It's my birthday and I wanted dark beer. Hung a tote with empty bottles on the handlebars, got on my bike and went to buy some. Not there anywhere. Visited all the shops along the way, nope, they say, got none. Arrived at the brewery gates. Just like all the rest of the alimentary industry here, they have a retail outlet by the gate, where it's cheaper because it's both without an intermediary and somehow the goods sold are the faulty ones, mislabeled or whatever, so formally not for sale. When I got to the gates, there's a reception committee, tambour band... Well you shouldn't have, really, it's too much of an honor... And then a coach with four fat horses comes out from the yard. Ah, yes, the Days of beer are starting.
I enter the shop, two guys sit there, no customers. Says they haven't made dark beer for a few years now, because it needs sugar, and they owe šećerana big time. Took some ordinary beer then. Later I heard that nobody knows what they make it of now, because they don't even have cash for the ersatz corn, to which they switched because they also owe skrobara a lot. And the debt came when the manager took a big loan from Kula bank, where Radoman Božović was the manager, and then swindled the money (probably kicking back the agreed share), and all of a sudden the brewery is incapable of paying out its debts, and the interest accrues. All to decimate its value, so then to buy it off with the stolen money and make private. And that's not the only case, there are too many of them to prosecute, and nobody's even trying to. Because that seems to have been the plan from the start. The scam at the levels of power, to privatize the society's property by simple robbery.
The trabant was malfunctioning, so I took it to majstor Piksi in Čurda. Packed Nina's poni bike, collapsible, and returned on it. Dropped by Marina for a coffee, as I had promised once. And told her this is strictly coffee, no affair. Wrote the whole event in her article.
Finally around 28th we have a schedule somewhat detailed... we're lifting anchors in some ten days. Reporting to oldwave: „Finally the winning combination of cables, ripping the vinyls finally works, even on my contraption of a machine. Last night I took down what remained of Korni grupa that I didn't take before ('41 and a couple of things from the first album, today Dead sea goes), then follow the remainder of Neca Falk, Boom 72 and a few more, as much as I can do until weekend, then I take out the disk and pack it in the suitcase. Later we'll talk about transfers - exclusively via The Net or mail, any triper with waiting on the busodrome is out of the question, time is tight (Booker T & MGs).“
All the rain that was delayed during the bombing, they did seed the clouds with who knows what, are coming now. There's 10cm of water in the basement, which is a first. It's coming from the spillover pit, which Vlasta made us dig under the lower landing of the stairs, in case the system leaks, so the boiler doesn't explode. Ahem... this is not steam heating, the temperature never goes over 40°, there's no excess pressure. We keep it no higher than 1,5 bar.
We fish the walnuts floating in there, paddling so the water circles, waiting for them nuts to come to us. The freezer box is okay, we had lifted it on 12cm pieces of wood, just in case. And all the cables are somewhere higher.
Rain, rain.... the laundry can't dry properly. I replace the battery on the trabant, but it seems there's an extra cable which looked like some extra grounding, which I'd have to reattach with what tools I have, and all the rain which was suppressed during the bombing was pouring now... I just gave up and asked Vanji if I could have the car (the lada, the fregata being gone for good) for the remaining days. "Pour and ride" he said... meaning "if you have the cash, buy gasoline wherever you can - we don't have it". As far as work was concerned, I was on leave until I quit, the boys can do it all by themselves. I dropped by Blenotel to check on them while they're dežurni at the server, and as I was finally in the building during the working hours, went downstairs to say my goodbyes to Dragana. She was, ahem, still looking good, specially with some tiny stool or something under her left heel, must keep that ankle raised some time every couple of hours, so one can't fail to notice the view... Eh, well, in some other life. Didn't stay long, one cigarette, not even a coffee.
I bought about six liters, I think, from some dealer in my area, which is three pepsi bottles and the guy knows that I know where he lives. That's to guarantee the quality. There were cases, near romanian border, that someone sells ordinary gasoline as super (nb. we have a type of gasoline called premium, which is actually lower grade, only 86 octanes; the 95 is called super). They caught him pouring kiwi juice. He was lucky to get out in one piece. But that was before 1995.
Meanwhile, aman managed to pull a big one yesterday - they did probably the first more or less live stream (by shuffling a couple of Mavica cameras with internal floppies, which went to someone's nearby box to upload fresh videos to the server) from some protest yesterday. Amazing.
Around this time, we packed Skviki to Brlja, his kids are of elementary school age, and they have a yard (he finished the house meanwhile and moved in), so it would be a perfect match. And it did fine over there, for a week or two, and then a passing dog ate it. They had no fence, and just let it roam the yard.
On thirtyfirst we poured the concrete around the left post of the gate. While I was working around that, there comes Mrga (aka Mrgud, a curmudgeon).
- You going?
- Going.
- What can I tell you, you know it all. Just one thing: don't deal with ours. Nobody will fuck you like your own.
And I memorized* that, and boy, was he right.
On 1st of september, Lena went to school, sat a little and then asked the teacher whether she really has to sit there, we'll be in America next week. The teacher wished her a good trip and all the best, ciao so long.
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* couldn't possibly say „remembered“, can't remember something you never heard before... sorry about your language.
28-VIII-2021 - 5-VII-2026