I think if you have been reading this blog for even just three months, you will have gathered that 2006 has been pretty much the annus horriblus of this 26 year stint on Earth. But still, let’s reflect with Xine’s Lucky Tens…

 

Ten People of the Year (for good or bad):

 

Emma (fucked off, but in a good way)

Kels (always. And now a TEACHER)

Beth (Gay Best Friend)

Gillian (emotional support, lager and lime, music etc)

Wayne (for services to events, and occasionally something to laugh off)

The Suz (because we piss ourselves at stupid crap. Like me saying "errrrr, Soozaaaan, naaah". Exactly...

Joseph Quinn (has lightsabre will travel)

Chris Hall (rallying as cure-all)

Jonjo (moved back to Newc and annoyingly made Buckfast good again)

Darren (accompanied me on my first holiday for a hundred years, but then did something bad.)

 

Ten Events of the Year That Made Me Who I Am Today etc etc:

 

1) Going to Rome – I went on holiday. I had fun. I liked the statues.

2) Walking out of work in May – Nothing says “fuck you” to a boss like taking three days off in April and not going back for a year. Still, I’ve got two more months at the Mags, so at least I’m not mooching.

3) Maundy Thursday – I got drunk and smashed my head off a wall after watching Wayne and Susan rub the whole fucking thing in all day. I now occasionally find this funny, so don’t worry.

4) Getting published – but not having anything to show for it (I did have a party though, for which I’m glad, just for the fact that I got pissed for free.)

5) The Red Rooms May 2006 – I met Joe, and he makes me laugh and takes me to see The Tempest with Patrick Stewart and doesn’t expect me to be sensible.

6) Tyne Tees Interview – Oh yes, I am “Impoverished Graduate”. And the crew took me for food afterwards and we talked about Hammer Horror. It was the best sort of nice day out.

7) Going to Kels in August – Always a total joy. Only this time, with Firefly and lots of wine.

8) Raz’s wedding – which was perfect and gave me two great days to be with my old housemates who rule.

9) Walsingham – Me and The Mam go on one crazy weekend. To a shrine. Pilgrimage exactly what was needed to exorcise ghosts of Maunday Thursday. And bought glow-in-dark Mary, so even better than that.

10) BFEmma going to Korea – on her leaving night out, I spent £100 on wine for the two of us. It was bloody worth it though, because I miss the daft git now. She came home for Christmas. I don’t think she’ll mind me telling you it went a bit wrong and we spent most of the time drunk and in tears.

 

Music of the Year:

 

CSS – one of those first hear love it moments.

Shit Disco – Happiness.

A lot of The Smiths – Miserablism and dancing in the living room.

Cat Stevens – Still like being wrapped in cotton wool.

Anything WWE-related - ….er….

Paul Oakenfold – Ready Steady Go. Ideal for hoovering / bus journeys / imagining revenge

Serenity OST – I like it.

Beth Brennan – International Woman of Mystery. Because it’s mine very own theme tune!

Imogen Heap – My Woman of the Year.

Led Zep – Stairway to Heaven. Reminds me of The Percy.

 

Films I liked:

 

Superman Returns: (See below)

Mirrormask

Hollywoodland – Ben Affleck is good!

Capote – possibly best film I saw all year.

Silent Hill – Sue me.

The Producers

Jarhead

Er… Can’t think of any more released this year that I saw and liked.

Oh, Pirates 2 was ok.

 

TV I liked:

 

Dr Who – deepest joy.

Torchwood – silly, but so much fun.

Heston Blumenthal In Search of Perfection – he vacuum packs chocolate with a hoover so I don’t have to.

The Hairy Bikers – saved my life.

[adult swim] – because Aqua Teen Hunger Force makes me wee my pants.

Big Brother – to my chagrin.

Not Going Out – worryingly, I’ve had more random dirty dreams about Lee Mack this year than anyone else. I blame the medication.

Neighbours – being off work sparks major obsession last seen in 1989.

Mythbusters – I want to be a Mythbuster. My dream job.

Top Gear – naturally.

 

Ten Celebrity Crushes That Didn’t Go Away:

 

Russell Brand

David Tennant

Noel Fielding

Ioan Gruffud

Triple H

Simon Reeve

Russell Crowe

Brandon Routh

Neil Gaiman

Adam Baldwin

 

Ten Books Which May Not Have Come Out This Year But That I Read And Loved:

 

The Requiem Shark (Nicholas Griffin) – Pirates are good.

Anansi Boys (Neil Gaiman) – My copy is signed. w00t.

Romanitas (Sophia McDougal) – Fab.

The Stand (Stephen King) – I reckon it’s his best. And had me fraught.

Red Carpets and Other Banana Skins (Rupert Everett) – Essential and hilarious to anyone interested in the absurdities of Hollywood.

The Time Traveller’s Wife (Audrey Niffenegger) – Bloody Richard and Judy somehow manage to get it right again.

The English Passengers (Matthew Kneale) – Looks a bit dry but is actually the funniest book I read all year. And it’s nautical and therefore good.

The Historian (Elizabeth Kostova) – Again, Dick and Jude’s researchers show their good taste.

Stardust (Neil Gaiman) – I’d been showing OBFKels a picture of a funny village called Wall I’d been to. I bought this book the next day. Guess where it’s set(ish)??

Master and Commander (Patrick O’Brian) – Now, I love my nautical novels, and this is very good.

 

Ten Things I Couldn’t Have Done Without:

 

1) Cigarettes. Sad but true.

2) The Independent

3) Teleport TV

4) My laptop

5) The black dog

6) The Mam and The Dad

7) The Percy Arms

8) Books

9) Time off work

10) Coffee

 

 

Ten Things I Want to Try in 2007

 

1) A new haircut

2) Cuba

3) Not drinking for three months

4) Smartening myself up

5) Driving

6) Dating

7) Being a Guide leader

8) Finishing The Novel

9) Pet-ownership

10) Working at the Crown again. For a week or so.

 

Ten Hopes for 2007

 

1) I need more cash. For the purposes of having a life.

2) I’d like to get a better job. Possibly in the field of making things up.

3) I’d like to remain single for a while.

4) And then I’d like to have a satisfying relationship with David Tennant.

5) I’d like to move home and put down some tentative roots.

6) I should lose three stone. I should do this by giving up booze, which I really want to do but no-one will let me J.

7) I lost my sense of humour down the back of the sofa this year, I require it back now.

8) I wouldn’t mind my tonsils out.

9) A happy, healthy family.

10) That my friends and I remain happy and bright, like something out of a Noel Coward play.

 

 

So there we have it. Ten lists of ten things that sum up this year and my hopes for the next. I’m of the opinion that 2007 has to be better that 2006, because this year has been so systematically poor. (I’m staying in for New Year just in case something falls on my head or I get glassed by charvs or something in the dying minutes of the year…) Obviously it hasn’t been all bad, but hey, when my DVD player broke two days ago after I’d bought myself a DVD as a present for the first time in five months, it was hard to see the good.

If you read The Mam’s space, you’ll know by now that my Aunty Clare died the week before Christmas, and as she was one of my best-loved relatives, it wasn’t the best end to the year. Or perhaps it was entirely fitting, and she knew it was time to go before a new start in 2007. I don’t know. But either way, she’s the lucky one, and she bloody deserves her place in heaven and possibly a big crown. I wasn’t going to make excuses for the lapse in time since my last entry, so I’ll draw a veil over that.

Christmas Day was fun, I’ll give it that, although when The Mam handed me and The Dad a glass of wine at 11am, I knew it wasn’t going to be a day of any great stress. Well, the three of us, 24 crackers, a bottle of whiskey and as many films as we could possibly watch was exactly what the doctor ordered, to be precise. And thank God for it, because the next few days were fairly traumatic due to a major crisis in the life of a best mate. It’s no joy when all you can do is offer the same advice that failed to make you feel better when your last crisis occurred. Needless to say, I sat and listened and tried to be cheerful, but really, it’s all you can do not to run out and strangle the people who hurt your friends.

Oh well, at midnight, my three month SAD will kick in and I’ll be looking forward to the first 6am sunrise whilst holding a kitchen knife and a packet of Citalopram. Again. Bloody festive period… Why do I only get into it on Christmas Eve when it’s already almost over?

 

I’m going to go and not get dressed to go out. Good luck if you are: you’re braver than I. Don’t let 2006 bite you on the ass as it finally fucks off. Have fun, because you all (ALL) deserve it.

Tonight I will be wearing a greyhound and drinking cider and green ginger (I haven’t got the heart to tell The Mam that the last time I drank cider and green ginger (September), I played football in the house, danced solidly for two hours and puked in the bin. I’ve come a long way since I used to drink it in the Gibside when I was 17. (Oh God, that was ten years ago. I’m a weaker drunk now than I was when I was still regularly attending school assemblies and wearing a house captain badge.) She’ll find out in good time.

 

See you next year.

Laters.

xx

 

 

 

 

 

 

All in all, it must be a Saturday because I have a hangover.

 

I also have deep, deep fear because I'm meeting my mate Caroline (and The Suz, whom I can vaguely remember but haven't seen since well before Princess Diana wasn't murdered by the Royal Family, the Prime Minister had been interviewed under caution by the police, and the ugly one from Busted actually became popular) at The Metrocentre™ tomorrow for coffees and I suddenly realized the other day that this is possibly the most sure-fire suicide mission since Rod Hull's TV "went a bit funny". Obviously The Metrocentre™ can ordinarily be compared to something akin to something like Dante’s seventh circle of Hell, complete with seven-headed teenage mothers eating the souls of any innocent out for coffees as though they were so many Greggs pasties, and a river of bile and sputum flowing copiously past Woolworths and Claire’s accessories. But naturally when Santa’s already packing up his sleigh and the elves are dreaming of a few weeks off when they can get down to the sales, it’s an absolute fucking abyss of heaving, irate bodies, each fingering the edges of the Elvis plate they bought at Collectibles and wondering if it’ll be enough to take off a few heads.

It is also, more disturbingly, the last place that I should ever hope to hide in the knowledge that I have done absolutely no Christmas Shopping and am therefore to be considered in the same social-leper-esque bracket as Jade Goody, Myra Hyndley and the bloke who chatted me up last night. I have twenty pounds with which to pay for all my bus fares this week, go for two lunches with friends (why call me at Christmas when I haven’t seen you for a year? I am corporeal every other month of the year, and far more agreeable to the notion of spending money…), and buy Christmas presents for my parents. At least I’m an only child and incapable of having a meaningful relationship: I might spend three hundred and fifty days a year weeping myself to sleep over the fact that the only company I will have in my old age will be feline, but it does so cut down on costs… I was heartened by a trip to the pound shop the other day. I think I can persuade The Dad in the next week that he needs a twelve pack of batteries.

In all honesty, this month has been one long trip to shit-creek as regards to money. My mobile was cut off due to an “administrative error” at O2, and when reactivated, bounced due to the fact that I’d assumed it was paid and taken out my last forty quid. This, in turn, caused two paid referral fees to magically appear (no such luck with there ever being an admin error on one of them cheeky fuckers) and as a result, pushing me even further over my overdraft so that my Telewest direct debit didn’t come through. So, Imagine the fun when I return home from work to find that my mobile is off, I have no landline or internet, and that I have to spend the evening watching bloody Eastenders because I haven’t used Terrestrial TV since I was like, 4 and didn’t know what else anything was. Then, when I call Telewest, I’m informed that I owe them £117 because the previous month’s payment never went through as they requested it fifteen days late and I always pay on the first. And about three minutes after I call The Mam, sniveling, and claiming that at least things can’t get any worse, I find the NPower bill that I’ve been chasing up since October last year on the mat and its for…. Wait for it…. £321.

I went to the bank yesterday and I have 71p. No word of a lie.

So The Mam lent me aforementioned twenner, and really, I should have simply put it in an envelope and said “surprise” when I gave it back to her, because that’s what I have to buy their presents.

I am a pikey, penniless, probably soon homeless, old bag, rapidly choking on her own bile and considering the implications of taking vows just to get a decent feed each day. If I ever, EVER have to eat cous cous with nothing in it again, I will embark on a killing spree and I will probably be victim number one.

 

Still, you’ve got to look on the bright side, eh? I’m in the process of selling every I have that’s worth over a fiver on ebay, and writing a GCSE essay for a mate for twenty quid. If I get anything less than a B, it shall only serve to increase my ever-growing suspicion that going back to do my Masters degree was possibly the biggest waste of time and money ever. Apart from the fact that it was a proper laugh, that is. Oh, and that it gives me something to keep secret when trying to impress men.

 

It has to be said, however, that it may be quite tricky for me to rustle up anything above twenty pence for most of the stuff I own, bearing in mind that almost everything I own came from Poundland’s Wakefield branch. Hologrammatic stickers with walruses on, anyone? Or perhaps a scratchfoil Last Supper in a plastic frame? No? then how about my collection of BVM scapulas? They’re very popular in Ireland, I hear. Or would be if any bugger could tell me what the fuck they actually are.

God, I can sympathize with Mark when he says that he makes Marvin the Paranoid Android sound cheerful.

 

All of which isn’t to say that I’m not failing to see the funny side. In actual fact, the worse things get, the more ridiculous it all seems. This year, whilst being generally acknowledged by everyone who knows me as being the one that would have either killed me or put me in a really foul mood, has not been without its laughs. After all, who else but me could have a birthday party that no one could come to, and out of those that did, no one could stay longer than an hour? Or go to Rome and have a really nice time till they get to the airport to come home and have to pay a hundred quid to fly due to an administrative error (pesky things seem to plague me), and then wake up the next day with the left leg of an average African Elephant and be diagnosed with blood poisoning from a blister? Say what I like about 2006, it’s been memorable. And if I ever have to suffer dementia and live in a world of endless memories from a long-distant past, I bet you ten quid (if I have it…) it’ll be a world of the flat, the boy, the book and the job that robbed me of the first marble I had to lose all those years before.

 

Hell, I’ll probably win the lottery and meet some bearded lecturer next year.

 

Or perhaps I’ll always be a miserable cunt.

 

My doctor says I’m special.

 

Actually, if elephant-legged paupers with emotional barriers are your thing, and you have a beard, give me a call. I might even get my scapulas out…

  

Laters.

xx

 

 

 

I give you......

 

 

Envelopes, baaaad.

 

 

In other news: lost eight and a half pounds at fat club this week. So you see, eating three kilos of cous cous a week can help you to lose weight.

I have shed, in one week, this:

 

 

That's the fish, not the man with the happy face.

As the loverly Joe says; if I carry on like this, I'll have to remove the "Not" from the blog title.

 

Bringing us once again, to this:

 

 

 

Which I only include because it's been a while since this chimeric freak last graced our screens. And considering I'm unable to withstand still using Paint, I like her.

 

Right, off to bed to prepare myself for another day of going "oh, I'll do that" and ending up with 400 letters to fold and post. I'm not complaining, my job has always involved stuff like that. I'm whingeing.

 

It's different.

 

Laters.

xx

 

PS: I understand this to be the world's most pointless blog entry. So we're going to have a contest. If anyone can tell me where I got my blog subheader from off the top of their head, I will love them forever and ever.

Be warned, however, as this will involve trips to watch the wrestling.

 

x 

So, it's Sunday and The Mam's PC is moving slower than a granny in the cat food aisle at Asda. Business as usual.

 

I'm re-reading Allen Carr because I have a pain just below my ribcage and no money. And apparently, giving up the tabs can be enjoyable. Oh, as if! Still, it's worth a damn good go, but the sad fact is, that because I smoke roll-ups, I'll only be saving about a tenner a week. Still, I went the whole weeend without drinking, including going out for a drink with Joe on Friday, so the savings might be made through giving up the booze instead. I've definitely been drinking too much this year; whether it's through stress or just plain old balls-to-the-wall "fuck it". I think maybe the reason that I feel like shite 99% of the time might have something to do with the fact that I regularly fill my body with heinous toxins. Just guessing, like. But everyone I know who drinks or smokes (or worse) is generally miserable or ill. I'm very proud to say that I gave up a gloriously hedonistic lifestyle a couple of years back, and without sounding like someone's maiden aunt, not taking drugs anymore has definitely made me a nicer person to be around. The problem with so many drugs now is that they are pretty much acceptable on the average Friday night out, and although I'm only 26, when I was at uni if you took coke to go to the pub, you were either a) tragic or b) fucking mental. And not mental in the interesting way: In the "twitching like an electrified ferret by the slot machines in a white tracksuit" way. Now, every Tom Dick and Harry is on it to go down to their local 90s theme bar, and yeah, it feels pretty fucking great, but really... so does smack. Apparently.

Anyway (and sorry The Mam, but I need to get this shit off my chest), I once took ketamine at a house party and distinctly remember not being shocked or even interested by the fact that one of my housemates was on all-fours thinking he was a moo-cow. If that happened now, I'd be pre-dialling 999 and The sodding Samaritans. And yes, I realise that I may be square, but I've done it pretty much all the way and everyone who has can see how utterly pathetic the whole thing is. I mean, I once took three pills to watch Critters in the house, and when it wasn't as good as I thought it would be, smoked three hits of salvia, thought  was in a tunnel for an hour and had to smoke almost an ounce of weed to regain some semblance of normality. In case that doesn't sound ridiculous enough, I reapeat again, it was to watch Critters. In the house. On a Wednesday.

Obviously, this isn't Notlikeparis' House of Rehab, but when you think fucking about with drugs is cool just because (and I will carry this sad, sad fact to my grave) you think it's what writers should do 'cos you've read The Subterraneans, then remember that Kerouac died young, Thompson shot himself, and Dylan Thomas suffered "an alcoholic insult to the brain". In fact, fuck it, go here and marvel that you will probably be able to think of a load more who aren't even listed.

Dunno why I need to write about this today: just some stuff I've been thinking about recently. (I was really miserable the other day and got to thinking about aforementioned crazy phase. I was wondering if it was that which has lead to me being such a miserable specimen and concluded that it probably was.)

In some ways I miss all that stuff, and I can't bring myself to regret it, but like going out to student nights without a coat, there has to be a point where you outgrow it all and move on. I was lucky enough to do that when I was still only 23. I must have been pretty mature about it. Hell, I'm not even mature enough to give up serious binge drinking at the age of 26. Hopefully I'll get there before 40. And if I can give up onion rings before I'm 75, I'm definitely on the right track. 

 

Mmm.... onion rings...

 

The Mam forced (asked) me to go with her to Slimming World, and despite the fact that I'd have rather paid an emo kid to give me style tips, I went. The first week, I thought, would be a fairly easy task.

No.

Slimming World appears to work by asking you to follow the most complex diet plan ever invented, and thereby have no time to eat, ever. Still, I'm an intelligent person and had got the hang by day three. Unfortunately, as you will know if you have ever been to a fatclub, the group's individual weight-losses are read out in the post-weighing session, and naturally, this being an ever-so-slightly competetive environment, I launched into full on militant diet mode, snatching contraband bread from The Mam's hands in Asda and lecturing the poor woman to death on the benefits of red days and butternut squash. Still, I lost over half a stone in two weeks, until I went out with Gillian the night before my third weigh-in and had six pints and a kebab.

Five pound weight gain. Fucksticks.

So this week has been hardcore, and I'm going for another little half stone sticker which to me seems more like the VC or something. Because I'm poor, I can't afford the seventy five portions or whatever of fruit and veg per week, so I'm dancing happily round my kitchen in praise of a diet that says I can eat as much cous cous and pasta as I like and still lose weight. God bless you, passata and mullerlights. You know there's a light at the end of the tunnel when there's a raspberry and cranberry mullerlight in the fridge. I'm not quite ready for beige cardies and a fat arse yet. By this time next year I'll be scaring off even more men that usual, because I'll be 5'11" and THIN. I mean, I can just about get away with now, even with les armes du jambon , but hey; tall, slim and massive boobs? Men will be fleeing from me in terror like never before. Get in.*

 

Right, my hair won't wash itself (more's the pity), and seeing as Sundays are now actual school-nights again, it needs to be done. Apropos to work, I never thought I'd say it, but I'm actually sort of looking forward to going back to the Crown in March. I don't know what's more worrying: My re-emergent facism manifesting itself in a diet, or being acquiescent about going back to the place what made me wibble. It will be one year since I began to shake on the job. Time to move on and get on with it, methinks.

 

Laters.

xx

 

*The plan here is to possibly use my man-horrifying powers to eradicate all useless pussies with inferiority complexes before they take out their neuroses on me or my mates. This may seem unduly harsh, but it's happened to me and every one of my friends at some point, and if I ever have to dumb down again, it will kill me. And I mean, with like, crosses for eyes and holding a white lily and everything. I'm sick of men assuming that because I'm not super trendy and skinny that I'm somehow homely or subordinate. Because they usually get a shock when I'm not. This method will save time and ball-sacks all round. Although we almost have enough scrotal skin between us all to fashion a lampshade, so it's not all bad.

 

Oh, and by the way, I'm joking.