London Munch (Part#1)
Well...I'm back from my first Munch.
The London Munch no less.
There is one in Swindon, but I didn't fancy it much. I thought there might be both a better crowd, more diversity of people, and hopefully more females, =P, at the London one. I kinda feared the Swindon one might be six Transvestites and Crossdressers from the outer villages, but erm, that's probably an unfounded statement based on typecasting. My experience at the London Munch has given me confidence to perhaps turn up at the next Swindon one, as everyone in London proved to be just normal people, and it was just like a normal pub night. Well...a few differences, I'll elaborate, as I do that whole blog thing, of explaining how the night went...
Shall we commence?
Check.
Okay, I'm gonna do the whole day, not just the evening Munch.
So we start at 7am with our good friend the Postie, and absolutely fantastic, Adam's tapes of the Sony Conference arrived. So...the Jennie bitch wars have finally come to an end....I have what I need, in terms of media assets. I didn't get 'em from Jennie, but I got 'em from her ex-boyfriend, so that's good enough for me. =) Hahaha...
Sorry, I'm only talking about Jennie, because I'm trying to make "The Jennie Bitch Wars" a running joke, but as we saw in LA, she's not always a bitch, only when her job requires her to be - so respect!
The REAL significance of recieving the tapes, was that Adam only did them yesterday, that means the moment I got off the phone to him, he dubbed them and posted them same day. That's incredible.
What's so brilliant about it, however, was that I was off to London to TC Video Soho, to convert my NTSC tapes to PAL. His tapes therefore, had arrived in time to be part of that conversion process, so they had arrived in time for me to take them to London.
Fantastic.
However, 7am was a little too early for me to suddenly be awake and doing things, not least because I had only got ready for bed around 4am, so I had barely had 3hours sleep....
Yet I was confident as long as I got up around mid day, I would be able to have time in London to run a number or errands.
I set myself the following goals:
Post Joey's ISBN and Nielsen Book Data forms, I had completed,
Cash Joey's Cheque,
Take the NTSC Capcom tape back up to Capcom, as Sam had a PAL tape waiting for me to trade,
Take the other NTSC tapes to TCVideo to get converted to PAL,
Pop along to Cake, and see if Bianca "Steve wants to Spank her" Bianca Lee-Chang, had any Nintendo Betas for me.
Maybe nosey round some clothes shops, and see if I liked anything.
Go to the London Munch in the evening.
So I thought great(!) - if I'm up midday, I can still get into London, and do some of this, before going onto the London Munch, and really get more value out of the expense of actually catching a train up there.
But, perhaps blaming the postie, or maybe it was gonna happen anyway, given how late I went to bed the previous night, I didn't gain consciousness until 15:00pm in the afternoon.....Scheiße! as Martina might say. =P This was crazy...I was still tired actually, and could have easily slept on till 17:00, but I just knew I had to get up, so pulled myself up, and started thinking - how long would it take me to get ready!?! When could I catch the bus? When would it get me to the station? When would the train arrive in London, how long would it take me to get to Soho via tube?, etc, etc....and I came to the conclusion I could perhaps make it for either 17:00 or 17:30, at risk of being 18:00......scheiße! There's that word again! =P So my first call was to, yep, "call", ( there's THAT word again too - lol ), TCVideo, and check what time they were open till. Amazingly enough, most of the staff weren't going to leave till 18:00pm, whilst Sandra was staying on later still...
So I heard what I needed to hear, I was all set...BUT...I had to hurry, or I would miss even 17:30...
So, naturally,
I stopped on MSN for a chat with Joey. =P
Doh.
But no, it was funny. She was unfortunately having some dodgy side effects from some drugs she was taking, and her typing was all over the place.
I had recently been catching some of those music programmes running on the Open University on BBC2 at the moment, and they contain 80s musicians with dodgy haircuts giving little lectures on production and composition techniques, and last night I saw a Jazzy Organ player, explain the different sorts of genres of music there were, and different styles, and how you had a normal chord, but by adding a few extra notes to it, you could make the chord sequence sound more jazzy. So he played the opening bars of the soap opera Neighbours, in a normal fashion, using normal chords, and then he played the same musical phrase in a really jazzy way, explaining that he merely added some extra notes to each chord to jazz it up.
So here I was chatting to Joey, and I felt she was introducing extra letters to her words, to really jazz them up.
There was one line featuring a word beginning with the letter "S", that she accidentally slipped an "X" into, and it suddenly made the word sound sexy, and really flow off the tongue if you were to say it. I really thought it was cool and innovative, like she was making all these new little buzz words, kinda like my ciaousers - that merges ciao and trousers, but y'know, she was doing it accidentally, and some words seemed really cool, and others were more obviously typos, but it was entertaining, and innovative, and I felt it to be highly creative, and I enjoyed seeing these different sort of words popping up on the screen, all really new and interesting, but she began to think I was making fun out of her, by saying how fantastic her mis-spellings were, so I had to clear up that although I did find it funny, I wasn't laughing at her, but just really enjoying seeing what she would come up with next.
Her very last line had to be the best though.
When we went to say bye, she spelt: "Thanks" with a B in it! something like Thabnks, or maybe it was Thbanks, or perhaps Thanbks....yeah, that was it...Thanbks! And I just left the conversation then. I didn't wanna get typing why that was so brilliant - because of course, it takes the symbol of love - and for me - that is "B", the Lady B or Bev, I've loved so much, for so long, and it puts it right in the middle of gratitude. So to me, that word, meant love and gratitude in one. And that was fantastic. I mean all the sh*t I've been through with B, I'm still nonetheless grateful for the times she made me float, I'm grateful for the meaning she gave my life, I'm grateful for the ambitions she drove me to, I'm grateful for the way she creatively inspired me, from getting into inflatable architecture, to the songs she inspired me to write. And of course what it first felt like, to be starring at each other smiling, which was November '98, but an unforgettable little instance in my life nevertheless. Huge impact for me, I literally floated, and could feel my knees shaking, but just to be starring into her eyes for a while, us both smiling...but I don't want to exaggerate this occaision, as I get the impression now that B may not have seen in it as much as I did at the time, but for me it was euphoric. Although Joey did tell me later, B was stuttering, and kept going: "This B-b-b-b-b-b-b-boy..." which I thought sounded really cute. But I should make it clear, she hasn't ever really been seriously interested in me, I haven't ever properly got to know her, beyond a few chats at college, and thankfully last year, getting to know her better through LiveJournal, so yeah - gratitude, and Bev. I'm really grateful to Bev, for all the positive things that have come out of the experience, and the emotions I've felt. So thanBks! B & Thanks...lol...good combination.
God...I'm even grateful for December's rejection, even though I do often wish that we could just be friends, now she's finally totally ruled out anything else. As for all our differences and problems, I do think she's an incredible person, and certainly remains someone I care very dearly about, and will probably love forever.
But I packed it in.
I had a train to catch.
And I took a bit too long getting my shit together....and wasn't able to catch the bus I wanted, but made it in good time for the following bus, but alas, was leaving Swindon station at 16:59, so was only gonna arrive at around 18:00...was pretty scared TCVideo would be closed, and began thinking about pushing the tapes through the letterbox with a note....
The train journey there was quite good.
I sat next to a lady reading a book,
and decided to get out Joey's ISBN Agency stuff, to showoff a bit, that whilst she was reading a book, I was publishing a book...lol....but, er, she didn't seem to notice what it was, and seemed pretty engrossed in her own book, but I began to write the address on the envelope, getting it ready to post....then the tanoy went, and the driver announced a pair of glasses had been left in first class, and if anyone suspected them to be theirs, they should make their way to the buffet car to enquire, and the lady sat next to me piqued up with a little comment, so I told her about me needing glasses, and how I had lost mine on a train once, and that seemed to break the ice, and we were chatting for the rest of the journey.
She works as a financial assistant, and has set up her own Limited Company, which was fantastic to hear, as I need to do that myself in the next year or two, so we talked about each other's companies, and what we were doing and how. Spookily she seemed to believe in my DVD more than me, I had to point out some criticisms and problems with DVD Magazines. I really do feel that if it was such a good idea, more people would do it, or it would have happened by now. I'm making a proper DVD production here, not just a magazine on a DVD. But I guess the distinctions can become a little blurred.
Eitherway, she got off at Reading, but took one of my business cards,
and I was able to finally finish writing the address on the envelope, and seal it up, ready to post, which I found a lot easier to do now we had stopped, and my pen wasn't shaking, nor hand, nor fold-down chair table wobbling about all over the place. Y'know trying to write on a bus? It had been like that, but being at the Reading platform, meant I was able to write the address properly, with no shakey letters as you might get in transit.
I even put a first class stamp on it.
It was all ready to go.
=)
And just writing this, I've realised I fucking forgot to post it, after all that.
=P I'll nip out and post it once I've finished writing this.
Totally.
So...got off at London, rushed about like a mad gibbon, dodging people, knowing it was 6:00pm, and I should have been there at 17:00pm, and slightly worried....and OMG....the queues for tickets for the underground!!!!
Two of the ticket machines were "closed", and there was a line of about 15 people all behind one machine! Incredible. I've only ever seen queues of about 3, at most 5 people....but this queue stretched the width of the ticket gates, so people were trying to get through this line too, as it was blocking the walkway....blimey!
Thankfully, one of the two closed machines got switched back on again, but still, it was very busy, and it took me an incredible 10minutes to get a ticket....
So now it was 6:15pm....and I'm totally worried, but tear off to BakerLoo, and then down Oxford Street, towards Poland....turn in, and race it down to TCVideo....finally get there...and thankgoodness Sandra and her assistant were still present! =) Fan-tabulous! ^_^ Oogle-doo. Hahah...I'm making up words now. Doogle-dodge-'ems. =) And Jam Sandwiches.
So I sort out the tapes, make sure they're gonna be converted using Alchemist, and that Adam switched the tapes to inhibit recording ( which he hadn't done, but I checked, and switched them myself, and then labelled them also ). Sandra was happy to take on the extra tapes for the same pre-arranged fee, so I was good to go again.
Capcom was gonna be too far, and now it was 6:30, likely closed even...Cake sometimes stayed open late, so I hurried off down there...
A lone security guard stood there, having a cigarette. I asked if Cake was still open.
"Who do you want to see?"
"Er...Bianca..." ( I had to stop myself from saying: I-wanna-spank-her )
...oooh, god, I love this taste still on my lips, I'll tell you about it later on in this post....
So basically, the security guard unlocked the building, and went to the reception phone, and checked both Bianca and Sian's extension, but neither were there, he assumed they had already left, so I explained I had just been in the area, stopping by, and knew it was quite late, so thought they might have left, but had thought it worth a try anyway.
From there, I looked up Capcom....over in Hammersmith....would take me too long to get the train there, and then get the train back, I thought, so I concluded I would be better off posting it. It was unlikely any staff would still be there, since it was almost 19:00 at this stage, and if I set off, I wouldn't get there till 19:30 or perhaps even 20:00...and I'd miss the Munch, if I tried to get back...so crazy....
However, I did need to go to toilet, so began thinking about restraunts, which might have a toilet I could use....and suddenly, I realised I had eaten nothing all day and was pretty hungry, so I sought out a take away. Rummaging through my pockets I was only 40p short of cash to purchase sausage and chips, which I thought ironic, as there had been a beggar at Paddington, going around asking people for 40p, and here now, that was exactly how much I needed to have a meal. So rather reluctantly, I went to the cash machine, which annoyingly, damn you lloyds ... only served me a blummin' £20!!! So, I wanted 40p, but could only get £20. Do you see how my account depletes so easily!?! Yikes! ( I'm broke atm btw )...but I make a mental note to pay all the change back into my account asap - before I spend it in other words.
But it was also all good:
The take away - because I needed to kill time before the Munch started at 7:30pm, plus I wanted to arrive fashionable late, as opposed to being the first person there.
Plus the £20 - because if I wanted to buy a drink at the bar, I now had some money.
But of course, in the end, I would be on free water the whole night....touché! ^_^.
So, I got me bangers'n'mash...er..sorry, batterred sausage and chips, and begun to attempt to kill time. Which largely involved, finding a quiet spot that wasn't a wind tunnel, nor crowded with passersby, and sitting and eating my take away in peace. ^_^
Since I was in the Oxford Circus/Tottenham Court Road area, and Holburn was only the next stop, I thought I would walk it, for a good time killer, and a few windy paths to orientate myself amongst, since I took the backroads at first, as opposed to the main road, but soon I found the venue, The Princess Louise. I was still dying to use the toilet...but didn't fancy actually turning up at the Munch desperate to go, so since the regular pub was downstairs, and the Munch was in the function room upstairs, I thought I could use the pub toilets, before officially entering the Munch...but the first thing that greeted me as I approached the door was a sign saying: "Our toilets are for customers only". =P Crapper. I didn't want to go in there, introduce myself, whilst wiggling, and then run off to the Loo, so I looked around for another venue, and found a cafe opposite, and asked the staff about toilets: "Sorry, the toilets are only for customers". =P Eeek! A guy could wet himself in london, if he doesn't eat or drink out. =P Parp!
I didn't argue with the lady, but thought - sod it, I'll go in the Princess Louise, I'll be a customer in a few minutes when I attend the Munch....so in I marched, with a confident stride, and no member of staff challenged me, as I walked in through the door, and straight to the toilets at the back.
Arriving at the urinals, and a guy is like on the far side, so I take the urinal furthest from me, and get my penis out to piss. The floor has a weird grill on it, and then the urinal is infront of that. I'm not sure whether to stand on the grill or piss into it as part of the urinal, but keep my feet behind the grill to avoid getting urine on my shoes.....only, I've been holding in for so long, it doesn't seem to want to come.....and then some really tall guy comes in and stands right next to me...and I'm totally put off...especially 'cos I'm here for a Munch, and I totally can't pee, and I stand around with my dick in my hands for a few moments feeling like a complete lemon, and he's exactly the same. Not perving, but usually you can hear the noise when someone starts pissing in a urinal next to you, like a tap that's been left running, but no, nothing's happening with either of us. At this point, I'm getting a bit embarrassed, and figure - look - go upstairs, have a couple of drinks, then you'll be able to piss yourself....so I give up, with a murmour of "i'll-try-again-later" so I don't look like a weirdo who just went to loo to feel himself up, and proceed to the sink...I get the water flowing...but no soap! Can you believe!?! No soap! =P Just shocking!!! Good job I didn't actually piss, as I'm really fussy about that sort of thing. But I try to compensate by really giving my hands a good manual scrubbing under the tap, which leaves my hands pretty wet, so likewise, I have to use the rather weak air-dryer, that likes to randomly stop when I put my hands under it, instead of continually going till I remove them, a couple of times, until my hands are totally dry - and there's a reason for explaining all this effort...because there's a punchline of sorts. After all that effort to get my hands dry, I go to leave, and pull the door open by the handle, and the blummin' handle is all wet...worse than that, it feels a bit moist and slimey, and I'm like - urg(!), and attempt to wipe dry my hand on the side of my trousers, as I make my way up the staircase from the toilets, leading to the rest of the pub.
I then carry on around the corner to a second flight of stairs so as to get upstairs where the Munch is supposedly taking place.
I wasn't entirely sure if it was the right staircase, but when I saw the guy's legs in front of me were covered in black PVC, I figured it was the right place, and as he moved further up, a sign he had been obscuring became visible - "Private Function Upstairs - Welcome to the London Munch!!" =) With wavey underlines, and a bit of decoration.
So, accordingly, I made my way upstairs to see what it was all about....
Much like a fan convention, in fact reminiscent of BotCon Europe 1999, there was a table at the front with flyers on, plus stickers. Much like you'd get a badge when attending a fan convention, only you were...er....handed a felt-tip, and prompted to write your name on white label stickers clearly designed for use on envelopes (so nothing like a fan convention then? Ed).
"Yeah, you can put your normal name, or your internet name..." this was like an internet community gathering. Maybe. Sort of.
"Are you MissGoth...er..." I struggled to remember the rest of the name...Gothica, perhance!?
"Oh, no, that's her over there..." and points to someone chatting over a pint in the corner.
"Oh, right, well, that's the only person I've had net contact with, so I thought I'd ask..."
"Oh, right..." she replies. She had asked earlier if I was a newbie, as I must have obviously looked like one, and now offered: "If you go over to the bar, get yourself a drink, and come back and see me, and I'll introduce you to a few people..."
So I head off to the bar, noticing on my way a lady with purple hairclips. Hmm...^_^...purple.
Of course, I ordered water.
"Tap water?" the barman asks, just to make sure.
"Yes, thanks, I'm totally skint" he might have read from my face, but er, "Yeah, cheers" was all that was actually spoken.
Drink in hand, and conveniently blanking everyone I had pushed past to get to the bar (save one chap, whom I had checked wasn't waiting to be served, before proceeding to request my water), I was now looking around for people to speak to.
Oddly enough now, I can't remember who the first person I spoke to was....but I do recall talking quite early on to the chap I had first spotted in the PVC trousers. Got introduced, and talked about it being my first munch, etc, but conversation fodder was pretty sparce, and whilst being able to chat to him had contributed to the friendly atmosphere, I saw across the room, the lady with the purple hair clips, remove some black material from her trousers, to expose....purple trousers!!! Purple trousers! =) Purple Trousers ( no, she didn't have three legs, no fear ). I didn't fancy her particularly, but purple is groovy, so I explained I was off to mingle, and went to sit near her, exclaiming at her purple trousers, and how cool purple was in general, and how I had to chat to anyone wearing purple. She was quite grateful. It was her first munch also. She had agreed to meet some friends there at 19:30pm, and like myself, had arrived fashionably late, albeit in the hope that her friends would already be there by the time she arrived, but alas, despite their trendy lateness and general purple trouser-ness, their friends hadn't turned up. Sorry, I switched to plural there, because with this purple trousered lady sat her colleague. I believe the purple lady was Mana, and her slightly red haired friend, Angel. Angel immediately reminded me of Joey. She had a similar face, and had the same sort of dark sense of humour. Was making a few jokes and seemed quite entertaining, moreso was when she playfully spanked Mana or slapped her on the leg..hmm...Mana...I'm not getting that name right. Might have been Manda, or Mansa, or haha...Mensa..., no I joke with the last. Even still, yeah, she claimed purple the colour of emperors...I can't remember what we really talked about to be honest. Just bits of it- Angel was Mana's friend and had come down from Scotland, and had attended an Edinburgh Munch before, and, er, some bloke sitting next to us also joined in the chat, as we started talking about assumptions people make regarding people's limits, in terms of how far one takes certain fantasies, and what the difference is in real life, and just online, or reading fiction. Mana confessed she wouldn't let a boyfriend know what sort of kinky material she was reading, incase the boyfriend then thought that those fantasies were really what she wanted to do, when really, she might just be into reading about it, and not necessarily doing it. But likewise, she saw her ex-boyfriend's flatmate checked out a lot of dirty kinky websites on his computer, so started to fancy the flatmate, thinking he was really kinky, but although he was a great guy, and a real character, it turned out he wasn't into doing any of that stuff, and preferred to just talk about it on his computer, than do any of it for real.
I kinda explained my history at that point, about having erotic email penpals online, but never being up for meeting to do anything for real. Then the few times I was tempted to traverse fantasies to reality, the people I was chatting to would chicken out, so always, one of us would chicken out, and I'd think: "Is this what I really want?"....and certainly when I was in unrequited love with Bev, waiting for Bev, i.e. "Wait and make it perfect" as per our weird discussion Nov '98, seemed much better, than just being shallow, and meeting someone off the net for casual encounters...complete strangers, you're a bit worried about, personal safety-wise too. But y'know, five years in, and now I know I don't have to wait for B, and I certainly know she doesn't want me, and I have a proper rejection, I can feel single for the first time in my life. So of late, what with all the common-place chickening out, and much like Bev, where you give and give and give, and don't get a lot back...(although I can't slag off Bev, as she was wonderful, and I used to enjoy the way she replied to quite a lot of my LiveJournal comments, and I'm really grateful to her for that, and I do love her, but, y'know, it was unrequited love, she's good friend fodder, but she wasn't in love with me back, so it was very one way), likewise, you can write tonnes of emails to someone, really invest in that person, getting to know them, what makes them tick, etc, but there's nothing really at the end of it. Worst of all, is when they chicken out, by removing their membership from the website you met them on....so imagine one day getting on really well with someone, and the next they've vanished, it's a bit frustrating....and each time you start over with someone, you feel so exhausted, because you've put in the effort, and never got anything back. I mean, I've been getting jaded, where you just can't be bothered to even try now....you'll see someone's profile, and just think: "I can't be arsed to email them, even though it looks like we have similar interests, I just can't be bothered". And worse still, the latest lady I spoke to online, I wasn't even believing her photos were real, and she was pretty offend...but, y'know, the lady I was chatting to before her, nicked all her photos off of ebay...and they still had the ebay icon, and she's like from Guildford, but the blummin' photo is from an auction from an ebay seller from California...I'm like, no you're blatantly lying to me...I mean - what's going on here?
So this is the logic, in calling the internet shit,
and just going to a pub, for a social meet up, with people into Kink.
It's not a kinky event in itself.
Lots of normal people in a pub essentially.
Just getting to know each other first,
and meeting new people...
you can talk about fantasies later,
rather than discuss a fantasy online with someone, but someone you've not really met or would feel safe around....via an event like a Munch, you get to be friends with someone first, perhaps.
I say perhaps, because I don't think a Munch serves any particular purpose. It's just a meeting place for people, and it's very much up to each individual as to what they get out of it.
In fact, the guy in PVC trousers was telling me there's an under 35s Munch on the third Saturday of each Month...if I might feel more comfortable around people my own age. Indeed, a brief glance around in the early hours of arrival, and most people looked around their 40s. Lots of fat old people. Lol.
But there were pockets and handfuls of younger people, and certainly for the rest of the night, I saw ample diversity, as you'll come to learn as I continue typing.
Indeed, going back to Mana, or whatever her name was,...hang on, letsee if I have her name written down...ah, no I haven't....but yeah, her friend Angel was around 25, so they were pretty similar ages...
Discussion wise, I do remember mentioning Anthony Storr's Stimuli Theory V.S. Freud's Nirvana Principle, but you've heard it enough on this LJ elsewhere, so I won't bother to explain...
....but yeah, then Mana's friend turned up...a Lady called Foxxx, a bit of a BBW, but not huge, and starting singing her happy birthday: "Wow! I didn't realise it was your birthday!" I exclaimed, and she subsequently explained it wasn't for a week yet, Foxxx was just wishing her happy birthday for then.
Anyway, Mana and Angel were a pretty comic duo to watch, teasing each other, and making jokes, but conversion with them both dried up a bit, and I was pretty eager to meet the rest of the room. I spoke briefly with the guy to the right of me, who also happened to be the guy I had seen at the bar when ordering my water, but soon excused myself, and went to mingle.
There was a really really hot girl stood near me, chatting to a bloke....they looked a bit involved, like a couple, and as I negotiated around, they entered into each other's body space. She was fit, but they both looked a little busy, so I thought I would look around to see who else there was, but it was really crowded by this stage, and it was difficult to move to a suitable position to begin talking to others, so I just turned to them, asking if I could introduce myself, and hoping I wasn't interupting anything. But they were really cool. The girl was called Desk, or something like that, oh - Deck! That was it, Deck, and the guy was called....er...fudge I can't remember. Really should have paid more attention to the guy. =P Oh well, but his lady had a massively exposed midrift...just beautiful stomach. The amount you saw, she might as well have come in trousers and bra. I mean, you could see the full runway/stomach, no fat at all. Meanwhile the face....good hair, make up, she looked like Billie. Not in a fat and stupid way, Billie sometimes seems a bit dim doesn't she? A bit common...lol ( or maybe that's just Rose )...but these people were from ...oh gosh, my memory is like a siv...somewhere in West London that sounded pretty posh, and they were reasonably well spoken, although not as in posh. They were very down to earth. Very welcoming also: "Yeah, we come down here from time to time, and always meet newbies, and there are new people coming all the time", or words to that extent. I kinda asked what she was into..."Oooooh...I like to be spanked!" she said, grinning at her master, who pointed out the collar he had got for her. "Do you like it?" he asked. It had a jewel in the middle, that seemed to bounce against her neck, I wondered if that felt at all distracting, and queried whether she could feel it. "That's the reason it's there!" explained her dom. Only they confused me a little, claiming to be an incestuous Daddy and Daughter..."Oh, are you for real? Or just roleplay...!?"
"Oh, no, roleplay silly!" teased Deck, but the father confused me a bit, and still now, I haven't figured out if they were really father and daughter, because she had very similar eyes to him, and they looked so right together, almost as if they were the same type of person.
She seemed to speak as if trying to help me find my feet in realising fantasies, and when I told her I liked ankle bones, she was like: "My god! There are whole clubs devoted to foot worship...there's loads of places...look them up, you'll have no trouble, if that's what your fantasy is, or what you've always wanted to do..." and she continued to imply there were loads of girls up for being worshipped.
Soon enough though, the conversation did dry up, and I went to move on.
Unfortunately the crowds meant it was difficult to move, and I hung around a little bit after I had said bye, just 'cos you couldn't really move, but...
Well...the same problem again....I thought I would walk through the whole room, i.e. from the side I was on, near the entrance, to the very back wall, near the window, just to walk through everyone, see who everyone was, etc, and who might take my fancy to talk to.
But once again, I found myself unable to move, so because of this, turned to two girls near me, and asked if I could introduce myself, so I met...gosh, I can't even remember what the first girl's name was, but her friend's name was PrettyName, and she explained how she had struggled to find a good online username that hadn't been taken, and had mused to herself: "Oh, if only I could think of a really PrettyName", and then thought - "Ah!" and put down "Prettyname" as her id.
Got into a very short topic about cliches, given my crap response of: "Oh, that's a really pretty name...", that she's no doubt had said to her a million times, but other than that, that was pretty much all the conversation. They turned back to two blokes they had been chatting to, so I took the chance to charge through the rest of the crowd, and see what was on the other side of the pub function room....
This was when I met...er, some bloke and his wife Sandra. The guy's name sounded like Ron, but it was something foreign, that blatantly wasn't Ron, but I can't recall it properly now...I'm not even sure if I heard it correctly, so I'll just call him Ron. Heard the sweet story of how he met his Wife at this Munch three years ago, although back then, it was only like 6 people or so, and has since massively grown. Sandra was character watching. She found observing people, and seeing what odd characters would walk in next, quite amusing. Whilst Ron confessed he first came to a BDSM Munch for the sake of philosophy, not for sexual kink. He began to explain how interested he was in issues of power, and powerplay, and the whole sub/dom thing, from a philosophical perspective, and began to talk about examples of power in everyday life, from Governments, to Medical Professionals - to concepts of when you're ill and when you're not...and what is being ill, and what is being healthy - and how you're told when you're one or the other. Sandra and Ron both talked a little about Michael Foucalt(spelling!?), which interested me a bit because Alan's play - Madness - which I had seen on Tuesday, was based on his work, so this is an author I guess I ought to read. I mentioned Marilyn French's Beyond Power: Women, Men, and Morals book to him, explaining how it essentially picked to pieces the male bias of certain religions and tried to look at what society would have been like, with females at the helm. I'm phrasing this incorrectly...there's special words for it...is it patriarchy which I think is the male thing...and then there's a similar word of feminine ways of doing things...but I can't remember it...a good book, anyway, but he hadn't heard of it. When I mentioned Adorno however, it was: "Wow! Dialectic of Englightenment! Awesome book!" - fantastic! Another Adorno fan. ^_^. Hadn't heard of much of the others...
Was it odd to be talking academically about philosophical texts? Indeed, his wife almost looked a bit bored as we rattled on, although confessed not to be. Ron explained:
"Yeah, everyone here, you all know what they do, how they're into S&M, so you don't really need to talk about it, so you just talk about other stuff..."
Eitherway, it was cool to meet them, but once again, I wanted to mingle, so bid them adeiu.
There were a couple of young girls sat in the corner, like I said, only a small handful of girls my age had turned up, so I gravitated towards their table, and a lady called Jade sat at the table was very friendly, and introduced me to everyone at said table. In fact, it turned out she organizes the Putney Munch, so suddenly all became clear why she was so friendly....she's used to being a hostess, making people feel welcome, plus she's out to plug her own event, and get people to come along to it. It was good she introduced me to everyone else though...a guy called Mike, a guy called Steve, a guy called Andy, in a thundercats T-shirt, and the two girls who looked my age - Jo and Lauren. Jo was blonde, and I don't really like blondes, so I was more interested in Lauren, and kinda liked the way her shawl exposed her right shoulder ( from my POV it was the left shoulder, but obviously, was her right shoulder ). But, no, I was standing at the back, behind the table, so not really able to communicate.
Then a guy called Alex comes along and introduces what looked like a Post-Op Transvestite to the group...bloke's face, but real breasts, in a low-cut top. She/He (and there was some confusion) introduce themselves as Andy...so now we had two Andys, an Alex, and myself Andrew. It was like invasions of the "A"s....if only exams could be like that...A,A,aye?
Mike got up to order drinks, and asked me to watch his coat, so luckily, I was able to take his seat till he got back, and sit opposite Lauren. The venue was really noisy though, and her friend Jo was yabbering on about something I could only barely hear, but fully engaging Lauren. So I was sat near someone I fancied chatting to, but wasn't really able to chat. Thankfully, Jade was there to keep me company, and introduced herself and what she did. Alex came over briefly to give her a shoulder massage, but not seriously, just came over to chat basically, and rested his hands on her shoulders as he did so. "This is my personal massor..." or whatever that word is, for someone that gives massages...Alex and Jade both had quite weathered faces...and Alex also wore denim jacket and jeans, which also looked worn, so it worked as an aesthetic, and they looked good together. Both sharing similar traits, and perhaps would make a good couple, although there was no evidence beyond the massage comment to suggest they were actually a couple.
In justifying the Munch, Jade had explained it was good to have friends on the scene. I guessed for advice, or being able to talk to people about stuff, if you're trying out kinky ideas, etc, to work with other people's experience and knowledge, but she summed it up as just meaning that if she had friends over, she didn't have to hurry about the flat hiding the whips, etc.
Whilst Jade and Alex were talking however, I attempted to turn my attention to Lauren, and Jo. It was really noisy so I was only able to couple a few of their words together to figure out what they were talking about.
I'm not sure what they mentioned at first, I just didn't get it, although they kept stopping to turn to me and apologise they were just talking between themselves, but I was happy to let them continue: "You don't mind me eaves dropping?",
"Oh, no, no, not at all"...
So I made an effort to listen to what was being discussed, to see if I could contribute to the conversation.
From what I gathered, Jo was telling Lauren that the more she slept with someone, the more she would fall in love with them. Lauren was in denial, claiming that she didn't find the sort of guy her lover was, to be that attractive.
"What are you talking about?" she retorted, mentioning a few positive adjectives I had trouble hearing, notioning that although not stunning, he was pretty fit.
"Yeah, well, you should see him naked..." commented Lauren.
Actually, I should stress, incase I get anyone in trouble from this write up, I could have completely misheard this.
Addressing the fact I couldn't hear properly, Lauren turned to explain...
"Sorry we're just nattering like this, and can't explain..."
"We're talking about poly relationships..." explain Jo. "Just too much jealously...just doesn't work...don't go there..."
"Oh!? Are you in one then?" I enquired.
"Oh!? No...finished that long ago. I was, yeah, but it's over now..."
..whilst Lauren then went onto explain she had been introduced to the convenience of no strings sex. Only since last week, and had only slept with this guy once, but it was a time, and date, all pre-arranged, and you just turn up for sex, and, as she put it: "None of that, oooh...what do they want!? Or, what's going on between us? Or, what does it mean?, that you get with relationships." and she seemed to imply it was liberating in a way, not having to worry about the complications. Yet she also knew that this person that she was seeing was also sleeping with other women, and her and Jo had been discussing how she felt about that. Lauren was claiming it was no problem, whilst Jo was foreseeing that the more she slept with him, the more she would begin to fall for him. She refuted this, both on the terms that she wasn't like Jo, this guy wasn't the sort of guy she would normally fall for, and besides all this, she had only slept with him once, and only had this arrangement since last week....so it wasn't like she was in a relationship with him.
After chatting with Jo and Lauren for a while, I thought I had best mingle again, so let Mike know where his coat was, and went to move on....only, once again I couldn't. Yet Mike was chatting to some big lady with an american accent, I thought I might as well get introduced and make her accquaintance too, so I did as much. She was babbling on about how she was from Norwich, with an Admin job, but was set to move to London soon, and mentioned she was setting up her own production company, to produce a movie about goblins. She claimed cinema distribution, if talks with a contact of hers went well, whilst the movie itself was to be filmed and editing by contacts she had made that were recently out of film school....some friends had made some excellent shorts, and TV dramas, and were now ready for Film, so she would use her contacts to help them produce a film, and they would produce her film script...something about goblins...and she had also managed to secure the interest of some celebrity actor, who apparently liked goblins, and was excited by the idea. She was waiting for the actor to see the script and confirm his involvement, so that she could use his name to help in recruiting funding. It was obviously all very much at the ideas stage, and whilst she appeared to have what she needed to prepare a pitch, I did get the impression she was all talk, and goodness knows if she could pull it off. I at least gave her praise for gathering talent around her....obviously, with my DVD, I've tried to do everything myself, and that has been really difficult, whereas she has a group of graduate film makers and editors....but even still....from idea to cinema distribution, I'm dubious. However, I know one can get stuff put on at select cinemas if not nationwide...so let her try. If she thinks she can do it, fantastic, and maybe she can, and will be able to. But I kinda lost interest in her talk after awhile, as I felt I had seen it all before. I liked the passion with which she spoke, as that was genuine, like she really believed in the project, but I would really step back, and play wait and see. I had learnt the distribution, I had learnt that they had yet to pitch for finance, they had yet to make any pilot, showreel or demo to display the production house's competence (although conversely her friends did have a number of good completed projects behind them) but, yeah - I basically had all my questions answered. It was time to move on. Nonetheless, I left Mike guessing who the lead actor was, and the lady dropping hints, as he guessed. If no one was to know yet, why was she teasing him like that?
Oh well....
I headed back towards the front of the Pub, where I met a couple of guys my age.
"Yeah, no, my mate just brought me along", he mentioned, notioning towards another guy a similar age, with an oriental girlfriend...wasn't sure if she was Japanese or Chinese (didn't look Korean), although looked london born and bred, despite the oriental features.
The guy mentioned he had studied Graphic Design at Uni, but failed to get work in the field, so was now in the financial industry, I assumed doing Admin but didn't know.
We had a discussion about methods to get freelance graphic design work.
And of course friends asking for free websites all the time. =) And how you have to prioritise...like Joey is getting hers done atm, but India is unfortunately having to wait, I still need to do Rowen's CGI stuff, and Adam asked me to do the RadCon website, but I had to turn him down, as I'm too busy atm.
But yeah, mentioned the trick of just going through the yellow pages, and asking businesses if they want a site done.
He did though, seem resigned to trying again now. He had given it a few years, and had no luck, so had switched careers. He did know it was possible, as some of his friends had landed jobs, but he concluded that it all came down to the person. Also mentioned that it wasn't necessarily a lack of work, but in London especially, tonnes of competition.
There was a couple stood opposite us, and I kinda sensed that they might want to be included in our circle, and join in our conversation, as they were kinda looking our way, so I turned around, and introduced myself, and we got chatting.
I can't remember either of their names....it was a tall guy with shoulder length wavey hair, and small goatee, and a short and stout lady, with gingery/golden hair, and they both were nice and friendly. The bloke had a fantastic way with words, managing to slip in words that added flavour to sentances...clever adjectives and metaphors, almosts poetical in part, but with none of the ponce. He looked like some kinda roadie at a Gig...you can imagine him part of the Wayne's World 2 stage team, listening to the guy going on about the jar full of M&Ms annecdote. I digress, once again I was asked for my IC username, which I didn't have, but assured them I would register by the weekend.
He explained how they owed a lot to IC. One fateful night in Leeds, he had seen the lady, and thought hang on...do I know her? A bit further down the road, and it struck him he had seen her photo and profile on IC, so he realised, and went back and spoke to her, and that's how they met, and now they're boyfriend and girlfriend. =) How sweet.
But Leeds!?!
Turns out he was a yorkshireman! Blimey! =P
Little piece of genius though - we realised we were stood right in the pathway of people trying to move from one end of the room to the other, or at least get to the bar, and we had had a constant flux of people brushing against us, or bumping into us, or saying: "Excuse please..." every three seconds, and he saw that the table behind us, wasn't pushed back, so we moved the table, to create more room.
My rucksack had been getting in the way too, and he kindly informed me of a bag holding area at the front I had failed to notice. So, I got to ditch my bag there, which was cool. Suddenly felt a bit lighter, and whatnot. Eitherway, I decided to move on yet again....
CONTINUES IN PART#2...
Still to come in Part #2:
The London Munch no less.
- Fearing Swindon Transvestites
..I kinda feared the Swindon one might be six Transvestites and Crossdressers from the outer villages...
- The Postie delivers the final blow in the Jennie Bitch Wars
So...the Jennie bitch wars have finally come to an end....
- Setting Goals for the day
...Bianca "Steve wants to Spank her"...
- Joey on language innovations
...There was one line featuring a word beginning with the letter S, that she accidentally slipped an "X" into, and it suddenly made the word sound sexy...
- Love and Gratitude:
...she spelt: "Thanks" with a B in it!...Thanbks!...So to me, that word, meant love and gratitude in one.
- Chatting to a girl on the Train
...the lady sat next to me piqued up with a little comment...
- The race to TCVideo
... rushed about like a mad gibbon...
- No Cake with Capcom
..."Er...Bianca..." ( I had to stop myself from saying: I-wanna-spank-her )...
- Going for a takeaway
... So, I wanted 40p, but could only get £20...
- Toilet Politics:
..."Our toilets are for customers only"...
- Arriving at the Munch:
...I saw the guy's legs in front of me were covered in black PVC, I figured it was the right place...
- Meeting Mana(!?) & Angel
...purple is groovy...
- Father & Daughter (with nice exposed midriff!)
..."Oooooh...I like to be spanked!" she said, grinning at her master...
- Pretty Name
...Got into a very short topic about cliches...
- Ron(!?) and Sandra
"Wow! Dialectic of Englightenment! Awesome book!"
- The Putney Posse
...if she had friends over, she didn't have to hurry about the flat hiding the whips...
- Penetrating Jo and Lauren's nattering
..."We're talking about poly relationships..." explained Jo...
- Ambitious Admin:
...she was setting up her own production company, to produce a movie about goblins...
- Graphic Design Guy:
...He had given it a few years, and had no luck, so had switched careers...
- Leeds Girl and Guy:
...One fateful night in Leeds...
- Foxxx & Jade on an IC nick:
...A name is very personal, and I am very much an individual, and stubborn...
- Caressing Lauren's Shoulder:
..."Woah!" I shuddered, and took a few steps backwards, somewhat overcome by the sensation...
- Clubbing, anyone?
...her and Jo were off to a Lesbian club...
- A second time with Lauren's Shoulders:
...it felt like I was alone, suspended in a black void, just myself, and a shoulder...
- Lauren compliments me:
...I took the complement, even if I didn't recognise what she was talking about...
- Andy on Audio:
...so I mentioned the bands I knew, and we started talking about music production...
- Lauren Falls on Me:
...and stuck her cheek out to be kissed...ah(!). I'm not used to that...
- Leaving:
..."Bye! Bye to you people I never met..."...
- On the tube:
...a guy doing air guitar...
- The girl that controls her family:
...She started cracking up with laughter as everytime she nudged his arm, his eyebrows raised....
- Swindon Posse, from a Thursday gig:
...Eitherway, all of these girls, and this guy, had apparently just come back from a gig for a band called Thursday...
- Beatbox near ASDA, and considering Jax:
...I had done a human beatbox against the wall of the subway...I loved the echo...
- Reflections on Lauren:
I don't actually love her. And that bugs me.
There is one in Swindon, but I didn't fancy it much. I thought there might be both a better crowd, more diversity of people, and hopefully more females, =P, at the London one. I kinda feared the Swindon one might be six Transvestites and Crossdressers from the outer villages, but erm, that's probably an unfounded statement based on typecasting. My experience at the London Munch has given me confidence to perhaps turn up at the next Swindon one, as everyone in London proved to be just normal people, and it was just like a normal pub night. Well...a few differences, I'll elaborate, as I do that whole blog thing, of explaining how the night went...
Shall we commence?
Check.
Okay, I'm gonna do the whole day, not just the evening Munch.
So we start at 7am with our good friend the Postie, and absolutely fantastic, Adam's tapes of the Sony Conference arrived. So...the Jennie bitch wars have finally come to an end....I have what I need, in terms of media assets. I didn't get 'em from Jennie, but I got 'em from her ex-boyfriend, so that's good enough for me. =) Hahaha...
Sorry, I'm only talking about Jennie, because I'm trying to make "The Jennie Bitch Wars" a running joke, but as we saw in LA, she's not always a bitch, only when her job requires her to be - so respect!
The REAL significance of recieving the tapes, was that Adam only did them yesterday, that means the moment I got off the phone to him, he dubbed them and posted them same day. That's incredible.
What's so brilliant about it, however, was that I was off to London to TC Video Soho, to convert my NTSC tapes to PAL. His tapes therefore, had arrived in time to be part of that conversion process, so they had arrived in time for me to take them to London.
Fantastic.
However, 7am was a little too early for me to suddenly be awake and doing things, not least because I had only got ready for bed around 4am, so I had barely had 3hours sleep....
Yet I was confident as long as I got up around mid day, I would be able to have time in London to run a number or errands.
I set myself the following goals:
Post Joey's ISBN and Nielsen Book Data forms, I had completed,
Cash Joey's Cheque,
Take the NTSC Capcom tape back up to Capcom, as Sam had a PAL tape waiting for me to trade,
Take the other NTSC tapes to TCVideo to get converted to PAL,
Pop along to Cake, and see if Bianca "Steve wants to Spank her" Bianca Lee-Chang, had any Nintendo Betas for me.
Maybe nosey round some clothes shops, and see if I liked anything.
Go to the London Munch in the evening.
So I thought great(!) - if I'm up midday, I can still get into London, and do some of this, before going onto the London Munch, and really get more value out of the expense of actually catching a train up there.
But, perhaps blaming the postie, or maybe it was gonna happen anyway, given how late I went to bed the previous night, I didn't gain consciousness until 15:00pm in the afternoon.....Scheiße! as Martina might say. =P This was crazy...I was still tired actually, and could have easily slept on till 17:00, but I just knew I had to get up, so pulled myself up, and started thinking - how long would it take me to get ready!?! When could I catch the bus? When would it get me to the station? When would the train arrive in London, how long would it take me to get to Soho via tube?, etc, etc....and I came to the conclusion I could perhaps make it for either 17:00 or 17:30, at risk of being 18:00......scheiße! There's that word again! =P So my first call was to, yep, "call", ( there's THAT word again too - lol ), TCVideo, and check what time they were open till. Amazingly enough, most of the staff weren't going to leave till 18:00pm, whilst Sandra was staying on later still...
So I heard what I needed to hear, I was all set...BUT...I had to hurry, or I would miss even 17:30...
So, naturally,
I stopped on MSN for a chat with Joey. =P
Doh.
But no, it was funny. She was unfortunately having some dodgy side effects from some drugs she was taking, and her typing was all over the place.
I had recently been catching some of those music programmes running on the Open University on BBC2 at the moment, and they contain 80s musicians with dodgy haircuts giving little lectures on production and composition techniques, and last night I saw a Jazzy Organ player, explain the different sorts of genres of music there were, and different styles, and how you had a normal chord, but by adding a few extra notes to it, you could make the chord sequence sound more jazzy. So he played the opening bars of the soap opera Neighbours, in a normal fashion, using normal chords, and then he played the same musical phrase in a really jazzy way, explaining that he merely added some extra notes to each chord to jazz it up.
So here I was chatting to Joey, and I felt she was introducing extra letters to her words, to really jazz them up.
There was one line featuring a word beginning with the letter "S", that she accidentally slipped an "X" into, and it suddenly made the word sound sexy, and really flow off the tongue if you were to say it. I really thought it was cool and innovative, like she was making all these new little buzz words, kinda like my ciaousers - that merges ciao and trousers, but y'know, she was doing it accidentally, and some words seemed really cool, and others were more obviously typos, but it was entertaining, and innovative, and I felt it to be highly creative, and I enjoyed seeing these different sort of words popping up on the screen, all really new and interesting, but she began to think I was making fun out of her, by saying how fantastic her mis-spellings were, so I had to clear up that although I did find it funny, I wasn't laughing at her, but just really enjoying seeing what she would come up with next.
Her very last line had to be the best though.
When we went to say bye, she spelt: "Thanks" with a B in it! something like Thabnks, or maybe it was Thbanks, or perhaps Thanbks....yeah, that was it...Thanbks! And I just left the conversation then. I didn't wanna get typing why that was so brilliant - because of course, it takes the symbol of love - and for me - that is "B", the Lady B or Bev, I've loved so much, for so long, and it puts it right in the middle of gratitude. So to me, that word, meant love and gratitude in one. And that was fantastic. I mean all the sh*t I've been through with B, I'm still nonetheless grateful for the times she made me float, I'm grateful for the meaning she gave my life, I'm grateful for the ambitions she drove me to, I'm grateful for the way she creatively inspired me, from getting into inflatable architecture, to the songs she inspired me to write. And of course what it first felt like, to be starring at each other smiling, which was November '98, but an unforgettable little instance in my life nevertheless. Huge impact for me, I literally floated, and could feel my knees shaking, but just to be starring into her eyes for a while, us both smiling...but I don't want to exaggerate this occaision, as I get the impression now that B may not have seen in it as much as I did at the time, but for me it was euphoric. Although Joey did tell me later, B was stuttering, and kept going: "This B-b-b-b-b-b-b-boy..." which I thought sounded really cute. But I should make it clear, she hasn't ever really been seriously interested in me, I haven't ever properly got to know her, beyond a few chats at college, and thankfully last year, getting to know her better through LiveJournal, so yeah - gratitude, and Bev. I'm really grateful to Bev, for all the positive things that have come out of the experience, and the emotions I've felt. So thanBks! B & Thanks...lol...good combination.
God...I'm even grateful for December's rejection, even though I do often wish that we could just be friends, now she's finally totally ruled out anything else. As for all our differences and problems, I do think she's an incredible person, and certainly remains someone I care very dearly about, and will probably love forever.
But I packed it in.
I had a train to catch.
And I took a bit too long getting my shit together....and wasn't able to catch the bus I wanted, but made it in good time for the following bus, but alas, was leaving Swindon station at 16:59, so was only gonna arrive at around 18:00...was pretty scared TCVideo would be closed, and began thinking about pushing the tapes through the letterbox with a note....
The train journey there was quite good.
I sat next to a lady reading a book,
and decided to get out Joey's ISBN Agency stuff, to showoff a bit, that whilst she was reading a book, I was publishing a book...lol....but, er, she didn't seem to notice what it was, and seemed pretty engrossed in her own book, but I began to write the address on the envelope, getting it ready to post....then the tanoy went, and the driver announced a pair of glasses had been left in first class, and if anyone suspected them to be theirs, they should make their way to the buffet car to enquire, and the lady sat next to me piqued up with a little comment, so I told her about me needing glasses, and how I had lost mine on a train once, and that seemed to break the ice, and we were chatting for the rest of the journey.
She works as a financial assistant, and has set up her own Limited Company, which was fantastic to hear, as I need to do that myself in the next year or two, so we talked about each other's companies, and what we were doing and how. Spookily she seemed to believe in my DVD more than me, I had to point out some criticisms and problems with DVD Magazines. I really do feel that if it was such a good idea, more people would do it, or it would have happened by now. I'm making a proper DVD production here, not just a magazine on a DVD. But I guess the distinctions can become a little blurred.
Eitherway, she got off at Reading, but took one of my business cards,
and I was able to finally finish writing the address on the envelope, and seal it up, ready to post, which I found a lot easier to do now we had stopped, and my pen wasn't shaking, nor hand, nor fold-down chair table wobbling about all over the place. Y'know trying to write on a bus? It had been like that, but being at the Reading platform, meant I was able to write the address properly, with no shakey letters as you might get in transit.
I even put a first class stamp on it.
It was all ready to go.
=)
And just writing this, I've realised I fucking forgot to post it, after all that.
=P I'll nip out and post it once I've finished writing this.
Totally.
So...got off at London, rushed about like a mad gibbon, dodging people, knowing it was 6:00pm, and I should have been there at 17:00pm, and slightly worried....and OMG....the queues for tickets for the underground!!!!
Two of the ticket machines were "closed", and there was a line of about 15 people all behind one machine! Incredible. I've only ever seen queues of about 3, at most 5 people....but this queue stretched the width of the ticket gates, so people were trying to get through this line too, as it was blocking the walkway....blimey!
Thankfully, one of the two closed machines got switched back on again, but still, it was very busy, and it took me an incredible 10minutes to get a ticket....
So now it was 6:15pm....and I'm totally worried, but tear off to BakerLoo, and then down Oxford Street, towards Poland....turn in, and race it down to TCVideo....finally get there...and thankgoodness Sandra and her assistant were still present! =) Fan-tabulous! ^_^ Oogle-doo. Hahah...I'm making up words now. Doogle-dodge-'ems. =) And Jam Sandwiches.
So I sort out the tapes, make sure they're gonna be converted using Alchemist, and that Adam switched the tapes to inhibit recording ( which he hadn't done, but I checked, and switched them myself, and then labelled them also ). Sandra was happy to take on the extra tapes for the same pre-arranged fee, so I was good to go again.
Capcom was gonna be too far, and now it was 6:30, likely closed even...Cake sometimes stayed open late, so I hurried off down there...
A lone security guard stood there, having a cigarette. I asked if Cake was still open.
"Who do you want to see?"
"Er...Bianca..." ( I had to stop myself from saying: I-wanna-spank-her )
...oooh, god, I love this taste still on my lips, I'll tell you about it later on in this post....
So basically, the security guard unlocked the building, and went to the reception phone, and checked both Bianca and Sian's extension, but neither were there, he assumed they had already left, so I explained I had just been in the area, stopping by, and knew it was quite late, so thought they might have left, but had thought it worth a try anyway.
From there, I looked up Capcom....over in Hammersmith....would take me too long to get the train there, and then get the train back, I thought, so I concluded I would be better off posting it. It was unlikely any staff would still be there, since it was almost 19:00 at this stage, and if I set off, I wouldn't get there till 19:30 or perhaps even 20:00...and I'd miss the Munch, if I tried to get back...so crazy....
However, I did need to go to toilet, so began thinking about restraunts, which might have a toilet I could use....and suddenly, I realised I had eaten nothing all day and was pretty hungry, so I sought out a take away. Rummaging through my pockets I was only 40p short of cash to purchase sausage and chips, which I thought ironic, as there had been a beggar at Paddington, going around asking people for 40p, and here now, that was exactly how much I needed to have a meal. So rather reluctantly, I went to the cash machine, which annoyingly, damn you lloyds ... only served me a blummin' £20!!! So, I wanted 40p, but could only get £20. Do you see how my account depletes so easily!?! Yikes! ( I'm broke atm btw )...but I make a mental note to pay all the change back into my account asap - before I spend it in other words.
But it was also all good:
The take away - because I needed to kill time before the Munch started at 7:30pm, plus I wanted to arrive fashionable late, as opposed to being the first person there.
Plus the £20 - because if I wanted to buy a drink at the bar, I now had some money.
But of course, in the end, I would be on free water the whole night....touché! ^_^.
So, I got me bangers'n'mash...er..sorry, batterred sausage and chips, and begun to attempt to kill time. Which largely involved, finding a quiet spot that wasn't a wind tunnel, nor crowded with passersby, and sitting and eating my take away in peace. ^_^
Since I was in the Oxford Circus/Tottenham Court Road area, and Holburn was only the next stop, I thought I would walk it, for a good time killer, and a few windy paths to orientate myself amongst, since I took the backroads at first, as opposed to the main road, but soon I found the venue, The Princess Louise. I was still dying to use the toilet...but didn't fancy actually turning up at the Munch desperate to go, so since the regular pub was downstairs, and the Munch was in the function room upstairs, I thought I could use the pub toilets, before officially entering the Munch...but the first thing that greeted me as I approached the door was a sign saying: "Our toilets are for customers only". =P Crapper. I didn't want to go in there, introduce myself, whilst wiggling, and then run off to the Loo, so I looked around for another venue, and found a cafe opposite, and asked the staff about toilets: "Sorry, the toilets are only for customers". =P Eeek! A guy could wet himself in london, if he doesn't eat or drink out. =P Parp!
I didn't argue with the lady, but thought - sod it, I'll go in the Princess Louise, I'll be a customer in a few minutes when I attend the Munch....so in I marched, with a confident stride, and no member of staff challenged me, as I walked in through the door, and straight to the toilets at the back.
Arriving at the urinals, and a guy is like on the far side, so I take the urinal furthest from me, and get my penis out to piss. The floor has a weird grill on it, and then the urinal is infront of that. I'm not sure whether to stand on the grill or piss into it as part of the urinal, but keep my feet behind the grill to avoid getting urine on my shoes.....only, I've been holding in for so long, it doesn't seem to want to come.....and then some really tall guy comes in and stands right next to me...and I'm totally put off...especially 'cos I'm here for a Munch, and I totally can't pee, and I stand around with my dick in my hands for a few moments feeling like a complete lemon, and he's exactly the same. Not perving, but usually you can hear the noise when someone starts pissing in a urinal next to you, like a tap that's been left running, but no, nothing's happening with either of us. At this point, I'm getting a bit embarrassed, and figure - look - go upstairs, have a couple of drinks, then you'll be able to piss yourself....so I give up, with a murmour of "i'll-try-again-later" so I don't look like a weirdo who just went to loo to feel himself up, and proceed to the sink...I get the water flowing...but no soap! Can you believe!?! No soap! =P Just shocking!!! Good job I didn't actually piss, as I'm really fussy about that sort of thing. But I try to compensate by really giving my hands a good manual scrubbing under the tap, which leaves my hands pretty wet, so likewise, I have to use the rather weak air-dryer, that likes to randomly stop when I put my hands under it, instead of continually going till I remove them, a couple of times, until my hands are totally dry - and there's a reason for explaining all this effort...because there's a punchline of sorts. After all that effort to get my hands dry, I go to leave, and pull the door open by the handle, and the blummin' handle is all wet...worse than that, it feels a bit moist and slimey, and I'm like - urg(!), and attempt to wipe dry my hand on the side of my trousers, as I make my way up the staircase from the toilets, leading to the rest of the pub.
I then carry on around the corner to a second flight of stairs so as to get upstairs where the Munch is supposedly taking place.
I wasn't entirely sure if it was the right staircase, but when I saw the guy's legs in front of me were covered in black PVC, I figured it was the right place, and as he moved further up, a sign he had been obscuring became visible - "Private Function Upstairs - Welcome to the London Munch!!" =) With wavey underlines, and a bit of decoration.
So, accordingly, I made my way upstairs to see what it was all about....
Much like a fan convention, in fact reminiscent of BotCon Europe 1999, there was a table at the front with flyers on, plus stickers. Much like you'd get a badge when attending a fan convention, only you were...er....handed a felt-tip, and prompted to write your name on white label stickers clearly designed for use on envelopes (so nothing like a fan convention then? Ed).
"Yeah, you can put your normal name, or your internet name..." this was like an internet community gathering. Maybe. Sort of.
"Are you MissGoth...er..." I struggled to remember the rest of the name...Gothica, perhance!?
"Oh, no, that's her over there..." and points to someone chatting over a pint in the corner.
"Oh, right, well, that's the only person I've had net contact with, so I thought I'd ask..."
"Oh, right..." she replies. She had asked earlier if I was a newbie, as I must have obviously looked like one, and now offered: "If you go over to the bar, get yourself a drink, and come back and see me, and I'll introduce you to a few people..."
So I head off to the bar, noticing on my way a lady with purple hairclips. Hmm...^_^...purple.
Of course, I ordered water.
"Tap water?" the barman asks, just to make sure.
"Yes, thanks, I'm totally skint" he might have read from my face, but er, "Yeah, cheers" was all that was actually spoken.
Drink in hand, and conveniently blanking everyone I had pushed past to get to the bar (save one chap, whom I had checked wasn't waiting to be served, before proceeding to request my water), I was now looking around for people to speak to.
Oddly enough now, I can't remember who the first person I spoke to was....but I do recall talking quite early on to the chap I had first spotted in the PVC trousers. Got introduced, and talked about it being my first munch, etc, but conversation fodder was pretty sparce, and whilst being able to chat to him had contributed to the friendly atmosphere, I saw across the room, the lady with the purple hair clips, remove some black material from her trousers, to expose....purple trousers!!! Purple trousers! =) Purple Trousers ( no, she didn't have three legs, no fear ). I didn't fancy her particularly, but purple is groovy, so I explained I was off to mingle, and went to sit near her, exclaiming at her purple trousers, and how cool purple was in general, and how I had to chat to anyone wearing purple. She was quite grateful. It was her first munch also. She had agreed to meet some friends there at 19:30pm, and like myself, had arrived fashionably late, albeit in the hope that her friends would already be there by the time she arrived, but alas, despite their trendy lateness and general purple trouser-ness, their friends hadn't turned up. Sorry, I switched to plural there, because with this purple trousered lady sat her colleague. I believe the purple lady was Mana, and her slightly red haired friend, Angel. Angel immediately reminded me of Joey. She had a similar face, and had the same sort of dark sense of humour. Was making a few jokes and seemed quite entertaining, moreso was when she playfully spanked Mana or slapped her on the leg..hmm...Mana...I'm not getting that name right. Might have been Manda, or Mansa, or haha...Mensa..., no I joke with the last. Even still, yeah, she claimed purple the colour of emperors...I can't remember what we really talked about to be honest. Just bits of it- Angel was Mana's friend and had come down from Scotland, and had attended an Edinburgh Munch before, and, er, some bloke sitting next to us also joined in the chat, as we started talking about assumptions people make regarding people's limits, in terms of how far one takes certain fantasies, and what the difference is in real life, and just online, or reading fiction. Mana confessed she wouldn't let a boyfriend know what sort of kinky material she was reading, incase the boyfriend then thought that those fantasies were really what she wanted to do, when really, she might just be into reading about it, and not necessarily doing it. But likewise, she saw her ex-boyfriend's flatmate checked out a lot of dirty kinky websites on his computer, so started to fancy the flatmate, thinking he was really kinky, but although he was a great guy, and a real character, it turned out he wasn't into doing any of that stuff, and preferred to just talk about it on his computer, than do any of it for real.
I kinda explained my history at that point, about having erotic email penpals online, but never being up for meeting to do anything for real. Then the few times I was tempted to traverse fantasies to reality, the people I was chatting to would chicken out, so always, one of us would chicken out, and I'd think: "Is this what I really want?"....and certainly when I was in unrequited love with Bev, waiting for Bev, i.e. "Wait and make it perfect" as per our weird discussion Nov '98, seemed much better, than just being shallow, and meeting someone off the net for casual encounters...complete strangers, you're a bit worried about, personal safety-wise too. But y'know, five years in, and now I know I don't have to wait for B, and I certainly know she doesn't want me, and I have a proper rejection, I can feel single for the first time in my life. So of late, what with all the common-place chickening out, and much like Bev, where you give and give and give, and don't get a lot back...(although I can't slag off Bev, as she was wonderful, and I used to enjoy the way she replied to quite a lot of my LiveJournal comments, and I'm really grateful to her for that, and I do love her, but, y'know, it was unrequited love, she's good friend fodder, but she wasn't in love with me back, so it was very one way), likewise, you can write tonnes of emails to someone, really invest in that person, getting to know them, what makes them tick, etc, but there's nothing really at the end of it. Worst of all, is when they chicken out, by removing their membership from the website you met them on....so imagine one day getting on really well with someone, and the next they've vanished, it's a bit frustrating....and each time you start over with someone, you feel so exhausted, because you've put in the effort, and never got anything back. I mean, I've been getting jaded, where you just can't be bothered to even try now....you'll see someone's profile, and just think: "I can't be arsed to email them, even though it looks like we have similar interests, I just can't be bothered". And worse still, the latest lady I spoke to online, I wasn't even believing her photos were real, and she was pretty offend...but, y'know, the lady I was chatting to before her, nicked all her photos off of ebay...and they still had the ebay icon, and she's like from Guildford, but the blummin' photo is from an auction from an ebay seller from California...I'm like, no you're blatantly lying to me...I mean - what's going on here?
So this is the logic, in calling the internet shit,
and just going to a pub, for a social meet up, with people into Kink.
It's not a kinky event in itself.
Lots of normal people in a pub essentially.
Just getting to know each other first,
and meeting new people...
you can talk about fantasies later,
rather than discuss a fantasy online with someone, but someone you've not really met or would feel safe around....via an event like a Munch, you get to be friends with someone first, perhaps.
I say perhaps, because I don't think a Munch serves any particular purpose. It's just a meeting place for people, and it's very much up to each individual as to what they get out of it.
In fact, the guy in PVC trousers was telling me there's an under 35s Munch on the third Saturday of each Month...if I might feel more comfortable around people my own age. Indeed, a brief glance around in the early hours of arrival, and most people looked around their 40s. Lots of fat old people. Lol.
But there were pockets and handfuls of younger people, and certainly for the rest of the night, I saw ample diversity, as you'll come to learn as I continue typing.
Indeed, going back to Mana, or whatever her name was,...hang on, letsee if I have her name written down...ah, no I haven't....but yeah, her friend Angel was around 25, so they were pretty similar ages...
Discussion wise, I do remember mentioning Anthony Storr's Stimuli Theory V.S. Freud's Nirvana Principle, but you've heard it enough on this LJ elsewhere, so I won't bother to explain...
....but yeah, then Mana's friend turned up...a Lady called Foxxx, a bit of a BBW, but not huge, and starting singing her happy birthday: "Wow! I didn't realise it was your birthday!" I exclaimed, and she subsequently explained it wasn't for a week yet, Foxxx was just wishing her happy birthday for then.
Anyway, Mana and Angel were a pretty comic duo to watch, teasing each other, and making jokes, but conversion with them both dried up a bit, and I was pretty eager to meet the rest of the room. I spoke briefly with the guy to the right of me, who also happened to be the guy I had seen at the bar when ordering my water, but soon excused myself, and went to mingle.
There was a really really hot girl stood near me, chatting to a bloke....they looked a bit involved, like a couple, and as I negotiated around, they entered into each other's body space. She was fit, but they both looked a little busy, so I thought I would look around to see who else there was, but it was really crowded by this stage, and it was difficult to move to a suitable position to begin talking to others, so I just turned to them, asking if I could introduce myself, and hoping I wasn't interupting anything. But they were really cool. The girl was called Desk, or something like that, oh - Deck! That was it, Deck, and the guy was called....er...fudge I can't remember. Really should have paid more attention to the guy. =P Oh well, but his lady had a massively exposed midrift...just beautiful stomach. The amount you saw, she might as well have come in trousers and bra. I mean, you could see the full runway/stomach, no fat at all. Meanwhile the face....good hair, make up, she looked like Billie. Not in a fat and stupid way, Billie sometimes seems a bit dim doesn't she? A bit common...lol ( or maybe that's just Rose )...but these people were from ...oh gosh, my memory is like a siv...somewhere in West London that sounded pretty posh, and they were reasonably well spoken, although not as in posh. They were very down to earth. Very welcoming also: "Yeah, we come down here from time to time, and always meet newbies, and there are new people coming all the time", or words to that extent. I kinda asked what she was into..."Oooooh...I like to be spanked!" she said, grinning at her master, who pointed out the collar he had got for her. "Do you like it?" he asked. It had a jewel in the middle, that seemed to bounce against her neck, I wondered if that felt at all distracting, and queried whether she could feel it. "That's the reason it's there!" explained her dom. Only they confused me a little, claiming to be an incestuous Daddy and Daughter..."Oh, are you for real? Or just roleplay...!?"
"Oh, no, roleplay silly!" teased Deck, but the father confused me a bit, and still now, I haven't figured out if they were really father and daughter, because she had very similar eyes to him, and they looked so right together, almost as if they were the same type of person.
She seemed to speak as if trying to help me find my feet in realising fantasies, and when I told her I liked ankle bones, she was like: "My god! There are whole clubs devoted to foot worship...there's loads of places...look them up, you'll have no trouble, if that's what your fantasy is, or what you've always wanted to do..." and she continued to imply there were loads of girls up for being worshipped.
Soon enough though, the conversation did dry up, and I went to move on.
Unfortunately the crowds meant it was difficult to move, and I hung around a little bit after I had said bye, just 'cos you couldn't really move, but...
Well...the same problem again....I thought I would walk through the whole room, i.e. from the side I was on, near the entrance, to the very back wall, near the window, just to walk through everyone, see who everyone was, etc, and who might take my fancy to talk to.
But once again, I found myself unable to move, so because of this, turned to two girls near me, and asked if I could introduce myself, so I met...gosh, I can't even remember what the first girl's name was, but her friend's name was PrettyName, and she explained how she had struggled to find a good online username that hadn't been taken, and had mused to herself: "Oh, if only I could think of a really PrettyName", and then thought - "Ah!" and put down "Prettyname" as her id.
Got into a very short topic about cliches, given my crap response of: "Oh, that's a really pretty name...", that she's no doubt had said to her a million times, but other than that, that was pretty much all the conversation. They turned back to two blokes they had been chatting to, so I took the chance to charge through the rest of the crowd, and see what was on the other side of the pub function room....
This was when I met...er, some bloke and his wife Sandra. The guy's name sounded like Ron, but it was something foreign, that blatantly wasn't Ron, but I can't recall it properly now...I'm not even sure if I heard it correctly, so I'll just call him Ron. Heard the sweet story of how he met his Wife at this Munch three years ago, although back then, it was only like 6 people or so, and has since massively grown. Sandra was character watching. She found observing people, and seeing what odd characters would walk in next, quite amusing. Whilst Ron confessed he first came to a BDSM Munch for the sake of philosophy, not for sexual kink. He began to explain how interested he was in issues of power, and powerplay, and the whole sub/dom thing, from a philosophical perspective, and began to talk about examples of power in everyday life, from Governments, to Medical Professionals - to concepts of when you're ill and when you're not...and what is being ill, and what is being healthy - and how you're told when you're one or the other. Sandra and Ron both talked a little about Michael Foucalt(spelling!?), which interested me a bit because Alan's play - Madness - which I had seen on Tuesday, was based on his work, so this is an author I guess I ought to read. I mentioned Marilyn French's Beyond Power: Women, Men, and Morals book to him, explaining how it essentially picked to pieces the male bias of certain religions and tried to look at what society would have been like, with females at the helm. I'm phrasing this incorrectly...there's special words for it...is it patriarchy which I think is the male thing...and then there's a similar word of feminine ways of doing things...but I can't remember it...a good book, anyway, but he hadn't heard of it. When I mentioned Adorno however, it was: "Wow! Dialectic of Englightenment! Awesome book!" - fantastic! Another Adorno fan. ^_^. Hadn't heard of much of the others...
Was it odd to be talking academically about philosophical texts? Indeed, his wife almost looked a bit bored as we rattled on, although confessed not to be. Ron explained:
"Yeah, everyone here, you all know what they do, how they're into S&M, so you don't really need to talk about it, so you just talk about other stuff..."
Eitherway, it was cool to meet them, but once again, I wanted to mingle, so bid them adeiu.
There were a couple of young girls sat in the corner, like I said, only a small handful of girls my age had turned up, so I gravitated towards their table, and a lady called Jade sat at the table was very friendly, and introduced me to everyone at said table. In fact, it turned out she organizes the Putney Munch, so suddenly all became clear why she was so friendly....she's used to being a hostess, making people feel welcome, plus she's out to plug her own event, and get people to come along to it. It was good she introduced me to everyone else though...a guy called Mike, a guy called Steve, a guy called Andy, in a thundercats T-shirt, and the two girls who looked my age - Jo and Lauren. Jo was blonde, and I don't really like blondes, so I was more interested in Lauren, and kinda liked the way her shawl exposed her right shoulder ( from my POV it was the left shoulder, but obviously, was her right shoulder ). But, no, I was standing at the back, behind the table, so not really able to communicate.
Then a guy called Alex comes along and introduces what looked like a Post-Op Transvestite to the group...bloke's face, but real breasts, in a low-cut top. She/He (and there was some confusion) introduce themselves as Andy...so now we had two Andys, an Alex, and myself Andrew. It was like invasions of the "A"s....if only exams could be like that...A,A,aye?
Mike got up to order drinks, and asked me to watch his coat, so luckily, I was able to take his seat till he got back, and sit opposite Lauren. The venue was really noisy though, and her friend Jo was yabbering on about something I could only barely hear, but fully engaging Lauren. So I was sat near someone I fancied chatting to, but wasn't really able to chat. Thankfully, Jade was there to keep me company, and introduced herself and what she did. Alex came over briefly to give her a shoulder massage, but not seriously, just came over to chat basically, and rested his hands on her shoulders as he did so. "This is my personal massor..." or whatever that word is, for someone that gives massages...Alex and Jade both had quite weathered faces...and Alex also wore denim jacket and jeans, which also looked worn, so it worked as an aesthetic, and they looked good together. Both sharing similar traits, and perhaps would make a good couple, although there was no evidence beyond the massage comment to suggest they were actually a couple.
In justifying the Munch, Jade had explained it was good to have friends on the scene. I guessed for advice, or being able to talk to people about stuff, if you're trying out kinky ideas, etc, to work with other people's experience and knowledge, but she summed it up as just meaning that if she had friends over, she didn't have to hurry about the flat hiding the whips, etc.
Whilst Jade and Alex were talking however, I attempted to turn my attention to Lauren, and Jo. It was really noisy so I was only able to couple a few of their words together to figure out what they were talking about.
I'm not sure what they mentioned at first, I just didn't get it, although they kept stopping to turn to me and apologise they were just talking between themselves, but I was happy to let them continue: "You don't mind me eaves dropping?",
"Oh, no, no, not at all"...
So I made an effort to listen to what was being discussed, to see if I could contribute to the conversation.
From what I gathered, Jo was telling Lauren that the more she slept with someone, the more she would fall in love with them. Lauren was in denial, claiming that she didn't find the sort of guy her lover was, to be that attractive.
"What are you talking about?" she retorted, mentioning a few positive adjectives I had trouble hearing, notioning that although not stunning, he was pretty fit.
"Yeah, well, you should see him naked..." commented Lauren.
Actually, I should stress, incase I get anyone in trouble from this write up, I could have completely misheard this.
Addressing the fact I couldn't hear properly, Lauren turned to explain...
"Sorry we're just nattering like this, and can't explain..."
"We're talking about poly relationships..." explain Jo. "Just too much jealously...just doesn't work...don't go there..."
"Oh!? Are you in one then?" I enquired.
"Oh!? No...finished that long ago. I was, yeah, but it's over now..."
..whilst Lauren then went onto explain she had been introduced to the convenience of no strings sex. Only since last week, and had only slept with this guy once, but it was a time, and date, all pre-arranged, and you just turn up for sex, and, as she put it: "None of that, oooh...what do they want!? Or, what's going on between us? Or, what does it mean?, that you get with relationships." and she seemed to imply it was liberating in a way, not having to worry about the complications. Yet she also knew that this person that she was seeing was also sleeping with other women, and her and Jo had been discussing how she felt about that. Lauren was claiming it was no problem, whilst Jo was foreseeing that the more she slept with him, the more she would begin to fall for him. She refuted this, both on the terms that she wasn't like Jo, this guy wasn't the sort of guy she would normally fall for, and besides all this, she had only slept with him once, and only had this arrangement since last week....so it wasn't like she was in a relationship with him.
After chatting with Jo and Lauren for a while, I thought I had best mingle again, so let Mike know where his coat was, and went to move on....only, once again I couldn't. Yet Mike was chatting to some big lady with an american accent, I thought I might as well get introduced and make her accquaintance too, so I did as much. She was babbling on about how she was from Norwich, with an Admin job, but was set to move to London soon, and mentioned she was setting up her own production company, to produce a movie about goblins. She claimed cinema distribution, if talks with a contact of hers went well, whilst the movie itself was to be filmed and editing by contacts she had made that were recently out of film school....some friends had made some excellent shorts, and TV dramas, and were now ready for Film, so she would use her contacts to help them produce a film, and they would produce her film script...something about goblins...and she had also managed to secure the interest of some celebrity actor, who apparently liked goblins, and was excited by the idea. She was waiting for the actor to see the script and confirm his involvement, so that she could use his name to help in recruiting funding. It was obviously all very much at the ideas stage, and whilst she appeared to have what she needed to prepare a pitch, I did get the impression she was all talk, and goodness knows if she could pull it off. I at least gave her praise for gathering talent around her....obviously, with my DVD, I've tried to do everything myself, and that has been really difficult, whereas she has a group of graduate film makers and editors....but even still....from idea to cinema distribution, I'm dubious. However, I know one can get stuff put on at select cinemas if not nationwide...so let her try. If she thinks she can do it, fantastic, and maybe she can, and will be able to. But I kinda lost interest in her talk after awhile, as I felt I had seen it all before. I liked the passion with which she spoke, as that was genuine, like she really believed in the project, but I would really step back, and play wait and see. I had learnt the distribution, I had learnt that they had yet to pitch for finance, they had yet to make any pilot, showreel or demo to display the production house's competence (although conversely her friends did have a number of good completed projects behind them) but, yeah - I basically had all my questions answered. It was time to move on. Nonetheless, I left Mike guessing who the lead actor was, and the lady dropping hints, as he guessed. If no one was to know yet, why was she teasing him like that?
Oh well....
I headed back towards the front of the Pub, where I met a couple of guys my age.
"Yeah, no, my mate just brought me along", he mentioned, notioning towards another guy a similar age, with an oriental girlfriend...wasn't sure if she was Japanese or Chinese (didn't look Korean), although looked london born and bred, despite the oriental features.
The guy mentioned he had studied Graphic Design at Uni, but failed to get work in the field, so was now in the financial industry, I assumed doing Admin but didn't know.
We had a discussion about methods to get freelance graphic design work.
And of course friends asking for free websites all the time. =) And how you have to prioritise...like Joey is getting hers done atm, but India is unfortunately having to wait, I still need to do Rowen's CGI stuff, and Adam asked me to do the RadCon website, but I had to turn him down, as I'm too busy atm.
But yeah, mentioned the trick of just going through the yellow pages, and asking businesses if they want a site done.
He did though, seem resigned to trying again now. He had given it a few years, and had no luck, so had switched careers. He did know it was possible, as some of his friends had landed jobs, but he concluded that it all came down to the person. Also mentioned that it wasn't necessarily a lack of work, but in London especially, tonnes of competition.
There was a couple stood opposite us, and I kinda sensed that they might want to be included in our circle, and join in our conversation, as they were kinda looking our way, so I turned around, and introduced myself, and we got chatting.
I can't remember either of their names....it was a tall guy with shoulder length wavey hair, and small goatee, and a short and stout lady, with gingery/golden hair, and they both were nice and friendly. The bloke had a fantastic way with words, managing to slip in words that added flavour to sentances...clever adjectives and metaphors, almosts poetical in part, but with none of the ponce. He looked like some kinda roadie at a Gig...you can imagine him part of the Wayne's World 2 stage team, listening to the guy going on about the jar full of M&Ms annecdote. I digress, once again I was asked for my IC username, which I didn't have, but assured them I would register by the weekend.
He explained how they owed a lot to IC. One fateful night in Leeds, he had seen the lady, and thought hang on...do I know her? A bit further down the road, and it struck him he had seen her photo and profile on IC, so he realised, and went back and spoke to her, and that's how they met, and now they're boyfriend and girlfriend. =) How sweet.
But Leeds!?!
Turns out he was a yorkshireman! Blimey! =P
Little piece of genius though - we realised we were stood right in the pathway of people trying to move from one end of the room to the other, or at least get to the bar, and we had had a constant flux of people brushing against us, or bumping into us, or saying: "Excuse please..." every three seconds, and he saw that the table behind us, wasn't pushed back, so we moved the table, to create more room.
My rucksack had been getting in the way too, and he kindly informed me of a bag holding area at the front I had failed to notice. So, I got to ditch my bag there, which was cool. Suddenly felt a bit lighter, and whatnot. Eitherway, I decided to move on yet again....
CONTINUES IN PART#2...
Still to come in Part #2:
- Foxxx & Jade on an IC nick:
...A name is very personal, and I am very much an individual, and stubborn...
- Caressing Lauren's Shoulder:
..."Woah!" I shuddered, and took a few steps backwards, somewhat overcome by the sensation...
- Clubbing, anyone?
...her and Jo were off to a Lesbian club...
- A second time with Lauren's Shoulders:
...it felt like I was alone, suspended in a black void, just myself, and a shoulder...
- Lauren compliments me:
...I took the complement, even if I didn't recognise what she was talking about...
- Andy on Audio:
...so I mentioned the bands I knew, and we started talking about music production...
- Lauren Falls on Me:
...and stuck her cheek out to be kissed...ah(!). I'm not used to that...
- Leaving:
..."Bye! Bye to you people I never met..."...
- On the tube:
...a guy doing air guitar...
- The girl that controls her family:
...She started cracking up with laughter as everytime she nudged his arm, his eyebrows raised....
- Swindon Posse, from a Thursday gig:
...Eitherway, all of these girls, and this guy, had apparently just come back from a gig for a band called Thursday...
- Beatbox near ASDA, and considering Jax:
...I had done a human beatbox against the wall of the subway...I loved the echo...
- Reflections on Lauren:
I don't actually love her. And that bugs me.