The Horror of the Bus

Today was a Sunday like any other. I woke up at twenty to nine, looked at the clock, and decided I could allow myself another hour or so. I eventually got up nearly two hours later.

Not a good start.

To make matters worse, the only reason I got up was because I was warned that the sealant in the bathtub, which doubles as a shower (the tub, not the sealant), was mouldy, and so if I wanted a shower that morning I had to get in there within a matter of seconds, otherwise I would have to wait. I considered this, thinking that perhaps it would be better to have a shower later once the issue of the mould had been obliterated and I didn't have to worry about airborne spores embedding themselves into my skin and leading to an extensive and disgusting fungal infection. However, I suddenly remembered that I was supposed to be meeting with Paul at around 1ish. Given the extent to which the mould had pervaded the sealant and the length of time solving this problem would take compared with the relatively little time I had left, I decided to risk the grossness of the mould and have a very quick shower. At first, all was well. I was singing some Gershwin to myself and just generally having a pleasant time. Then it came to shampooing my hair. A bit of mould fell from the shampoo bottle on to my chest. This was unpleasant in the extreme. It's probably one of the grossest things that has ever happened to me, although I got off reasonably lightly compared to what happened later.

Once I had got myself ready, I went downstairs and decided I had enough time for breakfast. I opted for waffles with maple syrup. They were delicious. I felt like I was living in an American sitcom. Life was good. This illusion was cruelly shattered when I went to leave the house, yelling to my mother (who was at this point in time scraping mould off the bathroom wall) that I was leaving. At this point, she pops her head out of the door and pointedly asks me, "Have you got any you-know-whats?". To you, dear reader, this seems perfectly innocent. She could have been asking me if I had money. She could have been asking me if I had any breath mints. She could even have been asking if I had any miniature Voldemort dolls. Unfortunately, I knew exactly what this highly undescriptive question meant.

She was asking me if I had any condoms.

Apparently I can't leave the house without my rubbery little friends.

I was going to see a friend who happened to be male, not scouting for business. I'm not a prostitute. If I leave the house without johnnies, so be it. I'm not going straight from my abode to someone's bed. Why do I need condoms? Feeling somewhat bemused, I nodded my head (I actually did have condoms, but didn't plan on using them, except maybe to make some balloons if Paul was being particularly boring) and left the house, wondering why she felt the need to ask this and feeling slightly hurt that my mother seems to regard me as some kind of streetwalker.

Anyway, I made my way to Paul's, getting slightly lost in the process, and subsequently mocked. We insulted each other, watched some TV, insulted each some more, watched some stand-up, ate chocolate buttons (I'd never had the giant ones before, but they own the little ones. I'm never buying small ones again) and did some other things that are probably best not talked about. We also gave each other a top five list of celebrities we would sleep with, given half a chance. Here is my list:

Clockwise from op left.: Bradley Cooper; Ben Stiller; James Marsden; Jared Leto; Benjamin Burnley. Best. Orgy. EVER.

After getting unceremoniously kicked out of Paul's house by the man himself at around twenty to six, I proceeded to make my way home by bus. This is where one of the most traumatically disgusting experiences of my life occurred. I am sat on the bus, minding my own business, when a man gets on, who was either blind, homeless or both, because what he was wearing was appalling. From the bottom up: navy blue embroidered women's house slippers; lilac socks; blue straight-cut jeans that were ankle-swinging by a good two inches, complete with braided silver belt; a too-tight knock-off England shirt; electric pink and black striped fingerless gloves; and a long brown ladies' coat with fur trim. Now, don't get me wrong - I can deal with homeless people. I've done charity work with homeless people. Homeless people don't bother me. The thing that offended me about this particular homeless man was the stench emanating from him.

Yes, ladies and gents, this man absolutely reeked of piss.

The overwhelming odour seeped from his every pore. It was all I could do not to gag as he walked past me. Luckily, he sat at the back of the bus (I would have been much happier if he'd sat upstairs, but beggars can't be choosers. No pun intended). It's okay, I thought to myself. I don't have much longer on this bus. I can cope.

Not so. For this misguided soul then decided to shut every window on the bus.

That's right. I was slowly being gassed by the fumes coming off this clearly incontinent fellow. At that moment I wanted to weep. What had I done to deserve this? I've led a good life. I've been pleasant to others. I've been charitable. I've even carried condoms when I don't need them. And yet here I was, sat aboard the same vehicle as a urine-soaked man with terrible dress sense. Life is not fair.

Luckily, the bus soon ground to a halt and with that I leapt off and swiftly made my way home. I took a last glance back at the man who had further lowered my opinion of public transport. And do you know where he was going? The off-license. NO!, I wanted to scream. Alcohol consumption is directly linked to pee production! I really do not think you need to be generating any more of that right now, because you know what, you stink!

Shuddering with ill-disguised disgust, I went home to my mother and proceeded to recount my sorry tale. The response I got when I told her about the shutting of the windows shows just how little she understands these things. "Maybe he was cold", she suggested. I gave her my most withering look. "Mother," I said. "It is inconceivably hot today. I was marinading in my own sweat. And he was wearing a winter coat. I seriously doubt he was a bit chilly. It was an attempt on my life. I was being gassed to death with piss. Forget mustard gas, forget chlorine - if you're really intent on gassing someone, pickle yourself in your own pee and stand close to the intended target, ensuring you have sealed off all access to clean, unpolluted air. They will either suffocate or slash their own wrists in an effort to escape the nostril inavsion. That's the way to get 'em."

Instead of the sympathy I so clearly deserved, she rolled her eyes and went back to watching 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory'. What did I do to be treated with such a lack of concern? I reckon it had something to do with those rubbers...

Run that by me one more time...

It's Thursday, and despite having only spent four days at work (that's with leaving two hours early on Tuesday) and having had last week off in its entirety, I am truly exhausted. I cannot comprehend how people cope with this slog on a day to day basis from graduation to retirement. Four days and I feel ready to drop dead. This is probably not helped by the fact that I have been out every night so far this week (excluding tonight) and wasted several hours that I could have spent sleeping on the internet. I swear my computer is possessed by Satan:

The humble laptop, or as I prefer to call it, the Devil Incarnate.

Somehow, I manage to convince myself, after glancing at the clock and calculating in my exhaustion-addled mind that I have to get up again in seven hours, a few more minutes of playing Tetris and stalking people on Facebook won't hurt (I'm still crap at Tetris, and one day I'll get myself into serious trouble, most likely of the legal variety, with the stalking). When I next look at the clock, an hour has gone by, and I don't know where it's gone. How on earth can you lose an hour? It's just plain careless.

On the bright side, work is actually kind of fun. The hours are far too long (8:o0am - 5:00pm should not be legal) and the filing copious (my office is probably solely responsible for mass deforestation in the Amazon), but the banter is beyond what I could have possibly hoped for. When you have spent half an hour discussing the merits (or, more accurately, demerits) of Lycra, more specifically men in Lycra, and developed a six-pack (maybe in my dreams) from laughing hysterically at the mental image of Bill in a mankini and Rick's proclamation that he doesn't want VPL, you realise that you are working with people who probably ought to be doing stand-up rather than working in a dingy basement. I have also discovered that I am probably world-class when it comes to filing. Despite having only been working in this office for a week, I have managed to file more PPMs (I'm still not sure what they are, but they sure are fun to do) in three hours (150, to be precise) than the resident lazy-arse manages in a day. I do realise how smug and pompous I sound right now, but given that I'm basically Wonder Woman in a pencil skirt, I think I'm allowed to be:

If you put some clothes on her and surround her with stacks of files... that's me. If I lost about six stone

Quite apart from work, recently I have been spending more time than is strictly appropriate at the cinema. Last week on Tuesday I saw 'Get Him To The Greek' (quite funny but ultimately 'Forgetting Sarah Marshall' was the superior film), the following evening I attended a showing of 'Predators' (about as dire as the first one but minus the embarassing effects... the original was sonewhat reminiscent of 'Tron'). The reason I left early on Tuesday was, as far as my mother was concerned, to get back in time for the 4:30pm showing of 'Inception'. In actuality, it was to get home, cook dinner for myself and Paul (my best friend - I'd call him my 'brother from another mother', but given recent events, that may not be entirely appropriate - in fact, it would be legally questionable) before attending the 7:45pm showing, whilst simultaneously consuming indecent amounts of vodka, given that it was a Tuesday afternoon.

The secret to staying reasonably sober when one has consumed vast quantities of alcohol, I have discovered, is to avoid going to the toilet for as long as is humanly possible without your bladder exploding. In the dingy lighting and alcohol soaked atmosphere of the club/pub/bar/your own bedroom, it is possible to maintain composure. Nobody can really see you, and even if they can, they won't remember it in the morning. However, once the harshly lit, alcohol-free zone of the bathroom has been entered, it all goes chaotically wrong. What could previously have been described a graceful gait now becomes awkward and ungainly, with limbs flailing at angles that, were you sober, would be enough to make you scream in agony. You start to walk into things, crashing into precisely-stacked pyramids of toilet rolls, sending them rolling in all directions, and crying when you accidentally kick the Andrex puppy on the discarded packaging of said toilet rolls.

Every time you kick the Andrex puppy, God turns on the sprinklers in your eyes.

Not only this, once you've broken the seal, so to speak, you will pee like a racehorse. The FFL (First Fatal Piss) must be avoided at all costs. It is the secret to drunken dignity (an oxymoron if there ever was one).

Readers, I'm sorry to say that I broke my own golden (no pun intended) rule. I tried to wait, honestly I did. I sat cross-legged, I limited my liquid intake, I even did a funny little jig in the middle of my conservatory which was indicative of my agony. Eventually, I could wait no longer. I have to make a visit to the bathroom, and with that, the floodgates open. Every five minutes I had to leave my bewildered guest on the sofa, shouting over my shoulder in a bid to explain my predicament, in order to rush up the stairs and sort out the plumbing. I really could have used a cork, but I doubt this is medically advisable.

Luckily I had recovered by the time I got to the cinema, but the ache in my gut was rapidly replaced with an ache in my head. Firstly, I realised whilst walking to the cinema that I had forgotten my glasses, which meant that I was squinting for nearly two and a half hours (not helped by the fact that I was dragged by Paul to the very back row - great). Then there was the plot. I only found out this afternoon what Leonardo DiCaprio's character's full name was. Then there was this one guy who was central to the plot. I never worked out why. Honestly, I got to the end of the film and sat shellshocked for a few moments, wondering why nothing had been explained. Then I turned slowly to Paul, looking him dead in the eyes. I said, "Paul. I know we have sat here for the better part of the evening now. And I did genuinely concentrate for that time. Mostly. So there's just one thing left to say... can you tell me what that whole film was about?"

If you enjoy headaches and feeling stupid, you should see this film.

Another problem with being in the cinema for that length of time sat in front of a film you don't understand, is that you are inclined to fidget. This in turn generates heat. Incredible amounts of heat actually, verging on Equator temperatures. I was honestly melting in that cinema. My carefully styled hair was flatter that a witch's tit by the time I left. Fantastic.

Anyway, by sitting here typing this post, I am yet again wasting precious sleep time. Who wants to place bets on whether or not I will end up snoring at my desk tomorrow?

This House Is Not A Home - It's A Sauna

Today marks the beginning of Father-Daughter Bonding Week. This is not an event recognised by any calendar or shop-bought diary. It is an unofficial holiday concocted by my father, and although it may have got me out of work for a week, I think I'd rather take the 9 to 5 slog and slump in front of the computer all day (which, to be honest, I would do anyway - this is one area of my new job that I am highly adept at) than spend this amount of time with him. I suppose, when you think about it, it's desperately sad in its own way, but if I'm perfectly honest, I don't really miss Dad a whole lot since the split. This does not mean that do not I love him. It simply means that a week of day trips and listening to rants about everything, my mother being the topic of choice, is unappealing. Unappealing is an understatement. I can't think of a word to describe it. This illustrates what a terrible daughter I am and also what an incredibly tedious man my father can, on occasion, be. In fact, when I arrived last night, my spirits were raised only by the presence of the Girlfriend's car at the bottom of the drive. You know there are problems when you're more excited by the prospect of seeing your father's girlfriend that actually seeing the man himself.

The Girlfriend is a wonderful woman. She is a policewoman and is excellent at correcting my father when he says things that are mildly offensive. She has also proved herself to be some sort of dietician. Up until meeting the Girlfriend, you would open my father's fridge and be faced with the conundrum of what to have. Bread? Bacon? Or beer? Beer and bread? Or bread and bacon? A Triple B? Such decisions!

I'm spoilt for choice! How will I ever decide?

This may seem a perfectly reasonable diet to a recently separated middle-aged man, but as far I was concerned, it had gotten to the point where dinner at my father's place was something to be avoided at all costs. Luckily, since the Girlfriend came along, she has estbalished herself as the Patron Saint of Tesco, saving my father's fridge and, in the process, his arteries. However, this time, even the Girlfriend could not lift my spirits. I was exhausted. I was running on three hours sleep. The only thing I was truly looking forward to was my bed. I was to be disappointed.

Allow me to explain. My father's house is a four bedroom property that is Grade II listed. "Wow!", I hear you say (well, probably not, but humour me for a second here), "Just imagine all that history!" Well let me tell you, history is no replacement for air. When you own a building of such 'historical value' (the quote marks indicate the scorn with which I regard this supposed value. When you have spent a childhood searching for hidden passages, removing bricks to see if there may be any long-lost treasure lurking and digging up the back garden in search of great hoards of gold and riches, and your greatest prize, in fact your only prize, after all that effort, was a single rusty door knob, your view of historical value would be tainted too).

Rusty door knobs - responsible for the death of my childhood dreams.

Anyway, it transpires that as the owner of such a historical gem (*coughbullshitcough*), certain responsibilities are bestowed upon you, mostly involving protecting the historical integrity of said building. We already broke this rule once by plastering over some brickwork in the lounge, mainly because it was so dark in there that we kept walking in to things. Why the brickwork is so integral to the house's history, I will never know. People knock walls down all the time. The National Trust can't purchase every freaking brick in the country. I'd like to see them try. What a tourist attraction that would be:

Hey kids, let's go and see a shitload of bricks! What a treat!

Anyway, I digress. The part of staying in a Grade II listen building that really gets my goat is that fact that you can't change anything at the front of the house. Do whatever the hell you like to the back, install an indoor boxing ring, establish a crack den, even demolish it if you like. Just don't change the front. At first this doesn't seem to be a problem. But there is a catch. The windows don't open.

England is currently enjoying a heatwave. I say enjoying, but this is a misnomer. The first few days are enjoyable. Britain is renowned for what is generally shitty weather. Most summers, we drown in a mixture of rain, mud and our own self-loathing. When the sun shines, people wet themselves with excitement. They run to their local pharmacy and purchase their entire stock of sun scream. They gorge on barbecue food. They flock to the beach in their thousands:

...Where'd I leave my towel again?

For the first few days, the heat is the best thing that has ever happened to England. And then, as us English are wont to do, we start to complain. Our paranoia results in the issuing of hundreds of health warnings. If we had our way, we would crawl into some kind of bunker and sleep until the heatwave is over. As a friend of Facebook so accurately observed, "We, the English, love sunny weather. Except the English sunny weather, it's too hot and bothersome. We prefer Spain or Jamaica." How right you are, my friend. Anyway, this is merely to give you an indication of how hot it currently is here right now. Now imagine your room is at the front of your house. The very same house, in fact, whose front windows do not open. Earlier in the evening, I had congratulated myself on my success in winning the computer for the evening. Imagine my fury when I eventually retired to bed, only to realise that my sister had won the one electric fan in the house. A computer, whilst a source of entertainment, is of no use when the percentage of your body that is composed entirely of water is rapidly on the decrease, due to the fact that most of it is escaping out of every pore in your body. I seriously contemplated stealing the fan. My sister was asleep - she would never know. After battling with my conscience for a few moments, I decided that I am not completely heartless. I went downstairs to my father and presented him with my predicament. He pointed out that, in my panic, I had completely forgotten about the connecting door between our two rooms. A compromise was reached! The connecting door was opened, the fan was repositioned and switched to the 'oscillate' system. My internal water supply was, it seemed, saved.

Air, I soon discovered, does not travel far.

I tossed. I turned. I stripped (contain yourselves). I wrapped my bottle of water from the fridge of my duvet and cuddled it like a particularly bizarre soft toy. A turbulent night's sleep was had, which, combined with the previous night's escapades, resulted in me not getting up until 12. In a bid to wake up, I took a very long shower. I had forgotten how much I missed my father's power shower, the one with the glass door. I drew grotesquely oversized genitalia and wrote rude messages, sniggering to myself like a boy in the early throes of puberty. Once I emerged from the shower, a small problem arose in that I suddenly seemed to have acquired extensive hand dandruff. I have shed enough skin to build an entirely new set of hands. It appears that my entirely family are doomed to turn in to snakes. Is this some kind of pandemic that the government ought to be alerted to?:

Snake fever - the new swine flu.

Once I had recovered from the unnerving discovery that my hands were now missing significant skin coverage, I went downstairs, only to be informed that we were going shopping - clearly my father remained undeterred by the fact that I had spent most of the time round at his house asleep. My sister had decided that she wanted new riding boots, so new riding boots she would have. The most exciting part of this trek was when my sister decided to imitate the Paco Rabanne advert at the checkout (if you want to watch somebody who can actually dance, try the parody. I'm not even being sarcastic. The reason my sister's imitation was so funny, is because it was so accurate. She looked like a praying mantis on drugs. Mat Gordon - the model in the original advert - can't dance. By comparison, the guy in the parody is Michael Flatley). We then moved on to TKMaxx, where I conned myself into thinking some t-shirts might actually fit, and then went into the changing rooms, discovered they didn't, and contemplated the pros and cons of a gastric bypass. Deciding that I preferred food, we went out for lunch and I ate the world's biggest chicken bake. This was about four hours ago now, and I still can't move.

So, that was my day, in short (or very long, depending on how you look at it). I now ought to attempt to finish my book. I'm currently reading 'Juliet, Naked' by Nick Hornby. I wish I could say I liked it, but in all honesty, I feel a certain sense of apathy towards it, which is going to make my attempt to review it here (shameless self-promotion, I just felt my soul die a little bit) incredibly difficult. The sooner I manage to drag myself to the end, the sooner I can read something superior in quality and then race through the rest of my pile of books. I want to see the look on the library man's face when I return my five books in less than a week. You know you lead a boring life when this your main source of joy. How do I live with myself?

The Role Of The Mediator

One prominent and rather unpleasant aspect of being an average sort of person, I am beginning to discover, is that people think you are someone you can turn to in times of trouble. My bland exterior provides a canvas upon which people paint allegiances. People take one look and me and go, "Aha! Look at her dull and unremarkable face! Clearly this person has yet to take a side! I shall mould her to my own design, like some sort of deity! Mwahahahahaha!" Obviously this is an internal monologue, otherwise I would see these things coming and I would know to run as fast as I could in the opposite direction (which, admittedly, is not very fast. At all). Instead, I am forced to take on the role of the mediator, which, let me assure you, is one the most difficult and misunderstood roles of all time and never recieves the sort of recognition and admiration it deserves. Just look at those bastards with all their fancy BAFTAs, Emmys and Oscars. All they have to do is prance around in a more-often-than-not ridiculous outfit and say some poncey shit. They don't know how easy they've got it. They should try keeping a carefully passive expression when they're sat listening to various members of their family making slanderous accusations about each other. The ability to do this is the mark of the true actor. Honestly, I should have a display cabinet crammed with all sorts of awards by now. My talent is being wasted.

Oh, who am I kidding? The reason people rant to me, is because I am spineless. Really, it's a wonder I manage to even maintain an upright stance on a day to day basis. Not only am I spineless, but I am a bitch, and a two-faced one at that. I can listen to somebody have a rant about a person who they find profoundly irritating, and I can nod along, agree with their many and mostly repetitve points, even interject with an amusing anecdote or juicy morsel of gossip about that person from time to time. I can then have a conversation with said irritating person, who I may find quite annoying myself, and listen to them wax lyrical about their hatred for the initial ranter. I have developed an uncanny ability to pretend to like people and cover up my bitchy tracks with more bitching. I am the epitome of bitch. My soul is tarnished. I will burn in hell.

Hell is other people. Or, you know, just flames and shit.

Okay, maybe that's bordering on melodramatic, in fact it may even be fully-fledged melodrama. The central idea of this blog is that I am average. Bitching is a very normal thing to do. I am no different from everybody else. My soul could maybe do with a bit of a spit-n-polish job, but other than that, I can probably stroll through those pearly gates with only the merest hint of a raised eyebrow from St Pete.

Anyway. Back on topic. I started off as a negotiator. This began when I was quite small and parental arguments were something that were infrequent and highly undesirable when they arose. The following conversation is an example of my work:

Me: Mummy, why are you crying?
Mum: Because I'm sad.
Me: Why are you sad?
Mum: Because Daddy said some mean things, but don't worry about it, sweetheart.
*CUE LEVELS OF WORRY THAT ARE UNHEALTHY IN A CHILD SO SMALL*

[Ten minutes later]
Me: *poking head round doorframe* Daddy, Mummy's sad.
Dad: *washing up in fury. He is so angry that the water is bubbling, or that could be my childish imagination working overtime* Yup.
Me: Maybe you should go and say sorry?
Dad:...Nope.

Eventually, I discovered that negotiations don't work. I have learnt to simply listen and be sympathetic, or at least pretend to be. Sometimes pretence is easy, and other times it is more difficult that trying to maintain a plentiful supply of oxygen whilst breathing through a straw that has been thrust up one nostril. I have found that on the phone it is easier. On Friday, my father rang me. I had to endure a twenty-five minute rant, starting off with his ex-girlfriend, continuing seamlessly on to his current girlfriend (might not be so current anymore) and rounding off nicely with a vicious attack upon my mother. In this time, I managed to dress myself with one hand. Even the bra. Now that, my friends, is talent. One of the distinct advantages of being on the phone is that your face is hidden. In fact, you don't even have to listen. Sympathy can be feigned with a series of non-committal grunts and a series of 'mmm's and 'ahh's - variety of pitch makes this act all the more convincing. In the mean time, you are free to roll your eyes like marbles and make a variety of obscene gestures without the person at the end of the line ever knowing. It's marvellous. Modern technology never ceases to amaze.

As if the moaning endured on Friday wasn't enough, I am having to endure yet more today. This seems unnecessary, given that I got home at five this morning after going out clubbing in New Cross. We went to Venue. The exterior pretty much sums the place up:

Venue - it's shit, but it's good shit.

The interior doesn't get much better. Take a look at the photo album on the site and you'll see what I mean: http://www.thevenuelondon.com/Main/main1.htm (bit of promotion right there - don't thank me). However, this is one of the the best things about the loveable little den of vice and iniquity that is Venue - no matter how shit you look, there will be someone who looks worse.

So anyway, Sarah (my fellow borderline alcoholic) and I take the night bus home at around 4.30am, eventually rolling home at about 5. We enter the house stealthily, like ninjas, only without the outfits. We even manage to make sandwiches without waking anybody. We eventually go to bed at around half past five. We are up again by half nine. We make breakfast. Sarah goes home at about ten forty-five. I retire to my room. My mother enters at half eleven-ish to inform me that she is taking my sister to a horse show. I nod blithely without tearing my eyes from the computer screen. She leaves.

And then the screaming starts.

Such fury I have not heard since a few days ago, when I encountered the terrifying "lady" screeching in what was presumably righteous indignation at a traffic warden (admittedly they are soulless and a waste of perfectly good oxygen, but still, the levels of abuse were unnecessary) out of the window of a BMW. Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine I would genuinely hear someone scream, "FUCK OFF YOU SLAAAAAAAAAG".

A BMW - it's shiny, but it doesn't buy you class.

So my mother hustled my sister out of the house, slamming the door with one final venomous hiss of, "Piss off." For a while I comtemplated whether the mother I know and love had been replaced by a particularly vicious snake:

Take one mother, add anger, simmer gently. The result may swallow you whole.

I sat debating this for a while, before deciding that I didn't particularly care. Arguments have become commonplace around here in the past few months and rather than analyse every deeply hurtful insult hurled like a grenade across the battlefield that is my home, it is often easier to duck down into the trenches and play dead. This is what I did, but then who should knock on my door and stroll into my room but my mother's boyfriend, with whom she had had the argument that had initiated her reptilian metamorphosis. He spent a few awkward moments attempting to justify himself, with varying degrees of success. Once again, I was relegated to the role of sympathetic ear. My sympathy is wearing thin. I now feel like I want to do something like this to my darling family:

I KEEL YOU.

You see that look in my eyes? That is lunacy. Sheer lunacy induced by listening to far too many people's problems. Such is the curse of the average.

The Curse Of Being Average

One thing I have come to realise over the years is that I am hopelessly, insufferably, unfortunately, average. Being average is by no means a bad thing - it grants you near immunity from abuse as, really, there isn't a whole lot worthy of insult. The curse of being average is that it renders you almost completely invisible. To the world as a whole, I am part of the scenery, about as exciting as a lamppost and just as noticeable. If you were to notice me, it might be with the same level of enthusiasm as you note a tree, or a house, or a bus. Just one of those things.

Average-ness pervades my entire being. I am from an average background (parents are separated, one sister two years my junior, live in a suburban town with its fair share of chavs, grumpy pensioners and yummy mummies), of average intelligence (reflected by my distinctly average exam results - no awards of academic excellence in my display cabinet) and of average appearance. I have fairly unremarkable features set in a fairly unremarkable face. Honestly, I get bored every time I look in the mirror. Just take a look at it:

Look! It's my boring face! (I don't have an extra bit of head by the way, that's my sister. If I did, I could hardly describe myself as average. A more accurate description would be medical phenomemon.)

This face lies atop a fairly unremarkable body. My figure is such that may be described as voluptuous on a good day, and just plain fat on a bad day, which I like to blame on a slow metabolism but in actuality is most likely down to a tendency to eat when miserable/angry/bored/feeling any emotion whatsoever. With obesity rising in the UK, this in itself is average. So there you have it. I am the epitome of average - it is inseparable from my being. Far from being some sort of gypsy voodoo curse, it it just one of those things that I will have to deal with. Certain coping mechanisms have presented themselves - I dye my hair, naturally a drab mousy sort of hue, with the brightest pigments I can lay my grasping hands upon, and the consumption of vodka in vast quantities certainly makes for some more interesting nights out. However, there is little to make me stand out from the crowd, so to speak. I'm just another cliche.

In other words, what you will read here is the documentation of my life. How it feels to be cursed with average.