midnight motorway noises
03 April 2006
urban gentrification scheme
Last night, on our way to the cinema, Chris and I encountered a beautiful fountain.
It was an enormous jet of water, spurting up out of a hole in the pavement to ten feet tall , then falling slowly and pitter pattering down on to the ground. It changes height like the equalizer line that goes up and down when you're listening to music. I imagine the song that's playing to be the French national anthem with lots of jazz flute.
I saw one of these fountains once before with Anneka and Fergus. Anneka came with welly boots and a little brolly. Fergus got a bit wet from playing in it and because he didn't have welly boots or a little brolly.
I was sitting at my computer today and I saw another one out the window, across the road. White water spraying up, glad to be out from the dark, dank under-glasgow world.
It is very exciting to see. The water looks so pleased to be free finally. It is a rare release of unrelenting, unexpected, completely unpredictable abandon.
I don't want to hazard a guess as to the scientific reason behind the increasing regularity of these urban springs. I'm sure all the man in the luminous yellow jacket has to do is turn a big iron red wheel clockwise somewhere nearby. It makes you wonder though. What if it happened in a football pitch during a game? Or in the pub? "Yeah, just a glass of water please barkeep..." What if it sprung up in the middle of your living room while you were watching a repeat of Changing Rooms? Could it be transformed with a couple of pebbles and some little froggy figurines into an attractive water feature? What if the whole city was on a giant water bed that some miscreant is going around puncturing with a knitting needle? At the moment I feel a bit like the ground is wobbling around underneath me but I never imagined...
Well, until Glasgow floats away into the distance, I'll let the noise of the new municipal fountain mingle with the midnight motorway noises. Until the man in the luminous yellow jacket comes. Until it happens again.
It was an enormous jet of water, spurting up out of a hole in the pavement to ten feet tall , then falling slowly and pitter pattering down on to the ground. It changes height like the equalizer line that goes up and down when you're listening to music. I imagine the song that's playing to be the French national anthem with lots of jazz flute.
I saw one of these fountains once before with Anneka and Fergus. Anneka came with welly boots and a little brolly. Fergus got a bit wet from playing in it and because he didn't have welly boots or a little brolly.
I was sitting at my computer today and I saw another one out the window, across the road. White water spraying up, glad to be out from the dark, dank under-glasgow world.
It is very exciting to see. The water looks so pleased to be free finally. It is a rare release of unrelenting, unexpected, completely unpredictable abandon.
I don't want to hazard a guess as to the scientific reason behind the increasing regularity of these urban springs. I'm sure all the man in the luminous yellow jacket has to do is turn a big iron red wheel clockwise somewhere nearby. It makes you wonder though. What if it happened in a football pitch during a game? Or in the pub? "Yeah, just a glass of water please barkeep..." What if it sprung up in the middle of your living room while you were watching a repeat of Changing Rooms? Could it be transformed with a couple of pebbles and some little froggy figurines into an attractive water feature? What if the whole city was on a giant water bed that some miscreant is going around puncturing with a knitting needle? At the moment I feel a bit like the ground is wobbling around underneath me but I never imagined...
Well, until Glasgow floats away into the distance, I'll let the noise of the new municipal fountain mingle with the midnight motorway noises. Until the man in the luminous yellow jacket comes. Until it happens again.
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gillyscribbles, at 11:48 pm
3 Comments:
aww ... watery magic. Wow it looks even better than i remember. .. Good times. I can'twait till summer !!
in the summer, though, would you really take your shoes and socks off, roll your jeans up and jump it? what if you jumped onto some glass? or a syringe? or trifle?
ok trifle wouldn't be so bad. but it's hardly disney world.
ok trifle wouldn't be so bad. but it's hardly disney world.
ahhh but didn't a wiseman say ... "better syringe in foot that foot in meat pie ..." Never a truer word spoken.
