Sunday 20 March 2016

#9 NINE LIVES





NINE LIVES!



"NUMBER NINE - Doctor's orders!"   Quoi?  It's not intuitively obvious where this bingo call comes from, but your grandparents would have known. In World War 2, army doctors used to give out a laxative, which was called 'Number 9'. Have I given you a fascinating piece of trivia to fill any conversational lull in your next dinner party, or what?  

Nine is not as rich in associations as seven but there are a few: nine bells (no idea) nine ladies dancing (12 days of Christmas, or gay edition of Strictly?), Nine Elms (New Covent Garden, Battersea Dogs Home), dressed up to the 9s (9 is a biblical superlative, later often associated with clothing), the whole nine yards (highly disputed origin), a stitch in time saves nine,  cloud 9, 'nine times out of ten', nine day wonder, and of course, the wonderful Niner Simone.  There are two other weird aspects of 9: one is that back in the days of, literally, dialling telephone numbers on a revolving dial, the 9 was almost the furthest number, and therefore the longest to move round to and longest to return to base, in order to dial the next number. So in picking 999 as the emergency number it would take longer to summon help than necessary. Now of course 111 has been chosen for non-emergency medical help. A lesson learned? Not really, these things don't apply to push button or mobile phones in the same way, and there's less hurry with a non-emergency call.

Finally, when you multiply a number by 9, then take the resulting digits and add them together, it always come to 9. For example, 6 x 9 is 54. Add 5 to 4  =  9. I can't think of a single aspect of my life which is helped in any way by this numerical phenomenon, so it is relegated to the category of clever, very hard to explain and utterly useless).

All numbers are unique, but to paraphrase Orwell, some numbers are more unique than others. Seven is the single most popular number in our culture but nine runs it close for use in expressions. Of course, cats have nine lives, or they think they do, which is why they often look knowing, and quite smug.




DIFFERENT IS GOOD


 In the next few weeks I would like to 'memorialise' some people who have made a unique contribution to history, by daring to be different. Some choices may be surprising to you but probably not the first one:

Muhammad Ali


 Ali used his fame when he was at the top of his game to
make a stand against the Vietnam War on religious grounds. One of the most popular sportsmen in history, known all round the world, with a higher recognition factor than Elvis Presley, he drew the wrath of the American Establishment by these actions. Arguably he was the greatest boxer ever, just like he said, but the humanitarian model he created was just as influential as his dancing in the ring. Parkinson's is taking him but the memory will linger on and on.



















 ALI'S QUOTE/UNQUOTE:

'It's just a job. Grass grows, birds fly, waves pound the sand. I beat people up.'

'I know where I'm going and I know the truth, and I don't have to be what you want me to be. I'm free to be what I want.'

'Sonny Liston is nothing. The man can't talk. The man can't fight. The man needs talking lessons. The man needs boxing lessons. And since he's gonna fight me, he needs falling lessons.'

TEEN A-Z

I used to be such a fogey: this is something I started to write a few years ago, probably as an outlet for anger. Fortunately the star of this particular show is now fully mature and unrecognisable from this portrayal, it says here...

A           ACNE:  eruptive skin condition, disfiguring, varying from the spot to the relief map.
               See also: ‘ackney  (once a very poor London Borough, now a very poor London Borough)
                                Acme: 1950s floor polisher
                                AC/DC:  bisexual rock band
B           BISEXUALITY: in teenagers, condition of uncertainty about sexual orientation often        lasting for more than an hour at a time.
C           COOL: ultimate accolade. State of grace impossible for anyone to achieve over the age of 25
D          DENCH (as in Dame Judi):  cool. Transient term, origin obscure. Likely to be only slightly more opaque in two years’ time than it is now.
E          ELECTRICITY BILL: meaningless paper transaction mapping how not-Green people are. Teenagers may safely ignore this till they leave home; however vengeance can be wreaked on cruel parents by leaving all lights and appliances on 24/7 and turning up thermostats. Parents will soon tire of nagging about this.
F           F-WORD: Used sparingly it still has great impact, particularly when grandparents and guests are around. Over-use, to the same level as parents’ usage, persuades parents that teenager is now adult, can support him/herself, without further pocket money.
G         GREEN: All teenagers say they will vote Green when they are old enough. This is a bit cool, and saves them finding out anything about the major parties and politics in general, about which they know next to nothing, having prioritised gaming for the last 10 years.
H          HILARIOUS:  slightly funny. Good example of Chronic Exaggeration Syndrome e.g  ‘BREAKING BAD is the best television programme EVVUH’, ‘I look so bad in this people will vomit’, ‘You are SO mean, £100 is NOTHING these days’
I           I:  the first word in every sentence, will probably also be median and final word.
J           JESSIE J:  Already disappearing over the horizon, damned by too many parents liking her
K          KOOL-AID:  the soft drink used to disguise the poison used in the mass suicide in Jonestown. Examination of the victim’s records showed that every one of them was American and had two or more teenagers at home.
L          LESBIAN (see BISEXUAL) compulsory stage of teenage girls’ development coming between ballet classes and vegetarianism.
M         MUM:  Hate-figure, Madonna, nag, confidante, traitor, teacher, rival, companion
N          NEUROSIS:  is entirely normal, in fact obligatory for teenagers; only psychosis should raise an eyebrow.
O          OMG: textspeak, for Omigod. A strange incantation, for the totally godless non-believer.
P           PERSONAL HYGIENE: a State of Grace devoutly to be desired but still having the status of 
              an ambition rather than a habit.
Q           QUEER:  see bisexuality
R           RANSOM NOTE CRISIS: when teenager is kidnapped, awful dilemma at to whether to pay,              pretend you haven't received the demand for a few days in order to have a holiday, or write                  back saying 'forget it, we've let his/her room'.


I don't know why it stopped at 'R', probably she came in the room and I had to cover up.....


POST OF THE WEEK





FILM REVIEWS:


THE GOOD:  The Danish Girl. I liked this a lot and found Eddie Redmayne very plausible, if not as a woman, then certainly as a man who desperately wanted to be one. His journey from transvestite though transgender to transsexual (though stopping short of TransSiberian railway) had the ring of truth and evoked sympathy and admiration for his courage. I am reliably informed by my local sexual politics expert that his portrayal is flawed, though how you can know this without seeing the film beats me. Hearsay, rumour and received opinion I guess. Hmm.

THE BAD AND THE UGLY:  High Rise. The Guardian liked this film and gave it 4 stars. I actually can't remember a film I've enjoyed less, left early (as one of the later departees, having given up hoping for a bomb scare) and would have left after 15 minutes if I hadn't spent £12 to get in, and it hadn't been so cold outside. Ben Wheatley directs the film based on a J.G.Ballard novel about a dystopian 1970s tower block. So, potentially good story, excellent cast (though Tom Hiddlestone may be photoshopped as in some shots his head looks much too small for his shoulders) lots of room for lovely retro seventies interiors, clothes and hairstyles – but with all that going for it, it's still a disaster. Packed with gratuitous sex and violence (I prefer sex and violins these days) it starts off badly and quickly deteriorates, having tried to out-do Tarantino and failed. Truly self-indulgent film by a director who was clearly on some left-over 1970s acid. You must go and see this film – if you've done something really bad and deserve sadistic punishment. May become a cult film on grounds of rarity value as the director will clearly never work again. OK, I liked one shot, lasting about 7 seconds, of the car park, from the top of the block: very painterly. That's it. If I have said anything at all which makes you want to go and see it, I apologise for my mistake. Sorry.











No comments:

Post a Comment