Sweet F.A. - Furious Angel

The Day I Lost My Words

Vixx — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 06:00:03 +0000

I’ve lost my notebook.

It’s not lost lost. It’s in the house. (Um, I think). I distinctly recall taking it out of my handbag whilst going . . . well, somewhere, someplace where I obviously didn’t want to chance dropping/losing/misplacing my words. Only now the safe place I stored my notebook might as well have been inside a fucking BEAR TRAP for all the good it’s done me. There’s nothing safe about being COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY MISSING.

Neither strictly a diary nor a note depository, my moleskine kind of spanned the two, a no-man’s land for thoughts and ideas about my novels, including a list of possible titles, notes about my characters – birthdays, parents’ names, education, distinctive characteristics etc. – and nonsensical free-writing. It’s 50+ pages of my tight, loopy handwriting and the surreal outpouring of the more fantastical contents of my head. It is not good that it’s been mislaid.

What bothers me most is that it was a gift from Claire, uber-BFF and rootin’, tootin’ advocate of Vikki Blake, my literary alter-ego. It probably wasn’t her intention, but this notebook? It was one of the best gifts I’ve ever had, for – intentional or not – it symbolised her belief. Her faith.

I repeat: it is not good that it’s been mislaid. Sob.

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The Day With the Insomnia and Big Questions

Vixx — Sun, 14 Feb 2010 17:42:48 +0000

I’m often asked how I do it: the full-time job, the part-time job, the freelancing, the studying, the book, the kid, the husband, the gaming and the various other projects etc. etc. My reply is usually a rueful grin – aw, shucks, stop, just call me Super Vixx – but truth is, I actually don’t know. I’m starting to believe that there’s a considerable possibility that I don’t do it anymore. I’m starting to believe that the only reason I manage to cram everything in is because my awesome husband does the cooking, the laundry and most of the cleaning, and I’ve become the Queen of the Half-Assed. My unspoken mantra has become If Something’s Worth Doing, It’s Worth Doing Half-Heartedly And With As Little Effort As I Can Get Away With.

I’m been struggling with my sleep, though. It’s not something I’ve traditionally had issues with, so having to lay awake, tossing and turning, huffing and puffing … well, it hasn’t been helpful. I’ve never been able to run on little sleep, not even when S. was small and sleep deprivation was part of the job description. Even then, even when I figured I was all prepped and ready for it, M. had to step in and take more than the lion’s share as we established – pretty early on, as it happened – that our household was going to be a happier one if I scrapped at least six hours a night. That should’ve been the first clue, right? The first indicator that motherhood and I were barely going to be on nodding terms, let alone having coffee mornings together.

Anyway.

So, yeah … I’m losing sleep. And I think too much. Even as I lay there, listening to M. snore and staring up at the spiderweb cracks in the ceiling, I’m trying to figure out what it is that’s keeping me awake. ‘Cos it’s a sign of stress, right? Loss of sleep? Only, I don’t feel stressed. I feel perfectly fine. Yes, I’m busy, but I’m busy with things I enjoy, you know? Work’s great, and my book – though a little reluctant sometimes – is coming along okay (85k words in, my friends – Eighty-five thousand fucking words. Chapter 11 was kicking my ass for a bit, but now I think I have it head-locked and ready to give me back my lunch money). I don’t do the online thing quite so much anymore, and what I do is cool and great and perfectly manageable. I don’t get to play games as much as I’d like but pft, what’s new? We already knew that. And so I lie there, these thoughts tumbling about, and I’m starting to wonder if it’s simply the complete lack of stress that’s stressing me out. That it’s my feverish scouting for a reason, an excuse, that’s doing me more harm than fucking good. That maybe it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy when there’s no real reason to keep you up at night, meaning I’ll just keep on searching for an excuse and never find one until it winds me up so badly it finally does stress me out and I’m in a worse mess than when I started.

See? Told you I think too fucking much.

I need to stop taking my laptop to bed with me, though. And my phone. And I need to fall back in love with reading¹. And, between you and me (‘cos, you know, the internet and my globally published blog is such a private forum), I suppose I have been grappling a little with the Big Questions, recently – the big OMG-I’m-Nearing-My-Mid-Thirties-How-Did-That-Happen? conundrum, and the Wait-A-Minute-Is-This-My-Life? stumper. I had my heart broken by people whom I had thought were my friends, and I once again regressed to spiral-permed, buck-toothed, unilaterally unpopular 14-year-old me (the me I was shortly before I had my braces removed and I realised that my breasts were weapons). Only this time, I’m all bitter and black and cynical and mean and thoroughly unpleasant and I can’t even redeem myself with the excuse that I’m just a kid. The older I get, the harder I get. One strike and you’re out, dude. I’ve got no time for second chances. Move along and take your sorry with you. Or bend over and I’ll shove it up your ass.

I try to be a better person and rise above it. But it’s like my core, the very essence of me, is just a bucket of dark, bubbling hostility. I read about people like Becca and think – holy Christ. She is such a good person. Me? I like to think that I’m a good person. That I’m a thoughtful friend, and a kind mother with a good soul and a warm heart. But the truth is I’m just me – confused and confusing, clusterfuck me – fumbling around in the darkness that is my life and trying to get to the other side without smashing my shins on the fucking coffee table.

Edit 19:15: it’s just occurred to me that I’ve written a long, rambling entry on Valentine’s Day without even mentioning it. If that, my friends, doesn’t properly exemplify how I feel about VD day then I don’t know what the hell will. Whilst I’m not totally without sentiment (I can get quite emotional and attached to the strangest things, and I have a steel box full of small, silly little mementos that someone, somewhere, touched me with), I’ve never liked Valentine’s Day. Having been in a safe, secure relationship for sixteen years with the love of my life, I can be confident that it’s nothing to do with being snide and single, either. I just find it crass and stupid and infantile and utterly without consequence.

See? I AM A DARK BUBBLING BUCKET OF HOSTILITY.

1 The last two or three books I’ve read have been shite. And since I won’t ever – EVER – quit a book, even if it sucks donkey balls, it means that for a moment or two there reading became really laborious. It’s the closest I’ve ever come to understanding M.’s POV when it comes to recreational reading).

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The Day About Letting Go

Vixx — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 06:58:32 +0000

I thought you were all great. I thought we were all friends.

I feel stupid. Again. And desperately, humiliatingly hurt. But at least I know who you really are now – albeit three years too late.

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The Day with Girl Gamers Suck

Vixx — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 12:37:02 +0000

Introducing my latest project – girlgamerssuck.com.

You know me. I like games. I often don’t have time to play as much as I would like – and when I do play, I’m often kinda crap – but I’ve grown up with gaming and I love it. It’s part of my childhood, part of my life and undeniably part of who I am.

I have loved the last six months I’ve been writing for AeroPause. Having skirted the world of online game geekery for a number of years – SHH.com aside, obviously – its been wonderful to fully immerse myself without the guilt or hang-ups. The guys I ‘work’ with are all kinds of awesome, and I hope to be there for many years to come. And it’s spurred me to run with an idea I’ve had for as long as I’ve been online – a gaming site for women.

Yes, there are loads already (although – in my defense – there wasn’t ONE when I first thought of the idea!). But they’re generally all pretty . . . meh. See, I don’t do pink. I don’t care about girl power. I also don’t care about pony games or dream weddings and I don’t play MMORPGs, either. So I’ve ended up creating what I hope is a gaming site for people who genuinely don’t give a shit about gender. People who wouldn’t mind exploring some of the psychology around gaming, as well as keep abreast with selected news and reviews.

It took forever to think of a name. I originally didn’t really want to focus on the ‘girl’ or female aspects but to be honest, it’s impossible for me to drive the message that girls can game without that focus – which is where my idea comes from. I didn’t want to rip off any other girl gamer sites with a similar name, but I realised that I also didn’t want to drop the female aspect – which is why I seemed to keep coming back to the sarcastically titled girlgamerssuck.com.

So please – come visit me! Comment and contribute. Is there anything you’d like to see on there – anything I’m missing? What do you like? Dislike? It’s been forever since I launched a new project from scratch so please tell me your thoughts and help me get this thing off the ground!

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The Day I was Ill. Again

Vixx — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 12:29:57 +0000

Ugh. I’m ill again.

I think I recall crowing last year that I managed to miss most of the flu/coldy things floating about. My Fate God heard me, laughed outrageously, and has been making me pay ever since. Bastard. It feels like I’ve spent the last three months coughing and spluttering. I wouldn’t mind, but the cough is this disgusting, phlegmy gross mess that makes people cross the street to avoid me and my voice wouldn’t be out of place in a porn movie. Whispering in low, husky tones is amusing for about a week, but after that it just becomes tedious.

Anyway.

Thankfully though, I was phlegm-free for Christmas. Which was lovely by the way. S’s holiday started early thanks to three millimetres of snow we had the Monday and Tuesday before Christmas which somehow justified a school closure, and although that meant I didn’t get my leisurely rest on the first day of my own holiday, it meant that we got two extra days together – yay. Father Christmas brought everything S wanted (which was a fucking miracle, by all accounts – he was not easy to buy for this year) and his extended family got him everything else. This year he’s obsessed with football, mainly Tottenham Hotspur and Cardiff City, so his bedroom now looks like a teenage boy’s thanks to the football bed linen, trading cards, football shirts, balls and Tottenham Hotspur-logoed alarm clock. I don’t mind admitting that I get a little pang of regret when I look in there now; although it’s wonderful that he’s growing up, forging his own personality and likes and dislikes, but it feels like it’s all too fast.

As for me, I was very lucky this year. I received many books (including Stephen King’s new one, and the Ant and Dec biography), DVDs (Michael McIntyre, Russell Brand, George Michael, Grey’s Anatomy, 24, Steve Coogan) and games (Assassin’s Creed II, SingStar Take That and with Christmas money I bought the Batman AA Collectors’ Edition, Lips #1s and pre-ordered Bayonetta). M also bought me some ‘fancy’ walking boots and a decent all-weather coat, now that I’m at one with nature and am forced to – sigh – go walking with D, neither of which I have to send back ‘cos I think they’re gross. Score! One brother got me Zelda: Spirit Tracks and the other cash towards my Paul McCartney ticket (mental note: write that up soon) and two Guitar Hero figurines which are totally awesome. Heh. And the gifts we bought for our loved oones seemed to go down well, too. Which is always the best part. :)

Best of all? We managed to get through all of Christmas without putting anything on a (groaning) credit card. That is definitely a first!

Christmas Day itself was low-key but lovely; M cooked, S and I ate, and my in-laws joined us for lunch. Not for a second doubtful about Santa or his origins, Sam spent the entire day in raptures over his gifts and playing with everything – which meant I spent most of the day opening brightly-coloured boxes and untwisting those INSANE wire thingies that seem to hang on to every child’s gift in the universe. Between Christmas and New Year we visited friends and family and generally dossed about, and then for New Year we had our BFFs up from Brighton to stay, which was – as it always is – incredibly awesome. We christened one of M’s Christmas gift – a top-of-the-range slushy maker! – by making fruit slushies and loading them with vodka, washing down platefuls of antipasta and tortillas. A perfect way to chime in the new year, and no mistake.

As for 2010? I don’t really do resolutions, but I am hopeful. I’m proud that I’m significantly smaller than this time last year, and I would like to keep that up, but I’m trying not to obsess. I’ve, inevitably, gained a bit of weight of Christmas but a) who hasn’t and b) who cares?! Like I’ve said previously, I joined a gym in mid-December and – chest infection pending – I hope to get back into some semblance of regular exercise soon. Otherwise, I don’t have any particular promises I wish to make/break. All I hope for is a happy, healthier, financially-stable year, and to keep on loving my boys more with each passing day.

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