I absolutely hate this time of year, everything comes flooding back, everything that I more or less manage to hide the rest of the year.
I hate pretending to be normal, happy, bouncy, fun Charbs at work, I hate being in company, but I hate being alone more, cos thats when it hurts more, at least in work I can distract myself because i'm acting so hard to hide the pain.
I hate it. I hate the wrench in my heart as that date gets closer and closer, I hate feeling like I'm going to break down in tears any moment, sometimes I do, luckily always alone and no one knows about it.
I know I have people to fall back on, people who'd be more than willing to help me, but I can't, physically can't bring myself to tell them how much it still hurts
(shit I'm crying now)
Welshy last night, he offered, he's there. I know, he's a good boy. but I snapped at him, told him that I was fine and to leave me alone, that I didnt need his help, although I do, but I still prefer to keep these things to myself, to deal with them on my own.

Anyway. Its time for my usual end of year review.
Its been a good one really. There was New Zealand, I can close my eyes and I'm in the bush, I'm watching the sunset and stars over the Kaikoura mountains. I'm crawling under or through four tonnes of blue ice looking at the bubbles imprisoned in it on the glacier. I'm seeing the baby dolphin play against the waves of our boat, I'm standing on the edge of the bridge, shit scared about jumping off, feeling the fear as my feet dangle out of a plane. I hope the memories of that stay forever.

And I have Welshy. I'm glad, that I found him, glad that I have his friendship, perhaps sometimes I do take him for granted and his willingness to always be the one who takes that godawful 4 hour train journey so we can see each other. I'm very glad too that I realised before it was too late how much he means to me. (I wont get any more soppy and girly, he reads this sometimes!! - and it sickens me!)

I have my job too, I hate it and love it equally, I hate always being poor and bored, I hate the fact that again its nothing degree related, but I love how easy it is, I love the people I work with.

The only real downside to this year, is my Mother's continued attempts to keep me here forever and losing Chris.

So my New Year's ambition is to get a real job doing something I'd love, something degree related at last!

And now to Wish you all a very Happy New Year!!!

My Holiday was great fun! We saw Stonehenge, something I've always wanted to see and one day i'll see it better than just chuntering past in a slow traffic jam!
We hunted for the Wild Dartmoor ponies on Xmas day, eventually finding ourselves up a massive tor looking at an old church, we got lost (thanks to SatNav and her insistance to take the senic route) in several country lanes and once even a farmers yard!
We went to the Eden Project and Plymouth! It was great!

I've been on a bit of a bender lately.
On Wednesday I had to go to some stupid meeting thing at work, talking about how to give talks to the public, we played some silly bonding games, like WinkMurder, I was the only one who knew this game, but I was also the only one there under 40 so maybe its a new game!
Anyway, we then had to do this exercise of telling our life stories.
Urk. I hate telling mine, I hate the idea of sympathy. People at work know my past but only in a throw away sense.
I was gonna give the much edited version of it, when the guy who was leading this exercise interrupted the start of it "I was born in Greenwich Hospital, just 10 minutes walk from work"
With: "Oh so you're the boring saddo who's never left Greenwich in their life"
Which upset me greatly, fuck it still rankles, and the only way to deal with that was to go into heavy stupid detail about listening to Dad die, to having him threaten to hit me, when he went insane and the horrid smell of death and every horrid, pointless to share little detail, about how I tried to get my life back on track again and then got stuck here after my Mams car accident.
I hope I left him feeling a little abashed and ashamed of himself. God knows I'm not here still through lack of trying!
Anyway, this effected me, maybe its the time of year as well, but I started drinking heavily that night, cried myself to sleep and then prepared for our work xmas party the next day, where again I drank stupidly heavily, danced in bare feet across the Great Hall, screaming "I PREDICT A RIOT" to the office staff, trustees (including a peer of the realm!) and curators, who were until then quietly enjoying mulled wine, mince pies and quietly piped carols.
Ooops.
It had a pretty great night, I went with 3 other lads that I work with, who all took it in turns to be my perfect date (one even stole me a rose from the table decorations, didnt have the heart to say I don't do flowers) We got hammered on cheap drinks, danced like loons and I have several drinking injuries to prove it was a good night!
I got up and went to work last night, still sulking over that stupid comment and how shit I viewed my life to be, went to the pub (AGAIN!) with guys from work, and set about drinking heavily again, the lads that I'd been out with last night, were sipping coke and suffering quietly and there I was drinking two drinks to everyone else's one and it all ended dramatically when I suddenly got an attack of the Girly Weepies, disappeared subtly (I hope) to the toilet, cried heavily for a couple of minutes, drunk-texted Welshy with a very dramatic "My life is shit" text and then returned to drink some more, with people none the wiser!
Hurrah! Luckily sanity has resumed today and I'm having a sober day!
We're escaping London tomorrow to go to Devon, no one wants to be at home for Xmas so I'm having a sneaky sicky and we're staying there till the day after Boxing Day. It'll be remote and quiet and peaceful and not a trace of christmas about!
Bah Humbug!
Hope you all have lovely Christmases' and I'll be back on Friday!

"So" I enquired at the end of last nights event. "What are you gonna do with all this bamboo?"
She shrugged. "Just break it up and bin it I guess."
"You cant do that!" I was horrified, I dont know much about plants but wasting them like that seems like a crime to me.
"I'll take one home!"
She shrugged at me again. "Suit yourself."
So that is how at 9pm last night I was struggling down the road carrying a 7 foot tall bamboo plant. I had right difficulty getting him on the bus, cos he's actually taller than a bus and got trapped a lot in traffic lights, over hanging trees, low flying aircraft, that kinda thing.
However he's now safely placed in a corner of my kitchen, awaiting a pot to live in.
I named him Brutus, he looks like a big masculine plant to me!

Hyde - its difficult to say what exactly is my Mum's main problem with Welshy. Mainly I think its jealousy, she's always struggled with the idea that she's not the most important thing in my life, and she's been totally reliant on me for a long time now. Fear of me leaving home is another one I think again because she's relied on me for so long.
I dont really know how to deal with it, other than to try and ignore her as much as possible.

I've been lost in a little daydream just now, remembering how cool it was that I used to be able to take huge 6 foot long strides, which gradually grew longer and longer until i was almost flying and hovering along, whizzing along the ground and I really missed how I couldnt do that anymore and then reality hit me with a huge bang and I feel geniunely sad that that was only a dream I had once and I never have been able to fly.

Still no backing down on the Mothership and her anti-Welshy Stance!

last week in my feverish ramblings I told my Mum about Welshy.
She reacted better than I thought she might.
Although, she refuses to use his real name or even bring him up at all if she can help it. She refers to him as "Your friend"
As in "Is that your friend texting you?"
We went out Christmas shopping with her best mate, The Agraphobic, who spent a great deal of time talking about her eldest sons Girlfriend, normally she'd use this as an excuse to compete against her but she kept stubbornly silent.
Today I happened to mention that I was going to meet him and stay out tomorrow night. I wasnt expecting an invitation for him to stay but I was expecting her to ask to meet him, instead it went as follows
Me "You can meet him if you want."
Her: "Do you want me to?"
Me: "Its up to you."
Her. "I wont then."

hehe, its kinda funny, I wonder how long she can deny his presence?

I have the flu. Proper doctor-diagnosed, signed off of work flu and everything.
I read a article once that claimed most people suffer from 2 colds a year. In my case thats probably about right, but they're always pretty mild and never stop me from struggling into work or getting on with whatever and they pass really quickly as well.
This flu has completely stopped me dead though. I have achey joints, my head hurts. I've gone from proper goose-bumpy, teeth chattering coldness, to having sweat pour off of me. I've had falling down bouts of dizzyness and for two days was unable to leave my bed, as it is, going to the kitchen is still enough to put me out for a good few hours.
I hate it. I hate being ill like this cos I can't actually or show whats wrong with me, so I feel like a fraud, I need like a limb hanging off before I'll give into to the idea that perhaps i'm not so well!
And being ill is so damn boring!
I'm getting strangely addicted to the shopping channels, especially GEMSTV, (although i never wear jewellery and wouldnt dream of buying the tat that they sell)
I'm probably the only person in the world who is still willing to struggle into a job they hate, rather than sit at home snuggled under the bedcovers!