Boots, boots the chemist

Ok, there's no easy way to say this, so... I've got something I need to tell you all. Something important.

I'm thinking about... well, I guess you could say, I'm thinking of learning how to beatbox.

Now I know this is difficult for you to accept. Some of you have known me for a long time now, and I never gave any indication that I was interested in... beatboxing.

But I am, Ok? I just am! And I'm going to do it whatever you say! Well, unless I give up, forget, or suck at it. But I've thought about it, and realised that learning how to beatbox must be the most embarrassing thing I could possibly do. I'm me, for goodness' sake, if I were any less 'street' I'd be... something that's the opposite of a street. A tree maybe. Or kitten.
A doily! Because doilies are funny and pretty and posh, like me :D (Modest, too. (Me, that is, not doilies (unless dishes and such are rude, in which case (ahh help, I've gone too far in!))))

Anyway, returning from that peculiar little diversion, the main reason I want to learn to beatbox is that I could shock people with my coolivity, because I don't seem like the kind of person who could do that. However, another good reason is that I fear I take myself too seriously. If anything is going to fix that, it'll be trying to beatbox in front of people. Time to get some training in, methinks.

P.S. The post title, Boots, boots the chemist, is in reference to Soul Survivor of '06, when Mike Pilovachi taught us all "beatboxing for dummies". We are forever in his debt.

Albuquerque!

Take a Weird Al Yankovic song, a zany (that's right, I said zany) flash toon, and what do you have?

This, apparently, and I'm not sorry. Love it so much, I just thought I'd share it with you all :D yes indeed!

Also, how proud I am to finally announce that my blog is finally living up to it's name. Almost. Almost Almost Daily Exploits of Me. Although turns out, very little of it actually comes under the heading of "stuff I did." Not that there's actually a heading.

BE QUIET, ME!!!

My What-Ifs

Some of my what-ifs, for your amusement.

Oh my gosh, what if Boh3m3 just walked round the corner? What would I say, do? Would I play it cool?

Wouldn't it be weird if that guy told me he loved me for no reason? He's kinda hot. What if he turned out to be a psycho? What am I saying. Of course he would turn out to be a psycho.

Heheh. If I stood up and shouted "STOP LOOKING AT ME" in the middle of this church service, what would happen then? oh, but then what would I do. Hm. Probably burst into hysterical tears, run away, and laugh myself to death when I got around the corner.

What if I was a famous writer? What if I had a secret pen-name? It would be really fun to tell people in a really subtle way and then they'd be like "OMG I've read everything you'd ever written", and I'd be all cool and humble about it. Naturally.

If gravity was the other way up, we'd all have to jump over lights and step over doorframes and such. Plus, going outside would be terrifying. We'd have to grapnel our way from lamp-post to lamp-post.

What if all the people I liked the best came and rescued me from... something? Like an office job. And they all just burst in through the door and swept me off my feet and we all went and spent the day on a massive exploring adventure. Or a beach adventure.

What if I met Dave tomorrow...

What if someone could actually see my thoughts? ... What if they didn't like me...

Well, now you guys can see some of my thoughts. And if you don't like me, I guess that means the real me isn't worth liking. But the one person who knows me better than anyone else, loves me so much he died for me. I guess that makes me pretty special. (In a modest, self-effacing way of course.)

Party party party!

I'm knackered!

I've spent to day shopping, then bowling with some friends (while desperately trying to keep one from telling the other about his surprise birthday party tonight), then the aforementioned party, now this.

The surprise party was awesome, Austin Powers themed (yeah baby!) and a great laugh. We all dressed up, or most of us did anyway, and got our groove awn. JUSTIN TURNED UP which was LOVELY and I hadn't realised how much I missed him... if you're reading this, sweetie, I love you from the heart of my heart. But then he left, which made me sad again.

Matt, the birthday boy (he's 21 and a growed up now! ... sort of), has been hanging out with guys a lot more lately. Which is good, and meant that he was much more appreciative of the fact that I am ladyshaped than normal.

Anyway, now I'm tired, but not quite done for the night... I might post a youtube video... we'll see.

Catalyst +

I am elated! It's not often I have a reason to use that word, but if ever someone was elated, it's now.

Tonight, I gave a talk at Catalyst +. I was really nervous, as it was the first time I was talking by myself, and I wasn't all that sure how long my material would last - I'd only ever prepared for ten minute talks before. Everything went wrong today; the video I was going to use wouldn't download (because the interwebs broked AGAIN), and I very nearly didn't get my notes printed off.

So anyway, after lots of frantic one-sentence prayers, I took the mic off of Dave and grabbed my Bible. I opened with the immortally stupid line: "Is it an emotional wreck in here or is it just me?" I can't explain quite why I was so emotional, just on the off-chance somebody reads this who knows, because the news isn't public knowledge yet. I only found out moments before the talk, so I was still in a bit of a crisis state.

I went through my (sort of) carefully prepared material point by point, and it felt so much more fun and relaxed than any of my previous talks. I really got into the swing of things! Praise the Lord, he squished my nervousness, and I didn't panic even when I was asking for information from the audience. See, I would have been sunk at that point; if the audience isn't willing to volunteer information, you know you've lost them. Fortunately I had some very good friends in the room that night, who were willing to share if only to makes things easier for me. Everything ran so smoothly, and I was hugely relieved when I stepped away from the front, having delivered my three convenient bullet points and said what I meant to say.

Dave asked me afterwards how long I thought I had talked for. I don't blank out after talks any more, at least, so I could remember it, but I hadn't a clue how long I had taken! I thought back over the material, judged that I hadn't rushed myself or padded it out too much, and ventured a cautious guess of ten minutes.
"From the time you got up to the time you sat down..." he started,
"Yeah?"
"Was half an hour."

SO! I did it! I said my first proper talk! And I didn't mess it up! And loads of people said it was good!

For the record, it wasn't me. The part of that talk that was me was the stumbling, nervous, hesitating, repeating part. The rest of it - quite possibly the majority - was God. Who, by the way, rocks.

Psycho on the bus

I met a psycho on the bus yesterday. I say a psycho; he actually seemed nice, he smiled at me and he was cute and everything, but when a conversation starts with "Have you got a boyfriend?" you just know things are going to go downhill from there. I wanted to give him a chance, of course, because (as I said) he was cute and I was flattered, but things did not go well. After about five minutes, it was apparent that he was a crazy man. When he found out I'm a Christian, he said he was one too, and that everyone needs forgiving; he, for example, was being prosecuted for something, as a matter of fact he really needed to talk to his lawyer about that...

I honestly don't know where men got the idea that we women like bad boys. No. We don't want to be horribly murdered, thank you so very much; give me a lovely geek any day.

He then proceeded to tell me all about how he likes to treat women well, and how the date is always her choice... oh gods I've had that conversation before and every time it sets off alarm bells. What I'm worrying about the most is that (as he so kindly informed me) he's had his license taken away, so he'll most likely be catching the same bus next week, and I'll have to explain why I haven't called him. I do feel kind of bad about it, actually; he could just be a lovely mentally challenged person who I've completely misjudged. But still, I was a little scared.

Is that really how people find partners these days? Just pick someone you like the look of, and go as far as you can as fast as you can? That's not how I do it! I just want to get to know people. As friends. In normal, non-pressured situations. Dating as a concept really doesn't work for me, and I don't really know why people put themselves through that.

So, psycho on the bus, if you are reading this: I am not interested. Sorry. And I would have told you in person but I was afraid you might chop me up into little bits.

Homophobia

I was told recently that everyone, when maturing, goes through a phase where they are attracted to the same sex, and that if you become consciously aware of this phase while you're in it, you will react against this so strongly that you will become completely homophobic. So much so that the very thought of homosexuality will disgust you. Interestingly enough, if this is true, it means that homophobic people genuinely can't help the way they feel.

There may be hundreds of closet homophobes around the country, afraid to admit the way they feel because they fear persecution, even though it isn't their fault. Perhaps we should extend to them the same love and acceptance we ask them to show towards gay people.

On the other hand, maybe something happened in some people's developments that means they loathe and detest homophobes, and they really can't help that?

I tell you what, it gets confusing if you try and take free will out of the equation.

It's ok, don't be scared

It's funny what power there is in symbols, isn't it? When I saw the film O Brother Where Art Thou for the first time, the scene with the flaming cross sent shivers down my spine. The fictional parallel of the Death Eaters in the Harry Potter books made more sense to me than ever. And chances are, even seeing this swastika on my blog shocked you.

The reason I've got this particular symbol on my mind is that last night I got to thinking about a friend of mine. He's very tall, strong, with blond hair and blue eyes. He's intelligent, confident, a good leader and a political thinker. He's fiercely devoted to his country and believes in fighting for a greater cause. Another time, another place, who knows what he could have become? How quickly he could have risen through the ranks?

I'm not saying this to indicate that I think any less of him after this realisation. I still love the boy for all I'm worth. It just made me think that maybe the line between 'good' and 'bad' people isn't as solid as we like to think. After all, murderers and rapists are as human as the rest of us; a fact we all like to ignore whenever possible. Is it unreasonable to suggest that, in different circumstances, we might have made the same choices as these people? You might argue that some people are inherently bad, in which case there must have been a lot of inherently bad people around in Nazi Germany.

This reminds me of the time my history teacher told me about an experiment carried out where people would be asked to deliver increasing electric shocks to people every time they made a mistake. It wasn't really a person being shocked, just a tape player making scream sounds, but the study found that almost everyone would keep going until the 'person' died. Because men in white coats told them to.

I'm scared.

Not boobs.

Well, a bunch of strangers requested that I blog about boobs, so...

No.

Ah, sorry, did I disappoint you? But don't worry, I'm going to blog about something BETTER than boobs. Seriously. No kidding. Here follows a list if such things.

1) Ice cream.
It's been so long since I had Ben and Jerry's (indisputably the best ice cream ever conceived by man). Cookies and cream, phish phood (sp?), and above all, Dublin mudslide... I love the Irish cream in that. Leading me to number two good thing...

2) Baileys.
The only alcoholic drink that I actually like. It tastes like happy!

3) Lost.
Yes, I am addicted, but tragically I am several episodes behind everyone else. Steven, if you read this, I AM MOST DISPLEASED. I needs the Lost.

4) Music.
Into Nina Simone at the moment, she is an absolute legend!

5) Being funny.
I LOVE being funny. I don't know how often it happens, but when it does, it makes me feel good that I can make people laugh... sadly, I don't think I've found a medium that communicates my particular sense of humour. Video certainly doesn't. (Oh, on that note, I may not be making many more YouTube vids, and almost certainly no vlogs.) Writing? Well, I seriously hope I can be funny. Let me know.

6) Poetry. VASTLY better then breasts. I mean seriously, have you read the Raven? Sheer genius. I also recommend blue peace incantation, Salome and "Hole in the floor". Plus, of course, anything I've written. ;) (re-plugs http://creativesplurges.blogspot.com/)

7) Sunshine.
Not only a beautiful thing, which makes people happy (and tanned), but also the source of all life (indirectly, of course). And, to top it all, you can call people it and it makes them smile, so they actually become a little more sunshiney. Which is really rather special.




______________

LINKS to the poems I recommended

The Raven
Blue Peace Incantation
Salome (about 3/4 of the way down)
Hole In The Floor

Oh Em Gee, WALES!

So, I'm back from Wales. Please excuse the net-kid excitement in the title, I just felt it was necessary for some reason.

At this point I realise that "I'm back from Wales!" has no impact since you probably didn't know I'd gone. So here follows my reason for going in the first place.

It was the annual YFC staff conference! I was staying in a hotel in a Welsh castle! And again with the exclamation marks! Anyway, basically I've spent five days with the coolest people known to man. So many people don't realise this, but honestly, your average Christian is pretty darn cool. On the last night, a worship session sort of morphed into a disco - not entirely sure how - and I was truly struck with the awesomeness of the other young Christians there. Seriously, they could sing, play a million instruments each, and dance like you wouldn't believe! A couple of the guys and gals there were legendary breakdancers, and of course there were the ones who were just willing to go do it, however stupid it might have looked. Which it didn't.

So, today I had to come home. I mean, I wanted to, of course, but there's something so special about getting away from it all to focus on God that I really didn't want to let go of. And on the way home, riding in the front seat of my boss / co-worker / friend's car, I had a sudden freak-out moment. I was shouting

"ABINGDON!!! Dave, look, ABINGDON!! Can we go? Can we? Please!! Oh please, look we're ahead of time..."

Dave understood, of course, because I'd already told him about my Dave from Abingdon, but he still said no... smelly Dave. (I know. How inconvenient that they have the same name. Well you're just gonna have to put up with it, sorry.) Anyway, basically, he's cool with my 'internet friend' - I could tell because he was mocking me for it, which he wouldn't have done if he was worried. And boy did he mock me for it. Because, of course, however sensible you are and however real a relationship is, when a normal (non-internet-obsessed) person says "Anna met some guy on the internet", it sounds bad. C'est la vie.

Back to the subject! How was Wales? Windy and grey. Windy I was fine with, I find it invigorating (even though it dries out my skin like nobody's business, as if you care), but grey I wasn't. I'd started to get a tad SAD-ish by the end of the week.

Fascinating factoid (the "oid" indicating that it's something like a fact, but not): Stilton was created by Stan himself.

STAN ->

WHY oh WHY is the internet being so SLOW? It makes me want to cry, it really does. Well no it doesn't, but you see what I mean. WORK, DARN YOU.

Babies, babies everywhere.

So those of you who know me, will be aware that all the guys I work with are pregnant. Were pregnant. Their wives, I mean. ANYWAY. The current state of affairs is that Ian's (Joel Enoch) came on Christmas day, and baby 2 (Chris', Amelie Grace) was born this evening. Well, yesterday. Well anyway.

So now we're just waiting for baby 3.

The funny thing is, despite my aversion to babies, I am simply overjoyed at the growth of the Catalyst family. I've said many times that there's nothing more beautiful than newborn parents, and the smiles on the faces of Ian and family tonight completely reaffirmed that. "We're a proper family... We've got children!" Bless him!

So, congratulations all round!

Phobias

Also, I apparently have a phobia of deep sea fish. Never knew that before.

But you can see why, can't you? Fecking Aaaah, that's why. Huge fecking teeth and freaky-ass eyes. You know, lots of them have freakish lights as well, which they use to scare each other or to eat each other with their huge fecking teeth.

Urgh.

Fortunately, God be praised, I'm not likely to ever encounter one of these grisly fish-beasties in real life.

My phobias are convenient like that. I will never have to face my paralysing fear of deep sea fish, just as I will never have to confront my fear of space travel. I mean, honestly, we've got food and air and water here, is it really necessary to go hurtling off into the void in a tin can with limited supplies of the above and unlimited things that could go wrong?

Besides, what's so interesting about space? Our endeavours so far have reduced a silvery orb to a ball of grey dust. And there's so much yet to be discovered down here! We know less about our own oceans than we do about the surface of the moon.

Not that we should go looking through the oceans. Ohno. I'm just saying, is all.

Seriously though, these angler fish (the ones with lamps glued to their heads) are the stuff horror stories are made of. My brother and I made up an awesome horror story about how a bunch of space-fish that looked like that woke up and came to feed off us. Except they didn't just feed off us, they also injected millions of eggs into our bloodstream through their hollow teeth, and we would basically incubate the eggs until they hatched and began to devour us from the inside out. It's slow, it's painful, and you survive for ages. Ugh.

Ok, so possibly it's my fault I'm so scared of them!

But still. Freaky, creepy fishmonsters.

My Left Eyebrow.

TWO DAYS! TWO DAYS a muscle underneath my left eyebrow has been randomly spasming. It's not visible, but it's certainly not fun. WHY is it doing it?! What POSSIBLE REASON could it have to want to DO this?!



I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I think it's affecting my mental health. Maybe it's a warning. If so, it's a fairly rubbish warning, in all honesty, and certainly very off-putting. The worst part is, it's like hiccups. It stops twitching for a few seconds to lull me into a false sense of security. THEN IT STARTS AGAIN.



I just find it quite upsetting that I have no say over what my face does. I'm not used to this loss of control. Usually my face is my willing and obedient servant, humbly performing the simplest of duties at my slightest command. But NOW... oh, NOW it wants to do it's own thing.



Which apparently is twitch. And make me feel like I look permanently confused. Even though it's not noticeable. So people think I'm crazy for constantly going on about my left eyebrow twitching.



Oh gosh, this whole post has been about my eyebrow! That's got to be some kind of record. "Least significant blog post ever." Maybe it could be the start of a series...



Join us next week for: My right ear!



... Nnnno.

Happy New Year, apparently!

Oh my. I've put a video on YouTube. That is SO much scarier than blogging, because here a) I have complete control over what I say and how I say it, b) it doesn't matter how I look, and c) I'm pretty sure people don't actually read this, whereas people do watch videos on youtube. So, I'm nervous.

Still, to the important part. Happy New Year. I hope 2007 is as good for you as 2006 has been for me! Here's to returning to routine and a healthy lifestyle. My sleep patterns have gone to pot, many nights I don't get to sleep until about 5. AM. I know... so, of course, I'm not waking up until 2pm... oh dear.

As you probably haven't noticed, I've put hit counters at the top of my blogs, and I've put links to them in my signature on the boh3m3.net forum. Chances are, if you're reading this, that's how you got here.

Because it's difficult to get exposure, you know? I refuse to spam people with the link (not often, anyway), so I just leave links in key places, so if anyone's actually interested in me, they can find it. The one glitch in the plan is that nobody seems to be interested. Maybe they will be if this YouTube thing takes off, who knows... it can be so unpredictable!

I'd like to say I don't care, but I do. I'm doing this because I'm interested in people, and so far my internet experience has been sad and pariah-like, with me feeding off their lives. Here's hoping interactivity is on the cards.

Ooh, I just noticed that "on the cards" is a reference to tarot. Sorry. There's the linguist in me again! I'm odd that way.