Five Things You Shouldn't Miss

Film: "Bronson". Disturbing stuff about a man who's spent 30 years in prison, of which 25 in solitary confinement for various violent crimes, but who's (strangely enough, must add) never actually killed anyone. Based on a true story, as they go.

Book: "Lowboy" by John Wray, who's quickly becoming my favourite writer ever. Odd little story about a schizophrenic boy who goes missing on a mission to save the world from global warming. Wray has a way with words that really puts you inside the twisted minds of the people he writes about, and you kind of end up feeling a bit twisted yourself at the end of it.

Music: The Hickey Underworld, loud bunch of rock'n'rollers from Belgium, of all places. Check out their weird and beautiful video for "Blonde Fire".

Snack: I've snowed in on olives. Eat them by the jar, I do. And I'm such a philistine that I actually prefer the green, de-stoned once with the pimiento inside.

Workout: My brother got me hooked on them giant rubber bands. They look a bit crappy but they're actually dead efficient. I used his for about three minutes and my arms are still sore, three days later. I'm gonna have biceps like Arnie in a couple of weeks.

My Hobbies Include Typing, Answering Phones and Drinking Coffee.

I think I'm addicted to my job. Workaholic is the proper term, I believe.

Waking up on a monday and NOT going to work was deeply traumatic. I walked in a daze all morning, thinking about all the typing I could be doing, all the double-bookings of dates I could be solving, all the e-mails threatening people to drop them from the programme if they don't send in their texts IMMEDIATELY I could be sending and above all, all the biscuits I could be dunking in all that coffee...

It actually went so far that I bundled the Monster in the buggy and WALKED TO WORK. Considered going in, just for a minute or so, just having a quick look around, water some plants or something. But I realised that would be crossing some invisible line and then I really would never leave my lovely little glass-walled cubicle again, kid or no kid needing his mother. So I walked home again, crying a tear or two.

I miss my office. I've been a good girl, can I please come back now?

Snap-And-Swing-Auntie.

Jenny turned up unexpectedly and swung my child.

An Elephant Is Not Just For Christmas. It's For Life.

Some of my friends are really gifted people. Sonia came to visit today and brought Monster a striped elephant that she's crocheted herself! How cool is that?! She'll make a good wife one day, that pretty little lady.

Highlight of the week: the arrival of my new camera. Expect a LOT more pictures on this here dandy young blog, folks. Then again, considering I've managed to break two cameras and three web cams within the last year, don't hope for too much. It may not survive the weekend.

Last day at work tomorrow. Then off to Miriam's for a few days of tender loving stuffing our faces. I'll return fatter and well-rested.

How Do You Like Me Now?!

I just touched human poop with my bare hands, cool as a cucumber and didn't even almost puke.

Beware Of The Judder Man, My Dear, When The Moon Is Fat.

It hasn't stopped snowing for three days.

Baby Monster woke up imorally early this morning, and thus so did I. Breakfast in bed consisting of gingerbread stars and two satsumas, then up, up and away.

Stocked up on watercolours and play-doh. Who knows how long the weather will last, and I'm not an out-doorsy kinda mother when it's below freezing, thank you very much. Much stains on clothes and furniture before the day was over (note to self for next session: put newspaper down first, muppet!).

Spent the afternoon marvelling at the very small artist I gave birth to and re-reading John Wray's "Canaan's Tongue" (it's like an episode of Deadwood written by a drunken preacher who's listened way too much to the Grateful Dead and should bloody well be compulsory reading for everyone in the whole world).

It's dead quiet now. The snow has muffled the usual sounds of cars and footsteps and children playing. It's almost eerie. What sound there is outside my windows falls flat in the depth of whiteness, there's nothing for it to bounce against, just the still softness of the snow, and it lands in the white folds of winter's lap and dies like a bird.

Winter is all sadness to me. All death and no birth. No wonder people kill themselves.

Fear And Loathing In Southern Sweden.

The snow came today. It wrapped my tiny world in an all-encompassing protective white blanket, or was it a straitjacket? Does it protect me, or does it protect from me? Does it mother, or does it smother? Is it clean and white or does it just lack all colour?

I think I'm a bit depressed. Nothing excites me and all my thoughts have holes in them.

I need a haircut and a reason to go on, I need a hot young thing to keep me warm at night, I need more money and more time, I need to be younger than I am, I need to grow up and accept that life stinks and then you die, I need to realise I'm never gonna be a rockstar and I never was.

Problem is I don't wanna.

When You Were Born, So Was I.

(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens;only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody,not even the rain,has such small hands

- e.e. cummings

We Could Be Heroes, Just For One Day.

And Then There Was Dr. Finch

I've just read Augusten Burroughs' "Running with scissors" in one single sitting.

That book is now my best friend.

All Things Considered.

All my flowers die. They all die, and my love affairs never last.

I don't think I've ever been content and I don't think I've ever been in love.I don't have a best friend. I don't even have a particularily close friend.

I have two brothers and three sisters and I don't know anything much about them. I couldn't tell you their favourite colour, or what food they like, or what kind of books they read. They, on the other hand, probably know even less about me.

I was married once, to a man who doesn't know my real name.

When you live your life in smoke and mirrors you end up kind of lost. Thing is though, I kind of like being lost. I kind of like it that you know nothing about me that's worth knowing.

I know all of it. I know it all. I alone know. It's all mine and you can't have it.

Uh-Oh, Huh-Oh.

Now, when replying to an e-mail at work, check very carefully that you reply only to the original author and not to the entire department.

My darling colleague E doesn't always pay attention as much as needed. That's why everyone in the whole region including my bosses now know that I think the cover shot for the 2010 program is shit. (It does look like a chick giving a dude a lap dance.)

And then, as if that wasn't enough... One of the senior colleagues replied back to the whole department and made a quip about my lap dance-comment, sort of in a 'doh!-ish fashion, and I got a bit riled and replied (still to the whole region) "Hot tip to R: www.google.com" which PROBABLY didn't help my cause.

PS. I'm going to Stockholm in the morning. Very important project meeting on Monday for the very important project girl. Yeah.

Full Moon And Things That Go Bump In The Night.

I just went downstairs to bring the pram indoors, and when I opened the front door a BLOODY BAT ATTACKED ME!

Guess who screamed like a banshee? Yes, the bat. Albeit very silently with it's little bat-voice. And I did too, but more audibly.

When I say "attacked", maybe I should specify that it kind of bumped into me when I stuck my head out the door. Hit my left temple though, with could have been fatal, had it been not a bat but a heavier object like a rock or a barn owl.

I hope I don't turn in to Bela Lugosi over night. I don't think it bit me, but maybe I'm just in too much shock to have noticed the bite yet.

30 Up, 30 Down.

There's that thing going around Facebook where you're supposed to do a list of 15 books that you've read and really enjoyed.

No one's tagged me. How were they thinking? Everyone knows I'm like the most well-read person EVER. Their loss. Hmmpf.

So, on popular demand...errrhmm...here's my list:

Elle's Top 15 Jolly Good Reads:

1. The Hotel New Hampshire - John Irving
2. Don't Let's Go To The Dogs Tonight - Alexandra Fuller
3. The Rum Diary - Hunter S. Thompson
4. The God of Small Things - Arundhati Roy
5. Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
6. In My Father's Court - Isaac Bashevis Singer
7. The Horrific Sufferings of the Mind Reading Monster Hercules Barefoot - Carl-Johan Vallgren
8. All Families Are Psychotic - Douglas Coupland
9. A Sweet Scent of Death - Guillermo Arriaga
10. The People's Act of Love - James Meek
11. Green Hills of Africa - Ernest Hemingway
12. Beautiful Losers - Leonard Cohen
13. Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now - Andrew Collins
14. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles - Haruki Murakami
15. Lowboy - John Wray

This is, without over-thinking, my fairly spontaneous list. That's the point, you see, it's supposed to be the first 15 good books that spring to mind. Aaaahhh...yes.
Feel free to leave your own list as a comment. I'm always on the prowl for reading tip-offs.

Next time I think I'll do a list like this, but with 15 jolly good albums. Oooh the suspense! Can you endure?!