'Jane-world'

When he who decided that I wasn't for him dumped me so unceremoniously almost a year ago now, one of the accusations he hit me with at me at an increased decible level was that I lived in 'Jane-world' (my real name for those confused). This was by no means a positive thing in his opinion, the suggestion very much being that there was something 'inherently wrong' with Jane-world.

My first thought was 'no shit', of course I do, we all live in our own little corner of the world emotionally and psychologically to some degree, we are who we are, we can modify that, we can try and learn from our mistakes but ultimately we are all individuals, with our own personality, thoughts and beliefs but as time went on and I struggled through the hurt I began to be concerned that maybe there was something somehow 'wrong' with Jane-world.

It's taken me some time but slowly I have realised that actually there isn't! Jane-world may have had more than perhaps it's fair share of ups and downs recently, it may not be perfect, I might be a little no pun intended individual, I might not always get it right by a long chalk and I might not be a success as some people judge it but I am who I am, the good and the bad and there is nothing 'inherently wrong' with that, it is just what it is and perhaps my stubbornness (for want of a better word) not to lose myself and become something someone else wanted me to be was perhaps the real issue.

Jane-world may have it's pretty crap bits here and there but if nothing else it's honest, it's upfront, it's learning to love life and I even kind of like it from time to time (thought by no means all the time.)

Most of all I hope it never tries to undermine another's confidence and self belief in the manner that original accusation did mine!

Motivation........ zero!

So, I have all this time on my own, I could do a million things, well ok, maybe that's something of an exaggeration but you get my drift, but I'm not, I'm doing what I have too and precious little more.

It's nice but it's kind of aggravating at the same time!

My motivation seems to have 'done the off', something that doesn't often happen to me and what I am doing I feel I am doing in a half hearted fashion much of the time. It's not hard to be demotivated I'll admit, where looking for a job is involved, the constant disappointment in there being very little out there gets wearing and the knowing that even when there is a possible I am up against usually hundreds of other 'desperately seeking somethings'....most of whom are usually younger and better qualified than I am. But I trudge on with that one.

It's all the other stuff, I just can't get myself going with my usual verve, I am always busy but somehow not as busy as I would like to be.

I'm not entirely sure why I am suddenly afflicted in this way but I suspect that having been given a break from the last years pretty extreme stresses my small mind has decided to take a little 'recovery holiday' and given up the ghost to some degree, much as as soon as one is on holiday from work one is hit with a heinous cold or some other yukky-ness.

I'm not depressed (believe me, I know depressed), I'm not miserable, I'm just on a kind of mental low power level...which would be fine and dandy but dammit, I feel guilty for not rushing around like a thing demented! I think that over the last year I have got so used to feeling stressed that as soon as the stressors are gone I feel a little lost! Probably normal 'habit' reaction I know but still damn annoying!

*Note to self - it is ok to be a bit lazy for a week!

Sexual stupidity!

My apologies if this offends anyone but I just couldn't resist, it's just so completely unbelievable and whilst such stupidity shouldn't be remotely funny, somehow it is!

The link is flaky, hence the screen shot, click to enlarge.

It's a small, small world!

So, I 'twitter' (@gemmak500 if you're interested, which you are probably not but I digress), in fact I twitter somewhat obsessively some might say but thus far only once have I had such the surprise I had one day last week and among all the turmoil of that particular week, this incident was one of the few happy highlights.....if not the highlight!

I have been 'twittering' for a fair few weeks to one lady in particular. I don't recall who found who originally but we got on very well from the off and daily had pretty quickly had a good dialogue going.

One evening last week she asked me where in Buckinghamshire I live, the reason being she had spent some of her childhood in the county. One question led to another and it quickly transpired that myself and my new friend were in fact old friends!

She spent her first ten or so years in the street that runs parallel to the the one in which I was bought up and now again live, we were friends and junior school and 'went round to play' at one another's home fairly often for a number of years!

How cool is that! Much reminiscing ensued needless to say!

Her family moved away and we obviously lost contact, we now live two hundred miles away from one another but I wonder what the probability of bumping into each other among the millions on twitter are??

What a small, small world it is sometimes!

Home alone again!

Well, the title says all I need to really, my mother is in the Midlands with my sister for a week and I have a whole, unadulterated, yummy, hopefully very relaxing week home alone!

I have no idea exactly what I will do but just that in itself is is a relaxing thought. I do of course have the job issue to contend with but at least I will have more time to concentrate on that, the rest, who knows but just to do my own thing for a while is a very smiley thing! :)

I really need to chill some before my stressed head 'pop's!

The chilling starts here......

Cat perch!

This is so cat and so hilarious.

There's no embed link but you can see the video HERE!

The week that was...

....was not a good one, this one I am determined will be at least something of an improvement!

The last one began with my being dumped by the man that I thought was 'different' and ended with my annihilating my precious laptop on Saturday night, it was a death by a half a cup of tea, which given my usual care was particularly annoying. Really, I have protected that machine almost with my life and at three years old it still looked brand new. Various forms of CPR were performed and it has resided since in the airing cupboard in bits but all to no avail, it was a fatal blow. Bugger!

On the upside it means I have a bright shiny new one now, courtesy of my mother who very kindly offered to lend me the necessary readies to buy it, there was no way I could raise that kind of money right now....I hate borrowing money but I had no choice. Life without a laptop is almost unthinkable in gemmaks-ville.

Among all of this there is one very definite silver lining however, I have by default rid myself for ever of the horribly heinous Vista!

Woot ;)

The best way

The thing about sex

So then, the whole sex thing, why does it have to be such a minefield or in some cases almost a battlefield? The last year has taught me something I already knew but hadn't had to deal with for quite some time, that unless one is prepared to have casual sex with just about anyone the average date is going to become something of a physical obstacle course and trying to get to know someone whilst always on the back foot, isn't very conducive to anything, sexually or otherwise!

Guys nowadays aren't generally big on commitment of any kind, our dating game has become like I read it always has been for years in the U.S., one has a series of dates with various people, rather than 'in my day' (hell I sound old) we tended to see one guy at a time. I am happy to do either but I just can't get my head around seeing a series of guys maybe just once or twice and having sex with them all! It's just not going to happen but it appears to be a very difficult path to tread. Guys just don't appear to accept it and to be fair nor do many women and I don't think it's specific to the men I have met because the more I discuss it and the more I read the more it seems it is the norm.

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy sex as much as the next person and I have always believed it is a natural, fun and lovely thing that we shouldn't have too many hang-ups about hopefully. I don't have strong moral issues on the subject and I certainly don't have religious issues but I do have self respect and emotion and I am just not going to date three guys in a week and shag (I choose the word purposely)them all.

I understand that the harsh reality is that the world turns on money and sex, I hope I am far from a prude and I hope I am realistic. I don't expect a guy to marry me or even date me for months on end before he tries to get messy, but longer than one evening would be kind of nice and a little respectful!

Maybe in part it is our own fault, in the fight for equality we have given the impression that we are 'up for it' or the ladette culture has perhaps lost women some respect from the male of the species. I appreciate guys now don't really know where they are sometimes with women, and I understand the Venus and Mars principle but really, there is nothing to prove. I'm not interested in a mans sexual prowess first, I'm interested in the man...if he's cool then the prowess is a natural progression and all the better for it.

Call me old fashioned, call me naive if you will though I believe I am far from either.... but if I wanted to fornicate with every Tom, Dick (pun intended) or Harry that came my way I wouldn't be unemployed and penniless now would I!

Something cheerful....

.....for a change and with a large dollop of amusing cuteness thrown in! :)

Treading water

Well, who knows, I certainly don't!

I seem to have launched inelegantly from one crisis to another this last year, it's been one thing after another, in varying degrees of size and shape and again I find myself not really knowing what I think or what I feel.

I've done all I can with the latest situation and as ever I suppose I just have to look forward and get on with life. A little more battered and bruised around the edges I may be, but hopefully as a result also a little wiser and a tiny bit tougher.... once I get my head back together.

Life isn't too straightforward generally at the moment, my mother is struggling somewhat with the loss of my father and is requiring a great deal of support, the job situation hasn't changed (and to be honest Lord knows how I would cope with that too right now) and I don't really know which way is up sometimes, I feel like I'm just treading water in an emotional sense lately and for now maybe that's all I can do.

Can something nice happen next please?

On getting it wrong again

So, it seems this dating game is not my forte, I just don't have what it takes or my judgement is pretty severely impaired in one way or another.

Really, I thought I was being careful, I have tried and tried not to fall into the traps of thinking people can't be trusted and generalising but it seems all I am doing is proving the very theory I am trying to disprove. I keep telling myself that one time I will get it right but however I play this damn game I just don't seem too!

This time I thought I was cool, we appeared to have everything going for us, in fact we did and in many ways we still do have, but what I hadn't accounted for was his 'issues' and whilst I have been left pretty flattened by this latest incident I really can't say he was dishonest or bad, he is just struggling with life himself right now and I happened to be a casualty of that. Something I think he hadn't anticipated and is himself very sorry for.

None of that changes the fact though that again I am left confused and with puffy eyes and a shiny nose, this I promise you is not a good look, and whilst I know I did nothing wrong, that in itself makes it harder.... and more than that, the fact that I understand his issues and can't help him (or myself by proxy), despite knowing the psychology, is particularly difficult for me to get my head around.

I really didn't think I had got in this deep but it seems I have and what it leaves me feeling that concerns me the most, is that I have really begun to feel scared now to even try again. I mean, how on earth do I know who I can trust not to hurt me? I've got it wrong so often! I don't want to be a cynic, I don't want to always be looking over my emotional shoulder. I used to think the gains were worth the risk but I am so sick of being sad and I just don't know anymore if it is actually worth the risk or whether I should just give up and forget the whole thing.

I don't want to feel like this anymore, I was never a player or into games and this time, even though everything seemed right, even though I did all the things one is advised to do, I still managed to get it very wrong.

Oh...and to add insult to injury, aside from the puffy eyes, the shiny nose and the emotional fallout, all I seem to have left of this latest foray into matters of the heart is his cold and razor rash. Great! How bloody delightful!

And it was going so well

'Was' is the operative word here because having finally met a man with whom I clicked and who I thought was different, something went wrong.

We spent the weekend away, we both had a fantastic time together, really, I'm not an idiot, this was good for both of us, we communicated on the same level and we never stopped talking or laughing. It really was different, right up to the last minute.

I got home late last night and he called as promised.... but instead of the usual lovely conversations we have had previously for hours on end....he called a halt to it. Bang, out of nowhere!

It seems we have a serious case of cold feet for want of a better phrase, well it's more complicated than that but isn't it always.

To be fair he was completely honest and I understand his reason, in fact more than that I have great empathy with it but none of that changes how miserable and crap I feel right now, or the fact that I really am beginning not to trust my own judgement any longer and think trust is a thing of the past per se. In fact understanding somehow makes it harder because despite that I can't do anything about it.

Maybe single is the better option, maybe I'm done with men..... I'm losing the faith.

Numbers four and five!

Are taking place this weekend, Saturday and Sunday, that's dates with the new man before anyone suggests it's man numbers four and five! Yes Mr. B. that's directed at you! ;)

This is all very strange and a bit scary, we only met 'for real' ten days ago but already it seems like we have known one another for much longer, we seem to be able to talk unendingly, and about almost anything at all and there are none of those uncomfortable moments that are usually apparent at such an early stage. There are also no mind or dating games going on which is particularly refreshing.

Like I say, pretty scary but pretty nice, though the little pessimist in me is already wondering where and when it might suddenly all not seem so simple.

But yes, I know, PMA and live for the day, I'm learning!