Year of play

"My father taught me to work; he did not teach me to love it. I never did like to work, and I don't deny it. I'd rather read, tell stories, crack jokes, talk, laugh -- anything but work."
--Abraham Lincoln

I've been reading a book recently called Screw Work, Let's Play on "how to do what you love and get paid for it". I'm only a few chapters in so far, but I find it inspiring.

My Dad, like countless Fathers before him, had an attitude to work that I am trying to shake off -- with the help of Mr Williams' book.  My Dad has always told me that you're not meant to enjoy your job or the work you do -- if you enjoyed it, they wouldn't pay you to turn up.  I am slowly starting to realise this doesn't have to be the case -- in fact, the most 'successful' people are ones who do enjoy what they do. They are successful at what they do, and successful in the wider sense that I strive to be -- happy with myself, and with where I am.

That's where this blog is coming from.  Unlike previous incarnations, I want this blog's purpose to not just log my life, to not simply record the day-to-day in a hopefully well-written way, but to show the journey to brightness.

One of the first exercises in "Screw Work, Let's Play" has you imagine you can take a year off.  What would you do with it?  "But I can't take a year off," you cry, or you do if you are anything like me, "I have bills to pay and rent to pay and..." -- and that's where you're cut off.  Imagine it differently, then.  You can take a year off work, and the author will pay you your normal salary, so you're no worse off.  Now, get to imagining.  You write down all the things you would do, if you could do anything.

Because it's my journey and my blog, my year of play filled with grand and impossible things is as follows:

Travel the world.  Especially the ancient civilisations of South America.
Write and blog.
Interview passionate people.
Perform and write poetry.
Have adventures!  Hiking, rock climbing, camping, surfing, snowboarding...  Also learn to do all these things.
Save the sea turtles.
Be a fire look-out in a National Forest.
Help people in need.
Study Zen.
Take pictures.
Enjoy music.
Help animals.

In my next post, I'll move on to the next stop.  What would I do with my life if I knew I could not fail...

The story of my teeth (or why I can't eat solid food)

For almost as long as I can remember, I've had problems with my teeth.

Not like cavities-and-fillings problems, although I have had my share of those as well, but problems more like my teeth didn't meet and my bottom jaw slightly overlapped my top.

I can remember various hospital visits and x-ray appointments, but no action ever being taken. Maybe I was asked at the time, and said no to surgery, or if they just said let's wait and see. I don't remember, but neither would surprise me.

The option of doing something about it didn't come up again until a few years ago. It was a winter's night in the city of Leicester, some chav scum beat me senseless and fractured my jaw, and what followed was weeks of hospital appointments and more x-rays.

Only this time moulds were taken of my jaw, and the puzzled doctors tried to work out how it was meant to fit together and how it got so displaced in such a little scuffle. The scuffle was a good size, I insisted; a perfectly normal, averaged-sized scuffle. I explained how weirdly my jaw was meant to fit together -- that is it was not "right" to start with.

I ended up with some minor orthodontic work, metal brackets on my teeth with elastic bands attached to try and right the displacement caused by the punch, and the fracture. It didn't work. Then a more serious option was presented: I could have surgery. I would go under general anaesthetic, they would cut my face open, put metal plates in it, then wire my jaw shut. But in the end all would be as it should be again.

I weighed up my options and decided since I was trying to "make it" as a journalist, I couldn't afford to have my jaw wired shut. So I politely declined, and carried on my life with a wonky jaw and an inability to eat foods that would slip through the gap between my top and bottom jaw.

Again, a few years on and during a routine dentist appointment, I'm asked if the condition ever bothers me. "Sure it does," I tell them "But I'm used to it now, and mostly I don't think about it". The dentist tells me how I can be referred to a specialist in London, and they will run through my options. "I can't afford that" I say, but thank God for the National Health Service: I wouldn't have to afford anything.

What followed was again more appointments, more x-rays, more impressions and moulds. Somewhere along the way, even though I wasn't supposed to, I felt just a tiny bit pressured to agree to surgery -- like I would have wasted everyone's time if I decided against it. But really the decision was made for me one day when I was struggling to eat a simple sandwich, so I agreed to surgery.

The surgery will be in a year, and until then I have braces on my teeth like a teenager. It's been a week now since they were fitted, the pain and dull ache of them has subsided but I still have a sharp bits of wire ripping the inside of my cheeks, and still struggle to eat. And to think, this was meant to make eating easier for me... I just have to tell myself, by Christmas in 2011 the surgery will be done and the braces will be off. In 18 months it will all be over.

No entiendo

I love the sound of other languages.  I don't know if the people are discussing Big Brother, Eastenders or eating babies, I'm happy to listen if the words sound like music.  I especially like the sound of Spanish.

I think my favourite Spanish phrase -- after "dos cerveza, por favor" and "Viene tormenta!" would have to be "No entiendo", I don't understand.

I always say the phrase the same way, with a shake of the head, a sad expression and a low voice. "No entiendo" as if I am truly sad that I can't understand what they are saying.

I use this on charity muggers.  "Hello mate do you have a few minutes to --" "No entiendo", and I hurry past.   The words, the shake of the head, the sad look -- it does a job that a gruff "No time, sorry mate" just doesn't fulfill for me.  The fact that I can't look even remotely Spanish with my resolutely pale skin and unconvincing pronunciation must only confuse them further.

I'd like one day to live awhile in a country where English isn't their first language.  Even if it's Spanish, I'll still use "No entiendo" when "dos cerveza" won't do.

Your Daddy's Gonna Die

One night, I had a dream where this crow came and said: "Your aunt is gonna die."

I was so scared, I woke up my parents, but they said it was just a dream and to get back to bed.
 
But the next morning, my Aunt Stacy was dead.
                                    
It wasn't three weeks later when the crow came back to me in a dream and said, "Your daddy's gonna die."  I didn't know what to do.
                    
I finally told my father, but he said: "Oh, not to worry." But I could see he was rattled.

The next morning, he wasn't himself, he kept looking around, waiting for something to drop on his head -- because the crow didn't say how it was gonna happen, just those words: "Your daddy's gonna die."
 
He left home early that day, and was gone a long time.  When he finally came back, he looked terrible, like he was waiting for the axe to fall all day.

He said to my mother: "I've just had the worst day of my life."
"You think you've had a bad day?" she said, "This morning, the milkman dropped dead on the porch." (extract from 'Big Fish' (2003) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0319061/)

In the winter of 2007, my aunt died of cancer. She was my Dad's older sister, and as a kid she'd played a big part in raising him in a big family in east London, in post-war Britain.

My aunt had been in remission, but when the disease returned she chose not to fight it. I'm not sure if anyone knows for certain how long she had known for, and kept quiet.

I signed up to trek the Inca Trail in Peru the following year, to raise money for Macmillan Cancer Support -- giving something back to the people who had given so much care and support to my family when it was needed most.

My aunt is still missed by everyone who knew her, it doesn't seem right that she's simply not around any more.

I recently got the news my uncle, that is one of my Dad's older brothers, was ill and in hospital. He'd become confused, disorientated, and was sent for tests. Just about the worst fear was confirmed: it was a brain tumour, and because of the size and scale of the tumour, it was inoperable. This kind of cancer is often considered secondary to a possibly-undiscovered or undiagnosed primary cancer elsewhere in the body. The upshot is it's not a good prognosis. It's heartbreaking, and I can't decide if it's a blessing or a curse that he doesn't know he's dying. It's certainly not easy on his family that he often doesn't recognise them.

But it's the entirely selfish element that brings me to this post. I'm scared now my Daddy's gonna die. This is two of his older siblings, and I think it was Hodgkin's Lymphoma that killed his own Father at an early age. It's been a long time since my Dad thought he was going to die young as well, like there was some in-built early expiry date -- but I can tell he is quietly worried as well. What if these aren't isolated incidents, but instead a trend, a sign of things to come -- not just for him, but for all his siblings?

All I can do is offer support, to try not to worry unduly about something that might not happen -- but remain wary -- and start planning another fundraising challenge, to raise money for the people who need it.

Lost and Found

I got wondering today about lost property offices.

What if there was an office where everything you had ever lost was being kept? There would be hats, scarves, single gloves, jackets lost in clubs, wallets left on counters in shops. Maybe there would be beliefs or abstract emotions that had fallen by the wayside.

All these things exist in an office, in a room, and wait to be retrieved. But to retrieve anything there is a price. The cost for each item you want to keep is you would have to exchange it for something else, something you would miss. You have to choose which item you would miss more.

Do you want that scarf you were given as a present one winter which you left on a train late at night, two days on? Do you want your favourite jacket that you left on the back of a chair, which you realised was missing, but came back to find it was gone?

Do we value more the things we lose? What if you visit the office and you find these things you had almost pined for were no longer your style?

What if that feeling of confidence you once had and lost you now found feels more like a false bravado?

Maybe you would leave the lost property office with none of the things you missed.

Ways you probably wouldn't die in a vacuum

I just read a fascinating science article entitled "Five Ways You Probably Wouldn’t Die In a Vacuum, and One Way You Probably Would".  The author does a fine job of debunking the myths of popular science fiction, crossing off freezing and death by exploding eyeballs along the way.  But you'll have to follow the link for yourself to get the full benefit, as I have no intention of spoiling it by regurgitating it all here.

I do have a small problem with the article, however.  Their ways just seems to lack imagination, if you ask me.  I can think of lots of ways that you probably wouldn't die in a vacuum.

So without further ado, I present the Come Back Brighter Guide to Top 5 Ways You Probably Wouldn't Die In A Vacuum.
 

1. Shark Attack.  Sharks are ferocious predators, equipped with row upon row of razor-sharp teeth and super-sensitive senses, they have ruled the oceans for millions of years.  However, the odds of being attacked by a shark in the vast emptiness of space are very slim.  A shark would be one of the least likely things you are going to come across in the last few seconds of your life, and while it would be a terrifying sight in most circumstances, a blood-thirsty great white would probably not be your demise in the vacuum.  It might be, though.
 

2. Struck by a Meteoroid.  A massive hunk of space rock, hurtling through the universe at hundreds of miles an hour, would do untold damage to even the hardiest of space crafts.  The effect of one on a body made of flesh and bone would be similar to that of a fly hitting a car's windscreen.  However, despite space being literally littered with this intergalactic debris, it just doesn't rank up there as a way you would probably die in a vacuum -- you would have to be spectacularly unlucky, more unlucky than just finding yourself moments away from death in a vacuum.  But it could still happen.
 

3. Accident Around the Home.  Accidents at home are high on the list in which people meet their unfortunate end, but the good news is that in the vacuum of space your odds are drastically lowered.  Falling down the stairs is a common accident on earth, and a big killer, but in zero gravity stairs quickly become redundant.  Misadventures with electrical appliances may cause a great number of accidental deaths back on terra firma, but outside of space stations -- literally outside of space stations -- I predict the numbers drop dramatically.
 

4. Lightning Strike.  An estimated 107 people worldwide are killed by lightning strike every year, and while this might seem very low when you consider the sheer number of people on the planet and the number of lightning flashes annually, it is even more improbable in the vacuum of space.  Do you hear thunder?  No, that's just the sound of your blood boiling (actually something that also probably wouldn't kill you in a vacuum).  Does it look like rain?  No, you are just losing consciousness.  Because space is a vacuum, there is no weather, so it follows that you can be reasonably sure you will not die from a lightning strike.  You could shelter under a tree from the rain as much as you liked, if it wasn't for the fact there are no trees and no thunder storms.

5. Car Accident.  You are more likely to die in a multi-satellite pile-up than a car accident in space.  Not even the Japanese have started putting cars into space yet, which is a shame because there's far fewer people on the road in space.  There is also far fewer roads.  Both of these factors make it incredibly improbable that you could be hurt or killed in a car accident while in the vacuum of space.  However, considering all the junk that is dumped out there, it is not impossible.

Things I Love Thursday

Today marks the return of the much-lauded "Things I Love Thursday" -- a post that needs no preamble or introduction from me.

Absolute Radio. It may sound funny to "love" a commercial radio station -- it doesn't have the cred of an obscure digital station, or an controversial pirate operation. It doesn't even have a great playlist. But what it does have is "Workforce Requests" -- a simple and much-replicated idea of taking requests from people in work. Why do I love them for this? For a start, it gives me an opportunity to think about the songs I like so much -- I can spend a few minutes thinking What song would I like to hear today? and becoming nerdily excited at the thought of each prospect. Then, when I have chosen my two songs, I have to think how best to sell these songs -- why should these songs rather than any others be played. Considering I don't much like working in sales, it's a funny thing to enjoy -- but it's no secret I love thinking creatively, and the chance to write well but succinctly about music is a little thing that makes me happy.

Yesterday I got a call from the station, they wanted to play my choice -- Teenage Kicks by the Undertones. This was all the validation I needed. It made little difference to me that the boss turned off the radio in the office before I got to hear my request -- the important thing was that I was chosen.

Today I am going to request Lies Are Much More Fun by The Grates. I doubt they will have it, but if they don't -- shame on them.

Another thing I love this week is unexpected items in the post. I love getting post. In the days before the internet I had penpals and used to look forward to their letters, but as ever growing up as meant the only post I get is bills and letters from the Student Loans company. One of my little pleasures at the moment is Postrcrossing, where I can exchange postcards with people from all of the world. But better is still is when a friend on the other side of the world decides you need a care package, and sends you a box filled to the brim with a book and a homemade CD and salt water taffy and cat toys.

My Dad was puzzled by it and asked me why I was getting such boxes in the post. Just because someone felt I needed it -- and that was the most important thing.

I think the last time I wrote one of these, I listed Autumn as one of the things I loved. It's quite fitting in a way that winter was conspicuous in its absence of Things I Love Thursday, and it's now Spring.

Spring is definitely a "thing" I love. The mornings are lighter, it doesn't get dark until later, and gradually we are getting to leave heavier items of clothing at home. The sun is warm, the air is fresh and today I even sat outside and ate my lunch. Ok, granted, it was a little cold -- but I wouldn't have been able to do it at all a month ago. In fact, I think it was probably snowing a month ago.

The biggest thing in my life right now is an impending move. Having had to reluctantly move out of my house last December, it's been a long few months living with my parents -- the only highlight being the kittens who are fast becoming cats. But on the weekend that the girl and I decided to start looking round potential new places to live, we found one almost right away. We'd heard horror stories of people looking at dozens, we only needed two. And now we move in next week. It's not just moving out again, it's moving to London this time -- something I have wanted to do for years.

I've been down... but I've come back brighter

At a cross roads

I feel at a kind of cross roads today, that I could choose one path or the other -- and though it's been playing on my mind all week, I'm not sure yet which decision would be for the best.

It's no secret that this blog is woefully neglected recently.  In a way, it's almost funny that when I was unemployed I was inspired to write "Things I Love Thursday" posts, but since returning to work those have dried up, along with almost everything else.

I'm considering today shutting the whole blog down.  I know it won't really make that much difference -- a locked, unwritten blog as opposed to a never-updated one -- but I guess it is a matter of admitting I'm just not going to write any time soon. 

I feel guilty that more than neglecting my own blog, I am neglecting the great writers that populate my google reader list -- some of my favourites will have unread posts numbering in double-figures soon.  I'm just slack.  When I get home in the evening I know I should look for a new job, I know I should be writing and reading. But I don't.

Of course, the other path is to stop being so slack and make an effort.  If I can't think what to write about, then just force something -- every other day, post something, even if it's just comments on the day's news.

I don't know yet which road to take.  Maybe it is best to be shutting up shop and one day in the hopefully-not-too-distant future when I am feeling better and have more opportunity for blogging coming back and maybe writing at an all-new URL, but on the other hand -- thr question is best for who?

Picture taken from flickr, via google image search.

Finding my way

Maybe I read too many comics when I was little.

I have a desire to help people with my life.  In my romantic moments, I try to convince myself and others that this is what I really do in my sales role -- I help people to get the training they need.  Just like when I used to work ordering replacement parts for broken-down buses: I told myself I was helping save the planet with public transport, and my role was vital to getting these vehicles back on the road.  I never really manage to convince myself of these things.

So what, really, is helping people?  It's just too vague. 

Are we talking about charity? Medicine?  Law enforcement?  Deworming orphans in Rwanda?  Someone a few years ago suggested I join the Peace Corps, but it's not open to non-US citizens, and even then what would someone like me do afterwards?  I have even tried to join the military at one point, even if that was less for noble "I want to help people" reasons and more for selfish ones.  But even wanting to help people is selfish, as I once wrote in a blog post called Why I Hate Superman, because it's about satisfying me.

When I was hiking the Inca trail in Peru I had an idea. 

I would set up an adventure sport company that was dedicated to improving the lives of people in countries where it operated.  I was inspired in the town of Agua Calientes which seemed so dishevelled and broken down, and contrasting so starkly with a grand, expensive hotel for the rich tourists who wanted to visit Machu Picchu.  I thought to myself why couldn't some of that money go to the community?  Who knows, maybe it did -- maybe large sums was funding education and medical care. 

But what I conceived was that there are amazing, beautiful places around the world that are also suited to activities like mountain biking, all-terrain boarding, snowboarding, paragliding -- but also situated in deprived places.  So what if people came and they had their fun and then their money didn't go into making anyone richer, but instead was invested into schools and hospitals and water systems.  Apparently it's all been done before, though, and it's just not that easy to make profit with these adventure sports.


So, back to the drawing board with that one.

Struggling

I can't pretend things aren't tough at the moment. 

The girl is struggling some days to keep everything from getting to her -- the combination of living with my parents, living up to an hour outside of London, not being happy with things at her work, and the uncertainty with my work all piles up and threatens to overwhelm her.

For me, too.  I'm worried that my work will fire me as I'm just not making the sales required of me -- they told me in a recent meeting that hitting 50% of my monthly sales target doesn't even cover my wages.  Naturally, I'm looking for other jobs but that too adds another layer -- applying, trying to craftily interview without my current work finding out, dealing with rejection. 

The girl and I have considered that maybe I need to give up on marketing and communications altogether -- but in favour of what is hard to know.  I took a test online about what careers would suit me, but it didn't have any great answers -- it told me things like writer, web editor, graphic designer.  Creative jobs I aspire to sometimes, where I can also be left alone to work in peace.  But highly skilled and competitive fields.  As it is my job history looks a little too fragmented, not because I don't want to hold down a job, but the jobs I enjoy for one reason or another don't last.  I'm torn between wanting to make this one last when I often can't stand it, just to show commitment, and wanting to get out as quickly as I can to something I do enjoy and am good at.


Some days the girl looks at places to rent in London that fit within our budget, albeit tightly -- but then she feels despondent that I haven't the security we can rely on, and so we can't look at them.  I promise to try harder, to do better in work, to do better in my job search, but I often feel like I'm a failure.  This whole post seems so very familiar, why have things not moved on?  It's clearly something in my behaviour patterns, but I don't know how to break them.  It's bad enough when it's just me affected, but upsetting the girl or adding to her worries is even worse.

Shed your skin and let's get started

Here we are, it's early on a Sunday afternoon and the day has a slightly unreal feel to it.  A lot of my life often has a slightly unreal feel to it, stemming from how often I fall asleep when travelling -- that time just after waking up always feels slightly drained of colour, and still a little like a dream.  This way, most of the motorway service stations and petrol stations in the world feel like a dream -- unless I've been the one driving.  Train station almost certainly feel this way.  I don't quite know why this morning does, but I drank so much yesterday I might not be completely straight yet.

Because it was my birthday earlier in the week, I arranged to meet friends in London for a few civilised drinks yesterday, among the Shoreditch elite.  The bar I'd chosen, since I have come to consider it as my spiritual home, was promising to get busy -- since Saturday was a big day for sport, marking the start of the 6 Nations rugby tournament (with England playing Wales, and Ireland playing Italy), as well as a few premier league football games, but when the girl and I arrived shortly after 2 it was still just getting going. 

We were joined before too long by the girl's friend Sara, who is very lovely and someone I consider a friend in her own right these days rather than just one of the girl's mates.  We toasted my birthday and settled ourselves in on some big sofas, content to spend the rest of the day in good company.  And the company kept getting better, when guest of honour Conor, of radiogael.blogspot.com joined us.  I'm a big believer in making internet friends into real life friends -- as evidenced by the fact I will have been dating a fellow blogger for two years this year, and have met many other amazing and brilliant bloggers over recent years. 

I'm pleased to report that Conor is every bit as smart, funny and interesting in real life as he is on his highly-readable blog, and as is often the way it didn't feel like the first time we'd met.

As the day wore on and the bar filled up, Sara had to leave to prepare her flat for a party she was throwing that evening, but in her place we were shortly joined by the charismatic China Blue who was having a bad enough day, even before the general disarray of the London Underground.  I'd like to think that her day was improved by joining us, since I know that ours certainly was that much brighter for it.

As the rugby games finished and the afternoon turned into evening, we headed out into the night in search of food -- and luckily for us found it, with little fuss or hassle, in a much smarter city-types bar close to the station.  Sara had invited us to her house party that night, so we'd collectively agreed that a break from the drinks and some food would be in order before we were to set off to join the great and good of Notting Hill.

China Blue joined us for dinner, but decided she'd prefer to head home than to party into the night in Notting Hill -- so the three of us (the girl, Conor and myself) caught the tube out into the Notting Hill night, to what seemed like a very trendy party thrown by Sara and her flatmate. 

These parties always amuse me, since Sara is Australian (which might go without saying, since she's one of the girl's oldest friends) and her flatmate is South African.  The latter I hadn't even known until that day, when the more-perceptive Conor had noticed it immediately upon talking to her.  The part that amuses me is that other than the standard "how do you know the host" ice-breaker questions, people would always ask me where I was from -- and when I replied that I was English, they'd be surprised and tell me I was the first Englishman they had met that night.  Often the only one at the party.  People would presume I was Australian, like the girl and Sara, or South African like so many of the guests, or last night it was thought I might be Irish, like our good friend Conor.   My English accent was foreign and difficult to understand in the noisy party atmosphere.

I feel decidedly less travelled at these parties, but it was a lot of fun -- even if we didn't stay too late.  The three of us were worse for wear after the afternoon, but still a lot better than some of the party's guests, and together we caught a bus to guide us home -- sitting on the top deck, right at the front, we could spy on all the people out in the city...

And so here we are, the girl and I having a lazy Sunday at home with a couple of cats who are craving attention after being left alone all day yesterday.  I feel very lucky today, and the working week feels thankfully a long way off.

Another year older, and deeper in debt

This will be the last year I can count myself among the twenty-something bloggers -- so perhaps I should start looking for a 30-something community instead.  I turned 29 this week and once again have to stop and take stock of my life.

I can't remember how I celebrated my 19th birthday now, except that I was in my first year at university, in Derby.  Did I invite friends to come and see me, and were they too busy?  Did I visit my parents back home?  It's all a mystery to me now.  I guess it wasn't that spectacular.

29 was much better.  In a less than surprising turn of events, I invited friends from home to join me for a meal out locally -- with the idea that I could have a separate celebration in London for people I knew there, making it easy for everyone.  Friends at home didn't have to go to London, and people in London didn't have to trek out to the suburbs.  Except it didn't quite work out that way, and in the end all my friends at home except one -- and, of course, the girl -- couldn't or wouldn't come, so I ended up cancelling my meal out and instead ordering Chinese takeaway and watching a dvd.  I would pretty much live on Chinese takeout if I could get away with it.

On my birthday itself, the girl gave me what could be possibly one of the best gifts ever -- a week-long holiday in Barcelona, later this year when it's warmer.  And she didn't just give me a print-out of the booking confirmation page, she made a kind of flip-book to read that gave me little bits of info on each page to keep me guessing until the end.  We then headed into London to do what we had planned for last year, until the snow ruined everything -- which was visit the London Planetarium.

Except there is no London Planetarium any more, and hasn't been for years, it seems.  Now the only one is at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, which was lucky because Greenwich is one of my favourite places to be, and so as well as Planetarium show we got to look round the museum of the Royal Observatory and learn all sorts of cool things about space.  I'm a big nerd about space, and for way longer than was really appropriate still had glow in the dark stars on my walls and ceiling.

This weekend is drinks in London with friends old and new, in my favourite bar in the world -- Kick, in Shoreditch.

That old factory sense

Following a conversation over lunch with her colleagues, the girl asked me the other night what my favourite smells were.

I consider scent to be one of the most under-rated senses -- you might consider not being able to live without hearing, or a life lived without sight, but rarely is a thought given to our sense of smell.  Which is funny, because it reportedly has the strongest link to memory recall.

I remember the time I spent in New York -- ten years ago this year, as it happens -- and how I later came to think of Manhatten as a city of smells.  I had a theory that you could navigate the city blind, going only by the unique smells individual blocks or streets had.  One street always had a guy selling roasted chestnuts, another place smelled like blocked drains, somewhere else might have smelled like fresh bread, yet another of steam from the subway.  I wonder now what I might remember from those days and nights, if I was just given the smells -- if the jazz club in an underground disused meat locker might have had a particular smell of sweat and candles, or what the sheets in the hostel smelled like.

I struggle to name five of my favourite smells, without resorting to cliche -- like the smell of fresh baked bread, or newly-mown grass.  But even those have strong memories attached to them, of walking past the supermarket every morning on the way to school, and on cold, frosty mornings feeling warmed by the smell of bread as it came out the vents of the shop's bakery.  Or summer Saturday afternoons when the grass had been cut...

It's strange in a way how we can't smell ourselves.  I know that I must have a distinct smell, the combination of my deodorant and aftershave mixed with whatever makes me smell like myself, but I wouldn't recognise it.  I'm always slightly surprised when someobody notices my aftershave, comments on it, or even can name it.

I came across a smell earlier I had forgotten about, and forgotten the memories of.  As I poured what was left of a forgotten glass of beer down the sink, it foamed up around the plughole, and I smiled as I remembered weekends when my Dad would pull the sofa in front of the tv to watch West Ham play football -- and the big glass mugs of beer he would have.  Sometimes as a kid he would let me take a sip, or I would just smell it and get the foam on my nose.  In years to come, what smells will remind me of here, and now?

And as ever, I turn it over to whoever may be reading -- what are your favourite smells?  And what stories do they tell?  Do you ever smell something and recall something you didn't even realise you had forgotten?  Tell me everything.

How to whip up a frothy frog nest

Another week.  I apologise unreservedly for the lack of updates here recently and the lack of comments on sll my favourite must-reads -- I don't often get the chance to read or post from work, and by the end of the day I rarely want to spend more time at the computer.  Rest assured, I am still around and grabbing my reading while i can.

So, what's new?  Work continues to suck and blow in equal measure.  I am hitting somewhere around 50% of my sales targets currently, and while I have days of lucidity where it will occur to me that if I work really, really hard then there is almost no limit to my earning potential, I quickly get disillusioned and would rather do something I enjoy for a decent wage.  But hey, at least I have a job -- that's a step in the right direction.  I recently interviewed elsewhere for a marketing role, and though I got on famously with the interviewer who was very senior in the company, their client didn't want to meet me and that was the end of it.  I am choosing to think this was maybe a blessing in disguise, since the location was horrible.

Speaking of locations, the girl and I have been looking online for places to live in London.  Reluctantly, we are having to admit that Greenwich in all its bohemian and center-of-the-earth wonder isn't going to happen, and that we can get more bang for our buck elsewhere.  Somewhere with easy access to rock climbing as well as central London and road links to where my parents live are all top of the list -- and with reasonable property prices, it is Canary Wharf that is looking the most attractive.

I feel bad, though.  I'm not particularly great at my job, and so my earnings are still quite low, and in turn this is causing us problems in finding somewhere in London -- the girl doesn't make bad money, but my half isn't quite measuring up; so sometimes I feel like I'm holding us both back.  All isn't lost though.  It's a quiet period in business almost everywhere so I can reasonably expect things to pick up there, and to get better at my job -- I can only get better at my job, right?  Not least because we are being sent on a sales training course.

Sometimes in ym work I feel like I have a toolbox, filled with various useful things, and yet all I am using out of it most of the time is one screwdriver.

In other news, my beginner's climbing course is complete, so once I have taken an official safety test I will be free to climb without an instructor.  I joined a rock climbing group on Meetup.com, but it seems their preferred venues at the moment are London's biggest and most popular indoor climbing centres.  I might just try and find people to climb with at the wall where I've been going -- it's quieter, though obviously much smaller, but also open to the air.  In time, once I've got the practice and gradually bought some equipment, I'll start finding outdoor excursions -- but one step at a time.

Maybe that idea isn't so unlike work?

And on an entirely unrelated option, I was thinking to myself early Facebook needs a "hell no" option as a response.  "Do you want to be friends with this person?" Let's see, you never liked them when you were at school together and that was something like 15 years ago -- this isn't just a "yes" or "no" decision, it's a "hell no".  Do you want to join the group for a Big Brother Reunion in Australia?  Hell, no.  So let me ask you -- what options would you like to see?  Or maybe you would like to make the real world more like social networking, making it easier to hide or ignore people who annoy you, or just maybe you would like to live in the Ukraine with an adopted penguin, as I have been wondering this week?  I encourage everyone to read Death and the Penguin by Andrey Kurkov, one of the most darkly brilliant books I have read in a while.

Tongue that's sharp like a thumbtack

When I told my boss recently I couldn't work late on Thursday nights because I was starting a rock climbing course, she stared at me blankly.  She stared at me and asked flatly if I was joking.  I was puzzled and told her, no, I really couldn't work late on Thursday nights.  Apparently I joke about things so often and so seriously when I'm serious it's hard to know if I'm being sarcastic -- she said it was like me saying I had a needlepoint class or something.

I take exception to this.  I don't know if the impression people get from me is that I am as unlikely to go rock climbing as I am to go to a needlepoint class, or if she really can't tell what is meant to be serious.  But to me, the two bear no comparison.  but sure, I'm a  funny guy -- if you take funny to mean "strange".

Anyway, this isn't another post about my stupid work.  Instead it's a post about teh awesome that is rock climbing, and how I might be tempted to make Swiss Cottage leisure centre my spiritual home.

Sure, I've climbed before now.  I'm kind of mad at myself for not getting into climbing when I lived in Utah, when it was such an ideal place to be doing it -- along with not getting into all-terrain boarding, and never really learning to snowboard properly.  But I guess it wasn't the right time.  As I say, I have climbed before but only in a couple of relatively brief one-off sessions.  It was enough to know I liked it, obviously, or I wouldn't be doing the course -- however, now after only one official lesson so far I feel confident enough to rank it up there alongside swimming in greatness.  I think if I had the time to do one or the other on alternating days I would be in a lot better shape than I am.  But I think what climbing has in common with other activities I enjoy is the quiet moments of almost zen-calm.

The climbing wall, despite being housed in a leisure centre, was open to the elements -- which last week meant it was cold enough to see your breath in the air, and the ropes were both cold and wet.  The condition of the rope wasn't much of an issue when you were climbing, only when you were holding the rope while someone else climbed -- then you noticed how quickly your hands got cold and numb.  It was also cold enough for my toes to get numb.  I'm going to be better prepared this week, even as I write this I am searching online for the right kind of gloves -- though I suspect serious climbers probably laugh at the idea of wearing gloves on a wall.

In many ways, the wall not being entirely indoors was a good thing -- it felt like I was actually doing something, instead of being somewhere hot and loud and probably smelly.  The real test will be if I continue climbing on my own after my introduction course has finished, though that may involve trying to convince people I know that they want to take up climbing, too.

It's important to fill non-work time -- days and weeks -- with things we enjoy, it gives us something to look forward to and motivation to get out of bed.  It might still be Ah crap when the alarm goes off, but if you then remember there's a great band playing in the evening or whatever then it can get you through. Last year I spent a lot of time going to the gym in the early mornings to get fit for Peru, but that was more of a threat -- if I didn't go to the gym then I would never make it Machu Picchu.  It also has to be said; having someone pretty neat like the girl to come home to always helps, as well -- so I'm very lucky there.

That's the thinking, anyway -- but there's a tightrope between this and wishing your days away.  Let's see how it works.  Until then, though, share with me your thoughts and ideas -- either on the things that you fill in to your days and weeks, or how you manage to not wish away your days while still looking forward to something coming up.  Our operators are waiting for your call.

The Polysyllabic Spree

There's not much to say with what's happening just lately.  Britain is unusually cold and has been blanketed in snow and ice almost constantly since December -- thawing only to deny a white Christmas before coming back.  There was a day last week where it reached -20C in some parts of the country.  Sure, it's winter, but it's not normally this cold, or for so long.  That's about as interesting is that info goes.

Instead, I'm going to write about someone else.

Nick Hornby is the author of one of my favourite books -- High Fidelity -- a novel about music and love and growing up or growing old and how they are sometimes inseperable.  I don't know if it ever won any awards, and I doubt it was ever critically acclaimed or even makes anyone's "must read" lists, but I've ranked it in my top 5 for a long time.  I also greatly enjoyed About A Boy, although the latter inspired a much worse movie adaptation.

Unfortunately, Hornby's later novels have left me cold.  How To Be Good I am fairly sure did win awards, but it did absolutely nothing for me.  Long Way Down irritated me more than anything else.  But that's just me.  I'm not saying Hornby is a bad writer, or that they were bad books, just that they did nothing for me personally.

I might be more inclined towards harsh judgements of his work if I was any kind of a writer myself, but most importantly if his non-fiction wasn't so bloody good.

I don't recall where I heard about 31 Songs, where Hornby predictably enough writes about 31 different songs -- without ever talking about his memories associated with the songs.  That, to me, was a stroke of genius -- just writing about the music and the musicians and the history, and in a way that was so engaging and accessible that I immediately wanted to track down every song mentioned and listen to them for myself and see if I could experience the same magic.

More recently I picked up a copy of The Polysyllabic Spree, in which Hornby can't resist making another music reference.  The book is a complete collection of the columns he wrote for literary magazine Believer, which in the same simple concept as 31 Songs, he simply writes about what books he has bought and read each month.  And just the same, he writes about each book with humour and wit, managing to make each one -- books I've never heard of, and authors I wouldn't have considered -- seem indispensible.  Like with 31 Songs where I had to download and play these songs, Spree makes me want to dig out a notebook and record each title, before ordering them from my local library.

You might hate Hornby's fiction, or you might hate fiction entirely -- I know people who look down their noses at the idea of reading something "made up" -- but since these aren't fiction, unless you have an overwhelming grudge against the man's style as a whole, you can't go too far wrong with them.

And in closing, I had my meeting at work I mentioned in my last post, and, yeah, I told them pretty much what was suggested in comments.  I didn't jump up and down for joy about the job, I even admitted to not "enjoying" sales, but I kept mostly quiet -- because there wasn't much to say.

You blame yourself for wanting more

Having been in my job now for something like 10 weeks, I am now due to have a "meeting" with my line manager.  I don't know if this marks my 3-month probation (which technically wouldn't be until February) or if they just feel like now is as good a time as any to talk to me.

My dilemma is what to say.  Obviously they want to know How I'm "settling in", discuss any issues I (or she) may have and any additional help I may need. 

My progress to date has been followed in almost minute detail in our all-too-frequent meetings, so I'm sure they would have mentioned if there was any concerns on the side of the business there.  I'm bitter that due to a mistake using a sum function in Excel I overcalculated my closed business in December.  I prematurely claimed to have exceeded my target, before discovering later when I used a calculator to add up the figures that I was instead a good £5k short of it.  I don't know if it's possible to ever know honestly what they expect us to achieve or what is acceptable -- logic would have it that they deliberately set our targets out of reach to make us work harder.  Being someone for whom nothing is ever good enough, this doesn't do me a whole lot of favours.

I'm also wonder what -- if any -- issues they may want to bring up.

But the main concern for me is how much truth I should give them.  How am I settling in?  Settled in fine, I get on well with my colleagues and enjoy working with my immediate colleagues, which is a big plus for me.  But the job bores the shit out of me, and I don't enjoy it.  How's that for an issue?  I feel there is nowhere for me to go in it, there is little to no creativity open to me, and few of the things I have enjoyed in previous jobs I've been lucky enough to hold.  I have actively been looking for other jobs.  Sometimes I resign myself to staying, with the idea that if I can stand it and if the worst it gets is boring then at least it's stable -- other times I say no to settling, say bollocks to the middle, and want more. I blame myself for what I can't ignore, I blame myself for wanting more.  There are probably literally thousands of places out there that would benefit from my passion and creativity when I am fully engaged.

That's not exactly the kind of thing you can bring up -- not and expect to escape being fired.  On the other hand, if fortune should smile on me and I do find something better in the near future, they might feel betrayed if I lied in the meeting and told them everything was sunshine and kittens when I was really looking around for something else.  On the third hand, it's not like if I tell them how I feel and what I want out of life they will magically pull it out of thin air.  The truth is I took this job knowing it wasn't what I wanted, but I was in no position to hold out for that magical elusive position and this gave me what I needed -- a job, good earning potential, and prospects, at the expense of creativity or enjoyment.

Most people don't like their jobs.  Many people hate their jobs.  Some have no job at all.  I'm lucky in so many ways.  But I still have no idea what I am going to say to them.

Enough flavour to last all 52 weeks

I don't really do New Year's resolutions, I've decided.

Over the years, I have made lists in January of things that I want to achieve over the coming year ahead, but whether I stick to them seems completely arbitrary -- I don't think the date has any measurable effect.  Either I resolve to do things over the year I planned to do anyway, or pick a bunch of things I think I should do or would like to do, and maybe I do them and maybe I don't.

There's things I want to do this year.  I want to move into London.  I want to learn to rock climb so that I can do it without supervision.  I want to finally learn to snowboard properly.  I want to get into shape (a shape that isn't round).  But none of those things depend on being new year resolutions -- I will achieve them because I want to, screw January 1st.

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy New Year's eve -- I know a lot of people hate the pressure to have a good time, but I think these people can put the pressure on themselves.  I saw in 2010 at a small fancy dress party with friends and had a lot of fun, but in previous years I've had a good time doing nothing more exciting than go to the cinema, play pool, or stay in and watch TV.

2009 was a rough year in many ways.  I lost my job to redundancy, and the girl spent several months in exile in Western Australia waiting for the paperwork for a new work visa for her company -- money was tight and the distance put a strain on our relationship.  In the end, we made the tough decision to give up our house.

But 2009 was also a year of adventure for me.  In May, I travelled to South America with a group of about 30 other people to trek the Inca Trail in Peru, raising money for Macmillan Cancer Support.  Through rough  terrain at high altitude and on bruised and blistered feet, I made it to Machu Picchu.  The trek also wasn't helped by injuries I sustained falling down the stairs at home.  But Peru was an amazing, vibrant country -- and the girl's welcome at Heathrow airport when I got back stands out as a high point of any year, not just 2009.

Not content with travelling to the Southern Hemisphere just once in a year, in August I flew out to Perth to join the girl in Australia for a few weeks.  Together we visited friends and family (her family, not mine -- though we tried to see some of mine while we were there) and saw the sights of Perth along with the south coast of Western Australia, Melbourne and the Yarra Valley.  We took boat tours to spot whales, ate fish and chips in Fremantle, dodged rain showers, went off road driving and admired the unique Australian wildlife and scenery.

The redundancy, too, had a silver lining when I got a new job in London -- getting a new job at all in this financial climate was an achievement, so getting one that will enable the girl and I move to a new flat in London in the next few months is even better.

2009 also saw new friends made -- the girl and I travelled to Oxford one rainy Sunday to meet Tully, a lovely Aussie blogger who was visiting these fair isles on business.  We met Tully again a few months later for brunch in Melbourne, where the magnificent Miss Milo put us up (and put up with us) for several days and played the perfect hostess.  If you don't know these two, take the opportunity to check out their own personal journeys.  Australia also gave us the chance to connect with friends we hadn't seen since they were in London.  Sometimes the world can seem so small to make and keep friends from all over the world, and at the same time insurmountably large when these people are also so far away.

I want 2010 to be a continued year of adventure, and I want to work more on becoming the person I want to be -- and I know that is an internal journey I have to make, an adventure of the spirit perhaps, something I won't find on a rock pile in the clouds of a South American mountain or in a monthly payslip.

Freak powered brunch

I saw a competition recently to win a year's supply of coffee.  As a famous non-drinker of coffee -- with notable exceptions of a holiday in Rome last year, and very occasional after a meal -- it seems like a strange contest to want to enter.  The simple explanation is, of course, it's about a girl.  And not just any girl, but the girl, for whom I'd do most things.

To win this grandest of prizes you had answer a simple question -- what 3 people, living or dead, would you like to have brunch with, and why.  Not as simple as the ones where you copy and paste an answer from a block of text you have to read, but worth a go.

The trouble is, the competition expired before I was able to think of three people.  And I still can't.

I thought of the first one easily: Carol Ann Duffy, the poet laureate.  An openly bisexual Scottish single mother, who just happens to write some of the best poetry I have ever read -- and I include Pablo Neruda in this.  I would expect her to be opinionated and interesting and intelligent, and I know from having met her she is a warm person.  She would be able to comment on contemporary issues, both domestic and foreign, and share interesting stories of her own life and travels.

I figure that's a great place to start, someone who brings controversy to one of Britain's most conservative roles, and with whom I have a great personal affection.

A contrast, then, would be the late Hunter S. Thompson.  I have no less affection for Dr Thompson, in case that is unclear, and I suppose in many ways he shares key traits with Ms Duffy -- both being talented, engaging writers, and both being controversial figures.  But I wonder if they would get along?  Thompson who spent years on the campaign trails, the pioneer of "freak power" and who saw into the hearts of the Hells Angels and the American Dream.  What would he make of a contemporary Scottish poet?  What did he feel about poetry at all?  What would Duffy think of Thompson's writing?  Would the two of them fight like cat and dog, or would they get along famously?


A third guest is even trickier.  Having two literary figures -- however different -- surely means the third has to be someone completely different.  Ideally it would be interesting to have someone with whom I disagree or dislike, but it seems pointless to try and pick someone on that merit alone.  All the usual targets I know or imagine would be disliked just as strongly by existing guests as by myself.  I can't think of a worthy adversary, someone I disagree with but respect. 

On the other hand, I wouldn't want it to be a circle jerk of mutual appreciation and adoration.


Considering my first two are also both white and English speakers, I feel as if I should have some kind of diversity -- not for its own sake, but to bring a different angle and different discussions.  This suddenly makes me realise how little I know outside of my own comfort zone, speaking only English fluently -- but that's no excuse, when major works are frequently offered in a variety of translations. 

So instead, I open it up to my readers -- in an effort to avoid this whole thing descending into an exercise in complete pretentiousness by citing thinkers or writers or rebels of places I know little about, who would you suggest as a third person?  Someone that would react or complement in some way with the existing two I have chosen, but also widen the cultural net?  I'll invent some award to give to whoever comes up with the ideal third guest, and hopefully in the process give me someone whose life I should know more about.


Perhaps there should be a scientist or a soldier?  Maybe I should have an astronaut or a farmer or just a relative of yours?  There needs to be more audience participation around these parts -- since I appreciate anyone coming here at all, I should maybe involve you more.


It must be said at this point I can't imagine either of my guests having "brunch", but that's by the by.