Crazy Days

It's a crazy day today, so I'm just dropping in to say hello. Steve and I have friends coming over today, so I'm off to fetch them from the train station in a bit, and it should be chaos tonight (read: hangover tomorrow). Whoopee!

I've also just had the job interview I mentioned a few weeks ago. It got delayed and I had it today. I think it went well, but I guess I'll only know how well it went when I find out if I got the job or not. Should hear by the end of the day, so I might have good or bad news for you this weekend, dear readers.

I also want to boast about something Alesa gave me-

 

Isn't that amazing? It has my name on it. I'm so proud. Thank you so much, Alesa!

What has everyone been up to this week?

Inspiration...

...from dinner at an Italian restaurant? Well. Lest anybody think the writerly, studenty life involves little but writing, studenting and general meandering about our gloriously sunny campus (yes, the sun is rare. I'm excited.), let me disabuse you of that notion. Tonight, I'm going out. Just for a meal in town, for a friend's birthday, but the unusual thing about this is: there will be about thirty other people at dinner too.

The last time I went out with more than a handful of friends, I was seventeen, it was lunch after my school graduation, and I entertained my entire class of sixty by trying desperately to fish a cherry out of the bottom of my friend Tarun's sweet lime soda. Believe me, I had no idea everyone had fallen silent and was watching me struggle. Such was my absorption in getting that cherry.

So it's been, what? Five years now since that outing? And here I am again, about to embark on a similar feat of large gatherings at a restaurant. The reason I mention this is because, when I find myself amongst so many people, most of whom I won't know in the slightest, I invariably get Ideas. I steal things off them. Someone might say something funny and in my head, I'll go ping! I'm going to use that line! Or I might see someone with an absolutely exceptional nose and I'll immediately want to use that nose on a lovely, charming new character.

It's an illness. I could swear it is. I don't know about other writers, but I personally find it very hard to bump into an unusual characteristic or witty banter or magnificent nose without thinking I want to use that. Books are always on my brain. Ideas. Those sneaky things.

How do you get your ideas? Can you hear your friends say something funny without wanting to tweak or use it in some way?

I'm a sucker for Greek gods

I've managed, by and large, to recover from my sleepless night. I caught a few hours in the late morning and am now looking forward to an early night. 

Have just been into town with Lindsey, where we dropped into a bar for a drink or two. Minor hitch in this plan: apparently, I managed to walk all over Asda, town and the bar with a hairband stuck to my back (well, below my back actually) and only realized it was there when a group of older men with tankards of beer decided to ask me if it was deliberate. My face went so hot you could have scrambled eggs on me.

Steve's started a blog, and has a few posts up already. It's focused on sport and his opinion of current sport news and updates, so if you like that kind of thing, do see him. He manages to make it sound interesting to me, which is a feat, because I'm very un-sport-y. So I reckon someone who likes that stuff would love it.


I've decided to attempt an experiment in writing Half. There are certain things I absolutely love, and I've decided to include them all in the novel, and see if they work together. If I could read my ideal book, it would have all of these things, so I thought: why not write something with all these things I love? Can I make it work, even if they seem incompatible?

So into my slightly dystopian premise, I'm planning to infuse:

• Sherlock Holmes
• Greek mythology
• Clothes/shoes
• Slightly Victorian language
• A sexy love interest and an electrifying romance
• A man who growls. I love men who growl. See my previous mention of my love for Kevin McKidd. He growls, in a nice way.

I've loved Sherlock Holmes and Greek mythology ever since I discovered them, separately, as a child. I've never been able to really use that love in my writing yet. Obviously, the book will not at any point be about any of that list. It will just include them. Can it work? I suppose we'll have to wait and see...

Snapshot of a university day

As I write this, I'm sitting in the Learning Zone, a new building designed so that students at Lancaster University can study, work, talk, eat and hang about, all twenty four hours a day. One end of it is covered with long, large windows, looking out into Alex Square, the centre and hub of the university. In the interest of putting off doing my work (I've written about 700 words of yet another dissertation chapter and think I can take a break), I thought I'd describe what I see and offer a snapshot of university life.

Across from me sits Lindsey, friend, flatmate, fellow student, slightly insane and not a little bit dopey either. She's more engrossed in her phone than in her work and occasionally looks up to offer me yet another update re. her job, her manager and the rota. I listen with one ear. Around us are various other erstwhile students, some diligently working, others sprawled out on the sofas with their iPods plugged firmly into their ears. Today, the windows are closed, so it's quite warm in here. So warm, in fact, that I've taken my hoody off. Gasp. In England, too.

Outside, in the Square, which is actually more of a very long rectangle surrounded by shops, banks, passageways and trees, it's still light, though the sun has vanished. Very English. Two girls sit on the steps, smoking. Two boys appear to be enjoying a couple of milkshakes. I'm tempted to ask them where they got theirs, because I tried getting a Diggles milkshake not fifteen minutes ago and was told they were closed. A girl dressed, apparently, for the Antarctic is passing by, her hood so dense it could probably shelter Lindsey, me and the rest of the Learning Zone, were we to feel the chill. Someone's getting money out at the cash machine. A group of first-years are laughing over sandwiches. I can tell they're first-years because only first-years wear skimpy clothes in the cold and laugh that loudly. Trust me. The rest of us have too much work to indulge ourselves. (Okay, I confess to mild sarcasm.)

As early as it is, I can give you a snapshot of the Square tonight, or on an average university night. Girls in short, pretty dresses and coats totter on high heels, already drunk, to get the bus or a taxi. Boys make sure they look steady and reliable, to prove they are men and can hold their drink. Occasionally, someone will try to climb a tree and break an arm. The buses will take them into town, where they'll dance for hours at Cuba or the Sugarhouse or one of the other clubs, and they'll drink till they're silly. I do this frequently, so I know.

Yes, that's university life. Work, drink, dance, play. Work some more. Work whilst nursing a hangover, whilst suffering stomach cramps, whilst being sick, whilst contemplating tomorrow's night out. Then go out. Then work some more. That's the final-year student's life, anyway.

Steve is driving up to see me tomorrow. Am very, very excited about that.

Bruv, Bruv

First off, Stop Crying Your Heart Out. Oh, I do love this song. My character Sean is a big fan of Oasis, so I try to listen to them when I can. Research, you know? (Or so I claim. In reality, one might call it procrastination.)

On a different note, I thought I'd share a story I remembered today. My friend Amina claimed about a year ago that, whilst walking through the streets of Lancaster one afternoon, she overheard the following conversation. I remember laughing so hard and can actually recall almost every word she said.

[The scene. Two trackpant-wearing young men hover beside a pigeon, that happens to be pecking at a discarded piece of KFC chicken.]

Boy1: Bruv, check it out. 
Boy2: That's wicked, bruv.
Boy1: It's eating it, bruv.
Boy2: That's like bruv eating bruv, bruv.
Boy 1: Bruuuv...

Now if you're anything like me, you'll probably laugh and then doubt very much that this actually happened. Happily, I'm quite convinced Amina was telling me the truth. Not only because I've overheard many such bruv-filled conversations myself, but because, in Lancaster, the home of pigeons-flocking-the-cobbled-streets, this seems more than likely. It's wonderfully, delightfully true.