I must be willing to give up what I am in order to become what I will be
Albert Einstein

Post christmas note to self: I love my mother and not just because there were sugar free cranberries on the table.

i know this p***** be yankin

stilletos and broken bottles

I can't tell where it is
That old timeless scent
Of fires burning well
And teapots pouring dreams
Of ladies and their dogs
And smoke filled salons
I can't remember anyone
Because presently I'm here
Amongst the throng of fake gurus
And chai latte sans sucre
In frozen yoghurt bars
Where many make their own
Intent on finding the one which hasn't been

Why do I love Tom Odell so much?

I am so excited about this

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/video/2012/dec/14/film-trailer-pedro-almodovars-im-so-excited-video

Now this is christmassey assey assey

if you watched silver linings, you might want to read...

Interview with flavour of 2012:

 http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2012/dec/13/jennifer-lawrence-in-hawaii-eating-doughnuts

Best actress in a comedy or musical
Emily Blunt (Salmon Fishing in the Yemen)

paramita means going to the other side. In other words, actions that take you across the river of samsara

what should i do little baby?

In another world we were feeling fine...

this makes me laugh

“Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.”

Rainer Maria Rilke

Men should under no circumstances wear leggings.

This is the morning

What was that day
Or unslept night
What tea was sipped
Under foreign covers
Where did you drive
And with which testing thoughts
What urban trial was had
What livid person spat your way
What didn't you adore
And who returned that
For you to melt into a seat near mine
And taste long gone leaves of memory
For you to sidle down a busy street
Swinging hands as cold as old loves
Styling the air with rapid grace of voice
Singing the only melody we both know

The bigger picture is a better life

soft soft vocals for a harsh winter's day

Might do might say might love
might be
might burn might trip might sink
might stall
might love and love in love for all
might just wake up
from the mighty fall

soothing...

which way does the spirit go? 

Russian mystical armageddon

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/is-the-end-of-the-world-really-nigh-authorities-reassure-russians-over-mayan-armageddon-prophecy-amid-reports-of-unusual-behaviour-8375660.html

si je pouvais, je ferais disparaitre la frime

I wonder whether my cassolette is pleasing in general.

make yourself into a work of art

Julia Holter

There is too much sorrow in this town without you trailing yours around...

Un froid qui brûle, un froid qui détruit, le soleil se cabre

Benjamin B

Sad Sufjan

unrequited

When the laughter stops

Bill Bailey when the sun goes down...

ring the bells that still can ring and sing your head off to those still listening

Love is a dirty word

True Love, my dear, 
is putting an ironclad grip upon 

the soft, swollen balls 
of a divine rogue elephant

 and 
not having the good fortune to Die!

     Hafiz

If your grandmother is dying...

Hard is the world that does not give to every love a place

Bogota, me gustas

Funk the buddha

http://www.funkthebuddha.com/this-month-3/thismonth/

si je pouvais changer le monde un peu...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/filmblog/2012/nov/12/disability-in-film-untouchable

Above all, don't lie to yourself. The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to a point that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others. And having no respect he ceases to love.”

Dostoyevsky

Venice flooded

'One misunderstanding is that if you do the right thing, then life's storms will stop. If you do the right thing, the storms actually get bigger. This is because they know they can't blow you down like they used to.'
David Deida

American way

Hellraiser thieves on choppers

All thanks go to Bruce Springsteen. Congratulations America, you can stay leader of the free world for a while longer.

Small is beautiful

Bardem. Weird nosed but attractive

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/shortcuts/2012/nov/04/javier-bardem-pass-notes

Cinqasept . Juste pour les flaneurs

"The misery movement has rapidly gathered momentum and in recent months it's become apparent that, along with the Sam Cam handbag, the latest must-have accessory is a big dose of depression"

Where the hell am I going to dry my laundry now?

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/drying-laundry-indoors-poses-a-health-risk-warn-experts-8276607.html

The insides and outsides of my empty heart
Are fluttering in perpetual rhythm
In time with the corners of my tired mind
In time with the longing of another you

If a man knows more than others he becomes lonely
Carl Jung

Je veux vivre

women stop giving birth to have a cup of tea

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/bowler-hats-prudes-and-cod-sauce-new-astrix-film-does-little-to-challenge-french-clichs-about-britain-8215403.html

Quel le ciel me tombera sur la tete
et que la colle me manquera

Notre cœur est un trésor, videz-le d'un coup, vous êtes ruinés

Balzac

jazz trio, Roller Trio

foodies or foodists?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/sep/28/lets-start-foodie-backlash

New Hampshire, New England

Girls HBO there, Sky Atlantic here

<iframe width="360" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/Q_L52eExAHU" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

“Reason is powerless in the expression of Love.” Rumi

Into autumn

Guiding Light, Tennis

http://urbangems.org/


"Beauty is nothing other than the promise of happiness" Stendhal, On Love

New York and the film location scout

" Going to bed with a dream and waking up with a purpose"

Sufre como yo
Yo quiero que tú sufras lo que yo sufro
y aprenderé a rezar para lograrlo
yo quiero que te sientas tan inútil
como un vaso sin whisky entre las manos
y que sientas en tu pecho
el corazón
como si fuera de otro
y te doliera.
yo te deseo la muerte
donde tú estés
y aprenderé a rezar para lograrlo
yo quiero que tú sufras
lo que yo sufro
y aprenderé a rezar
para lograrlo

Yo quiero que te asomes
a cada hora
como un preso asomado
por tu ventana
y que te sean las piedras de la calle
el único paisaje de tus ojos.

yo te deseo la muerte
donde tu estés
por dios que y aprenderé a rezar
para lograrlo.

The French perspective on affairs is very different: the attitude there is more philosophical and more tolerant. "Affairs are not actively recommended, but they are not prohibited either," says Hakim in her book. Contrast the UK, where (despite the fact that affairs are very common), the language around them is loaded with negativity (think "cheating", "dishonesty", "love rat"). When Jane heard of Steve's extramarital relationship, she felt "betrayed": but why, exactly, did it have to be a betrayal? Relationship psychotherapist Paula Hall of Relate agrees with much of the logic of Hakim and Barker. Her line is that if anyone thinks there's a safe place in a marriage, they're kidding themselves: marriage, like everything else in life, is risky.

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/features/the-real-secret-of-staying-married-8168012.html

 "the hours when spiders mend their webs"

Beth Orton on sleepless nights

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2012/sep/23/beth-orton-interview-sugaring-season

"Another reason I love my Kindle is that I no longer have to lend my books out to people"

Don't speak

Marilyn's first photo

Seinfeld, I love you

http://comediansincarsgettingcoffee.com/

"There is a lot of confusion and this is not new. By now we should learn from our mistakes, but we don't. I don't think a movie can solve a problem like that. Unfortunately it doesn't have that power. But it can inspire a question."

Penelope Cruz. Read more in her interview in the Guardian:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2012/sep/18/penelope-cruz-twice-born

sus ojos me mienten y me enganan
pero siempre te amo y te extrano

Deafiningly you fill me
a silence wraps my heart
and in it you appear
under blankets of despair
warm and into love
you break a mind's rotten life
injecting life in droves
and holding Hope's hand
you make that all is broken
and unbreak all that is lost
with a still and quiet soul
erring through worlds
in positive winds

Vanishing not wandering

fortune teller

You're a pretty thought, I suppose.

Downton addicts

If you haven't seen it, you might as well be dead.

Love the sound, love the title

Worth the wait and no more wait...

Drifting through life

Frances Ha

Greta Gerwig plays a jobless, loveless kooky girl in the film that went to Toronto.

Speed, precision, creativity, flair, patience...

'Dans la vie, on n'est jamais loin de basculer'

Philippe Djian

Amazons and fires

Amazon's CEO shows off the new "Kindle Fire tablet".

Lady Lilith

 A pre-raphaelite beauty. How did she grow her hair this long?

"Sometimes you gotta do what you don't wanna do/ To get away with an unordinary life"

Cat Power

En me souvenant d'Avignon

City of Photographers
22nd September
Rich mix

On the road

Dream as if you'll live forever, live as if you'll die today

fleetwood mac

C'est un garcon particulier. Je le sais depuis le debut. Pas seulement a cause de son air en colere son dedain ou sa demarche de voyou. A cause de son sourire, un sourire d'enfant

She was Camille

F is for fake 

But the devil whispered behind the leaves, 'it's clever- but is it art?'

Kipling

hurts like heaven

you should know me

"life has a gap in it. It just does. Don't go crazy trying to fill it"

Take this Waltz

Ode to the great Chavela

your sisters sister

My new favourite people shown above. If I could be anyone else, I would be any of these three. Please see the film. It is not only emotionally charged, it is as real as they come.

Preacher's rock, preikestolen, Norway

Haim: The summer we haven't had

"I've seen gypsies who made it all the way and kept going,"

Chan Marshall from Cat Power

Stevie Nicks does it better than Lykke Li.

The day we went to the sea

Tishani Doshi, poet from Madras

The day we went to the sea
mothers in Madras were mining
the Marina for missing children.
Thatch flew in the sky, prisoners
ran free, houses danced like danger
in the wind. I saw a woman hold
the tattered edge of the world
in her hand, look past the temple
which was still standing, as she was —
miraculously whole in the debris of gaudy
South Indian sun. When she moved
her other hand across her brow,
in a single arcing sweep of grace,
it was as if she alone could alter things,
bring us to the wordless safety of our beds.

GV art London- Coming of Age exhibition

The ART AND SCIENCE OF AGEING

49 Chiltern Street London W1U 6LY

produced by Danger Mouse with motown undertones

summer in a song

great sound and a little bit of hippiness

A band whose sound relies on the guitar

Mic Jagger doing yoga

Breaking Upwards

Breaking Upwards is a New York romantic comedy with a twist. It takes the monogamy out of it and replaces it with problems and solutions.

Fiona Apple "Werewolf"

I could liken you to a werewolf the way you left me for dead
But I admit that I provided a full moon
And I could liken you to a shark the way you bit off my head
But then again I was waving around a bleeding, open wound

Day of Women

http://www.dayofwomen.org/

This is a really worthwhile not for profit organisation worth sneaking a peek at if you are a woman in recovery

Enchanting Soko

Action expresses priorities

London is france's sixth biggest city. Click here to read about it

If you want to celebrate the queen's jubilee with a twist and a shout, then listen to Neil Young's God Save the Queen. Guaranteed to keep the monarchy in power, by hacking up the volume a little

A change in the weather is sufficient to recreate the world and ourselves.
Marcel Proust

A reminder of the important things in life

Woolgathering, Patti Smith

Patti Smith "Woolgathering"

"Retreated in the peace of these deserts
With few but learned books together
I live with the deceased in conversation
And with my eyes I listen to the dead."

      Francisco de Quevedo

Jackson, you big talking man...

Grimes

sunrise over the Isle of Skye

Daniel Buren at the Grand Palais, Paris

Creativity is the residue of time wasted.

Albert Einstein

Picasso bullfight

Nagarkot

Nagarkot, a town, which at 2, 200 metres, lives in the clouds.

http://shitgirlssay.com/

I miss that dress

2 Why did she cut her hair?

3 We should hang out more often

4 Guess who I ran into?

5 I have so many stories for you

6 Could you do me a huge favour?

7 I'm so pale

8 Was I super annoying last night?

9 I'm excited for our date this week!

10 So good, right?

http://shitgirlssay.com/

Wild Belle

Memphis on the Mississipi.

One day.. some day, any day please!!!

Sundance comes to London for one weekend

http://www.sundance-london.com/film-and-events

I can't get enough of her accent

Mina Tindle

Dominique A

Hail the unbranded pack of ciggies

Neil Young's new album in june

When you fall in love, it is a temporary madness. It erupts like an earthquake, and then it subsides. And when it subsides, you have to make a decision. You have to work out whether your roots are become so entwined together that it is inconceivable that you should ever part. Because this is what love is. Love is not breathlessness, it is not excitement, it is not the desire to mate every second of the day. It is not lying awake at night imagining that he is kissing every part of your body. No... don't blush. I am telling you some truths. For that is just being in love; which any of us can convince ourselves we are. Love itself is what is left over, when being in love has burned away. Doesn't sound very exciting, does it? But it is!

Hitchcock:definition of happiness

BLOOM

La Grande Laura Gibson

"I need a man who can give what he takes
and he smiles in my eyes and he loves what he makes"
                                                                               
 Sharon Van Etten "Life of his Own"

Inspiring Plan, Plan B

Johnny fais moi mal

Holborn on a sunny day

The good book

The Shins Simple Song

1963

Wild woman and man
let distinct suns sing
and the moon inside rejoice
listen out for time
but catch eternity with
your free flowing breath
spread white butterfly wings
Over your whimsical worlds
sweeten your own powers
thrive in your pure visibility
trickle water through stone
use human love and universal hope
and make it your own home.

my journey

My journey is my friend
it waits for me every day
escorts me to my work
and laughs with me at play

My journey tell me things
I never could have known
It points me in directions
that only birds have flown

My journey watches me
from rooftops and cafes
and hurries me along
to avoid any delays

The Tree Trunk

John Pawson, photographer, says this looks like the foot of a dinosaur. I don't because I can't even imagine what that would look like but I do think like it looks like the trunk of a particularly big and bold tree ... and I really love trees.

My monday morning civil wars

http://www.myspace.com/thecivilwars

"Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle."

Plato

I've run away to join the fairies

 "La musique me permettait d’échapper à ces relations sociales contraintes.”
Soap and Skin.

Perfume Genius

A hair-raising, beautiful love song

Happy International Woman's day

New Beach House album....

"I hear a lot of music that's just lazy-- you know, people in their bedrooms singing some shit into the microphone."
JULIA HOLTER, upon the release of her new album, Ekstasis

Andrew Bird Eyeoneye

Marquez turns 85

"La vida no es la que uno vivió, sino la que uno recuerda, y cómo la recuerda para contarla"
Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Tim Burton's advert for la Cinémathèque française.

Exposition Tim Burton à la Cinémathèque... by lacinematheque

PIck me up

 UK’s first annual contemporary graphic art fair and festival, celebrating graphic arts
opens in March at Somerset House...
click on picture link for more...

A particularly beautiful bookshelf

Here are more:
http://www.flickr.com/groups/mybookshelves/