SHORTLISTS AND PRIZES - AND A PRIZE FOR YOU...

Really, I do talk utter shite sometimes.

As you know, I have just moved house. (Have I said this?) And I do not, as yet, have broadband - until AOL get off their posteriors and activate the request I put in a long time ago. So, what with that and being up to my ears (almost literally literally) in paint, and having a blocked sink, failed heating system and a number of other tribulations, I do not really have time to write a blog post and then delete it. On purpose.

But I had to, because it was utter shite.

I was trying to talk about how and why I'm uncomfortable about prizes and shortlists for things. But then I realised I was talking out of an inappropriate orifice and gave myself a talking to from the correct one. This is essentially what I said:

"Listen and be grateful, you stupid old bat. After all, it's not exactly often that you get shortlisted for something that actually, according to a lot of people who keep emailing you, might be rather special. For crying out loud, you fool: Neil Gaiman and Paulo Coelho are on the same shortlist."

I then, of course, replied to myself, "WHAT??? Are you serious?"

See, when I first heard that I was shortlisted for Author Blog Award, I had my arm up a blocked sink pipe, and I didn't take much notice. Then people started emailing me and someone said it was on Book2Book and Bookbrunch. And still I didn't really register, because by then my arm was fiddling around in a cooker that wasn't working.

And then someone else said something about Neil Gaiman and Paulo somebody and I hit my head on the corner of a radiator that I was trying to bleed. By then I felt a bit dizzy and thought I'd woken up to find it was all a dream. Besides, I had failed to locate the boxes marked "shoes and boots", despite there being many of them. So, I really wasn't too interested in Neil Gaiman. (Though I love his books - grovel, grovel - especially The Graveyard Book.)

By the time I decided that this shortlist was even more interesting than the inside of a wardrobe that I was by then trying to re-erect, I couldn't get online anyway so I still have very little idea what this is all about. But I agree that it sounds lovely and I am grateful indeed. (Even with the absence of boxes of shoes.)

The kind organisers sent me an email and said I should ask people to vote for me, but there's no way I'd do that. They suggested I put the logo on my blog but I can't, because the connection is so fragile that if I go to get the link I'll cause untold damage. They also said I should spread the word about the awards, so I am at least doing that.

Anyway, I'm just going to say thank you to whoever nominated me, and to those who have emailed me with lovely comments and to the hard-working people who have organised the awards. And to anyone who has already voted for me, as I know some of you have.

My original post tried to unpick why being shortlisted for things causes me angst and discombobulation. (Not that this often happens, you understand.) I can't really explain. I guess this is just me. I had a strange upbringing, which I may tell you about one day, and competition played an unpleasant part in it.

Anyway, forget the discombobulation: I am hugely grateful to whoever came up with this idea, and those who nominated me, even if I do now have a bump on my forehead which is going to be hard to explain (the bump, not the forehead) when I face a serious audience this evening at the Wellcome Foundation, where I am chairing an event for which I am not prepared. Unless they ask me to unblock a sink, of course. I am very prepared for that.

Oh, and one other thing, is the prize chocolate or sparkly wine? Because if it is, I may well have to discard any residual discomfort about such things and ask you to VOTE FOR ME!

PS - When this post goes out, I will be on a train so I might actually be able to get broadband. Off to London to chair the above event. Impeccably bad timing two days after moving house. Back on the sleeper. Mainly, I am leaving my family to deal with the blocked sink, lack of broadband, lack of TV, and stinking eggs in the cellars.

PPS - NEWS FLASH: I found the shoes and boots! AND, to celebrate that and the fact that I just passed 500 followers - no, I don't mean I passed them: that would be rude. I just mean I passed the 500 mark  -  I am going to offer a free copy of my new book, WASTED, to a randomly picked commenter to this post. (As in THIS post, not the Wasted blog - but if you also sign up as a follower to the Wasted blog, you'll be entered in the weekly prize draw AS WELL.

I may talk out of my posterior sometimes, but I'm generous, I think. And you don't even have to vote for me. Unless there's chocolate or sparkly wine at stake.

Off to unpack shoes and put them all in a pretty line. Or two.

Please forgive any typos - you have no idea of the screaming that has been going on in this office while I have battled against slow and erratic connections and I am not damned well going to open the doc up again to check it. So there.