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The forecast is shiny, the bands alluring tinyurl.com/36d5z9u , the golden syrup for flapjacks is straining at the bag to get out.

One more sleep, but I don't know how I'll manage to.  Maybe I should pack.  Can I just be there already. Why am I going to work tomorrow?  Idiot.

Stone Circle (Leon Neal/AFP/Getty Images)
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Oh gosh jolly foxy moxy.  I am actually going to this: www.fencerecords.com/news/fence-records-presents-the-away-game/

Oh oh oh.  I really am trembling as I write this.  Can't believe it.  Discovered the Fence Collective at Green Man last year but have always loved the Glasgow Scene.  Missed out on the Home Game this year because I didn't find out about it until Feb, but some intangible thing (guardian angel) inspired me yesterday to find out some details so I didn't miss the next one.  And curled up waiting for me was the news that tickets for this even more amazing event would sell tickets today.  One call to my most trusted internet wiz later, and at the magic hour of noon, while I was squirming in first aid training, he scored me tickets in the 7 minutes they took to sell out.

No idea who I'm going with or how I'm getting there.  I've never been to The Highlands.  What an awesome adventure.

Now I'm going to go and pinch myself.  Lots.  Hard.  And squeee like I've never squeed before.
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The best kept secret of English graduates is that Jacobean plays are cracktastic. Never knowingly passing up an opportunity for incest, adultery and corruption, the playwriters take lascivious delight in whipping it all up with rapier wit from its cast of unremitting bastards of both genders to a murderous and often gory crescendo. 

Marianne Elliot's whirling production at the National is a tenner if you pre-book.  Run.. it's stone cold brilliance.

Must turn off interweb and revise.
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When I saw this Guardian article I was delighted.  www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/mar/03/racist-question-brown-answer-curious  It wasn't just me!  In fact Ariane was much kinder than me, for stating she didn't believe it was racist.  But the 1400+ comment debate that followed largely featured defensive derailing, belittling and accusations of oversensitivity.  And to a person, these defensive harangers chose to distract from the fact that she was not  complaining about the first question, only the follow-up question(s).  Featuring the word "really. "

In a nutshell, when a complete stranger asks  "where are you from?" - this is not an insult of any sort.  And I cheerfully offer up my home town.

If they follow it up with - "but where are you really from" - that person is both insulting me and outing themselves as ignorant.  And I do not tolerate ignorance but I won't rise to the bait of insults.

Because the key word is "really", although "no" and "but" can be added as fun intensifiers.  It  means a complete stranger is accusing you of lying, and denying you the right to self-identify, and asserting their entitlement to extra information to reinforce their prejudices. 

My evolved response is to tell them my birthtown, and to end on a question "how about you?".  I nod and smile at their answer and then turn away, walk off, or never return to their place of business.

Don't get me wrong, I'm glad that overt racism is no longer socially tolerated, so that bigotry has to invest in the joys of plausible deniability.  But it's still alienating and distressing.

Slow Club

Feb. 6th, 2010 08:36 am
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What to say about Slow Club. Amazingly it's 3 years when I saw them for the first time in the Rescue Rooms blowing The Hours off the stage with their fun and mesmerising slot. They had also scattered the club with hand-made adverts for their own gig a week later at the Social, so I went straight out and got tickets. Since then, they have gone from an amazing tiny band to an act that get played on Scrubs. They fizz with joyful, not-quite-twee sounding melodies with razorblade lyrics nestling inside. Sherbert and arsenic, my favourite cocktail.

And now they've got a single UK gig this side of summer being hailed as HMV's Next Big Thing. Corporate-tagging aside, this Garage gig is going to be amazing. I just found out about it yesterday, as a speshul birthday surprise. And it's a tenner. Come see, with me. Before it sells out! P.S. I have one spare ticket, bought on a just in case basis.

http://www.ticketweb.co.uk/user/?query=search&INTERFACE=ticketweb&category=misc®ion=gb_london&search=slow+club&beginmonth=02&beginday=9&beginyear=2010
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at the Pembury, playing board games.
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Young man, there's no need to feel circelily.

Which song was this lyric from?

Get your own lyrics:
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So I have had my start date confirmed as 4 Jan and my last exam is 15 Dec so... I've just booked 4 days in Marrakesh with a backpack. Pre-Christmas sunshine. Burnishing an awesome year :D

Oh my god!

Nov. 26th, 2009 01:56 pm
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Oh my god I passed the interview. Subject to ex-boss not hating me (and as far as I know, she doesn't) and no sleep-walking crimes, my dolescum status has a 2009 deadline.

I'm going to be the Living Wills finance girl. Oh oh oh! I've nearly done it. 2008 February Resolutions ftw!
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www.postmodernbarney.com/2009/04/uncomfortable-plot-summaries/

This is half a year old, but new and giggleworthy to me.

My faves:

300: Gays kill blacks.
BEAUTY AND THE BEAST: Peasant girl develops Stockholm Syndrome.
BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA: Redneck trucker kills Chinese immigrants.
FALLING DOWN: Life is difficult for white men.
GONE WITH THE WIND: Rich, white slave owner enjoys getting raped, miscarries.
ROCKY: White man beats black man.
W.: Unspeakable disaster afflicts America. Then terrorists attack.

and I grdgingly have to accept:

BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER: Teenage serial killer destroys town in fit of semi-religious fervor.


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And I will share lots about exciting Ontario odds and ends.

But---


I got all 3 seasons of Veronica Mars for 36 quid.  :::does the Dance of Sad Geeky Joy:::
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 Comes from [livejournal.com profile] rahirah rahirah.livejournal.com/411832.html  who has crisply encapsulated the arguments that leave me frothing but too easily tied up in knots until I'm inarticulate.
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I missed doing this in the New Year and just came across it now so I thought I'd try it.  And, hmmmm.  I appear to be underwhelmed by their selection.

SF/fantasy novels everyone must read

The Guardian has come up with a list of 1000 novels everyone must read. (well every Guardian reader anyway). This is the Science Fiction & Fantasy component.

 The ones in bold I've read; the ones that are underlined I loved; the ones that are in strikethrough I hated.  Italics mean I’ve heard of and may try.

Here's the List )
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I had hoped to go to 2 London parties then sneak off to Eygpt this weekend but a housebound cat needing daily antibiotics has put a stop to that.   Lovely as my friends and neighbours are, I could not ask that of them.

Said cat went in for first dental treatment, with the expectation that they would remove one tooth, or call if more serious work was needed.

Instead I got no call and they whipped out 8 teeth including all his remaining top molars.  All!  I was gobsmacked but now I think I'm emerging from shock as I intend to make a formal complaint. I'm really quite angry that they did not consult with me before proceeding.  I would have not opted for that all at once, even if delay of some would have only bought him a couple more years of toothiness and cost more in the long run.  Poor Funks.

But saw a longlost friend yesterday who said she's going to Latitude with a bunch of mates next week.  As travel has always been the factor preventing me from Latitude so far, I've lept at the chance.  So now I'm doing at least one festival a month, May to Sept.  Hee.  But Florence and the Machine are not at this one, so I think that her Sept tour is my best bet to see her.

Life.  It's a funny old game.
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In all the time I’ve been going, I don’t think I’ve ever written about Glastonbury.
Even talking about it, I am conscious of not conveying how it feels, what it’s like, how it’s shaped my life, my attitude and my values. And I may fail here as well. But that’s no reason not to try.

Here are the consistencies:
  • I have always bought a ticket – I just felt that it was such a privilege to be there and if Eavis was kind enough to create it, the least I could do was pay my way. Student, unemployed and working – always paid.
  • I have always agreed with Eavis’s verdict at the end of every festival – best festival ever. The most recent is always the best. You want to yearn for the good old days, then stay away and nostalge all you like.
The sheer force of the creativity and dedication that hundreds, even thousands, of people bring to the festival awes and humbles me. Wicker sculptures, living arches, wooden scorpions, stone dragons, steampunk scrap metal edifices belching flame, every rubbish bin painted, silken flags, beaches, gardens, bike-powered mobile stages, glow-lit pools. Are only some. This year. Because every year brings new evolutions, new imaginations, new artisans motivated and inspired by past festivals and current interests. It floods me with serotonin and oxytocin.

It is the festival of the Moment. Always personal, but also often shared, sometimes communal. This year I was blessed with many.

Cut for length. It appears I witter rather... )
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Now off to pack for a 5 am start on the trains tomorrow.

Boing boing boing
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Just seen the first episode of Psychoville thanks to the genius of iPlayer - my very first time with the latter! Utter joy - oh LOG I missed you so. And the final cherry on the arsenic sundae: at the end of the episode it said: "More Like this: Last of the Summer Wine Season 30." I couldn't make it up *gryn*
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I am awhirl. Giddy with the new. Loving the bimbling even as ankles sore. Planning Black Light Theatre. Golden Tiger tamed. Castle and Boathouse Hostel lie in wait tomorrow. Just because it sounds quite sweet and I'm a sucker for rivers. But I am possibly low on blood sugar and high on Pilsner sugars so maybe I should go and remedy that. Then proper sentences might emerge. But don't count on it.
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