Flaming Zinc

I am hanging with James Blunt and Mr Muscle. Yes, I am cleaning the flat so I can have a relaxing weekend. It is a sad state of affairs that I am too knackered to go watch Alex play softball, have a few drinks and eat chicken wings. What can I say it was a tough week. The laundry is spinning away (I’ve even done the bedding for good measure), I’ll mop the floors, and tackle the bathroom. All the while I’ll sing very loudly, out of tune to my current obsessive repeat play album.

I knew about this weeks and weeks ago. How did I know that Sigourney Weaver was doing a radio play? Our parcel delivery guy told me. He knows everything that is going on in the Soho/Noho area, we always have a chat when he is in our office, and he had bumped into Ms Weaver when she was recording in a neighbourhood studio.

The funny thing is about New York is that per square mile it is ,apparently, packed with celebs. Colleagues can barely nip out for a sandwich without spying a Liev, Matt or a lesser spotted Katie. Me, I see no one. I walk about in a bubble (an opaque one), so caught up in my head that I don’t even acknowledge people I know (or am even married to so)!

She showed a lot of initiative trying to figure out the spelling of initiative.

First of, “inisutive” (which is what it sounds like in my head) but that drew a blank on the spell check. Several more variations of “innisuteve” and still no closer. Next up the online thesaurus, the time honoured trick of finding the word by the back door. Enterprising. No. Industrious. No. Directive. No. Frustration levels rising. I know the word is in there, but it is like a locked room with a lost key. In the end I called Alex, if the UK hadn’t been asleep it would have been mum getting the screechy phone call.

In my defense, at no time did I actually think that initiative was spelt “inisutive”, I know that is wrong. I can recognize initiative in a sentence, but can’t weasel the fucking word out of my brain. At times my dyslexia can feel like being paralyzed.

In about eight weeks, or so, school starts for me. Technically since it is a correspondence course I can kick it off when ever the study materials materialize materialise (no, I just couldn’t do it). I am starting to panic that I will be biting off more than I can chew, and I am trying to remember the work loads of the arts students that I used to scoff at in Manchester. The science departments pretty much had a full time week of lectures, practicals and reading. Of course if I did more of the reading then I might not have found myself in a perpetual daze, wondering when things would start to make sense and get slightly more interesting (who’d have thought that the study of volcanos could be so tedious). Whereas my chums in the arts block appeared to only have 7 or so hours of lectures per week, plus a hefty dose of reading and essay writing. Naive me used to think that reading novels, plays or poetry was a soft option to staring down a microscope trying to figure out what type of feldspar I was looking at (x polarisation and twinning drift into my consciousness.

I really don’t know what to expect. In theory I have over twenty hours of potential study time (comprised of 5 lunch hours, 4 two hour week day sessions, and at least ten hrs spread over the weekend), but that does not take into consideration procrastinating and navel gazing. But, this would give me five hours per subject per week.

I am anxious that I might be tearing my hair out my Christmas, but the opposite could be true too. The structure and brain activity might be the kick up the arse I need to put a little pep in my step.

I really wasn’t expecting too much from Case Histories by Kate Atkinson (I found Not The end of The World to be a very lack luster collection of short stories), and so it didn’t disappoint. It turned out to be a very pedestrian effort to dabble in the mystery genre. There were no surprises, every character evolved into something rather obvious and dull. There seemed to be a check list of caricatures and issues that needed to be touched on.

1. Ex-married, ex-forces, ex-policeman turned PI (who has a volatile relationship with the ex-wife, worries he is loosing daughter to the new father figure) – check

2. Reliable (ethnic) friend to 1 – check

3. Sexually repressed middle aged woman who turns into a lesbian – check

4. Waif with a secret – check

5. Hot nurse with a secret – check

6. Wife with a secret, planning on running off with the vicar and leaving her horrid step kid behind – check

7. Missing child – check

8. Distant father figure who abused his children and died alone – check

9. A girl who talks to god and Joan of Arc (due to possible tramatic event, see 7 and – check.

10. Batty old women, who has many cats and is frightfully posh – check

11. Nasty relation to 10, who wants her inheritance (but not her cats) – check

Throw in some cliches into the mix and you’re done. Poorly written fiction really annoys me. But, not as much as the assumption that mysteries or sci-fi are some how lesser genres and require less care when being written. There are some awesome modern authors who write complex and intelligent prose (just scrapping the surface with Ian Rankin, Iain Banks, William Gibson, and Jeff Noon) unfortunately Atkinson isn’t one of them, and I shall resign her to the Atwood bin.

I have had a long and bizarre week. Best laid plans were thrown out the window and I am so glad that it is Friday night. I have been abusing my ipod by only listening to the one album, over and over again. It is just such a kick arse album, and I have my mother (she of impeccable taste) to thank for bring James Blunt into the sound track of my chaos. I feel a minor gush coming on, but reading the blurb on his website and an interview, you can’t quite feel relieved that he is not another cookie-cutter-break-out-from -a-boy-band. Anyone who thanks Carrie Fisher on their CD sleeve and was hoodwinked by a university degree (a “proper” dinosaur never crossed my pants thru out my time at Manchester) has my vote. So I took it as a positive sign that when I went to get my morning Starbucks, unplugged myself to order and heard that they were playing one of his songs. So cool.

I’ve been pissed off with myself for the past day, I made a stupid mistake that has cost me in the wallet and I am my own worst enemy (and harshest critic). But, when I got home something was waiting for me that put a smile on my face. A parcel containing our DNA swaps (so CSI) for the National Geographic Genographic Project. In short using genetic markers found by analyzing the DNA in the remaining indigenous populations they have been able to mark out epic migrations. Alex and I are participating because the money from the kits will be channelled back in, and were curious to see if we have any thing “hidden” in our genes. We will get a picture of our global family tree and ancestral wanderings.

Today I found myself edging towards a catatonic stupor, and I should have gone to the gym in an attempt to re-animate myself. Instead I find myself haggling with the god of barter. If I throughly clean the kitchen counter tops (paying special attention to the coffee marks on the cooker), and do my hand washing (which has been gathering dust for a month), and put away the clean laundry that has been sitting out since Thursday (shameless house slut that I am), and send the late birthday cards for my young cousins, and reply to the emails that I have had simmering way too long, and find away to banish poverty/famine/war/fishtanks. Then I don’t have to do 20 minutes on the tread mill and yoga tomorrow morning. I can sleep till 6:30am and reward myself with a Starbucks on the way to work.

Free will rocks!

****** WARNING CONTAINS SPOILERS & OTHER FLIGHTS OF FANCY ******

After spending the last two days (7.5 hrs in total, split over two sittings) ploughing my way through HP6 I am a little lost that it is over. But, isn’t that always the case after a big event. The euphoria crashes away, and you are left in the dip trying to make sense of it all. I really didn’t mean to finish it so quickly, it’s just that I didn’t have much else to do. Either hand washing clothes and bleaching the kitchen counter tops, or read. Given that Alex was taken up with programming yesterday we only managed one episode of BSG, this seemed as good a way as any of entertaining myself.

My verdict, all be it a biased one, it was an enjoyable read and makes me eager HP7. But, the Order of the Phoenix is still my favourite. This one was missing some of the detail that I loved in the early books. I am a sucker for Christmas and all the other holidays that she described in such detail. The white mice in the crackers, exploding snap, Halloween and home made Easter Eggs were all absent. But, they are approaching 17 and there are loose ends to be tied up. It is also an altogether darker time.

I had two suspects for the “Half-Blood Prince”, either Hagrid or Snape. It was the latter, but I liked her deluding us about the monarch-angle. I had heard rumors of Dumbledore’s death before I read the book, but I have a feeling that it is not as cut and dry as we might believe. I still harbor hope for the good in Snape to shine through, but that might be clouded by Alan Rickman, I have my fingers crossed that he is a double-double agent. Perhaps our favourite headmaster knew his time was limited and that is why he imparted so much about Voldemort’s past to Harry. Arming him for the forthcoming fight, and sealing Snape’s place at the Dark Lord’s side.

So, the clocks are turned back and we must start the wait all over again.

Displacement activities whilst I wait for “You know who” to be delivered:

• Avoid all websites/blogs with sped read reviews
• Catch up with the mother
• 20 minutes on the treadmill
• Listen to Jonathan Ross on Radio2
• Clean flat
• Reconcile bank account

I have decided that if it has not arrived by 1pm then I am off to Borders to buy a copy, there is only so much waiting a girl can take.