicating in English, thus to this day i know roughly 3 phrases in German - all useless. The writing of letters was also a prelude to us going on the school exchange. I never went, but those who did brought back Blink 182. Something I think you will agree, we needed. It is what they call in History "Cultural Exchange".

I was paired with a girl called Annika, who to this day I am still in touch with. Though now when we do communicate, which is quite rarely, we use email. All her emails to me have always had an air of flirtatiousness which i can never work out...something may have got lost in translation. I have never thought of Germans as being flirty. They are more black and white, more down the line. Do they lack subtlety or am I being cruel? Anyway she keeps promising to come to London so I guess we will see.

So since about the age of 13 or 14 I have been writing letters, mainly to girls, and with a few exceptions, mainly to girls I wanted to sleep with, or in fact was sleeping with. Letters are sexy, provocative, seductive. You have to sit down and think about that person - you can distract yourself when writing emails, you can also edit a lot more easily. Thus you need to know what you want to say. Though when writing letters it is useful if you can write legibly - I cant. I think this is where I am falling down. I also used to write on terribly garish (and cheap) writing paper, I have put an end to that now. Orange A5 paper from WH Smith doesn't really say sleep with me does it? In fact it doesn't say much at all. Its also hard to read from.

Theo Van Gogh's letters to his brother Vincent are some of the most fascinating and insightful art historical documents ever discovered but what will historians of the future use as their primary sources? Emails, blogs and text messages are arbitrary - can be edited, destroyed. Where are they "kept"? Is their a big computer somewhere that has saved every email ever sent? And if so, imagine the task of sifting through all that information. Or does all this information, dialogue and discourse just simply disappear and cease to "exist". I wonder. If so making sense of 2008 is going to be a pretty tricky job in 2108.

A final thought on letters: I think it is important to remember that no one will be remembered as a Man of Emails.

Overheard conversations...

Two gems from an overheard conversation in Hackney last week.

On their schooling...

A: I come from a mixed background...
B: What, girls and boys?
A: No, good and bad.

On a friend of A's...

"What have you got to worry about? You cut your finger...yes, it's the end of your cello playing career...well you know what...thank fuck for that."

A women in Hackney this morning, talking on her phone...

"Its even more distressing for me because i don't know if i will ever use this eppy pen."

Right.

You can't start a fire worrying about your little world falling apart...

So our first post is an extension of Gumtree. That is PR. Perhaps I should also upload my CV and start making a big noise about me, me, me. Anyone else got something to sell? Get on board.

I thought that the first entry was going to read "Why work when you can blog" (D is now taking care of this entry) or something to that extent...so instead we will have the wise words of Bruce Springsteen...in times of crisis he is as good a person as any to turn to (he worked his magic on Barack Obama, so he can do the same for me).

In advance i think it might be wise to say sorry, as what will follow will probably be quite downbeat...its been a fucking odd week and a bit. The result being that I am now whoring myself out to various recruitment agents...who refer to you not as a person or a client but as a candidate. I am not a fucking candidate, i am a person you fucking tits. I regard recruitment agents very much the same as i do estate agents, they are a necessity but should be avoided at all costs. They are all cocks. Yesterday i went to meet one who kicked my ass for an hour and a half. I didn't really want that. I wanted someone to be nice to me and tell me i was alright. Her first thoughts about me were: he is sharp...he is vain. I am both of these things. But that isn't insight that is just fact.

Remember PR is image. Image and lying.

She also told me that i had started to believe my own hype. Well know one else is believing are they so some ones got to (Obama believed...he's all about believing). I think what she didn't pick up on is that I'm not believing my own hype one bit...hence my downbeat nature. So i suppose i got a way with a lie. I'm pretty much there then. Image and lies.

Anyway to end this post i will take my cue from the first one...if you know anyone who would like a (PR) gun for hire (has the look, will lie), get in touch.

Who needs a job when you can blog?

So, I lost my job just over a week ago. I am officially unemployed. I've been to the Job Center and everything. Boohoo, I know. 

But fear not, reader. This post is not going to be an airing of my own incredulity at the current economic climate. Nor a long wanking, indigent, self-pity-fest (see above post). No, on the contrary, in fact I feel that - at the slight risk of sounding clichéd, and much more serious risk of just sounding like a massive twat - I've been given a gift. The gift of time. 

Time, firstly, to do all the things normal people do that got neglected while I was working long and unpredictable hours; Things like washing behind my ears and other hard-to-reach places, dealing with seemingly bottomless piles of laundry of such awe-inspiring grandeur it's almost sublime; and shopping for, and cooking REAL FOOD. It won't be just a lunchtime sausage roll and a sandwich from Greggs for me anymore, but homemade soups, stews, cakes, bread, scones! Things that take love and patience and care to create. I'm even going to make fucking jam! Jam: a culinary realm whose dark art has hitherto been the reserve (or should that be preserve?) of old women at church bake sales. I'm taking them on. Because I've got time.  

I've got the time to exercise my mind: spending the morning over coffee and a crossword, or spending hours over an extended game of chess. I can work through all the unread books on my shelf I've been meaning to read for months. I've now got the time to shoot the breeze and chew the fat and cud with my fellow man, or publican, depending on where the sun is relative to the yardarm. We can discuss the whys and wherefores of existence. We will contemplate "What ifs..." and "Why nots..." and put the world to rights. It will be all masticating, ruminating and cogitating, like a Mastechef final of life! And I will be Lloyd Grossman!...erm...Because I've got TIME!  

Anyway, I'd better wrap this up, my Domino's pizza has just arrived and Deal or No Deal isn't going to watch itself.

D

Le Chapel Blanc requires a lovely couple!

Hi folks. Up for grabs is a lovely, large and light room in a very friendly house. The household is made up of three ladies and one gent and a terrapin in their mid to late twenties who are all good friends and work in the creative industries. We're just a two minute walk from Brick lane and the tube which is ideal. We are surrounded by amazing restaurants, an incredible pub and the Atlantis art store is a stones throw away. The house is a three story affair, with a nice living room where we enjoy quite a bit of eating and socializing, two loos and bath/shower.We're looking for a friendly couple ideally of a similar age who'll be up for an occasional pint or three and enjoy the smell of cooking bacon or veggie sausages on a Saturday morning. £300 a month each is a really good price for what's on offer (ie. £600 a month for the room). Drop me an email if you're interested ...
P. S. Move-in date is the 14th Dec. A deposit of £444 will also be needed for our humble landlord.