Primary school

Where was I? Oh yes Tudor Grange - a school for handicapped children - It said so on the gate. I believe that we were all physically handicapped in some way, though I had no yardsticks for measuring any other sort. My contact with human beings had been seriously limited up until then. Mostly I knew nurses, doctors and other people like me.

Another Tudor grange memory occurred to me just now. We were assembled in the dining room one day, and the curtains drawn. This room was a miniature version of the dining hall at Hogwarts academy and on this occasion, all seats were arranged facing a large white screen. In the centre of the floor was a movie projector. I had never seen one before. Much excitement ensued and then the lights went off and the film began. They showed us "The War of The Worlds" , which was rated as an adults only movie.

I remember being scared witless by the martian invasion and had nightmares about it for weeks afterwards. i wonder how many others experienced that kind of terror for the first time that day? It didn't put me off however and to this day I love sci fi and horror films.

By the time I was nine, I was able to dispense with the leather support frame and was declared fit to join the world of the normal. I packed my bag for the last time and bade farewell to Tudor Grange forever.

Going home was difficult - again - I felt that I did not belong. I had to share a room with my younger brother and the house was unheated and poorly endowed with facilities. Everone there was more or less a stranger to me and acclimatisation must have taken a while.

I was enrolled in the village primary school and a new phase of my life was about to start.

First day at Primary school was also the first day for a new headmaster. Strict discipline was a novelty for me. It had never been necessary before, but in this motley crew of children, aged from 7 to 11, there were plenty who really needed a firm hand. With Mr Webb they got it. Having been used to a kindly old lady teacher, some were under the impression that they could still do just as they wanted. As he entered the playground to assess the assembled throng, we all became aware that this was not someone to cross. The rabble was soon confronted and the biggest and toughest singled out for a proper dressing down. He also took this opportunity to show us his cane; though I don't think he ever used it. A cowed and silent line entered the single classroom and sat exactly where we were told to.

The classroom was arranged with the teacher's desk halfway down the room, next to the old coke burner, and then I think, six tables forming groups on the basis of age and ability. Oddly I was placed at the far right of the room with the high ability kids, and we were expected to work harder and achieve more than the others, though we were taught as a class.

I loved to write creatively, and maths I took to readily. Mr Webb would tell stories about his time as a fighter pilot in the war and tales of his doings in his previous schools. His son is the same age as myself and he was in the same class and on the same table. We were to become friends over the next few years and we still exchange cards at Christmas.

I became aware of the complexities of real life in a community where there is diversity and realised that I was no longer protected by anyone. I had to stand up for myself if I wanted to be normal. I am sure that the others had been briefed as to my background and condition, and so by and large I was left alone. Of course it may have been my white spindly legs and skeletal torso that gave the game away.

My favourite activity was always the Nature Walks, where we would wander the fields or the river banks learning the names of native plants and animals. That has stayed with me and I still recall all the names of the wildlife here. I can still smell the smells of the river and of the spring and summer flowers. The new mown hay and the smells of autumn leaves as well as the less pleasant rural smells still stay with me.

Primary school was a big step in my development and for the first time in my life I felt a part of a group.

Hospital years continued

I have racked my brain, and that isn't easy at the moment, to find more memories of my time in the isolation ward but I can't come up with much more. There are feelings and impressions and olfactory memories but little else. There was, for a while, in the bed next to mine, a gypsy boy, who was probably suffering the same disease. He was not strapped down however and was very protective of me. I guess that we were friends of a sort but that concept was pretty alien to me at that time, never having mixed with anyone outside the family. He is shown in one of the photos, along with my brother who was visiting at the time. Whenever the nurses arrived to issue the dreaded streptomycin, he would threaten to kill them if they hurt me. I don't even remember his name but I remember that link between us. Eventually I was allowed out of the frame and fitted with a leather support that kept my leg straight. At least with this i could walk around, albeit with crutches and later when the legs got some strength, a stick.

I think that once the disease was under control, I was moved from the hospital to a special school even further away from home. This was a Tudor building, set in woodlands on the outskirts of Birmingham. Dark and dreary and panelled in oak, smelling of wood polish and surgical spirit. I was taken there by my mother, with a man who I can't recall. I suspect that he was trying it on with her and much of their conversation in the car on the way was beyond my understanding. I suppose I must have been five or six by then. Even the novelty of a car ride did not take away the fear of the unknown and the journey was long. I remember it was raining and dark when we arrived at Tudor Grange. I was whisked away immediately into a dining vault, where the children were eating. All heads turned in my direction and I was seated by myself and a plate of tinned spaghetti with bread and butter was put in front of me. I was crying and could make out very little through the tears. I don't remember seeing mother again before she left.

I am sure that the school was a pleasant enough environment and that the staff were decent too. I recall some names and have vague memories of some faces. We were not abused at all, though I seemed always to be hungry. We had no radio or TV and had to make our own entertainment. The day was rigidly organised into an institutional routine, and for the first time in my life I sat in a classroom with other children. I could already read so I had a slight advantage over some, though others were much older than I was and therefore more advanced in many ways.

At the end of each school day there was a quiet time, where we would all go into a room where we could sit in comfortable chairs and listen to soft music or hear a story. On piece of music that haunts me and carries me back to this time is a piece called - All in an April Evening. This made me cry at the time and in the right circumstances can do so now. If you want to hear it I can send you a copy on request. This was a time for reflection and for allowing feelings to emerge.

Oddly I do not remember having anyone that I could turn to for help with anything at all. There were plenty of staff to cater for physical needs but no-one that I could confide in or ask for explanations. I was one of the herd and that was it. Self reliance is born in such circumstances and that has remained with me for life. I still cannot confide in anyone.

The house may have been austere, but the grounds were extensive and well kept, and even more importantly, accessible. We could wander and explore and play, and did so in all weathers. We had trees to climb - not easy with a restricted movement- bushes to hide in, and grass to lie in. No doubt, we residents found an equilibrium, if not happiness in our enforced confinement.

Visits from family were even more restricted. I saw one parent every two weeks, just for saturday afternoon. I would prepare for the visit by removing my leather support so that I could sit more easily on a bus on in a cinema seat. Visits must have been a strain on the family, both financially and otherwise. I know that my father's resentment of me just grew and grew as I became more of a burden on him. I rarely saw my brother and sister and really almost forgot who they were.

Institutionalisation is a defensive mechanism I am sure, and it became my way of life. I went home for brief holidays now and then, but never felt that I belonged with the family. Eventually being away was where I was supposed to be and it felt right.

There was a rugby ground next to the school and we'd often spend saturday afternoons watching very large men, hurtling around a field, getting very muddy. Occasionally we'd wander out to the front of the school and watch cars trundling up and down the main road on the other side of the fence. Leaving the premises never crossed my mind. I was there until I was nine years old.

Mumbo jumbo

Capricorn

Your intuitive nature is especially strong, dear Capricorn, and you won't have to think about things because you have the ability to just know what the answer is. If there is any penetrating detective work that needs to be done, this would be an excellent time to get to work on it. Your caring, sensitive nature will get you through any door you want to walk through today, so keep that smile on your face at all times.

That was my horoscope for today, which if it is to be believed, holds true for 1 in 12 of the world population. I don't hold much store by any mumbo jumbo at all, and the idea that our lives are influenced by alignments of planets, and or constellations that are so distant that the numbers boggle the mind, seems so bizzarre as to border on the ridiculous. And yet there is a huge industry attached to horoscopes. Millions of people, not all of them stupid, do believe and organise their lives on the advice of some mystic or other who consults astrological charts and makes up statements so vague that they could apply to anyone at any time.

I suppose that astrology, like religion, gives people a straw to grasp in a world that is becoming increasingly more complex. There are others who seem to cope with change and mystery without the need for such a crutch, but there are plenty out there who have a real need for fantasy in their lives to fill gaps in knowledge and ability to comprehend.

I have heard it said that there are no athiests on a battlefield. I don't believe that for one minute. Can people go through their whole lives without the need for supernature, suddenly develop that need, simply because their life may be coming to an end? I suspect not, although I can understand some people not being prepared to drop the God thing altogether, let's face it we all use insurance policies.

Today, I am intuitive. Well I have my moments like everyone else and yes I do tend to have a sense of what someone that I know well is going to do. There are some people that I have been able to predict since I have known them and yet there are others that I have no clue about. My caring sensitive nature will get me through any door? Well as it is raining again and I plan to stay in that can only mean metaphorical doors, so I'll keep a watching brief on that one. Those who know me would laugh at the notion of me keeping a smile on my face. It has been a while since that happened I assure you. Mostly I don't.

Hospital years

Filling in this area will not be easy. I do have a number of clear memories but chronologically they are confused and rather a blur. I'll do what I can anyway and fill in with things that I know and things that I guess.

My time in the children's ward was short. I had an infectious, notifiable disease and could not be kept with normal people, so I was ushered off to an isolation hospital in a city, some 3o miles away from home. My parents never had a car and so bus journeys were the only way that they could visit and costs prevented those from happening too often. I was strapped into a metal frame with leather attachments that kept me horizontal and still, and that was to be my life for some months while I was given large daily injections of streptomycin. I remember watching the trolley come around each morning, knowing that there was a needle the size of a drainpipe heading in my direction. I can even remember the feeling of the needle going into my bottom and the cold numbness of the intramuscular injection. It hurt, and I wince even as I write this. To this day I have a fear of injections and will do whatever I can to avoid them.

The nurses were very kind and under the control of a fierce looking ward sister. Not being able to get out of bed, much of the ward was a mystery to me and I recall imagining that hoprrible things happened to people who went into the room at the end. A nightmare that recurred throughout my childhood was of my bed bing wheeled into that room by the ward sister and there she cheerfully told me that my head had to come off.

Each day, whatever the weather, our beds were wheeled out onto the verandah. This was so that we could all enjoy the fresh air, thought to be a panacaea for TB sufferers. It was often cold and sometimes even damp but it was part of the routine. Nurses would spend some time with us and I recall being taught to read while lying in my frame. This brought the escape of reading books and I would retire into my own little world that I shared with characters from Enid Blyton's books.

I did everything in bed and yearned to get out and stand up, but that wasn't to be for two years.

I have no memory of being either happy or unhappy there. I remember the odd visit from family but they never seemed to be important or life changing in any way. I felt out of control and that my life was not something that I had any say in.

Le weekend

Well I am back. At least I think I am.
I'll begin by saying that the weekend was a qualified success and that a good time was had by most. The plan was to celebrate my son's birthday, and as he is a sports fan we chose to go to a sports and leisure facility for a weekend as a family. I should have known better really but aas everyone else was up for it, who was i to argue. On my track record of recent months, it was always going to be a risky venture. Anyway we picked him up on route and made it through central London and even enjoyed missing the congestion charge area. We arrived at our destination, collected bicycles and all was fine. The weather was good and i thought I'd turned a corner. An hour or so later, my daughter and her husband arrived and the weekend got started.

Now at these centres, the only thing that is free is the pool. The pool area is lovely, and described as a tropical paradise. It includes water slides, flumes, hot tubs, cold tubs and even an area to swim, so what better way to begin the holiday? We'd been in the pool for five minutes before we were asked to evacuate. The reason - a liquid spillage! Someone had thrown up in the landing pool for the rapids - Nice! Being in there felt a bit like being in a sort of human soup anyway and now they had the carrots! Oh well, undeterred we changed and hit the bar. By the time we left the bar it was raining - and it didn't stop again while we were there. So much for outdoor stuff - or so I thought. Anyway the rest of that day passed uneventfully and I lost at poker in the evening.

Saturday dawned wet and windy but we were due for badminton, short tennis and squash, all indoors, so that was ok. By ten we were ready for the off and hit the courts. Now i am not a good racquet sport player and I have never really been any good with a shuttlecock. I should never have set foot on that court, but I did and I now have every reason to regret it.

It started ok with me being humiliated as is ususally the case, but for some unimaginable reason I went for a very high and impossible shot leaning backwards as I did. I recall the outcome, it is said that my backwards fall was akin to a felled tree, my hands were in front of me as i went down and the first thing to hit the floor was my head. The sound echoed around the complex and I was horizontal. I remember thinking - "Oh dear" as i fell, and the impact on the back of my head and then my whole body tingling like pins and needles. I couldn't move a muscle. My face was fixed, eyes open, ashen grey, lilac lips. Everyone, including me, thought I was dead. Not being able to move, I was the only one who hoped so. I became aware of people looking down on me and slowly I became aware of my body again and movement came back. Getting up was not an option and medics were called. Meanwhile, a doctor on holiday arrived as did an off duty paramedic and I was checked over, for broken neck broken back, senility and political persuasion. As I lay there, I wondered as to what damage i had done to myself and remember all sorts of speculations from the on site professionals. They tried to turn me over and the effect was awful. Huge waves of dizziness and nausea forced me onto my back again.

An ambulance arrived and they whisked me away to the A and E at the nearest hospital and I was thrust into the last empty booth where I was left to sleep for what seemed hours.
Eventually though, I was seen by a lovely young female doctor who gave me a thorough check and decided that there was no obvious real damage and that I could go back, with the caveat that I was to be supervised, not allowed to drink, cycle or drive and not allowed to participate in any contact sports - well there was a relief.

I still have a slight headache and feel that I am in a different world to most people - not much difference there I know. The rest of the weekend was wet and generally people enjoyed themselves, largely by taking the mickey out of me, but it was fun.

Clearly I am back home, if not back to normal. I don't feel at all like drinking. I feel odd enough as it is. I am told that it could take a while for a full recovery. Meanwhile my liver is getting a well earned rest.

Enough of that anyway, I'll get back to the blog theme later on.

Formative years

The years between 18 months and 4 are a blur, as I suspect they are with most people. In those years of course one is building a personality and already forming a way of looking at the world, so although there are few memories, the subconcious mind is growing at an exponential rate. During that time we learn to walk, talk, and come to terms with countless concepts that only come from experience.

My parents moved from the house in the woods into a council house in a nearby village. This had three bedrooms, a lounge, a kitchen and a scullery. There was an outdoor lavatory and cold running water. There was no bathroom as such and water had to be heated in a copper that was coal powered. Coal was the only source of heat and the house lay on the outskirts of the village and was exposed to some vicious winds. There was no double glazing of course and in the winter, everything froze. It was the norm to scrape ice from the insides of the windows and I remember being fascinated by the patterns that ice crystals made as they formed.

Soon after we moved into this house, a place that my father would never leave, my sister was born. She was a home birth and I recall a lot of fuss and towels and people coming and going and then the house was more full than it had been. Another year passed and then a little brother, also born at home, and the family was complete, in numbers anyway.

During this period my father worked as a carpenter for a local furniture company. He was good at his job but it paid little and he felt obliged to seek work further afield in order to earn sufficient money to feed the mouths that he had helped create. The job turned out to be in a car factory some 50 miles away. This made for a long working day and was probably the beginning of his decline, and maybe even mine.

I have memories of Wagner's Tannhauser overture being played very loud and coming downstairs and conducting to it. Then being ushered back to bed.

I remember my grandparents' house and watching TV for the fist time; a small bakelite box that showed one TV channel only, and that for a few hours a day. I remember being utterly bored and impatient for teatime and tired of sitting on the floor, then being taken home in grandfather's car and being sick from eating too much rich food. At home food was mealtimes only and then it was very plain fare. Money was scarce and so were luxuries.

I recall being in a pram and seeing a man on a bicycle ride past, as he did so he took something white from his mouth and threw it away. This happened more than once and I wondered what it was. Eventually I learned that it was a cigarette. I must have been very young at that time.

I recall being put into the branches of a tree to have a photograph taken and being left there and unable to get down. I am beginning to find a pattern in my life already!

I also have some memory of pain. Not being able to walk well without it. I remember being taken to the doctor by bus and I vaguely recall my mother having to carry me home. She had been told by him, not to let me walk. I had been diagnosed with TB and was taken into hospital the following day. I remember vividly, being left there and feeling bewildered and utterly abandoned. I was four years old - just. A chapter had finished and a new one was about to begin.

memory lane

I am getting to an age when remembering things sometimes isn't easy. I can remember vast amounts of trivia and I struggle to forget things that I don't want to remember, but when it comes to recalling important short term stuff, like appointments and what someone said to me 5 minutes ago, I am beginning to suffer lapses. As a result of this i thought I'd make an attempt at some sort of autobiography that I can record here. With virtually no-one to read it, it may seem like a trivial matter or a waste of time but if i write while i can still recall things, then maybe, if I live long enough to forget completely, I'll be able to read it through and relive some of the past experiences. I may not manage to keep it going but I will make an attempt and see how it goes.


I'll start with my mother, who was born in Canada at a place called Oromocto, somewhere near Fredirickton in New Brunswick. Her family moved out to Canada and bought a farm. Immigration was encouraged by the Canadian government, who wanted to increase the population and mortgages were made available to all and sundry in order to buy property.

The family was large and times were very hard. Canada has an unforgiving winter climate and living conditions were cramped and harsh so mother and her twin sister were not particularly welcome arrivals in an already overcrowded house. With five other children to care for the twins became a burden and their parents decided to ship them back to the UK to live with their Aunt and Uncle, a childless couple. Effectively they were given away at the age of four years and an elder sister escorted them back on board a ship.

They were brought up in a strict household and although well looked after, their parents were elsewhere. In Canada, the farm burned down one day and the insurance company refused to pay up on some very dubious technicality. As a result the whole family were homeless and penniless and were forced to return to the UK just as war was growing in Europe.

They rented a ramshackle house in the countryside, surrounded by a tiny woodland and called it Oromocto. And still there was no room for the twins. They stayed where they were and although they got to see their family from time to time, their lives remained separate. And so my mother and her sister grew up with their aunt and uncle, living through the war and the years of deprivation that followed from it.

When she was sixteen, mother met my father. He had been in India during the war and had succumbed to various illnesses as well as developing a huge chip on his shoulder about asian people in general. I know little of his past and little of him, though I suppose they must have loved each other at some stage. ( I am one of three.) She became pregnant pretty soon after the relationship began and she was only seventeen by the time that she gave birth. I guess that I was as unwanted as much as I was unexpected. I don't think I was ever forgiven for my untimely appearance in the world. I am pretty sure that they married before i was born, though there are many that have suggested otherwise in the past.

They couldn't live with the aunt and uncle and so they moved in with the rest of the family in the already crowded ramshackle hut in the woods. There, until I was 18 months or so, we stayed, and my earliest memories were formed. Memories of the smells of pine needles, of too many people, of sunshine and the big outdoors and being left alone.

First thing

I see that Google is investing in biotechnology. It seems that all of a sudden the world is waking up to the idea that biotechnology can be both useful and profitable, while the inherent risks and dangers associated with it are being put to one side in the name of Mammon.

Don't get me wrong, I believe that biotechnology is a wonderful and fascinating world which can potentially solve many problems and make people's lives better and healthier. Only the other day I was watching a pretty hysterical programme on Tv that looked at some of the monstrosities that farmers are producing, not only through selective breeding but also through genetic manipulation. At first glance, chickens with no feathers appear pretty hideous and one considers words like "unnatural", but at the end of the day what is the point of domestic animals anyway? If they were not going to be eaten, would they exist? Can you imagine herds of cattle, flocks of sheep and whatever the collective name for pigs might be, running loose over the western world? I think not. Were it not for Omnivores, these animals would have become more or less extinct anyway.

The featherless chicken was produced to solve a problem. That of overheating in tropical countries. Now farmers in the middle east and central Africa can produce chickens much more effectively than they could before. The chickens will suffer less in the heat and everyone is happy.

Human insulin, routinely injected by type one diabetics is produced by bacteria. The gene that signals for the production of that hormone was extracted from a human cell and inserted into harmless bacteria. The bacteria are then grown in culture and allowed to express the gene and the insulin is purified and collected.

I could go on - the benefits of biotechnology are legion, but let us not overlook the potential risks and inherent dangers. The driving force behind business today is profit. Google would not be putting its money into a company if it did not expect to see a profit. What happens when that becomes the only driving force? Do the companies begin to cut corners and spend less on health and safety concerns? We have seen this happen with the railway system in the UK.

Money talks, of that there is no doubt. As an interviewer once said to Debbie Magee - "What first attracted you to Millionaire Paul Daniels?" Businesses, like people, look out for their own interests.

Good friends are hard to find

Anne called in today. I enjoy her company enormously and would like to spend more time with her. We do tend to get on very well and have quite a lot in common.

We talk of nothing most of the time but it's fun and I know i will miss her terribly when she goes.

I also envy her in that she has had the courage to follow her heart and hasn't let her head get in the way. That is an admirable trait and i wish her every success in her new life. She deserves that.

Memories

Writing on this blog is rather like talking to myself, but I am not aware of doing that out loud just yet. I have had a couple of comments made and they have been pleasant and supportive. Apart from that though, it does feel strange to think that these words are simply being stored on some remote hard drive, probably in a warehouse in Seattle and that basically, no-one, including the author gives a toss one way or another.

I was scouring the internet news this morning - well glancing at it actually. and found nothing noteworthy, so i decided to tidy a desk drawer in the hope that I would find the device that I have been looking for for the last couple of days. I found it, in a file with a few photographs. One of which was of someone wearing a cowboy hat. I was not there when the photo was taken but I do remember seeing it for the first time and it took me by surprise as I thought that I had put away all things relating to this person. I wanted to tear it up and say - "There - that's it." but of course I couldn't do that. Just like I cannot throw away anything that relates to that person. I have all the photographs filed away and even these I secreted lovingly inside a Terry Pratchett book, knowing that no-one else is likely to open it.

Sorting drawers has its dangers. It's a little like going for a medical examination - you never know what is going to turn up and there are some things that you may not want to find. An acquaintance of mine went to the doctor a week or so ago with pains in his legs. it turns out that he has a large tumour on his spine and since then he has also suffered a heart attack - he is 37. It doesn't seem fair that one so young should have to face that, but I suppose that there is a randomness to it all that makes outcomes and futures so hard to predict.

Open wide

An eventful morning, for me that is. I have been into college and at last have finished the Maya work. Not only that, but I managed to create a quicktime movie from it and then imported it into Director and then burned the CDRom so that is that done and dusted. Today is , of course, the deadline day so it's just as well really. I'll go back later and slip my work in at the bottom of the pile and hope that teacher doesn't notice that I am the last. (fat chance!)

Then I went to the dentist, from which I have just returned. This was a scale and polish job and i have to say it was far more uncomfortable than a filling. It felt like my gums were being sandpapered with a rotary disc and that the enamel was being stripped with an angle grinder. i suppose it is necessary but it does beg the question why? My dentist is a tiny Polish lady and she has to stand on a box to reach high enough to get to my mouth. She has bright red hair and no smile but I am sure that she is very good at what she does. However my gums still hurt and I am sure that my teeth weigh less than they did.

The pain will subside eventually and no doubt I'll have forgotten all about it by the time I have had a cup of coffee and a sandwich. I wonder why it is though, that the smallest women always manage to inflict the most pain?

DIFY

I think that DIY stands for "Damage it Yourself" This has been a bad week in a pretty bad year really. Everything i touch seems to fall apart at the moment. Still trying to finish the kitchen but having little success. To make matters worse, visitors are due later on this evening and they are staying all weekend. I think we may eat out!

The sun is shining this morning and I'd love to be able to make the most of it, but between the kitchen and other things I don't think I'll manage that somehow. Tony has rung, asking me to fix a dripping tap! He must be mad, or maybe he doesn't know about my catalogue of disaters in DIY and other things. Oh well I'll cycle round in a while and se what destruction I can inflict on his bathroom. Poor bloke can't see, so he won't notice anyway.

Clearly i am taking a break from it right now and I settled down to play a game on the computer for a while, while I drink my coffee. Guess what? The bloody game keeps crashing. Not only that, my back up hard drive has died and there are irreplaceable pictures and files on there.

I am beginning to feel persecuted!

Chemical warfare

I woke up this morning to a disappointment. All but one of my lettuce seedlings have been eaten by slugs. Why did they leave that one I wonder? Maybe it's a mutant variety that is slug repellant, or maybe the little bastards were just too full to finish it off and will be back later when I am not looking. I wouldn't mind so much if I hadn't nurtured them from seed and then carefully pricked them out and planted them with love and care and much mumbling under my breath. Well that does it - it is a declaration of war. From this point in time the mullusc is my sworn enemy and there will be no more prisoners. Forget Guantanamo Bay, from here on in it's genocide.

Some people swear by old cigarette ends soaked in water - I don't smoke. Others use beer traps - a waste of good beer. I could go around after dark with a torch, pick them up by hand and throw them over the fence into the neighbours gardens, but the way things are going for me right now they'd not only come back but bring a load of mates with them. No these treatments are too good and too kind. I am going to resort to chemical warfare. Slug pellets are the gardeners equivalent of Sarin, and I propose to liberally sprinkle these agents of death in every nook and cranny that I can find. That means that every slug, snail and any other misplaced molluscs wandering about in my empty lettuce patch will meet a slow and lingering death. I can only hope that it will serve as a lesson to any survivors and that they will pass that message on to future generations.

The eyes have it

I just had a visit from my friend Anne. That always helps to brighten my day.
We were talking about connections and the importance of eye contact and listening to people. Eyes are supposed to be the windows of the soul, whatever that may be. They certainly do convey a great deal to others. This seems to be a bit of an "eye" week as it happens. Yesterday, with my student, we were looking at the eye in terms of its anatomy and physiology, and today I have become aware once more that my glasses need replacing, no doubt at huge cost.

Thinking of the people that I feel closest to, they are both people with whom I made eye contact with easily. In both cases there was no discomfort and no looking away. It seems natural and is a communication within itself. Sometimes there was no need for a conversation, the link was almost telepathic. Once that link is established it is tough one to break, tough because the bond is rare and tough because it is precious.

absolutely nothing

Damn, it's raining yet again. Actually it is a deluge this morning and that puts paid to my plans. I had intended to go into college this morning to complete the maya work, while there was an expert around. Unfortunately I have to wait in for a delivery and then I'd have to cycle into town and I don't feel able to do that while the aqua vita is descending. I think I am jinxed this week. So far everything that I have started has gone wrong - I have managed to complete absolutely nothing without something going wrong.
I am within spitting distance of completing this bloody work and every time I get close something happens to deter me. I WILL FINISH IT! That has become my mantra and I will be so disappointed if I miss that final deadline. College last night was a bit f a waste of time. The tutor knows less about Maya than I do and that is saying something.

Nothing notable in the news today, although i must say that I haven't taken much trouble to scour it and I haven't been to collect the paper yet. I'll wait until the sun appears and that may take a while.

This is such a dull posting that I may withdraw it later and try to find something else to say. Maybe I could write about the dream i had last night, though it was very confused and real, I think I'd find it very uncomfortable.

Enjoy your day

Today

Sharing

I have just finished an essay on the importance of multimedia as a means of communication, and it got me to thinking about the whole issue of sharing information and feelings with other people. Information is one thing, but sharing one's self is a very different ball game altogether. To share ones self is a risk and sometimes that risk is worth taking. At other times it may not be and there lies the difficulty.

One of my favourite movies is Tim Burton's Big Fish. A wonderful fantasy and feelgood movie that bears watching over again. Billy Crudup plays the son and Albert Finney, the father. It is a filma bout coming together and for the son, to reach an understanding of the father, who has brought him up with stories, many of which are so far fetched as to be seen as lies. The son, through a close examination of those stories begins to realise that his father is more special than he realised and that his stories were a projection of his huge pesonality, and his way of communicating. The tragedy being that it takes the death of his father to allow him to reach that understanding.

I never communicated with my own father, nor him with me. I never knew him even though we shared the same house for a number of years, and I never mourned his passing. I felt no affinity for him and never missed him and that I suppose is a sadness in some ways. I guess that Big Fish, for me, represents what I would have liked to have experienced.

The fault may or may not lie within me. I have never been able to get really close to many people at all. Getting close means sharing ones self. That is hard and having taken that risk one has to live with the consequences. I am doing just that.

Not again!

It's almost unbelievable. This morning I read about a tetraplegic who was stopped driving his wheelchair on an expressway in Spain. His excuse was, that he was looking for a brothel! Am I missing something? is there a pattern here? Are the brothels of Europe a front for something?

It's heaving it down with rain again today. I knew that this would happen; as soon as it started it was almost bound to continue forever. The water butts are all full and British summer is re-established. I wouldn't mind the rain so much if it wasn't for the drop in temperature. I have had to go back into long trousers and shirts with sleeves.

Being sunday, Mothers day in some parts of the world, there is little to do and I suppose that I can just continue to potter on and attempt to complete something. That seems to be an impossible task some days. I either run out of something essential or I lose the will to go on, both of which mean unfinished bits and pieces all over the place.

I have been playing around with Maya this morning and trying to get my head around the complexity of 3D rendering. Wish there was someone I could consult on this as I seem to have forgotten most of what i thought I understood at the time. Being able to talk to someone is of great benefit sometimes but on the whole self reliance can be safer.

I'll keep scouring the news for more on the great brothel conspiracy, just in case there are sinister undertones.

Enjoy your sunday.

Ps Maya is not a person!

What is it all about?

Excuses

This morning's story was about an elderly Austrian, who, was stopped by the police after driving seven kilometres on the wrong side of a motorway. When stopped he told the police that he was looking for a brothel and got lost in the rain. At least it sounds like a good excuse and one would hope that he went on and found what he was looking for, after all there comes a time in life when there is little time or opportunity left to do the things that you always wanted to.

The championship has been settled and so the remaining matches of the season are more or less irrelevant as far as my team is concerned, though there is still the cup final to look forward to.

I have some DIY to do in the kitchen and in the living room I guess, so I can get on with those jobs today, or if the rain holds off i can mooch in the garden, and maybe later on I'll go and see my old lady friend as I haven't seen her this week. She really is a gem and I feel bad if I don't get to visit at least once in the week.

It's saturday and after an uneventful friday night, when it rained pretty heavily again, today looks like being much the same. I suppose I can be creative in finding excuses for not completing the assignments, but losing my way to brothel while caught in the rain, won't cut the mustard I think.

Enjoy your weekend, I am sure that you will.

Deadlines

Well my splurge of inspiration has well and truly faded. I know what they mean by hitting the wall. However hard I try at the moment I just cannot see way forward. ( that goes for all aspects of things right now.)
The main obstacle is the Maya movie. In order to do that I actually have to attend college and be there for hours. I have a version of Maya at home but it's a home learning version and will not produce the finished item. Oh sure i can practice and sort out a design but then I'd have to do it all again at college.
I had a letter from the tutor yesterday telling me what I already knew - ie that the final deadline is a week away. Wish I could see what the point is!

Eurovision

This weekend is the Eurovision song contest. This annual event was once taken very seriously and to win was an accolade that led to fame and stardom. The modern version is a joke, nothing is taken seriously and a once trivial event has become even less than it once was. The presenters have always been capable of sending it up, but now even the performers do. Everything in the media seems to be going the same way. Some people refer to this change as "inclusivity" but it could more accurately be referred to as "dumbing down".

Patrick Moore, the aging denizen of Astronomy has this week complained that the BBC is now being run by women, and as a result, is biassed in favour of that gender. He goes on to suggest that this has led to the lowering of standards-a brave man indeed.

I agree in principle to "inclusivity" but how far should it go? Should physics have the maths removed to make it accessible to the innumerate? Should books be replaced by audio to accommodate the illiterate? and should the utterly incompetant be allowed free access to medical training, on the basis that they enjoyed playing doctors and nurses with their siblings?

There is a real danger that "inclusivity" by it's very existence, is creating an excluded elite. Some people don't want "War and Peace" in comic format, or abbreviated versions of Mahler symphonies for those with short attention spans.

Those who watch the Eurovision contest, and read the Sun or the Mail, take heed. Being dumb is ok, but it's not clever and it's not funny!

Much ado

Yesterday I had a lovely surprise. Anne called in and the silence was broken. She came bearing a home made carrot cake, and we sat and drank coffee just like old times. So far the highlight of my week.
I have made a lot of progress on the assignment too and the interactive CDRom is about done. I'll have to get someone to test it before I burn and label it. The kitchen is past the really messy stage too so the last couple of days have been reasonably successful. Having said that, the weekend looms again, and nothing is planned. that is a mixed blessing but on the whole i think I prefer it that way.

When writing here, I rarely know what i am going to say until I sit down and make a start. Often it's a case of the first thing that enters my mind and then I go into a free fall of rambling. Now and then a news item will catch my attention and at other times i just feel like sharing my thoughts (with myself?), though I know that one person does read what I say.

Today, like yesterday is one of those days where i don't have a point to make or anything to rant about so I will just witter.

Holly, my musical student is due soon, and i look forward to that. She is such a nice person as well as an amazing talent. the hour with her slips past very quickly. I am sure that she could teach me as much as I teach her, though the subject matter would be different.

It's cool and raining again today, so no watering to do and no outdoor jobs. Maybe that is as well as i hae so much to do indoors.

Oh well have a good thursday.

Farewell Tony

So Tony Blair is to stand down. Now I am sure that there are so many people out there, that will be glad to hear that. For every leader, the continuous erosion by the media takes its toll and he has been rained on for a long time. The right wing press has done its customary assassination, and no doubt the self serving, grasping and ignorant will soon have the opportunity to bring their party back into power. Those who consider Mr Blair to be a bad prime minister, would do well to recall some of his predecessors. Remember Margaret Thatcher and the destruction of British society and industry? Remember the Falklands war and the sinking of the Belgrano? Remember the total uselessness and impotence of John Major? Now imagine what he might be replaced by. Can you really imagine Gordon Brown as PM? Well get used to that for a while and then consider the Tory Party again. Look at what they did last time and start planning for vast leaps in mortgage rates, cuts in public service and the gap between the poor and the rich growing exponentially.

It seems that the whole world is turning right once more and soon it will be back to every man for himself and sod the rest.

Communications and lies

Canada in the news again. This must be something of a record. Nicholas Sarkozy has been invited to join George Bush, to eat Poutine at a "Dinner of Fools" by some jokers from Quebec. No doubt there will soon be a recording of the phone call circulating on the web.

I hate the phone, by and large. If I talk to someone, I'd much prefer to do so face to face. On the phone it is so easy to lie, whereas body language tends to give away ones motives and intentions. I was always brought up to tell the truth, and lying does not come easily to me. I am not saying that I have never lied, I am sure that I have, but it always makes me feel uncomfortable, and besides, I have such a poor memory that I always got caught out. Telling the truth has it's drawbacks too as so often it involves telling someone what they don't particularly want to hear. Surely though, that is better than letting them find out the truth by some other means. My strategy these days is to say very little at all and to offer opinions only when asked and to avoid making any comments about my own personal feelings. It makes for a quiet life i guess.

eMail and text messaging are as bad in many ways - worse in some. I have heard of people being sacked or dumped by text messages. If that isn't a demonstration of sheer cowardice then i don't know what is. To destroy a person by text or email is morally and ethically evil.

Having said all this, telephone conversations and email are so much better than nothing at all. At least it is a way of keeping a line of communication open, and i know that I would be lost without the latter. I could live without a phone I think. My mobile phone lives in a desk drawer a lot of the time and i rarely need to pay any charges on it. I am never happy though, when I have no access to email.

I am not sure if Mr Sarkozy saw through the prank, or just didn't like Poutine, or maybe doesn't like George Bush. Maybe all three.

ps For anyone who doesn't know what Poutine is - It's basically french fries covered in cheese and gravy; a sort of coronary in a takeaway. It is delicious.

DIY

Tuesday has almost gone; my student just left and I will have to get changed again to continue with the kitchen. Ever wished that you hadn't started something. The trouble is with starting things that you never know what the outcome will be. Sometimes that is a good thing of course, and makes for an interesting life (so they say!), but when it comes to DIY, one small job always develops into something far more complex. Removal of wall paper, like the removal of clothes, can reveal things that are best not seen, and now I find that I am having to make good walls that have seen better days.

A dull day here in most senses of the word and I haven't even ventured out for a newspaper. I guess I'd not get time to read it anyway. I am hoping that one day I will have a fellow blogger to bounce ideas off, but for now I'll keep going in the hope that I can at least register something in the mind of someone.

NASA turns away from the Whitehouse and finds something Bright

Decorating is not my idea of a great time, but it does have its benefits too. It is such a mindless activity that I can more or less switch off my remaining three brain cells and give them a well deserved rest. I am waiting for paper to soak before I can scrape it off at the moment, so I have time to sit and write a few lines before I head back to it. Another advantage is that it is a good displacement activity, it is yet another way of avoiding the issue of this bloody assignment. I have gone as far as negotiating a possible solution with my tutor but it didn't solve the fundamental problem of motivation.

I see that NASA have discovered a supernova. Such sightings are pretty rare, and must give astronomers a chance to find yet more pieces in the jigsaw that is the history of the universe. I love looking at the night sky; it always fills me with a real sense of my own insignificance. So many suns and such huge distances involved, so many potential worlds out there and so much that we will never know or comprehend. It always puts things into perspective. At the end of the day, there is very little that matters and we are all just transient collections of elements, that have no lasting impact on the overall structure. We are only important to ourselves and will easily be forgotten.

So decorating is pretty pointless really. It's nest making I suppose and needless to say largely driven by the female of the species while executed by the male. It is another means of control. I'm sure that it will look good for a while, but I thought it
looked ok before. Oh well, back to it I suppose. Have a good one!

Another kitchen

Today hasn't panned out as expected. I decided to move a kitchen unit and as a result tore off a strip of wall paper. One thing led to another and now i am in the throes of decorating the....king kitchen. Just what I didn't need with the deadline rapidly approaching. At least there is no college tonight, being a bank holiday, so i don't have to offer any feeble excuses. Shit I seem to spend my whole life either apologising to, doing things for, or being in pain over women. I'd happily become a misogynist if i could spell it and if I didn't like some women so much.

It's blowing a gale out there and has been most of the day. At least I am not missing anything outdoors, though after a weekend of doing almost nothing outside, I am getting cabin fever here. I'll soon lose the facility to talk sensibly. Come to think of it I think I lost that some time ago.

Oh well dear reader, i hope that your monday is better than mine, but I expect it will be.

Today, for the first time, I had evidence that my words have reached at least one person. Well, reached may be stretching a point, I don't claim ever to have managed that, despite years of trying, but they have at least been read. I'd probably continue anyway but it is nice to know that I am not totally alone.

This morning I was reading about an interdenominational football match, arranged somewhere in Scandinavia, as a means of integrating the Muslim community with the other denominations. (I am sot sure who runs the God Squad in Norway!) Anyway all went well in the run up, but when the Muslims found out that there were to be women on the opposing team, they withdrew on the grounds that they could not run the risk of physical contact with "them". So the whole thing was called off. According to the report, all was not lost as it did give the two sides something to talk about.

I wonder if their motives were not something different to those reported. I think that the Immams know that women always play by a completely different set of rules, and that those rules are continually subject to change, according to whim, fancy, false memory and or no reason at all. Hence, in any conflict or competition with the XX persons, there can only be one result. Even in an argument, if a man tries to have a last word, it is simply the beginning of a new argument. Most women know what they want and always get it.

Anyway it is raining - just. Not enough to do anything useful, just enough to make things damp and unpleasant for the bank holiday. I can at least spend the day at my desk and make an attempt to get as much done on the assignment as possible. I'll probably also add to my blog as it is a substitute for communication, even if it doesn't reach it's target.

Enjoy your monday.

Controversy

No sign of a change in the weather. It feels like August and I am disporting myself in shorts and teeshirts on a daily basis. Long may it last.
I found out this morning how to upload images to this site so I will add a graphic element to my ramblings and perhaps that will make the whole thing appear to be more worthwhile.
I was thinking that maybe I should try to be controversial, but that is becoming increasingly difficult. I suppose i could get onto the subject of religion, but as i despise all religions equally even that is a tricky one, besides no-one wants a fatwah placed upon them for simply expressing a viewpoint do they Salman? So maybe I'll just stick to the mundane and everyday life of someone who never was.
I have my musical student coming today. That is something to look forward to and I hope that I can be of some help to her. I am sure that she just needs to build some confidence in her abilities, other than those of a musician.
Apart from that I did have some interesting mail today. As a result of one of the bloody assignments - the one I have yet to complete - the manager of the bar that I have been designing materials for, wants me to take on the brochure and stationery for his hotel. That will be quite a big task but hell - what else do I have to do?
I have a little icon flashing on my screen that I haven't seen before. Let me investigate.
Ah it's a warning to tell me that my bluetooth wireless keyboard battery is expiring. I'll wrap up now and maybe come back later when i have found a replacement or found something worth writing about.
Take care and have a good day.

How stupid can people be?

I have just stopped laughing at a story about a scam in Japan. Well maybe laughing is an exaggeration. I don't laugh much but I can manage a pretty heavy smirk from time to time.

The scam goes like this. Apparently, poodles are fashionable in Nippon society, and what every wealthy Japanese woman wants is one of those stupid dogs with equally stupid haircuts. Being fashionable, of course, they are much in demand and fetch high prices. Now that in itself is not particularly amusing, but the guy who is importing lambs and shearing them with poodle hairstyles is. How stupid can people be? - A rhetorical question of course but surely lambs not opnly look different to dogs but they smell differently and make very different sounds. Good grief they even crap differently! The article suggested that a woman became suspicious when her pet refused to eat dogfood. I wonder if she tried to get it to sit, or fetch a stick? Imagine trying to take one for walkies or getting one to befriend a neighbour's German Shepherd?

I guess that I have been stupid many times (recently) but I hope that I am never lacking the ability to distinguish between species.

Ties that bind

Here we go again - another beautifully sunny day without a cloud in the sky. We really could use some rain here, before the beaurocrats begin to impose water restrictions.

I decided this morning, while attending to my morning routine and reading Jeremy Clarkson in the most appropriate place, that writing and urinating can be compared. When out for a drink or two on a friday night, it is quite possible to go for hours without going for a pee. However, once you do go, that is it. From that point on it just seems to flow - the seal is broken and there is no stopping it. So it is with writing. I haven't written for months or even years, yet the other day I came across this site and I broke the seal. Now, for better or for worse I seem to be flowing freely again. No doubt I'll dry up shortly but for now I am back.

I was reading this morning - no not in Jeremy CLarkson, that Malasia have declared neckties to be a health hazard. Now excuse me, but this is not news. I have always considered them to be so. In my job, the wearing of a tie was seen as vital. At least it was for men. I could never really understand why women should not have been placed under the same rule; however, the tie was the statement that you were at work and that you were in harness. Remove it at your peril.
Of course all my colleagues wore ties and some liked to sport a vast array of styles and colours, almost relishing the garments. One dear friend, routinely wore bowties, and not the clip on sort either, but I digress. There were those that wore just one, and I came close to that category.

Now apart from the psychological effect of wearing this symbol of slavery, the tie is not something that one washes on a day to day basis, and to make matters worse, it is the first landing place for dribble, nose drops, and most unmentionables that descend from facial cavities. Ties collect organic material like Imelda Marcos collected shoes. I have seen ties that could be stood up in a corner. They are breeding grounds for new life forms and sites of micro-evolution and yet they are dangled in front of all that we meet. For those who work closely with people, doctors, teachers etc, they are perfect ways of spreading diseases that we have yet to discover, and yet someone somewhere still thinks that they are a good idea.

Well done Malasia for raising this issue again, albeit 20 years later than the UK. Maybe their scientists could find a way of resealing the bladder sphyncter after that first visit to the gents.

If my reader is there - good morning.