I'm off on ubertrip daan saath tomorrow, and won't be back (and probably not online) until the 7th. I'm not really feeling up to it physically (as in, I want to go to bed right now at 7pm), but as I've spent about £100 on train and concert tickets, it has to be done. Luckily, I'm feeling entirely up to it mentally. My last entry, much as it embarrasses me now, seems to have had a cathartic effect, and I'm ready to take on the world again. Just preferably from an armchair.

I *will* have an early night tonight. Well, early by my standards. (Eleven.) Providing I've got everything sorted and some much-needed Sims-playing done first.

Last night, I worked on the novel. Yay, for the keyboard that came with my new computer is amazingly conducive to writing it (it speeds up my typing and it makes a pleasing sound as I do so) and I've hit a "Woooo, the novel rules!" patch. When potential publishers realise they can't actually pick up its bulk without dislocating a shoulder, they'll go, "Oh Mykos, not another fool who hasn't realised novels are supposed to be 85,000 words long not 850,000 words." But, they will glance at the first paragraph, out of curiosity and politeness, and go, "Beep, she really knows how to write, though!"

(Obviously, the writing style is rather better than that displayed here. Getting to make things up and rewrite endlessly helps enormously.)

But I'm getting a bit ahead of myself, here, as it's taken me five years to write the first tenth of it.

My weekend in Edinburgh with Ibid and Alex was pleasant and blessedly rather less insane than the previous one, by the way. Most of it was spent wandering and talking, about the usual type of things, such as Ibid and Alex actually being the same person, and my disappointment over the world having such a dull spheroid form. If I had any say in the matter, it would look like a bunch of grapes. In fact, I concluded, I might even have to write a science fiction novel about such a place called "Planet Of The Grapes".

While out into city, I saw a boy of about nine wearing New Rocks. I felt there was something decidedly wrong with that, though I couldn't say what. It's not really a case of thinking "a childhood without too many luxuries is a good thing", because how I envy kids these days who can download music off the Internet, and sell their CDs online if they get sick of them, whereas In My Day, when I bought a CD, not liking it wasn't really an option, as it would be another two months before I could afford another. And, much as I cringe at mini-moshers who dress like models for Attitude Clothing catalogue and its ilk (who will probably invoke World War III, what with their talk of satanic bands from Germany who are actually from Norway and just own sad amounts of Kiss merchandise), this guy wasn't really like that.

Also, you will be thrilled to know that I finally gave in and slept with Alex. However, only in the most technical large-double-bed-sharing-in-separate-sleeping-bags sense, because I didn't want to sleep on the floor, and my primary intention in going there was to give him a good weekend, just not *that* good a weekend. However, I would wholly recommend the experience, as I evidenced him neither kicking, snoring nor sleeptalking.

On Friday, we went to Finsternis, which plays ethereal and experimental industrial. Not the most obvious combination of things to dance to, and indeed, no one was dancing. The setting and accompaniment made it a pleasant enough place to sit and chat, but not the sort of place I'd regularly want to pay £3 to get into, as I go to clubs to dance and meet people, neither of which were particularly easy there.

And on Saturday, The Mission: one floor of rock, one of goth. The music on the rock floor wasn't heavy enough for my liking - the best it got was Rammstein and Fear Factory, and the two Electric Six songs in the set speak volumes. (There were also a distinct lack of people wearing black - scary.) The goth floor had a likeable mix of genres, but most of the songs were overly obvious choices. The atmosphere was cool though; I'd go back.