» Letters they'll never read

Dear me ten years ago and preggers,
don't marry that twat. He's a full-blown basketcase and will reduce you to a puddle of depression and fear within weeks of your return into his open arms. He will not even pay for the divorce he will force you into, entirely too late for all of the 15 months you will endure.

If you marry him, he will have the legal right to turn up every few months and demand to see his son - whom he does not care about otherwise. He will not call or write or ask about him, but merely terrorize the both of you for the hell of it.

Don't argue that he will also have the legal obligation to care *for* said son, he will not pay a brass farthin' and the fookin' courts in this country will not do a thing. Just pick one of the civilized European countries you're allowed to live in where they won't treat you like a leper for giving birth while single. You can always find a job.

That MA degree you were too afraid to quit? It will save your life and will finally lead to a PhD and an academic career. Just remember not to write papers with good English and shitty argumentation.

And don't get mad at the kid or at yourself when things don't go as you want them - floors can be washed, being late is no catastrophe, and the kid will love you as devotedly as you will love him.

Oh, and ten years later you will find a great guy - just don't yell at him, he doesn't take it well.

Best,
older and wiser joansie

(long time lurker finally popped)
(Tue 9th Mar 2010, 10:26, More)

» Easiest Job Ever

The dream of every literature nerd... I got paid for reading books.
While doing a literature PhD and spending a few hours a week teaching tidbits of what I knew to gangly undergrads (my formal job), I moonlighted as a literary advisor to a publishing house. This basically meant reading two to three books a week and writing a one-page report on each of them, outlining the plot and narration and advising the publishing house on whether or not they should have this book translated and published here. This paid as much as my formal job.

My rough guess is that I read about 400 books during a 3-year period: mostly novels, but also history, natural science and the odd memoir. Many books were really good,, and there was also the thrill of finding out stuff no one else had any idea about: I got to know Jonathan Strange, Never Let Me Go and the original source of the Munich movie before anyone else around here. (I tried to keep some of the books - I still have giant folders full of print-outs of novels on my shelves.) I I came across a really bad book, I could simply skip through it and report it, truthfully, as too dull to be read by the public. I never would have had the opportunity to get, or even know about, any of these without the job.

I even got to attend the big book fairs - in Frankfurt and London - for the publishing house. I didn't get extra money for these, but I got to take fancy vacations, stay in hotels, eat a lot fo good Chinese food (which does not really exist here) on the company account, and order the books that I wanted to read in the next few months directly from their publishers. Unfortunately, the whole arrangement was dumped when my employers decided they had no more money to spend on foreign books. But it was a beautiful time of getting to be a know-it-all and being paid for it.
(Thu 16th Sep 2010, 7:40, More)

» Greed

I put up with
a jealous, whiny, batshit insane knob-end for two years.

And have been with another passive-aggressive selfish bastard for another two years so far...

... in return for two great kids.

There are no sperm banks in this country.

And yes, I am aware of the irony in complaining online about some being passive-aggressive.
(Tue 19th Apr 2011, 22:17, More)

» Amazing displays of ignorance

My cousin grew up in the Black Sea region.
Now I probably need to explain first: all the jokes that the Brits have about the Irish, the Germans about the East Frieslanders, etc, the Turks have about the people from the Black Sea. They are known for setting up signs by the roadside saying "rest area and cafe 100 m behind you." You get the drift.

Now my fair cousin imbibed a fair portion of that genius, and also inherited a lot from "that" side of the family. We lived together for a while when at university and were known for eating well, even in the mornings. So it came to pass that we got up one morning, tired and sleepy (and possibly hungover), and she offered to boil eggs.
"OK", I said, disappearing to the bathroom, "remember the boiling time is eight minutes."

Note here: this is for those gourmands like myself who like the white real solid and the yolk still liquid. Chuck the little buggers in the boiling water with a little pinprick in their bums against cracking, lift'em out in 8 x 60 seconds. 9 if they are very big or directly out of the freezer. 7 if they are tiny.

Anyhoo.

A quick shower, dry-off and make-up session later, I wandered into the kitchen to see the water bubbling merrily in the pot. And the eggs abandoned on the kitchen table.

"Why didn't you cook those?" I asked.

Her answer?

"You said the water had to boil for eight minutes..."

Not quite awake yet, sure, but. Still. Boiling the egg water for eight minutes?

Edit: It has just come to my attention...
that a freezer "freezes."
I should probably have called it a fridge.
Ah well. Time to go smoke a homosexual male.
(Wed 24th Mar 2010, 16:04, More)