So for Halloween I dressed up as a miserable old bastard who stays at home and shouts at people as they walk past in a gruff tone. I made sure not to shave for a week, get all kinds of food stains down myself (not to mention the two day old skid marks), have a partial dry bugga creeping out of my nose, the obligatory ear wax, the torn ill fitting Farah slacks and the crusty 'beige' handkerchief and I even found a stray dog to help me live in my own (and dogs) filth for a week as preparation; now that's commitment. But alas nobody witnessed my costumed triumph as I stayed home as usual. Oddly my roommates failed to notice the difference and the dog has been asleep for a couple of days now. I'm sure he's just tired.

We just had a ceremony to flush 'pugsy' the goldfish down the toilet. Actually he was black, I called him Norm just for kicks. He'd been kinda quiet for a couple of weeks (the fish not Norm), just bobbing along and never diving to the depths like the other two (actually he does sound like Norm on a metaphorical level). Maybe he was scared shitless of the giant plastic Octopus that my roommate Jim put there, we'll never know.

But today he was floundering around on his side gasping for life like Silver grasping at his dignity. The poor little bugger, I thought about picking him out and ending his suffering with a clever. But I'd never killed anything bigger than a spider before, well nothing I'd admit to, but it would have been a mercy killing. By the time Jim and Canadian Kandy got home he was almost dead but still managed to give us the finger. So we respectfully gathered round the toilet and bid him farewell for the many years of calming service and finger nibbling by throwing him into a dark, cold and stinky grave (still alive and giving the finger). Oh pugsy, how we'll miss you.

Karma part II



Regarding the past post; this wasn't the only time somebody let me down (although not so rudely). I've met various people with contacts who never bother to follow up on them as promised. As silly as it sounds, I think it's a London thing. This is a cold town socially, it's difficult to make new friends here in my experience. But when it comes to networking I think it's even worse. I dunno, if I say I'll do a favour for someone I generally do it, but I mistakenly expect others to follow suit. I mean, it's not like they're pledging to go into battle with me, it's just some names and phone numbers you know?

And I'm not being hostile about this, I find this whole farce rather amusing. I just don't appreciate people telling me it's my own fault for trying...

Karma



So yesterday afternoon I was again trudging my way to another interview. This was a quick 15 minute review to screen designers for possible second interviews and to build up a freelance pool etc. And also just enough time for yours truly to get on his knees to cry and beg for a job like Silver with a reluctant hooker. The studio was a couple of floors above a cafe and I had some time to kill, so I went in to buy a bottle of water. They had one of those charity boxes on the counter which I dropped some change into for some good karma. I thought 25p for a job was a fair trade. I had a good interview and to keep the good karma going I gave directions to some guy on the way back home. I don't know if he needed them but that's not the point.

And the point is that everything always balances out.

I get home feeling good and all but in the back of my mind I'm thinking that somethings going to happen to piss me off before that end of the day. Right. There was a rejection letter from some Xmas job I applied for, which I thought was just kinda silly. But later in the day I call up this guy who was a friend of a friend I met last week in some bar. He's a designer from Australia and I thought might be able to help me with some contacts yeah? And he's all like 'yeah dude totally, call me later in the week' etc. So I call, and you know what he said? He said he'd changed his mind and decided not to help me out as we'd be competing for the same jobs... Which is a load of bollox as he works in production and NOT creative like me. He sounded so laid back about it too, like it didn't matter that he gave his word in good faith to help a bloke out. I was actually speechless from the pettiness of his attitude. What a fucking' jackass son of a bitch; fuck off back to Australia you slimy pompous assed fucker. I hope your Mother gets violently buggered by a Kangaroo you shithead.

And thus, the natural karma of the day was restored.

You know, with all the shit going down in the world right now the thing that really keeps me awake at night is not knowing when Dave Sharma going to update his blog? I feel like I've missed out on so much of the boy's life. The highs of bangin' a drum and occasionally Sam. The lows of torn drum skins and bangin' Sam. The excitement of 'basement bhangra' and boredom of bangin' Sam.

Dave, when oh when are you going to actually put something up on Davesharma.net!? Stop torturing us you loveable Shagetz!

I think I'm developing a fetish for Avril Lavigne and some strange rash under my right armpit.