My Mumbling Thoughts

"A decade ago I never thought I would be at twenty-three on the verge of spontaneous combustion - woe is me"

2008-07-24T17:50:43Z

I think I'm a non-smoker.

I'm not entirely sure why or when it happened, but suddenly, I no longer had the need inside me to light up every day and inhale all of that harmful smoke that at the time felt oh so damn good. The last time I bought a pack of cigarettes was a month ago, and over those four weeks I've been slowly phasing cigarettes out. I've got one left in my pocket-book just because, well, it's just there. And yeah, I get the odd pang every so often (I've actually got a mini craving now simply because I'm writing about it) to stand outside and let the wind sweep my hair all around my face as I slowly suck on my filtered cigarette. I'm not sure those pangs will ever go away; once a smoker always a smoker in my book.

I wonder if this is a phase that I'm going through, this non-smoker phase that I'm trying on for size and seeing if I can actually make it, manage to sustain and deal with my nerves without the aid of those fantastic miniature crutches. I have gone through plenty of non-smoker phases every so often, but they only lasted for about three days until I began to smoke regularly once again.

But this is the longest I've been without regularly smoking at certain points during the day. I used to always smoke after I ate, or while I had a drink in hand. I smoked when I was bored, when I was writing, when I was just sitting around and watching DVDs. Smoking was always there, and now it's just slowly petered out. I've smoked those cigarettes that I bought a month ago and they've spanned out whenever I thought that I should smoke. Yes. I need a cigarette now. I just ate a giant meal. Now would be a good time for a fag.

So I lit up, and didn't like it. All of a sudden I didn't find them as beautiful as I once did. I didn't enjoy the smell anymore, I didn't enjoy pulling that smoke inside of my mouth, down my throat into my lungs and inhaling so deeply to make sure that I soaked up every last drop of nicotine. I didn't like drinking with them dangling from my fingertips. I didn't like the way I looked when I exhaled. They were revolting. Smoking had all of a sudden become disgusting and I thought fucking hell I can't believe I've been smoking since I was sixteen. That's a long time to be looking like an old disgusting hag.

I watched other people smoke when I was out and about and they looked filthy surrounded by that loitering cloud. I could see the small particles cling to their clothes, wrap around their fingers and comb through their hair. It was nasty. I hated walking by smoke recepticles that gave off that stale stench of old cigarette butts. How did I get duped into thinking that smoking was so glamorous?

To replace my dirty habit, I've picked up a new one: drinking Diet Coke. It has to be in a can (the ones in plastic bottles taste different to me) and I drink at least one every single day. Sometimes I'll have two, but I'm trying to keep it down to just the one a day. I don't want that to get out of control as well. And as always I'm constantly chewing gum because if I don't have gum I'll freak out and kill someone.

I try not to think too much about me being a "non-smoker" because truthfully, I doubt I'll ever properly quit. I'm sure down the road I'll have the odd cigarette here and there just for the sake of Good Old Times, but as far as me huffing and puffing on twenty cigarettes every other day? I think those days are past me.

As I say good-bye to an old friend that harmed me, I've also lost the need to go out and get proper wrecked on alcohol and drugs. Don't get me wrong, I'm still all about getting drunk and dancing my ass off. I don't believe that I'll ever get tired of that. But as far as the drugs go, um, no thanks. Even when I was poor I always thought I could go for a gram of coke or buy a Henry, just because I thought it would make me feel better, but alas, that feeling has dissipated inside of me as well. I'm not sure why I found the tragic life of being constantly strung out attractive and glamorous, but there was a time not so long ago that I would have sold my left kidney just to chill with the white lady. It's sad, but true.

Perhaps it's because I'm a wee bit older than when I first moved away from home, and with age comes experience and perspective. I had my time of "fun" and now I'm over it. I no longer want to wake up late in the day with my nose blocked up and feeling like it has been turned inside out because I once again snorted an entire fucking gram of powder. I hate getting stoned because it makes me too fucking paranoid and I'm tired of feeling out of control and wasting my money on a temporary fix that doesn't fix shit. I don't want to escape my reality any longer, but rather live in it and enjoy it. I'm not sure why I was so scared of it in the first place, but it's really not a terrible place to be.

Last summer was hard for me for so many reasons, but when I got back to my city lover I thought my second year was going to be exactly like my first year: crazy, mental, a whirlwind of drugs, alcohol and promiscuous sex. Goddamn those were the days, the fucking good days when I was out every night meeting new people left and right and never giving my body the rest that it needed, that it used to scream out at me in furious pain and I ignored because hey, I can handle it. I'm Sam. I can handle anything.

My second year of uni was nothing like first year. It was shit. It sucked. I was depressed and poor for 3/4ths of the time, and it was mostly my fault. And I actually thought, 'fuck, if I only had a gram...'

This summer has been much better for me. I'm still with my city lover and while I do occasionally go out from time to time to dance as the evening sun sinks below the buildings, I'm not as wild as I was only a few short months ago. I'm not as depressed which is just a blessing. Being in those dark corners of my mind last year was a scary place and I thought I'd never see the end. I've had plenty of good nights alone, which is something that I've learned I can do and be okay with it. I'm still trying to clean up my debts, but when that's taken care of I can finally say good-bye to the year that nearly killed me, and it can take my bad habits with it as I walk away with my middle finger pointing straight up to the sky.

I'm not sure what my third and final year holds for me, but I know I'm walking into it with a lot more confidence that I've built for myself, and with a clear mind that knows what I want; I know I want to do really well, to spend a hell of a lot more time writing and to keep a part-time job (which I'm sure I can easily do with the help of Simon). I want to read a full library of books, really make an effort in my classes and stay focused. Of course I want to have fun, go out and take care of my wee freshers, but I know I don't have to live excessively all the time. But mostly I just want to enjoy myself and be happy. Third time's a charm, eh?

"When the heat dies down I'll be back in town, but until that time I'll be round at mine"

2008-07-23T19:48:31Z

The weather plays an important role in my memory, as I'm sure it does for many other people. It surrounds us 24/7 whether we consciously realize it or not. I think about it almost as much as a meteorologist might think about it, but probably in a different sense. I think if it's going to be extremely warm, then which summery top will I want to wear; or if it's going to be cloudy and rainy, I have to remember to pack my umbrella for the day, even though I hardly use it. I enjoy feeling the raindrops fall on me even if it is particularly cold outside.

But the weather triggers different memories inside of me, memories that don't necessarily hold any kind of importance, but are replayed across the front of my mind nonetheless. Whenever it's particularly cold and crisp, with the sun shining and being reflected off of the frost that has stretched out across the leaves from the night before, I remember the mornings when I'd be leaving for work early and climbing into my car. The garage door would be open with the morning sunshine falling at all different angles. I'd squeeze in between the wall and the edge of my car, crank on the engine, sort out which CD I wanted to listen to that morning, strap myself in with the seatbelt and wait until the car was warm enough so I couldn't see my breath every time I exhaled. Those were my mornings every single day, Monday through Friday while I worked back home. The routine is engrained inside of me, and even when I went back for Christmas holiday, sometimes I'd wake up and wonder why I was still in bed. I was supposed to be sitting in traffic fishing out my second cigarette with the window cracked so to not let all of the heat escape.

Summertime holds so many more vivid memories for me, though. The swealtering heat, the stale lingering moisture in the air and how I would do my best to not move unless it was absolutely necessary. With every movement I was sure that I was generating more heat and making it hotter than Mother Nature had already inflicted upon us. North Carolina summers were always scorchers and there were some days when Mel and I didn't do anything in the house except lay in our dark rooms with the ceiling fans on the highest setting to keep the air circulating. Momma hated running the air conditioner all day because it "ran her goddamned bill through the roof," so she left it on a timer and we would get our hands smacked if we dared touch it. Those ceiling fans were our best friends for nearly four months every year.

We would watch the evening news with Momma and the weather(wo)man would let us know if we were at level Red or level Orange, and if that was the case they told us it was probably best if we stayed indoors. If it was level Yellow, then it would be safe for us to venture out into the natural sauna and they would always remind us to wear our sunscreen for protection.

When dusk finally came late in the day people would step outside briefly to water their lawns. "That's the best time to do it," Momma would say to us. It was so the water wouldn't be wasted just evaporating underneath the unforgiving ball of fire that baked us with no remorse, never giving us a break until sunset. It was a temporary relief until the sun rose again the next day.

After a week of trying to think of new ways to prevent from melting, I would step outside and smell a change in the weather. The smell of rain was always so thick and even though the clouds had yet to roll in I knew we should be expecting a nice thunderstorm even without the help of our local weather forecaster. I became so in tune with predicting the thunderstorms that sometimes I would sit in our breakfast nook and wait as the dark clouds quickly took their respective positions above our house and watch for the first drop that would immediately dissipate after hitting the scalding concrete. One by one I watched as the raindrops fell and evaporated until there were so many falling that the ground couldn't keep up with absorbing them all. That's when I would stand up, push the chair back under the table and walk outside barefoot without an umbrella.

I would walk the entire neighborhood alone as my clothes became heavier with the weight of the rain on me and feel the warm water slowly run down the side of my face and hit me on my eyelashes. I'd be sure to keep an eye on where my feet would step as well to avoid smushing the worms that came up from the soil gasping and breathing the fresh air. Steam would always rise from the hot asphalt and I walked through the mist as if I were the only person in the world who ever did this sort of thing.

Usually the lightning and thunder would start erupting in the clouds after some time and that was my cue to start walking back home. Momma didn't mind that I liked going out in thunderstorms when it was a heavy, steady rain, but she didn't like it when I would go out with a greater chance of being electrocuted. After I was back indoors, I'd towel dry myself off, slip on some lightweight pajamas and feel like thunderstorms were Mother Nature's gift to us for all of the suffering hot days when we thought we could no longer take it.

We don't get many days like those here in merry old England. We get rain, but it's cold and there's never any steam rising up from the streets. I'd never take a stroll outside when the rain pours over here. When I'd come back inside I'd be purple from the cold and have to go to the hospital for hypothermia. Summertime here is very different and a lot more unpredictable than from North Carolina. Every day I'll check what the weather will be like, and if the temperature begins to peak above 72 degrees (F) I can already begin to feel the prickle of heat on the back of my neck and the sweat shine on my face. I get all sweaty with excited anticipation and can't wait to feel the warmth surround me, to feel the layer of humidity on my skin and have to peel my thighs off of plastic chairs and benches.

This week has been like that for me, pushing all of those memories up to the surface and leaving me aching to be back in our house in North Carolina with the windows wide open, drinking sweet tea, eating bar-b-que and wiping my forehead with the back of my arm because it's just so goddamned hot outside. The warm weather here (which is hardly 'hot' in comparison with the heat from home) is a decoy and off in the distance is a mirage of my past summers.

"Stroke by stroke you fill my empty soul with color"

2008-07-22T17:51:37Z

I remember the first foursome I ever had. Well, the only foursome to be correct. It wasn't long after Ash and I had broken up the first time, and I was left alone in a giant building with nearly three-hundred middle-aged men that always stared at me while I typed prettily behind my desk. They disgusted me and I always said no matter how desperate I got, I'd never touch any of them with a barge pole. Aside from the interns who only came around during the summertime, I was the youngest person there at the ripe old age of twenty. I'd prance around the office in my cute outfits, teetering on my designer heels and knew that the majority of the men that I came in contact with could barely speak without chewing on their own tongues. It never made me uncomfortable, but more angry that I couldn't even go into work without having to swat off their inappropriate comments about my tiny size, my young legs that easily carried me everywhere and their accusations that I teased them simply with my presence.

But back to the foursome. I was "tricked" into it, and because I was pathetically naive back then, I didn't understand what Griffin meant when he kept on asking my friend, Sarah, if I was "cool".

"Is she cool?" he kept asking her. And Sarah kept on reassuring him that, yeah, I was totally cool.

After Griffin left us outside in the suffocating Virginia heat, Sarah asked me if I wanted to go out to a happy hour. Of course I agreed, because when do I ever turn down a chance to get rat assed drunk? I don't. She told me that we were all going to meet up at seven after work and that her and I could meet at work and then drive over to the bar together. It sounded just like every other happy hour except she told me not to tell anyone else about it.

"We want to keep it quiet, you know, only a select few that don't piss us off," she explained to me. And it made sense. It sounded fine to me, and I was glad that I wasn't going to have to listen to Earl ramble on about his pyramid scheme and try to convince me to buy his book on money saving strategies.

Seven o'clock rolled around and I met Sarah in the work parking lot, just like she said and told me that we were going to meet Griffin and another guy, Charles, at their hotel. Apparently all of the bars were strict on carding on this particular evening and they thought it would be safer, since I was still underaged, if we just hung out at their hotel room and drink beer. I wasn't too keen at first, but Sarah said that it would be fine and it'd be fun.

So there we sat, just the four of us, in Griffin's hotel room drinking light beer and watching Deadwood on HBO. I felt like I was back in high school, awkward and unsure of what to do. I didn't even like beer. Where was the vodka? Or the southern comfort? Or hell, even the tequila? I nursed one beer for about an hour and that was all I drank the entire evening leaving me stone cold sober.

I'm not entirely sure how anything got started either. It just seemed like one minute we were watching TV and the next Sarah was sitting on top of Griffin's lap making out with him.

Huh. So they're like that. That's cool, I thought to myself. I knew that Sarah was separated from her husband and on the side she would hook up with random co-workers whenever she felt like it. I never judged her; I could care less who she slept with. Of course there wasn't much left for Charles and me to do except sit there and make even more awkward small talk.

Charles told me that he had never done anything like this before, and the only reason why he even considered it was because Griffin said that it would help his marriage.

"Do what?" I asked him stupidly.

"You know. This."

I sat there trying to grasp onto what he was saying and it finally smacked me right in the face when Sarah lead Griffin into the bedroom part of the room and tossed her top aside.

Ohhh....wait a second. I'm supposed to be - with Charles- here? Now? Oh god.

I could have gotten up and said no thanks, it's not my bag of goodies. I could have left. Nobody was forcing me to stay there and participate. But for some reason I stayed. I stayed and I let Charles take my halter top off, and we shared the bed with Sarah and Griffin only to switch partners halfway through.

To this day I'm unsure of why I stayed. I was completely sober and if I had it my way I would have been out my face or on my drug of choice, but that wasn't an option. I don't even remember much of anything except that I didn't like it, I faked it the entire time and didn't even feel like I was a part of the whole thing.

A couple of days after the whole ordeal, I sent one of my favorite bloggers an email describing the entire evening and asked her for advice, for guidance, for support. I told her that the whole time I didn't feel like I was there; it was as if I was hovering above near the ceiling and watching some other person inhabit my body, and I observed the entire thing from a bird's eye view. I told her that I didn't have anyone to talk to, anyone who wouldn't judge me; I mean, I had just slept with two married men and a married woman (who, yes, was technically separated). I was confused and felt entirely alone.

She sent me a full response that helped me find the light at the end of my mental tunnel. There was so much in her response, but there was one part in particular that stood out to me and to this day I live by her words:

I think the best gift you can give yourself is a blank check to make mistakes. Forgiveness is divine, and finding the divinity within yourself is crucial.

Those words were exactly what I needed to help me move past that situation and not make it out to be some kind of huge deal. I had had a foursome. So what? Okay, they were married, but that was their problem to deal with, not mine. I even forgave Sarah for not telling me the whole truth about what was already planned for the night, and told her that in the future she could trust that I wouldn't freak out and go mental on her. I was capable of handling those situations, but I'd like to be prepared for them beforehand. I like to be kept in the loop.

I took that night and my mentor's words and decided right then and there that I wasn't going to feel bad about my mistakes any longer, whether they be sexual or not. I was young, single and allowed myself to live freely without reservations. It made me brave. It occasionally made me reckless when I wasn't in a sober mind. And it enabled me to live with myself and be okay with the life that I was carving out day by day.

Now, almost three years after I sent her that email, I'm happier with myself than I ever was back in VA, or with any of those old perverts that fantasized about me and fucked me to feel younger and better about themselves, regardless of how I felt. I feel more in control of my life and comfortable in my own skin. I know there's still a lot of things that I need to come to terms with, but I'm sure I will with due time. But I've had my time alone, I've had my one-night stands, I've had my fair share of drunken encounters and drug/booze infused nights. For so long I was scared to allow someone into my heart, so I kept them at arm's length and felt more in control when I was emotionally detached from them. Now I just want someone who will look me in the eyes when we lay together. Finally I can say that I'm ready for that.

"I won't be sad but in case I'll go there every day, to make myself feel bad"

2008-07-18T15:29:26Z

The other week I had a brief stint of bravery. I remember it so clearly and it pittered away almost as quickly as it came. I had built myself up and convinced myself that this was indeed the day that I was going to swallow my nerves and ask Aussie boy out. No more sitting around and pussy footing around the issue, I thought to myself. Sometimes you can't just sit by and wait for things to happen. Sometimes you have to kick the damn ball in order to get it rolling.

I didn't ask him out because he left work early to go on a three day holiday. By the time the weekend was over and we were all back in the office, my courage had slinked away back into the dark crevases in my spineless body. Again I went back to sitting and staring at him thinking why doesn't he buy shirts one size smaller? They would look a lot better on him if they fit him properly. Or why didn't he get a hair cut? He wouldn't have to always have to brush it out of his eyes if he'd just get it trimmed a little.

Yes, I'm a stalker freak. I've accepted this fact about myself and do my best to seem as "normal" as possible whenever I'm in public. Needless to say, it's constantly proving to be a challenge for me. On days when I find it hard to hide my stalker freak tendancies, I blame it on the fact that 'I'm a writer, and I need to observe people in their daily routines in order to better describe my characters in the stories that I write.' Ha! Whatever.

The other night, Helen and I found ourselves sitting opposite each other on our settees, and had a very deep and honest conversation about the boys in our past, the boys in our present and the Unknown boys of our futures. We talked for a fair few hours about why we put ourselves through so much stress over the most simple things? Text messages leave us hindering by our phones all day, and when we do get a message, we hate ourselves a little bit every time we jump with excitement. Then we hate ourselves even more when the message isn't from the person we were hoping to hear from, but rather just a friend to send us a funny story about some random stranger on the bus. Facebook is the deadliest place on the internet and if we're not careful we can easily spend an entire day combing through their profiles; we look at every picture, scrutinize it until we're satisfied with the imaginary story that we've invented, and then move on to their wall posts. It's not until the other person comes home and we realize that we haven't even gone to bathroom all day.

Why do we torture ourselves? We're almost 100% positive that the boys we're interested in don't do this. They go and do other boy things like play the Wii, watch football and cut trees down in their back gardens. They don't care enough to pilfer through our internet profiles or wait breathlessly by the phone.

And then I wondered out loud to Helen about how it's stupid we have all of these dumb games between men and women. What's with waiting a certain amount of time to text a boy back? Or call someone? Or sending messages? Why can't it just be simple? Why can't a person just honestly go up to another person and say, 'Hey. I think you're cute and was wondering, if you're interested, if you would like to go out with me sometime?' Why do we need all of the boundaries and those shitty 'rules' of dating engagement? Why does it have to be so hard?

I know why I don't really put myself out there. And by 'really' I mean 'emotionally'. It's just as basic and simple as all of the above questions: fear of rejection. It's a big one. Nobody wants to know that the person that they've taken an interest in, doesn't share the same feelings. Nobody wants to get shot down, left in the middle of a room humilated and stripped naked exposing their raw emotional feelings. Who cares if they're a stranger that you may never see again? They're a stranger who hasn't earned the right to see me in a vulnerable state. And telling a boy that I like him? Is a very vulnerable place to put myself in.

And also, hidden deep within this I Am An Independent Woman veneer, lies a hopeless romantic. I don't care if it is the 21st century, I want a boy to ask me out. I want him to charm me. I want there to be something. I'm an easy girl to please. It doesn't take much to make me smile. Even a little bit of conversation and banter would do it. Why do I have to be the one to ask them out? Isn't one of the priviledges of being a lady is that we don't have to get the ball rolling?

And also (again), I automatically assume that if he doesn't ask me out, or even speak to me, that means he thinks I'm ugly, isn't interested and would much rather fuck a chicken.

Remember, I'm a freak.

I told Helen that it feels like it'll always go back to Ash for me. He's there still, all the time lingering in the back of my mind, reminding me of our past relationship. I still compare boys to him. I know, I shouldn't do it, but I do. I read old emails. A couple of weeks ago, I found myself on his old blog that he doesn't write on anymore and read some posts that he wrote about me that weren't easy to read. And there it was, all of those raw emotions again boiled to the surface and left me remembering about a time when I wasn't pleasant to be with.

"It scares me," I told Helen. "I'm scared that I'll never be in a healthy, happy relationship ever again. What if I fuck the next one up too? You know, if I ever get another one. It makes me want to crawl under a rock knowing how much Ash hates me."

"Well, if I'm honest, I know that I don't really hate D. He is a good person, and we were good together. But I had to hate him just to deal with things, because if I didn't, I'd sit and go mental. I would think about his next girlfriend and know that she was getting all of the good qualities that I had first. Maybe that's what Ash had to do with you. There's a fine line between love and hate."

"Yeah. Something that makes me not hate D just a little bit is knowing that if he feels anywhere near as bad about what he did to you, like how I feel about what I did with Ash, then he's living with quite a burden. Because I feel it every day. It never really goes away. It just sits there and I haven't been able to let myself let it go."

Which rounds me all the way back to Aussie boy. Yes, we haven't ever really spoken properly, and yes, he might think that I'm ugly, or even have a girlfriend, and the chances of me getting shot down and humiliated are high. My face will flare up, I will stutter, I will ramble, I may even trip and fall flat on my face as I'm walking up to him. But nonetheless, it never hurts to try. I have to get over this fear that keeps me (literally and figuratively) sitting in the same place. Otherwise I may never get to experience the other half of goodness that might happen if he agrees and says yes.

"Stop trying to catch my eye, I see you good you forced faker; just make it easy, you're my enemy you fast talker"

2008-07-17T15:02:06Z

There's a group that exists at my uni, a group that I have hated ever since I saw them in the middle of my first year: those pretentious, wannabe, snobby, fuckface hipsters. Jesus they really get under my skin and irritate the living shit out of me. When the weather's nice, I see them all sat outside on the lawn reading Chekhov or Nabokov trying to appear smarter than they really are and quote passages that makes them seem like they're all existential, when really they're just posing hipsters that fuck me off. Kiss my ass you granola eating*, tree hugging, soapbox shouting, ostentatious fucktard.

Yeah. I don't like them one bit.

They all huddle together and look down upon the rest of us who don't listen to the same kind of indie music, don't take the same kind of interest in their documentary films or don't sit around and read the classic books (and just an FYI, I'm totally going to read Chekhov and Nabokov; they're on my Amazon list, and I've wanted to read them long before those hipster assholes even knew who they were). It's that group of kids that just put themselves above everyone in the university -- hell, everyone in the world -- and have convinced themselves that they are different, funky, unique and original.

Sadly, I have to tell them that there's not one fucking thing original about them. Because they all cling together like cotton candy, that just makes them like the rest of us, the masses, the "unoriginal", "boring" crowd.

There are two girls in particular that I'm not big fans of. First, there's Lucy (of course her name has to be Lucy), and then there's Milla, who is kind of like my unofficial arch enemy at university. I have taken it upon myself to square off with her and do everything I can to show that yes, I am better than she is, and she's just a big pile of shit.

Part of me hates myself for feeling this way, for hating two girls that I don't even know based purely on what I've observed and know from hearsay; but then there's that other part of me that doesn't fucking care and wants to prove just how awesome I am and how shit they are.

Take Lucy for example. She actually wrote this to someone:

I have no phone. I feel like I'm missing something essential, like my arm's been cut off. Or it would if my arm was an important means of communication. Which I suppose could happen if I were deaf....

....anyway, I digress. Friday? x x

Seriously, what is that? Why does she have to go and write some bullshit message and try way too hard to make it seem like all of her conversations, even those that are generally quite simple about the fact that she currently doesn't own a phone, and turn it into some kind of long-winded message? Just tell the person, 'Yo, no phone at the moment. Friday still on?' But no, she has to go and make it seem like she has all of these fantastic thoughts that are overflowing in her brain, and fucking hell, even a small conversation about her lack of said phone are so important and interesting.

Fuck. Her.

And then there's Milla. Fucking Milla. She just thinks that she is so fucking brilliant and is on the fast path to Big Things in the music/magazine industry. Yeah. Somebody was stupid enough to put her in charge of this new and "upcoming" magazine that's in my local area. And I say they were stupid enough, because the girl can't even differentiate between "there", "their", and "they're". I've seen her published articles in our uni newspaper that don't make any fucking sense. This is basic primary school stuff. The magazine is supposed to be jammed pack of reviews about CDs, gigs that people have gone to and new bands that are busting out in our local London area. The idea of it I think is really good, but the actual execution was sloppy and rushed. They don't seem prepared and everything just seems like it was all thrown together at last minute. It didn't impress me, and even though I can't stand the girl, I would have given her props if it was decent. I'm not that much of a cunt to not give a person kudos when it's deserved.

I was asked to join and maybe I could even write some articles for it, but I declined stating that I'd much rather have my ass cheeks stapled together than have to work under Milla. It's related to what I'd like to do, but if I do it, I'm going to do it my way, and carve out my own path without her anywhere in sight. Fuck her handouts.

Basically what it boils down to is that they're competition and I recognize this. What pleases me slightly, is that I think they recognize me as competition as well. Our uni is quite small, and even if you don't know people personally, you know who they are, you know what they're about based on who they hang out with and the groups that they're in. It's all very high school and cliquey, just like in all of those after school programs. Lucy and Milla are those girls that are more than happy to get up, shout about saving the planet, volunteer their time cleaning up trash in Central and then try to make the rest of us feel bad about ourselves because we decided to stay inside and get stoned or watch DVDs. Whatever bitches. I don't need your judgement. I am all about saving the planet and trying to make the world a better place, but I'm not about shoving that statement down other people's throats, and I'm sure as hell not about making those people feel bad because they're not urgently following in my footsteps. People like them make me think that they have serious control issues.

I know they're not the first competition that I'm going to come across in my life. I'm going to have to get used to the fact that there are people in this world that I'm not going to agree with and not like because we have different views. But hate me after you get to know me; don't hate me just because I'm not wearing some vintage t-shirt that you paid £35 for, and automatically look down at me and assume that I'm not worth your time. And in return I won't call you a cunt whore motherfucking asshole shitface. I think that's fair.

* What am I talking about? I love granola bars!

"Every breath is at stake when you're the one I want to be"

2008-07-15T15:48:59Z

My mother is the strongest person I know. She has struggled for the majority of her life and yet she still stands, she still wakes up every morning, she still continues to go on with life every single day trying to make it a little easier on herself. True, we haven't always seen eye to eye, but what kid always agrees with their parent? You know, unless they're like that creepy robot kid. Of course we're going to argue and have disagreements and I'll march off in a huff because gah! parents just don't understand!

I have never cursed Momma ever. I'm actually afraid what she would do. Probably hit me. I've only raised my voice at her one time in a proper shouting match which scared me, and shocked the hell out of her. Not even an hour later we were both in her room crying and I was apologizing over and over for being so disrespectful.

But even though we argue and we don't agree all the time, she is the one person in the world whose opinion matters most to me. I know it kills her that I'm so far away and it must seem like I must have abandoned everything I know by living over here; she doesn't like London. She visited once for a couple of days and "didn't see what I liked about it".

"You need to give it a proper chance, Momma. You can't just stay in Central for three days doing the tourist thing and walk away thinking that's London. It's not. You should come to my uni, see where I live, go to the neighboring towns. You'll see. London is a lovely place."

"It's dirty and they don't have AC. I have menopause, don't they know this?"

Just because she doesn't like the city, though, doesn't mean that she doesn't love to brag about her eldest daughter that moved away and is studying to be a writer. She tells me that she goes to work and tells everyone how I did it all by myself, how she didn't help with anything except signing on the dotted line, which was a mission in itself. And she tells them to wait, because one day, just you wait and see, her daughter is going to have the best selling book on the shelves.

Oh, how she loves to exaggerate; but I swell with pride knowing how happy she is and how proud she is of me. I am her Wee One. And when she's feeling really good and wants to annoy me, she calls me Manta, which I hate but secretly love.

Our relationship these days is a lot stronger and healthier. After I went back this past Christmas, we had a long talk about things and I just kept repeating to her, I'm twenty-two now, Momma. I'm twenty-two. I'm twenty-two. I'm not her little girl any more, and when I say I don't want to do something (like move to New York), I don't have to, because I'm twenty-two. She has to listen and respect my decisions, just like I do hers. Now we talk for hours like adults, and I'm even brave enough to slip in the odd curse word or two in our conversations.

"Samantha Leigh," she'll say to me in her motherly tone.

"What? It's true. He looked like shit."

"Well there's no need for you to say it like that."

"You forget that I learned it from you."

Which is true. I get everything from her. Everything I know and everything I was taught, I learned from her. I am the spitting image of her when she was my age. I remember a portrait that used to hang on my grandma's wall in her small mill house in Ranlo, North Carolina. It was Momma sat in one of those poses that painters of the 70's made people sit in, with her hands folded neatly in her lap. She was wearing a pink cardigan, her hair short and bobbed, generally like how I wear mine, and when I saw it I was startled by how similar I resembled her. I am my mother's daughter no doubt.

Aside from her physical attributes, I gained her stubborness, her ability to clean a bathroom like nobody's business, her shyness, her boldness once we get over the shyness, and yes, even a bit of her strength that I admire so much. Although, there are some things that I'm sure I got from my father even though he split when I was only young, like my smoking and my heavy drinking. Momma has never been a fan of The Drink, and she has never inhaled any kind of smoke the entire time she has been living on this planet, even though Grandma used to smoke two packs of Camels every day up until her heart attack. But daddy smoked, and she made a comment about how we smoked the same kind of cigarettes when she took them away from me when I was sixteen. I believe that a big part of who I am now is based on how I was nurtured, by sometimes you can't help what nature engraves inside of you and fall victim to the statistics.

Come July 31st, it will be Momma's fiftieth birthday. It's strange to think about, because as far as I've ever known she has always been forty-two in my mind. But this birthday seems big for some reason. Maybe it's because she's entering into a new decade. She's leaving her forties, the decade when she retired from the Air Force, of us moving away from North Carolina, and the decade when Mel and I were teenagers giving her hell. Her fifties is a new era of her getting her business law degree, earning the most money she has ever earned her entire life, and her two girls turning into two women that are embarking on a new change in their lives as well. Everything is different and I feel it.

I remember one night, Momma and I were looking through pictures as we occasionally do. We both get sentimental and like to sit down and remember how life was Back Then. Mel doesn't share the same kind of feelings, so usually it's just Momma and me, sat downstairs on the couch flipping through the years when we lived in that house in California, or that other house in Colorado. I remember the house in North Dakota. I loved that one the most. I'll stop on one of the birthday pictures of when I was small with half of my body lying across the table with chocolate icing on my fingers, and there's Mel sat off to the side with chocolate icing on her face and her tongue sticking out a little bit.

"Yeah, that's when we were poor and I had to make all of your cakes," Momma said with a little laugh.

"Are you kidding?" I said to her. "I loved those cakes. They were so much fun to make. My favorite part was spelling out Happy Birthday with those sugar letters. Those were awesome."

"I suppose you were young so you didn't care or know any better. There are better cakes out there."

"Yeah, but those cakes don't matter. I'd take a Momma-made cake over some crappy store bought cake any day."

And it's true. If I could, every single one of our birthdays would be celebrated like that photograph.

To celebrate the big 5-0, Momma and Mel are driving down to North Carolina to visit Janice. If I'm not mistaken, Janice is making her birthday cake (with Splenda since Janice is diabetic; everything that's sweet is made with Splenda in Janice's house). Mel jokes and says that Momma is turning half a century old, Momma tells her to wait until she gets to be her age and she won't find it so funny, and I just sit and listen to them argue over petty things like they always do and can only hope that my momma has fifty more good years ahead of her.

"Everything in my body says not tonight, everything in my body says no"

2008-07-14T19:29:19Z

I don't buy much 'stuff' these days. With the majority of my money going towards rent and back rent that I owe, the only stuff that I buy is stuff that I need.

Yeah, I would look fit in that dress, but I kind of want to have money to eat this week. Although, if I don't eat, I'd probably look a lot better in it.

Then I remember that food is necessary to live, and I want to look hot in the dress, not be buried in it.

So when I received my care package boxes from Momma and Mel last Thursday and Friday, I was really excited to have stuff that I don't necessarily need, but want nonetheless. Mel was awesome and hooked me up with some of my favorite magazines (Vogue, Cosmopolitan and Us Weekly), I got two new pairs of cute pajamas, dvds and six new books that should keep me very busy for the remainder of this summer. I also got a mountain of Kraft mac 'n' cheese (hello Velveeta!), who knows how many packets of gravy, plus many more packets and boxes of cookies and brownies (so much for being healthy; when I have Duncan Hines in my possession, all reason goes out the window).

I was so excited just to have new stuff, to see new stuff to have it all be mine. It was like I had a massive shopping trip at Target and I wasn't even in my small flat in London anymore; I was back in Virginia making dinner with the TV on in the background (or in this case, Bridget since we don't have a TV).

Friday night it was raining outside. I could hear it lightly tap on the window. I was alone in the flat since Helen was working, and I thought that being at home by myself isn't so terrible these days. I think I'm slowly adjusting and getting used to it. It's nice to have the flat to myself every so often, to clean and have everything stay clean for more than an hour. Occasionally I walk around in just my underwear. Why? Because I'm alone and I can. I pee with the door open. I listen to my music loud and sing along even if I can't hit all of the high notes. I dance. Lord do I dance.

It's fun.

With my new boxes full of stuff, this Friday night was especially nice for me. I changed into a pair of my new pajamas. I made mac 'n' cheese, and only mac 'n' cheese. I read my Us Weekly magazine from cover to cover, while listening to my iPod and singing loudly hoping that the neighbors could hear me. After my mac 'n' cheese was ready to eat, I put in the first disc of Weeds Season 3 and watched a couple of episodes back-to-back, histerically laughing out loud and talking to the screen as if the characters could hear me. I didn't want to watch them all in one go, though. I wanted to save some episodes and slowly savior them all since I wasn't sure when my next box of stuff would be coming. Instead I opened up one of my new books and read deep into every page for hours until it was a little past midnight and my eyelids were slowly falling over my eyes.

I considered it to be one of the best Friday nights I've had in a long time alone. I didn't get dressed for a night out. I didn't spend any money. I didn't drink myself into oblivion. And more importantly, I resisted the peen.

Of course I enjoy going out, partying and getting lost in the London haze. But on this particular Friday night, I had a better time indoors sitting on the settee alone in my new jammies and listening to the rain.

Blogaversary: Year 3

2008-07-13T05:01:01Z

X needs no introduction. Thank you, sir, for writing this guest post. I can only hope that someday you will grace the internet with your writing again.

***

I have my faults, but I never hesitate to apologise when I am in the wrong. I started to compose a new email.

Sorry for being so immature last time we spoke. Just want to clear the air.

I sent it.

Her response wasn’t as quick as it had once been. It used to be that, back when we were absolutely and sickly infatuated with each other, we used to bounce messages back and forth, dozens every day. She’d never admit it if you asked her, but she used to love hearing from me. The timestamps on the messages made me feel as though she did nothing but sit, prettily waiting in front of her computer, checking her inbox for a message telling her how I couldn’t wait for the next time I’d see her, then reply and tell me how much she couldn’t wait to have me hold her tightly in a strong embrace.

Things had changed since then. We’d grown distant recently, alternating between blowing up at one another in bitter arguments and ignoring each other. I had almost forgotten that I had sent her an email by the time I’d received a reply:

There is nothing to “clear”. Leave me alone.

Where I pride myself on not holding a grudge, she apparently hadn’t gotten over me breaking up with her and fucking her best friend.

I don’t claim to be an expert on relationships because given my track record, claiming such a thing would make me a liar, and a liar is not something I claim to be. I am, despite that, treated as though I am a relationship expert, and people often come to me with questions, the people mostly being girls seeking to improve their understanding of the opposite sex. One thing I am asked over and over again by girls is, “where is this going?”

It is, despite its appearance, a valid question. It is valid in the sense that an answer can be given, much like the similar questions, “what is your problem?” or “can a fist actually fit in there?” Much like with those questions, however, a straightforward answer is rarely possible, and much explanation is often required.

I can preface the following with “no word of a lie”: every time I have been asked where “this” is going, I had not thought about the destination of “this” until that exact moment. The reason for that is that the endpoint of “this” only seems to become an issue to women after they create a situation in which there is no concrete reason for men to care about where “this” is going. If you’ve just implored me to push three of my fingers in your vagina in an alleyway (and my fingers are not small, trust Amanda on that one) then it’s highly likely that I don’t want things to get any more complicated than they already are. I’m not sure your vagina could take the four-finger salute without adequate preparation.

While fitting four of my fingers inside that girl’s snatch proved difficult but eventually possible, it has become harder and harder to say the same about picking up women these days. There’s no challenge left in it any more. If there’s any one thing about a woman that sets me after her, it’s her not being easy. It’s not solely about being pretty, it’s about being attractive, and believe me, your sale price for the cow is definitely not looking attractive when you’re round every morning delivering your milk to my stoep.

By all means, ladies, if you want to score, go for it. (Sam’s got my number.*) All I’m saying is that you shouldn’t try to use sex as some sort of bait to try and trap a guy into a relationship. As the old saying goes, how can you expect a guy to respect you if you don’t respect him? Or even yourself, for that matter?

And that’s all it really boils down to. What I’m really on about here is treating yourselves the way you’d like to be treated: with some fucking respect. Otherwise he might end up in a relationship with that hot best friend of yours whose legs weren’t so easy to part in the first instance.

---X

* I’m just kidding. My girlfriend is better-looking and smarter than you, whoever you are.

---------------------------------

Trish, my fellow American, my Virginian lover, my English sidekick. You are too random and hilarious for your own good. I miss you. Thanks for writing this for me, Poodle.

***

How does one describe a girl who gets so drunk that she doesn’t even remember her own flatmate because she dyed her hair brown? Well, I guess that would be a good way to.

Ahh, I remember the day I met Samantha ------, in the smoking room of the airport because the Customs Woman made me cry. Bitch. She, ever so shyly, came up to me and asked me for a lighter. Little did she know, that I possessed no lighter, but in fact matches. I would hope that they would have suited her, and they did. The rest of the time was spent smoking cigarettes. Hers, might I add. Cause I had none. And I probably still to this day owe her loads of cigarettes. I should bring her back a carton. Effort. During that first encounter, we judged each other. Harshly. Because that’s what we do. She thought I was one of those ditzy bitches who’s vindictive and malicious. And to be fair, I am. Sort of. I’m more blunt then anything, and I shant lie when you ask me a question, even if it's mean. Then I judged her. Probably hasn’t left her computer for 14 years. This is a first for her, leaving the house and all, I thought to myself. Here’s the kicker:

I, too, “haven’t left my computer for 14 years” and she, too, is “one of those ditzy bitches who’s vindictive and malicious”.

Here’s another kicker, just cause I like saying the word.

Turns out, she’s a computer geek, in a that-could-probably-get you-somewhere-in-life.
I play World of Warcraft.

And the whole bitch thing? In this case, I’m totally better than her. Only because I’m nice to people when they drop their bags in the middle of the tube station. Samantha walks right by cause it ain’t her business. I feel compelled. She goes up to people and yells at them when she’s drunk simply because she is drunk. And bored.

Samantha is the kind of girl that I can walk into the Bop with, when it’s covered in confederate flags everywhere, and we think to ourselves silently “we’re home”. But we know we’re thinking it. We have silent conversations. FREAKS.

She and I both, however, are slowly but surely, becoming Blair and Serena. No idea who’s who, but we’re doing it.

She got me to start blogging again. I haven’t done it much, but I do it. She’s convinced me to diet with her, and to smoke less, and we gossip behind people’s back within earshot. She has introduced too many T.V. shows that I have missed out on. And what have I done for her?

Stolen her cigarettes. I know. I’m awesome. But I knew you’d miss it! (HAH! MEL TOLD ME!)

We scare people. No, seriously, we scare people. Pete got scared. Swindon got scared. I’m pretty sure half the University knows us as “those two americans” or “those two yanks”. Can I just make this clear? We are not yanks. There, I said it.

God I can’t wait for my Chinese food to get here. OH! It’s here!

It’s funny whenever people type like that because it seems like I typed it out all together, but really, there was a good 15 - 30 seconds where I was just staring at the door like a weirdo.

We’re the kind of people who say to each other “if you don’t have anything nice to say, then come sit in the corner with me and talk shit about everyone”. But at the same time, we’re also the kind of people that say to each other, “I love you, but if zombies come after us, I’m tripping you”.

So much love.

The rest of the years that I have known her were filled with alcohol and boys. Stupid, stupid creatures with their stupid, stupid…alcoholness.

Annnnyhoo, it wasn’t until 2nd year where we became as close as we are now, and I learned the truth about Samantha:

She’s a blogger. And a drunk. And lazy.

But I knew those last two in the first year. And yes, I am aware that I have misused the use of a colon (hehe..dirty). But you know what? I don’t care. And do you, fellow reader, know why?

Because I am hung over.

SO, when Samantha asked me to write this entry for her, I felt no less than honoured. I just want to take a minute here to say that yes, this really is how I am in real life. Samantha is a dear friend who feeds me when I am hungry, gives me drinks when I am thirsty, and feeds me addiction when I am fiending. Such. A good. Friend.

Every bumper sticker that you see on our profiles on Facebook from each other, is totally us. I mean totally and completely.

So this is my ode to you. I love you Samantha -----. One day, we will have our babies. But please, please don’t tell my children that Free Willy is dead.

"The bus driver laughs and he shakes his head; says, 'You're okay, I drive this route everyday'"

2008-07-11T13:53:51Z

Because I don't have time to write a proper post, but still want to write nonetheless: bus observations. Happy Friday!

* Yesterday when I was sitting on the bus after work, two guys began slapping each other and play fighting - well, I hope they were play fighting. Normally, this wouldn't bother me, but one of the guys who was getting slapped was sitting right next to me. I ignored it for the most part and slanted my body towards the aisle a little more to avoid a fingertip grazing my cheek. A girl who was standing near the door gave me a look that said, I'm so sorry you are sitting next to him. I'm also glad it's not me.

* I noticed when one man got off of the bus, he shouted at the bus driver, 'fucking wanker!' I wasn't sure why he shouted that because I had my earbuds in, but I figured it had something to do with the fact that our bus driver kicked us all off at the next stop. It wasn't too far from the flat, so I had to walk a little further, but it was still funny to see that guy yell at the bus driver.

* There is a woman that I see every so often, either in the morning or afternoon, and for some reason she drives me crazy. She's quite small, I'd say about my height (5'2") or maybe shorter, and she carts around this gigantic stroller (pram) with two kids that are nearly the same size as she is. I do realize that everyone has the right to ride the bus, but what annoys me about her is the fact she seems to expect everyone to either help her with her giant stroller with two toddlers in it, and accommodate her. First of all, your kids seem old enough to walk - make them. Second of all, stop expecting everyone to be nice strangers and help you push your mini bus around. And when we don't help you, don't give us horrifying looks as if we're Satan. They're not my kids. That's not my mini bus. Not my fucking problem. P.S...I don't like your collars on your shirts that resemble doilies.

* And no, I don't mind mothers, fathers and their wee offspring. I just mind it when they think that the universe must bow down to them simply because they've procreated. Guess what? People have been doing it for years. You're no different. If you're having such difficulty living in the city with your kids, then perhaps it's time to consider moving elsewhere; I really don't like that doyley lady.

* On a related note, I do get fucked off with folks that that are healthy and perfectly capable of standing, but won't give up their seat to an old man/woman or a pregnant woman. If I can, then I always try to give up my seat to those who shouldn't be on their feet in a jerking bus. Especially if it's raining; life just seems so much more difficult when it's raining and you're standing on a bus.

* There are also two guys that I occasionally see on the bus, and I shamelessly stare at them; one of them is the spitting image of Kevin Spacey, whom I have had the biggest crush on since I was fourteen and saw him in American Beauty. I swear, if I could, I'd have my way with that man. And the other guy looks exactly like Matthew Bellamy from MUSE, you know, if he was addicted to heroine. Still, heroine chic is quite hot.

* I wish that London had a better bicycle route for all of the annoying bicyclists that get in my way every morning and every afternoon. I commend them for getting out there, conserving energy, saving the planet and wearing lycra in public. But when your giant ass is the only thing I can see and it's not even eight o'clock in the morning, AND you're slowing down traffic because you don't know how to scoot over, then I get really peeved and wonder why don't you just get a bloody Oyster card, pay the measly 90p and get hell out of our way.

Viewer Discretion Advised

2008-07-10T15:03:25Z

Yesterday I recieved my first rude comment ever on my blog. At first when I got it, I was all, Awesome! Helen, come and check this out! My first rude comment EVER. But after thinking about it for a little while, I wasn't too impressed. Who was this person that just took it upon himself to call me whiney and tell me to shut up? On my OWN BLOG? I don't think so, man. That's just not gravy.

And before I even carry on, I don't want this post to seem like I'm just a pussy bitch that can't handle one person saying something negative about me. I'm sure there are loads of people in this world that like to say mean things about me, and I know of a couple people who just plain hate my guts, and that's fine. I don't really care. It's the principle in this case that bothers me so much.

I have to approve for comments to be published, mostly because I don't want to let the spam comments through advertising 'hot asian bitch that get cumshot'. Um, no thanks dude. That's not really what this blog is about. But in the back of my mind, I thought about that one fateful day that might arise -- the day that someone writes something mean in the comments. Do I publish it? Or do I just chuck it in the pile of porn advertisements?

I decided to join a couple of blogging communities here in the London area, because I thought it would be nice to try and develop some relationships with other local bloggers. I mean, I can't go to BlogHer, so why not try and find something similar here? There's a whole community out there, and wouldn't it be nice to try and connect with others of similar interests? And that's when Mr. JT walked into my life here on My Mumbling Thougths. I had to decide yesterday whether or not to publish his rude comment. I figured since he had taken the time to read my one post (and I'm sure that was the only post of mine he has read), I should acknowledge that and publish his comment, even though it wasn't exactly rose colored for me.

But then I thought about it a little more, and thought, oh hell no. This is MY blog. MY Mumbling Thoughts. MY words. And his comment simply isn't kosher. It's something that many other bloggers before me have been repeating, but it's true -- nobody is forcing you to read this. If you don't like it, simply move on quietly and you never have to return. Personal blogs are just that: personal. It's all about me. This is where I write about my life. I am Narcissus and my blog is my pool of my own reflection (although, I suppose that isn't a good thing since he drowned, but whatever. You get the point).

And yeah, I tend to whine a lot. I write about when I cry, how I feel sorry for myself and have elaborate pity parties just for one. I'm shallow, selfish, conceited, rude, obnoxious, offensive and self-absorbed. I complain all the time about how I live in one of the greatest cities in the world, but how life is still shit, because GOD, everything isn't perfect All. The. Time.

I can do that though, and you want to know why? BECAUSE THIS IS MY BLOG AND I'LL CRY IF I WANT TO.

If you have a different opinion to me, then that's awesome, feel free to tell me. But do so in a respectful and fair manner. You wouldn't go up to a random stranger on the street and call them whiney and tell them to shut up (at least I hope you wouldn't), so what gives you the right to do so on someone's blog? I know when we post things on our blogs, we're exposing ourselves to everyone else in the world with an internet connection and may have to face their scrutiny, but at the same time there's a common courtesy factor that one should take into consideration as well.

I may not have control in my every day life to delete people and their rude comments, but I do have that power here on my blog, and I think I'll be exercising my right to not let anymore negativity get pass here. It looks like JT was the (un)lucky randomer to be my first and last rude commenter. Besides, I'd hate for some of my extraordinary regular readers to be jailed for shanking a bitch. Thanks y'all. You guys rock and make me smile.

"We don't care about the old folks, talking about the old style too"

2008-07-09T15:11:03Z

I don't know what it is, but for some strange reason I tend to attract old people. I'm not sure if I have Good Samaritan written on my forehead somewhere, or maybe it's just because they think, hey! That nice girl looks like she'll help me! but I can't rid of them.

Just the other week when we were having some of the nicest weather that London has seen in weeks, an old lady who was standing at the edge of the street was waving me over. I was walking with Alex who was on the phone and mumbled to me, 'just keep walking. She's crazy.' But I couldn't help myself. She was looking at me dead in the face and continued waving to me in a rushed panic.

I walked over to the old lady who was dressed in a heavy winter coat, a hat and mittens. She had a slight tick as well and couldn't help her head from shaking every so often.

Please don't let her be crazy. Please don't let her be crazy, I repeated to myself.

"Hiya. Are you okay?" I asked her.

"Oh thank you, dear. Could you just help me cross the road please? I've just gotten out of hopsital, and I'm too afraid to cross the street on my own."

"Yeah, sure. That's fine."

"Thank you, honey. Thank you so much." She hooked her arm in my arm and we waited for the Green Man that says it's okay for us to cross.

Once we made it safely to the other side, she told me that she was just going to Sainsbury's and that she'd be fine from there.

"God bless you, honey. God bless. And be careful crossing back over. These people are crazy drivers here."

"I will do. And it's not a problem," I said and let her continue on her way to the store.

When I crossed back over to where Alex was, she was laughing at me.

"You're too fucking nice," she said.

A couple weeks before that, I had to help another old lady who was blind and had an accent that made my ears strain just to try and decipher what she was saying. I think she might have been a little bit crazy as well, but it just added to her insane character.

I left work early and was on my way to Kingston to meet up with Helen. I had my earbuds in, as I always do when I'm out and about on my own, and I had a glazed look across my face, which should let people know not to stop me; I don't want to have a conversation with you; I don't want to fill out a survey; I don't want to join that fucking charity. So I was startled when when out nowhere, this arm came flying towards me and caught me off guard. An asian man who was apparently too busy to help this old woman flagged me down. I took out my earbuds and gave him an annoyed look.

"What?" I asked in a pissed off tone.

"Can you help her get to the store since you're walking in that direction? I'm going this way," and he pointed in the opposite direction.

I looked over at the old lady who was chewing on her bottom lip and staring at the ground.

"Are you serious?" I said.

But he didn't even answer. He just walked away and left me there with her.

Fuck. Well I can't just leave a blind woman standing here on the busy sidewalk.

"Hiya," I said in a sweet voice to her. "So you're going to the store, huh?"

"Just to Sainsbury's. I need to get my lunch," she replied in her thick accent.

"Great. Well, let's go to Sainsbury's then." I took her arm into mine, and began the very slow walk leading her around like a guide dog.

She talked and talked and talked, and I just walked and said 'mmhmm' when it was necessary. I found it interesting, though, at how many people would notice that she was blind and quickly got out of her way. We just took a straight path and every one else made room for the two of us. I thought that was kind of cool. And when we finally made it to the store, the man we asked to help us find her lunch (two bars of dark chocolate and a chocolate milkshake), was really nice and patient with her.

Up at the till, she counted out her own money which seemed like three years. It was only £2.30, but she insisted on feeling every single coin in these plastic bags that separated them all. When I offered to help her out, she snapped at me and said that she could do it herself. Fair enough. The woman who was patiently waiting pointed at her and mouthed to me, is she your mother?

No, I mouthed back and shook my head. I just met her ten minutes ago.

She smiled and acted like it was the nicest thing she had seen her entire life.

Yeah, I guess.

After she finally paid for her very chocolate lunch, we made the long journey back to the social services building where I dropped her off. The man (security guard maybe?) that was trying to find her social worker didn't have the same amount of patience as the lady at Sainsbury's, and I could tell he was getting frustrated with her. She didn't know the woman's name. All she knew was that she was a 'team manager'.

I really needed to get going, so after I checked with him that she would be fine and was in the right place, I left. I felt bad, but at the same time I thought that I had gone above and beyond what some people would have done.

But the one old lady that I partially take care of is our neighbor two doors down from us named, Olive. You would think that she was my grandmother, and now I'm afraid that she relies on me too much. When it gets to be time for us to move out, I'm not sure what she's going to do. She's 87-years-old, just had a pacemaker put inside of her and has lived in the same building for over forty years. It's crazy.

I've been helping her out for the past two months or so, taking her trash down for her and occasionally going to the shop for her to pick up a few things that she needs. She always gives extra money to me, but I refuse and give it back to her, sometimes when she doesn't realize it. And I don't mind, because it's not really that big of a deal. However, sometimes I get slightly weirded out when she randomly calls me 'just to chat,' or when she gives us small nick knacks from her house that we have no use for, just because she wants someone to have them before she dies. And when we do chat, the only thing she talks about is how she's really independent, her daughter with schizophrenia and she can be really patronizing about us 'young kids' these days.

I get it, Olive. It sucks to be your age.

Bless her. I realize that she doesn't really have anyone else, and I do try to help her when I can. Momma always says to me, how would you want to be treated when you get to be that age? Well, I suppose I'd want some nice, young girl to help me across the street when I just get out of the hospital, or not judge me when I have only chocolate for my lunch. And I suppose I'd also like that nice girl to listen to me ramble on about the same stories every time we chat and not have her complain when I give her pointless things from my mountain of crap that has been collecting dust since the 19th century.

Or, I'd much rather just be left somewhere in a cottage where I wouldn't bother anyone and let nature take its course.

Como te llama?

2008-07-08T15:20:14Z

It's always exciting and nerve wracking at the same time when one of your favorite music artists release a new album. If it's good and exceeds your expectations, then hot damn, it just makes you fall deeper in love with the man or woman that can strum your heart strings and make you sway to the music. But if it's bad? God. If it's bad. Well, I cry. I don't know about the rest of you, but it's like I have to bury them and mourn the loss of one of my best friends.

Luckily for me, Albert Hammond Jr.'s second album, Como Te Llama?, rocks my motherfucking socks. For those of you who don't know him, I have to ask, um, why? He went to pursue a solo career from one of my ultimate favorite bands EVER, The Strokes, and I think it was a really good move on his part. I love The Strokes; lord knows that I would give anything to have even two minutes with that gorgeous god that is, Julian Casablancas (what a fucking cool name as well), but their third album was a bit...meh. I know, I loved it when it first came out, and it is a respectable third album. HOWEVER, it just didn't move me the same way that their first two albums did. With songs like Reptilia, Alone Together and Hard To Explain, how can you really top yourself?

And then I thought, what is it that makes an album a good album, a great album even? An epic album? Is it the catchy tunes? Is it that those songs represent a specific time in one's life that can transport them back to an era that wasn't so demanding and more carefree? Is it the lyrics? Is it that one particular guitar solo, or drum beats that make your toes tap along uncontrollably?

What is it exactly?

Really, I would have to say that it's a combination of all of the above. There are some albums that I listen to and think, not exactly my personal favorite, but I can't deny that this is a damn fine album. But then there are others that are just so disappointing that I want to find a dark corner and cry. Take Coldplay's recent album. Seriously, what is that bullshit? I've listened to it twice the whole way through and it makes my skin crawl. I just have to ask, what happened? Where did they go wrong?

I blame Gwyneth. Way to kill the music. Things were fine before she came along. They were churning out songs like Sparks, We Never Change and Amsterdam. I mean, yes, they were huge, popular and known all around the world, but the music was still epic, and moved 20,000 of their fans in the Nissan Pavillion to sing along to In My Place. Then she came along and next thing you know that shit song, Green Eyes comes out on their third album, X&Y. Lame. It upsets me.

I have to say that I've moved on from The Killers now as well. They're so cocky and up themselves these days, part of me feels sad for them. Their second album, Sam's Town was mediocre at best. Yeah, I loved the few ballad songs that they had on there, but after the first five songs, the rest of the album kind of deflates and you're left with filler songs that aren't exactly fulfilling, but leave you feeling empty. I hope their next album isn't some chop house attempt at music like Sawdust. I didn't even buy that album it upset me so much. Why was I going to pay full price for songs that I already had? You shouldn't try to milk more money out of your fans. You should do your job and create more beautiful music that's worth paying for.

I don't listen to the radio, partly because I can't stand the commercials after every two songs. It's annoying and changing stations every five minutes gets old really quickly. Instead I go by other people's recommendations (generally Helen or Ryan), and scour the internet for up and coming bands that haven't been corrupted by big labels that force them to be creative and musical when they don't have anything left; or by Mtv and the glitz and glam of the stupid Grammy's. I hate the Grammy's.

So it makes me happy that Mr. Hammond Jr. has given his fans a second album that I can both respect and enjoy at the same time. It's creative and slightly experiemental, but not so crazy to the point where his fans from the Yours To Keep era won't recognize him; yet at the same time, his new fans can still get a flavor of his old sound while still enjoying his newest songs. Spooky Couch is not so much spooky as it is just a pleasant instrumental break in the album that actually made me smile while I was on the bus this morning. Gfc is radio friendly, and has more of a classic Albert sound that has already had multiple plays on my iPod. And then you've got songs like Rocket and Victory At Monterey that are definitely a different sound to get used to, but you do so happily and welcome the change with open arms, not a face of absolute disgust.

* Correction: Because I am shit and don't take the time to research my posts like I should (I'm impatient), Melissa was awesome and pointed out that 'Green Eyes' is not off of Coldplay's third album, X&Y, but rather their second album, A Rush of Blood to the Head. And I have to say, if that's the case, then maybe it isn't Gwyneth's fault. Maybe Chris Martin is just creatively tapped and hopefully one day he will return to us. I hope so. And thanks again to Melissa for showing me the error of my ways.

"'Meet me in the bathroom,' that's what she said"

2008-07-07T19:30:08Z

One o'clock on Saturday afternoon and my phone rang. I thought it was Alex to talk about our funny evening; getting drunk in an Australian pub whilst dancing to Jamaican music on the 4th of July is funny. FUNNY.

"Hello," I answered in my sleepy voice.

"Hey, Sam. It's X," the voice replied.

Not Alex! It's not Alex. Quick, sound alive like you're not hungover. Oh, X doesn't care. He knows about your drunken ways. He made a comment about how I sounded like I had just woken up anyway, so it's not like I could have disguised it even if I tried.

We made plans for my first ever blogger meet. Back in the day, X used to write on his blog called october4th, but closed up shop, because "not having any drama" gave him zero writing material, which I highly doubt. I always enjoyed reading X's words, no matter what it was about. I remember ages ago as well when I first moved over here, he sent me an email saying that if I ever wanted to meet up to give him a shout, but because I'm lame and got caught up in my own little world, we never did. We decided to meet up on Sunday around 3ish at Victoria station. I could manage that. Afterall, I had been to Victoria station once to pick up a friend a little over a year ago. No biggie.

Helen mentioned that I could take the 170 straight to Victoria and not have to spend extra on the train. It would be a little bit of a journey, but when did I ever hate long bus journeys where I could stare out the window and listen to my iPod? I love that kind of shit!

I wasn't even on the bus ten minutes when we ran into scary traffic and I thought, now is exactly the time I hate being on long bus journeys. Traffic is always annoying, and it's even more annoying when the weather is being typically English: rainy, cold and windy. X rang me while we were paused on a ramp and told me that he had just missed his train and might be a little late.

"That's alright, I think I'm going to be late too," I told him.

"Well we can be late together then."

During the hour long bus journey, I didn't really think much about 'the meeting'. It didn't exactly feel like a 'blogger meet' rather than just me finally meeting someone that I've already 'mentally met' in my own head. I do that with all of the bloggers that I read -- we've already met, I already know them, and I'm sure that they already know me. I talk about them to all of my friends as if we've known each other for years and keep in contact over the internet. Why do I do this? Because I'm strange I guess.

I also had no idea what we were going to do in Central. I don't usually go to Central during the daylight hours. If you want to know of any good places to go clubbing and for drinks though, then I'm the girl to ask. Roadhouse in Covent Garden? AfterSkool at The Quad? Koko in Camden? Zoo Bar in Leicester Square? I'm all over that shit. But during the daytime, I'm useless.

I actually made it to Victoria on time, and smoked a cigarette before I went inside the huge station. I stood around for a little while until I started getting funny looks from some of the workers. I guess they thought I was going to cause some kind of trouble, because I must look like the trouble-makin'-kind. I went into the larger area of the train station with all of the shops and scouted the place for the bathroom. I figured I could kill time by emptying my bladder, but decided that paying 30p to pee was ridiculous. I wondered what would happen if someone was really desperate and didn't have 30p to pee? What then? Would people get offended if they took care of business in public? They really couldn't get angry; it's their fault for charging the public to do something that is natural and they can't really help.

After a while of waiting and watching the pigeons walk around, my phone started vibrating and I saw that it was X calling. He had arrived and asked me where I was.

"Um, I'm in that big, open space by the toilets."

"Right, that's a little vague."

"I don't know, the place with the big board with the numbers on it."

I am shit.

"Okay, what shops are you near?"

"Oh right! Well, there's HMV, WHSmith, Monsoon."

"Well I'm near WHSmith. I don't see you. Jump up and wave or something."

"No! People will think I'm a mentalist. Oh wait, I see you."

And then what did I do? I waved like a mentalist. And as I was walking toward him, all I kept on repeating to myself in my head was, don't call him X. Don't call him X. He has a real name.

From there, we kind of just walked around Central for about two hours and chatted about random things. It was really cool. He knew all of the names of all of the popular streets and knew which direction they went. I just walked around aimlessly and took the most complicated routes around all of the different people, which X pointed out to me. What can I say? I'm a complicated woman.

We stopped into his favorite record shop, and I could tell why he loved it so much: because it fucking rocks. If I wasn't poor and saving money, I would have loved to do some damage to my bank account in there, but alas, the lightness of my purse reminded me that I would need to save it for another day.

Whilst walking around though, it began to rain and we decided to tuck into of one of the Virgin Record stores. In the bottom basement area, they were having a serious sale on CDs, books and DVDs; you could get a CD for £2! And books for 50p! Honestly, it was practically like we were robbing the place. However, after a quick glance at the items that were on sale, we could see why they were so cheap -- most of it was shit. They had about twenty albums in some weird language that X apparently knew how to speak, and there were albums with titles like "Even better than the original!" by cover bands. Awful. Although, I really could have gone for the Olivia Newton John album (Xanadu was on there!) and the best of the Bee Gees (nothing from Saturday Night Fever, though, so we didn't see how it could be 'the best').

In the end, I managed to get an Oasis album that I don't have for £2, and X got a book for 50p. It was pretty good, and right up our price range.

I had to pee so we stopped into one of the many McDonald's where I didn't have to pay anything to use the toilet, as it should be. After that, though, X told me that he had to dart because it was getting near his bedtime (early dude!). It was probably good that I was heading back then, though, because while I was on the train back to my side of London, I recieved a text message from a nervous Helen that simply said, Yo sam i'm worried. Just give me a txt. Just as I was typing up my reply, she began to ring me.

"Hey honey, what's up? What's wrong?" I asked her.

"You're okay?

"Of course I'm okay. What's wrong? Are you okay?"

"I don't know. I was just getting myself all worked up and in a panic. You know how my paranoid brain is. I just was really groggy when you left this morning, and didn't even ask where you were going, or what you guys were doing. And I thought, 'what do I know about this guy? Nothing! What does Sam know?' He could be chopping her up into little bits and hiding her in a floorboard somewhere! I'm a terrible friend! Honestly, if you hadn't answered, I might have called the police."

"Honey! Aw, bless your heart. No, no I'm fine, and alive. It's okay, really. I had a good time. X is lovely, and not a murderer." If I could have, I would have reached through the phone and gave my care bear a hug.

Later on that day, she told me that she had had a really bad dream that left her shaken up.

"You know how sometimes when you dream something like that, it really affects you? Well, the logical part of my brain kept on telling me, 'Helen, she's fine. She's just out having a good time and will text you later.' But the paranoid part of my brain, that little one percent was telling me that you were getting cut up and put in a freezer somewhere. See? I don't just stress over boys. I stress over my friends as well."

As I was talking to her, my phone started ringing upstairs. Alex tried calling me, so before I went to sleep I gave her a quick ring back.

"Hey honey, what's up?" I said.

"Nothing much. Just got off work and wanted to see how you are, how your day was?" she asked me.

"It was really good, I had a nice time. I just hope he doesn't think I'm crazy. I tend to ramble a lot and talk about random stuff. Poor Helen, though, she thought that I was dead somewhere. Bless her."

"Yeah, me too! That's why I'm calling; I was just a little concerned. I mean, you've never met the guy before, and Central is a big place."

I didn't bother explaining that I had already 'mentally met' him. I don't think she would have understood my logic. Instead I reassured her that X was a really cool fellow blogger, a really cool guy, and that she had nothing to worry about. I love my worrying friends.

All in all, I would consider it to be a good first London blogger meeting. I've already told him the next time he should come round to my neck of the woods, and I'll show him my side of London. I'll even go to east London if he doesn't mind this crazy American walking around his town, probably embarrassing him because I have no sense of direction. London is such a big place; I should cover as much ground as possible. But I'm thinking we should go to my London first. One word for you X: Yogo. And it has nothing to do with NASCAR.

Chapter 1 - Girl Meets Girl Pt. 1

2008-07-05T14:55:04Z

I remember when I was in the nineth grade living in rural North Carolina in a small town with a population of six thousand people. A girl in some of my high school classes with bleach blonde hair, Amber White, fascinated me. I'm not sure what it was specifically about her that I was attracted to; maybe it was how she could manage to look cool in a pair of overalls and a white vest top; or maybe it was that she was the only girl in a group full of boys who were known around the school as the "tough guys," "the bullies," "the assholes". I envied her. I would see her sitting at the back of the school bus, where all of the 'cool kids' stayed every afternoon, surrounded by four or five of her muscle jock bullies, and wonder how she did it.

Despite wearing little to not make-up, Amber was a complete and total knock-out. Her blue eyes were the first thing that grabbed your attention against her pale complexion that was almost porcelian like and glittered just like the pink Smackers lip gloss that she always applied at least ten times a day. She was not as fragile as the porcelian doll that she resembled, however, and also had a reputation of being tough and rude because of the guys she always hung out with. I even remember her being suspended for a couple of fights that she started herself. To a plain, 13-year-old girl with glasses, I found her to be amazing, and aspired to be just like her. I wished that I could walk around our high school as if I owned it, just like Amber did.

]]> I spoke to her once in art class. We were making paper machet face masks, and she was sitting to the right of me poking the eye of her mask with a wooden popsicle stick.

"This shit is stupid," she said out loud to nobody in particular. I took it as an opportunity to make conversation with the girl that I looked up to so much.

"Yeah, tell me about it," I replied, trying to have the same annoyed tone in my voice.

She looked over to me for the first time of the entire school year, but stayed silent.

"I mean, it's not like we're actually going to need any of this shit in the real world; you know, unless we plan on being a sculptor our whole life," I continued, amazed at myself for saying the word 'shit' out loud.

She laughed a little, and a part of me smiled inside knowing that I just made Amber White laugh.

"That's true, but who wants to be a fucking sculptor for the rest of their life?" she said, and pushed her chair back and walked to the door grabbing the bathroom pass as she went out. When she returned, she smelled faintly of cigarette smoke and we didn't speak for the rest of the class.

I wish I could say that that was the defining moment which brought us together as lifelong friends, but sadly, that would not be the case. I think the only thing it guaranteed me was to not be the next victim that caused her to be suspended from school for another five days. No, after that very brief conversation, the only time Miss Amber White and I would speak would be in geometry class when she wanted to know the answer to a question that Mrs. Durr had given us. Considering that my mathematic skills didn't go any further than the basic multiplication table, Amber found me to be useless and would turn around in her chair rolling her eyes. It made me hate myself for not being a superior geometry expert.

It wasn't just Amber as a person that intrigued me, but rather her way with the guys that she encountered, whether it was the muscle jock bullies that always surrounded her like bodyguards, or even just our teachers. There was something captivating about the way she would subtly manipulate them, and I would watch them fold and bend under her womanly fingers that didn't look like they would ever form a fist and slam up against the face of another human being -- but they did, and on many occasions. I observed her gentle body language, how her voice would change to a higher pitch and sound more like an innocent girl rather than the hard image she portrayed, and then watch the men she was speaking to collapse like an old city building under her charm. At the time I didn't understand the power that she possessed, that even I possessed if I ever took the time to harness it; but seeing each and every one of her male victims crumble to her non-physical force made me sit up and pay attention to how she interacted with people of the opposite sex.

While I longed to be a part of Amber's selected group, the people that I regularly hung out with would probably be considered the "leftovers". We all could have fit into a group, but didn't really put that much effort into getting to know the people we meant to be related to, and therefore were cast aside and eventually forgotten about. My friend, Lauren, played the flute and was never fully accepted by the rest of the band geeks. She spent all of her free time educating herself on anime comic books when she wasn't practicing the new song they were assigned in her music class. She always wore her hair down parted right in the middle, and had a different t-shirt on each day that had some kind of fantasy scene on it. I thought she was weird, and I never really considered her to be a good friend, but she had the same lunch as I did and she was someone to sit next to in the cafeteria.

"See this?" she said to me holding up her right hand.

"What? I don't see anything," I said to her.

"My fingernails. I'm trying to grow them out so that they're all the same length. They're a little translucent for my liking, but I'm taking these vitamins that my mom takes for the wrinkles under her eyes. Apparently they're supposed to help your skin, hair and nails. I've been taking them for a week now. Can you tell a difference in my nails?"

"Um, yeah, I guess so. To be honest, Lauren, I haven't really paid that much attention to your fingernails."

"Well, that's what these vitamins are supposed to do then; help people notice my nails." She tore open her chocolate milk carton and broke her right index fingernail.

"Shit!" she screamed out. "Well there goes a fucking week flushed down the toilet."

While Lauren reached into her bag to pull out her nail file, and mercilessly even out her fingernail right at the lunch table, my eyes glanced over to the opposite side of the cafeteria where Amber and her jock friends were sitting. She was perched flirtatiously on the table while all of the guys surrounded her on the little red, circle seats that looked like they might break under the sheer weight of their athletic frames. I didn't get it, how did she do it all the time? How was she able to carry herself in a manner that said 'don't fuck with me' but still be feminine and cute and pretty? She had all of the guys falling for her, and yet she stayed single. She didn't give them one morsel of her time, and yet their attention and eyes were always on her.

Everybody knew that Amber wasn't easy and there were even rumors about if she was a lesbian, because she never had a boyfriend. I knew better than that. She was just waiting for the right guy, the one guy that deserved everything that she was worth, and Amber knew that she was worth everything in the world. She wouldn't just give herself to any of those drooling fools that followed her around like a sad puppy. She believed that being with her was a privilege and you had to work hard for her approval.

Lauren finished evening out her fingernail and looked up at me, then followed my stare across the cafeteria.

"Oh god. There you go staring at your girlfriend again," she said.

I snapped out of my gaze and cleared my throat.

"Please," I retorted. "I don't like her that way. I'm not a lesbo. I just think she's really cool. I wouldn't mind being a little bit more like Amber."

"Yeah, yeah. I've heard it all before. Well, if you're not in love with Amber, then who do you like?"

I sat up a little straighter to this question. There was only one boy in the entire school that I liked and fell for the second that I saw him.

"What makes you think that I like anybody? This school is a deadbeat land for anyone with any potential to get out of this godforsaken town."

"Oh please. Everyone likes at least one person. Come on, tell me. I told you about me liking Dalton."

"Yeah, you volunteered that information. I didn't ask for it. Besides, you probably don't even know who he is. He likes to keep quiet and not draw attention to himself," I shuffled uncomfortably on my seat.

"Oh I get it. You're embarrassed of him? He's a freak isn't it? I wouldn't blame you to keep that information to yourself then," and she dropped the conversation, picked up her Papa John's pizza slice and started eating.

He wasn't a freak, and I certainly wasn't embarrassed of him. He was a skateboarder, a punk and made me believe in love at first sight. My immediate feelings for him started in the pit of my stomach and grew branches and limbs throughout my entire pre-pubescent body. I was paralyzed every single time he passed me by in the hallways, or whenever I'd sit behind him in English class every morning. While Mr. Griffin would drone on and on about his favorite authors, my mind would wander and I'd imagine scenarios of my crush asking me out on a date, and I would accompany him to all of his skateboard competitions, and we'd be the sweetest couple in school that nobody knew about because we both liked to keep to ourselves.

"Ugh, fine. It's Lenny Lukowitz," I blurted out.

"Ew. Yeah, I'd totally be embarrassed by him," and she carried on eating her lunch as if I didn't say anything at all.

"I feed the pigeons, I sometimes feed the sparrows too; it gives me a sense of enormous well-being"

2008-07-04T14:28:07Z

A conversation that I had in my head yesterday. Now you can see why it's hard for me to live inside of my brain...

- Look at 'em. They're so cute.

- For dirty pigeons, yeah, sure. If that's what you're into. I wish you would stop feeding the greedy bastards.

- Well it's better than letting all of Carlene's cereal go to waste. I don't eat it, and those are four perfectly good boxes of Rice Krispies and Wheatabix in there.

- OR, you could have just given it to someone at work. I'm sure someone at work would have taken it. Now thanks to you and your fucking bright thinking, there's going to be thousands of them out there next week just waiting for you to refill that pitiful wicker bowl.

- Whatever. I think they're sweet. Look at her! She's cleaning the random bits of Rice Krispies off of the man pigeon. That's love right there.

- Or nature. You're gay. And feeding the pigeons is stupid. You want to know something? Doves. They're pigeons, just all white. LIke, albino. So the dove being a representation of love? Is really just a dirty pigeon cleaning random bits of Rice Krispies off of the dude pigeon. Put that in your pipe and smoke it.

- God, pessimistic much?

- Nope. Just realistic.

Anyone want any cereal?