Can't STOP.

This weekend has been one of the nicest ones I can remember in a while.

I have gotten sooo much stuff done. After weeks of bitching about our spare room being basically full of crap, I cracked the whip yesterday and attacked that room, which is now completely clear and clean. The stuff that was in there, has been thrown away or stored. We found boxes in there that were still in there from when we moved in 18 months ago.

I also ended up cleaning most of the house, washing dishes, clothes, hoovering, sweeping, mopping, polishing... cleaned the chickens out, cleaned the window-sills. It's ridiculous... I work really hard during the week and don't get a huge amount of time. I get up at 6.30am, leave the house at 7.45am, get to work for about 8.45am, then I leave usually at about 5pm, hit all the traffic in the world, get home for about 6-6.30pm and then by the time I've showered and eaten it can be as late as 8pm. By which time I usually feel exhausted and not very much like doing anything. Then you have to factor in the fact that I go kickboxing two-three times a week, and usually try to hit the pool at least once a week. So once daily life is done, I always feel like I have NO free time. My point being, during the week I'm usually out of the house for about 11 hours a day, I also have insomnia - so I usually feel tired - by the end of the week, you'd think I'd feel that the best thing to do would be to relax and NOT DO ANYTHING at the weekend.

Oh no. I might sleep in for a while, but I find it incredibly difficult to stop and not do anything. I have multiple to-do lists. I can't switch off. I routinely think about work out of work time, I usually end up emailing myself with reminders to do certain things.

When I do have free time, I always feel like I have to be doing something. It's almost like I feel guilty for NOT doing anything. It's why, when I'm not away at weekends seeing friends or family, I'm constantly busy with various things that I need to do around the house. And annoyingly, a messy house really stresses me out... I can't relax if the place is untidy or needs cleaning. And, since we moved, the house is much bigger, which of course presents its own set of challenges. It's a nightmare to keep on top of everything.

I need a holiday. And a maid.

First Dance Music

So I'm getting married next year, and have been having discussions with my long-suffering better half about what we're going to shuffle to as our first dance.

It's prompted some interesting conversations.

I LOVE Rock & Metal music. He does not. There are plenty of unconventional love songs out there, with absolutely beautiful words, but alas, not many people know them. And in the pastel-puke worthy world that is the typical wedding, most people plump for something uber-cheesy. I had hoped to avoid this and have something a. cool and b. that I like. After all, if you MUST dance like you're trying to move a large wardrobe around, at least do it to a song you like? But like Ian pointed out, the entire concept of the first dance is ridiculous, humiliating and embarrassing and we'll never get away with NOT doing it... so, and it's hard to argue against this, why not make it SO smoochy and cheese-tastic that it becomes ironic and privately amusing? He even suggested Three Times a Lady AND Barry White, to which I say NO! For the love of all things musically sacred NO. I have my limits.

Ian has come up with a lovely song that we probably will use, but in my fantasy land, I'd be shuffling to one of these: The Only Reason (Puddle of Mudd), I Was Married (Tegan & Sarah) or Yellow (Coldplay).

Ruminations on the Royal Baby

So, unless you've been living under a rock, you'll know that the newest member of the royal family - Prince George - has now arrived. 

It seems to me that most people are thoroughly interested and excited about this, or couldn't care less about it. I would say that I am mostly ambivalent, although of course it's great to hear good news for a change. 

My thoughts though, don't stem from what it means to have a monarchy in this day and age, or about whether or not it might be redundant or why... actually, I was thinking that baby George is going to grow up in the hypothetical goldfish bowl. His life will never be normal - in fact, it'll be mapped out for him from today. I was thinking about this and it occurred to me - isn't this true for most people?

I mean, most of us will end up in certain kinds of jobs, living in similar places.. I mean, how different are our lives anyway? In one of my favourite author's books, 'This is How' by Augusten Burroughs, he talks about how on a day to day basis most of us stay within a small geographical area. So the chance to do new things and to go to new places are minimal, unless we make a huge effort otherwise. 

And, once you're settled into mediocrity, we do and say the same things over and over on a day to day basis. One of the things that bothers me most about my life is repetition... I try to make sure I do difference things. In the last year or two, I've been continually working on new photography projects and I've started kickboxing regularly. I've passed my driving test and started a new job. Fortunately, I'm at a point where I've got lots to look forward to and things to plan... namely my wedding. It is just the little things that are tedious. Housework is a perfect example of this. The routine of getting up and getting to and from work is another. They say don't sweat the small stuff, but I have to say it's the small stuff that pisses me off the most. It's the stuff that gets in the way.

Sometimes I wonder what would happen if we all were to get up one idle Tuesday and throw caution to the wind... to abandon time and routine. What would work be like if we didn't all continue to adhere to social codes, etiquette or civility. When I go to work I very much put my 'diplomatic' and 'friendly' head on - where I normally don't feel much like that. How much happier might we be? I'd love to never have to iron again. Or to think that I need to wash the dishes or that I've run out of cat food and have to go and buy some more. Would it be so bad if we were just ourselves and could do the things we really wanted to do? Of course this assumes that we want things to be different. I think most people seem fairly content with cheeseburgers, beer and TV and that is where the problem lies. But that's another topic for another day.

Maybe for baby George, it WILL be different. After all... he'll grow up with the world watching him, but equally, he'll be less constrained than the rest of us. After all, it won't be him scrubbing the toilet on a Thursday evening, or popping to the shop for milk. He'll be able to pursue whatever career he might want - or not - because nothing will be off limits. So, maybe he'll get a better deal than the rest of us drones after all...

Song of the Day

Eternal Sunshine

I'm watching 'Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind'. I remember watching it when it first came out. It spoke to me in some huge profound way. I really like Clementine. I thoroughly identify with her... this broken, bizarre person, with the desperate urge to 'apply my personality through a paste' - hair-dye obviously. But I just really like the story.

There's a perfect moment where Clementine receives the tape from the session when she has her memory of Joel erased. They hear her saying the most acerbic things about him, about how he's boring, how he's changed her and all the tiny minute things he does that piss her off. The typical petty things that emerge when you've been in a relationship with someone. And then of course, she goes to his flat, and he has a tape, in which he talks openly about her - the things she does. And she listens to it. They verbally destroy each other. Hearing the worst about yourself from the person you love is always terrible. But it happens - it will happen. It has happened for me.

And then this happens:

How perfect. After all, you can't know how much you will love someone until the next person comes along. And you will either love them more or less, which will create a fork in the hypothetical road that you walk down. You will stay, or go. You will stay and try because whatever it is that you have means enough that you don't want to let go.

I suppose the real question is - deciding what to keep and what to discard.

If you knew that all you'd have left would be tears and heartbreak, would you keep that, rather than have nothing at all?

I'm reminded of this quote, which explains what I'm trying to say much more elegantly than I ever could:

''There's just this for consolation: an hour here or there when our lives seem, against all odds and expectations, to burst open and give us everything we've ever imagined, though everyone but children (and perhaps even they) know these hours will inevitably be followed by others, far darker and more difficult. ''
Michael Cunningham, The Hours

Oh, Baby.

So, I've been having a recurring dream that I have a child. I say dream, it's more like a nightmare. It's incredibly vivid. In it, I wake up and find that I have a baby boy, called Henry, with blonde curly hair and blue eyes. That's all that really happens in this dream.

It's scary for me because I'm not the sort of person who has ever really strongly wanted children. I could only foresee myself having children if I had some kind of by-accident. However, as I am the kind of girl who takes the issue of contraception seriously, I can't see how I might inadvertently get pregnant. I suppose, if I did, I'd roll with it and work it out. But it's not something I am necessarily planning.

I mean, the whole issue of pregnancy and childbirth really freaks me out.

But the bigger issue in hand is what I privately refer to as 'the morph'. I know lots of people that get married - and the morph happens then too - but worse, they have children and they basically deteriorate into dumbness. They cease to be able to have conversations about anything other than pregnancy/the baby they've just had. Or they talk about awful, socially-unacceptable things, like breastfeeding, what it was like to give birth etc. I don't care what anyone says, no-body really wants to know how it feels to squeeze out a watermelon through something that only a grape ought to pass through. I. DON'T. WANT. TO. KNOW.

I mean, there are so many things to talk about at any given time - I just think that women who have just given birth to babies, their world shrinks and becomes so tiny that they don't know how to react to other normal, childless people any more. Some of these women never actually come out the other side of the morph. The change is permanent.

You can tell which women are susceptible to the powers of the morph - these are the women who suddenly have an inexplicable desire to bound home and cook their husbands dinner and wash their socks. They love housework. They want to give up work. They like to bake. They stop going out. I seriously think that this anti-feminist attitude is still out there at work, it's still brainwashing women. And for those that resist 'the morph' they are made to feel like they're abnormal - weird.

Perhaps this is more my issue... it's not necessarily about becoming a mother, it's more about a loss of identity. If you become Mother, does that mean you lose something? It's a bit like titles. A man is always Mr. A woman is initially Miss and she's expected to become Mrs when she gets married, and change her name. If she sticks two fingers up at the world and opts for Ms, there are sniggers as she isn't obeying the status quo. This is why on my email signature at work, I don't use a title. I just use my name. Because I want to avoid this whole issue. It's why I have an issue with changing my surname once I'm married next year. And I don't know how I'll avoid the issues of titles. I wish I was a Dr and then I wouldn't have to do this.

Marriage and parenthood has the capacity to wreak havoc with a woman's sense of identity and who she is. The thing is, I quite like being me. I appreciate one's personality will of course change over the years, but I don't know that I like the change being foisted upon me.

Love

So, I must confess, I'm a long-time admirer of Courtney Love. I also think she is incredibly attractive.

Admittedly, there are many things she's done that are pretty bad... drug use, blah, blah. She's a woman who understands the concept of excess. I know lots of women who gently and quietly self-destruct, or basically fade away in front of your eyes, but she is a force of nature. She is a fireball, and I absolutely love it. I mean, if you are going to hell, take everyone else with you.

I love that she's viewed as controversial. If she were a man, no-one would give a shit about the things she's done. But, most people don't know what to do with women like her. That's one of the reasons why I like her. She completely subverts expectations of what women are ''supposed'' to be like. She's like the anti-woman, hence, why she scares the shit out of everyone.

Perhaps this is more a statement about me, but I thoroughly identify with most of the songs she has done either solo, or with Hole. They do speak to me.

For me, she's my generation of Feminist. She's a colossal fuck-up, BUT she dares to be different. She seems unafraid. And rather like a lot of other Feminist-y people that you might look up to, she hasn't been broken. Most women ahead of their time are crushed by circumstances.

Take a listen to the below... enjoy :)