Signs, Portents & Omens - a Disinterested Observers Guide
Note to Self: Play nice with rioters
Daily Obsession: NaNo ate my soul
Daily Object of Use: The lack of a PC
Song Stuck in my Head: Kylie & Nick Cave "Where the Wild Roses Grow"
If you look you find exactly what you want to see. I’ve noticed this recently. This morning huddled on the bus from rain, wind, and the decently priced loaf of bread, I looked out of the window (as is often my wont) to spy a bird of prey making off with some small ex-furry thing. When I say ex-furry, what I mean to actually say it was ex and furry.
For the second time I’m heading off to a riot, this time at the behest of the female parental unit. We are going to Paris for a hectic weekend with a group of school kids. The last time I was around school kids I was one of them. This is going to be more than a little weird. Actually, less weird more annoying…
You don’t read about us in the papers, there’s no news groups or internet help sites for people like me, it’s not even accepted as a cover up, and yet we exist. I’m part of a lost generation. Well, a bastard generation at the very least. My name is Decembers Virtue, and I have a problem.
Imperial and metric systems of measurement. My ability to switch between one and another is in fact worse that the previous or the preceding generations. Hell, my neighbours 7 year old can do this better than me. I’m measurementally challenged. Let me clarify for you.
For giving the weight of a person I use stone and ounces. Fair enough right? At least they’re both from the same side of 1960. For measuring out the weight of an ingredient to cook I use grams. I can weigh out a pound or a half pound of cheese (using my eye alone, no need for a set of scales here) like a thing possessed, and yet I never use either (the unit or the cheese) in my daily cooking.
I use centimetres and feet for distance but have a complete inability to use inches and metres. More than a little confusing because I don’t know how many centimetres there are in a foot, or how many nth’s of an inch to a centimetre. When giving my height I use feet and inches. I wouldn’t know a kilometre or a kilo if they came up and poked me in the eye after announcing themselves with a capital K.
How the hell can I use something and yet have no clue what it is? “Ah yes officer, he was about 5’9.” The pun intended, but I wouldn’t know what 9 inches were if I didn’t have a ruler, and yet I can say I know what they are.
My schooling system seems to have hot-wired my brain. Maybe it’s similar to only being able to touch-type when I’m not thinking about it. Somewhere deep down I know the difference between imperial and metric, I know the nuances, I just refuse to believe in them. I’m going to pick and chose (or have picked and chosen for me) what I want, and logic be damned.
I bought and started to read Kafka on the Beach With Dynamite by Haruki Murakami. Ok, it’s not called that, it’s called Kafka on the Shore. It’s about a Japanese boy and some guy who finds stray cats, I think. There’s probably no dynamite. There probably ought to be though. My title is far superior, plus it’s catchy, whereas the book so far isn’t. I’ve had to put it down and pick up my copy of Yes Man by Danny Wallace to keep my attention, which is bad because I ought to be writing, but obviously I’m not. In defence it puts me in the right frame of mind to write my NaNo. In offence I’ll be in Paris with the afore-mentioned parental unit away from PC’s and Nadessico. I really ought to learn how to spell her name.
*le sigh* Better wrap my tongue back around my high-school French. “Pardonnez moi Monsieur, c’est combien pour le garçon?”
Daily Obsession: NaNo ate my soul
Daily Object of Use: The lack of a PC
Song Stuck in my Head: Kylie & Nick Cave "Where the Wild Roses Grow"
If you look you find exactly what you want to see. I’ve noticed this recently. This morning huddled on the bus from rain, wind, and the decently priced loaf of bread, I looked out of the window (as is often my wont) to spy a bird of prey making off with some small ex-furry thing. When I say ex-furry, what I mean to actually say it was ex and furry.
For the second time I’m heading off to a riot, this time at the behest of the female parental unit. We are going to Paris for a hectic weekend with a group of school kids. The last time I was around school kids I was one of them. This is going to be more than a little weird. Actually, less weird more annoying…
You don’t read about us in the papers, there’s no news groups or internet help sites for people like me, it’s not even accepted as a cover up, and yet we exist. I’m part of a lost generation. Well, a bastard generation at the very least. My name is Decembers Virtue, and I have a problem.
Imperial and metric systems of measurement. My ability to switch between one and another is in fact worse that the previous or the preceding generations. Hell, my neighbours 7 year old can do this better than me. I’m measurementally challenged. Let me clarify for you.
For giving the weight of a person I use stone and ounces. Fair enough right? At least they’re both from the same side of 1960. For measuring out the weight of an ingredient to cook I use grams. I can weigh out a pound or a half pound of cheese (using my eye alone, no need for a set of scales here) like a thing possessed, and yet I never use either (the unit or the cheese) in my daily cooking.
I use centimetres and feet for distance but have a complete inability to use inches and metres. More than a little confusing because I don’t know how many centimetres there are in a foot, or how many nth’s of an inch to a centimetre. When giving my height I use feet and inches. I wouldn’t know a kilometre or a kilo if they came up and poked me in the eye after announcing themselves with a capital K.
How the hell can I use something and yet have no clue what it is? “Ah yes officer, he was about 5’9.” The pun intended, but I wouldn’t know what 9 inches were if I didn’t have a ruler, and yet I can say I know what they are.
My schooling system seems to have hot-wired my brain. Maybe it’s similar to only being able to touch-type when I’m not thinking about it. Somewhere deep down I know the difference between imperial and metric, I know the nuances, I just refuse to believe in them. I’m going to pick and chose (or have picked and chosen for me) what I want, and logic be damned.
I bought and started to read Kafka on the Beach With Dynamite by Haruki Murakami. Ok, it’s not called that, it’s called Kafka on the Shore. It’s about a Japanese boy and some guy who finds stray cats, I think. There’s probably no dynamite. There probably ought to be though. My title is far superior, plus it’s catchy, whereas the book so far isn’t. I’ve had to put it down and pick up my copy of Yes Man by Danny Wallace to keep my attention, which is bad because I ought to be writing, but obviously I’m not. In defence it puts me in the right frame of mind to write my NaNo. In offence I’ll be in Paris with the afore-mentioned parental unit away from PC’s and Nadessico. I really ought to learn how to spell her name.
*le sigh* Better wrap my tongue back around my high-school French. “Pardonnez moi Monsieur, c’est combien pour le garçon?”