Wed 5th January 2011

Letters I received in a single day (5th Jan):

From my credit card company: "You have failed to make a minimum payment." They want 242.88 "immediately".

From the Council: "Our records show that your Council Tax payments for 2010/11 are not up to date. YOU ALSO HAVE AN INSTALMENT OF 119.00 DUE ON 01.01.2011."

From my mobile phone company: Outstanding amount: 19.13. "...If we don't receive your payment immediately, we'll be taking the following steps..."

From a debt collection agency: Outstanding balance: £2,860.25. "Despite our previous letter, we are disappointed to note that your replayment arrangement remains in arrears."

From the gas company. "Despite previous reminders, our records show that we have still not received payment for your gas bill. Your account details will now be passed to our debt collection representatives who will visit your premises to disconnect your gas supply or fit a prepayment meter at your premises if safe to do so."

Yesterday, the University also emailed: "OVERDUE TUITION FEES 2010-11. "...a late payment administration charge of £20 has been
added to your account as payment was not received by the due date."

Paid the gas, paid the debt collector. The credit card can wait: my credit record can hardly be worse than it already is. And I survived for over 40 years without a mobile. The Council Tax and the University are the awkward ones, although there's a hardship fund for students I could apply to.

It's time-consuming, dealing with all this. I'd guess a total of a day a week goes into fencing emails and phone calls, maintaining constant vigilance over my bank account (I'm not allowed to go overdrawn and if three payments bounce they'll close my account), and deflecting innocent questions. "No thanks, I'm a bit caffeined out. Water's fine", Training your mind not to think about it. Especially at night.

It won't always be like this.

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looby, n.; pl. loobies. A lout; an awkward, stupid, clownish person

M / 61 / Bristol, "the most beautiful, interesting and distinguished city in England" -- John Betjeman [1961, source eludes me].

"Looby is a left-wing intellectual who is obsessed with a) women's clothes and b) tits." -- Joy of Bex.

WLTM literate woman, 40-65. Must have nice tits, a PhD, and an mdma factory in the shed, although the first on its own will do in the short term.

There are plenty of bastards who drink moderately. Of course, I don't consider them to be people. They are not our comrades.
Sergei Korovin, quoted in Pavel Krusanov, The Blue Book of the Alcoholic

I am here to change my life. I am here to force myself to change my life.
Chinese man I met during Freshers Week at Lancaster University, 2008

The more democratised art becomes, the more we recognise in it our own mediocrity.
James Meek

Tell me, why is it that even when we are enjoying music, for instance, or a beautiful evening, or a conversation in agreeable company, it all seems no more than a hint of some infinite felicity existing apart somewhere, rather than actual happiness – such, I mean, as we ourselves can really possess?
Turgenev, Fathers and Sons

I hate the iPod; I hate the idea that music is such a personal thing that you can just stick some earplugs in your ears and have an experience with music. Music is a social phenomenon.
Jeremy Wagner

La vie poetique has its pleasures, and readings--ideally a long way from home--are one of them. I can pretend to be George Szirtes.
George Szirtes

Using words well is a social virtue. Use 'fortuitous' once more to mean 'fortunate' and you move an English word another step towards the dustbin. If your mistake took hold, no-one who valued clarity would be able to use the word again.
John Whale

One good thing about being a Marxist is that you don't have to pretend to like work.
Terry Eagleton, What Is A Novel?, Lancaster University, 1 Feb 2010

The working man is a fucking loser.
Mick, The Golden Lion, Lancaster, 21 Mar 2011

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The twelfth day of Christmas

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looby, n.; pl. loobies. A lout; an awkward, stupid, clownish person

Rummage in my drawers

The Comfort of Strangers

"Just sit still and listen" - woman to teenage girl at Elliott Carter weekend, London 2006

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