Oh, to be a starfish...

Quantum decline

You take it for granted for ages. The “situation” in the background, you know, [whispers] dementia!

Then you go through a couple of days of a trough, which turns into 5 or 7, and you realise you’ve taken a small but significant step down in your abilities.

Concentration at an all time low. Every time I try to read and prepare for D&D the detail of most of it is lost, so much so at times that when it comes to running the game it feels like I’m reading the passage for the first time. 

My prep is like this: procrastinate, procrastinate, read half-heartedly, procrastinate, read thoroughly and make notes, do nothing on the day of the game, read the notes haphazardly in a hurry - eyes darting all over the page - ditto for the actual original text, then run game. 

It’s an effort. Fuck I wish it wasn’t like this. Am I getting away with it? 

I asked and one person said it was noticeable how I'm not as on it as I once was but it was still really good, and the other person said they hadn't detected any decline at all. 

I like to think I’m experienced enough to provide a decent experience for everyone - myself included.

Suffice to say this is the new reality. 

Also some occasional minor hallucinations: white objects like my Apple mouse which in my peripheral vision suddenly burst into view like a firing flash gun set at F2.

I’m going to have to up my dose of Sertraline from 100mgs to 150mgs for a while. Finding it all a bit difficult. The noise of busy pubs; sitting indoors, not finding any satisfaction in YouTube clips or much else for that matter. 

Like a smoker who can’t afford cigarettes, or the straight-jacketed man with itchy balls. 

Just restless: an unquenchable thirst for a drink that doesn’t exist. 

At least I can still string a sentence together, spot typos, grammar errors and punctuation errors (are they ever not errors these days?) with alarming speed - like Robocop spotting perps in his multiple cross-hairs.

My handwriting still receives compliments. 

Forgetting my multiplication times tables now. Had to think what 7x8s were. Known them off by heart since I was 9.

You lucky, lucky bastard.

And you 'n all.

Politics 

I still think I’m over-qualified for Trump's cabinet.

I’m not a rapist, or a tax evader, or a fraud of any kind. In fact I haven’t done anything to be pardoned by him yet. 

So no ambassadorships or secretary of state jobs.

I am completely unqualified for any post in government, which oddly enough would actually make me qualified in this (mad) instance.

I’m better informed than Tulsi Gabbard who repeats verbatim RT propaganda like a Talking Barbski doll-bot and of course RFK Jr who seems to be just a very damaged person through drug-use and personal trauma.

Despite my dementia I’d be much better than this shower.

Trouble is the MAGA crowd would accuse me of being a DEI pick and that wouldn’t be a good look for Trump or Project 2025.

Sod it then. It's CEO of the World Bank for me.

Plutocrats 

Just as Elon Musk spent hundreds of millions of dollars getting the stooge known as Trump back into office, the Reform Party is Musk's next project. They are of course natural bedfellows.

Another one in the mix is Nick Candy - the property developer, who in a Sunday Times interview today quite openly speaks about his fondness for Saudi Arabia and its society: its great quality of life and law and order.

Wow. Think about this for a moment. Saudi and many of the Emirates states have the most appalling human rights records, a catalogued history of indentured workforces, the scandal about the workers who built the Burj Khalifa and many other erectile dysfunction buildings in that part of the world.

But what amazes me these days is that somehow, at some point the concept of democracy became devalued. People now speak openly about appalling regimes and dictators as though these are great people running great societies. The MAGA movement led by Trump, Tucker Carlson, Tulsi Gabbard praising Victor Orban, Poot'n, Xi of China. All autocrats with appalling human rights records, especially for women and LGBTQ+.

I just can't believe how up-front they are about it too. There's almost no attempt to hide their undemocratic leanings. I assume they operate in echo-chambers for them to think this is 'normal'.

These billionaires who manipulate the media like never before are out to get even richer, dividing the wealth of the world up between themselves like the oligarchs they are, depending on ordinary people to vote them in.

Already Trump is pulling back on his promise to make groceries more affordable - one of the promises he made in the election.

I cannot believe we've come to this point. People died in the Peasant's Revolt, The Peterloo Massacre, Chartism, Trades unions and the suffragette movement, to have human rights, to be recognised by those holding power as fellow humans with a stake in society ie. the vote.

Is it that history has become irrelevant due to ignorance?

- Forget it G - that happened a long time ago. It's history.

- What, like Jesus?

If it looks like fascism smells like fascism and acts like fascism, it's probably fascism. 

I've lost friends who have swallowed this shit hook line and stinker. And I'm prepared to lose more any who fall into this vortex of bigotry and hatefulness.

They're laughing at us.

And finally...

Had to throw 2 pairs of pants out this week: structural integrity of the gusset. Quite the disappointment. These things all happen at the same time don’t they? Waves of exploding heels on socks, disintegrated gussets and holes in your favourite t-shirts. 

These things happen in clusters don't they?

One thing’s for sure, I shan’t be buying nylon pants ever again. 

Optimum Girths

Comparing Nibs

I don't think many people hand-write much these days apart from shopping lists. I hand write lots - having written a diary since I was a teenager.

I mentioned this to Mark the other day on a video call and we got our nibs out and had a comparison.

He surprised me by getting out his vintage Parkers. Beautiful things, So elegant.

While some people love watches, I love stationery.

Here are 3 of my pens: 2 Rotring Art Pens and a Lamy Accent. I had a Cross which I wrote with for years but it recently bit the big one. So I took up with the Lamy Again.

Some pens

Post

I love getting things in the post and today was a very special day. 

In 1992 on the Tottenham Court Road I did a personality test. It said I was a very BAD person.

I didn't want to be a BAD person. Luckily they had a book which would make me into a GOOD person.

It was called Dianetics.

I bought it but didn't read it. 

32 years later they're still sending me these every few months.

Contains a lock of Tom Cruise's pubes, destined for Ebay

I love how desperate/persistent they are. They have less than 40,000 estimated people left in Scientology and as a result they are running out of money. 

One of the good things about the internet is now everyone can see how preposterous it is as nothing is hidden - they can't keep a lid on their secrets anymore.

We all know about hydrogen bombs and Thetans and volcanoes and Xenu. It's laughably-bad trash-sci-fi made into a religion. And we can all see it and make fun of it all, which of course they cannot bear.

Good.

And then my new pants came as well. 

State of the (f)art pant

What a day! Can't wait to wear these bad boys.

Think I'll get the letter framed.

Accents

I like accents

When I was at school kids were bussed in from surrounding villages I'd never heard of. Some of them had accents so thick I could barely understand them.

You never hear westcountry accents elsewhere - especially London. Everyone assumes you're dumb if you speak in the westcountry burr, so if you have one people tend to lose them.

People in London - especially public school types - also think that about the Welsh. Don't believe me? Having Welsh parents I'm particularly sensitive to these things, and people say the most extraordinary things they wouldn't dare say about West Indian or Pakistani people anymore, instead directing their bigotry against other minorities.

I realise the animosity works both ways.

But you get my point.

Now that I've returned to the town of my birth I seldom hear those very strong accents from 40 years ago. I think with decades of radio, television and now social media those accents have homogenised. 

The BBC has an archive of regional accents going back to the 1920s in remote parts of rural Britain, and most have disappeared.

Thanks to those awfully bright people who run the BBC, it's no longer available.

Anus is best said in a south African accent. The south African tongue around ‘anus’ is something to behold; something to savour.

“Yah. EYEnoose is my five-reet word.” (How to speak South African.)

“ ‘andy tups.” What you get from watching daytime TV.

The same person said:

"When I shout at someone, it's all over after that."

 Well, it may be all over for you, but it may not be for them.

Bloody cardigan-wearer.

The size of heads

I have a very large head. It is in disproportion to my puny frame. I take a XL in hats. 

Not a large - AN XL!!

Jacqui has a very small head. Think a lemon and a grapefruit.

As scientific as it gets

I wish I didn't have such a massive head. 

I wish I was a little bit taller...

Why I want to live in a Carry on world

I want Barbara Windsor to wiggle past to the music of Eric Rogers.

I want Charles Hawtrey to keep a hot water bottle under his kilt because it keeps his dangler warm.

I want Valerie Leon to work in a camping shop and show me how to get the [tent} pole up.

I want Terry Scott to be Tarzan.

I want Kenneth Williams to be Kenneth Williams over and over again.

I want Bernard Bresslaw to say 'I only arsked' in his high-pitched voice.

I want Sid James to be the lothario and do his laugh and go "Cor blimey!" when he sees a naked lady.

I want Joan Sims to be absolutely disgusted when the nude men turn around.

I want compulsory double entendres.

I want distinctive, infectious laughter.

I want silly to replace depression.

I want to be a highly repressed male surrounded by right dolly birds.

And what is wrong with that?

Oh. Okay.

Put on your best pants, Major Tom

What the glitterati of mid-Somerset are wearing this season

Met my old friend Shelley for lunch on Friday at the Sheep and Penguin - I wore my finest pant and my Hong Kong Phooey T-shirt. 

I dress to impress.

It's rather akin to Vogue cover photos, where on the inside cover of the magazine they even tell you what perfume the model is wearing. ('Model' is a word that never looks right to me on the page - how about 'Moddle'?)

Hence knowing I have the McLaren of pants on and a highly sexy T-shirt - whilst never revealing said garments - is like wearing under armour before a rugby match. 

Like Clark Kent wearing his Superman outfit underneath his corporate suit.

I felt invincible!

These most fragrant of pants are my under armour, my scent, my most gussetted treasure.

My special occasion pant.

I can feel you gloating.

Damn I wish I'd bought more of the same.

I am also using beard oil to curl my magnificent whiskers (for I am the most pubic man in Wells). 

I can't wait for my whiskers to turn white as this will make me (even) more sexy.

I get the eye from the old ladies these days you see. My key demographic has changed.

Dementia Towers

Maybe we are all demented here. Dad forgot the surname (that's 'Last Name' to Millennials) of the guy opposite who's lived there for 50 years, and then forgot to put the carrots on.

It may just be tiredness.

I've often said I have dementia in a 10' radius. Come within my aura and you too will see; you will forget things which remained hitherto unforgettable. 

But, if we all have it (or early signs of it) where is this going and at what rate?

It could be like The League of Gentlemen, or The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Although I see the latter Leatherface family walking their horrible dogs on The Bishop's Fields now and then, so they're already taken.

Like all these bridges, I shall cross them when they arrive 'neath my feet.

Food for thought though.

What I'm watching

Watching YouTube too much. But these are good things to subscribe to:

The Lincoln Project - Trump hates these guys. If you want any more reason, they make commercials to absolutely ruin him, often in answer to the ones his team have made. They are doing an invaluable service.

NRL - The greatest rugby tournament in the world is back next month. No kick-tennis here.

Vlad Vexler - London-based Russian philosopher and all-round intellectual giving his views on what's really going on with Putin and Russia, what their motivations and intentions are.

Netflix: biographical docs on Orson Welles, Quincy Jones, David Geffen. All really good. 

Televisual Offal

The Masked Arsehole - filmed in RetardoVision for the freshly lobotomised. 80s one-hit wonders and drug-addled soapstars who no one can remember and when unmasked everyone goes "Oh no - it's them!" but actually they don't have a clue who it is, because they've long been erased from everyone's' collective brainage for evolutionary purposes.

You can tell the budget goes on the panel 'talent' rather than the singers.

Utter, utter, utter shite.

"Take it off! Take it off!" chant the masses: the type of people who clap and miss.

And then on BBC breakfast they're interviewing Tiffany. Now if you don't know who Tiffany is, she was a teen popstar in the 80s who performed at shopping malls (those large derelict structures in middle America) and drew huge crowds, and had a hit with "I think we're alone now." It turned out her mother had forced her to perform and in an act of rebellion she posed nude for Playboy. 

Now why did I remember that?

Anyway, there she was on The Masked Anus - 40 years on from her fame - and everyone is acting surprised to see her. The reason they're surprised is because they haven't a clue who she is. And then - THEN - she is being interviewed on BBC Breakfast on Saturday morning.

No one bloody cares!

It all goes to prove my theory that the human species has peaked a few generations ago and we are now on a fast rewind back to our primal bollock stage.

Remembering Pronouns

2 teacher friends have recently told me of separate incidents. 

One, where at the end of a long term they called a pupil by their previous female name - cue sharp intakes of breath from the rest of the class. Having known this pupil by this previous name for 3 years and then having to adopt their new chosen name, it was an understandable brain slip. I mean anyone who knows teachers appreciates how exhausted they are at the end of a term, right?

The second was in D&D and one child called a biological female 'her'. Cue more sharp intakes of breath. Bear in mind that last year 'she' was a 'they', and now wishes to be referred to as a 'he'. It's very difficult to keep up with all this and for most part take it seriously. Most of us don't want to offend and are happy to go along with it, but we all secretly know that he is blatantly a she.

My solution to teachers when they are trying to avoid splitting the class up into boys and girls and avoiding modern sensitivities is this: 

"Vaginas to the left - penises to the right."

Done.

And no one will get offended at that!

I have already invoiced the Department of Education 30 guineas for my consultation services.