girlofprey

Margaret Atwood, Good Bones, 'Alien Territory' (after a lot of stuff about how men don't have bodies):

"Those ones. Why do women like them? They have nothing to offer, none of the usual things. They have short attention spans, falling-apart clothes, old beat-up cars, if any. The cars break down, and they try to fix them, and don't succeed, and give up. They go on long walks from which they forget to return. They prefer weeds to flowers. They tell trivial fibs. They perform clumsy tricks with oranges and pieces of string, hoping desperately that someone will laugh. They don't put food on the table. They don't make money. Don't, can't, won't.

They offer nothing. They offer the great clean sweep of nothing, the unseen sky during a blizzard, the dark pause between moon and moon. They offer their poverty, an empty wooden bowl; the bowl of a beggar, whose gift is to ask. Look into it, look down deep, where potential coils like smoke, and you might hear anything. Nothing has yet been said.

They have bodies, however. Their bodies are unlike the bodies of other men. Their bodies are verbalized. Mouth, eye, hand, foot, they say. Their bodies have weight, and move over the ground, step by step, like yours. Like you they roll in the hot mud of the sunlight, like you they are amazed by the morning, like you they can taste the wind, like you they sing. Love, they say, and at the time they always mean it, as you do also. They can say lust as well, and disgust; you wouldn't trust them otherwise. They say the worst things you have ever dreamed. They open locked doors. All is given to them for nothing.

They have their angers. They have their despair, which washes over them like grey ink, blanking them out, leaving them immobile, in metal kitchen chair, looking out at the brick walls of deserted factories, for years and years. Yet nothing is with them; it keeps faith with them"


And, suddenly, I have a fancy reason to like all those rubbish, hopeless, and yes, often mentally unstable characters :)

Not that I imagine this is all of it, of course.

I just had the worst dinner ever. In fact, I think 'survived' is more appropriate. Worse even than the Oxford dinner. It was pretending to be cheese tortellini. IT WAS NOT. Perhaps if made with gravel. Or some poison. SO BAD. Yack.

Anyway. Actually, I bought the new Yeah Yeah Yeah's CD, and I'm just listening to it, and iTunes is telling me the first track is 50 minutes long - wtf?? I have newfound respect for the band if they recorded a song for that long, though. But I'm listening with some disbelief.

I'm trying to count up all the things I have to do over the next few weeks, and keep getting overwhelmed and losing count. It includes: ( Fair list ) And lots of other things I'm sure. I feel the need to lie down in a dark room with a cool cloth on my head just thinking/writing about it. But I'll get it sorted. I'm sure (::eyes it unsurely::)

In the meantime I am going on the internet and watching TV. Snuff Box is actually quite alright, if a bit spare and random. It's about a man who's been a hangman since he was fourteen (bloodlines) and all that, and so is incredibly rich and something of a psychotic wanker, to the point of helping a pretty girl control the dog she's walking until it turns out she has a boyfriend, at which point he boots the dog down the street and tells her to fuck off. For example. It stars Dixon Bainbridge from The Mighty Boosh, aka Matt Berry. Who it turns out looks like this



without the moustache. Woof, somewhat. Also it has this for a theme tune - written and performed by the lovely Mr Berry. Whom I love. Rather a lot. Yes.

Also:

My final and utter verdict on Mac from Green Wing, which will probably change at some point over the next few days:

There is something quite sexy about his whole hair-loose shirts-skinny jeans combos. I'll admit that. And I do see the slight chemistry in his scenes with Caroline. But he is just so rubbish at dealing with this in any sort of acceptable way, and so apparently willfully oblivious to the blatant lust and utter brilliance of Caroline, and Sue, and Guy, whether he's emotionally stunted or scarred or just a wanker or whatever, that I refuse to ship him with any of them. He doesn't deserve it. They should all do sex with each other instead. Causing Mac to explode. Yes.

Roll on, Series Two.

And that song's still going on, by the way.

Hello.

I am awfully busy of late, hence not much of posting or commenting.

Possibly this will continue for a while. Like, until January 20th.

Work is too much :(

End of term this week. I want to have written an essay by this time, but doubt I will have done. Then I go home for probably just a week, I think. Like, Christmas Day, then a day or two for good measure, then return so I can concentrate the better.

I keep trying to arrange lovely things to do with my family whilst am there, like Operas and films and such, and my mother continues to be randomly working. This very annoying How dare she go to work and abandon her child omg!

I have seen Narnia. I have a crush of disturbing strength on Edmund and the boy who plays him.

I am quite desperate to go see King Kong (but have Flatmate Christmas on Friday, Mother is WORKING on Saturday, and yargh!), as am already rather in love with Jack Driscoll, aka Adrien Brody, and slashing him completely at random from clips in the trailer. Again with the disturbing strength. And when one of the male leads in the film is a gigantic ape, this can lead to down some dark and terrible roads. But if he's going to wear thick black wool coats of loveliness or alternately loose shirts and jungle t-shirts, then I REALLY HAVE NO CHOICE.

I will probably not watch Secret Smile tonight, for David Tennant. But I feel that I should watch Blackpool.

I wish it were Christmas and all of my essays were done. Yes.