Out Of My Tree

The dressing up like a girl was ’successful’ – people said I looked nice; I of course did not believe them and was an idiot about it which I totally got called on (in a nice way, I am going to try harder to not think I look like an elephant-whale now. Trying is what I shall be doing)

I danced like no one could see me and sang my heart out -luckily the music was so loud no one could hear me but I know I’m going to gte asked why I know all the words to ‘Hit The Road Jack’… God, I need to get back on stage again. Anyway.

There were balloons and hearts everywhere and it was so good to see two people so in love.

I have a love/ hate relationship with Weddings. I may have mentioned it before but I am a bit tipsy right now and can’t be bothered to go on a hunt through my old posts so if I am repeating myself skip the next bit.

Weddings (well, in this case Civil Partnership) are about hope and the two people involved have hope that the future will last forever and be full of happiness and bliss and peace and comfort and all those good good things. The Bride and Bride were so obviously in love and it brought a tear to my eye knowing how happy they must feel today.

The hating of weddings part is the same reason I hate marathon runners – it’s something I’ll never be able to do. I just don’t think my heart is built to let somebody in that far.

Anyway, my feet and legs didn’t hurt as much today – I was able to walk around in my heels and dance for extended periods of time without wanting to scream in pain or hobble like an old woman – that’s got to count for something, right?

So, right now I need a pint of water and all the sleep in the world.

Love you all.

Okay so one of the problems with being a lazy bitch tired all the time crap me is when a thing like a Friday comes up and you realise that the week is gone and you should make a real effort on your blog because, well, you’ve been a bit lax. A bit?! Talk about bloody understatement.

But because you love me (right?) you’re going to let it slide. You want a reason?

I used up all my energy today buying a handbag and a cream pashminetta for a reception tomorrow.

I shopped for pretty girl items . And what with buying a dress last week I’m really starting to worry that the hormones may have had a surprising effect.

If I start giggling, wear pink or buy Heat magazine. Shoot me.

A couple of times today I wanted to pull the plug on the rest of humanity. I’m sorry but you all had to go. Well okay, not you, you, you and you. You could stay if you got me a coffee and I’d let you stay anyway. But the rest of them? Gone.

I knew today was going to be ‘one of those’ when I got on the bus and saw that someone had been vomited on the floor. I had been feeling a little nauseous before I got on (my ‘baby’ 23 year old brother stayed home with dizzy sicky urghness) but had things to do so left the warmth and comfort of my bed. Not that sleep was a thing that was being had last night (a combination of stomach pain, my yowly cat inside the house, the neighbour’s beast animal outside the house and inconsiderate bastard teenagers coming home at an unforgivable time, shouting to their friends in the taxi before banging the door and then sitting on the wall outside the house (yes, I peeked) talking about ‘how fit Paul was’ (’so’ fit and they ’so would’)). So I suppose I knew today was going to be ‘one of those’ at 4 a.m.

Regardless.

I went to the Blackburn office today and spent 5 and a half hours there providing cover for the abandoned office. Everyone else was off sick, on holiday, or at appointments. It was a little… dull… but just because there was no one to talk to. Whenever anyone did walk in I was like a small puppy jumping up and begging for attention. I suppose the humping their legs was a bit much but it entertained me.

On the train on the way there I kept getting flashes of the nonsense I wrote yesterday and a potential ending has begun to formulate. I’m having a debate with myself about having a happy ending just to please myself or a more realistic one. Maybe I’ll write both and flip a coin. Let fate decide.

The train on the way home was odd. It was full so I was standing up which I don’t care about, but the motion and the relaxing music and even the latte I was drinking were making me sleepy. I’m sure I nodded off for a second, my eyes were so heavy. And it was sudden. Odd.

Am starting to consider employing someone to poke me in the arm once every 10 minutes just to make sure I stay awake. God, how much would that job suck?

I am having a clear-out of all the crap on my MacBook. I am going to be ruthless (ruthless dammit) and am going to delete all the programs I don’t use and just organize it all better. I realised it was time to do this when my ‘To Be Sorted’ folder got bigger than my ‘Sorted’ folders. It’s a whole late Spring-Clean housekeeping affair. I need to get some space back so that I can fill it with even more useless crap. I know, I know. I need a back-up drive or something… Yes. Eventually. Promise (that’s to myself)

Tomorrow I have to buy clothes. Horror. An outfit for a ‘do’ I’m going to on Saturday. I just know it’s going to one of tjose moments when I’ll want to be brave and wear something bright and cheerful but will come home with black.

Which reminds me – must take my heels with me for trying on! And now I feel all weird and girly.

Today was an absolutely pathetic day for me. I went to the doctor’s and have had my blood pressure medication doubled. W have to wait and see what this will do to my ‘mood’ before anything else can be added into the mix. So I am going to have to try and raise my mood some other way. I have been recommended Dong Quai and am giving it a go – it’s all worth a try! Am just going to accept the early morning blues and just take it as further proof that I really am not a morning person.

Anyway – this is the Writer’s Island post I have been blathering on about for a while. It’s a once a week flexing of the writing muscles triggered by a prompt. This week’s is The Return .

***

“We are experiencing technical difficulties. Mainline Trains is sorry for this inconvenience and thanks you for your patience.”

The forced cheery recorded voice did nothing to raise anyone’s spirits and the groans and mutterings only served to increase the air of desperation and despair in the carriage. The train manager rushed through – not looking panicked, but walking in such a way to convey an air of importance and urgency that no one confronted him this time. This felt like more than just leaves on the line or a shorted fuse.

Not that it mattered how long the journey took, it was getting there that counted. Two more stops. Two more planned stops before reaching the beginning and end. If only she could get the butterflies in her stomach under control. It was ridiculous feeling this way. Nothing was going to happen. She would get to the station, have a coffee, wait for her train back and leave. It was just as well she liked trains. Two changes, three hours and spending time with a lot of impatient strangers for a complete waste of time. There was no way she was going to achieve her objective.

If the train ever starts up again she would get off at the next stop and have a wander around. See somewhere she had never seen before – a bit of an adventure of cheer herself up and help forget this foolishness. As soon as the idea settled in her head she felt an immeasurable sadness overtake her. A sense of lesson not learnt bubbled in the void she had never filled because it didn’t exist to anyone but her.

She thought about what had started this as she sipped the Jack and Coke she had nostalgically bought earlier. It was starting to go warm which didn’t help stem the overwhelming flood of memories fueled by the list of reminders of sweet pain and drama. The letter that had fallen out of an old book, a photograph found, an old song on the radio, a man wearing his coat and then the damn news reports showing the same video over and over and over, Every item and repeat a body blow until she could barely stand.

She had tried writing it out but the words wouldn’t come, her old trick of singing it out but her voice was cracked and emotionless. She tried drinking but the alcohol just opened new holes in her head that apparently could not be closed again. Therapy had been tried many years before but she hadn’t been ready then and she still didn’t feel ready now. She was too tired to deal with all this in anyway but this. A grand and unforgettable act that would hopefully fly past the world’s nose unnoticed.

Fly past the world… Fly past the world… Fly past the world… And try not to think about the way things always end up. Ended up. Things will be different from now on, luck will change. Just so long as the train got to the station where she had spent so many of her happiest moments. Where she left her happiest moments.

It was ridiculous to think that by returning to the place where her dreams died she would find them again – like they would be floating in the ether waiting to pop back in and live again. She smiled as she remembered every nightmare of the last few years and how they would end with her full of light and warmth.

She just had to hold on a little longer and get there.

Being named on a list is always a dodgy thing but not when the list is for a I Love You This Much Award it’s a thing to celebrate. I will be doing my own list tomorrow, but for right now I just want to say thank you to Karl at Secondhand Tryptophan who will always have a special place in my special place and urge you to buy buy buy his wares and wears !

The reason I am putting my list off is well…

I finally wrote something.

No, it’s not here – I just want to spend some time getting it right before I put it in front of you and considering how late it is right now and that I have an early morning doctor’s appointment means I am leaving a half-assed post tonight.

Forgive me?

Well, I feel like nothing else in the world. I feel like I want to explode into a tiny sparkly pieces. I’ll feel better tomorrow.

It’s a leap year. I’m allowed a day off from Blog 365 .

It’s today.

I’m rebooting my brain and hoping for the best.

Right well. I have been a bit hopeless recently. The whole bleeding for 14 days and feeling like crap and wanting to kill everyone as my nerves are on fire and everyone in the whole world irritates me is over. I am now on a weird no mans land thing regarding my own personal medical hell. I forgot to refill my blood pressure medicine and with the bank holiday the two day waiting period it means the earliest I can collect it is Thursday (even though I have a doctors appointment on Wednesday (yes I love the NHS)) and even though I know it is my own fault and everything my body is doing including the rising blood pressure is my own doing because I am a lazy beached whale I still feel lie there is someone picking on me.

AND I am feeling guilt all the time about my blog and how I am not entertaining enough to keep the interest of anyone. I know it’s because I haven’t been out and about on the blogs recently and it’s not that you aren’t all fascinating and wonderful people (because you are) it’s just becasue I am so damned tired.

Yes, I know (I can hear my mum’s voice in my head right now) we are all tired and I should just suck it up and get on with it but I can’t. I am so down at the moment.

I have been transferring all the Scout crap off my computer and putting all my own stuff back on so I can carry around all my ‘beautiful’ memories but I’m serious when I say I have no idea why I am bothering with all of it.

I am finding it so damn hard to write anything here that doesn’t just sound like whinging. Oh, I know it’s my blog and I can cry if I want to but the traditionally English part of me is screaming at me to STFU and be polite and not discuss my feelings, or be overemotional or… oh God. I’m sorry.

I had something I was actually going to write about – what was it?

Oh yes.

I am so unbelievably horny at the moment.

During the whole enforced menstrual cycle thing I was feeling anything but… The day I finished (yesterday) this wave of want went over me and as I was sitting in the cinema I fantasised a little and wished I weighed about half what I weigh now, looked a lot less like me and a lot more like somebody good looking and could just go to a club, pick someone up and scratch that itch. Nope. Those days are well and truly behind me as well as being ridiculously dangerous.

But is this what I really want?

No.

As you know (or may not) the last time I felt love not alone wanted needed I don’t know how to describe it alive(?) has been playing on my mind a lot recently. It was 9 years ago and since then I have done everything in my power to make sure I don’t feel that again. The one time I have let myself believe turned out to be a huge mistake that nearly cost me my oldest friendship. I am a stupid person in life, but in love? There are pieces of toast with more common sense.

None of this is really adding up to a happy Bec at the moment. And yes, when I go to the doctors on Wednesday I will be begging her to help me stop feeling like this.

Oh how I wish Eternal Sunshine were real.

Anyway, a bit of lightness in an otherwise dark day. A meme. Stolen from Penelope at It’s Me… Penelope , who in turn stole it from Karl at Secondhand Trytophan who in turn stole it from Delmer at What’s a Delmer Look Like? – is this enough linkage?

The Rules: You highlight the things you can do and you leave in normal type the things you can’t. It’s that simple.

1. Give advice that matters in one sentence.
2. Tell if someone is lying. (I used to be able to but no more)
3. Take a photo.
4. Score a baseball game.
5. Name a book that matters.
6. Know at least one musical group as well as is possible.
7. Cook meat somewhere other than the grill.
8. Not monopolize the conversation.
9. Write a letter.
10. Buy a suit.
11. Swim three different strokes. (Being a beached whale means BEACHED)
12. Show respect without being a suck-up.
13. Throw a punch.
14. Chop down a tree.
15. Calculate square footage.
16. Tie a bow tie.
17. Make one drink, in large batches, very well.
18. Speak a foreign language.
19. Approach a woman out of his league. (I am changing to man and my – yes, or else I would be able to approach no man!)
20. Sew a button.
21. Argue with a European without getting xenophobic or insulting soccer.
22. Give a woman an orgasm so that he doesn ’t have to ask after it. (Even if I change the words round I still have no idea what this means)
23. Be loyal.
24. Know her poison, without standing there, pondering like a dope.
25. Drive an eightpenny nail into a treated two-by-four without thinking about it. (If this is an ordinairy nail then yes I can do this)
26. Cast a fishing rod without shrieking or sighing or otherwise admitting defeat.
27. Play gin with an old guy.
28. Play go fish with a kid.
29. Understand quantum physics well enough that he can accept that a quarter might, at some point, pass straight through the table when dropped.
30. Feign interest.
31. Make a bed.
32. Describe a glass of wine in one sentence without using the terms nutty, fruity, oaky , finish, or kick.
33. Hit a jump shot in pool.
34. Dress a wound.
35. Jump-start a car (without any drama). Change a flat tire (safely). Change the oil.
36. Make three different bets at a craps table.
37. Shuffle a deck of cards.
38. Tell a joke.
39. Know when to split his cards in blackjack.
40. Speak to an eight-year-old so he will hear.
41. Speak to a waiter so he will hear.
42. Talk to a dog so it will hear.
43. Install: a disposal, an electronic thermostat, or a lighting fixture without asking for help. (I’ve never tried a disposal but I’m reckoning it shouldn’t be all that hard. It’s all about RTFM)
44. Ask for help.
45. Break another man’s grip on his wrist.
46. Tell a woman’s dress size.
47. Recite one poem from memory.
48. Remove a stain .
49. Say no.
50. Fry an egg sunny-side up.
51. Build a campfire.
52. Step into a job no one wants to do .
53. Sometimes, kick some ass.
54. Break up a fight.
55. Point to the north at any time.
56. Create a play-list in which ten seemingly random songs provide a secret message to one person. (Ooo, podcast potentail here!)
57. Explain what a light-year is.
58. Avoid boredom.
59. Write a thank-you note.
60. Be brand loyal to at least one product.
61. Cook bacon.
62. Hold a baby. (can, yes, afraid of doing so? Yes.)
63. Deliver a eulogy. (one of the harder things I’ve ever had to do)
64. Know that Christopher Columbus was a son of a bitch.
65. Throw a baseball over-hand with some snap.
66. Throw a football with a tight spiral. (If you mean put some spin on a rugby ball – yes, if I think about it)
67. Shoot a 12-foot jump shot reliably.
68. Find his way out of the woods if lost. (Follow stream or sunlight – if both of those aren’t around… panic…)
69. Tie a knot.
70. Shake hands.
71. Iron a shirt. (yes, well? No)
72. Stock an emergency bag for the car
73. Caress a woman’s neck. (Can we change that to a man’s neck?)
74. Know some birds.
75. Negotiate a better price.

See there are some things I can do. Oh and No. 22. if this means what I think it means then I can do it… without changing the words.

So, the great and wonderful BBC decided to take my weekly special time with David Tennant away to show the Eurovision Song Contest (Russia won, UK came joint last – that’s what we get for entering someone who can’t even win The X Factor) so I was facing a night in slowly drowning in my own boredom.

Then I thought about what I was going to do last night (but my leg hurt so I didn’t go) – cinema. Couldn’t decide what I wanted to see so did a little tinkling with the times on the Odeon website and figured I could see two.

I really wanted to see Indiana Jones (I know reviews all over the shop say ‘hopeless’ but I’m a sucker for Spielberg) and got there just in time. Getting to see a good trailer beforehand really helps me with the buzziness. And the one today was for The Dark Knight which I now cannot wait for.

Turns out that was the most exciting thing I was going to see in that screen.

I mean, yes, there was all the elements that made the old ones great. The humour and the chases and the excitement and the rest of it were all there and they were the same as before. And that was the problem. It was all the same as before. This film would have been a winner if it had been released in the 80s – reviews would have been jumping about extolling the wonders of the Lucas/Spielberg team. And they would have been right. For then. But now, we, the great cinema going public want and demand a little more.

And that’s exactly what I got with the next film I saw – Iron Man.

Holy God, that was a good film. I knew it was going to be full of action and heavy bass lines and adrenaline but I never expected it to be funny. And I laughed and felt good and… I have no idea how close to the original it was and I don’t really care – it was a damn good experience. I am very glad I saw it. And Robert Downey Jr? Oh how I have always loved him in things and oh how I love him in this.

So much I will probably see it again during the week.

OH I FORGOT.

The many deaths part of the title – all the people I killed because they rustled, talked, moved, coughed and slurped during the film, trailers and adverts.

I feel a little like lying in a field under a tree today. I feel like staring at the sky letting the rain fall on my face while I listen to nothing but the world.

Tomorrow will be a good day.

So I guest-posted over at Kapgar’s today. Which is a pucker time all of it’s own, so go there and leave comments – make me seem popular – please!

Your favourite comment whore…

Bec

P.S. Writer’s Island post tomorrow. Swears on it, I do.