I just realised that this:
Is not a pair of teeth symbolising batman's aggressive personality as I have thought for the past ten years.
It is apparently a bat.
Total number of trains: 5
Total number of bus replacement services: 2
Total number of taxis for when bus replacement service failed: 1
People sleeping with self in one room: 6
Putting antennae on a headband before donning rest of costume and opening door to Kirsty's Mum's friends?: Priceless
Corpse Bride and Headless Horseman, AKA Housemate-Ali and her Mike
Recognise those flowers, keen blog readers? I know some of you do.
Birthday girl Kirsty (Housemate-Kirsty)
Mike and Mike
(Mike A is not dressed up because his bus and trains total was about 900).
Some Housemates: Me, Ali, Nik (batman), Lucy (Angry Christmas Mum...)
Humouring caught on camera
Doing The Sprain. You will only know about this if you happened to watch the said episodes of Saved By The Bell with Nik and I. We are quite sure you didn't.
Probably more humouring...
Definitely more
Ali's Mike did ask me what happened to the Ladybird. I don't know!
Ali's morning hair
Tada!
Last night Nik and I realised that if we were going to go to Kirsty's Tim Burton themed fancy dress 21st we should probably make Tim Burton themed costumes. It might sound obvious to you, but to two people who type and file for 8 hours per day, it is not. What seemed most obvious was pasta with cheese, watching a Saved by the Bell DVD and wearing sweat pants. Oh, and not typing or filing.
Nik is going as Batman. Her costume is really quite good. You see, she formed an aliance with Ali early on in the week, who painted her costume for her. Me, I ignored the whole thing. And then I realised and made Nik buy my stuff on her day off. Although I'm allegedly going as a ladybird, I'm really going in normal clothes with a red and black circle attached to my back.
We filmed all 90 seconds of the making of the costumes for you here. Perhaps before you watch this you should be aware that I can't draw, I am sort of left-handed and scissors AREN'T and that the paint on Nik's t shirt was wet:
Then we called Ali and she came to help, because, as you can see from the video, I am thick
Total training contract applications for deadline 31 July: 22
Total responses: 5
* One telephone interview
* One "no"
* Two "we do this next year but we're interested"
* One assessment centre... this week :D
"So I was sick of being hot and sweaty all day today," my Dad said to me.
"Yes me too," I said.
"So I went to Matalan and bought what I thought were combat trousers."
"You? Combats?"
"Yes. Anyway they're the kind where you can detach the legs to make them shorts. They were three quid so I thought bargainous."
"Well done," I said.
"I was in the changing room and I took one of the legs off just to check the length, and I thought okay, 31 is better than 32 so I bought it."
"What on earth is coming?"
"I got back home," my Dad said, "And I realised I had brought the trousers home with one complete leg and one half-leg."
"Trousers for amputees, if you will."
"Yes. So I went back, and they'd decided to have a half price sale where you couldn't return anything."
"Ah yes, those."
"So I had a word with someone and they said I could go and buy the half a leg myself. So I did. Luckily, it was reduced."
"So you got a quarter of a pair of trousers for half price?"
"Yep. How cool is that?"
Greenday's
Time of your Life reminds me of Cornwall.
When I was 17 me and my best friend journeyed to Newquay. I remember her air freshener was a Mr Rush and it smelt surprisingly pleasant, like sweets. It was our first trip away. When we were driving down we thought lorry drivers were waving at us. It turns out we had a flat tyre.
Newquay was the summer I discovered hats. Good hats, not hats that made me look like an elf, or bald, or both. We spent a lot of time in the dark shops stuffed with embroidered clothes that smelt of weed.
We thought we were pagans, that summer. We spent a lot of time late at night in our caravan concocting oils to burn, and celebrating festivals, midsummer, lammas, whilst the smell of dusky summer drifted in the windows. One time we didn't have any matches left for candles so we lit the grill instead. I remember we played cards by the grill. We didn't really know how to play Texas Hold Em Poker, but we thought we were cool.
I remember I walked across the misty grasses near the sea once. The rain seeped into my flip flops and made my feet squelch. I remember I lay down in the grass and called my Dad.
This was the first real time we went out to clubs. We got dressed in faded demin and white t shirts and went and drank barcardi and coke and chatted to surfers. When I went to the toilet my head would spin but we'd drink more as we stood out on the decking watching people night swimming. As we walked home we'd admire the wet suits hanging from every other pink windowsill.
We reinvented ourselves that summer. We bought Quiksilver t shirts and wore beads and flowers in our hair. We delighted in going to cafes in the middle of the day and ordering frappuchinos which we would take to the beach where we attempted to surf. Once I fell off my board and the sea pulled down my bikini bottoms and filled them with sand. I was so mortified I stayed underwater for as long as I could.
I felt smug as I went to collect my A-level results knowing at least I was tanned and looked like a surfer.
And then everything changed. It's funny really. I think I'd like to go back there someday.
I scurried out of Primark gladly leaving the trampled sweatshirts and mile-long queues behind me. Right, public library, I thought, walking vaguely in the direction of Victoria square. I eyed Lush as I walked along New Street, ignoring the shouting Birmingham Mail man.
(I did buy a Big Issue though, why don't more people? It gives homeless people jobs, and I don't really care if they go and spent my £1.50 on alcohol because it's just £1.50 to me, regardless, and I think it's a lot more for them. Anyway, perhaps this is for another, more serious blog)
I reached Victoria Square fountain, which according to someone at work, means the library should be "unmissable". I looked around. I put my glasses on. I could see a lot of unnamed buildings. Helpful. I took a walk around them all and to my dismay found none of them were a library. One of them was a law firm I've applied to which I sharply exited lest they spot me and realising what I dunce I am in practise.
I dialled numbers quickly.
"Yellow," my Dad said.
"Hello. Do you know where the library is?"
"Birmingham library?"
"Yes, I need to get my books out. I'm not allowed in the university ones," I said.
"Have you got more fines?"
"NO. I am in between courses. Okay where is library?"
"Okay do you know where I dropped you off the other day, near that big scaffoldy building?"
"Yes," I said.
"If you got out my door and not yours, you'd be facing the other way, yes?"
"You can say left and right, Dad, I am not remedial."
"We'll see. Okay so go over there."
I paused as I walked past more grubby white buildings and pigeons.
"Okay I am by a big road, with buses and a pub."
"Okay, you need to go inside to Paradise Circus."
"Isn't that in London?" I said.
"No."
I walked for a good few minutes, across the road, through an empty shopping centre, around a ramp until a police office heard me saying loudly to my dad that how could a sign not have a library on it and wasn't every in Birmingham just illiterate.
Nice police officer directed me across a white building and behind a very tall building and through a mall.
"How will I ever get out of here?" I said to my Dad.
"Get a bus from Bristol Street and it'll take you right home."
"What's Bristol Street?"
"Have you heard of the Bristol Road?" It must be pointed out to my readers that I live on the Bristol road.
"Yes."
"Well it's that. I have to go now," he said faintly, probably wondering what on earth he'd raised.
I walked out of the mall and hey presto, there was the library. A tiny black door. "Unmissable". Fuck you.
The library didn't
havea legal section. By this point I was probably beyond irritated, and didn't even react when I realised I'd stood in a stationary lift for 5 minutes (QUITE A LONG TIME TO STAND IN A LIFT).
I quickly exited the building. In front of me was a fountain. My eyes widening, I crept forward. It was the original fountain. I was right back where I started!
"Oh, hello!" My dad said.
"Hello. So I found the library. No legal books. I came out, and I'm where I was!"
"Well, yes."
"No, I mean, I'm on New Street!"
"Is there another entrance, then? Turn around?"
I turned around, and only the bloody town hall remained.
"It's not there. I have no idea how I got here."
"It must have disappeared then, Gill. That's what must have happened."
He paused. " You are remedial."
I switched the light on as my Dad sat down on the sofa with our dinner.
"Pica!" said a voice in the corner.
My dad raised his eyebrows.
"That's Picachu, Mike's stuffed toy that talks," I said.
"To lights?"
"Well, there is some debate..." I said, dreading the nightly discussion that was coming.
"He does!" Ali said, jumping up and covering Picachu's eyes. Picachu remained silent. "He never does it when people are looking."
"We have video evidence though," Nic said, thrusting her camera phone into my Dad's face. "Pica pica pica," the video went. The video ends in a spectacular finalé with Pica saying "Picaaah pica pica chooo!"
"It's completely random when he makes noises," I said. "He makes a variety. And once, when I walked into the living room, he said 'pica hiya!'"
"I know!" Ali said. "Once I walked behind him and he said 'Pica! Pica! Pica!'"
"The most scary part is when he watches you though and says Pica just as you turn the light out to go to bed. I think there's a light sensor behind his right eye. There's a big bulge. Feel," I said, gesturing to Mike.
"He does not have a fucking light sensor," Mike said, grabbing Picachu. "Look. There are three wires that make three sounds."
He tapped Picachu's head.
"Pica!"
He prodded Pica's back.
"Pica choo!"
He whacked Picachu on his bum.
"Picaaah pica pica chooo!"
"See?" Mike said.
"No, he can totally see. And look," I said, touching Picachu's back as he said "pica!". "He doesn't always make the same sounds, those aren't sensors, he has
feelings."
Nik and Ali loudly cheered, both snatching Picachu, covering his eyes and turning him upside down whilst he sqealed.
Mike stood up, picked Picachu up and turned the battery off, much to our collective moaning.
My Dad quietly ate his food in the corner, staring intently at his plate.
"That," I said to him, "is what I have to work with when someone at work asks me what I did last night. Every night."
I have a TRAINING CONTRACT INTERVIEW. OVER THE TELEPHONE.
I left my make-up bag at home this weekend, amid wedding getting-ready.
This is okay, I thought as I walked along in the morning sunshine. I look okay. My hair was sort of shiny, although still behaving in manner of starfish at the back because I slept on it. My eyebrows were at least plucked and I was wearing my nice suit. And furthermore, my red pants that make me feel pretty.
I stepped onto the bus.
"God, cheer up love, you look terrible!" the bus driver said.
I take that back.
"I've never been here," Mike said as we walked into the Mailbox.
"Oh, I have," I said. "When Laura worked at Fatface I visited her."
"I remember."
"And when I came here to buy those bath things."
"Yes..."
"And then when I went to Fatface alone to look at the beautiful clothes. I think it's such a nice place, and really pretty."
I paused. "In fact, I used to come here all the time."
"I never realised it was open-air," Mike said.
"Oh, is it?"
What do you say about your own sister's wedding? How do you put it into words how you feel when you see your sister and her new husband coming back up the aisle?
We were hideously late to the wedding. Like half an hour is-the-bride-going-to-turn-up, angry-texts-from-Rob's-mother type late. This was not really because Suzanne's courset had 18 bra hooks, or because she has a lot of hair that needed curling, or even because I had to get my shoe re-heeled at 8am. It was because we left late and that's all there is to it.
Oh and because the photographer faffed so much outside our house that all our neighbours came out to see:
At half past ten I tugged on Dad's hand and announced to everyone that we were going to write Dad's speech now. So we shut ourselves in the study for half an hour and did just that although I think Suzanne was rather terrified.
What struck me most about getting ready in the morning was not that Suzanne was stressed about said corset, or garter or hair but that she
wasn't stressed at all about the service. The committment, it wasn't an issue. How beautiful is that?
The ceremony was perfect really. And you all know I wouldn't just say that. What the vicar said, it made sense. The readings were about love, and honour, and I think almost everybody in the room welled up when Suzanne's voice shook during the vows because everybody - and I mean everybody - could hear how much it meant to both of them.
However at this point twin-Rachel and I sat in the wrong chairs and the vicar had to tell us to move. Classy.
Everybody oohed and aahed as we walked back up the aisle. Mostly we heard how beautiful Suzanne looked - and she really, really did - but of course we could not escape the whisper of "sisters" as Rachel and I walked up the aisle behind her.
There was much confetti throwing outside and champagne drinking and old cars. Probably only around 15 of the guests said "you much be Rachel" to be, however, we did also get called a "dynamic duo" which I thought was particularly ridiculous.
It was time for photos at the Botanical Gardens. Oh the photos. I thought getting in on the photographer's phtos would mean mine would automatically be good. So not true.
How beautiful is this though?
See how the light shines on her face?...
...This is how:
Yes, that's a foil board the best man had to use to shine it on her face. And it actually worked!
The photographer wanted us to get close...
So Rachel shut her eyes
At this point he pushed my head into hers, but not before LICKING HIS FINGER AND THEN RUBBING IT ON MY FOREHEAD TO GET RID OF STRAY HAIRS. Of course, this only angered the hair.
Rob's family:
(some of) my family. Roughly speaking, that's (from the left) two cousins in the background, two nans and one nan's new husband (remember that blog?), southern Auntie Sheila and my cousin katie in background, two small children are my cousin Laura's children (some of them), my dad's brother steve's wife julie poking up behind my dad, my dad, Suzanne, Rob, uncle Peter, me, uncle John, Eilneen, Aunti Terry, cousin Laura's daughter (one more) Jenny, behind her, my uncle Chris, Aunti Shirley, uncle Dennis. That's probably 25% of them. Pretty good going.
Both:
The meal was nice although I believe Mike was rather hungry as the first course and the last course were composed of fruit and most of you (some of you?) know how Mike feels about fruit.
Rob were rather jittery pre-speech but proved rather good conversation and people-watcher:
Next came the speeches. The video of my dad's is 200Mb and is on my computer but nowhere will bloody well host it for me. Rob's speech and Steve, the best man's speeches were really very slick and it amazed me they could say such moving things so easily and geuninely. I guess my Dad's was still my favourite, though, because there was so much emotion in it, from the shaking hands to the erm apes dressed like a bride and groom he pulled out.
(That's right. We couldn't decide what to get Suzanne as we didn't want something generic. They're going to Monkey World soon. So we went to Build-A-Bear and got these, but apes:)
Aquote from his speeche if you will, my personal favourite:
My dad: I was going to mention some comic things my girls said and did when younger, but I could only think of Gilly as she was a
born comedian from a young age. I will wait to say those. Where's Mike?
[pause]
When you're ready Mike.
Me: Dying.
And then there was the obligatory cake-cutting, although this was made interesting by Suzanne having to mind the dowel that was holding the cake together:
Beautiful really, picture-perfect. I think they placed their champagne like that deliberately.
After this Mike, Hannah and I took a wander. And I must say, since my blog has become a sort of wedding blog, that Hannah is just great. She comes in at last minute and talks to everyone and dances for hours. She knows Mike because she's dating his best friend, me because we did dance soc together, and Suzanne because she's a medic. Anyway Hannah took this:
And then what left is there to say, except my eyes welled up every now and then, as I watched my sister and husband dancing their first dance. Admittedly this could be because I had previously removed my shoes on said walk with Mike and put them hastily back on
undone and danced with Rob's dad to Aerosmith's Don't Wanna Miss a Thing.
Other couples floated onto the dance floor gradually, and suddenly it was ten o'clock and I was getting on down to Sit Down by James with my dad, an anthemic song that embodies mine and Suzanne's youth. And then we moved into Abba and Grease Medleys and a million small children flooded the dancefloor.
And then everybody there danced the night away.
On Friday morning I sat bolt upright in bed knowing somehow that the heat and the way the light shined in the room meant it was no longer 7am. I stared at Mike who looked back sleepily. He had returned from Preston the night before so we are now living together again, which I celebrated by being evil to him as it was clearly his fault I was still in bed at twenty to nine. This was the precise time I was supposed to pick my graduation gown up.
I leapt out of bed and called my Dad. He was in fact half an hour away himself, having been up all night printing wedding Order of Services and then indeed dreaming about it.
As it goes I got my gown in two minutes (it would appear my head is very small), got my tickets and did the photographs before someone unecessarily anal told us we needed to be in the graduation ceremony for TWENTY TO TEN when it started at HALF PAST TEN.
The actual ceremony involved a ridiculous procession, a staff, a man wearing a gold tassell, and Johnathan Coe, who made me fall in love with Birmingham all over again and made me want to write and even made me wish I was on my tenth book and not my first because he's come so far.
And of course as I shook the Chancellor's hand and walked back down the steps (holding my hat), I felt a bit proud and a bit teary as the doors of my English degree finally closed. And when I went into the tent flanked by my Dad and Mike and Anonymous Mentor gave me a hug, I whispered thank you for the 75 in her ear and I almost wish I had another year left.
Sometimes on my way home from work, I walk through Boots as a shortcut to the train station that allows me to ogle bath products. Today I wandered past the hair dye section.
"Ah," I thought, thinking vaguely of a remark made on the hen night regarding my roots. Never ever dye your hair red. The roots, they never go.
I selected Jamaica brown so as to match the other bridesmaid in every way possible. She did however warn it was a little dark, but I decided that the night before my graduation was as good as any to dye my hair.
Little did I know three hours later would see me meeting my housemates' parents wearing my bra, a towel and a lot of hair dye, and four hours later, with two dark blue ears.
"You know, they test the parents on what modules we took, at graduation," I said into the phone.
"Yeah, right," my Dad said.
"Seriously, so get practising."
"Well, you did English..."
"That's more of an umbrella term for what I did."
"Yes. Okay, you did English literature," he said.
"Well done."
"I think I may have to do a Google search the night before."
"And what would you search for, exactly?" I said.
"Well, English. And if that didn't work, I'd try modules."
"Seriously, name one."
"Shakespeare."
"Okay but that one's easy."
"Wait," he said. "Something's coming. Hardy!"
"Hardy and..."
"... And..."
"End of nineteenth century. Drama."
"Hardy..."
"He said daft things all the time."
"Hmm...."
"Gay?"
"Hardy and..."
My Dad panicked.
Click
Yes all, I have moved. My hosting was due to run out, so I spent a rather fraught day with Dreamweaver, swearing at Mike, looking up php and css and eventually turned to blogger for hosting. And they're actually doing quite a good job!
And now, you can leave comments. And there won't be a guestbook. So I am expecting all 90 readers to leave them. Okay?
Warning - horrible pictures below.
Thank you to Cat from Middlesborough for informing me of her trials and tribulations with her 4 year-old trainers. The photo was aptly titled When trainers attack.jpg:
I never knew so many people would want to get famous this
way...!
However the most astonishing pictures so far were submitted by Billygean's own Mike. He fell off his bike on Thursday (but this is okay because cyclists average one fall per year so as long as Mike's are minor I don't mind); he is now unable to sit down and has had to cut one of the legs of his boxer shorts off, so he tells me. I am glad his Mum is dealing with this:
Damn sexy muscly thighs though, all things considered, don't you think?
My dad came over today and brought the post with him. Little did I know moments later I would be staring at a feedback sheet for all of my modules. And then, inevitably, blogging about it.
Language and the law got 65. And I quote:
"The trouble with this essay is that it is not actually a very direct answer to the question ... This answer does not do what the question asks."It goes on like this for some time. Why did you feel the need to give it 65 then? Nobody forced you to, you almost sound begrudging.
Theories of the mind (my Freud and Jung as applied to the novel The Silence of the Lambs) got a "borderline first" initially with comments like:
"Extensive and meticulous. Wide range of [what looks like] aluftus."It's proper tutor handwriting. However second marker steps in and says:
"There is no debate at the beginning on psychoanalysis and film. ... Some very good analysis - weakness in the lack of culture of the key debates in psychoanalysis and film."*Blinks* Ah, maybe this is because it was about a book and not a film?
Might this have something to do with your recent publication on psychoanalysis and film? No?
My dissertation has the best feedback:
"Do you really claim that George III was so important in the development of modern psychiatry?"Possibly. Perhaps I read it somewhere. That's usually the case when you're bullshitting. And why not; he inspired the first psychiatrist and made the nation aware that it doesn't just happen to the poor. Yes *juts chin out*. I do. What's the problem?
"P 34. Reeve's use of 'men' here needs unpacking. Is she (in context) talking about males or about human beings, or are the two senses overlapping in some interesting way?"What? What are you talking about? That makes utterly no sense (in context) and why are you asking me questions? I have finished! I am a lawyer now, leave me alone!
There is no mention of Reeve on page 34. *Baffled*
"Extensive bibliography, but some problems with edited literary texts. Not all seem to be of the best scholarly quality, and you don't always make explicit (with 'ed.') where the name listed is an editor's."I KNEW you would find something in there to nit pick at. Okay, a) stock the library with more scholarly editions then b) fuck off with your bloody editors, you obviously figured it out, and c) I think you'll find when you're writing a word in single quotation marks, the full stop has to go out of the quotation marks, not in.
The shoes, they have persuaded my trainers to attack me as well, thus leaving me unable to function outside of the house. Imagine trying to make sure the person you're meeting does not notice you're slowly soaking your trainers with your own blood. Yes, these are my socks.
The good thing about all of this is that readers have been sending me photos of their interview-ruined feet:
Warms your heart, doesn't it?
It went well. Ish. If the day were a book it would be a George Eliot I think. Mostly quite good, enlightening in places, but a little too long. By about 400 pages.
I wore beautiful suit. It is black (lawyers don't seem to venture (argh, capitalists) away from this. But it has pink stripes.
I invested in girly witch shoes that once again my surgeon would disapprove of. They have bows on. I felt funny wearing shoes with bows on that were so pointy that made my feet look like barges. And you could see the tops of my toes, and furthermore, my drill-scars. Weird.
Oh, did I mentioned I was severely distracted due to the shoes' vicious and relentless attack on my feet? They left my bunions well alone, but my heels? Holy fuck.
So on the way home, I went to Lush. And, as I told the mildly disturbed lady at the checkout, this was okay, and I wasn't spending too much anyway.
