Month: October 2006

November 2005.

The first of ten Post Of The Week competitions is hosted, with a series of guest judges.

In a rare encounter with public speaking, I give a talk about blogging to a writers’ conference at Nottingham’s Broadway Cinema, followed by a Q&A session and a series of creative writing exercises. My notes for the talk are posted on the blog.

“The new Madonna album is, essentially, and provided you edit out all the usual aren’t-I-just-so-uniquely-fascinating fame-is-such-a-headf**k me-me-me-ness of the lyrics, one great big, non-stop-segued, spangly-disco-balled, glad-rags-on, hands-in-the-air, yo-DJ-pump-this-party, we’re-all-in-this-crazy-ship-together, ooh-these-are-good-ones, Christ-he’s-smiling-back-have-I-pulled-or-what, sod-the-attitude-let’s-SCREAM, (well-OK-just-a-little-bit-of-attitude-then), most entrancingly transiently transcendentally meltingly beltingly everything-just-SO, sometimes-life-is-just-like-the-movies, move-over-losers-Miss-THING-has-come-to-town Saturday Night Out of the year.”

A Bob Dylan concert leaves me cold. However, as the therapy begins to kick in, I am moved to observe that the times they are a-changin’.

K starts his own moblog. (Now long defunct. Some of us just don’t have the staying power.)

“Nice, aren’t they?”
“They’re gorgeous. But Mike, what are you supposed to do with them?”
“Oh, you just have to love them.”
“That’s all?”
“That’s all.”

At a contemporary ceramics gallery, the purchase of bobbly fruit and pillows causes some raised eyebrows.

Walking the Forest Path: a weekend ramble in the Derbyshire Peak District is blogged at great length, over several episodes. Buried within the wildlife descriptions is a major nugget of news.

Frizzy diva! Amdist much discussion of “what is mauve” and “what is puce”, qB creates an exciting new bespoke shade.

Unbeknownst to me at the time, a Sons & Daughters / Vincent Vincent & The Villains / Ralfe Band gig review helps to land my next journalism gig.

A remembered quote from an old John Peel show, which I transcribed from memory on I Love Music, makes it into his wife’s section of the Margrave of the Marshes biography. Sheila, take a bow. I always knew I’d make it into hardback one day.

December 2005.

A three-column layout is trialled, and swiftly withdrawn.

“And you may ask yourself: how did I get here?” Troubled Diva becomes a finalist in the Best Poof category at the grandly titled Weblog Awards 2005, where it finds itself in distinctly gung-ho, yee-hah, right wing company.

The final nail is hammered into the coffin of my unreconstructed 1980s student politics radical chic. (Look, it was a drag hunt, OK?) All of my newly acquired gung-ho, yee-hah friends must have loved that one…

Tom Worstall’s 2005 Blogged anthology is reviewed – needless to say, at some length.

The Sum Of All Years meme requires me to pen a year-by-year autobiography, in which the number of words for each year matches my age at that time.

After drunkenly attempting to channel the spirit of Jarvis Cocker at a karaoke evening in a lesbian pub, the only honourable course of action is to leave the country. I therefore spend the next three weeks – including Christmas and New Year’s Eve – working in the Chinese city of Hangzhou.

My time in Hangzhou gets off to a wobbly start, all alone in a freezing apartment, but improves immeasurably once I acquire a flatmate (J, now in London, still reading the blog).

Christmas Day winds up in an over-priced nightclub, watching go-go Santas gyrate to a gangsta rap version of “Jingle Bells”, and avoiding unsolicited While-U-Wee back massages from the toilet attendant.

January 2006.

New Year’s Eve is spent at the closing night of Hangzhou’s only venue for live rock music, watching a selection of local bands.

Oh God, the trippy Korean twigs. Flashbacks, maan. Flashbacks!

I get an unsolicited lapdance from a singing waiter in an extravagantly camp Thai restaurant. Man magnet, me.

A fantastic weekend is had – but not blogged – wandering the surreally futuristic cityscapes of Shanghai.

There is a rather fine cake shop.

A diary-style write-up of my Hangzhou experience (entitled “Go-go Santas, turkey and twigs”) is published in the Nottingham Evening Post.

The first of several “Open Mike” sessions is held, in which readers’ questions are answered almost as soon as they arrive.

As a long-list judge for The Bloggies, I discover that cup-cake blogs are huge news o’er the pond.

Some online agony-aunting is indulged in, as I attempt to offer some dating tips to a perpetually single 25 year old.

Upon returning from a business trip to the States, K’s business partner finds that a live bullet has been planted inside his suitcase.

What would it be like if I really did “just do it for myself, and if anyone else happens to like it, that’s a bonus”? To find out, Troubled Diva Xtra is semi-secretly launched.

The Cognitive Behavioural Therapy sessions are concluded.

Following a meeting with the deputy editor, the Nottingham Evening Post invites me to join its team of freelance music reviewers.

After a couple of weeks’ inactivity, a gig is secured with a new London-based client. Apparently, I am to spend “between four and six weeks” working in Canary Wharf. Little did I know that this was to expand to five months…

February 2006.

“Post of the Week” is discontinued – but plans are made to set it up on a dedicated site. Sadly, the planning fizzles out during the spring, as other commitments get in the way…

Troubled Diva is a finalist at the European Satin Pajama Awards (hosted by Fistful of Euros), in the category of Best Personal Weblog.

The London Phase commences, with four or five nights a week being spent at the Britannia Hotel at Canary Wharf. Sunday evenings see me at Horsemeat Disco in Vauxhall; Wednesday nights are spent at Get Yer Kecks Off And Win A Hundred Quid Nite at the White Swan in Limehouse. Other than that, I’m out every night – more often than not, with friends that I have made through blogging. So it wasn’t all just shouting into the void, then. Never have I felt more grateful of the social blessings which the medium has bestowed.

Meanwhile, and inevitably, blogging itself becomes decidedly thin on the ground.

(Note to self: one of these days, when you’re no longer concerned about maintaining any sort of reputation whatsoever, tell them about The Night Of The Five Cs.)

My 44th birthday is spent at an alt.gay.goth-slash-industrial night, with my middle-aged gut squeezed into tight leather kecks, having balloons filled with laughing gas shoved down my mouth while dancing to It’s A Sin by the Pet Shop Boys. How deliciously age-inappropriate!

K buys me an exercise bike for my birthday. Shamefully, it is still sitting in the entrance hall, inside the box that it came in.

March 2006.

The month begins with two diametric opposites. At the White Swan, Ian and I witness a sixty-something Latvian transvestite called Viola do a full strip-tease. The following night, I meet qB for exceedingly posh nosh at a sleek Conran joint: the Plateau Bar & Grill. This is just the sort of contradictory existence which I love.

“Also, Mike – wieviel wiegst du?”
“Er, zwei oder drei mal pro Woche…?”
Over dinner in an Islington gastropub, a long-buried memory resurfaces.

Down at the BBC Television Centre, I attend the live recording of Making Your Mind Up, in which the UK’s Eurovision entry is selected. Following this joyous re-absorption into the Eurovision brotherhood, I become a regular at the monthly Douze Points nights at the Retro Bar.

A hatchet job on an Osmonds concert (“like being beaten repeatedly round the head with a Hallmark greetings card“) causes protest letters to be written to the local paper.

Pop Quiz Theme Week sees David (ex-Swish Cottage) and I winning the Retro Bar quiz – and lumbering ourselves with a drunken madwoman “team mate” in the process, who develops a worrying habit of knocking our drinks over and falling off her chair. A couple of nights later, the I Love Music message board crowd holds their own music quiz, which our team is winning… until I have to leave early, at which point the lead crumbles. (Not boasting! Just saying!)

My cousin, who is a Something at the House of Commons, gives me a personal, access-all-areas, in-depth guided tour of the Palace of Westminster. We nip out onto the roof, where I stand only a few feet away from the illuminated clock tower of Big Ben. In the main debating chamber of the Commons, I stand at the dispatch box and pretend that I am running the country. Shortly afterwards, we have a drink in the suprisingly poky Members’ Bar, rubbing shoulders with the Honourable Members. I find myself in utter awe of the mad Gothic splendour of the place.

Loving London. Absolutely loving it. But then, I thought my time down there was nearly up…

April 2006.

With my stay extended for an indefinite period, being out every night starts to lose some of its initial sparkle. Down at Canary Wharf, I am showing signs of becoming assimilated into the matrix – why, I’ve got the “business casual” T.M. Lewin shirts, and everything.

I am interviewed live on BBC Radio Nottingham for a second time, talking about blogging again – but at considerably greater length, and with considerably greater articulacy and confidence. My contribution is made at the BBC studios in Westminster, which is frankly pretty bloody exciting (especially when I accidentally blunder into the ITN newsroom).

A jolly little mini-blogmeet is hosted in Soho, at the Duke of Argyll on Brewer Street.

A stag weekend – incorporating another jolly little mini-blogmeet – is held in Manchester, starting in the Northern Quarter and ending (where else?) on Canal Street. It is by no means a typical stag weekend; we spend the afternoon shopping for outfits in Selfridges, and I have invited GIRLS out for the night as well.

On Friday April 28th, K and I register our civil partnership. Or, as I put it late that night, I’M FOOKIN MARRIED!!! Friends join us for early-doors drinks; this is followed by a lavish multi-course banquet for our respective immediate families.

That we should have lived to see the day.

The following afternoon, we fly off to the Maldives for a blissfully relaxing not-a-honeymoon-actually in a tropical island paradise.

2006 is fast shaping up to be the best year of my life.

May 2006.

Just five days after returning from the Maldives, I fly off to Athens, where I am to be covering this year’s Eurovision Song Contest all week, on behalf of Slate magazine in the USA. As a member of the official press pack, I get access to the rehearsals, the press conferences and the parties, along with a massive bunch of fellow journalists fellow fans on the blag. This is the week which I have been looking forward to for well over a year, and it doesn’t disappoint – although filing my daily dispatches proves to be my most challenging writing assignment to date, by a long long way…

…not least when my laptop irretrievably crashes, just as I am mailing my first article to my editor, and forcing me to a) blag a higher level accreditation (already once denied me), so that I can use the PCs in the press centre, and b) re-write the entire article from scratch, immediately and without delay. (It had taken me over four hours to write it the first time round.) One of the most stressful days of my life – I finished the evening drenched in sweat, not having eaten since breakfast time – but also one of the most fulfilling, as the re-written article was a significant improvement upon the original.

On the afternoon of the finals, I blog the final dress rehearsal live from the Press Centre.

However, I omit to mention the news which I have received by telephone from K in the UK that morning. K’s sister – whom we only saw a couple of weeks earlier, at our civil partnership – has suffered a massive stroke, and is in intensive care.

This casts a long shadow over the long-awaited finals night. I drink myself through it, stay up all night at the winners’ press conference and the after-party… and generally rely on Denial to see me through.

Upon returning to the UK on the Monday, I learn that all hope for K’s sister’s survival has been extinguished. In the meantime, my fourth and final Slate article has – has – to be written. It takes me all day, and I miss my last train. This is when I realise that professional journalism is no walk in the park.

By the time I make it to K’s parents’ house on the Tuesday, M is dead.

June 2006.

It is my great honour to deliver the main eulogy at M’s beautiful, extraordinary, moving funeral.

I am still working three days a week in London – when I should be at home, supporting K.

2006 is no longer the happiest year of my adult life.

July 2006.

My five months in London come to an end – but not before I have been reunited with a school friend who I haven’t seen in over 30 years, a cousin in his thirties who I haven’t seen since he was an infant… and J, my flatmate from Hangzhou who is now working for the same client in Canary Wharf.

Oh, and there is the week where every evening seems to start with complementary glasses of champagne at some Do or other… and my introduction to the ABSOLUTELY BLOODY FANTASTIC Phoenix Arts Club on Charing Cross Road (one of London’s last outposts of true Bohemia, which evokes warm memories of the late lamented George’s Bar). So, you know, not all bad… not by a long chalk.

Upon my return, I do my level best not to start every sentence with the words “When I was in London…” But frankly darlings, Nottingham has never looked shittier.

As you will have observed from the lack of links in most of the above, the separation between blog and life has never been sharper.

Back on the blog, the first embedded Youtube video is posted – after which, Troubled Diva Xtra makes a brief comeback as a clicky-on-the-piccy Youtube blog.

Year Four of Which Decade Is Tops For Pops? kicks off, five months later than it should have done. This year, the 1970s emerge victorious for the second time.

August 2006.

Three years after the original photo-shoot, our weekend cottage is featured as the cover story in Period Living magazine. A few weeks later, Alan Oddverse pens a parody which is several shades more entertaining than the original article.

The podcasts re-commence, as have the Stylus Singles Jukebox reviews (but not for long), and the gig reviews for the local paper.

My first pair of vari-focal spectacles are purchased. Can it really only be three and a half years since I danced topless in a nightclub for the very last time?

A Madonna concert is attended, and a rather grudging, oh-must-I review posted.

Suddenly, and after many many months, the blogging mojo returns. (Here at Troubled Diva, these things are more cyclical than at most normal blogs. God, what what must it be like to have a normal blog? I guess I’ll never know.) Arbeit macht frei, an account of a nightmare holiday job in a wholesalers’ warehouse, is the first decent bit of non-music writing that I’ve done since China.

Who’s for a melon martini, Mike and K style?

My first feature-length article for Stylus magazine is published.

Troubled Diva is featured in .net magazine’s cover feature on The Top 50 British Blogs.

September 2006.

I pledge to make at least one post per day for the whole of September. If I succeed, then I shall buy a webcam and make an inaugural vidcast. If I fail, then the name of the blog will change to Clapped Out Has Been from October 1st. The tension of it all, eh readers?

A nasty attack of groin strain leaves me stranded in the city centre, and unable to walk, until K picks me up and takes me to hospital. A post explaining this earns me a measly three comments. A follow-up hissy fit (“Nobody cares. I hate you all.“) earns me 26 comments. Much more like it.

The experience moves me to change my comments box strapline, from the age-old “Purge yourself – go on, purge yourself” to the much more descriptive “Transitory fluff, yoo-hoos, woo-hoos, poor-yous and me-toos.”

A two-page colour feature on Troubled Diva appears in the magazine section of the Nottingham Evening Post, complete with a coquettish, FHM-style photograph and a list of Blogging tips for the newcomer.

A series of photographs from the “social linchpin years” of 1990-92 show me at my very gayest.

There is a major discussion on the whys and wherefores of comment box etiquette, an account of a gig by a New York band which took place on the day after 9/11, a list of 100 things which make me happy, and – since I have just started receiving promo CDs on a regular basis – an exclusive track-by-track lowdown on the forthcoming Scissor Sisters album.

My duties for the local paper have stepped up a couple of notches, as I am now reviewing as many gigs as I can squeeze into my schedule, as well as semi-regular album reviews for the Friday entertainment supplement. Meeting the deadlines can be tough – but I am deliberately pushing myself, in order to derive maximum benefit from the experience. Besides, I still get an adolescent kick from being on the guest list.

“We didn’t pay for a mere prototype, you know. We thought we were getting something unique for our £900,000. Ah well, that’s show business.” I get into a right old strop about the current proliferation of Sky Mirrors from that mercenary old tart major contemporary artist, Anish Kapoor.

Telegraph Poles on Snob Alley: a four part comic memoir of the nouveau riche 1980s, and my favourite work on the blog this year. Hands up who remembers Cliff and Olga? Come on, it was only five minutes ago!

My friend and colleague JP is seriously injured in a traffic accident outside our company’s Hangzhou office.

As the month ends and the pledge is successfully met, I take suggestions for September’s final post – finally opting to list 10 Reasons Why I Think I’m A Clapped Out Has Been And 10 Reasons Why I Think I’m Not.

October 2006.

A snapshot is provided of my whereabouts, circumstances and states of mind in October 1996, 1986, 1976 and 1966.

A Journey South concert review is potentially compromised by my proximity to the artists’ parents. Well, a hatchet job would have been too predictable…

My favourite albums of the 1970s are listed, year by year. A request for reader recommendations unearths a previously hidden coterie of Jake Thackeray fans. Who knew?

“Look, I’m bruising. This is a vicious sport! Why was it never banned? OK, I’m getting a tea-towel and wrapping it round my… stop LAUGHING, will you!” K and I go conkers bonkers.

As promised, an inaugural vidcast is posted. However, the second one is much more like it – and it goes on to spawn its own caption competition – which in turn goes on to spawn the most remarkable spoken word MP3 from a certain Scottish blogger of note. In such surprising ways does our chosen medium manifest itself.

Back down in London for the evening (hooray!), I make it over to Girl With A One Track Mind‘s debut book signing, and stick around for drinkies afterwards. But which other Midlands blogger of note ends up sharing my hotel room?

The local paper prints my first lead album review: a 500 word hatchet job on the forthcoming, tatty, lazy, half-baked so-called “greatest hits” compilation from George “Penelope Pitstop” Michael.

My colleague JP returns to the UK (and today, to the office), already well on his way to a full recovery.

And finally…

On October 30th 2006, Troubled Diva celebrates its fifth birthday.

It has been a fascinating experience, reviewing the past five years of my life in such depth. Not having kept a diary since adolescence, I have never had access to this level of detail before, and it is remarkable how long-forgotten blog entries can trigger such powerful memories.

I have also realised, with a force that has never really hit me before, that Troubled Diva really is a very peculiar weblog indeed. In fact, it’s a f**king BONKERS weblog, if you ask me. Where do all those mad surges of energy come from, and why do they have to alternate with all those periods of near inactivity? Why can’t postings be regular, and moderate, and normal? Jeez, you lot must think I’m bi-polar or summat! I’m not! Honest! I’m just a neurotic, narcissistic, self-obsessed drama queen, that’s all!

There also been times over the past few days where I have observed myself almost as a cartoon character: tearing around the place, squawking and squeaking, and living a life which seems packed with an uncommonly high number of “incidents” – good and bad, clever and stupid, sorrowful and triumphal, important and trivial.

(Particularly the latter. “Doubled Trivia”, someone once called this place.)

I have also been reminded of the extremes of self-aggrandisement and self-deprecation which peremeate these archives. Both can, at times, make me cringe. Hopefully – and at least over time – the one will generally balance out the other. And besides, if there’s one thing which the tragic events of this otherwise fantastic year have shown me, it’s that moments of pleasure, joy, excitement and fulfilment should be savoured as they happen, and never taken for granted. So if that comes sometimes across as “Gee, isn’t my life amazing!”… well, I guess that’s because my life frequently amazes me.

This blog has taken me to places that I never thought I would go. Backstage at an annual music event that I have loved since childhood. In front of a writers’ conference. Onto live radio, and onto the printed page. And it has introduced me to many, many wonderful new friends – who, in varying ways, seem to be capable of tuning into my way of thinking, making sense of it, and making sense of me. (And vice versa, many times over.) As a former Neurotic Boy Outsider who felt for a long time that nobody truly “got” him, and that he wasn’t much good at anything at all, this kind of collective mutual validation is something to which I ascribe the highest value.

But I’m delirious, and gushing… and knackered. (This little exercise took far longer than I had expected, but then I never was much good at doing things by halves.) Time for a congratulatory glass of something cold and refreshing. The sodding album reviews can wait until tomorrow.

Cheers, readers! Here’s to blogging!

November 2004.

Only four posts are made during November: a slagging of Alan Hollinghurst’s The Line of Beauty (premature, as I ended up loving it); an account of my first Reiki session (a major help on my path back to mental serenity, even if it is just Placebo effect smoke-and-mirrors); an ode to the joys of my newly purchased iPod (which earns me a good kicking in a forum for iPod-h8erz); and an announcement that, from December 6th, Troubled Diva will return to a full regular service.

December 2004.

A week’s holiday at the luxurious Banyan Tree resort in Phuket – essentially, a holiday to get over the previous holiday – proves immensely therapeutic. Upon our return, regular posting does indeed resume.

A doomed attempt is made to convince my readers (and indeed myself) that the Band Aid 20 version of “Do They Know It’s Christmas” is superior to the 1984 original.

“Love your work!” Another London blogmeet is attended, back in the basement of the Green Man.

Finally converted to the superiority of Firefox over IE, and to the delights of del.icio.us. Thanks to Adrian, the “Linkrack” on the sidebar becomes powered by del.icio.us for several months, before collapsing in an ungainly heap when del.icio.us changes the rules.

Commence an extended series of postings about music, in which I write (in frequently laborious detail) about my 100 favourite singles of 2004.

January 2005.

News of the tsunami disaster prompts a lengthy Phuket retrospective, disguised as a Maroon 5 review.

A competitive element is added to the “100 singles” write-up, as readers are invited to guess my favourite single of 2004.

As attempts to explain the new-at-the-time genres of crunk, glitch and microhouse to my readers fall on stony ground, the acronym NMC is introduced, in order to flag posts with significant non-musical content. I have a slight strop about this.

Steve of My Ace Life re-works the 2004 Xmas photo in a Gilbert and George style.

Troubled Diva is nominated as Best UK Weblog in the The Queery Awards, hosted by the US site Queer Day (now defunct). Curiously, one of the other nominees isn’t even British…

Over on the I Love Music message board, I mark the occasion of the 1000th UK Number One by hosting a poll of the board’s favourite Number Ones of all time. The Top 100 singles are posted in real time during Radio One’s Sunday afternoon Top 40 show, and archived on Troubled Diva.

Troubled Diva becomes a finalist in the Best GLBT category at the 2005 Bloggies. Distressingly, I am still in the middle of my interminable series of music-related posts, few of which have much in the way of gay-related content. Whoops.

A think-piece is penned on the changing usage of the word “f**k”.

End of an era: George’s Bar closes its doors for good, with an unforgettably debauched final night.

February 2005.

One hundred music posts down the line, my favourite single of 2005 is revealed – as correctly guessed by Leith reader chav gav.

Fellow “World’s Best Poof” Bloggies nominee Siobhan (of Tranniefesto) and I have an in-depth discussion on the politics of cross-dressing.

The acronym CBATG (Can’t Be Arsed To Google) is introduced. At the last count, Google returned 1,280 results for it…

K and I subscribe to the Lovefilm DVD rental service. I duly solicit my readers for movie recommendations – which we are still working through to this day.

Is it that time of the year already? Which Decade Is Tops For Pops? gets going again. (This year, for the first time, the 1980s win it.)

“I WANT MY F***ING APPLES!” The boot is put into another swanky hotel – this time, it’s the Cumberland at Marble Arch.

On the occasion of my 43rd birthday, someone at Merchants Restaurant is Having A Larf. Is he Having A Larf?

March 2005.

This year’s Comic Relief stunt involves making your selection for the Bloggers’ Disco.

In anticipation of the Bloggies results, I am interviewed for the BBC’s website.

My “proper” music journalism debut is made on the Stylus Singles Jukebox, reviewing the week’s new releases. This becomes a regular weekly gig for many months – and a major writing challenge, which takes up large chunks of my Sundays.

“It was an honour simply to be nominated. It was an honour simply to be nominated. It was an honour simply to be nominated.” At the Bloggies, the World’s Best Poof award goes elswehere.

“Good morning Bulwell! How’s it hanging, Arnold? Coming atcha, Top Valley!” I am interviewed live on the BBC Radio Nottingham breakfast show. Ee, it’s all going off, intit?

The Troubled Diva Parallel Universe Top 40 becomes a regular weekly feature for a while.

A pedometer is purchased, and the Troubled Diva Keep Fit Club gets underway.

The Write Like A Diva contest is hosted, with is-it-me-or-isn’t-it entries on the subject of My Gayest Ever Moment. Clare, JonnyB and Peter pit their entries against one of my own. A lack of entries also causes me to throw an April Fool hissy fit.

April 2005.

I Can Pick ‘Em Department, Parts Nine and Ten: early plugs are made for Joan As Policewoman and The Long Blondes.

A dramatis personae is published, detailing some of the more regularly mentioned non-blogging Friends of Troubled Diva.

The blog notches up its 500,000th page view.

K and I celebrate our twentieth anniversary as a couple, by seeing Bebo & Cigala at the Royal Festival Hall, shopping for outfits (and an uncommonly nice hat) in Selfridges, and having a posh meal at Harry’s Place.

A CD-length Back To Mine mix is posted.

May 2005.

I Can Pick ‘Em Department, Part Eleven: the day after the General Election, and before Michael Howard has resigned, I tip David Cameron to be the next leader of the Conservative Party.

The year’s Eurovision coverage kicks off with my first piece of proper print journalism, as Time Out‘s music section leads with my previews of the 2005 entries. For the second year running, I watch the finals with friends in the Peak District. My reactions to the televised contest are published by Stylus magazine.

I Can Pick ‘Em Department, Part Twelve: become one of the first bloggers to link to Mimi In New York.

Troubled Twat, or My Boyfriend Is A Diva. A week’s guest blogging commences at My Boyfriend Is A Twat.

June 2005.

The start of the month finds me in a rather flat state of mind: pissed off with Nottingham, and living for weekends in the cottage. But it’s only a mini-wobble.

Seasonal maxim: You know that spring is ending when you tire of the smell of asparagus in your urine.

An exhaustive Readership Survey is issued and analysed. Lyle is duly awarded the dubious accolade of being, statistically sepaking, Troubled Diva’s most typical reader.

I become a contestant on Big Blogger 2005.

A scathing review of Les McKeown’s Bay City Rollers ruffles feathers in Rollerland.

In an attempt to win one of my lovely mugs, Anna produces a review of the 40 In 40 Days project… in verse.

The PDMG is opened to the public once again, and a commemorative photographic tableau is published.

Quickos comes to stay with Mike and K.

July 2005.

“I am loved, ergo I am worthy of love.” At an REM concert, I am ambushed by unexpected emotion.

The above post serves as the kick-off for a chain of 26 guest-written Blogging Consequences, which occupies the rest of the month – as does the Big Blogger 2005 competition, during which I post a photograph of my one and only dabbling in drag. (And it weren’t pretty, neither.)

“There has long been a repressed radio presenter in me; take a listen, and see whether you think it should have remained repressed, or whether I have a future in broadcasting bright and breezy “drivetime sounds” to the blogosphere.” The first podcast is published.

My last European business trip takes place, to Vienna.

August 2005.

An sizeable excerpt from the blog is reproduced (sans permission, natch) in the pages of The Independent, as part of a two-page spread on “Citizens of the internet”. However, the piece wasn’t actually written by me. Instead, the dear confused old Indie lifted one of Vitriolica’s Consequences pieces, crediting the author of Troubled Diva as “Anonymous woman”. Oh well!

Vitrolica then goes on to win Big Blogger 2005, leaving me in second place. Oh well!

“Ten years ago, I was led by my dick; now I’m being led by my stomach. It’s all moving up the body, you see. Who knows: in ten years’ time, it could be my head…”

The blog is briefly renamed troubled nitro-diva power plus 4 (with active fructose micro-ingredients). Ooh, satire.

“The overall effect is akin to reading a travelogue of an exotic far-off country which you know you’ll never visit.“ As a result of the Big Blogger experience, I make the online acquaintance of Girl With A One-Track Mind.

A parody of Naked Blog wins me a Port Of Leith T-shirt.

September 2005.

Of seating plans, turtle doves and symphonies in watered silk. A five-part series on weddings is published, including a couple of tales of satisfying karmic retribution. Hands up who remembers Horace and Doris? And how about Ron and Yvonne? (A printer-friendly Word document of the whole series is here.)

The Trash Boudoir mixes seek to recreate the atmosphere of a seedy backstreet 1980s gay club.

“All these years, I’ve been standing on the sidelines, the perennial Detached Observer. Sometimes sneering – sometimes spinning my wheel and muttering my incantations – but most usually dabbing my eyes, raising my glass, Wishing Them Every Happiness, and tearing up the floor at the disco afterwards.

Now it’s my turn.”

I come out as an opera hater. Minus fifty Poof Points!

K’s company receives a celebrity endorsement. In order to identify her, a game of Twenty Questions is played in my comments box. (Don’t bother clicking. It was Zoe Ball.)

A Secret London Gathering Of Extremely Nervous People With Weblogs is attended. I wonder whether we’ll ever have another one?

October 2005.

I start transcribing my mother’s detailed account of the first twenty years of her life, on a separate blog – but not before sharing an account of her experiences as a model for Vogue magazine.

Many months after first consulting my GP, I commence a three month course of cognitive behavioural therapy. (Excellent, and recommended.)

November 2003.

Guest Month ends – with a “best of” round-up – as the weekly business trips expand from Paris to Cologne and (best of all!) Barcelona. Consequently, and after an extraordinarily prolific work-rate over the past 18 months (looking back at it all now, I’m actually quite astonished that I ever wrote so much) Blogger’s Block begins to bite, and signs of work-related stress start to mount up. It’s a tell-tale sign…

I Can Pick ‘Em Department, Part Four: ahead of her victory in the second Guardian competition, an early link is made to Belle De Jour.

A good month for culture: Mariza in Birmingham (and I know for a fact that she has read my review), challenging installation art in Barcelona, DV8 Physical Dance Theatre in Paris (with ex-pat Parisian buddy Sarah, my regular dining companion of the time), the Turner Prize exhibition in London (we liked the Grayson Perrys)… and an audience with lovely Kevin McCloud (sigh!) at an interior design exhibition.

K leaves the company which he founded seven years earlier, and starts from scratch all over again with his canine cancer venture.

Guest blogger Zena turns up, with a series of posts detailing all the “w@nkers” she has ever slept with. As soon as the series is completed, the posts vanish into thin air. (“Think of it like a fascinating woman you met at a cocktail party who left before you got her phone-number.”)

In parallel with Zena’s posts, a new competition is launched: Who’s The W@nker? (“Tell me the story of a relationship in which you were the w@nker.”) The competition is won by Sarah, with this story.

December 2003.

I Can Pick ‘Em Department, Part Five: an early link is made to PB Curtis: then at It’s Funny Because It’s Shit, now at Monkey With A Typewjkl;.

When satire falls flat: we still don’t talk about the which recreational substance am I on? project. Some people thought I was doing it for real, you know…

“F**k off, I’m dead. Now go outside and look at the f**king flowers.” During another wild weekend in London (actually, it was on the dancefloor of the Two Brewers in Clapham), and just ahead of yet another a business trip (this time to Zurich), a major decision is made. Troubled Diva is put on hold for an indefinite period, and an emotional farewell speech is made…

January 2004.

The weekly business trips continue. The blog remains closed.

February 2004.

An article about a trip to Barcelona is published in the Nottingham Evening Post, and re-printed on the blog.

On February 23rd, the silence is once again broken, with The Great Troubled Diva Shall I Or Shan’t I Start Blogging Again? Potential Act Of Monumental Hubris Comprehension Test. Across the blogosphere, knowing eyeballs roll heavenwards.

March 2004.

The hiatus having lasted less for not much more than two months, full time blogging re-commences on March 8th.

In the meantime, I have become a regular on the I Love Music message board, and a tireless advocate of the Scissor Sisters, whom I go to see live at every opportunity.

The Nottingham house is taken off the market, and a decision is made to stay put for the forseeable future. Goodbye, architect-designed dream home! We were never worthy of you in the first place!

Midweek boozing sessions are back on the agenda, thanks to my new friend (and future blogger) Alan of Reluctant Nomad.

“I’ve been to paradise… but I’ve never been to Bulwell.” Nottingham’s tram service is opened, and a bunch of local dignatories board it for an inaugural ride. Finding myself in their midst, I record the experience. (“Do you think they’ll have white wine in Hucknall?“)

Which Decade Is Tops For Pops? returns, to cheers all round.

Simultaneously with this, an anonymous employee of News International attempts to “out” Belle De Jour in my comments box, ahead of a would-be exposé in The Times. (The comment is swiftly deleted, even though the “outing” subsequently turns out to be inaccurate.) The enusing intrigue and kerfuffle drags on for days, as I find myself thrust into the middle of all the fevered press speculation regarding Belle’s identity. Why, I even come up with an amusing (if highly fanciful) conspiracy theory of my own. As a result, March 22nd becomes the busiest day ever on Troubled Diva, with nearly 2000 page views. Way to make a comeback!

K goes public for the first time about his new business venture.

April 2004.

A hand-drawn version of the front page appears on April Fool’s Day; allegedly, I am testing a new handwriting recognition package. (But how did he do those links?)

Troubled Diva picks up a mention in Simon Garfield’s feature on blogging in The Observer. In brackets. In the middle of a list. On the second page of the article. But still, eh!

The Which Decade project, which has been dragged out for a few weeks on account of all the Belle-related excitement, is won by the 1960s.

A reader-compiled “Songs you have to hear” track listing is assembled.

At a “swanky do” in a Nottingham hotel, I experience my first – and, to date, my last – panic attack.

Arboreal porn alert! A walk through the Manifold Valley leads us to a spot which we christen Harlot’s Nook.

“F**k off, you vaseline-arsed fairy.” A scathing review of one of the Scissor Sisters’ support acts earns me my first (and hopefully my last) piece of hate-mail.

Easter is spent in Lisbon with Dymbel and Dymbellina, soaking up the fado.

Window Into My World: The Troubled Diva Pointlessly Detailed Journal Theme Week starts well, until midweek illness calls a swift halt to the venture.

A performance MP3 of the Boutique Hotel Casual Shag post is published. In many ways, this remains my favourite piece of work on the whole blog.

May 2004.

Blanket Eurovision coverage re-commences, with detailed song-by-song breakdowns of the finals and the inaugural semi-finals alike.

An attempt is made to live-blog the Eurovision semi-finals, in front of the telly, with a laptop. This proves to be tougher than it looks. The coverage starts well enough, before descending into drunken bitch-queen one-liners. (“State of ‘er!“)

The Eurovision finals are watched from the comfort of the cottage, with friends. Spookily, Zoe of My Boyfriend Is A Twat blogs the event before it takes place…

June 2004.

In the first of what would prove to be a spate of such ventures, I spend the week guest-blogging at Karen and Pete’s Uborka. The week ends with the hosting of Krissa and Stuart‘s online engagement party. Not a dry eye in the house…

A camp-as-knickers Bollywood MP3 (“One Two Cha Cha Cha” by Usha Uthup) gets Troubled Diva linked by mega-blog BoingBoing. The enusing traffic spike is well lush. More exciting still is the revelation that Usha lives on the same street as one of my regular readers.

There is speculation as to the mysterious privately pressed acetates which my stepmother used to keep under the bed. Could they really be lost recordings by The Beatles?

Regular daily traffic to Troubled Diva peaks. It has stayed at more or less the same level ever since.

A nasty run-in with the Hosting Company From Hell sees http://www.troubleddiva.com become permanently unusable. While the site is down, I guest-blog over at Sashinka’s place. A hyphen is added to the URL, which is re-launched under its new domain on June 29th.

I Can Pick ‘Em Department, Part Six: Become one of the first bloggers to plug Joe. My. God.

July 2004.

K and I experiment with different hairdos. While my hair is re-styled for the first time since the late 1980s, K decides to dally with the dreaded TUFTS. After vocalising my loathing for the TUFTS, a hideous pact is made…

K attends his first rock gig for 18 years – Captain Beefheart’s Magic Band at the Rescue Rooms – and survives the ordeal unscathed.

All of Nottingham mourn the passing of city centre busker Frank Robinson, better known as Xylophone Man. Over 3000 people petition Nottingham City Council (unsuccessfully) to erect a statue in his honour.

The foreign business trips are slowing down, but there is still the occasional jaunt to Paris to contend with. Annoyingly, my presence is required there only a couple of days before disappearing to Peru for two and a half weeks.

During my Peruvian absence, the blog is maintained by five guests, all of them local: Alan, Ben, Buni, MissMish and Nixon. Just as an earlier guest week had spurred the creation of Aprosexic, so does this fortnight eventually lead to the creation of Reluctant Nomad.

August 2004.

Directly upon returning from Peru, K and I crash the get-together that the guest bloggers have arranged during our absence. It is our first meeting with Ben, with Miss Mish – and with Nottingham’s last outpost of true Bohemia, George’s Bar on Broad Street. A new social era begins…

I Can Pick ‘Em Department, Part Seven: Become one of the first bloggers to link to Petite Anglaise: specifically, to this post. Although I am not yet to know it, I have already made my last business trip to Paris.

As is hinted, the Peruvian trip turns out to be more of an endurance test than a relaxing break. I arrive back in poor health, and remain in poor health (and off work) for some time thereafter.

This period of ill-health provides the trigger for my worst period of depression since 1999. Posting on the blog is severely curtailed, with posts generally appearing once or twice a week, if at all.

“Dog tired of the damnable persona, the expectations, the limitations, the repetition, the pop-up chorus line (sorry, nuffink personal like, luvyaloads), the dead weight of accumulated history.”

Less than six months after my last blogging “comeback”, is it now curtains for Troubled Diva again?

September 2004.

A very quiet month – although I am secretly blogging elsewhere, deliberately in a very different style, under the assumed character of “Neil”. The writing is stark, confessional, and fairly high on scandals and misdemeanours. Although the original host blog is still on hiatus, some of the main posts can be viewed here. (The stories are true, but the narrative voice is invented. Give a man a mask, etc.)

October 2004.

With the mental wobbles intensifying, I finally start to talk openly about the matter – although not on the blog – and pay a visit to my GP.

Some hand-drawn guest-blogging is accomplished at Guild Of Ghostwriters. This is the best one: a full page comic-strip, detailing my past as a child cartoonist.

K authors his first and last guest post: a guide to maintaining crisp lawn edges.

Compensation for mis-sold endowments is obtained, to the tune of over £8000.

Returning from a business trip in Amsterdam, news of John Peel’s death reaches me. He has died in Cuzco (Peru), where my physical ailments were at their most debilitating over the summer.

The wobbles show their first signs of abating.

Still with no actual work to do at work, I continue to amuse myself with Nottingham, My Nottingham and the never-ending Shirt Off My Back Project, with daily photos all the way through the month. Midweek boozeathons have become the norm, although I have formed an age-inappropriate attachment to the podium in the middle of the dancefloor at the local gay club.

There is much activity in connection with Chig’s 50 Number Ones Project, with various MP3 medleys being made available.

A series of “defining vignettes of the 1980s” are posted, covering sanctimonious self-righteousness, greed, style fascism and dogma.

But really, November 2002 is basically about the shirts.

December 2002.

Horrified by the crap camera angles which I have been using during the Shirt Off My Back Project, my partner K breaks his silence on the blog.

A day later, as plans are announced for future legislation regarding same-sex civil partnerships, I go down on my knees in the bedroom.

K and I spend a day Doing Art in London, which causes me to post a major rant against Gunther Von Hagen’s disgusting Bodyworlds exhibition.

Now that K has taken over photographic duties for the Shirt Off My Back Project, the images start getting much artier.

On December 15th, after 10 weeks, asta is declared the winner of the 68th and last shirt in the project.

This is immediately followed by So you think you’re a Blogaholic?, a quiz designed to test my readers’ knowledge of the 56 blogs in my sidebar. The quiz is won by Amanda, who receives a set of Old Curiosity Box CDs.

Some of my co-workers discover my weblog, as I learn at the office Christmas party. Gulp.

The Christmas holiday period is dominated by illness. Not one of our best.

January 2003.

I successfully give up alcohol for the month. This turns out to be a good move, as the protracted illnesses of the Christmas period trigger a period of mild depression – as discussed here, with reference to the unsuitability of happiness as an interesting subject matter for fiction.

My spoken word guide to the gay Nottingham dialect causes quite a stir. Shent fookin gerrin enneh! Get kokkart!

“F**k off, teal scum!” Those lovable little critters, the racist ducks make their debut.

The sidebar image changes, as does the strapline: “My fish always comes out wonky. It’s a curse.”

Troubled Diva is long-listed in three categories at the Bloggies: Best European/African, Best GLBT and Weblog of the Year.

In a rare brush with political blogging, I state my opposition to the imminent invasion of Iraq.

I Can Pick ‘Em Department, Part One: Become the first blogger (outside of her own household, that is) ever – that’s EVER! – to link to My Boyfriend Is A Twat. The honour!

February 2003.

Return to drinking alcohol, while vowing “The days of cracking open a shared bottle of wine in front of the telly, night after night after night, are gone.” (Yeah, right.)

Receive a comment from a member of the Estonian girl band Vanilla Ninja, having just raved about their (sadly failed) Eurovision entry, Club “Kung-Fu”. “Troubled Diva – the blog that the STARS read!”

Attend my first public London blogmeet, downstairs at the Green Man on Great Portland Street. You know: the famous one, where Pete met Karen. (Meg took a great photo of their historic meeting, in which I appeared either to be giving Pete dating tips, or else passing favourable judgement on his bride-to-be’s cleavage.)

The weekend – which I refer to as “Apotheosis Of Blog” – ends with me dancing topless in public, for what was almost certainly the last time ever (barring the odd cartoon representation here and there).

The first of the fully interactive, MP3-enabled instalments of Which Decade Is Tops For Pops? is launched (causing a major intra-blog kerfuffle over the relative merits of Whitney Houston’s and Dolly Parton’s renditions of “I Will Always Love You”.)

I earn my first sneery, snarky, who-the-hell-does-he-think-he-is reference on another (now defunct) blog. A year or so later, we’re exchanging friendly e-mails and linking to each other.

March 2003.

Following a nail-biting tie-break round, the first Which Decade? contest is won by the 1970s.

Threatened by possible redundancy, I hide out in my comments box until the all-clear is sounded. This morphs into the Let’s Get More Comments Than Wil Wheaton Project (yeesh, me and my Projects), which sees me receiving over 235 comments in return for a £100 donation to Comic Relief – but without leaving my comments box for the duration, meaning that publicity for the stunt has to be raised by others on my behalf.

(Commemorative photo-doctoring by Zoe.)

As a reward for reaching the comments target, the ex-blogger most recently known as Somewhat Muchly gives me the domain name of http://www.troubleddiva.co.uk.

A poetry reading in Beeston is dissected at length. (One of my favourite posts, but it’s a shame that I didn’t give it a proper ending.)

The month ends with the first Troubled Diva Guest Week, in which I am joined by Anna (little.red.boat), D (Acerbia), noodle vague (The World, Backwards), Faustus M.D. (The Search For Love In Manhattan) and Mr.D. (whose experience during Guest Week inspired him to start his own blog, Aprosexic).

April 2003.

Passing quickly over the ear-bashing horrors of the Match The Intro competition…

…we arrive at Apotheosis of Blog (slight return), in which a secret cabal of bloggers steal the official A-list from the filing cabinet, and replace it with their own.

The Troubled Diva merchandising range is introduced.

The long period of professional activity draws to a close, as I fly off to Paris for the first of many, many business trips.

I Can Pick ‘Em Department, Part Two: become one of the first bloggers to plug Call Centre Confidential – arguably one of the first examples of a new approach to personal blogging, which sees tightly themed and constructed writing come to the forefront, in place of the usual links-and-commentary paradigm.

My first audio-blog: a “performance art” recitation of… well, you’ll see. (Remember audblogs? They were all the rage…)

An article on Troubled Diva appears in Web User magazine’s regular Blog On column, based on this interview.

Installation Art Thursday takes place, as I stage The Perpetual Impossibility Of Sensory Gratification.

May 2003.

Hard house is danced to, on beer, for the last time ever. Farewell, hard house.

The Which Is The Best Madonna Album? Project gets underway, as I experiment with stepping the music criticism up a notch. (Music and Bedtime Stories end up tying for first position, in case you were wondering.)

Fye-ya! Diz-eye-ya!

Over at the cottage, the PDMG (Princess Diana Memorial Garden) is installed.

Discover that Troubled Diva is an anagram of Voidable Turd.

But in the morning, with all done and dusted, and what remained of the spell completely broken, this awful quietness and retreat descended upon the room. A shuffle back from intimacy to cordiality. From “oh yeah, me too, absolutely” to “do you want a shower now, or wait till you get back?” From new best mate, to cipher, to statistic. No phone numbers. No point. Respective little black books already bulging, with page after alphabetised page of half-smile memories, mild accusations, slowly fading obligations.

A casual shag in a boutique hotel forms the basis for one of my absolute all-time favourite posts.

To Riga, for the second Troubled Diva Eurovision Takeover – including a Latvian fireman, on the beach, in wet pants, rescuing a sopping wet beaver.

June 2003.

After mocking a US Care Bear blog for ripping off my site design, and dolling up the blog with Care Bears a-go-go, karmic retribrution strikes, as I find myself trapped inside a Care Bear for a whole week. Only the intervention of The Blessed Esther Rantzen saves me.

K and I flirt with the idea of buying a new house in Nottingham. It’s an over-ambitious conceit, which comes to naught.

Blogspot is abandoned for good, as I migrate to my fourth URL: http://www.troubleddiva.com. Just to keep everyone on their toes.

July 2003.

A Blog Hiatus Of The Month competition is hosted.

The 100 x 100 project is launched: a series of 100 posts of exactly 100 words in length. Yes, I know… doomed. A project too far?

Ah yes, the Diva Rhyming Slang quiz. My, I was full of ideas back then.

The Old Curiosity Box series splutters to a close, as I belatedly realise that nobody is actually downloading my super-rare MP3s. Puh.

August 2003.

The ill-fated 100 x 100 Project – my first serious misfire – is put out of its mystery, via a marathon weekend Blogathon.

Ah, the Zbornak interview. What fun that was – especially the autobiographical musical.

“Will I be cooking lunch, or will I be cooking dinner? ” A photo shoot takes place for Period Living magazine. Little did we realise that it would take another three years for the article to be published…

September 2003.

The Nottingham house is put up for sale. We don’t sell, and opt to stay put instead.

I Can Pick ‘Em Department, Part Three: The Rolling Stones at Wembley are followed by an extraordinary club gig by the then unknown Scissor Sisters. Nottingham Pride was fun, as well.

How often does your partner read your weblog? An in-depth survey is conducted. (The answer? Not a lot.)

Troubled Diva – the blog that the STARS read! Babydaddy from the Scissor Sisters sends a “thanks for the gig review” e-mail.

Oh God, the Sambuca drinking game. How young we all were.

October 2003.

I appear in a local am-dram production, playing a camp stereotype in a reality TV show. To this end, I adopt a bleached blonde “Hoxton fin”.

And then there were the costumes…

Directly following my thespian triumph, I am dispatched to Paris for the forseeable future. To cope with the absence, Guest Month is launched. Frankly, darlings… it was a triumph. Hands up, who remembers Aunt Cyn?

Down at our local gay club, K’s drink is spiked with DRUGZ. Not big. Not clever.

Enter Danny, my sex-hungry “guest blogger”. Except it was me all along, you fools! Hands up, who remembers The Spritzer? Ee, we’ve done some bonk-blogging in our time…

October 2001.

On my second day of blogging, I “out” a nascent super-chef as a mardy, aggressive git, pushing my fledgling blog into the Google Top 10 for his smart Ludlow restaurant for several years to come. Indeed, I am still in the Google Top 10 for the chef in question. The story subsequently went all around town, as we were amused to discover. Sorry, Claude – but you were unacceptably rude to my partner in public, while remaining perfectly happy to take his money. Revenge is, indeed, a dish best served cold.

November 2001.

Following an e-mail from a “concerned” friend about my new venture (“Are you having a mid-life crisis?”), I adopt his withering summary (“Dermot O’Leary does the South Bank Show”) as my first strapline.

Receive my first external link from a total stranger. Feel curiously validated.

December 2001.

Receive my first ever search engine referrals: for “biker gaydar”, and (hah!) “cute bum”.

After decades of self-repression, come out as a fan of prog-rock, following this admission with an ecstatic gig review of my favourite prog-rockers. The experience feels like coming in from the cold…

Coin the medical terms “The Fist”, “The Screwdriver” and “The Spasm”.

First appearance of my future avatar: James Gillray’s “A Voluptuary under the horrors of Digestion“. One of these days, I might get around to telling you more about our Gillray collection, which has been strangely under-represented over the years.

The first photo of myself appears (caught in the act of winning 200 quid on a Channel 4 game show), swiftly followed by the first of the legendary Christmas photos.

January 2002.

Discover, with some measure of dismay, the existence of blogging awards and the concept of “A-list bloggers”.

Forty days shy of my fortieth birthday, embark on the autobiographical 40 In 40 Days Project.

Stop buying the NME, after 28 years as a loyal weekly reader. Discover, with some measure of surprise, that it is still possible to “keep up” without it.

Begin a period of involuntary work-related exile, stuck in a wind-lashed Portakabin in the middle of a car park in the industrial North East. The Project From Hell has commenced…

February 2002.

Attend my first blogmeet: a gathering of London gay bloggers, down at Pop Quiz night at the Retro Bar.

Clean up my act, and stop hot-linking to other people’s images. (NAUGHTY! DON’T DO IT!) Start receiving over 100 visitors a day, and have a bit of a “Sally Field moment” about it (success being something of a novelty, after decades of mediocre underachievement).

After making one lengthy autobiographical posting every day, without fail, for forty days, I reach the end of the 40 In 40 Days Project. The next day, I turn 40. A party is held.

Abandon the basic Blogger template design (see above), in favour of the mauve-flavoured template which persists to this day. Farewell, fat opera singer in red dress!

March 2002.

A crude early prototype of the Which Decade Is Tops For Pops project makes its debut – without MP3s, and without reader participation. Actually, it’s all rather half-baked and crap. But a milestone, none the less.

The underscore changes to a hyphen, as troubled_diva.blogspot.com moves to troubled-diva.blogspot.com.

A good eighteen months away from the birth of MP3 blogging as we now know it, the Troubled Diva Old Curiosity Box is opened for the first time, with a posting of Cristina’s “Is That All There Is?” Over the next eighteen months or so, around 140 rare MP3s are posted, generally on a weekly basis.

“Electroclash” is suddenly all the rage, and I’m quick to jump on board the bandwagon.

My multiple personalities are introduced: Country Mike, Office Mike, Gay Mike, Rockin’ Mike, Stylish Mike and Web Mike. Posh Mike, Scary Mike and Baby Mike are unaccountably absent from the list, Sporty Mike and Ginger Mike more understandably so.

April 2002.

Chapter Three of Peter’s collaborative fiction project, The Naked Novel. To this day, this remains the only fiction I have written since adolescence. To this day, I’m still rather proud of it. Hmm, there’s a message in there somewhere.

Home broadband arrives in Nottingham. Goodbye, 56k dial-up! I only have to suffer you at weekends now!

My first international business trip takes me to Amsterdam for the night. Within a couple of hours of landing, my (straight) clients have unwittingly dragged me off to what turns out be a gay bar. Coming out at work was never easier.

Spend most of the rest of the month in the wind-lashed Portakabin, growing progressively more over-worked, miserable and lonely. The “Portakabin Diary” becomes a regular weekly feature for a while, as Troubled Diva briefly flirts with angst-blogging.

An unfairly bitchy early post is discovered by a friend of the people that I was unfairly bitching about, and is quickly removed. The blushes remain for the rest of the month, as an important lesson is learnt the hard way.

Make my first of many visits to the one-time spiritual home of the London gay blogger: Sundays at the Royal Vauxhall Tavern, where The Dame Edna Experience ruled (and still rules) supreme.

Add a Tag Board to the site, for a short while. Does anyone still remember Tag Boards? Oh, they were quite the rage.

May 2002.

On May 4th, Troubled Diva welcomes its 10,000th visitor.

Ohmigod Kylie at the NEC YOU GO GIRL.

To Tallinn, where I attend the finals of the Eurovision Song Contest for the third time. To the horror of some of my more cultured regular readers, Eurovision-related content dominates the blog for a good couple of weeks – and not for the last time, either.

June 2002.

Install the YACCS commenting system – which remains in place to this day, with all 17,000+ comments still archived and available. Peter of Naked Blog is the first reader to leave a comment.

At the Royal Concert Hall, Brian Wilson delivers one of the most touching and memorable concerts that I have ever attended, including a complete run-through of the Pet Sounds album.

Portakabin-related angst reaches fever pitch – and then is no more, as I am finally released from the Project From Hell. In its place, a lengthy period of professional inactivity commences. With little else to do, blogging takes centre stage, as Troubled Diva enters what I have long considered to be its twelve-month Golden Age.

This gives me time to research and post the first ever list of the UK’s most linked weblogs. Surprisingly, only four blogs from that first list (Plastic Bag, Blogjam, Rather Good and Interconnected) are still present in the most recently published Top 50.

July 2002.

The month starts with great excitement, as a technical fault with the then all-powerful Blogdex sees me sitting at Number Two on its listings for a day or so, earning myself my first major traffic spike. (Well, as major as traffic spikes ever got in those dim and distant pioneering days.) Oh, it was all about the Blogdex and the Daypop back then. Technorati? Wassthatthen?

(Traffic spikes? Popularity charts? How soon was that early innocence corrupted?)

The Stations Of The Diva series starts: another set of autobiographical posts, based around the various addresses I have lived in. Who knows, perhaps I’ll finish it one of these days?

To London, to watch Madonna upon the West End stage… followed by a chance encounter which ushers in a most unexpected temporary return to London hedonism, mid-1990s style.

The Guardian’s “Best British Weblog” competition is launched, with a deafening crash which splits the UK blogosphere in half. Honestly, you wouldn’t believe the kerfuffle which this caused – indeed, it was all that anyone could talk about for a few weeks. Myself included. Oh dear. I still blush a bit over that one.

Over at the Nottingham Arena, Neil Diamond rocks my world. Of all the gig reviews that I have written over the years, this one is probably still my favourite.

“Daddy, what’s sex?”

August 2002.

THAT London weekend. The one where I… where we… where they… nope, still can’t blog about it. Maybe I’ll blog about it in another five years’ time.

The following weekend, K and I spend a disillusioning night in a past-it “boutique” hotel (OK, it was the Hempel, and here’s my hatchet job), before heading off to Vietnam for two amazing, incredible, best-holiday-ever weeks. Troubled Diva duly takes its first hiatus, before returning with a detailed day-by-day diary of the Vietnamese experience.

The day before we depart, a chance meeting at a cricket match inspires K to start his next business venture. Nevertheless, it will still be over a year before he is in a position to make his move…

Post titles are introduced, in dinky little title boxes, thus bringing to an end the quickfire, hit-and-run, linky-love, one-or-two-line posts which used to be such a major feature of this, and of so many other blogs. The tide, it was a-turning…

The site acquires its first RSS feed, making it a relative early adopter – and the Mozilla browser is tinkered with for the first time (we hadn’t yet started calling it Firefox).

September 2002.

The long-defunct Isabella’s Teddy blog points out my alarming facial similarity to… erm, yes.

Oh God, Stylistic Tic Eradication Week. The era of the scary-bonkers blog stunt had just commenced…

The mammoth 100 things about 100 bloggers which also apply to this blogger series gets underway.

In the name of experimentation, I write a lengthy gig review whilst four pints the worse for wear. It turns out to be really rather articulate.

The Guardian “Best British Weblog” competition conspicuously fails to shower me with glory.

October 2002.

The infamous – and bafflingly popular, considering a) how much it makes me cringe to this day and b) how often people still refer to it, in strangely wistful “ah, them were the days” tones – Shirt Off My Back Project gets underway…

(I’m wearing this one today, as it happens.)
…and as if this wasn’t enough, the Nottingham, My Nottingham series is launched. Wow, I really did have a LOT of spare time on my hands back then…

First mobile phone purchase, unwillingly made. Four years later, and I’m still using the same handset. Well, if it works, right?

My first full year of blogging ends with a wild, wild, wild (but also rather upsetting) weekend in London. In the midst of the maelstrom, I sneak off for a couple of hours’ relative normality, at Sashinka’s party…