When I was at work tonight, I had a strange allegorical epiphany. Me, we, us... the staff of this well-known chain bookstore, we're bonafide Native Americans. Red [polyester] Indians as it were (gosh, I'm funny.)
We were welcoming to the new settlers, new people. We embraced changes and adapted ourselves and our ways (those in which we'd become very settled) in the name of harmony and the greater good. The immigrants, the settlers were all full of smiles and promises of things being better, more positive; a future we could all enjoy.
There was the promise of us sitting down and sharing turkey together; a 10% discount on hardware.
They raped our land and defaced our realm. Everywhere, gawdy purple signs screaming that they've arrived as we indigenous folk are pushed to one side. Super Mario edges out Oscar Wilde and builds a fucking strip mall over a multimedia burial ground. Neon signs that don't match but command the most attention, video games and mindless entertainment spattered all over the walls like the blood of hundreds of thousands of authors. Austen, Hugo, Orwell, Burgess... all slaughtered at the hands of Sonic the Hedgehog. Money grabbing. Opportunist. They bulldozered our forest and filled it with Tetris towerblocks (for the Nintendo Wii, of course.)
Layer upon layer of tacky gimmicks are slapped down like the strata in sedimentary rock until the original format and form has almost disappeared entirely. Compressed and pushed down, literature becomes an outcast in its own country, it's own domain.
They call it progress.
I see this new development, and it just looks like someone has defecated in the middle of my place of work. Stupid, white Europeans ruined the North American continent, just like stupid, mindless 'gamers' are ruining my bookshop.
Thursday, 9 October 2008
Thursday, 25 September 2008
Give and take
"Errr... have you seen what she's given him?" the Geordie Rat asked put-upon looking boyfriend after I'd just finished serving her equally vacuous son last night at work, and was still raw from the intense physical scars endured by merely completing a transaction with some one so shockingly devoid of any sort of manners or social skills.
Given him? What had I given him? Whatever it was, she seemed pretty indignant at her son's receipt of such an item? I was worried. To provoke such a reaction, it must have been something pretty bad...
Maybe he's a heart surgery patient in a very fragile post-operative state and I'd given him a shock?
Maybe she didn't read my lanyard properly, assumed my name was Gemma and that in touching my hand to receive his change, I'd inadvertently given him some uncomfortably embarrassing venereal disease, resulting fortnight of itching in unsightly locations before the anti-biotics kicked in?
Maybe I'd become momentarily confused; muddled betwixt the cold, harsh reality of the shop floor and my imaginary safe-haven, where I routinely dish out social justice and given him a swift smack in the mouth?
I'd given him a Scottish £5 note as part of his change.
I hate gypsies.
Given him? What had I given him? Whatever it was, she seemed pretty indignant at her son's receipt of such an item? I was worried. To provoke such a reaction, it must have been something pretty bad...
Maybe he's a heart surgery patient in a very fragile post-operative state and I'd given him a shock?
Maybe she didn't read my lanyard properly, assumed my name was Gemma and that in touching my hand to receive his change, I'd inadvertently given him some uncomfortably embarrassing venereal disease, resulting fortnight of itching in unsightly locations before the anti-biotics kicked in?
Maybe I'd become momentarily confused; muddled betwixt the cold, harsh reality of the shop floor and my imaginary safe-haven, where I routinely dish out social justice and given him a swift smack in the mouth?
I'd given him a Scottish £5 note as part of his change.
I hate gypsies.
Heart surgery
It's always the nice people, the generous ones, the ones who give their love completely and honestly, without question or expectation. They get routinely and royally fucked. Taken advantage of. Manipulated. If you've got someone, someone who loves you for who you are without any expectation, then you should really know just how lucky you are. Not a lot of people get this.
I've seen nutter boyfriends and girlfriends come and go so many times over the years, but hey - that's the point of exes, right? So you can learn from your mistakes and (theoretically) make a more informed decision next time around. If a relationship's right, then there's always a way to make it work. If not, well, you can blame whatever you want - work, distance, other people... but it comes down to the simple fact that you weren't right. I've heard it all before; just be big enough to admit that you weren't the right fit and work on finding the one who is.
It tears me up inside to see people I care about getting exploited by others, or making decisions that I know aren't healthy or sensible. Pretty much everyone I know, at some point I've had varying strength urges (depending on just how ridiculous the situation was/is) to scream at "WHAT ON EARTH ARE YOU DOING?" But I guess when people are in 'relationships' (although I think a lot of the examples I'm talking about couldn't even be called that without Trading Standards getting involved...) they invest to much emotion in that other person, they don't want to see when it all starts to fall apart, buckling and shaking at the seams. I don't profess to be an expert on love and relationships and whatnot, but I've had some pretty horrendous experiences at the hands of some pretty horrendous people, and and midway through 2007 I decided to remove my silly-little-girl head and screw on a new, sensible one. Firmly. After I broke up with my ex-boyfriend, I made a conscious decision that I'd rather remain single forever than put myself through such a circus again. It sounds extreme, but I realised that I was one of those silly people, too. Maybe I'd reached the top of the learning curve, maybe I had some sort of emotional epiphany, but I decided that relationships were out of the question until I wokred out exactly what it was that I wanted and needed, and what exactly I could offer some one in return. I'm not a cynic, and when I love, I love completely, wholly and unconditionally. I'm in a very healthy place now, I'm with someone and what we feel for each other easily transcends what either of us have ever felt for another. I know because we communicate. He told me, and I told him. It might sound ridiculously simple, but a lot of couples I know hide things, shround parts of themselves in secrecy and then stumble around in genuine confusion when it all falls apart. Not healthy. It therefore might sound easy for me to judge, but I can view it objectively now, having seen and experienced both sides of the spectrum. If we can be this happy, so can you. (I know I sound like Paul McKenna here- this was not intentional, and for that, I apologise.)
I see couples every day, mutual loathing and resignation etched into their faces, held together not by adoration but desperation. Fear of loneliness; the social stigma of singledom. I love you reduced to a punctuation mark, used only as a point around sentences are hinged, because - like the full stop followed by a capital letter, they know they should. Thats how language, and love, should work. But no one feels grammatically, it's not supposed to be functional, it should be beautiful. When was the last time you got all enamored over a semi-colon? I see people desperate for affection, putting their all into unions which to me just seemed doomed, clinging to commas for dear life. The needs of their partners and themselves mutually exclusive; they invest so much and get nothing in return. I've seen someone trapped by jealousy and suspicion, checking text messages, e-mails and Facebook accounts with the precision of an MI5 hacker. Without trust, relationships rust.
I really love my boyfriend, but my bit on the side's got a really nice chin. It's alright for me to text/e-mail/ring my ex all the time, as long as my girlfriend doesn't find out. Kissing isn't cheating, really... it's not like I shagged her. Using someone so you aren't alone when you'd really rather be with someone else. Exploiting people's kindness and offering nothing in return, not even a token gesture or a heartfelt thank-you. I'm just chatting to girls online; I'm never going to meet them, so it doesn't mean anything. I'd drive the four hundred miles to see him this weekend, but I can't be arsed so I'll feed him the old 'no money' line. Drunken cliches at Christmas parties (I really love my girlfriend, though!)
Relationships are fucked; complex. You can complain about your boy/girlfriend (that makes it sound like you're dating a hermaphrodite) and the resultant situations and predicaments all you want, but as soon as someone else suggests that your relationship might be flawed, you angrily jump on the defensive. As an objective force, one can never really understand the nuances between two people when they're alone together and how they interact one-on-one. You can, however, and do, form opinions and ideas. You want to protect your friends, especially those you know have been hurt before. You want to wrap their hearts in cotton wool and bubble wrap, so when they inevitably get broken it won't hurt. You can't bear to see that crushed look again, total devastation. But, at the same time, we need to make these mistakes. If we don't ignore that little voice in our head occasionally, we won't have that point of reference, that scope to avoid the same mistakes again. Some people inevitably fall into the same trap over and over, but maybe the resultant heartbreak is the only way they'll learn. I guess all we can do, their friends, the people who love them, all we can do is be there to pick up the pieces, glue them back together and never, ever say I told you so. No matter how stupid we think (or know) they've been.
We are the surgeons who will crack the ribs and repair the broken hearts.
I've seen nutter boyfriends and girlfriends come and go so many times over the years, but hey - that's the point of exes, right? So you can learn from your mistakes and (theoretically) make a more informed decision next time around. If a relationship's right, then there's always a way to make it work. If not, well, you can blame whatever you want - work, distance, other people... but it comes down to the simple fact that you weren't right. I've heard it all before; just be big enough to admit that you weren't the right fit and work on finding the one who is.
It tears me up inside to see people I care about getting exploited by others, or making decisions that I know aren't healthy or sensible. Pretty much everyone I know, at some point I've had varying strength urges (depending on just how ridiculous the situation was/is) to scream at "WHAT ON EARTH ARE YOU DOING?" But I guess when people are in 'relationships' (although I think a lot of the examples I'm talking about couldn't even be called that without Trading Standards getting involved...) they invest to much emotion in that other person, they don't want to see when it all starts to fall apart, buckling and shaking at the seams. I don't profess to be an expert on love and relationships and whatnot, but I've had some pretty horrendous experiences at the hands of some pretty horrendous people, and and midway through 2007 I decided to remove my silly-little-girl head and screw on a new, sensible one. Firmly. After I broke up with my ex-boyfriend, I made a conscious decision that I'd rather remain single forever than put myself through such a circus again. It sounds extreme, but I realised that I was one of those silly people, too. Maybe I'd reached the top of the learning curve, maybe I had some sort of emotional epiphany, but I decided that relationships were out of the question until I wokred out exactly what it was that I wanted and needed, and what exactly I could offer some one in return. I'm not a cynic, and when I love, I love completely, wholly and unconditionally. I'm in a very healthy place now, I'm with someone and what we feel for each other easily transcends what either of us have ever felt for another. I know because we communicate. He told me, and I told him. It might sound ridiculously simple, but a lot of couples I know hide things, shround parts of themselves in secrecy and then stumble around in genuine confusion when it all falls apart. Not healthy. It therefore might sound easy for me to judge, but I can view it objectively now, having seen and experienced both sides of the spectrum. If we can be this happy, so can you. (I know I sound like Paul McKenna here- this was not intentional, and for that, I apologise.)
I see couples every day, mutual loathing and resignation etched into their faces, held together not by adoration but desperation. Fear of loneliness; the social stigma of singledom. I love you reduced to a punctuation mark, used only as a point around sentences are hinged, because - like the full stop followed by a capital letter, they know they should. Thats how language, and love, should work. But no one feels grammatically, it's not supposed to be functional, it should be beautiful. When was the last time you got all enamored over a semi-colon? I see people desperate for affection, putting their all into unions which to me just seemed doomed, clinging to commas for dear life. The needs of their partners and themselves mutually exclusive; they invest so much and get nothing in return. I've seen someone trapped by jealousy and suspicion, checking text messages, e-mails and Facebook accounts with the precision of an MI5 hacker. Without trust, relationships rust.
I really love my boyfriend, but my bit on the side's got a really nice chin. It's alright for me to text/e-mail/ring my ex all the time, as long as my girlfriend doesn't find out. Kissing isn't cheating, really... it's not like I shagged her. Using someone so you aren't alone when you'd really rather be with someone else. Exploiting people's kindness and offering nothing in return, not even a token gesture or a heartfelt thank-you. I'm just chatting to girls online; I'm never going to meet them, so it doesn't mean anything. I'd drive the four hundred miles to see him this weekend, but I can't be arsed so I'll feed him the old 'no money' line. Drunken cliches at Christmas parties (I really love my girlfriend, though!)
Relationships are fucked; complex. You can complain about your boy/girlfriend (that makes it sound like you're dating a hermaphrodite) and the resultant situations and predicaments all you want, but as soon as someone else suggests that your relationship might be flawed, you angrily jump on the defensive. As an objective force, one can never really understand the nuances between two people when they're alone together and how they interact one-on-one. You can, however, and do, form opinions and ideas. You want to protect your friends, especially those you know have been hurt before. You want to wrap their hearts in cotton wool and bubble wrap, so when they inevitably get broken it won't hurt. You can't bear to see that crushed look again, total devastation. But, at the same time, we need to make these mistakes. If we don't ignore that little voice in our head occasionally, we won't have that point of reference, that scope to avoid the same mistakes again. Some people inevitably fall into the same trap over and over, but maybe the resultant heartbreak is the only way they'll learn. I guess all we can do, their friends, the people who love them, all we can do is be there to pick up the pieces, glue them back together and never, ever say I told you so. No matter how stupid we think (or know) they've been.
We are the surgeons who will crack the ribs and repair the broken hearts.
Saturday, 20 September 2008
Open your mind, open a book*
Richard and Judy's bookclub, teachers at Emmanuel College of literary censorship, every woman in love with Jack Reacher, every man who wants to be Jack Reacher, anyone who looks like a condom full of wallnuts, people who live their lives on finance at the advice of Sophie Kinsella, anyone with a job in PR and a boyfriend called Luke, writers who dedicate texts to 'the Holy Spirit', crap local authors who pretend to have IRA connections, anyone who takes a strop because you can't pay for DVDs with National Book Tokens, Daily Mail readers, anyone who takes the credit for the work of a ghost writer (James Patterson, I'm looking at you), TV tie ins, Life, Death and Prizes!, designing your novel a Da Vinci rip-off cover to try and boost sales on the back of Dan Brown's wholly undeserved popularity, Katie Price's series of Pony books for children, awful pseudo-poetry about brokendownmachinetypethings, Heat magazine (and the rest), Instant Messenger users, Lee Child, Patrica Scanlan, Maeve Binchey, Ian Rankin, Jeffrey Deaver, Dean Koontz, Khaled Hosseini, James Ellory, Marian Keyes, Tess Gerritsen, Linwood Barclay, Jodi Picoult, Harlen Coben, Philippa Gregory and the rest.
A word of advice:
One should only read books which bite and sting one. If the book we are reading does not wake us up with a blow to the head, what's the point in reading? A book must be the axe which smashes the frozen sea within us.
--- Franz Kafka
One of the most inspirational quotes literature in that it caputures the raging gulf between what it 'should be' and what it actually 'is'. There's so much more out there, and people are just blinkered, they refuse to see it. Writing is fundamentally a form of entertainment, or escapism, but it has the potential to be so much more. It has the power to make us look at things in a different way, to challenge our opinions, to educate and to comfort. It forces us to revise our viewpoints and puts us more in tune with the world.
But the majority of people can't even see it.
Open your mind, open a book.
Please?
*Copied from the original blog post viewable at www.myspace.com/girlcalledkillx
A word of advice:
One should only read books which bite and sting one. If the book we are reading does not wake us up with a blow to the head, what's the point in reading? A book must be the axe which smashes the frozen sea within us.
--- Franz Kafka
One of the most inspirational quotes literature in that it caputures the raging gulf between what it 'should be' and what it actually 'is'. There's so much more out there, and people are just blinkered, they refuse to see it. Writing is fundamentally a form of entertainment, or escapism, but it has the potential to be so much more. It has the power to make us look at things in a different way, to challenge our opinions, to educate and to comfort. It forces us to revise our viewpoints and puts us more in tune with the world.
But the majority of people can't even see it.
Open your mind, open a book.
Please?
*Copied from the original blog post viewable at www.myspace.com/girlcalledkillx
Friday, 19 September 2008
Yarrrr me hearties!
Shiver me timbers!
Today, 19th September, is International Talk like a Pirate Day! This most important of occasions was first brought to my attention three years ago by one of my very good friends. I was driving from Edinburgh to Gateshead when I recived a completely pirated-out text message (complete with picture of Captain Jack Sparrow) to inform me of this fact.
I've celebrated it every year since, and would argue in favour of it being officially recognised as a bank holiday.
Who's with me?????????
Today, 19th September, is International Talk like a Pirate Day! This most important of occasions was first brought to my attention three years ago by one of my very good friends. I was driving from Edinburgh to Gateshead when I recived a completely pirated-out text message (complete with picture of Captain Jack Sparrow) to inform me of this fact.
I've celebrated it every year since, and would argue in favour of it being officially recognised as a bank holiday.
Who's with me?????????
Hockey Moms: an appendix
When I wrote my entry last night, I was exceptionally tired and my brain had taken leave of my skull as I'd just spent a while posting in German on my other blog. Having not studied anything Deutsch for almost for years now, I found it more difficult that I really should have done, my brain collapsed in on itself like a badly made flan and now all I have is a unicorn clomping around in my head where all of my coherent thoughts should be.
A fact about Palin I should have mentioned last night, but forgot: she opposes benefits for same sex couples, but that's alright - she's not homophobic as she's - allegedly - 'got loads of gay friends'.
For fuck's sake.
A fact about Palin I should have mentioned last night, but forgot: she opposes benefits for same sex couples, but that's alright - she's not homophobic as she's - allegedly - 'got loads of gay friends'.
For fuck's sake.
Thursday, 18 September 2008
Why I don't want a 'Hockey Mom', and neither should you
I've never really been quiet in my criticism of all things American. I don't like their attitude, I don't like how they're raping the English language with their elevators and their sidewalks and I blame them wholeheartedly for Starbucks and McDonalds sprouting up like capitalist daisies on every fucking street corner. Maybe I don't want to "have a TERRIFIC day", and I definitely won't be tipping you just because you advised me thus in a totally most contrived manner to try and squeeze a couple of 'bucks' out of me. Maybe I want to have a shit day. Ever think of that, Yank? Eh?
On a serious note, my disdain for the lower strata of seventeenth century British emigration is - generally - light hearted. On the whole, I see America for what it is: a caricature. But sometimes, the place genuinely scares me. As the dominant superpower (rapidly losing ground to China one multi-national corporation at a time - see ya, Lehmann Brothers!), economically, politically and socially, whatever happens in America affects all of us. And when I look at the average American, I really do panic that my future is essentially in their hands.
Which brings me to the 2008 presidential campaign. In the red corner (not that there's any such thing in the US!!!!) we have Barack Obama, the democratic candidate and - if American didn't allow the deep south to vote - possibly the United States' first ever black president. In the blue corner, straight outta Vietnam, we have John McCain. The trigger happy, pro-life Republican who was, until recently, eight points behind Obama.
Eight points behind, at least, until he hired self-confessed 'pitbull with lipstick' Sarah Palin as his 'Running Mate' (c'mon, even if you're pro-America, some of this terminology is ridiculous...). Since it was announced that Palin would be campaigning alongside McCain with a view to taking up office as his vice president should he win, the Republican party has not only caught up with the Democrats, but McCain has managed to accrue a four point lead over Obama. Now, I'm not politician, but I think such a massive surge in popularity following the appointment of this All-American 'Hockey Mom' as the potential 44th president's number two must be attributed to her in some way. Credit where credit's due.
So while Obama resorts to trading thinly veiled insults (three days after Palin's pitbull metaphor, Ol' Barack gave a speech - allegedly about the Republican manifesto - using the ill-advised metaphor "you can put lipstick on a pig... but it's still a pig." Funny, yes. Stupid, yes. Women all across America were outraged! Nonpartisans suddenly started shifting right! He's obviously a sexist, we can't possibly vote for him. And that's the story of how Sarah is winning the day.
But let's take a closer look at this woman. We all know John McCain's dangerous; bomb Iran for no reason? Sure. But what about her? Maybe she'll be good for him, a calming influence who'll stop him bringing about the end of the world quite so quickly. Maybe Miss American Pie can avert nuclear Armageddon at the hands of someone straight out of 'Nam.
Nah.
She supports drilling for oil in her home state of Alaska, rather than looking to develop renewable energy resources. Short-term, I guess this could be marketed to the less intelligent voters as a good idea; self-sufficient fuel supplies would end the reliance on the Middle East. Never mind the rest of the world: America's going to be okay. Well... for the next fifty years or so. What happens when the oil runs out, Mrs. Palin? Ah, well, cross that bridge when we come to it. Never mind the devastating environmental impact of a country the size of the USA showing no sort of global responsibility for its Carbon emissions (highest in the world). Fuck the environment. Never mind that we're raping Alaska's natural beauty with power stations and giant iron pipes that stretch right on out over the horizon. Oh, that doesn't matter. That's what the Americans do. They've taken the breathtakingly outstanding landscape of their continent and turned into one great big fucking shopping centre.
When quizzed about the environmental impact of her plans to drill holes all over Alaska and burn the contents of them all over the North American continent, Palin showed neither concern nor any real knowledge for the poor polar bears:
"These magnificent, cuddly white bears are doing just fine* and they don't need out protection.** If the ices melts, they'll adapt to living on the land."***
*No. No, they aren't.
** Yes. Yes, they do.
***If the ice melts, Sarah, they'll become extinct. That's what happens when greedy, stupid humans destroy animals' natural habitats.
Okay. So she's an idiot. But give an idiot power, and then things get dangerous. Look at Bush. It's really trendy to lay into Bush without really knowing anything about the politics or reasoning behind many of his decisions. It's funny to reel off his mis-quotes because bands like NOFX wear 'Not my President' tees. Yeah, I'm totally political, I bought Rock against Bush vol. 1. That said, the man is - quite clearly - an idiot. It absolutely stupefies me that he was voted in not once, but twice (which reinforces my earlier point about how I panic that decisions that affect my lives are left in the hands of the general American public; a public who, quite clearly, are happy to re-elect the man who, when asked by a British child what the White House was like, replied "It is white") As I said, I try to make a point of not complaining too loudly against Bush unless it's relevant to the point I'm making, as I don't want to be lumped in with all the fifteen-year-olds who really wanted John Kerry to win in 2004 just, uh, well, 'cos Green Day said so!
Yes. Stupid people + power = dangerous. Look at the monumental disaster that is Iraq. My personal stance on the US invasion of Iraq (another example of the UK aligning themselves to America without the British public being consulted. Cheers.) is that it should never have happened in the first place, but now that they're there, they had fucking better stay and sort their mess out. Think of them as being grounded until they tidy their room. Iraq is a shambles and an embarrassment and an example of the rich exploiting the poor for thinly veiled reasoning. It's not what this blog is about, but it's an example of why I really worry about the next US government.
So, Palin, yes. Well, as well as thinking polar bears are invincible (why not just send 'em to the Sahara, Sarah... I'm sure they'll "adapt"), this handy, little bite-sized article from Time magazine should tell you all you need to know about McCain's 'Running Mate'. They say that behind every great man is an even greater woman, well, apparently behind every potentially dangerous, neo-conservative, hyper-right presidential candidate is an even more ridiculous running mate. A member of the National Rifle Association, Palin believes all Americans have 'the right to bear arms', which is the most ridiculous law I have ever heard in my life. What's more dangerous than giving stupid people power? Giving them guns! Recently, I was reading an article on hurricane Ike, and there was a Texan family refusing to evacuate their home. They were pictured sitting on their porch armed with rifles, apparently they were going to blast the storm away with guns? I'm not even kidding.... Far too often, stories of school shootings and random gun murders ricochet across the Atlantic and hit headlines with the impact of a rogue bullet. I don;t understand how a supposedly developed country can think it's okay for citizens to be roaming the streets exercising their 'constitutional right' to blow each other to bits.
But, as Georges Clemanceau said, "America is the only country on earth to go from barbarism to decadence without civilisation in between"
(If you don't agree with me, have a look at how New Orleans is doing, two years after Katrina. Then tell me how any American, or indeed anyone in the world with a concept of human suffering, can sleep at night.)
In the wake of the recent incident at Virginia Tech, I think it's wholly irresponsible as an American politician to do anything but condemn gun use. But no. Never mind that it's dangerous, stopping Septics packing heat would be wildly unpopular and you've gotta think of the opinion polls (I mean, who cares if a few university students get shot along the way... really?) But it's okay. Palin clearly knows the fear of losing a child. Her son's, like, totally gone to Iraq. I'm not trying to detract from how scary that must be for him, but how come everyone's applauding her for this? There are parents all over the world whose children are serving in war zones and they get no special credit, no praise is heaped on them. They just get on with their daily lives without making the everyday heroism of their child a fucking publicity stunt.
And let's not forget that the potentially second most powerful person in the world has brains rival to go with her strong moral conscience (or severe lack thereof.) Not content with thinking that we could send Arctic animals holidaying to the equator, she's also a Creationist. Which is nice. Of course God created the world in 7 days. Sure. Never mind all of the scientific evidence backing up evolution, or anything. No, no, God is sitting up on his white cloud right now, kicking back in his toga and thinking "Wow. What a brilliant job I've done. We've come so far since the Eden-prototype." She supports the teaching of creationism in schools, which is not only scientifically unsound, but downright dangerous. Religious extremism is rife in the USA, and I am not talking about Islam. There are 50 000 000 Americans in the Bible Belt who'll all be voting for McCain in the hope he hurries up and bombs Gaza, just to bring about the end of the world that little bit quicker. They believe we're in the End Times. They believe the Rapture is coming and God will save them all, whisk them off the Heaven and go fire and brimstone on the Atheists' collective arse (and Jews, and Muslims, and Sikhs, Hindus, Pagans and Fundamentalist Badger Worshippers.) Separation of church and state is so important; indoctrination should not occur as part of any school curriculum. Religion is something someone should be able to make an informed decision about; not something to be taught as an absolute truth in a classroom. From a country near the forefront of scientific progress, this is an astounding attitude.
And so we come to my last problem with Mrs. Palin (excluding the fact that she was clearly on acid when she named her kids): she is vehemently anti-abortion. Now, I'm pro-choice, however I understand that abortion is a very sensitive issue and one that commands widespread debate and opinions and is capable of stirring up the strongest of emotions. Whatever your stance on the procedure is, however, I don;t think that anyone has the right to judge a girl or a woman who decides that having a baby is not the right move for her. Having never been in a situation where I'd need to consider an abortion (thank goodness), I can only imagine how difficult a decision it must be to undergo the procedure. It's clearly an extremely difficult time physically and emotionally, and I think that anyone who even attempts to manipulate guilt from those who choose to terminate pregnancies should be utterly ashamed of themselves. I have no problem with the pro-life standpoint, no problem with debate and discussion of the two polar viewpoints, however to exploit the fragile emotional state of a girl considering or post-abortion is entirely different to expressing a pro-life viewpoint.
Palin is quoted as referring to the termination procedure as "the atrocity of abortion." Atrocity. A word frequently used to describe the 9/11 terrorist attacks and other events of a similar magnitude. That's hardly comparable to a girl who's made a conscious choice to terminate a baby that she can't afford to provide any sort of life for, is it? The use of such emotive rhetoric is absolutely reprehensible; despite Palin's personal viewpoint, she should understand that abortions are a bonafide medical procedure and provide solutions - albeit difficult ones - to unwanted pregnancies. I think that when running for a position of power, one should be able to keep one's personal opinions private and focus on the issues that matter. Whether or not female Americans have terminations is not a pressing economic, social or political issue and therefore I fail to see how it is relevant to the presidential race. Palin is just as entitled to oppose abortion as I am to support it, but the difference between her and myself is that I would never, ever attempt to exploit guilt or shame form someone to recruit them to my point of view.
So to summarise, McCain is dangerous, and his 'running mate' and potential US vice-president Palin is quite clearly no better. Her views on abortion, creationism, climate change and the constitutional right to bear arms show that she is out of touch with global* social, political and ecological concerns. Her children are named Piper, Willow, Bristol, Track and Trig. How, then, can she be expected to run the most powerful country in the world?
*Well, Western social, political and ecological concerns. I doubt there's many Saudi Arabians who support abortion, and China's not exactly hot on climate change, but I'm talking the the context of Westernization.
On a serious note, my disdain for the lower strata of seventeenth century British emigration is - generally - light hearted. On the whole, I see America for what it is: a caricature. But sometimes, the place genuinely scares me. As the dominant superpower (rapidly losing ground to China one multi-national corporation at a time - see ya, Lehmann Brothers!), economically, politically and socially, whatever happens in America affects all of us. And when I look at the average American, I really do panic that my future is essentially in their hands.
Which brings me to the 2008 presidential campaign. In the red corner (not that there's any such thing in the US!!!!) we have Barack Obama, the democratic candidate and - if American didn't allow the deep south to vote - possibly the United States' first ever black president. In the blue corner, straight outta Vietnam, we have John McCain. The trigger happy, pro-life Republican who was, until recently, eight points behind Obama.
Eight points behind, at least, until he hired self-confessed 'pitbull with lipstick' Sarah Palin as his 'Running Mate' (c'mon, even if you're pro-America, some of this terminology is ridiculous...). Since it was announced that Palin would be campaigning alongside McCain with a view to taking up office as his vice president should he win, the Republican party has not only caught up with the Democrats, but McCain has managed to accrue a four point lead over Obama. Now, I'm not politician, but I think such a massive surge in popularity following the appointment of this All-American 'Hockey Mom' as the potential 44th president's number two must be attributed to her in some way. Credit where credit's due.
So while Obama resorts to trading thinly veiled insults (three days after Palin's pitbull metaphor, Ol' Barack gave a speech - allegedly about the Republican manifesto - using the ill-advised metaphor "you can put lipstick on a pig... but it's still a pig." Funny, yes. Stupid, yes. Women all across America were outraged! Nonpartisans suddenly started shifting right! He's obviously a sexist, we can't possibly vote for him. And that's the story of how Sarah is winning the day.
But let's take a closer look at this woman. We all know John McCain's dangerous; bomb Iran for no reason? Sure. But what about her? Maybe she'll be good for him, a calming influence who'll stop him bringing about the end of the world quite so quickly. Maybe Miss American Pie can avert nuclear Armageddon at the hands of someone straight out of 'Nam.
Nah.
She supports drilling for oil in her home state of Alaska, rather than looking to develop renewable energy resources. Short-term, I guess this could be marketed to the less intelligent voters as a good idea; self-sufficient fuel supplies would end the reliance on the Middle East. Never mind the rest of the world: America's going to be okay. Well... for the next fifty years or so. What happens when the oil runs out, Mrs. Palin? Ah, well, cross that bridge when we come to it. Never mind the devastating environmental impact of a country the size of the USA showing no sort of global responsibility for its Carbon emissions (highest in the world). Fuck the environment. Never mind that we're raping Alaska's natural beauty with power stations and giant iron pipes that stretch right on out over the horizon. Oh, that doesn't matter. That's what the Americans do. They've taken the breathtakingly outstanding landscape of their continent and turned into one great big fucking shopping centre.
When quizzed about the environmental impact of her plans to drill holes all over Alaska and burn the contents of them all over the North American continent, Palin showed neither concern nor any real knowledge for the poor polar bears:
"These magnificent, cuddly white bears are doing just fine* and they don't need out protection.** If the ices melts, they'll adapt to living on the land."***
*No. No, they aren't.
** Yes. Yes, they do.
***If the ice melts, Sarah, they'll become extinct. That's what happens when greedy, stupid humans destroy animals' natural habitats.
Okay. So she's an idiot. But give an idiot power, and then things get dangerous. Look at Bush. It's really trendy to lay into Bush without really knowing anything about the politics or reasoning behind many of his decisions. It's funny to reel off his mis-quotes because bands like NOFX wear 'Not my President' tees. Yeah, I'm totally political, I bought Rock against Bush vol. 1. That said, the man is - quite clearly - an idiot. It absolutely stupefies me that he was voted in not once, but twice (which reinforces my earlier point about how I panic that decisions that affect my lives are left in the hands of the general American public; a public who, quite clearly, are happy to re-elect the man who, when asked by a British child what the White House was like, replied "It is white") As I said, I try to make a point of not complaining too loudly against Bush unless it's relevant to the point I'm making, as I don't want to be lumped in with all the fifteen-year-olds who really wanted John Kerry to win in 2004 just, uh, well, 'cos Green Day said so!
Yes. Stupid people + power = dangerous. Look at the monumental disaster that is Iraq. My personal stance on the US invasion of Iraq (another example of the UK aligning themselves to America without the British public being consulted. Cheers.) is that it should never have happened in the first place, but now that they're there, they had fucking better stay and sort their mess out. Think of them as being grounded until they tidy their room. Iraq is a shambles and an embarrassment and an example of the rich exploiting the poor for thinly veiled reasoning. It's not what this blog is about, but it's an example of why I really worry about the next US government.
So, Palin, yes. Well, as well as thinking polar bears are invincible (why not just send 'em to the Sahara, Sarah... I'm sure they'll "adapt"), this handy, little bite-sized article from Time magazine should tell you all you need to know about McCain's 'Running Mate'. They say that behind every great man is an even greater woman, well, apparently behind every potentially dangerous, neo-conservative, hyper-right presidential candidate is an even more ridiculous running mate. A member of the National Rifle Association, Palin believes all Americans have 'the right to bear arms', which is the most ridiculous law I have ever heard in my life. What's more dangerous than giving stupid people power? Giving them guns! Recently, I was reading an article on hurricane Ike, and there was a Texan family refusing to evacuate their home. They were pictured sitting on their porch armed with rifles, apparently they were going to blast the storm away with guns? I'm not even kidding.... Far too often, stories of school shootings and random gun murders ricochet across the Atlantic and hit headlines with the impact of a rogue bullet. I don;t understand how a supposedly developed country can think it's okay for citizens to be roaming the streets exercising their 'constitutional right' to blow each other to bits.
But, as Georges Clemanceau said, "America is the only country on earth to go from barbarism to decadence without civilisation in between"
(If you don't agree with me, have a look at how New Orleans is doing, two years after Katrina. Then tell me how any American, or indeed anyone in the world with a concept of human suffering, can sleep at night.)
In the wake of the recent incident at Virginia Tech, I think it's wholly irresponsible as an American politician to do anything but condemn gun use. But no. Never mind that it's dangerous, stopping Septics packing heat would be wildly unpopular and you've gotta think of the opinion polls (I mean, who cares if a few university students get shot along the way... really?) But it's okay. Palin clearly knows the fear of losing a child. Her son's, like, totally gone to Iraq. I'm not trying to detract from how scary that must be for him, but how come everyone's applauding her for this? There are parents all over the world whose children are serving in war zones and they get no special credit, no praise is heaped on them. They just get on with their daily lives without making the everyday heroism of their child a fucking publicity stunt.
And let's not forget that the potentially second most powerful person in the world has brains rival to go with her strong moral conscience (or severe lack thereof.) Not content with thinking that we could send Arctic animals holidaying to the equator, she's also a Creationist. Which is nice. Of course God created the world in 7 days. Sure. Never mind all of the scientific evidence backing up evolution, or anything. No, no, God is sitting up on his white cloud right now, kicking back in his toga and thinking "Wow. What a brilliant job I've done. We've come so far since the Eden-prototype." She supports the teaching of creationism in schools, which is not only scientifically unsound, but downright dangerous. Religious extremism is rife in the USA, and I am not talking about Islam. There are 50 000 000 Americans in the Bible Belt who'll all be voting for McCain in the hope he hurries up and bombs Gaza, just to bring about the end of the world that little bit quicker. They believe we're in the End Times. They believe the Rapture is coming and God will save them all, whisk them off the Heaven and go fire and brimstone on the Atheists' collective arse (and Jews, and Muslims, and Sikhs, Hindus, Pagans and Fundamentalist Badger Worshippers.) Separation of church and state is so important; indoctrination should not occur as part of any school curriculum. Religion is something someone should be able to make an informed decision about; not something to be taught as an absolute truth in a classroom. From a country near the forefront of scientific progress, this is an astounding attitude.
And so we come to my last problem with Mrs. Palin (excluding the fact that she was clearly on acid when she named her kids): she is vehemently anti-abortion. Now, I'm pro-choice, however I understand that abortion is a very sensitive issue and one that commands widespread debate and opinions and is capable of stirring up the strongest of emotions. Whatever your stance on the procedure is, however, I don;t think that anyone has the right to judge a girl or a woman who decides that having a baby is not the right move for her. Having never been in a situation where I'd need to consider an abortion (thank goodness), I can only imagine how difficult a decision it must be to undergo the procedure. It's clearly an extremely difficult time physically and emotionally, and I think that anyone who even attempts to manipulate guilt from those who choose to terminate pregnancies should be utterly ashamed of themselves. I have no problem with the pro-life standpoint, no problem with debate and discussion of the two polar viewpoints, however to exploit the fragile emotional state of a girl considering or post-abortion is entirely different to expressing a pro-life viewpoint.
Palin is quoted as referring to the termination procedure as "the atrocity of abortion." Atrocity. A word frequently used to describe the 9/11 terrorist attacks and other events of a similar magnitude. That's hardly comparable to a girl who's made a conscious choice to terminate a baby that she can't afford to provide any sort of life for, is it? The use of such emotive rhetoric is absolutely reprehensible; despite Palin's personal viewpoint, she should understand that abortions are a bonafide medical procedure and provide solutions - albeit difficult ones - to unwanted pregnancies. I think that when running for a position of power, one should be able to keep one's personal opinions private and focus on the issues that matter. Whether or not female Americans have terminations is not a pressing economic, social or political issue and therefore I fail to see how it is relevant to the presidential race. Palin is just as entitled to oppose abortion as I am to support it, but the difference between her and myself is that I would never, ever attempt to exploit guilt or shame form someone to recruit them to my point of view.
So to summarise, McCain is dangerous, and his 'running mate' and potential US vice-president Palin is quite clearly no better. Her views on abortion, creationism, climate change and the constitutional right to bear arms show that she is out of touch with global* social, political and ecological concerns. Her children are named Piper, Willow, Bristol, Track and Trig. How, then, can she be expected to run the most powerful country in the world?
*Well, Western social, political and ecological concerns. I doubt there's many Saudi Arabians who support abortion, and China's not exactly hot on climate change, but I'm talking the the context of Westernization.
Politically, I'm pro-Europe. Britain has in recent years had a history of aligning itself politically and economically to the US and I think, personally, these moves should be towards the EU. If our economy wasn't so inexplicably intertwined with the US markets, we wouldn't all be feeling such fallout from the subprime crisis just because the Septics are incapable of taking out a mortgage properly or even running their own banks (I'm kidding!) I'm not saying I want us to go to war with the US or anything, like, we should always be total BFFs and... things (again, irony!) but I think that the UK gets swept up in a lot of decisions made by the American public without really getting their own say. That said, the actions of whoever wins the race to be the 44th president of the USA has inevitable implications for all six billion citizens living on planet earth, which is why I hope to God that America makes the right choice.
Irony, part I
A film called Smart People starring Sarash Jessica Parker.
She's neither 'intelligent' (as I believe the Americans interpret the word), nor 'well-dressed'. For anyone who disagrees with my second point, I'd direct you to stills from the wedding scene in the Sex and the City film in which she has a fucking peacock superglued to her head.
She's neither 'intelligent' (as I believe the Americans interpret the word), nor 'well-dressed'. For anyone who disagrees with my second point, I'd direct you to stills from the wedding scene in the Sex and the City film in which she has a fucking peacock superglued to her head.
Tuesday, 16 September 2008
Thought for the day
Even though my all-time favourite German-specific letter is the scharfes S, ß, I do have a penchant for all things umlaut. My favourite umlauted (because that's a word) letter is definitely U, as, in some fonts and type faces, it looks like a smiley face:
Ü
Ü
Monday, 15 September 2008
1 new msg
Ah, the mobile phone. Do you have any redeeming features? Okay, okay, apart from the fact that in German they refer to you as 'ein Handy', because you are a 'hand'-held phone (which is rather cute), is there actually anything that you're good for, apart from being a little satanic quadrangle of pain?
Well, let's have a looksie.
People with mobile phones are often exceptionally rude. When I serve them on the till at work, they think nothing of answering their hideous little oblong of misery as I'm trying to talk to them. People go for dinner and sit with their phones out on the table, just in case they receive a text that just can't wait until the meal's over for a reply, normally from some vacuous acquaintance about their equally vacuous new bit of fluff. Texting's exceptionally narcissistic and not really a favoured mode of communication amongst humanity's higher strata. I mean, let's face it... the serial texters are never discussing world politics or human rights in these exchanges, are they? It's always 'I'm going to get my hair done!' or 'Oooh! I've bought a new nail varnish!' or 'Look! A photo message of my dog dressed up like a fairy!'. You get my drift.
Basically, they make boring people look and feel important (especially those ones who drive Audis and have stupid bluetooth headsets) because they get to have conversations in public that couldn't possibly wait until they got home. Marvellous. I think we need more technological advancements to make stupid people feel like their mundane existences are exciting and important. I think we need to allow them self to construct and even more elaborate fallacy based around illusions of grandeur as they buy their Daily Mails and look like they're going to cry if they accidentally bump hands with the filthy, little shop girl. (That's what anti-bacterial handwash is for. Or Bleach.) So good.
Anyway, this blog is to bring you two stories from either side of the mobile phone spectrum. The first took place on Thursday evening as I was propping up the information point at work, trying to look busy as there was - quite simply - nothing to do. A very busy and (un)important woman in a cheap Primark suit (can't let them know I'm struggling with the repayments on my double parked Merc) came down the stairs, cardboard coffee cup for the woman on the move in one perfectly manicured hand, mobile phone inevitably clamped to her head in the other:
"...well I don't understand why they couldn't have used some of the gravel that was already on the drive.... Well, yes darling.... I'm not paying through the nose for imported gravel...... oh, grey? ..... Sounds lovely......"
I hear a lot of crap on mobile phones, but this one stuck in my mind. Why would you want or need to be having an urgent conversation about gravel at half past six on a Thursday night. I mean if you're getting your driveway done, surely the tradesmen (probably immigrants *shakes middle class fist*) will be gone by then? Surely it could have waited until you got home? But no.
From the other side of the spectrum, my boyfriend (who hates mobile phones nearly as much as I do) lost his rectangular Hell-box on Saturday night and assumed he'd left it on the staffroom table at work. Unlike the majority of the population, not having a mobile phone for an evening was not a big deal, and didn't cause him to sit in the corner of a darkened room, sobbing and lamenting how many text messages he was missing. Plus, we normally just turn our phones off anyway, so it didn't make much difference. (An aside, people always look at me like I've started dribbling on myself when I tell them I often turn my mobile phone off, or as if I'm imparting to them that I like to go out on an evening and rape cows or something else equally as unsavoury. Why? Why is it so hard to comprehend that I find the incessant BZZZT BZZZT of receiving text messages left, right and centre from my brainwashed peers ("I couldn't live without my phone!") really rather intrusive? Is that really so difficult to understand?)
Anyway, the next day at work it wasn't there, and he conceded he must have left it in the bowling alley where we'd been on Saturday night. As we left work and walked to my car (which was parked in the same place as the day before), he spotted it lying on the floor of the car park. I think that sums up my relationship with mobile phones perfectly; they should all be allowed to go on little camping trips every now and then... they should all be allowed to spend at least one night under the stars. Unsupervised. They grow up so fast.... *sob* you've just gotta learn when to let go...
It also proves that there is no crime in Gateshead. The streets are safe. The Daily Mail can shut up shop and relocate to somewhere where there 'is' actually crime. (Oh, wait... it can't possibly leave Britain, immigration n'all that.)
So the moral of this story is this: Gravel Woman? Maybe leave your phone in a car park over night. The world won't end, you'll remove yourself from your proverbial 'high horse' (possibly, though I do suspect you may be Super-glued on...), and you might realise that there's more to life that RSI in the thumbs and the possible rick of a brain tumour, all in the name of squeezing and compacting communication 2 lss thn 160 chrctrs.
TTYL BBZ x
Well, let's have a looksie.
People with mobile phones are often exceptionally rude. When I serve them on the till at work, they think nothing of answering their hideous little oblong of misery as I'm trying to talk to them. People go for dinner and sit with their phones out on the table, just in case they receive a text that just can't wait until the meal's over for a reply, normally from some vacuous acquaintance about their equally vacuous new bit of fluff. Texting's exceptionally narcissistic and not really a favoured mode of communication amongst humanity's higher strata. I mean, let's face it... the serial texters are never discussing world politics or human rights in these exchanges, are they? It's always 'I'm going to get my hair done!' or 'Oooh! I've bought a new nail varnish!' or 'Look! A photo message of my dog dressed up like a fairy!'. You get my drift.
Basically, they make boring people look and feel important (especially those ones who drive Audis and have stupid bluetooth headsets) because they get to have conversations in public that couldn't possibly wait until they got home. Marvellous. I think we need more technological advancements to make stupid people feel like their mundane existences are exciting and important. I think we need to allow them self to construct and even more elaborate fallacy based around illusions of grandeur as they buy their Daily Mails and look like they're going to cry if they accidentally bump hands with the filthy, little shop girl. (That's what anti-bacterial handwash is for. Or Bleach.) So good.
Anyway, this blog is to bring you two stories from either side of the mobile phone spectrum. The first took place on Thursday evening as I was propping up the information point at work, trying to look busy as there was - quite simply - nothing to do. A very busy and (un)important woman in a cheap Primark suit (can't let them know I'm struggling with the repayments on my double parked Merc) came down the stairs, cardboard coffee cup for the woman on the move in one perfectly manicured hand, mobile phone inevitably clamped to her head in the other:
"...well I don't understand why they couldn't have used some of the gravel that was already on the drive.... Well, yes darling.... I'm not paying through the nose for imported gravel...... oh, grey? ..... Sounds lovely......"
I hear a lot of crap on mobile phones, but this one stuck in my mind. Why would you want or need to be having an urgent conversation about gravel at half past six on a Thursday night. I mean if you're getting your driveway done, surely the tradesmen (probably immigrants *shakes middle class fist*) will be gone by then? Surely it could have waited until you got home? But no.
From the other side of the spectrum, my boyfriend (who hates mobile phones nearly as much as I do) lost his rectangular Hell-box on Saturday night and assumed he'd left it on the staffroom table at work. Unlike the majority of the population, not having a mobile phone for an evening was not a big deal, and didn't cause him to sit in the corner of a darkened room, sobbing and lamenting how many text messages he was missing. Plus, we normally just turn our phones off anyway, so it didn't make much difference. (An aside, people always look at me like I've started dribbling on myself when I tell them I often turn my mobile phone off, or as if I'm imparting to them that I like to go out on an evening and rape cows or something else equally as unsavoury. Why? Why is it so hard to comprehend that I find the incessant BZZZT BZZZT of receiving text messages left, right and centre from my brainwashed peers ("I couldn't live without my phone!") really rather intrusive? Is that really so difficult to understand?)
Anyway, the next day at work it wasn't there, and he conceded he must have left it in the bowling alley where we'd been on Saturday night. As we left work and walked to my car (which was parked in the same place as the day before), he spotted it lying on the floor of the car park. I think that sums up my relationship with mobile phones perfectly; they should all be allowed to go on little camping trips every now and then... they should all be allowed to spend at least one night under the stars. Unsupervised. They grow up so fast.... *sob* you've just gotta learn when to let go...
It also proves that there is no crime in Gateshead. The streets are safe. The Daily Mail can shut up shop and relocate to somewhere where there 'is' actually crime. (Oh, wait... it can't possibly leave Britain, immigration n'all that.)
So the moral of this story is this: Gravel Woman? Maybe leave your phone in a car park over night. The world won't end, you'll remove yourself from your proverbial 'high horse' (possibly, though I do suspect you may be Super-glued on...), and you might realise that there's more to life that RSI in the thumbs and the possible rick of a brain tumour, all in the name of squeezing and compacting communication 2 lss thn 160 chrctrs.
TTYL BBZ x
Let me entertain you
Up until 1988, Iceland only had one TV channel and it didn't broadcast on a Thursday, in order to encourage the citizens to 'do something active'. It is a medically accepted fact that a majority of Icelandic babies born prior to 1988 were conceived on a Thursday.
I look around and I wonder what would happen if a similar sort of thing was introduced in the UK. On Sky there's something ridiculous like 950 TV channels (and God-knows-how-many DAB radio channels) none of which actually have anything on. I'm not really a massive fan of television. I don't really want it. I think it's a distraction from the possibilities of the world. I'm not saying that I never watch TV (especially when David Tennant is on), it's just who wants to spend their evenings staring at a pixelated oblong? (I'm also talking to you, serial instant messenger users) What happened to conversation? To reading? To going out with your friends? The theatre, the cinema, the pub... whatever? People can't do that any more as they're ensconcing themselves in technological networks; watching TV and checking their MySpaces.
Technology is progress, or so they tell me. And once it arrives and establishes itself, there's no going back. Shops opening on Sundays, bank holidays, Boxing Day, New Year's Day... it would have been unthinkable thirty years ago. These were days of rest for every one. Days where you could spend time with your family or friends or just have some time to yourself to relax and do things you want to do. We're moving towards this twenty-four hour existence, and I wonder how long it'll be before our shopping centres are opening on Christmas Day. You may scoff, but I promise you, it's going to happen. The Metrocentre shopping centre next to where I live opens until 10 in the run up 'til Christmas, and the only reason that they can't keep it open until midnight (as they want to; I know someone who works in the management suite) is because they employ so many people still at school.
We're cultivating this ridiculous accelerated culture where we think that we need to move quickly to seem important. You drink your coffee form a cardboard cup and can order your lover online according to your exact specification (who has the time for first dates?) People are living their lives on finance and get so caught up in keeping up that there's no time to stop and appreciate the small things in life.
Now it exists, now it's established, there'd be outrage if we tried to take Sunday shopping away from people, and shutting down the TV stations on a Thursday would be out of the question. Why? Because people have lost the ability to entertain themselves. People are so used to having everything on tap, and everything to hand that they are incapable of thinking up new and innovative ways to keep themselves amused. In a cheap attempt to keep their already obscene profits as high as possible, TV corporations and chain stores feed people this bullshit about how they need to buy a new pair of shoes on a Sunday (on credit) and how their enjoyment of their Friday night will intensify a hundred fold if they tune in to the latest import-strength American drivel from FOX or CNN or whoever. We're born consumers, pound signs etched into our brains and the companies know that there's no profit to be made from those who shun advertising and who'd rather spend their evenings throwing a Frisbee around the park.
The people who enjoy spending night after night watching TV only do so because it masks the fact that they're not enjoying life that much after all. The solution? I'm thinking early-80s ReykjavÃk.
I look around and I wonder what would happen if a similar sort of thing was introduced in the UK. On Sky there's something ridiculous like 950 TV channels (and God-knows-how-many DAB radio channels) none of which actually have anything on. I'm not really a massive fan of television. I don't really want it. I think it's a distraction from the possibilities of the world. I'm not saying that I never watch TV (especially when David Tennant is on), it's just who wants to spend their evenings staring at a pixelated oblong? (I'm also talking to you, serial instant messenger users) What happened to conversation? To reading? To going out with your friends? The theatre, the cinema, the pub... whatever? People can't do that any more as they're ensconcing themselves in technological networks; watching TV and checking their MySpaces.
Technology is progress, or so they tell me. And once it arrives and establishes itself, there's no going back. Shops opening on Sundays, bank holidays, Boxing Day, New Year's Day... it would have been unthinkable thirty years ago. These were days of rest for every one. Days where you could spend time with your family or friends or just have some time to yourself to relax and do things you want to do. We're moving towards this twenty-four hour existence, and I wonder how long it'll be before our shopping centres are opening on Christmas Day. You may scoff, but I promise you, it's going to happen. The Metrocentre shopping centre next to where I live opens until 10 in the run up 'til Christmas, and the only reason that they can't keep it open until midnight (as they want to; I know someone who works in the management suite) is because they employ so many people still at school.
We're cultivating this ridiculous accelerated culture where we think that we need to move quickly to seem important. You drink your coffee form a cardboard cup and can order your lover online according to your exact specification (who has the time for first dates?) People are living their lives on finance and get so caught up in keeping up that there's no time to stop and appreciate the small things in life.
Now it exists, now it's established, there'd be outrage if we tried to take Sunday shopping away from people, and shutting down the TV stations on a Thursday would be out of the question. Why? Because people have lost the ability to entertain themselves. People are so used to having everything on tap, and everything to hand that they are incapable of thinking up new and innovative ways to keep themselves amused. In a cheap attempt to keep their already obscene profits as high as possible, TV corporations and chain stores feed people this bullshit about how they need to buy a new pair of shoes on a Sunday (on credit) and how their enjoyment of their Friday night will intensify a hundred fold if they tune in to the latest import-strength American drivel from FOX or CNN or whoever. We're born consumers, pound signs etched into our brains and the companies know that there's no profit to be made from those who shun advertising and who'd rather spend their evenings throwing a Frisbee around the park.
The people who enjoy spending night after night watching TV only do so because it masks the fact that they're not enjoying life that much after all. The solution? I'm thinking early-80s ReykjavÃk.
Thursday, 11 September 2008
Seven years on
I was in a Physics lesson when the 9/11 attacks in the USA happened. This wasn't when I found out about them; that was much later, but I remember working it out later, given the time difference and the order of events... I was sitting in a Physics lesson. I guess the magnitude of the events on the other side of the Atlantic, something I can't really even begin to explain, are devastatingly juxtaposed against the image of my fourteen year old self, staring out of the window into the unusually bright September sunshine, clock-watching, willing the lesson to end. Wholly disinterested in GCSE Physics and not overly ecstatic to be back at school.
I was fourteen years old.
I found out about the attacks a few hours later. When my sister and I were younger, we used to walk up to my Nana and Grandad's house after school, where we'd get biscuits and warm drinks in the winter and watch Countdown but never be able to crack the conundrum. I remember thinking it was strange that day, arriving at my Nana's house to find the television and radio off.
"Let's play cards or draughts or something instead, shall we?"
My Nana seemed somewhat frantic, but I guess I was really too young and self-absorbed to think too much about it. I think she figured she could maybe shield us from what was happening, maybe not forever, but an event like that was an unprecedented loss of innocence, something that myself and my nine year old sister probably weren't ready for. I spent a long period of my childhood overhearing but not really understanding stories of IRA terrorist attacks on the news. I had this recurring nightmare that would creep over into the day time that one day there'd be a knock on our door and one of my parents would answer it to an Irish soldier and be shot on sight. They'd rush our house and kill us all and it terrified me. Maybe it was naive of my Nana to think that she could protect us from something this big; maybe you don't agree with that level of censorship - but it was borne out of nothing but love. Who wants to have to explain something like that to two kids? Who really can? Where do you even begin?
It was a whole new conundrum, and it even had Carol stumped.
I think, in a way, time was on my side. At the age of fourteen, despite - like every other teenager in the world - thinking I knew it all, I was really too young too be able to even begin comprehending what was going on. I was detached from it. I remember my Mam picking us up and my Nana intercepting her in the hallway, and having a conversation in hushed tones
"It's like something out of horror movie"
And I think that's how I saw it. On our way home in the car, my Mam explained to me that there'd been attacks in America, and tried to explain in layman's terms (if such a think is possible) the concept of terrorism, fundamentalism, Islamic extremism. Thinking about the 9/11 attacks today makes tears prick at my eyes, and I don't say that to try and sound like a 'good' person or a humanitarian or whatever; I say it because it's true. I think it took a few years, a few anniversaries and X amounts of minutes' silences to really allow me to understand what had gone on that bright Manhattan morning when hate turned day to night. I grew up in a post-9/11 world and I think it has had an impact on me. I remember getting the bus to school the next day with my friends, one of whom has dual UK/US citizenship and who's family live in Pennsylvania, where United 93 came down. She'd had no sleep that night trying to contact her family, she didn't know whether they were alright or not. They were, thank goodness.
But what about those who weren't?
At the time, one of my best friends at school was Pakistani, and it had never been an issue before. Suddenly, people were giving her and the other Asian kids at the school sideways looks and glances, as if it was their fault, or maybe just because they were genuinely scared. Within our own group, even though the events in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania were all anyone could talk about, as soon as she happened upon the conversation it stopped dead. Not because we thought she was a terrorist or anything that ridiculous, but for the first time in any of our lives, race was an issue. We didn't want to offend her or upset her and we didn't know if talking about it in front of her would make her upset or angry or what. Again, it's not something I remember fondly, but it was a hard time. In all honesty, I think she preferred it that way. At the age of fourteen, all you want to do is fit in - being different is one thing, being different because you're labelled dangerous because of your heritage is something I can't even begin to imagine. We've discussed it since, and she told me it wasn't as hard as people imagine, or even as she thought it would be.
She told me she can't get on a plane now, without being treated like a criminal.
Whether you like to admit it or not, 9/11 changed the way non-Muslims view Islam, and that saddens me more than anything. If you see a Middle-Eastern face in the departure lounge, a part of you, sub-conscious or otherwise, hopes that they're not on your plane. It's not right and it's not a nice thing to admit, it's something that many people are uncomfortable with admitting, but it's true nonetheless. It's a devastating byproduct of being a part of the 9/11 generation: fear and suspicion. These two emotions are very dangerous as the majority of people aren't intelligent enough to convert these feelings into anything other than hatred. I don't think that this is because people are inherently 'bad' or 'evil', just ignorant and scared. I flew from Paris to Newcastle last January and there was a guy with a Pakistani passport on our flight. He let me in front of him in the boarding queue and just seemed a genuinely nice guy. That counted for nothing amid the uneasy looks of our fellow passengers. They weren't glances spiked with hatred or anger or malice; simply terror. Which is exactly what terrorism is designed to inspire.
But what the extremists don't seem to realise, is that they're making things as uncomfortable for 'their own', for Muslims as well as Christians, Jews, Hindus, Atheists and Jedis.
Surely that's defeating the point.
I hate the world how it is, and I hate the fact that religion, something that people are supposed to take comfort from, something that is touted as a set of rules to which one should adhere to lead a good and honest life, is predominantly the cause of it. I don't understand how someone can harbour so much hatred and anger towards another predominantly because their beliefs differ from their own. It's madness. I know eco-warriors and people who denounce global warming. I know hyper-liberal Guardianistas and right-wing, Hitler-esque Daily Mail readers. I know chavs and goths, readers and gamers, 22-year old virgins and people who've been shagging everything that moves since they gave it up to some guy named Terry in the back of a Nova at fourteen: Once you pop, you can't stop! People inevitably have different beliefs, interests, morals and ideals. We all see the world in different ways, want different things and have very different visions of our own, private Utopia, which is precisely why it can never exist. We seem to have lost the art of compromise, of tolerance.
No one seems to remember that we're all human.
It tears me up inside, as I realise that to most people, that counts for nothing.
Everyone is very quick to denounce 'Islamic Extremists', and I think with statistics on your side, that's very easy. The events of 9/11 still make me feel sick to the core: 2, 823 people died on that day in New York alone. 17 babies were born without fathers. We'd never seen anything of that magnitude before, and despite being too young to fully comprehend what was happening at the time, thinking about it in retrospect makes me feel - well - there's a torrent of adjectives I could use here, each laced with the utmost in negative connotation, but none of those are really appropriate. They're just words, and no matter how much I condemn what happened, it's never going to change the events of that day. Couple that with the subsequent al-Qaeda attacks in Bali, Madrid and London (I apologise if I've forgotten somewhere). Sure it's easy to hate the Muslims, right? But what about us? Dated 10 September 2006, this article from the Independent cites 62, 006 dead in the name of 'The War on Terror'. That's 20 times as many people who died in New York on September 11 2001 and that was two years ago; that number's risen every single day since then and will continue to do so. How are we okay with turning a blind eye to mass murder of Iraqi and Afghanistani people when it's essentially no different to what happened in New York, London... where ever? I think people justify it with a well they started it attitude. What are you, eight??!!
As Gandhi said, an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.
And I really think we're getting to a point where none of us can see.
Extremism isn't unique to Islam. People blather on all the time about 'strong Christian morals', but let's not forget Christianity's checkered history. In America's bible belt, today there are around 50, 000 militant Christians who believe that we are in the 'End Times' and that the Rapture is almost upon us. They support a US-invasion of Gaza and other areas of the Middle East because the sooner we eventually head into (what I hope is NOT) an inevitable nuclear war and the world is completely fucked, the sooner God will save all of them and unleash full-scale fire and brimstone on the rest of us. They don't care about us because we don't believe what they believe. A right to choose is not an option.
In this context, how is Christianity in middle America any less dangerous than Islam?
Just because they aren't flying planes into buildings and blowing up tubes doesn't mean their hatred isn't very real.
I'm not attempting to whip up any sort of backlash against Christianity here, I'm just trying to illustrate how it's very easy to only see what you want to see, and how much the media influences us. Constant reports on 'The Dangers of Islam' do nothing but reinforce the fear in people's minds; fear of what they don't understand. The fact of the matter is, 99.9999999% of Muslim people are not going to try blow you up. Fifteen years ago we were all terrified of the Irish, but now everyone's sort of forgotten about hat as a new subject for media scaremongering has emerged. All this does is lead to further segregation and hatred and whilst I'm not naive enough to think it will - or even could - go away over night, I wish it would. We're all people at the end of the day.
The events of 9/11 were truly abhorrent, and I know that for millions of Americans and other affected nationalities around the globe there are scars that will never heal. I can't even begin to imagine what it must have been like to see the towers come down in person, and I won't belittle what the people who had to endure that terror had to go through by attempting to guess what it might have been like. That would be disrespectful, and I don't see how it would help. All I know is that I don't want to live in a world like this, and it saddens me more that I can coherently explain that I don't have a choice.
I was fourteen years old.
I found out about the attacks a few hours later. When my sister and I were younger, we used to walk up to my Nana and Grandad's house after school, where we'd get biscuits and warm drinks in the winter and watch Countdown but never be able to crack the conundrum. I remember thinking it was strange that day, arriving at my Nana's house to find the television and radio off.
"Let's play cards or draughts or something instead, shall we?"
My Nana seemed somewhat frantic, but I guess I was really too young and self-absorbed to think too much about it. I think she figured she could maybe shield us from what was happening, maybe not forever, but an event like that was an unprecedented loss of innocence, something that myself and my nine year old sister probably weren't ready for. I spent a long period of my childhood overhearing but not really understanding stories of IRA terrorist attacks on the news. I had this recurring nightmare that would creep over into the day time that one day there'd be a knock on our door and one of my parents would answer it to an Irish soldier and be shot on sight. They'd rush our house and kill us all and it terrified me. Maybe it was naive of my Nana to think that she could protect us from something this big; maybe you don't agree with that level of censorship - but it was borne out of nothing but love. Who wants to have to explain something like that to two kids? Who really can? Where do you even begin?
It was a whole new conundrum, and it even had Carol stumped.
I think, in a way, time was on my side. At the age of fourteen, despite - like every other teenager in the world - thinking I knew it all, I was really too young too be able to even begin comprehending what was going on. I was detached from it. I remember my Mam picking us up and my Nana intercepting her in the hallway, and having a conversation in hushed tones
"It's like something out of horror movie"
And I think that's how I saw it. On our way home in the car, my Mam explained to me that there'd been attacks in America, and tried to explain in layman's terms (if such a think is possible) the concept of terrorism, fundamentalism, Islamic extremism. Thinking about the 9/11 attacks today makes tears prick at my eyes, and I don't say that to try and sound like a 'good' person or a humanitarian or whatever; I say it because it's true. I think it took a few years, a few anniversaries and X amounts of minutes' silences to really allow me to understand what had gone on that bright Manhattan morning when hate turned day to night. I grew up in a post-9/11 world and I think it has had an impact on me. I remember getting the bus to school the next day with my friends, one of whom has dual UK/US citizenship and who's family live in Pennsylvania, where United 93 came down. She'd had no sleep that night trying to contact her family, she didn't know whether they were alright or not. They were, thank goodness.
But what about those who weren't?
At the time, one of my best friends at school was Pakistani, and it had never been an issue before. Suddenly, people were giving her and the other Asian kids at the school sideways looks and glances, as if it was their fault, or maybe just because they were genuinely scared. Within our own group, even though the events in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania were all anyone could talk about, as soon as she happened upon the conversation it stopped dead. Not because we thought she was a terrorist or anything that ridiculous, but for the first time in any of our lives, race was an issue. We didn't want to offend her or upset her and we didn't know if talking about it in front of her would make her upset or angry or what. Again, it's not something I remember fondly, but it was a hard time. In all honesty, I think she preferred it that way. At the age of fourteen, all you want to do is fit in - being different is one thing, being different because you're labelled dangerous because of your heritage is something I can't even begin to imagine. We've discussed it since, and she told me it wasn't as hard as people imagine, or even as she thought it would be.
She told me she can't get on a plane now, without being treated like a criminal.
Whether you like to admit it or not, 9/11 changed the way non-Muslims view Islam, and that saddens me more than anything. If you see a Middle-Eastern face in the departure lounge, a part of you, sub-conscious or otherwise, hopes that they're not on your plane. It's not right and it's not a nice thing to admit, it's something that many people are uncomfortable with admitting, but it's true nonetheless. It's a devastating byproduct of being a part of the 9/11 generation: fear and suspicion. These two emotions are very dangerous as the majority of people aren't intelligent enough to convert these feelings into anything other than hatred. I don't think that this is because people are inherently 'bad' or 'evil', just ignorant and scared. I flew from Paris to Newcastle last January and there was a guy with a Pakistani passport on our flight. He let me in front of him in the boarding queue and just seemed a genuinely nice guy. That counted for nothing amid the uneasy looks of our fellow passengers. They weren't glances spiked with hatred or anger or malice; simply terror. Which is exactly what terrorism is designed to inspire.
But what the extremists don't seem to realise, is that they're making things as uncomfortable for 'their own', for Muslims as well as Christians, Jews, Hindus, Atheists and Jedis.
Surely that's defeating the point.
I hate the world how it is, and I hate the fact that religion, something that people are supposed to take comfort from, something that is touted as a set of rules to which one should adhere to lead a good and honest life, is predominantly the cause of it. I don't understand how someone can harbour so much hatred and anger towards another predominantly because their beliefs differ from their own. It's madness. I know eco-warriors and people who denounce global warming. I know hyper-liberal Guardianistas and right-wing, Hitler-esque Daily Mail readers. I know chavs and goths, readers and gamers, 22-year old virgins and people who've been shagging everything that moves since they gave it up to some guy named Terry in the back of a Nova at fourteen: Once you pop, you can't stop! People inevitably have different beliefs, interests, morals and ideals. We all see the world in different ways, want different things and have very different visions of our own, private Utopia, which is precisely why it can never exist. We seem to have lost the art of compromise, of tolerance.
No one seems to remember that we're all human.
It tears me up inside, as I realise that to most people, that counts for nothing.
Everyone is very quick to denounce 'Islamic Extremists', and I think with statistics on your side, that's very easy. The events of 9/11 still make me feel sick to the core: 2, 823 people died on that day in New York alone. 17 babies were born without fathers. We'd never seen anything of that magnitude before, and despite being too young to fully comprehend what was happening at the time, thinking about it in retrospect makes me feel - well - there's a torrent of adjectives I could use here, each laced with the utmost in negative connotation, but none of those are really appropriate. They're just words, and no matter how much I condemn what happened, it's never going to change the events of that day. Couple that with the subsequent al-Qaeda attacks in Bali, Madrid and London (I apologise if I've forgotten somewhere). Sure it's easy to hate the Muslims, right? But what about us? Dated 10 September 2006, this article from the Independent cites 62, 006 dead in the name of 'The War on Terror'. That's 20 times as many people who died in New York on September 11 2001 and that was two years ago; that number's risen every single day since then and will continue to do so. How are we okay with turning a blind eye to mass murder of Iraqi and Afghanistani people when it's essentially no different to what happened in New York, London... where ever? I think people justify it with a well they started it attitude. What are you, eight??!!
As Gandhi said, an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.
And I really think we're getting to a point where none of us can see.
Extremism isn't unique to Islam. People blather on all the time about 'strong Christian morals', but let's not forget Christianity's checkered history. In America's bible belt, today there are around 50, 000 militant Christians who believe that we are in the 'End Times' and that the Rapture is almost upon us. They support a US-invasion of Gaza and other areas of the Middle East because the sooner we eventually head into (what I hope is NOT) an inevitable nuclear war and the world is completely fucked, the sooner God will save all of them and unleash full-scale fire and brimstone on the rest of us. They don't care about us because we don't believe what they believe. A right to choose is not an option.
In this context, how is Christianity in middle America any less dangerous than Islam?
Just because they aren't flying planes into buildings and blowing up tubes doesn't mean their hatred isn't very real.
I'm not attempting to whip up any sort of backlash against Christianity here, I'm just trying to illustrate how it's very easy to only see what you want to see, and how much the media influences us. Constant reports on 'The Dangers of Islam' do nothing but reinforce the fear in people's minds; fear of what they don't understand. The fact of the matter is, 99.9999999% of Muslim people are not going to try blow you up. Fifteen years ago we were all terrified of the Irish, but now everyone's sort of forgotten about hat as a new subject for media scaremongering has emerged. All this does is lead to further segregation and hatred and whilst I'm not naive enough to think it will - or even could - go away over night, I wish it would. We're all people at the end of the day.
The events of 9/11 were truly abhorrent, and I know that for millions of Americans and other affected nationalities around the globe there are scars that will never heal. I can't even begin to imagine what it must have been like to see the towers come down in person, and I won't belittle what the people who had to endure that terror had to go through by attempting to guess what it might have been like. That would be disrespectful, and I don't see how it would help. All I know is that I don't want to live in a world like this, and it saddens me more that I can coherently explain that I don't have a choice.
Monday, 8 September 2008
Message in a bottle
I hate text messaging. I hate Instant Messenger. I hate telephones (especially mobile ones). I hate the fact that kids are growing up thinking that they can make 'friends' through websites like MySpace and Facebook, spending their lives glued to a computer screen seeking comfort in a 'comment' from some boy in Arkansas who's nothing but a few lines of carefully constructed text and an image in a 100x100 square. Technology is killing communication. What's more divisive and lonely than the image of an awkward fourteen year old girl, socially inept and feeling isolated, cutting herself off even further from reality and spending all of her evenings typing away frantically to someone hundred of miles away? Yeah, my best friend lives in Plymouth. I met her on Livejournal. How is she ever going to break out of that rut and gain some confidence if she shields herself away from life and all of its possibilities?
I used to really judge people like this. There were girls in my year who had 'online boyfriends' and people who spent all of their time on MSN chatting to people they'd never met save for a few private messages on faceparty.com (as was the social networking site of choice back in the day!) But, hey, a lot of people aren't as lucky as me, and now I understand that these technological 'relationships' are borne out of nought but loneliness and desperation. It's an outlet for those who feel misunderstood and isolated to connect with others who 'totally get them' (pardon the cliches, but it's usually the Emo-type kids!) My problem is, though, friendships, relationships, whatever... they need to be tangible, they need to have substance. We're creating a world where a lack of companionship can be polyfillaed in by websites like this. But to me, it's kind of like putting a rug over a stain, rather than scrubbing it out. The loneliness won't go away and quick fixes never work; it'll only make you lonelier.
Now as I wander back form this tangent, I come back to the original subject of this blog: communication. Apart from their divisive qualities (and before you all get on at me as a hypocrite, I do recognise the positives of social networking websites too - they're a handy way of keeping in contact with people...), social networking sites bore me. In the context of communication, what are they? Jut a glorified instant messenger. The hardly have the substance or the romance of a letter, do they? (Not that anyone ever sits down and writes letters any more.) The Internet facilitates doing things more quickly and efficiently; email is faster than 'snail mail', hence we feel like we need to do these things faster. We're fed these ridiculous lines about how busy people are more important and we buy into some sort of accelerated culture to make ourselves seem more cosmopolitan.
Why?
The other evening we drove to Bamburgh and sat on the beach as the sun went down. In the fading light, against a golden sky, illuminated with pink, scarlet and flashes of aqua we wrote a message in a bottle and threw it out to sea as the tide came in. Against the backdrop of one of the most amazing sunsets I've ever seen and under the watchful eye of the castle, the stubborn tide kept forcing our message back, again and again. We edged further out to sea, our clothes getting soaked and our legs becoming progressively more numb, hurling the bottle out again and again only for the obnoxious ocean to scupper our efforts. You're no King Canute. Eventually, when neither of us could feel any of our extremities (paddling in the North Sea in September is never the warmest of experiences...) we gave the bottle one last almighty hurl and hoped for the best. It washed back up onto the shore, but the tide was coming in.... I hope that it relented in its objections to our message and carried it back out when it turned.
Sometimes I feel overwhelmed by all of this technology. I feel like it's killing everything we know; books, history, friendship, communication - it's all evolving and changing... and not necessarily for the better. Sometimes I feel like it's blocking all our attempts to preserve older ways of doing things. Don't want a book shelf full of books? Try an iLiad Reader! Don't want to talk to people? Send a text message! Don't want to meet your future husband face to face? Try match.com (it's a romantic story for the grand-kids!) Designer babies, cars on finance, credit, debit, express lanes in supermarkets. Check in online if you're only carrying handbaggage. Am I the only one who realises there's more to life than speed and efficiency? Maybe that's why I'm investing so much faith that the tide changed its mind and played postman to our letter - I guess I need someone else to realise that there's more to life than this whole who has the time? mindset. Soemtiming as old and wise as the ocean must surely understand why we - humanity - need more messages in bottles and less 'new notifications'.
Please?
So, where is that bottle now? It could be in Scandinavia or washed up on an oil rig in the North Sea. It might be en route to Europe or have worked its way up 'round Scotland and be halfway to Canada in the middle of the Atlantic. Maybe it never washed back out and a dog picked it up, having mistaken it for a stick, and carried it home with real pride; a souvenir of his walk on the beach. Maybe its still there, waiting for someone like us to come alond and pick it up right where we left it. That doesn't make it any less magic. All I know is that one day someone, somewhere - whether it's a walker five minutes down the coast at Bamburgh or someone sunbathing on Bondi Beach - will find that bottle, pick it up, and read what we wrote to them. I hope it makes them smile, and I hope they appreciate it. I hope they understand.
Forget text messages, instant messenger and social networking....
THAT'S real communication.
I used to really judge people like this. There were girls in my year who had 'online boyfriends' and people who spent all of their time on MSN chatting to people they'd never met save for a few private messages on faceparty.com (as was the social networking site of choice back in the day!) But, hey, a lot of people aren't as lucky as me, and now I understand that these technological 'relationships' are borne out of nought but loneliness and desperation. It's an outlet for those who feel misunderstood and isolated to connect with others who 'totally get them' (pardon the cliches, but it's usually the Emo-type kids!) My problem is, though, friendships, relationships, whatever... they need to be tangible, they need to have substance. We're creating a world where a lack of companionship can be polyfillaed in by websites like this. But to me, it's kind of like putting a rug over a stain, rather than scrubbing it out. The loneliness won't go away and quick fixes never work; it'll only make you lonelier.
Now as I wander back form this tangent, I come back to the original subject of this blog: communication. Apart from their divisive qualities (and before you all get on at me as a hypocrite, I do recognise the positives of social networking websites too - they're a handy way of keeping in contact with people...), social networking sites bore me. In the context of communication, what are they? Jut a glorified instant messenger. The hardly have the substance or the romance of a letter, do they? (Not that anyone ever sits down and writes letters any more.) The Internet facilitates doing things more quickly and efficiently; email is faster than 'snail mail', hence we feel like we need to do these things faster. We're fed these ridiculous lines about how busy people are more important and we buy into some sort of accelerated culture to make ourselves seem more cosmopolitan.
Why?
The other evening we drove to Bamburgh and sat on the beach as the sun went down. In the fading light, against a golden sky, illuminated with pink, scarlet and flashes of aqua we wrote a message in a bottle and threw it out to sea as the tide came in. Against the backdrop of one of the most amazing sunsets I've ever seen and under the watchful eye of the castle, the stubborn tide kept forcing our message back, again and again. We edged further out to sea, our clothes getting soaked and our legs becoming progressively more numb, hurling the bottle out again and again only for the obnoxious ocean to scupper our efforts. You're no King Canute. Eventually, when neither of us could feel any of our extremities (paddling in the North Sea in September is never the warmest of experiences...) we gave the bottle one last almighty hurl and hoped for the best. It washed back up onto the shore, but the tide was coming in.... I hope that it relented in its objections to our message and carried it back out when it turned.
Sometimes I feel overwhelmed by all of this technology. I feel like it's killing everything we know; books, history, friendship, communication - it's all evolving and changing... and not necessarily for the better. Sometimes I feel like it's blocking all our attempts to preserve older ways of doing things. Don't want a book shelf full of books? Try an iLiad Reader! Don't want to talk to people? Send a text message! Don't want to meet your future husband face to face? Try match.com (it's a romantic story for the grand-kids!) Designer babies, cars on finance, credit, debit, express lanes in supermarkets. Check in online if you're only carrying handbaggage. Am I the only one who realises there's more to life than speed and efficiency? Maybe that's why I'm investing so much faith that the tide changed its mind and played postman to our letter - I guess I need someone else to realise that there's more to life than this whole who has the time? mindset. Soemtiming as old and wise as the ocean must surely understand why we - humanity - need more messages in bottles and less 'new notifications'.
Please?
So, where is that bottle now? It could be in Scandinavia or washed up on an oil rig in the North Sea. It might be en route to Europe or have worked its way up 'round Scotland and be halfway to Canada in the middle of the Atlantic. Maybe it never washed back out and a dog picked it up, having mistaken it for a stick, and carried it home with real pride; a souvenir of his walk on the beach. Maybe its still there, waiting for someone like us to come alond and pick it up right where we left it. That doesn't make it any less magic. All I know is that one day someone, somewhere - whether it's a walker five minutes down the coast at Bamburgh or someone sunbathing on Bondi Beach - will find that bottle, pick it up, and read what we wrote to them. I hope it makes them smile, and I hope they appreciate it. I hope they understand.
Forget text messages, instant messenger and social networking....
THAT'S real communication.
Thursday, 28 August 2008
How I Write (by Andrew)
Since Kim's set this blog up mainly to reconnect with writing, I thought I'd add my own thoughts on how I write. I'm no authority on the subject, but every little helps.
So...
Forget that old notion that you need peace and quiet, I need chaos and noise and distractions. I don't like my environment ro be sterile, I like it to be full of inspiration; in short, everything that is familiar to me. It's always been like that. I've tried creating environments without distraction, where everything is nice and quiet and I can concentrate on my work. Except it doesn't work. I get bored, because until I get into the flow of things (if at all) I need to fidget and be distractable. I've built my room the way I want it, and it has everything in it that I want and need.
I have to decide beforehand that I'm going to write. Usually the day before. If I pick up my laptop and open Word on a whim, I may end up with a few lines, but that will probably be all. I need to have agreed with myself that tomorrow is a writing day. Most of the time it comes about because I actually have ideas that I want to get down. I don't think you can force it otherwise. Personally, I need to be excited about it.
I try to be up early. If I lie in I feel tired and groggy and uninspired. A cup of tea is a must, followed by another. Usually I'll sit around, check my e-mails or what-have-you, make some more tea, look around my room. Finally, I'll open my laptop, open Word and load whatever it is I'm writing.
When I'm writing, I have to use Word, and I have to have the document arranged to A5. When I was younger I used to do this to make my work look like the size of a normal paperback book, and the habit has stuck. I can't write anything otherwise.
Once I've opened the document, I'll usually go make some more tea, maybe have some breakfast. I might take a shower, I might not (sometimes I wait until I've finished writing). After that I'll probably sit down, type a few lines, browse the internet for a bit more. Maybe I'll put some music on.
When I start writing proper, I like to have some appropriate music. Sometimes this is the catalyst for my writing, a signal to my brain that tells it that it's time for work. Sometimes, if I have a particular feeling in mind, I'll put one song on repeat, turn it up loud, and block out everything else. Other times I let i-Tunes make its own mind up. Once I'm absorbed in writing, it tends to drift away anyway. If i run out of tea I'll go and make some more. No exception.
That's how I do it. It's a seemingly random and chaotic method of working that nevertheless is rigidly structured and usually has me strung out on tea by midday. I tend not to proof read any of my work, or read over it as I'm typing. I just let whatever's in my head come out, and once it's down I shut the laptop and forget about it. I'm usually thinking about what I'm going to write next.
Another thing: I try not to look at anything I write for a while after it's written. A month or two is probably preferable, just to get some distance, so that when you come back to it it's fresh and new. It makes it easier to be objective.
So...
Forget that old notion that you need peace and quiet, I need chaos and noise and distractions. I don't like my environment ro be sterile, I like it to be full of inspiration; in short, everything that is familiar to me. It's always been like that. I've tried creating environments without distraction, where everything is nice and quiet and I can concentrate on my work. Except it doesn't work. I get bored, because until I get into the flow of things (if at all) I need to fidget and be distractable. I've built my room the way I want it, and it has everything in it that I want and need.
I have to decide beforehand that I'm going to write. Usually the day before. If I pick up my laptop and open Word on a whim, I may end up with a few lines, but that will probably be all. I need to have agreed with myself that tomorrow is a writing day. Most of the time it comes about because I actually have ideas that I want to get down. I don't think you can force it otherwise. Personally, I need to be excited about it.
I try to be up early. If I lie in I feel tired and groggy and uninspired. A cup of tea is a must, followed by another. Usually I'll sit around, check my e-mails or what-have-you, make some more tea, look around my room. Finally, I'll open my laptop, open Word and load whatever it is I'm writing.
When I'm writing, I have to use Word, and I have to have the document arranged to A5. When I was younger I used to do this to make my work look like the size of a normal paperback book, and the habit has stuck. I can't write anything otherwise.
Once I've opened the document, I'll usually go make some more tea, maybe have some breakfast. I might take a shower, I might not (sometimes I wait until I've finished writing). After that I'll probably sit down, type a few lines, browse the internet for a bit more. Maybe I'll put some music on.
When I start writing proper, I like to have some appropriate music. Sometimes this is the catalyst for my writing, a signal to my brain that tells it that it's time for work. Sometimes, if I have a particular feeling in mind, I'll put one song on repeat, turn it up loud, and block out everything else. Other times I let i-Tunes make its own mind up. Once I'm absorbed in writing, it tends to drift away anyway. If i run out of tea I'll go and make some more. No exception.
That's how I do it. It's a seemingly random and chaotic method of working that nevertheless is rigidly structured and usually has me strung out on tea by midday. I tend not to proof read any of my work, or read over it as I'm typing. I just let whatever's in my head come out, and once it's down I shut the laptop and forget about it. I'm usually thinking about what I'm going to write next.
Another thing: I try not to look at anything I write for a while after it's written. A month or two is probably preferable, just to get some distance, so that when you come back to it it's fresh and new. It makes it easier to be objective.
Goodbye
It doesn't matter whether you're leaving for four days, four weeks or four months. Maybe it'll be four years, and the Olympics visit more frequently than you. Saying goodbye is never easy. I know I've had it easy, I've never had to say that many goodbyes, and the ones I have had to say have only been for a small amount of time. Sometimes I've wanted to say goodbye and not been able to, which only had a detrimental imapct on things in the long run. Sometimes I've missed my chance to say goodbye to someone, and still regret it to this day. It's a horrible word, a lonely word. It breeds segregation, and a lot of the time signals a chapter of your life coming to an end.
Tonight I said goodbye for a little while as I'm going to France. I know it's not long, and I am looking forward to going, but I think sometimes you don't realise how integral a person can be to your entire existence until you're faced with the prospect of spending some time without them. I'm not saying I'll spend the entire time I'm away sobbing in le corner, but I think it will be strange only having minimal contact with someone so important to me. I guess the finality of saying goodbye threw up all sorts of questions, memories - not all of them ones that I'm entirely comfortable with - and even though it's for merely nanoseconds in the grand scheme of things, it doesn't mean that I won't miss the things here very, very much.
But, as much as I'm looking forward to going away and all the fun I'll have, I guess I can count myself doubley lucky that I have a reason to look forward to coming home again; a hotdog and a game of bowling with my name on it :D
Incidentally, for the next few days, as I am in France, I won't be able to contribute to this. Sigh. Failure at the tenth hurdle. I know the idea was to post once every day, but I promise I'll make up for it when I get home. Once I've readjusted after a spell on Planet Travel, and spent some quality time with the boy I'm (reluctantly) leaving behind.
Tonight I said goodbye for a little while as I'm going to France. I know it's not long, and I am looking forward to going, but I think sometimes you don't realise how integral a person can be to your entire existence until you're faced with the prospect of spending some time without them. I'm not saying I'll spend the entire time I'm away sobbing in le corner, but I think it will be strange only having minimal contact with someone so important to me. I guess the finality of saying goodbye threw up all sorts of questions, memories - not all of them ones that I'm entirely comfortable with - and even though it's for merely nanoseconds in the grand scheme of things, it doesn't mean that I won't miss the things here very, very much.
But, as much as I'm looking forward to going away and all the fun I'll have, I guess I can count myself doubley lucky that I have a reason to look forward to coming home again; a hotdog and a game of bowling with my name on it :D
Incidentally, for the next few days, as I am in France, I won't be able to contribute to this. Sigh. Failure at the tenth hurdle. I know the idea was to post once every day, but I promise I'll make up for it when I get home. Once I've readjusted after a spell on Planet Travel, and spent some quality time with the boy I'm (reluctantly) leaving behind.
Sting Ray
I drove past a sign today on the way into Alnwick which read Children's Play Area. Thing is, the l was kinda small, stuntend and slanty, leaning against the P like a sleepy back slash, in need of a rest. Any way, this made the P and l look a little like an R, which obviously at first glance looked as if the sign was advertising a - rather ominous sounding - Children's Ray Area.
Which gave me a wonderful image of all these obnoxious children that one comes across these days being dumped into a huge tank of Manta Rays and Sting Rays (maybe a few Electric Eels for good measure.) That's one way to sort out these 'youths' I keep hearing so much about. Acquatic discipline. That's what we need!
Made me giggle.
Which gave me a wonderful image of all these obnoxious children that one comes across these days being dumped into a huge tank of Manta Rays and Sting Rays (maybe a few Electric Eels for good measure.) That's one way to sort out these 'youths' I keep hearing so much about. Acquatic discipline. That's what we need!
Made me giggle.
Tuesday, 26 August 2008
Football: Some musings.
I really, really don't understand our national fascination with football. Sure, people need to have hobbies, things that interest and them, and I'd never proclaim something to be unworthy or devoid of any entertainment based purely on the fact that I don't like it, but football... I just don't get it. And that's not just because it's something that I, personally, don't enjoy.
Grown men who don't shed tears at funerals are transformed into a sobbing mass of mucus and pain when their team get knocked out of some competition and therefore remove themselves from the possibility of winning some wholly unimportant shiny silver trophy. Like druids involved in some sort of collective hypnotism, a shared religious experience, crowds recount chants - word perfect - and take part in very precise rituals. They dress in appropriate robes (£44.99 from JJB Sports for the basic replica shirt) and chips and beer are their bread and wine as they seek absolution from their everyday lives. Genuine anger and hatred can be conjured for rivals and referees who give decisions the 'wrong' way, and players can be vilified, held up for their heroics or even both in the course of a ninety minute ceremony, all to the backdrop of subconscious cliche conditioning by 'pundits' and 'commentators'; those we look to, those who's expertise we can buy into, reshape and pass off as our own:
It's a game of two halves
There's no love lost between those two
He's in acres of space
That's a beautiful pass
They desperately need those points
People - many of whom are totally blue-collar - are prepared to fork out extortionate amounts of money every year, to trundle down to a glorified school field once a week in order to get depressed. I think of the season ticket fee as a optional misery tax that some people choose to pay. It's like £500, £600 pr year, quite often paid by those who can't afford it. And that's not all. Being a football fan is an expensive occupation... price hikes on replica shirts, £4.00 for a pint of watered down lager in the stadium and the cost of travelling around Europe cheering on your team in international competitions (until they're inevitable knocked out by some Spanish team who are just, well, better.)
It's no wonder people are in such debt.
I think it's wholly irresponsible of football clubs to exploit their fans, the majority of whom are made up from the working classes and therefore from lower-income backgrounds (sorry about that hideously stereotyped generalisation, there... feel free to correct me if you know otherwise.) I don't know what causes this national obsession, this indoctrination into the way of the soccerball, and neither do the fat men in suits fill the boardrooms of these stadiums who are all buying a new Mercedes a week from money that would be better spend in trust funds for the average fan's kids. All they do know is, it's there. This need to follow a team, the comradery, the spirit, whatever. And like all opportunists they feed on it and they exploit it, squeezing every last penny out of those who cannot really afford it. It's like Robin Hood in reverse.
And where does the money go? Football clubs are multi-billion pound businesses now. Many could argue (probably correctly) that if we didn't feed all of this money into them, the economy would suffer. Gone are the days of friends kicking a ball around in the park, falling over in muddy puddles, scraping knees and getting home in time for tea. Grass roots morph into designer suits as fans' money is used to pay greedy, spoilt brats ridiculous amounts of money (I think some 'top players' - awful phrase - in the UK are on £200 000 per week) just because they can push a ball into a net with their foot. Wow. Big skill. Silly, little boys as young as sixteen suddenly have more money than you or I could ever even comprehend having access to, and whilst fans struggle to feed their families and make sacrifices on luxury items during this period of economic recession, they crash a Ferrari a week and fall our of VIP nightclubs, wasted off their face. You hear about Joey Barton beating the crap out of some guy in Liverpool who was just minding his own business, but no real action is taken because he's got money. Lee Bowyer and Jonathon Woodgate were 'allegedly' involved in a racially motivated attack, but nothing happened because they've got money. You hear about 'roasting' scandals and gang rape, but it's all brushed under the carpet with a boys will be boys mentality.
Because they've got money.
Too much money.
Personally, I'd cap the wage of everyone involved in football in any capacity to £30 000 per annum and give all of the other revenue that this obsession generates to public services, especially the NHS. How can we, as a society, justify having nurses on, like £15 000 per year, when almost every professional footballer in this country earns more in one week than the majority of us could dream about earning in our entire lives. People who are integral to society, rather than little boys who are, really, just entertainers. They should be the ones who feel disposable, not the people who are saving our lives every day.
Just thinking about the inequality makes me so angry. Professional sports stars (and other vacuous 'celebrities') earn FAR TOO MUCH MONEY. I know we're all capitalists here in the Western world n'all, but what kind of message is this sending out to kids? Nah, little Billy, don't bother training to be a paramedic. You'll make much more money kicking a ball around for ten years, or - if you're not bright enough - wait 'til you're sixteen and shag that girl who got her boobs out on Big Brother. The fee the Daily Star'll pay you will set you up for life. (And you can afford to go private for your Chlamydia treatment... provided, of course, any one bothers to study medicine any more.............)
That's why they get themselves in so much trouble; they can't handle the responsibility; splash out, engage in complete financial excess... and this quite often has detrimental consequences. This never used to happen fifty years ago, when football was played by normal men on normal wages, who just wanted to enjoy themselves. People don't become footballers now because they genuinely care about the sport, or because they genuinely care about the fans. Sure, they sign for a new team and get pushed in front of a dozen flashbulbs and utter a few words about a 'great club' with 'an amazing atmosphere', but all they care about is buying into the cult of celebrity. And really, who's fault is that? It's a sad fact about the society we live in that anyone can make enough money if they're desperate enough. So who am I to judge a teenager who is offered a multi-million pound contract purely because he can kick a ball in a straight line? Why shouldn't he make money from calendar sales and shirts with his name on and magazine shoots where he models clothes for some ridiculously overpriced label that he'd probably never wear himself in real life, but all his impressionable young fans will go out and buy in a bid to emulate their heroes 'look'? What does it matter?
Because, like parasites, they're leeching off their fans - the people who really pay their wages - without giving a crap about giving anything back. It's a complete lack of gratitude.
And that's the definition of disrespect.
You could argue that if there people are stupid enough to feed all of their disposable income and then some into following football, then they can't complain. No one's forcing them to, so what does it matter? Thing is, the majority aren't bright enough to make the distinction between enjoyment and exploitation. It's irresponsible to encourage those who don't realise that they can't afford it, and that's precisely what the clubs are doing.
Grown men who don't shed tears at funerals are transformed into a sobbing mass of mucus and pain when their team get knocked out of some competition and therefore remove themselves from the possibility of winning some wholly unimportant shiny silver trophy. Like druids involved in some sort of collective hypnotism, a shared religious experience, crowds recount chants - word perfect - and take part in very precise rituals. They dress in appropriate robes (£44.99 from JJB Sports for the basic replica shirt) and chips and beer are their bread and wine as they seek absolution from their everyday lives. Genuine anger and hatred can be conjured for rivals and referees who give decisions the 'wrong' way, and players can be vilified, held up for their heroics or even both in the course of a ninety minute ceremony, all to the backdrop of subconscious cliche conditioning by 'pundits' and 'commentators'; those we look to, those who's expertise we can buy into, reshape and pass off as our own:
It's a game of two halves
There's no love lost between those two
He's in acres of space
That's a beautiful pass
They desperately need those points
People - many of whom are totally blue-collar - are prepared to fork out extortionate amounts of money every year, to trundle down to a glorified school field once a week in order to get depressed. I think of the season ticket fee as a optional misery tax that some people choose to pay. It's like £500, £600 pr year, quite often paid by those who can't afford it. And that's not all. Being a football fan is an expensive occupation... price hikes on replica shirts, £4.00 for a pint of watered down lager in the stadium and the cost of travelling around Europe cheering on your team in international competitions (until they're inevitable knocked out by some Spanish team who are just, well, better.)
It's no wonder people are in such debt.
I think it's wholly irresponsible of football clubs to exploit their fans, the majority of whom are made up from the working classes and therefore from lower-income backgrounds (sorry about that hideously stereotyped generalisation, there... feel free to correct me if you know otherwise.) I don't know what causes this national obsession, this indoctrination into the way of the soccerball, and neither do the fat men in suits fill the boardrooms of these stadiums who are all buying a new Mercedes a week from money that would be better spend in trust funds for the average fan's kids. All they do know is, it's there. This need to follow a team, the comradery, the spirit, whatever. And like all opportunists they feed on it and they exploit it, squeezing every last penny out of those who cannot really afford it. It's like Robin Hood in reverse.
And where does the money go? Football clubs are multi-billion pound businesses now. Many could argue (probably correctly) that if we didn't feed all of this money into them, the economy would suffer. Gone are the days of friends kicking a ball around in the park, falling over in muddy puddles, scraping knees and getting home in time for tea. Grass roots morph into designer suits as fans' money is used to pay greedy, spoilt brats ridiculous amounts of money (I think some 'top players' - awful phrase - in the UK are on £200 000 per week) just because they can push a ball into a net with their foot. Wow. Big skill. Silly, little boys as young as sixteen suddenly have more money than you or I could ever even comprehend having access to, and whilst fans struggle to feed their families and make sacrifices on luxury items during this period of economic recession, they crash a Ferrari a week and fall our of VIP nightclubs, wasted off their face. You hear about Joey Barton beating the crap out of some guy in Liverpool who was just minding his own business, but no real action is taken because he's got money. Lee Bowyer and Jonathon Woodgate were 'allegedly' involved in a racially motivated attack, but nothing happened because they've got money. You hear about 'roasting' scandals and gang rape, but it's all brushed under the carpet with a boys will be boys mentality.
Because they've got money.
Too much money.
Personally, I'd cap the wage of everyone involved in football in any capacity to £30 000 per annum and give all of the other revenue that this obsession generates to public services, especially the NHS. How can we, as a society, justify having nurses on, like £15 000 per year, when almost every professional footballer in this country earns more in one week than the majority of us could dream about earning in our entire lives. People who are integral to society, rather than little boys who are, really, just entertainers. They should be the ones who feel disposable, not the people who are saving our lives every day.
Just thinking about the inequality makes me so angry. Professional sports stars (and other vacuous 'celebrities') earn FAR TOO MUCH MONEY. I know we're all capitalists here in the Western world n'all, but what kind of message is this sending out to kids? Nah, little Billy, don't bother training to be a paramedic. You'll make much more money kicking a ball around for ten years, or - if you're not bright enough - wait 'til you're sixteen and shag that girl who got her boobs out on Big Brother. The fee the Daily Star'll pay you will set you up for life. (And you can afford to go private for your Chlamydia treatment... provided, of course, any one bothers to study medicine any more.............)
That's why they get themselves in so much trouble; they can't handle the responsibility; splash out, engage in complete financial excess... and this quite often has detrimental consequences. This never used to happen fifty years ago, when football was played by normal men on normal wages, who just wanted to enjoy themselves. People don't become footballers now because they genuinely care about the sport, or because they genuinely care about the fans. Sure, they sign for a new team and get pushed in front of a dozen flashbulbs and utter a few words about a 'great club' with 'an amazing atmosphere', but all they care about is buying into the cult of celebrity. And really, who's fault is that? It's a sad fact about the society we live in that anyone can make enough money if they're desperate enough. So who am I to judge a teenager who is offered a multi-million pound contract purely because he can kick a ball in a straight line? Why shouldn't he make money from calendar sales and shirts with his name on and magazine shoots where he models clothes for some ridiculously overpriced label that he'd probably never wear himself in real life, but all his impressionable young fans will go out and buy in a bid to emulate their heroes 'look'? What does it matter?
Because, like parasites, they're leeching off their fans - the people who really pay their wages - without giving a crap about giving anything back. It's a complete lack of gratitude.
And that's the definition of disrespect.
You could argue that if there people are stupid enough to feed all of their disposable income and then some into following football, then they can't complain. No one's forcing them to, so what does it matter? Thing is, the majority aren't bright enough to make the distinction between enjoyment and exploitation. It's irresponsible to encourage those who don't realise that they can't afford it, and that's precisely what the clubs are doing.
Monday, 25 August 2008
Life, death and prizes!
There is a magazine on sale in the shop where I work - possibly called Chat! or Now! or something similar, that has the tag line Life, death and prizes!!!!!! (All of which appear to be nestled in between stories of the girl who's tortoise sat on her head and nearly killed her, a child who dialled 999 when its mother was attacked by a wayward albatross and a man who left his wife to sleep with his sister's pet Border Collie.)
Life, death and prizes!
I'm not even kidding.
People will buy anything. It genuinely bemuses me. They'll spend 68p (or whatever) on that, but won't fork out a few more pounds for something like Oscar Wilde, William Shakespeare, Douglas Coupland. Why? How come we stigmatise books, all of which are bursting with entertainment, imagination and wonderment, and yet hold up there glorified leaflets, monosyllabic transcripts of Jeremy Kyle episodes as genuine, worthwhile reads.
There is literally nothing else I can say about that right now.
Life, death and prizes!
I'm not even kidding.
People will buy anything. It genuinely bemuses me. They'll spend 68p (or whatever) on that, but won't fork out a few more pounds for something like Oscar Wilde, William Shakespeare, Douglas Coupland. Why? How come we stigmatise books, all of which are bursting with entertainment, imagination and wonderment, and yet hold up there glorified leaflets, monosyllabic transcripts of Jeremy Kyle episodes as genuine, worthwhile reads.
There is literally nothing else I can say about that right now.
Thought for the day
Families are weird.
You love them, you like them, but if you weren't related to them, chances are you wouldn't want to have anything to do with them. This doesn't apply to everyone, but after an awkward encounter of non-conversation with my cousin today, I found myself thinking, how many of these people would I actually want to be spending my time with if my blood ties didn't require me to?
Admittedly, quite a lot. I'm quite lucky in that a lot of my extended family are very nice and genuinely entertaining... but a few of them? I am honestly not entirely sure we've come from the same gene pool.
You love them, you like them, but if you weren't related to them, chances are you wouldn't want to have anything to do with them. This doesn't apply to everyone, but after an awkward encounter of non-conversation with my cousin today, I found myself thinking, how many of these people would I actually want to be spending my time with if my blood ties didn't require me to?
Admittedly, quite a lot. I'm quite lucky in that a lot of my extended family are very nice and genuinely entertaining... but a few of them? I am honestly not entirely sure we've come from the same gene pool.
Saturday, 23 August 2008
Writer's Block
Okay, so I'm failing at this already. Like, four days in and I can't think of anything to write. But I guess that was the challenge, right? I mean I want to push myself, to improve, to be able to have a period of three hundred and sixty five days over which retrospectively show me how I have grown and - hopefully - improved as a writer. That's hardly going to happen if on my sixth post I just blather on about how uninspired I'm feeling, is it?
And so we push on.
Writer's block affects us all from time to time. I always struggle with the term writer's block. Being, as I am, a huge grammar geek, I wonder about the apostrophe. It bothers me a lot; haunts me in my dreams (no, really....) Surely writer's block afflicts all writers technically rendering it writers' block. Although, however, when one is using the phrase, one is generally referring solely to oneself, which would again shift that little trickster of the punctuation world one space back to the left: writer's block. Hmm. Maybe it doesn't really matter, but these are the kind of things that bother me. I blame text messaging and the Internet - but that's a whole new blog for a whole new day! (Yes! I think I just inspired myself!)
As I'm referring to myself, I guess I'll punctuate it as in one singular writer suffering from the affliction. If you'd care to correct me on this one, or have any idea as to clearing up this confusion, please do not hesitate to contact me. I lose sleep over contexts where I'm not one hundred percent clear on the apostrophe. True story.
And so to writer's block. What I always wonder is, what precisely is this 'block' that I keep hearing so much about. What sort of substance can wedge itself so deeply into the cognitive recesses of the world's most imaginative and creative individuals and stop them in dead their tracks. It's like the worst game of musical statues ever, stuck in a limbo between your imagination and reality and not quite able to access either... due to this ridiculous 'block'.
I guess I kind of imagine it like a breeze-block; reinforced concrete, seemingly impenetrable... although one day you will inevitably manage to chip pieces and pieces of it away with some sort of pneumatic drill powered by fantasy, uncovering bit after bit of an idea, like a jigsaw puzzle in reverse until you have a tangible piece of language with which you can work. That's my writer's block... but what's yours? And how do you beat it?
Maybe it's a block of cheese and you're a mouse that munches and chomps your way through; maybe you greedily feast on too much and regurgitate letters that subsequently form words, sentences and paragraphs. Ideas. Maybe you face a block of wood, and you're a karate master - a sensei - cracking the balsa with your bare hands, sending uninspired feeling splintering off in all directions, evil spelks and shards scattered everywhere, lying dormant, defeated. You may feel as though you're atop a high rise tower block, standing precariously close to the edge, daring yourself to jump but unable to find the courage. Take the leap, branch out and send yourself in a new direction. Feel the air whipping up against your face as you free fall though a never-ending vortex of language. It's one of the most liberating experiences ever, and it's available to you every time you open a book. Literary sky-diving. Extreme writing. Whatever you want to call it! Maybe you're trapped in a really awful Hollywood blockbuster, with no real plot, poor dialogue and Will Ferrell cast as the lead. *Shudder*. You know that the quality of what you're producing is abysmal, but you feel uninspired by your contemporaries. Every generation, literary or otherwise, needs its saviours. If you can't find one, be one. It really is as simple as that.
Have you ever gotten to the point where you repeat a word so much, or consider a word over and over in your head so many times that it begins to lose all meaning? Block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block.
Block.
Once I forgot how to pronounce London, as I was shelving book after book about the capital city in the Travel section where I work. I sat and pronounced it over and over, shifting the stress back and forth from syllable to syllable, my own phonetic game of pong. The word lost all meaning, despite being one of the most recognisable words in the English language. Repetition breeds redundancy (and I'm not just talking about semantics here!) I've been talking about writer's block for so long that the phrase itself has begun to lose all meaning. Like Vienna to Ultravox, it means nothing to me... and therefore I feel blindly optimistic that I shall beat it tomorrow, the next day and every single time.
I just really wish I was clearer on that apostrophe.
And so we push on.
Writer's block affects us all from time to time. I always struggle with the term writer's block. Being, as I am, a huge grammar geek, I wonder about the apostrophe. It bothers me a lot; haunts me in my dreams (no, really....) Surely writer's block afflicts all writers technically rendering it writers' block. Although, however, when one is using the phrase, one is generally referring solely to oneself, which would again shift that little trickster of the punctuation world one space back to the left: writer's block. Hmm. Maybe it doesn't really matter, but these are the kind of things that bother me. I blame text messaging and the Internet - but that's a whole new blog for a whole new day! (Yes! I think I just inspired myself!)
As I'm referring to myself, I guess I'll punctuate it as in one singular writer suffering from the affliction. If you'd care to correct me on this one, or have any idea as to clearing up this confusion, please do not hesitate to contact me. I lose sleep over contexts where I'm not one hundred percent clear on the apostrophe. True story.
And so to writer's block. What I always wonder is, what precisely is this 'block' that I keep hearing so much about. What sort of substance can wedge itself so deeply into the cognitive recesses of the world's most imaginative and creative individuals and stop them in dead their tracks. It's like the worst game of musical statues ever, stuck in a limbo between your imagination and reality and not quite able to access either... due to this ridiculous 'block'.
I guess I kind of imagine it like a breeze-block; reinforced concrete, seemingly impenetrable... although one day you will inevitably manage to chip pieces and pieces of it away with some sort of pneumatic drill powered by fantasy, uncovering bit after bit of an idea, like a jigsaw puzzle in reverse until you have a tangible piece of language with which you can work. That's my writer's block... but what's yours? And how do you beat it?
Maybe it's a block of cheese and you're a mouse that munches and chomps your way through; maybe you greedily feast on too much and regurgitate letters that subsequently form words, sentences and paragraphs. Ideas. Maybe you face a block of wood, and you're a karate master - a sensei - cracking the balsa with your bare hands, sending uninspired feeling splintering off in all directions, evil spelks and shards scattered everywhere, lying dormant, defeated. You may feel as though you're atop a high rise tower block, standing precariously close to the edge, daring yourself to jump but unable to find the courage. Take the leap, branch out and send yourself in a new direction. Feel the air whipping up against your face as you free fall though a never-ending vortex of language. It's one of the most liberating experiences ever, and it's available to you every time you open a book. Literary sky-diving. Extreme writing. Whatever you want to call it! Maybe you're trapped in a really awful Hollywood blockbuster, with no real plot, poor dialogue and Will Ferrell cast as the lead. *Shudder*. You know that the quality of what you're producing is abysmal, but you feel uninspired by your contemporaries. Every generation, literary or otherwise, needs its saviours. If you can't find one, be one. It really is as simple as that.
Have you ever gotten to the point where you repeat a word so much, or consider a word over and over in your head so many times that it begins to lose all meaning? Block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block, block.
Block.
Once I forgot how to pronounce London, as I was shelving book after book about the capital city in the Travel section where I work. I sat and pronounced it over and over, shifting the stress back and forth from syllable to syllable, my own phonetic game of pong. The word lost all meaning, despite being one of the most recognisable words in the English language. Repetition breeds redundancy (and I'm not just talking about semantics here!) I've been talking about writer's block for so long that the phrase itself has begun to lose all meaning. Like Vienna to Ultravox, it means nothing to me... and therefore I feel blindly optimistic that I shall beat it tomorrow, the next day and every single time.
I just really wish I was clearer on that apostrophe.
Friday, 22 August 2008
Hypnopedia
It is amazing just how much time one can waste on Wikipedia. It truly is the procrastinator's best friend. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE Wikipedia (hell, my degree came from Wikipedia...), but how - after logging on to check the nationality of footballer Nemanja Vidić to settle a dispute between my soccer-ball obsessed family members (he's Serbian, in case you were wondering...) - how then, an hour and a half later did I find myself fully informed about the BALTIC Centre for contemporary art, the civil rights movement in the USA in the 50s and 60s, plot developments from Neighbours (full o' spoilers from Australian users!), the discographies of Reel Big Fish, MGMT and The Dandy Warhols and now the cast list for Six Feet Under? I don't even watch Six Feet Under.
I never have.
What manner of sorcery is this!? I can only assume that the website has somehow wiki-hypnotised me.
Argh!
I never have.
What manner of sorcery is this!? I can only assume that the website has somehow wiki-hypnotised me.
Argh!
Application of redundancy
Today, being the third Thursday in August, was GCSE results day. This year, being 2008, is therefore five whole years since it was all about me and my friends, ripping open our brown rectangular deal-breakers and facing the music regarding what lay within. I can still remember that day as clearly as ever, various friends littering the school hall, wanting to be together, but separate; revelling in each other's joy or providing support though each other's pain. We'd all be there for each other, regardless. I stood in the back right-hand corner of the room, in a little triangle formation with my two best friends tied to me by invisible diagonal strings, completing a perfect isosceles.
"I've passed Maths!"
"I've got AN A in Maths!!"
"Me too!"
"Haha, I think I've failed R.E.!"
There were hugs and tears, jumping up and down, smiling and celebrations. Almost everyone got what they wanted, and we talked our less fortunate friends through their options, too (it all worked out okay in the end.) It didn't matter. We were all off to Sixth Form, full of hopes and dreams and expectations. Vague imaginations of the similar ordeal on A-Level results day were put to one side, as we advanced one step closer to University and all that entailed. Halls of residence, three hour lectures and nine-pence Asda own brand noodles (just add water.) There'd be new friends and old friends, boyfriends and "special" friends, or as was my understanding of it, and it all seemed terrifying, but in the best possible way. All we wanted to do was enjoy ourselves; we had all the time in the world, right?
"So, what do you want to be when you grow up?"
I'd love to be a writer, or a journalist. I have vague flirtations with more sensible career options like publishing, and a part of me would love to teach, mainly because I still remember that amazing impact some of my teachers had on me, and I'd love to think I could, in turn, capture some of that enthusiasm and inspiration and bestow it onto others. But I don't know. Hell, a part of me still wants to be a rock star (musical talent pending.) All the way through school, I figured I'd work it out whilst I was at uni.
Uni came and uni went. I miss it a lot now it's over; you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone. I don't think I got as involved as I should have done, I think I wasted a lot of opportunities, not even necessarily on purpose. I had to work part-time alongside my studies to pay my rent, and spending twenty hours of my week in a bookshop didn't really leave a lot of time for practical work experience in between lectures and shifts, pints of Diesel and walking home through Sandyford at 5am with a traffic cone on my head. I'm not bitter, and I had a fantastic three years at university, but I guess, with hindsight, I should have gotten more involved. I think it was mainly a confidence thing, but that's no excuse. I guess I always just figured that my grades would get me through, secure me the job I wanted easily and life would be grand. But that's not quite how it works.
When you go through school with top marks, you're untouchable. In the real world, it doesn't count for shit. I see all of these kids in the Chronicle, jumping up and down celebrating their own 4 As at A-Level, their own GCSE constellations, bursting with stars as far as the eye can see. They remind me of me, so happy, expectant and proud of themselves. Pride with good reason, don't get me wrong - I'm so happy for every single person who had the courage to rip that envelope open, heart beating in their throat and blood pulsing in their ears and behind their eyes, especially those who got just what they wanted. Even more so those who exceeded their own expectations. I am happy for them, and proud of them... but it also makes me feel so, so sad. Five years later, what have I got to show for it? I look at these kids, swollen with pride, and it breaks my heart to think of how many of them will be in my position in fiv years time... how much potential is just going to get crushed under the weight of reality. You can't live in a dream world forever, and I know there's more to life that school (thank God!), but I guess I always thought it's count for at least something. Now? I look at my achievements, my qualifications, the letter A photocopied ten or eleven times, and I don't feel proud or superior. I know it doesn't put me in any sort of advantageous position. I just feel empty. And cheated. You work hard, you pass your exams and you get a good job (I don't necessarily equate 'good' with 'well paid'... to me 'good' is synonymous with 'enjoyable'.)
She's going to go far.
You've done amazingly well.
Congratulations.
Congratulations.
Congratulations.
All of the accolades fade away to nothing. My life support machine's gone flatline.
I know you meant well at the time, and at the time I believed you... but it doesn't mean anything any more.
The reality is this: I can't find a decent graduate job in this city, and I have far too dense a social network here to allow myself to think about leaving. It would be a very selfish thing to do, and probably not even something I'd want to. I love it here, the people are wonderful. Due to a lack of viable employment prospects, I am currently stuck in a degrading job that fails to motivate me in anyway whatsoever, where I work in constant fear of a berating at the hands of a monster constructed entirely of hormones and overdosed on power. I am sick to the back teeth of filling out application forms for jobs that I know I'll get no reply from, and it's starting to really grind me down. I am Joseph Heller and this is my very own Catch 22. I can't find a new job because I don't have any relevant experience for the limited opportunities that there are. I couldn't get said experience because I was always working to fund my way through university.
Work experience trumps work ethic every single time.
And I'm drowning in a sea of application forms, and not one single employer looks likely to throw me a rope. Take off your A-Level flotation device and your GCSE armbands, and you'll find out that you can't swim after all. My degree is the fucking Titanic.
Help me. Please.
I'm so adrift, I can't even write anymore. That is why I started this blog, and so far nothing I've written has been of any value - entertaining, informative, whatever. That's just a list of things it isn't. I need to step this up a notch, because I hate feeling useless and I loathe my self-redundancy. If no one wants to employ me, I guess I'll just have to work a zillion times harder at the writer thing.
Or marry rich (!)
"I've passed Maths!"
"I've got AN A in Maths!!"
"Me too!"
"Haha, I think I've failed R.E.!"
There were hugs and tears, jumping up and down, smiling and celebrations. Almost everyone got what they wanted, and we talked our less fortunate friends through their options, too (it all worked out okay in the end.) It didn't matter. We were all off to Sixth Form, full of hopes and dreams and expectations. Vague imaginations of the similar ordeal on A-Level results day were put to one side, as we advanced one step closer to University and all that entailed. Halls of residence, three hour lectures and nine-pence Asda own brand noodles (just add water.) There'd be new friends and old friends, boyfriends and "special" friends, or as was my understanding of it, and it all seemed terrifying, but in the best possible way. All we wanted to do was enjoy ourselves; we had all the time in the world, right?
"So, what do you want to be when you grow up?"
I'd love to be a writer, or a journalist. I have vague flirtations with more sensible career options like publishing, and a part of me would love to teach, mainly because I still remember that amazing impact some of my teachers had on me, and I'd love to think I could, in turn, capture some of that enthusiasm and inspiration and bestow it onto others. But I don't know. Hell, a part of me still wants to be a rock star (musical talent pending.) All the way through school, I figured I'd work it out whilst I was at uni.
Uni came and uni went. I miss it a lot now it's over; you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone. I don't think I got as involved as I should have done, I think I wasted a lot of opportunities, not even necessarily on purpose. I had to work part-time alongside my studies to pay my rent, and spending twenty hours of my week in a bookshop didn't really leave a lot of time for practical work experience in between lectures and shifts, pints of Diesel and walking home through Sandyford at 5am with a traffic cone on my head. I'm not bitter, and I had a fantastic three years at university, but I guess, with hindsight, I should have gotten more involved. I think it was mainly a confidence thing, but that's no excuse. I guess I always just figured that my grades would get me through, secure me the job I wanted easily and life would be grand. But that's not quite how it works.
When you go through school with top marks, you're untouchable. In the real world, it doesn't count for shit. I see all of these kids in the Chronicle, jumping up and down celebrating their own 4 As at A-Level, their own GCSE constellations, bursting with stars as far as the eye can see. They remind me of me, so happy, expectant and proud of themselves. Pride with good reason, don't get me wrong - I'm so happy for every single person who had the courage to rip that envelope open, heart beating in their throat and blood pulsing in their ears and behind their eyes, especially those who got just what they wanted. Even more so those who exceeded their own expectations. I am happy for them, and proud of them... but it also makes me feel so, so sad. Five years later, what have I got to show for it? I look at these kids, swollen with pride, and it breaks my heart to think of how many of them will be in my position in fiv years time... how much potential is just going to get crushed under the weight of reality. You can't live in a dream world forever, and I know there's more to life that school (thank God!), but I guess I always thought it's count for at least something. Now? I look at my achievements, my qualifications, the letter A photocopied ten or eleven times, and I don't feel proud or superior. I know it doesn't put me in any sort of advantageous position. I just feel empty. And cheated. You work hard, you pass your exams and you get a good job (I don't necessarily equate 'good' with 'well paid'... to me 'good' is synonymous with 'enjoyable'.)
She's going to go far.
You've done amazingly well.
Congratulations.
Congratulations.
Congratulations.
All of the accolades fade away to nothing. My life support machine's gone flatline.
I know you meant well at the time, and at the time I believed you... but it doesn't mean anything any more.
The reality is this: I can't find a decent graduate job in this city, and I have far too dense a social network here to allow myself to think about leaving. It would be a very selfish thing to do, and probably not even something I'd want to. I love it here, the people are wonderful. Due to a lack of viable employment prospects, I am currently stuck in a degrading job that fails to motivate me in anyway whatsoever, where I work in constant fear of a berating at the hands of a monster constructed entirely of hormones and overdosed on power. I am sick to the back teeth of filling out application forms for jobs that I know I'll get no reply from, and it's starting to really grind me down. I am Joseph Heller and this is my very own Catch 22. I can't find a new job because I don't have any relevant experience for the limited opportunities that there are. I couldn't get said experience because I was always working to fund my way through university.
Work experience trumps work ethic every single time.
And I'm drowning in a sea of application forms, and not one single employer looks likely to throw me a rope. Take off your A-Level flotation device and your GCSE armbands, and you'll find out that you can't swim after all. My degree is the fucking Titanic.
Help me. Please.
I'm so adrift, I can't even write anymore. That is why I started this blog, and so far nothing I've written has been of any value - entertaining, informative, whatever. That's just a list of things it isn't. I need to step this up a notch, because I hate feeling useless and I loathe my self-redundancy. If no one wants to employ me, I guess I'll just have to work a zillion times harder at the writer thing.
Or marry rich (!)
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