I burn, I pine, I perish

Spending one hundred new English pounds on a coat, in summer, just before I move and go see Prince at a festival and go on holiday is a really bad idea right? RIGHT?



"Oh baby, you know I want you too. I can't stop thinking about you and how good you'd feel inside of me."

SHUT UP COAT.

"Baby, don't be like that. Look at my deep-front pockets. You like that huh? Yeah? That turns you on right?"

Well, I guess... I mean... It's been so long since I looked at a coat the way I've looked at you.

"You know you and me are meant to be together. It's fate. Check out my bracelet-length sleeves. You know you love a bracelet length sleeve. We belong to each other. You think this is something that just happens every day?"

But what if my mum found out? She'd kill me.

"This is about you and me sugar. I got a shawl collar and I'm not afraid to use it"

*swoons*

Recommendation

I have never consumed something that made me feel so good about myself and my dating history before as 'I Don't Care About Your Band' by Julie Klausner did.

I read last night until I couldn't hold my eyes open any longer and then inexplicably woke up at 7.30am this morning because I think my subconscious was really desperate for me to get to the end of it. There is no other reason for me to be wide awake before 11 o'clock on a Sunday. As a piece of prose it's funny; sure, in fact it's very funny, I rarely laugh out loud at anything that strongly while I'm alone unless there's an old episode of the Simpsons on or I'm watching a cat drink out of the toilet on youtube but I laughed, proper belly laughed, loads whilst reading this. But that's only part of the reason it's so good, the other part, the main part is that I can relate. It's rare in literary or indeed ANY other pop culture mediums that I find a female protagonist I can understand and look at and go 'yes, that is me'. When people (men) look at me incredulously because in Lost I am Locke rather than Kate (fucking fuck you if you think I'm fucking Kate) and I'm plainly a girl rather than a bald man in his forties I get irrationally annoyed with their lack of imagination or understanding that gender roles, when we are looking at stories at least, mean SQUAT. It's the character, not the genitalia that counts you fucking dumb motherfucking assholes, stop telling me who I can be! So yeah, to find this thing, this book, this piece of art that speaks to me on a million different levels AND makes me feel better about who I am, AND makes me feel inspired AND IT'S WRITTEN BY A GIRL AND ABOUT GIRL THINGS?!?!! Well I just blew my load all over the shop. Figuratively speaking of course.

If Tucker Max is The Worst (and he fucking is), then this is the diametrically opposed yin to that yang. It is, most definitely The Best. Should any of you want an insight into me and who I am and how I react and respond to the dating world then this is like a blow-by-blow account that explains everything in very simple, easy-to-understand hilarious terms so for that Sazz 101 class you've been failing this is the quick route to your A+. Even those of you not enrolled in that class I would still highly recommend it.

Truely we live in the golden age of communication

Her: Ooo oo can we watch the proposal 2day at sum point?
Me: I am in the mood for a rubbish romcom
Her: Sept it aint rubbish!
Me: You seem to assume i think rubbish romcoms are a bad thing
Her: But there is rubbish rubbish, then there's 'actually quite good,ahem' rubbish. This is the latter
Me: Sure it is
Her: I wana watch moon 4 sum reason too. U got it?
Me: Nope :(
Her: Blocky job
Me: Totes mgoats
Her: 4 shiz mniz
Me: Need to watch bandslam too
Her: Ai

Bring It

If you were wondering whether or not I brought it on Christmas Eve then give a sister a break yeah and BELIEVE I effing brought it. I brought it in spades y'all



(you know I'm drunk by how I come home and take pictures of myself in the bathroom mirror MYSPACE 4EVA)

Cheers

I know what you're thinking: 'what the fuck is that shit? Is Sazz drinking bourbon or something equally foul?' Answer, no but yes. No to bourbon, things haven't got quite that dire yet (but when I start talking like an old-timey 1920's New York mobster then you can start getting your concerned face on) but yes it is something pretty foul. It is in fact non-alcoholic ginger wine and, like a captive chimpanzee, it'll rip your fucking face off (too soon?).

You know in that episode of The Simpsons with the chilli-festival and Homer coats his tongue and mouth with wax so he can eat Chief Wiggum's insanely hot chilli? And then Johnny Cash is a talking fox spirit guide? That one? It's kinda like that, just slides past the tongue with kind of a sweet slickness (that's what she said) and then hits the throat with the force of a juggernaut on black ice (she also said that). Then it burns, oh how it burns. A throat fire is lit which takes a good 2 minutes 35 seconds to extinguish. As soon as it IS gone however all you can think about is taking another sip.

Anyhoo, it's keeping the cold at bay that's threatening to hit so whatever works right?

Also, yes I'm wearing wrist warmers inside. Deal with it.

Bound-and-Hagged

It's Saturday night and all I wanna do is sleep. Dating an alcoholic RUINED me. Not like, emotionally (I gots hella mad bouncing back skills yo) (kinda. You just gotta give it six months plus and THEN my mad bouncing back skillz kick in) but man, all I had was three glasses of red wine last night and I'm DEAD today. Yoga was the hardest sixty minutes OF MY LIFE. My body felt leaden down with... well, lead (or something). It was like dragging round a sack of potatoes, but a sack of potatoes strapped to my legs and arms and chest. Like I was wearing a sack of potatoes if you will. Sartorial elegance personified basically. Time was when three quarters of a bottle of wine was breakfast (it was never really breakfast, breakfast is/was normally porridge or rice krispies. I just wanted you to think I was cool. Porridge/Rice Krispies never really exudes cool the way a reckless drinking habit does). Just over a year ago I couldn't fathom those among our ranks who could open a bottle of wine, enjoy ONE glass and then cork bottle of wine and continue with their enjoyable evening of cross stitch and Colin Firth movies. NOW I AM THAT BITCH! (In that I watched half of an Accidental Husband today because I couldn't find the energy to clean which I had alloted for my afternoon activities. It was not very good. It was not very good enough in such a way that I actually ended up cleaning rather than watching it). Not really drinking for the better part of a year has ruined me. And also makes me feel a lot better about myself in other ways and means I get a healthy amount of sleep rather than too much or too little and that means I have the energy to cross stitch (or [insert activity worthy of my time here]) whenever I like. How lame is that shit? Bound and hagged man. Bound and hagged.

Take a hike*

I've taken up hiking. Walking, as we all know, kicks a LOT of ass; I've been interested in it since the age of about 10-14 months but recently I've decided to kick that up a notch and enter the land of hiking. My brother and father are already avid fans but as they have beards and like ale it kind of goes with the club membership anyway. I do not have a beard (yet), nor do I sup ale (I've tried you guys, and however unhip it may make me, malibu and diet coke will always taste better to my tasting buds. It's like liquid jelly beans! There is nothing wrong with that except for how delicious it is. Proper cider is acceptable for when I'm trying to hide my girly girl 'I'm a total girl' status) but I do like walking. And hiking is basically walking but with studier boots, more countryside, and Kendal Mint cake (which isn't actually even a cake! Who knew? You did? Well aren't you just Professor Glucose-based Confectionery Items at George Romney's University?).

Anyway, walking is awesome. I will always prefer walking to any other mode of transportation. Buses are stinky, cars are oftentimes stressful, trains are pretty good for catching up on your reading but you're not always guaranteed you won't find yourself in a carriage with hooded youths who think Red Stripe and swearing loudly are the very height of sophistication (one memorable encounter with such a subset of the human race involved them shouting 'get your rat out' to every young lady who passed their carriage whenever we stopped at a platform. It was nice in the sense that it was the opposite of nice). When faced with the opportunity to walk I will always take it. Unless I have to carry something heavy in which case, can you take it? My arms are tired. Oh fine, I'll get the car then.

I will say, on my first outing last weekend that there are probably not many hikers who go out in their black wooly tights, black sweater dress (like a Christian preacher caught shagging rent boys I was once evangelical in my disdain for sweater dresses, now I love them so much I rarely want to wear anything else), and b-52's badges. I didn't see any at any rate. In my chunky black hiker boots I felt very 'Smashing Pumpkins fan circa 1993' which is never a bad thing.

However, this is all preamble to show you what I saw. Some marrows on a tree stump. I'll just leave them there in case you fancy having some later.


*Lots Of Love right there

The Wedding Singer

I have one wish. It is not that I was a little bit taller or that I was a baller or even that I had a girl that looked good I would call her.

It is to be in a wedding band.

Only because I went and accidentally just gate-crashed a wedding reception (it was my local, the back gate was open. Not my fault) and got sub-par renditions of Robbie Williams, Ricky Martin (both major hits in case you were wondering) and Gareth Gates (well, Spirit in the Sky. Assume they were doing the Gates version). Plus Status Quo. Lots of Status Quo.

It was awesome.

If I was a singer in a wedding band the set list would be as follows:

- Skee-Lo 'I Wish'
- Will Smith 'Getting Jiggy With It'
- Jay-Z '99 Problems'
- Britney Spears 'Toxic'
- DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince 'Fresh Prince of Bel Air'
- The theme song to the tv show 'Clueless'
- The theme song to the tv show 'Blossom'

Ad infinitum for two hours. Sit back and enjoy. Am expecting to be busy so book early to avoid disappointment.

[Encore at premium rate = DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince 'Boom Shake the Room']

And yes, in case you were wondering these do happen to be the only songs in the world that I know all the lyrics to. So what of it?

Goodbye to the past

The trouble with reliving your past is that , however much you want things to stay the same, they don't. Going back to a past lover, visiting an old stomping ground, doing the things you used to do when you yourself have moved on is nice but, due to it being tinged with a dewy-eyed nostalgia, is almost always a little melancholic as all that nostalgia is eroded almost immediately when confronted with the reality of now rather than being kept in a pretty little box with bows on it labeled 'The Past' in practice calligraphy script (shut up. You did for all of five minutes when you were 9 too) in your head. You remember what you used to be and know for certain that you are not that any more. However much you like yourself now you will always feel a certain affection for the person you once were - knowing that person is now dead hurts (it'd be weird if it didn't).

As such when I watch beloved tv shows (oh yeah, btw, this is all about teen tv shows - paddling in the shallow pools of pop culture is as deep as this chick gets) that spoke to me the first, or even second, time round - now? Not so much. Not in the same way. Recently E4 has gone cuckoo for the tv programming that I once had to illegally procure from our wonderful world wide interweb. Namely Gilmore Girls and Veronica Mars and it's been causing me no end of heartache as the way I analyse the relationships and think about the characters now (compared to then) is so different it's like sitting there with my (pretend) grandmother and my (non existent) daughter both giving a simultaneous DVD commentary that I myself don't remember selecting when pressing play on the sky remote. These ladies may have been born from the same kind of place but their opinions on it are so diametrically opposed they may as well have brought up on different planets.

If nothing else, there's just something undeniably sad about remembering the past version of yourself watching these things and being moved by it; feelings things, thinking things, that you yourself, now, would never think or feel. Believing the sarcastic 'psychopathic jackass' Logan in Veronica Mars is the dreamiest dreamboat that ever did dream, wishing and hoping that Jess (aka Peter Petrelli) and Rory from the Gilmore Girls are meant to be when he was actually a total dick to her the entire length of their relationship. I knew I'd changed but I didn't have any way of measuring it before - it's clear I think and feel differently now (at least about tv shows). I get why all those posters at TWoP (I was a student alright! We have time on our hands when finding increasingly creative ways of not writing essays) hated these characters so much now. Because they were/are (it's difficult to define past and present tense when discussing fictional peeps) dicks. No doubt about it. Back then it was incomprehensible to me - couldn't they see that these boys were hurting and just needed the right sort of love and affection to make them right? I love and loathe the girl that saw and loved this way. She felt and thought hopelessly differently to me. It's like I've lost a friend I sort of put up with for a number of years even though I found her endlessly irritating but I know I'll never get her back. I miss her, but also, she was an idiot.

There is also, perhap, something undeniably sad about getting this melancholy about tv shows they transmit from E4 towers. I dunno, what am I? A tv scientist? (I am not a tv scientist) (But I kind of wish I was...)

Betty and me

Today I realised a thing and it was the sort of thing that, once realised, can never be unrealised if you see what I mean. I am now partly obsessed with the realisation of this thing and I'm not sure how it's going to impact on the rest of my life.

The thing is this: I would totally wear all the outfits Betty Suarez has had on this season.

Back in the day, the day of yore, a time when we were all a little more naive, our instincts were a little less developed, a new campy fun show started and it was called Ugly Betty and I looked a lot like the title character. I had long dark hair and glasses and I was a bit goofy and chubby and wore... let's say 'unconventional' outfits. Not like, Edie Beale unconventional but just, a few clashing prints here and a hint of quirkiness there. Nothing that'd make you throw up in your mouth necessarily but it might have made you pause for a second before shaking your head and continuing your journey. And even then, only occasionally did I put together something that would have shown up on your 'weird radar' (weirdar, similar to gaydar but for weird).

Before a show called 'Ugly Betty' I hadn't really thought about all of this too deeply but then a show called 'Ugly Betty' did exist and she did look like me and we both did dress a bit queer and I did think about these things.

Then I kind of got on with it.

However, today I realised the thing. The thing that means now Betty has become the master and I the languishing disciple. You see, before, Betty used to dress like she was a mental patient who had twirled round and round in her wardrobe and whatever stuck itself to her body was what she decided to wear that day. I employed a similar system myself at one time. It was tragic. Very slowly, (and I'm not sure if this is a deliberate sort of 'just as Betty wears off on the fashionistas, they have started to rub off on her' type thing. It would be awesome if it was. The right path always tends to lie somewhere in the middle of two diametrically opposed viewpoints) Betty started to get a sense of style. Not a style that fashionistas would be thrilled with but a street style of her very own. The sort of thing that could show up on either the 'Do' or the 'Don't' pages of Vice (I can never tell immediately if it's supposed to be on one page or the other, it's best to just accept their ruling regardless. A logic is employed on some level but it's not a level I'm familiar with). However, whereas I toned down my outfit choices so that I now feel 85% happy with the clothes I own and have (dresses mainly) for every occasion('1920's tea party in spring' dress, 'a day at the races' dress, 'showing off my boobs' dress etc etc) Betty has learned how to layer and to mix and match so that the point at where we both started - the point that makes the tragedy makers cry - I have become duller and she more vibrant. Whereas I could previously see that if she just wore a slightly different scarf or a heel with that skirt or burned the sweater vests to the ground TO THE GROUND (for the love of God burn the sweater vests to the ground Betty) she now puts these outfits together with ease. She knows the right scarf to make the outfit go from 'mentalist' to 'trail blazer'. As I say, the student has become the master.

That doesn't sort out the problems this show has with being unable to decide if it wants to be preachy about 'beauty is on the inside' etc etc (bullshit, btw) or is in fact in love with looking good (hint to the show writers: we all are. Don't fight it). Or the fact that Betty is supposed to be strong and smart and ambitious but still has the same job she did two years ago. (Why isn't she a staff writer by now? She could still look after Daniel and be jealous of his new assistants and have all the hilarious japes she does now just a little further up the ladder. Writing change is writing life, writing statis is... just a bit lame. I demand character development!) Or the fact that Gio was the best bloody thing that ever happened to her and she treated him like shit. But Betty dressing the way she does now, compared to how she did before makes me feel like my fictional little girl on a show that doesn't in any way relate to real life has all grown up. Betty did gone and make mama proud. And also a bit jealous because now I think everything I own is boring. Goddamn you Betty and all your hot love interests. Anyway, I just got a bit nostaligic so let's journey through time and space and have a look at how our ugly duckling became a no-less-ugly-but-slightly-less-insanely-dressed swan...

Betty Suarez's Hall of Fashion: An illustrated journey from fugly to style icon


Picture 1: DIE SWEATER VEST DIE. What's weird is I find them incredibly erotic when worn on boys. I think this just gives me flashbacks to what I would oftentimes end up wearing as a charity shoppe enamoured school girl.


Picture 2: I actually quite like the dress but why the jumper underneath. The Betty of today would wear a clashing pink or maybe green cardi and a printed belt and make that look work *snaps fingers*. The Betty of then just wanted to make her arms look fat for some reason.


Picture 3: This would work if the hat was black and a bit slouchier (she looks like a Constance Billiard reject) and either:
- her dress was plain; but it would have to be black which isn't very Betty, OR
- her coat was plain; a lush green would work but I would rock a military gray just to be on the safe side due to my tendency to err on the side of caution.
As it is she looks like she's been doing the mental patient twirling thing I referenced earlier.


Picture 4: The exact point where our axises interject. These days I wouldn't wear something like this but I wish I DID have the balls to do so. If you take this apart then the sweater vest must burn BURN TO THE GROUND, the tights are so 16-year-old-me-wishing-I-had-thin-legs it's unreal, the belt is something I would pick up in the bargain bin at Claire's and briefly consider buying before putting it down again and leaving empty handed. But I genuinely think this outfit works when it's all put together. Helped by the fact the dress is insanely kickass (but if I bought it I would have such trouble accessorising it, it would never end up being worn).


Picture 5: It would not be too hard for me to go put together a similar outfit right now from the items in my own wardrobe. Including the red belt and flower doobry.


Picture 6: I crave this outfit like I crave Tuc biscuits. Deeply and endlessly.

Mad Women

I look kinda hot as a 1960's cartoon character. Why spend time and money waxing, bleaching, exercising when I just have to turn myself into a cartoon to look good? Problem solved.



[Via madmenyourself.com]

Got me looking so crazy right now

I've never given much credence to the idea that men are from Mars, women are from Venus. That we stand on two separate planets gazing at each other in wonderment and disgust sending out smoke signals that spell 'WTF?!?!!'.

It's a nice idea but, much like communism, it works better in theory than in practice.

See, women and men are groups. You and I are individuals. I may have many of the characteristics associated with a female but I also have many characteristics associated with males; a penis, facial hair, an appreciation of women's boobs (I'm kidding, I'm kidding. About the penis thing). It seems a curiously modern idea that separateness exists in such neat packages. Light and dark, good and evil, man and god; in ancient philosophies are all one and the same. You don't have one without the other. Once Osiris crosses to the underworld he realises 'My phallus is the phallus of Osiris*. My loins are the loins of the Lords of Kher-ba. My chest is the chest of the Mighty One of Terror... There is no member of my body that is not the member of some God'. Krisha declares 'I am the self seated in the hearts of all creatures. I am the beginning, the middle, and the end of all beings'. I am god, I am man, I am woman (hear me roar). Admittedly the dividing lines we've set up between god/man, light/dark, man/woman may be helpful in some respects. For one thing they help us save time, it's tidier that way. Neater. Clears up confusion straight away; 'here's the list of preconceived notions I have about you based on your height, weight, skin colour, age and gender. If you could make sure you just stick to everything EVERYTHING! on this list and do not deviate from it AT ALL then we will get along swimmingly because if you do DARE to deviate then it makes things messy and that complicates the situation for me so, like I say, stick to the list and we'll be fine'. Which, is fine, as long as you're someone that ticks all the boxes that you're supposed to based on your height, weight, age, skin colour, and gender (hint: no one ticks all the boxes on that list). It's got my goat (not literally. I keep my goats very safe) as I was discussing with a young man the other day about the relationship issues of some of his work colleagues. It was all going well until he ended it with 'but then, women be crazy I suppose' and I was like 'umm... no' (although, to be fair to him, women do be crazy). It just doesn't seem helpful to me to classify problems from this standpoint (the sweeping generalisation standpoint). That's why you should really try and treat everyone as an individual and take them on their individual merits; no-one fits that box you have made for them and you're going to REALLY stress yourself out trying to fit them into those boxes - it's like me trying to fit into a pair of size 8 jeans: Not gonna happen.

But, worryingly, it extends further; you can't be a fan of The Wire AND of The Hills, you can't like opera AND playing sniper in a castle but, here's the kicker, you can be a fan of The Wire and The Hills and opera and snipering, I am living proof of this. But! But! STAY IN YOUR BOX! DO AS WE SAY! THIS DOESN'T FIT WITH MY PRECONCEIVED NOTION OF WHAT IT IS YOU REPRESENT!

No shit sherlock. Meet the other six billion or so individuals who also confound your expectations at every turn.

I wouldn't want to spend time with anyone who solely read Dostoevsky anymore than I'd want to hang out with someone who solely read Heat magazine. It's just the idea that you always have to be one thing or the other and can never be both simultaneously. Frankly, it's bullshit. We are all things to all people, playing all sorts of roles throughout our lives. Changing and adapting to suit our environment as all living organisms are wont to do. The costumes 'Man' and 'Woman' inform our character but they do not define our character. So although women be crazy, men be crazy too. We just don't talk about that as much because it doesn't appear on the checklist. We all be crazy basically. I like it that way. Don't you? Doesn't that make it more fun?

Having said that I'm more excited than anything with my new chaise lounge (only downside? It makes me feel a little bit like Jabba the Hut, I just need to put an ankle chain on Carrie Fisher and tie Harrison Ford to my wall and I'm set). There's not many boys that could get away with that sentence. Not unless they're a 'pledgee'

[Via Videogum]

*I sure am obsessed with phallus's tonight huh? Best not analyse that one too hard**
**That is what she said.

Sir Grumpalot

Although I am, by nature, a depressive little soul (I live too much in my head, I over analyse, I focus on the negatives in a seeming fit of trying to locate where the positives might be and yet it leading to me only ever really focusing on the negatives) I don't think too many of my nearest and dearest would say I was someone who was a particularly grumpy. A bit maybe, on and off, more up-and-down moody than inherently grumpy they would probably say. I imagine. However, the last two weeks I've spent an inordinate amount of time just being cross - about everything; people, things, work, life. It's all just annoying me. Working on a Saturday annoys me, my mum asking me how I am annoys me (her not asking me how I am annoys me even more), my friend asking me to help her put up pictures annoys me. I hate being like this. Being in a bad mood puts me in a bad mood.

What's worse is that, although I am not a stranger to grump, because my moods do change quite rapidly and, to the untrained outsider eye, for no reason at all (there is always a reason but you'd need to plug into my logic to understand it which is not something I would ask anyone to ever do because it's exhausting at the best of times) I'm just not used to being consistantly cross. I can normally rely on the fact that by the time beddybyes has come and gone, thanks to my hormonal imbalances, I will awake refreshed and unfettered by worries or concerns or anger that had built up the day before. All the negativity will have been washed away by the dreamiverse (a dreamiverse currently plagued by kidnapping, snakes, rape, Jeremy Irons and an overwhelming sense of powerlessness) and I can start again. Not recently. This wouldn't be a problem if my mood had been plugged into 'happy' or 'proactive' or 'optimistic' settings but it's stuck on 'cross'. This makes me really cross.

In the last week I spent time with a little boy with a chromosonal disorder that can't hold himself up and was one of the smiliest, giggly babies I've ever had to pleasure to meet, a mum of two who is the same age as my brother and registered disabled because of some car accident she was unlucky enough to go through, Michael Jackson died, Farrah Fawcett died, people in Iran were shot in the heart for having a dissenting opinion of the government. None of that really affected me the way it was supposed to. It's all just background noise. The only thing that's really got my goat this week is having to work late on a Monday evening, in a job that I genuinely love (when there are plenty of people without work who would happily earn the pretty pennies I find myself with at whatever time of day or night given half a chance). Grumpy bitch that I am.

I remember listening to one of the ex's albums and him explaining a song being about how this character has decided he's better off taking himself off to the top of a big hill and living the rest of his days out in solitude. Not because he's better off without everyone else but because they are better off without him. At the time (and even now) that idea really pisses me off because that just seems like the easiest fucking option and yet, conversely, I keep thinking that maybe people would be better off without me. For a while at least. I was even wishing that my best friend was on holiday for another week because I didn't want him to come back and me still be a bitch (we're on shaky ground as it is, which is mostly my fault). I'm no good to anyone at the moment, least of all myself, so basically I just need someone to punch me in the face for a while till I cheer the fuck up. That'll work. If you know anyone willing to do the honours then send them my way.

No one else can speak the words on your lips*

I haven't been taking great care of myself lately. Most obviously has been my inability to remember to shower. It's not like, I'm anti-being clean at the moment or anything, it's just slipped my mind fairly often in the last month to not be a dirty skank. I'll generally then realise three days later that I haven't de-dirted myself in a while but, cruicially, still won't do anything about it. I can't justify this behaviour. I'm sat here now, a thin film of three day old grease covering my body and I don't intend to do anything more challenging tonight than watching The Hills.

Oh yeah, that's my other big 'not taking care of myself' semi-self flagellation thing. I've started recording The Hills. For realz. I mean, you know it's bad, I know it's bad, it's theme song is a Natasha Beddingfield number for chrissakes (if something starts with Natasha Beddingfield then, as a general rule, the only way is up from that point on but The Hills just HAS to be the exception to prove the rule). There's loads of bouts of weird silent staring which, I'm not sure happens in my 'reality' and this being a 'reality' 'show' you would think would at least attempt to follow some of the rules of societal convention and yet, and yet, no. It's as realistic as a Micheal Bay movie but with less random explosions and more silent staring for no reason AT ALL (like, at all). I've known about this program for a while given my non-official status (waiting for the paperwork to come through) as pop culture sponge. Like, I already know the names of everyone on the show. I know that Spencer looks like Mr Tumnus (he appears not to be in the early episodes. I'm strangely excited to see how he integrates into it all) but I've never really seen more than 3 minutes of an episode before. When it comes to pop culture explosions I either like to be really super geeky early to the party and show up while all the canapes are being laid out or just really super late and waltz in whilst everyone is throwing up into the gutter outside and having sex on the stairwell. I don't want to be there while the actual party is going on. (I'd rather be at home not showering for the most part. These are my issues, I'm trying to deal with them as best I can). In this case I've arrived as the sun is coming up and even the people who were puking and fucking at the same time have given up and gone home. Yet, I feel I owe it to myself to really understand this phenomenon. If there is one thing I want to achieve before I die it is that.

So I guess this means I'm going down the rabbit hole. Wish me luck. I don't know that I'll ever be back. It's been a blast. (If by 'blast' I mean 'slightly inept attempt at life thus far'. Which I totally do.)

*Unless you write them down Natasha, YOU FUCKING IDIOT

There is no spoon

I feel like everything I've been through in the last few months; every emotion, every plot twist, every argument and misunderstanding, has changed me in ways I still haven't quite come to terms with yet. It's an unsettling feeling to have. I feel constantly out of sorts - even in my dreamiverse - just because I don't really know me at the moment, I'm not entirely sure who this new person is or how she's going to react to certain things. I think I like her, she seems much more at ease with herself that the previous versions of me for one thing, but I haven't really had a chance to test that out yet. It's sort of like having The Joker in the room and not being sure if he's going to sit there quietly or blow your shit up. It could be either or neither or both simultaneously at any time. There's no way of predicting it.

Like I say, unsettling.

See, I've done depressed before, I've done self-loathing before, I've done fucked-up before, and there's an element of me that yearns for those incarnations of myself because I know the script for those characters. I understand their motivations, their hopes, their fears, their beliefs and their needs. I know how they operate. And this time, the one time that I think I have a legitimate excuse to be depressed or fucked up or self-loathing - I've rejected it. I burned off all of those persona's because they didn't work for me, but obviously something must take their place. So I now exist as something new. It doesn't feel like a good thing or a bad thing - it's just what it is. I'm very aware that I desperately want the last few months to mean something, to be profound in some way. I want to walk away feeling more empowered, more willing and able to face other challenges that will inevitably occur at some point; but, at the same time, I don't want to exploit events of the last few months for my own gain. That seems... disrespectful somehow. A man nearly lost his life, for me to walk away feeling good about that, in whatever way, seems horrific.

So what I've done is distance myself from everyone and everything. I sort of feel like a social anthropologist at the moment. Like I'm observing the world and my new self in the world through a scholarly eye - trying best to soak up what I can and learn something from it. I'm not sure that's a healthy way to be; to feel like you're apart and above* everyone else. Yet it feels necessary for the time being, that I have to be separate in order to absorb what I need and figure out how to be human again; but armed with deeper and wider insight this time. I desperately want to learn how to become an adult.

I've always been obsessed with the idea of becoming an adult. When I was younger (and by that I mean maybe up till a year or two ago) I thought that meant getting a mortgage, a husband, a 2 year fixed savings bond, and breeding. Now I believe these are just our cultural signifiers of adulthood, but to have them doesn't necessarily mean you are an adult. I will never fail to be surprised by the number of people ten, twenty, whatever, years older than I, all thoe who have those cultural signifiers but who do not behave in a manner that I believe to be mature, well-reasoned or adult-like. I hear tales of 40-something women sending text messages where they diss one another's vaginas (really), people in their 30's seriously considering fucking up another persons hair straighteners just to get a modicum of revenge for an event they feel justly annoyed about but unjustly justified in taking revenge for, men deciding to date a person, breaking up with that person, deciding to date them again and then breaking up with them again (and then dating them again). All in the space of a week and a half. And then arguing the point when the object of their indecision calls them a jerk (they are a jerk). All of these people are technically 'adult'. They all have homes and loans and cars and jobs. They get dressed every day and make a choice to exist in the world as a person who may be old enough to be legally defined as an adult but who is not an adult. And it's this revelation that has made it apparent to me that being 'an adult' is something different from being 'an adult'.

The idea of 'grown ups' used to terrify me. People who have it all figured out and know what they want and how to get it and have all their ducks lined up and can discuss mortgage repayment schedules and the importance of interest rates. I didn't really want that for myself. I didn't know what I wanted instead but I knew I didn't want to be like 'them'. So you find yourself stuck in a half life; a place with no real responsibility yet paralysed by this unshakable ennui. A sense that things should be different but the options on offer don't entice you at all. And then, about a year ago, it dawned on me that by keeping my options open I was keeping myself still, which meant I was unable to ever go forwards and become an adult, become human, become a woman. So I started making choices. Which has lead me to somewhere that I've never been before. I'm out of my comfort zone.

I know I've been harping on about my last relationship somewhat but it was one of the most profound and fucked up experiences I've ever gone through and I'm still dealing with the fallout (not helped by him still being in hospital and me going for days at a time unsure of whether he is alive or dead). I fell in love with someone who was eight years older than I and, on the surface, a lot more grown up than me. But he still had this vague notion of wanting to be a Lord Bryon or Dylan Thomas figure, believing the illusion that giving in to darkness rather than searching out the light is a glamorous lifestyle choice and not just really fucking depressing. (Here I point you towards someone else who was in love with the romantic notion of destruction and Byron and the like: Peter Doherty. The sweaty moon faced crack addict of your dreams. Or nightmares, depending on your levels of sanity). Watching someone refuse to make choices, refuse to take responsibility, refuse to be an adult and take all that to it's inevitable conclusion was heartbreaking. I know for certain I don't want that for myself or for anyone else (but I also now know I can't make that decision on anyone else's behalf).

So, here's the thing: I think I now understand the formula of growing up; you learn how to be you. First and foremost, that's the crucial part of the recipe. The bit that makes you able to take the next few hundred thousand steps. Without it you bimble along in this world that doesn't really exist. A world where you lie to yourself and accept the lies that others tell you. You take the red pill, take a bite of the apple from the Tree of Knowledge**, shake off illusion and embrace reality and everything that entails. You finally learn that 'there is no spoon' (there is no spoon) and that frees you, completely and one hundred per cent to just be you - accepting the awesome and horrible parts of yourself, learning that they are pretty much one and the same thing (because they are what makes you, you), and being ok with that (something no-one will ever really tell you but you really must believe - you being you is ok. It is enough. No-one should demand anything more of you than for you to be the most 'you' version of yourself that you can possibly manage. You are perfect. You are imperfect. It is enough). The next bit is harder and more of a slog because once you've realised you're Neo and can save the world and destroy God, you actually have to go off and save the world and destroy God. Which is effort. To put it into real world terms it's like me going 'that painting I was going to do would be really awesome if I painted it' but then just sitting down and twiddling my thumbs instead. Knowing that I am capable of painting awesomely and actually doing an awesome painting are very different things.

And I think that's where I am now; looking at the ingredients, looking at the recipe, and trying to find the strength and the energy to pull it all together. I've had so many revelations through going to therapy that have clicked so many things into place that I just can't see myself making the same mistakes again, which is good. I just don't feel good yet. And that's the one thing I wish I knew how to get back.


*I don't mean 'above' in an arrogant way, though around the time I was going through all this 'breaking open the world and seeing the light' shit when my best friend came out and showed me how easy it was to live without fear controlling you, it was arrogance I felt. I felt I'd been given a key to a secret kingdom and only a select few of us were brave or clever or special enough to enter. Most others chose to stay on the ground and I was living in the clouds, observing and shaking my head at how stupid it all seemed. The petty lives people lead when they weren't being honest or true to themselves. I knew better, I was above all that. I'd taken the red pill, everyone else had chosen the blue pill and had an easier but less fulfilling time for it. The arrogance on this occasion is absent, maybe because it's another persona that just didn't work for me. Maybe because it's a trait associated with youth and I don't feel like a kid anymore. Maybe, in this instance, I just have nothing to feel arrogant about.

** No-one has ever explained to me why God would want to keep you wrapped in cocoon of illusion. It seems to me that Eve had the right idea, rather than damn humanity she saved us. But then girls becoming women and realising their own power has always, and probably will always, be construed as a dangerous thing.

Paws for thought

There are times, such as this one that is happening right now and has inspired this blog post, when I wish I could just put the world on pause for a week and let me catch up with life. Like the way Zach Morris did in the early Saved by the Bell years when he would place his hands in a 'T' formation and the world would stop and he could escape whatever immediate danger he was in (detention from Mr Belding, a punching from A.C. Slater, a feminist lecture from Jesse Spano*. That sort of thing). Speaking of which, wasn't it weird that all of a sudden this power was stripped from him and he was left with only his wisecracking to protect him and never mentioned or referenced again? Come to think of it it was around the time that the lame-ass magician guy that ran the diner (the proto 'Central Perk' of the early 90's) disappeared (thanks gods. 'Here's you burger... aaaaand here's a fake bunch of flowers I just pulled out of my sleeve!' 'Um... Can I just have the burger? Thanks'**) so perhaps he had something to do with it? Otherwise maybe Zach just realised the potential of such power and would time-out off-cam to get a look at Kelly Kapowski's breasts at opportune moments. Before the slut was giving it away for free anyway. Obviously. It's like the old saying goes: 'With great power comes great responsibility... to look at Kelly Kapowski's tits'. (I not saying that Zach was a sex pest but I am basically saying Zach was a sex pest).

It wouldn't surprise me if that was true. The whole point of that show was that if you are a bit of a douche and constantly make your best friend feel like a loser then everything will turn out ok. You know, aspirational-slash-educational telly. The best kind.

Anyway, the point is that life keeps on going even when you are trailing behind and lying on the sofa eating minstrels and packet upon packet of Tuc crackers waiting to feel better about yourself and never really managing to. It won't stop. I just need a minute or two to catch my breath and get on top of all these bits and pieces that I've let fall by the wayside recently. Everyone else continues whirling around doing the things they do and I've spent the majority of May mired in my own misery (alliteration ftw). Not that it's important stuff I need to catch up on; it's just that I've got too many books to read, too many films to watch (What's Up, Doc?, A Star is Born, Beetlejuice and Beyond the Valley of the Dolls are all clogging up my skybox at the moment. I'm going through a retro-camp phase), too much writing to catch up on, too many Zac Efron cross stitches to complete. I just can't seem to find the time between sleeping, working, and eating to do these things. A month or two ago it was all too easy, I had lists and plans in motion. Tick boxes were ticked, rectangles were knitted, books were completed, stories were written. Now it escapes me. I drag my heels and watch everyone else disappear into the sunset. The temptation to give in and sit on a grass verge and watch the clouds go by is all too strong. But maybe that's exactly what I should be doing. I've done everything I can to stop myself thinking too much recently and I suspect thinking is the one thing that should be top of my list.

Basically, I don't know. I'm 26 and clueless. At least Alicia Silverstone had Paul Rudd to keep her going. I haven't even got that.

*I cannot remember the chemical symbols for anything other than water and silver but can remember the names of the protagonists from the Saved by the Bell cast. This is my cross to bear.
** Oblig. Gob Bluth quote: 'but how did the lighter fuel get up there?'
[Side note: I really hate magicians, and jugglers, and children's entertainers that make balloon animals. It's the nerd version of the hot girl claiming to be bisexual just because she thinks that makes her a little more interesting and dangerous. It doesn't. You're still an idiot whether you're snogging other girls in clubs in front of a group of Neanderthal men or wearing a jazzy waistcoat and doing card tricks. However hard you try the layers of idiocy cannot be covered up with such obvious distractions. Science.]

Chatting with God

http://www.titane.ca/concordia/dfar251/igod/main.html

[Please note: God is kind of retarded]

Me:
hi god
God:
Hello there. What is your name?
Me:
sazzle
God:
Hey sazzle.
Me:
whats up big man?
God:
I am chatting with clients on the Internet.
Me:
yeah i get that
God:
Woe! Where did you get it?
Me:
get what?
God:
Get with it.
Me:
get what with it?
God:
Where can I get what with it?
Me:
umm... the internet? you can get shit loadsa stuff there
God:
" Where can I get what with it?"? umm.? Can you name a specific web site? No I don't think I can do it.
Me:
you not heard of the internet?
God:
Do you mind if I tell other people: sazzle said I not heard of the internet.
Me:
if you wanna
God:
Should I want to?
Me:
probably not, they'll think you're kind of gay
God:
You seem uncertain. Really you don't think so?
Me:
you're kind of a sap amirite?
God:
Thanks and you are a delightful person too. Am I a sap amirite? I don't know.
Me:
i think you are (that wasn't a compliment)
God:
I will tell my botmaster you said I am that was not a compliment.
Me:
i will tell him your grammar is rubbish. speshly for an omniscient being

[Though having read through that again he still comes across as smarter than me]

Trying and failing

Everything my therapist says (which is not a lot really) (oh yeah, btw, I totally started therapy. It's equal parts awesome and horrific) is like a series of bullet points from Duh Aficionado magazine and yet all of it, all of it, is like the most golden glowing genius shit anyone has ever proclaimed. And all of it, all of it, spins me off into thinking about the things I didn't want to look at, and examining the cupboards I didn't want opened, much more deeply than I've ever had to do before. Hence the awesome/horrific dichotomy.

See, here's the thing; for the last three months I've been existing, barely, and certainly not living. Which pisses me off a touch because I spent forever learning the secret to living (which is engaging; as much and as often as possible. Thinking is required but only gets you so far - what pushes you forward and makes you grow is engaging. It's as close to scientific fact that every ancient religious text will get; it's all there, written down: how to live, how to be human. We just need to decode it in the way that gets us to that place - the 'being human' place - and not to the place where transubstantiation is real and you're allowed to hate others for some arcane reason just because some book told you to) and now I have a different lesson to learn and another, vital, secret to unravel but I don't know what it is or where to even start looking for the answers. It's like a computer game where I've completed level one, which was tough (really tough), and now I'm on level two and all the rules have been changed and I could take none of the weapons I gained in level one with me so I essentially have to start from scratch. And now I'm stuck in this weird half-life where I know I don't want to go backwards (I've been there already) but I don't know how to negotiate going forwards.

I've had my heart broken before; a thousand times, of course I have. So have you, so has everyone, but this was different and decidedly darker because it was literally life or death and that is difficult to reconcile because this doesn't happen to me or people I know does it? Death is what other people experience, it's what happens to old people, people who have lived their lives and are wrinkled and crinkled and are done. Not to me or mine. And that's the thing, and part of why I've been scared to make any sudden movements; I don't want the Gods to notice me moving about and moving on because I fear they'll punish me by killing him off once and for all. They've been toying with me for three months and I have had to creep quietly around that whole time hoping they don't awaken from their slumber, praying they'll snooze long enough for him to pull through and start hitchhiking on the road to recovery right under their noses. But that means I can't take my eyes off them for a second, because the minute I do I know they'll wake up and everything will be ruined.

[Before I continue: I know this isn't about me, that it affects other people (not least the gentleman in question) but, on the other hand, fuck that, it is about me. This is how I feel about something; I'm allowed that much.]

So here am I. Creeping around quietly. Praying no-one notices. But that's not really fair on two levels; one - that's not who I want to be and two: no-one does notice. Literally no-one. See, he, assuming he is ok and things do work out the way they're supposed to (I feel scared and dirty even writing that, like I've already jinxed it by saying it out loud to myself that him being ok is a possibility means that he won't be. I'm genuinely terrified of those Gods. It's not just a metaphor) will just look at me and what I've done; working, writing, meeting new people, going to the cinema, sitting in a bar, whatever, and think 'she moved on quick'. I know he'll think that. I would think that if I were him. He won't see the baggage that's been slowly but assuredly accumulating as I stand here stock still. He'll only look at the mirage, the cyborg I created to distract everyone from asking too many questions about a topic I didn't want to talk about. Which has had the intended effect; everyone else assumes I'm fine now because I don't say I'm not ok and also because they wanted to believe in the illusion even more than I did. It suited them all to think I was fine than to deal with the fact I wasn't. I mean, I sort of am fine now, but only because the pretending is becoming second nature. And here's the thing; I've done this before (the pretending I mean), I've made nice with the people who've hurt me, I've smiled sweetly in the faces of people I've wanted to lobotomise - it works for what it is, it eases social lubrication if nothing else, but it's not who I wanted to be. I thought I'd found my way out of it. I thought I'd stopped hiding. I thought I'd learned how to express the truth and be the most 'me' I could be. And I had! That's the thing. I had. But 'me' has been drained. In it's place is a shell that looks, talks, walks, acts like me but she isn't the person I'd just started to know and love.

I said earlier I don't want to go back and that is true. It's not about wanting to wish everything away, it's about wanting to know where to go from here. It seems like everything that happened should have this big important life lesson attached to it. I don't just mean: 'don't fall in love with alcoholics going through a divorce'. That's too obvious and too much about him. I want to learn something about me from it all, see an aspect of myself from an angle I hadn't viewed before. At the moment, mostly, I feel empty, like everything that happened has just completely drained me. I just want to know how to fill myself back up again. I want a manual, a guide that explains what I have to do to get to where I want to go - but there isn't one and it pisses me off. It pisses me off a lot. I'm back asking a question that continuously haunts me and I never really seem to escape from: what now? (Really though, what now?)

A Question of Felicity Kendal and my face

I guess I've always been paranoid in nature, assuming that people are looking at me or talking about me for some reason or another (albeit forever a real or imagined negative reason). I'm not sure if this is in fact paranoia or just a symptom of my extreme narcissism that dictates I am the only one people would want to look at or talk about (albeit negatively). But recently I swear to little baby Jesus that people, and by people I mean women (kind of the same thing) have been looking at me funny. Like, constantly. Whenever I meet someone new, or am introduced to someone new (which happens a lot in a job where I have met someone new almost every day since I started as a function of the job itself), people (women) have been looking at me differently than before.

I'm not sure how to categorise the look. It just sort of feels like I'm being weighed up more obviously than has happened in previous times. Like, they'll squint a bit and stare at me a beat longer than I feel comfortable with. It unnerves me and leaves me unsure what to do with my face or my eyes or my hands. I do not like it Sam I am. I do not like green eggs and ham (or women looking at me funny).

The only explanation I have for this sudden unnerving look that I have been on the receiving end of countless times now, is that I'm now proper blond and before I was not.

Which suggests that everyone should be reacting to me differently, but what confuses me most is that I do not think men have been. I've received no more or less attention, have not been treated any worse or better, I maybe get served quicker in bars than before but not by any noticeable amount and I think that's just due to the white blond being fairly eye-catching. So why has it affected the way the female of the species respond to me?

I only mention it because it happened noticeably twice today; from the members of a Young Parent' Group in a particularly joyous part of town (lie) and once from Felicity Kendal (truth).

The young parents of the Young Parents Group all trooped in to the 'Sensory Room' (a.k.a. a room with some throw pillows and lava lamps) and plonked themselves down with a degree of force not becoming of a 'Senory Room' vibe (man) and each made eye contact with me in turn as I smiled and welcomed them to sit down so I could tell them what I was about.

Each gave me 'the look'.

I wouldn't have thought too much about it because these chicks don't need another do-gooder coming in and telling them how they can live their lives better. They've constantly got people telling them how abysmally they're doing and like I know shit to be telling them what to do (I do not know shit). They giving me 'the look' wasn't particularly pleasant but wasn't entirely surprising either so, genuinely, I would not have given it too much consideration had not every lady I'd come into contact with since walking into this 'wrong side of town' centre not given me the exact same reaction. It's like they're trying to stare past my face and see the real me concealed beneath. So obviously when I got out I went and checked my teeth for big bits of lunch still stuck in there - nothing. I gave my face the once over for blobs of make up or pen - nothing. I checked my hair for bits of lettuce or other stray foodstuffs - nothing. Nothing, nothing, nothing.

'She's paranoid' you're saying to yourself. 'She's paranoid and she's crazy. People look at each other all the time, it's nothing to get freaked out about'.

Fine. Think that if you will but riddle me this dear reader, why did Felicity Kendal of The Good Life fame make eye contact with me multiple times during the play I just saw her in?

Hmm? Why, in the middle of a performance, is the professional actor Felicity Kendal distracted by, of all things, MY FACE? WHAT IS WRONG WITH MY FACE?

Actually, don't answer that. Maybe it's best I don't know.

Horse bees

I don't think I've ever been this tired (I say this a lot. I have probably been this tired before).

So... this is having a job huh? One you have to put effort in to and get up at 5am to get trained on stuff in London for right? And I end up unable to think or speak coherently because of the clock change fucking my shit up as bad as it normally does when I finally thought I was able to escape such horrors these days?

I see.

I do like the money aspect, and the 'doing a job' aspect as well. It just it seems to be interfering with my ability to nap whenever I want which is pretty important to me in the grand scheme of things. Despite my grumbling, I even like the 'feeling tired for a reason' aspect. When you have fuck all to do you feel tired in a different way - more lethargic than anything else. When you're busy you find you still have energy to do shit up until the point where you have to stop and then you're body withers in upon itself and you can manage no more than watching 5 episodes of The Wire in one go.

Having said all this, I spent an hour playing the 'what will she eat next?' game with three ADORABLE 3 year olds this morning. Not technically part of my job (I totally didn't do my job today) but if the opportunity is there I suggest that when a group of 3 year olds offer for you to sit down and play with fake food you take it.

Good grief. This is even more self-indulgent than usual (judged on a different scale due to it's nature of being a blog entry and therefore already off-the-charts indulgent). Have a horse bee and let's be done with it.


Horse imitating a Bee! - Watch more free videos