It's always been the custom that I write my cranial noodlings with a hot cup of tea at my side, but I've fallen victim to Winteritis (you know the condition, when you come home from work and instead of going out and buying milk, you bolt the door, make yourself comfortable, and are hidden from the world until 8am the next morning) and as such, I haven't bought any milk. I could have some green tea, but I'm never totally convinced by the taste, and trying to clean the residue from your mug makes you wonder what the hell's in it.
So I've got Fanta.
It's not the same, quite honestly. (Excuse me while I just go and get a fleecey jacket.)
I'm back. It's evidently been so long since I did this, as I am continually hitting the comma whenever I try and type an 'm'. Is that common for someone who uses a computer on a daily basis, yet hasn't used it for blogging? I must ask around (unless you want to do it for me, of course).
This fleecey jacket is well snug, especially for something I bought by accident. Well, I say accident, what actually happened was I was looking for a coat, and on the page I was viewing, this looked like a coat. So I ordered it, it arrived, it was a zippy-top, really, but a very warm one, albeit not what I was looking for. I spent a full 24 hours preparing myself for the rigmarole of returning the poor thing, but no - I like it too much, and it replaces something I'm about to get rid of anyway, so... I kept it. Anyway I've got a coat, a lovely winter coat, I don't know what I was thinking!
Much like when I elected to stop in and not buy milk.
So what was I up to when I last wrote? (I'm stooping low enough to have a scan through my last entry now. Has it come to this? Ah, ok, it was September, for the band's birthday. I didn't think I'd written that recently!) We've had some nice little shows since we turned 1. All electric shows, for which Matt surprised us all with a quite frankly stunning new musical instrument. It's safe to say he's enjoyed all our shows what we've played in the last 12 months, but it's nothing compared to the delight he's experienced with a keytar. Yep! Most would scoff or scorn at the idea of a keytar (indeed, he's the only person I know of who plays one), but it fits. He's more relaxed onstage, he engages more with us and the audience (at our last show, he turned off one of my guitar pedals during 'I've Still Got Your Blood On My Curtains', the japester), and the songs sound more focused as a result. Never dismiss a keytar out of hand, is my advice to you.
At a gig the previous week, we really bonded with an audience member. The poor sod had been steadily drinking, so by our second (and last) set of the night, he was quite well-oiled. I dedicated the song to anyone "who has lived in a terraced house next to permanently bonking neighbours during an intense bout of sexual frustration..." when this guy raised his hands skyward** and bellowed "SEXUAL FRUSTRATION, WOOOO!"
It took a full two days before I realised how that was more of an insight than he might have intended. I could not stop laughing.
New folks have moved in to the house that has been gloriously empty for a few months. There are people living either side now, neither are especially noisy, which is a blessing. I had a bit of a scare last night when they started playing dance music, much as tonight when someone, somewhere, started letting off fireworks, but that all seems to have died down a bit now. At least there's no awkwardness like there was with my erstwhile ever-shagging neighbours, like the time a letter for them got delivered to me by mistake, so I knocked on, and the boyfriend looked out of the upstairs window and said "Down in a minute!" and then answered the door in clothes that can only be described as "I picked these up off the floor just now, to prevent my opening the door whilst naked" (woolly jumper, bermuda shorts, slippers, bed-hair). I think my mouth did a flappy thing as I handed over the parcel.
But then I seem to revel in awkwardness. I drew a cartoon this week, which is a representation of something that actually happened a couple of years or so ago, when boarding a rail replacement coach. Pretty much an exact transcript of the exchange is in this cartoon:
I'm scrabbling for things to share now (presumably to put off another glass of Fanta), like some hapless idiot who doesn't communicate for weeks on end, then tries to cram everything he knows into a conversation over a cuppa. But I should probably just sign off, and let more things simmer, and perhaps wait until I have a definite point to make. In fact, I'll aim for the not-surfacing-until-tomorrow-morning.
Goodnight all, and stay tuned for more blogging!
John-to-tha-Mac-to-tha...
Okay I'm stopping now.
xx
*I wrote "brewing up" and instinctively glared at my empty Fanta glass, balefully.
**Or perhaps as Samson might have done when he was tied to the pillars.
