"If I touch a burning candle I can feel no pain; if you cut me with a knife it's still the same."

There's this guy... For now I'll call him Dan. As of late, I've been becoming painfully aware of the fact that I think I love him. Which is a whole lot more crap than it sounds.

Dan is the most volatile, enigmatic, weird, insane, amazing dickhead I've ever met. He changes his tune as often as his clothes, I can't ever really know what he's thinking, he messes me around all the motherfucking time because he knows I'll always go back for more like a weak little puppy, he lies to me, he promises he'll stop hurting me but I know he never will - these are honest facts, as much as I hate them, but they fade into insignificance when he pays attention to me and stops being a dick for a short while. Why is this?

If it isn't obvious enough, I'll spell it out; I don't know why I'm so drawn to him. There's no denying it, he's nice to look at - but there's no way in hell anyone can be hurting so badly over something that's only skin deep. 

Roy Orbison said that love hurts - and, "like a stove, burns you when it's hot". It's true. Every time I think I'm happy on my own, something happens and I end up turning into his bitch yet again. Sometimes I wonder when I'm going to have the balls to end this constant cycle of friends -> attraction -> more than friends but not quite enough -> fighting -> awkward -> barely friends -> friends - but most of the time I'm avoiding confronting the fact that the only way for the cycle to end is to remove him from my life - for now, at least, an unthinkable option. Not even considerable for a minute. It can't be a coincidence that the times I'm at my most happy are when we're more than friends, still in those blissful first days of seeming paradise, before he does something to piss me off and I confront him and immediately regret it but know I need to grow a spine so refuse to take any of it back and he says/does things and I get more angry and dig myself into a deeper hole and he ends up furious at me while I'm banging my head against a brick wall, literally despising myself for ruining everything yet again, rendering any backbone-therapy useless in my refusal to blame anyone but myself.

We're currently hovering somewhere between the fights and the awkwardness, and this time really does hurt more than the others - because, instead of being interested in making up asap like he usually is [despite how I've managed to portray him thus far, I'm pretty sure he's a good man who does genuinely care about me... or maybe that's just the pathetic submissiveness talking], he's busy in the early stages of dating someone else. Call me selfish, because I know I am, but even though knowing he's happy usually makes me happy too, I can't help but resent both of them to the point where I know I'm miserable and bitter to be around and should really let it go before it consumes me completely - but is that something I can hope to control when I feel my heart breaking a little bit more with every passing day I know he's talking to and laughing with someone who isn't me? When I know [or just deliriously hope] I'm a million times better for him than anyone else he's ever going to meet? When a tiny tiny tiny part of me is convinced that he loves me too?

I suppose the wisest thing for me to do now would be to slap some sense into myself, even if I continue to wish with all my heart for him to drop everything and come to me begging for forgiveness he's unsure I'll give him, saying he'll stop being a bastard because I make him want to stop being one. Because I'd say all that and more if I knew he wouldn't stop speaking to me. I wish, so much, he could enter into my head for one day, just to see himself through my eyes and realise how much he means to me.

...come out. Makes everything better.

In my infinite wisdom, I left my nice, warm closet and came out to mum, and now I'm like... what, in the name of Frond, possessed me to do that???

Here's how the conversation went:

Me: I'm thinking of going into town tomorrow.

Mum: Cool. Why?

Me: I want to see Ben and Rory and Stefan.

Mum: Okay.

Me: I'm bi.

Mum: ...

DUDE.

Quote of the day: Homosexuality is God's way of insuring that the truly gifted aren't burdened with children.  [LOVE IT - Sam Austin]

...forget about them.

While the title might suggest that I'm feeling happy and carefree, I am the opposite. I'm confused, annoyed, and a little bit pissed off.

I asked a friend what he thought of me a couple of days ago, and while what he replied was largely positive, one thing stuck in my mind, and remained there for me to mull it over and become steadily more furious.

"It's nice to talk to you and forget the world."

Ugh! I am so sick of people saying stuff along those lines to me! Why do they seem to think I'd ever take being compared to an anaesthetic as a compliment?? Yes, I struggle to deal with my own reality, how good do they think it makes me feel knowing I'm just a means of escape to them? Okay - at the end of the day, maybe I make them feel a little bit better, knowing they can "seek respite in me" or whatever, but then, once they're gone and there's just me on my own, then what do I do? I'm good for more than making people forget about the world

What lemons?

You know what?

It was actually really, really good :)

The atmosphere on the first day couldn't have been more different to that of my disastrous first day at my old school. Maybe because it's not a private school, maybe because the people are just different, or maybe because I'm less brickwall-esq than I was two years ago, but there was minimal awkward idiocy that's always been so characteristic of me. I was able to open my mouth and form comprehensible words and, even better, no one's had me done for harassment yet! How cool? 

English lang was good. The teacher's awesome. She's one of these people who, you can tell, is really passionate about their subject - and not so ready with soul-crushing one-liners like "you're all going to fail and it will not be my fault", like the old one. I got talking with someone remarkably similar to me, in preferred writing styles and hopes for where it'll take us. I think that's great - there's totally not enough people wanting to write nowadays.

And something else - I've just discovered that the word "singsonging" exists. How bloody cool?

Quote of the day: Homer: Wow, your paintings have brushmarks! And your statues have wieners!

Fat Tony: Your words honour my family. [The Simpsons]

...just try not to do anything stupid

First day of sixth form tomorrow.

[It's interesting to note, that single sentence gives away a surprising number of personal details - the obvious one, my rough age; an indicator as to what area of the country I live in, seen as different counties have different term dates; a definite clue as to where I'll be this time tomorrow. Funny old world.]

So. Yeah. New year, new school, new beginnings. Paradise, clearly.

Ask anyone at the school I've been going to for the last two years, and they'll most likely attest to the simple fact that I am socially awkward when confronted with an influx of new people. I'm generally okay, provided the group I'm in is relatively small and likeable, and/or I have friends to just bum around with, making contact with "the others" unnecessary, if standoffish, but that's too bad. Unfortunately for me, the school I'm starting is three times the size of the one I've just come from, and I have one friend moving with me. 

When I'm nervous, I do one of three things:

1. Lose the ability to speak
2. When I regain it, inevitably blather on about nothing, speech gaining in speed and incoherence as I panic
3. At some point, attempt inappropriate physical contact

To put it bluntly, I'm buggered.

[On the upside, I've just figured out how to do numbered lists on this thing.]

I'm seriously scared of messing up. Everyone knows that first impressions really matter - and, as I've been saying, I'm monumentally bad at them. I highly suspect the reason it took me so long to make friends at my old school was because the large majority of the year had me down as a neurotic redhead taking a half-arsed vow of silence with nothing better to talk about than the shape of clouds and a habit of hugging complete strangers.

Bleh. Sometimes I wish I could file away my social retardedness, like I do with my nails. But then if I did, would I be the same person? Most likely not.

This rather witty cartoon cheers me up. Kudos to whoever gave the card to Luke.

Quote of the day: You see, Mud Boy, goblins are stupid. I'm not insulting them. It's a proven fact. Brains no bigger than rats. One of the Goblin's generals, and this is their top fairy, was caught trying to pass off a forged credit card by signing his own name. [Foaly, Artemis Fowl: The Arctic Incident]

...don't worry about a thing, 'cos every little thing is gonna be alright :)

Coolest song ever, no?

Anyway. Hiii. Today I've had two burgers and a massive bottle of WKD [shut up, I'm a lightweight] and I'm feeling squashy and well-fed and warm and huggy. Unfortunately, Soph, who I've been camping out with for a week, is fed up with my love, so have some e-affection. I have a lot to spare. At the moment, I'd cuddle a stranger if they didn't have me arrested first.

You know when you're just feeling really happy-go-lucky, and just generally amicable? That's mee. I think I might still be on a little bit of a high from this awesome party I was at yesterday. 

"Arse of steel". That is all.

Quote of the day: I just saw a Chinese person! [Sophie, in a Chinese restaurant. The quintessential Sophie statement.]

...a rant about being queer.

Hey.

In case you didn't know, I'm bi. Combine this with my libido the size of a planet, and you have an girl with an uncanny ability to find most human beings highly doable.

This is good, in that I ultimately have more hypothetical options than any straight or gay person ever will. At the same time, many, many times have I spent ten minutes staring at a hot girl's butt before realising all her fourteen million friends are giving me serious evils. I guess it's a problem any straight boy will encounter at some point.

I think girls-who-like-other-girls are in a strange position - unlike gay men, who seem to automatically have an edge that makes them any woman's best friend [admittedly true - male enough to understand and thus advise on other men, but unlikely to perv on you], lesbians appear to be only any good if they are three things:

   1) Hot.

   2) A cheerleader.

   3) Making out with another hot lesbian cheerleader.

Ask around, you'll find that at least 90% of guys would not pass on an opportunity to sit in on a lesbian porno filming. Even a lot of older-generation homophobes turn a blind eye where fit lesbians are concerned. Why, then, is the subject of man-on-man completely taboo, an unspeakable topic to be kept hush-hush? I can't be the only person who found Brokeback Mountain to be possibly the hottest, as well as the saddest, film ever.

The blatant sexism is maddening. 

It's like - what is this charm that gay men have that lesbians apparently don't? Seriously? While everyone loves a camp guy, not all homos are all that camp, just as not all lesbians are butch. I'd like to think I'm not. Megan Fox is bi too, and she's not butch. She's freaking hot, but that's besides the point.

Going only slightly off-topic, I'd like to take this opportunity to dispell some rumours about bi people. One. We do not want to do anything and everything that walks.* Two. We are no less human than any hetero/homo. Three. There's a lot more of us than you might think.

I believe everyone is bi to some degree - how much so determines what category you fall under, be it "straight" or "gay" or "other".

At the end of the day, I'm just grateful I'm not a boy. It would be a whole lot worse if I had a bonerable dick between my legs.

* Attraction is not the same as actively doing.

Quote of the day: Mowing your lawn is against nature. [Rufus Wainwright, in response to being told homosexuality is against the very forces of nature.]