COMPETITIVE VULTURE CULTURE

It is a silly notion that, to this day, has impregnated the western world with this culture of competition.
Be the best in sport...
Be the best in the classroom...
Be the best in what-have-you...
And keep the prices down (if you grow some hairs on your b***s and fight the Cartels...)
Or, when we were kids, "my dad can beat the s**t out of your dad".

It has become a cutthroat industry. Succeed! Win at any cost!
Whatever happened to the noble and humane "live and let live"?

Stick a needle in, swallow a substantial amount of pills and then go ahead and win the race. Here, take
some more drugs and go on, parade your trophy on TV...


If competition's good for you, is it bad if I wish to wake up, do my job and go about my day?
I'd certainly give up top honours (which I do not have anyway) for a couple of drops of enjoyment and
enlightenment...



Who is the strongest
Who is the best
Who holds the aces
The East or the West
This is the crap our children are learning


"The Tide Is Turning"                   (ROGER WATERS)




Someone tried to sucker me into a conversation re "who is the best vocalist ever, in rock music" the other day. I avoided of course...
There are NO "bests". There are NO "winners". Success cannot be measured by the headlines one creates but by the satisfaction of his/hers creative "libido" (need).
There are no "bests". It is, maybe, experience you carry along that develops your taste. So, opinions differ and believe me competition has nothing to do with it.
So, being true to my accumulated experience, I'd say : "f**k me if I've ever heard anything like the voice of Peter Hammill". It still intrigues me how he explores this most expressive of "instruments".
Jeff Buckley embarked on a similar exploration with undoubted potential before his life was cut short.
Peter Hammill! I'll enjoy this while you parade your trophies...

HEROES AND THE PINK ELEPHANT

Woke up this mornin'.....walked out the room
turned a stone over.....there was a hero there, too

Excuse my amateurish blues tsiattisto (traditional Cypriot rhyming) but I need to keep perspective. I need sanity. I need my spirit NOT to be broken.

No disrespect to the families who lost their loved ones in a blast two years ago but, it seems to me we are the loudest, most sensationalist group of people on this earth. We change the meanings of words at will. I had to go back to the dictionary and look up the word again. No disrespect, but it was a clear
situation of "wrong place, wrong time?". Any way I look at it, it spells VICTIM to me. Innocent victim but still, victim.
Besides, what are the chances of coming across a hero these days in this place...

Reminds me actually of the talking heads on TV :
"TRAGEDY!!! Blood on the asphalt. Another person has tragically died after his car..."
Now, I'm no expert in ancient Greek drama but I'm sure the death of ONE person does NOT a tragedy
constitute.
What next? The animal lovers will hold vigil every time a cat gets run over in the street? Don't get me wrong, I love cats, they're my favourite pets but these f....rs don't look right, left and right again before crossing the street. Not to mention them being too lazy to walk twenty meters down the road and use the bloody zebra crossing...

It used to be every stone you turned on this island there was an alizavra (lizard). But today, only heroes.
"You blind yourself with comfort lies
  Like lightning never strikes you twice
  And we laugh at your amazed surprise
  As the ark begins to sink" wrote Justin Sullivan

no, there are no more heroes, just victims, incompetent fools and loud people...



There are no more hummingbirds
Like there used to be
They're fat and slow and careless now
They turned blue and mean

And the parrots sound like monkeys
Screaming from the trees
As the decent people
Fumble for the keys

"Civilians"                            (Joe Henry)