please end summer, you suck

Not only will summer ending be a good thing in itself but it will reduce the number of summers before we see a conclusion, for there must be a conclusion, to the right-wing insanity of much of the world at the moment. IE the end of summer will be a hurdle. Indeed if we see, as we surely must, Trump's power reduced at the US midterms in um 2027, then we really only have one full summer to get through. 

I have made a decent writerly space for myself on my small balcony which actually works well although the wifi is not always brilliant (but still, it gets there more or less). It was a junk space for years and I will most definitely sometime be locked out there you bet but I also find it very good for getting stupid little things done, like today I finessed my first lecture of the year. This is the so-called view from the balcony - pretty ridiculous I suppose, though it is definitely trees (and slightly miserable pot plants which I water lovingly every day). 

Mouldy cat picture rescued from a street in Flemington, plant Laura didn't want anymore and I did. 

The loyal animals nearby: Helms

Nancy - very much in repose

Perry - he stays close

Books for me to read while I wait for someone to come and rescue me when I get locked out on the balcony, which will definitely happen one day before too long. 

sunday morning in helsinki (two weeks ago) - part one

Greetings to you from the Hotel Anna. I think I have actually stayed here twice before, or perhaps only once. Definitely I stayed a few days here on my first ever trip to Finland, which I believe was in 2011. It is old school, I suppose I hate that term as much as I hate any term which has kind of detached from its original wry or hip meaning, so that really people who use it actually just mean 'old' (ok well I guess they mean 'old but valid'?). For instance, my room has this phone in it, and I am pretty sure it's not even ironic:

I don't have a clue about the story of this hotel but when I see the other people staying here, in the breakfast room, I suspect they have been guided here by their valuing of proximity to the city and an eschewing of costly (faux-) luxury. I had a quick look at Tripadvisor expecting a swathe of 'never since I had my wallet stolen in Phoenix in 1981 and had to slum it in a run-down...' reviews - not a reflection on the place as I see it but on its resilient rejection of frippery - but there were none, which I can't interpret. 

I'm on the fifth floor, this is what I see out the window this morning (just before 9 am). Not bad. 

I had to have the window open as the room was quite warm when I got here, it wasn't uncomfortable. I was zonked, as they say, so although there were drunken gronks going past having super loud conversations (the last one just some young men bellowing, I know they were young because I looked out the window to see who was doing this, they had the faces of 80 year olds though) I wasn't that bothered. 

The big dumb thing about today is that whereas I was originally scheduled to get in on Saturday morning, in fact I didn't make it till Saturday evening - whole waste of a day - and things don't get started in a hurry in Finland on Sundays. You guessed it - this is depressing and embarrassing but just true - I can't handle the day without coffee. I had some coffee in the breakfast room but it was the coffee of non-coffee drinkers i.e. insufferably bland, I just had some the way junkies put water in their old needles hoping to get a little of the residue. So my next step is to go out and find an outlet for one of the cafe chains - Espresso House - which apparently is due to open in 8 minutes. Not 7, not 9 but 8. 

More anon.