Man, pretty sure those last posts were way miserable. I'm not miserable. You can get a lot of attention by jutting out your bottom lip, poking yourself in the eyes to draw some tears and moping like Obama being president aint no thang (I haven't read the papers in ages so you're just going to have to work with that. Obama's still a big deal/black, right? Whatevs, he was once), and that's the truth.
I try to rise above that sort of kiddie play and prefer to use extravagant lies and tight skirts in order to demand the attention of my peers but when shit gets serious and boys are ambivalent about a repeat performance I am as likely as the next 6 to have a self esteem crisis. My one life skill has proven itself, in quite the stickiest of circumstances, as useless as it was hard won. How ought one to respond to such a catastrophe? Self indulgence seems a reasonable a start; Ben and Jerrys a reliable fall back.
I can't read my previous posts because my Internet connection is still being broadcast from a time before sliced bread. That's alright. I'm sure I wouldn't make any more sense if I could read them. I've drunk a lot of Duvel (aka WEIRD EUROPEAN DRUNK TONIC) and at this point I'm really enjoying the Sprite left over from a Sunday party in my bedroom. Yum yum yum.
Tuesday, 10 November 2009
Saturday, 7 November 2009
I was discussing with Amy the myriad traumatic twists and turns of my recent romantic ventures and she interrupted me midflow to inform me that, "your love life is so tedious. It's like a Jennifer Lopez/Ben Affleck film". Tell me about it. No wonder I've got a fucking blog. Unlike Amy, I've never watched a Jennifer Lopez/Ben Affleck film; but I am - reticently - aware that their most notorious onscreen coupling was in Gigli. I'm going to give you all the benefit of the doubt and assume that, with the exception of Amy, you won't be acquainted with the plot intricacies of Gigli. Courtesy of Wikipedia:
"Larry Gigli (Affleck) is a low-ranking mobster who is commanded to kidnap the mentally challenged, Baywatch-obsessed younger brother (Justin Bartha) of a powerful federal prosecutor to save his mobster boss from prison. Gigli successfully convinces the young man, Brian, to go off with him by promising to take him "to the Baywatch." However, Gigli's boss, Louis (Lenny Venito), does not trust him; he hires a woman calling herself Ricki (Jennifer Lopez) to take over the job.
Although Gigli is attracted to Ricki, he resents the fact that Louis does not have faith in him and that he has to take orders from Ricki. He is also frustrated by Brian's insistence on going to "the Baywatch" and by Ricki's lesbianism. The events take a darker turn when Larry and Ricki receive orders to cut off Brian's thumb, something neither of them wants to do.
Ricki's girlfriend (Missy Crider) shows up at Gigli's apartment, accusing her of cheating. She slits a wrist and has to be rushed to the hospital. While at the hospital, Gigli goes to the morgue and cuts off a corpse's thumb, which he sends to his boss as Brian's thumb. Gigli and Ricki go back to his apartment and Gigli confesses his love, leading to a sexual encounter between them.
Afterwards, they are called to meet with the mob's boss. Starkman (Al Pacino) reveals that he didn't approve of the plan to kidnap a federal prosecutor's brother and scolds them because the thumb they sent won't match Brian's fingerprint. He shoots Gigli's superior Louis dead. Starkman is about to kill Ricki and Gigli as well, but Ricki talks him out of it. They decide to take Brian back to where they found him. On the way, they discover Baywatch shooting an episode on the beach and leave a happy Brian there."
UM, TEDIOUS? So even if I became a lesbian mobster who kidnapped a retard, subsequently rediscovered my love for dick after meeting O'Bannion from Dazed and Confused, had to use my silver-tongued charm to save my love and I from the very jaws of death and THEN ended up in a fucking Baywatch episode, Amy would still be bored by my consequent heartbreak. Even if my dalliances merited universally negative reviews, cost $54 million, and won an award for being the worst of their kind for a quarter century, Amy could not care less. Gigli is a trainwreck and so is my lovelife. And my hair. I've still got purple hair. Will the torment never end?
There's two bottles of whiskey in my room, one of gin, half a litre of vodka, and some unopened £2 Cabernet Sauvignon. I was going to go back to Oxford to defend against the inevitability of falling mouth first into the bottom of this collection - I am, if nothing else, sensible that although total oblivion is, at this point, tempting, it is ultimately probably not conducive to my mental, emotional, or physical well being. Instead, I rang Andrew in the hope that he would cheer me up. I then thus discovered that he, my fourth closest male fried (um, pretty close yo) has taken to signing on to my Facebook and Friend Requesting boys I have told him I fancy; regardless of whether I actually know them or not. Or rather, jubilantly in spite of the fact that I do not know them. Please direct your hate mail to The Star, 21 Rectory Road, Oxford. Meanwhile, I'll get started on the vodka.
"Larry Gigli (Affleck) is a low-ranking mobster who is commanded to kidnap the mentally challenged, Baywatch-obsessed younger brother (Justin Bartha) of a powerful federal prosecutor to save his mobster boss from prison. Gigli successfully convinces the young man, Brian, to go off with him by promising to take him "to the Baywatch." However, Gigli's boss, Louis (Lenny Venito), does not trust him; he hires a woman calling herself Ricki (Jennifer Lopez) to take over the job.
Although Gigli is attracted to Ricki, he resents the fact that Louis does not have faith in him and that he has to take orders from Ricki. He is also frustrated by Brian's insistence on going to "the Baywatch" and by Ricki's lesbianism. The events take a darker turn when Larry and Ricki receive orders to cut off Brian's thumb, something neither of them wants to do.
Ricki's girlfriend (Missy Crider) shows up at Gigli's apartment, accusing her of cheating. She slits a wrist and has to be rushed to the hospital. While at the hospital, Gigli goes to the morgue and cuts off a corpse's thumb, which he sends to his boss as Brian's thumb. Gigli and Ricki go back to his apartment and Gigli confesses his love, leading to a sexual encounter between them.
Afterwards, they are called to meet with the mob's boss. Starkman (Al Pacino) reveals that he didn't approve of the plan to kidnap a federal prosecutor's brother and scolds them because the thumb they sent won't match Brian's fingerprint. He shoots Gigli's superior Louis dead. Starkman is about to kill Ricki and Gigli as well, but Ricki talks him out of it. They decide to take Brian back to where they found him. On the way, they discover Baywatch shooting an episode on the beach and leave a happy Brian there."
UM, TEDIOUS? So even if I became a lesbian mobster who kidnapped a retard, subsequently rediscovered my love for dick after meeting O'Bannion from Dazed and Confused, had to use my silver-tongued charm to save my love and I from the very jaws of death and THEN ended up in a fucking Baywatch episode, Amy would still be bored by my consequent heartbreak. Even if my dalliances merited universally negative reviews, cost $54 million, and won an award for being the worst of their kind for a quarter century, Amy could not care less. Gigli is a trainwreck and so is my lovelife. And my hair. I've still got purple hair. Will the torment never end?
There's two bottles of whiskey in my room, one of gin, half a litre of vodka, and some unopened £2 Cabernet Sauvignon. I was going to go back to Oxford to defend against the inevitability of falling mouth first into the bottom of this collection - I am, if nothing else, sensible that although total oblivion is, at this point, tempting, it is ultimately probably not conducive to my mental, emotional, or physical well being. Instead, I rang Andrew in the hope that he would cheer me up. I then thus discovered that he, my fourth closest male fried (um, pretty close yo) has taken to signing on to my Facebook and Friend Requesting boys I have told him I fancy; regardless of whether I actually know them or not. Or rather, jubilantly in spite of the fact that I do not know them. Please direct your hate mail to The Star, 21 Rectory Road, Oxford. Meanwhile, I'll get started on the vodka.
Friday, 6 November 2009
This evening a man came over to fix our washing machine. He is three days late. Sam's bedsheets have evolved gills and we'd stopped expecting him. I opened the door in my pyjamas, the top half of which is comprised of a "WEED IN ME GARDEN" jumper. The jumper features a tasteful transfer of a rasta man pushing a wheelbarrow full of marijuana and a brightly coloured boombox. Behind the rasta is a sign which reads, "don't walk on de grass, smoke it". I also had my hair pinned up with a half eaten biro and I smelt like floor polish.
"Sorry," I told the man, when he raised his eyebrow at my wardrobe and, probably, general lifestyle, choices. "I thought you were someone else". "Yeah, I'm not your boyfriend!" he cackled. NICE ONE DICKHEAD. I know I'm not wearing my old wedding dress but I'd still say that this look falls solidly under the "HEARTBROKEN AND ALONE" category rather than "COMFORTABLE IN LOVE". In any case, that's the sort of remark which isn't ever going to win you friends. Not quite as bad as "smile! It might never happen!" - HOW THE FUCK WOULD YOU KNOW? IT ALREADY FUCKING DID, MORON - but certainly up there. I'm going to go and take more drugs and think about how you're not my boyfriend and nor is anyone else. Oh wait, except I can't, because you, "the washing machine doctor" are going to drain smelly, four-day-old washing machine water which smells like raw sewage into our grill pan and you are going to demand an audience for the arsey remarks you will make throughout this process.
Did you guys know that if there's money in the pockets of your trousers when you wash them the coins will block the washing machine filter and the water won't drain out of the metal basket the clothes are in and then the door won't open and then your clothes will stink and so will the whole downstairs floor of your house? Neither did we, but Washing Machine Doctor sarkily informs me that this is common knowledge. Personally, I think Washing Machine Doctor ought to work on his bedside manner. I've never heard a proper doctor complete her diagnosis with "...you didn't fucking know that? Are you fucking retarded?*". Maybe that's because a proper doctor would be able to see that no, I am not retarded. It's a moot point and, anyway, it wasn't me that broke the fucking washing machine. I don't have change to go throwing away.
*I ought to, grudgingly, clarify that WMD didn't actually say that. But he looked at me funny and I know it was what he was thinking.
"Sorry," I told the man, when he raised his eyebrow at my wardrobe and, probably, general lifestyle, choices. "I thought you were someone else". "Yeah, I'm not your boyfriend!" he cackled. NICE ONE DICKHEAD. I know I'm not wearing my old wedding dress but I'd still say that this look falls solidly under the "HEARTBROKEN AND ALONE" category rather than "COMFORTABLE IN LOVE". In any case, that's the sort of remark which isn't ever going to win you friends. Not quite as bad as "smile! It might never happen!" - HOW THE FUCK WOULD YOU KNOW? IT ALREADY FUCKING DID, MORON - but certainly up there. I'm going to go and take more drugs and think about how you're not my boyfriend and nor is anyone else. Oh wait, except I can't, because you, "the washing machine doctor" are going to drain smelly, four-day-old washing machine water which smells like raw sewage into our grill pan and you are going to demand an audience for the arsey remarks you will make throughout this process.
Did you guys know that if there's money in the pockets of your trousers when you wash them the coins will block the washing machine filter and the water won't drain out of the metal basket the clothes are in and then the door won't open and then your clothes will stink and so will the whole downstairs floor of your house? Neither did we, but Washing Machine Doctor sarkily informs me that this is common knowledge. Personally, I think Washing Machine Doctor ought to work on his bedside manner. I've never heard a proper doctor complete her diagnosis with "...you didn't fucking know that? Are you fucking retarded?*". Maybe that's because a proper doctor would be able to see that no, I am not retarded. It's a moot point and, anyway, it wasn't me that broke the fucking washing machine. I don't have change to go throwing away.
*I ought to, grudgingly, clarify that WMD didn't actually say that. But he looked at me funny and I know it was what he was thinking.
I dyed my hair purple by accident. I didn't realise it was going to be purple. I suppose it wouldn't have been if I didn't decide to embark on an exhaustive grooming programme as I waited for the dye to develop and, thus distracted, forgot to wash my hair until two hours after the recommended time. Boots ought to make their warnings more explicit - I thought I'd get a rash, or that all my hair would fall out, at worst. I never dreamed I'd be condemned to spend the next two months looking like Evanscence are my style inspiration. Rough fucking justice. On the plus side, I plucked my leg hairs and four days later my calves remain gleaming. Small consolation. My hair's a real fat-goth-with-a-LOTR-obsession shade of purpley black; the exact colour angst-ridden teenage girls and middle aged medieaval reenactment groupies (trust me, that's a real and thriving subculture) go crazy for, and it makes me look ill. "It wouldn't even be fine if you were 13" was Sam's generous assessment. I'm not even kidding, that is quite generous. Particularly for Sam, and when Sam's trying to be generous, you know you really look like shit. Woe is me - and then some.
I've tried using St Ives facial scrub on my scalp in an attempt to exfoliate all the colour out. Top tip: don't. Issy, who can usually find something nice to say about each and every fashion/make up/hair disaster I contrive to make, could only bite her lip and plead; "it's not permanent, is it?". I fucking hope not, babes, I really fucking hope not.
Rather than locking myself in the house until it fades, or until I get really hot and can shave my head without fear of total social rejection (whichever comes first) I elected to go out in public and drown my sorrows. I tried to fight a woman from Glasgow and gave the most expensive blowjob of my life (£6 for a cab, £??? in lost jewellery, the entirety of my self esteem, and limitless gallons of hot, prickly, morning-after-shame which has since mutated into two-days-later shame and shows no promise of waning. How is self esteem so strictly limited and yet pure unadulterated embarrassment is the shit that keeps on fucking giving? Going down on someone else should always be free, surely that's only fair? These are not rhetorical questions, I am confused and distraught...?)
Now I have two options:
1) Leave the house. Attempt to seduce first boy I meet in order to regain some degree of sexual confidence following mediocre performance which I wholly attribute to distracting peripheral sight of own awful hair. Risk further rejection and be forced to kill self. Die purple-haired and pathetic.
2) Stay in house. Tidy, write dissertation, become better person. Miss Fireworks Night, aka THE HIGHLIGHT OF MY YEAR, possibly fall into not-getting-back-on-the-horse trap and spend the remainder of my lonely, lonely life in my bedroom. Let purple hair fade, but, ultimately, become the sort of person who could, should, would like to, have purpley-black hair.
This is probably the worst thing that has ever happened to me, and, naturally it is all my own fault.
I've tried using St Ives facial scrub on my scalp in an attempt to exfoliate all the colour out. Top tip: don't. Issy, who can usually find something nice to say about each and every fashion/make up/hair disaster I contrive to make, could only bite her lip and plead; "it's not permanent, is it?". I fucking hope not, babes, I really fucking hope not.
Rather than locking myself in the house until it fades, or until I get really hot and can shave my head without fear of total social rejection (whichever comes first) I elected to go out in public and drown my sorrows. I tried to fight a woman from Glasgow and gave the most expensive blowjob of my life (£6 for a cab, £??? in lost jewellery, the entirety of my self esteem, and limitless gallons of hot, prickly, morning-after-shame which has since mutated into two-days-later shame and shows no promise of waning. How is self esteem so strictly limited and yet pure unadulterated embarrassment is the shit that keeps on fucking giving? Going down on someone else should always be free, surely that's only fair? These are not rhetorical questions, I am confused and distraught...?)
Now I have two options:
1) Leave the house. Attempt to seduce first boy I meet in order to regain some degree of sexual confidence following mediocre performance which I wholly attribute to distracting peripheral sight of own awful hair. Risk further rejection and be forced to kill self. Die purple-haired and pathetic.
2) Stay in house. Tidy, write dissertation, become better person. Miss Fireworks Night, aka THE HIGHLIGHT OF MY YEAR, possibly fall into not-getting-back-on-the-horse trap and spend the remainder of my lonely, lonely life in my bedroom. Let purple hair fade, but, ultimately, become the sort of person who could, should, would like to, have purpley-black hair.
This is probably the worst thing that has ever happened to me, and, naturally it is all my own fault.
Monday, 26 October 2009
I haven't written anything for ages. I hope you don't think it's because I haven't been doing anything. Apart from anything, that would imply that when I do write a post it's because I have been doing things and frankly we're on shaky ground with that suggestion. I got off with my first ever Northern boy. He even writes "alreet pet" in texts; so exotic. I've been listening to Paul's "Westwood 2" cd obsessively and consequently find myself singing "I've got hooooooooooooooes, in different area cooooooooodes" at any, and all, inopportune moments. We found a rare fungal growth in our shower which looks and feels exactly like pasta but is, quite definitively, not pasta. I think that's pretty much it, give or take ten million or so progressively more embarrassing incidents that I think you and I can both live without repeating.
Monday, 19 October 2009
Jake went to the Fantastic Mr Fox premiere and fell over. Face first into the red carpet, right in front of all the photographers. Hahahahhaaaaaa.Never mind, Jake - to my intense disappointment none of the paparrazi agencies have any photos of your big moment on their websites. At least we'll always have this

...reeeeeeeeeeeeeeal nice.

...reeeeeeeeeeeeeeal nice.
Saturday, 17 October 2009
I don't want to get into how I ended up looking through pictures of babies in fancy dress at 5 in the fricking morning (FYI, it's because I exhausted all the normal porn available on the Internet................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................KIDDING) but how funny is this baby Superman? Probably not that funny when you're hanging from a windowsill on the eighteenth floor and urgently need rescuing by a flying man but the real superheroes are busy in Afghanistan and so Superman has sent his massively underqualified intern instead, but for right now, quite funny, eh?

Look at his little stupid old man face! He looks so uncomfortable and not at all heroic.
"You have no idea how much little children are fond of any costume party. They want to be dressed in the most mysterious costumes and thus be very popular and significant at the party. Christmas and New Year occasions give them such a possibility. Children like to be dressed in fancy dress. Being princesses, princes, witches or even skeletons makes them feel special and in fairyland". Quite. Couldn't have put it better myself! I mean, obviously, I could. Even the baby in the picture could have put it better - but well done for trying, guys.
When I have a baby I am going to dress it up like an idiot and laugh at it all the time. Babies always have the upper hand, what with everyone not only calmly accepting the fact that they constantly shit themselves but actively encouraging this totally anti-social behaviour by inventing a special underwear designed to be pooed on. Sick and wrong.
I have come to accept that the billion-pound p/a (about that though, right? Probably? More? Less?) nappy industry is more than equipped to crush my one woman anti-crapping yourself crusade, and so, in the spirit of picking my battles wisely I ask only that we all make an effort to not take babies at all seriously. Theirs is a leisurely existence of tits on demand. The only other people who see tits as often as babies do are porn addicts, and there is a lot of evidence to suggest a correlation between porn addicts and rapist. Despite the obvious connection, there have been no official investigations into the number of babies who have been convicted of sexual assault. You really have to ask yourself “why is that?” and the only logical answer is “massive government cover up, d’uh”. There are a lot of babies in high places (not just MJ’s son Blanket. Hohoho) and they cannot be trusted. Did you know that Hitler was once a baby? As was Peaches Geldof. We must strive to make them look as stupid as we can at all possible times or they will realise their infallibility and, eventually, take over the world. Don't let that happen.
When Lucy was a toddler she got so stressed out by her parents' divorce that she lost all of her hair. Her father responded to this tragic manifestation of pure human misery by sticking a transfer tattoo which read "BOOM CHICKA WAH WAH" across her forehead. That's actually not what it said, I can't remember what it said, but it was something equally if not more hilarious and the point remains that Lucy's dad is a fucking MARTYR. Sometimes, when I tell that story to guests they stare at me with disdain, or even bonafide disgust, as I gasp the details out between convulsions of rib-breaking laughter - but that is because some of our guests do not understand that babies need to KNOW THEIR PLACE OR THEY WILL GET US ALL. I'm sure that you guys can understand that. You can all read and so have a head start on the majority of our guests already.
Whilst my concerns relating to the likelihood of a dystopian future in which babies have decided they no longer need conceal their inhumane manipulation of their adult carers with displays of cutesy vulnerability but rather openly enslave us all with whips and chains and oversized Tickle-Me-Elmos are substantial, I also have other reasons to encourage the (ultimately harmless) derision of the very young. When I am a mother, I expect to experience occasional, residual flashes of hatred towards the thing that ruined my vagina. I think it much healthier to acknowledge this hatred and express it through transfer tattoos and undignified wardrobe choices rather than, say, refusing to let my daughter go roller skating with all her friends. I know it was because you hate me, Mum. It's not true that the skates fuck your feet up and make you crippled. I've checked. I'll always feel like I've missed something and no amount of retrospective titting around on wheels will fill the gaping chasm. If you'd only expressed your resentment sartorially, I'd be a lot more well adjusted. You bitch.

Look at his little stupid old man face! He looks so uncomfortable and not at all heroic.
"You have no idea how much little children are fond of any costume party. They want to be dressed in the most mysterious costumes and thus be very popular and significant at the party. Christmas and New Year occasions give them such a possibility. Children like to be dressed in fancy dress. Being princesses, princes, witches or even skeletons makes them feel special and in fairyland". Quite. Couldn't have put it better myself! I mean, obviously, I could. Even the baby in the picture could have put it better - but well done for trying, guys.
When I have a baby I am going to dress it up like an idiot and laugh at it all the time. Babies always have the upper hand, what with everyone not only calmly accepting the fact that they constantly shit themselves but actively encouraging this totally anti-social behaviour by inventing a special underwear designed to be pooed on. Sick and wrong.
I have come to accept that the billion-pound p/a (about that though, right? Probably? More? Less?) nappy industry is more than equipped to crush my one woman anti-crapping yourself crusade, and so, in the spirit of picking my battles wisely I ask only that we all make an effort to not take babies at all seriously. Theirs is a leisurely existence of tits on demand. The only other people who see tits as often as babies do are porn addicts, and there is a lot of evidence to suggest a correlation between porn addicts and rapist. Despite the obvious connection, there have been no official investigations into the number of babies who have been convicted of sexual assault. You really have to ask yourself “why is that?” and the only logical answer is “massive government cover up, d’uh”. There are a lot of babies in high places (not just MJ’s son Blanket. Hohoho) and they cannot be trusted. Did you know that Hitler was once a baby? As was Peaches Geldof. We must strive to make them look as stupid as we can at all possible times or they will realise their infallibility and, eventually, take over the world. Don't let that happen.
When Lucy was a toddler she got so stressed out by her parents' divorce that she lost all of her hair. Her father responded to this tragic manifestation of pure human misery by sticking a transfer tattoo which read "BOOM CHICKA WAH WAH" across her forehead. That's actually not what it said, I can't remember what it said, but it was something equally if not more hilarious and the point remains that Lucy's dad is a fucking MARTYR. Sometimes, when I tell that story to guests they stare at me with disdain, or even bonafide disgust, as I gasp the details out between convulsions of rib-breaking laughter - but that is because some of our guests do not understand that babies need to KNOW THEIR PLACE OR THEY WILL GET US ALL. I'm sure that you guys can understand that. You can all read and so have a head start on the majority of our guests already.
Whilst my concerns relating to the likelihood of a dystopian future in which babies have decided they no longer need conceal their inhumane manipulation of their adult carers with displays of cutesy vulnerability but rather openly enslave us all with whips and chains and oversized Tickle-Me-Elmos are substantial, I also have other reasons to encourage the (ultimately harmless) derision of the very young. When I am a mother, I expect to experience occasional, residual flashes of hatred towards the thing that ruined my vagina. I think it much healthier to acknowledge this hatred and express it through transfer tattoos and undignified wardrobe choices rather than, say, refusing to let my daughter go roller skating with all her friends. I know it was because you hate me, Mum. It's not true that the skates fuck your feet up and make you crippled. I've checked. I'll always feel like I've missed something and no amount of retrospective titting around on wheels will fill the gaping chasm. If you'd only expressed your resentment sartorially, I'd be a lot more well adjusted. You bitch.
Tuesday, 6 October 2009
Have you ever noticed how everyone has a totally funny dance they only do for dubstep? Skream drops and the crowd gets a full foot shorter as everyone bends their knees and purses their lips in concentration. The lip pursing probably has nothing to do with the crowd getting shorter but it does look totes lolz. Does anyone stand up straight whilst dancing to dubstep? I am going to research this LOADS. I've never noticed it before, I'm not normally in a fit state to, like, see by the time the dub djs take to the decks.
Recently I've been feeling distracted. Distracted and frustrated and impotent. Words like that, but I really mean them. The situation is serious, evidently. I'm ascribing this to third year existentialism. The reality of gainful employ no longer hovers on a distant horizon, o'er a reassuringly placid ocean of six day weekends and having no need for an iron, but rather looms menacingly in my peripheral vision, distinct though notional through a haze of dissertation panic and coursework anxiety. I've only got one year to engineer a worth ethic, or glamorous literary contacts, or at the very least, a brief romance with a tutor. Obviously the sensible thing to do, with the inevitable so indomitably bearing down on me and the light flashing atop Canary Wharf insistently reminding me that eventually we all have to sober up, even students and bankers, would be to confront reality with the support of six hour stints in the British Library and a tidy bedroom. Better to walk before you run, though.
And so. I made the laudable and extremely mature decision that I would grant myself one month, this month, my first back in London, of doing whatever the fuck I want before pulling my finger out, knuckling down and turning over a new leaf. It's all been essentially fun. I've attended a lot of great parties, celebrated a handful of meaningful events in the lives of dear friends, and met enough new friends that it's not a huge problem that my approach to celebrating a meaningful event is likely to forever alienate the dear friend getting a real job, becoming too old for a young person's railcard, or having their work featured somewhere other than Vice (important milestone, I'm told. Nice to just be featured in Vice, I'd have thought. I'd be excited to be featured on the wall in the boys' toilets. I'm excited to be featured on my own Facebook). It's all been very urgent and vital and hedonistic. Or rather, it was supposed to be. Everyone else seemed to be enjoying themselves. I've been suffering a pervading and insistent feeling of angst. Nothing doomily depressing enough to be poetic, all very pedestrian and reasonable. Paranoid hangovers. Brief moments of clarity when I realise that I have only initiated a conversation with someone because I have been told that they are interesting and yet am absolutely ignoring every word they say, fidgeting with the impatient boredom which is usually the preserve of only the very, very stupid.
By the second week "doing what the fuck I want" would have involved significantly more films, and a lot less straight vodka. It turns out that an alarming proportion of my social life is comprised of getting drunk when I really don't want to. Once you realise how personally other people take your sobriety the reckless thrill of another gram sours quicker than vomit on your new suede shoes and everything sucks. Now I'm granting myself a month of not getting drunk. I'll spend my days in the British Library, and maybe I'll remember how to have a conversation again. I can start writing my dissertation and stop shaving my legs. I can't wait. A whole month of doing what the fuck I want!
And so. I made the laudable and extremely mature decision that I would grant myself one month, this month, my first back in London, of doing whatever the fuck I want before pulling my finger out, knuckling down and turning over a new leaf. It's all been essentially fun. I've attended a lot of great parties, celebrated a handful of meaningful events in the lives of dear friends, and met enough new friends that it's not a huge problem that my approach to celebrating a meaningful event is likely to forever alienate the dear friend getting a real job, becoming too old for a young person's railcard, or having their work featured somewhere other than Vice (important milestone, I'm told. Nice to just be featured in Vice, I'd have thought. I'd be excited to be featured on the wall in the boys' toilets. I'm excited to be featured on my own Facebook). It's all been very urgent and vital and hedonistic. Or rather, it was supposed to be. Everyone else seemed to be enjoying themselves. I've been suffering a pervading and insistent feeling of angst. Nothing doomily depressing enough to be poetic, all very pedestrian and reasonable. Paranoid hangovers. Brief moments of clarity when I realise that I have only initiated a conversation with someone because I have been told that they are interesting and yet am absolutely ignoring every word they say, fidgeting with the impatient boredom which is usually the preserve of only the very, very stupid.
By the second week "doing what the fuck I want" would have involved significantly more films, and a lot less straight vodka. It turns out that an alarming proportion of my social life is comprised of getting drunk when I really don't want to. Once you realise how personally other people take your sobriety the reckless thrill of another gram sours quicker than vomit on your new suede shoes and everything sucks. Now I'm granting myself a month of not getting drunk. I'll spend my days in the British Library, and maybe I'll remember how to have a conversation again. I can start writing my dissertation and stop shaving my legs. I can't wait. A whole month of doing what the fuck I want!
Friday, 2 October 2009
Fatal stabbing two hundred metres from our house last week, this week the man a few doors down on the opposite side of the road arrested for murdering a woman, mutilating her body, packing her remains into a suitcase and dumping them in a farm in Kent. We've walked past his murder house! Past his murder car! Past his murder self, probably. Welcome to New Cross, freshers.
Oh, god. Don’t come close. I’m dying. Again. As a kid I had the strongest constitution of all my friends. My knees were permanently scabbed and I invariably had a broken bone or two, but never a cold or flu or conjunctivitis or an ear infection or tonsillitis. I was fiercely suspicious of “headaches” and instantly, irrevocably distrusted any person who claimed to have suffered from one. I consumed a huge amount of Calpol - but mostly because it was pink and my mother was an inattentive parent rather than due to any genuine ailment. I fell into a lake on a cold December evening and it was my brother who was consequently admitted to hospital with pneumonia. I didn't catch chicken pox; chicken pox caught me. You get it.
Then I went to University and BAM! POW! KABOOM! Actually, that’s not strictly true. First I got Glandular Fever which chewed up my previously unassailable immune system and spat it out in a viscous puddle of lung gunk. And THEN I went to University. Bam! Pow! KABOOM! Now I only need to read an article on the NHS and I'm in bed for the next six months having caught MRSA by proxy. I mean obviously, not that - don't be absurd - but I am always ill.
I truly, madly, deeply, hate being poorly. There are no benefits, unless you get so ill that you lapse into coma and then Busted come and sing at your bedside, saving your life with their pop punk riffs and tasteful highlights. I used to dream about that. Most contagious diseases, illnesses or infections, however, are significantly less glamorous and have little or nothing to recommend them to the average student. If I had children and a job or genuine, adult pressures, I think I’d really appreciate a few days of feeling sorry for myself whilst my husband makes a fuss of me - but my entire life is an interminable, sybaritic exercise in self indulgence. If I wanted to spend all day in bed, I would. I do. I have more rewarding attention seeking techniques than simply lying prone for hours at a time blinking back my own tears. Fuck being poorly. Fuck being poorly right in the slightly squinty eyes.
I’ve spent the past two years coughing, sneezing and puking and my biggest complaint, aside from the parties missed and the conquests repulsed, is the sheer fucking expense of being ill. With this latest batch of freshers (by the way, thanks a lot, you little shits. You make me feel aged and decrepit and then you make my throat swell up so badly that I can’t swallow which is especially concerning given the amount of liquids I’m losing from my nostrils? Thanks) and the exciting new ways to feel shitty they bring with them from their various home towns, I made the decision that I was absolutely, under no circumstances, going to spend any of my precious, precious student loan on medicines. I was going to use objects from around the home! It's a fucking recession, after all. I would stuff socks with lavender, drink herbal teas, feng shui the bathroom, develop a recipe for Vics using only oats and kitchen bleach, bedazzle myself with healing crystals and then sodding well get better.
So, you guys, want to hear all about it? About how my homeopathic remedies were a resounding success and I’ll never venture into Boots again so long as we both shall live? Yeah, well, unlucky. Quelle fucking surprise, this guide to inexpensively curing yourselves of myriad symptoms has fallen at the first hurdle. All I have discovered so far is that poppers is not a worthy alternative to Olbas Oil, that whiskey and honey is preferable to cough syrup but considerably more costly and that whilst ketamine has a lot of short term benefits it is, at the end of the day, ketamine. That although going through a box of tissues at a rate of sixty a day feels unbearably decadent, blowing your nose in a towel not only causes unsightly red rashes on your face but also will alienate you from your housemates’ affections forever. I am forced to conclude that the best remedies come courtesy of the pharmaceutical conglomerates and that the only way to avoid getting ill and hating it is to grow up, engineer yourself some responsibilities in the form of children and spouses, and then appreciate a few blessed days of boring boring bed rest. TOTALLY RUBBISH.
Then I went to University and BAM! POW! KABOOM! Actually, that’s not strictly true. First I got Glandular Fever which chewed up my previously unassailable immune system and spat it out in a viscous puddle of lung gunk. And THEN I went to University. Bam! Pow! KABOOM! Now I only need to read an article on the NHS and I'm in bed for the next six months having caught MRSA by proxy. I mean obviously, not that - don't be absurd - but I am always ill.
I truly, madly, deeply, hate being poorly. There are no benefits, unless you get so ill that you lapse into coma and then Busted come and sing at your bedside, saving your life with their pop punk riffs and tasteful highlights. I used to dream about that. Most contagious diseases, illnesses or infections, however, are significantly less glamorous and have little or nothing to recommend them to the average student. If I had children and a job or genuine, adult pressures, I think I’d really appreciate a few days of feeling sorry for myself whilst my husband makes a fuss of me - but my entire life is an interminable, sybaritic exercise in self indulgence. If I wanted to spend all day in bed, I would. I do. I have more rewarding attention seeking techniques than simply lying prone for hours at a time blinking back my own tears. Fuck being poorly. Fuck being poorly right in the slightly squinty eyes.
I’ve spent the past two years coughing, sneezing and puking and my biggest complaint, aside from the parties missed and the conquests repulsed, is the sheer fucking expense of being ill. With this latest batch of freshers (by the way, thanks a lot, you little shits. You make me feel aged and decrepit and then you make my throat swell up so badly that I can’t swallow which is especially concerning given the amount of liquids I’m losing from my nostrils? Thanks) and the exciting new ways to feel shitty they bring with them from their various home towns, I made the decision that I was absolutely, under no circumstances, going to spend any of my precious, precious student loan on medicines. I was going to use objects from around the home! It's a fucking recession, after all. I would stuff socks with lavender, drink herbal teas, feng shui the bathroom, develop a recipe for Vics using only oats and kitchen bleach, bedazzle myself with healing crystals and then sodding well get better.
So, you guys, want to hear all about it? About how my homeopathic remedies were a resounding success and I’ll never venture into Boots again so long as we both shall live? Yeah, well, unlucky. Quelle fucking surprise, this guide to inexpensively curing yourselves of myriad symptoms has fallen at the first hurdle. All I have discovered so far is that poppers is not a worthy alternative to Olbas Oil, that whiskey and honey is preferable to cough syrup but considerably more costly and that whilst ketamine has a lot of short term benefits it is, at the end of the day, ketamine. That although going through a box of tissues at a rate of sixty a day feels unbearably decadent, blowing your nose in a towel not only causes unsightly red rashes on your face but also will alienate you from your housemates’ affections forever. I am forced to conclude that the best remedies come courtesy of the pharmaceutical conglomerates and that the only way to avoid getting ill and hating it is to grow up, engineer yourself some responsibilities in the form of children and spouses, and then appreciate a few blessed days of boring boring bed rest. TOTALLY RUBBISH.
Thursday, 1 October 2009
Managed to wean (ween?) myself off Thin Lizzy. Off of Thin Lizzy...AND ON TO DIRE STRAITS. It's all I can do not to ring all my friends up and sing down the phone. A tiny part of me is convinced they'd even enjoy it. It's maybe my stupidest part. My left toe that never gets the joke or my upper ear. Still. A tiny part is a tiny part nonetheless and Dire Straits are absolutely and completely amazing. I don't think it's possible to listen to this song without shouting along whilst doing dramatic poses. Let me know how you get on.
Um, wow. Juliet's paired a velvet baseball cap with a ballgown and that isn't even in the top five most WHAT THE FUCK things about this video. Fucking amazing. You and me, babe. How about it?
Um, wow. Juliet's paired a velvet baseball cap with a ballgown and that isn't even in the top five most WHAT THE FUCK things about this video. Fucking amazing. You and me, babe. How about it?
It'd be sensible for me to go to sleep right now and I'm definitely, eyelid droopingly tired, but I can't. I can't go to sleep. If I'm asleep then I won't be listening to Thin Lizzy's Dancing In The Moonlight on repeat anymore. I'm never going to be able to sleep again
NEVER!!!!!!!!!! IT'S SO FUCKING GOOD. WHY IS IT SO FUCKING GOOD? I am so uncool. And I'm walking home, the last bus is long gone, and I'm dancing in the moonlight...GUITAR SOLO...neeeeeeeeeeeow neeeeeowow neeeeoooow...DANCING IN THE MOONLIGHT, IT'S CAUGHT ME IN IT'S SPOTLIGHT, IT'S ALRIGHT, ALRIGHT, DANCING IN THE MOONLIGHT ON THIS LOOOONG HOT SUMMER NIIIIGHT.
NEVER!!!!!!!!!! IT'S SO FUCKING GOOD. WHY IS IT SO FUCKING GOOD? I am so uncool. And I'm walking home, the last bus is long gone, and I'm dancing in the moonlight...GUITAR SOLO...neeeeeeeeeeeow neeeeeowow neeeeoooow...DANCING IN THE MOONLIGHT, IT'S CAUGHT ME IN IT'S SPOTLIGHT, IT'S ALRIGHT, ALRIGHT, DANCING IN THE MOONLIGHT ON THIS LOOOONG HOT SUMMER NIIIIGHT.
Wednesday, 30 September 2009
I have so many crushes on so many men at the moment. Too many man dem, some might say. God, sorry. It's getting a little ridiculous. The sheer number of my potential one true loves, that is, not my bad jokes. My bad jokes are always worth it. I can't even decide which one I like the best. Again, that's the boys, not the jokes. They're all lovely.
I'm ill so I've been lying in bed with balls of tissue paper stuffed in my nostrils (blowing my nose is a) loads of effort and b) not sustainable, environmentally or economically, at this rate), trying to organise this windfall of superhunks into various categories using a points system which will enable me to pick an official favourite.
I don't know where all these perfect boys came from, but recently I've met loads and I'd like to congratulate the men of London on their elegibility. Thanks, boys. For being so lovable and funny. I'd also like to encourage all the girls in the world to have faith. It's one thing explaining that your best friend is charming and good looking, and absolutely another to reassure your entire sex that you've met a full on batch of "life partners". That's all.
I'm ill so I've been lying in bed with balls of tissue paper stuffed in my nostrils (blowing my nose is a) loads of effort and b) not sustainable, environmentally or economically, at this rate), trying to organise this windfall of superhunks into various categories using a points system which will enable me to pick an official favourite.
I don't know where all these perfect boys came from, but recently I've met loads and I'd like to congratulate the men of London on their elegibility. Thanks, boys. For being so lovable and funny. I'd also like to encourage all the girls in the world to have faith. It's one thing explaining that your best friend is charming and good looking, and absolutely another to reassure your entire sex that you've met a full on batch of "life partners". That's all.
Tuesday, 29 September 2009
I tried to go to Sainsbury's tonight but got distracted by the Lovvers gig on the way. If I'd known I was going out I'd have gone to see Teen Sheikhs. Andrew, if you're reading this, know that I really mean that. Apart from anything else, The Lexington sells some whiskey which is out of this world. I can never remember which one it is I like so much, though, so I generally end up drinking all of the others first. I guess any drink that is your 11th of the night tastes nice. That's something to think about. Isn't it? Is it? I don't know, I'm drunk. Imagine! I've got a two hour seminar discussing some of Sartre's more abstract theories at 9am tomorrow morning and I really wanted to make a good impression on my new tutor. Perhaps she likes the smell of corporate lager in the morning. Um.
Lovvers were really fucking good. I've never seen them before, apparently I am entirely and laughably alone in this. I have downloaded some of their songs though, so don't unfollow me just yet. I'm still slightly cooler than you are. Like, just. I downloaded some of their songs and I checked with a band member earlier and can officially confirm that I did this LEGALLY. Which is a relief. I would have felt bad had the band member told me that it was ILLEGAL. I would have then felt especially bad if he had asked for MONEY because I DIDN'T HAVE ANY AFTER SPENDING MY WEEK'S FOOD ALLOWANCE ON BEER. I don't even like beer.
The New Cross Inn is the second most depressing venue in London. I'm actually 99% sure it's the most, but I'm leaving room for manoeuvre on the basis that I hate being proved wrong. Even though Lovvers were really fucking good, most of us just stood around tapping our feet. So, that sucks for them. They were so fun! The New Cross Inn is so dreary! Absolute travesty. It was almost enough to make me dance at the front with Anj and her friends, only I was aware that if the band actually had been enjoying themselves up until that point they wouldn't once I started trying to dance. The singer jumped off stage and turned his back to us. I don't know if he always does this - I assumed it was because the crowd was so dry he didn't want to look at us anymore, and so that the band could enjoy themselves playing at one another even if the rest of us were going to stand around looking like we were waiting for a bus.
I thought that was pretty heroic of him and I fell in love. This was confusing, as earlier in the night I had decided to fall in love with the bassist who was tall and had a really lovely smile. A really really lovely smile. Swoonsome. I have come to the conclusion that the best way to deal with this massive, massive, where-the-fuck-are-you-UN? crisis is to just wait until Thursday and then concentrate my affections on whichever individual is like, wearing the best jumper or looks least likely to put up a fight or whatever at Off Modern.

(Dreamboats to the right)
Lovvers were really fucking good. I've never seen them before, apparently I am entirely and laughably alone in this. I have downloaded some of their songs though, so don't unfollow me just yet. I'm still slightly cooler than you are. Like, just. I downloaded some of their songs and I checked with a band member earlier and can officially confirm that I did this LEGALLY. Which is a relief. I would have felt bad had the band member told me that it was ILLEGAL. I would have then felt especially bad if he had asked for MONEY because I DIDN'T HAVE ANY AFTER SPENDING MY WEEK'S FOOD ALLOWANCE ON BEER. I don't even like beer.
The New Cross Inn is the second most depressing venue in London. I'm actually 99% sure it's the most, but I'm leaving room for manoeuvre on the basis that I hate being proved wrong. Even though Lovvers were really fucking good, most of us just stood around tapping our feet. So, that sucks for them. They were so fun! The New Cross Inn is so dreary! Absolute travesty. It was almost enough to make me dance at the front with Anj and her friends, only I was aware that if the band actually had been enjoying themselves up until that point they wouldn't once I started trying to dance. The singer jumped off stage and turned his back to us. I don't know if he always does this - I assumed it was because the crowd was so dry he didn't want to look at us anymore, and so that the band could enjoy themselves playing at one another even if the rest of us were going to stand around looking like we were waiting for a bus.
I thought that was pretty heroic of him and I fell in love. This was confusing, as earlier in the night I had decided to fall in love with the bassist who was tall and had a really lovely smile. A really really lovely smile. Swoonsome. I have come to the conclusion that the best way to deal with this massive, massive, where-the-fuck-are-you-UN? crisis is to just wait until Thursday and then concentrate my affections on whichever individual is like, wearing the best jumper or looks least likely to put up a fight or whatever at Off Modern.

(Dreamboats to the right)
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