The snick of the balls...

Yes, it's Masters time!

I can't help it, I love watching snooker. I'm dead against all other sports, but snooker has an acceptable level of exertion as far as I'm concerned.

I was unsurprised to see Peter Ebdon walk all over Steve Davis today. Steve's not been playing the best for a while now, he may just be past it (gasp!). Although I wanted him to batter that baldy bastard Ebdon...

Enough about snooker! It's not exciting for most people and certainly not the reading about it.

I'll tell you a story:

Last night after I'd done some ferocious blogging and blog-surfing I began to potter home. I was feeling a little disorientated, as one often does after spending hours gazing into the Screen of Doom, and I was just wandering along in my wee daze listening to good ole boy Marilyn Manson when someone jumped out in front of me bearing a big smile and extending their hand. Now, I'm not the sort of person to be overtly rude to people, I often find myself involved in long, drawn out conversations with beggars, charity collectors and librarians about how much money I have, so I stopped.

I figured this plump American was probanly trying to hit on me for Tsunami Relief money or something, and she would've been on a hiding to nothing, that being precisely what I had in my pocket. But I'd stopped before I knew what I was doing - I'd committed, so I thought I may as well hear the sob-story.

"I'm only training," she said, no doubt to make me feel more comfortable about the guy standing behind her. I wasn't all that concerned.

"I'm doing a bit of fundraising," bells and sirens clanged and screamed in my head, so it was a money thing... "I don't have any," I said, reasonably, and truthfully. I didn't have any money. "Oh, please, just listen to my story..." She pleaded, so I shrugged. Go on, my body language said, and she did.

"Do you have any piercings?" Suddenly I'm on the back foot. Piercings? Questions? Is this a survey? "No..." Came my wary response...

"(slightly disappointed) OK, well, you see..." The tale unfolded, "I may have got my nipple pierced a while ago (May have?! Surely it's a black and white issue!) and it kind of got infected and I had to have it removed..."

"That's terrible," I said. And in my mind it was! Nipples don't deserve that kind of treatment, they should be cherished!

"Yes," she continued, "and so now I'm trying to raise money to get reconstructive surgery done, because it's really affecting my self-confidence and... And... And..."

The story probably continued with a bit more wheedling and pleading, but I wasn't really listening. In the end I made my excuses and buggered off, completely confused. I spent the entire walk home wondering if it really had happened. Had I imagined the whole thing? Why would someone say such things to me? Why would they be so mean?

If you read yesterday's entry, you'll already know how I was questioning my existence and this threw me into deeper worry. Was this some agent of the Real World trying to alert me to the flimsiness of my constructed consciousness? Was she actually looking for money? What was going on?

If you're reading this, mystery nipple-less American, I'd really like to know.

For anyone else, no, I did not make it up. Unless I'm actually having some sort of breakdown, because I'm certain it happened.

And, for the record, I wouldn't be all that concerned about having some random woman's nipple rebuilt anyway. I'm pretty sure I'll not be reaping any of the benefits.

Here's the V for Vendetta poster I was trying to put up yesterday:



Ahem, it appeared once and vanished... What happened? I do not know... I will leave the little box there just in case it decides to expand into a lovely picture of V again.