Recursive Words

I was going to go to bed at a fairly normal time last night, but then fell down an internet rabbit hole of my own making.

I was going to go to bed at a fairly normal time last night, but then fell down an internet rabbit hole of my own making. Before I knew it, it was 2am, and the first Formula One race of the new season would be broadcast at 4am – from Melbourne, Australia. I wondered about grabbing a couple of hours sleep on the sofa but somehow that didn’t happen.

After watching the race I eventually fell into bed at 6am – waking up three hours later. I’m not entirely sure how I’m going to get through the rest of today. I don’t seem to be able to get away with surviving on such little sleep any more.

Anyway.

It’s been a quiet weekend so far.

In an outrageous fit of extravagance on Friday I spent a little of the hard earned YouTube money on a new gadget for myself – an “Amazon Fire Max 11” (or at least, some combination of those words, but perhaps in a different order). I also got a pen for it – which seems to employ some sort of sorcery to affect writing on the screen. It’s tremendously clever, and I understand none of it.

A veritable treasure-trove of procrastination awaits.

The hope is that this little machine can go pretty much everywhere with me, and – who knows – I might even write something of consequence using it (even my eyes are rolling at that one – we all know I’ll just tinker with it endlessly, rather than use it for anything even vaguely constructive).

In other news, our eldest appears to have broken up with her boyfriend. I met her in the kitchen in the early hours, after she had been to the pub with her sister. She had her hair cut yesterday, and seemed to have pulled herself up by her boot-straps. Suffice to say I’m ridiculously proud of her for wanting to get on with her life. I imagine there are going to be more bumps in the road ahead, but facing the world down with a new haircut seems like a pretty bloody good first step to me.

After murmured conversations about dropping out of college last week, our youngest daughter has met with her tutors and agreed to continue. We’re crossing our fingers and toes that she will carry on. Conversations were had about next year – about an apprenticeship or internship at a company connected to her college. Like I said – fingers and toes firmly crossed – if she carries on I’ll be super proud of her too.

Our middle daughter has been knocking it out of the park recently. After working two jobs for the last month, she resigned from the local café and is moving towards working full-time at the huge pub in town – table running, serving behind the bar, and making food in the kitchen too (she showed us her chef uniform this week). Alongside that she’s still finding time to visit the gym, and the weight is falling off her. So yes – super proud of her too.

Finally, I’m actually (fingers crossed) starting to feel better too. I’m still not 100%, but I can at least potter around the house doing things without coughing my lungs up. There have been murmurs at home about calling friends to have a belated birthday drink in town at some point – perhaps to coincide with my other half’s birthday next week. We’ll see.

Right. I better go. There’s a cup of coffee and a hot-cross-bun with my name on it in the kitchen.

We just got back from the cinema – after finally seeing the latest (and perhaps final?) Bridget Jones movie. I had heard mixed things about it – some friends loved it, some hated it, some were indifferent.

We just got back from the cinema – after finally seeing the latest (and perhaps final?) Bridget Jones movie. I had heard mixed things about it – some friends loved it, some hated it, some were indifferent.

I loved it, and I can’t really put my finger on why.

Yes, it’s quite predictable, and yes, the laughs are sometimes forced, but oh my word did it ever rip me a new one emotionally.

Maybe I’m a poor judge. Perhaps that’s it though – I try not to judge movies – I’m there for the escape – to see the world through somebody else’s eyes – to walk in their shoes for a little while – to laugh and cry with them.

I’m not going to say anything about the story because I don’t want to ruin it for anyone. I’ve had enough of the “Paul from Midnight in Paris” idiots mansplaining the synopsis of books and movies to whoever might listen – dictating what should be felt, what should cause amusement, and what should be considered watchable (or not).

For me the cinema has always been about being there in the moment – or rather being taken somewhere other than here. For me, that’s the magic.

Tonight, during a quiet moment in the movie I heard several people around us quietly giggling, and sniffing. I wiped a tear from my own cheek – and smiled.

If it is the last movie, I’m going to miss Bridget.

I’m sitting in the dark of the junk room, bathed in the light from the computer screen, surrounded by silence throughout the house.

I’m sitting in the dark of the junk room, bathed in the light from the computer screen, surrounded by silence throughout the house. Everybody else is already in bed, and the clocks are ticking inexorably towards Monday. if I sit still and keep my mouth shut, the infection that has plagued me for the last several weeks seems to leave me alone.

It wouldn’t take much of a clairvoyant to predict a request for more antibiotics from the doctor tomorrow. I imagine that might require a second visit to the nurse, and a second listen to my innards as I attempt to inflate my lungs.

I’m fed up with feeling terrible now. My birthday pretty much got cancelled, and apart from a trip to the garden centre for a cup of tea and a piece of cake earlier, I’ve not set foot outside the house for a week.

It’s all my fault, isn’t it. I wrote about wanting to start running again. That’s all it took for the universe to turns it’s attention on me, and whisper “let’s get him”.

While cooped up in the house over the last week I’ve watched a lot of television, and scrolled a lot of the internet. Years ago we used to joke about reading the entire internet – that will never happen any more because a legion of robots are writing an infinite number of next pages, just before we reach them.

After attempting to scroll through the dross at Facebook a couple of days ago I almost posted an incendiary post about the utter cesspool it has become. While scrolling I blocked perhaps three quarters of the posts I saw – “suggested” posts, written by robots. While reporting and blocking the umpteenth fake-news story I stumbled upon, it suddenly occurred to me that the reporting mechanism isn’t really reporting anything – it’s using humans as engines to help clean the swamp.

I closed the browser tab, and sat back in my chair – shaking my head.

It won’t be long until AI avatars are reading and responding to content, as well as creating it. It will be portrayed as “incentivising conversation”, or some such codswallop. Meta have had their fingers burned with similar experiments in the past.

Anyway.

Roxy Music just started singing “More Than This” on Spotify. Well played, universe. Well played.

It’s late on Friday night, and I’m wondering if my body has started to turn a corner. After a week taking steroids and antibiotics, I took the last of them this morning.

It’s late on Friday night, and I’m wondering if my body has started to turn a corner. After a week taking steroids and antibiotics, I took the last of them this morning. The cough is nowhere near as bad as it has been, and I have been able to help out a little more with chores.

Of course it would have helped if a certain cat hadn’t sent us all into panic stations this morning.

While sitting on the edge of the bed, thinking through the need to eat something before ramming another handful of tablets into my mouth, my other half burst into the bedroom to tell me there was something wrong with the cat.

I won’t go into too much detail – beyond the discovery of quiet a smelly mess in the upstairs bathroom, and sick under the dining table.

It’s probably worth noting that this “many storied” cat of ours – “George” – has probably used up more than his quota of lives already. He was run over when he was young, and had his back-end and legs re-built – then a couple of years later he got a blockage that caused him to have all of his bits and pieces removed – turning him into neither a boy or girl. While going through that surgery a mistake was made that nearly killed him – requiring emergency surgery that wiped out his insurance, and all of our savings.

I can still remember having the conversation with the children – should we have money in the bank, or should we save his life. Given his continued existence, you can guess what happened.

We didn’t go on holiday that year.

Anyway.

I jumped in the shower and then had a shave (I looked like a caveman) while my other half searched for the local vet. She then left for work, called our youngest daughter (who started out towards home immediately), and I got us an appointment at the vet. I then climbed into the attic in search of the “pet carrier” (read: cage).

Half an hour later I arrived at the vet carrying a rather grumpy ginger cat – yowling to anybody that would listen. After booking George in and confirming his name, address, age (15!) and bank details, we sat and waited.

I love vet waiting rooms – you never know what you’re going to see.

We saw a gangly boxer dog that (as my famous step-grandfather once told me) “didn’t know if it was having a shit or a haircut”. It noticed George after a few seconds and snuck towards the cage for a sniff. George moved with the speed of Zorro and clattered against the cage bars – causing the Boxer to reverse across the floor at speed and cower behind it’s owner’s legs – physically shaking – not taking it’s eyes off George the entire time. If not for the cage bars, I’m pretty sure George would have made a bit of a mess of the dog’s face before it knew much about it.

A few minutes later we were beckoned in, whereupon our yowling, poorly, frightened cat put on the biggest charm offensive you’ve ever seen. The vet found NOTHING wrong with him. She weighed him, stuck a thermometer up his bum, injected him with something, and turned him this way and that – he put up with all of it, and sat on her table like some sort of stoic gollum – taking great interest in the hedgerow outside her window.

He didn’t once flinch, complain, or react to anything she did. Even she was impressed. She was more impressed that a 15 year old cat was in such good condition. She obviously doesn’t realise how many staff he has, and quite what a charmed life he lives.

So.

We paid the requisite amount of money for the visit, and took him home again – then rang everybody to lower “panic stations” a bit before getting on with work, chores, and whatever else the day might throw at us.

The good thing?

I really do think I’m getting better (at last!). I just got off a livestream on YouTube – the first in perhaps 10 days – and made it through a couple of hours talking without coughing much at all.

Fingers crossed.

On the way home from visiting my parents last night, after being sick for the better part of two weeks, my other half pretty much ordered to me to book a doctors appointment.

On the way home from visiting my parents last night, after being sick for the better part of two weeks, my other half pretty much ordered to me to book a doctors appointment. The confirmation came through within a couple of hours (while still en-route – it’s a long way), for an appointment the same afternoon. Unheard of.

Immediately after getting home I walked to the doctors, booked myself in, and sat waiting for my name to come up on the screens. I think it’s perhaps the third time in twenty years that I’ve ever had to visit the doctor for me.

After sitting in the waiting room, trying to avoid the gaze of a blonde woman sitting opposite (I’m still not sure if she liked me, or was amazed at how ill I looked), my name came up on the screen.

I saw a nurse – not a doctor – who asked all manner of questions before requesting I pull my shirt up. While she prodded around with a stethoscope, I tried to breathe deeply, and coughed spectacularly.

“You have an infection in your left lung. I’m going to prescribe a course of antibiotics, and steroids – starting immediately you get home. I want you to take 8 steroid tablets, and 2 antibiotics immediately, then follow the instructions on the labels”.

I’m going to rattle by the end of the week.

The kids giggled while watching me down the first round of tablets. They’re all pretty hopeless at tablets – I crammed them in my mouth like M&Ms and washed them down with a swig of water.

You know the worst thing?

The kids had prepared an enormous birthday dinner for me – the table was crammed with all manner of “party food” – cold cuts of meat, bread, cheese, dips, vegetables, pickles – you name it – it was on the table.

I didn’t really feel like eating any of it.

But I did.

I felt so sorry for them.

After dinner I quietly took myself to bed, and slept straight through until morning. The nurse had warned me that the steroids might affect my sleep – she wasn’t wrong. I woke at 4am, 5am, 6am, and finally 7am before scraping myself out of bed.

Apparently the steroids will make me hungry too. I don’t think I’ve ever been on steroids before.

So. Here we are. I’ve been sitting quietly in the study all day, getting on with work, and making starring appearances on calls from time to time – where everybody commented on how rough I looked and sounded. Wonderful.

The good thing? If I sit here and don’t talk, I’m not too bad.

I guess I just need to keep taking the tablets, and see what happens.

p.s. I got my age wrong on the previous post – I’m 52, not 53. Apparently I’m now old enough that I have to work it out.

Greetings from deepest, darkest Cornwall, where I’m visiting my parents for the weekend.

Greetings from deepest, darkest Cornwall, where I’m visiting my parents for the weekend.

After arriving late on Friday evening, we wandered into Looe on Saturday – known from a recently famous television show as “Shipton Abbot”. We wandered around the town, half-expecting to walk into the characters from the TV show.

Today – Sunday – we wandered to a Victorian country house a little way away and went for a walk around the house and gardens. They are looked after by the National Trust. We chatted with one of the volunteers on site for some time – reminiscing about visiting with our children years ago.

It’s been a good couple of days away. A good break.

I will admit that ever since my parents retired down here I’ve always preferred to visit when none of the holiday makers are here. I wonder how the local communities get through the winter – it’s so quiet. I guess if you’re used to a seasonal way of life you budget, and hope to make enough during the season to see you through. It’s a very different way of life.

Tonight we’re holed up at my parents – catching up on stories, and half-watching television. “Call the Midwife” is on, and silence has descended upon the house. It’s funny how some television shows seem to cross generations.

My parents bought me a mug for my birthday – saying “I’m kind of a big deal on Youtube”. I can’t help thinking of Fin in Star Wars saying as much to Han Solo about him bing “kind of a big deal in the resistence”.

I’m self deprecating to a fault, and the worst self-marketer I know.

I hadn’t really thought about my birthday until today. Tomorrow I’ll be 52. I’m not sure if I feel it or not – or quite how I should feel. I do know that I need to start running again – or walking at least.

Leaving the house would be a start.

It’s too easy to become consumed in work, making money, and to forget about friends – and yet I also know that so many of us are struggling – running flat out to keep our head above water – worrying about the future – worrying about the present.

It’s hard.

Isn’t it interesting how something as simple as an upcoming birthday can cause you to reflect – to refactor. Perhaps this year I will make no grand promises to others — I’ll just promise to myself to keep in touch with those I care most about – my friends – both near and far. How long does it really take to say “hello”, “how are you”, or “how is your day?”.

I know in the past I’ve often become tired of being the one to reach out. The reality is reaching out is easy. Reading the quite wonderful book about the boy, the fox, the horse and the mole reminded me that asking for help is quite often far more difficult than accepting it. If I might give a friend the opportunity to share a burden, or lighten a load, I’ll happily take the chance.

After a week and a half struggling with a cough and cold, I’m finally starting to feel better this morning – or at least if I sit quietly, I don’t cough my lungs up. My head still slowly fills with snot though. Too much? Sorry.

After a week and a half struggling with a cough and cold, I’m finally starting to feel better this morning – or at least if I sit quietly, I don’t cough my lungs up. My head still slowly fills with snot though. Too much? Sorry.

It always interests me that when you’re properly sick, entire days seem to vanish. Apparently it’s been nearly a week since I wrote anything of consequence in the blog, and yet I can’t really remember much about the past several days. The majority of the time has vanished into a haze created by ibuprofen and paracetamol.

I hate taking tablets, and it’s not without good reason – just sitting here now – dosed up – I don’t have a headache, but I can feel the pressure in my head. The “dead of night” sound of blood rushing through my ears is a pretty consistent roar at the moment.

ANYWAY!

We’re getting ready to travel to the coast for a few days – made somewhat problematic by my other half forgetting to charge the car all week (we have an electric car). I foresee an enforced stop at a services for an hour along the way to leave it on a fast-charger for a while.

We’re travelling light. Warm clothes, walking boots, and not much else. In related news, I just discovered that all of the washbags I have used for the last several years have been thrown away – so that’s helpful.

I should go grab some lunch before we leave. We have a long journey ahead.

Hopefully the next few days will afford the chance to sit down and write something a little more consequential for the blog. It’s about time.

After signing myself off work sick last Wednesday, I returned to work on Thursday and Friday even though I was quite obviously getting worse.

After signing myself off work sick last Wednesday, I returned to work on Thursday and Friday even though I was quite obviously getting worse. Even missing a day caused so much paperwork that I didn’t dare contemplate taking any further time off.

I got markedly worse over the weekend. I think perhaps Saturday night was the low-point. There was a moment in the evening when my sides hurt from coughing, I kept coughing up rubbish, I couldn’t get my breath, and had a banging headache – where I started to wonder about taking myself off to hospital.

I didn’t in the end.

I spent much of Saturday and Sunday sitting on the sofa watching television – something I very rarely do. Whenever friends talk about recent television shows, they take for granted that I won’t have seen whatever they’re talking about.

I watched two entire seasons of “Silo” – a post apocalpytic thriller – using a free trial of “Apple+”. I’ve now bought the books on my Kindle to find out the rest of the story before they make the third season. The only problem – it looks like the TV series has cherry-picked bits and pieces from six books.

Anyway.

Slowly on the mend now, and more than conscious that I kind of fell off the radar over the last few days.

Looking forward to visiting my parents for a long weekend at the end of next week. I won’t tell you how much paperwork that generated, either.

I’m not entirely sure where today has gone. One of the kids brought a pretty awful virus into the house, and it got me. I think this might be the first day I’ve had off work for over a year.

I’m not entirely sure where today has gone. One of the kids brought a pretty awful virus into the house, and it got me. I think this might be the first day I’ve had off work for over a year.

You wouldn’t believe how long that first paragraph took to write – replete with spelling, grammar and punctuation mistakes. My brain seems to be running at about 50% or lower – which is pretty disastrous for a software developer.

It’s odd – being sick – I’m not used to it, and I’m not good at it. My thoughts are jumbled. Forming sentences on the screen is a struggle – changing my mind mid-sentence about how to relate the thoughts in my head.

Have you ever thought about that? When we think, is it in words, sounds, pictures, or something else? Can we ever know? I suppose it’s a similar question to languages – do people think in a language, or does the language just come out of our mouth without too much thought? A good friend who is multi-lingual likened it to switching radio stations in your head. I like that idea.

I struggle with one language most days.

You know the funny thing though? I’m fairly fluent in lots of computer programming languages. I’m guessing they exist in a different part of your brain – but then it’s still all about forming structures on the page (or screen) – imparting information in a prescribed way. When we talk or write we naturally impose grammar rules while arranging a dictionary of words. Computer programming languages are just the same – with rules around syntax and punctuation.

Anyway. It might interest you it just took five attempts to type “anyway”. The letters came out in the wrong order, then the edits were on the wrong characters, or reversed.

I’m good at reversing things. I always have been.

Maybe there’s a connection there between the way some people’s brains work, and the things they are good at. In the movie “Arrival”, we initially struggle to communicate with the aliens because their understanding of time, and therefore order is different than ours. Perhaps my “relaxed” relationship with order is what makes me a half-decent software developer – with the ability to look at complex problems from unexpected angles.

I think some people might call it “insight”. In chess it’s called “seeing” – the ability to look at a pattern, and truly understand it – to see the nature of it – the nuances – how you might interact with it to manipulate it.

Maybe that’s why some people are good at dealing with others? Perhaps we don’t all see each other in the same way. Perhaps some people see more than others, without consciously looking.

It’s probably liked to empathy too.

I often accuse myself of “thinking too much” – of worrying too much about what others might think or do – playing out hypothetical timelines – agonising over choices I will never make. There’s a part of me that envies those that can blunder their way through life, perhaps unintentionally affecting those around them. There’s another part of me that silently castigates them too – watching in silent disbelief at their thoughtless ignorance.

I don’t know why I’m writing this any more. I was waiting for the washing machine to finish, and didn’t want to watch daytime television. I’m not good at “being sick”.

After several months chasing our own tails, we invited some friends over last night. There really wasn’t much of a plan – other than escaping from each other’s normal lives for a few hours.

After several months chasing our own tails, we invited some friends over last night. There really wasn’t much of a plan – other than escaping from each other’s normal lives for a few hours. We filled the table up with bread, cheese, crackers, and wine and caught up properly with each other’s adventures.

I’m often mindful of the refrain “why don’t we do this more often” that inevitably follows time spent in each other’s company.

After saying goodnight in the early hours I pottered around the house – “clearing the decks” – and found myself replaying the conversations, laughter, and stories of the night.

Something I’ve written about in the past came to mind and has been rattling around my head ever since.

We’re all kind of like leaves, floating down a river together. Sometimes we become tangled together for a while, and sometimes we drift further apart. We never quite know when we night see each other again, but it doesn’t seem to matter.

We each have our own stories, unfolding as we try to make any sort of sense of where we are, or where we’re going – filled with happiness, sadness, hope, and regret – and we each play a small part in each other’s stories as we tumble along the river together.

In the past I’ve written about “sliding doors” – about the realisation we sometimes have – when we know we’re at an inflection point in our own story.

Last night was interesting because – while running this way and that, not really involved in the conversations at the table – it struck me that we’re all facing those “sliding door” moments all the time – making choices, doing our best, and wondering what tomorrow might bring.

It was an odd moment of detachment.

I wandered back into the lounge, and was immediately grounded by a question from the table – all eyes turning towards me.

“What sort of dog would you be?”

A friend volunteered the answer before I had a chance to respond:

“A labrador, obviously”

There followed an eruption of smiles and laughter, and another friend suggesting that not only can I be likened to a labrador in character, personality, and action, but they can be likened to me too – so much so that they have begun calling their young labrador retriever puppy a version of my name.

It’s not a bad legacy really, is it.