Getting Better At Being Me

Happy Valentine's Day folks... Or as single people prefer to call it... Happy Fuck You Day!

If you're looking for a light,fluffy, sentimental piece about the significance of Valentine's Day... Then you really don't know me at all do you? Let's get back to talking about me.

Last half term was not a good half term. In fact I'd even go so far as to say it was the worst of my career. It was always dark, always freezing cold. Teachers were tired, kids were cranky and ill-behaved and I think there was hardly a member of staff or student who wan't roaming the corridors looking for someone to punch in the genitals (except perhaps the site team who have the patience of saints).

For the better part of six weeks I felt like a slug in a Dan costume.

Despite spending an average of twelve hours a day working I never felt any sense of accomplishment and that made me depressed and moody. My teaching was probably complete crap. I felt stretched so thin, my attention focused in so many directions, that I found myself unable to do anything well. This was compounded by coming down with a horribly coldy fluey buggy thing on Friday.

In summary, then, I was not feeling good.

I'm up in Northumberland now, staying with Lauren and the in-laws, grateful for a change in scenery and already I can feel my old self coming back drip by drip like coffee into a percolator.

Wonderful, refreshing, life-giving coffee.

Excuse me a second.

....

Back!

So, I spent yesterday doing all the stuff I need to be doing more of. I went into Newcastle nice and early, had breakfast at Starbucks, looked round some cool shops and went down to the quayside to pay a visit to the Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art.

Andrea Zittel's exhibit 'Wagon Stations' was (and is) a charming ode to nesting instinct which feels like walking around a high concept Ikea showroom. Zittel has built, decorated and arranged a series of caravans that explore the different definitions of what humans need to survive (from improvised firepits to bookshelves). The caravans are built from a range of materials in a range of styles with a palette of uterine reds, earthy browns, rusty oranges and imperfect chromes that illustrate our tenuous relationship with our environment.

Also on show was a multi part video installation by Elizabeth Price which was equal parts impressive and bewildering. A quartet of short films across three screens which create a scathing attack on consumer culture through the medium of close ups of toy cars over the cheerful pop synth chords of Take on Me (no, I'm not joking).

So, just in case you were remotely bothered, I'm doing a lot of cool stuff and feeling a lot better about being me.

Now I'm off to put a dent in my endless pile of A Level coursework marking.

Toodle pip!