New Term

It looks like today was the start of term for the local FE college. Loads of sixteen-year-olds squealing and giggling on their way to the grown-up world of Oldham College. If I’d looked out the back of the bus, there would probably have been a whole parade of dogs following, so high-pitched was it all. My head is belting again. Joy.

Still, it’s only a three-day week for me this week, which is nice.

Fluttery

According to the BBC today, the British moth population is in decline. And I can’t deny it, while I know that any creature being in decline isn’t a good thing (well, except ants and wasps, but we’re shit out of luck on that one) I can’t help but have “Good.” as my first response on learning that there’s less of the little fluttery furry-bodied bastards than usual.

Oliver Stone

I have a theory – I’ve developed it while sat on the train tonight. I think Virgin Trains don’t want me seeing people too much. They’re jealous, they’re used to the shape my arse makes on their train-seats. Bear with me on this.

Every time I’m travelling TO see someone, the train runs at least three-quarters of an hour late. And to be honest, 45 minutes delay is a good journey. However, every time I’m travelling back AFTER seeing someone, the fucker runs on time. And in some cases, as today, it even runs slightly early.

It’s a plot, I tell you, a fucking plot.

A Trickle Through The Dam-Wall

Some people who read d4d™ will know how regularly I talk about wanting to get back into writing creatively (as opposed to d4d™’s creative ranting *grin*) and seeing how I do with the ideas that have been floating around in my head.

Well today, with no special work needing to be done while sat on the train, and after a disturbingly domestic and relaxed weekend (in spite of the Virgin Trains debacle on Friday) it’s finally started to happen. Four pages may not sound much, but it’s 400% of my output in the last four years. While other things have been going on – you know, small stuff like Life, Friends, Relationships, Chaos – I’ve been uninspired to write this kind of thing. (d4d™ is, in this context, a very different type of writing method) The ideas have been flowing, but there’s been no impetus to expel them onto paper/laptop, and so it’s all been filling the reservoir in my head, staying there in idea form, waiting to fledge into something else.

And now the reservoir’s dam is cracking, and the ideas are beginning to flow out – and it’s in a positive way. When last I was writing in this form, it was more of a need to purge, to get rid of the poisons that had been built up. There was an almost obsessive need to heal, to get it all out any which way I could, to stop it harming me. That’s not there this time – it feels more like story-telling, rather than sucking out venom from wounds.

I’ve no idea where this will end up – or even if it’ll be any good when it comes to the conclusion I already know about – but for now, well, I’ll be happy just to be back writing, and seeing where the tale takes me. It’s not going to be overnight – I don’t expect to be anywhere near finished on it before 2005 at the earliest – but it’s happening, and as I’ve got (at a conservative estimate) 32 hours of train-time in the next eight weeks, I’ve got the opportunity to get a load done, and we’ll go from there really.

IKEA

It’ll come as a shock to most people, but until today I’d actually never visited an IKEA store. But I’m now an afficionado of the Swedish furniture freakshow, and to prove it I have *ahem* even made a purchase. I don’t know what his name is in the catalogue, but it really should be something like HYSSINGSID. Yes, I managed to go, and come back with a metre-long multi-coloured furry snake. Sometimes I even worry myself.

So – what were my thoughts about the joys of Brent Cross Ikea? Well, first and foremost was “Fuck me it’s big!”. But it’s got some good stuff in there – come the time to move, I can see that there may be another shopping expedition there. But it’s not somewhere I’d want to go on a regular basis – the majority of people in there today made me wonder if they’d been thrown out of the local Asda store for sheer stupidity. Abandoned trolleys, people dithering about so badly that I actually saw three people walk into display stands – not just brushing impacts, but full-on whacks. But then, one has to find comedy where you can.

If it weren’t for the people though, I think it’d be fine. The actual stuff they sell seems fine (although I haven’t braved the furniture ordering/collection section, which seems to redefine the phrase “fucked up”) and most of it is devastatingly cheap, too. Plus they’ve got some ace leather sofas to collapse on – definitely been listed in the mental notebook of “Hmmm, potential future purchase”.

If I return (OK, When) though, it won’t be on a summer Sunday just before thousands of students go to university. Timing-wise we really could’ve done better. Next time it’ll be on a cold evening after work, when no-one sane is out shopping for furniture and house-wares. Without too many people there, I suspect it might even be an almost pleasant shopping experience. Might.

Nearlytimeforanupgrade

Bugger,the_space-bar_is_beginning_to_knacker_on_my_laptop. Oh_cunty_fuck.

2000+ starts here

Well, it pains me to say it, but I think that Prince Harry making a film about AIDS in Lesotho is probably a good thing. It’s interesting sometimes, the things that travel between parents and children, isn’t it?

To me, anything that raises the profile of AIDS and HIV is a good thing – I’ll be interested to see what he’s had to say on the subject, whether verbally or visually.