[Note: insert picture here of a 'thing']

The ‘thing’ above represents the fact that I know that i don’t have to explain or apologise when I don’t write here for a few days.

This is not my job, it is my blog,and no-one ain’t paying me nothin to write shit, so, you know,waddafuck… Excuse me, I appear to be talking like an idiot.
But then, well, it’s a matter of personal discipline, and I like writing stuff, and I like it when people like it, so i do feel bad, and… Ah fuckit.

The funny thing is, I have ideas of things to write, and they manage to hang about in the little brain for about 3 minutes, while I think about how pleased I am that I’ve had a good idea, then the fact that I’m quite so pleased with myself manages to push the idea out of an ear, or something, and I can’t remember what it is, anymore.

Thing is, I’ve been working six day weeks, and there hasn’t been one night this week when I haven’t been out at a birthday, or the football, or for oh, hell, none of it matters anymore. In less than five hours time I am on holiday for the week.

I will be running far far far away to the Western Isles and there I can write, or sleep, whenever I want.

I very happy.
There will be content, I assure you, but in the little days of no content, simply be content with my content.
For I am the enbodiment of contentment.
I am content.

very quiet.
very quiet on little.red.boat, that is.
not very quiet off screen.
very very fucking busy else.
sorry.
Want to write.
Can’t.
Sorry.
Will, though.
Don’t, y’know…

In the dictionary in front of me, it describes axis as ‘A straight line about which a body or geometric object rotates or may be conceived to rotate.’

Which frankly sounds like nothing more complex than a simple toilet-roll holder.

I had always wondered where this phrase came from, and now I realise that in thinking of it, the powers that do brainstormed on ‘what is evil?’, threw some ideas around, settled on:
“Toilet paper, toilet paper is evil”.

Therefore, thinking of what to class the perpetrators of evil, they decided to call them the ‘toilet roll holders of evil’, but eventually decided that they might not be taken seriously, so they settled on the euphemism ‘axis‘, while knowing, all the time, that what they actually meant, of course, was ‘toilet roll holder‘.

So why might world leaders have decided toilet roll was the most evil thing in the world?
Well, I happen to be in a position to help out with an answer to that question, thanks for asking, because it just so happens that they consulted me on the problem.
No, they didn’t.
But if they did, I could have told them three things.

1) Toilet paper is the most unreliable thing in anyone’s life. It runs out exactly when needed most, and, in case you didn’t know - It Does This Intentionally.
Toilet paper likes nothing better than to sit there in the twilight hours eating itself, slowly, so that just when you pop to the bathroom, thinking there’s plenty, you’re confronted with two scraps of comedy tissue and and fat contented-looking cardboard tube.
And it does this, you will understand, while you are at your most vulnerable.
Because it is evil.

2) To amuse itself with variety, toilet paper will sometimes multiply, rather than consume itself.
It will grow, profligate, and overrun the cubicle until you’re never really sure where it all is, any more. It does this only in offices, restaurants, airports, and at the home of your new boyfriend/girlfriend’s parents.
And it’s reasoning is this:
With such proliferation of white tissue, it reasons, eventually you will lose track of it all, and, when you are not looking, it will be able to grab hold of the back of your trousers, or the top of your tights, or the bottom of your shoe, and stick there, flapping in the wind, and make it look, for all the world to see, like you are unable to wipe your bottom properly.
Because it is evil.
I know this, because it happened to me yesterday.
Luckily I noticed only two steps from the bathroom door, but I would like to take this forum to stress, once more, that I know how to wipe my arse. I have done for years. Which brings me to the third proof.

3) Toilet paper exists to make me blush. Blush to the point of exploding. You see, there always comes a time, talking with friends, or family, or parents and new boyfriends, when the story of me and toilet paper crops up.
You see, there was a time when I would back into rooms, pants around my ankles, waving toilet paper and singing the ‘mumeeeeee, can you wipe my bottttom….‘ song.

I was twenty one at the time.

That’s a joke. Based on the Lee and Herring theory that any memory can be made into a joke with the addition of the words ‘I was twenty-one at the time’. Really, it’s a joke. I’m Kidding about being 21.
I was twenty two.

A hahahaha.
I was, of course, actually two.

The point is, that of all memories, of all stories, this is the reoccuring one.
Why?
Because it is the worst.
Why does it reoccur so?
Because the toilet paper wills it.
Why does the toilet paper do that?
Because it is evil.

The case for the prosecution rests, m’lud.

Politics, news, current affairs, issues of social justice, liberty and free speech and that kind of shit have always been big things for me.
They take up a bunch of our conversational time, make complex webs within my family, my relationship and my peer group and are generally thing I find myself passionate about, frustrated by and absorbed in.

The decision was taken almost as soon as this site was started, however, that it should be about cheese samwidges, lambs and my inability to get through a rainy day without crying, or a serious day without giggling.
I remember an article in the Onion in the immediate post 9/11 issue - ‘A shattered nation longs to care about stupid bullshit again’.
I know I can’t give proper and rounded opinon on the big things.
Other people, like my beloved, can, and do, and I leave him to it.
I can’t do it.

Not in writing, not without getting shot down, and being unable to deal with it; so I wrote, and write, and will continue writing, about the stupid stuff. Because it’s what I enjoy.

There are a couple of things though, that have been floating around, and I want to write them down.

---

A few weeks ago, I sat in the office, listening to a recording of the twin towers falling down.
I’d been given the cd in a see-through promo case, and sat and listened to it, 73 minutes of it. I listened to some parts of it several times, trying to find an extract that we could use.

While listening, I tried to figure out what I was listening to. It could have been a recording from an underground air duct. All you could hear was a low contiuous rumble, an industrial hum almost, and every now and again, suddenly, louder and louder rumbles, crashes, everything. With no time line in front of me, and only a vague theories of how the recording may have come about, or what it was, I sat, and tried to create the rest of the picture around this recording.

There was a loud rumble. Was that a plane hitting? How long after did the first building fall, was that it, then? Could I hear sirens? Could I hear people?

No, it turned out, I couldn’t. My brain, so familiar with the images of that day, had taken over, and woven this eerie unknown soundtrack around what information I could remember and built it up into a whole.

I couldn’t have heard sirens, because the recording was a reproduction of the seismic activity in New York on that day.

The ‘industrial hum’ that I’d thought was air conditioning had turned out, actually, to be the noise in the earth of a city going about its business. The rumbles when they came, and when they amplified, were the sounds of the ripples in the earth, crushed and moving under the weight of the falling towers.

So did I actually hear the planes hit? I don’t know. In my listening, I did.

There’s a story about it here, along with a short audio clip of the CD.

I found it very affecting.
I thought of it in the last weeks again, about repercussions and aftershocks and the ripples in the earth.

And there’s probably something profound to say about it.
But I’m not the one to say it.

Or rather the toe problem is no problem.

No toe problem. Not no toe, although that would have solved the problem equally as well, I suppose, but now the toe problem is no problem so there’s no need for toe chopping. No go on the no toe thing, then.

It was an ingrown toenail, or the beginning of one, or something.
When you knocked it even with the force of a featherweight pixie, it caused enough pain to bring tears to the eyes for more than 10 minutes.
It was also getting a bit painful to walk, and all.

So of course I should have gone to the doctor.

One bottle of wine and several sharp implements later, I was absolutely fine.
Like that time with the bottle of wine and the nail scissors and the stitches, remember that? Happy days.

So you see, it may not be sensible, but at least it works.
Go on, then, tell me off…

Unless you’re dropping a dictionary on your foot, in which case they could be seen as related, but they still wouldn’t be.

For some reason, probably best not to elucidate on right here, right now, I’m looking for something heavy to drop on my foot.

It needs to be heavy enough to hurt, and even bruise, but not to break the toe.

A while ago I dropped a box of books on my foot, and the corner, striking a nail, produced an effect similar to the one required presently.

I have not -however-, got a box of books at hand at the moment, and even if I did, I wouldn’t be sure of striking with the corner, and think that a flat side ‘thump’ wouldn’t do the job at all.

There is a large dictionary on my desk, and that would appear to have the required weight/corner facilities, but I don’t want to harm the dictionary. I suppose I could wrap it in something.

I know this sounds odd, but it’s part of a larger and very cunning plan, which, for fear of disagreement, I shant mention here now.

But it’s either:
a) A work of art
b) An unusual masochistic fetish
c) A medical issue combined with fear of doctors
d) An attempt to create blog-content
e) A cry for help
f) Something to do.

Hm.
Perhaps if I put my foot under the table leg and dropped the dictionary on the table…

For the record, can I be the founder member of the;
‘I really don’t care who Belle de Jour is. Really. I honestly couldn’t give a fuck’
club?

Just get on with it, she’s good at what she’s doing, let her get on with… y’know… and…

Look, the first meeting of the
‘I really don’t care who Belle de Jour is. Really. I honestly couldn’t give a fuck’
club will be somewhere in Islington on… oh, it really doesn’t matter, you’d all just show up hoping to catch a glance of BdJ anyway…

Forget I mentioned it.
The world has gone mad.
I’ll go and drink alone.

All I can say is:
Appalling, disgraceful, vile, ridiculous, nauseating, evil, hurtful, wrong.

Who in the world, who with half an ounce of social conscience, who with any respect for their fellow woman, or person, whatever, who, who, would take a bag of apples to a cinema?

There’s just nothing right about that whatsoever.
It’s wrong. It’s all wrong.

Fuckers.

Also, the film was rubbish. I shall review it later, more fully.
Any of the more misogynistically nervous among you may want to get your feminear-muffs out.
Also anyone who likes this kind of film.
Or anyone who likes Julia Roberts.

I’m the worst person to go to the cinema with, I really am.
Too picky.

In the meantime, a Mona Lisa Simile:

‘Watching ‘Mona Lisa smile’ is like having honey covered dog food dripped into your handbag while you’re not looking. I don’t know why. It just is.”

There is, at present, an advert on the radio station I spend much of my day listening to.

In said advert, a lady picks up the phone and is greeted by a friendly sounding voice.

‘Hello’
says the voice
Hello, this is your diahorrea attack, I was just phoning to find out when would be good for you…

“Oh right”
says the lady,
“Well, Wednesday’s no good at all, thursday it’s my turn for the school run, there are dinner parties friday and saturday… no, it’s looking very very busy…”

Voiceover: “If you simply haven’t got time for diahorrea…

Or something.

Now I have serious issues with this advert.
Oooh, I have even more issues now, I’ve just realised that had I only remembered the name of the product, I could have been looking at some serious blog-advertising money.
Not really. I wouldn’t take dirty cash.
And how much dirtier can money get than ‘the profits of poo’ I’d be offered for this?
It would be ’shit money’. I wouldn’t sell out for shit money.
I’d sell out for good money. If anyone has any…

Where was I?
Oh.
I have issues with this advert.
I just can’t think of anything worse in the whole world than picking up the phone to hear a voice saying “Hello! I am runny poo! Are you free to talk?”

Why would anyone in the world not put the phone down?
Why would anyone Not say “I’m sorry, you have the wrong phone number”
or “No no, I can’t talk right now”
or “Euw, get off the phone, you’re talking shit. Quite literally.”

After consideration, I’ve decided that the only thing more concerning than the idea of being phoned up by chatty wet waste matter is the idea of meeting someone who was prepared to look through their diary and seriously deliberate over the day on which they would most be ok with having diaorrea…
“Oh no, hang on, listen, if I shuffle these meetings around then I could certainly make an opening for you on Tuesday…”

I mean, I don’t agree with deputising, but surely this is something you could pass on to an inferior you don’t like very much - “Jill? Can you come here a moment? There’s someone on the phone I’d really like you to meet up with…

I spy, with my little eye, something beginning with c.

Workfriend: Ok Anna, I’m off, see you at 7.30…
Dumbass, here: I’m in at 7.30 tomorrow? What?
Wf: No, you know, for the comedy show. Tonight.
Dumbanna: ohhhhhhhhh….

And for once, that nagging feeling that I had forgotten something I should have remembered turned out to Actually represent something I should have remembered that I’d clearly forgotten, not the usual existential angst.

And the show was, well, it was ok. Just ok.
But I’m hard to please.

Talking of hard to please, despite having spent the last few months wearing a large yellow duck-bill on my face and hiring an entourage of men over 70 in bikinis to follow me around singing songs about how funny I am, it turns out I’m not funny enough to win a bloggie. In hindsight I suppose writing about it could have increased my chances. Should have thought have that sooner.

I didn’t think I would feel this relieved. I can’t imagine anything more likely to shut me up than a little voice in my head telling me I Had To Be Funny. So someone called Margaret Cho won instead. Who clearly knows how to deal with that little voice, being a comedienne, and everything. So ‘rah’ that lady, good lass, yadda yadda yadda, lets move on.

But, having said that, I’m proud to have been nominated for something, and wanted to say thank you for that, and thank you for voting at all, and for voting for me if you did.
Thank you.
I will now go back to practising silly writing until someone starts paying me for it.

Yes.
And well done to all the other people who didn’t win either.

I’ve got a feeling I’ve forgotten something, but I can’t remember what it is I’ve forgotten.

I need distracting.

Anyone who could arrange a troupe of dancing badgers outside my window gets a prize.

A nobel prize, I should imagine, seeing as I’m on the fifth floor.

No, not like that.

It just occurs to me, every time I wear nail varnish, that nail varnish looks really stupid on me.

You may be as surprised as I am that this revelation should have to come to me more than once.

And this stuff’s bright pink.

I look like the girl that isn’t allowed near her mum’s make up cabinet in case she accidentally drinks something.

Somewhere in my development, I missed the point at which I should have been told how to be a proper girl.
I remember I was off one wednesday in October 1989. Was it that class I missed, I wonder?
How to wear nail varnish?

Because everyone else seems to have been there.
The class where they taught nail varnish and wearing earrings. And heels.

I sometimes worry if I’m actually a girl at all.
I hope I am.
This would be a very bad point at which to find out otherwise…

This weekend, I recieved three e-mails from three of the most impressively monikered people I’ve ever heard of.

And I’ve decided that the scale of thought and deliberation that seem to go into thinking up the names of people that send me spam, they should be the next things to enter my vocabulary.

“Jesus Mahony!”

“Quite frankly, I couldn’t give a Ponce Viola what happens, as long as the project launches on time…”

“Hm. What would Yugo E. Objectively do in this situation, do you think? What do you mean you’ve never heard of him?”

Overall, I believe they slip seemlessly into conversation.

Maybe.