Wit & Wise Words

Tuesday 31 August 2010

Many thanks to the Great WebMaster!

Dogslife is going mobile!

You'll be able to enjoy my whining and other stuff wherever you want (provided you got a smartphone with Wifi, 3G or Edge). All thanks to the Great Red-Haired WebMaster.

Well isn't that just great? A special lightweight version of the blog for all you diet-obsessed frenzies out there. Reminds me of a quote:
Introducing 'Lite' -- The new way to spell 'Light', but with 20% fewer letters.
It's from Jerry Seinfeld.

Aside from that, the Great Red-Haired WebMaster advised me to create twitterfeeds, for the posts and comments. Let me just say: It's bloody hard to find a good introduction of max. 20 characters, so no mocking, thank you.

Let me just say I'm pretty satisfied. With life at the moment. It may be the last day of August, which usually makes me grumpy (except when September first is a weekend day), I'm perfectly content to listen to 'Video killed the radiostar' on Classic21 and to go to school tomorrow.

I will probably be of another 'constitution' in a few weeks, but right at the moment, pessimism doesn't seem so brilliant anymore. I'll have to find a new philosophy. What was it that you adhered to, Krivi? Mentalism? What was it again?

Well, what a toad I am. Krivi follows Krivianism. And I follow Oscar Wilde: I have nothing to declare but my genius.

Sunday 29 August 2010

State of Affairs: Dispersing

I sprained my ankle yesterday. How? Well, to make a long story short, I went to Leuven, met up with friends for drinks, ended up eating pizza, drinking beer, meeting two English hippies that couldn't stop saying 'oh man' but were very nice. And spraining my ankle. I tripped on the sidewalk. No, I wasn't drunk. Just everyday average clumsy.

Anyway, I hobbled along through the city 'till 00.30, then some of the girls had to go home, and I texted my parents, who didn't answer no matter where texted or called. So I took the one o'clock bus to Vaalbeek, and crashed at a friend's. Must have been around 2 AM when I got in bed.

Subsequently, you can imagine my dismay at being woken at 5 AM by my throbbing ankle, that had swollen to the size of big grapefruit. I tried to fall asleep again and succeeded, only to be woken up again at 9.30, by my ringing phone. Mum.

"Oh, am I waking you?"
"Noooo..."
"Darling I'm so sorry, I didn't think to check your bedroom last night..."
"I'm at Annaëlle's."

My parents were out for dinner at a friend's the day before. And apparently were asleep when I called.

"Dad threw a huge fit this morning about the fact the he could be a 'papa poule' (a father hen? a doting daddy?) but I was totally irresponsible..."
"Mmm-hmm."
"I'll be there in 30 min to pick you up."

So I proceeded to dress, painfully getting my ankle in my shoe, and go downstairs, where I found my friend's mother. Could have been quite awkward. Luckily she always liked my quiet, polite manners and I got through my cornflakes making small talk. In the end, she drove me back home.

I must confess I deeply enjoyed her slightly chastising my mother.

Mother who has wrapped my ankle in a bandage and had the decency to look ashamed.

This was a shitty post but I wanted to write it. So, done. Oh yes, Krivi? Marine, I don't know if you remember her, was even crazier than usual last night. I made the mistake of dropping your name in the conversation, and she spontaneously concluded you and I have a thing going on. I hope I convinced her otherwise, but I did find that highly amusing.

Friday 27 August 2010

I am not in my normal state.

Did I already tell you I am a pessimist? No? Well, there you go then. I am a pessimist. In fact I like being a pessimist so much, I actually wrote an ode to pessimism. Ode which I'm planning to recite in front of 70 people in October.
Be as it may, you'll understand that pessimists are not supposed to be perky. Or giddy. Or giggly. Or harbour a stupid grin from ear to ear.
Pessimists are not supposed to listen to 'The Beatles''s 'From Me To You', 'I Want To Hold Your Hand', 'Love Me Do', any version of 'Rockin' Robin' or anything up tempo from 'The Beach Boys' with said stupid ear-splitting grin on their face, even less are they supposed to sing giddily along. Things I do. Heaven help me, I can't even seem to be a pessimist correctly. Some of you might think that's a good thing, but you'd be wrong on so many levels I'm not even going to elaborate them here.

I'll blame it on the summer. The summer, the holidays, the nice weather, the good feeling hanging about, the projects I'm planning and the good resolutions I'm taking (those good resolutions won't last two weeks into September, but hey, let's forget about that for a while).
About those projects and resolutions: since this'll be my last year at my current school, I am pretty determined to end up in detention at least once. I do not want to leave this school with a blank record. I have not yet figured out how to end up in detention, although briefly envisioned scenarios involved obviously recognisable graffiti (lame, I know), a false alarm evacuation, and a wide variety of firecrackers. I am however pretty sure a certain red-haired friend of mine with extensive experience of detention will be able to help me out.
The other project is to put wisdom in the toilets. No, you didn't misread that. I have discovered over the summer that I have an extreme fondness for quotations, and I am willing to share so much I'm going to print that wisdom out, laminate those sheets and stick them all over our loo. And I'll sign all those sheets Wolves, just to see if some have a good memory and will rat me out.

I'm definitely going to have fun. I'm going to try to save the lost cause that is the school's journal. I am going to try and go out a little, instead of locking myself up in my Ivory Tower, like my mother loves to say.

Ah, all those wonderful images that these dreams bring up... It would almost make me regret that the coming fall will bring back my melancholy and pessimism (my normal state). But hey, we'll see that when we'll get there, won't we? After all, it is quite possible we'll all  die in atrocious circumstances before.

FIN

PS: As a bonus, here's some of all those cheesy songs I chattered about. Remember what I said about the worst coloured blog? Still stands, apparently.


Wednesday 18 August 2010

Fashion Victime

I just realised I'm being an ungrateful, spoiled, egoistical kid. You know all the venom I spit out about my mum being a fashion victim? I shouldn't. Really, it's her money, those are her clothes and she wears what she wants, what should I care? Besides, it's not like it has no advantages for me. Do you really think I'd own a pair of Armani Jeans if my mother hadn't worn them then given them to me? Do you really think I'd find a fantastic leather jacket, aviator model, from DIESEL in the attic? Do you really think every time I need a decent outfit I'd run to her? My mum might be a fashion victim (or might have been), although not by far as bad as the ones cited below, that's her choice, just like it's mine to almost never buy clothing and receive hers, or her friend's.


Barcella "Fashion Victime"
Geüpload door slam. - Bekijk originele web video's.

I on the other hand totally like the grunge look. Initiated by Kurt Cobain, whose brains ended up as wallpaint. The Nirvana guy who screams unintelligible stuff in the mic in 'Smells like Teen Spirit'. The whole thing just seems so easy and comfortable. Don't give a shit about your appearance, don't seek attention...
In the end I wear T-shirts, jeans and jumpers. I pretty much loathe dresses and skirts, heels and make-up. But I don't judge people on clothes. Wouldn't that be small-mindedness? Note that I almost did judge my mother on that. Oh, well what the hell. I'm her teenage daughter. I get to not have solid arguments once in a while...

Monday 16 August 2010

Me, my parents, and ridicule.

Can anybody explain the obsession women have with shoes? Normal women that is, I hold a very respectable 5 pairs, of which only two are in frequent use. Proving that I'm not normal. My mother on the other hand, who you might consider a normal, bordering on hormonal 'giddy' person, has enough pairs to line all the plinths of the house. Most pairs she probably only wore twice or something.

In fact, I'm pretty sure that if I stole the lesser loved half of all her pairs of shoes, she probably wouldn't notice even if I was wearing them. Not that I would want to, some of those heels seem like pure torture, and don't get me started about my mother's total lack of discretion in the choice of her colours. Turquoise blue is among her favourites, as well as orange, and fuchsia. She actually owns a woollen longcoat which is entirely fuchsia. Plus tape-à-l'oeil que ça tu meurs. She has a penchant for loudness and extravaganza, and although I don't usually object to that, when it's your mother, someone who should at least try and be a role model, it puts a whole different perspective on the situation.

My mother is embarrassing, she's the total opposite of me with my quiet, cynical nature, and she seems surprised that I'm not your average teenager. Elle me pousse au crime is what it is. But I am a typical adolescent in the fact that I have frequent fights with my mum. Oh don't misunderstand me, I love my mum dearly but sometimes she is just so infuriating I want to slam my ashamed face into the nearest wall.
Those are the moments where dad looks at mum with an adoring look in his eyes and tells not to be ashamed of anything except our own actions. Since after all ridicule never killed anybody.
The whole process is so sickeningly sweet it brings bile to my mouth. God damn those stupid three-minute life lessons.
Not that I'd ever dare to oppose to dad. I idolize him, and I know that's doing no good, not being able to be critical of him makes looking at the world objectively really hard.

Every time he tells us and more particularly me that ridicule never killed anyone, I mutter "I know that by now, the whole family would already 've died thrice if it did", in a bittersweet kind of way. Shame is an annoying emotion, seems to be chronic in most humans, considering one or another member of their family, the 'black sheep' in some cases.

I'm not a black sheep. The whole family is too weird to fit in the concept of black sheep. In fact we'd be the black sheep family, resulting in us all being normal in our weirdness. Follow my trail of thought? Good, neither do I.

Yet I differ from my parents and the rest of the family in my shyness, my independence, my cynicism, my pessimism. I wish so much to be discreet I sometimes get confused with the wallpaper. Quite an achievement. My greatest one yet? How should I know.

On choisit ses amis, pas sa famille. Right-ho. I wouldn't trade mine, though. They are infuriating beings, but I love them too much to ever consider changing them. They're family. They are the ones you learn to live with, by definition. And as long as they don't treat you too badly, you owe them. So guess I'll go on loving them, all the while muttering and whining while I disappear in the wallpaper, never admitting how much I like them, their weirdness and their quirks.

God, if he exists, is a bloody bastard.

Sunday 15 August 2010

Back from the Heart Of Darkness

Dear Mr. Stanley,
First I want to thank you for the title of your book, that I stole for this post's title.
Next, perhaps I should make a comment about the Congo you explored and described a long time ago, before you were dead.

It's quite simple: I can't. I can't formulate an opinion about that too big country. There were days during those three weeks where I dreamt I was back home. I would cry alone in a corner and tell no one, because I knew it would scandalise them. I was in fucking Africa, having a once-in-a-lifetime experience. I was shown some of the most miserable people on this earth, I had to be there and show compassion. Never ending compassion and support. I should have thanked the heavens for my lucky situation. And I didn't feel like it.
But they couldn't understand. Understand that to feel okay I need to be almost invisible. Watch and listen in without being the centre of the attention.
Something that is quite impossible in a country full of black people, especially if you're white. Especially if you're white foreigner. Especially if you're a young white foreigner.

There were moments I wanted to be alone that much that I snarled at those guys. Not nice. And I didn't give a damn.

And then there were those other moments, mostly on the road, when you realise the beauty of the place, the kindness of the people. Moments that made up almost all of the bad experiences.

I know I didn't live up to the experience and probably was unworthy of it. But I'm tellin' no one except y'all. Or I'll be that spoiled sociopath, psychopath, that sorry excuse for a human being.

I wonder why I was born a human, I differ so much from most of them that I really am a sorry excuse for a human being. But then again everyone differs so much from the others. Guess we're all sorry excuses for human beings.