So, for a long time people have been saying to me that I seem to always have a new phone, and I always laugh it off. Surely I don’t really change that often? Well, I decided to look over my purchased/contracted/inherited phone history and… well… the results aint that pretty.

So, from the top of my phone ownership, I present to you: My call history; or Fifteen years in technology hell.

Dates are approximate. I’m sad enough to remember every phone, I’m not quite sad enough to remember the exact dates (“It was a sunny afternoon in the height of Spring…”)

1998: Sagem MC820 – Apparently could text, but didn’t have a phonebook.

2000: Nokia 5110- It had snake. I loved it. First phone I bought for myself, when everyone else had 3310’s. Used it til it packed in.

2003: Nokia 5210- The “toughphone”, inherited from a friend. Used until my mother put in in the loft accidentally (I later gave it to my ex when it surfaced years later)

2003: Sagem MY x-6 - Man, it was amazing. It took photos and had alarms and everything. Used it til the battery gave up, and unable to replace it I upgraded it to…

late 2004: Motorola V220- Which was awful. Truly awful. Just one of the worst experiences of a mobile. I held on til uni time, where I got a contract, and…

June 2005: Samsung d500- My first “iconic” phone. It was good, but I wish I’d waited the extra week (not even kidding) to get the Sony Ericcson K750, but that does come up later. Made me realise I don’t much like sliders. Used until stolen. Swines.

December 2005: Treo 600- Oh my god. Everyone laughed at me for carrying such a brick, but it was one of the best phones I have ever owned. Just amazing. Touchscreen, keyboard, threaded messaging, long before the smartphone boom took over. Incredible. I used this until I got cut off from orange (again, the swines) and got tempted to the dark side…

September 2006: Motorola SLVR RED- Crap. Beautiful, but awful user experience. When it stopped picking up calls, I started using…

January 2007: Nokia 3100- A friends old phone, that I used as a spare for a long time. I then let a friend borrow it… and never saw it again.

August 2007: Motorola RAZR- Which was great. Truly a great little thing. Did everything it needed to. Stayed until I left Vodafone at the end of my contract for always overcharging me (the… you get the picture), and finally inherited a…

November 2007: Sony Ericsson K750- Well, a D750 to be precise. Great little phone, but being an inherited relic, it didn’t last that long. I went to the phone store and got…

December 2007: Alcatel Mandarina Duck- Another contender for my favourite phone ever. It was a clamshell. It was bright green. It had a bauble. I loved it more than anything. Unfortunately, being quite cheap, the keyboard just gave up. I tried to get a replacement, but seriously, these bitches are like gold dust. If anyone has one, get in contact.

May 2008: Nokia 2610- The cheapest phone I could find. I used this for the longest time. Far too long, considering you can’t actually see the screen in any sort of light at all. In the end I cracked and upgraded to…

June 2008: Nokia 5300- or the “doctor Mario” phone (it looked like a pill. Shut up). I liked this one, but I still don’t quite get sliders. I eventually ditched it to go back on to my current contract (I know right)

October 2008: Motorola ROKR e8- I STILL OWN THIS. Well, sort of. As of a few days ago, my current boyfriend was using it, but it may have finally given up. Good innings though. I used it for a long while actually. It’s really blooming good. Well. I did cheat on it briefly with…

May 2009: LG Cookie- Which I hated and gave to a friend after about a month. This taught me that I hate touchscreens. It was an expensive and foolish purchase.

2009ish?: Samsung E2110- A bit of a side note. I can’t actually remember when I bought this, but I got it solely for Orange Wednesdays and giving the number to people I wasn’t sure I should be dating. I paid £5 for it, and it’s more than paid for itself over the past years.

November 2009: Samsung E2120- One winter, I dropped my ROKR in the snow and thought that was that. So I went to the o2 shop and got myself this £10 gem, which I still have as my backup (the fella has it at the moment… I don’t trust him with it). Best feature is the fact that it plays radio without headphones. Brilliant.

March 2010: Nokia X3- I bought this to go to India when I realised my little Samsung was dual-band. Used it right until I washed it. Oops.

June 2010: Sony Ericsson w995- I borrowed this off my mum because I was going through a difficult breakup and I kept finding reminders of my ex on my phone. Seriously.

September 2010: HTC Desire- I decided to take the plunge and get some high technology. And you know what, it was a total hassle. Yes the phone could do everything, but I had 3 motherboard failures on the model in the first 2 months. I stuck with it for a longish time though, so I guess it wins points there. Finally, last month, the touchscreen broke, and the bill to fix or replace it was higher than I was willing to go.

November 2011: Nokia E5. My current phone, inherited as I needed email access. Reminds me a lot of my old Treo. Surprisingly, I quite like it. For now.

… I think I have commitment issues.

Not a long one this time, mainly because all I really want to say has been said very well here, and because I've been all over twitter with it over the past few days. There's just a few things I want to say, regarding why it's important for me, personally, and why I'm not going to just let it go.

Let's talk Sherlock and, specifically, Irene Adler. Before we start, yes, there are tons of television shows out there that are worse for their representations of women. Lets be plain here; Steven Moffat is not some crazed mysoginist with a need to punish women through media. There is a surprising amount of it about, but he is not one of those people. Those people are beyond worrying about, and not worth talking about. They have that viewpoint, nothing I'm going to say would change that (primarily because in their eyes, I'm not a real person). What really worries me is that I honestly do think Moffat is doing his best job at representing women, by having them in the spotlight, by allowing (at least some of them) some sexual agency, and simply by giving them some truly cracking dialogue. It feels like here is a worrying blindspot, rather than anything active. What's missing is the key final ingredient; if you swapped out [female character] for [male character], would it feel the same and carry the same story? The answer is no. Not at all.

My problem was solely in the climactic moments of the episode. As I put it in an earlier rant:

In the original, she outsmarts Holmes and earns his respect. Here she is undone by her feelings for him, then rescued. Not cool.

It was a similar feeling of disappointment that I got with the Doctor Who Christmas special, in seeing the "magic of the mother". The sentiment of "Look at this amazing, powerful woman!" was, I suppose, lovely, but it came rather crushingly with the message "She has so much power men can never have, because of her womb!". If you put a woman on a pedestal, you are making her an object. And you know what? If you place all power of woman in her ability to produce offspring, you are also telling child-free women (or women that cannot concieve) they hold no power.

I don't want to be laying in to Sherlock or indeed Who. Both give me a lot of joy. Of course I don't think that Sherlock is bad, because it isn't. It's wonderful. It's challenging, beautifully written, with excellent acting, a wonderful art style... I could go on. I had a ridiculous grin on my face for most of it. That's why things like this come as a blow. It's one thing for some sitcom to use stock characters, but when a gorgeous, thrilling gem like this falls, it falls hard. 

There's more to be said on the subject I'm sure, but, not wanting to go in to spoilers, I can't really specify the changes that need to be made. The bottom line is simple. It's not going to ruin my enjoyment of the works of one of possibly the most exciting and dynamic writer in television. But it is going to dampen it. Above all, I think it is important to be active in our disapproval, rather than develop a blindspot to it. Then nobody wins.

So right now I'm packing my things to return to London. And I can't wait.

I have an odd relationship with the city, being a poor person. As somebody who has never had what my family would call a "proper" job, i.e full time, with some sort of growing pay rate (I'm sure I'll come back to voice my distrust of such things another time) I can't really afford London, and therefore have lived in some of the "roughest" parts of the city. I can't afford to go out often, and therefore spend a lot of my time in my rather small room in my flat. Travel costs, you see. Not as much as outside of London, but enough to make a difference.

It's very hard to explain what you miss about London, until you're in this particular position, like I am, counting down the hours to return. When I'm there, sometimes I wonder why I'm bothering; I obviously can't afford to keep up with London, I mean next to nothing in the eyes of the big city, and, as a lot of my friends have found out, even if I did work full time I would still not really have enough money to enjoy life here. I've been thinking for a long time about the practical choices, and am facing them now, and am filled with heartache at the idea of quitting the city.

What makes London so magical is, in a way, it's overwhelming humanity despite the harshness. The fact that some of the greatest minds in the world flock to it. The fact that you can pay a fiver to go upstairs in a pub and witness some of the finest storytelling of your life. The ability to go see some of the most important artifcacts in the world for free in the museums. The walks, oh God, the walks. Nothing for me beats getting lost in London. Turning the corner into what seems like another world. The only thing that excludes me is money, but I don't feel that as harshly as when I return home.

I am very fortunate to have a group of very close friends whom I love. Dearly. I spent last night with most of them, ushering in the new year, and was struck by how happy I was in their company. We have all been friends since school, some of us since birth, and they remind me of all the positive things about myself, and indeed, about relationships. Returning to the town without them there feels like returning to a burnt out world. I cannot afford to live in this town in a way completely different to London. Rather than a lack of pounds, it is a lack of culture. The nearest accessible theatre, in fact the only accessible theatre, is half way back to London again in Stevenage. There are no galleries, no museums, in fact barely any shops within walking distance. The one great saviour is the walks; the town sits on the ancient sand hills, with beautiful stretches of woodland. But, strangely, I don't feel any enrichment from taking these walks. I feel that I have nothing to link it to.

London and I will likely be parting in June, in time for the Olympics. I don't think I could stay in the city for that time, and practicality is slowly but surely winning out. It's time to find what can support me, a way of affording the years ahead, of compromise on dreams. My partner is moving away from the U.K at this point also, and we have (so far) agreed to part on friendly terms then. I will also have come to the end of the majority of the taught classes of my degree. I want to make sure that all of those things are softened by the knowledge that I made the most of them.

My resolution for the new year is simple; enjoy the next six months as much as possible. Take in all I can from everything I care about. See the people I love. Enjoy the city I love. Enjoy being the "playwright" and not worrying about the next step. And seeing where it takes me.

Happy new year everyone x

So I've deleted all my other blogs and joined posterous. Well, I say I've deleted my other blogs; I still have a Tumblr. Though I don't know if I'd class Tumblr as a blog, more as a craplanding party. I have so much crap over there, seriously.

The reason I wanted to start blogging again is pretty simple; new year, new thoughts, and hopefully less censorship. I wanted a clear, easy way to share my thoughts with people. And. Well. Here we are.

2011 has been a very odd year for me, kind of like a long-press of the reset button on my life. I had a lot of healing to do after 2010, and it really did take me the whole year. Now I'm back on track, or at least wobbling over the tracks, ready to get things back on the right way.

I hope that this blog will end up being entertaining, if only for me!