Friday Forgot Something Important
The thing I hate the most about Satnavs is that although they do find wherever it is you’re going, but you tend to have absolutely no idea how you got there. So you are no less lost, in a sense, you just happen to be in the right place.
Well, I am getting a bit like that with my calendar. I write so much in my calendar that I tend to assume I put everything in it, which I don’t. The only problem with this is that I make no effort to memorise appointments or events anymore, assuming them to be in my calendar.
Previously, I used to just remember stuff. That wasn’t entirely failsafe, but I was generally pretty good at keeping things in my head. Now, once I write things down (or even when I don’t, but assume I have) they just vanish from my head altogether, leaving me entirely at the mercy of the computer.
And frankly, it’s unsettling. When I do forget something now I feel a bit like you do in those dreams where you’re entirely naked in a public place, or when you’re suddenly on stage, expected to give a grand performance on a musical instrument you never learned to play. Other people get those dreams, right? It’s not just me.
Umm, so it’s time for our traditional Friday de-lurking amnesty, time for you shirkers to step out of the shadows, and talk utter pish on the internet. Friday, after all, is not really for doing work, is it.
1. Are you early, late or completely punctual for appointments?
2. What is your most embarrassing memory failure?
3. What piece of technology would be like a helpless child without (‘your phone’ will be accepted, but please bear in mind it’s a pretty poor answer – not that this is supposed to be all that challenging of course, but a better answer will win you so much more respect, and let’s face it, that’s what it’s all about, eh)?
4. Which dream is the most disconcerting – the falling one, the public nudity one, the crumbling teeth one, or the on stage with no idea what to do one? Or even a different one, if you like.
5. What was the last question again?
The Mountain Goats – You, or Your Memory
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Bob Dylan – I Forgot More Than You Will Ever Know
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The Last Battle – Photographic Memory
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Micah P. Hinson – I Still Remember
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The Men They Couldn’t Hang – A Night to Remember
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1. Late, without fail, even when I should be on time something always seems to make me late.
2. I forget my Mum’s birthday absolutely every single year. NOT THIS YEAR THOUGH! OH YES!
3. Google Maps. It’s the world’s best ever ‘save me from my own fuckwittery’ software.
4. Either the crumbly teeth (does everyone else actually have that dream or is it just me) or the one where I’m on stage in a play I have never read with no idea what I am supposed to say or do.
5. What time is the fucking pub?
1 – It depends really. I’m generally roughly on time, but for work stuff I’m more likely to be early than late, whereas with friends being fashionably late is expected.
2 – When I was about 15 that I walked out the house without putting trousers on. Seriously. Other than that I’ve missed plenty of birthdays, parties, lunches and just about anything and everything else – I used to rely on a friend of mine to remind me about important stuff (which worked), but she’s moved to Rome and I still haven’t invested in a diary.
3. Glasses/contact lenses. I am completely fucking useless and lost without them.
4. The crumbling teeth one is awful – waking thinking you’ve broken them all is not nice. The naked on stage one and falling ones don’t bother me so much – I embrace them.
3 -
“When I was about 15 that I walked out the house without putting trousers on”
How far did you get before you noticed?
I got shouted at by my sister. Out the drive and about 10m down the road…
1. I tend to be fairly on time. Mainly because I assume I’ll get lost and leave early to allow for this.
2. I’m not great with names when I first meet people. This can be something of a problem when people tell me for the third time in an hour…
3. Threadsy. If I had to check every one of my (six?) email accounts individually I’d probably have killed someone by now.
4. I don’t really remember my dreams, but I once had a dream where I got on a train, and then it turned out it was a boat, and then terrorists tried to blow the boat up, and then I hid in a washing machine. Note: this is true.
Incidentally, how fucking boring is it when people tell you about their dreams? I just want to shout “NONE OF THAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED.”
5. 4.
1. I’m embarrassingly prompt. Like almost always exactly on time. It doesn’t matter how early or late I leave I usually time it just right.
2. I continually forget every year that my Dad’s birthday is the 26th not the 24th. 2 years in a row I’ve phoned to be told to phone back in 2 days time!
3. I dunno phones, computers, I’m stuck in front of these things for my entire waking life. I think I’d probably be a better person if the power went out. Actually thinking about that scenario .. as long as I have a fridge and a gas hob all will be fine.
4. I’ve had the crumbling teeth one a couple of times, but it’s the falling one that makes me wake-up with my heart racing. That’s the one that messes with my head. Actually I had one where someone put a possessed baby head down my throat and it started biting me from the inside. That image’s remained with me for a while.
5. Oh I dunno I went off on a tangent. Scroll back up and check for yourself.
1. Usually a bit early, but not drastically.
2. Not taking a belt with me when I was singing in a choir concert in the crypt of canterbury Cathedral. My trousers split seconds before the choir walked on, in the middle of a very serious requiem mass, there am I reducing members of the audience to helpless laughter because my trousers would not stay up.
3. Perhaps something as fundamentally basic as shelter, on the grounds that children could be helpless long before technology got sophisticated.
4. OMG, do you have the teeth one as well? I thought it was just me. the drowning one is unsettling. The ones involving my evil exes and former employer making my life hell are pretty uncomfortable. Though my Dad used to have dreams about getting lost on the chess board (a game he doesn’t even play…)
5. It was ‘How much money would you like me to give you on the never-never, Ed?’ Honest. And with the kid due next week and the cost of bringing up children well into six figures…a lot.
1. my time is the always the right time!
2. i’m shite with names, so if you hear me going ‘Alright pal?’ it means i’ve forgotten your name…..sorry!
3. My Magimix
4. snakes in the bed!
5. Is that big Stu? oh it is, tell him to fuck off he’s history to me….cunt!
1. Anally on time – dunno why nobody else seems to care
2. erm – i forget
3. ipod
4. masturbating in front of my mum never a good one – particularly when ur knob comes off in your hand – should i book a shrink appointment now ?
5. Is that the psychiatrist’s office ?
Threadsy? That sounds brilliant – I have a good half dozen or so emails too, although I can’t say I’d really want them all in the same place.
Chutters, I am shite with names too, particularly as I am often introduced to people at gigs when shitfaced these days. It leads to a lot of enthusiastic ‘OH HI!’s petering out into shamefaced ‘err.. how are you getting on’s.
Some of these dreams are fucking weird by the way. Are you lot sure you’re alright?
that masturbating one is just flamming bonkers…….
……go and see Freud
1. I am almost always early or at least on time. I wish I was more relaxed about being late.
2. I can’t remember….
3. iPod or before that Walkman and Mini Disc player. I have to have headphones.
4. I have a recurring dreams about bands playing gigs in inappropriate places. Quite often CenterParcs- type holiday villages. Sometimes weirder. I am invariably trying to find the toilets and can hear the band on the stage without being able to find them.
1. Early or on-time; never late.
2. Left the house for work, got in the car and drove about 5 miles before realizing that I was still in a tee shirt.
3. Toilet.
4. For me it’s the one where I’m back at school at exam time, and I’ve just remembered that there was this class I was supposed to have attended all year.
5. Something to do with food, wasn’t it?
Chutters – worse than choking on a possessed baby head?
1. Completely and utterly Type A punctual.
2. That the house I lived in for 8 years had sliding glass doors to the patio. I magnificently smacked full on into them, almost knocking myself out, in front of my children and a neighbor.
3. Google. I despise how much I use that site.
4. I have packing dreams where I am moving house and have to endlessly sort through closets and drawers. It’s exhausting and utterly boring.
5. I forgot.
1. Yes.
2. I find that sufficient amounts of arrogance can compensate for any memory lapse.
3. Microwave.
4. The one where the bank forced me to pick people to be killed at random. That was about fifteen years ago and it still upsets me.
5. Why did I just sit through Battleship Potemkin again?
Or rather, pick people at random to be killed.
1. Always early. Unless relying on other people, in which case – always late.
2. Girlfriend’s name. Sorry, ex-girlfriend’s name.
3. The internet. I like to pretend I can get by without it. But I know I can’t.
4. I used to have a dream about a giant talking housewife badger. Kinda like Mrs Tiggywinkle, but with rabies. She lived in a tree outside my house.
5. The Last Question was a science fiction short story by Isaac Asimov. It first appeared in the November 1956 issue of Science Fiction Quarterly and was reprinted in the collections Nine Tomorrows (1959), The Best of Isaac Asimov (1973), Robot Dreams (1986), the retrospective Opus 100 (1969), and in Isaac Asimov: The Complete Stories, Vol. 1.
1. Always 2 minutes late, never any massive lateness, just 2 minutes
2. I forgot the name of the girl I was out with the other week. she was even less impressed when i went all-or-nothing and had a stab at it + failed
3. I rather like my music pillow which I just plug my ipod into and listen to tunes or audiobooks as I drift off. Not sure how helpless I’d be without it, but I no longer wake up with sore ears from headphones, or, more worryingly, wires wrapped round my neck.
4. The teeth one always freaks me out, except in my dream they are getting pushed out rather than crumbling. Anyone know what this means?
5.I’ve been interviewing all week, so I’m going to go for:
‘do you have any reservations about my suitability for this job?’
actually it should be:
‘oh, you do?’
I miss Bart’s fives. Welcome back my little ginger pal.
Chris, guessing and guessing wrong is a real winner.
oh i didn’t see that one!
1. Roughly on time but overheating due to realising I was late and rushing to make it on time
2. Forgetting my brother-in-law’s birthday last week. It was fairly embarrassing sitting talking to the pair of them whilst looking at cards on the mantle piece which made me realise, thinking do I bring it up or not
3. ipod without a doubt
4. Last night’s was particularly horrifying – i sold my car to by a subaru impreza with neddish stickers all over it, then drove to a huge tent/festival that was like Creamfields with loads of gadges of their face on coke. Oh, and Bart was in it (as per usual)
5. I’m putting the kettle on, anybody for tea?
Bart, you are never early or on time…….
1) Early. You have to be really.
2) Five minutes ago when I realized that I hadn’t e-mail my Mum and and stopped writing my five to take care of wishing her a happy Birthday.
3) Alright, if I can’t be boring I’ll be really pretentious. My AT2525 mic. It has saved my sorry arse more times than I care to remember. Good workhorse that sounds pretty damn good on almost anything. And cheap as chips to.
4) Lying paralysed in bed, not being able to move or cry out. Add an imminent threat to the room and it is a real treat…
5) The last question was a little personal. If you must know.
1. I’m late for everything, apart from appointments. For those I always have such a drastic fear of being late that I over plan and arrive ridiculously early instead.
2. Like the rest of you I’m shit with names, or even remembering who people are. I’ll be in a conversation thinking “I know this guy is in a band, but I’m fucked if I can remember which one”. Usually remember moments after they’ve wandered off thinking I’m a fanny.
3. SICO, the robot from Rocky IV. I don’t have one, but just knowing he is out there somewhere makes me feel safe.
4. Attacked by a small, rubbishy animal on live TV, and not being able to defeat it.
5. I’m on a horse.
Everyone has crumbly teeth dream Matthew.
It’s apparently a fear of growing old. In your case though it may actually be a fear of the fact that you have disturbingly crumbly teeth…
1. usually early, then I get pissed off as most of my mates are usually late
2. names, I never remember folks names, I have good friends who I could tell you every single last details about, excpet for their names
3. fuck you -my iPhone
4. got to be the falling
5. “Which dream is the most disconcerting – the falling one, the public nudity one, the crumbling teeth one, or the on stage with no idea what to do one? Or even a different one, if you like”.
1. I utterly loathe tardiness and will endeavour to be on time ALWAYS.
2. Missed the first board meeting for a post I took up a few years back. Doubly embarrassing as I was leading on most of the agenda items.
3. iPod. I almost cried when my last one packed up. It’s gets a listen for an hour every morning, an hour on the way home and possible the evening too. BEST. INVENTION. EVER.
4. Crumbling teeth, an anxiety dream apparently, and one which I have all the time. I don’t think I’ve ever had the falling dream and only infrequently get my nads out in public. And yes we’re still talking about dreams you fucking pervert.
5. Something about badgers?
1. I’m getting progressively later. Always used to be unfashionably early, becoming a bit more lax as the years go on.
2. Always seem to forget important things that my wife tells me. funny that, and she says i don’t listen.
3. Id struggle without my i-pod.
4. BEN! Cripes, i have that one too but the threat is usually an old guy with a gun and whilst i’m in a state of paralysis in my dream, it doesn’t paralyse my lungs in the real world.
So, either that, or this dream where i dream that these other people are telling me fucked up dreams on a blog comments page and then they all come true. Hellish.
5. How do you know if the fax machine is plugged in?
I must confess I didn’t quite appreciate how nuts the dream question was going to be. We might all get locked up if this continues.
1. Early for appointments. I’ve stopped being on time for everything else because everyone else runs at least 15 to a half hour late.
2.two years ago I completely forgot my dad’s birthday.
3. i’d say my kindle, but i carry so many real books around that it’s almost redundant. so, to be boring, my iphone (because of the map function and the ability to look things up on wikipedia)
4. I used to have these nightmares where I managed to escape whatever horrible thing was happening only to have everything reset and I realized that I wouldn’t be able to escape again.
5. gee brain, what are we going to do tonight?
i used to dream that there was a guy wearing a mask standing on my roof, and he would swing down on a rope, crash through my bedroom window and chase me around the house with an axe…….
i once had a wet dream all over an ex-girlfriend
1. Hmmm? Why, what’s going on?
2. What is your most embarrassing memory failure?
3. The shower. You think I can be a bit dim on times, right? You should see me before I’ve had a shower in the morning.
4. I had a dream last night about a nice hotel but it was full of cowboys and there was one of those small panels in the floor that have electric plug sockets in but when you opened it it wasn’t plug sockets but a tiny hole that opened into a really nice warmly-lit study with comfy leather chairs and lots of great books and a nice bottle of whisky and an open fire but I couldn’t stay there long because someone had to go and check on the cowboys but the hole was tiny and really difficult to get in and out.
5. Newton fucking Faulkner.
1. Pretty punctual – it’s a matter of respect
2. ……….and after she’d let me introduce myself she said “for Christ’s sake, we used to go out together”.
3. The technology involved in producing clean running water.
4. It’s quite abstract: I’m trying to reach a smooth spot in a desert landscape, but which ever way I try, the land in front of me crinkles up: Horror.
5. Why?
wait, can I change my answer to number 3? Books! I would be completely lost without books!
1. Are you early, late or completely punctual for appointments?
Late-ish
2. What is your most embarrassing memory failure?
I once forgot the name of a good friend of mine who I’d known for years. It was inexplicable and actually quite worrying. I sorta managed to cover up alright, by pretending I was just struggling to remember his last name, but it was still bad.
3. What piece of technology would be like a helpless child without?
I’m developing a dependency on spotify.
4. Which dream is the most disconcerting – the falling one, the public nudity one, the crumbling teeth one, or the on stage with no idea what to do one? Or even a different one, if you like.
I get the sensation of falling pretty often when I’m drifting off, doesn’t really count as a dream, though. I always give a start and yell “HUH!!”, which scares the shit out of my girlfriend every time.
5. What was the last question again?
Being too late to answer the Friday fives can be problematic. You’re scrolling other responses to make sure you aren’t just repeating other people’s answers/jokes.
Dylan, I was going to say that Newton fucking Faulkner isn’t a question, but maybe he is, because he most certainly isn’t the fucking answer.
Titus, nice work with the ex-girlfriend!
Chutters, no more dreams please. I assume that was related to the reason the ex is now and ex.
not at all……she was asleep and i think she just washed it off in the shower in the morning
1. Are you early, late or completely punctual for appointments?
Very, very early. So I don’t miss anything and have time to read my book
2. What is your most embarrassing memory failure?
I always forget peoples names, always
3. What piece of technology would be like a helpless child without?
A book, still the perfect portable reading device
4. Which dream is the most disconcerting – the falling one, the public nudity one, the crumbling teeth one, or the on stage with no idea what to do one? Or even a different one, if you like.
I have dreams where I forget how to run/walk/breathe. They are scary
5. What was the last question again?
Spandex
I still cringe when I remember – thanks for the prompt.
1. I’m tragically early, i usually leave enough time to get thoroughly lost beforehand and always end up wandering around finding the quickest escape route, just in case
2. Going out on a blind date to realize 20 minutes into the date that the guy was an ex from when i was 16
3. google chrome
4. stuck inside of a shrinking glass box, you can see the outside world, your friends are waving at you but you cant get to it and you are running out of air.
5. The make apps that tell you where the closet pub is, downloading that one now
How on earth do you people always end up forgetting your exes? I haven’t seen any of mine since we split up, but I am pretty bloody sure I’d know immediately if I accidentally ended up on a date with one of them again.
I rarely forget an ex, no one else ever looks at me with the same level of pure hatred and disgust.
Could be worse. I tended to get pity.
1. Late – on so late.
2. Working at the Pleasance Courtyard one summer during the Fringe, I was approached by a young tourist who I assumed was in need of help/directions. My friendly “Hello Sir, how can I help you today?” was met with an embarrassed look from said tourist and an “Erm… it’s me *random name*. We, like, slept together last year??… Twice???” Awkward.
3. I barely have a phone, I gave my ipod to a friend who was going on a long journey because I didn’t want her to be lonely, and I can hardly get on the internet because Scott is always on it, so I would have to say, DVD player.
4. The not being able to move/breathe one. Terrifying.
5. When can I have a gin and tonic? (Answer: not for at least another 4 months)
1. Late but I always make sure I’m not going to the last person to turn up for gigs/practise.
2. Forgot to wipe “naughty pictures” of an ex girlfriend before I gave the laptop to my dad to fix.
3. Boringly my iPhone, but specifically the Edinburgh bustracker app, dunno what I’d do if I still had to rely on timetables.
4. The thing where you feel like you’re falling before you even fall asleep freaks me out.
5. Why do some people still not understand that it’s £1.20 wherever you want to go on the bus? Because that’s the general type of person you get on the 22.
I’ve always wondered, when these ‘hacked’ pictures turn up to embarrass people, what sort of person takes naked pictures of their bloody girlfriends on their fucking phone? And now we know.
That Edinburgh Bus Tracker thing is fucking awesome.
1. I like to think I’m on time but other people would probably say I’m a little late. Maybe because I stopped for a fag.
2. I was rude about a girl to her sister (having forgotten they were sisters.) ‘Oh yeah, that weird, goggle eyed girl, that’s my sister’ she said.
3. Computer, internet.. etc. Reckon I could live without my phone most of the time.
4. I have the getting on stage dream, I never know the songs or even any chords. Also the one where I’m running to or from something, but can’t run because my legs won’t run. Never had the teeth one- looking forward to that.
5. I don’t know, can you repeat that?- I wasn’t really paying attention.
1.i am the late type. i just say “you go ahead, i ‘ll come find you”. that way no one gets upset waiting.
2.at a birthday party, there was that girl that came and said “oh how are you, long time no see etc”. i couldn’t remember who she was, even though she explained where i knew her from. akward.
3.i was devastated when someone broke into my house 3 years ago and took my laptop.first thing i did was to go get myself a new one..
4.i had a dream that i was sleeping and there was a coffin in the next room and the man in it got up. and i could hear him but i couldn’t move.
5. it hasn’t been asked yet.
1. very punctual, unfortunately my wife is not.
2. I can’t remember birthdays of family, I call my mother on the wrong day annually.
3. Model Name: Mac Pro
Processor Name: Dual-Core Intel Xeon
4. The dream where I try to run and can only move in slow motion. Very frustrating, I wake up annoyed and tired.
5. Homo says what?
1. Always early for appointments, always a little late from Sunday dinner at mums.
2. I had an appointment at the bank the other week, and when asked, I couldn’t remember my rent, when I’d moved to my current flat, how long I’ve worked at my current job, my salary or my bloody age. Somehow, they still granted me a loan.
3. I have to go with my macbook. I wouldn’t mind going phoneless, but no internet, iTunes, Bubble Shooter and Zoo Keeper? Colour me helpless.
4. Quentin Tarantino picks me up to go watch his movies in an empty movie theater and having him quote all the lines simultaneously with the characters. To be honest, it’s the only dream I can remember, which is probably more disconcerting than the dream itself.
5. I wouldn’t know, this is my first time. (Hello?)
1. Either shamefuly late or shamefully early. Because I am so often late I end up trying to prevent the inevitable lateness and end up looking like an ass 45 min early.
2. I had a roommate one summer whose name I could not for the life of me remember. We’d already been living together a month and it would have been fairly embarrassing to ask, so I just kept calling her “Roommie” for the duration of the summer. So of course I was asked if I was Lisa’s roommate, and had no idea who Lisa was.
3. My GPS. The reason I am so often late is that my sense of direction is absolutely hopeless. I get so lost so easily to the point of being impressive.
4. It used to be the teeth one, but after my teeth got knocked out in a terrible cycling accident (and since replaced thanks to the wonders of medicine) it seems rather silly.
I’d say the worst dreams for me are the blindingly painfully happy ones with a deceased friend, or a love that could never be, or any other thing one thinks they are over, because when you finally do wake up its just awful.
5. Would you like a hug? I think thats a good one. I’ve had a rather shit day, so I would most definitely want to be asked that one.
As an aside, I was lucky enough to be in Manhattan the other day and finally saw Broken Records! Fantastic show!
Disconcerting dreams….hmm…let’s see.
There is the teeth falling out, the brakes on the car failing, being blinded by the sun and unable to see properly, shooting a baddie and the gun wont fire, the cheese plant at the bottom of the stairs eating me alive, suddenly becoming aware of pure evil in the next room and opening the door anyway to ‘have a go’…..
I am sure there are more. I dont find them terribly disconcerting though….just annoying and they get in the way of the ones where I am Spiderman or can fly.
I had a school one the other night though. I had to be at an exam the next day and I spent the whole dream wrestling with the competing logic that I am 31 and have completed high school and have a job etc. versus the fact that, “hey look, you ARE at school and you DO have an exam tomorrow.” Maybe that’s what it is like to be mad for real…..poor sods.
1. Neither.
2. Im shit at names and even worse at faces, people in edinburgh all have soft faces and I would only be able to tell you apart if I was blind and alowed to sqeeze your faces with my hands with my freaky white eyes in your faces.
3. dmg-01
4.I have had a recurring skateboard dream for the last ten years at least once a week, no shit!. I also started having reccurring dreams about killing rats.
5. A good question would be what is your favourite marker pen? or would you rather be gary glitter or a child gary glitter fan in gary glitters care? or if you could would you kill yourself just to see who cried but the next day be alive but be missing one bollock?