Blue Saturday

"being surrounded by *real* specious bullshit makes a person unable to deal with "jokey-jokey" or sarcastic or even well-intentioned iterations of the bullshit"

You nailed it perfectly there BB and I wouldn't expect less from such an incisive poster as thee.

paperwork so piled up i don't think it can be done, like the washing up piled up in my sink except i know that can be done, work till half past 8 tonight then back to my empty house, time for bed, get up bright and early so i can fail at stuff again, comfort starving didn't pan out so back to food even tho the taste doesn't innerest me at all...people round me take on an uncomfortable, faintly menacing tinge and beneath it all my brain up on bricks, burnt out and it's cold outside and i don't see so much human warmth right here now

and somehow it feels just the tiniest bit okay, to feel aloof and blue and look at the grey world thru blue lenses, there's a crumb of comfort in retreating from all this booshit

Blue is better than grey because at least blue is a feeling, and grey is the absence of all feeling. <3

Emperor Bu of Ryo asked Great Master Bodhidharma,

"What is the highest meaning of the holy reality?"

Bodhidharma replied,

"Clear and void, no holiness."

The emperor said,

"Who are you in front of me?"

Bodhidharma said,

"I don't know."

Make Him Fall In Love

havetherelationshipyouwant.com

9 Powerful Words You Can Say That Remind Him Why He Needs You.

i mean, this isn't this but one eyebrow raised way up

feel like the protagonist of a Huysmans novel but with higher anxiety

Does "relationship advice for women" play upon the same anxieties as "management speak for the office" or a different set. I feel like there's a whole universe in there, but it basically boils down to "don't be you, be some idealised of notion of what society tells you 'he' wants."

(But also, I now can't stop thinking about zen and cool and status and cultural capital and effort.)

((And what tie I should wear tonight to see my friends and whether I should iron my shirt for tomorrow. Like, I think "going to see Interpol" is one of the few occasions in my life that probably would require ironing my fucking shirt, but really: fuck ironing a shirt. And now I am wondering who irons Interpol's shirts. Like, what a shitty job.))

Make Him Fall In Love
9 Powerful Words You Can Say That Remind Him Why He Needs You.

catapulted into Snow Crash universe where I regain one final chance at finding love by learning to hack and write love-viruses for people's cybernet-jacked branez, and then realising, wait, that is basically what PUAs think they are already doing, right?

sigh

had my penultimate CBT session today, given a sheet to fill in with Helpful Things We Have Covered, was torn between the desire to look attentive and get pats on the head by filling in everything we ever covered and going yes, yes, Helpful Things, gold star for me in my final homework please, and the giant cloud of "actually all this stuff is vague as shit and is this all I have to help me out there in the Big Wide World?" which actually descended over me while thinking about it

feeling you on the pileups of stuff, obv

further to love-h4xx0r daydream, at some point 10+ years ago I had been playing a lot of Nethack and also reading Snow Crash and totally had a whole imaginary cyberpunk roguelike in my head on the realisation that Neuromanceresque upgrades were basically the same as scrolls'n'potions

if I had written it then perhaps I could bask in reflected coolness of the recent roguelike revival

then again it would have been terrible and generic and not very convincingly synthesised and anyway there was already a Neuromancer text adventure in thee 80s where you could upgrade your brain, right? never played it but remember reading the walkthrough serialised in ZX Spectrum magazines every month

(things unique to my generation: the ability to say "I grew up reading magazine-serialised walkthrough solutions for text adventures I've never played")

still spend the odd hour reading those now :/

speaking of reading, i just had the horriblest epiphany whilst reading a book, something about feeling the lives of the other people in my life, and experience them within the web of their relationships and the isolation of their being in themselves, and this is maybe good, a little step outside the cell of solipsism, but it felt overwhelmingly sad (no doubt that was just the solipsism reasserting itself) and i am now pretty secretly weepy for the next while

i pictured myself inside my own family members' heads, i guess, in short

Our little Egyptian cousins are the descendants of one of the most ancient races on earth, but they are very wide-awake to-day in more ways than one.

Little Egyptian boys and girls are as keen and bright as their cousins of any land, and though their religion is that of Mohammed, the same as of our little Arabian cousins, their principles are most upright and correct.

Of recent years many, many thousands of little American and English cousins have visited the banks of the Nile, and frequent intercourse with strangers has given our little Egyptian cousins a very broad and intelligent outlook on life.

They have learned scraps of English, and indeed French and German too, almost unconsciously, and if the donkey boys of Cairo and the other great tourist resorts are keen little fellows in their efforts to get coins from strangers, they are equally desirous of pleasing and give good value for their money.

The Egyptians of to-day are a cleanly, progressive people, and if they prefer donkey or camel back in preference to automobiles and railways as a means of travel it is because their country is not as yet developed to its full possibilities.

Some day things will be different, for the railway on land, steamboats on the Nile, and electric cars running from Cairo to the Great Pyramids are bound to somewhat change things.

It is safe to say, however, that for long years to come little American cousins visiting Egypt will look upon riding donkeys and camels and sailing upon the queer dahabeahs on the Nile as one of the pleasantest recollections of this old historic land. If, too, they can make such warm friends of their little Egyptian cousins as did George and his uncle Ben the people of modern Egypt will remain ever in their hearts as the kindest, most likable of folk.

Maybe I am unable to even relate to other solipsists at this point.

My life just got a whole, WHOLE lot weirder at this point.

i'm guessing weird's not wholly bad

Weird as in my presence being requested & required at a certain band I'm seeing tonight's aftershow weird. Most fans, well, they stalk bands. Me, I am stalked *by* bands. (Not really, there's a family connection which accounts for this. But still.)

I'm just having this weird disparity where I'm too shy to even talk to people in shops, and have to psych myself up for 20 minutes to ring the Council, but here I'm just going to go to some party and chill with international rock stars and... I don't like leaving the *house*. How is this my life?

Like, obviously I'm stupidly excited. But also, at the same time, this is deeply deeply weird.

i find it way easier to talk to people with whom i have something to talk about than random business-of-life interactions tho

Ugh I just wrote out a post in response but it looks name-droppy and dumb so argh.

I'm trying to find someone to go with, but it's like... I feel like such a shit person in general, that I can't even persuade a friend to go "hey I have a plus one to a rock concert and you can go for FREE but the catch is, you have to hang around all night with depressing, selfish, solipsistic me" and no one would want to do that.

Also, rock stars are NOT REAL and I want them to remain unassailable, perfect, Olympian figures, not people you have to interact with. Because people are *terrifying*.

just dont mention fingerbanging

You have just guaranteed that fingerbanging is the first thing I will talk about!

Oh phew, one of the Orcadians will go with me. She's pretty no-nonsense so she'll keep me in line.

i dunno, is it a good idea taking Middle Earth characters out in public?

Don't be silly. There's nothing Middle about Orkney. It's pretty much as far "up" as you can go until you hit Norway.

Sorry, I'm just going to spend the day wandering in, going "BLEEEEEEEEE" and then wandering out again.

I was right about needing the Red Saturday thread. Just walked out of my job. Got my payslip today from last month where I took a week off sick, they docked my wages, should've read the small print in my contract I guess. But I found out they haven't docked other people when they've been off sick. And while asking about that, got pulled into director's office and bollocked for talking about it in the office instead of going to them. That was the final straw tbh. Packed my bag and left. Didn't make a scene, just went. Not sure what happens now, I suppose I'm breaching my contract by leaving before my notice is up but fuck it.

BB, I support whatever you need to do to tackle this appearance with equanimity or w/e but I'm just going to freak out for you over here.

got pulled into director's office and bollocked for talking about it in the office instead of going to them

yeah nobody shd have to put up with this kind of Stalinist bollocks

yeah ridic. I doubt they'll bother to try for breach of contract, they would have to demonstrate actual economic loss by you leaving, which is likely more trouble than it's worth (n.b. I'm not a lawyer!)

The really awesome part is my wife works there too, and they're going to let her go as well, so I've proper fucked this one up.

ouch, sorry man

That's...what?? Was that already in the works, or is it a reaction to your situation? Because not that she would probably want to work there at that point anyway, but I'm almost 100% sure that's not legal.

They hadn't told either of us before, but they were going to do it anyway when I finished my notice period in 3 weeks. And it's completely legal cos thanks to the fucking Tories you have to work somewhere for 2 years before you have any rights.

CUNTS.

I don't believe that was in the works, because that manager sounds fundamentally dishonest. Make life as unpleasant for them as possible. Starting with getting back the docked-but-shouldn't-have-been days you were off sick.

I can't, it's in my contract they don't pay sick pay.

Can someone pls take over my financial management/paperwork? I'll do all the emotional labor, I'll be the cheerful, friendly, cute one, I'll take notes and write articles and stuff, but the idea of doing my taxes, finding out the state is going to take all my money anyway because my student loans are in default, the very THOUGHT of dealing with multiple lapsed retirement accounts that I'm going to have to empty out to live of off soon if I can't make money somehow... it's paralyzing.

My wife was just talking to someone else who recently left the company who alleged that another ex-colleague was made redundant partly because he was gay and the director who chewed me out earlier is a massive homophobe (obviously that wasn't the official reason). Just gossip of course but I can well believe it.

My situation is not as bad as first looked, my new job agreed to move my start date a week earlier and my line manager (who has been really good about all of this shit) has agreed I can do documentation from home for 2 weeks and never come back to the office again. But they're still going to let my wife go after that. I've half a mind to refuse to do the documentation because they are a bunch of cunts, but realistically we're going to need the money soon.

oh man cp, that all sounds horrendous

Oh hey at least you have a new job lined up!! That was well done.

Oh Jesus, CP, echoing The whole "that can't possibly be legal!!!" sentiments, but, basically: CUNTS

Anyway, I have survived; Interpol did not eat me, in fact a certain someone's certain brother was really incredibly lovely to me and took care of me and I've been hugged a bit too much, but, well: BLEEEEEEE!

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/87/Symbol_thumbs_up.svg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkOj282VD-Q&feature=kp

there must be more to life

There is more to life, but I really feel like I ought to go and make a "InterSecretPolMachines supergroup album five anticipation thread of squee" to go and squee all over because my squee is too squeesome for this thread.

Thanks to everyone who said nice things. I haven't really been posting to ILX much for a long time so I wasn't even sure if people wouldn't just be going "who are you anyway", well maybe you were but that's fine.

I'm currently sucking it up and doing my working from home thing. At least I won't be out of pocket, but I'm really angry about the way they're treating my wife over it. I have checked the contract for my new job and I haven't accidentally agreed to work in a Victorian factory again and they do pay sick pay.

I'm hoping starting CBT next week will help with some of my many issues, but I know a lot of people don't think it's any good.

We are currently enrolling the counselling blud badge holder into something approchaiong a paler buleuf hairnet cum snood of plasticity or something

Sopremtimes there is a beautiful elaouqenuce to the made up foppery of typing exercised prose but aolso at times there is nothing but the empty laxiness of a man who is quietly firtierring his life away in a w ay that wd disgust even hunself where the to talk iopenly about syuch.

hard at it here

oh god i work with madmen, meanies and the occasional damaged niceness

http://positiveattitudechangeseverything.com/

hey, that's my life sorted

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Only a few months into her new job, Nancy wondered whether or not she should have said yes to the CEO position at Soup, Inc. Sales were declining, bankruptcy rumors were swirling, and employee morale had never been lower. The company had lost both flavor and heat; and nobody likes lukewarm soup. How was Nancy going to turn it around? Sometimes the answer you need is right in front of you. On a lunch break, Nancy steps into Grandma’s Soup House, a little place she hadn’t noticed before, and happens upon an unexpected source of inspiration.

Soup tells the “stirring” story of how Nancy discovers the key ingredients to revitalize her company, her team, and herself. A recipe for success for anyone in any position, Soup delivers the powerful message that the quality of your career, business, and team is determined by the quality of your relationships. People are hungry for positive change and a fresh sense of purpose and passion. If you are ready to stir the pot and lead by example, Soup is a fun and engaging story that supplies you with the tools you need to build a winning team—at work, school, or home.

dying here