It’s 4.04am, I’m still awake and feeling rather ropey due to having contracted swine flu. I’m actually wondering if it’s the Tamiflu that’s keeping me awake. That or having been in bed for two days and being a bit fed up of it, so my body is actually rebelling by not sleeping.
Either sounds fairly plausible, although to be fair anything sounds plausible at this hour. Seeing as I’m being bedridden, I might get up in an hour, make some coffee, watch a DVD and then sleep till five in the afternoon. I can actually do that, because basically I’m in bed whether the sky is dark or light or somewhere in between, so I might as well sleep erratically.
I think part of the reason is that I haven’t listened to any music in a couple of days, so at about 1.30am I was being all like ‘Buuhh… so tired. But some new music sounds awesome.’ And I’ve now discovered a couple of artists who are pretty good. And as I write this a drag queen called Kiki has just come onto Last.fm (I’m not sure why, because the last thing that I was actually listening to was Linda Thompson’s Versatile Heart, which, for some reason, I do not yet own, despite having completely loved her comeback album.
Need to get… Linda’s album, Jason Crigler, Lucy Wainwright Roche… possibly some Jenni Mauldaur. And old Kiki is actually turning out pretty good, so that might be another one to add to the list. This will, of course, require an iPod reshuffle, which for me is about as exciting as them bringing Christmas forward. I wonder who actually has the power to do that? Probably the Pope.
Anyway, having swine flu (as I’ve previously mentioned) I have fuck all to do apart from lie in bed all day and do stuff that I’ve wanted to do but haven’t had time, like catch up on The Supersizers and read Moth Smoke by Mohsin Hamid (The guy who wrote The Reluctant Fundamentalist and who is obscenely talented). Moth Smoke is very good, by the way, if deeply weird.
I’ve also started writing a short story which I thought up at Livvi’s house (I always think of stuff to write when I’m at Livvi’s house… I dunno if I’ve just been underrating creative mess my whole life, or it’s just that something about sleeping on the floor makes me feel like a Skins teenager. Not that I actually got any sleep while I was on the floor, but it was probably whilst I was not sleeping that I got the idea for the story). Anyway, the story contains the line ‘She left him in the conservatory with an erection that he couldn’t get rid of, and lacking in the self love necessary to get rid of it himself.’ You can probably guess what sort of thing it is, but it damnably needs to be written, so that’s another thing to keep me entertained on my sick bed.
So basically I’m blogging a) because people have been hassling me to blog, despite the fact that no one seems to really like my blog, I don’t really like my blog, and nothing interesting is ever said in my blog. Which proves, if nothing else does, that people really are as perverse as as the tales would have you believe. I’m also blogging because b) I have a trendy disease: the trendiest of the trendy, in fact. Swine flu – it’s been on the news, and it’s therefore cool. And I have it, and am being treated for it accordingly, and this is a novelty worth documenting. Although I suppose it was basically inevitable. However, moving onto c) It’s half four in the morning and I can’t sleep and I’m listening to music. Of course I need to blog. What the hell else would I be doing?
So just to let you know what else has been going down whilst I fester in my bed of sickness and lurgy, I streamed a bit of 2007′s Marie Antoinette earlier today – yesterday. Big mistake, it’s a piece of shit. A piece of shit distinctly lacking in dialogue, and a very tarted up piece of shit which people never tire of pointing out to be visually stunning. Yes, that’s because it’s shot at the Palais de Versailles, and it’s starring Kirsten Dunst, and she wears really nice clothes. It’s not going to be hideous, is it?
Anyway, I’m on Last.fm trying to find someone else I can fall musically in love with, because I’ve occasionally been accused of living in the past/relying on genetics to produce good music, and basically treating musicians like that race horse genetic engineering model that we did in Y9 Biology. Sadly, Last.fm ascertains what I like and recommends artists that are a) either related to artists that I like or b) of the same era (ancient) of the artists that I like. Thus no progress is made. It’s also now trying to make me like the Fleet Foxes because I like Bon Iver, and I’ve got the horrible feeling that since I don’t completely hate the stuff it’s playing me I might have to actually make the effort. Anyway, I’ve discovered a couple of beautiful Denny-penned Fairport tracks that I probably wouldn’t have heard otherwise because they were recorded post-Thompson era, so I think I can deem that to basically be a good thing and move on.
So last week was a week of stuff happening, because in the day I was doing work experience at Disney, and by night I was watching good telly, mostly Torchwood. Well, I say that it was good, because for four awesome episodes of awesome Torchwood was the best thing I’d seen on the BBC in ages, and then the last episodes turned it into the inevitable train wreck that Russell T basically creates by making characters too awesome for their own good. Anyway, I shan’t go into that now, because I had that (long) conversation with Hannah on the way back from Livvi’s. Which was really good, by the way, and did that thing of reminding me that I’m more of a regular teenager than I habitually assume, by watching Nick and Nora’s Infinite Playlist (which was well-acted but underwhelming, by the way. And if music was going to be such a big focus then it should have been better. Although I dig a film about ‘musos’ (as my mother calls those who like well-written, well-executed songs), the idea of a band which leaves xXUlTrAsEcReTcLuEsXx as to the whereabouts of its next gig… oh dear. And oh dear, never before in my life have I tYpEd LiKe ThIs. I actually find it weirdly enjoyable.)
Having been blogging for forty five minutes, it’s now ten to five, and therefore not far off from a time that it would be acceptable to get up and make a coffee. This is the problem at waking up at one in the afternoon. Last.fm is trying to make me listen to some wanker who reckons that ideas are like sparrows. And whilst we’re on the subject of pretentious indie lyrics, can I just give Regina Spektor a gentle slap for announcing that ‘The sea is just a wetter version of the sky’.
No it’s not, love.
