...drink boozahol this November. This is because I wish to increase my motivation, and decrease my paunch. I am going to allow myself three strikes for the whole month. Ergo any revelry must be carefully chosen, and not subject to the usual whims ('Hmmm... It's Wednesday lunchtime. Maybe I should get drunk ?').

I start writing this entry, and The Get Up Kids doing a cover of The Replacements' 'Beer For Breakfast' comes on random. The Universe is conspiring against me.

...been watching the music channels this evening. You'll be pleased to hear that I haven't had a drop of boozahol, and plenty of lesbian tea. Anyway, I shall relate some of my thoughts on the televisual smorgasbord wot I've been served up :

- We watched the Biography channel's account of the Led Zeppelin story. Clearly this channel lacks the type of clout that viewers might hope for. Which of Led Zeppelin's rock and roll peers were interviewed during the programme ? A couple of members of Heart. I shit you not. I'm not even sure they were always in focus. After the mighty Zeppelin there followed the Bon Jovi story. Despite Blonde Curly Physio's desire to see what exactly motivated Jon's dubious choice of hairstyles throughout the ages, it was too much to bear, and I was compelled to touch that dial.

- There was a countdown of the sexiest folk in rock on the Kerrang! channel. There was only one woman in this countdown, which was Gwen Stefani wot of No Talent Doubt. At number two there was that bloke from Him, who is kinda like a goth Morton Harket. At number one was Billie Joe from Green Day. Now, I'm not sure whether hobbits are still generally in vogue, but I'm not convinced they were ever sexy*. I was clearly unsatisfied by Kerrang's choice of the sexiest people in rock. Was Meat Loaf in the top ten ? Was he fuck. Arbitrary yakshit.

Who is really the sexiest person in rock ? Eh ? Eh ?

*I actually have nothing against the guy. I think I was just craving a glass of wine by this point.

...not drinking will be good for my head and body, but bad for finding myself in scenarios involving adventure. So I may have to start living vicariously.

I am nothing if not demonstrative. So here are some examples of how exciting my brother's life has been recently, thrown into sharp contrast with my tedious existence :

Number of sharks stroked
Lemonbrother : 1
Lemonsquash : 0

Number of days spent eating large burgers for all three meals
Lemonbrother : 1
Lemonsquash : 0

Number of farms visited containing FAINTING GOATS
Lemonbrother : 1
Lemonsquash : 0

Hmmm. How can I redress the balance, in adventure terms ?

...to somewhere you don't need a car to get around. Cars are twats. This opinion is admittedly coloured by the fact that I know nothing about them; and so, when something needs fixing, I have to get a man to do it, and generally get in a flap.

I just bought a car off Surf-Film-Maker Chap. It got through its MOT less than a fortnight ago. And now the engine is leaking like a toddler who's been funnelled a flagon of cider.

I took it to a man. He filled it with sealant, and told me to leave it run for half an hour (about twenty-five minutes ago). He said if that didn't work, I will probably need a new radiator. Eek! That sounds pricey.

It is also worth mentioning that, despite having got rid of a crap car at the scrappies recently, I still have three. This sounds very decadent; but the reality is that my driveway looks like a knacker's yard. One of them I could happily take to the scrappies now. However, the brakes on it are seized up. Wot this means is that is cannot reverse. As it's single-lane country roads with passing points almost all the way to the yard, I can see that the trip will end half way in a Mexican stand-off with a lorry, or a grockle in a Mondeo. If that happens, I will have to offer to reverse their car for them.

I am about to don a skirt and crop top, grab my pom-poms, get back in the front driveway, and cheer on that sealant with every last drop of my depleting gusto.

...of the month on Saturday night. And verily, the most was made of it. The evening featured :

• drinking cans of Strongbow whilst watching fireworks. It felt like being fifteen again.
• having the most rancid burger of all time from the van at the fireworks display. Bowk!
• getting bled dry by a quiz machine. Why the shitting fuck would I know when N*Stink had their first number one ?
• playing and winning a game of 301, despite the fact that my adversaries were both on 'double to win' before I'd even got off the starting blocks. I recommend grasping all three darts sharp-end first between your forefingers, and lobbing them at once to get your starting double. Scatterguntastic! If only I'd have thought of it about ten goes earlier.
• watching 'Pimp My Ride International', and getting disproportionately annoyed with Fat Joe. "That value-imposing tubby slug. Of course he drives a Skoda - he's in Russia, you corpulent fuck! Give us back Xzibit! Or have you already eaten him ?" etc. etc.
• keeping my housemates up ludicrously late by playing Slayer as loud as I could.

Perhaps it's better for all concerned if I just stick to lemon squash in future.

...for my 'three strikes only' month. One is that I've just handed in my notice to my landlord, so I'll be out of The House Of Rock by the close of November. This will necessarily entail a leaving party. Crumbs!

Plus, I might be going for a weekend in Bundoran with Surf-Film-Maker Chap, me ole chum Jellycube, and her chap. This will necessarily entail smurfing, and... You know wot else. Begorrah!

In other news, I got sent a joke by The Walrus (my dad) via the medium of SMS. It didn't go quite how I expected :

Little 5 year old girl Daisy, sees a group of workmen turn up next door to build a house. She takes an interest and starts to talk to them. The builders with hearts of gold adopt her as their site mascot. After a week they present her with a pink hard hat & gloves. Even a wage packet with £5.
"Goodness," says mummy, smiling; "are you working there next week ?"
Daisy replies: "I think so mummy, provided those cunts at Jewsons deliver the fucking bricks."

...nice the other night. Surf-Film-Maker Chap's girlfriend is a junior school teacher. She is puzzled by the fact that an eight-year-old girl in her class had become obsessed by her boyfriend, despite having never met him. Indication one was on parents' evening, when the girl's mother asked her how SFMC was, and seemed to be on first name terms with him.

Then when they went on a school trip last week, the girl asked if she kept any photos of him in her wallet. She does, and showed the girl - who snatched the photo, and started kissing it. She then announced that she was going to run away with SFMC, get married, and they would join a choir together. Although I love the thought of SFMC joining a choir, I don't think his lady has anything to worry about just yet.

...blog my dreams, but I've had two notable ones this week :

1) There's an epidemic of some new-fangled disease. Symptoms include delirium and incredibly hairy hands. Fatalities' last words all concern some long-lost Van Halen album from the mid-seventies. It is a jazz odyssey. I figure maybe I can help find out what's causing the disease if I locate said album. But can I find it on Google ? Can I jizzbiscuits.

2) I had this one this morning. People who've been very naughty are sent to a corrective school - Blog School. Aaarrrrggghhhh!

Does this mean I should eat less cheese, or more ?

...The Walrus yesterday, and he told me a lovely story.

He was in a pub a few miles away from where he lives. This particular hostelry is decorated in quite an eccentric fashion. A woman with rather large coiffeured hair is sitting at a table. Above her is a fake branch. A small stuffed bird sits atop the branch. Or at least it did for a bit, before plummeting into her hair. She feels a sensation as it lands, and has a cursory feel of her hair, but finds nothing.

Now, the stuffed bird has landed the right way round, and is nesting in her bouffant, looking perfectly forward. Her company are almost unable to talk, so weak are they with laughter. After a while, she twigs that everyone is laughing at her, and wonders why. Her husband tries to tell her, but is also rendered almost speechless. She manages to flip the stuffed bird out of her hair, which lands on the table. She shrieks.

Our bouffanted heroine doesn't see the funny side, and implores her husband to go and complain to a member of staff. He is still uncomposed, but he sucks it up and takes the stuffed bird to the man working at the bar.

"This sparrow fell into my wife's hair, and I really must complain," he says. "It's an awful thing to happen."
"No it isn't," says the barman.
"What do you mean, it isn't awful ?"
"No sir, it isn't a sparrow," he says; "it's a linnet."

Everyone in the bar falls over.

...'three strikes' month is going atrociously. I was doing pretty well until this weekend; when I managed to fall off the wagon so spectacularly that I broke my arse-bone.

Mind you, considering this is my last month here at The Edge Of The World, I guess it was inevitable. As was the hatching of a plan for a leaving party. It will be a job keeping my guests from desecrating my house any further, as everyone believes the house is going to be demolished after we move out. However, the landlord has recently stated that he might U-turn on this issue, and find more tenants before deploying the wrecking ball. Pop goes our deposit.

But this is by the bye. The important thing is that we are having a party. It is going to be a moustache party. Anyone who shows up sans moustache has to pay a fine (most likely a forfeit), and also have one drawn on in permanent marker. This will be on December the first. Anyone wanna come ?

...can be found here :

What is it to be an 'animal' ?

"I'm a little surprised this issue hasn't been tackled before in another case," Lucci said.

Well, quite.

...set this morning for amount of absolute shit that dropped into my inbox after just one night - 457 messages. Yes, that's 457 people who I suspected might love me for a fraction of a second, before realising it was actually *NO-ONE*. Harumph!

Anyway, onto slightly less whingey matters. I am being interviewed by a reporter from The Rag this evening. The subject of his piece is 'The Dangers Of Blogging'. Now, I have already devised wot I think is a moderately comprehensive list of the associated perils and pitfalls. But I would like to know what you think The Dangers Of Blogging are, please.

...things I found strewn across my hard drive :

...criticised by my so-called friend Pinkwellies, who claimed at last night's quiz that I was "scraping for content". Well, especially for him, here's something else I found littering my hard drive :

Which brings me quite nicely onto my next point. The Heart-Stopping Alleged Lesbian was at the quiz again last night, looking more adorable than I can ever hope to adequately explicate here. I was almost unnerved by how pleased she seemed to see me, and beamed an awful lot. She also seemed to be looking at me an awful lot during the course of the evening (although she could probably say the same about me). Now, when you catch someone's eye across a busy pub (not with a fishing line), what should you do next ? Should you instantly look away abashed ? This is the tactic I have been almost involuntarily applying thus far; and I'm as good as certain that it's the wrong one. What should I actually be doing ?

I didn't get the chance to ask one of her mates if the girl I always see her with is actually her lebanese lover, which was remiss of me. Although the evening wasn't entirely bereft of reconnaissance, as I have invited her (and admittedly all of the others on her table) to my leaving party; and I have also been invited to a party at which she will be in attendance. So two good potential 'get to know you' opportunities.

Oh my god. What the fuck am I like ?