Something happened on Tuesday. 

I got an email saying “AGENT HENDY.  Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to take the following job:”

Title: "refreshing copify until the jobs go from £6 to £20 is tedious"

I thought; I recognise that title.  I tweeted that earlier in the day. 

Copify are a copywriting agency for freelance writers.  Essentially, finding jobs for people like me to write things to promote a business, or idea.  I have taken a few jobs - one was for a tech blog, and one was for a greeting card company.

You apply for an account, you become a copywriter.  They email you with copywriting jobs, you accept (if you want), and then they pay you.  Once you’re signed up and pre approved, the process is astonishingly straightforward.

So, I attempted to accept a few assignments on Tuesday. But the number of writers does not match the number of jobs - in short, there aren't enough jobs.  I clicked "accept".  I read: “This job has been taken.”  I went to their jobs page.  I refreshed.  I waited.  I refreshed again.  More waiting.  I was basically waiting for a job that would pay more than £6. 

I got frustrated. 

So I tweeted: "refreshing copify until the jobs go from £6 to £20 is tedious" and thought nothing more of it.

But then Copify emailed me.  They had seen my tweet, and wanted me to write a blog.  Clever bastards. 

I didn't know what to write.  Part of me wanted to bite the hand that feeds, and declare Copify to be a shambles - then expect them to pay me for my ramblings. But, aside from a few frustrations, I do like them.  The jobs I have completed were fun to write, I was given feedback, and paid within a few days.  And now of course, I see they have a sense of mischief. 

Do I get paid now?

I wanted a baby, but my boyfriend was laughably unsuitable, I’d sometimes laugh in his face.  He lived with his “parents”.  Reluctantly “Trevor” moved in – he was a bad man, he wouldn’t even have sex with me saying stuff like ‘oh, i need the toilet’, and then not coming back for hours. Then, finally, when forced, we started having sex.

‘I don’t trust you,’ he would whisper as he came.

I hatched a plan. 

I would jerk him off in his sleep and then use a turkey baster to make baby. My attempts failed, and shortly afterwards he died.  *shrug*

I’m not the only woman who does this. couldn’t be bothered to speak to any men before writing this article

Be wary of us bug-eyed loon women - we are used to getting what we want

I imagine you are furious reading this piece.  I do hope so!   sperm-theft sperm-theft  sperm-theft sperm-theft

People say “what about a man’s right to his body, and to his future?” and i say : sperm-theft sperm-theft  sperm-theft  sperm-theft

I am a quiet boy, and I sometimes think people forget that I am there.  People are reminded sometimes.  They look at me, and attempt to draw me in, I imagine from some kind of genuine embarrassment, rather than through any real concern.  I don’t mean to be so quiet, and when it dawns on me how long it’s been, I practice a line or two, or drag my fingers cross my brain and rummage deep, trying to find something to say that will have some desired affect.  A laugh maybe, something significant.  A tale, a lie – a strewn set of words.  There was this one time at a friends barbeque; I replay it in my head over and over when I am feeling nasty.  I hadn’t said anything for 47 minutes, and I was sat around a table with 4 people I knew rather well, and 3 people I did not.  As time went on, the pressure to inhale, let alone speak – well that was unbearable.  My friend suggested that they have a poker tournament after the meal, and another friend, looked at me, and addressed the group.  Then, a girl said “You don’t play poker either?  We could go to the lounge and watch some chick flicks”.  I interrupted her and said “I could learn to play”.

Everyone laughed.  I think I was set up, but still, everyone laughed, and somebody said that I was quick witted.  Another boy looked at me and smiled, and I knew that my quip had afforded me so much.  People got a gist, and I was placed high up on a mantle for a bit.  There was no need for anecdotes or banter with the new people, and I relaxed and started conversing freely.

Anyway, now when I haven’t said anything for a time, I am aware that the balance can be restored with a carefully timed quip or response, and there is less the need for a diatribe or extended blah blah to mark my territory.  I sometimes wait for hours to deliver this, and if it doesn’t come, I worry less.  Not like I used to. 

Nothing is like it used to be.

In the summer of 2010, I walked along the side of a motorway with my friend to buy some toilet roll.  The trip was a success.  On our way back, my friend tripped on a protrusion, and fell.  There was nothing I could do.  He lay in a pool of blood for 3 minutes as I put my arm around him, patting him and breathing tenderly on his face. 

After a car beeped at me, and pointed, I pulled at his body and dragged him into a clearing, throwing discarded maccy dee wrappers on his legs, and dumping leaves on his groin.  No one ever found the body, and to this day, nothing bad has happened.  I sometimes go back to the spot where it all happened, his body is still there.  People walk over him and sneer, his arms still clutching a TESCO bag.

I tell you this because recently I wrote to Haringey council about the accident.  I didn’t mention that my friend was dead, as I thought this may provoke suspicion.  Anyway, they awarded me damages of £4,500 because I said I had been having a headache for 7 months.

I have spent the money on a statue of my friend, and it is now in the back garden, it shoos away the aphids, and my green beans are coming along a treat.

If I have learnt anything from this escapade, it is the true meaning of friendship. 

(download)

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In 2009, I wrote a little piece on OCD and Anxiety.Here ‘tis http://www.thecalmzone.net/2010/11/getting-the-better-of-anxiety/

I also interviewed Lynne Drummond, a consultant psychologist at South West London and St Georges Mental Health NHS trust.  She was lovely.  The interview made up some of the article, and was intended to be turned into a podcast.  Unfortunately, technical difficulties at the time meant that it was never released.

At 09:28, I was distracted by my sound engineer’s shoes, and lost my trail of thought, and ended up asking Lynne a question that she had just that minute answered.

ocd_.mp3

(download)

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ocd_.mp3 (11.45 MB)

I told James that my heart was surprised, and asked him if he noticed it as well, verging on embarrassment.  Just half a mile to our right was millionaires row, the third gated community.  We walked along the waters edge and on past the public house my dad took his paperwork to.  If you are to dine alone son, take a paper.  No one questions a reading lone diner, something to remember.  He dined alone, my dad.  He was born to make the connection.

We went to the largest rival on the parade, the sprawling assent of the cliff railways, and the flumes.  Truly an epitome of taste, and messy, always busy.  It was opened last summer, and there were fanfares, poster campaigns.  There were faces in the door, petitions to sign.  There were many young men, a lot of drugs were smoked, it was a meeting point, and you could hire boats.  Teeny bodies zoomed up and down tarmac and into cafes, and around ice cream stalls.  Two guys I had seen were here, and I learnt that they would give you free chips if you went in, and sometimes money to boot.  Soggy chips with burnt blobs, but no one ever complained.

We entered the beach bar, sheepish with faux written confidence and a nervous wiggle.  My upper lip showed full puberty, and my demeanour.  James had no money so I bought him half a pint of light ale, and I had the same.  There was a room out the back where a clown was getting ready, big clompy shoes, ready to entertain a gaggle of screaming birds, and adults eager for pints of orange squash, with straws. 

There once lived a man called Dan. He ran a small accounting firm on the west side. He was head of the Jews, and ran late night gambling dens . He had a lovely wife who made computer games for bang- whizz.com. He was popular, known to many as stellar, a man of some social standing. Whilst counting numbers one day, it dawned on him that the tools he had would not get him through, and that he could no longer believe anything he heard. People began to talk about him behind his back.

On the drive back home one night, his car came to a halt on the brow of a hill. He climbed onto the roof, and began to take off his clothes. With a lit firework between his buttocks , he shouted to the sky. People stared, and coaxed him down, shielding their eyes, and asking what he thought he was doing. After a while, he committed a most heinous crime. A police van came and took him to the cells. He was charged, and sent down for 6 months. Whilst in prison, Dan developed some new skills. He learnt how to cut hair, and soon all the prisoners were coming to him for a cut. He specialised in the buzz mullet, which was a new style he had thought of whilst sleeping in the arms of Harry Belgrano, a murderer from Arnos Grove.

The cut was striking, and soon visitors to the prison would remark on the trend. One day , a reporter interviewed him . A photographer took pictures of the prisoners, and for a moment, he was big news.

The following is an excerpt from that interview:

“what made you think of the buzz mullet?”

            “It was always in me, but it took prison to coax it out”

“Are you sorry for what you did?”

            “I apologise for nothing. I have nothing to be sorry for. “

“But what about the families of those you wronged?”

            “Look at the Buzz Mullets. They speak for themselves.”

Our flight was wobbly and violent, and lasted one hour. By the time he had stopped pinching my arm, I had soiled my copy of Gide. We shook down at Charles De Gaulle and took the main line across town. A dogged eared man with a sneer startled me and I focused on a boy who spoke in rhymes. I picked up the gist, scrumpled up thoughts, willing lines to merge, feelin’ a little lost. My limbs fell awful heavy and we climbed a stairwell into the night sky. I’m giddy in a moment, and we pass the Louvre. Our batteries seep brown sludge on the pavement and it makes the walk hard and I sink in the quicksand. We’re mocked in a bar and a waiter points to the front window where he says it is warmer for us. We sit with the sound of gurgling water pouring down our ears.

The next morning was bright and heavy. We walked, paying our respects, dripping with glee, tired and ruminating, and then we stopped where padlocks swing taut on a bridge. Outside a bar under the glow of a heater, we ate eggs on toasted bread, dripping oily salad washed down with more coke. The women beside us looked up to the starless sky, waiting for a sign. There were two lovers next to them, the weekend turned long, the auditorium was filled. I heard snippets about the Queen, the homecoming, and dogs in trees. The air was still, and this perhaps was the wake up call. A sleek lady dressed in black says something about a soul, and questions fellow diners “Monsieur De Gruchy?”

We found the Royal quarter and the earth opened up. We walked until our feet burst, then further ‘til the crust covered the sores. In the distance - the two squares, the other side of Paris, and out to the suburbs. Words became tired and spent, but in this way, totally appropriate. Climbing the stairs, and ready for reward, I turned to be breathless, full of broken thoughts, washed away.

Heading down to the metro, soon back in the corner, ready for fuel. At the restaurant, a man in tight black trousers brought us drinks and a menu. I noticed a woman beside us scoffing at pasta like a pig, her husband had brown glasses. They talked of how the French did not understand, they were crazy Americans. She clocked me several times, and I wished her to be far, far away. We agreed this was a special time, and the money in our pockets could be put to good use, ordering salmon and Quail’s eggs.

That night we walked up to the tower, hassled by men in scarves who tried to drag our arms clear from our sides. Each debacle was the end of the line; cafes were showing late night films. We clearly are not men of the world. The next morning, we took the underpass to a cemetery and found the tomb, interrupting the funeral, gawping at a corpse. I thought about the others that lay resting without the same, for they had thoughts too.

We flew back that night