Rationcrination & Hominism

Why are suit trousers so criminally baggy here in England? Our suits used to be tight as a whistle here before we adopted the Italian style of tailoring. It's not Italy here, is it? We have no need for trousers which would definitely slow you down, in fact, probably make you float to the ground quite nicely, if you were to jump out of a building. And you'd probably be jumping out of a building in the first place because of the suit trousers. You'd really want to kick yourself after that, wouldn't you? So then you go to kick yourself, but you slip over because of flat, stupid English loafers. Then where are you? On your arse, crying into a handkerchief that for some reason comes with a suit, dreaming of fitted trousers and shoes with laces and some detail.

It is the same conundrum every time I try to or go to hire a suit. Why must the trousers be so parachuted? I think I get so wound up about it because you end up looking around 10kg heavier than you actually are. Plus, you just literally have to dress the same as everyone else. Black tie means black tie, not a red one, a blue one, a patterned paisley one, a houndstooth one - no. For girls, however, it is called Formal. This is basically any dress on which the skirt is not too high, and the bodice not too low. Other than that, anything goes. No wonder why so many more men in the world commit suicide than women (the ratio is 4:1) - we are piledriven by conformity, into the very ground on which we stand, becoming nothing more than stunted statues that depict the very ugly, ungroomed facets of patronisation, involuntary sameness, noncommunication, and sedate sedentariness that fill the corridors of manly self-fulfilling prophecies and dull testosterone, until the whole unlively building bulges like a bulbous over-pregnant stomach, whereupon it bursts open, and the life of man begins again. And all I wanted was fitted trousers.

I also made a trip to Walton Library today. Walton on Thames (surely you've gathered that by now? Not Walton-on-the-Naze, nor Walton-on-the-Hill, definitely not Walton Superior) library. Very limited selection of books. The majority is all recent pulp and chick lit and crime thrillers that may be turned into films one day to save their authors from complete obscurity. The rest is local history and blah. If you want to find Voltaire do not go there. If you want to find Poe, you're probably better off settling with the Teletubbies homophonic offering. Hardly any Arthur Conan Doyle either. No 'Classics' section, just Fiction, Crime, Children's, History - a very vague offering. What they have done is taken their first shabby incarnation, a terrible late-70s crammed and cramped, complete with carpet tiles, and just spaced it out on a modern top floor of a new building near the Heart. Same amount of books. Practically nothing but the decor is new. I am glad for the space, I suppose, but I'm not exactly going to start two-stepping around the shelves, am I? Only unless I'm really agitated, and today I was only irritated, so that was lucky I suppose. I did get one book out, though, an Sherlock Holmes collection, but with only two of the stories in it that I wanted to read; two out of three is not too bad though (pun intended): The Crooked Man and The Resident Patient. Missing, however, The Valley - which may be a novel for all I know - and another short one, The Speckled Band.

Why have I suddenly got into crime fiction? Well, in preparation for a new project I intend to undertake, overtake, and generally dominate until it is a decent piece of writing. The research has begun well enough - a mix of the internet (what would we do without it?) and book-flicking to start with. Heavier stuff is to follow, I am sure, but it will all provide the basis for what I hope will be worth the time involved. I hope, holistically speaking, that it will be greater than the sum of its parts; what I mean is that T(R x I x W) = N. Time, Research, Imagination, Writing, and Novel. That is probably not an accurate equation, because maths prodigiousness has basically avoided me since the last sum I did on the GCSE Maths paper. Anyway, you get the general gist of what I am saying.

Another thing, I recommend that you have a go on these games: Crimson Room, Viridian Room, White Chamber. I don't know if you've heard of them before, but they have sparked the inspiration for my new project. I would say play Crimson (as it is the first), then Viridian - being a sequel to the Crimson, and then White, because it is the newest. They're kind of hard, but I think you'll enjoy trying - for a while, anyway, before you start ripping your hair out, getting bored, and wishing that I had never showed you them in the first place. I like them.

I have to ride the Indian bike now. I am being summoned.