Saturday Night

So I'm sitting in this bar in Bath so tired I want to rip my eyes out just to get some shut-eye. The girls are all dressed up but I've just come from work so I have to borrow eye-liner and mascara from a stranger to feel at all comfortable. My clothes are still too shitty for the place I'm in and I feel desperately unattractive (okay, that's an exaggeration) though the girl in the barbie-pink crop top makes me feel less so.
So in the hallway of this bar I watch all the girls in their little mini lycra dresses, some so short you can see their cheeks peeping from under the hem. A group of unattractive young males are gathered in a corner. One (seated) is poking his finger at his friend's fly. After a while the guy just undoes the fly and lets his cock out - semi-erect (which is rather disturbing) and smallish - in front of everyone, like a child, as if it's the most normal thing in the world to do. A drunk woman with a bob and large teeth sits down next to me and asks if I'm 'alone tonight.' Although I say no, that I'm waiting for friends, she still threatens to 'adopt' me and so, fearing I may smack her in the face, I get up to find my friends.

Monday, 23rd September 2009

Cleaner

The man who cleans the Severn Beach Line train has grey hair cropped short on top but in a rat tail at the back. He wears a gilet with holsters for his cleaning solutions and sweeps around your feet with an extended dustpan and small brush. He has blue eyes and wears glasses. He trails a clear polythene rubbish bag containing emptied coffee cups and chocolate bar wrappers behind him. He also has a moustache. He doesn't talk.

Monday, 21st September

Further Musings on the Train

A painted alien on the bridge over the track smiles at us. It's hot in September and I have my feet out of my pumps so I can stretch my toes. A stout lady in a blue shirt, wearing sunglasses that shelter her eyes, is holding a lead being pulled taught by a scruffy grey mongrel excited at the commotion caused by the train and the vibrition of the platform. A boy and a girl are sitting in a car park cross legged and facing each other. Fit basketball players, arms dark and toned, are wearing loose vests. They are with a girl who looks stunning in a blue backless sports dress, texting on her mobile phone. Three Sikh children run into their house making star shapes in the air with their arms. The smallest in a bright magenta top with her hair pulled back.

Monday, 21st September 2009

Elderly Couple Waiting for a Train

"An elderly couple ask if they can sit down and the woman next to me apologises for not noticing them.
When seated, the elderly woman says to her husband, who has a face that is gentle and lined from similing, 'I shall miss this place Rog, I shall miss it.' and again 'I shall miss this place...' until he replies,
'yeah.'
She talks of some relative who has arranged to have them moved.
'To the Straights,' Roger says.
'Yes,' she replies and then, 'where're the Straights?'
'You know when my father came over to Fishponds?' Roger asks.
'yeah...'
'That was the Straights'
and then missing any poetic intention her husband might have had, she starts talking about their new garden and bedrooms and how it will all be fine, awaiting his agreement after every line but she is really only reassuring herself and when the train comes and they stay on the platform I really hope they were supposed to.

Monday, 21st September 2009

Acoustic Singer, Looking for a Guitarist for Open Mic Nights

'I never look at the ads in Tesco. But for some reason I did and there was this ad: 'acoustic singer looking for a guitarist to play open mic nights.' So I contacted her and she's coming along,' he said smiling.

'Put her on next to fill time before we put the good acts on,' I replied.

She walked into the room in a grey flat cap with a large pendant round her neck and muttered to herself in the corner. Then shouted encouragement to the man on stage.

'So what do you do then, just solo stuff or do you need a guitar?' he asked her.

'oh I just make it up,' she replied.

He slid his hands deep into his pockets, 'you mean you make it up on the spot?'

A smile tweaked the sides of my mouth.

'Yes I just open my mouth and it sort of comes out, it's a gift from God,' she said.

'Right,' he said, straight faced as I shook with silent laughter.

'On you go then.'

What else could he say?

She walked to the stage took the microphone and with the lungs of Lulu belted out:

'I LOVE THE LORD AND I'M NOT ASHAMED TO SAY IT, I LOVE THE LORD, OH YEAH, YEAH, YEAH, I LOVE THE LORRRRRRRRDD...'

I tried to take photos but I was shaking so much that I couldn't. The audience were hiding in each other covering their faces. I had to leave, it was overwhelming, my sides hurt.

Then I thought, while standing in the toilets pulling myself together;

she wasn't actually that bad.

Friday, September 11th 2009

Canteen: Out, Out, Damned Spot.... or The Case Of the Metaphorical Jizz

The boys flock to our table, arms flailing like characters in A Clockwork Orange.
One, in a waistcoat, gets particularly excited. He goes from swinging his hips like he's got an imaginary hula hoop round them into a full pelvic thrust directed at our table. His groin hits the table and a fittingly phallic candle falls from the centre. The flame is extinguished and wax sprayes over the table and me. Then he just leaves and the wax will not come out.

Tuesday, 8th September 2009

Sainsbury's, 3pm

At the supermarket there's a toddler with short blonde curls waddling up and down in the bouncy way toddlers do wearing a pink princess' dress. She's holding a foil helium balloon that says 'happy birthday' on it and the ribbon is too long, so the weight trails along the floor behind her and I wish, just for a second, that I could dress up as a princess and do my shopping around the aisles of Sainsbury's with a balloon and people wouldn't look at me and think I had discharged myself from a mental health unit, they would think; isn't she gorgeous.

Sunday, 23rd August 2009

Chippenham

On platform two a little girl of about four is sitting next to her mother seconds after someone has knocked her head with the door to the ladies toilet (the girl had only cried when the adults started fussing) A conductor walks down platform one, my side of the tracks, and the little girl points at him and says loudly, 'mummy, why does that man sreyt, why does that man sreyt? The conductor does not turn but continues the straight path he walks. When no answer to the girl's question arrives she points at the plastic disc he uses to signal trains to go and says, 'mummy, why's that man holding a spoon? Why's he holding a spoooon?'
Oh to be the age again when massive objects that resemble small objects could be one and the same thing.

Sunday, August 23rd 2009

Night Bus

Sometimes, riding the bus at night wearing a jacket with a hoodie underneath as they do in Dogma, I like to pretend I'm going through Brooklyn or Harlem. Even though I've never been. I hum the theme from Requiem for a Dream and give people sideways glances. I notice the lights in the police station illuminating a young man with a bulldog on a lead taught away from his body staring out at the free world as he awaits his judgement. Some Asian kiddies blast D.R.E Next Episode from their speakers and smoke weed so strong it seeps through the open bus window infiltrating my nostrils.
I ask myself why I'm making allusions to backstreet America. Why is it so cool?

Monday, August 3rd 2009

Trainspotters

When I arrive at the station at nine in the morning, the trainspotters are out in force. Two of them photograph the train we are on, a shitty two-carriage local train that's probably pretty old. One of them is wearing a beige blazer and has a very smart camera, as if these things help him blend in. He could be any normal businessman walking down the street, no one knowing about his dirty little secret. Which gets me thinking... are trainspotters like early stage or well behaved crack addicts? Both try and look as if nothing out of the ordinary is going on, both wake up desperate to get their fix and both look ashamed if you stare at them too long. Do they go to trainspotters anonymous, the NA of the trainspotting world? the TA.
The spotters get very, very excited when the 9.09 to Weymouth arrives. I, embarrasingly, have read the notice on said train and happen to know that it's an old train called back into service. But I am not salivating and holding a video camera, I'm staring bleary eyed on a Saturday morning and thinking- with the cost of our transport system can we not afford new trains?

Monday, August 3rd 2009

Things That Scare Me

The filthy pit of regurgitated nothingness
that is the education system.
The terror of China.
The terror of Capitalism.
The uncontrollable population explosion (we are like rats).
The death of the natural.
The reactionary squirm in members of said population upon mention of above taboos.
The disturbing result.

Monday, July 27th 2009

Festival Bar

One beer, two beer, three beer four 3.20, 6.40, 9.80 more...
can I see some ID please?
I'm like nineteen or some shit.
can I see some ID please?
left it behind.
Can't serve you then.
(sighs)
one beer, two beer, three beer, four 3.20, 6.40, 9.80 more...
What can I get you?
er... (dilated pupils stare into space)
what do you want?
er...
one beer, two beer, three beer, four 3.20, 6.40, 9.80 more...
four quarter full pints are sitting on the bar.
are those done with? (asks a ten year old boy)
er... I can't give them to you
one beer, two beer, three beer, four 3.20, 6.40, 9.80 more...
do you have any warm water?
what do you mean?
do you have any water that's not been in a fridge?
yeah that water has been in here all the time.
(I hand him a bottle of water)
This is too cold, it is not room temperature.
Sorry.
I AM NOT SORRY YOU FUCKING MORON OF COURSE IT ISN'T ROOM TEMPERATURE WE ARE NOT IN A FUCKING ROOM WE ARE IN A FUCKING FIELD!
one beer, two beer, three beer, four 3.20, 6.40, 9.80 more...

Monday, July 27th 2009

Bee Cause

T: Oh thank God, somebody normal!
I've taken 2C-Bs
I've taken 2C-Bs
and tomorrow I have to dress up as a bee

S: why?

T: I'm so fucked

S: why are you dressing up as a bee?

T: I am so drunk

S: why are you dressing up as a bee?

T: A BEE!

S: yes but why are you dressing up as a bee?

T: BEE CAUSE

(then she flew back into the bar)

Monday, July 27th 2009

The Figure Creeps Within Us All

A figure is standing outside the window. Could it be a trick of the eye...for I only looked from the corner. The figure doesn't see me notice it and even goes as far as to bend its head down to get a better look at me sitting infront of my T.V.
I'm intrigued; the infinite possibilities that surround the mysterious figure unfold inside my head and I begin flicking through them. From the ordinary passerby to the stalker I never knew I might have and then I realise that my life is not as exciting as 'Without a Trace' so turn my head to continue my involvement with a fictional scenario in the programme.

The figure creeps within us all...

Found in a notebook from a few years ago

Whorehouse?

Here’s an idea, let’s give up on looking for a career and agree to say yes to anything going: Female dancer? Ethical street fundraiser 8.10 per hour for a wirthwile charity; get paid to change the world with people who can’t even spell… Smoke weed or show how nasally inserted hormones affect behaviour for Bristol University — £17. Lady models wanted 18+ subject to competition as ad has been viewed 566 times. Alternatively, join the 198 women who looked at an ad for massage staff working in a ‘friendly clean & safe environment.' Or, be a masuer- whatever that is… Lastly, does anyone fancy being a female toilet cleaner in the middle of nowhere?

Monday, July 20th 2009

One For Yesterday: My Magic Stick

On the train, the safety information notice talks of a magical box aboard which contains 'emergency light sticks.' I imagine that the first thing I would think to do if the lights went out following (I also imagine) a horrific crash, would not be to check for survivors but 'get me a light stick NOW!!!' then, light stick in hand, I'd whisper magic words and my magic stick would magic the tragedy away. If YOU notice any suspicious light sticks in the hand of any suspicious looking persons (me) please contact a member of staff...

Sunday July 19th 2009

Help Me to Help You, Help Me to Help You

Let me charm you with humour, let you think I don't know what your talking about. Let me be your dancing monkey and friend, let you smile at me the way a parent or monkey owner might. Let me embrace you and congratulate you on your intelligence, let you pretend you think intelligence is multifaceted and nothing to do with the height of your IQ. Let me be your bard and double up as your court jester, let you parade around the court sharing your ideas about string theory and quantum mechanics, existentialism and evolutionary theory. Let me pretend that my synapses aren't whispering the mysteries of the universe to each other and my cerebral cortex retains nothing academic, muses not over the thought of eschatological verification, does not debate Shakespeare or Sartre, let you assert yourself, explaining everything you believe you know but I do not. Let me be the hunched and hollow shell, let you be full of the praises you are given on a daily basis.

Sunday, July 19th 2009

Graduation

Shaving my legs makes them itchy... people stressing at me makes me ANGRY, I do not like the rain on graduation day, I like the sun and the way it makes you look great in photos (occasionally).

Friday, July 17th 2009

Dressing Up

Yesterday I went into Topshop with a friend. I said 'if I had money and balls I'd dress cool.' She said 'take what you'd buy to the changing room.'
I picked up a 1950's play suit, a hip hugging lycra pencil skirt, a green corseted top with underwire and a figure hugging gold beaded brilliant blue mini dress. I looked svelte:

If I could wear anything I'd wear cowboy boots, I'd wear a T-shirt that showed my bra when I stood side on and hot pants. On my feet killer fuck-me heels, high platform and probably red. I'd wear Vivienne Westwood and Couture and I wouldn't be out of place on a page in Vogue Magazine (aside from the face), I'd wear a ballerina's tutu as worn in Swan Lake, I'd wear Marilyn Monroe's dress. I'd wear a catsuit.

Thursday, July 16th 2009

Psycho

There's a man up the road who is locally known as psycho, an homage to Hitchcock. He lives adjacent to his brother. Last night Norman Bates crept out of his yellow (the colour of choice for psychopaths) front door and next appeared in his brother's garden. This was around eleven at night. He spent some time inspecting the window sills as I stood puffing away on a cigarette. Every time I turned my head he had silently disappeared in the blink of an eye. Like a ghost. Then he would return again. I think he's supernatural. And an asshole.

Wednesday, July 15th 2009

I Like the Rain When I Am Inside

I like the rain when I am inside. The way it slyly breaches the dry concrete and grass, slightly at first. The way it falls with more confidence a few minutes later and the stains it leaves get bigger, until they join up. Then the water is no longer drip-dropping, no longer spraying, but bombing it down. Whack, WHACK, WHACK, take that concrete. I like the way the little boy across the street sticks his face to the glass of the window pane until someone opens it for him to listen to it properly. And smell it and feel it, because it’s not tedious yet.

Tuesday, July 14th 2009

Morning Poem... Not Really Poetry

Walking past a cafe early in the morning, a waitress hears the phone go and says, ‘it might be a customer!’ With cheerful mock excitement . A man by the laundrete stands as if he’s supposed to be an art installation, topless, dreadlocks spilling over his shoulders and with jeans the colour of his skin. Last nights green pickled chilis lie scattered on the ground as if they’ve died there. And a postman trustingly leaves his bmx at the foot of someone’s driveway while he delivers a parcel. On the train journey, a discarded football which could be as old as the 80s is rooted to the embankment by the side of the traintrack and the movement of the train is enough to send you to sleep. At the station I get excited about the on platform WIFI I can use while I wait for my connection, until I learn that it’s 2.99 per half hour. The zone name ‘cloud’ suddenly seems ironic.

Wednesday, July 13th 2009

It's Not Heartache

It is not heart ache because it is not my heart. The air in my lungs is thinner, upper arms tingle and I am sinking. I wiggle my toes to see if they are in pain. They are not but the ground beneath them is less real. The eyes are deceptive, the image of the outside world altered, more detached than usual. Reality bends with the air in my body. Then my mother butts into my thoughts when, seeing me hanging out the window, she says; 'you look like a suicide case.'

Wednesday July 8th 2009

Wilkommen

Hello, my name is Sophie Collard (SoMiraculous on twitter) I write stuff, which I usually post on Facebook but I'd like to be able to stick photos up too so thought I could do with a blog. You can try guessing my age from my photo but anything past 26 will potentially offend me. So here goes, my new blog.