I mean WHAT THE HELL do you think all those OTHER BLOGGERS are chatting about at such length, anyway?? #3

Now Playing: Lemonpillows: Doesn't Matter
Topic: Creepy Lesbo

Vanessa: What do you read? Books, papers, the sides of buses, magazines, messageboards, letters, cereal packets, blogs, other people's mail?

Harv: Books, papers, occasionally magazines
jatb: I read every scrap of text I catch sight of: packaging, adverts, road signs, books, legislation, websites, text messages, newspapers, the small print.
fmc: Books yes, papers not much any more ? I don?t commute anymore (hahahaahaha, just had to get that in for you saddo Londoners), the sides of buses the backs of buses, magazines I thought they were only there for the pictures ? at least that what the boyfriend tells me about Pammie?, messageboards what are they?, letters from the bank, cereal packets only in the supermarket to look for the GM ingredients label (I had a job interview once and told them that I was an avid reader of cereal packets ? I didn?t get the job), blogs duh, other people's mail NEVER.
Looby: Modern and classic fiction, (lately: Tristram Shandy and Don Quixote), books about modern European history and politics, (a history of contemporary Italy, a book about Russia since the fall of communism) memoirs (Norman Manea's autobiography about life in Romania from 1935 to the present day); The Guardian, Times Literary Supplement, Private Eye, Good Beer Guide, Eurovision Song Contest Handbook, What's Brewing (CAMRA newspaper), the dictionary.
Rose Madder: I read all sorts of stray text, papers etc, and books when I have to (and occasionally for pleasure).
Vic: Booooooks, and lots of them, and the occasional message board that pertains to my activities (xdcuk.net, dogging.com and the like)

to be continued ...

Whaddaya mean it's too POMPOUS and SELF CONGRATULATORY? I'm only FOCUSSING, on ME, all the time?! #2

Now Playing: Lemonpillows: Change
Topic: Creepy Lesbo

Vanessa: Do you read any of the other blogs that I've linked to? Is there a difference in how you feel about reading about someone you know compared to someone you don't?

Rose Madder: no, but it would be very different to read about someone I don't know.
Vic: I occasionally skim select ones, but with so many you link to I've only seen a small fraction. With respect to me knowing the blogger, of course it makes a difference, but only in the quantity I read as opposed to considering it a secret view into the mind of the blogger etc...
fmc: I had no real interest in reading about someone I have never met (and never even heard of ? it isn?t like reading a biography of Pepys, who at least you have heard of ? these people have no connection at all with my life). I was interested in reading about you ? it felt like a way of finding out what is going on in my friend?s life (who I rarely see and should call more often).
Looby: Yes - Lemonpillows, Another Sarah, Tess's blog. I suppose there's a bit of added interest in that you can compare the online persona with the real one. I see blogs as simply another type of meeting or interaction really - pub, cinema, lunch, read blog.
jatb: I read some of the other blogs, far fewer than I used to when I was blogging. And now almost entirely restricted to the ones which are work safe. There is a slight difference because I know more about you and feel I can perceive a subtext to your blog which I can't have the remotest idea about in others. But that only applies when your blog handles absolute reality, and anyway it's only my feeling about my perception. How far removed that might be from your perception of reality is anyone's guess.

to be continued ...

Can we just stop all this talk about ME and really FOCUS on the ISSUE of ME for a second, here? #1

Now Playing: Lemonpillows: Angel
Topic: Creepy Lesbo

The atmosphere was tense, crackling with expectation and sexual electricity as we made our way across the hotel lobby.
A blog convention with a difference, and not just in the smouldering intensity of the attendees' long lashed limpid eyes. No, this room, this gilt edged bejewelled velveteen palace was to hold a select panel for the next few hours.
The anticipation was already unnerving us all, and introductions proved somewhat hurried and flirtatious. All eyed and sized and appreciated the intellectual and physical prowess on display. This was no mere blog meet. This was to be a Convention on the Future of Vanessa's Blog.

First, the attendees: Harv, a six foot darkly intense young executive of a mid European marketing firm, known for his artistic dilletantism, and his culinary skill. Debonairely dressed from head to toe in discreet armani, travelling businessman Harv felt very much at home in the expensive hotel surrounding. Harv was first to arrive, and, noticing the youthful yet stooped, serious professorial figure entering after him, Harv registered an interest with a flash of his mahogany eyes, and was quick to order drinks for the party gradually gathering. His smoothly delivered choice of mojito cocktails all round was approved of by all, save he of the defiantly radical tastes, cutting a pose reminsicent of early Kerouac as he slouched against an ottoman, scuffing it carelessly against his artfully distressed footwear, Vic.
Vic had travelled down from his academic pursuits in the frozen wastes of the north, where he had tensely allowed his underlings to pursue the guarded secrets of the universe, of extreme physics. His intelligence and learning shone through his blue-gray hooded eyes, and his hunched, Beat poet manner, as he crouched edgily over a cigarette. Vic's attention wavered from his pursuit of a more manly aperitif as six foot swedish intellectual and artiste Rose Madder made her accustomed dramatic entrance to the lobby. Rose Madder's faded dark clothing lent her a boho chic, while her long sinuous blonde limbs were given vitality by a sharpness of gesture, a directness that revealed itself as she sat, brusquely greeting first the sophisticate, Harv, then the saturnine Vic, and crossed her legs beneath her.
Rose Madder's entrance was quickly and loudly followed by a bright energetic explosion of a woman, bursting into the lobby in a hurricane of wide full lipped smiles, breathless apologies, as she leant in close to allow her widely set and strikingly brilliant aquamarine eyes to make her introduction for her. This was fmc, and her sudden, insistent familiarity broke the tension briefly. She busied herself darting about the group, between long folded legs, and insouciantly crossed ankles with an ease and near arrogance - if arrogance can be drawn as a form of perfection, a perfect confidence that invites a trust - which instantly set the group at ease. An illusory trust, perhaps, as she reveals in her perceptible distaste for th mojitos the keen eye and I turned to the little band of artists, radicals and the sharp tongue of the engineer.
It was time for me to reveal myself, and establish why we were gathered. I turned to the company from the lobby desk where I sat, calling gently to the company of five to focus their assembled incisive wit upon the gleaming flat screen inlaid into the low carrera marble occasional table nestled tastefully by fmc's perfectly contoured knee.
Five, you say? Yes, five. The deep, dark chesterfield recliner creaked steadily about to face us and the strong silent presence it contained (which had hitherto gone unnoticed as we fluttered and jabbered our suburban introductions) made himself known with an imperceptible truculent nod from his craggy manly features, cast into shadow by his sinewy taut frame. Looby was among us.
Looby's deep set, inscrutably masculine visage eyed the two other men warily. Harv's elegantly manicured hands, his dashing long legs were noted, as was the contrast of Vic's rugged furrowed complexity, his rough hewn yet simple clothing belied by the affectedness of the Gitanes in his hand.

A clicking sound on the onyx tiled floor of the PomPom Hotel Lobby distracted Vic from his nicotine crutch, as a latecomer arrived; jatb, renowned pentathlete, tapped in her choos across the icily reflective inlaid stone flags. Wordlessly she took a seat on the arm of Looby's chair, the gold flecks in her clear, deep indigo eyes acknowledging us with the briefest of nods.
Rose Madder's attention snapped towards the screen, eager to interrogate the mystery placed before us. fmc paused from her effusive, intensely physical greetings, and Looby restrained the impulse to suck meditatively on his cuban cigar, as Harv's discreet cough directed all attention on me.

Vanessa: Do you read my blog at all? A lot? A little? You just skim? Why/not? Does my blog embarrass you?

Looby: Every entry, entirely.
Vic: I skim unless I hit across a post that grips me, like when you get livejournal to say your cat got run over, I almost prepared another "my rabbit has died" reply :-/ I'm not embarrassed by it though, it's only a blog.
Rose Madder: I read it a little.
jatb: I read almost every entry because I enjoy reading it. It doesn't embarrass me at all.
Looby: 1) Curiosity to see how you're doing, 2) for the pleasure I derive from reading, because you write well (oops, sorry - that was a bit supportive, wasn't it :) 3) curiosity at how someone else negotiates the privacy/revelation balance. I look to you and other bloggers for some examples about how to do this and 4) to see who'll be the first amongst us to find a point for the bloody thing. Oh yeah, and to click randomly on your blogroll to find interesting blogs.
fmc: I don?t read it much ? in fact, today is the first time that I have successfully managed to get onto the site (last time I looked was admittedly around 6 months ago because you threatened me with publishing my supersonic squeals). I skimmed a little. There were a lot of words ? now don?t laugh ? if you are a wordy person and have time to sit at home, on your own computer and read a blog in the same way as you would read a letter or a book then you will be fine. If however you are at the other end of the spectrum ? only use the web for speed dialing for flights, get bored if a connection is made in less than a millisecond, and get interrupted by your boyfriend every time you try and read a book, and keep finding washing and ironing and lawn cutting and STUFF to do instead - then reading reams and reams of pages about someone elses life, whilst sitting in the office ? is a bit unlikely. No your blog doesn?t embarrass me ? should it? Should I be embarrassed that my friend pours her heart out on the page or should I be worried about what she says about me?
Harv: Don't read the blog because I keep forgetting to. What's the web address again?

to be continued . . .

I dunno when I'm s'posed to learn ...

Topic: Looby

That staying up till 2am picking out old photos for my Moblog is a waste of oxygen?

More deeply weirdo searches

Topic: Eurotrash

lovely colourful teddy's greetings
how to wank a boy
sarsparilla vanilla
sarsparilla vanilla
arsehole shaggy
'can't do it now either (at the age of 22)'
'charlotte dymond' poem
+enema + shop +london
fish allergy weal on chin
'weird places to live'
belly button sex blog
sidsel endreson
video of Berk decapitation
Nanna's beautifully rich recipe for yoghurt
peter andre having sex with katie price
self brease exam male
Ass smells bad...any medicine?
ophelia dahl lesbian
chilli rose spider
Vanessa
when a dog lifts leg in affection
enema receipt
sexi calendars 2004
embarrassing story wank
definition 'flirting thrills'
ex-girlfriend slag knickers
amy handcuffs blog
boring idiotic give me fun website
drama queen - Vanessa - No Angles
cooked tits boiled girl
'vanessa's lunchbox'*

*think I've had that one before....

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Pissing bloody bollocks to the blog

Topic: Hurtling to Obscurity

Fuckin stupid ... grrrr ... grumble, moan ...

It's a shitty shitty week - I've been getting in three hours late from work, eating something foul tasting, then collapsing by seven or eight o clock, and not waking till forty minutes after the alarm the next morning, which leads to ethical crises extraordinaire: a little late and no coffee, or a lot late, but awake? (clue: actually, no, you don't need a clue, nobody would be surprised which was the damn answer).

Also shitty: fell asleep and didn't go to a lesbobookclub discussion of my favourite book ever, even though I had spent three months underlining natty quotes, rehearsing my speech about why the heroine was a thinly veiled roman a clef representing yours truly, and also pinned every last shred of dignity and hope upon it being the final opportunity ever to ensnare a woman who can actually read or converse without gulping "gosh you're so intelligent, I find it hard to keep up with you" (clue: never true; other clue: basically an insult; another clue: never going to be taken well unless you're looking for a Top Dog for your prison ward).

Still shitty: It's summer. It's hot. And there's no way it's not going to get much hotter than this. I'm pasty skinned, pale and celtic looking - kinda grey, kinda lumpy, kinda oatmeal, sorta tones of wet cement with an undercoat of blue - and that's after twenty five hours on a sunbed this spring. Clutching a warm bottle of water, plastering myself with sticky fly attracting sunblock and running from shade to shade to get to my non-air con workplace is somewhat less than a thrill a minute. I like Autumn. Roll on frigging autumn. My clothes are wrinkled (no iron), and sweaty (no car) and grubby (no washing machine). This was never going to be pleasant, but I'd at least hoped for hygienic.

The shit it shitteth all day long: hayfever. Taking double the max dosage of hayfever tabs, but still spend half the day wandering around with a mouth like a fractious anus, one finger hesitantly laid a centimetre below my nose, intoning the hayfever sufferers' mantra, 'ah ... ahh ... ah, ah ... ah'.

It shitteth nightly also: In Liverpool, I sneaked a look at Sarah's weighing scales, and it turns out I weigh fourteen pounds more than I should do. That makes me a fat lardy munter overcompensating for my turdy lardiness by eating willy nilly. This must stop. There have to be limits set (clue: biscuits). Deadlines established (clue: bikini). (hah! bikini! What bikini?!) (clue: exactly. Get off your lardy arse).

Even shittier: I had hard-won tickets for a poetry recital (fuck off, okay, I like it), where Seamus Heaney, Harold Pinter, Tony Harrison (that's three living eternal geniuses - poets, for the uninitiated) and Vanessa Redgrave and someone called Balcon (actors, ah buh-leeve) were reciting the poems of Stephen Spender (mate of Chris Isherwood, whose book 'Goodbye Berlin' was filmed as 'Cabaret' - dead good, possessor of big feet, ex boyf of one of my uni profs, and well into artistically arranged nude Nazis - oh do keep up at the back, there, we'll be testing you on this later), discussing his work, and reading works of their own inspired by Spender. It took me forever to secure a single ticket at the very furthest end of the auditorium, and guess what? (clue: involves snoring, in bed, at home).

Yet shittiest: My fucking ever-reliable car, with the broken glow plugs, with the broken brake light, with the flat battery, with the used up battery cell, with the impending MOT in two week's time, and the garage twenty miles away across the river in Barking .... (clue: kranken. Again).

Solution? Went to boss and asked him to help do my work. Decided to go to work late every day, in jeans and trainers (I speet on your dress code), and play classical music extremely loudly at all times to distort colleagues' sense of absolute entitlement to my attention. Allowed myself with perfect impunity to lose my rag completely at least twice a day. Spent this evening in a mad effort to paint my fingers and toes a violent and repulsive purplish pink, phone several friends, plan a weekend of socialising, and bought some scales to go on a diet. Yumlicious.

Things I've done this weekend:

Gotten really bloody upset that Kinja isn't working at the moment.

Made a MoBlog

Spent thirteen hours on motorways, and still only advanced my CNPS score by one (22!)

Wound people up deliberately by being obstructively Tory at inopportune moments; I don't really and truly think that the poor could send their children to private school if they'd only re-prioritise. Sorry.

Done my level best not to chat with relatives.

Inherited twelve photographs of me and my sister in party clothing in the nineteen seventies.

Paddled in the beach at Formby. Until I saw the sheer billions of evil stinging jellyfish polka dotting the incoming tides.

Begun to be amused by Vernon God Little, after hating the first 53 pages.

Listened to a Kurt Weill / George Gershwin / Cole Porter cabaret set at the Purcell Rooms.

Eaten indonesian food with jatb, with whom I don't rant pointlessly about politics, and I feel extremely empowered about that...

Noticed that an entire family striding out of a funeral home in full black gear with white shirts looks bizarrely boy bandish.

Or like Reservoir Dogs. Except I had silver trainers on, which makes me Mr Brown.

Forgot to get in the Daimler to get to the graveside because I was (a) having fun singing in a high pitched voice, (b) desperate for a pee.

Snuck out of a wake to get a lift to a Cheshire Starbucks, then been accused of sneaking in beer on my return. Wish I'd thought of it first, you know.

Broken my mobile phone. The microphone doesn't work. Don't ring me. I'll only get irritated and cut you off without explanation or by your leave.

Taken about a gazillion photographs, and deleted about 300 in the realisation that obsessive attention to trivia is an unattractive thing in a humanoid.

Nearly committed murder against the hordes of Spanish exchange students who broke every single train exit barrier at London Bridge, eight hot, stickily sweat drenched, pulse thumpingly annoying hours into my journey home.

Hitched home in order to leave earlier. Which meant I had to stay awake. Mucho cola, as they Do Not Do Real Caffeine Up North.
(peasants)

Gotten jealous over the guest blogger's posts.

Sat this afternoon in the sun, staring at the customers and visualising their bloodied heads exploding over the windows behind. Not good. Not good at all.

Rejected another demand for money from Tybalt. I'm not being mean, I don't have any. She can join the queue of creditors.

Wondered whether to blog the unjustice of a date where I decide I'm not that interested, then end up all twisted up inside because, dammit, she also didn't phone me. Darntwattit, I was disinterested first, you bastard!

Prevented myself from blogging a devastatingly blow by blow account of bedroom events on said date as revenge, on the grounds that nobody will like me any more if they realise I'm capable of that sort of thing.

Secretly decided to do it months later, when nobody will notice. Hah.

Guest Blog: Found

Mood:  amorous
Topic: Belle de Jour
Oh no! I'm blogging too late! So now it's technically Sunday, and that means a day has been missed on the blog.. Sorry, Vanessa... But I will try to make up for it.....

YOU

I always knew I would meet her. Eventually. Yes, I had made mistakes. Thought that I'd found her, then discovered I had been wrong all along. But I always knew she was still out there. Waiting for me to find her. I always kept that hope: kept on looking.

The first time we met, I had been so nervous that I hadn't eaten for three days. I was living on adrenaline and nicotine, hoping my stomach would calm down enough to give me at least a fighting chance of not looking exhausted. And malnourished. I needn't have worried: she looked exactly the same. As soon as I saw her, I began to laugh. A hearty chuckle born out of relief and an end to weeks of longing. She wound down the window.

"What are you laughing at?"
"Nothing. You just look as nervous as I am." She blushed, her top lip curling into that point I now know so well, and told me to "Get in you silly bugger"

The drive to my house seemed to take an age. Every traffic light on red, every crossing busy. And she was nervous - missing gears and jumping on the clutch. I tried not to look at her, to ease her nerves, but I couldn't help it. Here she was. With me. After all this time. I wanted to remember every minute. Soak up every second with her.

We dumped her bag in my room and, both suddenly shy, moved into the kitchen.
"How was the drive, then?" I asked. A normal, nothing question to try and calm both our nerves.
"Oh, you know. Ok."
She smiled at me. "Could murder a cuppa though."

I jumped at the chance of having something to do. Something to take my mind off the way she was making me feel. Just by being there. Leaning against the wall looking at me.

"White, half a sugar, right?" I hoped I'd got that right. I had heard somewhere that it was important to remember these things - like how someone took their tea and coffee. It meant something important, though what could be more important than just being with her right then, I couldn't for the life of me remember.

"Well remembered", she exclaimed. She sounded impressed. I hoped she was. I grinned to myself as I filled the kettle.

She moved to the window.
"Lovely view" she giggled.
"Mm" I mumbled, not meaning the wall of the yard she was looking at, but the view of her, in my kitchen, leaning over the sink to get a better look at the yard.

"Oh my God! We so have the same cd collection! I have almost all of these albums. That's freaky."
The tea made, biscuits produced, we had moved back to my room and she was examining everything on display. As if, by knowing what was contained within those walls, she would know me completely. She soon gave up: the only thing anyone could conclude from the jumble of artefacts in my room is that I am a person who collects 'stuff'.

But she was devouring the cd collection like it was full of treasures. Like a little girl in a toyshop.

"Can you put this one on? Please?" She handed me a Kristin Hersch cd. "I've not heard this one. Thanks"

I removed some random home-made compilation from the cd player and put her cd in. The Hi-fi refused to play. Typical. I pressed some buttons, jiggled the cd around, not wanting to seem the kind of person who would shout at an inanimate piece of machinery.

"What's wrong?"
"Oh, nothing. It's not playing. Does this sometimes."

I decided to hit the damned thing anyway and she laughed.

And then. Then she did something I will never forget. She moved up behind me. I felt her getting closer. She put her hands on my waist, then slowly, she moved them into the pockets of my jeans. I must have groaned. Or gasped. Or both. I don't remember. I just remember that wonderful feeling. I was afraid my legs were going to buckle and fail me. So I moved. Turned around to face her. She had that grin on her face. Like she knows she's 'got' me, and I don't need to say anything. Because she knows exactly how I'm feeling.

"I, er, ", I gasped.
"Shhhh", she implored, pressing her finger to my lips. I began to move my lips again, to say something, but she shook her head, so I stopped.

And then she kissed me.

Looking into my eyes, she stood on tippy-toes, and she kissed me.
Softly. Slowly. Brilliantly. Passionately. It was a kiss like I had never experienced before.

It was everything I had ever dreamed of and more. I put my arms around her waist and pulled her closer. She didn't resist, and I felt her buckle under the weight of what we were feeling.

She pulled her lips away and looked at me. Just looked, mouth open, for a few seconds. (though it felt like an age) And began to speak.

"I have wanted to do that for so long. I thought today would never come."

And right then, as she spoke, I could see my plans, the future I had mapped out, drift away, like a morning mist which, when cleared, reveals the most beatiful droplets of dew.

And I knew then, as she smiled at me, that I had finally found who I was looking for.

--------------------------------------------------

Well, I hope that 'cuts it' as a worthy post on the esteemed blog of Vanessa. I shall probably *not* be asked to return (he he).

I have enjoyed messing with your mind :o)

xxx
GuestBlogger
xxx

Guest Blog: Cunty-Minty-but-still-a-sweetie-guest-bloggy

Mood:  caffeinated
Now Playing: Eva Cassidy - Songbird
Topic: Creepy Lesbo
Cuntymint. Odd word, that. C-U-N-T-Y-M-I-N-T. But I like it. I don't know what it means, though I could hazard a guess, but I won't. Just, well, CUNTYMINT, innit?

I'm having an attack of the "Fuck You"s today. *twitch* Not enough sleep, too much caffeine, and the prospect of a weekend without my slippers. It's just too much. *drapes hand across forehead in dramatic pose*

But anyway. I think. Sometimes. (Really, I do - you can see the pain on my face and hear the whirring) So, well, in that vein, I present:

Ode to a Cow

I am Cow hear me Moo
I weigh twice as much as you
And I look good on a barbecue
Yoghurt curd cream cheese and butter's
Made from liquid from my udders
I am cow, I am cow, Hear me Moo

I am cow, eating grass
Methane gas comes out my ass
And out my muzzle when I belch
Oh the ozone layer is thinner
From the outcome of my dinner
I am cow, I am cow, I've got gas

I am cow here I stand
Far and wide upon this land
And I am living everywhere
From DC to NewFoundland you can squeeze my teats by hand
I am cow I am cow I am cow
I am cow I am cow I am cow

(I am cow: The Arrogant Worms)

*ahem*

I've been wandering around singing that song all day and, well, getting some odd looks. Of course, it could have been the pink tutu, but, well, personally, I think it was the song.

*taps fingers on desk in a really annoying rhythm while trying to think of something else to write*

My trainers smell.... They got wet the other day when I took them for a walk in the rain. They're dry now, but, well, they still smell. I smelled this morning too. I stayed up all night to do some work and, well, sitting in one place for too long and getting all hot with genius creativity kinda makes you smell. And I did. Smell, that is. So I had a shower. Why is it, that after a shower, despite getting out of the bath and rinsing down the tub, there are still bits of fluff left? Why can I never catch every bit of fluff in the bath? And you know, those last bits of fluff always look like something sinister when you're sharing a house with people you don't really know. Like, er, well, things that live, anyway.

Oooh - and I've had a *STALKER*. *nods head in conspirational manner*. Yes, a stalker, and a psycho one at that. She stalked me in a chat room, and then by text, and now she knows where I live. (Ok, so yes, I told her, but, well, she didn't seem psycho then!)

See, well, your esteemed author here didn't give me any particular topic to 'blog' on, and, well, I live a very boring life, so I'll make something up.. I'm supposed to be offensive, so, well, I'll be nice instead. Right. So, as I'm having a 'fuck you' moment right now, I'll list by name, all those I would gladly kiss on the cuntymint:

S, who is just so wonderful I'm starting to worry very much that she can't possibly exist in real life. Yummy.

S2, who is a 'thinking woman's crumpet'. Yummee.. Funny and wise, a definite tasty one.

C, who I just want because I know I can't have her. She tells me all about her love life, and always seems to have the whole of the lesbian population falling at her door. Apart from me. Or maybe I should start doing that....

NS, who is funny, gorgeous, brill to go on a night out with, but, unfortunately not interested. Just my type, too *sigh*

T. Utterly gorgeous, femme, curvy, sensual, but utterly utterly attached. :o(

N. Very attractive, but I only want her because I strangely like the idea of playing the Big Bad Lesbian and taking her 'innocence', then dumping her.

Hmmm... Right. Ok. Ya think that's enough to count as a post on the esteemed Vanessa's blog? Well, if it isn't, then fuck you, coz I'm falling asleep and have really really squeezed out the last of any inspiration I might have had just so I can blog this before collapsing, snoring and drooling, onto my bed. I've not slept for two whole days. And the bank, (the wankpots that they are) have taken money off me that they shouldn't have. So I have no cash. I'm living off my cheque book until next week. And then the ex rang me in an evil mood and shouted at me for ten minutes before hanging up. I listened. I really am too soft.

Ok... So I'll leave you with the following thought for the day:

Tough cookies crumble pretty easily. Cookies that are nice and soft in the middle are more flexible and harder to break.

Use that one next time someone tells you to 'toughen up'. (And I made it up all by myself - aren't ya proud?)

Oh - and suggestions are needed as to what topic to blog on tomorrow. As I'm a total comment-whore, I expect lots and lots of ideas. In the comments. To which I will reply to make it look like I'm more popular than I really am. Natch. :o)

On Having a Posh Voice

When you have a posh voice (lifting at the end of sentences to indicate you've at some stage changed your accent by force, natch) you often get asked to read at funerals.
So in the run up to the funeral, you have to worry about your text, your lines, your phrasing, your delivery. You have to think about your clothes - a pair of shit trainers sneaked in under the dark suit will reflect in the spotlight at the lectern, you'll never get away with it.
You have to deal with the clammy palms, the false starts, the rehearsal with the vicar, and the waiting in the apse for your cue.
As you wait, closer to the coffin than anyone else in the church, you recall what you had forgotten.
It's a funeral.
Someone you loved is dead and inside that box. That box right there.

Inevitably you cry. Because it's so sudden, so close to you, and you're alone, it's big lurching gulping sobs, not the snuffle of slow realisation you see in the congregation out front.
Nobody next to you has a tissue, because nobody is next to you. Nobody can lean over and squeeze your arm. Seeing your cousin snuffling doesn't help you, because your cousin's face is one in a sea of faces, all pointing up at you.
You have to wipe your nose on your sleeve, and practise gulping the snot down. You have to count to breathe evenly because your cue is coming. You have to remember to wipe your mascara upwards, because nobody's there to tell you that it's halfway down your face and glinting in the lamp's glitter. You need to get your voice back down an octave or two from strangulated sob to normal, because here's your cue.
You get to worry what people think of you. Whether they rolled their eyes when you fluffed a line.

Then you get to hope there's no toilet paper on your shoe, and your black jacket isn't covered in grey cat hairs as you descend the steps to the pews again, where for decorum's sake you'll sit at the end, with the smelly and eccentric aunties who need easy exit routes in case their incontinence pads don't last.

Nobody will say if you did okay or not, because nobody's interested in your reading. They're caught up in themselves.

Staring up at the altar, you're going to try to calm your breathing and your racing pulse back down so you can focus on the reason you're there - to think about and pray for the soul of the person who has died. You try to do this, but spend so much time feeling guilty for having not really thought about them much so far, having only cared about not fucking up your reading, that you're ushered out of the church on the arm of a relative you don't like before you got around to grief at all.

You posh voice affords you all these privileges. It never fucking gets you invited to speak at a wedding or a christening.

So that's why I'd rather get in the box myself than read at my granddad's funeral tomorrow. Okay?

Topic: Shy Lux

Kill Bill
Brilliant. Like watching somebody else playing on their playstation in front of you. Really badly.
Although I could have done with remembering to return it to the dvd shop less than two weeks overdue, then I'd have had enough money to buy it.

The Butterfly Effect
Absolute toss, but harmless enough. Lovely ending, which fit the Oasis track in the background perfectly, and that made me instantly know what I'm going to write in my last blog post, in July. Ashton Kutcher reminds me horribly of someone I know, without the acne. He seemed inordinately pleased when I told him this.
By the way - sitting alone in the front row of even a mildly mind fuck style of horror movie? Bad idea. You're not going to like it when they burn the doggie.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Absolute crappy bollocks. Not worth the popcorn.
Saw this on the big screen at Odeon Leicester Square - but was seated so far away, I might as well have waited and watched it on my postage stamp sized portable. Still, they'd decorated all the auditorium seats in the same fabric as Joel's bed, which was a minor, momentary mind wobble when the lights went up.
I usually love Charlie Kaufman's movies - okay they never quite hit the spot, but that feeling of not being quite on the button, but insane to have tried is terribly attractive in a movie. However, this one was pants. I understood about 40% and couldn't be bothered to try to understand the rest.
Whoever the woman is who dumped Kaufman three years back, and made him obsess over this nostalgic lovesick nonsense, you owe me ten pounds fifty.

Chopper
Now this is a good movie. I'm a little disturbed by how violent I like my movies at the moment, but hooray for untrained actors like Eric Bana who eschew thinking themselves into a role in a precious diva-like fashion, and actually have a bash at acting the script.

Frida
For some reason, I didn't manage to download imagine the sound to this movie properly - after a gazillion codecs, I managed to get sound that registers at whisper volume if I crouch with my head right by the laptop speaker. It's a peculiarly intimate way to see a movie. Me and Alfred Molina - complicit audiences to Salma Hayek's great performance. Didn't know she was Arab-American, by the way.
Overall, a little too much money spent - sometimes a movie seems so slickly produced, you end up wondering if they would have tried that little bit harder had all that glossy golden crowd scenery been available.

Unwarranted Attack on a Fellow Blogger

Now Playing: Jacques Brel: 'Jojo'
Topic: Lactose Incompetent

I'm really really not sure what I make of a blog called Scattered Words.

I was obviously, as an out homo, going to take exception to lines like this:

"10. Develop self-discipline. Do something every day you don't want to do. The homosexual/lesbian emotional mindset is very self-centered and self-indulgent; recovery means learning to be Christ-centered and self-denying."

So I made every attempt not to take offence, and to listen properly to where he's coming from.

Reading on, the guy's explanation for blogging his attempts to brainwash himself out of being gay in order to fully embrace religion goes:

"So what does that have to do with anything now? Not all childhood abuse survivors are homosexual, you say? You say right. Though, being exposed to sex so early -- being forced to deal with adult issues so soon screwed me up a little. As a result, I was sexually active "by choice" at a pretty early age. Thirteen, if I remember correctly. Throw in a rocky relationship with an emotionally distant and detached father ... well you get the idea.

The sexual abuse robbed me of my childhood. I skipped some pretty key developmental steps that I'd give anything to go back and change. But I can't. I didn't grow into a "man" the way I was supposed to and I can't do it now either (at the age of 22). My experiences now will never mirror what a 12 year old boy (or whatever age) goes through."

Fair enough. It's deeply personal.

I disagree strongly but who am I to say that billions of twelve year olds have repressive disturbing experiences of childhood? Who am I to rant on about the gazillions of kids who were abused sexually as children who don't use it as a lifelong excuse to claim victim status in all things? Who am I to point out that it's the concept of 'normal' stages of development that history proves is a false concept?
Who am I to note that this guy's abdicated all responsibility for his own desire, and made even feeling love / lust or interest into a transgressive act?
Who am I to point out that this sort of thing demonises the church in a way that I also object to?
Who am I to point out that continually going on and on and on about gay porn whilst berating oneself is possibly far more perverse and masochistically sexualised than simply enjoying it, and accepting who you are?

And then he links to "christian porn". What's with that? Methinks the ladyboy doth protest too much.

I understand that this is someone's personal thoughts. I do. Why is it that something about the thing reminds me of the engineered titillation of Belle de Jour?

Particularly when you read something as agonised and misguided as this:

"I'm absolutely devasted by the fact that I'm gay.
[...] I'd love to be at any other place other than where I am. I'd love to be able to make fun of myself and not take all this so seriously -- but it weighs so hard on my heart. It hurts so much. It's like a disease. A chronic illness that no one really knows what the cure (or cause). Except for those of you whom would say Jesus (and sin). And I agree."

I have no wish to kick someone while they're obviously down. But I'm gay, and I've been broadly christian. Not only is this not the answer, this is so Wrong, so utterly Wrong, that my every busy body fibre of being cries out against it, demands I protest.
The attitudes portrayed in the blog so desperately require some form of non-judgemental counselling, not anonymous blogging. Somebody needs to listen to this guy, not to tell him that gay is right, or gay is wrong, or gay is taking you to hell. But to find out why in hell's name he thinks blaming other people's actions is going to allow him to absolve himself from responsibility for deciding for himself who he is. What he is.

I have to stop. It's making less and less sense the more I write. And I could rant all day.

I dunno. More evidence of Why Blogs Are Wrong?

Politicaaal

Topic: Yidaho

Events in Abu Ghraib, Chechnya, and Haiti have had at least one tiny ripple, over here - I re-animated my'dormant membership of Amnesty International.

You'll probably think it's tofu knitting, if you're right of centre, or appeasement if you're leftist, but Amnesty really works.
My personal conviction about this stems from a bizarre experience of receiving a reply to an Amnesty letter once.
I recall I was working with a muslim academic from UAE on translating some of Edward Said's fables, many years ago, when an Amnesty letter I'd written to the then leader of Israel resulted in a personal reply. The Secretary of State himself (later to become president) had decided to take the time to write back to me to explain in great detail why his army had been instructed to kill arab children in the street. Apparently I was a victim of media propaganda, and was not to think of these dangerous terrorist militias as 'children' per se. Oh, and that the killing would continue, thanks.
The job I was working on at the time I received this state apologia for the most incredible brutality put me into contact with arab academics some people who were extremely interested in what an Israeli government's justification of child killing might be -- especially when its intended audience was not the UN, the US, any figure of state at all, but a UK undergraduate who had written simply asking why it happened.

It's the simplicity of the thing that makes Amnesty work. You write letters, and you ask why. You ask if it might be possible to calm down, old chap. You remind them that someone somewhere knows these people are still alive.

Current Appeals for Action:

• Haiti: The re-trial of Louis Jodel Chamblain ? a test of the judicial system in Haiti
• Women of Rwanda: marked for death
• Belarus: Stop the silencing of trade union activists
• Ratification - Bahrain
• Angola: Stop forcible eviction of families
• Stop violence against women - Act now
• Ratification - Jamaica
• Thailand's anti-drug policy should not be killing people
• Burundi: Women under attack
• Ratification - Burundi
• USA: "Double jeopardy" for some Guantanamo detainees
• "Justice only in heaven" ? End the death penalty in Uzbekistan
• Ratification - Yemen
• Viet Nam: Help free Le Chi Quang, imprisoned for internet use
• Mexico: Stop violence against women in Ciudad Juarez and Chihuahua

It costs #24 or USD$25, or CA$20, or AUS$55 or Kr240 to join Amnesty International. Then you get to write some letters to Ministries of Foreign Affairs, and that might cost you a few stamps.

Bromide

Topic: Yidaho

For months and months this blog was subject to searches for le.sb.ians pis.sing or Van.essa Bl.ue.
No longer, as lately I've been delighted by the esoteric search terms that return the hapless to this here pile of mumbling platitudes. Some of them are quite poetic in their glittering banality, as if they represent some sort of fractured attempt to find yourself through minutiae.

Recent searches leading to this blog:

• flutterings + colourful + clothes
• sarparilla drink UK
• 'the dare game' sex
• horror blog
• card index of Heidi written by Johanna Spyri
• 'the beach' 'alex garland' differences film book message
• oriental psychic readers
• belgian biscuits + kinky
• little vanessa
• chilli sauce stain carpet remove -recipe
• "i've had breast implants"
• lingerie shoot uk photography
• Helen Mirren's bra size
• Very hairy and scary girls
• Vanessa's blog

Meanwhile, on the inhospitable side of the planet, someone's been using Proxify to read my blog. I have to point out that although I have four sitemeters working on the page, I don't actually look at them much anymore (I've moved my addictions on, now, to browsing kinja, see). Even if I did read them obsessively, and thus cared, I'd have to be fifteen years more technologicallly savvy than I am to work out who you are from your IP address. There isn't oxygen enough in the world to waste on finding out how to do that.
Flattered people go to such lengths, though. You fools.

Fractured Moments

Topic: BillyWorld

Last time I dated - as opposed to picking people up accidentally and shagging them at intervals with no real commitment - there was no mobile phone. Nor any email or internet, for that matter. Texting is an addition to dating that I can do without - in the run up to a date, who wants a 40 word daily update of someone trying to pretend to be someone better, cooler and sexier than they are? Leave it for a telephone call, or better still, maintain the damn mystery till it's life story time, four drinks in.

I got on one of those rickshaw things in Soho on Friday night, in the small hours. They're disturbingly rickety, run slower than a fast walking pace, and have you worrying for the health of the obviously dazed and disoriented drivers, who wheeze and grunt their way up the wrong streets so predictably that you can't bear to let them know they've gone the wrong way, and eventually just plead to be let out somewhere. Anywhere.
Also not helping: your position prone on the freezing, jalopy seat provides a perfect view of the car air freshener that dangles just below the arse of the driver.

I've always been good at two timing, and have only ever faintly worried that I don't seem to have the moral guilt that others experience - in fact, the only times I've come clean (so to speak) were when I worried that being so successful at lying to everybody concerned might go to my head, and I'd become uncontrollable. A little freedom being a bad thing. So on a date last week, it was a nice coincidence that the bar set for the venue was downstairs from a gig performed by a folksy singer-songwriter I'd chatted to online. I messaged her that I'd pop in. Partway through the date, under the guise of popping out to the toilet, I managed to appear onstage for two numbers next door.
Excellent. A moment within a moment. If it returned to my seat near the bar a little late, and looking flushed, I could always blame the oysters.

Spending the night at an undisclosed location in the city, I expected to be overcome with nostalgia for the days when I lived in Soho and Bloomsbury. Not so. It struck me that there was nowhere to shop, nowhere to buy shite coffee and a plate of beans on a hangover morning, and most of all, no park to lie in the sun and pretend yesterday didn't happen at all. I think I'm getting seduced by the leafy suburbs. Morphing horribly into a character from Coming Up For Air.

I was meant to go for a curry with all my colleagues on Friday. I was never going to turn up, but couldn't be bothered to formulate an excuse, then forgot to cancel at all. So I stood the boss up. Oopsy. Bad move. And even worse, nobody rang to ask where I was. This is not a good sign. What excuse can I use? Shall I fake a road accident? I could probably remember to limp for half a day at most.

Topic: Looby

The unthinkable has happened. In the flat where I live alone, above the wardrobe, is a big spider. I walk into the room, and both I and the spider are immobilised by fear. It's like starting a staring match with a dog; there are no limits, and no possibilities.

I just got in from a wild night out, and I desperately need eight hours of sleep.

But - there's a spider. A spider! In my bedroom.
It's horrific.

Fish Snuf M*vie

Topic: LondonLifer

So I went to Whitstable, with Rose Madder, on Monday, and took my camera because I wanted to photograph dead fish. It was raining like a blood shower in a slashpic, and the cold gradually froze me over until I couldn't feel anything at all, and got giddy. My brain froze over the worst.

Rose Madder used to be a photographer of sorts, and I hoped I could pick her brain for ideas, although my main idea was to go to the fishermen's market stalls on the wharf where they sell the fresh catch, and photograph series of dead fish. Rose Madder's advice was to be brash, stick your camera in people's face when it's the right moment, and shoot, without worrying about etiquette or permission. She said they let go of the scruff of your neck eventually.

I couldn't do it - I got one snap of some cockles and mussels and chickened out. I resolved to take a series of pictures of fish that had died of natural causes, instead.
Meantime, the rain was barrelling down, and we ducked into a harbour pub to shelter, and eat oysters. In May. Wrong month to eat oysters (yeah, now you tell me that, old woman at work, now you tell me).
Feeling nauseated, queasy, bilious, tipping slightly to the left on bends, feeling rather at sea, I try to walk it off along the beach. The tide is out and I want to jump the scum on the waves, and see if I can get further out into the harbour than anyone else, so I can be King of the Beach. I want to skim a stone that goes further than three hops. And I want to find me a dead crab, a fish if possible; failing that, 700 digital close ups of seaweed bunches will do.
First beach I got to, I could not believe my luck. I found a wild fish, about two foot long, a handspan in diameter, died of natural causes. I snapped away like a paparazzi finding Becks' bidet occupied. Brilliant. I found a salmon!

I did mention the cold was freezing my brain over, didn't I? A salmon. Wild. Yeah. On the beach. There were other varieties, too. Plaice, Giant Crabs, Dover Sole, Lobsters. Died of natural causes. No embarrassment in photographing this lot in close up for hours.
I found three salmon, actually. I was lining em up to snap 'em and p'raps even pretend I'd been on a trawler and brought up the nets myself, when I saw one of them was wearing a barcode label.
It even took me a while longer to work out what creature had filleted all the flatfish so neatly. Or to look further up the estuary towards the back doors of all the Oyster restaurants lining the flood barriers.
Doh.

In other news, Vanessa learns that eating bad oysters can be compounded if all subsequent meals mainly consist of chilli, tabasco, beans, and boiled eggs.
I am not pleasant company in any small, airless space right now.

Ice Cream Prize

Topic: Shy Lux

The Art of Lesbian Online Dating, Vol # 2

Topic: Belle de Jour

Courtesy of Merc.


Welcome back young grasshoppers..
Hopefully with the assistance of the lesbian rules volume one.. you have managed to procure yourselves a woman for the evening..
Excellent.

Here are a few simple guidelines to ease your passage (fnar fnar) through that hazardous jungle also known as the first date.

This volume is going to concentrate on "the date at the meet" .. the favoured pre luurve scenario for the w.i (woefully inept)

• what to wear:
  
  This is an often debated subject amongst pre daters.. it requires multi phone calls to friends.. the hiring of a homosexual male for the evening so that he can give you an unbiased view of your backside "in this".
  
  The answer to this quandry, my friends is simple:
  CLASSIC.
  
  something along the lines of nicely aged levis, a black v-neck something in *lightweight wool*.. and boots, not white hi-tec's thankyouverymuch.
  
  accessorise well.. do not approach the first date by wearing a sovreign on every finger for 2 reasons -
  1) green fingers are not attractive on anybody.. 2) as women are genetically predisposed to notice everything, lust object will take one look at your "decoration" and decide that you obviously never take them off, ergo you havent been laid in a very long time. this may be offputting. go easy tigers.
  
  nb* .. by lightweight i do not mean something large and arran favoured by the military or shephards in nova scotia - you do not want your object of desire to think that you spend your life looking like a large shiny beetroot.



• what not to wear:
  
  the answer to this question my friends, is also simple.
  
  ANYTHING FLAMMABLE
  
  the reasons for this are three fold..
  
  1) - flammable garments are a crime against fa-h-sh-un.. loud hawaii prints and manga cartooned shirts should have been banned when "miami vice" finished its t.v run..
  if you have problems letting go of your polyester.. take a deep breath.. stand in front of a mirror.. and repeat after me:
  i am not don johnson.
  i am not don johnson.
  i am not don johnson.
  
  (for the cheaters out there - neither are you thomas magnum p.i - that excuse is unacceptable)
  
  2) there is always one person at a meet that holds a grudge against wearers of polyfabrics.. it is likely that they have evolved further than you.. so they may be aware of the destructive properties of fire.. and more to the point.. willing to use them..
  beware the quiet one in the corner holding a cigarette, rest assured that her motives will not be innocent.
  avoid prolonged trips to the hospital burns department by adhering strictly to this rule.
  
  3) can you say "sweaty betty?"



• the discussion of drinks..
  
  so.. you have got this far.. you are appropriately dressed.. you have managed to tempt o-o-d out on a date.. you hit the bar.. the question will arise:
  
  what are you drinking?
  
  a. - go for a spirit and mixer.. think vodka redbull.. TVR.. vodka & cranberry (although when opting for this bevarage it may be wise to jokingly tell lust object that no, you dont have a urinary tract infection.. you just like the taste).. tequila and fresh orange.. etc.. etc
  
  why not beer i hear you cry?
  
  1) .. nobody likes a beery burper..
  2) .. ordering a pint of beer speaks volumes.. it says: "i like to drink pints, i belch alot, on a sunday morning i like to sit on the sofa wearing my favourite football teams strip and read the news of the world whilst scratching things"
  3) .. pints = large volume of liquid.. large volume of liquid = many trips to the toilet.. beware of leaving o-o-d frequently when going on loo runs.. this leaves her as easy pray to the other w.i meeters.. drink small.. unless you want to dig her out from underneath a pack of leeches on your lavatorial return.
  
  shandy - its an absolute no no.. its like beer.. but for the alcoholically inept.. it just screams.. "im a secret lemonade drinker.. but i like to disguise the lemon as beer when im out so that i can still keep some semblance of social credibility" .. (urban myth #13775)



• the early date "getting to know each other" chatting..
  
  young grasshoppers.. here we have an infallable plot.. you see, you have chosen a "meet" as your first date.. this means that you will be in a smoky and loud environment.. surrounded by bad dancing and other assorted shennanigans..
  
  this will work in your favour..
  
  a) - object of desire will not be able to pump you for the kind of information that you dont want to divulge for 2 simple reasons..
  1- she cant hear you, you cant hear her.
  2- smoke. she cant see you, you cant see her.
  
  your date is likely to avoid conversation as she feels that you may find her less attractive if every time she speaks you can see her tonsils..
  
  b) - as all conversation is out.. you will have to resort to finding other forms of entertainment..
  ladies and gentlewomen..
  i give you..
  the dancers!
  even when sound has been compromised by the environment.. it is still perfectly possible to observe and mock flailing on the dancefloor.. this is a win/win situation..
  1) - she will assume by your mocking of the uncoordinated limbs afflicted that you yourself can dance.. an assumption that never needs to be disproven.. - WIN
  2) - the amusement value of the above is endless.. so a dull evening of stilted conversation and stuttering has been well and truly avoided.. - WIN



• temptations as the evening and alcoholic consumption progresses..
  
  temptation 1 - lift your top to expose your bra.
  temptation 2 - drop your trousers to expose your underwear.
  temptation 3 - dance.
  
  oh, where to begin.
  
  1 - NO .. this is an abysmal tactic.. i cannot be emphatic enough..
  
  breasts are nothing more (when publicly displayed btw, bedroom frolics not included) ..than bags of fat.. udders.. do you really want to show the the woman that youre attempting to impress 2 fat-sacks poorly contained in an "originally white but now multiwash gray" bra? ..
  no, you dont..
  it is guaranteed that if the grrl youre attempting to bed sees this she will run a mile.. even if she is polite enough not to run forrest, run.. you will not be getting any goods at the end of the evening.. this is a fact.
  
  2 - NO .. this is THE MOST abysmal tactic.. once again, i cannot be emphatic enough..
  
  odds are #1000 to #1 that you are not famke janssen, angelina jolie, milla jovovich, pamela anderson etc.. you may think that you are.. but believe me.. this is the alcohol taking control of your brain..
  you are not a supermodel.
  you are not an underwear model.
  you are not a fetish lingere model.
  even if you ARE any of the above.. it is good taste not to prove this until you are out of the public eye.
  
  odds are #100 to #1 that you are wearing boxer shorts (i have no idea why, but that isnt the point) .. what you are planning on doing in your drunken state.. is to remove your outer leg cladding garments.. to reveal enough reams of fabric to house a small family of refugees.. also.. boxers are made for men.. they have that little slit down the middle that in a cruel twist of fate is likely to be gaping to reveal the proverbial god-knows-what.. also.. in the downwards dragging of denim.. you run the risk of taking some short with you.. thus enabling the woman of your dreams to make some serious judgements about you regarding ass crack cleavage..
  prospective shag has every right to run at this point.. in fact i would positively encourage it.
  
  3 - you are drunk.. you are poorly coordinated.. you are attempting to strut your stuff.. you think you look like john travolta in the days of saturday night fever.. this is alcoholica dancia.. a halucinatory state, if you will..
  you actually look like youre having some sort of seizure.. this is no good thing..
  women.. being intelligent, observant, and worldly wise associate dancing with bedroom skills.. why?.. rhythm..
  if you can dance.. you have rhythm.. therefore the motion of your ocean will guarantee one sweet ride..
  if you cant dance.. you dont have rhythm.. therefore it would be fair of your date to assume that the motion of your ocean will be choppy at best.. you may become over excited and fall off whichever surface you choose for "amour".. and basically.. she will decide to ditch you on the spot as you clearly couldnt fuck your way out of a paper bag.



• have we reached the point where we bring in our mumandbestfriend who explains the route of our allergies?
  have we explained why we only drink decaf tea?
  have we discussed whether deodrant is a good idea or a bad idea and if that sandalwood stuff from Lush is really lush? (or just hums like a lesbian)



• the do's and donts of small gestures of affection..
  
  welcome to rocky territory grasshoppers..
  
  the hand hold - on a tricky scale of 1-10.. the to hold or not to hold comes in at around 8..
  
  it is my belief that you should ALWAYS wait for the other person to make this move..
  
  if you dont wait.. and she accepts your hand.. this is a signal..
  it says - i love you.. i want to settle down with you.. raise kittens.. and then impregnate you with a turkey baster.. i know its only our first date.. but i want our child to be called moonbeam.
  
  if you dont wait.. and she is oblivious to the reaching to grab hand movement.. or rejects it so that you quickly have to compensate by fluidly moving the failed move into some sort of other gesture.. you will end up looking like you have some sort of motor functioning problem.. possibly a twitch..
  really.. if you dont believe me.. try it in front of a mirror.. failed hand grasping always leaves you looking "twitchy"
  not particularly attractive i think you will agree.
  
  the light and flirtatious touch -
  dont make that move.. leave it to the object of affection..*
  hell you dont want to appear needy do you?
  
  nb* if object of affection does make this move.. this is not your cue to pounce and put your tongue down her throat.
  
  kissing.. (pre club leaving.. pre bedroom.. la la)
  dont make that move.. leave it to the o-o-a..
  so, your hormones may be running riot.. you may be primed.. you may be feeling quite unable to wait..
  BUT..
  if lust object rejects this move.. you have no way of compensating to make it look like anything else except a failed attempt at smoochage.. unless you have the brass balls to follow through with the lip swing and risk planting a smacker on the cheek of the next passer by.. (a move that undoubtedly the woman that you are with will NOT appreciate, and no, the risk of flight is not enough to make her kiss you just so that you dont go slavering on strangers)
  
  all this aside.. if you have followed the rules vol:1 and vol:2 this far.. youve done enough damned work.. let ms prospective make some effort for a change..
  (plus.. it never pays to look easy)

Source

Death in the Family

Topic: Lactose Incompetent

Sunday night, and I've driven out of London to catch a late movie. I missed the start, so opted to go see a horror movie, instead, one that toyed with the premise of going into the past and changing it, and what ripples that could have on your life.
Driving back at midnight, slightly nervy as I don't know where I am, already having stopped once to try to find myself on a map, window down just far enough not to be dragged out through it, radio on XFM low, wondering if men feel quite as nervy as women on the street at this hour, noting that basically there are no women on the streets at this hour, unless they're in a mini skirt on the street corner - I pass a brightly lit fast food burger joint in Thornton Heath. As I pass, I deliberate: pulling over, getting out, getting a kebab? Then dismiss leaving the car as too dangerous at that hour, in an area I don't know - and an odd movement flickers in my peripheral vision. Just a flicker, but it's someone - maybe a few people, moving fast. With something at their feet.
I'd been speeding, slowing as I came towards a roundabout, trying to recall which route on the map translates to the deserted wasteland of a Sunday night in front of me. The glimpse is only peripheral, and it passes quickly by with the rest of the street. As it passes I hear a sound.
Dull. Heavy. Yet reverberant. Like a chair leg quietly knocking against a chamber pot.
If you've ever heard this sound, you don't forget it. If you hear it once, you'll recognise it forever.
It's the sound the bone inside a skull makes when it hits an immovable object.

Today, my grandad died. He was an okay grandad when I was a kid, he was a nice guy. He tried to give all his grandkids aims and aspirations, and that's a good thing. He gave me #10 for every exam I passed, which I still have, in the same post office account, and haven't ever brought myself to spend. (Not spent because when am I ever going to find myself with any other money so honestly earnt?)
As I grew into an adult, I could see that he was belligerent at times, but he had a large family, and a large house, and it was a nice place to sit and read a book you got for Christmas. I guess I'm saying, I liked him, but he wasn't close.
The last time I spoke to him, he was staying at my parents' house when I phoned. He picked up the phone, was told it was me, and because the phone was by a computer proudly announced he'd never chatted on the internet till now, then hung up.
The time before that was when he wrote me a letter wishing I'd find God and someone to spend my life with. I found that letter pretty upsetting, especially as I had a girlfriend of eight years standing at that point, but I guess then I knew that he at least knew, although my aunt had hinted as much, and at his disapproval, but he was pretty old, so I can forgive him for that. I guess. Eighty nine is pretty old.
And I never had any other grandfather, either. I sort of regret that when I was told to attend his ninetieth birthday party with the instruction that I might never see him again, I'd replied "you promised me that when he was eighty". But not really. I didn't mean it like that. Really.
There's no grandparents left now. I think that's the frightening part of it. Everybody expects an old chap to pass on one day. But now he's gone. Who's next? I find that much more frightening. I don't want any of the rest of my family to die. They haven't had eighty-nine years to torment us yet.

Back in Thornton Heath, I'm stuck at a red traffic light on a roundabout, turning right, and realising what the sound is, my memory leaps back in a rush to the other three times I'd heard it.
I heard it in '01 when my car hit a dog running off its leash round Bellingham, hit it in the head. It survived pretty well, but the shock and horror lasted for ages. I heard it in '98 when I was living on a dangerously lawless estate in Kennington, when I looked out of my window and saw my neighbours kick the jaw loose from a passersby's head, because he'd said hi in an australian accent. I heard it in '92 when a group of eye-rolling kids in Brixton smashed glass into my face and then drop kicked my head for the fiver in my pocket.
I'm ashamed of it, but my first impulse is to drive away. Away from the beating, away from Thornton Heath, away from the violence, away from my own impotence to stop it. What could I do? A skinny woman on her own in a car. I turn the corner and drive, trying not to hear the sound.
What does that make you, if you don't care? I ask myself, as I reach the next red light, still on the roundabout. Do you know who that makes you? Is that what you're about?
I pull the car further to the right than it needs to be to make my turn. I know I am going to go back, but I don't want to know that I'm going to do it. Every other time I'd heard that noise had ended in a scene of mob law, with police who weren't interested, were mates of the people involved, or who just wanted me to fit up some black guy, and didn't care who it was, or how correct my statement might be. I don't like the police in the areas I think of as war-zone London, I don't want any more contact with them than necessary.
But I have a phone. He might be dying. I knew it would be a he. And I know that what seems like a heavy roll of carpet, behind that sharp flicker of movement, isn't. I don't want to think about what I will have to do. I just pull the car round the junction and turn back into the road behind me.

There was nothing I could do for him.
You can't go back to the past and change things. The decisions we make in the present are the ones that have ripples. The past is the past - we've already lost the moment.