Based on the lj interests lists of those who share my more unusual interests, the interests suggestion meme thinks I might be interested in
1. ukiyo-e score: 9 (my interests include three ukiyo-e artists, so yes)
2. ross noble score: 8 (um, he's okay)
3. chris ware score: 8 (yes)
4. bristol score: 8 (it's where I come from, so I guess so)
5. scott walker score: 7 (yeah, but no more than most other people I know)
6. the day today score: 7 (Chris Morris is on my list)
7. teppei score: 7 (more atommickbrane than me, I think)
8. big star score: 7 (they're okay)
9. robert crumb score: 6 (i have him listed as Crumb)
10. krazy kat score: 6 (I have creator Herriman listed)
11. sun ra score: 6 (hm, I am amused by him)
12. derrida score: 6 (yeah, some)
13. ornette coleman score: 6 (ditto - I've seen him live!)
14. son house score: 6 (yeah, I like him)
15. bradbury score: 6 (I like Malcolm more than Ray, but I can't say I'm a giant fan of either)
16. brass eye score: 6 (see #6)
17. wat score: 6 (what? Um, Angkor Wat is high on my holiday visit wishlist...)
18. sam cooke score: 5 (yeah, he's great)
19. solomon burke score: 5 (ditto)
20. natural history score: 5 (not especially, no)

Type your username here to find out what interests it suggests for you.
Popularity Ceiling: (Please be patient!)

changed by ouwiyaru based on code by ixwin
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I have a feeling I've done this before, but worldofagwu tagged me, so here are the ones he expressed an interest in:

billy wilder
One of my favourite movie directors ever, top five I would think. People like him get good bonus points from me for being able to handle different kinds of films with equal aplomb - big favourites by Wilder include Double Indemnity, Some Like It Hot, Sunset Boulevard and Stalag 17, which is a much more impressive range than nearly any other favourite director of mine, perhaps excepting Howard Hawks.

dostoyevsky
Long one of my favourite writers, though I've not read much of him lately, because I read all the big ones years ago. I think he is among the most compelling and powerful writers ever, and ahead of his time psychologically (compare the three Brothers Karamazov with Freud's ideas of id, ego and superego, for instance).

girls aloud
I watched Pop Idols: The Rivals or whatever it was called, and particularly remember the moment when Louis Walsh (if I recall the people accurately) said his charges would not be a boy band but a "vocal harmony group" and Pete Waterman said "my girls will be a pop group", and despite liking the male singers better, I could see how it would turn out. What I didn't foresee was Girls Aloud turning into one of the all-time great pop groups. That may well be largely down to the writing and production of Xenomania, but whatever the case, I love their records, and they are certainly in my top ten most listened to acts of the last several years.

hernandez brothers
As it happens, I've written about them very recently on Freaky Trigger, so I refer you there.

match of the day
You know how big a football fan I am (worldofagwu and I went to see Bristol Rovers' playoff victory at Wembley together a year ago), and Match Of The Day is one of very few long-term unmissables in my TV schedule. I can't tell you how stupidly happy it made me when I heard the theme tune again after a couple of years of ITV's inferior highlights show, and I get that again with the first one of every new season.

rauschenberg
Until he died some weeks ago, Robert Rauschenberg was my favourite living artist. I find his combines among the most endlessly captivating pieces of art the world has ever given us. I like how hard he is to pin down generically - AbEx, Pop, neo-Dada, whatever - and the complexity of what he is doing, and the sheer sense of fun involved in the famous tire and goat, for instance.

the wu-tang clan 
Probably my favourite hip hop act ever. I have more by them than almost any other act ever (possibly only Willie Nelson and the Fall score higher), thanks to the many members all making solo albums. The RZA's gripping productions are at the heart of this, as Ghostface (especially when he raps over old soul numbers) is the only one I have really special love for as a rapper, but the superhero and martial arts schtick appeals too, especially GZA's use of samples from a Lone Wolf & Cub adaptation on the magnificent Liquid Swords album. Other great albums: The 36 Chambers (Wu), Cuban Linx (Raekwon), Iron Man (Ghostface), Tical (Meth), the Ghost Dog soundtrack (RZA - worldofagwu bought me this as a birthday present after we saw the movie).

One of those nice music memes wherein you let a random selection of tracks answer questions. Most people would use an iPod, but being a) an old man meaning I don't have one and b) anal so I have a database with a random listing generator, I am using other means.


A surprising number of successful combinations there, albeit mostly on an ironic level...

"List seven songs you are into right now. No matter what the genre, whether they have words, or even if they're not any good, but they must be songs you're really enjoying now, shaping your spring. Post these instructions in your LJ along with your 7 songs. Then tag 7 other people to see what they're listening to."

Frankly I don't want to tag anyone else - I never mind being tagged (makes me feel as if someone gives a damn about what I have to say, which is good), but I feel too intrusive tagging anyone else. I may struggle here, and I don't know that any of these are shaping my Spring (and they are all old, but then so am I)...

Good Times by Chic - live version where a rapper starts giving us Rappers' Delight over the instrumental break, which made me very happy.

Penguin at the Big Apple/Zing Went The Strings Of My Heart by the Trammps - the only disco record to rival Chic in my affections, a lush instrumental going into a brilliant cover, the transition marked by Jimmy Ellis's great "Ha!"

No More Doggin' by Rosco Gordon - he was a wonderful old R&B singer, and if there is one American record that led to the invention of ska in Jamaica, this was it - listen to this and the very close cover by  Owen Gray and Kenneth Richard, and my point will be obvious.

Here's to the State of Mississippi by Phil Ochs - one of the records I feel most evangelical about every time I hear it, and my favourite protest song, attacking the state for its racism, politics, religion and everything else: "Here's to the land you've torn out the heart of / Mississippi find yourself another country to be part of."

A Whiter Shade of Pale by Pat Kelly - obviously the lyrics are pretty risible in the Procol Harum original, but Pat doesn't worry about getting them right, and since he has an extremely clear (and lovely voice) you can hear every word, from the opening "We skipped the light and dangled" onwards.

Mmm... Skyscraper I Love You by Underworld - it's the synth drums that I am particularly loving lately.

Wish Someone Would Care by Irma Thomas - my favourite female singer ever, and this may be her best performance, a magnificent blaend of beauty, feeling and power.

My top 10 artists are apparently:

1. Marit Larsen
2. John Lee Hooker
3. Tom Waits
4. Britney Spears
5. Termanology
6. Patsy Cline
7. Christina Aguilera
8. Robyn
9. The Adverts
10. Carrie Underwood

Father went to college -good lord no
Father finished college
Mother went to college -good lord no
Mother finished college
Have any relative who is an attorney, physician, or professor - nothing remotely like that, no
Had more than 50 books in your childhood home - actual total 1 - a Bible - before I started getting my own, but I don't suppose I reached 50 at any point as a child
Had more than 500 books in your childhood home
Were read children's books by a parent - occasionally, when very small, but I missed all the classics everyone else read
Had lessons of any kind before you turned 18
Had more than two kinds of lessons before you turned 18 - I assume this is more than what we had in school, in which case no to both
The people in the media who dress and talk like me are portrayed positively what people are those?
Had a credit card with your name on it before you turned 18 - no
Your parents (or a trust) paid for the majority of your college costs - nope
Went to summer camp  - I am English, so n/a
Had a private tutor before you turned 18 - no
Family vacations involved staying at hotels - mostly no, but occasionally yes
Your clothing was all bought new before you turned 18 -mostly, yes
Your parents bought you a car that was not a hand-me-down from them no
There was original art in your house when you were a child -haha good grief no
Had a phone in your room before you turned 18 - no
You and your family lived in a single family house - yes
Your parent(s) owned their own house or apartment before you left home - yes
You had your own room as a child no -shared with my brother
Participated in an SAT/ACT prep course - I am English, but nothing along these lines
Had your own TV in your room in High School - no
Owned a mutual fund or IRA in High School or College - good grief no
Flew anywhere on a commercial airline before you turned 16 - yes, one holiday to Switzerland
Went on a cruise with your family no
Went on more than one cruise with your family no
Your parents took you to museums and art galleries as you grew up - haha not a chance

I score pretty low on that, but my family weren't poor. Started working class, but my dad worked hard and bought his own butcher's shop, and made a success of it, so we were comfortable. They did send me to a fee-paying boarding school for the last four years of my education, for instance.

From freakytigger: This is Acclaimed Music's aggregate list of the top 107 albums of the 1990s (as of now). Put any that you own in bold. Put any that you have heard all through or used to own in italics. Put a strikethrough any that you hate (whether you've heard them or not!). Underline any you want to hear. And put an asterisk by any that you would count as one of your own favourite albums of the 90s. Turns out I have 52 of them.

Since everyone else is doing it...

The 106 books LibraryThing says are the most frequently unread. Bold=I've read it, asterisk=I've read it more than once. Turns out I have read 58 of them.

So I asked carsmilesteve and he selected three of my interests and three of my icons for me to explain. This means if you want, I will select three of each from yours. Or you can ask me to explain some more, though we will run out of icons quite quickly as I only have six, and one is just a photo of me (not the one I'm using here, no, although I understand that you may think so).

Dave Clarke: not our old pal Dr C (WINOLJAFAIK), and not the one with the Five from when I was a kid, but the great techno DJ, who I love when DJing, making his own records (Archive One is among my favourite albums) or remixing others, even though a track by him scored very poorly for me in the League Of Pop on poptimists recently, dammit.

Fiona Rae: One of my three favourite living painters (Rauschenberg and Riley, if they are both still alive - I am willing to consider artists from other parts of the alphabet too). British, in her 40s, abstract mostly except sometimes she does funny Miroish figures. She made the Turner shortlist many years ago. I claimed to friends that she was clearly influenced by my favourite cartoonist ever, George Herriman, of Krazy Kat 'fame', and was told I was a fool, and thought my friends probably knew better than me - then a few years later she wrote a small piece in the Guardian explaining how big an impact Herriman had had on her, and I felt very smug. She was also the first person who drew me into one of those galleries where you have to ring a bell and ask to be let in and there are only a couple of works there.

John Barth: One of my favourite novelists, an experimental postmodernist (oulipo style at times) with a great passion for the great stories. His first six novels were: a black comedy; a nihilist campus comedy; a 17th C picaresque; an alternate-world SF novel; three novellas around Greek mythology; and a collection of experimental often autobiographical short 'stories'. Then his seventh was a huge epistolary novel that was also a sequel to the previous six. The first of his I read, Tidewater Tales, is a contemporary tale of a couple going sailing, and also a sequel to the Odyssey, the 1001 Nights, Don Quixote and Huck Finn.

This is a bull by Japanese Zen artist Mokurai. I wanted a nice Japanese painting to use (many of you will know I have a website all about Japanese arts), and this one reduced beautifully.

This is a painting by one of my two or three all-time favourite painters, Paul Klee. He did lots of faces that I think are funny and adorable and beautiful, so seemed more suited to an icon than works by other favourite artists like Kandinsky, Cezanne or Sesshu.

I wanted an icon for use when I put photos up, under the misapprehension that once I got a camera (Xmas before last) I would take quite a few photos. I've hardly taken any, sadly. I am as keen on cute kitten pics as the next man, unless the next man is called Alan perhaps, and this was one I had saved - it is a camera bag, I believe, and the it looks a bit like pressing a button, so it seemed a good choice.

Based on the lj interests lists of those who share my more unusual interests, the interests suggestion meme thinks I might be interested in
1. chris ware score: 15
2. ross noble score: 12
3. scott walker score: 12
4. big star score: 12
5. robert crumb score: 11
6. sam cooke score: 10
7. george herriman score: 10
8. t rex score: 10
9. derrida score: 10
10. ornette coleman score: 10
11. bristol score: 10
12. son house score: 9
13. solomon burke score: 8
14. the day today score: 8
15. stooges score: 8
16. fritz lang score: 8
17. ukiyo-e score: 8
18. harold pinter score: 8
19. sun ra score: 8
20. talk talk score: 8

Type your username here to find out what interests it suggests for you. Popularity Ceiling: (Please be patient!)

Hm. Fizzles out at the end and I'm not that huge a fan of Ross Noble or Big Star, but otherwise very accurate all the way down. The fact that three of those are already on my interests list seems like cheating, but I guess they are written slightly differently.

Pinched from Sarah: soundtrack to your bioflick, from an iPod on shuffle or in my case my 'make random comp' feature of my database. Since I extend it a bit, we'll have a cut...

Grub-ology:

• What is your salad dressing of choice?
This interviewer seems to be assuming I would ever eat salad, which is untrue.

• What is your favourite fast food restaurant?
None that I can think of.

• What is your favourite sit down restaurant?
I'm hopeless on these. I like La Strada.

• On average, what size tip do you leave at a restaurant?
10%, more if the service was good.

• Name three foods you detest above all others.
Spices, cream, the jelly in pork pies.

• What is your favorite dish to order in a Chinese restaurant?
none - I avoid them

• What are your pizza toppings of choice?
Just cheese and tomato, normally

• What do you like to put on your toast?
marmite, sometimes raspberry jam

• What is your favourite type of gum?
none

Tech-ology:

• Number of contacts in your cell phone?
about 20

• Number of contacts in your e-mail address book?
I tend not to add people to that, but it would be between 50 and 100

• What is your wallpaper on your computer?
a lacquer painting by Shibata Zeshin

• How many land line phones do you have in your house?
1

• How many televisions are in your house?
2

• What kitchen appliance do you use the least?
I guess the washing machine just about edges this.

• What is the format of the radio station you listen to the most?
I rarely do, and when I do it's usually Radio 1


Bi-ology:

• What do you consider to be your best physical attribute?
None. If forced to pick one, maybe my arms

• Are you right handed or left handed?
right

• Do you like your smile?
No, but I don't really dislike it either.

• Have you ever had anything removed from your body?
Some teeth, tonsils.

• Would you like to?
No

• Do you prefer to read when you go to the bathroom?
Yes

• Which of your five senses do you think is keenest?
eyesight - used to be excellent, now okay

• When was the last time you had a cavity?
A year or so, I guess.

• What is the heaviest item you lift regularly?
nothing much - maybe shopping in a heavy week

• Have you ever been knocked unconscious?
No


Misc-ology:

• If it were possible, would you want to know the day you were going to die?
No.

• If you could change your first name, what would you change it to?
No idea at all. It's hard to imagine.

• How do you express your artistic side?
I don't have one.

• What colour do you think you look best in?
None, so stick with black mostly

• How long do you think you could last in a medium security prison?
I'd be okay there, I think.

• Have you ever swallowed a non-food item by mistake?
Don't think so

• Can other people read your handwriting?
Yeah, usually, unless it's very hurried

• If we weren'’t bound by society’s conventions, do you have a relative you would make a pass at?
No

• How often do you go to church?
Never, except very occasionally as an architectural tourist

• Have you ever saved someone's life?
No

• Has someone ever saved yours?
Yeah, I guess doctors did once, and the woman I love has done so too.


Dare-ology:

*For this last section, if you would do it for less or more money, indicate how much.
• Would you walk naked for a half mile down a public street for $100,000?
Yes - for less than that, really.

• Would you kiss a member of the same sex for $100?
Yes - I've kissed several.

• Would you have sex with a member of the same sex for $10,000?
Yes - I've fucked several too.

• Would you allow one of your little fingers to be cut off for $200,000?
With anaesthetic, yes. Sounds a pretty good deal to me.

• Would you never blog again for $50,000?
Yes

• Would you pose naked in a magazine for $250,000?
Yes - but no one has ever offered me a penny to get my clothes off, and they never will.

• Would you drink an entire bottle of hot sauce for $1000?
I couldn't do it.

• Would you, without fear of punishment, take a human life for $1,000,000?
Unless it was someone I thought deserved death (and there are few such people), absolutely not.

• Would you shave your head and get your entire body waxed for $5,000?
Sure

• Would you give up watching television for a year for $25,000?
No - it's one of my most consistent pleasures.

So this game is to take a pre-written set of questions, and shuffle your iTunes or whatever (for me, it's a database that generates random selections), and use the titles as answers. I was going to exclude any that weren't in English, but as it happens none such came up.

I was tagged by my very dear friend lunacee, but I am declining to carry the practice on. But I'll do the quiz. Feel free to do it too.

( the quiz )

You know I'll go for any of these 'memes' that are listy...

( 10 interests list )