Lonely Werewolf Girl in Australia and New Zealand

Piatkus's new edition of Lonely Werewolf Girl has now been issued in Australia and New Zealand, by Hachette. This edition will be published in Britain in March. (ISBN 9780749942830)

In the past, I've sometimes had problems with book distribution in Australia, so I'm pleased this book is now there.

The sequel, due out later this year, will be called Curse of the Wolf Girl. (Kalix is on her way to college, to try and improve her reading skills.)

Andi Sex Gang

Here's the trailer for Bastard Art, a documentary about my good friend Andi Sex Gang, which is due out this year, directed by Vince Corkadel.

I was pleased to see the trailer, though slightly alarmed to see myself featuring in it. (In fact I have the last word in the trailer) I can't remember what I said about Andi. Some nonsense, possibly. But the rest of the documentary will be good.

I once did a brief reading at a CD launch for Andi, and from the stage I told an anecdote about him. This anecdote, I may say, brought the house down. Sadly, I can't repeat it here, unless I made this one of these blogs with an adults only warning in front of it.

I first met Andi in 1977. We were both squatting near Clapham Junction. Soon afterwards we both moved to Brixton, and have hung around South London ever since. I'm looking forward to seeing Vince's film, though I'm not certain when it will be released.

More Progress

I finally bought a phone with a camera. I may be the last person in the country to have one. When the phone arrived I charged it up and sat down to read the instruction book. After one page of this hefty work, I became bored and depressed. The instructions were simply too tedious to read. So I abandoned it, and will just work the phone as best as I can without reading any instructions.

I have already taken my first picture! As you can see, I have swiftly mastered the art of digital photography. Possibly a new career is opening up.

Getting back to the subject of great 70s music - weren't we talking about that - no? - I was sure someone mentioned it - here are Roxy Music performing their first single, Virginia Plain, on top of the Pops in 1972. I saw Roxy Music play in Glasgow, at the start of their career, when Eno was still in the band. That was brilliant. Although I would have been too young at the time to appear in the audience with full glam-rock outfit and make-up. But that probably wouldn't have been a good idea in Glasgow at the time anyway.

Black Perfumed Scarf

I wrapped up well and struggled out into the snow. Once outside I realised that my neck was really cold. It struck me that I needed a scarf. I can't remember that happening before. I can't remember when I last wore a scarf. I wasn't even sure I had one.

I retreated indoors and rummaged around in the wardrobe. To my surprise, I came across a nice black scarf. I don't remember ever seeing this garment before. I've no idea where it came from.

Pondering the matter - quite suspiciously - I noticed that the scarf smelled of perfume. Quite nicely, in fact. This was odd. Where has this mysterious perfumed scarf come from? I'm baffled. Did some lover storm out in the huff, leaving the garment behind? Always possible, given my poor track record in relationships. Right this moment she might be thinking 'What a useless boyfriend he was. And he stole my scarf.'

But I can't remember anything like this happening. It's a mystery. How long would perfume last on a scarf anyway? Not long, I wouldn't have thought. Or maybe it would, if it was high quality merchandise. Anyway, I'm now wearing the scarf. And probably smelling slightly more perfumed than usual.

London is thickly covered with snow. This is a big pain. I have purchased Tamanohikari Super Premium Ginjo Pure Rice Sake over the internet, and am warming myself with this fine Japanese product.

Extreme Piggy-Back Terror

My new wi-fi has certainly changed my life. Because of it I've developed two new damaging obsessions. I'm obsessed with how fast it is, and I'm obsessed about anyone piggy-backing on my connection. Previously I never had to worry about these things. Now I'm checking it all the time. So it's a big step forward.

The speeds seems to be OK. But, to my horror, while browsing through the rather complicated logs and settings in my router, it did seem to me that there were other people using my connection. Another computer, and also an iPhone.

I thought I'd set a password, but apparently this wasn't good enough. People had already invaded my network. I was briefly terrified, and felt unable to cope with this cyber terrorism. I had a vision of some Jack Nicholson-type character smashing through my door with an axe, crying 'You'll never stop us using your wi-fi connection!'

When I calmed down, and realised this probably wasn't going to happen, I was annoyed. I mean, these people can't be far away, can they? Is someone in my block using their damned iPhone on my connection?

* Shakes fist at fellow residents *

Considered knocking on everyone's door, demanding to know who the culprits were, possibly coming to blows with suspicious parties. Eventually decided against it.

Subsequently, with much furrowing of the brow, I learned how to make my connection more secure, a complicated process involving mac address filters, Wpa2 and suchlike. So this was all very stressful. But I think it's secure now. The other computer and the iPhone are no longer appearing on my connection, or in the log

Checking the internet, I notice that all these security measures can be broken by other people if they're determined enough. Sigh. So I will no doubt be checking the whole thing obsessively for the foreseeable future. Go wireless. It's a boon to OCD sufferers. Hours of new stuff to worry about.

In-between fighting off these cyber-terrorists I noticed the sink in the bathroom was looking quite dirty. Wondered about cleaning it. I'm not a great house-cleaner. Eventually decided to make an attempt. Sprayed it with cleaner and rubbed it with a cloth. This had little effect. Was frustrated. Why didn't it work? What's the point of selling stuff that claims to clean sinks if it doesn't do it when you need it? May have to scrub harder.

Injured by Slippers

I've always avoiding buying or wearing slippers. Even when the temperature plummeted I've know that if I ever wore slippers, something bad would happen. Mainly, I'd turn immediately into an old man, shuffling around, probably complaining about stuff.

Glamorous movie stars would cease to visit me. I would no longer be welcome at London's most fashionable nightspots.

However. Right now it's really cold in London. Walking round my flat, my feet are cold. I tried wearing shoes but I don't like wearing shoes indoors. At the supermarket, in their small clothes section, I noticed some slippers. I looked at them sort of longingly, thinking it would be nice to have warm feet, but I hesitated. I knew it was a big decision. I almost resisted, thinking 'I will never wear these comfy tartan footwear items' when I noticed that one of the pairs of slippers was sort of moccasin-shaped. Nice and fluffy inside, but not really looking too much like slippers really. If challenged, I could possibly deny they were slippers at all.

So, furtively, checking no one was looking, I slipped them in my basket, then headed for a checkout point. I felt quite guilty about the whole thing. On the other hand, London is knee-deep in snow these days, and my flat does suffer from drafts.

Back home I put on the slippers. They were very warm. And did look quite like moccasins. Not too slipper-like. I thought I might get away with it. Possibly I would not turn into an old person overnight.

However. There was a slight feeling of discomfort in one foot. I'd bought my normal size, but they felt a bit tight round the toe. Maybe because they were so fluffy inside. I ignored this, because my feet were very warm. This turned out to be a terrible mistake. When I took them off at the end of the day I noticed my toe was quite sore, and next morning it was even sorer. For some reason , wearing this slightly-too-tight slipper seemed to have crushed my toe into my foot, causing pain in the joint and tendon, and this pain didn't just go away as I might have expected. Next morning my foot was really painful, all the way up the tendon.

I stared morosely at my feet. Now not only were they cold, they were sore too. I limped around the house the whole day, complaining about stuff. I knew it was my own fault really. I knew bad things would happened if I ever wore slippers. Now I'm practically crippled. How could an overly-snug slipper cause such damage? I may never walk properly again. Damn my lack of self-control.

Staggering Technological Advances

This week the Millar household has seen great technological progress. (as I've mentioned before, I am always very far behind with technology.) Firstly, I upgraded my internet connection to 20Mb, and second, I got a wireless connection.

I notice - because I've been obsessively checking - that the speed varies a lot. The fastest it's been is 18Mb but sometimes it's only 10Mb. That seems OK anyway.

It does strike me that I probably have no real use for this. My previous connection was 2Mb. That didn't cause me any problems. It was fast enough for everything I did. What do I need this extra speed for? Nothing, as far as I can see. But perhaps it will be useful in the future. Maybe for downloading my robot-cyber-fantasy-bride, or something like that, when technology has advanced some more.

Though the speeded up connection didn't cause any problems, the wireless connection wasn't so easy. I told my internet provider I was a Mac user. They said they'd sent me their router, but don't come complaining to them if it didn't work. Fine. I appreciate your terrific customer service.

But it wasn't too hard to connect. There was a tricky moment, where things hovered in the balance, and my computer seemed to be about to give up the attempt, but the Mac airport assistant rode to the rescue. Now I have this wireless connection, I can move around. But I expect I'll never move anywhere, and will remain sitting at the desk in the exact same spot I always sit in.

I was pleased of having some new technology to play with just two nights ago, when I was woken by an extremely troubling dream. It was so troubling I had to get out of bed. This very rarely happens. I'm not prone to bad dreams. But this was so bad I got up and sat at my desk, feeling tired, but not really wanting to go back to sleep in case I got the dream again. I wonder why that happened? I don't remember being quite so troubled by a dream before.

I don't often remember my dreams. Although only a few weeks ago I did have an had a erotic dream so vivid that I woke up quite astonished, thinking, wow, I wish I could dream like that more often.

This graphic sex dream involved a woman I know, but have never had any romantic involvement with. Later I was sort of tempted to mention it to her, but decided against it. Mentioning it might seem creepy. Or is that a mistake? Might it be a compliment? Is there any sort of established etiquette? I might be having an autistic moment here. It's probably the most obvious thing in the world that you shouldn't mention things like that. But I sort of wanted to.

Probably I just shouldn't mention it. If you are socially incompetent - and I'm fairly socially incompetent - it's best to err on the side of caution. Probably friends don't want to hear you've been dreaming about them. But these tricky social problems will melt away when the robot-cyber-fantasy-brides get here.

Shot Full of Holes

I saw my doctor last week and while I was there I asked him about flu vaccination. I'm still worried about being carried off by swine flu. Unfortunately, while supplies of the swine flu vaccine have started arriving, so far they're only being given to 'priority cases.' Like pregnant women, and infants, and people with health problems. (But I'm an author. Shouldn't I be ahead of these people?)

However, the doctor did tell me that anyone could get a seasonal flu shot, protecting you against other sorts of flu. I sort of grunted, and this grunt meant - 'OK I'll think about it for a few weeks and probably not do anything about it.'

I thought I was being quite clear but strangely the doctor misinterpreted this grunt and immediately pulled out a syringe, and told me to roll up my sleeve. Before I knew what was happening I was inoculated against other forms of flu.

I was perturbed. I don't like medical surprises. I like a long time to think about things. I don't like to take rash actions, like for instance, getting vaccinated when I wasn't expecting it. Afterwards I trudged round the shops wondering what dreadful symptoms the flu shot might cause, and counted myself lucky to make it home before being completely incapacitated by harmful side effects.

But I survived the experience. So I suppose that's something anyway. While I'm still susceptible to swine flu, I am at least protected against various other forms. I've only had flu twice in my life. Readers of my blog may remember that the second time was just last year, and it involved suffering on a scale rarely seen in this world. I endured a terrible period of illness when I was unable to do anything except lie on the couch and watch SpongeBob SquarePants.

* That's what you do all the time anyway. *

Well yes, but this time I was feeling a lot worse than normal. I was sore, feverish, and I felt very sorry for myself, and this feeling sorry for myself continued long after the other symptoms departed.

Here, for no real reason except I like Japanese electronic music with female singers, are Hangry and Angry. They just made a good album, Sadistic Dance.



Really, I’d like to walk around looking like that. For a day or two anyway. It would certainly make life interesting.

Wikipedia tells me that 'Hangry & Angry is a Japanese pop duo ….the group is a collaboration with a Harajuku fashion store, and serves to promote various products, including stuffed toys fashioned after the members.'

OK, nothing artistically dubious about that. It's credible enough for me. I wonder where I can get the stuffed toys?