January Sales and the Degradation of Society

The following is a work of humour, and should not be taken as a bitter man's rant on the January Sales and humanity as a whole. Despite the fact that that is exactly what it is.

Is it just me, or does humanity suffer a slight evolutionary lapse during that period just after Christmas and the middle of January? It appears that the whole of mankind declares "Well, enough's enough." and discards any sense of civility and common decency in favour of kicking each other's heads in. It's as if after being nice and polite to everybody for almost a year it's just too much, and all their pent up anger reveals itself in the glorious eruption of the January Sale Riots.

Now, I may be a misanthropic bastard at the best of times, but after tripping over a myriad of trousers, shoes, knickers, and elderly people, all casually strewn across the floors of even the most reputable retail outlets like fallen soldiers of some bloody war, I've achieved a new level of people-hating wonderment. Human behaviour has always fascinated me, largely because I've never really understood most of it. People will get into heated arguments as to how best to remove a red wine stain, where to park the car, or what paving slabs they should use for the patio, whilst I'd be more interested in discussing reality (the illusion of?) and the ethical implications of Hitler possibly being reincarnated as a starving African child as some kind of karmic debt.

The latter is apparently not appropriate 'light conversation' to have over Christmas dinner. Especially if you feel the need to stand up and goose-step energetically around the dining room... Mind you, it's better than doing it in the middle of a restaurant.

Anyway, I digress. I'm relatively certain I don't belong in the human race any more, either because I'm too highly evolved to be considered human (please stop your derisive laughter...) or am just a completely alien life-form. Or both. Or neither. Either way, consider this my resignation from humanity, I'll go and live with the dolphins if the aliens reject my application. But my point is I fail to see the logic behind the mob-mentality, general disregard for garments and readiness for combat all in the name of 50% off jeans... I can't help but feel that were we in the grips of a nuclear fallout this would be acceptable!

Back to the story at hand... I went to try a shirt on in the fitting rooms (as you do) and was instructed to use one of the vacant cubicles, a fairly obvious instruction I felt but I wasn't going to question this person's qualifications. The only problem was, there was no indicator as to whether a cubicle was vacant or not, so it was more changing-room roulette than shopping. Which sounds sort of fun when I word it like that. Anyway, I approached a door and went to open it (presuming, somewhat 'stupidly', that an occupied fitting room would be locked) only to find staring back at me a rather startled woman struggling into a fairly sizeable negligee. The best I could really offer in this circumstance was to back out of the cubicle apologising profusely whilst everyone in the area glared at me like I was a broad-daylight changing room rapist.

Admittedly, they can be forgiven for making such accusations considering the circumstances. I fear that were this to be a court case, it would very much be one sided. And not the one sided-ness that would be in my favour!

Perhaps I'm wrong (first time for everything, I suppose). Perhaps appropriate decorum for shopping is to fight your fellow man over a reduced garment, and to just throw anything that you either disprove of or is the wrong size on the floor. I'm sure the house-elves will be pleased to clean it up afterwards.
Hopefully society will recover by the middle of January, but until then there's only one tactfully designed shirt left in Marks and Spencer's and it's every man for himself!

National Novel Writing Month - A Retrospective

I went into National Novel Writing Month at the beginning of November with a spring in my step and a song in my heart, and with my wide and dewy eyes I gazed upon the word count that was to be my goal. 50,000 words.  Having only found out about this event 3 days into it, I would have to average 1851 words a day which, whilst seemingly a little steep, was perfectly manageable.

Under certain circumstances.

One of said circumstances is that you can keep your imagination from bouncing around like an over-excitable labradoodle. I started with a respectable and serious novel with deep philosophical and political connotations which would put our entire social paradigm into question, but before long I noticed small cracks starting to appear, revealing a sense of humour beneath it. Not that this novel didn't have room for humour, but the contrast between the main narrative and these snippets of wit and whimsy was so stark that it would have been more subtle to walk into an office with an electric blue mohawk and a 'My Little Pony' briefcase. It wouldn't work!


Unfortunately, my imagination spotted this and leapt onto the idea with the fervour of a horde of crazed rabbits that have just seen something that rabbits really like (don't think too much about that metaphor, I certainly didn't). Suddenly, I had the idea for the novel I was writing at the time, a sequel, a completely different novel, and about two or three plays running rampant in my mind.

There was also an infinite number of monkeys at my door wanting to talk to me about a script for 'Hamlet' they'd worked out, but I told them I had enough problems of my own and to come back sometime next week.

Anyway, in conclusion, I've decided to dedicate myself to my imagination, take it out for candle-lit meals, long walks, and write a novel in my own time rather than try and squeeze a story out within a month.