life
Merry Christmas (I Don’t Want To Fight Tonight…)
Christmas Eve, and I’m having a gentle, quiet and pleasant day. Having purchased a new Apple keyboard – one of the flatter, squarer variety, it’s now a little easier on my fingers to type, plus I’ve just done 1,000 words of fiction. I don’t even mind that they weren’t necessarily exceptional words. They weren’t there an hour ago, and that’s what’s important. I’ll probably aim for an update at some point in the next couple of days, but I’m doing okay right now – this isn’t the Christmas I expected to have six months ago, but I’m thinking good thoughts, and looking forward to good food and watching some cool stuff, both televisual and filmic. Life is treating me okay right now, and I just wanted to wish everybody out there a very happy christmas. See you on the other side of the Christmas divide…
Monday Morning (Here Again…)
I’m about to speed off into town again (this time to purchase a roasting tin), and I’m also attempting to get my head together. My brain is still in something of a fog after the absurd exertions of last week – while I’d love to be all action, all writing, all the time, there are simply points where my brain just waves the white flag and I have to go with it. I am, at least, being able to catch up with lots of the television I’ve missed (both British and American), and there are a couple of major missions I’ve set myself that I’m chipping away at over the next couple of weeks. On top of this, I will hopefully be doing another TV Eye update on the stuff I have seen – particularly the conceptual car-crash that is Season 3 of Heroes. I’m not certain exactly how Christmassy I am feeling right now – but then, it’s an odd and unusual time for me. I’m just going to have to wander into this new world, and see where it takes me…
Whistlin’ Past The Graveyard
A quiet weekend – one I’ve been decidedly grateful for. My experience of the run-up to Christmas has, for various reasons, evolved into an operation on an almost industrial scale that naturally expands to fill whatever space is available – I finally got everything done on Friday, and after a frantic time in the dimension-warping labyrinth that is the Arndale Centre I got everything sent off – 20 minutes before the end of that postal day. Okay, I could conceivably have sorted it on Saturday, but I really didn’t want to cut it that fine, and considering I was running on only four hours sleep, it’s an understandable impulse. I did have fun sorting it all, however, and I’m hoping that what I’ve done goes down well – but while there’s the little voice at the back of my head that does want to get a positive reaction, most of me knows that this is about the giving, and that it was important to me to do Christmas right this year. Just because it’s my first Christmas for a while where I’m actually on my own, it doesn’t mean I can’t still do things right, and have a good time in the bargain.
Shopping today – stocking up for the next three weeks, plus some official Christmas treats – and while I have indulged myself a little, I don’t have a mountain of chocolate to work through, and I think that’s probably a good thing. I’m going to have a relaxing time, catch up on some TV watching, and enjoy myself. There’s also been some DIY happening – after last weekend’s epic effort from Anna to finish her laminate floor, we’re now onto finishing the new wardrobe in my room, and have been encountering Ikea’s interesting attitude to providing screws that actually fit in the holes you’re supposed to fit them into. A slightly busted screwdriver didn’t help, so Anna has high-tailed it to B+Q, and will soon be returning to put the finishing touches on the piece, and I’ll finally have somewhere decent to hang my clothes and store more stuff.
It’s an odd feeling to have gotten to the point where I don’t have much to do, and can legitmately take a breath – everything in the writing and publishing world has essentially shut down for the next couple of weeks, and aside from an outstanding review (of the deliriously nutty Korean film The Good The Bad The Weird), I don’t have any major work to do. I’m also basically sorted for my monthly wages until March 23rd 2009, so I can genuinely pause here – I’ve got to kick myself into gear once 2009 commences, but right now, I can simply be.
I’m also doing better in myself. Last weekend was very, very hard, and I did feel somewhat stuck in a frame of mind that didn’t seem likely to shift – but then, I woke up on Monday morning, and suddenly everything seemed a little easier to deal with. Since then, I’ve had my ups and downs, but I’m still feeling balanced, and better, and certain that however traumatic the last year has been, I’ve made the right choice, and I’m heading in a direction that I actually want to go. Sure, I’d rather be doing it in company – but if these are the cards I’ve been dealt. I can complain, and I can moan, and I can be miserable – or I can remember that none of that is going to change the past, and concentrate on making a better future.
And however many gloomy predictions there may be for 2009 – and there are plenty of voices shouting “Doom!” – I’m going to do my best to have an excellent year, get my life back on track, and have some serious fun into the bargain.
That’s my plan. And I think it’ll do me for a while.
Flashback: Jingle All The Way…
It’s been a rough time for me, recently. This weekend’s been quite difficult – lots of DIY related upheavals, and some of my darkest moments for quite a few weeks. I could blog about that, about how hard life feels at the moment – but I’m not going to.
Instead, it’s time for a brief look back at a happier time, and one of the most genuinely fun afternoons I can remember spending. My friend Tris and I were always talking about working together to break into the Media, and while it never happenned (One important life lesson – if you talk about doing something more than actually doing it, it’s fairly likely that it won’t happen) we did have one brief moment of glorious collaboration. We’d done plenty of stuff separately and together- he’d helped out on legendary video project The Alchemist, while I’d co-starred in the even more legendary fan film spoof The New Airwolf: The Next Generation (the first chapter of which has notched up over 90,000 hits on Youtube, a fact that never fails to stun me…), but the only point where we truly collaborated and created something together that was neither mine nor his but by both of us – it happenned one afternoon in 1999, and involved creating truly crazed jingles for an audition tape to aid Tris’ aim of breaking into radio. Tris’ radio career never took off (in the same way as my filmmaking career hit what could politely be described as ‘a few snags’), but he did get plenty of experience, including a run on Hospital Radio where the following jingle did get some airtime. It’s only about a minute long, it was written with the track ‘Something Wicked This Way Comes’ by Barry Adamson as a backing, it rhymes ‘cool’ with ‘strawberry fool’ (as well as suggesting a different use for furniture polish Mr Sheen) and it never fails to makes me smile. So, if you’ve ever wanted to find out what it’d be like to hear me both singing and (believe it or not) rapping – now’s your chance… (Although if you have, consider me officially scared…)
Nighthawks at the Diner
Friday night. Alone again. I haven’t blogged much for a while, mainly because I’ve been busy – two major chunks of proofreading that kept me occupied for a while, as well as proving that the concept of proofreading while getting writing done isn’t completely impossible. There have been deadlines, and reviews to do, and book reports to write, and I’m in a situation where wage-wise, I’m at least relatively sorted until the last week of March 2009, which isn’t a bad situation to be in. But, melancholy has been rearing it’s ugly head again. It doesn’t help that there’s a bit of DIY-related uproar here, with Anna currently installing a laminate floor in the frontroom (a new fireplace has already been delivered and fitted), with the result that because the work isn’t finished, the only usable room in the lower floor of the house is the (rather small) kitchen. Also, because of my recent purchase of a new computer, I’m on an ultra-strict budget right now which means that my possibilities are, at the moment, pretty limited. I’ve got a certain amount of christmas preparation still to do, and plenty to occupy myself with…
Some more personal and not particularly happy Friday night thoughts behind the cut…
Let Me Introduce You To My Little Friend…
So, I have a new computer. It’s essentially a beefed-up version of my old computer, a shiny new Mac Mini with the maximum memory and hard disc it would take, and it’s certainly making life a lot easier. Things are running quicker, and the Internet is now actually possible to use – before, I was stuck with a not-tremendously-quick USB dongle, and it didn’t exactly make life easy. There are now a whole lot of possibilities available, and it’s nice just being able to do things like watch BBC iPlayer in full screen without the whole thing giving off steam. I’ve also managed to consolidate my entire music collection together, with the worrying discovery that I’ve got 49 GB of audio content on my computer, equalling nearly 37 days of solid listening.
I’ve also been down with a brief touch of illness, and have now got another one of those weeks when I’ve got to be very, very careful to make sure that everything happens on schedule. Work, Christmas and various other things all have to happen, and I’m going to make sure they do. There’s just an awful lot of other stuff I’d like to be doing in the meantime. Anyhow, it’ll all work out in the end…
Swings and Roundabouts
Proof that life has an annoying habit of delivering another knock at exactly the wrong moment, I got two book rejections in one go this morning. Both were from US publishers, and neither fell into the category of “Oh well, at least they seemed to enjoy it…” – one thought it was fun, but didn’t think it was their thing and found it easy to put down, while the other seemed to really like the prologue, and from then onwards found it confusing and didn’t like any of the characters. Being already tired, bleary and sliding back down the slope towards depression again, it wasn’t like I was in fine fettle this morning, and this just sucked all my enthusiasm for the day out of my system. I know I’ll get through this, but currently all I want to do is curl up into a corner and spend most of my time crying. Practical work is helping a little – I’ve had a review to work on this afternoon, I’ve still got the website to finish, I’ve got another reading report to do, and I’ve got some proofreading starting next week… but everything outside the window is grey, and trying to believe that this is going to work out okay in the end is getting a little difficult.
In which NanoWriMo singularly fails to eat my life…
Work always ends up getting in the way. It’s one of those things you can’t help. My burst of 5,000 words in a day on Monday ended up with me shaky on Tuesday, and while Wednesday was much better (3,000 words) and Friday almost as good, a blizzard of work has gotten in the way. Thursday was supposed to be the day for a job interview – a Christmas Temp job that will, if succesful, be taking up my weekends, and a few potential extra days here and there between now and Christmas. Unfortunately, thanks to a logistic shift, it got moved from Thursday afternoon to Monday morning – and of course, life being what it is, I’ve got a stack of work that urgently needs to be finished by Monday morning.
My NanoWriMo total is, right now, 10678 words. I won’t be able to do any more writing until at least Tuesday, but I am continuing to have some useful thoughts about the book. Particularly, I’ve rescinded one particular plot device I was going to employ, which means I’ve now got an energetic and strong female antagonist with which to endanger my main character for most of the book – hurrah!
I’m also currently engaged in updating my website, and carrying out various other details. Certain aspects of this life are almost – almost – starting to feel normal. Anna and I are certainly getting on well, and I am at least doing okay in making ends meet (as long as one particular delayed invoice does eventually get paid). I can’t pretend there aren’t moments where I feel horribly lonely, and where I miss George more than I can say… but I have to get through them. And, in certain ways, it’s that entire period of my life that I miss, and the fact that any potential for it to continue or to improve is gone. But it’s better that we did this than try to stay together and end up hurting both of us. I want her to be happy, and no matter how hard it may be for me right now, I want myself to be happy too. It’s going to be a long road, but I’m hopeful that eventually, I’m going to get there.
They seem to have had an Election, don’t you know?
With the entire blogosphere exploding with joy, it seems slightly redundant to say anything other than “Hurrah!” about the US Election – although it’s nice to see my innate cynicism proved wrong, it was great to wake up to find out the successor to George W. Bush is (a) not a Republican and (b) actually seems to have a brain, and of course it’s satisfying to see the Republicans being shown the door after the mess they’ve made over the last nine years. These are politicians we’re talking about, so it’ll be educational to see how much actual change happens (Anyone who remembers the euphoria surrounding the New Labour landslide all those years ago will also remember how that all ended up), but I’m a little more optimistic about the state of the world than I was, and it was great to wake up to some genuinely good news (even if my sleep last night was appalling, and I was wide awake at about 4am).
The only other election-related moment was where I was pondering the whole aspect of there still being plenty of people in the US who might not be jumping through hoops at the idea of a black President, and was having West Wing S1 finale flashbacks – when I suddenly realised that the reason the actress Elizabeth Moss who plays Peggy in the superlative Mad Men has always looked so damned familiar is that she also played Bartlett’s teenage daughter Zoe in The West Wing. Somehow, at a time when it’s easy for me to get depressed about personal issues, this odd bit of succesful remembrance cheered me up no end. Life is officially strange…
Saxon Bullock 