Dear Reader,
I wrote this before I left for London but never found the time to post it. I think I was a bit ticked off about a few things, or so it would appear:
I have had a list of things building up lately in my head of what I do and do not want and somehow, I feel the need to put this down into words on a screen to clear it all out of my system. Some have been gargantuan mistakes and some have been delightful discoveries, and some things just made me laugh. Let me just vent for a moment please...
Things I DO NOT want:
I am tired, oh so tired of the tediousness and difficulty in this global information super-highway age of STILL not being able to get a decent service on getting my favourite magazine (shamefully, I admit that this is US Elle - no, honestly, it's got really good articles in it and a searingly witty problems page that makes me laugh every time) delivered to my door or available on my Mac at a reasonable price. First attempts to solve this problem involved occasionally "going down Vaclavak" (god, how have I made this possible to say in a Bristolian accent - possibly because Prague now reminds me of Bristol and its small town mentality) and getting an overpriced copy of said magazine once every three months. All for the sake of not being able to hold off from buying magazines any longer than that. Yet this means roughly £10 spent in one go in a place where getting £20 for a 90 minute meeting that I traipse across town for an hour to get to and from is a rare moment of luck, as most meet-ees expect this for decidedly less.
I do not want then, in my attempts to subscribe, like a true devotee would, to be given no other choice than to subscribe for two years, without seeing a subtotal of the elevated cost that allows for sending it all the way from the US to the little old Czech Republic, before purchasing. I also do not want to then be told to wait 6-9 weeks for an account number to be sent to me that then allows me to contact customer services to ask to cancel my subscription, because any other form of logging in is denied me by the fact that I am not a US citizen and the customer service website is only set up to accept such customers. (In other words, no zip code, no way in...Even using a real but not mine zip code didn't work - believe me, I tried!) However, I was saved this time by the fact that they automatically allow you access to the digital version of the magazine, which though useless to me because it's only compatible with an iPad that I do not have, at least sent me my account number. Which brings me to the useful bit of information I'd like to impart: If you want to get two free issues on top of the 24 you're paying for in advance, you'll automatically get it if you try to cancel. They give you that option before you do. Good to know if you're a US Elle addict like me, though this time I have declined, because I really can't afford to spend that amount of money upfront.
What I DO want:
Having become rather enamoured with my former flatmate's pop songs (in Danish) and often looking them up on YouTube to do aerobics to, I clicked by chance on an interesting looking video listed in the side bar and discovered possibly the most heart-wrenching but beautiful song ever. And as a result of that, I found a further video of the same artist, just talking through her little creative life of singing and writing and recording songs. She had faerie lights and a sort of semi-piano/keyboard and just the typical gorgeously design-conscious and creative room that you find in any Copenhagen flat that I would die for. In essence, I want her life.
What I have to accept but fear I cannot cope with anymore:
Randomly, just as you think you're making progress and pushing things forward, my brain decides to overturn my positive thoughts and throws me into totally unpredictable, unbearable emotional pain. For no apparent reason. There I was, happily getting through my self-inflicted relentless timetable that allows for me to make training videos to try to get voice work and singing clients and work out how to upload them to a blog and newsletter that I update and send out once a week, and suddenly, without warning, I am thrust back into the depths of grief about ex partner. Why? I don't understand the workings of my brain. As Karen in the BBC comedy 'Outnumbered' put it so succinctly, "Isn't your brain supposed to be on your side?"
Things that seem to be getting worse and I'm not entirely sure why, nor convinced there is anything I can do to fix them:
We all knew I got a lot of tummy ache. Between having a Mum, grandma on Mum's side and grandma on Dad's side who all had the most appallingly painful periods, it was kind of inevitable that that side of things would be kind of a struggle. But inheriting IBS as well? Come on people! What is this?! I was just battling the former and thought I'd got over the worst of it, when recurring IBS problems decide to continue to plague me like an irritating toddler that you thought had finally learnt to amuse him or herself, only to realise 10 minutes later, that that pulling feeling is them tugging at your trousers because they are bored. Again. Frankly my dear, I have had enough. Go away pain, please. Go and bother someone who sits at home smoking dope all day. They can handle it.
Things I found amusing this week:
I did my little money-saving trick at the bookshop again the other day, now that they've transferred their foreign magazines section to the basement section, not behind the counters at the tills, and grabbed a handful of magazines to take up with me to the cafe. I read as much as I could of magazines I liked but didn't want to buy (the UK Elle I can buy next week in Londoninium for a third of the price it is here- hurrah!) and discovered, as I was reading, that there are trivial bits of knowledge I have that amaze even me sometimes. There was an article that featured the name of a clearly Icelandic woman, Aslaug Magnusdottir, and I laughed to myself as I read the first name in a German way in my head, then realised from the surname that she's not German, but Icelandic, and thus suddenly had a flashback of my Icelandic teacher (yes, I once had one...) yelling at us that the 'AU' sound is NOT pronounced 'ow' like it is in German, it's 'eoi' with a kind of cute, childlike-sounding delivery that is much softer and dreamier. I can understand her disgust at the mispronunciation. But it was funny how vividly I remembered that disgust. And that I can tell you how to pronounce it correctly. I must be one of about 10 people in the UK who happen to know that. And I imagine I am one of one person in the Czech Republic who knows that. Not that it's a useful piece of knowledge or anything, I grant you that, but it is nonetheless, interesting. Maybe. Or maybe I'm one of one who actually finds that interesting. Oh well. I am unique, if not actually of any consequence. You can write that on my gravestone, "She was unique, if not actually of any consequence."
And with that, I bid you farewell. At least for now.
Ms. Platform Edge.X
