Spin me a tale

[imomus]

I'm spending the day on ICE trains, getting from Berlin to Holland, then performing in the evening, wearing funny clothes and making stuff up.



I planned to give Click Opera a holiday today, but at the last minute I thought I'd post this photo and ask you, dear reader, to make stuff up yourself: a short (fifty words or so?) narrative related in some way to the picture.

I won't say anything at this stage about what the photo is, who took it, who's in it, where or why it came about. Think of it as a Rorschach onto which you can project whatever you like -- a rumination, a story about the characters, a joke, a piece of philosophising, a weather forecast, a sci-fi scenario, a haiku, a fashion report. Be creative, be kind, give me something interesting to read when my iPod crackles to life in the Dutch wifi!

Comments

[gillen.livejournal.com]

Too late. I'm still amusing myself with the notion of "Momus on ICE!"

[cutup.livejournal.com]

It's sort of a reverse of Kafka's Metamorphosis - a time-lapse picture of a reindeer that becomes a little girl, then a bigger girl, and then an aged woman, who hangs onto her love of fish through every stage of the journey.

Lapp

[(Anonymous)]

The Lapps, genetically closer to the North African Berbers than to their European neighbours, had always puzzled the Bishop. Peering at the photo, he thought of another group of exiles in Europe - the Jews. Who had the more genuine life, the people who sealed themselves off from the world with a book, or the people who had embraced the land so different from their ancestors? The Bishop felt his clerical collar, as if to feel whether it was a shackle, or a symbol of learning.

[cerulicante.livejournal.com]

"The Mongolian chapter of the Momus Fan Club prepares to receive their god-king and musician."

[(Anonymous)]

“We are Mongolian model agency big stars. Every ten year or so it become fashionable to be seen with us in your magazine. Usually during period of western guilt! Other times they write about making lots of money. These day we compete with bleak forest, and grimy high rise estate, although the latter is sooo Sleazenation.”

[(Anonymous)]

“Yeah hi. Damon Albarn here. This is a shot I took of Jamie Hince’s niece Jocasta, with a local woman in Övörkhangai. Anyway it’s a shame that intelligent people cannot live by folk culture. They get bored quickly, hate pulling out their own teeth and whine about toilet paper. That’s at the heart of the new Gorillaz album.”

[(Anonymous)]

This post modern family unit embrace new frugality in preparations for a child friendly music festival. Frugal chic pervades this years festivals as style conscious hip-sters abandon colored and patterned wellington boots in favour of more traditional mono coloured varieties. The demure head scarf also makes a come back with the younger festival groovers. These recessionary times have witnessed a trend away from branded high street fashion towards down home functionality and recycled fabrics. This trend is also picked up in the culinary sphere with a marked increase in bring your own picnic feasts relying on home produced food. Hunting and fishing have also seen a return to favour and in a strange twist younger generations are looking to their grandparents for pointers in these newly energised outdoor pursuits.

[dekersaint.blogspot.com (from livejournal.com)]

We have been fishing. We caught these fish. Yes, these are our reindeer, though obviously, we have a different word for them. Do you want to use my camera? OK, we are leaving. No, thank you.

[krskrft.livejournal.com]

I love how this is obviously intended as trollbait. Like, obviously.

[jrpaperstacks.livejournal.com]

He always hated that the smallest child was assigned to hold him. His neck sloped and his eyes stayed fixed on the ground, as she stared, admiring her huge pet. "One day soon," he thought, "I will learn to fly."

[(Anonymous)]

Ancient descendants of the early 'Tocharian' people of the XianJiang province of China.

Due to Indo-European conquests and forced miscegination.- alot of Chinese/Mongels in that area have a high degree of Norse phenotpyical features such as light hair and eyes.

[(Anonymous)]

Hisea as a little girl. Not the one of the left, the one on the right. And not like Benjamin Button, like Benjamin Mutton. An ancient race of backlanders who migrated to Japan via the ram railroad. Hisea grew younger when she met an older man. And now they are like one in a rain dance of love and lust, twirling together towards a green pasture of beauty.

[(Anonymous)]

Hey Nick!

I read Click Oprea everyday just to have a look your way on things, keep up the supremely interesting work!

Brian from NW California.

[(Anonymous)]

In too much pain from my recent accident to go on at length right now, except to say: obviously a feature from a forthcoming issue of American Vogue (come on, this look was done months ago by its continental cousin) showcasing the upcoming fall fashion line--French and Japanese designers, mostly, whose names I can't spell and can't find the symbols for on my monolingual keyboard. Something about "the texture of the taiga" in modern natural/synthetic blends. Sorry, that's the best I can do right now... Good luck later!

[kumakouji.livejournal.com]

[(Anonymous)]

By the way, Vogue should get Cintra Wilson from the NYT to write the copy for this imaginary feature--she's the best, most original, and funniest writer for that rag--well, at least since a certain Scotsman left!

Just read this excerpt from a recent Wilson "Critical Shopper" piece and ask if I'm not wrong:

"Much of the clothing at Bird appears to be recovering from its too-adventurous lives. To live vicariously through the scars on one’s casual wear is an interesting kind of psychic trompe l’oeil, suggesting that one has been more kinetically active than one really has. It seems a bit perversely bourgeois to demand a patina of robust character from our clothes in an economy in which garments bearing the marks of age are not an elective style choice for so many. But if your leisure is too demanding to damage your play clothes through the rigors of actual motion, Bird poses an interesting conundrum."

And going on, referencing Henry James through William Gaddis:

"As the ghost of Gaddis argues, there is such a thing as a counterfeit so well done that it can be, in its way, more authentic than the 'real thing.'"

[(Anonymous)]

"Dad has become increasingly strange lately. I'm starting to worry."

[(Anonymous)]

fucking brilliant kuma!

[(Anonymous)]

Ahh--as the painkillers kick in:

The Real Sámi (a Jamesian joik)

My charcoal smudge slipped from my fingers; the sitting was ruined and I dismissed my subjects--all three children and the reindeer, too--who were also evidently rather ill from bad salmon and, not just in the case of the animals, perhaps flea-infested.

Then, alone with the shaman's seventh wife I had a discomforting minute or so. She encapsulated an entire saga into a single sentence: "I say, come now--just let Odin do for you, couldn't you?" But I could not, would not--it would be awful to see them emptying out the pail of fish-heads once again; but I made believe that I could, to please them, for a week or more of sittings. Then I dismissed her at last with a heap of coins, and I never would set eyes on any of those Lapps again. I managed to acquire the remaining duodji, those woven handicrafts so popular in Guovdageaidnu, but my friend Magga repeats that the Chief Herder and his kin did me permanent damages, led me down the wrong path. If that be
not false I'm content to have paid the krones--for the memory, for the cold, frozen memory.

insight from time in porn

[zenmonkeykstop.livejournal.com]

"If a man has a picture of himself holding a fish on his dating site profile, he's married."

[(Anonymous)]

I went " a bit too far with the make up and costumes this time" you think. I managed to adopt a couple of kids from a poor country on my travels " Like a Virgin" Indeed. All i need now is a hit song. Oh and maybe Bjork can use us on her next album/video.

Toodle-oo the noo
Momus

People among nature

[(Anonymous)]

There is a sense of spirit visible in the faces of these people. They need no church, their world is among nature. They live a simple life as an expression of the divine. Spirit does not need religion, it can be experienced by being still and watching the stars or the sea. Where do you to find spirit, where you go to find peace and be with yourself reflected in the world? What moves you ata deeper level? All religions that stand against nature will ultimately fail.
Rob Howells on a Friday afternoon in London.

[cap-scaleman.livejournal.com]

Hamburgers? HUMBUGERS!

Having it your way!

[pay-option07.livejournal.com]

My question is what do they do later, after reading this article from the Guardian.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/feb/26/toilet-roll-america

It's also terrifying to discover the reindeer population is on the demise. If all their lives would revolve around the humble cabbage, it might be a better world.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

It ain't Momus unless it's logged in as Momus, mate!