When was our zenith?

When did we peak?

I'm talking about human excellence. In the sciences, arts; creativity. What it is to be human. What we can achieve if the best minds and talents are nurtured, encouraged.

Very few people know who the engineer of the Burj Khalifa was. 

More people know what Kim Kardashion has for breakfast.

Great people of our age are pouting morons.

Exude Izzy! Exude!

I just watched a documentary on Stanley Kubrick, genius director. 

He picked the greatest hard-science fiction author of his age - Arthur C Clarke - to co-write the story with. Arthur C Clarke had an extensive background in science and predicted back in the early 60s the use of satellite technology for communications, so that a doctor in London could perform an operation on a patient in Calcutta.

What we now call a futurologist.

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) features iPads , artificial intelligence, and asks fundamental questions about our place in the universe.

Unlike the great cultural milestone that was Sex in the City 2. 

Kubrick created a new standard of special effects, technologies and ways of shooting scenes by aiming for perfection, and encouraging and enabling excellent people to go and figure things out so they could contribute to his vision.

He used Zeiss lenses made for NASA which were F0.7, to shoot Barry Lyndon and lit the whole film by candlelight and no electric lights, having exhaustively studied English 18th century paintings. 

His films became fewer as he got older as the perfection he sought in preparing for his movies was increasingly exhaustive. For example, he employed his nephew to photograph every house in Commercial Road in Shoreditch, which entailed a separate shot up a ladder so there was zero perspective convergence. (This is all before digital cameras, let alone Google Streetview).

It took a year, and they made a huge Bayeux Tapestry of them all. 

Stanley said 'It sure beats going there, huh?'

In the end they made the front they needed on a film set. 

What's all this about then? 

I suggest we probably peaked 60ish years ago. 

We live in an age of homogeneity: botox and fillers and deadening hairdos with which people try to reach an aesthetic singularity, finished off with make-up techniques perfected by drag queens. 

Young men with absurd dental implants, bulging  biceps and shoulders, with the skin colour of pure creosote. Then covered in tattoos that look like any doodled notepad next to a telephone.

People no longer wish to be individual. This idea that for northern European women the upper lip should be as plump as the lower lip, despite having the wrong bone structure and skin colour to accommodate it.

Music that is so utterly banal and boring as to reduce me to sleep in seconds. Where people like Cowell talk about "The Product" rather than the song.

Scum.

That anyone creative is at the bottom of the pile. That English, art, drama and music are now the least popular subjects in state schools, leaving only kids from wealthy backgrounds with the opportunity to pursue careers in them.

The country that gave the word the most mongrel and elastic language ever, and the person who shows us who we are, now eschewing it all to turn us from a 1st rate Britain into a 3rd rate China.

The commodification of everything has put a stick in the spokes of what it is to be human. As Frank Zappa said, American culture can be summed up as “What’s the bottom line?”

So kids are driven to careers which will soon be swallowed up by the leviathan of AI, or A1 as US Education Secretary Linda McMahon calls it.

Yes, she of the WWE.

An art scene that is purely market-driven to decorate the foyers of large banks and the preposterous homes of those who toil in them, in order to show off their great taste they neither have nor are even interested in acquiring. 

"I mean, they must be good. I paid a fortune for them!"

Our differences which were fascinating and wonderful are eroding. Those old colloquialisms found all over the British Isles, subtly different accents from town to town, have become disappeared or are disappearing fast thanks to radio, TV and now the internet.

For example you rarely hear rural Buckingham or Kent accents any more. They've been replaced by estuary English.

Those almost incomprehensible accents I heard at school have softened to become a broad Mummerset.

I listened to a fantastic podcast the other day which explains how social media has essentially fucked us up. 

That it was all going so well and the future was rosy, until in 2006 Facebook introduced the Like button and Twitter the opportunity to retweet...

PICK YOUR BINARY SIDE AND START HURLING INSULTS!

It’s really worth listening to.

We live in a world where a narcissistic conman and reality TV star and who has aspirations to be an unenlightened despot more appropriate to Turkmenistan than a liberal democracy, is the leader of what used to be known as The Free World; enabled by immoral lickspittles whose CVs comprise solely of how far they can get their tongues up Jabba the Trump's anus.

In summary,, I'll leave you with this. 

And...breathe

So we arrive with nothing. We leave with nothing. 

It's the in between that's the difficult bit.

Well, I found it quite difficult anyway. 

My Dad who is quite wise said it's about picking where you want to be on a line with money at one end, and pleasure on the other. What are your priorities?

I think the old bugger's right.

"Hey Stud! Let's boogie!"

Went out with friends on Friday at 4pm. Came home around 10.30. I had a good time but I'm on the cusp of 56 and I don't want to have let myself down. I can be quite a show-off with a few beers inside of me, and quite dumb as well.

I think I had a good time. 

My key-demographic is now the horny pensioner. Thankfully nothing has happened in this department, and luckily with my diagnosis and living in the parental home, it should be a sufficient repellant.

Apart from that, I am running Dungeons and Dragons on Thursdays and the thrill-factor seems to be back on eleventy, which is where we want it.

We had 2 guest players this time and they enjoyed it too.

So that's good. We are back on track! Also playing Mondays, Wednesdays and the very occasional Friday.

Been playing BG3 - over a 1,000 hours just on the PC.

Reading the paper. Do you go to the columnists you either love or hate? I do. Nothing inbetween.

What's that about?

Here's something beautiful. Check out the harpsichord!

Trump - a footnote, from a YouTube commentator:

An Insurrectionist threatening to invoke the Insurrection Act??? A Draft dodger demanding he be honored with a military parade??? A Felon demanding law & order??? The irony is not lost.

Holiday Dementia Special!!!!!

Reunion

Not the title of my difficult third album, but of a little group of some Blue Schoolers from a long time ago,  who gathered together in The Crown last night.

It was a smaller gathering than I expected and as usual with these things some people who said they were coming didn't, and others who said they might didn't. So there.

I had good chats with Ali, Pat, Sarah, Richard, Clare and Anna. It was amazing to all be in the same room. 

(Anna's dog wants to have sex with me. It's difficult. Tbf I probably led him on.)

Get yer coat luv: you've scored.

And today I met Shelley for coffee and took her to see Tanith on her last day at work ever. They hadn't seen each other in years. So that was good.

So many old school friends in 24 hours. It's really nice. And last night I phoned the wrong Claire, but it was really nice to speak to her again so I'm going to call her later for a catch up!

Slightly too much to drink last night but I think I got away with it, apart from the masturbation joke which Ali and Nerys recoiled from. 

Blame it on the FTD. I always do.

Body Dysmorphia

However, the photos of the event were a surprise to me. Instead of the Apollonian figure who looks back at me from the mirror every morning, was the body of a 12 stone weakling with a pot belly. I looked like I have spina bifida - Ian Dury Legs with Purple Ronnie's torso.

Couldn't be bothered to Photoshop my face onto it...

Bloody 'ell. I HAVE got Spina Bifida. Oh, there's always something...

"Gurt big head on 'ee!" "What an Elmer." I can hear you all saying. 

And you'd be right. 

I need to have a full head and body transplant. Maybe for next Xmas. 

Or I'll just have the money instead.

Words were no good anymore!

I've been going round saying odd words. Bungleflumps is at the top of the list. I don't know what it means. I say it a lot.

It just comes out now and again. I have yet to get to the stage of going up to random people and asking: "Do you know Bungleflumps?" "Can you direct me to Bungleflumps?" Or even to the stage of "Are you Bungleflumps? Are you? ARE YOU????"

So for the now, we will keep Bungleflumps at arm's length. I'm sure it will all become clear later.

Later.

Do you remember old Bungleflumps? 

Remember what he did to Dicky Price? 

Marvellous.

Eric Andre

My latest obsession is Eric Andre. He's a comedian - on the very fringes of theatre. He's a natural successor to Andy Kaufman, Chris Morris, Sacha Baron Coen and Johnny Knoxville. Watching lots of Eric Andre and being hungover has led to this crass bollocks that I am typing now but you are already  reading due to TIME.

His humour is gross-out, hits on the public, making his chat show guests feel very uncomfortable, and inexplicable, surreal stunts.

At the moment I'm trying to watch everything I can. It's a miracle the way he winds people up that he hasn't been seriously hurt by someone.

This is not for the faint-hearted and may truly offend: 

Well, I warned you.

RPG UPDATE!

Great gaming week. It got off to a bad start as Monday's was cancelled, but Larry has got the Temple of Elemental Evil up and running (it's a GAME, OK?!) having done a ton of work on it. We're playing it on Roll20 which is an incredible (and complicated) platform to use. But the maps and everything look fantastic. 

Wednesday afternoons are sorted for the foreseeable: thanks for all your hard work Larry!

And then on Thursday I ran Tomb of Annihilation for my Wells group. I really enjoyed it and so did they, which is the main thing.

Also, Patch 5 finally became available for Baldur's Gate 3 on Macs and the difference is awesome - you can now play it again instead of judder-judder-judder; give up.

Also my 20 mini 10-sided dice arrived. 

Xmas has arrived!!!

Hallelujah!

There you go. Have a nice one.

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.

Yes, we're ALL Neurodivergent now

 What's your diagnosis?

Many of us have got a diagnosis these days. Lots of adults are being diagnosed rightly or wrongly with ADHD. There are lots of people on the autistic spectrum too. It seems to be getting larger. It's almost galactic in its proportions these days.

It's easy to dismiss all these things now as the latest hook to hang your coat on, as though we're all automatons devoid of free-will and and our neurological make-up is to blame for any discrepancies in our behaviour and societal misdeeds. 

Our behaviour is usually a mixture of nature and nurture, though we still have the fight or flight from our reptilian brain, there to keep us alive in extreme circumstances.

And while it's easy to mock the trendy new penchant for diagnoses later on in life, it doesn't half give you some relief. What I mean is, it can go someway to explain why you are who you are.

Disclaimer: I'm not a trans person. I've always been happy in my body and never for one moment doubted I was a male. However, I do exhibit a lot of classically non-masculine behaviours. Masking is one of them.

As a child I felt very awkward socially. What I said wouldn't go down well with the other kids - I was a follower not a leader. I was a cry-baby, and the following of others became outright copying.

A kid came to the school and I really wanted to be his friend. He seemed so confident and life was just easy for him - I thought. I don't know how he put up with me to be honest. I would have been a bit freaked out. The only things I didn't copy in the end were his taste in music (all that Goth crap!) and I couldn't get my hair to do what his did.

There were other kids I tried to be like too. But I wasn't tough or working-class or good at sport. So I didn't fit in with them either. 

I just wanted to draw things and play with Lego and play Dungeons and Dragons.

Why did I never fit in to one 'friendship group' as they call them now? To be honest I never saw the need for social cliques and I didn't really understand them, but I knew I ought to be in one. I would look at them and think - well, I like these people, and she's nice from that group - he's a nice person in that group, but you have to choose a group or you're an outsider. If you do choose a group you then like 3 of the people but the other 3 are arseholes and you just have to put up with them. 6 to one and all that.

So when I went to art school I reinvented myself with long hair (which I'd I'd always wanted) and trying to be cool, which tbh I wasn't very good at. I guess I was a late bloomer so when I was older (out of school) I was a lot more popular with the girls, which was nice. But it was all a bit of an act.

You're probably asking what does all this bollocks have to do with neurodiversity? Here's a list of my worst traits.

• Easily-distracted: can't concentrate on 70% of lessons, can't even start to revise, loathe exam times, can't read a book, 
• Lack of concentration: silly mistakes, lack of focus, 
• Copying others, behaviour, dress-sense, style,
• Oversharing, inappropriate information, too much information, wrong time, wrong place, faux-pas
• Inappropriate behaviour, saying the wrong thing, being outrageous, being obnoxious
• Oversensitive cry-baby, stress-monkey, worrisome, sleep-deprived, self-loathing
• Insensitive -smart-ass, gob-shite, harsh, hurtful

That's me. Now I'm not trained in any of this and I haven't had any diagnosis other than that of FTD, but I share a lot of the above traits with people with ADHD and those on the Autistic-Spectrum and seemingly always have done since I was little.

And while I may or may not have ADHD or be on the spectrum, at least by analysing myself and identifying the above, the elephant in the room is there for me to see it. Now I know its there I can train myself to be in the moment and identify when it is operating and either stop it or work around it. It's actually really handy for the person, not as an excuse as though to say "Yes, sorry I was being an arsehole - it's my neurodiversity" rather like the drunk would blame the bottle, but to acknowledge the signs and signifiers of behaviours and either mitigate for them or withdraw myself from a situation.

It's actually really pleasing to have this - it makes life easier and it makes liking myself a lot easier too. I'm kind and sweet-natured most of the time. I'm perceptive, a relatively original thinker and I am a very good judge of character. I'm an oddball and many of my friends are oddballs and characters. I'll help anyone who's a friend. I'm generous with my time and money. I'm all right in other words.

It's all right being a weirdo, oddball, nerd. In fact it's actually rather good.

The End of Dungeon Mastering

I've been running 2 campaigns for months and months. In fact, my Monday online group has been in the same campaign for over 2 years. But both are ending pretty much in the next couple of weeks, and I will be a player once more.

I'm a little worried that my brain will atrophy quicker now I will be sitting back letting someone else do all the hard work DMing, with all the planning, research and writing involved.

I have 2 new characters I want to use: a gnome wizard called Bibble Babble, and a Gloomstalker Ranger/Assassin for the longer in-person Sunday campaign.

Not to be confused with Babble Bibble!

I can't wait.

I will be back to DM though. It's been really good and I think I am a better Dungeon Master than I was before. You never stop learning, despite the fact you may have a leak in the knowledge banks...

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! 

It's all in the mind...

 How are you?

Have you ever regretted asking that question? Sometimes if you're having a bad time of it and you really know the person who's asking, you can open up. 

But otherwise, please spare the details. 

I once asked an ex-work colleague how things were, and he proceeded to tell me every project that he had managed to get for the company. Oh my god - it went on and on and on. After half an hour he said "...and that one's worth nearly a thousand pounds." 

At that point I just said goodbye and walked off. I didn't care how rude it appeared.

That one's worth nearly a thousand pounds! I think he'd got his decimal points in the wrong place!

We're British, and asking how are you is just a polite soundbite. It's showing an interest in the other person without wishing to be intrusive. It's not really asking for much of an answer either - it's more of an implied wish that the other person is in good health in body and mind. 

You never want to burden people by actually answering truthfully, or boring people senseless with the minutiae of your working life. 

You just say, 'not too bad', 'mustn't grumble', 'fine thank you' - that kind of thing. 

Saying you feel amazing - fantastic, is borderline vulgar. It's boastful. After all, no one likes a show-off.

I think this should at least be on the National Curriculum. It would help enormously for those of us who don't wish to be stuck in embarrassing and tedious conversations.

Concentrate

Why did the model stare at the orange juice?

I'm in a pretty good place at the moment. The Sertraline is STILL working - or at least mitigating the worst of my anger, and I feel calm and content most of the time. I can concentrate on reading and writing; I even did something useful yesterday and tidied and cleaned for an entire morning (long overdue it must be said) while I had the house to myself.

On reflection, I've stalled writing as I don't think I have any thing that new or interesting to tell you. I've been getting fitter by running in intervals with the dogs as I've joined in with their squirrel chasing. We've yet to catch any as the squirrels are unfairly advantaged by having eyes on the sides of their heads giving them almost 360' vision, and are also able to run up tree trunks.

But at least I am getting fitter. 

One thing I have noticed with my vision is my eyes seem to work in slow motion. As I'm running I have to look at the uneven terrain and I have to concentrate on it. It's like the centre of my vision is more in focus than the outer, and the information is taking fractionally longer to get to my consciousness. So I'm really having to concentrate a little bit more to avoid hazards, in other words.

Maybe I should run on football pitches and the like. It's only a matter of time before I have an accident.

Spinal Tap

Had a lumbar puncture the other day. Odd procedure. I've got to say the staff at The National Hospital for Neurology and Neuroscience  are incredible. I felt so put at ease - everyone there was charming. I would hazard a guess it's a great place to work.

So you sit on the edge of a bed and crouch over. They give you an anaesthetic and then the procedure. They asked if I wanted to contribute some more for research purposes. Yeah, knock yourselves out: take another pint! 

So I was there as the spinal fluid was extracted. It took a few minutes - how many I couldn't say. 

Repercussions - the next day I had pain around my coccyx area, and a slight headache. These pains I was told to expect, and they lasted about 3 days. Small potatoes really.

So now I have to wait till the new year to get the results.

Xmas

Jacqui's last day at work for 2022 is on Monday 12th. That means that the mad dash to get Xmas ready will  be a gentle canter instead. I can't do the shopping - I've always hated it but in recent years I've found the crowds and general hubbub really disorientating and unpleasant. Thankfully one of the good things about shopping is miserable buggers like me can do it all online now.

I've always loved Christmas so I'm looking forward to seeing friends and family. I'm looking forward to playing games and good cheer. I realise some people hate Christmas and I understand why, but as an opportunity to be amongst people and have fun and good times it tops any other event in the calendar IMO.

Creativity

I've been writing character personal quests in Drakkenheim. These are secrets the players' characters have that they don't tell the others. There's a list of them from 'I need to reclaim a family heirloom' to 'I am the rightful heir to the kingdom!' to 'I must kill the leader of this faction.' 

Threading these plot points into an already complex story is great fun. It gives me enormous excitement to secrete these things throughout the adventure knowing that the characters will discover the lost items or make a certain event come to pass.

The great thing about Dungeons and Dragons is the Dungeon Master AND the players make the story. It can potentially go anywhere. 

It's the highlight of my week. And oddly I'm becoming less and less tired after a long session.Maybe because I'm fitter?

Trying hard not to be a burden

Every Day is Nostalgia Day

My sister came up to visit briefly, in order to go to see Abba (second time for me). 

It's an extraordinary thing. Mainly middle-aged people; some older, some younger. Everyone in a party frame of mind. Many dressed up. 

The journey there was stressful only because of my condition. Once you get there it's a really lovely arena due to its pleasant staff and the calming environment of the foyer's wooden interior.

It's easy to dismiss, but this Abba show means something to people. It's the happy-sad Swedish nature of the songs - but also the time it was created. The 70s may have been bleak socially and economically, but it was very creative musically. And it was my childhood. There's a certain poignancy about the Abba songs that best reflects the time, in my opinion.

At the concert everyone stands up and dances. Especially the 'David Attenborough' guy (as my sister called him) in the row in front of us, though thankfully a few seats to our left. 

Luckily the people directly in front of us looked really square and lived up to expectations, not getting up from their seats until Dancing Queen, giving us a clear view.

So we're in the arena, sat down -I'm  feeling happy, nostalgic, sad. Such a mixture of emotions. FTD has given me a sense of melancholy - that I somehow long for my past, yet much of the past I remember is a past that admonishes me.  

I sit in cinemas watching Star Wars films with tears in my eyes throughout the whole movie, glad no one else can see me. Like a time-traveller, I switch back and forth from the present to the little boy in Swansea Odeon next to my big Dad, watching the whole film through a C-3PO mask.

I'm living my life in multiple time-lines. Everything has a resonance to a previous age - anything at any time can draw parallels with past experiences and I'm suddenly in a classroom getting told off and crying, or being a total shit to some poor girlfriend; it can be anything. The emotion generated is visceral. I cry out, swearing.

'Why are you here? Let's get back to the present.'

At last, that calm inner voice.

And I return to the present moment. Having done a Mindfulness course I'm 'mindful' enough to acknowledge my awareness in realising where I was in my mind and having the ability to return, and I give myself a pat on the back for doing so.

As an epilogue, my sister loved the Abba concert and I loved it just as much as when J and I saw it back in June.

Just as well as I'm going again in 2 weeks! 

"That's all I can see is green stuff!"

Those wonderful people at RDS have organised 6 Monday morning sessions at the London Wetlands Centre in Barnes. 

Yesterday was the second session.

Thankfully after the horrendous storms we had on Sunday, this was the breezy, bright Autumn day we needed.

We were encouraged to embrace nature. It was too far for me to go barefoot in the grass, and I've never been one to hug a tree. But I do find them enigmatic and mysterious. I've always been fascinated by what goes on under our feet, and it's only recently we're starting to discover the communication between trees and fungi.

Charlie and Raksha gave out notebooks and information leaflets. In order to give back I took lots of A-levellish photos with my iPhone. I have a ton of pro-photographic equipment which I have barely used for years as you end up being a photographer when you really should be experiencing being in the moment with nature. 

Twats.

Rather like the people who go to a concert and video the whole thing. They're missing out on the experience in order to get a third rate recording of it.

The title of this comes from a hide we were in. A dad was showing his little boy how to use the telescope to see the wildfowl. The boy was struggling and said "THAT'S ALL I CAN SEE IS GREEN STUFF!"

Made me laugh anyway.

Am I a burden?

J's having a hard time at the moment dealing with it all. Work, the future, the house, kids, the dogs, the past. I always think it's me and me alone that's the problem. I think of myself at times as the constant reminder to her that she made the wrong decision in marrying me. She asks all my friends and they say - no - he was always like this.

Thanks.

Really constructive!

Let me break this down. 

I have never been the easiest person. I am relatively thin-skinned, I am quick to anger, I am a total coward when it comes to confrontation...blah blah blah. Posts passim

However, in my 40s I had become a lot calmer. More thoughtful. Always trying to become better from my 30s, I'd read lots, been on courses, had therapy. None of us are the finished article. 

It is so hard. I have tried to get a thicker skin, be more calm, be less outspoken, think more about proffering my opinion etc.

When I met J I was in a good place: a more mature and less abrasive me. 

Then FTD. Oh the irony.

I became angrier again; with myself, with the world. Temper frayed, my intolerance worsened. My faux pas knew no limits.

I can hear my Mother's voice: 'Leopards don't change their spots!'

While an addict suppresses their addiction, the addiction is always there, and like a dormant volcano it can occasionally spring back into action.

I can't tell you how hard it is to keep it together all the time. If something angers me and it can be anything - the coping mechanisms I've created and deploy you would not believe. And it is really hard work, which adds to the tiredness people with dementia experience the whole time. Even a couple of days on holiday are tiring - and that's just talking to people you know.

So just remember that I am having to consciously deal with anything life throws at me now - when all of this used to be done unconsciously.

I am trying so hard not to lose who I am - to lose the best of me. 

I don't want things to be like this either.

Drakkenheim Continued

Sunday - a 4 1/2 hour DMing session. We had 2 special guest stars, Larry and Adrian from the other Drakkenheim group (from the games holiday) who met the Sunday players at The Bark and Buzzard Tavern in Emberwood.

From there they went to The Rat's Nest Tavern and and into the burrows, managing to defeat the hoards of Ratlings (2' tall bipedal sentient rats) and the Rat Prince and his Warlock. On the way back they chanced upon a wailing from a ruined house. It turned out to be a wretched ghost or in this context, a Warp Witch. On defeating the creature they heard a clapping behind them. 

This was a strike team of The Queen's Men - sent to duff them up and take their magic items away. 

However, by the skin of their teeth our heroes prevailed. It was a really exciting session in a really vivid setting of a shattered city, its characters and lore. 

I'm really looking forward to the next session.

My Monday session with a different group of players and the world setting is markedly different. Their characters are much higher level and are unfortunately going through giants like a dose of salts. D&D is very difficult to get the balance right at times.

And it's very tiring too, but worth it.

The Truth about my dementia

 The Grim Bit

What to write anymore?

I could go on about the minutiae of my life in that droll way I do which everyone is very complimentary about. But I think it's getting boring. 

I suspect it's lost its way a bit.

So what can I tell you? I don't want to sound self-pitying. It's a danger area I try to steer clear of. It never helps anyone.

I'm going to try to cut through the chummy guff and tell you what I can. 

There are 2 people immediately involved with this dementia issue: J and me.

Our relationship has been more companionship than anything for the majority of our marriage. There was a period I wasn't aware of when J couldn't bear to be with me due to how I'd changed.

We had relationship counselling 2 years ago. It was always going to be the sticking plaster over the rift.

It was horribly upsetting. For me, I felt such a failure. I still couldn't understand why things had just gone; just petered out.

We then got my FTD diagnosis.

The more we learned about the condition, the more it explained why I didn't get where J was coming from most of the time, my lack of empathy, why I was behaving like I do, and the symptoms I was directly conscious of, like tiredness, irritability, oversensitivity to light and noise, my unwillingness to do shared activities or go anywhere, losing words, substituting words, the ever increasing brain fog, my temper and even more faux pas than ever before.

We probably use FTD as the whipping post more than it deserves, nevertheless...

...here we are J and I, in the present. Her working upstairs and me downstairs typing this. 

I try not to think of the future as it means further degradation of my brain and behaviour. Nothing I nor anyone else can do about it.

I've always been nostalgic for romanticised visions of my past and at the same time haunted by those myriad times where I let myself down, which I'm reminded of every morning as I wake up.

J is very future-focused (management -speak) and we are finding it very difficult.

What is our relationship, what will future relationships look like, how rapid will my deterioration be?

It's very difficult planning if you don't have even a rough idea of timings; key-moments.

I don't know where any of 'this' is heading. 

But this is where we're at.

Mitigating the Inevitable

Okay, let's try and be positive here. I am trying to keep my brain fit and functioning. This is how.

I'm playing with the dogs every day - Stanley and I play a game with these balls which bounce irregularly. I throw them off the wall and he goes crazy trying to catch them. I think it's his new favourite game. He's not interested in the other balls that have a regular surface and bounce predictably. We do this for half an hour at a time. 

Aren't dogs brilliant?

I love the dogs. Chippy is a bossy dachshund who is deeply suspicious of strangers, and Wilbur is a dopey Spaniel who is the greediest dog in the world, but he's lovely.

I've also started juggling again, to try and keep my coordination from going. Years ago in the 90s there was a juggling craze. While juggling 3 balls is muscle memory you do get out of practice and I used to be able to do tricks. I'm trying to do 4 ball juggling again as I used to really like that. I'm getting there...

I read lots of news  - The Times everyday, parts of The Guardian, BBC website for news as it happens, and also other magazines and feeds. Looking forward to today's news to see who our latest totes-inappropes PM will be.

I also run D&D games as no doubt you know. This involves assimilating huge amounts of information, storylines, and roll-playing numerous characters while riffing with the players. All the while trying to keep the flow of the story and plot(s). It can be exhausting.

I DM'd a new campaign yesterday - very different in its setting (think Game of Thrones meets John Carpenter's 'The Thing') which I think went pretty well.

I write a journal every night. It's complete salacious garbage but it's my complete salacious garbage.  

It's cathartic, if nothing else.

So I am trying to keep going - keep ticking over - while the temptation is to sit on my backside watching the same old stuff on YouTube!

All things considered I'm doing okay.

I'm okay.

SHUT UP GERAINT

Nothing to say

I feel I have less to say these days. And that's not like me at all.

I read the newspapers and walk the dogs and play my games, do my chores. I just don't seem to generate the same yield of rants and opinions that I did even a year and a half ago.

This must be part and parcel of the general decline in my brain activity. 

I've had the intention of reading lots of Dungeons and Dragons books and have achieved very little - a chapter a day at best. Disappointing.

I still have my lists. My reminders on my calendar that pop up to put me back on the tracks.

God it's easy to ignore those. 

In fact I laugh in the face of digital pop-up reminders! 

I chat over the news with J, but less so I think these days. It may be that with the 5th rate venal scum we have running the country that it's just too depressing to talk about any more.

D&G Decline?

We keep on cancelling the Monday evening sessions. Sometimes people just don't respond on the WhatsApp messages if they're able to attend or not. It may just be my perception of things but I feel there's a decline in the energy - the positivity - that used to drive the games.

It may be the particular adventure we're doing is less interesting, my DMing (Dungeon Mastering) or just that people are tired after work, the campaign has just atrophied, or something else. 

Maybe it's just my perception.

Perceptions are everything though. 

I get concerned as I drift off into the Astral plane of dementia, that the silvery cords that bind me to you, the world and everyone and everything are disintegrating atom by atom, molecule by molecule.

They are here...

(This is a big D&D reference from the Astral Projection spell!)

Already I feel more distant than I did when I started this blog 9 months ago. 

Increasingly separated from everything until there is nothing.

Oh well, look on the bright side.

😶‍🌫️

Finally Retiring

I've sold my van, which is being picked up next week, and 2 of my masonry chums are coming to buy my old tools, though I am  keeping my hand tools for futile purposes.

2 other friends have asked me to carve a green man for each of them. I'm happy to do this. Whether I get round to doing it is another thing, but as usual I INTEND to do it. It's a great get-out clause I learned from an old (non-masonry) boss years ago. We INTEND to be there. We INTEND to win. I INTEND to knock smack on the head, etc etc..

I'm not really on smack by the way.

Finally I'm doing something meaningful and getting shit done.

A new world beckons. I shall visit my friends, sort out the house, sell things on Ebay, run myriad games groups.

Well, I intend to of course...

My Brain has Stalled...

Have you seen my sausage?

 I talk a good game at times. Like a lot of people I have great advice for everyone on how to live. 

Today I am on the struggle bus, as J calls it. 

We walk 3 dogs every morning. Today X's Dachshund ran off in the woods. For 40 minutes we were in stress-city calling him, chasing him, calling him again. Hearing him bark in the distance. 

The other 2 dogs  - Wilbur especially - were getting stressed by it all. Why weren't we moving? Canine panic!

For us humans it was worse on J than it was for me. The very thought of losing another person's dog is so horribly stressful.

Eventually we got him. He had crossed the road a few times (not good) and I managed to lure him from 20 feet. He'd obviously scared himself witless and it was a huge relief to all. 

When we got home J had to jump straight into work. 

That's not the best way to start the week of course.

I can hear J upstairs. Sounds like she's up against it at work but I may be wrong. 

Me, I just can't get going, which is why I'm writing this.

I had a list of things to do - admin things relating to closing down my business. They'll wait till tomorrow.

I have some other things to do - physical stuff like putting some weeds and plants through the garden mincer and cutting a tile for a neighbour's DIY project. I can do those and at least they will be the boxes that I tick today,

Let's not set our sights too high today: listen to my body; listen to my brain.

I ❤️ Unimogs

Like a lot of men my age I'm notoriously difficult (in general too it must be said) but specifically in this instance with regards to buying presents for. 

So for Xmas my family had taken note of me extoling the many virtues of Unimogs - 4 wheel drive utility lorries made by a division of Mercedes - so they got me a driving experience with one!

Now me being me I left the gift card on the bookcase and did little about it as with FTD your executive functions become increasingly inert. After all, it's much safer here in front of the computer surrounded with D&D books.

Cue stepson Ben who prompted me to act, and we booked the session in for Saturday 20th August. We drove there - 5 of us - (leaving the dogs to be capably looked after by a neighbour's son) and had a very pleasant afternoon at https://tanksntrucks.com in the heart of Kent.

I'd never done off-roading before but it was really fun. Unimogs are quite different to regular vehicles. The 1984 model I drove had 10 gears and lever to make it go forward or reverse, so it was possible (if you were mad) to drive it at 70MPH in reverse. 

It's a very mechanical vehicle and and a very enjoyable experience pootling along. 

I would thoroughly recommend it. 

By the way, I was knackered in the evening, falling asleep on the sofa. J pointed out that it was not the 45 mins of driving the Unimog, but the socialising I had done that day that had done for me. 

And she was spot on.

Dream car...

What is there left to do?

• Sell van
• Liquidate (or whatever term they use) company
• Transfer stuff over to me after taxes etc
• Sort out the garden
• Decorate J's bedroom
• Decorate Ben's old bedroom
• Other stuff.

That is a lot of stuff. Easy to become quickly overwhelmed. I must break it down into smaller pieces or I'll be having sleepless nights. 

There's always so much to do isn't there?

Dementia Boiling over

 I'll fight you for a beer

Having FTD BV/SV isn't great. Well, it's shit actually. I get by. I'm keeping busy and active and that's pretty good for me. 

I did a load of gardening last week, filled the skip, ordered things for the house. God - I'd let everything slip for months and months and now there's mountain to climb, but I'm breaking it down into doable chunks. It's good for me to keep active - have lists of achievable tasks for each day and it's good for my mental well-being.

But however much I do, I still have dementia. And it comes to the surface when you are least expecting it.

On Saturday I was at a friend's house. It was a birthday party. We were all sat outside with the blistering heat and the 11 year old daughter of our host was fetching us drinks the whole time.

A new couple joined us, sat at the other end of the table. He had one of those voices that just carried above all others. A sort of unfortunate nasal South eastern accent. He and a woman were talking politics. 

He said a couple of things that jarred with me. "Margaret Thatcher. She had a job to do." It was all sounding rather Daily Mail to me. I had to leave the table.

After a relatively short time everyone apart from him and the woman were indoors. Later, after even more beer in the heat, he was talking to J. She flailed her arms around, gesticulating. 

I couldn't hear what was being said, but neither could I help it anymore. I stormed up to him to berate him of his Daily Mail bollocks and the fact everyone came indoors leaving him outside as that's all they could hear was his voice talking shite.

I was quickly ushered away by everyone.

I'm afraid this is probably the future. I'll expect to be hit a few times in the short and long term. And at the age of 53 never having had a fight in my life, it's probably not the best tactic.

But at the time I was unrepentant and angry at this guy's views.

And another thing...

I woke up sweating with alcohol in the early hours and made my way down to the hammock beside the pool (!) and expected J and everyone else to be furious with me. 

When J found me she was really sweet. I wasn't expecting that reaction. Oddly no one seemed to mind. Maybe I'd said what they were thinking. Or maybe the waters had been calmed with everyone being told I had this weird dementia.

I was too embarrassed to ask. It was S's (our host's) belated birthday party and I'd presumably upset the evening, or had I provided the entertainment? 

We had breakfast and drove home.

We have another 'do' in the near future where I know there are 2 people who drive me nuts with their pro-Putin right wing views. I think avoidance of them and alcohol will be the order of the day.

Improvisational Skills

I DM'd some downtime for the players in last night's session with my Monday crew. You may know we have a WhatsApp group called D&G which was set up before I joined. I asked after a month or 2: 

- Why is the group called D&G?

- Dungeons and Dragons!

- No that's 'D&D' not 'D&G'.

- Oh.

They're all dyslexic, see. No one had noticed.

Anyway, the players finished one part of the adventure. It's kind of done in chapters - modules in old 1st Edition - which they have to complete, and then they have downtime - like a rest back in the town where they live, with minor events thrown in for good measure. 

They had rescued a dwarf called Morley from a hermitage on an island that was under attack from some aquatic zombies. They later revealed to the dwarf that there was a price on his head. Morley, suddenly terrified, pleaded with them and told them he'd been set up.

From here on in I basically improvised a story with counter claims and subterfuge with a powerful local merchant who is very popular with the townsfolk, despite being an utter crook. None of this will play to any single group's  benefit. Any outcome will be a Pyrrhic victory at best. 

Just like real life really.

The session went really well and served to enrich the environment with role-play and (almost) zero combat. 

I really enjoyed doing it and it gave me a lot of confidence and contentment with my neurological faculties, in stark contrast to Saturday night's frolics.