Pendulum
Sunday and Monday I kinda got my shit back together, and played far too much Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time. I've finally managed to get Two Thrones (the last of the trilogy) on my Xbox, so I figured I'd play them all in order. Even thought it's a good few years old now, I'm still utterly charmed and impressed by SoT. And knowing the story structure and what's coming doesn't hurt it at all, it just makes you appreciate how clever it is to begin with.
We went round to Matt & Bex's last night to carve pumpkins for tomorrow, which was fun. Everybody else made plans and sketches and I just kind of improvised. Which shows in the result, a kind of angry cat-thing. It's not as clever as any of the others for lack of planning, but I like it and I still think it's oddly eerie!
Then it was back to work this morning! And for all that the job is killing me/tiring me out/it doesn't go anywhere/I'm not getting to live my life at all (such as it is) I STILL enjoyed it! I guess being on the open road is just a good thing for me! I would've had an early finish too (even with London being a mess because of the state visit from the Saudi royal family closing a disturbing amount of the roads a man may wish to travel down whilst in our nations capital; Trafalgar Square in particular was a bloody shambles!), except I get the impression that one of the new drivers just kinda quit in a huff 'cos he couldn't cope, because I was on my way home having been dismissed for the day when I was suddenly called in to clear up the mess! Which I did. Much as it was irritating at the time that I couldn't just fuck off home, I do get some satisfaction from being the saviour/go-to-guy when shit goes bad.
Even with all that done, I still got home at a semi-reasonable hour, and have just had one of my trademark ridiculously long baths, for the first time in what seems a very long time! It was lovely and relaxing, listening to Bob Dylan CDs and soaking, without interruption! Maybe things are looking up after all, eh?
Bad Things Are Happening Right Now
Well that didn't go at all according to plan. I woke up feeling terribly again, had a bit of an extra lie in then went down to the stall for our Hallowe'en extavanganza, which was pretty fun. Shaz went as a zombie cheerleader and I went as a scuzzy Nightwatch style vampire, all covered over in my hoody and leather jacket (and gloves and sunglasses!). As the afternoon wore on though I started to feel worse and worse until I just got sent home to sleep. And here I've been ever since. Shaz has gone to the Samhain ball without me, and it's me and Archie sitting about being lonely and bored. I know I'd complained about going to this thing, but only because it's such a pain having to go all that way after working a six day week; I'm sure I would've had fun when I got there... but I guess now we'll never know.
Oddly though I've been thinking/dreaming about an alternative/goth/metal/whatever club night for New Years where fancy dress is mandatory (and I don't mean in a dressing as something silly kinda way, almost the reverse, dressing for the fanciest night ever! But with vampires and werewolves and fairies and such...) and I'd like it to be called The Last Night, because it would be, for that year at least. Of course it's far too late to do anything about it now, but in my head it seems like a really cool Gothic (yes, with a big G), baroque sort of thing.
Wonder what I'll do now? Probably just go back to sleep again...
Brian Damage
Well, the past couple of days have been a bit of a disaster. Work was continuing as normal with it's relentless approach to grinding me into a vaguely human smear when yesterday I had a migraine. A big one. For those of you who are counting such things, it's the second in the space of a month, and given that my normal rate for such things is one every halk decade or so I can't help but wonder if this is my body's half arsed way of telling me to slow down. Except I can't slow down, if I do I don't get paid as much, end of. Looking through a list of triggers on a nearby website I can't help but notice how many of them I could have. This is not good and not a situation which we can allow to go on indefinitely, but still... it's the first job I've had in a long time that I actually LIKE. Okay the pay is pretty crap (although better than Diligenta) and the hours are insane, but I still enjoy what I'm doing.
On top of that, we've got the stall to run tomorrow (for which I'm supposed to be producing fliers and posters, although of what I don't know because nobody has told me) and then the Sammain ball that we still don't have finished costumes for... thank god I've got Monday off!
Monday Rights and Wrongs
I worked Saturday too, another trip down to London (this time delivering furniture), then back home just in time to help pack the stall away and then home. In the evening we went to a kind of welcome home/early halloween party for which I dressed as a vampire (complete with fangs and red contacts) which was fun. Then home early Sunday morning for some well deserved sleep.
Sunday itself was largely spent pottering about looking for things for our own Halloween extravaganza on the stall on Saturday, although I also managed to find a (large) handful of Xbox (and GameCube) games that I hadn't got and promptly (and possibly unwisely) bought those. As I think I mentioned last week, I had been considering the Half Life 2 Orange Box, but I kinda fell down there with regards system requirements, having no idea where on Earth I was gonna find a free 20GB of space. I have a typically half arsed plan to sort this out (involving shifting all the media to an external USB drive), but that naturally requires money which is already in short supply despite my having been paid on Friday. I guess that's what buying a big handful of games and some coloured contacts will do for ya.
Then today was back to work, and back into London early again. Everything went wrong pretty much as soon as possible, although none of it was actually my fault. Oddly though, all this going wrong actually lead to me being home at a reasonable hour of the day, which can't be bad. I've even managed to do some work on the mask I should in theory be wearing for the dreaded masked ball on Saturday. I couldn't say I was looking forward to it at all, but Shaz was and I agreed to go because she wanted to. On the plus side I have booked next Monday off work, so I will at least get a rest that way, which is nice.
Ah well, time to go enjoy the rest of the evening before I inevitably fall asleep!
My Velocity
It's been another long week, all I seem to do is work. I'd complain, except for all the long hours and whatnot, this is the only job I've ever had where I don't wake up in the morning and think I can't possibly face another day of THAT. I'm sure it'll get to be me eventually though. On the upside, while I'm working these ridiculous hours I am getting paid many pennies, which is good. And if I didn't have so much debt, I'd actually be building up savings, which would be good. It's not like I have enough free time to actually spend the money I earn on anything, although the Half-Life 2 Orange Box is out today, and I'm very sure that'd be thirty well spent pounds, assuming I ever got any time to play any of the games therein!
Not complaining though, as I've said.
No.
Well okay, I am complaining a bit, because I did like the regular hours and having a life thing that working office hours allowed me. I don't really see a future in van driving anyway, it's not there's a natural progression there, although why that should worry me is almost beyond me; I don't think I've ever held a job long enough to get promoted!
I'm working tomorrow too, driving in the morning and on the stall in the afternoon, assuming I get back in time. I was at least offered the choice of routes and rejected the trip to Cardiff almost out of hand! There is apparently, a limit.
So, free time.
I remember it; dimly, like memories of childhood, I remember there was a time after work or at weekends when you could do what you like; mess about, play video games, watch movies. I haven't watched a movie since my birthday, and that was Hot Fuzz and I fell asleep before the half way mark there! Shocking. And apart from Guitar Hero heroics at parties I haven't played a video game in what seems like a very long time indeed.
Ah well, I already know this can't and won't be forever, I just need to take advantage of the work to try and clear a few debts. I just don't know what my next move should be...
Tired, Tour Of London
I've just finished three days of very early mornings and long days, travelling down to London and back. To start with just driving in London is a trial, there are so many idiots you need to keep an eye on (most notably yourself; whatever you think you know about driving does not apply in our nations capital), but once you start to get that down you can actually start to look about and admire the view; in fact it's taken me three days to realise that on the way home I ALWAYS drive past BBC Broadcasting House, where the very radio programmes I am listening to are coming from. I also seem to go through Trafalgar Square on a pretty much daily basis. Today I also went straight past the Houses of Parliament (wonderful view as I was coming over the bridge across the Thames) and in previous days I've visited St Pauls Cathedral, Westminster Abbey and Marble Arch to name but a few. However the weirdest thing/place I've seen was today, when I went through the Rotherhithe Tunnel, a tunnel about a mile long that goes under the Thames. From the look of it it's probably late Victorian (judging from the wrought iron work on the emergency exit stairs and very neat white tiles used to line the tunnel), and is very narrow and doesn't appear to have been designed with the prescience to anticipate the widespread use of the car (which, to be fair had hardly been invented at all at the time). Most disturbing (once you get used to the idea that you are driving through a one hundred plus year old tunnel under a huge river) is the haze which seems to settle down there, as though the exhaust fumes are just settling down there in a yellow green mist. I guess that's what the smogs used to be like, back in the good old bad old days, eh?
Anyway, it's late, I'm tired and hungry and it's time for Heroes! And for the last two days of the week I get a lie in before going to deal with the hell that is DHL! Yay me!
That Was The Week That Was And A Birthday
So, following on from where we left things at the end of September, it was Saturday, and working on the market for once didn't seem like a chore, it seemed like a day off! I got a lie in before I started and we finished at a reasonable hour.
Then there was a surprise party for my birthday which was actually really fun! The surprise had been slightly spoilt earlier on that morning by a careless email sent to the wrong address, but I knew there was SOMETHING going on, I just wasn't sure what. Anyway, I was surprised to really enjoy it and also be very drunk and not come home until four in the morning; this would turn out to be a very bad idea, as I started work at 5am on Monday on the London trip and I was not even slightly recovered from the party. To be honest I was terrified that I'd fall asleep and then wake up in dead in an accident. Luckily that was not the case. Sunday (birthday day!) was mainly spent in recovery, but as it turned out nothing like enough recovery for the week ahead.
Monday and Tuesday I did London which wasn't hard work per se, apart from the starting at nothing o'clock in the morning before I went to bed, which was troubling. The rest of the week was spent doing more supposedly light courier work for DHL, which still takes up a good eleven plus hours of the day. By the end of the week I was utterly shattered, which might explain why I woke up Saturday morning with an utterly debilitating migraine. I spent the whole day in bed, in the dark and then almost inexplicably decided to go to the local funfair with Shaz Matt and Bex in the evening. This was not a good idea and the last hour or so of the night was utter torture. I still felt like shite when I woke up this morning and so had to miss out on the family visit to Shaz's grans for her birthday, which I feel bad about, but not as bad as I'll feel if I either can't go to work tomorrow, or die in an accident 'cos I haven't had enough rest.
So, there we are; I've been at work - a LOT.
I enjoy this new job, but I already find the work/life balance to be skewed horribly in favour of work; I haven't so much as cracked the spine of a book, picked up a miniature or watched a movie all the way through in the past two weeks, and that can't be a good thing, can it? Still, it's honest work and it is earning me money, which is what I need right now. But maybe I should be keeping an eye open for something with more prospects and better hours? Not saying I give this up right away, but I wonder what sort of life we'll have if work is all I ever seem to do... I mean I haven't even had the time to spend any of my birthday money yet!
