Twenties.
So here I am. Thirty-eight today, my passport tells me. As does the entire technical support staff of Facebook, apparently. Can’t wait to see what they’ve all whipped ’round to get me. Those guys. ..Ooh, let’s see – now, they know how much I love old funk records… or big books of poster design… or Parisian café culture, er… or sharp shirts – ooh! – or Berlin inter-war, realist cinema or… Dr Who, so it should be easy for them to choose something good…
Actually, I talk of German silent cinema but we did, in fact, spend most of yesterday in the twenties. In celebration of me taking a significant diary-date step nearer the end of my thirties. Hmm. Anyway – Joe May’s syruppy gorgeous Asphalt, 1928, followed by Deutsch directorial legend Fritz Lang’s M, 1931. Films so closely linked by time, place and production people, yet so different in dialogue – not simply because one’s a late silent movie and one’s an early talkie.
Won’t bore you here, but you should see M in particular – launched the career of Peter Lorre with a quietly startling kangaroo court scene. ..Which you now can’t help thinking is because a kangaroo’s is a bloody odd costume to put a paedofile protagonist in – in any film. But you’re just being silly. So stop it.
Anyway – again – here I am. Apparently older. Apparently almost none-the-wiser.
If you’d like to know, Caroline bought me a nice big book of graphic-type stuff, in a little-veiled attempt to make me stop using bloody arrows in everything I design. To little avail, perhaps, as I found a fair few in it. I’m also sitting here in a birthday shirt, of course, listening to another birthday CD – John Coltrane. Helpful stuff to write to, as I continue with the sumptuous come-to-bed copywriting for Halo’s catalogue this afternoon, because I usually employ the clink of Martini glasses, a swinging walk and a wry wink whenever I’m making advances to my poor, beleaguered wife. So I, at least, am in the mood.
Other than that, I’m ignoring the screams of bankers and investment managers echoing from around the world and looking forward to a little mexican dinner at Coriander’s tonight with Mater and m’lady. Whether we’re facing a second Great Depression or not, I shall aim to stay chirpy in all things – because it seems clear to me that it’s all good. It’s all good.
However old I’m supposed to be.