What now then?

Why this blog is rubbish

I read the other day that most good art is created by flawed individuals who may be in a bad place. Some examples would be Larkin, Picasso, Caravaggio, Liszt.

And there is that current conversation of separation between art and artist: do we take down the Eric Gill because he sexually abused his daughters? If yes, do we take down the Caravaggios because he was a murderer? The difference is surely how long ago these things happened. If the 20th century it's more pertinent. If it happened now immediate expulsion. The 16th century? Doesn't matter!

I do find it genuinely easier to write when I'm in a bad place. My ideas just flow out of me, like thought-diarrhoea. And I'm as fucked-up as Philip Larkin, but I just don't get angry any more.

This post has taken days to get going.

The thing is I'm trying - and often succeeding -  to live in the moment and notice beauty and warmth and pleasure. All the easier while I have no capacity for planning (or indeed facing the future) anymore.

I have so much time I can use what grey matter I have left to take on big ideas and watch and listen to footage of the likes of Christopher Hitchens and Werner Herzog. 

I've always like the company of intelligent people.

What was I saying again?

Gut-buster

I'm fat again. It's sugar. Sugar in biscuits, sweets, beer. I look bloody awful, and my jeans have never been tighter, and yes, I do wash them at 30', so it is me.

I've felt really indulgent recently, and the new Lidl is amazing for biscuits and being me I want to sample all of them. 

I tend to drink alcohol on Tuesday evenings and at the end of a D&D session on a Sunday - having drunk zero-alcohol beer up until then, to keep my struggling brain as functional as possible.

I need to be more disciplined. I yo-yo these days.

Favourite Dinner party guests

Mars Bars are the most popular confectionary. The reason is they are sweet, and not much else. And the textures are easy on the gob. Is it the best chocolate? Of course not; I wouldn't even describe it as chocolate. 

But it's the most popular. 

I use this particular metaphor to remind people that popular doesn't mean best. It often means least offensive.

People who I would love to have met, who may not have got on so well at a dinner party would certainly offend a lot of people.

Frank Zappa - highly difficult music, very intellectual guy who interspersed his music with offensive words and lyrics. The man who put the sneer into rock and roll. Huge output of music from large orchestral pieces to self-indulgent guitar solos, with incredible songs using multiple key changes, meters and improvisations. Check out the band he had in the early 70s with George Duke and Ruth Underwood. 

Werner Herzog - auteur director and actor. Made feature films and documentaries, usually of individuals trying to achieve something in a world that is alien and hostile to them. Aguire Wrath of God, Fitzcarraldo, Grizzly Man. He is fascinating to listen to, and the stories of the making of his films are as fascinating as the films themselves. 

Andy Kaufman -  a performance artist masquerading as a stand-up comedian. The joke is on you. And if you don't get the joke, at least Andy is laughing. Also Elvis's favourite Elvis Presley impersonator.

And why do I admire them? Because they're mavericks. They followed their vision without any compromise or tangents. I realise they're very Marmite (adj). But mavericks tend to be. 

You may hate them, and that's okay.

By the way, I am the antithesis of a maverick. 

My Current Addictions

So much news going on and so much of it terrifying. I've found CNN is the best one in the States: Fox is rabid, MSNBC horribly smug.  Thank goodness for Sky and BBC and C4 in the UK. And left and right criticise them.

My list of top news stories is as follows:

Trump. This is huge. America split down the middle. And I fear this could end in a civil war, the implications of which would be profound for America but also the rest of the world.

Ukraine: Belarus is about to install Russian nukes and Medvedev is threatening to sever the info cables under the sea that connect us to each other. This could be the start of Cold War 2. But is Putin desperate enough to actually go ahead? We (collectively) in the West certainly didn't trust the USSR back in the day (some of us didn't trust America either) and I see no reason to trust Russia/Iran/ChinaNorth Korea now.

Starvation in North Korea. This is a country that can't grow enough food to feed its 26 million inhabitants and there is a starvation there that echoes the starvation in the 1990s. Compounding this is the fact that the leadership is spending money it could feed its citizens with on its nuclear development program, and has stopped importing food from China. In fact over the last 3 years it's closed its borders and expelled foreign citizens to the extent we only know what's going on there from the few people brave enough and canny enough to have communications with the outside.

B Johnson is dominating the front pages in the UK but this story is a footnote. If you haven't already realised that to him the truth is an irrelevance then you should probably get some therapy. 

Buffoon.

Swatting

I always hated this time of year as it's exam weather - the most brutal time to be indoors for days swatting away. Seeing as I never could get down to any effective form of revision, and would always get sidetracked, I have always hated exams as the stress I endured was awful.

The Executioner.

This is all a pathetic attempt to try and make a pun about swatting as now I'm running round the house looking for flies (for some reason we get a lot of them here) with this bad-boy (pictured). And it's addictive.

However, this farcical attempt at a joke is not working and probably was never going to.

Sorry. I'll go now.

Silence!

Where's my anger to?

It's gone. Seriously. I'm also not reliving past confrontations and shouting out aggressively in the house. This is a great relief to everyone working from home, but J suspects I'm just trying harder and could have done better all along (which I can understand - I'd be suspicious too) but it's honestly not like that. It just stopped. 

Is it possibly because I'm now forced to look forward in time and make decisions for my future?

I suspect that is the reason. Plus the Sertraline.

What people don't get about the broad basket of neurological conditions known as dementia is that the sufferer can show different symptoms even during a single day. It's like a rollercoaster. 

My cognitive abilities are definitely on the wane though. I can't deal with complex plans and what ifs. I get it all confused in my head and all I remember is the last things that were said. For example - I remember a conversation as starting off unpleasantly but ending pleasantly. 'So it's all going to be all right then', is how I interpret it, having forgotten or not taken in the main meat of the sandwich.

Perhaps then, it's my new found ignorance that has chilled me out.

I'm going with it anyway. 

Fat shaming myself

I'm fat again. This is due to a relapse with the beer. Luckily I'm a happy drunk again - not a maniac. To be fair I started off having the odd pint again then built up to 3 or 4 on a Tuesday, and 2 at the end of a long session on the Sunday. However, I am paying the price for my week in Wells and the week of indulgence spent in the rotten pubs there. At least they're cheaper than Kingston.

So I'm a fat bastard and should do something about it.

Perhaps less beer?

Reading/Watching

At least I'm reading tons at the moment., The other day I received a new RPG book from a company I'd backed on Kickstarter. It's about 240 pages and I read 70% in a day - obviously skimming parts of it. 

I am writing stuff for adventures but I am creatively bereft - I'm on empty. I'm not sure I will ever be able to churn ideas out like I used to. I can develop things but only very slowly. It sometimes takes days for an idea to gestate into something useable.

I'm also reading a novel in bed. It's rubbish, but easy. Like Neighbours or most movies these days. Algorithmic bollocks.

Don't want to read something heavy like Chomsky in bed, although it would get me to sleep quicker: boring old sod.

However, one of my current addictions is Rugby League (again) particularly the NRL, although I prefer how the game was played in the 90s and noughties rather than it is now. So a lot of my time is spent or rather wasted watching YouTube clips.

What I also do is read the comments on a news page on YouTube from Trump/Putin/conspiracy supporters which is utterly utterly depressing. I never ever join in the conversation as it would be very bad for me to get swallowed up in such a mire.

Are they still there? 

D&D

Monday's D&G (Dyslexic D&D) session seems to have atrophied - people have busy lives and probably playing with a cranky demented DM in charge may be straining the credibility of enjoyment, but people have busy lives, family and work. The trouble is the lack of communication. In this day and age with digital communication there is no excuse. Even if you're late (fewer and fewer people seem bothered about punctuality anymore - as a general observation) a text is all you need as a courtesy to those you are directly affecting.

The Sunday session - Drakkenheim - is approaching the final chapter. Lots of politics and diplomacy afoot, as well as more sinister plots and undercurrents. It's so fascinating. It's the only complex web of intrigue I can get my head around these days. Don't get me wrong - it's difficult to plan but I've discovered (rather like the writers of the TV series 'Lost') you don't need to start off with answers - just start new threads. Watching the players discuss them and come up with their own theories as to what's really going on is part of the game. 

As Larry says, Drakkenheim has been truly 'epic' - it is the most Game of Thrones as far as political intrigue and role-playing that I've ever experienced in a D&D game. Considering the old school stuff I played years ago was just open a door, kill the random monster and nick its treasure, this is a different ball-game altogether.

It still has all the combat and peril of old school, but things matter more with vivid characters and different factions all competing for control - life is more complicated than good vs evil, humans vs orcs. Both old and new versions are fine - but this has been one of the best written campaigns ever. And it's a 3rd party product.

Waiting room

Nothing

 I can't think of anything.

 Just sitting here. Drizzle outside. Dogs don't seem interested in walking, That's a let off.

Nothing springs to mind. No more Youtube clips. Done all of the only podcast I like. 

Cars go by. Too fast for this road.

Can't concentrate on reading for long enough. Have to make myself.

Head is numb. A light head cold with no other symptoms confines me here. It's the wafer-thin mint that tips me in to total atrophy.

Apart from this of course.

Sip some expensive herbal tea. Drinking too much caffeine these days.

The others are working upstairs.

At breakfast J talked about when she was married. I don't think she counts this as one. Or certainly not anymore anyway.

I don't have much in the way of empathy but that was pretty telling.

It must feel like that to her though. That's valid.

Nothing like feeling a spare part. Reminds me that it's a recurring theme of my dreams - abandonment, isolation, pointlessness; purposelessness. 

Continue waiting.

Driving Fail

I cancelled a hire car this week. A slight cold was enough to dent my confidence in my concentration levels for a 3 hour drive on motorways. 

Expensive waste of money. 

The others need a break from me. I don't know how they experience me. The shouting is pretty horrible I gather. I'm trying to keep a lid on that.

More difficult than ever to be self-aware - nigh on impossible. Self-analytical is different of course.

Would have been nice to see everyone. I'm only going to take trains from now on, to Castle cary and back again.

It would be good to see other people but they all work hard and need their weekends.

My parents are properly old now. That part of middle-age where your parents' generation topple like dominoes.

I have to get out and go places for everyone's sake. Their mental health as much as my own.

Games

This is what I live for now. Meeting up with people. The joy, the energy of the shared experience.

I even watched some of the rugby. I don't like it so much these days - all that kicking drives me nuts. Finding rugby league more fun. More tries.

When I can't run D&D games anymore it will be something. Maybe not as profound as I expect. A gradual decline to nothing and then total apathy. I think that's how it goes.

Sorry for being depressing. I promise I'll make it up to you.

Stop this self-pitying bollocks!! 

Right - Pick myself up out of this fug and get on with it. Get into my walking trousers (for there are such things) and get the dogs walked. 

READ READ READ!! Force myself to do so and take notes. Prepare for Sunday and Monday - 2 - possibly 3 sessions of Dungeons and Dragons! Madness I know. 

I will be very knackered.

I move back and forward like Arthur Fowler "Shut up, Pauline!" in an effort to galvanise myself out of this seat.

I can only control myself in all this. Get up and do stuff.

It's the only way forward!