It's finally getting closer and I'm getting a real sense of being on my way. My room looks more than ever like a tornado hit it, but I'm fairly confident that come Sunday most of that dreadful mess will squish into my rucksack to someday adorn the floor of my Japanese bedroom. I went to visit my grandparents yesterday who made me promise not to come home for the funeral if they died while I was away. Old people are so cheerful. Apart from making clear their funeral wishes, they were in good spirits. I got some great stories from Granda about the dangers of being a merchant seaman shipping goods to China in the 'fifties (no problem if you don't mind the police boarding your ship and pointing machine guns at you), the best way to outwit Liberian customs officials when you're in your underwear, and why it's a bad idea to hire zombies.
At the moment I'm loading all my CDs onto my new shiny iPod (so pretty) and wondering how I'd forgotten The It Girl by Sleeper was such a good album. I'm trying not to worry about the fact my passport hasn't turned up yet. If it isn't here tomorrow I'm in trouble.
I've got a mad day tomorrow - I'll be pacing the floor waiting for the post in the morning, then I'm going to Aberdeen to return Andy's DVDs and try to sell my old uni books (I swear they've been breeding) and see if anyone will take my shoddy old laptop off my hands. Then I'm going to go out with Lucy in the evening, which is always great fun.
On Saturday I'm going to spend the day running around like a headless hungover chicken trying to pack, then on Sunday I'm spending all day on the train (because I know how to have fun) and I'm staying with Kate (who I used to live with in Bangkok) on Sunday night. She has promised food and wine. I reckon Monday is going to suck: 5 a.m. start with a hangover, flight at 10. It'll all be worth it in the end - after Monday comes Tuesday.
Thursday, March 23, 2006
Wednesday, March 15, 2006
Strategic Leadership
My longsuffering brother has been trying to teach me how to play poker.
"I have... a pair of flushes."
"No you don't."
"Ok. And remind me, which is higher: flush or straight?"
"Flush."
"Right."
We are playing for pasta shells and this is the most I've handled raw pasta since primary 2. I'm fighting the urge to drown it in PVC glue and stick it to a smeary finger painting.
It might also be worth noting that this is now the fifth time my brother has tried to teach me poker. I think it's going the way of cryptic crosswords and bridge, joining my personal Room 101 list of Things I've Spent Hours Trying to Understand But Leave Me With The Feeling I Will Never Get Back The Wasted Time.
My luck improves when we switch to Texas Hold 'Em. I win the hand with 2 pairs and an ace. I rattle the pasta shells across the table. This isn't a bad way to unwind after a day of chronic beaurocracy.
It has been decreed from On High that our department is no longer City Development. We are now Strategic Leadership. This means at the top people can be promoted without having to demote anyone else (because that looks untidy and we want everyone to play nicely). When in doubt, call in the consultants and create a new department. This looks fine on paper but we quickly realise when we start answering the phones that this is a title no-one's bothered to say aloud up to this point.
"Good morning, stateege- strategiclip - city development." We can't answer the phone without laughing, and we can't say 'strategic leadership' without sounding like we've had several tequilas.
Of course, this begs the question of what strategic leadership actually means or does. Leads strategically? How? With a chessboard, sat nav or a piece of string? And if we only have strategic leadership now, this implies that earlier leadership was perhaps lacking strategy (like the Scotland football team). Did we have crap leadership, or barely adequate leadership? Wandering around in circles leadership or watching the clouds leadership?
Questions, questions. Thankfully I don't have to deal with them because I only have two more days of work and I think I can avoid answering the phone until then.
"I have... a pair of flushes."
"No you don't."
"Ok. And remind me, which is higher: flush or straight?"
"Flush."
"Right."
We are playing for pasta shells and this is the most I've handled raw pasta since primary 2. I'm fighting the urge to drown it in PVC glue and stick it to a smeary finger painting.
It might also be worth noting that this is now the fifth time my brother has tried to teach me poker. I think it's going the way of cryptic crosswords and bridge, joining my personal Room 101 list of Things I've Spent Hours Trying to Understand But Leave Me With The Feeling I Will Never Get Back The Wasted Time.
My luck improves when we switch to Texas Hold 'Em. I win the hand with 2 pairs and an ace. I rattle the pasta shells across the table. This isn't a bad way to unwind after a day of chronic beaurocracy.
It has been decreed from On High that our department is no longer City Development. We are now Strategic Leadership. This means at the top people can be promoted without having to demote anyone else (because that looks untidy and we want everyone to play nicely). When in doubt, call in the consultants and create a new department. This looks fine on paper but we quickly realise when we start answering the phones that this is a title no-one's bothered to say aloud up to this point.
"Good morning, stateege- strategiclip - city development." We can't answer the phone without laughing, and we can't say 'strategic leadership' without sounding like we've had several tequilas.
Of course, this begs the question of what strategic leadership actually means or does. Leads strategically? How? With a chessboard, sat nav or a piece of string? And if we only have strategic leadership now, this implies that earlier leadership was perhaps lacking strategy (like the Scotland football team). Did we have crap leadership, or barely adequate leadership? Wandering around in circles leadership or watching the clouds leadership?
Questions, questions. Thankfully I don't have to deal with them because I only have two more days of work and I think I can avoid answering the phone until then.
Monday, March 06, 2006
You Will Make a Fine Pair of Mittens, Cat
Dot, our next-door neighbour, dropped in to return a DVD. "Your cat's been in that tree for a while," she commented.
Me, Mum and Malcolm looked at the cat.
"She's fine," I said. The cat sat in a fork in the tree, looking stupid. It does that a lot. To be fair, she does also fall off things a lot and so probably isn't the best cat to sit in thin, whippy branches at the top of a tall flowering cherry tree.
"She's stuck," Mum groaned, watching as a bird landed on the next branch and snickered at the cat. "Go do something."
I went outside and started climbing the tree. The cat eyed me smugly as if to say, you look absurd. I realise this is revenge for the mice.
Biscuit is on a one-cat mission to rid the world of mice. I don't have a problem with cats eating mice (it's what they're there for), but Biscuit doesn't eat the whole mouse. No-one likes finding a mouse head under the table first thing in the morning. It came through the catflap with a mouse the other night, undetered by me yelling, "No! Eat it outside!" and let it run around the kitchen for a while before it escaped into the lobby. Cat chased the mouse under the edge of the front door, and I shut the cat in the livingroom so I could get rid of the mouse. Easy, I thought. I opened the front door and the mouse weaved unsteadily down the pavement, fur sticking out at strange angles and soaked in cat dribble.
I was reading the next morning and heard a faint scrabbling noise. No, more like a mousey nibbling noise, and very nearby. At first I thought it was under the floorboards, but then I realised it was in the room. I picked up Mum's handbag, took it to the back door, and very carefully peered inside. In the front pocket there was a small (entirely different) mouse nibbling a tampon. It had the good grace to look slightly embarrassed. The cat came to see what all the fuss was about, saw the mouse - ah, that's where it went - and leapt at the bag. Tampons spilled all over the step and the mouse tried to escape again. I grabbed the cat in one hand and the mouse in the other, struggling to keep them in my grip. I threw the cat into the kitchen and slammed the door, clapped my hands together to stop the mouse escaping too close to the house and, still in my pajamas, briskly took the mouse to the bottom of the garden. It hid behind a terracotta pot and didn't ask for the rest of its tampon back, which is just as well. The cat had sulked all day and seemed to be planning revenge.
"You're a bloody stupid cat," I told it, wedging my foot against a sturdy branch. The cat hissed at me and wobbled.
"Be careful!" Mum squealed. I think she was talking to the cat.
I tried to pick up the cat. It growled and tried to get its footing in a knot of honeysuckle which bent under the weight. Time for the big guns. I took the secateurs from my back pocket and started pruning the honeysuckle around the cat, who watched me with utter disdain. With enough of the honeysuckle out of the way, I lunged for the yowling cat, scooped her around the belly and dropped her down to Mum.
"Ow! Look at that. Little besom," Mum wiped the scratches on her arm. I half-climbed, half-fell out of the tree. The cat fluffed her voluminous tail at me as if to say, now we are even. She stalked off in the direction of the field, her favourite hunting ground for mice.
Me, Mum and Malcolm looked at the cat.
"She's fine," I said. The cat sat in a fork in the tree, looking stupid. It does that a lot. To be fair, she does also fall off things a lot and so probably isn't the best cat to sit in thin, whippy branches at the top of a tall flowering cherry tree.
"She's stuck," Mum groaned, watching as a bird landed on the next branch and snickered at the cat. "Go do something."
I went outside and started climbing the tree. The cat eyed me smugly as if to say, you look absurd. I realise this is revenge for the mice.
Biscuit is on a one-cat mission to rid the world of mice. I don't have a problem with cats eating mice (it's what they're there for), but Biscuit doesn't eat the whole mouse. No-one likes finding a mouse head under the table first thing in the morning. It came through the catflap with a mouse the other night, undetered by me yelling, "No! Eat it outside!" and let it run around the kitchen for a while before it escaped into the lobby. Cat chased the mouse under the edge of the front door, and I shut the cat in the livingroom so I could get rid of the mouse. Easy, I thought. I opened the front door and the mouse weaved unsteadily down the pavement, fur sticking out at strange angles and soaked in cat dribble.
I was reading the next morning and heard a faint scrabbling noise. No, more like a mousey nibbling noise, and very nearby. At first I thought it was under the floorboards, but then I realised it was in the room. I picked up Mum's handbag, took it to the back door, and very carefully peered inside. In the front pocket there was a small (entirely different) mouse nibbling a tampon. It had the good grace to look slightly embarrassed. The cat came to see what all the fuss was about, saw the mouse - ah, that's where it went - and leapt at the bag. Tampons spilled all over the step and the mouse tried to escape again. I grabbed the cat in one hand and the mouse in the other, struggling to keep them in my grip. I threw the cat into the kitchen and slammed the door, clapped my hands together to stop the mouse escaping too close to the house and, still in my pajamas, briskly took the mouse to the bottom of the garden. It hid behind a terracotta pot and didn't ask for the rest of its tampon back, which is just as well. The cat had sulked all day and seemed to be planning revenge.
"You're a bloody stupid cat," I told it, wedging my foot against a sturdy branch. The cat hissed at me and wobbled.
"Be careful!" Mum squealed. I think she was talking to the cat.
I tried to pick up the cat. It growled and tried to get its footing in a knot of honeysuckle which bent under the weight. Time for the big guns. I took the secateurs from my back pocket and started pruning the honeysuckle around the cat, who watched me with utter disdain. With enough of the honeysuckle out of the way, I lunged for the yowling cat, scooped her around the belly and dropped her down to Mum.
"Ow! Look at that. Little besom," Mum wiped the scratches on her arm. I half-climbed, half-fell out of the tree. The cat fluffed her voluminous tail at me as if to say, now we are even. She stalked off in the direction of the field, her favourite hunting ground for mice.
Sunday, March 05, 2006
Bucking Faltic
Snow wraps horizontally past the window, but it's been doing that a lot recently so I barely pay it any attention. I've had two days off work this week and been sent home early twice. There are some advantages to living in the sticks after all.
I went outside on Friday afternoon and made an experimental snowball. It packed perfectly. Hmm. I rolled the snowball a little. As it got heavier, it sank deeper and grew more quickly. Aha... In five minutes I had a ball of snow three foot high and it seemed a shame to waste it. I called for reinforcements.
"Come in the garden and help me."
"You're making a snowman."
"Of course."
"You're twenty-four."
"So?"
"You're making a snowman!"
"It's a perfectly sensible thing to do. It'll be fun."
"You're only asking because you won't be able to lift the head onto the body."
Damn. "If you help me with the snowman, I'll help you build an igloo."
My brother paused for a moment. "Deal."
The snowman turned into something of a six-foot snow hunk, but the igloo was beset with structural difficulties (I blame flimsy materials) and it sagged in a manner not unlike the Scottish parliament. It lasted a day and collapsed beautifully.
Mum has been away this weekend, so naturally me and my brother have trashed the house. Or rather, I've trashed the house. I managed to drop a glass of red wine in such a way that it bounced and sprayed wine everywhere, including my eyes, the carpet, the wall, the chair, and the ceiling.
"How the hell did you manage that?"
"Shut up. Ow. It stings."
The wine marks won't come off the wall - scrubbing removed the paint but left the wine. Mum will be convinced this is the product of some wild orgy. The worst part is I was only reading a book at the time. I lead a wild life, I do.
I went outside on Friday afternoon and made an experimental snowball. It packed perfectly. Hmm. I rolled the snowball a little. As it got heavier, it sank deeper and grew more quickly. Aha... In five minutes I had a ball of snow three foot high and it seemed a shame to waste it. I called for reinforcements.
"Come in the garden and help me."
"You're making a snowman."
"Of course."
"You're twenty-four."
"So?"
"You're making a snowman!"
"It's a perfectly sensible thing to do. It'll be fun."
"You're only asking because you won't be able to lift the head onto the body."
Damn. "If you help me with the snowman, I'll help you build an igloo."
My brother paused for a moment. "Deal."
The snowman turned into something of a six-foot snow hunk, but the igloo was beset with structural difficulties (I blame flimsy materials) and it sagged in a manner not unlike the Scottish parliament. It lasted a day and collapsed beautifully.
Mum has been away this weekend, so naturally me and my brother have trashed the house. Or rather, I've trashed the house. I managed to drop a glass of red wine in such a way that it bounced and sprayed wine everywhere, including my eyes, the carpet, the wall, the chair, and the ceiling.
"How the hell did you manage that?"
"Shut up. Ow. It stings."
The wine marks won't come off the wall - scrubbing removed the paint but left the wine. Mum will be convinced this is the product of some wild orgy. The worst part is I was only reading a book at the time. I lead a wild life, I do.
Monday, February 27, 2006
The Wedding Stapler
I'm grinding my teeth. I sit with three other support assistants (as us admin flunkies are euphemistically known), Laura, Louise and Lynsey. This is every bit as bad as it sounds. My name doesn't start with L so it was never going to work out. Lynsey is getting married in May and if that were all I'd heard about the greatest day in human history I would say hooray and well done, what a marvellous meringue.
Unfortunately I hear about this wedding every. Single. Day. She's sitting on my right, just out of arm's reach (more's the pity) and nattering in her peculiar nasal Aberdonian whine about how she got the bridesmaid's shoes in Next and they go really well with their pink dresses, and they've got these really cool favours but she can't face wrapping them because it's such a chore and speaking of chores she's got to go to the church and talk to the God-bothering minister about hymns even though she hates hymns and her Mum wants to invite these third cousins but she hardly knows them but once you've got that many guests a couple more won't matter, and by this point it's all I can do not to grab the stapler, pin her down on the keyboard and staple her mouth shut.
I hate weddings. The waste of a year's salary on a one day theatrical spectacular that you must enjoy on pain of death; the overeating; the queasy mixture of friends and relatives that should never have been forced to meet; the ridiculous dress that can never be worn again - and the simpering justification for this pointless waste is because it's the bride's special day. Bollocks. Every day is my day and I don't have to prove it to anyone.
Unfortunately I hear about this wedding every. Single. Day. She's sitting on my right, just out of arm's reach (more's the pity) and nattering in her peculiar nasal Aberdonian whine about how she got the bridesmaid's shoes in Next and they go really well with their pink dresses, and they've got these really cool favours but she can't face wrapping them because it's such a chore and speaking of chores she's got to go to the church and talk to the God-bothering minister about hymns even though she hates hymns and her Mum wants to invite these third cousins but she hardly knows them but once you've got that many guests a couple more won't matter, and by this point it's all I can do not to grab the stapler, pin her down on the keyboard and staple her mouth shut.
I hate weddings. The waste of a year's salary on a one day theatrical spectacular that you must enjoy on pain of death; the overeating; the queasy mixture of friends and relatives that should never have been forced to meet; the ridiculous dress that can never be worn again - and the simpering justification for this pointless waste is because it's the bride's special day. Bollocks. Every day is my day and I don't have to prove it to anyone.
Sunday, February 26, 2006
30 Days and Counting
I finally have a date to go out to Japan, an event that provoked much Tigger-like bouncing. I fly out on the 27th of March and start work about a week later. With the Inuyama festival and, well, not seeing BF for 4 months, I'm sure I'll find things to do with the time. I'll spend the weekend before I leave in London with Kate, my flatmate from last year in Bangkok, fearing for my sanity and my braincells. Kate parties hard. With any luck I should make it to the plane.
BF helpfully pointed out that if Nova had stuck to their original schedule, I would've been arriving in Japan tomorrow - a factoid that made me want to repeatedly smack my head off a hard surface. Time goes so slowly when you want to be five thousand miles away.
BF helpfully pointed out that if Nova had stuck to their original schedule, I would've been arriving in Japan tomorrow - a factoid that made me want to repeatedly smack my head off a hard surface. Time goes so slowly when you want to be five thousand miles away.
Wednesday, January 11, 2006
Feeling Peaky
I work as a temp for a council planning department. Mostly I file, update mail, and process planning applications. At the moment I want to bury myself in finnicky tasks to make time go and money come faster. I want to get to Japan, start my new job, see my boyfriend and do exciting things instead of counting the minutes until lunchtime. Everything is filed and I stand with my forehead against the window and watch people walking nine stories below. A plane bisects the glass and sky and, for the first time since I came back from Thailand in November, I want to be on it. January blues settle like a toad below my ribs.
I sustain three irritating injuries before noon: a splinter, a bleeding gouge from a file refusing to be filed, and an interesting barcode effect in one elbow after the stack of folders I was carrying slipped and sliced me as they fell. This is the point when I decide today is January Blues Day. Pass me my harmonica.
Melancholy is like crying. It does you good to indulge now and again. I wallow in self-pity and count the awful things that stack against me. My boyfriend is in Japan, so I curse the gods for our not getting together when we were at the same university. I suspect the gods had little to do with our choices of boy/girlfriends and the lucky timing that meant we were never both single, but that would be missing the point of January Blues Day. Mostly I just miss BF and wish I could talk to him now instead of doing crappy non-work.
I have no money. I loved the holidays when I had them and would have fought scrappily with anyone who tried to take away one day of my Christmas holiday, but in the cold light of January all I can see is skinny paychecks and the staggering cost of going to Japan. Eek. And that's before we even get into the duvet-clutching nightmare of student debt that will haunt me until I am a hundred and twenty-four. It's January Blues Day, so I allow myself a long-suffering sigh. Aaaah. God, that's good.
It's nine-thirty now, January Blues Day is nearly over. Normal service will be resumed tomorrow. That's something to smile about.
I sustain three irritating injuries before noon: a splinter, a bleeding gouge from a file refusing to be filed, and an interesting barcode effect in one elbow after the stack of folders I was carrying slipped and sliced me as they fell. This is the point when I decide today is January Blues Day. Pass me my harmonica.
Melancholy is like crying. It does you good to indulge now and again. I wallow in self-pity and count the awful things that stack against me. My boyfriend is in Japan, so I curse the gods for our not getting together when we were at the same university. I suspect the gods had little to do with our choices of boy/girlfriends and the lucky timing that meant we were never both single, but that would be missing the point of January Blues Day. Mostly I just miss BF and wish I could talk to him now instead of doing crappy non-work.
I have no money. I loved the holidays when I had them and would have fought scrappily with anyone who tried to take away one day of my Christmas holiday, but in the cold light of January all I can see is skinny paychecks and the staggering cost of going to Japan. Eek. And that's before we even get into the duvet-clutching nightmare of student debt that will haunt me until I am a hundred and twenty-four. It's January Blues Day, so I allow myself a long-suffering sigh. Aaaah. God, that's good.
It's nine-thirty now, January Blues Day is nearly over. Normal service will be resumed tomorrow. That's something to smile about.
Saturday, January 07, 2006
Karma and Suicidal Spiders
Lisa sat down and said, "There was a letter for you on the table."
"A good letter?" I said.
"From Nova."
"Did it look good?" The interview was three weeks ago. How could it be good?
"A4," she said like this confirms everything, but I am stubborn.
"Maybe they ran out of rejection letter-sized envelopes."
"A4 and fat."
"Maybe they wrote 'fuck off fuck off fuck off fuck off fuck off' over and over on ten sheets of paper to fill me with hope then crush me when I finally opened it."
"Maybe you got the job."
"It's possible."
I am wildly superstitious about interviews and pathologically afraid of them. I start being generous to beggars and avoiding cracks in pavements. I wash spiders down the drain accidentally on purpose all the time, but after interviews I hope being nice to them will swing the karmic scales in my favour. One turned up in the shower a week after the interview, and I took great care not to drown him. Unfortunately Stephano the Suicidal Spider chose to hang out by my shampoo bottle for a week before vanishing in mysterious circumstances and I feared I had failed some cosmic test, dashed away my teaching post in Japan and instead earned ten pages of fuck off.
I open the letter. "We are pleased to offer you a teaching position..."
Now I can resume my spider-drowning ways.
"A good letter?" I said.
"From Nova."
"Did it look good?" The interview was three weeks ago. How could it be good?
"A4," she said like this confirms everything, but I am stubborn.
"Maybe they ran out of rejection letter-sized envelopes."
"A4 and fat."
"Maybe they wrote 'fuck off fuck off fuck off fuck off fuck off' over and over on ten sheets of paper to fill me with hope then crush me when I finally opened it."
"Maybe you got the job."
"It's possible."
I am wildly superstitious about interviews and pathologically afraid of them. I start being generous to beggars and avoiding cracks in pavements. I wash spiders down the drain accidentally on purpose all the time, but after interviews I hope being nice to them will swing the karmic scales in my favour. One turned up in the shower a week after the interview, and I took great care not to drown him. Unfortunately Stephano the Suicidal Spider chose to hang out by my shampoo bottle for a week before vanishing in mysterious circumstances and I feared I had failed some cosmic test, dashed away my teaching post in Japan and instead earned ten pages of fuck off.
I open the letter. "We are pleased to offer you a teaching position..."
Now I can resume my spider-drowning ways.
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