United on the Carpet

Well Hello,

This has been a rather long hiatus non? I have returned from a Southern, and may I add warmer, hemisphere and have yet to write about anything. But frankly that time away was full of long periods of ridiculous brain ramblings on my own and lying in blissful sun on the beach, being chatted up by old(er) men in skirts and daydreaming and I ought to really be more productive than that about this blog.

I'm not even sure where to start so I should just launch really. Last time we met there was a certain job that I must admit despite being good at and having many a friend to work with I hated and couldn't abide. It was unhelpful and soul destroying no matter how hard I tried to help or create soulfulness in any capacity. So there I was floundering in a world of big financial fish and pretending I knew things that I just made up. and so what did I do after three months soul searching in the bright lights of Shanghai and the hippy free for all artsy Waiheke Island...? I am again working for a rather large financial institution that I must admit makes me want to cry. I would like to point out at this point that 1. I did this to stop myself cold calling so thank your lucky stars I'm not interrupting you watching Deal or No Deal with offers for Scottish Power.. Sorry not cold calling, I forgot, official title was Energy Broker... deal breaker, soul into million pieces breaker, fist smasher.. all the same to me.. and 2. In this current climate, and I'm aware of the irony here, there isn't much else to do... the karmic world of banking creates jobs for people who can't get anything else because the banks caused the recession. see fun times non??? 3. Well there isn't currently a three, a three for all is soon to come..

So Shanghai... a world of twinkly lights and big buildings and little French Buildings and communist statues. Fake trees in abundance amused me I must admit and I rather enjoyed a tree covered in pants (this was a picture but The Pant Tree is totally what I'm going to call my grocery store if ever I own one) I spent much of my time, pre Christmas, with the man himself, Father Christmas Chris Kringle. I have photographic evidence I'll have you know. I must admit I was a little bit scared of the things I might have heard about China as a country but the crabs in tanks staring at you, like the tramps and hipsters staring at you were giggle worthy (I must admit there was a lot of staring because of my delightfully blonde little nephew speaking Chinese)

The food is nuts and that is the best thing ever. All you can eat Teppanyaki with bottomless beer and eely bits. Wandering around the "Notions" market was, well heaven, with any possible bit of random craft goods you might ever want. I bought back so much I am not even sure I have use for it all but who doesn't need 7 mini cameos and chopsticks... Show me the one who doesn't and I'll show you a boring, hungry fool... There is the element of returning to some kind of olde laundered China that comes just walking down an alleyway. An alleyway lined with hanging silk trousers blowing in the wind that smells from second to second of sewage to garlic pak choi... and a lingering smell of dye and peaking umbrellas from slotted windows. Older women and workmen on bikes and a friendly student learning about European culture from us to pass the time. A small dog leaning off a balcony amidst the laundered bras. A world of fake sunflowers. A small mouse crawling around the comb shop, "combs can be so pretty". There we go.. an element of static writing that is not linked. I'm not dismissing the Chinese translations into English but being told do my duty to the five forests (which makes no sense) was a source of endless amusements. Just make sure not to pummel in a bamboo forest.

The stars though, the stars on the mountain. I crawled (almost literally) up the mountain with sickness, then crawled up the lodge's wooden stairs strewn with Christmas decorations. Becoming the crazy sick lady in the attic was intriguing for the youngsters flitting about the house but I came down to eat and take advantage of a bar.. Very irresponsible of me I know but I"m nothing if not a creature of habit... How long does it take for that mouse in the maze to realise the electric shock and pain is linked to the goodies it's eating? Well, for once I wasn't ill due to a hangover but from indulging in the Chinese food. Anyway, the Stars.. the stars... they shone endlessly in the empty sky. From light polluted giant ceramic flowers on the side of the motorway there was nothing but crisp bamboo, crisp air and world of stars dropped like salt all over the night sky's table cloth.

In the bins I found magazines due to be recycled. Magazines celebrating the anniversary of Flying Nun record label. A trip to Real Groovy was made, CDs and incoherent singing courtesy of the Island Rock radio... this is rather rambly but memories often are.

The shop was strangely the hub of excitement on the island. Kids were taken there on days off from school to go and look at kittens and learn about second hand excitement (something that I feel should be instilled in every child at a young age.. I know I had it done to me) There were the regulars, a lesbian woman who flitted between the aisles filling her and her partner's house for guests, a lone woman who had been left to the housewife of art. There was a donated pork pie hat, it had been trimmed. I was deliberating it, I was trying it on when a woman came in and said it was her's. She had been in a Ska punk bad doing her own songs and Madness covers.. The best hat story I've heard.. so far...and she even skanked for me. I bow down to her two toned greatness! In the next installment of my blog (which will happen soon when I'm more awake) there will be various other people I met and harassed/chatted to/ate with/drank too much with/danced about with.

There I was, down the Whanganui River singing to the goats with no way off the water for three days. This is the End... my only friend the end.. That's it. I was on Apocalypse now... Have you ever almost continuously rowed a Canadian canoe for three days straight, riding the rapids and avoiding the waves paved through by jet boats?

I sat amidst the possums... upon a barrel (yes, the boat was loaded with barrels full of our "dry" items and beer...) after ghost stories by the riverbank and hot camping curry there I stared and stared.. The stars, a theme I know, were the most spectacular speckles of light I've ever seen.

I sat there for hours. Literally... like on the The Bridge to Nowhere where I sat and looked out to nowhere... I'm still looking out to nowhere. Singing mindlessly and staring into space that was what I did. and I still remain answerless..

I have mostly been learning about work related things and attempting to read Perfume but buying 2nd hand copies of JM Barrie.

I have mostly been listening to "United" by Pete and the Pirates and sung it incessantly. I must admit I am a little addicted to going through Pete and the Pirates phases.an my amazing new record player. The video is full of lovely singing and cats. Cats moving their heads in time. To music. What the bloody hell more could you want? United on the carpet with a kitten... .and Dexys on Vinyl on my amazing new record player. And anticipatory dancing to Let's Spend the Night Together...

Then there's the semi erotic walks to work with the full on sunglasses and fur coat, as the weather and I have yet to decide what kind of day it will be... a Django Django day with the weather in hiatus and anticipating a storm? A little storm. I've assumed my old habit of listening to music as a rallying war cry on the way to work, I still change the song to fit in with walking in a movie, a movie where the heroine works in a call centre.

Recession and Responsibility-A Banker's Tale... Trademark call centre lovers...

And cooking Easter dinner for people with two kinds of lamb (Homemade Moroccan rub with cumin, coriander seed, flaked almonds and tabasco and then garlic and rosemary) cos that's how I roll...

soon to come part two of adventures and other parts of life.

I shan't get shirty when they say I look peculiar...

Why Hello...

I should probably preface this again with the fact I have many thoughts today that possibly conflict and also may not exist so bear with me.. As I will with you. If you were to ask me.

So, today.. ah yes this appears to be a Sunday/after work midweek tradition of writing this blog when I'm not entirely sure what I'm thinking but I'm sure there's something to be gleaned out of the bizarre tired feeling I've got today.. Firstly, an amazing and superbly accomplished but even more modest and kind woman died this week and I have felt very lucky to have met her and enjoyed her company. She was never too busy to care about someone else which was the most amazing quality and it most definitely was not her time. I am very saddened by her passing and I only met her a few times but will always remember them.
I went to the funeral and even though I knew she'd done so much never realised quite how much and I know all her friends and family are very proud of her.

As funerals might do to a lot of you they make you really think about how much good you yourself are doing in this world. I am currently lying in bed listening to John Cale on 6music not doing anything hugely productive so I must up and away at some point. I feel the need to physically move and change things. Though John Cale has oft proved himself an excellent bedfellow. One of my favourite Welshmen, after my dad obviously. No matter how many times I hear Hallelujah sung by idiots and insipid Xfactor winners it still makes me cry. Leonard Cohen and John Cale, even Rufus Wainwright, do it justice to the lyrically succinct melody of melancholic beauty. Especially to one who's not sure if God exists. or even god for that matter. Is now the time to be philosophical? on a whim perhaps. and yet again I've gone once more unto the breach of talking nonsense. Before I can succeed at this writing lark I suppose I ought to control and coral my thoughts into some kind of sense but I do like to feel

In the words of a youtube comment "a story Boccaccio or Chaucer would write" this is not only true.. but also quite possibly the most intelligent sounding comment on youtube I've ever seen.

I must momentarily stop. I have just discovered someone on the radio who I can't even describe. Well I could, in comparisons to such French Ideals as Jacque Brel. Jake Thackray is from Leeds. Leeds. But if they had a sense of humour and had Noel Coward like aspirations. I've been put into a profoundly happier mood by this. By his own admission "I missed out on rock and all my influences were French".. ah my friend.



And this is my favourite, and the one that was just played on the radio. Needless to say I am in love with him mostly because of his nose and his jumpers. What a handsome witty man.. just goes to show my mother's right that I do have a thing for Northern Blokes.. yes that is their title don't you know.



Frightfully, frightfully la di dah!

Now I shall continue to write, lest I sit here all day listening to Mr Thackray. LIes all lies, I'm just going to write and listen.

I have just remembered something, whilst searching for Gene Vincent on the excellent Hype machine (not so excellent as I can't seem to find any as it's not working but still.. excellent usually). Somewhat unrelated I dreamt in Beach Boys songs last night. I awoke with Surfer Girl in my head, convinced I must've heard it yesterday. But now I've remembered that some friends were living on an ice lake in a posh hut just outside what was supposedly the Liverpool Docks, getting a boat to and from work and city. And we were sat in this hut, that from the inside seemed to be a large flat and had several floors and empty rooms to be quickly filled, and listened only to Beach Boys. Here the nuances of how dangerous and exciting it was to live on an Ice lake by the docks were explained to me. One after each other they depicted moments of near death and adrenaline, at potentially falling through the ice when drunk on the boat trip back. That going for one's morning jog was slightly hairy. And yet never once did I think the question their decision of living upon this hazardous but beautifully arid and blue silver landscape. There was no question of why one shouldn't live there.

And for another possible rant. I was in a restaurant the other day and I was having very interesting conversations but I couldn't keep my thoughts straight or my feet still when they played a Joe Meek, Gene Vincent et al extravaganza on repeat. There are never too many times to hear Telstar. and now I feel the need to jive and dance. Admittedly there is a part of me who will always imagine a certain Libertine in Telstar


and whilst perusing that I found not only a rather odd version of Venus in Furs being sang by Barat and Brett Anderson, which I only say is odd because it sounds almost normal in comparison to the raw original but also this hilariously drunk almost karaoke version of Kokomo sung by Moldy Peaches' Adam Green and Carl Barat. Worth it for the little dance in the middle by Carl and Adam screaming names of various islands.


I seem to have gone off on a Libertines binge and this has made me somewhat nostalgic for the aftershow party at Brixton academy like a crackden and the first days of Uni. There were libertines posters needless to say. This song still makes me want to cry and watching footage of gigs and the fans shows how amazing they were before they got into the limelight fucking each other up and becoming the bogeyman of the masses and mail readers. My best friend and I had planned our joint bohemian wedding in Albion, I got Carl Barat (who I do believe is married now... so is Julian Casablancas which saddens my 15 year old self) But there were others and happiness and things that meant something and it makes todays music, not to sound like an old fart, really fleeting and bit a sad. I liked the poetic nonchalance of the Libertines (even Dirty Pretty Things to a degree though they never had the passion really did they?) but now everything is so accessible to the masses. Not that I think music should create segregation but I still remember being awed by Arctic Monkeys getting a number one. An Indie band being big again was weird for me. and I don't tend to like some of the same things as everybody else much in the same way they don't like my things and I"ve oft been called weird. I don't mind it so much. I just liked being part of something smaller that was growing and actually being in touch with humanity. Or maybe that's what discovering music feels like at that age and never again do you feel that way about a band but mindlessly listen to 6music waiting for something or someone to make you feel that way again and hoping that you've not turned into the 20 something square that goes "oh yeah man Indie pop isn't what it used to be but don't you just fucking love Plan B??" If that's the case I'm running away and joining the indie pop circus.
and in some places it isn't like that. Indietracks festival is a place born of those who love what I do. And it's small and happy. and not full of wankers in maxi dresses discussing the nuances of Florence Welch's fringe. I work with many a person like that. I'm not naming names, though I'd like, nor am I going to get as annoyed when older people are surprised I like the Stones and Gainsbourg. How he physically makes me tingle and the beginning of Syd Barrat's Golden Hair makes me go into a psychotropic haze of delight and the sadness that tinges it with a tragic beauty. I know it all sounds very very um…. very pretentious and you know what some part of me doesn't really care. I care very much about the things that I like, so much so that I've apparently used up my data quota for the month in a matter of days writing this and listening to Jake Thackray and the Libertines and pretending things matter still. They do still matter but I suppose you have to work at it. I just wish there was some kind of movement that happened now. Something I obviously might have to start myself. Something to escape and run away from the emo shit and ridiculousness of the long boring day of nothingness in an office.

I've recently bought: Metronomy's English Riviera (which I know probably comes into the everybody likes it category and this pains me. not as much as listening and almost liking that foster the people song. ok I might actually cry now that I've admitted that. I hate it I really hate it when I like something as popular ok! Admitted admission and I'm a big pretentious geek. I don't care!

I've recently made: a long green silk evening gown that I wore to a graduation ball and then promptly threw up all the free red wine and delicious dinner I had all over it. Fun was had but it wasn't pretty (well it was quite 20s at first especially in a setting of an old hall with many an Art Deco furnishing)

I've recently read; um.. let's see what did I finish when I last wrote this… ooh I read When God Was a Rabbit which was movingly excellent and re read One Day as I like to do this every year around the time I graduated to remind me that I may not have lost everybody I ever made friends with and had a connection with and that I may still have time to do something useful and meaningful in this world and not just work in my equivalent of a Mexican restaurant.

I've recently done: very little but sat in bed and looked out of the window.

I've recently been: to London and Belfast. and discussed getting a garden in our new flat. and want to grow beans. and started a lot of sentences with and which pains me somewhat but I can't really go back and change them all now. and...


A bientôt x

Young blood? on somebody's hands....

Well once again I find ridiculous affinity in a song that was probably written for a mass market of lost souls who all feel individually and uniquely the same morose silliness... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WdO85Qf4Pocbut still here we go as it's true we ARE all young and naive still We require certain skill.. Yup we all do. So once again I start my blog that is usually born in some kind of malaise or other. I'm not going to be all misery guts... I live where the trains sleep, I still find things interesting. That's nice. but once again I float along in a world of not feeling fulfilled. One goes to the gym merely as a distraction, a vent for frustration, both sexual and boredom. I am rivalling the ennui of the English Opium Eater. Only my diaries contain less opium, more wine. So I go to the gym and blast some guns into oblivion and become the cliche. I have no 1. Cat, 2. lover 3. Wine (today) 4. particular life goal except to change what I'm doing.. I have broken out and I'm almost certain I'm the only one rowing to Joy Division so that's a good start... No life at all in the house of dolls.. No love lost eh no love lost...? or fall back in love eventually.. I must admit I've been spoilt and finding someone interesting to talk to amidst the streets seems futile. it's bizarre how many a person is scared of a Velvet Underground obsessive with a penchant for the word cunt. We are a dying breed non?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QiyXjv1aaf8

I am aware of the irony of what I may be about to write but having spent many an hour ambling around and listening to the delightful conversation between Jarvis and Adam Curtis on 6music about computers and their maddening influence on the world it's like re-attempting-reading The Diceman.. a depressing and somewhat scary experience that makes one put the book down, or in this case the computer, and walk slowly away avoiding eye contact. This has indicated to me how static the world can become it's been on my mind for the last few days now and every conversation i've had regarding it seems to be on a computer. This cultish near necessity is scary and writing it on a blog makes it seem even more ridiculous. There is a habit I have, I think of amazing insightful things to write, I think of loads of things I want for my birthday and Christmas and then boom gone. I was walking under my pigeon bridge delighting in the amazing aggressive post punk feminism of Those Darlins. Deliberating why the boys who you want as your bro don't treat you that way and those who do make you feel like a potentially incestuous strumpet. I just wanna roll and play in the dirt with you and you just wanna stick it in. That is something that makes me want to flee my town and make it to San Fran or Washington and start a new revolution. It's coming, at least something ought to be, hard and fast. I've spent weeks eyeing up young, old, men, women everybody undressing them with luckily just my eyes, but there will be pouncing and the pouncing will turn to a taking. A tying up and a thrashing..? I look into their faces with sunglasses on and hear fucking music in my head. Music to fuck girls by... music to be taken roughly by.. oh dear if this doth persist this blog, sporadic as it is, will eventually become a long overdrawn, writhing, wrenching, slapping, arse grabbing, whipping, jodphur wearing Jilly Cooper novel..set in the North West. Now that's an idea... only without a horsey set, Chester doesn't strike me as as much fun as the metropolitan sweat and lust of the inner city.. writhing and rubbing against the cobbled floors and brick walls. I keep wishing I had some kind of deep message to portray however, I do feel I could give an analytical and accurate portrayal of the youth and sex obsessed generation that I am but a victim of. The only other issue of this is that I fear I'm becoming selfish, not self absorbed as apparently that's what happens when one lives alone, but less inclined to do good for other members of humanity. This must be stopped as a loss of humility and altruism means the end of humanity in the soul, it's not gone yet and I'm sure it's just in hiding coming out for smaller things than just to one person.

The sexual ambiguity of turning 24 is somewhat annoying me. I was happy to be 23 and in the words of Blink 182 have nobody like me. I know secretly they did but sometimes, sensitive as I am, I enjoy being a stand offish bitch. This is why reaching the age of 24 has posed some questions about what is necessary for a woman to exist in this day and age, on her own, eating fish fingers, dancing in her pants, who doesn't take down her party bunting as it makes her feel like she's at a country fair in the 40s and listening to Dylan's birthday commemoration on 6music. God only knows. I'm going to seek to find, to not seek and then hopefully find by chance.

The pressure upon myself to say something elusive...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=urRLqUGhWP0

As I work on my Beasties Boys esque sabotage of the western world whilst simultaneously attempting to form a Ronettes Sans Spector tribute band and marvelling at Michelle Obama I shall think too deeply, drink too deeply and potentially grow another year older before I complete my next blog. I think i should write to commemorate my passing into mid 20s... a carefully assessed analysis of the young and irresponsibly philosophical.

A bientot Cherie...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_lwthVtaocc

Any time will do...

Well, 

Here is another boring Monday evening... It's still sunny.. ish.. the sky is bruising quietly in the background.. I've had to stop listening to the radio as my entire left hand is covered in songs I must remember. This is a good thing, naturally, however, it may eventually lead to ink poisioning or septicemia.. So I thought why not write something slightly more permanent.. or however permanent something upon the net of inters can exist in cyberspace. 

Firstly I have a confession. I'm 100% addicted to the new(ish) TV on the Radio song "Will Do".. Not only do we have some virtual reality loving and guitar playing in the video but it's achingly beautiful, reeks of patience and longing.. a sentiment that nobody ever really forgets and some may not want to. I know I don't like forgetting that. so yes here is the video, and I will bet you some of my hard earned banking money that you fucking love it* (*offer null and void if you read it and believe it... I also haven't really got any money so it would only be about 40p which if you're still a student will let you afford a copy of the Guardian... I snuck back to campus life today... nostalgia and cheap newspapers sigh).. 

http://www.youtube.com/wat

ch?v=dXLpXu9T7j0 well ok it won't let me embed it but I urge urge urge you to find it.. stop being lazy reading this and go and find it now. 

Now you're back I've had a little waltz down memory lane for other amazing TV on the Radio songs but frankly I stop dead at Wolf Like Me.  Reasons abound for me loving this song but nothing quite gets you howling at the moon like the should be proverbial Rochester stylee "Dog drawn bitch" hehe... Nobody quite does sexual longing like the ridiculously sexy bespectacled Tunde Adebimpe.. needless to say I'm rather enamoured... and drift away whenever I hear it... 

if you've ever met me you may know that I often take my ipod to the loo in work.. Yes I know it's odd but it's a minute of pure being locked in a room on your own without having to talk to anybody-ness... and you can't beat TV on the Radio for that. except maybe the Human League.. 

Right on with the list. I'm being hard on myself today this shall be less wistful than I'm feeling and less depressing than I'm contemplating writing about and much much less self indulgent.. Speaking of raw animal magnetism and sex Pete and the Pirates' rather excellent Cold Black Kitty has a certain Kinks' "Wicked Annabella" about it.. it's dark and dirty and she's been playing in the alleys all night. The Kinks femme fatales were never real femme fatales.. they were dark women lead astray into the undergrowth of the "Big Black Smoke" or in Annabella's case she has lots of little demons that do her own bidding.. whenever I'm in a mood I go and sit in the park of the pseudo suburban area I live in and watch from atop my little hill the cars go by amidst the greenery.. the bizarre halfway house of smokey life with the undercurrent of dirt and sod... Village green and the big black smoke down there at the end of Dead End Street.... 

I've always admired Nick Cave's growl.. I grew up thinking of him as the man who murdered Kylie but I never really liked her much anyway, after my sister played the Locomotion for hours on end.. I've read parts of his books that are raw.. but Grinderman are moving me.. moving me to excellent feelings that I've missed.. The Palaces of Montezuma is a piece of art.. Mama's gonna buy you a mocking bird, a pretty A-Line dress... lyrically it's incredible and always reminds me of the excellent laidback grandness of early 90s indie or the SoftBoys.. and vocally he's gone all Destroyer.., So much to promise in such a nonchalant way... the promises of someone who has nothing but gives everything.. a quiet sigh in the empty halls of Montezuma's palace... drifting all through the gardens of Akbar's tombs and up the gods. 

I guess there's a new theme emerging.. confused love.. but I read something yesterday, a quote a friend put upon her facebook.. (yeah I know I'm quoting another's facebook page but it was all so right..) "The best moments in reading are when you come across something - a thought, a feeling, a way of looking at things - that you'd thought special, particular to you. And here it is, set down by someone else, a person you've never met, maybe even someone long dead. And it's as if a hand has come out, and taken yours...

but music does it too... after going for an amble around the park, scowling annoyed at the ducks, (whom I usually adore by the way), and moping to songs I heard some of these songs (yes I"m addicted to 6music but I can't help it.. I write and write the lists and they're never fulfilled) and all the songs seem so irrationally relevant.. bizarre non?  so not to sound stalkerish I've been searching for more Yeah Jazz after hearing the song "Sharon"... I'm not elaborating.. but I fucking loved it. 

I will however elaborate on my reasonings for not going to the gym today.. in the gym they don't let you play wii tennis in your underwear whilst Black Sabbath blasts Ironman into the living room and out into the softly becoming springlike air..

I'll go and buy the flowers myself... I've been reading Mrs Dalloway and the stream of consciousness reflects my flitting and silly mind.  The springlike air about her writing and yet the near death cycle of her characters are gorgeous... her loneliness in a crowded London.. or her just being alone... They aren't the same... 

I can't decide.. so end on a happy note.. .... happy belated international Women's day... 

if you were in the area you may have seen a few natural talents on stage whom I'm endlessly proud of. .xxxxxxxxxxxxx

Under The Bridge....

And so a freezing frost has fallen upon the city.. I watched this descend in minutes and in the dark it's shining in a haze... 

There are lots of tiny needles falling it's incredible. 

and so I have decided in this end of January ennui and haziness that I wanted to write something. Even if it is slightly self indulgent, but what am I if not hedonistic in my indulging of my own indulgences.  Fog seem rather a lovely case of pathetic fallacy right now though.. a cloud of confusion has fallen upon my brain and it is a case of not knowing anything. Is ignorance really bliss? I'm quite enjoying it but also detesting it somewhat.  The lights of the car are blinding without the fog and shine brighter when it's lifted but they spread and splinter across the world when it's foggy.. but is that just shared confusion I don't know. I'm not one to be concise when it comes to anything but I feel somewhat stark at the moment except for the nights I have spent in the last few weeks listening to Pixies, syncing itself with the noisy bumps my washing machine makes, and warbling until 3am.  

It may be true, but I really hope not, that if you don't use it you effectively lose it.. is that forever? god I hope not as I am still in the realms of a job I thought I'd leave over a year ago contemplating things that I wouldn't normally and discussing things that should be kept for the pages of Take a Break.. 

I'm glad to say though that I have noticed smaller things that make me happy in the last few weeks. 

1. Putting my feet up on my glass coffee table as a sign of defiance at it's inability to remain streak free. I would like to point out to most Estate Agents, who are fast becoming a race of peoples I vastly dislike, that streaky coffee tables, brown relatively uncomfortable blocky sofas and white carpets are ridiculous ploys for deposit stealing schemes.. I'm fucking onto you.... 

2. I've mastered the art of reading a magazine and doing the G2 crossword WHILST discussing banking issues on the phone with the great British public.  If I didn't forcibly remove every angst ridden ridiculous conversation I have had of late from my brain with a pair of powerful pliers then I would be writing some kind of book that revolved around a psychotic mad woman.. oh no wait.. 

3. That I've obviously grown up to some degree as I resisted from spending all my wages on a pair of Isabel Marant trousers and instead bought a month's supply of chickpeas and toilet roll. score. Whether I'm pleased about this I'm unsure. 

4. This is the best thing I've enjoyed recently. I live under a bridge; bread eating at bus stops with my Judd Nelson fingerless gloves aside I am not quite a hobo, though I had a lovely discussion with the Big Issue man today.  This bridge lets loose the trainspotter in me. I must admit the journeys and noises it makes aren't the most exciting in the area, that coveted title must go to the monthly window cleaner who seems to stab my windows with a battering ram when I'm naked or perhaps the late night winter ice cream van, redundant in the hazy shade of winter.. or so I thought (now I'm no shouting Daily Mail reader with the tolerance level of teenage talking head asked about the latest tweets by bored looking newsreaders but I do sing "Drugs van la la la" to the theme of Teddy Bears' Picnic that emanates from the van itself). The Bridge itself, and yes I'm going to make it a character now use my English degree to show some kind of insight with the Bridge and it's situations in life itself.  The Bridge is a mother holding host to a family of noisy yet delightful pigeons, I say delightful as they have yet to shit on me on my way to work, no no the public wait for that when I get there.  The Bridge has a nice little nook, now back to the hobo bit, a nook that if it were warmer I would curl up in and watch the world go by.  But the number one best thing about The Bridge is the array of clutter I find under it.  Difficult stains.  Dogs. Dog shit (not so excited about this bit but it adds to the atmosphere obviously).  and the creepy baby carriage... complete with half emptied tin of oak stain. I'm going to keep a list. 

Things I'm still disliking though are checked shirts. I have delved into the Primarni men's sections (yes I know it's cheap and shit but at least I'm wearing something ludicrous that cost me £3... bad) I do admit I'm rather hypocrite as I am currently wearing a plaid, flannel nightie complete with plaits in my hair and wooly slippers. It's true, at night I get my Laura Ingalls Wilder outfit on and pretend I'm in Skins. Well I do when I'm not pretending to be Ginsberg. 

And adverts for work. I am still holding out for my telepathic application I have been sending to 6music since the day I first tuned in "Yes I do know lots of things test me Jarvis- The National? Why yes they are rather good but you acclaim them a bit to reverently. Oh look a song I've never heard before.. ooh thanks for waking me up to the Strokes again cheers"

As my inner monologue is coming out in spurts, it was only a matter of time-Hell was wrong Love doesn't come in spurts, words and inner monologues and madness do-I should probably wrap up what is a rather disjointed entry that is mostly being used as a state of proving I've hopefully not become an inane gimp, just a raving narcissist. 

Well actually the madness might be ongoing. I start to worry when I find it interesting that the billboards on the way to work have changed. 

I don't want to put many pictures in today. I want to paint something instead and put it up soon. My art work is becoming more and more hippy fair with sideline of hemp. It upsets me. 

Things I've been doing: Deliberating feminist ways to enjoy a play we're putting on in the town of Liverpool.. That Takes Ovaries is on at the Unity on the 10th, 11th and 12th... 

The people who find it strange I'm a feminist confuse me.. I enjoy filth but it's my equal rights to do what I want without being labelled a man hating menace.... pigeon holed into a place that created all the holes for pigeons in the world. 

Knitting... eating spaghetti... reloading all my music onto my computer as a mishap has deleted everything. I've been sat on my floor listening to Nico and sighing. 

There will be more I'm just confused by life.... and my loss of music has stolen my heart for awhile... emotions aside.. no wait no emotions aside I resent stoicism and silence.. 

and planning my trip to Coachella.... to explore the world. On the road again... 

There's a Storm A'coming..... You'd Better Run...

Well, I know dear Reader (s) that it's been a good few months. What can I say? I've become the queen of self destructive procrastination and possibly self destruction itself. Maybe I've been busy who knows.. anyway I'm back and I've decided I need some kind of structure to write something useful as I'm still in the same nonsensical customer driven job that nobody really cares a bit about (mostly me) and I feel the need to reach into some kind of atmosphere of creativity, however futile it might be (lack of readers and possible self reflective narcissism haha) 

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness!
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run;
To bend with apples the mossed cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o'erbrimmed their clammy cells.

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reaped furrow sound asleep,
Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers;
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cider-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours.

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too, -
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing, and now with treble soft
The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

a celebration of the harvest and impending death of the crops the reap to sow. This and Byron's We Shall go No More A'Roving are filling my mind at the moment. I just hope to one day be able to write my own thoughts in some vague way as exquisitely beautifully. there are no words for how much I want to share my own work on here but I think I'm still a bit scared.

So.. I won't dwell on the last few months or should I? I'm not sure.. What have I done with myself.....? The mighty British Autumn has flown in and turned to Winter (albeit with many an afternoon spent reading Keats to myself and dwelling on the weather and it's, eek Alevel, pathetic fallacy) I don't want to start this off in a miserable light but I must admit there are certain things lacking.. certain people missing and certain things seemingly unattainable. An interesting job providing me with some kind of useful life experience (not one where one is consistently screamed at for something you have no control over... ) 

There have been several gigs.. mostly of friends of mine though most notably Of Montreal and their excellence and bizarreness.. We trekked (ok from Liverpool to Manchester it's not that far but you try waiting for the last train when it takes you to somewhere randomly in the suburbs of Liverpool and you have to wait for a myriad of taxis named after Greek letters to come and pick you up in the cold with your post gig sweat on.. not so pretty) to Manchester and squeezed into the smaller bit of the Academy student uniony place to be confronted with a giant Koy carp with AK47s attached to his arms, skeletons in trainset footie pjs.. men in zipped up onesies. and Kevin Barnes in all his bouncy glory wearing the most gorgeous appliqued jacket, turqoise cowboy boots with um tights and a pinny. That's all. sigh. What a treat. 

With incredible live tunes Suffer For Fashion and the ecstatic Heimdalsgate Like a Promethean Curse bouncing off the walls. Ironically the subject matter, no matter how depressing never fails to cheer you up, never fails to unite you with the two rather young indie pseudo emo boys behind you who seem to know every word to every song and the annoying girl in front of you who keeps elbowing the camera.. no matter.. everybody's been depressed and living vicariously through Barnes' self analogy of the pill popping approach to cheering up... C'mon Chemicals indeed. 

On this Remembrance Sunday, unfortunately being a bit ill I wasn't awake at 11 to be silent but I was Silently asleep, I always feel rather melancholic. As much as I'd describe myself in a pacifist light and am rather against war as a method for retrieval of any kind of semblance of humanity I always think of those without a choice, the two World Wars of those celebrated poets and those totally anonymously strewn somewhere in a foreign field.  The futility of those deaths due to negligence makes no sense to me, the deaths themselves were for us I understand that but were so many necessary when better judgement for those at the top could have saved the human lives that they probably saw as necessary fodder. I don't know I can't help it. I can't stop myself buying poppies I can't stop myself thinking of those that died and those that survived. For years after my family and I travelled to Arnhem in Holland from our suburban home in Naarden to take my Grandfather back to the site of his paratrooping, the site where he saved and helped so many and each year there were fewer men and women smiling proudly and staunchly in the Dutch fields.  Being taken over as a country itself the Dutch lacked no humility in parading these heroes that helped rescue them from Nazi regime and it always filled me with an immense sense of pride that they still cared. 

But this is also a day of Burmese freedom with such grace.. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/nov/14/aung-san-suu-kyi-burma-democracy

Anyway, I know I"m rambling about a bit but frankly I don't care, I'm rather enjoying have some kind of small vent to discuss with myself things in my own head haha and listen to 6music on a coldy and chilly Sunday afternoon. 

I have friends who believe this should be some kind of confessional, a sexcapade of sorts... a sort of Belle Du  Jour.. but 1 that would require a formal sense of prostituting myself which I'm not quite prepared to do.. yet. and 2. might require a lot more sex than there is though I must say the recent weeks have foretold some interesting shenanigans. If only I were to put them aside as one offs and decree that each and every man or woman I meet is a potential. Potential what I hear you cry? I'm not sure.  A potential lover, a potential lifesaver, a potential poet or perhaps just lacking in potential. I know I must come across as a massively um.. technical term for this might be Fucked Up Bitch.  After giving yourself away I found myself the other day deliberating why I felt so selfish of late, I always seem to want to do things for others and yet recently self preservation has kicked in two years too late.. haha. I don't like it. I liked not being a fucked up weirdo but selflessly giving away bits of self to make others feel better. I hope I still do sometimes I'm too honest I suppose. and self obsessed but who else have I got to be obsessed with at this point? My lovely flat is lovely yes but not  person, the men I pine for (the one who I sometimes catch myself staring at and then start an argument with instead of making any sense with, the one I flirt mercilessly with, the one well I can't think of anymore really...) well saying that I can think of one I wanted to see again.. 

The scene, so I don't forget in my latter years of dotage, a rather lacklustre Halloween party where everyone seems to be obsessed with their own medical semblance instead of enjoying themselves. giving into their own labels and not dressed up. We'd given up our own labels for the night, Zombie Sherlock Holmes and Wonder Woman respectively. So we sneak away, stopped briefly by cracked up looters and make it into town with little to no money and sneak into our favourite boat shaped club in the centre of Liverpool.  This is where we gatecrashed a stag weekend. What had been about 17 lads from Manchester had deteriorated into a motley group of about 5... and one had the beard of a devil and hair of an Angel.. blonde and blue eyed with a handwash only jumper that was about to get (fake) bloody.. And this is the reason I now own a moping version of eek Mumford and Son's Little Lion Man. We kissed briefly to this nonsense, very suitable as frankly he was like a little baby lion. Well to cut a long and self absorbed story short we ended up in the most depressing of venues, a strip club full to the brim of half naked girls selling their wares shaking their money makers and confusing my loins... should I find women like this attractive even when they break the fourth wall and bellow for some bog roll in the toilet... and whatnot but not getting very far as I had no money, didn't even pay to get in frankly... There was possible outing of colleagues and a frogmarched lion man kicked out.. So we retired to their rented flat (bear in mind there were a remaining 12 men somewhere stashed in there) and continued our night of serious drinking into the small hours discussing Joy Division and each other.. Getting to the point of talking and staring that you know things might happen the fluttering of blonde eyelashes and the meeting of moistened lips and gorgeous soft furry cheeks.. mostly when you sneak off to the toilet and get a slight little knock on the door and open it to find a wide eyed bearded man gorgeously kissing you.. and then running away in a pair of blood streamed brogues into a lift. Now to be graphic or not who knows. Mirrored walls make for interesting viewing when you're trying to stop concierge from getting into the lift with appendages throbbing in your mouth. Were their cameras god I hope so.. Having this bearded Joy Division worshipping fiend at my disposal in stopped lift was something beyond. and watching myself give him long and slow orgasms was heartstopping and moist making beyond belief.. yes beards are sexy and I'm deep in the depths of a Pogonophilia (look it up) frenzy but the nipple ring and tight pert everything was too much for me and we got a good look at the mirrored walls as we stopped only when the door opened to a ghost in the hallway, the only ghost at the party where those taken were taking others in deep and hallowed flicks of a tongue. 

but this was the moment of more than just passion when someone warms you up, sits on your feet curls up next to you and holds you sleeping in front of his friends (despite apparently having someone) then you want to hold onto them forever and not let go. keep their taste in your mouth as they sing 90s dance tunes to you in the haze of the midmorning Sunday morning cooling on the breeze as I stare out at the hazy Liverpool city centre and then back to the floppy haired creature curled up under Holme's cape warm and calming. 

and that is my obsession down in writing so as to stop it going around in my head. constantly. Like so many other things that I've tried to forget.. Sat inside on this cold and what looks like now rainy Sunday listening to old Blues songs and staring at the clouds, if you remember I do love clouds, they always look beautiful and are the one thing I cannot capture no matter how well I want to, I miss people and not just the general population but specifics. friends lost. and honesty. and fairness. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3b84zfPEe_g the Guitar is perfect.. I look for you in every passing car... the most heart ravaging loss in Win Butler's eyes.

Labels though are those things applied to them, they can't be objective. always subjective and the lost love are things that are always subjective. I think I've been watching too many films (I've gone on a bit of a French binge and bought Jules Et Jim, Les Enfants du Paradis, amongst others despite having no money) but for the first time yesterday, I watched, the Breakfast Club.  Not only does Simple Minds make me want to wail and dance simultaneously but Judd Nelson and their given honesty makes me cry inside. and out. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nAdaQhitdKg the first few beats of this song and the wail cannot be beaten.. I have been singing it all day and I don't want to diminish it by saying it's the best song to sing in the shower ever but it is. Retribution and loss 80s bratpack synth stylee.. What could honestly be better? Nothing. that is the Answer nothing! It makes me want to punch the air.. oh wait Is that the point?

Jarvis Cocker .. we are having a party myself and I.. I don't know what I'm listening to but it's incredible I might have to leave this poetic justice and find out.. I'm looking for it and I can't find it online damn you and your incredibly beautiful music. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1bB7aIrWhs I'm totally and utterly in love and my heart has stopped momentarily listening to this.

Sorry slight 6music interval there. I do tend to write in stream of consciousness and I'm confusing myself listening to Jarvis Cocker and his exquisitely deep tones. 

for example now There's A Storm A'coming by Richard Hawley has filled my small living room and I'm dozying around in the dark glutting my sorrow on the old men's blues. 

I can't help it, I seem to enjoy being melancholic, all I suppose I need is my Gin instead of my bottle of Night Nurse, a ripped blue velvet gown and a fag. and to be leaning and screaming out of my small balcony window. but instead I'm going to go and paint. You see I have this plan to get out of the banking gig and become an artist of great unappeal. See what becomes of me when I get to do something I actually enjoy. God forbid haha. 

Things I have been avoiding: Gym (though I have been) the emotional roulette that is my Ipod (listening to some songs on Arcade Fire's the Suburbs bring back forgotten and missed well things, and Suburban War and Ready to Start are achingly amazing..) bills.. though thankfully the last bit of post I got was the ticket I ordered for an Interpol gig and not my council tax overdue evilness.. 

painting.. I'm finding myself more and more annoyed by my own painting and I want to radically change it. hmm.. and writing this. but now I've started I'm so excited and much happier than I could possibly fathom. applying for my postgrad course (though since the protests I"m rather looking forward to being a student again)

and I'm going to ignore the remnants of la Fete Du Fromage a Friend and I had for well I'd say Dinner, but it was all through the day... Breakfast Club and cheese, Julie and Julia and cheese, Blue velvet and cheese (and slight freaking out. though I watched Mulholland Drive on my own.. melty man how you haunt my dreams and nightmares... so in comparison Blue Velvet was surprisingly normal.. Though Dennis Hopper you erstwhile genius you had the Suave fucker down.. only in dreams...)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9UWo8LJnqLc the hooker on top of the car is a vision of uncoordination.
Also if you happen to be in the Liverpool area and haven't done so yet go to the Biennial it's only on for another week or so and the entirety of the old Rapid building on Renshaw street is full of incredible items. The Rooms are thematically adjusted to be so creatively inspiring. There's a room of flags, every item has a flag painted on it or originally bought with a different flag on it and a mini UN children's set of chairs and tables painted with the flags.. a Marxist lounge full of books amidst the red walls and black sleek sofas, the heaven and hell of the mirrored ceiling (unlike previous ones I've mentioned) with people everywhere. a Hipster video.. that has to be seen to be construed They want everyone to be beautiful.. just stick with the madness it's worth it for their conceptual itemisations.
But my favourite room is one with thread attached to the walls where you bring in something to be fixed. but it creates its own pattern around the wall as the items are labelled and left on the desk still attached to the thread. The thread creating a creative web of illusion. I'll put a map in but go to the Bluecoat too (the ribbon room.. I don't want to give it away but if you are a ribbonophile like I am this room is swimming with heavenly goodness)

and just to point out that Jarvis has just put on quite possibly the sexiest song ever.... Down in Mexico... I have goose pimples and for a myriad of reasons linked to this song. and Dear readers, I'm running down to Mexico.. apparently there's a cat named Jose Cuervo who will make you forget all... I"m going back to the 50s.. See you down the diner. xx

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/
and if you tune in now he's playing the soundtrack of Clockwork Orange.. oh be still my synth sodden heart. xx

Are You Trying to Seduce me Mr Gainsbourg?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yRkovnss7sg  this is the truth, universally acknowledged. 


Bon soir mes petites...

I am fully aware that this has become a rather sporadic event, my blogging.. alas tis that I'm surely becoming an incomprehensible nonsense filled goon. Proof of this 1. I'm sure I'm losing my grammatical skills and conversational ones as well at that.. 2. I'm consistently worrying about either the boredom I have inflicted on my life or the boredom that has become my life. 3. I wish I was roaming Paris in big sunglasses sweeping through the streets to Shakespeare and co eating crepes. 4. I'm obviously becoming more logical as I've written things in list form. 5. I've been watching too many vampire related things both Buffy and Eclipse (yes I know I'm thoroughly ashamed of myself and the entire establishment that they represent) see http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/jul/12/charlie-booker-twilights-unscary-monsters for a rather entertaining Brooker downsizing of something I'm ashamed to almost like... (Desperate Romantics aside.. why must you belittle my guilty pleasures so Brooker.. why??!!?)

So in order to make this up to myself I"m going to go off on a rather exciting rant about the most amazing new album I've listened to this month or for that matter in the last few weeks, Time has no calling in this matter... anyway yes Highlight by the wonderfully maudlin National is my new favourite album.. I must admit this is largely due to a certain 6music dj playing it at around the same time each morning as the mournful moans seep into my brain gearing me to face yet another day of the ratrace and remembering how utterly emotionless some elements of life are (work) and how lovingly amazing it is to actually feel something (be it bitter despair or happy light). So the incessantly played song was indeed the lovely Anyone's Ghost that I must admit did hit home slightly... it would for anybody who possesses even the tiniest bit of Romantic (and romantic) bitterness in their bones.. Go out at night with your headphones on... that lost hazy feeling of sitting out in the dusky summer night listening to anything that makes your heart scream and soar at the same time. The clouds always look better when one's listening to lustful mourning.. the pining heart can somewhat hide behind them....http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2XnRl-m5QPI
Getting lost in your own thoughts but so lost in love and loss that you become a ghost of yourself... pretentious maybe.. beautiful and haunting..definitely..
However, twas not all gloom and doom with their album as I mistakenly read Lemonworld as Lemur world.. that would be more entertaining.. England is beautiful.. and Afraid of Everyone is a mist of youthful fear and that inexplicable worriesome thought you have that nobody quite understands...
further musings on this may or not be advisable when one is searching for a home (seriously, Oscar the Grouch is becoming my new role model) and when I'm a tad confused about life but I did drunkenly rediscover Neil Young's beautiful Heart of Gold from the exquisite Harvest album.. If you've ever taken advantage of the cheap gin and fumes in the Pilgrim (Liverpool) and then found lots of change in your wallet from constantly spending notes instead of the money you've already broken then attacked the juke box with vigour.. Me and Jukeboxes... the love that dare not speak it's name.. nah lies.. it is the most open and fulfilling relationship a young girl can know.. on another note I adore the High Violet album cover tis tres pretty...


On a more bolshy womanly note I've also taken to listening to Janis Joplin in the shower. If you've never sung Piece of my Heart into a bottle of Minty shower gel and irritating the entire alleyway below you have never lived.
Also you never saw my exquisite performance that happened on the eve of my birthday..
And so I'm 23 now.. when I wrote my last blog I was awaiting the actual hour of my demise cough sorry growing up and becoming a real adult.. Now I've been 23 for well over a month but I thought I'd share the fabulousness of my birthday night..
A small sparkly room full of the most shiny superstars on the planet<>.. Ah the memories. what a memory I must say it was an incredible night and thanks to everyone who was there and sang their little hearts out..
imagine if you will a Francophile Bowie atop a sofa doffing her reddened quiff and swigging from a bottle of Sav blanc whilst swaying and singing, out of time may I add, a duet of Sarsdedts Where do You Go to My Lovely.. a personal tribute to an unmentioned time and I must say I grinned all night.. and danced. and got rather warm in my jumpsuit.. but twas a night of excellence.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8XQZYIiNgo
Anyway I've neglected my knitting somewhat recently however, I'm coming up with ideas for my petit nephew's recent birthday.. he is a year older and I have celebrated a year of being a Graduate..

Yes this it the time I evolve, or devolve some might say, into my Dustin Hoffman phase (I have recently downloaded a lot of Simon and Garfunkel.. coincidence? I think not.. actually probably is)... that ennui he goes through, the sheer boredom and fear is always there.. who knows what to do when the world's at your feet and you've got so many places to turn that they eventually meld into one big nothingness.. they are all so possible that they become impossible and scary.. we are deep sea diving in a small pool, alone...

On at potentially more joyous note the World Cup is bloody over.. Yes I have actually enjoyed watching football for once.. England out.. but the team I wanted to win got to the final... Hup Holland indeed.. I have 1. got a massive crush on Sneijder 2 love me a bit of bright Orange and 3. feel the roots of my youth spent in the 'Dam coming out shouting "Ja hallo" at those silly Spaniards. (though When Cassillas cried it was very sweet) needless to say I used up my testosterone quota for a while (I must say a lot of shouty men in one room is quite a sexy experience...

as is Salma Hayek in From Dusk Til Dawn.. Sorry I watched it recently watched it and had a craving for Latina foot soaked whiskey of a vampire's tootsies.
mmmm..

Working my artistic skills in the office (and mostly out of it) I have downloaded Don McLean's Vincent (Starry Starry Night) a song that makes me want to lie in a field and watch it swirl.. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwE3VdZ_AHQ I'm working on painting the silliness in my head.. and on that note I shall put up a few videos and think of something more interesting to say next time...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0zAP2dUpAcA
download- National (and sneakily try and find some Arcade Fire Suburbs tracks cos I'm fucking gagging to hear it properly but I want to listen to the album the entire way through at least for the first time... awful habit I know but I'm hideously excited)
thinking about- the tattoo I want... it's French
as is the Movie I Most want to see-Gainsbourg.. yes. oh god yes, moi non plus... oui maintenant viens.... I am honestly in complete lust with Eric Elmosnino.. Je T'aime...Once I've seen it my entire next post will be about it... Attend.
Goodnight Kiddies


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UYxxgvA8rlM