The wilting

As I anticipated, I am a rubbish blog-mother, in the same way that I am a rubbish plant-mother, and a rubbish friend, because I can't look after something for longer than my attention span permits, which is about 10 seconds. Sad - I know but I am back, not that I think anybody reads this, and I have nothing to say. Ha! But, like the people I live with, I simply continue, maybe tell the same story a couple of times more than necessary, simply because I'm bored and cannot come to terms with getting a hobby or so. 

I have an excuse ready, if you like, I have been working on two essays, which I have handed in today, and rewarded myself with a trip to the cinema, to focus on something other than trying to write legible notes and transforming those into legible essays. I failed a bit, but for now, I'm just happy to have them out of the way. There are two dissertations to be written - and I sort of have two ideas/titles/fetishes that I consider making the essence of my life for the next 3 months or so. Due date is May 23rd, and until then, everything is uncanny or simply cinematic. 

God, this is going to be a diary entry, isn't it? I've always been rubbish at those, too. So far, I've collected ideas and made lists and lists of potential titles, and every night I fall asleep thinking -this is the best title so far. I won't have to say that dissertation titles are not like Fiona: ogres by night and first class titles by day, very much the opposite. What seems to be the next Pulitzer at 1 am, is Metro's page 6 by day. Frustrating! However (that's the word to go with) I sort of know (that's probably the most-used phrase among fellow students right now) what i want to do. One title that I'm stuck with is 'A Lift to Die for', which sounds a bit like Arnie's next movie, or something that Mike Leigh could direct. My idea is to analyze how various characters' identities fade (away) until there is nothing left to fade, i.e. they die. Sounds crap, I know, but that's what I'm working with. My other dissertation hasn't even gone as far as to have a crap title: it's just 'work-in-progress' right now, or rather, 'work-in-contemplation-of-progress'. Channel Four is just a hint more interesting at any time of the day, than working out what to write on. Maybe heritage films. Maybe.

Sadly, I have no creative energy left (ever had) to be inspired enough to write something truly original, or at least something that hasn't been done before about one billion times. Right now, all my energy goes into choosing tomorrow's breakfast. And that's where it ends. Or not, I dedicate almost the same amount of energy and time to getting dressed and make-up, only to wear sweat pants and look like a tramp who found two lipsticks. Frustrating. Also, my iPod died last week, my computer is on its way out and I want new shoes, but I can't find any. Now that's something to complain about. I haven't been to the gym in a week, I look sluggish and my lethargy is growing like ivy. It's hopeless! Additionally, the sun's come out in the last few days, and whereas EVERYBODY else is enjoying themselves, constantly talking about the weather, I sit inside with swollen eyes because the first pollen are in the air. Happy days, now it's meds until September. If I am lucky. So here I sit now, at 20 to 10, feel guilty about the gigantic amounts of food I've stuffed myself with in the last couple of days, want to go back to the cinema and watch more of Never Let Me Go and just take a break from, well, taking a break. I want somebody else's life, and face, if that's possible. But only the life will do.

Sip of water, deep breath, and move on, girl! Get your ass up and going. May be I should pick three movies blindfolded and then write about them whatever comes into my head. Hm, maybe that's not a good idea, right now in my head is the thought: god, that scented candle sucks. I cannot recall a single movie  that quote features in. Not even in Mike Leigh's. Though he is definitely the person to to when you're having a bad day and you need a pick-me-up, watching other people get drunk on your behalf. A pound of tiramisu has the same effect, but it's harder to get than a Mike Leigh film, and less improvised, so he says.I'm updating my facebook page about twice per second and nothing happens, apart from all the status updates about 'going home' or partying into the weekend. I think I need to throw up. I don't WANT to party - all I want is a week on my own, nobody else around, just the peacefulness of my own thoughts and the debris that's currently clattering my brain. I am effectively turning into a cat lady, minus the cat, I'm allergic. What prospects. I'll be the crazy old lady in the village who has fictional cats, because she can't afford to keep real ones and is also allergic to anything with fur. Maybe I'll get a parrot, like the old lady in 'The Ladykillers' (1955), the original version, of course, not the rubbish Tom Hanks version. I have some self-esteem left. 

'Da steh' ich nun, ich armer Tor und bis so klug, als wie zuvor', said Faust when he realized that after studyig for so many years, he had nothing to brag about. Like nothing, apart from a couple of majors in Maths, Physics, Theology, Philosophy. Hello? He obviously had no problem writing a dissertation, or two. And yet, he is still complaining. That's the nature of mankind, I suppose. There is not limit to complaining, like a classmate of mine once said: 'Oh, my Cartier is ticking too loud'.

Maybe I just eat myself into an orgasm, like this woman I read about in a Metro article. 

Why Kafka just isn't Brad Pitt

I admit, it's not the most pungent, fresh, exciting and palatable topic, but it's the one I chose to write on. Why? Because I am dominated by food and cannot think of anything BUT food, even when I read stories about a clerk-turned-beetle-turned-compost. In 'The Hunger Artist' ('Der Hungerkünstler'), the starving artist is fed my breakfast when he leaves the cage after 40 days fasting. Not really MY breakfast, but the breakfast I had today. A sort of soupy, semolina pudding with milk and maple syrup (of course Kafka did not have the genius to add the maple syrup - was there any in 1915 Prague??). I love sweet, soupy breakfasts like porridge, pudding, grits, milk rice and semolina, so Kafka's story slightly backfired when I read it. Instead of being disgusted, I actually thought - yum.

I just finished an essay on Babel, and again realize how much I hate the movie. I always have. The first time I saw it, it did not ring the usual 'auteur-film' bells, I was deeply unimpressed. Poppa Pitt with a melancholic expression carrying Elizabeth (I and II) through the Moroccan desert. How tacky can a film be? (I suppose that question was answered with Benjamin Button).
I like the various 'voices' of the movie, the different languages and especially the Japanese bit of it that reminds me of Lost In Translation, in a good way. I even appreciate the Moroccan desert panorama shots, though usually, I despise docu-styly movies hoping to impress with epic images. BUT Brad Pitt as anything but Brad Pitt??????? I quite like him as Joe Black, appreciate his Tyler Durden, love Rusty Ryan - but Richard Jones???? There are other ways of coping with midlife crisis (cf Tom Cruise, Johnny Depp). Was there no pirate-movie casting at the time? Was there no crap action film script lying at Brad's bedside?

I should probably do some proof reading or research my Kafka piece, because my blood pressure rises every time I think about potential casting choices for Richard Jones (along with splitting the movie into four different features). 

A not-New Year's resolution

I have to admit, I am not the person to run, write or organize a blog. I am, and here follows a confession, utterly, utterly lazy, unmotivated, complacent and greedy. If it doesn't come to me within two seconds, it won't come at all. Ever. So about a month after my first post, a second, catching-up thingy.

Yes, I bought these flowers myself, not expecting anybody else to buy me some.

Yes, it's been a busy month, I'm at my parents', where I am left alone with a huge kitchen and sheer endless supplies of food (and a Kenwood food processor), all day long. What else to do than bake, cook and try recipes that I'd never venture doing in our humble student kitchen. Actually, it is more the disposal of the food that is much easier here, because there are always people around to eat what I cook, people that aren't fussy, people that are meat eaters, people that fancy three-course meals every day.

Because, let's be honest, I am a single student with a small kitchen, and recipes rarely adapt to my needs, and what I need is one, or maybe two scones. And a one-portion beef stew, and a one-portion brioche recipe, and a one portion pork pie recipe, and a one-portion... well you get the picture (whoever you is, if there is a you outside my head). Don't get me wrong this is not a frustrated single speaking. No - it's a slightly overweight (muhahaha) student speaking who is sick of reading recipes that could feed the entire British army, if not the entire British population. I'm not a thicko either, although usually preoccupied with letters rather than numbers, I am the offspring of two accountants and I am fully capable of calculating, hence I am able to downsize recipes. What I can't do is quarter eggs or work with thimbles as measures.

ALSO, shops don't sell the stuff I need in single-appropriate sizes. You HAVE to go for the gallon of syrup, the ton of flour, the yard-long bread, the wheelie bin full of sugar and baking powder, enough to make a continent rise. Of course, these things 'keep well', 'are always handy' and 'easily stored'. But did I mention that I am a greedy, fat student with limited space to store my gallons of syrup and milk, and not even enough will power to let a bag of flour sit on the shelf for more than a month. I do my best to cram the stuff I buy into the small space in the cupboard that is reserved for them, and labelled accordingly, a technique referred to as 'tetrising'. But what I cannot ignore is the voice in my head screaming 'flour, butter, sugar, eggs - cookiessssssss' (and trust me, that voice is quite loud). I realize now that my accolade is taking biblical proportion, but, hey, that's exactly my approach to food.

I realized during the last two weeks at my parents' that I should try to 1. get a bigger cupboard and 2. find ways of using the limited content of my food cupboard in order to make tasty stuff in one-portion format that will help me to turn myself into a one-portion size person. OMG, is that a New Year's resolution?

Britain - a nation in simile

You read 'smile' didn't you. Interesting psychology, but not what I'm on about.

What I'm talking about is the omnipresent and unnecessary use of 'like' in the language of Britain's youth (and recently, transgressing borders into the register of an older generation). It occurred to me on the bus back home to Chavtown-upper-Mousle that for some people, 99,9 % of what they say is 'like'.

- I feel like, like, you know, like, d'you know what I mean, like (Unknown on iPhone in Bus line 49)

No, I most certainly don't. And it would not bother me that sixteen year-old, underprivileged school leavers talk in similes that really aren't any, but considering that my seminars at uni start sounding like bus conversations - it does. I include myself when I say that my seminars consist of about 70 % similes, used to support arguments, to express personal opinion, or simply to articulate a full stop (imagine a coherent sentence with an added 'like' at the end, just to emphasize the end of the spoken - it reminds of army radio transceiver conversation - over and out). Britain, I'm afraid, has grown into a simile-abusing nation, with so little to say, that it has to flavor every sentence with an additional 'like' or two, just to fill up the unused narrative space that is lingering as a faint atmospheric mist over the island.

As I said, I do not exclude myself in the use and abuse of 'like'. In fact, writing, I am terribly self-conscious and catch myself wanting to use 'like' whenever everything else just sounds so, well, 'un-like'. But, there was a time when my use of like was strictly limited to the creation of similes and the expression of appreciation (he acts like an ass, I don't like that). However, Britain has corrupted me. The minute I set foot on this faintly damp island there was no going back, I was infected with the virus, or the like. Not using 'like', or not liking the use, is more than just a declaration of foreignness, it is the epitome of denial vis-a-vis the English language and culture - it is the ultimate betrayal of the British people, their Queen and of the head of the Church of England (which happens to be the same person). 

Retrospectively then, is the sixteen year-old school leaver with five children the future of British culture? Does Britain rely on snuffling teenagers with a limited register? Does the same no-winter-coat-wearing teenager embody British culture at its fullest? And why do I still not understand what she was saying on her overpriced phone?