The Daytime Shame Syndrome

A weekday off from work has a lot to be said for it, we all crave it, personally I'd kill for it, but when I finally have one, an interesting psychological occurrance takes place.

Since I was a kid (I'm obviously kidding, I was born like Athene, fully grown and ready to talk back to my parents), it's been imbedded in my upbringing that running loose in the daylight hours on weekdays is bad. Why, I never really understood, it may have something to do with too much enjoyment, empty shops with nobody in your way, no queues, no pervs trying to feel you up on a crowded bus, and thus, something oh so sweet is also oh so bad and forbidden.

So I went to school, I went to more school, and I started working, all in the daytime. In my job I have to work every other weekend, which means that I, every other week have a weekday off to compensate (like a boring tuesday night can really compensate for a moist, regrettable saturday night of not knowing where the hell you are). Thus leaving me free to roam around as I please for a whole day.

At first I was excited, woohoo, I'll go walking, go scare some kids or grannies at the park, but you quickly realise that you wake up nearly as late as they go to bed, and when you do get up, you're too afraid to go outside. What if you see someone you know on just a greeting basis, and they think you are unemployed or homeless, or slightly prostitutional, because let's face it, who else roams the streets on weekdays except freaks and mothers with their babies? And you certainly aren't pushing any carriage around, and whilst we're being honest, those love handles come from your chocolate babies. You can't go up to the person and say "hey, I've got a day off from work" because you don't know them that well, and if you did anyway, they'd think you were one of those freaks that talk to strangers on the bus.

Even your neighbours become your own worst enemies. What if they happen to peak out the window just as you're leaving or entering the house at an unreasonable, homeless person time? Naturally you've got the perfect excuse for why your neighbours are also at home at the time, they are either retired (at the age of 35?!), unfit for work (unless it's off the record) or a mom to be (that's surely just a love for chocolate cake that's starting to peak out at the belt line). All this makes you a prisoner in your own home, and let's face it, your place isn't exactly fun central.

You lie in, the extreme version, trot around in ugly clothes your partner would burn in a black ritual if he or she ever saw, over-eat, watch tv til your brain hurts from too much womanhood on display, and sometimes you might even try to take up a lost hobby that once was lost for a reason. You can't knit for fuck, and your paintings are that of a five year old crackhead...no, I take that back, THAT I would pay to see!

Shame creeps in just around dinnertime, boredness, panic at how little of your day off is left, the feeling of skiving, lying to your mum about having tummy aches to stay in because it's snow outside and you know your face will be buried in two feet of white pain before the first bell rings. You grow more and more sure that this day in particular must have been the best day ever at work, something extraordinary happened, everybody got a bonus or free chocolates, a palace in France, a night with Christian Bale (after anger management).

But they never did, and you long for your day off once again. For the shame, for the angst, for the isolation from the pain of public transport.

The Curse of the Cinema Snacks

I can still remember my first non parental cinema experience as a kid. It was the spring of 1989, and my girlfriend and I were going to see “The Little Mermaid”, the original, not the shitty replicas or rip-offs you get today, and we were going ALL ALONE. Filled to the brim with anticipation we strolled into the cinema in our pink sneakers with white unicorns, bought one teeny, tiny bar of chocolate each with our hard earned money from sneaky neighbourhood lotteries which for some unknown reason never had any winners (who suspects cute little girls?). With the sugary masterpieces in our hands we sat quietly nibbling them in our seats, enjoying the brainwashing Disney experience.

That was then. Going to the cinema these days is a totally different experience.

A year ago I went to see the new Batman film, “Batman Begins”, you know, one of those films that manages to please both sexes. The men get to satisfy their hunger for blood and meaningless violence, whilst women sigh and long for Christian Bale’s luscious, willing lips, but Christian Bale’s bedroom habits is not the issue here, so let’s move on. The problem is that tiny bar of chocolate that was tiny back in 1989. In eighteen years it has grown into a cornucopia of sugar orgies, and it hurts both the eyes and ears, my friend.

Sitting there waiting for the Batman to Begin (tee hee... oh come on, one cheesy line and you roll your eyes at me?), I was almost trampled to death by a wild herd of teens carrying a truckload of king size drinking cups, king size bags of chocolates and various other candy goo, the boxes of popcorn were like skyscrapers and the bags of crunchy, crackly crisps could be heard from miles off. Jealousy struck me at first, staring down at my, still, tiny chocolate bar with tears in my eyes, but then it hit me that I wasn’t sad because I wasn’t part of the sugar and snack orgy, I was sad because the cinema had lost it’s innocence.

Once upon a time a tiny chocolate lasted for two hours. Now, it’s gone before the first annoying ad rolls across the screen, and you used to be able to SEE the screen, free of huge bags and cups and greedy hands raping the aluminium and cardboard designs on the rows in front of you. Actually HEARING the film is also a lost bonus. Today you’re wrapped into a frenzy of crunching, crackling, smashing, popping, slurping and oral prostitution that makes you wish you could read lips...especially Christian Bale’s lips...mmm. In the entire room chocolate wrappers, empty bags, deformed or tasteless popcorns and empty bottles fly about looking for new homes, rolling down the stairs to the rhythm of the cinema swine’s’ chews. And I, lover of all sugary things and defender of their eaters cry my bitter tears in my seat, accompanied by an empty chocolate wrapper, and I pledge, just like Batman, that next time, next time I’ll get them. I’ll show them how it’s really done, because if you can’t beat them, join them, and then booby-trap them. They will beg for mercy when I come strolling with my very own popcorn machine, cotton candy maker, slurpee dispenser, hot dog stand, baskets of hot nachos, ice cream machine and crates of assorted chocolates, and I will whip their pleading snack craving bodies with hot dog breads and straws till they...

Ok, chocolate rehab for me...