Carnivorous Worms!

I started this blog as a way of documenting past events online and how they have helped me grow as a person.  I am the first generation who grew up with the internet evolving at the same time, never will it be the same. Younger generations will be just used to the internet being there, older will remember pre-internet, the good old days of books and Encarta, university without facebook photo tagging and no iphone to answer all your queries.  I am part of an age group that actually became young adults, teens to tweens, as the internet took hold of the world and became a part of life; I think for many of us it had a profound effect in some of our most influential years. 

I’m only 4/5 days into this project and I’m finding it both enlightening and hard.  As I go to sleep every night my head is filled with ideas for tomorrow blog, sometimes filling in gaps I previously forgot.  As I warm up under the duvet in my very cold room, I am torn as to whether to leap out of bed and grab a pen to write it all down or even switch the computer on and just blog again, but the necessity to remain nice and toasty has so far stopped me.  I am surprised how much this is really re-awakening my mind and making me search the vaults of memories for all those unique moments that have defined me.  It keeps me up for a good half an hour; tonight I shall take the pen and paper with me so I stop tormenting myself!

On the most part it’s been a lovely reminder and often during or after (as a treat for completion) I fire up the removable hard drive and search for some remnant of that time, an email, photo, video or even logged back into long un-active accounts just for the reminiscing moments.   With computers ever growing memory capacity and the internet storing information for a possibly infinite length of time on massive servers, we are now able to return to memories from many years ago.  There is no need to de-clutter one’s life so much, you just move on and leave traces behind and it is surprising how many of them remain in one way or another!

In most of my trawling of old memories it’s been a positive experience, those relationships and experiences have run their course and I am happy with the outcomes.  Occasionally I do ponder about re-establishing connections, but I’ve refrained in the cases of the blogs so far.  (EDIT: - Until today, I just put the wheels in motion in the case of the Knight – I’ll inform you how that goes ?!).

 Five years is a long time, I was a very idealistic teen and I know that the memories are probably best left as that.  Actually I’m pretty content with my story so far on this blog, and so I am happy to let it lie. BUT I have found myself, as I consider future chapters and how to tackle the more difficult parts of my time online struggling to resist the urge to reconnect with people I had not so easy journeys with.  There are a few chapters which never really concluded or if they did, I have regrets of how it happened.  Until yesterday I’d kept a strong mind, but then I slipped and I actually slipped into the messiest one of all... When I share the details, you’ll realise why this was such a BAD idea but it will take me time to put it all down on here...

I’m ashamed I did it; I guess I just needed to know a few things to get closure.  But instead of just asking all the questions and leaving it at that, I got myself embroiled and let them walk straight back in like they owned the place.  Boy I feel stupid!  I thought I was strong enough to not let it get to me...

I’m happy now in life, real life, that is why I started writing this but all this reminiscing has lead me to open a big can of carnivorous worms!

From Groupie to *Rockstar*

If someone had to write a book on a being a virtual groupie, they certainly could interview me!  In my short 6 month stint:

·         I lovingly created CD copies of their EP with hand-made covers by moi and formally distributed them to “select” friends.

·         I contributed my vocal talents to remixes.

·         I created picture slideshows with photos I stole from their website.

·         I stuck promotional stickers on everything and anything, including the Parthenon in Greece!

·         I learnt all the lyrics to their songs as I set my media player to play their songs over and over again.

·         I tried to make their band name a commonly used expression of coolness, unsuccessfully.

·         I stayed up late into the night/morning listening to them feature (well the Knight really) on a late-night student radio show.  I even got a shout out and made fan pictures in paint for them.  Boy I was so cool!

·         And when they split, I offered my shoulder to cry on if required and then just bounced off to the next band!

I did all of this without even meeting them!  I was the epitome of a fanatical virtual groupie.

So when Jewish Emo Gangster Dachshund (JEGD for short) suggest a musical collaboration, I considered the proposition long and hard.  So far I had only witnessed the musical scene from across the fence, was I ready to become the scene?  It took around 30 minutes for me to stop pondering and just start bouncing around the room as ideas sprang in my mind.

So our pooches got a photoshop make over, now donning the essential rock band instruments, and I brushed the dust off a sound recording programme disc which I had actually received from one of band members.  It was a sign that this was all meant to be, DESTINY, he had passed the gauntlet and here I  WE were about to take myspace by storm!

The first few recordings were pretty awful but soon I got the swing of it, doing parodies of well known songs with a canine twist.  Unfortunately JEGD was not as into the whole concept as I was and soon it became a solo project.  Well I say solo, I let  of course included my doggy Diva do a few cameos and a woofing backing track.

I know this all sounds positively insane but I’ll shock you even more by telling you that our establishment was actually to counter an already rising star.  A team of two Chihuahuas, whose high pitched remixes of classics had already begun to take over petspace and were driving all those that didn’t like the Cheeky Girls slightly mad.  So although it was pretty barmy as a concept, I was not alone in my looneyville!

My Our big hit was a reconfiguration of the simple song “You are my Sunshine” with the replacement of Bonio; because all dogs need a bonio a day!  It was one of those annoyingly catchy songs, everyone knew the tune and the lyrics were pretty hilarious(if I say so myselt).  It took Petspace by storm and unusual for a music MySpace page we actually got requests to be our friends rather than the normal trawling to find anyone to add.  

For those that don’t use MySpace; MySpace allows you to place a song on your page that automatically plays when someone views your profile.  So your fans actually promote your music and it was such a thrill to click on a new profile and hear a blast of your track.  It even got to that stage when I would have to pause the song about two lines in as I was getting sick of my our own voice! (You know that’s when you are really famous!)

I assumed it was only a matter of days before the contract landed in my mail box and in the meantime I did a few more tracks – for the album of course.  But I think the fame started to get to me, JEGD was long out of the picture and my doggy Diva was lucky if she even got a woof at the end.  I started adding human profiles too, breaking an unspoken-rule of Petspace but I was conscious that every time I checked in on the Cheeky Chihuahua duo they were amounting ever more fame.

Then the day of reckoning came, Cheeky Chihuahuas got a record contract!!!!!!!! WHAT THE DOG?!

It was a sad, sad day...  And soon my our rockstar venture joined the pile of no longer active music pages where only our loyalist fans visited.

I guess those two Chihuahuas had something going for them. Maybe it was their hot American blonde owners or the fact one was probably dating a music producer – either way we were outcompeted and bowed out gracefully (I managed to refrain from smashing up the recording programme disc).  Plus I felt pretty guilty for getting swept up in the storm of fame and the prospect of glittery lights!  I had snubbed a few people in the process including my diva dog but everyone forgave me.

Even though my musical stardom was only brief, I am able to relive it occasionally when I am unleashed in a late night session of bandhero  or singstar.  When I wasn’t flouncing about, I really did have a giggle and I know a few people who still can’t help but laugh when they see a Bonio and find themselves singing the song ... I think that’s a mission accomplished!

And I was to discover rather than chasing fame, sometimes it just comes right on up and hammers on your door...

The Jewish Emo Gangster Dachshund

My introduction to the magical world of Myspace was through the growing buzz around Myspace music and my groupie antics for the Knight’s musical entourages.  My personal profile got very little action and in the real world my life was growing more busy!  When the band forum finally disbanded after hopping about for a bit while appendages and members slowly fell away to the wayside, I began a new project to eat up my time.  Many of my friends were now embracing the myspace revolution, but still in my mind my life was positively boring barring the apple-of-my-eye.

See I was the guardian to a positively radiant pooch, a clever and cute bundle of fluff with great patience and charisma.  Together we were a team and actually were at competitions most weekends, even having a brief flash of stardom on the BBC with Rolf Harris.  Sorry I am deviating but she is a pretty remarkable dog! 

 When your dog is more renowned than you, it doesn’t take much for you to go off the rails of normality.  So when I saw a “doggy” profile on myspace, soon to be re-coined “petspace” by the surprising vast community, I couldn’t resist bragging about my four-legged friend.  You had to learn quick that your lovely human opinion was unnecessary, instead the community was a pet point-of-view hive.  Full of simple pleasures, frankness, squirrels and food.  Worries were left at the door and instead replaced by a general warmth of making new friends and sharing your daily canine shenanigans.  Oh if life were so simple as a dogs!

I now talked about myself in the third person and took on the alias of The Missus.  I was too young to be called Mum and The Missus is in fact how my mother addresses me to this day when prompting me to feed/walk/entertain my four-legged diva!  It was surprising how by just replacing your profile information with that of your canine companion, fears of stalking and unnecessary male attention which was splattered across the news melted away.  My parents didn’t mind because it was just photos and anecdotes of the most mundane kind.  Even though my diva is way cooler than me, I didn’t feel that my friends would really get it and so I concealed my new profile from prying and often spiteful eyes.

It became my oasis of making new friends and oh I did – all across the world, all ages and background and I formed connections I will never lose.  It was the beginning of a journey of creativity, business ventures, love, heart-ache and a little fame on the way.  It seems only right I take the time to document it all because it really was a unique time in my life.

I learnt quickly to sift through the general drivel of cutesy profiles and look for the more serious, thoughtful and genuine people.  But in this world, as with dogs in the park it was okay to just sniff butts and walk on, clicking accept friend request didn’t mean you had to invest time and energy into getting to know them, it just was a “Collect ‘em all” kind of attitude which was engulfing much of the myspace world. From musician to pet-owners, people were adding anyone and everyone with much thought.

And it was in the midst of many friendship requesta I saw what I can describe as the most emo picture of a dog you can imagine.  In black and white and aged, the long nose of this standard dachshund pointed remorsefully at the floor, you knew immediately this wasn’t some dog dressed in pink and being carried around in a bag.  This pooch had attitude.  My diva and Emo Dachshund became friends and exchanged the standard pleasantries but I was soon to see that Dachshund was more colourful than I could imagine.

His art was in being frank and funny, coarse but fair.  One-liners of pure gold would cascade into the comments like they were being copied straight from Jack Dee himself!  I soon found out more about the writer behind, he was a she!  A few years older than me and she didn’t live in the UK or America or even Europe, she lived in Israel.  I guess I’d lived in a bubble and thought Israel would be a world away from my little island, certainly not have the internet or flashy cameras or follow popular fad but I grew to see that excluding the climate we weren’t that dissimilar.

A friendship grew, we artistically challenged each other (more on that later) but my photoshop skills, music recording and video all got tested.  We checked in on each other every few days or so, with a little update on life.  Jokes and a little mickey taking of the pettier petspace goings on also helped pass the time joyfully.

It was one normal boring day when I just logged on as normal that I saw something that brought reality crashing through the virtual myspace walls.  I guess it had been a few days since I had heard from them but thought nothing of it as she was at uni.  I saw a message; normally the opening would be the cue for a big smile and a hearty reply.  Alas this was not the case, it simply read “Sorry for not being around, a suicide bomb went off and big bro got hurt”.  Our world weren’t that similar at all... I don’t recall my reply but I think it just aired my concern and thoughts.

She had a gun in her house and was trained to use it, she had done military service.  She was under constant fear of her own or her family’s safety, we really were worlds apart... Her world was a dangerous one and how I admired her courage, the way they just picked themselves up and kept going, refusing to bow to terrorism.  And Emo Dachshund now donned a black hat, titled to one side – he was bad-ass, no one messed with gangster Dachshund, we smiled and laughed.  

I realised that my escape from my “boring” life was pretty self-centred; she was escaping the war-zone on her doorstep.  She had reason to want to escape, her dogs never went outside their garden and she was safest when at home.

We drifted apart as the sparkle of petspace fame began to grow in the back of my mind.  We never exchanged emails or names but we shared a common love for our pooches as well as smiles, fun, heartache and a few memories but she taught me that my security, freedom and safety are a lot to be thankful for.

... And I’m pretty sure I’ll never meet another Jewish Emo Gangster Dachshund...

Just Curio.us

Before I get swept up in the whirlwind of my Myspace long-term affair, I had a brief embrace with an interesting and entertaining site. I was introduced to it on one of the many threads that appeared on Knight’s blog during our daily time-wasting sessions, but unlike the others that merely tippled I became somewhat of an addict.

JustCurio.us describes itself as “Strangers helping Strangers” and that was it in a nutshell. The simple concept was that you posted questions anonymously and then others answered them, about anything and everything. It offered complete anonymity apart from revealing your location. In general it was a hive for general teenage drivel and lots of spam but occasionally thought provoking debate was started. The more I frequented it, the more I noted that in fact there were some intelligent and clever people from around the world, oh and a curious character called RED who not only spammed but also could change his country through various hacks.

I soon became enthralled in the randomness of the whole place and the 24/7 nature it evoked with the international audience. It was this that lured me into late night internet talking, improving my touch typing no end! And the more you answered and read the more the anonymity drifted away; soon I could identify a few characters just from their location, unique style of writing and question posed. There was a diplomat from Serbia, a house-wife from mid-Texas, a mature mystical lady singleton and a Canadian music fanatic. In the midst of the anonymity we began to not only recognise and learn about each other but also had tricks for signalling to each other. So questions would draw us in and our conversations would then roll into topics completely unrelated. Unfortunately the nature of the site meant that any information you did share was forever up there for all to see, so there was little way to form contact outside of the realms of this ever evolving site.

One particular character singled me out, I think we shared many common interests music, a fascination with the world and a general positive outlook. The Canadian made sure to flag to me every night and when the site eventually filled a server or two and was on the verge of being brought done for maintenance, it was he  who threw me a rope and pulled me into a forum where many of these intelligent people had congregated to discuss things free from the prying eyes of others. It was all elaborate and one had to pass the stringent rules of the Serbian diplomat to even be allowed to sign on.

Unfortunately once I entered this world the anonymity was pushed away swiftly and almost too fast for me. Discussion was more directed and it was evident that many did not approve of my age or feel I had a sound contribution to make. But one stood by me, he messaged me frequently on there and we exchanged emails. All I knew him as was the Koala and all he knew me as was Donks. I found out more about him, he was in his forties, single and a real music buff but the general negativity I felt in the forum saw me drift quickly away.

I say negativity, it was probably more a need for me to be the centre of attention and feeling I had no contribution to make. They discussed world issues, music from before I was born and a lot of debate over the role of women in society, and I wasn’t ready for seeing the bleakness and social corruption in countries like Serbia. It was a world away yet it tore at my heart!

So time passed and I became embroiled in the Myspace rise, but once again the ever gallant Canadian bear tracked me down there. Long exchanges occurred and he would reimerge every so often, even aroused some male envy but I never saw him as anything but a sweet and intelligent virtual friend. In some of his messages I thought he may be a little too interested in a girl half his age, but I realised that actually we had shared some pretty enlightening moments and he wished to show he cared.

Still to this day we chat on facebook occasionally and he leaves me a little message or a “LIKE” and I know that that Canadian Koala is still around and smiling.

A beautiful indication that a long friendship out of the depths of the internet world can be sparked when you are just curious...

My Knight in Shining Armour

nce upon a time when internet was only new, the sound of dial-up rang through the air and you only used google when Encarta could not find the answer, there was a young girl bound in a contract by her father to partake in a hobby riddled with beards and anoraks.  In the hope of finding some sanity in the midst of all the un-coolness she happened upon a forum frequented by young cavaliers.  However, one day the evil baddie running the operation issued the doomed words “Service will resume shortly”.

It was in the midst of this I met the unlikely hero.  Since forums across the expanse of the growing web were now dead, many had moved to the “Support Forum” to seek solace or to rant at the poor tech guys trying to resolve the situation.  I drifted on to it and browsed away, amused by the relentless insults most likely conducted by those that were being paid to work but already suffering classic internetaholics symptoms.  One character stood out, he was keeping himself content during the outage by posting witty comments in between the moans and groans.  I took the cue and brought out my finest material, which lead to some fun-filled banter, a few private messages and an invite to join his forum.  He was “admin”, I was already swooning at his authority!

Some context, I grew up in a sheltered middle-class family and attended an all-girls school.  My significantly older sister and her ever changing upgrades (or downgrades) of boyfriends had instilled a general wariness of male relationships.  Combine this with my lack of boy interaction and the resultant was a perceived cavern between myself and those alien testosterone filled humans.  In addition my previous internet exploits had amounted to Harry Potter based fan fictions, which are definitely not the common haunts for teen boys.

Flash forward to my invite to HIS forum and I about wet myself!  That buzz still is deep within me...

Did I mention, this forum was not just any forum; it was a band forum - cue teenage swoon!

And this random admin guy was not just any old admin guy, he was the DRUMMER for said band– cue teenage FAINT!

So started a friendship and my first ever pseudonym.  Everyone knows that every modern day fairytale requires a donkey, and so that was my rank and he was the knight, dashing and witty.  He introduced me to his forum but only under my alias to a gaggle of 30-somethings killing time at work.  Some of them were band members, some of them “fans” and the forum was a hive of daily activity which I partook in.  However, behind the scenes was were the knight showed his true colours, during school days we’d publically banter on the forum (as school had yet to block it) but it was on my return to home I’d sneak on messenger and spend hours chatting costing my parents a tidy fortune and many heated rows.  This wasn’t meaningless drivel exchanged, it was witty and poetic.  He really had an art for words and I revelled in the challenge of keeping up with his artistic mind.

I’ve yet to mention the real dark cloud in this, and you may have already sensed it.  I was a mid-teen, only just 16 and he was in his 30’s.  On recollection and in his defence, I think I lied to begin with and added a few years on – probably believing he wouldn’t listen to the world of a 16 year old.  I vaguely recollect the day I revealed to him my lie; there was disappoint followed by a general acceptance that we could be friends on the condition it was our little secret saving him the embarrassment.  Deception online was easy, and did it really matter if I was 18 or 16 – in my mind it didn’t and his friends would know no different.  I tend to speak with wisdom beyond my years and thus the verbal restriction of the internet was an ample concealment of my true number. 

To be honest, our little secrets made it all the more captivating.  We had little in-jokes and soon flirtation was weaved between the lines but it was oh so innocent.  It was bound to happen, we spent so much time talking, we exchanged numbers and I remember vividly texting him from the top of the Parthenon in Greece and cheeking mobile exchanges while in class – it was positively rebellious for me! And did I mention he was in a band!

Every girl needs a band crush, many girls swoon to the tune of a teenage band only just emerged from their parent’s garage.  But here was I, a “groupie” to an already established band who had been lucky enough to play Glastonbury!  I was cool, my friends thought I was cool and there was even some envy that I was on the inside and the acquisition of further groupies from my friendship group.  But I failed to see the cracks, this was a band that had peaked and was now slowly disbanding, they had got real jobs now and the glow of idealistic belief that a record contract was around the corner had worn off.

In fact during my time as a fanatic groupie the band officially disbanded!  But please don’t fret, it was all okay – he had another band!  I could now be insane stalker-groupie to them instead!  The forum remained active and life continued much as normal...

Meanwhile the veil of secrecy surrounding us started to slip.  I had made some friendships with the other members now and they had not only figured out I was younger than I proclaimed, they had also seen that the knight had grown fond and protective of me.  They encouraged me even more so to come to the south coast where they were based to see the band (pre-disbanding) or for drinks.  I’d yet to even officially go in a drinking establishment with my parents let alone travel to foreign fields and grace one with technical-strangers.  The knight never asked me to these group gatherings, although we did wistfully discuss meeting just the two of us on many occasions but I think we both knew it to be a hopeless fantasy.

My relationship with the knight also sparked an unhealthy new skill – internet stalking!  This was pre-facebook days so one had to be far more sneaky.  After hearty conversations about our lives, I soon had enough information to track down his ex (uh-oh).  It came out that he was just out of a rough on-and-off relationship with the manager of their band (!), and I guess I took it upon myself to track her down and assess the competition.  In my head she was some kind of evil princess, ravishing  but commanding.  In reality, she was just a girl – the kind of girl that drinks and smokes a lot and is at all the latest party scenes – rather bohemian.  I couldn’t compete with her party self, but I never felt I had to.  Occasionally I’d note a change in his demeanour and more than once she had been the cause, an early warning that going out with people in your friendship group is always a risk!  Even though she was no threat, I did take it upon myself to know as much about her as possible – made easier by a forum she frequented to air her dirty laundry on an almost daily basis.

I never told him I did this, and in some respects I am ashamed I did stalk this girl but I had this urge to know more about how he ticked.  I did discover many things, but I shielded my eyes to them.  For the knight was divine in my eyes, his armour buffed and shiny.  The truth really was more a dulled battered tin man, not in a negative wa,y just a realistic view, and he never portrayed himself as anything more than this but I and my wistful mind painted an altogether brighter picture.  I was for him an escape from a dull job and a monotonous life.  I tuned out the fact he smoked and drank and just focused on those delightful words that emanated from his finger tips.

But the ever-growing knowledge of me, my reality and the friends we now shared began to strain things.  He initially said work was becoming busy so we couldn’t talk anymore during work hours. I held out to the hope that I would hear from him in the evenings or weekends, he even cammed (a novelty back then) with his (maybe our) friend and we giggled into the late hours. But soon I never saw him online; no internet in his flat was the excuse – understandable in the days of expensive dial-up. Texts used to cost a lot explaining in my mind why I didn’t get much of a reply now but his emails grew less and less frequent.

One day in early summer I realised it had been a month of no contact... I took the step to delete his number. I sent an email, a nice inquisitive one and got a reply a few weeks later but something had disappeared...

The spark... there were moments that I know my naivety had missed and in retrospect  with more wisdom filled eyes I should have seen the signs that our romantic innocent  relationship had more dark undertones and sexual tension but I really was just too slow on the uptake!

I was young... too young for him ... Our 7 months of fun and innocent flirtation had opened my eyes.  I had a new found trust in men and in many ways I wish I could thank him for that but in others I know that it ran its course.  To be frank I almost forgot this initial step on my evolutionary journey into relationships and I do not think of it often apart from when I hear one of his songs come on my music player or when I rifle through my collection of DVDs and see The Fisher King staring back at me, one of his many educated introductions into my life and a film I will always love. 

I remained friends with his friends for a while; they even added me on facebook (!) and commented on how my life is progressing.  I noted only recently two had culled me but I remain friends with one, and maybe part of me hopes that remained connection will lead the knight to pop up in my friend requests.

The likelihood is he won’t but I do wonder if he ever thinks back to those long deep conversations and those moments of true compassion we shared...

We never met, I don’t regret this – it probably would have resulted in hurt on both parts, but I must admit this writing is inducing a fleeting dream of randomly bumping into him in later life.  With a more confident head on my shoulders, experience and success in my back pockets and a general thankfulness for that time we shared, I think we could have a giggle and laugh as we once we did...

But life is just an ever changing conveyer belt of people and places and I can’t press the reverse button, just got to keep stepping forward. 

And if it wasn’t for that handsome knight and his band of merry men trying to get a break I would have never entered the newly erupting world of Myspace and the next chapter in my journey of internet discovery....


UPDATE: Sometimes Windows Media Player has psychic tendancies - a choice of over 10,000 songs and cue one of their old tracks just as I click publish! FREAKY!

Confessions of an Internetaholic

I doubt I am the first to self-diagnose themselves as an internet addict, nor the last and I imagine that with time there will even be a booming business  in detox clinics (if there aren’t already – and yes, I had to resist the urge to leap straight on google – a true sign of one on the brink of full on dependence to search-engines).

To say this is my first blog would be a lie, I might even be regarded a seasoned blogger by some.  I have done the writing, pictures, video even, let complete strangers into my life who have in turn become firm friends and even broken into the radio, however fleetingly it was, all over the realms of the internet. BUT this was all under the protection and veil of a perfect pseudonym – my dog!

Yes you read that right; I had some success of the minor variety on the world of myspace portraying a dog-eyed view of life.  Please don’t go running for the back button as you feel that you have accidently fallen onto a crazy canine lady blog – I am perfectly sane and I promise that there will be no woofing on here.  If you are interested, the reason for the muttley alias was a fear of the big World Wide Web during my teens, or at least that is what I told myself.  With retrospect and a more confident head on my shoulders, it was probably a combination of an intrigue to find out what it was all about and a genuine belief my life was just too boring to share.  It kept the parents content and was a way of sharing anonymously with the world without my friends or family knowing.

I know I am not alone in escaping the mundane-ness of life for the infinite realms of the internet in the hope of some excitement and popularity.  The secrecy and freedom that it allowed was both liberating but also brought dangers.  I’m not talking about the newspaper headlines, more so a hidden but growing obsession to control what people could know about me.  You can lead a triple life.

I was quick learning the steps and my internet tango has been passionate, dramatic and tragic in parts. However I have yet to share the details with anyone, like an illicit affair I have kept it hidden oh so well...

So since I hung the musty dog costume up 4 years ago, this is me for the first time being me and revealing the truth of my internet embrace so far.

Strap yourself in for a journey that I’m not even sure I am ready to brace, which will tell all about the complex evolution of my relationships....