A Portrait of the Artist in Six Words, Courtesy of Dr But Why?

Anna MR - A small number of large experiences.

This Post Is About Orgasms, Take Two, aka The Second Coming. The Anniversary Edition, Including the Final and Ultimate Truth on the Matter at Hand.

Ognuno sta solo sul cuor della terra
trafitto da un raggio di sole:
ed è subito sera.

(Salvatore Quasimodo)

(The author of this blog would like to thank all her siblings-and-partners-in-crime, who came and exposed themselves, so beautiful, so naked, so poignant, so funny, so brilliant. Thank you. You made my earth move, you changed my life.

She would also like to point out that the idea for an anniversary post was put into her head by someone else. Bloody poets.)

This post is about everything. And love.

I started this blog about two years ago. Happy Birthday, blog girl. It is quite safe to say a fair amount has happened in these two years - when I started blogging, I was married in the tropics, now I am divorcing in the Arctic (okay, near enough, and it sounds good).

Now before y'all hasten to lace your congratulations with commiserations I will categorically state that this is not a miserable state of affairs, at all. Being a divorcee in the Arctic clearly suits me, is much more right for me than the other option, because I am if not happy (for what, pray, is happiness, and do people seriously expect to achieve it as a permanent state of affairs?) at the very least the shape of my life is a shape that fits, if you see what I mean.

(I am here reminded of several lines from some Finnish poets - names forgotten, sorry. One says something to the effect of "Life is given to you so you can decide what position you'd like to be dead in", another "Life is made that way so you wouldn't long to come back too quickly", and a third states that "Just as the visitor starts to feel at ease, it is time to leave." The last is a bit startling, because I am rather feeling at ease in my life - even with the pain. The pain, in fact, is okay, has been okay for quite some time, it's the sticky immobility horror that is still bad to cope with. Time to shut up in these brackets.)

So yes. My life is a shape that fits, and it's surprising to me, really, how difficult it's been getting here - although to be fair there have been times before now when my life has fitted me okay and I've given it up, either through choice or necessity. I have clutched various instructions and users' manuals on life in my time - and I'd bet I'm not the only one. They tend to state very standard guidelines, though - if you're from a cold country with miserable weather, fantasise about warmer climes, please, if you're single, hope for a relationship. And so on.

I don't mean to sound miserable or embittered here. For I'm not, gentle Reader, most emphatically. Spring has returned, bringing with it birdsong (the other night when I was on my way to the sauna, the blackbird gave me a single and piercingly lovely wolf-whistle. I interpreted that as A Very Good Sign (hello, sis). Put a spring in my step, I can tell you that for free), things that grow, and light - all good things I appreciate greatly (nothing wrong with seasonal change, though, and autumn and death-moon and all that are fine too when their time comes). But there is a certain unnameable something, a wistfulness that the return of spring stirs up in me. Particularly, I suppose, the light, that unreal light of Northern summers which seems to glow from the inside, more and more the later it gets. The further into spring and summer we get, the lighter the light becomes, in both meanings of the word, a weightless other-worldly light which makes you feel like something will come, some redemption, darkness and death are no more, Heaven will surely come unto the earth, and the feeling builds up and builds up with the light, and I can't help myself, can't help my body and soul responding to it and believing the feeling, even though this is my forty-first spring (although only my thirty-first of these my native white springs of such painful beauty. As it is, existence owes me ten more springs, wouldn't you agree? And so, once I'm dead, I will come back for ten more springs. Yes). But alas, maybe it is my age, maybe it is my nature, but while I allow myself, once more, to believe it, can't help but believe it, once again, one more time, I also know it's not going to happen, it will build up and build up and never peak, for just as you think it will, it turns and though it is still lovely it is already descending. I tried to explain this the other night to someone who, miraculously, seemed to get me despite the garblational pig's ear I made of it.

So yes. This blog is two years old, and - probably rather by coincidence than by planning - it has had a fine birthday present from the one-and-only Montag (whom, incidentally, I urge you all to visit. He cares about stuff, and is poignant, funny, angry, amongst other things, sometimes alternately, sometimes concurrently, so there's something for everyone over at his house). Although he is stupefyingly prolific on his "main" site, Montag also has another site where he posts a poem a week, because he fasts and writes poems weekly, for peace. And the present for my blog girl, gentle Reader, was a poem, dedicated to yours truly and my sisters. This is a special and fine thing and one I cannot hope to match, so I'll just say thank you again, Montag, and here - have some trees. I believe you have a liking for them.




(So, if you got this far, gentle Reader, thank you for bearing with me. To all those who have gone on at me about putting up a new post, you've only yourselves to blame (love you really). I feel it may well be I'm pretty much written out for a good long while to come. But another anniversary is also approaching, so I may have to return before too long for a few words on the Second Coming.)

I will have a December post if it kills me

Some while back, I noted I had written no posts at all in December, last year. In fact, I was, at the time, having a blogging crisis (I am fond of the artistic licence to exaggerate) during which I came very, very close to giving it up altogether. Oh, thank God I didn't, because it would have been unthinkable...but I note I have not exactly been particularly wordy recently either. This is, of course, to do with the climate and the weather and the darkness - location, location, location, in other words, dear Reader. Living a stone's throw from the North Pole has its lighter and its darker sides, and currently, we are going through the latter. It has a strange, flattening effect on one's writing (at least this is as convenient an excuse as any I'm likely to come up with before December's done again, and I still don't have a December post to my name). Weirdly enough, the darkness does lend itself to some lovely photography (excuse me while I blow my own trumpet).
These pictures, dear Reader, are from my balcony, and depict not the constellations above me (a chance to see them would be a fine thing in current prevailing weather conditions) but a very wet type of sleet falling.
I am so fond of these photos (I took a couple a few weeks or so ago, when we first had a light dusting of sleet) that I have already got several up on my flickr site, and I'm too embarrassed to flood more and more of the same thing there (don't ask me why - it is as much my site as this one, so I should be allowed to do whatever dorky thing I like there. Mostly, I do, too, but for some reason, these (oh God) artsier efforts make me feel shy). Which is why I am treating you, dear Reader, to them, here on my bloggy. Here, have another one (sorry, but I do like them an awful lot).

And because I do like you, too, an awful lot, although I've been neglecting to say much, here's one more showing my downwards view as well as the galaxies of snow. I think it has a distinct stage-lit feeling to it. The blogger enters, upstage left...she is going home.

It's official: I'm nice. Oh shite

Goddamit all to vitun hell, I have another award, flung straight back at me by no less than my hero herself, Madame Signs of the Deft Pen (and Keyboard). Thank you, Signs, I muttered under my breath (and, to be honest, to her straight up as well), thanks a vitun bunch. She has only given me a "Nice Award". Nice. Me. I am reknowned, all over my world, as a sharp-tongued pathologically self-centred meanie ex-punkette, I am, and also, increasingly as a reclusive hermit who's just short of taking the monastic oath of virtuality (the idea for which is © Signs-the-very-same-as-above, and I'm not laying claim to having invented it, just jumping on it with gusto, because it's a good one). I am not nice.

And now, it seems, I am. My world-view has crumbled down, I don't know what to do and where to put my hands, I have never realised but I am actually viewed to be a tea-and-cucumber-sandwiches, kittens-and-balls-of-yarn, tell-me-your-woes type. And the worst of it is, because it is Signs who has come up with this assessment, it must be true, and no amount of swearing in Finnish is going to change the situation. I console myself with Signs' words "Nice is the New Cool".

I have been given no instructions as to how to behave now, but I expect usual rules apply, one must nominate others to suffer the same fate. Not very nice of me, this vindictive passing-on of the hot potato, it rather contradicts the terms of the award, but see if I care (that's how nice I am, do you hear, Signs?). Right. I pass the niceness-trouble on to

NMJ, Ms Legs my Cyberfriend, because she is lovely to her bloggy guests, cares about people in the world, she brought me Marmite although she hates the stuff, and I have met her and can verify it, she truly is nice. Really nice.

The Periodic Englishman, for similar reasons: he is lovely to his bloggy guests, cares about people in the world, and we, too, have had Marmitey transactions, albeit of the virtual kind, but (see above) virtual is fine by me. I have also, once upon a time, given him a pink pony, and it's high time that poor creature had some feline company, I think.

Right, that does it for now, I think - and this isn't to say, by the way, that I think the rest of you blogfolk are not nice, because I think you are very nice, the lot of you (see above, oath of virtuality, etc). You are all so nice you are welcome to come for tea and cucumber sandwiches over here at my house, whenever the mood grabs you.

Award-splat (thank you, housut)

I have a backlog of blogposts, it seems. Some while ago, the fine legwear of a blogger, young master trousers (whom I have awarded a while back with the Finnish name housut, by way of an apology for, upon visiting his site for the first time, misquoting him to himself and generally acting like a caricature of a teacher, all of which he was very gallant about) said some very nice things about this wee bloggy of mine (which I simply cannot repeat here (much as I'd like to, believe me), because that would be boastful and big-headed, and that simply won't do), and also gave me this here award:
which really is most kind of him.

Apparently, the particulars surrounding this award are somewhat hazy - there are no rules as to how many you can give away and the like. I am going to give one to Signs, not only because she's nice and I like her, but also because she fits the definition very well and extremely consistently, and also because her blog tends (deceptively) to look a bit too serene and consequently needs a splat to madden it up a little. I of course reserve the right, since there are no rules, to go on a splatting-frenzy some other time and give out more to the many deserving who are today left without.

An attempt at flow of consciousness

Anybody remember Vick's Vaporub? My mum used to smear it onto my chest, maybe even my back, when I was little and ill. It was of an unnatural blueish hue, with a very sticky greasy consistency. I disliked it intensely and would object to, even struggle against it being spread onto my person. It sort of stung as well, I seem to recall, and the odour was sharp. I suppose the vapours were meant to ease breathing.

I bought a Blistex lip balm a few days ago. It has camphor in it, and my, does it sting your lips. I am addicted to the stuff. My lips have never been softer. It says you are allowed to smear it onto your nose as well, to stop it from getting chapped during a cold. I am really glad we haven't progressed to video blogging as yet, because I am a sight to behold.

My older son told me (not more than an hour ago) I shouldn't take revenge on him and his relationship just because my relationships all "piss up a tree" ("kusee puuhun", for those of you who understand Finnish). It has been a while since a male person has managed to upset me as much. Quite a while, in fact. I should probably just forgive and forget, though - he did go out (on my request) and buy me a thermometer earlier, and he made me the world's worst cup of coffee, too. So for the record, there was a time today when he was being a nice son as well.

Time for more lip balm.

I have smoked seven cigarettes today. I am counting them. As soon as I wrote this, I started very intensely fancying an eighth one.

Whenever I am not at the computer (and, believe it or not, it is for quite a segment of the day) I come up with my best stuff. Once I sit down, it all goes. I have a little notebook and my best posts are often ones I have managed to write there first, while the thoughts were in my head.

I am going to go and smoke another one now. Yes I am. I may write more once I'm back.

I should maybe explain myself. I "go to smoke a cigarette", because nobody in Finland smokes indoors at home anymore - I can't think of a single person who does. Everybody goes onto the balcony, if they have one, and onto the communal mattoparveke ("rug balcony" - we don't generally have fitted carpets in this country either, and taking your rugs out once a week for a lurid beating on the rug balcony is the moral duty of each Finn. Needless to say, I fail most miserably at this), if they don't. The upstairs neighbour at my parents' place is a non-smoking nazi (sorry for offence caused for other anti-smoking people and victims of nazis). She will bang her windows and balcony door shut the instant my footsteps are heard on the balcony, and she doesn't stop at that, either. She will send anonymous hate mail (with delicious lines such as "you make me lose all hope for mankind") and shout abuse, too. I detest confrontation and stay silent (but continue smoking, it's not forbidden).

I should maybe explain myself some more. My own neighbours don't seem to care so much that I smoke on my balcony. But. I am staying at my parental home, oh woe, a victim of putkiremontti (plumbing renovations, another quaint Finnish custom), have been for four months and a day today.
A putkiremontti renders your home completely unlivable in for months. The picture above shows what used to be my bathroom. This is the third summer running, for circumstancial reasons (yes, the relationships that piss up trees) I have spent crammed into my parents' place with my unruly teenagers.

This has probably been my longest post to date. I have a policy of non-deletion, so I'm stuck with it now.

Time for more lip balm. And maybe another cigarette.

It's Not Pants - one of my non-commercial commercial breaks

The multi-talented and creative That's So Pants is treating us in blogdom to Chapter 1 of her new novel The Full English. I have been there and read that and would be very happy to read more - in fact, I am quite peeved I can't (as yet, anyway). I urge you to go and have a read too.

An unfortunate typo led them to me

My "cyberfriend" is gone. It was great to meet her. It was she, who, many months ago, (publicly) exposed the habit (which I was more fond of than I'd care now to admit) of publishing lists of googlehits as being lazy blogging. I haven't published them since, and only once mentioned a particularly juicy hit, but the one I'm about to quote is too good, and she will be too tired out by her recent travel travails to be able to chastise me for laziness...

Reader - I have been the source of much knowledge for many seekers in my time, but (to my recollection) none have come with a quest as obscure as the person who landed on my site, with the undying search words

"puss between toes"

I kid you not.

NMJ said to me

NMJ said to me, I feel as if I walked here, and I said, Well, you did, in a way.

We first "met" each other when I was living in the tropics and was a virtual blog virgin. She was a blog I next-blog surfed onto, and realised (to my delight) some people online actually could write. Besides which, she was fun and quirky and clearly someone I wanted to know. I nearly ruined it straightaway, though, as I accidentally hit "next blog" and lost her. It took me forever to remember her blog title "Velo-Gubbed Legs".

I am really glad I remembered it in the end. Knowing her has brought an untold amount of good stuff to my life.

I would like to thank the Academy, Dr Why, my mum, and five others

The eminent blog doctor, Dr But Why?, has presented me with a Thoughtful Blogger award. Being an awardee not only means I can have this label on my blog margin mantelpiece, but I also get to salute five other bloggers. Ok. Ahem. Here goes, unaccustomed as I am to public speaking...

The Courageous Blogger award goes to someone dearly beloved by me, my dear Ponipoika McPoni, aka The Periodic Englishman, for the obvious reason that he is very brave, strong, and courageous. He is also many other things, but I particularly want to recognise this aspect - easily overlooked because he is so many things, including riotously funny - of him and his blog in my award-giving.

I am also giving out four Creative Blogger awards, in no particular order, namely to

NMJ of Velo-Gubbed Legs. NMJ's was the first beautifully written blog I came across. Hers is a special house of flowing words and thoughts, of sharpness of mind and goodness of heart.

Ms That's So Pants, of the site that bears her name. She is anarchic, she is thoughtful, she is funny as all hell.

trousers, a young man with a good stonewash look and a voice of his own, pleasing on the ear and with something to say. housut, I salute you. (I realise you have recently said you are not doing another tag. housut, this isn't a tag.)

Reading the Signs, an outstanding writer of very real merit, and my fellow offender in many a blogland crime. Signs has recently also received the blogland Nobel, the Inspirational Blogger award, but I'm not going to let that hinder my awarding her. I'm just not, because that's the way it stands.

So, you lot, your contributions to blogland are seriously appreciated by yours truly. Toddle off now to Writer's Reviews to pick up your badges. If you find out how to get blogger to accept uploading them, let me know too. I am finding it fiendishly difficult and hence cannot display mine, much as I'd like to.

(The description of a thoughtful blogger is actually really sweet, sounding like a nice person to hang around with, and in my present state (I have been a bit oddy lately, as you, Dear Reader, may or may not have noticed) this hit me where it hurts, so I'm trying to hide behind some serious corny. The blabbing I do around this post does not mean I'm less than serious about taking off my hat for the people I have awarded, though. Because my hat is firmly off and I'm applauding wildly.)

PS Ha-ha! I have done it, with cunning. Firefox was the key, I am sad (as a Safari devout) to say... now quickly quickly, I need to get it up in the sidebar as well...

8 random factoids

I have been tagged by Signs (again - Signs, you will pay for this). I am finding this surprisingly difficult, as I harp on about myself so incessantly anyway at various forums it seems there isn't a fact I haven't visited somewhere or another. But, for beloved Signs, I am willing to try.

Here are the "Rules":
(Note from Anna MR: Please adapt or ignore as you see fit).

1. Let others know who tagged you.
2. Players start with 8 random facts about themselves.
3. Those who are tagged should post these rules and their 8 random facts.
4. Players should tag 8 other people and notify them they have been tagged.

1) I have a good head for languages, which sadly has been completely thrown to waste, as I only speak two fluently (Finnish and English) and one passably (Swedish). I have, though, during my life attempted to teach myself several others, namely (in order of appearance)
- Swedish (yes I know, but I was teaching myself it at home as a six-year-old, before I started it at school at 11)
- Latin
- Hebrew
- Greek
- Welsh
- Russian.
Do you see a pattern of little use developing here? In addition to these, I did a smattering of German at school. Something tells me it would have been more worthwhile for me to focus on that and learn it, rather than spread my energies on a collection of difficult others.

2) I have slightly webbed toes - not all of them, I hasten to add, before you die of disgust. Just the two toes next to my big toe (why don't toes have names, the poor things? Index toe and middle toe), and not all the way up, just to the top joint. I have always known this about myself, but my mother only noticed it when I was five. We were in the sauna, and she exclaimed (in Finnish, so I am treating you to one of my translations) "Dear God, child, you have webbed toes!" to which I replied, "But mum, so do you." She does as well, and she had never noticed that (she was 33). This genetic anomaly has been carried to both my children. I also have minute feet - nowadays I take size 3 1/2 - before I had the children, I took a 3 (that's 36 for us Europeans, by the way).

3) I also have the wrinkliest palms in Christendom, or nearly - my mother and older son have these too. Another genetic anomaly.

4) In theatre, I have played one bitch, one bloke, four frustrated and/or mistreated wives, one madwoman, and Sylvia Plath's mother. Amongst other things. I don't know whether I am typecast or not.

5) I have had eleven cats but only one dog. The cats were called (in order of appearance) Sune, Nelson and Lulle, The Puss and Parsley, Punch, Eek-y-Puss. Between The Puss & Parsley combo and Punch, I also hand-reared four kittens (Parsley fucked off and never came back, and left me to deal with them). They were called (in order of appearance) John, Paul, George and Ringo (what else). I fed them from a special kitty bottle. They slept on my pillow, climbed in my dreadlocks, and called me Mum in kitty tongue. I found homes for all of them. George was the smallest and had the most disgusting habits. She (yes) was also the last to go. I have regretted giving her away at all ever since, although it is now nearly nineteen years and four moves-of-country ago, so she'd probably have given up by now anyway. The dog was a lurcher called Burroughs (after William S.). My first husband kept him - another great regret of my life.

6) I like French roast coffee (black, plenty of sugar) and Earl Grey tea (usually white, no sugar, occasionally black, with lemon). I prefer white wine to red, as even very small amounts of red has started to give me god-awful hangovers, and it stains my teeth and lips black.

7) I have fear of flying (manageable, barely), mild vertigo, middling claustrophobia. I will put off going to the doctor's and dentist's until I absolutely have to go. I get travel sick quite easily.

8) My unfulfilled/able ambition is to play the title role in Hamlet.


Phew. Done. In turn, I shall inflict the suffering on the following poor bastards:

Dr But Why
trousers
Ario
Mellifluous Dark
Zola-Ink-Spots
Anticant
Rhysaurus (he doesn't know I exist, I don't think, so this should be a goody)
Basest (he hasn't said a word since May, but perhaps he shall now)

Phew again.

Dr But Why's beautiful WET SPOT MACHINE

Seeing is believing. Ok.

Chop chop everyone, go and see *it* - The Beautiful Dr But Why's Incredible WET SPOT MACHINE. You don't know you've lived till you've seen it.

And although she must get all the credit, don't forget you heard it here first.

Word, as they say.

Oh bugger

I was going to write a thoughtful and very concise post. It was all worded in my mind.

I went to Ario's site. I saw a quiz. I took it.

You're Watership Down!

by Richard Adams

Though many think of you as a bit young, even childish, you're
actually incredibly deep and complex. You show people the need to rethink their
assumptions, and confront them on everything from how they think to where they
build their houses. You might be one of the greatest people of all time. You'd
be recognized as such if you weren't always talking about talking rabbits.


Take the Book Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.

My reputation - nay, my whole self-image - as an elitist literary snob is ruined.

Oh bugger.

This is for you, dammit

I don't know. There I was, committing an act of great altruism and love, and what do I get in return? Petty quibbling on whether the Republic of Ireland can actually be considered a part of The British Isles or not.

Now don't get me wrong. I am not some uneducated twirp who thinks England is the name of all the countries thataway, forrin geerrl as I may be. I am speaking purely geographically - not geopolitically - when I claim that The British Isles is the name of that island group. To me, this smacks of the reluctance of the Canadians to be known as North Americans - which is, of course, abject nonsense, because they just are, ok?

Anyhow. Just in case this matter needs any clarification, I sent my beautiful, 22-hours-a-day Finnish sun over to comfort a weather-violated friend in the Republic of Ireland. You had better be nicer about it after this clarification, as I am wondering whether such a magnanimous act was altogether wise - it has gone down to + 16 here and it is absolutely pissing down (my summer holiday starts in two days).

For good measure, I'll send another sun. The first one can be for the weather-beaten friend who is, beyond any shadow of a doubt, not only in The British Isles, but also in Great Britain. So there.

This is for you

One or two of my dear people have been suffering terribly from the recent weather conditions to mistreat the British Isles. In an attempt to offer them some comfort, I am now sending them the Finnish sun, with an added feature of the auringonsilta, the sun's bridge - that's what we call the reflection of the sun on the water.

There you go. Hope it helps.

A Rant. Possibly, my first around here.

I have realised I don't seem to rant about anything on my bloggy, ever. That is a bit strange. I have a feeling I might have unwittingly cultivated a (very false) impression of myself as someone very placid, sedate, calm, non-ranty. It's all wrong and false. People must have thought I am a right royal pain in the arse with my never-rantingness (I am, though, they're right - but for entirely different reasons - at least in the world of "real time", "outside-bloggy", whatever you wish to call it).

Ok. I am now going to rant and I am going to make it quick. In less than ten minutes, I will have posted a fine rant and gone for a cigarette on the balcony, just you wait and see.

I read about these a while back, I can't remember where, but I failed to be all that angered by them when I met them in writing. But lo - last weekend, I was out of town for midsummer, a big date on the Finnish calendar (very nice it was too, in many ways, and I have some nice photies which I cannot get round to posting anywhere), and went to a huge supermarket to shop for food for the long weekend, and these - items - hit my eye from their shelf.

They are stupid. I cannot bear stupidity.

They are unnecessary. I only bear unnecessity if it is clever, funny, intelligent, amusing, something. Not if it is stupid and unnecessary.

They are horrible and symptomatic and symbolic of a stupid era and stupid people and a stupid culture of stupid nouveaux-helplessness that just really, really piss me off.

They are - straws you dunk in milk, to get flavoured milk, when the milk is sucked into the lazy gob through them.

I fucking ask you. Chocolate flavour was the one that wanked me in the eye, but I believe banana and strawberry are also in existence, and surely this is only the horrendous beginning. Oh, so help me someone. I mean, it isn't enough we have ready-grated cheese, for those who are so-incredibly-busy with "juggling their lives" (aaaaaaaargh) or being shit and useless or too bone-idle or what-the-fucking-ever to actually use a cheese grater (you may note this has been a pet peeve for a while). No. We have to do away with spoons as well - it is, after all, way too time and personal lazy-arse energy consuming to actually pour a glass of milk and stir in a spoonful of cocoa powder from a box.

I am NOT very old. I turn 40 this September. But even I am so old I think a real cup of cocoa is a cup of Van Houten, mixed into a drop of hot water (with ample sugar) before the hot (or cold, as the mood grabs you) milk is poured on top. In a few years, this incredible skill - "cocoa-making of yesteryear" - will no doubt have vanished into the doctoral theses of social anthropologists.

Please, the god of all cranky ranty wankers such as myself, let the underprivileged underclasses from all over rise and come raping and pillaging and fucking eating us alive with our chocolate-flavoured fucking straws. We don't deserve to be in the driving seat anymore.

THAT, Dear Reader, is how those straws make me feel. And now I'm off for my fag.

And God Said, "Let There Be...

...totally unexpected internet connections for those who sigh under the yoke of plumbing-renovation-induced exile."

Ok, so it lacks a little of the short-and-snappy snazziness that "...light" has as the better-known continuation of the phrase. But it is currently making me almost as pleased as light, I am telling you. For some reason, my hope-against-hope effort of plugging in my modem at my parental abode has yielded a brilliant and wonderful result, after two days of it just sitting in the corner, blinking away.

I no longer have to bother librarians, or feel like the oldest kid in the internet cafe.

I am very happy.

(Tagged with) Thinking

The naughty-but-nice Reading the Signs has tagged me with a Thinking Blogger award. She reckons she likes my blog (I love you, Signs), and that I am "interesting" (marry me, Signs) and "take lovely photographs" (you're talking about someone else, girl).

I am dying to mention this, because it has pleased me greatly. The only trouble is I should tag 5 people back. 5! (Mental note to self & Signs - I will have to kill you, nice as you are.) Does it always have to be so bloody many? I only read about five sites, honestly, and Signs is one of them. In the recent past, I have tagged absolutely everyone I have ever read, in some cases twice, and people have told me straight up they will never, ever answer one of my tags ever again. Or possibly, any tags. But I can't display the badge, (probably because it seems to be beyond my technical capabilities - it won't show on Preview at all, but also) unless I tag five others.

(For godssakes, Signs. I am supposed to be organising a temporary eviction from my house this weekend, as well as attending the pre-dress-rehearsal dress rehearsals of The Maids, not diddling about online like this. But here goes...)

1. Happeningfish is my respected friend and a dedicated theatrical. As a bit of a weekend actress myself, I am full of awe for her commitment and talent.

2. Restless is one of the first blogs I started to follow, in its previous incarnation "My Failure". This is the online living room wall against which the New York artist Kurt Strahm leans his discarded canvases.

3. BibliOdyssey was also an early find, and it remains mind-blowing. If you have tendencies to lose yourself into the internet, you may well be able to do so for a whole lifetime just on this site.

4. PostSecret. I may be bending the rules here slightly, as I cannot tell PostSecret I have tagged them - you have to contact them via a home-made postcard or an email. I don't know whether I can be bothered to write them an email, Signs, and a postcard is right out, it is way too real-time. This is what it's about: "You are invited to anonymously contribute your secrets to PostSecret. Each secret can be a hope, regret, funny experience, unseen kindness, fantasy, belief, fear, betrayal, erotic desire, confession, or childhood humiliation. Reveal anything - as long as it is true and you have never shared it with anyone before."

5. To Say Nothing About the Dog - I have tagged The Disorganizer before, but as he hasn't replied to it, I'll have my revenge and tag him again. That'll teach him. He is totally off-the-wall and odd in real life too.

There. Now I need to get to work packing my books away. I'll maybe explain later, and maybe not.

(PS and yes, no badge. I can't get it to show. That'll teach me.)

(PPS The incredible Ms Signs has also provided, with kind assistance from her His Outdoors, instructions for dummies as to how a badge is displayed. Hence, you can see it above this post. Yay!)

This blog is about trousers. And shame tolerance.

This blog is a year old. Happy Birthday to me.

My first ever post, sometime in April 2006, was a shamefully self-indulgent weepy about being oh-so-alone in the world. I don't think anyone had time to read it (thankfully), as after a night spent tossing and turning in deep embarrassment over it, I went back and deleted it the next day. It is the only one I have deleted, and I have a pact with myself I shan't do it again. Sometimes I even make myself live with the shame of spelling or grammatical errors (recently I wrote the word "elk" with an s-plural, the horror, the horror). The reason for this will become apparent in a moment.

My second post, the first one available now, is really eloquent. It says something like "just to see if I can find my way back to post again".

My third post, the second available, is about buying or not buying a pair of ludicrous trousers. I had put on a fair amount of weight in the recent years, and the trend continued with exponentially accelerated velocity in the US. I didn't buy the trousers mentioned in the post, and I'm glad. Since I returned to Finland in the summer, I have lost (thanks to a combination of picking up smoking again after 5-6 years and actually using public and pedestrian forms of transport, plus some fun exercise) 8 kg - that's 17.6 pounds, ca. 1.26 stone to you non-SI types - and they would've fallen off me.

My fourth post, third existing one, is probably the longest one to date, and deals with shame tolerance. (And here's the aforementioned reason.)

So there you have it, these really are my themes. Trousers = everything menial, trivial, embarrassingly uninteresting, unimportant stuff. Shame tolerance = my attempts at writing about things which do matter to me. I am, of course, equally (or more) inclined to be embarrassed and ashamed over the "trousers" posts as well. In a bundle of ways, this blog is actually all about increasing my shame tolerance.

What has this year brought to me? I have met some very nice people, startlingly nice people, brilliant people I wouldn't have met otherwise. I have avoided meeting any real wankers, which is pretty good going, as this is very possible online too. (The internet has some really wanky corners and people.) These are good things.

I have increased my shame tolerance levels no end. This, too, is a good thing (I hope - if it goes out of hand, I don't know whether it'll continue to be a good thing).

I am also aware of the fact I have returned to a much smoother writing process, I am not as blocked up as I was - I was as blocked up as a blocked-up-thing when I started. This, also, is a good thing.

I have had blog fatigue once or twice, when the whole thing seemed inane and dorky and I thought I'd never go back to it. Then I did. Which, I think, is also a good thing. Oh, goodness abounds around me. How good is that.

As a birthday present to my wee blog, I think I might start seriously considering changing my photo.

This has been a trousers post.