Pips

Shed Animal

2009-05-19T21:54:00.003+01:00

Pictured above is our Shed Animal, which lives in our shed (hence the name) and according to eye-witness accounts is a rat-chicken-kangaroo hybrid. I'm slightly sceptical myself, but apparently it lives on a shelf in the shed, so is able to leap a metre high (and down again when disturbed), moves like a chicken and is the size of a large rodent. Someone suggested it's a hedgehog, but that would be boring! Never has taking out the compost been so exciting. Will Shed Animal appear and attack? Has it mastered wielding the weapons in the shed and is planning a massacre? To be safe most family members now rattle the shed door before entering, thus announcing their presence to Shed Animal. Surely it's only a matter of time before we have to garden in packs in case of a Shed Animal attack. I just hope I don't get to see what it really is because then I wasted five minutes drawing that stupid picture.

Felix

2009-04-28T20:44:00.006+01:00

One of my favourite hamsters ever, belonging to my sister, now deceased - the hamster, not my sister. Hobbies included sleeping, shoe fetishism, drinking, stealing chocolate out of the wrappers in the bin and looking cute. Pretty much the same as my own activities! I think he was 1/4 rat, 1/4 hamster and 1/2 woman. He also had a talent for extreme acrobatics and breakout attempts:

Rest in peace, my furry friend.

$$$

2009-04-18T15:19:00.013+01:00

Having paid off all my debts on Wednesday (when I say all I mean all - including my student loan and money from my parents and those outrageous gambling & whoring debts) I thought I would celebrate by going on a little eBay shopping spree. Most of my everyday things took a battering on my round-the-world trip so need replacing, and apart from that I need a wardrobe update because I've been pretty restrained thanks to my lack of funds. After a while of being impoverished my Scottish meanness really kicked in and it now takes some effort to make myself spend money at all. Unless it's a plane ticket, that's not a problem... I can usually persuade myself that I really don't need the item and it's overpriced - especially after seeing Asian prices for similar things which were always undoubtedly fake and sometimes of lesser quailty but ohhh so "cheap cheap". So the only thing I bought on eBay was a new aerial for my phone (since the old one looks like it's been chewed by a wolf) for £2.45. After that I looked at ladies' boots but I felt I'd reached my spending limit for the week and my browse through the available items was really just for fun. I found some very interesting items. Basically, if I ever feel the urge to dress up as a dominatrix, a gladiator, a five-year old girl, a robot, a yeti, or just a massive slut I'll know where to look. Check these out:

After that, just to contradict what I said earlier about not being able to spend money, I almost bought a couple of rolls of Laura Ashely wallpaper, despite the fact that I don't own a house or even rent one, but live with my parents who don't need new wallpaper. Maybe it's a nest-building instinct that has kicked in thanks to the glorious spring weather we're having at the moment (think fog and 7°C), or I'm just extremely stupid. Take your pick.

I've got mail! Hell yeah!

2009-03-29T20:38:00.004+01:00

I just ate a rabbit's head, and I discovered that having a rabbit's head in my mouth is not a good look for me. But enough about experiments with Easter chocolate...

I caused outrage and barely contained hysteria among my friends this week by deleting my facebook account. I say 'deleting' but my data's all still there, squirrelled away somewhere for the British government to use against me if I ever show signs of being liberal or wanting to blow things up. Oh and when I say 'outrage' and 'hysteria' I mean that one or two people noticed I'd left and were a little surprised, maybe even raised their eyebrows or something.

My reasons for quitting Ye Olde Book of Faces are complex, but the straw that broke the camel's back was the new Twitter-style thing going on all of a sudden. There's a reason I'm not on Twitter (it's pants) so imagine my disgust when facebook seemed to be jumping on the bandwagon. Also, lack of privacy, data stealing and stalking are not cool. I'm starting to sound like one of my whiny customers, but despite all this I'll probably be back on it when I get over myself.

I'm still on German facebook, which is pretty crap too. There's this thing which is a cheap imitation of poking, called 'gruscheln'. Noone has a clue what it's supposed to be. Some random gruscheled me the other week so on the off-chance that I knew him (everyone uses pseudonyms on there) I looked at his page and it was just some asshole on a racing bike. There was no other info about him, just this pic of him (or someone he wants to be) racing around in skin-tight lycra on this gay bike. Whatever.

So yeah, I'm happily receiving emails now instead (sometimes "Gay Man on Bike has just gruscheled you. Check it out!" No thanks.). If I feel really melodramatic one day maybe I'll wave goodbye to the internet altogether and just write people letters and send carrier pigeons. It'll be a few years before that could ever happen though. And only if more racing cyclists gruschel me until I'm thoroughly pissed off.

Speaking of pissed off, work was really amazing again last week. What amazed me most was how dumb people can be. And animals. First of all we had this complaint from an old lady. Nothing special about that - but when we tried to call her back she had no recollection of ever having made the complaint (just a few hours before in fact) and claimed she had been in hospital for the last three weeks. Yeah, that'll be right, getting her head checked I suppose. Then on the second attempt she said she was with her carer right now and then hung up. I can't bloody wait for the third attempt. No doubt she will suddenly be completely lucid and recall every detail about the conversation from last week.

Then there was the lady who called because she was ordering a pump for her washing up liquid bottle. Nothing special about that - but she was ordering a new one because her dog ate the other one. Yeah. Technically I don't think we should have had to supply her with a new one as she kind of still had the other one. It just wasn't that accessible...

On that note I'm going to retire and prepare my nerves for another week of lunatics. Otherwise I'll end up like the demented lady.

The beans. Take cover...

2009-03-02T22:04:00.004Z

I feel like I should write an update on my life, but actually there are no beans to spill. Which is kind of lame. I've given up on going to random house parties with mad international couchsurfers and the token Scotsman with bad teeth. Well ok, they stopped inviting me, probably because my teeth are too good to play the token Scotsman with bad teeth and I'm not a couchsurfer. I'm a homebody who lives with her parents. I'm stuck in a monotonous job until the depr..I mean recession is over, which will probably be when I'm 35. Until then the most exciting thing I have to look forward to is when the next person who has drunk washing up liquid calls me for advice. To vomit or not to vomit is usually the issue. Yup. I seem to have become the crisis helpline for friends as well as washing-up liquid consumers, which makes me feel wise but boring because I rarely have interesting problems myself.

Problems are a sign of something happening in your life... like when I had root canal treatment the other week. Not entirely pleasant - just imagine a fun-loving sadist using tiny metal files to grate into your tooth for half an hour. We're talking 20mm but it felt like they went all the way to my brain. But even after the injection wore off I was pain free and pretty happy. A bargain at £68! I've never had so much fun in recent memory. Oh wait, apart from when I cocked up a million times at work with the German procedures. They happen to be insanely bureaucratic (SURPRISE). Each email that's sent out about an installation/ deinstallation/ repair of the stupid laundry-product dispenser has to be sent to seven people or more and you have to somehow work out who they are supposed to be depending on whereabouts in Germany the installation site is, who sent you the request and what your uncle had for lunch. Add to that a complex Excel attachment which you have to put together from the garbled comments and incomplete details called in by the engineers who all speak jargon in strong regional German accents and call from their mobile phones with crappy signals and hey presto, you have a recipe for disaster.

Other than that life is simple and I think I can safely say I am on the way to becoming one of those crazy old ladies who has lots of cardigans and cats and obsessively reads romantic fiction and is addicted to cake.

International Sunset Collection

2009-02-23T18:08:00.013Z

Mt. Maunganui, New Zealand and Penang, Malaysia

Edinburgh, Scotland and Port Douglas, Australia

Oxford, England and Ko Pha Ngan, Thailand

Luang Prabang, Laos and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Whitsunday Islands, Australia and Hoi An, Vietnam

I love the sky. I hope to expand this blog entry!

Neues Jahr, Neues Glück

2009-01-07T18:54:00.003Z

Happy 2009...

I'm hoping for a year of new opportunities work- and location-wise, having spent the most part of last year unemployed and trundling through the world, seemingly leaking money out of my backpack; then after that just unemployed, without the backpack. Looking at my CV, which lists a string of random jobs never lasting longer than six months, I think it's time to focus on doing something I might actually want to do long-term -- such as magazine publishing, something travel- or art-related, or professional crocodile wrestling.

An appropriate New Year’s resolution would probably be to blog more than once every two months, and maybe even post some photos… But my camera’s gone into early retirement and demanding of myself to write more is just not going to work. New Year’s resolutions are mind games, really, and my mind is too simple… I do have one solitary resolution though, and only because I’m likely to achieve it. I’ve set myself the goal of paying off all my debts (two considerable overdrafts and a hot little student loan, plus a tidy sum owed to my parents) before my 24^th birthday in May. I’m going to do it or die trying -- I’m putting myself through a job that I always imagined I was too good for (oh how the mighty have fallen) -- not quite prostitution, but being a call centre minion. They call me an ‘agent’, but even that glorious title isn't quite going to hold me for more than six months I reckon. Give me four months tops...

I expect to be shouted at a lot, but I have a fair bit of experience of this after working the phones in a luxury 5-star hotel and a top-notch academic publisher. Rich people and academic brainiacs are spectacularly grumpy and evil for some reason. In German giving someone a right royal blocking is called ‘to make someone into a snail’. I’m going to be getting calls from Germans, so I was practising telling them not to make me into a snail, but I’ve now been warned I’m more likely to get rude calls from Brits, who will generally ask to speak to the manager within the first five minutes of the call. That suits me just fine actually, and my manager is going to be a busy man. But we will see –- Germans are famous for their rudeness, so I may soon be a snail wearing a headset.

See you in approx. two months.

;-)

My 2008

2009-01-01T21:26:00.005Z

January

nights out in Reading & High Wycombe
reunions on campus
my sister visited me in Oxford

February

travelled to Vienna
got my jabs for travelling to Asia
bought my first antique :-)

March

celebrated my last weekend in Oxford
moved back to Edinburgh

April

left the U.K. for five months of backpacking...

September

returned to Edinburgh with lots of photos, memories and dirty laundry

fruitless job searching

built a pond out of bricks and mortar (yes)

perfected my Thai red curry

enjoyed several studenty Edinburgh house parties

weekend at Tressait, Strathtummel

October

turned down a decent publishing job in Bath in favour of fun Edinburgh weekends and long-term unemployment

visited my sister in St Andrews

November

started job with Paperchase

Killiecrankie Clan meeting/ceilidh

weekend in dolly Dollar

December

abseiled off Arthur’s seat for charity

visited friends in London area for brilliant weekend

worked throughout Christmas and Hogmanay, then struck down by flu

stalked Dylan Moran at Paperchase

The Hibernation Season...

2008-11-25T20:24:00.002Z

I've been curling up with big books (Captain Corelli's Mandolin), watching DVDs (The Philadelphia Story) and baking :-) ... Since I got back I made a German apple cake, Orange and Cinnamon Muffins, Flapjacks, Chocolate & Date Loaf, Blueberry Muffins, and Lemon Teabread. It's very therapeutical and great distraction from job seeking! Which I'm still doing, whilst temping in a stationary shop. I worked in a shop three years ago and quickly remembered how crap it is on my first day. Smile, be polite to people who don't deserve it, keep on your toes for hours without a break, resulting in back and foot ache, carry out menial repetitive tasks... Every job has its downsides but I seem to be really good at picking jobs where you are expected to be regularly insulted by the customers or whoever you're dealing with. Being a secretary was especially bad because people seem to have less qualms about being rude if they are on the phone to you. It doesn't count unless you can see the person you're insulting, or something... This also seems to apply to authors and their treatment of their editors (but possibly only at highly-respected academic publishers). I got this really funny email when I worked as an APE and I wish there was an equivalent for shop assistants:

How To Be An Author - 7 steps to becoming more annoying:

1 Start by calling me (the production editor) by the wrong name or saying it in a weird way:

Dear Jenny / Jonny, Dr, Professor Mrs Johnny,
OR- don't put my name at all. (It doesn't matter who I am, I will leap to your service immediately, tugging my forelock in deference, oh great one.)

2 Make a dig about how busy you are or how unfair it is that you should have to do anything for your book. If possible, use this as an opportunity to brag about international travel and how difficult it will be to contact you.

e.g: Please note that from April to June I will be at my PARIS APARTMENT. Then I will be in Morocco for a month. After that I will be on my private island, where the only means of communication is asking a local shaman to translate your message into dolphin noises and send them to me via sonar.

3 Answer my questions in either a sharp or patronising way, putting some words in CAPITALS for emphasis, even though this is the email equivalent of SHOUTING and what you are saying is really not that urgent or important. If you get the chance, always put the word NOT in shouty capitals. I love that, it is endearing.
This should be coupled with a crazy idea you have had that a small detail about the book will confuse/alienate the readers, even though they probably wouldn't notice it at all.

So putting together what we have so far:

Jenny Johnny,

Looking at my proofs again I see that in some places you have set 'foreign' expressions in italics. This must NOT be done! Otherwise the reader will think that I am ignorant/ xenophobic or bent on the annihilation of all non-English speakers in the world with a big gun that fires pure sarcasm into peoples' eyes and boils children alive. This is NOT what my book is about. You are mutilating its soul and the readers will be horrified. This MUST be changed urgently or it will threaten my reputation and the publisher's.
You had better fix this before the end of this sentence or everything will be ruined and I will tell all my colleagues.

4. Always try to add in a remark about how one of our systems is stupid or flawed, ideally basing your comment on misunderstanding what I have asked you to do. If you can, throw in how you think other publishers are better than we are. That never fails to make us cry.
E.g:

I think your house style for this is INSANE. Surely if you don't set everything in max caps people will ignore the whole text. Next you will say that I can't have the whole book in 18 point bold so it can be read from a distance. I have published many books with other publishers and they always let me do this. In my experience readers like to be at least 10 feet away from the book and with your antiquated rules, all they will see is a blur, even with binoculars.

5. Also popular is repeating something you have already told me many times (because I am stupid and must be told often) and then asking an annoying question before signing off.

E.g:
Don't forget that when the book is bound, all the words MUST be the right way up and printed on PAPER.
Is the book published yet? How about now?

Now?

Now?

Oh my God! Isn't it published yet? If I had gone with [X publisher] they would have done it by now.

6. Sign off with some vague or patronising phrase. If you can get some insincerity in, all the better. Only the true master can add a really barbed comment here, but some manage:

'Much thanks for trying your best for this important project.'
'Thanks for being so efficient.'

7- Try not to sign your name here, because that might make me think I can use it, as if we are equals. Instead, either leave your usual long email signature:

Professor Basil Metabolism
Made Up Name Professor of Indignation
Expensive East Coast University
USA

Or just an initial, leaving it up to me to puzzle out what to call you.

See? Easy.

Still in the burgh...

2008-11-05T17:54:00.010Z

...and still unemployed! Which does nothing for my bank account, but gives me lots of time to make plans. Job-wise there were some hot leads but the trail always went cold, so I'm back on Plan A (staying in Edinburgh and getting any old full-time job), after Plan B (moving to England for a publishing job) and Plan C (moving to New Zealand to become an abseil-guide). Notice how Plans B & C require considerable amounts of travel and rent money (which I don't have). So I'm living at home and really I should be extremely depressed, but currently can't think of a time when I've been more content! I haven't lived with (or even in the same country as) my family for five years, so I'm actually quite enjoying being part of a busy, warm, silly family again after my house-share experiences which range from dirty but sociable to clean but antisocial. On one occasion even clean and sociable, that was an interesting one... Anyway, I spend a lot of time keeping in touch with friends who are out of reach, meeting up with those nearby, working my way through my reading list, experimenting in the kitchen, and dreaming up little arty projects. This is when I'm not job searching. The friends I keep in touch with are mostly a different set from those I was in touch with this time last year! Some have gone, some have come... I expect more but I give more too. Before I get all deep and philosophical, here are some pics linking to my favourite art & crafts websites at the moment. I have to include ironic ones because there is only so much seriousness I can muster when faced with glue, twigs and fluffy balls of wool.

Back in Edinburgh!

2008-09-11T11:14:00.004+01:00

Here I am again, after 5 1/2 challenging, amazing, adventurous and memorable months of backpacking! I'm doing boring things like reading 5 months' worth of junk mail, lots of laundry and unpacking, updating all my software (probably the most boring, hands down), getting my bodyclock back to normal, and of course job searching... Living at home is okay so far and there is a bedroom in the making for me, which I look forward to cramming all my worldly goods into in a couple of weeks. And there's lots to look forward to - I'm already planning my next big trip (to South America) and pondering what to spend my first salary on. Getting a little ahead of myself there... And even though Edinburgh is a great city, there are loads more to explore and live in, so I'm plotting how to get back to Hong Kong or finally move to Berlin like I've been threatening to for about five years! Watch this space.

Auf Wiedersehen Oxford...

2008-03-04T22:37:00.001Z

Let's take stock - Oxford's been good for my CV, bad for my bank balance, good for my health, bad for my social life (which I had to spice up in other cities). I think I've grown a thicker skin thanks to my job, but I haven't decided whether publishing is 'the one'. Maybe I'm a complete commitment phobic job-and location-wise anyway. I know I only stuck it out for six months because I have travel plans, but I fear I just don't like staying in one place - my attention span is too short! How pathetic.... anyway here are some of the things I'll remember about Oxford (fondly or not so fondly):

'Florence'/'D. Florence'/'Florence D.' the Indian typesetter who is probably four people operating from one email address
The Nosebag and its cakes!
my colleague with the tattoo of a punctuation mark (can't tell you which :-) )
people who get excited about the type of paper they're going to use on their next book
cauliflower AND broccoli in cheese sauce in the canteen
Raoul's cocktails
cycling down the hill at my house when the sun's going down
yoga, especially the bit at the end where we were told to lie like corpses
living in a loft for a bit; that was fun (espesh climbing up a ladder when drunk)
having faulty stock four times in six months (prob a record).. and they still want me to reapply (prob for comedy value not competence)
road rage and verbal abuse from drivers and the time that lorry clipped me
G & D ice cream :-)
the fishy smell of digitally printed books
Christchurch Meadows and those fields in Summertown which were always flooded when I wanted to go for a walk or run there
'Zombies and Consciousness' - my fave (Philosophy) book I worked on
Carling Academy live music
Shakeaway or AMT choc milkshakes every time I was at the train station..
flexitime and a 35-hr week, getting up at eight and being home by six
rice pudding from the canteen :-)

Me....Who Else?

2008-02-18T21:54:00.024Z

I'm honestly quite good at...	I'm seriously quite rubbish at...
baking	cooking
drawing	painting
photogrpahy	spelling 'photography'
starting creative projects	finishing creative projects
travelling	staying in one place
living abroad	saving money
keeping a journal	watching horror films
reading maps	drinking red wine
flirting	feminism (I don't follow through)
nesting	making my bed in the morning
collecting and sharing quirky links	Karaoke
sleeping	answering my phone
monogamy	dating
being my friends' IT support	wearing jewellery
being rude	being a lesbian
defragmenting my harddrive	religion
making playlists for minidiscs	wearing matching underwear
writing long emails	Maths
giving advice	babies
reading	eating spinach or lentils
spelling	being at the airport on time
working out	saying no to sweets and treats
being sarcastic	getting a tan (forget it)
art galleries	making my hair look normal
yoga	any ball sports
eating haribo	riddles
saying what i think	impressing people
writing (starting) novels	ballroom dancing
making lists	academic study
being nerdy	poker
listening	driving
telling little fibs and huge lies	relationships
keeping calm	being the centre of attention
wii	swimming

Vienna

2008-02-11T18:36:00.000Z

After my first trip to Vienna I'm completely in love with the place. Not only because its architecture & art are so beautiful, but also because Vienna's last makeover was in about 1989. I don't mean the place is retro and hippyish, just a bit out of date! Most of the hairdressers have faded ads for perms in the windows; the loos in the airport had a vending machine for sweets instead of condoms; everyone smokes, all the time and everywhere, I bet even in hospitals. And I only saw two modern structures - everything else was built around 1900, in Vienna's heyday. It's now ranked as having the fourth-highest standard of living. Which is fair enough - who can say no to eating Torte and Schnitzel against stunning backdrops?

Back to the Bubble!

2008-01-21T08:25:00.000Z

Campus is called "the Bubble" for a reason - it's a claustrophobic, self-contained and artificial place. I got very fed up with it in third year - after living in Venice, where there was something new to discover every day (mostly by getting lost), the Bubble seemed undeniably dull. Even the hordes of baby ducklings and bunnies couldn't make up for it. Frequent escape missions to Leamington were my method of survival.

I was probably at my most insane ever (and that's saying something) when I spent the entire Easter break on campus to write my dissertation, and I (and the bunnies and ducklings) were pretty much the only living beings there. If I remember correctly I made some cake and posted it to my sister in Scotland, this is how bored I was. And I remember going for a walk on campus at dusk and there being a couple of first-years in the piazza. For a split-second I thought "Wow, other human beings", then I realised that they were racing each other across the square, using their desk chairs as vehicles. Clearly as mad as I was.

Seven months later though I'd just about gotten over my antipathy and dared to return! Go me. Believe it or not I realised I'd missed campus and student life. Especially during the first fifteen minutes I spent on campus - then the novelty wore off! But I'm a bit of a nomad and sometimes I'm not even sure what my home country is - thank god my passport decides for me - so seeing campus felt a little bit like coming home. And considering how static life in the Bubble felt sometimes I was surprised to notice a few changes whilst running around to see my few remaining campus-bound friends. Much fun was had catching up and reminiscing... It seemed the majority of people I saw couldn't wait to finish (especially because of the workload, which in January of your final year is bound to seem crushing), but were aware they were going to miss the social life and the student lifestyle. I think I was scared of the same things; I remember being preoccupied with a dire future ruled by bills and a mortgage, probably because I had no idea what I was going to do and where, and bills and mortgages were the only things I could envisage. I'm glad I have slightly more concrete future plans, at least for the next year! My student days are definitely over and although I miss certain aspects I think this is the place to be in life, when the best is yet to come.

Polar Wanker

2008-01-15T13:31:00.001Z

I haven't had the best time at work since I got back - understatement of the year - but luckily I have a very special author to keep me amused. I've fondly nicknamed him "Polar Wanker" because he's quite high-maintenance. He likes to call me once or twice a week to discuss his book. Other people have discovered email, but not Polar Wanker. He likes a good chinwag.
Well, actually he just shouts at me (but it's kind of in my job description to be abused on a daily basis so it's ok). And I shout back (which is definitely not in my job description). One of the things he wanted to make me do was change all instances of the word 'Polar' in his book to lower-case 'polar's. There were a lot, so I told him to do it himself. He didn't like that.

It's probably a good thing I won't be around long enough to get an Author Feedback form from him. But things are getting better; we've managed to have a couple of conversations without shouting now, and he's realised that emails aren't so bad actually. These emails have caused me a lot of mirth. Not the messages themselves so much, as they mostly go along the lines of "Where are my proofs? Why haven't we published yet? Who got my affiliation on the cover wrong? It's 'Dark Lord of Polar Biology, Random University in Wales'. Get it right, you piece of shit."

But he has a really funny signature block at the bottom of his emails, and it has confirmed everything I ever suspected about him but also revealed his softer side. Firstly, there's a link to his staff page at his University, which has a wicked picture of his chubby happy little bearded self against an Antarctic backdrop - from which I learned that although he looks merry it confirms that bearded men are not to be trusted. He also lists all his research grant money, which is super-interesting. I calculated he got £1,109,810 (I'll just say that again: £1,109,810) between 1997 and 2009. Then I noticed he listed some of the amounts in Euros and couldn't be bothered working out the correct amount.

The best bit of his email signature is this though:
"For an example of how sad my life has become see:
http://www.dtimages.co.uk/ and/or http://www.seaweedpostcards.co.uk/
And for a completely different view of plankton take a look at:
http://www.louiseandsarah.com"
I'm so glad he agrees it's sad to love seaweed and plankton. I'm now thinking of striking up a sarcastic conversation about plankton next time he calls; that might melt the ice...(no pun intended).

N.B. one perk of working on his book are the images, which are sometimes a bit like this and make me smile:

Some Unfounded Accusations (which may result in legal action against me)

2008-01-13T22:29:00.001Z

I have to say I feel a bit bad posting a photo of a total stranger here - not because I'm such a tender, caring person but because he a) definitely has an internet connection and could, by some horrible coincidence, see this one day and b) looks like he might like to find out where I live and burn down my house if he sees this.

THIS FACE has put me off internet dating. Before I saw THIS FACE I thought internet dating was pretty shite, and now I'd rather stick my head in a bucket of eels than sign up. The reason I saw THIS FACE is because a friend sent me a dating application on facebook and I thought, what the hell, it's the Christmas holidays, I'm very much single, and a bit bored, so I'll have a peek.

Bad idea - this is one of the better looking candidates it spat out at me. And yeah, looks aren't everything, but this scares the shit out of me. Putting my three years of university-level picture-analysis skills to use I would say this was either taken in the guy's bathroom in front of his steamed up mirror or in his dad's garage in a gentle haze of exhaust fumes. His hair and dodgy stubble demonstrate serious neglect on the personal hygiene/grooming front. The facial expression was probably meant to be a bit sultry but actually makes you want to run screaming from the room. The cropping is close and probably hides a multitude of sins such as bad dress sense and porkiness. I'm not even sure he has a right eye! Using this guide I think he fits into the "Dark, brooding" category, hence The Truth is that he's "Dangerous, possibly a pirate", which is supported by the fact that he is half blind and has a secret pirate eye patch hidden in that drawer where he also keeps his machete, chain saw, someone's amputated foot, and a picture of his mum.

I rest my case.

My 2007

2007-12-31T17:41:00.000Z

january

moved into Hurst

february

went home again because campus sucked

march

saw Scott Matthews live

april

finished my dissertation

may

my Birthday
trips to Edinburgh & St. Andrews
worked part-time as an Analyst

june

sat my Finals
went to my first Ceilidh
Final Fling-ed
moved to Edinburgh

july

graduated
travelled to the Basque country and Madrid

august

enjoyed the Festival with Rachel & Catherine
saw Baillie and the Fault, Union of Knives and The Shins live

september

moved to Oxford
started work at OUP as an APE

october

saw Turin Breaks live
explored Oxford with lots of visitors

november

travelled to Venice
took on Biology & Classics books at work

december

bought my round-the-world flights
had a great Christmas in Edinburgh
got one of my Venice photos published in travel guide