Christmas

Her name is Christmas -- like the Bond girl in "The World is Not Enough" -- and juvenile as I am I can't wait for the opportunity to turn to her and make the same joke: "I thought Christmas only came once a year". I'd sleep with her just for the chance to say it.

Internet dating seems once more to have stalled -- there was a couple of false starts, one girl seemed keen when I complimented her on her smile, another liked that I wrote her a long and rambling second email. But neither came to anything. And yet one night I went the largely-pointless flirtomatic website I always see advertised on MySpace, and have heard people refer to. The website is pretty stupid, just horny guys looking for people to have cybersex with -- pulse optional, age negotiable. Just as I was about to write the site off as a bad idea, this girl caught my eye. I sent her a friendly -- as opposed to sleazy -- message and we talked for the rest of the night, switching to IM fairly quickly. We share a taste in music, but there's still plenty of room for me to recommend bands or songs to her. We'd been talking less than a week when I asked for her phone number, now days don't pass without a message or two back and forth. It's not quite calling each other, but there will be time for that later.

I made her a CD the other day -- I vaguely suggested it last week and she jumped at the chance -- and was wondering what to do about her address, she'd be wise not to trust me with it quite yet. The funny thing is, she lives in Shropshire -- a long way from here, but coincidentally the same county as where Fiona lived, back when we dated. It wasn't very close back then, either, when I lived in the Midlands. Funnier still, I know what town she lives in -- she made reference to it the other day, so bored I stuck her second name into a search of the phone book. There was a list of names. For no reason, I put Fiona's surname in -- and up comes her Dad's new address. It seems familiar. I go back to my original search and I notice that one of the people on the first list lives a mere 5 doors away from Fiona's Dad. And if I was a gambling man, I'd put money on it being her.

I don't know where it's going to lead. Right now we're just friends and I don't feel a stir of anything more than friendship for her, which is just as well. But I want to see where the friendship leads -- if people come into our lives for a reason, I'm eager to find out what significance we will have for the other.

And just to mess with my head, now San wants the two of us to to Paris for the weekend, for her birthday. Just her, and me.

Musical Monday (#8)

This song in many ways sums up punk. It might not be "Anarchy in the UK" or "God Save the Queen", or even a random discordant offering by some obscure and largely talentless band that Lester Bangs used to love, but just the same it feels like music wouldn't be the same without it.

As it stands, the song itself appears merely to be about unrequited teenage love -- a common enough theme for punk -- but apparently the lyrics were changed. The Undertones changed the originals words to "I wanna hold her tight -- get teenage kicks right through the night", just one word makes all the difference.

The song was about masturbating. It had originally gone "I wanna hold it tight" -- and if you listen to the rest of the song, it makes sense, the "teenage love, so hard to beat". It's not about tender, warm, romantic feelings but instead conducting one's self in a solo symphony. It is in good company, though, along with the Vapors' "Turning Japanese" and the Buzzcocks' slightly less subtly titled "Orgasm Addict".

Just the same, this song embodies so much -- it is frustrated and sad and filled with longing. Punk wasn't just about being pissed off about the state of the country, it was a musical rebellion against the over-elaborate prog rock -- by making stripped down, simple songs about masturbating.

The song is more than that, though -- Ferghal Sharkey has a unique and disarming voice, the music might be simple but it's not deliberately obnoxious and discordant. He does the political as well as he does the heartfelt, but it's this song that can't be rivalled.

You can, however, come close. I don't include today the Undertones original -- I doubt anyone here has never heard it -- I include instead the cover by Nouvelle Vague. I'm rarely a huge fan of cover versions, and Nouvelle Vague can seem the wrong side of novelty sometimes (remember Mike Flowers Pops?) -- but they take this song and make it their own. The longing increases, even if the original song is hard to beat.
No pun intended.

The week in review

Readers, forgive me, it's been nearly a week since my last update. It's frustrating, I need a kind of telepathic typewriter to update for me -- since I will think of things to write about, then either forget or miss the chance to update. Then before I know it a week has passed. Maybe I should write a bunch of updates all at once and then slowly leak them out over a course of a week.

So, the week in review, in reverse order: After silence from them nearly all week, the dating website opened the lines of communication with me yesterday. I had emailed them on Thursday for the second time, and it probably sounded quite snotty -- but so it should, they have £100 of my money, I wasn't happy about it and I had already emailed them last weekend. But I take back every bad thing I said about them, they have been incredibly cooperative. It was explained to me how I accidentally signed up for the year's premium package -- it's the default, if you don't select what one you do want, which is slightly cheeky to my mind. However, when my bank told me they couldn't get my money back what I wasn't expecting was the website to turn around and gladly offer to correct my membership and refund the difference. Even refunding $171, having deducted some for the 5 days use. Cross your fingers this story has a happy ending.

Yesterday was a half day at work, what was called an "away day" and meant to be a chance for everyone to mix and get to spend time together outside of work. Following an hour-long company meeting. That said, there can't be too many companies that provide free beer, wine or vodka jelly for meetings -- and then free pizzas afterwards. Because of wet weather apaprently the original plan of going to Hyde Park to play sport was abandoned in favour of going to the pub for a quiz. Since I work on the sports team, I didn't think it wise for me to say "I don't like sport", but needless to say I am still emotionally scarred from all the years of being picked last.

Side tangent, is it wrong or abnormal to still be bothered by incidents at school, like 15 years later? I don't so much hold grudges, but I have always had issues with "letting go" of my feelings. This can be that I have difficulty letting go of feelings I had for girls I once dated, or it can be that I am still angry at how I was treated by a teacher.

Back on topic; we went to the pub, for a free bar and a quiz. It seemed like forever before they actually started the quiz -- especially since we'd been told after the meeting to just go turn off our computers and go straight to the pub. The worst afternoon drinking a free bar is usually better than the best afternoon at work, so you can't complain too much. The fact is though that nobody actually mixes and talks to anyone other than the same people they always talk to. I stood up at one point and looked around me and realised I knew almost nobody. I'm still too shy to just walk up to people I don't know and start talking to them. Just the same, it was a good afternoon and I got home from work early which is always a bonus.

The rest of the week has been pretty uneventful -- I went to the movies with Sanyu on Thursday night, to see a beautiful French film, I met with a recruitment consultant on Tuesday -- he contacted me last week after seeing my CV posted on Monster. That's the website, Monster, not on a monster, although that would be unique. Unfortunately, when we met he told me that companies don't like to go through a recruitment consultant to recruit for junior roles, that it's a very quiet time of year without many jobs going, and that I'm better of staying where I am for as long as I can. Which makes you wonder why he contacted me in the first place. Work itself alternates between being something I can do quite happily, and something I absolutely hate. So long as it isn't something I hate all of the time, it's probably good enough for now.

And that's about it, Musical Monday had to be postponed earlier in the week -- but if I can get it written early it will be up as planned this Monday.

Worse than a drunk dial

Sometimes it amazes me that I am able to tie my shoelaces without help. The fact that San calls me a street urchin because my shoelaces are often undone, and trailing through puddles, might go some way to explain this morning's activities.

The Internet is a wonderful thing; it enables you to waste hours of your time without ever actually being awake or paying full attention. I was sat around watching pointless videos on youtube, while outside thunder rumbled somewhere in the distance and it continues to rain so hard that I'm thinking of building an ark. This all seems like a very fitting background.

You know how on these sites there are always the “meet people near you!” ads? The ones we all ignore? Put it down to not really being awake properly, or being distracted, but today I didn't ignore them. My attempts at Internet dating so far haven't been exactly full of promise, but the desire to meet new people is still there and short of going to bars and hanging around my own the Internet seems as good a way as any.

Last week I wasted hours of my life filling out an epic personality test on eHarmony -- only to find at the end of it you had to pay to use the service. It could have told me this to begin with, before I did compatibility tests and personality tests and took a quiz that seemed scarily familiar -- until I realised it's the same test mental health professionals have been giving me for years.

Today I went to this other site, and dutifully filled out who I am, who I am looking to meet, browsed the site a little, all the rest. Then I took a look at the account page. Cut to rumbles of thunder.

I have a "Gold" membership. For $180 a year. At no point when filling out my card details do I remember changing the "no thanks" to "yes please, feel free to charge me extortionate sums of money for a service I will get bored of in a couple of days".

I did what any sensible thinking individual would do in this same circumstance, sent them an email explaining I'm a retard and that they should close my account because I would be cancelling my cards. I tried calling them -- an international phone call on my mobile phone isn't going to be cheap, either -- but my service provider is one step ahead of me and has barred international calls.

True to my word, I called my bank and reported my card as "lost". Card now cancelled, new card reissued. Then I called my card protection service and passed on the same details to them. I don't think it will do me any good, however -- because I expect the transaction has already gone through, and in order to claim this money back it would have to be genuinely fraudulent. This requiring police reports and the rest, and I'm in no hurry to get myself investigated for fraud.

The new mobile phone from LG will have a built-in breathalyser, this means that the phone can automatically block you from calling predefined numbers if your blood/alcohol level is above a certain level -- and stop you drunk-dialling your ex. I need an equivalent for the Internet, something that detects how awake I am or how much attention I am paying before it lets me give out my card details.

Life, or what passes for it

A year ago, the bombings in London left me cold. Terrorism was not new to England, or to London, growing up the threat of the IRA was always there. Even today there is a noticeable lack of bins in central London, in the stations there is a wealth of junk food and no bins to dispose of it in. I'm surprised there's even post boxes.

But this was a different animal.

And then exactly two weeks later, another group of young men tried to do the same thing again. Where are they now? It hasn't occurred to me to think of it since that time, but now I do wonder what happened to those men after they were arrested. Are they in prison, in holding cells? Have they been shipped to some overseas detention centre? I'm not overly concerned for their welfare -- however callous it sounds -- I just dislike how these things disappear from the public eye.

Fast forward just over a year, and our secret services -- or whoever -- foil a major terror attack. Men are in custody, the press are full of dire warnings, and London is on the highest alert possible. The city seemed unnaturally quiet today, perhaps because this level of alert says an attack is imminent.

The trouble can be, though, when do we know who to believe? It was only a couple of months ago that there was a dramtic raid and men were arrested, one was shot, and it was said a chemical weapon attack on the UK had been avoided at the zero hour. Tabloid newspapers were full of warnings of an impending attack, an attack that didn't come. The men were released without charges, without any evidence of chemical weapons or criminal activity, and the police made awkward apologies for shooting one of them.

Then remember even before July 7, there was the time with the tanks at the airport. They wouldn't say why they were there, what they were achieving, we just had to believe we were being kept safe. Sometimes it feels like a lottery. We weren't kept safe on July 7, and two weeks later an attack only failed through luck.

Are these men guilty? Were they planning the largest scale terrorist atrocity we have ever seen? Should the government be allowed to detain without charge potential terror suspects for longer? Or will they soon be released without charges, as just as convenient smoke screen to distract people from other troublesome issues? I have no answers for this, only more questions.

I resent and bristle at the press statements about people who hate freedom or want to destroy our way of life. I doubt very much these people are consumed with rage about people having equal rights to vote. More likely they are displaced, angry and frustrated -- like so many of us can be, like so many of us are. They are easily influenced and easily led and they think Britain sending bombs to Israel or invading Iraq, Afghanistan, is the same thing as blowing up commercial airliners.

But it comes down to what can you do? The official lines are remain vigilant, go about your normal life. Life has to go on. But I wonder, when will it end? Will it ever end? With the IRA there were ceasefires, peace talks, negotiations -- but how do you sit down around a table with people who plan these things? If indeed these things are real at all.

Maybe this is just how life is going to be.

Musical Monday (#7)

So it's a day early: bite me. I wanted to something more positive and upbeat than Serial Killer Sunday.

Sometimes things in life can get overwhelming. I think my problem has always been that I get too hung up on details, and that I need to take more time out just to consider the little things, the things that make me happy.

Today I found an old, old diary that was about to be deleted over its host site, I hadn't been there in six months and forgot it had existed. It combined this song with this picture. Perhaps it's out of place the picture says "Tell me, where is this bright side you speak of" when the song seems to be about taking pleasure from small things.

I love the song, it's so different for Audioslave -- who go up in my estimations with almost everything they do -- it seems happy and simple and just about living life.

"I like colourful clothing in the sun, because it doesn't remind me of anything"

I once made everyone stop and mark the day when I said it was all going to change. When I realised I was the centre of the universe and everything was going to work out just fine. I think now that might actually just have been a manic episode more than anything else, but I want to try and set a milestone for myself. Mark a day on the calendar when I got things into perspective finally and turned my life around. In whatever way.

None of that matters, what does matter is this song is incredible, even if I probably don't understand it properly.