This blog is sponsored by tj's place and the st.john's international ariport

it is 2:45am
what do you mean you haven’t bought the latest issue of newfoundland quarterly with work by un certain terre neuvien par hasard!!!!!!
in which some things get accomplished but others not.
but first some explanation. getting these published is no mean feat at present.
the plan was to write them on the i-book use the tom ridge to transfer the imagery to the computers at wordplay and thus publish publish them there – the computer there are so old that i cannot find a usb connexion and i will be banned from the pouch cove public library if i upload - download? – anything. with the volvo i can go the airport and in the 30 minutes of free parking that i am allowed download while having my tim’s.

problem is i don’t have the volvo yet.

rang angie to pick me up in pouch and was told that jim was heading out to talk to someone who was leaving the next day. he would give me a lift into town.

while waiting i head down to the ocean where the morning group hangs out and sam is there. we chat a bit talking about the building in pouch and he gives me the low down on what is for sale some up insullivan’s loop but too crowded, one out by him but he doesn’t know where, don’t see why the gruchys hang on to their place it could house four families. whale were seen a couple of days ago, caplelin are pretty much gone, wat
ched a seagull guard a lobster pot. paul’s?

arriving early we do an outing around pouch and bauline where i pointed to all the houses that i had looked at to buy. he rubs it in by showing me one that i knew about in bauline that was for sale in 1999 for $5000. – remember all funds are in loonies. full ocean view.

while he was saying good-bye downstairs – i was dragged into the upstairs studio to hear tirades about the place. the dirt, the disrepair etc. i said i know but it has improved and proceed to point out the improvements made in the last year. i found out that the welcoming committee at the elementary school residences was to see my reaction when i walked in and only to disappoint them when i said things look great. people forget that i was here during the demolition of the school, i was here when the old wiring was pulled out, when there were barely doors. so to me it does look great. i still prefer the pipe house or anything on the ocean but it is cleaner than the lower pipe house.

i also have come to realise that the place is treated like a hotel in a vacation resort. people expect sharon to come in and clean their mess daily, they expect to leave the place in a mess and have sharon drop by to clean. i have seen better but these places have definitely been worse.

two people in the school now must be part of a secret society as they lock themselves in their rooms and never come out. i like being alone up here but the idea of the school was to have an artist colony to foster communication and since there is no bar close by the common rooms were to be used that way. david and i leave our doors open the others only come out to get food from the kitchen and head back to their rooms.

stopped by tj to see about the volvo, the breaks work now and vibration in the steering column was fixed i should ring him in the evening.

at the gallery undria and later ally helped in the hanging of the show which was done in an afternoon when we finally fond some touch up paint to match the wall. it looks good and as soon as jason’s work arrives it will be finished – oh canada post. the opening is to-morrow.

nothing is hurried – which i like at wordplay - so while hanging i ran up the street to canada customs to get back my $21 that i paid in tax on the film i had shipped.

i stopped into the family barbershop to talk see if the newfoundland quarterly got the portrait of messeuirs doyle and powell? they did the issue is out and i cannot find it.

met angela antle who interviewed me on the cbc when i had the show in gander. wasn’t at all what i expected.

for lunch didn’t go to the duke as it seems that no one was hungry thus thought about arthur arthur for some samosa – closed 11 months ago. thought about auntie cray’s but remembered that the other bookshop in duckworth street was now closed and there was a middle eastern restaurant in its place.

the short life span of businesses along duckworth street – the buck weavers fast food is now a sushi restaurant, which is beside the middle eastern restaurant which is beside django’s the bistro. i still have my $100 gift certificate that i cannot seem to make use of.

entered asked for a falafel and tabbouleh. the falafel was being cooked as we speak. so what is usually a fast food type of thing was going to take some time – 30 minutes actually.

there were a few strange things, the falafel in fact everything was serve on a burrito – a falafel wrap – instead of pita. you could get a pickle with it. the manager name is rafael diaz.

there was a woman in the seated in the window also waiting and looking over a pretty bad map of st. john’s. where should she go? the tourist board was open.
-where have you been
-the bars in george street. the first mistake.
mentioned the ship for music.
she hadn’t been to signal hill, didn’t know what it was even though it was outside her window at the hotel newfoundland. i ranted.
mentioned the battery – if she could handle it she was very preggers and to get a axi to take her to cape spear so at least she could say that she could go no farther in north america.

it is funny how things are circular here in newfoundland – she is an airhostess for …
continental airlines – another rant about the quality of service – well not really as i don’t know what the service is like. she was here because she didn’t know what the airport code yyt was. she also had no clue on where the rock was.

there were many things – never eaten middle eastern food her first falafel and tabbouleh – which was now out of the cooker and being broken into even smaller pieces by hand by the person behind the counter, then arranged neatly on the tortilla with a hummus spread.

i reckoned that i had plenty of time so i ran back to the gallery to pick up ubaldo and make a snap of her, the manager and the woman making lovingly preparing the falafel.

i was right there was still a good ten minutes left as she then took the falafel wraps and placed them in a george forman type of grill to toast the tortilla a bit.

the tabbouleh was mainly mint with a spittle of bulger and a hint of tomato, there was so much mint that it took on the appearance of mould.

it looks like there will be a new enterprise in the spot come next year.

ringing tj we found out that everything was fine but it needed a speedometer.
-what for?
-in case you’re pulled over
- i won’t get pulled over

it will be ready to-morrow. ( no airport, no dominion for decent coffee and food) have to go back to pouch early.

the lift of the evening was sponsored by a reporter who wanted to make snaps of david who is the next show at the gallery – paintings made at dusk around st. john’s
and pouch. i scammed a digital camera so that we can wander later – between dusk and dark using the excuse to document potential property for me and my mum.

ride back starts with a how modern newfoundland should be and ends with a anti bush rant – no disagreement here. early evening when we arrive at the school, i head south to a house that has potential on a hill with nothing but land between it and the ocean. i add to the homage to carl english series with a great basketball hoop behind the house. problem is there is too much land – my mother is very picky one can only see water no land whatsoever along the horizon. it fails. i also photograph in a livyer formalist style – merging clothes lines wires with fences, houses with an atv thrown in..

notice that i am nodding more at people but not stopping them to take their snap.
photograph the mural under the pipe house but ignore the lobster pot sculptures.
passing paul’s place he calls out and entering his shed i ask if he got the snap i h ad promised – nope. furious i ask if jordy did – he doesn’t know. his wife was there – whom i photographed in the blizzard of 2001, i promised to send her an image also. i was recognised by other who remember me photographing the capelin last july.
i photograph their daughter and will bring up a print from st. john’s to-morrow.

i come back to download the snaps and head to northern pouch to do the same making sure that i show that harold’s house has land – the most promising spot even if his house would need improvement to be a pit. run into henry langmead – whose house was sold to other yanks when we pulled out $75 000. three acres on the ocean no land in sight on a cliff with an outbuilding am always a bit depressed when i pass 28 sullivan’s loop.

am escorted by a dog on my way up and his friend on the way back, i stop at sharon’s place to photograph a bench and broken swing set. before heading back as it is getting to be time to make snaps with david.

pick up the digital and go scouting, looking for pratt like building - think of ted’s place. ted’s there, i ask after the boat that he is building and he shows it to us, almost finished needs paint. david asks to have a light turned on as he wants artificial light with the waning ambient light. i worry that we will piss off ted. he is awaiting his son to help plough his potato patch. i head over to the ocean and find a pile of potatoes that didn’t make it from last year. some snaps made of the outbuildings. tell him about harold’s place and now he is interested – pisser. walk over to sharon’s place to see the new deck that she built, didn’t know about it and thought that it was the picnic table that i had seen or jesse’s seat for her. i stumble across a deck made from pallets with a restaurant chair on it. too late in the evening for me but david is fine.

he makes more snaps heading back to the school we download them on the i-book and head out again. all the time talking about art and life and their links. am shocked this sort of thing doesn’t happen in the real estate conglomerate that fronts as an art school below the 49th. it is not the talking that is shocking everyone talks – and talks and talks – it seems to be a pentecostal like justification for not actually making any art not like that seems important.

david is one who keeps his studio open for chats, more or like the studio cooperatives people were in at goldsmiths’.

we head out again to the town hall, he making snaps me watching the skateboarders in the main road and the potential for accidents as it is narrow and a blind spot for traffic.

get up the nerve to go over and speak to one of the kids. mention that i have been documenting people that i run into on the rock and i would like to photograph them sometime soon so that i can rid people of the idea that the province is made up of toothless cod fishermen, yearning for the days that flakes stretched to the horizon.
it would have to be earlier in the evening
-how about to-morrow?
-will be in st.john’s maybe over the week-end ok?
-ok and he gives me a ghetto like handshake.
cannot wait to start based on what was said in the car up to pouch and this the new series will be the other 10% or is it 5%. from the fact that 90 (or 95%) of canadians live within 160km of the states.

head into bruce’s to show david some of my work that is on the wall there. one of the subjects is behind the counter. we chat a bit and i threaten to make another soon.

it is now ten we download the work to take into the gallery to-morrow. am quite pleased with myself the day was no great shakes but it reinforced that i am more a c.f.a. than a tourist. feel much more at home here than in peasants pissoir more subjects of substance are discussed here than in the intellectual mecca of the saic realty company.

in wisconsin the tension line is the illinois border. i now know that the tension line is the 49th parallel and we are hundreds of miles above that.

now to get that volvo…

to-day's blog
CHASED FROM THE DUKE!
GRAPE VIEN
AND, SHOCK HORROR
GRAFENBERG'S