Today is a good day…. Officially, Not Like Paris Hilton has had over 50,000 hits since it’s creation a year and a bit ago.

Obviously, this mostly includes your good selves, me, The Mam and er, me. BUT, it’s still exciting. So exciting, that I include proof:

Of course, you can’t actually see what it says, so I’ll run you through it. The Mam is circled, because (bless her) she’s always popping over from Like A Jumble Sale. Presumably to make sure I’m not writing about how I’m not eating, or how I’ve discovered crack or something. However, because there is no certain way to tell who the actual Golden Hitter was, I’ve made the decision to credit it to the last person who visited according to the list, and that was…. Er, someone who googled “not like paris Hilton + christine arnold”. So, someone who knows me? Someone I may have told to google that precise phrase to find us? Hmm, we may never know. Although my Derren Brown-like psychic skills lead me to believe that such a person is a stud… hung like a horse… but works in IT…??

Well, who knows, eh? It's disappointing, because the prize for being the 50,000th visitor was a night of intense sexual experimentation with yours truly, followed by a game of Operation. Still, life goes on...

Anyway, I write this at The Mam’s, where I’m in deep cover after a bad night with the upstairs neighbours, a flying sideboard, an attempt to break someone’s arm, several eardrum-splitting screams, the phrase “MY EYES MY EYES, NO NOT MY EYES”, and ultimately, the police.

This is the eighth time I’ve had to use my powers as a concerned citizen, and the third in two weeks. And guess what? The stupid cow won’t press charges, and every time she’s removed from their flat, she’s back in half an hour. My patience with this particular brand of idiocy has long-ago worn thin, but since their fights invariably involve me having to wear ear-muffs to bed (I’m not joking) or sitting up till half three on a school-night listening to something that even Quentin Tarantino would class as “a bit much, actually Uma”; I’ve taken to calling the polis just to get them to shut the fuck up. Of course, there was the night that they then sat down together to watch the entire Matrix trilogy at full volume for the rest of the night, but I could hardly dial 999 and complain that “the first one was ok, the second one I managed to sleep through, but the third one was really taking the piss”, because they’d just think I was reviewing the films.

Naturally, it’s all very well calling the law at the time, but in the cold light of morning, I always realise that even council estate Neanderthals have a fairly good chance of working out who keeps grassing on them. So I hide for a few days, carry the laptop to work with me (note to anyone I work with: I’m not just being a tosser, this is a safety precaution), and make sure I always leave a light on when I’m out. And the TV. And, if my paranoia does not abate, cut-out dancing people a la Home Alone. All pointless, of course, thanks to Gateshead council’s woeful inability to understand the fact that I have a J O B, and cannot therefore wait in for someone to fix the boarded up front door which could probably be removed by a consumptive hummingbird.

Honestly, I may not live to see 52,000 hits…

The irony of all of this: the wallpaper falling off the bathroom wall onto my head when I’m having a bath; the bulletproof glass in the spare room window; the silverfish; the way that the man two doors down looks at me like he’s a starving cannibal and I’m a Zinger Tower Burger; is that my bus stop – the one I have to ask for every time I come back from town – Is named after the soccer club it’s next to. Which means that every single day, I have to present a man I don’t know with a pound and ask him to drop me off at “The Pitz”.

Seriously.

And every day, because 90% of the time they’re Polish, they say “eh?” and I end up having to go “TAKE ME TO THE PITZ! MY STOP! IT’S THE PITZ!”. And even the old ladies snigger, and I want to die.

The worst part about this is the fact that the bus which goes to my parents’ (Whickham -the very nice part of Gateshead) now goes through my estate, and I was sitting behind two typical Whickhamite ladies, and as I was about to get up to alight, I heard one of them say to her equally coiffed friend, “Oh, I hate that our bus has to come through all of this nowadays…” with a dismissive wave of the hand and a nauseating waft of Gucci pour Bitch.

I hoisted up my Primark keks, kicked up my Green Flash, and made sure my giant Milanese tote with the sequinned pug on it twatted her in the head as I went to get off.

Anyway, this is all true. So there you go. Sometimes stupid things happen to you, don’t they? I had one of those “oh God” moments the other day when I remembered an embarrassing encounter from the morning BFEmma left for Korea. I had promised to meet her and Darren (*spits*) at Mezzo to go to the airport at half eight in the morning. This was a simple plan. Wake up, get dressed, get on bus, go to coffee shop I go to almost every day. No. The time went too quickly, My hair had dried into an asymmetric representation of “Critters 2”, and there was no bus. (Probably a Polish holiday.)

So I got a taxi with my last coppers, and realised that it was going to cost more than I had, so asked to be dropped off at the top of Northumberland Street (Newc’s main shopping street) for a cash point. As I was running down it after paying at 8:32, A girl suddenly stepped out in front of me, smiled, and said the following… Oh, before I tell you; have a think as you read it about what you would have thought she’d meant in saying it if you were a bit all over the place.

She said “Who does your hair?”

….

I stopped, and slightly in shock, I said… (I want to die as I type)

“God, thanks, er, no one’s ever asked me that… er, Mops… er, Matthew, it’s expensive, but it’s worth it… looks a bit messy today but nice of you to er, say…”

…….silence……

She looks at me, the ground, the sky, furrows her brow and says:

“Oh. It’s just cos we’re (gesture over shoulder to big shiny hair salon) offering 20% off today to new customers and…. Would you like a leaflet?”

IDIOT IDIOT IDIOT: YOU HAVE TO WORST HAIR YOU HAVE EVER HAD, REMEMBER? YOU FELL ASLEEP ON YOUR FRINGE AND IT’S STICKING UP IN HOMAGE TO CAMERON DIAZ IN THERE’S SOMETHING ABOUT MARY AND GENERALLY ACTING THE TWAT ALL OVER. WHO THE FUCK WOULD WANT TO GO TO ANY HAIRDRESSER THAT DOES THAT TO PEOPLE??

So being a rational person, I say, rationally and without any hint at all of being embarrassed:

“I’m sorry, I have to go and catch a flight to Korea.”

And walk off for three paces before breaking back into my run. The absurdity being that I was carrying nothing more with me than a small bag with a robot cat on it. The obvious choice of luggage for someone travelling halfway across the world. Was she supposed to think I was going for the day?

Anyway, I got to Mezzo and we spent another hour waiting outside Sta Travel for BFEmma to buy bloody laptop insurance. It was that sort of day.

I did, however, make them walk the long way back through town: The way that would lead us back past the confused girl. So that I could offer to take Em’s suitcase for her and (oh God) point at it as I went by.

Probably not that embarrassing in the grand scheme of things, but surely what I will remember most clearly about the day my best mate left to go away for a year. Which is pretty typical.

Right, must off. It’s work tomorrow and I have to concentrate deeply on every nanosecond until then so as not to waste my weekend. Expect to see me staring wildly at the wall and then collapsing into a coma at half nine.

Laters.

xx

If there’s just one thing to like about getting old (and let’s face it, as soon as you graduate nowadays you lose your place in the great hip queue, unless you write The Mighty Boosh or decide to form a band); it’s the secret joy at discovering that you actually like a song by one of those “kids” bands. Obviously, you’ll sit in the pub and hold your head in your hands and look pained when someone puts it on the jukebox, and say “I’m really sorry guys, but I think I like this… I didn’t realise it was *insert name of shit band here*, I can’t believe it…” But secretly, you’ll be dancing away inside your head; secretly planning your next bus journey into work when you can listen to it at full blast and imagine it’s Friday again. And all the time, you say “fuck you, Emos” to yourself. “I’m still fucking groovy, and you’re not. I like good tunage, but don’t have to pretend that I cut myself and bother to dye my hair. I get to like the odd song, and still have a Girls Aloud CD because I was 15 in ’95 and we were IRONIC. Fuck you!”

Which is my way of saying that this week, I have been listening to Shinobi vs Dragon Ninja by The Lost Prophets.

And I’m not a retard.

Go team Me!

Not much else to report, other than the fact that I’m actually not bad on Guitar Hero (which is a computer game – do keep up at the back) and have clearly, on reflection, been spending too much time with people younger than me.

I’m so easily influenced, I make Danielle off Celeb Big Brother look like Rosa Parks. (See? Again with the “pop” culture!) I shouldn’t be allowed to be around tha kids. I have a horrible feeling it will involve some sort of mid-life crisis eventually, and possibly even the throwing of “shapes” at weddings. At 26 I am too square to bear, and I think that should be the way things remain.

For example: Fat Club, Tuesday night, (pound and a half off, thanks for asking – that’s a stone so far *beam*) someone was talking about Warehouse. I heard “I went to Warehouse”, and thought “Ah, possibly some shitty new club”. They were talking about the shop, and I definitely did a quick mental shuffle, with the outcome a definite “is that still going??” moment. You see, in the six years since I became poor, bitter and most importantly, employed, I had almost completely failed to ever see a branch of Warehouse on any street. In any town. I have subconsciously deleted an entire high-street retailer from my knowledge.  The cold, hard truth of this matter is that Warehouse is simply not a part of my life, and has therefore slipped entirely from my mental radar. I can’t afford it, for a start. And nothing will probably fit, due to my startling resemblance to Desperate Dan’s shithouse door. (OK, this is probably a slight exaggeration, but I am blessed in two extremely obvious chest-area ways, which makes the idea of a skimpy halter-top a laughable and frankly dangerous proposition.) And most importantly, I’d rather Jack than have some anorexic witch take back the ludicrously optimistic size 16 “kick-flare” (what the fuck is a kick-flare anyway? Plenty of room for abusing the homeless?) jeans I’ve managed to rip whilst getting a leg the size of a juvenile Redwood in. To make matters more depressing, there’s always the odd trip to Topshop which cannot be avoided with skinny friends during sale season. Oh look, I have once again banged my head on the ceiling above the escalator for the seventieth time since my early childhood. Oh look, I am going to have a laugh and go for a look in the “tall section”. Oh look, it seems that baby giraffes are after nothing more than black trousers and jersey sacks with oddly arranged armholes. Oh look, here’s me going to look at the jewellery because it is all that will fit. Oh look, I’ve got my fucking finger stuck in a fucking plastic ring which I forgot would a) not fit, and b) make me look like a comedy drag act. Oh look, I’ve just brained the shoe department assistant with the twelve-inch spike heel predictably on the only pair of ugly, plastic shoes which will fit my admittedly nice-enough feet.

Oh look, I’ve found a nice top which fits. Oh look, its thirty quid.

Oh look, I’m crying and begging to be taken home.

I don’t enjoy it. And I am therefore glad that I’ve managed to forget at least one of these places of torture.

Now, if I could only get started on Hennes, I could forget about the fact that according to their sizes I’m a 22.

Bastards.

Laters.

xx

Well, I never thought I’d say it; but all men are bastards. Especially, it turns out, the ones you really thought were not.

For any of you who read BFEmma’s blog, you’ll know that she had a bad Christmas. This has just been made a million times worse, so I want you all to hold hands and send out some good vibes in the general direction of South Korea. I’ve known BFEmma since I was a wee girl, and we’re more like sisters than friends. When she hurts, I hurt, and I don’t like it. She deserves so much better.

This is a blog for her because I want her to know that she will always have at least one person (although there’s many more) who will always be here (look, it’s pretty clear I’m not going anywhere – I can barely even leave my desk for ennui) and willing to do whatever it takes to see she’s ok.

She’s a one-off is our Em: a genuine individualist and a talented, clever one at that. She was the girl who went to get a bollocking off the MD of the Co-op when she worked there (because she had pink hair), and came out of the meeting grinning like a loon saying “He was in a punk band! His used to be green! He says I can wear a hat!”. She was also the girl who answered back to a teacher in France when we were 11 (Mr McKenzie: “Christine and Emma, throwing food at the table isn’t acceptable. Would you behave like this at home?” Christine: “Hurr…errr…” Emma: “Well sir, there was this one time…”) And she was the girl who first gave me Bacardi when I was 15. And danced with me to Astral Conversations With Toulouse Lautrec at 1am.

I love all my friends, but when you’ve been best mates for almost 22 years, it’s pretty special. After all, it’s almost impossible to see someone every day for 14 of those years and not ever have a major falling out. (Which isn’t to say we don’t bicker: she’s a belligerent git and will never admit I’m right, which obviously, is all the time.)

So here’s to BFEmma. NLPH stalwart and wielder of the most impressive boobs in South Korea.

Chin up. Some twat isn’t worth forgetting who you are. And Jesus, if you ever do that, I won’t know who I am.

Love you.

xx

There’s a thing what keeps appearing on the Arnold family desktop: It says “An error has occurred… yada yada… Do you want to continue running scripts on this page?”

I usually click yes, because they sound important.

But sometimes, generally in a fit of pique (I love fits of pique. They make me feel like I’m in a play by Oscar Wilde), I press no.

For fun.

And you know what?

Nothing happens.

Thought you’d like to know.

Anyway, the day has come and gone when I was either to recover from 2006-it is, or go, in no small measure, completely mad. That day was yesterday, and it was upon arranging a way to pay the errant ‘leccie bill (which would amount to ninety fat squids a month for a YEAR), and then going to the bank and discovering that I have only been paid half of what I should have been for the last month’s envelope-stuffing torture, that I lost it, walked in circles for a bit, had a fag, dripped copious amounts of misery-snot on the Mam’s pillow, and then exploded. And then thought “actually: Fuck it. What’s the worst that can happen?” and fell promptly asleep from exhaustion.

And, indeed, what is the worst that can happen? That they come and repossess my N64 or my collection of rosary beads? Or that they charge me lots and lots of paid referral fees? Hey, I can claim them back. So go the fuck on boys, take your best shot: I have NOTHING. And therefore you cannot touch me.

HA HA HA!

So there we go – I might have gone mad, but I don’t think it will kill me. Complacency is my friend. Seven years of constantly shitting it over money, and I finally learned to relax.

Still, they’ll cut my cable off, and this is not a good thing. But I like reading. And I can play on the N64 till they take it away. I am so fond of Worms.

I also think that the fact that I had my hair cut yesterday and it looks great has contributed to this sense of peace. I may be on the very edge of financial ruin, but still: I look good. Hurrah!

I’ve also decided not to pursue a court case over the book, because I remembered that I spent the last year hating it. And panicking in case I spent the rest of my career trying to explain that the reason it was so toe-curlingly shite was because my publisher was about as literary-minded as a (**made diicult to read for moral reasons**) giant pulsating phallus with learning difficulties, and insisted that it be written in a “style” best reserved for children’s books and Sun readers. A publisher who sends his first book off to the printers without having read it, and who blames his copywriter when he forgets to actually tell Waterstones it’s out. Oh, and who will not admit any of this, despite its glaring obviousity (good word), because in actual fact, he’s run out of money and would rather have a go at the person who’s been doing all the work for six months than admit the fact that he’s stapled his own bollocks to his forehead.

Hurrah!

And I still have good hair.

Hurrah!

And I owe Barclays three hundred quid through no fault of my own (“admin error”. Again.)

Hurrah!

My life. The life that keeps on giving.

Hurrah!

But you know what? I’m actually in a good mood today, because everything’s gone to shit and there’s absolutely nothing I can do!

HURRAH!

Hmm…. I may have gone mad after all…

Where is my misery? Will 2007 be the year of grinning inappropriately and chasing old ladies in my underwear?

Let’s hope so!

w00t!

Laters.

xx

2007, and I feel a bit better! Obviously, this has more to do with OCD and the belief that getting rid of 2006 was some sort of purging process, but hey, I’m not back at work till the 8^th, The Mam has a rather fine looking silverside on, and I simply cannot stop listening to Young Guns (Go For It). Oh, and my song of the month December 2006 – Owner of a Lonely Heart, which I’ve had on every jukebox from The Percy to Quinns in the last thirty one days. “MOVE YOURSELF”. It works for me. Although it’s usually just to the bar.

So, New Year. Did you all have fun? I sat in with The Parents and drank cider and Greeen Ginger till two. Jools was on, and we even popped over to the London Eye for the fireworks at midnight.

Highlights included The Dad hearing The Kooks announced and seeming genuinely concerned that it would be my Aunty Flora and Uncle Trevor (surname Cook) for a few moments. And his rash assumption that Amy Winehouse was an escort that Phil Jupitus had hired. And The Halliwell’s Game, which was a staple of my post-uni life in Leeds, but doesn’t work with parents. The basic idea is that each person takes a turn at reading the synopsis of a film from the bible Halliwell’s, and the others have to get the title. Simple? Not when each of us is trying to do ones from the others’ genre/era. The Dad thought I’d get anything with Michael Keaton in (for why?), and I rather naively assumed they’d know Faster Pussycat Kill Kill!, which they did not. But still, everything was back to normal at midnight, and I have to say I very much enjoyed The Dad’s rather sprightly chair-dancing (with a fat sack of cat on his knee no less) to I Don’t Feel Like Dancing. The Scissor Sisters Live was on this morning, and I was impressed by his only very slight frown at Jake Shears’ black rubber unitard. Still, it may have been the whisky talking, but it’s very definitely his “song of the year”. And he’s 70 this year, so go him.

The Mam, bless her, wheeled out a small buffet at about half ten, with three neat pieces of mince and potato pie each and a selection of dips and stuff. Naturally, within three minutes of clearing the table, me and The Dad were in the fridge, ensuring that there was no pie left “to go to waste” (fat chance). The Mam then informed the group where the Rennies are kept, although, bless her, she’d have been the only one who needed them, and we’d eaten almost half a pie each.

Half a pie, cider and Greeen Ginger: What could go wrong? I went to bed at two after watching The Big Fat Quiz of the Year for the fourth time, and a good-natured bicker with father over Noel Fielding. My hopes of marrying him seem remote, as The Dad maintains that were I to bring him to the house, “You wouldn’t get through the door”. Actually, I think this may be the way with every boyfriend I ever have again after past experiences. The Dad does not share my taste in men. But then again, neither does most of the rest of the world. Or me, for that matter. The weak and the sickly being, for the most part, the general theme. Hooray!

And so here I sit. It’s 15.17 by the clock, The Mam is reading in bed, The Dad has a cat once more au knee, and I’m unnecessarily wearing three pairs of pyjamas and my coat. Life, as they say, continues apace; as odd as ever, when considered. I’m certainly not going anywhere today. But tomorrow is another day. And one which I’m sure will be filled with me calling Telewest and asking them nicely for a free wireless router. If I can surf in bed by the end of the week, I may almost be able to go back to work without having a hissyfit. Almost.

Have a good day. Remember that resolutions are ridiculous oppurtunies for advertising execs to make you feel guilty. I’m going to download some industrial music. For no good reason. 2007 could be my year of goth. But I don’t think so. Orange is my favourite colour.

Laters

xx