I have a valid reason for disappearing. Actually, several.

First, a lorry rolled over my back and crushed me flat into a painful pancake. Okay, not really, but it sure felt that way. So through the course of Ayuvedic treatment and in between being Cripple and being Okay, I was laid out flat for days. Sitting at a laptop to do anything beyond answering one email at a time was very painful indeed.

Then, as I recovered, we're now going through enormous Panic At the Disco at work as we try to get two books out before the end of the year. It doesn't pay to be lazy, I tell yah. The laziness will come back to bite you on the ass. Real hard. *chomp*

Then I got all moochy and pissed off
at the world in general
at myself
at anybody who came within two feet of me
and wallowed in a bit of my own self-misery for awhile, which made me do really stupid things like go out and buy a bar of chocolate for RM30 (it is unbelievably DELICIOUS though) and watch trashy medical dramas for hours on end.

Life is more interesting when you actually, well, have a life and go out and do things you know.

I decided that it was time to sort out the eternal back pain.

So I've been to an Ayurveda centre - another reason to love India - where I got lovely jubly oil treatments and was legitimately allowed to sleep for two hours in the middle of the day.

It was so so so so so soooooooo nice and I get to do it another 13 times. Yay!

I tell you what. It sure beats the crappy Chinese acupuncture thing I did last year. Let's compare:

The Chinese treatment sticks needles into you in all the most painful places. Treatment is only 20 minutes in a freezing room. The Doctor was freaky and disallows everything in your diet except rice and steamed vegetables for 100 days. And you pay a bloody bomb.

The Indian Ayurdeva treatment pours lovely warm oil down your back (or wherever you're hurting). Treatment is 2 hours in a warm, airy room. The therapist is a jolly Indian lady who laughs a lot and although you have to restrict your diet a bit, it's only for 14 days and they let you eat fruit (the Chinese doesn't) And you don't pay a bloody bomb.

Truly, another reason to love India and feel just that little bit more irritation for the Chinese.

I feel like a really really big giant accidentally stepped on my back.

So painful can die.
So painful I cannot even breathe properly.

And I don't even know why.

When did this pain come from? WHERE?

I made lots of achy noises and stretches in the office today. It was very attention seeking. I wanted somebody to go "Awwww poor thing lah you." Not that that would actually alleviate the pain.

It hurt when I sit on a beanbag, it hurt when I sit on the floor in our chill out room at the office, it hurt when I sat at my proper chair at my proper desk. So finally, I decided that the only way forward was to eat Arcoxia.

I legged to the pharmacy and bought some very precious little chemicals. They were so expensive but heck, I'd spend anything for that pain to go away, please please please.

I don't care what people say about how they wreck your body and they screw up your liver and blah blah. Pharmaceuticals and chemicals and pills are WONDERFUL. I'm now trying to think of creative ways to turn it into a continuous 24-hour intravenous drip. I'll make it myself, dig a hole in my veins, stick the piping through and then live in pain-free bliss.

There are new big projects in the air, which involve me speaking Cantonese and I don't know how I am going to manage that. Takkan I go and pronounce "shoes" the wrong way leh.

I stared at JP and asked, "So why exactly am I doing this?"

He gave a very long explanation, as he always does - very detailed, very precise - and then finally, "Well, we thought you would be good because you look very.... interesting."

I looked at him *blink blink*

Interesting?

I said, "There's two ways you could interpret that!"

That's what people say about strange looking fruit, you know, when they come out as a kind of mix-breed plant. They say, "Oh what an INTERESTING specimen!"

Or when there's something very upsetting about the way that people are doing things in in upper management. They say, "Oh that's a very interesting sort of decision. Hmmm" and they go away and think about it because it is confounding and disturbing.

Well, perhaps I shouldn't be so self-derogatory. If it'll get people to watch, and do, and be enlightened, I'm game. I'll even wear some makeup for the event!

Dear Dollyblog readers,

If you like Dollyblog and you are reading this, please please please help to do something very important.

Read this post by KinkyBlueFairy (who has said it all and very well) and then PLEASE GO HERE to sign the petition to lobby for Better Law for Wildlife in Malaysia.

Animals - both domestic and wildlife - have just about no protection here and the abuse that goes on is beyond terrible. People who commit the abuse against animals suffer very little or no consequences so it is extremely easy for them to get away with immense and frequent cruelty.

Please help to save the lovely animals. Please please sign the petition.

So the evening out was ab ab fab. I mean, really, I was all filled with wonder the whole night long seeing as I haven't been out in a fantastical aaaaggggggge- mainly because there's been a lot going on in my small world/cave and because I'm just too damn lazy. Anything past Bangsar is an adventure all unto itself.

I wore a brand new dress from Beach which is a record-breaker for me. I've never worn anything with so much material all at once. It felt very odd, you know, to feel so decent. Even my mother approved! I was going to make an effort tonight to go out in something other than jeans and Wonder Woman tshirts. I was even going to put on makeup, but as is typical in my life, the makeup pouch was left in the office, so I had to make do with some old cruddy stuff that I dug up from another makeup bag.

Then I was going to put styling stuff in my hair so I don't look like Noddy, but I couldn't find it anywhere. I dropped by parents house before going out and thought that while I was there I would go see if the old man had any good styling stuff. It was all that horrid gel stuff that only people over 50 use. So I had to settle with looking like Noddy.

Okay, so the real secret of going out tonight was to go perve on a boy. Ah but not just any boy! The most beautiful one in all the land! He was hiding behind some drums but I found him! I found him!

I had gone out to this bar the week before with parents for the old girl’s birthday and there was this fantastic bossa nova trio which was just beautiful beautiful beautiful sounds and this absolutely divine looking boy sitting there at the drums. I thought, if only they would dangle that in front of me as a carrot to get to Enlightenment, I’D BE ENLIGHTENED IN A SECOND! Really, if Manjushri decided to pop by earth, he would look like this boy.

So last night I dragged out a poor friend and her husband to go drink wine, listen to more bossa nova and perve on boys at this jazz place. Yay! This has become my new favourite place and I shall be there at least once a week. I intend to become best friends with at least one of the staff there and be so regular that they instantly recognise my voice on the phone when I ring to make a reservation!

The bossa nova trio were on first, followed by another act which was whatever lah, who cares. We got there, squished up on a tiny table and ordered our drinks, after which The Husband almost spilled all his beer on me. He then spent the next half an hour apologising to me even though he hadn’t actually spilled any beer on me. Silly.

Anyway the gig started. Without that boy. And I was all WHERE IS THE BOY? and The Friend was all WHAT! We paid RM40 and the boy isn’t here?!

The two percussionists of the week before had been replaced by a grand piano and a big set of drums. A pianist was a man who looked like he sold duck rice in the day and the drummer was this bad ass looking guy who would have been hot if not for the rotten attitude.

The Friend said, Eh, since your boy isn’t here, at least this drummer also quite cute wat.

I said NO NO NO NO NO. The other one is more beautiful and he has nice, more chiselled features. Wah che, like talking about art.

As the trio played on, The Friend kept saying, Eh not bad wat. He’s cute the drummer! In the absence of the other one I think you should just go for this one lah.

But he had this ugly up-himself smirk on his face the whole way through it and this irritating habit of chewing his gum in a really obvious way. I suddenly had this horrible, horrible thought that he would be one of those guys who just sits all leaning back with his hands behind his head, with this smug righteous look on his face while some girl gives him a blow job.

Ew ew ew

I told The Friend and she looked at me with this really disapproving look. Then she screamed a bit and said Yah you’re right actually.

And five minutes later, Eee yer now I can’t look at him anymore.

Then!

The beautiful boy walked in with his beautiful face and a lovely shirt. He sat down behind The Friend so I told her look – SLOWLY! – at him. Right then the blow-job drummer was doing some schwang solo, scrunching up his face like he was God’s gift to the city.

The Friend screamed just then, EEEEEEEEEE NO LAH The other one is SO MUCH cuter which filled, I’m sure, all the spaces in between drummer boy’s beats that were silent.

I said, OMG! HELLO! I THINK THE GUY UPSTAIRS AT THE BACK DIDN’T HEAR YOU!

The fat old guai lo in the front turned around and gave us a real dirty look. hah.

But after the bossa nova trio finished their set and cleared off the stage, the beautiful boy started moving about with his buddies, setting up for the next act. I was all, Oh! It looks like he’s playing the next set and got very happy.

The Friend and Her Husband finally decided too, that actually he WAS better looking than the blow-job drummer. He looked nicer, he had better features, and The Friend said, He looks like a painting! and we ooh-ed and ahh-ed and felt very young.

The second group was so unexpectedly good it blew us off our seats. I felt bad for being so Oh whatever who cares about it when I first came bceause they were excellent. I mean, you know, objectively speaking. Even without the beautiful boys (yes plural) it was SO GOOD and you all have to come with me when they play again later in Nov. The Husband sat there very still with staring intently at the stage with a very fixed looked on his face. I wondered if it meant he was fascinated or bored, but trying to force himself awake. He said later, If a guy is staring at something like he’s looking at a stripper, it of course means he’s interested lah!

Jamie Aditya, the MTV VJ from Them Days was also there, doing a flashy smashy special guest appearance where he played along with the group for a bit. There were cameras following him around, and panning the room for enthusiastic shots of the audience applauding. This will probably mean that bloated and unflattering footage of me will now end up going out somewhere on some TV when I least expect it. I used to think he was gorgeous, and, as with any boy who’s called Jamie, I run around saying, Oh my god, if I married him, *I’D* be Jamie Aditya. Hah. Up close, he has these fascinating long eyelashes, like an emu. A very pretty celebrity emu.

Not as beautiful, of course, as the Beautiful Boy. I had thought last week that if I wrote a short story about him it might get him out of my system. It didn’t. I all sorts of funny prose running around my head while the gig was on and he was being all lively and energetic and full of general gorgeousness. So I sat and did what I usually hate of writers, which is to scribble all these self-indulgent notes to myself about the shape of the lights in the room and how to describe the background noise in lyrical ways.

After the gig ended, the musicians bounced all around the room air hockey pucks and the audience buzzed about trying to tell them how fantastic they were and how much they loved them. The Friend was so excited she rushed up to the manager and bought their CDs like a Real True Fan. As one of the other drummers passed by our table with a drink, I screamed at him OH MY GOD That was so great! like a crazed fangirl but he was all nice about it, clinked glasses and had a chat. He was also a kind of gorgeousness – the kind that can swash about in flipflops and folded up slacks like a fisherman, and still look good.

We decided to go home, finally, so The Husband went to the bathroom while The Friend and I waited for him near the bar. The Beautiful Boy was standing there drinking water so The Friend hissed very loudly That’s your chance to go tell him how fabulous he is. Go. Now. Go.

If I think someone is remotely attractive, I instantly become this awful pubescent 13-year-old girl again and get all stammer and nervous and forget all my grammar. I faltered and looked around then looked at her helplessly like help-you-know-I-can't-do-that-because-I'm-a-big-chicken but The Friend was hissing in a really violent way, so I thought I’d better go over. NOW!!!! Gooooooooooooo!

I had a wonderful elaborate plan to be all subtle and stylish and casual so I slid next to him in my long slinky dress with lots of decent material and asked the bartender also for a glass of water. I thought that while he fixed the water, I would turn around to the Beautiful Boy in a by-the-way kind of way and say Oh, you guys were fantastic! Really! And gush in a very sophisticated way.

But just then, he turned round and walked away.

The Friend was glaring at me from across the bar with eyes like thunder. But to keep up the sophistication, I had to drink the water lah, like I really wanted to drink tap water because I really was thirsty.

Memang potong stim!!!! I was so mad with that 13-year-old pubescent personality that resided deep within all my split personality(ies).

I shall have to endeavour to say hello. At least. One day. Really. I love to talk so much so I can manage this I think. Really.

It was now 2am and my head was aching from the wine. When you haven’t drunk for ages, one glass floors you completely. (The Friend said, There is a solution to this you know. You just have to drink more and more often! So clever, The Friend).

We went home. I did some complicated file transfer thing with someone 8 hours away in London and had discussions about something I can’t remember anymore. Then I went to bed.

Just as I was falling asleep, I suddenly realised that hey, The Beautiful Boy has this really familiar sort of look about him, like I’ve seen him before. It was 3am at this point and I was exhausted and had to wake up in 4 hours, but it was one of those things which you just have to figure out when you think of it. Like when you need to think of a particular word and won’t rest until you trawl through the whole dictionary to find it. Luckily though I remembered real quick that he looked exactly like this boy Mark, from high school, like 12 years ago (oh gawd, the ageing process is fast and scary).

12 years ago! I was impressed enough that I could remember someone from that long ago and what he looked like. So I HAD to get back online and go through Facebook, find Mark and look at his photos. And yes, yes that’s who it was. A dead ringer for the Beautiful Boy. He’s so good looking he even married a totally beautiful girl – it’s like total beauty karma. I left a manic message on his wall that I found his doppelganger in KL, then went to sleep, contented.

I'm going out tonight for a girls' night out but still feeling more-than-half guilty about it.

We're supposed to be setting up for an exhibition over the weekend so all the KMP elves are heading down to Sunway after 10 to do all the carting back-and-forth of stuff. But but but I'd made these huge plans to go out and I so so so did not want to cancel them.

So I sent this big long pleading grovelling begging message to everyone, please let me know go out tonight and I'll like, volunteer at the exhibition ALLLL WEEKEND
AND
pack up and clear up and cart things back to the office when it ends
AND
clean the office for a month
AND
AND
AND

BUT BUT

if you do still need more hands, please tell me and I will still come to help out.

There's this thing, you see, which I never thought I'd ever get: and that's that responsibility thing. It occured to me that I'm actually starting to see all this - KMP, KH and the whole big family - really as a part of me. Not going to help set up wouldn't actually be such a big deal to anyone else. Before, I would have thought, "Aiyah there's bound to be someone there who will do it" but then after a few years on a spiritual path, I suppose you do start to become a liiiiiiiittle bit more aware about other people and and liiiiiiittle bit less selfish about just fucking off and doing what you want. So I've been thinking thinking thinking 24hoursnonstop about how to make up for really fucking off tonight.

They were all lovely about it. Everyone said, "It's fine. You go ahead with your plans. It's okay wan."

Susan sent a message, "Oh my god you sure are 'trading' in a lot just for one night. haha"

I replied, "Have to have to! Takkan later I kena scolding for being selfish!!!! I don't want to be selfish so I make up for it double double okay. Seriously, is it okay or not?"

She said, "Yes it's okay. haha so funny!"

Okay, so I'm going to have a fabulous night tonight and then I'm going to work my ass, my legs, my liver, my every organ off this weekend at the exhibition. Even if I have to tie all the stock onto the roof of the matchbox car I'm now driving, I'll find a way to clear up the whole exhibition and cart it all back to Bandar Utama!