My Friday Night

1. There are two kinds of unsuccessful artist. Their talent is misappreciated either by the public or by themselves.

2. Seriously, it baffles me how many people consider themselves artists. As long as one considers any poem, drawing, etc. art (as one should, given that the word implies nothing about quality) the term is correct for anyone who creates poems, drawings, etc. Yet it doesn't feel right, even disrespectful of people I consider real artists. Interestingly, I don't mind people who are not exactly Thierry Henry calling themselves footballers. I guess a lot of socialization went into that.

3. In many cases, people thinking they're artists will have little to do with their correctly sensing a talent for X and a lot with their having had it a little too good in their childhoods, having a distaste for work and a vague feeling that different=better. (Milan Kundera is with me on this one.) The stupid haircuts are just an epiphenomenon, I believe.

4. The majority of "actually artists" (as in "I work in a pub, but I'm actually a novelist") used to be absorbed by Berlin, but during the last five years or so, rents have increased considerably over there. (Just to clarify: Whether someone works in a pub or not says little or nothing about the quality of their work, as judged by me.)

5. Even so, it was great to see a few people whom I literally hadn't seen in over a year. Induction: The speed at which people change once they've passed the age of 33 or so is so slow that no change at all can be sensed after a year.

6. Where I live, people either don't get married or get married when children are underway. Which means that getting married without any children underway is an almost revolutionarily nonconformist, and hence extremely romantic, thing to do. Having to answer the question whether there are children underway in the negative about a hundred times is a small price to pay.

7. Home is where the loo is.