It's not over tonight. Just give me one more chance to make it right.

I've come to the conclusion that I'm a bad reader. If that's the correct way of saying it.
What I mean is, I can happily pick up a book to read. I like it. I enjoy it. But it's the way I read that's so bad. At compelling parts, I get completely sucked in and can't help but allow my eyes to jump ahead. Not loads, just a little further down the page. Just enough to find out what I needed to know. And I skim read too, to find what I need quicker.
I can't help myself. I always do it.
I always feel guilty about it then, 'cos when I go back to read from where I was, I already know where it's going. So I've all but ruined it for myself. Taken away a climax!
I've never, ever skipped from within a book, right to the last page to see the conclusion. But I wonder if what I do is some kind of new fangled medical condition. And what if this condition grows into something bigger. Would I be destined to feed my craving so much, I'd do the dirty deed and read that last page?

I guess I could judge how much I enjoyed a book by how guilty I felt about reading it.

Mum gave me £50 to get some shopping in for myself. She's so good to me. I've had to put it in my bank account to cover a debit coming out. How fucking crap is that?! Times is 'ard. I could really use a break right about now.
I've had a smoke.
I really miss The Girl.
She said she would wait until however long it took. I can't even begin to describe how amazing it felt to be me right then. That another person would ever think so much of me as to say that.

Deep inside, I don't think I've ever felt happier.

Who's got a match? I've got the petrol to set it to.

So, the weekend....

Cheese on toast, red wine, weed, Star Wars Monopoly, Sweeney Todd, yummy shortbread, Linkin Park, drunk girls fighting, reconciliation with mojo, no milk, hair colouring, crazy mosh-pit, dry chicken, first time bus journey, more wine, broken Sat Nav, mini Snickers, wrong turn, lone tram journey, car buying tips, more weed, over-knee socks, mouldy bread, spaced out cats, smelly fish, lack of sleep.

Time goes by so slowly for those who wait. And those who run seem to have all the fun.

I think I've lost my mojo.

I tried so hard and got so far. But in the end, it doesn't even matter. I had to fall, to lose it all. But in the end, it doesn't even matter.

Dear week commencing the 14th of January,

I know you're not officially over yet, what with the weekend looming, but so far you have proved to be a complete waste of time.

Whilst I'm a firm believer that 'tomorrow is another day', you've done nothing to confirm that line of thinking, instead choosing to make each and every day as utterly rubbish as each other. There have even been times when I've not realised what day it is and have had to double check, which is simply not good enough.

Each day you should have not only provided me with some work, but also with a phone call or two, allowing me to plan for more work in advance. To say you've failed in this department is an understatement of the largest proportion. Not only has the phone been deathly quiet, but I've not even had enough work to restock my fridge. Did you see my fridge last week!? In addition, I'm now also facing a week ahead with just one job tentatively booked in. This simply isn't good enough and I am seriously considering writing a strongly worded letter to Chronos and the screen-writers of "Gone With The Wind".

You've done nothing to arrest my dislike of daytime TV (although i did love the re-runs of Ally McBeal if I'm totally honest), but I'm sick, sick, sick of seeing adverts about Debt Consolidation, Car Insurance, that fucking Churchill dog, those goons from Halifax singing and dancing and I'm even tired of the trailers for the new series of Skins. And just who the fuck does Jeremy Kyle think he is? I know what I think he is!

I've been getting up early, only to be presented with another flat day. Even though I've tried to be as pro-active as I can about filling my days with work, by early afternoon, my motivation and drive have flown the coop and I'm left feeling like I might as well write the rest of the day off. I've been going to bed at a reasonable time, only to find myself lying there worrying about things and dreading that the following day isn't just a repeat of today. Needless to say it has been.

Every night, you've presented me with bad dreams. Two of which involved such horrible things that I've been jerked out of my bodily rest and thrust into the dark and dingy reality that is my bedroom. You've ignored my pleas to have naughty dreams about The Girl and instead have given me mixed visions that have horrified me to the point of waking up in a startled and bemused state.

Not only have you been utterly crap as far as work is concerned, but it's obviously had a knock-on effect on my finances, meaning I can't go to see The Girl this weekend. I don't think I need to explain how pissed off that makes me feel.

The only comforting thing is knowing that you wont be around next week, specifically next weekend, when I will be spending some time with The Girl and then topping the weekend off by seeing Linkin Park play.
That aside, it's been a complete waste of a week of my life and I sincerely hope our paths never cross again.

Yours annoyingly,
bedshaped

p.s.
This is the first time in a long while that I feel my depression biting at my heels again. Thank you so much for that.

There are no raindrops on roses and girls in white dresses. It's sleeping with roaches and taking best guesses.

I think one of the worst things about living on your own is how common it is to feel uneasy or scared. Or maybe it's just me.
Sometimes, it's easily explained things making those unusual noises, but that doesn't stop your heart skipping beats or your breathing rhythm to quieten and slow down enough to enable you to hear a pin drop. Then your mind starts wandering and you find yourself imagining all sorts of things.

It happened earlier, while I was soaking in the bath.
It's one of my few luxuries nowadays, to run a hot bath and have a nice long soak, complimented with a book or magazine and music playing in the background. I could hear voices outside, but was unsure if they were out the back of the house or out the front. Out the back would be impossible, I thought, because unless someone is willing to scale a six foot fence, (in the dark....in the pouring rain....through some very muddy fields) there's no way for them to get around there. So, must be out the front then. That's not so bad. It's probably just people walking down the road, past the house.
I settled back into my magazine, putting it down to nothing unusual.
Several minutes later, there's a thud. Then another one. Then another, sounding like something is being thrown against the window downstairs.
By this time, I'm like a startled cat, sensing impending doom.
Another couple of thuds, then definitely something weighty slamming against my front door. I've now reduced my breathing to that of a corpse and my mind is racing. Should I get out and investigate? Should I shout something down the stairs? Should I just make any kind of noise so whoever it is knows somebody is in? Of course, who-ever it was must have known the house wasn't empty because they would have been able to hear the music playing and seen some lights on.
While my mind is trying to think of something sensible to do, the doorbell rings. I have a doorbell that doubles as an intercom, so when the button is pressed on the outside, I can hear who it is on the speaker that's at the bottom of the stairs. I could hear voices. Whispering. Then laughing. Then shouting. Then nothing; the intercom had switched off.
There was one more bang on the door. Not a 'knock'. A definite bang. The voices raised up again, then faded away, presumably as whoever it was moved off.
I lay there in the bath, unable to enjoy my magazine, the music or my rare luxurious moment anymore. It had been ruined. Bastards!
I stayed in there for another five or ten minutes before deciding I felt confident enough to get out, get dressed and come downstairs to investigate. Before I went downstairs, I checked outside from the safety of an upstairs bedroom, without the light on of course.
Downstairs, I sheepishly opened the front door and checked to see if I could see anything unusual. I was half-expecting to find my car or van had been damaged or perhaps a horses-head had been left by the steps.
Nothing. It all looked ok.
False alarm then.

I've probably watched far too many horror movies!

I hate confrontation.
When I've been out with friends and trouble has kicked off, I'm the first to back the hell out of there. I've been caught up in a nasty fight outside a club once before and I learnt a valuable lesson from that night. Never be anywhere near a fight again.

When I think about it, I've been in a few potentially serious situations, so it's no wonder that I'm nervous when I think I can smell danger. Ok, so the bath story wasn't exactly danger per se, but I think my experiences have perhaps instilled a safety mechanism inside my head that makes me more susceptible to wanting to run or hide than be in any kind of scary situation. Either that or I'm just a big pussy!

The nightclub fight involved glasses and bottles being broken and used to lash out at people. I have no idea how it started, but once it kicked off, anybody who was even close to the rumble (which after a short time involved at least 10 people) got dragged into it. The screaming and shouting was deafening. The door security weren't getting involved, presumably because it was outside the club, although they did keep shouting that the police were on their way. Luckily, this was enough to make most people see sense and eventually, people who'd been thrown to the ground were able to get up and walk away.

I stupidly chased a guy who I'd watched steal something from the shop I was working in. I'd obviously been influenced by too much Starsky and Hutch, although none of that came as any help when he suddenly stopped running, turned on his heels and pulled out a sharpened screwdriver on me.

In my more active clubbing days, I had a knife pulled on me because I was apparently talking to a girl who this particular guy liked and wanted to teach me a lesson. A few weeks later, he came up to me in a different club and said he never intended to use it on me. He just wanted to scare me off. I told him he'd done a good job.

One of the worst ones I can remember is having a neighbour from hell. A couple of weeks after moving in, the guy next door decided he didn't like me. Stupidly loud music was just the beginning. It was bloody Country and Western as well! Loud banging on the walls followed, along with lots of shouting, swearing and threatening directed at me. The walls were so thin I could hear every "pfffffssssttt" when he opened another can of beer. This went on for a couple of weeks, coming to a horrible conclusion when one night he decided shouting through the walls wasn't good enough and proceeded to try and kick down the front door, telling me that when he got inside, I was gonna "get it". Fortunately, he wasn't able to kick the door down and went back round to his own house, ranting and raving about something. Unfortunately, he returned a few minutes later with a samurai sword and began hacking at my front door. Obviously, I'd phoned the police by this time. In fact, I'd phoned them way before he got to the 'hacking' stage. They were certainly taking their time though and jumping out of the window briefly entered my head.

There was also a 'road rage' incident a few years back. I wasn't aware that I'd done anything wrong, but a guy in the car behind me obviously thought otherwise and took his opportunity to tell me when we pulled up at some traffic lights on red. He pulled up alongside me, wound his window down and began to shout and scream at me as if I'd just been caught sleeping with his partner or something. I tried my best to ignore him and 'willed' the lights to turn green, but my prayers weren't answered and next thing I knew, he was out of his car and thumping on my window asking me to "step outside".

Without having to think too hard, it appears I've been in a few 'situations' but luckily none of them resulted in anything more damaging than turning me into a scaredy-cat.

Procrastination running circles in my head. While you sit there contemplating, you’ll wind up left for dead.

Blogging....It's a funny old game, eh?

Obviously, it's all about personal preferences when it comes to which blogs one reads.
For me, I like a recipe of honesty, wit, comedy and tragedy. Add a dash of reflection, optimism, observation and real life, all folded nicely into a mixing bowl that's dished out on a reasonably regular basis. I like opinionated people who can be passionate about their thoughts and feelings. People who aren't afraid to bare their souls on personal matters. People who can be controversial, without sounding like an arrogant twat. People who actually enjoy interaction with others and who don't judge other bloggers by their sparse comments boxes. People who are aware of the unwritten blogging rules and aren't afraid to bend and break them, without being an obnoxious twonk.
I can't be arsed with reading about who fancies who in school, "why the whole world doesn't understand me", endless and pointless memes, or regurgitated bollocks that's basically been copied and pasted from somebody else's place. But like I said, that's just me, because obviously thousand of others do.

According to Technorati, who are currently tracking 112.8 million blogs, there are 175 thousand new blogs being created every day. Obviously, a lot of these never get off the ground for one reason or another. I've read that almost 80% of blogs are abandoned within the first month and just over 1 million never even get past that first posting. I guess that's mostly down to the blogging platforms making it so easy to create a blog in the first place.

Statistics aside though, there's still a mahoosive amount of people blogging out there. So why is it that I still find it so difficult to find a guy's blog engaging enough that I want to keep going back to it? I want to find more blogs written by guys that will stimulate my interest enough that I can't help but keep going back.
I know there are some really good blogs written by guys out there that are hugely popular, and rightly so. Some of them I have bookmarked but not linked from here. I find myself a little put off by them though, mainly because of their popularity and the fact that their comment boxes are choc-a-bloc with responses from other bloggers that make me feel somehow insignificant. A little silly on my part, I know, but that's just how I feel. In fact, the contents of comment boxes on certain blogs can be intimidating for me, enough so that I shy away from returning as regularly as I'd like, or even at all. Or sometimes I will continue returning, but never comment myself or even open the comments up, which is a shame because it takes away some of the essence of it being a blog in the first place.
Maybe I'm just too picky!

I love the idea of blogging. In the past few years, it's arguably changed the way the people of this world of ours are perceived. If nothing else, it's become an extraordinary tool to bring people closer together in some way, shape or form. Of course, it's also flourished in becoming a great way for budding writers, artists et al to be discovered, when in the past they may never have even got their foot in the door.

The main point of this entry was to highlight the fact that I find it difficult to find good blogs by guys. This got drowned out somewhat by the rest of the post and in essence, that apparently makes me a crap blogger myself for not sticking to the point in question and getting side-tracked too much.
Oh well.

I’m a binary code that you cracked long ago. But to you I’m just a novel that you wish you’d never wrote.

During the recent festivities, I acquired one of these:

I have to admit, I've never really been that taken with Laptops. In fact, when I showed The Girl, she was the more excited one and at one point I thought she was gonna take it up to her bedroom and start stroking and caressing it. Luckily for me, she was preoccupied getting killed by some person (probably on the other side of the world) on World Of Warcraft.

To test out the wireless connectivity, we tried to hook it up to The Girl's connection. And tried. And tried. With a little bit of fiddling and undoubtedly a lot of luck, we finally managed it. They don't make it easy, do they?
We both had a chuckle when my Laptop was searching for 'active' connections within its range and it picked up The Girl's neighbours' connection. Amusingly, instead of just having a 'standard' name such as SKY###### or BT-INTERNET######, it was listed under their names; Jack and Jill's Internet*. Considering the neighbour has gone through several boyfriends since splitting with her husband and seems to have only just settled down with a steady partner in the last few months, I wondered at what point in their relationship she decided to rename her internet connection. Bizarre! And slightly amusing.

I may start blogging from my Laptop. Once I figure out how to type on the finicky keyboard without making spelling mistakes every other word.

*Real names changed to protect the innocent.

Just 'cos you’re raising the bet and call the shots now on me. It really doesn’t faze me how you spend your time.

I took this a few minutes ago:



No, I'm not de-frosting or cleaning my fridge out. This is simply the current sad state of affairs of its contents....or lack of. Oh, and those eggs went out of date on the 18th of December. Go me!

Still....think of the money I'm saving by not filling it up (not that it's ever full anyway). I'd like to say I'm also losing weight due to lack of food to eat, but I was bought a tin of Celebrations for Christmas and it would be rude of me not to eat them, right. Except the Snickers ones of course. Damned food of the Devil!

My mum would hit the fucking roof if she saw how pathetic my fridge looked. Perhaps a good job then that my folks never visit me, huh. I've decided to save empty packs of things and print out pictures of fruit and salads to put in the fridge, just in case they decide to pay me a visit.

This quiet serves only to hide you, provide you. What I knew, what I knew, it'd come back to you.

There are so many things I want to achieve this year, it's difficult to know just where to begin. Being devoid of a beginning doesn't make the goal any less achievable, it just means the journey may be a little more bumpy.