Thursday 22 November 2012

People don't seem to take me seriously anymore... No idea why.

Dinner with Marmie, Father and Older-Brother-Glyn

(Older-Brother-Glyn has been shortened to OBG)

Marmie: Have you heard that Lisa's planning to go to America for 6 months?
OBG: No! What's this about?
Me: I'm planning to go to Kansas, it's going to be awesome!
Father: *Rolls eyes*
Me: Well, that's hardly supportive is it?
Father: I'm sorry, but you come up with a lot of over the top ideas, it's hard to tell which ones are actually realistic enough to get supportive over.
Me: Give me some credit. I'm actually going to do this one.
Marmie: She's been really excited about it.
Father: Okay, I'm sorry. I'll try to be more supportive.
OBG: So whereabouts are you going?
Me: I'm going to Kansas City. *Eyes widen as a thought comes to me* Oh my days! I might get swept up in a tornado and end up in Oz!

Everyone stops eating and just stare at me

Me: What? It could happen.
Father: You seriously don't see my point?
Me: What? That's totally valid. They do get tornados in Kansas I'll have you know.
Father: Yes, that's what we're finding unrealistic.
OBG: Somehow I don't think you hold a realistic view of what would happen if you were to be hit by a tornado.
Me: *Shrugs* Whatever, I'm going to buy some ruby slippers just in case.
Father, Marmie and OBG: *Rolls eyes*
Me: You're all just jealous that you don't have an excuse to buy a dog and call it To To.


...


Comment put on my Facebook page after I put up a link to my post about being homeless in a couple of weeks

Marc: I can't tell if you're being serious about not having a house in two weeks or whether this is just another one of your whimsical posts, but if you are then I may have an idea...


...


Phone conversation with Younger-Brother-Daniel

(Younger-Brother-Daniel has been shortened to YBD)

YBD: Mum tells me you're going to America for 6 months.
Me: That's the plan.
YBD: It's a course at a church?
Me: Yup
YBD: ... Lisa, are you joining a cult?
Me: What? No! It's a bonafide university!
YBD: ... It sounds like you're joining a cult.
Me: In what way does it sound like a cult?
YBD: They have church cults in America.
Me: They have church cults here too. I'm not in one now.
YBD: I don't think you should do it, they may do weird things like take out your brain and stuff.
Me: I'm pretty sure if they did that, it would be on the prospectus... Or at least the news.
YBD:Not if they're clever about it.
Me: So, you're telling me that the only reason I could possibly be going to America is if I was joining a cult?
YBD: What other reason could there be?

I fear I may have turned my life into one big 'Boy who cried wolf' scenario. I make a couple hundred unrealistic comments and visions of my future and suddenly no one believes a single thing I say anymore.

Oh, and in case you're worried. I looked into it and the uni/church place I'm going to stopped stealing brains years ago. Something about not having the funds for the surgery anymore... Damn recession has ruined everything.

It's mainly just lessons and singing and stuff now. I'm very excited about it. I'm kind of hoping that my living on the streets will help me save the money needed to go. But I'm coming state side y'all! This is all due to happen in July if I haven't died from pneumonia or hep b or the plague or some other type of disease that one might find living on the streets.

Peace out my lovelies.

Tuesday 20 November 2012

The clock is ticking...meh

I don't know if anyone had ever found themselves reaching that point in their mental state where the situation that they are in has become so far fetched and ridiculous that normal conventional emotions no longer apply...

I'm there.

Ladies and gents, in two weeks time I will no longer live in the flat I am currently residing in. The lease will be up. The rent will no longer be taken. People will be giving me my deposit back and throwing me out of the flat.

This was all fine and dandy when I initially found out that we wouldn't be renewing the lease because I just assumed that I wouldn't need to worry too much about it as I would obviously have found myself a new place to go to in plenty of time and that when it got to the point where people were coming to look at the flat and we were starting to pack boxes, I would naturally know where I was taking those boxes to...

Guys, I have no clue where I'm taking my boxes to.

Literally none.

Nada.

Not a sausage.

In what is coming closer to a week and a half away, I will be what I believe the kids are calling 'homeless.'

Now, whenever I imagined a scenario where this kind of dilemma was looming over me, I always imagined that I would feel some form of dread or worry or general freak out type reaction to emanate from my person. However, I have found, now that I am facing said dilemma that there is no freak out happening. In fact, (and this is as baffling to me as I'm sure it may seem to you) I am pretty laid back about the whole thing.

Line-Manager-Monica keeps on checking with me at work to see whether I have chosen to freak out as of yet, but each time I tend to find myself shrugging and coming out with the ridiculously vomit-inducing optimistic phrase of "It'll all work out, I'm sure." (And when I say she keeps on checking, I think she was on 30 minute intervals today.)

I have several theories for this ultimate calm I am protraying...

One.
I am a psychopath and as such, am devoid of all emotion so could not care less about the tragedies of living without a home... if this is the case then this must be a very early onset of psychopathy (yes, that's a word... kinda) that has just kicked in over the past week... wait, no... couple of days... wait, no... today, *remembers seeing that there was a new burger at McDonalds today and doing a little dance of joy in the passenger seat of the car (much to Work-Buddy-James' disdain)* ah, crap. Never mind

Two.
I am in major denial about my whole situation. I will continue to pretend that it doesn't exist right up until my landlady takes my keys away from me and leaves me on the doorstep in the rain holding a bunch of wet cardboard boxes and my 2nd hand lap top... I wonder if I sat outside the window of my flat at that point, I'd still be able to pilfer the wifi... Note to self: Check the area outside my living room window tomorrow morning for possible crouching locations.

Three.
I have become the thing I never thought possible... a die-hard optimistic that simply doesn't know a bad situation when faced with one. Instead I look at each trial and face it with a smile and a can-do attitude! *Remembers the other day when she found herself stuck behind a really slow person at the train station, tutted impatiently and fought her way round him, only to find he was blind and was feeling his way with a cane...* Ah, crap. Never mind.

Four.
I am completely blinded by the sheer amount of extra money I am going to have next month by not having to pay any rent or bills plus getting back my deposit so I can't possibly see a downside to the whole thing. I'm telling you, this is something I can't help but feel a little bit excited about... I mean, I haven't had money in what feels like... well, I'm not too sure if I've ever had money. But anywho, the idea that my entire paycheck next month will be all mine without any rent or stupid unecessary things like bills for electricity and water taking it all is such a beautiful thing, I really am struggling to find a downside.

And yes, people have said to me that when I spend that first night out in the cold with no roof over my head, the downside might hit me. But I will say to you what I said to them, it won't hit me nearly as hard as they think because I plan to make me a duvet out of £20 notes. My friend Mike actually asked me today why I chose twenties instead of fifties... can you imagine? Clearly I'm going to be using my fifties to keep my fire alive. It has that really nice purple finish to the note that will add that extra colour to my man made bonfire.

And finally...

Five.
As mentioned in the first paragraph, I am so far beyond freaking out that I have now developed a brand new emotion which consists of an empty space of no emotion whatsoever... It sounds drastic and dark, but think about it really. Wouldn't we all want that? Someone comes up to you and says to you, "Hey guess what? The world's going to end!" Instead of freaking out about it and wasting the last moments you have alive, you just shrug it off, think 'oh well.' Get the biggest loan off Wonga.com you can and sod off on holiday! There you go! A dark cassim of empty feelings doesn't sound so weird and depressing anymore, does it?

So anyway, there we go. I'm without abode in just under two weeks and the main worry in my brain appears to be whether or not I'll find somewhere with wifi access so that I can still blog and shizzle.

Actually, I might just ask my current internet provider to keep the internet running after I'm gone and I know for a fact that if I sit on the stone step out by my back door, I can still reach the wifi... The new occupants will only notice I'm there when they need to use the kitchen. And how often do people use kitchens nowadays anyway really?

Besides, with all my new cash that I will have from not paying for a place to live, I could buy a perfect camouflage outfit that will make it look like I'm just a giant bush that has blown onto their porch by the wind. Or I could even mix it up and buy me a cats costume too. I could just perch myself on their porch and occasionally lick a paw and groom myself. Who knows, they may even take pity on the stray cat and leave me out a bowl of milk or something... awesome.

I know a lot of you reading this are probably screaming at me to get a move on and try to find a place to rent rather than dreaming of different cat costumes to wear (I'd be a black cat by the way, that way I get to be a cat and blend into my surroundings). But you see, it's a little more tricky than that... I'm kinda hoping next year, in around July time to pack up my troubles in my old kit bag and head off state side for 6 months... yes that is correct. I am aiming to come to America. It's a whole thing that I've been looking into and not finalised but am telling everyone like I have finalised because then that means it's true (damn, I might be that chippy optimist after all). But as such, I really don't want to sign a contract for a new lease because then I won't be able to go and blah blah blah.

This is a lot of information that I have thrown at you, sorry about that.
Let's summarise shall we?

1. I am homeless in just under two weeks.
2. I am surprisingly zen about the whole thing.
3. I will be looking into a cat costume for using wifi so that I can still blog, tweet and read internetual things.
4. I will be coming to Kansas, America (fingers crossed) in July 2013 for 6 months. More regarding that no doubt to follow.

So with all that, I bid you adieu as I head to bedfordshire without showering because I'm too tired and also slightly gross.

Peace out my lovelies.

Eureka! I've found the answer!

Had a bizarre 'The Script loving whilst pretty much unconscious' moment this morning.

My radio alarm went off this morning with The Script's new song playing. Without thinking or being properly awake, I reached for my trusty Shazam app, found it on iTunes and bought that shizzle only to fall asleep again.

About an hour later I woke up to The Script's previous song on the radio. This time, it had managed to weave itself into my dreams where, for some bizarre reason, Rihanna was in a sewer dancing to it with a bunch of dancers. Then I was there dancing along with them... Can I just say, I am an amazing dancer in my head... Seriously, I can move. Anywho, I ended up being pulled along by male dancers, some dressed in red, some blue, and some black and my subconscious read that to be the GB flag colours (I may not be that clever in my head (either that or I secretly think I'm German)) and I had to choose which colour I wanted. The red meant that I wanted to see famous people, and black meant I wanted to see politicians... I didn't get as far as what blue meant because I half woke up and was shazamming the second Script song before I knew what I was doing or had fully woken up. I don't know how they did it but The Script have some form of magical mind power that has me buying songs in my sleep. Kudos to you The Script... Clever boys.

In other "I'm sick" news. You'll be pleased to know that I am no longer throwing up over anything that moves. My work colleagues were also pleased to know this, not that any of them would come anywhere near me yesterday... Apparently being ill with something that is contagious means that people aren't too fond of being near you... I do believe I have found the answer to people leaving you alone on public transport.

Right, that's it, today whilst I am on the train I shall sneeze in a nice over dramatic way and when I receive the odd looks, I shall say "Don't worry, the doctors who quarantined me did say that the virus was almost definitely gone..."

Get in. Man. Heinakroon will be so proud of me.

Peace out my lovelies.

Monday 19 November 2012

Careful, you may catch a cold if you read this.

So I get to play a fun game today... It's the game of "how long in the day will I last before I pass out or die?"

You see, I'm sick. Like majorly so. As in, I am pretty sure that not only should I be in bed, but the bed should be in a government funded quarantined space to stop the entire world coming down with my life threatening virus.

But I'm not. I'm on my way to work, spreading my virus to all the unsuspecting passengers on the very many trains I have to take to get into work.

My reasons for this? Well, they are two-fold:

One.

I have a very important meeting to attend today with very important people and I'm the one that has to set up paperwork and audits and minutes and so on and so forth.

Two.

The regular readers of my blog will know that I am sick a lot... I mean, a ridiculous amount... It really is stupid and unbelievable how often I get sick. And it's not just the stupidly low immune system I have... Nope. I also have the tendency to undercook chicken and give myself food poisoning, or try and walk down stone steps with my hands full so that I almost break my leg.

Yes, my subconscious has a death wish and I appear powerless to stop it. But anywho, due to this, my sickness levels at work are not too great. I really try not to smack my head on the boiler in my bathroom a week into my new employment, but sometimes (especially to me) these things just happen.

So today, although I have spent the weekend holed up in my flat, trying my hardest not to chunder all over the place, I am on my way to work, trying really hard not to chunder all over a new space.

So I've set myself a bet, the longer I last without dying the bigger prize I get. Not too sure what the prize is yet but I'm pretty sure there are bonus points for not throwing up over the important people in this meeting this afternoon.

So my nose is red and swollen to twice its size thanks to the amount of tissue activity I've had to make it endure, my stomach is telling me that I categorically should not have got out of bed this morning and my voice sounds remarkably like how I would imagine a frog to sound if it could speak real English words, but I am going in! Lets hope I don't pass it on to everyone I come into contact with... I'm aiming for 40%... I think that's reasonable.

Peace out my lovelies.

Saturday 17 November 2012

It actually happened... My phone is fixed!

I'm feeling a little scared writing this post as I'm using the new blogger app on my phone and two days ago I spent an hour writing one on the app. It waited until I was good and finished and then it just decided to send it away, never to be seen again. As such, I'm a little suspicious if it and am scared its going to do a repeat performance... If it does I will kill it using all kinds of violence and death.

Lets just hope by doing so I don't also kill the phone that has just been beautifully recreated and allows me to do beautiful things like look at the screen and not see blue lines and shows me who's ringing when I look because its helpful. I love, love LOVE having a working phone. It has been a long cold and dark period of my life... A life without 3G which means I was writing tweet sized remarks about my day in my notebook and then commenting on them so that they looked popular and loved.

A life where I would force people to sit down and write about their day instead if telling me so that I had something to read... And it was hell to pay if they didn't have at least ten funny remarks and at least two mentions of either cannibalism, zombies, the fact that they are also socially awkward at times, the end of the world, and some form of scientific reference that I categorically do not follow but read anyway because I think it's making me smarter.

I lost a lot of friends over this time. Apparently, without an internetual outlet to express all my extra quirks, I become a little bizarre and strange and not worth hanging out with on account of people fearing for their lives or own sanity as if my crazy was contagious...

But I am back, I am raring to go, and now I think I'm going to vomit because I spent the night with a cat and now my allergies are turning into flu.

Peace out my lovelies!

Update.

I did in fact throw up. I know you wanted to know so... You're welcome.

Sunday 11 November 2012

There appears to be some kind of curse on me and phones

Okay, so by now you will all be aware of the ridiculousness of me and the mobile phones in my life.

I am currently functioning on two iphones due to the mistakes I make with them, one of them has a sim card but Lord Voldemort made me drop it and now you can't see the screen. I have got around this by learning how to use the phone without actually seeing what I'm doing. The main way in which I have learnt to do this is to use Siri to call all the people needed. This is all well and good and tends to work okay, however there are occasions like last Thursday when I asked to ring Oldest-Friend-Cafrin and Siri put me through to Kathleen instead... that always leads to interesting conversations when people answer the phone and ask who you are because you haven't called them in years and so they no longer have your number and you act shocked because the person on the other end of the phone does not sound like the person you wanted to call at all so the conversation usually ends up like:

Other person: Hello?
Me: ...Um, hello?
Other person: Who is this?
Me: ... Who's this?
Other person: You called me!
Me: I know, but I don't think I meant to.
Other person: What?
Me: I'm a little confused right now.
Other person: You're confused?
Me: Sorry about this.
Other person: Who are you??
Me: Who am I? WHO ARE YOU??

But that's only occasionally. 35% of the time I get the right person. The rest of the time Siri tells me he's having a problem or is unavailable and then I have to deal with my problems of feeling rejected by the only man I have ever felt comfortable enough to call on without throwing up over them due to commitment issues.

Anywho. That's phone number 1. Phone number 2 is the iphone I used to use before I got phone number 1. It's an iphone 3G and to say it's been a little abused is an understatement. I basically use it as a glorified ipod touch. You see, since getting the iphone 4S I upgraded to a mini sim card that doesn't like to be used in any other phone other than my iphone 4S. As such, I can't use my iphone 3G as my real phone but I can use it for games, the occasional text from iphone to iphone when in possession of wifi access and camera usage when I'm in a place that doesn't require a flash... oh and also the occasional tweet when I'm again in possession of wifi access. Mainly I use it to play mahjong, The Simpsons Tapped Out, and Jurassic Park.

Back to the abuse I mentioned. This phone has half the glass missing from the top of the screen and cracks running through the rest of the glass in every which way you can possibly imagine. It has been dropped a few times in the course of it's long and gruelling life with me. However, the screen still works which is a vast improvement on phone number 1 so it tends to go everywhere with me anyway.

Which brings me to the thing in question that has made me write this post. You see, the most annoying part of having a working iphone 4S with a broken screen is that I will get an influx of texts, hear that I have these texts, and not be able to do a damn thing about them. I do occasionally shout at the screen with words along the lines of

"WHY ARE YOU TEXTING ME WHEN I CAN'T READ THE TEXTS? I'M JUST GOING TO COME ACROSS AS RUDE AND SOMEONE WHO DOESN'T LOVE YOU BECAUSE I CAN'T RESPOND. WHY DOES THE WORLD NOT KNOW THAT I DON'T HAVE THE ABILITY TO READ TEXTS THAT IT SENDS ME?"

But on the other occasions I may be in places where shouting the above words would make me come across as 'weird' or 'a person of concern' to a passing policeman or psychiatrist (you think that sounds implausible but I work in a mental health hospital which is where apparently a lot of Psychiatrists like to hang out and get money). On these occasions I might ask Siri if he can read me the text, in the vain hope that he has learnt how to do this since the last time I asked him. He never has. I swear that man is so lazy.

It also forces me to ask others with the iphone 4S if I might borrow it to put my sim card in so that I can read a few texts or just send out a mass text that says, 'I can't read your texts people, please stop sending me them'. However, I have yet to ask a person that has said yes to this, including my own family.

I was out for a meal with Marmie, The-Father and Older-Brother-Glyn a few weeks ago and I asked them if I might be able to borrow either The-Father or Older-Brother-Glyn's phone so that I might be able to know what it feels like to have a working phone again. However, I was met with a great deal of reluctance. In fact they bother just said No and then hid their phones from me for the remainder of the meal. Apparently I can't be trusted for even five minutes at a restaurant table, in their full sight, with one of their phones. I found this a little over the top and harsh... until last Tuesday.

I was on the train, listening to phone number 2 as it also serves as a good source for playing music. I was sitting on the train and my stop came up. I got up and made the usual fight through the mass of people on the train to get to the doors before they decided to shut and force me to ride to the next station.

I had been successful right to the door as there had been a woman in front of me leading the way and I simply slipped into the path that she was paving away. However, just as I got to the door, I felt a snag on my earphones. A man, right in the doorway had decided to wear buttons that day. Who does that? Anyway, the earphones caught on the button and before I could salvage the situation, my iphone was dislodged from my pocket.

I watched it fall. Like it was in slow motion. I heard the people around me gasp and swear as they too saw it. Out my pocket it came, down it fell, past the other people standing, past the actual train itself as it managed to find it's way through the small gap between the train and the platform. It went down and down until it landed on the small bit of ground next to the track. I just stood there gobsmacked. I had made it to the platform, a few others were staring as well, most were just trying to get on the train.

A woman tapped me on the shoulder. "Go get one of the men that work here, they have a device that can pick it up."

I had approximately two minutes before the next train arrived, that is if this current train didn't trample it to death when it left the platform. I watched the train leave, luckily it didn't touch my phone. I felt a little hope within me and went on the search for this mysterious working man with the even more mysterious device, hoping that it might be something mystical and glowing.

I walked up and down the ridiculously long platform, (seriously, why do they build them so long?) I found no one. Another train was approaching, I could hear it and I could also feel my stomach about to heave up it's contents. The train came, I couldn't even bring myself to check on it. Instead I closed my eyes tight, crossed everything that I could possibly cross, sent out a desperate prayer and then made my journey up the stairs to the main entrance, which would mean another five trains would pass before I would be able to come back down with a man and his magical device.

There was an option 2 that I almost went with which was just jumping down and grabbing it, but due to the chance of death for the sake of not having a crushed phone, I decided that my family and loved ones might have preferred I find the magic man first.

It felt like the longest journey ever finding this man. It didn't help that my imagination had gone into overdrive and I was trying to convince myself that I wasn't in fact on a quest to look for a hobbit type creature with a magical golden staff...

I eventually found a man who was actually pretty ordinary looking for what I expected, he was normal sized and wearing the same uniform I've seen all the working people at the train stations wear... I was a little disappointed if I'm perfectly honest. Trying not to show my disappointment, I explained my situation and he went with me back down to the platform where the incident occurred. I still had hope for the device, imagining the latest in technology that could cause objects to levitate in front of our very eyes.

We get there and have to wait as another two trains go by. Apparently this man couldn't actually get my phone, he had just walked me down in case I got lost? I don't know, maybe he just wanted to see the magical device at work.

Eventually, after the second train left the station and, as far as I could tell, my phone still seemed to be intact. Another depressingly normal sized man in depressingly normal looking clothing turned up with his device.

It was a sodding stick for picking up rubbish. What an anti-climax.

Not to mention, the man dropped the phone after attempting to pick it up once and then, when he did get the phone up to the platform, instead of placing the phone carefully down on the platform floor where I could then pick it up, or even placing it my hands, the man noticed a paper that had been thrown on the platform floor under a bench. He became incredibly excited by this fact and threw my phone onto the platform floor with gusto as he (and I'm not exaggerating here) pounced on the paper to pick it up with his rather boring looking device.

I wasn't too sure how to react to this, on one hand he had just saved my phone from death by train, on the other hand, he might have caused more damage by throwing it on the platform floor. Do I say thanks? Do I complain and blame all the cracks on the screen on him in the vague hope that he buys me a new one?

I was so flustered and confused I went to my default British move which was politeness in all causes. I muttered a thanks and walked off.

There you have it. I should not be allowed near phones. Especially as I have bought a new screen for phone number 1 on ebay and received it to realise that I bought a white screen for a black phone... hmmmmm. Ah well, it will be unique. I just need to get it fixed on now...

Peace out my lovelies.

Saturday 10 November 2012

I have permanent finger cramp and an awesome word count to show for it.

Hey peeps,

Can I just say, this novel writing melarkey is awesome. I'm feeling all inspired and ready to face the world. And given that this novel is about the end of the world, then you can imagine how prepared I am!

For those who do not know, I am doing NaNoWriMo this month. Which is basically writing a novel of 50,000 words in a month. I have kept above the curve slightly for the month so I'm happy and am currently on a word count of 20,510 words.

My main motivator (as it was with the last book I wrote) is One-And-Only-Daniela. Seriously, when that woman wants something done, she will not rest until it is! And given that what she wants done is me writing a book, she tends to lean towards slave driving me to reach my goal each day.

You see, what I have done in this book is write in a character who has the name Daniela and has a few similar qualities to a certain One-And-Only person I know. As such, she is asking me for a new installment to the book every hour or so. I kid you not.

On Tuesday, I went to work, I had to work mainly on the ward in the morning, so I was away from my computer. I get into my office at about 1pm and find 5 emails all from One-And-Only-Daniela at different points in the morning demanding to know where her next installment was to read. With each email, the damands got more and more intense. I actually feared her towards the 5th email, I was almost convinced that she was going to pop out at any point and hold a gun to my head until I had another chapter to give her.

I then went on to write her a chapter, using my entire lunch break to do so. I was proud of it. I loved it. Something awesome happened in it between two of my characters, it was sweet and light and funny. I was really happy with myself, seeing that as my lot for the day.

I send it to One-And-Only-Daniela.

Five minutes later I get an email. "Finished it. Please write more. I'm WAITING!!"

As such I have been levelling off at three chapters a day which is a lot more than I thought I would be doing but is something that is completely down to One-And-Only-Daniela. If you ever need help getting something done, then she's your lady.

I do have two more things to discuss with you from my week, including another mishap with my phone (I know, I need serious help) and a wedding that was amazeballs but also painful (for me, not for the bride and groom, as far as I know they had a good time). I was going to do a run down of both in this post as well but I figure they're big enough for a blog on it's own so will keep you in suspense for a little longer!

Love you all.

Peace out my lovelies.

Friday 2 November 2012

Get in! Published writer here I come!

I have started the NaNoWriMo project today and I am over 6,000 words! This is awesome, given that I should be doing only 1,677 words a day. According to the website, I should finish my novel in one week.

Alas, the problem lies in the fact that the novel in my head is a lot longer than the word count NaNoWriMo expects. As such, it may look like I have won the challenge at the end of the month but the novel won't be finished!

Does this mean I fail or win? I'm a little confused on the outcome.

Peace out my lovelies.