Carnivals and cotton candy and you

Wow – my attempts to return to the old blogging world were rather abortive. But I'm going to make an effort again, having seen a veritable smorgasbord of grotesquery over the last few weeks which I feel it my duty to share with you. Firstly though…

What on earth have I been doing?
A good question. Well, things have been pretty busy over the last month and a halfish… teaching music in primary schools around Warwickshire is a very new experience, and good fun. I'm taking a photography course at Warwickshire College which is great… I'm still volunteering at Oxfam, and have got a conference paper to write and some work to do on a WSAF photo exhibition to which I'm very much looking forward. Fleur and I took a trip to London a couple of weeks ago to see lovely lovely lovely Konstantin, Ruth and Rod which was fantastic and which must become a more regular occurrence! (Although the 'Megabus' we travelled on could only be classed as 'mega' under the assumption that 'mega' in fact means 'being reclined upon by a noisy Spanish woman with a hairy back'.)

Anyway!
Some of my favourite blogworthy things in recent weeks have been the following:
1.) Getting a quote for car insurance, I was asked to choose from a list of occupations (that's 'occupations', not 'workplaces' or 'randomly–selected items'...) which included….
'Aircraft'
'Amusement'
'Amusement arcade'
'Armature rewinding shop'
'Artificial inseminator'
'Asphalt coating'
'Bowling Alley'
'Boxer' (I only include that to highlight the absurdity of the rest of them)
'Corrugated and solid fibre boxes'
'Copper Ore'
'Distilled Liquor except Brandy'
'Dolls'
'Earth Moving'
'Electric Lamp'
'Finfish'
'Folding Cardboard Boxes'
'Grapes'
I could go on but let's just say my favourites were 'Special', 'Other' and… 'Shellfish'. I was going to go for 'Earth Moving' but it was 'Student' in the end. Hmm.

2.) This week's issue of 'Pick Me Up'. It's been a while since a poor–quality woman's magazine has prompted me to write a blog entry, but this one really does contain some sterling nuggets of wisdom. 'Top Tips' include the following:

'In those awkward-shaped containers, like Marmite jars, it's hard to get the last bit out. Try standing the jar upside down. You'll be amazed at how much is left!'

Yes, very good. And this:

'If you haven't got time to warm your plates in the oven before tea, just sink them in some hot water. They'll be hot in no time!'

Yes, much less time consuming. This week's 'Pick Me Up' also contains articles with such titles as 'Drinking Your Own Wee: The Pros and Cons', a poem entitled 'The Checkout Girl' which includes the delightful couplet 'Put me coat on, grab me bag / Aaah at last I can have a fag' and one of those flowchart quiz things which can be followed as such:

'Have you felt this panicked before?'
No….
'Does your chest feel tight and constricted?'
Yes…
'Get help straight away. It might be a heart attack.'

The same medical advisors also advise us to check out a bowel cancer website in order to find out 'how your bum works' – and, best of all, Jeremy Kyle has his own problem page. God I love these magazines.

Anyway, more of all that later, no doubt. Here are a few recent pictures for those of you who like that sort of thing. Some double exposures from the little Holga…some of them have turned out pretty interesting. The reddish ones were cross–processed (in the chemicals normally used for slide film). Will keep experimenting!

: 15 May 2006 23:35 |  Comments (4) |  Report a problem