Monthly Archives: May 2009

Drowning Girl
1963
Roy Lichtenstein

Hehheh… moths and Statham, eh? No chance…

I’ve spent most of my weekend feeling glum; when i’ve been out and about I know that I have a stony expression on my face and I feel nothing yet at the same time like I could quite easily burst into tears if the wind blew in a different direction.

Everything’s pent up, caught in my throat, and in between periods of staring into space thinking about my lot, I think of the skin on my arms.

I’m going through one of those phases where I feel unhappy with the whole MW#1 “thing”; these happen every so often separate from anything particularly bastardly he might have done, I guess I just get fed up.

I generally rail against conformity and normalcy but when it comes to relationships it would be nice to conform, if conforming means having someone in my life to love who loves me. Then I would be able to communicate my needs rather than bottling it all in my head, ask for things without feeling needy.

“Can I have a hug please?” or, “I want to wake up with you” – Simple statements that are not asking for very much. I am utterly unable to say such things; it is better to be quiet and sort of die inside, muttering “I wish he’d hold me!” over and over in my head as I do so.

Talking of same old same old… Ugh, I must try harder to write about other things! You know, things of importance, like uh, moths and Jason Statham? I am going to have an extra long hot shower today and try not to hum this song from South Pacific as I do so… (her reaction at the end is priceless)

BTW it is supposed to freeze at points as the original vocals are missing. Lost Vocals has an interesting selection of undubbed actors and actresses singing – It is a particular shame that Ava Gardener was overdubbed…

This evening in an attempt to help myself feel a bit less blue I ate ice cream for the first time in three months and watched Last Chance Harvey, which I had read had good reviews and I thought I would be in the mood for being a bittersweet tale of romance. Alas, post-viewing there was no improvement in my feelings, on the contrary- At least before I was just feeling a bit glum, but by the end of the film I was having to mop the snot up as I wept at how sad it all was.

It’s supposed to be sad, but the ending is supposed to be hopeful. It is I know, but I was crying so much that this kind of didn’t help me very much. Dustin Hoffman and Emma Thompson were excellent and I particularly enjoyed Thompson’s performance. The scene where she has been sidelined by her date and retreats into the toilets to try and suck it up was depressingly familiar.

Today’s general sadness was brought on by (of course!) thinking too much, this time about the unfulfilled life I lead when it comes to personal relationships and intimacy. It is hard and incredibly frustrating to want to do so much with and for someone but to be prevented from doing so by my own reticence and the lack of a supportive, amenable partner.

How ridiculously sad and hateful towards myself I feel when I think about inviting him out for dinner. This is ridiculous because why on earth should I hate myself for asking if someone would like to go out to eat? I irrationally feel that way because I recognise how insignificant I am to him and I know how much he means to me. Sigh.

It hurts, and when it hurts I think of the skin on my forearms and cutting to punish myself for thinking such ridiculous thoughts; I then remember that I haven’t done so for years and I shouldn’t, so I don’t reach for the scalpel blade and just keep on feeling glum.

When I met up with my Mum in Lahndahn tahn the other day as we are wont to do we talked about MW#1; I talked about his recent surgery and how I had found it very difficult and had a sort of minor meltdown over it and how there seems at times to be a bit more intimacy to things but it is basically same old same old.

My Mum is always terribly sympathetic and kind, I think perhaps due to her good nature and the fact that she has to put up with my Dad. I always feel that when MW#1 moves away for a job or settles for someone not me the whole world will be laughing at me- “Stupid Monky. You didn’t actually waste all those years of your life on him did you? You didn’t think he would actually be with you? IDIOT. LOSER.”

Of course although the LOSER label hovers over me I continue to live up to it and keep caring for someone who never quite comes through on anything. I keep longing to curl up with this same person and ye gods actually want to spend time with him. Oh brain, what is wrong with you… :/

I think that as time is passing I am becoming more sentimental in my reactions to things that would not have done so before. Now, maybe this is because I am becoming more mushy as I age or maybe it’s down to too little sleep or near continual non-relationship angst; maybe i’m just feeling things more, or perhaps I express emotional pain better?

I would have thought that as I clocked up the years I would have become inured to certain things, not go backwards and be affected where I wasn’t before. Case in point: The series on the South Pacific that’s on television at the moment. Beautiful blue seas, amazing animals and fascinating tales of human migration. Included in the amazing animals category is the Tiger shark, a rather large beast that is famed for eating pretty much anything going.

ARKive – Tiger Shark
Bill Curtsinger – Tiger Shark Story

These Tiger sharks congregate for two weeks each year off the shores of a small Hawaiian island where fledgling Albatross offspring are attempting to make their maiden flights. These birds have a large wingspan and the area available for them to practice flying is not sufficient so more often than not they end up splashing down into the shallows just off the beach. In the water are the sharks. You can guess the rest.

When I watched the feathery feeding time in the past I would think of how it was nature just doing what it does and would not become upset in any way. Now I watch it and shed tears for the Albatrosses, inwardly cringing when I see a webbed foot right on the edge of the gaping maw of the stripy predator.

Am I more sentimental? I don’t know- I still accept that this is nature in action, it’s just that there’s something else lurking below everything. Maybe empathy? If that’s the case is that the same as anthropomorphising the creatures in play? I don’t think so.

I think the causes behind my new found weepiness are many and I don’t think there’s one in particular. It just seems a bit strange to be getting upset over what seem to be trifling things, and by upset I don’t mean a couple of tears- they are always hot, and I feel in quite a lot of pain when I shed them. It hurts to cry over the plight of the disappearing honeybees…

As the wind got up the other day I noticed something brightly coloured flouncing about against the glass as I shut my firedoor; I assumed it was a piece of litter or other detritus but I was surprised to see it move about on its own accord. It turned out to be a butterfly or moth of some sort and I had no idea what particular type it was. It settled on the concrete outside the door and being overly excited by its unusual appearance I raced to my camera and poked it up against the glass.

What the hell is this I pondered, the colours seeming so out of place for my damp little corner of the world, but the urge to find out quickly slipped my mind. This evening however I was spurred into action by the reappearance of the exotic creature on the wall outside the firedoor. I was confused- Brightly coloured like a butterfly with unfeathery antennae but wings that closed on top of each other like a moth.

Wikipedia – Differences between butterflies and moths

In my head the Cinnabar moth came to mind – I know that they’re black and red – This didn’t seem to fit the bill though as it was bigger and had white on it that I didn’t remember Cinnabars having. A bit of trawling through the butterflies and moths of the British Isles led me to the Scarlet Tiger Moth, Callimorpha dominula. Bingo.

I feel lucky and privileged to have seen my little colourful friend; only one generation is produced each year. It is somehow appropriate that it is outside my room, given how it “occupies damp areas such as fens, marshes, river banks, as well as rocky cliffs near the sea.” Or at least the damp bit :)

There’s a drool-worthy programme on BBC2 at the moment about the flora, fauna, peoples and cultures of the the South Pacific; in it I discovered that there is such thing as carnivorous caterpillars. They hang around in the leaf canopy pretending to be twigs and then BLAM! they snap onto the poor oblivious fruit fly that has wandered over it and munch away. Bizarre-o.

As I was typing to MW#1 this evening about my new black and red friend I discovered that he has The Fear of butterflies and moths; interestingly Leia Ewok Village is similarly troubled, and I have had to hunt down and “dispose of” a fair few errant moths who made the fatal mistake of fluttering into Leia’s vicinity.

Mottephobia is a fear of moths, Lepidophobia a fear of butterflies and Lepidopterophobia a fear of both. Apparently.

It is awesome to be human!

This video is the real-world equivalent of my morning daydreams.

I daydream to comfort myself, I daydream when bored. I daydream I am somewhere far away from my shoebox, where the bedsheets are crisp and white and a ceiling fan turns the air over; I daydream I spend my afternoons wandering along the beach then taking a post-lunch nap, drifting off to the sounds of the fan and water lapping outside the window.

I am warm and happy and completely contented, because I know that there is nothing to wake me or keep me awake, no tossing and turning as the thoughts fight in my head. No worries, or alarms to be set, zero shrieking of students or banging of doors. I know I will either wake up of my own accord or be woken by the sensation of warm skin against my back and and an arm sliding underneath to roll me closer.

In these dreams I make some sort of Ewok-esque mewling noise of annoyance combined with contentment; he brushes an errant strand of my hair up off my face and says: “Hello creature… Can I tempt you out of your nest…? How about we go exploring?”

It’s the sense of longing in Siege’s video that sends me off on my reveries… That lovely High-Definition sense of being. I guess it’s also the gorgeous light, beautiful woman and the amazing house too :) I wish I could escape my shoebox and the loneliness I feel, but the only escape I will be doing this Summer lies in the fantasy lands of my head.

Gene plus Quattro. Eeee. I will stop now.

A short video of Guinea Pigs being washed and groomed. It’s excellent, honest. I particularly like the bit where one is being shampooed and it happily sits whilst its ears are massaged.

BBC – Show time for groomed guinea pigs

Also, for the last couple of days on the way to work I have spied a black 4×4 with the numberplate P11KEY. Good times.

Wikipedia – Pikey

This evening I passed time quietly sewing together the ginormous rip in my dressing gown; I hadn’t worn it in a while as the hole was so big and I had got fed up of being without a bit of coverup for when I have to complain to the students :)

I purloined some thread from work and I sat and watched Michael Portillo investigate the science of aggression, wrongly crushed over DCI Gene Hunt and took in a lovely programme about the South Pacific. Lots of super slo-mo wave shots. Again, good times.

A rather unusual off-the-cuff invite for a beverage with MW#1 found me wandering into town to his usual haunt and on the way I passed a rather lovely restaurant that was being decorated by the addition of four or five animal rights protesters. Oh dear.

The protesters’ small banners proclaimed that they were protesting the foie gras on offer in the restaurant they were stood outside; as I walked past them one gentleman asked me if I would like a leaflet about the “barbaric practice of using ducks and geese to produce fois gras” “Definitely not!” I replied, and alas then I made the fatal mistake of stopping to engage him and a cliche of a rather aggressive woman in conversation.

I am a meat eater that enjoys meat. I believe that animals should be treated with respect and compassion but that they can and should be used as part of scientific experiments. Welfare is important and in this country the farming community has done much to improve things, but there is definitely much more that can be done. I have tasted foie gras and I have not enjoyed it; this is the only reason I would not order it off the menu.

I think that if you’re going to protest about the production of foie gras then you should really also be protesting about the treatment of the Eastern European workers that pick the vegetables that end up on my plate, or the low wages of the kitchen staff or the small farmers going out of business or the impact of the farmed fish on the environment or… you get the idea. There’s horrible shit going on everywhere, which is not to say that there’s so much going on that there’s nothing anyone can do, but it’s about a proportional reaction and to me that means that I will not give my support for the charities to do with the poor lil wovvley animals. Reality please.

Me: “I know all about how fois grois is produced. I’m really confused as given all that’s going on in the world, don’t you think there are more important things to protest about?”
Overly Calm Man: “Well, there are many things that you can choose to protest about but today we have chosen to protest this.”
[he waves a leaflet in front of me]
Overly Calm Man: “Don’t you think that this is barbaric?”
Me: “It’s not a priority to me given what else is going in around the world right now. For instance, the number of children living in poverty in this country is disgraceful.”
Angry Woman: “We are choosing to protest about this. What are you doing now? Why aren’t you protesting about that then?”
Me: “I choose to give to charity to support my causes.”
Angry Woman: “We give to charities too. What’s the point in protesting about something like reducing child poverty- That won’t get anything done. We protest about fois gras and generally what happens is that it gets removed from the menu straight away.”
Me: “Riiight…”
Overly Calm Man: “You’re talking about child poverty, but surely it is important to stop exploitation of all kinds? We believe in equality.”
Me: “So you are equating the value and rights of a duck to that of a child?”
Overly Calm Man: “Yes.”
Me: “Right. Sorry, I cannot continue to have this conversation with you. I’m going to walk away now.”

So, protest about the welfare of ducks and geese because protesting about human lives is just too hard? Aand imply that I lack compassion, am lazy and should devote as much time and energy to caring about a duck as I do the abused student who is beginning to fall into the cycle of abusing her siblings?

DO YOU LIVE IN THE SAME WORLD AS ME? YOU DELUDED NAIVE FOOLS.

The protesters: Viva Vegetarians International Voice for Animals
Wikipedia – Fois gras controversy

Here’s what Viva say on their website about the production of foie gras. Commentary by me :)

“It’s no wonder foie-gras has been dubbed ‘torture in a tin’. Ducks and geese are being driven from the ponds and into intensive farms in their millions, where they are routinely abused in the name of ‘fine dining’.”

Do you know what torture in a tin is? Why not take a look at the CIA’s practices in Iraq and elsewhere? Ducks and geese are driven from “their” ponds the same way cows and sheep are driven from “their” fields. IT’S CALLED FARMING.

“Every year in France, 30 million ducks are forced into cages so small they can’t even stretch their wings. Trapped and helpless, a metal tube is thrust down their throats and vast quantities of food are forcibly pumped into their stomachs so that their livers swell painfully to up to 10 times their natural size. There is no escape and no respite.”

Ducks and geese are able to store fat in large quantities in order to prepare them for migration and the Winter season. How do you know that this process is painful? Does this make it bad? Millions of women carry around something that has only have their DNA for a full nine months which is then seriously painful to remove. Is this bad?

“The suffering of these birds is so extreme it would be illegal in this country. However, free trade laws mean that every year we import tonnes of these diseased livers, marketed as an expensive delicacy. Britain is a driving force behind this cruel industry.”

Do you know what else is illegal is this country? Child abuse. Gender differentiated pay. Violent pornography. Drugs. The production of foie gras in this country has been banned due to our nation’s warm fuzzy heart that finds it far easier to give money to animal charities than to those that care for abused women. Jog on… Diseased? Not necessarily so. And do you know what? Some people even eat shark that has fermented for months. Also, driving force? Around 20,000 tonnes produced a year of which 50 (or 160 in these stats) is brought into the UK. I do not call that a driving force behind an industry.

“For the millions of little female ducklings born in France another horror awaits. They are tossed alive into electric mincers at just a few days old to suffer a violent and horrific death – their only crime is they don’t put on weight as quickly as their brothers.”

Right, so being a female duck is a horror in itself? Well, I suggest you take a look at the decidedly odd balance of sexes around the world, especially in China and India and then get back to me.

“The pain and suffering caused by foie-gras production has no place in a civilised society. Our aim is simple – to make Britain a foie-gras free zone.”

There is undoubtedly suffering associated with traditional foie gras production methods. I would not say however that the removal of foie gras will make our society any more civilised, as when “the government estimates that as many as 95% of rapes are never reported to the police at all. Of the rapes that were reported from 2007 to 2008, only 6.5% resulted in a conviction, compared with 34% of criminal cases in general.” What civilized society would you be referring to exactly? [source]

I believe that there is absolutely *no* way that you can tell me the suffering of a duckling is on a par with a victim of torture, so stop using your ridiculous emotional language to anthropomorphise your argument.

Thanks.

Skeezy abandoned multi-storey Soapland (that is a bit Spirited Away)
Michael John Grist – Queen Chateau Soapland Haikyo, Ibaraki

I was browsing Carrier looking at all the gorgeous justifiable-only-as-the-honeymoon holidays when I read that one suite at The Royal Palm in Mauritius – it’s located in the neighbourhood of Pamplemousses :) – contained as well as a private pool its own hammam of all things. What was this thing I pondered and Wikipedia answered my question: A Turkish Bath.

Why would you need such a thing in a hotel suite? The mind boggles. Anyway, I don’t think I fancy Mauritius… French Polynesia – though *not* Fiji – and Hawaii I would happily fancy the pants off :)

So I was looking at Turkish Baths and their history, the tradition of the soap boy attendants being the lovers of the clients – graded on appearance, how skilled they are at making their clients come – before way down at the bottom I came to the usual Wikipedia list of See also. Here amongst the obviously Turkish words and Japanese versions I spied Soapland.

Soapland is “is a type of brothel in Japan where male clients can engage in sexual activity with female prostitutes, although officially the clubs do business as places where the client is bathed.”

Typically, once both client and worker have stripped off, the client’s body is warmed in a bath before he lies on a mattress. The worker “… covers herself with liquid lotion for lubrication. Then she slides her body up and down the client’s body; this is known as “awa odori,” or “bubble dance”. “

To me at least, this sounds like serious fun. Mmmm slidey goooodness… I imagine the textural experience would be *amazing*. I must give myself an extra good scrub in the shower tonight.

The excellent Japan for the Uninvited covers most everything strange and undecipherable from that country, including an article on Soaplands

From berlin

As I sat staring into space in an attempt to motivate myself into getting in the shower the following “conversation” went on in my head.

Me: You’ve got all that holiday time owed you, right?
MW#1: Right…
Me: Well how about we take off somewhere, just for a few days or so?
MW#1: Um…
Me: How about Berlin?
MW#1: Uh… Berlin?
Me: Yes, Berlin. You can use your language skills to order me food and cocktails – which I could do myself but you’d get to show off – and we can wander the city (in short bursts) – Me getting excited over the breakfasts, fabulous art and shrapnel blast marks, you getting excited over meat and cheese and Cold War things. We can eat until we are about to pop and then go back to our hotel room where you can spend some quality time making me, and as a side effect you, happy. I’ll make sure we’re near an accessible U-Bahn station so you don’t have to do stairs. It will be awesome and won’t be trop cher. What do you say…?
MW#1:

See– Even in my random indulgent thoughts reality – the silence – has to intervene. Goddamnit.

Why can’t I day-dream of MW#1 rubbing sunscreen into my back as I lie on a Hawaiian beach? Oh yes, that’s right, I do :D

——————————————- Post-shower post:

Aaaand reality intercedes again- I’d forgotten about the whole “Oh, what? I forgot to tell you to bring your passport? And we were going to go to Paris for the weekend too…” incident. Bloody hell… That and the “Come with me then” Dubai thing seem to be about as close as I get to spending more than twenty-four hours in MW#1’s company. I actually laughed as I scrubbed myself; I can laugh now at their gobsmacking awfulness, but that wasn’t always the case, that’s for fucking sure.

Bed and Patrick and sleeeep. It’s actually past midnight and it’s quiet.

I feel an urge to print out this essay by Milton Glaser and hand it to all my Year 13 students… Ranting and inspiration in good measure:

Milton Glaser – Ten Things I Have Learned

[via]

During my daily browse of ASOS.com I came across the following:

Insight – Pluto Pup Bow Back Bikini (£37.50 £30)

It’s the lack of podge removal that caught my eye- Yes, when women wear such low-slung pants the over-hip spillage is usually what results. I found it interesting that such natural padding has been allowed to remain, but maybe i’ve too little to occupy me on this Bank Holiday…

I know it’s ASOS, but why the fuck do they have like a bajillion bikinis and so few one-pieces (429 styles to 29)? Not that I am in the market for anything swimwear-y, but all the skimpy little numbers give me The Fear.

Although I am sure many women have the confidence to wear a two piece – and look damned good whatever their size – I am not a slender fifteen-year old and as such feel that there is no way I could ever expose anything from my hipbones to my bra band.

Plus, what are all these suits that you need to have boobs for? I mean, my girls were always squashed whenever I swam, being a gentle rise in the front of my suit rather than floatation aides…

Daily Fail – Too fat for fashion: How Tanya Gold found size sixteen is shunned by designer brands

I know it’s the Daily Fail and so is an easy target but really: Fat = “…the Martin Luther King of retail…”

Really? Reeeeally Guardian columnist Tanya Gold? Ooh, well of course, you being a size 16 and your “battles” to find up-it’s-own-arse designer clothing that fits (that costs about as much as my rent) TOTALLY equals the struggle for racial equality. They hang fat people from trees yeah, discriminate against them in the judiciary – all those uppity fat wimmin’ – shouldn’t be allowed to ride buses with the rest of the population and are polluting the “thin” people’s DNA? Yes, OF COURSE.

Your surname’s Gold- can I take a guess that you’ve some Jewish heritage in your background, just as my distinctive surname indicates Irish extraction? Right. Well, your personal comparison to MLK is about as appropriate as comparing Amy Winehouse’s apparent eating disorder with the emaciation of Holocaust survivors you stupid indulgent prick.

After being prevented from passing a quiet evening by the students two metres from my door – laughing, shrieking, clapping and the like for hours – at 12.30am I had finally had enough. Out I went stony faced on the preamble that I was taking a bag of rubbish out and on the way back I interrupted their card game to make my offence known.

What I meant to say was: “Hi, sorry, but could you please keep the noise down? I’m only a couple of metres away and i’m trying to sleep. Could you please keep the noise down after 11pm? Thanks.”

What I ended up saying: “Hi, sorry but could you please keep the noise down? I’m literally a couple of metres away and pretty much every night I am kept awake by *you* and *your friends* and to be honest it’s driving me crazy. I know i’m being a party pooper but if you could pleease keep the noise down after 11pm that would be reeeally appreciated.”

Oops.

I now feel bad for ranting a bit at them when I don’t even know it is always them and have been spending most of the day trying to think up a suitable apology. I’ve not seen any of them on my travails today so I guess time will pass and there’ll be little point in apologising. I’m just gonna be that grumpy bitch from G8.

This is a rare case of me actually saying a bit too much – although it was truthful – rather than too little. Hopefully it’ll be quieter tonight and I won’t be kept up. It’ll be decidedly unamusing if another set of students keep me up… Fuuuuck…

Last night being fans of all things Jason Statham me and Leia Ewok Village went to see Crank 2: High Voltage. Although at times I could barely believe what I was watching – giant Godzilla-style puppetry, Geri Halliwell as Mrs Chelios – I found it an enjoyable experience, though not up to the masterwork that is the original Crank.
Statham was on squee-inspiring form from the get-go, delighting in being shirtless and shouty for a good proportion of the film. Friction. Amy Smart’s character had evolved into being far less annoying than in the first film and I found myself laughing at actual jokes and in disbelief on an overly frequent basis. Bonjour Motherfucker.

After the late-night exposure to all that testosterone I have spent today hiding what seems to be an almost perma-scowl behind my big sunglasses- Too many slow people in town, too many thoughtless kids, annoying couples that won’t separate to let me through. I want to walk without having to go round you goddamnit! Get a room you fucks.

I have multi-tasked the scowling with lots of self abuse – not in that way – beating myself up about how if I could just grow a pair and make better life choices I might not have woken up alone this morning, and instead would be getting some soft warm manfur action. How I might spend the Bank Holiday in the company of someone who manages to both love and appreciate me rather than spending it feeling glum.

This beating up is something I do on a semi-regular basis, but as previously stated for all the introspection I will continue to waste my time on people who don’t do me justice whilst at the same time knowing that eventually i’ll get left behind and i’ll be devastated. Idiotic.

Maybe i’m just tired. A nap might be of use…

Oh Statham…

I’m currently experiencing an attack of the crazies- I’ve been sat staring into space for the last half hour or so pondering a variety of things and have just spent ten minutes wandering around my shoebox unable to decide on what to do.

I could dye my hair back to the flame red it once was or I could read the JG Ballard book i’ve had sat on my desk for the last week or I could unpack a box or I could have a nice hot shower and scrub the grime off of me… but no. I watched half of Cape Fear (Scorsese version) before giving up and I got through five minutes of an episode of Supernatural I had been meaning to catch up on before ditching it. Maybe instead of “the crazies” i’ve picked up a dose of the “ADHD” from the kiddies…

Not much satisfies it seems. I feel podgy and am fairly dissatisfied with my general appearance, aside from my pleasing haircut. I feel a bit over-upholstered and self love really isn’t doing it for me at the moment… I need to curl up.

I am very much looking forward to seeing Nitram and Leia Ewok Village this weekend- That at least is something at I can commit to…