Saturday, 4 July 2026

My latest misadventures

Why always me, I thought as the last-remaining
Alcott barrier on the London network
clamped down on my back, it
was an honest midjudgement on my part
I'm sure they'll - ouch.

Extrication was an impossible task,
there was an ineffectual flailing of limbs
and a plaintive cry 'Excuse me. Can somebody help?'

Boots I saw muddy boots and a sarcastic
ha-ha look at this one
flapping like a crab with its claws taped up
you know the penalty for Fare Evasion son

Sir I am 57 years old.

We all saw you on CCTV trying to
scuttle under the Alcott
she's an unforgiving mistress isn't she?

What the hell. Can you just release -

My partner of course was nowhere to be seen,
and I could hardly blame her. She didn't need
to get mixed up in another one of my escapades
what with her professional standing. We would laugh
about it one day, maybe later this
very day, over a nice casserole and a glass of vino

* * * *

I'd purchased the not
inexpensive can of Qhoopass™ for an occasion such as this
popped the flap to see the liquid iron filings
slurp and assemble rather pleasingly, then ascend
my enemy's leg his chunky faux leather clad
treetrunk leg. Now, I thought, he
will rue the day. Oh he will rue it.
So long as he withheld his disbelief
long enough for the patent Qhoopass™
congealing process to render him paramagnetified 

* * * *

My pride and joy allotment crater
had flooded, so I tried to rescue the
latest cucumber crop. 

First things first I should alert my tidy wife
but the burning sun and the floods, the
exponential fruit and vegetable growth
it was all too much really. Whatever
you do don't panic

Stuffed some of my proud cucumber in my mouth
my fat mouth to test its resilience. A moist chew
and most delish to use a word my wife hated

I was going to offer a cutting of
this fast growing heritage gourd
to Annette my co-worker
but right now yes I should warn the others

To lend myself some dignity I donned
a straw hat and my vintage t-shirt
the one sporting the legend
Canned Iron Comedian
we all liked the way it hung on my dadbod

The water was rising and my top was wet
tried to pull it off over my head
but it got trapped in the straw hat
my mouth full to choking with fruit
or was it a vegetable, and I recalled

The words wise words of Wolsey: All
human activity is meaningless, and
struggle is futile boy

Some local children had spotted my pool
and began to frolic, good for them

* * * *

But once she found it charming the sweet talk
and the queer slang I used

She said you big dummy don't you see
how the whales and elephants
are looking down on us from their jungle perch

She was convinced they were spying on us
something to do with the refraction of light
nacreous clouds, the fata morgana

At first it seemed quirky cute later
frankly insane, plus she had the temerity
to say they were trying to burn the five statues
of our heroes the great ones our champions
the five true statues we'd been searching for all our lives

We had never been told their names
why do your sky creatures have it in for those guyz
oh, she said, you know they're guyz

I needed some new vocabulary to
pull down the ropes from the skyline

Friday, 3 July 2026

Ivory Power more like

The decision of granting of tenure is a life long commitment
Oooooh I'm up for tenure mur mur muh

I left teaching because I couldn't get tenure
I stopped worrying about tenure
So it looks like I got my tenure

The rules have saddled colleges
with self-indulgent prima donnas
elbow-patch eggheads and smug becardiganed twerps
who seem to think they're philosopher kings

Checklist, I never leave home without
One, my laser pointer with five settings
it's a real ice-breaker with the sophomores

Tenure can be used as a club to wield against the powerless
O me! O life! I'm having a mid-term crisis
I mean, I have tenure. I really can say whatever I want

Two, reference management software
i.e. EndNote to manage libraries

Tenure in any department is a serious business
His tenure review is in three months
It means, essentially, employment for life
You can't get fired, even if you're bad at it?
He's trying to get an article in print
What does Gopnik say?

I mean, I have tenure and it's a terrible idea
Well I'm up for tenure this fall
I really can't say whatever I want

Three, leather bound notebook
it adds a touch of olde worlde class
yet remains entirely blank

I can really say whatever I want
I'm up for tenure at Columbia!
It keeps them around forever and they don't have to work hard
What does Gopnik think?
I'll be up for tenure in a few years. Does that count?

Four, my periodic table temperature-controlled mug
gifted me by a fellow Nobel Laureate

Professor Thurber loves to teach
but I really didn't want to become a professor
or get tenure or even teach or even exist

Maybe we don't have to wait for tenure. Maybe we
just say goodbye yellow brick road goodbye Harvard
or maybe we just have to wait to wait to wait for tenure

Five, I like to wear the full gown, hood, Tudor bonnet regalia
my track record of astronomical research
deserves a certain ceremonial grandiosity

I probably shouldn't be saying this on TV, but
a dual monitor setup is de rigueur
sure a stylus tablet, the stream deck and
to the extent that tenure supports ergonomic peripherals
a high-end USB microphone, and academic freedom, I support tenure

"I'm a tenured professor"
Congratulations. I'm so happy for you
Professor Thurber swears by Hagoromo fulltouch chalk and yet
the academic tenure process stands in the way of great research
Oh Donald you don't have to tell me about
the dramas played out in academic departments

I have a tenure joke, but you won't get it

Pluracy

Taylor Swift (Irish accent)

Taylor Swift (Japanese accent)

Taylor Swift (Scottish accent)

Taylor Swift (French accent)

Taylor Swift (Australian accent)

Taylor Swift (Italian accent)

Taylor Swift (Jamaican accent)

Taylor Swift (German accent)

tˈeɪlɚ swɪft (unintelligible accent)

Taylor Swift (Dutch accent)

Taylor Swift (Irish accent again)

Taylor Swift (Swedish accent)

Taylor Swift (Spanish accent)

Taylor Swift (Russian accent)

The gang gets the technology

The gang reassembles in the old flat
it's not an apartment or a condo Mehgun
in superliminal munculate mode
due to the archetypal limbo state discovered
back in 2050 by the Lunar HoloMonks

ElVee proudly displays an apple
box of tiny green lightbulbs
'You remember these, they're collectors items'
he gathered from the wreckage of the house next door

He thinks there's a market for everything
but he's the market. 'You're the market buddy'

Later sat in Loop's room with a floral IPA
I point out their window at the new shops
which were once shady lock-ups. They're in
a low mood 'They just sell trash'

Try to lift them up 'Maybe I want to buy trash'
They jab back 'You can certainly afford it, all that
cash under your mattress'

The dynamics are the same, the main difference
is we have a Skiv-0h for the washing up. Mehgun says
'doing the dishes' of course. She's visiting as usual,
stays long weekends at least half
the week never any suggestion of paying rent
but I've learned to keep my fat lip shut

Something's off and I try to voice a thought
about cheap nanosurgeons who fail their Grade One
stitch class but ElVee waves me away
'That's such a 1986 thought, you
can't live in the past' but that's
exactly the point

It was (certainly not) the worse of times
wait a minute, it was always the worst
once we had t-shirts printed up
reading We are the Worst after the Dean's remark

The fire in the swimming pool.
'The corpse in the shopping trolley'
adds ElVee. 'And the bomb that
definitely wasn't a bomb!' pipes up Mehgun

She suggests taking
the aeriolator to the newmarket
see if anyone wants our vintage lightbulbs

Loops still likes to squeeze my shoes,
always with the shoe envy
'Green - felt' he murmurs
'They're not for sale.'

Their grandson avatar has popped up
naturally I point out these munchkins
are illegal now. Loops says it's a mere residue and
Bobin is pure fog which can't be detected

But 40 years ago or 40 years ahead
even if we are the worst I say
let's all make up and be fuzzy friends again

Thursday, 2 July 2026

Beanstock Festival

Bean Day were the headliners
Haricot Styles, Fava John Misty
you get the picture (yes we see)

He enjoyed them all
but he never found his way back
he's been driving round the car park
looking for a way out
in a clapped out cracked up tractor

He's been living off black beans baked beans kidney beans
they never held the festival again so he
can dust the crops with the gift of methane

He's been bin diving for rags and tools
his one-man tent has seen better days
his bin diving in a ditch
his bin diving in a foxhole
has rendered him unrecognisable
even unto himself yes
we've all seen better days

He's been living off soy beans butter beans broad beans
he's been sick he's been well he's been
to heaven and he's seen hell

He's seen sunshine and he's seen rain
he's treated them all with disdain
he's been better but haven't we all
and he's been down so long
it feels like up to him

He's been living off and in and under the land
he reckons he's got another 25 years in him
the festival of survival is second nature
the spectacle of surprises will never end

Wednesday, 1 July 2026

The Zelkova Tree

I think that I shall never see
anything like the Zelkova tree

A tree which sits on Dulwich Common
it's been added to Google maps
native to Japan, this foreign
import has led some to rhapsodise
about its charms - 'splendid, awesome
with a muscular fluted trunk'

Others are less impressed
with this 200-year-old guest

'good tree'
'adequate tree'
'I mean its a tree innit'

    'Just the tree
    near the park
    and near the road'

Tuesday, 30 June 2026

A tortoise named Winston Churchshell

music to vibe out to
modo fac tincan folklore
quirly-candy-toy sound
Electric Chariot section
smoking the green stuff

there are people who will read the Bible
pure kosmische musik energy
this is what an apple tastes like?
I may have a problem

a small journey to just getting baked
and drawing stuff trippin' like a butterfly
every place that you can imagine
oh my nihilism - is this canon?
like some lost artifact or memory

music to groove to, almost like a great book
for the first time and walk away
at 10:27 I start to ascend
difficult to listen to where this feels broken
First Dance Wedding Tune 

I'm believing every word, music to get lost in
honestly the best song
whale speaks of all time not even kidding
kicking ass all choppy and shit
in these fast times that we live in

I guess if you were a weed head in the 90s
and grew up with divorced parents
and had no culture or responsibility
and your head was lost in a cloud of pot smoke
this song met your low expectations