Jarkko Lehmus Diary

Praise The Lordi!

Saturday 20th May, 4pm: "Yeah, dad... I hope they do well against the Chezk Republic. So, if they win, they'll be against either Canada or Sweden in the final? I hope it'll be Sweden... Heh, heh... What? The Eurovision Song Contest? Lordi? That's crazy! They don't stand a chance, but it'll be a great laugh! Apparently the Greeks are trying to ban them from performing, the local presenters say that hell will freeze over before Finland wins and if they do, they'll get Lordi tattoos! Yeah, I'll be watching it. We'll have a little Nordic get-together at Paula's and Graeme's house. Food, booze and Terry Wogan... Oh, of course. He's this sarky old codger of a presenter. Funny as they come. Ok... Enjoy the match. Talk to you later."

Saturday 20th May, 11pm: "FIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAND!!!! HARD! ROCK! HALLELUJAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!!"

Mr Lordi and his jolly monsters of rock!

The whole idea of the evening was to get all mashed up, ignore the rubbish music, make jokes about the inbred political voting and the ridiculousness of the whole institution, giggle at Terry Wogan and cheer at Lordi when they came last. Talking about getting sucker punched: Lordi is the first ever Finnish winner of the Song Contest and, just to piss on the traditional cheesy power ballad values, they cleaned up with the biggest ever points total in the history of the competition! I tip my hat to the Finnish nation for having enough balls to unleash these monsters to wreack havoc on the gayness of Eurovision, to all the independent donors who pooled enough money together to pay for the pyros the band couldn't have otherwise afforded and finally to the 100 000 000 Europeans who watched the show and voted the freaks to win!

Who gives a flying flopsie about icehockey anyway? I'm proud to be a Finn! We might not be pretty, but we sure as hell rock! While the devil is freezing his nuts off and the Greeks are admiring their fresh tattoos I'm gargling with the left over tequila to regain my voice and planning the trip to Helsinki in May 2007: lunatics on pogosticks and stagediving the Eurovision way!

A Shocked Prostitute Bitches About Whores

I watch TV very seldom mainly due to the brain rotting content it blasts at me every time I try my luck and switch it on. Big Brother is a prime example. I came home feeling like a tadpole beaten with a sledgehammer, whipped up some grub and sat on the couch to enjoy it in the sickly glow of the telly. 10 minutes later my food sat on the table untouched simply because I can incapable of locating my jaw. It had fallen on the floor and shuffled somewhere to hide. Big Brother was invading my peaceful evening with a true vintage selection of attention whores. Channel 4 has really outdone itself this time and dug the most twisted freaks out of woodwork, including a raving queen of a garage attendant from my local BP. A very helpful chap who insisted on helping me to dry my motorbike after I'd washed it. While stroking the bike he was joking, I hope, that if he'd have as much money as the bike cost he'd offer it in exchange for a night with me. It's a slightly disconcerting to think that he's in with a chance of winning some 400k. That's enough money to buy a van and a bunch of Albanian goons with previous experience of hijacking for sexual exploitation. I might have to leave the country... The name means 'King of The Birds', by the way.

I might be a kind of a prostitute myself, but at least I have the excuse of artistic fulfilment... But I'm still a prostitute. I mentioned earlier about the financial changes in arts in Scotland, right? The bomb dropped a week and a half ago: from the next financial year the company will have £1.2 million more to play with per year. Let's say that again: 1.200.000 Pounds Sterling! That's an increase of about a third in the yearly budget of the company! All this talk of more performances, new work, foreign touring and the looming new building is all fine, but when the announcement comes in the middle of negotiations over pay my first thought is: "Show me the money!" I understand the company's been really stretching the pennies for a few years, but come next financial year I'll waiting with my rucksack open.

Let's face it: what we put out bodies through is not humane, so we should really get paid decent amount of money for it. The Edinburgh Festival programme is a prime example. Here's last Tuesday evening in a nutshell:
My body is screaming: "What the effin' 'ell are you trying to do to me!" and my chiropractor is mumbling: "What the effin' 'ell are you trying to do with this body..." Ribs all over the place, a bunch of vertebraes heading for the hills and pelvis having a whole party of its own.

Although I have willingly chosen this profession and suffer the consequences of my boneheadedness it's only natural to try to roll the blame on someone else so I blame Rubinald Rofino Pronk's parents for giving their son too good genes, Krzysztof Pastor for creating evil choreography and Kwik-Fit for replacing half of my muscles with steel cables and crowbars during my last oilchange. Solo material is all ok: it can be adapted, but to add insult to injury I'm whacking my legs all over the place with Vassilissa next to me. She's an ex-rhythmic gymnast. Doh! There's quite a noticeable difference between 90 and 190 degrees... Can I die now or should I crawl into my cave first?

See what I mean!

Then again if I'm promised that rucksack full of money come next year, I'll stretch the old body like there was no tomorrow and by the end of the summer I'll be the loosest bitch on the block... But does that mean that I'd sleep with the garage attendant if he wins Big Brother?