Month: May 1999
Unconventional Means Part 2
Having savoured the delights of Saturday night London, and after crept into my bed with the sun well above the horizon, this Blatherskite was in rag-order by the time he stumbled into the Commonwealth Institute on Kensington's High St., a little too late to barge-in and search for the thread of Jan Bondeson's 11 o'clock 'Basilisks, Vegetable Lambs, Stuffed Mermaids and Other Monsters and Marvels from Old Natural History', or Daniel Wojcik's 'From Spirit Photos to Apocalyptic Polaroids'. (Image of Sergio Della Sala) *Tardy* If we hadn't been so tardy, we would have lurched into the latter, familiar as we are already with vegetable lambs, and Bondeson's *A Cabinet of Medical Curiosities* (I.B. Tauris, 1997, ISBN 1-86064-228-4), and intrigued by what Wojcik had to say... A Cabinet of Medical Curiosities (Amazon.com) A Cabinet of Medical Curiosities (Amazon.co.uk) *Wry Grins* Instead we managed to make it to see Ted Harrison's 'Pre...
Unconventional Means Part 1
'We were somewhere over Manchester on the edge of England when the drugs began to take hold... and suddenly there was a terrible roar all around us and the sky was full of what looked like huge bats, all swooping and screeching and diving around the plane, which was going about a thousand miles an hour on the way to the UnConvention in London. And a voice screaming: "Holy Jesus! What are these goddamn animals?" 'I thought about telling the pilot, dragging myself up the aisle, fighting off the lizard-like stewardesses with my sword-stick, but no... ...no point in mentioning those bats I thought. The poor bastards will see them soon enough.' +Unconventional Means 1+ By 1100 hours, Blather's leading gonzo journalist staggered from his plane at London City Airport and lurched into the steaming fleshpots of the City. By 1900 hours he was seated by the Thames - outside...