Rules of Haiku

I occasionally dabble in haiku, an ancient Japanese form of poetry. It's supposed to be about nature, but balls to such restrictions. You find haikus can be about anything these days. To explain how to do it, here's a haiku... about haiku.

Five syllables first
Seven syllables follow
End it with five more.

Well. Isn't that the most evocative, heartfelt thing you ever read. Maybe we should stick with nature-based haiku after all. God, I was bored when I came up with that.

Frantic Scribble

"I would often black out for 10 hours at a time only to realise that 10 more pages had been scrawled out."
-Bret Easton Ellis on writing American Psycho

The following is an exercise that I was given at a writers' group at my local library. With a set time (maybe two minutes), we were to write as fast as we could about anything. Here's what I scraped out of my brain and dolloped onto the page:

I was lifting weights when my mum called me down. Exercise, like writing, is something I try to do nearly every day. The reason? My writing mind is as much of a muscle as you will find on every other part of my body- it needs to be worked daily. If it isn't worked, it will shrink.

I put the dumbells down and when I got downstairs, my mum handed me the Chron. It was open on the Groups page. She'd found an advert for a writing group in Lees Library, just down the road from me.

I showered, dressed and darted out of the house. Opportunities like this must be grabbed by the throat. Hesitation must not hinder me.

As with a few groups I've visited, I was about half the age of the other members- and I was the only guy. Not exactly the clientele I should be marketing my drug-riddled, paranoid writing to. But, I thought, they might be interested in the poem that Aphelion Magazine took from me.

Who knows.

So now I sit in Lees Library, eating chocolate-chip cookies that one of the ladies brought in, and forming erratic, mostly meaningless sentences.

Afterwards, the group coordinator told us that the purpose of this was to get used to hand-writing words and to develop a rhythm- a counter to writer's block, in effect. To keep the words flowing. This two-minute challenge seems like a good way of starting a bout of writing, whether you're planning on a one-off haiku or full-blown, tolkien-length saga. I didn't revolutionise the world of literature, but I liked the pressure of it.

Try it. Step away from the keyboard, pick up the pen, set the countdown on your battered 2007 Sony Ericsson (What? Only I still own one of these?) and... write.

Jaqui Smith's Husband

“'Did I bring the porno?' What to I look like? Some kind of 'non-porno-bringer'?”
-Peter Griffin, Family Guy

It has been nearly a year since the husband of Home Secretary Jaqui Smith was caught using her expense to pay for two pay-per-view porn movies for her husband. Since then, the MPs' expenses scandal has deepened and deepened.

I've already mentioned in 'Human Nature', a previous blog, that greed is intrinsic to human character and that our MPs are just like every other normal person- they'll take what they can when they can.

There was something about this particular expenses claim, however, that didn't sit right.

The Daily Mail quoted Ms. Smith as saying, “I am sorry that, in claiming for my internet connection, I mistakenly claimed for a television package alongside it.”

What?

This is the equivalent of writing a cheque to your gas supplier and “accidentally” missing a digit off.

The majority of Britain was angrily asking, “Why are my taxes being used so that Jaqui Smith's husband can have a wank?” I, however, wondered who actually pays for porn these days.

Ms. Smith had already claimed for her internet connection, which is usually an up-front monthly bill these days. Did neither she, nor her husband, realise how much porn was available online, right at their, um, fingertips? No matter how weird or bland his tastes, he'd find his niche on the net: the internet caters for a wide range of tastes. Or so I believe.

What her husband did was ultimately pretty normal- the adult entertainment industry is the biggest industry in the world. Lots of people do the same thing as him. I just don't know why Ms. Smith used a medium she'd have to pay for separately in the first place, let alone claim for it on her parliamentary expenses. And why didn't anyone else ask this?

It just goes to show how up-to-date our MPs are with technology, society and the world. Why is it that the higher that people climb through the ranks of politics, the less of a grip they seem to have on reality?

Pressure

My back is against the wall, more bills than money to pay...
When I need relief I pray
- The Pressure, Sounds of Blackness


Early 2004. I was in third year at uni, desperately trying to catch up on the mountains of media coursework that had piled up. Something had gone wrong- I'd hesitated when starting the work, convinced I was going to fuck it up. And I was right. My assignments were laid out in ways that didn't help- headings were jumbled, practical projects were on hold while I caught up and team-members were getting impatient. Before Christmas there had seemed so little to do- then a few months down the line, I had a world of work to plough through and little idea of how to finish it all.

How was I supposed to tell a comedy club how to utilise their advertising budget? How could I have advised the heads of ITV on how to improve Parkinson when the talk show moved over from the BBC?

I'm just a simple man. After two-and a half years at uni, I started to wonder why I was there. But I was no defeatist. I would finish that degree.

Hence, I sat back down at the computer, the gold background blurring the contrast of the meagre 500 words that I'd managed to knock out. I could stare at the screen longer that way. I needed to finish this, fast. That's why I'd been living on 6 hours sleep a night for the past two weeks, jamming chocolate and Red Bull down my throat every evening.

A lecturer of a separate module had already snapped at me earlier that week, playing the tough industry veteran. I owed him some overdue work as well. Out of spite, I worked on something else to get his face out of my mind. Only this module was also perplexing me. Something about an inventor. He's made a microphone. We are required to advise him on how to protect his invention legally. We're studying media, not product design. This won't relate to our future remotely. I wonder how much of this course actually will.

My hands were moving over the keyboard again. There was an extra distraction of sorts, but something I might not feel if I wasn't so busy. Media legality slipped out of my mind as I stumbled to the toothpaste-stained sink at the other end of the room. The light above the mirror illuminated my reflection, my worn face obscured by months of fluoride-spit and grime. I forgot work for a moment and thought, Why didn't I clean here?

A growl of sorts responded to this, right from the centre of me. Then I blew chunks of pizza into the sink, strands of bread base congealed, hanging in saliva. My vision obscured behind watery eyes and my knees gave way.

Leaning with my head on a cupboard door, I tried to think of what I'd eaten and when. I couldn't place anything, but I'd not been hungry so I must have had pretty regular meals. It could only be one thing, I figured.

That was the most pressure I had ever put myself through. The right amount can get people to achieve all sorts- just look at how technology can leap forward during wartime. Without the Nazi's efforts to dominate the globe, America wouldn't have invented the atomic bomb. Britain wouldn't have developed the cavity magnetron for anti-submarine aircraft, and eventually the microwave oven. I got my degree in the end, so there was a certain sense of macabre logic to the insane graft that I put in- and the insane bullshit I put up with- even if it didn't pay off in the long-run. I'm still poor as fuck and the outdated equipment wasn't used in the industry then, let alone now. At the time, I was immensely pissed off with the situation. If the course had been laid out better, I would have had more to do in the first semester and less to sever my nerves with in the second.

Despite all this, I couldn't help feeling a sinister, nihilistic sense of enjoyment from what I put myself through. Lecturers wanted this work off me, or I wouldn't graduate. Today, in an attempt to get my writing noticed, I am the master and the slave. I write when I want and I stop when I'm tired. But how alive am I feeling? When was the last time I felt the constant thumb of pressure? And how much quicker can I get work written, and hopefully published, If I play the master a little more?

Well. Let's say I choose March as the month to test this. By the first of April I want to have written every day. I've got around 20 projects that I started and never finished. I'll polish off as many as I can. I never work to targets as I never have any idea of how long anything will take me, whether it's writing or driving or anything else. My only real target is to feel that burden until the 1st April, that daily guilt that I carried every day towards the end of third year at uni. Back then I had to work, otherwise- what was I doing?

Add to this the fact that I am using up leave and am in work for one day a week, for the next month. April 1st is the date that the annual year changes over, so I had to take my leave now or I would have lost it. Hence, the time that I have to do this should allow for immense wordage.

As Joe Cabot from Reservoir Dogs would say... Let's go to work.

Audacity

“With audacity one can undertake anything, but not do everything.”
-Napoleon Bonaparte

I've just received a letter from my old university asking me if I'd like to join many other graduates by donating money to help more students get through their degrees.

“For one nursing student, this cash injection has put a roof over her head,” it says.

Over the years, I've become more and more bitter about my Higher Education experience. I'm aware that I'm quite privileged to have been able to go, but I feel, in retrospect, that the decision was a rash one. I am £9,000 in debt because of my university course. This is a small figure compared to the average £12,000 debt for most 2005 graduates (my graduation year) according to The Institute for Education Policy Research.

I'm pretty appalled that The University of Salford has the nerve to send me this letter. I'm sure many other graduates feel the same. However, I can already imagine the university heads' response to this complaint. They would tell me that it was my choice completely to go to university. Nobody made me do it, and I knew I'd have a large debt to pay off at the end of it. They are right. I just did it because, at the time, it seemed like the right thing to do. What chance did I have of getting a media job with a Merit-level GNVQ?

Universities are businesses. They are there, primarily, to make money. I was a customer, and I paid for three and a half years to get a 2:1 in Professional Broadcast Techniques. Granted, I grafted my arse off to get it. But it would be nice if it was actually worth more than the paper the certificate was printed on. What did I want at the end of all this? I cannot answer that question, to this day. Here's why.

Britain's UCAS system (University and College Admissions System, I think- their website doesn't define this) allows people to apply for various universities at the same time as every other applicant: at the start of their final year at college or 6th form. This was certainly the point at which I went wrong with my adult education. Why apply for a university course when you are knee-deep in a college course? I was half way through this course when I was encouraged to start filling out the form. I was in the middle of one of many heavy modules, consisting of a 2500-word report, a practical project, research and an evaluation. And my grades were slipping. I was too busy to be thinking about the next step.

Let's imagine that my college course, a GNVQ in Media, was less work-intensive than it was. Let's say I had more time to think about my future. I would perhaps have realised that it was still too early to be thinking about my next step. I needed to know what my strengths and weaknesses were- and this couldn't be done with only 50% of my grade marks available.

Here's one proposal for the government, who are ultimately responsible for the growing numbers of people going through HE: force students to take a gap year between Further and Higher Education. Insist that UCAS applications are only sent by students who have completed their Further Education courses.

And here's a proposal for Salford University- and every university. Only put on a course if it will realistically prepare applicants for work in that field. My Professional Broadcast Techniques course taught virtually much nothing about the techniques of broadcasting anything professionally. Throughout the majority of the course we were making pre-recorded programmes. This is Media, in a way, but not Broadcasting. Broadcasting is defined as “to transmit (programmes) from a radio or television station.” I presented on a radio broadcast once, but using a university organisation's Restricted Service Licence. It wasn't integral to the course. Also, the equipment we used on the course was too old for industry use. So even if I wanted to be, say, a cameraman, I would have learned everything on a format that was outmoded. How similar would it be to industry-standard technology? Who can say?

Add to this the breadth of the media industry. If you want to work in TV, why study a course that includes radio modules? I didn't know what I wanted to do, but it was difficult to focus when such a variety of modules were on offer. Variety may be good, you might say. Yes it is, at Further Education level. Variety is vital then. It is the opportunity for students to recognise their strengths. But at Higher Education, you should be focussed on the line of work that you want to go into at the end of it all. Unlike a course tailored for one line of work, an unfocussed course ultimately won't help the students.

I have one last gripe. At college, I grafted consistently for two years. The modules were work-heavy and intensive. Before every deadline, everyone exhausted themselves to be ready in time. After one deadline was met, we were given another module brief. I finished the course with a decent grade and went to university with no idea what was in store.

In contrast, not only was the university course content too broad, it was also drastically mismanaged from the start. When I got to uni, the workload was so light, so unlike my intensive college course, that defied belief. In first year I was given virtually no assignments. First-year students all over the campus, each year, were in the same boat. Nobody had anything to do. In second and third year, the work fluctuated between sparseness and having six imminent deadlines. Work was always dumped on us in one giant heap. Towards Christmas in third year, I was under so much stress that I would vomit into the sink in my bedroom.

So no, University of Salford. I would not like to donate a portion of my meagre insubstantial wage back to you, after everything you've taken off me. However, even though I make a pittance and even though I am normally an extremely tight man, I still give £5 a month to Oxfam, to help people a hell of a lot poorer than any of your potential students.

Lassie's Stunt-Dog Jumped on Me

I have yet to see one completely unspoiled star, except for the animals - like Lassie.
-Edith Head, costume-designer-to-the-stars

It's early 2007 and I'm trying to chase after a girl who's a few years younger than me through some dodgy South Manchester suburb as dusk falls. It's hard to run when you're in a suit and business shoes with a long black overcoat and you've got a lap-top case strapped over one shoulder.

You should always dress up for a job interview.

Tonight I'm shadowing a door-to-door saleswoman as a working interview with CSC, a face-to-face marketing company in Manchester. At the office they'd given me a purposefully vague introduction to the work- I can't even remember what they told me it was I'd be doing. “Forward-thinking marketing”, or some psycho-babble that made it sound a thousand times more complex and yuppie-fied than it turned out to be: Going to people's houses, and getting them to change their gas and electric suppliers to CSC's.

That is Saleswoman's job.

“I joined this company when I was sixteen,” she snorted, “and within a year I was living in a penthouse apartment.”

Really, I thought. And you're, what, a supervisor? Who brings these people up? Don't they get taught not to brag? And why “Was living” ? Been demoted to the basement, maybe? Her attempts to seduce me into the job are having the opposite effect. I answered the ad because I wanted to promote ideas to people. That's how I interpret “marketing”. Pushing your way into ageing people's homes in an attempt to get them to pay for something is “sales”. Funny how the professionals of these fields don't seem to accept the difference. I know I'll be saying “no thanks” to the manager.

We leave one door after the home-owner seemed half asleep and completely disinterested. She didn't exactly force us away, though.

Saleswoman asks me, “What did you notice about her?”

“Um... her house was very- warm.”

“She was on drugs.”

We march further down the street. “Not this one,” Saleswoman says, passing one one of the semi-detached houses that already uses her supplier. She walk-runs up the next drive and simultaneously knocks on the door and rings the bell. A middle-aged woman answers hesitantly.

I'm starting to feel depressed from all the rejection, even though I'm not the one being turned down.

“You're eligible to pay less,” Saleswoman says, showing her a chart of complex figures. “Just give me a few moments and I'll explain it to you.”

In a few seconds, Saleswoman has managed to bully the home-owner into inviting us into her lounge, where I'm greeted by three large but playful collies. The closest jumps up to me and I catch her front paws and drop them down carefully again. The woman calls the dog's name. It's a girl. I ruffle the thick fur around the dog's neck, my fingers disappearing into the coat.

“They look just like Lassie,” Saleswoman says.

Home-owner tells us it's funny she should say that- it's funny that everyone says it- because parts of the new Lassie movie were filmed nearby in Yorkshire a couple of years ago. Dogs in films can't be overworked, she heard, so the film crew needed a few collies to act as stand-ins. One of her dogs- she points her out- got a walk-on part in the film.

She doesn't show us any proof of this and we don't ask, of course. She does give us proof of identification and home ownership as she fills out the paperwork, however, while I keep the dogs company for a few more minutes.

It occurs to me at that moment that there is a big distinction between the dogs and Saleswoman. Saleswoman has to be overtly nice to every potential customer- an act she has down to a tee- in order to get commission. In contrast, the dogs just want company. They are truly happy to see me and have no ulterior motives. “Unspoiled”, you could say.

As for me... although today has been an interesting experience, I still need a Goddamn job. Hence, the quest continues...

January Chaos

'I played a heap of snow in a school play. I was under a sheet, and crawled out when spring came. I often say I'll never reach the same artistic level again.'
Stellan Skarsgard 


Bollocks to blogging in three-month quarterly summaries. And you know what? Bollocks to magazine-style professionalism, and the constant niggle of 'how publishable is this, outside of this blog?' These thoughts do not matter right now. What matters is that I stop being a 'bell chod', as one of my readers put it, and update this blog more regularly. So here you go.

My first sound-off is to remind you (again) that, in the space of one month, I have had a few publishing successes. Stray Branch, a literature publication, accepted a story. My poem found it's way into Aphelion- another lit magazine (both online), and also my letter was featured in the Oldham Evening Chronicle- my local newspaper. I intend to carry on this way: reeling out material and getting it published.

It was fairly easy to keep this up: I was pretty much stranded inside when 15cm (9 inches) of snow was dumped all over the town of Oldham, bringing it to a standstill. This disruption also occurred from Land's End to John O' Groats. Just to remind those living underground. I'm 27 and I've never seen snow like it.

I wondered up the hill behind my house while it fell- the whole of Greater Manchester is normally visible from Heartshead. In fact, on a clear day you can see the Clwydian mountain range on the North Wales coast some 50 miles away. I marched up the track to Heartshead's summit, trudging through iced puddles, the snow falling so thick it looked like mist. Each snowflake was twice the size of a cornflake. The eroded path forked, heading into two parts of oblivion. There is a beacon tower up there, known as Heartshead Pike, that has stood since 1863. It's not quite on the summit, but it's a good a place as any to get a panoramic vista. On that day, however, I got half-way up the track before realising I couldn't actually see anything in front or behind me. And if anyone was going to get lost on a hill like that, it would be me. So I backtracked. I took a few decent pictures on my phone when the visibility cleared up further down the road.

January's high-point number two occurred when I was updating my LinkedIn account. I suppose you could call LinkedIn 'the business version of Facebook'- a social networking site without the socialising. I searched the site using my Hotmail contacts and found a girl I'd pulled in 2004 when I was at uni. She was from down south, and was visiting friends in Manchester at the time. She kinda looked like Eady from the film Heat (the one DeNiro, erm, 'gets with'), only said lady is fitter.

It turned out that she worked for the TV company BSkyB. I was studying media at the time, so we swapped Email addresses and she promised to pass my CV on to the production team, for what it's worth. Back to 2010: I connected to said lady on LinkedIn. She's now BSkyB's head of trade marketing.

Has anyone else pulled any high-profile people? Comment below!

Speaking of business- now the snow has passed and I have loads of annual leave to use up before the business year ends, I won't be in work much. So stay tuned for more bizarre accounts of what I've been dumb enough to get involved in.