Quite Random

Terror!

Terror terror terror. Terror! Terror, terror terror terror terror. Terror terror terror, terror “TERROR!”. Terror. Terror, terror, terror.

Terror:

• Terror
• Terror terror
• Terror + terror = terror.

“Terror terror terror terror”

Terror.

Prayer for a Wednesday

O Noodly Master, O Flying Spaghetti Monster
Give me the strength to get out of bed early enough to make my morning tea
Do not let the Today programme lull me back to sleep.
Grant that I may find a warm seat on the left of the bus where that little ledge is that I can rest my foot on,
And allow me a quick and straightforward exit at Brixton.
Spare me from saying things at work like “I’ve got that meeting room booked now but they’re still in there”
Or indeed even from caring.
Give me the grace to go to the cafe for my meeting instead, at least they do good coffee.
Spare me so many meetings, as I never get any work done in them,
And they are extremely dull.
Allow me not to be distracted by trivial concerns,
Such as how much pesto might be left in the fridge.
And O Noodly Master, I know that you are a gentle and kind noodly deity,
But force me to sit down and do my coursework when I get home,
And allow me not to be distracted by the telly,
For thine is the noodliness, the meatballs and the glory
For ever and ever
Arrr.

Reply to all

It’s evil.

In the work environment, petty squabbles snowball to become all-out battles of words, people finding ever more polite ways to tell each other to fuck off, and all for the benefit of an ever-growing list of recipients, people who really need to read this. It’s either copy them in now, or send it to them later with an ‘FYI’ at the top… ‘can you believe what they said? Mm? No. Me neither’. A pause between each new message addressed to all and sundry, a haitus between each new response. It’s like listening to an argument at a Quakers meeting.

In your personal life, reply to all is all about the banter. Someone wants to organise a party / night out / dinner / weekend in Blackpool. They e-mail everyone they have ever met, including a really confused Dutch guy they got drunk with in Bangkok four years ago. Someone hits ‘reply to all’ with a witty retort, because when you’re all on the same mailing list, well, you’re all friends aren’t you? No. Few people know each other, the ones that do phone each other, and the Dutch guy spends the next five years even more confused as to why he keeps getting sent viruses by a hairdresser from Bracknell he has never met.

So. Ban the ‘reply to all’ button.

What else would I like to ban today?

• The guy outside Brixton Tube in the mornings shouting ‘Metro Metro Metro!’ as if he’s feeding pigs.
• The sight of Jade Goody in tears. For pity’s sake. It’s like a sea lion with conjunctivitis.
• Waking up and feeling more tired than when you went to bed.
• January.

I like lists.

Another rant about work… yep…

I hate going on about this, but it’s a bit like trying to get a bad taste out of my mouth. This blog is my mental granite, my Wrigley’s Extra (the blue one), my Euthymol. OK, enough with the imagery. But while I’ve mentioned it, holy fresh feeling Batman, is Euthymol good. Really. I shall never look back.

Gah. Consultants. Small minded people. I have to try and avoid thinking about work at the weekend, it’s not healthy. This weekend, my good mood has been threatened about three times with recollections of last week’s collection of prize ‘pearlers’. I’m talking about questions and comments so ludicrous that you have to look over your shoulder to see if you’re being wound up by a crank caller with a camera crew. I could recount them all, but it’s kind of a ‘you had to be there’ thing. I keep thinking of the question asked of a caller in Channel 4’s The IT Crowd – “I’m sorry… are you from the past?”.

The thing is, I think they think I’m slow in the head, these people. They have a tendency to throw me off altogether when they come out with something award-winningly doltish. I have to collect myself for a moment, pick my jaw up off the desk, and respond using words of no more than two syllables and the sincerest tone I can muster. It’s just the pause while I collect myself. I hear this feeble little voice in my ear – “you still there?”. I’m gibbering. Silently, but I’m gibbering.

And I think I’ve got it bad. Someone I know has to deal with irritating Italian pornographers and snooty chess grand masters.

Stunning 1 bedroom flat. With added crap.

No-one can actually enjoy moving home. Well, maybe some people get some twisted enjoyment from it. Maybe some weirdos move as often as they can for kicks (I love jumping in and out of hire vans, me). For any normal person however, the prospect of dealing with estate agents or letting agents (a kind of strange and untrustworthy human subspecies with sinister glazed eyes and broad unconvincing smiles), finding deposits, working out how to find unfamiliar places that only might be any good, poking around kitchens and trying to see the positive side in bad cookers, peeling paint and two feet clearance around the bed, is, well, poo. It’s worse in winter, when everything’s dark, it’s worser in London, where accommodation takes the mickey, and it’s worserer when you don’t really want to be in London anyway. London. Still can’t work out if it’s the best city in the world or an overrated shithole.

Boo hoo me.

Last night I saw a flat in Wandsworth Common. Looking in a kitchen cupboard, I said to the lady showing me around “someone’s left a bunch of rubbish in this cupboard!” – they had. Old crappy kettle, mysterious plastic products with no discernible purpose, half-used and dried-out scouring pads. On top of the fridge sat a microwave that looked just about large enough to microwave an egg. She said in response to my question, “yes, this flat is furnished”. What? Furnished with old, used crap?

Barcelona… hang on… I went to Spain the other week! Yes, must remember to blog about that. Mmm. Cortado.

5 things me me

Chain blogging indeed!? I like this idea.

Adrianne asked, I’m doing it, pass it on, do the same.

Five things less than likely to be known about me:

1. I self-harmed in school, once writing my name on my arm with a pencil sharpener blade. A teacher had a concerned word with me when he spotted it. I can’t remember why I did it.
2. I was caught kissing my first girlfriend in school when upon seeing a passing teacher, in order to appear innocent, I decided to whistle nonchalantly. This whistling actually got us caught as, up until that point, the teacher who caught us didn’t have any idea we were there. I broke up with the same girl by writing her a typed letter. She responded by saying (quite fairly), “I thought I was your girlfriend, not your bank manager”. I have not always been so successful with women.
3. When writing, I often write the second letter of a word or the second digit of a number first, and then go back and the first letter or digit. I have no idea why.
4. I think I’m a coward.
5. I frequently feel like someone just walked over my grave when I pee, and have been known to involuntarily shudder, which sometimes looks odd in pub toilets.

Beatbox cookup

I meant to blog about my holiday then I got distracted by this.