Continuing an account of the activities of Bronwyn Gosling, Grayling Muir and Curt Finks back in 1992. Part of a weekly series (Part 1 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5).

When Curt Finks left his cottage that morning, his thoughts were broken down as follows: 80% on ink and printing equipment, 15% on Brent Geese migration, and 5% on the piece of apple pie that was left over. He was not thinking about the leaves on the path that lay before him or the black wooden gate that had been jammed shut for the past few days. He pulled on his jacket, checked his pockets for his sandwich and apple, and hurried down the steps, only to slip on the leaves, slide down the path, tumbling headfirst over the gate.

Trying to maintain some sense of dignity he brushed himself down, retrieved the apple and his cap, and set off once again, heading for the twitchers’ hide on the edge of the fens. He would need to hurry if he was to meet Bronwyn at their rendezvous point, entering the hide together to minimise the disturbance to the birds. He picked up his pace. Tripping on a curb by the cul-de-sac in the new estate, he found himself trying, unsuccessfully, to right himself for the second time that morning, his landing cushioned by a pair of unfamiliar white sports shoes.

Investigating further, looking up, and then even further up, he found himself being helped to his feet by a huge binoculared stranger wearing a purple sweatshirt under unzipped waterproof. It bore the logo of a Canadian university. “Curt Finks, I presume”, the stranger laughed, shaking his hand and putting his other arm around Finks’ shoulder. “Are you alright? The name’s Muir”. Curt Finks rubbed his hands on his trousers, inspecting his palms for cuts and embedded gravel, and issued four hundred words of angst before the other man stopped him with a smile and a friendly shake of his head.

Later that afternoon, following sandwiches and tea, after which Finks had “certainly not” had a postprandial nap, Grayling asked Finks about his traumatic morning. Curt had warmed to the Canadian professor, despite his slovenly dress. It transpired that an enthusiast from a fanzine called “Fringe of The Fringe” had door-stopped Finks when he was still in his pyjamas, asking for details about his yearly Edinburgh Fringe show. Discussion quickly moved to Finks’ “famous printing set” and his bespoke programmes, unique to each performance. Did he keep a copy for his archives? Finks had no idea what she was talking about.

To be continued in a week

Reconstructed from Curt Finks’ 1992 diary (by Ali and GANTOB 2023)

Finally, if you have 400 words you would like to contribute to this blog, please get in touch.

Yesterday’s excellent blog by JR received a lot of kind words:

• “The blog entries so far have been really, really good” (bobbinsofbrisbane)
• “This one really moved me” (missiformation)
• “I love this one. Art brings comfort and sanctuary… (I also love Anthony Gormley)” (mitzee75)

Today we hear more from JR, in another powerful post. Thank you very much JR!

I saw Brian Cox the physicist on TV talking about entropy and time. Entropy cannot decrease over time. Descent from order to disorder is ineluctable. Kaos always wins. Viz the 1992 Brit awards.

How is order kreated? Through konnektions of course. Konnektions can be physikal, molekcular, atomik; but recent events in this blog have exposed a metaphysikal form. GANTOB may have stumbled upon the dark matter which glues sentient and imaginary beings together. A  form of kwantum entanglement that can kreate physikal effects from intangible konnektions formed solely from koh-inky-denki.

Let me elaborate. I have never consciously met GANTOB or Little Grapefruit. However, the book and the blog keep throwing out koh-inky-denkis…

Little Grapefruit’s travels through the kapitals took her to Vienna. I have no doubt that while she was there she would go to the Naschmarkt. She would have met her friends and distant relations on the many fruit stalls. We used to stay near there. If she looked back through her time teleskope, capturing the light from 25 years ago, she would see me and my 6-year-old son being vox popped for Austrian TV as we bought a kilo of mushrooms. We were on the six o’clock news. From Naschmarkt it’s a short roll or tram to the Hundertwasserhaus. Looking through my own time teleskope I can see myself walking the same textured floor she rolled along. To this day I have a print of the krazily kurved konstruction that is Hundertwasserhaus on my study wall. It’s not a place you read or hear about very often. Koh-inky-denki.

GANTOB lives, at least as I type, in a manse. I am now a karer for a woman, a child of many manses. A manse-rvant if you will. The manse child has kanker. Treated with 5FU and other kemikals. Yesterday, after a year of waiting, I saw an NHS dermatologist. He diagnosed kronik keratosis on the kranium and prescribed 5FU. Koh-inky-denki. I didn’t see that coming. It will burn my bonce and I will have to be plastered like The Benefakor. Koh-inky-denki. If I’m beaned by a stray GANTOB pamphlet the next time I walk under a bridge I’ll know for sure something is going on and another konnektion has been forged.

The mere reappearance of the kemikal 5FU is remarkable as it now konnekts 3 stories in this blog. Its purpose is to destrukt kanker.  Kanker is a perverse konnektion of korrupted cells. 5FU is a destroyer of those konnektions, a delivery system for targeted kaos. The trick is to focus the destruktion to avoid kollateral damage. That is where klinikal science needs metaphysikal help. Can the dark matter of koh-inky-denki, uncovered via this blog, konnekt with the interstellar ley lines and the angel of Mu-Mu to kreate a kure? Science advances logikally and it is fair to have faith in science. There is also hope in konjekture, and with hope all is not lost. Hope on and keep the faith.

JR

6 December 2023

To answer JR’s point about Naschmarkt – Little Grapefruit did indeed visit when she was there (though she didn’t write about it).

However, another figure important to the GANTOBverse does mention Naschmarkt, but that is in a story that is hidden deep in earlier posts:

• Either a hidden hyperlink within the Vienna leg of Little Grapefruit’s trip: you need to look really closely
• Or an Austrian-themed clue within the pictures in Stuart Huggett’s Dr Who post (easiest to see in the first photo)

Finally, if you have 400 words you would like to contribute to this blog, please get in touch.

Good luck, GANTOB

In this 5th day of contributions from GANTOB correspondents, JR reflects on the power of coincidence. JR finds connections between GANTOB’s work and his wife’s treatment. Thank you JR for sharing your experiences and for your deep reflection on all things GANTOB.

My wife, H, and me deliberately mispronounce “coincidence” as “Koh–Inky-Denki”. The phrase “never underestimate the power of Koh-Inky-Denki” is often used.

In August I saw GANTOB’s pamphlet 8 and entered the Kompetition. My question involved art, money, sickness, memory and comfort. It was answered with a quote from Anthony Gormley in GANTOB’s book. I enjoyed the book but my eye drifted off GANTOB’s literary ball. I missed the blog, until an unexpected package containing 3 pamphlets associated with death, prediction and Krossing arrived. Subjects at the forefront of our minds. Koh-Inky-Denki? One pamphlet pointed me at the blog. I am now up to date.

GANTOB initially moved on from the letter “K” fixation, but it returns in later blog posts. The Benefaktor  makes a point on the +ve and -ve duality of the word “sanction” and suggests “sanktion” should be used as the +ve connotation. I struggle to find a positive connotation for cancer, but I’m sick of seeing and hearing it and henceforth am adopting “kanker”.  I thought this would be a personal neologism but it is actually the Dutch spelling. Koh-Inky-Denki?

H has pankreatik kanker. Stage 4, inoperable, terminal. A clinical trial involving a cocktail of chemotherapy drugs (including 5FU as used by The Benefaktor, Koh-Inky-Denki) keeps her alive but there are days when she gets tired and just sits looking at the garden or the TV.

H is a minister’s daughter, her early life was peripatetic. Her formative years were spent in Newcastle. She retains a great fondness for the North East. I anticipated GANTOB’s response in the Kompetition. I went to the North East and spent a month’s pension on a 6×3 foot steel sculpture of the Angel of The North. I installed it in our garden for H to look at on her quiet days.

Gormley’s work is narcissistic, focussed on his body, but it invites us to consider both the human form and the human condition. H’s condition is poor, but she has Faith, our AOTN brings her Komfort.

I will supplicate to anything, real or imagined that might help H. GANTOB rightly says we cannot avoid loss* but I had a fever dream where I appealed to The Ancients of Mu-Mu for the interstellar ley line to be rerouted through our AOTN to bring healing. Can Angels of Mu-Mu be justified?  Sculpture often lasts beyond an artist’s first death** but can it postpone one?

JR, 5 December 2023

Footnotes:

* Pamphlet X13 Paint Them Black

**Pamphlet X12 Who Died Last, which references Banksy et al.

Each of the intrepid explorers of the GANTOBverse have provided 400 words about the characters introduced in the first GANTOB book (published September 2023) and this blog. In return they will be sent a kopy of the book of this blog (planned for publikation 23 January 2024). Each household can provide up to three blogs. You can still provide a kontribution, as long as you have an excuse for late submission.

All is quiet in The Manse. We live on the edge of the village, behind some mature trees. I can’t hear the wind in the trees. I hear some scurrying about outside. Sounds like one of the squirrels making her trip from the trees to the bird feeder.

I have a lie in to mark the successful conclusion of part 2 of my trilogy. Little Grapefruit’s travels have taken the pressure off for a few days. I’ve been doing some sorting and packing. After the church merger we’re moving in a month, destination unknown.

Ali is stressed of course. The documentation for The Manse and the church is all in his name. I’ve been doing what I can. But there are distractions everywhere. The cats, who I think are ours rather than The Manse’s knows that something is up. B____ has already been locked in the eaves once, and K____ has been bringing up her breakfast.

I make a list of things to do and use this to draw up a Gantt chart, colour coded for household, new job and GANTOB (the project). There are 33 days left before I can come out of character and disappear back into the real world. Part 3 of my trilogy.

After tomorrow I will be handing over the blog to GANTOBers. I have received enough submissions to make this a worthwhile endeavour, with more contributions promised. I will still have some blogs of my own to write, and I will need to try to tie it all together into some sort of konklusion, though life rarely fits into neat calendar years. Returning to my earlier reading about the “intentional fallacy” It all feels rather democratic. It certainly fits with my earliest ideas around “repositioning” when I was trying to work out how GANTOB fits into The KLFRS: “changing the image of (a company, product, etc.) to target a new or wider market”.

I think that we can answer the question asked in the unnumbered pamphlet “You Decide”. If you haven’t read that pamphlet, you can read more and apply yourself (deadlines are there to be ignored). Currently we are at exactly 23 copies of GANTOB’s 2023: A trilogy. I don’t think that I need explain the significance of 23 to you reader. Might we reach 45? As I said, you decide. I’m still waiting on an application from ChatGPT (other platforms are available).

GANTOB

29 November 2023