Into the lines

What say you? can you love this gentleman? This night you shall behold him at our feast.

The train pulls in, I search the crowds of people from my hiding place. My heart is in my mouth and I run my hands through my hair nervously.The summers sun is high in the sky, Southampton has never looked this beautiful. Finally a solitary figure appears at the doorway.

Read o'er the volume of young Paris's face and find delight writ there with beauties pen. Examine every liniment and see how one another lays content. And what obscured in this fair volume lies, find written in the margant of his eyes.

I wait a moment, taking in this first glimpse,watch as his eyes scan the crowds and hold my breath as his gaze finally meets with mine. He smiles.

This precious book of love, this unbound lover, To Beautify him only lacks a cover.
The fish live in the sea and 'tis much pride for fair without the fair within to hide.

As we walk I keep glancing over at him, sneaking looks as he talks of all the things he wants to do, the people he knows and loves, the dreams he has. It comes naturally, easily even to talk to this stranger. To share everything with him.

And so shall you share all he doth possess, by having him, making yourself no less.

The summers sun is a thing of memory now but as the leaves come tumbling down to our feet I am still walking with him, still sharing our hopes and dreams, always on our way home.

Raising the bar each and every day

Those of you who read my notes on a regular basis will know it is unlike me to write something purely on a whim-often there are hours of planning involved and sometimes pie charts to alleviate the need for excessive bracketing and what not,I have for example not used a bracket once in this sentance yet being so against their frequent appearance as I am. It's always important to start a good note with a description of your intentions and a smattering of falsehoods and I feel I have acheived this effectively today and so am greatly pleased.Today is my day off,I awoke bleary eyed a few hours ago and glared at my window which had had the audacity to stay open all night despite the fact it was clearly raining. It makes you wonder doesn't it? I mean what is the point in having these glass sheilds fitted in every room if they do not prevent the weather from lightly sprinkliing the candle you brought on sale in pier in order to tie in the colours of your cushions with the rest of your room with rain water? Anyway I chose to bravely ignore the windows indescretions after a ten minute glaring match and decided to set about having a day off. I wasn't sure as to what fashion would best suit this and so emptied out my chest of drawers and stood knee high in vest tops and novelty tshirts-one of which bore the legend "Babe" and sadly didn't refer to the supposedly classic but hugely overrated film of my childhood. I setttled on a grey knee length tshirt for my days adventures, picked mainly because it said XXXL on the front and not on the label where one would usually expect to find the size of an item. Pleased with my choice I quickly jumped back into bed because it was far too cold to be just wearing a tshirt and besides, the window was still open I could catch my death.What to do next was a difficult one,on the one hand I wanted to text Ian but on the other my phone was charging and to reach it I would have had to have done all sorts of leaning,I comprimised by moisturising my face and neck for twenty minutes in order to undo years of neglect. Looking years younger I found myself suddenly full of energy ready to face the day head on and get down to some real doing of things. I had no definate sense of what it was that I was going to do but just by deciding to do them I felt more productive. Annoyingly at just this point of renewed vigour the corner of my fitted sheet slipped off and I was forced to move to the other side of the bed in f ear of the tangling of feet and other such sinister occurances.Ian is always warning me of what can happen when sheets misbehave and often accuses me of being the catalyst-whether he thinks my feet have some sort of velcro like quality I can't be sure but I had to admit on this occassion I could be the only person to blame although the window was now smirking.It took me awhile to come to terms with the loss of my side of the bed stolen as it was by sheer bad luck and unfortunate circumstance but as the once cold side of the mattress began to warm so did my mood. My phone rang. Suddenly all was turmoil, I found myself leaping in the manner of Jennifer Grey in the lake scene of dirty dancing in the direction of my phone and landing with a dignified crunch right on target, which was unfortunate as I had not intended to land on the actual phone. I looked at it quickly and decided that although it seemed perhaps a little pissed off I ha ddone no lasting damage and so opened it to receieve my call.The caller was Ian, just ringing to tell me of his day and ask what time I was starting work. I explained that it was my day off and he asked me what I'd been up to then. This was slightly disconcerting as, I wasn't convinced that my days adventures thus far would translate that well in normal conversation, the fitted sheet incident was sure to sound a little ropey if not fully explained. I side stepped this unsolicited probing into my personal affairs by switching the conversation back round to him, he seemed not to notice which was lucky, I couldn't have people wrongly thinking my day off was not being fully utilised. This leads me to the present and this is where the story must end, there were minutes that remain undocumented leading up to this exact moment but rest assured you have just read the fruits of that time, quite why I don't know, possibly you're not the motivated achiever that I am.

The truth is out there...probably

It scares me, I switch on my computer and after the prerequisite thirty eight minutes of loading crashing and rebooting I am instantaneously connected to the internet-the whole world at my finger tips. I can explore new realms of knowledge and belief,learn about anything in the whole world all from the relative comfort of my rickety green chair and what do I do? I type in www.facebook.com and click on "write a new note". No insightful day of discovery for me, no, just a self indulgant wallowing in good old me- for what purpose?Why do I do this?Is it to share my own thoughts and feelings on public issues in an open forum?No, no it is not. It is, quite honestly to prattle, ramble, digress, befuddle and confuse. I have no interest it seems in anything greater than my own little world- I leave the big stuff to Jack Bouer and stick to what I know best-none sense.I sense this may be the sort of prattling that led my brother to say that anyone who read my notes would think me mentally unhinged, reading through what has already spewed forth from the tangle of my brain I can't help but see his point so I shall quickly pluck a subject from obscurity and focus on that- aliens and time travel(phew I was worried I wouldn't be able to think of anything- why did I write phew? it is an exclamation and clearly a false one as I had to process the thought and write it down which does take the edge of the sincerity a smidge).Ok here's a little tangle of a theory I remember discussing with father dear:He made the point that time travel did not and would not ever exsist, I asked how he could possibly know this to which he replied quite logically that if was invented in the future then we would be visited by people from the future- a sound point(clearly he had not watched back to the future and was unaware of the lengths that man would go to in order to keep the time space continuum in tact). The word "visit" got me thinking though-no there arent many references of people claiming to be from the future in the history books, strange really given how people will do anything to get on Jeremy Kyle these days. There ARE reports of visitors though, more specifically: aliens. Grey is the most commonly referenced alien being(the one with the bulbous head and black eyes). There have been sightings of these creatures for centuries, there are even cave paintings that depict eerily simillarimages.This got me thinking even more(I was very much into my X files at this stage and whilst I do not have any particular belief in the truth of these sightings I certainly knew a fair bit about them)about evolution, the human race(and indeed every other species on the planet)is constantly evolving, just because man as we know him is the last in old Darwins picture does not mean that is the end of the story. Now my knowledge and understanding of this next bit is limited to tiny snippets of information I have gleened over the years but here we go: each generation is geneticaly more evolved than the next, as our surroundings and lifestyles have morphed and changed so have we-it is natures way of equipping us for survival. As technological advances have been made it has been less and and less neccesary for physical superiority to put you at the top of the food chain(don't worryI'm not about to go on some super size me rant about how our childrens childrens children will all be big fat fattys-though it's probably true-damn you subway and yourtasty offerings!). What will inevitably happen(as is the case now in some ways) is that the mentally superior will thrive and flourish no longer constrained by their physical limitations. It is predicted that the cranium (I just wanted to write cranium, ok?yes, I could have said head-shhh)will continue to grow(yes people our heads are already getting bigger-sad but true,'tis the ultimate realisation of a metaphor-god's having a good old chuckle and thinking"they think that's bad? Wait 'til they see my plans for the wind changing"-hmmm may not be a metaphor I'm thinking of but anyway I must press on)and our bodies will become increasingly smaller due to the fact we have developed machines to do the physical work we had previously relied on manpower for. It is also said that with the development of new technologies our need for verbal communication will diminish and our mouths will become smaller as a direct result with the possible development of mental communication(as telepathy not as in "crazy" that would be hysterical though, future generations of humans waving theirskinny little hands around and doing monkey impressions as a new and evolved way of communication).Also, and this is pure speculation on my behalf here(where as the rest of this is obviously completely true)isn't it likely that as the ozone layer continues to fragment and lets more and more of the suns dangerous rays that we will become more of a nocurnal being? Sheltering inside during daylight, this would mean that our skin would no doubt start to lose pigmentation and become increasingly pale, our eyes would also change in order to adapt to the dark. They would likely become bigger with larger pupils(just as our pupils now dilate in order to take in as much light as possible). So where does that leave my littletheory? How does it all tie together in my brain? We have my dad saying that time travel could never exsist because we have never been visited from the future,we have countless sightings of "greys" dating back to before we could even comprehend space craft and the like. We have the theory of evolution which dictates that man will continue to adapt to it's surroundings and we have scientists predictions of how our environment will change our bodies over the course of many hundreds of years. Yes dear readers, when I was about eleven years old I came up with the bizarre but not completely unfounded idea that aliens are in fact not aliens at all but humans visiting from the future. It is very unlikely that a being from another planet would have what is essentially a humanoid form(although star trek would have you believe otherwise) is it not more likely that "greys" are merely more advance versions of ourselves? If they do really exsist(and this is admitedly a large chasm of an if which would really destroy my theory if the answer were no)and they were from another planet, they would surely be more active in communicating and letting themselves be known, if they were visitors form the future they would act in stealth,observing quietly lest they disturb the fragile threds of time.It's amazing how a little thought many years ago has spawned such a large note, contrary to appearances I am not a great believer in aliens or time travel, it's just that over the years little snippets of documentaries and half a paragraph in a science magazine from time to time have culminated into this theory and I thought I should write it down-you may not agree but I bet you watched the Xfiles too.

Lots of words very little punctuation(except brackets)

How far back can you remember?Your earliest memory, the first time that language and vision came together effectively enough for you to store a snapshot of yourself for the very first time, the first little step you ever made in creating the intricate maze of sights, sounds and touch that you have today (I have amused myself greatly in writing this, a moment of possibly mature thinking marred now by my own psyche thinking "intricate maze of sights,sounds and touch?"-what a pretentious twat). I was talking with the lovely Ann today about this, and the difficult thing is obviously trying to think which one would have been the earliest, you have no distinct timeline when you're very small (as in a child, I am not suggesting the vertically challenged are in anyway unable to visualise time scales and walk around not knowing what year they live in or indeed whether they have hit puberty). Also- and this is touched on in my mothers note memory and the nth dimension(how amusing I believe I just "cited" my mother)it is very difficult to be sure that you remember things yourself or from what you have been told and have seen in photos. For instance I remember sitting on the old yellow swing in the back garden, wearing a blue dress with white spots-however there is a photo that I have seen countless times of this exact scene so I'm probably not really remembering it-false memory syndrome(see my note on when I met santa for further proof of it's exsistance-the false memory thing not Santa, just to be clear).There are certainly some memories that I have though that I believe to be all my own: worryingly I can remember having my nappy changed(I have checked and this isnt due to the fact that I was ten and still in nappies thank god, that would be a smidge traumatic), I remember not liking it because it was a disposable one and the table stuck to my side and pinched a bit, I remember being in my cot and pulling at the yellow wall paper by my head-and then my parents discussing decorating my room which made me think "A HA!, nice new wallpaper to peel off-excellent"charming little brat that I was. Also being in my red buggy and Mum letting me out, as soon as my feet touched the floor I was off like a shot, I remember my determination to flee!escape!explore the world on my own all at the tender age of two or three, my little feet pounding the pavement and then all at once I fell!DISASTER-I don't know if you remember but the world actually ends when you fall over as a child, you'll be all happy and joyous one minute and then a snivelling sobbing dribbling wreck the next, this time was different though. Instead of hurtling to my doom I tripped, my feet went sprawling out behind me, my hands went down to cushion the blow and.....nothing, I opened my eyes and by some sort of Matrixesque miracle I found myself hovering inches above the pavement! My mother in her infinate wisdom had guessed there might be some sort of break for freedom(she's not psychic it's just that I did this every time)and put on those reign thingys, shockingly she had been quite able to keep up with my lightening pace and had managed to pull up the slack enough to prevent the inevitable hysteria that would have ensued had my knee lightly grazed the floor. When she hoisted me back to my feet I was a little subdued and decided to put off my asperations for world travel until I was a little older, after all we were only minutes away from the house and look at what had nearly happened!Then of course there are those things I have previously touched on, sticking a bead up my nose to see how far it could go, forcing my arm down the back of the radiator-the actual intention being to see how long it took for it to get stuck(half way through neighbours if you're interested), getting a new doll and being really really excited about bringing it into play group, on the way there I fell over just before we got to the car park (Mum wasn't on the ball that day so the world actually ended). After a lot of consoling I was ushered into the open arms of one of the playgroup teachers who asked to see my beautiful doll, rekindling some of my preapocolyptic excitement I held her up only to discover her head had fallen off when I fell(brings a tear to my eye even now).I also remember my first encounter with reverse psychology, I was a bit older but still pretty small. The whole familly were supposed to be going to see Jamica Inn at the Salisbury playhouse. We all got ready and were standing by the car...all of us but one, who shall remain nameless(except if you read this bracket then you will see that it was Sarah). Dad was trying to cajole her to no avail, I can't remember why she didn't want to go but I do remember that on this occassion she was forcibly carried to the car(Mum and Dad were clearly set on instilling culture into their childrens lives). I don't remember the journey down there but knowing what happened next I can only assume that Sarah( whoes identity I will take to the grave) was not overly pleased with the whole scenario and continued to rather vocally express her displeasure. When we arrived in Salisbury my parents decided to placate her by taking us all into C&A and buying her a denim jacket(super nanny would probably disapprove of this but then she is noteably without children so she should keep quiet). The twins were having none of this and proceeded to kick up such a fuss that they too were soon sporting their own denim jackets(you can imagine my parents looking at each other with tired sad eyes,"why did we have four of them? why are we being punnished"that look would say). As my mother dear was paying for the jackets I remember my father looking down at me and saying "now, you're far more grown up than them aren't you, you don't need a denim jacket because you're a good girl and are looking forward to the play", I remember looking up and feeling all warm and smug at my superiority and replying "no Daddy I don't want a denim jacket". It's almost tragic because I think the reason that my subconcious chose to store this memory for over twenty years was because that was the first time I had felt mature and clever. It didn't matter that I secretly had wanted a denim jacket(well who wouldn't? it was the eighties)the fact was that my Dad had said how grown up I was so I was keeping shtum, sadly though time has rippled outwards and onwards and now I see that memory for what it was, an ingenious intervention on my fathers behalf to prevent the injection of denim into my wardrobe. I shall stop this note now dear and devoted readers, numerous and adoring as you are I fear I may be keeping the ever enduring Ann awake with the clittering and clattering of the keyboard, and if she reads this note tomorrow discover that it was our earlier conversation that cause this disruption to her sleep it is highly likely she will never speak to me again, thank you and good night.

Animals

It has come to my attention through accident and circumstance(I am lying clearly but if we don't mention it I feel that it will pass unoticed) that there are new comers out there delving into the glorious realms of note writing. This is probably a good thing but I can't help but feel that certain guide lines are not being adhered to as they stagger unknowingly (much like bambi-you know on his first day when he's all legs and saying "bird" and "flower" a lot, don't actually like bambi that much, I know it's supposed to be a classic but I can't help but notice that it's just not that good,this may well be all one sentence I can't tell, I find the comma a far more effective tool than the full stop and don't get me started on the bracket-it's as if GOD made it for me(if you believe the bible this is actually quite possibly the case)I'm closing the bracket now, bear with me as I reread what I was writing and see if I can pick up where I left of) oh yes, people were staggering unknowingly, well you get where I'm going with this, they're probably staggering unkowingly into the unknown or something equally predictable,it's all QUITE the cliche ANYWAY, the point that these virginal minds are failing to grasp is that notes are SUPPOSED to be self indulgent. You are SUPPOSED to be able to fling such trivial matters as spelling and coherance to the wind and prattle on in a non sensical way for one badly punctuated and seemingly never ending paragraph, this is the point. Dear and devoted readers, where would we be if we were sudden;y constrained by such monsterous thoughts as-am I talking to long? are people bored of listening? Am I now living in a world of make believe that revolves entirely around me and my entirely ficticous audience of thousands(actually sod it,it's my ficticious audience...MILLIONS)? The answer to all these things of COURSE yes, but it is clearly bad form for people to actuallly say so. The only acceptable comments on a note are such things as "that was amazing, you are a genius" or "I like your notes so much I want to offer you a publishing deal so you never have to work in a bed shop"(the second one probably doan't apply to everyone).Its the same as someone walking in on you when you're in the shower singing the greatest hits of Barbra Streisand and saying "that's shit that is"-that's never happened to me because I happen to be an extremely accomplished bathroom singer but the point is still the same. So I say this ,allow us our self indulgent rants, accept that we write them for our own personal feeling of importance, do not mock or jeer(if I call someone a "cad" in a minute you are allowed to hunt me down and shoot me) and if you like stories about animals heres one:Judging by my mother dears status she took my neice lily to the zoo, Lily is a particularly small little human(being one and a bit we can hardly blame her) but she is none the less pretty wise(I am now thinking of Yoda-legend) she was taken to the ostrich enclosure at which point she gleefully proclaimed that the ostriches were in fact "Chickens", it just goes to show that no matter how clever you are whether you're wrong or right can all be down to perspective(it also proves I have unfair expectations of a one year old)...So in summary(itsimportant to do this I find as I have been told I have a tendancy to ramble-grossly unfair obviously but these things happen)allow us our self indulgent prattling and do not mock, we were only singing in the shower(I may have forgotton my own point but I do feel strongly about the shower singing thing)THE END(finally)

Midnight not a sound from the pavement

APPARENTLY I don't put enough disclaimers at the forefront of my notes explaining that my spelling has always veered more to the creative and artistic rather than the accurate. A certain brother of mine who shalll remain nameless commented on my terrible grammar as if I was proposing myself as some sort of verbose genius(which I am, of course)-to my amusement said brother was slurring beautifully at the time and talking round in wonderful twirling circles of befuddlement, so it took the edge off his critisism a smidge.So, dear readers for those of you that find my introductions unclear I shall speak in plain and simple english(without digression of any kind unless this counts...which it doesn't). These notes are not interesting, they are for my own venting of daily frustrations or the sharing of events with friends(nice friends who know that my intended grammar is imaculate if not my actual grammar-this is not a digression). Anyway, damn it I've bored myself before I have even begun, how very irritating but I will try to persevere for your sake dear reader. I had a lovely weekend in the land of Andover and managed to attend one of the two beer festivals I had planned to go to(the first was cancelled due to rain and postponed til September...genius).I found the whole experience not unlike the last scene in Titanic when the old lady dies(sorry if you haven't seen it, but lets face it...it's Titanic)and ends up walking down the stairs with all the people she ever met surrounding her. I mean obviously I wasn't dead(to my knowledge) but I kept looking around and thinking "god, I went dancing with her when I was five" or "jesus, that woman looks just like Vernon Kay"(I would never be so canny as to think that without having been prompted, it was two evil individuals making cruelly accurate observations). There was a lovely moment towards the end of the night when I found myself standing by the fire with Ian and thinking how cozy it all was but sadly it was marred by the fact that upon closer inspection there atop the pyre was the skewered head of a happless boar-kind of ruined the moment.Alas my friends I can talk no more(I hear your collective sigh and feel ashamed at my lack of enthusiasm this night)It is now twenty five to one, I have been awake a mere three hours this evening and yet I sense my bed calling to me(it's a jedi thing) good night and fare thee well

Another note, how lovely

I want you all to be very quiet, it is hideously early in the morning and Ann is trying to sleep, if I make an spelling mistakes now I will have to(rather conveniently)leave them be for fear of excessive keystrokes causing unwanted awkeness in the afor mentioned flat mate(who is extemely charming and understanding(possibly a slightly transparent attempt at appeasement but none the less accurate :P)). I was alarmed (in a very quiet and not at all disturbing manner)to discover myself awake at this time and that my little online friends chat box in the left hand corner of the screen was sadly declaring "No one is available to chat"(this was a doubley bad statement for me because it proved that my increasing suspicions that no one is in fact two words were possibly based on some grain of truth). GADZOOKS!I cried!-not literally obviously, but internally where one is liable to spout all manner of bizzare and archaic phrases coined by "The naughtiest girl in school" and several of the more irritating members of "The Famous Five"-why, if I am awake whilst others are not then I must find another way to communicate with the great wide world, after several failed attempts at becoming a world famous singer intent on using my fame to gain influence amongst the youth of today and create a career on the back of my one chart topping hit "I'm not particulary fond of the day after Sunday" I resigned myself to writing another note.What I would like to discuss today(by which of course I mean prattle on about in a slow and disjointed meandering fashion)is the topic of perspective.Let me tell you a story, it happened when I was a very very small little young person, I saw my very first celebrity. I was particulary excited that night(being a very very small little young person I was in the habit of getting particularly excited over the prospect of a new set of crayola crayons that featured the elusive and much sort after "aquamarine"so let us not put too much store in my excitement), the next day being the very next best thing to my birthday, oh yes, the day that followed would be Christmas day. Four children ran around the house filled with butterflys and the promise of sugar.I, being the smallest of the four was not certain of the purpose of the running but had developed the rather annoying habit of doing exactly what my siblings did, just a little slower and much less effectively.My sister Katy and I were dressed in fluffly red dressing gowns(how festive you might think, but actually no, we wore them all year round)and I remember that lovely cozy warm winters night feeling of contentment. My parents had the unenviable task of trying to get all of us into our beds and asleep simultaneously, being such a daunting task they had started early, this may be the passage of time altering my perspective but I believe we had just had our lunch(yes mother dear I am joking, it was probably about five oclock in the afternoon though, I was always always flummoxed by the early dark of winter....conspiracy that is against all small people).Bubbling bursts of magic and forever filled my mind(how strange and out of place that description seems, I have the overwhelming urge to describe a fried egg for the next ten minutes-word-smith that I am ;p)then, without ceremony I was whisked away by a slightly aggetated father dear and plopped into my cot bed(either that or my parents kept me in some sort of prison compound for years, there were bars I can tell you that much). Both mother dear and father dear came in then to tuck me in and kiss me goodnight, full of promises that the other three conspicuously lively and chattering children were in fact getting in to their own beds and yawning for asleep at that very moment(I viewed this with the cynisism it deserved(forgive the spelling I was after all very small))."Now remember, Father Christmas is coming tonight, and if he sees that you're awake he won't leave you any presents, so you must get to sleep". Lights off....sounds of my supposedly sleeping siblings trooping downstairs to watch the second part of Dynasty filled me with a sense of injustice. So great was my indignance that I was asleep within minutes....Suddenly it was the middle of the night. There was a thickness to the dark that told me EVERYBODY in the house was asleep. My senses were straining and my mothers words came back to me "if he sees that you're awake he won't leave you any presents", then I heard the bells, my stomach lurched as I made out the distinctive sound of reindeer hooves on the roof above my bedroom(which is admitedly slightly strange given that there was no roof above my bedroom). It was too late! Any second now I would be rumbled, no presents, no christmas...i squeezed my eyes tight tight shut and held my breath. Huge lumping footseps approached my bedroom door and then......I opened my eyes...there at the door way stood father christmas, his shape was indistinct but the twinkling triangle of his hat gave the game away, I had not expected him to look like this, more like the shape of Orion in the night sky than a portly man with a long white beard and a snug red suit, but then celebrities often do look didfferent in real life. He must have been distracted that night because despite my eyes being on him the entire time I heard the rustling of stockings filled with presents and exhaled in releif that I had not ruined christmas after all.The next morning having had the usual christmas breakfast of an entire selection box of chocolate bars I told my family of what I had seen, certain they would be awed and inspired at my tale. To my frustration my brother and sisters exchanged knowing glances and rolled their eyes, my parents were kinder, yet still I felt there was an element of disbeleif lurking about the place. Even to this day I can still see the outline of stars at my bedroom door (in my head of course, I'm not suggesting this is a nightly visitation thing)and remember with certainty that I HAD NOT WANTED to see father christmas and had been terrified the entire time. Isn't it strange how a little imagination and the element of suggestion can turn a man you see every day and know better than anybody else into a magical being that you are unlikely to see more than once in your lifetime? It's all a matter of perspective.....and now I'm probably goign to be late for work.....bugger x