Alasdair Watson

Do I:

a) go clubbing, dance for hours, and generally have fun, but come home exhausted in the morning?
b) stay home, have an early night, and be generally well rested, but miss out on potential excitement?

As of Monday, I’m employed again.  So, that’s the end of my free time.

What worthwhile things have I done with it?

Well, I’ve seen a few films :
SAW: enjoyable serial killer horror.  Cary Elwes gives an excellent performance, some genuinely horrible bits.  Hits what it’s aiming at. 
AVP: Complete rubbish, but enough to keep my attention for as long as it asked for it.  Felt a bit cheated by the ending. 
THE INCREDIBLES: The best Pixar film yet.  Serious contender for film of the year.

I’ve read a few books:
JONATHAN STRANGE & MR NORRELL: excellent, imaginative stuff, thoroughly recommended.  The ending felt a bit sudden, although not rushed or unsatisfactory.
UNDERGROUND LONDON: One of the best books on the topic I’ve read – not perhaps as in depth as some, but it covers a great breadth of stuff, and does it without ever becoming dry, as plenty of other books do.

And I’ve been out and about a bit.  Hadn’t realised that the National Gallery has what is possibly my favourite painting on display, so that was a nice surprise yesterday, and I spent quite a while with that.  Finally managed to see John Dee’s bits and bobs at the British Museum, too.  Must’ve taken him a hell of a time to carve that wax.

If it weren’t for this lack of money thing, I could really live with unemployment.  As it is, I’ll be working for Sanctury Group as a web programmer.  Click around under “artist managment” on that site, if you’re at all curious about which acts are with them…

The first thing my iTunes random shuffle presented me with this morning was Johnny Boy’s “You Are the Generation That Bought More Shoes, And You Get What You Deserve”.  It followed it with Carter’s “Bloodsport For All”.  It’s really quite hard not to see an omen in that today.  I’d be creeped out, if I weren’t busy being resigned to nuclear (or perhaps I should say “nukuler”) armageddon.  American voting public, I despise you.

But you really do have to squint.

Yes, I got a new job.  Only one more week of loafing about for me, and then it’s back to work.  I suppose I’d better find out about these oystercard things, since it looks like I’m finally going to have a job that’ll make getting one worthwhile…

Normally, when a topic enitrely fills my friends page, everyone’s remarking on some kind of unusual weather.

Not today.

Fuck.

[Written on the PDA this afternoon]

I’m a daft bastard and have inadvertantly trapped myself on a platform at Wimbledon station for half an hour.  Thank god for modern technology, eh?

It’s been six years since dodgyandcors and incursus got married.  That’s really gone and stuck in my head, because it’s reminded me of two other anniversaries that are coming up in the next couple of weeks.  On Wednesday, it’ll be six years since a close friend of the family died, completely unexpectedly.  That was one hell of a shock.  And the later in the month, it’ll be six years since Ellie dumped me, and that was horrible in the way that only that first binning can be.  And all that’s going through my head is “It can’t be that fucking long, can it?”

Apparently, it can.

But thank fuck for six year perspective, eh?  I look back, and I almost don’t recognise my 21 year old self.  Almost.  And no, I don’t wish I could go back and give myself any advice, although a slap isn’t out of the question.  And, of course, in six years time I’ll be saying that about my 27 year old self, but that’s not a shock.

I’m really not sure where I’m going with this.  It just doesn’t seem like six years since I spent my working week in that server room in Kiln Lane, and lived in a poky wee bedroom at my parents place.  It doesn’t seem like six years since my driving ambition was a job in Edinburgh.  Doesn’t seem like six years since…  I could go on.  I don’t know, maybe it’s not really a shock that this time of that year imprinted so strongly on me – it was one hell of an emotional switchback, after all.

But jesus, six years, and look at all the shit I’ve crammed into it, and it’s still not half enough.  And part of me wants to hear that the next six years can be a little calmer, that maybe I can go a few years without something happening in my life to shock, confuse and generally bother me, because it feels like eighteen months of relative calm is the most I’ve managed since I left school, and another part of me says “Don’t be bloody stupid – look at the amount you’ve learned, and there’s more to come!”

Ah, hell, I don’t know what I’m thinking, but my train’s due any minute, and my good christ, six bloody years?  Could we make time pass a little less quickly, please?  I’d like to get more stuff done.

Got a new phone today, because I was due an upgrade, and it was free, and I need something to forstall my technology lust for the next few months, because I won’t be able to afford any of the shiny toys I’ve had my eye on.  The phone has a decent camera (well, it’ll take 640×480 images and not look utterly shit, which is what I wanted) and bluetooth, so I can get the damn things off without having to email them.  This makes it actually worth having a cameraphone.  Hurrah!  Now all I have to do is resist spending 50 quid on a bluetooth adaptor for the palm…

Things that Rock (ii)

I’ve skimmed my “recent entries” page.  The great majority of my posts lately have been of the complaining sort.  Or at least, they’ve started out with something that happened that I didn’t like, and meandered on from there.  This is totally unnacceptable.  Just because I’ve had a bit of rubbish time of late is no excuse for degenerating into the sort of behaviour that characterises other people’s journals.

So, unemployment, day two.  (Technically, day four or six, but I’m counting from this Monday, rather than last week, and I don’t intend to include weekends in the count.  The last two days of last week were time to unwind, that’s all.  Yes.)  Thus far, I’m enjoying the little things.  Like the luxury of a reasonably leisurely breakfast in the morning, rather than having whatever I manage to grab on my way to work.  The time to make coffee, and toast muffins before doing anything with my day is fantastic.  Muffins and chopped liver are a great way to start the day.  (I can hear the retching from here.  You’re all freaks.  Liver is great, and good for you, too.)

In case you’re wondering, I am utterly determined to enjoy being unemployed, even if I’d rather it was only for a short while.  Yeah, I have a few worries, and it’s going to crimp my lifestyle a bit, but on the other hand, I have the novelty of free time.  I can actually do most of the things I want to in a given day, and still have spare time.  There’s a very real danger that I might get around to some of those jobs I’ve been putting off for years – Ninth Art has already had some upgrades to its search function today, with more planned, and assuming that I’m still unemployed this time next week (I’ve got other things to do for the next while) I think I might finally get around to coming up with an overhaul for Black Ink.  God forbid I should be unemployed long enough to actually feel like doing some writing, though…

Yes, I know how well the last few times that I’ve remembered that I’ve got a website there and tried to do something with it have worked out.  This won’t be any different, but it’ll at least look prettier.  Well, it should.  Well, it might.  Maybe.  Stop looking at me like that.

Things that Rock(i)

Have one of them doing-the-rounds things instead.

Name a CD you own that no-one else on your friends list does:
Sadly this is much, much too easy for me.  One at random from the pile of CDs by the computer:  The Newcranes – “Frontline”.  Early nineties crustypop from a Derby pub band.  I suspect that if anyone on my friends list owns a copy it’d be yaruar (as the only person I know who actaully recognised the name “Tansads” when it came up in email conversation a few years ago), but I’m willing to bet he doesn’t.

“This love was made in heaven, this love was made from lust,
And now it’s in the trash can with the other dirt and dust.
This love was made in heaven, this love was so divine,
But now instead of sweet white wine it tastes of turpentine.”

Clearly, unsung lyrical masters.

Name a book you own that no-one else on your friends list does:
A little harder, by not much.  “Stagolee shot Billy” by Cecil Brown.  Best text I’ve been able to find on the “Stack” Lee/Billy Lyons legends and the various blues, folk and pop songs that have grown out of it.  Bought it when I was intending to take a shot at writing a graphic novel about it.  I might yet go back to it – it’s one of the few writing projects I’ve got left in the back of my head that doesn’t just piss me off.  (I also note that I’ve still got a book on the way the “Little Red Riding Hood” fairy tale has changed over the years that burge lent me a couple of years ago (and I really ought to return) sitting next to it.

Name a movie you own on DVD/VHS/whatever that no-one else on your friends list does:
The Prophecy III.  I figure there’s a reasonable chance someone out there owns the first one, but I’m willing to bet I’m the only one with the two sequels.

Name a place that you have visited that no-one else on your friends list has:
The Bushmills distillery.

Can you drop me a line with your email address?  I’ve got the track burge said she’d get to you all MP3ed on my computer, but I don’t seem to have an email address for you to send it to…