Friday, 31 December 2010

NYE

For the last few days I've been trying to find something to do tonight, but every suggestion that's been made to me has left me feeling a bit.....well......meh. The fact is that I really don't like New Years Eve, and I don't want to celebrate it. So I'm not going to. I'm going to stay at home and watch the telly. I may even go to bed before midnight if I feel so inclined.

The problem with NYE is that it so emphatically marks the passing of time. It draws a big fat line under the year that was, and forces you to consider all your acheivements and failures, every decision and mistake that you've made over the course of the last 365 days. It also makes you look ahead to the following year, and all the things you have to look forward to or to dread. I seem to remember that I mentioned all this last year, and I will probably bring it up every year to come, because I'm a creature of habit. In fact, this is what I said of 2010 at its beginning:
This year will be the year I graduate from university. It will also, I hope, be the year when I get a permanent, full-time job, and the year when I move to a place of my own, which nobody can tell me not to decorate or fill with cats

Well....I graduated. I got a job. I haven't moved yet, but we have started getting estate agents round to value the place, so those wheels are in motion, and two out of three aint bad, as the Loaf says. It feels slightly affected to look back at my acheivements with pride gleaming from between the lines. Perhaps I should have sent Christmas cards after all. Then I could have included a little newsletter so that people I never see and who couldn't care less could read all about my year. But then, why bother? I can just direct them here and they can read all about it as it happens. Of course there are things I don't write about here. I've made more than my fair share of mistakes this year, and done things I'm not proud of, but I've learned from them. It's unrealistic to expect that I will never make a mistake again, so I suppose all anyone can hope for is not to make the same mistakes they made in the past. I wasn't going to make a resolution this year, but actually that's a pretty good one, and it seems a shame to waste it.

So......my resolution for 2011 is to Make Brand New Mistakes!

Monday, 27 December 2010

Not for a few years yet

My mum: Right, I'm going to get in the shower.
Baby: Nanny need change nappy?

Sunday, 26 December 2010

Well that told me

Me (blowing raspberries on a baby's tummy): I spy a belly! Gonna get your belly!
Baby: Go way Ardie Megs. My belly.

Sunday, 19 December 2010

To you. Merry Christmas. Love from me.

I never send Christmas cards. This is because I'm useless. This year, however, I'm making a conscious decision to not send Christmas cards, as opposed to just forgetting, leaving it too late or not being bothered. Instead I have followed the example of some charitably minded friends, and donated my Christmas card money to Shelter. So you won't be receiving a card from me. This won't surprise you, as you almost certainly haven't for several years if ever, but this year you can rest safe in the knowledge that it is both intentional and aiding a very worthwhile cause.

Saturday, 18 December 2010

An early Christmas present

One of my Christmas wishes has already come true. The radiator in my room has been fixed! Technically it wasn't so much an elf that repaired it as a man from British Gas, but he got the job done in a handy elf-like fashion. Of course, there is one little fly in the ointment (I mean come on! It wouldn't be me unless there were fly-ridden ointment involved), and that is the fact that the radiator has been broken for years, and I hadn't had it fixed because I couldn't afford to do so. Or so I thought.......

It was free.

Yep.

I've been piling blankets on my bed, and shivering my way into and out of my clothes for years for absolutely no good reason whatsoever. Why did it never occur to me at any point to just call them and enquire as to how much it would cost? They would have told me it was free and the problem could have been solved.

Lesson learned: even if you pride yourself on being a die-hard pessimist, it's always worth checking whether something is possible. Occasionally people - and, indeed, utility companies - can surprise you.

Thursday, 16 December 2010

All I want for Christmas is you......and some other stuff

Things I want for Christmas:


1) Boots that don't fall apart / make me skid everywhere / let my feet get wet if I so much as look at a puddle

2) A new laptop - shrieks of mirth! Santa doesn't love me that much

3) More chocolate than anyone can reasonably eat, since I'll be embracing the 'Christmas doesn't count' rule this year

4) For Santa to bring an elf with him to my house, and get it to repair the radiator in my room. If they can build etch-a-sketches they can fix plumbing.

5) This ring in gold. I can't really justify spending that much on a ring for myself, but I've wanted it for aaaaaaages. I would call him Fiver.

6) World peace or some such hippyish sop to the universe, to make me feel less guilty for being a materialistic cow


..........Oh, and a pony. Always and forever a pony.

Monday, 13 December 2010

Overheard on the bus

"I find women really pretty when they cry. Seriously. They go all pink and shiny-eyed. It makes me want to be mean to them so they cry more."

I will not be surprised when this man's photo turns up on the evening news.

Wednesday, 8 December 2010

Quote of the day

"Megan, sometimes you say words and I'm like.....yeah......ok.....I have no idea what you just said"

Tuesday, 7 December 2010

My life as a penguin

Everywhere is cold.......outside, in my house, in the office.......if I were a penguin, I would be so much more comfortable. Someone would have to lift me onto my chair at work, but once I was up there I could quite happily slap away at the keyboard with my wings, and honk down the phone, and all would be well. Then I could come home through the Arctic weather without feeling like bits of me were about to drop off. Once home, and having been assisted to open the baby gate, I would be entirely comfortable in my bed, which is, after all, approximately the same temperature as a snow drift. Why has nobody lauded this already as a flawless solution to Winter?

Sunday, 5 December 2010

Things that make me smile No.70

Daddy: What are you doing? We don't draw on giraffes. Do we draw on giraffes?
Baby: Yes.

Thursday, 2 December 2010

Things that make me smile No.69

A couple of days ago I received a letter from a concerned reader (trans: a facebook message from a mate) asking "Why has nothing made you smile in the last two months?". How remiss of me to lead my readers to believe that I haven't cracked a smile since September. So just to reassure you all:

Yesterday I saw a builder on the tube. He had tattoos all up his massive arms, paint-spattered clothes and a belly that bore testament to a lifetime's enjoyment of beer. And he was utterly engrossed in a book entitled "Baby Led Weaning". Aw!

And today I have learned...

.....that drinking the best part of a bottle of champagne is not the way to convince people that you ought to be allowed to wield a jigsaw. After much whining, I was eventually permitted to cut out an apostrophe, and made a sterling job of it, if I do say so myself. Ahem. I might have cut into the table a little bit, but the boys did that too, cutting out the rest of the sign. It's still the best apostrophe ever cut out by a drunk girl called Megan in a warehouse in Manor House tonight.

Tuesday, 30 November 2010

A gradual gradient of graduands

I graduated yesterday. Well, technically I graduated a few months ago when my results were published, but the ceremony was yesterday. The journey there was made unecessarily stressful by a combination of the tube strike and of an idiot woman pulling the passenger alarm in protest at the train being diverted from the Charing Cross branch to the Bank branch. Potential time taken changing branches at Camden = two minutes. Time spent half in and half out of Kentish Town station waiting for a supervisor to come and investigate the alarm = twenty-five minutes. Where's the logic?

Once I got to the Royal Festival Hall, where the ceremony was being held, everything went fairly smoothly. Parents found, gown sorted, photo taken. The photo was potentially the most important part of the proceedings. I certainly wouldn't have wanted to be the one to tell my Grandma she wasn't getting one! After a bit we heard the PA system vaguely in the distance and split up to go and take our seats. At some point I became aware that everyone was moving in the same direction. Away from the hall. Toward the exits in fact. And at that point I started to actually listen to the PA system, and realised that we were being evacuated from the building. Hundreds of gowned, mortar-boarded students and their familes were summarily turfed out onto the Southbank in the freezing November wind. Several of the more determinedly entrepeneurial stall-holders from the nearby Christmas fair seized the opportunity by opening up early and starting a brisk trade in hot chocolate and mulled wine, while the ubiquitous tourists looked on in confusion, probably wondering if this was some kind of quaint English tradition. Eventually we were allowed back into the building, although none the wiser as to what the security alert had been due to, and took our seats. Thirty seconds walking across a stage willing myself not to trip up, and one hour, fifty-nine minutes and thirty seconds of mind-numbing tedium later, we emerged, filled ourselves with free prosecco and escaped.

In the evening my parents took me for an amazing dinner at the Cinnamon Club in Westminster. I'm not a food blogger, and strongly suspect that I'll sound like a bit of a twerp if I start talking about the food in any detail, so I'll limit myself to saying that it was absolutely delicious, beautifully presented and very much enjoyed. My parents amused themselves thoroughly by laughing at me blushing at the sommelier, who evidently considered it part of his job to flirt with any remotely eligible female who crossed the threshold. I can't say I minded too much, since he was very obliging in finding me white wines to match every course (my red wine allergy is one of the great tragedies of my life), and his decorativeness was second only to his skill at his job.

All in all it was a fun day. It didn't exactly run smoothly, but then the things that I'm involved in rarely do. Still.....at least the chaos that follows me everywhere gives me something to write about.

Friday, 26 November 2010

North and South

I'm feeling a little ashamed at the moment. It's all Sarah Palin's fault. Yes Democrats, that's right, one more thing to hold against her.......she made me feel stupid. More specifically, she made me realise that I'm just as stupid as she is. I'm definitely going to have to improve my knowledge of politics and geography. Then when someone says to me "Haha! Wasn't it funny when Sarah Palin said North Korea were US allies?", I wouldn't have to pretend to laugh and then scuttle off google-wards to find out which Korea is which.

Tuesday, 23 November 2010

Wait.......where are you going?......don't you want an answer?

On my way home today, a large, middle-aged American lady walked up to me at the bus stop, took my hands in hers and asked me "Why so sad, pumpkin?", before walking away.

New levels of randomness.

Sunday, 21 November 2010

A matter of timing

I like tea, but it bothers me that it goes from tongue scaldingly hot to unpleasantly tepid in the blink of an eye. I dislike being left with mere seconds of agreeable temperature in which to drink it.

Friday, 19 November 2010

I've got a theory.......it could be bunnies

I have a theory. It's tenuous, so you may have to bear with me on this one, but I became convinced today of its existence. I think that studying literature turns one into an involuntary amateur psychoanalyst. You spend so much time analysing words; everything that's said, the way it's said, in what context, what isn't being said. It's inevitable that the approach would bleed out into real life, whether you want it to or not. But then, as somebody with a more than generous supply of paranoia and social insecurity, I've always read a lot into the things people say. So maybe it isn't so much that studying literature has made me do this, but that it has given me the habits and skills to make me really, really obsessive about it. Why this word rather than that one? Is the presence or absence of an exclamation mark going to change the entire tone of this email? Does that statement reflect the feelings of the character or merely what the narrator wishes the reader to believe to be the feelings of the character? Oddly enough, in the context of that rather convoluted sentence, the narrator and character are the same person; the one speaking to me. I seem to be conferring multiple personality disorder on those I communicate with, or at the very least a rather worrying premeditative and manipulative attitude to their dealings with others. Of course, all this isn't to say that I ever get my analyses right. I'm still impressively bad at reading social cues, and regularly screw up epically due to some spectacular misjudgement of someone's character or intentions. In fact, maybe it's my unnecessary engagement in the minutiae of people's speech that blinds me to the bigger picture. I'm so busy worrying about the inference of their last sentence that I completely fail to notice that they're upset, flirting with me, angry, or just a despicable human being. Perhaps some day I'll learn to see the wood without looking at the trees. In the meantime....bonus points for anyone who can identify the quote in the title.....

Thursday, 18 November 2010

My new area of expertise

When the girls have their milk before bedtime, they get to watch TV. If I happen to have possession of the remote control at this time, I confess to being more inclined to pick out something I like than something they do. At the moment I'm quite keen on Billy - a monotone-voiced, animated Northern kid with a propensity for daydreaming - but try to avoid Peppa Pig where possible, as it bothers me that the pigs' heads look like hairdryers. Dora the Explorer is so unbearably repetitious that I want to cram a stuffed giraffe into each of my ears just to make it go away, but I would watch her anyway, if it kept me from having to go anyway near In the Night Garden; a program so creepy that it has actually been known to give me nightmares.

Sunday, 14 November 2010

I never did find the pen though

A quick rummage down the back of the sofa cushions in search of the red pen belonging to a magnetic drawing board turned up a spoon, a pair of scissors and a lilac cardigan. It's been months since I've seen that cardy. Serendipitous sofa booty = awesome.

Saturday, 13 November 2010

You learn something new every day

Today I have learned not to allow babies to play with my mobile phone. Last number redial is far too easy to press.

I should probably talk about something other than babies, shouldn't I? Apologies for the recent excess of auntie-blogging, but when you live with them they do rather tend to fill up your home and, by extension, life.

So what else have I learned today, that does not relate to small children? Erm.... that's a good question. I suppose I've learned that spending most of the day on the sofa watching back to back episodes of Come Dine With Me is not conducive to my continuing education. I've also learned that going to the bank on a Saturday means using one of those paying in machines, which in turn means being forced, through aggressive impatience disguised as friendly helpfulness, to assist the myopic, technophobic old lady in front of me in the queue to use said machine, and then getting my hand chewed by the envelope chute when attempting to use it myself.

I think that may be the sum of today's learning experience.

Tuesday, 9 November 2010

Tea time

The unconditional love that a child gives you is at once wonderful and humbling. There's a lot of comfort to be found in coming home from a bad day to find eager faces at the window and little arms held up for cuddles. On the other hand, part of me worries that my bad mood will taint them in some way. I don't want such perfect innocents to ever know what sadness is, even at a remove. So I plaster on a smile, and I read stories and sing nursery rhymes, and wait for these simple pleasures to take the rough edges off my stressed out mood. It works, to an extent. In fact, I suspect I get much more from our interactions than they do. At the age of two they barely know me from Adam, so I feel privileged that they allow me to be part of their games. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go back to drinking imaginary tea from a pink plastic beauty and the beast tea cup. She put imaginary sugar in, and I can't stick sugar in tea, but I'll drink it anyway.

Sunday, 7 November 2010

Loathe at first sight

I've taught the babies to say "Molly gone for walk". It's a good thing too, since this will always be the answer to the question "Where Molly?". I have never seen such a look of fear suffuse the face of a living creature, as when the poor animal trots through the door and spies the terrifying toddler beasts in the room. They've done nothing to deserve it. They've never even got close enough to lay a finger on her. She's just a wuss. But I suspect all they will ever know about her is a brief glimpse of a pair of goggling eyes and the tip of her tail as she flees. The clatter of the cat flap as she makes good her escape is inevitably followed by a plaintive "Where Molly gone?". Molly's gone for a walk, munchkin........because she hates you.

Saturday, 6 November 2010

Invasion

My twin two-year-old nieces are now living with me. They are quite implausibly cute, but their presence does serve to confirm my suspicions that motherhood is a looooong way off for me. I'm too fond of lie-ins to be woken up so early, and make quite enough mess all by myself without kiddies to help out. However, Auntie-dom looks set to be great fun, and I anticipate it furnishing me with plenty of anecdotes, which will have me cooing while everyone else looks back fondly on the days when I talked too much about cats. Starting with this one:

Baby: Want juice, Daddy
Daddy: What do you say?
Baby: Bees

Wednesday, 3 November 2010

A sting in the tale

What's the one thing that could make an overcrowded strike-era tube train worse? A wasp in the carriage. Stop flailing and screaming you bunch of ninnies. You're not helping matters.

Sunday, 31 October 2010

Happy Halloween

This is a very serious issue. I feel very passionately that this is a practise which must be halted immediately. The effects on society are too great for us to waste time pussy-footing around; pandering to people's sensibilities and personal demons.......

Are you ready for it?........

I hereby declare war on lazy pumpkins. If you haven't the dedication to carve your squash properly then just don't bother. Drawing a face on with black marker pen is not an appropriate alternative. Un. Acc. Ceptable. That is all.

Saturday, 30 October 2010

Hold Please

I'm becoming quite the expert on the hold music genre. I fail to understand why anybody thinks it's a good idea to traumatise their callers with the dulcet tones of a blarting keyboard labouring away at Greensleeves, or the Moonlight Sonata as played on a child's toy xylophone. Worse still is the Americans, who insist on playing adverts to you while you wait. By the time I actually get to speak to a human being every nerve in my body is shrieking at me to hang up the phone. Perhaps that's the point? On the other hand, it can really brighten my mood if some company decides to play me a little Kings of Leon, as happened a couple of days ago. In reality I'm still sitting quietly at my desk, but in my head I'm having a little boogie. It's very cheering.

Sunday, 24 October 2010

With a trowel

I saw a woman on the tube, whose foundation was so thick and orange that a good half-inch at the hairline of her white-blonde barnet had been stained a delicate shade of tango. It left me eyeing her companion and wondering how, in all conscience, she could have allowed her friend to leave the house like that.

Saturday, 23 October 2010

Morning has broken me

Today is the first Saturday in over a year when I haven't had to go to work. I sank into my bed last night with a smug little smile, as I flicked the switch on the alarm to 'Off', with a flourish.........

.........fast forward to this morning when, on the dot of 8:00, I sat bolt upright in my bed, convinced I was late for work, my body instantly flooded with so much adrenaline that my chances of getting back to sleep were rendered about as high as the survival prospects of a chocolate bunny at a weightwatchers meeting. It's vastly unfair. Is a Saturday lie-in really so much to ask for after a long week? Oh well. At least the early start gives me plenty of time to get my laundry done and my groceries purchased; that being my main aim for the day.
My goals are pretty humble.

Wednesday, 20 October 2010

Today I learned...

...that it's not the done thing to get excited about stationery. My exclamation, upon being presented with a box full of shiny new staplers and rulers and things, that it was 'just like Christmas!', was met with the blankest of blank stares from the box-bearer. Judge all you like, stationery lady. Some of us have to get our kicks where we can!

Monday, 18 October 2010

No...you're right...this was much more discreet

Man at train station: Did you just see me looking at your tits?
Me: Er.....no?
Man: Oh, thank god. I thought I'd just been really unsubtle there.

Sunday, 17 October 2010

There are no fish in the sea

Back during my previous bout of unemployment - not the one that's just ended, the one before that - I was watching the telly when an advert came on for a certain dating website that declares its ability to find your perfect match through a series of scientific and mathematical formulae. Given that I was single and, more to the point, had far too much time on my hands, I thought I'd check it out. I spent un unfeasibly long time checking boxes to indicate things like how much importance I place on fidelity, and my level of interest in the fauna of Papua New Guinea, and clicked the 'find my matches' button. This was the response:

"Sorry. We currently have no matches for you"

I am officially incompatible with the entire world. This probably isn't surprising given my extreme levels of intolerance for....well....pretty much everything actually, and it leads me to wonder whether it's odd that I would rather be single than date someone who commits such trivial crimes as writing in text speak or disliking cats. I genuinely would though. Apparently I'm incapable of just making do with someone who's not quite perfect. Maybe I've watched too many Disney films, but I find myself unwilling to settle for anything less than the fairytale. This, of course, means that I will end up, to quote from the play I was recently in, "dying alone in a house full of old Argos catalogues and cat food". With any luck the abundance of kitty chow will prevent me being eaten by my feline companions before the smell of my decomposing body alerts my neighbours.

Saturday, 16 October 2010

One week in

I've finished my first week at the new job and, while I could cry with the sheer exhaustion of unaccustomed work schedules and unecessarily extreme anxiety, I'm actually really happy about things. Now that the initial feeling of OhgodwhatifIcan'tdoitwhatifImakeafoolofmyselfwhatiftheyallhateme has dissipated somewhat, I'm beginning to think that I could be perfectly content in this job. Everybody's been really friendly and, thus far and as far as I know, I seem to have avoided any graphic displays of gross incompetence or idiocy. It's nice to feel hopeful about the future after months of desperate job-hunting, so here's hoping I make it through the probation period without cocking it all up. I'd be devastated if I had to start over with the endless stream of fruitless applications and daytime television.

In the meantime, I need to acquire some new clothes. At the library they didn't really mind what I wore, so I cheerfully pranced around in my usual array of clownish outfits, piercings and cleavage, but I need to be a bit more appropriately attired now, and lack the resources. Far too many of my clothes are too tatty, low-cut or outlandish for an office environment; even one that seems to be fairly casual. I'm informed that "as long as you don't dress like a bum or a slag you'll be alright", but I suspect that my usual ambition to look like I tumbled into a fancy dress box may be frowned upon too. I can't keep wearing my mother's hand me downs for long, so I suspect that a chunk of my first paycheque will have to be invested in a work wardrobe. Of course I'd much rather spend it on tutus and corsets, but there are times when even I am forced to acknowledge the necessity of behaving like a grown up..

Tuesday, 12 October 2010

Whistle while you work

I started my new job this week. A quick scroll back through my previous posts reveals to me that I neglected to mention that I'd got a job. It's all rather a huge relief, and a testament to the importance of whinging about your unemployment at every opportunity, especially when at the pub. Sooner or later someone is bound to hear you and say "I've got a job you can have". Possibly just to shut you up.
Anyway, back to the point. I realised that it's been about four years since I last worked full-time, so I anticipate high levels of exhaustion until I get used to it again. Last night I was so knackered that I was in bed by 8:30, which is a little pathetic I admit, but it's 8:43 now and I'm still just about awake, so evidently I'm acclimatising already. Nervousness is surprisingly tiring you know, and I was very nervous indeed. I'm informed that I looked a little less terrified today than I did yesterday, but given that every glimpse I got of my reflection yesterday showed something resembling a small white rabbit that's just realised an entire herd of ressurected mammoths is headed straight at it, that's probably not saying much. In my defence, the job is very new to me, and I challenge anyone not to be a little alarmed by spreadsheets with figures in the hundreds of thousands, when their previous experience of finance runs to "I'm afraid that book's late and there's a fine on it. That'll be 17p please".

Friday, 8 October 2010

Update

Apologies, oh beloved blog readers (all three of you). It's been a busy couple of weeks, starting with performance week of the play I was in. It went fairly well on the whole, despite such minor hitches as the failure of my gun to actually make a gun-like noise at the appropriate time (I'm told by the director that I should have shouted 'bang!'. Really? How naff would that be? Besides, I was too busy laughing to shout anything) and the five minute long blackout that turned the show into a radio play. Funnily enough I was laughing through most of that too, but I like to think that the audience attributed the quaver in my voice to the psychopathic rage of a gun-toting madwoman. Anyway, I'm assured I was mahvellous dahling, mwah! mwah! As if anybody at an amateur dramatics group would say anything else to your face. Your reputation is safe, so long as you never leave the pub while there are still others there to talk about you. The highlight of the performance week was the lovely kitty who came and joined us in the dressing room; coming up the back stairs and then curling up under the dressing tables. Sweeeeet! I bet the tale of a theatre cat would make a lovely children's book.

After the run of the play ended, I took a trip up to Derbyshire to visit my parents. During this trip I was taken still further North to see my grandparents, who took us out for lunch. We drove for miles, past endless lovely looking country pubs, with pretty views over the fields, in order to reach...a Toby Carvery on a busy roundabout. Yum. The rest of my time up there was spent in turning into an old lady. I helped make chutney, started learning to knit socks, and spent an afternoon pottering around the gardens at Chatsworth. It was all very lovely and restful. Less restful, I found, is driving anywhere with my mother. As soon as she folds herself into her little convertible Toyota rollerskate she gets a terrifying gleam in her eye, and any long stretch of straight road seemingly irresistibly draws her foot to the floor of the car. She becomes the veriest picture of a midlife crisis, zipping along narrow country roads, laughing at my strangled entreaties that she please keep at least one hand on the wheel.

On my return to London I was accosted by a charming man, who told me I was the most beautiful woman in the world, before walking into a bench and falling over in a drunken heap. Classy.

Sunday, 26 September 2010

Watch out...

After finishing work yesterday, I decided I couldn't be bothered to go home before the dress rehearsal, and since it was such a lovely sunny day I thought I'd walk to the theatre. It's only a few miles as the crow flies, but I'm not a crow, had rather optimistically struck out in the right general direction without a map, and spent a fair bit of time dawdling along collecting conkers so it took a couple of hours. Over the course of this two hours I managed to get asked out three times. The first time was a pleasant surprise, and he seemed very nice, so I gave him my number. Unfortunately he then sent me a text later in the evening, all in full on txt spk, and we know how I feel about that. I should probably stop being such a stuck up cow and give him a chance though. After all, it's not as if handsome, pleasant young men make a habit of (oh look, a conker!) asking me out. The second man who approached me yesterday was neither handsome or pleasant; being seemingly incapable of hauling his eyes away from my bustline, an enterprise not aided by the fact that it was pretty much at eye level for him. Still, I offered a polite refusal and wandered on (ooooo, conker!) up the hill. Sadly I noticed nothing about the third man. He could have been my soulmate and I will never know, because by this time I was furtively looking round for hidden cameras. One guy asking me out is flattering. Two will bolster my ego for a month. Three is downright suspicious, and leads me to suspect that somebody is playing a particularly dull practical joke on me. I was half expecting Jeremy Beadle to jump out from behind a tree (is that a conker tree?) with a camera. Wait...is Jeremy Beadle dead? Hang on.....yes, wikipedia says he's dead. Perhaps the ghost of Jeremy Beadle is haunting me. What a horrifying thought.

Saturday, 25 September 2010

Things that make me smile No.68

Someone must have a fire going. It smells of coal smoke outside my place of work; a smell which, along with tomato plants, sawdust and honey, is guaranteed to take me back to childhood visits to my grandparents.

Thursday, 23 September 2010

Don't read this if you're squeamish

I may have made a casual, off-the-cuff remark the other day about my lack of respect for my cat's hunting abilities, prompted by her obsession with bringing earthworms into the house. It's worth complaining about. They shrivel up and stick to the carpet, and scraping them off is a disturbing and undesirable tactile sensation. Still, I should really know better than to tempt the fates by objecting to such a trivial inconvenience. In what seems to me to be a gross fate-based overreaction, I came home tonight to a hall full of feathers, a sitting room full of feathers, and a dining room full of very large, very dead pigeon. Now, my cat is not large. In fact she's not much more than a kitten; her recent foray into motherhood being but a chavvy teenage mistake which could have been easily prevented with better sex education in schools. So I was, and don't tell her I said so, ever so slightly impressed by her acheivement....

Breaking news! While I was typing that she brought in what appeared, at first (and very alarming) glance, to be a large turd. Luckily it turned out to be a half-eaten sausage. What is wrong with this animal?

....Anyway, back to the pigeon. It was surrounded by kernels of corn. Or wheat. Possibly barley. I'm not an expert on arable farming. Some sort of grain. They probably spilled from the bird's stomach when she ate it (sorry squeamish people, sorry, I did warn you) but it gave the odd impression of her having laid a little trail of them to coax it into the house. Maybe she did. Maybe she's out there right now with a little bag of cheese pieces, luring unsuspecting mice to a violent death. Run away, little critters! Run for your lives!

From tiny acorns, mighty piles of crap do grow

The cat is going a bit weird and excitable over my nail polish. She keeps trying to lick it and chew it off. Is there catnip in nail varnish?

I was supposed to be going for a walk on Hampstead Heath today, but it's pouring down, so we've taken a raincheck (ha!). This leaves me, once again, without a plan for the day, which inevitably leads to me walking upstairs, looking at the huge pile of clothes in the corner of my room and then walking away again. I don't have room to fit all my clothes into my wardrobe and drawers, which really means I should do a big sort out, but I don't know where to start. Massive quantities of it doesn't actually fit me anymore, but I'm cagey about throwing it away. What if I put the weight back on? I'll have nothing to wear.
I think I may have been a squirrel in a former life. Quite aside from the clothes mountain, I have endless stacks of books, which I couldn't bear to get rid off, and numerous odd containers full of 'stuff'. Stuff with sentimental value, stuff that might come in handy some day, stuff that just doesn't have an assigned place to be, so ends up in a 'stuff' box. And of course, having so much junk, I have a squirrel-like tendency to forget where a specific thing is. Staple gun? Yes, I have one of those! Erm....
Just don't ask about the stash of acorns under the living room carpet.

Wednesday, 22 September 2010

Things that make me smile No.67

Somebody just pointed me towards the Savage Chickens page, and I immediately stumbled across this comic. I may have to start being good.

Tuesday, 21 September 2010

Season of mists...

It's beginning to feel ever so slightly autumnal down here. The last few days have had a new bite in the wind, and my toesies have been hinting to me that it may be time to put the duvet back on my bed. I even have a conker in my coat pocket. It's all prompting me to empty my online shopping bags of floaty maxi dresses and flippy cotton skirts, and refill them with faux fur, shearling and velvet. Of course I still can't afford to actually buy any of these clothes, so it's all a bit of a waste of time really. Window shopping for the digital age. But then what else am I supposed to do while I'm unemployed? I'm trying to fill the day with productive things like knitting or working on my sign language, but there's only so much time you can spend on such things before you start to go a bit doolally, and I'm quite doolally enough to begin with. On the plus side, I finally dug out Firefly from the back of the shelf and started watching it. I acquired it when I was working on my dissertation, and then I went straight into exam revision, so I developed a bit of a Pavlovian response to it, where every time I looked at it I got an intense feeling of guilt, as if I had far more important things to do. Now, fortuitously, I have nothing more important to do, and it really is brilliant. Why would they cancel it? It's a mystery.

Saturday, 18 September 2010

Wakey wakey

I fell asleep on the tube on the way home last night, which is rarely a good idea. Happily I live at the end of the line, and was woken up when the train got there by a tiny, elderly Venezuelan man. I know he was Venezuelan because it emerged we were going in the same direction, and I ended up walking most of the way home with him. I wouldn't normally pick up strange men at train stations, but it's hard to feel threatened by a five foot nothing octogenarian who tells you that you remind him of a dog he had when he was a little boy . Apparently it had hair just like mine. I can only assume it was a red setter. Anyway, my new best friend chattered away to me until the time came to go our separate ways, at which point he uttered the words I hear so often from the old people who talk to me at bus stops and in supermarkets:
"You know....you seem like a nice girl....I have a son......"
I have to wonder whether these men know that their parents are pimping them out to every random girl who has the manners to smile and nod while they talk. And do all ageing relatives do this? Do I need to worry that my Grandma is trying to sell me off to every nice young lad who gets her the washing powder from the top shelf in the Co-op? And if so, what do I do about it? Tell her to stop? Or give her a list of my requirements and send her forth?

Monday, 13 September 2010

Vet-tastic

When I picked up my cat from the vet last week, I spoke to the receptionist and she called through to the office.

"Hi, I have a Miss Megan M******** here to pick up her cat Molly, and a Mrs Molly R****** to pick up her dog Megan."

Classic.

Sunday, 12 September 2010

popularity

A woman in the library was trying to persuade her child, who was about seven years old, to take out a book entitled How to be Popular. A fairly heinous message to try and force on a child, I'm sure you'll agree, but the kid's response was wonderful.
"But I don't want to be popular, Mummy" she said. "I have two friends. That's lots."

Saturday, 11 September 2010

A well-shod shell

Oh dear, a whole fortnight without posting. Bad blogger! Still, now that my library contract is over, I'll have a fair bit of time on my hands. The silver lining of unemployment?
Incidentally, I didn't get that job I wanted. I was horribly disappointed, but a little bit of a cry and a slightly larger bit of wine cheered me up, as did this:



I challenge you to watch this and not smile!

Tuesday, 31 August 2010

Tenterhooks

Every week I apply for a whole sheaf of jobs. I've yet to get an interview for any of them, which is irritating since I really need a job, but not catastrophic as I don't actually care for the jobs themselves. Today, however, is the closing date for one that I applied for a couple of weeks ago, and which I really want. Really really want. See those italics? That's how much I want this job. I'd underline it too, but it's possible to go too far with these things. I'm now just playing a waiting game and doing pointless maths in my head. Say it takes them a day to go through all the applications and discount all the duds...another day to go through all the possibles and make a shortlist...that's Thursday afternoon...but they'd probably leave it till Friday to make the calls...or would they just wait until Monday? I'm driving myself a bit loopy basically. And while time seems to be stretching itself out like a rubber band where this is concerned, it's just pinged itself back with a snap in another area of my life. I suddenly remembered last night that I'm supposed to have my book down by tonight for the play I'm rehearsing, and I haven't even started learning my lines yet. Oops. I can learn an entire play in a day, right?

Saturday, 28 August 2010

A bit of mush

This weekend I was supposed to be heading off to the midlands for my parents' anniversary party. Unfortunately I can't make it due to work commitments. So, to honour the occasion from afar, here is an unprecendented, and probably ne'er to be repeated, burst of sentimentality. Cynics look away now!

Love doesn't come from perfection,
From symmetry and shine,
The shimmer of unworn silk
Or that fast-decaying bloom.


It's knowing with eyes tight shut
The line of your lifted brow.
It's being surprised every time
By the thing that makes you laugh.


Love isn't found in perfection,
In the gloss of the bright unused.
It's the dearness of the familiar
And the sudden rush of the new.

Monday, 23 August 2010

Things that make me smile No.66

I love the contrast of the gun I wield in the play I'm rehearsing, against the tackily bright pink nail polish I'm currently wearing.

Sunday, 22 August 2010

Imagination deviation

A lot of kids have imaginary friends. I suppose it must be more common among only children or those whose siblings are distant in age. My brother and I were pretty close in age, but we had a slight problem in that he loved to compete over things. I didn't object to competing generally, but didn't like competing with him, since the only thing worse than a bad loser is a bad winner, and as a kid he was both. So we had imaginary enemies. Their names (and for the life of me I cannot remember why) were Doodoo and Mary, and we used to devise all sorts of games and feats of physical daring in which to battle them. We always won of course. I'm beginning to suspect we were slightly odd children.

Friday, 20 August 2010

Bunny business

Last night, on my way to rehearsal, I saw a woman walking her dog. From a distance the dog seemed to be moving in a slightly odd, and very slow, manner; something which was explained when I got a bit closer and realised that it was, in fact, a large black rabbit on a leash. Thinking that this was was one of the strangest things I'd seen in...ooh...a couple of days, I turned up at rehearsal and gleefully told one of my fellow cast members about it, only to be met with the response "Aw, how lovely. I used to do that with my rabbit". Surely this isn't ordinary behaviour? Is it?

Tuesday, 17 August 2010

Sometimes you just need the emphasis

I received this text message from my brother while I was out and about:
"Your -ing cat did a -ing s**t on the -ing bathroom -ing mat. I hate your -ing cat. The end."
Sometimes there just aren't enough profanities in the world. Needless to say, my -ing cat is not popular at the moment.

Monday, 16 August 2010

Awkward

I'm currently rehearsing for a play, one of the lines in which goes as follows: "I know I'm old. I remember when a Brazilian was a person". Last night the 70-something man directing the play stopped us to ask if anyone understood the line, because he didn't. There was a burst of nervous laughter followed by what seemed like an eternally long silence, as I blinked down at his innocently expectant face and prayed for somebody else, anybody else, to answer the question.  

Saturday, 14 August 2010

How high is a ladder?

I'm mildly amused that the person spec for one of the jobs I just applied for includes "Must have a good head for heights". It's a library, people, not the Empire State Building.

Monday, 9 August 2010

Carry On Camping

My weekend camping trip was absolutely wonderful, and barely rained at all in the end. We are so epically un-rock 'n' roll that we spent our time pottering around the local farmers market and playing rummy and charades. We must be getting old.
On which note, it's my birthday tomorrow. I'm not thrilled, I have to say. I don't like having a birthday when things aren't going too well, and my continuing and relentless inability to get anyone to even interview me for a proper job is sending me a little bit loopy. On the other hand, this was the year when I managed to graduate, so I have at least acheived one thing, not that it seems to be helping much at this moment in time.
The whole birthday-based bad mood was not helped much by coming home to find my birthday cake gone. Ok, my Tesco finest tartes aux fruit. Hey, it's my birthday dessert, and I can have a tart if I want to. Except I can't. Because my brother ate them. That's right ladies and gentlemen, as if it isn't pathetic enough to have to purchase my own birthday cake in the first place, I don't even get to eat it. I suspect this proves my theory that the universe is out to get me. You know, just because you're paranoid, doesn't mean they're not out to get your tartes.

Sunday, 8 August 2010

Kent inna tent

I've gone camping in Kent this weekend. Everyone else headed off on Friday, but I work on Saturdays so had to take the train down after work. (Will have to take the train down after work? I'm experiencing a little tense tension as I'm writing this on Saturday to be posted on Sunday) Anyway, the weather forecast is looking decidedly ominous. It's omming like a black cat sitting under a ladder amidst the shards of a broken mirror. I have a strong suspicion that we will end up (are?) huddled damply in a smoky tent with a multitude of plastic cups of wine. Actually that doesn't sound so bad. Bring on the rain!

Saturday, 7 August 2010

Libraries - Also full of confused old people

Man: Is this library card valid here?
Me: Nope, that's Westminster. We're ***********.
Man: This one?
Me: No, that one's Brent.
Man: What about this one?
Me: No sir. That's a Boots Advantage card.

Wednesday, 4 August 2010

Libraries - full of crazy people

Me: Your session's over. The computer's booked for somebody else now.


Man: We didn't realise it was making so much noise. If we'd known we'd have gone to sleep.

Me: Ok. Could you let the next person onto the computer please.

Man: (moving) We didn't realise. It's a pity it's a pig.

Me: Thanks

Man: Ok. Keep drinking. Stay in control mate.
 
Me: Er...ok. Bye.

Tuesday, 3 August 2010

Read Me

I found this on the pavement as I walked up my road.


Obviously I had to read it. It was all too wonderfully Alice in Wonderland to resist. I opened it up expecting a treasure hunt, or some random piece of whimsy from an easily amused stranger. Instead I got this:


It's like a Nigerian email scam gone old skool. Strangely enough the first thought that came into my mind wasn't 'A scam, how awful!'. It was 'but there isn't a 362 bus around here'.

Wednesday, 28 July 2010

Things that make me smile No.65

I was at a pub with a friend last night, and we'd just got our drinks from the bar. As we picked them up and moved away, Spike went to shut her bag with the hand holding her bottle of tonic water, and poured most of the latter's contents straight into the former. There was an absurdly long moment before she realised what was happening, and an even longer one while I stood there and laughed.

Tuesday, 27 July 2010

Every little helps - to piss me off even more!

  1. I order a Tesco grocery delivery for Sunday.
  2. It doesn't show up.
  3. I ring Tesco, who tell me there's a problem in-store and my groceries can't be delivered today. We re-arrange for Monday.
  4. I try to go online to remove from the order the items I needed for that day. My order status is 'delivered'. I can't make any changes.
  5. I call them to ask about this. It emerges that they haven't duplicated my order, they've duplicated the last order my brother made from his account. They rectify this and I make my order changes.
  6. Near the end of the delivery slot on Monday I get a call to say the van's broken down. My delivery will be late. I'm given a new time slot.
  7. The new time slot comes and goes. No shopping.
  8. I call them again. They haven't managed to get the van working. My groceries won't be delivered today either. I grit my teeth and re-arrange the delivery for Tuesday.
  9. On Tuesday my order arrives in a prompt and timely manner.
  10. I get my regular mini bank statement by text. Tesco have over-charged me by about £25. I call them again to complain about this and am told someone will get back to me.
  11. It's now two hours later and I'm still waiting for that phone call...
This spectacular display of incompetence is brought to you by Tesco. Their solution to the problem is to give me more vouchers to use on my next order each time something goes wrong. At this rate my next order will be free.

Sunday, 25 July 2010

Blooming heck

I forgot to post about this when it happened, but it makes me laugh so much I can't resist a little flashback. I was walking to the tube station after work, surrounded by all the identikit city boys in their suits, when a gust of wind came along and blew up my skirt. Thankfully I was perfectly decent, but unfortunately that decency took the form of a pair of bright white, lacy, knee-length bloomers. Foxy.

Saturday, 24 July 2010

Things that make me smile No.64

On my way home yesterday I found a copy of Vogue just lying on the pavement.After a loooong long day at work that was something of a highlight.

P.S. When typing this out I originally wrote 'sidewalk' instead of 'pavement', then had to go back and anglicise myself. Disgraceful.Next thing you know I'll be talking about faucets and diapers.

Wednesday, 21 July 2010

Flashback

When I was a child I was fairly plain looking, while my cousin, who's the same age as me, was really pretty. I once confided in a friend of my Grandma that it made me sad that people always commented on how pretty my cousin was, but that no-one ever said that to me, and she started telling me the story of the ugly duckling who turns into a swan. It was part way through the tale that my Grandma joined us.
"Don't get her hopes up, Olive" she said "Sometimes ugly ducklings grow up to be ducks".

Tuesday, 20 July 2010

Things that make me smile No.63

Caterpillar! I know that's an odd thing to smile about, but I genuinely can't remember seeing a caterpillar since I was a child, and this was a really good one; bright green, several inches long and as thick as my thumb. It was trundling determinedly across the pavement on its nubbiny legs like a little mobile piece of foam rubber. I sat on the wall and watched it for a while but then some Johnny-head-in-air Old Street trendster narrowly missed treading on it, so I moved it onto the grass. I was tempted to take it home and put it in a jam jar and see what it would grow up to be, but I didn't think it would enjoy the hour long tube journey.

Monday, 19 July 2010

Things that make me smile No.62

Cat cafes. No seriously, look at this. In Tokyo you can actually go to a cafe, order a latte, a blueberry muffin and a kitten to cuddle. All for the bargain price of about £6. It sounds like my idea of heaven, but somehow I can't see the health and safety police being particularly supportive of a similar set up in the UK. Maybe I should just settle for a cup of Nescafe and the seven cats currently in residence in my own home.

Sunday, 18 July 2010

Travel

I don't travel well. Not in the sense of getting sick (unless I get on a boat), but mentally I don't travel well. I start to worry about missing the plane about two days before I set off, and don't calm down until I'm safely at my final destination. Travelling alone is even worse, and I was utterly terrified heading off on my trip last week. Not only was I flying to Barcelona alone, late at night, trying to negotiate the bus, find my hostel, find the coach station, buy a ticket, make sure I got on the right coach etc etc, but I had to do all this with the serious handicap of being me. I speak no Spanish beyond a tentative and poorly pronounced 'Ola', I'm scared of strangers and I have the world's worst sense of direction. Honestly, I once got lost on my way to work. It was a ten minute walk that I had done five days a week for four years, and I got lost. Anyway, I made it through the whole process with remarkable and surprising ease and managed to find the coach station, much to my pride. I was rather intimidated by the idea of navigating the Spanish ticket machine but waded bravely in, and was amazed to find that I understood exactly how to book a ticket to Zaragoza. It wasn't until several pages into the ticket buying process that I realised why I understood it. It was in English.

Saturday, 17 July 2010

Honey, I'm home.

Well, I'm home. Did you miss me? I actually got back on Tuesday but, while I've got my internet working at home now, my laptop has decided to have a minor nervous breakdown, so I still don't have much opportunity for updating this. I'll write a few posts today so as not to get reported to blog social services for neglect.

The Nowhere Festival was, of course, absolutely magical. I'm not sure I'm capable of writing about it without sounding absurdly gushy and saccharine, so I'm going to keep it brief. I spent a wonderful week basking in the creativity and fun, and trying not to bask in the sun. It was insanely hot out there, which made for a quieter festival than in previous years. A lot of the things that were scheduled to happen in the day had to be put off or cancelled because everyone was otherwise engaged in minimal-exertion, maximum-cold beer activities. It was still really nice to spend that quiet time in camp with friends though. Night times were as lively as ever, with dancing, cabarets, fire shows and all things nice. I came home filthy, exhausted, mosquito-bitten and a million times happier than I was when I left. I feel far better equipped to deal with the real world now that I've recharged somewhat.

Friday, 2 July 2010

Things that make me smile No.61

I popped out to the shops at lunchtime today and saw a man walking along with his flies undone. Not usually a big deal, except that this particular man didn't happen to be wearing any underwear. Eeek! It did occur to me that perhaps I ought to let him know, but I was laughing too hard.

Come on already

I cannot begin to express how much I'm looking forward to going away on Monday. The last few months have been one disaster after another, and have ground away at my optimism and enthusiasm until they are but residual nubs, huddling fearfully together in a seething mass of resentment and misanthropy. Cheerful stuff, eh? Nowhere promises me a chance to recharge everything that's good in my psyche. Much as I hate to be sappy, I'm forced to admit that it does me a lot of good to spend time in a community that's completely unconcerned with the usual business of selfishness and judgement. Roll on Monday!

Thursday, 1 July 2010

Get your teeth into this one Freud

I dreamed that I had a hedgehog, which I wrapped in a ball of clay and put on a camp fire. When the clay was hardened I cracked it open and pulled it off, taking the hedgehog skin with it. Inside was a teeny tiny, perfectly formed, cooked baby.
Which I ate.

Sunday, 27 June 2010

Ew. No really...ew!

I mentioned I currently have kittens. I said I had three though. That was inaccurate. Well, it was accurate at that moment in time, but the cat actually waited about 24 hours and then had another two. Five kittens.* Anyway, I was lying on the sofa with a pile of kittens on my chest, nuzzling at my face and generally being very cute, when I felt a tug on the stud in my lip. It turns out that lip studs bear a passing resemblance to a cat's nipple. Who knew? It also turns out that a determined kitten can be quite hard to remove from a nipple-esque item of facial jewellery.



*Who still need homes by the way. Do you want a kitten? Yes you do. Do you know anyone else who wants a kitten? Yes you do.

Saturday, 26 June 2010

British Tele-cock-up

So I found out why my internet wasn't working. BT cut it off because I hadn't been paying my bill, which was odd because the money was going out of my account each month. An hour on the phone arguing with them resulted in a bit of investigation on their part, and finally turned up an answer. When I spoke to them last year to switch the direct debit for the phone and internet to my bank account instead of my brother's, they didn't actually change over our BT account. They changed my father's. I've been paying my parents' phone and internet bill for about six months. Nice. Monumental fail on the part of BT. Thank goodness I have a really uncommon surname so the mix-up was with somebody I was related to and able to get the money back from. If my name had been Smith it could have been a million times more complicated. As it was, we got it sorted out, but I still have to wait until Monday for my internet to be reconnected, and I have to have a new phone number. It's all incredibly annoying.

Actually, I nearly forgot the most annoying part. I should point out that the account was still in my brother's name although I was paying the bills (theoretically anyway). My first call to BT was picked up by a man.

Man: Are you authorised to speak on your husband's behalf?
Me: Excuse me?
Man: Do you have your husband's permission to speak to me today about your account with BT?
Me: Excuse me?!?!

I've never put a lot of thought into the whole 'Am I a feminist?' question, but I think I must be. My hackles went straight up. I'm not entirely sure what hackles are, but they were up! First of all, don't assume that the male name on the account is my husband. Secondly, and more importantly, 'permission'? Seriously? How dare anybody think, let alone say, that a woman needs permission from her husband to sort out a problem with their phone bill. A bill that she's paying! After the long, drawn out process of getting everything sorted out, I forgot to make a complaint about him. It's probably a bit late now. Still, perhaps karma will take revenge on him. If there's any justice in the world, that revenge will involve his wife, a phone bill and a subsequent trip to A&E to remove it.

Friday, 25 June 2010

Pants

Summer dress + breezy weather = knicker-flashing calamity

Thursday, 24 June 2010

Nowhere - Noclothes

I'm ridiculously excited about heading off to the Nowhere festival in a few weeks, and I'm having to use every scrap of will power I have to prevent myself from buying lots of new clothes with money I don't have. In hindsight, I shouldn't have even gone on Ebay, because as soon as I did I saw a hundred things I wanted. Ooooo look! A floral tutu! Tights with different coloured legs! Harlequin ruffs and faux-fur shrugs and sequin hotpants! Actually, it's probably not a good idea for me to wear hotpants anyway, but that's beside the point. I want exciting and exotic new clothes in which to prance around the desert! Never mind. I'm sure digging through the mountains of clothes in my house will turn up many, many items that I'd forgotten I owned. That's almost as good as having new stuff.

Wednesday, 23 June 2010

buzzz buzzz

I often drink enormous quantities of diet coke and then wonder why I feel anxious. Duh.

Tuesday, 22 June 2010

Things that make me smile No.60

I recently booked a flight to Spain, and was amused to note that my luggage allowance is exactly the amount of weight I've lost since I started dieting in November. No wonder I was tired all the time. I was carrying the equivalent of a large, heavy suitcase around with me wherever I went. I think I should be allowed to take an second bag with me as a reward. After all, they would have had to carry the extra weight if it was still attached to my person.

Monday, 21 June 2010

Pity party

The man who broke into my house was released last week, and the police called me to let me know. He's still going to be prosecuted, but he isn't being kept in custody in the meantime. At the beginning of the phone call, I was worried, and a bit cross, about him being released into the world. By the end of the call, when I'd heard his history and how apologetic he'd been about the whole thing, I couldn't help feeling sorry for the guy. He really has had an awful time of it and, while that doesn't detract from the fact that he did a horrible thing to me, it does make me feel a little safer. Because he's not an habitual criminal, and he's not a bad person. He's just a bloke who made some piss-poor decisions, and then followed them up with one massive mistake. Apparently he asked if he could apologise to me, and was told it would be inappropriate for him to meet me, but I asked the policeman to pass on my acceptance of his apology. One person to whom I told this story kindly informed me that I was a doormat, but I don't think it's productive to bear grudges. I also like to think that if I went off the rails and screwed up in a truly monumental way, that somebody would be prepared to accept my apology for it.

Sunday, 20 June 2010

Things that make me smile No.59

Man outside pub: Wow, you look really pretty. Did you dress up for Ascot?
Me: No, this is just how I dress.
Man: What, every day?
Me: Yeah, pretty much.
Man: Don't people find it a bit strange?
Me: Sometimes. Just today somebody asked me if I'd dressed up for Ascot.

Saturday, 19 June 2010

Baby on board

I gave up my seat for an old woman on the tube last night, and stood in front of her, reading my book. After a few moments of studying me, she started apologising profusely for accepting the seat, and tried to make me sit back down. I was briefly baffled, and then twigged that she thought I was pregnant. Oh god, how humiliating. It's not the first time it's happened to me, but it never stops being mortifying. Of course, me being me, I did as I usually do and tried to save us both from embarrassment by going along with it, smiling sweetly and insisting that I wasn't that far along and was perfectly happy to stand, while doing quick maths in my head in case she started asking questions about due dates. She didn't, just launched into a story about her pregnancies, before kindly advising me that Mothercare sells 'Baby on Board' badges for expectant mothers to wear on public transport. Maybe I should get one. Apparently it would be perfectly believable, and it would be nice to always get a seat. It could raise some awkward questions if I bumped into someone I knew though.

Friday, 18 June 2010

Travel woes

Today I'm going out for a friend's birthday drinks. I would never head away from London for two hours in order to spend one evening with people and head back the same night, but apparently I'm quite prepared to make the four hour round trip to Fulham. She'd better bloody appreciate it!

Tuesday, 15 June 2010

Ow

I climbed a tree the other week, for the first time in ages, and was surprised that it made me a bit nervous. It wasn't even a tall tree. I seem to have developed a fear of injuring myself, which I imagine happens to everyone as they grow up. I took it to extremes this week though, when I gathered the stuff together to put up a picture and immediately started getting anxious, because I knew, as sure as eggs is eggs, that I was going to hammer my own finger. Of course, the wonderful thing about self-fulfilling prophecies is that they do tend to fulfil themselves. I hammered my own finger.

Monday, 14 June 2010

Mister Sandman

I bought myself a graphic novel. It's the first part of the Sandman series, and I basically bought it because Amazon kept recommending it to me due to my love of Neil Gaiman's novels. I didn't expect to be particularly enthralled by it, but I've found myself reading it a little bit at a time to eke it out, and I find the illustrations amazing. This is a bad bad thing. I'm enough of a geek already, with my Buffy fixation, fondness for World of Warcraft and complete lack of social graces. I don't need to add to the list.

Sunday, 13 June 2010

Things that make me smile No.58

"Are you watching the football?"
"No"
"Whaaaat? But you must watch it!"
"Why?"
"Because you are Eenglish"
"But I don't like football"
"Everyone in England likes the football"
"Not me"
"You are bad Eenglish person"

Saturday, 12 June 2010

Things may be looking up. Just don't look up.

I'm having a bad run of luck at the moment. Still, a pigeon crapped on me yesterday. That's supposed to be lucky. Maybe things will improve now.

Friday, 11 June 2010

Things that make me smile No.57

Squirrel fishing. I haven't done this in years but it's great fun.

You will need:
1 length of string
Some food
A park with reasonably tame squirrels

All you need to do is tie some food to the end of the string and wait for your squirrel. When he engages, use the string to lift and dangle him. They're generally so intent on the food that they don't care about being suspended.

Thursday, 10 June 2010

Hot squirrels

I'm desperately groping for something to write about. I'm still doing all these on a Saturday thanks to lack of internet, and my mind is full of yesterday's break-in, to the exclusion of all possible inspiration. I asked for two random topics from the friend I was just on the phone to, and was offered 'squirrels' (see tomorrow) and 'heat'. "Heat?" I asked. "Well yes" he replied "it's pretty hot". Apparently I am required to be terribly British and talk about the weather, so yeah, it's pretty hot. It's also started raining since I started this post. This actually makes me rather happy, as I love that hot, wet pavement smell you get when it rains in the summer.

Wednesday, 9 June 2010

Things that make me smile No.56

I saw the frumpiest transvestite ever in Marks & Spencer the other day. I'm all about freedom of expression, but part of me wonders why you'd bother dressing up as a woman just to wear Clarks sandals and a long beige cardigan.

Tuesday, 8 June 2010

Nailed it

I have to wear dark nail polish at all times for the foreseeable future, because I'm the sort of idiot who forgets to don gloves when doing her hair and accidentally dyes her nails orange. Oops.

Monday, 7 June 2010

Narrow boat

Having joked last week about moving onto a barge, I've actually seriously started considering it. I've been looking at the prices of narrow boats on Ebay and Gumtree, and it seems genuinely do-able. The only problem is that it seems quite hard to find a residential mooring in London. They all seem to have long waiting lists. Still, I'm going to continue my research.

Sunday, 6 June 2010

Things that make me smile No.55

It ought to be a little hard to find things in the break-in to smile about, but it did make me chuckle a little that the intruder had carefully placed half a digestive biscuit under the beak of the toy crow that sits on my coat rack.

Saturday, 5 June 2010

Of mice-catchers and mentals

I don't even know where to start. Remember how I said that my sanity wouldn't take any more problems? The universe has decided to test that theory. In the early hours of Friday morning, an escaped mental patient used a spade to break into my house. He put together a meal for four people, made up of beansprouts and tinned peaches, moved loads of stuff around and generally made himself at home. Most disturbingly, I found one of my hammers in my bedroom, suggesting that he'd armed himself with it before investigating the upstairs bedrooms. He also had a knife and my spare door keys on his person when the police picked him up. I had planned to be at home that night, but had gone for a drink with a friend on a whim, and stayed on his sofa when it got late. I've never been so relieved to have made a spur of the moment decision. My mum had to call me at work to let me know what had happened, and that they were coming down to help me sort things out. They had hoped to get things cleared up before I got back, to save me from the upset of seeing it, but the scene of crime officers were otherwise engaged so we had to be careful not to disturb the evidence. It's all ridiculously traumatic and, even though the house is fully secure now, I'm a little concerned about being alone there when my parents go back to the Midlands tomorrow.

To add to the fun, my cat picked the same time to give birth to three kittens in the tea towel basket under the kitchen sink. Thanks for that Molly. If anyone wants a kitten, there's one tabby and two black and white, and they'll be available to take home in about six weeks. Free to good homes.

Friday, 4 June 2010

Itchy feet

I'm feeling hugely restless at the moment. Probably the result of having finished my degree but not yet persuaded anyone to employ me permanently. At the moment I'm feeling the urge to sell most of my belongings and move myself, my books and my cats onto a barge. Cats like barges, right? We would tour the country like canal-borne nomads... slowly admittedly, but what's the rush? Anyone know anyone who wants to sell a barge?

Thursday, 3 June 2010

Things that make me smile No.54

Pugs. I'm not really a fan of small dogs, but I make an exception for pugs. They may look like they've run head first into a rockery, and sound like they've smoked forty B&H since the age of two, but they're still inexplicably charming.

Wednesday, 2 June 2010

Visitation

Ok, so I lied about the puppies. So sue me.

My parents are visiting me today. It'll be nice to see them, as I don't think I have since Christmas. Plus my mum's going to take me shopping and treat me to a new outfit. I'm very excited about this, since hardly any of my clothes fit me any more, and there's only so much a girl can do with belts and safety pins. I suspect it will need to be a sensible outfit that I can use for interviews, should I ever get any interviews, so I'll need to resist the urge to deck myself out like something from a child's dressing up box. I don't think many interviewers would take kindly to the tutus and clumpy boots that I'm currently hanging my nose over.

Tuesday, 1 June 2010

Time to change

There are very few things in this world that I really care about, but this is one of them. If you want a nice light-hearted start to your day then you might want to stop reading. Come back tomorrow. There may be puppies and rainbows. Puppies sliding on rainbows. Puppies sliding on rainbows while eating sherbet and blowing bubbles. Today, however, there will be the topic of mental health. I talk pretty frankly about my experiences with depression, because I think it's really important that people understand how common it is. There's a huge stigma attached to mental illness, which just ought not to be there, and the only way it's ever going to go away is if people talk about it. It's an uncomfortable subject for many. I've discovered over the years that a lot of people would rather I just didn't mention it, and I wonder why it bothers them so much. It could be that they're scared, in the same way some people don't like you to say the word 'cancer'. As if somehow, by saying the word out loud, you might call the illness down upon yourself. Maybe it's that people think I should be ashamed of my mental health 'issues' (god how I hate that word), and it's my frankness about it that bothers them. Or maybe it's simply that it's not a particularly fun subject to discuss. I suspect that the way people respond to the topic says more about their attitude to their own mental health than it does about their attitude to mine, but a stunning one in four people will experience a mental health problem of some sort at some point in their lives, so you'd have to be pretty damn lucky for it never to affect you or someone you care about. Doesn't that make it worth erasing the prejudice? The days of lock 'em up forever asylums are long gone, and so should be the stigma surrounding 'madness'. Frankly it's hard enough to deal with a problem of this type, without ignorant people treating you like you're crazy or telling you to snap out of it.

The Time to Change website has lots more information, and allows you to make a pledge to end mental health discrimination.

Now...onto the puppies...

Monday, 31 May 2010

Flip-flop -splish-splash

Flip-flops are a bad idea in the rain. I don't particularly mind the whole wet feet thing, but I could do without the liberal splatters of mud that they flick up the back of my legs and skirt.

Sunday, 30 May 2010

Things that make me smile No.53

I saw a pearly king and queen walking through the City the other day, making the city boys in their suits look as drab as if a pair of flamingos had joined the pigeons in Trafalgar Square. The lady laughed and winked at me as I passed. I think she must have been amused by the expression of childlike joy that leapt onto my face when I saw them.

Friday, 28 May 2010

Things that make me smile No.52

Men who try to look macho while walking daft little rats masquerading as dogs. It's never gonna happen mate. Get a real dog.

Thursday, 27 May 2010

Adventure

I want to go on some mini-adventures. I don't think I make enough out of living in this amazing city so, now that the exam stress is over, I want to go and explore it. Of course all explorations need to be free or very cheap, as I'm still poverty stricken, but there must be loads to do that doesn't require money. The first thing I want to do is go and swim at Hampstead Heath ponds. I've never been and I feel this should be rectified. Want to come with me?

Wednesday, 26 May 2010

Yick

Peppermint tea is like downing a mug of hot toothpaste. Wrong. Just wrong.

Tuesday, 25 May 2010

Things that make me smile No.51

Today I have my last exam for my degree. By 5pm it will all be over. As I'm writing this on Saturday, I don't know how I'm feeling, but I like to think that I will spend the evening in a pub garden somewhere, soaking up a bit of evening sunshine and getting happily drunk. Of course it's entirely possible that I won't have slept in several days and, instead of celebrating, will fall into bed at about 8 and sleep like...something that sleeps a lot.....er....a koala? I imagine koalas sleep quite sweetly; all snug and satisfied with little puffs of snuffling eucalyptus breath. Yes, I think I'd like to sleep like a koala.

Monday, 24 May 2010

Tomorrow

Tomorrow is the last exam. I wonder if I'm panicking yet? I suspect I may be. In my first year of uni I got so stressed about my exams that I didn't sleep or eat. Of course, the inevitable happened, and I fainted mid-way through the exam, pulling my chair and desk over with me, and landing practically in the lap of a girl who would later become my friend. As if that wasn't undignified enough, my skirt flipped up around my waist, flashing my knickers at the row of devout, burqa-clad Muslim girls alongside me. In a shock twist, I actually got my best mark that year for that exam. I think I'll settle for a lower mark though, if that is the price I have to pay for a good one.

Sunday, 23 May 2010

Hop little bunnies!

I do baby rhymetime sessions sometimes at work. I quite enjoy it really, but it does require some forward planning when getting dressed in the morning. For instance, it's obviously a lot easier to crawl around on the floor with small children, or under the bookshelves to plug the cd player in, if you remember to wear trousers. It's also, as I discovered on Friday, a good idea to wear...how shall I put this?...adequately supportive undergarments. It's quite difficult to dance around to "hop, hop, hop little bunnies" when you have to hold your arms over your chest for fear of giving yourself two black eyes.

Saturday, 22 May 2010

Ode to the Chameleon

Apparently it wasn't sufficient to write a post for every other day last week. Apparently it is also unacceptable for those posts to appear at 10am. With this in mind I have scheduled this week's posts to appear at 6am, and have written one for every day of the week. We at alittlenutmeg value our customers. They are always right. Of course my time could possibly be better used today by revising for my exam on Tuesday, but that is unimportant. I would just like to take this opportunity to inform everyone that, if I fail my degree, it is entirely the fault of the Chameleon.

Thursday, 20 May 2010

Things that make me smile No.50

I saw an old lady on the bus who seemed to have taken Zandra Rhodes as her role model. She had vividly dyed hair, multi-coloured make-up with diamante jewels along one cheekbone, and an extraordinarily eclectic mix of clothing. When she got off the bus people were turning to each other and laughing or sneering. I was full of admiration though. I hope I look just like her when I'm her age.

Tuesday, 18 May 2010

Side effects

At around the same time as I started this blog, I started dieting, and have lost a lot of weight. I haven't talked about it on here as I think I talk about it too much in real life and, frankly, it's very dull, but there are some odd side effects that I wanted to mention. One is that there are several people who I've known vaguely for a long time, and who never had much time for me before, who seem to suddenly consider me worth talking to. It seems slightly peculiar, and I wonder if there's been an accompanying change in my personality as my confidence has recovered that makes me more fun to talk to now, or if they're just that shallow. The other effect is that people have started chatting me up again. Obviously this is quite enjoyable, but there is a little, contrary part of me that regrets the loss of the 'git filter', the repellent that being overweight provided against superficial people. Now I can't help but look at people who ask me out, or flirt, and wonder whether they would they have liked me before. Not because it would upset me if they wouldn't have, but because I'd know whether they were worth the effort of getting to know.

Sunday, 16 May 2010

Things that make me smile No.49

I'm constantly charmed by the little moments of friendship that strike me as strangely touching, such as being able to ask a mate to adjust your bra straps or pick that weird hair from under your skin without them batting an eyelid.

Saturday, 15 May 2010

I'm trying

I currently have no internet access at home, and my weekday job has evil blocks on the computers which stop me accessing this site, so I'm only really able to blog from my Saturday job. In order not to disappoint my loyal fans (well, the chameleon, who once told me she looks at my blog every morning - lies!), I'm going to attempt to line up posts today and schedule them to go out on different days this week. I've never tried this before, so I'm not sure how it'll work, but I'll give it a go.

Saturday, 8 May 2010

What is the world coming to?

Yesterday a man in the library threw a book at my head because there weren't any slots left on the computers. Minor concussion and a tory government all in one day? I despair.

Tuesday, 4 May 2010

Highly visible

Yesterday I spent the day working for one of London's major tourist attractions. The job involved standing around in the cold asking people whether they wanted to visit the exhibition. Most importantly, it also involved my first ever high-visibility jacket. The jacket makes you look official. Unfortunately, the employer's logo is very small, so it just makes you look generally official, which means you get asked a lot of questions that do not in any way pertain to the job you're supposed to be doing. These range from the logical to the completely inane.
'Where is the nearest tube station/toilet/McDonalds?'
'Is there a height restriction to go over the bridge?'
'Why did they build a castle right in the busiest part of London?'
And my personal favourite. 'You know the Union Jack?' I nod to acknowledge I have heard of such a beast. 'Which of the stripy bits represents which country?'

It was bitingly cold by the river. It actually hailed at one point. I was wearing afore-mentioned flourescent yellow jacket with two fleeces, a cardigan, a long-sleeved top, a short-sleeved top and a thermal vest. For the record, this little lot is not enough to keep you warm. It is also not enough to stop men attempting to stare at your tits. Seriously mister, what can you possibly hope to see through that lot? The high-vis jacket may not protect you from perves, but it does make you highly visible to cyclists. Unfortunately, they being Evil London Cyclists, this just means they have something clear to aim for.

Wednesday, 28 April 2010

Kick me while I'm down why don't you?

I suspect I may be being punished for something. What, I'm not quite sure, since I haven't done anything particularly bad lately. No worse than usual anyway. However, somewhere along the line I must have done something to make the fates very, very angry with me, as over the last week or so the universe has been layering problem over pressure over crisis to create a giant trifle-like arrangement of stress. The latest development - the whipped cream if you will - was the witnessing of a severely unpleasant fight between a car and a pedestrian. The person in question got off incredibly lightly considering how horrific the accident looked, which is a relief, and today I've been considering my reaction to the whole thing. I've always thought, despite being a bit of a flake, that if it came to a crisis like that I would be fairly capable. I was wrong. I fell to pieces, shrieking until my knees gave way, whereupon I sat on the pavement and sobbed. Not the most productive response to the situation. Thank goodness there were other people there who were a) more useful and b) more sober than I was.

And now, if you'll allow me to stretch a metaphor to absolute breaking point, please cross your fingers for me that this particular trifle recipe doesn't include sprinkles. My sanity won't take it.

Thursday, 22 April 2010

Cyclists are evil

I'll moderate that a little. London cyclists are evil. Having spent some time in bike-happy San Francisco, I am well aware that there are places in the world where people are not filled with a sudden murderous impulse towards pedestrians as soon as they get a saddle between their legs. It's just unfortunate that London is not one of those places. I'm frequently forced to jump back as bicycles tear through red lights, with no heed to the people trying to cross. Today was a new high though, as I got stabbed in the hip by a handlebar when a wheeled git mounted the pavement, ploughed straight into a group of pedestrians, hitting several of us and calling us all idiots before veering back into the road. I wish I carried a walking stick. At that moment in time nothing would have given me greater pleasure than to have poked it into the spokes of his wheels and watched him go flying.

Wednesday, 21 April 2010

Things that make me smile No.48

I was approached on the tube today by an extraordinarily camp man, who twirled his fingers in my face and declared "Well don't you look like a modern-day pre-raphaelite!". I'll take it.

Things that make me smile No.47

Today I finished my last ever essay for uni. I still have one exam left to do, but they don't worry me nearly as much as coursework. Unfortunately I have the worst time management skills known to mankind, and often find myself sitting in front of a blank computer screen, two days before the deadline, struck with the realisation that, not only have I not even started, I also don't understand the question or know anything about the topic. This occasion was no different, and I've produced ten pages of the most absurd bullshit in history. I've really turned blagging, hedging and just plain making shit up into an art form with this one. Still, NEVER AGAIN!

Sunday, 18 April 2010

Things that make me smile No.46

Digging up worms and putting them on the patio table so I could watch the robin keep coming back for them. Then realising I was that robin's bitch.

Saturday, 17 April 2010

The luggage invasion

London is full of suitcases. Accompanying these cases are the seeming millions of bewildered foreigners who are stranded here due to the invisible volcanic miasma that overhangs our fair city. When the news first broke that all planes were grounded, I was incredibly sympathetic. However, my sympathy has been gradually eroded by the menace that is the suitcase en masse. They fill the library as people squabble over the computers, trying to find alternative routes home. They viciously trip you when dragged through the streets by their aimlessly wandering, directionally challenged owners. And they cause my journey home to take twice as long as it ought to by lingering, seemingly abandoned, in tube stations, prompting evacuation of the immediate area so investigation can take place. This is not an 'unavoidable delay' Mister Tube Station Announcement Man. This delay could have been easily avoided had the owner of said case had just put it in a corner, sat on it and stayed there. Now some poor bomb disposal expert has to tentatively open a case, which will turn out to be full of a week's worth of dirty laundry and a small plastic model of Big Ben. Excellent use of his time. Thank you very much unpronounceable Icelandic volcano, for sharing your bounty with us.

Monday, 12 April 2010

Pet hates

I have so many of these that it defies belief. I should probably learn to be more tolerant, but where's the fun? Anyway, here's a selection of my top irritations
  • Incorrect use of the word 'literally'. 'I'm literally bursting for the loo'. Really? I want to see some bladder explosion before I'll accept that as fact.
  • Books that aren't in order. Yes, I know, this is really cliched in a library worker, but it's a problem I've had since I was a child. When I go to a friend's house and their books are thrown on the shelves willy nilly it makes my fingers itch to fix it.
  • Waiters who fill your wine glass for you. Is it just me or, if you're sharing a bottle of wine with somebody, don't you wait until you've both finished your glass to top them up? I don't want mine re-filled when my friend is only halfway through hers. It just seems rude.
  • Text speak. Once upon a time I did internet dating, and would automatically reject anyone who used it. 
  • Following on from the previous one - people who say 'lol'. Just laugh for God's sake. What's wrong with you?
  • People who chew with their mouths open. I understand that some kids are never sat down at the table to eat, and it's hard to learn table manners when sitting in front of the telly on your own. But when these kids grow up do they never eat out with a friend or at someone's house? Did they not eat in a canteen at school? So how have they managed to avoid ever being told that they are revolting and make everyone else want to throw up?
  • Being waved through a doorway. I know this is a controversial one, since it's very polite of people to say 'after you', but I really don't want to walk into the room first. Please don't make me.
  • Leggings worn as trousers. At least put a long top on. Frankly, if I wanted to know that much about your front lawn I'd be trying to get you drunk right now.

    Saturday, 10 April 2010

    Things that make me smile No.45

    Looking out of the window at work I thought it was snowing. When I went for a closer look I saw a man on an abseiling harness dangling from the office block opposite. With bucket and squeegee in hand, he laughed as he liberally showered passers by with soap suds. Extreme window-cleaning. How wonderful!

    Tuesday, 6 April 2010

    Idiocy

    Last night on my way home I missed my stop on the bus. This is a journey I do almost every day, and I missed my stop. Not just a little bit either. I went so far in the wrong direction as to render it necessary to cross the road and get on another bus in order to get home. It wasn't as if I fell asleep or anything, I just wasn't paying attention. Apparently thinking through a presentation on the fantastic representation of unemployment and the benefit system in Alasdair Gray's Lanark is sufficiently enthralling to turn a simple journey home into a mission into the unknown.

    Monday, 5 April 2010

    Dress to impress

    When I was a child I was desperate for my parents' approval. I was scared to ask for anything in case they didn't like it. I would keep silently wearing shoes that I'd long grown out of because I knew how much my mum hated taking me shopping for new ones. When I got a little older I declared my intention of becoming a doctor, thinking it would make them proud. It didn't. While, in reality, they probably would have been supportive whatever I'd chosen to do, it seemed to me that there was just no pleasing them. The less reaction I got, the harder I tried. While most teenagers refuse to communicate with their mothers, I would offer up every story I could think of to mine, dredging up little details, desperately hunting for the one which would make her laugh. It rarely worked. I was the same at school. I modelled my behaviour around what my 'friends' expected of me, crushing every instinct to behave in a way which didn't fit the norm. I still somehow managed to get it wrong though, and continually exposed myself to ridicule. Looking back, my desperation to be liked must have been all too obvious and incredibly irritating.

    It wasn't until I was about twenty that I decided enough was enough. I realised that there's little value in a friend who's only your friend because they think you're something you're not, and that it really isn't the end of the world if somebody doesn't like you. These days I still make concessions to others, but only to the extent that I try to behave in a way that's appropriate to the situation. No dancing on tables at a funeral! I also make an effort to be polite to people that I don't like, because I know that I'm a terrible judge of character and may change my mind about them later. I'm not very good at working out who other people really are, but I at least know who I am. And so does everyone else. In some of the circles I move in, people probably think I'm a bit dull, while in others I'm seen as worryingly strange. I guess it's all about perspective. I'm probably actively disliked by more people than I used to be, and I've lost a few people along the way, but I've also never had such good friends. They still ridicule me, but it comes from an affectionate place rather than a spiteful one, and these days I laugh along instead of crumbling in mortification. I wouldn't swap those few friends who mock me to my face for hundreds who'd do it behind my back.

    Thursday, 1 April 2010

    Policy-less politics

    The upcoming elections are bugging me. Yep, I'm back on politics again. I know I ought to steer well clear of it, since I freely admit that it isn't my area of expertise, but the joy of a democratic society means that even those of us who are as well-informed as the average earthworm are allowed to express an opinion. The problem I have is that I don't really know what my opinion is. I always vote, since my few feminist principles insist on it, but I can't say I ever get particularly enthused about it.

    I've been asked before why I don't get excited about politics, since it directly or indirectly affects every area of my life. It's not that I don't care, I just find it all incredibly depressing. Most politicians come across as grasping children fighting over treats. They want the country but they don't really seem to know what to do with it once they've got it. I also dislike the idea that if I want my vote to actually make a difference then I have to vote Labour or Conservative. I won't vote Labour because of the Iraq war, and I won't vote Conservative because my maternal family are from a coal-mining town, and the Tories put them through some of the hardest times of their lives. Plus I'd probably be disowned.

    To me it makes sense to vote for the Lib Dems. So many people say they'd vote for them but they wouldn't get in so there's no point. If all those people voted for them then maybe they would get in. Who knows if they'd do any better, but they'd be hard pushed to do worse. Their slogan this year should be "Give us a go. We've never buggered it up before". And Nick Clegg may have his faults but really, look at the alternatives. I can't take Cameron seriously when his campaign posters show him airbrushed into a plastic mannekin head, and every time I look at poor old Gordon Brown I just want to sit him down in a corner with a blanket and a werthers original. The man looks broken.

    Oh, and a word of advice to a certain campaigning party. Parking a vehice with a huge banner on it outside my place of work, and using a megaphone to shout racist slurs under a thin verneer of politics doesn't make me want to vote for you. It makes me want to fill water balloons with wallpaper paste and ask the college upstairs if I can borrow their window.

    Monday, 29 March 2010

    White Mischief

    White Mischief are known for their extraordinary themed parties, and Saturday's Great Exhibition event  lived up to the hype. Not only lived up to it in fact, but exceeded every expectation.Performances ranged from The Great Voltini's spectacular electric display, to some of the most beautifully artistic Japanese rope bondage I've ever seen, with quirky touches such as Miss Chameleon's hilarious flea circus thrown in for good measure. And frankly I don't think you've lived until you've been part of a vast crowd singing Bohemian Rhapsody to the accompaniment of a lederhosen-wearing Bavarian oom-pah band.

    The aesthetic at White Mischief events is always amazing, with the costumes being a particular feature. Some party-goers are hardcore steampunkers, who make a lifestyle out of neo-Victoriana, while others just take any excuse to get gussied up. I count myself among the latter group. Having spent a mere ten minutes on Saturday morning rummaging through my wardrobe for anything vaguely appropriate, in hopes of being able to cobble together an outfit during quiet moments at work, I confess to feeling decidedly underdressed upon entering the venue. I was instantly immersed in a world of shining clockwork, luxe velvet and imagination. These steampunk guys don't do things by halves.

    Pardon?

    Oh, you want to know what steampunk is?

    Well, imagine a parallel world where the microchip was never invented. In fact that whole electricity thing never really took off. Clockwork mechanics and the steam engine rule, and the cast includes vast thinking machines, frock coat clad cyber-pirates, and pith-helmeted explorers bound for outer-space or the depths of the ocean. Basically it's Victoriana brought up to date. Think Phillip Pullman's His Dark Materials for grown-ups, or Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, but with better acting.

    Next time I go to a White Mischief event I'll remember to bring cash for the amazing stalls run by various steampunk artists, writers and craftspeople. I'll also take a gag for the friend who insisted on walking around them declaring loudly that she could make this stuff for half the price. Maybe she could, but I certainly can't. I'd also remember to take my walking boots and crampons. The maze-like Scala may be a stunning venue for this kind of affair, but if you venture down to the foothills of the smoking terrace then you're going to require a stronger constitution than mine to get back up to the peak. Or an oxygen tank.

    Plus

    There seems to be a trend at the moment for fashion magazines to produce a plus-size special feature or edition. Apparently I'm supposed to be pleased about this, but in actuality it just makes me cross. Leaving aside the issue that most of these models are only about a size 14 anyway, why does their inclusion have to be 'special' thing?  A one-off parade of plus-size models doesn't break down the taboos the fashion industry has about the larger lady, it just serves to emphasize them. These women should be included as a matter of course. Once upon a time it was a big deal for a black model to appear in a mainstream fashion magazine. Now models of all races are included as a matter of course. Why can it not be the same with plus-size models? It seems absurd to me.
    It's a safe assumption that shops want to sell clothes, yes? If I see a dress on an anorexic 13 year old then it's possible I'll think 'pretty dress', or even 'nice photo', but I'm unlikely to go and buy the dress. If it looks good on said underfed pre-teen then chances are it's not going to look good on me. However, a pretty dress on a pretty woman who actually looks like a woman is an aspirational image. It's something I can look at and imagine myself in. It's still a fantasy, but it's one my logical side is prepared to accept, and the chances of me heading off to purchase that dress are greatly increased. Now, I'm the size of the average UK woman. That means that approximately half of the women in this country are the same size as me or larger, and I bet most of them would react in the same way as I do to those two images. So why does the clothes industry choose to alienate such a huge portion of the potential market? It doesn't make financial sense.

    Tuesday, 23 March 2010

    Things that make me smile No.44

    I haven't known what to do with myself today. Last night I had such horrific nightmares that it seemed like I barely slept, and when I woke this morning my voice was completely gone. I have to wonder if I was screaming in my sleep. I've been on edge all day, partly because of that, partly because I'm waiting to find out if I've got an interview for a job I really want, and partly because of a few silly things which are bugging me more than they ought to.
    All in all I haven't felt much like smiling, but then I remembered the strange middle-aged man who approached me yesterday to ask a) if I wanted my driveway resurfacing and b) if I had 'plenty of boyfriends'.
    How many is plenty? Ideally I could do with several partners. A geeky one for conversation, watching Buffy and fixing my laptop. A big beefy one for DIY projects and for carrying me home after one too many gins. A creative one who can whip me up a costume and take me on off-the-wall adventures. Plus, of course, one for shenanigans. If anyone knows where I can acquire these specific, task-oriented beings then please do let me know. For preference they should come in a variety of shapes and sizes, and fold up small for storage when not in use.

    Things that make me smile No.43

    Yesterday I saw a charming production of Harvey at my amateur dramatics group. It's such a sweet, heart-warming play that you can't help but go away with a smile on your face. There's nothing like the sight of an invisible, six-foot-one-and-a-half-inch white rabbit taking a curtain call to leave you with that warm feeling in your insides.

    Sunday, 21 March 2010

    Things that make me smile No.42

    It's the first day of Spring! Unfortunately I have cleaning to do (although even that is strangely appropriate), so won't be able to go out and enjoy it, but I've thrown open the windows to let in the breeze and the bees.

    Things that make me smile No.41

    I love that, in my Saturday job, my instructions for the day often include things like watching a certain programme on iplayer.

    Friday, 19 March 2010

    Things that make me smile No.39 and 40

    Yesterday there was a really creepy baby on the train, who stared malevolently and consideringly at my friend as if trying to decide the best method of killing him. She was both terrifying and hilarious.

    Today I had a half day at work, so in the afternoon I came home and made some lists. Lately I've started feeling anxious and out of control again, and one thing I've found works really well to control that feeling is list-making. I've noted down things that need to be dealt with urgently, and things that it would be nice to get done, and scheduled them into my diary in manageable chunks. I'm so much more relaxed and cheerful now that's done. Hopefully the upcoming Easter break from uni will mean I actually manage to do some of it.

    Wednesday, 17 March 2010

    Things that make me smile No.38

    That's right folks, it's back by popular demand! Well...by popular demand I mean that one person told me she liked it, but she is quite popular. And demanding.

    Anyway, today I saw pigeons having an intimate moment. Pigeon porn may not do wonders for the sex life, but it sure is good for a laugh.