December 2020

Well, we're all still here, I guess, and that's something. 2020 is nearly done.

Unsurprisingly enough, I entered December still absolutely devastated by the loss of Charlie. If you don't read often, Charlie was my perfect (border collie) son, and he died very suddenly and unexpectedly at the start of November, through circumstances that were, technically, my fault (there's no need to message me again saying 'don't blame yourself' — I know. And yet)

Every time I think I'm okay, something new causes me to totally break down. I've been working on a project about the visual language of grief for my MA (inspired by my experiences after Charlie passed), as I've been interested in how triggering/upsetting a lot of traditional grieving materials can be. While in the middle of this, I recieved a card from the vet saying how sad they were and how loved Charlie was (words to this effect are already guaranteed to set me off — for some reason people telling me how loved he was and how happy his life with me was only serves to make me feel even more devastated to have lost him)... They also included a badly printed photocopy of this text/poem, which again, absolutely broke me.

I know a lot of people take comfort in the idea of 'the rainbow bridge' as a kind of heaven for pets. But I personally can't bear it — any of you who knew Charlie will know that the most important thing to him (maybe even more important than his beloved kibbles/goobles/croquettes) was his people. I don't want him to have to wait there for me until I die. He'd hate it. I might be ages.

My imagining of heaven for Charlie is that, the morning when me and my partner came down and found him dead, and our world fell apart, in another dimension he cheerfully woke up, like normal. He went out for his usual morning walk with them, came home and cuddled with me on the sofa. Maybe later on there's a knock at the door and it's Justin and Dav, come to take him out for a walk over the Yorkshire moors which have somehow magically materialised outside our front door. Tired out, he gets home and goes upstairs to find that Ava's bedroom is there, and he can go and curl up with them on their bed and watch a movie together. He comes downstairs later that night to find Sarah and Edd (his old owners) in their living room, where he can snuggle with them on the sofa. Every day is a cosy combination of all of his favourite people and places. Every night he gets to go to sleep on the sofa on his favourite throw with a kiss on the head from me. Every door knock is another friend. Who could it be? Naomi... Caroline... Jason... Davey... Eilidh... Gabe... Beck... Megan... Kier... Jay... Nat... Tabitha... Heidi... Rosie... Any one of the many other people in his life who loved him so dearly. He was always so so very loved. He shouldn't have to wait for me. All I ever want is for him to be happy.

Trying to be kind to myself. Obviously grief is exacerbated by loneliness and absence of usual cheering treats like a gig, or an exhibition, or nice food out with friends. I like trains, and because of uni and Samaritans volunteering, I still get to go on them at least once a week. I treat myself to a Wasabi tofu curry (they're really kind of bad but also somehow incredibly comforting, and one of the only train station food places that's stayed open). It sit up on the mostly deserted balcony of Waterloo station and eat it slowly while people watching and trying not to get too cold. Simultaneously depressing and really nice to eat somewhere not my house.

 PSA, PUT YOUR NOSE AWAY

As mentioned last month, before Charlie passed I wouldn't have imagined wanting to spend time with other dogs, but actually I so desperately miss his presence, thinking about and meeting and hanging out with other dogs is one of the only things that brings me comfort (my Instagram discover page is basically all cute dog videos now, THEY'RE SO PURE AND SWEET 😭)

As part of this, I re-joined Borrow My Doggy as a borrower, but quickly discovered that the success of the app is mostly for dog owners looking for help (like me and Charlie)... If you're on the other side and want to hang out with a dog, well, join the VERY LONG queue. I basically gave up on it after lots of un-responded to messages, but happened to get in touch with Max's owner very soon after she listed him. He's a 2 year old long haired dachshund, and unlike most dogs on the website, he doesn't need ongoing walking, just a place to stay for 3 weeks while his owner went to visit family in the US (inadvisable TBH but that's for her to decide I guess)

Anyway, we met up with Max and his owner (and her daughter) in the park, and I was reminded once again of the correctness of my choice to have dogs and not human children 🙃

We got along well, Max liked us (becoming immediately particularly fond of my partner), I liked him and his owner, and we agreed that he could come and stay with us for three weeks over Christmas/new year.

Our ongoing Bond-watching-spree continues, with 'On her majesty's Secret Service', which I'd never seen before — also the only George Lazenby Bond movie. He was probably the hottest Bond, and this is probably the last Bond movie for some time with any real emotional depth, so we quite enjoyed it, I think.

Lol, 'art'. Is it good or bad? I don't even know!

hahahaha lolsob

Why did I decide to do an MA again?

As well as my ongoing forays into Borrow my Doggy, I continued looking for a new friend on a more permanent basis. I'd already established that a) most UK shelters are empty apart from the most challenging cases because everyone wants a dog for lockdown, and b) UK shelters are reeeeeeeally picky and my experience as a dog owner counts for naught if I don't have a garden.

I started looking at Romanian dogs instead (they have a big problem with strays and over-populated shelters over there, and there's now a steady stream of them being adopted in the UK), and fell in love with the beautiful Creme.

Sadly, while there are LOADS of Romanian dogs and the charity are a bit more open minded about circumstances, no garden remains a deal breaker. They have so many dogs over there and Creme has been stuck in the shelter since 2017, despite clearly being a BEAUTIFUL girl... If you're thinking of adopting a Romanian dog and you DO have a garden, please consider her, because I fell in love with her and hate to imagine her languishing the rest of her life in that sad place (even though it is probably what will happen). 

Max came over for a trial day, and proved to be an incredibly needy little man. (I am trying not to call him a boy because Charlie was The Boy. I fail often, but 'Little man' is also hilarious to me, so it does work most of the time.)

He absolutely will not stand for being anywhere other than directly draped over a person (he's not that fussy about who), which does make getting anything done quite challenging, but on the bright side, he is incredibly warm and smells bizarrely good for a dog. I wonder whether I should get a papoose.

2020 BIG MOOD

WE GOT A TREE! This was actually quite exciting because I've not had a christmas tree since leaving home aged 19 (I'm now 32)... First there was no space... Then there was still no space... Then finally there was space but Ava hated watching plant-life die, and we didn't have a car anyway and... Finally now, Tabitha insisted. I baulked a little at the price (bloody London), but considering our lack of experience we chose a PERFECTLY sized one, decorated it very tastefully, and it has barely shed any needles, AND it massively lifted my spirits, so I am calling the whole thing a grand success.

Diamonds are Forever, first of the Roger Moore Bonds, a comedy caper around Las Vegas, bizarrely low stakes (There are some diamonds or something? Maybe a laser?) but the late 60's Americana and only-mildly-problematic early gay represetation in the form of comedy villains Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd more than makes up for its lack of plot. 

Okay we're on day 273 and I finally caved and went to Muji and bought some stretchy trousers, it's all downhill from here folks

Paperchase have a big cheap book of motivational stickers on sale at the moment, if you feel like that's something you might enjoy... 

I was really sad the first day Max came to stay. I guess it made sense. He's a soft, squidgy long-man with several naughty foibles, and about as far away from Charlie as you could imagine in a dog. (He's also very impractically designed, though that's not his fault). In his sweet, soft, sleepy moments, his presence is a balm. In his mischievious, crime-spree moments, he just served as a reminder of everything I've lost. Will any other dog ever be as good as Charlie? As loyal? As desperate to please? As good and smart and brave? Maybe I guess. (But it probably won't be Max.... sorry Max)

 

In a chain of events which began with Charlie's dramatic explosive diarhhoea episode over our landlord's sofa, I come to be stood in Battersea Park at 8am on a chilly Thursday, being shot by a photographer from Which magazine, which seems about as unlikely as anything that's happened this year. 

In a year where a lot of other things I love have been taken away from me, I feel lucky that I can still rely on my one true love, public transport! (Please don't take that away from me, no, don't send me articles about how fucked it all is, just let me enjoy this while I still can 😭)

 

Talking of public transport, I had been planning on travelling down to my parents in Chichester to drop their presents with them, but with restrictions ever tightening, and having left it too late to reliably post them, me and my dad agreed to an evocative rendezvous in romantic Crawley (the mid point between us), in which I placed a bag of presents on a train station bench, stepped back and allowed him to pick them up, and he handed me a little sanitsied baggie full of christmas money (in a baggie in case I wanted to wait the requisite 72 hours before taking it out and rubbing it on my face, or whatever it is you do with cash, I'm not sure, I've forgotten).

We talked about tax returns and how much I miss my dog and then we both got back on near-empty trains home again.

Live and Let Die is basically a blaxploitation film, which I'd never really recognised when I last watched it on ITV as a child. It also involves a mildly nasty Bond repeatedly outwitted by much cooler, more charismatic villains than he is, an extremely creepy and not-okay romance plot, and a double decker bus chase. It's fine I guess but we're definitely getting into the shit-Bond era

Are we allowed to see people? One person outdoors if you both touch wood and hold your breath right? 

I haven't seen many people this year compared with how life would usually be, so it feels like a rare treat to catch up with Nat (accompanied by my adorable annoying temporary companion)

I've spent way too much money this year considering there's nowhere to go and nothing to do, and for a while back there, no one apart from Rishi was paying me, but I REGRET NOTHING, especially not buying my own Nintendo Switch and throwing away hours of time trying to drown my sorrows creating the perfect farm in Stardew Valley.

I cannot even imagine how miserable I would have been if I'd spent this year in Yorkshire. Sorry Yorkshire but you just weren't for me. The downside of living on a 24-hour bus-route main road is that no one will let you have a dog, but the upside is that there's always interesting people to watch out the window, and there's always something happening. I especially love minor drama, though it's mostly just normal people going about their normal routines, with which I have now become intimiately aquianted.

('Middle aged man who smokes outside the Indian restaurant' and I have only ever exchanged a few words. The night before Charlie died I carried him out onto the street and he had a bad butt incident outside the takeaway, it was so bad that this man, who I think runs the place, looked at me with sympathy rather than disgust as he ought to have done. I said 'I'm sorry, my dog is really sick', and then I came out a few minutes later and washed down the street with a bucket, and he said 'thank you!' with slight surprise, as though he'd expected me to leave it. The next day he was sat in his car nearby when I carried Charlie's body out. Now he sees me every day with Max, and he smiles really sadly at me. I guess I like him now and forgive him for making my room smell of cigarettes when I have my window open.)

Maybe I'm hamming it up a bit now but fucking hell. Actually found it easier to get into the festive spirit than I expected this year though, thanks to Tabitha's boundless enthusiasm (honestly, thank goodness for Tabitha, random spareroom-found-housemate who has been a HERO this year in so many ways, all hail Tabitha), and my own need to cling on to something distracting. I'd kind of managed to forget about Brexit though, lolsob

Me, my partner, and Tabitha, had a nice quiet Christmas day. We cooked a competant lunch, walked Max, opened our presents together, called the relevant family members, watched the Muppets Christmas Carol AND a Nightmre Before Christmas, and generally managed to be cosy and fine. Decent present haul too (in quite a middle aged kind of way :)

I mentioned Creme earlier on in the month, and had been going through quite a lot of hoops to try and welcome her into her lives, including an hour long zoom interview, and having to make a video tour of my house and street, but we finally heard on Boxing Day that they wouldn't consider us for her (or for any of their other dogs) due to our lack of garden and how busy our street is. 

Fine, they have to do what they think is right, and maybe indeed we couldn't welcome a potentially difficult Romanian dog (by all accounts they're usually a bit chaotic for the few few weeks then become absolutely super pets, but it was those first few weeks they were worried about)... But I know, and have proved, that it's perfectly possible to keep a happy dog in this house. Battersea Park is an absolute doggo adventure zone (only 2 mins from our house), and we are experienced with a wriggly, tense rescue border collie... there is a dog out there we could offer a home to, but how do we find them?

I returned to 'pets4homes', a mostly legit but occasionally dodgy classified ad site for all kinds of pets in the UK, everything from £3000 dachshund puppies, to the equivalent of 'a man in the pub trying to sell you his pitbull for £50' 

If you set the filters to 'for sale', 'under £500', dogs aged 2 and up, you basically filter right down to people who are either 1) desperate to get rid of their dog because their life circumstances have changed and they don't much care about the money, 2) people who have bitten off more than they can chew with a dog they can't cope with and just want it gone, and possibly 3) people who have stolen a dog and want to get shot of it for some easy money. 

Basically we're looking for option number 1 (possibly number 2 depending on how intense the dog is), and trying to use our dodgy-deal-sense to skirt around any potential number 3. 

I sent hopeful messages out to a number of people, not really expecting to hear anything back. But... I did.

The Man with the Golden Gun is James Bond at his most dislikeable (it honestly amazes me audiences in the 70's still wanted to see this guy), and is another movie blatantly playing to the trends of the time, this time Kung-fu movies, with every possible martial art thrown in for absolutely no discernable reason. Christopher Lee plays the three-nippled Scaramanga, who I'm now old enough to appreciate as quite hot,  and one finds oneself not really caring if Bond lives or dies. Still, a fun enough romp on many levels.

In the early hours of boxing day, an indvidual or individuals covered the northbound Victoria line of Oxford Circus in an impressive amount of graffiti, including a Grenfell mural and some Covid conspiracy theories (you win some you lose some I guess). I for one applaud their audacity (while sympathising with the doubtless underpaid staff who had to clean it all off). By the time I got there for my Samaritans shift on the 28th, all that was left was some small pieces between re-applied ads on the other side of the tracks. I enjoyed getting to see the traces, anyway.

For a while in the middle of the year I managed to get the most thorough moisturising/skin care routine of my life going (a routine which previously consisted of precisely nothing at all)... I even started flossing, the worst thing in the world! 

But since Charlie died I basically only do the 'good' self care, which for me = eating, showering and sleeping (well, and I DO wash my hair once a week, but don't tell me to enjoy it, I hate it just as much as I have done my entire life) 

I guess I'll try and get back on it all soon?! UGH, BODIES

 

 

 

On the 30th we went to meet a dog. She's nice, I don't think she's stolen, and unless I have been CONNED for a £50 deposit, we will be bringing her home on January 7th. I will introduce you to her then. I don't want to do it before then in case it all goes wrong for some reason. (She's beautiful.)

 

 

 

So, here we are. Weird old new year's eve, huh. 

This time last year I was alone in my friend Deb's apartment in Boston, cat-sitting while she visited family on the other side of the world. I was just beginning to move past the grief of the end of mine and Ava's relationship a year ago, and I'd recently met someone new who I was excited about. Charlie had just had a health scare but seemed to have come out the other side unscathed and I was excited to get home and take him on more London adventures. I felt incredibly excited to be in the USA, a country with which I am deeply in love, despite all its flaws. I remember being overwhelmed by a sense of peace and contentment.

Tonight I am working my first 'night watch 2' at Samaritans, the 2.30am – 6.30am shift. I will get on a train at around 8 tonight, sleep in one of the small bedrooms at the branch (right through midnight, unless some rowdy Carnaby Street revellers disturb me), and drag myself out of bed at 2am to take calls from people going through the darkest shit you can imagine. I can't talk about any of it, for obvious reasons. Six months in, and I am both pleased and slightly alarmed by my ability to completely zone it all out after I leave the branch. I couldn't do a job that bought me into contact with this stuff face-to-face, but over the phone, I can say the things and be the person people need. Sometimes someone's taken an overdose and the line shuts off and you don't know if they're going to live or die, but other times you hear someone transform from a broken wreck who can't go on to a broken wreck who can go on, and they thank you for listening, and you hang up and things feel okay for a moment, and then you forget about them forever.

It's harder to forget that there's a pandemic on and Charlie is dead. I miss my friends. I miss breathing on people in crowded rooms. I miss not having to think about whether the supermarket is going to have run out of things.

But this year I started an MA for some reason. The exciting person stayed exciting (and now I get to have them in my house all the time) and I still have enough money to pay the rent every month. So those things are good, I guess.

I really hope you've got some good things to hold onto as well.

November 2020

I'm taking the rare step of writing this blog in parts over the course of the month. It's been... the worst month. And reliving the events over again in text form at the end of it feels quite unbearable. So I'm doing it now, midway through. I guess I could have just skipped this month, but I've been doing this for so long now, it would feel somehow like cheating. Life brings good and bad, and things have been a mixture for me over the years, but not like this before.

But I mean, things started out fine. Me and Spen discovered our shared passion of the Bond movies, and decided to watch them ALL in chronological order. I didn't document Dr. No, so we're launching in here from the second one, From Russia With Love. It holds up pretty well in some respects, though not without it's problematic elements...

Uni is a lot, but sometimes you get to meet a nice new typeface, so that's something.

Group work is super stressful, but we slowly managed to find some kind of focus, pondering how we see the internet and what these mental maps we have mean for the ways we connect with one another.

I'm tired of zooming.

And then the boy got real sick. You've never seen so much shit in your life. I should have realised something was wrong. But he's been ill before, he gets upset tummies semi-regularly, so we just did what we usually would, which was give him 24 hours and if he was still bad, we figured we'd take him to the vet. 

I can hardly bear to talk about it. He was so ill. Why didn't we realise there was something so wrong?! 

We came down to him the next morning, and he was gone. He had died in the night. Just like that. The best friend I've ever had. The most perfect, pure light, snuffed out. We had shut him in my housemate's bathroom to sleep because he was so ill, and he died alone in that small, cold, lino-floored room. 

I have never howled so loud. I have never known utter desolation like it. 

Every time I think I might be feeling better, my brain flashes back to seeing his soft, sweet little body, cold on the floor. He was the most perfect creature I had ever met, and he was MINE! I got to snuggle up with him every night, and he loved me with such perfect, unquestioning sweetness. 

I have never grieved for a human like this. His loss is unbearable and I still can't really imagine ever feeling true happiness again. I know that sounds like hyperbole and I know things will get easier, but there's just this void inside me that was never there before. 

This is his collar tag. The unfathomable boy. But the older he got, the more we understood each other. The closer we got. I was so excited to live out the rest of his life with him. He was only 8.

We realised pretty quickly what had happened. He was prescribed some painkillers for his achey hips, in the hope that they might make the physiotherapy he was having more impactful. They were the same liquid painkillers we'd given him when he originally hurt himself last christmas, and again a couple of times during the year, most recently I think in July. We were used to giving them to him. But this time, for some reason, the vet gave us a different sized syringe. Previously, his dose was 'full syringe', for a 15kg dog. However, 'full syringe' of this larger syringe was a dose for a 70kg dog. We dosed him for a 70kg dog, without realising, without checking. He had just two doses. And then he was gone. 

Of course, it was an easy mistake to make. One anyone could have made. No one's fault. But ultimately, our fault. We killed our best friend. I and my partner are still deeply in love with one anothr. In fact, we are clinging onto one another for dear life. But grief shared is not grief halved. Grief shared is waking up at 3am sobbing at one another. Grief shared is lying awake at 5am in complete silence, knowing that the brightest light in your life is gone, and it's your fault. Grief shared is being unable to eat or drink. Everything hurts, everything reminds us of him. 

I can stop crying if I can stop thinking about it. For even a moment. Watching another Bond as a distraction for just a couple of short hours.

People are kind. There are flowers. There are chocolates. I enjoy them all on some level, but also find it torture on another level. Why are people giving me gifts?! I don't deserve gifts?! I fucked up the best thing in my life. The most loved boy, by so many people. I don't deserve anything. 

It's just torture.

Two people sent me very generous hampers full of artisan vegan cheese to try and soothe my woes. While the above sentiments of not deserving anything still apply, these bought me more joy than I could have imagined feeling at this stage. (And more generally, the way people have rallied round to support me has meant a huge amount. Special shout out to my old neighbour in Hebden Bridge who phoned and listened to me absolutely howl at her for over half an hour.) 

 I had just bought Charlie a brand new 15kg sack of kibble/goobles/croquettes (delete according to your vernacular), and it was sitting around making me miserable. Battersea dogs home don't take food donations, but the local homeless shelter was very pleased to recieve it. I can barely lift 15kg, so my friend Sarah very kindly drove a ridiculously long distance to pick it up and drop it off for me, and we had a socially distanced chips in the park. I cried but I did not completely lose my shit and wail, which felt like progress.

Since moving to London the rain mostly stopped bothering me, it doesn't have the same bleak, grinding greyness as it did in the valley somehow. But it still gets me down, especially when I'm already down. Felt very strange not to be forcing myself to go out in it as I previously would have done. Found myself wishing I had reasons to leave the house.

Thunderball is... really bad?! Apparently it was the biggest grossing Bond film of all time but it's mostly just interminable underwater diving scenes. Weirdly disappointing, though not without some highlights.

I told my tutors at uni what happened, and they offered me time off, but I didn't really feel able to take it, as I was already feeling the pressure, and terrified of falling behind. 

Our next large project until Christmas is a visual essay, of which we get to determine the subject. Despite mourning for a pet, during the course of the previous couple of weeks I had encountered many of the same tropes we encounter when mourning a person. Dated script fonts, soft focus images of the crematorium, bad poetry, embossed white 'with sympathies' cards with delicate drawings of flowers... It got me to thinking about the Western visual language of grief and whether it helps or hinders us when processing grief. (Also interesting side avenues around the commercialisation of death and how impersonal these materials are at what should be such a personal period of rememberance)

Anyway, this is what I'm thinking about and trying to formulate into some kind of coherant piece of writing/design, so wish me luck... (And please get in touch if you have any experience of grieving and remember how impacted, or not, you were by the materials surrounding you at that time)

A mess of a brain

My partner's friend Nick very kindly invited us to come out and hang out with his 1 year old Shibe Inu Miko, if we wanted to. We did want to. Miko is a sweetheart and we have a fun (socially distanced) park time.

I haven't really mentioned this, but ever since July this year I have been a fully trained up Samaritans phone listener, working 4.5 hour shifts 3 times a month. We're generally discouraged from being too loud about our role on social media (as it could put off someone we knew who might have been thinking about phoning, in case they got the person they knew) (Even though the chances of that are extraordinarily low given how infrequent our shifts are and how many volunteers there are across the country).

But anyway, it's a real privilege to offer people support through some of the bleakest, wildest shit you can imagine humans having to experience.

I had to take a couple of weeks off though, as I wasn't feeling emotionally stable enough to carry out the role. I decided I was ready to return, but right before I came into my shift I had a text from a friend with some horrible sad news, and the moment I saw my shift leader (who knew what had happened with Charlie) and he asked me how I was doing, with his gentle, kind, Samaritans voice, I just became a total blubbering wreck.

(As an aside, in the days immediately after Charlie's death, I wasn't suicidal at all, but I felt, like no other time in my life, the need to absolutely wail, and also to talk in detail about my experience of his death, which was very traumatic in a number of ways. Although lots of friends offered to talk to me, I didn't want to put that weight of grief and experience onto them, so I called both the Samaritans and Blue Cross Pet Bereavement phoneline. They were both very helpful, and even though I knew exactly how the Samaritan would treat me and pretty much what they would say to me, I still needed to hear it all, but more importantly, needed the ability to vent and wail in private. If you're ever feeling overwhelmed by life, even if you're not suicidal, I truly encourage you to call (or email) the Samaritans. Hearing a calm, gentle, caring voice on the other end of the phone who you can tell anything and be truly honest about how you're feeling and what you're experiencing is HUGE, and the whole reason I do what I do there is because I know how much it matters.)

Anyway my shift leader told me to go home but after the immediate wave of grief passed, I did stay for half my shift and just did emails, which gave me something to feel worthwhile about. Hopefully by next shift I'll be back up to speed on taking calls again.

The bad news I recieved was about the original very good boy, Stompy. Long time readers of this blog might possibly remember him, he belonged to my good friend Jess, and during my early/mid twenties in Brighton he was a regular fixture in my life, often coming over for mini-breaks or days out, and we would often take him out walking. We even had a canal boat holiday together one time! Anyway, he reached the ripe old age of 15, but Jess texted me to tell me he hadn't eaten or drunk for 48 hours and she was really scared. Right before I went into my Samaritans shift she got the news from the vet that he needed to be put to sleep, and they would do it the following day. 

Unlike Charlie of course, his death would be peaceful, controlled, and planned, and he had reached a beautiful ripe old age, but for Jess this was still every bit as devastating as my loss of Charlie, having had him as her constant companion for over a decade. I would have shed a tear for Stompy's loss regardless of my own current circumstances, but its timing did feel particularly cruel. 

Good night to two of the very goodest boys. What a horrible cruel month.

In the spirit of completionism, we watched the original 1967 Casino Royale, which let me tell you, is... not anything like the Daniel Craig Casino Royale. Or any other Bond movie ever. It was made by a totally different production company, with totally different actors (though Ursula Andress, the first Bond girl from Dr. No reappears, but in an entirely unrelated role). It is basically a parody of the other Bond movies thus far, but it was marketed as a straightlaced regular Bond film for its cinematic release, which left viewers bemused to say the least. "The chaotic nature of the production features heavily in contemporary and later reviews. Roger Ebert said "This is possibly the most indulgent film ever made"... Time described Casino Royale as "an incoherent and vulgar vaudeville" and Variety declared the film to be "a conglomeration of frenzied situations, ‘in’ gags and special effects, lacking discipline and cohesion."

It also has an utterly weird and wonderful cast, including Woody Allen, Peter Sellers, David Niven, Orson Welles and... Ronnie Corbett?

Anyway if you're a fan of Bond movies and you want to waste an incomprehensible but nonetheless kind of enjoyable couple of hours, this is worth a look in...

One way which I really did not expect to feel was 'ready for another dog'. Of course I'd thought about what would happen when Charlie died before he was gone, but I'd imagined it would be a number of years in the future, and that I probably wouldn't want another dog for a long time after his passing. Maybe I'd travel! Or take the opportunity to have an office job! 

But having him wrenched away so suddenly and unexpectedly has left a huge dog-shaped hole in my heart and my home, and even as soon as the day after his death I lay awake in bed late at night, tearfully browsing shelters and imagining what it would feel like to love another dog pal.

Could I love another dog pal? Would anyone ever compare to Charlie? I mean, no, but also, dogs are inherently loveable, and the moment I saw FAT TED, I realised that yes, I could love again.

One thing that became very quickly apparent was that everyone wants a dog for lockdown, and for once, shelters are really struggling with demand/supply ratios for dogs right now. Which is good for dogs, but bad for sad humans like me. 

In the knowledge that maybe this was grief acting, I decided nonetheless to reach out to a few relevant shelters to at least get on a waiting list, in the knowledge that it might be many months wait before there's a friend for me (In my favour is that I've cared for a difficult breed — collies — and that Charlie was originally a rescue, but a big down-mark is that I don't have a garden, which I suspect pushes me very far down the list on many larger shelters, even though I have lived happily with a dog here for well over a year.)

I was recommended Dogs Blog by (also recently dog bereaved) Jess, as that's where smaller, more obscure shelters post, and we had fun browsing for friends together.  

I fell in love with beautiful, fine-maned Geordie, but his shelter, after some initial enthusiasm about me, ruled me out due to no garden.

Wiccaweys shelter are doing wonderful work caring for a wide range of collie and collie adjacent dogs. I definitely can't take two, probably not even one this big, but Thelma and Louise are a joy and seeing their social media content on the Wiccaweys instagram has been a cheering force.

Finally there was Watson, who seems like a very sweet boy, but his foster carer seems very flakey in terms of actually wanting to find him a new home (maybe he's so good she wants to keep him?!)

Anyway, suffice to say, there's a long road ahead in terms of getting a new pal, especially when all I really want is my old pal back, but in absence of that being possible, I am doing what I can to find a new friend.

Here's maybe the saddest visual diary I've ever drawn.

Finally managed to get inducted to the letterpress workshop at LCC, yessssss. Was horribly precocious and over excited, and really hope I'll be able to use it lots as they have ssoooo muccchhhhh stuff, and are super experimental and fun in terms of what you can do there. 

One of the additional stresses this month was that, during Charlie's last-but-one night, he was incredibly unwell on our sofa. Not just your regular 'bit of a bad tummy'. It was, frankly, a shit-tastrophe. Honestly, all I could do in the moment was laugh at how bad it was, though obviously the following day, after he was gone, I was absolutely devastated with myself for not recognising that something was more wrong than just a regular upset stomach. Anyway, despite being covered with throws, the sofa was in a very bad way (and it was the landlords). I paid to get it profesionally cleaned, but to no avail, and the lingering smell of shit in the living room three weeks on was frankly a depressing reminder of loss and heartbreak (as well as just being, y'know, a constant smell of shit). So I bit the bullet and got rid of the old sofa and bought a new one from Ikea. (All told, Charlie's death has cost me around £750, from crematorium costs, professional clean of the sofa and the room where he died, removal of sofa, and new sofa, which I will have to leave behind whenever I move out as it's just a replacement for the landlord's one.) Frankly a hefty chunk out of my savings feels like the least punishment I deserve for what happened, but it still stings.

Anyway, we had a fun/stressful evening rearranging the living room in anticipation of our new (slightly smaller but infinitely more comfortable) sofa arriving the next day.

And arrive it did! (Though I also ordered a rug and Ikea just DIDN'T INCLUDE IT and the delivery men lied and said they had, and Ikea are entirely uncontactable, so that's another stress but ANYWAY) Me and Tabitha spent a gleeful morning assembling it, and then I dashed straight into uni to have a fun play with the riso printer. Me and three other people on my course agreed to meet up so that if it was stressful (and it was) we'd have backup to try and figure things out. It was nice to do some experimentation, and see everyone else's work — this is a collage I made of Mareena's arabic glitchy 'Peace', and Sarah's raincoat print. 

I printed this year's christmas cards, so if/when you recieve one from me, please be mindful that I made them under great stress and technical experimentation. Oh and also they're just a single sheet rather than a folded card because I haven't done my print finishing induction yet, SORRRYYYYYYYY (but I've gotta count the pennies where I can after this month's catastrophe....)

Both me and Spen agreed that 'You only live twice' was our favourite Bond movie so far. Utterly silly and fast paced from start to finish, though probably most notorious for its preeeeetttty problematic racism (Sean Connery in utterly shit yellow-face anyone?)

Anyway, here we are at the end somehow. I'm glad I wrote this blog in parts as I am utterly overloaded with uni work right now, and they just keep piling more on. I'm very tired and quite stressed, but to be honest the more occupied my brain is the better. I'm not crying every day any more but there is a constant sadness in my head that I have never experienced before, even at my lowest. It feels like I'm just trying to get through every day, every hour, without thinking about him. Without missing him. Without hating myself. I can't imagine how I will ever feel better, though I know one day I will. I just have to keep going until then, I guess.