…Yeah! We had our housewarming on Saturday… it was just meant to be a little morning activity, but it spread out into general riotous behaviour all day! I think we drank something like eight or nine bottles of champagne, plus sundry beers as well as a good BBQ.
For more photos see my photoset on Flickr.
It’s Tuesday, the first day back at work after Easter. Man, am I tired. It was a fantastic weekend, though I didn’t get any study done (urp!) and spent the last day (yesterday), lying around in my pj’s, hung over. Aside from that, it was great - Steve and I bottled one lot of beer (28 750 ml bottles of wheat beer) and then put on another one (something called “Imperial Pale Ale”), I got a copy of Final Fantasy XII, which is fantastic so far, we went to Steve’s sister’s for dinner on Saturday, had Ben, Tash, Jeremy and Megumi round for dinner on Sunday, and got slaughtered! We were drinking some vodka that Jeremy and Megumi brought back with them from Japan (well not vodka per se, but a Japanese equivalent, the name of which I have completely forgotten), plus Steve’s Margaritas, and the rest of the Mexican Cerveza homebrew that we made about six weeks ago. Jeez.
I also started working on a bit of an update on the site, of our trip to Vietnam that we took back in October. It’s a work in progress at the moment, though I’ve got about a week’s worth of material already up. Feels nice to have something to show family, etc. I’ll be updating it over the next few weeks (hopefully).
Hungry. Think we are going for a swim tonight too. (Oh, did I mention no exercise over the long weekend either?)
Can’t believe I’m still catching up on the Sapa trip. Things have been so incredibly busy and it’s so difficult to write in the evenings when you’re really tired.
Anyway, right now we’re on a boat leaving Cat Ba Island in Ha Long Bay. It’s 8:30 in the morning and crazy to think of what I do on most other mornings at 8:30.
Anyway, back to the market. It was totally crammed with Flower H’mong people - all carrying things and selling - food, animals, silver, embroidery… apparently it is the main point of social contact for them, so you’d see them in big groups together, all having a good time… old men drunk and staggering on corn wine, big covered areas where they serve pho, market after market stall, an area where all the animals were being sold (ducks, chickens, water buffalo, puppies, etc…)
We wandered around - in some places it was really crowded, mostly with H’mong people but also lots of tourists. Steve and I ssat down at a food stall, even though lunch was at some restaurant somewhere. I think we were some of the only whiteys who actually sat down to eat the real food. People don’t seem too surprised to see you sit down next to them, but at the same time, they find it funny if you want some of the chili sauce, etc. A woman fed rice noodles to a baby beside us, while on the other side was a slightly-rowdy guy. Drunk maybe.
We saw a few tourists stop and point at us, no doubt amazed that we’d “gone native”, food-wise. (It was weird, meeting people who had been told back in their home countries “not to eat anything fresh”, because of the water, or whatever. It was weird, and a real shame, because the food was so amazing. They missed out on so much.)
I bought a watch (!) at the market - a 10,000d Casio digital watch, complete with alarm and light. Steve had to take the back off and insert a piece of plastic cut from a battery pack to get the third button to connect though.
We also bought a bottle of sweet corn wine, that we’d seen women selling in large tanks and small re-filled water bottles. We couldn’t tell if it was alcohol or petrol, at first. One woman I made the drinking motion to just looked away, but another smiled and nodded. It cost us 5,000d (50 cents!) and I’ve heard it’s flammable - at least 30%. We’ve only made it through a little bit so far.
All in all though, it was an incredible place to see.
The bus back to Sapa took three or four hours. Along the way, (near Lao Cai) we stopped at the Chinese border. It was quite surreal, as the only thing separating Vietnam from China (other than a few gates and bridges) was a river, so you could see right across the river (The Red River) to China.
Back in Sapa, we were put up in the other hotel - some partnership arrangement - which was three star instead of two star - which had a huge balcony out the front, and commanding views of the “flower valley”, which was unfortunately shrouded in cloud. A double bed! A shower and a bath! Disposable slippers!
We showered and went for dinner. It was a set menu - a bit strange, consisting of pumpkin soup, fruit curry, rice and spring rolls. We were still a bit hungry afterwards, but flaked out anyway.
The next morning, at 9:00am, we went with another guide on a hike to Cat Ca Village. The walk wound down the hills, down through a pretty village, where we were allowed to have a look inside a woman’s house. I bought some beautiful woven scarves!
We walked back up to Sapa - there was a bit of a drizzle so we were glad we’d brought our ponchos - and then had the rest of the day to ourselves before our bus back to Lao Cai left at 6:30.
We decided to go for a wander around Sapa. At first we just explored the surrounding area - the market there (I got a Sapa t-shirt!) and stopped for lunch at a little place. I don’t know if you’d call it a restaurant, as such, maybe cafe is a better word. In any case, they are often part of someone’s house, with four or five tables, possibly bia hoi and sometimes other things for sale. This place had bottled beer, made a beautiful fried rice and steamed spring rolls (wrapped in cabbage) and sold various “wines” (up to 20%, say?), like honey wine, medicine wine, etc., and packs of herbs, including dried starfish, and one that had a dried lizard on it.
From there we wandered up to the town square, and then to a large lake, lined with government buildings and a guest house.
A guy crashed his scooter right in front of us! On a straight road! I don’t know what he was looking at, but next thing there were sparks and he was sliding down the road underneath his bike. He leapt up, got back on his scooter and then raced back down the road, the way he’d come. We saw him stop a hundred or so metres down the road and have a look at his knee. Poor guy.
The rest of Sapa was quite beautiful, with a real alpine feel about it. There were an awful lot of huge hotels, which I found a bit surprising. Flash French restaurants.
We decided we’d go check out this restaurant that we’d seen earlier, that sold H’mong food, called the Green Sapa Restaurant. We went upstairs and found ourselves face-to-face with an old man in a beret, with an animated face. He brought us inside (basically his living room) and asked if we, since it was cold, would share some plum wine with him. We knocked back a couple, then he got out the “medicine wine” - made from medicine plants from Mt Fancipan (which was where he was originally from). It was actually very good.
Then his daughter arrived and he told her what we’d ordered, and she set about cooking it (H’mong grilled pork and fried fish with lemon). He went off to the market and left us with a cute wooden set of Connect-4, to keep us busy.
The food was delicious, and when the old man returned, he challenged Steve to a game of chess. It was such a funny game, he came out guns blazing, and completely annihilated Steve. We had to run to the bus, but I think we grinned all the way back to Lao Cai on the bus, it was so neat.
Not feeling the best today - actually, I didn’t feel that great yesterday either. I hope I’m not coming down with something. Apparently there are a few people around at work who have been off sick. I can just see it getting piped through into all the different offices and rooms around the place. In particular, my eyes feel really dry and painful, even when I use eyedrops - the regular kind as well as my prescription ones. Maybe there’s just a lot of pollen in the air now that it’s finally spring.
It’s been a gorgeous day, and I’ve been stuck inside, very unhappily. Sunny, warm, people walking around in non-office clothing, wandering around doing non-office things. Who are these people? How do they make their money? I ask myself that every day. Like the old Talking Heads song - “how did I get here?” It all feels like some sort of slow car crash that I’ve been watching in slow motion. Work, that is. Everything else is so great at the moment that I almost feel selfish complaining about my job. I have to just keep reminding myself that I originally took it as a temporary thing when I first came back to the country. I have no idea what possessed me to stick around for so long.
One thing I did do, was finish reading Never Let Me Go, by Kazuo Ishiguro. It was a funny sort of book, a lot less dramatic and compulsive than I expected. Mind you, I’ve never read any of Ishiguro’s other books, so maybe it’s just that I’m not familiar with his style. At the same time, thought, it had a bittersweetness about it, a schoolgirl’s innocent commentary about her sheltered life. I found I put it down when I was somewhere around the middle, as I grew a bit bored hearing all about Kathy and her ongoing battles with Ruth, and finding about what made Tommy tick. I guess I kept waiting for the punchline, the decisive moment, the minute when all of the details would come to have a fuller meaning, but they didn’t… That said, I found when I finally returned to the book, there was something about it that made me continue. I guess I wanted to find out whether Kathy would finally become a donor, and what would happen to her. But you never find out, though Ishiguro does let it slip that Kathy will stop being a carer by the end of the year. Somehow despite my dissatisfaction with the novel, it had a lovely wistfulness and sadness about it that has stayed with me.
I’ve been doing quite a bit of spinning lately, not writing much though, not studying, just spinning and watching movies in the evenings. It’s nice but makes me wish I had more time to myself. The weekends just wash away, and then I’m back at work again. I wish I could work from home.
Maybe I’m just feeling a bit flat from Saturday night. We stayed up really late, drinking vodkas and looking out Alex’s window over all the lights and the ocean. But it is nearly home time - at last!
The best thing about Ryvita crackers is that they don’t really seem to go stale. At least the ones in my desk drawer haven’t. I’ve been having them with peanut butter on them, on and off, for the better part of a month. They still seem crunchy and don’t have that stale taste to them.
I’ve been up to heaps lately.
The weekend was particularly good. On Saturday, Daphne and I went to Golding’s to do an Art Clay class. We came out of it with a silver ring each, that we’d made, and a necklace in the cast shape of a leaf. Steve picked us up, and we dropped Daphne off at her place. At the same time I picked up this aquarium that she was getting rid of. It’s quite a bit bigger than my one - 40 litres - and quite a bit longer.
Sunday we went to the pet store and got a new air pump (a flash Eheim one) to go with the undergravel filter and a hood light. Sunday afternoon was spent removing all the plants, then the fish themselves, then siphoning all the water out of the old tank (retaining as much of the old water as possible, in buckets, cooking pots, etc.), and finally transferring the gravel over to the new tank, then the fish, then the plants. It looks great now!
On Sunday evening we went to the premiere of the DVD release for the movie “The Last Hurrah” (the website for the book and the movie is here.) It was really fantastic. The Paramount was packed with bikies, most of whom showed up in their leathers and carrying helmets. They’d all shown up to lend support to two bloody tough buggers, both over 70, who had made the trip from China to Holland in three months. It was really fun.
After that we went to dinner at the Flying Burrito Brothers. We ate spicy pumkin seeds, pork crackling with salsa verde, burritos and enchiladas, and drank some beautifully sour and salty margaritas. Staggered home.
Also recently I got this great book from Amazon, called French for Reading. In addition to this, I also got some great books from Amazon.fr - including french versions of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, The Old Man and the Sea, The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe and The Magician’s Nephew. I’m really set up now. So my French lessons have been really enjoyable so far. I haven’t studied French formally since school, but I am finding it really interesting. I’m doing it for the express purpose of being able to read books in French - just to load up on books written in another language and have a crack at it. Sometimes that approach can be good - a bit like how we approached Old Norse for my uni paper.
I’ve also been really busy lately with all the reviews, etc. I’ve been writing for NZGamer. I think I’ve written eight reviews/columns in the past three weeks. Considering the fact that you have to give the games a decent play before you review them, my spare time in the evenings after work’s been pretty non-existent. I’m enjoying it though. I’ve got another three due this Friday.
Work is still boring me to tears, and I’m wracking my brain trying to think of how I can change my situation. Everything else in life is going swimmingly, and it’s frustrating to feel like how I earn a crust is beyond my control. Sure, it gives me the opportunity to do things like the art clay course, and to go out and buy fishtank stuff, etc. etc. etc., but at the same time I feel like I’m not being true to who I am with this job. Like I’m faking it. And it’s not even enjoyable to pretend to fake it anymore. I read about people who are librarians, teachers, doctors, accountants, journalists, or who serve in the armed forces. They’re such cut and dry sort of jobs, jobs that require a definite decision. I just don’t know how I could do something like that. I’ve thought about teaching, but thinking about it and feeling a passion for teaching are two such completely different things. I know I’m piddling around, wasting time. I need to set myself on some sort of strict regimen of no booze and plenty of writing - but other things seem to creep in and distract me. Perhaps I’m just too easily distracted. Sometimes I think things would be better if I wasn’t working, other times I think the structure is what I need to get out of bed and leave the house every day. I think Harvey Pekar said something similar about his file clerk job. You hate it, but at the same time it helps you out in ways you don’t want to acknowledge. It’s sort of like having to drink cod liver oil, I guess.
I haven’t written, and it’s partly because when I think about it, I don’t know if my news is particularly interesting, and partly because I’ve fallen out of the habit of writing every day. It’s so strange, while you’re doing it it feels so natural, but when it’s been a while, the act of sitting down and just doing it looms up like this huge white wall. It’s not ‘writer’s block’, it’s impetus. Or inertia, depending on how you look at it. In my case - definitely intertia. To be fair, I have been busy with uni classes - Italian and Old Icelandic - but now it’s the break between semesters, and all I have to do all day is work (and not think too hard). I’ve made the resolution to beef up on my Old Icelandic grammar, and read some eddas over the break, but aside from that I feel a void in terms of creative output.
I’ve been sick for the last two weeks - ever since Friday the 28th of May, when I had Jeremy round for dinner. Aart’s here too, so the three of us had my cream of celery soup, and then chicken rendang, supplemented with beer, then champagne (I was nominated for an award at work, and just being nominated earns you a bottle of Deutz), and finally Aart’s Mohitos, which did the worst damage.
Then we decided to go out - I called Connie and she was at home, a bit drunk, and I texted Craig, who was at the Bristol playing pool. We stumbled outside (and this is where my memory starts to haze over) and wandered past Jeremy’s old house, knocking on windows, etc., realised we had walked too far and then had to climb back up the hill to Connie’s. Had a smoke at her house and then we wound up at JJ Murphy’s. Apparently I walked straight in, and the others just followed me. I walked up the stairs and into some back room, with the others thinking “where is she going?” One of the barstaff came in and retrieved us, and apparently I was annoyed because they didn’t stop us earlier.
Then of course some bright spark pointed out that we were in the wrong bar, so we left, walked up Cuba street, and staggered into the Bristol. Craig was there, and a few of his friends, and of course I must have bowled up and said “I want to play”. I remember playing pool - very, very hazily - and I remember kicking ass. I’m not kidding. I was as astonished at the time as I am now, thinking back on it. Only trouble was, they couldn’t drag me away from the pool table. Even when it was someone else’s turn I kept picking up the cue and going to take a shot. I must have been so annoying. Really. Then we went to a club, but I don’t think we stayed very long. Saturday’s hangover was the hangover from hell. I thought I was going to die. And that’s where this deep chesty pain and coughing has bred from. Fool.
I’m slowly coming back to life again, getting a little more energy. Last week, though, was a wipe out. I had a half day off on Monday, and all of Friday off sick. Then we had a long weekend, so this week (after all the days off, and feeling shitty) feels a little surreal. It’s hard to get back into the work rhythm though. And the no writing bothers me. I blame it on Aart (poor sod), not in a nasty way, it’s just the truth - in my wee place there’s no room for me now to spread out and feel safe to write anything. He’s always there. Hey, he’s good company, a good person to share a house with, but where writing is concerned, he’s making it difficult. So - I have to find a new place to do this. The library would be good if it wasn’t that little bit too far away. I suppose I could take a slightly longer lunch break, work a little later, or just throw it all into the wind. I need an outlet though, and it’s starting to get frustrating.
That said, I’m feeling pretty optimistic about things in general. Yeah, so maybe that’s an incredibly vague thing to say. It’s weird, maybe it’s because I’m in that break between classes and I have less to do - but I’m really enjoying ‘life’ at the moment. Walking to work, walking home (pity about the part in the middle), having coffee at the Aro St. cafe, reading, doing general stuff with friends (went to the Zoo on friday with Jeremy and Aart), talking to my parents on the phone, feeding my fish in the morning - I’m happy. Happy because of the little things. It makes a nice change from stressing about something or other, and nothing in particular.
Hey. Well, things have been going pretty well here, in this place - the Capital city of the most isolated country in the world. It’s Friday, and for we poor slobs who live from 6pm - 7:30am Monday to Friday, plus weekends, it’s like being on the verge of a religious epiphany. In this part of the world it’s Autumn (as opposed to what seems to be the rest of the world - even Australia’s still practically in the middle of Summer), which means shitty, overcast days and a general dampish feeling in the air. Still, from where I’m sitting, if I crane my neck around about 50-60 degrees, I can see one of the Picton ferries coming into the harbor, catching the sun. It’s pretty peaceful.
I splurged last weekend and bought myself an all in one fishtank (well, I did have to get a heater). It’s very, very cool, and has rocks and plants and even water in it, which has been nicely aging over the last week. All I need now are some fish. My parents are coming to stay at my place over Easter (four day weekend!!) and mentioned they might bring me a fish or two as a housewarming present!
I don’t have any major plans for the weekend, aside from using my voucher for a half-hour massage tomorrow. I’m booked in for 11:30. Mmm…massage! After that I’m meeting Daph and Graeme at the Black Harp at 1:00 for lunch. (They’re using their vouchers from 12-1, then we’re going to use another prize voucher Daphne won at the Black Harp.) Should be a cheap day! Can’t go wrong! I’ve also got a pile of books I intend to work my way through, plus there’s Italian study for the test we’ve got coming up on the 9th, and some Old Icelandic translation and reading to do. I’m actually considering doing just Old Icelandic next semester. I love Italian, but at the same time, it’s going to get more complicated as we go along, and I am going to start running out of free time. I can just see it now. Plus it would only mean one day up at uni per week. Not that I don’t enjoy it up there, but it gets rather stressy when you’re constantly trying to get back to work etc. etc.
Travel is on my mind again, especially now that I’m a permanent employee here and thus eligible for a nice 4 weeks worth of holidays per year. I really want to save it up and then use it for a month’s holiday somewhere. But where? I’m thinking maybe the Pacific somewhere. Rent a place for a month and hang out.
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This from Monday’s Dominion Post:
Pigeon Gets A Gong
A Royal Air Force pigeon that delivered the first news of Allied success from the Normandy beaches on D-day - June 6, 1944 - will be recognised as the greatest pigeon to have served its country. Gustav, a grizzle cock pigeon, will be honoured in a London exhibition at the Imperial War Museum’s 60th anniversary show. He will get the Dickin Medal, the animal equivalent of Britain’s highest military honour. He died when his breeder stepped on him.
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It’s about half four and time is ticking (initially wrote ‘tickling’) by slowly. I’m really looking forward to tonight. No plans, just some reading, writing, gin and tonics and a little Old Icelandic translation. Most of my weekends have seen something similar.
Aedan is apparently in NZ - in Wellington - at the moment, over from Ireland. James went out for dinner the other night with him but I decided not to go. Sometime back during the time I was in Dublin we had an incident where he asked me at lunch if New Zealand had an IT industry. I said “no, we ride around on sheep and use abacuses.” He stood up and picked up his tray and said “everything’s always a joke with you!” and stormed off. He didn’t speak to me again - what a freak. Nobody else could believe it, and I didn’t think it was worth the hassle to try and figure out what his problem was.
Ben’s also coming back soon - in a month, I think? And I even got an email from Brugt recently, saying he was also coming over, sometime in November, to try and get work in a mountain hut. Nice. So it would seem that leaving (for the moment) is not all that necessary - everyone seems to be coming to me, these days.
Hey there. I’m sitting here at work, listening to Metric, Franz Ferdinand and Camera Obscura. I’ve had a morning of work, then an Italian A/V class, and then Old Icelandic. I’m at work till 6 and then I’m meeting a friend at the Aro Street Cafe at about 6:30. I was off work yesterday with the worst allergies I’ve had in a long time - I looked in the mirror at one point and the whites of my eyes were completely red. I just lay around at home (well…I lie, I went to a lecture), sleeping and doing Old Icelandic translation. Ate leftover Chicken Rendang for dinner. Played some Elder Scrolls III, which is a new purchase. A new time-waster. But it’s a good way to unwind from staring at text and flicking back and forth through a glossary all day.
Oh, and on Friday night we celebrated James’s birthday, down at the Brewery (of course). I had a few after work drinks, and then went home, had dinner, etc., then went back into town at around 9:30. Alan and James were fairly twisted by that stage - Lisa carted Alan off home shortly after that, and James lasted only until about midnight, when he started taking his clothes off and doing his Mick Jagger impersonation, after which John (one of the regulars) bundled him up into his car and drove him home. I stuck around talking with some people I had never met before - really the first time I’ve ever sat around in a bar after all my friends have gone home. It was actually quite nice. You just find yourself rattling on about nothing in particular, not really caring what the other person thinks. Kind of like writing an online diary — just just prattle for the sake of hearing your own voice. Terribly, terribly self-centred. At least you have a chance of scoring when you’re in a pub.
Egad. I’ve been thinking about that lately (scoring). Not in a particularly fixated way, but more as an abstract concept. I’m going out with Aart, right? Well, it’s such a strange thing, I really don’t feel ‘attached’, even though we are basically a couple. I feel quite single. I’ve hardly been out, scouring the pubs for a different lover every night, it’s just that I don’t feel attached in the sense that I feel…single. I realise I’m repeating myself. I don’t feel part of a relationship. We send each other emails and things but that’s really not a relationship. It’s just so weird. I don’t know if it is going to work out or not. I know that’s hardly positive thinking, considering he is yet to even place a toe over here, but at the same time it seems like a difficult thing to switch off and on again. It just seems so abstract, so theoretical. There’s no practice to the concept. We are ‘a couple’ in name only, really. It’s more than a little bizarre. Probably not a good idea thinking about it too much.
Things are quiet at work, too - the new person has started, who will be taking over my role. She’s trained to the point where she’s doing most of the work and I’m twiddling my thumbs. I will be taking over some other work for other people, but they’re either busy or not around. It’s quite strange.
Jeez, look at the time already - 4:15. Less than 2 more hours to go. My, but the day has flown. Actually starting to feel quite sleepy right now. Oh yes, I nearly forgot, I have a new strategy for coping with the upstairs neighbors. I don’t know if I’ve written about this but there is zero soundproofing between my flat and the one upstairs. I hear every creak and groan in the floor - it is highly annoying. Everything sounds so loud too, BANG - you know? Voices aren’t so bad, because they are usually so faint, and during the day I’m moving around and making noise of my own. But when you lie down to sleep, you really hear every little thing. It’s been making falling asleep quite difficult. Even with earplugs. Each sound just stands out in contrast to the silence that you tend to dwell on it anyway. And the more you try to ignore it, of course, the more you wind up listening out for the next one. So last night I put my stereo on its ’sleep function’, where it plays for an hour and then turns itself off, playing really quietly, but just loud enough to hear through the earplugs. It worked like a dream. Sure I didn’t fall asleep straight away - I wasn’t really relaxed enough, I kept thinking “is this going to work?”, but I think I slept better than I have in quite a while. It also means that I won’t feel so ill-disposed towards the neighbors.
Perhaps harping on about sleeping patterns isn’t an interesting writing topic, I don’t know; but missing out on sleep, being tired all the time and not able to catch up on it can completely affect your reality. You get cranky, ill, feel lethargic…so I guess it is a major ‘thing’ for me at the moment, getting enough sleep.
It’s nearly daylight savings soon, rather, the end of it. I think we go back an hour this weekend. The nights are getting longer. When I woke up this morning I couldn’t make out the face of my watch; I’m going to have to start using my cellphone in the mornings to figure out what time it is.
It looks like it’s going to rain. Heavy dark cloud outside, with strangely illuminated white buildings across the road.
Yes, I’ve found myself in exactly the same sort of work situation as the many times before… A job where you can get your work done, most days, in half the time you’re sitting there at your desk. It reminds me of school. You’d get your work done, and then, because it’s really not the done thing to crack open a good book in the middle of maths class, you sit there bored for the rest of the class. It’s something similar here. At least, I suppose, there is the internet, which is a form of reading, but you’re still stuck there in your chair. And co-workers have the nasty ability to sneak up on you (wearing headphones and listening to CDs probably doesn’t help too much on that front either).
Yesterday I was walking home from the Brewery (met James in town and we had a coffee at Felix and then walked over to say hi to Alan & Lisa) and I stopped in at “Bizy Bee” books. I really didn’t mean to go in there, but I wound up at the second-hand kids’ section, and wound up walking out of there with a wee stack of books - “Rumble Fish”, a Ruth Chew book, a little story collection about Witches, even a Bobbsey Twins (man I used to love those. I bet it’s terrible.).
Today the plan is to meet (at the Brewery. How convenient.) and then get some takeaways from Satay Village and then head up to Alan & Lisa’s and get out a video. I was planning on heading home and delving into my childrens’ books and maybe doing a little writing (I have been procrastinating, doing nothing) and go for a run (also procrastinating). BUT –
This is why the idea of getting a place of my own is starting to look like a good one. I wind up being so busy every week, seeing friends and catching up, having lunch, etc. that maybe I wouldn’t feel too lonely if I was in a place by myself. I don’t know how much it will wind up costing me, but I really just want something small, not fancy. Just clean. Enough room for bed, desk, maybe a table. A comfy chair. The smallness seems to be important to me, somehow. I don’t want to get into something large and ridiculous. Small and functional, but something I can easily make feel useful. If it’s all one room (minus the bathroom, of course), then so much the better. Even if I don’t get into the damn bill manhire course, I know that living in a place of my own will be better for me creatively. It’s like Jeremy needing to move into a two bed place so he can make one into a studio. He’s paying $190 a week though. I can’t afford that, especially if I’m going to be at uni next year. (IF. But I still have to consider it, don’t I?)
Well, at least by christmas I will know if I’ve got in. Then I can have a wee think about what I am going to do next. At the moment my plans depend on two things that - at the moment - aren’t certain. Am I going to get into the class? Is Aart going to come over and work (will he find a job? will he get sponsored? What are the odds? I don’t know).
We’ve got a work christmas party on this saturday. At least it will be a free night. We’re supposed to dress up. The theme is “The Titanic”. Christ Almighty. That’s the problem with dress-up parties. You’re terrified of being the only one not in costume, of looking like a complete and utter party-pooper, but at the same time, I really can’t be bothered trying to find some sort of dumb costume, when I’d really rather do christmas shopping (and buy myself presents) with the money. But now I’ve said I’ll go. Ah forget it. I can’t be bothered with this costume thing. Maybe if it was a friends’ party, but this is work, for God’s sake.
I’m reading Margaret Atwood’s “The Blind Assassin”. I got it signed by her when Daph and I went to go see her a few weeks ago. It was brilliant. Daph also won a (hardback) copy of “Oryx and Crake” that she gave me, saying it was more my thing than hers! Brilliant! Brilliant! Book is brilliant too, by the way.
Speaking of Brilliance, I re-read “Rumble Fish” last night. That book is fantastic. So is the movie, for that matter. Brilliant.
What else is news…I’m not even sure how long it’s been since I last updated, so please forgive me if I repeat myself.
Things are still strange, with my grandfather dead. I have been thinking about death and dying a lot lately, which of course isn’t completely unexpected. It’s a normal thing. It’s a necessary thing. People don’t think about death enough, in my opinion. I think people spend too much time trying not to think about death. We pretend that it’s not just around the corner. We think everything is going to stay the same if we make it. We tell ourselves axioms such as “nothing is certain but death and taxes”. But we call these things “axioms”, and quote them in university essays, and we don’t think that these statements are fucking true, and then suddenly the change hits, and someone dies, or you die, and you wring your hands and say “woe is me”, and worst of all, you’re suprised that it’s happened. “It happened so quickly,” we like to say. Then we think about it and decide that when it happens to us, we would like to go quickly, even if it is difficult for the family. We’re selfish that way. We don’t want any pain, any fear - any life - in our death. People are funny things that way. We want to “rage into the light”, or however it goes, but at the same time we don’t want it to hurt too much.
Anyway, I think it’s good to think every day, “This isn’t going to last much longer. One day I will be dead and everything will carry on without me.”
Then again, once you’re dead you won’t mind so much.
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