working towards perfection (and failing)

Tag: katiefinger

that was 2015

TrueFunny.com - New Year funny resolution 2014 wallpaper funny pics

2015 was the year of the Baby Niece. It was also the year of the spiralizer, but no, I don’t own one.

I flirted with the internet, using paying blogging platforms. One just upped and left with $48 of my hard-earned cash and the other is flirting back with me. I go by Poppylicious. My anonymity still means the world to me. I discovered survey sites and earnt lots of Amazon vouchers to spend on Christmas presents. I rock. Sometimes.

The Blokey turned the big Four Zero. Our kidney continues to do well.

I went to Wales. I went to Belgium. I lost weight with Dukan. I enjoyed a bit of Yorkshire hilly regions. We laughed with a real-life Bill Bailey. The boiler broke and then got fixed. The cats don’t argue quite so much anymore.

Work is slightly pants. It might get pantier, it might not.

Yes, I made that word up.

I am going to endeavour to write more here in 2016. I like writing on sites where I get paid, but I sometimes feel that I’m only writing or commenting to make money, and likewise, that people are only commenting on my posts to make a bit of extra cash. That isn’t what blogging is about to me. To me it’s simply about putting a little piece of myself out there, for the world to see. Or not. It makes me feel more valued, gives me a purpose. Besides, we’re paying for this domain; I should use it more often!

So, happy new year. I’ll be spending mine in bed, snuggled up with Blokey because he has Man-Flu. Huzzah!

Keep on rockin’.

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who the fuck is edward cullen?

onceuponatime

… in a not-so far away land, lived a girl with an insatiable need to write about herself for all the world to see.  Oh, she had kept diaries in the past, but these were full of silliness and teenage-angst.  Nobody ever read those diaries. Nobody ever will, until our heroine is dead and buried.  She tried various means of introducing herself to the world at large, but finally settled on Xanga.com.

It was a jovial little place.  The girl let people into her head – warts and all – and they still wanted to be her friend.  This made her feel all squishy inside.  She discovered that the world was very teeny-tiny (one person she befriended was a real life friend of her Baby Brother) and that most folk are completely bonkers and attention-seeking numpties.

She frolicked happily in XangaLand for five and a half years, until the time came to fly the nest. XangaLand shaped the girl into a woman and when her Blokey offered to buy her the katiefinger.com domain, it only seemed fair that it be put to good use.

One day KatieF went back to XangaLand and found that it was gone. GONE! Oh, woe. But it offered our young(-ish) woman the opportunity to download all her posts and save them on her computer.  This she did, and then she made a new blog* and now all her old Xanga posts live there.

At some point she will read through those ancient posts and have a laugh, but for now she’s just happy to have seen an occasional snapshot of a life once lived.

Just who the fuck is Edward Cullen?

(*it did dawn on me a very long time later [today] that i could have just imported them into a page on this blog, but i didn’t.)

#18 – the meaning behind your blog name

imaginaryfriends

Back in the spring of 2000 I bought my first PC.  It was ridiculously expensive but I was proud as punch to have the money to afford it.  The computer took pride of place in my living room in my teeny one-bedroomed rented flat in the centre of Norwich and I very soon discovered the delights of the Internet.

At some point my Baby Brother popped by for a weekend and he introduced me to Yahoo!  But I needed a username.  Hmmm … “What about Katie Finger?” he said.  “Why?” I said. “Because that’s the name you used to write in all your books.” he said.

[this conversation is paraphrased … the year 2000 was a very long time ago and my memory is somewhat hazy of the finer details]

I don’t know if Katie Finger was an imaginary friend or just a name I made up when I played schools with my dolls and my books. We found one of the books a few years later and I was a tad miffed to realise that it should have been Katy Finger.

[i am katyfinger on instagram]

I’m a great believer in imaginary friends and I actually believe they exist.  Yes, I’m a numpty.  I had two (three if we count Katy).  At one point I had a (n imaginary) friend called Geoffrey. He was a boy.  I also had a (n imaginary) dog who may never have had a name because nobody knows what it was.  I used to take him for walks, pulling him on a (n imaginary) lead. This always strikes me as really odd because I’m not a dog lover, and I was a trifle scared of dogs when I was little.  Maybe my (imaginary) dog bit me.

Or something.

So, that’s where the lovely katiefinger came from; a memory rekindled by my Baby Brother. She’s a link to my childhood.

Age creeps up, finds it’s not wanted, buggers off.

Grow Old

I’m edging nearer and nearer to forty. This doesn’t excite me, but doesn’t fill me with dread either.  It’s simply a number after all and (somewhat fortunately perhaps) it won’t be popping up to say ‘Hello!‘ this year. The discovery that my everyday life is full of little foibles which make it apparent that I’m ‘growing up’ is a trifle irksome though.  So, this is my I Know I’m Growing Old Up When … Top Five list.

Rhif Un: Yr angen i fod yn brysur  … It’s Sunday, I’m lounging around and I feel terribly guilty and worryingly slothenly.  I have a desire to actually do something.  I’ve done two loads of washing, cooked a beef dinner, danced like nobody was watching (thank you, Just Dance 2,) enjoyed a very long, ridiculously hot bath and prepared fully for my day at work tomorrow (clothes, lunch, bag all ready).  I’ve even cast on and knitted two rows for a new knitting project, despite not knowing what the knitting project is yet.  It will be (partly) bright pink, is as far as I’ve got.  I’ve drunk copious amounts of tea. I feel idle.  I never used to have this problem; lazy-ness? Yes please, is the response a younger version of me would make.  I’m wasting the day and I desperately want to just waste the day, but I know I shouldn’t be. I must be growing up.

Pocet Dve: Safra … I’ve actually started to physically say ‘Gosh!‘ quite a lot. Who on earth says ‘Gosh!‘ except old(-er) people?

*gosh*

Numero Kolme: Minun mielikuvitusta  … As a child and young person my thirst for reading books which were actually for adults was insatiable. They were grow’d up, had BIG words and sometimes – if I was very lucky – they were a little bit on the naughty side.  When I visit the library/bookstore these days I always make straight for the Young Adult (Plus) Fiction shelf.  Always. It’s like an addiction. I recognise that in many respects I’m simply re-living my teenage years through the characters in a book; I’m a bit of an emo-adult (an emodult?) really. It’s a little bit sad, a little bit pathetic and a little bit ridiculous … almost a way of me trying to turn back time and grab those teenage years again, clinging onto them with the knowledge of what I would do differently.  Because every dark brooding nineteen year old of the male species whom I bumped into would be a Vampire. Or a Fallen Angel.

Obviously.

Númer Fjögur: Hvers vegna svo grátt? … I’ve been dying my hair since I was thirteen.  If I do my sums I imagine that maybe I’ve dyed my hair at least sixty times, if not many more (my maths skills are lacking somewhat). I’ve never had the inclination to be too outrageous; I’ve had bright red streaks a couple of times and gone for the black goth effect on occasion, but usually I’ve stuck to some more subtle shade of red or purple. But just recently I’ve started to think that I should just allow Mother Nature to do her worst and see what happens; she’s usually impressively quick to turn the occasional strand grey and once she gets going she likes to show her capabilities to their full potential.  I’m intrigued to know just how long it will take for my hair to go (completely) grey and if it will look strikingly lovely (it won’t). So, I umm’d and ahh’d and was considering it and then yesterday I chickened out and dyed my hair again.  My excuse is that I have a hen weekend coming up.  The reality is that I’m just a female who doesn’t want to look old.

Yet.

Zahl Fünf: Musik in meinen ohren … There used to be a time when I would have shuddered at the merest thought of actually admitting that I quite like certain music tracks.  Right now I’m listening to Lawson.  And I don’t care what you think about that.  This isn’t to say that my tastes in music have changed dramatically; they haven’t.  I’m still a gothicky (post-)rock chick, but now I sometimes dance in my underwear to stuff I shouldn’t.  And it’s liberating.

VERY liberating.

liar, liar, pants on fire

The biggest lie I’ve ever told, still tell, and will continue to tell for always and eternity, is ‘I’m a good listener‘.

Two things happened at work yesterday which made this apparent in my pretty little head.  The first was a VAK questionnaire I indulged in, simply because it was more detailed than ones I’d done in the past, and because the class I was supporting in were doing it too.  It came as no surprise to me that I’m a visual-kinesthetic learner.  My scores for these are fairly balanced, although I score ever-so slightly higher for visual.  Basically, I like to learn through looking and doing. It also came as no surprise that my auditory score was so low as to be practically non-existent.

I’m the Queen of Switching Off.  I can switch off during my favourite tellybox shows (thus missing important audio clues, but thoroughly enjoying the colourful pictures), in lessons, in meetings, mid-conversation (in person and on the phone) and even when nobody is talking at all.  I’m convinced that when I switch back on again I must go from glazed to panicked because that’s what it feels like in my head.  A typical evening in my house may involve me enjoying Blokey’s company and random conversations.  The conversations may go something along these lines:

Blokey: talks about something amazing
katieF: Mmmm hhhmmm (nods encouragingly)
Blokey: talks about something earth-defying
KatieF: Oh right. That’s great … (smiles encouragingly)

The conversation will continue at some point (possibly the following day, maybe the next week) and will go like this:

Blokey: Well, (name) did (whatever) and we all laughed very loudly because it was smashing
KatieF: Sorry, who?
Blokey: (name)
KatieF: What did he do again?
Blokey: (whatever) … I told you the other day!
KatieF: Did you?  I don’t remember.
Blokey: You never listen to me (whine, moan, stomp off like a teenager having a bad day)

Okay, so he doesn’t stomp off, he just gets a trifle irked.  You would think that after ten years together he should have realised that I switch off sometimes.  He’d do better if he drew me diagrams and made me act out the scenario.

So, that’s why I’m always writing notes, and if I’m not writing notes I’m doodling, because if I’m not listening I must be doing, and if I am listening I still need to be doing or it won’t go in.

That must be the most ridiculous sentence I’ve ever written.

The second thing which occured involved a friend and a meeting, and us leaving the meeting and only me seeing that she was upset about something (that will be my high visual senses kicking in). I comforted her when she burst into tears at her desk and told her that I may be a bit shit at giving advice but I’m a good listener.  Ha, ha. Then she was telling me stuff and my mind started wandering … it took an incredible amount of willpower to fight the glazed expression and the random thoughts from popping into my head. I think I succeeded.  Just.

But it made me realise that I am NOT a good listener.  I’m probably the worst listener in the world.  But I do try my hardest and I want to take this opportunity to publically apologise (anonymously) for not listening to you.

And of course, the first sentence of this post is a lie, because ‘I’m a good listener‘ is not the biggest lie I’ve ever told, still tell, and will continue to tell.  No, the biggest lie I’ve ever told, still tell, and will continue to tell will always be ‘Oh, I’m fine‘ …

It must be that time of year again

My brain has gone poo-ey. 

I started to write a post about family (mine), but I can’t form my words to express myself in a way that makes sense.  It feels as though there’s a little man in my head and he’s trying to pull a big heavy door across my brain, forcing me to spend all my energy on holding him/it back.  I’m sure it’s just tiredness.

Tabatha-Cat has walked off in disgust because I ignored her. 

*sigh*

Just recently I’ve been besieged by forgetfulness.  There was the problem of Hugh Dennis.  It took me the whole of an episode of Mock the Week to remember his blasted surname.  Then there was the problem of which film I’d seen at the weekend.  After two days of being unable to remember (just days after seeing it) I had to ask The Blokey to jog my memory.  It was Surrogates, in case you were wondering.  I’ve just received an email from a friend reminding me that I had promised to send some photos; I’ve known that I needed to email this friend but for the love of goodness I couldn’t remember why. 

Sometimes I sit here and I forget what I’m doing.  I forget words, and I forget what I’m talking about.  I certainly can’t think clearly.  The Blokey has noticed. It’s making me sad.  And it can’t be normal, can it?

Rational Head informs me that it’s simply tiredness and stress, that I’m all wound up like a tenser than tense something that’s tense and eventually it will either a) drain away, or b) erupt quite spectacularly in a very public place.  At the very worst, says Rational Head, it’s mild depression and, says Rational Head, you’ve dealt with that before and you can deal with it again.  Married life has been stressful (not the being married bit; just the significant Big Bits that all seemed to happen because after we got married!) and so I can surely be excused a bit of depression?

Irrational Head is a bit of a minx.  She makes me Google my symptoms.  On the one had this Google lark is good; depression and anxiety can cause forgetfulness.  On the other hand, the one which Irrational Head waves in my face, it’s a tad bleak.  Parkinson’s.  Dementia. Adjustment Disorder.  You’ve got ADD, screams Irrational Head.  She’s probably right. 

The Blokey wants me to go and see the GP (this is the same man who wouldn’t go and see his GP for three years, when it was obvious there was something seriously wrong with him …).  I’m not so sure.  There’s a big part of me which wants to be diagnosed with something (anything) because then I know that I’m right and not just a bit doolally.  But if the GP can’t find anything wrong with me, and is hesitant even to diagnose anxiety or depression, then that would be awful … truly awful. 

In other completely random and totally off-topic news, The Blokey wants another cat.  I know he does because he wants us to visit the animal shelter from whence came Tabatha (and find her a friend).  He says that it’s not him who wants another cat, but me!  Tsk.  So, should we, shouldn’t we … Oh, the decisions!

My pussy needs some attention (and I have a hungry belly) …

The Problem

I have a (vaguely) irrational fear.  Well, I have many if truth be told.  But this is probably the silliest and oddest one.

It concerns katiefinger. 

She was (virtually) born in the July of 2000, the misspelling of an imaginary friend (Katy Finger) who played ‘school’ with me when I was six or seven.  Her birth took place at Yahoo! but over the years she’s spread her (soft and fluffy) wings and found new places in which to nest.  Find a katiefinger and you’ve probably found me.  Not always, mind.

Katiefinger is Elizabeth and Elizabeth is katiefinger.  Elizabeth is quieter and it takes longer to get to know her.  Prod her and she runs.  Slowly seduce her and she’s yours, for always.  Katiefinger is simply the ego Elizabeth would like to have all the time, not just after a) a few drinks or b) when she’s known you (in reality) for more than a few weeks. 

But Elizabeth is also the secretive one, the one least likely to tell you Things That Are Important.  She tries not to gossip and she doesn’t like upsetting people.  She probably cares a lot more than katiefinger does.

Katiefinger has a lot to say.  And she likes to gossip about work and tut-tut at family members and friends who annoy her.  People annoy her lots.   

And therein lies The Problem.

Within the cosiness of the Blogging World, katiefinger has no issue with grumbling, poking fun and laughing at various folk.  But she’s fed up with living a Double Life. 

Or is it Elizabeth who’s fed up with that?

Either way, I want out.  I don’t want to hide katiefinger from the people I know in Real Life.  There are oodles of people who know me online and are happy to accept me (katiefinger.)  There are oodles of people who know me in Reality and are happy to accept me (Elizabeth.) 

Why am I so worried about combining the two?  (I mean, who’s going to read my blog anyway?)  I want a place to hide, but like anyone, I want credit for what I write and how I feel.

*sigh*

So, my irrational fear concerning katiefinger?  I don’t want Real Life people to stumble upon her and realise she’s me.   

(but secretly I do)

(I just wanted you to know)

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