Month: September 2002

I started a thread on Barbelith yesterday called Crises of Modern Western Life in which I suggested that the two fundamental crises attacking Western identity at the moment were crises of nationality and crises of mascunlinity: “Both are fundamentally linked in some profound ways that I’m not sure I’m able to articulate – but are to do with ways of deriving pride or self-respect from some aspect of self-definition. I was wondering if anyone felt they could extend some of this thinking in a useful direction – suggest some linkages, some failures in my thinking or perhaps some other crises that my subservience to colonial middle-class hetero-patriarchal values may have forced me to put under some kind of erasure… ” I’d appreciate any thoughts anyone might have…

You don’t want to watch Notting Hill. You really don’t. But it’s on television and it’s so bloody sticky and although you know it’s kind of going to make you want to kill everyone if you catch more than a moment of it, if you do catch a moment of it then it’s got you in its massive drooling fangs and it won’t let go – by god – no. But I don’t want any of it. I don’t want the crappy friends with broken bits, and I don’t want the Aryan Nation version of West London. I don’t bloody need Ronan Keating howling in my sensitive earbits. And most particularly I don’t want the godawful shame of getting really emotionally involved in it – and worst of all the hideous embarrassment of suddenly wanting one of those least fashionable of all things… A bloody boyfriend. It’s a phase. I’ll get over it. Godammit.

I went out last night to G.A.Y. ostensibly to see have a dance around and get drunk and watch the Sugababes, except I got a bit depressed and cynical quite early on in the evening and spent a couple of hours glaring at half-witted poofs all desperate to pair off as quickly as humanly possible. So instead, my friend Nick and I wandered off and got fake tattoos sprayed onto our aging flesh. Here’s mine:

A while ago I went on a low-carbohydrate diet to try and lose some weight. And although the diet itself was borderline impossible to maintain, I did find that my skin cleared up, I stopped farting all the time, my moods radically stabilised and I felt much more energised and up for stuff. Now I’ve been reading about Candida and I’m thinking, “Hmm well that all sounds remarkably familiar…” I should go to the doctors really…

I’m not one for the constant tracking of page impressions, but I do check my stats every couple of days to find out if anyone’s crouched behind an Ice Rink whispering about me behind my back. Once you reach my level of web celebrity you have to be careful about these things. You wouldn’t understand, I’m sure. Anyway, because of a recent upgrade in the kind of reporting facilities I have, I now know the search terms that people are using to come to my site. Now of course everyone else has had this ability for years. I used to have it too. Sigh – those heady days of youth… I’ll never get them back now…

I’m commenting on this recently regained ability because I keep getting referrals from people who search for Workshy Fop. Turns out I’m the third most visible fop on the planet according to Google. What an honour. Clearly this too is an honour that most of you have little chance of even beginning to aspire to. But if you want to see if you even rate, might I suggest submitting your picture to Am I a Workshy Fop or Not?