Damn the man - I am still crippled. Less crippled than before, but more than I'd like to be.
But it's not all bad. I enjoy feeling like a victim and I imagine pity right and left.
Once I hobble off the bus, out of the store or up some stairs, with a nicely mustered pained yet very brave and enduring look, people follow me with their eyes. You know how you feel when you accidentally let a door fall shut behind you and it turns out there was a little old lady following close behind you, who got smacked in the head? Maybe you don't know, which is a good sign for humanity. In any case, I like to think that this is how people feel about me. Bad. Bad they didn't let me sit down, bad they made me wait, bad they didn't offer to carry me up the stairs. Yep, that's right. I am just full of confidence that the world is in mourning until I can once again impatiently brush by little old wobbly couples taking up the whole damn sidewalk with their staggered walk, push by ladies with four-row deep baby strollers and obviously make all those people on crutches feel like slow moving chunks of badness impeding the progress of good, healthy individuals on their way to the pub. I can't wait to be her again!
Or just maybe I will end up being nicer. I can't promise, but I do feel like it might blow being a little old lady with one of those pull-behind shopping carts (complete with a dachshund peaking out of it) that you need to use both for balance and in order to transport anything larger than a few sticks of celery or a bottle of milk. Worst of all I can almost see myself heading there, still a good bunch of decades away, but since when am I not able to get up from a fall, hand or foot twisted or gaping hole in head, and just get on with life? It's the beginning of the end my friends. Better score some karma points while I still can.
Friday, 11 January 2008
Tuesday, 8 January 2008
McCanns Plan on Making Maddie Movie
It's in the Metro, in the Evening Standard, it's everywhere. I will need to pour myself a G&T in order to deal with this. If you have not caught on yet, Maddie is a UK version of JonBenet Ramsey set in 2007, with the added feature of foreign actors, hot co-stars and, so far, no body to prove or disprove a thing. As you might know I have tried to deal with Maddie before back when I began this little diary and I thought we had reached a place where I felt comfortable letting her go. I had agreed to stop the obsessive metro reading (I started biking to work just for this purpose!) and the Sky News rankings and I was doing so well, honest, but there is no way I could have foreseen this one. Or could I have? A multi-million dollar film deal! Opportunistic? Indeed. In it's purest form. Not that that's a bad thing. And I was going to write on Obama and New Hampshire. Puhleease.
Monday, 7 January 2008
On Facebook and it's Friends
I am so annoyed at my annoyance of facebook. I am annoyed that I even have an opinion and more annoyed that I spend enough time on that site to be annoyed by the annoying people who clog up my feeds by adding, then removing, then changing, then re-spelling their favorite book, joining the facebook please respect my privacy group (my what?), throwing hamburgers and finagling their religous views from hopeless to black beans. But God do I love the personality tests, I mean I AM Carrie Bradshaw. Is that bad?
Last night newly acquired husband played with dopplr, I mean why just stick to giving the world y0ur address, your status as 'out of town' and maybe some party invite that give directions how to best get to your house along with pics of that new computer that your second to last status update advertised you just got for X-mas and that photo album you posted that shows that your balcony door is made of plywood? Why not document all your past and future trips in one perfect stalking package and make sure to put down a link to your blog and address book and write a review of your hotel with a specific recommendation of your room number?
This morning I got an email from Dopplr on behalf of newly acquired husband talking about being a fabulous jet setter who believes in serendipity and a re-invite to hi5 (they just don't give up) while WAYN informed me that I have contacts in town, which freaks me out because I am still paranoid that I accidentally hit that 'search my address book for contacts already on WAYN' and inadvertently send all my old college profs an invite. Of course before having my morning coffee even I already checked flickr and removed some porn from my myspace comments page although I do not seem to be important enough to be invited to 'small world' and I have not heard from anyone in Linked in a while either.
I just can't decide what I think about all this. The first time I posted a picture on the wide wide interweb I was a bit freaked out about how it could be used, the first time I wrote a sentence here I was worried about masses of people commenting (don't I wish) and the first time I wrote on someone's 'wall', I still checked my spelling. No longer. I love being able to see what my friends are up to, stalk ex friends from times long past (did they get fat? married? still stuck in my little town?), try to make myself just transparent enough to be found by people I want to find me and not by the ones I don't, I love looking at people's vacation pics, browse their contacts to find people I lost touch with, I love that my friends can know with what's going on with me without me having to write about every mundane thing that happens. All these sites are essentially the equivalent of chain emails about mundane things that are in turn the equivalent of sitting-by-the-well-village gossip that is not really worth writing about in an email or, grasp, letter. Not that I do the latter.
Nothing has happened and I have just about forgotten, only temporarily reminded by some friend's hacked myspace account posting that above mentioned porn, that all that info IS available to EVERYONE who wants to see it. I just counted up at least five social networking sites that know enough about me to ruin my career as a senator. I am fine with this, but honestly I have a lot of faith in our youth and there is no way that some nifty kid has not figured out a way to get all my useless personal information and I am only to find out in the future what havoc can be done with it. Until then, happy networking.
Last night newly acquired husband played with dopplr, I mean why just stick to giving the world y0ur address, your status as 'out of town' and maybe some party invite that give directions how to best get to your house along with pics of that new computer that your second to last status update advertised you just got for X-mas and that photo album you posted that shows that your balcony door is made of plywood? Why not document all your past and future trips in one perfect stalking package and make sure to put down a link to your blog and address book and write a review of your hotel with a specific recommendation of your room number?
This morning I got an email from Dopplr on behalf of newly acquired husband talking about being a fabulous jet setter who believes in serendipity and a re-invite to hi5 (they just don't give up) while WAYN informed me that I have contacts in town, which freaks me out because I am still paranoid that I accidentally hit that 'search my address book for contacts already on WAYN' and inadvertently send all my old college profs an invite. Of course before having my morning coffee even I already checked flickr and removed some porn from my myspace comments page although I do not seem to be important enough to be invited to 'small world' and I have not heard from anyone in Linked in a while either.
I just can't decide what I think about all this. The first time I posted a picture on the wide wide interweb I was a bit freaked out about how it could be used, the first time I wrote a sentence here I was worried about masses of people commenting (don't I wish) and the first time I wrote on someone's 'wall', I still checked my spelling. No longer. I love being able to see what my friends are up to, stalk ex friends from times long past (did they get fat? married? still stuck in my little town?), try to make myself just transparent enough to be found by people I want to find me and not by the ones I don't, I love looking at people's vacation pics, browse their contacts to find people I lost touch with, I love that my friends can know with what's going on with me without me having to write about every mundane thing that happens. All these sites are essentially the equivalent of chain emails about mundane things that are in turn the equivalent of sitting-by-the-well-village gossip that is not really worth writing about in an email or, grasp, letter. Not that I do the latter.
Nothing has happened and I have just about forgotten, only temporarily reminded by some friend's hacked myspace account posting that above mentioned porn, that all that info IS available to EVERYONE who wants to see it. I just counted up at least five social networking sites that know enough about me to ruin my career as a senator. I am fine with this, but honestly I have a lot of faith in our youth and there is no way that some nifty kid has not figured out a way to get all my useless personal information and I am only to find out in the future what havoc can be done with it. Until then, happy networking.
Saturday, 5 January 2008
Sirens and Trains
Back in the days, in small town Germany, I used to love to fall asleep to sirens, trains or some other distant commotion. It reminded me that there was an unexplored world out there, a world beyond the grasp of a kid that was just coming to grips with the idea that the universe did not revolve around its little life. I used to wonder about those souls on those trains, in those ambulances or laughing at those parties, walking along our road. It was all so intriguing because I was forbidden and plain unable to part take. My imagination gave my town a lot more credit than it deserved. Only a few years later I was able to answer my own question regarding what goes on in those night hours to which the answer is a resounding: nothing.
Of course in German there is a word for everything including the longing or curiosity to take of in the middle of the night just to know what goes on in the world. The word is Fernweh, meaning the opposite of homesickness (Heimweh); I guess loosely translated it means, farawaysickness. The English word according to the interweb is wanderlust, wait a second, I thought that was another German word? Whatever.
So last night I was trying to fall asleep to a bunch of ambulance sirens dashing by our house, your odd night bus coming to a screeching halt, people throwing bottles around in our neighbors front yard. A typical Friday night. Nevertheless I was building it way up in my mind, making the lives of those people a lot more interesting than they probably are, itching to know what goes on, what happened, where are they from, where are they going. Strictly speaking the answer is easy, they are going to St. Mary's hospital by Paddington or to shag their catch at their house. But maybe they are going somewhere really cool and interesting I have not been! Imagine that!
I have been feeling the onset for a while, but I am pretty certain now that I am developing a nasty case of wanderlusting. Not the Ryanair to Prague for a weekend sort of wanderlusting, but a real big get away. I want to be totally lost, weirded out, I want to be a babbling idiot lost in the back country of India/a dazed and confused tourist in Tokyo or a safari guide or guided in Kenya. I only have a few requirements: I don't want to have a schedule, I don't want to know where I will be tomorrow and I don't want to understand what's going on. And I do want someone to pay me while I do that. How hard can it be? Am I too old to be that irresponsible?
Of course in German there is a word for everything including the longing or curiosity to take of in the middle of the night just to know what goes on in the world. The word is Fernweh, meaning the opposite of homesickness (Heimweh); I guess loosely translated it means, farawaysickness. The English word according to the interweb is wanderlust, wait a second, I thought that was another German word? Whatever.
So last night I was trying to fall asleep to a bunch of ambulance sirens dashing by our house, your odd night bus coming to a screeching halt, people throwing bottles around in our neighbors front yard. A typical Friday night. Nevertheless I was building it way up in my mind, making the lives of those people a lot more interesting than they probably are, itching to know what goes on, what happened, where are they from, where are they going. Strictly speaking the answer is easy, they are going to St. Mary's hospital by Paddington or to shag their catch at their house. But maybe they are going somewhere really cool and interesting I have not been! Imagine that!
I have been feeling the onset for a while, but I am pretty certain now that I am developing a nasty case of wanderlusting. Not the Ryanair to Prague for a weekend sort of wanderlusting, but a real big get away. I want to be totally lost, weirded out, I want to be a babbling idiot lost in the back country of India/a dazed and confused tourist in Tokyo or a safari guide or guided in Kenya. I only have a few requirements: I don't want to have a schedule, I don't want to know where I will be tomorrow and I don't want to understand what's going on. And I do want someone to pay me while I do that. How hard can it be? Am I too old to be that irresponsible?
Friday, 4 January 2008
Bonefishing in England
Understanding the English is so long and complex a subject I have stayed away from it until now. After watching "Jeeves and Wooster" (Yeah, turns out Dr. House, aka Hugh Laurie is famous for that stuff) last night and not being able to muster more than a half-assed grin, I have been reminded that my cultural assimilation is not going so well.
After a year of residency on this windy island, a nice little book came my way: "Watching the English" by Kate Fox, an English anthropologist who admits that she hates the damp tropics and prefers looking at her own culture. Very English if you ask me. The English sure like watching themselves and are pretty damn obsessed with how genius yet tricky their behavior is. And rightfully so. Nothing makes that more obvious than a good natured question regarding social class. People fall over themselves trying to explain that there there is no real class structure left and then inevitably every English person involved ends up speaking about themselves, their family, their college, ultimately about their class, comparing notes and strangely enough, all knowing exactly where they fall in that class structure that no longer exists and even more strangely, no matter if identifying with upper class or working class, each loving and embracing theirs.
Sometimes I get the idea. I have been learning the obvious key words in order to identify who I am dealing with. I mean, do you go to the loo or the toilet, do you eat pudding, dessert or afters? Is your fave local pub named "The something or the other Arms" or does it serve steak bites in red wine sauce? Also I learned that some pubs better be bypassed by someone as clueless as myself, not because I will get my ass pinched and I have to say I adore being called "love" by big husky guys, but because someone will try to get in a fight with newly acquired husband, just because. And I don't adore watching that (although of course he'd kick everyone's ass).
Unfortunately for me, I also don't seem to get what is sanctioned behavior and what is not. People get so trashed they fall down a full flight of stairs in the underground, city boys pass out on the sidewalk, Armani suit and tie dipped in Guinness; girls dress like sluts with an endurance and dedication that amazes me (and I have lived in Miami mind you), but yet I always manage to say or do something even to those sluts and drunks when I figure nothing could be insulting now, that does not go over kosher. Because thinking that anything goes is an illusion; I just don't seem to understand the fine nuances of what goes.
As Salman Rushdie said and I am paraphrasing: Learning to understand the English is like eating a bony, spiky fish. There is a right way to do it and everyone knows it, but nobody will tell you, instead everyone will watch you choke and figure it out yourself. A great exercise, that bony fish eating.
After a year of residency on this windy island, a nice little book came my way: "Watching the English" by Kate Fox, an English anthropologist who admits that she hates the damp tropics and prefers looking at her own culture. Very English if you ask me. The English sure like watching themselves and are pretty damn obsessed with how genius yet tricky their behavior is. And rightfully so. Nothing makes that more obvious than a good natured question regarding social class. People fall over themselves trying to explain that there there is no real class structure left and then inevitably every English person involved ends up speaking about themselves, their family, their college, ultimately about their class, comparing notes and strangely enough, all knowing exactly where they fall in that class structure that no longer exists and even more strangely, no matter if identifying with upper class or working class, each loving and embracing theirs.
Sometimes I get the idea. I have been learning the obvious key words in order to identify who I am dealing with. I mean, do you go to the loo or the toilet, do you eat pudding, dessert or afters? Is your fave local pub named "The something or the other Arms" or does it serve steak bites in red wine sauce? Also I learned that some pubs better be bypassed by someone as clueless as myself, not because I will get my ass pinched and I have to say I adore being called "love" by big husky guys, but because someone will try to get in a fight with newly acquired husband, just because. And I don't adore watching that (although of course he'd kick everyone's ass).
Unfortunately for me, I also don't seem to get what is sanctioned behavior and what is not. People get so trashed they fall down a full flight of stairs in the underground, city boys pass out on the sidewalk, Armani suit and tie dipped in Guinness; girls dress like sluts with an endurance and dedication that amazes me (and I have lived in Miami mind you), but yet I always manage to say or do something even to those sluts and drunks when I figure nothing could be insulting now, that does not go over kosher. Because thinking that anything goes is an illusion; I just don't seem to understand the fine nuances of what goes.
As Salman Rushdie said and I am paraphrasing: Learning to understand the English is like eating a bony, spiky fish. There is a right way to do it and everyone knows it, but nobody will tell you, instead everyone will watch you choke and figure it out yourself. A great exercise, that bony fish eating.
Thursday, 3 January 2008
Shreds of Modesty
Are you comfortable doing a handstand in the candy isle? Holding your hair up in an elaborate bun while pretending to put on make up next to a rusty car on a main street? Sulking picturesquely next to some antique mirrors in front of your local coffee shop?
Spent my lunch break doing self-portraits, which manifested itself in a very shameful display of cowardice. Focus, meter, set camera down on a more or less suitable object (ahhhh, saved camera with crippled wrist from landing in slime and motor oil), finding that window when no pedestrians face me, but damn, people walk fast or slow, whichever is the one I don't need. Then trying to keep that seriously sexy face while they walk, stall, get the kid out of the buggy, the cigarette out of the pack or the phone into the bag, point and laugh. The latter only in my mind or maybe not. It's very difficult to be vain and even more difficult to find a purpose for the vanity. I need a hypothetical explanation to those curious minds as to why I am face down on a park bench in the freezing cold, waving blue mittens into the directions of the lens like a lame duck, while holding my head still and stiff in that previously focused-on spot on the arm rest, hair hopefully nicely disheveled, a great clump of mud on my boots just in the frame and the self timer beeping with increasing frequency.
I think I need a crew to give me more credibility, someone to fan me, someone to hold the reflector and most importantly that critical mass of people that makes it look like something creative and purposeful is going on that Joe Schmoe is just not able to grasp upon passing by.
Spent my lunch break doing self-portraits, which manifested itself in a very shameful display of cowardice. Focus, meter, set camera down on a more or less suitable object (ahhhh, saved camera with crippled wrist from landing in slime and motor oil), finding that window when no pedestrians face me, but damn, people walk fast or slow, whichever is the one I don't need. Then trying to keep that seriously sexy face while they walk, stall, get the kid out of the buggy, the cigarette out of the pack or the phone into the bag, point and laugh. The latter only in my mind or maybe not. It's very difficult to be vain and even more difficult to find a purpose for the vanity. I need a hypothetical explanation to those curious minds as to why I am face down on a park bench in the freezing cold, waving blue mittens into the directions of the lens like a lame duck, while holding my head still and stiff in that previously focused-on spot on the arm rest, hair hopefully nicely disheveled, a great clump of mud on my boots just in the frame and the self timer beeping with increasing frequency.
I think I need a crew to give me more credibility, someone to fan me, someone to hold the reflector and most importantly that critical mass of people that makes it look like something creative and purposeful is going on that Joe Schmoe is just not able to grasp upon passing by.
Wednesday, 2 January 2008
2007 in Reverse Order
Quick summary. We moved to London, spent as little time there as possible, re-found some great old friends, bitched and moaned about the weather, the food and NHS. Began to love our neighborhood even in the rain, Thai pubs and herbal medicine, eloped more effectively than we could ever have hoped for, honeymooned, returned and there we are.
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