don't panic

so after all the excitement and ranting of the last couple of posts it's time to get back to reality. hopefully the general tone of this thing will be improving considerably over the next few weeks/months. the main motivating factor for this being a new job, which will mean less all round tedium, miserableness and moaning on my part hopefully. 3 more weeks of the old job to go, but it's remarkable how much more enjoyable it is when you know you're not gonna be there til the end of the world. in other news: i hate the new black eyed peas song with a passion; julian's name is michael; it's a long weekend...

walk the walk, talk the talk

the trip to the clinic the other day wasn't without it's plus sides. one particular source of amusement was the guy sat next to me in the waiting room. he was a bit of an odd one really. from what i can establish he was on the phone to his mum - i wasn't deliberately being nosey and listening in, honest - whose name was mary. it's all a bit beyond me to be calling your parents by their first name, mum or 'you' usually suffices. anyway, this guy, let's call him julian for arguments sake, is chatting away to his mum, telling her all about his little trip to the gum clinic and how he fancies the nurse who does the test. all of which is in the most outrageously camp voice going. apart from his laugh, which was deep enough to give brian blessed a run for his money. so the question is, is julian really a screaming queen or is he putting it on? and if he is putting it on why? i'm sure he's a perfectly lovely, reasonable guy, and i've got nothing against camp guys in principle, but i just wonder why certain people think they need to fit a certain kinda stereotype to feel part of the gay community. maybe it's just that, while in the closet these guys tone themselves down for general consumption and then when they do come out, revert back to their natural state. either way, if they're happy, so what? it's just bizarre. being gay you can find it hard to be accepted by straight society. but equally i reckon some guys must find it hard to feel accepted by the gay community unless they wear the right clothes, go to the right places, walk the right walk and talk the right talk. and what do we end up with? a scene full of standard issue Sohomo's. and i reckon that is that's at the expense of people just being comfortable being themselves, it's a bit of a shame.

positive thinking

i know it's been a while since i've written anything worthwhile in here, so here we go...

positivity is generally thought of as a good thing. the power of positive thinking and all that is suppose to bring dreams into reality i guess. if you believe in something enough - you can make it true. positive is good. but not always, there's one notably absence. three little letters. hiv. who'd have thought something so small could be so huge at the same time? it seems like over the past few months, i've had every cold, fluey thing and general under the weather-ness that's been doing the rounds and i suppose there's only so many times that you can be told you're immune system's fucked before you start wondering if there some truth to it. and i guess as a gay guy, who's had the safe sex message rammed down ur throat (no pun intended) since u were first sexually active, a fucked immune system equates to one thing - those three little letters. and those three little letters equate (in my head, and totally naively, of course) to a long, slow, drawn out, painful death, completely alone and devoid of sex. so, as a result of a level of paranoia worthy of an x-files double bill, i popped along to my local gum clinic last week for a hiv test. which was nice. i guess however careful you are, there's always gonna be a remote possibility of something going wrong somewhere along the line, but i suppose i was pretty certain i'd get a negative result. in fact, due to the fact i was raised on a healthy dose of denial, if i'd really thought for a moment the result would have been positive i probably wouldn't have been sat there in the first place. you can keep knowing what you're up against and being able to fight it the best way possible. ignorance, as an alternative, is truely bliss. so with the test done, there's a couple of days to stew before the results get back. within the space of 2 days i'd gone from being convinced i was negative, and stupid to have been there and even considering it for a second, to being equally convinced that the results would be positive. in fact, i'd even decided on the title of the first blog entry i'd write depending on which way things went. on the way to collect the results things seemed to be going pretty well. my new mobile was winging it's was to me in a courier van which was worth getting a little excited about, pretty much all the traffic lights on route were turning green for me, the sun was shining and parking wasn't a problem. i guess before i'd really had time to think about the options and how the scenario might really play out, i was sat there with someone holding my little folder of notes and the all important blood test results. then after a few minutes it's pretty much done. walking off out into the sunshine and heading off to work, where the only sign of where'd i'd been that morning was the little bruise where the blood'd been taken and a bit more of a bounce in my walk than usual. the alternate blog title was gonna be 'jesus fucking christ, dear god no' and the result was negative.

ambition :: tearing out the heart of you

sometimes i wish i could be like the other people i work with. one guy's been there for twenty years. doing the same thing that i'm bored to tears of within 20 months. it's be much nicer if i was happy spending ten hours a day sitting at a computer without engaging my brain (and i'm not talking about cruising on gaydar). but, alas, i'm not. and it's high time i got off of my arse and found something a little more worthwhile to do with my life. unfortunately, it doesn't seem to be as simple as deciding I want a new job. there's the minor task of finding another job i'd rather do, and the not so minor task of applying, interviewing and getting the bastard! i think perhaps if i don't find someone soon i'll be force to lobotomise myself, so that, even thought i'd still be doin the same brainless shit, i wouldn't mind so much and have no desire to do anything else.

sleep the clock around

there's a common misconception in this country that when the clocks jumped forwards last week for BST it's british summer time. in fact, the truth is that it's in celebration of the fact that when the weather's like this - beautifully bright without a cloud in the sky - there's nothing better to do than listen to the bright and breezy summery sounds of belle and sebastian. so, for further reference BST = belle (and) sebatian time. go forth and listen.... in other news, the lovely spangly weather isn't likely to last for long, cos there's gonna be snow at the weekend apparently. and there was me thinking that spring might have sprung. still, it's a lovely day to be stuck in front of a desk...

let go - there's beauty in the breakdown

well, i've not written in here for a while. there's a few things which i've thought about writing about, including welsh bands turning shit, the pope and the catholic church, and various other shit. unfortunately, these flashes of inspiration didn't coincide with me sitting at a computer, ranting about it and sharing it with my adoring public (that's you, that is). so instead of reading about that, you can read about this. which I think is going to turn into one of those entries where I find a very long winded way of saying nothing at all. i'm reasonably confident that it'll be less miserable than the last one. perhaps not a lot though. I was reading a thing about depression last night, and there were a list of 9 symptoms or tell tale signs of someone suffering depression. out of the nine, i would said i could fairly conclusively tick off eight of them in the past couple of months (if you're wondering the one which i couldn't check off was suicidal thoughts). now the sun's putting in a bit of a more regular appearance i think i've perked up a little. i think perhaps i must only write in here when i've got something to moan about - if you were to just read this and not see my any other time it could probably give the wrong impression. i should write more i think, and pop to the moblog more often. i saw someone the other day who i'd not seen for a good few months. in amongst the usual 'where you been, what you been up to' catch up, i said i was busy trying to work out what to do with my life. the response was 'still?'. which is guess is a good point. how much as changed in the last few months? how much progress has been made? truth be told, not a lot really, in some ways progress has been reversed. but i'm nothing if not a little optimistic (although i admit, you'd be hard-pushed to notice recently). i promise next time i'll have something significant (although i'd settle for vaguely interesting) to write about. just means you might have ot wait another month or so....