Elevator Music?

‘I used to always get embarrassed in interviews,’ she says, ‘when people asked me what my hobbies are, because I have none. But recently I realise that I do: taking dead pictures of myself. Other than that I have no hobbies.’

‘Being awesome,’ Neil Gaiman suggests. The crowd cheers.

‘Being awesome,’ says Amanda Palmer, ‘is not a hobby. It’s a way of life.’- Quotes rearranged into prose from singstotrains

I think I need new books but I'm too lazy to browse through the shelves in the local library and can't quite be bothered to figure how the book search function works.

It has been a quiet week so far.

I've landed my first ever 'real' job at a costume shop, something which I enjoy telling people.

People:Where do you work?

Me: [happily] At a costume shop!

But only because it goes with all sorts of whimsical nonsense of pretend and dress up. Which I am of course obligated to do, secretly, in the store room, trying on random wigs and wondering whether I would ever dare to go blonde.

The store room is I suppose, exactly as I imagine it would be. Creepy mannequins that stare contemptuously down at you during the day in nothing but their strange smooth body ("You don't mind looking at lingerie do you?" I am asked quite seriously on my second day of work. I say 'no' and then kind of wish I hadn't because, really what would they they think of me now?). Then there are stacks and stacks of boxes that contain masks and wigs and you know, costumes. Sometimes, I am suppose to do stock taking. This is not fun.

The shop takes orders from all around the world. Which is why I found myself answering a phone call from Canada who wanted, quite desperately, to know why the masks for her wedding hadn't arrived yet.

I am not good with people. I know this now.

Apparently, I am not good with credit cards either because of the 5 cards I have tried to transact, 3 of them have been declined. The owner reassures me that it is because their card has gone over the limit "But we don't tell them that," he says cheerfully, "we tell them they have got their expiry date wrong!"

The owner is... Have I put through the theory that life imitates art much more often then the other way round? As it is, the owner is quite like Edna Mode, small, large glasses, fluent in English, German,Italian and Spanish. Also, he likes classical music, which I agree with. Then, he asks me which composers I like and I pull the usual culprits out of the bag (Beethoven, Mozart, Bach). In truth, I know this only because for most of my life, these are the only classical musicians that have been mentioned and were relentlessly indoctrinated during music class.

Nonetheless, I get the (almost word for word) what an unusual teenager I am speech and how no one ever listens to classical music anymore.

:/

However, I get away with playing Death Cab for the rest of the evening which he seems to enjoy at any rate. *shrugs*

So, this is my holidays. Working quietly at a costume shop, listening to music and thinking about getting new books at the library.

Oh my god, I'm going to turn into one of those cooler-then-thou indie teens and then the world will end in a great raging battle of good and evil with the plants winning and we'll all relocate to Mars only to discover that there are martians living there already.

And they hate us.

Then, we get vapourised.

Someone save me.