Opening dialogue from The Naked Civil Servant:

Quentin's Father: Are you going to spend all day in front of that mirror?
Quentin: If I possibly can.

<img src="http://www.fosca.com/mememe.jpg"></img><img src="http://www.fosca.com/mememe.jpg"></img><img src="http://www.fosca.com/mememe.jpg"></img>

Awake from a dream akin to that scene in "Being John Malkovitch". A world where everyone, male and female, looks like me.

Except for me, it's not a nightmare.

Living as we are in an age of celebrities-uber-alles, I take great comfort in the most useless instances of name-dropping and celeb spotting.

I have once spoken to Morrissey. I said "'Scuse Me." He was standing in front of me at a gig.

I've emailed Mo Tucker of the Velvet Underground to tell her that her website had an error on it. She emailed me back. "Thanks."

Feel free to add your own stories. On no account must they be interesting or impressive.

Thing is, I'm outdone by magazines and gossip columns who actually print such accounts as entertaining and revelatory. For example, "Spotted: Dale Winton in a road, yesterday". That sort of thing. It's beyond parody.

Heat Magazine is a trashy and fun magazine that I shamefacedly confess to enjoying. But it does have an irritating habit of extending its net of celebrity definition a little too far. They recently published a two-page photo spread on Radio 1 DJ Dave Moyles spotted having a cigarette outside Broadcasting House, his place of employment. It was the photos that got me. What is the reader's reaction meant to be? Surprised? Impressed?

A few weeks ago I attended <a href="http://www.promnight.co.uk/">"Prom Night"</a>, a London club which plays the music of 80s John Hughes films like The Breakfast Club, Pretty In Pink, Some Kind Of Wonderful, and so on. A bit like those School Disco clubs, but with much more style and class, and much less of a hen night / stag night / office party element. In England, we don't have Proms at school. We just watch them in countless US films and TV series and grind our bad teeth in envy.

They even nominate a Prom King & Queen for the night. Needless to say it was me as soon as I walked in:

<img src="http://fp.promnight.f9.co.uk/Prom%20Night%20site/06-02-king-queen.JPG"></IMG>

Bucket of pig's blood not pictured.

The Prom Queen, amusingly, was so reluctant to be with me it wasn't true. So it really was just like being back at school. She handed back her Prom Queen sash soon after the photos were taken. So I snatched it up and put that one on too. I intend to wear it at the next Fosca show.

To be fair, though, her reluctance, as she explained to me later, was mainly due to not having her best ballgown on. She'd been a regular to the club, and you can only get crowned once. And the club isn't on again for a while.

I requested "High Fidelity" by The Kids From Fame. And they played it, too. A wonderful record, with one of the campest opening lyrics of all time:

<i>"Other boys may turn me on / But I let temptation slide…"</i>

The new Fosca album is released on August 12th. The same day as the "Sapphire and Steel" DVD. A fitting coincidence.

Not only that, but on the sleeve of the former, I happen to be wearing the same tie as David McCallum on the latter:

<img src="http://www.fosca.com/traycardback.jpg"></img>

<img src="http://www.blackstar.co.uk/img/video/cover/front-sorted/7000000/07/16/31.jpg"></img>

"All irregularities will be handled by the forces controlling each dimension."

Handle me! Handle me!

Last night, I managed to be very clever and fit all of my week's nightlife into one evening.

I met up at the Dublin Castle in Camden with the aloof Johnny Johnson, who was once the singer in <a href="http://www.siddeleys.com/">The Siddeleys</a>. She remained my escort for the first three of the four outings.
<img src="http://www.howdoesitfeel.f9.co.uk/twodickon.jpg"></img>

After catching the set there by the talented <lj user=linusland>, managing in the process to say hi to <lj user=jinty> and <lj user=andypop>, we quickly relocated up the road to Dingwalls and caught most of Cinerama's set. After greeting <lj user=mzdt>, it was off to Tottenham Court Road to investigate <a href="http://www.popstarz.org/naginfo.htm">"Nag Nag Nag"</a> at The Ghetto, which is a Popstarz-offshoot club that plays "electroclash". I'd been given a flyer at The Liquid Lounge the previous Saturday, and told I'd fit right in there. Well, I did and I didn't, really. Plenty of dressed-up young things dancing away, but after being there for an hour, I still didn't recognise any of the music. To my out of touch ears, it just sounded like hard industrial dance music, with a synthy edge. Not really my sort of thing. Maybe I came at the wrong moment, but I was feeling restless, and retired to the club next door,"The Rabbit Hole" at The Metro, where they play, well, pop songs that I did recognise.

Some things learned:

-Johnny Johnson will not get on a tube train.
-Cinerama are a fantastic live band. Better than The Wedding Present ever were. Even when they actually <i>become</i>The Wedding Present for a few songs, they're still better.
-David Gedge fans aren't <i>just</i> thirtyish men with thick necks, tidy little sideburns, and faces like Rodney Bewes. Although it did seem that way when I last saw Cinerama a couple of years ago, the audience tonight was much more healthily mixed. Lots of nubile young things of all sexes. And Sean Hughes, who passed me by the toilets and pretended to not know who I was, the fool.
-Mr Gedge still looks exactly the same as he did on the sleeve of "George Best". Same initials as Dorian Gray.
-Dingwalls is far too small for Cinerama. And too hot.

At the Rabbit Hole, a man sat next to me:
Man: Where's your bird?
Me: I haven't got one.
Man: But you must be here to pull birds, right? All dressed up like that?
Me: (shocked silence)

Rented out "Girl, Interrupted". Winona Ryder's opening dialogue is now unintentionally amusing:

"Have you ever confused a dream with life? Or stolen something when you had the cash?"

I'm new to this LiveJournal game, so when you click on my "Memories", it says "user has no memories".

Which suits me fine.

I do have a terrible trouble remembering names and faces. And this in turn often gets me into terrible trouble with people whom I haven't seen for some time. They take great umbrage if I can't remember their names, or anything about them at all.

But I can't help it. My brain is connected up so badly. I think Andy Warhol said something similar: that there were chemicals lacking in his brain which other people had and he didn't.

My ambition is to leave my name to a new syndrome.

Admittedly, there are some painful, unhappy memories of my past I have deliberately blanked out in order to look myself in the eye of a morning.

That time I sat through all of the "The Horse Whisperer", for starters.

My stock apology is the the same as God's Last Message To Mankind, taken from the missing final verse of The Book Of Revelation. This has been lost for centuries, and was only recently discovered by myself in a wet hedge near Brentford.

I'd better impart it to the world now, before I forget that too:

<i>Revelation 22:22:
And I heard the Lord God's last message unto every man:
<center><b>"DON'T

TAKE

IT

PERSONALLY".</i></b></center>

One of my favourite jokes heard recently was by Jeremy Hardy:

"My daughter asked me to buy her a pair of Nikes. I told her, 'You're 11 years old, you can make some yourself.' "

I couldn't actually go to Mardi Gras, as <a href="http://www.fosca.com/">Fosca</a> were rehearsing all afternoon, but I did go to the Liquid Lounge in the evening, where many revellers had ended up, including Suede in their little VIP aftershow area of the club.

Pretty much everyone I know who's in the least bit lavender was there, including <lj user=charleston>, whom I hadn't seen for some time, holding court with a gaggle of admirers as usual. She compared me to her friend Katherine Gifford from <a href="http://www.snowpony.com/">Snowpony</a> for some reason. I still don't know what she meant by that. But then, the whole night was clouded by an alcoholic haze. This is something I really should address: I like to have a nice night out, but I could do without the amnesiac element of several jars too many. Not to mention the effect on my wallet.

Matt sends me a small review of the new <a href="http://www.fosca.com/">Fosca</a> single from "Unpeeled", the unofficial paper-only fanzine for the John Peel show:

"FOSCA: Secret Crush On Third Trombone

"The "A" track is a bit of accomplished and muscular whimsy, if there is such a thing, pushed along by a seriously overweight bass. An attractive noise, 80's bombast saved and beyond by sharp lyrics and impeccable timing. Neat, but not a patch on… "Diary of an Antibody", spoken diary entries, increasingly odd, funny and poignant "of course I blow my own trumpet, anyone else's would be unhygienic" and "sex is the PE of adult life and I've got a note from my mother…" I'm afraid it's one of those "must have" records, please buy it, or at the very least get on to Uncle John, hassle him to play it and then tape it."

Reviewed by "Zak Ordinance Jnr of the Fifth U.S. Tactical and Social Gathering Bombing Wing".

I don't <i>think</i> that's anyone I know.