30 Day Song Challenge - Day Seven

A song that reminds you of a certain event.

The hardest part of this was thinking of an event, oddly. My first instinct was last Hogmanay and the song would be Justboy by Biffy Clyro, but it's already been done over on friendface. I also considered Yes by McAlmont and Butler, which reminds me of APRIL THE EIGHTEENTH - a night out that has gone down in history amongst my friends for being one of the funnest things ever to happen to us.

But I think I will choose the Orbital version of the Doctor Who theme, which reminds me of the first time the alternative music society at uni DJ'd the main venue in the students's union, and got a crapload of people dancing to it. Which was awesome.

No Use Crying Over Split Infinitives

New Year's Resolutions are rubbish, aren't they.

Mostly everyone has a vague notion that they'll eat less crap and exercise more. Maybe they'll also be a bit tidier. This falls apart either:
a) instantly, when you awake at 1pm on New Year's Day and realise it is the time for a Doctor Who marathon and piles of crisps, or:
b) more gradually over the first few weeks of the year as you remember that January is horrible and exercise makes you feel sad.

But we do it anyway, because it's nice to aspire to something less obese and poor-skinned than we are currently.

My New Year's Resolution, aside from the whole writing 12 books thing, is to get paid for my words.

I write a lot, about a variety of things, and some of it's not half bad. I do local news, fiction, humour, film and music reviews, comics, comment pieces and of course I blog. I've had stuff published in lots of places this year, working full time in unrelated jobs as I went. I've written for Outlook (City of Edinburgh Council newspaper), The Link (South Edinburgh newsletter), Tales of One City (the library services blog), The Edinburgh Reporter (hyperlocal news), The Broughton Spurtle (hyper-hyperlocal news), The Chutney Exhibition (comedy), Brikolage (arts), Hecklerspray (gossip), Billygean (blog) and have secured a blogging job with The Skinny's new website - although nobody knows when that's actually going to go live. That's not bad going.

There again it occurred to me this year that I've been working away on a generic concept of 'getting as much experience as possible' for ten years now. This isn't as bad as it sounds; I started writing for the local paper at the age of 15. Over that period I have made an eye-watering forty-five of your Scottish pounds.

I don't do this because I have some kind of martyr complex. Offering my services for free is the only way I know of gaining that all important yet ill defined 'experience' craved by prospective employers. It's also the only way I know I'm going to see my name in print, which is narcissism, if anything.

There is an argument that citizen journalism and young folk like me trying to get an 'in' are destroying the profession, as if the advent of the internet hadn't already given print media in its entirety a severe bollocking. The argument goes along the lines that seasoned professionals are being made redundant all the time in favour of younger, cheaper hacks who will do the same job for half the price, and the quality of the output suffers as a result.

Frankly - naively, perhaps? - I think good writing shines through. I am more likely to read - and pay for - an article on something that doesn't interest me if it's well written. Given the choice, an editor is surely going to use something that has been properly researched and written to industry standard? Isn't it in their best interest to print readable content?

Yes, being made redundant is beyond crap, but in a profession like journalism it's hardly the end. There's a living to be made in freelancing, and you've already got the contacts, years of experience and knowledge. Do you know what young freelancers like me have? Enthusiasm, and Twitter. I can't pitch an article to an editor who I know likes me, or an old mate I used to work with on such and such a paper, because I only just finished university, and I didn't do a journalism course when I was there. Instead, I have to try and second guess total strangers who universally ignore me. (Being ignored is far more irritating than being rejected and for all you know it might be your own fault - you could be writing to the wrong person because people change jobs and email addresses all the time.)

But so what. That's how things go. And for every older hack made redundant, and every bright young thing who did the MA at Napier and is now on the Evening News for a starting salary of 16k, there are hundreds of people who never make it at all. Some of them are undoubtedly very good writers. Better than the ones who make it, probably. I can only surmise that they aren't tenacious enough, however tenacious that may be.

Perhaps 2011 is the year I will find out.

Chapter Twenty Three

A chapter featuring Adric. Happy 47th, Doctor Who... As ever, links to previous parts can be located here.


Adric felt for his bow tie on the bedside table only for his fingers to grasp dry, empty air.

"I'm not at home," he said groggily.

He tried to sit up, and gasped in pain. This reminded him about the incident with The Gang Who Must Not Be named, the gun, and the shower of broken glass that had mostly ended up implanted in various of his limbs.

"But," he said thoughtfully to the room, "this isn't the hospital either. That would be a bit lighter, and I could hear people coughing and making other ill noises from other rooms. And a nurse would have heard me talking by now, due to my lack of volume control, and they would have come through and told me to keep it down for goodness sake."

He considered.

"A nurse!" he remembered suddenly. "That nurse last night wasn't a real nurse! She was an un-nurse!”

Adric was flabbergasted that he hadn’t realized this right away. It was so obvious!

“She's orchestrated my removal from the hospital...” he pieced it together in his mind. “And she made sure Tim was out of the way before she did it! That means she must know something about his history and thought it wasn't worth the hassle of involving him. He always saves the day."

Adric allowed himself a minute or two for a brief montage of Tim running around battling things and selflessly saving people from mortal peril. For some reason the soundtrack was the Saturdays, whom he did not much care for. But on the plus side, Tim was wearing some rather delightfully figure hugging jeans.

However, now was not the time for introspection or even flights of fancy. It was time for action.

With difficulty, Adric sat up and swung his legs - perfectly honed from years of badminton - over the edge of the bed. His bare feet met cold linoleum with a grimace.

He stood up, wobbling slightly, and moved forward through the dark. His plan was to keep going until he found a wall - simple but effective, you'll probably agree, assuming that you’ve been paying attention. It worked for Nicky and Bracken, after all. They found the door almost instantly.

The only trouble in this particular case was that Adric still had a piece of glass from the accident in his left ear which the hospital had missed, and it was affecting his balance in the negative. He was favouring his left side, essentially walking not in a straight line, but a sharply curved one. The end result was that he went round and round in circles.

This would have looked hilarious to any guards observing him through the highly expensive night vision cameras installed in all the rooms, but fortunately for Adric's dignity they were all engaged elsewhere. Unfortunately for his health, all the circling made him so dizzy and confused that he eventually fell over, and lay in a hospital-gowned heap on the floor.

"Timothy," he whispered uselessly, before his eyes closed and he fell into darkness once more.

* * *

Timothy, the man himself, had not really left when the so called nurse had told him to. Years of questing had instilled in him a perpetual sense of suspicion – although he liked to call it curiosity - and mistrust of all authority figures. This sometimes got him into scrapes but on this occasion was well justified.

After apparently leaving, Tim hid behind the bins to see what the 'nurse' - 'if she's a nurse then I'm a hedgehog sailor,' thought Tim grimly - would do next.

Sure enough, she gave Adric a jag, failing to warn him beforehand or give him a sweetie afterward as a real nursing professional would have done. Another clue was the way she plunged the syringe – full of a highly suspect green liquid - into his side like a person more used to stabbing people up might do, rather than in the manner of one who is looking for a vein in an arm or other limb.

She was then joined by someone in two balaclavas (for extra mystery) who helped her lift Adric's ungainly frame into a waiting vehicle.

Tim was formulating a rescue plan when he felt warm breath on his ear, and turned to see three figures in black, all wearing the designated two balaclavas too.

"Who are you," he inquired, engaging them all in combat at once. Tim had learned some sweet martial arts moves on a quest involving a lot of Ming, he knew swordplay from a time travelling one where he'd met king Arthur, and he knew how to rumble from watching Westside Story 38 times.

"Who do you work for?" he continued, lightly maiming one of them in the arm.

The heavies failed to answer, even in quip format. They just kept coming at him, wordless and powerful.

"Alright," Tim said, "you lot are the strong but silent type. I can appreciate that. Not really my cup of tea, but whatever."

Without any of them realizing what was happening, he tied two of them together using their own shoelaces, which was his signature move.

"Your move, El Nombre," he said to the third and biggest guy.

El Nombre paused.

"How did you know my name?" he asked, which was arguably rather foolish given that it could have been a bluff, in which case he would have given away his identity for no reason.

"We've met before," Tim explained, "don't you remember? We teamed up with a dwarf to defeat an evil wizard who had taken over your village and forced your mother to marry him."

"Tim?!" El Nombre squawked incredulously, "oh my god, I totally did not recognise you! It's been what, five, six years? How have you been?"

"Oh you know, doing away," Tim replied. "What about you, you're on the side of evil now? What's going on there? You were a freedom fighter when I saw you last!"

"It was inevitable really," El Nombre explained, removing the top balaclava with a practiced flourish. "given the events that ensued after you left."

"But Micky Chinnigan was dead! The village was saved!"

"Wizard Chinnigan wasn't dead," El Nombre shook his head emphatically. "You may remember I made a joke about the fact that we never saw the body, so he would probably return, like in one of your soap operas."

"But he was in a burning building that exploded to the ground! It melted all our beards clean off! Nobody could survive that!"

"Well maybe he did an illusion and we only thought he was in there. Whatever happened, he certainly wasn’t dead.

He returned one day when I was at Market and burned my home to the ground, my wife and mother trapped inside. I still hear their dying screams as I returned on Joel, my aging donkey. If only he had gone faster, perhaps I might have saved them... But no, it is not the fault of Joel. He did all he could, helping carry the bucket of water to put out the flames like a trooper."

"Then what happened? Did you swear you would have your vengeance?"

"I did. But Chinnigan was long gone. His diabolical laughter echoed around the village for the rest of the night and much of the following day, but I could not follow the trail. It was fragmented into giggles and cackles that flew every which way on the autumn wind."

"So you became a mercenary?"

"I did."

"What better way to discover your evil doer than by networking with other evil doers yourself."

"Quite. I was not about to let him get away with his crime."

"So what happened then?"

"I knocked about doing petty work for a little while," El Nombre rumbled, "then I travelled north to Peru. I saw on Chilean Gumtree website that there was some mercenary work going on there. That is how I came to be with my current employers."

"The clan of the cape."

"I couldn’t possibly comment on the identity of my employer, señor."

"No," Tim agreed, "of course not."

They scuffed their feet against the ground awkwardly for a while, like young children in the school playground whose mums have told them they have to play together.

"So have you been instructed to fight to the death, or incapacitate, or what?"

“‘Despatch’ was the word used, if I remember correctly. ‘By any means necessary.’"

"I thought as much. What would you say to taking me alive? I'm rather interested in this clan of the cape, and if I'm not very much mistaken then they have taken my partner prisoner."

"Why?"

El Nombre clearly hadn’t clicked that the partner in question was the very person he himself was helping to kidnap.

"I haven't the faintest idea," Tim said, "but I would like to find out. You can kill me afterwards, if you like?"

"Its nothing personal," El Nombre asserted, "it's a contractual obligation merely."

"of course as a mercenary," Tim began,

"I can be as cut throat as I wish," El Nombre continued, "yes, I am aware of that. But I have my sense of honour to consider."

"You consider it honourable to kill an old friend for money?"

"I consider it honourable to finish the job I am paid to do."

"Surely the clan of the cape didn't say anything so specific as 'kill Timothy Mahogany-Barnes if you get the chance'? I would imagine their instructions to be a lot more vague. 'Despatch anyone who gets in our way by any means necessary,' or something like that.”

El Nombre looked uncomfortable.

“Well I mean technically I wasnt really in your way, was I? In fact I was rather out of your way. I was hiding behind a bin, for crying out loud."

"Spying on our highly secret activities," El Nombre pointed out.

"The natural response of the seasoned adventurer," Tim reasoned, "you must empathise with that?"

El Nombre studied him carefully.

"Oh what the hell," he said, "come on then, let me 'take you alive'. I can't promise you'll stay that way once we get there, though."

"No no, of course not," Tim grinned in elation, "cheers for this mate."

"Not at all," El Nombre replied, tying his hands behind his back with a loose knot.

"Taking this guy alive," he told one of his colleagues, manhandling Tim roughly into the back of a black car with tinted windows. "He took the others out. I think that certain members of the facility might like to extract that feeling of smugness to teach him a lesson."

El Nombre's companion grunted disinterested assent. He was thinking about the sausages he was going to have for his tea. He'd been looking forward to those sausages all day. Mmm, sausages.

Tim gave El a nod of thanks, and put his head down so as not to draw any more attention to himself than was necessary. Adric was in the car in front, and he couldn't afford not to be awake to see where they were going.

"Oh no you don't," El said gruffly, tying a blindfold around his eyes.

But it was made of chiffon, and Tim could see through.

“Thanks again mate,” he whispered, barely audible above the car’s 80 gigawatt engine.

“No problem,” El replied, without moving his lips or opening his mouth. “Now shut up.”

And so, as part of a convoy, Adric and Tim moved towards the mysterious facility where almost everyone else mentioned in the story was being held.

MGEITF

So, the reason I finished at the library in the middle of the week was to give me time to cover the Media Guardian Edinburgh International Television Festival (MGEITF) for The Edinburgh Reporter. Naturally this is on a voluntary basis, ie for no money. In all honesty I just wanted the thrill of being around loads of buzz word spouting TV industry people, who are all very trendy and mostly made out of iProducts. HOWEVER, I feel that the delegate goody (goodie?) bag thing has actually been payment in itself. Check that bad boy out. Highlights which you should be able to locate in the photograph include:

- The Radio Times! Normally costs more than one of your GBP. (Arj Barker reference there for two of you)
- The Doctor Who Adventure games, the main review of which seems to be 'OK but a bit slow'
- A YouGov memory stick! (no idea, they must be a sponsor)
- A tiny bottle of water!
- Mints from ITV!
- Chocolate coins!
- Chocolate in bar format for the less piratically inclined amongst the delegates!
- And a DVD extolling the virtues of the Clyde Waterfront. At an event which has, since its inception, always been held in Edinburgh.

This is loads better than the Film Festival press pack, which just had, like, film related stuff in it. And a notebook so that you could write about the films. Whatever dudes. There are kids* at this event, and we will give them sugar.

Anyway, I will link to stuff as and when it goes up on the reporter, but until then you'll just have to watch telly or something.

*I don't really mean kids as such, just young persons - part of the point of this festival is to help young people gain knowledge and experience of the industry, which is quite a nice thing. Course nobody ever fuckin' told me about it as a young(er) person, but still. It's all good.

Robert Pattinson Collects Belfries

In lieu of an interesting photo today, here is an old one featuring a couple of books I inherited from a big library clear out. We had to remove 9 shelves to make room for a spectacularly underused information pod. Totally worth it.

Furthermore, the creator of surprisingly readable Doctor Who blog The Mind Probe has created another internet gem, The R-Patz Factz. This is a bit like the Chuck Norris facts, but more topical as they are about sparkly vampire hunk - or vunk - Robert Pattinson. Follow the blog! Join the Facebook group! It's going to be an internet phenomenon the like of which has never been seen.

Health and Safety

Our landlord doesn't much care for fixing stuff. I don't even want to contemplate the fridge, which was on its last legs way before we moved in. But I have to say, the buzzer is a genuine cause for concern. The sign pretty much explains why.

In unrelated news, an entertaining article combining gaming and Who can be found here.

Meanwhile a vitriolic letter to someone who rejected me out of hand for a job advertised as something it wasn't is on my other blog, here.

Doctor Who

First episode - I heart Steven Moffat
Second episode - I heart Amy Pond (Karen Gillan's quite good too)
Third episode - The pacing is a bit off here, but I heart Bill Paterson, and now I want to watch Truly, Madly, Deeply
Fourth episode - I notice what the fangirls mean, and slightly heart Matt Smith
Fifth episode - I heart Toby Whithouse. Maybe I should watch the rest of Being Human.

If you would like to read more in-depth articles about both new series and old, I would urge you to look at this blog by a lifelong fanboy. Some of the references go over my head but it's very entertaining, so I imagine for readers who've seen all the old episodes it must be ace.