Diary of a Dosser.

Today I woke up the Angela Rippon having a good old rummage through a lady's downstairs furniture. They were trying to get a bit of cash together so that they could leave behind their home counties, mother hen lifestyle behind for a bit and go on safari in East Africa. I still think its selfish to sell family heirlooms to take a holiday. Cash in the Attic ruins lives.

I ate a pizza for lunch, thats Italian. It was nice. I paid for it with cash from my attic.

There were two groups of tramps on the island earlier, rather than the usual one. One lot was sat on the bench nearest me, the others were sat opposite. I wondered whether it was just necessity that had separated them, or if they were two rival tribes, locked in some sort of grueling drinking battle. Which ones could down the most Frosty Jacks in the course of the day? A scrawny little dog kept going back and forth between them, like some sort of carrier pigeon.

I thought, christ, it must be so soul destroying just sitting there all day watching the world go by. Then I realised I was doing exactly the same only a few hundred feet higher. I might pop down and join in.

The Universe.

Driving home just I noticed a little yellow road sign hanging on a lamp-post. It had an arrow pointing towards 'Jupiter' in bold black font. I always knew Birmingham was at the centre of the Universe.

In other news, regardez le livre 'GOD EXPLAINED IN A TAXI RIDE'.

Picture, if you will, the scene. A sedate library in suburban Birmingham- school children busily tapping away at the computers, chatting on MSN, pensioners grazing amongst the shelves, leaving behind them a trail of sweet wrappers and tatty D.I.Y bookmarks given to them by dutiful grandkids, and the occasional wiff of baby poo drifting from the junior room. At the desk the twirly fan is going full-pelt, keeping me cool as I read like a good librarian, and keeping the dank haze of the public at bay.

Suddenly, my eyes slide to computers where a young boy has just risen from his wheely seat. He mutters something, storming towards the doors. He doesn't stop. His fist goes right through the glass of the door, and he leaves. I stand there, momentarily having lowered my book to observe, before reaching for my dustpan and brush and wading out to sweep up the debris. Its like Baghdad out here (I think). A little bit later the boy returns, his hand wrapped in his adidas hoody, blood seeping, oozing out of the sodden rag. That bit wasn't real, although he did come back, and his hand was scratched. The STATE of our society eh?

Back to the book anyway, its a titillating little dossier- at a mere 125 innocently illustrated, gorgeously brief pages. Its by a guy called Paul Arden, who used to be the creative, sorry, Executive Creative Director of Saatchi & Saatchi. He rambles merrily through the narrative, splashing out on witty anecdotes, cherry picking heart tickling reminiscences and going to town with brain poking questions. It may be petite, but it made me think a lot. And so, go read it yeh.

*KISS*

New places, New faces?

So I'm sat here typing at my laptop on the balcony of my new 33rd floor apartment in a glass tower in the middle of the Brumhole. I think the initial excitement of moving has worn off now, giving way to the mentality of a housewife. It falls upon me to vacuum the living room floor. Its a pretty impressive view from here though, and I'm looking forward to many moonlit nights spent gazing out across the city, watching the cars glide along its veins, and the wind rustling through the trees as it breathes.

I think as a people we tend to associate moving home with new beginnings, fresh starts-cleaning slates and mooching over leaves. I've noticed that even though I've only shuffled a couple of miles down the road from my 'old' place (as of less than a week ago), I've started to think like that too. Its a strange thing, but suddenly moving to a new place becomes a kind of emancipation from the past, a breaking out of the prison that our former habitat became. I think this has a lot to do with the baggage that we tend to accumulate around ourselves and attach to specific places. In a shiny new place there are no lingering memories, no pre-conceptions, only memories waiting to be made- and its exciting to think about what could be achieved now that we're 'new people'.

Of course, there's no getting away from the fact that I'm still in Birmingham, the city I was born in over 20 years ago, and that I'm still part-way through a degree- so my chances of making any big life-changing decisions here are as limited as they were previously. Lets forget about that though. The wind is now quite literally beneath my wings and so I intend to leap, gazelle-like through the tall grass of life, leaving a flurry of dust and debris in my wake, and more than likely being pursued by several lions in the form of debts and regrets!

Keep watching, my first resolution is to be a good blogger.