Bored to death

Apparently when you yawn it's because your body needs to take in oxygen. I often find I yawn when I'm bored so if being bored leads to a lack of oxygen, if I didn't yawn could I die? Could I literally be bored to death?

I've certainly on occasion been so bored I've lost the will to live. And I know I shouldn't say that, my sister always shouts at me when I say I'm losing the will to live. And when I think of all the people I've lost over the years I do feel a moment of guilt for being so flippant.

Weirdly I have a vague awareness of my mortality. That awareness comes and goes though. Like sometimes I'll be really aware of it in some kind of weird belief that I could die at any minute. Well I suppose we all could really. And then I have other moments of arrogant belief that stems from a reliance on the reality of television and film and novels where everything always works out well in the end and as I am the lead character in the story of my life then surely nothing bad is ever going to happen, that won't eventually come good. Rather than dying my story will just end on a high note and my life will be preserved in a state of suspended animation or something...actually I have no idea what a state of suspended animation even means, but I was listening to the Divine Comedy the other day and that line is said....I might wiki it and see what it actually means....

*opens up a new tab on t'internet*

Oooooh ok, I have decided I don't want to be preserved in a state of suspended animation at all...I hate being cold! And in any case I've completely lost my train of thought now. The point is that sometimes I find myself wondering if what I'm about to do could potentially be fatal. And then I go and touch the nearest bit of wood - because of course touching wood means that no bad thoughts will ever come true - I dunno how it works, it's a branch of science that I don't understand.

I had a funny spate of car accidents a few years ago - nothing major, and none of them my fault. I'd be stationary in my little clapped out 17 year old VW Polo (Margo her name was, I loved that car, everyone ridiculed her and called her names but she was like a beloved pet to me) at some traffic lights, or in a queue for the roundabout when some buffoon in a fancy car would misjudge the distance and smash into the back of me. I often wondered if they were so amazed by the age of my car that they needed to get a closer look, but it did mean that each time I got into a car I wondered if I would have another accident and if it would actually be serious. I was so worried about it in fact that after Margo finally went to the big carpark in the sky after her final arse ramming, I acquired a beautiful Mazda (The reverend, he was green), and was terrified everytime I drove it because it was just too pretty to injure. Perhaps due to the respect the Reverend demanded by other drivers I never had any incident in it, but the stress of driving him became too much and I sold him on and bought a slightly scratched Ford Fiesta...(initially named Fernandez after my Spanish friend Cristina Fernandez, but the fact that Fernandes played for Everton and my car was blue...well I had to change the name to Fernando for Torres)
Within a month of owning Fernando a black cab drove into the back of me. But it was ok, just nicked the corner and no damamge was caused.

Anyway... I was watching Jade's wedding on Thursday night. And I cried. I don't much like weddings mind you, so it wasn't really the wedding. I like Jade. She's provided me with many hours of reality tv viewing. And she inspired one of my hair cuts - yeah most women copy Jennifer Aniston, but not me, I go in the hairdressers with a picture of Jade Goody. Again due to the nature of watching TV and all that, I am assuming that even though her cancer is terminal, and it's called reality TV for a reason, somehow at the end she'll pull through and it will all be ok. But then of course while watching Jade's wedding it occurred to me that that it's not a soap opera, or edited in a way to make you think it's worse than it is. She really is dying. And it's so sad.

When I think about death the overriding sadness for me is the thought of all the songs and TV shows I'll never know about. Sometimes when I'm thinking about my friend Nick who died a few years ago I think about all the cool songs he never got to hear. And I know it's stupid because well, once we're dead we're not going care about songs we wont get to hear - or maybe we'll still hear them...who knows?

But anyway. Life is for the living. Sometimes it crosses my mind that I waste a lot of my life sitting on my sofa watching TV when I should be making the most of it. But essentially at the end of the day all we can do in life is strive to live the happiest life we can. And we all find happiness in different ways. And if your home is where you're happy then my home is on a sofa under a red blanket in front of a TV.

The first rule of geek club...

I don't know how it happened. One minute I was perfectly self centred and hermit like watching TV on my own, maybe at a push texting fellow programme fans all the way through with a running commentary - but God forbid I actually watch the show in their company.

The next minute not only do I suddenly have a boyfriend, but I've also come up with the grand idea of inviting a group of likeminded people to my place to watch geeky type shows on my TV.

And not just once either...oh no...a regular monthly occurrance.

Who am I and what have I done with Helen?

And tonight I have finally realised why I have always returned home and locked the door behind me...it's so I wont have to tidy up!

I just spent the best part of Monday night cleaning...and irrational cleaning at that - I mean I'm fairly sure my fellow geeks wont walk straight into my flat on Thursday and look in the oven...but the oven I cleaned nevertheless!! And I rearranged my geeky toys for maximum display purposes so that they will look around my room and think how cool it is.

And so far the fact that someone is going to sit in my space on the sofa hasn't brought me out in a cold sweat. I don't really care. It's only for one night right?

I'm sure that's not the only reason I've been anti-social. I think that I have become more sociable because for the first time in a very long time I am happy. Truly happy. Not the sort of happy that I used to be when I was sat on my own watching TV, that was merely consolation happy, the sort of "you know what? I'd rather be sat on my own watching TV.." kind of happy. But then again, there are not that many things I'd rather be doing than watching TV.

It's funny how bad news travels fast, people prefer to moan about bad things than celebrate good things, and we believe the negative things far more easily than the positive things. I've spent way too long believing the bad things, even though deep down I knew they weren't even true. So it only took 1 person telling me I was miserable boring and unsociable and that no one really liked me to create that negative state of mind that I've been carrying around for the last 10 years.

I've watched TV on my own for a long time because I assumed no one would want to watch it with me. But I found someone who does. And so now I am happy.
And now I even have the courage to not only meet new people, but invite the people I already knew, into my home to watch TV with me.

I hardly recognise myself...but that might be the big daft grin that's permanently distorting my face.