It's dark and we're wearing sunglasses

Julie went to a party on saturday. She went ice skating in east kilbride and my dad decided to kick about until it was time to pick her up. I just remembered I haven't told anyone this story. For some reason he decided to explain, in some detail, what the shopping centre was like, ignoring the fact that until I was like 13 or 14 I spent every weekend there, watching shit films and buying tacky junk. Even after that I had a friend who preferred going there to going to town so we had many an after school jaunt. I informed my father of this and he gave me a look of disgust. He then said when he returned home and told my mum about his experience he said the following:

"If I'm dying in East Kilbride, please take me somewhere else, anywhere else."

He then told us about some shop he ended up in.

"I don't know if you've heard of it. Holland and Barratt?"

I told him that the shop was indeed well-known. They had adverts on the tv and everything. In fact I almost got a job there once but bad luck prevailed.

Apparently the prices in there are disgustingly high. A fact he complained about for most of the walk to Parkhead. Yes, my dad and his mate were bemoaning the prices of complementary therapy and supplements whilst walking through a rabble Celtic fans who were trying desperately to get as drunk as possible before the early kick off.

Sometimes I just wanna hug him.

Tiramisu is awesome

I wrote a lot last night. I kept starting with a fresh idea and falling asleep half way through. As a result my sentences begin neat and legible and end in CATHERINE WHEN YOU WAKE UP REMEMBER THAT YOU WANTED TO WRITE ABOUT ENGLISH TOURISTS AND THEIR DAIRY COMPULSION.

Least that's what I can make out.

I also seem to have written over my last paragraph at least three times making the words really dark and swirly.

On the plus side I am actually writing again after a period of nothing?

Oh so tawdry

I have a choice.

Dirty pretty things ticket or a haircut.

Carl Barat all half naked smoking with his guitar or a way to stop looking awful.

The man who gave my little parisienne a theme with his offhand comment about epiphanies that I loved so much I copied it out on notebooks and scraps and hands.

Or being to see without shaking my head all the time.

I'm going to have to be sensible and go with hair. After all I have seen the band already and I do have exams around the time they're playing.

Oh it is so hard being financially wise but it'll be worth it.

Incredibly tired. Beyond tired. Summary of life over past few days: no sleep, made cookies, went to Perthshire where I: looked at stones, watched a man make fire, saw lots of ducks, hated on some posh girls who were afraid of bees. Then I: went to el cinema, met bob and his friend who remembers reading my boobs (and phoned the other friend who remembered what was written on my tshirt), tutted at djs who didn't have the music I wanted, dozed amongst girls underwear, watched celtic win for once, ate cookies.

To do: sleep.

Also the sun is shining in case you haven't noticed and my cheeks got burnt because they always do the instant the sun appears. Bad side: itchiness. Good side: freckles!

L'amour ne dure pas toujours

Back when I was on livejournal often I used to browse this which led me to buy Lost in Translation

and Lady Vengeance

purely because they looked so goddamn beautiful, which they are.

I found it again the other day when I was bored and spied a film called Dans Paris. I know of this film because amazon is offering it as a deal with Chansons d'amour (my musical about threesomes which is now out on dvd and I have spent many an hour holding longingly but alas, it costs too much). So I thought I'd have a click, see what it looked like.

Checklist for a french film:
Attractive male with a big nose

Women in various states of undress

Quiet romantic whimsy that is cute but also decidedly odd

That fantastic muted grey of Paris that probably has social connotations that I never really listened to in my French film class


I have to stop finding foreign films I can't afford to buy. They are so rarely in stock or cheap.

ASS FOR RENT

were the words above the mobile number I didn't note down.

No thanks, I already got one :) was the message I scrawled back on the table. Another number was clearer underneath with the words I'll do anything CALL ME reeked a little of desperation. And by little I mean I cringed to read those caps.

The toilet had no numbers just crossed out hotmail addresses. Want to cyber with hot guys? They will send pics of their big cocks I promise! Here was a girl pimp. Another hand had crossed them out. Yet another replied with Why would you want cyber sex, it is so tragic :(.

Ah thank god Romeo didn't add Juliet as a friend. They would have talked about their shared interests, *written tantalising fantasies* and changed screennames to reflect their new found love. Until a blocked cousin adds them on an anonymous account and discovers the truth. Juliet will appear offline as she is added to a big chat window and Romeo will sign off distraught, missing her reappearance after the others have lost interest.

So very tired.

I am too lazy to edit

Oh and incidentally On the road is a fantastic book. I mean it was always one of those classics people rave about but I'd been so utterly disappointed with Trainspotting and A clockwork orange that I never picked on the road up. Because it was in the same pile in my cupboard, in case that makes no sense. Regret! It is awesome. I'm a third of the way in thanks to boring bus journeys and it's one of those pieces you can just read so easily.

Also I found this when I looked him up on good old wiki which, if you are too lazy to click, is a list of thirty essentials for writing like Mr Kerouac.

Favourites:


1. Scribbled secret notebooks, and wild typewritten pages, for yr own joy

6. Be crazy dumbsaint of the mind

10. No time for poetry but exactly what is

13. Remove literary, grammatical and syntactical inhibition

and the best:

29. You're a Genius all the time

I've fallen slightly in love.

High class games of sorrow

Oh, it's all ridiculous.

I've been reading, now that I've had a chance to catch my breath. I pulled out my copy of the perks of being a wallflower even though I know all the words by now and reading it is like listening to a favourite song you've played so many times the tune's lost meaning. I forced myself to read it properly this time, like the first time I read it and then I looked down the list of books within it and worked out what ones I have and what ones I can get a hold of for free. So my dad gave me his copy of On the Road though not the copy he 'read three times before I was your age' (I'm not sure if that was bragging, or pride or what but those were his words). I've had This Side of Paradise bookmarked for months keeping Virginia Woolf company. To kill a mockingbird, peter pan, great gatsby and catcher in the rye I've read, Hamlet I have never finished since my copy is so heavily annotated it drives me mad. There's one or two I think my dad might have somewhere but then I'm stuck. No more cash to buy the written word. The sooner I write my own, the better.

The pile of literature just keeps growing. There's all the books I started over Christmas and never finished. The last book I read cover to cover might have been breakfast at tiffany's or dorian gray. I haven't finished Bronte or Milton or Gogol or Pushkin. Then there's the short stories: Fitzgerald, Salinger and Gilman. I've been losing myself in films instead. A couple of hours in a dark room with a big screen I can switch off my head and watch. I'm good at watching. Not dvds though, the last film I watched at home was the blob as I stuck pins in my fingers. I didn't even look at the screen, I know it too well. In the cinema I can pretend I'm somewhere else. I shouldn't really be going, I'm supposed to be saving and blowing half my week's allowance on a film isn't what you'd call money savvy but screw it. I spent too long missing films for whatever reason and I love the experience too much. There's no need to speak and comments whispered in my ear tickle and make me smile but I don't have to react. I can just sit and watch and when the credits roll I can start the day again.

I didn't come here to say this but I lost my point somewhere, assume it was interesting ok?

It isn't insane on paper

I've been thinking a lot lately. I mean I'm always thinking a lot, it's kinda a problem, but I've been thinking a lot about different things.

Like how a lot of stuff don't matter but that isn't a bad thing. Sorta exploring the advantages of apathy.

I've been thinking about identities.

I've been thinking that even though I try and hold myself objectively I still get worked up over the little things.

I've been thinking that sometimes personality traits are just personality traits and it's better to let them be than try and understand why.

I've been thinking about how we all run from our past and there's that fear that if we share too much it might catch up with us.

I've been thinking about life, which makes a change from death.

But I'm still not sure if it makes much difference.

I'm thinking about symmetry and repetition and those dreams I have of conversations in ridiculous situations that play out for me in real life and feels fake. The time you gave me that look made more sense when we were falling. And ok there were no cats or parties in bathtubs that time you told me about that thing but the words were the same. I used to wonder if I was alive. There's the theory that this world is merely the creation of another world, and it in turn is a product of another imagination and so on. They made movies about it but I only ever watched the first one. Long leather coats don't do it for me.

I went on a philosophy course once and they asked us if we knew the world we lived in didn't exist would we try to escape it. I've never seen the point in wondering such a thing. If it were true what would be the point? We'll never know, just like we'll never know if there is a God or if it could have worked out or if it was all a big mistake or if I'll be here waiting for you in the end.

We won't know because we'll never ask and we won't ask because sometime it's just enough to look in the mirror and know that the person looking back is you and that it's all going to be alright. And all this means is I had a rough week and I'm not sure if I'm over it yet but I'm trying. It's frustrating really. I want someone to congratulate me but I'd have to sit here and tell you why all of these thoughts are important and then the whole thing is superficial.

I sat for a couple of hours with my legs off one end of bed and my chin hugging the mattress on the other side. I haven't read a book like that for years. Just for a moment there were no thoughts because I was just a girl reading a good book and though there were interruptions:clothes tossed over my head with stories about zombies, the beep of my phone bringing me appearances of ducks where there shouldn't be ducks, vague plans and amusing tales of urine, it was easy enough to fall straight back in until my foot fell asleep and I was shouted back downstairs.

One month and my exams will be over and my second first year will be complete. I can't fucking wait.

Please shut up

Talking to myself again causes the Tesco queue to stare. I'm not crazy. I swear I'm not crazy, although the thoughts racing through my head are scaring me again. The important thing is not to listen.

shhhhhhhhh.

an old woman talked to me at the bustop. She'd been in town since the back of 11. Just wanted to get a bus, get home before the football ended. I didn't feel like telling her I'd been awake for days. I've been awake for so long it don't make no sense. I cleaned and swept and mopped and wiped and cleaned and my head is too woozy.

a swan held up my train.

I want to write but I can't. my handwriting has gone spider scratch. the world fell apart on monday night and all I can think is maybe, just maybe I need to stay awake a little longer and soon it'll be quiet.

Just please, please stop talking.

everyday brings a new cut on my hand and I don't know how it got there.

I wish I could create something tangible. More tangible than my dusty words.

i want to tell you a secret, one I've never told anybody else before. I want to whisper it in a smoky bar where the music is too loud and scream it down the sleepy streets. Murmurs just as I fall asleep.

I have 500 words to write on a subject I care not about but here are 300 you might read and forget as you close the window, move onto another journal. And all I can say for definite is

Still not gay, she's just really pretty

there is a new programme called Pushing Daisies about a guy who can bring people back from the dead by touching them. I have decided I like it but I think I like it because Anna Friel
kinda looks like Zooey Deschanel
and I love Zooey. The show also has this narrative style that's really quite Douglas Adamsy and so I watch and my brain goes this is like The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy that wasn't a good film really but I saw it anyway and thus fell in love with Zooey. However, the show is not the film and Anna is not Zooey and I'm left I dunno expecting something else?

I guess I'll just say Zooey some more. Zooey, zooey, zooey.

Zooey!

This heaven gives me migraines

They started in fourth year maths. In front of me sat a line of those who were just whiling away the days before their sixteenth birthday and the freedom that would bring. One of them hated me, called me a frigid cow for two years straight until he got so high he forgot who I was. Another plotted to bomb a whole area where the rival school was situated.

"But ma granny lives in Eastfield!" The fat girl was distraught.
"So tell 'er to go to the Spar that day." He tried to return to his plan.
"She disnae shop there."
"So tell 'er she 'as to that day."
"But she 'ates it! You're gonnae kill ma granny!"
"No fer fucksake, amurnae. I don't have a fucking bomb!"

We had a test that day. I couldn't see the questions. I couldn't see the numbers of my calculator. I remember not being able to feel my fingers hold the pen so I'm not sure how I wrote. A girl who used to be my best friend but barely spoke to me these days took me by the arm when the bell rang for lunch. She led me to the office and left silently once I was seated. My old tech teacher brought me water and clucked over me like my Papa did. Aggressively caring. When I threw up the staff yelled at me, like I'd planned it. the boy next to me waiting for his social worker kept dancing and cracking jokes until I managed a smile. He even tried to hug me.

Since then the headaches have been frequent. Some of it can be blamed on forgetting my glasses half the time and straining. I read far too much with screwed up eyes and a frown. Last night I stared hard at the word document that had too many blank spaces and wondered if I'd eaten enough. I gave up early and lay in bed until the book fell from my numb fingers and the pillow engulfed me. I was drowning and I tried not to panic. When I panic I can't sleep and if I can't sleep everything gets a lot worse. So I shut my eyes not too tight and my mind takes me to a bar that's really a couch in somebody's bedroom and I'm trapped awkwardly between these two guys who talk way too loud and laugh at me. One falls asleep, dead weight on my thighs and the other plays with my hair speaking nonsense. Then I watch myself pass out and one of them carries me because we have to go, somebody's found us when we should be hiding. They chase us but I never wake up and with the loudest bang they fire a gun at my head and just as I jerk awake a cat with a big fake moustache yells "gotcha".

I got full marks in that maths test though, despite working blind.

So pleased with ourselves for using so many verbs and nouns

smelt like something I almost recognise stinging the back of my throat bringing up memories of something I don't understand I don't wanna get any closer, her hair will tickle my nose.

It's HAIRDYE. Her hair stinks of hairdye. I remember that time I coloured my hair to no effect. I wish my hair wasn't so dark. Then I could pour on a different identity every six to eight washes. I want to reach out and wring the red out of those curls. Blood-like swirls onto the bus floor. Fingers are itching in my pockets. She leaves before I lose control.

That urge tumbles in my mind and I grin. I like that image. I created an image. I could have wrung it out like a sponge full of paint. We drive past the archaeology site. All filled in. A few weeks ago there were pits and foundations and diggers and men. Now the ground is smooth. It saddens me but I don't know why. Futility.

My cousin had her baby. Healthy baby boy.

My finger is oozing this awful blood stuff. I woke up with it. What the fuck is wrong with you, body! Why must you destroy yourself when I am not looking.

Headache. Been up for too long. Talked way too much. Ice cream now. But it's the cheap kind. Tastes of ice.

Why is Napoleon eating cookies so funny?

Why am I reading the Livejournals of webcomic artists instead of writing an essay?

I do not know but it is fun.

And I was going to add a picture from here because he was being a bad influence on a kitten and because I love him but it won't let me upload pictures today. ANNOYING.

I do not want to do this essay. I have made one and a half bags instead. I DON'T EVEN NEED ANY BAGS. I HAVE SO MANY ALREADY.

Also my mum is sitting on the other couch expanding a tape measure towards my face. My nose is 54 inches away from her.

Also, also I went to Somerfield with my pyjamas on. I bought ice cream and riesens. I am getting fat again and I do not care.

Oh dear god I am bored.

I swear we were infinite

I forgot how ridiculous wordpress is. I mean it has graphs to show you page views and stats and Best Day Evers. It can tell you what people searched for to get to your blog, or what link somebody clicked to get to your blog and what they clicked once they got there. It makes me feel like I'm spying on my readers to be honest. Although I get a kick out of it, it's more information than I ever needed. And graphs are always pretty.

I have this huge desire to do something bold, fictionally speaking I mean. I've got an idea but I can't do it until I get my essay done. See when you're writing about a philosophy where pleasure is the path to ease suffering it is all too easy to just not bother writing anything at all.

Also: this philosophy decides to talk about everything is made up of atoms and then throw in some advice about relationships. Namely, if she ain't there to fuck, go fuck someone else! It's almost as good as the rules of when to pee. Oh Classical Civilisation I love you so.

A post that's not entirely to do with football I swear.

One minute you're utterly disappointed in a bunch of over-paid men in shorts and the next you're hugging strangers and nearly falling down stairs. That final whistle brings a wave of adrenalin that builds as two players start squaring up and suddenly both teams are at each others throats. We want blood. I want a riot.

Yay football hooliganism!

Ack that'll do you'll not continue reading if I write anymore and I do so crave attention. I will say somebody had a big banner made up that said "Shame of Scotland" and this huge arrow pointing at the Rangers fans. I may have giggled. Imagine caring that much to make a banner. Nothing will ever compare to the time that some Rangers fans decided to bring potatoes to throw onto the pitch at the beginning of the match a few years back. You know because of the famine. Hilarious.

Anyways sometime when we weren't winning (as in most of the second half) I had an idea. I might have interpreted Pandora's Box in a rather vulgar way. I might have laughed at the idea of opening her box. I'm not sure whether I told myself a lewd joke or whether there's an image worth using there.

Also: the sky was utterly gorgeous above the stands at one point and I even had my phone loading up to see if I could take a picture. I miss having a proper camera. Although maybe I don't need more pictures of the sky. So there I was waiting for my agonisingly slow phone to let me take a picture when I was suddenly kicked by a guy who'd lost his seat. He scrambled over my shoulder and sat in the seat next to me. I had to pocket my phone. He didn't seem like the sort of guy that'd appreciate me blocking his view just to capture the sky. Not like the game was really that interesting at that point anyway.

Swallowing words while giving head

Sometimes I'm torn between the truth and a lie. There's so much I want to write about. Not in a holy crap here's an idea that'll become a cult classic with a weird cover but just in an outpouring of thoughts. Like yesterday before my head finally met the table and my eyelids crashed down I scrawled every single thing down in my notebook. Such a shame that it was over what little work I've done on my essay but I'm sure I'll work it out. The problem with this as a medium is that I never know how far to go. I don't talk too much about what's been happening because it's boring to write and half the time it's with one of you that's reading. That's the real problem here. You are reading.

The other day I decided to be honest. I had a flash of determination and I typed up all the things I've ever wanted to tell you but couldn't. Sometimes the words are there choking me and other times I have to bite down on them to keep from shouting out loud because you'd leave. It's funny that honesty would make you leave but we're always happier with the lie I guess. So I wrote it all out and then I deleted it and wrote different thoughts. If I had one thing to say I wanted it to be the most perfect truth. Then the phone rang.

By the time I came back to my laptop the mood was gone and I deleted the draft.

There's just moments when I feel like I exist for other people. This is me digressing by the way, I can't be arsed plotting the points of how I got here. It's like some days I am entirely selfish. It's me, me, me and either I fucking hate everything I think and say and do or I am amazing and I wish everybody I've ever known would stop by so I can scorn them with my superiority. But there are times when every thought in my head is about somebody else. There's so many conversations and situations that aren't real but could be and I want to solve everyone's problems. I want to make everything right. Sometimes it's like if I don't fix it then I'll be stuck in this objective rut and I'll never get to be my brilliant self again. I'm not really sure why. I mean, I guess it'll be because people always did lean on me so even when nobody asks for my help I feel the need to give it?

I get frustrated with what I do write. My ultimate goal, aside from making a name for myself even if it's a different one I pick, is to write the absolute truth. Something people will read and smile because they thought they were the only ones who were like that.

I'm doing suspiciously well at the moment. I suspect a fall to come.

Ugh

What ungodly hour is this and why am I seeing it?

I'll just sit here and bleed at you

Brothers Bloom has a date!

Highlight the black! It makes me smile every time.

The world is round and he might return

FAO: boy with impressively glossy hair

Why did you have to stare at me the whole train ride home? I mean, I'm not even looking attractive today. I haven't brushed my hair, my jeans are covered in questionable stains as are my hands, my boobs are all lop-sided and I keep forgetting I'm awake and surrounded by people and saying words out loud.

Ok, so those might be perfectly valid reasons to stare but still. A girl has her esteem issues and spending all day dancing with mops doesn't exactly result in what you might call sex appeal. Unless you like mops. A lot.

Also your hair was crazy shiny. Seriously how?


So anyway I sewed a buncha stuff over the past few days instead of doing my last essay of the year. It's great being poor, motivates me to finish projects so I can actually have clothes. I'll probably take pictures later when I'm looking less like my previous description. I managed to find 2 uses for my Assassin's Creed tshirt and recycle 2 pairs of jeans I almost cried over when they started to disintegrate and do something with a tshirt I might have stolen from my ex. Maybe. I'm actually annoyed I didn't steal more from him but I had to go and give his clothes back didn't I. Phah morals. Least I kept his Sega. Ha, I can't write that without singing it.

Also Julie made me this:

for this.

I'm tired so English blah

So I get up 7am blah. Get on the bus and don't notice it says Charing Cross or do notice but think it's an 18 I can stay on longer yay. So the driver takes me down the m8 and shouts at me when I complain. He opens the doors though but doesn't actually stop so I have to jump. Classics is pointless because it's an essay handback tutorial. First off I got a fucking A on an essay about two books I didn't read because I'm a fucking genius at blagging so I certainly didn't need the tutorial. Moderately pretty girl who's unfortunately very obviously from Birmingham and speaks so loud did well too. I was glad. I was glad because I remember her name and that she's from Birmingham and has a stupid colour of hair. She has an identity and I'm glad she did well but not better than me. Then the tutor who is not our lovely Greek but an English gay (still lovely though) tells us that nobody answered the question I did right that he'd read. But I totally did, see the aforementioned A. Then he puts up a godawful hypothetical question on Virgil. I have not read him yet. I have not attended any of the lectures on him bar the one I've blogged about. Togas hurray. He writes up the way French people do essays apparently. The structure goes thesis, antithesis, synthesis. He proposes we come up with one for the question.

Dead silence.

"Well get into groups then. Talk it over."

Birmingham girl has read the book. She doesn't really want to talk. None of us have the book with us.

"Well," I begin with no real idea and they all look at me expectantly. Balls.

"Thesis could be the comparison with Homer and epic and bam there's the big build up, look at me I can write epic stuff. Antithesis is well the negative of comparing to Homer. And then synthesis I don't know because I haven't read it."

Dead silence.

"Well you can say that then." Balls.

Gay tutor looks hella bored as he interrupts the sleepy silence and asks "So anyone cracked it?"

Deadest silence of all. I laugh. Why do I always laugh. He looks at me and I try to make words good. Basically I repeat what I just wrote but slightly more eloquently. Then I started speaking a little too much and ruined the effect but still I got a look of admiration.

"Very interesting. I wasn't thinking that at all." And then he starts talking about the rushed epic opening mimicking a later scene in the Odyssey and how Virgil became the epic man to copy and not Homer. He talks style and lots of words and I beam.

It was almost worth waking up so very early and being kidnapped by an irate bus driver.

You seem so out of context

I love it when everything comes together. You know that big snap in your head when everything clicks into place and ties up so neatly. It happens when I finally work out a pop culture reference or get a joke or whatever. Sometimes it's just the feeling that life is pretty goddamn magical, mostly curled up on other people's couches watching tv from a different angle but sometimes it's when a girl walks by with huge headphones. I don't mean kooky Natalie Portman loves the shins headphones, I mean mini-stereos on your ears. And as I perked up from my dead window seat on the bus she noticed me staring and gave me this look. The look said "fuck yes I have crazy headphones!" Fell in love for about an hour.

But anyway a long long time ago I found a comic here and 'no no only rapes' became something of a catchphrase in my house despite my mum protesting that rape was never funny. Bored this morning as I pretend to read a long philosophical Roman poem I browsed the livejournal archives of the author of this comic and found it had been him that drew the comic.

I dunno it's kinda nice knowing that I liked something years ago only to like it again now.


So um how are you today? I'm maybe just a little bored. And I seem to be writing a noir piece about cyborgs. I DON'T KNOW HOW OR WHY.

And here I thought I'd be outrunning boulders

"So what do you think? We got an oldie?"

I look up at the big golden mess of hair that constitutes loud mouth. I know his name. I'm sure I know his name but it escapes me. I wish I was better at names. I hold back a laugh but I know I'm grinning inanely. I mean yeah it's old. It's a goddamn skeleton of a fallow deer from the whatsitlithic period. He's smiling back but then he picks up a leg bone and points at the broken joint.

"See it's all worn down here. Maybe from like a lot of moving?"

He's being serious. I am not a biologist. Or a boneologist. Oh god jokes about boners.

"Well it's a theory, at least." It's all I can manage without giggling.

"Huh?" I take a deep breath. I haven't really spoken much today, sometimes my mouth forgets how to move. Plus you know I'm short. Sound doesn't carry very well from where I stand.

"It's a theory." It came out all sarcastic and I sort of feel like I should say more but the fat woman in a bad waistcoat is back to talk about pelvic bones and plates in skulls. Every grad student in this department seems to be a crazy hippie or a fatty. We move onto a dead reindeer. The words please stop sitting on the antlers amuse me.

"Do you think that's a cut? Kinda looks worn." He hands me a lump of something.

"Yeah, I'd say so." And so we ponder what cut up the reindeer.

For a moment my vanity flares until I remember I'm in scruffy mode. Like hella scruffy mode. He's just proving the judgement I shared with the german girl. This guy loves to talk. I prove this theory by sticking out my boobs a little. Skinny guy on the other side glances down. Loud mouth talks.

Just another day in archaeology. Talking shit and touching bones.

I don't need no educayshun

Cliiick for biiig

I've been secretly falling apart

Every night I stay up too late with whatever tv series I'm wanting to watch all of/is closest to me at the time and I write. Usually I'll put a hat on to write. This is because I love my hats and I never wear them out. I'm justifying the cost. So I'll write and write and write and feel goddamn wonderful doing so, although mostly I keep that to myself out of politeness. I start on my laptop creating file after file. Some are merely titles and an introductory sentence. Some are thousands and thousands of cascading words. Once the battery dies I trail onto notebooks with doodles and notes and any words that pop into my head. Then I fall asleep and scrawl all over my skin and my sheets and wake up the next morning ready to access the damages. Mostly everything I write can be scrapped. Maybe I'll salvage a sentence or two or an image I was particularly proud of. Even if what I've written is good there's still the endless rewrites. I can't progress if something previous needs work. I often think that if I could just get it right the first time I could get a lot more written.

Today is my last day of the holidays which fucking sucks really. I'd take a week less if it meant I was actually off at the same time as everyone else. I'm going to have 2 weeks of Julie laughing at me from her bed when I drag myself to classes I don't care about. But that's a different rant. Today is redraft day. I'm going to go through everything I've written since September (plus the two pieces I wrote between my awful stage and my present stage) and rewrite the ones I still like. It's a chance to see what I do right and what I do wrong and fix it all til I'm damn near perfect and then I'll rewrite it some more.

It's just a damn shame I didn't have the motivation to do this like a week ago.

Life seem unreal, can we go back to your place?

I have a habit of sticking things in my mouth. Har har yes make all the penis jokes you want, innuendo is all the rage these days. I sucked my thumb for the longest time, I couldn't sleep otherwise. From there I moved onto biting my nails, then the skin around my nails, then my fingers. I still chew on my lip and the bump of the teeny scar, usually when I'm nervous or lying a big lie or just plain distracted. Pens find their way between my teeth, making me cringe when I hand them out to attractive but ill-prepared boys in classes. I try to keep my fingers out of my mouth as much as possible but I am truly awful at breaking habits. My nail split earlier today. I'm not a girl who cares much for the upkeep of my nails after spending so long keeping them short to play guitar. So it was split and I forced myself not to bite it, tried my hardest to wait until I got home and could so easily cut it straight. But of course it bothered me and I pulled it off triumphantly as I gave up watching Celtic lose. Of course that just opened the floodgates. Soon I was working on the skin on another finger. It's just so easy to pull off in dinky little strips. I must have pulled too far this time because it started to bleed. No biggie, thinks I and I squeeze and suck and smile. But the blood doesn't stop. It swirls round my cuticle like the remains of my nail polish and bubbles pop up with the slightest of pressure. All I can think is there are no more plasters.

Bollocks.

Making love with my ego

I've got my trilby on. It's cheaper than a fedora and has the added feature of actually fitting my head. The feeling is coming back to my teeth now I've eaten something slightly more substantial than a frozen piece of cake. My essay is done. Shite but done. The sun was shining when I left and I giggled at the dogs next door, little rat things that they are, and the cleavage that assaulted me to say hello! goodbye! The stars shook their head at me as I jumped off the bus. I'm always missing my stop. I'm too used to being stuck in traffic for hours.

I have the weekend to myself before uni starts up all over again. But there's only one more deadline screaming at me. Ignoring the exams anyway. It's April. Everything will be over in a month or so and the summer will stretch before me like a great big yawn. Time to find a job, save for my dream. Money's such a fickle old thing. I'm reckless when I have it and miserable when I don't.

But for now I have roughly £3 in my purse and a trilby over my hair and my bad eye. The word document is blue and white and waiting for me. There's a half a stupid grin on my face because the night is young and my mind is racing. The guitar on my stereo moans and screeches and I flex my fingers, ready.

Fuck tomorrow and the inevitable realisation that everything I've written is a pile of shit. Tonight I am a fucking goddess and you will bow down to me.

Sleeping in

"It's a fucking masterpiece." The man rolls his eyes and slaps me until tears splash down his fingers. Then he finishes dressing me . Braces roll down my breasts and I pull them away with my thumbs. "This is fucking ridiculous." He slaps me again and my head is swallowed in a hat that's far too big. To see anything I have to crane my head back. There's a girl I knew from a long time ago. She's always here. There's a kitten in her arms wrapped in a trenchcoat. "What happened to him? I have to tell him it's a masterpiece." The cat slaps me.

There's a party in the bath and she's sitting on my lap, playing with the edge of my hat. I'm drowning in her hair but she smells so good I don't want to push her off. But now she's babbling in French and I don't understand and I can't understand and I can't stop talking because if I stop talking they'll all leave me. Ducks roll out of the taps as I try to adjust the water and one of them spits a paper boat at me. It slices a line through my arm. I unfold it but the words won't keep still long enough for me to read them. The girl is kissing my neck and I keep pushing her away. The cat is curled up on my lap playing with the ribbon that hangs down from the top of my stocking. The man is on the phone telling everyone I've finished and they laugh and I struggle to get out of the tub to take the phone away. Somehow the girl dies. There's blood everywhere and I snatch the cat up and put him in my pocket with a ball of string. The boat crumbles in my fingers and petals stick to my skin.

Marie-Antoinette is in the kitchen slicing carrots and laughing. There are more cats in her hair. I disentangle them and try to rearrange them in the coat but they are just cats in a coat, nothing more. The dead queen lets out a shriek of laughter and a Russian shows me the door.

"It is the Queen's naptime," she places a finger to my lips and it tastes like metal. The cats are tangled again in one big kitten ball and I roll them out the door with me and when I wake up I'm staring at the blue of my carpet, my nose inches away from the pile of paper I stayed up too late scribbling on.

Can't you see I'm trying?

The wind brings me whispers of revolution. There are rumours of atrocities, outbursts of violence all over the city. Passion burns away the grey. I move out of the centre. Too many people, so many oblivious to the burning words in my mind. I want to shake them, wake them up. Shout and scream and laugh and cry but it's enough just to walk and know that I am right and they are wrong.

Glass crunches underfoot as I step around dirty puddles and trip over stones. Students thrust leaflets in my face or want just a minute of my time, not my money. One of them skips backwards as I stalk past, singing Baby please don't go and I smile despite myself. But I don't have a second to spare.

The road I'm heading for is lined with trees and since it's still the holiday I have the street to myself. I pause for a moment on the bridge, nodding to the skull by the feet of a man I can't identify. I forgot my glasses so I have to strain to see the ducks dive and sway. The stone is crumbling beneath my fingers and I wonder what it would be like to pull my weight onto the curved edge. To swing my legs dangerously above the swirling yellow water. I take a detour behind the museum, closer to the river. The spire peeks out above trees. I perch on the edge of a bench to execute my plan. The bench is dedicated to a woman named Joan. It's my gran's name. My earliest memory is of her. We walked down a path with huge imposing green trees and the whole place smelled of pinecones. There were red squirrels like my favourite toy and I sat on a stone wall with my feet miles away from the ground, eating cherry tomatoes and making up stories.

I fold the paper carefully, hoping I remember how to do this right. I ruin two sheets before I have a satisfactory boat in my hands and I fold it down flat again to paint my dreams on the prow. Pink blossoms fall on my lap and I place them on the deck. Once the coast is clear I lean out and push my craft into the sea. I ask the ducks to make sure it reaches its destination safely and I fancy one of them nods. In my story you'll find it, like you've found all of my messages scrawled on desks and walls and pieces of paper left lying between the pages of books for rent. I want to switch all these squares screaming deals of cheap booze with words that make your heart soar. That encapsulate that perfect moment in a film when everything is quiet and dimly bright and there's a sense of peace and sadness.

And I want you to find me on a wall with my feet not quite reaching the ground, waiting for you and making up stories.

I'm a fool for you

"Hey Catherine. It's CHRISTMAS!"

"It's not April Fools' Day anymore."

"I know. I just like to be mean to you. BYE!"

I'm a fool for no one

"Hey Catherine! Time to get up! It's CHRISTMAS."

"No, it's not."

"HAHA I know! April Fools!"