What's the real difference between a day off and an off day? I keep feeling the weight of the myriad things I have got to get done, both domestically and in the Grand Scheme of Things. This means that the little things, the tiny steps on the road to enlightenment (or indeed, basic hygenic living) sometimes get put aside, overlooked during all the fretting about more important stuff. Fortunately, today I managed to redress the balance somewhat and have begun focussing on the small stuff with a view to it all forming part of some indecipherable puzzle of which I am at present not fully aware.
The first revelation came from doing me washing. I've probably spent enough at the launderette in the last couple of years to cover the cost of my own washing machine. Not that I'd want one in me flat. I've spoken before about hermit-like existence of the machine I have as a neighbour. Relations have deteriorated further since I discovered it was responsible for the leak that caused this to grow in me guest bedroom:
That's all been fixed now, but it was all very unpleasant for an unnecessarily long amount of time because the maintenance bods couldn't figure out what was causing it. So I am naturally wary of washing machines in the wild.
In captivity, in a well-run lauderette, they are harmless enough. They have to be fed tokens in order to be coaxed into working for you. But their associates, the tumble dryers, will happily work for cash. I was short of pound coins today so while the washer was in the middle of its cycle I popped over the road to the Saint Catherine's Hospice shop with a view to buying something cheap and cheerful to get some change. I came across this:
Twelve episodes of the 1950s Invisible Man TV series for a piddling £1.50. Aren't charity shops brilliant? And to think, I'd almost spent twice that on a railway magazine in the Costcutter (the rail publications placed tastefully on the top shelf next to the porn. There was a crossover point between the two that was marked by a title called Hornby - I think that must be a form of rail-based porn, nudes draped across diesel engines, that sort of thing. Not really my bag. No, really).
The St Catherine's shop was rife with incident. While I was browsing the unwanted biographies downstairs a woman was attacked by a stand in the shape of a swastika that was overburdened with handbags. It turned out there was a castor missing from one of the 'feet' causing the stand to topple over and strike this woman. As I prepared to pay for my DVD I overheard the lady on the till saying "of all the people it could fall on it had to be her". The injured party was obviously an unpopular regular. Fortunately, she took a shine to me, impressed with my domesticity when I told her I was in the middle of washing my shirts. I confessed to her that she wouldn't think me domesticated if she saw the state of my flat. There's another journey of a thousand steps that needs to start earlier rather than later.
I have a favourite washer and dryer, so back at the launderette I transferred my load from one to the otherwhereupon I discovered 25p loose in the drum! This day was getting better and better. I then took the time to enjoy reading Saga by Brian K Vaughn (author of Ex Machina and Y - The Last Man) and Fiona Staples (haven't come across her artwork before, but it's very good). In fact I'm happy to make it my Sixth Comic Book Recommendation. Well worth a read.
And then I went to the pictures in York to see The Cabin in the Woods, my Eighth Film Recommendation. It was showing on Screen 5 at the Reel Cinema, which was tiny, having only 30 seats. The screen was quite small too, small enough that you could see the pixels of the the digital projection. This didn't spoil the film, though. No, that honour was taken by the irritating woman who had a hysterical laughing reaction to a particularly jumpy bit and then proceeded to laugh on and off for the next couple of scenes. Could have predicted that, mind. They were told off in the first few minutes for having their phone screen glowing away while they gawped at some no doubt hilarious meme photo. And they were chatting. Grr.
The film was great though. I can't tell you anything about it, though. Suffice to say it was good enough to elicit a comment from someone sat behind me that went something like: "Oh my God, (SPOILER REDACTED)", which I am sure is exactly the response the film makers wanted.
I started the week using one of the two new pedestrian/cyclist entrances to York station. It seemed fitting then that the week should end with me exploring the other one. Of course, if I had realised where it was on my way out of the station I could have used it and not had to go around the houses to get to the cinema. At least I found it on the way back.
So to summarise: In not having anything to do today, I ended up getting a lot more done than I usually would. Have done. Or something. And that is how you find the Invisible Man. Or something.
Look, just go with it - it's all a bit Zen.
More soonliest
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