Pooh what thou wilt

Winnie on a day trip and honey picnic at Boleskin House a few years ago.

Seasonal reductions time: I ventured out into the wild today noting as I passed through the bleak terrain that many unfortunate folks in both the public and private sector are being forced to work, or at least to turn up, sit in the correct place and appear to be interested.  In the supermarket, where bread and washing tablets were necessary purchases, there were many tempting seasonal reductions in that forlorn  aisle where barbecue stuff and inflatable swimming pools used to be. Now there's just lots of bargain nuts in packets, Christmas Pringles in strange flavours, wrapping paper and biscuits for cheese in sparkly tins. They'll all be gone tomorrow of course and the edibles scoffed long before next week's dazzling (?) episode of the BBC's War and Peace airs. Meanwhile, just in case you can't wait for chocolate fix a consignment of Easter Eggs has arrived from Milton Keynes via the Kincardine Bridge and are now in the place where the festive bulb planters  and neon elf hats once were. Get them purchased soon because they'll need that spot for the weedkiller, garden machetes and suntan lotion by early February.

Avoiding social media explained

I know it's now a cliche type of overkilled, over shared thing but I do like this picture, because a) it's a great natural and unstaged dramatic shot, b) it's clear and sharp in a way you'd not expect and c) it's nothing like any of my recent real life New Year experiences. This is a proper opium for the masses, expose the thick turds/working class heroes, Chavs and drunken drones of society at their best. See, this is how they behave when simply out on their own trying to celebrate the change of some numbers on a calender in non-public space in some city. So it plays right into the hands of the right wing press and media and reveals that soft and ignorant underbelly that we all love and hate within ourselves. This is Britain and frankly it's not so great. It is however honest, embarrassing and captured in that  unlikely moment in a classically artistic way. Strange things happen all the time it seems and now and then time just freezes.

Aside from the odd dip into Twitter (capturing gems as above) I've steered clear of trying to gauge my own and other's feelings towards 2016 via the web. Same shit different year I'd say and avoid making dumb promises to yourself about lifestyle or plans. Just get the next few days under your seasonally adjusted belt and life will eventually take a hopefully pleasant course as the year unfolds. That's a reasonable expectation. Ultimately it'll all make as much sense as the latest Sherlock episode, be as predicable as the Ten O'clock News and as repetitive and familiar as The Force Awakens. I wonder if it'll taste like this cake?

Bye bye 2015

I don't make resolutions, I don't start revolutions. I'm not reviewing the year or looking back either, that's for others to do and they're welcome to it. Anyway sometimes I chop vegetables for soup or stew or as a form of meditation and mind clearing, though next year most veg around here will be tastily and conveniently steamed in the new vegetable steamer. That's just a start of how things will be, I'm meditating over dropping the whole meditation thing though. I might just resort to simple medication.

Forces to be reckoned with

I'm with the popular view that the director of the new Star Wars film, "Return of the phantom force to be reckoned with and all that other geeky malarkey" had a pretty simple remit from the big boys at Disney. "OK, we have about $4 billion riding on this investment. Make a film for us and whatever you do don't fuck it up." I hope that he hasn't and I'll find out this afternoon when I finally get to see it. I suspect I'll not be disappointed, I go back all the way with this franchise as do most of my family and no doubt, come rubbish films, unexpected character deaths or the reemergence of old ones we'll stick with it. Turns out that Star Wars is for life pretty much.

Loog

Behind the times as ever, asleep at the wheel, up my own bahooki, etc. just discovered the Loog three string guitar project, concept and possible pyramid and finger injuring scheme. Naturally I'm there in mind, body and spirit. I would include soul if I had one but I think that I may have misplaced it in some previous post or accidentally sold it on to the devil or some other strange historical/pantomime figure. I might therefore become a Loog disciple or maybe even a heretic sometime in the year of our Loog 2016.

Of course all of this means something...

The Dead

Interlinked nonsense: Sometime this year I decided that "The Dubliners" by James Joyce was the greatest book ever written (albeit it's short stories but interlinked stories nonetheless) and that the "The Dead" is probably the greatest short story etc. etc. I still think that (and that). So despite the fact that we're damp and snowless those final paragraphs in "The Dead" still seem to resonate and reverberate nicely at this time of year. Nicely isn't a work you'd use to describe the effect of or the writings of Joyce, no not at all, but it works for me. Toffee and writing spring to mind. The cold and soulless moments emit a strange warmth and comfort and sense of common feeling and a sense of meaning for life and for literature. The other dead are properly dead too (despite what their website may say), the Grateful Dead; strange also to get back to liking their sometimes bland and insipid music, their irritating cultural position in some smoke filled American version of the world and their incompetency. Perfectly imperfect, that's what I must be pursing these days. Not even pursuing, more like falling into a black hole having been pushed or tripped up by some clumsy cat whilst searching for, there it in the dark. 

So there is no such thing as a dark night of the soul. It's just another trivial point on that continuous procession of stuff that you sometimes ride on, sometimes get trampled by and sometimes avoid in life's great (dark but with occasional flashlight moments) experience.

Post Christmas = too Decemberist

Now it's post Christmas and in this outpost of post Christmasness procrastination I'm being even lazier than ever about posting. That's because I'm way too busy with the seasonal stuff to think straight or straightforwardly. I haven't even seen the news or read a newspaper since I don't know when and I'm none the worse for that either. I did venture out today, not sure I'll try that again. Too busy, too frantic and too Decemberist.

Strange Christmas

When you're drifting, close on to the edge, outside of the law, far from religion and civilisation, bereft of beliefs and wandering a lonely road...or just living and existing in Fife then Christmas is a strange, disturbing time of year. (Thought not as bad as Easter). Really nothing makes sense, the meaning, the lack of meaning, the greed and industry and the pointless sales that precede and follow the great and misunderstood day. Anyway it turns out I do like raiding the fridge and pulling crackers, giving and receiving presents and so on. Maybe it's not so strange after all. So Happy Christmas, I'll say no more.

On a break for Christmas

Well actually not on a break yet, have to work a bit tomorrow, feeling a bit like the fellow in the card above. Those Victorians really knew a thing or two about the Christmas message.

This could be a tiny bird or a cartoon version of my good lady. Depending on how seasonally overcome you are you'll see what you want to see I suppose. Meanwhile here's a reminder that it's tea (drinking wine) time and some good career advice from the Guardian newspaper. Good to see that Mr Balls is putting his pension pot to good use.

More Wobbly Weather

The view this morning: blasted by a warm but wet west wind, thundering against the house and battering rain across the windows. Suddenly the sun appeared and we set about delivering Christmas cards and messages of world peace, existential warmth and the meaningful rebirth of a new style of Scottish politics across our small community. Generally all of this was well received and we came away with some sense of our house not being the most untidy and cluttered in the area. Always a good if only temporary feeling. Next there was a feast of eggy bread and burnt animal  followed by a trip up town for some sanitised stones to prevent me and the cats from accidentally pissing into wardrobes and plant pots. Not long after that I started drinking wine and eating overage chocolate, now everything is looking a bit wobbly once again. Best to stay away from Twitter and eBay then.

Crossroader

It has emerged that only the third ever (known) photo of Robert Johnson has emerged. That's quite a bit of emerging. Now the myth and the magic can be revised just a little bit. I presume the picture was taken post the crossroads incident and that he had some kind of career thing going on at this point. It may prove that despite selling your soul to the devil you still show up in photographs and presumably also have a reflection. I know that I do.

American Friday

Well not really American, no pancakes and coffee, only mince pies and tea and rain. I did however listen to Grateful Dead's American Beauty at least four times, deliberately. Well it's either that or Radio Scotland's daily gibberish. It did get me thinking if there was/is such a thing as a ten track album with no bad tracks, nothing you'd skip or get bored with. Of course that in itself is a highly subjective judgement to make and while I can think of possible contenders it's not easy (obviously "best of" albums and compilations don't count) as even some of the so called classic albums carry at least a couple of also rans. American Beauty being a good example, firstly it is a seriously acquired taste and secondly it's patchy and just carelessly played here and there. I'm actually intrigued by just how much of the Dead's live stuff (not this album) is suspiciously out of tune for chunks of time and I'm not a person who generally picks that kind of thing up. I missed hearing that amount of detail back in the day, for some strange reason.

Playing a tune

The daily problems that come from having a short attention span: For me playing a song all the way through, properly and without mistakes or taking shortcuts is a bit like swimming a length in a long tepid swimming pool or running up a muddy hill or climbing some rock face. There, that's that said. Writing a whole paragraph full of meaningful words and getting them in the correct order is also a bit of an issue. Then to make matters worth some kind of picture has to be added so as to create some sensible frame or context. That is difficult. Then there are the spelling mistakes in emails that the spell checker misses because they are words but not the words I meant to use. Ugh.

Not what anyone thinks

Our mission to reseed (or even seed) nearby and hospitable planets has begun. We've approached this task with a stoical realism and a little bit of fanatical devotion (always useful). This mix has enabled us to at least get through the sorting and packing stage whilst better and more practical minds concentrate on building the starship. I'm sure you're familiar with the plan, the hijack, the execution, the journey, the conflict, the remorse, the realisation, the illumination, the scattering of the seeds (?) and then the end credits rolling. The good news is that the mission is on schedule to be completed by Christmas, a festival celebrated on many planets apparently, so we're on course. Watch out for average standards of space catering and areas of random turbulence on the trip.

Escape from Fife

Nothing to do with anything really just a big, wacky photo of Dali signing books.

A bit bugged to find that I've lost (finding v losing) a Grateful Dead CD. Lost of course in the worst way, I have the box but can't find the disc. Extensive and largely pointless searching has taken place and resulted in no result. I however find that getting across the Kincardine Bridge and exiting Fife by the only open door isn't as bad or jammed up as I thought. Whilst it's hardly smooth it's not a totally solid jam and of course all the picturesque abandoned villages along the way help the journey pass pleasantly. Only taken me two weeks to discover that. Roll on the glorious 5th of January when our engineering lords and masters promise to free us from the tyranny of wonky bridges and give us back at least four hours every working day.

Festive around here

An explanation may well follow.

Great festoons of mad lights and colours dance like a Frank Zappa sculpture while we look on, dazed and confused playing our internal musical instruments. Christmas is a load of happy nonsense that binds us up and sets us free, at times.

World, I forgive but please stop destroying yourself whilst humouring all the swarming masses of teeming masses of multitudes of masses that are amassing wealth and maintaining an unjust status quo all across your battered surface. Take us through the crust, suck us into the magna, take us back to when we were lost and drown us in the deep and non-biblical waters. That should fix things.

Urinal measures

The badly behaved cat that peed in the plant pot relaxes and repents after a long process of healing and psychotherapy. Bed still intact and relatively dry 24 hours later.

As I travel across this odd, unjust and often strange world I do from time to time encounter things that simply cannot be explained. Often I list them here.

I am well and truly seasonally adjusted enough by now. The presents and trees and lights have done their wicked work and I'm in that comfortable pre-Christmas coma, not knowing quite what to do next or quite where I am.  There are many working days ahead, some snow, some bad weather and some terrible television but I am determined to make Christmas No. 60 one of the least troublesome and most enjoyable. I'll be keeping my head down of course, dodging the bullets and steering clear of queues and inconvenience. It's a plan but it's doomed already.

V is for Very Naughty Boy

For a short week this one has taken too long, the high spot being the final episode of the underrated and possibly ignored "the Last Kingdom", it will return possibly with a revised title. Anyway I'm fed up with Trump, ISIS, the Forth Bridge and winter rain. Not that my feelings will make any difference to anything. Maybe it's that toxic mixture of frustration and futility that turns kids into terrorists and businessmen into fascists , maybe it's hormones, demons or bad religion. Maybe it's just the way things are and we're stuck in some universal loop. Of course looking on the brighter side of things today I did enjoy a decent and not too plastic Christmas lunch, a shorter commute and my first glass of life giving red wine in about a week. Tomorrow I'm on the road again as more grim winter weather looms over, but that is for another day.

Walking in the air

Whatever the circumstances and obvious errors there are leading up to the damage and closure of the Forth Road Bridge there's no doubt that the folks trying to fix it have a tough and challenging job: respect. In other news I've discovered that the cat did not take a dump in the flower pot, she peed in it instead. Let's just say that the passage of time and the (relative) warmth of the house does not help the situation.

Fifty Shades of Rain

I'm trying hard to remain upbeat and positive, chipper and on top but with a double two hour  commute in the blackest rain I've seen (at least this week) it's tough. The world may well be ending by degrees and our our small corner is teetering on the brink whilst numerous other countries have already tipped over the edge. I though it had tipped when I saw what I thought was one of our cats taking a bad weather avoiding dump in a flower pot by the TV. Turns out she was just striking some sort of pose. I'm no idea why but it fairly put me off my toasted cheese and ham sarny and I missed (thankfully) most of  a truly cringeworthy interview on the Channel 4 news with a complete dick-head musician (?) who's claim to fame was that he'd once led the Brian Jonestown Massacre. I'm treating myself to coffee and the last wee cake in a bid to revive myself.