[Pink Pig Time Machine by Wilfrid: November 24, 2008]
I had thought Camberley was located somewhere in that uncharted terra incognita casually referred to as "South London". I suppose it is, but South London extends, if I'm any judge, almost as far as the White Cliffs of Dover, and possibly into the Channel.
It was a mistake, then, to jump into a black London taxi somewhere in the West End and ask to whsiked Camberley-wards. An expensive mistake, and it was an exceptionally cold journey too as the bitter November night closed in. The objective, during this protracted London stay, was to look up close friends for a couple of days. On the second, they sweetly threw a dinner for me and my party, and we feasted on jerk chicken, rice and beans.
Emerging from the suburbs, I spent a final night in Soho (and looked at some new sculptures by Rachel Whiteread at the D'Offay gallery) before finally heading back to New York with a new copy of Alexander Trocchi's first novel, Cain's Book, for the flight.
After fifteen nights away from home - from the new apartment in Gramercy Park, in fact - there was an early start the next day for shopping, getting keys cut, shifting furniture around, and still unpacking. As for shopping, the one thing I needed above all, I had somehow concluded, was a silver-topped evening cane from a shop in SoHo called Posh. To go with that, I bought a goose at Union Square Greenmarket (yes, I do sometimes look back and wonder).
The evening entertainment allowed me to dive back into what songwriters have called the New York "groove". It was the annual Cavestomp garage rock festival, held at the much-missed Coney Island High on St Mark's Place, then a dark and intensely smoky dive of a venue. Among the attractions were two bands still extant, The Raunch Hands and The Plug Uglies, but the main attraction was the frenetic absurdity of the deathless Fleshtones, who even as I type are taking remote hinterlands of Ontario by storm.
Sunday followed, as it so often does, and involved fistfuls of beer at McSorley's, then the compilation of a cassoulet featuring parts of the purchased goose. A 1996 Crozes-Hermitage, and a long night's sleep.
Next week, Thanksgiving.
