In my previous job, I used to be a big fan of Buzzword Bingo. It helped to cut through the boredom of our regular branch meetings. The boss would never let us down, over-using wanky management buzzwords like ‘cognisant’, ‘paradigm’ or ‘synergy’. My favourite was ‘copacetic’.

So how about okcupid profile bingo? Here’s an example bingo card I prepared earlier:

If it goes well, we could turn it into an okcupid drinking game and market it to the masses, although the nanny state government here frowns on that sort of thing. Come to think of it, they frown on gambling too, so bingo is probably out too.

And then Erast Fandorin said in a squeaky but perfectly clear voice, “Tell me about her. About Bezhetskaya.”

Zurov tossed an exuberant lock of hair back from his forehead. “Ah yes, I forgot. You’re from the train.”

“From where?”

“That’s what I call it. Amalia—she’s a queen, after all—she needs a train, a train of men. The longer the better. Take a piece of well-meant advice: put her out of your head or you’re done for. Forget about her.”

“I can’t,” Erast Fandorin replied honestly.

“You’re still a babe in arms. Amalia’s bound to drag you down into the whirlpool, the way she’s dragged so many down already. Maybe the reason she took a shine to me was because I wouldn’t follow her into the whirlpool. I don’t need to—I have a whirlpool of my own. Not as deep as hers but still quite deep enough for me to drown in.”

“Do you love her?” Fandorin asked bluntly, claiming his privilege as the offended party.

“I’m afraid of her,” said Hippolyte with a dismal laugh, “more afraid than in love. And, anyway, it’s not love at all. Have you ever tried smoking opium?”

Fandorin shook his head.

“Once you’ve tried it, you’ll hanker after it for the rest of your life. That’s what she’s like. She won’t set me free! I can see perfectly well that she despises me and thinks I’m not really worth a damn, but she’s spotted something or other in me. Worse luck for me! You know, I’m glad she’s gone away, honest to God.”

Boris Akunin, The Winter Queen

Vimes was smoking a cigar with great pleasure. Somehow this seemed the time and the place. Snuff was all very well, but a good cigar had time and wisdom and personality. He would be unhappy to see this one go.

The opening line of someone’s profile:

“ANGLE ….. haylo rapped around my ankles”

Words fail me.

Why would I have such an intense dream about you after all this time? We didn’t say a word yet it was so vivid, so profound, so real and so horribly bittersweet that I could think about little else for days.

I guess it didn’t help that I’d tried to email you a few weeks ago (and got no reply). Stupid subconscious.

A cat met up with a big male rat in the attic and chased him into a corner. The rat, trembling, said, “Please don’t eat me, Mr. Cat. I have to go back to my family. I have hungry children waiting for me. Please let me go.” The Cat said, “Don’t worry, I won’t eat you. To tell you the truth, I can’t say this too loudly, but I’m a vegetarian. I don’t eat any meat. You were lucky to run into me.” The rat said, “Oh, what a wonderful day! What a lucky rat I am to meet up with a vegetarian cat!” But the very next second, the cat pounced on the rat, held him down with his claws, and sank his sharp teeth into the rat’s throat. With his last, painful breath, the rat asked him, “But Mr. Cat, didn’t you say you’re a vegetarian and don’t eat any meat? Were you lying to me?” The cat licked his chops and said, “True, I don’t eat meat. That was no lie. I’m going to take you home in my mouth and trade you for lettuce.”

- Haruki Murakami, 1Q84

My neighbourhood is usually really quiet apart from a dog a few doors away who likes to bark now and then for no particular reason. (Incidentally, from the sound of it, it’s probably a tiny dog but there’s a evil note to its bark that suggests the creature was spawned in the fiery pits of hell.)

Anyway, recently I’ve noticed a disturbing new trend. If I wake up with a headache, it’s almost guaranteed that at least one of the neighbours will mow their lawn. This morning, four neighbours decided to shatter the Saturday morning silence with their lawnmowers! Is it National Lawn-mowing Day or something?

If that wasn’t enough, this afternoon a neighbour was practicing the drums and another had a giant blow-up castle in their backyard (and every kid within ten kilometres was enjoying it with lots of obligatory (and quite understandable) shrieks and laughter!). Oh joy.

And the worst thing? Now I want a giant bouncy castle in my backyard too.

Either I’m funny or the world’s funny, I don’t know which. The bottle and lid don’t fit. It could be the bottle’s fault or the lid’s fault. In either case, there’s no denying the fit is bad.

brb

Tonight I’ve ingested caffeine (espresso), alcohol (port), chocolate and now melatonin. Perhaps I like to keep my brain:

• on its toes

• off balance

• guessing

“Never allow someone to be your priority while allowing yourself to be their option.”

At the start of this year I came across this quote (probably in another okcupid user’s journal) and I decided to apply it to my life. It’s a simple philosophy, it’s easy enough to comply with and it certainly saves you some heartbreak.

Ever since then, I’ve seen the quote pop up in many places. It mostly seems to be attributed to Mark Twain. Now I haven’t read a lot of Twain recently, but it sounds a little too self-help ish for his era. A quick and lazy internet search reveals that it has also been attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson (which seems unlikely again) and someone named Nina Potts-Jeffries.

Obviously this comes to mind:

and, more interestingly:

Anatomy of a Fake Quotation

Anyway, I watched the rather creepy first episode of the new season of The Walking Dead tonight. Speaking of philosophies to live your life by, I’m now going to ship in a large supply of canned food and nail my doors and windows shut every night.