Monday, 27th February, 2006

Self Assessment

meme

I'm a bit of a sucker for personality tests ("me" is my favourite subject), and although I'm loathe to start filling up my weblog with those "Which Thundercat are you?"-type things, this personal DNA test (via) was just too much fun not to share...

Animated Creator

But the one thing that the results failed to mention — and it's something about my personality that I'm very aware of — is my shambolic disorganisation.

I was thinking, the other day, whilst scrabbling around the house desperately trying to find my driving license, that I wish I could be more organised in my life. Whilst I love the seemingly random way that things and thoughts happen to me, it would be great to have the more important things in Proper Places™

It's not just physical things. I wish I was more organised about my work — both the photographic and filmbased stuff, and my hobbyist approach to coding.

In our more fantasist moments, me and some friends talk about the idea of getting together to make Stuff™. I personally dream of being able to bash out some ideas for things, then have someone more versed in the dark arts of Proper Programming™ take them away and make something robust out of them.

I want a Code Monkey.

But I also want a Life Monkey — someone who will go round after me, tidying up the loose ends and helping me sort out all the things that need sorting out. Preferably before the deadlines for those things pass.

Too much to ask?

Probably.

I'd best go see if I can find my P60...

I would have said I was more like the Yamaha YZF 600 S Pumyra myself ... (wishful thinking)

Underskirts

photo

(via flickr.com/people/si08han)

Part of a film I never got around to making

Aye — one of the large blocks that make the windowsills of the Shire Hall at the castle. The patterns in the sandstone made wonderful stripe-movements when I was experimenting — and I used a couple of images like that for the LA1 Series of prints

It's Probably Better Not To Ask

link audio Kris

I should have linked to this ages ago, because it's stunningly good.

Kris, you talented little fucker you

Bath Time

photo

(via flickr.com/people/si08han)

It's that time of the month again...

...

Bugger.

That was my 1111th picture on Flickr. A few moments ago, I had a cunning idea — wait until 11:11pm, take a picture of the clock, then upload it with the title "1111" as a little note of what number picture it was.

But damm my Flickr-happy fingers. I totally forgot and ended up with a rather sorry picture of two candles on the edge of my bath.

How poo.

They're nice grapefruit-and-lime candles, if that's any consolation.

...

The thing is though, I've been a right industrious princess today I've sorted out a lot of things (including finally sending Miss Mish back her earring), and getting a bit of work done just before the client rang me to see if I'd done it yet.

(*phew*)

And I decided that I would spend the rest of the evening relaxing — which is not something I often get the chance to do.

A bath, a glass of wine, a mug of Horlicks, then an early night in preparation for a few days away.

What's the betting though, that at 2am I'll still be up, pissed as a fart, listening to shite music and taking risqué shots of myself that'll never see the light of day?

Permit Me A Moment Of Introspection

self moan

I wonder sometimes, just what the hell is going on. I wonder where I've been. I wonder where I'm going.

Taking that personality test earlier made me thinka lot about my assertion that most of the great things that have happened in my life have happened purely by chance. At various little crossroads along the 34 years of my life so far, things have hit me out of leftfield and sent me scurrying in new directions.

I ask for stuff to happen, but the things that actually happen turn out to be more exciting, more fortitious, more *fun than I could ever dream of.

But sometimes, it would be nice to have a little control over things.

I'm not sure I'm making exactly the point I wanted to make here, so let me try and rephrase.

This time last year, apart from being about to collapse into a blubbering heap on my kitchen floor (and spending a good seven weeks knocking back antidepressants), I kinda knew where I was. Things were a lot more sorted than they are now.

Now I'm finding myself coasting on a wave of serendipity — bumbling from one Exciting Thing™ to the next — but back then I had a certain sense of solidity

It's at times like these, I feel the need to ask myself a series of questions. I want to know — from myself — where exactly I see myself ending up. Where I see myself going. And whether or not I feel totally happy with myself.

Granted, I'm not exactly someone who wallows in self-pity about their lot in life. As I've said (perhaps over-said recently) I'm thoroughly loving every minute of life right now. Things — socially, financially, and egotistically — are great.

But there's something gnawing at the back of my head at the moment. It's a feeling exasserbated by just turning 34 — and a feeling that will most likely increase with each day that I get closer and closer to 35.

35, you see, is what I like to call "Half Way". I know that if I carry on with my current lifestyle — the drink, the fags, the endless nights of debauchery — then 35 isn't really half-way — it's more like "nearly there". But there is a sense in my head that a half "three-score-year-and-ten" is the time to take stock, and maybe think about things a little harder than previously.

...

It's a day-over six months since Kath and I split up, and I've really tried to avoid talking about it. Partly because it wasn't something I wanted to talk about (I'm a fragile sod), but also because I could see she was still reading this — and I didn't want to say anything out loud that I thought she might hear.

But I've been thinking that maybe, maybe, I don't care anymore.

...

Not that long ago, Kath and I were talking quite deeply about what we both wanted to happen in our lives. We talked about moving in with each other, we talked about future plans. We talked about having children.

And part of me, at the moment, is really missing that. As much as I love the freedom and independence to go out, be myself, and indulge in the more debauched aspects of my personality, I really miss that stability — that sense of assurance — that she used to give to me.

Don't get me wrong — I loved that woman with every single fibre in my soul, and it hurt so much when she left. But after this amount of time, the love fades a little, and all you're left with is an empty space where someone used to be.

And it's not that you feel less towards that person — it's just that you focus more on the things that are missing from your life in terms of yourself, rather than in terms of them.

If that makes any sense.

...

Not too long ago, I found myself in bed with someone. That's actually quite a literal recounting of the events — I have no idea how I got there, I just remember the nakedness and the sex.

But I also remember really wanting them to stay, even though I was in a hotel room that only had single beds.

I wanted that closeness again — that feeling of "waking up" and seeing someone there.

At the moment, the closest I get to that, is when Tish or Biscuit licks my face in the morning.

...

Ack. Sorry. Morbidness. Wallowingness.

It's just that it occured to me recently, that I could spend the rest of my life doing this — getting drunk, pulling only-just-met strangers, and letching after younger trannies in clubs in Milton Keynes — or I could try and define a path that I wanted to go down.

What I don't want to do, is find myself standing in Napoleons, on my fiftieth birthday, realising that I've turned into the same type of predatory trannie that used to pounce on me when I was younger.

...

What I want is kids.

And I want dresses.

And I want sex.

And I want links.

And I want traffic.

And I want wine.

And I want fags — in every sense of the word.

And I want moving images.

And I want more sex.

And I want, just once, to wake up and see the face of someone I utterly adore in the bed next to me.

But do you know what I want, more than anything else in the world, right now, right this very second?

...

No neither do I. That's what makes life great