Have you ever been reminded of something out of the blue and suddenly become totally obsessed with it again? A book? A movie? A band? For me, at the moment, it's a band; LUSH God, someone happened to remark that the Lush "Best of..." album was pretty good and I ended up diving into the box of all my old tapes at the back of the closet until I had dug up all my old Lush albums. It doesn't get much more lovely than Lush's SPLIT album, which includes classics like "Kiss Chase", "Light from a Dead Star", and the utterly crushing "When I die". And let's face it, "Ciao!" is the best break-up song EVER! So, now that that's out of the way, what should I be on about? Ian said: "you'll be pleased to know. L7's "pretend we're dead" is playing in the background and it seems appropriate" Bastard, you're the one that stuck those Beatles tunes in my head too, now I have to go diving back to my tape box and dig out HUNGRY FOR STINK and BRICKS ARE HEAVY. Honestly, L7 mentioned on the Sinister list, I'm only slightly less suprised then when Ministry was mentioned. I already had "Can I Run?" pounding in my head at the mention of L7. (that was a brotherly 'bastard', btw, meant with affection) Ahh, the songs of my youth... Idleberry mentioned the Corduroy Smoke message board, and you should all go there, because it is ace. Sarah Clarke earned a special place in my heart when she said of the Smiths; "It's even better when the batteries run out and you can stop listening to that whinging old git with flowers stuck up his arse" Beautiful. She also mentioned McCarthy, and it's nice to see that someone else remembers them. I think I still have a copy of THE ENRAGED WILL INHERIT THE EARTH somewhere around here. Robin Stout said; "I've been *dancing* to I'm Waking Up To Us." It's extremely danceable isn't it? Sadly, I've got it in the car right now, and driving and dancing don't go entirely well together. Archel (and others) mentioned the original animated form of Lord of the Rings, and I have to add that it is indeed ace. Rotoscope animation is the type of animation used, I believe. It makes the thing look a bit freaky doesn't it? The follow-up was the Return of the Kings animation, but it wasn't done in the same style or by Bakshi, and it's utter shit. Rachel (Sunset) had some god things to say about happiness, and I can't think of any better way to put what she said. All the points she made about happiness are the straight truth. She said: "the moments of happiness have overtaken the moments of sadness and I find myself believing that things could be ok. just that little bit more" ...and that's beautifully true. That's life. Joe made five points about his problems with Goths, and I'm not giving Joe shit, cause I dig where he's coming from, but the thing is that I can replace the word "Goths" with "indiekids" or "christians" or "frat boys" and all those points could still be considered true. Yeah, most goths are annoying, so are most indiekids, so is anyone defined by an 'image'. I mean, the whole pancake make-up and black lipgloss and stuff is really kind of silly, but then again, some of those too twee for school indiekids can look and be just as stupid. Let's face it, the indieboy listening to his Smiths tape and banging on about how the world is full of betrayal and falsehood as he scribbles out bad romantic poetry into his notebook is just as much a twat as the goth banging on about death and twilight and such as he listens to some shit goth trance metal on his headphones. Joe did say he thought it was just an attempt to pull, and of course it is, most of those 'images' are an attempt to pull. nafees said: "i used to think george bush looked like a monkey, now around christmas his ears have changed and he looks like an elf" Bad enough he looks like an elf, does he have to talk like he's running a fucking Dungeons & Dragons game? "We will defeat the EVIL ONE!! We will crush the EVIL!! Colin! Roll your D20 to see if your vorpol blade kills the EVIL TERRORIST GOBLIN!" The fuck is wrong with him? EVIL ONE? Is he reading the draft script for Lord of the Rings? I keep expecting Gollum to slouch out from behind the podium or something; "Precioussss? I waaants my precioussssss..." Rachel Fruitloop said: "most everything I have to say in this post is smutty or ridiculous" Thank goodness, there's been an annoying lack of smut on the list lately. Where is the smut of the old Sinister I know and love? Hmmm, a lot of people have said a lot of things about Christmas depression and how much they hate Christmas and I can see where they're coming from. But Christmas, like everything else, is what you make it. I will say that like Rachel, I started liking Christmas a lot more once I was old enough I could decide whether I wanted to go my relatives or not. I always hated half my relatives, and I certainly hated going through the motions of having to pack myself into a car and drive off to their houses or entertain them at mine. And being an atheist at Christmas can be annoying, but I moved beyond my angry atheist phase and into my amused atheist phase. The whole commercialism and capitalistic angle of it used to dig at me to, then I realized that it didn't matter. I'd give prezzies to my friends and the people I wanted to and that was it. I've already said how I think of Christmas as Santy Claus day, sure it's just a day like any other, but I'll be damned if I let anyone get in the way of me enjoying myself. Like just about everyone, I've got a lot of negative experiences tied up with the holiday season, and that part of it's always hard, but it's not so very different from the rest of the year. Plus, there's that little punky boy inside me that insists that no one is going to spoil his day. Fuck all the commercialism and religious idiots and crap false sentimentality, I will enjoy myself because I won't let the bastards win. There's been a lot of talk of love and friendship and betrayal and the like on the list again, and I'll be damned if I have anything earth shattering to say on the matter. I've got lots of stories to tell about being screwed over, about love and friendships falling through and fucking up, and I guess I could dwell on them, but they're past. The holidays do get me down, because I start thinking about people I miss, and you start thinking about regrets and all that. A girl I loved very much killed herself not long ago. It didn't come as much of a suprise. She'd been dead almost two months when I found out, a mutual friend told me. We'd dated for a short time years ago, right after high school, and one night we were kissing and I slid my hand up her sleeve and felt the scars on her arm. She was a cutter, and she'd use a razor to carve herself up. Quite badly too. She had carved words like 'hopeless' into her arm. You'd never have known it from looking at her, she'd always wear long-sleeved shirts to cover the scars for one thing. She was a gorgeous young girl and she had a smile like you wouldn't believe. She cut because she said she didn't feel any control in her life, and she hated herself because she blamed herself for what her father had did to her when she was younger. And she told me, quite calmly, that she'd kill herself for real someday. We drifted apart, for various reasons, mainly because she couldn't handle a relationship and I didn't think I was helping, because I was just confusing her. The night I found the scars, we had talked in the back of a coffee shop, and we kissed and held hands and she said she never wanted to let go of my hand, and she didn't let go of my hand until we were at her house. She let go of everything a few years later. I knew another girl who'd been badly abused. Her father had once broken three of her fingers with a hammer because she'd shoplifted. She had a lot of problems emotionally, but we used to work together and she'd make me laugh every night, and she survived and she's got a family now and a kid and she's happy. My best friend recently announced he's having a baby, and he's got a great wife and a great job and he's one of the nicest, most stable people you'll ever meet, and once upon a time he'd told me he didn't want to live to see twenty-one and he devoured every drug he could and did everything he could to make sure he wouldn't. Then one day he met someone he could love and he cleaned himself up and now he loves life with a passion you wouldn't believe. The good and the bad. That's life, how you deal with it and how you take it. I do get sad at this time of year. The hypocrits and their false love and joy they plaster on just for show, and the commercialism, and the lonely people I see and talk to, and all the sadness that goes along with the holidays, even though were not supposed to notice it or mention it. Fuck that noise, there's a better world out there, behind all the bullshit. Find the people, and places, and things that make you happy and hold onto them. We only get one shot at life, so enjoy it. None of us are alone, just look at this list, everyone goes through the dumps and gets the short end of love and everyone gets the highs and the lows. We're all living inside the same skin, dealing with all the little horrors of being human. I'm nearing the rambling stage I'm afraid, and I've fallen into seriousness and sad bastardy near the end of the post. Ah, bugger it, the old hippie inside me is showing. Cheers and shouts to Laura Llew, Kirsten, Rachel Fruitylooper, Elise, and the rest of my friends. And a tip of the glass and happy thoughts to all the lonely people, I know things might suck, but there's better things out there, and I hope you all find them. Jim _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp +-------------------------------------------------------------------------+ +---+ Brought to you by the Sinister mailing list +---+ To send to the list mail sinister@missprint.org. To unsubscribe send "unsubscribe sinister" or "unsubscribe sinister-digest" to majordomo@missprint.org. WWW: http://www.missprint.org/sinister +-+ "sinsietr is a bit freaky" - stuart david, looper +-+ +-+ "legion of bedroom saddo devotees" "peculiarly deranged fanbase" +-+ +-+ "pasty-faced vegan geeks... and we LOST!" - NME April 2000 +-+ +-+ "frighteningly named Sinister List organisation" - NME May 2000 +-+ +-+ "sick posse of f**ked in the head psycho-fans" - NME June 2001 +-+ +-+ Nee, nee mun pish, chan pai dee kwa +-+ +-------------------------------------------------------------------------+