Glass Birds, Guns, and the ability to think entirely in abstract metaphors.

The shaman seeds. We are children playing with guns now. We can not even pretend to understand what we are doing. I just hope I've not pulled the trigger.

Intense, soul-baring, cosmos-communing agony/ecstasy and the most beautiful experience. Imagine knowing everything. Losing the ties which bind your soul and experiencing the entire universe. The human brain is possibly not built to process such input. Or possibly the brain is so much better than we thought, and can generate such things if given the proper stimuli. Imagine experiencing the death and decay of your body and knowing that this will come to pass, accepting this as inevitable as you swallow back the blood and feel your bones crumble. This is not frightening. Imagine being able to see everything between people. The intricate connections between each one of us and the universe. The thousand complex layers of motivation, ego, instinct, desire which drive us.

Know that inside everyone is a kernel of infinity.

What would happen if we dared to let it free?

We live now in fear. Our true selves are glass birds. They are so fragile, we keep them in cages inside fortresses of ego. We think that if they touch the world outside they will shatter.

Try it. Unlock the door and the glass bird will be feathers and warm beating heart and fly out into the world. It is eternal and ever changing.

You do not need to fight anymore.

We just went to the health centre to pick up some weed. On the way back we waved to a policeman.

Irony and Alienation

When people feel alienated from mainstream society, they tend to join subcultures. But now the subcultures have become so exclusive, with so many rules and ideals, that they are hilarious.

I have no natural home. I flutter around between the punks, goths, 'alternatives', 'normals', ravers, stoners, unique human beings. Each group is ironically the same. I laugh at them all, I can identify with them all, and therefore I belong nowhere. I'm a culture-whore, running from the Chemical Brothers to Jefferson Airplane to Rammstein to TaTu to the Velvet Underground. Lately I have mostly been listening to goth, EBM and electro. Nine Inch Nails being the only example that you will have heard of. I haven't even heard of the rest. Alva Novalis? Huh? But they're good. I found them in a 'Gothic Compliation' I downloaded. I love random musical discoveries.

Sometimes I just wish I belonged somewhere. It must be nice to be able to think of yourself as part of a defined group. Then you know what you're doing, what might be fun, where you belong. Animals survive by specialisation, so maybe being a generalist is a bad strategy. Creatures like rats are generalists, and everybody hates them despite their evolutionary success. General handymen are paid less than specialist artisans.

Being a 'generally everything' is not getting me anywhere. My life is utterly lacking in focus. My music collection is bizarre, my education piecemeal, and my wardrobe an utter mess. I feel like I'm not expressing myself anymore, not bothering to discriminate between 'me' and 'not for me, thanks'.

I'm too cowardly, or too lazy, to bother being me anymore. I've fucking dissipated. Fail, again.

Equal and Opposite Reaction

Every time of happiness is followed by a time of miserable payback.

This is really fucking annoying. I want to curl up in a corner and cry. Instead I have an essay to write, but every period of intelliegence is also followed by a period of dull stupidity, and my brain has lost its processing abilities.

So yes, I'm miserable, bored, and tired of this. I'm going to do really badly on this assignment, which is 20% of my course, and basically I fail. It doesn't help that I was woken up this morning by my dad turning on my bedroom light and shouting at me. I don't know why anybodyt think that its acceptable to do that to somebody. Manners?

Stupid fail. The worst thing is that I can see I'm being irrationally morose. I just have no idea how to stop being like this apart from waiting it out. This sucks so much. Not even the prospect of free cocaine is cheering me up. Those who know me will understand, that's a very bad sign.

I can't even make a decent blog post, let alone converstion, and as for a 1200 word essay on tradition and dissent, well, fuck off . Fucking stupid world, stupid bitch, fail. I feel so horrible that I should stay away from everbody, but that is not the sensible thing to do. I feel so aimless and pointless and worthless. Why now? I was doing everything right.

Camera Wish

Last night I was thinking how nice it would be to own a camera. Today I walked past the Oxfam shop to see their window display filled with old cameras. Proper style ones, which take film and have big chunky lenses and flash attachments and all sorts of arcane and fascinating equipment.
I could take photographs of all of the things I stare at. I could make whole insufferable albums of blurry abandoned buildings and half-obscured faces, empty shots of little interest to make people feel vaguely sad.

I wonder if I'd be any good at it. Probably end up throwing the camera at a wall after about 3 failed shots. Everything worth doing is so freaking difficult.

I've lapsed into worn-out melancholy, and it's not even midnight yet. Fucking idiot.

Thought Pattern

Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Chocolate. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Violence. Essay? Failure. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Bondage. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Kinky sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. (stupid brain) Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Damn. This is incredibly impractical. But hey, sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Fucking. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Fornication. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. (going to Hell) Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex. Sex.

Proper ladies do not think about sex quite this much.

But... sex?

Dread...

I am waiting for karma to kick my ass. Or drop a grand piano on my head. Maybe clawed hands will reach up through the floor and drag me down to Hell. Now that would be a real adventure.

I Took A Gamble

And I won.

I went on another random adventure. It was Burns' night, and I was all set for staying in, when a ridiculously attractive and incredibly cool guy added me on MSN. Had fun talking, eventually decided that I'd go to his house for drinks. We both lack possession of a sense of danger, and operate in a world where it is always a great idea to sleep at strangers' houses and invite random people home. Fire is fun to play with, and we're indestructible.

Turns out that he has a girlfriend and is trying very, very hard to be good. It also turns out that I am an excellent agent of moral decay.
However, as moral failures and bad people, we cannot be held responsible for our actions.

We played baccarat and I think I'm moving up in the world. I may be a harlot but fate was my guide. Moth, meet flame. It's all good fun, made even better by the terrible evilness of it all. Yes, I'm going to hell, and it's going to be a great party. Life is strange and oh so random these days. I keep trying to understand but it's futile. Just go with it, and don't think too much.

Woke up early and out into distant memories of mornings. Had breakfast in a cafe and read newspapers. Odd, the things I find novel. The gaps in my life experience, which are slowly filling up. Still feel like I'm playing catch-up sometimes.

But I digress. I still won.

In fact, I can scarcely comprehend the levels of winning which I have reached.

And Yet More Actual News

Everything is happening at once. I got my marks back on my last assignment today. So far my scores are 76%, 70%, and 81%. Not bad, but not really outstanding either. Although they could be seen as miraculous, considering I've done no work and write all of my essays in a drunken panic.

A Lucky Escape

Before I decided to go to Sheffield, my plan for Friday night was to go for a drive with the stoners. The car owner had been asking me to go for days, join them randomly driving about, hotboxing the car and generally smoking masses of weed.

Turns out that, last night, the cops stopped them. Driver got arrested for having a flick knife and fuckloads of weed, passengers got cautioned. I feel so fucking lucky now.

This also serves as a reminder of just how close to the wrong side of the law I am.

Sheffield

Now that I've had some food and sleep, I can write all about my adventures. It all began on Friday night, at about 5pm. I awoke from my 3 hours of sleep and checked Facebook, to find an invite to a demonstration in Sheffield. After not a lot of thought, I decided to go. So I packed my bag and set off, kept awake only by energy pills. Ioan met me at the train station and we went back to his house, via the vodka shop. We sat down and began to drink. Kayleigh arrived, in an incredibly drunken state, and then details become somewhat more fuzzy. Kayleigh went home to sleep, and a couple of Ioan's housemates came round.

I do realise that I am at best an obnoxious drunk. At worst, a violent liability. After half a bottle of vodka I managed to get hold of a kitchen knife, causing much panic and consternation, and also for some reason I ran away in just my socks, crying and laughing maniacally, and scaring the wandering students. Luckily I was found and bought home. It was all so rock'n'roll, drunken escapades, and waking up the next morning in another strange bed. I should really stop doing that. I admire the bravery of the guy. Or his clarity in seeing through my psychopath act. Or possibly his opportunism in seeing that I was really wasted. Anyway it was all good fun.

Waking up was a nice surprise in that I did not have a fatal hangover. Which is lucky really, because today was the actual mission. Me, Ioan and Kayleigh walked, with only Ioan having any idea where we were going, for many many miles to the green where the demonstration was starting. It was a nice walk. I would loveto do some photography in Sheffield actually, some of the old industrial buildings would make brilliant image. The march was from Ellesmere green to the middle of the city. I'd never been on a real protest before, and I will definitely be getting involved in more. We got placards and a police presence, closing roads and stopping traffic as Socialists, Anarchists, Muslims, trade unionists, pacifists, regular folk all marched together, chanting and waving banners. Marching done, speeches began over an almost non-existent PA system.

The situation in Gaza is horrific and criminal. 1.5 million people are crammed into a tiny area of land, under occupation, blockaded in by a massively superior military force. Human rights for these people are practically non-existent, they live in constant fear as Israel seems free to break international law as it likes. They bombed a school with white phosphorous, for fucks sake. Then they tried to deny it. When the UN exposed them, they then claimed that militants were firing on them from the position. Even if this was true (and I don't say it isn't possible), this presents a chilling insight into Israel's campaign. Children are regarded as acceptable collateral damage. This can never be justified.

After the speaking, I got the train back to Derby, utterly strung out with exhaustion. I staggered around Derby, wondering why my stomach hurt and then realising that I had not eaten anything for the past sixteen hours. Greggs to the rescue, nice warm food to revive me long enough to buy some drawing paper and get the bus home. What an awesome adventure I had. The past 24 hours had absolutely everything. I hereby pledge to have many more adventures like this.

And, dear reader, look up the situation in Gaza. Look up the situations around the world. Don't just ignore injustice. Take action!

Exhaustion

I am so tired that I am close to physically collapsing. 48 hours with 8 hours of sleep, lots of alcohol and high energy expenditure has drained all of my strength. A report on my adventures in Sheffield will have to wait.

Turns out that I do need sleep after all. Damn being a regular mortal.

Ioan (he's Welsh, he has an excuse for spelling his name like that) has just spent a long while searching for me. I ran away in a drunken rage. I suck at life. :)

Still Got It

Stayed up all night again. Still not sleepy. Having my own little morning rave. I think I ate and drank way too much sugar. Especially considering that alcohol is just a special kind of sugar. I also have the benefit of having woken up at 4pm yesterday. So plenty of energy suddenly requires burning. I am annoying everyone. I am so fucking awesome.

I'm playing electro with the bass whacked up, dancing around like a maniac. At least I'm now fully clothed. I think Transmetropolitan has got to me.

Actually, staying up all night for two consecutive nights reading all five years of Transmetropolitan is probably what's done it.
For those who don't know, its a comic/graphic novel, written by Warren Ellis. Fucking read it. It is the best thing I've read in many years. It was worth giving myself permanent insomnia for. It has mildly altered my view of reality. It's my new desktop background. I actually want a tattoo inspired by it. And no, I am not obsessed, just impressed.

Now where was I? Aside from the return of my fucking swearing problem. Actually I was not anywhere. There was no unifying theme or reason for this post.

Just: Hey, I'm alive! Who'd'a thought it?

Typical Night

Go out, go to the shop, buy a packet of fags and a 200ml bottle of the cheapest vodka going. Go to someone's house, smoke a couple of spliffs, have a few drinks, listen to Chemicl Brothers remixes and cheap electro, watch Family Guy, leave. Keep the shop workers company for a while, meet a couple of people, walk through town to a street, wait on the corner while some guy visits a dealer's house. Decide to go, sit on a bench pouring vodka into coke as police cruise by. Eat sweeties, drink. Walk. Friend's house. Eat leftover pizza, drink tea. Demand the return of my jeans. Get them, thank god. Get a phonecall, leave. Somoeone is walking home my way. Company is always good. Walk. Meet the guy, walk more, swigging vodka and coke, smoking. Compain about this town, the people in it. Find a traffic cone in a skip, steal it. Abandon it because those things are actually quite heavy. Make escape plans. Property development, university, mad get-rich-quick schemes. As rain starts to fall, light cigarettes from other cigarettes in a chain-smoking double act. Reach the conclusion that this town is shit. Every day, we figure out the same thing.

All the people here are bored. And instead of fixing things, creating something to do, they go out and get wasted. You're never more than ten minutes from a drug deal here, thirty on a really bad day. There are no jobs going, just people getting drunk, day in, day out. Nothing better to do. The world outside is nothing. The world inside, creativity, ambition, has long since died. All we have are our mad stoner schemes and drunken dreams. Everyone here is just a kid, grabbing at the nearest entertainment, the easiest relief from the mind-numbing tedium of living, and hang the consequences. Hang our brains and hang our livers, hang the fact that intelligent and loving human beings are rotting away here, dissolving into the acrid scum of small town wreckhead life.

Yes, I am feeling bitter. I know members of Mensa, musical geniuses, artistic talents, people who in another life would be out there right now, at university, in an apprenticeship, learning, living, experiencing the world, and all they do, like everyone else here, is sit around, play Xbox, smoke weed and occasionally bitch about the world. Hell, I may have just partially described myself, but at least I'm taking some courses, and will leave this town someday. I am considered an oddity and an outsider for this. I want more than a dead end retail job and a shitty rented flat. I want more than a bottle of vodka and some pills for the weekend. I think secretly, everyone does. But they don't dare to try, because they know it's too hard, it won't happen. Maybe I'm the stupid one here.

So, what am I doing? Continuing a random mental theme I've had going for a while, what the fuck am I doing with my life? Slumped unwashed in front of a laptop, slurping rum and apple, reeking of cigarette smoke, tapping out useless and hateful thoughts. I really should be a journalist.

That is pretty much what this is. Part gonzo self-reportage, part internal monologue, part harsh critique of small town life. Its good to keep my thoughts somewhere. One day this could be the inspiration for a book. One day... everything comes down to 'one day'. Then we go and get wasted and that day recedes ever further into the mists. It doesn't do to be too hopeful in a place like this.

They really are out to get you.

I just posted about how I feel paranoid this morning. Then I went to check my inbox.

There, I find an email, subject line: "Pip, Will you survive this month?"

Thanks a lot, ipoints. And no, however paranoid you make me, I still do not need home insurance or a credit card. Even if I get free points for it. Can you imagine me with a credit card?

I Hate Mornings

It is now 4pm, but as I have been awake for less than half an hour, this is my morning. We have no food suitable for first-thing eating, so my breakfast was a handful of Japanese rice crackers, a cow biscuit, and my patented DeathCoffee®. This is possibly contributing to the MASSIVE PARANOIA. I woke up to find unfamiliar number missed-calls on my phone, a mysterious package delivered to me, and the world in a generally unfriendly state. Or perhaps my mind is in an unfriendly state. The missed calls will be from my friend who always calls me from random peoples' phones as she has no credit, the package is something I ordered, and the unfriendliness consists mainly of my brother calling me a twat (and then getting hit by his girlfriend).

But still, I am entirely on edge. I should maybe finish my breakfast with whisky. Or codeine. Or some kind of tranquilisers. Ah well, at least I'm going out soon. That might help. Or make things massively worse, but never mind.

Reasons

I am not unhappy because of a traumatic past, or a chemical imbalance in my brain. It is not the fault of an oppressive capitalist society, or the lonliness endemic in a fractured society.

Oh, no. I am unhappy because I am a bad person. I am distrustful and suspicious of all other human. I frequently threaten violence. I am unintentionally but fundamentally dishonest. I am filled with the worst kinds of irony, cynicism and contempt. I have an unpredictable rage but sometimes I just sulk. I deliberately freeze out emotional relationships, preferring meaningless hedonism and easy detachment.

Maybe I was an asshole in a previous life, and now I'm in hell. But I was reborn with my misanthropy intact, thereby dooming me to fall ever downwards in the cycle. There are plenty of hells, you know.

Oh God.

My life is utterly meaningless. There is absolutely no point in me being alive.

Question 7 of Application Form

IMPORTANT

This area is intentionally blank, however please do not write in this area.

[ large beige space ]

I though I should write my autobiography. But it would be boring, cliched, and utterly unbelievable. Though I really should try, just so that I don't have an blur where my memories and life story should be. Hell, I couldn't even make a simple timeline of my life, let alone a coherent narrative.

Firefly and Stuff

I watched a few episodes today. Halfway through, my friend came round, sat herself down, ate all my sweets, spent the whole time playing on her phone and then declared it boring.
Also watched the Obama inauguration ceremony. It was kinda sweet how he fluffed up his swearing-in lines. I don't think he's going to be quite the messiah people make him out to be, but he can't be worse than Dubya.

I got my story up to 10,000 words after a couple of sleepless nights, but then had a massive deja vu delusion that I had already got a story to 10k but had lost it. Yes, my grip on reality is that tenuous. I also utterly hate my story. I would never want to read such utter dross. It's beyond embarrassing. I really can not write, at all. It just passes the time, I guess, so I carry on. I still have a whole bunch of ideas to ruin.

Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas

I actually read a book! After a long while of having a flea-like attention span, Fear and Loathing was the perfect way to ease my drug-traumatised brain back into the focus required for the printed word. This is a mad ride of a book, filled with quotables and brilliant scenes. It will have you laughing, riding with Raoul Duke and his attorney, gazing in disbelief at their debauched and outrageous antics, and musing with Thompson on the death of hippy idealism.

Really don't even attempt to count, let alone equal, the epic drug and consumption here. This book captures an insane session with defined skill. Gonzo indeed; you don't know which parts are Hunter S. Thompson's experiences, which are Raoul Duke's experiences, and which are their collective drug trips. This book is harsh, definitely outrageous, and perfectly matched by Ralph Steadman's illustrations.

I am not sure how I avoided reading Fear & Loathing for so long. Writing, drugs, trash and journalism are among my chief interests, and this definitely combines them all, in a deliciously dirty soup.

Desire

For some reason, I only want what I can't have, what will harm me, and what doesn't exist. No wonder I'm so morbid.

Detox Over

Well, I lasted 6 days. And on the seventh day, I got cider, and I saw that it was Good. And so I saith unto myself, bugger this abstinence for a lark, and so it was decreed, that alcohol is permitted to myself, and to all, without fear. So saith the Lordess.

My gran took us out to the Hanging Gate for Sunday lunch, it was sehr gut. See, we never get that kind of meal usually, so it is a rare treat rather than a traditional weekly staple. And I got some pear cider, because well, the self-inflicted ban on alcohol got really boring. And I need something to take my mind off the pain in my throat and chest. The Irish coffee was just a nice end to the meal.

Every time I speak, somebody either laughs or looks shocked. I have started losing my voice, and now sound like a cross between Joan Rivers and Kermit the Frog being slowly strangled.

Thomas Truax

This guy is genius. He has mad-scientist invented instruments, smartly brilliant lyrics, and is on youtube here.

By the way, that spinny thing in the left hand side of the video is a real instrument, called Sister Spinster. She's the drummer.

I know that my music tastes have got really weird lately. I'm branching out.

Online Anarchy

I sit in my comfortable home and think about post-apocalyptic anarchy and the possibility of creating a better world.

This guy has one solution to the problem.

Problem? You didn't realise that society is inherently flawed and certain to fall? That we live in an opressive and non-optimal system? That we, as an intelligent species, could do so much better than this?
Well, realise it. And then, do something about it. Yeah, I have spent far too long reading. But honestly, I don't know how so many people can live without questioning the structures of the world around them. There are so many changes which we could make for the better. "We must be the change we wish to see in the world" said Gandhi. Or, possibly, we must be the trouble we wish to see in the world. Yes, Gandhi and webcomics are the main building blocks of my political worldview.

This is all Steampunk's fault. Ergo it is all Abney Park's fault, because years of listening to their music somehow sent my thoughts sepia-toned and post-apocalyptic. I think Captain Robert would be pleased.

OMG OMG OMG! *swoons*

Abney Park are headlining Whitby Goth Weekend in April.

I must go. Or I will actually die.

Pressure?

So my dad bought me a 16GB flash drive. And gave it to me with the words 'This is for your course work.'

I already own a memory stick. This one is apparently exclusively for my Open University courses. So he expects me to create 16 gigabytes of scholarly work?

I don't do well under imaginary pressure. I haven't been able to paint since I got good quality paints for Christmas. Nothing I can do will ever be good enough to justify using expensive Windsor & Newton acrylic paints and synthetic filament brushes. But soon people are going to start asking questions and getting all offended because I haven't used my present. I can't force myself to paint though, or it all goes horribly wrong and I end up breaking everything.

Damn damn damn. This may be why I am not massively functional. If I can cause myself this much stress and utterly destroy my abilities just because of imaginary pressure, then how am I supposed to operate in the real world?

Tattoos!

Once again I am planning tattoos. The decision-making has progressed slightly. The current ideas are:

• An Om on my right wrist
• A pentacle somewhere. Still working on what kind
  
• A vine with leaves/flowers curling across my foot
  
• A frog. Possibly sitting on the vine.
• Another vine/fine line tribal design on my left ribs.
  
• A moomin!
  

Also they are opening a piercing studio here, so expect the impulse-bought metals to start appearing soon. But I will try to keep it classy. Face metal is no longer my thing.

I am irretrievably broken.
I guess I just have to work with what I've got.

Though it still makes me cry sometimes.

Another comic?

Sick

I am ill. Even iller than usual.

I am burning with fever, coughing my lungs up, and my head is about to explode. Or possibly my eyes will fall out. Everything in my body hurts. Stupid body,
It seems unfair that as soon as I stop my worst excesses, then I become sick. Where is my reward for virtue?

Meh. I can't sleep but I can't do anything useful or fun either. I never get this ill. And my mum refuses to buy me codeine. So yay, even more pain.

The Ultimate Flake-Out?

It is broadly termed 'Eastern Spirituality'. This covers all schools of Buddhism and Hinduism, as well as yoga, Ayurveda and generally anything involving incense. Westerners are allowed to pick and choose whichever aspects of these appeal to them. Generally chanting and prayer beads go down well, but rules of abstinence and anachronistic rules can be ignored.

As my spiritual path is most recently described as 'Extreme Hedge-Witch Shaman of the Universal Pantheon', then I think I am already as religiously flaky and/or schizophrenic as you can get. I have already combined

1. Paganism (a religious version of Pick'n'Mix)
2. Pantheism (all you can eat)
3. Shamanism (tonight we dine in the spirit world)
4. LaVeyan Satanism (we are all gods)
5. Hinduism (my heritage, of sorts, and also with Pick'n'Mix tendencies)
   
6. My own personal musings and an unhealthy dose of magical thinking.
7. Imaginary Buddhism
8. Voodoo. The cool version of Catholics.
   

So yes, maybe religion is the way forward. Fetch out the Nag Champa, prayer beads, oil lamps, chalices, candles, athames, statues, pentagrams, mantras, idols, and free sex (that last one is for the Satanism).

Product

Well, I stayed up till 6am last night, and as well as chatting about a ninja pirate army and writing notes on the invention of tradition, I thought about important stuff. The whole point of detoxing was to get my head together and move on in life, and maybe I will now make a start on this. I wrote pages of stuff about life, problems, and general rubbish. Re-reading it now makes me sad.

I still feel like I have done too much wrong, made too many mistakes. There is no way to fix this. I have fallen down a level, and I will never go back to being who I was. I am stuck on this level, and I will have to make it my home.

I have to realise that I will never make it anywhere. I won't be anything amazing, I won't change the world, I am nothing special. Most people are perfectly happy to live with those facts. I have to as well. No point dreaming of what will never happen. I can't live in dreams forever.

But then again, why bother living if I make no difference to this world? All I will ever get is a drudge job, and by the time I'm thirty my brain will be just as dull as every other small-town shelf stacker. Though I'll probably be dead by then anyway, so it doesn't matter.

I don't know why I'm bothering to detox any more, but now I've started, I don't want to quit. I'm trying not to add to my already epic list of failures.

?

Unknown Value.

I seem to have run out of words. I can no longer express myself in any way. The stuff in my head has no way out. It will just sit in there and ferment until I explode. Or maybe it will turn into thought-alcohol, and get my psyche really drunk.

What the fuck. Yeah. Just had to listen to Friend going on about love and drugs. The two things I want more than anything but can not have. She knows this. She doesn't care.

Nobody cares. Not really. I need to stop caring about their not caring. I need to sort myself out. Everything is difficult and weird. I don't know what I think or feel at all. This sucks.

Job?

Went to the Jobcentre today. I may soon be getting work of some kind. This is a scary thought. It will only be part time work anyway, probably only a temporary placement at first. I am not even capable of finding real work.

The detox is going fine. I haven't drunk alcohol, smoked, or taken any kind of drug except headache pills for, ooh, about 38 hours. I already want to cry. Alcohol was the gag which stopped my brain from screaming. Now its been taken away, I have to listen to it all the freaking time.

On the other hand, I just ate a penguin shaped lolly, so it can't be all bad. And no, I am not eating healthily. I think if I give up all of my vices at once I will actually die. For some reason I am incredibly tired now. I got sick of games and can't concentrate to do any useful work. In fact, I suck at everything today.

Stupid brain. Its such a distraction.

Oh No

I now have Twitter. This allows me to update people on what I am doing. It is, apparently, addictive. It's like an entire network of Facebook status updates.

Oh, how self obsessed can the internet generation get?

Well, I have connected my Twitter updates to my blog, via a happy little widget that lets everybody reading this see my status in the sidebar. I'm sure that at some point, the archives of information on my whereabouts and nefarious deeds are going to present some kind of privacy/security issue. Not that anybody reads this stuff now, but in the future, my millionaire fiance's father will hire a private investigator to check up on my past, and then everything will go hilariously wrong and I will lose my last chance of being rich.

However, random announcements on my life are worth sacrifices.

And so begins...

Starting at midnight, I will spend at least 10 days detoxing. I can not remember the last time I went a day without either drinking or smoking, so this seems to be a necessary measure. If I fail, stage and intervention or something.

I have 36 minutes left. I think I will go have a final drink.

[intermission]

Yummy, Baileys. And the matter of: what will I do with my time? I should have at least 50% more free time while I detox. Maybe I will finally get around to tidying up, and catching up on my course. Or maybe I will just finish Fallout 3 and Guitar Hero Legends as well as World Tour. No, I will do useful and fulfilling things. Like writing things that nobody will ever read, and painting things that nobody will ever see.

On the other hand I could just become an ascetic Zen hermit. What fun. I'm sure that in a couple of days I will be going mad, but things were starting to get a bit silly.

[end]

[credits]

Neurotic Brooding.

My scheduled activity for tonight was neurotic brooding about the past. However this plan was derailed by the fact that I got really stoned.
Have you ever tried being neurotic while stoned?

I just thought about the past and it made me sad. Its 4.12am and I've had 3 hours sleep in the past 40. I will honestly go to bed after I've written this. The haze is wearing off and the neuroses are now utterly inspired.

Eeeeeeeh :D

Friday was fun. Get tipsy, then have a stoned all-night comedy show and PS3 session. Yes, four random people from disparate lives, just being calm and getting along in a totally drama-free way.

Although you know your IQ has been depleted when it's a great novelty to find somebody who can actually talk about books.

It is Saturday afternoon, and I have not slept since Friday morning (or whenever I woke up). However I am still randomly happy, and drinking stupid amounts of Extra-Strong Milky Syrup of Caffeinated Death. No, the word 'coffee' does not do justice to what I drink.

And adding to the random happiness, I just got given two fluffy toy bunny rabbits which are incredibly cute and pastel coloured, with bows and silky soft fur and... *tranforms into bizarre Japanese-style child-woman with many fluffy toys*

"Fear Me!"

And anyway, moving on from this, this is what happens when I see in the dawn with a spliff. It creates Awesome, a tangible commodity which I own. At this very moment, people are making me a free bacon sandwich. The rest of my day will now be spend being so incredibly cool that I will not detail it here, lest you die of envy.

Webcomics

Are good.

xkcd is the beautiful geek in webcomic form. It gets a million bonus points for its many Firefly and Summer Glau references.

Cyanide and Happiness, you probably all know already. The name sums it up, really.

Questionable Content is a cute indie comic, with great characters and ongoing storylines.

Diesel Sweeties an '8-bit robot romance' is a new discovery in the realms of weirdness.

Scary Go Round is strange. There is lots of it too. It is possibly more random than I.

Strange Fiction has some of the best characters around, although it can be a little patchy. I love it anyway, its one of the first webcomics I read.

FreakAngels is just fucking beautiful. Great art, story, characters, and humour. A webcomic which I would willingly pay money to own in book form.

Right, the reason I have written this post is not simply for your amusement, (although I hope you love at least one of the links) but so I can remember which webcomics I like. Yes, I have a sucky memory. Feel free to add more links via the comment function, if it hasn't shrivelled up and died through lack of use.

Targeted Advertising Works!

Finally GoogleAds Adsense has shown something useful. Indeed, this is a downright awesome, yet slightly dubious product: The Pocket Shot!

This is possibly the first company to realise the huge untapped market of closet alcoholics out there.

And new blog adverts make a nice change from the ones for rehab and alcoholism treatment. Well, if you can't beat 'em, join 'em. Pocket shots all round!

Achievement!

Today, I stayed in and got stuff done. Finally, I have finished and sent off my assignments, with a day to spare. I don't think that I will do very well on either of them, but at least I've got them out of the way. I did my standard thing: panic for days, then sit down and prevaricate, and then finally get down to it, read the materials, and whack out a continuous stream of pretentious bollocks which may possibly bear some relation to the task. I have no idea what I actually wrote. It's almost like automatic writing. I don't do the work, I am merely the vessel for some bizarre spirit of undead faux-intellectualism.

Much more amusing than possessed essay writing is the fact that I finally managed to play Fallout 3, which is a great game. I usually have a 'no stupid gun game' policy, but this bears enough resemblance to Oblivion to get away with it, and has a pretty neat targeting system that allows messy decapitations galore. It is so satisfying to see somebody's head explode in a shower of blood, bone and brain fragments, as their body collapses, still spraying arcs of blood across the walls. Yes, antisocial gaming here we go. And yes, I have not got very far, but this looks to be almost as addictive as Oblivion, which has taken uncountable hours of my life so far. So yes, if I disappear for a while, I'm (probably) not dead, I'm just playing Xbox 360.

And now for more achievements: I got my books for my German course today. This is a course which follows on from high grade GCSE level, and will possibly be quite difficult. With an arts course, it is easy to wing it, you just write standard essay-garble and hope for the best, but with languages, if you don't know the grammar and vocabulary, then there's no way to hide it. So yes, I will have to actually do some work.

There were some other achievements somewhere too. Ah, yes. I have started successfully working my way through Guitar Hero World Tour on hard, which means that I now count myself as able to play it. There is way too much gaming related news today. I need to do some stuff in real life. Ah well, tomorrow I will be going outside, to see many people and get horrifically drunk to celebrate Tom's birthday. The insane five day weekend starts now.

Buddhist New Year

OK, following on from the Resolutions post... my New Year is now on the 11th Jan, this being the first full moon in January. The resolutions have already changed, become scaled down and generally more abstract.

• Treat your body well
• Treat your mind well
• Treat the external world and its inhabitants well
• Save up as much money as possible (without turning into a miserly recluse)
  

So yes, these are somewhat vague. And I have five days now to be utterly irresponsible and then... Oh fuck.

Crisis Dilemma and Doubt

Actually, in the physical world, there is no crisis. Everything is fine, don't worry.

In my mind, there are a million conflicting thoughts, ideas, and ambitions. This year has already been recognised as a time of 'sink or swim'. If I don't get my ass in gear by 2010, then chances are I will end up stuck in this town forever. I do like Belper, we've had some great times here, but I do not want it to be my only experience of life. I need to spread my wings, broaden my horizons, see the world, explore, experience new people and places.

However, it would be far too easy to get trapped here, turn into an ignorant local type, for whom Derby is the capital of the world and Nottingham is another country. How would this happen? Well, the persuasive action of unlimited drugs and a familiar environment. I've only just settled in to the town, got to know the dealers, local faces, etc. And seeing as most people left are those who didn't go to uni, this has narrowed my choice of companions down to workers and stoners. So I spend my days with wreckheads, with the workers joining in at eveings and weekends. I have basically unlimited and everlasting free time. (For a few more weeks at least).

The problem is that getting wrecked gets me nowhere but poorer and lazier. When it is your permanent state, then it stops being fun or interesting. However, if you stop being wrecked, then everything becomes much, much worse. Sensible and productive activity becomes very difficult, because you are always either too wrecked, hungover, coming down, or asleep.

This has somewhat spoiled my ambitions of doing really well in my course and then getting into uni. Assignments 2 and 3 are basically write-offs, as I did no work for two months. I do not regret this, as these were the two months before drugs and alcohol became dull and everyday occurences. However, I will probably regret it a lot later, when I get a really awful final grade. I still judge my worth by my grades; this has been drummed into my brain almost since birth, and sadly I have not been able to completely shake the habit.

Now my friend wants me to get a flat with her. However, she is a much greater wreckhead than I, and I predict that, in the very unlikely event of us actually being able to afford this, then it will quickly degenerate into a lovely drug den. This will be fun, but it will be expensive, and I will be even less able to work than I am now. However, I will gain some inependence (I really can't still be living at home when I'm twenty), and maybe this will actually give me the strength to organise other aspects of my life. Home is possibly too comfortable, and lets me forget that I will have to fend for myself.

However, I need to gain more willpower if this can succeed. I went out with Madma today, thinking that I would try and spend no money and smoke not even a cigarette. Instead, I spent £16 on pretty much fuck all of lasting value, and all of this due to me giving in to persuasion way too easily. I would have been able to quit smoking if it hadn't been for today. I think I will try again to quit. And I will quit buying in weed on random weekdays. It's too expensive, and I need to be saving as much money as possible for the future.

How do I get willpower? I'm just too nice to resist anyone asking me for stuff. I need strength, to realise that real friends will not resent me for not giving them free money.

I really don't know what to do with my life right now. I know that the basic answer is to carry on, finish my course, get my credits, then go to uni or get a job, but it is never that simple. There are so many details and principles to sort out as well. Too many decisions to make, and I have no idea what to do. I think I'll end up sitting at home, crying and hoping that it all goes away...

(Orthodox Church's) New Year's Resolutions

Well, my first set of official resolutions (#1 no random drinking) have all failed. But as it's only the 5th of January, I still have plenty of time to start again. And again, if I fail. I still have many more festivals which I can use as an excuse.

I found these on Earth Calendar: Epiphany (7th Jan), Balloon Ascension Day (9th), International Thankyou Day (11th), Orthodox New Year (14th), Azerbaijan's Day of Sorrow (20th), OK this is getting really silly. But that calendar is brilliant. Did you know, my birthday falls on Rosh Hashanah this year? That's the Jewish New Year, so even if I fail until then, I can still make a new start.

In fact, I am practically guaranteed to fail, as resolutions are stupid, and the way to make lasting changes is to gradually incorporate them into your life.
Still, I persist, as it makes me feel like I am becoming a better person. Newish Year/Nonspecific Festival's Resolutions:

• Not get wasted without good reason. And no, "I was bored" or "It was there" are not good reasons.
• Eat healthily. Meals of fruit, vegetables and protein. Refined sugars should not be the main part of my diet.
• Keep my room in a habitable state. If I have to transfer stuff to the bed or floor in order to walk/type/sleep, then it needs tidying.
  
• Take some kind of exercise each day. Guitar Hero and missions to town both count.
  
• Each day, make a little bit of time to draw, write, and read. Regrow a few braincells.
  

There may be more. Or, if they prove impossible, I may change some of them. You never know, by Towel Day (May 25th), I may have been so successful that there will be room for more.

Crazy Mood Swings

Ok, today has been too weird. I've managed to freak everyone out with my stupid moodswings. Hell, I even managed to freak my self out. Going from happy, to screaming, to breaking things, to crying on the floor, and then back again every hour or so is not normal.

I have got much better at Guitar Hero today, thanks to Maddy coming round to give me back my glasses. I left them at hers on New Year's Eve, and since then I've been wearing my old pair. They gave me awful headaches, but I was too lazy to walk across Belper to get the proper ones. Anyway, we ended up playing co-op all afternoon, me on bass (hard) and her on expert guitar, which is crazy.

Anyway, the actual news type thing is that there is a guy who apparently likes me, and who I should apparently get with. I'm just thrown off, can't make a proper decision, because I'm not sure what he wants. If its just sex, then that's all good. But if he wants a proper relationship, then I don't know what to do. Getting involved with him would be an act of violent cruelty; I am way too much of a mess to be with anyone. But on the other hand, I can't avoid relationships for the rest of my life. I don't want to die alone as a mad spinster bag lady.
Anyway, this guy, etc. Based on all evidence, then this will go horribly wrong. But I may as well try and at least make some friends, and see what happens. I have been avoiding people for the past three days and I am already feeling depressed, so obviously I need a social life. Although people are way too much effort...

Unfit For Human Habitation

Both myself and my room fit that description right now. I have some kind of chest infection, shortly to be exacerbated by cigarette smoke, and my brain is definitely being an utter bastard to live with right now. Fuck it, it's Saturday night, I could be out right now, receiving adoration and alcohols. Instead, I'm sat in my room, dying.
And as for my room... the amount of times I've tripped over the stuff covering the floor is uncountable. And the amount of times I've stood on something which should not be stood on, and the amount of times I've randomly thrown extra stuff onto the floor, is getting stupid. I can not see anything. My bed, desk, floor and chair have disappeared. Just to get to this laptop I had to move a monumental stack of rubbish and/or valuable stuff. I have to balance my plate of food on the typewriter, and leave my glass of rum and coke perilously close to my glasses of dirty paint-water and white spirit. Even my pet mouse has been living in darkness, her cage hidden under a stack of clothes. This is fucking squalid. And what am I doing? I'm sticking pictures on the walls. That way, nobody will look too closely at the floor.

Essay Avoidance

Yes, I am meant to be writing a reflective commentary, and then something about the Dalai Lama, and then, woe is me, I have to write a concise essay on poetry. Poetry about owls. And I have 5 days to write all this. I have done basically zero work on any of these chapters. And my brain is utterly fried due to spending the past couple of months in a state of drunken highness. And I am incredibly ill due to ignoring the fact that I was slightly under the weather and continuing to wander about in the cold getting wasted. So the slight cold has grown into the dreadful wreckhead flu. See, boys and girls, drugs are bad.

And why the fuck have so many people written poems about owls? And why in the name of all gods does anybody want me to compare these poems? I only just realised that I had to do this. I didn't look any further than the first page of the assignment to avoid panicking myself, but actually, this leads only to a nasty surprise. I think I may fail again.

New Year's Eve

Well, I am finally conscious enough to blog about it. I can't really remember the details, and everything else is slightly hit and miss with the accuracy, but hey, this has to be recorded. So, at 4 or 5pm I went to Maddy's house, where we got all tarted up. She has a corset! Jealous, me? Anyway, our first stop was a visit to certain dodgy individuals to obtain our supplies. I got the stars, wife got the green, and after a double-drop and a spliff, we were off.

Wearing my pointy stilettos, while she changed to flat shoes, we walked up Mill Lane. This was a slightly painful test of endurance, but the destination was deifinitely worth it: Tom's house. This is where things start to get very hazy. There were crates of beer, bottles and bottles of vodka, sambuca, Martini and Sours. There were mostly boys there; actually me and Mad were the only girls. And put a bunch of wreckhead guys in a room with that much alcohol, then things will always get stupid. Thankfully I avoided the 'vodka-sambuca-Martini-apple sours shots challenge, but the mixture of said drinks plus cherry sours in a jug could not be ignored. Neither could the cans that kept getting passed to me. There was a guy there who everybody had been telling me for weeks that he fancied me. I didn't believe them until we ended up making out. By this time I was well up on the pills, and then I washed down another with apple sours.

Then we walked back down Mill Lane (luckily by this time I was too fucked to feel pain) and everyone went to the pub, while I went to Jess & Alex's awesome party. I really don't remember much, but I think I got off with all my wives and probably was way too high to do anything remotely normal. There were glowsticks and champagne, and we possibly planned out our future careers in porn. After we were finally chucked out, I remember nothing until me, Anna and Kayl, along with everyone from earlier, ended up at a random party in the house across the drive from Muz's sister's place. There were lots of drugs, and lots of people from all over Belper, and also many that I have never seen before. John Lennon and evil black Spiderman were quite unexpected guests. I remember pills, and spliffs, and a dab of pure MDMA. I then remember slapping Ozzy, and then complimenting him on his glowing UV lip piercings, which confused him slightly. I also lost my scarf, which I am disproportionately upset about, and getting my bag utterly soaked with beer and covered in mud, which strangely doesn't bother me at all. Eventually, me, Kayleigh, Joe, Barney, wife, and a variety of other people ended up crashed on a sofa in a back room, surrounded by those more hardcore/drugged up/conscious than us.

Eventually, at about 9.30am, me and Kayl got a lift home from my mum, went up to my room and crashed out. For the next 12 hours, my pupils were unaturally huge. Try sitting at the dinner table in that state, trying to look inconspicuous and sober. Well, nobody has mentioned anything yet...

All in all, a good New Years Eve. For the first time in my entire life, I managed to celebrate the occasion properly. Hard core, dudes.