Okay, this has been bugging me for a while. This is a question I've seen/heard in a lot of interviews (can also be "When did you decide you wanted to be a singer/actor/athlete" as applicable by profession) and it always irritates me.
Can I alter the question slightly so people can understand how I hear it?
"When did you decide you were hungry?"
"When did you decide to breathe oxygen?"
"When did you decide to wake up this morning?"
So, when do you decide to do something so intrinsic to your basic make up? Once you mastered the skill of it and decided this was what was missing previously in your life? Like, I've always been good with math, but I wasn't born knowing 6+7 would always equal 13. I learnt the basics, and remembered them for next time. But there wasn't a set time limit, I didn't wake up one day just knowing quadratic equations and that day, that exact day, was the day I knew and understood maths.
Likewise, I can't remember when I loved writing first. I know my year 4 teacher had some crazy good ideas for creative stories and that's what led me to understand creativity comes from within. I had a large book collection of my own, and frequently went to the library, so words made sense to me so much. I even remember in high school my teachers were so into the basics of English that there wasn't any room for creativity (we did a few creative writing projects. Did they never notice my marks crept up from 6/7 out of ten to 9/10 when we got those few projects?) and I stopped writing things down for a few years. Note, I did not stop creating, I just wrote in my head, I would storyboard in my head constantly. They were daydreams, but they were better than nothing. And then my friend Sammie introduced me to fanfics and I had like, a major release from my years of not writing. I was catching up.
If you're a writer, or a singer, or an actor, or a footballer, that's who you are, whatever level of success you have (and what is success defined as? Fame? Wealth? Ability? A combination? A sense of realism or sticking to the rules? Personal goals being met, whatever, surely?) and it's not something you can decide upon. It's just a question of finding the thing that gets the fire burning in your gut, the thing that is your compulsion in life, and not ignoring that outlet in spite of what life throws at you.
I did not choose to be a writer. I am a writer. Like I am a brunette. Like my eyes are both green and blue. Like the sun rises in the morning and sets in the evening.
I am a writer. Fact.
Tuesday, 23 April 2013
Sunday, 21 April 2013
huh. interesting.
So I'm on my lunch break at work and checking this because my amazing friend sent me a message and I wanted to read and reply.
If you don't have blogger, there's a page where you can see who visits your blog and be all nosey about your readers. That's how I know I am viewed a LOT by a spambot. Anyway this new one came up and I am nosey so I had a look and it's a psychology blog. About depression. With a check box system to see if you are depressed or manic. I scored pretty high on depression with all the crap going on right now with work.
But you know what? I've been depressed before and it seemed much bleaker back then. I just find it weird that I scored high on it when I feel pretty okay. Maybe it's because I know why I feel like I do or maybe the thought of my son is enough to keep me from being completely screwed. Outside of work I'm not too bad but since I'm here so damn much I guess it's hard to tell.
I wanna go to bed now. Still have at least four hours though. Yay.
If you don't have blogger, there's a page where you can see who visits your blog and be all nosey about your readers. That's how I know I am viewed a LOT by a spambot. Anyway this new one came up and I am nosey so I had a look and it's a psychology blog. About depression. With a check box system to see if you are depressed or manic. I scored pretty high on depression with all the crap going on right now with work.
But you know what? I've been depressed before and it seemed much bleaker back then. I just find it weird that I scored high on it when I feel pretty okay. Maybe it's because I know why I feel like I do or maybe the thought of my son is enough to keep me from being completely screwed. Outside of work I'm not too bad but since I'm here so damn much I guess it's hard to tell.
I wanna go to bed now. Still have at least four hours though. Yay.
Saturday, 20 April 2013
A solution?
I'm going to talk to my boss in the next week about reducing my work days to 4 instead of 5.
It's not much, but those 24 hours would make a huge difference for me.
The only crappy part is that I have another three night shifts, a night off (which I've agreed to do a quiz thing on) two more night shifts and an evening shift before I'd be able to talk about it properly.
Speaking of which, I'm officially halfway through my overnight marathon! And I've gone home pretty early every single day so far (especially at the other store, I didn't leave 40 minutes before my finish time ;) ) which is a huge help. I probably won't be blogging for another week as I'll be completely out of it and rambling utter crap until then, but I'll miss you, readers and spambots. If you end up missing me too, a nice little message goes a long way with my ego ;)
Until then, night night!
P.S. I won't just be working and sleeping. My awesome friend Lydia is writing a distopian novel, so I'll be reading and thinking and having it warp more dreams of mine where my characters are in her Island world before giving her some feedback. Again, that probably won't be for a week. Sorry.
It's not much, but those 24 hours would make a huge difference for me.
The only crappy part is that I have another three night shifts, a night off (which I've agreed to do a quiz thing on) two more night shifts and an evening shift before I'd be able to talk about it properly.
Speaking of which, I'm officially halfway through my overnight marathon! And I've gone home pretty early every single day so far (especially at the other store, I didn't leave 40 minutes before my finish time ;) ) which is a huge help. I probably won't be blogging for another week as I'll be completely out of it and rambling utter crap until then, but I'll miss you, readers and spambots. If you end up missing me too, a nice little message goes a long way with my ego ;)
Until then, night night!
P.S. I won't just be working and sleeping. My awesome friend Lydia is writing a distopian novel, so I'll be reading and thinking and having it warp more dreams of mine where my characters are in her Island world before giving her some feedback. Again, that probably won't be for a week. Sorry.
Friday, 19 April 2013
Becki
So, this will be a short, and probably nonsensical post, but I want to do it anyway.
If you read my other blog, that is serialising my story until I can afford the time to get my act together and self-publish/mail it out to book agents ( which you can find here) then this will make a little more sense to you.
See, I'm actually about halfway through writing the second book in the series, and two of my friends have read almost about as far as I've written, and I find it really funny that they've both said the same thing about one of my characters, Becki (hence the title).
Becki is kind of the characterisation of every awesome girl I've ever known; the girls at my high school who would never bitch about a person and spent their times helping others, the friends who have always given amazing advice, or just a shoulder to cry on. Those girls you meet who get on with everyone and when you first meet them you wonder how they manage it but they're just so nice that they kind of make you think you're a horrible person because you show your negative feelings way more. They make you want to be better, you know the type?
Anyway, they have both said the same thing about Becki's love life and it makes me feel a little bad, because yes this has crossed my mind, but not in the way they have both suggested (if you have been reading it, and you're not Sammie or Lydia ... Becki and Carter, they've both tried to set them up now) and I think I'm going to upset them when the time comes where that may be a possibility. So sorry. I'm sorry you won't like where I take it. And since Lydia was asking about when ... it's the 4th/5th story in my head when that happens. So a looooooong time from now.
And if you're reading this blog and not caring much for my actual writing, sorry. But I'm sure you'll get over it.
If you read my other blog, that is serialising my story until I can afford the time to get my act together and self-publish/mail it out to book agents ( which you can find here) then this will make a little more sense to you.
See, I'm actually about halfway through writing the second book in the series, and two of my friends have read almost about as far as I've written, and I find it really funny that they've both said the same thing about one of my characters, Becki (hence the title).
Becki is kind of the characterisation of every awesome girl I've ever known; the girls at my high school who would never bitch about a person and spent their times helping others, the friends who have always given amazing advice, or just a shoulder to cry on. Those girls you meet who get on with everyone and when you first meet them you wonder how they manage it but they're just so nice that they kind of make you think you're a horrible person because you show your negative feelings way more. They make you want to be better, you know the type?
Anyway, they have both said the same thing about Becki's love life and it makes me feel a little bad, because yes this has crossed my mind, but not in the way they have both suggested (if you have been reading it, and you're not Sammie or Lydia ... Becki and Carter, they've both tried to set them up now) and I think I'm going to upset them when the time comes where that may be a possibility. So sorry. I'm sorry you won't like where I take it. And since Lydia was asking about when ... it's the 4th/5th story in my head when that happens. So a looooooong time from now.
And if you're reading this blog and not caring much for my actual writing, sorry. But I'm sure you'll get over it.
Wednesday, 17 April 2013
Grammaratzi
So ... I've said all that stuff about how mental I actually am these days. And I've said about how dumb people can be about my name.
And tying those two together, you get a neurotic mess who hates misspellings and poor grammar but still couldn't tell you the definition of a preposition or whether she ends sentences with one. Yay for hypocrisy!
Seriously, I hate bad spellings and poor grammar. I don't mean typos, we all do that, and I read through some of these and think 'really Siobhan, don't think ahead of what you're typing' though that's totally what I'm doing even now. I end up in a word mess, or replace words with those that don't make sense. I can forgive a typo.
I cannot forgive your/you're or their/there/they're replacements. I can't forgive should of/could of. I can't forgive infinately. You know what I do on words I'm not sure of? I open my word processor, and type the word I'm thinking of, and let that do the work. I just have to be careful if it's on my story file that I delete the word, or it ends up like.
" ... I said quietly.necessary"
Because I can never remember if it's two c's or two s's. I also do this a lot when my friend Jodie hints on the times we get to meet up about having a cheeky margarita because I cannot spell that. But see, windows is into Mexican food and accompanying alcohols so it totally helps me out. Thanks windows, you tequila-holic, you!
See? I'm admitting I can't spell every word out there, but do I just think 'fuck it, I'll write how I texted when I was 13 and couldn't afford credit so put an essay in 120 letters' or do I go to a reliable source that's right there on my computer? God, most people have smart phones, they have predictive texting (like, my windows phone is cool with predictive writing, it makes a tonne of suggestions based on the words that came before but if you're going for a different word it's cool beans about it, unlike apple who when I had an iPhone, stealth-changed a word just before sending a text, demanding I send a new text to sort out my phone's issues. It also thought 'me' wasn't a word and changed it to 'mr'. Really.)
There is just no excuse for it.
And tying those two together, you get a neurotic mess who hates misspellings and poor grammar but still couldn't tell you the definition of a preposition or whether she ends sentences with one. Yay for hypocrisy!
Seriously, I hate bad spellings and poor grammar. I don't mean typos, we all do that, and I read through some of these and think 'really Siobhan, don't think ahead of what you're typing' though that's totally what I'm doing even now. I end up in a word mess, or replace words with those that don't make sense. I can forgive a typo.
I cannot forgive your/you're or their/there/they're replacements. I can't forgive should of/could of. I can't forgive infinately. You know what I do on words I'm not sure of? I open my word processor, and type the word I'm thinking of, and let that do the work. I just have to be careful if it's on my story file that I delete the word, or it ends up like.
" ... I said quietly.necessary"
Because I can never remember if it's two c's or two s's. I also do this a lot when my friend Jodie hints on the times we get to meet up about having a cheeky margarita because I cannot spell that. But see, windows is into Mexican food and accompanying alcohols so it totally helps me out. Thanks windows, you tequila-holic, you!
See? I'm admitting I can't spell every word out there, but do I just think 'fuck it, I'll write how I texted when I was 13 and couldn't afford credit so put an essay in 120 letters' or do I go to a reliable source that's right there on my computer? God, most people have smart phones, they have predictive texting (like, my windows phone is cool with predictive writing, it makes a tonne of suggestions based on the words that came before but if you're going for a different word it's cool beans about it, unlike apple who when I had an iPhone, stealth-changed a word just before sending a text, demanding I send a new text to sort out my phone's issues. It also thought 'me' wasn't a word and changed it to 'mr'. Really.)
There is just no excuse for it.
After-effects
So I mentioned a few posts ago about my having TTP. It was sleep-deprived ramble, but the basics were there. For future reference, the following are all side-effects I still live with as a result of my blood trying to destroy itself. I will probably add to this list, because catch 22, I can't remember shit easily:
1. In order to function as a person, I need to write lists. When I first got discharged, these lists included 'get dressed' 'brush hair' 'change boy's nappy' 'get boy dressed' 'eat breakfast'. I kid you not, I couldn't get through the basics of a day without my lists. My lists these days aren't so bad, but I still have them, and a memo board on my wardrobe door with reminders. I remember things better when I write them down. This is how I cheat people into thinking I'm semi-decent at my job, I'm meant to start with a checklist, and a cleaning list, and a stock list, and a list of things I need to check off before leaving, and basically, my first hour at work is lists. If I'm without even one of these lists, shit doesn't get done. People might say I was ditsy or whatever, but no. I need written confirmation that I need to clean out the hot chocolate machine otherwise that shit is gunged up and gross another day. I actually cannot think without lists.
2. I can't hear you if I'm writing. I can't do both any more. I can concentrate on my writing, or sort-of concentrate on you. Fun experiment if you know me, have a conversation with me. I could maybe participate and give you some opinion or insight, if I'm not doing other stuff. Wait an hour, and ask me my recollection of that conversation. Did I refer to it as last month or some time ago? Was I vague in the details? Was I tired? I'm wondering if something happened with how my brain communicates with my ears because I can take a little while to understand stuff.
I'm interrupting the list a second. My mother just reminded me to get a nap before work. Regardless of this list, STFU. I've been doing nights for months and I know how I function best. It's lunchtime. Go do one.
3. (Back on it) I don't like reminders, despite the above. I need to be able to think for myself. I need to get more independent in any way I can. My mother got told stuff by my doctor and she goes overboard way too much (basically, they said I shouldn't ever be alone. Which, for the kid of hers who valued alone time so much she spent entire days in a local park buried in the trees and daydreaming, is way too fucking unfair. Hence her breathing down my neck with stupid fucking reminders I don't need because ATM I'm still so tired my head hurts) ... neatly bringing us to another point actually ...
4. Sleep is a real thing for me. Like, when I first got discharged, I would have 12-14 hours at night, wake up and be a pitiful excuse for a human being, go for a 4 hour nap, wake up, eat dinner, put my kid to bed, go to bed myself. Even now, I need a good ten hours. When I first went back to work, I requested only day shifts (my doctor was like 'you're the first person I've met with this thing, we'll play it how you want. Even my doctors at the hospital were like 'you're the only real judge of this thing') and my boss said no. He said my doctor hadn't put any medical caveats in, so it was full time or nothing. My biggest regret is giving in, but I was so unwell even then that I couldn't get the words or the confidence to argue, and if my sense was still with me I would have left that job and sued the fuck out of him. Anyway, that's gotten worse and now I'm facing 6 nights in a row at work, starting at 10.30 at night. They are actually fucking killing me right now. I feel like I'm going through a lot of the same stuff I went through just before my diagnosis because of all the nights I do, and I don't know if I genuinely am or if this work is causing a set-back that's not as bad. They are masking the symptoms of an illness that can kill without any treatment. When I said I hate my job? This can be attributed. I do not want to die while my son is so young, while I'm still so young, while my writing is still unfinished. I do not want to be trapped like this.
I get headaches on lack of sleep. Lack of sleep being less than 9 hours a night. But you know what? Sometimes, it just doesn't matter how much or how little sleep I get. Because when I wake up I hurt, like I ache everywhere and it's like I've been running for months. I'm not that tired when I go to sleep, but waking up is a real bitch. Way back when, some days I couldn't get out of bed. Not in the sense of 'my bed is so warm, I don't want to leave' but in the sense of 'can I move my legs today? They feel so heavy and worn out. I ache in my bones'. I'm not yet thirty, how is this even okay? When I first went back to work, it had lessened out, but still, there was maybe one bad day to three good. Now, I wouldn't be able to tell you, I don't have a good sense of one day compared to the next.
5. I can't concentrate on more than one sound. Back to the hearing thing. If two people talk to me at once, it feels like everything stops and goes blank. In a job where sounds are important and five different machines beep at once as everyone hollers back and forth, this isn't good. I've learned tricks in the last 4 years of being back there to cope with it (I had seven months on sick leave) like the person closest to me will get my immediate attention, but even then, I have to pause a lot while I think things through. How people can't tell that there are problems in my head is beyond me sometimes with this job.
6. I have delayed reactions. It took me about three years to take my driving test, because I was rubbish at reacting to problems on the road. My instructor knew something of my blood problems (not as much as I'm putting on here, but enough to know how close I came) and he worked with me to improve them enough to pass. Technically, I wonder if I should even now be allowed to drive, since you're meant to declare before applying that you've had a stroke, but since I only had the initial signs of a stroke that was kept back with the miracle of science, I never had to declare it. Anyway, before I got ill, I could see things happening before they did (good logical thinking, I'm not a psychic) and try to prevent them with good foreplanning. And after? I could watch a cup of coke drop to the floor and spread out, and just say 'I knew that was going to drop' but I would still be standing there looking at the cup while someone else picked it up and cleaned it, and all I could do was repeat 'I knew that was going to drop' while not doing a damn thing to stop it. I can't make my body respond to brain signals like I used to, and I can't always get my brain to understand what it's seeing or hearing straight away. I used to do this trick, I've stopped it so much now, but someone would speak to me, and I would repeat them (parrot trick) and while repeating them, I was giving my brain enough time to hear, then understand what they were saying. They might have repeated it again, thinking I was a moron, thus buying me extra time (and I might have repeated again while the words fell in place in my head). I couldn't answer a straight question. I still can't, but instead now you just get a sleepy pause.
7. I get irrationally angry about the tiniest things. I can't explain this one, except I know I was more mellow before. I have a theory, like in The Eye (the Japanese one, since that's the one I watched) where some of my blood donors attributes may have come into who I am now, since for some reason I can tolerate both popcorn and pepperoni which I couldn't before, and I like steak pretty rare (and like I said in a previous post, I was once borderline vegan).
8. I don't have my memories any more. Not really. You know when you have a vivid dream and you tell people about it, but then your memory of the dream is recounting it for others? That's what 23 years of my life looks like. I don't remember being a child, a teenager, university, my son before he was 1. TTP took all that from me. Even now, my friends will be like 'remember the time ...' and my answer is no, not to be a bitch, but because I can't access that any more. Do you know what I can still access? Facts. The typical human adult has enough blood cells to wrap around the world three and a half times (though obviously, not mine). Humans are one of the few species with an aposable thumb. It is should Have, not should Of. Zac Efron is the sexiest male on this planet. The Simpsons were originally a short on some TV show not in the UK. Cat was Zoe's mother, not her sister. My son's first steps? I think he took those when I blinked, he was in stealth mode. That's what mum says. Someone I went to school with reminded me recently of making her dance to steps in front of the entire school. Sounds like something I would do, and I remember what the school looked like, so maybe?
I know there's more, but I can't really concentrate since my mother's helpful advice, sorry. Maybe this should be number nine, concentration is fucked once someone talks to me.
1. In order to function as a person, I need to write lists. When I first got discharged, these lists included 'get dressed' 'brush hair' 'change boy's nappy' 'get boy dressed' 'eat breakfast'. I kid you not, I couldn't get through the basics of a day without my lists. My lists these days aren't so bad, but I still have them, and a memo board on my wardrobe door with reminders. I remember things better when I write them down. This is how I cheat people into thinking I'm semi-decent at my job, I'm meant to start with a checklist, and a cleaning list, and a stock list, and a list of things I need to check off before leaving, and basically, my first hour at work is lists. If I'm without even one of these lists, shit doesn't get done. People might say I was ditsy or whatever, but no. I need written confirmation that I need to clean out the hot chocolate machine otherwise that shit is gunged up and gross another day. I actually cannot think without lists.
2. I can't hear you if I'm writing. I can't do both any more. I can concentrate on my writing, or sort-of concentrate on you. Fun experiment if you know me, have a conversation with me. I could maybe participate and give you some opinion or insight, if I'm not doing other stuff. Wait an hour, and ask me my recollection of that conversation. Did I refer to it as last month or some time ago? Was I vague in the details? Was I tired? I'm wondering if something happened with how my brain communicates with my ears because I can take a little while to understand stuff.
I'm interrupting the list a second. My mother just reminded me to get a nap before work. Regardless of this list, STFU. I've been doing nights for months and I know how I function best. It's lunchtime. Go do one.
3. (Back on it) I don't like reminders, despite the above. I need to be able to think for myself. I need to get more independent in any way I can. My mother got told stuff by my doctor and she goes overboard way too much (basically, they said I shouldn't ever be alone. Which, for the kid of hers who valued alone time so much she spent entire days in a local park buried in the trees and daydreaming, is way too fucking unfair. Hence her breathing down my neck with stupid fucking reminders I don't need because ATM I'm still so tired my head hurts) ... neatly bringing us to another point actually ...
4. Sleep is a real thing for me. Like, when I first got discharged, I would have 12-14 hours at night, wake up and be a pitiful excuse for a human being, go for a 4 hour nap, wake up, eat dinner, put my kid to bed, go to bed myself. Even now, I need a good ten hours. When I first went back to work, I requested only day shifts (my doctor was like 'you're the first person I've met with this thing, we'll play it how you want. Even my doctors at the hospital were like 'you're the only real judge of this thing') and my boss said no. He said my doctor hadn't put any medical caveats in, so it was full time or nothing. My biggest regret is giving in, but I was so unwell even then that I couldn't get the words or the confidence to argue, and if my sense was still with me I would have left that job and sued the fuck out of him. Anyway, that's gotten worse and now I'm facing 6 nights in a row at work, starting at 10.30 at night. They are actually fucking killing me right now. I feel like I'm going through a lot of the same stuff I went through just before my diagnosis because of all the nights I do, and I don't know if I genuinely am or if this work is causing a set-back that's not as bad. They are masking the symptoms of an illness that can kill without any treatment. When I said I hate my job? This can be attributed. I do not want to die while my son is so young, while I'm still so young, while my writing is still unfinished. I do not want to be trapped like this.
I get headaches on lack of sleep. Lack of sleep being less than 9 hours a night. But you know what? Sometimes, it just doesn't matter how much or how little sleep I get. Because when I wake up I hurt, like I ache everywhere and it's like I've been running for months. I'm not that tired when I go to sleep, but waking up is a real bitch. Way back when, some days I couldn't get out of bed. Not in the sense of 'my bed is so warm, I don't want to leave' but in the sense of 'can I move my legs today? They feel so heavy and worn out. I ache in my bones'. I'm not yet thirty, how is this even okay? When I first went back to work, it had lessened out, but still, there was maybe one bad day to three good. Now, I wouldn't be able to tell you, I don't have a good sense of one day compared to the next.
5. I can't concentrate on more than one sound. Back to the hearing thing. If two people talk to me at once, it feels like everything stops and goes blank. In a job where sounds are important and five different machines beep at once as everyone hollers back and forth, this isn't good. I've learned tricks in the last 4 years of being back there to cope with it (I had seven months on sick leave) like the person closest to me will get my immediate attention, but even then, I have to pause a lot while I think things through. How people can't tell that there are problems in my head is beyond me sometimes with this job.
6. I have delayed reactions. It took me about three years to take my driving test, because I was rubbish at reacting to problems on the road. My instructor knew something of my blood problems (not as much as I'm putting on here, but enough to know how close I came) and he worked with me to improve them enough to pass. Technically, I wonder if I should even now be allowed to drive, since you're meant to declare before applying that you've had a stroke, but since I only had the initial signs of a stroke that was kept back with the miracle of science, I never had to declare it. Anyway, before I got ill, I could see things happening before they did (good logical thinking, I'm not a psychic) and try to prevent them with good foreplanning. And after? I could watch a cup of coke drop to the floor and spread out, and just say 'I knew that was going to drop' but I would still be standing there looking at the cup while someone else picked it up and cleaned it, and all I could do was repeat 'I knew that was going to drop' while not doing a damn thing to stop it. I can't make my body respond to brain signals like I used to, and I can't always get my brain to understand what it's seeing or hearing straight away. I used to do this trick, I've stopped it so much now, but someone would speak to me, and I would repeat them (parrot trick) and while repeating them, I was giving my brain enough time to hear, then understand what they were saying. They might have repeated it again, thinking I was a moron, thus buying me extra time (and I might have repeated again while the words fell in place in my head). I couldn't answer a straight question. I still can't, but instead now you just get a sleepy pause.
7. I get irrationally angry about the tiniest things. I can't explain this one, except I know I was more mellow before. I have a theory, like in The Eye (the Japanese one, since that's the one I watched) where some of my blood donors attributes may have come into who I am now, since for some reason I can tolerate both popcorn and pepperoni which I couldn't before, and I like steak pretty rare (and like I said in a previous post, I was once borderline vegan).
8. I don't have my memories any more. Not really. You know when you have a vivid dream and you tell people about it, but then your memory of the dream is recounting it for others? That's what 23 years of my life looks like. I don't remember being a child, a teenager, university, my son before he was 1. TTP took all that from me. Even now, my friends will be like 'remember the time ...' and my answer is no, not to be a bitch, but because I can't access that any more. Do you know what I can still access? Facts. The typical human adult has enough blood cells to wrap around the world three and a half times (though obviously, not mine). Humans are one of the few species with an aposable thumb. It is should Have, not should Of. Zac Efron is the sexiest male on this planet. The Simpsons were originally a short on some TV show not in the UK. Cat was Zoe's mother, not her sister. My son's first steps? I think he took those when I blinked, he was in stealth mode. That's what mum says. Someone I went to school with reminded me recently of making her dance to steps in front of the entire school. Sounds like something I would do, and I remember what the school looked like, so maybe?
I know there's more, but I can't really concentrate since my mother's helpful advice, sorry. Maybe this should be number nine, concentration is fucked once someone talks to me.
Baroness Thatcher
So my parents (yeah, I still live at home) have been watching Baroness Thatcher's funeral. Mainly, we've been worrying about the strain on the pallbearer third on the right because he looked like he was about to cry/drop the coffin going up the steps of St Pauls.
I haven't really said much about her going, except to ask my brother not to repeat the crass jokes he's heard in front of me. I think it's really disrespectful and if he doesn't want people to make fat/lazy/smelly/arsehole jokes about him at his untimely demise, he'd do well to stop that shit.
Anyway, I never really got the whole 'lets hate Thatcher' bit (cue my friend Sammie commenting because she's my favourite Midlander and therefore the only person I know in any way affected by Thatcher's policies) even though when I was born, she had a good 5 years left in office, so my earliest 'memories' are of Thatcher Britian. I think she came into an undesirable role at a difficult time and made the best decisions she could for the majority of her constituents. She was never going to please everyone. Fuck, she was barely ever going to please anyone. But she never answered to yes-men, or tried to be everyone's friend, and yeah sometimes she had to be strict but my favourite teachers were always strict but understanding.
She had a lot of admirable qualities you know. Screw the politics, or her opinions, I'm not discussing those, but she was firm as I said, both in what she said and how she saw the world, and in standing by her decisions. She went head-to-head with people who thought they knew better and never backed down and you know what? A lot of that time she was right. She could think her way logically through a problem and take in as many aspects as could be foreseen and made educated decisions. In her private life, she was very much in love with one man, though her way of showing that was discreet and private and didn't come into her work.
I think she was pretty kick-ass, as a person. More people need those qualities. Did you see the Iron Lady with Meryl Streep? That is what a role model looks like. Not Jordan, or EL James, or Justin Beiber. Baroness Thatcher would kick all their asses.
And for the record, I tend to vote Lib Dem.
I haven't really said much about her going, except to ask my brother not to repeat the crass jokes he's heard in front of me. I think it's really disrespectful and if he doesn't want people to make fat/lazy/smelly/arsehole jokes about him at his untimely demise, he'd do well to stop that shit.
Anyway, I never really got the whole 'lets hate Thatcher' bit (cue my friend Sammie commenting because she's my favourite Midlander and therefore the only person I know in any way affected by Thatcher's policies) even though when I was born, she had a good 5 years left in office, so my earliest 'memories' are of Thatcher Britian. I think she came into an undesirable role at a difficult time and made the best decisions she could for the majority of her constituents. She was never going to please everyone. Fuck, she was barely ever going to please anyone. But she never answered to yes-men, or tried to be everyone's friend, and yeah sometimes she had to be strict but my favourite teachers were always strict but understanding.
She had a lot of admirable qualities you know. Screw the politics, or her opinions, I'm not discussing those, but she was firm as I said, both in what she said and how she saw the world, and in standing by her decisions. She went head-to-head with people who thought they knew better and never backed down and you know what? A lot of that time she was right. She could think her way logically through a problem and take in as many aspects as could be foreseen and made educated decisions. In her private life, she was very much in love with one man, though her way of showing that was discreet and private and didn't come into her work.
I think she was pretty kick-ass, as a person. More people need those qualities. Did you see the Iron Lady with Meryl Streep? That is what a role model looks like. Not Jordan, or EL James, or Justin Beiber. Baroness Thatcher would kick all their asses.
And for the record, I tend to vote Lib Dem.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)