Shocker. Two posts in two years. Whatever happened to goenrounsen? Well... I just got busy. Life took all my stolen moments and stuffed them in a big bag called work. And in fact, now more than ever. Goddamned hectic it is.

Setting up a business is quite some piece of work. You think it's going to be about your area of specialism - but actually that's just a third of it. The other third of your time/sweat/energy is devoted in roughly equal measure to getting business, getting people to work for you and the poxy admin of form filling. It makes you wonder how anyone ever set up a business ever - let alone how they made it work. But this is the law of increments and experience that says that what doesn't kill you, makes you stronger. So today I am mad flustering about a bid for this, and the status of that, but tomorrow I will have come out the other side and be all the more experienced for it. At least I hope so.

Ever since my scooter was taken out from beneath me by a passing motorist, I have been driving this nasty little hire scooter that makes me feel decidedly uncool. Makes me realise that it's not just about transport. I like my scooter because its quick and efficient, but it also matters to me that the quality of the ride is good, and that I'm proud to be riding it. Right now I have none of that. I feel like an oversized chav. But at least my leg is okay - x-rays came back fine. Lucky, lucky, lucky...
posted by Joel at 8:41 AM

Larry David's character in Curb Your Enthusiasm http://www.hbo.com/larrydavid/ is what I'd have turned into if I stayed in LA. Muttering, cack-handed, never quite fitting in. I always found it quite entertaining - the whole Los Angeles scene is pretty ridiculous from the outside - but being on the outside is also not so good. You end up feeling like a bit of a twat. Then it all gets closer to Philip Larkin - the man on the outside looking in - never able to join the party. But where Larkin was miserable, David is funny.

Speaking of funny. This wasn't. And Larkin hit the nail on the head there. There's nothing worse than a room full or people laughing when you aren't. It's like a sort of black laugh you hear. I bunker down. It really wasn't funny.
posted by Joel at 2:02 PM

tum te tum. Working from home today. Taking the chance to escape the manic office and get some of the duller plod plod work done. But when working from home one must be disciplined. Radio, TV, food, internet - all are there for the taking - and all must be kept at bay, even though the day job work is as exciting as scraping three day porridge from the oven top.

Something gives me the fear more than turning 30 in May. I've stepped into the unknown. I've started watching car adverts. I mean, I've always seen car ads, just as I've always seen cars on the street. And I may have remarked at how "that one is quite nice" and "that one is shit", but only now am I starting to think "I would like one of those I wonder how many years it would take to pay it off". This is a whole new rubicon. I never gave two sparrow's shats about cars before - and suddenly I now do.

This is my most obvious sign of middle age so far. I've gradually started going out less and less and enjoying staying in more and more and that doesn't cause me much strife. Although I should point out I never was a massive goer-outer, and now I have a lovely wife and a nice house in the inner suburbs (even writing that only causes a minor flinch), so reasons for staying in are many. But it's the car ads that do it. I've always had cheap hand-me-down cars. Always had my dad to do the choosing and help with the maintaining. But now the decision is mine and it makes me feel old. The fact that I'm swinging towards a Toyota Corrola doesn't even bare thinking about.
posted by Joel at 4:43 AM

Yeah. That Question Time was wack. i just turned that
shit in. Bouffant infested soundbite politicians who
couldn't string a sentence together and instead just
turned every question to their one and only hard-wired
answer, which was either that Bush is a real great
kickass guy or that Kerry is also a real great kickass
guy, but he's also real balanced even though he just
a'loves goin'a'geece shootin'. They made Richard
Littlejohn look good. I mean he talks tat as you'd
expect, but at least he can talk and make an eloquent
point (of tat).

And then there was the audience - a rabble of Miami
randoms who were there for the holler. I should have
expected nothing more. I always forget how much the
Yanks love their sport and then you see them in action
and you realise that, particularly outside of the
North East and West coast, that's all this election
race is to most American voters. A completely
partisan, with-us-or-against-us, excuse for a
superbowl party with balloons falling from the ceiling
and ticker tape and big hair and jesus and... just as
every american sport can't be played without a whole
team of umpires, referees, linesmen, officials etc,
you can almost guarantee that this election race will
end up with the lawyers.

But anyway. Good news about the Boston Red Sox eh?
Broke the 80 year bambino curse. Good stuff.

Send instant messages to your online friends http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com

posted by Joel at 8:42 PM

I like small bon mots like this - cos like... that's how it is. Stairs are like that. Confounding.

I also just enjoyed watching this very much.

And listening to this is grand.

And whilst having access to this is rapidly revitalising my blogging...

and getting a new job is smashing...

this remains the prevailing thought for the day.

posted by Joel at 3:06 PM