Here follows a prize winning limerick.
There was a Norwegian called Lars
Who'd meet Gary Numan in bars
His life had no meaning
A failure so seeming
Till he helped with the single called Cars
For this charming little ditty, my mate Dave and I recieved a jar of pickled herrings, and a jar of pickled gherkins. I think you can agree they were well deserved.
This is the most well received piece of writing I've been involved in to date.
Thursday, 4 February 2010
South Wales Fight Club anyone?
Not so much for the fighting, but then at least there might be something positive out my latest bout of insomnia. I think I could even hack the extremely grubby Newport version of Helena Bonham Carter that would be bound to show. Possibly dressed in pyjamas after buying some fags from Somerfield on her way over.
After some research* into insomnia, and how to beat it, I've discovered I've been making a number of mistakes.
Mistake #1 - oversleeping to make up for lack of sleep.
Like today for instance - not getting to sleep till 3 and staying in bed till 11. All this does is reset your body clock so tonight it'll be half three before I drop off.
Mistake #2 - going to bed early to make up for the lack of sleep aka my dad's traditional remedy of "Having an early night".
What this amounts to is lying in bed for six hours getting more and more pissed off at not being able to sleep until you go straight ahead and launch into mistake #3: the relaxation CD.
Mistake #3 - The relaxation/self hypnosis music
These generally take the form of gentle ocean noises or baroque music overlaid with the gentle sounds of someone talking in a soothing voice. This voice pauses from time to time - I guess the guy with the microphone is trying to contain his mirth that people are giving him $20 to listen to him ramble. Or perhaps he has to step away from the tape machine to help his assistant with another barrow load of cash.
I've discovered I'm not all that keen on these sleep tape voice over chappies. I don't think I've ever hated anyone in my life, but they are coming pretty close. Generally it's about fifteen minutes in, and then they utter the words, "By now you have fallen into a deep and relaxing sleep."
Well I have news for you Mr Sleep Hypnosis Man, with the stupid beard:
NO I FUCKING AIN'T.
And you know why I'm not in a deep and relaxing sleep?
It's because I'm lying in bed listening to somebody talking.
He's telling me to lie back and let my scalp go limp. That's right - my scalp. That thin layer of skin over the top of my skull, the one with the very few, and very thin muscles. The body part that I tend not have much in the way of concsious control over.
I don't know how to relax my cheek muscles either, or my lips. And thank you, but no, I'd rather not relax my intestines - pretty sure if I did then a short time later I'd be very far from relaxed.
My new insomnia beating technique
I'm going to try this one tonight. It's going to involve me lying in bed. Perhaps I'll do some deep breathing. Then a little light music, or the gentle sounds of the trilling of waves over a sandy beach. The sun is warm, and beaming down on me. It's filling me with its healing rays. And I am relaxed. And I am calm.
Then the sound of vigorous splashing breaks the calm, and there's a thumping noise, like feet in expensive shoes drumming on wet sand. As I float gently off into a deep sleep, feeling relaxed and calm, I smile at the irony that Mr Sleep Hypnosis Man didn't seem all that relaxed and calm as he went off for the big sleep.
*Research = Google
After some research* into insomnia, and how to beat it, I've discovered I've been making a number of mistakes.
Mistake #1 - oversleeping to make up for lack of sleep.
Like today for instance - not getting to sleep till 3 and staying in bed till 11. All this does is reset your body clock so tonight it'll be half three before I drop off.
Mistake #2 - going to bed early to make up for the lack of sleep aka my dad's traditional remedy of "Having an early night".
What this amounts to is lying in bed for six hours getting more and more pissed off at not being able to sleep until you go straight ahead and launch into mistake #3: the relaxation CD.
Mistake #3 - The relaxation/self hypnosis music
These generally take the form of gentle ocean noises or baroque music overlaid with the gentle sounds of someone talking in a soothing voice. This voice pauses from time to time - I guess the guy with the microphone is trying to contain his mirth that people are giving him $20 to listen to him ramble. Or perhaps he has to step away from the tape machine to help his assistant with another barrow load of cash.
I've discovered I'm not all that keen on these sleep tape voice over chappies. I don't think I've ever hated anyone in my life, but they are coming pretty close. Generally it's about fifteen minutes in, and then they utter the words, "By now you have fallen into a deep and relaxing sleep."
Well I have news for you Mr Sleep Hypnosis Man, with the stupid beard:
NO I FUCKING AIN'T.
And you know why I'm not in a deep and relaxing sleep?
It's because I'm lying in bed listening to somebody talking.
He's telling me to lie back and let my scalp go limp. That's right - my scalp. That thin layer of skin over the top of my skull, the one with the very few, and very thin muscles. The body part that I tend not have much in the way of concsious control over.
I don't know how to relax my cheek muscles either, or my lips. And thank you, but no, I'd rather not relax my intestines - pretty sure if I did then a short time later I'd be very far from relaxed.
My new insomnia beating technique
I'm going to try this one tonight. It's going to involve me lying in bed. Perhaps I'll do some deep breathing. Then a little light music, or the gentle sounds of the trilling of waves over a sandy beach. The sun is warm, and beaming down on me. It's filling me with its healing rays. And I am relaxed. And I am calm.
Then the sound of vigorous splashing breaks the calm, and there's a thumping noise, like feet in expensive shoes drumming on wet sand. As I float gently off into a deep sleep, feeling relaxed and calm, I smile at the irony that Mr Sleep Hypnosis Man didn't seem all that relaxed and calm as he went off for the big sleep.
*Research = Google
Friday, 22 January 2010
Right, that's enough procrastinating. Time to work...after this blog post
It's Friday night.
It's 10 PM.
At night. On a Friday.
And I'm at my desk. Not still, but again.
See, the thing is this. I've spent 26 hours at my desk this week. And my biggest accomplishment of the week was that I hoovered the stairs, and I used the attachment with the little brush, and the flat one. And I emptied the bag.
Not that it needed emptying, but I did it anyway.
It's not writer's block - I can hear the words, I can even get them written down. And that's the problem. It all seems so dull. It all seems so pointless.
Basically it all seems a bit crap.
So my new approach is to eschew the pleasures of an early night and get back to it first thing in the morning, and instead I'm going to embrace the pleasures of some whiskey, on the rocks, and write something.
And it might be shit, but I don't care. Right now I'm envying the day last week when I wrote 3700 words and pretty soon realised it was for a scene I didn't need. But at least I'd written something.
Or I might get drunk and post to facebook.
It's 10 PM.
At night. On a Friday.
And I'm at my desk. Not still, but again.
See, the thing is this. I've spent 26 hours at my desk this week. And my biggest accomplishment of the week was that I hoovered the stairs, and I used the attachment with the little brush, and the flat one. And I emptied the bag.
Not that it needed emptying, but I did it anyway.
It's not writer's block - I can hear the words, I can even get them written down. And that's the problem. It all seems so dull. It all seems so pointless.
Basically it all seems a bit crap.
So my new approach is to eschew the pleasures of an early night and get back to it first thing in the morning, and instead I'm going to embrace the pleasures of some whiskey, on the rocks, and write something.
And it might be shit, but I don't care. Right now I'm envying the day last week when I wrote 3700 words and pretty soon realised it was for a scene I didn't need. But at least I'd written something.
Or I might get drunk and post to facebook.
Friday, 15 January 2010
Pets, pets, wonderful pets
Tonight I plan to watch A Fish Called Wanda.
It's something of a reward.
Over 12,000 words have been pinned, squirming to the page. Over half of these aren't the words: "Oh Jesus, Jesus, buggery piece of shit this is bollocks I'm writing".
I'm led to believe this is positive.
I've been swimming.
I've been kicked in the head by a small child and his plastic float.
I didn't sideswipe that car that zoomed up the dedicated right hand lane and forced his way into the backed up ahead only lane. And it was a BMW. And it had one of those "I'm poor with contraceptives" cards in the back window.
I have (mentally) given a troglodyte armed with trolley a severe verbal tongue bashing.
I haven't made any crank phones calls to Aneka Rice. Or Zora Suleman.
I've even written a blog post (this one counts).
But the top class comedy movie, A Fish Called Wanda, starring one third of Monty Python, about a fish, called Wanda, and with poor old animal loving Ken causing several small, yappy dogs to snuff it, isn't a reward for all this.
This film, where one small, yappy dog is crushed under a big heavy box, where another small, yappy dog is savaged by a Doberman Pincher, and where the final small, yappy dog is also killed*, all of this small, yappy dog slaying is for none of the above.
Next door have a small, yappy dog.
And it yaps whenever that concept physicists known as time is passing.
It's been yapping all fucking day.
At one point I shouted, "Shut up," quite loudly. Had someone been in the room next to my office they might have heard me.
Watching A Fish Called Wanda with its three glorious scenes of small, yappy dogs yapping no more is going to be so sweet.
* I'll know how the third yappy dog snuffs it about two hours. I cannot wait.
I've also written the phrase "small, yappy dog" so many times that now I don't know if there should be a comma in there or not.
It's something of a reward.
Over 12,000 words have been pinned, squirming to the page. Over half of these aren't the words: "Oh Jesus, Jesus, buggery piece of shit this is bollocks I'm writing".
I'm led to believe this is positive.
I've been swimming.
I've been kicked in the head by a small child and his plastic float.
I didn't sideswipe that car that zoomed up the dedicated right hand lane and forced his way into the backed up ahead only lane. And it was a BMW. And it had one of those "I'm poor with contraceptives" cards in the back window.
I have (mentally) given a troglodyte armed with trolley a severe verbal tongue bashing.
I haven't made any crank phones calls to Aneka Rice. Or Zora Suleman.
I've even written a blog post (this one counts).
But the top class comedy movie, A Fish Called Wanda, starring one third of Monty Python, about a fish, called Wanda, and with poor old animal loving Ken causing several small, yappy dogs to snuff it, isn't a reward for all this.
This film, where one small, yappy dog is crushed under a big heavy box, where another small, yappy dog is savaged by a Doberman Pincher, and where the final small, yappy dog is also killed*, all of this small, yappy dog slaying is for none of the above.
Next door have a small, yappy dog.
And it yaps whenever that concept physicists known as time is passing.
It's been yapping all fucking day.
At one point I shouted, "Shut up," quite loudly. Had someone been in the room next to my office they might have heard me.
Watching A Fish Called Wanda with its three glorious scenes of small, yappy dogs yapping no more is going to be so sweet.
* I'll know how the third yappy dog snuffs it about two hours. I cannot wait.
I've also written the phrase "small, yappy dog" so many times that now I don't know if there should be a comma in there or not.
Sunday, 10 January 2010
Avatar - the movie
This was great. I loved it.
So what if it was a basic story that's been done a hundred times before. So what if the bad guys might as well have been running around with swastikas and kicking puppies.
It was a basic story, done well.
The visuals are stunning.
I was impressed by the whiteness of some of the marine's whites.
The music was atmospheric, though strangely familiar. I left the theatre humming "My heart will go on"...
My only criticisms were:
So what if it was a basic story that's been done a hundred times before. So what if the bad guys might as well have been running around with swastikas and kicking puppies.
It was a basic story, done well.
The visuals are stunning.
I was impressed by the whiteness of some of the marine's whites.
The music was atmospheric, though strangely familiar. I left the theatre humming "My heart will go on"...
My only criticisms were:
- The 3D - not really sure what it added (aside from 30% colour loss)
- The IMAX at the Cardiff Bay Odeon is too small to be a real IMAX screen. It's a fake IMAX. It might have the super high resolution of an IMAX but you don't sit right up close and you don't have to move your head to see everything like in a real IMAX.
Though the highlight of the evening had to be the drunk man on the train who spent the whole journey chatting up a student maths teacher. With real verve and wit he moved on to the tricky subject of personal relationships, because what's the point in the chat up if she's taken?
"Do you ever have trouble getting boyfriends?" he said.
"I've got a girlfriend," she said.
It took him a while to work this out, and the his jaw hit his chest.
Eight chapters in, and still going!
At the beginning of last November I finally got fed up with trying to inch chapter 17 along to its oh so hard to find conclusion, and go back to the beginning and fix all the stuff I knew I'd done wrong first time around.
So I added the heading "Second Draft" and started back on chapter 1.
Just over two months later I've just finished chapter 8, and some of it doesn't seem half bad. Going to work on half good next I think.
There is hope though. Earlier I read a couple of chapters from later on in the book, and I actually laughed out loud. A quiet laugh, but it's still a laugh. And though it's my own stuff and this might lead to the accusation of bias I think I've avoided that - normally I read my stuff and cringe, so things are looking up!
Not enough stats lately, so here's some:
- Word count: 110,858
- Word count of stuff I've cut: 53,107
- Number of times I've written chapter one: 7
- Version of chapter one is currently being used: 1
- Time wasted blogging: 0!
- Time wasted on Fallout 3: Um...
Sunday, 20 December 2009
The CAI is awesome!
No, not the Kai, but the CAI.
For those of you who have never watched Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, the Kai I'm talking about was Kai Winn. A character so odious and slimy she could slip between the microscopic gaps in an hermetically sealed air lock. I would actually wish for a transporter accident episode just in the hope she would be welded into a metal bulkhead to give her some compassion and warmth.
But since this isn't Wikipedia it's not the place for in depth discussion of odious Star Trek characters.
The CAI is the Cardiff Arts Institute, and it is AWESOME!
Not because of the funky music room cunningly arranged so that only a handful of people (aka the band) could see and hear the music.
Not because of the hard chairs.
Not even because of the single wash basin in the toilet with four taps (call me strange but I don't really care to be thigh to thigh when washing my hands with a man who has just been touching his penis. Call me hetero if you will).
Nope. It's awesome because of one thing.
They have Lego on the walls.
In case it's not immediately obvious what that means I'll trying to phrase it in another way.
They have Lego on the walls.
Look, here's a picture.
Go here for some more pictures of lego on walls.
If the camera on my phone wasn't so poor I'd have taken a better picture. Perhaps of the phrase "big balls" that someone had put up there. Or of one of the many phallic symbols.
They have flat lego bases glued to the walls and an ample brick supply to suit any need.
How cool is that? A place you can go to listen to some music, have a drink, and play with lego!
In fact the atmosphere is so cool it's actually chilly. I looked up from my recreation of a Mark 7 Sea King Helicopter with fully functioning rotor blades at my date and I actually think I froze a little.
I think I recovered well by letting that drunk guy in the street hug me - it showed my sensitive side.
I showed my humourous side this morning in reply to a text asking if I'd escaped from the crazy hugging man. I said he might have been crazy but he cooked a mean breakfast.
She's been laughing so much at that she hasn't been able to reply.
For those of you who have never watched Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, the Kai I'm talking about was Kai Winn. A character so odious and slimy she could slip between the microscopic gaps in an hermetically sealed air lock. I would actually wish for a transporter accident episode just in the hope she would be welded into a metal bulkhead to give her some compassion and warmth.
But since this isn't Wikipedia it's not the place for in depth discussion of odious Star Trek characters.
The CAI is the Cardiff Arts Institute, and it is AWESOME!
Not because of the funky music room cunningly arranged so that only a handful of people (aka the band) could see and hear the music.
Not because of the hard chairs.
Not even because of the single wash basin in the toilet with four taps (call me strange but I don't really care to be thigh to thigh when washing my hands with a man who has just been touching his penis. Call me hetero if you will).
Nope. It's awesome because of one thing.
They have Lego on the walls.
In case it's not immediately obvious what that means I'll trying to phrase it in another way.
They have Lego on the walls.
Look, here's a picture.
Go here for some more pictures of lego on walls.
If the camera on my phone wasn't so poor I'd have taken a better picture. Perhaps of the phrase "big balls" that someone had put up there. Or of one of the many phallic symbols.
They have flat lego bases glued to the walls and an ample brick supply to suit any need.
How cool is that? A place you can go to listen to some music, have a drink, and play with lego!
In fact the atmosphere is so cool it's actually chilly. I looked up from my recreation of a Mark 7 Sea King Helicopter with fully functioning rotor blades at my date and I actually think I froze a little.
I think I recovered well by letting that drunk guy in the street hug me - it showed my sensitive side.
I showed my humourous side this morning in reply to a text asking if I'd escaped from the crazy hugging man. I said he might have been crazy but he cooked a mean breakfast.
She's been laughing so much at that she hasn't been able to reply.
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