What's a girl to do?

The Lanark Academy is well and truly riddled with cretins. They are now campaigning for Boris bloody Johnson as rector. We only got rid of Prince Philip a couple of years ago. No, I’m not joking. This is very bad news for my eye-twitching. Started yesterday morning and hasn’t stopped yet, with more news like this I haven’t a hope in hell of recovery. Retired doctor in one of my Scandowegian classes suggests whiskey, however I fear a Christmas pudding style suicide would be too tempting if I even got close to a bottle.

Meanwhile, in the world outside my cell, single mum bashing appears to have come back into vogue, (not sure that it ever really went away but it looks set to be spot on trend for spring.) The government’s latest ruse to improve the lot of lone parents (“lone parents” yeah right, sorry but if you’re a lone dad and not a widower you must have done something pretty florganing awful…but now I’m getting sidetracked…) is to force them into cleaning, caring, routine manual tasks and so forth, i.e. all the stuff they get lumped with routinely, before being ordered to do some more in return for minimum wage- and often a slap on the arse to boot. Even better, they then get to pay for their kids to be packed off to a stranger while they empty someone’s wastepaper basket/bowels. Thus their earnings are cancelled out (Duh! Mr Brown) and the result is double shifts without pay and extra homework on weekends. Not to worry though, Middle England has acquiesced and gone back to the Telegraph crossword, and the unemployment figures suddenly seem a little cheerier. Ah yes the kids, well doesn’t matter if mum’s not around, they’ve always got a playstation and a box of Micro-chips.

What about parent number two? Well he’s most likely to be found cowering under the stone from which he first emerged and clutching a copy of Steve Davies’ The Divorced Dads' Handbook: Practical Help and Reassurance for All Fathers Made Absent by Divorce or Separation, a sizeable chunk of which is devoted to wriggling out of child support payments. Fiddled pension contributions, offshore bank accounts and staying away from overtime for a bit are all options. My favourite comment on this book comes from a zealous reader review on the British amazon site: “Women would learn a lot be reading it too.”

Of course some mothers do manage to get the reluctant father to pay a bit of maintanence, write the odd birthday card, perhaps even take the kids for a few ours of playstation round his place, but they’d better beware the flak they’ll take for it. Beverly Macfarlane for instance, who wanted her fair share of the family assets after 20 odd years of marriage and the unpaid childcare which allowed hubby to create a £131 million fortune selling insurance, 63% of which has been awarded to him in a settlement that he is currently challenging. Judge described him as a man of “extraordinary talent and energy” - I’d love to see him rack up quite so much cash, even half as much, while rushing home to collect the kids from the childminder every night. Tediously, Ms Macfarlane has been branded the Phyllis Dietrichson type.

Now time to make the vital journey from laptop to bed again. Dear God please let me have no more nightmares about typos and red pen that says 69%.

Good Night and Good Luck
Olga Whim Signing Off.

Domestic drama

Naz has a new girlfriend. This equals nightly squeals of Slavic pleasure and the noise of malcoordinated sexual athletics. I get it in surround sound. By day silence is resumed but squalor continues to well up around me. As I slump into position at my desk my bare feet sink into scatterings of nut clusters trapped in fronds of fitted carpet. Staggering away in horror I topple a four foot high pile of newspapers onto a similar sized mound of pesto smeared crockery. Something must be done. An hour later my fears of mould/rat related diseases have been allayed, and the vital journey from bed to laptop and back again (3ft) appears less of a physical endurance test. (The mental and emotional one is a little more difficult to overcome.)

Then Naz returns from whatever he does all day:
Naz: Spring cleaning eh?
Olga: (through gritted teeth and refusing eye contact) Correct.
Naz: So did you do the kitchen too?
Olga: I don’t work in the kitchen.
Naz: (Trying to sound threatening)You wanna consider washing up some time in the next few days?
Olga: I’ll consider it.

There will be no washing up from me Naz. You donated my soap to the German theatre. Petty I know, but so far I’m winning, and there are less than three weeks to go.

In other news: Professor Worm up to his old tricks: more misogyny with my cornflakes; Lanark Academy so stinking rich that the library canteen writes sign regretfully informing clientele that £100 notes are not accepted; and I have now developed a fully fledged crush on Charlie Brooker after his latest rage involving mobile phones. Fury and wit, such a good combination. He is however the spitting image of a certain (committed to being single) acquaintance and is a confirmed bachelor himself.


Good Night and Good Luck.
Olga Whim signing off.

In praise of the would-be millionaire-murderess

Reading the coverage of Carol Anne Hunter’s plot to kill ex partner, Mr Love, one begins to wonder if her prison sentence might have been a little shorter had her plan been a little less well thought out. The “cold, businesslike callousness” with which she organised her plot seems to have been far more offensive than the crime itself. Described by her former colleagues as “superwoman”, and her ex partner as “a career icon”, the implication seems to be, that like so many people, she began to take that tough business attitude home with her. Yet we somehow swallow this behaviour from father’s who treat their wives and children like employees, while customers and useful acquaintances are handled like family. Perhaps if Hunter had been a little more reassuringly hysterical she’d be looking forward to a few less prison suppers.

Hunter’s desire to murder her ex partner came after his decision to disinherit her and their children from the £600,000 Bedfordshire mansion, Lionsfield House, in which she owned a 40% stake and had paid the entire £80,000 cash deposit for. According his new will, the house would now go to Mr Love’s new wife, a childhood sweetheart he contacted on the internet after feeling “lonely and isolated” due to Hunter’s frequent business trips.

Another view would be that Mr Love couldn’t cope with his wife’s financial success, was failing in his own career- peddling his lectures like a travelling salesman, but yet had grown accustomed to the luxuries his wife’s hard work had afforded him. Childhood sweetheart kept stum and didn’t answer back and he married her after little more than a year, a public commitment he didn’t consider during the 22 years he spent with his sugar mummy. ‘Lonely and isolated’ or otherwise, Love deserved a good deal of what he got from Ms Hunter, except her house that is.

Back in the courtroom, Hunter has been sentenced to eight years. The judge appears to have watched a little too much film noir, branding Hunter ‘manipulative’ using her ‘infatuated’ new partner, Mr Lee, in order to ‘achieve her evil aims.’ So the plot thickens, first she’s the ice-queen tycoon who froze out her long term partner and couldn’t keep a man because she was devoted to her job, now she’s the smouldering femme fatale who all the boys go crazy for: Mr Lee himself has admits to being an “old fool, blinded by love.” You can just see the Judge nodding slowly relieved that Lee has remembered his lines, then reiterating, “You had taken leave of your senses, you were deeply infatuated.” (Loony Tom Cruise to play this part in the movie version.)

Lee’s involvement was of course the (bungled) hiring of a hit man to murder/maim Mr and Mrs Love. Lee was a financial adviser with Rothschilds, and only became interested in the plot after realising that the way things were going he would never get a slice of that Bedfordshire mansion and something had to be done about it. Lee received a sentence half the length of Hunter’s.

The sentences come at the same time as new reports suggesting that women who choose to have children face more discrimination at work than any other section of society.(Like we didn't already know.) Hunter was one of the few that successfully managed the juggling act: two children, whining partner and a £150,000 a year job running a large company. I’d bet my bottom dollar that she was the one slipping away from a meeting if one of the kids got sick to boot. No wonder she reached breaking point when her partner, who’d enjoyed the fruits of her labour for more than two decades and never made a public commitment to her, repaid her by STEALING from her and their children; a truly callous act of revenge in response the humiliation he suffered as a result of his inadequacy in contrast to Hunter’s competence.

Hunter does have something to look forward too though. Going down to the women’s prison canteen to collect her porridge, she’ll be universally hailed as a heroine by her new housemates.

Procrastination

Another day, another bus-load of underprivileged kids at the academy:
Billy: Is it really true that you don’t have to do maths at university?
Olga: Yah, das is true.
They regard me with deep, deep suspicion.

I awoke this morning with an internet hangover: sore eyes, pounding head, and strange memories of an old schoolmate starring in a u-tube horror movie. There must be better ways to deal with insomnia than cackling at online photos of adversaries from yesteryear.

Frazzled by my nocturnal existence in cyberspace and ricocheting from one bureaucracy to another, the highlight of one woman’s day was gloatingly informing me that my latest guilty e-bay parcel has now been packed off to the arsehole of the universe. No wonder they speak to you through bullet proof glass.

Having slotted some community do-gooding and dictionary flicking into a hectic schedule of tax evasion and handbag evaluation I finally collapsed in a pathetic heap clutching glossy tales of ‘Victoria’s LA drama’ and a breezeblock of SCOTTISH shortbread.

And then I hear a little voice in my ear, “Men are the new women” says Richard, cue eyes to the heavens and near spontaneous combustion from Judy, (and proof of universal consciousness as unemployed Britain is momentarily paralysed by mass fantasy involving their telly and an axe.)

Tawdry debate follows, Richard makes sure the nation is aware that he’s cooking Judy’s dinner tonight (can’t help seeing images of that genius kid’s raw pigeon and Ms. Finnigan nodding in approval as she swallows it down to avoid a tantrum from hubby).

And then he says, “We men, we’re not quite sure what we’re for any more.” And if you listen very, very carefully, you can hear the muffled sound of several million women choking in horror as they find themselves in agreement with him.



Good Night and Good Luck
Olga Whim Signing Off.

Lapp Dancing

Woman with clipboard: Hello Miss!
Olga Whim: Are you selling me something?
Woman with clipboard: No. Stress test...
Olga Whim: You’re a Scientologist.
Woman with clipboard: No, yes…Stress test?
Olga Whim: You’re all mad.
Woman with clipboard: Ok.

[…]


Girl with flyer: Comedy?
Olga: No.
Girl with flyer: You don’t want to laugh?
Olga: No
Girl with flyer: You hear that, doesn’t want to laugh- Never!
Olga: That’s right.

The best way to deal with this scenario is to let them catch your eye, indulge the conspiratorial smile, allow them to make the approach, and when they’re just close enough, whisper, “Don’t even think about it.” Menacingly.

[…]

I did laugh again however, against my will. The following transcript is translated from Scandowegian.

Gertrude: Yes Olga, I think you have a point- the emergence of previously non-existent sexual swearwords being used against girls in school playgrounds across Ikea is certainly an indicator of the increasing sexualisation of children.

Olga: And then there’s the Pratz dolls, not to mention the, how do you say, “pole-dancing kits” being sold to kids as part of the weekly shop.

Gertrude: What is “pole-dancing”

Olga: Um…well, you know, (raised eyebrows, asymmetric smile) when a woman sort of dances round a pole…

Gertrude: What?

Olga: She takes her clothes off, or she doesn’t wear clothes, and the mens, they pay money, (absurd gesticulation).

Gertrude: What is the pole?

Olga: Like a….stave? For the mens.

Pause.

Gertrude: Oh….you mean like a, a porn-club?

Olga: (Desperately swallowing an avalanche of laughter) Yes.

Gertrude: And the children?

Olga: They are selling the poles to children- at the supermarket! Don’t look at me like that! It’s true, they say it’s for training- I mean exercise, for the childrens.

Class bell rings, Gertrude looks relieved.

Gertrude: Well, see you all next week.

Previously silent male classmates: Cheers, bye.

Olga: Google it, google “children’s pole dancing.” …God NO! No don’t do that, VERY bad pictures.

END.

Natives

Natives

Today I abandoned my usual duties in order to act as ambassador for the Lanark Academy. This is an annual event whereby a bunch of native children are bussed in and offered elk sausage in the hope that some of the future inmates will be neither royalty nor the offspring of millionaires, ahem.

I gleefully begin the session with a power point presentation of Scandoweigan celebrities. Within minutes a furious row breaks out as to whether Henrik Larsson really has joined Man U. Attempting to return to scholarly activities, I try a little Scandoweigan on them. It’s not long before I come across a language barrier that I hadn’t quite bargained for. The wee dears are calling things for me to translate, trouble is, I don’t get a word of it. “‘Jit’ you say?” comes my shrill voice, “JIT” the small boy repeats. I feel my neck redden and turn to the sniggering teacher for interpreting, “Jet! He’s saying ‘jet’” she sighs. Momentarily I’m still confused, “Oh you want to say ‘AIROPLANE,’ that’s easy ‘flyggplan,’ you know, like, FLY-PLANE” The class roar with laughter and my cheeks burn as I catch sight of my arms in my peripheral vision. They are flapping.

We try to continue, and when think I can’t be more humiliated, the teacher resorts to speaking French to me in the hope that we may develop a little more mutual comprehension. I realise that for four years I’ve been living in the Scottish equivalent of the green zone, beavering away at obscure Nordic tongues, and after all this time I can barely conduct a conversation with the locals, with whom I allegedly share a mother tongue. Shameful.

All’s well that ends well however, and a round of elderflower cordial appears to be popular, as does Scandoweigan once the lads and lassies discover that the word for ‘sport’ is ‘sport’, ‘rugby,’ is ‘rugby,’ ‘football,’ is ‘fotboll,’ and ‘cricket’ is ‘cricket.’

“This university lark’s a right skive!”

So this is what we've come to....

Spring is here, al fresco fag breaks are becoming less chilly by the day, and there’s been a flurry of activity among the inmates here at the Lanark Academy. Yes it’s that time of year again, the student union elections are upon us. They set up shop outside the university library (the wet dream of some 1960’s wank -stain with a slab fetish, you know the type, they write for all the standard undergrad bibles referring to concrete as ‘sensual’). The few of us that actually use the building for a long forgotten art called ‘research’ are subject to a tirade of abuse as we try to gain access without buying a stale SCOTTISH biscuit in support of some under-developed ginger teenager campaigning under the motto “PINTS NOT POLITICS.” The truly worrying thing is that this bloke will be earning six figure sums working for some Hagueite in a few years.

Just when I think I’ve escaped to the safety of my lair (10ft by 10ft, laptop, newspapers, library books, tobacco, bed, 60 outfits, 12 pairs of shoes, selection of postcards; nothing superfluous) I realise this mockery of a fashionable, if slightly archaic, political system, has now seeped into my home. It invades in the form of zee German’s rasping voice discussing campaign strategy with one of his Teutonic floosies on the telephone.

After managing to be something approaching nice for a whole week I can’t quite manage any more. Naz has I think begun to sense the combination of fury and hysteria that radiates from my every pore, and so responds in the usual way, by acting like I’m his mother. He lists his achievements, tells me when he’ll be home, shifts nervously and reeks of the desire for approval. If this carries on I may have to break the news that I’m not his real mum.

Good night and good luck.
Olga Whim signing off.

Continental Philosophy

Why, oh why did I ask the zee German what he was reading? Lying sprawled on the generic Scandinavian sofa-come-double futon-come hell of reassembly, and dressed in what appeared to be his old school uniform, the simple fact of his existence arouses silent fury as I cross the threshold (for the first time this year) into the Bob Dylan sound tracked sitting room. He raises an eyebrow and I flinch with irritation as I begin a mildly autistic arrangement of my freshly laundered pyjamas on the clothes horse. The silence is deafening. Despite my better judgement I can feel the urge rising in my throat to bait him into conversation. Unable to resist, I pose the apparently harmless, venom laced enquiry: “So, uh, whadaya reading there?”

I don’t know if you’ve noticed the tendency of men educated at public school to precede their utterings with a series of ill defined guttural noises, which coupled with their drawl and general neglect of diction makes it nigh on impossible for the listener to discern when the sentence-proper has actually begun. In this case I hadn’t a hope in hell. “Pardon?” I reply. He repeats several noises in a patronising tone, (remember with the natives, just increase the volume and they’ll work it out in the end). Eventually I loose interest in the game and make “mystified” face. With thinly veiled satisfaction he waves the book at me, and there amongst the German I make out a name I recognise. “Oh HEGEL” I laugh. “Yes, Hghghghl” he sighs, and charitably informs me that if I take the time to consider the context of the writing, I might benefit from a reading, although it would, of course, be impossible for me to gain more than a superficial understanding.

Considering my reply, I carefully hang up the last pair of knickers and inform him that when speaking English, it is customary to rhyme Hegel with bagel.

[…]

Transcript of text messages between Olga Whim and Louisa Whim 24.01.07

8.10am Louisa to Olga: >=()…<<< face
8.11am Olga to Louisa: Don’t give me no back chat sucker
8.12am Louisa to Olga: Don’t make me…Blaps you up
8.14am Olga to Louisa: Mmm squirty cream
8.15am Louisa to Olga: I know
8.15am Olga to Louisa: Your mum
8.17am Louisa to Olga: Your mum is gay
8.18am Olga to Louisa: You’re gay
8.18am Louisa to Olga: No I ain’t.
8.22am Olga to Louisa: But you know is the biggest rudegirl and you is just a little chief
8.23am Louisa to Olga: Woteu
8.23am Olga to Louisa: ?
8.24am Louisa to Olga: Wotev.
8.25am Olga to Louisa: Go to school little boy.

Psycho

Psycho


So, was it just me or did anyone else laugh out loud when they finally saw Norman dressed up as his mother?

I’ll explain why I’ve got David Blunkett’s doppelganger posted up here. His name is Jimmy Worm and he’s professor Emeritus of Connoisseurship, (specifically of the going to the cinema variety), at the Lanark academy. He’s also, unfortunately for us both, my supervisor at present.

Enthusiastic about writing a slab on feminist approaches to Hitchcock, I spent the last week trawling through everything I could find on the subject, and then on Sunday afternoon, I found some interesting comments by Professor Worm himself. Referring to feminist critic Laura Mulvey’s seminal 1975 text (containing the first coherent articulation of the fact that the camera treats male and female subjects differently in conventional cinema), Worm asserts that:

“Mulvey’s text inspired a generation of feminists who had mis-read it to obsess over the male gaze in Hitchcock’s work which simply isn’t there”

I have several problems with this:
1. Worm gives no evidence or even explanation as to how the feminists have “mis-read” Mulvey, he simply assumes he has the authority to denounce whoever he likes without coherent argument because he tows the line of official culture.
2. Worm is quite happy for himself and others to waste research money (funded by the taxpayer) on autistic obsessions linked to political, academic and cultural agendas that he sympathises with.
3. You don’t need to obsess in the slightest (I do of course, but it’s not necessary) to find countless examples of the male gaze throughout Hitchcock’s work, and representations of female subjectivity are few and far between to say the least.

So I went round to have a chat with Worm this morning. He didn’t even look up from his desk until I quoted his words on Mulvey and the feminists, at which point he said, “Well, you know, Mulvey doesn’t even really believe that stuff you know”, “Really”, I answer, surprised, “Does she say this anywhere?”. “No not exactly”, he replies, frustrated, “But I do know her you know”. Right, so I just footnote that opinion as private, undocumented confession to Jimmy Worm do I? And if she has said that to you, why does she keep referring to “that stuff” in her current writing? And then Worm continues “And she was writing that stuff in 1975” Right, yeah, the dark ages…or is it just other things happening in 1975 that you’re not to hot on, Worm?

So I realise it’s time to go in for the kill, I cite all the problems with the argument following Worm’s quote, and give him a list of contradictory examples to which the best he can come up with was:

“Well, I don’t see how you can assume it’s a male gaze, I mean men never even watch Hitchcock, they like action movies”

As I stomped home (clogs and cobbles- you can really make a lot of noise) I realised that there are two things alike about worm and my dear father, not only do they have the same arguing style Well I don’t care if you’ve actually read this person’s stuff, I met them at a party once and you see what they actually think is exactly the same as me, in fact I’ve been a great influence, but they must also be the only two men on the planet to have an autistic Hitchcock interest. The rest of the man’s career must have been built on the back of dungaree wearers.

So Worm, you missed your opportunity not to patronise me in private, that’s fine because one day I’ll shred you up in public.

In the meantime you can suck my big, fat clit.

One week down, eleven to go...

One week down, eleven to go…

Finally I have completed my diploma in connoisseurship! After a fourteen hour love in with my laptop yesterday my crushing expose of the quantity of semen in architectural theory has been received in triplicate by the office. Now all that remains is to wait for the judgement by the official proprietors of culture.

Meanwhile we’ve had a visit from Nigel, our pompous little landlord. A typical example of Naz’s friends, he thinks he’s wild because when he went to Lanark Academy he convinced the social anthropology department to let him do his dissertation on poker players-“You see the thing is, most people make the mistake of playing poker for fun…and backgammon too, I don’t understand why other people don’t sit down and work out all the probabilities, I mean why doesn’t everyone else take the time to consider the benefits of playing a more defensive game?” Then he begins his Lord bountiful monologue about how much I must be enjoying the pad, “I mean double glazing is just such a joy isn’t it…” I’m tempted to interrupt and enquire how he’s enjoying having his mortgage paid by my student loan but Naz’s forbidding expression stops me in my tracks.

On the brighter side, Gertrude is looking radiant, Sexy and Helliot have split up again, possibly for good this time, and I have three hundred hours of American teen drama to wade through.

Olga Whim signing off.

83 Days To Go.

Naz has spent the evening torturing me with Polish humour and pearls of his grandmother’s wisdom. Zee German has colonised the sitting room and is listening to Highway 61 Revisited for the sixty first time in a row, and meanwhile I am trying to commit suicide by burying myself alive in cashew nut shells and Guardian jobs pages.

My younger sister, Freya, has finally divulged the secret of her social success. This afternoon I called to wish her Happy Birthday and enquire as to how much of Saturday’s £70 Primarchè jewellery hoard she was managing to wear in one go. Finding an anonymous missed call on my phone usually results in bailiff terror and the need for several aspirin. She simply responds with a message stating her wherabouts, (BIMM, a.k.a. Blaggers Institute of Modern Music), an invitation for more texts and the promise of replies, “to whoever you are”. Then she puts kisses, not one but three.

Prior to pillaging Primarché for plastic baubles and fancy pants I took her out for noodles as a birthday treat. Spotting a blond waitress sporting “Ingrid” on her name badge I decided to take a chance and ask her if she was Scandowegian. The gamble paid off and I got to “have a bloody achievement in the restaurant”, as Freya put it. After being reeled in by my faultless accent Ingrid asked which part of Ikea I was from. Then comes the faux modesty, “Well actually I’m British, just an aspiring clog-wearer really…”. Suddenly Freya remembers the one bit of Scandowegian I taught her, turns to the bemused waitress and says, “The noodles were shit-good! Thanks, Bye”. At the risk of further interrogation I throw down some cash and make a run for it.

Back in the land of Scottish lentils, (NOT lentils, SCOTTISH lentils), life is grey, Gertrude is refusing to reply to my emails, and zee German has finally replaced Bob Arsing Dylan with the only thing worse…yes ladies and gentlemen, an evening with Leonard Cohen awaits.

Olga Whim signing off.

The Beginning of The End.

I finally arrived back at the Lanark Academy to find myself in such denial that when asked for my address by a cab driver I couldn’t remember it.

Inga, dear Swedish mother, and her wife, Anna, saw me off this morning before GNER provided their usual extraordinary service, including an all expenses paid trip via grotty coach around Newark Northgate and beyond.

Back in the land where the national cuisine consists of oats, offal and Irn Bru I find Naz and zee German hosting a gathering of shy Euro brats with some kind of salmonella infested carrot cake as the centrepiece. No need to be gloomy though, the Fawcett society have sent me an evening’s entertainment in the form of their newsletter screaming “Reclaim the f word!” across the cover. So this is what I get for yet another charity direct debit. Perhaps this is divine retribution for a previous position as a successful saleswoman for Sky mini-dish and digi-box insurance: “Flooding, theft and footballs at only £9 per month, yes this is mandatory…”).

Tomorrow I am reunited with Gertrude, meanwhile I will try not to eavesdrop on the Euro brats discussing “The Dangers of Alchohol”. I am considering joining them momentarily to pour myself a mug of gin, in silence, and then leave.

Good night and good luck,
Olga Whim signing off.