All the pretty thoughts...

Lori Bori sat on a wall
I’m reading Jane Eyre (Charlotte Bronte), thanks to my aunt’s suggestion. I’ve uncovered a completely new-found love for Victorian literature. For ages I was totally into modern/postmodern literature for pleasure – possibly as rebellion against the past ten years of required reading in school and at University. But I’ve fallen deeply in love with 19th century lit. It all started with Anna Karenina (Leo Tolstoy) and has filtered into Thomas Hardy, the Bronte sisters and Charles Dickens. In my near future I am looking at opening up Wuthering Heights, A Tale of Two Cities and probably The Scarlet Letter.

I had a most lovely lunch involving a dark, quiet café, a steamy café mocha topped with whipped cream and Jane Eyre. Upon leaving the café at the end of my lunch hour I felt I had been many miles and centuries away from Glasgow and The Year of Our Lord 2005, and the short vacation from present reality eased my disordered soul.

Lori Bori had a great fall
I’ve been wary of text messaging since it was first introduced to me many years ago. Something seemed so vile, so dangerous about it. I have since discovered three (though undoubtedly there are many more) reasons to be suspicious of “txt”ing.

1. It promotes anti-social tendencies.
2. It promotes bad grammar.
3. It is prone to embarrassing mishaps.

It promotes anti-social tendencies.
Text messaging allows people, who under normal circumstances would have to face up to their fear (or dislike) of verbal interaction with another, to avoid human interaction while yet satisfying an immediate necessity to communicate. For those of us who really hate to call certain people for whatever reason – dislike, nervousness, awkwardness or paranoia – are now able to side-step that niggling obligation and are no longer forced to face our ever-growing anxiety of interacting with other human beings.

2. It promotes bad grammar.
wot if i wer 2 alwys talk 2 u like this? u may think its no big deal until u read a hole msg n txt spk. even then u may think its no big deal. but wot if ur kid brought home a book report & the teachr wrote on it ur kid is below avg in punctuation capitalisation & spelling. ur kid cant seem 2 stop writing like hes on his mob. plz teach ur kid 2 stop txting bcuz he is gonna fail skool.

3. It is prone to embarrassing mishaps.
I’ve worried since my first text that I would accidentally send the wrong text to the wrong person. I often send my husband cutesy text messages through the day, and it is not uncommon that my texts include rather personal and… er… intimate information. “Scott” falls in my phonebook between “Sarah & Ian” (a landline) and “Sherri” a mere acquaintance at my previous church. I have feared that some day Sarah and Ian might come home, see the blinking light on their answering machine, press the Play button and hear an automated voice recite, “Hello, sweetiepants. I hope you aren’t busy when you get home because I’d like to get that way.” And of course, I wouldn’t want Sherri to get that SMS either.

Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at it) it finally happened; however, it was only sent to “Sarah” who is first in the S’s and is a good friend. I’m sure she won’t hold it against me. (Again, fortunately, not only did it go to a good friend, but it also safely said merely, “I love you Scotty McHotty. Kisses and love.”)

This can happen to anyone with various negative outcomes. I know a guy who accidentally sent a flirtatious message to his girlfriend – addressed to Michelle, most definitely not his girlfriend’s name. Michelle never knew why he didn’t text her back.

All the king’s horses and all the king’s men
I think the problem was that they sent out the horses first instead of the men…

Couldn’t put Lori together again.
I have always been a conscientious Christmas shopper. I look for deals on new, factory sealed items on eBay, and I begin my shopping early, usually in September.

This year we have been struggling a bit (I’m being modest) money-wise, with Scott’s University fees and books and lack of immediate action on the part of SAAS to get some government money flowing our student’s way, so I have yet to get started on my Christmas shopping. It is a real burden for me, which Scott can’t seem to identify with or share. Having always been a Christmas-Eve shopper, he feels I’m ridiculous for counting October a late start on Christmas shopping.

But luckily, once some dough comes rolling into our bank account, I will be fully prepared and ready for action. I have a detailed list of what everyone shall get (or at least what store they shall get it from)*, with an approximate figure of how much it will cost. If all goes according to plan, I shall be able to purchase a few gifts a week until all the gifts are purchased with plenty of eBay trolling time and before the stores have all sold out!

*I am still uncertain of two people – my dad and my mother-in-law, but these will come in time. Last year, the ole mum-in-law made it easy by oohing and ahhing over a certain item in a store while I was in her presence. And my dad is always hard to buy for ahead of time, but I am usually able to find something while searching for someone else that hits the nail on the head – or so I hope – and I am depending on another such event this year, though I may never be able to beat the CS Lewis box set I found a couple of years ago. Note to Christmas shoppers – if you do really good one year, it only means you have to do better the next. Hold out on the good stuff until you know you’re about to die.