Blimey, I haven’t written on this blog for ages. It must be a month now at least. Reasons being; I’ve completely changed my job so I now have no internet access (well at home, but we’re always using a p2p program so the connection speed is arse, it’s like using the Macintosh that I set up in about 1996 for my dad.) Anyway life has, as ever, moved on in many ways.
Firstly, my new job, where I spend 8 hours a day in a Young Offenders Institution chasing paper round their offices. I’m a temp so I’m on better money than most of the people who work here, I can work as and when I choose (not totally; if I chose I wouldn’t) so I start at 8.20 and finish at 4.20. It’s great, so much better than my last job, as I have no pressure, no responsibility and no worries. Whilst the money isn’t great, it’s as good as what I was on and I’m not travelling as far.
It’s an open plan office, which is new to me, but is also a welcome change to my last office environment, me on my own in (granted, a very nice) office in charge of my own workload. Now I just do as I’m told and when I’ve done that I do what I like. In fact I think I’ll have this afternoon off. (See isn’t it great!)
So the new job has made me feel a great deal better about my prospects and myself. As has the lady who now enjoys spending time in my company (and my bed). On top of this I have given up drinking caffeinated coffee. Which, I feel, has a great deal to do with my less agitated, less tetchy and generally more positive outlook on life (that and the sex). I still get the odd bout of rage; when cables get tangled, changing my bedding, the state of my house, etc. But these things are perfectly understandable, apart from the cables. How do electric cables get tangled up so quickly and so well? You can put a cable in a draw for 5 minutes, get it out again and it’ll be wrapped round anything and everything else? Why has no one invented a cable that will not tangle? Perhaps using magnets?
So things are good. (To all those people who know me, yes I thoroughly agree that statement doesn’t sound like me, but hey! people change).
Or do they…?
Wednesday, December 10, 2003
Friday, October 31, 2003
My last day....
Well, i'm here finally on my last day in this godawful job. And i'm elegiac. I'm sat twiddling my thumbs because even though i've only been given three days to get all the work done for the training programmes up to christmas, i've done it all anyway. The story is a long one....
I handed my notice in on Friday which went really well. I was thanked for my honesty in expressing that there was someone out there more capable at the telesales aspect of my job. On Monday i found out that they wanted me to get everything done and leave on November the 7th, they asked me if that was okay. Hmm... thought for all of a millisecond and said YEAH!!!
On Wednesday morning i left an answerphone message stating i would be an hour or so late as i was getting my haircut. (The MD does the same when getting his haircut and they call me senior management so i thought Hey!) When i arrived in work there was a letter on my desk telling me i was leaving this friday and that i would still be paid up to this Friday, even though i'd behaved impolitely and unprofessionally. Now anyone reading his knows me and thats like a red rag to a bull.
I wrote a letter to the old cunt who sent me that one. He's 66 claims to be a Film Director of international reputation (as in he once when he was younger worked with some famous people, i mean ever heard of John Sichel??? I doubt it.) but he's just a grumpy old cunt with an out of date TV and Theatre training centre on his doorstep. No one stands up to him, no one. So i did.
The letter merely apologised for my behaviour saying that i was acting as i had seen others behave, and that i recognised and accepted the new
I handed my notice in on Friday which went really well. I was thanked for my honesty in expressing that there was someone out there more capable at the telesales aspect of my job. On Monday i found out that they wanted me to get everything done and leave on November the 7th, they asked me if that was okay. Hmm... thought for all of a millisecond and said YEAH!!!
On Wednesday morning i left an answerphone message stating i would be an hour or so late as i was getting my haircut. (The MD does the same when getting his haircut and they call me senior management so i thought Hey!) When i arrived in work there was a letter on my desk telling me i was leaving this friday and that i would still be paid up to this Friday, even though i'd behaved impolitely and unprofessionally. Now anyone reading his knows me and thats like a red rag to a bull.
I wrote a letter to the old cunt who sent me that one. He's 66 claims to be a Film Director of international reputation (as in he once when he was younger worked with some famous people, i mean ever heard of John Sichel??? I doubt it.) but he's just a grumpy old cunt with an out of date TV and Theatre training centre on his doorstep. No one stands up to him, no one. So i did.
The letter merely apologised for my behaviour saying that i was acting as i had seen others behave, and that i recognised and accepted the new
Tuesday, October 28, 2003
Too much time to think about These Things.
I'm not sure i can attribute my sudden well being to the act of sexual congress. Both Emily and myself have been wondering why we aren't changed, why we don't feel that different. Sex is one thing, caring about someone is something different, and we have a situation which makes us hunger for each other i.e. we work together and have to hide the fact. Plus we're both a few years out of the loop when it comes to intimate physical contact. My groin hurts like a motherfucker. We've used muscles that neither of us have used for a long time.
Perhaps the funniest thing is that last night i had a nosebleed whilst on the job. Is it a physical manifestation of my real fears and anxieties. I doubt it...
What still concerns me is the necessity of it. I enjoyed what we did on Sunday, though i enjoy certain aspects of making music a great deal more than a bit of animalistic rummaging.
I've always attributed my lack of sexual desire to:
A) Having spent time on Prozac; before which i was a horny and near unstoppable shagging machine.
B) My most serious relationship to date which i believe made me confuse sex with commitment and being loved.
I find being loved very hard, in the same way i find being praised hard. I worry that perhaps i don't like the girl as much as she likes me and that if i sleep with her, in the end, she'll fall in love with me and never want to split up. I suppose that makes me feel trapped. But why should i feel this way? Is it because i don't really fancy her? Is it because she's not the most attractive girl in the world? I've always found independence a turn on and i've always found that an independent girl will miraculously transform into one emotionally dependent on me and i don't like that. I am attracted to them as they are not how they've become because of me.
I find sex a messy and strangely uncomfortable affair, perhaps i'm too pragmatic and rational a person to cope with the notion of feeling horny. Yes i can be as stiff as the next man in seconds, but i feel detached from it. (Not literally) Yesterday i wrote that i think too much about everything and that really covers it, even when i'm concentrating on the job in hand i'm thinking about other things; thoughts, feelings, am i doing it right, what do i do next, what do you want me to do???? and this detracts from the all encompassing feeling of sexual pleasure thats meant to absorb me and make me a part of her.
Nick: whats the name of that book you had about sex?
Maybe i'm just not doing it right.
Why do i worry so much about emotionally hurting them?
Why can't i be like all the other men in the world and not care, just fuck em and dump em.
Move on to the next?
Music in my Mind: Pet Sounds. I can't imagine writing a song like ...Made For These Times even though it resonates within my life more than many songs. Ever since i first heard it, i heard my own life in it. Like my own confusion about the world around me and the way we're supposed to get through it. I'm 24 and i still feel as lost, submerged perhaps, in the world around us. Feelings and emotions do not make sense. Intellect and intuition don't make sense. You are nothing until someone tells you you are.
Perhaps the funniest thing is that last night i had a nosebleed whilst on the job. Is it a physical manifestation of my real fears and anxieties. I doubt it...
What still concerns me is the necessity of it. I enjoyed what we did on Sunday, though i enjoy certain aspects of making music a great deal more than a bit of animalistic rummaging.
I've always attributed my lack of sexual desire to:
A) Having spent time on Prozac; before which i was a horny and near unstoppable shagging machine.
B) My most serious relationship to date which i believe made me confuse sex with commitment and being loved.
I find being loved very hard, in the same way i find being praised hard. I worry that perhaps i don't like the girl as much as she likes me and that if i sleep with her, in the end, she'll fall in love with me and never want to split up. I suppose that makes me feel trapped. But why should i feel this way? Is it because i don't really fancy her? Is it because she's not the most attractive girl in the world? I've always found independence a turn on and i've always found that an independent girl will miraculously transform into one emotionally dependent on me and i don't like that. I am attracted to them as they are not how they've become because of me.
I find sex a messy and strangely uncomfortable affair, perhaps i'm too pragmatic and rational a person to cope with the notion of feeling horny. Yes i can be as stiff as the next man in seconds, but i feel detached from it. (Not literally) Yesterday i wrote that i think too much about everything and that really covers it, even when i'm concentrating on the job in hand i'm thinking about other things; thoughts, feelings, am i doing it right, what do i do next, what do you want me to do???? and this detracts from the all encompassing feeling of sexual pleasure thats meant to absorb me and make me a part of her.
Nick: whats the name of that book you had about sex?
Maybe i'm just not doing it right.
Why do i worry so much about emotionally hurting them?
Why can't i be like all the other men in the world and not care, just fuck em and dump em.
Move on to the next?
Music in my Mind: Pet Sounds. I can't imagine writing a song like ...Made For These Times even though it resonates within my life more than many songs. Ever since i first heard it, i heard my own life in it. Like my own confusion about the world around me and the way we're supposed to get through it. I'm 24 and i still feel as lost, submerged perhaps, in the world around us. Feelings and emotions do not make sense. Intellect and intuition don't make sense. You are nothing until someone tells you you are.
Monday, October 27, 2003
Four Years Later.
(Firstly let me apologise for what i'm about to say) I had actual, physical, sexual intercourse this weekend. After about four years in the (pardon the pun) fucking wilderness, i have put my man bit inside a girls bit. And yes, it was fun.
Has it changed the person i am? Not really, i'm happier, i suppose and the road rage was utterly non-existent this morning.
My groin hurts. But it hasn't changed my world, except that all the expectation and angst, anxiety and nervousness thats prevented me from doing it before has gone. What the fuck was i so worried about?
But then we're very comfortable with each other and we could talk openly about it. I've been incapable of having sex within the last 4 relationships i've had, purely because of nerves and anxiety. The weight of my social conditioning and testosterone squashing me into a nervous wreck, too frightened to be 'impolite' with a girl. The expectation of males is to get in there and get on with the job, but that used to just make me more nervous. I don't understand where my new found confidence in this area came from.
The whole problem with sex and my life, before, during and after is that i think too much about everything.
Music in my Mind:The Last Broadcast by Doves. Listened to it coming back from Tamworth with Emily, sounded great. Listened to it on the way to work, sounded great.
It's my own music thats in my mind at the moment though, we haven't practiced for a month nearly and i'm busting to sing and play. I've got real feelings running through me and i want to fucking scream them out through my music, not only that but hopefully i'll be starting to have some singing lessons soon...
Has it changed the person i am? Not really, i'm happier, i suppose and the road rage was utterly non-existent this morning.
My groin hurts. But it hasn't changed my world, except that all the expectation and angst, anxiety and nervousness thats prevented me from doing it before has gone. What the fuck was i so worried about?
But then we're very comfortable with each other and we could talk openly about it. I've been incapable of having sex within the last 4 relationships i've had, purely because of nerves and anxiety. The weight of my social conditioning and testosterone squashing me into a nervous wreck, too frightened to be 'impolite' with a girl. The expectation of males is to get in there and get on with the job, but that used to just make me more nervous. I don't understand where my new found confidence in this area came from.
The whole problem with sex and my life, before, during and after is that i think too much about everything.
Music in my Mind:The Last Broadcast by Doves. Listened to it coming back from Tamworth with Emily, sounded great. Listened to it on the way to work, sounded great.
It's my own music thats in my mind at the moment though, we haven't practiced for a month nearly and i'm busting to sing and play. I've got real feelings running through me and i want to fucking scream them out through my music, not only that but hopefully i'll be starting to have some singing lessons soon...
Friday, October 24, 2003
The End...?
I left my letter of resignation on my Managing Director's desk this morning.
I have not felt so happy and full of life, as if the weight of the world has been lifted, since i found out i had been given the job.
The environs of the job have been the reason i have felt trapped, i am isolated physically by it's rural setting and alienated through my employers lack of interaction with the outsider world.
I feel happy.
I really, really fucking do.
I have not felt so happy and full of life, as if the weight of the world has been lifted, since i found out i had been given the job.
The environs of the job have been the reason i have felt trapped, i am isolated physically by it's rural setting and alienated through my employers lack of interaction with the outsider world.
I feel happy.
I really, really fucking do.
Thursday, October 23, 2003
How do you ignore being patronised?
It's something i've always worried i do when i talk to other people. I know that i don't patronise or talk to people in a condescending (sp?) fashion, i have no arrogance in me to do so. The MD of the "company" i currently work for ignores everything i say, considers it irrelevant and doesn't believe me when i say things. He doesn't find any of my humourous comments funny, he just sighs and continues with what he's saying. It's killing me, becuase he's no better than i am at anything (apart from sucking cock). He is so fucking arrogant it's beyond belief.
Over a meal with Emily last night i realised why they treat me this way. It's because they see me solely as their telesales donkey, the reason they don't recognise my talents in other fields is because they see me solely as their telesales donkey. In them seeing me this way it crushes me even more that i can't do the job, don't want to do the job and will be leaving the job. It also reduces me to something i am not. My whole image and persona for them is built round this task i have to carry out for them. Yes! i realise i was employed to fulfil this role, but i can't and as soon as i tell them so i might as well hand my notice in. Which i want to do within a week or two. Well i'd walk out today if my social conditioning and awareness of how the world works stops me from doing so. but to what ends should we go to seek happiness?
Over a meal with Emily last night i realised why they treat me this way. It's because they see me solely as their telesales donkey, the reason they don't recognise my talents in other fields is because they see me solely as their telesales donkey. In them seeing me this way it crushes me even more that i can't do the job, don't want to do the job and will be leaving the job. It also reduces me to something i am not. My whole image and persona for them is built round this task i have to carry out for them. Yes! i realise i was employed to fulfil this role, but i can't and as soon as i tell them so i might as well hand my notice in. Which i want to do within a week or two. Well i'd walk out today if my social conditioning and awareness of how the world works stops me from doing so. but to what ends should we go to seek happiness?
Wednesday, October 22, 2003
James: thank you for the emails, they made me feel better. Don't worry, this job will be over soon, i am facing up to the inevitable and looking at going into teaching. I think i'm going to do a post-compulsory PGCE in literacy (rather than numeracy, i can't teach what i don't know!). This job has clarified my hatred for the corporate/sales/cock-sucking environment. The people i work with are so uninterested in the people who work for them, they are only interested in this insignificant little company they've created over the years. It is so tired and staid it's beyond recognition. When i tell people i work for a video production company they go "Wow!". But they're shit, they produce wank corporate videos for wank backslapping companies. A day at work is like watching a mass fellatio session. Everyone backslapping and being smug about they're shit productions of theatre and video. They're caught up in their own little worlds and i hate them for it.
Nick: you know me well enough to know how i talk and feel about things. I am working on stopping it, i am working on getting myself out of this fucking awful mental state i'm in. I just feel trapped by the fact i can't do the one thing i have to as the main part of my job. I feel trapped by the necessity to start having a career (mainly because of the attitude all these cunts i work for have, positivity, drive, ambition, etfuckingcetera) but they're so positive with each other they just don't see that it's all shit. They have no creativity, yet they train these poor fuckers who've spent 10,500, to try to be creative, but then shit all over any ideas they may have, replacing them with their late 80's ideas of entertainment and art.
I love you both, and i'm starting to love myself again. I'd started to think iwas working towards something with this job but i'm not. The carrot at the end of the stick is corporate bullshit they wouldn't ever let me get involved in the aspects that i would want to be. I want to be creative, they don't want other people to be creative. I hate fucking writing and talking about it. As it doesn't make it any better. It just makes me angrier.
Nick: you know me well enough to know how i talk and feel about things. I am working on stopping it, i am working on getting myself out of this fucking awful mental state i'm in. I just feel trapped by the fact i can't do the one thing i have to as the main part of my job. I feel trapped by the necessity to start having a career (mainly because of the attitude all these cunts i work for have, positivity, drive, ambition, etfuckingcetera) but they're so positive with each other they just don't see that it's all shit. They have no creativity, yet they train these poor fuckers who've spent 10,500, to try to be creative, but then shit all over any ideas they may have, replacing them with their late 80's ideas of entertainment and art.
I love you both, and i'm starting to love myself again. I'd started to think iwas working towards something with this job but i'm not. The carrot at the end of the stick is corporate bullshit they wouldn't ever let me get involved in the aspects that i would want to be. I want to be creative, they don't want other people to be creative. I hate fucking writing and talking about it. As it doesn't make it any better. It just makes me angrier.
Tuesday, October 21, 2003
Never before have i felt like this...
I cried at work today.
I tried my hardest not to.
I actually cried at work.
I have never had a job that made me this upset. Only once in my life have i felt this powerless, futile and out of control and i cried then.
I cried at work today
No matter how i say it, there has to be something wrong.
I cried at work today
Looking at it now and feeling more numb than i did earlier, it doesn't seem to mean anything to me anymore. There are too many factors adding up at the moment. I have so many things that can make me happy in my life but there is one thing that is ruining it all.
I have a new female friend. We are a lot alike. We are getting on in ways i never saw myself ever doing again with another human being. We are being kept apart by my job. I am being made to feel wretched nearly every minute of every day by this job. Every aspect of it is killing me. I have gained all the experience it can give me, or rather all the experience i want to take from it. I could improve my sales technique, i could make my boss thousands of appointments but i can't. Because i don't want to.
I hate the people i work for, i hate everything they love, everything they work for, everything they believe in. I am not prepared to make myself like them. I am a funny, intelligent, creative, caring and loving human being. These people do not know this, they don't want to know it, they just want me to make appointments for my boss, who visits customers, who give money to the people i work for. I do not want to do this, they do not deserve me, they do not recognise or deserve my talents, i fucking hate them and their smug, self satisfied lives.
I...
Cried...
At...
Work...
Today............................................................................................................
I tried my hardest not to.
I actually cried at work.
I have never had a job that made me this upset. Only once in my life have i felt this powerless, futile and out of control and i cried then.
I cried at work today
No matter how i say it, there has to be something wrong.
I cried at work today
Looking at it now and feeling more numb than i did earlier, it doesn't seem to mean anything to me anymore. There are too many factors adding up at the moment. I have so many things that can make me happy in my life but there is one thing that is ruining it all.
I have a new female friend. We are a lot alike. We are getting on in ways i never saw myself ever doing again with another human being. We are being kept apart by my job. I am being made to feel wretched nearly every minute of every day by this job. Every aspect of it is killing me. I have gained all the experience it can give me, or rather all the experience i want to take from it. I could improve my sales technique, i could make my boss thousands of appointments but i can't. Because i don't want to.
I hate the people i work for, i hate everything they love, everything they work for, everything they believe in. I am not prepared to make myself like them. I am a funny, intelligent, creative, caring and loving human being. These people do not know this, they don't want to know it, they just want me to make appointments for my boss, who visits customers, who give money to the people i work for. I do not want to do this, they do not deserve me, they do not recognise or deserve my talents, i fucking hate them and their smug, self satisfied lives.
I...
Cried...
At...
Work...
Today............................................................................................................
Wednesday, October 15, 2003
Madness, madness they call it madness.
As my friend James points out on his blog, he advert banner above changes to fit with what has been written. What scares me is there are no adverts above mine. It says this blank space brought to you by google Arf! Arf!
I had a lovely meal in a place called El Piano in York last night. One of my brothers friends, and in turn my friend is leaving (again) to live in the big smoke, so he'd organised a bit of a celebration. He'd booked the moroccan room, which was great. Cushions on the floor, low tables, musical instruments, those things over the window (carved wood flaps) whatever they are and a wonderful selection of vegetarian food. They'd provided forks but eating with fingers was better. I bought a bottle of wine for £6.99, i haven't paid that much for a bottle of wine for ages. Not that it's a lot of money, but more than i'd usually pay. It was a Shiraz Cabernet which was delicious and went with the food beautifully.
I had a really enjoyable time, it was a group of people who'd never (all) met each other, so the conversation was very good. But there was the part of me, before i left the house, that kept telling me to stay in and be bored. I am my own worst enemy. The walk to the restaurant was lovely there was a clear sky, the Minster standing tall on the skyline and a comfortable temperature for walking. Delightful.
Oh. It's time for me to go home. Thank f**k.
I had a lovely meal in a place called El Piano in York last night. One of my brothers friends, and in turn my friend is leaving (again) to live in the big smoke, so he'd organised a bit of a celebration. He'd booked the moroccan room, which was great. Cushions on the floor, low tables, musical instruments, those things over the window (carved wood flaps) whatever they are and a wonderful selection of vegetarian food. They'd provided forks but eating with fingers was better. I bought a bottle of wine for £6.99, i haven't paid that much for a bottle of wine for ages. Not that it's a lot of money, but more than i'd usually pay. It was a Shiraz Cabernet which was delicious and went with the food beautifully.
I had a really enjoyable time, it was a group of people who'd never (all) met each other, so the conversation was very good. But there was the part of me, before i left the house, that kept telling me to stay in and be bored. I am my own worst enemy. The walk to the restaurant was lovely there was a clear sky, the Minster standing tall on the skyline and a comfortable temperature for walking. Delightful.
Oh. It's time for me to go home. Thank f**k.
Friday, October 10, 2003
Bloody italics.
I must apologise for this whole site being italicized. For some reason blogger has just made every one of my posts italic and if i go back, edit them and republish, they're still in italics. Hmmph.
Tuesday, October 07, 2003
Affected Youth
If you read this then hey! hello and thanks. I would recommend though that you read my friend James' page. It's a lot more interesting and funny than mine. But then he has the pleasure of being in Japan at the moment, and he has an incredible way (much like (you) Nick) of picking up on the mundanities of life and making them intriguing and surreal.
I've had Freeview available to me for the last four months or so. For the very first time BBC 4 broadcast something that i watched. Moreover it had me spellbound for nearly an hour. Home was an hour long special written by J.G. Ballard, and starring Anthony Sher. Now Mr. Sher has had something to do with running the RSC and i think he's linked to the musical of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. That he has the ability to act as he did in Home, dwarfs any other profession he may choose. It was an incredible expression of how reality is the root of madness, shown through a man refusing to ever again interact with the world or to step outside of his front door.
He viewed it as an experiment, a great adventure to be had following his wife leaving him and a serious car accident. He took stock of the food, a fortnights worth at best although as a food technologist, he tells the camera, he can probably make it last longer. It doesn't last much longer sadly for our protagonist. From here on in, his meals start to become much more bizarre. Firstly there's the grass and leaves soup. Next, blendered garden worms, then the shampoo and ouzo cocktail.
" Because one of the main ingredients of this is Vitamin E." He tells us. Then proceeds to down it, gagging unpleasantly convincingly. I can't remember if thats before or after he pulls out one of his back teeth with pliers and the last of the brandy, it just underlines the hallucinatory feel of his world. His next meal, is i think, books. He happily tears the pages out and munches telling us they have no carbohydrate value, but they fill the void. After this it descends into chaos as he starts to eat the neighbours pets, caught in a basic animal trap of his own design. His madness is rooted in a belief that his house is a living, powerful entity. He observes a massive expansion of the upstairs, he sees a bright light forcing the house outwards in crazy geometric patterns. This is what his experiment has become, he has become a channel for the house's power to flow through and he loves it, his idea of reality is so twisted now that he has no qualms beating the bayliff to death with a video recorder, when the bayliff (played by Keith Allen, shallow grave anyone??) attempts to see what is going on upstairs.
It's f**ked up and my description is sadly doing it little or no justice. I recommend though that you see it. I now have it on VCR if anyone would like to borrow it.
Of great interest to me is the last blog i published. It's typical me: bitch and moan, the funny thing though is that after i published it i made two succesfull calls and two appointments. I just got on with it. Spoke to these chaps about their video needs/uses and convinced them both to meet with Lynsey. Unbelievable. Describing my issues and problems with it seemed to solidify my feelings about cold calling. I have a warm and friendly voice, i am well spoken and confident and so long as i remember these things i will succeed. I do not ring these people to make them have appointments i ring them to discuss the ways in which we could help them. This is how i need to see what i am doing. Not the whole pressure/sales thing. It is from my confidence and success that more confidence and success will flow.
My review/description of Home is neither long enough nor short enough. I begin to write but feel i'm weighing the reader down with boring exposition, but i wanted to show you this programme, to try and give you some idea of the crazy, surreal experience watching it was. But perhaps i fail. Through not wanting to write too much, from not having a belief in my own choice of words, whatever, i just hope it makes you try and find it to see it.
Music in my Mind: Eno - Atmospheres feat Ending (An Ascent) - a beautiful 4 minute riff which you've all heard (NSPCC adverts, 28 Days Later, etc.) Happily going to sleep of an evening with ambient soundscapes drifting me to the land of nod. Driving to & from work: Sasha & Digweed - Communications - mainly for Phaser by 16b, Waah by Pob and Enjoyed by the Chemical Brothers (basically an instrumental version of Out Of Control)
I've had Freeview available to me for the last four months or so. For the very first time BBC 4 broadcast something that i watched. Moreover it had me spellbound for nearly an hour. Home was an hour long special written by J.G. Ballard, and starring Anthony Sher. Now Mr. Sher has had something to do with running the RSC and i think he's linked to the musical of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. That he has the ability to act as he did in Home, dwarfs any other profession he may choose. It was an incredible expression of how reality is the root of madness, shown through a man refusing to ever again interact with the world or to step outside of his front door.
He viewed it as an experiment, a great adventure to be had following his wife leaving him and a serious car accident. He took stock of the food, a fortnights worth at best although as a food technologist, he tells the camera, he can probably make it last longer. It doesn't last much longer sadly for our protagonist. From here on in, his meals start to become much more bizarre. Firstly there's the grass and leaves soup. Next, blendered garden worms, then the shampoo and ouzo cocktail.
" Because one of the main ingredients of this is Vitamin E." He tells us. Then proceeds to down it, gagging unpleasantly convincingly. I can't remember if thats before or after he pulls out one of his back teeth with pliers and the last of the brandy, it just underlines the hallucinatory feel of his world. His next meal, is i think, books. He happily tears the pages out and munches telling us they have no carbohydrate value, but they fill the void. After this it descends into chaos as he starts to eat the neighbours pets, caught in a basic animal trap of his own design. His madness is rooted in a belief that his house is a living, powerful entity. He observes a massive expansion of the upstairs, he sees a bright light forcing the house outwards in crazy geometric patterns. This is what his experiment has become, he has become a channel for the house's power to flow through and he loves it, his idea of reality is so twisted now that he has no qualms beating the bayliff to death with a video recorder, when the bayliff (played by Keith Allen, shallow grave anyone??) attempts to see what is going on upstairs.
It's f**ked up and my description is sadly doing it little or no justice. I recommend though that you see it. I now have it on VCR if anyone would like to borrow it.
Of great interest to me is the last blog i published. It's typical me: bitch and moan, the funny thing though is that after i published it i made two succesfull calls and two appointments. I just got on with it. Spoke to these chaps about their video needs/uses and convinced them both to meet with Lynsey. Unbelievable. Describing my issues and problems with it seemed to solidify my feelings about cold calling. I have a warm and friendly voice, i am well spoken and confident and so long as i remember these things i will succeed. I do not ring these people to make them have appointments i ring them to discuss the ways in which we could help them. This is how i need to see what i am doing. Not the whole pressure/sales thing. It is from my confidence and success that more confidence and success will flow.
My review/description of Home is neither long enough nor short enough. I begin to write but feel i'm weighing the reader down with boring exposition, but i wanted to show you this programme, to try and give you some idea of the crazy, surreal experience watching it was. But perhaps i fail. Through not wanting to write too much, from not having a belief in my own choice of words, whatever, i just hope it makes you try and find it to see it.
Music in my Mind: Eno - Atmospheres feat Ending (An Ascent) - a beautiful 4 minute riff which you've all heard (NSPCC adverts, 28 Days Later, etc.) Happily going to sleep of an evening with ambient soundscapes drifting me to the land of nod. Driving to & from work: Sasha & Digweed - Communications - mainly for Phaser by 16b, Waah by Pob and Enjoyed by the Chemical Brothers (basically an instrumental version of Out Of Control)
Monday, October 06, 2003
Another weekend spent Sleeping, Smoking and Washing...
It’s all gone tits up. On Friday I spent the day shirking my telephone reponsibilities, finding anything and everything to do rather than phone loads of people I don’t know, who don’t know me, have better things to do with their time and who don’t want an appointment with one of our sales managers. But it is the main thrust of my job. Whereas the main thrust in my previous job was cutting lettuce and whilst I didn’t enjoy it, I did it (except of course for the mornings where I stayed in bed!). You got on with it because you had your boss breathing down your neck to get it done. If you weren’t cutting enough he’d happily tell you to get a move on. I don’t have this with my new job. There is the constant pressure to get appointments, but without the actual threat.
Although that threat reared it’s quite unattractive head on Friday. My boss Duncan wanted a word with me at the end of the day, so I went to see him and we had a discussion about appointments and sales calls. He said he wanted me to think about it over the weekend then have 10 minutes with him today explaining the situation. He either expected me to hand in my notice or to tell him that I do want to be good in that aspect of my work and that the future is bright.
Of course I went to him with the latter. There is a part of me that would love to hand my notice in and have done with the world of telesales, but the experience this workplace can give me is invaluable. Add to this the fact that I AM CAPABLE OF ANYTHING I TURN MY MIND TO and you have success. It’s just a real big hurdle I have to get over and whilst there is a whole load of helping hands ready to help me over this hurdle, there is only one person who can decide whether I make it or not and that person is me. The obstacle to my happiness, wellbeing, success and fortune is me or rather my mind.
I am uncharacteristically nervous when I sit down with the telephone, which doesn’t get me off to a good start. I am then thoroughly aware that I MUST make some appointments from the (let’s say) 40 calls I have to make. Then when I am on the phone to the person I am thoroughly aware that they don’t have time for me or what I have to say, they aren’t interested (but that’s because I don’t make it sound interesting). I then worry about not knowing the right thing to say, which makes me say the wrong thing, I panic in the gaps between either of us saying something which is when my mind makes those pauses in the conversation even longer and more painful than they are. When they say they’re not interested I accept that and put the phone down. I do not know how to convince someone of something, although I am incredibly good at explaining the way something works to somebody. I worry that I am saying too much, but feel uncomfortable with my smaller script. I feel uncomfortable using sayings and phrases that I would not normally use, they do not come out of my mouth comfortably, either to my ears or somebody elses. I am too preoccupied thinking about what the other person might be thinking about me to think clearly about the subject and conversation.
It’s just not me.
Although that threat reared it’s quite unattractive head on Friday. My boss Duncan wanted a word with me at the end of the day, so I went to see him and we had a discussion about appointments and sales calls. He said he wanted me to think about it over the weekend then have 10 minutes with him today explaining the situation. He either expected me to hand in my notice or to tell him that I do want to be good in that aspect of my work and that the future is bright.
Of course I went to him with the latter. There is a part of me that would love to hand my notice in and have done with the world of telesales, but the experience this workplace can give me is invaluable. Add to this the fact that I AM CAPABLE OF ANYTHING I TURN MY MIND TO and you have success. It’s just a real big hurdle I have to get over and whilst there is a whole load of helping hands ready to help me over this hurdle, there is only one person who can decide whether I make it or not and that person is me. The obstacle to my happiness, wellbeing, success and fortune is me or rather my mind.
I am uncharacteristically nervous when I sit down with the telephone, which doesn’t get me off to a good start. I am then thoroughly aware that I MUST make some appointments from the (let’s say) 40 calls I have to make. Then when I am on the phone to the person I am thoroughly aware that they don’t have time for me or what I have to say, they aren’t interested (but that’s because I don’t make it sound interesting). I then worry about not knowing the right thing to say, which makes me say the wrong thing, I panic in the gaps between either of us saying something which is when my mind makes those pauses in the conversation even longer and more painful than they are. When they say they’re not interested I accept that and put the phone down. I do not know how to convince someone of something, although I am incredibly good at explaining the way something works to somebody. I worry that I am saying too much, but feel uncomfortable with my smaller script. I feel uncomfortable using sayings and phrases that I would not normally use, they do not come out of my mouth comfortably, either to my ears or somebody elses. I am too preoccupied thinking about what the other person might be thinking about me to think clearly about the subject and conversation.
It’s just not me.
Wednesday, October 01, 2003
Seasons of mists and mellow fruitfulness...
I had my first round of telesales training last night. I had an hour and a half of it before I went home. Now I accept it’s a part of my job that I need to conquer and I’m fully prepared to try. It’s just that it’s really hard. When I heard myself back on the recording I sounded awful: I spoke too fast, I sounded desperate and nervous and basically didn’t sound like me. It was hard. Give me a guitar and someone who wants to listen and I’ll change their world. Give me a telephone and someone who doesn’t want to listen and I’ll fail to do anything except f**k up. It ruined my day yesterday.
The drive home cheered me up a bit though. I was booting it round the back roads to work with a guy in a large, burgundy Nis**n behind me. He kept up and I was really enjoying the drive. He overtook me on a straight “Fair play” I thought to myself. I have no problem with people overtaking me. As we came into the village of Escrick though I took a left, which brings you out at a different bit of the A19. I sailed past where he was waiting to turn my way, so I rolled my window down and gave him a pleasant wave! I love having fun on the roads, it’s so much better than driving aggressively. He managed to get out only one car behind me, which he promptly overtook. As he caught up with me he flashed his lights, so I turned and gave him a little wave. He waved back! What fun.
This morning’s drive to work was beautiful. The shafts of sunlight beaming through the trees, a slight mist accentuating each separate shaft of light and the huge milky sea that was the sky. It helped that I had my minidisc of my mixing on. I’m not much of a beat mixer (not for a few years at least) but I know great music, and I also know how to put tracks together. I just can’t seem to find the time to practice. My decks are setup in the lounge so we’re usually watching TV. Which is the biggest waste of my life ever. As much as you can enjoy a TV programme, you can laugh, cry, be made to think (though not that often), it does not compare with experiences you have in your own life, communicating with others for example. It just sucks up your energy and thoughts, preventing you from doing anything. I think it was Hitchcock who said:
Television is known as a medium because it is neither rare nor well done.
I shall leave you with that thought as you sit down to stare at a screen.
The drive home cheered me up a bit though. I was booting it round the back roads to work with a guy in a large, burgundy Nis**n behind me. He kept up and I was really enjoying the drive. He overtook me on a straight “Fair play” I thought to myself. I have no problem with people overtaking me. As we came into the village of Escrick though I took a left, which brings you out at a different bit of the A19. I sailed past where he was waiting to turn my way, so I rolled my window down and gave him a pleasant wave! I love having fun on the roads, it’s so much better than driving aggressively. He managed to get out only one car behind me, which he promptly overtook. As he caught up with me he flashed his lights, so I turned and gave him a little wave. He waved back! What fun.
This morning’s drive to work was beautiful. The shafts of sunlight beaming through the trees, a slight mist accentuating each separate shaft of light and the huge milky sea that was the sky. It helped that I had my minidisc of my mixing on. I’m not much of a beat mixer (not for a few years at least) but I know great music, and I also know how to put tracks together. I just can’t seem to find the time to practice. My decks are setup in the lounge so we’re usually watching TV. Which is the biggest waste of my life ever. As much as you can enjoy a TV programme, you can laugh, cry, be made to think (though not that often), it does not compare with experiences you have in your own life, communicating with others for example. It just sucks up your energy and thoughts, preventing you from doing anything. I think it was Hitchcock who said:
Television is known as a medium because it is neither rare nor well done.
I shall leave you with that thought as you sit down to stare at a screen.
Tuesday, September 30, 2003
Monday the 29th September
I love my friend James so much. He spent the last year telling me to watch a film called “Waking Life” by Richard Linklater. I have now seen most of it and enjoyed it more than my limited vocabulary can express. It is animation over film. It is about philosophy and life. It is stunning. The world is in constant motion, the backgrounds shift, the foreground merges into shapes, people fly. I tried watching it with one of my friends, but bless him he didn’t understand much of it – how arrogant does that sound? But it is true, he didn’t.
Whereas I spent three years at Uni studying many of the ideas and issues that the characters talk about, so I was halfway there. To anyone not interested in philosophy or life or the human spirit this film will be lost, they’ll call it boring and just talking – “not very exciting is it”. These people though could never understand the feeling of knowing that other people think the same way as them.
Whereas I spent three years at Uni studying many of the ideas and issues that the characters talk about, so I was halfway there. To anyone not interested in philosophy or life or the human spirit this film will be lost, they’ll call it boring and just talking – “not very exciting is it”. These people though could never understand the feeling of knowing that other people think the same way as them.
Thursday, September 25, 2003
Not enough hours in a day.
There aren't enough hours in a day. Well, there are just not a day where one has to go to work. It's wrong. Totally wrong. Before my new boss came i was posting maybe once a day, it's been a week and a half since my last blog. What's happened? What's changed? What's new pussycat? I'd ordinarily say "Not much", but thats not strictly true. Much has happened, the world has turned, lives have ended, new ones begun.But has anything happened in your life, you fool!? This is after all meant to be about you...
Quite.
What i was meant to be saying was how i am now addicted to The Sims. What a game! Why bother getting on with your own life when you can control other peoples. All you do is make them eat, sleep, have fun, dance, use the toilet, but it is incredibly good fun. I have already wasted a few hours of my life staring at the screen giving them long lists of tasks to carry out. Top fun.
Yeah! I had a good weekend with my family. Spent the Friday evening in my old local. With my brother and his new wife. Had a few beers, then a few vodka's. Great fun. On Saturday we made our way over to my other brother's house in Knaresborough. We went out into Harrogate for the evening which again was very pleasant. But it's not saying anything about me is it? Does it have to?
The reason i'm writing today is because my boss is out at a meeting. I have the office to myself again, like i did before he came. I can look at porn, surf the net, basically do f**k all. The only problem though is that it just makes work for me, for myself. In shirking my responsibilities i am only disadvantaging one person, me. Well thats not strictly true. I disadvanage the company by wasting their money on doing nothing and through my inability to gain new contacts and appointments i also seem to be wasting their time. But telesales is neither easy nor fun.
I have started to enjoy it a bit more though, Eric (my nu boss) is motivating me, and his presence makes me react less emotionally to the calls than i used to.
Why are you talking about work, you don't care, so why should anyone else!?!
True.
Band practice tonight though!! Come on! Should just be the bassist, drummer and me as well which will be great. I know how to play the tunes, so does Luke (bass) and John holds it all together, i've just got to get sooo much better at playing and singing. It really is a f**king chore. All i want to do is play a bit of mad piano/organ and sing. I can sing so well when i try, it's just too much when i'm tw*tting a guitar at the same time. Get some beers down me, that'll fix it!!
If you haven't seen a film called Equilibrium, please do so. It's like a British version of The Matrix, perhaps a little too much like the Matrix. But, it is really, really good. It doesn't try to be something it's not, it doesn't base itself solely on clever camera techniques and the final fight is certainly one of the most interesting things i've ever seen done with guns. One particular moment pisses all over the Matrix. When you first see Christian Bale's character utilise his fighting skills - oh my word, it's great.
Quite.
What i was meant to be saying was how i am now addicted to The Sims. What a game! Why bother getting on with your own life when you can control other peoples. All you do is make them eat, sleep, have fun, dance, use the toilet, but it is incredibly good fun. I have already wasted a few hours of my life staring at the screen giving them long lists of tasks to carry out. Top fun.
Yeah! I had a good weekend with my family. Spent the Friday evening in my old local. With my brother and his new wife. Had a few beers, then a few vodka's. Great fun. On Saturday we made our way over to my other brother's house in Knaresborough. We went out into Harrogate for the evening which again was very pleasant. But it's not saying anything about me is it? Does it have to?
The reason i'm writing today is because my boss is out at a meeting. I have the office to myself again, like i did before he came. I can look at porn, surf the net, basically do f**k all. The only problem though is that it just makes work for me, for myself. In shirking my responsibilities i am only disadvantaging one person, me. Well thats not strictly true. I disadvanage the company by wasting their money on doing nothing and through my inability to gain new contacts and appointments i also seem to be wasting their time. But telesales is neither easy nor fun.
I have started to enjoy it a bit more though, Eric (my nu boss) is motivating me, and his presence makes me react less emotionally to the calls than i used to.
Why are you talking about work, you don't care, so why should anyone else!?!
True.
Band practice tonight though!! Come on! Should just be the bassist, drummer and me as well which will be great. I know how to play the tunes, so does Luke (bass) and John holds it all together, i've just got to get sooo much better at playing and singing. It really is a f**king chore. All i want to do is play a bit of mad piano/organ and sing. I can sing so well when i try, it's just too much when i'm tw*tting a guitar at the same time. Get some beers down me, that'll fix it!!
If you haven't seen a film called Equilibrium, please do so. It's like a British version of The Matrix, perhaps a little too much like the Matrix. But, it is really, really good. It doesn't try to be something it's not, it doesn't base itself solely on clever camera techniques and the final fight is certainly one of the most interesting things i've ever seen done with guns. One particular moment pisses all over the Matrix. When you first see Christian Bale's character utilise his fighting skills - oh my word, it's great.
Monday, September 15, 2003
I'm not alone anymore...
Oh well. It was never gonna last forever, this not having a boss thing. My new Sales Manager has started today so i have to make it look, not only like i know what i'm doing, but like i enjoy it and am good at it. He seems nice enough, enthusiastic, pleasant and confident, but the onus is now on me to be good at my job rather than just look like i am. I had my 3 month review last week, on the tuesday when i wrote my last entry. I was lavished with praise, but i think that was because i beat the MD to it.
He started by saying that he started all his staff reviews by asking them how they felt. (Now i'm quite proud of this) i said: "i'm doing better than i thought but not as well as i'd like" Which is perfectly true. I am doing much better than i thought i would be. i expected to be crap at this job, to never get appointments, to feel like a prat (one t or two?) talking to people who have n interest in hearing what i say, but it's all rubbish. I am good at my job.
My book "See You At The Top" by Zig Ziglar, is teaching me a lot. I've never been one for motivational/self help books - i mean self-help, how does a book written by somebody else help you...
Anyhoo, hometime!!! Yay!
He started by saying that he started all his staff reviews by asking them how they felt. (Now i'm quite proud of this) i said: "i'm doing better than i thought but not as well as i'd like" Which is perfectly true. I am doing much better than i thought i would be. i expected to be crap at this job, to never get appointments, to feel like a prat (one t or two?) talking to people who have n interest in hearing what i say, but it's all rubbish. I am good at my job.
My book "See You At The Top" by Zig Ziglar, is teaching me a lot. I've never been one for motivational/self help books - i mean self-help, how does a book written by somebody else help you...
Anyhoo, hometime!!! Yay!
Tuesday, September 09, 2003
It's gonna take time, a whole lot of Precious Time.
I've just had an epiphany. Well, i had it whilst urinating at work. Not on my desk or in the office, in the toilet. I thought about the last girl i had been trying to impress. At some stage i ended up with a guitar in my hands. As is ever the way, people always say "Play something we can sing". And i always fail miserably to recall anything they'd know. Usually because i don't actually know what they know and people are oddly reticent to suggest.
What i did in front of one of my old school friends, whom i recently met up with - partly the thanks must go to Friends Reunited, but it was before i'd paid my fiver. So Hah! I put 2 and 2 together i.e. saw which company he worked for then checked their website for the way his company write their email address. Voila! Anyway, what i did was played his acoustic guitar, i played a couple of my own songs. He sat awestruck (maybe too strong a word, bemused maybe) he really dug it though. When his mate came round for a bit, he made me play it to him too.
My epiphany, you see. Is that i don't do it in front of the peole i really want to impress. Now, don't get me wrong, i was as keen to impress my old friend as i would be to impress you. (whoever you are) But i didn't do it in front of a girl.
I've heard people like Billy Joel talk about how he pulled women by playing the piano. I am an artist. People should only have to understand me through my art. Or rather, i think i'd prefer people to understand me through my music, instead of by talking to me. The more time i spend in the company of women, the more i talk. The more i talk, the less attractive i become. Whereas, the music i create is something people like. Some of my lyrics are as anti-capitalist ranty, as some of my thoughts and beliefs. Yet, these are conveyed with music and my voice's approximation of a tune. Perhaps they don't listen to what i say. I don't half the time.
Now what was i saying?
What i did in front of one of my old school friends, whom i recently met up with - partly the thanks must go to Friends Reunited, but it was before i'd paid my fiver. So Hah! I put 2 and 2 together i.e. saw which company he worked for then checked their website for the way his company write their email address. Voila! Anyway, what i did was played his acoustic guitar, i played a couple of my own songs. He sat awestruck (maybe too strong a word, bemused maybe) he really dug it though. When his mate came round for a bit, he made me play it to him too.
My epiphany, you see. Is that i don't do it in front of the peole i really want to impress. Now, don't get me wrong, i was as keen to impress my old friend as i would be to impress you. (whoever you are) But i didn't do it in front of a girl.
I've heard people like Billy Joel talk about how he pulled women by playing the piano. I am an artist. People should only have to understand me through my art. Or rather, i think i'd prefer people to understand me through my music, instead of by talking to me. The more time i spend in the company of women, the more i talk. The more i talk, the less attractive i become. Whereas, the music i create is something people like. Some of my lyrics are as anti-capitalist ranty, as some of my thoughts and beliefs. Yet, these are conveyed with music and my voice's approximation of a tune. Perhaps they don't listen to what i say. I don't half the time.
Now what was i saying?
Bigmouth Strikes Again.
Well i've put my foot all the way down my throat this morning and actually managed to kick my own arse. I received an email, which claimed to be from someone around the time of september the 11th 2001. It had not stopped in it's travels since then and was meant to be a eulogy to the great and the good who died. I have no problem with that. But it was badly written, didn't scan as a poem, was plagarised from many different sources and was mainly sent by some thicko somewhere to make other people weep and worry about something that did not affect them and could have been avoided. I responded, not wishing to break the chain, to all the people in my address book. I added this:
That date in the year 2001, that no one will ever let us forget does not make up for the years of repression, oppression, bombing, killing and slave labour that America still foists on us all. America kill people because they are different, they keep down people who don't want to be a part of their western world, who don't see the world the same way as them.
Our differences of culture, of background, upbringing and life experiences are what brings us together. We should unite in our differences not try and make everybody see things one way.
I am very sad for the people who lost their lives, i would be callous and in-human if i did not feel for my fellow man. But these events did not appear out of thin air.
Cultural domination, especially by such a shallow, materialist culture should not be allowed. Are you forced to work in a factory for the equivalent of a bowl of rice a day? Have America bombed your country near constantly for as long as you can remember? Does America hate you for your religious and political beliefs? No? Do you think if they had you'd view things the same way?
I love you all very much and i would hate to think anything would happen to any of you. But i cannot stand unnecessary sentiment, wallowing in pity, sentiment for sentiments sake, proving your worth through showing how much you care for people you don't know. Think of the uproar when Diana died. Do any of those thousands of people we saw on telly mourning, think about her at all anymore? The answer is no.
Love to you all.
Oliver R Tones
Resident Cynic & Reality Checker
Now, i received a reply from one person who merely said "The sense you speak boy.". Which justified to me what i had written. Yet when i arrived at work i found an email from another friend, condemning me for my comments due to a situation i was unaware of in their lives. I felt like a c**t.
So I responded:
If you believe in the human soul and anything afterwards you know that we'll all get to spend eternity in the company of the ones we love.
I'm sad to hear about your friends as i am sad to hear about the loss of life in any situation. If i'd known, do you think i would honestly have written the same email? I may be insensitive, selfish, opinionated, hypocritical but i am not knowingly callous and would never say anything to hurt or upset people i love and respect.
Life is a series of events, some good, most bad. The people who deserve to live, die young and the people who don't deserve to live, live long lives, causing suffering and unhappiness to everyone they meet. I am working my hardest to stop being the latter of the two.
This email is exact proof of how, through our actions we can cause pain and suffering. My email was not aimed at you, it was not aimed at your friends. I am sorry if i offended you and upset you through my insensitive rantings.
Sorry.
That date in the year 2001, that no one will ever let us forget does not make up for the years of repression, oppression, bombing, killing and slave labour that America still foists on us all. America kill people because they are different, they keep down people who don't want to be a part of their western world, who don't see the world the same way as them.
Our differences of culture, of background, upbringing and life experiences are what brings us together. We should unite in our differences not try and make everybody see things one way.
I am very sad for the people who lost their lives, i would be callous and in-human if i did not feel for my fellow man. But these events did not appear out of thin air.
Cultural domination, especially by such a shallow, materialist culture should not be allowed. Are you forced to work in a factory for the equivalent of a bowl of rice a day? Have America bombed your country near constantly for as long as you can remember? Does America hate you for your religious and political beliefs? No? Do you think if they had you'd view things the same way?
I love you all very much and i would hate to think anything would happen to any of you. But i cannot stand unnecessary sentiment, wallowing in pity, sentiment for sentiments sake, proving your worth through showing how much you care for people you don't know. Think of the uproar when Diana died. Do any of those thousands of people we saw on telly mourning, think about her at all anymore? The answer is no.
Love to you all.
Oliver R Tones
Resident Cynic & Reality Checker
Now, i received a reply from one person who merely said "The sense you speak boy.". Which justified to me what i had written. Yet when i arrived at work i found an email from another friend, condemning me for my comments due to a situation i was unaware of in their lives. I felt like a c**t.
So I responded:
If you believe in the human soul and anything afterwards you know that we'll all get to spend eternity in the company of the ones we love.
I'm sad to hear about your friends as i am sad to hear about the loss of life in any situation. If i'd known, do you think i would honestly have written the same email? I may be insensitive, selfish, opinionated, hypocritical but i am not knowingly callous and would never say anything to hurt or upset people i love and respect.
Life is a series of events, some good, most bad. The people who deserve to live, die young and the people who don't deserve to live, live long lives, causing suffering and unhappiness to everyone they meet. I am working my hardest to stop being the latter of the two.
This email is exact proof of how, through our actions we can cause pain and suffering. My email was not aimed at you, it was not aimed at your friends. I am sorry if i offended you and upset you through my insensitive rantings.
Sorry.
Friday, September 05, 2003
Blogs..Huh..Good God! What are they good for....?
I spoke to my previous employer for the first time in 3 months, last night. He seemed tired. He mainly talked about how this would be the year he remembered as ‘the year people didn’t come to work’. It was like that when I was still there, over the 13 months I worked for him, my sick days must’ve averaged out at one a month, if not two. One of his workers got married last year after about 18 months of living together. Whilst I was there they essentially split up and we rarely saw him in work. I was told last night that in the last seven weeks he must’ve worked two.
Now you might think my old boss is stupid for letting his staff carry on like that, but what you perhaps don’t realise or know is that it’s incredibly difficult in this day and age to find people who want to work. Even more difficult is finding people who want to work and cut lettuce. It’s incredibly hard work. The only reason I’ve been happy doing it is because I accept work like that in my understanding of the world. Both my elder brothers worked on holdings at different times in their lives, so it was perfectly normal that my first summer jobs would be the same as theirs. I started at 15 making boxes for an hour or two. For every box I made I received a penny. I was making upward of 500 boxes of an evening though, so at 15 it was reasonable money. The next year when I left school I went to work full-time – until I started college in the September. It was f**king hard going, fortunately though I worked with a lad I’d been good friends through school with, and there were attractive young females there. It’s not like that anymore. One of the guys who works there is just over 30, maybe 33 or so. We went out nearly every Friday afternoon/evening when I worked there. He and I always got on very well, he introduced me to The Smiths and The Cure, and I introduced him to great, crazy music. I now love the two bands he played me; he was not so easily converted.
But he’s an alcoholic. One of three I’ve met in my life, each of whom I know well. It’s the most upsetting condition I’ve ever experienced. Each of these people have nothing better to do with their lives than drink as soon as they are able, to kill the pain, to alleviate the boredom of living, to make themselves more fun or to make other people more bearable, I don’t know. This is just me guessing at what drives them to drink. Perhaps these are the reasons I could become one if I chose. However I choose not to, in the same way I’ve chosen to never do heroin or ketamine or acid. Humans are weak willed by our very nature; it’s only things like self-respect and confidence that stop us all becoming addicts. Then again we can all be seen as addicts; the majority of us want nice clothes, nice cars, nice houses, nice jobs, nice friends and nice families. We are born with none of these things (except maybe the families) so we spend our lives chasing these things as if they’re round the next corner. Some people work hard for them, some are given them and some people never get them. I want these things as well, I’m as human as the next guy, but there are sacrifices I will not make, money I will not spend, and debts I will not incur.
I would love to find a drug that stills the constant whirl of thought and emotion occuring inside my head pretty much constantly, but that is life; it is the curse of sentience and being self aware. Prozac is a drug that prevents these thoughts, but it comes with too harsh side effects. Apathy, loss of libido, nausea and depression are the side effects that I remember. Whilst I don’t remember Prozac making me more depressed or particularly nauseaous, I must confess to it’s other side effects. The modern world aims to make us numb, Prozac is the ideal drug for that as it removes the analytical ability of the mind. A part of that then is an apathy toward everything which doesn’t concern you, things just wash blandly over you. You feel excited by the day to day, knowing you’re doing things, experiencing things, but it removes a point of perspective or a past or a future, you live solely in the now. Part of that apathy leads to a disinterest in almost everything including sex.
Now when in was on Prozac I had a girlfriend and suffice to say we had lots of sex, and in fact it helped me do so for longer periods than I’d usually been capable. Since that time though I have had little interest in sex other than the odd animalistic urge that bursts through my apathy and cyncism. I have never read Prozac Nation, and am not sure I ever will. American’s take drugs in a very different way to other people, prescription drug addiction I think was invented in America, not least because of the ready availability of habit forming substances. Read: Bret Easton Ellis, Hunter S Thomson, Armistead Maupin. Reading these books, particularly BEE’s, do something to me. I recently read The Rules of Attraction. Partly because I wanted to see the new film made of it (I haven’t as yet) and because I love BEE’s writing above all others. His characters are all cool to me, I want to be them, I want to experience their total lack of thoughts and cares. On coke behind sunglasses describes almost all his characters and whilst I don’t personally enjoy or agree with coke (perhaps it doesn’t agree with me?) the attitude’s of the characters toward life, the media, social lives and other humans touches me in a way these fictional people can never be. I want to care as little as them about everything, I want to waste my life strung out on mind-warping tranquilisers, motel rooms, dirty college sex and lusting after perfect women who don’t really exist. A woman who is perfect in my eyes can be a slut to others, a saint to their family. Who they are is utterly dependant on who’s looking at them.
But back to the alcoholics. I’ve had one living in my house for the last fortnight – granted I’ve not been there for the last week – I don’t mind, he’s homeless as well. He’s a very old, good friend. When I say old I mean it as well, he was forty this year. He taught me a lot of what I know about guitars and playing them he’s also always encouraged me to make music and inspired me to impress him. He will be one of the main beneficiaries of my eventual wealth, firstly through a good job in my studio then through alcoholics anonymous. He drinks if he’s able. Cheap cider, cheap lager, whatever is f**king cheap and in large quantities. Now our generation laugh about excess and damaging our bodies, but alcoholism will kill you. Spending time with someone whose breath constantly stinks of booze is horrible and upsetting. He doesn’t need it to enjoy time with us, but his life is so f**ked up that he has no choice. He doesn’t enjoy drinking, but he has to.
Perhaps in the same way I now feel compelled to write. This writing is for no one but myself, it is written as if there is a reader, but if I didn’t write it like that I wouldn’t write it. I’ve never known if writing is a cathartic experience for me or not, I feel better having written things and I sometimes feel better when I read it back. Does it allow me to analyse my own life the way I can others lives? I don’t think so. Even though I’m capable of viewing my life objectively, I cannot act on this perspective. I cannot make decisions about my own life the same way as advice so readily suggests itself to other’s predicaments. My life has seemed to me to be a search, for something better, something beautiful, something that is not the way my life has gone. As I grow older though it becomes clear that all the emotions that make me feel there is something else, are just distracting me from my life. Emotions seem to do that to me. Longings for girls who I’ve wasted every chance I’ve had with, retorts that come to me three seconds too late. I am too caught up in the emotional moment to control my thoughts and my actions. My thoughts spiral out of control as emotions charge round my body, my mind goes blank, is it chemicals rushing round me? Electrical charges? I do not know. Perhaps I never will.
I spoke to my previous employer for the first time in 3 months, last night. He seemed tired. He mainly talked about how this would be the year he remembered as ‘the year people didn’t come to work’. It was like that when I was still there, over the 13 months I worked for him, my sick days must’ve averaged out at one a month, if not two. One of his workers got married last year after about 18 months of living together. Whilst I was there they essentially split up and we rarely saw him in work. I was told last night that in the last seven weeks he must’ve worked two.
Now you might think my old boss is stupid for letting his staff carry on like that, but what you perhaps don’t realise or know is that it’s incredibly difficult in this day and age to find people who want to work. Even more difficult is finding people who want to work and cut lettuce. It’s incredibly hard work. The only reason I’ve been happy doing it is because I accept work like that in my understanding of the world. Both my elder brothers worked on holdings at different times in their lives, so it was perfectly normal that my first summer jobs would be the same as theirs. I started at 15 making boxes for an hour or two. For every box I made I received a penny. I was making upward of 500 boxes of an evening though, so at 15 it was reasonable money. The next year when I left school I went to work full-time – until I started college in the September. It was f**king hard going, fortunately though I worked with a lad I’d been good friends through school with, and there were attractive young females there. It’s not like that anymore. One of the guys who works there is just over 30, maybe 33 or so. We went out nearly every Friday afternoon/evening when I worked there. He and I always got on very well, he introduced me to The Smiths and The Cure, and I introduced him to great, crazy music. I now love the two bands he played me; he was not so easily converted.
But he’s an alcoholic. One of three I’ve met in my life, each of whom I know well. It’s the most upsetting condition I’ve ever experienced. Each of these people have nothing better to do with their lives than drink as soon as they are able, to kill the pain, to alleviate the boredom of living, to make themselves more fun or to make other people more bearable, I don’t know. This is just me guessing at what drives them to drink. Perhaps these are the reasons I could become one if I chose. However I choose not to, in the same way I’ve chosen to never do heroin or ketamine or acid. Humans are weak willed by our very nature; it’s only things like self-respect and confidence that stop us all becoming addicts. Then again we can all be seen as addicts; the majority of us want nice clothes, nice cars, nice houses, nice jobs, nice friends and nice families. We are born with none of these things (except maybe the families) so we spend our lives chasing these things as if they’re round the next corner. Some people work hard for them, some are given them and some people never get them. I want these things as well, I’m as human as the next guy, but there are sacrifices I will not make, money I will not spend, and debts I will not incur.
I would love to find a drug that stills the constant whirl of thought and emotion occuring inside my head pretty much constantly, but that is life; it is the curse of sentience and being self aware. Prozac is a drug that prevents these thoughts, but it comes with too harsh side effects. Apathy, loss of libido, nausea and depression are the side effects that I remember. Whilst I don’t remember Prozac making me more depressed or particularly nauseaous, I must confess to it’s other side effects. The modern world aims to make us numb, Prozac is the ideal drug for that as it removes the analytical ability of the mind. A part of that then is an apathy toward everything which doesn’t concern you, things just wash blandly over you. You feel excited by the day to day, knowing you’re doing things, experiencing things, but it removes a point of perspective or a past or a future, you live solely in the now. Part of that apathy leads to a disinterest in almost everything including sex.
Now when in was on Prozac I had a girlfriend and suffice to say we had lots of sex, and in fact it helped me do so for longer periods than I’d usually been capable. Since that time though I have had little interest in sex other than the odd animalistic urge that bursts through my apathy and cyncism. I have never read Prozac Nation, and am not sure I ever will. American’s take drugs in a very different way to other people, prescription drug addiction I think was invented in America, not least because of the ready availability of habit forming substances. Read: Bret Easton Ellis, Hunter S Thomson, Armistead Maupin. Reading these books, particularly BEE’s, do something to me. I recently read The Rules of Attraction. Partly because I wanted to see the new film made of it (I haven’t as yet) and because I love BEE’s writing above all others. His characters are all cool to me, I want to be them, I want to experience their total lack of thoughts and cares. On coke behind sunglasses describes almost all his characters and whilst I don’t personally enjoy or agree with coke (perhaps it doesn’t agree with me?) the attitude’s of the characters toward life, the media, social lives and other humans touches me in a way these fictional people can never be. I want to care as little as them about everything, I want to waste my life strung out on mind-warping tranquilisers, motel rooms, dirty college sex and lusting after perfect women who don’t really exist. A woman who is perfect in my eyes can be a slut to others, a saint to their family. Who they are is utterly dependant on who’s looking at them.
But back to the alcoholics. I’ve had one living in my house for the last fortnight – granted I’ve not been there for the last week – I don’t mind, he’s homeless as well. He’s a very old, good friend. When I say old I mean it as well, he was forty this year. He taught me a lot of what I know about guitars and playing them he’s also always encouraged me to make music and inspired me to impress him. He will be one of the main beneficiaries of my eventual wealth, firstly through a good job in my studio then through alcoholics anonymous. He drinks if he’s able. Cheap cider, cheap lager, whatever is f**king cheap and in large quantities. Now our generation laugh about excess and damaging our bodies, but alcoholism will kill you. Spending time with someone whose breath constantly stinks of booze is horrible and upsetting. He doesn’t need it to enjoy time with us, but his life is so f**ked up that he has no choice. He doesn’t enjoy drinking, but he has to.
Perhaps in the same way I now feel compelled to write. This writing is for no one but myself, it is written as if there is a reader, but if I didn’t write it like that I wouldn’t write it. I’ve never known if writing is a cathartic experience for me or not, I feel better having written things and I sometimes feel better when I read it back. Does it allow me to analyse my own life the way I can others lives? I don’t think so. Even though I’m capable of viewing my life objectively, I cannot act on this perspective. I cannot make decisions about my own life the same way as advice so readily suggests itself to other’s predicaments. My life has seemed to me to be a search, for something better, something beautiful, something that is not the way my life has gone. As I grow older though it becomes clear that all the emotions that make me feel there is something else, are just distracting me from my life. Emotions seem to do that to me. Longings for girls who I’ve wasted every chance I’ve had with, retorts that come to me three seconds too late. I am too caught up in the emotional moment to control my thoughts and my actions. My thoughts spiral out of control as emotions charge round my body, my mind goes blank, is it chemicals rushing round me? Electrical charges? I do not know. Perhaps I never will.
Wednesday, September 03, 2003
Tell Me Why I Don't Like Mondays... (Part2 - Wednesday)
As i was saying about pub etiquette: I kept me head down in a pub and watched the world go by. That's what i look for in a drinking establishment nowadays. The Charles Bradlaugh was aperfect example of the perfect pub. You got every type of person in it at all different times and it was light and airy and inviting and had interesting views and things to look at; all in all my (and probably Nick's) ideal pub. It fits the way i was brought up in pubs. I'm sure your local and formative drinking years have made you (the reader) behave a particular way in pubs.
I've lost my thought process for this one....
Anyway, the house sitting is still going well, apart from the fact i put all the neighbours wheelie-bins out last night! Doh! They don't need to go out til 2morro. Oh well, i'd been back in York picking up my phone charger and letting Luke have his cash card back - he'd left it at mine over the weekend. Sat down to say hello to my housemates, ended up sat watching Dr. Who till nearly 10, still left before the end as well. Tara my beautiful Siamese cat is no fun to look after whatsoever. When you walk in the house she just starts shouting at you, when you feed her she shouts at you, when she's eating she wolfs it down like there's no 2morro, then starts shouting at you. She is beautiful though. Her full Siamese pedigree name is.... wait for it... Adwuiam Sweet Satin....
Mmm, what a handle
Is anyone reading this?????
As i was saying about pub etiquette: I kept me head down in a pub and watched the world go by. That's what i look for in a drinking establishment nowadays. The Charles Bradlaugh was aperfect example of the perfect pub. You got every type of person in it at all different times and it was light and airy and inviting and had interesting views and things to look at; all in all my (and probably Nick's) ideal pub. It fits the way i was brought up in pubs. I'm sure your local and formative drinking years have made you (the reader) behave a particular way in pubs.
I've lost my thought process for this one....
Anyway, the house sitting is still going well, apart from the fact i put all the neighbours wheelie-bins out last night! Doh! They don't need to go out til 2morro. Oh well, i'd been back in York picking up my phone charger and letting Luke have his cash card back - he'd left it at mine over the weekend. Sat down to say hello to my housemates, ended up sat watching Dr. Who till nearly 10, still left before the end as well. Tara my beautiful Siamese cat is no fun to look after whatsoever. When you walk in the house she just starts shouting at you, when you feed her she shouts at you, when she's eating she wolfs it down like there's no 2morro, then starts shouting at you. She is beautiful though. Her full Siamese pedigree name is.... wait for it... Adwuiam Sweet Satin....
Mmm, what a handle
Is anyone reading this?????
Monday, September 01, 2003
Tell Me Why I Don't Like Mondays...
I'll tell you why. Because we've had two days away from work where we can be ourselves, spend our time the way we want to and enjoy life in the way we're supposed to. But then Monday is usually the day where that freedom is wrested off us for another five days. So we begrudge our lives, our boss, the place we work until Wednesday when we get used to it again, then back to Friday. Those of us who work with people their own age, with similar tastes and habits, who go to the same places, are so lucky. I don't, nobody i work with is under 35, they've all got partners, houses, cars, children, pets, holiday homes, caravans, etc. It doesn't mean anything to me. I wanna talk about films and TV and girls and music and getting wasted at the weekend, not holidays and moving house and D.I.Y. And i wonder why i feel i don't fit in....
Since Saturday morning i have been house-sitting for my parents. What fun, you might think?! But, not really, no. I'm even more paranoid about making a mess or ruining the furniture than i am about my own house, or indeed than when i lived at home. Hang on, is anyone actually reading this....? Because i'm certainly writing as if they were, what if no one ever reads it except me? Well at least it'll help me remember what i do in my life!
On Saturday i went shopping, (i can think of no more unhealthy way to spend ones leisure time) for some more trousers for work. I am wearing them now. They're very smart kinda ribbed black trousers, I'm not sure they 'go' with my shoes but then i've always been wary of Black clothes Brown shoes, Oh well! F**k It! After going shopping my friend (of many, many years) Simon and I got the bus into Selby. We went to a few of the pubs we usually do, had about four pints before getting back on the bus and heading back to my parents village. Where we set about getting some food. Whilst i was rooting fruitlessly in the freezer and fridge, Simon found a takeaway leaflet then found the set meal for two, i then found the phone...
They charged us delivery! Hah! My village is like two miles away, cheeky slags. It was very nice though. We then went to my lifetime local - The Forresters Arms. By any pub standards it's dire. But as i explained to my friend (and housemate) Luke, it's where i learnt the rules of getting wankered and pub etiquette. Now pub etiquette is a new thing t y'all i'm sure, it was to me until i gave it form and said the words (whilst drunk) on Saturday night. Where did you spend your formative years getting drunk? Clearly mine were spent in my local, which means i am a sad old git. Always have been always will be. (The way Freud believes we're formed by our formative experiences) Let me elaborate...
My early years in pubs were spent testing the water. (Not literally) You sat there quietly sipping your first/second/third pint, i didn't really like beer (still don't a great deal, except on hot days when the condensation's running down the side of the glass, mmm....), but you drank it all the same. Safe in the knowledge it would make you a man. You sat, scared to death of the bigger young people who you were scared of through school, but who look at you different now you're in a pub. You tried not to offend anyone, you didn't talk at the top of your voice about shagging and fighting, you didn't sit perched on a bar stool, getting slowly lower until the bar met your head or time was called. You just got drunk really, really fast.
Hang on. I really should do some work...
I'll tell you why. Because we've had two days away from work where we can be ourselves, spend our time the way we want to and enjoy life in the way we're supposed to. But then Monday is usually the day where that freedom is wrested off us for another five days. So we begrudge our lives, our boss, the place we work until Wednesday when we get used to it again, then back to Friday. Those of us who work with people their own age, with similar tastes and habits, who go to the same places, are so lucky. I don't, nobody i work with is under 35, they've all got partners, houses, cars, children, pets, holiday homes, caravans, etc. It doesn't mean anything to me. I wanna talk about films and TV and girls and music and getting wasted at the weekend, not holidays and moving house and D.I.Y. And i wonder why i feel i don't fit in....
Since Saturday morning i have been house-sitting for my parents. What fun, you might think?! But, not really, no. I'm even more paranoid about making a mess or ruining the furniture than i am about my own house, or indeed than when i lived at home. Hang on, is anyone actually reading this....? Because i'm certainly writing as if they were, what if no one ever reads it except me? Well at least it'll help me remember what i do in my life!
On Saturday i went shopping, (i can think of no more unhealthy way to spend ones leisure time) for some more trousers for work. I am wearing them now. They're very smart kinda ribbed black trousers, I'm not sure they 'go' with my shoes but then i've always been wary of Black clothes Brown shoes, Oh well! F**k It! After going shopping my friend (of many, many years) Simon and I got the bus into Selby. We went to a few of the pubs we usually do, had about four pints before getting back on the bus and heading back to my parents village. Where we set about getting some food. Whilst i was rooting fruitlessly in the freezer and fridge, Simon found a takeaway leaflet then found the set meal for two, i then found the phone...
They charged us delivery! Hah! My village is like two miles away, cheeky slags. It was very nice though. We then went to my lifetime local - The Forresters Arms. By any pub standards it's dire. But as i explained to my friend (and housemate) Luke, it's where i learnt the rules of getting wankered and pub etiquette. Now pub etiquette is a new thing t y'all i'm sure, it was to me until i gave it form and said the words (whilst drunk) on Saturday night. Where did you spend your formative years getting drunk? Clearly mine were spent in my local, which means i am a sad old git. Always have been always will be. (The way Freud believes we're formed by our formative experiences) Let me elaborate...
My early years in pubs were spent testing the water. (Not literally) You sat there quietly sipping your first/second/third pint, i didn't really like beer (still don't a great deal, except on hot days when the condensation's running down the side of the glass, mmm....), but you drank it all the same. Safe in the knowledge it would make you a man. You sat, scared to death of the bigger young people who you were scared of through school, but who look at you different now you're in a pub. You tried not to offend anyone, you didn't talk at the top of your voice about shagging and fighting, you didn't sit perched on a bar stool, getting slowly lower until the bar met your head or time was called. You just got drunk really, really fast.
Hang on. I really should do some work...
Friday, August 29, 2003
A Good Good Morning to you All
Hello, i imagine you came here after following the link out of the email i sent you? I do hope so. There's not much here as yet, i only started it yesterday. But what there is please enjoy. If you know me, none of it will come as a surprise, except for the odd few sentences that still amaze me. The extract below will one day end up in a book, i intend to write one about the modern world and how it will be the death of the human race if we don't get our arses into gear. When i heard that in Britain alone we produce 50,000 new cars a year, i nearly died. What the F**k is the Point?
But thats by the by. I had my second band practice last night. It was great. Luke on Bass, John the drummer, me shouting and screaming and our friend Andy embarrasing me on the guitar. You'd be amazed, i know i was. I've actually found a really good reason for living, my new job bites, which is upsetting me a great deal, but playing music live is incredible. We could get on stage now and still wow people, but we're gonna jam a hell of a lot more before that! Though i will let you know when it's happening, so you can all come see me.
One particular song works so well, it will make you wanna dance, like Fool's Gold (yeah right...)
Here's the words:
The Cloudbank has no deposit to make today/The Sun tingles on my arms like it's been so long away
Do I miss the melancholy of all those rainy days/Or is it just your beauty, that keeps me in a daze
To want to give love
Is to want to keep on living
To get love back is why we're born
Never one to enjoy feeling without purpose/Freedom got to run deeper than the surface
The names we give things so untrue and unstable/The truth is something we can never ever label
To want to give love
Is to want to keep on living
To get love back is why we're born
Hello, i imagine you came here after following the link out of the email i sent you? I do hope so. There's not much here as yet, i only started it yesterday. But what there is please enjoy. If you know me, none of it will come as a surprise, except for the odd few sentences that still amaze me. The extract below will one day end up in a book, i intend to write one about the modern world and how it will be the death of the human race if we don't get our arses into gear. When i heard that in Britain alone we produce 50,000 new cars a year, i nearly died. What the F**k is the Point?
But thats by the by. I had my second band practice last night. It was great. Luke on Bass, John the drummer, me shouting and screaming and our friend Andy embarrasing me on the guitar. You'd be amazed, i know i was. I've actually found a really good reason for living, my new job bites, which is upsetting me a great deal, but playing music live is incredible. We could get on stage now and still wow people, but we're gonna jam a hell of a lot more before that! Though i will let you know when it's happening, so you can all come see me.
One particular song works so well, it will make you wanna dance, like Fool's Gold (yeah right...)
Here's the words:
The Cloudbank has no deposit to make today/The Sun tingles on my arms like it's been so long away
Do I miss the melancholy of all those rainy days/Or is it just your beauty, that keeps me in a daze
To want to give love
Is to want to keep on living
To get love back is why we're born
Never one to enjoy feeling without purpose/Freedom got to run deeper than the surface
The names we give things so untrue and unstable/The truth is something we can never ever label
To want to give love
Is to want to keep on living
To get love back is why we're born
Thursday, August 28, 2003
Here's a formless rant i wrote a few days into my new job (not that that has a great deal to do with it)....
Remember when you were young / You shone like the sun / Shine on you crazy diamond
Now there's a look in your eyes / Like black holes in the sky / Shine on you crazy diamond
Remember when you were young / We had so much fun / Shine on you crazy diamond
Perhaps it was just that you’re naïve and innocent outlook that left you unaware of responsibility, repercussion and retribution?
A perspective free from the evil and hatred, that exists deep within us. The evil that can take years to manifest, can take years of repression, and still not surface. Waiting for the one straw, slowly floating toward the earth, to fall effortlessly onto the dromedary of your personality.
Are humans naturally evil, or is it merely an invention of ours to help delineate the good from the bad, and from the ugly?
Humans are, under the surface mostly, animals; we eat, sleep, f**k and s**t. Any other activity is that which our civilization/culture has created to divert us from the truths: we eat, sleep, f**k, s**t then die. No other animals take the time out to consider these things, as they’re too busy doing them. Not attempting to analyse how they do it, or more importantly, why they do.
We’re told it’s because they don’t have the capacity for it, this is perhaps true, but is as verifiable as it is unverifiable. Who’s going to ask a sparrow whether it’s happy with its lot?
I think these thoughts at a million hertz per second, faster than any computer, emotions swirling around my opinions, forming them and shaping them, directing them to my mouth. Conviction forces my vocal intonation into patterns I can’t control, I sound angry or sad or ecstatic. I can control these things but that takes analysis, the ability to think as I speak, about what I am saying.
Put me in front of a girl who I find incredibly attractive and all that goes out the window. My analysis goes into overdrive, I start to doubt why anything I could say could really interest this girl, or how my life could appear exciting to them. I can analyse the way I say things, as clearly and carefully as I could before, I just can’t find the words to say nor the questions to ask.
I spent three years in the study of the Media and Culture. Over that time irrespective of what I was being taught, the Media started to gain a new prominence in our lives. It started to invade our newspapers, our local news shows, the internet, and our magazines. Magazines, which up until more recently catered for hobbies and interests and diverting activities that took us out of the drudgery of our day-to-day life. Now we’re supposed to believe that adoration of celebrity is a hobby, that it is an interest, which should free us from the mundanity of our lives. Yet it doesn’t, it merely serves to underline the difference between us all, those who have and those who have not. Those who want it and those who don’t.
Hollywood has always produced stars. The ones from the golden age of cinema, as in it’s beginning to the late sixties, were global names. People who you shared deep escapist fantasies with, sat in the darkness, watching them, feeling voyeuristic either consciously or not. Beautiful people in exquisite environs living dramatic lives, the like of which normal people could only dream. But that was the beauty of it, the lives the stars led were unattainable, the products they used, the places they ate, where they holidayed; all were too expensive for an average working person. Now though, through cheap sponsorship, clothing deals with high street stores, product placement, many of the stars connotations are available to buy into. To use the same hair product of your favourite star is to become them, feel closer to them, and try to see life from their point of view.
As humans we learn jealousy and desire very soon. As children there will always be the rich child, the one who’s parents unfailingly give them everything they could ever desire, except love. It is into this world of possessions that we are thrust, we are told to work our lives away in order to make the end of our lives more enjoyable. We work for 40 years so we can die comfortably in the last 20. When are faculties are going, our bodies complain at us, our feelings are desensitised by years of world famine and war; we are expected to holiday and gallivant as if we are young once again. We get to the end of our lives with only symbols to show for it. We own our houses, having enslaved ourselves just to say it is ours. We have a new car every few years, why don’t they build them to last? The same for computers, every day they increase in power and usefulness, but what does that help us to achieve, what more can we do simply because we can do it faster? Soon computers will be reaching speeds where every improvement is imperceptible to human eyes. What good will that do us, what purpose can it serve?
I have been alive now for 24 years. In the quarter century I have been alive the world has turned faster than ever before. Between 1970 and the end of the 80’s we achieved all we could hope to on this planet. Since that time, we have done nothing new. No massive leaps in healthcare have occurred, the reason being of course that Pharmaceutical companies seek only one thing: profit. They fund research into drugs they know they’ll be able to market, they control intellectual copyright on drugs that save lives, milking the needy for all they can. They force massive spending – in this country – by the NHS, who cannot afford the prices. When the health service cannot afford certain treatments, those who can go to private healthcare companies, thus undermining the whole public sector.
Which is of course a theme that began with Thatcher and Reagan. Their belief was that people should be able to do what they want; it is the right of the individual to make their own choices. It is the individuals right to die if they cannot afford healthcare. It is the individuals right to starve if they cannot work. It is the individuals right to be fired if they do not agree with their company’s ill treatment of their workers. It is the right of the individual to trample all over others on their way to the top.
Yet there is no progress. Companies only sell us what their research tells them we’ll buy. Where is the good in that? A company creates a great new product, but it still only does what its predecessor could do, it’s just in a more friendly box/case/chassis etc. 50,000 new cars are made in Britain every year, surely we should assume that 50,000 cars go off the road in the same year? We’d be wrong. At that rate, surely over 50 years, there would be more cars than people, more cars than roads, more cars than ground to cover. What is wrong with the world today? Whose logic dictates that we must constantly produce items for leisure, time saving, and transport. Does the amount of money made by car companies mirror the investment in Public transport, or do car companies have no interest in Public transportation? No because they seek only one thing: larger profits for their shareholders. Do these shareholders seek more money to plough into charities or public services? No they only need money to have more money, like power, money corrupts all those who it touches. People want to hoard it, to feel they’ve achieved something; money is a tangible measure, a simple system of tokens that show us how successful we are.
Remember when you were young / You shone like the sun / Shine on you crazy diamond
Now there's a look in your eyes / Like black holes in the sky / Shine on you crazy diamond
Remember when you were young / We had so much fun / Shine on you crazy diamond
Perhaps it was just that you’re naïve and innocent outlook that left you unaware of responsibility, repercussion and retribution?
A perspective free from the evil and hatred, that exists deep within us. The evil that can take years to manifest, can take years of repression, and still not surface. Waiting for the one straw, slowly floating toward the earth, to fall effortlessly onto the dromedary of your personality.
Are humans naturally evil, or is it merely an invention of ours to help delineate the good from the bad, and from the ugly?
Humans are, under the surface mostly, animals; we eat, sleep, f**k and s**t. Any other activity is that which our civilization/culture has created to divert us from the truths: we eat, sleep, f**k, s**t then die. No other animals take the time out to consider these things, as they’re too busy doing them. Not attempting to analyse how they do it, or more importantly, why they do.
We’re told it’s because they don’t have the capacity for it, this is perhaps true, but is as verifiable as it is unverifiable. Who’s going to ask a sparrow whether it’s happy with its lot?
I think these thoughts at a million hertz per second, faster than any computer, emotions swirling around my opinions, forming them and shaping them, directing them to my mouth. Conviction forces my vocal intonation into patterns I can’t control, I sound angry or sad or ecstatic. I can control these things but that takes analysis, the ability to think as I speak, about what I am saying.
Put me in front of a girl who I find incredibly attractive and all that goes out the window. My analysis goes into overdrive, I start to doubt why anything I could say could really interest this girl, or how my life could appear exciting to them. I can analyse the way I say things, as clearly and carefully as I could before, I just can’t find the words to say nor the questions to ask.
I spent three years in the study of the Media and Culture. Over that time irrespective of what I was being taught, the Media started to gain a new prominence in our lives. It started to invade our newspapers, our local news shows, the internet, and our magazines. Magazines, which up until more recently catered for hobbies and interests and diverting activities that took us out of the drudgery of our day-to-day life. Now we’re supposed to believe that adoration of celebrity is a hobby, that it is an interest, which should free us from the mundanity of our lives. Yet it doesn’t, it merely serves to underline the difference between us all, those who have and those who have not. Those who want it and those who don’t.
Hollywood has always produced stars. The ones from the golden age of cinema, as in it’s beginning to the late sixties, were global names. People who you shared deep escapist fantasies with, sat in the darkness, watching them, feeling voyeuristic either consciously or not. Beautiful people in exquisite environs living dramatic lives, the like of which normal people could only dream. But that was the beauty of it, the lives the stars led were unattainable, the products they used, the places they ate, where they holidayed; all were too expensive for an average working person. Now though, through cheap sponsorship, clothing deals with high street stores, product placement, many of the stars connotations are available to buy into. To use the same hair product of your favourite star is to become them, feel closer to them, and try to see life from their point of view.
As humans we learn jealousy and desire very soon. As children there will always be the rich child, the one who’s parents unfailingly give them everything they could ever desire, except love. It is into this world of possessions that we are thrust, we are told to work our lives away in order to make the end of our lives more enjoyable. We work for 40 years so we can die comfortably in the last 20. When are faculties are going, our bodies complain at us, our feelings are desensitised by years of world famine and war; we are expected to holiday and gallivant as if we are young once again. We get to the end of our lives with only symbols to show for it. We own our houses, having enslaved ourselves just to say it is ours. We have a new car every few years, why don’t they build them to last? The same for computers, every day they increase in power and usefulness, but what does that help us to achieve, what more can we do simply because we can do it faster? Soon computers will be reaching speeds where every improvement is imperceptible to human eyes. What good will that do us, what purpose can it serve?
I have been alive now for 24 years. In the quarter century I have been alive the world has turned faster than ever before. Between 1970 and the end of the 80’s we achieved all we could hope to on this planet. Since that time, we have done nothing new. No massive leaps in healthcare have occurred, the reason being of course that Pharmaceutical companies seek only one thing: profit. They fund research into drugs they know they’ll be able to market, they control intellectual copyright on drugs that save lives, milking the needy for all they can. They force massive spending – in this country – by the NHS, who cannot afford the prices. When the health service cannot afford certain treatments, those who can go to private healthcare companies, thus undermining the whole public sector.
Which is of course a theme that began with Thatcher and Reagan. Their belief was that people should be able to do what they want; it is the right of the individual to make their own choices. It is the individuals right to die if they cannot afford healthcare. It is the individuals right to starve if they cannot work. It is the individuals right to be fired if they do not agree with their company’s ill treatment of their workers. It is the right of the individual to trample all over others on their way to the top.
Yet there is no progress. Companies only sell us what their research tells them we’ll buy. Where is the good in that? A company creates a great new product, but it still only does what its predecessor could do, it’s just in a more friendly box/case/chassis etc. 50,000 new cars are made in Britain every year, surely we should assume that 50,000 cars go off the road in the same year? We’d be wrong. At that rate, surely over 50 years, there would be more cars than people, more cars than roads, more cars than ground to cover. What is wrong with the world today? Whose logic dictates that we must constantly produce items for leisure, time saving, and transport. Does the amount of money made by car companies mirror the investment in Public transport, or do car companies have no interest in Public transportation? No because they seek only one thing: larger profits for their shareholders. Do these shareholders seek more money to plough into charities or public services? No they only need money to have more money, like power, money corrupts all those who it touches. People want to hoard it, to feel they’ve achieved something; money is a tangible measure, a simple system of tokens that show us how successful we are.
The Discombobulation Strikes Back...
Never in all my life have i found technology so confusing. i've just been round and round and round and round in circles trying to find my way back to here. I went to go look for it when i'd published by first writing but couldn't find it. It's gonna take me a week or two to get used to this.
Anyway, here are some interesting words i've written down. Some rhyme some don't, if you read it a few times you'll see more rhyme than don't but in incredibly complex ways.
The God of Logic
It’s always the same when I get close to someone, they look at me that way and my heart just seems to melt,
I get obsessed, I give up thinking about anything else,
My whole being starts to centre around that person, when they’re not around I think about them,
When they are I don’t know what to think, I know that if I ring them I’ll come across as desperate,
I know that if I don’t they’ll think that I don’t care, when I text I feel like I’m a psycho,
That they don’t understand where I’m coming from, I think about it all too much, my animal instincts gone, as a man I’m supposed to lead with my dick, my body tries it’s hardest, my mind takes over, slows me down, makes me stop and think,
But it’s all about nothing, trying to break down my programming, stop me from failing or even from trying, the outcome is always the same.
I never bother but instead just seem bothered, I never worry but instead am just worried, I never love just feel like I’ve lost, I’ve never dreamt or wished just because of the cost of failure, repercussion, responsibility,
I never listen because I’ve heard it all before, I never talk because it’s saying it once more,
I never love just seem to obsess, I only hate because it’s easier in the end.
Before we’ve even met I’ve run the whole relationship round and round my head, it was good don’t get me wrong, but in my head it’s just too long, from when I last saw you, til I can touch you again.
Throughout the universe, in all animal lives, they don’t have to cope with neuroses, paranoia, the insides of their minds,
Animals could teach us more than we’ll ever know, we think we’re something special, or so we tell each other so.
When I look into your eyes, sentences won’t form, but my mouth continues motoring, throwing out bullshit I don’t mean, what I mean and what I say are totally unconnected.
What I mean cannot be described, what I say cannot be believed.
Never in all my life have i found technology so confusing. i've just been round and round and round and round in circles trying to find my way back to here. I went to go look for it when i'd published by first writing but couldn't find it. It's gonna take me a week or two to get used to this.
Anyway, here are some interesting words i've written down. Some rhyme some don't, if you read it a few times you'll see more rhyme than don't but in incredibly complex ways.
The God of Logic
It’s always the same when I get close to someone, they look at me that way and my heart just seems to melt,
I get obsessed, I give up thinking about anything else,
My whole being starts to centre around that person, when they’re not around I think about them,
When they are I don’t know what to think, I know that if I ring them I’ll come across as desperate,
I know that if I don’t they’ll think that I don’t care, when I text I feel like I’m a psycho,
That they don’t understand where I’m coming from, I think about it all too much, my animal instincts gone, as a man I’m supposed to lead with my dick, my body tries it’s hardest, my mind takes over, slows me down, makes me stop and think,
But it’s all about nothing, trying to break down my programming, stop me from failing or even from trying, the outcome is always the same.
I never bother but instead just seem bothered, I never worry but instead am just worried, I never love just feel like I’ve lost, I’ve never dreamt or wished just because of the cost of failure, repercussion, responsibility,
I never listen because I’ve heard it all before, I never talk because it’s saying it once more,
I never love just seem to obsess, I only hate because it’s easier in the end.
Before we’ve even met I’ve run the whole relationship round and round my head, it was good don’t get me wrong, but in my head it’s just too long, from when I last saw you, til I can touch you again.
Throughout the universe, in all animal lives, they don’t have to cope with neuroses, paranoia, the insides of their minds,
Animals could teach us more than we’ll ever know, we think we’re something special, or so we tell each other so.
When I look into your eyes, sentences won’t form, but my mouth continues motoring, throwing out bullshit I don’t mean, what I mean and what I say are totally unconnected.
What I mean cannot be described, what I say cannot be believed.
...And you will know me by the trail of the depressed.
Welcome one and all to this my new weblog (or blog as all these techno-types like to call it!) I've never kept a diary, though i have tried on many occasions, i've never published my thoughts in this fashion, though i sing songs at people. It could be s**t, it could be great.
I'm only on here because my friend has one, and his is inspirational to me. I only hope when i'm getting going that i could bring something to other people the way he does through his writing.
If you end up here, then i am sorry there is not much to read follow this link until i get something written, worth reading.
Welcome one and all to this my new weblog (or blog as all these techno-types like to call it!) I've never kept a diary, though i have tried on many occasions, i've never published my thoughts in this fashion, though i sing songs at people. It could be s**t, it could be great.
I'm only on here because my friend has one, and his is inspirational to me. I only hope when i'm getting going that i could bring something to other people the way he does through his writing.
If you end up here, then i am sorry there is not much to read follow this link until i get something written, worth reading.
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