Seven Things That Make Me Interesting

I've been tagged by Muddynosugar for this meme and apparently I've got to do several things to fulfil all contractual obligations and save myself from being tarred and feathered. *

1. You must thank the person who has given you the award - 
2. Copy the logo and place it on your blog - 
3. Link the person who has nominated you for the award -  
4. Name 7 things about yourself that people might find interesting. 
5. Nominate 7 other Kreativ Bloggers.
6. Post links to the 7 blogs you nominate - 
7. Let the nominated victims bloggers know they have been tagged -

So, here goes:

1. Muddynosugar, cheers for the tag and btw, we share a coffee preference (ie two spoonfuls of coffee, no sugar, just wave the milk at it will you) and a starsign. There you go, two bonus interesting things. 

2. the logo... let's see if I can do this, for I be very new at this blogging thing and have never put a picture on here...  hmmm, not where I intended it to be but hey, it's up and on. Yay!

3. Yep! It's up there! Go on, scroll back up, see!

and now, to the main event.....

Seven Interesting Things About Me:

1: I'm A Gamer, behold my mighty weapon!

I am a girl who games. It's been twelve years since I got my first playstation and I still get a thrill when I have a new game in my hand. I've slaughtered my way through legions of scary monsters on Silent Hill, flown around a world littered with gems on Spyro, spent hours perfecting the jump, pause, jump jump, count of two, twat the monster, swerve round the hole, jump up to the box, spin, spin and oh bugger of Crash Bandicoot.  But my favourite sort of games are simple hack and slash role play games. Baldur's Gate? Maxed out every character. And it's sequel. Champions Of Norrath ? Fabulous fun. Take three friends and a forest full of orcs, dragons, huge spiders and kobolds and what do you get? Fun. 

2. I Have Several Fears That Are Not Quite Phobias But Are Close Enough.

Everyone is afraid of something, right? I don't like heights. That's common enough, a lot of people don't like them. How about the dark? I'm not quite phobic about the dark, it has to be really dark before I'm quaking, not quite can't-see-your-hand-in-front-of-your-face-dark but getting on for that. I'm a big wuss.

The biggest phobia I have is somewhat more unusual and I'm not sure it even has a name. I don't like things with blades, and especially things that combine blades with speed. Food processors, lawn-mowers, chainsaws. I hate them. I won't use them, I prefer not to see other people using them. Nasty horrible things. 

I also don't like horses. 

3. I Own Two Guitars; I Can't Play Either Of Them

I've always loved the guitar, my dad plays rather well and frequently serenades family parties. Growing up, I was always desperate to emulate him and make my own music. I begged him to teach me. He said I wouldn't practise. He finally relented when I turned 30. He gave me a guitar (electric), I bought a second (acoustic). Almost five years later, I still can't play. He was right. I did not practise. 

4. My Body Is Weird. #1

My toes are the same length as dd2's. She is not yet 9 and a size 3/4. I am thirtysomething and a size 6/7. She has long elegant feet, mine are small and pudgy. With short toes. 

5. My Body Is Weird#2

I have lazy eyes, frequently seeing double or blurred. When I was younger, I was offered either an operation or exercises to correct this. I took the exercises but eventually gave up on them. and so over the years they've gone back to being lazy. When I'm tired, it gets worse. I also sneeze in the sunlight.

 6. I Have ... Fascinations. 

Occasionally, my sister will ring me up and say "There's this documentary on tonight, you'll love it, it's right up your street...it's about conjoined twins." Or people with hypertricosis  or telepathy, or the hunt for the chupacabra. Weird stuff. I love it. Anything that is on the fringes of normality, things that may or may not exist and things that science cannot explain. I love the macabre, the abnormal and the downright spooky. 

7. Things On Tv I Don't Watch:

Soap Operas, because you need to watch them religiously or you have no idea who is who and who is shagging who. I can't keep up with all that. 

Reality TV, because reality is in the eye of the editor.

Sports, because they all bore me witless. 

so................ there are my seven things you may find interesting (or not!) and now for the tagging... except I'm not sure I know seven other bloggers, so I'm going to tag some people and if anyone else wants tagging, please comment with your blog address and I'll amend the entry. Ok? 

Tagging....

Rosiescribble

Nickie - although she may have done this meme already. 

* I may be overreacting just a wee bit here. 

Comments

I thought nobody was reading this. Or, of those who have possibly glanced at it, none cared enough enough to comment. 

Apparently I am wrong. 

Apparently the comments thing wasn't working.

Oops. 

Fixed it now! Hopefully. 

Seven things that make me grumpy...

I've been tagged by Nickie at typecast with this meme - she thought it suited me - and so I am doing this post before I forget. 

1. Facebook.  Or, rather more specifically, some of the stupid apps on there. So-and-so is 50% happy today? Oh really? Do they know this because they answered four questions and the app told them so? Were those four questions: are you happy? Are you sad? Is your favourite colour soft pink, grey or blood red? Choose the animal that best represents your mood - kitten, slug or raging swamp-beast. Do these people not know if they are happy or not, or is the app a way of yelling to the world "Ping me! I'm having a miserable day today."

And following directly on from facebook is... drum roll please ...

2. text speak . I don't know whether it is my age(rapidly heading towards 'mature'), or my nature (pedantic) but text-speak annoys me. And not just text-speak but the complete bastardisation of every word some people write. You need a translation device for most comments. I am thinking of creating a group on facebook. It shall be titled "I thought you were intelligent until I read your status updates" and I shall disqualify any potential member who writes 'better' as 'beta', 'mates' as 'm8s' and 'boys' as boiz'. Consider yourselves warned. 

3. the new remote control. An odd choice you may think, but let me explain. For all the years we've had cable TV, we've had the same type of remote. Grey, big buttons, reassuringly heavy. Chuckable. I had my cable box replaced this week and with the new and snazzy box, came a new and snazzy remote control. Very nice looking, all blue and silver. Except the damn thing is lighter, especially at the front of it. You press one of the ridiculously small buttons and the damn thing turns over in your hand. I keep pressing the wrong buttons, they are stupidly small, almost halved in size. It's got quick launch type buttons to get to the settings and ondemand quicker. Yeah, just what I need, for the kids to be able to access the PIN codes without having to trawl through six or seven menus first. I'm not impressed. 

4. Horses on verges I live on an estate where there is a high number of Traveller families. Not in caravans for the most part, but normal houses. It's not the Travellers themselves that make me grumpy, it's their horses. I'm no big fan of horses, I'd rather not have to walk anywhere near an animal that is twice the size of me, has teeth the length of fingers and comes complete with iron bolstered kicking apparatus. But often, I get no choice. Wherever the is a sizeable patch of grass, you will often find a horse tethered up. And not only on verges but also the gardens of empty houses and the grassy play area that surrounds the local playground. They are bad enough when tethered, but when they get loose, an annoyance becomes a danger. This isn't a rural village, it's an urban housing estate, I don't believe horses belong here at all. 

5. Crowd roar on football video games I get that it's part of the whole experience of being at a real life football match, I know it comes as a package for live games, but for the love of all that is claret and amber striped, why the hell am I listening to it in my own house? Dh is a lover of the beautiful game, and a lover of the beautiful console equivalent, and I respect that. I don't mind him playing, but the noise is grating. "WooooooooAHHHHHHHHHooooooooooAHHHHHHHhuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh" There's no words, no rhythm and no respite. Because it's low in tone, it carries through walls and floorboards, because it crescendos to a screaming frenzy it seems to be louder than the game would suggest. It's annoying and tedious and now I have a headache. Bah.

And on from that...

6. People who play music on their mobiles without earphones. You're on the bus, it's packed but fairly quiet, you're already irritated because you have five bags of very heavy shopping and you're sharing your seat with a fidgety six year old and then the worst happens. Some arse with a phone gets on and all you can hear is noise. It's probably meant to be a chart hit, but the tinniness of the crap speakers make it impossible to actually tell*. It could be bhangra, it may even be the world's finest singer doing a cover of your favourite tune ever. All you can tell is that it is annoying.  *Unless it is a rap song filled with expletives, in that case, the lyrics will be crystal clear. 

And finally, the last thing that is making me grumpy this week:

7. Me. Ever had one of those weeks where you just annoy yourself? My head doesn't seem to want to think (that'll be the football chanting induced headache then), no ideas are forthcoming for either of the two assignments I have due in soon, I can't seem to type at all ( my favourite button is the delete key) and for some odd reason, my toes are hurting. I am just grumpy, inside, outside and all the way through like a stick of rock. 

Passing this meme onto these ladies:

@muddynosugar
@yummyno1
@rosiescribble
@tara_cain
@metropolitanmum

Unicorns, flying cats and other stuffed stuff.

The world is a weird and wonderful place, filled with eccentric people and fabulous animals. And this is nowhere more evident than the seriously creepy/magnificent / unusual (delete as applicable) collection going under the hammer at an auction house in Dorset. 

The entire contents of Brading The Experience museum are up for sale, waxworks and taxidermies mostly. Including rogue taxidermies of creatures that simply don't exist: unicorns, flying cats and a yeti (although the jury is still out on the yeti's non-existence).

Taxidermy is a art that seems to be coming back into vogue. The Victorians loved it. In the days before conservation, it was perfectly acceptable to bring home an actual lion from your travels abroad, have it stuffed and displayed in your study. Assuming you could afford it. Although most taxidermies are not that big. 

These days, it's a specialist art. Not many people know how to do it, and not many people are interested in learning, but there are still some taxidermists left. Some doing it as an art form, others as a business. 

The biggest collection of taxidermy I've seen is at Cliffe Castle in Keighley. No lions, but plenty of birds, rodents and creatures of the British countryside. It's quite a thing to see animals preserved in such a matter. So lifelike you'd think they are breathing. In fact, when we took dd1 and ds a few years ago, dd1 asked if they came out of the cages at night. It's not hard to believe they would. 

How do you know you suck?

When I started writing, almost thirty years ago, I really didn't care how good I was. That's easy for a four year old. As long as you can write your name and all the letters facing the right way, you're golden. 

I started writing actual stories when I was about seven or eight and still didn't care. 

At thirteen I got my first typewriter, not only could I type stories and make them look printed, I can type faster than I can write longhand. This was about the time I started showing my stuff to other people. And they all liked it. So I figured I was pretty good at it.

I wrote all through my teens, got a couple of poems published, stood up at the Love Apple once and did some stuff onstage. What did I care? I was a teenager, fearless I was. 

I wish I still was fearless.

It's a funny thing. The more you learn about your craft, the less you seem to know. In my early twenties I decided to get serious about writing novels and bought some books on the subject. Bad idea, I succeeded in killing my muse for about ten years.  Why? Because I wanted it to be better and for it to be good and done properly. It's taken me a long time to realise that there is no proper way to write. Each writer's ways of getting that story down are as individual as the writers themselves. 

I went back to writing in 2004. I had come across something called National Novel Writing Month and thought I'd have a crack at it. I had a few ideas but no outline, no tightly plotted line with action points marked in red pen. I struggled through it but I did it.

The year after, I failed the challenge entirely. It wasn't a writing problem so much as a life getting in the way problem. 

The year after, and every year since then, I've won, and won comfortably. I've given up going into it with anything more than some nebulous ideas scribbled on bits of paper. I let myself leap into the unknown with no plot and just then everything develop.

Call me an OLPer (organic linear plotter - I think) or call me a pantser (as in flying by the seat of-) the label doesn't matter. What matters is the realisation that I do not plot and I do not plan and I simply cannot sit down and draw up a plot-line with action points on it. 

So I'm writing again now. Good stuff. Now the problem is, how good is it? Worth reading? Worth publishing?  The only way I'm going to learn the answers to that is if I let people read it. I'm assured that it's definitely worth reading, publishing may be another matter. When I've polished the novel enough to send out, then I'll know. 

Cracks fingers and settles down....

Been a while since I posted. Yep, another blog, dead on the net. I'm so fabulous at this writing everyday thing. [sarcastic smiley]

Well, since I'm stuck on the current novel, and also stuck on the Uni Assignment, it seems the only form of procrastination left (which still falls within the remit of writing) is blogging.

I am spending far too much time on the internet reading forums, playing games and not being very productive. Now that spring is here and my brain has finally realised it has a conciousness, I am hoping to be more productive.

Of course I'm making all the normal promises to myself about giving up smoking (ten days so far, the nicotine replacement is working well enough), eating healthier (um... let's just pass on that one) and taking more exercise (moving swiftly on...) I'm making promises about more specific things. More time outside, more time being social with people I can actually look in the eye, and more writing.

So, back to the blog. And back to being a blogger with something people may want to read, and not a bookmark that you might remove after having it six month because the owner never bloody updates.

A couple from The Haunting Of The Orc And Dragon, a nano I wrote in 17 days about three friends, one of who is an amputee and another has achondraplasia. It was in response to a nano dare to write a story with disabled characters.

Because we were passing the Golden Duckling Chinese takeaway we stopped off in there to place an order. We often go there, it’s cheap and the food is plentiful. As with the pizza orders, we never seemed to vary our Chinese food order either. A special Sweet And Sour for me, curry for Figgis and a Special Fried Rice for Bel. We have no imagination when it comes to food. Not even Figgis, whose capacity for imagination in every other area is outstanding.

Bel wriggled up and onto the nearest chair. The guy behind the counter was new,at least I hadn’t seen him before. Bel winked at him. He seemed to be fascinated with her every move, as though she was some exotic creature that he had never before seen. Bel was used to this, she drew stares wherever she went. When she was in good humour she would smile at people and ask if she could help them. Bel in a bad humour looked evil enough to make most people think twice about opening their mouths. People who were stupid enough to make comments to a bad tempered Bel usually found themselves on the wrong end of an acidic retort. If the guy behind the counter wasn’t careful, he was going to experience it first hand.

And then it happened. The stupid bugger opened his mouth.

“Hey,” He said, and smirked. “You, you’re a dwarf ain’t you?”

Bel looked up at him. He wasn’t much to look at, an acne covered teenager who looked like his IQ was half that of toast. She sighed. “ I have a form of dwarfism, so yes, I’m a dwarf.”

“Seen any hobbits lately?” He sniggered.

“Seen any braincell activity lately?” Bel smiled pleasantly. “Hobbits? No, I don’t believe I have. I do think I’ve seen an orc though. Or is it a goblin?” She turned to Figgis. “Which are the really stupid, ugly ones?”

“The tall stupid ugly ones are orcs.” Figgis said helpfully. “The small ugly stupid ones are goblins.”

“So, you’re what? Medium height?” Bel asked sweetly. “I guess that makes you the half-witted bastard offspring of the two.”

“What?” The youth looked surprised.

“No, perhaps it is unfair to call you such names,” She said, still smiling. “After all, it can’t be your fault that you grew up both stupid and ugly, hereditary was it?”

“Hey!” He said. “Shut up.”

“And that sparkling wit, it’s so, what’s the word? Witty.”

“Shut up!” He said again. “Fucking dwarf.”

“Oh!” Bel clapped her hands together in glee. “It knows how to swear!”

Things could have got very ugly at that point, except that the bloke who actually owned The Golden Duckling came out to see just what was going on. He didn’t look very pleased at the youth’s version of events, which ran predictably along the lines of the youth being harrassed by three drunken foul-mouthed patrons calling him names. That was us, presumeably.

Bel tried to explain nicely that she was verbally defending herself against the ignorance and tactlessness of his employee. The owner must have been related to the youth because he launched into a defence of him that mainly consisted of saying what a nice polite boy he was. Bel told him that he was not a nice boy, far from it. He was an ignorant boy with less brains than a mollusc, a boy who would go far in the field of being a complete prick and a boy that was not likely to lose his virginity with anything that didn’t possess four legs and a wooly coat,. and only then if he was lucky, and it was a blind sheep, with no sense of smell, and it was cornered.



“Fuck, I’m drunk.” I said to Bruce, “Why did I drink the punch?”

“Because you’re a masochist?” He suggested, smiling the smug smile of someone who is sober when all about them are pissed up and feeling it, the smug smile of someone who knows he is going to be hangover-free in the morning.

“Oh ha ha, you are so funny, Bruce.” I said “Blimey, how do you go through life being called Bruce? It’s just one of the most crap names ever.”

“Well, thanks a lot.” He said. “I’m rather partial to it myself. It’s better than Ralph.”

“That’s not your middle name is it?” And I very unkindly shrieked with laughter. “Bruce Ralph?”

He nodded.

“Go on, tell me. What’s your surname?” I whispered. Crossing my legs just in case his surname was just as funny and I wet myself laughing. At that point it was looking like a distinct possibility.

“Simpkins.” He said.

I howled. I absolutely howled with laughter. I couldn’t help it. “Bruce Ralph Simpkins?”

And then what followed was the most embarrassing moments of my entire life. Bar none. Well, until they were surpassed by the embarrassing events of the morning after. But as October ticked over into November, they were still at the number one spot.

“How much did your parents hate you to saddle you with that?” I managed to ask through my giggles, and then I wasn’t worried that I was going to wet myself laughing because I knew without a shadow of a doubrt what I was actually going to do was puke. I ran for the ladies, threw myself down to my knees and was very, very ill. That wasn’t the worst bit. Oh no, that was still to come. Because I’d run off halfway through tormenting poor Bruce, he’d been worried about me. So, like the gentleman he was, he decided to come and see if I was ok.

“Hey!” I heard through the door. “Are you all right?”

“Yeurgh.” I said. And spat bile into the pan.

“Can I come in? Do you need a hand?” He walked into the stall and tried helping me to my feet. Despite the fact I’d got rid of most of the alcohol in my stomach, the rest seemed to have hit my bloodstream at a phenomenal rate. I could barely speak, let alone get up. He tried gripping me under the armpits and hauling me to my feet, with me still snorting hysterically with mirth. Then it happened. I slipped, he slipped, and to stop me falling back down he grabbed a hold of my arm. Except that he grabbed the wrong one. And it came off.

I’d never seen a man faint before, but good old Bruce hit the deck like a sack of spuds. Which, in my disgustingly inebraited state, I found hilarious. It was not my finest hour. I landed back on my arse beside him. When Bel found us a minute or so later we must have looked a right state. Bruce on the floor, with my arm in his hand, and me on my arse in drunken hysteria. As I said. It was not my finest hour.

“How did the seance go?” I mumbled to Bel.

“Shut up, you bloody drunken fool. I can’t get you up, I’ll have to get Figgis to help.” She yelled for help and we were suddenly surrounded by lots of people, Figgis and Jherek, Tyler and various others. All of whom were both amused by poor Bruce fainting and by the fact that I was now ‘legless as well as armless’ Gee, thanks for that one Figgis.

Bruce was carted off in the small side room until he recovered. Apparently he’d never noticed that I only have one arm, no wonder the poor bugger fainted. I was carted off home in Jherek’s van because nobody dare put me in a taxi. The last thing I remember was being helped out of the back of the van by two Jack Sparrows and a small witch that swore incessantly at me.