I'm pretty sure our oven is the same temperature whatever

She walks down the stairs and stops midway. She stoops for a moment, in front of the drop in the ceiling, even though she is not tall enough to have to duck for it. Her hair is black and wiry, but it would be hard to mistake the black wire coming from her ears for hair. She finishes walking down the stairs and goes to the fridge, opening it with the same hand that holds an mp3 player. She takes out two plastic bowls – one with rice, the other with chilli – and places them on the kitchen table, eyes on them all the time. She shuts the fridge door and goes back up the stairs managing to never make eye contact with me.

Some notes

1. From a distance, a short distance, the mound looks archaic. I want to pray to it. I eat my lunch there and pray to god for an avocado.

2. The sun reflects off the dried gravel as I shield my eyes by looking at the floor. Woodchip and broken glass. Grass. The sea would be invisible if it weren’t for the land.

3. Across the coast I can see the line where the shade meets the sun. I watch it. I watch it waiting for it to bathe me in warmth.

I haven't written a blog post in a while.

Somethings I like on the internet.

I like that most of Dischord Record's back catalogue is now on Spotify.

I like that my friend Sarah Reid has a blog of her writing. I wish all my friends had blogs.

I like that I can listen to this song repeatedly.

I like DJ Berndt, inventor of the internet.

Also, I read this a while ago and remember thinking, Why haven't I gotten around to reading Oikos yet?

i watched as sudden flames
tore through a novel i had
spent ten million minutes
composing

what was the use? what was the use!

she only ever let slip
the truth involuntarily
as a sudden collision
took place in her

- Marcel Proust
"The Prisoner"

subtitles:
man: where's the coffee?
woman: we're all out.

would anyone like a copy of Granta 113? I have two spare copies for some reason. First come, first served. GONE!!!!

The Way Cafegoers Are

Since I hadn't talked to anybody for quite some time
I had nothing against exchanging a few words
however briefly
with someone or other

I thought and thought about how it could be done
but the more I studied the faces around me the more difficult it appeared
with all those eyes that seemed not to see:
the world has certainly become depressing

- Kjell Askildsen
"Thomas F's Last Notes for the General Public"

"I just want to make a perfect tray of tofu"

The best way I have found to cook tofu is by frying them in a lot of oil, separately/on their own.
It's practically deep-frying them and probably negates any of the beneficial health properties they might at one point have held.
This technique also works well, to a reasonable degree, with aubergine.

The Wisest Course

She lit an oil-lamp
You have no current? I said
No, she said, but I have running water and gas
Ha, I said, you have gas
She began to undress

- Samuel Beckett
"First Love"

i am beginning to realise how little i understand

i am beginning to realise how little
i understand about science
to rectify this
i have started listening to
anatomy and physiology podcasts
and watching youtube videos
searching words like 'phagocytosis'

i have several powerpoint presentations
on my usb memory stick
but all of the time spent trying
to understand more about science
results only in being able to
recall words like 'phagocytosis'

maybe tomorrow i will buy
some A3 paper and colour pens
so that i can explain to myself
exactly what a phagocyte is/does

if i had a tumblr or something

When Cherries are in season
they cost like
two euros a kilo or something
in Spain

there's this song i think you'd like although i don't know if you'd actually like it because the only reason why i think you'd like it is that it reminds me of you and i don't know what to do about this

i like the way you
(when sitting opposite me)
chew with your whole mouth

your jaw moves independently;
your eye-lids fall with pleasure
as you eat your food

i like the way you
are persistent when something
won't stay on your cutlery

patting it down with the side
of the knife repeatedly, i could count
but i could not keep a straight face

Papa Topo

Thinking about turning this blog into a Papa Topo Fan-site.

Dear people,

The Pygmy Giant have been kind enough to post a story I have written on their website. The website has a 'comments' feature, where you can leave feedback or general thoughts at the bottom of the story.

One commenter has already said, "This is haunting in its self-centredness and emptiness."

A friend of mine, who read the story previously, told me that it was both "funny and crushing."

Do you agree with these views?

It is quite short and should not take you too long to read. If you are too busy reading other things you can copy and paste it into something like text edit and use the 'speech' function (if you have a mac)(I often do this when editing) or otherwise maybe there are similar online programmes which will enable you to have the story read to you. This could also be helpful if you are blind.

If you cannot be bothered with those options but would still like to have the story read to you email me your number and I will phone you and recite the story to you over the phone. If interest is high, I will just make a video as my mobile contract is poor and I do not get many minutes for my tariff.

My left eye is twitching, a sign that it is possibly time to go to sleep.

Many thanks,

waiting all day for my new phone to arrive
the floor in my room is wooden
and marked like my face
by the bottom of my chair

I look at it thinking
my landlady will be pissed
as she plans to sell the house
next summer

I tell myself to buy
a second hand persian rug

keep on going to the living room window and looking at people who are not delivery men
I swam six hundred
meters in a former
school swimming pool
that is now open to the public

the lifeguard was on at the desk
when I walked in at 7.30am
I gave him £3.50
he said alright geez
and told me where to put my shoes

a low buzzing noise, it is not for me
you will tell me you lost your phone
as the reason you have not been in
contact with me for over three days now

it was in your bedroom somewhere
are these the things you mean when
you tell me you feel like you cannot
be honest with me

I assumed it was more serious than that

no signal indoors
the last two parties I have been to
I have left early

I like going to the cinema alone
as having to look straight forward
while sitting side by side seems like
a poor social event

sometimes I think my intelligence
and grasp of basic
philosophical theories
is so weak and that I am so incapable of achieving anything

I am fully versed in the abbreviations of msn messenger emoticons

How much do you love the place you live?

Dear people,

I live on the south-east coast of England. I have often thought about living in a different country or travelling abroad for long periods of time. Sometimes I go on three-hour long walks that don't really go anywhere. I walk and I breath and it feels like the air inside my lungs is freezing and expanding and all the bronchioles are stretching outward. Today I walked through a field and 'S.O.S' by Abba started playing in the distance, but very loudly. It was hard to tell exactly where it was coming from. If someone else was there I would have looked at them, I think we would have looked at each other simultaneously and we would have smiled and laughed.

Have you nearly done all your Xmas shopping? Is there anything you'd like for Xmas or would you rather have money? Are we still on for next Saturday? Was it Nietzsche that said the most profound thoughts come whilst walking?

Many thanks,

The Incredible Melting Man (1977)

Feel like running in slow
motion down an empty corridor
into and through a glass door

'Novelisation' of the Argos Catalogue [unfinished]

The Catalogue

Jewellery & Watches
They are not close. And yet, they sit very close to each other.
“What is the time?”
“How should I know?”
“Why are you so vain?”
“I am not vain, I’m just extremely vacuous.”
“Is that why you’re smiling? How does one become extremely vacuous?”
“I see you’re listening.”
They smile, baring teeth.

Gifts, Gadgets & Hobbies
They don’t know me, they have never known me, she thinks. She bites a nail into bits, crunching it with her incisors. She swallows the bits of nail and looks at the jagged, wet edge on the tip of her finger. To her side is a box. In the box there are various objects, a helmet that looks like it is in the shape of hair from Robotech is most visible, all that’s left from the five riding lessons she took last year. Her hand brushes an unpanelled section of the attic floor, a soft yellow-cloud-like material. She rubs her hand, superstitiously, feeling it itch. She pulls up the ladder, then the door. Then she turns the light off.

Kitchen & Laundry
Denim dungarees on his Christmas list, wanting to look like Mario. He is a monster now. He is an advert for washing powder. He does not care one iota for me, my health, or any emotional issues I may have. He is ferocious and brutal. Most of my time is spent trying not to wake the monster dressed in denim dungarees, and yet I cannot do anything without waking him. So I do nothing. I make him food, but he is not grateful.

Home & Furniture
She sips coffee – instant granules, hot water, milk, brown sugar – at the kitchen table. It has been raining for most of the morning, but that suits her fine. She had nothing planned. The washing machine has been turning for a while now. All of this is comfortable to her, the rain, the washing, the coffee. She lifts a foot up and tucks it under her bottom. She has not even bothered to check her answer phone today.

Sports & Leisure
“Grandchildren are great, you can give them back afterwards.” he remembers an uncle writing in a Christmas newsletter once. How long ago was that now? He would like to write to his long dead uncle: “When does giving become spoiling?” He has more questions like this stored away, an escritoire in some cob-webbed corner of his brain. The unanswerable. I know there is no such thing as romantic love, he thinks, but there is romance and there is love and somewhere they most cross over and spill into each other. Perhaps they cancel each other out.

When assembling the table-hockey table he troubleshoots the term “Romantic Love” because he know it will return no results.

Health & Personal Care
She gets in from work and has a shower. She ties her hair up before having a shower and only washes her fringe with shampoo and conditioner. She shaves her armpits and half her left leg before getting bored and stopping. The water has washed away all the dry sweat that has accumulated on her skin throughout the day and is now washing away fresh sweat caused by the heat of the water and the size of the shower cubicle. She turns off the shower and gets out, wrapping herself in a towel as she stands in front of the steamed mirror. She wipes her hand across the glass, but where she wipes quickly steams up again. She opens the door to let some fresh air in and feels it catch on the droplets of water she has missed when drying herself. She wipes the mirror again, this time with a bit more success. She looks at a small red mark by the corner of her right nostril, a fresh spot buried deep under the skin. She blames her diet and tells herself to eat healthier food. She shakes out some of the water from her fringe with the tips of her fingers, separating the hairs. She ties the towel just above her breasts and walks back to her bedroom where she will spray herself with deodorant and sit for a while in her underwear before getting dressed and straightening her hair.

Technology, Computers & Office
It has gotten dark
I haven't turned on any lights
just this, staring back.

Making a Bluetooth connection feels archaic.

Baby & Nursery
We had discussed names, sex, quantity etc,. Talked about, mythologized, it was like they already existed somewhere, in our shared imagination, between the lines traced by my phone up to a satellite in space and then back down to yours. But, of course, if it had come into being at the time it would have been aborted.

Toys & Gaming
Alan is 9 years old. He is waiting for his weekly chess lesson to start. He is the best chess player in his school, and only once has the teacher managed to ‘check’ him. Both acted graciously after the match, but as his mother drove him home from the chess lesson, Alan burst into tears. His mother asked if anyone had picked on him or called him names, but Alan could not muster a reply through the sobs.

The chess lessons take place after school in classroom 4b. While Alan waits for the others to arrive he and the chess teacher, Mrs Crab, take out the chess boards and arrange the tables and chairs. People pair up as they come in. Alan watches them, one by one they take their seats, avoiding him, until the last person runs in late, dismayed with who he has to play.