Important stuff:

The interview went ok. Could have been better, could have been worse. I find out how I did next week.

Also, why do train announcers talk about "the next station stop"? Why not "the next station" or, indeed, "the next stop"? Ok, every station isn't necessarily a stop and every stop isn't necessarily a station, but I wouldn't have thought anyone would really raise a complaint along the lines of, "Hey, you said the next stop would be Newington, but we've stopped at this dull random place in the middle of nowhere!" (Well, Newington is just a . . . but anyway.)

Other stuff what I have been doing:

Firstly, grrr! There are two day-long death metal festivals happening in London this year. Obviously, I go to loads of death metal gigs there anyway, but festivals are particularly appealing, due to having better atmosphere and being better value for money. But I can go to neither of these: on day of the first I'm at a goth festival and one of my cousins is getting married on the day of the second. Beeping goths! And cousins, weddings, who'd have 'em? Worse, I have to listen to or play in my family's EVIL soft rock covers band at the reception. Bah.

Anyway. Friday brought UKC's first ever cyber night. Sadly, the WORRYINGLY ENORMOUS PEN from last time was nowhere to be seen (possibly due to Emma locking herself out of her house), but Anna did donate a set of deeply gothic rubber stamps, with bats on and everything. Unfortunately, doorman Martin (dressed for his duty, by trying out attire he'd acquired for a funeral) was very bolshy about which stamp was used, so he didn't get confused (bless).

Dan sold glowsticks. I don't think I've ever seen purple glowsticks before and they're PRETTY! I saw Teratoma for the first time and although they're apparently normally quite calm and synthpoppy, they were very stressed and consequently NOISY. But I liked it. Their stuff's rougher round the edges than the work of more established acts, but sufficiently accomplished, disturbing and unique.

I didn't see much of Xykogen, due to discussing POWER METAL! with Chris Formerly Of Christchurch, an unexpected appearance from Former Vice President Nick who I haven't seen for aeons, and having to leave early to get the last bus, but they seemed pretty good. The night was slightly dead though, as was I, so I was happy to go.

On Saturday, Bryn came round. We watched "Sleepaway Camp" (my housemates have such amazing taste in films) and played "Simon The Sorcerer 3". I was supposed to go to Nodnol to Slime in celebration of Vix's birthday, but I could barely keep my eyes open all day, so I didn't.

Sunday was not a good day.

<writing angst>

The time had come, I thought, to focus on a single writing project that I might be able to publish. The trouble is, the easiest format to publish is the novel and the vast majority of my writing projects are going to end up much shorter or much longer than the recommended 85,000 words. But there was one, the tale of a bowel-mouthed fourteen-year-old Marilyn Manson fan exacting revenge on his classmates, which I've been writing slowly for the last three years, that looked set to meet the target, so I wrote about 2,000 words of it. Only then did it occur to me that this was the most original idea EVER.

Ah well, forget word counts, thought I. Let's focus on the project that excites me the most: namely the one I've been working on for five years. It's likely to end up being 400,000 words, but it's going to be so stunning publishers will take it anyway.

So I focussed on it. I stared at my multi-page list of ideas, themes, necessary relationship developments and messages to myself for several hours, trying to work out where to start outlining a story with five protagonists, at least fifteen plots and no events. I growled a lot, stood Purposefully in the kitchen ("have a seat," Sleeve suggested; "No. I'm Malingering," I declared), bit most of my nail polish off, ate lots of toast, several Mars Bars and the mint biscuits Bryn had accidentally left behind, and got nowhere, other than doubtful and frustrated.

I then spent several hours lying on my floor hating myself, writing and life. Eventually, I remembered I hadn't emptied my recycle bin since I deleted Spider Solitaire and retrieved it. But after a few games, I remembered my vow to the Dark Lord: to approach everything with devilish glee and managed to answer Former Housemate Jo and Twi's e-mails (dated September and October).

My attitude needed further refinement, but that came over the next few days. What I dislike most about life and consequently struggle with is its greyness. But I can't do much to make it more exciting. I can be a bit braver about talking to people at gigs and maybe I'll take up mountaineering or something, but no matter what I do, a lot of living is going to remain rather routine. What I can do, though, is try to get the most out of everything.

The trouble is, I attempt to work (by which I mean write fiction, at the moment) all the time. Ok, I go to gigs as well, but even on the tube I think I should be writing. I don't want to do this, even though it can be tempting - I can't read a book or watch a film or see a band without going, "Eee, I want to make something!" Hopefully, this desire will be easier to fight once I have some sort of creative career, but at the moment, I don't yet feel my writing is leading me towards one and I can't rest until it is. I haven't written more than 5% of anything, apart from my zine thingy which is nearly complete, but happy with it though I am, it doesn't feel like the beginning of an art terrorism campaign. Nonetheless, I know I need to make an effort to spend time on activities that aren't writing, for colour and to replenish my mental stamina.

As it is, though, I can't stop writing until I feel I've done a sufficient amount for the day, which I rarely do, either because I either get distracted, allow my work to become sloppy, or edit (necessary though it is) instead of making anything new. Hence I spend hours drained and uninspired, put off doing more interesting or useful tasks, and go to bed feeling ill at heart.

Instead, I think I need to ensure I spend a small part of each day creating something marvellous and fresh and useful: something that needs editing only for accuracy, something I'm willing to show for myself. Let's say 500 words for now, which I'll try and pen before breakfast, so I can spend the rest of my day throwing myself into whatever other activities I feel like.

</writing angst>

I spent most of Monday putting my website back together (but I've still got a long way to go), then went to London for some live blaaaaaack metaaaaaal! The bands - Lugubrum, Skaldic Curse, Necro Ritual and Yersinia Pestis - were worth far more than £7 entry fee.

It was a distinctly underground occasion (I hadn't even heard of the headliner before I got the flier) and there were only about sixty people there, among whom I felt somewhat misplaced in my Kreator longsleeve: my least mallcore item of apparel (until I got a Nile longsleeve the next day), but still one that bears the name of one of the giants of not-that-extreme-comparatively-speaking metal. I was also keenly aware of the fact that I own all of eleven black metal albums and three of them are by the somewhat risible Dimmu Borgir. (Or 17 if we include Venom, who invented the genre but don't really fit into it, and Kovenant, Mortiis and Void, who are more industrial.) In fact, I only own 110 metal albums full stop (or 191 if we count gothic metal, nu metal, hard rock and industrial rock as metal, which most extreme metal fans don't). This is Not Many and I only get MP3s legally and on whims (and when I have a home Internet connection). Certainly, I'd like to own more, but, you know, without an income, it's best to resist spending money wherever possible.

But I had a very good day for Random People (tm). A bloke offered to copy me his entire rarity-filled CD collection(!) and a girl gave me her e-mail address telling me to let her know when I'm next going to a gig. The train home was delayed by about an hour and a bloke started talking to me on the platform and we had one of those over-analytical Slimelight-stylee conversations. He also made me a series of questions starting with, "You are in a film. What's behind you?" I answered, "Thick forest, filled with tall dark foreboding trees." He said this meant I'd been scarred by demons in my past. But who hasn't? I think it just means I'm so black metal it hurts. That, or I just spent far too much of my childhood on boring woodland walks. (For the record, I was in a large clearing, looked at my shoes when I met the mummy bear, jumped over a three-foot wide stream, scrambled over a five foot high wall, and found a large rusty but ornate gold key in the desert.) And when he got off the train, I spoke to a guy who'd been to the gig.

Tuesday was less interesting. I spent a few hours writing an uber-introspective journal entry which I've since decided against putting online, then returned to London to see Nile. They were pretty good, though I think support band Dying Fetus stole the show and opener Seethe were also good, despite being unnaturally proud of the fact that they're from Milton Keynes. (Though I suppose they've more cause to be proud of their origins than the other two bands, who are American.) I stayed with Jo O London afterwards.

On Wednesday, I sat in Paddington station for three hours, working on my computer game, while I awaited my train to Oxford. My time there was somewhat weird - I went to the interview, which lasted half an hour - then left again, as I was carrying too much to wish to wander around the city. Being vain, I'd insisted on wearing New Rocks to the gig which I then had to carry and the strap on my shoulder bag had broken the previous day. Oh well - hopefully I'll get to explore it at more length soon.

My laptop battery died and when I reached London I was nearing the end of my book, so I went in WH Smiths in Victoria station in search of further reading material for my trip back to Whitstable. I couldn't find any decent fiction, so I gloomily made for the young adult section. Such things are increasingly filled with poor-but-stylised fantasy novels and books claiming "this is YOUR life", but one tome caught my eye, and it turned out to be a new David Belbin novel I hadn't even known about. YAY! (David Belbin being one of my favourite young adult writers, as well as an acquaintance.)

At home, I watched a programme about polar bears which made me strangely happy (oh dear, I'm turning into Lars), phoned people, and finished the David Belbin book, which had shocking but satisfying grim ending.

Yesterday, I wrote for about twelve hours. Yay! Then I played Spider Solitaire for four. Oops. But it was a mostly pleasant day. I listened to Slayer, whose rockingness I'd never fully picked up on before, and watched a programme about (actual) dragons. I now totally want to be a nature documentary maker, which isn't an utterly impossible goal because my Ph.D may involve fieldwork (it certainly will if I do it at Oxford), so then I might then be able to go on and do it for a living and film stuff by way of observation. For now, though, time to catch up with my friends list after a week away and get back to the (three thousand) novel(s).

I do feel better, though. AND I had major inspiration for THE novel this morning. Hurrah!