Pushkin, 1834

Пора, мой друг, пора! покоя сердце просит —
Летят за днями дни, и каждый час уносит
Частичку бытия, а мы с тобой вдвоем
Предполагаем жить, и глядь — как раз умрем.
На свете счастья нет, но есть покой и воля.
Давно завидная мечтается мне доля —
Давно, усталый раб, замыслил я побег
В обитель дальную трудов и чистых нег.

Pinched from this rather wonderful site.

Only 23 hours and 40 something minutes early,

but prematurity is a symptom of (my) life, and I will be as busy as pants (to quote dear BiB) all day today (apart from sleeping). So Happy New Year one and all. Here's to 2006 (he takes a sip of Staropramen).

More Master and Margarita

(how's that for an alliterative title!). The new Russian TV adaptation of Bulgakov's classic has proven to be an enormous success. I for one cannot wait to get my hands on the DVDs...

Following mentions

of Staropramen, Gambrinus and other Czech beers over at BiB, as well as a comparison with the more Teutonic beers of Berlin, and a slight Petrozavodsk/Piter-based reminiscence about Baltika and Bochkarev, I did feel an urge to publish a top ten of Central/East European beers. I failed miserably in this endeavour because:

1) I can't remember the names of 10 beers.
2) Those of you who are native to or resident in these areas will disagree, and I could really do without the hassle at the moment.
3) Apart from Staropramen, the only beers from anywhere east of Dublin I've drunk in the last 6 months were a rash of bottles of Polish beer from an off licence in Hanwell. One was raspberry flavoured, and I cannot for the life of me remember what the others were called.
4) This site, despite being shockingly American, is rather good: www.realbeer.com. And does far more justice to Central/Eastern European beers than I ever could.

Instead I'll leave you with some Slovak drink-driving humour, simply labelled "Promile":

Abject laziness

are the only words I can use to describe the Domino's Pizza website. For those of you too lazy to pick up your phone, dial and place your order, you can now set up an account and order online. It is very tempting though... Mmmmm pizza...

In a last minute tactical shift

the Drunken Master HiFi has brought in a supersub a la Ronnie Rosenthal or Ole Gunnar Solskjaer to DJ with us on NYE @ the Hansom Cab. We will be there from 7pm onwards, and remember, free entry, pub prices and open till 2am. For those of you born after 1979, John will be adding a hint of modern music that youngsters listen to, rather than the Vera Lynn, George Formby and Schubert I was going to play. Anyway, the invitation stands, dear readers. Be there or be somewhere else with better music, cheaper drinks and people you know...

Parts of the UK

are grinding to a halt as we speak due to snowfall. A whole 6 inches last night. Trains have been cancelled in the south east. Temperatures are expected to drop to -10 tonight. As far as I can remember, certainly back to 1982, the year I started at infant school, it has snowed/been cold/been icy in the UK every year. Maybe not in Central London, but snow has fallen to some degree somewhere every year. And yet we are still entirely unprepared/unable to deal with it. I have travelled on trains in Russia towards the end of winter with snowdrifts several feet deep either side of the tracks. Germany and the Czech Republic are both seemingly capable of dealing with harsher winters than us. Surely more could be done than simply sprinkling grit on the roads, advising drivers to carry food and blankets in case they get caught, and telling commuters to leave London before 8pm to avoid being stuck if snow starts to fall.

So it's all over

again for another year. this seems to have been the shortest Christmas on records. Driving back on Boxing Day was ludicrously busy, and there were queues of cars waiting to get into Brent Cross - surely people must have no money after the rash of late Christmas shopping this year, or maybe the lure of slightly reduced towelling in Fenwicks was too great. Or, more likely, I believe, retail therapy is required after a morning/afternoon/evening/day/Christmas dinner with their families. Or maybe they simply want to return all the presents they received and swap them for a trouser press or something equally useful. Anyway, all I remember is that when I was a kid, it was nigh on impossible to find anything open from mid-afternoon Xmas Eve to 9am on the 27th. This is, of course, to say nothing of the sales with online retailers that began at midnight on Xmas Eve... I am not (as you may have been able to tell) a religious man in any sense, but this has been the first Christmas I have not worked in 8 years, and let me tell you, it is bliss. Everyone should have these few days off, irrelevant of race, sexuality, religious persuasion or whatever. It is nice.

New Year's Eve

will see the Drunken Master HiFi in session at the Hansom Cab, Earl's Court Road, London. 7pm-2am. No ticket required. Pub prices. The ideal place for a drunken funky New Year's Eve party. Some of the songs Sam and Luke will be playing as the evening progresses (and the blood/alcohol level increases) will include:

House of Pain - Jump Around
De La Soul - Buddy
Oliver Cheatham - Get Down Saturday Night
McFadden & Whitehead - Ain't No Stoppin Us Now
Madonna - Hung Up
Mylo & Miami Sound Machine - Doctor Pressure
The Jackson Sisters - I Believe In Miracles
Deee-Lite - Groove Is In The Heart
Dan Hartman - Vertigo/Relight My Fire
Sub Sub featuring Melanie Williams - Ain't No Love (Ain't No Use)

Noddy Holder

of Slade fame once sang/screamed "It's Christmas". And today it is for our Czech and Polish cousins (and probably other Central Europeans as well, but I simply do not have the energy to check at the moment - I'm sure those of you with more experience in these matters will be able to tell me...). Here in Blighty, it all kicks off tomorrow (well, it all started mid-September this year, but nonetheless), and, having made my trips to friends and relatives in the provinces, I am now enjoying the usual fare of Paul McCartney Christmas hits (never play The Pogues "Fairytale of New York" enough for me). So dear reader(s), I wish you all the best for the Xmas season, and for 2006. Enjoy.

Christmas shopping

Don't you just hate it. I actually hate wrapping the presents more, but this due to my congenital inability to use scissors. It must be more than a decade since I wrapped a present. Generally people watch me and then are compelled to take over with a friendly 'bless him'. So, if you ever receive a badly wrapped present, it will have been done by my own fair hand, with considerable investment in terms of time, concentration and sanity on my behalf...

Central/East European cigarettes

are one of the great vices of my life. I have gone for months/years without really smoking, but the merest hint of an aroma from any vaguely Central or East European fag immediately transports me back to my youth in Petrozavodsk. Proust pondered precisely this in that dreadfully long masterwork of his, but it seems that smell is the sense most closely linked to memory - see here and here.

When

will I get rid of this accursed cold. I have had it (it feels like) for months (please remember that male British hets become excessively dramatic when discussing colds/flus). Well, weeks at least. It ebbs and flows. Why can I not just be ill for 2 or 3 days and then it's gone. And I'm not alone - nearly everyone at work, on the tube, bus, in Central London and in Ealing seems to have a cough and/or runny nose that they can't get rid of.

Santa Claus is coming to town

if you live in Auckland, that is: santarchy.com

Tonight's listening

since I got in from the cold and very busy centre of London has been varied. Payday yesterday, so I had to rush to Sounds of the Universe (after nearly a month off buying music). I bought the two rocksteady compilations, a Studio One CD, the new Gilles Peterson compilation and dear Abi let me buy a copy of the new Tropicalia compilation two months before release. Despite this, I am listening to the CD I bought for DJing on New Year's Eve - Now 62. Mylo vs Miami Sound Machine is rather good. OK. I am now starting to worry myself.

Help

dear readers. The discussion of Bulgakov and comfort reading over at BiB coupled with Xmas shoppers requesting help picking books for friends and family today has driven me to the edge of despair. Please recommend some authors/books for me to read. Those of you who know me know what I read (repeatedly), and those of you who don't, take a chance. No Daniel Deronda, though;)

Lunchtime

has arrived, and I am sufficiently tired (having got in at 1am and got up at 7am to come to work) not to want to leave my desk and spank my Xmas bonus on CDs, clothes, trainers, or anything else. So I shall blog (a little). More will follow this evening once I've collapsed onto the sofa at home. But in the meantime, the following thoughts are running through my mind (this is the point to turn away, dear reader...)

lifelongdisappointment.com is a site full of the most delightful vitriol about bosses and co-workers.

Will Harry guide Portsmouth to victory at home this afternoon? Do I even care?

Is Grozny not the most apt name for the capital of Chechnya - why change it? Maybe it would be better simply to swap it with my hometown;)

Richard Pryor

Richard Pryor has passed away, aged 65, after years with multiple sclerosis. Although he was famous in the 1980's for a series of dreadful (and less dreadful) films, his live stand-up shows from the mid-late 1970's are absolute perfection. Please, I beg you, dear reader(s), invest in one of them. You will laugh like the proverbial drain. Unless you believe the Two Ronnies to be the cutting edge of comedy....

End of an era

Yesterday saw the final Routemaster journey in London. The 159 that terminated at Brixton bus garage was the last trip on a real route - just short of 50 years since the buses came into use. The bendy buses and other faceless abominations that may be ecologically sound have won, and a true London icon has been lost. There are excellent homages to the Routemaster on the BBC and the Routemaster Association.

My passion for these buses stems from my university days, living up on Finchley Road. I used to be able to catch the Number 13 every day, either to the Tube, or, as tended to be my want after a particularly late lecture, I could travel all the way from Strand, up Regent Street, Oxford Street, through St John's Wood and Swiss Cottage, and finally home. And then risk certain death in the winter trying to disembark onto an icy pavement from the platform.

This Croatian

site is rather wonderful - thanks to this BBC report that pointed me in its direction...

New Year's Eve

will see the Drunken Master Sound System in session at the Hansom Cab... More details to follow...

Five tracks on (very loud) constant rotation

on my Minidisc (can't afford an Ipod yet...)

1. House of Pain - Jump Around
2. The Pogues - Sally MacLennane
3. Joe Gibbs & The Professionals - Chapter 3
4. Jah Screechy - Walk and Skank
5. Eek A Mouse - Anerexol

What to buy

the reggae obsessive in your life for Xmas...

Lullaby of London

As I walked down by the riverside
One evening in the spring
Heard a long gone song
From days gone by
Blown in on the great North wind
Though there no lonesome corncrake's cry
Or sorrow and delight
You can hear the cars
And the shouts from bars
And the laughter and the fights

May the ghosts that howled
Round the house at night
Never keep you from your sleep
May they all sleep tight
Down in hell tonight
Or where ever they may be

As I walked on with a heavy heart
Then a stone danced on the tide
And the song went on
Though the lights were gone
And the North wind gently sighed
And an evening breeze coming from the East
That kissed the riverside
So I pray now child that you sleep tonight
When you hear my lullaby
May the wind that blows from haunted graves
Never bring you misery
May the angels bright
Watch you tonight
And keep you while you sleep

Thanks to Mr S. MacGowan & The Pogues.