Although they want me to stay in a hotel down in Cheadle next week, and the week after that, and the week after that, while I'm learning the job. Funnily enough, one of the other new people is Patrick who used to work at Parkhouse for a few months a year or so ago, so I wasn't entirely surrounded by complete strangers. I've got a headache, presumably as a result of more or less working today for a change, or possibly the stress of a new job, or maybe I'm under telepathic assault by space aliens, I don't know. But for the rest of this week we're going to Cheadle on a minibus every morning and back in the evenings - spending four hours on the road in total and a bit less than that actually at work.
Anyway, enough of this accountant-talk. I've just been watching a new cartoon called Robotboy about, well, a robot boy. It's quite good, if not an all-time classic. There's a new series of Foster's Home For Imaginary Friends too, which is an all-time classic, so I'm happy. And then there's the second half of one of tonight's football matches while playing othello online. Perfect new-job-stress relief!
Tuesday, November 01, 2005
Monday, October 31, 2005
Witches bad, pumpkins good
There was a really good cartoon called 'Pumpkin Moon' on Sky yesterday, chronicling the great Halloween conflict between pumpkin lanterns and toy witches.
Which is a small comfort, but doesn't entirely stop me being scared about starting a new job tomorrow. What if it's nasty? So, in an attempt to ignore the whole thing and wallow in old childhood memories, I've been embarking on a train of thought set off by Scholiast's train of thoughts relating to her birthday.
It occurred to me that while I can't remember my sixth birthday party, I can remember writing about it in school the following day. Or rather, not writing about it. I got as far as something like "Yesterday it was my birthday. Robert Brown, Robert York, Robert Hodgson..." and then got lost in reminiscences about the party and the interesting fact that my three best friends were all called Robert, and didn't write anything else. The Roberts wouldn't have been the only ones at the party - I always had six guests at these things, that being the number of screaming children my parents had decided they could cope with. And that must have been quite a feat in itself - me, six other six-year-olds and my brother being four and doubtless embarrassing to virtually-grown-ups like us.
I'm pretty sure Juliette Wilson, who lived down the road, would have also been there. Possibly also James Small, if he was at the school at that time and friends with me (I can't quite remember), but I don't know who else might have made my priviliged guest list. It was the done thing to invite Gavin Barnes to parties, but I have a feeling that at the age of six (and having only been at my new school for a month) I hadn't quite realised the importance of getting in with the coolest kid in the class, so I don't think he was there.
This provokes further memories about Robert Brown, who I remember practically nothing about. He and I were both new at Clinton Park school that year - my first year of primary school was at Tumby Woodside school, which closed down at the end of the year and forced its 28 pupils to the schools up in Coningsby and Tattershall. I went to Clinton Park, where my dad was a teacher, while most of the rest went to Coningsby, so I was forced to find a new best school friend to replace Robert Hodgson.
Not being a naturally sociable type even then, at playtime I found a spirally snake painted onto the tarmac playground and amused myself by running around in circles on it until Robert Brown came up and started a conversation: "What are you playing?" "Running." "Can I play?" "Yes." And we were best friends after that. But then he moved away almost immediately afterwards and I never saw him again. Clinton Park's pupils were mostly the children of people attached to RAF Coningsby, so people were always coming and going when their fathers got posted to another base. Even so, most people stuck around for more than a few months, so I don't know what was going on there. I shifted my best-friendship allegiance to Robert York, and we were inseparable for the next few years until he moved away too - and even then we wrote to each other for a while and a few years ago got in touch through Friends Reunited.
Robert Hodgson, meanwhile, I met again when we both went to the grammar school and found that we didn't have anything in common any more, so we didn't hang out together. But I haven't the faintest idea what became of Robert Brown, or whether we'd find something to talk about if we met up again today. He's unsurprisingly not on Friends Reunited for Clinton Park, and you can't really Google someone with such a boring name unless you want to read a million articles in the hope that they'll mention where the subject went to primary school for a few months in 1982. It'll just have to remain one of those mysteries.
Which is a small comfort, but doesn't entirely stop me being scared about starting a new job tomorrow. What if it's nasty? So, in an attempt to ignore the whole thing and wallow in old childhood memories, I've been embarking on a train of thought set off by Scholiast's train of thoughts relating to her birthday.
It occurred to me that while I can't remember my sixth birthday party, I can remember writing about it in school the following day. Or rather, not writing about it. I got as far as something like "Yesterday it was my birthday. Robert Brown, Robert York, Robert Hodgson..." and then got lost in reminiscences about the party and the interesting fact that my three best friends were all called Robert, and didn't write anything else. The Roberts wouldn't have been the only ones at the party - I always had six guests at these things, that being the number of screaming children my parents had decided they could cope with. And that must have been quite a feat in itself - me, six other six-year-olds and my brother being four and doubtless embarrassing to virtually-grown-ups like us.
I'm pretty sure Juliette Wilson, who lived down the road, would have also been there. Possibly also James Small, if he was at the school at that time and friends with me (I can't quite remember), but I don't know who else might have made my priviliged guest list. It was the done thing to invite Gavin Barnes to parties, but I have a feeling that at the age of six (and having only been at my new school for a month) I hadn't quite realised the importance of getting in with the coolest kid in the class, so I don't think he was there.
This provokes further memories about Robert Brown, who I remember practically nothing about. He and I were both new at Clinton Park school that year - my first year of primary school was at Tumby Woodside school, which closed down at the end of the year and forced its 28 pupils to the schools up in Coningsby and Tattershall. I went to Clinton Park, where my dad was a teacher, while most of the rest went to Coningsby, so I was forced to find a new best school friend to replace Robert Hodgson.
Not being a naturally sociable type even then, at playtime I found a spirally snake painted onto the tarmac playground and amused myself by running around in circles on it until Robert Brown came up and started a conversation: "What are you playing?" "Running." "Can I play?" "Yes." And we were best friends after that. But then he moved away almost immediately afterwards and I never saw him again. Clinton Park's pupils were mostly the children of people attached to RAF Coningsby, so people were always coming and going when their fathers got posted to another base. Even so, most people stuck around for more than a few months, so I don't know what was going on there. I shifted my best-friendship allegiance to Robert York, and we were inseparable for the next few years until he moved away too - and even then we wrote to each other for a while and a few years ago got in touch through Friends Reunited.
Robert Hodgson, meanwhile, I met again when we both went to the grammar school and found that we didn't have anything in common any more, so we didn't hang out together. But I haven't the faintest idea what became of Robert Brown, or whether we'd find something to talk about if we met up again today. He's unsurprisingly not on Friends Reunited for Clinton Park, and you can't really Google someone with such a boring name unless you want to read a million articles in the hope that they'll mention where the subject went to primary school for a few months in 1982. It'll just have to remain one of those mysteries.
Sunday, October 30, 2005
Memory loss
While I was memorising thousands of binary digits this morning, part of my brain was adding up how much money I've got and working out what to do with it. I remembered that I'd spent a fairly significant amount of money some time in the last couple of weeks, put it on the Barclaycard and thought it was a good thing I was getting this extra money at the end of the month, because otherwise it would have stretched my monthly pay a bit. But I couldn't remember for the life of me what this expenditure was for.
I spent absolutely ages racking my brains, trying to work it out. I knew it was something unavoidable, not a regular monthly payment but something that I had to pay every now and then, and for about a hundred pounds, but what could it be? Okay, I'm pretty relaxed about my money, but could I really have spent such a lot of it and forgotten? After running through every kind of household expenditure and tax I could think of, I'd just about come to the conclusion that I must have either dreamt the whole thing or been hypnotised into handing over my hard-earned cash to Paul McKenna. I gave up and decided to wait for the Barclaycard statement to see if that would remind me, then took my glasses off to clean them and remembered - "Oh yes, the new glasses!"
I'm not sure what the moral to this story is. You can still become world memory champion even if you've got a memory like a sieve? I really am so relaxed about my money that I can spend it and not consciously register it? My memory is going as I spiral helplessly towards thirty years of age? I really was hypnotised, possibly by an evil optician like in 'The Miserable Mill' by Lemony Snicket? Or perhaps I'm just plain mad.
In other news, I've been spending quite a lot of time lately playing othello/reversi at Kurnik, a Polish games website where you can play just about any weird game you like, without downloading things or signing your life away. It's where all the cool othello players hang out nowadays, and I've been sort of meaning to start playing there for ages now, but only just got round to it (and then only because I was bored stiff at work). But the whole site really does deserve a plug - not many people go out of their way to provide a place where you can play connect 4 with people from all over the world.
Also, Kurnik is Polish for henhouse. I think that's an excellent name for a website.
I spent absolutely ages racking my brains, trying to work it out. I knew it was something unavoidable, not a regular monthly payment but something that I had to pay every now and then, and for about a hundred pounds, but what could it be? Okay, I'm pretty relaxed about my money, but could I really have spent such a lot of it and forgotten? After running through every kind of household expenditure and tax I could think of, I'd just about come to the conclusion that I must have either dreamt the whole thing or been hypnotised into handing over my hard-earned cash to Paul McKenna. I gave up and decided to wait for the Barclaycard statement to see if that would remind me, then took my glasses off to clean them and remembered - "Oh yes, the new glasses!"
I'm not sure what the moral to this story is. You can still become world memory champion even if you've got a memory like a sieve? I really am so relaxed about my money that I can spend it and not consciously register it? My memory is going as I spiral helplessly towards thirty years of age? I really was hypnotised, possibly by an evil optician like in 'The Miserable Mill' by Lemony Snicket? Or perhaps I'm just plain mad.
In other news, I've been spending quite a lot of time lately playing othello/reversi at Kurnik, a Polish games website where you can play just about any weird game you like, without downloading things or signing your life away. It's where all the cool othello players hang out nowadays, and I've been sort of meaning to start playing there for ages now, but only just got round to it (and then only because I was bored stiff at work). But the whole site really does deserve a plug - not many people go out of their way to provide a place where you can play connect 4 with people from all over the world.
Also, Kurnik is Polish for henhouse. I think that's an excellent name for a website.
Saturday, October 29, 2005
Anthology of Interest
Okay, it seems everyone wants me to do this documentary. Fine. If he does turn out to be evil, it'll be your fault. So, having decided that, I'd better get on with writing my books, so they can be launched to tie in with the theatrical release of this oscar-winning masterpiece.
I haven't really talked about my literary aspirations here before except very vaguely, so for want of anything better to write about, I'll describe 'How To Be Clever', so that anyone reading this can steal the idea and write it first before I get round to it.
The basic idea of the book is that, unlike some others that promise to increase your intelligence, aptitude, intrinsic moral worth, all that kind of thing, HTBC shows you how to make other people think you're clever, while actually remaining just as thick as you naturally are. This is an art that I've cultivated over the years.
It will include lessons in things like how to memorise a pack of cards (actually quite easy, with just a little bit of practice and the right technique), how to get into Mensa (there are actually very few different kinds of puzzles in IQ tests, so if you know what to look out for, and practice them a bit, you can increase your "IQ" a few notches), how to work out square roots without a calculator (they don't teach that in schools any more, so anyone who knows how to do it must be a real genius, right?), how not to play chess (trust me, once people think you're clever, they'll automatically assume you're a great chess player. The trick is to avoid actually playing a game, at any cost) and much more.
There'll also be lots and lots of useful random facts that you can slip into conversations, encouragement to be more creative and spontaneous (if you're going to be a genius, you have to be eccentric) and probably pictures too, just in case the book gets bought by the kind of person who doesn't like reading.
I've been writing little bits of it every six months or so for the last couple of years, and one of these days soon I'm really going to sit down and put metaphorical pen to paper, then try to get the thing in print. I don't want to approach publishers until I've actually written the whole thing, in draft form at least, because I'd hate to have to meet a deadline. I'm very bad with those.
Of course, I also resolved recently to write another book, didn't I? I've got ideas, but I think in the end I'll just sit down and write the first thing that comes into my head, and see what happens. It might be a masterpiece. It might be the complete works of Shakespeare. It might be about a terrapin called Dean. We'll just have to see.
I haven't really talked about my literary aspirations here before except very vaguely, so for want of anything better to write about, I'll describe 'How To Be Clever', so that anyone reading this can steal the idea and write it first before I get round to it.
The basic idea of the book is that, unlike some others that promise to increase your intelligence, aptitude, intrinsic moral worth, all that kind of thing, HTBC shows you how to make other people think you're clever, while actually remaining just as thick as you naturally are. This is an art that I've cultivated over the years.
It will include lessons in things like how to memorise a pack of cards (actually quite easy, with just a little bit of practice and the right technique), how to get into Mensa (there are actually very few different kinds of puzzles in IQ tests, so if you know what to look out for, and practice them a bit, you can increase your "IQ" a few notches), how to work out square roots without a calculator (they don't teach that in schools any more, so anyone who knows how to do it must be a real genius, right?), how not to play chess (trust me, once people think you're clever, they'll automatically assume you're a great chess player. The trick is to avoid actually playing a game, at any cost) and much more.
There'll also be lots and lots of useful random facts that you can slip into conversations, encouragement to be more creative and spontaneous (if you're going to be a genius, you have to be eccentric) and probably pictures too, just in case the book gets bought by the kind of person who doesn't like reading.
I've been writing little bits of it every six months or so for the last couple of years, and one of these days soon I'm really going to sit down and put metaphorical pen to paper, then try to get the thing in print. I don't want to approach publishers until I've actually written the whole thing, in draft form at least, because I'd hate to have to meet a deadline. I'm very bad with those.
Of course, I also resolved recently to write another book, didn't I? I've got ideas, but I think in the end I'll just sit down and write the first thing that comes into my head, and see what happens. It might be a masterpiece. It might be the complete works of Shakespeare. It might be about a terrapin called Dean. We'll just have to see.
Friday, October 28, 2005
Baby You're A Rich Fag Jew
I've got money! Lots and lots and lots of it! Ooh, and so many things shouting out at me to buy them. We finished work at lunchtime today (the Select people came and kicked us all out of the office, so they obviously couldn't wait to get rid of us), so we did the farewell drinking session this afternoon and early evening. So I can still get up earlyish tomorrow morning and go to see Grandma without feeling terrible - see, I'm just fine when I stop drinking Stellas after three pints and move on to something else.
So, unemployment until Tuesday, and then I'll be a normal wage-slave again. I'll have to stop talking here about the delights of not working and find something else (the life of an accountant probably doesn't qualify as interesting enough).
I haven't had a chance to watch it yet, but I taped 'The 5000 Fingers Of Dr T' this morning. An absolutely wonderful film, that surprisingly few people have heard of, it's a live-action version of a Dr Seuss book - a concept which should be completely impossible, but somehow works in this case. It captures the Dr Seuss look perfectly, and that's an amazingly difficult thing to do. Dr Seuss himself isn't as appreciated in some quarters as he should be, but the fantastic imagination that goes into his drawings is something that's unmatched in all of history. He's one of my all-time heroes.
So, unemployment until Tuesday, and then I'll be a normal wage-slave again. I'll have to stop talking here about the delights of not working and find something else (the life of an accountant probably doesn't qualify as interesting enough).
I haven't had a chance to watch it yet, but I taped 'The 5000 Fingers Of Dr T' this morning. An absolutely wonderful film, that surprisingly few people have heard of, it's a live-action version of a Dr Seuss book - a concept which should be completely impossible, but somehow works in this case. It captures the Dr Seuss look perfectly, and that's an amazingly difficult thing to do. Dr Seuss himself isn't as appreciated in some quarters as he should be, but the fantastic imagination that goes into his drawings is something that's unmatched in all of history. He's one of my all-time heroes.
Thursday, October 27, 2005
Hmm
Is it too late to call off this whole documentary thing? Today's filming session had more telling me what to do than I like to have in my average day. Which makes me wonder again why I'm doing this if it's only going to get on my wick, when the end result is going to be people sitting and watching me going about my everyday life and talking about memory stuff. None of which is something I really like. So should I call Nick and tell him I don't want to do it, or just put up with it so as not to hurt his feelings?
Also, I've got a sort of reputation in memory circles as the kind of person who's down-to-earth, and doesn't go in for self-promotion. If there's an award-winning documentary about how great I am, it might damage that reputation.
I think I'll just do nothing and hope he realises what a dull documentary this would be. Anyway, officially the last day of work tomorrow! Got my P45 and final payslip today, the money's in the bank tomorrow, I would imagine there's going to be a fair amount of drinking too. Which might be a problem seeing as I'm taking my grandma out to lunch on Saturday. Ah well, I'm sure I'll be fine as long as I keep off the Stella.
Ross and Joey are drinking midori on Friends at the moment. Or several years ago when they filmed the episode, anyway. And it's probably coloured water, to be fair. Still, it's good to see.
Also, I've got a sort of reputation in memory circles as the kind of person who's down-to-earth, and doesn't go in for self-promotion. If there's an award-winning documentary about how great I am, it might damage that reputation.
I think I'll just do nothing and hope he realises what a dull documentary this would be. Anyway, officially the last day of work tomorrow! Got my P45 and final payslip today, the money's in the bank tomorrow, I would imagine there's going to be a fair amount of drinking too. Which might be a problem seeing as I'm taking my grandma out to lunch on Saturday. Ah well, I'm sure I'll be fine as long as I keep off the Stella.
Ross and Joey are drinking midori on Friends at the moment. Or several years ago when they filmed the episode, anyway. And it's probably coloured water, to be fair. Still, it's good to see.
Wednesday, October 26, 2005
I will not celebrate meaningless milestones
I don't want to leave my job and start a scary new one! Someone arrange things so I don't have to, please. Tomorrow is sort of my last proper day of work - not only do I have something to do (showing Kim from Luton the wonders of the bank reconciliations) but I'll be filmed either working or pretending to work. I'll wear my Parkhouse t-shirt as a sort of private joke. After that I doubt we'll be doing anything on Friday, and we certainly won't on Monday (officially our last day) because I don't think anyone's going to come in. We get paid on Friday, you see.
And then on Tuesday I start at the new place. This brings with it all kinds of anxieties. Can I still remember how to do management accounts after all this time doing financial analysis? Will the people there like me? Will I like the people there? Will I get lost on the way there on my first morning? I tend to do things like that when I'm nervous.
I got my new glasses at lunchtime. I was sceptical about their claims that they wouldn't be in before Thursday, so I went and checked on my lunch break, and they were there. Both pairs - the ones with normal lenses and the ones with the extra-thin ones which the people there assured me would take a couple of weeks. I don't know why I asked for the extra-thin lenses anyway - I didn't particularly want them, but I can never resist a sales pitch. I'm wearing the normal-lens ones at the moment, because I think they look better.
The new glasses are a lot less obvious than my old ones, if you see what I mean. A particularly short-sighted or unobservant person might not notice that I'm wearing specs at all, because they're quite small and less ostentatious. I think it's as close as you can get to contacts without the ickiness of sticking things in your eyes. I'd still rather not have glasses that look like everyone else's, though. Maybe when I've got a bit of money to spare I'll splash out on some Timmy Mallett ones. Or Jan Formann's ones, with an L on one side and a K on the other so he's got 'LOOK' written across his face. Then again, two of us wearing those at memory competitions would just look strange...
And then on Tuesday I start at the new place. This brings with it all kinds of anxieties. Can I still remember how to do management accounts after all this time doing financial analysis? Will the people there like me? Will I like the people there? Will I get lost on the way there on my first morning? I tend to do things like that when I'm nervous.
I got my new glasses at lunchtime. I was sceptical about their claims that they wouldn't be in before Thursday, so I went and checked on my lunch break, and they were there. Both pairs - the ones with normal lenses and the ones with the extra-thin ones which the people there assured me would take a couple of weeks. I don't know why I asked for the extra-thin lenses anyway - I didn't particularly want them, but I can never resist a sales pitch. I'm wearing the normal-lens ones at the moment, because I think they look better.
The new glasses are a lot less obvious than my old ones, if you see what I mean. A particularly short-sighted or unobservant person might not notice that I'm wearing specs at all, because they're quite small and less ostentatious. I think it's as close as you can get to contacts without the ickiness of sticking things in your eyes. I'd still rather not have glasses that look like everyone else's, though. Maybe when I've got a bit of money to spare I'll splash out on some Timmy Mallett ones. Or Jan Formann's ones, with an L on one side and a K on the other so he's got 'LOOK' written across his face. Then again, two of us wearing those at memory competitions would just look strange...
Tuesday, October 25, 2005
Zoom - it's part of my name
On the way back from Luton today, I saw the strangest company slogan I've ever seen, written on the side of a van. The company in question are called Huntleigh Healthcare, or something along those lines, and the slogan was "Healthcare - it's part of our name."
They either deserve applause for coming up with a brilliantly ironic swipe at senseless advertising, or else public derision for putting something so mindlessly stupid on their vans. Either way, this blog is dedicated to Huntleigh Healthcare, or Something-beginning-with-H-and-ending-with-something-like-leigh Healthcare, anyway.
In other news, if I'm going to get back into the habit of watching EastEnders, I'm going to need reminders. Addiction has always been something I've needed to work at. But I'd resolved to watch it this week just because I've always loved the Mitchells. Don't ask me why. I might catch the repeat on BBC3 tonight, if I can be bothered.
Also, I've been practicing speed cards for the last couple of nights, three packs a night, and I've made mistakes in all six packs. And they were all over 35 seconds, too. I really need to get back in training on a regular basis.
They either deserve applause for coming up with a brilliantly ironic swipe at senseless advertising, or else public derision for putting something so mindlessly stupid on their vans. Either way, this blog is dedicated to Huntleigh Healthcare, or Something-beginning-with-H-and-ending-with-something-like-leigh Healthcare, anyway.
In other news, if I'm going to get back into the habit of watching EastEnders, I'm going to need reminders. Addiction has always been something I've needed to work at. But I'd resolved to watch it this week just because I've always loved the Mitchells. Don't ask me why. I might catch the repeat on BBC3 tonight, if I can be bothered.
Also, I've been practicing speed cards for the last couple of nights, three packs a night, and I've made mistakes in all six packs. And they were all over 35 seconds, too. I really need to get back in training on a regular basis.
Monday, October 24, 2005
Okay, I've got one now!
My mistake, obviously, was to decide to do my blog before taking my washing out of the machine. Which is still working more or less fine, incidentally. Positive reinforcement always does the trick.
When I won the WMC back in August 2004, the local news came round to film me at work. Marketing director David, never one to miss a chance to promote the company, strategically placed Parkhouse Recruitment logos around the office (including an enormous triangular toblerone-shaped thing intended to be displayed at rugby matches that happened to be in head office at the time because nobody had remembered to send it wherever it was meant to be), and produced from somewhere a T-shirt with the Parkhouse logo for me to wear on the interview.
I kept the shirt around in my desk for a couple of other photo shoots that week, and then basically left it there and forgot about it, until I was clearing out my desk last week and finally took the shirt home with me. Now, this shirt is either black or very dark blue, I'm not quite sure. Sort of navy blue, if the navy had been taken over by goths or vampires. I put it in the wash without considering the consequences, and now I find that all my white things that were in there tonight are now a sort of greyish-blue colour. Or maybe bluish-grey, I'm not quite sure.
If you were wondering, I don't do that separating-whites-and-colours thing when I do my washing. That's always struck me as the kind of thing that you'd only do if you deeply care about your clothing being whiter than white, and spend hours agonising about the different brands of washing powder, or nasty liquid-filled plastic bubbles, and fabric conditioners, and little bags that you put little cubes of washing stuff in the machine with, because using washing machines the way they were designed to be used and putting the stuff in the drawer just isn't good enough. No, I refuse to conform to what these profiteering companies want me to do, and just buy the first box that comes to hand from the supermarket, and bung everything in together. This doesn't lead to nearly as many disasters as you would think.
It has tonight, though. Although it's a very mild kind of disaster. My white jeans are now greyish-blue, which is a shame, and a towel, a couple of hankies, and some pants and socks, but the only work shirt in there was the one that was grey already, and the work trousers seem to be exactly the same shade of brown that they were when they went in, so obviously they're immune to dyeing somehow. I remember the last time this happened, years and years ago and involving socks, all my work shirts went a uniform shade of dull grey, so I've been quite lucky here. And the jeans look quite cool, really. It would have been nicer if they'd had a sort of tie-dyed look, but it's all one smooth shade. Maybe it'll wash out. Or half-wash out. Or maybe I'll try washing everything with something bright red and see what that does.
When I won the WMC back in August 2004, the local news came round to film me at work. Marketing director David, never one to miss a chance to promote the company, strategically placed Parkhouse Recruitment logos around the office (including an enormous triangular toblerone-shaped thing intended to be displayed at rugby matches that happened to be in head office at the time because nobody had remembered to send it wherever it was meant to be), and produced from somewhere a T-shirt with the Parkhouse logo for me to wear on the interview.
I kept the shirt around in my desk for a couple of other photo shoots that week, and then basically left it there and forgot about it, until I was clearing out my desk last week and finally took the shirt home with me. Now, this shirt is either black or very dark blue, I'm not quite sure. Sort of navy blue, if the navy had been taken over by goths or vampires. I put it in the wash without considering the consequences, and now I find that all my white things that were in there tonight are now a sort of greyish-blue colour. Or maybe bluish-grey, I'm not quite sure.
If you were wondering, I don't do that separating-whites-and-colours thing when I do my washing. That's always struck me as the kind of thing that you'd only do if you deeply care about your clothing being whiter than white, and spend hours agonising about the different brands of washing powder, or nasty liquid-filled plastic bubbles, and fabric conditioners, and little bags that you put little cubes of washing stuff in the machine with, because using washing machines the way they were designed to be used and putting the stuff in the drawer just isn't good enough. No, I refuse to conform to what these profiteering companies want me to do, and just buy the first box that comes to hand from the supermarket, and bung everything in together. This doesn't lead to nearly as many disasters as you would think.
It has tonight, though. Although it's a very mild kind of disaster. My white jeans are now greyish-blue, which is a shame, and a towel, a couple of hankies, and some pants and socks, but the only work shirt in there was the one that was grey already, and the work trousers seem to be exactly the same shade of brown that they were when they went in, so obviously they're immune to dyeing somehow. I remember the last time this happened, years and years ago and involving socks, all my work shirts went a uniform shade of dull grey, so I've been quite lucky here. And the jeans look quite cool, really. It would have been nicer if they'd had a sort of tie-dyed look, but it's all one smooth shade. Maybe it'll wash out. Or half-wash out. Or maybe I'll try washing everything with something bright red and see what that does.
Zoom's 97 varieties
Getting close to my hundredth blog entry. Who would have thought I'd still be finding things to talk about after all this time? You'd think I'd be reduced by now to counting the number of entries I've made and trying to get away with filling a whole page with talking about it, but no, I manage to come up with ways to keep this thing so fresh and interesting, you'd swear I was just starting out on this thrilling adventure that is bloggery!
Sigh. I hate running out of ideas.
Sigh. I hate running out of ideas.
Sunday, October 23, 2005
I need a holiday
Which is a strange thing to say, really, since I haven't been doing proper work for months. But I just feel like I need a break from the sort-of-but-not-quite work routine I'm in at the moment. Maybe starting my new job next week will feel like a refreshing change.
Actually, what I need is an adventure, preferably involving magic, dragons and an assorted cast of friends and enemies with unusual and charming personality quirks. I must sit down and write it some time. I've just got back from seeing Howl's Moving Castle, and while I maybe wouldn't recommend it to anyone who likes their plots to make sense, it's very atmospheric, and I left the cinema feeling all magical, which is always a good thing. It also sort of inspired me to sort of combine two of the unwritten stories that have been circling in my imagination for absolutely ages now, with added bits and pieces arising from that idea. Trouble is, I have a feeling it needs to be a graphic novel, or at least profusely illustrated with the pictures interacting with the words at important points. If only I could draw, this kind of thing would be so much easier.
Back to work tomorrow. On Tuesday I've got to go down to Luton to show the assorted eejits there how to do the handful of things I do that they've decided are worth doing in future. They've left it much too late to take over these things, so I'm quite certain they're going to just drop it - it's not vitally important information, it's just presenting a few figures they already have, but in ways that make sense, which comes in handy if you want to plan for the future. I'm sure people will miss them once I've stopped doing them, but I've never felt that they were essential to the smooth running of a company.
I'm thinking of bowing to the inevitable and getting a DVD player. I've always tried to resist it, because I know what I'd do is get lots of cartoon DVDs that you can't get on video and spend all my time watching them. But while wandering through the auctions on eBay today, I found a complete collection of Bosko cartoons that I'd really quite like to have. And if I'm going to achieve that back-burner ambition of mine to watch every WB cartoon ever made, it's going to be a lot easier to collect them on DVD rather than VHS. And yes, lots of them, Bosko included, are public domain and I could get them from various other sources, but I much prefer to track down obscure ancient video releases. Finding them is half the fun. More than half if they're not very good cartoons.
Ooh, less than a week and I get all that money! Which reminds me, I had a call from my dad this morning about getting together with grandma and my brother on Saturday - he's going to bring my Christmas presents along with him. He probably bought them last year some time. I sometimes wonder if his internal clock is just wound up too fast. At least he's meeting me at Attenborough on Saturday, not coming round to pick me up here, so for once I don't have to get woken up by him knocking on my door three hours before the time we agreed...
Actually, what I need is an adventure, preferably involving magic, dragons and an assorted cast of friends and enemies with unusual and charming personality quirks. I must sit down and write it some time. I've just got back from seeing Howl's Moving Castle, and while I maybe wouldn't recommend it to anyone who likes their plots to make sense, it's very atmospheric, and I left the cinema feeling all magical, which is always a good thing. It also sort of inspired me to sort of combine two of the unwritten stories that have been circling in my imagination for absolutely ages now, with added bits and pieces arising from that idea. Trouble is, I have a feeling it needs to be a graphic novel, or at least profusely illustrated with the pictures interacting with the words at important points. If only I could draw, this kind of thing would be so much easier.
Back to work tomorrow. On Tuesday I've got to go down to Luton to show the assorted eejits there how to do the handful of things I do that they've decided are worth doing in future. They've left it much too late to take over these things, so I'm quite certain they're going to just drop it - it's not vitally important information, it's just presenting a few figures they already have, but in ways that make sense, which comes in handy if you want to plan for the future. I'm sure people will miss them once I've stopped doing them, but I've never felt that they were essential to the smooth running of a company.
I'm thinking of bowing to the inevitable and getting a DVD player. I've always tried to resist it, because I know what I'd do is get lots of cartoon DVDs that you can't get on video and spend all my time watching them. But while wandering through the auctions on eBay today, I found a complete collection of Bosko cartoons that I'd really quite like to have. And if I'm going to achieve that back-burner ambition of mine to watch every WB cartoon ever made, it's going to be a lot easier to collect them on DVD rather than VHS. And yes, lots of them, Bosko included, are public domain and I could get them from various other sources, but I much prefer to track down obscure ancient video releases. Finding them is half the fun. More than half if they're not very good cartoons.
Ooh, less than a week and I get all that money! Which reminds me, I had a call from my dad this morning about getting together with grandma and my brother on Saturday - he's going to bring my Christmas presents along with him. He probably bought them last year some time. I sometimes wonder if his internal clock is just wound up too fast. At least he's meeting me at Attenborough on Saturday, not coming round to pick me up here, so for once I don't have to get woken up by him knocking on my door three hours before the time we agreed...
Saturday, October 22, 2005
Five past nine
Whatever happened to telly programmes starting on the hour? BBC1, 2 and 3, ITV1, 2 and 3 and Channel 5 all have shows starting at 9:05 tonight. It's probably a sinister conspiracy.
It probably wasn't worth doing two posts in one day just to observe that, but hey. I've also got 'The Penultimate Peril', and if there's anyone out there who hasn't read the Lemony Snicket books, you really should get out there now (or when the shops next open) and buy some.
Plans for tomorrow - practice a bit of memory, see Howl's Moving Castle, get some lights for my bike, write a book or two, become some kind of millionaire.
It probably wasn't worth doing two posts in one day just to observe that, but hey. I've also got 'The Penultimate Peril', and if there's anyone out there who hasn't read the Lemony Snicket books, you really should get out there now (or when the shops next open) and buy some.
Plans for tomorrow - practice a bit of memory, see Howl's Moving Castle, get some lights for my bike, write a book or two, become some kind of millionaire.
Scientific progress goes boink
That's better. Stella Artois is horrible stuff. I'm sure there are people in the world who can drink more than three pints of it with no ill-effects, and I'm sure they're very admirable and manly people, but I'm just not one of them. So what was meant to be just showing my face at the work do last night ended up leaving me going to bed at half nine, feeling on the verge of collapse. Possibly I'm getting old.
Anyway, I'm sorry if I gave the impression last night that I was going to write about earth-shattering and exciting news, but it really isn't anything like that. When I got home from work last night I had a call from Nick the TV producer, who rather sneakily had decided to phone me to ask if I'd made my mind up about doing this documentary, rather than waiting for me to email him. So I said yes, and having thought about it a bit decided not to get back to him and say no after all. So I'm going to be on TV, yay.
He also wants to film me at work next week, so as to get to see work colleagues who know me. Not that we're going to be doing much in the way of work, although I suppose we can pretend to be busy and industrious for the camera.
So at about quarter past six I went out to the pub to meet the work people. Coming in the door, I took my glasses off to wipe the rain off them, and they snapped in half. Luckily they had a roll of sellotape behind the bar, so we made some repairs, and while they don't look pretty, they stay on my face, more or less. I haven't got a spare pair, unless you count my prescription shades, so I'm just going to have to go with the Harry Potter look for the time being. (Katydid once said I look like 'Harry Potter all grown up', which is the nicest thing anyone's ever said to me)
So this necessitated a trip to the opticians this morning. It's been three or four years since I had an eye test, so I thought it would probably be a good idea. What impressed me, though, was that everything there is much more technological than it was the last time I had them checked. Maybe the Boston Specsavers is just a lot less up to date than the Derby one (the Derby one is much, much bigger, so it probably is), but this one has lots of fancy electronic gadgets for probing and measuring your eyes. I was impressed. My prescription hasn't changed at all, same as the last eye test I had, but my new glasses are going to look a bit different. Big round ones seem to be out of fashion nowadays (well, they were never in fashion, but at least you could get them last time I was buying a pair), so I've had to go for some little rectangular ones instead. Two pairs, this time, to avoid something like this happening again. Everyone at Specsavers was adamant that the new ones would look much better on me than my old ones, so I suppose I'll get used to them. But I've worn round glasses for ages now, and I think they're part of my unique charm. Ah well.
But they can't put the things together until Thursday at the earliest, maybe not till Saturday, so I'm going to be stuck with the old ones when I'm captured on camera at work next week, most likely. My major worry about this documentary thing is that Nick is secretly evil, and is planning to make me look really bad, and while having taped-together glasses may look cute and eccentric if you present it one way, it could also make me look like some kind of socially-inadequate nerd (yes, I am one of those anyway, but you can make me look not like one if you make a documentary the right way, I'm sure).
There's just been a poll on Football Focus for cult hero goalkeepers, and Paul Bastock was one of the choices. Quite rightly too - for many years he was Boston Utd's only good player, always the kind of guy who was much too good to be playing in a non-league team, and really to be admired for sticking with the Pilgrims through thick and thin. If I had a mobile, I'd vote for him, but the poll is texts only. Perhaps I should get one. I seem to come across situations where one would be useful more and more frequently these days.
Anyway, I'm sorry if I gave the impression last night that I was going to write about earth-shattering and exciting news, but it really isn't anything like that. When I got home from work last night I had a call from Nick the TV producer, who rather sneakily had decided to phone me to ask if I'd made my mind up about doing this documentary, rather than waiting for me to email him. So I said yes, and having thought about it a bit decided not to get back to him and say no after all. So I'm going to be on TV, yay.
He also wants to film me at work next week, so as to get to see work colleagues who know me. Not that we're going to be doing much in the way of work, although I suppose we can pretend to be busy and industrious for the camera.
So at about quarter past six I went out to the pub to meet the work people. Coming in the door, I took my glasses off to wipe the rain off them, and they snapped in half. Luckily they had a roll of sellotape behind the bar, so we made some repairs, and while they don't look pretty, they stay on my face, more or less. I haven't got a spare pair, unless you count my prescription shades, so I'm just going to have to go with the Harry Potter look for the time being. (Katydid once said I look like 'Harry Potter all grown up', which is the nicest thing anyone's ever said to me)
So this necessitated a trip to the opticians this morning. It's been three or four years since I had an eye test, so I thought it would probably be a good idea. What impressed me, though, was that everything there is much more technological than it was the last time I had them checked. Maybe the Boston Specsavers is just a lot less up to date than the Derby one (the Derby one is much, much bigger, so it probably is), but this one has lots of fancy electronic gadgets for probing and measuring your eyes. I was impressed. My prescription hasn't changed at all, same as the last eye test I had, but my new glasses are going to look a bit different. Big round ones seem to be out of fashion nowadays (well, they were never in fashion, but at least you could get them last time I was buying a pair), so I've had to go for some little rectangular ones instead. Two pairs, this time, to avoid something like this happening again. Everyone at Specsavers was adamant that the new ones would look much better on me than my old ones, so I suppose I'll get used to them. But I've worn round glasses for ages now, and I think they're part of my unique charm. Ah well.
But they can't put the things together until Thursday at the earliest, maybe not till Saturday, so I'm going to be stuck with the old ones when I'm captured on camera at work next week, most likely. My major worry about this documentary thing is that Nick is secretly evil, and is planning to make me look really bad, and while having taped-together glasses may look cute and eccentric if you present it one way, it could also make me look like some kind of socially-inadequate nerd (yes, I am one of those anyway, but you can make me look not like one if you make a documentary the right way, I'm sure).
There's just been a poll on Football Focus for cult hero goalkeepers, and Paul Bastock was one of the choices. Quite rightly too - for many years he was Boston Utd's only good player, always the kind of guy who was much too good to be playing in a non-league team, and really to be admired for sticking with the Pilgrims through thick and thin. If I had a mobile, I'd vote for him, but the poll is texts only. Perhaps I should get one. I seem to come across situations where one would be useful more and more frequently these days.
Friday, October 21, 2005
Too much, too young
It shows what kind of person you are when you're on a night out and you're thinking "I must get home quickly so I can write in my blog about everything that's happpened tonight."
Also, the length of time it's taken me to type the above sentence is quite alarming. Somebody, either Lee or Zoe, kept ordering rounds a bit quicker than I can comfortably drink them. With the result that I've had four and a half pints of Stella by nine o'clock. I know from experience that more than three and I'm useless for the next day at least. I switch to rum and coke after three pints, as a rule.
It's no good, I can't do all the typing I was planning to do tonight. Getting the spelling right (and this is very important to me) just takes too long. I keep hitting the wrong keys. Tomorrow, I'll tell you all about everything that's happened tonight. But now, I'd better go to bed.
Also, the length of time it's taken me to type the above sentence is quite alarming. Somebody, either Lee or Zoe, kept ordering rounds a bit quicker than I can comfortably drink them. With the result that I've had four and a half pints of Stella by nine o'clock. I know from experience that more than three and I'm useless for the next day at least. I switch to rum and coke after three pints, as a rule.
It's no good, I can't do all the typing I was planning to do tonight. Getting the spelling right (and this is very important to me) just takes too long. I keep hitting the wrong keys. Tomorrow, I'll tell you all about everything that's happened tonight. But now, I'd better go to bed.
Thursday, October 20, 2005
Howling at the moon
Curse of the Were-Rabbit is absolutely brilliant. But I've remembered today that I can't go to see Howl's Moving Castle tomorrow night, because I'm going out with work people for Zoe's birthday. This seems a bit excessive to me, since we're all going out next Friday too to celebrate our unemployment and/or unprecendented wealth. But still, it keeps me on the streets.
Thursdays off work also give me a chance to buy comics the day they come out, too. This week's selection are all pretty good, but don't inspire me to write about them. On the other hand, though, I read the Beano in Smith's like I do every week, and I was pleased to see a Billy the Cat and Katie story. They keep making attempts to bring Billy back, in the hopes that he'll catch on with the youth of today who don't buy the Beano for adventure stories, and I think that's highly commendable. The tastes of readers seem to be leaning more towards that kind of strip now, judging by the last vote-for-a-new-strip thing that selected Zap Zodiac, which is as close to a non-comedy adventure strip as the Beano has come for yonks.
Funnily enough, there was also the second part of a 'Beano gang' adventure (a multiple-page story with all the characters from multiple Beano strips, which they do from time to time - usually with much better art than this one) featuring Lord Snooty, who concludes that he's too old-fashioned to appear in the Beano nowadays. That's probably fair enough - they kept him on for years when nobody liked it, just because he was the last surviving character from the first ever issue - but it's strange that an attempt to resurrect an old character was put in the same comic as a definitive statement that they're not going to bring back another.
Also funnily, the story featured some snippets of old Lord Snooty strips, one of them showing Polly, the black caricature who (in a genuine attempt at political correctness) was part of Snooty's gang for many years, but who they generally try to avoid talking about now.
I also did a bit of memory training today. Just enough to convince me that I'm still horribly out of practice and need to do a lot more to get back up to my best. Sigh. Ah well, got to stick to those resolutions. When I'm settled into my new job, I'll take a week off and cram pi back into my skull. 25 days holiday at the new place, by the way! Wheee!
Thursdays off work also give me a chance to buy comics the day they come out, too. This week's selection are all pretty good, but don't inspire me to write about them. On the other hand, though, I read the Beano in Smith's like I do every week, and I was pleased to see a Billy the Cat and Katie story. They keep making attempts to bring Billy back, in the hopes that he'll catch on with the youth of today who don't buy the Beano for adventure stories, and I think that's highly commendable. The tastes of readers seem to be leaning more towards that kind of strip now, judging by the last vote-for-a-new-strip thing that selected Zap Zodiac, which is as close to a non-comedy adventure strip as the Beano has come for yonks.
Funnily enough, there was also the second part of a 'Beano gang' adventure (a multiple-page story with all the characters from multiple Beano strips, which they do from time to time - usually with much better art than this one) featuring Lord Snooty, who concludes that he's too old-fashioned to appear in the Beano nowadays. That's probably fair enough - they kept him on for years when nobody liked it, just because he was the last surviving character from the first ever issue - but it's strange that an attempt to resurrect an old character was put in the same comic as a definitive statement that they're not going to bring back another.
Also funnily, the story featured some snippets of old Lord Snooty strips, one of them showing Polly, the black caricature who (in a genuine attempt at political correctness) was part of Snooty's gang for many years, but who they generally try to avoid talking about now.
I also did a bit of memory training today. Just enough to convince me that I'm still horribly out of practice and need to do a lot more to get back up to my best. Sigh. Ah well, got to stick to those resolutions. When I'm settled into my new job, I'll take a week off and cram pi back into my skull. 25 days holiday at the new place, by the way! Wheee!
Wednesday, October 19, 2005
Motion picture funnies
Having sounded all virtuous yesterday about doing useful things on my day off tomorrow, I've remembered that I need to go and see the Wallace and Gromit film, so I think I'll do that too. Or instead. We'll see how I feel. Then on Friday after work I'll go to Derby's artier cinema and see Howl's Moving Castle. And probably write about them here, it's been a while since I've done something like that, and variety is the Spice Girls, or whatever the saying is.
Got to work twenty minutes late this morning, not having seen any real reason to get out of bed, to find Suzy waiting outside and nobody else to be seen. By the time someone with a key turned up, it was 9:15. I'll have a longer lie-in in future. Sheesh, I can probably count the number of work days to go on the fingers of one hand now - I doubt I'll be in more than three days next week. So let's say it's five days to go! Probably four, since we almost certainly won't be in on the final Monday (which is officially the last day). It's kind of sad, in a way.
Got to work twenty minutes late this morning, not having seen any real reason to get out of bed, to find Suzy waiting outside and nobody else to be seen. By the time someone with a key turned up, it was 9:15. I'll have a longer lie-in in future. Sheesh, I can probably count the number of work days to go on the fingers of one hand now - I doubt I'll be in more than three days next week. So let's say it's five days to go! Probably four, since we almost certainly won't be in on the final Monday (which is officially the last day). It's kind of sad, in a way.
Tuesday, October 18, 2005
The Importance Of Being Zoomy
I sometimes feel like I'm under some kind of obligation to make these blog posts of mine funny and interesting, even on days when nothing out of the ordinary has happened to me, I haven't interacted with any of the interesting people I know, and I haven't even seen anything on TV worth commenting about. But then I remember that the ones where I'm trying to be clever and/or funny are always the worst ones.
Anyway, nothing's happened today that I consider worth talking about, so I thought I'd talk about something that hasn't happened. It hasn't rained here today, although I see from the telly that it's pouring down at Old Trafford (no goals at half-time, although Man U should be expected to beat Lille without too much difficulty). I can't actually remember the last time I had to cycle to or from work in the rain, strangely enough. It has rained, quite a lot, but never during those all-important timeslots between 8:10 and 8:30, and 5:00 and 5:20 on work days. And it doesn't seem to have rained here in Derby anywhere near as much as it has in the rest of the country.
I'm quite impressed by this, really. Possibly someone's installed an impressive system of weather-controlling devices or giant invisible umbrellas in order to make my life slightly easier, or possibly it's just coincidence.
Another day off on Thursday. I'm going to use it for a trial run of the commute to Burton-on-Trent, just to see what kind of time I would get to the office if I catch the train at half past eight (I don't have to start till nine at the new job! Yay!), and then I'm going to do some serious memory practice.
Also, at some time before November 26th, I'm going to practice othello in the kind of professional way that I've always meant to do. I think I'm going to switch to the diagonal opening, and hopefully catch some people by surprise. As long as they don't read this blog, that is.
Just got an email from Step, telling us that he's written a "poem about the assertion that Zoomy has powers a lot like King Midas only much ruder." There's a story behind this that I probably shouldn't go into in such a public forum in case it puts anyone off their lunch, but it just shows the kind of conversations we tend to get into at these meets after a lot of drink and very little sleep. Step wrote me another poem for my birthday, incidentally - that was why he wanted to know the exact details of my age. I'm going to get it framed and hung on my wall, because it's very flattering.
Anyway, nothing's happened today that I consider worth talking about, so I thought I'd talk about something that hasn't happened. It hasn't rained here today, although I see from the telly that it's pouring down at Old Trafford (no goals at half-time, although Man U should be expected to beat Lille without too much difficulty). I can't actually remember the last time I had to cycle to or from work in the rain, strangely enough. It has rained, quite a lot, but never during those all-important timeslots between 8:10 and 8:30, and 5:00 and 5:20 on work days. And it doesn't seem to have rained here in Derby anywhere near as much as it has in the rest of the country.
I'm quite impressed by this, really. Possibly someone's installed an impressive system of weather-controlling devices or giant invisible umbrellas in order to make my life slightly easier, or possibly it's just coincidence.
Another day off on Thursday. I'm going to use it for a trial run of the commute to Burton-on-Trent, just to see what kind of time I would get to the office if I catch the train at half past eight (I don't have to start till nine at the new job! Yay!), and then I'm going to do some serious memory practice.
Also, at some time before November 26th, I'm going to practice othello in the kind of professional way that I've always meant to do. I think I'm going to switch to the diagonal opening, and hopefully catch some people by surprise. As long as they don't read this blog, that is.
Just got an email from Step, telling us that he's written a "poem about the assertion that Zoomy has powers a lot like King Midas only much ruder." There's a story behind this that I probably shouldn't go into in such a public forum in case it puts anyone off their lunch, but it just shows the kind of conversations we tend to get into at these meets after a lot of drink and very little sleep. Step wrote me another poem for my birthday, incidentally - that was why he wanted to know the exact details of my age. I'm going to get it framed and hung on my wall, because it's very flattering.
Monday, October 17, 2005
Skeletor, Dick Dastardly, Count Duckula, Tom Cat, Captain Pugwash
Yes, two entries in one day, just to make up for skipping Saturday. Don't expect deep insights, though. I've just seen the video to Franz Ferdinand's "Do You Want To?", which has the above list of cartoon characters written on a wall, for reasons presumably best known to the band. Nice mix of personalities there.
It actually surprised me a bit - I'd been under the entirely mistaken impression that the Franz Ferdinand gang were significantly younger than me, as everyone seems to be nowadays, somewhere in their early twenties. And that would mean that they were of a generation less likely to know of Skeletor or Duckula (both have made various resurrections over the years, but there's a definite gap for that age group, as Ed Cooke and his friends demonstrated at the world championships when we got talking about Skeletor, like you do).
In fact, it seems that three of the four band members are older than I am! This teaches me two important lessons: 1) Don't assume that cool people are young, and 2) It's not too late to become a pop star! This has cheered me up quite a bit, really.
It actually surprised me a bit - I'd been under the entirely mistaken impression that the Franz Ferdinand gang were significantly younger than me, as everyone seems to be nowadays, somewhere in their early twenties. And that would mean that they were of a generation less likely to know of Skeletor or Duckula (both have made various resurrections over the years, but there's a definite gap for that age group, as Ed Cooke and his friends demonstrated at the world championships when we got talking about Skeletor, like you do).
In fact, it seems that three of the four band members are older than I am! This teaches me two important lessons: 1) Don't assume that cool people are young, and 2) It's not too late to become a pop star! This has cheered me up quite a bit, really.
After the merrymaking
Twelve hours of uninterrupted sleep after last night's entry, I was woken by my alarm at half past seven this morning thinking "God, I'm still knackered..."
I spent a while debating whether it was worth the effort of getting up and going to work, and ultimately decided that it wasn't. Called the office at 8:45, but nobody was in yet. Called back at 9:15, intending to confess that I had a hangover after a weekend's boozing, but Zoe just said I could have the day off without me needing to give any reason, so that's all right.
Anyway, it was a great party. And everyone did more or less fit in the flat, so I needn't have worried about that. Documentary guy wants to film a Poohsticks meet some time, which we all think might be cool. Although we'd have to watch what we say, and behave a bit more decently than usual. He also wants to film an othello tournament, which might be very cool for the game, raising public awareness, making it look sexy and appealing and so on.
Also, talking to the aforementioned docco-wallah (thanks for the expression, Sam) was a lot of fun - he's a nice guy. He was flattering/patronising/humouring me to a certain extent, but not so much that it's likely to become annoying. And I suppose you're not going to get anywhere as a filmmaker if you don't develop a habit of doing that automatically, so I can't blame him. He was filming me for a couple of hours in the morning, with a minimum of rearranging my furniture and asking me to say things more than once, so if he carried on like that it would be bearable to do this documentary thing. But I'm still not convinced that I want to waste my time with it.
On the other hand, if I'm going to keep those resolutions of mine, I probably should. A bit of self-publicity like appearing on TV would probably help with the aim of getting a book published. I said I'd let him know some time after this weekend, so I've got plenty of time to think about it.
I spent a while debating whether it was worth the effort of getting up and going to work, and ultimately decided that it wasn't. Called the office at 8:45, but nobody was in yet. Called back at 9:15, intending to confess that I had a hangover after a weekend's boozing, but Zoe just said I could have the day off without me needing to give any reason, so that's all right.
Anyway, it was a great party. And everyone did more or less fit in the flat, so I needn't have worried about that. Documentary guy wants to film a Poohsticks meet some time, which we all think might be cool. Although we'd have to watch what we say, and behave a bit more decently than usual. He also wants to film an othello tournament, which might be very cool for the game, raising public awareness, making it look sexy and appealing and so on.
Also, talking to the aforementioned docco-wallah (thanks for the expression, Sam) was a lot of fun - he's a nice guy. He was flattering/patronising/humouring me to a certain extent, but not so much that it's likely to become annoying. And I suppose you're not going to get anywhere as a filmmaker if you don't develop a habit of doing that automatically, so I can't blame him. He was filming me for a couple of hours in the morning, with a minimum of rearranging my furniture and asking me to say things more than once, so if he carried on like that it would be bearable to do this documentary thing. But I'm still not convinced that I want to waste my time with it.
On the other hand, if I'm going to keep those resolutions of mine, I probably should. A bit of self-publicity like appearing on TV would probably help with the aim of getting a book published. I said I'd let him know some time after this weekend, so I've got plenty of time to think about it.
Sunday, October 16, 2005
Partied out
I'd like to write about the party we've had here over the weekend, as well as the surprisingly enjoyable visit by Nick the documentary producer on Saturday morning, but I'm tired. A bit under three hours of sort-of-sleep isn't really enough for me, so I'm off to bed now to recharge my batteries before I go back to work tomorrow.
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