20.09.16 - Dar a cara á tapa

Hallooo,

I write to you (from yesterday evening) from the dark husk of our living room, with no light or sound but the incessant yapping of dogs outside, since the electric company cut our power earlier for alleged non-payment of bills and I now have to wait for them to come back, show them proof that we did in fact pay the bill in question, and get them to turn the power back on. Apparently they might not even show up tonight at all but I have to hang around in case they do, and in the meantime I've had to resort to using a spare iPad just to write this e-mail like some kind of common pleb. How positively Dickensian...

• (Update @ 10pm 19.09.16: No word from the electric company. So dark...)

• (Update @ 2pm 20.09.16: Still no news. Fridge starting to emit strange smells.  A man upstairs sounds like he's building a shed.)

• (Update @ 2:30pm 20.09.16: When will the waiting end?)

But all is well otherwise! We picked up yet another cat last week - called Valente - as part of Gaby's ongoing quest to rescue every stray in São Paulo, although this one is strictly temporary until his owner finds new lodgings. He was neutered yesterday and spent the rest of the day wobbling around the flat in comical fashion as the anaesthetic wore off, poor thing. Don't get too used to him though.

On Tuesday we went to see local piano-meisters João Carlos Martins and Arthur Moreira Lima play a show together at the Teatro Bourbon, after Ridaut scored some box tickets from work. Having never heard of either of them beforehand I was pleasantly surprised, and even a little moved by their backstory, which they frequently expounded upon in jovial fashion between songs. They both grew up as child prodigies and best mates, and were fast-tracked by Eleanor Roosevelt and President Kubitschek respectively, before studying in the States and Russia during the Cold War. Then at the height of his fame, Martins was assaulted and paralysed, but regained enough movement in his hands to become a conductor, and eventually start playing the piano again. It was quite poignant when the show cut away from his rather hesitant recitals to old footage of him shredding merrily away to Rachmaninov, but overall it was all very life-affirming and interesting. Bit of cultcha, innit.

And on Friday, we went to another show, compered by the son of one of Gaby's supervisors, who had apparently given up on his studies to pursue a career in magic. And very cool it was too, sort of a variety show made up of different kinds of magic - a surrealist Magritte homage with pipes popping out of paintings and back again, a tongue-in-cheek deconstruction of a trick (sorry, "illusion") to show how it's usually best not to know the magician's inner workings, a minimalist sketch involving leaves and straws that apparently took 8 years to perfect, mindreading, escapism, slow motion air ping pong, and finally a showstopper featuring a man who looked uncannily like a robot mannequin doing a demented line dance with his Dr. Frankenstein-esque master. Then we went for a pizza, which was pretty good too.

Otherwise work continues apace, I've reentered the footballing fray with all the match fitness and grace of a post-summer-holiday Wayne Rooney, and have tentatively road-tested Gaby's electroacoustic at our nearby practice rooms (the conclusion being that yes, I need a new guitar...). I have whipped up a frothy new compilation for your listening pleasure (but can't access Spotify right now, for power-related reasons, so I'll upload the link to my blog in due course), and my phrase of the week ("to put the face to the slap") means to get stuck in, basically. I also draw your attention to this book, which I first found in Foz do Iguaçu, and which sets out to translate (poorly) into English a load of Brazilian proverbs, resulting in a funhouse-mirror take on the translation game. Most amusing...

'Til next we do Skype,
Born Fred, as Fred as the wind blows.


Postscript @ 4pm 20.09.16: The power came back on almost exactly 24 hours after it was cut off (and minutes before the company's self-imposed deadline, which disappointingly meant I didn't even get to unleash my pre-planned rant over the phone).  I have been bathed, clothed and am recuperating over tea.   

And here's compilation I mentioned: https://play.spotify.com/user/freddypowys/playlist/6WtPQHYUmbzcoROnoPxK7d