Sinister, I'm disappointed in you. When I joined you, all those years ago, I knew that it was easy to divide the world up. There are many ways to divide people. For example, everybody falls into one of three groups: those who can do maths, and those that can't. Similarly, I assumed the world could be divided into the people who were on Sinister and those who weren't. I was having a chat with The Boss the other day. The Boss used to be an anthropologist, and we talked about how anthropologists and computer people are similar in that both vocations tend to attract outsiders. Anthropology attracts outsiders because it legitimises the whole idea of being an outsider; you're hard at work studying and analysing all the normal people. Don't ask me about computing. When I joined, I assumed Sinister was a natural place where outsiders would congregate. And, primarily, it seemed to be. There are lots of reasons why I'm not normal, but the one I want to concentrate on here is relationships. Normal people have relationships like they drink water. They meet someone, and suddenly, bang, they're going out. They know what to do to get from Point A to Point B. It all happens naturally; they don't need to think about it. It's in their blood. I'm one of those people who can't do that. It doesn't happen. The bridge between my mind and another's never appears. And I kind of assumed that most of Sinister was like that too. Recently, though, I've found that I got it all wrong. All B&S fans except me are deep in "loving relationships". Nearly everyone on #sinister, it turns out, is seeing someone. They can just chat to each other a couple of times and suddenly know that they love each other, that they are made for each other, that everyhing will be all right. That just doesn't make sense. I've even seen people being all romantic and couply at sinister picnics. It's a horrific, awful sight. Holding hands and looking at each other starry-eyed and everything; it makes me shudder. What am I missing, that stops me from being with someone? Why can't I form any sort of contact with the normal people out there? So now, I think I'm the only single person left, and with no hope of that ever changing. It's a lonely place. xx caitlin -- More whinging like this at: http://www.joannou.net/topofthestairs/ The Sinister Recipe Tree Archives, at: http://www.joannou.net/topofthestairs/sinifood/ "When life gives us lemons, we just sit there and sulk about it, in the corner of the room, in a fetal position." - Matthew Henderson, on the Sinister mailing list. +-------------------------------------------------------------------------+ +---+ 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 +-+ +-+ Snipp snapp snut, sa var sagan slut! +-+ +-------------------------------------------------------------------------+