Life since Guy Fawkes Night

Superstruct finished in a crazy webcast thing, which was the most (and the weirdest) fun I’ve had in ages.  I wrote the 33,000 word beginning section of a surprisingly elegent sci-fi novel, and am now seriously struggling to maintain momentum and self-discipline.  I submitted a speculative job application, and am at peace with the fact that there’s a 95% chance that nothing will happen as a result of this.  I discovered The I.T. Crowd, and wondered why I hadn’t done so sooner.

I went to a Goldsmiths open day on four hours sleep, managed to sustain a cogent and upbeat conversation with a member of their Business Development Office, and thoroughly enjoyed the vibe and atmosphere of the place.  That said, I have – thus far – failed to submit a Masters application, and am in the process of working out to compress my aims and academic interests into a page-long “personal statement” that doesn’t make me sound like a twat.

I bought a new jacket.  I finally read Brasyl, by Ian McDonald.  In Brighton, I was “turned” by vampires in SoHo, but didn’t find Mr. Smith.   I went to Cornwall to see a friend from university.  I learned why – as a woman – it might not be a good idea to accuse your housemate of shortening your menstrual cycle, and marvelled at the windswept desolation of the University of Exeter’s Penryn campus.  I spent too much time on trains.

I discovered the concept of the cloudworker, and have embraced it a viable and desirable life goal.  I attempted to talk my parents out of investing in property.  I met Paul in London, and hit a public lecture at UCL about “feral cities“.  I’m currently ordering some jottings for “notes towards a genealogy of alter-urbanism”, a tangetial ramble through history and fiction which really needs be to decide on a format … be it blog post, article, wiki, or pamphlet.  I speculated on how capitalism is like nature, colonizing those volcanic islands that pop up from time to time in the North Sea.  I bought a copy of Imaginary Futures: From Thinking Machines to the Global Village, which I fully intend to devour over the next couple of days.  I cried at The Devil’s Whore in the same way as I once cried at Ken Loach‘s Land and Freedom, and thought a great deal about constitutional reform.

What have you been up to?