…under surveillance. Creepy!
Neighbourhood Watch
20 Thursday Aug 2020
Posted Humour, Photography, Social Comment
in20 Thursday Aug 2020
Posted Humour, Photography, Social Comment
in…under surveillance. Creepy!
26 Tuesday Apr 2016
Posted Animals, art, Celebrities, Community, Poetry, Politics, Relationships, Social Comment, Writing
inTags
Ai Wei Wei, Bastet, cat scan, cats, CCTV, hieroglyphics, Isis, kumquat, mummified cat, NGV, surveillance, votive
(Image: Louvre, 2004- Guillame Blanchard)
I have news for all you cat lovers:
apparently your pets want to kill you.
And this one keeps me under surveillance
as I water my host’s garden tonight.
Two gimlet eyes spy on me from the wall
which divides this property from next door’s.
I could turn the hose on my stalker, but
today I have been at the NGV*
to view how Ai Wei Wei celebrates cats.
He has over forty in his compound,
but, curiously, only one of them
makes an attempt to open doors. This puss
looks like she could deal in execution.
Like Bastet, she has the soul of Isis.
Maybe she is trying to work out why
I am cultivating the flowers here,
in this inner city terrace’s yard.
Where is the missing person I’ve replaced?
As Wei Wei replenished his bike’s basket
with a new floral tribute every day,
to give the cameras something to record,
I confess that I like to perplex her.
Under the kumquat tree she remains still-
a furry camouflaged CCTV,
unmoving as a mummified votive.
Will she spring to life and sink her needles
into my neck, for not being the one
who conforms to feline expectation?
Are there easier targets to pounce on,
with unsheathed claws, scattering the petals?
Maybe she is an opener of doors
and has succeeded in her freedom bid
and, though human, I am the one who is trapped,
because I accept that we are all watched
and that someone is trying to decode
the hieroglyphic details of our lives,
so that we feel that we are never alone
and inscrutable eye slits follow us.
03 Sunday Nov 2013
Posted Arts, Celebrities, Education, Family, Film, History, Humour, Literature, Psychology, Social Comment, Suttonford, television, Writing
inTags
arras, Artem, Denmark, eBlaster, Hamlet, intelligent parenting, Laertes, Machiavelli, Montalbano, Ola calendar, Ophelia, paranoia, Pasha, Polonius, Rainbow portrait, Reynaldo, Rosencrantz and Guilderstein, spyware, surveillance
Carrie was eager to spill the beans, and I don’t mean the caffeine
variety, though we were in our favourite haunt, post-Hallowe’en.
Tiger-Lily told me that Juniper’s mother has been spying on her daughter
via eBlaster, she whispered, looking over her shoulder. Juniper discovered
that her mother was monitoring her every keystroke and was downloading
her e-mails.
Maybe that’s why her daughter can be so aggressive, I replied. No one
takes kindly to having their privacy invaded. I mean, take Hamlet..
Hamlet? Carrie looked confused.
Yes, he put on an antic disposition to cover up his anxiety at living in a
surveillance state.
I’d hardly call the Boothroyd-Smythe’s residence a temple to
totalitarianism!
No, I continued, but you take my point about Hamlet being annoyed when
people started influencing his girlfriend and manipulating his best mates?
Well, it’s years since I read the play, stated Carrie. But, apparently Gisela,
Juniper’s mum contacted a company called SpectreSoft and ordered a
product, which she then had installed on Juniper’s computer.
Well, they used to say that people who eavesdropped never heard
anything good about themselves, I remarked.
The thing was that Juniper had only been Googling stuff for her
coursework and was using Twitter to gossip about a Housemistress called
Miss Fotheringay, who is apparently seeing an older man, to the delectation
of all the girls in her year, Carrie expatiated.
So, it has all been relatively innocent trivia? But did Juniper find out that her
mother was turning into Elizabeth 1, all ears and eyes, like in that Rainbow
portrait?
She was furious and ran away to her father’s house. He supported her
human right to privacy and all sorts of nonsense was raised re/ access.
Sounds over-inflated, I opined. It’s half term. I wonder if things will cool
down and she’ll return before school starts?
Well, her trust has been shattered and she says she would prefer to board.
If the school allows it. Her brother didn’t seem too upset. He just threw out
all her yarn and needles and took over her room, as it has much more space,
Carrie added.
Isn’t John- that’s his name, isn’t it?- worried that his mum may spy
on him?
No. He says he could disable anything that she tried to attach to his
equipment. But he considers her cool for trying.
An obnoxious little Polonius-in-the-making! Someone will spear him
through the arras one day! I ventured.
If Juniper’s put into Miss Fotheringay’s house, then she can spy on her
teacher’s comings and goings for the rest of the girls, Carrie predicted.
St Vitus’ is probably as rotten a state as Denmark! Girls can be so
Machiavellian!
It’s all about trust and, sadly, human relations were ever thus! I
pronounced. Even Rosencrantz and Guilderstein were traitors and
Ophelia was relaying information about her lover to her father.
Reynaldo was keeping a check on Laertes. Everyone’s paranoid!
Carrie bit into a piece of shortbread. I wonder if anyone is spying on
me? I shred all my receipts, but what if Gyles is intercepting my accounts
and he discovers how much I am spending in Costamuchamoulah each
month? What if he sees how many times I have clicked on ‘Artem’, or
‘Pasha’?
Or ‘Montalbano’? I teased. Just be upfront. That’s the secret. Don’t
hide behind an arras.
What’s an arras? She looked puzzled.
According to the guys, it’s the curvy bit of her anatomy that Ola wiggles
on ‘Strictly’, I informed her.
I shouldn’t worry about Gyles uncovering your secret passions. All the guys
will be too busy clicking on Ola’s Calendar, by all accounts, so it’s touche and
you can bet that male viewings won’t come in single spies, but in battalions.
I think your tiny peccadilloes are relatively innocuous and will be below the radar.
If you’re worried, though, I’d just buy Gyles Ola’s calendar for Christmas. That’ll
keep him off your tail!