#modular

let's get the not particularly humble brag out of the way:

i spent friday afternoon driving supercars around a track.

so for christmas my parents got me a Virgin Experiences voucher to go abseil down the big red spindly sculpture thing in Olympic Park. except when i tried to book it it was was no longer available. i was able to exchange the voucher for another Experience, and looking down the list it was like:

• wine tasting
• massage
• supercar track day
• bottomless brunch

and so there i was on friday, in a portakabin on a disused airfield just outside Hemel Hempstead, learning how to not crash several hundred thousand pounds worth of car. then an instructor drives three of you round the track in a normally-fast BMW, going slow to teach you each corner, then going fast, then doing everything wrong on purpose so you know what not to do, then going really fucking fast to make sure you're suitably terrified by the time you get behind the wheel.

and then they call you up one by one, sit you down in a stupidly fast car, and let you at it, with an instructor in the passenger seat extremely calmly talking you through which cones to aim at, which corners to cut, when to brake, when to floor it. i drove:

1. a Toyota Supra done out in the exact colour scheme and decals as the one from The Fast And The Furious (2001). great car, but i was a bit too nervous on my first few laps to get much out of it.
2. a Subaru Impreza WRX STI. got in it slightly disappointed, as the instructor wanted to put me in an Audi R8, but that was occupied. i was not expecting it to go as hard as it did. very fun in the corners.
3. a Lamborghini Gallardo LP540. honestly not as fun as the Scooby, felt a bit too abstract, and it was LHD so i didn't trust my proprioception.

supercars are not like other cars. you might think you've driven fast. floor it in a supercar, it genuinely feels like you're going to fucking hyperspace. like you are being willed forward by God Herself. like your soul has some inertia and needs a second to catch up to your body. it's a visceral, intensely physical experience. 11/10 i need to go back there i don't even care

and that was just day two out of a run of four busy days.

for a little while back in 2018/19 we would occasionally pack up our laptops, leave the office, and go work from the 6th floor bar at the Tate Modern, mostly as an excuse to leave the dinge of One Southwark Bridge. last year we tried it again unsuccessfully; the Tate is somehow way more popular than pre-pandemic, and there were massive queues for the bar and a sign saying "no laptops". we ended up in the terrace at the Anchor pub instead, which was fine, but not what i'd been going for.

i'd had a little revelation that right on our doorstep was a venue that ticked all of my boxes: The Barbican Centre. which ticks the additional box of being my favourite place on earth (lmao when i wrote this i forgot the background of ghost.computer was the pixel art Lauderdale Tower. what a nerd kara). so thursday we went and tried it out, a few of us grabbing a table on the lakeside terrace, and it went pretty well! a little cloudy and windy but worth trying again.

after that was London Synth Club, at the Walthamstow Trades Hall & Institute. which is basically a working men's club except with pride progress stickers on the bar and "terfs are weird" stickers in the ladies' loos. great venue, great vibes.

Synth Club is a scrappy little event put together by this guy Ben from the EMOM scene, one part meetup, one part open mic night. buncha synth men (plus me) with their synths talking about synths for several hours, puncuated with short live sets. i did a little set on a tiny but surprisingly versatile Eurorack system built into an Ikea TAVELÅN box. got some very loud industrial techno/garage(?) out of it. somewhere between SOPHIE & Modeselektor vibes? good shit; went about 47% to plan, which is about par.

still trying to find any photos or video of the set. surely someone in the room had some

my old friend Ed lives in the area; i texted him an invite not expecting anything (i had never successfully invited anyone to a live performance i've done? so i eventually just kind of gave up inviting people). he turned up! with his best friend/ex Emma, who it turned out is a member of the Trades Hall. we had a lovely evening!

saturday we met up with my parents, my brother, and his partner, in Leicester, and spent the day wandering around, doing lightly tourist things, my dad reminiscing about his uni days, the "kids" (the under-35s) doing silly things on the playground equipment and injuring ourselves (okay tbh that was just me).

we ended up at The Marquis Wellington pub at my suggestion, which it turned out was my dad's local. it's changed a lot in the last thirty seven years apparently.

and then at last, sunday. i went climbing for the first time in a few months. inspired by how weak i felt on the monkey bars in Leicester, i only managed 45 minutes before giving up. and now i ache even more. it's perfect timing though, i go on holiday next week so i'm just on time to have my rekindled habit entirely broken by the change in routine. love my brain, it's great here.

then in the evening was our movie night, we watched Who's Afraid Of Virginia Woolf (1966) from Piers's list, a stressful movie about horrible people, which was actually incredible.