Erattatatat

Firstly, just to ammend yesterday's rant, I will get used to this haircut, and it isn't anywhere near as bad as it looked during that first moment of facial pallor when it was all too tidy and blow-dried, but I reserve the right to moan about it for a few days more.

Secondly, the parental units arrived today and the first small truckload of materials have made their way to the new flat. Okay, carload... but they were all DVDs, CDs and Games, which I thought was quite a feat. Tomorrow everything else must go, but not in a horrible SALE type way which might imply I was getting rid of them...

I watched the end of the X-Files season 4 last night and immediately had to watch the start of season 5. Gethsemane is a crueler than cruel episode, second, perhaps, only to Farscape's Bad Timing. I would never have slept if I hadn't at least gained partial closure from Redux I, and as it was I still struggled.

I wish I could write such cruelty. To have my readers hanging on tenter(sp?) hooks, waiting for the next installment. Time will tell I guess.

Oh and I wrote an entire post of the surprinslgy long running Background Chain Fiction, Kyuuketsu to Kessen (Bloodsuckers and Bloody Battles - about vampires, demons and clan wars in a fantasy version of Feudal Japan: Sengoku) using the syllable structure of a traditional japanese Renku (5, 7, 5, 7, 7). I'm not really sure it worked and there was no good reason for it. Also it was the hardest post of my life. Still it's something to blog about, right?

Bad hair life.

I suggested that I might talk about my hair-related issues today. Well lucky you, I feel like unloading said issues upon this very (virtual) page. Let's start with some background.
My hair, as you can see in the (now out of date) photo above, is brown and very, very thick. It started off blonde and curly, but by the time I was about eight it had gone pretty dark and most of the curliness had left it years before even then. Even from a young age I recall hating my hair. I hated a hell of alot of other things about myself then, I'll admit, but the hair issue remains still, so I guess it must be pretty rooted (no pun intended). But why did I hate my hair?

Because it never looked right. Because mum liked to make it look worse (but isn't that the job of all mothers?). Because it liked to form annoying little tufts. Because everyone else thought it was wonderful (providing they were female and over 30). Because haircuts took so long. Because thinning can really really hurt. Because it caused me all manner of grief throughout secondary school where it was often the subject of ridicule. Because, sometimes, just sometimes, it looks great and it always gets messed up or loses something by the time it's on public display. Because how good it looks affects how good I think I look generally and it looking bad makes me feel awful and ugly.

Psychiatrists make of that what you will (just don't tell me your conclusions).
So this haircut on monday...

I've been dreading getting my haircut for a while now. I've kinda been growing it on and off sicne I started University, since I think I have one of those faces that is better viewed within a frame, if you'll indulge the rather conceited sounding analogy. Everytime I go home my parents and my brother ridicule it or command me to get it cut again. Last time I got away without doing so, but then ahd to shorten it a bit for work (a small disaster in and of itself). Then up to monday it had grown to it's longest yet and apart from being a bit too thick and scruffy, I really liked it. I knew that I needed it cut for my Graduation, at least so that it could be neat, but I hadn't yet found a barbers/hairdressers that I could actually trust with my long hair. I was terrified I'd find the wrong one. And guess what?

Sitting there, on the chair watching my hair get snipped away, I was worried. Then I saw myself and it looked okay and I was like, "Tidy that up a bit and it'll be fine"... If only I'd actually said that. I look at myself a while later and think, "Oh God! I look like one of the beatles!" But I reassured myself that this is only an intermediate phase and all will turn out okay. Then the guy took out the mirror and asked me if thit was alright and my face just paled. Eventually I told him that it was indeed fine (because I'm too polite and because there wasn't really anything he could do to save it) and I fumbled for the money in my wallet, handing it over with a shake and leaving the store as quickly as possible. Then I walked home at that speed one is only capable of doing when you feel the full force of angry embarrassment (something I had also experienced a few days prior to this after beign hit by an egg thrown from a student flat as I walked home from Eruntane's) and retreated into the bathroom before applying vast quanities of Brylcream wax to disguise the horror I had been given.

What makes it so much worse is that people keep complimenting it... It worries me that people think I can look good with, that I can suit, a haircut I so despise. It's like the feeling of horror I get hearing my voice on recording after not hearing it for a while and thinking "Everything anybody ever said about me is justified by that voice. If only they could all hear the voice I hear and see the me I see."

Of course if everyone did then I'd probably lose as many admirers as I'd gain. I have to be thankful that people do see me differently from me, because I'd never love myself the way other people can. And missing out on that would be terrible. Plus many of things I probably thinka re "great" about me are possibly lies anyway. We never really see our true selves, even fi we think we are the sole keepers of such a conception. No one see's all of a person, except (if you believe in such a thing, I do) God. If He manages to love you after seeing the spiritual equivalent of the Full Monty, then He must be pretty cool, right?

And whoah, how did a talk about hair get so deep? Time to call it a night I think...

If I said I was busy, would you believe me?

Most humble apologies for the extended absence from blogging but:

-I've been working alot recently.
-I've had very little of interst to say.
-I've been feeling very lazy (as usual).
-I've been trying to catch up on my X-files watching.

And so on...

Yeah so it's one week and one day after my last post. Sheesh, doesn't time fly when your busy trying to survive a SALE at work? It doesn't? kuso...

Ok, so what's news worthy this week?

We had a flat warming party tonight, even thjough we aren't compeltely moved in to the new place yet. There was much sushi and cheesecake and I felt satisfied that it went pretty well.

I've been asked to be the Best Man at the distant wedding of the Other One and the Doctor, which is exceedingly exciting and honouring news, whikst also being darn terrifying... Me+Responsibility+Public Speaking=Mental Breakdown.

I've come up with an idea for a breif narrative poem inspired by baby bunny rabits (or baani-chan as we like to call them). Funnily enough for me, it's going to be dark and little scary and plenty with the weird. But it will have a kawaii baani-chan in it, so everyone's a winner.

No luck so far on the job-hunting front.

I got my hair cut and whilst Eruntane reassures me that it isn't, I still believe it to be the worst hair cut in the world, ever, barring none! It's just in time for my Graduation next Tuesday, hurrah! I may elaborate on it tomorrow if i have less tot ype about and more inclination. Night!

...and...

A new stereo;
New beeding;
New storage, and, finall;
New inspiration!!!

Double ugh.

The List of *NEW*

Very soon I need to acquire:

A new mobile phone;
A new laptop;
A new Nintendo DS or PSP;
A new pair of glasses;
A new haircut and;
A new job.

Ugh.

A Fate Worse Than Anglicanism....

Random title... It comes from a conversation I had with Eruntane last night about how I would make a terrible Vicar, a point we both agreed whole heartedly on. Still I'm amused to imagine what my Parish would be like (Mental Note, remember these imaginings for when you finally get around to writing CONFESSION).

In other news, the Green One and I appear to have actually got ourselves a flat for the next year. All I need now is a job to pay for the rent.

In other, other news, my CDs arrived this morning: Hurrah! I have ULTRA BLUEd and now I shall Dragon Quest VIII.

I bid you adieu!

A Handful of Darkness...

Wow, two posts in one day. Can you tell I'm feeling guilty and irresponsible?
Anyway this evening was worthy of blogdom as Eruntane, the Green One and I went to see Dylan Moran perform his stand-up stylings at the Aberdeen Music Hall. It was most amusing, with some chocie descriptions I mostly can't remember :( due to being rather tired throughout (for no apparent reason, hmm - paranoia of weeks gone by is kicking in again, entirely unjustly, stupid paranoia) but I do remember his comments on Aberdonian winter:

"You can open up the Hotel window, stick your hand out and grab and handful of darkness."

I like the way this man thinks.

In other news, my little foray of this morning (now proof-read and corrected at the request of Eruntane) has lead me to think that, while my laptop is dead (oh yeah, that happened) and Darksyde is therefore beyond my reach, I could focus my writing energies on the fictional city of Cadreden. Cadreden would be everything I've ever imagined Aberdeen might be; dark, creepy, full of secrets and plots and strange locations that hold more meaning than they might first seem. Cadreden would at the same time be everything Aberdeen currently is; thriving, beautiful, cold and grey.
For those interested in the origins of the city name, Cadreden is how Aberdeen first appeared in the predictive text of my old Nokia. I always figured it should be the name of a fantasy city (and indeed in the idea for my other "on hold" novel, The Dream, there was a city called Cadredin - the I being required to make it fit a language pattern).
Now all I need do is sit down and right soemthing. A hard thing to convince myself to do on someone else's laptop.

A Short Story Around Every Corner...

Apologies (again) for my not blogging last night, but it seems I just can't find anything interesting to say about anything at the moment. Having said that, there was a minor event this morning I felt worthy of relating to you, so I shall:

After the Green One and I had perused through the corridors and rooms of another set of flats (makes them sound like mansions doesn't it?) I had to take a different route home via our nearest ASDA supermarket. This meant travelling along Union Street, Aberdeen's central shopping district, and then down past Castlegate, the old central square of the city, and onto Beach Boulevard, which surprisingly enough, heads towards the beach. This lead to some random explorations in both the physical and mental planes of existence and the inspiration for various possible writings.

Firstly, at Castlegate, I was admiring the Mercat Cross, a monument made up of a circle of arches carved into what might be sandstone but which is now a dark black. It's quite a striking piece and it dates back to the City's earliest origins, marking some agreement or other nearly a millenium ago. Anyway as I walked past it I started imagining the arches as gateways to some other place and what if that really were the case, that some work of arcane magick (the k is neccesary, honest) could be situated at the end of a prime piece of high street shopping.
I thought about this as I wandered on down past the Salvation Army Citadel (an oddly turreted building that always makes me think of fantasy more than reality) and onto Beach Boulevard.
I have walked this way to ASDA at least once before and I was always intrigued by the little streets that head off from it (towards the harbour) which I had never explored and had trouble imagining what their contents might be. On a whim I picked one of these streets (Hannover Street I believe) and followed it down towards it's conclusion. This turned out to be the bottom of a road I had only just left, but beside it was another road which lead vaguely beachwards so I followed it and, rather than taking the street I had originally intended to bring me out beside ASDA, I found myself lured away by the sight of a church tower. Following these industrial backstreets, lined with various builder's merchants and harbour support services I found myself wandering into an Aberdeen I knew logically must exist (its harbour has been its central soul since it was first founded and is obviously crucial to the modern North Sea oil industry), but which I had barely experienced. Looking over my shoudler I could see the Citadel and the clock tower of the Sheriff's Court (also very turretous and fantastic), reassuring me that I was still in the same city, but all around me there were warehouses and signs of a culture compeltely alien to me, built on services and supplies I had nothing to do with. I felt like an intruder.
Still the Church Tower lured me on. It had a fine detailing at the top and a shroud of trees which made it seem very incongruous amidst all the angled, corrugated-iron rooftops.
Then I rounded a corner and there it was, St. Clement's churchyard. It was filled with well-kept graves and a sign told me that it was open for visitors, so I stepped in through the cast-iron gate and felt its silence englulf me.
As I approached the church building itself I realised something was amiss. It appeared boarded-up and the stained glass windows were hidden behind mesh coverings. A sign in fluroescent yellow on the board door informed me that CCTV camera's were in operation. I casually circled the building, staring at all the unfamiliar signs of its abandonment and saw parts of it covered in grafitti as well as further warnings that CCTV cameras would be watching me.
Ideas began to form in my mind. A Church, hidden away in a district that had no need for such an anachronism, for surely this church had once been for sailors and their families, but now it was lost amidst warehouses and chemical facilities. Something was going on there, something that meant people made sure it looked clean and tidy, well-kept, with neatly cut grass, but were concerned that no one should enter.
Expect a story about it soon :P

Ass(or/aul)ted Toys.

I played with toys in work today and whistfully dreamt of buying some (I'd left my wallet at home).

Otherwise it was a pretty straight-forward day. There was watching of X-Files (poor cigarette smoking man) and Aliens bonus features (Brits + early James Cameron = good film + bad relationships). There was also posting, involving my favourite pastime, worldcrafting. I had a bit of fun with this one, although the images I wanted to use had been in my head for the past two weeks and so, to some extent, it was just about putting them in in the right order with the right words. I think I was reasonably succesful.

My CDs have been posted! Wooh!

By Hook Or By...

Well as I mentioned in my last update, I was going to go out dressed as Captain Hook. It happened. There's photographic evidence and everything. I had a silly costume on and my hair and beard all waxed up (still trying to wash it out). Still the most amusing part of the evening (costume wise) was walking back to Eruntane's flat in itm getting assaulted by a drunken footbal fan, sung at (Don't You Ever - Adam and the Ants) by some other drunken gentlemen and being chatted up by a man dressed in fairy wings and face paints...
Other news of worth that night (indeed very exciting news) was that after a day of hillwalking The Doctor and The Other One returned somewhat engaged. Not sure how that happened, but the ring was very pretty and the Doctor was grinning inanely for some time afterwards.

Yesterday I was invited around to have a dinner at the home of one of the members of Eruntane's church. The food was fantastic and the weather was good. The conversation was also intersting, awkward though it was at times and chaired by the intimidating "Scary Professor" who I found immensely likable, in spite of the fear factor.

I'm verging on laconic at the moment aren't I?

Ich Trinke Champers mit Laschfisch (Thanks Franz ferdinand)

I've been getting awfully lazy with these blog updates haven't I? Bad Seraph, Bad, Bad Seraph!
Anyway, it's mainly because I keep getting lost in various events occuring elswhere online, like message boards and MSN messenger conversations and by the time I have concluded the best part of those I'm too tired to care about what happened to me. Knowing that hardly anyone is reading this isn't a great incentive either, but hey, I promised more details about Thursday, so here they are:

Thursday was, as has perhaps already been said, an odd day. I went in to Uni first to take part in a class photo (something I wasn't all that sure I really wanted to be part of), but for some reason was running a hour ahead of schedule so found myself reading message boards and chatting on MSN (as usual) whilst various members of my 'class' drifted in to the computer room to join me. We chatted, then we went to get our picture taken and waited about half an hour standing around like moron whilst the external examiners (who for some reason were to be part of the picture as well - ???) finished their lunch. We of course had had no such luxuries and were desperate to allieviate our hunger. Fortunately by about half 2 (the photo was supposed to be over by 2 at the latest) we were free to do just that, so we bought ourselves some slightly overpriced Ginster's sandwiches and wraps and sat in the Cruickshank botanic gardens enjoying the weather, the banter and fearing our soon-to-be-determined fates.
This too was (bien sur) delayed by the external examiner's luncheon, but by twenty to five we were being called into the Zoology Building's crowded foyer to be handed an ominous looking envelope.
I received mine after a friend who had wanted to get into Vetinary College but was pretty certain she wouldn't get the required 2-1. As I took my envelope I saw her crying into her boyfriend's shoulder. I was distraught. Could it really be that bad? I clutched my envelope in concern. Then I saw her jump up and down, still crying hysterically and I began to get confused. Was this good? Bad? Buh?
Fearing the consequences of speaking to her just yet I took myself aside and opened my envelope, pulling out the first piece of paper within.

"Cheese and Wine!?"

Aha, wrong piece of paper. instead of the one telling me how I would fare in the world of graduates, this was one saying that we were all invited to enjoy the above perishables in the cruickshank gardens before our graduation with the usual parental units. I put it back in the envelope and took out the next sheet. This one was made of better paper and looked both reassuringly and ominously official.

Degree Classification: Lower 2nd Class

After a few seconds of translating this into soemthing I could actually udnerstand I nodded, accepted my fate and wandered aimlessly towards people I knew. In truth I was a little bewildered. A 2-2 was the very best I had been expecting, but I couldn't really say I had been hoping for it. I had trained myself in apathy so well that when I finally received the result, I just didn't care, but everyone around me was exploding with emotion and here I was, a little island of confusion and silence.
I met up with another classmate who informed me that he too had recieved a 2-2, so I was somewhat relieved that I wasn't alone in this category, and then I went over to the Vetinary wannabe and discovered that she had managed a 2-1 after all and my confusion became further complicated by the immense feelings of pride and joy for her, contrasting bizarrely with my internal mutedness.
Eventually we went back out to the gardens and I rang my mother. A Transcript of the covnersation would appear thusly:

ME: I GOT A 2-2.
MOTHER: Huh?
ME: IT MEANS I PASSED, IT'S GOOD!
MOTHER: OH? SO HAVE YOU FOUND A FLAT YET?

You've gotta love the down-to-earth pragmatism of a parent, right?

Next there was chapagne. Generally I don't drink. I don't really like alcohol and I don't want to get drunk, but I like champagne and I don't begrudge a little celebration, so champagne there was and I drank it. 2 glasses to be precise. Which is alot for me, although not alot in the sense that it was intoxicating, especially since the stuff we were drinking was so cheap as to possibly not have any real alcohol in it, still...
Afterwards we went to someone's house for pizza, snacks and more champagne (just one more glass, and about 3 hours after the first two, so again no danger of drunkenness for me - less could be said for some of the others) and I came to realise that my one regret for my four years at uni is not, as I thought it might be, not working hard enough to achieve the 1st I possibly could have achieved, but is in fact not getting to know my classmates as well as they deserved. My usual outsider attitude has done them a disservice. Still, there's a while before graduation and we plan to do a few other things by then, so that'll be fun.
Now for today: I have work, then I have to dress up as Captain Hook. I live a very odd definition of life, don't I?

On Earning a Tutu/Gravegull

I got my results today. I got a 2-2. It's not a fantastic result, but it's still quite good and is more than i deserve. Many of my friends got 2-1's but I'm nto jealous. they really worked for theirs and earned it. I am justly proud of them and pleasantly surprisded formsylf as well as comfortable that the universe hasn't given me too much more than I deserve. I don't feel guilty.
It's been an odd day, worth blogging about, but I;m shattered now, so here's the bare bones of a poem I was inspired to write today:

Gravegull

He dances
Like a clown,
Marching
Back and forth,

King and beggar,
Pacing his,
Court, his
Net, his
Patch. His

White, ghost
White feathers

Like blossoms,
Like prayers,
Like tears, as

They fall,
Past the names,

And land
In a heap,
In a wreath.

Listing Again

Apologies for delays in blogging, but since my little song, below, I just haven't found anything worthy of blogging happening in my life. To summarise the last few days:

I have watched the end of Last Exile (it was quite good)
I have read lots of Lucifer (it's brilliant)
I have played a reasonable amount of Dragon Quest (it is, as always, fantastic)
I have bought DVDs (oops)
I have read some stuff by Poe (it's all a bit bizarre)
I have eaten copious amounts of toast with chocolate and hazelnut spread (mmmn)
I have thought about writing (current short story idea involves vampires in Prohibition Era Chicago)
I have watched LOST (wow)
I have watched ALIEN (also wow)
I have watched half of Immortal Ad Vitam (Huh?)
I have viewed a flat (it's number 19)
I have recorded various songs (lalalala)
I have joined a Silent Hill forum (creepy)
I have had lunch on campus (sunny)
I have received my tickets for the graduation ball (ticketish)
I have had weirdly cool dream (inspiring the previous short story idea and, well, weirdly cool)

That's about it really. Tomorrow I get my exam results. Eep.
Added a new link to a friend's blog, Askelsyand this time dedicated to her brilliant artwork and her future plans for a graphic novel. Woohoo!

Fall.

Today was a nice relaxing day, but really not blog worthy, so here's a poem/song thing possibly inspired by Last Exile:

Fall.

Falling
In a sea of clouds,
I dream
And I'm not waking up.

Drifting
In these skies of blue,
I cry;
Am I filling the cup?

Aching
As the winds pass me by,
I scream;
It's breaking apart.

Melting
In the gaze of the sun,
I try
Not to smother my heart.

But the winds keep on changing
And the clouds dissapear,
There's nothing that's holding,
Nothing keeping me here
So I fall...

Aiming
For the glittering sea,
I wait
For the pain of impact.

Daring
Those white, wheeling gulls,
I shout,
And they're screaming right back.

And the ocean's expanding
As the cloud's dissapear,
And in dreams of safe landings
Are those waves that I hear?
Let me fall...

No boundary
And no limit
No horizon
To keep straight
No runway
And no guide-lights
No flight plan
And no wait
No cushion
And no safety
No glider
And no blades
But I know I'm gonna make it
I'll be riding on the waves...

And the winds are dying down
As the clouds dissapear
I know the sky is ending now
The final seconds near
As I fall...
Only fall...
Let me fall...

The smell of smoke in my hair...

Sorry for not updating last night (or the night before) but at least in the case of last night I was too tired to do so having just come back from a long walk and a barbeque at the beach!! It was wonderful:

Sunset and burnt food
Ripples in the river flow
As the swans pass by.

Yes the bit of beach we had chosen was right at the mouth of the river Don and a flotilla of swans (8 of them, but one seemed to be a bit reclusive) drifted near us by a sand bank, just before the waves of the north sea broke the stillness of the water.
Further out a large tanker remained anchored opposite the harbour. When the sun set and the night got colder it was lit up like a little island and was yet another pleasant sight to view from our little campfire, which we kept going until after 11. There were burgers, sausages, posh crisps, roasted marshmallows, melted tea-cakes (as an experimental marshmallow subsitute) and the all pervading smell of smoke. It was great.

The river by the bridge
The smell of smoke in my hair
Distant city lights.

The prescient's can't predict a no-day, but I can...

In the style of Fank Herbert, this was very much a no-day (much like my non-days of a month or so ago). Not that it was a bad day, per se, just that it really doesn't feel worth blogging about. I watched an ep of the X-Files, three eps of Last Exile and played some Dragon Quest. Apart from work and an evening of Ligretto, mints and Noir, that was it. Sorry folks, the dullness is spreading.