Here's a guessing game

For some reason, I always find M watching "Mr and Mrs" when I come in and he's been all alone (Americans: "Mr and Mrs" is like the British version of the "Newlywed Game"). I guess there's worse things he could be watching. I guess there's worse things he could be doing too.

So we decided to ask some of the questions to each other. M's now trying to guess my favourite restaurant. He's actually said quite a few ones I did like: The Kitchin; Diner 7; No 1 Sushi Bar; The Mosque diner; Cosmic Cantina/Torrero's; Blue Nile; any place I've ever had dim sum.

Now, I'd like it to be known that 1) I had to come up with my choice of favourite restaurant fairly quickly; 2) I thought about my favourite place to eat, rather than my favourite restaurant. Bottom line: my choice is pretty shite and when he heard it (cos he was never going to guess it), he was really disappointed. He could even be considering divorce.

Because we wanted to know

I don't read books. For pleasure that is, I don't read books. The last book I read was over the Christmas holidays, Brooklyn. I was completely absorbed. I took it in the car to read, even though I get carsick when I do that. I wanted to shut out everyone and everything. I wanted to consume it and it to consume me. Instead of my feast, I had to make do with hors d'oeurves.

I don't write; I don't write for pleasure. And of all, I find writing most pleasurable. I like being able to edit my thoughts, right then and there, no one ever knowing the stupid thing I said the first time (and stupid comments are what they are most likely to receive when they speak to me). I like trying - no, testing different words. I like to weigh their impact. And when I write, all I want to think about are words and sentences and cadence and metaphors and allusions (or is it illusions - you see, I'm still learning). I want to fall into my thoughts, as if the words and letters are like leaves from a fallen tree. And I've raked them up in a big pile. I'll fall backwards into them, like they do in TV movies. And throw them in the air. But the thought-leaves and the word-leaves keep falling from my mind-tree. And I have to rake them up again. This is what I want to do with my words.

I watch TV. Reality shite like Relocation, Relocation. I'm not giving away the ending if I tell you they get the house, right? You can put all the obstacles you like, edit how you wish, but in the end, you know how it is. It's the same for the games that fill my time. Someone will win, someone will lose - maybe even me. It will end. Maybe in an hour, like a TV show, maybe in a couple of hours. And even if I get emotional about those things, soon enough, I won't remember those people, that house, that silly match. I won't become absorbed by it; it will not become absorbed in me.

Basically, I fill my time with crap, rather than the things that matter to me. Because reading and writing (learning and growing and changing and gaining and evolving and knowing) matter, I want them to know they matter, that they are real. And I can't. Because my real life won't let me make them real. Because my real life and my real job makes what really matters to me just a fantasy. I feel like if I try to let what I find to be real in to stand next to my real life, a Harry Hill style fight breaks out. I have consistently been (whether good or bad, that is to be debated another time) an all-or-nothing kind of person. My real life gets it all, what I find real gets nothing.

And I write this not only because you wanted to know. I write this because I wondered why myself.

2010: Moving on?

Happy New Year and all, y'all. Hope it's been a good one for you. Since we've past into a new year, I thought I'd talk about a topic we'll be hearing about for a next couple of weeks: resolutions.

I have always felt sad for people who did not view making a New Year's resolution as a positive thing, or mocked those who did it. I'd like to think of myself of as a defender of the resolution and an observer of the tradition. My most successful resolution was the year that I said I wouldn't eat any red meat. And I did that very thing for nearly three years. The only exception having bacon; I couldn't turn my back on bacon. Still can't. Which probably explains my very large back. Anywho, I think my point is that making a resolution isn't always an exercise in futility.

The only time I find resolutions irritating is when it comes to the gym. In my experience, from now until the end of the month, the gym will be filled with fatties sweating it out, clogging up machines. It will peter out in the following months until British Summer Time (daylight savings time) comes, and then people get a clue and quit. It's actually led me to go for a run outsinde today. Heaven help me until the spring.

Despite my appreciation of the resolution, I had not made one this year. Why? I don't even really know. I have this feeling of contentment, I reckon. I definitely believe its never too late to change. And I would say that's a very American belief. When challenged, British people - children not excluded - give a shrug and say, "I've always been that way." And despite their attempt at matter-of-factness, really, they say these words with pride. I find it terribly irksome.

Forgive my aside, I shall get back to my point: I think I have no resolution because I don't see the need to change anything. I'm not perfect, mind. I could be much tidier: I still have wrapping paper from Christmas on the bedroom floor. I could be healthier: I will probably have a Papa John's pizza for dinner. I could be better with my work: there's lot of planning to be done. But I guess I'm learning to accept myself - I'm learning that there's a time to change things and a time to just accept who you are. The Eagles, via Ecclesiastes, said such a thing, no?

Or, maybe I'm just a lazy git who hasn't bothered with a resolution.