So, following the train-wreck that is my legal career, I've decided that I want to pursue a career in radio. My parents, and their incessant desire for a 'plan' for my life, have been badgering me more than a pesky badger trying to convince a fisherman to give him his fishin' worms. In other words, very badgery indeed, and rather depressing.
Parents have that great ability to summarise what you do in negative terms. It's a skill that comes with being a teacher and trying to promote constructive criticism. Sometimes though, it's just fucking annoying.
"What's the plan, son?"
"Well, I want to work for a year, maybe try and get a part-time job and try and get some work placements or experience with a radio station before enrolling in a masters next year."
"So, you plan to bum about for a year?"
(Grrrrr THAT'S NOT WHAT I SAID!!!)
I won't even tell you what they say when I tell them that I'd love to someday write for a career.
Anyway, I'm trying my bestest, and I'm ploughing my way through work experience applications. The stations that I applied for today are....
BBC Radio
ClassicFM
XFM
NME Radio
Capital FM
Chill
Fun Kids Radio
Heart Radio
LBC FM
...and that's just the London ones.
I also tried Jazz FM and Heat FM but unfortunately they don't take work experience folks. Smooth, non-job-giving bastards.
So, if I'm trying to get a job in radio and I'm not employable with any of these guys, then I might be slightly screwed.
Slightly? Totally.
In the pushing-Marlon-Brandon-up-a-potholed-hill-during-a-mudslide way.
Anybody have any hints or suggestions? Cos Marlon's looking hungry, and I smell of fried chicken...
Showing posts with label be happy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label be happy. Show all posts
Saturday, September 25, 2010
Friday, September 17, 2010
Happy-Go-Fucking Lucky McPositive and the Fork in the Road...
KABLAMMO!!
That's the noise of a bad moment, a little percussive volley as my corpus callosum is rent in twain and my head explodes, brainz n' all, like an egg in a microwave.
So about 5 months ago (Monday the 12th April in fact) I wrote a piece about my ill-fated and toe-blistering initial attempt to get back into shape as part of my (woefully inadequately fulfilled) 101 things to do and haven't really written anything since.
A cynic would suggest that my pot bellied attempt to be less dough-like stopped my brain working for almost half a year, but I don't think that's the case.
Basically, I had an exam in June, but thanks to the dual forces of working two jobs, and being a lazy earfucker, I managed to fail...spectacularly. Then, after spending the summer studying...I failed again. And lost my job as a lawyer.
KABLAMMO!
So that was yesterday. Now I'm one of the 99.9999% of the world again. I have no fucking clue what I'm doing with life.
Since 2008 I've been approaching my career as a lawyer who was going to become a writer at the first opportunity. It was comforting; financial security, quite prestigious, challenging and keeping with the 'artist' bullshit scenario that we all paint about ourselves in our minds.
That's the problem. When you spend enough time convincing yourself of a fact, it becomes all too easy to see it as a truth. Now I have to rethink some other things about myself that I though were true, like being a great lover, having the physique of a gladiator, or being an original member of The Sugarhill Gang.
So cut throat corporate law is probably not for me. Small-town Atticus Finchery maybe, but not the Michael Clayton red-braces-and-Porsche-Boxter type. Some cliché is coming to mind about heat and kitchens, but it escapes me.
So what now?
I think the next stage for me is a masters degree of some sort. I've been looking at either an MA in radio production or print journalism. I want to give the writing future an actual attempt.
What do you think? Become a nicotine/adrenaline headline jock or an NPR/Radio 4 type doing radio dramas and producer 'Gardener's Question Time'? Both sound good.
That's the noise of a bad moment, a little percussive volley as my corpus callosum is rent in twain and my head explodes, brainz n' all, like an egg in a microwave.
So about 5 months ago (Monday the 12th April in fact) I wrote a piece about my ill-fated and toe-blistering initial attempt to get back into shape as part of my (woefully inadequately fulfilled) 101 things to do and haven't really written anything since.
A cynic would suggest that my pot bellied attempt to be less dough-like stopped my brain working for almost half a year, but I don't think that's the case.
Basically, I had an exam in June, but thanks to the dual forces of working two jobs, and being a lazy earfucker, I managed to fail...spectacularly. Then, after spending the summer studying...I failed again. And lost my job as a lawyer.
KABLAMMO!
So that was yesterday. Now I'm one of the 99.9999% of the world again. I have no fucking clue what I'm doing with life.
Since 2008 I've been approaching my career as a lawyer who was going to become a writer at the first opportunity. It was comforting; financial security, quite prestigious, challenging and keeping with the 'artist' bullshit scenario that we all paint about ourselves in our minds.
That's the problem. When you spend enough time convincing yourself of a fact, it becomes all too easy to see it as a truth. Now I have to rethink some other things about myself that I though were true, like being a great lover, having the physique of a gladiator, or being an original member of The Sugarhill Gang.
So cut throat corporate law is probably not for me. Small-town Atticus Finchery maybe, but not the Michael Clayton red-braces-and-Porsche-Boxter type. Some cliché is coming to mind about heat and kitchens, but it escapes me.
So what now?
I think the next stage for me is a masters degree of some sort. I've been looking at either an MA in radio production or print journalism. I want to give the writing future an actual attempt.
What do you think? Become a nicotine/adrenaline headline jock or an NPR/Radio 4 type doing radio dramas and producer 'Gardener's Question Time'? Both sound good.
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
Clockwork Spraytan and my Family Folk
So I've had this piece of music playing in my head all day.
It's called the Funeral of Queen Mary by Purcell, and is used in the classic Stanley Kubrick film A Clockwork Orange, based upon the blood-chilling epnumous novel by Anthony Burgess. The book and film tell the tale of Alex, a psychopathic teenager, and his gang of Droogs as they nightly wander around on drug-laced milkshakes in an orgy of 'ultraviolence', rape and burglary. The book caused a sensation when released because of its violent and sexual language, its graphic depiction of rape and murder, the invented argot (a mixture of slavic, pigdin russian, gypsy and street slang) of the main character, and the perceived strong anti-societal message. It is obviously one of my favourite books. Alex, the charming psychopath, reminds me of a younger (albeit less murder-n-rapey) version of myself.
As I sat in work today, back hunched and sweating towards my targets before the quitting hour, a message popped up on my screen and I was informed that all my work for the day (finding, interviewing, referencing and taking documentation) with a candidate - about 7 hours worth - was now ENTIRELY useless because his safety tickets were expired. I felt a bit like Alex. I wanted to go on a bit of an ultraviolent rampage myself (again, without the old rape part) and kill lots of people. I can see how people go on killing sprees. The problem is though, that my psychopathic side (and it does exist) doesn't have the stamina for relentlessness. It's only good in short bursts or periods of mania. Not always and forever. Therefore it's a fake clockwork orange I am. A clockwork spraytan.
When I got home however, I had received a card from my granny and granddad. They're the best old people in the world, and it cheered me up completely to get it. My granny (Mamo you can read about here) is a wickedly funny and cruelly intelligent person. She once gave a police officer a dressing down when a bomb was suspected to be near her house, just because she hates the Po-lice. My grandfather is a writer, and he's written a lot, over 100 books at this stage (the links only shows some of his publications apparently) in his own name and with psuedonyms. I'm not sure how many, but's it's LOADS! He calls himself a hack, and told me all about the story of Ned Purdon when I was younger, the character of the Oliver Goldsmith poem:
Here lies Ned Purdon, from misery freed, Who long was a bookseller's hack;
He led such a damnable life in this world, I don't think he'll ever come back
He's an amazing man, and a phenomenal writer. Every time we chat we talk about writing and he always tells me that to keep as busy as possible is the key. When he asked me how much I write, I told him that it could alternate from 200 to 2000 words in a day, depending on the day. He told me that the best trick was to polish off 500 words that were almost perfect if you could. It cuts down on the edit, and makes for a speedy process. Of course when I seriously get down to writing, I'll try to do double that, but it probably wont be near as good. He also tells me that no writer worth his salt is published before he has a collection of shoeboxes filled with rejections slips. He's not wrong, I fear.
My grandad - Séanie, we call him (sha-nee) - can also sing a song for almost any word you can ever come up with. When he was a teacher he used to write librettas and musicals for the boys he taught. His office, in my grandparents place, is like a museum. The entire house is full of books, and his study has a huge bureau, with wall to wall bookcases and two huge cabinets stuffed with the pieces he's written. We've all had dedications I think; mine was in a book of childrens verse that he compiled and dedicated to my broheim and I, and it's such a source of pride in the family. Him and I are very similar in ways, and we have this running joke about the books I borrow (he has 1000's of them!) from him and never give back. All books in his house are 'our' books, so I can take them at will.
So now I'm going to go to bed thinking of the many stories and words he's written, and dreaming of those that I'll write myself someday.
Goodnight folks, keep writing.
x
It's called the Funeral of Queen Mary by Purcell, and is used in the classic Stanley Kubrick film A Clockwork Orange, based upon the blood-chilling epnumous novel by Anthony Burgess. The book and film tell the tale of Alex, a psychopathic teenager, and his gang of Droogs as they nightly wander around on drug-laced milkshakes in an orgy of 'ultraviolence', rape and burglary. The book caused a sensation when released because of its violent and sexual language, its graphic depiction of rape and murder, the invented argot (a mixture of slavic, pigdin russian, gypsy and street slang) of the main character, and the perceived strong anti-societal message. It is obviously one of my favourite books. Alex, the charming psychopath, reminds me of a younger (albeit less murder-n-rapey) version of myself.
As I sat in work today, back hunched and sweating towards my targets before the quitting hour, a message popped up on my screen and I was informed that all my work for the day (finding, interviewing, referencing and taking documentation) with a candidate - about 7 hours worth - was now ENTIRELY useless because his safety tickets were expired. I felt a bit like Alex. I wanted to go on a bit of an ultraviolent rampage myself (again, without the old rape part) and kill lots of people. I can see how people go on killing sprees. The problem is though, that my psychopathic side (and it does exist) doesn't have the stamina for relentlessness. It's only good in short bursts or periods of mania. Not always and forever. Therefore it's a fake clockwork orange I am. A clockwork spraytan.
When I got home however, I had received a card from my granny and granddad. They're the best old people in the world, and it cheered me up completely to get it. My granny (Mamo you can read about here) is a wickedly funny and cruelly intelligent person. She once gave a police officer a dressing down when a bomb was suspected to be near her house, just because she hates the Po-lice. My grandfather is a writer, and he's written a lot, over 100 books at this stage (the links only shows some of his publications apparently) in his own name and with psuedonyms. I'm not sure how many, but's it's LOADS! He calls himself a hack, and told me all about the story of Ned Purdon when I was younger, the character of the Oliver Goldsmith poem:
Here lies Ned Purdon, from misery freed, Who long was a bookseller's hack;
He led such a damnable life in this world, I don't think he'll ever come back
He's an amazing man, and a phenomenal writer. Every time we chat we talk about writing and he always tells me that to keep as busy as possible is the key. When he asked me how much I write, I told him that it could alternate from 200 to 2000 words in a day, depending on the day. He told me that the best trick was to polish off 500 words that were almost perfect if you could. It cuts down on the edit, and makes for a speedy process. Of course when I seriously get down to writing, I'll try to do double that, but it probably wont be near as good. He also tells me that no writer worth his salt is published before he has a collection of shoeboxes filled with rejections slips. He's not wrong, I fear.
My grandad - Séanie, we call him (sha-nee) - can also sing a song for almost any word you can ever come up with. When he was a teacher he used to write librettas and musicals for the boys he taught. His office, in my grandparents place, is like a museum. The entire house is full of books, and his study has a huge bureau, with wall to wall bookcases and two huge cabinets stuffed with the pieces he's written. We've all had dedications I think; mine was in a book of childrens verse that he compiled and dedicated to my broheim and I, and it's such a source of pride in the family. Him and I are very similar in ways, and we have this running joke about the books I borrow (he has 1000's of them!) from him and never give back. All books in his house are 'our' books, so I can take them at will.
So now I'm going to go to bed thinking of the many stories and words he's written, and dreaming of those that I'll write myself someday.
Goodnight folks, keep writing.
x
Saturday, March 6, 2010
From Anger at the Febrile State of a Saturday Evening to Nostalgia.
I'm sitting in the living room in my PJs at 01:07 with Spark listening to the radio. I had a bath about two hours ago and my hair's still fluffy. I just had a lovely cup of tea, and my stomach is warm.
All over London now, women in high heels and low cut black dresses are drinking too many vodka-based drinks and dancing to poorly produced music in wannabe nightclubs, more similar to germ-infested Thai sweatshops than bars. They drink as if they're afraid of something and then go home to vomit or fuck strangers, or claw the eyes out of other girls or pass out in doorways.
Men, or boys, in clothes-with-other-people's-names-on-them dance badly to poorly produced music and talk to each other based on arbitary and ill-defined social rules about how much they can drink or what person's name is on their boxers, the waistband of which everyone in the bar can see, or which celebrity they wouldn't have sex with or which gaudy piece-of-shit platinum and diamond-soaked timepiece they would like to buy. They drink as if they have something to prove, and then go home to vomit, to fuck strangers or to get into an argument to the point where there's almost, but not quite, a fist fight.
They are tired. They act like they've got more money than they actually do. They hate all but maybe 20 of the people in the club. They take thousands upon thousands of photos and they will wake up tomorrow and convince themselves that they had a really good night, despite the hangover, the cut lip, the STD, the Facebook photos and the broken relationships.
It's one of those evenings where I realise that the fact that I'm a boring shite is okay. I've been really down recently, and part of that probably has something to do with the fact that I, more often than not, am one of the faceless 'They' to whom I refer. We have all been conned into believing that the only way to live is to spend our money and hard earned free time gravitating towards alcohol, with an accompaniment of shite wannabe-music.
I've just realised the irony of the word 'wannabe'. It's officially a word, as it's in the Oxford English Dictionary, but it shall nonetheless always be a wannabe word in most people's estimation. 'Nonetheless' is good, as are most threesomes of any sort.
-
Spark is surprising me tonight. After having known him for almost five years, we've never sat and listened to hip-hop together. I don't mind rap, but I wouldn't be a fan of the newer stuff, and Spark's always hit me as an Acoustic man, but here we are, listening to Jay-Z while S bobs his head and I type. We are breaking ground on new territories in our friendship it seems.
Now he has put on the main song from Civilisation 4, Baba Yetu. This reminds me of that time we both lived in Virginia for a year. Mark sings along and does that thing he does where he sings a song in a different key or adds an impromptu harmony
I tell Mark that I've started writing about him when I had initially intended to have a wee rant about how culture dictates us to go and act like guffawing wankers in shitty nightclubs, "getting the cans into us" as S says. He tells me that my blog has gone downhill in terms of content if I'm using him as subject matter.
We listen to YoYo Ma playing Ecstacy of Gold from his Ennio Morricone album. It's simply beautiful and as the vibrations (from the bitchin' Bose bass amp that S bought last summer) creep across the floor and make the phlegm in my chest vibrate, the hair on my arm rises up and I've suddenly got goose-pimples. This really reminds me of the time we lived in Virginia. It was absolutely the best time of my life.
One of the guys in our apartment in the US had a huge computer screen and ran linux. He was a very good fellow, a scientist turned law-student, who was interested in Goethe, talked to a stuffed mascot of Nietzsche (whom we all called Saddam) had a copy of Milton's Paradise Lost (with the original Gustav Doré wood engravings) and played the cello. His name is John.
My happiest memory of the flat is sitting on a Saturday night, with a Dominos pizza the size of a cartwheel (a thin-crust pepperoni with green peppers) and a bottle of Coke, playing Civ 4 for hours on end and listening to Yo Yo Ma. The pizzas were always cut into a grid of squares instead of the traditional wedges, and we would eat it as if it were fine finger food at a champagne reception. It was great. People always talk about their perfect year, that was mine, a beautiful year.
I'm sitting in the kitchen now, it's 03:09, and I've been typing, listening to music and spotifying. I've collected the music we were listening to before Spark went to bed, and added a few more that'll help lull me off to (if not sleep) rest. Here it is, folks.
I just realised that I've been smiling for the past twenty minutes, even though I've been sitting on my own in the living room, typing my vague and innane thoughts and trying not to yawn. I might not go to bars or clubs for a while, they're starting to annoy me. Sitting with Spark tonight was really cool, perhaps that's something to do more.
-----
----
---
--
-
ps - we decided tonight that instead of 'poker night' or other man-things to maintain guy friendships, we're going to have a Pizza and Civ5 night when we're both lawyers.
PPS - this is the first post in almost a year, and almost 100 posts, with the tag 'PIZZA'. How the hell did that happen?
All over London now, women in high heels and low cut black dresses are drinking too many vodka-based drinks and dancing to poorly produced music in wannabe nightclubs, more similar to germ-infested Thai sweatshops than bars. They drink as if they're afraid of something and then go home to vomit or fuck strangers, or claw the eyes out of other girls or pass out in doorways.
Men, or boys, in clothes-with-other-people's-names-on-them dance badly to poorly produced music and talk to each other based on arbitary and ill-defined social rules about how much they can drink or what person's name is on their boxers, the waistband of which everyone in the bar can see, or which celebrity they wouldn't have sex with or which gaudy piece-of-shit platinum and diamond-soaked timepiece they would like to buy. They drink as if they have something to prove, and then go home to vomit, to fuck strangers or to get into an argument to the point where there's almost, but not quite, a fist fight.
They are tired. They act like they've got more money than they actually do. They hate all but maybe 20 of the people in the club. They take thousands upon thousands of photos and they will wake up tomorrow and convince themselves that they had a really good night, despite the hangover, the cut lip, the STD, the Facebook photos and the broken relationships.
It's one of those evenings where I realise that the fact that I'm a boring shite is okay. I've been really down recently, and part of that probably has something to do with the fact that I, more often than not, am one of the faceless 'They' to whom I refer. We have all been conned into believing that the only way to live is to spend our money and hard earned free time gravitating towards alcohol, with an accompaniment of shite wannabe-music.
I've just realised the irony of the word 'wannabe'. It's officially a word, as it's in the Oxford English Dictionary, but it shall nonetheless always be a wannabe word in most people's estimation. 'Nonetheless' is good, as are most threesomes of any sort.
-
Spark is surprising me tonight. After having known him for almost five years, we've never sat and listened to hip-hop together. I don't mind rap, but I wouldn't be a fan of the newer stuff, and Spark's always hit me as an Acoustic man, but here we are, listening to Jay-Z while S bobs his head and I type. We are breaking ground on new territories in our friendship it seems.
Now he has put on the main song from Civilisation 4, Baba Yetu. This reminds me of that time we both lived in Virginia for a year. Mark sings along and does that thing he does where he sings a song in a different key or adds an impromptu harmony
I tell Mark that I've started writing about him when I had initially intended to have a wee rant about how culture dictates us to go and act like guffawing wankers in shitty nightclubs, "getting the cans into us" as S says. He tells me that my blog has gone downhill in terms of content if I'm using him as subject matter.
We listen to YoYo Ma playing Ecstacy of Gold from his Ennio Morricone album. It's simply beautiful and as the vibrations (from the bitchin' Bose bass amp that S bought last summer) creep across the floor and make the phlegm in my chest vibrate, the hair on my arm rises up and I've suddenly got goose-pimples. This really reminds me of the time we lived in Virginia. It was absolutely the best time of my life.
One of the guys in our apartment in the US had a huge computer screen and ran linux. He was a very good fellow, a scientist turned law-student, who was interested in Goethe, talked to a stuffed mascot of Nietzsche (whom we all called Saddam) had a copy of Milton's Paradise Lost (with the original Gustav Doré wood engravings) and played the cello. His name is John.
My happiest memory of the flat is sitting on a Saturday night, with a Dominos pizza the size of a cartwheel (a thin-crust pepperoni with green peppers) and a bottle of Coke, playing Civ 4 for hours on end and listening to Yo Yo Ma. The pizzas were always cut into a grid of squares instead of the traditional wedges, and we would eat it as if it were fine finger food at a champagne reception. It was great. People always talk about their perfect year, that was mine, a beautiful year.
I'm sitting in the kitchen now, it's 03:09, and I've been typing, listening to music and spotifying. I've collected the music we were listening to before Spark went to bed, and added a few more that'll help lull me off to (if not sleep) rest. Here it is, folks.
I just realised that I've been smiling for the past twenty minutes, even though I've been sitting on my own in the living room, typing my vague and innane thoughts and trying not to yawn. I might not go to bars or clubs for a while, they're starting to annoy me. Sitting with Spark tonight was really cool, perhaps that's something to do more.
-----
----
---
--
-
ps - we decided tonight that instead of 'poker night' or other man-things to maintain guy friendships, we're going to have a Pizza and Civ5 night when we're both lawyers.
PPS - this is the first post in almost a year, and almost 100 posts, with the tag 'PIZZA'. How the hell did that happen?
Saturday, February 6, 2010
The Little Things
So after my last little, er...wobble on the board, I decided to try and chill and enjoy my time a bit more. This means getting a bit more sleep and to another, listening to the Jurassic Park overture before I get up in the morning to get all szhuzhed up...
...and ease back on the jittifyingly large intake of caffeine to which I've grown accustomed. I mean, much as I like my Starbucks wake-up juice (a venti white-choc mocha with two extra espresso shots) and enjoy the sensation of needing to pee every three minutes, I think it makes one rather tense. Work now doesn't seem all that bed and stuff. Plus, I've decided to just lean back and go with it, even if that does mean sticking the old head in the sand a bit regarding money and the looming threat ofGerman invasion eviction or Council-tax flogging.
Anyway, I was coming home from work on Thursday night and decided to run and get my hair cut (because that's a mental night out for me) at a wee barbers were Spark and I got our scalps mowed before graduation. I went in, sat down and the (gorgeous...seriously gorgeous, but married to a scary-looking guy) tiny Romanian woman who had cut my hair before started chopping away, occasionally making small talk about the weather. Presently, she asked me whether I wanted my sideburns cut in and when I told her i didn't, she looked at me and asked me 'why'.
I didn't have an answer, I suggested that I might possibly grow out the beard again.
She shrugged, looking doubtful.
I asked her if she didn't agree. She shrugged again, and was silent for a moment before declaring 'your face is too long for a beard, you look strange.'
So the rest of the session was rather marred by the fact that we both dissolved into tears of laughter.
THEN when I was walking home, newly-barbered when I was stopped dead in my tracks. Breathless I stood there, like a fat emo looking at a new shop called 'Sensitive Cheeseburgers' as my eyes took in something that I have searched for in my time here in London but not had the luck to find. Now, as I was walking, a minute's stroll from my bed, I had been touched by the hand of good fortune and stumbled across a shop which dealt specifically in tobaccos, whiskeys and chocolates. Yes, an independent tobacconists, right here in my little niche of the world, West Hampstead, London, England, UK, Europe, World, Space.
Robert Graham (Est 1874) is a Scot outfit that deals in the good stuff in life and when I bolted into the shop and demanded 'How long have you been here?' the poor bemused woman behind the counter was rather nonplussed. We shook hands and chatted for a while, and I left with her card, having offered my services if she wanted any weekend staff.
God that would be sweet, surrounded by cigars and boutique cigarettes and pipes and whiskey and rare chocolates and.....well, I'm getting distracted here. I left, and went to the coffee shop at the end of my street where I had a 'diet' espresso (just the one) and ruminated and scribble in my little notebook. I went home, read and went to bed, all happy and smiley. It's the little things I suppose.
Now, it's Saturday, and I'm sitting in my bed listening to Classic FM and considering a bacon sandwich. I fucking love lazy weekends. I'm about to go and meet a blog-friend for his birthday drinks too. I'm rather excited tbh, as this fella's a top-notch bloke, and a great writer to boot. Should be fun!
Also, at this point, I realise that I have inadvertently completed another of my 101 things to do. Wow, I'm totting them up this week:
55) Find a nice tobacconists in London, with a nice blended pipe-tobacco to rival my favourite – Peterson’s Connoisseur’s Choice.
Not only were there many many different types of beautiful carcinogenic tobaccos to fawn over, but they had it...my favourite, the Connoisseurs Choice.
Yahtze!
Now I just have to find a racist to punch.
Completed 8/101
...and ease back on the jittifyingly large intake of caffeine to which I've grown accustomed. I mean, much as I like my Starbucks wake-up juice (a venti white-choc mocha with two extra espresso shots) and enjoy the sensation of needing to pee every three minutes, I think it makes one rather tense. Work now doesn't seem all that bed and stuff. Plus, I've decided to just lean back and go with it, even if that does mean sticking the old head in the sand a bit regarding money and the looming threat of
Anyway, I was coming home from work on Thursday night and decided to run and get my hair cut (because that's a mental night out for me) at a wee barbers were Spark and I got our scalps mowed before graduation. I went in, sat down and the (gorgeous...seriously gorgeous, but married to a scary-looking guy) tiny Romanian woman who had cut my hair before started chopping away, occasionally making small talk about the weather. Presently, she asked me whether I wanted my sideburns cut in and when I told her i didn't, she looked at me and asked me 'why'.
I didn't have an answer, I suggested that I might possibly grow out the beard again.
She shrugged, looking doubtful.
I asked her if she didn't agree. She shrugged again, and was silent for a moment before declaring 'your face is too long for a beard, you look strange.'
So the rest of the session was rather marred by the fact that we both dissolved into tears of laughter.
THEN when I was walking home, newly-barbered when I was stopped dead in my tracks. Breathless I stood there, like a fat emo looking at a new shop called 'Sensitive Cheeseburgers' as my eyes took in something that I have searched for in my time here in London but not had the luck to find. Now, as I was walking, a minute's stroll from my bed, I had been touched by the hand of good fortune and stumbled across a shop which dealt specifically in tobaccos, whiskeys and chocolates. Yes, an independent tobacconists, right here in my little niche of the world, West Hampstead, London, England, UK, Europe, World, Space.
Robert Graham (Est 1874) is a Scot outfit that deals in the good stuff in life and when I bolted into the shop and demanded 'How long have you been here?' the poor bemused woman behind the counter was rather nonplussed. We shook hands and chatted for a while, and I left with her card, having offered my services if she wanted any weekend staff.
God that would be sweet, surrounded by cigars and boutique cigarettes and pipes and whiskey and rare chocolates and.....well, I'm getting distracted here. I left, and went to the coffee shop at the end of my street where I had a 'diet' espresso (just the one) and ruminated and scribble in my little notebook. I went home, read and went to bed, all happy and smiley. It's the little things I suppose.
Now, it's Saturday, and I'm sitting in my bed listening to Classic FM and considering a bacon sandwich. I fucking love lazy weekends. I'm about to go and meet a blog-friend for his birthday drinks too. I'm rather excited tbh, as this fella's a top-notch bloke, and a great writer to boot. Should be fun!
Also, at this point, I realise that I have inadvertently completed another of my 101 things to do. Wow, I'm totting them up this week:
55) Find a nice tobacconists in London, with a nice blended pipe-tobacco to rival my favourite – Peterson’s Connoisseur’s Choice.
Not only were there many many different types of beautiful carcinogenic tobaccos to fawn over, but they had it...my favourite, the Connoisseurs Choice.
Yahtze!
Now I just have to find a racist to punch.
Completed 8/101
Monday, January 25, 2010
Twitterings
So I'm a pretty heavy-duty Twitter user, and in the past two weeks it's really started paying off for me. Not only have I really begun to interact with some amazing 20-something bloggers, but I follow some really cool celebs and, best of all, some cool comedians. Twitter is a great way to vent, to try and make your friends laugh, or two circulate rumours that beloved celebrities are dead ("What? Eminem and Johnny Depp? ...Oh wait, they're fine.")
In the last 10 days, I've had two amazing Twitter experiences.
First of all, when Esquire Magazine (UK) whom I follow @esquireuk were looking for suggestions from readers for home-remedies to combat the cold. I tweeted back with my suggestion (gargle salt water for the throat, take a shot of tabasco for the sinuses, then mix warm water w/ honey, lemon and ginger) and forgot about it.
Days later, when they published the results on their webpage, guess who came in at number 1!
I mean, yeah, it's only a little retweet, and it's not even attributed to me, but fuck it, it was so cool!
-----
----
---
--
-
--
---
----
-----
Then, today, I was looking through my Tweet-feed when British funny-lady Sarah Millican (@SarahMillican75) tweeted her followers to offer them free tickets for her last ever radio show on Wednesday night. I replied back and within minutes she told me my name was on the guest list.
So yeah, it gets derided all the time, I sometimes drunk tweet celebs and it's probably endemic of some massive shift towards a society of antisocial weirdos who publish every minute thought, but fuck me, it can be fun!
x
In the last 10 days, I've had two amazing Twitter experiences.
First of all, when Esquire Magazine (UK) whom I follow @esquireuk were looking for suggestions from readers for home-remedies to combat the cold. I tweeted back with my suggestion (gargle salt water for the throat, take a shot of tabasco for the sinuses, then mix warm water w/ honey, lemon and ginger) and forgot about it.
Days later, when they published the results on their webpage, guess who came in at number 1!
I mean, yeah, it's only a little retweet, and it's not even attributed to me, but fuck it, it was so cool!
-----
----
---
--
-
--
---
----
-----
Then, today, I was looking through my Tweet-feed when British funny-lady Sarah Millican (@SarahMillican75) tweeted her followers to offer them free tickets for her last ever radio show on Wednesday night. I replied back and within minutes she told me my name was on the guest list.
So yeah, it gets derided all the time, I sometimes drunk tweet celebs and it's probably endemic of some massive shift towards a society of antisocial weirdos who publish every minute thought, but fuck me, it can be fun!
x
Monday, December 28, 2009
Here's to 2010...an en masse resolution
Okay, so can I find anyone who actually liked 2009? Actually, can anyone say they actually enjoyed the Noughties?
(btw - i'm gonna swear like a fucking cunt in this post, and because I'm watching American Psycho at the same time, I might also kill a hooker...just saying)
I've realised that this year has been a fucking shit-show of a bollocks-fest, a drawn-out, melodramatic pile of itchy goat testicles. The only relative positive to this putrid, mediocre year is that we can throw a helluva massive hoolie to wake this horrible fucking decade to the Underworld.
There have been a few highlights of course, little things have made the year quite nice at times, and downright hilarious at others. A few classics spring to mind:
-the many happy hours with my partner Dr McQuillan writing, presenting and editing our radio shows ‘The Conor(s) Show’. We were nominated for an award for it, but the best times we had were the off-air moments when we’d stuff our faces with chocolate, wine and crisps.
-visiting my brother in the Czech Republic and hill walking with the boys in France.
-somehow graduating without losing all my hair or killing anyone
I’m sure there are more but I can’t think of them right away. There were a few bad times too, but let’s not go into them, any more whining Fort Boloxi nonsense on this old Pizza Box and things’ll get fucking ridiculous.
There have been a few really cool things that changed my perspective. These life-defining moments have given me a weird insight into how I look at the world and have changed my attitude in their own ways. The ‘Boom Boom Pow’, the crazy tumble-drier fall down the escalator at Waterloo Station both taught me to toughen up and helped give rise to Mr Happy-go-fucking-lucky McPositive, and his little brother The Pizza Devil. The mad snow and horrible fucking flight schedule have made me realise that I love and miss my family, and the sheer fucking horribleness of October-December have made me want to get a job and start being productive with my time, and make sure that because I have the next 6 months free means that I have to make something of my time.
There was one great thing that happened recently though, which I believe is a hugely good omen for the year to come. My flatmate, Sparky (Mark) recently had a spot of good news. On Christmas Eve, he took his girlfriend for a drive to Navan Fort, a lovely ancient fort in Ireland, covered in snow and looking absolutely beautiful. He got down on the knee and popped the question...and of course, she said yes. I’m absolutely delighted for them both, and I know that 2010 will be a phenomenal year for them both. I’m going to make it a great year for me too, it’ll just take a bit of work.
So now, with one of my best friends getting married (at some wonderful undisclosed future point) and with the crazy humming noise in my head spurring me on, I’m going to make a resolution. Not some vague ‘eat less, work more’ promise to myself, just a promise to say (in the words of Jay) bollocks to the middle and make the year a great one.
So, we're going to have a great year okay? All of us. There'll be low points too, obviously, and we'll feel the normal highs, and lows, but let's make a resolution to actually try and make ourselves happy this year, to live proactively and make a productive difference. Let's take this next decade by the balls, us 20-somethings, and try to make the Tweenies (my name for the next, looming decade) as fucking happy and good as possible...WHO'S WITH ME???
Oh, and here is a great song about what I like about this time of the year, it makes me cry every time...
Here's to 2010, folks...
(btw - i'm gonna swear like a fucking cunt in this post, and because I'm watching American Psycho at the same time, I might also kill a hooker...just saying)
I've realised that this year has been a fucking shit-show of a bollocks-fest, a drawn-out, melodramatic pile of itchy goat testicles. The only relative positive to this putrid, mediocre year is that we can throw a helluva massive hoolie to wake this horrible fucking decade to the Underworld.
There have been a few highlights of course, little things have made the year quite nice at times, and downright hilarious at others. A few classics spring to mind:
-the many happy hours with my partner Dr McQuillan writing, presenting and editing our radio shows ‘The Conor(s) Show’. We were nominated for an award for it, but the best times we had were the off-air moments when we’d stuff our faces with chocolate, wine and crisps.
-visiting my brother in the Czech Republic and hill walking with the boys in France.
-somehow graduating without losing all my hair or killing anyone
I’m sure there are more but I can’t think of them right away. There were a few bad times too, but let’s not go into them, any more whining Fort Boloxi nonsense on this old Pizza Box and things’ll get fucking ridiculous.
There have been a few really cool things that changed my perspective. These life-defining moments have given me a weird insight into how I look at the world and have changed my attitude in their own ways. The ‘Boom Boom Pow’, the crazy tumble-drier fall down the escalator at Waterloo Station both taught me to toughen up and helped give rise to Mr Happy-go-fucking-lucky McPositive, and his little brother The Pizza Devil. The mad snow and horrible fucking flight schedule have made me realise that I love and miss my family, and the sheer fucking horribleness of October-December have made me want to get a job and start being productive with my time, and make sure that because I have the next 6 months free means that I have to make something of my time.
There was one great thing that happened recently though, which I believe is a hugely good omen for the year to come. My flatmate, Sparky (Mark) recently had a spot of good news. On Christmas Eve, he took his girlfriend for a drive to Navan Fort, a lovely ancient fort in Ireland, covered in snow and looking absolutely beautiful. He got down on the knee and popped the question...and of course, she said yes. I’m absolutely delighted for them both, and I know that 2010 will be a phenomenal year for them both. I’m going to make it a great year for me too, it’ll just take a bit of work.
So now, with one of my best friends getting married (at some wonderful undisclosed future point) and with the crazy humming noise in my head spurring me on, I’m going to make a resolution. Not some vague ‘eat less, work more’ promise to myself, just a promise to say (in the words of Jay) bollocks to the middle and make the year a great one.
So, we're going to have a great year okay? All of us. There'll be low points too, obviously, and we'll feel the normal highs, and lows, but let's make a resolution to actually try and make ourselves happy this year, to live proactively and make a productive difference. Let's take this next decade by the balls, us 20-somethings, and try to make the Tweenies (my name for the next, looming decade) as fucking happy and good as possible...WHO'S WITH ME???
Oh, and here is a great song about what I like about this time of the year, it makes me cry every time...
Here's to 2010, folks...
Sunday, November 8, 2009
Positivity!!
Okay, so I've made a few wee resolutions about this week
Basically, I've been looking over my posts from the past while and they've all been a bit...well, whiney. Whingeing and moaning is fun, but I've been rather self-indulgent with it, and should maybe man up a little and repress those little (and large) negative feelings down, only allowing them to re-emerge in later life as a massive stroke or a shooting spree with an automatic weapon.
So from now on, well, for this week anyway, I'm going to be known as Happy-go-fucking-lucky McPositive, my new name for the week starting Monday 9th of November. I'm going to make a physical effort to smile, to be happy and to make light of stressful situations.When something bad happens (like falling down an escalator and losing my wallet, or being mugged by a flock of pigeons or something) I'll laugh it off, it's all going to be a massively hilarious joke.
I'm also going to see if I can refrain from drinking and smoking for the week. I probably have had more than enough chemicals in my body for the last couple of months for my liver to have earned a week's respite. If I manage to get a job and actually seem to have kept it by Friday, then I'll reward myself with a pint, but not before that.
I've been watching The Thick of It quite a lot recently, and have to admit that I massively admire Malcolm Tucker; the absolutely apoplectic Scottish 'Enforcer to the PM' who goes around telling the entire political world what a cunt they are. Other than being a huge fan of Peter Capaldi thanks to the amazing 'Local Hero', I think that he's one of the greatest comic creations in the last decade, and defintely Armando Iannucci's greatest since Alan Partridge. I'm going to be like him for the week; infallible, but slightly less crazy-angry.
So, to begin the week, I've got a really random quote from a conversation I had earlier today. I was chatting to a friend (with whom I had gotten apocalyptically drunk with on Hallowe'en) who had laughed at my 'Waterloo Fail' story and invited me to a party. She had mentions it before and this was my response:
"What, the farmyard theatre with the he-she stripper and the dwarf pole dancer who spits piss at people?"
So yeah, I didn't go, but that sentence reminds me that life is bizarre and potentially amazing, even if it's just to sit back and wonder who wants to have dwarf-piss spat at them.
Maybe the week will answer the question...who knows?
Have a good 'un :)
ps - Actually I do know, at no point this week will I have any interaction with dwarf piss. If my internet arrives, as it should do on the 12th, I will celebrate by watching a dwarf-piss porn vid, or maybe by just pretending to watch it while closing my eyes tightly and trying to remember the contents of section 2 of the Irish Non-Fatal Offences Against the Person Act.
Basically, I've been looking over my posts from the past while and they've all been a bit...well, whiney. Whingeing and moaning is fun, but I've been rather self-indulgent with it, and should maybe man up a little and repress those little (and large) negative feelings down, only allowing them to re-emerge in later life as a massive stroke or a shooting spree with an automatic weapon.
So from now on, well, for this week anyway, I'm going to be known as Happy-go-fucking-lucky McPositive, my new name for the week starting Monday 9th of November. I'm going to make a physical effort to smile, to be happy and to make light of stressful situations.When something bad happens (like falling down an escalator and losing my wallet, or being mugged by a flock of pigeons or something) I'll laugh it off, it's all going to be a massively hilarious joke.
I'm also going to see if I can refrain from drinking and smoking for the week. I probably have had more than enough chemicals in my body for the last couple of months for my liver to have earned a week's respite. If I manage to get a job and actually seem to have kept it by Friday, then I'll reward myself with a pint, but not before that.
I've been watching The Thick of It quite a lot recently, and have to admit that I massively admire Malcolm Tucker; the absolutely apoplectic Scottish 'Enforcer to the PM' who goes around telling the entire political world what a cunt they are. Other than being a huge fan of Peter Capaldi thanks to the amazing 'Local Hero', I think that he's one of the greatest comic creations in the last decade, and defintely Armando Iannucci's greatest since Alan Partridge. I'm going to be like him for the week; infallible, but slightly less crazy-angry.
So, to begin the week, I've got a really random quote from a conversation I had earlier today. I was chatting to a friend (with whom I had gotten apocalyptically drunk with on Hallowe'en) who had laughed at my 'Waterloo Fail' story and invited me to a party. She had mentions it before and this was my response:
"What, the farmyard theatre with the he-she stripper and the dwarf pole dancer who spits piss at people?"
So yeah, I didn't go, but that sentence reminds me that life is bizarre and potentially amazing, even if it's just to sit back and wonder who wants to have dwarf-piss spat at them.
Maybe the week will answer the question...who knows?
Have a good 'un :)
ps - Actually I do know, at no point this week will I have any interaction with dwarf piss. If my internet arrives, as it should do on the 12th, I will celebrate by watching a dwarf-piss porn vid, or maybe by just pretending to watch it while closing my eyes tightly and trying to remember the contents of section 2 of the Irish Non-Fatal Offences Against the Person Act.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
