Timorous Beastie

Subterranean homesick alien

2009-12-01T18:59:00.004Z

The cold air whipped past my ears in a long, sibilant howl and unseen snaps, crackles and pops accompanied the whir of the wheels as I cycled over twigs and tiny acorns. It was late and both the cycle path and the fields beyond were blanketed in darkness. The faint beam of my headlight captured glimpses of movement as woodland creatures scurried in the hedgerows. Trees tossed their branches back and forth in creaky dips and sways. I was all alone in the eerie night. Then I saw it.

Some distance away, on the other side of the fields, was a dim blue glow. It disappeared from view momentarily as I rounded a bend. Then it returned. As large as a house, it had a pulsating, phosphorescent quality that did not illuminate so much as throb. Trees shielded it from view, but I could make out a cluster of white spheres about the size of footballs hovering close to it on one side. What the...? Again, with a tantalizing shimmer, it slipped out of sight beyond a steep bank. At the next bend, it'd be visible again, and closer. I slowed, readying myself to be taken, trance-like, on board the beautiful craft.

With my last snap, crackle and pop on this earth, I emerged from the final bend and looked up in wonder. There it stood before me: a bungalow with blue and white Christmas lights.

Hobbits

2009-11-23T17:03:00.005Z

How has it gone unnoticed for this long that Emperor Akihito is a surviving member of the Flores species Homo Floresiensis?

Foiled again

2009-11-20T08:36:00.004Z

After her many shenanigans in Tokyo, Screechy eventually moved, with her husband, to Washington DC, and I moved here to England. We stay in touch occasionally, but I did not expect to see her again, since we are no longer colleagues nor living on the same continent.

A couple of weeks ago, she contacted me about a conference taking place next year in Spain and asked if I wanted to present with her. The conference is not in her field, so why she'd want to fly half way round the world to present on something she's not an expert in is unclear. Perhaps that's why she needs me.

I had already submitted a proposal to present myself and was looking forward to a screech-free weekend of drinking roija and shoveling manchego into my face. But I had the perfect get-out clause: the deadline was looming for any further proposals. "I'm sorry" I replied. "We don't have enough data and there's just not enough time to do it before the deadline."

Two days later, she emailed me back. "Hurrah! They've changed the deadline!"

4.00 am in Hovisville

2009-11-14T04:21:00.002Z

I’ve read an easy chapter on semantics. I’ve read a dense and inaccessible chapter on syntactic parsing, not understanding any of it. I’ve listened to Beethoven. I’ve listened to Glasvegas. I’ve got up and checked my email. I’ve decided that 2.30 in the morning is a good time to search for sample questionnaires online. I’ve searched Google images for ‘facial disfigurement’. (Nothing whatsoever to do with my research; it’s just one of the places my mind goes when I’m awake and alone at three in the morning). I’ve lain in the dark and graduated from thoughts on how best to get a bird feeder up the tree outside my window, via the incessant pain in my head, to my imminent failure to complete my PhD, consequent financial ruin and early and in some way humiliating death. And surprise surprise, I’m still awake.

Quote of the day

2009-11-11T14:21:00.002Z

Will Self, upon being asked if he'd be going to see the film adaptation of Dan Brown's Angels and Demons:

"I'd sooner have my buttocks fret-sawed off, varnished and sold in a provincial gift shop."

Whatever can go wrong...

2009-11-07T21:37:00.003Z

I had ordered the bike in June, but by the time I was summoned to collect it, November was thrashing Hovisville with all its angry might and darkness was upon the town by three in the afternoon. The rain was torrential and unrelenting, but having waited this long, I was loathe miss my chance.

The new bike is a strange fish. For one thing, it’s pink. Aside from that, it’s not the sit-up-and-beg Dutch or Japanese style that I’m used to. It has 14 gears and forces me to lean forward to reach the handlebars, making it impossible to carry an umbrella.

So with my head exposed, I set off through the hailstones towards home. Such was the fury of the weather, that by the time I’d got to the end of the street, my jeans were waterlogged and my bra was wet. I could barely see where I was going for the rain in my eyes.

In such conditions, I felt it unwise to stay on the road, so veered towards the pavement only to realise, too late, that the smooth slope I’d seen ahead of me was actually a large brown puddle with a kerb submerged beneath it. To stop in time, I had to brake and bring my feet to rest in ankle-deep water. Cursing, I lifted the bike and myself free, trailing great streams of water as I went.

With around 300 meters to go, I noticed that the road ahead was flooded. Passing cars were, with a pleasing hiss, casting a graceful, five-foot arc of filthy water across the narrow strip of pavement I was about to cross.

In retrospect, I don’t know why I bothered to brake, since I was already soaked to the skin. But once the wheels were set in motion, they were doomed to continue, skidding across the piles of sopping leaves, and delivering me, chest-and-mobile-phone first into the freezing deluge I’d been so keen to avoid.

I like to think the arc I created matched that of the finest Ford Mondeo.

Epistemological heuristic didacticism

2009-11-01T20:34:00.002Z

When I taught English, I would be asked questions like “What does the mean?” When I taught writing skills, I would be asked “What does refute mean?” But it’s all ballooning out of control now. The little bastards are asking questions like “What’s the difference between dialectic, dialogic and didactic?” I’ve had to look stuff up! This is not on!

West coast main line

2009-10-28T10:58:00.001Z

When I moved to England, I missed the earthquakes that had been such a regular feature of life in Japan. Some would make Timorous Beast cry out in the night. Some would rattle the room for ten seconds before disappearing as suddenly as they’d arrived, leaving a sickening sway in their wake. Others would gently shake the furniture and remind us of the busy earth beneath.

Now I live next to the railway line. At night, the trains snort into my dreams, shaking the building. Sometimes I feel I’m in Tokyo and reach out to touch Timorous Beast’s hand.

Erratum

2009-10-26T21:26:00.003Z

Che has been moaning that my link to Tim was not representative, and she has demanded that I link to this one.

A weekend with Che

2009-10-21T13:45:00.001+01:00

We kicked off the weekend watching the incomparable Tim Minchin, and feasting on Bradford’s finest curries and chapattis, and then repaired to Hovisville, where we spent Saturday discussing lambs, sampling cheeses and eating lemon and fennel sausages. Sunday took us to the windy seaside for an afternoon of browsing in a wonderful second-hand bookshop. The latter included the added bonus of a love-in with the lovely bookshop owner’s little brown dog, who would take off down the length of the shop, leaping over piles of books in pursuit of his tuggy thing, and return triumphant to snarl and savage the thing with all comers.

The chav express

2009-10-16T08:31:00.000+01:00

At one end of the carriage, chocolate-smeared toddlers kicked chairs and clambered over headrests. At the other, men with tattooed necks broadcast techno music for the captive passengers. In the middle, a band of brassy-haired thirty-somethings in fake tan and gold jewellery had cackled and screeched their way through three bottles of Blossom Hill rose and a sex quiz from Heat magazine, and were now making headway on the cans of ready-mixed rum and coke. It was 11.15 in the morning, it was Bradford, and the train was going to Blackpool.

Twisted firestarter

2009-10-11T19:23:00.004+01:00

I am now officially a PhD student, which means I'm teaching linguistics to English 18 year olds instead of study skills to foreigners. Perhaps that explains why I spent my Saturday morning learning how to say "The turtle saw the man" in one of the 250 Australian Aboriginal languages rather than, say, doing my own research.

And in case you're wondering where the hell I've been these past few weeks, I've moved away from Stroppy Teenager and into my own flat. Alas, an Internet connection has not followed me quite as promptly as I'd planned. If you hear anything about Virgin Media's headquarters being firebombed or Andy from the Virgin Media Swansea Broadband Team being disembowelled and strangled with his own intestines, rest assured it wasn't me - I was in the local Internet cafe all night.

Usurped

2009-09-25T16:41:00.000+01:00

Crazy Landlady and Stroppy Teenager have buggered off, leaving Oscar the Cat in the care of Bible Thumper, who has been evicted and is in the process of moving out, making it unlikely that he’ll feel inclined to continue offering free pet-sitting services. That leaves me, who expressly told Crazy Landlady that I had no intention of looking after her cat and Chinese Couple in the room next to mine.

When I come home, Chinese Couple call me into the living room.

“There is cat. But there is also cat outside. We think this cat is not Oscar.”

I look under the coffee table.

An enormous tabby cat, which barely resembles Oscar, is crouched in the corner, yowling in fear. Outside the back door sits a forlorn Oscar, yowling in misery. It falls to me to evict the intruder.

Angel of the north

2009-09-21T21:15:00.001+01:00

Wilkinson, a chain of general homeware/hardware-type shops scattered across the north of England, is the true angel of the north. They sell everything a poor PhD student could ever need: wooden spoons for 25p, frying pans for 3 quid, curtain hooks, screwdrivers, colanders, corkscrews, baking dishes, lamps, laundry baskets. You name it, they have it. You can even fall in love there.

My fantasy

2009-09-17T21:16:00.003+01:00

Sorry about the lack of blog posts lately. Work has been busy and home has been...eventful. Fellow tenants change with the weather: Peter the Teacher was moving in, and then he wasn't. Chris the Bible Thumper did move in and is now being thrown out. Stroppy Teenager and her navel-gazing boyfriend have taken root on the sofa, and four Chinese people appear to be moving in this weekend. I've been asked to move out early, move out late, pay more rent, and finally, move into Stroppy Teenager's room.

In response to all this, I shall simply tell you that I dreamt I had reluctantly agreed to share my bed with Stroppy Teenager. In the dream, I woke in the middle of the night, dragged her out of bed by the ankles and punched her repeatedly.

House sharing by numbers

2009-09-05T21:27:00.007+01:00

Phones thrown at walls by Stroppy Teenager: 3

Pictures smashed by Stroppy Teenager: 1

Number of times I've used the washing machine: approx. 15

Number of times I've emptied the washing machine of Landlady's washing and hung said washing up: approx. 15

Items of my food eaten by Stroppy Teenager: 3

Sinkfuls of dirty dishes left for days: approx. 90

Wet towels left in the bathtub: 9

Lights in the hallway without a bulb: 3

Broken TVs left in my room: 1

Boxes of landlady’s stuff stored under my bed: approx. 20

Number of times Stroppy Teenager has woken me up at 3.00 am: 6

Bars of my soap thrown away: 2

Number of times Landlady has bought soap: 0

Space in the fridge for my food: 0

Pairs of dirty tights and undies left in the hall: 7

Tenancy agreements given to me: 0

Leaks in the bathroom: 1

Attempts made by landlady to fix the leak in the bathroom: 0

Cats left in my care: 1

Months it's taken me to realize I'm not especially tolerant: 3

Number of weeks till I move out: 2

A higher power

2009-08-29T20:11:00.003+01:00

Scottish Justice Minister Kenny MacAskill’s announcement that a certain Libyan prisoner faced “a sentence imposed by a higher power” may have revealed more about Scotland’s national character than MacAskill intended. Not only is God up there controlling our fate, allowing us to go on blaming others whenever we make a poor decision, but cancer is also a form of divine punishment. Not so much compassion as Presbyterian bullshit then.

Lock up your sons

2009-08-22T18:22:00.003+01:00

To make our international students feel at home, we took them to the pub. They’d only been in the country a week, but with the benefit of beer, inhibitions were lowered and stories of romance were shared.

One had fallen in love with the guy in Barclay’s Bank. Another wanted advice on the etiquette of arranging a date with someone she’d met in the aisles of Wilkinson’s. A Chinese girl began to describe a Syrian guy she’d met on campus. Everyone in the group leaned forward to catch her idiosyncratic pronunciation over the noise of the pub, our eyes wide with anticipation.

She looked around at the watching eyes and gushed, “He had such a beautiful penis!” Smiles froze on the gathered faces as an uncomfortable silence descended. Two Japanese students glanced at each other doubtfully. People looked at their hands and shuffled in their seats. One brave Turkish girl finally spoke up, “What did you say?”

“Green eyes” repeated the Chinese girl, “He had beautiful green eyes.”

My first night in jail

2009-08-16T20:17:00.001+01:00

I went to a performance of Tosca in Lancaster Castle. The idea of sitting in a castle that dates back to Roman times listening to Italian opera is an enchanting one, but it was the fact that Lancaster Castle is also a functioning “category C” prison that really sold it to me. Initially, I approached the wrong gate; the one with barbed wire and a sign bearing a portcullis and the letters HMP. I recognised the correct gate by its gift shop selling mock 14^th century goblets. As I sat on a carved oak bench listening to Scarpia singing of molten tears, I wondered if the category C prisoners could hear it too.

Lettuce be thankful

2009-08-13T19:08:00.000+01:00

No more shall my spinach spill over and my pine nuts plummet to the kitchen floor. My rocket shall be restrained and my dressing won't drip. The bowl is here. Long live the bowl.

Beast spared

2009-08-09T16:55:00.002+01:00

Timorous Beast and I talk every weekend with the aid of Skype and webcams. I enjoy seeing my sofa and hearing the sound of the cicadas (or these days, rain) outside our apartment in Tokyo. This time, mid conversation, Beast cocked his head to one side and said, “Oh!”. Then the camera began shaking violently. An earthquake! Being unable to actually feel it myself, I could only judge its strength by the intensity of the shaking, which seemed to be increasing. We looked at each other in surprise. “Go stand in the doorway” I cried. Beast, reluctant to seem rude by exiting stage left in the middle of a conversation, remained on the sofa. “Go to the door!” I yelled, “Go to the door!” He disappeared off camera and I was left watching the back of the sofa. A minute later the shaking stopped, his footsteps padded across the wooden floor, and he was back. I even got a glimpse of his bum as he passed the screen.

Hat-trick

2009-08-05T22:27:00.001+01:00

Last week, my part of Hovisville had a powercut. I was tucked up in bed, so it was not so much an inconvenience as a sleep aid. The streetlights outside my window were instantly extinguished, the teenager’s TV silenced, and so I slipped gently off to dreams of the 1970s.

Yesterday, we sent our international students into town to open bank accounts. An hour later, they returned empty-handed. “Electric does not work in whole town centre.” They said.

Tonight, my landlady told me where she keeps the torch and matches. “Just in case”, she smiled. “Ha, yes”, I replied, “but I doubt there’ll be another one, eh?”

An hour later, and halfway through Property Snakes and Ladders, everything went dark. Now I’ll never get to gloat over how much money that twat with the penthouse flat lost.

Post box

2009-08-03T18:31:00.004+01:00

I have neither a salad bowl nor a persian rug as yet. What I do have, however, is a slip of paper from the post office informing me that I have "2nd box's" waiting to be picked up. How mysterious: who is 2nd Box and what has he sent me?

Behind the times

2009-07-26T19:08:00.003+01:00

I have just made my first purchase on ebay! Well, I think I have. It may turn out, in due course, that I failed to enter the right bank account details or forgot to verify something or other that I was supposed to verify and thus will be charged a small fortune in return for no goods at all, or that I've actually bought an antique persian rug for £3000 instead of a pasta bowl for a tenner. Only time will tell.

Dear green place

2009-07-17T07:23:00.002+01:00

I said in my previous post that trips to Scotland do not usually ignite my heart with joy, but to be fair that’s probably because my trips to Scotland generally involve staying with my mother in a place that makes people inhale sharply when I tell them I’m from there.

The wedding I’ve just attended took place at Glasgow University, somewhere I've not been since I graduated. The sun shone for the whole weekend, which I suspect it had not done in the intervening seventeen years, so I walked for miles, revisiting my old haunts and reacquainting myself with the beautiful West End. I’d forgotten how majestic it is with its grand, sweeping terraces, huge mansion flats, and gothic towers and quadrangles.

I visited the Hunterian Museum, which I’m ashamed to say I’d never done before despite having lived just round the corner from it. Had I known when I was 20 that it contained a mastodon’s tooth and a weasel’s penis bone, I'd have been a regular. I left satisfied and, as I strolled through Kelvingrove Park, bumped into the happy couple from the wedding the night before.

A lovely day was had and by the time the evening, and my trip to the place that makes people inhale sharply, came around, I was feeling quite sentimental.