Monday, 30 March 2009
A Farewell To My Taste In Music
Today's two main problems - I have been up since 8am cleaning the house (very distressed as I had to throw my bathmat out - it was getting impossible to clean) and I've spent this morning listening to Journey.
Sunday, 29 March 2009
Symptoms
So here I am. It's a lovely sunny Sunday afternoon and I'm sitting in my flat eating my dinner, contemplating cleaning and preparing to go back up to those north-eastern wastelands to stay with my mum over Easter. I will, of course, be getting the train, because I can't drive. Even if I could drive, I wouldn't be able to afford to drive. Even if I could afford to drive, I'd still crash the car somehow, or lock myself out.
In America, it seems really unusual to not be able to drive when you're in your twenties, but I think it's quite common over here. My inability to drive rarely manifests itself as a symptom of my quarter-life crisis.
One thing that does make me go "OH GOD WHY IS MY LIFE NOT WHERE IT SHOULD BE?!" is my diary. I have two diaries - one little one for every day appointments and what-not and one work one, that never gets used. It is the latter that causes me distress. It's pale pink with a lovely fuzzy image of a puppy on the front, and it looks lovely and sweet, but it's evil.
On the first two pages, there's a section called Personal Memoranda and another called Useful Contacts. They include spaces for useful information, such as:
Passport number (my passport expired about five years ago)
National Insurance number (aha! Well, I've definitely got one of these, if only by virtue of the fact that I'm over 16, and I even know where my card is!)
Vehicle data (nope)
Credit Card information (giving me a credit card would be dangerous)
Savings Account number (one of those things I keep meaning to get but failing to do so)
Current Account number (I definitely have one of these, although judging by the state of it, that's not necessarily a good thing)
And the useful contacts section includes spaces for me to put the number of my accountant, my alarm company (my only contact with any alarm company was when the fire alarm went off in my house and a strange little man who was visiting the flat downstairs and had set the alarm off in the first place put me on the phone to someone and made me figure it all out before slamming the door in my face), building society, gym, office, solicitor - very useful, but I have none of these things! Instead of worrying that I don't have BMW or a widescreen television, should I be worrying thatI don't have an accountant or a solicitor? It's like every time I open my diary (very rarely, as I have nothing to put in it), I feel failure staring me in the face. Hidden behind those big, melted chocolate puppy dog eyes is pure evil. The words in my diary are like those of a disappointed pushy parent.
Another thing that has concerned me lately is that I have found myself buying teabags. I have never been a tea drinker, but I have found myself gratefully accepting cuppas at friends' houses, not just to be polite, but because I actually want a cup of tea. And the next thing I know, I'm in Tesco buying teabags, not for guests, but for myself.
I've also taken to reading those little catalogue supplement things you get in magazines. What are they even called? They come in the TV magazine and the weekly women's magazines, which I'm ashamed to admit are the only magazines I read on a regular basis. These little supplements sometimes advertise special wide-fitting shoes, lap-trays with farmyard scenes and paintings of flowers on their wipe-clean surfaces and hideous blankets with distressed looking Westies on them. I read these ones partly to laugh at the things they sell, and also partly to have a strange, and very, very secret desire to actually BUY some of them. Why?! The other kind is less concerning - the supplements that also have the wide-fitting shoes, but also have clothes. Not amazing clothes, just nice, everyday clothes in a wide range of colours. This wouldn't be something to be concerned about, had I not just suggested 'nice, everyday clothes in a wide range of colours' was a good thing.
Oh, also, I now get excited about towels, bedding and kitchen utensils.
That is what my life has become and I have nothing to show for it except an impressive collection of cheap and uncomfortable shoes and a lot of spatulas.
In America, it seems really unusual to not be able to drive when you're in your twenties, but I think it's quite common over here. My inability to drive rarely manifests itself as a symptom of my quarter-life crisis.
One thing that does make me go "OH GOD WHY IS MY LIFE NOT WHERE IT SHOULD BE?!" is my diary. I have two diaries - one little one for every day appointments and what-not and one work one, that never gets used. It is the latter that causes me distress. It's pale pink with a lovely fuzzy image of a puppy on the front, and it looks lovely and sweet, but it's evil.
On the first two pages, there's a section called Personal Memoranda and another called Useful Contacts. They include spaces for useful information, such as:
Passport number (my passport expired about five years ago)
National Insurance number (aha! Well, I've definitely got one of these, if only by virtue of the fact that I'm over 16, and I even know where my card is!)
Vehicle data (nope)
Credit Card information (giving me a credit card would be dangerous)
Savings Account number (one of those things I keep meaning to get but failing to do so)
Current Account number (I definitely have one of these, although judging by the state of it, that's not necessarily a good thing)
And the useful contacts section includes spaces for me to put the number of my accountant, my alarm company (my only contact with any alarm company was when the fire alarm went off in my house and a strange little man who was visiting the flat downstairs and had set the alarm off in the first place put me on the phone to someone and made me figure it all out before slamming the door in my face), building society, gym, office, solicitor - very useful, but I have none of these things! Instead of worrying that I don't have BMW or a widescreen television, should I be worrying thatI don't have an accountant or a solicitor? It's like every time I open my diary (very rarely, as I have nothing to put in it), I feel failure staring me in the face. Hidden behind those big, melted chocolate puppy dog eyes is pure evil. The words in my diary are like those of a disappointed pushy parent.
Another thing that has concerned me lately is that I have found myself buying teabags. I have never been a tea drinker, but I have found myself gratefully accepting cuppas at friends' houses, not just to be polite, but because I actually want a cup of tea. And the next thing I know, I'm in Tesco buying teabags, not for guests, but for myself.
I've also taken to reading those little catalogue supplement things you get in magazines. What are they even called? They come in the TV magazine and the weekly women's magazines, which I'm ashamed to admit are the only magazines I read on a regular basis. These little supplements sometimes advertise special wide-fitting shoes, lap-trays with farmyard scenes and paintings of flowers on their wipe-clean surfaces and hideous blankets with distressed looking Westies on them. I read these ones partly to laugh at the things they sell, and also partly to have a strange, and very, very secret desire to actually BUY some of them. Why?! The other kind is less concerning - the supplements that also have the wide-fitting shoes, but also have clothes. Not amazing clothes, just nice, everyday clothes in a wide range of colours. This wouldn't be something to be concerned about, had I not just suggested 'nice, everyday clothes in a wide range of colours' was a good thing.
Oh, also, I now get excited about towels, bedding and kitchen utensils.
That is what my life has become and I have nothing to show for it except an impressive collection of cheap and uncomfortable shoes and a lot of spatulas.
The Roaring Twenties
That's what they called the decade. Well, so far, I'm all of 22 and it seems like I've spent the entire last two years roaring - but not in a good way.
I am a student suffering the misfortune of graduating in 2009, struggling to find a job, somewhere to live and some sort of healthy relationship, all in between deadlines.
On March 5th, I lost an election. Had I won, I would have had a full-time job for the next year and everything would be fine - until, of course, I started this whole process again then. That evening, I drank a lot of wine, cried, fell down the stairs and stumbled home with messy hair and smudged makeup, where I proceeded to fall into bed. I sobbed my way through an Alternative Media lecture the next day and watched, almost surprised, as the world carried on turning around me.
As it tends to do, after a few days of occasional crying fits, lots of moping and a less than thrilling shift in a call centre, life went on as usual. My mum sent me some chocolate through the post, which was nice.
So now, here I am, almost a month later, at 3:22am, scouring the internet 'looking for' and 'applying for' jobs, which really translates to blogging and drinking alone. I make sure just to buy Lambrini - I can't waste my money on proper wine. It's quite strange that it's 3:22am, considering we had no 1am-1:59am. I think the first sign of aging is complaining that you've lost an hour of sleep when the clocks go forward, and tragically, I have begun to do this.
The second sign, quite possibly, is this insane broodiness I've been feeling lately. I suspect this has been sparked by all the old school friends I've added on Facebook - at least half of them have kids now. The sensible part of me knows that I don't want a baby yet - after all, what on earth would I do with it? I'd probably accidentally put it in the washing machine and just hope it got nice and dry on the spin cycle, because I don't have a tumble dryer and I can hardly drape it over the clothes horse.
This blog exists for me to rant and ramble about the every day goings on - interviews, deadlines, graduation, and all the silly little thoughts that go through my head.
The 'quarter-life crisis' is apparently enough of a phenomonen to have its own Wikipedia page and over 200 thousand results on Google, so I'm here to document mine.
I am a student suffering the misfortune of graduating in 2009, struggling to find a job, somewhere to live and some sort of healthy relationship, all in between deadlines.
On March 5th, I lost an election. Had I won, I would have had a full-time job for the next year and everything would be fine - until, of course, I started this whole process again then. That evening, I drank a lot of wine, cried, fell down the stairs and stumbled home with messy hair and smudged makeup, where I proceeded to fall into bed. I sobbed my way through an Alternative Media lecture the next day and watched, almost surprised, as the world carried on turning around me.
As it tends to do, after a few days of occasional crying fits, lots of moping and a less than thrilling shift in a call centre, life went on as usual. My mum sent me some chocolate through the post, which was nice.
So now, here I am, almost a month later, at 3:22am, scouring the internet 'looking for' and 'applying for' jobs, which really translates to blogging and drinking alone. I make sure just to buy Lambrini - I can't waste my money on proper wine. It's quite strange that it's 3:22am, considering we had no 1am-1:59am. I think the first sign of aging is complaining that you've lost an hour of sleep when the clocks go forward, and tragically, I have begun to do this.
The second sign, quite possibly, is this insane broodiness I've been feeling lately. I suspect this has been sparked by all the old school friends I've added on Facebook - at least half of them have kids now. The sensible part of me knows that I don't want a baby yet - after all, what on earth would I do with it? I'd probably accidentally put it in the washing machine and just hope it got nice and dry on the spin cycle, because I don't have a tumble dryer and I can hardly drape it over the clothes horse.
This blog exists for me to rant and ramble about the every day goings on - interviews, deadlines, graduation, and all the silly little thoughts that go through my head.
The 'quarter-life crisis' is apparently enough of a phenomonen to have its own Wikipedia page and over 200 thousand results on Google, so I'm here to document mine.
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