When will I learn that my constant quest for new readers generally leads to, you know, new readers?

And that Moo cards are sneaky and evil.

Last time I went back to the Homestead I cleared my bookshelves of the books I wanted with me in Southampton. Among the many Georgette Heyer’s, Tom Sharpe’s, Wyndham’s and Asimov’s were, of course, my beloved Iain Banks. I set myself down to read The Crow Road once more and was struck, as ever, by the opening line.

“It was the day my grandmother exploded”.

I knew then and there that this book had to be shared and that P would probably enjoy it. Even more to the point I knew I’d enjoy discussing it afterwards – that is half the fun of sharing books you’ve loved, after all.

Without thinking I thrust a moo card into the book as a bookmark (no corner-turning in the Meadow Towers Household, thank you very much!), bundled it into the box with the other books, and forgot about it till a week later as I was getting ready for college. The book went into my bag and I didn’t realise the moo card was still in there till P opens the book and goes “oooh, what’s this…”

Bollocks.

Hopes that he might not be the inquisitive type were dashed this evening when he announced “your website is very cool”.

From a brief discussion it turns out the last thing he read before going to the South of France for a holiday (lucky bugger) was me enumerating how I’m not cute. As a parting shot this evening he announced that he was going to read more of the website…

Which means he will be greeted with such gems as the need for me to hide my lascivious eyes, my Aston Martin fetish and (of course) the ubiquitous breast post.

Please answer me this question – how am I meant to look him in the eye next Wednesday?

More and more I am starting to doubt the wisdom of this whole “blogging my life” malarkey. Yes I’m an adorable scatterbrain who just needs to be loved, but do I really need my class mates, work colleagues and family reading this? Then again, it’s a bit late to stop now 😀

As an aside, P needs a better blog-name. The Man Who Called Me Feisty is a bit unwieldy for day-to-day use.

Ok, so I can die happy. Maybe not die, that’s is a little severe and against my whole “I’m actually enjoying my life at the moment” thing, but at least I can be sick and happy.

Seriously, I read this and did a happy dance. It also goes to show how well Moose knows me when I say “guess who’s down to play Gambit in X-4?” and she says straight away “Sawyer?” I think we might have had the conversation before, though, so she just gets points for memory and not perception.

Anyway, my all time favourite X-Men character played by one of my all time favourite pieces of eye candy? *

X-Men 4 rumour – Josh Holloway to play Gambit.

You know, I don’t care if it’s false. It’s made me feel better when I was having a crappy day and that’s all that matters.

* For both of them it’s the accent. Quite where along the line I got kinked to Southern making me weak at the knees, but there you go. That, and Gambit wears a swoopy coat… He’d have me at hello.

I just saw Casino Royale with Moose and the Latvian Lovely. I do recommend seeing the film if only to oggle Daniel Craig’s absolutely perfect body. The man is, well, divine in this movie.

Always knew he’d make a good Bond.

And for those whose preferences run to the other gender, there is always Eva Green who is also looking so stunningly beautiful I’d do her.

The slightly worrying thing however is that my biggest sigh of lust in the entire film was not reserved for either Mr Craig or Ms. Green. It was for the mind-blowingly gorgeous Aston Martin DBS that Bond is issued with and, in true Bond tradition, writes-off in about five minutes flat. (I think I was more upset about the fate of the car than I was about the fate of James Bond).

I’m not a petrol head by any stretch of the imagination but this car…

*weeps in despair*

I want!

I’ve always had a think for Aston Martin’s and the classic British cars – a good old E-type Jag is another that is guaranteed to get me swooning into the passenger seat – something I think is probably due to watching the earlier Bond movies when I was far too young. Maybe Bond didn’t always drive one, but the DB5 is still the quintessential car to me.

So modern cars have the safety, the fuel economy, and the road handling and the yada yada yada. Ferrari’s, Porsche’s and Lamborghini’s have the raw muscle. BMW’s and Mercedes have the money and the prestige. But these Aston’s (and Jag’s) have style. They are so ravishing it almost hurts.

It’s never going to happen this side of Hell turning into an ice rink, but if I somehow do manage to get my hands on one of these cars, don’t for the life of you think I’m going to be happy keeping to the passenger’s side. Oh no, it would be the driving seat all the way baby!

Well, everyone knows the passenger seat is also an ejector seat… 😉

bond, james bond, casino royale, aston martin, db3, jaguar, e-type

I looked in the mirror to check all was in place before going round to the Divine M’s for a dinner party this evening and was struck with the rather surprising realisation – I’d date me.

Well, I would.

If I was a guy and not me and… You know what I’m trying to say.

The reason I feel it’s blog worthy is because for the longest time, like forever, if you’ll forgive me going all Valley Girl on you, I didn’t think that. I barely looked in the mirror, let alone felt good with what I saw.

So 😛

And yes, Old Surly & co have been telling me this for donkeys years now, but, well, I thought they were just being nice.

Now – bring it on 😉

Just felt like sharing 🙂

(Though I fully reserve the right to change my mind tomorrow – I expect this is just a momentary aberration caused by the excess sugar consumed today – still, it’s a nice aberration).

When they give the spiel on the evils of RSI, they never tell you the following: that getting RSI and the subsequent nerve damage can lead to uncontrollable small tremors in your hands.

We’re not talking full on Parkinson’s scale tremors here, just teeny shakes barely noticeable to the eye, and certainly in no way impairing to day to day activities.

Unless, that is, you want to use liquid eyeliner.

Then you’re on your own and heading into Clown’s-Ville.

*grumble*

*reaches for the make-up remover for the tenth time*

Sometimes I wonder why I even bother.

A little while ago I had a mini-rant about 500 word essays. I promised I would explain/elaborate at a later date. I just didn’t plan on the date being this much later! Ah well, at least I remembered eventually – that’s got to count for something?

I have a problem. I have to write an essay. The essay isn’t the problem – an essay is just an argument in words after all and I like arguing and I like words – it is the length of this essay that is getting to me.

It’s only meant to be 500 words.

Yup. I haven’t written 500 words since, well, last time I did A-Levels (or GCSE’s for that matter). The last piece of work was my thesis where my introduction alone was nearly 2000 words! Now my introduction needs to be two sentences.

Which means concise.

Which means I am screwed as I have never been concise in my life. My blog posts are frequently over the 1000 word mark. It’s not uncommon for them to be 2000 words. I think the longest clocked in at just over 3000 words – though I admit that was stretching to the breaking point and beyond what you want to read on a blog.

If you’re counting, this makes approximately 155 words.

So yup, I am, as previously mentioned, screwed. Up a malodorous backwater without any means of propulsion. Shafted. And all other pleasant types of things (Oh, 180).

So what wondrous subject have I got to condense into 500 words (which approximates 2 handwritten – handwritten! I can’t read my own bloody writing half the time! – sides)?

It boils down to gender discourse in one of Angela Carter’s short stories – “The Snow Child”. A topic which, if you set your mind to it, it is easy to write 5 thousand words on. I’m not stressing the assignment. In fact I was enthused about it before I knew how little I had to say.

We even did a mock essay plan! It’s at these points the differences between me (two degrees, 24, writes for a past time) and the majority of the class (18/19, just done A-Levels, still to even experience Uni) become startlingly clear. In Uni you write essays constantly. Long, complex essays. A-level essays are smaller but at the same time more important – you write just two before your coursework. You are quite expressly NOT permitted to voice your opinion as that is considered arrogant, as we were told tonight. Work from the text, don’t use the text to support you. At most the reverse of MSc where opinions are liked and even necessary.

So the essay plan was “P.E.A.R” (point, example, analyze, refer) or “Intro, point 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, conclusion” and I had to struggle not to laugh out loud. 500 words just keeps ringing in my head. Five points plus intro and conclusion.
Say 450 words for points, 50 for the rest.
That gives me 90 words to make my points.
And don’t forget I have to quote things, so say two quotes for each point, fifteen words each.
That leaves 60 words for each analysis.

On fuck I am so monumentally screwed! If you are counting along with me now by the way, we are approaching the 475 word mark. Time for the conclusion?

Why did I write this post? To illustrate how little 500 words is to me now. It’s two and a half pages of my tatty handwriting. It’s taken me thirty minutes to scrawl. It’s just about enough to express my disgust at a 500 word limit but no way enough to do justice to “In what ways does Carter use language to present male and female in The Snow Child?”

Yes, I will also post my essay (when it’s written and marked) for the edification and amusement of you all ^*

Now I’ve got to go to bed and ask myself why I find it so hard to be concise. When did being verbose and being able to write 5000 word essays become a good thing? Surely brevity is also a virtue? Wasn’t the Gettyesburg Address also child-sized? To be able to quickly sketch your argument and clearly illustrate it… Now that’s a good skill to have, surely?

And the final word count of this post? Six hundred and eighty glorious words, give or take a handful.

^* If I get a good mark that is. If I get a bad mark I shall crawl under my desk and die in shame. No really, I will.