Me and Diogenes

I know it should be 'Diogenes and I' and it's upsetting my OCD to just leave that title but leave it I will.

HELLO there, so here we are again then eh?  There's so much to tell including my future death festooned in monkeys, the lobster -v- shrimp costume argument, the having to lose at least half my body weight (she exaggerated) in a year and oh, I dunno, the thing I've picked to talk about today! 

...the rest will follow in due course.

So, yeah - gosh, where do I start.  Hell, I'll just jump right in.  Remember about 18 months ago when I went totally nuts and ended up on meds and seeing a shrink?  I did mention that over here didn't I?  I can't be arsed to look back over my previous posts but it was around the time I went totally mental and turned up at someone's 40th birthday party crying and in my dinner covered pyjamas and no shoes?  Yeah, if you are going to do 'break-down' you have to do it in a totally memorable way.  The thing is, the people at the party were so nice they completely ignored these minor details, welcomed me in and gave me food.  I calmed down a little bit - food always fixes me, but was gently lead to see my doctor the next day.  The upshot was that together with the meds I had to 'see someone'.  Someone who wore Hush Puppies to be precise. 

Back to the present. 

(I pulled myself out of the mire by the way......well, I thought I did.  That, it would seem, remains to be seen!)

So, I'm sitting in my litter strewn car waiting for a heavy rain shower to stop.  A piece of paper had fallen out of my bag and in my boredom I picked it up and after a cursory glance realised it was some notes I'd made at one of the 'Hush Puppy' sessions.  It was weird, I'd pretty much forgotten everything that had been discussed and I think I only attended twice before buying the bald dog and feeling much better.  The piece of paper had stuff written on it which Mr Hush Puppy had told me were his early thoughts about what I'd told him about myself and how I was feeling/behaving and he'd told me to go away and Google this stuff so we could discuss it at our next meeting.  I remember that I couldn't be fucked to do it so cancelled the next sesh  and as you know, Derek the bald dog turned up next.

I'd written one phrase at the bottom of the page.  One phrase which the Hush Puppy guy had said was very significant and I needed to look into it for discussion.

The phrase?

DIOGENESE SYNDROME

I Googled it in the car and told my housemate (The Tidiness Nazi) about it when I got home. 

Me: .....so, what do you think?  That cheeky Hush Puppy wearing bastard INSULTED ME!

Tidiness Nazi:  So he said you are on the foothills of developing some sort of squalor and self neglect syndrome?

Me: YEAH, the cheeky bastard!  Granted I can admit that some of the symptoms listed ring slightly true - the whole apathy, social withdrawal and lack of shame thing.  That's got me ALL over it but the rest can fuck right off!

T.N: It says something about poor reasoning and stupid decision making too doesn't it?

Me:  ....your point being?

T.N:  Oh, I don't know.  Shall we start with the plan to dress up and climb the Himalayas dressed as a fucking lobster despite being a lazy fucker who hates walking or doing pretty much anything?  Then there was your plan to become a worm baron with the largest worm farm in the whole of the UK?

Me:  That was an eco venture!  It's not my fault the worms turned out to be scary.....

T.N: Well, I think that the fella might have had a point.

Me:  ....how rude!


So I called my mate Bison in order to get some proper sympathy and reassurance that I wasn't permanently broken!

Me: .....so what do you think?  I've been properly insulted!

Bison (can barely talk for laughing): Ha ha ha ha ha, you've gone wrong and it's official!  You've got a 'syndrome' named after some ancient Greek bloke who went nuts and lived in a barrel!  You'd LOVE to live in a fucking barrel, go on ADMIT it!

Me (not helping my case): I will admit that after reading that bit I did get lost in thought about how snuggly and cool it would be to sit in a massive fuck off barrel on a big soft cushion with a blanket over me just listening to the conversations of other people in the street without them knowing I was there....

Bison (still laughing!!):  This is hysterical.  Some bloke told you to look into a syndrome he was concerned you had started displaying tendencies towards and you couldn't be arsed, which is one of the symptoms and now you are offended?  HAH HAHA HA HA HA HA HA....you've joked you were going to end up as a crazy old lady

Me:  ....shit. 

Bison: Just remember, I'm supporting you through the medium of laughter (starts laughing again)

So next I spoke to my cousin Bakes who, when I told her about Diogenes, pissed herself laughing too!  What the hell's wrong with 'Team Sketty'?  They're shit man! 

Me:  I should go and punch that bastard in the face for saying that I was turning into a Crazy!

Bakes:  .......(long pause)......isn't that one of the symptoms?

Me:  Shit.....


So there you go, 18 months ago some bloke decided I was on a slippery slope towards turning into the type of person who might walk around town dressed weirdly with a bald dog in a pram collecting newspaper with which I could wrap up and neatly stack my own faeces.  Well guess what Mr Stupid-Hush-Puppy-Know-It-All?  I've applied for the funding through the Cycle to Work scheme to get a bicycle with a basket on the front to put my bald dog in SO THERE!

...and on a totally unrelated note - here's a picture of the lobster (or possibly shrimp) outfit I'm getting:

An ever-growing horror...

I share the events of today in the hope that someone will read back over some of the aspects of my life and tell me it's all totally normal.  I might then feel better and the suspicions that there is a cosmic conspiracy against me might start to fade.  In short, The Fates have again yanked my chain and y'know, I just wish I could have seen my face throughout that half hour.  

...for that's all it took.  HALF A FUCKING HOUR to make me question my purpose on this planet again.  Let me start - oh, and for the non-believers please let me reiterate that everything I write is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth (with my jaded comedian's view of the matter).

Let me set the scene.  As regular readers know I share a house with my best friend 'The Tidiness Nazi'.  I am in fact the 'anti-tidiness Nazi' so I guess that would make me her nemesis in some way. Not only this, I am frequently a monumental fuck up to the point I'm not allowed to use the kitchen if she's not around.  There have only been a couple of fires and scaldings.....and an electrocution but I still maintain I'm an adult and should be treated so.  I also share the house with an elderly cat who has mental health issues and will not go out during daylight hours, a hairy dog with a form of extreme medical stupidity and a mostly bald dog who not only eats all of the cat's food but also loves me to the point of ridiculousness.  Today, the Tidiness Nazi went out for the day and left me in charge of the critters.  

Things HAD been going well; I'd cleared the junk off the window sill of my bedroom and had started to put the cat food up there which the cat was enjoying.  She now sits in the partly open window enjoying the stuff other cats do when they are outside.  The hairy dog was downstairs occasionally woofing at passers by and running in and out of the back yard.  The bald dog?  Why, he was curled up with me having a lie in.  

The time came to get up, do my laundry and consider getting ready to take the dogs for a lovely walk at the creek.  I started to bimble about and worked my way downstairs.  Hey, the sun's shining and it's a beautiful day.  I'd love to eat something but I'm not allowed in the kitchen.  Sigh........

I went upstairs and, through the open door of the Tidiness Nazi's bedroom, I spied a line of drips of rather wet dog shit.  Turning to my faithful hound I yelled the usual "What have you done!" He, realising he was in for a right Royal bollocking, headed off down the stairs and out into the garden.  Tutting, I wearily got the cleaning gear out and made good before the Nazi returned home and we were all collectively in trouble.

I then went into MY room to find.............the most enormous wet dog skid mark I have ever seen.  ON MY FUCKING BED!  "OH JESUS CHRIST" I yelled out loud this time as I wearily started to strip the bed.  As I got to the side nearest to the window I actually stopped with horror.

Yup, the next horror stopped time momentarily.  There was partially digested CAT FOOD VOMIT all down the wall, on the floor and all over my stuff which included shoes, a soft turtle toy I use as a pillow sometimes and paperwork.  Eyes wide I tried to take in the scene.  There was FAR too much vomit for one cat, I've seen cat vomit in my time but I'm sure her stomach couldn't have held THIS much food!  Couldn't the little bastard have done  it out of the window?  Did she invite other cats in THROUGH the open window for a feline bulimia party?  I think "FOR FUCKSAKE!" my expletive of choice on this occasion.

...you think this is all?  

You'd be wrong.

I stripped the bed and threw everything down stairs ready for the laundry.  I was wondering where I would find the mental strength to deal with the wall of vomit but deal with it I must.  Even more wearily I went back into the Tidiness Nazi's room to fetch the cleaning stuff......

...It was only NOW that I spotted the enormous turd and a diarrhea IN HER BED - NEXT TO THE PILLOW!  The shitty drips had been just a warning of the true horror within that room.  I think that one of my eyes started to twitch at that point, my hand became a claw and the words got stuck in my throat.  I think I tried to yell "HOLY MOTHER FUCKING FAAACK JESUS ON A FUCKING FUCK FUCK FUUUUUCKING FUCK!" ...or words to that effect, but they just came out as "Jejeje ffffffffffff".  Starting to seriously die inside I cleared up the turds and stripped off her bed.  By this time the little dog had come to the bottom of the stairs to see what was going on.  In an act of wasted breath I yelled at  him a bit more until he ran back outside to play happily in the sun.  

By this time, my mental capacity was becoming diminished and I stomped around upstairs muttering to myself and thanking the deities for taking the piss out of me again.  Heading back into her room I noticed something which made my blood run cold

A shitty partial shoe print on the Nazi's mattress.

Had I not had enough? The more I looked around me the more I noticed there were shitty footprints all over the fucking house.

With dawning horror I looked at the bottom of my shoes.  Yes.  You are there already aren't you?  There was undiscovered shit and I'd trod in it and walked it ALL OVER THE HOUSE.  

Fearful of an embolism I said  nothing.  I tried to clean the bottom of the shoes in the sink but hell, they had knobbly bottoms.  OF COURSE THEY HAD KNOBBLY BOTTOMS which meant that the shit was nice and embedded in.  I might even have started to laugh manically to myself at this point.  I know I uttered no other word as I went around the upstairs of the house on my hands and knees cleaning up my own shitty footprints.  I found the other shit site.  Foolish of me to have not started at the beginning and worked out that that the sequence was BED - RUG NEXT TO THE BED - DRIP ACROSS THE FLOOR - ONTO SKET'S BED FOR AN ARSE WIPE (horrified cat vomits?).

That's the problem with being a detective - if your first clue isn't the start of the mystery you end up with shit everywhere.  Ask Sherlock Holmes. 

The bad BAD friend....apparently

Well, it would seem that I am a bad friend.  This was decreed before 8am this morning and I feel it is a somewhat unfair assertion bearing in mind I'm so great and everything.  I have experience of really bad friends.  Some CORKERS of bad friends.  Bad friends who've been sooooo bad I've spent hours fantasising over how I would wreak my revenge over the betrayal of friendshiply trust.  Much of this fantasising involves me becoming obscenely rich and paying hench-people to create ruination and misery.

....I kinda hate it when friends turn out to NOT be friends.

Anyhoo, as I said, I was decreed a bad friend myself before the day had even started.  I thought I was being honest and cute.  My housemate; The Tidiness Nazi didn't agree.  This is how the day started.

06:20hrs: Alarm goes off and I begin my hour of snooze button/waking up gently.  I say 'waking up gently' but I really call it my 'crying time'. I could never just hear an alarm and get straight up, I like to have a significant amount of time just lying and weeping gently up into the atmosphere.

06:40hrs: Second alarm goes off and my bald freak dog jumps from the bed and runs across the landing and into the Tidiness Nazi's room.  I hear the sound of her big dog jumping down from the bed and this usually heralds her getting up and letting 'the kids' out for a piddle.  There is no other sound...

06:55hrs: Third alarm goes off and by this time I am being driven mad by my dog constantly running in and out of the room crying and NO sound coming from the Nazi's room.  I am forced up EARLY which goes against every cell in my Being.  Not wanting to  be the one who has to tediously go ALL THE WAY downstairs to let the creatures out I choose instead to bang about and cough dramatically in a feeble and ill-planned attempt at subtly waking up my slumbering housemate.

NOTHING

07:01hrs: It occurs to me that the Nazi is dead.

07:03hrs:  After some consideration.  Well, 2 minutes of consideration and being at least 43% even louder and hearing nothing from the other room I decide to go and investigate.  Minus contact lenses, glasses and entering a darkened room I squinted my way across to the bed.  The Nazi isn't moving.  Yup, dead for sure; there can be no other explanation.  Now, at this point an unexpected thought kinda, sorta, accidentally popped into my head.  That thought?  The realisation that I'd be able to legitimately take the day off work (cough).  Hell, actually I'd probably be able to score a couple of weeks of unquestionable compassionate leave!  On reflection I accept that after poking my sleeping housemate with a stick, jumping back in fear and, laughingly explaining my thought process to her, I might have come across as a little bit uncaring and not as good a friend as she would hope for.  Hell, she should just be grateful she's still alive after all!

I won't say I was disappointed that I'd got another week of work ahead of me - that would be wrong!  Well,  I kinda was disappointed but not because she was alive, if that's what she was thinking.  That too would be wrong.  I'd have to find another way of getting legitimate time off work.  The whole 'trekking up the Himalayas to do good stuff for charity' thing didn't come off and pretty much everyone who I'd ever met - EVER,  mocked me for my laziness and uncharitable nature.  Also for my fear of monkeys, insects and frightening strangers.....and unrecognisable foreign food......and children.

The Tidiness Nazi lay in bed looking really quite angry for such an early time of day.

"Yeah, you'd LOVE it if I were dead wouldn't you?  I bet you were thinking of all the compensation you'd get!"

"What compensation?  I wouldn't get compo if you randomly croaked it in the night!"

"The house - I've left you the bloody house haven't I?  You'd get the house to do with as you bloody well please...."

(tutting and looking aghast - which I accept might have been the wrong facial expression to wear at this type of news) "Ah shit, but then I'd just have to spend  money I don't have doing the thing up so I could sell it and start living the dream"

....The Tidiness Nazi didn't find this amusing ONE. LITTLE. BIT.  What's the matter with her, she was still alive after all AND I'd taken the time to poke her with a stick in order to establish her living/dead status.  I could have just gone to work and had done with the matter. To be fair, if the dogs hadn't needed a piss she'd  have been potentially decomposing in her bed all day. I didn't mention that.

...I thought my side of the conversation was kinda cute and amusing (she grumbled).  I don't know what is the matter with people nowadays

The Fly

I tried on sunglasses today. It didn't go well; I just ended up looking like The Fly so I guess I'm going to have to stick with my old ones which makes me look like one of the Blues Brothers and that look hasn't been acceptable since the 80's.  Damn me and my stupid face...

So, talking about The Fly, the Tidiness Nazi told me the horrifying story of a fly she heard buzzing hysterically which had been caught up in a spider web at the lighthouse she works at.  I'd already had thoughts of flies in my mind from the sunglasses thing but now I was thinking about THE FLY - Brundlefly himself.

Oh, she couldn't reach the high window to save the aforementioned hysterical fly and by the time she'd found a towel to flick up he/she had fallen silent by the way.  No doubt it was victim to a spider's venom (shudder) unless it had fainted.  Can a fly faint?

Y'know, my friend Bison is a  weirdo - I made a random fly type comment a few months ago and he quickly and confidentially shared his knowledge on how one would sex a fly (for those emergency fly sexing situations no doubt).  Who the hell knows how to sex a fly and why would you share this knowledge with a girl? I KNOW now know how to sex a fly; I should stick it on my CV.  That's knowledge I could do without I tell you! I guess ol' Bison has gone past the trying to be sexy and impressing people stage.  Perhaps he thought this WOULD impress me.  Most men flex their muscles, give you 'the look' or charm you by trying to be cute.  Not Bison though, oh no.

He can sex Damsel flies too.

He also likes taking photos of insects having sex.  In fact, my pal Bison is the foremost insect pornographer of his age.

I love my friends

(mostly)

So, back to Brundlefly.  When the Tidiness Nazi told me the story of the hysterical fly it suddenly reminded me of the original 1958 version of The Fly and that horrifying scene at the end with the bloke's head on the fly's body trapped in the web.  Stuck with me for years that did.  Of course, I ended up in a Fly reverie and I got lost in thought longer than one should thinking about what it would be like to be me but on a fly's body.

Oh God.

I'd be phobic of myself for a start.  Can you imagine still having your own thoughts and looking like you facially but having the body of a fly.  At least I wouldn't have to worry about putting on make up.  I'd have no opposable thumbs for a start but hell, I'd still have the same face and it looks pale and I have dark circles around my eyes without make up.  I'd desperately want to use some concealer, mascara and a bit of lippy but then again, I'd have the fucking body of a fly so no one would care about my facial blemishes.  I guess I'd have more on my mind really....

I guess though, in an emergency, I'd be able to seek a lipstick without it's lid on and fly at high speed into the thing hoping it'd get on my lips.  Shit, I've made myself laugh now, how funny would the end of the film be if the guy who saw the fly stuck in the web shouting 'help me' did a double take 'cause the fly had not only my face but one of those crazy woman make up faces on it. Y'know the type; a diagonal smear of pink lipstick over crooked lips and 2 splashes of electric blue eye shadow over the eyes.  Then again, if I'd flown head first into lipstick I'd look ridiculous.  I'd look ridiculous any way with my tangled hair and hairy fly body.

I'd be able to fly about but this would be a small compensation for being a fucking fly.

Hey, I'd be a fly but without the huge field of vision.  I'd be screwed wouldn't I.  I also wouldn't be able to get a fish pedicure.  I'd LOVE a fish pedicure.

All joking aside though, it'd be awful to be mainly fly.  Flies don't have necks do they? Our heads are the wrong shape for a fly body and if, during the 'fly-erisation' process thing I became a neckless fly I'd be even more screwed. No great eye vision and no neck to turn around and look over my shoulder. I guess flies don't have shoulders. Anything could creep up and potentially eat the shit out of me.  I'd end up as just indigestible bits left in a web; a lone wing and a leg. No one wants THAT!

That does it.  If any scientists expect me to get into an experimental transportation device accidentally with a fly they can fuck off and that's my final word on the matter.

I'm tired.

The glutton

My Tidiness Nazi housemate informed me she'd been to the chiropractor and had to rest so it was going to be a 'make your own' night tonight with regard to dinner. 

Disaster!! 

I am famed for my inability to cook even the simplest thing.  I think that it's mainly because I can't be arsed to cook and then when I'm hungry I want something immediately and therefore end up with a dinner that is on fire but frozen in the middle.  I will now post a number of pictures of culinary disasters I've had to endure:

 I present: VEGGIE BURGER!

 A lovely OMELETTE!

 A little seasoning to my Domino's pizza!

 MmmMMMMmm, MINI PIZZAS!

Well done Linda McCartney, here is one of your VEGGIE PIES!

So yeah, you can probably guess why I was somewhat nervous about it being a 'make your own' night.  I decided to go with my signature dish; ice cream.  I then decided to have a different flavour ice cream for dessert.  I was happy.  Heck, if this regime goes on much longer then I might end up with Ricketts but hell, I'll be happy.  As happy as a Tap Dancer (who would be unable to stop a pig in an alley).  The only downside to my happiness was the judgemental look on the face of the Nazi.  The good news is that she couldn't stand it any longer and I scored some spaghetti bolognaise out of her disgust! 

In other news, 'Mental Health' work colleague and I had a candid discussion about stuff.  She's got a painful patch on her arm which is clearly arm cancer (only it seemed to be better today) and I shared the story about the time I was startled in the early hours by the unexpected sight of my own vagina reflected in the mirror when I was bending forward.  That sight, at an angle I would never have expected to have viewed it from, has haunted me ever since and I've been obsessed I'm horribly deformed 'down there'.  As previously shared, I've now been unable to pull a bloke for a number of years, possibly due to the fact I accidentally exude 'fuck off' vibes from every pore whenever someone talks to me, so have been unable to gauge the level of horror on the face of any potential sexual partners.  I sort of described it to her in it's full 'angry looking' detail and she nodded sagely and told me it was perfectly normal!  Phew!  She then reflected that perhaps we should get a bunch of girls together for a nibbles and vadge party so we can all sort of have a quick look to make sure we're all the same.  I think that 'Mental Health' work colleague now suspects that if ours are the same and mine might be wrong then perhaps HERS is wrong too! 

It's hard being alive innit?

Suitcase Fun

I've been a bit quiet of late haven't I? Oh well, I guess no one really cares and I've had very little to say any way.  I recently got lost in deep thought after seeing a notice for Tap dancing classes on the wall in the kitchen back at the office.  I had a sudden vision of me in the shitty church hall Tap dancing at high speed with an enormous smile on my face.  Tap dancers always have enormous smiles don't they?  People often perceive them as gigantic wankers but hell, they're bloody happy and in my head I was really pleased with myself and having an absolute Tap dancing ball!  I discussed this with my pal Bison and his Tap dancing happiness theory was that Tap dancing originated in 'the olden days' when people knew no better and this was quality entertainment.  I reflected then that if  playing with a hoop and a stick back then was akin to having an X-Box, then Tap dancing must be like having a Wii.  Of course we realised we were talking utter shit but it seemed like a serious historical conversation at the time.  Not the type of historical conversation someone like say, David Mitchell might have, but a historical conversation nonetheless.

Ooh, I forgot - I can do a bit of Samuel Pepys-ing: proper news here;  Elizabeth Taylor kicked the bucket today.  Shit, that reminded me.  As perhaps the crappiest of diarists, I didn't log the huge Earthquake and Tsunami situation which has fucked Japan did I? Rather in-eloquently (is that even a word?) I can say it was REALLY bad shit.  Actually, really REALLY bad shit.  If anyone in the future is reading this (who am I kidding?) there are much better accounts of what happened pretty much ANYWHERE else you'd care to look.  Sigh, I'm so bloody rubbish.

Any hoo, I called this entry 'Suitcase Fun' and here we come to another of my reveries.  Yesterday I had to attend an all day training session on Safeguarding Vulnerable Adults so I had great scope to get lost in thought.  At one point the trainer used the example of a guy who'd ended up allowing bad people (bad is probably a bit of a weak description actually) to live in his flat but they murdered him and put his body in a suitcase! After the initial feelings of 'bloody hell, poor bugger!' I started thinking about the haunted suitcase I took away with me last year.  It was deep and I wondered if I would fit into it (whilst alive).

I was totally gone. I knew I wouldn't be able to zip it up myself so would have to enlist the assistance of housemate and famed Tidiness Nazi Steph to help.  I guessed she would but then would have to have a laugh to herself by walking away and leaving me!  Hell, I could feel the claustrophobia and hear my weakening voice as I tried to bawl at her in a commanding way to demand that she unzip me.  Later on I shared my fears that she would one day soon zip me into an enormous suitcase and would then just leave me in it for hours as I slowly suffocated.  Hell, who knows if suitcases allow air in?  I would guess not and that's why so many dead people end up in them.  Do they leak bodily fluids or allow the stink out?  NO, I don't think they do and that is why it would be bad for me to be completely zipped up in one.  We came to an agreement that should I, at some time in the near future, ask her to assist me in being sealed up in the haunted suitcase, she leaves gap enough for me to breathe through.  I am pleased to announce that this agreement has been reached.

I was then lost in thought again.  I could see the suitcase in front of the tv with just one of my eyes peering out of the gap.  I actually took comfort in this vision.  It sounds lovely. 

...apart from the fact the sodding haunted suitcase would never stand up on it's own.  I'd be mightily pissed off if it fell over and I was unable to see anything.  Is it wrong to fancy Sportacus from Lazy Town?