Music.

Yesterday, I saw Jens Lekman at the Odeon Theater in Vienna. The venue was simply amazing, a huge neo-classical hall, mostly empty save for the space in the middle that was used as 'stage' and the tribune with the seats for the audience.

There is only a crappy mobile photo but look:

It was the first time I ever saw Mr. Lekman play live, and it was great. He started out with a couple of songs that he accompanied with his guitar only, except for some occasional support from his drummer, and I must say, I almost prefer those simple arrangements to the album versions. Towards the end he sort of increased the volume, using more pre-recorded tracks. Then he walked away from the microphone and stood right in front of the audience and did Shirin. End of the set.

An encore was requested, but he just said: "That song just now felt like a good ending, and I wouldn’t want to spoil it. If you want to hear any other songs, just come to me later and I will play them for you personally." (He actually kept the promise, too.)

It was a good night.

Interrail #8

Dear friends, I am horrible with uploading and blogging photos.
One prime example is the seemingly inexhaustible stock of Interrail travel pictures, which are now over a year old and still waiting patiently on my hard drive to be posted and written about. So I figured it was about time that I continued the series. As you perhaps remember, the last stop was Paris.
After that we hurried on to Amiens, a small town in Picardy, famous for its gothic cathedral (built between 1220 and 1270).
Apart from that, it’s just an ordinary French small town, I guess. See yourself.

Upon arrival, we find the weather decidedly colder than we had experienced in the days before. Button up!

Here we go then! The façade. Much excitement. Amiens was my favourite gothic cathedral back then. (I’ve since decided that it’s not that easy to say.)

Max and a couple of headless martyrs. The sculptures in the embrasure of the portals are worth the visit alone.

Inside. (Can you see the cracks? That’s for trying to get too close to heaven.)

I walked all the way to the centre of the labyrinth.

This is sculpture is called la Vierge Dorée. It used to be gilt, hence the name. It also used to be on the outside of the cathedral, which is why it is no longer gilt.

More martyrdom!? Don’t you love catholicism and its crazy love affair with death? Don’t you love the executioner’s bum? Don’t you love the little dog looking on in wonder? One day I will write a paper on the significance of all the little dogs looking on in wonder in Christian art.

More death love! I would have loved to take this (decidedly un-gothic) little cherub with his skull home with me. It would have been great on my non-existent mantelpiece.

Outside: Official buildings are still decked out in Bastille Day decorations!

Well, well! (Haha, oh no.)

Are you in the mood for some flying buttresses? Honestly. How could you not be?

Me in full interrail gear. Go front-and-backpack! And already we say good-bye to Amiens. Efficient tourism, is what I call that. On to ... LILLE.

Hello, international waters. So the Dutch word for rental is cognate with "whore" and "Hure". Car whoring, anyone?

WAITING FOR THE EUROSTAR!!!

WAITING FOR THE EUROSTAR TOO!!! Bye!

Film time & Bear suit weather

Today I spent two and a half hours queuing (and freezing) for tickets for the Viennale. As a result I have tickets for: Submarine, Le Havre, L’hypothèse du tableau volé.

Trailers!


Exciting. I will report back upon having watched.

Unfortunately, there is no trailer for L’hypothèse du tableau volé to be had, but instead here’s a picture of Susan Sontag in a bearsuit (photographed by Annie Leibowitz and found in this treasure trove of pictures), and that will be all for today.

.
Good night!

October!

I figured it was time to kick-start this blog and write something.
I sincerely apologise for being like: "Aiee, lurkers! Y U no say anything!" and then disappearing for almost a month. I’ve been rather busy, and also I’ve been avoiding the blog out of guilt because I promised you Florence pictures, but the film I had developed came back blank and I cried bitter tears. It’s horrible. I will steal some of the digital photos from M.’s camera, though, so the whole trip won’t be entirely undocumented, visual-wise.

Also: What do you know? It’s autumn, already!

Several new things are in my life, like a tutoring job at university, to which I’m supposed to dedicate 2 hours of my week, which is what I get paid for. In reality, I’m kinda working over-time for free, because I really enjoy it (?). It might well be that I am – by nature or nurture – conditioned to be something like a teacher. It’s not a profession that receives much respect these days, but it’s still better than something that might be paraphrased “expert on books and pictures”. Imagine if the experts on books and pictures went on strike! Mayhem! (I’m being facetious, and I also have a strong futility complex.)

Another new thing in my life is actually a lack. Another one of my best friends (dot) has moved away, left the country, buzzed off, cleared out, absquatulated, gone expatriate. Considering the amount of friends I have, this is even more of a tragedy that it would already be if she was just one of many good friends. I made a list, and it turns out, as of now, I have two (2) non-related people in my vicinity who I would without doubt call my friends, and who don’t already have at least 15 people in their life who are much more important to them than I am. And one of them is my boyfriend. Everyone else is scattered across the globe. But the scattered people are not that many either.
I don’t want to moan, this is just something that I’ve been thinking about quite a lot, recently. I’d like a couple more good people in my life. Why am I so crap at making (and keeping) friends? Is there a way I can learn how to be better at it? Open University or something? I’m puzzled.

But anyway. Here’s two autumn outfits that I made today. I wanted them to reflect my new boring trademark style.

Allons-y au cinéma! by housewitheyebrows

October Staple by housewitheyebrows