Hey kids.
Drinkwater asked me to stop writing white text.
It's back to the lower case for you. Don't know what made me think you deserved capitalisation in the first place.
So, as you can see, I have totally ignored his request.
I'm a reactionary writer. Apart from this weekly e-mail stint I have going on, I initiate very few e-mail conversations. At present I have one person whom I e-mail a stupidly large amount. And then one or two others whom I keep in semi-regular contact with via shorter, more concise writings. There have been times when I've had several stupidly large e-mail conversations going on, but they tend to dry up after a few weeks. Why? Because of the reactionary nature of my writing. When I am asked questions I answer them. But then, unless I make a conscious effort, I forget to ask the other person their opinion on that subject. I'm too self absorbed and tend to rant off on tangents, which I then end with little room for further discussion. Great for airing my opinions. But not that great for deep and meaningful conversations. So I'll leave that unresolved.
He said it made my e-mails take twice as long to read.
Hmm. Back to the dreaming. I've been sleeping a stupid amount this half-term. Upwards of fourteen hours a day. Which makes for some damn fine dreams ^_^ So let's go back on my promise not to tell you any more of them. Wait a bit. That was if they were emotionally meaningful ones! This last one, that I'm about to detail for you, was just plain odd. Or maybe prophetic. Whatever.
Ha ha.
I'm standing on a raised platform in the back left corner of the hall of my old middle school. People are walking back and forth in front of me, carrying scenery all over the place. Some people place an ocean in the middle of the hall. I fly up and hover in the air and start talking. People fall silent and listen to my instructions. Right, some more lightning over there. More lightning appears over the ocean. A bit darker. The walls of the hall fall into blackness and I'm hovering over an ocean. A boat. A wooden boat, badly damaged, appears in the upper right hand corner. Bigger waves. Huge waves tower over the boat, threatening to overturn it at any second. A woman. A woman in soaking wet clothes clings to the deck of the boat. Lightning. Lightning splits the air apart. But after the thunder. Cut! Lights come back up, we're back in the hall. What the fuck was that? What? That sound! Lightning, sir. No, that was thunder. I want to hear lightning! What?
I'm soaring over a bridge. The roads which should be beneath it are raging rivers. Cruel rocks stick out from it and shards of wood flow round them. The sky is a bright blue and the sun shines fiercely. There isn't a cloud in the sky. I fly along, above the bridge and come to the ruins of a tower. I fly to the damaged roof and look to the West.
I see the City Centre. Except it's three times as large as it should be. And is made of marble. It's been abandoned for centuries and vines crawl through its structure. Gargoyles turn their heads as I fly past them into the main hall.
I race with children along the walkways of the city. Their legs are severed at the knee, shiny metal stumps where their knees should be. They lean forward and fly along the ground at amazing speed. It's evening. I have my lower legs but lean forward too and, like them, shoot forwards as if I'm flying against the ground. As if I could take off at any moment. We race for hours and it gets darker and darker. We get tired and come to a small hall.
We sit down and eat. Someone in white arrives and herds the children into the back of a huge white van. I ask where they're going, but when they turn to tell me their eyes and mouths are gone. Their hair falls out in clumps and I fly back in disgust. The van drives away and I'm flying over a fountain in the middle of a park.
It's a bright sunny day and I can see the tower on the bridge in the distance. I can't remember if what just happened was a dream of it really happened. I fly back to the school hall and everyone has gone. The sun is setting and makes the dust in the hall look as if it's dancing. It's autumn. No-one has been in the hall for a long time. The ocean has been taken away and only scraps of paper remain.
Yes. Things will happen on Monday. Strange and wonderful things.
Hmm. What I was directing at the beginning seemed to me, at the time, to be a part of the Bible. Since I've never read the thing, I don't know if it was or if I made it up. Anyway, that was one of those nice epic dreams. More happened but I can't really remember the details. All I know is that it spanned many, many years.
Music is becoming more and more important to me.
So I received #2 (never got #1) of Jude's weekly e-mail thing a few days ago. To summarise who does what, as far as I'm concerned:
- Drinkwater seems to write long descriptions of his daily life with the odd extremely dodgy dream thrown in for good measure.
- Rees tends to rip stuff out of books which he thinks will amuse us all and delivers highly cryptic comments which only those who they are intended for understand.
- I write shite.
- And Jude has joined this hell I call Shapes with a highly humorous, mostly fictitious, attractively rendered mixture of news, interviews, games and agony aunting.
Only problem with Swampy Mail so far? 457KB!!! That's pretty damn huge for something you send as light entertainment. Disgusting.
Time was I listened to a tune because I liked the sound of it.
Hmm. Some of you people who I e-mail might not get some (or any) of those other guys e-mails. If you really want them, simply find their name in the To box of this e-mail and ask them to add you to their lists. Or don't.
That's still the case, but now I find myself listening to certain stuff in order to feel a certain way.
Some of you will care about this. Probably. www.transmetropolitan.co.uk! It is being made! Yup, none other than myself went and registered the domain a few days ago. There's a welcome page of sorts up at the moment. Go take a look if you have the time. Anyway, I've been learning a lot of new HTML lately and I haven't really had anywhere to demonstrate it. Made a nice new site (www.ukschool.cjb.net) for a friend of mine. But that was a one off. So now, for the sheer fun of it, I have decided to make a website about (shock-horror) a comic! Transmetropolitan no less. As I said, only a few of you will even know what that is. So for those of you who are unenlightened. It's a damn fine book. Short, sweet and to the point ^_^ So, yeah, I'll be bringing all that I know of HTML and design to that little site. And with 20MB to play around with, it's gonna be damn sweet. Hmm. Oh yeah, that'll be launched properly by the end of July / beginning of August at the latest.
Like I'm manipulating myself. Which is always fun.
What's next? www.preacher.co.uk? Could well be...
Hence I shall be listening to much more music now. Whoopee.
Received a whole load of nice new music in the post this week. Muse, Ash, Feeder, JJ72, 3 Colours Red, Idlewild, CO.UK. These were the bands on there. And now I want to hear more of their stuff. What shall I do? Go out and but it? I think not. Nay, I shall ask you kids (specifically those of you who live near me and hence can lend me stuff) whether you have any of their CDs. Why CDs? So as I can MP3erise them. I've only got 850MB of music so far. It's not enough! I need more!!! Yes. The point. If you have CDs by any of those bands, please let me know and I shall happily take them off your hands for a few days.
Damn, I was meant to ask a riddle, wasn't I? From last week.
I got a massive (522 pages!) book called Teach Yourself XML today. Which may not sound like everyone's idea of a fun read. But when you need to learn the language (and sharpish) it's a goddamn godsend. So I'll be learning that over the next couple months. And then you can be prepared for a whole load of XML websites to spurt from my proverbial loins. Which I'm sure you'll all want to witness.
Okay. Here goes.
Attached you will find my latest masterpiece (hmm). Mail me your impressions, people.
Hmm. Fuck riddles. I can't think of any.
And that's it for this week.
So I'll simply tell you what the question was next week.
Later,
Caleb
www.transmetropolitan.co.uk