tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75291735380168816672024-02-20T12:00:50.374-08:00Miss Blue’s ViewsMiss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.comBlogger24125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-86381824679534833952013-05-31T12:42:00.001-07:002013-05-31T12:49:40.088-07:00From the windowI live on a busy road in Brighton. My front window looks out over the road and beyond the blocks of flats, I can see the sea. It's awesome. At some point every day, I stand in my bay window and watch the street, unseen, unnoticed by the people below, which is fine with me, I'd rather keep myself to myself. The street is full of shops and interesting people, why would you look up?<div><br></div><div>Just now, however, I was closing the heavy sash window with a loud rattle, and a guy on the street heard the noise and looked up. A cool, long haired, indie muso type (thinking about it now, he looked a bit like Eric Balfour). He met my eyes and, unlike most people, didn't look away. So I smiled. A bit. He smiled. A bit. And gave me a little wave. So I gave him a little wave back. He didn't stop walking and after this two second exchange, he looked back at the street and I turned away from the window.</div><div><br></div><div>We'll never see each other again, and even if we did, would we remember? But that little connection, that unexpected moment of 'hello', it made me smile :)</div><div><br></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br></div><br></div><br></div><br></div><br></div><br></div><br></div><br></div><br></div><br></div>Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-966406778702123072013-04-24T13:42:00.001-07:002013-04-24T13:47:58.120-07:00Corporately socialI am the least sporty person I know. I don't play sport, watch sport or read about sport. I tune out when people talk about football, I start fidgeting if there's a game on a TV in a pub, I have been known to rant about how much of a news broadcast is taken up by reports of a sprained ankle or a disappointed manager. I'm overweight, uncompetitive and not particularly physically adept. These things, along with the utter, utter boredom I associate with sport, don't tend to make me a great contributor to the near-mandatory involvement in the vastly tedious organisation known as the Work Social Club. Which I am beginning to learn, is not really about socialising, it's about sport. And drinking. And more sport.<br />
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My firm recently decided it was time to start a Social Club. We've more than doubled the number of staff in four years and such rapid growth is starting to breed the inevitable 'silo' effect of departments not communicating, cliques forming and gossip rumbling. So the bosses felt that social events would get people to meet in a non-stress environment, bond and strengthen their working relationships. Nice theory. <br />
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One of the girls in my team was put in charge of setting up said Social Club. She's about to turn 30, she's bright, vibrant, healthy, enjoys a glass (bottle) of wine, goes to the gym every day, rugby on the weekend and dressed as a Playboy Bunny or Sexy Lady Cop for at least three hen parties last year. So, after the meeting with the new Social Club Committee this afternoon..<br />
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Me: So what activities did the social club decide on? <br />
Organiser: Oh loads! Cricket, softball, boules, rowing, sailing, hockey, football, rugby, korfball... <br />
Me: Anything for non-sporty people, like me? <br />
Organiser: Of course! You can come and watch! <br />
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When I (gently) pointed out that spectating was not exactly an inclusive activity for non-sporty folk, she sniffed and said 'Well, what else is there?' A few minutes later, she piped up with 'Oh, someone suggested pottery classes. GOD, I can't think of anything more boring!'<br />
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If I'm honest, I was stuck for responses at that point. Mostly because I don't actually care, the idea of spending any more time with these people than I have to makes me a little nauseous. But on the way home, I came up with: film club, book club, chess club, music night, opera night, theatre night, photography shoot day, art classes, cooking classes, sewing club, glass blowing, singing group, talent show, craft club, model railway club and hell yes, pottery classes. I considered giving her my list, but as I'm not even vaguely interested in being the one to organise such things, I'm not going to put the idea out there.<br />
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Which brings me to my point. My bosses wanted to set this up to encourage people to ge to know each other in a non-work environment. To get people to open up, share, bond. But by making the 'social' aspect entirely about competitive sport (and, as a byproduct, drinking), the people who will want to be involved are those people already engaged at work: the fit, active, extroverted, confident, competitive, socially competent ones. Those of us who are physically less secure, introverted, shy or just plain bored, are not going to express any interest in joining in and, from my point of view at least, will avoid it like the plague. And I think the rest of the sporty types could be missing out on an opportunity to get to know us.<br />
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One of the girls in my office, let's call her Mabel (not even close to her real name), is one of the great Socially Inept. She's in her late 20s, but dresses like a 50-something librarian. She is slim, but in an ironing board way, doesn't style her hair, or wear makeup. She works hard and my guess is that she's a genius at what she does. When I speak to her, I get the impression she's not really interested in small talk, but indulges me because it's polite. I'm not a finance geek, so can't engage her on that topic and don't know anything about her to engage her on other subjects. She comes across as stiff and aloof, but I suspect it's either shyness, or, like me, just plain boredom. <br />
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A couple of years ago, however, I had a brief insight into what might be going on under that tight ponytail and those dowdy print dresses. I didn't go to the firm Christmas party (never have), but saw some photos of the event afterwards. It was a fancy dress party (one of the reasons I didn't go) and the theme was animals (the venue was the London Zoo, get it...?). Mabel turned up dressed in a skin-tight leopard print catsuit. No makeup and hair in her standard ponytail, flat-chested, flat-bottomed Mabel, in a cat suit. And no-one had explained about appropriate underwear for such a tight outfit either, ouch. She's been the talk of the firm every Christmas since then. <br />
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But what made me wonder was that, even though it was a terrible outfit for someone shaped like her (I can't do catsuits either, but I rock a vampire beer wench outfit), she had wanted to show everyone that she was interesting. Exciting. Scandalous. Sexy. She was more than the person they saw at work every day.<br />
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I suffer from it occasionally too, the ego-trip of 'wait, there's more to me than pie charts and telling you the font is wrong!'. But I kerb that instinct more and more often now, as people are unnerved, confused, taken aback and sometimes downright shocked at anything outside what they consider the norm. I think about how they talked (talk) about Mabel and her catsuit and clamp down the urge to start a discussion about Amanda Palmer's (who?) latest (naked) video, how much I fancy Benedict Cumberbatch and just how badly I want to write TV shows the way Mark Gatiss does. Because that kind of talk in a corporate environment will get you Labelled As Weird.<br />
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The downside is I struggle more at my job because I'm not 'bonding' with the other staff over Fantasy Football (really?). There are moments where I can garner a glimmer of a connection - brief opinions on the Lichtenstein exhibition at the Tate, an Oxbridge English Lit graduate noticing I'm reading Cormac McCarthy, someone wondering why I haven't been watching Game of Thrones (I don't have Sky). But for the most part, I bite my tongue, push down the passion and keep it to myself, or risk dilution, derision, confusion.<br />
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I like the work I do and I really like the money I earn from doing it, but after nearly five years in an increasingly corporate environment, I find myself questioning my reasons for spending so much of my life in an environment that's slowly excluding me. And it does make me wonder if I'm not the only one.<br />
<br />Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-30690847115948376362013-04-21T13:05:00.001-07:002013-04-21T13:08:40.216-07:00Weepy<p>I was watching Inside The Actor’s Studio this afternoon and James Lipton had Liam Neeson on and toward the end of the show, asked him the ‘standard’ questions. The last one was ‘Finally, if heaven exists (and I’m sure you have no doubt of it), what would you like to hear God say when you arrive at the pearly gates?’</p> <p>Liam responded with ‘I gave this a lot of thought James.’ He paused, his eyes filled, and his voice cracked ever so slightly as he continued…</p> <p>‘Your wife’s inside… with a big chilled bottle of pinot noir’.</p> <p>I’m still weepy.</p> Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-84661475060515159542013-03-02T11:32:00.001-08:002013-03-02T11:40:49.571-08:00Ketchup for one<div dir="ltr">
When I was 17 years old, I left home for university and moved into my first flat. My parents were paying my rent and I had a small allowance for food and expenses until I got a part-time job. I had been waiting for a place of my own since I was 14, I was so excited to be making my own rules, decorating with my second hand furniture and charity shop crockery and doing my own grocery shopping. That task alone signified my journey to independence. I had accompanied my mother on countless expeditions to our local supermarket, I knew what you bought for five people and how to make your dollar go far enough (mince, not steak, ice confection, not ice cream). I still waver between the budget range and the posh range at supermarkets to this day (though the posh range wins more often now that I'm earning proper money).<br />
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On my first visit to the supermarket as a not-living-at-home teenager, I realised I not only had less than one-fifth of my mother's grocery budget, I also only had to buy things for one. I don't really enjoy cooking (though I'm told I'm quite good thanks to parents who insisted I knew the basics before I left home) and I'm often happy with something-on-toast. So I was pretty much after staples. Coffee, sugar, bread, butter, ketchup. I bought the cheapest coffee on the shelf. It was instant coffee and the absolute worst, worst, diabolically worst coffee I've ever tasted. Pablo brand coffee if you're interested (and here's an equally bad TV ad for it <a href="http://youtu.be/m3uSVIZEuvM" target="_blank">http://youtu.be/m3uSVIZEuvM</a>), I don't think they make it any more. Probably because it's carcinogenic. But I bought it because it was cheap and it came in a tiny little jar, which I thought was quite sweet. I also bought a bag of sugar, a small tub of butter and the smallest bottle of Heinz tomato sauce I could find (we don't call it ketchup in Australia). I was so proud of my first purchases for my new life. These small items, so insignificant, so mundane, so ORDINARY, were symbols of of fearless independence, of making my own decisions, of freedom. And I couldn't wait to embrace it all.<br />
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Twenty-two years later, I have just come out of my only serious relationship, eight years with a good, kind man, who remains my friend, even though he's decided he needs to make his own choices about his future. It's been three weeks since I moved into my own place, a tiny flat by the seaside and I'm not going to pretend it's been anything but difficult to adjust. Once again, the insignificant, the mundane, the ordinary, have been the momentous emotional triggers - seeing the dishwasher open in the 'wrong' kitchen, making toast for one in my four-slice toaster, scanning the supermarket shelves and the disappointment of remembering I don't need to think about what he'd like for dinner. Coming home to an unfamiliar place, without my friend there to talk to - it's been hard.<br />
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But tonight, I went to the supermarket with only two purchasing goals - dessert and ketchup. There were individual chocolate sundaes on special (I'll let you know how they turn out) and I found the ketchup at the end of one aisle. I saw the big bottles first, the kind I'd always bought two of, because we tended to get through them quickly and they were often two-for-one. I frowned. I didn't need a bottle that big and they weren't on special. Then I saw the little ones beside it. At half the price. So I picked one up and suddenly I was in the kitchen of my student flat in 1989, putting the tiny jar of Pablo into the empty cupboard - MY empty cupboard - the vague smell of Formica and carpet cleaner in my nose and the thrilling anticipation of my independent future ahead of me.<br />
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And for the first time since my relationship ended, I realised I was excited about making my own decisions again. I realised that I could go back to being the strong, creative, vibrant person I was before I decided taking care of another person (even though he'd never asked me to) was more important. I realised that desperate, aching pain underneath my breastbone might not stay there forever. For the first time in weeks, I felt good about something, without the sharp, bitter taste of loss tainting it. I was going to be okay. Not all the time, not every day, not even every hour, but I was going to be happy. Happy about my decisions, happy about my plans, happy about my future. Happy buying ketchup for one.</div>
Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-133589928638551702012-05-20T10:33:00.000-07:002012-05-20T10:33:22.730-07:00The weight of preventing boredomMy chap's choir are rehearsing today for a concert at the Royal Festival Hall on London's Southbank, which is fairly touristy spot on the river, lots to see and do. So I thought I'd go with him in the car in the early afternoon, rather than brave public transport later in the day, and spend the rehearsal time wandering around taking photos and peering in shop windows. However it's a grey, cold, windy London day, so I find myself perched at a table in the lobby of the Royal Festival Hall, where the wifi is strong and free and there's a café downstairs.<br />
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Earlier today, with the prospect of photos in mind, I was getting ready to leave the house and realised I'd been preparing for my afternoon of leisure since the week before. Last night I'd charged my camera battery and computer, decided on the netbook over the laptop, based on battery life, cleared the CF card for the camera and debated with camera bag to take - would I need both the wide angle and the 50mm lens? This morning I dug through several cupboards to find the Kensington lock to secure the laptop to a mooring hook in the boot of the car and decided the purchase of a lock box for the boot might be worthwhile.<br />
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Last week, I researched (in person, with a photo on my phone as proof) the parking arrangements at the venue (and found them satisfactory) and bought a last-minute ticket for the show online (singles only, up in the nose bleed seats) which I collected a couple of hours ago by swiping my credit card through a slot in a self-service ticket machine in the foyer.<br />
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In my rucksack right now, I have a netbook with mini-mouse and mat, DSLR camera with two lenses, iPod and Sennheiser earphones (the chunky kind), smart phone, wallet, notebook and pens and the April issue of the Fortean Times. All in the name of staving off boredom. I commented to my chap as we were leaving, my shoulder groaning under the weight of all this technology, that 15 years ago I would have taken a book and maybe a pad and pen.<br />
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Technology has provided me with so many options for staying occupied and connected that a pen and a book aren't enough any more. Of course I still HAVE a pen and a book, in case of no wifi, battery death or eyesight begging for forgiveness from bright screens. But it's unlikely that I'll use them when I have the kit to take high resolution photos, tweak up the colours and contrast from the featureless grey of the London sky and upload them to Facebook, with comments and tags, so my mum in Australia can see how I've spent my Sunday. All within 30 minutes of taking them. I have my own music and thick earphones to protect me from the horrors of other people's conversations and a smart phone in case I don't want to crank up the netbook. All in the name of 'just in case'. <br />
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The concert starts in a couple of hours, so I'll go back to the car and secure the netbook and hide the camera bag in the boot as best I can, telling the niggling voice in my head that it will all be fine, our car doesn't look like it has anything valuable in it, there's CCTV and guards in the car park, which is brightly lit and hardly a spot for theft from cars. It's that, or lug it all with me into the theatre, into the toilets, tuck it under my seat and apologise to people trying to get past in the narrow space between rows. Between the netbook and the camera, there's £1,200 worth of gear sitting in the boot of our little car, obscured only by the vinyl boot cover, protected only by the locking mechanism on the car and a flimsy keylocked coated wire. If it was just a book and a pen I wouldn't even be thinking about it. <br />
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Is it worth it? I ask myself. I honestly don't know. Would I have taken the photos and uploaded them to Facebook TODAY had I not had the means to? They're not particularly interesting photos, and in the grey light, not even very good. My mum will probably like them, she likes most of the things I do, and I amused myself by tagging myself in a photo of the exterior of the hall - 'that's me, right now, right there!'. My chap has also posted a photo from inside the hall with his iPhone and I've commented with *waves*, as I can hear them rehearsing from where I'm sitting, so we're doing that coupley-Facebook thing that makes everyone a bit nauseous - us included.<br />
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Would I have had more value in a book and a pad and pen? I wrote this post sitting here, took some photos in less than ideal light and had a look over what my friends were posting on Facebook. I probably could have read an entire book in the time I've spent on tech today. Or written someone a letter. Or started that young adult novel series I've been promising I'd write.<br />
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Would that have been a more valid choice? Should I see posting photos on Facebook as 'connecting' with people? Should I have stayed home and Hoover'd? Does it really matter? Other people spent their afternoon at the football. Or watching TV. Or at the pub. Or weeding the garden. Or, in the case of people at other tables here, doing physics homework till that got boring and ended up watching rap videos on YouTube.<br />
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Choices aside, what I find really interesting about my own behaviour today is that I would rather haul over 10kgs of stuff around with me, fretting quietly about their safety when I leave them in the car, so I can take and edit photos and get online to write about them, then write about hauling 10kgs of stuff around to do just that. The clichéd part of my brain is humming with phrases like 'sign of the times', 'addicted to technology and validation', but the short answer is, I have the means to do this, so I am. Reading my book can wait for lunchtime tomorrow when I hide from the people I work with and letter writing can wait for those evenings I can't bear to look at a computer screen any more that day.<br />
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Taking photos today showed my friends and family on the other side of the planet what I'm seeing, in almost real time, and many of them will never see those things in person. Taking photos in bad light gives me another opportunity to learn about taking and edit photos and writing a blog post is always practice, even if it's as long and rambly as this one. But most of all, I enjoyed taking photos and writing this post. Which I think is the best validation of all.Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-87651529109441011102012-02-18T10:29:00.000-08:002012-02-18T10:35:38.089-08:00In defence of the souless commuter<strong><span id="zw-135917d590a5FXTSA7cdf05">Or why I wouldn't have stopped to listen to Joshua Bell play in the subway.</span></strong><br />
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<span id="zw-135917d1226BVUlmW7cdf05">Recently, a friend of mine reposted one of those <a href="http://www.snopes.com/music/artists/bell.asp" id="zw-1347b816313c8iNXa7cdf05" target="_blank" title="Facebook/email stories"><span id="zw-1347b81630ab_nrU47cdf05">Facebook/email stories</span></a> stories about violin virtuoso Joshua Bell busking in the New York subway and how all but two people and a few small children ignored him. It was paraphrasing an article called '<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/04/AR2007040401721.html" id="zw-1347b8266c9D-tCPs7cdf05" target="_blank" title="Pearls Before Breakfast"><span id="zw-13447c3264epT15Jw7cdf05">Pearls Before Breakfast</span></a>', a 'social experiment' engineered by Gene Weingarten and the Washington Post in 2007. Weingarten won a Pulitzer Prize for it. Interestingly, his second Pulitzer was for a (very insightful and moving) <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/02/27/AR2009022701549.html" id="zw-1347b83cf11GIcrbz7cdf05" target="_blank" title="article about the deaths of children left in their cars"><span id="zw-1347b83cf06u8GS87cdf05">article about the deaths of children left in their cars</span></a> by forgetful parents - I suggest you read them both, not just for the quality of the writing, but also to understand the common point he is highlighting.</span><br />
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<span id="zw-135917d122bz3qKfv7cdf05">Most people I've heard react to the Bell story with 'oh yes, isn't it terrible how we just rush through life and don't enjoy the beauty, we must stop and smell the roses more often, it's so sad, we've become such automatons and slaves to the modern industrial world' - Weingarten compares the video of Bell's busking performance to that of <span id="zw-13447dc82dbr5tUP77cdf05"><a href="http://www.koyaanisqatsi.org/films/koyaanisqatsi.php" id="zw-1347b87c705BsYZvW7cdf05" target="_blank" title="Koyaanisqatsi ">Koyaanisqatsi</a> </span>('Life out of balance'), an 80s film illustrating our descent into robotic antdoom, becoming cogs in the great wheel of progress and industry, the loss of beauty, art, music, self in the layers of urban consumerism.</span><br />
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<span id="zw-135917d1230p6mKXU7cdf05">Weingarten, Bell, the Washington Post and the makers of Koyaanisqatsi make a good point. There should be space for art, music, beauty, peace in everyone's life. But I resent the implication that because I work 9-5 as part of The Great Corporate Machine, I am ignoring the opportunities for beauty in my life.</span><br />
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<span id="zw-135917d12364UtU_37cdf05">For the record, Weingarten's article is not judgemental. He presents the facts and statements from the people interviewed and allows us to draw our own conclusions - as a journalist should. What I resent is the way his objective view has been regurgitated into chain emails and Facebook posts, with the obligatory 'oh it's too sad', inviting similar comments lest you be one of the unenlightened, the spiritually void, the Tin Man without a heart.</span><br />
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<span id="zw-135917d123c4KZBke7cdf05">I work 9-5.30, five days a week. I travel 75 minutes each way to reach my office so I can live in a three bedroom house with a garden instead of a studio apartment. My office is in a modern high rise building made of glass and steel and I have a desk in a cluster of six other desks in a giant room that I share with 150 people, computers, phones, printers and photocopiers. My firm provides financial services and I am the sole 'creative' on staff, providing branding, formatting, application support and layout design for pitch documents, presentations, client reports and process flowcharts. I like my job, but it's not what I dreamed I'd do - I tried that for 15 years and got tired of being broke. Ten years ago I made a conscious decision to work </span><span id="pbdiv1"></span><span id="zw-135918403a8ZT-z07cdf05">40 hours a</span><span id="zw-135918403a9Up0zks7cdf05"> week and </span><span id="zw-135918403aavWwEs07cdf05">get paid e</span><span id="zw-135918403abwT15ZC7cdf05">nough to b</span><span id="zw-135918403acH-N7PT7cdf05">e able to </span><span id="zw-135918403acvIX4yB7cdf05">spend my e</span><span id="zw-135918403adrOUc_C7cdf05">venings an</span><span id="zw-135918403aesND2yW7cdf05">d weekends</span><span id="zw-135918403afCh61dO7cdf05"> filling t</span><span id="zw-135918403b0fS0Li87cdf05">he parts o</span><span id="zw-135918403b1a42z-K7cdf05">f my life </span><span id="zw-135918403b2Ckg_l_7cdf05">I don't sp</span><span id="zw-135918403b3js6ki7cdf05">end at wor</span><span id="zw-135918403b5SriymT7cdf05">k with thi</span><span id="zw-135918403b6CplbJn7cdf05">ngs that m</span><span id="zw-135918403b7wobWSA7cdf05">ade me hap</span><span id="zw-135918403b8MjeSY77cdf05">py.</span><br />
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<span id="zw-135917d1247Wn-Kb7cdf05">Now I give 48 hours a week of my life in exchange for more money than I've ever earned in my 23 years of working. And that money means that in the last 12 months, my partner and I were able to afford to go to the theatre a dozen times, visit art galleries, museums, travel to Australia for two weeks, spend a week driving around the island of Ibiza, eat out at nice restaurants and buy so many CDs and DVDs we had to buy more shelves to accomodate them. I also bought a camera. A good one, which meant I could finally start working on photography, a hobby I've been interested in since I was child.</span><br />
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<span id="zw-135917d124cNqaGBd7cdf05">Working for 'the man' also provides me with private health insurance, life insurance and a pension I'd never get if I'd stayed working in the arts.</span><br />
<br />
<span id="zw-135917d1250vS6f7e7cdf05"><img alt="" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKpbGec8lkQQtWanGVpnboHJTtztOpZ76Tiq4Z1rr1saus1sSACmWICnpbkSlvDLgwC6sds003W8cswA8Wa-cHilTJ2tAXQk1iJmUE02xSOBAvc6P41i3KTK3nyqCaJVGHQXQtGFmtEE25/" style="float: right; margin: 5px 5px 5px 5px;" width="239" />Yes, the commute gets frustrating. Yes, the workload can get tedious and open plan offices are noisy, distracting and tiring and yes, I could fit all the work I do in five days into three - but that's not how the system works. You're required to spend a portion of your 40 hours chatting to colleagues about fairly irrelevant topics, offering cups of tea if you're making one and showing an interest in other people's holidays and photos of their children - if you don't, you don't 'fit in'. Apparently 'fitting in' is key to getting the work done. And getting the work done is key to getting paid.</span><br />
<br />
<span id="zw-135917d125565SoB7cdf05">Once, a delivery made to my home had to be left on the front porch and I asked my boss if I could go home to ensure it wasn't stolen. It was 11am and my firm provides me with remote access to our systems, so I offered to work from home for the rest of the day, rather than waste three hours of my work day making the round trip. But my boss asked me to come back to the office as 'it looked better' for me to be present in the office. For a time, I worked at home two days a week when we were commuting from further away, but was relieved to give it up when we moved closer, as I was forever being asked 'Now, you're not in tomorrow are you?' and explaining that while I wasn't physically present in the office, I would be performing the same tasks and often working harder to justify that fact.</span><br />
I have no illusions about how 'pointless' my job is in the greater scheme of the universe, but I work a lot less hours and make a lot more money than I ever did in the theatre. I also have a lot more time for myself.<br />
<span id="zw-135917d125al1LO6x7cdf05">Long distance commuting was one of the most stressful experiences I've ever had. And it wasn't about how much time I was spending travelling to and from home. It was about the physical and mental abuse of the public transport system. In a city like London, and I'm sure this applies to New York, Washington and any other city with a mass transport system and sprawling suburbs filled with people who work in the city centre, there are more people than the system can cope with. Trains are expensive, crowded, dirty, smelly and aging at an exponential rate.</span><br />
<br />
<span id="zw-135917d125eHnA5ok7cdf05">We used to position ourselves on the platform where we knew the door would be on the incoming train and arrive 15 minutes early to grab that spot so we'd at least have a chance of getting a seat. It was that or end up standing in the aisles for 90 minutes of creaking, jerking, juddering into London, only to pile off and be shoved about by people made late for work by signal failures, overheating rails in summer, frozen points in winter, or my all time favourite - llamas that had escaped from a farm and were wandering over the tracks.</span><br />
<br />
<span id="zw-135917d1263BaFzEq7cdf05"> The result of this is that more often than not, I was rushing through the station, either late for work, or, worse, late for the train home, meaning I could be standing on the platform for another half hour until the next one. And I was one of a couple of million people in exactly the same situation, sardining ourselves into overcrowded train carriages, weaving through platforms fill with people, jostling for a place in the queue for the escalator, hoping we didn't end up pressed up against someone with body odour, bad breath or the tinny screeching of pop divas through plastic earphones. This is not an environment for appreciating art, music or culture.</span><br />
<br />
<span id="zw-135917d1267D6Dw327cdf05">A few year ago I heard about an organisation called '</span><a href="http://www.slowdownlondon.co.uk/" id="zw-135917de1bfsmZa1H7cdf05" target="_self" title="Slow Down London"><span id="zw-135917de1baRHxq1W7cdf05">Slow Down London</span></a><span id="zw-135917de1bcbUTgA77cdf05">' whose mission statement is 'to inspire Londoners to challenge the cult of speed and appreciate the world around us.' They went to the papers with a campaign stating they would be walking the streets of London during rush hour, stopping people and encouraging them to slow down. I am here to tell you that if one of those people had stopped me rushing on my way to catch my train home, which, had I missed, would mean 30 minutes less of my evening at home, I would have punched them in the face. I challenge any of them to match my record of cultural experiences over the past 12 months - all done because I can afford to do so - because I work a 40 hour week in The Machine.</span><br />
<br />
<span id="pbdiv2"></span><span id="zw-135917d126eYweEe07cdf05">So I say, not so much to Gene Weingarten and the Washington Post, who performed the experiment in what I hope is an unbiased piece of reporting, but to everyone who has ever forwarded that email, reposted that Facebook article or commented with a 'oh I know it's so sad' - you try commuting through a metro system with a million other people on a daily basis and see how keen you are to stop and listen to a guy playing the violin. Experiencing beauty like Joshua Bell playing the violin is one of life's imperatives. But you cannot tell me that experiencing that beauty when I have time, space and energy to actually enjoy it is not just as important.</span>Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-12532715852276005822011-01-15T15:02:00.001-08:002011-01-15T15:02:45.648-08:00Dead things<p>Earlier this week I came home to find a dead pigeon on the glass roof of the little porch over the front door to our building. I’m guessing it flew into the glass windows that front our building and broke its stupid neck. It stayed there for three days before I decided I would have to be the one to call the building maintenance company to bring a ladder and a bucket of disinfectant. I took some photos and emailed them as evidence, but it’s been three more days now and the bird carcass is still there. I’ll spare you the day-lit ones, but thought this one was worthy of a bit of gruesome fascination. </p> <p>Disclosure – I hate birds. The thought of little bags of tiny bones covered in soft, slightly oily, seed-scented feathers creeps me out on some deep biological level. Pigeons occupy a special place in my scale of loathing, for their lack of navigational skills and capacity for crashing into innocent humans on their way back from the bus stop (the humans, not the pigeons, pigeons don’t take the bus as far as I’m aware). </p> <p><img style="margin: 5px 0px 0px; display: inline" title="IMAG0296A" alt="IMAG0296A" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6bbG9H5ctdAFLB9kyipC877l7l3zMOt9N7BjovqlOsY2xkhnaJtQE80yeCbUNduNUK1C_sMhyphenhyphenWEZuVuSCIxdHUw7XNrfPHQsvkuMb-0_6cdxS83wUrSNdmuivOqVLfLtCzwvswe3O_KrM/?imgmax=800" width="240" height="226" /> The bird on our porch roof is not yet rotting, but the corpse is starting to flatten out as gravity overrules the muscular structure. One of its feet is curling into talons, more like a Poe-style raven than an idiotic flying rat. But I find myself oddly intrigued by the fact that this creature, living earlier in the week, is now formless, inert, at the mercy of the elements and helpless. In a word, dead. And I wonder about humankind’s preoccupation and fascination with death. Funerals, cremations, burials, religious and otherwise, Halloween and festivals like Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead). I wonder at my predilection for horror films and novels, for vampires (before it was decided they ‘sparkled’ and drove Volvos *grits teeth*), for Frankenstein and his monsters and just how much I enjoyed Christopher Golden’s recent undead anthology <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Zombie-Anthology-Undead-Christopher-Golden/dp/0749952539/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1295131591&sr=8-1" target="_blank">Zombie</a>. </p> <p>I’m sure studiers of human nature have better explanations than I, but I’m assuming it’s because it is the final Great Unknown. Because we really don’t know what happens after death, because, well, we’re dead and no-one’s come back to tell us (I’m not talking about people who die for a few minutes and are revived by the way, I mean properly dead like my six-day-old pigeon-corpse buddy). Humans aren’t good with unknowns. We don’t like to have unexplained mysteries, we like certainties. Uncertainty is frightening. So death really pisses us off. So to deflect that anger and fear, we make stuff up. We hand out stories of tunnels of light and angels with harps on clouds, or fire and brimstone to keep the kids in line. Or that you’ll come back again, in another body (but conveniently won’t remember your past lives). Or that you won’t die at all, you’ll simply change form, into a ghost, a vampire, or a spirit, floating in the ether around your family and friends, protecting babies from falling out of their cribs. </p> <p>But I look at ol’ pigeon here and I’m not convinced. His feathers are limp in the wind, his insides are now his outsides, his eyes are glazed over and he’s a soft, damp toy without any batteries. He’s not coming back, he hasn’t moved on, he’s just stopped. He’s not aware of the rushing traffic. He’s oblivious to polite behaviour in public, he won’t hear his pigeon buddies taunting him about his choice of ankle cuffs, the daily food shop is no longer required. He doesn’t have to pay his rent to sit on a lion in Trafalgar Square and his wife won’t nag him about coming home late after a night out on the seed with his mates. He won’t have to go into his boring job sitting on ledges outside office windows. Everything is quiet in his world. </p> <p>People might be frightened of death as a Great Unknown, but I think they’re more frightened of not getting everything done, of not following through on those childhood dreams, or parental expectations. Lately, having been in a romantic relationship for nearly six years, I find myself frightened of what my death would mean to my partner, but my fears about what death means to me lessen as I grow older and my life is fuller of memories and adventures. No, I don’t want to die yet, but I’m not as frightened of my mortality as I used to be. Because in my noisy, busy, adventure and information-filled world, the finality of death seems like the best, last chance to sit down and have a rest. Peace. Solitude. Tranquillity. The ultimate quiet time. </p> <p>Then of course my chap suggested that it would be cool if the pigeon turned into a zombie. Thanks babe.</p> Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-91770893986462755772011-01-09T14:26:00.001-08:002011-01-09T14:27:41.226-08:00Reviews and a new blog<p><img style="margin: 5px 0px 0px 5px; display: inline" title="tickets1" alt="tickets1" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPbJNxPKe89tA7arTts-aVdRCkAwlnUsM0LWjeLFczRINnvjV9YH7SykTlIzvSunrhXfISVnE71riuFmkE5Wc_RogoSYhKW5JdQYD3ejA8TZvC9sD2uAoOI6-C6HpwSLofMXwF1SovHMnW/?imgmax=800" width="240" height="187" /> When I started this blog, it was intended as a tool to get in some reviewing practice in case that paid opportunity ever arose (ha!), but instead, it evolved into tales from my life, rather than my cultural experiences and overly poetic opinions on live entertainment. So while it’s not updated frequently (guess what my only New Year’s resolution was?), it’s been lots of fun, so I’ve decided to keep it that way. </p> <p>To that end, I’ve started a sister blog with actual reviews and have included my first two theatre adventures of 2011 — the gorgeously gorgeous ‘Flyboy is alone again at Christmas’ by Matthew Robins and a one night stand with the equally fabulous Tom Lenk.</p> <p>You can find my review blog at <a href="http://blues-reviews.blogspot.com" target="_blank">blues-reviews.blogspot.com</a> (Blue’s Reviews) and this blog will now be known as Miss Blue’s Views (for that is what they be) at the original address.</p> <p>Even if no-one reads them, I’m having fun :)</p> Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-84770129442291139942010-09-12T06:54:00.001-07:002010-09-12T06:54:15.859-07:00How to dissuade a bicycle thief<p>One of the managers at my office has had his bicycle stolen twice in the past few months. I suspect this has rather a lot to do with the fact that he can’t be bothered chaining it up in the secure car park underneath our building, but insists on keeping it at the public bike racks outside on the street. As he often works late, and the area around our office gets very quiet once the suits have headed home, there's a good chance it will be a prime target for thieves when the sun goes down. </p> <p>As he still can't be bothered putting it in the secure car park, he has come up with a slightly more... innovative... deterrent. <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkV3itUgOenqCgSluYRgFKvg2qUVN6cM8M8KXAbghie568uBGfOXjg8J0BYrxrepTtkeWxrB0zespvti7ddMoJKP7N8h1ERvT5pk76TlDPG7Obz8_V3WVcBAbYm-vq17k8IiAZa7x98dXY/s800/0becba8a16b1b947720edbf0ce26e3e4.jpg" target="_blank">Click here to see.</a></p> Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-61912853610187621572010-08-07T11:50:00.000-07:002010-08-07T11:50:29.962-07:00Body adornments<p>I like jewellery. I don’t wear it often, especially not at work for a) comfort (rings and bangles are not conducive to eight hours hammering on keyboard and mouse) and b) talking points. I dress as frumpily as possible at work for the specific reason of avoiding the ‘oh, that’s unusual, where did you get that?’ conversation. The people I work with are accountants and statisticians and fit those stereotypes, anything beyond pearls and charm bracelets is ‘unusual’ and therefore worthy of a mildly-horrified comment on my fashion rebellion. I cite an example from a few days ago - another girl, younger than me, but so quiet and socially inept she makes the average church-going librarian look like Madonna. She’s more straight-laced than anyone I’ve met and I find that interesting, because I suspect she has a dark gothic side that she doesn’t show at work. Wouldn’t surprise me to learn she’s a dominatrix at a biker bar on the weekends. My example, however, is an overheard conversation between two of the other secretaries about this girl. Apparently they’d been sitting beside her in a meeting and her skirt had ridden up slightly, revealing, not sensible 70-denier pantyhose, but stocking-tops and the hint of a suspender belt. You’d have thought she’d stripped down to rubber underwear and given the managing director a lapdance, the shock of it was so conversation-worthy. Hence my reticence for any attire beyond a pale blue Marks & Spencer shirt and sensible shoes. If I came in dressed in black, with biker boots and chandelier earrings, there’d be whispered conversations for weeks. </p><p><a rel="lightbox" title="Figure 1" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhT4BuhoKmAeI2Ug7SfNGY_dWqDdulPIlJnO0rAqgg-Ji-AXeINWqK_XEj3mZnY4bIuGgKdpKIDeBvETRb-euEMdNlfUiibZsUTkgtrBeRCjbbcTXMstELanwrghT6CEBT1EeUP-niiPigb/s1600/P1050059_sml%5B6%5D.jpg"><img style="margin: 5px 0px 0px 5px; display: inline" title="P1050059_sml" alt="P1050059_sml" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzcLLuXIAVLmU6mEAvWLUbRRWDfuOzcJYKScNqX4aJHgthnCNXcTeZCHLJAjKgf7LM8IOFehgfNM67m5CT_wXH9uOwNHkKXxLPxjjbgBc9S3jXa4PN3ih5zndSyJJWn9FKBp2IqT0Z_ycz/?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a> I also have a problem with spending a lot of money on jewellery (unless it’s handmade and unique), so tend to leave my jewellery shopping for markets, antique shops and thrift shops. Not only will I never afford Tiffany, Cartier, Harry Winston, I can’t tell my diamonds from my cubic zirconias, so it’s all a moot point. My tastes are wide and varied, but head towards vintage, Goth and art deco - drives my chap insane in terms of buying gifts, but he has exceptional taste and hasn’t gone wrong yet - see Figure 1. </p><p>When I was younger, I didn’t consider myself a ‘jewellery person’ - ie someone who bought and wore jewellery. I was a stage manager for years - a career in paint, power tools and rigging also incompatible with jewellery, my mother didn’t and doesn’t wear a lot of jewellery (she doesn’t even have her ears pierced) and growing up in the 80s in rural Queensland didn’t provide a lot <a rel="lightbox" title="Vintage is good" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZE91jXMrp9phUhtSHFxD-YeA0ehyphenhyphenlp_vm7ad_Ie1CffJkKnkH26Qtb5SC75zCqSn4i-aZKFB7_VmDpyctNJ_fPeAl5xyuaTd4L-USyvq4JwOaG2rvh0F9cPiDd8daIRQl8bOO_jvaDlB-/s1600/P1050067_sml%5B8%5D.jpg"><img style="margin: 5px 5px 0px 0px; display: inline" title="P1050067_sml" alt="P1050067_sml" align="left" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8A4bMTdBtvqXfzB-7ympDg2_EWIqT3YNqkgZuQ-lMGgXQmo2Q7WOhxwXXz25mJF4XGVprj_jJFkZYTlEnUdjROaWoqGesubi6-Ngs0nL0hPMpBfwTdblIHP7UqAQcQy_rsPLeGlJ9qNJp/?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a>of options for anything that wasn’t made of plastic. So I grew up assuming that because I wasn’t a ‘jewellery person’, all the lovely things I saw at markets in London, Paris, Venice, weren’t for me. I confessed some years ago to one of my oldest girlfriends, that I wished I was a ‘jewellery person’, because I’d love to wear some of the things I saw. She looked at me quizzically and said ’well, why don’t you become a jewellery person?’. The simplicity of her solution floored me. Why couldn’t I? Would people who knew me be shocked? Would they think me pretentious to try and change my behaviour after a life time? Would they even notice? Or, as my friend pointed out as I bought a necklace and some earrings, wouldn’t they just enjoy the beautiful adornments as much as I did?  </p><p><a rel="lightbox" title="www.kriketdesigns.com" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYmKZUPxvZWLaX5QNGRB-wDjSw1125Msk7DqvkZG1Xfp1eBzce9l1L-pZd5-pMM6MAP_bLFdTqBUN71iYxkY8s8Sh3Qv8o7JfhY_SYSEkeUwZPjws_hfi9ghYIJNCp0VmWtPQAuJZsvQqV/s1600/P1050074_sml%5B8%5D.jpg"><img style="margin: 5px 0px 0px 5px; display: inline" title="P1050074_sml" alt="P1050074_sml" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqA3kp9s1WQqb-fGALjEA3tcL3ZeEGbMYlHFG_BVftrBmAEE5WHWEetjdSoRiM0HD8Orn8CCb0ivUtpD3TZluJfwo49tLxTc6wGRFCAr8b0uD0Zrp6va9Zr9_mn5PHy3ng4vLGW2R9gXb5/?imgmax=800" width="221" height="240" /></a> Speaking of adornments, this is my latest acquisition, an early birthday gift from another of my extremely talented, beautiful and creative friends, Kriket Broadhurst. See more of her work at <a href="http://www.kriketdesigns.com" target="_blank">www.kriketdesigns.com</a> and make sure you check out her <a href="http://www.kriketbroadhurst.etsy.com/" target="_blank">Etsy shop</a> and read her <a href="http://kriketbroadhurst.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">blog</a>. As a fully-fledged ‘jewellery person’, it thrills me to have such gorgeousness in my life.</p>Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-5793505438061507212010-07-31T14:57:00.000-07:002010-07-31T14:57:14.901-07:00Sanctuary in the cityThe city felt empty yesterday morning. It wasn’t, by any means, still hundreds of people in suits trudging along the footpath, weaving in and out of slack-jawed tourists hauling giant suitcases, tutting at those who cause them to pause in their single-minded get-to-the-office-by-nine scurry. But the air was cooler, cleaner, than it has been for a few days and summer holidays meant the train was less crowded. The lack of closeness in the air, having a seat to myself, the streets free of jostling, shouting school children, made me feel like there was more room in the commuter chaos I find myself swept along with every morning. I wear headphones with my iPod, rather than earbuds, in an attempt to force out some of the ambient noise: other people’s tinny, over-loud earphones buzzing sibilant hip-hop, whining secretaries bitching about colleagues on their phones, housewives incapable of turning off the keypad tones on their mobile devices, which chirp incessantly as they fumble through text messages. Sometimes I wonder if commuting deadens brains to the existence of other people. <br />
<br />
The tranquillity I felt yesterday might have been the lack of these distractions <a rel="lightbox"="" title="Glass and steel" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwpcqve2cZXP-qlxMpHoRKjuc70AGCwMiULZp4hD0OIoLIpKFO0guMxGrP8pBejz4Htg4ZJ5nlbG-SNmveEXDG487mmQ4G3tUK3HFxyBdxoEGUy20KF9Y9taxyzoVj4wwM1WMyoChjHKRz/s1600/DSC_00277A%5B4%5D.jpg"><img align="right" alt="Glass and steel" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZx5f9okO32TGpw_P9ka_IgSd9HSAdoXv8FqqhyNkpGt-cLYDV-OOCphDMNmBP2tvjw2pcYX-OOzAfqVfO-kOpFK-QWg0k9i-m0b7wjKcEjF8ZDH_vtW42LbSy_H7ZmP-B-BAR-JvBdBUP/?imgmax=800" style="display: inline; margin: 5px 5px 5px;" title="Glass and steel" width="180" /></a>on the train. Or the kind of English weather I moved here for - blue sky, cool sun, slight breeze. Or Chris Isaak’s ‘Speak of the Devil’ on my iPod. I felt indulgent as a result and as I was about 20 minutes early for work, I headed to Prét for a coffee and one of their tasty salmon bagettes and snuck up to a place I know behind my office that is usually empty before the working day begins. The building owners have termed it somewhat grandly as a ‘roof garden’ and technically it is a roof and there are things growing, but it’s mostly concrete and steel, looking over more concrete and steel. It’s quite pleasant in a sterile, corporate way, but the best thing is that in the morning there’s no-one there. So I sat, reading, eating my breakfast, looking up at the buildings occasionally when the sun came out. I like my job, I like the work I do and the office I work in, but yesterday, sitting outside, drinking coffee and contemplating the city around me, was by far the most enjoyable part of my day.Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-26944649316051892032010-07-18T11:11:00.001-07:002010-07-18T11:41:06.449-07:00Collectormania! (or why I went to Milton Keynes)<p>On a recent trip to Dorchester, for a music festival my chap was involved with, we decided to stay in Abingdon, about 15 minutes drive from Dorchester and an hour from Milton Keynes – the UK’s answer to Canberra (ie a ‘planned’ city with all the excitement and originality of a rat maze). This is only significant because this particular weekend it was host to *dramatic pause* COLLECTORMANIA! Now, historically I’m not a big attendee of communal sci-fi-related events, there’s a little too much interaction required for my taste and I know I’d look ridiculous in any form of character costume (though as a faux-redhead for the past 20 years, I have considered going as Agent Scully if she discovered Krispy Kremes). But I like seeing all the fans in their natural habitat and I love the chance to buy cool sci-fi and horror secondhand DVDs and CDs at very discounted prices. In the past I’ve acquired some funky jewellery, posters and unusual genre-specific books that I’d have to spend twice the money on ordering on the net – if I had even found them in the first place. Collectormania isn’t sci-fi only, there are also opportunities for those who collect sports merchandise and soft toys (no, mystery to me too), but the driving force behind this event appeared to be the myriad of ‘famous’ guests they’d managed to round up to get paid for photos, autographs and handshakes with the salivating general public. The Milton Keynes website is gone now, but the list of famous faces included, among about fifty others, Kate Mulgrew and Tim Ross (Star Trek Voyager), Barry Bostwick (Rocky Horror, Spin City), Chris Barrie and Norman Lovett (Red Dwarf) and most interestingly, Linda Hamilton and Sir Patrick Stewart. Most of these people weren’t there on the Friday, which is probably just as well... </p> <p>Now I’ve written <a href="http://missbluesreviews.blogspot.com/2010/03/my-failure-at-fandom.html" target="_blank">quite extensively</a> about my views on 'drive-by' fans (a phrase <a href="http://philsrandommusings.blogspot.com/2010/03/frustrations-of-fanhood.html" target="_blank">coined</a> by an astute Twitter-mate of mine named Phil), so I won’t repeat it here, other than to say I understand it (kinda) but I don’t like it. Not from the actor’s point of view - why the hell not make money from saying hi to people agog with your famousness – but from the fans’, collecting an autograph, a photo, a three second ‘experience’ that’s about as genuine as paying for a Big Mac and having the server wish you a good day. But as I was happy to circumvent the queues and head straight for the merch stands, I figured the thousands of fans in their homemade Princess Leia and store-bought Star Trek costumes would be a good people-watch while I pored over books on the art of Ray Harryhausen and behind the scenes photos from the Indiana Jones films. My chap, supportive as ever, agreed to come along on the same basis – and I think he was curious about the mysteries of uber-fandom. Plus, in my role as railway-enthusiast WAG, I’ve been to enough model railway exhibitions in pokey church halls to make up for this geek digression. </p> <p>The event was held at Stadium MK – a football stadium (this is not my photo, there are people in it) – and the <a rel="lightbox" title="Stadium MK - with people" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDrZLeysynQ1vdCRjjJ5vFGQb04UHvy25olOLENMR_sJ921qve2DIK36aRlxqR9Wn6DHJ28a8m0zZOiWZZesGE27jvcLUKDWUxtbcsYzKHlDwFskvp8gUZJGEUaOFQuen2e-QWOG635PqJ/s1600/stadiummk%5B5%5D%5B4%5D.jpg"><img style="margin: 5px 5px 0px 0px; display: inline" title="stadiummk[5]" alt="stadiummk[5]" align="left" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_gMstoG21KlmzDbv3BGEkieyJabRXTezPG0c3W0m2BvYYr-RBbM2OgGwZbskDAQ-F4BAjMTk0nRCHOrf4B54_PK5-H_ZVrjlKx14d2VnayLaQ3T2Y80LJPFZP41-smXN513B3S9eA3II5/?imgmax=800" width="200" height="60" /></a> organisers had set up stylish white lawn tents  and desks with chairs around the top level of the stadium (the covered bit behind the seating) – the weather is always dodgy in the UK, and the risk of damp celebrities too high to have them set upon the field. We arrived quite late in the afternoon, an accident on the M1 turning our two hour drive into four and half, despite trying two different detours around it, and although I wasn’t expecting hordes of people, being late on the first day of the show and it being a week day, I was anticipating a crowd. First indication something was amiss – not many cars in the car park. We could hear a variety of sci-fi themes being piped through the stadium Tannoy (we arrived to Space 1999 and departed to Voyager) and I shared a ‘watch out for tumbleweeds’ look with my chap as we got out of the car. Inside, we didn’t fare much better. Asking the volunteers at the front entrance where all the merch stands were, my chap was directed to ‘all the celebrities are on this level, round to your right..’ at which point another volunteer corrected our young helper with ‘we don’t use the ‘c’ word, dear, they’re ‘guests’’ (*snort*). </p> <p>We walked round to the right, glancing into the tents to see Barry Bostwick in a very sharp suit discussing something with the folks at the ’door’ to his tent, Tim Ross and some ’lesser’ Voyager actors chatting and tapping pens on tables and Kate Mulgrew, rugged up against the chill stadium breeze, smiling and looking very blonde, sophisticated and lovely. But there were NO fans. I’m sure there were massive queues right round the stadium over the weekend, but at 3pm on Friday, you could hear crickets, even over the piped Best of Sci-Fi. To be honest, we felt a bit sorry for them all. My instinct was to offer them a cup of tea, just to break the awkward silence and relieve the boredom. I’m sure they’d had a lot of people offering them tea. Biscuits too, at least for the big stars. </p> <p>We spent about an hour wandering around the vendor stalls, blinking at the vast array of <a rel="lightbox" title="Michael! Michael!" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAt2Hm6dnrHSY4H6TqeOadJ_sVvrx1hfDbpdfCm64ZH2V4KmkKhAVmxsYm7ntfFUVwHAHSnHfyj_vAub0pEVuHjP9vgqbI-HxVuTE9c2-TsDhoDMNoqGuks_mRjVOYzzTjZ8cYX79VDPeh/s1600/lostboysposter%5B3%5D%5B3%5D.jpg"><img style="margin: 5px 0px 0px 5px; display: inline" title="lostboysposter[3]" alt="lostboysposter[3]" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiv1yMH2gzIkg6UxPPOH5GI4BhLj0-kLv68WlNGAGMma9ctYXOItENNLDq-7Vt7SPu6cENsEp3yZzbm2axAipMYmjL25JhAM0bN8xNqpiJwoMfQvgcQj189wCLTWbTy8OETNAp5-Iu12PxF/?imgmax=800" width="107" height="151" /></a>action figures, puzzling   over tables full of Beanie Babies and signed football tshirts, admiring a large set of hand-painted Alien dioramas and pondering the proliferation of ‘Team Edward’ badges (which I explained in rather too much detail to my chap when he asked what it was). We got three DVDs for £6, my chap bought a book on the history of Sherlock Holmes in film and TV and I spent entirely too much money on a silk-screened poster commissioned for a screening of The Lost Boys at the <a href="http://www.originalalamo.com/" target="_blank">Alamo Drafthouse Cinema</a> in Austin Texas. Behold its awesomeness. </p> <p>Then we got McDonalds and sat in a strategically designed park beside the motorway with a man-made water feature. Milton Keynes. It’s all happening there.</p>Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-30282885875378226492010-06-22T05:14:00.001-07:002010-06-22T05:14:34.734-07:00Saving the planet one energy company at a time - kindaA major energy company has offices in the building where I work. This energy company are currently promoting a 'green' campaign and have filled the lobby with banners, bunting and energy-friendly paraphernalia like cardboard trees telling us in bright bold lettering how we can help save the planet by taking alternative modes of transport to get to work, re-using plastic bags and switching off lights and computers.<br /><br />This company have offices on the second, third and fifth floor of the nine storey building. The entrance lobby is on the first floor. The stairwell door is right beside the first elevator. Our office is on one of the highest floors, so we often share elevators with staff from other firms in the building.<br /><br />It's been two years since I started working here. I haven't seen one person from this 'green' energy company use the stairs yet.Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-82367815656939101772010-04-11T09:09:00.001-07:002010-06-05T17:26:36.083-07:00Which witch, witch doctor?<p>Found this rather creepy flyer in our mailbox yesterday (click to embiggen). Phone number deleted to protect the innocent – ie the folks he’d be ripping off.</p> <p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_zrLRW6q3fBm7rvZo-VkeCFHUwkZcMphyphenhyphene9sm2bDNCfmJnzeOFFbUJbt1-jaFsdSAZWtvO55tzWVLrJEEvGcYXle5BuD58ZtyYSXqCRgwbDKHQkFLuBxxEngn8Snq0X38dHDUTdK6bE1u/s1600-h/witchdoctor%5B5%5D.jpg"><img style="margin: 5px 0px 0px; display: inline" title="witchdoctor" alt="witchdoctor" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjt013AyVdYAk9T1z8nBwZzazb6zrn6mNXIl2455NOHYNiQkZPWZTylTZbNyVOC_RPd9J8eZilCXmtnFPsEKbjYsA6KYrLEOAnauM94NiiAZ3BZA4k5bZwIdSfio2-GGy8N8_JDX_RcFvJq/?imgmax=800" width="200" height="130" /></a> </p> <p>Aside from the 'mysterious' symbols (why are two missing in the first set?) and the odd amalgamation of problems he can solve - stress, depression, court cases (just who is his target audience?), would you really trust a 'spiritual healer and advisor' who purports to be an expert in a field he can't even spell?</p> Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-81429730396366037722010-03-27T11:48:00.001-07:002010-03-27T11:54:41.086-07:00My failure at fandom<p>I've been a fangirl for more than two thirds of my life. It started in 1985, when I first heard about a Norwegian pop group called <a href="http://www.a-ha.com" target="_blank">a-ha</a>, who I still follow today (and have tickets for their last-ever *sniff* UK concert in November this year). I bought all their album<img style="margin: 5px 0px 0px; display: inline" title="band_bw" alt="band_bw" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvZQ2VHnLFdFipEhYtiKiZ0mPAAhSA82wd8dfAVKrqpX_Na9PF2eEePrm8NgDoCjuDn7iQ3go3RD1aDDMnWwgyEePSu9yVOSgnJG8wUMmlk9zMfZPkKm9fAL9dmgq6mU_Vh8ylOPPXffPM/?imgmax=800" width="197" height="240" />s in the 80s (replaced them on CD in the 90s, put them on my iPod in the 00s), read all the magazine articles and bought the merchandise. In my 20s, I collected X-Files episodes, memorabilia  and spinoff scientific books on the myths behind them. In a fortunate choice of jobs, I successfully <strike>stalked</strike> made contact with an actor whose work (and face) I had admired for years and inadvertently got myself invited to dinner at the family home. In my 30s, I followed a British pop band around the country (and even to Amsterdam), then nearly bankrupted myself following a related band after they broke up – this however, resulted in meeting my partner of five years (the drummer's best mate), so there was an upside to financial ruin. </p> <p>I've hung out on forums and in chat rooms talking about songs, guitars, jeans and haircuts, I've made new friends at gigs (friendships that lasted longer than the bands themselves) and read (and written) all manner of good (but mostly bad) fan fiction, even <a href="http://www.katspace.org/enarrare/" target="_blank">before the internet existed</a>. I've collected entire series of TV shows and books, I've written reviews (some of which resulted in the band seeking me out to say hi) and taken hundreds of (mostly blurry) photos. I've admired and sighed and swooned, I've cheered and danced and waved my hands in the air, I've gone back to gigs, movies and performances more than once, then tracked down rare footage (well before YouTube) to view at leisure in my home. I thought I had a pretty good understanding of the fan thing. Turns out I was doing it all wrong. </p> <p>One of the things I was got wrong was that I never <img style="margin: 5px 5px 0px 0px; display: inline" title="crowd" alt="crowd" align="left" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRbo54HP3USiXp7qJaYBktHzomIaA_UfkmOlQFoBZvztgP5zyiApxduqJBjqyD9Dejo2Vw10cOr4-BpFE2SCmUjyr6H9tmOog2P7LkhRHGWubn12MJI_PhHcj4JcrtAoKHTiEvVIk_7AYs/?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" />really wanted to MEET the object of my admiration. The few times I did meet them, reality was inevitably grounding and sometimes disappointing. How do you live up to a performance in real life? You can't. I think in the back of my mind I knew that, but for the most part, I didn't want their only impression of me to be labeled, with a gigantic neon sign above my head, as a FAN. </p> <p> As a FAN, I knew the Famous Person in question would be on  their guard. Fans collect information, they collect it and share it, some to gloat over their ability to acquire it, others just to share and enjoy it with others they know would appreciate it. People in the public eye are aware of this and adjust their conversation appropriately. I wanted to have the kind of conversation I'd have if I was meeting someone through friends, or work, go to dinner, coffee or a pint and have a chat, not the one-sided kind where that someone was worried I was secretly taping the entire thing. </p> <p>My other apparent mistake is that I don't approach fandom in the same way as a lot of the 'serious' fans out there, who don’t collect information or art, but experiences: conversations, photos with, signed objects, touched objects, waiting at stage door, attending multiple book signings, not to tell the actor/musician/author how much they enjoyed their work and have a conversation about process or other work, but just to say hi, shake hands and tally up another meeting. It's not to enjoy the object or the experience itself, for what it is, but to log another point in the grand scale of fandom. </p> <p>I came to this realisation very recently – last weekend in fact. I went to my very first book signing. I've never gone to one because I figured while it's nice to have a book with the author's signature on it, I always wondered what the point of it was. The author isn’t my friend and speaking to him for 20 seconds that he isn’t going to remember in the thousands of 20 second meetings he'd have in his lifetime isn’t going to overly enrich either of our lives. </p> <p>Fandom, I'd always thought, is about trying to make a connection. You see a film, a play, hear a song, read a book, you're impressed, moved, something about the work touches you. The person who created it is obviously someone you admire for their talent and creativity – and we always want to make a connection with someone we admire. In this age of interconnectivity, of Web 2.0, suddenly this becomes more possible. We follow a Famous Person on Twitter, and if we're lucky and clever enough, they'll see a tweet we send to them and reply to it. Receiving a response from someone you admire is heartening and I always harbour a microscopic (and therefore futile) hope that this could, might, just may be the start of an ongoing conversation… but it rarely is. Particularly if, like me, you back off immediately, in terror of being labeled as a FAN. </p> <p>The book signing was for <a href="http://joehillfiction.com/" target="_blank">Joe Hill's</a> new book <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Horns-Joe-Hill/dp/0575079169/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1269200805&sr=8-1" target="_blank">Horns</a>, and as I've outlined in a <a href="http://missbluesreviews.blogspot.com/2009/10/most-triumphant-literary-discovery.html" target="_blank">previous post</a>, I had a fairly triumphant experience discovering this particular author. </p> <p>So I went to the signing, queued up for an hour, had my book signed and chatted about jet lag – my 20 seconds with Joe Hill. All fine. But the odd part of the day was the other fans. </p> <p><img style="margin: 5px 0px 0px 5px; display: inline" title="horns" alt="horns" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipMxF3Z9nj9lXSZSD4MbKkT5vGglQwAKkmEF9xFj5Yqgi20vzyiZO6MbD9hgbV0-M4pyzBjKtp2SxpD5EpgQbRdQvCoZtNj_FmcraxfstP0RGJt7pS9tZrmZrJrW-77-4_Bq4UlGEmFLn0/?imgmax=800" width="156" height="240" />I already had my copy of Horns and had considered taking my copy of Heart-Shaped Box, but thought that was a bit presumptuous, as the signing was specifically for Horns. I shouldn't have worried. Some of the other people there had brought two, four, eight and ten copies EACH of the book to be signed. And sign he did, nice chap, knowing full well that these books were going straight onto eBay and he wouldn't see a penny of the mark up his signature would give them. He posed happily for photos and made jokes with everyone, some of whom had been to a few, if not all, of the signings he'd done throughout the UK that week, despite being weekdays and all times of the day.</p> <p>Now I get the following-around thing. I've taken days off work to travel to the other end of the country to see a band play and meet with friends who are also fans. But that was an entire evening, sometimes a weekend including sight-seeing, four or five hours of music and dancing and drinking… not two minutes of small talk and watching someone sign a book. </p> <p>A lot of the fans knew each other, obviously from attending signings, and were comparing notes about the next one they were going to (for another author) and past signings with other authors. One woman was joking about how she'd had to curb her book signings because her 'social life' was starting to encroach on the time she was spending with her children. But the most extraordinary thing were the lists. Lists of who'd been to what signing and how many books they'd managed to get signed, whether the author was happy to sign multiple copies and have their photo taken. These signings, it seems, were not a chance to connect with the person who'd enriched your life with their creativity, they were notches on the great bookmark of fandom. Your status as a fan increased with the number and variety of signatures you'd managed to acquire. </p> <p>I’ve done some obsessive-compulsive things in my fan career, I own some rubbish merchandise and have spent way too much money on things non-fandom folks would see as irrelevant. But if this acquisition of two minute meet-and-greets is what it take to be considered a 'fan' in the age of the internet, I feel that my aversion to meeting the Famous Person, my contentment with a one-sided 'relationship' and my desire only to connect with them to tell them how much I enjoyed their work appears to make me a failure. But I do wonder if my experience of fandom isn’t richer as a result.</p> Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-67187085212176286702010-03-09T10:46:00.001-08:002010-03-20T11:48:37.194-07:00The nervous youth<p>We renewed the tenancy agreement on our flat this month, for another year - mainly because (aside from the fact  that we like it here and the rent's good) we don't want to move house again. We've moved five times in five years and that's just a few too many cardboard boxes.  </p> <p>As part of the renewal process, our letting agent decided they'd send <img style="margin: 5px 5px 0px 0px; display: inline" title="DSCN3961a" alt="DSCN3961a" align="left" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFwgvfBtQAf0T0wzgr4OVtm00sfnzdosT8wrcdYSrqdY6LQ4IGd2UnxViDDKVXqW1SrRG8F34MpB0KsFz_wVIpDT0m9DEY0O8xfAXVsNEW6CyZlQ_51USHxm4zUTo68DHWNjftWix6sYJs/?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" />someone round to a) get the agreement signed and witnessed in person and b) do an inspection of the flat to make sure we hadn't sold off the appliances, repainted the walls black or ripped up the carpet. Fair enough, if I was a landlord I'd want to check that too, even if the tenants paid the rent on time, didn't complain (much) or cause any complaints to be made. Like us. </p> <p>So, in anticipation of a middle-aged hawkeyed spinster obsessed with grease on hob exhaust grilles (yes, I'm speaking from experience), we got up early, Hoovered,  tidied, dusted and even washed the balcony windows (not a big task, but, oh my, the difference - we live on a very busy road with many polluting cars and trucks). The flat looked more than presentable and I was no longer paranoid about the disdainful inspector's imminent arrival. </p> <p>The doorbell went and I put on my best welcoming smile, prepared to offer said harridan a cup of tea, when in walked a boy. </p> <p>Yes, in a suit (or rather a sweater vest and tie) but a boy nonetheless. He couldn't have been more than 19, but looked about 15. He smiled nervously and shuffled a plastic sleeve of papers, looking for our tenancy agreement. They hadn't even given him a clipboard, bless - first tool of intimidation, the clipboard. As a stage manager I found it a terrific symbol of authority, right up there with walkie-talkies. </p> <p>The boy finally found the agreement and we signed it, then he swallowed and said ‘I’ll just do the inventory’ and poked his head into the few rooms of our wee abode, rushing off a series of ticks on his list. I altered his list before signing it (we own the fridge but the other flats came with theirs installed) and he blinked, then nodded, wide-eyed and agreed. Too bad we're so honest, could have got ourselves a washer-dryer and cooker. </p> <p> He was gone a minute later in a flurry of floppy hair and nervous nodding, but I have to wonder - what would he have done if he'd turned up to find we'd gone all Pacific Heights on the place? What if we'd repainted the ceilings to match the Sistine Chapel, torn up the carpet and carved Satanic symbols into the floorboards, punched holes in the walls and torched the balcony with a bonfire-style BBQ? What if, my chap said, we'd taken out all the walls and tiled the entire flat in pale green, with nothing but a toilet in the centre of the room? </p> <p>I have to wonder, would our young inspector just have nodded, hyperventilating, and got us to sign the agreement anyway, then run away in tears of terror? I felt at the time that if I'd looked sideways at him and suddenly hissed 'BOO!' he might have wet himself. I can't imagine him standing up to the Andrex puppy, let alone a psychopathic Satanist decorator. Which, fortunately for him, we're not. But I have no idea about our neighbours.</p>Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-26166578817167408332010-02-07T09:09:00.001-08:002010-03-20T11:48:14.142-07:00Really old stuff<p><img style="margin: 5px 0px 0px 5px; display: inline" title="P1030456" alt="P1030456" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEispUYqRrkuPzJZRR42C7QUvgv2PCJhhWInMQhMWPHWZyIkWpWW6qnA7HIjOudNAo8aj7_4ZirZfvC4SVGnhVFG9WwFNbmIJkwK6tbu9oFMlmCc8nL77KA3P5CsHUYLCqX17lauISaeeO2W/?imgmax=800" width="248" height="188" /> One of the coolest things about living in the UK is just how mind-bogglingly old everything is. In Australia, unless you're looking at Aboriginal art and landscape formations (which are also cool but not as accessible to the city-girl), everything ‘old’ within sensible driving distance of a pub or coffee shop is only just over 200 years old - like The Rocks in Sydney. All the cobble-stoned olde worlde goodness you can handle, but only two streets really, dating back to when the first English chaps decided to set up house when they got off the boats in 1788. </p> <p>In Britain, people have been building things out of stuff that doesn't fall down (stone, pretty much) for thousands and thousands of years. <a href="http://www.orkneyjar.com/history/skarabrae/" target="_blank">Skara Brae</a>, in the Orkneys, for example, dates back to 3100 BC - that's FIVE THOUSAND YEARS. I don't know about anyone else, but that starts getting beyond what <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUUVLpdxU5reH1p_v5lkK8yFhia7redbysjbA5_ZF98yQ5U2Bfc1BQb1m05yrAnAYNit5Z0qHkUWwH2n-aRfIPnqdJ_f-dGX6c9T54DLO8eID_YWf_N3cpEUdpomVjvqFQCafbYKGcYxJl/s1600-h/P1030451%5B12%5D.jpg"><img style="margin: 5px 5px 0px 0px; display: inline" title="P1030451" alt="P1030451" align="left" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkrmw0FK6-Nq7kqZw6Yr1mzq46aVNk6Alv-beaoLdysbiWLx3_7YKkWvJXaKtbfZygGvrgeW4ef71KCiVhrcXtuT1GJ0GsuNWRChobNe2JKl_W_kTInb98GdFAJ2fTfxQ1f5At_QfS2mNa/?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a>my wee brain can cope with. The other useful thing is that the UK is quite small geographically, so most areas near water (rivers, lochs etc) have been populated for a long time by people  fond of building things out of sturdy materials that would withstand snow, ice and the perpetual rain. Which means that today, in our modern society, where we can travel from London to Cardiff in five hours instead of five days, the remnants of these ancient buildings survive in the most suburban of locations all over the place - mostly now protected by government and private organisations dead keen on history. </p> <p>Half an hour's drive from our flat in Greenwich, is the village of <a href="http://www.eynsfordvillage.org.uk/" target="_blank">Eynsford</a>. It's one of a thousand 'historic' villages dotted all over the UK, that you drive through in a blink of an eye. They are mostly full of city commuters (the only people who can afford to live in such picturesque surroundings) or families who've lived there since their great-great-grand-someone settled as a farmer centuries ago. These little villages tend to sit between great tracts of open land, but comparatively close together, so a drive through the Kent  countryside will be mostly green fields (crops, sheep, cows) then a tiny village, then more fields, then another tiny village. The villages sometimes join up as the urban sprawl creeps outward and housing developments of 'Tudor-style' semi-detached homes are seemingly dropped into empty land by an unseen hand (my chap likes to call it the 'house-machine being left on' - hundreds of identical houses in nice neat rows), but more often than not, they're quite separate. </p> <p><img style="margin: 5px 0px 0px; display: inline" title="P1030433" alt="P1030433" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDENSHMN1Mwc1xsAd9BXsOlc3DrxSLCJpIkxdDkzLYw0TbS1whUb4l8m014j2aV7J4JvM0-lldfpEQB80QHQySBpEITwzaBk2mHx5D1zvJk38xd0Vfd5l4Qqe1UmM0jPTlvlrNUldOzLNW/?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" />But the cool, if slightly surreal, thing about them is that you'll be driving along and  suddenly, out of the corner of your eye, you'll spot a pile of stones, a shadowy dip in the landscape, a structure that looks out of place in the suburban skyline. It will be sitting there, quietly, as it has for a thousand years, with livestock, tourists and local teenagers wandering past and through it, mostly oblivious to any historical significance (this is particularly true of livestock), it's just part of their neighbourhood. But in a lot of cases, an unassuming pile of rocks, a stone wall or a ramshackle structure will be older than anything around it (the earth not withstanding). Point in case, <a href="http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/server/show/nav.14623" target="_blank">Eynsford Castle</a>. Or the ruins thereof. </p> <p>A few weeks ago, on the one sunny Saturday we've had since Christmas, we'd programmed our sat nav with the postcode given to us in the English Heritage guidebook (which lives in our car for such adventures). We drove past the point on the map where the sat nav's voice <img style="margin: 5px 5px 0px 0px; display: inline" title="P1030453" alt="P1030453" align="left" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5N6yNTQmWeddaIYQLR4z4-4BSbPuGlaI0R0OtlVAcRddRpLVdI4zuhKwA2KfWi0NzLQBv1OabotQztkuzu_B2L6wLJakLMGoMXlgXWc2OE17c2OTLdSTS5NRDpUAxOq6XlaFShxFd0R6D/?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /> (an Irish chap named Sean) said (or would have said, had we not turned the sound off) 'You have reached your destination', five times before I finally spotted the English Heritage sign post saying 'Eynsford Castle'. I'd been joking to my chap that it was probably in the middle of someone's backyard... well... five minutes later we were negotiating a winding lane, in between the back fences of several semi-detached homes (and some very sweet slanty cottages) to what looked like someone's back driveway, to park alongside what were evidently local residents' cars (including a trailer) and lo, there was indeed the ruins of Eynsford Castle. </p> <p><img style="margin: 5px 0px 0px 5px; display: inline" title="P1030434" alt="P1030434" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5OWZ5UmtiA_uDhLpyvwAkNfuIuafX1jL7-5S4CZum9OGdeI37hjtVBb9joVojxd5E6S4bctbUbdKsiE2jkfiLO5LXx85GuVPEM3pVO3aA4nV7p22rhjD3j6Xone5iT-VibkZwrQfNvk_g/?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /> The ruins are surrounded by what was a moat at some point (if I had a castle I'd so want a  moat) and English  Heritage have built a sturdy wooden bridge over the hollow that was the moat, leading into the main body of the castle, which is built on a raised section of ground. Now basically a pile of stone half- walls, it's more like a fort built by over-enthusiastic boy scouts who were called in for their tea before they could finish it. There is very much a feeling that it was a defined structure at some point, the information boards list out a kitchen, a great hall, a solar (lords and ladies chamber or bedroom) and undercrofts for both, with a spiral staircase that lead up to the first floor. Apparently there was some kind of Saxon structure built there before the castle was built in the late 11th century and many changes of hands and conflict surrounding the building throughout its life - at one point it was even a kennel and stable. </p> <p><img style="margin: 5px 0px 0px; display: inline" title="P1030436" alt="P1030436" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvvPY1PGmdklQsdbHB8rz-c1dfhkxfSfs4tOXwwSDlIy9l_UqIZzYznalZwaQuqP88o33Mv70PO3fFRM4QmSkxCcu0QgeDNw5oJN4aQt7H4raMZGuWtIpDarfZisyFZd-r2ywmalFp-lMb/?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /> It was a gloriously sunny day, but it was still very cold (witness the remains of a snowman still frozen in the  centre of the main section of the castle), not to mention the arrival of a family whose children didn't seem to grasp the concept of keeping their voices below a shout in public, so we did the rounds of the ruins, me <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/missbluesreviews/sets/72157623246778521/" target="_blank">taking entirely more photos than necessary</a>, then wandered down to the stream at the back of the ruins. Snow melt water had raised the water to the top of the bank and there were a couple of resilient ducks trying to swim against the substantial current (and winning, to their credit), and the  stream flowed down into fields that were more like wetlands - we suspected the stream had been diverted from its original path at some point, to irrigate the fields below. Sometimes I think we've been watching too much Time Team. </p> <p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWiXr7fTANcGu18RHRV4CbUgCb5Blc0olQmsU4Yfwq4Dxo0zUrQy3ZL7igf1BXreFVOoaXDe-TfxVTspDPRtrmIqNvgOX-j3uckeFQKfZWrPac99DIPfD_y4_qewbIounfYzR-gEU8HKRP/s1600-h/P1030461%5B1%5D.jpg"><img style="margin: 5px 5px 0px 0px; display: inline" title="P1030461" alt="P1030461" align="left" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3zBwFOfEcNff6oyddDPQ1_VM_m8vKnl_Bw2vVAGJw8bcVKRfSeuwfCHMoL6fUdVO4V6EwCxE0cVKSqAgFVhD8TnHszwQOGnriH4n-ZhZxiqsvg5XnrlGIxKJfb7j-EBSiF-4Fs1WotnmU/?imgmax=800" width="248" height="188" /></a>But there was very much a feeling of something having happened there, rather than a cold, empty pile of stones, which is one of the best things about living in a country with so much history. The sense that you are standing where people stood a thousand years ago, where someone built a home and went about their daily lives, just as you are now (but they were probably considerably more smelly). It's one of what I call 'amoeba moments'. When you realise that in the grand scheme of the universe, you're an amoeba. A tiny, tiny organism bearing little or no impact on the gigantic surroundings that are space and time. That the world will go on around you, or without you, and maybe one day, a thousand years in the future, someone will stand where you stood, wondering what your life was like, but, like you today, with no clue about who you actually were. Or maybe they'll just have a picnic. </p>Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-84067684734331291682010-01-02T10:27:00.001-08:002010-03-20T11:47:53.580-07:00Snow<p>I grew up in Far North Queensland. Which is so far north it requires capital letters. The temperature in summer can get up to 40° Celsius and even in winter it doesn't get much lower than about 17°. Humidity stays around the 60/70% mark all year. So it's pretty warm and sticky most of the time, but particularly at Christmas time. Traditionally my family don't do cooked lunch, it's ham and potato salad and sparkling apple juice, then sit around trying not to sweat. </p> <p>I don't like hot weather. I don't like having to reveal that much skin to anyone but my partner and I don't like wearing shoes with a no-sock requirement. I like trainers. And boots. The sandal and flip flop require a pedicure and inevitably cause blisters while you're wearing them in. I hate blisters. </p> <p>I moved to the UK in part to get away from the hot weather. That and the lack of culture, artistic merit and availability of tickets to arena concerts (yes, yes I know, topic for another post). But mostly for the weather. Unlike most English people, I like the weather here. I like the rain (unless I'm required to walk long distances in a direction opposite to home), I like clouds and I like the temperature no higher than 22 degrees. While I don't really enjoy the early darkness six months of the year brings, British Summer Time means it's sometimes light at 9.30 at night. Which is awesome. </p> <p><img style="margin: 5px 0px 0px 5px; display: inline" title="Phone-0008" alt="Phone-0008" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-hWrAzgpDUfMgaK0bvKwjt_IX49ulDwVydyNetsRboAnLrct1j7ROKx3ZGS0iiNu7CHfwbPPqgIIKCvRH5hEr4fGb7i1nafldQeN8kwnDBKh_czVNYvoNgnVsaLNRJ07VmlC56ZH5DDUY/?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" />However, I'm not convinced about snow. The first time I saw snow (actual snow falling from the sky, as opposed to sitting in frozen lumps on the side of a mountain) I was in New York on holiday. I was travelling on my own (though I was staying with my brother in Brooklyn, he had to work all week) and I had just finished looking at treasures in the Pierpont Morgan Library and Museum on Madison Avenue. I was collecting my coat from the cloakroom at the front entrance and looked out through the glass door to see tiny white fluffy things floating around in the air. It took me a minute to realise what it was, and I think I must have been standing there looking amazed because the large black security guard at the door stepped forward and asked me if I was okay. I said I was, I'd just never seen snow before. He was amused in the way that I'd only ever seen New York characters on television amused - he laughed out loud and announced to the couple who were leaving the museum behind me that I'd never seen snow! They smiled in that kindly patronising way that New Yorkers do and stepped past me, putting up their umbrellas as they left. </p> <p>I had an umbrella with me (my first overseas trip, I had EVERYTHING with me), but I wasn't going to miss out on my <img style="margin: 5px 5px 0px 0px; display: inline" title="DSCN2933" alt="DSCN2933" align="left" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGhiGIN689ZvfPrfiYf6b4iuVZ9Udh4MjnoSNHN-qWkNptF6Q6c3ogVX-qUCFykukz4LNPAANVxkMs4spzFufImfJp9RWnsv6fHyI9M-4HEI7sTnAsOZYhSx-pXsrFYfSaFo0X2IpOTJ6Z/?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" />first snow - I walked back up to Central Park, gazing around at the snowflakes with an expression not unlike Jeff Bridges' in Starman and trying to catch them on my hand and my tongue. That night it snowed enough to make the pavements slippery and give mailboxes and railings snow cone hats (though CNN would have you believe that a blizzard was on its way). I ventured forth into freezing sleet (this time with my umbrella, can't tell you what a difference it made), thanking my sensible hiking books and diligent shop keepers with grit bins for stopping the worst of the pavement slipping and then realised why snow in an urban environment is not necessarily a wondrous thing. Once the city heats up the snow enough to ice over, everything is slippery. If the snow stays as snow it's fine, you can plough through drifts in waterproof boots and the soles will grip as they should and so long as you don't try and rush, you'll get where you're going without falling over. When it's icy, chances of arriving at your destination without a soggy bum are slim to none. </p> <p>I hate falling over. I hated falling over as a kid, the embarrassment, the pain and the indignity at not being able to maintain a simple thing like balance. I was always the last one to make it back to the beach when we were rock-climbing, I never let go of the railing on my few attempts at roller skating and I don't even like stepping into a wet bathtub without having a two-handed grip on something that can't break. I hated it as a kid, but now in my late 30s, and weighing considerably more than I did at 14, there's a lot more of me to land on my knee, elbow or my substantial behind. </p> <p><img style="margin: 5px 0px 0px; display: inline" title="DSCN2946" alt="DSCN2946" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbN0hNk2ZybIOUq1UqZTE6mDqWS9Y6ab_LS8A-Nm2dSHt6ANWqJKK_JY49gfv3dISjHMAbCOK199_c-RVGqo0BuAGL1X-zye_1lRuj3Hq_FQa3ns9hJulj5AifxNAuBYrLFPHfGtvTqYAZ/?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /> So here is my quandary. I love to watch the snow. I love to see the white feathers swirling, floating, piling up on tree branches. I love the way it sits on top of post boxes and window sills, the icing sugar on sponge cake look of roofs and lone trails of footprints (human and canine) through pristine parkland. I like seeing kids (and grownups) making rude snowmen and chucking lumps of it at each other, I like the way that dogs are ridiculously excited by it and zoom around, nose to the ice, trying to figure it out, as if they've never seen it before. It's still a marvellous magical phenomenon to me, and I get completely snap-happy. </p> <p>I also hate the snow. I hate slipping and catching myself before I hit the ground almost as much as <img style="margin: 5px 5px 0px 0px; display: inline" title="P1030252a" alt="P1030252a" align="left" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3tU0ozSxAoUsX0JOrmOn0EST3ccVnIn_L8rAq7qeEtabsIomFK6kg74outH4h2QcxlHqoF0m1r7gNJTZ0MFZJl3kESaLTIkhvwmScYFdFUwET8JDDITJuU-eBV4eI-SFEWfk8nXuRSz7h/?imgmax=800" width="240" height="199" />actually falling down. I hate having to leave extra time to get to the station in the morning, I hate having to remember spare socks and hoping that my boots will hold up to their waterproof bargain and my toes won't be wrinkled and cold when I get to the office. I hate the messy slippery slush left behind after several thousand pedestrians have traipsed through the snow on their way to work, much earlier than me. I hate the way the UK's transport system breaks down when more than an inch of powder lands on the train tracks, roads and airports. Just before Christmas there was an unexpected snowfall about 4 o'clock in the afternoon, a good two inches landed on London with a 'whoomp' and all vehicular transport ceased to function. </p> <p><img style="margin: 5px 0px 0px; display: inline" title="P1030253" alt="P1030253" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLs7sVp-iQc6gMFM444Sfjnp8BLjWg7qf-SRIGoBw9oZyabbEkanpqdgT2O0hchhP7-xb0DQDNB-k-ei8USoOxFF6Q3h-TcYLmtFwg8rYHO35DD9XOASQrQdxUV258O-Q9sTQ4IXP_Z2mh/?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" />Trains were delayed, cancelled, gave up and went back to their train duvets in their train sheds. Traffic banked up as cars slipped and skidded on roads (hills were impossible) unless they'd managed to get in behind the frantically-deployed army of grit lorries. Buses stopped in case they slid on the road or crashed into shop fronts at three miles per hour, killing everyone on board and spoiling Christmas displays. We got to our next-to-local train station, waited for a bus in the snow only to be told they'd all stopped, then gave up and walked home. It's normally a 30 minute stroll over a grassy heath and along not-unpleasant shop-lined streets, but it took us nearly an hour plodding along in our hiking boots (I exceeded the limits of their waterproofness at about 40 minutes). I held onto my chap's arm with a vice-like grip, paranoid about ice patches and spent the entire walk with my eyes on the ground, placing my feet in a steady, stomping fashion like so many snow-shoed Eskimos before me. </p> <p><img style="margin: 5px 5px 0px 0px; display: inline" title="P1030209a" alt="P1030209a" align="left" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0A5cVGaYKc_bCY5JECzIGl9no2RtXAuTld7VCcN8S3Y2RGg-tNsSUYdQt8ud95KUqOqCLtNp184ctMM7ZRWSNRzhPB6rDoi74NMQqop2k75Y8cbTuGxcATIICeCzpqU-3PYxeTDtKCygx/?imgmax=800" width="240" height="214" />Of course later, in my contrary way, I was taking photos from the window of our flat, watching in wonder at the swirling flurries and wondering how long the road surface would stay coated in the snowy frosting before a car (or a grit lorry) came along to destroy the illusion. </p> <p>I think snow is a bit like action films where the hero beats up the baddie/alien/volcano with an array of heavy artillery, staggering triumphantly through bloody noses, broken ribs and bullet wounds. I like to watch, but faced with actually getting physically involved, I'd rather stay in with a cup of coffee and biscuit if it's all the same. </p>Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-61764032138746768602009-12-13T15:30:00.001-08:002010-03-20T11:47:33.384-07:00The reality of working in show business<p align="justify">I'm not going to pretend to be objective about reality shows. I hate them. I've hated them since the very first Big Brother leeched its way onto our screens in Australia nine years ago and I've studiously avoided them in any shape or form. I particularly loathe the talent-show versions where people with average voices and minimal stage presence win competitions voted for by the public and get massive record deals. But the main reason I hate them is because they have taken away budgets for decent television programming and work from trained performers - and not just in television. Suddenly lead roles in theatrical productions are being given to individuals with little or no formal training and certainly no formal experience. </p> <p align="justify">We were given tickets to see Oliver! last week. I had a vague idea there might be someone from a reality show<img style="margin: 5px 0px 0px 5px; display: inline" title="oliver!-theatre-tickets-theatre-royal-drury-lane-london" alt="oliver!-theatre-tickets-theatre-royal-drury-lane-london" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-uGWrbRa7yVuV0_Aqek1HJeyeTsuOYukk36MtZcsqSW3iHVfeaRO6X3KpgELdUVq4_X_XNlkRXdPKP8rpz091toStOmt9ntfyzYSeyrYpIThKHJYOjnUW5ttzdV4QkQwAvNqJcglwjC8v/?imgmax=800" width="150" height="150" /> playing Nancy (the coverage of these shows means it's impossible to completely ignore them) and I was pretty sure she'd won a competition to play the role. However, when we got there, the 'alternate' Nancy was on for the evening, Australian actress, Tamsin Carroll. Tamsin was exceptional, as I would expect from a young woman who has been working in the theatre since childhood. But it got me thinking. Why was there an 'alternate'? Not an understudy (the role of Nancy has two understudies), but someone who plays the role for a specific number of performances each week. </p> <p align="justify"><img style="margin: 5px 5px 0px 0px; display: inline" title="carrolloliver_1225380120" alt="carrolloliver_1225380120" align="left" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjcubJL3-YdAPR094rO0hLMMT1ZCt1k2rfkrPZ35Lo2Wpw3COvoAV5FJ1IXB2GjUVgu6oprTpF4JKdcF9A9KtKaepHwV9rghjxo6iVFg_yFPPP_ZIleJUYfhzwMOKf0b1U1ga4l10tMfzX/?imgmax=800" width="200" height="142" /> Most West End shows run eight shows a week (six nights and two matinees) and often additional rehearsals during the week for understudies and swings (performers covering multiple supporting roles). That's two hours a show onstage and for a production like Oliver!, leading actors usually have some vocally strenuous numbers. So logic would dictate that you're going to need some strong singers. Singers with training, technique, experience. Singers who can handle eight shows a week, two hours a night and not lose their voice by Saturday night. </p> <p align="justify">I don't know anything about Jody Prenger, who won the reality show competition for Oliver! other than what was in her bio in the programme (lots of reality TV and a Disney cruise ship gig) and a YouTube video, which, to be honest, wasn't a patch on Tamsin's performance the other night. I also don't know anything about Connie Fisher, another reality-show winner who went on to play Maria in The Sound of Music. But I do know she also had an 'alternate' after her voice packed it in three months into the run. </p> <p align="justify">Two for two. Add Martine McCutcheon (television actress and former pop star), who had to drop out of My Fair Lady for 'health reasons', three for three. Is anyone else seeing a pattern? Tamsin Carroll played the role of Nancy in the Australian production of Oliver! (with no alternate) and Jody Prenger's replacement next year, Kerry Ellis (who understudied Martine McCutcheon in My Fair Lady) doesn't look like she'll have an alternate either. </p> <p align="justify">I feel I'm stating the obvious here, but evidently it needs to be stated, because it keeps happening. Actors like Tamsin and Kerry, who work their way up through the ranks of the chorus, understudy and supporting roles – 'work' being the operative word – who have the talent, skills and guts to play the leading role to its fullest, aren't given the opportunity because those roles are given to the folks who've been on the TV. Regardless of whether those TV folks  have the talent and stamina to handle the role. They're famous, so they'll bring in the crowds. </p> <p align="justify">Musicals are not the only genre where this is happening – Daniel Radcliffe garnered lacklustre reviews for an<img style="margin: 5px 0px 0px 5px; display: inline" title="godot350" alt="godot350" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2zTVHTObEr0bhNOWxFpWOnAQSxhRuo8zJzzCWXcTyAXRLcJOsqQPCdv-JJxL51gNJFO3YnKpe_cUE5gOKDyKB_P47iOvBL_QOiDk4390pnfBNY8cpvPNBmGDEzoLXCy8HDfCd7dX6zhpx/?imgmax=800" width="250" height="189" /> average performance in Equus, Josh Harnett lacked the presence and gravitas of his theatre-trained co-star Adam Godley in Rainman (but Harnett was aware of it, and suitably humble in his curtain call) and Kelly Brook has been hired for her 'talents' to play an 'ordinary woman' in Calendar Girls. Not to say 'famous' equals 'no talent', I saw the superb (theatre-trained) Gillian Anderson in What The Night is For, Brendan Fraser and Frances O'Connor were just perfect in Cat On A Hot Tin Roof (and I'm eagerly awaiting James Earl Jones and Adrian Lester in the latest production of same), John Barrowman was wowing theatre crowds long before he was Captain Jack Harkness and I can die happy knowing I saw Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart in Waiting for Godot. But these are all performers who put in the ground work from day one, who earned their dues and got the break they worked for. They have talent which made them famous, as opposed to  mass-market personality appeal which made them famous. </p> <p align="justify">There are arguments for getting the famous people in - what good is a show if no-one comes to see it? And people will come to see it if there's someone famous in it, regardless of whether they have the chops to carry off the role. I rebutt this argument with 'then educate people about the difference between good and famous'. What if all school children were inspired to see wonderful productions for the production's sake and not so they could say they'd seen Kelly Brooks' baps? The famous people argument reduces theatre to water cooler chat. People go to see the shows to say they've seen it, regardless of how bad it is. So what's the point in getting the good people in, when no-one will see it? May as well have a less-brilliant show that thousands see for the wrong reasons than a brilliant show that hundreds see for the right reasons, right? And so it goes, until there are less and less good shows to see. </p> <p align="justify">Then I ask myself – would I have seen Waiting for Godot if Magneto and Captain Picard hadn't been cast? The truth? No. I wouldn't have. Because the London tickets were £50 each. If they'd been £10 then a much better chance. But I'm not about to fork out a fortnight's worth of groceries on the off-chance the show might be good. I paid a tenner to see Cyrano de Bergerac at the National Theatre some years ago, Stephen Rae was in the lead role and it was bloody awful. But McKellen vs Stewart? They could recite the phone book and it would be awesome. </p> <p align="justify">So what's the solution? Aside from abolishing reality TV? In my book, education. Get the kids while they're young, expose them to good story-telling, beautiful production values, moving performances and teach them how to appreciate what they're watching. Let them know that performance is a job, it's work and not just something you fall into because you're an Irish set of twins with big mouths and big hair. Think of all the wonderful stories we'd all get to see and hear, how much more beauty and light there'd be in the world, how much more hope and productivity there'd be if people were inspired, Roddenberry-style, to want nothing more than to enrich their souls. There is nothing enriching in reality TV. It is voyeurism in its most despicable form – the twitch of the net curtain to gossip about your neighbours. It is stealing jobs from talented performers, writers and directors and, worst of all, robbing us of the stories to weave into the once luxuriant fabric of our community and culture. It has no place in an intelligent society and I look forward to its ultimate demise at the hands of a public so bored they have no choice but to seek out new stories.</p>Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-67024650308825229522009-12-08T14:55:00.001-08:002010-03-20T11:47:08.741-07:00When did I become a Ma’am?<p align="justify"><img style="margin: 5px 0px 0px 5px; display: inline" title="Pret A Manger caffe latte, England, Britain, UK" alt="Pret A Manger caffe latte, England, Britain, UK" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeudGonLzylnMVYU5nx-0si9iGoYhvooOXClv9UtZpcSheCCvEEDnJOl-h5KSF3xDxsELl3s4LpSGftH-zyd0Tt4I_Q5443xi9-Cq1Y8dZ-Sf4VcDSSrXKqEz85-KUE064ctZMdtPV4S3F/?imgmax=800" width="224" height="240" />I was in Prêt a Manger today, which I am most days, as I buy my morning latté from them. Prêt make the best lattés of all the chain stores in London. I'll go to Starbucks at a pinch (and load it up with vanilla or caramel), Costa as a last resort and Cafe Nero ONLY if the baristas are Mediterranean. English Cafe Nero baristas evidently all drink Nescafé at 40 degrees Celsius and wouldn't know a good latte if it imploded in front of them. The best coffee I’ve found in London (so far) is made by the lovely ladies at <a href="http://www.allinlondon.co.uk/directory/1150/37533.php" target="_blank">MUGI</a> in Ealing Common. Polish construction workers drink it at 7.30am with nothing but cigarettes, so you know it’s good. Should you find yourself on the Ealing Common High Street, I recommend a detour, for the coffee and the hilarious music videos on Russian cable television.</p> <p align="justify">I am a caffeine junkie and used to drink five or six cups a day. However, in a begrudging concession to my health, I only have one coffee a day now, as it made my heart beat irregular when I was a stage manager working 80 hour weeks in my 20s. So my one cup a day is significant and not to be treated lightly. I've tried to support my local small businesses and have gone to all the independent coffee shops in the five blocks around my office (mostly run by aging Italian men who employ contemptuous eastern European girls) and they all make terrible coffee. I mean the kind of terrible that makes you wish you'd ordered Maxwell House instead. I suspect they're all using Maxwell House to make coffee for their English customers, assuming they won't know the difference and keeping the really good, fresh, medium-roasted Italian good stuff for themselves. Bastards. </p> <p align="justify">Anyway, when I was ordering my latté from the friendly folks at Prêt today, I realised that one of them had called me 'Ma'am' when she gave me my coffee. Ma'am. As in 'Madam'. Mrs. M'dme. Missus. M'lady. Not Miss. Or even Ms. </p> <p align="justify">I realised that people had been calling me Ma'am for quite some time. In restaurants, bars, on the phone (where I tend to get 'Mrs' in front of my surname too) and certainly in the mail. And it made me wonder, when did I become a Ma'am? When did it become obvious that I was no longer a Miss? That I was now 'of a certain age' that commanded this level of respect from customer service types?</p> <p align="justify">Is it my expanding waistline that lends me a matronly air? My lacklustre work attire (who can be bothered making an effort for pie charts?) or sensible walking-through-the-park trainers? I refuse to believe it’s crows feet, I have too much natural collagen (mostly thanks to 20 years of chips and chocolate), so it’s got to be my attitude. Evidently I have thrown off the exuberance and naivety of my youth and present myself (to customer service folks at least) an imposing worldly figure impressive enough to inspire in them the use of a befitting title. Or at least fear that I’ll get more annoyed with them if they call me ‘Miss’. </p> <p align="justify">They might have a point.</p>Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-61977811309236690362009-10-31T18:10:00.001-07:002010-03-20T11:46:46.080-07:00When Twitter goes bad…<p>Sometime this afternoon, some chap in Birmingham tapped off a random tweet to a chap named Jim and happened to mention @stephenfry in the tweet. He also happened to mention that although he respected and admired our 'National Treasure', his tweets were sometimes.. well.. a bit boring. He even apologised in the same tweet '(sorry Stephen)', possibly assuming that Stephen would not even read the random mention in his Twitter timeline, let alone bother to reply. He certainly could not have anticipated what happened next. </p> <p>Evidently poor Stephen was having a bad day and, as so often happens when you are alone in your room with only the internet for company (and I speak from personal experience), the tweet struck a nerve. A big sharp one. Stephen retorted with a snippy comeback, then promptly decided he'd had enough of all the nastiness on Twitter, blocked the guy (thus preventing him from apologising in person) and left, slamming the virtual door behind him. </p> <p>For those of you not in the know, Stephen Fry has over 920,000 followers on Twitter. Many of whom have not bothered to look for the original tweet (now deleted from the perpetrator's timeline) and, thinking that Stephen has abandoned Twitter on the basis of a single insult from a stranger, have launched frenzied attacks on this chap, who will no doubt have to close down his Twitter account and his blog and move to Manchester. Stephen has not been heard from in *gasp* over NINE HOURS, his business partner and webmaster, Andrew Sampson, has issued a stern warning to everyone that they are not to vilify @brumplum (the villain of the piece) and celebrity Fry-pals Jonathan Ross and Alan Davies, who were calmly enjoying their Saturday evenings in front of the tele, have been barraged by people wanting them to check that Stephen is okay. </p> <p>Not only that, but the exchange, such as it is, has become the subject of blogs, news feeds and, would you believe - headlines on Sky News and the BBC. The word 'bully' has been hurled in @brumplum's direction, along with a vast assortment of other, nastier monikers. All because some chap said to some other chap that he thought some of Stephen's tweets were... well.. a bit boring. </p> <p>Which brings me to my point (yes there was one) - just how significant is this Twitter thing anyway? I check Twitter nearly every day and follow just over 100 people (some of whom don't post much more than once a month when they remember, Noel Fielding I'm looking at you) but for me it's pure distraction. I don't expect to learn anything useful (although thanks to the QI Elves, I now know that anteaters are toothless), I hope to be entertained and more hopefully made to laugh. My contrary streak can't bear to conform too much to watercooler chat, so I don't follow Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher (although I do have Rumer Willis on my list) or either of the Hiltons (Paris or Perez). </p> <p>To get my moral superiority fix, I follow several members of the Skeptic Society, including two Mythbusters, I also follow several comedians, a bunch of musicians, a couple of ex-Star Trek actors, two or three great horror writers and most of the cast of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. So no life-changing, credit-changing, job-changing potential there, but it's a laugh and the best tweets are the ones with photos - a voyeuristic taste of the public-private lives of folks I admire. </p> <p>I hear that there are companies out there using Twitter as a marketing tool, but I have no idea who these companies are, because I don't follow them, so they are failing to sell me anything. I get enough junk mail in the post, why would I ask for more in my Twitter box? A friend of mine is using it for job-hunting - but she does work in media. A <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2009/OPINION/10/28/cashmore.online.privacy/" target="_blank">CNN column</a> by the CEO of social media site <a href="http://www.Mashable.com" target="_blank">Mashable</a> intimated that those people who aren't on social networks in the future are going to struggle with jobs, socialising and.. well, pretty much existence as we know it unless they sign up. Rubbish. Most people I know aren't on Twitter and they're doing just fine. I have a day job in financial services, the primary industry for the United Kingdom and as my firm is regulated by the Financial Services Authority, on their recommendation (for security and data protection), access to Twitter in my office is banned. On that basis alone I have my doubts about Twitter's future success as a business tool, at least in the financial services industry. And really, if you're a serious investor (and I'm not talking about Mr & Mrs Smith with a £10k ISA), are you going to log onto Twitter to see what the marketing department at UBS are tweeting today or pick up the phone to speak to an industry professional for advice? It's one thing to follow Waterstones to get the latest 3 for 2 deals on chick-lit, it's quite another if you're thinking about investing your children's trust fund. </p> <p>Then there's real life people. My partner, who is pretty darn internet savvy, follows a bunch of RSS feeds and delights in the Photoshop competitions on <a href="http://b3ta.com" target="_blank">b3ta.com</a> and he can't bear the thought of Twitter, for the sheer maintenance of the thing. And he's right, you do need to check it regularly to get any kind of sense of it. I do have a few real life friends on Twitter (pretty much my followers list!), but most people I know aren't. And aren't interested. They're too busy getting on with their lives to write about it in 140 characters or less. And for the most part, I'm grateful for that. Because while it's nice to know what your mates are up to, there's a limit to how many 'eating a sandwich' and 'doing the laundry' and 'I'm sooo tired' posts you can take before you start hitting your head on the keyboard. Twitter is supposed to relieve boredom, not cause it. </p> <p>And all those promises of how Twitter can make money for you, Joe Bloggs, sitting in your living room, just by sending a few tweets? Yup, just like all those work-at-home jobs stuffing envelopes on your kitchen table. Millions to make. :S </p> <p>The entire situation with Stephen Fry this evening has been a bit of an eye-opener for me, I'm amazed just how many people involved in Twitter take social networking so seriously, when everyone not involved is blissfully ignoring it and getting on with whatever they were doing before it was invented. I discovered today that you can follow people tweeting about a specific person in real time (or at least I can using TweetDeck), which is something I don't normally do because a) I'm not usually sitting at my computer for long enough to watch it unfold and b) I'm not usually interested in what people 'reckon' - everyone has an opinion, it's just now the internet has given anyone with a web connection the opportunity to reach potentially a worldwide audience. Even if they don't mean to. I look at Tweets from the people I follow because I've CHOSEN to read them, but I'm not interested what the man in the street is saying, because I hear it every day on the Tube, the train and in the office. And for the most part, when they're not discussing the weather, public transport or what they're having for lunch, they're just repeating what they read in the morning paper. Which is usually ill-informed and skewed toward being 'outraged'. Just like all these Twitterfolks are 'outraged' that someone could upset their beloved Stephen so. And now, hours after the event, most people are getting outraged without even knowing what it is that they should be outraged about. It also occurs to me that if Fry was serious about leaving Twitter, it takes three clicks to delete your account. Just three. </p> <p>So how significant is this Twitter thing? For me, average Twit, not that bloody significant. I'd miss hearing from Wil Wheaton, but if it all fell over tomorrow, if Twitter's servers were shut down all that was left was the fail whale, I think we'd all survive. Heck, we survived The Spice Girls breaking up, we lived through Britney shaving her head and the Mariah Carey Christmas Album, I think we'd get over a Twitterpocalypse. In fact I think you'd find that most people wouldn't even notice.</p>Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-75825480973433273192009-10-30T16:33:00.001-07:002010-03-20T11:45:05.095-07:00A most triumphant literary discovery<p>I have never had a problem with letting people know who my two favourite authors are. I don't bother to be cool and cite two of the world's most prolific and popular horror writers - Stephen King and Dean Koontz. I love their rambling, easy language, their ability to put you into the scene without having to think about the words they're using, their humour, their pop culture references and their musical imperatives - I fell in love with Dean Koontz after he had Christopher Snow addicted to Chris Isaak in Fear Nothing and Stephen King introduced me to Creedance Clearwater and Dylan. </p> <p>Good horror writing isn't about blood, sex, gore and stupid women who run upstairs when they should go out the front door. Good horror is about blood, sex, goosebumps, heart beats and that feeling that someone, or something, is watching you from the darkest corner of the room. Horror is about mystery, and the thrill of finding out what the creepy thing in the shadows is and how you can stop it hurting you and your loved ones. King and Koontz's heroes are clever guys with a sense of humour and good taste in food and music, who understand the loyalty and secret intelligence of dogs. Their much-adored wives are strong, smart and can handle a butcher's knife or a shotgun if the needs arises (and it frequently does) and their villains are terrifying on a tap-into-your-primal-fear level. They know about 4am, the sound of a train in the distance and the creaking noises in the old house that might not just be the wind. Here are two men who GET it. </p> <p>So, unlike certain celebrity actresses who believe everyone wants to emulate their lifestyle, I feel no desire to prove myself to be creatively superior by listing my preferred authors as a string of literary award-winning novelists with prose that you need to wade through like treacle. (I saw The English Patient nine times. I read the book once. And it took longer than those nine times combined. And I still prefer Aliens.). Nor do I want to cling to the ranks of the post-modern feminist by name-dropping Tolstoy or Dostoevsky (I can't even spell Dostoevsky, I had to look it up). I've read Austen, the Brontes and Dickens, I've ploughed through Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke (science fiction is written for men, women are just not interested in that much detail, trust me on this), I've buzzed through Clive Cussler, James Patterson and John Grisham, I even tried out Minette Walters once (just once). I have never tried to read what is commonly referred to as 'chick-lit' as I know I'll hate it. Nothing with that many pastels on the cover could hold my attention, as there's definitely not going to be ghosts, rock music or hot vampires in it. Vampires don't do pastels. Not even ones who drive shiny silver Volvos. </p> <p>But I digress, this post is about an author I discovered last year. I was shopping on my own and realised I didn't have a book with me to prevent Nigel-No-Mates stares while I ate my lunch. So I popped into the first charity shop I found (best source of £1 novels and you never know what you might find) and spotted a promising black paperback with a creepy moth and a razorblade on a chain on the front. The blurb on the back was tempting, a<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiz-NCl9zTKBCaPCUIkCd1OaXFZA_m5CG2Ac08o0wv5JdwNNAXlPuUPTETwb7m4FR0V-D9hK4Ku8lkABxaTvVnKAJ-IWjy5YYtDvprwCmpgCI41OVxoGAI56yFHQ6fmsRh1G6lVqwvBn7Rb/s1600-h/hsblg%5B4%5D.jpg"><img alt="Heart-Shaped Box" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuRH4rwzmwwtVNcJtVfiNIvuhBZxDCtiliOZG0oqizjROmB1UQSz3X8IbqPKzIfnScNwWUy6vL-pBAoIfzcSgPQzPTDooCBkbprLNY1xwhUbnzaFR-FivVo9sx1roMHaV5Hy_wNdV1mQGh/?imgmax=800" width="156" height="240" /></a> modern ghost story about an aging rockstar haunted by the malevolent spirit of the departed grandfather of a former groupie, and there was a quote from Stephen King about just how good this debut novel was. So hey, I trust ol' Stevo, and it was £1.50, so I grabbed it. The book in question was 'Heart-Shaped Box' by some guy named Joe Hill, who I'd never heard of. Now, the more knowledgeable among you are already chuckling, but stick with me. </p> <p>The book was great. It was beyond great. It was fantastic. It was easy to read, it was funny, it was full of rock music references (how could it not be, its protagonist was an Alice Cooper style rocker) and it moved along at a rip-roaring pace. Our hero was sexy, funny, clever and he drove a Mustang. His latest groupie was smart and savvy and didn't take any of his crap. It was scary, spooky, creepy and all those other good icky words that describe the feeling you get when the hairs on the back of your neck go up. And amongst the in-jokes relating to music heroes, he won my eternal loyalty when he mentioned My Chemical Romance as 'sweet and young, but decided he quite liked them'. </p> <p>I was barely two chapters in when I chuckled to myself that this chap Hill, who was roughly my age, must have grown up on a steady diet of Stephen King and Koontz, just like I did, he had a similar conversational style, flow, pace. Some months later I went to his website, <a href="http://joehillfiction.com" target="_blank">joehillfiction.com</a> and discovered another book of short stories and a rather entertaining blog. So long as he kept writing, Joe Hill was about to join my top five writers list. I started following him on Twitter <a href="http://www.twitter.com/joe_hill" target="_blank">(@joe_hill</a>), secretly excited that I - me! - had discovered this fantastic new writer that no-one else had heard of! I even sent him a Tweet once about Airbourne, an Aussie AC/DC-style rock band, when he was looking for some new music. </p> <p>Then, in retaliation to the hype around Wolfram Alpha, he requested a bunch of questions from his Twitter followers, with the promise that the best questions would be posted on his website with his replies, and even if they were incorrect, they would at least be entertaining. And sure enough, they were. But halfway down the list, in between 'What was in the briefcase?' and 'Who made who?' was this question: 'If it were possible, which of your father's novels do you wish you had written?' A father who writes? Writes enough novels to be worthy of a mention by his son's fans? Who then, as they say in hippity-hop circles, is the Daddy? </p> <p>Off to Wikipedia went I, wondering who could be the father of this fantastic new writer who I, like Captain Cook before me, had discovered. My brilliant secret, shared with only a select few, this wonderful story that promised so much more in the same vein (no pun intended). And there, in all the linked-up goodness that is Wikipedia, was my answer. Joe Hill's father is... Stephen King. </p> <p>I have to say I nearly passed out in my triumph. I had picked up a book on the basis of its cover art, blurb and a line of praise from my favourite author and I had loved it. I hadn't been led down the media-driven super highway and read it just because he was related to the writer I admired above all others. It was untainted by hype and 'If you love Stephen King you will love this!!!' recommendations from Amazon. I had enjoyed this book knowing nothing about the author, with no expectations and no preconceptions. And it had been brilliant. I haven't been this excited about finding an author since my best friend bought me a copy of Poppy Z Brite's 'Lost Souls' (Poppy is also on Twitter <a href="http://www.twitter.com/docbrite" target="_blank">@docbrite</a>) and my excitement was pure, genuine and ALL MINE. Joe's next novel is out in February next year, it's called 'Horns', it's about the devil and I can't wait. I now have a third favourite writer.</p>Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-28504794336184018182009-10-30T12:51:00.001-07:002010-03-20T11:46:02.385-07:00Going gentle into that good night<p>I had a day to myself recently and decided I would check out our local cemetery, which, being <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgi7n0UpV7lTsfWWiCJXDgoWUoEeQJD9skgxdx2WrX6jPmaLKSb0gg17EV2L2fzl-15jxG0oB4PAgqqHyvJbjqaB2yZYhQi5wsqeQq8E8-sEfpr_PezXiMVO_PA4Hf6E_Vbnwn9_BPEyaRL/s1600-h/P1030053%20-%20Copy.jpg"><img style="margin: 5px 0px 5px 5px" height="188" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8lkbUvGZ5_hMo6P3CYdSNFpyIRuSnEIwPOE_IRZkozpm-3vptCR5oMPpHuxb_6WWA5b2cIsTcxCmmK7cBmpa8W8p2WFGZPYygV2PJgZtjxGPv2WAXGd2vifRHh1rAqj1QnBKwaARm1SGC/?imgmax=800" width="248" align="right" /></a>just beyond the grounds of a 400 year old house, was potentially quite old and cool. I'm a big fan of cemeteries, I like how quiet they are, how beautiful and old they are, even in Australia, where they've only existed in the form we recognise for just over 200 years. I like reading about people I don't know and wondering what their lives (and deaths) were like and <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKjJo1N7HL6KHoWXT_fXOaudeSczkNoCieD30at-KcX38fnY05vz4yn1K8k__PnIgJG74gozn2KCuErtYc2H5aYG3Jg_BPOv2I0AK_z5trzYyYYc0iYKzu5xfoxHYlPLtyY8zUDR6j7vTG/s1600-h/P1030022a%5B1%5D.jpg"><img style="margin: 5px 5px 0px 0px" height="188" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOLuMQbXRTHnmkIKArXYy3Cn8_piWYB6QHVcpx_RdagA-zOd0xwbXtyD11XfLlzgTzi_JVt2TX4je5VYxMg4g2Wlq5v5CiFiGmJNJrP6l-iWBShCXY05fkYQeXZg3CRbGVgPrwHgYTdrj2/?imgmax=800" width="248" align="left" /></a>pondering the way we as a people deal with death as the ones left behind.</p> <p>This cemetery is very well maintained and really not that old by comparison to some of the ones I've been to - most of the older graves date back to the 30s and 40s, and only a couple I saw were turn of the century. It's also not a full cemetery so there are more recent graves, and it looked like there was to be a <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsfde92NlGnCKm4VYKoJCuo3lhLpR2JKGB6FTv_roXB3C-5v_nJo7ICazseeAFVR9SqGH6wvJ1udVAI4jE1LIpzkL4lAK5e3d8i-I679sbLuTtiiaPvh_9Hs5YPFuCPy3074jvpm9dWGgP/s1600-h/P1030049a%5B1%5D.jpg"><img style="margin: 5px 5px 0px 0px" height="188" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_U2Kpl3PLe6uYxvBhbkdu1_kgJJtsNjGS1tIIXSKq9o_zMXelj_94S09kLJZO0SQJduZcSe253K5CON65FWILoMvySgKDs6EyDHf9aSPSsbGmX-BsVfkY4yFKEQueTxHCdJTgiGnPDjBb/?imgmax=800" width="248" align="right" /></a> funeral that day too. I found a few interesting graves, including a very old mausoleum with a worn sign saying 'Entrance to the Vault of William...' - that made me pause and look around suspiciously for a minute, expecting a door in the ivy to suddenly creak open.... it didn't, so I kept looking around. </p> <p>As I was wandering I could hear soft tinkling noises, which I assumed were wind chimes and there was a soft, sweet smell in the air. As I got back round to the main gates, I realised the wind chimes were closer and I turned a corner to find the children's cemetery. Now I've seen child graves before and it's always sad to read that they were only a few years, weeks, even days old when they died, but I've never seen anything like this. There were about 15 or 20 graves in a walled, grassed section of about 25 square metres, and most of the graves were covered in colourful toys, flowers, tributes, plants, ribbons, wind chimes, lit candles (on the grave and in hanging 'lanterns'), sparkly decorations, photos and trinkets. Little signs saying 'our beloved daughter', 'we miss you, mum and dad', 'for my sister', glass stones, teddy bears, other furry toys, even Chuckie from Rugrats and Stitch from Lilo and Stitch. </p> <p>One grave, a little girl's, had photos of her with the family spaniel, was completely filled with flowering plants with ornaments and toys hiding between them, edged in pebbles with a sign at the foot of the grave saying 'sssh, fairies are sleeping in the bottom of the garden.' Another, an Asian girl's, was the source of the sweet smell floating right through the cemetery - it was incense - and there were two smaller graves, side by side, literally covered in furry toys, for two babies who died a day apart. </p> <p>I didn't take any pictures of this part of the cemetery, these graves seemed so much more personal, such a public outpouring of private grief, it just didn't seem right to photograph them for something as frivolous as a weblog. The fact that some of these toys had obviously been there for some time and remained untouched says that I'm not the only one who felt this way. </p> <p>None of the graves were particularly recent, but as the candles and incense had been lit, I'm assuming that the families of these children come and visit regularly. I can't begin to comprehend having a child, let alone losing one, but I'm guessing that all these bright, cheerful toys and trinkets are an attempt to make sure their children aren't alone and frightened in the grey, dark graveyard. If so, it's working, this burst of colour, scent, soft chimes and light amongst the stark, cold stone of the rest of the cemetery is comforting, almost joyful, despite the tremendous sadness it represents. </p> <p>It does make for stark and poignant contrast though, when you see the one or two graves without all the colour and sparkle - like the one with a simple wooden cross, a name and date and a weather-faded, rain-matted teddy sitting quietly and loyally at the base of the cross. </p>Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7529173538016881667.post-7696537345021756292009-08-29T09:15:00.001-07:002009-08-29T09:15:50.863-07:00I am writingThis weblog has sat empty for sometime, but I intend to write lots on it. About everything and nothing in particular, but I do promise no whining or tales of just how boring my day was. Even if I have to make it up. <br /><br />I have lots of half-written posts on the C drive of my laptop, awaiting completion. When I do, anyone passing by this corner of the internet can read them too. Maybe they'll even write back.Miss Bluehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00081509631100360093noreply@blogger.com0