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» TMO Talk » The Library » I can't believe, today was a good day. (Page 1)

 
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Author Topic: I can't believe, today was a good day.
kovacs

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Dag it's hard sometimes isn't it? Life barnacles you with the small stuff, clagging you, weighting so it's hard just to keep on walking, keep your head up; hard just to get by. And every day on this board we hear about some of the shit that hits the 21st century media elite in so-called civilised modern Britain... boyfriend fucking with an ex, burglars fucking with your underwear. Just the small stuff can drag you down if enough of it pounds you at once. Minidisc breaks, coffee soaks your trousers, train pulls out just as you're running in, boss dresses you down, rain soaks you through...that's enough to get the whole day screwed.

So when you get a run of things that give you pleasure, especially if they're unexpected or free, you feel like Santa's dropped a gift in your lap and might take it back any minute, realising it was for the next kid. But nice things do happen: nice things you do when you make time for yourself, nice things you discover unexpectedly, nice things you allow yourself as a rare treat for the central human being in your life, nice things people do for you -- whether startlingly generous gestures from those you know or small but cheering acts of kindness from strangers -- and nice things you do for others, earning the secondary warmth and light that spills off from their gratitude.

I bet some good things, one good thing, happened to you today. Okay, so make it this week if you must. Please let's cherish the little cheering pleasures of our lives. If you have the time and energy, make the way you tell us about it into a kind of gift for the board, too, a packet of prose that might itself, in turn, give pleasure.


I'm volunteering this thread because Monday 20th to Wednesday 22nd September 2004 have become such a near-unbroken run of modest successes and small but surprising pleasures that I'm now waiting for something to go badly kaput and make me remember these three days with bitter nostalgia. My little bursts of contentment are no big deal in themselves, just odd stuff that didn't go wrong, or went more right than I'd anticipated; but they seem to add up to what I'd call a base-level happiness, and maybe most of the time that's the best we can expect.


Thinking about my list, I realise it tells me something about myself, about my conception of happiness... and also about my response to it, my suspicion of happiness -- my related tendency to be dissatisfied as a general state, as though that signifies ambition or drive, or aspiration. Maybe your list will tell you interesting things also.


Prelude: After lunch in my office I had a three and a half hour break before I needed to be back at work for a 4pm meeting. I'd anticipated this as a nuisance but actually it became a very-mini-vacation, given more relish by the vague naughtiness of doing it all during official hours.

Pleasures:

1. The "Very Important Products" range in Habitat, transforming the store's entrance hall into an odd but endearing gallery-shop. Odd because the displays aren't of anything especially valuable or even beautiful; the 4 champagne glasses with blown bubbles in the base are designed by an Olympic diver, which seems as perverse as asking a glass-designer to try an Olympic dive but does give the exhibition its touchingly amateurish quality. Lennox Lewis provides an alarm clock like something from the Innovations catalogue. A 1990s supermodel -- Linda Evangelista perhaps -- has contributed a quite supremely stupid lamp made of a bendy hose with a flower on the end; it looks like something from Marianne Dreams / Paperhouse, a schoolgirl's drawing brought to ugly life. The whole set-up is unsure whether it's an everyday shop display or a modern museum, caught between accessibility and chest-out ego. The plinths are grubby; the objets d'art have affordable prices beside them. The artists' names and sternly serious portraits look slightly absurd next to their work, either tossing off the totally banal (Ewan McGregor, a director's chair) or labouring over something that gives a sweet insight into their own home lives, their own priorities and bugbears (You imagine Lennox Lewis poking his tongue out as he draws the ruled lines on his alarm clock, adding all the wish-fulfillment detail. "important to get up on time," he mutters, shading in the black digits. "a man's gotta be punctual.") Only a couple of the invited guests are designers -- Blahnik with his? (her? funny how the name resonates without you even knowing the gender) dildo-shoehorn, Paul Smith to follow in the next wave with a snazzy coathanger. The others, a C-list party of almost hilariously-inappropriate names, are chosen only because of their fame in other fields, and you feel that could backfire. Sharlene Spiteri's CD rack, for instance, is one of the most obviously practical, well-designed items, yet would you want to own anything by the woman who sang "Say What You Want" while Chris Evans hamster-grinned? Would it be any kind of cachet to own glasses inspired by a diver, and why would you spend £25 on them when you could surely buy more attractive items, designed by designers, for the same price? And yet. You have an urge to buy something from this range... not because of the celebs but because you like the basic idea. Examining the feeling, it's partly the desire for a souvenir from a minor cultural event, a record of this interesting experiment, this charming little landmark in Britain's 2004 retail culture. And partly sympathy, the way you'd feel inclined to buy something from a local arts exhibition. Curiously, but typical of the almost dreamlike incongruity, you find yourself gravitating to Sterling Moss's black leather letter-trays. Not quite convinced, you leave without souvenir.

2. L’Occitane: if the Body Shop was a sixth form college, this would perhaps be an evening class MA, unless you’re merely falling for a con of luxuriously-coarse cardboard packages (the rough finish of expensive dollar bills, of raw wood… the curious prestige of things unfinished, natural, plain, in contrast to what now seems the vulgarity of smooth, processed neatness), French sales assistants (or rather one assistant, assistante, at the back of a store small as a private room, giving a sense of personal ownership, bonjour monsieur!), prices that allow them to treat you to a little extra, a bonus vial of fragrance slipped into your bag as though it was a personal gift even though you just spent £24 on a bottle of cologne and shouldn’t be grateful for tiny freebies. You bought a shower gel, there must be a posher and more pleasing French term for it, from this store last week and have returned to splash out more on the next bottle in the range. The L’Occitane mystique – the sad truth is that this is probably just a slightly upmarket chain, like Monsoon, but still you are buying into their corporate mythos like a happy sucker, and hell if it makes you happy – includes stories of how the fragrance got its name, which typically you lap up as though it was history or Madame Bovary. Yet the real truth is that you entered this shop last week, having passed it on the way to work countless times, because your dad’s bathroom was decorated with L’Occitane products when you visited the previous weekend. You are endeavouring, on a level you can’t even pretend is semi-conscious, to smell like your dad… or more elegantly put, to inhabit this specific aspect of his, in your eyes, success and stability. It should be an embarrassing revelation that you are becoming like your parent. This feels, instead, like putting a deposit on a bigger house… like preparing to move “up”, into something more bourgeois but nevertheless rather comfortable and pleasing.


3. You detour down to Piccadilly, on a mission you didn’t manage last Saturday because of the Swiss Re… to try the set-up they have at their Waterstones, with four perfumes supposedly fitting four specific novels. Your motivation here is the same as with Habitat; a desire to participate in something that seems at least mildly brave and interesting, a worthy experiment by a retail chain. The literature they provide – the leaflet that is, not the novels – has the same satisfying cachet as L’Occitane’s cologne boxes. “Naso e Parnaso… Italian perfumier Laura Tonatto… explores the relationship between literature and our sense of smell.” The fragrances lurk, pinkish paste, at the base of fat glass test-tubes on backlit displays, one on each floor. A strange combination of feeling cultured and ridiculous, the juxtaposition of literary criticism and bending over to smell almost as if gakking a white line or snorting a Vick’s inhaler. Ah yes, of course, Proust, wonderful.. how could we…yes, the madeleine…immortal prose… and then the mucousy <HAAARK> of physical connection with scent, so much cruder than the communion with text on a page. And yet…somehow the fragrances do escape the connotations of their most obvious parallels, the scratch-and-sniff book, the Boots counter, the impregnated strip at the edge of a magazine ad. They’re unusual, of course – “tobacco and verbena” for (ah! but yes of course…) Madame Bovary, “burnt juniper” for a novel by Gabriele D’Annunzio – and also delicate, surprising in their combination of flavours, unlike anything pre-packaged… convincing you of the leaflet-story about Tonatto’s expertise in recreating the scents of “the 1st century BC from museum archives”.

4. Feeling worthy after the trip, which after all was connected with literary history and appreciation, you read more hardcopy from the LRB on the tube back to work. The hunk of free printout is satisfying – again, worthily educational in its way compared to reading an abandoned tabloid or the Metro cartoons, but also chewily good, a textual Snickers bar. Having an A4, no-frills version for free is even more rewarding than having to wrangle daintily with the real thing, a double-size, pastel-watercoloured newspaper without spine-staples – and this printout is customized, its contents a run of James Wood, Frank Kermode, Terry Eagleton, Dog in the Night-Time, War Against Cliché, Autograph Man... just the meat, no filler. At the other end of the tube you overcome a silly shyness and visit Knickerbox, where two French-African women coo, gently-tease and compliment you. It’s her birthday? No? Oh you’re a nice man. And you know her size? What a gentleman isn’t he…she will be the happiest woman in London. Maybe in South London, you counter modestly, proud of keeping up the right tone and banter even if you do sound like a second-hand Hugh Grant. The real objective, when buying underwear for girls, is simply not to blush – and though you succeed, you’re surprised to realise how much you’re sweating.

5. Returning to work with a Pret mocha as reward…the act of carrying a shopping bag in one hand and sucky-top cup in the other makes you feel, as always, like Sarah-Jessica Parker. When this kind of take-out coffee was new, you used to love the illusion of cosmopolitan swinginess, the zooty purpose it gave you to stride down the street with a latte-to-go. Funny how that appeal hasn’t entirely died. This, you realise and cherish momentarily, is the kind of scene you imagined yourself in if you thought of your future career: neat dark suit flashing glossy lining as it flaps open, breezy bags, go-go coffee… zipping back to work for a “meeting”, vaguely imagined. The George Orwell paperback and LRB printout in the bag, the pretentious cologne and the pink underwear are just bonus points. And reaching work, as usual a few smiles and nods, shouts across a courtyard, the exchange of what you can at least fool yourself are genuinely-friendly banalities… I’m just off to see your boss… yes, have fun then, see you at the Greyhound tomorrow, yeah?… the sense of a collegial context, the reminder that for all your nagging conscience background-nudging that you should get out of this little place, you actually like going to work, and like everyone you work with. As if to punctuate the point, one of the guys from your corridor has left a bamboo plant on your desk as a present.. At times like this, almost saturated with gratitude for the good things that have come your way in such a short few hours, you wonder why you’re so driven by dissatisfaction…why you always have this motivating notion to move on, to look elsewhere, to feel unhappy with your lot, to pick holes in what you’ve got.

I have posted enough that belongs on a personal journal! Your turn; or, what the hey, thanks for your indulgence anyway.

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member #28

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kovacs

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Unfortunately I had another "moment of pleasure" (K. Bush) that happened an hour later and can't fit into what now seems a neat story-arc with a sense of closure... but for accuracy and the sake of completeness, I should add I finished my working day by stopping at Wendell's Deli under the London Bridge arches. Again, somewhere I've walked by countless times and always half-planned to stop at until it became a humble fantasy: one day I won't be rushing for the 16.55 and I'll buy a big chunk of sausage there, paper-wrapped and stuck with a label.

Today, my successes making me feel like I was lightly-charmed, a character in a romcom or sitcom where nothing really bad (only amusing frustrations) can happen, I ducked across the commuter stream and bought, indeed, a big chunk of chorizo which the man allowed me to taste first, and as a final gesture of thanks and acknowledgement to the day's pleasures, some chocolate halva.

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member #28

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discodamage
Again with the bagels ?
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i was going to write about the habitat stuff range but you did it with much more elegant befuddlement than i could have managed.

the only nice thing that has happened to me today was walking across blackheath and enjoying the noise that a flock of starlings (maybe, i dont know) made as they took off. it was like a sort of...fizz of wings. oh, and also, i laughed out loud on the tube, a rare but guaranteed pleasure; if anyone has today's/ yesterday's standard i highly recommend they dig it out and quietly enjoy the resemblance between michael crawford in his woman in white fat suit and tom jones' equally terrifying botox bellow on the page that follows it. if you turn swiftly from one page to the next, flick-book style, the effect is quite disarming.

i also heard someone say this on the tube, which gave me a whole-body shiver of quite grimly pleasurable hatred:

i mean, i know maybe six or seven very intelligent 24-year olds, and not one of them is earning more than £25k- its crazy.

only in london.

other than that, its been a... funny day. not funny ha-ha.

[ 22.09.2004, 18:41: Message edited by: discodamage ]

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EXETER- movement of Jah people.

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kovacs

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thanks for keeping me company on this thread Disco! you remind me of something else not good, but striking:

in the entrance of Waterstones Piccadilly, a well-groomed thirtysomething woman plugged one ear with her fingers, holding her phone to the other, and snapped, with a threat of tears in her voice, "no, the hurricane is not an excuse."

this is like how them angels talked in Wings of Desire! more good things that made you happy please everyone!

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sabian

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I'm not eloquent or very good with words even... So, I won't try to make this any literary achievement.

Good thing that happened today: I was informed that I am nearly guaranteed a position in the first week of Nov to start a teaching course. Basically, I'll be getting qualified to teach people stuff that I know... Instead of posting my knowledge base on these forii for you freeloaders!

Me, in charge of others' educations! AHAHAHA! Fools!

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Evil isn't what you've done, it's feeling bad about it afterwards... Yield to temptation. It may not pass your way again.

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discodamage
Again with the bagels ?
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that is ace, sabian. well done.

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EXETER- movement of Jah people.

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Vogon Poetess

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Yeah, well done Sabian, I think you would make a very good teacher: amiable, approachable and patient with the tech'tards.

Only one interesting thing has happened to me so far this week. One of the technicians took me over to the new machining workshop. It was like every scary factory scene in every Bond and SF film; incredibly sinister claws moving jerkily but really fast, changing angles and switchiing between blades and drills and then suddenly stopping. "Oh, these are the new computerised ones," the technician said proudly. They let computers run massive, tooled up machines! I bet the machines secretly manufacture robots at night.

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What I object to is the colour of some of these wheelie bins and where they are left, in some areas outside all week in the front garden.

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MiscellaneousFiles

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Nice work, Sabian. Not only do you get to feel superior to the group of rets you'll undoubtedly be put in charge of, you also get paid for it. It'd be like real life TMO for £££s!!!
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MiscellaneousFiles

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Oooh! I just noticed Kovacs's post!
Does anyone else think he should have a blog?

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kovacs

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You should think about whether something nice and good has happened to you this week, Misc, and share it to cheer us.

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member #28

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Bailey

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Good things of the past week

Being given a minidisc player by a near-stranger
A friend sending me the cutest pair of knickers in the post (long story)
Watching Super-Size Me and deciding to change my diet.
Seeing friends I don't see enough of.

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Maybe you're the mugs.

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Lucid
It's six o'clock somewhere,
I'm having crisps !
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quote:
Originally posted by discodamage:
i was going to write about the habitat stuff range but you did it with much more elegant befuddlement than i could have managed.

the only nice thing that has happened to me today was walking across blackheath and enjoying the noise that a flock of starlings (maybe, i dont know) made as they took off.

That's a murmuration of starlings godamit.

I found out that the collective noun for giraffes is a tower.

I also did a
liver flush at the weekend, this yielded 25 small stones, the largest about the size of my little finger nail, which was nice.

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It don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing...

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dang65
it's all the rage
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I guess the nice thing for me over the last few days was the release of The Music's new album. This has been a slow drip pleasure of course, as tracks leaked and singles were released and radio sessions were broadcast over a period of a couple of months. Then the whole album, some tracks still unheard, arrived on Monday. And it's crap. But wait. It's a grower. It's a volume 11 album, turn it up and it comes to life, listen a few times and you're singing along, a few more and it's stuck in your head. And the live versions are better and I'm going to see them next week in Blackburn.

Other good thing is that our 4-year-old has settled in to school with complete ease, which we really didn't think would happen in his case as he's a sensitive little soul, and our 2-year-old has settled in to nursery with complete ease, which we completely expected as he's a precocious little fucker. In fact, he was only supposed to go for a couple of morning sessions but we've had to book him in for more just to shut him up.

This thread is definitely blog-land isn't it.

Oh, and I've got completely and totally soaking drenched three mornings in a row cycling in to work. This is actually very unusual as the rain tends to suddenly stop at 08:00 as a rule. Anyway, I don't give a fuck if I get wet because us cyclists are well hard. *blows nose loudly*

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MiscellaneousFiles

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quote:
Originally posted by kovacs:
You should think about whether something nice and good has happened to you this week, Misc, and share it to cheer us.

Well my apartment's electrical system gave up the ghost on Tuesday, but luckily it wasn't my fault. Local disruptions caused the problems and thanks to Southern Electric they were fixed the same evening. Sadly, one of my PCs suffered a wicked fate. It will no longer boot - no lights, nothing. So I'm hoping that I'll only need to replace the power supply.

Despite this setback, I'm still feeling rather cheerful, because last Sunday my band started sounding like a proper band for the first time. We got together for four hours, and played louder than we ever had before. But it wasn't just the volume - after tuning up, I didn't feel like I was in control of my hands. I wasn't thinking about the next chord, the strum pattern, the (oh so deliberately ostentatious) stage moves - everything just happened. I don't remember selling my soul to anyone with a beard recently, but this was unnatural!

After running though our short set-list, we penned a new song. We took it from the starting point of a single bass riff to a complete track with drums, bass, rhythm and lead guitar and a great set of lyrics. The whole process took just over an hour. My ears didn't stop ringing until Tuesday night.

TMO GigMeat: Date to be announced...

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kovacs

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quote:
Originally posted by dang65:
This thread is definitely blog-land isn't it.

I don't think this is a fair criticism. I have a livejournal account, but should that mean I don't post anything lengthy and personal on here too? The point of my thread wasn't the sparkly-gush of "I've got a lovely new pair of shoes" for 1000 words, <afterthought> have any of you got shoes too, but to invite a sharing of the little nice things that emergy [ETA -- typo: emerge plus energy! ]from everyday life, because there has been a fair bit of gloomy personal news on here recently.

If I confined my mini-essay above to livejournal, firstly a lot of people here whom I like and respect would never read it, and secondly none of you would ever contribute the little, cheering things that might have happened to you this week.

If anything indulgent and diary-like got the response "take it to your blog", we wouldn't have had much of a board for the past 4 years.

[ 23.09.2004, 05:51: Message edited by: kovacs ]

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Abby
Slave Girl of Gor
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I am both repulsed and attracted to LIVER FLUSH!

How do you feel? Is your skin glowing? Do you have the urge to rollerblade everywhere?

Tell more!

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dang65
it's all the rage
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quote:
Originally posted by kovacs:
quote:
Originally posted by dang65:
This thread is definitely blog-land isn't it.

I don't think this is a fair criticism.
Not a criticism guv, just agreeing with previous observations and commenting on my own post which was about my kids starting school/nursery which even my own family don't want to hear about. Classic blog material.
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kovacs

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I meant really that I felt Misc wasn't fair to criticise, as you had contributed, Dang -- but as Misc then came up with a lengthy post, I retract any blame.

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member #28

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MiscellaneousFiles

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Oh Kovacs. I was merely saying that it read more like a blog entry than a thread. I didn't necessarily mean it in a bad way, nor did I say that you shouldn't have posted it. If anything I was encouraging you to blog - thereby allowing others to read about your always entertaining outlook on life.

Dang on the other hand was just being mean. I always thought he had something against you, but he's probably just jealous of your success and lifestyle.

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Thorn Davis

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Fucking wank! Wrong fred.

[ 23.09.2004, 05:54: Message edited by: Thorn Davis ]

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MiscellaneousFiles

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quote:
Originally posted by Thorn Davis:
Fucking wank! Wrong fred.

By the sounds of it, you're looking for *this thread, Thorn.
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turbo
Gold.....
What is it good for? You can't eat it, you can't smoke it, yet everybody wants it.
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This week is my first back at work after a great holiday, so by all intents and purposes it should be a crap week. However, I feel really refreshed and relaxed and even getting a speeding fine this morning didn't put a damper on things. We took my parents out for dinner on Monday night to thank them for lending us their car and they were so thrilled that both phoned me the next day to say thanks and how lovely the evening was. That made me feel really good. Also, my best friend called me from Singapore (where she is living at the mo) and we had a lovely long chat. It made me realise that true friends are friends wherever they are in the world. That also made me feel really good. I'm just feeling really positive and cheerful, so this is a good week.

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Forgive your enemies, but never forget their names.

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Astromariner
Going the right way for a smacked bottom
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My bank loan came through on Tuesday. I wanted to take a picture of the figure on the ATM screen so that I could frame it and put it on my desk. That evening, I logged on to amazon.co.uk and spent over one hundred pounds on books that people have recommended to each other on TMO and I've never read. A big fat parcel containing the assorted works of Hari Kunzru, Douglas Coupland, David Lodge, Paul Auster, Chuck Palahniuk, Graham Greene, Zoe Heller, William Boyd, WBC Pierre, and Lauren Slater is being speeded to my house as I type! This is very exciting.
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Bailey

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I love Astro. [Smile]

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Maybe you're the mugs.

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Astromariner
Going the right way for a smacked bottom
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:glow:
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Vogon Poetess

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One of the researchers who I sent off to the King's Cross district of Brussels has brought me back some Belgian chocolate! With a ribbon round it and everything. This makes up for taking a bite of weetabix saturated with sour milk this morning; despite the bottle clearly proclaiming 23 Sep as the use-by date.

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What I object to is the colour of some of these wheelie bins and where they are left, in some areas outside all week in the front garden.

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Lucid
It's six o'clock somewhere,
I'm having crisps !
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quote:
Originally posted by Abby:
I am both repulsed and attracted to LIVER FLUSH!

How do you feel? Is your skin glowing? Do you have the urge to rollerblade everywhere?

Tell more!

I reckon it needs all the help it can get, poor neglected squishy thing that it is. It was quite extraordinary - I could feel them moving like a tiny mouse under a duvet. The colander has never recovered. At the mo - the jury is out. I did feel good but I think my liver is filling in the spaces the stones occupied at the mo.. which is a recouperating jobbie. Can't be good for you though, having stones in your liver, can it?

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It don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing...

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MiscellaneousFiles

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On Sunday I'll be playing through Radiohead's old P.A. system.

[Cool]

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ben

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quote:
Originally posted by Bailey:
A friend sending me the cutest pair of knickers in the post (long story)

This was supposed to be our secret. [Mad]

Good things
Though I'm getting a little bit tired and wired now, (I was back in the capital both Monday and today) I had a great time in London last weekend and this weekend D and I are in Barcelona.

Perversely enough, I'm also quite enjoying work at the moment: good coverage in the nationals for some of my stories and some even better stuff just on the horizon. Not a lot of appreciation from my superiors but them's the breaks, I suppose.

Saw Shaun of the Dead, which was enjoyable and Something's Gotta Give which was excerable. Moral: never allow a pregnant woman to make a choice in a video shop.

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ben

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Sorry - that was a really bland post. [Frown]
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philomel
writes bad poetry on walls
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I am actually in the worst fucking mood I've been in for months due to a combination of sleep-lack, first flush of virus, overwhelming work stress (hark! procrastination!) and the onset of my first PMT for three months. TMI? Undoubtedly.

But! Good things have happened recently. Little bursts of happiness sparking through the red mist perpetually hazing my vision this week.

This morning, up early through inability to doze, squinting against the bright fresh light spilling down my street. I was almost at the corner of the road when my friend pointed out a squirrel on a fence, mouth hanging open and stuffed with nut. It regarded us, beady-eyed and bushy tailed (more so than any fluffy bunny), perched a mere metre from my head. It was brindled grey and brown, so close you could see the individual hairs as they shaded in tone, the faint pulse of the heart beating aginst the ribs, the dark drool staining the fur round its mouth. Its eyes were black. It leapt down, closer, body arching in an S as it moved, tiny paws clutching for grip. This pleased me, inordinately. Since my dramatic vermin rescue mission, I tend to regard the rodent population of my street with an almost maternal pride. I could have saved its life. Oddly, there's often a squirrel at the same place at the same time in the morning, sometimes scurrying across the road, sometimes scampering up the fence, claws scritching against the wood. It's part of a morning routine that I find quite pleasing. Breaks up the monotony of befuddled stride along Holloway Road and spiral down the stairs to an overpacked tube breathing stale air and other people's sweat.

Other pleasure: discovering when I got to my desk that I had four left over pyramids of toblerone softly melting next to my monitor. I bit the top off and let the base chocolate dissolve on my tongue and into and coating my tastebuds. Chewing the nougat nuggets that make my spit taste of honey.

Last night people-watching at Curzon Soho with my father who smoked Marlboro Reds and discussed the potential ban. Inhaling second-hand smoke in the almost-smug knowledge that I can practically classify myself as a non-smoker again, after a nine month interlude of happy puffing at soggy roll-ups and Marlboro Lights. Someone in a club told me that I was a 'fantastic smoker' as I spilled cigarettes from my too-small purse and lit up from tealights in fat glass pots. I gave up the next day as ash and the smell of smoke on my fingers spiralled my hangover into epic proportions. Anyway, back to Shaftesbury Avenue. Cinema in general makes me happy, even awful films. The drama of slouching into deep, cushioned seats surrounded by strangers, squirming through the adverts and scanning the trailers for potential. And films on the big screen, all-encompassing in a way that even the largest TVs can't begin to match. O yes, Code 46, which I hadn't read about and proved to be good: another happy moment. I'm beginning to prefer to go to see films with no sense of what happens, as it prevents crushed expectations and allows opportunity for pleasant surprises.

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the more brilliant her smile, the closer she always seemed to disaster

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ben

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quote:
Originally posted by philomel:
This morning, up early through inability to doze, squinting against the bright fresh light spilling down my street. I was almost at the corner of the road when my friend pointed out a squirrel on a fence, mouth hanging open and stuffed with nut. It regarded us, beady-eyed and bushy tailed (more so than any fluffy bunny), perched a mere metre from my head. It was brindled grey and brown, so close you could see the individual hairs as they shaded in tone, the faint pulse of the heart beating aginst the ribs, the dark drool staining the fur round its mouth. Its eyes were black. It leapt down, closer, body arching in an S as it moved, tiny paws clutching for grip. This pleased me, inordinately. Since my dramatic vermin rescue mission, I tend to regard the rodent population of my street with an almost maternal pride. I could have saved its life. Oddly, there's often a squirrel at the same place at the same time in the morning, sometimes scurrying across the road, sometimes scampering up the fence, claws scritching against the wood. It's part of a morning routine that I find quite pleasing.

There is a famous Edwardian print entitled "Philomel & The Squirrel" which used to adorn the walls of the parlours of well-to-do families throughout the land. It was a best-seller in the two or three years leading to the Great War. Virginia Woolf describes it as "the very latest thing in Kitsch ... utterly horrid" in an early draft of The Voyage Out. It depicts a rosy-cheeked young girl extending a hand (the other is in a fox fur muff) to a squirrel clinging to the end of a branch, its nose twitching with curiosity. The girl is wrapped in a long scarf and an expensive-looking charcoal dufflecoat. Woolf continues: "Decca sensed she was becoming more and more furious as she studied the print. What stupid or vulgar impulse had stirred in Helen's breast to make her bring such a thing into the house? Something about the child's vacant expression incensed her beyond reason ... After tea, [she] ordered the maid to take it into the yard and burn it."
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squirrelandgman
"well thats fucking funny"
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This cheered me up no end yesterday. It is a 30 minute 40mb mix by some geezer called poj.
It is the typical 30 seconds of many songs type affair but unlike many it works really well.
There are moments that had me proper grinning on the way up to Liverpool St.
Tracklist is...
Vivaldi - Summer, Presto [from the 4 seasons]
Ty - do you want more?
Missy - Get your Freak on
The 45 king - 900 Number
Cypress Hill - Insane in the Membrane
Pete Rock and CL smooth - Its like that
Daft Punk - harder, better, faster, stronger
AC/DC - Back in Black
Pepe Deluxe - Salami Fever
Grandmaster flash - The Message
The Mohawks - The Champ
Whodini - Five minutes of Funk
Dusty Springfield - Spooky
Tweet - Oops [oh my]
Queens of the Stone Age - The lost art of keeping a secret
Walter Murphy - Fifth of Beethoven
RJd2 - Ghostwriter
Kriss Kross - Jump
Million Dan - Dogz and Sledgez
Fatback Band - Fatbackin'
Beyonce - Work it Out
Black Crows - Hard to Handle
NWA - Straight Outta Compton
Michael Jackson - Billie Jean
Erick b and Rakim - I know you got soul
Spanky Wilson - Sunshine of your love
NERD - She Wants to Move
Beastie Boys - Triple Trouble
? - Intergalactic Wheels of Steel
Man Parish - Boogie Down Bronx
Prodigy - Girls
Audio Bullies - Face in a Cloud
Kelis - Trick me

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philomel
writes bad poetry on walls
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the more brilliant her smile, the closer she always seemed to disaster

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Sidney
Her Glorious Reneging Brumness
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Well, FWIW, I thoroughly enjoyed Kovacs' thread opener, elegantly eloquent as it is.

Anyway. I had to travel up to York yesterday for a meeting. I wasn't looking forward to it - a three and a half hour journey to talk about project management and construction timetables and tender returns blah blah boring blah. However, the people I met with were infused with such positive commitment and eagerness that I immediately felt buoyant. The project seemed to come to life on paper as we talked about all the good that it would do and the things that it would achieve and how much it meant to local people. I was impressed by how well prepared and knowledgeable these people were and by their belief in what they were doing. As the meeting went on, it became apparent that they actually appreciated me taking the time to travel to York to see them and that they had benefited from what I had to say. They also arranged lunch for me, which was thoughtful and kind. I came away from the meeting not griping to myself about the long journey as I had been on the way there but feeling a vague sense of fulfillment and happiness. Dare I say it, is this what people refer to as job satisfaction??

I have a similar meeting in Bradford next month, where my contact has offered to take me for an authentic Bradford curry. I am looking forward to this.

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They give you a pen as fat as a modest cock and you're expected to dab it on the page, as though you were mopping the dregs of an afternoon Tommy.

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