Tales of the mothership

So, a bit of context: When I was 14 my sex education primarily came through Neighbours and the occasional cryptic comment from my parents. Both were horrific.

The mothership once cornered my 19 year old brother and 17 year old self in the kitchen and asked us both whether we "wanted to know about the birds and the bees?" Instead of telling her to bugger off like rational human beings I think we both reacted with screams, yelps and frantic eye darting. Mum however, found the entire situation hilarious, made some horrendous comment about "your father" (which my sub-concious has thankfully, obliterated) and reached once again for her wine glass.

I'll save the time about she asked my poor brother and I to buy weed for her to another time. I have a reputation to uphold, after all.

Interpretation through Twitter, yeah

Twilight

@ladyisavamp

Sex

Is

Wrong

Unlessyouaremarriedtoacrazyobsessiveancientvampirewhosparklesinthesunandnotsosecretlywantstodrinkyourblood

P.S Whoar, have you seen the werewolf?

Rebecca, Daphne Du Maurier

@screwyoudanvers

So it's pretty boring on this island, I'm just chilling with this American bint but she keeps ordering me to do shit like darning. She can fuck right off.

Hello, attractive brooding man with suspected emotionally damaged past has been sighted...time to get my claws into him.

Totally saved him from jumping off a cliff. I AM SO GREAT.

We've eloped, innit. American bint was PISSED. Ha!

Bit creepy in this massive house...I'll just pretend I know what I'm doing, that'll be fine.

Jeez who was this Rebecca chick? She's dead people, MOVE ON. Especially you, Danvers.

This is awkward, might be married to a murderer. THIS ALWAYS HAPPENS TO ME.

Oh wait it's ok, apparently Rebecca was a right bitch. Ha! Shall we elope again?

Laters, SUCKERS! FTW!

HEY THERE!!!

So, like a lot of other people over the years I have watched a fair amount of Sex and the City. (fear not, this is not a blog about Sex and the City) but this combined with various conversations I have had with my brothers American girlfriend and other Americans I have met "around" has given me a fair insight into their differing style and approach to 'dating'. I may be wrong, but it strikes me that Americans will just approach each other and ask them out, and they'll do this ALL THE TIME and this is what constitutes dating. Kind of a sweeping net approach.

It also strikes me as standing in a very sharp contrast to the English approach, which in my experience tends to go more along the lines of:

Get wasted; Drunkenly pull someone; Get wasted, drunkenly cop off again; Maybe repeat a few times, but basically you're now going out. Only one party may be aware of this shift in relationship status, but that's ok.

To NOT BE SOBER is the key, key part of this. The thought of stone-cold soberly walking up to another person and being all: "Hi, I'm so and so etc etc, would you like to go for a drink?" is quite a terrifying prospect.

Much more familiar is to approach/be approached by a stranger, possibly fall over and redeem it all with an opening line of "HEY THERE!" accompanied with *JAZZ HANDS*

Winner!

Updates from the back

So those of you who have come in any form of contact with me over the past 8 weeks are probably aware, that I have been suffering from chronic back pain over this time. It has not been pretty.

Back pain is a familiar foe to me - I was afflicted badly in my second year, after a vigorous game of squash I was left virtually crippled having pulled a muscle. I literally couldn't believe that pain as bad as it was could be a muscular problem, but it was. Although I was left unable to walk standing upright or at any great speed for a couple of weeks - highlights included 1) being overtaken by a Granny on the street; 2) receiving a text from a friend which went along the lines of "I just saw a little old lady walking along and it made me think of you" - I did recover and despite the odd twinge, have been largely unaffected since.

But now it's back (no pun intended), with a brutal and vicious vengeance. The motherfucker. If I had to characterise back pain at all, I would simply say that it is a vicious motherfucker.

It has lead me into some pretty unpleasant circumstances. For instance, I cried, at work. Now I loathe crying in public (by public I mean anyone who is not my immediate family), and usually I contain my crying until 2 or 3 AM, in my room, alone. But back pain, the motherfucker, caused me to cry at work. The HORROR. I am now feeling slightly better about this outpouring of emotion though as when I was telling a friend of mine about my tale of cringe he told me to "Stop being so ridiculously British, you are allowed to show emotions, you know? Jeez". SORRY. SORRY!

My most recent humiliation was in the past few days. My back has been well on the way to recovery, but clever me decided that spending 8 hours driving over 2 days and then going for a cycle ride was definitely a brilliant idea and now I am paying the price with an epic relapse. I'm talking only-doesn't-hurt-when-lying-on-the-floor kind of relapse. FUCK. So having spent the past 8 weeks moaning and waiting for physio I finally decided to go Chuck Norris on their (the NHS') arse...and call up and ask politely for an appointment. I got lucky, and was able to see a physio the next morning.

So, this is how I found myself. Unable to drive, or walk to the hospital I had to get to bus. It was too painful to sit down at the bus stop, so I had to lean against a piss stained part of Salisbury's standing next to a bin with half extinguished cigarettes blowing smoke into my face; but at least the pain was bearable. Oh, wait no it wasn't, the brief respite was over. Shuffling from side to side to try and ease it, shaking from both the pain and exertion of standing up, sweating and just generally feeling and looking miserable, I found myself thinking,

"This, this, is living."

Brap! Brap! I hate it when my cereal goes soggy. Brap!

A colleague of mine remarked to me recently that I was born twenty years too late. My brother has frequently told me that he believes that I actually live in a cave, such is my lack of knowledge, or even basic awareness of current music and cultural phenomena.

The main foundings for these statements are because my musical passions lie firmly with Fleetwood Mac, The Beatles, The Kinks etc etc and because until recently I thought that "Dance music" was an acceptable term of description for anything remotely "dancey". Hell, I think with that one word I have proven my point. I mean, I can no more distinguish dub step from trip hop than I could determine one lobster from another.

I am however, not alone.

Now I am not the reincarnated spirit of the News of the World, so this blog will not feature naming and shaming, but I will say that a good friend of mine (you know who you are) did once interrupt a conversation about dub step with an apologetic "I'm sorry, but I just don't know who this dub step band are". Much hilarity and pointing and laughing followed this statement, but frankly, I'm just lucky that he said it before I did.

To be honest though, I'm pretty happy chilling in a glorious darkness of oblivion from the current trend of attempting to beat box about how you hate it when you're cereal goes soggy, or...whatever. At least by admitting, quite openly that I have no idea, it does save me a lot of hassle. There is no need to suffer the humiliation of pretending to be up with the latest tune by DJ pancake (again, or...whatever). Nope. It's far easier to play the ignorance card and I can recline happily in my chair of false superiority, with Penny Lane in my ears and in my heart - wonderful.

Diary of an angsty teenager

Day 1
I JUST WANT TO BELONG

Day 2
Maybe I'll join a cult.

Twitter for Fascists

The right to freedom of speech is incredibly important to me. I regularly attend events, seminars and read blogs and articles about protecting our right to free speech and the ways in which it is but a distant dream in too many countries in this world. I spent time working for Britain's leading organisation promoting freedom of expression, and the protection of these liberties was a huge influence factor for me when deciding which party to vote for in the General Election. So, you see, I care, about our right to free speech and freedom of expression.

HOWEVER. There, is one context when I will willingly and happily go full circle upon these values, and lead a horse-led fascist fueled charge in an attempt to SHUT UP the moronic sentiments which are inflicted upon myself, and others through the median of Twitter.

Now, I am aware, that this post will in all likelihood not be without some hypocrisy, so please excuse me. I tweet, and I write this blog and whilst I happen to think that I am the most fascinating person in the world, and that everyone who reads my tweets will be forever gripped in an enthralled state of interest, excitement and hilarity, I have come to accept that this is not always the case. I do like to think though that I will never be annoying enough to cause some random person with too much time on their hands to write a blog post about how they would like to forever ban people from expressing their most boring and inane updates every thirty fucking seconds.

'How can someone be aggravated into such a rage by Twitter posts?' I hear you asking. Don't get me wrong, pointless facebook statuses such as "I just pet my dog lol" also make me want to dive screaming headfirst into the abyss; but the sheer volume of twitter and tweets is far more terrifying.

Below are some examples of some of the tweets which make me want to track down each individual moron, knock on their door and pretend that I think they are brilliant and then actually, punch them very hard in the face.

First, literally, ANYTHING RELATED TO JUSTIN BIEBER. Every one of the tweets below, is real. I don't have the mental capacity to create the kind of spieling which "Beliebers" do. I officially hate that I know what a Belieber is.

RT IF U HAVE NEVER SAID ANYTHING BAD ABOUT JUSTIN BIEBER!!!

I no longer say "Justin Bieber". I only say "Justin" because my family already know who I'm talking about. #itsabelieberthing

*Call from unknown number.* Normal people: "I’ll just hit ignore." Me: "Maybe it's JUSTIN BIEBER! HELLO?!" #itsabelieberthing

Forget about Paige,forget about Jelena. It doesn't matter,all that matters is supporting that amazing boy named Justin Drew Bieber

So Twitter opens up an wall of white noise of MORONS bleating on about how much they love a high-pitched 14 year old. I mean, Jesus, somebody stop them! Who could stop this the ranks of sane people are calling, ah if only there was a way...

Worse, perhaps than the legions of ordinary morons yakking away, are the hundreds of equally tedious celebrities, who bore us all to tears with the updates of their lives. Apparently celebrities also eat bacon sandwiches. OH MY GOD. WHO KNEW.

Boring celebrity tweets include:

Cool, I'm about to reach 4,400,000 followers!

Hmmmm... Thinking Vegas... Comments..? Who's there? Any EPIC parties? talk to me cadre.... on the runway...

Both of the above are from the walking breathing car crash which is Charlie Sheen. Who is a tosser. I confess, my research for this blog was pretty limited, but you see, I knew that by giving a voice to an idiot such as Charlie Sheen, that I would not be disappointed. I went onto Charlie Sheen's twitter page and approximately 45 seconds later, BOOM, I have written confirmation that the guy is a prat.

And then, in a league of her own, is Elizabeth Hurley who bores the world with such thrilling nuggets of fact about herself such as:

Thank you to Estee Lauder for the bulging bag of goodies sent to my Gossip Girl trailer. Smothered in new product now....

Somebody stop this, for the sanity of the human race. Twitter facism, it makes a lot of sense.