Locative Steps (Week 6)

I enjoyed 21 Steps. It is not a locative narrative though. It does not make space into place. As the reader we are definitely in a particular space, high in the sky, a surveillance module for whoever is putting the main character through a test. But is not place. We are not immersed into the lived experience of a particular place, with its stories and kinks and dwellers. The deeper meaning of experiencing a locative narrative like Murmur, where the "reader" is told stories about a place by people who know it, while the "reader" is in it, is not achieved by following the movement of a line across a map. And, although 21 Steps is interactive, the interactivity does not bring you directly to the place as it does in Murmur.

I walked by a Murmur location the other it was at Church and Alexander. I would have called the number posted by my phone was dead, it was. I wonder how that place's meaning would have elaborated on what it already meant to me. I'll have to go back.

On His Own (Week 4)

He left with plenty of time to spare. He would have a coffee at the cafe across the street from the theater first. He'd worked them hard, late nights, vicious meticulousness, things had to be right, that's just the way they were. The horns sounded good in general, here and there they squeaked. He hailed a cab. "Take me to the Cotton Club." Rhythm's tight, but Max is hittin' the junk a lot these days, if he doesn't clean up I'm going to get rid of the fella.

Click:

http://tumblr.com/xl4yi8g94

SEE THIS (Week 5)

SEE THIS:



LEVEL 1

Look, hear, at this wonderful story:

If I buy this product, I will be happy. I will be strong. I will be handsome. I will be valiant. I will be a man.

And as that man I will most certainly find a desirable wife, whom will love me for those reasons. I will be King.

LEVEL 2
Look at this wonderful story:

If I smell a certain way, if I mask or mix my musk with this elixir, I will be accepted, I will be loved, I will be worthy of the touch of a gorgeous dame.

LEVEL 3

Look at thing wonderful story:

I am being coaxed in to believing that if I buy this product, that I don't REALLY NEED, I will fit into that unattainable archetype, one comprised of machismo and misogyny.

LEVEL 4

Look, wonderful story:

You smell. You, human, smell. That is not good, you must not smell. This man here, he smells better than you. You will never be him if you don't stop being smelly.

LEVEL 5

Look at story:

While you are distracted into focusing on this trivial dilemma of brand loyalty, and served a single ideal of beauty, that you will most likely never fulfill, 'cause you can't, you do not SEE that you are a consumer-slave, subject to a corporate mechanism. A worker, a cog, subhuman.

MEOP (Week 3)

The words that leave my lips-a-rhythm,

Fall on the down-BEAT of my breath,

Sounding out the SY-LA-BLE-SSSNAKE.


Reminding me of the ghost I'd met,

Marching drawing, falling, slowly amongst the traditions of his time,

The papyrus parchment rolled up, scrolled up, burnt up.


The fire that burnt that paper gave the heat that fed that baker who helped supply a writer with a dozen + 1,

Who left his assets to a kid with glasses,

Whose ancestors would build a computer,

They say.


Can we agree on that?

Where is the goddam meaning, Holden might say.

In my party-watch:


IFNID
N R
I A
TIMET W
Y, I O
O C T
HM.KS


What the hell does that mean?

Screw you Faulker!

I don't need a fuckin' truck to carry wood to burn the fire to feed the power.

Let's agree that start means finish, K?

THE START.

Chat Screen Cafe - (Week 2)

As I type this journal on my laptop, I know that the final product will be shaped by that very action. I know that I will not type this out whole, start to finish, I will check Facebook, just to check it, to ensure that my constructed identity, my calling card, is tip-top or to see if someone has communicated with me, "look a wall post."It's seems like the communication has become more of an ego-boosting, points-accumulating game, rather than an attempt at actual connection, "Hmmm with this CRAZY status update maybe I'll get 17 "Likes" and even more comments!" And after I check Facebook I will return to this writing with something else in mind. I have a friend doing a semester in Oslo, we Skype ever so often, I enjoy it. Like any conversation, it takes a while to warm up. We start by talking at each other, then comforts grows, then there is a period of intense engagement where you feel like you're actually in the room with the person, you have surpassed the mediation of the screen, you are outside the mind in asocially reactive and impulsive state. Then something from the real world interrupts the flow, and you are brought out of it. In a darker head space, doubt rampant, paranoia setting in, I look back at these conversations with a measured anxiety. I have not seen this person for, 2 months say, yet I feel like I was just with them, but then again, my only bearing on this person's existence is through their digital representation on a screen. How do I know that it's real? How do I know something out in cyberspace isn't creating this avatar for me to interact with? That last one is getting a bit too paranoid, it's hard to imitate a person's idiosyncrasies and to be able to recall those experiences had together alone. Anyway, I guess its hyper-real, it appears real and so why bother questioning whether not it is if it gets you off anyway. Long story short, Skype don't beat sitting across from one another at a cafe.

Bill's Cheap/Unique Secondhand/Vintage Boutique

Hooooey! Come on down yo Bill's Cheap/Unique Secondhand/Vintage Boutique: Where people come to look different! All Rights Reserved.

We got a sale goin' on, Heck! Who am I kiddin'? We always got a sale going on!

Come on by and buy garments that grandfather wore or that quirky neighbour who smelled like cabbage and was probably a pedophile.

Hey there young lady, what's your name?

June.

June what?

Li.

Why don't you tell me a bit about yourself?

I go to school.

Where?

U of T.

Well now, ain't that a bowl of fried dandelions. What brought you here today?

I like being unique.

Shit! Ain't that appropriate.

Why would you want to look like someone else?

My thoughts exactly.

K, Bye.

Wait just one sec there, here take this questionnaire.

Oh looky here, a long haired gypsy freak. What's your name son?

Damian.

That's quite a last name you have there.

It's polish.

How 'bout that. So why are you treading these tiles?

I don't have the money to buy expensive clothes.

I hear ya.

And in a broader sense, when buying previously used clothing, there is a history to the clothing and a character.

Don't read into it to much now. And do me a favour, fill in one of these questionnaires.

Hmm let me see here, madame, what's your name?

Priya.

And what brings you here?

I like to shop vintage.

You came to the right place.

Yeah, they ARE cheap and unique and the clothing has been worn, giving them sentimental value.

Here, fill in this questionnaire

Results of Style Questionnaire:

June Li:

-floral prints
-bright colours: green, purple and blue
-silky material
-guy's clothing

Damian:

-colour, matching colour
-70's palette: olive green, cream, burnt orange, navy blue, maroon

Priya:

-floral patterns
-earth tones
-anything black
-airy clothing for spring and summer

Hmm... What?

My memory of The Red Light is skewed, because it is a bar and I was drinking. We were actually looking for the Communist's Daughter, round Dundas and Ossington, when we walked in one night not too far back but too far back to give a specific date. We made the mistake because it might not have had text on it's blackish possibly read awning, we didn't see any anyway. Maybe it was November. The place had me at hello is this the Communist's daughter.
I believe it had some square exposed wood cafe appropriate tables in the window and along the wall on the left side of the narrow front section of the place. On the right of this narrow front section stood a bar with no stools and a curved edge. It was wood too, varnished maybe, it was dark I don't know. It had a grove of tap-levers, most notably St. Ambroise Oatmeal stoat. I had a couple of those at least, among other things.
On the way to the back section stood a juke box that only had 90s hip-hop and 80's stadium rock, I think we plated a Coolio, orange permeated its plastic side panelling.






Back:

It was lit by two lamps with yellow lamp shades. One immediately to your left upon entering and the other in the far right corner where two couches met their backs against the wall. On the left side of the room were a couple of round wooden tables with wooden chairs, three at each. Couch one sat on the right side of the far wall right arm meeting meeting the couch two's left. In the void between the couches one and two rose the table that supported the lamp. Couch one is floral valour that embraces your behind allowing you to sink in when you sit down. Couch two belongs in a movie theatre, red valour the colour of valor. A table for drinks stands at attention in front of both couched doting on its patrons.