Thursday, July 23, 2009

Greece: What Can I Say?

'What can I say?' is an excellent existential declaration of resignation. It is second only to the Russian declaration that translates (roughly) to: 'how could it be any other way?' These phrases are often used to describe something commonplace but troublesome, or in this case something for which words can add very little value.

'What can I say?' is how I feel about my trip to Greece. Keep in mind this was almost two months ago so clearly saying something wasn't top-of-mind, but I want to chronicle this trip here so when the book is published at the end of our wanders abroad there won't be a giant missing chapter.

We decided to take a week at an all-inclusive resort on the island of Kos, which (for us) was a bit of a splurge: beaches, pools, and all the free food and booze you can eat and drink. Basically, heaven. The ocean was cold but apart from that there's very little you can do to complain about an all-inclusive vacation in a resort. In fact we only left once, to go to Kos town, and that was just fine.

We did manage to spend a couple of days in Athens beforehand seeing the Acropolis and walking the city a bit. Athens is possibly one of the coolest cities I've been to in Europe, not only for the food (ranging from touristy to excellent) but just the overall vibe of the city: it felt like a place people lived rather than something that was gussied up for the sake of appearances. To be honest we were almost too tired to appreciate it: the vacation was an opportunity to recharge, and our time as tourists was just a prelude to laying on the beach and doing absolutely nothing.

Maybe that makes me a bad traveller. It's certainly different from the backpacking days in hostels. But all you can drink on the beach is a pretty strong argument for working a dayjob.

What can I say?

Monday, July 13, 2009

Interregnum

    An interregnum (plural interregna or interregnums) is a period of discontinuity of a government, organization, or social order.


Which is to say, my life right now. In London and otherwise. Which accounts for the absolute lack of posts on this blog in more than two months. So if you're still out there, I apologize profusely.

Things have been happening. We went to Greece. The photographic evidence is all over my Flickr stream, and if the code worked correctly I embedded it below. I'm not going to post about it because apart from Athens (which was great) and the beach (which was great and relaxing) there wasn't much to our trip to Greece. It was designed to relax, and relax it did.



My parents came for a visit. That's a massive blog post in and of itself, which I'll try to write up over the next week.

I saw Alan Moore and Michael Moorcock speak about the mythology of London at the British Library, a conversation which sparked my creative juices like nothing else has done since moving here. That's also another post I'll get around to in a bit.

The post title refers to the current reign of not-knowing in my life. Similar to how I felt before moving to London and not having a definite job, I'm now faced with an uncertain future on many fronts. There are a lot of giant question marks in my life right now. There are future goals but the road towards them is an uncertain and for me untravelled one.

I can't give details right now, but I will as I'm permitted. Nothing sinister mind you apart from the unknown. Although to bastardize Lovecraft - sometimes the fear of that is all the more sinister you need.