Bonus point for the reference in the title, you'll need a little of the main post to piece it together.
I have a friend called Laura. She's sweet bless her. She is also oblivious, refuses to listen to advice, bitches constantly, and generally wonders why her life is a mess when everything seems out to get her. Many an hour was spent in first year talking about the finer points of kitchen utensils in the classics common room with her. In second year, I lived with her. It did not go greatly. She had a habit of knocking and entering my room, instead of knocking and waiting, which is an issue when you tend to sit around either naked or in boxers a lot in your room. She also could not take a hint. An entire 45 minute conversation was had with her sitting on the edge of my bed, me and chris lying with a duvet covering us and a very obvious trail of clothes from the door to the bed, and she at no point during the conversation realised perhaps she should come back later. It is firmly accepted by all, that she was the cause of the 'break up' of the flat. We were all pretty lazy, and it was a shitty place with endless problems, but it was cheap and in a great location just by St Pancras rail station, Laura made it worse; she rubbed people up the wrong way, failed to socialize with anyone in it other than me (thereby further straining both the absent relationships with the others, and the increasingly tiring relationship with me), never washed up, left hairs all over the bathroom etc... Don't get me wrong there were good times; many a time was spent both staring at the fridge at 'the magic food hour'*, we were both insomniacs so kept each other company, loved out cheese music and once whiled away a good 4 hours on youtube listening to Lolly, Whigfield, O-Town, Spice Girls, etc...
Anyway, Laura text me the other day, asking if I wanted to meet. I knew she'd recently got a job working in London so figured she must be finishing around the time she'd said to meet. When I did meet her, it turns out she quit that job. Now, granted, it was charity fundraising, which is not a job she's suited for at all, is damned hard work even for people it is suited too, and her boss was seriously hitting on her inappropriately, but she gave it up after a week, which seems typically Laura. If it doesn't live up to expectations, not a dull office job, not a bar job, not being perved over, relatively decently paid, flexible time, decent holidays (please forward all such jobs to me), etc, she tends to give up straight away. It was the same for essays in Uni. We both took the same archaeology courses. We knew nothing about archaeology, and the archaeology department refused to teach us anything about it, despite the fact our degree was supposed to include it. She whined and bitched for 3 years about how she had no clue what to do. I, whined and bitched for a bit, then went to the library, and read about 70 books on archaeology for my first essay. I now understand archaeology, and even get 1's in my essays, so I clearly took the wrong subject.
This girl needs to learn to stick with things. I've given up giving advice to her. She's of the type of person where no matter what you proffer, she'll find some completely unrelated and hitherto unspoken exception to take to it, no matter how many times you adjust and refine your advice. It's a waste of time and energy. Now I just tend to nod and make an approving sympathetic noise every so often. I'm good at that skill; I developed it young. Truthful bitching over, she's still a friend, albeit one that I'm probably not likely to end up staying in close contact with for the rest of my life; there are a bare handful of people like that I've taken from university. Another 2 handfuls worth that I'll talk to every once in a while; Laura probably falls into this category. The total number probably doesn't exceed 20, possibly even 15. My social circles have decreased massively in the past year...
The Five: Chris, Lisa, Terence, Joel, Ryan
*The magic food hour, for those who don't know, is usually about 2am in the morning, but may strike at any time, and is a period where you are hungry, don't know what for, open the fridge, cupboards, freezer, etc, stand staring for 5 minutes, decide whatever you want, you don't have it, proceed to pace around idly for another 5 minutes, before returning back to the food stores, magically hoping something will have changed and suddenly your desires will be sated. Rinse and repeat for a long period of time. This tends to strike at 2am simply because most shops are shut then, and any that are open you usually can't be arsed to go to. Magic is clearly aware of Murphy's law.
Thursday, 17 June 2010
boywithaonetrackmind
I studied Classics. Classics is a pretty faggy subject, let's be honest. So I was muchly disappointed to only have one other boy in each of my latin and classical civilization classes at A-level., all straight. And this was in my sixth form where ~60% of the boys were gay, bi, or willing to be bi if they were drunk and you just blew them, it was a pretty open place; like San Francisco, except in a school. And then I went to Uni to study it for 3 years, and between my year, and the year below me, despite a 50-50 split of guys/girls there were only 2 other gays, both were obscenely unattractive.
So I was quite happy in my third year, when attending the new freshers' drinks, 'cause I was special and got to go to these things even though I was a finalist, to find a happy clappy, rather camp, loud, kinda obnoxious, but very hot (he had red dyed hair for one, i was a sucker) boy, who was a) clearly gay, b) confirmed gay by other freshers who had got to know him, c) clearly filthy minded, d) confirmed filthy minded by conversations had & overheard over the first 2 weeks. Hurrah, a cute gay boy to perve over, and possibly drunkenly end up with at the department christmas party etc etc.
Most other people, certainly in my year and the year below, hated him. Each new fresher year has some common trait, the year above was characterized by being absolutely massive due to an over-intake, and thus the year suffered from large class sizes, delays to marking, poor quality of service etc; my year was whiney, very whiney; the year below were litterbugs, you know that sentiment your mum always used to say, that your room looked like a tornado had hit it? That was the common room after the year below had been in it. The new freshers were loud. Stupendously loud. And hot gay fresher, as he became known in my head, and his new female bestie, were the loudest of the lot, you could hear them speaking from outside. But he was cute so I forgave him; I always got on with him, and my obnoxion tolerance is quite high for cute guys. Case in point: Terence.
HGF then went and got himself a boyfriend, a law student, who looked very well suited to him and seemed as crazy as he was and off they went into their budding fresher romance. Said romance ended, according to the associated news sources of facebook, a few weeks ago. Cut to tonight when HGF starts a facebook chat with me. We only ever talk on facebook when we're the only people up doing essays and BORED OUT OF OUR MINDS. It's the holidays, so whilst bored, essay deadlines were not encroaching, and so boredom naturally, went hand-in-hand with horniness. After some vague conversation, something I said prompted to go "I assume you're [i.e. me & Chris] are fairly... open then". The conversation went downhill from there, with me saying some other stuff eventually which made him flirtatiously ask if "that was an offer". Jackpot. I have patience where cute boys are concerned, or just a pathetic hope they'll notice me one day, it depends on your perspective. Either way it can often pay off when horny. Various talks then ensued, of our mutual perverted natures, liberal-even-for-the-gays attitude to sex, and general desire to fuck the hell out of each other.
It seems I may have found myself a potential new fuckbuddy for the Autumn term. Well, he'll need to release finalist stress somehow... Score.
At the very least, I got a decent hour long cam show this evening ;)
So I was quite happy in my third year, when attending the new freshers' drinks, 'cause I was special and got to go to these things even though I was a finalist, to find a happy clappy, rather camp, loud, kinda obnoxious, but very hot (he had red dyed hair for one, i was a sucker) boy, who was a) clearly gay, b) confirmed gay by other freshers who had got to know him, c) clearly filthy minded, d) confirmed filthy minded by conversations had & overheard over the first 2 weeks. Hurrah, a cute gay boy to perve over, and possibly drunkenly end up with at the department christmas party etc etc.
Most other people, certainly in my year and the year below, hated him. Each new fresher year has some common trait, the year above was characterized by being absolutely massive due to an over-intake, and thus the year suffered from large class sizes, delays to marking, poor quality of service etc; my year was whiney, very whiney; the year below were litterbugs, you know that sentiment your mum always used to say, that your room looked like a tornado had hit it? That was the common room after the year below had been in it. The new freshers were loud. Stupendously loud. And hot gay fresher, as he became known in my head, and his new female bestie, were the loudest of the lot, you could hear them speaking from outside. But he was cute so I forgave him; I always got on with him, and my obnoxion tolerance is quite high for cute guys. Case in point: Terence.
HGF then went and got himself a boyfriend, a law student, who looked very well suited to him and seemed as crazy as he was and off they went into their budding fresher romance. Said romance ended, according to the associated news sources of facebook, a few weeks ago. Cut to tonight when HGF starts a facebook chat with me. We only ever talk on facebook when we're the only people up doing essays and BORED OUT OF OUR MINDS. It's the holidays, so whilst bored, essay deadlines were not encroaching, and so boredom naturally, went hand-in-hand with horniness. After some vague conversation, something I said prompted to go "I assume you're [i.e. me & Chris] are fairly... open then". The conversation went downhill from there, with me saying some other stuff eventually which made him flirtatiously ask if "that was an offer". Jackpot. I have patience where cute boys are concerned, or just a pathetic hope they'll notice me one day, it depends on your perspective. Either way it can often pay off when horny. Various talks then ensued, of our mutual perverted natures, liberal-even-for-the-gays attitude to sex, and general desire to fuck the hell out of each other.
It seems I may have found myself a potential new fuckbuddy for the Autumn term. Well, he'll need to release finalist stress somehow... Score.
At the very least, I got a decent hour long cam show this evening ;)
Saturday, 12 June 2010
Death becomes her
An update on the family funeral dead nan situation.
So we went to the funeral last thursday; it was kinda bizzare and wierd. everyone was sort of there out of some wierd obligation, but not the obligation that she was a mother, or sister, or family or anything, i'm not sure what it was, but we were all there nonetheless.
The theiving aunt, her husband, and her sons completely blanked us, and refused to talk to us, even when they had to walk right up to us to say hi to other relatives who were there and we were talking to. The only person they did talk to was my dad, who went up to them as the executor of the will and a big argument which my dad refuses to elaborate on ensued. Sandra's daughter, Marie, was good enough to say hi and give me a hug though, which was nice, as I'm quite fond of her. Her son callum sort of said hi, but he's 13, so the antisocial grunt was probably more a feature of his age, than him trying to avoid social contact with me cause of some family dispute.
During the service, we learnt what a wonderful, giving person my nan was, how she brought so much love and compassion in to the lives of everyone she touched... My mum and I were sitting in the third row and trying very hard to stifle a fit of the giggles. Everyone else, whilst nowhere near crying, at least had the courtesy to maintian a completely impassive neutral expression throughout the surface. My mum left halfway through to take care of my crying nephew Will (he's only 1, so it's allowed to disrupt services with crying), and to deal with her giggling fit.
Sandra and Pete had completely cut everyone else out of the service, the vicar barely even acknolwedged the fact that my nan had 2 other daughters, and the programme said Sandra and family would like to thank everyone.... It was entertaining.
Immediately after the service we left. No waiting around to thank the vicar or say hello to people, straight to the car, straight to a different pub to the one everyone else was planning on going to.
Good things, were I got to see my auntie rosie again, who I think is my great nan's sister. Like my great nan, she's a fucking amazing woman, of the sort women around the age of 100 tend to be, crazy as fuck of course, but so wonderful to talk to.
I also got to see my cousins Spencer and Jim. These are Susan and Brian's children. I can never get over how much Spence (yes, my family is that classy, he's called Spence) looks like my brother Tom. Of course this makes perfect sense. Spence's mother is the sister of Tom's mother. Spence's father is the brother of Tom's father. It's a very very similar mix of genes, but still, it throws me.
My mum's always convinced I don't know the extended side of her family. I always have to point out I do, and no, not cause I saw them at the last funeral; I met them all when I was about 6 at my auntie rosie's 80th birthday, even the ones that otherwise avoid us, such as Spence and Jim. I would always recognise Spence if I bumped into him in the street, despite the fact I've probably met him for a total of 6 hours in my entire life.
Finally, the big entertainment of the day, was some old photos. Shirley, who probably everything representing god's failed first attempt at creating a human, had a wedding album amongst the photos. She looked semi attractive, for the day at least, and the guy she was wedding looked alright. Of course everyone's instinctual reaction was "Who on earth did Shirley manage to trick into marrying her, the poor guy". At this point, the oft forgotten fact was brought up, that Shirley moved in the same circles as the Kray twins. Her husband, was in fact, a Kray gangster. Ah, that explains it. We also then posited the theory that the real reason behind the downfall of the Kray empire, was in fact due to Shirley gradual and unrelenting assault on the very essence of their souls.
Also, the mystery of Shirley's provenance was reinforced. Due to Shirley's age, she was either my great nan's daughter, and thus my nan's sister, but had about 15 years after my nan and my aunt rosie were born. Or she was my nan's daughter, and had about 15 years before my mum and her 2 sisters were born, likely out of wedlock. Both my nan and great nan refused to ever talk about this subject, and the Shirley's birth certificate has never been found. The wedding album, which had been bought by my nan, was in my great nan's set of photos, and was inscribed with the title 'Our daughter's wedding'. The great family secret continues...
So we went to the funeral last thursday; it was kinda bizzare and wierd. everyone was sort of there out of some wierd obligation, but not the obligation that she was a mother, or sister, or family or anything, i'm not sure what it was, but we were all there nonetheless.
The theiving aunt, her husband, and her sons completely blanked us, and refused to talk to us, even when they had to walk right up to us to say hi to other relatives who were there and we were talking to. The only person they did talk to was my dad, who went up to them as the executor of the will and a big argument which my dad refuses to elaborate on ensued. Sandra's daughter, Marie, was good enough to say hi and give me a hug though, which was nice, as I'm quite fond of her. Her son callum sort of said hi, but he's 13, so the antisocial grunt was probably more a feature of his age, than him trying to avoid social contact with me cause of some family dispute.
During the service, we learnt what a wonderful, giving person my nan was, how she brought so much love and compassion in to the lives of everyone she touched... My mum and I were sitting in the third row and trying very hard to stifle a fit of the giggles. Everyone else, whilst nowhere near crying, at least had the courtesy to maintian a completely impassive neutral expression throughout the surface. My mum left halfway through to take care of my crying nephew Will (he's only 1, so it's allowed to disrupt services with crying), and to deal with her giggling fit.
Sandra and Pete had completely cut everyone else out of the service, the vicar barely even acknolwedged the fact that my nan had 2 other daughters, and the programme said Sandra and family would like to thank everyone.... It was entertaining.
Immediately after the service we left. No waiting around to thank the vicar or say hello to people, straight to the car, straight to a different pub to the one everyone else was planning on going to.
Good things, were I got to see my auntie rosie again, who I think is my great nan's sister. Like my great nan, she's a fucking amazing woman, of the sort women around the age of 100 tend to be, crazy as fuck of course, but so wonderful to talk to.
I also got to see my cousins Spencer and Jim. These are Susan and Brian's children. I can never get over how much Spence (yes, my family is that classy, he's called Spence) looks like my brother Tom. Of course this makes perfect sense. Spence's mother is the sister of Tom's mother. Spence's father is the brother of Tom's father. It's a very very similar mix of genes, but still, it throws me.
My mum's always convinced I don't know the extended side of her family. I always have to point out I do, and no, not cause I saw them at the last funeral; I met them all when I was about 6 at my auntie rosie's 80th birthday, even the ones that otherwise avoid us, such as Spence and Jim. I would always recognise Spence if I bumped into him in the street, despite the fact I've probably met him for a total of 6 hours in my entire life.
Finally, the big entertainment of the day, was some old photos. Shirley, who probably everything representing god's failed first attempt at creating a human, had a wedding album amongst the photos. She looked semi attractive, for the day at least, and the guy she was wedding looked alright. Of course everyone's instinctual reaction was "Who on earth did Shirley manage to trick into marrying her, the poor guy". At this point, the oft forgotten fact was brought up, that Shirley moved in the same circles as the Kray twins. Her husband, was in fact, a Kray gangster. Ah, that explains it. We also then posited the theory that the real reason behind the downfall of the Kray empire, was in fact due to Shirley gradual and unrelenting assault on the very essence of their souls.
Also, the mystery of Shirley's provenance was reinforced. Due to Shirley's age, she was either my great nan's daughter, and thus my nan's sister, but had about 15 years after my nan and my aunt rosie were born. Or she was my nan's daughter, and had about 15 years before my mum and her 2 sisters were born, likely out of wedlock. Both my nan and great nan refused to ever talk about this subject, and the Shirley's birth certificate has never been found. The wedding album, which had been bought by my nan, was in my great nan's set of photos, and was inscribed with the title 'Our daughter's wedding'. The great family secret continues...
Friday, 11 June 2010
But I thought the old lady dropped it into the ocean in the end?
I was supposed to be at a talk in 2 weeks, with the great Phil Hine, #2 in the list of important people in the Chaos Magic movement, but due to my travel dates, I had to rearrange that, and instead attended a similar event tonight, with Dave Lee, who is #3 #4 #5 depending on where you place Ray Sherwin and Ian Reed. I would rather unfortuantely put him at #5 therefore, but still , big important person, involved from the beginnings of the CM movement and pivotal to its development.
Christina, the lovely sweet little bit innocent and naiive woman who runs Treadwells, arranged an informal discussion evening with Mr Lee. The premise is, instead of them coming to present some form of new theory on the working practice of animal bones in tantric ouija or whatever, its far more interesting to actually talk about these people's lives; how did they get into what they do, how does it affect their daily lives, do they see dead people, do they talk to trees etc...
For those who don't know, which is most, likely all, of you, Dave Lee is a scientist by training, biochemistry, graduated University of Leeds in the 70s, and thus rather sceptical where religion is concerned. He actively describes himself as an atheist. But, as he points out, that does not mean he is not open to the ideas of higher consciousness, which is something entirely different.
One of the most interesting points he made during the evening was along the lines of the following. Atheists tend to say, they rely on science etc, science explains everything. And the scientific method is very good, and works. But it *doesn't* explain everything. 'Scientifically' observed and proven phenomena in psychology for example, does not reduce to the scientific language of maths, and molecular interactions. But just because you can try to describe 'the mind' in terms of science (grey, squidgy mass, electrical pulses, chemicals, etc...) does not negate, or conveniently render redundant the effects of physchology on that mind. It's all about languages. Quantum mechanics is great and explains a lot, but the problem comes that people are trying to explain quantum maths, with imaginary numbers in it, in english, and trying to see it, through the lenses of a relativistic universe, which if you're lucky works, but mostly doesn't. But doesn't mean either the relativisitic or quantum explanations are inherently wrong.
Anyway, back to the point... Listening to Dave Lee talk about his life, and his workings, was like having a conversation with a university professor. They mentioned things, and you went 'oooh i know what that is' and you could follow the dialogue perfectly well, and all the random internal references, and part of you goes, okay, i do actually know a reasonable amount about this subject. But at the same time, with every word they say, they demonstrate just how much more they know. Sure, you've read about that battle, you even wrote an essay on it, but they wrote the fucking commentary on it; they were part of the archaeological survey team; they presented their inaugron on it; you can follow what they're saying, but you're small fry comparatively.
It was nice really, by virtue of my magical and religious background, I know a fair bit, I can educate most people on tantra, kabbalistic ritual and meaning, christian doctrine, etc..., but i couldn't argue kabbalah with a hari krishna. i couldn't argue silver ravenwolf with a wiccan. I know enough to hold my own respectfully, but against a devout, they're probably going to know more about it than I am. But Dave Lee was dropping references left right and centre - the IOT, the pact, edred thorssen, pete carroll, ian reed, chaos international, the book of laws, liber mmm, liber nox, liber null, liber 777, aeonics, austin osman spare, the sorcereror's apprentice in Leeds, etc... and I knew it, all, I had a good working knowledge, and could happily argue my way with anybody on it and comfortably hold my ground. It was nice to get a bizzare confirmation that yes, I had read the 'right' things, insomuch as anything is right for chaos magic, i did understand the development of it, where it had come from, how the framework had been constructed, its influences, etc. And yet, at the same time, I was acutely aware I needed to go and study everything in much further depth. I might understand the development and evolution of these practicies, but Dave Lee was there, developing and evolving them back in the 70s and 80s, sure there's new developments to come, and to a large extent they're personal, especially in chaos magic, but even still
We did also get an entertaining story of Dave Lee and 2 others invoking Baphomet, in broad daylight, on a traffic island in a busy junction, complete with robes on back in the 90s though. And once again, everyone in the room who *wasn't* in Leeds in the 70s and 80s (i.e. all of us, as pretty much anyone who was is a well known pagan practioner and author nowadays) really wished they were. So much shit happened in that city around that time, so much development, so many important shifts and experiments and paths. It's the modern version of the Golden Dawn development, fucking pivotal, even to wiccans.
Christina, the lovely sweet little bit innocent and naiive woman who runs Treadwells, arranged an informal discussion evening with Mr Lee. The premise is, instead of them coming to present some form of new theory on the working practice of animal bones in tantric ouija or whatever, its far more interesting to actually talk about these people's lives; how did they get into what they do, how does it affect their daily lives, do they see dead people, do they talk to trees etc...
For those who don't know, which is most, likely all, of you, Dave Lee is a scientist by training, biochemistry, graduated University of Leeds in the 70s, and thus rather sceptical where religion is concerned. He actively describes himself as an atheist. But, as he points out, that does not mean he is not open to the ideas of higher consciousness, which is something entirely different.
One of the most interesting points he made during the evening was along the lines of the following. Atheists tend to say, they rely on science etc, science explains everything. And the scientific method is very good, and works. But it *doesn't* explain everything. 'Scientifically' observed and proven phenomena in psychology for example, does not reduce to the scientific language of maths, and molecular interactions. But just because you can try to describe 'the mind' in terms of science (grey, squidgy mass, electrical pulses, chemicals, etc...) does not negate, or conveniently render redundant the effects of physchology on that mind. It's all about languages. Quantum mechanics is great and explains a lot, but the problem comes that people are trying to explain quantum maths, with imaginary numbers in it, in english, and trying to see it, through the lenses of a relativistic universe, which if you're lucky works, but mostly doesn't. But doesn't mean either the relativisitic or quantum explanations are inherently wrong.
Anyway, back to the point... Listening to Dave Lee talk about his life, and his workings, was like having a conversation with a university professor. They mentioned things, and you went 'oooh i know what that is' and you could follow the dialogue perfectly well, and all the random internal references, and part of you goes, okay, i do actually know a reasonable amount about this subject. But at the same time, with every word they say, they demonstrate just how much more they know. Sure, you've read about that battle, you even wrote an essay on it, but they wrote the fucking commentary on it; they were part of the archaeological survey team; they presented their inaugron on it; you can follow what they're saying, but you're small fry comparatively.
It was nice really, by virtue of my magical and religious background, I know a fair bit, I can educate most people on tantra, kabbalistic ritual and meaning, christian doctrine, etc..., but i couldn't argue kabbalah with a hari krishna. i couldn't argue silver ravenwolf with a wiccan. I know enough to hold my own respectfully, but against a devout, they're probably going to know more about it than I am. But Dave Lee was dropping references left right and centre - the IOT, the pact, edred thorssen, pete carroll, ian reed, chaos international, the book of laws, liber mmm, liber nox, liber null, liber 777, aeonics, austin osman spare, the sorcereror's apprentice in Leeds, etc... and I knew it, all, I had a good working knowledge, and could happily argue my way with anybody on it and comfortably hold my ground. It was nice to get a bizzare confirmation that yes, I had read the 'right' things, insomuch as anything is right for chaos magic, i did understand the development of it, where it had come from, how the framework had been constructed, its influences, etc. And yet, at the same time, I was acutely aware I needed to go and study everything in much further depth. I might understand the development and evolution of these practicies, but Dave Lee was there, developing and evolving them back in the 70s and 80s, sure there's new developments to come, and to a large extent they're personal, especially in chaos magic, but even still
We did also get an entertaining story of Dave Lee and 2 others invoking Baphomet, in broad daylight, on a traffic island in a busy junction, complete with robes on back in the 90s though. And once again, everyone in the room who *wasn't* in Leeds in the 70s and 80s (i.e. all of us, as pretty much anyone who was is a well known pagan practioner and author nowadays) really wished they were. So much shit happened in that city around that time, so much development, so many important shifts and experiments and paths. It's the modern version of the Golden Dawn development, fucking pivotal, even to wiccans.
I would walk 500 miles.
So I'm off to the US on 22nd June for 6 weeks. I'm visiting NYC, Cape Cod, Boston, California, and if I can afford them, New Orleans, Harry Potter World, Alabama, Chicago, and Seattle. I didn't go to the US last summer and it hurt, more than i expected. California has basically become my summer home on a level I hadn't appreciated, and so I'll be really glad to go back. I get to go to Up Your Alley in San Francisco for the first time ever which will be awesome as I've always missed that and Folsom due to timing before, and NYC pride is the weekend I get there. Being miserable and broke in the UK last summer, I figured I might as well be miserable and broke on Huntingdon Beach instead.
Chris isn't coming. There are several reasons for this. He can't afford it, and I'm much happier to spend money I don't have and worry about paying for it later than he is. I'm planning on scrounging sofas, and paying some of my way by working whilst over there, and that's hard to do with someone else in tow. I can't afford to take myself even though I'm going, let alone paying his way too. But primarily, its because at the time I booked it, things were crazy. Things were bad. We'd skirted around the break up conversation several times. I was depressed. For a long time. He didn't know how to deal with it. It was taking its toll, on both of us. A serious one. And I cope less well with relationship issues than Chris. I needed time apart. More than just a 2 week jaunt round Europe. So Chris agreed to let me go, cause he's an awesome boyfriend like that.
And then, 6 weeks or so ago, the switch flipped. I stopped being depressed. Just like that. I still get upset, I still get pissed off, but my outlook on life is generally better. It's generally positive. You get this from the tone of my blog posts, at least I hope you do. They stopped being self involved, and started being about my general musings on the world. And yes, a holiday is nice, and yes, on some level, I probably do need time apart from Chris, so I don't panic too much when we move in together when I return. But I don't need it so much anymore, I don't need it for so long anymore. If I didn't have this trip, I'd still go places, but it'd be different. I'd probably have disapppeared to Adelaide for 2 weeks on 25th May for example. There were spare seats on Ryan's flight, my passport's always in my bag, it would have been so easy to pick up the standby. I would go to Bristol, cause a friend needs someone. I would go to Glastonbury, cause I need someone. And maybe, just maybe, I'd even take Chris to Rome for a week. But oh well, I can't cancel or change my flights without cost, so I might as well go, and have my time apart, and get my head sorted, and let it do the good that, whilst less needed now, is still helpful.
Oh I'm also broke. As in flat broke. As in I have £400 in my bank account and £600 worth of bills to pay, and haven't even found a place to stay in New York yet. Oh fuck. Still that always makes for the most interesting travel in my opinion. It's gonna be a phone call to the Amex people tomorrow or monday i think... PLEASE DON'T STOP MY CARD, I'LL PAY IT SOON I PROMISE!
Chris isn't coming. There are several reasons for this. He can't afford it, and I'm much happier to spend money I don't have and worry about paying for it later than he is. I'm planning on scrounging sofas, and paying some of my way by working whilst over there, and that's hard to do with someone else in tow. I can't afford to take myself even though I'm going, let alone paying his way too. But primarily, its because at the time I booked it, things were crazy. Things were bad. We'd skirted around the break up conversation several times. I was depressed. For a long time. He didn't know how to deal with it. It was taking its toll, on both of us. A serious one. And I cope less well with relationship issues than Chris. I needed time apart. More than just a 2 week jaunt round Europe. So Chris agreed to let me go, cause he's an awesome boyfriend like that.
And then, 6 weeks or so ago, the switch flipped. I stopped being depressed. Just like that. I still get upset, I still get pissed off, but my outlook on life is generally better. It's generally positive. You get this from the tone of my blog posts, at least I hope you do. They stopped being self involved, and started being about my general musings on the world. And yes, a holiday is nice, and yes, on some level, I probably do need time apart from Chris, so I don't panic too much when we move in together when I return. But I don't need it so much anymore, I don't need it for so long anymore. If I didn't have this trip, I'd still go places, but it'd be different. I'd probably have disapppeared to Adelaide for 2 weeks on 25th May for example. There were spare seats on Ryan's flight, my passport's always in my bag, it would have been so easy to pick up the standby. I would go to Bristol, cause a friend needs someone. I would go to Glastonbury, cause I need someone. And maybe, just maybe, I'd even take Chris to Rome for a week. But oh well, I can't cancel or change my flights without cost, so I might as well go, and have my time apart, and get my head sorted, and let it do the good that, whilst less needed now, is still helpful.
Oh I'm also broke. As in flat broke. As in I have £400 in my bank account and £600 worth of bills to pay, and haven't even found a place to stay in New York yet. Oh fuck. Still that always makes for the most interesting travel in my opinion. It's gonna be a phone call to the Amex people tomorrow or monday i think... PLEASE DON'T STOP MY CARD, I'LL PAY IT SOON I PROMISE!
I've never seen green before, maybe it's a good sign...
Yesterday I went to the doctor's. Actually, I went to the Working Men's Project Sexual Health Clinic, which is for men who work in the sex industy. That's whores in the vernacular. I hate STD tests usually, actually, mostly i just hate the urethral swabs. the large one makes me light headed, the small one makes me faint on a 5 minute delay, not good. But the nurses at the WMP are so lovely. GUM clinic nurses have sure enough seen and heard everything, but the nurses that run the men's and women's whore clinics have truly seen and heard it all. And what's great about that, is there's none of the preachy, or disapproving, or judgemental attitude that whilst they're not supposed to do, is always prevelant at the standard GUM clinics. They in fact provide a really good service; they give the 15 minute HIV test, they will give you any and every jab they can if you want it. they know who their patients are, they know there's no point in saying no sex for two weeks, no really, make sure, not even oral, you promise, really, etc... there's no use a condom next time, there's no get you in and out as quickly as possible, they take their time, explain everything even when you know it off by heart yourself, and whilst they don't preach, they will gladly explain any risks or problems to you, but once they've done it once that's it, they don't argue with you, they don't judge you when you can't get hold of every last sexual partner, they just protect you as best they can.
It's also even more privacy protected that most normal hospital files. You don't need a fixed address, or any address to register, you don't even need a real name, or a surname, you can go by a fake first name (as I do), and you get assigned a number which they use to call you when it's your turn, so no-one sitting in the waiting area knows who you are or anything, it doesn't matter if you're there illegally, they honestly just try to protect your sexual health as best they can. It's quite refreshing, sure that's what medical professionals should do in most opinions, but it's rarely that straight forward in practice.
I was doing quite well on their 'risk' questionnaire that they go through actually. List of last 3 sexual partners, what kind of sex, was oral and/or anal protected, was i active or passive, how many people in the last 3 months had i not used condoms with, did i smoke, did i drink, did i know what pep was, etc... i was being a (relatively speaking) good boy. and then he asked if i took any drugs. oh shit. erm mdma, mephadrone, ket, coke.... i regained a few plus points when he asked if i ever injected, which i dont, but then lost em when i realised i'd only taken drugs just the last weekend. ah well, it was nice whilst it lasted... the good news is i don't have HIV. Rest of the results to come next week...
Less good was today's earlier visit to the real doctors. As I'm going to the US on 22nd June for 6 weeks, I wanted a new set of meds from here, instead of needing them in the US and paying shitloads and claiming insurance. And yes, my insurance does cover my pre-existing conditions. It's one of the reasons my insurance costs so much. I hadn't been registered at a surgery here for the last year since my UCL registration at UCH ran out after graduation, so i had to sign up to a new one. It was going so well, turns out when you ring for a GP appointment, they arrange a callback, and you talk to the doctor on the phone, saving you time off work, travel, and pointless waiting unless you really need to be seen in person. Unfortuantely it went downhill when 5 minutes after trying to explain what drugs I was on for my hayfever, the doctor asked "is that an anti-histamine?" /fml Given it's a hayfever treatment it's probably quite likely to act on histamine levels, yes DOCTOR.
Also had to go for some new patient registration with the nurse, despite the fact i'll be moving soon anyway. The nurse spent 15 whole minutes arguing with me that the drug i quoted for my asthma, was in fact a 'preventer' drug, not a 'reliever' and i actually meant this other drug that i was on for my reliever. To which my counterargument was, no, i've quoted right, it's a reliever, i haven't been on a preventer 13 odd years. i've been on the drug i've quoted you for 15 years, and the drug you're quoting me, i haven't been on since i was 4. she refused to believe me, argued like hell for the full 15 minutes, before finally checking her drug directory to find out i was right. She also refused to believe I knew my own height. FFS woman, I paid £400 for a useless medical last year, I know my stats pretty damned well. She also said I was skinny, errr duh, though I have put on weight, I'm no longer officially underweight, I am now in the 10th percentile for my BMI, whoop
This is all why medical professionals are completely undeserving of my patience, and in the majority of cases, my respect.
It's actually a trait amongst people who spent most of their childhoods in hospitals I reckon. We all appreciate the NHS; we've had to use it so much that if we were on a US system we would have bankrupted our parents several times over by age 4. So the NHS, free healthcare, good concept. Doctors, ESPECIALLY paediatricians, not so much. When you've spent 4 months in hospital, 3 months of those on an gastrointestinal tube down your nose, you start to lose your compassion somewhat. In my entire childhood and teenagehood in and out of hospitals, referred to every specialist imaginable, and shuttled between 5 different research hospitals, only one doctor ever asked me "its your body, what do you think?" Now i get, they can only legally deal with the parents and such, but as said doctor pointed out, there's no point in trying to treat me if I'm not behind it. Unfortunately, most medical professionals, so it seems according to mine and others' experiences, when faced with mysterious undiagnosable and/or untreateable patients, treat them a bit like a science project and become to determined to solve the problem, which is great, except they tend to lose perspective of the fact its a person they're subjecting to these things. Also, traits of those spending their childhoods in hospitals, is we tend to know our medicene. We don't need a GP, we need our own prescription pads, sure we might have mental problems, but we're sensible enough to know how medications work, we're only gonna prescribe what we truly need. And we know what we need better than any doctor; we've tried every drug going for our conditions, we know how we respond, we know what works, what doesn't, what makes us projectile vomit 30ft, we know the exact drug names and dosages of our medication, and having to argue it every time you have a checkup with the nurse or doctor, even when they've known you for years, gets tiresome, and does nothing to restore your confidence in them. Luckily, Adam says I can bug him for all my medical ailments when he graduates from his medical degree in 6 years, and I'll be doing so before then anyway.
For the record, my medical issues, briefly, are asthma since a severe case of bronchialitis aged 2 which scarred my lung tissue permanently; severe hayfever every year, but in no other country but the UK (one of the reasons for my aim to live abroad eventually); an unspecified digestive system disorder since birth, despite endless biopsies, diet variations, drug cocktails etc, this last one has since declined to a managable level without medication since I was 18. I don't like to talk about my medical history, so posting even this on a random public blog is kinda a big step for me
It's also even more privacy protected that most normal hospital files. You don't need a fixed address, or any address to register, you don't even need a real name, or a surname, you can go by a fake first name (as I do), and you get assigned a number which they use to call you when it's your turn, so no-one sitting in the waiting area knows who you are or anything, it doesn't matter if you're there illegally, they honestly just try to protect your sexual health as best they can. It's quite refreshing, sure that's what medical professionals should do in most opinions, but it's rarely that straight forward in practice.
I was doing quite well on their 'risk' questionnaire that they go through actually. List of last 3 sexual partners, what kind of sex, was oral and/or anal protected, was i active or passive, how many people in the last 3 months had i not used condoms with, did i smoke, did i drink, did i know what pep was, etc... i was being a (relatively speaking) good boy. and then he asked if i took any drugs. oh shit. erm mdma, mephadrone, ket, coke.... i regained a few plus points when he asked if i ever injected, which i dont, but then lost em when i realised i'd only taken drugs just the last weekend. ah well, it was nice whilst it lasted... the good news is i don't have HIV. Rest of the results to come next week...
Less good was today's earlier visit to the real doctors. As I'm going to the US on 22nd June for 6 weeks, I wanted a new set of meds from here, instead of needing them in the US and paying shitloads and claiming insurance. And yes, my insurance does cover my pre-existing conditions. It's one of the reasons my insurance costs so much. I hadn't been registered at a surgery here for the last year since my UCL registration at UCH ran out after graduation, so i had to sign up to a new one. It was going so well, turns out when you ring for a GP appointment, they arrange a callback, and you talk to the doctor on the phone, saving you time off work, travel, and pointless waiting unless you really need to be seen in person. Unfortuantely it went downhill when 5 minutes after trying to explain what drugs I was on for my hayfever, the doctor asked "is that an anti-histamine?" /fml Given it's a hayfever treatment it's probably quite likely to act on histamine levels, yes DOCTOR.
Also had to go for some new patient registration with the nurse, despite the fact i'll be moving soon anyway. The nurse spent 15 whole minutes arguing with me that the drug i quoted for my asthma, was in fact a 'preventer' drug, not a 'reliever' and i actually meant this other drug that i was on for my reliever. To which my counterargument was, no, i've quoted right, it's a reliever, i haven't been on a preventer 13 odd years. i've been on the drug i've quoted you for 15 years, and the drug you're quoting me, i haven't been on since i was 4. she refused to believe me, argued like hell for the full 15 minutes, before finally checking her drug directory to find out i was right. She also refused to believe I knew my own height. FFS woman, I paid £400 for a useless medical last year, I know my stats pretty damned well. She also said I was skinny, errr duh, though I have put on weight, I'm no longer officially underweight, I am now in the 10th percentile for my BMI, whoop
This is all why medical professionals are completely undeserving of my patience, and in the majority of cases, my respect.
It's actually a trait amongst people who spent most of their childhoods in hospitals I reckon. We all appreciate the NHS; we've had to use it so much that if we were on a US system we would have bankrupted our parents several times over by age 4. So the NHS, free healthcare, good concept. Doctors, ESPECIALLY paediatricians, not so much. When you've spent 4 months in hospital, 3 months of those on an gastrointestinal tube down your nose, you start to lose your compassion somewhat. In my entire childhood and teenagehood in and out of hospitals, referred to every specialist imaginable, and shuttled between 5 different research hospitals, only one doctor ever asked me "its your body, what do you think?" Now i get, they can only legally deal with the parents and such, but as said doctor pointed out, there's no point in trying to treat me if I'm not behind it. Unfortunately, most medical professionals, so it seems according to mine and others' experiences, when faced with mysterious undiagnosable and/or untreateable patients, treat them a bit like a science project and become to determined to solve the problem, which is great, except they tend to lose perspective of the fact its a person they're subjecting to these things. Also, traits of those spending their childhoods in hospitals, is we tend to know our medicene. We don't need a GP, we need our own prescription pads, sure we might have mental problems, but we're sensible enough to know how medications work, we're only gonna prescribe what we truly need. And we know what we need better than any doctor; we've tried every drug going for our conditions, we know how we respond, we know what works, what doesn't, what makes us projectile vomit 30ft, we know the exact drug names and dosages of our medication, and having to argue it every time you have a checkup with the nurse or doctor, even when they've known you for years, gets tiresome, and does nothing to restore your confidence in them. Luckily, Adam says I can bug him for all my medical ailments when he graduates from his medical degree in 6 years, and I'll be doing so before then anyway.
For the record, my medical issues, briefly, are asthma since a severe case of bronchialitis aged 2 which scarred my lung tissue permanently; severe hayfever every year, but in no other country but the UK (one of the reasons for my aim to live abroad eventually); an unspecified digestive system disorder since birth, despite endless biopsies, diet variations, drug cocktails etc, this last one has since declined to a managable level without medication since I was 18. I don't like to talk about my medical history, so posting even this on a random public blog is kinda a big step for me
Tuesday, 8 June 2010
Oops I did it again...
So sure enough, mere days after my last post, the universe decides to prove just how right it always is about everything, and just how much simpler everything would work out if I'd just stop fighting against it so much.
I might have stumbled upon another job. Can't say more at the moment, and it'll probably come to nothing, just a posited idea at the moment, there is research to be done, people to talk to, things to arrange etc. But sure enough, I say, okay universe, once again I sumbit myself to your whims, and 2 jobs jump up at me.
In completely different news, I have started paying for Spotify finally. A lot of people seem to be mocking me for this, and I really don't understand why. Firstly, this allows me to take my music abroad. I'm currently on the £9.99 plan, which means i can sync it offline too, so by paying for something I use for hours a day, I can also eliminate the need to determine which music I want to take to the US with me, and can instead take all of it, and change it on the fly whilst I'm abroad for what I want to listen to when I don't have a net connection. After I get back, and am just using it at home again, I will probably switch down to the £4.99 plan, which effectively just removed the ads. I don't really begrudge this money. I'm very willing to pay for entire albums when I listen to them, and I like having a physical copy, in the same way some people collect vinyl. I currently need to buy The Baseballs new album. Buying singles however, for the random bits of music I listen to, or songs that get stuck in my head, or club mixes for houseparties, can be cumbersome and expensive. Even buying the mp3 download, the amount of random singles I listen to on spotify that I have no desire to own the full album for, probably amounts to beyond £1000 worth of 79p singles. I pay a whole £4.99 a month, the cost of a drink in London, and I get all the music I want, more or less. J-music they're not so hot on with their catalogue, but I can cope with that. Especially now spotify includes your local files, so I can listen to all my music, plus all the music of the internet. Win as far as I'm concerned. Paying for music isn't bad, just paying stupidly large amounts is. But the artists still deserve some recompense for their work that I enjoy.
It's for this reason that most small or indie bands, I will gladly throw money at, as I know that's what keeps them afloat and touring. The band I'm trying to get touring with, they offered me a load of free merch, but I paid for it, cause I'd rather give them £50 and make sure they keep on the road, partly so I hopefully have a job, and partly so they continue to make music.
Also, on the subject of indie artists, please see http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment_and_arts/10220002.stm. The BBC are a bit late on picking up on this, but it highlights the problem many independant artists suffer. Touring, producing and distributing records, paying your rent in the process, is not a well paid business as an independant artist. Most of them constantly just break even. CD printing, posters, tshirts, etc, it all costs a fortune, not to mention venue fees, and as the article points out, ticketing partners take a large majority of the ticket costs, but there's little other way to reliably sell your tickets. A lot of indie artists are trying different things, putting records online for pay what you like costs, though that's risky - so far only 6 people have payed 1c above the asking price for Amanda Palmer's latest record. Amanda Palmer herself makes use of her zealous fanbase to provide accomodation and food to reduce touring costs in return for getting to have your idol stay in your house for the night. Bitter Ruin are taking up this tactic, and have produced amazing hand drawn lyric books for their records to sell - it's something different, it takes a long time, but its appreciated by the fans, and paid for; good paper, hand written, signed on the back, hand bound, calligraphy on the front and wax stamped. Again, the BBC article points out independant artists are going down routes such as selling off backstage passes or unique merchandise for their tours. Websites are cropping up that allow artists to sell their music for a basic price, that then gives the fans the download in whatever format and bitrate they might like, not just a 192kbps mp3, and of course, DRM free, which might perpetuate the problem of piracy, but most fans who are willing to go down this route aren't likely to be mass pirates in my opinion.
Post ranting about biphobia to come at some point
I might have stumbled upon another job. Can't say more at the moment, and it'll probably come to nothing, just a posited idea at the moment, there is research to be done, people to talk to, things to arrange etc. But sure enough, I say, okay universe, once again I sumbit myself to your whims, and 2 jobs jump up at me.
In completely different news, I have started paying for Spotify finally. A lot of people seem to be mocking me for this, and I really don't understand why. Firstly, this allows me to take my music abroad. I'm currently on the £9.99 plan, which means i can sync it offline too, so by paying for something I use for hours a day, I can also eliminate the need to determine which music I want to take to the US with me, and can instead take all of it, and change it on the fly whilst I'm abroad for what I want to listen to when I don't have a net connection. After I get back, and am just using it at home again, I will probably switch down to the £4.99 plan, which effectively just removed the ads. I don't really begrudge this money. I'm very willing to pay for entire albums when I listen to them, and I like having a physical copy, in the same way some people collect vinyl. I currently need to buy The Baseballs new album. Buying singles however, for the random bits of music I listen to, or songs that get stuck in my head, or club mixes for houseparties, can be cumbersome and expensive. Even buying the mp3 download, the amount of random singles I listen to on spotify that I have no desire to own the full album for, probably amounts to beyond £1000 worth of 79p singles. I pay a whole £4.99 a month, the cost of a drink in London, and I get all the music I want, more or less. J-music they're not so hot on with their catalogue, but I can cope with that. Especially now spotify includes your local files, so I can listen to all my music, plus all the music of the internet. Win as far as I'm concerned. Paying for music isn't bad, just paying stupidly large amounts is. But the artists still deserve some recompense for their work that I enjoy.
It's for this reason that most small or indie bands, I will gladly throw money at, as I know that's what keeps them afloat and touring. The band I'm trying to get touring with, they offered me a load of free merch, but I paid for it, cause I'd rather give them £50 and make sure they keep on the road, partly so I hopefully have a job, and partly so they continue to make music.
Also, on the subject of indie artists, please see http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment_and_arts/10220002.stm. The BBC are a bit late on picking up on this, but it highlights the problem many independant artists suffer. Touring, producing and distributing records, paying your rent in the process, is not a well paid business as an independant artist. Most of them constantly just break even. CD printing, posters, tshirts, etc, it all costs a fortune, not to mention venue fees, and as the article points out, ticketing partners take a large majority of the ticket costs, but there's little other way to reliably sell your tickets. A lot of indie artists are trying different things, putting records online for pay what you like costs, though that's risky - so far only 6 people have payed 1c above the asking price for Amanda Palmer's latest record. Amanda Palmer herself makes use of her zealous fanbase to provide accomodation and food to reduce touring costs in return for getting to have your idol stay in your house for the night. Bitter Ruin are taking up this tactic, and have produced amazing hand drawn lyric books for their records to sell - it's something different, it takes a long time, but its appreciated by the fans, and paid for; good paper, hand written, signed on the back, hand bound, calligraphy on the front and wax stamped. Again, the BBC article points out independant artists are going down routes such as selling off backstage passes or unique merchandise for their tours. Websites are cropping up that allow artists to sell their music for a basic price, that then gives the fans the download in whatever format and bitrate they might like, not just a 192kbps mp3, and of course, DRM free, which might perpetuate the problem of piracy, but most fans who are willing to go down this route aren't likely to be mass pirates in my opinion.
Post ranting about biphobia to come at some point
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