Wednesday already

What day is this? Wednesday. Gah. I don't know what's wrong with me this week (but you bet it's hard to pronounce, huh?). I'm glad to say this week I am feeling far less violently angry towards my fellow trainees, and haven't repeated any comments about the best way to a man's heart being with a sharp knife to the sternum.

However, this week does officially suck. Work, of course, sucks donkey dick as ever. Yesterday I had some furious Scotsman shouting and swearing at me because we didn't get his fax or whatever. Today someone else was refusing to get off the phone until he could talk to a manager, despite having been told already by someone else earlier in the day a manager would, at best, only call him back. And not even that, in the end, they said it wasn't a management issue that this loser just didn't like the replacement handsets. Further ranting about work and colleagues should probably be confined to my Monday Monkey blog that I started to rant about working in PR.

I have managed to find the library copy of 100 Years Of Solitude, which is helpful since even the fines to date must be less than the cost of a new book. But today I think my wallet is lost. I didn't have it when I went to work this morning, and I still can't find it now. I've cancelled my cards -- and apparently they haven't been used -- but dammit, I hate losing stuff. Probably because I lose stuff a lot. I should probably revert to having a wallet on a chain, not to try and be punk but to stop me losing the bloody thing. It reminds me of when I lost my wallet on New Year's Eve, two years ago. Perhaps the worst possible day to lose your wallet on, before you go out.

There's not much in it these days -- a couple of cards, a blood donor card that I keep only to identify my blood type should I be in an accident, my driving licence. No pictures of loved ones any more, not even pictures of Avril Lavigne.

Other than that, I've had a headache all day and no money to buy painkillers with, and the back windscreen wiper on my car has decided that it doesn't want to do no stinkin' wiping of windows no more, so it has become purely decorative. Let's just hope it doesn't rain when I have to drive anywhere -- like to work, or home... I managed to get lost driving home last night, all because I've started giving a colleague a lift which involves driving out to the arse-end of nowhere. He got out the car last night and asked me if I remembered where I was going, I assured him I did and perhaps less than 30 minutes later I was thinking "This doesn't look very familiar" and it got increasingly less familiar.

Until I was driving down narrow, winding roads in complete darkness in the vague hope that if I kept going in a straight line I'd come to some kind of civilisation soon, and could see lights of some kind of life in the distance. As it turned out, my drive in a straight line idea wasn't all bad and eventually I made it back to where I had started without incident. That might explain why I was so tired last night.

What it doesn't explain is why the hell I am having such weird dreams lately. The details are mostly lost to me now, but it's enough that I spend half the day feeling slightly uneasy.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go and carry on looking for my bastard wallet.

Come with us now on a journey through time and space

The Mighty Boosh: A surreal sitcom about the mismatched friendship of two zoo keepers, Howard Moon and Vince Noir. Sort of, anyway. In honour of this, I present my Mighty Boosh top 5 (yes, it was going to be a top 10 but I couldn't think of enough things).

Top what? Just random top things I love about the show. With links to clips on YouTube where I can -- otherwise you will have to rent/download. As ever, the context would help enormously with these things -- but I can't guarantee it would ever make any more sense

1)Mod Wolves -- Vince is king of the mods, this comes in useful when confronted by mod wolves in the jungle room.
2)The completely random musical improvisations, including Calm a llama down, trapped in cabinets and Bob Fossil's I don't like cricket
3)"The Spirit of Jazz" who is scarily reminiscent of Papa Lazarou from League of Gentlemen. What's not to love about a guy who gets trapped in a hoover and says things like "I'll crawl inside you like a warm kitten"
4)Sort of related #2 -- the songs. I don't think the Mod Wolves dance really counts as a song, but my favourites are from Electro, Nanageddon and Old Gregg.
5)The supporting characters, from Bob Fossil, Zoo Manager, who doesn't know what any of the animals are, to Naboo the shaman who runs the kiosk at the zoo in series one.

It's more interesting than blogging about my work, at any rate.

In the pines, where the sun don't ever shine

Trying desperately to keep my chin up, following on from my last post. Work is becoming more familiar and more routine for me -- they set me loose live on the customers today, on my own. For a couple of days I have taken calls from some customers while a more experienced advisor listened in and gave me prompts. But today they felt I was ready to fly solo. Who knows if on Monday I will come in to a pile of notes about what I have done wrong.

Contrary to the opinion of some of my colleagues, I'm not heartless and evil -- and I would actually prefer to be able to tell people I am happy to authorise their claim and send them a new mobile phone, than to refuse them. That said, some people have claims that seem so ridiculous you can't help but laugh at them, knowing they will be rejected. What's that you say? You were in the garden and your neighbour's dog ran off with your phone, but it's okay because you've been using your Sim in a different handset... So let me get this straight, you dropped your phone down the drain as you got out of the car -- yet you were able to hold onto the Sim card and the battery? On the other hand, they might be genuine claims and I don't enjoy having to refuse anyone.

I got an email today about the last PR job I had an interview for. It was a job advertised on Gumtree of all places, and I went into it without really caring one way or the other. But the company impressed me, they had some good accounts and afterwards I felt like I could be happy working there. So, of course, today I get this email:

"Thank you so much for coming in to meet us last week. It was a pleasure to meet you. Unfortunately we are unable to offer you the position at this time.

I felt after meeting you that the role was a little too junior for your experience, and it might have been frustrating for you.
I wish you all the very best in your job hunting.
With kind regards..."

No. You know what? You really want to know what is fucking frustrating? It's training as a journalist, working for a newspaper without pay, working without pay in public relations for a further six months, and then having to work in an insurance call centre for minimum wage because apparently you're too experienced for a job you want. Now that you bring up the subject of frustration, that is frustrating.

I have actually replied to the email with a much more polite version of the above. I don't know what I'm supposed to do, should I pretend to be less qualified, experienced, competent? I get the opposite impression from recruitment consultants who hum and haw about if there is a cat in hell's chance of them being able to find me anything. I might try sitting on the underground with a hand-written sign saying "Will give sexual favours for a job in PR". Except for the fact that I believe you should be careful what you wish for, in case you get it, and I don't think any particular job is crucial to my happiness. Except maybe working with sea turtles in Mexico.

In other news, Luisa -- the mullet-haired Italian hottie from my now ex-place of work -- has returned to London after her seemingly-endless holiday in Italy. And it has officially ended between us before it begins, as she sent out an email to everyone she knows, announcing she is taking a job in Italy. I have no idea what was between us, if anything was ever between us, or what she felt for me. I'm not even really sure what I felt for her -- was it her I liked, or was it the fact that she was from Italy that appealed? I could never work out if I fancied her or not. And if she really did have a mullet. None of that matters now. Still, if nothing else she is responsible for introducing me to The Mighty Boosh. One of the most bizarre, surreal, and frequently silly sitcoms I've ever seen. I need to devote a whole post to things like trapped in cabinets, the Nanageddon, French dukes and the king of the mods. Among many many other things too numerous to mention, outside of a top ten list.

It's 12.30am and I need to sleep. I'm still tired from last night's excursion to see The Twilight Singers play in Camden. Their name to me brings up images of a black male voice choir, but instead they are the band (or maybe project) of Mr Greg Dulli. With the incredible and intense Mark Lanegan they were one of the highlights of Reading festival this year, and last night they were no less amazing. I was slightly disappointed they didn't drop some Afghan Whigs on us, but again their cover of Leadbelly's Where Did You Sleep Last Night was fantastic. So yeah, tired. And have just noticed I took the sheets off my bed to wash them so will need to find more before the afore-mentioned sleep can be obtained.

Objets trouvés

I've misplaced my copy of "100 Years of Solitude", which is annoying -- not least because it's technically the library's copy and not mine. I can't understand how I could lose it, it's not like it's a small book that could slip between the cushions on the sofa. So maybe I left it on a train.

And speaking of losing things on trains, everyone should go check out Found. Something about it -- about the 'found' items and the possible worlds and stories behind them really fires my imagination. I think sometimes we can get so caught up in our own lives, our own messes, our own dramas, that we forget to look around. It sounds trite and cliché, but I know sometimes I can spend so long with my head down and feeling like I'm drowning in one thing or another that I don't notice everyone else. I think these found items change that -- they make you stop, and think, and take notice and look around you and speculate. What is the story behind this note, what was behind this picture? There's whole lives and whole stories going on around us that we know nothing about. And I personally want in, so I'll be making some posters/flyers for Found to solicit submissions from people in London.

I remember in my French lessons at school, learning that the French phrase for lost property office was something like "bureau des objets trouvés" -- it seemed much more optimistic, "found" items, rather than lost.

Following on from last week's "Things I learned" I have decided to insert the "no index, no follow" code into my template here. Although it's all very interesting to see how people arrive at my blog from keywords like "semen" and Nicole Appleton's hair, it's not really what I'm all about. I'm not trying to increase my site traffic, so I'd rather if someone new comes here it's because they've seen my name in a comment or been looking for a blog. Besides, nobody has really got on board with the competition. Maybe you were all waiting to hear what the prize was first? Interestingly, I had a visitor here who had been googling for a Pablo Neruda sonnet. I went to the post the search had led to, and it was a funny feeling reading about how I had sent this sonnet to Lyndsay, back in February. I ended the post, slightly concerned I might make things weird between us. I need not have worried. Lyndsay doesn't blog any more -- not since diary-x died -- but I see her around occasionally on MySpace. Just recently she left me a message saying she owed me love of every kind, or words to that effect. It made me smile, but I knew she didn't mean it literally -- but I'll take all the love she's giving. Regular readers: there's no need to worry, I'm not about to start mooning after her again. Not today anyway.

This week I started a new job. It's just a temp job, on a three-month contract, working in a call centre for some multinational insurance company -- handling the incoming calls relating to a mobile phone company's customer's insurance questions and claims. It doesn't seem so bad, although I'm still training all this week. The job looks straight forward enough to do once you are familiar with doing it, if a little monotonous perhaps. The company rewards employees with perks like free lunches and incentives for performance or whatever, but I think these rewards might be to encourage people to stay in an otherwise dull job. On the plus side, it's closer than London, with shorter hours. The journey time in the car to work now is about the same as the journey time from my town into London -- but of course, I'm not bound by what time the trains are. I just get in my car, turn on the radio, and I'm home in time to feed the cat. On the other hand, although the perks are nice, the hours more sociable, the pressure much less -- and of course, I'm being paid which makes a change -- it's not really what I want to do with my life. I got to shadow some agents today on their calls, and chat to them when they weren't on the phone. I'd ask them if they liked their job, and nobody was enthusiastic. They liked it well enough, or liked things about it more than the work itself. But I'm still going to be looking for creative/media positions.

As a final note, to try and pull this all together, Lyndsay used to say something to me that I try to remember. Something so simple, and yet it seems to fit: she used to tell me "Chin up, Jay". Sometimes when I'm feeling sad, I'll say it to myself and making a conscious effort to lift my head a bit. It makes me smile to think of it, to want to remind her of it, and it does help you notice things around you.
Your homework assignment this week; find something.

Things I have learned today

It's quite a strange string of events that have lead me to today's lessons, but I hope you'll bear with me. I was visiting earlier the myspace page of the delectable China Blue, among others, as one does at 11am when you are still in your PJs but have already written resignation letters for two jobs. As I was saying, I was visiting China Blue when I noticed in her "about me" space was a link to her blog here.

This made me pause. Someone visiting CB could visit her blog, and from her blog find their way here. I can't tell you how many millions of people there are on MySpace, and in the world generally, and 99.9% of them would be free to visit my blog. But it also struck me that it would be possible -- if unlikely -- that one of my friends could see her among my top friends and pay her a visit. And from that visit, decide to visit her blog -- and why not, because it is amazing.

And maybe on reading a particularly great entry they might notice the comments link. And maybe they would read the comments, and see one of mine. Or maybe they would be looking at her various links, and follow one to my blog. It's implausible, but possible. Friends could then be in a position to read disturbing revelations about ill-advised one night stands with Filipino models, ex-girlfriends could read about secret yearnings for them and jealousy over their new birds. The possibilities are quite worrying.

I figured it might be a good idea to put some kind of stat counter on my blog, so I can at least know or have a good idea who is visiting. I had a vague memory of there already being one on here, so I visited sitemeter. But I couldn't remember my username or password, and had to return here to look through my template code for anything that might help. And help it did, it turns out my account is with statcounter -- and very much active, busy logging away to itself all kinds of details about my visitors.

And this brings me to today's lessons:
-- I seem to have an extraordinary number of lurkers.
-- Spiders (apparently) hate the smell of conkers
-- Disturbing search phrases like "her first time she fucked a dog" and "she knew she wanted to fuck the dog" will apparently both lead you to my blog, using MSN. This is only because of the phrase "feverdog" (and frequent use of the word "fuck"). Do you suppose the searcher from Toronto found what they were looking for?
-- Despite regular mentions of hot foreign girls, and probably lots of mentions of Norwegians, I apparently don't have any visitors from Norway. I do, however, have a visitor from what appears to be a communal blog, in French, and a Spanish girl in London. Even with freetranslation.com I have no real clue what their blogs say.
-- Roughly 35% of all my visitors are from the USA, with 23% coming from the UK and 15% from Australia. Other countries with 5% or less of the visitors include Sweden, Taiwan, Canada and Singapore. I mention these last ones especially, because they're among the lurkers.

It's funny, looking at search terms that have brought people to my blog. A lot of results come from key words, pulled from my entry about England. It's not just people looking for websites about girls and dogs, I was amused that someone in Germany found my blog after searching for the words "dim" and "Rachel Hunter". Sadly the word was out of context and might mean something else in German.

Someone in Lafayette, Louisianna came here after searching "can exes be friends after a break up". I wonder what they thought about this after they read my post about meeting Fiona.

The phrase "snowboarding sonnet" -- searched by someone in Mt. Laurel, New Jersey, is very interesting. It takes the searcher to this post, naturally about Lyndsay. And snowboarding. Who searches for sonnets about snowboarding anyway, and after they read my post did they want to read Love in the Time of Cholera?

The trouble with google and blogger is that every post showing on one page is one result -- so someone in Vancouver, British Colombia, looking for Mark Lanegan's song "little bit of rain" gets a months' worth of posts because one entry mentions Mark Lanegan, another one rain, and other ones frequently using the words "rain" and "bit".

Someone in Santa Monica, California, came here after searching "goodbye quote pablo neruda". Someone in Shady Cove, Oregon found this entry when they searched for "hotbody".

And so, I'd like to make a weekly competition -- for those who monitor their visitor stats -- the most unlikely or unsuitable search term that has been used to find your blog. This week, can anyone beat "she knew she wanted to fuck the dog"? No cheating.

Musical Monday (#11)

Silverchair. Silverchair remind me of being around 16 and listening to Nirvana. And perhaps a little confused about what I felt about Daniel Johns. I loved the raw grunge sound of the first album. There were parts of it that didn't quite sit easy with me -- or rather one thing, the lyrics. I didn't mind the content, or the subject matter, it was just the rhyming schemes were fucking terrible. It seemed like they would write a good song, and then as an afterthought write lyrics like the cat in the hat. I was almost surprised "Green Eggs and Ham" wasn't featured in any songs.

Later on, I learned to dislike other things about Silverchair. The main one being their apparent copying of the sound/style of other bands -- I read at the time of 'Frogstomp' that the band sounded like "a raw Pearl Jam" but I wasn't listening to Pearl Jam at the time, and so the comparison totally escaped me. When I listened to Pearl Jam albums that weren't 'Vitalogy', it began to make sense, and disliked the faux- Eddie Vedder vocals, and 'Frogstomp' was forever ruined for me. Sometimes I wish I had kept my copy, it's sometimes nice to listen to something you never play. After the album Freak Show -- a lot more commercial, and less Pearl Jam but apparently a lot like other bands -- I stopped listening to them altogether.

Freak is -- I think -- the first song on their second album, at least it is the first single from the album. I remember the cd coming with picture postcards of the band that I stuck up in my locker, oblivious to what people thought. The other boys were putting up pictures of playboy models, I was sticking up pictures of boys -- because I liked their music. Alongside pictures of Sarah Michelle Gellar, or Melissa George, or whoever. I wanted so much to have my eyebrow pierced like Daniel Johns, I longed for it and how it would look. In the end I settled for having the cartilage in my ear pierced instead, and didn't get my eyebrow pierced until I was 21. I wish now I had given everyone the finger and pierced my eyebrow, got in trouble at school and with my parents but it would have blown over. I guess we all look back and wish we had behaved a little less well when we were younger. Anyway, back on track I love the sound of this song. The intro is fantastically catchy, the simple guitar riff gets stuck in your head, then the drums kick in for a couple of bars and with almost no warning the song proper starts with the words "No more maybes -- baby's got rabies"; I did say the lyrics were shit. But parts of the song do stand out: "If only I could be as cool as yo/ Body and soul, I'm a freak", that could just have summarised my entire teenage angst. I felt like a freak -- the music I liked, the way I acted, I was an outcast. I remember writing something, somewhere with the words "they drive me out with burning torches, because they know I'm not like them". I felt like a monster from an old black and white movie, living alone on a dark hillside. And maybe it's this kind of feeling that they're alluding to in the song -- but it's also possible the lyrics mean nothing at all.

Just the same, it's a fantastic song -- rocking, and catchy and maybe not as grunge as the first album, but it was no longer in style by then. I never bought the second album -- and never even listened to an album past that. But I can play this song now and remember being 16 and 17, playing pool instead of going to class and feeling like I was a freak. Sometimes that feeling lingers, but I think of 16 year old boys out there now probably feeling the same thing.

Calm a llama down

You may remember last entry, you left your humble narrator wanting to make a concerted effort to say yes to life, and advertising on the internet for a "hot, foreign girl" to be my girlfriend in exchange for English lessons. The final ad actually ran with:

"Wanted: one flirty, foreign female who wants to learn English in exchange for being my hot, foreign girlfriend. And possibly teaching me another language, too.

French, Spanish, Italian; these are all good, but don't be limited. Norwegian would be good, too. And why stop there?

I'm not offering sex in exchange for language tuition; that would just be wrong."

After less than a couple of days waiting, I thought it was working when I got a reply:

"hi there
my name is sangri,and i am from spain and i like your ad very much
im looking for a nice boy, to show me round this big city, as i do get lost.....
can u help me????
i am studying english, but would like some personal attension, please right back"

Something about the reply didn't sit easy with me, I can't tell you what, but I didn't feel it was genuine. I replied, but guardedly. And so far I haven't had anything else from this "Sangri".

Shortly after this, I received another reply:

"hello,,
i read your profile it was so good to me.i feel you are the only one missing in
my entered life so i desided to stop on it and let you know that i am
interested to be a friend first.i also believe that coming to you will be a
probabilty of meeting that very thing thing that has been lacking in my entered
life. please contact me at (s_sarababy@---- ) i am a girl with respect
and responsible,i respect people also and believe if you contact me,i will
giove you a full introduction of my self okay. i hope to hear from you soon.
cares for my future love Sara,,
in addition contect me with the Emil that in side the massega thanks."

Before I had quite worked out what to say in reply to this one, I got another email with exactly the same text but a different address. I then found I could read the email as a reply to just about any ad, anywhere, ever. And have written all three off as spam, which leaves us with a score of: Jay - 0, Spammers - 3

I can't say I understand it, I thought girls from far and wide would be flocking to me following an ad like that. Maybe it was wrong to say I wasn't offering sex? That's probably what it was.

So far, the "yes" decisions I have been making haven't meant a whole lot of change in my. Monday night, Jon asked me if I was going to the pub. I had to get up at 5am the next day, but I said "yes". I wouldn't have missed much either way. Tuesday I worked at a PR event, and so when a colleague offered me a glass of champagne I said "yes". And when a waiter came over and asked me if I wanted another glass of champagne I said "yes", and when a waiter offered to refill my glass...you get the idea. Luckily for me, it stopped at three -- but considering the state some of my colleagues were in by the end of the night, I needn't have worried.

The final yes decision was on Thursday night -- following another invitation to the pub from Jon, and another yes from me -- we saw a girl I used to work with, when I was still bar tender extraordinaire. She's now in some management position in this other pub, and after some polite conversation and I mentioned how I'm looking for work again, she asked me if I would work there. So I said yes, and now I am. I've made clear it's only temporary until either some office work comes along, or a permanent job in PR -- it's not so bad. It beats going back to my old place of work and asking for a job again, and I need the money.

Tuesday was a strange day for me all round. At the media day I got to meet the girl who has effectively taken my place at my old place of work, and again I got the feeling of having been dumped when it seemed everyone was so in love with their new account assistant. I didn't really talk to her or work with her, but I'm sure she's pleasant enough and will do a fine job. And admittedly she is probably better suited to consumer fashion PR than I was -- I am beginning to wonder now if I'm not perhaps a little too cynical for PR, but that's thoughts for another day.

The format for Tuesday was effectively two events in one day -- an afternoon event, with editors and fashion editors from high end publications, a presentation and a q&a session with the big designer. Then it was everyone out, and transform it for the evening -- designed to have more of a party atmosphere, with no presentation or q&a session and with a DJ and celebrity guests.

The thing with celebrities, I find, is when you see them in real life you're not sure if it's really them. Liam Gallagher was the first person to catch my eye, and all I could think of was "Look at him! It's like he's king of the mods!" then quickly the hair, the glasses, the sullen expression all added up. But was it really him? It could have been some loser wannabe -- but then I figured that Nicole Appleton would probably have noticed if it wasn't, since she was with him. Over the course of the evening I saw (saw, rather than met -- I didn't speak to any of them) such dazzling darlings as Natalie Imbruglia, Camilla al-Fayed and Rachel Hunter. I didn't even recognise Rachel Hunter, until someone pointed her out as the incredibly tall blonde. I'd been wondering who she was.

Outside of the glittering world of media events, things are fairly quiet. San and I are on good speaking terms again, she recognises she was being a bitch and is sorry. I try to make a dig about it when I can -- "I've got a job interview today, please don't be mad, it involves going to Camden but I promise I'm not trying to make you jealous", that sort of thing. She deserves it. I talked to her about her relationship with Tim (Tim Nice but Dim), and am feeling a little better about it -- in a moving on sort of way. I talked to her about their proposed holiday together, and still disapprove of how she's funding it, but we remained civil.

Strangely, though, Fiona has seemed quiet lately. It's hard to tell with her, especially since years have passed before with us having next to no contact and still we manage to pick things up again. But just the same, I'm not too sure what's going on.

Say yes more

I keep thinking I need to update more, but then I think I need more things to update about and I hate writing my disjointed "here's everything that's going on" posts.

I've been reading "Yes Man" by Danny Wallace, the book that people are always saying changed their life. In a way, not unlike The Dice Man, but without the rape and the murder and stuff -- it's a lot funnier, a lot more positive, and actually true. He just follows the advice of a wise stranger on a bus who tells him to "say yes more".

Parts of it strike me as slightly dumb -- when he's saying yes to everything it seems like it could get really out of hand. Sometimes you can't walk down the high street without being stopped by several different charity muggers, and who has the money to say yes to them all? Every day? And every time they ring you up and ask for a one-off donation or to increase your payments, you say yes? And that's nothing compared to when he gets emails from Sultans needing his bank details... But there is something positive coming out of it, and taking his lead I am trying to say yes more. I won't say yes indiscriminately, and won't say yes to things I can't afford -- expensive foreign holidays, charity muggers, more credit cards -- but I want to be open to more things.

Speaking of being open to more things, I agreed with Jon to go out on Friday night. I gave some thought to things we could do that didn't involve just going to the pub, because I knew if I said I didn't want to go he'd ask what else there was. So I was prepared, and suggested a few other things -- an indie night in London, or a random night in one town or another locally. All too expensive, he said, and not enough people were out. So it was never going to be anything else. The really funny thing was I had asked San the night before if it was the first Friday of the month that was the club night we liked. She had replied yes, and then decided it was worth having an argument over. Apparently, she thought that by asking her about such things, I was rubbing in her face that I was going out and having fun without her and trying to make her jealous. I didn't bring up our conversation earlier in the week about her confused feelings for my replacement and the fun things they do together.

For a week or more, San's attitude to me has been noticeably shit. Or else she has just been in a bad mood generally. She sent me a message the other day to ask if I thought she shouldn't go on holiday. I replied with something like "What the fuck? You're starting an argument about something we talked about yesterday?" but yeah she was. Then later in the week -- when she responded to a message I sent -- I made a comment like I didn't think she was talking to me. Apparently, this was a bad thing to say because if she didn't think I was talking to her then she would be bothered enough to find out why.

I think I more or less managed to defuse both disagreements, or whatever they were. And continue to try and keep her at a distance -- which is never easy because if she doesn't hear from me then she takes offence and doesn't talk to me, and then if I mention that she's been quiet then I'm bad for not caring enough to ask why. But she's got an interview for some thing teaching English in Japan. I asked her if there's something about this time of year that makes her hate me and want to leave the country, since it was this time two years ago she was a bitch to me, broke up with me, then went to college in Maryland. It wasn't personal at the time, and it probably isn't now, either.

So I'm browsing the usual places like Gumtree and Craigslist looking for volunteer work for some good karma credit ratings, and something to keep me out of trouble here and there if nobody is going to give me any actual, paid work. It's not quite the same as saying Yes more, but it's close. I might volunteer my time for all sorts of things -- teaching a Colombian girl English, in exchange for learning Spanish; or volunteering my services to hospital radio in East London, or doing DIY work for a charity despite having no previous DIY skills at all. Actually, the Colombian girl has got me thinking -- I could try something like "Wanted: hot foreign girl who wants to learn English in exchange for being my hot foreign girlfriend"...

New Birds (Musical Monday #10)

#"...it's very easy to forget -- she's just sitting there in the pub with her new friends and her new life and her new hair, and it's been five years but you'd know just to look at her"#
Arab Strap "New Birds"

I did think of making this a belated Musical Monday post -- a Monday post, made on a Wednesday about events from a Tuesday. It's probably that kind of confusion that has brought down CastPost, since it's not working -- and unfortunately that means you won't get to hear the rambling Scottish indie low-fi genius of this Arab Strap song. I can't say if any of their other songs are rambling low-fi genius as I can't recall any others, and besides they're splitting up.

Anyway, the song is the usual fare -- boy in a pub sees girl he used to go out with years before, and can't stop thinking about kissing her, but when she invites him back to her place he remembers his girl at home and he says "there might be a slight regret and you might wonder what you missed but you have to remember the kiss you worked so hard on -- and you'll know you've done the right thing".

The thing with the song, though, is that it seems so sad. I think he misses the girl, maybe he still loves her and it's jarring to see her in the pub with her new friends and her new hair. Even though he is clearly very much in love with his own bird at home -- he does the right thing, after all -- the sadness in the music and his tone of voice is palpable.

And the music itself, it's a very low-key low-fi affair, although building to a suitably understated indie crescendo. I'll link to it here, if I'm ever again able.

I mention here the other day -- in my slightly cathartic and uncensored post about the fucked up things I do to myself -- that Fiona wanted to meet. She's been mentioning it for months, and when I couldn't see her Monday I suggested Tuesday. She accepted. So on a cold and dark Tuesday night in south west London -- after three years, I met Fiona off a train and we went to the pub.

It's been three years, and you'd know it to look at her -- she's just sitting there in the pub with her new friends and her new life and her new hair, and she's sitting next to you, showing you on her camera phone pictures of her flat. Alongside pictures of her friends in wigs, and lots of pictures of her boyfriend that he's taken of himself. He's not vain, she says, he's just amused at the sight of himself.

I forget most of what we talked about -- the usual unimportant stuff, but occasionally we'd talk about us. Talk about our relationship as it once was, or rather not the time we spent together but more about how it all fell apart when I went away. I broke her heart, and I never wanted to. She tells me cried for months, but I remember her seeing someone else by February -- probably just to make me jealous. We didn't know what the other was thinking at the time, and I didn't want to hold her back. Didn't want to hold myself back, just wanted us to be free and grow and then live happily ever after a little bit down the line. Except that, her current boyfriend aside, her relationships since have been typically shit.

Boyfriends with bordering-on-psychotic jealousy, boyfriends who really were pyschotic, had the nickname "psycho-" but she was still surprised when he turned out to be a psycho, the boyfriend that was a dick and cheated on her for months. I can't help but maybe feel a little responsible. But I also remember only too well the time I told her I still loved her and it was a huge drama -- even if she later on at the time did admit that she still loved me, too. And she only chose the other boy over me because he lived locally and I didn't.

There have been times where I've asserted I fall too easily -- a pretty girl who's nice to me and I'm already starting to fall, if she's funny and cool then I don't stand a chance. So I would tell myself it's not her, specifically, any more than I was in love with her the day we met. Any feelings stirred up aren't about her, they're probably more to do with me and my ridiculous obsession with love. I remember now her eyes, her hazel eyes being one of the first things I ever noticed about her, how the greens sparkled in the sunlight. But last night as we talked and I looked her in the eyes, in the light of the pub they seemed only brown. Pretty, but not sparkling.

#"You remember the way she swung her arms when she held your hand but you can't remember how she kissed and now you've got the chance to find out."#

We drank and talked and passed the time until it was time for us to brave the night air and catch our trains. I got off the tube at the same stop as her, even though I had to go one more further along -- just so I could say goodbye to her properly. I hugged her hard and close to me, wrapped my arms around her and just hugged her. I kissed the side of her head and said goodbye, and that was it. She left, I got the next tube and went home. I sent her a message when I got home, to say goodnight and let her know I was safe -- but I didn't get a reply. She said today she was probably already asleep.

Arab Strap- New Birds