Sunday 30 September 2007

That Lazy OCD rears it's head

Guess I'm not too surprised by this.




Which Friends Character Are You?

You are Monica. You have a go-all-out nature. Your friends better watch out, because you play to win. Also, when it comes to order and cleanliness, you're a bit obsessive compulsive. Your best trait, however, is your thoughtfulness. You go to great lengths to care for your friends.
Find Your Character @ BrainFall.com


So, where the hell is my Chandler?

Thursday 27 September 2007

Which Sex and The City Character Are You

HA! I knew it!!!!




Which Sex and the City Character Are You?

You are Carrie. You know what you want out of a relationship and you're not afraid to keep moving until you get it. Wit and charm are your biggest turn-ons, and you like guys who appreciate you for your mind as much as your body. You have fun playing the dating game, but secretly you just can't wait to find the guy who sweeps you off your feet and carries you into the sunset.
Find Your Character @ BrainFall.com

Tuesday 25 September 2007

Getting on with it...

I've been in a bit of a funk for...well a while really. I'd like to pigeon hole it and say that it's due to my friend's self-inflected tragedy at the beginning of this month, but I know that it started well before that. Since I've been back to the UK I've been uncharacteristically anti-social, and in truth I think this darkish mood began before I went to the US this summer. It's gotten so that people have made a few comments to me. Well, damn it I've decided that ends now. I'm getting back to my outgoing ways-going to events and having people over. I'm not going to meet anyone new sitting at home alone being a sorry sack am I? Time to get back to who I used to be.

However, having people over does mean I need to clean my flat. Shit! Better do that now.


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Now playing: Johnny Cash - Ring Of Fire
via FoxyTunes
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Now playing: PJ Harvey - Water
via FoxyTunes

Saturday 22 September 2007

I'm a Lazy Obsessive Compulsive

Not surprisingly, I've been thinking about this a lot. LOL! I have decided that I'm a lazy Obsessive Compulsive. I over think things, compulsively check things, or check on people (blogs, facebook profiles-hell facebook in general is an obsession at the mo') to a degree that I would consider to be a bit unhealthy. I worry about silly things that I can do nothing about. These worries will actually wake me up in the middle of the night and keep me up. Three of the same number in a row (ie, 222) have some meaning for me. When I see them I feel reassured somehow. I make lists constantly and am an internally organised person. However, I hate cleaning and am very abstract-random when it comes to my external organisation. That being said I obsess about how untidy my flat is and it bothers me-consumes me-to the point that I am mortified when people stop by. Since it bothers me so much, you would think that I would do something about it. I don't. I just blog about how I'm obsessed with the state of my flat, apparently. Oh and I obsess about blog topics as well, and like I said at the beginning of this I have been thinking about this topic a lot.

In fact I have been obsessing about being obsessive compulsive so much that I went on line today and looked up the symptoms for OCD and read a few articles on the topic. Attached to one article was an OCD screening quiz, which I took. I scored 12 and apparently 12 and up means that OCD is likely. Needless to say I'm not too surprised.

sigh....

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Now playing: Shriekback - Faded Flowers
via FoxyTunes

Tuesday 18 September 2007

A Little Lighter

My mobile rang at 4AM this morning. Normally I turn it off when I go to bed and of course on one of the few nights that I forget, it rings. I hit 'silent' and waited for a bit. If it was an emergency they would either call back or call my land line. Neither of the two happened, so I slipped back into my slumber. When I awoke I had a text from Steve. He got a ticket to London and will be here in October. Yay!

I got up and gathered my stuff. All of last week including this last Monday I had no energy to bike to work (or do much of anything really), but I was determined that was going to change today. I double checked that I had everything: bike lock, extra jacket, and helmet, and out the door I went still feeling like I had forgotten something somehow. Standing in the foyer it occurred to me what I had forgotten and I started to laugh. Then, I turned around, unlocked the door to my flat and went back inside to get my bike.

The rest of my day went on really well and things seemed a little brighter than they have for the past week.


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Now playing: Gorillaz - Clint Eastwood
via FoxyTunes

Sunday 16 September 2007

Grief Shmief

There are apparently slightly different stages of grief with suicide and this doesn't mean that they will happen in some order or that they will occur in even time increments. However, knowing this and knowing that my illogical reactions and emotional outbursts have a psychological base behind them, doesn't make me feel better. I also read somewhere that if you don't deal with the full process grief at the time a loss happens, you deal with that loss in addition to another loss when the other occurs. Fuck!

What Stephanie said about it being the way someone dies that affects you explains my extreme emotional reaction and darkness I entered into this last weekend. I have now successfully destroyed a friendship with someone who was just checking on me on Saturday. My flat is also state of condemnable disarray, which I suppose reflects how I feel internally.

I know there is nothing anyone can say or do to make this better and that I have to go through my own shit in my own way. I also know that feeling sorry for myself won't make things better (which was what my friend basically said to me while I was hurling abuse at him). Blogging helps in some weird way, but what I really need to do is log off this computer, quit searching for more news about Ray, John, and Ruby's suicide/murder and log on to my own life.

As I said before if this tragedy is affecting me like this, how the hell are those who knew Ray more recently and more closely than I did dealing with it?

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Now playing: Radiohead - Sail To The Moon (Brush The Cobwebs Of The Sky)
via FoxyTunes

Friday 14 September 2007

The Darkness Underneath

A little over 2 weeks ago an old and dear friend of mine, Ray (Luray), found me and made contact through MySpace. She and her first husband David (my old house mate) were pillars of support for me during a very dark time 12 years ago. When the marriage between her and David ended about 10 years ago, I tried to keep in contact with her, but as life does we up drifted apart and lost touch.

I was thrilled that she had found me. In her MySpace messages to me, she sounded happy. She did, however, have some issues with her lungs and throat, and they were keeping her from singing. (She and her husband are in a musical duo called Vertigo Butterfly) In addition, she was going in for a mammogram and was a tinge worried, but nothing NOTHING in her mail indicated she'd pull something like this. She spoke of her daughter, Ruby, with love and adoration, spoke of how much she loved and missed Europe and mentioned wanting to visit me, talked of the house they just bought in Portland and spoke about how much she missed Seattle.

It was my turn to reply to her message, and I intended to reply directly to her email as I don't really get on to MySpace much. However, I got busy. I did think about her during the week before this and wanted to email her a proper email when I had a chance. I regret now that I didn't of course.

On Monday I found out about this:

It was a horrifying shock to say the least. The world just seemed to be thrown off kilter when I read the article. I felt ill and couldn't breathe. I picked up the phone and dialled the first person that came into my mind, Matt, who offered to come over (thank God).

I spent the rest of the week trying to get my head around it and making sense of it. There is no sense to made of a murder-suicide. There is no way I could understand their motivation behind it without knowing the details behind it. I logically know that if I had emailed Ray back when I intended, it would have made no difference. However, I still can't help but wonder if there might have been something I could have said that might have changed the course of events. It's a thought that has been keeping me from sleeping. Another thought keeping me up at night is that if this is upsetting me, a friend from the past who now lives thousands of miles away, as much as it is how on earth are her close friends and family dealing with it?

I've experienced the death of a few close friends. By this point in my life, you would think that I would be an expert in the area of grief, but this tragedy, albeit removed from my daily life, really affected me deeply. My friend, Stephanie, wisely said, "...what you feel when someone dies can vary widely based on how they die." My friend Russ pointed out that I should "...just remember they are happier now, try and keep it in perspective. Don't let their pain become yours. You still have your life ahead of you. Stay focused on that and remember the good times. This way you will really honour their memory."

I'll never understand why she chose the action she did or why she took her daughter with her. There is nothing I can do at this point except acknowledge that it happened and continue down my path. However, I'm not allowing my busy schedule to get in the way of replying to messages from people I care about any more.

Sunday 9 September 2007

Why Did I Move Blogs?

If you are reading this then you more than likely received an email from me and thought you'd check it out. Some people might argue that having a blog is a stupid self-indulgent move. I agree that it is probably a bit narcissistic and self-indulgent to post stuff up here for all to see, and I'm not going to try and convince you that my postings will be somehow different in that regard. Fact is I find blogging purging to a degree, and I enjoy getting feedback. I also enjoy reading other people's blogs. It diminishes the sense of solitude that many people have in this day and age. It's nice to know you are not alone or as crazy as you might think when you discover other people have thoughts akin to your own.

So as many of you who are reading this spew already know, I have 2 blogs, but have decided to make a move (to a degree) to here. I do this for a few reasons:

1. My mother discovered my Spaces Live blog. Thus, I have decided that no one in my family will know of this one. As an aside, my family finding out about my blog was my own damn fault. I stupidly posted that URL in my signature file and then forgot to remove the sig file when writing my mother.

2. I've had a few people add me as friends on Facebook whom I don't really want seeing the more forthcoming blogs I plan on posting here. At first I thought I would post those on Facebook as I have actually met every person on there, but then I realised that perhaps that wasn't the wisest move. Just because I have met them, doesn't mean we are close friends. Plus there are VERY close friends of mine who are not on Facebook who would perhaps like to see this blog.

3. Anyone can comment on this blog. You don't need to be a subscriber like you do with Spaces Live or MySpace

If you have subscribed to either my MySpace or my Spaces Live blog, I'm not removing them.
I will be using them to post more generic announcement things (new podcasts, new projects I'm involved in, etc) I plan on writing a bit more of my daily activities (to be fair it will probably be more weekly, but I will write here often). I know that it perhaps isn't as nice as receiving a personal mail from me, but at least it's something. (I'll try and be better at the mails too) Also, as I've said before I plan on being a bit more forthcoming here now that my mother and others won't be reading what I write.

So that's it really. Please subscribe to this blog or bookmark it. Or, ignore it and never return to it. It's up to you really. But, have a nice day. :-)

H~