When I had been thrown out of Hinchingbrooke school I went to a local community college, The Huntingdonshire College, to take my English, History and Psychology A levels. I soon realised how lucky I had been, I found my new teachers really inspiring, especially Mr Salter, my literature teacher. He was very calm and very enquiring, with a wave in his hair and a beard styled very much like Karl Marx, which I think was no coincidence. The other students were irritated by the way that he would ramble off the topic, spending the most of the lesson recalling an event from his past, or discussing some moral or political point that had no direct connection with the book which we were studying, but I found all the new ideas and new perspectives that he brought to me very exciting.
Still, I wasn't the best pupil. The class went to see King Lear at the Barbican but I didn't see the whole performance. I think my classmate Tom and myself went to the pub. But I was very pleased with the 'Pastelism' fanzine and 'Bit Of The Other' Pastels video that I bought in the record shop on Hanway Street (now closed, has a Beatles Yellow Submarine mural on its façade, half of which has been erased).
Mr Salter and I became friends and, after I left the college, I'd visit his cottage now and again. We'd talk for hours, he taught me how to make Turkish coffee and encouraged me to play the piano more (he had just, in his forties, taught himself how to play). Jane and Howard would call his name to me in a childish sing song voice and laugh.
So, only a year or two ago, I was very happy with the internet offering the opportunity to reunite us. I found him easily, he'd moved to a city further North and was working in a secondary school. I read comments referring to him on student's myspace pages ('he's weird but cool.') I contacted him, we spoke on the telephone. And you know what? Despite my recounting stories and reminiscences he didn't know who I was.
Thursday, 30 June 2011
Wednesday, 29 June 2011
LSD in McDonalds
When I was seventeen I took a job in McDonalds. I wish that I hadn’t, I am embarrassed to admit it, but I did. It was in Peterborough, a dull city a half hour train journey from my dull home town. I worked there for only a couple of weeks until they sacked me, during the time that I was taking lots of LSD at Patrick's house.
I made friends with a fellow crew member called Tejeb (This may be misspelled, pronounced 'tay-web,') who had mutual friends in my home town I think. I don't remember too much about him. He had long hair, dearly loved the band Felt and shared my enthusiasm for LSD. We were in a pub in the city centre in the late afternoon after I had finished work one day and he gave me a tab. I thought, since we had been talking about taking the drug together, that we were to do so then and there, but it turned out that he was about to start a shift and had only given it to me to try some other time. Unfortunately I discovered this just after I swallowed it. So the trick now was to get back to Patrick's house before I lost my marbles.
I remember, an hour later, sitting on the train and asking a woman, trying to sound as reasonable as possible, "Is the train moving? You see, I have the sensation that we have been travelling for a very long time but perhaps we are still at Peterborough Station? I have taken some LSD you see and it's bothering me a bit." The kind lady assured me that the train had not yet started moving, invited me to the other side of the carriage to join her if it made me feel more comfortable and shared an orange with me.
I can't remember arriving at Huntingdon Station. I would have been taking the short cut to the side of the town which leads to Patrick's village, Godmanchester, because I clearly recall many policeman waiting for me on the other side of the field, on the ring road. I pulled myself together and realised that there had been a traffic accident. Still, it wasn't a pleasant experience walking past them.
Half an hour later I arrived at Patrick's house and he gave me tea and reassured me. I did well to get back so quickly because it was then that the effects of the drug increased a great deal. No doubt, whatever I got up to fascinated me.
I think of myself as being quite fortunate to have taken so much LSD at this time, every few days over a couple of months, and not have badly affected my mind. It is thought to trigger schizophrenia in some. At one point I went complaining to Kevin, the young boy (younger than me at the time) who sold it to me that he had sold me duds. "But Graeme," he explained, "you've taken it every day for four days in a row, you've built up a resistance" so that evening I took two and a half.
I got lost in LSD thought. I recognised that there was a whole new way of thinking, and I felt inclined to return again and again. It was always present when I was sober but I couldn't quite place it and it took me a few years until I stopped being preoccupied with and comparing the two states of mind. During those years I felt quite sad and objects, especially curtains, patterns and plants, would undulate if I stared at them. But the price was a small one to pay, they were the most interesting experiences of my life. The morning after the second occasion that I had taken it was a huge revelation. I sat on a bench in a small, ugly park near the town centre and I felt overwhelmed. Every thing, life, that I had known since birth was suddenly so new, with so many hidden facets revealed. I saw people as they were but I also saw how they moved within the wider context of society. Habitual ways suddenly stood out. People not seeming to be fully aware what they were saying or who was saying it fascinated me. I felt that I began to see more clearly how many people have a lack of self awareness but it also made me empathise with people effortlessly.
The trouble with LSD though is that you just can't be sure of anything. I wrote a song about this for my band The Projects called Planets and I like the line 'you think you know things but you know you may be wrong and you'd like to do things but you cannot get things done.' Mira and I sing on it. Mira suggested that it might be fun if we take mushrooms together and it could be a lovely experience but I am concerned that I might find my having MS too unpleasant.
I think it worked out well. I am a creative person, I’m full of ideas, I write, I make music, I seem to get along with people, I'm self confident and I'm rational and I think that I have LSD to thank for these things in some small part. I would say that the doses that I took were too high. I think taking small doses, as Francis Crick did to ‘help him think,’ to help him envisage the DNA double helix, is not a bad idea but I am not sure that I will ever take it again in any dose.
But I can definitely thank LSD for my being sacked by McDonalds. It makes knowing that I allowed them to employ me a bit easier to deal with. One morning, late for work, I was still under the influence from the night before. I was marvelling at the patterns of the tiles as I walked through the shopping centre and, for a short time, I thought that I was actually in Brent Cross Shopping Centre in North London where my mother would take me as a child. I finally got to work. It was a very quiet midday morning and I was alone behind the till. Someone ordered a strawberry milkshake and so I turned the machine on and wondered off somewhere and became fascinated by something and before I knew it there was a disturbing sea of strawberry milkshake on the floor. A manageress came in from the back room, saw the mess and, quite rightly, sacked me then and there.
I made friends with a fellow crew member called Tejeb (This may be misspelled, pronounced 'tay-web,') who had mutual friends in my home town I think. I don't remember too much about him. He had long hair, dearly loved the band Felt and shared my enthusiasm for LSD. We were in a pub in the city centre in the late afternoon after I had finished work one day and he gave me a tab. I thought, since we had been talking about taking the drug together, that we were to do so then and there, but it turned out that he was about to start a shift and had only given it to me to try some other time. Unfortunately I discovered this just after I swallowed it. So the trick now was to get back to Patrick's house before I lost my marbles.
I remember, an hour later, sitting on the train and asking a woman, trying to sound as reasonable as possible, "Is the train moving? You see, I have the sensation that we have been travelling for a very long time but perhaps we are still at Peterborough Station? I have taken some LSD you see and it's bothering me a bit." The kind lady assured me that the train had not yet started moving, invited me to the other side of the carriage to join her if it made me feel more comfortable and shared an orange with me.
I can't remember arriving at Huntingdon Station. I would have been taking the short cut to the side of the town which leads to Patrick's village, Godmanchester, because I clearly recall many policeman waiting for me on the other side of the field, on the ring road. I pulled myself together and realised that there had been a traffic accident. Still, it wasn't a pleasant experience walking past them.
Half an hour later I arrived at Patrick's house and he gave me tea and reassured me. I did well to get back so quickly because it was then that the effects of the drug increased a great deal. No doubt, whatever I got up to fascinated me.
I think of myself as being quite fortunate to have taken so much LSD at this time, every few days over a couple of months, and not have badly affected my mind. It is thought to trigger schizophrenia in some. At one point I went complaining to Kevin, the young boy (younger than me at the time) who sold it to me that he had sold me duds. "But Graeme," he explained, "you've taken it every day for four days in a row, you've built up a resistance" so that evening I took two and a half.
I got lost in LSD thought. I recognised that there was a whole new way of thinking, and I felt inclined to return again and again. It was always present when I was sober but I couldn't quite place it and it took me a few years until I stopped being preoccupied with and comparing the two states of mind. During those years I felt quite sad and objects, especially curtains, patterns and plants, would undulate if I stared at them. But the price was a small one to pay, they were the most interesting experiences of my life. The morning after the second occasion that I had taken it was a huge revelation. I sat on a bench in a small, ugly park near the town centre and I felt overwhelmed. Every thing, life, that I had known since birth was suddenly so new, with so many hidden facets revealed. I saw people as they were but I also saw how they moved within the wider context of society. Habitual ways suddenly stood out. People not seeming to be fully aware what they were saying or who was saying it fascinated me. I felt that I began to see more clearly how many people have a lack of self awareness but it also made me empathise with people effortlessly.
The trouble with LSD though is that you just can't be sure of anything. I wrote a song about this for my band The Projects called Planets and I like the line 'you think you know things but you know you may be wrong and you'd like to do things but you cannot get things done.' Mira and I sing on it. Mira suggested that it might be fun if we take mushrooms together and it could be a lovely experience but I am concerned that I might find my having MS too unpleasant.
I think it worked out well. I am a creative person, I’m full of ideas, I write, I make music, I seem to get along with people, I'm self confident and I'm rational and I think that I have LSD to thank for these things in some small part. I would say that the doses that I took were too high. I think taking small doses, as Francis Crick did to ‘help him think,’ to help him envisage the DNA double helix, is not a bad idea but I am not sure that I will ever take it again in any dose.
But I can definitely thank LSD for my being sacked by McDonalds. It makes knowing that I allowed them to employ me a bit easier to deal with. One morning, late for work, I was still under the influence from the night before. I was marvelling at the patterns of the tiles as I walked through the shopping centre and, for a short time, I thought that I was actually in Brent Cross Shopping Centre in North London where my mother would take me as a child. I finally got to work. It was a very quiet midday morning and I was alone behind the till. Someone ordered a strawberry milkshake and so I turned the machine on and wondered off somewhere and became fascinated by something and before I knew it there was a disturbing sea of strawberry milkshake on the floor. A manageress came in from the back room, saw the mess and, quite rightly, sacked me then and there.
Tuesday, 28 June 2011
Speed Chess
I used to love playing speed chess online. It used to be chess.net that was all the rage but now, I think it's chess.com? Or the other way around? A chess server with thousands of chess players from the completely inexperienced to Grand Masters.
I loved two minute and three minute lightning matches. I bought a load of books from the chess shop on Euston road and studied obscure openings that wouldn't fool anyone in an hour long match but really threw people who were playing quickly. I achieved a good international rating.
I was working at this new media company at the time, Howard worked there too, it was lots of fun working there. I'd play many games of chess throughout the day. Suddenly I became increasingly nervous and the excitement, and the adrenaline that I'd get from playing a game were replaced by fear. The countdown to the match became more and more difficult with each game, I became too scared to play chess!
It was good while it lasted though, when you are obsessed with defending and improving your international rating winning a game of speed chess is very gratifying.
I loved two minute and three minute lightning matches. I bought a load of books from the chess shop on Euston road and studied obscure openings that wouldn't fool anyone in an hour long match but really threw people who were playing quickly. I achieved a good international rating.
I was working at this new media company at the time, Howard worked there too, it was lots of fun working there. I'd play many games of chess throughout the day. Suddenly I became increasingly nervous and the excitement, and the adrenaline that I'd get from playing a game were replaced by fear. The countdown to the match became more and more difficult with each game, I became too scared to play chess!
It was good while it lasted though, when you are obsessed with defending and improving your international rating winning a game of speed chess is very gratifying.
Monday, 27 June 2011
Name Change
Howard went to the same school as me, although we didn't become friends until after I had been expelled for having some cannabis. This is a ridiculous story that I will tell another time. I didn't even know how to roll a joint.
One day we had nothing to do. We spent a while in the pub the Waterloo and then felt frustrated when we saw that the chip shop was closed for the afternoon. I noticed that the building beside it was a solicitors office and, since I was entitled to legal aid, I proposed that changing my name by deed pole would be a worthwhile way to while away some time until the chip shop opened.
Mrs Freeman, the solicitor could see me straight away. But I hadn't thought what name I should change mine to. Howard and I came up with a few ideas but none fitted and the solicitor had no suggestions at all. I decided to get rid of my surname altogether and have only a forename, I have never cared much for the name Wilson. The solicitor said that she would check the legality of having only one name and that she would contact me.
Coincidentally, the solicitor was the mother of a boy who went to the same school as Howard, my old school. Steve had thuggish tendencies and now, I think, works for the Metropolitan Police. A year previously, while we were all at the 5th form school ball, Howard made a funny come back to some insult or other that Steven had dished out and Steven, lost for words (he wasn't so bright) punched Howard in the face.
After a few days passed, Mrs Freeman telephoned and asked me to return to the office and sign some documents to finalise the changing of my name. I did so and she issued me with letters to post to my bank, the passport authorities, the vehicle licensing agency and so on.
I told my parents and was surprised that they took offence to me joining the likes of Sting, Prince, Madonna and Cher. They appeared to be genuinely hurt by such an idea as leaving my family name behind and so to avoid upsetting them I never posted my letters but have them still today, somewhere or other.
One day we had nothing to do. We spent a while in the pub the Waterloo and then felt frustrated when we saw that the chip shop was closed for the afternoon. I noticed that the building beside it was a solicitors office and, since I was entitled to legal aid, I proposed that changing my name by deed pole would be a worthwhile way to while away some time until the chip shop opened.
Mrs Freeman, the solicitor could see me straight away. But I hadn't thought what name I should change mine to. Howard and I came up with a few ideas but none fitted and the solicitor had no suggestions at all. I decided to get rid of my surname altogether and have only a forename, I have never cared much for the name Wilson. The solicitor said that she would check the legality of having only one name and that she would contact me.
Coincidentally, the solicitor was the mother of a boy who went to the same school as Howard, my old school. Steve had thuggish tendencies and now, I think, works for the Metropolitan Police. A year previously, while we were all at the 5th form school ball, Howard made a funny come back to some insult or other that Steven had dished out and Steven, lost for words (he wasn't so bright) punched Howard in the face.
After a few days passed, Mrs Freeman telephoned and asked me to return to the office and sign some documents to finalise the changing of my name. I did so and she issued me with letters to post to my bank, the passport authorities, the vehicle licensing agency and so on.
I told my parents and was surprised that they took offence to me joining the likes of Sting, Prince, Madonna and Cher. They appeared to be genuinely hurt by such an idea as leaving my family name behind and so to avoid upsetting them I never posted my letters but have them still today, somewhere or other.
Sunday, 26 June 2011
I Wish It Could Be Christmas Every Day
Howard and I spent the last of our teenage years doing nothing. Nights in the Royal Oak pub playing pool, visiting awful nightclubs in Cambridge and meeting no one. We had absolutely nothing to do.
Here is a good example of a typical night. We were in some bar in the middle of nowhere, a social club it looked like, fifties design. It was empty. Christmas was coming so I spent all of my money setting the jukebox up to play 'I Wish It Could Be Christmas Every Day' by Wizzard twenty times in a row. Of course the selection was only made, and it only played, once. We had no money but stole a bottle of wine, leaning over the bar.
There, that's a typical evening. Sometimes we made little films with Howard's dad's video camera but we usually just sat in a pub somewhere.
Happy Birthday Howard!
Here is a good example of a typical night. We were in some bar in the middle of nowhere, a social club it looked like, fifties design. It was empty. Christmas was coming so I spent all of my money setting the jukebox up to play 'I Wish It Could Be Christmas Every Day' by Wizzard twenty times in a row. Of course the selection was only made, and it only played, once. We had no money but stole a bottle of wine, leaning over the bar.
There, that's a typical evening. Sometimes we made little films with Howard's dad's video camera but we usually just sat in a pub somewhere.
Happy Birthday Howard!
Saturday, 25 June 2011
Nerdy Emails
When I was little I loved a couple of of cartoon annuals, 'The Willy The Kid' books by Leo Baxendale, who I later found out invented 'The Bash St. Kids.' They were anarchic and chaotic and I was fascinated by the intricacy of the cartoon strips with their asides and little jokes. I had a new look at them a few years ago and they were still good.
I saw that the author had hidden some swear words in them. In each book there was a letter from Willy himself, full of spelling errors and scribbled out words. One example of a hidden word that I remember off the top of my head is 'count dracula' being mentioned, only it follows a scribbled out misspelling of 'cunt dracula.' I think that it's quite interesting that the author of a comic book for children hides swear words in it, no? Quite strange?
Well, The Projects toured the UK with Broadcast in 2003 and James and Lisa got on very well. As a result James remixed one of our songs 'Accidents Will Happen' and I also had a remix by Matt/Simon and I thought that a 7" with them both would be super. I sent Leo an email and asked if there was any possibility at all of him doing a quick sketch of the band in the style of Willy The Kid. He wrote back saying that arthritis had forced him to give up illustration in 2002, it prevented him from holding a pen properly. Isn't the inevitability of ageing the saddest thing?
I have also received a couple of other celebrity emails. I wrote to Bjarne Stroustrup, the inventor of the C++ programming language saying only 'thanks for inventing C++' to which he replied 'No problem!' I had just completed a perfect copy of the ZX Spectrum game 'Manic Miner' by Matthew Smith that I wrote in C++. I then went on to make a fast 3D engine (I was pleased with it, for those who know C++ it used only pointers, it was slightly clever.) I also had a brief exchange of emails with Matthew Smith. Rumour has it that he took too many psychedelic drugs after writing his smash hit 80s computer game and lost his marbles.
I wanted to go on to become a programmer at some place or other making playstation games but after a little while I lost interest and carried on with my employer on Charlotte Road in Shoreditch and later freelance, making crappy games for the internet.
I also had a brief email exchange with Gary Gygax, the inventor of the role playing game 'Dungeons and Dragons,' who died a few years ago. I wrote explaining that I had enjoyed the idea of role playing when I was a child, studying the books and adventures, but usually no one wanted to play it with me.
I saw that the author had hidden some swear words in them. In each book there was a letter from Willy himself, full of spelling errors and scribbled out words. One example of a hidden word that I remember off the top of my head is 'count dracula' being mentioned, only it follows a scribbled out misspelling of 'cunt dracula.' I think that it's quite interesting that the author of a comic book for children hides swear words in it, no? Quite strange?
Well, The Projects toured the UK with Broadcast in 2003 and James and Lisa got on very well. As a result James remixed one of our songs 'Accidents Will Happen' and I also had a remix by Matt/Simon and I thought that a 7" with them both would be super. I sent Leo an email and asked if there was any possibility at all of him doing a quick sketch of the band in the style of Willy The Kid. He wrote back saying that arthritis had forced him to give up illustration in 2002, it prevented him from holding a pen properly. Isn't the inevitability of ageing the saddest thing?
I have also received a couple of other celebrity emails. I wrote to Bjarne Stroustrup, the inventor of the C++ programming language saying only 'thanks for inventing C++' to which he replied 'No problem!' I had just completed a perfect copy of the ZX Spectrum game 'Manic Miner' by Matthew Smith that I wrote in C++. I then went on to make a fast 3D engine (I was pleased with it, for those who know C++ it used only pointers, it was slightly clever.) I also had a brief exchange of emails with Matthew Smith. Rumour has it that he took too many psychedelic drugs after writing his smash hit 80s computer game and lost his marbles.
I wanted to go on to become a programmer at some place or other making playstation games but after a little while I lost interest and carried on with my employer on Charlotte Road in Shoreditch and later freelance, making crappy games for the internet.
I also had a brief email exchange with Gary Gygax, the inventor of the role playing game 'Dungeons and Dragons,' who died a few years ago. I wrote explaining that I had enjoyed the idea of role playing when I was a child, studying the books and adventures, but usually no one wanted to play it with me.
Friday, 24 June 2011
My Doppelganer
After a night out in Shoreditch in early 2010, Consuelo reported seeing my doppelganger. I think it was in the bar Dream Bags at the beginning of Kingsland Road.
A few weeks later she and our friend Hiroe saw him again, in the bar 'Catch,' but this time she took a photo. I had asked them to get his number if they ever saw him again, but they were too shy. He must have been too good looking! After all, he looked identical to me. He was even wearing the same clothes and had the same haircut! He was ten years younger, mind you.
So, if you see my doppelganger hanging out in Shoreditch then do get his email address for me. Perhaps it was a ghost?
A few weeks later she and our friend Hiroe saw him again, in the bar 'Catch,' but this time she took a photo. I had asked them to get his number if they ever saw him again, but they were too shy. He must have been too good looking! After all, he looked identical to me. He was even wearing the same clothes and had the same haircut! He was ten years younger, mind you.
So, if you see my doppelganger hanging out in Shoreditch then do get his email address for me. Perhaps it was a ghost?
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