Nathan Hall in the U.S. South July 2000

It's 97 degrees here. 97 degrees! The bugs have struck up their merry throng and all is well, apart from the fact that in the 7 seconds I ventured onto the front porch to partake of their night song one of them sank its fucking incisors into me. Rest assured it shall sing no more. Period. It's gone to the great invertebrate jazz lounge in the sky! If only the dispatching of offensive human musicians was that easy! Which reminds me, in Mojo magazine there is an advert that beggars belief -- for Tony Hadley's new album! That giant of the New Romantic movement! Which it hails as a full blown classic! Come again? COME AGAIN? One can only assume that the advert was drafted under the most dreadful threat at gunpoint of actually having to listen to it. Surely a more truthful advert would have said: "Another toilet pan of aural excrement from a bellowing has-been. Call the vet and end this madness." or "Once again -- it's Hadley behaving badly. You will be taken from this court where you will be hung by your moth eaten cape until you are dead!"

Anyway, as I said the temperature here is phenomenal -- almost as hot as Las Vegas and Phoenix, Arizona. If i run out of money and need to raise some fast cash, my lack of resistance could work to my advantage. I could position myself on a street corner wearing a conical hat, drape a a welsh flag over my shoulders and play feebly on a wheezing makeshift accordion while dancing the sailor's hornpipe, fainting at periodical intervals, for the amusement of the locals. Perhaps they'd shower me with enough dimes to buy a Diet Dr Pepper and a cardboard box for the night. "Oh you limeys you're so quaint -- oops! There he goes again! Wake up fella. Haw! Haw! Oh Mercy!" Just a thought.

Anyway, Lori had warned me that the Tallahassee main government building although impressive, does bear an unfortunate resemblance to a giant phallic symbol. I was pretty skeptical, since any tall building could be roughly referred to as a phallic symbol and CNN hasn't exactly been running frenzied stories about Wall Street coming to a standstill because its stockbrokers are falling around in paroxysms of laughter at the shape of their workplace. So as we drove down the approaching boulevard the tower gradually hove into view and it was indeed a mighty thrusting structure -- but, you know, so what? Hardly a matter for hilarity. However as we climbed the gradient of the boulevard the terrible truth was revealed -- for at its base -- one on each side -- was a huge hemisphere structure , looking for all the world like a pair of gargantuan bollocks. I mean these would put Godzilla to shame even after radical surgical enhancement and a turbo vacuum pump! It's totally obscene! And the local legislature sits there making decisions on state matters of the utmost seriousness! I award full marks to the architect for letting his obvious love of Carry on films to permeate his working life but please -- plans for state capital buildings must go through endless committees of people before they are built -- how did it get from a diagram on a piece of paper to a full blown sky scraping concrete erection. I have to say that as we went up the lift in it to see the spectacular views from the top I couldn't help thinking that Freud could have written whole volumes on the implications of such an expedition. We went not so much the heart of Tallahassee politics as the gonads of its government. (pause for laughter...no? Oh suit yourself. No really.I'm cool about it... Mutter. Flush. Bitterness.)

By the way, despite the stiffy related silliness above, the town is pretty damned impressive, with some beautiful buildings, and trees with Spanish Moss hanging down off them, and flowers everywhere. The weird thing is though is that you have no real focal point of a pedestrian area where everyone congregates at the same time such as St Mary's Street.(Hey my reference points really betray my years of globetrotting, eh?) There aren't streets of shops and pubs and cafes altogether. A bit weird to my sensibilities. The car is everything here -- so you can get to the monster malls like Kmart! These are quite an experience. Kool Aid actually exists. And once again Beef Jerky made an appearance. And the people ranged from stunning ultra tanned pretty people to horribly bloated blubber bottoms. Much more obese than you would see in Britain.And all their food names are different. Oh so different. Where am I? Don't. Recognise. Anything. Sweet God, where am I? What have I done? Shall I ne'er see that sceptred isle again? Mummyyyyyyy!

A short course of therapy ensues.

Went to a lake yesterday and was reassured to at last see 2 familiar sights. A duck and a pigeon. As you know, I genuinely find endless pleasure and hilarity from the mere sight of these 2 creatures and the sight of a duckling giving chase to a pigeon in a bid to adopt it as a second, surrogate mother, much to the accelerating pigeon's consternation was a genuine case of nurse pass the bandages -- my sides! God help me, I mean it! (I know! "You went to America to gather me tales about a twatting pigeon. Cancel my subscription!" Well buddy, me and pigeons come as a package -- take it or leave it!)