|
 |
Wednesday, 21 May 2003 |
I suppose -- as my brain finally congeals in the manner of a tub of lard left to cool -- I should give thanks that my basic needs, of shelter and sustenance, are so well-catered to that I'm free to self-actualise into this morose state.
10:12:25 PM 
|
|
Hell. Nearly a week since the last post. The truth is I have bugger all to say. Not here, not anywhere else either.
Tonight marks 6 weeks since I stopped drinking more than I'm supposed to, 6 weeks of near drought. And I feel awful. Physically, I'm probably better than I've been for a long time, on the days that is when I'm not crippled with a nauseating headache. But mentally... well, forget it. I've mostly stopped writing the countless long emails with which I clog my friends' inboxes. Anything I do write seems to have been produced by the group of monkeys with typewriters I read of recently. Frankly, crapping on the keyboard as they did might well be more artful than any of this shite.
And I'm heading down too: down, down, down; can't seem to pull up. I'm hoping this is just a stage, a necessary phase, and not the beginnings of another long cycle of depression.
Stay tuned.
Or not.
As you please.
9:44:43 PM
|
|
|
Wednesday, 14 May 2003 |
I listened today to some of Neil Young's Live Rust. Oh boy. As the opening notes of Like a Hurricane came through the earphones, I shivered and my hair stood on end. I instantly remembered 20 years' ago when I was 18: long walks, late on wet and cold nights, with that song playing full blast on my Walkman. And I remembered how lonely and mixed up and miserable and wracked with longing I was at that age, not all of which was brought on by the music in the first place.
And how much better do I feel now? I've learned a lot, gained some self assurance and some practised skill in a few things. I have a wonderful family and a small number of true, close friends. But when it comes to actually being me, being comfy in my own head, being able to deal with the reality of relationships, say when people are cross or tired, am I any much different? It didn't feel so today.
I'm not sure where I'm going with this. I suppose I was just struck with the thought today that as we come into our mid-to-late thirties, it seems the fears, the longing, the uncertainty and all the rest of those things that blighted our self image and our relationships as teenagers, those things we thought we'd finally dealt with as we turned 30, they're coming thundering back. And suddenly we're teenagers again.
Hell, I even went out the other day and bought a couple of Led Zeppelin CDs (and ripped them straight to my notebook). What's going on here?
I tell you, I'm really looking forward to turning 40, when I have all this stuff sorted out again. Oh yes.
I do hope though that there won't be a relapse every 20 years: can you imagine the old fart in the wheelchair, blanket over his knees, a tear in his eye as Comfortably Numb plays at full volume, again and again?
10:40:41 PM
|
|
|
Monday, 12 May 2003 |
Apropos of the last post, I shall make a goodly effort to spread only light and joy for the next week. Well, mostly only light and joy.
Let the good times um, er, roll.
10:00:30 PM
|
|
Um. I'm wondering if I may have overdone the grumpy, depressed thing a little in recent days? Reading back over the last few posts, I can see that people might be forgiven for inferring that I live in a very dark and strange place indeed. And that is strictly not so. Yeah, I'm struggling a little with life but, as I wrote (more or less) in a comment on the previous post:
I have a lovely wife, 2 perfect kids, cushy job, etc., etc. I do suffer from moderate levels of depression now and then and, I think, anxiety too, and I've tied myself in emotional knots for 1 or 2 reasons, which'll take years to undo. But I'm ok really.
The only hardship I face is being me. I shouldn't trivialise that -- it has caused me pain and grief for many years -- but, then again, I'm hardly in the same league as Rageboy, for whom, if indeed he suffers as much as he implies, I feel deep empathy.
Remember too, while I have been pretty openly and honestly "me" in this blog, I also reserve the right of all writers, painters, photographers and the rest of them to focus on the detail, to skew the objective and balanced representation, to do that kind of stuff in order to show emotion, rather than try to explain how it is. If I feel black tonight, I want to Paint It Black. Call it therapy if you will. And then I feel a little better and move on. Perhaps there's the danger in this blogging thing, for our words remain behind, long after the emotion that gave them life has gone. This is how I felt then, not for all time.
9:57:06 PM
|
|
|
Thursday, 8 May 2003 |
Vomit. Regurgitate. Puke. Throw up. Chunder. Barf. Technicolour yawn. Driving the porcelain bus.
Did I miss any?
It came over me early afternoon yesterday though, in hindsight, had been slowly brewing all day. I felt sick. Nauseated. Not "nauseous": please consult a dictionary if you don't know the difference. I'm sitting at my desk, feeling worse by the minute, having increasing difficulty reading. Eventually I give up and just sit there, eyes shut, breathing slowly and deeply. But it gets worse. I try a small amount of chocolate -- for the sugar -- and a cup of sweet, warm water, both to no avail. I'm sweating and beginning to shake. I'd go home but the next train isn't for another 45 minutes. So I sweat it out.
Time to go, and I wobble off slowly and unsteadily to the station. I make it to the train, seek out a seat right next to the toilet, and spend the next 10 minutes trying valiantly not to throw up. Two stops into the journey I admit defeat and retreat to the toilet. Do y'all want the details of what happened next? Let's just say it was protracted, painful, noisy and miserable. And then the hardest bit: emerging from the toilet into view, fully aware that the entire carriage has probably been trying its collective hardest not to listen to the apparent garrotting within. I slumped, soaked in sweat and drained, into a seat and hoped I didn't have stray bits of recycled lunch in my nose, beard or clothes. No one paid me any attention, for which I was profoundly grateful. There's something surreal about feeling that ill in public but simultaneously trying to look normal so as not to be embarrassed.
The subsequent evening and night were unpleasant. Thankfully, my body seemed to achieve some kind of tactical victory over the invaders sometime near dawn. Today I'm shaky and tired -- slept 2 hours after lunch -- and not eating much.
My wife tells me that the higher brain functions are the first thing to go with a viral infection like this. That would probably explain why today seemed to pass by in few minutes, leaving barely an imprint on my consciousness or memory. Oh well, it was relaxing if nothing else. Hopefully, my brain will be back online in a day or two.
10:03:08 PM
|
|
|
Monday, 5 May 2003 |
A while back I wrote An open letter to Peter Gabriel about how my dear wife had bought me a Peter Gabriel CD which flat refused to play on any computer CD drive, thus rendering it completely useless to me.
Well, I persisted, and today, afer the inspired application of a small piece of sticky note on the periphery of the disc, just so, I got it. Yay! Ripped it straight to AAC using iTunes 4. Now I can actually listen to the music I paid for.
9:34:34 PM
|
|
|
Friday, 2 May 2003 |
Bad karma day, the almost-inevitable result of a week filled with news of at least 3 family tragedies for friends and colleagues. I'm demotivated, miserable and grumpy as all hell. By some miracle I managed to restrain myself from smacking around the head any of the fat-arsed dunderheads who GOT IN MY WAY, the guy who pushed the lift (elevator) button with an oh-so-smart, little flourish WHEN IT WAS ALREADY PUSHED, myriad smokers puffing clouds of their stink ALL OVER ME... Anyone else?
Take no prisoners.
9:33:37 PM
|
|
|
Tuesday, 29 April 2003 |
The little Site Meter thingy tells me that my traffic is up to unheard-of heights for about the 3rd day in the last week. Intrigued, I checked the referrals report, which hopefully shows where my visitors came from. Now this really spun me out: they're mostly arriving -- hello y'all -- by way of Google searches on "andrew barnett". That's me!
So I did the Google thing too. And guess what? I am the number 2 second-top result. Today, at least, I am the second-most-famous Andrew Barnett on the whole Web. Woo hoo!
So, this is my 15 minutes of fame, huh? And the money, booze and women are where exactly?
10:26:57 PM
|
|
© Copyright 2003 Andrew Barnett.
|
|
|
