Ne faites pas du dimanche un jour comme les autres *

And now for a completely hippie moment
On the bus again- I put the customary paperback back into my pocket, and allow myself to feel what is there. Feel the present, look at fellow passengers, flex my bum muscles on the used grey seat; for once I won’t retreat into fiction, or into another deeper inner layer of
regrets
what ifs
memories
but breathe in and feel the anticipation of today fill me up and warm me. It’s good.

---

And now for a completely lesbiatric moment
There is something quite spiritual about dolphins, she says, as we flutter about in the sexshop; I’m admittedly there to pick up a present for an unsuspecting friend; as we play with what is on offer, I do wish they would leave the animals out of it. We leave with their last two Fun Factory dolphins, conspicuously packaged into bright pink wrappers that we can later happily display to fellow tube passengers.

---

And now for a completely cynical moment
I wish they would stop it with the let’s write to the undecided Ohio voters campaign bollocks. Can’t they tell that it’s incredibly arrogant and will backfire? That’s all I had to add.

---

And now for a completely grumpy cunt moment
It’s Halloween, people. Annoying children trick-or-bloody-treating, possibly. Time to put the lights out and lay low, after greasing the doorbell button thing with melted lard; since I’ve run out of anthrax.

* don’t make Sunday into a day just like every other day.

Skincare : no more broken eggcups
I just read this in some magazine :

Surveys and panels
Dermexpert, a leading skin-care company, is looking for women 20-35, any skin type, affected by facial acne Must have 5 to 6 white/red spots. Compensation: 160 euros.

A ha! a guinea pig job where people will pop your pimples for you. How lovely.
What I like about this is that you need to have a certain number of zits.
What happens if you only have 4? Or more than 6?
Also, do they have to be white and red, or just one or the other? Are white ones preferable to red ones?
I guess even if you end up completely disfigured, you come back home with the moral satisfaction of having helped modern science.

---

Internet, people, friends: I’m pleased to report that the upbeat mood is sticking around. No more tears, no more broken 50p eggcups.
Not that I had eggcups left.

I like compote, or Porque lo valgo
I don’t know what it is, besides the obvious explanation of non-simultaneous chocolate cake and fruitful masturbation, but I’m all upbeat today. As if I were high on something. Life. The realisation that I like myself, and that I'm worth more than the bad taste left behind from a unrealistic relationship.
Maybe it’s the Glorious End of The Infinite Sadness.
Yay!

---

This morning’s pre-breakfast reflecting went as such:
a. Why, in moments of anger, am I capable of picking something up and throw it at the wall, but always pick up the fifty pence eggcup from New Cross cheap-ass market? Why always something cheap that doesn’t matter? Isn’t anger meant to overlook thrift and carefulness?
b. Should I, like my lovely and very controlled, ass-kicking martial artist friend S, pick up Kendo? From his description, I understand it goes like this:
1.Put on Dark Vader mask and padding.
2.Pick up big stick.
3.Step forward.
4.Hit opponent on any of the following body parts: head, wrists, chest, and throat.
5.When beating opponent to a pulp, shout out the name of said body parts. Head! (whack) Face! (whack)! Just to make sure opponent knows exactly which bit it is that’s hurting like a bastard.
6.Now, your turn to get whacked into Dark Vader compote.
7.And relax.
Pricier than eggcups, but oh so much more cathartic.

---

*cough*
And finally, a big thank you to the lovely people who have put up with me for the past two months and reminding me that I'm worth it. I had forgotten - temporarily.

Snippets
It’s only after we left the house to trot towards the Saatchi Gallery that J leaned over and said : you have hair sticking out of your nose. Do you have any scissors on you? Since I did not, I carefully tucked it back in with my little finger.

---

Late last night, a quick succession of events culminated in me acting as referee in an arm-wrestling contest between complete strangers in a dodgy, grimy, sticky Soho dive. Time well spent.

---

Sometimes, when the hangovers let me, I read The Guardian, and I laugh, and spill tea over my 300 thread count sheets.(I don't spill as much as when I read The Times, naturally.)
Extracts:
Last week [The Guardian] launched Operation Clark County to help readers have a say in the American election by writing to undecided voters in the crucial state of Ohio. In the first three days, more than 11,000 people requested addresses. Here is some of the reaction to the project that we received from the US:

Have you not noticed that Americans don't give two shits what Europeans think of us? Each email someone gets from some arrogant Brit telling us why to NOT vote for George Bush is going to backfire, you stupid, yellow-toothed pansies ... I don't give a rat's ass if our election is going to have an effect on your worthless little life. I really don't. If you want to have a meaningful election in your crappy little island full of shitty food and yellow teeth, then maybe you should try not to sell your sovereignty out to Brussels and Berlin, dipshit. Oh, yeah - and brush your goddamned teeth, you filthy animals.
Wading River, NY

Real Americans aren't interested in your pansy-ass, tea-sipping opinions. If you want to save the world, begin with your own worthless corner of it.
Texas, USA

My dear, beloved Brits,
I understand the Guardian is sponsoring a service where British citizens write to Americans to advise them on how to vote. Thank heavens! I was adrift in a sea of confusion and you are my beacon of hope!
Feel free to respond to this email with your advice. Please keep in mind that I am something of an anglophile, so this is not confrontational. Please remember, too, that I am merely an American. That means I am not very bright. It means I have no culture or sense of history. It also means that I am barely literate, so please don't use big, fancy words.
Set me straight, folks!
Dayton, Ohio

MAY YOU HAVE TO HAVE A TOOTH CAPPED. I UNDERSTAND IT TAKES AT LEAST 18 MONTHS FOR YOUR GREAT MEDICAL SERVICES TO GET AROUND TO YOU. HAVE A GREAT DAY.
Harlan, Kentucky

More here. Enjoy. I know I did.

I love England, really I do.
Places I would like to visit:
Poppleton, just for the name.
and Farleigh Wallop, wherever that may be.
And Effingham, of course. Wait, I’ve been there already.

Surgery, celibacy, and the infinitely personal nature of experience
Metaphor Of The day, or Picture this:
secondary school, break time, the girls’ toilet is a hive of chatting adolescents applying lipstick. Marie-Laure is examining her complexion in the mirror – huge, white head spot alert! She starts squeezing mindlessly – SPLATTER! Conversations come to an immediate halt. Hey, isn’t that what cubicles are (also) for? Hasty wiping of the mirror, exit in shame.

This is a bit like squeezing a bit fat purulent spot. First it hurts much worse than it looks, for such a middle-of-the-range-looking spot. You just can’t leave it alone, and then you squeeze, and pus keeps coming out, a little blood too perhaps. And you keep going back for one little more squeeze, because it just has to come out, even if the mirror gets splattered in the process.
Then, maybe, when the crap’s out, then you heal.

---

I bought a bumper pack of AA batteries yesterday. I’m all set for a long spell of celibacy.
cel·i·ba·cy ( P ) Pronunciation Key (sl-b-s)
n.
1.Abstinence from sexual intercourse, especially by reason of religious vows.
2.The condition of being unmarried. [syn: chastity, sexual abstention]Wait, isn’t celibacy self-imposed? Or perhaps it’s a nice word to use when deep down I’m bitter that I’m not getting any?

---

I watched an Alexandr Rogozhkin film last night called The cuckoo. Wartime Lapland, three characters with no common language are thrown together by circumstances.

- [in Finnish] What’s your name, Russian; Ivan? All Russians are called Ivan.
- [ in Russian] Get lost, fascist!
- [in Finnish] Pleased to meet you, Gerlost, I’m Vekio. I’m not a fascist, I’m a Finn. I’m just wearing this uniform, I’m not fighing, the war is over for me.
- [in Lap language] Vekio, Gerlost, I’m Anny. I haven’t seen a man in four years, and now two come at once! so don’t get too close to me, or I get wet and I want to scream.

It’s a tale of prejudice and loneliness and longing and the failure to communicate, exacerbated by the language gap. At the end, all parties walk away with an altogether different version of what happened – as if they didn’t live the same events at all.
When a relationship falls through, how can both parties to walk away with the same version of events? Different memories, different emphasis. Better not compare them too much.

This is not a love song
These are the things that I miss.
I miss her voice; fired up, opinionated, passionate in every way, sometimes unfair and unforgiving, quick to dismiss and scorn, judge and trample. Such a relief from my wanting-to-be-careful considerations, such freedom. In secret, I called her my little bull; I never told her that. Perhaps I thought she’d be offended.
I miss her perspective, her sense of what is funny, absurd, shocking; I was so proud to be the one to see beyond the funny girl, beyond the entertainer. I thought: no one will love you like I do. (In every story, isn’t there a character deluding herself with that belief?)
I miss her brown body, so unlike mine, yet so familiar; and I miss her appetite, for food, for movement, for life, for sex, for me. It matched and legitimised mine; it opened up floodgates in me, new possibilities, new hungers, new, shared, power.
I miss her crazy hair (she always wanted to shave it off), her soft skin, and I miss her belly.
I miss telling her off for pulling out her toenails, for always threatening to get a bald head; I miss trying to convince her that I liked her belly.
I miss pretending to tell her what to do; I miss pretending that she deserved a slap.
I miss her unrealistic expectations, which pricked the mediocre in me.
I miss her dreams of domesticity, which lured the loner in me.

These are some of the things that I miss; and if that makes me inconsistent, I don’t even care.
(On the other hand, I really don’t miss her attraction for yappy lapsang souchong dogs.)

The pillow perspective
It’s a beautiful autumn day.
I found a probably imprudent, tiny insect in my mug of cold tea; I want to believe it was suicidal. I can be so romantic that way.
I have many encounters planned for this week.
It's 4.50 pm and I'm still in bed; it's called brooding.

---

A picture emerges:
· She fantasised about me beating people up for her. She fantasised about me going to Law school, become a powerful lawyer and fix injustices . She would have liked me to move over the Atlantic in one short sweeping motion and find my feet and be autonomous and strong. She would have liked me to initiate phone sex and to top her in bed. She commented on how hot other women were. She would have liked me to drive her places, to woo her, to be able of more, to know more. She would have liked me to pretend to boss her around, tell her what to do. She would have liked to look up to her partner.
· How I always felt that I was letting her down! And vowed to myself to try harder!
· It is hard always feeling on trial; it is harrowing always trying to impress, always trying to match someone else’s hopes.
· She liked that I was different, looked different, talked differently, perhaps even thought differently; but then it began to show that my way of being different didn’t fit into what she wanted for herself.
· Why is so difficult to accept the notion that I was loved for who I am not? And why did it take me so long to figure it out?
· It’s not like I don’t know what it is to invest a lover with my own expectations. Projection, anyone?
· Goddamnit, I still can’t shake the belief that it could have worked out. What do I need to quit?
"When someone sees you as you really are and wants to be with you, that's powerful."

Deep sea diving makes me feel claustrophobic
How much truth is there to the cliché that you really have to touch the bottom before coming up again? And how far down is the bottom anyway?

Six Feet Under?·
·The hedonist in me has shut up. One day, perhaps, I slowed down, and finally figured out that our/my only worthwhile pursuit is really intimacy; that on that quest we get sidetracked and lost and confused and lured and deceived, and all we get is sex, and sex and its corollary ego rub seem to fill the void for some time. And now, that has become a given, and I just can’t nod to hot fuck dates. I’m only/obviously flattered. But I’ll stay away, and not unleash the flirting beast inside. Keep the rampant shagster locked up.
· Relationships can be a great distraction. The general sense of rot that I am feeling is, I realise, deeper than the pain of the break up. When did it start? Was it covered up by the elation/hope/torment of this relationship? Where would I be had the relationship not happened?
· There is undoubtedly digging to be done; and I know I have to do it alone. Isn’t a break up, as horribly gut-wrenching as it is, the best time to start digging?
· Yours truly will be single and sleeping alone for a very long time.
· Yours truly will still be missing her for a very long time, and lapsing in my resolution of not daydreaming about her.

Vicarious extravaganza
Over the past few days, I’ve watched the entire first series of Six feet under and identified in one way or the other with almost every single character; I have read a dozen short stories, and identified with almost every single character, and now I’m off to read Gender bender: the champion of truth, justice and unisex underwear. It’s a comic book. I wonder if I’ll identify with…. etc.

---

Today’s fact that I shouldn’t even be entertaining: it’s the first time for .. well, what feels like a very long time, that I’m off work and not on a plane to go and be with her. I miss her company, that’s all.
Today’s list that I shouldn’t compile: all the things I wanted to do with her and which will never happen.
Pffffft.

Restraining orders are just another way of saying I love you

How grateful I am to the Sun, for this immensely gratifying tale of stalking:
Karen had been with her childhood sweetheart Martin for ten years when he said he had met someone else. It transformed the shy, quiet Karen into an obsessive, deranged stalker. “I tried to seduce my ex wearing make up and clothes I stole from his new lover. », she said. I wonder if I could make a decent stalker. It’s an occupation that requires a higher standard of organisation and obsession that I believe I’m capable of. One thing I know for sure, though, is that I’d never steal her new lover’s clothes and/or make up to try and seduce my ex. I’m just not willing to compromise on style, thank you very much.

I’d rather have a cup of tea
Internet, I have just turned down what amounted to a hot fuck date tonight. No, but, really. I even ignored the scintillating temptation of having something spicy to write to you about; I just turned it down. Not because I am washing my hair, or haven’t shaved my legs; I’m pretty well maintained in the grooming department, thank you. It would have been easy, it could have been fun. Instead, I’m in for an evening of movies and vicariousness. Do you think I should worry?

Why not take a long walk on a short pier
I have a whole week off coming up soon.
I might just elope to Brighton for a bit.
The first time I spent a dirty weekend in Brighton with a lover, we had a fight. She snapped at me in the middle of the high street, I snapped back, she darted off, and, since that was during that lost era before everyone had a mobile phone, we spent the rest of the afternoon vainly looking for each other. We made our separate ways back to London late at night on the same train, but we only figured that out when we hit Victoria Station.
The second time I spent a dirty weekend in Brighton with a lover, we had a fight, at four in the morning in our bed and breakfast room. So, in a truly obnoxious manner, I got my earplugs out of my bag and pretended to sleep. For the rest of the day and on the train back, we didn’t speak and it was then that I decided that it’d be better to go our separate ways as soon as we’d hit Victoria station.
The third time I spent a dirty weekend in Brighton with a lover, I mainly waited a lot. She’d said she’d be there at 5; at 5 she called to say she was down the pub with some mates and would be there at 7; at 7 she promised she’d be there at 8. I had dinner by myself in a dimly lit restaurant and flirted with the waitress. When the delayed lover turned up, a little after 10, my anticipation button had been flicked off. After that I lowered my expectations.

I can’t help but question my quasi-masochistic attachment to the place.
Who wants to go to Brighton with me?

Post-diluvian
I have just cried till my makeup was a smear on my chin and snotted all over J's shoulder, like he'd been trying to get me to do for some time. Good times, good times.
That's all, really.
Perhaps I'll be back tomorrow.

I’m watching t e l e v i s i o n
Ah, if I were a man.. I’d hope one of my friends would call up the fab five on my ass; Thom and that cute bespectacled food guy could redesign my living room; meanwhile I’d get Kyan and Jai to help me with something in the bedroom, while Carson would drive round the block in the suv.( I’m not really into blondes.) Or, more mercifully, he could be having fun in the closet trying to bring some colour into my life.
Watching Queer eye : yet another activity which is not much fun to do alone.
I miss her and I know I shouldn’t.

International finance, innit
I received an epistle from my bank saying the following things:
Dear Ms Ysengrin,
Thank you for your recent enquiry about working or living abroad. We are pleased to enclose the information you requested. You can also obtain further information by visiting www.bastardsbanklimited.co.uk or by contacting your personal adviser. Yours sincerely, etc.
Ah.
Well.
Explanation number one: someone is trying to get rid of me by hinting that I should take up offshore banking; that might be a polite way to tell me to bugger off and leave the country.
Explanation number two: I have been sleep-walking all those years and no-one bothered to tell me that I was calling up financial services and requesting meaty leaflets on international services.
Explanation number three: this is the hand of fate! Fate is telling me to leave the country! and to not close down that bank account!
Explanation number four: I have no explanation number four which would satisfactorily cater for my romantic side, since I won’t simply chalk it up to a mistake on my lovely financial adviser.
Now that my doubts on my partner’s ability to help me through a transatlantic move have vanished along with the partner, I might well consider a move after all. I am considering it right now. I’m giving myself a deadline of August 2005. There. And it’s got nought to do with Bastardsbank unlimited.

Failure of integrity
1pm: poised, intent and highly visible, I have been waiting for a good ten minutes when the number 578 bus sails (triumphantly, I think) past my incredulous figure. Righteous indignation is rising in my chest, shaking my fist at the driver just isn’t enough. The next stop is on the other side of the traffic lights; my boiling blood propels me down the road, panting, I reach it just when the front doors open; I make my wrath heard. What the fuck? Is that his idea of fun? I feel vindicated.
8.30pm, night has fallen, crowds are pouring in and out of pub; as I stride along St Martin’s lane, a young woman, clearly off her face, stumbles and falls, revealing a vast expanse of bare thighs. Amused/mildly revolted passer-bys watch; I help her, prop her up, make sure she knows where she is going.
This is my romanticized version of the day, for I am lying. I am lying because I was too lazy to run after that renegade bus driver, and possibly too meek, today anyway, to confront him. I am lying because I watched the piss-head fall on her bum just like everyone else did, without even trying to help. Too scared or too selfish, today, so I only thought about it, and kept moving. Just like everyone else.

Red Hot Catholic Love and the House of Hamlet
J had a home visit today from some religious nutter who launched into a near monologue on the light of the Lord. J played his favourite game, answering using only lines from South Park. Cultural references always come in handy.

---

So yes, I have been very much in my little bubble lately; but just like the rest of the Western world I have been following the US election warm-up; it matters because when America farts we get to smell it all the way here, don’t we. At this point I would like to propose Shrub as a modern Hamlet figure: George II, a spoiled, insecurity-plagued, wannabe king, whose blind loyalty to the ghost of his father’s regime and whose thrust for revenge against George I’s imagined enemies will, ultimately, bring about the son’s tragic downfall in the November elections. If we’re lucky.
This morning I heard some French journalist claim that in France, Spain, Germany or the UK, Kerry would be elected by more than 80% of votes. It’s really quite touching, this naïve belief that America gives a flying fuck about what European countries think.
Pah. Back to the bubble now.

So much cynicism in someone so young
Today I was asked what my thoughts were on unconditional love. After I gave my usual irritating chuckle, I replied that I didn't believe it existed; (except in the case of religious nuts, perhaps. But is that still love?)
I have many other things to write about but I'm really boring myself so I won't.

---

If this was meant for self-promotion.. I would be writing about all the ways I'm repairing, all the steps I'm taking to get better, learn and move on. But I'm not, this is hard and I'm not ashamed to admit that I have been living in a little bubble of hurt and uncertainty. I also know I'll get through it, because it's that or a tall bridge, and not only can we not have two suicides in the family, but I just won't be defeated yet.

The smell of fear

Aged 8, I envy my schoolteacher, who reveals one day that she has no sense of smell. No sense of smell, I think! No greasy whiffs wafting from the school kitchen, no stench of dog poo, no back-alley stench of urine. A near-perfect world.
In the school playground, we’re also fascinated by Eric, 7, who, dixit his teacher, has no sense of fear. To us sensible kids he appears simply crazy, throwing himself under the swings, climbing walls and trees regardless of danger; incredibly, rarely getting hurt.
I soon learned to treasure smell as the life-saving, life-enhancing gift it is. And sometimes I wish I could have a little tiny bit of what Eric had.

Too close for comfort
Because I was choking up, I got off the bus and walked home along the river instead.
Instantly the sense of space seized me; my eyes jumped to the horizon, far away down the waterline; then I looked up at the sky and breathed in.
Later on, I almost walked on a dear rat.
None of the above is a metaphor for anything.

Not the life and soul of the party, are we
Last night I saw Diarios de motocicleta and, naturally, I cried.
So what if the film is a fine exercise in hagiography? It’s still beautiful, and moving. It retraces the road trip taken by the young Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara across South America, and his political awakening. I wanted to believe that things would work out for him in the end; that he would put on his beret, grow his beard, lead the Cuban revolution already and get away with it, instead of getting caught and having his hands chopped off in the end. I always hope that things will work out.

Later, on the tube home, I read two short stories out of Faithless:Tales of transgression by Joyce Carol Oates -right at the top of my personal writers’ pantheon - and I cried some more.

I don’t know why, Internet, but I feel I should apologize for not being cheery right now.
J has just brought me some more dirty comics in attempt to distract me from my maudlin/dark mood. It makes me feel all warm and fluffy inside that he cares.

Just as well there are some serious bloggers out there
Since I’m clearly not one of them. [a nice way of relinquishing responsibility for the lack of information/ the amount of rubbish I post.]
I decided it was high time for me to figure out how I felt about this project for a European constitution thing we’re hearing about. I have amassed material, you see; after much perusing and frowning and digesting and deliberating, I came to the conclusion that I don’t know what to think about it. So that’s that from me.

---

Let’s face it: at the moment I have the concentration span of a common house flea. In a pathetic attempt at focusing, I have purchased novels and DVDs; tiny nibbles of digestible information and entertainment in palatable form. It’s no use. I can’t sit through a film, can’t focus on a plot. Even J’s collection of dirty comics fail to grab me for long. I’m plodding my way through Emma Donoghue’s Life mask; I l o v e d her previous novels, but, owning to my complete lack of knowledge of the politics of the times of George III, most of it goes way over my head. I’m also strolling through Dumas’ Pauline; a gothic tale of secret passages and dying black-haired heiresses. I already know the ending, and the book’s fate: relegation to the bathroom for constipated moments.
I wonder what hymns are on Songs of Praise today.

---

A happy birthday to my favourite Zabelie in the whole world!

The foxes are definitely getting hungrier. Last weekend they chewed my flip flops; today I believe they dug up and ate the newly-planted flower bulbs. Well, Internet, they shouldn’t come to me crying when they get daffodils blossoming out their arses. That’s all I’ve got to say.

I can't just close the door and walk away, can I

The week is finafuckingly over; my mother has left in a flurry of empty shopping bags; the flat looks like it’s been hit by hurricane Trevor or Mildred, or whatever affectionate name it’d be called if we had hurricanes this side of the Atlantic. This morning’s plan is to turn myself into the Incredible Cleaning Fairy and sort it all out, then get out of my crumpled, smelly old pyjamas and into clean clothes so that I can feel human again. Attractive, huh? I’m still ill, coughing and spluttering and weary-faced and in no position or frame of mind to go out and see fellow humans. Instead, when this pit is scrubbed clean and so I am, I will knock back large quantities of tea, bully the cat onto my lap, and dwell over last night’s dreams. My resolve to not think of her is about the consistency of lumpy custard, and the dreams don’t help. I’ve had the intense fuck dreams of course; the warm and fluffy dreams of love; the drama/arguing dreams; the sorting it all out dreams; the dream where I’m standing in her bedroom waiting for something to happen.
I really have to stop being so available, really.

« I don’t want to go back to school because at school they teach me things I don’t already know.” (Ernest, Les enfants, Marguerite Duras, 1984)

Hurrah
I have survived this week. Right this minute I am proudly skiving a work party. I left them to their plastic cups of organic apple juice and went to gobble up a blood-seeping burger on my lonesome.

---

When I saw that (rather bad) The eternal sunshine of the spotless mind film months ago, I wondered what kind of idiot would want to have memories of their relationship erased. I'm going through a grinder right now; but, given the choice of oblivion versus grinder, I know which one I'll pick. Better to have had and lost than to not have had at all.

Bonjour tristesse, naturally
"Sur ce sentiment inconnu dont l'ennui, la douceur m'obsèdent, j'hésite à apposer le nom, le beau nom grave de tristesse. C'est un sentiment si complet, si égoïste que j'en ai presque honte alors que la tristesse m'a toujours paru honorable. Je ne la connaissais pas, elle, mais l'ennui, le regret, plus rarement le remords. Aujourd'hui, quelque chose se replie sur moi comme une soie, énervante et douce, et me sépare des autres."
Françoise Sagan died last Saturday .
She had almost died so many times before, after a life of extremes for the sake of stylishness: smoking, gambling, driving fast cars, writing like she drove. The myth claims that her passion for gambling was so intense that she asked the Ministry of the Interior to ban her from casinos; that her drug abuse landed her in court on several occasions and led to a demand from the Right-wing politician Le Pen that she be guillotined. She infuriated many people; I enjoyed her novels and her interviews, and always saw her as a witty, articulate, infinitely bright, yet modest, gifted writer.
"I always believe things are going to work out. Every time I see a film about Joan of Arc I'm convinced she'll get away with it. It's the only way to get through life."

I am lapsing
I woke up crying; I'm being all kinds of sad this morning. Quick, coffee, then a brisk walk through the park.
I can't accept that it is over, is all.

I wonder how many hits this place gets from people looking for the Fairy Godmother's website.

Way better than Mystic Meg

Whilst waiting for the bus home, I nodded at the billboard poster that asked: ‘wouldn’t you feel more confident if you knew what the future holds?’

In a way, I have always known what the future holds; for my family have taken great care to warn me.
Thanks to my grandmother, I know that I shall have an insufficient pension; she told me so when I was 18 and I hadn’t started to work yet and save up from my emoluments. She also told me, at age 7, when my adult teeth replaced the baby ones, that around the age of 55 or so they would be pulled out, and replaced with ill-fitting dentures. She warned me that every single relationship I would have in my entire life would end in tears and disappointment, because men are simply too childish and unreliable, and women too gullible.
Thanks to my mother, I know that my joints will crack or creak where hers are cracking or creaking; that the arch of my feet will collapse and that I will have to wear special insoles in my shoes; I also know that after the age of 55 or so it will be too late to start a meaningful relationship, and not just because I will be wearing ill-fitting dentures. I am also getting ample warning about the many manifestations of menopause; when I commented that I was still of a relatively tender age, she claimed that it was never too early to plan for it.

I brush and floss dutifully. That’s at least one area where I have some degree of control.

24/7
At one point today, I thought of all the times she asked me to marry her, and I almost laughed.

---

S o
t i r e d.

I might not be able to lift my spoon to eat my soup; I might have to use a straw instead.

I'm boring

For many very obvious reasons, I choose not to write about my work on this blog; this week, however, work has been and will be taking me over almost entirely. I spent eleven hours at work today; if I had slept last night I would have dreamt of work. I'm pumped full of vitamins and cold remedies and anything I could get my feeble hands on, in order to be the very picture of efficiency and perfection and vision and discipline and.. and....

Only this week, though. On Friday things will get back to normal. I might then have more trivial matters to blog about. I love you all, even if I don't know you. Oh, and, wish me luck, even if you don't know me.

It is impossible to enjoy idling thoroughly unless one has plenty of work to do.Jerome K. Jerome

On a rainy autumn morning, my mom and I are busy perusing the Ninth edition of the Académie Française Dictionary. All the new words from other languages are listed separately; from Arabic we now have ayatollah; from Russian we have kalachnikov and goulag; from Norwegian, fart/fartage, which we don't understand yet which consumes us with teenage-like laughter. From German we now have bretzel - my mom says :I thought that was American, circa Bush period. I pretend to not be amused.

Smell yourself to better health

When I was wee, it seemed there was no ailment that my grandmother couldn’t cure with herbal concoctions. The smell of it brings me back to when I as the centre of the universe.. Perhaps that’s what makes me feel better. J has been taking the piss out of my valiant attempt to fight the Cold from the inner circle of Hell with herbs, calling me a hippie and monologuing as follows:

There’s been an accident on the M25, there are ambulances and helicopters and police cars and a gigantic pile up, dozens and dozens of people are seriously injured or dying, when from the crowd comes a voice:
- Let me through, I’m an aromatherapist! This is lavender oil, I’ll apply it to your ear lobes. See, doesn’t that feel nice? It’ll help your relax. I also have tea tree oil, let me apply it to that stump where your leg was.. Ah, you’re leaning over the side, see, you’re already relaxing ..
- No, says the truck driver, I’m trying to reach my leg so I can fucking hit you with it.
I don’t care if he sneers and jibes. Thyme rules.

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Last night I foolishly left a pair of leather flip-flops outside the garden door. This morning I found the chewed , pathetic remains of one of them in the overgrown grass. Foxes are getting hungrier, Internet.

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My mom is visiting.
She talks about the weather a lot.

The many, dissenting voices of me, Part deux

A I have taken down her pictures, I don’t read her blog. Rigorous discipline is the path to recovery.
B Oh yeah? Haven’t I caught you saying her name once or twice?
A Never. No. Maybe. So?
B Don’t you still calculate what time it is for her, six thousand miles away?
A Maybe. But I don’t check the weather forecast anymore.
C I am furious; I am wronged; I have to be vindicated.
D How do you reconcile the need to be vindicated with the urge/resolution to be truly generous?
A I have decided that I didn’t want her back.
B Oooooh, decided, hey, very nice.
C I’m the one who should have walked away.
D No, for once you did the right thing: stay the distance, negotiate, jump over the hurdles; you didn’t try to run away when things got tough. In fact you may have taken a bit more unfairness than you needed. Not bad, for an inconsistent Gemini.
C If I had walked away, I would feel that I’d had a say..and I wouldn’t feel like such a sucker.
D Pride, it’s all pride.
A Never. No. Maybe. So?
C She can’t stand to hear anybody’s opinion but her own. She thinks it’s a personal attack.
D Oh shut up. It’s exactly what you do, this self-righteous, sanctimonious attitude.
C Never…
A Discipline.
B Oh really.
C Burn the pictures! Do voodoo on her ass!
D Grow up.