Exterminate!

On the next episode of Doctor Who, the Doctor finally regenerates in female form as an African high priestess.

Meanwhile, in a vain attempt to appear more happenin', the Daleks don gold lamé Members Only jackets, then borrow some old robes from an Enigma video shoot to change up their winter wardrobe.

Just add Ecstasy. And patchouli-wearing, techno-loving Hippies.

* * *

I kid, but "L.S.I. (Love Sex Intelligence)" is one of my favorite songs from the '90s and I'd even say in my Top 25 for all-time pop favorites.

But the video, not so much.

Like me, the video has not aged nearly as well as the Doctor. But then I don't get a new body and face every time my contract runs out.

The video is definitely a product of its era--rave culture, which I only briefly experienced in my early 30s, way too late for it to have any effect. I already felt too old in my 20s; by the time rave got going, I was positively ancient.

Ancients of Mu. Heh.

Was this the beginning of Cool Britannia? Perhaps. After the synergy of the 1980s, I do think this is the point at which British and American pop culture began to diverge radically, at least for a period of time. First rave, techno, Madchester, and drum and bass; then Oasis, Blur, Suede, Lush, and all those other one-word bands. I don't know if they would qualify as shoe-gazers, but the era does seem full of navel-gazing.

But then, that's the experience of a then-30something American, who was living in Texas at the point, one who was well placed outside of the Gulf Stream of pop culture, one who had a better handle on what was happening in the states (Mexican and American) that bordered the Gulf of Mexico than he did on the sound of a bright cool Britain.

Would I do it differently? Should I have stayed in the mainstream rather than a backwater? I don't know. Sometimes I feel as though I missed out on something, excising myself from Washington, D.C. (a backwater in its own way, at least as far as happenin' international pop culture is concerned), at the beginning of the '90s.

However, I'm not sure I missed out on enough to make me truly regretful--other than for my lost youth in general.

* * *

Feh, regrets, I've had a few, but I've done it mostly my way so far. And yet, there has been this nagging question throughout my life: Canoe on the bayou or kayak on the raging river? April shower or eye of the hurricane? Champagne bubbles or supernova? Manhattan, Kansas, or Manhattan, New York City?

This feeling got to me again on a recent trip to Toronto, in which our hero, unable to find suitable parking at any West End TTC subway station, attempted to drive via Dundas, Bloor, and a number of wrong turns into the artificial heart of Hogtown. Mission accomplished, physically and vehicularly unscathed but psychologically frazzled, a situation made no better by the sky-high parking rates, humidity, and sensory overload of Buskerfest. (Not an intentional destination, I can assure you.)

I realize at moments like this that I'm not Kingston--a place visited in the spring for a job interview--but I'm not necessarily Toronto either. If anything, I'm more Montreal, a large city in which I feel extraordinarily comfortable--serene, sophisticated, soul-nourished, stimulated, safe, satisfied.

Which is problematic when the man you love lives in the TO suburbs and is unlikely to shift from that spot anytime soon.

This is also problematic because I haven't had a clue on what to do next for a couple of years now, and I don't have the stomach for more of the same. No plan, no direction, no emphasis, no ideas of any permanence.

You could say I'm living more in the moment than I ever have. But you might also say I'm rudderless, listing, unable to see beyond the end of my small craft. The world looks flat from this vantage. I could fall off the edge at any moment.

Forget the peace at last vs. blitzkrieg bop metaphors. This is more rock-meets-hard place, a spot that is hardly comfortable but all too familiar.