Less work.
And so I have the interview and they seem interested and they say they'll phone this afternoon and then they don't and I couln't reach them on the phone and I'm supposed to be starting properly at the shop on Saturday and if I'm not gonna be avaliable when I said I was gonna be avaliable then I really should let them know but I don't know if I've got this other job or not and rghghghghghghhh.
Friday, November 22, 2002
Wednesday, November 20, 2002
More work.
And on the heels of the shop job, an electronics firm is making encouraging noises over the phone. Yes, you read that right. Electronics. I was just bracing myself for the inevitable rejection letter addressed to Mr. Colin, but instead I'm being offered the chance of a job. A job. By an electronics firm. And they didn't call me Colin, either! Yay! I've to pop round in the morning for form-filling and so forth, but it looks like the thing is in the bag.
I need a job. I'm bored. This lady-of-leisure thing looks good on paper, but it gets old realllly fast.
And on the heels of the shop job, an electronics firm is making encouraging noises over the phone. Yes, you read that right. Electronics. I was just bracing myself for the inevitable rejection letter addressed to Mr. Colin, but instead I'm being offered the chance of a job. A job. By an electronics firm. And they didn't call me Colin, either! Yay! I've to pop round in the morning for form-filling and so forth, but it looks like the thing is in the bag.
I need a job. I'm bored. This lady-of-leisure thing looks good on paper, but it gets old realllly fast.
Monday, November 18, 2002
Squash: a sociopolitical overview.
As well as offering one the opportunity to buy soda-bread in the shop instead of having to make it or move back in with my Mum, the munificent retail outlets of Cork have also introduced me to MiWadi. Despite tasting a lot like other sorts of squash, Mi Wadi has Mi Wadi on the label instead of Kia Ora or Robinsons. It offers the discerning squash-drinker all the delights of squash without the embarrassment of fake tennis playing associations associated with Robinsons, or the slightly possibly a bit racist and actually rather disturbing thing that Kia Ora has going on.
They don't have Mi Wadi back home, you know. But we do have more flavours of supermarket own brand squash than in Cork so Nyahh.
As well as offering one the opportunity to buy soda-bread in the shop instead of having to make it or move back in with my Mum, the munificent retail outlets of Cork have also introduced me to MiWadi. Despite tasting a lot like other sorts of squash, Mi Wadi has Mi Wadi on the label instead of Kia Ora or Robinsons. It offers the discerning squash-drinker all the delights of squash without the embarrassment of fake tennis playing associations associated with Robinsons, or the slightly possibly a bit racist and actually rather disturbing thing that Kia Ora has going on.
They don't have Mi Wadi back home, you know. But we do have more flavours of supermarket own brand squash than in Cork so Nyahh.
Work.
Looks like I've finally got a job. The cornershop wants me to start tomorrow morning. Which is, y'know, good and all. Yay.
However, it sort of brought home to that if I'm not careful everything could still grind to a halt, move or no move. The way forward is not to reapeat past mistakes, or to dwell on them, but to learn from them. People have to play to their strengths. The TEFL course will be a good start, and there's a Reiki practitoner nearby who sometimes runs courses. Whilst I'm committed to a writing career, it would be foolish not to explore possible sidelines. Healing might prove suitable.
Looks like I've finally got a job. The cornershop wants me to start tomorrow morning. Which is, y'know, good and all. Yay.
However, it sort of brought home to that if I'm not careful everything could still grind to a halt, move or no move. The way forward is not to reapeat past mistakes, or to dwell on them, but to learn from them. People have to play to their strengths. The TEFL course will be a good start, and there's a Reiki practitoner nearby who sometimes runs courses. Whilst I'm committed to a writing career, it would be foolish not to explore possible sidelines. Healing might prove suitable.
Sunday, November 17, 2002
Chaos
A lot's been happening. Had a friend visiting the area over the weekend so we did friend things involving days out and fun and theatre and BEER.
I've also decided to write down more of my aura/visiony-type experiences, following another episode on Saturday. I won't necessarily be posting them here (although I'm damned if I know what else to do with the damn things, so this is where they'll end up). Apparently the fit-thread-thing and some other aura-inspired writings have pissed off quite a few people-- "too personal, showing off, just being self-indulgent, chiz moan drone"-- so they must be pretty damn good.
People only call stuff "self indulgent if:
a) they don't understand it and therefore they feel inadequate, or
b) it's better than their stuff and therefore they feel inadequate.
Either works for me.
For a long time I've fought shy of writing about the odd stuff that my neurological malfunctions throw up. Partly this is because they're very subjective and it's not easy to decide whether a reader is going to gain anything from them. Secondly, De Nile isn't just a river in Egypt; writing about this makes it all seem a lot more real and that means accepting that, yes, you have this condition, it's not going to go away, something that's not easy to do.
But... fuck, colours that sing, shadows turning into blue fire, the sensation of being a waveform passing through the nonspace of the Divine... that's not just a weekend in Margate. If something new can be derived from these experiences, then maybe it'll all be worth it.
A lot's been happening. Had a friend visiting the area over the weekend so we did friend things involving days out and fun and theatre and BEER.
I've also decided to write down more of my aura/visiony-type experiences, following another episode on Saturday. I won't necessarily be posting them here (although I'm damned if I know what else to do with the damn things, so this is where they'll end up). Apparently the fit-thread-thing and some other aura-inspired writings have pissed off quite a few people-- "too personal, showing off, just being self-indulgent, chiz moan drone"-- so they must be pretty damn good.
People only call stuff "self indulgent if:
a) they don't understand it and therefore they feel inadequate, or
b) it's better than their stuff and therefore they feel inadequate.
Either works for me.
For a long time I've fought shy of writing about the odd stuff that my neurological malfunctions throw up. Partly this is because they're very subjective and it's not easy to decide whether a reader is going to gain anything from them. Secondly, De Nile isn't just a river in Egypt; writing about this makes it all seem a lot more real and that means accepting that, yes, you have this condition, it's not going to go away, something that's not easy to do.
But... fuck, colours that sing, shadows turning into blue fire, the sensation of being a waveform passing through the nonspace of the Divine... that's not just a weekend in Margate. If something new can be derived from these experiences, then maybe it'll all be worth it.
Tuesday, November 12, 2002
Monday, November 11, 2002
Aura
I hate it when I get like this. There's just enough of me left to know that the rest of me is away with the fairies. Rational, rationale.
So here's what happened this time: a sort of synesthesic overload. Red, I was looking at red satin fabric and the colour swallowed me. It was like the sensation of someone sucking on your finger, only all over and all at once. Not sure I liked it. In the end I had to turn the light off.
This is both better and worse than the very extreme perceptual shifts. There's worse things than being God for half an hour and then waking up to find you've dribbled all down your front and bitten your tongue, but it's definately up there.
I get confused sometimes. Time goes out of whack. Memories, voices, things that happened years and years ago, people, all crowd in at once. (Please form an orderly queue. And if you don't have anything nice to say at least keep your goddamn voices down. I said I was sorry.) Memories ought to be better behaved.
I didn't go out today.
I hate it when I get like this. There's just enough of me left to know that the rest of me is away with the fairies. Rational, rationale.
So here's what happened this time: a sort of synesthesic overload. Red, I was looking at red satin fabric and the colour swallowed me. It was like the sensation of someone sucking on your finger, only all over and all at once. Not sure I liked it. In the end I had to turn the light off.
This is both better and worse than the very extreme perceptual shifts. There's worse things than being God for half an hour and then waking up to find you've dribbled all down your front and bitten your tongue, but it's definately up there.
I get confused sometimes. Time goes out of whack. Memories, voices, things that happened years and years ago, people, all crowd in at once. (Please form an orderly queue. And if you don't have anything nice to say at least keep your goddamn voices down. I said I was sorry.) Memories ought to be better behaved.
I didn't go out today.
Saturday, November 09, 2002
"I wouldn't normally do this kind of thing..."
(Or: Dere Dairy, Toda I wented to see sum aminals.)
I have had a bloody brilliant day today.
I'd been thinking for a while that the whole travel thing would be a bit pointless if all I do is run around trying to create an analogue of my London life, doing exactly the same things I did there (pubbing and clubbing, mostly) and not trying anything different. So today, me and the Bearded One did something very much out of the ordinary: we took a train to FOTA.
FOTA is a big ol' wildlife park not far outside Cork. All the critters are either totally free-range or in good-sized enclosures; not like in some places where the animals look sad and stressed out. This was a serious sanctuary, involved in breeding and re-introduction programmes.
We saw ring-tailed lemurs and spider monkeys and three sorts of gibbons and dozens of different waterfowl and these weird little rabbit-dog dudes that I don't know what they were but they looked like Eohippus and pelicans and mandrills and cheetahs and seals and oryx and giraffes and zebras and wallabies and colobus monkeys and flamingoes and pelicans and capybaras and a white-tailed sea-eagle and lion-tailed macaques and tapirs and all kinds of beasties! Oh, man-- it was fantastic. The monkeys alone could have kept you enthralled for hours.
The little colony of spider-monkeys was just amazing. They were playing on their climbing frame, nibbling handfulls of grass, carrying infants on their backs, and generally mucking around. Some of the monkeys got a bit mopey when it started to rain, but they had all these little shelters to curl up in. I think we made one of the gibbons feel a bit harrassed when we stood and peered in his window for ages. The boyf got into a staring contest with a rea and neither of them would back down for ages (eventually the bird won; rea and ostriches are well intimidating close up). I found out what sort of noise a tapir makes, a rather surprising dolphinesque squeal. S'pose you always expect something like that to grunt.
It was great. Definately going back there, if only to see the red panda which must have been hiding from the rain.
After we got back into Cork, we swung by the Palace Theatre and bought a couple of tickets for Somerset Maugham's The Constant Wife. I've only ever been to the theatre three times in my life before. We grabbed a takeaway curry on the way home, and chilled out for a couple of hours before heading back out to the theatre.
The play was a lot of fun, if a bit heavy-handed in places. The cast were good, especially the leading lady. We both really enjoyed it and we're planning another trip again soon, though I want to go to the opera next weekend.
Hey, look-- I'm turning into a culture-vulture!
(Although last night we ended up at the new Harry Potter, so probably not that cultural.)
(Or: Dere Dairy, Toda I wented to see sum aminals.)
I have had a bloody brilliant day today.
I'd been thinking for a while that the whole travel thing would be a bit pointless if all I do is run around trying to create an analogue of my London life, doing exactly the same things I did there (pubbing and clubbing, mostly) and not trying anything different. So today, me and the Bearded One did something very much out of the ordinary: we took a train to FOTA.
FOTA is a big ol' wildlife park not far outside Cork. All the critters are either totally free-range or in good-sized enclosures; not like in some places where the animals look sad and stressed out. This was a serious sanctuary, involved in breeding and re-introduction programmes.
We saw ring-tailed lemurs and spider monkeys and three sorts of gibbons and dozens of different waterfowl and these weird little rabbit-dog dudes that I don't know what they were but they looked like Eohippus and pelicans and mandrills and cheetahs and seals and oryx and giraffes and zebras and wallabies and colobus monkeys and flamingoes and pelicans and capybaras and a white-tailed sea-eagle and lion-tailed macaques and tapirs and all kinds of beasties! Oh, man-- it was fantastic. The monkeys alone could have kept you enthralled for hours.
The little colony of spider-monkeys was just amazing. They were playing on their climbing frame, nibbling handfulls of grass, carrying infants on their backs, and generally mucking around. Some of the monkeys got a bit mopey when it started to rain, but they had all these little shelters to curl up in. I think we made one of the gibbons feel a bit harrassed when we stood and peered in his window for ages. The boyf got into a staring contest with a rea and neither of them would back down for ages (eventually the bird won; rea and ostriches are well intimidating close up). I found out what sort of noise a tapir makes, a rather surprising dolphinesque squeal. S'pose you always expect something like that to grunt.
It was great. Definately going back there, if only to see the red panda which must have been hiding from the rain.
After we got back into Cork, we swung by the Palace Theatre and bought a couple of tickets for Somerset Maugham's The Constant Wife. I've only ever been to the theatre three times in my life before. We grabbed a takeaway curry on the way home, and chilled out for a couple of hours before heading back out to the theatre.
The play was a lot of fun, if a bit heavy-handed in places. The cast were good, especially the leading lady. We both really enjoyed it and we're planning another trip again soon, though I want to go to the opera next weekend.
Hey, look-- I'm turning into a culture-vulture!
(Although last night we ended up at the new Harry Potter, so probably not that cultural.)
First, there was the Hello Kitty vibrator. Then the Hello Kitty Warhammer toys. Now there's... well, no-one's sure, exactly, but I think I saw it move.
Another boring medication related post.
I've been reading quite a lot about this new drug, Provigil. It's an anti-tiredness med, originally developed to treat narcolepsy, and apparently it's the bee's knees: very effective, with few side-effects. I'm going to see if I can put my hand on some, because if I could find something to counteract the effects of all the Carbamazipine I'm taking my life would improve dramatically.
I know some of you will be reading this crap at work with matchsticks propping open your red and watery eyes because you've dragged yourself out of bed at some ungodly hour to do the utterly sucktasitc job that Fate has thrust upon you and are biting back a stroppy comment e'en now. I know there's also the issue of the existance of drugs like this being used to cover up the effects of overwork. ("Sick? Take a Contac and keep working. Stressed? Take a Valium and keep working. Eighteen hour days every day for the last week? Take a Pro-Plus and keep working! If you don't we'll find someone who will!")
But seriously, the stuff I'm taking for my epilepsy is just evil. I'm tired pretty much all the time. I still get stuff done (work hard, play hard, blah blah blah) but I'm constantly working round the side-effects; it's alarming how much of my day I spend wishing I was back in bed. There's things you can do to limit the impact of the meds: regular meals, exercize, vitamin supplements and so on, but it's hard to work out when all you want to do is keel over on the sofa and give it zeds.
And this, my friends and droogies, is coming from somebody on a relatively lightweight 1200mg of Carbie. I'm one of the lucky ones. How the hell people on higher doses or more than one kind of medication cope is a complete mystery to me.
I've tried pretty much every over-the-counter remedy for tiredness (Pro-plus, Yeast-Vite, various herbal concoctions) but they're all a bit rubbish, really. There's pseudoephidrine, in the form of allergy treatments, but it makes me jangly and headachey. As to the various extralegal "remedies" avaliable out there, I either can't take them at all because they make the fits worse, like MDMA, or they're just too fucking unhealthy to take regularly, like amphetamines. I'm not claiming that I've ever been an angel when it comes to recreational pharmaceuticals, but I was sort of hoping to make it to fifty. 'Sides, I neither need nor want to spend my life on a permanent speed high. I mean, how much more of a paranoid narcissist do I really need to be?
Unfortunately my chances of actually getting prescribed anything like this are slim to none. I'm not even sure that Provigil has been licenced for use in Europe yet. Then there's the issue of GP charges here in Ireland-- apparently it costs twenty or thirty Euros to see a doctor. Added to that, all GPs are heinously overworked and spend their entire lives feeling like crap and being around proper sick people. It's understandable, therefore, that they tend to give you rather short shrift if you come to them and go "I'm tiiii-er-ed!"
I'll have to see about online suppliers, which is less than ideal but there you go. I'm planning to buy my meds-- the asthma ones as well as the epilepsy-- online for the next couple of years anyhooo. (Which reminds me: I must check and see if anyone sells Carbamazipine. I stocked up before leaving London, but it won't last forever.)
On the plus side, my asthma's got wayyy better since leaving the London flat and its funny funny dry-rot. I've started singing again! It's going to take a while to get back on form but in a couple of week's time... Killer soprano! Hide yourselves, bad people-- here comes the KILLER SOPRANO!
I've been reading quite a lot about this new drug, Provigil. It's an anti-tiredness med, originally developed to treat narcolepsy, and apparently it's the bee's knees: very effective, with few side-effects. I'm going to see if I can put my hand on some, because if I could find something to counteract the effects of all the Carbamazipine I'm taking my life would improve dramatically.
I know some of you will be reading this crap at work with matchsticks propping open your red and watery eyes because you've dragged yourself out of bed at some ungodly hour to do the utterly sucktasitc job that Fate has thrust upon you and are biting back a stroppy comment e'en now. I know there's also the issue of the existance of drugs like this being used to cover up the effects of overwork. ("Sick? Take a Contac and keep working. Stressed? Take a Valium and keep working. Eighteen hour days every day for the last week? Take a Pro-Plus and keep working! If you don't we'll find someone who will!")
But seriously, the stuff I'm taking for my epilepsy is just evil. I'm tired pretty much all the time. I still get stuff done (work hard, play hard, blah blah blah) but I'm constantly working round the side-effects; it's alarming how much of my day I spend wishing I was back in bed. There's things you can do to limit the impact of the meds: regular meals, exercize, vitamin supplements and so on, but it's hard to work out when all you want to do is keel over on the sofa and give it zeds.
And this, my friends and droogies, is coming from somebody on a relatively lightweight 1200mg of Carbie. I'm one of the lucky ones. How the hell people on higher doses or more than one kind of medication cope is a complete mystery to me.
I've tried pretty much every over-the-counter remedy for tiredness (Pro-plus, Yeast-Vite, various herbal concoctions) but they're all a bit rubbish, really. There's pseudoephidrine, in the form of allergy treatments, but it makes me jangly and headachey. As to the various extralegal "remedies" avaliable out there, I either can't take them at all because they make the fits worse, like MDMA, or they're just too fucking unhealthy to take regularly, like amphetamines. I'm not claiming that I've ever been an angel when it comes to recreational pharmaceuticals, but I was sort of hoping to make it to fifty. 'Sides, I neither need nor want to spend my life on a permanent speed high. I mean, how much more of a paranoid narcissist do I really need to be?
Unfortunately my chances of actually getting prescribed anything like this are slim to none. I'm not even sure that Provigil has been licenced for use in Europe yet. Then there's the issue of GP charges here in Ireland-- apparently it costs twenty or thirty Euros to see a doctor. Added to that, all GPs are heinously overworked and spend their entire lives feeling like crap and being around proper sick people. It's understandable, therefore, that they tend to give you rather short shrift if you come to them and go "I'm tiiii-er-ed!"
I'll have to see about online suppliers, which is less than ideal but there you go. I'm planning to buy my meds-- the asthma ones as well as the epilepsy-- online for the next couple of years anyhooo. (Which reminds me: I must check and see if anyone sells Carbamazipine. I stocked up before leaving London, but it won't last forever.)
On the plus side, my asthma's got wayyy better since leaving the London flat and its funny funny dry-rot. I've started singing again! It's going to take a while to get back on form but in a couple of week's time... Killer soprano! Hide yourselves, bad people-- here comes the KILLER SOPRANO!
Thursday, November 07, 2002
ZoCher from Barbelith has pointed me towards this BBC site. For to learn Spanish.
Not much to tell you, so this'll be a short post. Found a couple of places that do TEFL courses, but they don't start till Jan/Feb. Finally found the library. Still no job, but things are looking up-- the folks at one of the agencies gave me a lead on a place that's hiring. I'm sure something'll come up.
Not much to tell you, so this'll be a short post. Found a couple of places that do TEFL courses, but they don't start till Jan/Feb. Finally found the library. Still no job, but things are looking up-- the folks at one of the agencies gave me a lead on a place that's hiring. I'm sure something'll come up.
Sunday, November 03, 2002
"Drunk. Loved friends."
No updates since Thursday 'coz I was in London for the weekend. It was great, if a little bit fweakish: I was staying with my friend Marianne who has the flat upstairs from where I used to live and being back there did all sorts of strange things to my head. On Friday I went up the Princess Louise with Lurid Archive to see D. Corvidae, who is currently gracing the Smoke with her presence. It was excellent to meet her at last! Later we met up with Pacha and went to an all-woman event in Vauxhall-- quiet but cosy.
On Saturday there was a goodbye bash for Pacha. A whole crowd of well-wishers turned out to see her off-- was very cool to see so many people there. I did my usual thing of somehow getting stuck in a non-mingly corner so I didn't speak to all the people I'd have liked to. Maybe next time (whenever that may be). Felt briefly homesick and mushy and waah-wanna-be-in-Londony, but it didn't last long.
Then this morning I had to leave at bastarding five a.m. to catch my plane. Which was a nauseating end to anotherwise fantabulous few days.
No updates since Thursday 'coz I was in London for the weekend. It was great, if a little bit fweakish: I was staying with my friend Marianne who has the flat upstairs from where I used to live and being back there did all sorts of strange things to my head. On Friday I went up the Princess Louise with Lurid Archive to see D. Corvidae, who is currently gracing the Smoke with her presence. It was excellent to meet her at last! Later we met up with Pacha and went to an all-woman event in Vauxhall-- quiet but cosy.
On Saturday there was a goodbye bash for Pacha. A whole crowd of well-wishers turned out to see her off-- was very cool to see so many people there. I did my usual thing of somehow getting stuck in a non-mingly corner so I didn't speak to all the people I'd have liked to. Maybe next time (whenever that may be). Felt briefly homesick and mushy and waah-wanna-be-in-Londony, but it didn't last long.
Then this morning I had to leave at bastarding five a.m. to catch my plane. Which was a nauseating end to anotherwise fantabulous few days.
Thursday, October 31, 2002
Wednesday, October 30, 2002
This has to be one of the best T-shirt slogans I've seen for ages.
While you're there, check out the other bits and bobs. The slogans are more dyke-specific than I could carry off with the Bearded One on my arm, but they made me chuckle. Oh, and for those of you from Barbie's Undies-- this is Cholister's new enterprise. (Must get around to sorting out my own Cafepress thingamajig.)
While you're there, check out the other bits and bobs. The slogans are more dyke-specific than I could carry off with the Bearded One on my arm, but they made me chuckle. Oh, and for those of you from Barbie's Undies-- this is Cholister's new enterprise. (Must get around to sorting out my own Cafepress thingamajig.)
Tuesday, October 29, 2002
"Aw Blah Erspanyol?"
Yes. I'm finally biting the bullet and learning Spanish. I've bookedmarked a ton of online courses but this looks like the most promising: Learn Spanish - Spanish for Beginners. I'm also going to get down the library in the morning and borrow a couple of tapes. My unilingual days are nearly at an end.
Yes. I'm finally biting the bullet and learning Spanish. I've bookedmarked a ton of online courses but this looks like the most promising: Learn Spanish - Spanish for Beginners. I'm also going to get down the library in the morning and borrow a couple of tapes. My unilingual days are nearly at an end.
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