Staking Out the Demons' Ground

Sat morn, few mins past 7.30. Looks like the day could be brighter after the early morning haze has cleared. Could be or could not be, hard to tell at the moment. BBC weather seems to indicate it is going to be bright and sunny all day today. This is a change to the forecast a couple of days ago when there was a big black cloud with raindrops as the weather symbol for Woodford this Sat. How things change. Guess a part of me prefers it when it is dull and rainin', otherwise the prospect of people out there in the sun and enjoying it is a bit too visible, bit too much for me to agree with when too much at the wrong time of year could mean the end of the world.

Strictly speakin' I guess I should be getting up these days and doing some meditation. Like this morning I could have splashed some cold water on my face and then gone into the small room where I have my meditation cushion then sat down and got to it. But I didn't , didn't even come close. Wouldn't have taken much to do, there just aint no excuses. Sleep last night was pretty heavy, full of dreams I can't remember. Had a glass of strong Belgium beer and then Tamdin made me a gin and tonic to accompany her as she had her second one. Alcohol. Shakes you down. Smoothes out the rough edges that is for sure. Don't think it is something that is too bad as long as things are kept in perspective, and a couple here an' there is OK, is OK...so long as it doesn't become four or five, more and more, if you see what I mean.

Sun morn now. Day cloudy but could brighten up and get sunny. We shall see. Just gone 7.30. Guess this is another of those occasions when I should be going straight to the meditation cushion but somehow I lose my way and dont make it. Maybe later today though, think I will have some spare time later. Yeah, easy to say...

Yesterday was spent mainly doin' house stuff with Tamdin. Keepin' things tickin' over. Main job that had to be done was going out and buying the cheapest possible lawnmower in order to cut our tiny patch of grass out the front. For years and years Tim our neighbour has done this but late last year his mower packed up big time and I said to him not worry about getting a new one as I would do it. My turn, so to speak, and all that. Behavin' like a good an' proper Englishman. So this was a few months ago and now it is early Spring the grass is getting long of course and I'm sure that quietly and patiently Timbo has been waiting for me to follow through and make good my word.

Finally found a mower we liked at B&Q. A Flymo mini-mower. This was after trying Homebase and getting seriously distracted by deliberating whether or not to buy a parasol for the back garden to stick on the deck. In fact it was barely a deliberation, more like a mild to serious disagreement between me and Tamdin. She wanted to get one and I didn't. That was the crux of the matter. The one she was after looked a too big, way too big for our small backyard.

I was saved by the salesman in the Base who said that it would not be a good idea to just buy a parasol and stand on their own without getting a table to put the parasol through thus making it stable in the wind. This was just what I wanted to hear but Tamdin didn't take it too well and there was an edge to things between us for a little afterwards. We ended up leaving the Base quite at odds with each other. I was feelin' like a right old party pooper for not going along with what she wanted and just buying the goddam parasol. Nevertheless in my mind there was no doubt that the parasol would have fallen over in the slightest breeze if there was no table ta keep it stable.

Just about made it down to Beezer an' a Queuzeer on reasonable terms with each other. Luckily what we found there the ideal mower, just what we was looking for. A Flymo mini mower for under 20 quid. Nice and compact. Took it back home feeling like we had stumbled across a bargain.

Back at home it wasn't long before I got the mower out the box and was trying to put it together. It was at this point that I realised why it was so goddamed cheap, as on initial inspection the instructions on how to assemble it were not that clear at all. Pretty daunting in fact. Do it yer fuckin' self. As usual in these kinda situations I steamed right in and tried to fix it up without properly reading things through. This kind of behaviour on my part is simply a symptom of panic and a blind desire to get things which I find a bit intimidating to be done as quickly as possible in order to get them out the way. Headache over so to speak. It is wanting to push the reality of the situation out the way and to move onto to something else a bit less stressful as quickly as possible. Throughout the course of my life I have probably done it a million times before. Kinda almost instinctive.

Tamdin told me to take a five minute break, have a breather and a nice cup of tea but I was not interested in that. All I wanted to do was get the fuckin' mower fixed, up and runnin, show Timbo I had done what I said I was gonna do. Dun it in spades. It was pure-cut 100% suffering as I knelt there and kept dropping the nuts and bolts that I was supposed to use to put things together. Kept getting things the wrong way around and I could feel the red mist descending. Just couldn't get a grip on what it was I was supposed to do. Another ruzzle puggin' fuck up on the way.

Finally Tamdin stepped in and pushed me out the way to have a look at it herself. When she started to initially do things wrong as well I felt like kicking her head in. Had visions of suddenly swinging my leg and connecting it with her head in as hard a way a possible. Knock out. Frightening pictures. Then after that going into an uncontrollable rage. No more Mr Cool, no more Mr Nice Guy. Managed to keep things in check however and take a few steps backwards from the situation. Just as well really as it was not long before she correctly got things together as far as the mini-mower was concerned and from then on it was more or less plain sailing.

Close call, that one. Makes me realise how much potential there still is in me to rip things apart and walk into the lands of destruction. People, objects, it don't fucking matter. If something is in my way then I will behave accordingly if the star alignment is particularly inauspicious. Wake up call. Enough to make me contemplate how far I am from acceptance in certain situations. How far away I am from the serenity and calmness I read about as something to aspire to and to develop from all those books on meditation I deal with.

Inner demons. Those same inner demons that wanted to make me kick Tamdin in the head over putting together the mini-mower are the same ones which made me biff Trevor Butler on the sniffer when I was barely 10 years old in junior school. Uncontrollable anger. Gotta let it out an' then there is hell to pay. Literally hell to pay. You pay by going to hell for your actions. Only way to successfully pacify those inner demons is not to hide from them, not to cower in fear of them or anything like that. Best to acknowledge them, honour them.

Stick a few stakes in the ground figuratively speaking and mark out their territory. Then respect their boundaries, give them room to play. They are lords of their own mandala aint no doubt about that. Stake out the ground, praise them, wish them well and let them go about their business...but in a controlled fashion. See my point do ya? This aint about suppression an' keepin' a lid on things or anything like that. It is about openness, acknowledgement and acceptance. They are dark forces indeed and potentially damn powerful. But the more they are kept under wraps then the darker they become, and the more fear they have the chance to generate because of it. Far better to say yes to their existence and show them all due respect. Seriously. Praise them, honour them, give them the chance to live as they have to...which is electric, wild, like forces of nature. Demons. Mine. No shame about that.

Better, much better that way. Then there wont be no more biffing sniffers for me an' causing a whole lotta explosions in blood. That aint no good 'coz it just leads to a kinda destruction from which it is difficult to build. Honour them, acknowledge them, those inner demons. Simple as that. Play the ritual. Play like you mean it 'coz you do. Be right up front about it and give those demons a space to live and breathe. Do it. Don't be ashamed about it 'coz there aint nuthin' to be ashamed about. They are forces of nature and nuthin' more than that. Electric, wild, powerful...

Dull Days and A Sense of Wonder

Dull day today, aint no gettin' away from it. Dull grey weather and incredibly dull at work where there was so little comin' in the way of orders that I really sat there an' thought we would be lucky if we didn't end up totally an' utterly bust by the end of the boogerin' year.

Yeah one of those kind of days where you sit there thinkin' just what the fuck have I done with my life to end up here? Dull, dull, dull. British dull in the only way that British dull can be. Nuthin' on the horizon...nuthin' on the horizon at the moment to get excited about. Sweet bugger fuck. Well, I've got a couple of Dylan shows next month which will be pretty good I'm sure but really that is about it.

Wonder what it will be like up at Samye Ling right now? Well, kinda quiet I guess. Probably just as cloudy and cold as it here. Probably just as dull. Colder, duller maybe. But, you know people up there are all together and they are in it for the big deal. Or that is how it seems. I seem to have lost that. Lost touch with my meditation. Outta touch with my meditation. Time maybe to have a break from all this bloggin' and all this poddin' an' just switch off for a coupla weeks an' see where it takes me...See where it takes me...Am I prepared to float an' see?

Well you know... I don't think so at the moment. Feels closer to the pulse just sittin' here an' writin' this, even if it does get boring an' repetitive at times. But there is always room for something good to come out, just like fishin'...just might throw the line into the deep an' pull out a big one.

Spring is slowly comin'. Feels slow on a day like today when it is so grey and cold. Heavy clouds, banked up way into the sky. Windy. Gets me thinkin' of another summer in the City and at the moment it does not seem like a prospect to look forward to. Would be nice just to get away from it all for a good while. Have a real change. You know, at work, with the work I do, which is basically sell Buddhist books, we hear about a lot of people into their practice. Followin' their paths...people into their meditation practice. People who have been following the path for a number of years now. Following their teachers. Now they are gettin' down to it. Sittin' an' meditatin'.

Doin' it right, if they are lucky. By contrast, I aint come close to doing any of that. Not come close at all. Part of me wants to, dearly wants, but a part of me also says that if I really wanted it so much I would have gone out and done something about it, which of course I haven't. So there we go. Instead of all that - the meditation, the solitary contemplation - there is the office to look forward to. Grindin' our through. Just tryin' to survive is what it feels like at the moment. There aint much hope of us breaking into another dimension of sales although we try our hardest within the boundaries set down for us by the money we have available in the bank.

Friday now. Early mornin' thoughts. Slept heavy. Tamdin was kicking me in the night to stop me from snoring. Like a little donkey she was, a right little kicka. Strange dreams just before waking, dreams of a wild East London where I was victim of a heist, just after drivin' down a big hill into a warehouse of shadows. Feel kinda heavy from it but not too bad, just getting myself together now for another day. Friday. That means I'm only at work till one then I knock off.

Mundane things on the agenda today. Cleaning the car being one of them. Got pretty damn dirty from the trip up north and now it needs a rinsin'. More than that in fact, a bloody good rub a dub scrub. Inside and out. Clean cars, dirty cars. To some people they make a hell of a difference. Guess I fall into the camp that can cope with a dirty motor for so long an' then I just have to go and get something done about it. Not one of those people however who look upon their motor as their pride an' joy and who would go ape as soon as the merest speck o' shit appeared on it. Nah, nah. Simple guy really when it comes to cars. Yeah, clean the car this afternoon if it all works out. Other than that, work will be pretty low key I expect; sittin' an' hoping more orders are gonna roll through the door no doubt. That's one thing we'll be doing I'm sure about that.

Trip seems so fay away now. Well, it was only a coupla days after all. Not as if I'd taken out six months to go an' travel America or anything like that. If I had then sure you would have every right to expect me to Yankee Doodle about it for months after. But this wasn't not like that at all. Just a toe in the water of the land o' da Hoots Mcgroots and then back to the Smoke again...quicker than you could snort a line of charly. Gotta make more time for travel though, there aint no doubt about that. Sure, I have said this before and not never dun nuthin' about it but there ya go... I've said it again.

Travel obviously changes one's state of mind. That is clear. We are all shaped by the environment in which we live. Therefore if the environment changes then we change also. OK deep down underneath the same stream of feeling is rollin' on, the stream that shapes your view of the world, but further up things change. For me it always easier when I have new things to see and reflect upon, even if it is only hills, valleys and a bunch of buildings. That is enough to get me dreamin', to get me thinking about whatever it was that set things in motion. As Van the Man said 20 years ago in one of his mid 80s so so album releases... tis good to have A Sense of Wonder.

Well I think I have that, always have, I may not articulate it very well either in words or deeds but it is there. Travel to new places brings on a sense of wonder. It is a ritual with me now that one of the things I do is imagine what it would be like to live in whatever place it is I am visiting. Almost always I see these places through rose tinted spectacles. Never seeing the daily grind that is surely the reality if you live there day in day out. Nah nah nah. See it instead as something that is potentially the answer to all the problems of my life. Whatever it is those problems might be. Oh yeah, if only I lived in this place or that place then things would be boom tinker and I would never be bored in my life again.

In years gone by the emotional impact such thoughts would have would have been enough to make me feel sad. Now I let it all wash over me. Mainly because it is clearer to me now that such thoughts are delusions an' nuthin' more than that. Wherever you might be there will never be any easy answers to the questions that life poses, and within certain reasonable limits it really doesn't matter where you are if you really want to get down to the fundamentals and sort things out.

So it is good that I don't get caught up so much in that kind of emotional drama these days. Don't mean the thoughts no longer go through my head... they still do, it is just that is easier to check them and in the checking process allow myself to see the other side of the coin. That don't negate from the pleasure of travel however. Always nice to step into a little side reality for a little while, with new things to brush up against, fall in love with, an' bring on a sense of wonder...

Trip Reflections Part I

Back from the trip to the north of England and Scotland. Monday now, fine day. Plenty of sun an' light. Left Thurs an' came back Sun. Lots of drivin' but that was cool. I like drivin'. Well, most of the time. London to Newcastle on the Thurs took about five hours or so, maybe more I can't remember right now. Overcast day and a cold wind, that is what I do remember. Grey, grey, skunk grey, March grey, making you want to cry out for da Springtime.

Snapshot memories -

Marriott in Newcastle was good. Managed a swim in the morning, then a sauna and a nice cold plunge which was not easy at all. Kinda like dipping ya knob in the Arctic. It was pretty damn cold and it was as much as I could do to have the guts to follow it through...decidedly cold.

Trip Newcastle to Eskdalemuir... going along the line of Hadrian's Wall east to west. Stopped off at a desolate place in the middle of nowhere to view the remains of a Mithraic temple built by Roman soldiers around 1800 years ago. Glad I saw it. Been to the sight of a Mithras temple in London where there is now the church St Stephen's on Walbrook built by Christopher Wren in the 17th century. And an amazing building that one is as well. This temple up by Hadrian's Wall was small, a replication of the original cave in which Mithras slayed the bull. Mithras. God of light. Originated from Persia which the Romans got to in the years BC and they must have brought the cult back with them. Always popular with Roman soldiers. Mithras, god of light.

Newcastle is a good town to pay a visit to out of the blue. Toon. Saw my old Aunty Mary and Uncle Tom. In fact they are me pa's aunty and uncle, Mary being the sister of me pa's old ma who died over 10 years ago now. Closer to 15 in fact. Aunty Mary and Uncle Tom. Names I have been familiar the whole of my boogerin' life. Both of them well into their 80s now. Their daughter Catherine lives next door to them with her husband Roger. Roger the Dodge. Good to see them. Me and Tamdin were glad we made the trip. So hospitable. Really is kinda humbling to be served by people in their 80s. They made so much effort. Cooked us a meal, a three courser. For them it must have been a lot of trouble and expense... I take my hat off to the love they showed to us. I salute them. Yeah, glad we did it. Never know what might happen. People get old, then they go into the Valley and it is too late, they are gone. This is a trip we have been saying we would do for years and years but never got round to do it. But now we have and it is good that it is done.

Surprising sometimes. Family. Tom and Mary's daughter, Catherine, has always been looked down upon by the rest of the family because they all think she is totally thick. Seriously looked down upon. Well she is a bit thick there aint no doubt about that but certainly she is not totally thick, no, far from it. And she is a good daughter, always there on hand to help her aged parents. The family think the same about The Dodge as well. Me ma an' pa look upon him with disdain, if not contempt. They think he does nothing. But The Dodge isn't thick and he isn't lazy at all, in fact The Dodge is a dark horse who has his own standards to live up to.

He knows what he likes and as we popped in to see them for a drink before the meal with Mary and Tom since they only live next door it was clear that he pursues things to a fair level of excellence. There are three things that The Dodge is into, in fact there are probably more things but the three things which I saw when we were there were his garden lawn which is immaculate, his fish of which he has many both in a tropical tank and in a pond in the garden and his home entertainment system. The thing about these hobbies of The Dodge is that he pursues them to the point of achieving something that you have to step back and take your hat off to him to show respect. Yeah, that was the thing I realised about The Dodge. He has his hobbies and he follows them through. He sets himself standards and from what I could make out they were pretty high ones, and he knew when he was falling short.

Comin' in from the cold... The wild, wild border country of Northumberland. Headin' into the West on a Friday afternoon. Shafts of sun on the horizon. Western sunlight, but above our heads a thick an' cloudy sky. Cold windy day. Really quite tremendous. Could have spent hours up there. All must have been fiercely contested lands at some point in time, way back when. Well at many points in time in fact, many way back whens. The Borders. England and Scotland. Wild tribes coming down an' raiding from out of the North. Rape and pillage. Must have been all too common. Both sides of the border. More often then not coming down rather than going up. No wonder Hadrian built the wall. Must have looked good when it was up and maintained. Lots of Roman soldiers. Before it began to crumble to pieces a couple of hundred years later when they all left town. Left the country. 400 AD. Something like that.

That part of the world has had this kind of thing happen for many centuries. Spankings. Guess if you went back just 300 or 400 years then it would be a pretty damn dangerous place to be. In the nature of the place. Wild and unprotected. Out on your own out there. Northumberland. North of the Humber land. But what magnificent scenery! Hills ranging ragged, cutting shapes beneath the sky makin' you sense the bigger picture. Mass accumulation of dreams. Centuries of people ridin' through the land as fast as they can, wanting to making it through to the other side without gettin' their asses whipped.

Love the land. Love the drive up the A7 to Langholm late afternoon early Spring, light stretching out for the first time in the year. Beautiful colours. Landscapes to dream by as we slide past in the motor. Place where we were headed to in Eskdalemuir was Samye Ling a Tibetan Buddhist centre that has been there for exactly 40 years.

Yeah, it was 1967 when two Tibetan lamas in their early 20s walked outta the mist and took camp there. Since then the place has steadily grown into what can only be described as a great achievement. A solid achievement, just like someone reached down from the sky and plucked a temple from outta the wild an' desolate lands of Tibet and put it down in a remote Scottish valley. Yeah, it really is like that. All under the direction of Akong Rinpoche. Sometimes difficult to appreciate just how many things it is possible to do with one life. Just how many things he has done with his life. He is a Tibetan lama and that circumstance alone marks him out from others, so many others, and when you study all the works he has initiated you realise just how much he has set in motion, how many peoples lives he has improved for the better, how many people he has switched on. It is powerful karma for an individual to have and only a true master would be able to wear it on their shoulders...

Love to think that one day we would move up there. Build a cottage on some land, go to the temple day in day out an' meditate meditate meditate. That is a dream, an' a good one. But it won't come true...

Thing is Samye Ling is so far away when you're down and livin' in the city. So far away. London is crowds, traffic, intensity, the lurking feelin' that you living in times close to the end of the world... Dunno why it gives that kinda feelin' , maybe it is the size of the place, maybe something in the air. The place it holds on the river, gateway to the universe. Anyway, back here in Woodford now and Samye Ling is way up there somewhere in another reality.

Changed my way of thinkin' for a short while, made me look at all this stuff I do on Ghost Eternal as totally irrelevant, and compared with what could be done with my life, a complete waste of time. But now I am back and settled after a few days what I do here seems necessary again, well, think it is necessary in regard to it being something I do that kinda keeps me happy and on the right track. By an' large it doesn't let the negativity seep through, stops a complaining kinda mentality from takin' over, an' that is important. Too much negativity around as it is, easy to run things down. The writin' might be weird at times, a wee bit out of kilter Jimmy, but it is a good outlet for me and as far as the world of Ghost Eternal is concerned that is all that counts.

Quick One on Booze an' Punchin'

Better sleep last night, think having half a bottle of the red stuff had something to do with it. Red wine and roast beef. Tasted pretty damn good to me. Still it would be good to get into a clean spell away from drinking. All too easy to snap a can of beer or crack open a bottle. Tamdin is just as bad as me. The red stuff went to her head last night pretty damn quick, and as a consequence she nearly buggered up the remote control on the TV. I came that close to kicking her head in. That is the uncontrollable nature caused by the booze.

She was trying to figure it out sittin' on the floor an' making a right old dogs dinner of it in the process. As she was kneelin' there beside me the temptation to swing my leg out at her and connect with her ear was quite powerful. No more Mr Nice Guy. Managed to resist the temptation but it just goes to show what lies beneath and how easy it could be to swipe away the veneer of respectability we continually fool ourselves with by thinking we possess in abundance.

Reminds of my days back in junior school in Plymouth when I had a violent streak which led to me lashing out on a couple of occasions. One time I was sitting next to my class mate Trevor Butler. He said something that I didn't like so I thwacked him on his hooter which just went splat and bloodied up large his cotton white shirt. Got into a bit of trouble for that and was sent to the headmaster. His mum went ballistic and I think me old ma ended up having to buy him a new shirt or something like that. Tough bananas.

Few more years down the line and I did exactly the same thing to a girl called Jacqueline Bacon for bugging me. That wiped the smile off her face I can remember that. Headmaster's office again. S'pose in this day and age I could get sued for assault or be permanently expelled for such violent behaviour, but back in the glorious early '70s it was all see as par for the course and a smack on the back of the knuckles with a ruler was the standard punishment for being a bad boy.

Anyway back to the start and the point being that me and Tamdin would do well to have a break from the booze at some point. Just to minimise any potential bad incidents happening. When she drinks she always wants to crash out and when I won't follow her up the stairs and into oblivion she gets upset, saying I don't love her, that my love for her is superficial and that she could do better, so much better. Stuff like that, an' it gets harder and harder for me to smile. Guess if we had a coupla squids then we wouldn't have so much time at night to get stuck into the happy juice but the fact of the matter is we don't so that is that.

Prior-Trip Disfracture

Tue early pm. Middle of the day and at work but there aint nuthin' wrong with that. Work is work, it is where I spend most of my time in the week. Busy at the moment coz I'm trying to clear the decks before headin' up to Scotland on Thurs. Well, just before Scotland we go to Newcastle to visit my old aunt and uncle. She was a right old bitch when I was younger but we won't talk about that. She is old now and decrepit. Mind you that don't mean she won't be able to spring a few surprises.

Weather cold. Kinda feel a bit tired. Woke up in the night at 4am. Slightly dodgy stomach, dunno why, as we only had Tibetan thukpa last night which is usually perfectly digestible. Tamdin had already gone off to the 2nd bedroom when I woke in the dark and it may have been her moving about that woke me. Turned out this morning over coffee that she had been kept awake by a bee that had been buzzing around in the room and that she couldn't get out the window. Doubt if it was a bee. After coffee I poked my head in there heard the buzz and came to the conclusion it was a fly. Body too light to have a bee buzz about it if ya know what I mean.

Anyway must have been that which woke me. Work kinda busy like, the Nepal stuff is being photographed and put on the site. Lots of statues, lots of Buddhas. Lookin' good. Prices are great and I am sure we are gonna be giving people a good deal. That is what it is all about. Bringin' it to the people. Work it up. Get it in, sell it good, an' order more. Keep the whole thing rollin' along. Make a bit on the way of course but we aint gonna be too greedy. Aint doin' all this just ta get a mansion on the hill or anything like that. Doin' it for the love and therein lies the difference between us and those who do it just for the bucks. Well I 'ope so anyway. Runnin' up an' down the stairs tryin' to get the shots done in the front room where the sun shines. Works most of the time.

Late pm now. Cold. Sprinkles of snow outside. March snow fallin' down. A cold snap is what they said and a cold snap is what we've got. Wonderin' what the weather is gonna be like up north. Have to see. Kind of looking forward to it, hittin' the road again. Different landscapes. Different thoughts. Tired now. Been going more or less non-stop since 8.45, ate my sandwich in the front of the screen. Ham sandwich, homemade bread. Still into the breadmaking. Knocking out loaves left right an centre at the moment. Dunno how much it costs in the way of calories but sure does taste good. Nuthin' like having a breadmaker and the smell of bread baking away in the kitchen. Then to pull out a loaf from the oven just before ya hit the sack is like takin' the road to heaven. All good stuff. Wonderful in fact.

Wed morn. Bright and sunny. In the office. Usually I don't do Weds because I work with Tamdin on Weds from home but this week is different because we are headin' up north tomorrow. Newcastle and then into Scotland. Woke up in the middle of the night. Think it must have been Tamdin that woke me. She must have been restless as well. Dunno what it was. Food last night was simple, rice and dhal so no possible cause of disturbance there. What time was it I woke? Think it was round 2 am. Funny time. Maybe something outside. Stayed awake for a while. Restless. Strange. Maybe some kinda excitement about gettin' on the road again but I doubt it. Not as if we are going to the end of the world or anything like that.

Early pm. Just had lunch. Boiled eggs and homemade bread. Tasty. So much better eating your own food. Used to always be goin' up the road to M&S at lunch time for one of their sandwiches and a drink, usually a juice or a smoothie. But to be honest Ilford aint the kind of place to fill you full of inspiration if you go up the High St every day. Usually bound to walk past a bunch of black, white or Asian youths brimmin' with attitude. The "I'm gonna stab ya if ya don't watch out an' show me some fookin' respect mon!" kinda attitude. Yeah, kinda good to get into a different cycle and give that type of experience a miss for now.

Not much more to say for the moment. Hit the road tomorrow see what that brings...

City Trampin' an' down the Highway

Grey day, Sat morn. Not yet 7.30 and I was up at 7. Down to Oxford today and then after that to Chippenham. Made my coffee and spent 15 mins or so browsing the papers on the Net. Sally Clark, the solicitor who was wrongly convicted and imprisoned here back in '99 of murdering her two sons, has died. I find this incredibly sad. She was only 42 and clearly she had never recovered either from the deaths of her sons or the nightmare situation of being sent to prison because the state thought she killed them. So sad. There is a picture of her on her release from prison who is now being reprinted in the papers. Blond hair and burning blue eyes which when I see them now speak of an experience beyond the comprehensionof 99.9% of the population. They speak of an experience that has burnt into her consciousness for the rest of this life and beyond, well beyond.

Comments by friends say that she never recovered from her ordeal and that she died in her sleep. You would have to be a remarkable individual to shake an experience like that off. It is easy sometimes to think that if the same thing happened to me I would be able to integrate into my practice of Buddhism and meditation; deal with it in a way so that it is does not end up destroying me. But the fact of the matter is that it is far easier said than done. It is only going to be when you find yourself in such a situation that you know whether or not you really have that much to fall back on in terms of healing energy, that much in reserve.

It is an indication of how fickle, how changeable and uncontrollable life can be. 10 years ago Sally Clark was a successful solicitor with two sons. Now she is dead at 42, her sons are dead and she spent nearly five years in prison beacuse the state thought that she killed them. Her burning blue eyes in that picture of her on her release from prison now stay me. It is obvious she had been to a place that made her unreachable and that the only road to release was the one which has led to her early death at the age of 42, nearly three years younger than me. Om mani padme hum. Rest in peace Sally Clark.

I think of my life in comparison and I see how trivial and disaster free it is. Here I am, still walking the earth full of wonder at the age of 45 and still getting excited about things like going into town to pick up a bunch of Doobies albums from the '70s, now remastered, repackaged and on Japanese import for a tenner each at the HMV Meg in Oxford St. A complete and utter bargain.

Yes, how trivial and trouble free my life is in comparison! Means I can never have cause to complain, never, never. But that aint gonna stop me from trying I'm sure. Aint gonna stop me from bad mouthing my parents over perceived wrongs in their dealings between me and my sister for example, aint gonna stop me sounding like the shit is falling from outta my arse when I get onto talking about the boiler at Wisdom Books and the pressures we have in meeting potentially very high new rent demands.

Walked back from Oxford St yesterday afternoon to Liverpool St station. Went in on the tube and instead of getting off in the City and walkin' west and into the sun I decided to do it the other way around. Got to HMV by around 2.45 or 3 I guess I can't remember now. Picked up the 3 Doobies CDs - Livin' on the Fault Line / Minute by Minute / Takin' It to the Streets and then got out of there. Didn't wanna stay there any longer than what was necessary.

Shot off across the Street and then down Poland St and into the heart of Soho. Cut across east and emerged just south of Soho Sq, along Manette St then across Charing X Rd, down Denmark St and onto the top of Shaftesbury Ave. Then it was down Bloomsbury Way across Southampton Row and onto Theobalds. Here I took a rain check at a Starbucks on Theobalds and had my usual, a fresh coffee grande. Best drink in the world for me when I'm in the mood for one.

Always like to Buck it up when I'm in town if I get the opportunity. I like those small and narrow Bucks where you can sit on a stool by the window and watch the never ending procession of London street life go right on by before you. An' that is exactly what I did in the Bucks on Theobalds whilst hungrily unwrapping my cellophane wrapped Doobies and poring over the fully restored artwork that these immaculate Japanese remasters offer the lucky punter such as moi. Really I think this Japanese series of remasters is good enough to submit to the Tate of Britain or something like that. Tate O' Britannia. Each one is a work of art; collectively they make a truly fantastic series right through from the debut self titled album to One Step Closer, released when they were megastars at the start of the '80s.

Yeah, well, anyway I guess all this getting a bit too much. Dooberator related stuff... going on and on and on about the Doobies and all the songs I'm gonna playlist on me Pod. If yers 'as never 'eard o' dem before then ya gonna be wonderin' what de fock is dis geezer goonin' on aboot. Believe me though if you are ever lucky enough to get into them then you will see what I mean.

After Bucking it up for 20 mins or so I was back on the streets and off down Theobalds again, past Greys Inn Fileds and then down Greys Inn Road before cutting across Brooke Street market and the back of Hatton Garden. Down Greville St, across Farringdon and into Smithfields. Come to be one of my favourite parts of town round here. Usually here on the weekends when it is a lot emptier. This time it was Friday pm so still quite busy.

Through Smithfields and then up onto the Barbican Highwalk by Barbican station. Down Seddon Walk west side of the Barbican and along the elevated walkways till dropping down onto Moorgate. Usual cityscape available for me to gaze over an' ponder as I strode through from on high. As usual so much to take in and see. The continual activity of rennovation and creation in this part of London always blows my mind man, always blows my mind. Period. Been going on ever since the Romans nearly 2000 years ago and it is unstoppable. A triumph of continual reclaimation.

Through Finsbury Sq then and down into Liverpool St. Got back to Woodford by 5 which was not too bad. Then a bit of time spent poddin' it with the Doobies and my new Bose sounddock. What to say? Hours went by. With the Bose I also got a voucher for 20 free itunes which I had spent by the end of the evening. Not entirely satisfied with my selection, mainly a combination of classical and easy listening. I guess I did it out of greed and the fact the 20 itunes were just waiting there to be spent. I didn't have the patience to hang fire for a little while, think it through and then pick up some stuff that I really wanted. Just went ahead and downloaded stuff instead. Turned into a bit of a desperate trawl around to use up the credits and get the damn things over an' done. Could have done better I guess.

Sun Pm now. Early afternoon. Blowy as hell. They said there would be storms and it looks like they're right. Winds coming in from the north. Apparently it is Scotland that is getting it worst but even down 'ere in da Smoke ya can feel it, aint no doubt about that.

Feelin' kinda tired. Long day yesterday that saw me up at 7 doin' this an' that for a couple of hours (bloggin' it an' poddin' it) before drivin' down to Oxford to see Robert and show him the statues that have come in from Nepal. After that it was cross country from Oxford to Corsham which is a small town west of Chippenham to pick up Tamdin., Then back on the M4 eastbound to London where we arrived back in Woodofrd at just gone 7pm. Dinner was beef noodles after a couple of cold Heinekens.

Tamdin would have preferred to have been drinking Leffe but I'm afraid I blew that one as I forgot to buy any stock for her. Kinda see her point, although I have been speaking Heinekenese for a coupla weeks now, getting into these little green an' silva cans shipped across from Amsterdam I have to say that sometimes I could do with slurping something a little stronger. The small 'Kens weigh in at 5% alcohol vol whilst bottles of Leffe Blonde hit a healthy 6.6%; you get a definite buzz on after downing a couple of those. An' that's all ya need at the end of the day, a buzz to soften the edges. Have to get down to Majestic Wine soon and pick up a coupla cases. They sell 'em there sometimes for a good price, so if I strike lucky that will solve the problem. Always a good feelin' when there is booze in the house, either in the fridge or stored down in the garage.

Relieved that Robert thought the statues were good. He liked the faces and he studied them well enough and long enough for me to be reassured by his comments. Think he is still grieving over the death of his daughter. Bound to be. Not yet a year. Kind of difficult to know what to say, I aint been anywhere near that kinda experience in my life so as far as advice and comfort are concerned I guess I am close to useless. Like so many other things, close to useless...close to fuckin' useless. He showed me some amazing Nepalese art and I regretted not getting there earlier as I was pushed for time and would have appreciated an extra couple of hours letting him show me stuff and explain it to me. Time was pressin' on however, and I had to go after a coupla hours, so much in the way of demands on time these days...

The ride west of Oxford down to Swindon was good, always good to drive on a bit of road you aint been down before. Wiltshire, the vale of Wiltshire. Middle England country, kind of... actually sometimes you get more of a sense of being on an island the further inland you are and away from the coast than when you are actually on the coast. Don't know why that is, must have something to do with the curve of the earth and the faint smell of the sea just beyond the horizon. Drivin' into the early Spring mid-March sun in the middle of a Sat afternoon. Drivin' into the west. Turning my head to look out the window at the scene passing by me, catching glimpses of valleys and vales I had never seen before, followin' the curve of the road. Easy drivin', a real pleasure.

Managed to remember the place in Corsham from where I was supposed to go to pick up Tamdin. She had been there for two days seeing patients at the house of local Buddhists, a couple, Richard and Anne-Marie. Such nice people, good people, kind people. Couldn't stay long when I got there as Tamdin had finished for the day and Richard and Anne-Marie were on their way out to attend a local meditation session at another gaff in the village. I just had enough time for a cup of tea and I realised sittin' there that I was knackered. Must have looked it as well as Tamdin commented on it straight away when she saw me. Saying I looked like some kind of zombie, spaced out. Rigours of the road I guess.

Maybe I aint quite as young these days as I think I am. Livin' an illusion. Thoughts crossed my mind yesterday or the day before of going to one of the fancy hairdressers in Woodford and forking out for some serious hair colouring to put on me nut. Get rid of the ever encroaching hullabaloo. Go for blonde, beach blonde or something staggering like that. Like the guys outta Point Break. Total change. Stun people. Something which I aint ever done before but maybe I should do so just the once, you know, just for the fuck of it. We shall see. There is the small matter of guts an' bottle to factor into it all and when it comes to those kinda things I usually find I am in short supply. Still, ya never know. Might surprise myself., and others.

Back on the road to London it was easy cruisin' and it was tricky not steaming along at 90 to 100 mph which would have got me an instant pullover from the Traffic Pogz if any were about but there werent so that was that. Guess you can say I got away with it, along with the countless thousands of others who were all doing exactly the same thing. Life eh... don't ya just love it? Bombing back down the highway to the Big City, city of bright lights, city of Celtic earth magic, Romans an' Ango-Saxons, to name but just a few. Before we knew it we were off the M4 an' swinging round the ole' rubber tyre of an M25 before swoopin' down through the Forest to Woodford. Dusk had just descended. there were the first hints that the evenings are now begnnning to slowly but surely stretch out again in terms of the amount of daylight on offer. Middle of March, best yet to come.

Palponics to the Dooberator

Fine day, Friday. Say it's gonna be cold again this w/end but it is all relative aint it? Fact of the matter is that it is hardly ever cold these days and most people, those who aint worried about the world going pop 'coz of all the excess sun are sittin' pretty, grinnin' like Cheshire cats as they ladle on the sun cream an' fire up the barbies. Me, well, you know for a long time I used to shit myself about it, the fact that the world is clearly getting hotter and things like winter in England with snow and frost an all that shit are clearly things of the past, but now I don't worry anymore. Not at all. Gone too far. It's all gone too far. Aint nuthin' we can do about it now, people aint gonna stop their habits like drivin' round in fuckin' big cars till they are told by means of a gun shoved in their chests by a big sweaty bastard that they just cant do it anymore. No messin', it's over. Till then forget it. People will do what people will do. Simple as that.

Had an incredible session of heart racin' palpitations when I went to bed last night. Think it was because of the salty pieces of gammon I cooked and ate for myself last night for dinner. Must have been the fear and pain of the animal coming through the food and hittin' the parts of me that lay beyond the mask. Either that or a whole bunch of additives that was no doubt used to preserve it. Brief dream pictures came through of the control scene behind this thing called life and consciousness. It was calm back there, mathematical but completely impossible to understand. Death, though, in that place, was familiar. Just the other side of the side coin. A different shade that is all.

Sometimes I get those heart racin' palponics. Just before I go to sleep when the dream landscape can turn shady and sinister as I make the descent into the dark. Dunno what to make of it. Last night as I lay there a part of me was trying to wake up and get some control over the situation, as I knew that if I managed to rise into consciousness the heart racin' would cease at least. But it was getting there that was the problem. It was like I was paralysed and in the paralysis it was impossible to control my beatin' heart. Eventually I managed to wake up out of it, and then I lay there on my back in the dark, way past midnight with my head spinnin'. Nice one.

Tamdin is down in Chippenham at the moment, seeing patients in her capacity as the best Tibetan doctor outside India and Tibet. Have arranged with her to go down and pick her up late tomorrow afternoon when she is finished. Burn a bit of oil on the highway, yeah, just for the hell of it. On the way down I intend to call in at Robert's place in Oxford. Take a load of the statues to show him that I bought in Nepal. Just to go over a few things with him. Tell him what prices we propose to charge for them, it will also be a chance for him to have a gander and cast his eye over the workmanship and give me his opinion as to their quality. Honestly an' strictly speaking I know they aint top of the range but at the same time I know they are nice. I think we are gonna be able to offer them at decent prices and that will make them affordable for a lot of people. At the end of the day that is the main motivation. Sales and availability. To get things out there and for things to be rocking along.

Robert has had a tough, really tough year due to the fact that his eldest daughter drowned about a year ago in a diving accident off the coast of Devon. Imagine that, one of your children going before you. She was only in her early 20s. Must turn your life upside down and I think this is what might have happened to Robert. Will see tomorrow. It will be the first time that I will have seen him since this tragedy happened. Mickey at Wisdom who has known Robert longer than I have has told me that Robert has been sending him emails about attempts to contact his daughter through mediums, psychics and stuff like that. Mickey has warned me that I might get a load of this from Robert when I see him tomorrow. We shall see I guess.

Don't think I'll mind if Robert wants to talk about that kind of stuff. He investigates things and what he was to say to me is always interesting. For Mickey who is a dyed in the wool Tibetan Buddhist from the old school, talk like that, I know, is a bit too much for him and he shys away from it as much as he can. Main thing is to show him the statues and get all that side of things firmed up so that they can go on the site early next week and we can start selling, people can start buying, and the whole deal goes down.

Then later next week me and Tamdin are heading up north for a few days. She has a meeting at a Tibetan Buddhist centre in Scotland with other Tibetan doctors. For the last few years I have gone with her as well because the centre is in an idyllic setting in the border country; wild, quite remote. Stuck at the end of the valley of Eskdalemuir. It is like stepping into another world for a couple of days. We always come back feeling we have been somewhere, which we have of course. This year we are also going up a day early in order to call in an an aged pair of distant relations of mine who live in Newcastle. Something we have been meaning to do for years, and you know how it is... one day one of them will croak and we will still not have done what we said we were gonna do. So now we're gonna nip it in the bud and get our visit in next week. Stay overnight at a local Marriott which has a pool so I should be able to get a dip in. And hopefully do what we can to bring a bit of joy and excitement into their lives. Well, ya know with me that is a bit of a tall order but even a crack arse such as myself can sometimes pull off big surprises.

Half day at work today. Think this afternoon a quick trip into town is most definitely on the cards. Those couple of Doobies CDs on Japanese import are just waiting there to be picked up - Livin' on the Fault Line and Minute by Minute. Who knows, I might just throw in Takin' it to the Streets as well if I think the good ole budget can stand it. Well, you see, these Doobies are only a tenner a go and the fully restored artwork is just simply fantastic so I think the whole thing, to go for a dirty triple, is a definite goer.

Wow! What a life eh? Who would have thought 30 years after I first listened and got into the Doobies I would still be able to generate the same level of excitement about them that I had when first got into them back in the deep '70s? Goes to show that those kinda things, if ya stumble across them when you're young enough an' still full of the magic o' life, will never, will never let ya down. They are embedded into yer bones and it is only fear and listening to the opinions of other people that pull you away from them as you get older and paranoid, and more inclined to live yer life by the rules that are not set by yourself but by others. When, in other words, you have fallen into the trap that is so easy to fall into. The Doobies though, when I was 13, 14 , 15 were simply the greatest, amongst others. It is all just as valid; the feelings, the visions I get when listening to those Doobies classics, they have stood up well, not aged in any way whatsoever.

Before I pick up the CDs I will get off at Liverpool St and take a walk through the city which on a Friday afternoon like today will be pretty awesome. Busy. All the city slickers makin' millions will still be there or windin' down for the w/end when they will leave the place deserted as they go to their villas in Southern Spain or country pads in the Home Counties or the Costwolds. Leavin' the place, the City, in peace so you can walk the streets and tune back into the times when it was the home of the Romans an' stuff like. Tune into the times when there was a temple to Mithras the Persian god of light standing roughly where Cornhill is today, and the Basillica was just round the corner. History. Livin' in the past in one way for sure, but in another it is tapping into the energy of life. Yeah man, I'll walk through the City in the early Spring mid-afternoon sun, before hittin' the West End an' pickin' up the Doobies on a triple decker. Really brothers, really sisters, this is a good life. Just gotta watch the old palponics I guess...

Dooberator & Family Blues

Fine day. In the middle of a patch of bright sunny weather. Clear blue skies, warm temperatures. Maximum visibility. Yeah, like I said in the previous post, better not to go to extremes...if at all possible. Too low to too high, just aint good. One day sittin' pretty, grinnin' like a Cheshire cat, the next feelin' like yer just about ta join the bleep an' booster brigade. Gotta find the middle ground and be happy with that.

Nice day yeah but I've got a bit of a thick head from the wine we drunk last night. It was strong enough to send Tamdin to bed before 10 and I nearly crashed in the chair in front of the box before snapping myself out of it and finishing off last night's post.

Poddin' it large with the Doobies at the moment. Still playing through in my mind the potential tracks that could go on the Dooberator...my ultimate Doobies playlist. In many ways though it is possible that the Dooberator will never get done because in my mind at least it is hard to imagine how the track listing on the classic Doobies albums like Captain and Me and Stampede could ever be improved in any kinda way. They are as just as perfect pieces of joyful song collections as you can ever wish for. Yeah, picked both these two Doobies albums up on the series of Japanese import re-mastered Doobies which are all available for a tenner each down at the HMV Meg on Oxford St at the moment. Bargain, serious bargain if you know what I mean, and you will only know what I do mean if you are in any way familiar with the Doobies magic. More I listen to them the more fantastic I think they are and quite honestly I don't think I will be holding out that much longer before divin' down there again and stumpin' up the cash for Takin' It to the Streets and Minute by Minute. Another couple for the collection.

There is a big thing with the Doobies as far as I am concerned. Yeah, that's right you've guessed it, the two fact that the group split into two incarnations right slap bang in the middle of the 70s. There was up till '76 the Tom Johnston led Doobies and then post-'76 till early '80s the mega commercially successful Michael McDonald led Doobies. There is a big, big difference between the two in terms of sound. The only Doobies album to straddle both Doobies was the '76 release Takin' It to the Streets which had both Johnston and Macdonald on it although it is unlikely they appeared on the same songs together, as by that time Johnston was on his way out and McDonald on his way in . So for the Johnston period Doobies you have these -

Doobie Brothers / Toulouse Street / Captain and Me / What Were Once Vices are Now Habits / Stampede / Takin' It to the Streets

out of which the best two are Captain and Me and Stampede

and for the Mcdonald period Doobies you have these -

Takin' It to the Streets / Livin' on the Fault Line / Minute by Minute / One Step Closer

out of which the best is Minute by Minute

Like I said, there are big differences in the sound between these two incarnations of the Doobies. The Johnston era is free range guitar driven melodic ecstasy with Johnston and Patrick Simmons writing virtually all the material; the Mcdonald era was soul-funk pop produced to a level of perfection that culminated in the smash hit single What a Fool Believes in '78.

For me at the time, being a teenager before the age of punk and livin' in places such as Plymouth and Lowestoft the Doobies were one of the best if not the best group in the world. But that was all due to the fact that I was into the Tom Johnston Doobies and when things changed so radically with the arrival of Mcdonald and the keyboard drenched sound he brought along with him it was like falling off the edge of a cliff. And if I wanna be truly honest I have to say that it is only now, more or less 30 years later, that I can say that I have truly recovered from the shock. Even though I remember vividly buying Livin' on the Fault Line and Minute by Minute I was listening to them vainly trying to hear sounds of Johnston and drawing a complete and utter blank.

There is no doubt I have to put the recovery down to this superb series of Japanese remasters which spans the period of releases from the Doobie Brothers to One Step Closer. All of them are given the meticulous attention to detail that make the Japanese so famous as a race of people on this planet. All original artwork is restored and the sound is simply fantastic. By the end of the year I can see that I will have probably forked out for the lot of them.

Thurs morn now, another fine day. Bright blue skies, all is gay. Above stuff about the Doobies written the day before. That was then but this is now.

Tamdin and I went up to my parents yesterday for a visit that had been pre-arranged some weeks ago. My parents live in Harpenden, Herts. Gotta admit it can sometimes be difficult with my folks, very difficult indeed. For a number of reasons. Firstly they can come across as quite ignorant of Tamdin and her culture, she being a Tibetan and among a people of refugees with a long history of Buddhism under their belts. Second my parents are not as close to me as they are to my sister with whom they feel a helluva lot more relaxed with. She is far more on their wavelength than I am, always has been. This has especially been the case since she has had a baby who is the apple of their eyes and the Future with a capital fuckin' F to my folks as far as the continuation of the family is concerned. Tamdin and I have no children and we won't be having any either.

My mother, the Bad Onion, can ask Tamdin the same kind of questions again and again, year in year fuckin' out, even though she has been given the same answers a hundred million fuckin' times, or so it feels like at least. All superficial bullshit on the part of my mother. I guess she and my father find it a struggle sometimes meeting up with us, grasping as they do at the things which they think connect us. But they have no real interest in our lives outside what is immediately relatable to them, and as the years go by those things which connect us become less and less. Guess it would be easier for everyone if they dropped the pretence and didn't feel so ashamed about it.

Leaves me out in the cold, but that's OK. In the context of life described on the pages Ghost Eternal it is hardly unfamiliar territory. At the moment my beloved parents are in the process of funding substantial renovations and an extension to my sister's property up in Cumbria. The whole idea behind this being that when my folks go up there they will have their own place to stay in the form of a self-contained flat tagged onto the end of my sister's cottage. Of course in the bargain my sister and her husband who happens to be a third cousin of ours get a massive boost to the price of their place if they ever decided to sell it. That and the fact that when my folks aint around they get the run of the place no questions asked.

All this is going on then, and the other fact to mention is that the person carrying out the renovations is Jonathon, my sister's husband, who is being paid to do it by my dad. Anyway, anyway, last night we went for a meal down in Harpenden. Prezzo, a new Italian that has been built in what was a doctor's surgery. Tamdin and I just had to sit there and listen to my folks excitedly explain to us how the work was progressing. The thing which really stuck in our throats was that the Bad Onion sat there and tried to tell us that it was something that involved us as well and that how when it was all over we were going to benefit from it as well. Well, just how me and Tamdin are going to benefit from Bridget and Jonathan having virtually a new place handed to them is completely beyond me but there you go...when the Bad Onion was going on and on, Tamdin was quiet, very quiet indeed. I think that she barely said a word to the Bad Onion in response and it was clear that if she had have opened her mouth something sharp and nasty would have come out of it. Think it is probably only a question of time before something is said. We are supposed to be going with my parents to spend a couple of nights with them at a pub in Suffolk over Easter and at the moment I am completely and utterly dreading it.

Too High

Too high, too high that is how it can feel sometimes. Think I had a bit of that yesterday at work in the afternoon when the final 2 boxes from Nepal arrived. By then I had broke the camel's back as far as unpacking and accounting for it all was concerned. After my initial doubts and disappointments before the weekend when I first had a quick glimpse of the kit on Friday it was a day of joy and relief yesterday as I carefully went through everything and saw quite clearly that it was all not half as bad as I had feared. Not half as bad at all, in fact now that I have gone though most of it I have to say, hand on heart, it looks as good as gold. Let me tell ya, as time went on yesterday in the back of the warehouse on the first floor with a warm breeze flowing through the open window an' sunlight streaming through it all became pretty damn wonderful. Yeah, by the end of it I was grinnin' like a Cheshire cat.

All this was in stark contrast to the weekend when I was looking out onto bleak mental horizons. All in the mind, all in the mind. On Friday when the stuff from Nepal first came along and we yanked open the boxes with crowbars such was my excitement and anticipation that I didn't realise I had fallen for the three card trick of building myself up for a fall. That was exactly what happened. In my excitement and nervousness for wanting things to be OK the stuff appeared distorted, the statues didn't look right; in short the product looked dubious through an' through. It was a bad experience. It left me feeling gutted. I had been carrying around in my mind a mental picture of how things should be because when I saw the things back in Nepal they were in different places and in a different time. Didn't reckon on the fact they would have to travel through time and space to get to East London. It was all a rush on Friday, a terrible sweaty rush, and when I walked out the door in the early afternoon I have to say my head was spinning.

Over the weekend I had doubts about my whole experience in Kathmandu, something which I had previously written so positively about. I had doubts about Phunsok and now I had it in my mind that he had set me up. Incredible, paranoid thoughts like that. Just couldn't get them out of my mind, thoughts that the statues were far worse than what I was expecting. Pictures passed through of Phunsok having set the whole thing up, taking me to see statues that he would never order for me, but leave me thinking that he would. Then he would pocket the difference after I went away and would send the cheap stuff in instead. Saturday night was the worst period of the whole lousy stinkin' weekend. I was lying there in bed deep in the middle of the night staring into the darkness with my heart pounding. All kinds of negative thoughts running through my head. Felt like I was standing at the edge of the world and thoughts of jumping off the roofs of car parks appeared in front of me and stayed long enough for me to consider whether I would ever have the guts. The answer to which is a definite no. No way Jose.

Began to think it would be a good thing never to get involved with the whole business of buying and selling statues ever again. Or any other stuff from Nepal for that matter. Too risky, too damn risky. This was what happened and now I was paying the price big time. You could never have any guarantees unless you managed to oversee the whole thing yourself right down to watching the boxes being packed and taken to the airport. All this was running through my mind. Thought of Robert and how it difficult it would be for me to tell him that I thought Phunsok had ripped us off, that he hadn't sent the statues that I wanted and that I thought I paid for. That would be tough. Phunsok was a very old friend of Robert's and in many ways a guru to him. How would it come across if I then told Robert stuff like that? Yeah thinking these things the whole fuckin' weekend just sent my heart a' pounding. Boom tickety boom.

Sunday was a fine early spring day and in the afternoon I went for a walk over to Highams Park from my gaff in Woodford. I love that park. You get a far, far distant view of the city. London town. Miles away an' over to the south and west. It is a great place to sit and look at the buildings of the city on the horizon. The Gherkin, Canary Wharf, the towers of the Barbican, the Millennium Eye, the Post Office tower. Like a sight from out of space. On a clear day they are all visible. Right there, standin' on the distant horizon.

Not only that but by the afternoon at this time of the year the sun is in the sky and shining on them from on high. Always gives me perspective on this incredible city. Love it up there in Highams Park, love it. Just sat for no more than 10 or 15 mins taking in the view before walking back. It was enough for me to get some distance on the whole business with the statues as well and for me to accept that what will be, will be. It is out of my control. Just better to lay back and let things happen. I did my best when I went over to Kathmandu, my intentions were as pure as they could be. If it is not meant to work and I get my fingers burnt then so be it. Came back from that walk feelin' better yeah. Got back in touch with the gods. Listened to what they had to say to me.

All in stages I can see that now. Life and the progress you might make is all in stages. Bit by bit. The walk on Sunday over to Highams Park led me out of the mire and to the realisation that I was going to accept and love those statues whatever the standard and condition they might be. Thought to myself on the Monday mornin' that when I went into work I would quietly go round the back and unpack all the boxes in my own sweet time. Just take it all in, the good and the bad. Well that is what I did and it was wonderful. There was no bad, it was only good.

Realised what a peaceful quiet place it was round the back as well. The back of the first floor of Wisdom Books in Stanley Road. Light an' airy, there was a stillness to the place I had never before noticed. Small children playing in gardens somewhere, delicate voices, birds singing, sun shining. All seemed pretty beautiful to me. Yeah man, and in the middle of it all the unpacking of the cargo from Nepal, the cargo that Phunsok had sent to me, just got better and better. So much so that I got to the stage where I was at right at the beginning of this post. Grinnin' like a Cheshire cat, an' high, most high.

In the Thick of It

Thurs early evenin'. Back in the house after another day at work. Still chewing over the boiler possibilities at work, or lack of possibilities I should say. Haven't yet managed to send off the letter to the landlords stating our acceptance of their quote, and also indicating what kind of payment schedule we would be proposing. Whole thing makes me sick as a parrot, as the more I think about it the more I am sure we are not going to be around after the end of the current lease. This means we will have funded them to significantly improve the building whilst seeing little of the benefit ourselves.

Feel like I'm up against an immovable wall. Similar feeling that I have had at various points in my life and the whole friggin' thing just makes me feel like screaming out in frustration at the whole dirty doggin' deal. Don't know what else it is we can about the situation without going down the path of confrontation and that is what we have been trying to avoid all along. Shit situation, bummer. Simple as that.

Other than that work goes on pretty much the same. Weather brighter. This afternoon was really quite warm and the first hint of what might be ahead in terms of warmer climates for 2007 and the prospect of a long, hot summer. Could be good, yeah I'm sure we will all feel a helluva lot better at work if we are there sweating our arses off whilst we're paying out hand over foot for a new fuckin' heating system to be put in as well. I mean...what a joke!

Fri now, sunny morning. Supposed to rain today but maybe it will later. At the moment looks OK. Best analogy I can give of the boiler situation is that we are like card players and I am the player who is looking at his hand and realising that there aint much to play with, only a few more moves now and then the game is up. Best thing I can think of at the moment is to write to the landlords and say that this is what we propose as far as payment of the quote is concerned, but not actually confirm our acceptance. It is just a desperate measure to get a few more days stall time but it is the best I can come up with.

All I can do is put down our proposal and then ask them to confirm that it is acceptable, once they have we can then we confirm our acceptance of the quote by return. Sound good ? Not really but what other options are there at this point? To go back to the other quotes would indicate to the landlords that we are not going to go with them and that in turn would probably see the concessions that we have managed to get taken away from us at a stroke. Don't really want to do that because at the moment we are at least in the position of making the best out of a bad deal. One step further down from that is making the worst out of a bad deal which really would be hitting rock bottom. The worst would be to still end up using them to do the works but having to pay everything on time with no terms whatsoever for spreading the payments out. If we hang around for much longer that is a possibility. Definitely want to avoid that.

Funny feeling when you know you aint got much to play with in negotiation. They have the facts, they have the power, they have the property. We on the other hand are more often than not relying on blind luck to pull us through and at the end of the day it is misplaced faith because there aint no doubt about the fact that we are going to pay the price. They have it all, the knowledge the paperwork, the lawyers, the surety that in one way or another the work is going to get done with us funding it.

Fri evening now. Bulk of the stuff I ordered from Nepal came in today. All looked OK apart from the statues which are not the ones I saw when I was over there. Needless to say their quality is inferior. Will have to go through it all on Monday now. Tired and disappointed is what I feel, no, there aint no hiding the fact that I feel disappointed. Maybe things will look better on Monday. Hope so at least. Got 8 out of 10 boxes so I hope the other 2 boxes arrive without there being any problem. All this stuff! Good and bad, pain and grief; just trying to work my way through life at the end of the day aren't I?

Better look at the post, Flying into Kathmandu, if ya want some background on all this Nepal business. First impression of the statues is not that good though and that is a pity because I had real of hopes of it opening up a whole new area for us. Now I aint so sure. What do I say to Phunsok? He did a lot of work for me and for not very much so I can't express my dissatisfaction too strongly. It has left me feeling sore. That is all I can say. Feels like we need a break sometime soon. A change in fortune, a change for the better at that. It's OK, it's OK, I guess. Just could have been so much better. We'll see.

Most of the other stuff looks good however and I think that once we sort out the prices and the shipping to charge they will be fine. Chance to expand the website. Better to think positive. Before I left work at midday I dropped in the letter to the landlords stating our payment proposal. Mainly full of bluster but it buys us a few more days before we sign on the dotted line and let them have their pound of flesh. In the lap of the gods. Proper people, proper companies are prepared for such eventualities. They put things in place to ensure bad things don't happen to them. Don't think we have really got to that stage and I really don't know if we ever will. Maybe, maybe not.

Best thing to think about is the website and the fact that that is doing well. It is able to keep us going. Streamlining the operation. That is what it should be all about. Concentrating on only doing the things which generate a decent return. Maybe this is the mistake. Spending my whole life, or my whole working life at least, trying to make money out of Buddhism. There are plenty of righteous and sincere Buddhists out there who would be simply disgusted with what we are doing anyway. Buying and selling. Buddhas and meditation. OK yeah we need to make money because we have to play within the rules of the capitalist system. That is the game. But we there in another dimension as well. At least for me and I guess for all the others who work at Wisdom Books. That dimension is the belief we are doing something which in some way is making a difference. Trying to push some good out into the world. I hope we do that. Yeah well, maybe we do, maybe we don't.

Kind of writing a lot about work, about Wisdom Books. Well I guess the answer to that is that it takes up a fair proportion of my life so I might as well write about it and in the process let out steam, get my worries and frustrations out of my system. That is OK I think. Pretty harmless activity I guess. At least it is not hurting others. Not running other people down or anything like that. No one will read this anyway so no one is going to walk away feelin' depressed or upset by what they read. No, it is just for me, this Ghost Eternal business, so I can walk away once I have let it all out an' hopefully feel better. Who knows ,once in a blue moon I might even stumble across some answers. That is always the hope. Probably a pretty distant hope but we can but try to strike it lucky. I guess.

Into town tomorrow which is fine. Transporting costumes for the Tibetan community. It is their March 10th demonstration tomorrow. The march through Central London in commemoration of the March Uprising in Lhasa nearly 50 years ago against the invading Chinese communists. After the march there is the yearly cultural event and programme down in Victoria. That is where I come in as I have to take the dance costumes and various other bits of kit down to Victoria in the motor. So that is that, my Saturday taken care of.

Sat morn now. Up quite early these days. Keep waking up around 5.15 and then after that sleep is right out the fuckin' window. Quality of dreams has been nervy, edgy, recently. Various scenes all disconnected and an underlying sense that things are not quite right. Think it is now the worry of the statues from Nepal and the fact that we may have been ripped off that is playing on my mind. Really hope that does not turn out to be the case, otherwise it renders all that I wrote about in Flying Back into Kathmandu close to meaningless.

Just can't get those pictures out of my mind of when I first opened the paper wrapped statues yesterday from the box and how disappointed I was at the sight of them. Everything else OK, statues not OK. Guess it is that which I am going to have to tell Phunsok. Anyway all these worries I have at the end of the day are petty and insignificant I know. Just business, just about making money. It is more the fact that we have not got what we were promised that sticks with me. But what I can do? They are here now, the statues that is, and we will just have to learn to live with them. Try our best to fix the right price.

Best thing to do next week I think is take a bunch of them over to Robert's and see what he thinks. It was Robert who put me onto Phunsok in the first place and I think I might have briefly mentioned him in the Kathmandu post. Dunno. Anyway if I didn't then Robert is an artist who lives on Oxford and who over the course of many years has travelled to Kathmandu to buy Nepali art and Phunsok is his contact man there. So it was Robert who suggested I go to Kathmandu to see Phunsok and try to buy statues etc for Wisdom and the website. Yeah, if I take the statues over to Robert to let him cast his eye over them at least he will give me his opinion as to their quality and as to what he thinks a fair price should be to sell them at. Before he told me that we should go for around three times the price of what we pay for them, so I guess that should be our yardstick.

Business, business. Beginning to wonder if there is any hope of reaching any kind of spiritual understanding of life when I'm mixed up in all this. It seems that there is never a point when I break through into new territory where all looks calm and manageable. There is always going to be something around to either bug or worry the shit out of me. That is the deal. Better get used to it. If I can't stand the heat, then I better piss off. Sometimes writing about these things seems like retreading tired old mantras that I have muttered to myself for years and years. Well, have they actually made much difference? Don't think so. Well, I don't know.

Maybe they have...could be worse, I could be jumping off the ceiling over such things, punching the lights out of people, screaming down the blower that this is not how things should be. I have more or less got out of that way of behaving at least. Got out of that in order to be at the point where I am now and that point is writing this, feeling like a powerless victim at the mercy of fate. Next stage is therefore to try to take destiny in hand, have more control, more self-power. Maybe I'm just too nice. No, no, it is not that. When I don't want to be nice then I am not nice at all, definitely still have that capacity in me.

Think it is more to do with fear, an inability to look at the consequences if things go bad. I might think I'm a pessimist but in actual fact the results show that in many of my dealings in life I come across as a hopeless, really hopeless, optimist. Just having blind faith that things will turn out OK and then feeling crushed and acting like a victim when they don't. Well of course in one sense I am a victim, a victim of my own delusions. It is dangerous and superstitious to sit back and think that the gods are looking after me and that things will be OK. It just don't work like that.

Fact of the matter is that in order to be protected from experiences like the boiler and getting statues from places like Nepal you have to do a lot of work behind the scenes to ensure you are not exposed. You have to be far more hard headed. Maybe that only comes with experience. Maybe I was too trusting with the statues, paying for them up front with not too many questions asked. Assuming that because Phunsok seemed a nice guy and we had good time together in Kathmandu that things would be OK. Plus he was introduced to me by Robert. A little bit more of a reality check might have come in handy.

This is the pattern of my life and there is nothing to suggest it won't continue repeating itself. On and on, fuckin' forever, well at least for as long as I am here, before I play dead man for real. Different situations will come along, different problems, and to all of them my fundamental reaction will be the same; unless I learn the lessons that life as I live it throws up at me. Learn the lessons and move on...with dignity, or at least with as much dignity as I am able to muster. Learn and then try to do better.

From my side I know where I am coming from, as for others I can never be sure. Wait and see how things transpire, then act accordingly; but above all I need to observe and modify my behaviour in whatever way is dictated by the course of events. It is important for me to realise this, not to continually forget and be back at square one, like a religious man from the middle ages relying on his prayers. Don't get me wrong, there is a time and place for such things but maybe not so much in the world I have to operate in. Well, in fact there is a time and a place for prayers even in the world of business but the brutal truth of the matter is that I don't know how to say those prayers properly in order for them to cut much ice. To cut deep and have a bearing on the unseen pathways in which life moves, bringing us all along with it, whether we are aware of it to any great degree or not. The unseen and seemingly unexplainable pathways of life that bring to us one place or another; the great movement.

Sad Eyed Bread Warrior

Sunny day, bright day. Sittin' in the office, just gone 1.15. Just wolfed down a cheese sandwich. Homemade with home baked bread that I did last night. Pretty tasty. Always good to bake bread; there is something nice, something wonderful about knowing there will be fresh bread at the end of an evening. I guess at the moment I'm doing around 2-3 loaves a week. Goes in phases. Question of finding the right flour. At the moment I think I've got the mix right. Combination of Dove's Farm organic wholemeal and Hovis granary. I like it, like it a lot. So does Tamdin. We use a breadmaker. Had it a couple of years now and it is a pretty reliable chunk of machinery. Basically it is like a little oven, well in fact it is a little oven. Gotta be careful when ya take the loaf out when it is done or else you run the serious risk of burnin' ya pandies. Everything is piping hot at that stage I can tell ya. Believe me I've had a few close ones but so far so your Bread Warrior has come through unscathed.

Well just like I said in the post prior to this one I did manage to get into town on Sunday and pick up a bunch of CDs. The 2 Doobies on Japanese import just like I described them, at an unbeatable tenner a piece; a cheap edition of The Boss's Greatest Hits which has come out in a new flip pack format for only a fiver, unbelievable. Same goes for an a copy of the Definitive Johnny Cash that I bought for a fiver as well. Again in a flip pack. These flip packs come with the minimal amount of packaging but in actual fact I think I find them more attractive than normal CDs. Especially when they are so cheap. Finally I also got the JJ Cale Anthology I mentioned previously for just 8 quid. Double CD.

All in all then five top quality CDs for 41 squids which I don't think is too bad at all. Just can't see how the CD is gonna fade away in fact I'm not too sure about this whole downloadin' business I have to say. Still recovering from my Minimum-Maximum experience which I went through a few posts back. Didn't go for Tunnel of Love by the Boss in the end. They had it there on the racks for eight but the Greatest Hits package at three quid less was just too good ta resist, and I have to say that after playing it in the car yesterday and today I think I made a good decision.

From out of the 2 Doobies I have given Stampede a run through and I have to say the remastered sound on it is simply excellent. Really really went way back into the dim and distant past to remember the tracks from when I first heard them which was over 30 years ago now. That is incredible you know; over 30 years since I heard Stampede by the Doobies!! Used to have the album on vinyl in the mid-70's when I was a tearaway teen living in Plymouth but for one reason or another I didn't manage to hold onto to it for very long.

At that time me and my friends had record swaps virtually every weekend where we would all meet up and swap records. It was an incredibly exciting and pleasurable thing to do, and I guess it is from those sessions that I can trace my roots of being not a particularly good or ruthless business man. Always seemed to feel that in the eyes of others I was gettin a bum deal. Probably I was doing not too at all of course but that was not my perception.

We used to meet up in the house of my friend Keith Jenkins. Junks. He was a great guy, son of a garden shop owner in Plymstock. He was an only child with a mane of curly hair whom his parents affectionately called Pogles after Pogles' Wood. If anyone else called him Pogles he went completely mad. Anyway whilst his folks called him Pogles we had a crueler nickname for him in the form of Puffballs, a reference to the fact that he had a big pair of balls which we all got to see when we camped in a tent in his back garden during the summers of the mid 70s.

Nicknames in Plymouth were a rough an' tumble business. The one which stuck on me was Basil. Fuck knows where it came from but throughout my years there I was more often than not known only as Basil. Variations on that were Basil Wasil which I think must have had something to do with the Bowie song Rebel Rebel which came out in '74 although it is a bit hard to remember now. Plymouth, oh man oh man I've lost contact with all those guys decades ago. Junks, Deano, Fordy, Robert Field. I used to live there from 1971 - 1976 and then we moved on to Lowestoft. My dad was in the docks you see, chasing a career in dock management, not only chasing a career but damn well succeeding in making one in fact. So for me it meant an itinerant childhood being shunted from one coastal town to another from one end of the country to the other. But all that is in another life now. Another life in the long and distant past. A life not always so fondly remembered.

Evening now and feelin tired. Had another talk with the landlords regarding the boiler and this time I didn't come away from the conversation feeling so positive as I did a few days ago. Maria Holgate told me that the bolier and the possible renewal of the lease were 2 separate issues and should not be lumped together. In other words they want us to commit to them doing the boiler repairs without them necessarily giving anything up as far as the renewal of the lease is concerned and what the possible new rent might be.

So any chance we had of thinking that getting the boiler done and being able to reap the benefits for a few more years beyond the remainder of this current lease has now been taken away from us. If, in fact, that chance was ever there. It is quite possible that we end up letting the landlords do the work for a cool 14 grand and then have nothing in the way of guarantees that we will be able to stay in the property beyond the end of the current lease.

The reason we will not be able to stay there is simply because the price will be too high. So this is the situation as it now stands. After my last meeting with Maria I was under the impression that they might do us some favours but now I am sure this is not going to be the case. I'm getting tired of all this, I think we might as well just take the pill and swallow it no matter how bitter it might end up tasting.

If we don't let the landlords do the work we are only going to be looking at a nightmare situation in getting other people in to do the job as everything they do will have to be run past the landlords anyway due to issues with the lease and access to the property. So, there we are.

Why did I give myself the illusion that my sweet talking was going to be enough for them to do anything for us that might be seen as a favour? Sad illusions. There is simply no chance. There is a strong possibility we will end up getting stitched up by this whole episode. When I spoke to Maria today she was business like and fairly abrupt. She told me as far as the lease renewal is concerned she had contacted a surveyor and was waiting to hear back. That is bad news as we know full well the price we currently pay for the place is under the going rate and therefore if a surveyor is going to get involved it means she will be seeking the full market value upon renewal.

This was something we were hoping they wouldn't do. In our minds we feel we have been quite good tenants and therefore we thought this might have been able to swing things a little bit in our favour. That really does not look likely in any shape or form. So, here we are; facing the prospect of forking out all this money for the new heating system and then not being around very long in order to enjoy the benefits. The only good point to all this is that the landlords have offered an interest free payment schedule on the bill which means we can probably stretch things out for about a year from now in regard to paying the full whack for what is due. But what a bummer of a situation the whole thing is. Just goes to show, if you can, buy the place you're either livin' in or working from. Otherwise it is like throwing money into a bottomless pit.

From the Boiler to the Doobies Via a Spit in the Face

Fri afternoon, nearly 2pm. Bright day, bright sunlight, fast moving clouds across a blue sky. Feelin' tired. Woke up early this mornin' an' I don't know why. Didn't get to bed till gone 12 but even so just after 5 I was lying there in the darkness wide awake. Wasn't long before I was poddin' it. Clicking through the trax I had put down on my latest playlist - Easies IV. Yeah, you've guessed it, the 4th volume of my easy listenin' playlist collection. A collection which has the potential to go on and on and on. Did that for 40 mins or so an' they just lay there in the early mornin' for another 20 before I got up. Mental excitement, that is what it is, must be...or something like that.

Tiredness I'm feelin' may have something to do with the fact it has been a pretty stressful week at work, at Wisdom Books. Met with the landlords yesterday with regard to the boiler, a subject that has been covered in the previous post Boiler Blues from earlier in Feb. Anyway the situation now is, I hope, a little more positive, possibly, although it depends on quite a few things falling in our favour. Basically the bottom line is that I am now thinking about takin' up the landlords originally horrific sounding quote of £14,000 and the reason is that they said yesterday they would be prepared to offer payment terms on the figure, in other words they would let us pay it all back gradually, over time, and hopefully a long, long time. On top of that there was also the possibility offered of tying in the boiler work with an extension of the lease. As it stands the current lease is due to expire Sept 2009. All this is positive. At least it is better than the guns at dawn scenario it appeared to be not so long ago. When I felt certain we were all headin' for a big confrontation with lawyers and all that shit, all the grief.

If we can get a reasonable indication as to what the rent is going to be when this lease lapses then it might swing things in the right direction as far the boiler is concerned. As long the proposed new rent is affordable. So I guess it is cross ya fingers time. Well, cross ya fingers if you're me; apart from a very small number of other people it is of no concern to any other living soul of course. Who's gonna really give a shit about worries like this if you ain't the person mullin' over them? And that's OK, don't get me wrong. I have hardly wasted much energy in my life worrying about other peoples' problems have I?

Anyway, here's hoping it all works out boom tinker. You see if we knew we were gonna stay for another 5 years minimum after the expiration of the current lease in a coupla years time it would put a whole new complexion on forking out 14 grand for the new heating system. Point is that at least then we would be gettin' a good few years use out of it. Far better that than just forking out all the dosh an' then having to leave the leave gaff in just over 2 years anyway. That would be the sucker punch. The killer tom-a-toe. Well, so, anyway, it was Maria the landlord's daughter who came round to talk it through with us and by the end of our talk I was cautiously optimistic we were both coming from the same direction as to what was gonna best for the future.

Fact of the matter is that we both know it will be better, much better, if it is the landlord himself who comes in and does the work involved in putting in a new boiler and heating system. If we don't use him and go for one of the other quotes, get someone in from outside, we know there is going to be the constant pressure of worrying over whether the work they do will come up to the standards required by the landlord in order for him not to turn round and say when it is all done that the work does not comply with the terms of the lease. Then we might find ourselves in deep fuckin' shit. So, in terms of the boiler and the blues that go with it, the best case scenario is this -

Landlord comes back with an attractive figure as to what the rent might be when current lease expires in 2009.

We also have the option to sub-let a part of the building if it looks like things are going to be tight as far as the new rent figure is concerned.

We go ahead and let the landlord carry out the boiler and heating works for the agreed 14 grand. We pay up front whatever amount they need to buy materials. We pay for the rest of the materials upon completion. Then we pay for his time and labour over a period of time in the future. Stretching the payments out for us so that they don't feel too painful.

If we can get to this point in the whole dirty doggin' deal we will have done well. Not only that, the fact that the landlord lives next door means that he can have keys to the building and come in and do the work whenever he wants. He can take the whole boogerin' summer over it, gettin' it right, that is nay problem for us as far as we are concerned. I'm sure they will be happy with this situation. Easy, easy, working an' livin' in style. No pressure from mouthy, uppity tenants sayin' do this do that or else we aint gonna pay no rent. No nuthin' like that.

Hope, hopes , hopes. I'm blind of course to the indisputable law that problems come along no matter which way the land lies. By that I mean I'm buying into the illusion that if this current issue over the boiler is resolved to every one's satisfaction then everything else will be just fine. Well actually life don't work like that. You get over one set of hurdles only to see them replaced by another bunch of problems that you then think are powerful enough to knock you over and leave you prone in the middle of the fuckin' road as if ya ticker just went pop. You know you just can't win in this game of life but addictions to the picture of a happy ending are just too strong to give up.

That is definitely my problem. All I want is to get this out of the way because I'm convinced that it will be the end of all problems once it is resolved. Then we can all sail off into the red sunset. All I'm doing by having that kind of fantasy picture is escaping from the process, or not paying attention to the process of working things through, of being open and working through the pain. The fact is things have to be worked through slowly and thoroughly if you are ever going to stand any chance of them not repeating themselves in such a way as to cause you grief.

Story of my life I guess. Do a similar kind of thing when it comes to feeding my addiction to music an' going out and buying CDs, wasting all my money. All that hard earned dosh. Always in the back of my head is the hopeless thought that this is going to be the end of the matter; as long as I'm allowed to buy this final CD that will be the missing piece in the jigsaw. The missing piece I have been searching for all these years to make the picture complete. Don't work like, it just don't work like that! But still I can't give up on the illusion that it will.

Just got to get it into my nut that it is a deluded state of mind, conjuring new enemies, new things to fret about. Just got to train my self to relate to such things in a different way. Still after all these years my overriding desire when problems appear is to move hell and high water just to get rid of them. Clean them away, wipe 'em clean. That in my mind is the solution. But it aint like that, just aint like that. Better to learn to live with them, to live and love them for what they are. Lessons of life, chinks of experience, stuff to watch as it passes and not be frightened. Problem for me in that regard however is that I'm a lifelong coward and I always want push things away that I don't feel comfortable with, either in a mental way or a physical way.

Thought about something the other day which happened in what is now the dim and distant way beyond. When I was in my early 20s living in Cardiff. After Uni, back in the early 80's this is. Thatcher's Britain. Fresh out of college and had never thought once whilst I was there about what kind of career I was gonna pursue when it was over. Then when it was over there I was with a degree but no job and no chance of getting one because I simply didn't have a clue about what it was that I wanted to do. Anyway I went to college in Swansea a nice enough coastal town on the coast in South Wales. When my course was over I drifted back up to Cardiff and ended up renting a place in Grangetown, a run down part of the city close to the docks. Corporation Road. On the edges of Tiger Bay. Shared a corner house with some ex-college students one of whom I was terrified of when he got drunk and turned psychotic which was fairly often.

Think I digress, or well not really digress just givin' ya some background information which ya may or may be interested in hearing about. So there I am in Cardiff livin' the life back in '84. Livin' the sinful life, lots of dope smoking that's for sure...an' shit like that. One day I was walkin' down Corporation Road and I remember it was a grey, cold and cloudy day, the kind of day which Cardiff seemed to specialise in back then. A tall bearded guy walked past me on the pavement and spat in my face! Couldn't believe it! Thing was I didn't chase after him or anything like that, in fact I think I just stood there and wiped the spit from my face before carrying on my way, going to wherever I was going. Probably into to town to hang round a record shop or something useful like that.

Thinking about it now (and I don't know why it came along back into my mind after all this time, but I think it might have had something to do with the stress I have been feeling recently over the boiler at work). Anyway the point that I found depressing when I remembered it the other day is that this guy who passed me and spat in my face must have seen me coming a good few yards away, and he must have thought to himself that I was the kind of guy who he would be able to spit in the face and not get much in the way of come back. And of course he was absolutely right! I didn't even say anything to him, let alone try to confront in any kind of physical way and sock him in the face for doing such a damn disgusting fuckin' thing. He must have thought he could get away with it, otherwise if he knew there might have been serious consequences from messing with a guy like me he would never have fuckin' done it but as it was he knew he was going to be able to do it and not get too much in the way of comeback.

It depressed me to see it in those terms. What did it say about me? In fact what does say it still say about me because how much of my essential nature will have changed since then? Very little I suspect. At the time I think I put it down to to the fact that this guy must have clearly been in some kind of mental pain to go and spit in a stranger's face, but now maybe after all these years I see it a little differently. Back then I just focused on him and what I perceived to be some kind of mental turmoil on his part. I was incapable of taking on board the fact that in whatever way I also had a part to play in the situation and the part was one of a victim and a coward.

A victim of a spit in the face and a coward to bear the disgrace of not standing up and doing anything about it. I didn't have the guts to make it known to this guy that what he had done was just plain wrong; completely and utterly unacceptable and that I for one would not tolerate that kind of behaviour. No, I didn't manage to do any of that and well, hell, I guess the episode was a snapshot of the way I have handled other similar kind of things such as that over the course of my years livin' on this planet. Depressing, that was how I found it when I went through things the other day. Even when I'm dead it won't end, this cowardly kind of behaviour. It only change into something else that for all intents and purposes will be completely unrecognisable but unfortunately just as true.

Yeah, fact of the matter was that as far as this guy was concerned I looked the kind of person too chicken to react to him and his action of spitting in my face. What kind of lesson is that? For me and for him? If I had tried to hit him maybe it would have knocked some sense into him but at the time that option was simply out of the question for the simple reason I was scared he would have hit me back. The guy was too big and looked just a little too crazy for me to try take on in any kind of physical way. So the whole thing just passed like that. It is more the fact that his feeling, his gut feeling, when he saw me coming was that he could get away with it and nothing that I did ended up showing him that he was wrong. That probably meant that he would have picked on another another sucker like me at a later date...with no kind of hint that it would lead to any kind of unfortunate consequences for him. Well, maybe the next guy that he met on his path through this world was a little but braver than this one and was able to administer to him a damn good kicking. Memories eh, what are we to do with them?

Weather has clouded over now, nearly 4pm. Want to go out but as a favour for my neighbour I said I would wait in with the key to his house to give to his brother who is due to arrive anytime soon. Yeah, when Tim called last night I was only too happy to help. Ain't much I do in my life to help others so any chance I get I take it as long as I think it is in the realms of possibility to carry out. Still, all the same, it would be good if Tim's brother gets back soon as I have stuff to do.

Originally I had wanted to go into town and pick up a coupla CDs from the HMV Meg in Oxford St. Got my eyes on a couple of Japanese import reissues of mid-70s Doobie Brothers classics, namely Captain and Me and Stampede. A couple of weeks ago I bought a copy of What Were Once Vices are Now Habits in the same series. They are all available for the extremely reasonable price of £10 each which, believe me is a bargain. They are simply beautiful CD editions with fully restored artwork and of course re-mastered sound, the attention to detail is impressive and if the intention is to bring back memories of what it was like to buy the vinyl editions when they came out in the '70s then there is no doubt that they have succeeded gloriously.

Of course nearly all the liner notes are in Japanese but that don't matter. The music is classic Doobies right from bang in the middle of their golden days. When I get my hands on these two that will be it as far as the Doobies are concerned. I will have enough of their stuff to put a pretty decent playlist of together which will go by the name of the Dooberator. Great group the Doobies, much derided by critics and all those who think they have exclusive rights on all that is cool. In fact they were not really that fashionable when they were at the height of their success as far as the UK is concerned so now they are almost completely forgotten.

Sat now, cloudy but bright. Absolutely slashed it down last night when I had to go over to Heathrow at 9pm to meet Tamdin at Terminal One coming back from Malaga. Not good driving in the poundin' rain when you feel like you have to hurry. Accident time. Anyway by the time I had picked her up and got back on the M25 eastbound to Woodford it had more or less cleared up. Neverthless didn't get home till just before midnight and by that point I have to tell ya I was feelin' absolutely shattered. All caught up with me. Didn't take long for me to lay my head upon the pillow and crash into a deep sleep. Got up this morning at 8.30 which is kind of late for me I guess but I feel better for it. Way to go. Back to the action and I'm lovin' it.

Think I'll quickly whizz into town tomorrow and pick up those CDs I was taking about in the paragraph above. Yeah, the 2 Doobies plus I think it might be good to get that JJ Cale anthology which was on special offer in HMV the other week. £8.99 for a double which is hard to beat. Hope it is still there. Also think I might pick up a couple more cheap ones by The Boss. Got my eye on Tunnel of Love and maybe even Human Touch or Lucky Town, all of those are usually available at around a Fiver these days. Then finally I might take a deep breath and get the Eagles' Greatest Hits on double CD which has also been around at well under a tenner in good ole HMV. Yeah I know the Eagles are not cool in any way , shape or form (bit like the Doobies only a lot, lot richer) but I have to admit to liking a good number of the their songs and they sound great when stuck in the Easies playlists. So there ya go, that's my plan fro tomorrow.