Today was a really bad day, the events of which brought alot of things into stark relief. For those you who don't want to be bored, I'm going to start with the bad. To be honest, the good isn't very interesting either. So I'm sorry for wasting three sentences of your time!
I work for a government department. My grade is low and my pay reflects this. I don't mind very much in the sense that my mental state at the moment makes me glad I don't have something more high pressure. I push a lot of paper and answer a lot of calls. I am effectively Ron Livingstone (kudos if that ref means anything).
But today I, or rather my manager's manager, received a written complaint about me. It was facetious, malicious and completely ungrounded. Now, I appreciate that I would say that, but the complaint was baseless on every objective level I can conceive. Beneath the anti-government schpiel that I'm more than used to by now, some valid points were raised. Except I was not responsible for the 'misinformation' or the time delay that this individual was so aggrieved at. I am also not responsible for writing legislation.
I know that I should be vindicated, but there were no words of reassurance from either my immediate manager (a rampant alcoholic whose memory and therefore testimony is entirely unreliable) or my managers manager. The complaint will be processed. I will be asked to fall on my sword, I imagine, and apologise to a man who's destroyed many people's livelihoods. I doubt I will lose my job, though I cannot be certain of this. And this on the day I receive notification of promotional opportunities I've been begging for for months. I'm not ambitious, but I need the money. I wonder how this will look on my file?
This is why I love film. I am put in mind of a fight club style negotiation:
All this has forced me to remember being fired from a job that I loved, all because of my tumultuous private life. The pay was offensively low, but I loved it. Working in film distribution was a dream, and because I blew it, I will never have the opportunity again. I took this job out of desperation and in this job I will stay. A promotion will keep me there, but any more static and I'm going on a serious re-evaluation of my life bender.
Hey, ho. everything happens for a reason, right?
Dan, my sole friend in the office is transferring out as he can't stand the office atmosphere. He's a smart lad, that one. So I will lose my smoke buddy and my fopp buddy. Having said that I probably deserve it, as when I met his girlfriend all I could think about was how much i wanted to have sex with her.
DON'T JUDGE ME, PEOPLE. NO SEX FOR NEARLY A YEAR. GOING. OUT. OF. MIND
On a happier note, I saw The Curious Case of Benjamin Button tonight. It was very old-school Hollywood, and had a lot to recommend it. The f/x really deserve the s before them, especially in the regression work. Absolutely outstanding, to the point I couldn't tell when the prosthetic make-up ended and the CGI began. Brad Pitt was outstanding. Very subtle, which is something I had forgotten he was capable of. This bodes well for Tree of Life (dinosaurs will make an appearance in that, apparently. I kid you not.) If I had to make any criticism it would be that the first half was stronger than the second, and that 2h45m pushed bottom-numbing boundaries that need not be pushed. But this ambitious sort of film-making (I say that well aware of some blatant Forrest Gump riffing) can only be applauded, and should be encouraged.
Bought the Fountain soundtrack today. Bloody expensive too, but I'm glad I don't have to Youtube it any more. I have also purchased a rather nifty check shirt and tan belt. My deposit has finally been returned by the landlord, so i thought i'd treat myself before the rest goes into debt repayment.
I want to be with Carina. I want to be with her so badly, it almost hurts. But Benjamin Button has given me hope that perhaps, even though we met at the wrong time and I fell in love at the wrong time, our moment might still come. She just has to want it too.
Waffle over. If you have finished this, thank you. Now go get a cookie
I work for a government department. My grade is low and my pay reflects this. I don't mind very much in the sense that my mental state at the moment makes me glad I don't have something more high pressure. I push a lot of paper and answer a lot of calls. I am effectively Ron Livingstone (kudos if that ref means anything).
But today I, or rather my manager's manager, received a written complaint about me. It was facetious, malicious and completely ungrounded. Now, I appreciate that I would say that, but the complaint was baseless on every objective level I can conceive. Beneath the anti-government schpiel that I'm more than used to by now, some valid points were raised. Except I was not responsible for the 'misinformation' or the time delay that this individual was so aggrieved at. I am also not responsible for writing legislation.
I know that I should be vindicated, but there were no words of reassurance from either my immediate manager (a rampant alcoholic whose memory and therefore testimony is entirely unreliable) or my managers manager. The complaint will be processed. I will be asked to fall on my sword, I imagine, and apologise to a man who's destroyed many people's livelihoods. I doubt I will lose my job, though I cannot be certain of this. And this on the day I receive notification of promotional opportunities I've been begging for for months. I'm not ambitious, but I need the money. I wonder how this will look on my file?
This is why I love film. I am put in mind of a fight club style negotiation:
All this has forced me to remember being fired from a job that I loved, all because of my tumultuous private life. The pay was offensively low, but I loved it. Working in film distribution was a dream, and because I blew it, I will never have the opportunity again. I took this job out of desperation and in this job I will stay. A promotion will keep me there, but any more static and I'm going on a serious re-evaluation of my life bender.
Hey, ho. everything happens for a reason, right?
Dan, my sole friend in the office is transferring out as he can't stand the office atmosphere. He's a smart lad, that one. So I will lose my smoke buddy and my fopp buddy. Having said that I probably deserve it, as when I met his girlfriend all I could think about was how much i wanted to have sex with her.
DON'T JUDGE ME, PEOPLE. NO SEX FOR NEARLY A YEAR. GOING. OUT. OF. MIND
On a happier note, I saw The Curious Case of Benjamin Button tonight. It was very old-school Hollywood, and had a lot to recommend it. The f/x really deserve the s before them, especially in the regression work. Absolutely outstanding, to the point I couldn't tell when the prosthetic make-up ended and the CGI began. Brad Pitt was outstanding. Very subtle, which is something I had forgotten he was capable of. This bodes well for Tree of Life (dinosaurs will make an appearance in that, apparently. I kid you not.) If I had to make any criticism it would be that the first half was stronger than the second, and that 2h45m pushed bottom-numbing boundaries that need not be pushed. But this ambitious sort of film-making (I say that well aware of some blatant Forrest Gump riffing) can only be applauded, and should be encouraged.
Bought the Fountain soundtrack today. Bloody expensive too, but I'm glad I don't have to Youtube it any more. I have also purchased a rather nifty check shirt and tan belt. My deposit has finally been returned by the landlord, so i thought i'd treat myself before the rest goes into debt repayment.
I want to be with Carina. I want to be with her so badly, it almost hurts. But Benjamin Button has given me hope that perhaps, even though we met at the wrong time and I fell in love at the wrong time, our moment might still come. She just has to want it too.
Waffle over. If you have finished this, thank you. Now go get a cookie
I have just watched the NEW T4 trailer and it looks good, But some book modification may now be necessary. You and me McG are done professionally lol
Deep down, I know there'll always be a part of me that doesn't recover.
Not sure how i feel about that.
Today I thought of Harry Potter and two awesome Harry Potter YouTube videos:
1st: the Harry Potter rap:
'
2nd: The mysterious ticking noise:
?
Whilst the glamour of HP has faded since the post-lucy fallout, those still crack me up. Maybe the films will re-ignite the series fire.
On a serious note: the antiques roadshow is a programme full of no good rotten liars
Sod all this history: you take an item on to see if its worth pawning to feed your middle-class, underground, spanking club
when they tell you how much its worth, you're not as surprised as you pretend to be, are you? You expect it to be worth money - in fact, you expect it to be worth more. When you say 'I didn't expect it to be worth so much' you're actually thinking, 'is that all?'
On a cheery note, i am stoked about T4. Even with McG at the helm, its looking good...
I have also discovered Little Boots. Bad dancing has ensued
1st: the Harry Potter rap:
'
2nd: The mysterious ticking noise:
?
Whilst the glamour of HP has faded since the post-lucy fallout, those still crack me up. Maybe the films will re-ignite the series fire.
On a serious note: the antiques roadshow is a programme full of no good rotten liars
Sod all this history: you take an item on to see if its worth pawning to feed your middle-class, underground, spanking club
when they tell you how much its worth, you're not as surprised as you pretend to be, are you? You expect it to be worth money - in fact, you expect it to be worth more. When you say 'I didn't expect it to be worth so much' you're actually thinking, 'is that all?'
On a cheery note, i am stoked about T4. Even with McG at the helm, its looking good...
I have also discovered Little Boots. Bad dancing has ensued
They will ask me to save them, and I will whisper...'no.'
Who's watching the watchbears?
Mickey Rourke: Robbed
Marisa Tomei: Robbed
In Bruges: Robbed
Waltz with Bashir: Robbed
The Oscars have been a joke for years now, but it doesn't stop me getting excited- only to be abused. I suffer from awards Stockolm syndrome, and I don't like it!
To be cap off a fine day, the ooma:
has gone and got herself a boyfriend, or at least I think she has
Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
Pick me! Pick me!
I don't sound desperate do I?
And none of that 'plenty of fish in the sea' malarky. I want one fish
Marisa Tomei: Robbed
In Bruges: Robbed
Waltz with Bashir: Robbed
The Oscars have been a joke for years now, but it doesn't stop me getting excited- only to be abused. I suffer from awards Stockolm syndrome, and I don't like it!
To be cap off a fine day, the ooma:
has gone and got herself a boyfriend, or at least I think she has
Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
Pick me! Pick me!
I don't sound desperate do I?
And none of that 'plenty of fish in the sea' malarky. I want one fish
So, after a successful morning continuing the painstaking process of editing my book, I now believe its about time i started talking about it.
As a tentative dip of the toe into the murky waters of sharing, I thought I'd begin by explaining what inspires me.
I've been working on the book for about a year and a half now. Before then my central interest had been screenwriting. I wasn't very good at screenwriting, and no amount of Final Draft was going to change that. But the experimentation was still useful. It taught me where some of strengths lay and where my weaknesses were. At that stage the weaknesses were winning out.
I put the screenplay in a box and there it has remained for a couple of years. I shudder to even think about it. For a couple of months I didn't even think about writing anything. The breakthrough oddly, was inadvertantly triggered by Harry Potter.
Lucy challenged the two of us to write a synopsis centred around how we thought Deathly Hallows would end the series. Mine descended into farce, but Lucy liked what she read and encouraged me to pick up the laptop again. It must be said she is an exceptional fiction writer in her own right, and was quite advanced with her own first book.
I wrote the first two and a half thousand words one day while at work, in an adrenaline fuelled daze. Much of my writing happens like that. With much stopping and starting I had a basic draft of 350,000 words written in a year. Its this I have to edit, and pare down to around 150,000 words. I work by the mantra 'don't get it right, get it written.' Much of the draft is crap, but with some time and thought, there's enough (hopefully) to make a good book from. I don't believe there's any harm in having too many ideas down on paper, unless you end up like Michael Douglas in the Wonder Boys. Too many words forces you to make choices, and that's a good thing.
Whilst editing, which can be fairly dull and requires intense concentration, I like to look for tonal inspiration. I'm very influenced by colour, for instance. If my book ever sees the light of day, I hope that I have succeeded in making colour a secondary character. Colour can get across emotion and atmosphere better than nearly anything. So I look to Rothko and Turner and Pollock, who, I believe, shared the same sentiment.
Music has also increasingly been used to help atmosphere and also rhythm. Hopefully, the chapter I'm writing now will share a similar rhythm and feel to this:
Film is also a brilliant source of inspiration. I like to think I'm a pretty visual writer, so taking the cues from moving pictures can be highly rewarding.
But ultimately, the best thing that anyone hoping to write can do, is read. You learn so much without evening noticing. Plus, its one of the great pleasures in life.
Now my blogs are appalling written, i know that. I feel as if I'm among friends, so i have nothing to prove. I don't edit, or read back. I blog as a cathartic exercise rather than a creative one. So you'll have to forgive me, and give me the benefit of the doubt!
Well after that self-indulgent waffle, I hope you're having a good weekend!
As a tentative dip of the toe into the murky waters of sharing, I thought I'd begin by explaining what inspires me.
I've been working on the book for about a year and a half now. Before then my central interest had been screenwriting. I wasn't very good at screenwriting, and no amount of Final Draft was going to change that. But the experimentation was still useful. It taught me where some of strengths lay and where my weaknesses were. At that stage the weaknesses were winning out.
I put the screenplay in a box and there it has remained for a couple of years. I shudder to even think about it. For a couple of months I didn't even think about writing anything. The breakthrough oddly, was inadvertantly triggered by Harry Potter.
Lucy challenged the two of us to write a synopsis centred around how we thought Deathly Hallows would end the series. Mine descended into farce, but Lucy liked what she read and encouraged me to pick up the laptop again. It must be said she is an exceptional fiction writer in her own right, and was quite advanced with her own first book.
I wrote the first two and a half thousand words one day while at work, in an adrenaline fuelled daze. Much of my writing happens like that. With much stopping and starting I had a basic draft of 350,000 words written in a year. Its this I have to edit, and pare down to around 150,000 words. I work by the mantra 'don't get it right, get it written.' Much of the draft is crap, but with some time and thought, there's enough (hopefully) to make a good book from. I don't believe there's any harm in having too many ideas down on paper, unless you end up like Michael Douglas in the Wonder Boys. Too many words forces you to make choices, and that's a good thing.
Whilst editing, which can be fairly dull and requires intense concentration, I like to look for tonal inspiration. I'm very influenced by colour, for instance. If my book ever sees the light of day, I hope that I have succeeded in making colour a secondary character. Colour can get across emotion and atmosphere better than nearly anything. So I look to Rothko and Turner and Pollock, who, I believe, shared the same sentiment.
Music has also increasingly been used to help atmosphere and also rhythm. Hopefully, the chapter I'm writing now will share a similar rhythm and feel to this:
Film is also a brilliant source of inspiration. I like to think I'm a pretty visual writer, so taking the cues from moving pictures can be highly rewarding.
But ultimately, the best thing that anyone hoping to write can do, is read. You learn so much without evening noticing. Plus, its one of the great pleasures in life.
Now my blogs are appalling written, i know that. I feel as if I'm among friends, so i have nothing to prove. I don't edit, or read back. I blog as a cathartic exercise rather than a creative one. So you'll have to forgive me, and give me the benefit of the doubt!
Well after that self-indulgent waffle, I hope you're having a good weekend!
In my head I am waging a war. A war against the commercials which make no sense, even taking into account their internal logic. As an army of one I crush them with my imaginery superstrength and laser-eyes.
This commercial FAILS. It failed before the economic crisis and it fails now. Firstly, I don't want the man who runs my bank to be holding an important policy conference in the pub. I don't want him drinking alcohol. And it seems to be that Happy is a maverick. He suggests an idea that stuns his unscrupulous colleagues. This commercial seems to be saying 'our company employs pricks,except Happy who is fictional any way.' And even if we do accept the reality of Happy given the logic of ad, what good does that do the man on the street? As the top dog, no mere customer will ever speak to him. We go through the automated prompts until reaching an evil underling, who this adverts suggests, may think that Happy is a loose cannon so disregards whatever hippy doctrine he happens to implement on any given day.
Another, far more obvious instance of this can be seen here:
So we are clearly meant to empathise with Kevin Bishop. But his superiors are knobs. Will his ideas ever see the light of day - I doubt it. How can I empathise with the maverick when I know he'll be fired by people who'll continue to give lava lamp incentives? It seems that Natwest is saying, 'yes, we admit it. We are run by snobbish Tim-evil-but-Dims. You know this, Kevin Bishop knows this, Bill Nighy knows this, but there's nothing any of you can do about it. Mwuah ha ha ha ha'
Leaving the banking theme for a moment:
So this advert starts promisingly enough. Cows, grass. Pastural, you think. I might give this cheese a shot. It then proceeds to illustrate just how processed the cheese is by taking you through the factory production line. WTF? When the poor, ignorant boy says 'its just cheese' i want to step in Annie Hall style and say, yes, but the cheese has been taken to within an inch of its life. And we all know that processed cheese should be square anyway. Cheese strings are just evil.
DFS are offenders for some of the worst adverts ever. I couldn't find the American Psycho one, so I am left with this recent entry:
So this dysfunctional family go in, bicker for an afternoon and compromise on a sofa that no one really wants. Way to go DFS. Its like Mike Leigh needed the dosh. The Juno inspired font is a nice if slightly odd touch.
And finally an advert that makes me angry purely on the basis that it exists. I will let it speak for itself;
If this blog works, I would like to thank Kellymonster for her tech-support
This commercial FAILS. It failed before the economic crisis and it fails now. Firstly, I don't want the man who runs my bank to be holding an important policy conference in the pub. I don't want him drinking alcohol. And it seems to be that Happy is a maverick. He suggests an idea that stuns his unscrupulous colleagues. This commercial seems to be saying 'our company employs pricks,except Happy who is fictional any way.' And even if we do accept the reality of Happy given the logic of ad, what good does that do the man on the street? As the top dog, no mere customer will ever speak to him. We go through the automated prompts until reaching an evil underling, who this adverts suggests, may think that Happy is a loose cannon so disregards whatever hippy doctrine he happens to implement on any given day.
Another, far more obvious instance of this can be seen here:
So we are clearly meant to empathise with Kevin Bishop. But his superiors are knobs. Will his ideas ever see the light of day - I doubt it. How can I empathise with the maverick when I know he'll be fired by people who'll continue to give lava lamp incentives? It seems that Natwest is saying, 'yes, we admit it. We are run by snobbish Tim-evil-but-Dims. You know this, Kevin Bishop knows this, Bill Nighy knows this, but there's nothing any of you can do about it. Mwuah ha ha ha ha'
Leaving the banking theme for a moment:
So this advert starts promisingly enough. Cows, grass. Pastural, you think. I might give this cheese a shot. It then proceeds to illustrate just how processed the cheese is by taking you through the factory production line. WTF? When the poor, ignorant boy says 'its just cheese' i want to step in Annie Hall style and say, yes, but the cheese has been taken to within an inch of its life. And we all know that processed cheese should be square anyway. Cheese strings are just evil.
DFS are offenders for some of the worst adverts ever. I couldn't find the American Psycho one, so I am left with this recent entry:
So this dysfunctional family go in, bicker for an afternoon and compromise on a sofa that no one really wants. Way to go DFS. Its like Mike Leigh needed the dosh. The Juno inspired font is a nice if slightly odd touch.
And finally an advert that makes me angry purely on the basis that it exists. I will let it speak for itself;
If this blog works, I would like to thank Kellymonster for her tech-support
bodies not dealing with the medication half as well as last time, and as such i'm smoking faaarr to much. don't know how don draper does it.
Forgot to mention last time that i have a case of very stubborn man- thrush. But fear not all you with weak stomachs, for there will be no photos illutrating this.
i'm a bit of a minger at the moment. half beard half stubble man, the DODGIEST haircut you will ever see, and i'm wearing lilac. My sleepy eye has suddenly become narcoleptic eye.
Yes thats right ladies, i'm quite the catch.
Forgot to mention last time that i have a case of very stubborn man- thrush. But fear not all you with weak stomachs, for there will be no photos illutrating this.
i'm a bit of a minger at the moment. half beard half stubble man, the DODGIEST haircut you will ever see, and i'm wearing lilac. My sleepy eye has suddenly become narcoleptic eye.
Yes thats right ladies, i'm quite the catch.
