Cities of a Far and Distant Future War

The trivial things I know are useless. Which sounds a little redundant, since trivia by its very nature is often useless, but when I say useless I mean oh my God, so much, much more useless than anyone else's trivia.

Other people's trivia has the flavour of genius. It's important and brilliant. They can use it in their books, to flesh things out and make their characters and places sing. It's stuff like when a classical composer was born or how much cheese exists in France or the names of cheeses or what cheese weighs or other stuff about things that are not cheese because my trivia is so useless, I can't even think of any beyond the giant fromage wheel that's now spinning inside my head.

I know nothing about cheese. I don't even know how it's made. I know you don't cook milk to make it, but then again...maybe you do! How the fook should I know, my trivia is useless.

Here is my trivia:

1. Every name of the marines from the movie Aliens: Hicks, Hudson, Vasquez, Gorman, Spunkmeyer, Frost, Drake, Apone, Ferro, Wierzbowski, Dietrich, Crow.

2. The name of the band who wrote the song Let Go from the movie My Demon Lover: Intimate Strangers. I also know all the lyrics. It wants the spirit world inside to protect you.

3. The age, height and CV of Armie Hammer. I know this level of trivia about a great, great many men. So many men, in fact, that I fear this useless information is starting to drive out normal information, like: how to walk. What to do with a spoon. Where my house is.

4. The name of the scary girl from Ringu. It's Sadako Yamamura.

5. How much milk needs to go in a packet of Angel Delight. It's 300ml, BTW. But if you put in a little bit less it makes the Angel Delight just a touch firmer, which I like. Then I put cherries and squirty cream on top and pretend I'm eating chocolate trifle. Because...I dunno. I can't afford real chocolate trifle? I can't be bothered to make real trifle? I can't be bothered to go out and buy ready made real trifle?? You know, lined up like this my life sounds pathetic. Which I suppose is the problem with listing the flotsam and jetsom floating around inside your head.

Suddenly your life is reduced to the aimless knowledge you've accumulated, and according to my aimless knowledge I'm a psychotic Aliens fan with terrible taste in music, a stalker-esque obsession with famous men, a terrible diet and poor spoon dexterity. Also, I might be cursed by a girl who comes out of TVs.

I'm composed of nothing. At dinner parties I couldn't let out little nuggets about the size of our galaxy or the mating habits of iguanas. Where that knowledge exists in other people, I'm just a void of pathetic film and hunk trivia. I could tell Lord Fontleby the Third about the dialogue Scott Valentine utters as he turns into a creature in My Demon Lover, but somehow I suspect he wouldn't care.

And then I'd do something like flick a fork into his eye, because all my knowledge about Bradley Cooper has shoved out the ability to use other items of cutlery, too.

Though please, don't go away thinking all of this depresses me. That I'm terribly sad about my vacuous brain and its suspect contents: I'm not. I don't feel guilty about it, either.

I love my brain. I love that it's like a giant future-war trash heap, littered with the bones and bricks of movies no-one else on earth has ever cared about. I love wading through its jagged landscape like Wall-E, forever sifting for jewels and dancing on dust, waiting for my Eva to come.

He always comes. He lives amongst the debris. Out of the ashes whole worlds emerge, and with them is life, and love, and everything. I love you, my brain. And I love your useless trivia.