The Spoons That Are My Ears!

I've just finished one month's 'proper' work as a gallery attendant in a museum of Egyptian antiquities. Here I am in a quiet moment wearing the head of the god of Anubis. This photo had to be taken quickly, before I was caught in the act! What can I say about my brief experience as a conventional employee? Only the same thing that I always say: no human should ever have to call another human "boss". As for museums as a work environment, I can only offer the heretical opinion that the living are more important than the dead, and taking away from the limited time of the living to look after the artefacts of the dead seems somewhat perverse. I sure as heck don't want some poor sap 3000 years in the future to give up their precious living time to stand guard over one of my broken old possessions. When I'm dead, I'm dead: I no longer matter and neither do my things. Only the living truly count. The dead have disqualified themselves from the world through the act of dying.

Like I said, my view on the issue is heretical. And there are always exceptions. For instance, Anubis in this picture is reading a collection of Italo Calvino stories. Calvino is dead but still matters enormously to me. He's my favourite writer by far. On my last working day at the museum I was delighted to discover that one of my colleagues (who happened to be Italian) was a huge Calvino fan. We were able to enthuse together! Shame I didn't learn this before. Ah well! Speaking of Italy, here's an interview with me that the Italian publisher 40K did a few days back. But if you don't speak Italian, have no fear, it's also available in English here. Caspita! Splendido!