Meme Machine

I suppose this is what a meme is...

Ten years ago
I was 16. I had finally convinced my parents to let me leave Devonport High School for Girls and was in my first few months of my first year at Saltash Comp, wearing my own clothes, talking my own talk and hanging out with boys. I rode a unicycle and listened to Pulp, Supergrass, Dodgy, Garbage, Bjork, 60s stuff. I read Sylvia Plath (for self-pity) and Shakespeare (for school) and drank lots of vodka whenever I could. I had nearly taken up permanent eyelinering (this was finalised the next year when I started dating a goth) and slept beneath a Klimt poster.

My family bought a dog called Eddie who I hated because he ate my shoes. My best friend left DHS to join me at Saltash which was brilliant because I loved her but also a bit crap because I had wanted to do something on my own. Within a couple of years we stopped talking because of an argument of which I have no recollection.

Five years ago
I was 21. I had graduated in the Spring and moved to Cornwall with my boyfriend. We were living in a cottage in Cawsand where I had some bar work and he made jewellery out the back. We had the best house in the world; a gorgeous cottage where we hung pictures we had made ourselves (including one memorable picture which hung in the lounge which was a paint-print of our bottoms) and a beach twenty steps from the door, but we were often unhappy and we split up early the next year. My older friends in the pub would all tell me I should get out of Cornwall, but it was another year and a half before I did.

One year ago
I had left the Channel Islands where I had been a receptionist in a hotel for the summer, gone for a splitting-up holiday in the Netherlands and was on my way to India. I wasn't really prepared for India as I'd only ever travelled on my own to Thailand before, and that had been a piece of piss and huge fun. India is anything but easy and is probably not the place to go to mend a broken heart. It is the place to go if you want beauty, excitement, nerves and diahorrea. I got more than my fair share of all these. I was very excited about the prospect of coming to New Zealand.

Five yummy things
Macaroni Cheese, Malai Kofta, Carl's Noodle Soup, Sushi, My Salads.

Five songs I know by heart
Oh I don't know, Sharon, really. I'd have to try singing them all and I just haven't the time.

Five things I would do with a lot of money
Set up a studio in Cornwall with facilities for sculpture, computer graphics and effects, photography, painting, vegetable growing, live music etc., travel a shitload, buy a bach with some forest in Dunedin for child-rearing, build an orphanage with Shane, pay my court fees after I slap George Bush.

Five places I would to escape to
Iceland, Japan, Djibouti, South America, Portugal.

Five things I would never wear
Bright pink. Anything with a big rubbish logo. That's about it.

Five favourite TV shows
Spaced, Black Books, The Office, Partridge, Eastenders.

Five things I enjoy doing
Drinking and bullshitting with my best friends, making things, singing, leaving places, beachcombing.

Favourite toys
Laptop, camera, keyboard, effects pad, pens, bouncy shoes.

Five people who get this 'meme'
Oh, must I?