And so we bid farewell to 2010 and the Noughties. I spent Millennium Eve in a small restaurant in Putney with my then-boyfriend Henry. I was 23. We'd been together for three years and I was pretty darn certain I'd spend the rest of my life with him. I was deputy editor of a pop magazine, living with my parents, and he was running a web design start-up with two friends in Dalston. We broke up, unacrimoniously, in 2001. Now he's an IT teacher and lives with his girlfriend of several years in a bungalow just outside Canterbury. I've been a PA in a City bank for a fair while and have far less clue about the future than I did ten years ago.
2010's not been the greatest for me although it's certainly had some spectacular moments. It started high as a kite, drunk and delighted in Prague, peaked again in March with probably the best holiday of my adult life in Finland, followed by the baking bliss of a glorious Glasto in June. Since then there have been many fun times: Morocco was relaxing, Paris was inspiring, Edinburgh was funny, the school reunion was hilarious, Lady Gaga was fantastic, Twitter has been life altering, and the Boris Bikes have been transformational. But there's been an awful lot of introspection too: a fair amount of heartache in the early portion and, for the past six months, the strange void left by the boyban, which was without doubt the single most important decision I made this year. It's left me utterly and terrifyingly bare, unable to distract myself from the truth, and I think I'm more honest, more vulnerable and more confused now than I was at the beginning - and I mean all of those things as positives.
If growing up is about realising we know nothing, then I am certainly a fair bit older and wiser than I was twelve months ago (when I was still convinced that the only way missing from my life was a man) and categorically better off than I was ten years ago, when pretty much my whole identity was Being Henry's Girlfriend And Interviewing Popstars. Not that that was a bad place to be, but it's not quite a picture of someone with a strong inner core of self-esteem. When I first went into therapy about five years ago, I remember describing myself as totally surface - together on the outside but an empty mess within, like a Rubik's Cube - easily able to alter my colourful outer persona to suit my audience. Sure, underneath there's an unattractive jumble of strings and black plastic underneath, but who cares about that as long as the others are fooled? These days things are slowly reversing and the value I place on the opinions of others is fading. I'll never turn their volume down all the way, and I don't want to - but there's more in my middle than taut lengths of fishing wire (NB this metaphor only really works if you've taken apart a Rubik's Cube). As I've started to care less about how I'm perceived, I've actually grown a bit more fond of myself, which in turn has made me feel less like I have something to prove. Which has probably ended up making me more attractive to that audience I used to be obsessed about pleasing. And that's a nice irony.
So. 2011. It's weird but perhaps fitting that I'm going into it feeling fairly zen, actually. I have no idea what it will bring and I'm not sure I'm really that fussed either way. I'm sure it'll be OK. I don't know if I'll still be in my job in another 365 days but I kind of hope I am. The boyban still holds, for how long I'm not sure. I'm looking forward to writing more, and travelling somewhere hot at some point. I'd like to get better at the ukulele, take some good photographs, do a lot of yoga, learn to use my sewing machine, see some good music at Glasto and elsewhere, be a good friend, a good daughter and a good member of society. I'm ending 2010 feeling exceptionally grateful to the many people who've been supportive to me, and thankful to those who've been unreliable or disappointing - I've learned from you too. Right. I'm off to meditate and make lunch. Wishing you all a great night out. But a) don't worry if it's rubbish, it doesn't really matter. And b) if it IS really fun, spare a thought for those who are struggling. You're one of the very lucky ones. Happy New Year.
Friday 31 December 2010
Monday 27 December 2010
Michael Jackson lied: you ARE alone
Happy Christmas, one and all. Sorry I'm late. It's been a strange few days and I am now trying to help my parents use their three-year-old vinyl-to-mp3 USB turntable, unopened until today, but the software that came with it is so appalling that I challenge its designer to use it without wanting to drag the stylus over his own retina after a handful of seconds. As a sample of the aforementioned crapness, how's this: it installs a handy shortcut icon on your desktop but will double clicking it open the programme? No it will not. How about right clicking and selecting 'Open'? No. How to open the programme? It is impossible - unless you uninstall it and reinstall it from the CD-Rom. Then it works. Oh how handy. I am now listening to Judy Collins' Greatest Hits through the tinny bass-free computer speakers for approx. the sixth time as it has taken several attempts to know if we're recording successfully. My mum is doing sudoku on a sofa a few feet away and keeps absent-mindedly breaking into a tremulous warble before abandoning it, saying, 'Oh, this used to be one of my favourites.'
My latest attempt to record Side B started crackling wildly so I stopped the recording after forty minutes, only to find that there was no record of it on their PC. I have now given up, something I don't find easy but which must be done in order to preserve the functional state of my parents' laptop - the alternative is putting it on the floor and then repeatedly jumping up and down on it in my Fitflop boots until it admits, out loud, that it is at least six thousand times less user-friendly than a Mac.
Vinyl-ripping aside, I have now reached the long-longed-for stage of Winterval where my duties are over. On Christmas Eve the three of us went to the Albert Hall for a carol concert, where we were joined by two of my parents' friends who I've not met before. Seven people came for lunch on the Day Itself, making ten in total. Then yesterday we went to a pub on the river to meet another (much larger) family and then walked back to their house for lunch. It's all been lovely and festive and fun and there have been many laughs, particularly from my dad's ecstatic and near-constant use of his new Britain's Got Talent judges' buzzer, but there's always a sense of relief when all the socialising is over and you know you can don your jeans and your unflattering jumper and not be polite to anyone for the next hundred hours.
But every year, the euphoria fades after around nine minutes and I am soon left feeling listless, yet with a list of things to do and a hangover. This year's list includes a) teaching myself how to transfer vinyl to my parents' PC, a fairly bearable task that pales into heaven beside task b), teaching my parents how to transfer vinyl to their PC, which may as well be labelled Inevitable Armageddon. Since I haven't yet managed to complete stage a), I've been spared stage b), but still feel like I've let the side down. Countless others complaining about the shit software online won't console my parents, who've been gestating this project excitedly for a long time, desperately keen to ditch the records to create valuable storage space for their burgeoning collection of old bedside lamps, blankets and Eighties skiwear. I had also allocated these days to: writing, learning how to use my sewing machine, practicing my ukulele and clearing out my Gmail inbox - a selection of chores that wouldn't be misery-inducing, except that my parents are constantly boiling, fanning themselves dramatically and opening the back door to encourage a through draft, so today I have been wearing Rudolph socks, fur-lined boots, jeans, a long-sleeved T-shirt, cashmere jumper, scarf, beret and fleece, but have still been freezing since dawn and am unable to do anything except lie around under a blanket and moan gently. I mooted returning to my flat but I think my mother is disappointed. I'd be happy to stay longer except I don't really want to.
Like I say, it's been a strange few days. I love Christmas and on the surface, Winterval 2010 has been splendid, but recent changes within have meant that I'm definitely more aware than I used to be of my solitude - and by that I mean that separateness that exists whether you're with close friends in a crowded room or on your own in an empty flat, a fact that wouldn't be changed by the addition of a boyfriend, twins or a short-haired Dachshund. In the past, I've distracted myself with going out, planning future evenings out, chatting on the phone to people about times I've gone out in the past and times I am planning to go out in the future, writing about going out, fancying boys, or telling myself that I wouldn't be alone forever. Now something massive has shifted and I've accepted that my old denial wasn't getting me anywhere. In some ways, we're all on our own - married with babies or not - and I have to like it or lump it rather than search endlessly for distractions. Such a Copernican shift, intangible though it is, is proving a little tricky. Ideally, I'd learn how to see our psychological isolation as a good thing rather than as ultimate proof that life is a crock. Somehow I have to come to terms with it rather than feeling that I'm being massively negative and buzzkillish - but in this, I don't think I'm alone: I can't imagine that I'm the only person who views the fact of their own psychological solitude with a sense of shame, and the fact of others' with pity. Right now, it seems to me cruel that we are genetically social creatures, and that the furtherance of our species relies on us being physically and emotionally connected at the deepest level, but that, from the moment our existence begins to the moment it ends, we are the only people in our heads and will forever be the only person who lives our life. Hunter S. Thompson had sensible things to say on the subject (below) - I just hope I get there soonish. Maybe Christmas isn't the easiest time to learn:
"We are all alone, born alone, die alone, and - in spite of True Romance magazines - we shall all someday look back on our lives and see that, in spite of our company, we were alone the whole way. I do not say lonely - at least, not all the time - but essentially, and finally, alone. This is what makes your self-respect so important, and I don't see how you can respect yourself if you must look in the hearts and minds of others for your happiness."
My latest attempt to record Side B started crackling wildly so I stopped the recording after forty minutes, only to find that there was no record of it on their PC. I have now given up, something I don't find easy but which must be done in order to preserve the functional state of my parents' laptop - the alternative is putting it on the floor and then repeatedly jumping up and down on it in my Fitflop boots until it admits, out loud, that it is at least six thousand times less user-friendly than a Mac.
Vinyl-ripping aside, I have now reached the long-longed-for stage of Winterval where my duties are over. On Christmas Eve the three of us went to the Albert Hall for a carol concert, where we were joined by two of my parents' friends who I've not met before. Seven people came for lunch on the Day Itself, making ten in total. Then yesterday we went to a pub on the river to meet another (much larger) family and then walked back to their house for lunch. It's all been lovely and festive and fun and there have been many laughs, particularly from my dad's ecstatic and near-constant use of his new Britain's Got Talent judges' buzzer, but there's always a sense of relief when all the socialising is over and you know you can don your jeans and your unflattering jumper and not be polite to anyone for the next hundred hours.
But every year, the euphoria fades after around nine minutes and I am soon left feeling listless, yet with a list of things to do and a hangover. This year's list includes a) teaching myself how to transfer vinyl to my parents' PC, a fairly bearable task that pales into heaven beside task b), teaching my parents how to transfer vinyl to their PC, which may as well be labelled Inevitable Armageddon. Since I haven't yet managed to complete stage a), I've been spared stage b), but still feel like I've let the side down. Countless others complaining about the shit software online won't console my parents, who've been gestating this project excitedly for a long time, desperately keen to ditch the records to create valuable storage space for their burgeoning collection of old bedside lamps, blankets and Eighties skiwear. I had also allocated these days to: writing, learning how to use my sewing machine, practicing my ukulele and clearing out my Gmail inbox - a selection of chores that wouldn't be misery-inducing, except that my parents are constantly boiling, fanning themselves dramatically and opening the back door to encourage a through draft, so today I have been wearing Rudolph socks, fur-lined boots, jeans, a long-sleeved T-shirt, cashmere jumper, scarf, beret and fleece, but have still been freezing since dawn and am unable to do anything except lie around under a blanket and moan gently. I mooted returning to my flat but I think my mother is disappointed. I'd be happy to stay longer except I don't really want to.
Like I say, it's been a strange few days. I love Christmas and on the surface, Winterval 2010 has been splendid, but recent changes within have meant that I'm definitely more aware than I used to be of my solitude - and by that I mean that separateness that exists whether you're with close friends in a crowded room or on your own in an empty flat, a fact that wouldn't be changed by the addition of a boyfriend, twins or a short-haired Dachshund. In the past, I've distracted myself with going out, planning future evenings out, chatting on the phone to people about times I've gone out in the past and times I am planning to go out in the future, writing about going out, fancying boys, or telling myself that I wouldn't be alone forever. Now something massive has shifted and I've accepted that my old denial wasn't getting me anywhere. In some ways, we're all on our own - married with babies or not - and I have to like it or lump it rather than search endlessly for distractions. Such a Copernican shift, intangible though it is, is proving a little tricky. Ideally, I'd learn how to see our psychological isolation as a good thing rather than as ultimate proof that life is a crock. Somehow I have to come to terms with it rather than feeling that I'm being massively negative and buzzkillish - but in this, I don't think I'm alone: I can't imagine that I'm the only person who views the fact of their own psychological solitude with a sense of shame, and the fact of others' with pity. Right now, it seems to me cruel that we are genetically social creatures, and that the furtherance of our species relies on us being physically and emotionally connected at the deepest level, but that, from the moment our existence begins to the moment it ends, we are the only people in our heads and will forever be the only person who lives our life. Hunter S. Thompson had sensible things to say on the subject (below) - I just hope I get there soonish. Maybe Christmas isn't the easiest time to learn:
"We are all alone, born alone, die alone, and - in spite of True Romance magazines - we shall all someday look back on our lives and see that, in spite of our company, we were alone the whole way. I do not say lonely - at least, not all the time - but essentially, and finally, alone. This is what makes your self-respect so important, and I don't see how you can respect yourself if you must look in the hearts and minds of others for your happiness."
Thursday 23 December 2010
Drulog
That is my new name for drunken blogging. Maybe it's already got a name. In which case feel free to tell me what it is.
I have been out for my work Christmas lunch. I was leading in the After Eights Wiggle game, at 18.9 seconds, but then Jackie beat me comfortably and I felt chastened until I remembered it meant she had to wear the Santa hat but it suited her really well anyway so I didn't feel happier for long.
What has been good is that I have been doing a lot of THINKING oh yes, that is obviously what I don't do enough of no but seriously, I have been thinking, because last night I was meant to go out with my ukulele posse, and I got home after work and I sat on the sofa and I was like, OK, I should go, this is the third night in a row that I've had plans, don't cancel these, and then I was like, but you don't HAVE to do anything. No one freaking CARES if you go, don't flatter yourself love. And I realised that something massive had shifted within me, and really, genuinely, I no longer feel like a failure. I do still feel sad about things. But feeling sad and not a failure is a million billion times better than feeling sad and feeling like it is totally your fault. So in some ways I feel way better than I used to. But undeniably I am still not feeling ideal. And I think the thing is, that I used to know what to do, because I had a mantra which was 'Do whatever would be most impressive to the people you want to impress' but now I know that, with the greatest respect, no one actually gives a FLYING FUCK what I do. So when your main motivation is taken away from you, you're left with just doing things because you actually want to do them, which may be, like, second nature to most of you, but for me it's totally new. So I was sitting on my sofa last night, thinking 'What do I actually WANT to do?' And there was a choice between sitting on the sofa, or going to play ukulele with my lovely ukey friends. And I sat there dithering and dithering more. I quite wanted to play festive music and socialise, I thought - but I also didn't want to get fat, and socialising equals boozing and possible mince pies. Plus I was genuinely tired. But for god's sake, Janey, I thought. It's Christmas. Stop being dull. Stand up. So I stood up and I got all dressed up - I put on a saucy black wool dress and high heels and did my make up and got my uke in its case and went and looked in the mirror one last time and thought that maybe I looked fat, and then I told myself off for being a superficial dickhead, and put my coat on, and then I felt tired and I sat on the sofa and then I thought 'God it would be nice to stay here tonight,' and so I did. I took my coat off, switched my fairy lights back on, breathed in a mince pie and stayed at home for the night.
And part of me thinks I was being really boring, but then since NO ONE CARES it doesn't matter, does it. And I think it's just going to take me a while to realise that I don't have to impress anyone ever again and that my existence is justified by the fact that I exist, and that is IT. I don't have to do anything else. I CAN do other things. But I don't HAVE to. It's liberating, honestly. And yes, it is all ridiculous.
I'm getting there, team. Big festive hugs from Me, while wearing velour, from the cushion-filled sofa, with O Come All Ye Faithful playing, written in the glow of fairy lights, knowing that there's a prescription for more drugs waiting for me at the doctor's. Mwah.
I have been out for my work Christmas lunch. I was leading in the After Eights Wiggle game, at 18.9 seconds, but then Jackie beat me comfortably and I felt chastened until I remembered it meant she had to wear the Santa hat but it suited her really well anyway so I didn't feel happier for long.
What has been good is that I have been doing a lot of THINKING oh yes, that is obviously what I don't do enough of no but seriously, I have been thinking, because last night I was meant to go out with my ukulele posse, and I got home after work and I sat on the sofa and I was like, OK, I should go, this is the third night in a row that I've had plans, don't cancel these, and then I was like, but you don't HAVE to do anything. No one freaking CARES if you go, don't flatter yourself love. And I realised that something massive had shifted within me, and really, genuinely, I no longer feel like a failure. I do still feel sad about things. But feeling sad and not a failure is a million billion times better than feeling sad and feeling like it is totally your fault. So in some ways I feel way better than I used to. But undeniably I am still not feeling ideal. And I think the thing is, that I used to know what to do, because I had a mantra which was 'Do whatever would be most impressive to the people you want to impress' but now I know that, with the greatest respect, no one actually gives a FLYING FUCK what I do. So when your main motivation is taken away from you, you're left with just doing things because you actually want to do them, which may be, like, second nature to most of you, but for me it's totally new. So I was sitting on my sofa last night, thinking 'What do I actually WANT to do?' And there was a choice between sitting on the sofa, or going to play ukulele with my lovely ukey friends. And I sat there dithering and dithering more. I quite wanted to play festive music and socialise, I thought - but I also didn't want to get fat, and socialising equals boozing and possible mince pies. Plus I was genuinely tired. But for god's sake, Janey, I thought. It's Christmas. Stop being dull. Stand up. So I stood up and I got all dressed up - I put on a saucy black wool dress and high heels and did my make up and got my uke in its case and went and looked in the mirror one last time and thought that maybe I looked fat, and then I told myself off for being a superficial dickhead, and put my coat on, and then I felt tired and I sat on the sofa and then I thought 'God it would be nice to stay here tonight,' and so I did. I took my coat off, switched my fairy lights back on, breathed in a mince pie and stayed at home for the night.
And part of me thinks I was being really boring, but then since NO ONE CARES it doesn't matter, does it. And I think it's just going to take me a while to realise that I don't have to impress anyone ever again and that my existence is justified by the fact that I exist, and that is IT. I don't have to do anything else. I CAN do other things. But I don't HAVE to. It's liberating, honestly. And yes, it is all ridiculous.
I'm getting there, team. Big festive hugs from Me, while wearing velour, from the cushion-filled sofa, with O Come All Ye Faithful playing, written in the glow of fairy lights, knowing that there's a prescription for more drugs waiting for me at the doctor's. Mwah.
Wednesday 22 December 2010
Doctor's (lack of) orders
So I went to the doctor. He was extremely friendly and understanding, but fell a little short of the 'actually helping' hurdle. There are, he explained, two treatments that are commonly prescribed for PMT. One is the pill. This has two advantages: 1) it can totally help with PMT and 2) you get a free contraceptive thrown in. It it also has two disadvantages: 1) it really might not help with your PMT at all - the only way to find out is to try it and 2) you may well experience some or all of these common side effects - weight gain, mood swings, depression, sore breasts, yadda yadda.
I've been on four pills before. One sent me absolutely insane. One made me gain weight (boo) but my boobs got MASSIVE (yay!). One made me gain weight and my boobs stayed the same size (cack). One was AMAZING but it's so strong that you're only meant to be on it for six months or something, and I've used up my quota. Based on that sample, the doctor said that the chances were that I would get some negative side effects from going back on the pill. Plus, he reminded me, I didn't really need the contraceptive bonus since.... There followed an awkward silence as the implied 'We both know you're not getting any' lingered in the room.
Great, I said. That all makes sense. Going on the pill doesn't seem to be the right solution. So, I asked, what's the other commonly prescribed medication? The doctor turned to me and winced vaguely. 'You're already on it.' Ah. My anti-depressant. OK, so maybe I should put the dose of that up? But I'm already a bit more numb than I used to be. Three weeks of increased numbness vs. one week of less crying per month... I dunnooooo. I am not keen to put up my dose. I don't know why, but I don't want to.
He printed out a printout and handed me the handout. Four pages of my options - take a drug that is quite likely to make me fatter and/or more mental, take more of a drug you're already taking, or try one of these Totally Unscientifically Proven Alternative Therapies: increased calcium, increased magnesium, increased B6, Evening Primrose, Agnus Castus, St. John's Wort. All of these have countless female proponents online saying 'IT'S A MIRACLE! It totally worked!' and just as many saying 'Nope. Still crying. Still want to stab my husband.'
What to do, what to do? I think I'll just carry on as I have been, sitting at home trying not to do anything that might upset me. It's not the most fun way to spend the week before Christmas and I'm certainly getting bored of the view from my sofa, reading about everyone else's fun parties on Twitter, but Chris has already told me off today for putting him down, so I'm clearly still being a miserable bitch and should probably avoid others. If everyone would just promise to do nothing except make me feel like a star, I'd be OK, but annoyingly Real Life doesn't seem to be like that. On the upside, it's a lot easier to stay thin at home than it is in the Outside World full of mince pies and endless booze. See? I'm focusing on the positives! I told you things were improving.
I've been on four pills before. One sent me absolutely insane. One made me gain weight (boo) but my boobs got MASSIVE (yay!). One made me gain weight and my boobs stayed the same size (cack). One was AMAZING but it's so strong that you're only meant to be on it for six months or something, and I've used up my quota. Based on that sample, the doctor said that the chances were that I would get some negative side effects from going back on the pill. Plus, he reminded me, I didn't really need the contraceptive bonus since.... There followed an awkward silence as the implied 'We both know you're not getting any' lingered in the room.Great, I said. That all makes sense. Going on the pill doesn't seem to be the right solution. So, I asked, what's the other commonly prescribed medication? The doctor turned to me and winced vaguely. 'You're already on it.' Ah. My anti-depressant. OK, so maybe I should put the dose of that up? But I'm already a bit more numb than I used to be. Three weeks of increased numbness vs. one week of less crying per month... I dunnooooo. I am not keen to put up my dose. I don't know why, but I don't want to.
He printed out a printout and handed me the handout. Four pages of my options - take a drug that is quite likely to make me fatter and/or more mental, take more of a drug you're already taking, or try one of these Totally Unscientifically Proven Alternative Therapies: increased calcium, increased magnesium, increased B6, Evening Primrose, Agnus Castus, St. John's Wort. All of these have countless female proponents online saying 'IT'S A MIRACLE! It totally worked!' and just as many saying 'Nope. Still crying. Still want to stab my husband.'
What to do, what to do? I think I'll just carry on as I have been, sitting at home trying not to do anything that might upset me. It's not the most fun way to spend the week before Christmas and I'm certainly getting bored of the view from my sofa, reading about everyone else's fun parties on Twitter, but Chris has already told me off today for putting him down, so I'm clearly still being a miserable bitch and should probably avoid others. If everyone would just promise to do nothing except make me feel like a star, I'd be OK, but annoyingly Real Life doesn't seem to be like that. On the upside, it's a lot easier to stay thin at home than it is in the Outside World full of mince pies and endless booze. See? I'm focusing on the positives! I told you things were improving.
Tuesday 21 December 2010
More moans
As the Faithful will know, after someone described LLFF as 'about mental health' I became a bit unsure. I'm happy to be honest about the rubbish that goes on in my noodle, but I didn't really want this blog to be labeled as single-topic when I've tried quite hard to make it fairly broad.
If I'm to be truly open, though, there's another reason I quash the compulsion to share my deepest thoughts. I know deep down that this is utterly absurd but that's hardly a rarity among my observations... and... well, OK, out with it: I worried that some handsome (or bearable) young man could be reading, and that my admitting to being a divider short of a lever arch file might deter him from, one day, tentatively emailing me to ask me on a date. Yes, I know: absurd. I cringe even to admit it. I mean, a) Fictional Bearable Man has four years of LLFF to read back on, so only writing about HILARIOUS antics from now on will hardly cancel out 650 entries of questionably certifiable content. b) In four years, I've only ever had one person get in touch with me flirtatiously as a result of what they've read here, and let's just say that didn't end well. c) I AM MEANT TO BE ON A FREAKING BOYBAN so any worrying about Fictional Bearable Men is absolutely against orders, and should be ceased IMMEDIATELY.
So with all that in mind, here's a description of my mental state over the past few days. You can read about it as long as you allow me to apply the caveat that I really don't think I'm THAT much more mental than anyone else, just fractionally more open about it. Allow me that indulgence, I prithee.
Last Monday I thought I felt the symptoms of PMT. I'm not sure what our problem is, but it seems like, despite menstruating more or less monthly for around two decades, the women I know tend to greet each new period with irritated surprise. You'd have thought we'd know exactly when it was going to happen, but no - the last one finishes and we just bury our heads in the sand and forget about it until the next one creeps up like an unwelcome drunk houseguest and ruins an otherwise perfectly good week. For the record, my PMT symptoms tend to include: body temperature always being wrong; near-constant exhaustion; physical sense of having ingested around ten pints of thick soup or porridge that has oozed through my intestine and is now filling up legs and arms et cetera; a perpetual feeling of foreboding. It is not unbearable, but equally it is not rib-ticklingly good fun. After about five days of this, I become convinced that the PMT is about to end and that good ol' MT should surely be about to begin. But no - I had a fairly over-sensitive weekend feeling anti-social and quiet, and then yesterday, day eight, I metaphorically hit the fan.
It started when Chris came into my office at around 11am for a chat. We nattered harmlessly for a few minutes and then he made some very light-hearted but unarguably derogatory comment about the Welsh, and then the Scots. I told him not to be racist, he (quite sensibly) told me to lighten up, I refused, and he (entirely reasonably) swore at me and stropped off. I sat there wondering what to do. I knew I was being insufferable and deserved to be firmly mocked. Equally, I do think that people should stick to their principles, and that 'harmless' prejudiced jokes between friends, even friends who know the other isn't really racist, aren't ideal. I get miffed when people use 'gay' as a derogatory term too. It's boringly puritanical, but I'd feel really awful if I went the other way. There's loads of ways to slag people off without relying on their nationality or their sexuality. (As an aside, I'm not even sure he was theoretically being racist. I don't think Welsh is a race, is it?) Either way, I didn't like him being prejudiced, but I should have let it go.
So I was a bit upset about that, annoyed at myself for being a dick, but I went off to Boots at lunch and got a few things sorted out, and the nice lady at the Benefit counter gave me 'dramatic eyes' (think Twiggy in the Sixties rather than this) and I went back to the office feeling slightly better. And then I got a phonecall from a very chipper friend, who told me I should be being more positive about something that I was being negative about, and for some reason I was so determined to persuade her that I was right to feel negative about it that I started crying. Fortunately my colleagues weren't in their offices so no one could see me as the decidedly-non-waterproof Benefit products coursed down my cheeks but I still worried that someone might come in and ask me something, so I thought it best to hide. I ducked under my desk and sat there, cross legged and sobbing, for about an hour. Then I got up, not really very sure at all why I had been crying for quite so long, wiped off as much of the sediment as I could, sat back on my posture stool and stared into space for another hour, unable to decide what to do. I didn't want to go to my non-negotiable evening engagement that I'd been excited about for AGES because I felt antisocial and ugly and boring and I knew I'd be expected to be loud and opinionated and hilarious. But I didn't want to go home to an empty flat. And I didn't want to see anyone else because I felt rubbish.
Then I realised that I had presents for two of the people at the non-negotiable evening engagement and I accepted that I had to go, but I couldn't shake off this weird under-confident paralysis. In the end I had to ask Chris to come and get me out of my office, which he did (after he'd emailed me to tell me he wasn't a racist). And he gave me a hug and I cried again and FUCKING HELL his dad is recovering from a stroke but will be paralysed for the rest of his life, and I know Chris must look at me like 'SHUT UP with your insignificant issues' but these freaking hormones are just so powerful - half the time you don't know why you're crying, you just feel so utterly negative and fed up. I wish boys could experience it just once because there is nothing more frustrating about knowing something isn't real but still not being able to ignore it. I imagine it's a bit like having a bad trip. And there's part of me that thinks we should all keep schtum about how it feels, that it's blog entries like these that spread the idea that women are mental and difficult and that boys are straightforward and superior. Perhaps it'd be better for women if people didn't come out and say 'Yes, I'm irrational. Yes, I cry when very little seems wrong. Yes, it sucks to be me sometimes' and instead, for the sake of equality, acted like all the other ladettes and said 'We're just like you but with bigger boobs!' Anyway. It's too late now. I write, therefore I press 'Publish Post'.
I went to the evening engagement for half an hour and handed over the presents. And it was weird - I'd felt so withdrawn, so utterly shy and gross, but then I got there and we were carol singing outside the Southbank Centre, and this crowd had gathered to listen to us, even though it was really flipping cold, and people were filming us on their phones and it was all sounding lovely, and I realised we didn't have a hat down to collect any money, and I put my furry hat down and everyone laughed, and then Christina said we weren't allowed to collect money and she picked up my hat. But what I thought was odd was how, even when I'm feeling utterly awful, I still can't quash my instinct to show off or get attention or put a stamp on things, to walk into the middle of the semi-circle and ask strangers to give us money, when thirty minutes earlier I couldn't even get the strength to re-don my Moon Boots. And I hate that. I wish I'd just be consistent and stay quiet rather than act up like some seal with a compulsion to bark. As soon as the singing had finished and a few people came up to say hello to me, I panicked again and went straight home. I watched the final of The Apprentice, which was long enough to take my mind off things, and then I went to bed.
No tears today but haven't managed to leave the house yet. I dunno. I'm off to the doctor in a minute. It's not remotely life threatening but I'd rather not hang round waiting for this to happen all over again in 28 days. And if the NHS don't have any answers I'm going to have to get me some waterproof mascara. To all the women out there: I love you. To all the men: love your women. We need you.
If I'm to be truly open, though, there's another reason I quash the compulsion to share my deepest thoughts. I know deep down that this is utterly absurd but that's hardly a rarity among my observations... and... well, OK, out with it: I worried that some handsome (or bearable) young man could be reading, and that my admitting to being a divider short of a lever arch file might deter him from, one day, tentatively emailing me to ask me on a date. Yes, I know: absurd. I cringe even to admit it. I mean, a) Fictional Bearable Man has four years of LLFF to read back on, so only writing about HILARIOUS antics from now on will hardly cancel out 650 entries of questionably certifiable content. b) In four years, I've only ever had one person get in touch with me flirtatiously as a result of what they've read here, and let's just say that didn't end well. c) I AM MEANT TO BE ON A FREAKING BOYBAN so any worrying about Fictional Bearable Men is absolutely against orders, and should be ceased IMMEDIATELY.
So with all that in mind, here's a description of my mental state over the past few days. You can read about it as long as you allow me to apply the caveat that I really don't think I'm THAT much more mental than anyone else, just fractionally more open about it. Allow me that indulgence, I prithee.
Last Monday I thought I felt the symptoms of PMT. I'm not sure what our problem is, but it seems like, despite menstruating more or less monthly for around two decades, the women I know tend to greet each new period with irritated surprise. You'd have thought we'd know exactly when it was going to happen, but no - the last one finishes and we just bury our heads in the sand and forget about it until the next one creeps up like an unwelcome drunk houseguest and ruins an otherwise perfectly good week. For the record, my PMT symptoms tend to include: body temperature always being wrong; near-constant exhaustion; physical sense of having ingested around ten pints of thick soup or porridge that has oozed through my intestine and is now filling up legs and arms et cetera; a perpetual feeling of foreboding. It is not unbearable, but equally it is not rib-ticklingly good fun. After about five days of this, I become convinced that the PMT is about to end and that good ol' MT should surely be about to begin. But no - I had a fairly over-sensitive weekend feeling anti-social and quiet, and then yesterday, day eight, I metaphorically hit the fan.
It started when Chris came into my office at around 11am for a chat. We nattered harmlessly for a few minutes and then he made some very light-hearted but unarguably derogatory comment about the Welsh, and then the Scots. I told him not to be racist, he (quite sensibly) told me to lighten up, I refused, and he (entirely reasonably) swore at me and stropped off. I sat there wondering what to do. I knew I was being insufferable and deserved to be firmly mocked. Equally, I do think that people should stick to their principles, and that 'harmless' prejudiced jokes between friends, even friends who know the other isn't really racist, aren't ideal. I get miffed when people use 'gay' as a derogatory term too. It's boringly puritanical, but I'd feel really awful if I went the other way. There's loads of ways to slag people off without relying on their nationality or their sexuality. (As an aside, I'm not even sure he was theoretically being racist. I don't think Welsh is a race, is it?) Either way, I didn't like him being prejudiced, but I should have let it go.
So I was a bit upset about that, annoyed at myself for being a dick, but I went off to Boots at lunch and got a few things sorted out, and the nice lady at the Benefit counter gave me 'dramatic eyes' (think Twiggy in the Sixties rather than this) and I went back to the office feeling slightly better. And then I got a phonecall from a very chipper friend, who told me I should be being more positive about something that I was being negative about, and for some reason I was so determined to persuade her that I was right to feel negative about it that I started crying. Fortunately my colleagues weren't in their offices so no one could see me as the decidedly-non-waterproof Benefit products coursed down my cheeks but I still worried that someone might come in and ask me something, so I thought it best to hide. I ducked under my desk and sat there, cross legged and sobbing, for about an hour. Then I got up, not really very sure at all why I had been crying for quite so long, wiped off as much of the sediment as I could, sat back on my posture stool and stared into space for another hour, unable to decide what to do. I didn't want to go to my non-negotiable evening engagement that I'd been excited about for AGES because I felt antisocial and ugly and boring and I knew I'd be expected to be loud and opinionated and hilarious. But I didn't want to go home to an empty flat. And I didn't want to see anyone else because I felt rubbish.
Then I realised that I had presents for two of the people at the non-negotiable evening engagement and I accepted that I had to go, but I couldn't shake off this weird under-confident paralysis. In the end I had to ask Chris to come and get me out of my office, which he did (after he'd emailed me to tell me he wasn't a racist). And he gave me a hug and I cried again and FUCKING HELL his dad is recovering from a stroke but will be paralysed for the rest of his life, and I know Chris must look at me like 'SHUT UP with your insignificant issues' but these freaking hormones are just so powerful - half the time you don't know why you're crying, you just feel so utterly negative and fed up. I wish boys could experience it just once because there is nothing more frustrating about knowing something isn't real but still not being able to ignore it. I imagine it's a bit like having a bad trip. And there's part of me that thinks we should all keep schtum about how it feels, that it's blog entries like these that spread the idea that women are mental and difficult and that boys are straightforward and superior. Perhaps it'd be better for women if people didn't come out and say 'Yes, I'm irrational. Yes, I cry when very little seems wrong. Yes, it sucks to be me sometimes' and instead, for the sake of equality, acted like all the other ladettes and said 'We're just like you but with bigger boobs!' Anyway. It's too late now. I write, therefore I press 'Publish Post'.
I went to the evening engagement for half an hour and handed over the presents. And it was weird - I'd felt so withdrawn, so utterly shy and gross, but then I got there and we were carol singing outside the Southbank Centre, and this crowd had gathered to listen to us, even though it was really flipping cold, and people were filming us on their phones and it was all sounding lovely, and I realised we didn't have a hat down to collect any money, and I put my furry hat down and everyone laughed, and then Christina said we weren't allowed to collect money and she picked up my hat. But what I thought was odd was how, even when I'm feeling utterly awful, I still can't quash my instinct to show off or get attention or put a stamp on things, to walk into the middle of the semi-circle and ask strangers to give us money, when thirty minutes earlier I couldn't even get the strength to re-don my Moon Boots. And I hate that. I wish I'd just be consistent and stay quiet rather than act up like some seal with a compulsion to bark. As soon as the singing had finished and a few people came up to say hello to me, I panicked again and went straight home. I watched the final of The Apprentice, which was long enough to take my mind off things, and then I went to bed.
No tears today but haven't managed to leave the house yet. I dunno. I'm off to the doctor in a minute. It's not remotely life threatening but I'd rather not hang round waiting for this to happen all over again in 28 days. And if the NHS don't have any answers I'm going to have to get me some waterproof mascara. To all the women out there: I love you. To all the men: love your women. We need you.
Sunday 19 December 2010
Friday 17 December 2010
Gagantuan
It's been several years since I walked into a packed concert arena. I'm older now, and possibly wiser, but the impact of the screams, the heat of the humans and the headiness of the adrenaline is still arresting. Breathless and flushed from dancing about like loons in a weird greenscreened white pod for the O2 promotional video we'd just recorded of ourselves in the foyer, Grania and I took our seats and fumbled about trying to fit our plastic cups full of wine and back-up tiny bottles of more wine into our limited cup holders. The fifty year old man on Grania's left was bursting to talk to us.
"Have you seen her before?" he asked. We shook our heads.
"I saw this tour in Birmingham," he said. "You're not going to believe it. It's amazing."
"Are you her biggest fan?" I asked.
"No but I love her. Two of her dancers follow me on Twitter."
Grania shuffled imperceptibly closer to me. The lights went down. The volume of the screams made my ears do that weird vibrating thing that I think is probably not good. A screen came down. Lights went on it. In more than a nod to MJ, Gaga was silhouetted and massive. And so it began.
"Have you seen her before?" he asked. We shook our heads.
"I saw this tour in Birmingham," he said. "You're not going to believe it. It's amazing."
"Are you her biggest fan?" I asked.
"No but I love her. Two of her dancers follow me on Twitter."
Grania shuffled imperceptibly closer to me. The lights went down. The volume of the screams made my ears do that weird vibrating thing that I think is probably not good. A screen came down. Lights went on it. In more than a nod to MJ, Gaga was silhouetted and massive. And so it began.
I've seen some good performances in my time: Michael Jackson, Madonna, Prince, Elton John, the Stones, The Prodigy, Justin Timberlake, Eminem, U2, Blur, Rufus Wainwright - like 'em or not, they all know how to put on a show. At 24 years old, Gaga has comfortably taken her place among those seasoned pros. She is one of those unbearable people who manages to be clever, funny, innovative, self-aware, courageous, talented and really good at dancing without making you want to maim them. Anyone else with that many amazing irons in life's fire and I'd be dreaming up graphic ways of shoving them off their pedestal for good, but with Gaga, I'm fine for her to stay up there and preen. She's a real one-off and not only did her show fill me with admiration, it also made me think that anyone with a passing interest in current culture should go see her live.
She's fucking weird, there's no doubt about that. Throughout the night, she wore a selection of extraordinary outfits - shoebox-sized shoulder pads, a Where The Wild Things Are-inspired costume that made her look like a big tree trunk, a futuristic silicone dress with white pants and plasters on her nips, a glitter catsuit for Poker Face, a black cleavage-revealing bodice which she accentuated with liberal smearings of fake blood, a little girl green frilly number that clashed brilliantly with her American mustard-coloured hair, all vulnerable on the big black stage while the Fame Monster roared and gurned in the background. Gaga is gaga for monsters. Her fans are Little Monsters, and they're encouraged to be as invidual and extraordinary as possible. "Do not, for God's sake, leave here loving me more," she panted. "Leave here loving YOURSELVES more." She has a fairly scary shouting voice, hints of Miss Hannigan. Her fans screamed on demand. "I'm like Tinkerbell," she cooed later, lying back on the stage. "If you don't clap, I'll die. Do you want me TO DIE?" We clapped.
Her self confidence is infectious. It's impossible feel vulnerable when one of the most famous women on the planet is standing in front of you and twenty thousand others, wearing a black leather studded bikini and strutting around stage, happy to let her thighs and buttocks wobble in full view of everyone, her arid hair tangled around her microphone. It'd be inevitable if a fair amount of what she says on stage is scripted, but there's no doubt that she makes an impact - even if her truisms do seem heart-threateningly cheesy in the stark winter light of Friday. "I didn't used to be brave. I didn't used to be this way. I used to be a geek," she said. "But your support has made me brave. You make me brave." We screamed.
Much of her act is spontaneous, though. Every time she ventured down onto the catwalk extension in front of the main stage, she was showered with gifts from her most loyal Little Monsters, and she took a generous amount of time to notice each item and appreciate it. "Does this say 'Born This Way'?" she asked, picking up a desperately proferred T-shirt. Without hesitation or concern for her stage outfit, she pulled it on over her leotard and performed the next section of the show wearing the cropped vest. Can't see Cheryl Cole doing that. Another person gave her a Penguin Classics edition of Warhol's diaries. "Oh, you've highlighted!" she said, charmed. She flicked through the pages briefly and read aloud to us from a passage about beauty:
"When you're in Sweden and you see beautiful person after beautiful person after beautiful person and you finally don't even turn around to look because you know the next person you see will be just as beautiful as the one you didn't bother to turn around to look at — in a place like that you can get so bored that when you see a person who's not beautiful, they look very beautiful to you because they break the beautiful monotony."
Then she nattered about the beauty that comes from variety for a minute or so, not lecturing us, not sounding patronising or naive, just being honest and confident and aware of her position of power and determined to use it for all our benefits. A plush Santa toy landed at her feet. "I do love Christmas," she said, "but for those of you who are lonely or angry, this is for you." She tried to rip off his head with her teeth but St. Nick clung on, until she impaled him with the stiletto heel of her white patent ankle boot, tore him apart and plucked out his kapok.
The only irritant of the evening came from two rows behind us, where there was a ledge surrounded by a barricade. One of the girls on the ledge was making an extraordinary amount of noise, mostly in the "Wooooooooo! I LOVE YOU GAGA!" genre, constantly during the 'Please cheer now' sections and, more vexingly, fairly regularly in the 'Please don't cheer here, she's talking and we want to hear what she's saying' moments. She also sang along, fairly tunelessly but word perfectly, throughout every song, which was fine when it was a deafening upbeat hit but slightly more annoying when it was fully audible over the one slow number, Speechless. "Shut up!" yelled someone further down our row, to no effect. I turned around to see who was making this noise. There was a definite possibility that the ledge area was reserved for wheelchair users but it was hard to see in the dark. "Is she disabled?" I asked Grania. "WOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" shouted the girl. "I don't know," said Grania, who turned around and tried to climb over the row behind to take a closer look but ended up almost kissing the man behind her and returned, shocked. "I LOVE YOUUUUUUUU!" wailed the girl. "There's no excuse for this level of noise," I said. "Not even muscular dystrophy." I turned and said, "Please can you shut up?" Another man joined in, "Yeah! I paid for tickets to hear Lady Gaga, not you." The reaction was not ideal: the girl's companion was guppying, gobsmacked in a my-friend-is-disabled-I-cannot-belive-you're-saying-this fashion, but thankfully the volume from their quarters diminished before a very un-PC fight broke out.
That decidedly unbeautiful moment kindly broke up the monotony of the rest of the evening's perfection, so for that I'm grateful. As soon as Bad Romance faded away, we wished the fifty year old uberfan farewell, bought our commemorative T-shirts and ran back to North Greenwich pier to get the final westbound Thames Clipper back to Waterloo. Freezing, we stood on the outside deck giggling and taking thousands of terribly blurred photos. Then we hugged lots and went our separate ways. Music doesn't make the world go round, but love is all you need.
Thursday 16 December 2010
Pretty complicated
Well, this complimenting-pretty-people thing is certainly interesting, in that most people think I am indeed insane, and that pretty people do still get told they're pretty, and that being told you're pretty is not some perverse code for 'You aren't that pretty.' I guess what it comes down to is that some of my friends get approached by guys in bars left, right and centre and I never do. I just assumed that it was because they were much prettier than me. Maybe it's more complex than that and that instead of worrying about my appearance, I should worry about the fact that my face says, 'I will eat you for breakfast. STAY AWAY.' Anyway. Food for thought. Unless you want to be thin, in which case don't eat it.
I went out with Grania last night to watch some comedy including the v. clever Abandoman, an Irish hip hop improviser, very impressive. There were four other acts too, some excruciating, a couple fairly funny, but no one made us laugh even an eighth as much as we did after they'd all finished and were clearing away the chairs, when we suddenly started reminiscing about Lapland and went through the runaway reindeer incident in graphic detail. I'm not sure I'll ever be able to stop laughing at the sight of the shockingly empty sled behind us, no sign of the Germans, the blankets, the expensive camera bags, just a bare slab of Scandinavian plywood. Categorically the funniest moment of 2010, possibly ever.
Tonight it's Lady Gaga at the O2 - can't wait. Have donned my festive meat bikini in her honour, trimmed with tinsel. I'll send you a photo.
I went out with Grania last night to watch some comedy including the v. clever Abandoman, an Irish hip hop improviser, very impressive. There were four other acts too, some excruciating, a couple fairly funny, but no one made us laugh even an eighth as much as we did after they'd all finished and were clearing away the chairs, when we suddenly started reminiscing about Lapland and went through the runaway reindeer incident in graphic detail. I'm not sure I'll ever be able to stop laughing at the sight of the shockingly empty sled behind us, no sign of the Germans, the blankets, the expensive camera bags, just a bare slab of Scandinavian plywood. Categorically the funniest moment of 2010, possibly ever.
Tonight it's Lady Gaga at the O2 - can't wait. Have donned my festive meat bikini in her honour, trimmed with tinsel. I'll send you a photo.
Wednesday 15 December 2010
No alibi
So I've been doing a lot of thinking about my appearance recently. It has emerged that there are deep down feelings of self-loathing that I never really noticed before, and that despite some evidence to the contrary, I believe in my core that I am physically well below average. We can discuss whether or not that is accurate in more depth at a later point, but what I wanted to address today was the following: I have just realised that I believe that empirically attractive people never receive compliments on their appearance, as it goes without saying that they look good, and thus the only people who receive compliments are those who are usually not quite up to scratch but have managed to pull something out of the bag at the last minute. This means that when someone compliments me, I do not hear, "You look fantastic, Jane," but rather, "You look better than you do normally. It's still not great but well done for trying." Basically, if someone compliments me on my looks, I take it as an insult or a pity vote as, if I was genuinely pretty, they wouldn't bother pointing it out, so obvious would it be. How fucked up is that?
Shit. Maybe it's not fucked up. Is it fucked up? Do you compliment your very pretty friends on their appearance? Or only the ones who look like they need a confidence boost?
Shit. Maybe it's not fucked up. Is it fucked up? Do you compliment your very pretty friends on their appearance? Or only the ones who look like they need a confidence boost?
Tuesday 14 December 2010
Six lessons and carols
Gosh it's been a long time since I wrote anything approaching a 'normal' blog entry, where 'normal' = general recap of the life I've been living outside my head, unburdened by mammoth discussions concerning my very mental state. Maybe it's time for a brief summary of things I've done and things I've learned as a consequence, NOT that everything in life has to be justified by also being a learning experience but that's a habit it'll take a while to shake.
So last Monday I had a top-up laser appointment at 5.30pm, which isn't nearly as exciting as it might appear to my male readers, although it does involve me lying nearly naked on a bed while another woman points a gun-shaped item at my nether regions while I writhe and moan, but honestly, it's not remotely sexual, I swear. I did learn that laser, pure laser, is much better than the stuff I used to have, which is called IPL (unknown TLA). IPL involves ultrasound gel and you come out all red and blotchy plus your skin is left all tacky from the gel, and it hurts like nothing I've ever experienced. Pure laser involves no gel and almost painless. Why would any salon buy an IPL machine when they could have a laser machine? Because one costs £15k and the other costs £55k. So that's fairly conclusive.
Then I went to choir and against my better judgment we went to the pub and I got home late. On Tuesday I met Em and we did a quick bit of shopping and then went for a drink and I battled with what to have in order to maintain my current dieting status (lesson: M&S nut snack pot should be illegal, and certainly marketing it as a healthy item is in violation of several trades descriptions acts, unless eating a handful of nuts and consuming approximately the same amount of calories as there are in a McDonald's Happy Meal is healthy), and then we went to Georgie's for the Christmas session of our book club, where we laughed a lot and played a hideous version of Secret Santa where the first person picks from the pile of presents and opens one, then the second person can either steal that one or pick another at random from the pile. Then the third person can steal either of the first two's, and so on. It's about as brutal as gift giving gets - particularly if some people are happy to steal while others feel uncomfortable with the concept. I came away with lovely white wool bedsocks from Accessorise: they weren't quite a white porcelain dish with rabbit figurine from Anthropologie, but could definitely have been worse. (Lesson: Prisoners' Dilemma - play hardball).
Then on Wednesday I went out with Grania for a catch up and we celebrated the fact that she is a brainbox and passed her fiendishly difficult exams, while many of her peers did not. (Lesson: she is cleverer than she thinks). Thursday we had a choir concert and I had too much to drink and took a duvet day on Friday, which I spent lying around until the afternoon when I got up and got ready for my ukulele Christmas party, an evening which began fairly sedately, continued at a noisy pub down the road until 12ish, then moved to a dive bar until 3 or 4ish, then moved via Boris Bike back home, holding hands as we cycled along in the bus lane, and ended up passed out, fully clothed, in bed after too much vodka. (Lesson: alcohol is amazingly fun but not in the long run. Actually, that can hardly be called a new lesson. What did I really learn...? I can stay up later if I drink spirits rather than wine. Useful.)
Saturday was a write-off - I was too tired even to watch The X Factor final, fell asleep on the sofa, failed to make soup and got a bit cross with myself for being unproductive. Sunday dawned clear and bright: I made the soup, tidied bits of the flat and was all ready to leave on time for the 3pm rehearsal when I applied my make up a little too enthusiastically and knocked my nearly-new glass bottle of foundation all over my black bathroom tiled floor, where it shattered dramatically, splattering its contents all over the floor, the side of the bath, the side of the sink, my brown suede boot, my tights, my dress, the shower curtain and the bin. Predicting that I might well return home, after the concert, slightly under the influence and perhaps needing to relieve myself as a matter of relative urgency, I thought that leaving my bathroom floor covered with shards of thick glass and Estee Lauder Double Wear was probably not the best idea. I thus hurried to pick up all the fragments I could see and then tried to mop up the foundation. It was not a success. In a crazed rush, I sprayed ready-mixed Tesco mopping solution all over the floor and went off to the concert, desperately hoping that my floor wasn't porous and that I wouldn't return to a streaky beige tile effect in the centre of my bathroom. (Lesson: haste makes absurdly inconvenient, expensive, tardiness-inducing waste.)
The concert went well, I felt truly supported by my wonderful family and friends, read my poem and a handsome hipster composer asked to collaborate with me in the new year. We all went to the pub, I ate mince pies, drank white wine and felt a lot of love. After closing time I took the bus home, found dried foundation all over my floor, pine-scented cleaning solution nowhere to be seen, either absorbed or evaporated, and realised something would have to be done before I could wee. I spent the thirty minutes around midnight in my stilletos and one-shoulder black dress, mopping hard with only partial success. Stupid stuff wears off my face after about six seconds in a gentle breeze but can you wipe it off tiles after a night on them? I certainly can't.
Em came over last night for dinner, we looked at photos and discussed ill-advised flirtations. Now I'm exhausted with 100 things to do at home, presents to wrap, admin to sort out, baths to clean, last week's Apprentice to watch, and I'm out the next two nights so I really should get an early one tonight, and what about my bank balance?, but what I'd really like is to get up the energy to go and see Pete's band play in Hoxton as I know it'd be a lovely festive evening. Muster muster muster. Droop. Snore.
So last Monday I had a top-up laser appointment at 5.30pm, which isn't nearly as exciting as it might appear to my male readers, although it does involve me lying nearly naked on a bed while another woman points a gun-shaped item at my nether regions while I writhe and moan, but honestly, it's not remotely sexual, I swear. I did learn that laser, pure laser, is much better than the stuff I used to have, which is called IPL (unknown TLA). IPL involves ultrasound gel and you come out all red and blotchy plus your skin is left all tacky from the gel, and it hurts like nothing I've ever experienced. Pure laser involves no gel and almost painless. Why would any salon buy an IPL machine when they could have a laser machine? Because one costs £15k and the other costs £55k. So that's fairly conclusive.
Then I went to choir and against my better judgment we went to the pub and I got home late. On Tuesday I met Em and we did a quick bit of shopping and then went for a drink and I battled with what to have in order to maintain my current dieting status (lesson: M&S nut snack pot should be illegal, and certainly marketing it as a healthy item is in violation of several trades descriptions acts, unless eating a handful of nuts and consuming approximately the same amount of calories as there are in a McDonald's Happy Meal is healthy), and then we went to Georgie's for the Christmas session of our book club, where we laughed a lot and played a hideous version of Secret Santa where the first person picks from the pile of presents and opens one, then the second person can either steal that one or pick another at random from the pile. Then the third person can steal either of the first two's, and so on. It's about as brutal as gift giving gets - particularly if some people are happy to steal while others feel uncomfortable with the concept. I came away with lovely white wool bedsocks from Accessorise: they weren't quite a white porcelain dish with rabbit figurine from Anthropologie, but could definitely have been worse. (Lesson: Prisoners' Dilemma - play hardball).
Then on Wednesday I went out with Grania for a catch up and we celebrated the fact that she is a brainbox and passed her fiendishly difficult exams, while many of her peers did not. (Lesson: she is cleverer than she thinks). Thursday we had a choir concert and I had too much to drink and took a duvet day on Friday, which I spent lying around until the afternoon when I got up and got ready for my ukulele Christmas party, an evening which began fairly sedately, continued at a noisy pub down the road until 12ish, then moved to a dive bar until 3 or 4ish, then moved via Boris Bike back home, holding hands as we cycled along in the bus lane, and ended up passed out, fully clothed, in bed after too much vodka. (Lesson: alcohol is amazingly fun but not in the long run. Actually, that can hardly be called a new lesson. What did I really learn...? I can stay up later if I drink spirits rather than wine. Useful.)
Saturday was a write-off - I was too tired even to watch The X Factor final, fell asleep on the sofa, failed to make soup and got a bit cross with myself for being unproductive. Sunday dawned clear and bright: I made the soup, tidied bits of the flat and was all ready to leave on time for the 3pm rehearsal when I applied my make up a little too enthusiastically and knocked my nearly-new glass bottle of foundation all over my black bathroom tiled floor, where it shattered dramatically, splattering its contents all over the floor, the side of the bath, the side of the sink, my brown suede boot, my tights, my dress, the shower curtain and the bin. Predicting that I might well return home, after the concert, slightly under the influence and perhaps needing to relieve myself as a matter of relative urgency, I thought that leaving my bathroom floor covered with shards of thick glass and Estee Lauder Double Wear was probably not the best idea. I thus hurried to pick up all the fragments I could see and then tried to mop up the foundation. It was not a success. In a crazed rush, I sprayed ready-mixed Tesco mopping solution all over the floor and went off to the concert, desperately hoping that my floor wasn't porous and that I wouldn't return to a streaky beige tile effect in the centre of my bathroom. (Lesson: haste makes absurdly inconvenient, expensive, tardiness-inducing waste.)
The concert went well, I felt truly supported by my wonderful family and friends, read my poem and a handsome hipster composer asked to collaborate with me in the new year. We all went to the pub, I ate mince pies, drank white wine and felt a lot of love. After closing time I took the bus home, found dried foundation all over my floor, pine-scented cleaning solution nowhere to be seen, either absorbed or evaporated, and realised something would have to be done before I could wee. I spent the thirty minutes around midnight in my stilletos and one-shoulder black dress, mopping hard with only partial success. Stupid stuff wears off my face after about six seconds in a gentle breeze but can you wipe it off tiles after a night on them? I certainly can't.
Em came over last night for dinner, we looked at photos and discussed ill-advised flirtations. Now I'm exhausted with 100 things to do at home, presents to wrap, admin to sort out, baths to clean, last week's Apprentice to watch, and I'm out the next two nights so I really should get an early one tonight, and what about my bank balance?, but what I'd really like is to get up the energy to go and see Pete's band play in Hoxton as I know it'd be a lovely festive evening. Muster muster muster. Droop. Snore.
Monday 13 December 2010
More Than Gifts - A New Festive Poem for 2010
It’s not just about presents, the grown-ups all warn,
Christmas is when Baby Jesus was born.
Stop asking for chocolate and gifts and guitars,
Your consumption alone is bankrolling Mars.
He’s the number one man in the Christian religion
He died for our sins – do you not care a smidgen?
Can you not at least try to pretend that you care
About the birth of the man who gave us the Lord’s prayer?
You’re taking the tests for St. Osmund’s next year
They won’t let you in if you’re this cavalier.
It’s not just about presents, I’ve said it before.
Hey – open your eyes, stop pretending to snore.
You lot are so spoilt, I cannot believe
All the stuff you think Santa will bring, Christmas Eve.
When I was your age we were grateful for coal,
A satsuma was plenty to nourish our soul;
But now a small trinket’s a Nintendo DS,
A Dickens book? Whatevs, it sounds like BS.
If Santa gives me what I want right this minute,
I swear I’ll be good, I won’t punch no-one, innit.
It’s not just about presents. I know, I’m too serious
But this consumerist hell always sends me delirious.
Just try to enjoy how the log fire roars –
No, you can’t open more advent calendar doors.
There are sixteen more days of the countdown remaining
So why are there only three doors still containing
The chocolates within? Have you scoffed them already?
I don’t care if that one was shaped like a teddy.
Oh stop stropping, will you, and wipe off those scowls
Or I’ll give you all haircuts just like Simon Cowell’s.
It’s not just about presents, nor Christmas TV –
Even though there’s no doubt that when seen in HD
EastEnders has managed to get yet more gritty –
The spots on the X Factor singers aren’t pretty,
And aren’t there more worthwhile things to be done
Than finding out who on Come Dine With Me won?
Give your mother a hug, write an old friend a letter,
Pray for world peace or pat a red setter.
These carols are gorgeous, and their meaning’s momentous
Why must all hell break loose if we miss The Apprentice?
It’s not just about presents. There’s much so more meaning –
We make up for lost time from the months intervening.
We don’t always show that we love one another
Thus this is the time when we totally smother
Our families and friends with affection and thanks.
It shouldn’t necessitate phonecalls to banks
To negotiate loans that we cannot afford
So we don’t look like Scrooge when they open their hoard.
But who am I kidding? We live a capitalist existence
And to change that machine, well, I’ll need some assistance.
But it’s not just about presents – and we all must remember
That Jesus was born on the 25th of December
And whether he is mankind’s Saviour or not
We still should give thanks for the good stuff we’ve got.
I don’t mean new jumpers or gloves made of pigskin
I mean for the fact that we breathe out and breathe in.
For the fact that we have a roof over our head
For the fact we have friends, for our daily bread.
For the fact you can hear my words – though they’re quite trite
At least your ears work and that’s pretty cool, right?
So give presents, OK – wrap them up good and proper,
And act thrilled when you’re given a new mattress topper
Instead of the watch you’d been loudly admiring
Or the green Mini Cooper you’d dreamed of acquiring.
But set aside some time each day just to sit,
Breathe out, then breathe in, then be thankful for it.
All that said, I’ll admit that it’s one rule for you
And another for me – I want so much it’s untrue.
My list is extensive and I can’t tell a lie:
If I don’t get the lot I will definitely cry.
Christmas is when Baby Jesus was born.
Stop asking for chocolate and gifts and guitars,
Your consumption alone is bankrolling Mars.
He’s the number one man in the Christian religion
He died for our sins – do you not care a smidgen?
Can you not at least try to pretend that you care
About the birth of the man who gave us the Lord’s prayer?
You’re taking the tests for St. Osmund’s next year
They won’t let you in if you’re this cavalier.
It’s not just about presents, I’ve said it before.
Hey – open your eyes, stop pretending to snore.
You lot are so spoilt, I cannot believe
All the stuff you think Santa will bring, Christmas Eve.
When I was your age we were grateful for coal,
A satsuma was plenty to nourish our soul;
But now a small trinket’s a Nintendo DS,
A Dickens book? Whatevs, it sounds like BS.
If Santa gives me what I want right this minute,
I swear I’ll be good, I won’t punch no-one, innit.
It’s not just about presents. I know, I’m too serious
But this consumerist hell always sends me delirious.
Just try to enjoy how the log fire roars –
No, you can’t open more advent calendar doors.
There are sixteen more days of the countdown remaining
So why are there only three doors still containing
The chocolates within? Have you scoffed them already?
I don’t care if that one was shaped like a teddy.
Oh stop stropping, will you, and wipe off those scowls
Or I’ll give you all haircuts just like Simon Cowell’s.
It’s not just about presents, nor Christmas TV –
Even though there’s no doubt that when seen in HD
EastEnders has managed to get yet more gritty –
The spots on the X Factor singers aren’t pretty,
And aren’t there more worthwhile things to be done
Than finding out who on Come Dine With Me won?
Give your mother a hug, write an old friend a letter,
Pray for world peace or pat a red setter.
These carols are gorgeous, and their meaning’s momentous
Why must all hell break loose if we miss The Apprentice?
It’s not just about presents. There’s much so more meaning –
We make up for lost time from the months intervening.
We don’t always show that we love one another
Thus this is the time when we totally smother
Our families and friends with affection and thanks.
It shouldn’t necessitate phonecalls to banks
To negotiate loans that we cannot afford
So we don’t look like Scrooge when they open their hoard.
But who am I kidding? We live a capitalist existence
And to change that machine, well, I’ll need some assistance.
But it’s not just about presents – and we all must remember
That Jesus was born on the 25th of December
And whether he is mankind’s Saviour or not
We still should give thanks for the good stuff we’ve got.
I don’t mean new jumpers or gloves made of pigskin
I mean for the fact that we breathe out and breathe in.
For the fact that we have a roof over our head
For the fact we have friends, for our daily bread.
For the fact you can hear my words – though they’re quite trite
At least your ears work and that’s pretty cool, right?
So give presents, OK – wrap them up good and proper,
And act thrilled when you’re given a new mattress topper
Instead of the watch you’d been loudly admiring
Or the green Mini Cooper you’d dreamed of acquiring.
But set aside some time each day just to sit,
Breathe out, then breathe in, then be thankful for it.
All that said, I’ll admit that it’s one rule for you
And another for me – I want so much it’s untrue.
My list is extensive and I can’t tell a lie:
If I don’t get the lot I will definitely cry.
Monday 6 December 2010
Version
Both these accounts of my weekend are 100% accurate.
Version 1:
"I hosted a party on Friday in Brixton. Lots of lovely friends came, including a few people I'd not seen for ages. I've lost a bit of weight recently and wore one of my favourite dresses and one girl said I should apply to join the Playboy Mansion, which I think she meant as a compliment. The music was fantastic, people mingled and I am pretty positive that everyone present had a good time. I got home late and went to bed. When I woke up on Saturday morning, I had no plans but Sarah suggested I join her and a couple of others to go for a pub lunch in Westbourne Park, followed by a trip to some studios nearby that were holding a Christmas market. She also invited me to go to a classical concert that night. I went for a run, did yoga, had a bath and then set out to join them for lunch, noticing while sorting out my bag that I had spent a whopping £9 the previous night - £7.50 on a pizza and £1.50 on a cranberry juice. Not bad given that I drank Prosecco pretty much solidly for six hours. Clearly my lovely friends had been very generous with the hostess beverages. At The Enterprise, I had delicious bangers and mash and felt very festive. Her friends were lovely and we laughed a lot. Then we went to the market, and I bought a gorgeous drawing for my flat that I know I will have for the rest of my life. Midway through the afternoon, my friend Fi texted and said she had a spare ticket for a musical in which my friends Anna and David were performing, and did I want to come? I was pleased to be asked, and felt like I should support Anna, so I said yes. An hour later another girlfriend invited me to dinner at her house but I'd already committed to Fi so I turned it down. Felt briefly popular. Fi and I had a lovely drink in Bourne & Hollingsworth, met the others, watched the (brilliant) show, which was based on Diary of a Nobody and was hilarious. Then we had a drink or two with the cast and I went home. On Sunday I did some writing and some laundry, ate nice food, lay around, watched the X Factor and went to bed."
Version 2:
"I had a party on Friday night. As I have decided will be my epitaph, it was "Nothing like I expected but still quite fun." The venue had reserved me a large area with sofas and big, heavy, Henry VIII style tables. A few of us sat round the head of one of the tables, chatting and waiting for the other guests. One girl came in, saw a notice on an empty table saying "Reserved for Jane", scrumpled it up and threw it on the floor. I took some pleasure in telling her that I was Jane and that she was welcome to sit there until we needed the table later on. But I still felt a bit discombobulated. Most of the early arrivals were my school friends and their associated men. They all know each other and joined us at the big table. By 9pm, others filtered in, but there was nowhere for them to sit and I didn't know if I wanted to make a scene by chucking off a group of eight strangers from the other reserved table so that two of us could sit down. I decided to leave it. Eventually, all my newer friends were standing squashed by the radiators mingling away, and my school friends were having a nice catch up with their old friends around the massive wood table. Mixing the two groups would have been contrived and unwelcome, so I decided to stay with the new friends since the old ones all knew each other. And then, suddenly, just as the music was hotting up, everyone came over to say goodbye, and by 1am, it was over. I hadn't danced a step. I went home feeling a bit flat, reassuring myself that parties aren't for the host's enjoyment, but couldn't stop focussing on the fact that one of my favourite people hadn't been able to attend as she had been in Rome on a third date. Yep. A third date. In Rome. The boyban's going well, but even I will happily admit that I was pretty darn jealous of that one. On the walk back from the nightbus to my flat, I slipped on the ice and banged my elbow really hard.
On Saturday I woke up feeling post-party-anti-climaxy. I then went for a run but pulled a muscle in my leg so badly after 20 minutes that I had to hobble home feeling really self-conscious that people would look at me and think I was really unfit because I was injured. Piled on the pounds with fattening lunch in a gastropub and then haemorrhaged my savings on a drawing that I love but that everyone else will think is a complete rip-off. Felt like a bit of a dick but the girl who'd done the drawing was so lovely and I didn't feel like I could change my mind and back out. I do really like it but I could have bought a flight to somewhere hot for that money. I don't know what came over me. I think it was the shopping equivalent of comfort eating. Silly, silly girl. Then Ses and I had a cup of tea in another pub and we started talking about online dating, and I realised that I am still a long way off being ready to face rejection, and that unless you are prepared to be rejected, you shouldn't sign up to online dating. So I'm single, a bit lonely, and yet can't do the one thing that could possibly change that: go on a date. Which sucketh somewhat. Then I went out for a lovely evening as Fi's afterthought because her husband couldn't come, and we sat with Ed and his boyfriend and David and his wife, and then afterwards talked to Anna about her husband. I was pleased to have been asked to the show, and to the dinner that I'd had to turn down, but I was clearly a last-minute choice. And I felt blue. :(
Yesterday I did nothing of any significance. I was invited (as an afterthought but still pleased to be asked) to play football in the afternoon but I couldn't because my leg was still hurting so much that I could barely walk, let alone run. Despite having the heating on all day, my feet never warmed up. My phone didn't ring until the aforementioned lovebird returned from Rome and called me. I did my best to be loving and supportive and excited and then hung up the phone and failed to sleep. This morning was unfun."
Guess which version gets stuck in my head? I've long been aware that life is just a game of selective editing - we all have many stories we can tell about ourselves. I can easily put on a brave face and project a positive narrative to the outside world if I have to, but the Jackanory going on in my head isn't quite so much fun. Shut up, SHUT UP, internal Jackanory!
And she all lived happily ever after.
Version 1:
"I hosted a party on Friday in Brixton. Lots of lovely friends came, including a few people I'd not seen for ages. I've lost a bit of weight recently and wore one of my favourite dresses and one girl said I should apply to join the Playboy Mansion, which I think she meant as a compliment. The music was fantastic, people mingled and I am pretty positive that everyone present had a good time. I got home late and went to bed. When I woke up on Saturday morning, I had no plans but Sarah suggested I join her and a couple of others to go for a pub lunch in Westbourne Park, followed by a trip to some studios nearby that were holding a Christmas market. She also invited me to go to a classical concert that night. I went for a run, did yoga, had a bath and then set out to join them for lunch, noticing while sorting out my bag that I had spent a whopping £9 the previous night - £7.50 on a pizza and £1.50 on a cranberry juice. Not bad given that I drank Prosecco pretty much solidly for six hours. Clearly my lovely friends had been very generous with the hostess beverages. At The Enterprise, I had delicious bangers and mash and felt very festive. Her friends were lovely and we laughed a lot. Then we went to the market, and I bought a gorgeous drawing for my flat that I know I will have for the rest of my life. Midway through the afternoon, my friend Fi texted and said she had a spare ticket for a musical in which my friends Anna and David were performing, and did I want to come? I was pleased to be asked, and felt like I should support Anna, so I said yes. An hour later another girlfriend invited me to dinner at her house but I'd already committed to Fi so I turned it down. Felt briefly popular. Fi and I had a lovely drink in Bourne & Hollingsworth, met the others, watched the (brilliant) show, which was based on Diary of a Nobody and was hilarious. Then we had a drink or two with the cast and I went home. On Sunday I did some writing and some laundry, ate nice food, lay around, watched the X Factor and went to bed."
Version 2:
"I had a party on Friday night. As I have decided will be my epitaph, it was "Nothing like I expected but still quite fun." The venue had reserved me a large area with sofas and big, heavy, Henry VIII style tables. A few of us sat round the head of one of the tables, chatting and waiting for the other guests. One girl came in, saw a notice on an empty table saying "Reserved for Jane", scrumpled it up and threw it on the floor. I took some pleasure in telling her that I was Jane and that she was welcome to sit there until we needed the table later on. But I still felt a bit discombobulated. Most of the early arrivals were my school friends and their associated men. They all know each other and joined us at the big table. By 9pm, others filtered in, but there was nowhere for them to sit and I didn't know if I wanted to make a scene by chucking off a group of eight strangers from the other reserved table so that two of us could sit down. I decided to leave it. Eventually, all my newer friends were standing squashed by the radiators mingling away, and my school friends were having a nice catch up with their old friends around the massive wood table. Mixing the two groups would have been contrived and unwelcome, so I decided to stay with the new friends since the old ones all knew each other. And then, suddenly, just as the music was hotting up, everyone came over to say goodbye, and by 1am, it was over. I hadn't danced a step. I went home feeling a bit flat, reassuring myself that parties aren't for the host's enjoyment, but couldn't stop focussing on the fact that one of my favourite people hadn't been able to attend as she had been in Rome on a third date. Yep. A third date. In Rome. The boyban's going well, but even I will happily admit that I was pretty darn jealous of that one. On the walk back from the nightbus to my flat, I slipped on the ice and banged my elbow really hard.
On Saturday I woke up feeling post-party-anti-climaxy. I then went for a run but pulled a muscle in my leg so badly after 20 minutes that I had to hobble home feeling really self-conscious that people would look at me and think I was really unfit because I was injured. Piled on the pounds with fattening lunch in a gastropub and then haemorrhaged my savings on a drawing that I love but that everyone else will think is a complete rip-off. Felt like a bit of a dick but the girl who'd done the drawing was so lovely and I didn't feel like I could change my mind and back out. I do really like it but I could have bought a flight to somewhere hot for that money. I don't know what came over me. I think it was the shopping equivalent of comfort eating. Silly, silly girl. Then Ses and I had a cup of tea in another pub and we started talking about online dating, and I realised that I am still a long way off being ready to face rejection, and that unless you are prepared to be rejected, you shouldn't sign up to online dating. So I'm single, a bit lonely, and yet can't do the one thing that could possibly change that: go on a date. Which sucketh somewhat. Then I went out for a lovely evening as Fi's afterthought because her husband couldn't come, and we sat with Ed and his boyfriend and David and his wife, and then afterwards talked to Anna about her husband. I was pleased to have been asked to the show, and to the dinner that I'd had to turn down, but I was clearly a last-minute choice. And I felt blue. :(
Yesterday I did nothing of any significance. I was invited (as an afterthought but still pleased to be asked) to play football in the afternoon but I couldn't because my leg was still hurting so much that I could barely walk, let alone run. Despite having the heating on all day, my feet never warmed up. My phone didn't ring until the aforementioned lovebird returned from Rome and called me. I did my best to be loving and supportive and excited and then hung up the phone and failed to sleep. This morning was unfun."
Guess which version gets stuck in my head? I've long been aware that life is just a game of selective editing - we all have many stories we can tell about ourselves. I can easily put on a brave face and project a positive narrative to the outside world if I have to, but the Jackanory going on in my head isn't quite so much fun. Shut up, SHUT UP, internal Jackanory!
And she all lived happily ever after.
Friday 3 December 2010
End of week summary
I like to think I'm as aware as I should be that the thoughts that have been whirling and eddying around the plughole of my head aren't nearly as fascinating to everyone else, which is why I spend a fair bit of time each week looking forward to therapy - I pay someone £45 to listen to me vent for an hour and hope to leave my sessions feeling lighter. But the past few weeks, as we've really got down to the very thin central onion layers and it's been harder and harder to process all the answers to the questions I'm having to ask, I am getting more and more exhausted. Which is why, dear Faithful, I have not written. I mean, I'm awake. I've come to work, I've gone out in the evenings. But the idea of constructing paragraphs filled with erudite social commentary or even just writing the usual crap that goes in here is a bridge too far.
But it's Friday afternoon and I've not written all week and I love it when people read what I write, and I can't expect people to keep coming back to LLFF if there's never anything new here. So here, in spite of the fact I have zero motivation to write and that I resent the fact that I can't tell you the most interesting hilarity from my week as the person concerned may well hear about it from this very source, here are some of the things that've been bubbling away alongside the feelings of omnifailure.
a) The other day I was on the District Line westbound to Hammersmith. It was about 5.30pm and the tube was pretty packed. Somehow I got a seat next to the partition (prime spot). At the other end of my section of seats, standing in the aisle, was a group of around five men. I reckon they were in their late twenties or early thirties, white and from East London/Essex, judging by their accents. They were being really loud and attention seeking. I tried to block out their conversation and read my book, but soon after, one of them said to another one, "Jesus, man, what's up with you? You're sweating like a nigger at a rape trial." I felt a bit sick and instinctively scanned the carriage for black people. There was a man, probably in his fifties, wearing a suit and holding a leather briefcase, sitting about three seats from the guys. He wasn't wearing headphones. There's no way he didn't hear. He was looking down at his hands. I was flooded with rage and started considering what, if anything, I could say to these guys. I wasn't scared of them hurting me, or insulting me, but it was a crammed carriage and I really didn't want to cause a scene. It was pathetic. I stayed schtum. A few minutes later, I heard another remark, this time about the 'Chink' guy who was sitting near where they were standing. They kindly altered 'Chink' to some sort of heavily disguised alternative after one usage, something like 'Kitchen sink' although I can't remember precisely. I winced. Someone else shifted in their seats. But we still did nothing. Their next victim was a wealthy-looking guy in his forties, wearing a suit and scarf, holding a newspaper.
"Bloody hell, mate," one of them said, elbowing the other, "It's fucking David Cameron!"
"HAHAHAHAHAHA!" laughed the others. The man ignored them. He was clearly posh and had bad hair, but other than that, he looked about as much like David Cameron as I look like Thatcher.
"It's David Cameron!" another one whimpered, delirious with hysteria.
"Oi! Dave!" shouted another.
"'E looks exactly like David Cameron!" said another.
"Which one?" said a fourth, who must have been criminally thick not to have grasped the point just yet.
"This guy right here," the first one said, pointing right at 'David'. They were about a foot apart.
"What about him?"
"He looks like David Cameron!"
"Oh my god! It's David Cameron!"
In the space of about two minutes, they said David Cameron more times than the actual David Cameron has heard his own name over the course of his entire life. 'David' shifted uncomfortably and carried on reading his paper. At one point he smiled weakly at them, which only encouraged them. It went from being merely unfunny to being a bit threatening. If the guys were like this at 5.30pm, I was pretty glad I wasn't going to be spending the evening boozing with them.
"Oi, mate, which stop are we getting off at?" asked one of them.
"Yeah, where are we going?"
"Hell," I said, fairly loudly, and then wished I hadn't, partly because I was scared and partly because I don't believe in hell and didn't like to be seen by many strangers promoting such an archaic and damaging religious concept. The men either didn't hear me or chose to ignore me, and I was glad, but the man next to me sniggered. At Earl's Court, the whole posse got off the train and several people laughed and joshed together with relief. We'd all been incredibly tense and uncomfortable, and the source of our discomfort had gone. But we'd done nothing. The black guy and the Chinese guy were still on board. Maybe they picked up on the fact that we'd all found it deeply unpleasant. But I doubt it. It was grim.
That night I went to a party where two people I talked to said it was worse to be picked on for being posh than for being black. I was outraged and then was made fun of for being an inverted snob so I gave up and changed the subject back to the X Factor.
b) A few months ago I heard a programme on Radio 4 about the benefits of taking loads of Vitamin D - like way over the suggested daily amount. I think you're meant to have 25 mg a day and these doctors were advocating taking 2000. Apparently it is amazing for your immune system, skin etc. so I started knocking it back about eight weeks ago. The week before last I got the first cold I've had in donkeys' and it lasted for nearly a fortnight. Either Vitamin D is crap, or it works and without it I would have been hospitalized.
c) In other supplement news, I have been suffering from peeling nails for about a year. It started without any warning and I couldn't calculate the cause - no major change in diet or weather etc. I tried moisturising more, I tried eating more gelatine, I tried cutting them rather than filing, I tried certain nail varnishes that were specifically designed to help with it. But nothing. Then I started taking Perfectil, that daily supplement for hair, nails and skin. It has totally worked. I recommend it. It makes your pee go the colour of a yellow highlighter but it's worth it.
d) There was an article in the Guardian last week about Katie Price / Jordan being editor of the Radio 4 Today programme over the Christmas 'period'. Everyone was outraged and everyone else said 'Shut up.' But it got me thinking about what I would want to do if I was guest editor of the show for one day. I think I'd want to cover the following topics: the finances behind the Alpha course, an investigation into the Landmark Forum, a behind-the-scenes look at the private tutoring 'industry' in London, an update on the proposed changes to the voting system in the UK, a report on only children in China vs. Britain, a piece pushing increased paternity leave in the UK, and something about Simon Cowell.
e) I think that's it for now. Tonight I'm going to a party. Here are my party nails:
But it's Friday afternoon and I've not written all week and I love it when people read what I write, and I can't expect people to keep coming back to LLFF if there's never anything new here. So here, in spite of the fact I have zero motivation to write and that I resent the fact that I can't tell you the most interesting hilarity from my week as the person concerned may well hear about it from this very source, here are some of the things that've been bubbling away alongside the feelings of omnifailure.
a) The other day I was on the District Line westbound to Hammersmith. It was about 5.30pm and the tube was pretty packed. Somehow I got a seat next to the partition (prime spot). At the other end of my section of seats, standing in the aisle, was a group of around five men. I reckon they were in their late twenties or early thirties, white and from East London/Essex, judging by their accents. They were being really loud and attention seeking. I tried to block out their conversation and read my book, but soon after, one of them said to another one, "Jesus, man, what's up with you? You're sweating like a nigger at a rape trial." I felt a bit sick and instinctively scanned the carriage for black people. There was a man, probably in his fifties, wearing a suit and holding a leather briefcase, sitting about three seats from the guys. He wasn't wearing headphones. There's no way he didn't hear. He was looking down at his hands. I was flooded with rage and started considering what, if anything, I could say to these guys. I wasn't scared of them hurting me, or insulting me, but it was a crammed carriage and I really didn't want to cause a scene. It was pathetic. I stayed schtum. A few minutes later, I heard another remark, this time about the 'Chink' guy who was sitting near where they were standing. They kindly altered 'Chink' to some sort of heavily disguised alternative after one usage, something like 'Kitchen sink' although I can't remember precisely. I winced. Someone else shifted in their seats. But we still did nothing. Their next victim was a wealthy-looking guy in his forties, wearing a suit and scarf, holding a newspaper.
"Bloody hell, mate," one of them said, elbowing the other, "It's fucking David Cameron!"
"HAHAHAHAHAHA!" laughed the others. The man ignored them. He was clearly posh and had bad hair, but other than that, he looked about as much like David Cameron as I look like Thatcher.
"It's David Cameron!" another one whimpered, delirious with hysteria.
"Oi! Dave!" shouted another.
"'E looks exactly like David Cameron!" said another.
"Which one?" said a fourth, who must have been criminally thick not to have grasped the point just yet.
"This guy right here," the first one said, pointing right at 'David'. They were about a foot apart.
"What about him?"
"He looks like David Cameron!"
"Oh my god! It's David Cameron!"
In the space of about two minutes, they said David Cameron more times than the actual David Cameron has heard his own name over the course of his entire life. 'David' shifted uncomfortably and carried on reading his paper. At one point he smiled weakly at them, which only encouraged them. It went from being merely unfunny to being a bit threatening. If the guys were like this at 5.30pm, I was pretty glad I wasn't going to be spending the evening boozing with them.
"Oi, mate, which stop are we getting off at?" asked one of them.
"Yeah, where are we going?"
"Hell," I said, fairly loudly, and then wished I hadn't, partly because I was scared and partly because I don't believe in hell and didn't like to be seen by many strangers promoting such an archaic and damaging religious concept. The men either didn't hear me or chose to ignore me, and I was glad, but the man next to me sniggered. At Earl's Court, the whole posse got off the train and several people laughed and joshed together with relief. We'd all been incredibly tense and uncomfortable, and the source of our discomfort had gone. But we'd done nothing. The black guy and the Chinese guy were still on board. Maybe they picked up on the fact that we'd all found it deeply unpleasant. But I doubt it. It was grim.
That night I went to a party where two people I talked to said it was worse to be picked on for being posh than for being black. I was outraged and then was made fun of for being an inverted snob so I gave up and changed the subject back to the X Factor.
b) A few months ago I heard a programme on Radio 4 about the benefits of taking loads of Vitamin D - like way over the suggested daily amount. I think you're meant to have 25 mg a day and these doctors were advocating taking 2000. Apparently it is amazing for your immune system, skin etc. so I started knocking it back about eight weeks ago. The week before last I got the first cold I've had in donkeys' and it lasted for nearly a fortnight. Either Vitamin D is crap, or it works and without it I would have been hospitalized.
c) In other supplement news, I have been suffering from peeling nails for about a year. It started without any warning and I couldn't calculate the cause - no major change in diet or weather etc. I tried moisturising more, I tried eating more gelatine, I tried cutting them rather than filing, I tried certain nail varnishes that were specifically designed to help with it. But nothing. Then I started taking Perfectil, that daily supplement for hair, nails and skin. It has totally worked. I recommend it. It makes your pee go the colour of a yellow highlighter but it's worth it.
d) There was an article in the Guardian last week about Katie Price / Jordan being editor of the Radio 4 Today programme over the Christmas 'period'. Everyone was outraged and everyone else said 'Shut up.' But it got me thinking about what I would want to do if I was guest editor of the show for one day. I think I'd want to cover the following topics: the finances behind the Alpha course, an investigation into the Landmark Forum, a behind-the-scenes look at the private tutoring 'industry' in London, an update on the proposed changes to the voting system in the UK, a report on only children in China vs. Britain, a piece pushing increased paternity leave in the UK, and something about Simon Cowell.
e) I think that's it for now. Tonight I'm going to a party. Here are my party nails:
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