More and more it seems to me that i don't really like most people. My life would undoubtedly be void and pointless without the ones i do like (many of whom i love), but i think i average about 1 person in every ten that i truly like. Furthermore i reckon a lot more people would come to a similar conclusion if we weren't caught in a world where being "friendly" is considered the way to be. "Friendly", as opposed to Friendly, is that state of being deeply disingenuous,f ake, unopinionated, and just being nice to people, regardless of any real connection with them. the perverse thing about this is it wouldn't be necessary, if people could just get along being polite, and civil; without pretending that they are best mates with people. If anyone's seen Ghostworld (the film), there's a girl in that that embodies this perfectly, running up to the Scarlett and Thora characters, and just shrilling at them "hey, you guys, we should, like, soooo meet up", when its obvious to the watcher and the girls themselves that this is very unlikely. Girls in particular (careful , generalisation coming) are quite bad for doing this. men tend to get quite staggy, or quite silent in the company of people they don't like, or don't know. You could, i suppose, blame adverts, or television, or whatever, but as a society we do seem to consider insincerity acceptable; surely, i find myself wondering, we can get along without it? you know, say hello, be polite, ask questions, try not to offend unless you have to, without all that coming into it. After all human connections are rare and precious, and to behave as if everyone is your best friend is degrading to them, your real friends, and yourself. Maybe its just we fear we aren't liked, or aren't even sure what friendship is. Who knows. Montaigne's essay On Affectionate Relationships says it all, really; its about a meeting of minds, of humours, of souls (whatever they mean). and if i hold you my friend, it is real esteem, not merely acquaitanceship. i do not feel compelled to extend enthusiasm, affection, and excitement on those i do not know, i will extend civility, politeness, and a certain level of interest, but you may have to wait to get the first three. It just isn't given gratis. Few things piss me off more than insincerity. What amuses me most about it, however, is that the worst offenders for insincerity are often the ones who don't get irony, and are quick to take offence. Peculiar.

I had an eye test the other day. Strange things eye tests: you allow a person you barely know to come very close, breathe heavily, and generally make you feel slightly uncomfortable. I don't feel the same strangeness about dental work, maybe because it has that whole surgical air, maybe because when having the eye test, one can see everything. Well, not much of everything; once glasses are removed, lights dimmed, and small light shone in yr eyes, you are only aware of the vaguest of shapes. but it's definitely more invasive, somehow. mine asked me first:

"any problems?"

to which i was about to explain as briefly as i could my feeling of underachievement, alienation, anger at my employers, and occasional loneliness, when she clarified with

"with your eyes, i mean?"

i said not really, but mentioned my occasional reading problems in the evening, then she hands me a board with paragraphs of varying print sizes on it, and asks me to read the smallest. i read it with feeling and gusto, and almost an actor's assurance. she's says its brilliant, and i'm very good at reading. Somehow i always undermine my whole case. the rest of my examination involves me trying to seem fine, whilst not actually lying about anything. It's a bit like an exam for which you don't know the wrong answer.

I even managed to pick a new pair of glasses that leave me safe from appearing like Timmy Mallett.

Having finished re-readings of a couple of Huxley novels, i've come to the conclusion that he is ludicrously underrated.As intelligent, funny and self-aware an author as the twentieth century had.

I contrast this with the sales of books by Jordan, Colleen McLoughlin, and varying shades of misery memoir (you know the sort: Don't Uncle, it Chafes, Friend Of The Family(but not all of them), Death to All Nuns). I may have to write one of my own, explaining how my life was ruined by the lavishing of parental love,abject respectability,comfortable living, reasoned boundaries, and instilling of moral values. Poor Rabid grows up with parents, to be bullied for going on outings with them to a sinister "park", accruing dangerous knowledge at a leisurely pace, and having sickeningly consensual early fumblings with women. Lord knows if I hadn't grown up with this deprived background i could have made some money from writing depressing books about being ass-raped. seriously, i do feel sorry for people who have had these upbringings, but i don't reckon writing badly-written samey memoirs about it is the answer. Now, if they could actually write and wanted to turn them into fiction......

The whole Jordan(or Katie Price, now she wants to be seen as telling the truth; there's nothing like exposing the real you, is there? it was bad enough when she was stripping the outside, the inside is even more obscene) thing is more disturbing, because as far as i'm concerned she is abusing people through ideas. The number of teenage girls and boys who buy her autobiographies (she has three! three!) is really chilling. As a model of the vacuousness of pure celebrity for it's own sake, she is peerless. she has no reason for fame, no good one anyway. and yet she seems to be a role model for people. girls see her achievements as admirable, boys see her as a model for a partner. Despite her being transparently pointless and stupid. Of course the argument could be made that she has made a success of herself on her own terms. but then so does a lucrative prostitute, or a successful criminal. The manner in which we gain our money and fame is surely more important than how much we have. Let us please not pretend that wealth = success, or fame= success. what you're known for, and the attitudes you convey are more important. hands up girls, who is happy having her as model of how to get what you want?? hands up, who wants young girls growing up thinking that sex is the best way to success?

i'm a bit angry, tis true. but it seems to me another example of capitalism screwing women for its own ends. All the just rhetoric of George Eliot, Virginia Woolf, Simone De Beauvoir, and countless others produces Jordan. christ, we're in trouble.

the picture at the top, more than incidentally, is by Grace Hartigan and is called Billboard (1957). a good reminder of what can happen when a person prefers to paint a picture than appear in one.