Tag: WeeGee

Posted in Some thoughts about my journey

The Interweb dating people

Posted on by WeeGee

I actually wrote this post last night but I wanted to have one of my little thinks before I posted it – mainly because of that thing I have about not being unkind and being generally fair to people on my blog. Anyhoo – I’ve had my think now and I am starting with a little point of order:

I really want to keep you up to date with my adventures, but I’m also very aware that the Interweb dating people are real people too. I don’t think would be fair for me to write too much about particular people here. So I’m not really going to do that – I’ll mostly just write in the general. Once in a while I might mention specific people as they relate to me – much like I do with people in the real world – because I don’t think that’s unfair or unkind in the slightest.

That’s the little point of order taken care of then.

I think I’ve just about found my feet in the online dating world, although I must confess I’m not entirely convinced that I’ve quite got my head around the etiquette of ‘winking’….

So far I have discovered several distinct species on match.com and I already have a favourite species. This is good and has also served to remind me that those of us who spend considerable chunks of our time being mental tend also to be people who know ourselves very well. I know who I am, and I know the way that other people impact on me. I suppose you could say, it gives one the advantage when it comes to separating the wheat from the chaff.

Anyway – here’s a little run down of the species I have identified so far:

Mr glass of wine: This animal ‘doesn’t like talking online’ and would prefer to cut to the chase, as it were. Mr Glass of wine gets a great big thumbs down because all that ‘not talking online’ stuff suggests to me that he isn’t terribly interested in getting to know anyone and has his mind on other things. Also the idea that I might consider meeting someone based only on a photo they want me to think looks like them and some kind of notional description about travelling, and socialising and other such generalities IS THE WORST IDEA I’VE EVER HEARD IN MY LIFE.

Mr I want to know the secrets of your heart: This is an usual but not at all rare creature who has very fixed ideas about how you behave in the online dating environment. He has a long list of questions relating to life, the world and the universe and will occasionally ask how you feel about getting married or some other big one plus one life event. They also tend not to get my hilarious jokes. I’m afraid ‘secrets of your heart guy intimidates me a little. He wants to know about things like my ideal Sunday, my biggest fear, my ambition in life, or what I had for breakfast on the 18th July 1999. Do you know what? My best friend doesn’t know some of that stuff about me BECAUSE IT ISN’T REALLY IMPORTANT TO HAVING A FRIENDSHIP.

Mr deal breaker: Mr deal breaker is a focused and determined creature. If he likes photography and you don’t he doesn’t want to talk to you anymore which is fine, I guess. I’m just not entirely sure why that kind of interests and hobbies stuff is so important. If the man of my dreams turns out to love Morris Dancing that’s perfectly fine but why would I need to love it too? I’VE GOT HOBBIES OF MY OWN YOU KNOW.

Mr slightly scary: I find Mr Slightly scary very difficult to deal with. On the surface he seems generally pleasant but there’s something a bit unsettling about him. If I said to you that he’s probably a life-long fan of musical theatre who has always lived with his mother and wears a trench coat would you know what was talking about? Mr slightly scary makes HUGE GINORMOUS ALARM BELLS RING IN MY HEAD

Mr very scary: This animal is extremely aggressive and should be approached and handled with care. He requires an INSTANT RESPONSE TO ALL OF HIS COMMUNICATIONS or he will, in no uncertain terms, let you know that he thinks you are pretty much the Whore of Babylon because you are ‘talking to other men’. It will probably come as no surprise to you that being called the Whore of Babylon is usually an instant conversation killer for WeeGee.

Mr I’m very probably normal and the kind of person that WeeGee will feel comfortable chatting to: This lovely little creature is a rare one indeed. In fact I have thus far discovered only two such rare gems. The very probably normal creature is, well, very probably normal. He’ll be happy to swap general chit chat about our days and let the conversation ramble around from there. He’ll be amusing and cheeky without being at all lewd. He’ll have something interesting to say for himself. Mr very probably normal might be keen to meet up but perfectly happy to have a chat over a cuppa instead of wondering what happens if he gets me smashed off my face on cheap wine*

Finally, and this I think is the most important one of all you can say to Mr very probably normal ‘You know you said you quite liked me? Guess what? I’m a nutter!’ and he will say ‘okay’ and then crack a joke about how I can’t possibly be a lunatic if I hate Coldplay, or point out that I’m actually ‘not that much of a fruit loop’ Which suggests an understanding of what I’ve said and an engagement with what I’m about – I think that’s pretty telling actually.

I suppose the only other thing I can mention about Internet dating is my mother. Mum is of the generation of people who thinks that the whole of the Internet is a dark and dangerous place inhabited only by people of the Mr slightly scary variety. She is therefore absolutely convinced that I’m going to wind up as headline news for being yet another poor innocent girl who was murdered by some ogre she met online. Different times, I guess but it does kind of bother me that she thinks I’m quite so naïve. I mean, I’m an awful lot of things but naïve is certainly not one of them. Anyway I mention this because in response to my adventures in online dating my mum is phoning me up every two minutes to check if I’ve changed my mind about meeting Simon the accountant from her church. I don’t mind that he’s an accountant and I couldn’t care less that he goes to church but if I add those two things to the fact that my mother thinks he is a potential suitor for me I KNOW THAT HE IS NOT A POTENTIAL SUITOR FOR ME.

So yeah – one week, a million and one lessons, a very annoying mother, a spot of online people watching** and two gems. I quite like online dating.

Lots of love from WeeGee xxx

 

 

*The answer to that question is I go all sweet and endearing for a while but end up crying and going home in the fullness of time

**I’d love to do it from the other side and see what tribes us female Interweb dating folks fall into. Maybe Brandon Bored could fill me in?

Posted in Some thoughts about my journey

A spot of quiet reflection

Posted on by WeeGee

Today marks the six month anniversary of How do you eat an elephant? An appropriate point for a spot of quiet reflection methinks……

I suppose the first thing to say is the fact that WeeGee started doing something new six months ago and is still doing it today. That’s a big achievement what my tendency to move on to the next obsession a little too quickly and all. In six months my blog has changed quite a lot – I guess it takes a little while to find your feet. You know what though? I’m actually rather proud of my little blog –that I started it, that I’ve kept on doing it, that I’ve managed to turn it into something that matters to me. Me being proud of something I’ve done doesn’t happen very often so I’m definitely giving myself a little pat on the back today.

Now I’ve had my pat on the back I’ll do a bit more reflecting on stuff. I’ve been a reflective mood for a while, so I thought I might as well turn that into a post. To be honest I’ve been reflecting on pretty much everything, but neither you or I have time for that so I’ll focus on the most important bits.

A lot of my reflection has focused on where I’ve been and how I go about keeping myself where I am now for as long as possible. As to where I’ve been, well I’ve been lost somewhere totally shitty. Looking on the bright side I’ve learned an awful lot about myself along the way and I feel like I’m coming out the other side stronger. I know also, how I got to where I got to – holding on too tightly to things that actually, when I let go of them, just floated away without doing any damage at all. That tells me I need to learn to let go because once in a while letting go is the right thing to do.

Keeping myself here feels like a slightly daunting task. As much as I tell myself I can do it, or how much I feel like I can do it, I’m scared that one day, out of the blue I suddenly won’t be able to do it anymore. I can’t predict what’s going to happen in my life which means I can’t predict what’s going to happen in my brain. I can’t promise myself that where I am right now is going to be where I’ll be forever. That’s the thought I’ve been having and writing it down made me realise that maybe that’s the whole point. I don’t want to stay here forever and maybe I have a better chance of keeping myself well if I keep on moving.

I’m anxious about happens when Mr Clever decides I’m officially better and no longer need the medication and small army of support workers to get me through the day. I guess I just need to be on guard –  if I feel like things are getting risky I have make sure I do what I’ve been guilty of not doing in the past: shout up. That’s quite a big challenge I suppose, although in the main scheme of things I like a bit of a challenge every now and then.

I had a bit of a revelation during my recent session with Mrs Mountain. We were talking about what happens when all the support stops and I said something along the lines of “I can’t have counselling for the rest of my life”. Her response was “Why not?” And the penny dropped. Counselling isn’t just about putting yourself back together when you fall apart – it’s also about keeping yourself back together which is actually the most important part….

Moving on – a good deal of my reflection has been about Mr Friendly. I think that’s fairly natural. For a long time I thought I just wanted him back in my life – that, if I’m honest, Mr Friendly in my life was the only thing that would make me well again. Guess what? I’m getting well again all by myself. Mr Friendly will probably always be my friend and I’ll always love him. The big thing for me is that when I think about loving Mr Friendly now I think of a friendly, fond kind of love rather than whatever kind of ‘love’ we had when we were together. Being back together with Mr Friendly is actually a really bad idea, not least because he hurt me very badly. What he did, or rather the way he did what he did was anything but okay and it really doesn’t matter that he didn’t hurt me on purpose. The thing is I don’t have to forgive and forget all that stuff and I don’t need to pretend that it’s okay – I just need to accept it and then leave it in the past.

Anyway – we’re almost 1000 words later and that, I think, is enough quiet reflection for one day.

In summary, I’m feeling pleased with myself at the moment: I’m still learning lessons, and I’m finally fairly comfortable in my own skin. Long may it continue?

I might be back later to update you on the developments in my online dating experiment. It’s quite exciting really because for the first time in a very long time – I feel a bit of an adventure coming on!

Lots of love from WeeGee who is getting to the point where she barely recognises herself and likes it!

Posted in Some thoughts about my journey

When will there be good news?

Posted on by WeeGee

When will there be good news: that’s a question I asked myself time and time again during some of my darker days. I think I’m finally  starting to work out what the answer is…

The point is that there is always good news – it’s just that when you’re full of the flat and empties, feeling pointless and bleak and wishing you were dead you don’t actually see it. I suppose when you’re in a good place you are more able to notice the good things when they happen.

I’m not really sure how I turn that into a lesson for the future, but it seemed like an important revelation to me so I thought I’d write it down for future reference.

I’m sure you’ll be excited to learn that I’ve got a longer more rambling post planned for you later. I’ve also (as is always the case at the moment) got rather a lot of reading to do. Catch you later, I guess…..

Lots of love from a philosophical WeeGee xxx

Posted in Reasons to be cheerful

Crazy Kid

Posted on by WeeGee

I had lentil soup for breakfast this morning. I didn’t really fancy any of the more usual breakfast items and I had lentil soup in the fridge. What can I say? That’s how much of a crazy kid I am…..

Over the weekend I’ve learned quite a few lessons about online dating. Here are just a few of them:

  • The internet dating world is a lot like the real world – most people are nice although there is a small proliferation of idiots
  • When someone offers to show you their rock polishing kit you should probably spot the potential for euphemism before you respond
  • When someone asks ‘do you like coffee’ they don’t actually want to know the long and boring story about how you gave up drinking it in 2010

Beyond that I can only really say positive things about my experience so far. I’ve spent my time chatting to some sweet and interesting people who I’d never have met in real life, which is really nice. It’s also rather good for one’s self esteem – what with people telling you’re pretty or attractive or even (get this) gorgeous! It perks you up a bit, even though you know they’re only saying it because that’s the kind of thing they have to say.

I do have a couple of small worries so far:

Small worry number one: I’m not entirely sure that my ‘how to spot a serial killer in a chat room’ radar is properly perfected. I mean – how do you ever really know?*

Small worry number two: That WeeGee thing of ‘getting all attached to people’ is already kicking in. I’m not attached in a scary clingy way; more in a I like you which means I’ll think about you from time to time and care about you and stuff. Much like how I feel about my blogging buddies I guess. Still – I need to be careful in the online dating world because not everyone cares as much as I do and sometimes my feelings get hurt.

The only other thing to say about my online dating experience so far is that not everybody gets my sense of humour. I KNOW! In all seriousness it is interesting to note that there are generally two kinds of people in the world: the earnest people and the flippant people. I definitely fall into the latter category and I’m not great at making conversation with people in the former.

Anyway – I’m determined to be ‘me’ which means I’m not going to be taking myself too seriously. So what if my profile is a bit light hearted? So what if I don’t have twenty ‘getting to know you questions’ lined up**? So what if not everybody ‘gets’ me? After all if somebody doesn’t get me we’re probably not going to have any fun and what’s the point in that?

So yeah. Online dating. Good for a giggle so far….

Meanwhile in other news it is now twenty days since I last had a noticeable attack of the mentals*** and I bought the wrong Pearl Drops toothpaste over the weekend. I’m telling you that because the toothpaste I inadvertently bought is bright pink. Pink! What kind of colour is that for toothpaste****? Nothing else to report today save that I am seriously considering going home and having breakfast cereal for lunch….. Told you I was a crazy kid today!

Ta ta for now

Love from WeeGeexxx

 

 

*I suppose the only conclusive proof would winding up dead in a ditch. Which seems a little extreme and deeply unfortunate

**I’d rather have a little ramble around our heads and see where we end up – you know: like how normal conversations work

***I’m not counting the day I was wearing squeaky shoes and it drove me MENTAL

****Unless you’re a small child

Posted in Some thoughts about my journey

Where I’m at

Posted on by WeeGee

I’ve not been very regular about blogging recently. I suppose I’ve been ‘otherwise engaged’ which is no bad thing. I’m also so woefully behind with my reading that I fear I will never catch up and so, for the sake of my sanity I’ve decided that I’m going back as far as I can tonight and then I have to draw a line under it all and start again. Sorry, sorry and triple sorry….. I hope I don’t miss anything major.

The first thing to tell you is that things are really starting to look up in WeeGee Land. But fear not! I don’t feel reckless or invincible or hyper – I guess the best way I can think of to describe where I’m at right now is to say that I feel capable and okay and both things feel sustainable in the immediate term. That’s quite good, no?

I spent most of last week readjusting my routines. I need to have routines, but the old ones were all designed with the purpose of keeping my broken brain in check. The all new routine regime keeps most of that stuff (I don’t want to get too complacent) but also builds in a bit of WeeGee enjoying herself just for the sake of it. Which is new. And nice.

Last night I phoned everybody I know* and got dates in the diary for catch ups because it’s time for the WeeGee to act on what she has always known – there’s a big wide world out there that is worth being part of. You can’t hide forever. Well – technically you can but it’s not a good idea.

I must confess that I’ve had a little think about the future of my blog. I’m kind of mid think at the moment. I know that I’m definitely not going to give up blogging but I feel like I need to work out some of the nuts and bolts stuff. I also feel like I need to keep an eye on how blog reading affects me. ‘Triggering’ isn’t really a word I would use, but I do think I need to be aware of myself and my moods – the last thing I want to happen is for me to use the blogs I read to give me ‘permission’ to go back to the worst of me. I hope that makes sense? I care a great deal about my blogging buddies, but I’m in a new place now and know that I need to care about myself first. Now I feel like I might be a shitty person even though I know I’m not.

So anyway – now I’ve done a bit of an update and a bit of an apology and a bit of thinking out loud**. Time for a spot of nice safe blog reading……

Lots of love WeeGee xxx

*With one notable and deliberate exception, but that’s a different story entirely

**Well not exactly ‘out loud’ but you know what I mean

Posted in About today

A little pointless ramble with WeeGee

Posted on by WeeGee

I’ve been in a thoughtful mood today, so instead of doing a standard beginning, middle and end kind of post I’ve decided to do a ramble around WeeGee’s head kind of post instead. Don’t worry though, I promises not to ramble us into any of the dark hell hole corners…..

I’ll start with a status update on my head injury because when you have an injury it is important to talk about it ALL THE TIME to ensure maximum sympathy from those around you.

The swelling has mostly gone down although there is still a slight puffiness hanging around if you look closely* The black eye is at the attractive yellowish purple stage which is upsetting because it looks like I have either a) a dirty face or b) very badly applied eye makeup. These things are upsetting because the WeeGee is an incredibly clean and well groomed creature in the wild. Finally the full extent of the cut has become apparent. The full extent is that it isn’t so much a cut as a small hole in my head. I’m surprised you can’t see bone: that’s how brutal it is.

Did I get any sympathy yet?

The only other consequence of my injury is that I can’t wink. I guess we just have to hope that I don’t meet the man of my dreams before it heals up because as far as chatting people up goes I don’t have much more than my sexy and alluring wink….

Writing that made me think about chat up lines (I told you this was going to be a ramble around my head). I don’t think I’ve ever used one myself but I’ve had a few used on me in my time. Here are some of my favourites:

  • Drunk Neanderthal man in a nightclub: ‘…..do you like Oasis’. Me ‘No I prefer Blur’**
  • Drunk man in pub: ‘What would you do if I kissed you right now?’ Me: ‘I’d probably poke you in the eye’***. Drunk man in pub: ‘I won’t bother then’****
  • Lovely guy with a learning difference at work: ‘My dad says I should get married to someone my own age’. Me: ‘He’s probably right’ Lovely guy with a learning difference at work: ‘I’m 44. How old are you?’

As you can probably tell, I’m not very good at getting chatted up……

Do you know what – I’ve never really been on a date in my life. Not in the formal sense of the word anyway. I’ve always either been a) in a relationship or b) too mental to go on a date. Technically speaking I don’t think I’m too mental to go on a date at the moment – it’s just that I’d rather stick needles in my eye than spend an evening making small talk with a stranger.

I made a nice vegetable tagine for dinner this evening. That isn’t very interesting but it did make me realise that although I would instinctively say that I don’t like tomatoes it isn’t actually true: what I don’t like is RAW tomatoes. Cooked tomatoes are actually up there in my favourites. It’s funny how the brain works, isn’t it. That isn’t very interesting either, is it?

Anyhoo. I think I’ve rambled around in a pointless fashion enough for now. I’ve done this rambling, by the way, because I don’t much feel like talking about the thing that is at the front of my mind today. I’m not hiding anymore but I’m in no mood for talking about what’s really going on.

Meanwhile in other news I have decided to postpone my Homeland viewing until Sunday so I can be at the same point as the rest of the UK. Nothing else to report today save that I was rather amused by the GROWN WOMAN who waved a leek in my face in the seven-eleven and asked ‘is this parsley’? ‘No, it isn’t’, I said. Because what else can you say?

Tatty bye folks

Lots of love WeeGee xxx

*Not that anyone is likely to look THAT closely

**Which wasn’t strictly true but it did the trick

***Regular readers will have predicted my action

****He lost extra marks for his woeful lack of persistence, by the way.