Taking a break.....

For my two readers out there you may have noticed that this has not been updated in quite a while. You have probably wept, ripped your clothing and had suicidal thoughts. I can only apologise and promise to be better. The reason for this break has been because I have written a book. I am laughing as I type this as I can't believe I have actually done it. That's a lie. I'm not laughing, I'm not sure people actually do that. I am in fact talking to a work colleague whilst I write this and she is discussing a severe work crisis. So I am not laughing. I feel that would  be inappropriate.

But it is done! The short version of how the book came to be is - I always wanted to write a book. So I did. The slightly longer version is this: I always wanted to write. I always had an inkling I was OK at writing. I had an English teacher who hated my guts and told me I was useless and so I didn't do English A'level as she predicted me a F at GCSE. I actually got a double A (turns out I did a lot better when she wasn't marking my work) but still didn't do A level as the thought of spending two more years in her company made me unhappy. She had also managed to ruin Jane Eyre for me and I wasn't prepared to have her ruin any more books by banging on about the 'sympathy of nature'. It never once crossed her mind that it was raining all the time because the book was based in England, instead it was always raining to sympathise with Jane. Much like the weather in Korea after Kim Jong Il died.

Anyway, left school, went to university, worked on the paper, ended up working in television but always had in mind that I wanted to write. Then when I went to work on EastEnders and in my first week I was asked to take part in a question and answer for the weekly newsletter 'the Walford Gazette'. This was traditional for every new comer and I emailed back my replies. The man that ran it, Laurence, emailed back and said he liked the way I wrote and offered me a weekly collumn. The majority of those articles are on this blog. After three very happy years on EastEnders I decided to leave and write a book. The Gazette and the response to it had made me think I could do it and I'd had an idea that I was eager to explore. I was going to go freelance to support myself so thought I'd have a lot of downtime to write.

Luckily/unluckily freelancing went really well and I've not had a day out of work for three years. Then last November whilst working on a comedy programme called Mongrels I got an email to my BBC account from Marie Claire magazine. This was strange not least because Marie Claire never email me and also because I don't use my BBC account for personal emails as, well, I don't work there. It was only chance I was there for 6 weeks and they coincided with this email coming through. The email told me I had got down to the final two in a competition I had no recollection of entering. It was the novel writing part of the Marie Claire 'Inspire and Mentor' awards. A great scheme where people who want to get ahead in certain industries are matched with a mentor who encourages and supports them. My interview was the first week of December.

I could find no evidence of entering the competition and had no idea what I had sent in to convince them I should be in the final two. I concluded to just go and see how it went. My mentor, if I won, would be the fabulous author Jane Fallon. I did the interview, convinced myself I'd cocked it up then two months later I found out I'd won.

Jane has been an amazing mentor. The advice and help she has given me has been incredible and the book I have now is completely different (but a hundred times better) than the book I started with. She has given me such support and knowing I have her help has forced me to be strict and dedicated to my writing. Obviously working full time and writing part time, plus trying to have a life and help out at things (trying to hold a jubilee party for 150 old people was probably not my best idea) is difficult but knowing that there is someone reading your stuff and wanting you to improve makes getting up at 6 to write so much easier.

So yes, it is done. I'm sure I've not seen the last of it but 90,000 words have been committed to paper. I'm not sure where it goes from here but it's been a hell of a year.

I suppose I shall now take a break from writing...by writing. Normal service should be resumed on here now.

Commercial life

I am thinking of living my life in accordance to adverts. I have ascertained the following rules 1. People only shave their legs if they are going on a date or want to leap on to a bus in a 1950s style skirt. You never see an advert where a woman says 'Good grief I look like a gorilla. I'm going to need a scythe to get through this'. Which would actually be a better selling point. 2. Laxatives works in a kind and gentle manner and allow you to lunch with your friends. Rather than cripple you with an explosive bowel and make you unwilling to laugh without laying towels down first. 3. When you clean your teeth you must immediately run your tongue over your teeth and smile at yourself. You must also always wear a white t-shirt when you clean your teeth 4. Mothers get very, very worried about getting stains out of clothes. This is accepted by her family as her 'caring' for them and greeted with laughter. Rather than worry she is turning in to Lady MacBeth and referring her to a therapist. 5. Only mothers clean, wash clothes, iron or hoover. If a man does it he will do it wrong and stare, puzzled at the bottle before putting bleach in his eye. Single women are slattenly whores who do not have time to clean houses. 6. Only women eat chocolate. Men are allowed to eat Yorkies but nothing else. Occasionally they may eat a twix, but only after exercise with other men. There he will rip back the paper and bite off half of it whilst smiling. 7. Animals need toilet paper 8. Children are universally amusing and wise. 9. If you own a massive, dirty dog then you must have white bed linen 10. Having your period makes you feel amazing. 11. If men have had a hard day at work they will loosen their tie 12. People only go to bars with people who drink exactly the same drinks as them. 13. It is acceptable for grown adults to drink WKD. 14. Ready meals make a satisfying and nutritionally balanced meal. 15. Old people only exist to eat Werther's Originals.

Exercise

I am in a slight mood. My wii called me fat the other day. Well actually first it bombarded me with mocking comments along the lines of 'Oh hello, not seen you for a while. It's important to take your fitness seriously." Then when it got over that it encouraged me to step on to the wii fit board. When I stepped on it let out an 'ouch'. Then it recognised me. Obviously everytime I get on the wii I want it to say 'You can't possibly be the same person, you weigh half as much!". It did recognise me, then it called me overweight, which yes is an improvement on obese (which I was) but I wanted the little wii mi to walking around in a pair of comedically large computer generated trousers not look no different to how I was before. So yes I've decided to start exercising. This is for many reasons. One being that I want to eat lots of Easter Eggs (yep I've still got some left, smuggy smug smug). Two being that it's spring/summer/monsoon season so I am more inclined to leave the house. Three being that I recently went to Iceland and spent time walking and swimming and remembered that I actually like it. Fourth being that one of my chums has become a pilates teacher and given that I work days and she works nights if I ever want to see her I need to attend her class. Oh look here's a link to her site here. Book in with her. She's very good For some reason I can not put a link in. Google claire toone pilates. That's her. Book. So my first class is tonight. Hopefully I won't break. I am also intending to go swimming again. I like swimming and am reasonably good at it. I used to be able to swim a mile in about half an hour or so (doubt I can now) so it's the one form of exercise I can be confident of not dying during. Apart from walking it's the only form of physical movement I can reasonably pull off. Running leads to falling over and not being able to breath within a few minutes. Tennis and general athletics I do not have the co-ordination or technique (this being hammered home to me during 5 long years of PE lessons), trampolining - fear of collapsing the trampoline, football, rugby, hockey, netball, squash - no idea of the rules despite being forced to play them at school. However, annoyingly the outdoor pool near me has closed down. Which distresses me. I do not like swimming indoors. It's too hot, too echoey, too chlorinated and you are unable to get properly dry. Outdoor is simply more fun. So I am going to attempt to go to Hampstead ponds. The lake holds no fear for me. Getting there does. I have no sense of direction and can't read a map. On my holiday I avoided all the sights of Rejykavik and instead wandered around a council estate. Which was lovely in it's own way. It's own way being not at all. So let's get energised. Let's Pilate.

Tracks of my life

This Friday I am going on local radio. Like most people whenever I hear my voice played back to me I go in to shock and wonder how anyone ever manages to have a conversation with me as I sound like a droning, high pitched, sqwarky lunatic. A bit like Mr Punch but more annoying. I also hate public speaking of any kind so this should go really well. My last and only experience of radio was on a training course where we had to pretend to work in a radio station, I got to read the travel news. I instantly forgot the names of any roads so all accidents and hold ups happened on the M25. Played back it sounded like Mr Punch had had a stroke and could only communicate by squarking 'M25, bad' repeatedly.

However, I am also going to inflict upon the listeners sixteen of my favourite songs so they may loathe me for reasons other than my voice. I am recording 'Tracks of my life'. Where I chose 16 songs and talk about their role in my life. At first I thought this would be an easy task. Then I started going through i-tunes and trying to select tracks. Also trying to select tracks that actually have a role in my life rather than 'I like it'. Now there are songs that I adore but which are not the greatest songs in the world. I generally like them for one line. For example 'Wicheta Lineman'. I don't like the first couple of verses, all the rabid exposition 'I am a lineman for the county' etc. But I do love, deeply the line 'And I need you more than I want you, and I want you for all time.' The question is - can I inflict three minutes of rubbish on people for the beauty of that one line? The answer is, I may have to as a lot of the songs I really love have gratuitous swearing in them and I can't play that on the radio.
Certain songs are easy. Waltz no 2 by Elliot Smith. One of the most beautiful songs I have ever heard and stands up to repeated listenings. Other songs - great memories - crap songs. Should I include 'I don't know much' by Linda Rondstat and Arran Neville simply because my brother and I found it funny to sing it like Kermit the Frog?
I have put a long short list together. Plan is to revue it nearer the time and whittle it down. See how long my nerve holds out and whether I can bring myself to put 'My Brother' by Terry Scott out there.

For F***s Sake

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2122302/National-Cleavage-Day-Holly-Willoughbys-cleavage-named-Britains-favourite-Wonderbra-poll.html

National cleavage day today apparently.

I look forward to national cocks out day soon.

Thank you for the days

My grasp on science is shaky at best. Never my strong point and when concepts get too hard for me I am quite happy to say ‘Ah well I don’t get it but I’m glad someone does’ and then stop thinking about it. I am fine with the fact that I don’t know about many, many things. I don’t understand how planes stay in the air, I don’t know why enormous boats float, I don’t know why people would want a bird as a pet but these things happen and they will not stop simply because I don’t understand why. So I may be very wrong when I make the claim that time is relative. Is that what E=MC2 is all about?

However it is whizzing by. Work is frantic. I had quite an in-depth conversation this morning with a colleague where we discussed the kids tv programme ‘Out of this world’ where she could pause time. Both of us were quite keen on this. Then we realised that we could have achieved something in the time we had spent talking about outdated sitcoms of the 80s. Time is speeding by. Not helped by the random weather generator that is the climate at the moment. It’s like a two year old with a remote control is picking the weather: Hot! Cold! Snow! Heatwave! Minus 6 at night but 23 degrees by lunch!

Now obviously, time is going at exactly the same speed as always. It’s merely my perception of it. Sitting through Avatar at the cinema took approximately nine and a half years. The time between my head hitting the pillow and waking up the next morning is about six and a half seconds. My nephew turns six at the weekend. I swear he was born a couple of weeks ago. However if I think of other things that happened six years ago it may as well be a lifetime ago. A very badly dressed life time ago.

I have no problem with ageing, I have nothing else to do and I wouldn’t be a teenager again if you paid me. However I do have quite a lot of things to do. (this appears to have something to do with the end of financial year – again something I have no concept of), therefore I intend to put Avatar on to slow down time to a crawl and then crack on with my to-do list

The Art of Sleep

I have never really mastered the art of power napping. I know the theory. Short, sharp sleeps make us work more efficently and power us through the afternoon. I get the sleeping aspect of it. I just don't get the short bit of it. If I go to bed knowing that I have got to get up in twenty minutes and carry on with my day then I don't relax and I don't sleep. If I tell myself that I have a four our window and if I am unconsious for all of it then it doesn't matter then I sleep well and deeply for about an hour. If however I don't set an alarm and have to be somewhere eight hours from the time of the nap then I will sleep deeply and soundly for 10 hours only to be awoken in the pitch black by a ringing phone.

Incidently there is nothing more disconcerting than lolling on your bed in broad day light, thinking about going for a walk or something, then closing your eyes as the light of the sun filters through the window and... then waking up ten hours later with no idea where you are, the house in darkness, completely unaware of what time it is, what day it is and what you are meant to be doing. The only thing you can work out is that something, possibly a small animal, sneaked in whilst you were asleep, had a lavish dump in your mouth then curled up and died in there for good measure. You also appeared to sleep face down as every crease your pillow had is now transferred to your face, these will drop out in a few hours. Also you appear to have been having some kind of wrestling competition with your clothes. Despite being able to sleep in pyjamas without spontaneously undressing yourself or wrapping your sleeves round your back, when you sleep in clothes you will wake up with them two sizes smaller than when they went on and discover you have had some kind of wrestling competition with them when you were unconsious.

You don't sleep like this at night. At night you drift off, during the day it's like you've been hit with a stun gun. You sleep or you die. At night, if you wake up unexpectedly you know exactly where you are and are content to wander to the bathroom or whatever with no need to put the lights on. Wake up suddenly from a nap and it's like you're in the middle of a horror film. You patrol the house for invaders and check for what may have gone on whilst you were asleep.

The biggest difference however is moisture. You can wake up after a nights sleep refreshed and raring to go. You wake up from a day time sleep sweaty, covered in drool and about to wet your pants.