So what do you call Notting Hill (the film), Facebook stalking and Christmas memories?

 

  

 People; stalking is creepy, even if you’re a cute cat.

     

Three rather random things happened to me on Christmas Night. I laughed at one, quite literally a minute later cried at another and 1 hour later screamed at a screen. A sanity check is probably overdue, but until then people… it is just us.

Zuckerberg, book-face Don, I’m not stalking him, other boys or even my ex-in-laws.

There is this boy; I used to have what could best be described as an on-again-off-again crush on him. In other words I was sometimes attracted to him (like for a week in September… crack neck) and other times (like during the fishing season, I don’t know when that is, making up things now) I was pretty confident that he was a member of the human race but held few strong opinions on him otherwise. I barely know him (so the crush when on was superficial), meet up with him rarely and am pretty sure he is gay. The last one is technically factually incorrect but it hurts my ego to suggest otherwise, as it would mean that he has not made a move on me why exactly?

In any case I went through the most unfortunate 6 weeks where I just kept bumping into him everywhere, it got quite ridiculous. I used to date heavily and used to go through a number of boys of ‘interest’ so my friends, unable to keep up with names tend to just have nicknames for them. This schmuck became known as ‘ Oh yeah, the one you’re stalking’… muppets. It got worse as then my friends started bumping into him too, they suggested that they could send me regular texts with his whereabouts to aid me in my ‘stalking’. I was further amused by the fact that social media seemed to be in cahoots too; twitter thought it appropriate for a week straight to, oh ever so passively, suggest that I should ‘follow him’. I am NOT preparing my defence.

Just to be clear the boy is NOT Zuckerberg (above). This story has been greatly abridged, you have lives.

So it appears that Facebook locked me out on Christmas Night. To get in I had to answer my security password or switch on my phone or identify my friend’s pictures. Switching my phone on involved getting the re-charger… fuck that. I fail security questions all the time… it would appear that setting sarcastic answers to security questions may be funny at the time but sarcasm is inevitably hard to ‘call back’. Pictures it was. The first picture I was asked to identify, the very first one of 5, of all my 100s of bloody friends, 100s, was….

Was I stalking him? Had I just not told myself??

  

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I was tickled.

How, how was that possible?! I give up, clearly the universe is conscious and I should just stop fighting my sane urges and stalk him in 2013, crush or no crush, it can become my side project. It made me wonder about the nature of coincidence; does our mind only notice coincidence when it means something to us? May be 7 blue trucks go past us every time we walk past Old Street station in the morning but we have never noticed because blue is not the colour of our parent’s divorce or a truck at Old Street is not what drove over our dream of being the Queen of the Cabbage Patch dolls at 20 10 years old?

More cats stalking. Only specialised Facebook stalking.

The thing I don’t get is Facebook’s criteria for these 5 people. These 5 are not people I Facebook stalk (don’t even pretend you don’t do it!), as there was 1 guy on there I can barely remember, plus I don’t facebook stalk this douche… ok once in a while I show a little curious interest, the kind of appropriate level of state sanctioned curiosity that keeps me interesting… and informed. But here is the thing, my sister, who I interact loads with, was on there. I suddenly had an epiphany, it was Christmas day after all, may be what has been going on is simple… this douche was actually the one doing the stalking. THAT was it! Sigh of relief, I now have 2 stalkers (yeah bitches, I already have one) and my subconscious has not been stalking some poor boy. Yep yep that is it!

That is NOT it.

*sigh*

*bang head on table repeatedly to ‘call me may be’*

Then once into Facebook, still giggling, I read my ex-niece-in-law’s status. She was just lamenting on all the people they have lost recently. I welled up, you can have an ex-husband but as many of us know it is so much harder to have an EX family-in-law; there is something about the dynamic that means that if you were a close family you still feel so attached and often feel artificially ripped from them. I lost the people that she listed too, I really had. They were my family, people I dotted on and adored, who were loved and loved me back. As I kept reading she listed one family member that I didn’t know very well. I did not know that he had died. No one had told me. Andrew (my ex) is a nice guy but how the hell had he thought it was ok not to tell me, I talk to him every so often and ask him about the family? Not much else to say, it was upsetting.

Facebook has become the main way for me to check up on the ex-in-laws, there are enough of them on there for me to know everything is ok and to get an insight into their antics, mischief and heartbreak. It is all I am allowed I suppose, as it is too painful and raw for both sides to still be close. It kills me, I see a beautiful quilt and I want to take a picture to send my ex-mother –in-law, she collects them and I miss being an aunt to the nieces and nephews, playing even disciplining. They say when you get married you are not just marrying a person but a family, divorce is the same and if you really loved the family and were loved that really sucks.

An hour later my dear friends, who I am staying with, suggested that we watch Notting Hill, I have watched it once before but a long time ago. Here is the thing, he falls in love after meeting her three times, people actually buy this shit, I mean this film made Hugh’s career! 

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What a load of bollocks!

Yes I agreed with my friend that the characters were really well-developed and that the shots often smart but what bull is this about a guy being in love with a girl after only meeting her 3 fucking times? Who wrote this stuff and how emotionally immature and redundant are they? No one, male or female, is in love after 3 meets. You might be infatuated, you might be in lust, hell you might be in serious like… but love… give me a break.

I can see myself ranting about this for some time so instead I will just make the following ‘succinct rants’:

• Does anyone really genuinely believe this?
• Only teens think they are in love after 3 dates, IN FACT teenage girls can declare it after one. Hell I was declaring my undying teenage love for a guy because he ‘looked’ at me at lunch.
• Guys are even less muppet like than girls on these things, Hughie get a grip.
• The notion that then in 2 mins having not shown any serious medium to long-term dating they show their whole lives flash before them… #bullshit

Is it me, is this the divorce, so unopen to love after 3 meets? Nope, you know what that is just about muppetry.

Plus plus plus… Julia Roberts was a cow in that film. Cows don’t deserve love.