Last Roll of the Dice

It grieves me to have to write something so depressing at this time of year when the rest of the world is pissing it up and celebrating an imaginary old guy with a white beard and natty red suit when they should be remembering the birth of Christ. But Hey Ho, that’s the way humanity rolls these days.

I’ll cut quickly to the chase.

My 8^th novel is completed, well, first draft anyway. The problem is that I am tired and in pain and feeling utterly dejected as a writer. I made the classic mistake, when I first self-published of thinking that my work would sell in great numbers; how foolish and naïve I was.

Let me tell you the God’s honest truth – If anyone ever tells you it’s easy being a writer or an author they are clearly lying and they themselves are neither of those things. It’s a bloody hard slog to write a 90,000+ word book, a harder one to edit and perfect it and an even harder one still to try and sell the damn thing. And I just don’t have the wherewithal to carry on banging my head against the wall for no return.

So, here’s the deal.

Over the next couple of months, I’m going to finish editing and preparing that 8^th one for publication. It’s a cracking story and the cover, as I’ve mentioned before, is unfeasibly fantastic. I’ll then do my best to promote it for six months and if I still find myself in the situation where I am now, vis-à-vis not selling any books, then I’m knocking it all on the head. I can’t kid myself any longer and I don’t have the physical capability to do so either.

This book is the last roll of the dice.

Sorry to be such a killjoy at Christmas but I’m on my last legs here.

September

Yes, it is a strange title for a blog post written in October. The thing is, there were no Blessham Hall blog posts at all in the ninth month of the year and here we are, a quarter of the way through the tenth. Call me Slacker!

Actually, I’ve not been that slack since the last post on August 28^th. I’ve worked on the next novel, getting it up to 12 chapters (or two thirds if you prefer) and its looking pretty good.

But for another thing, I took two weeks holiday in Ireland from September 15th to 29^th and if that sounds like slacking off then you’re wrong. I’m a great one for believing in investing in yourself and that’s what I did over there in the Emerald Isle.

You know the old phrase – “Feeling recharged?” Well I well and truly am. I was literally like a flat battery and Ireland was the charger. It’s done me an absolute power of good. My mind is much calmer, my outlook more philosophical, my body less achy and my imagination fired up. It was a great time of personal refreshing, based in the delightful West Cork coastal countryside with the gal I love.

I’ve put on a few pounds in weight but who doesn’t on holiday; unless they go to one of those hideous health spas. You couldn’t pay me to try one of those things. I can cover myself in mud, eat salad and abstain from alcohol at home so why pay for the pleasure?

And I can get an enema from the NHS.

But 5 pounds weight gain is a small price to pay for how that holiday has affected me. I wouldn’t go as far as to say something as crass as I feel like a new man but I’m certainly in a considerably better state than before I left.

I didn’t actually switch the old laptop on until this Monday, a full week after we returned. I used that time to unwind some more and just enjoy being at home here at Blessham Hall. I think that week was just as mentally restorative as the previous fortnight. Since Monday I’ve been writing for all I’m worth with zero self-criticism/loathing and no doubts about my direction as a writer/author.

I’ve been focussing on catching up with Substack this week but from Monday next it’s back to the novel with a vengeance as I shall be spending some of the weekend having a quick refresh read-through before plunging back into it. I feel rather excited at the prospect. And I’m not usually the excitable type.

I’ve got my granddaughter – Erin – signed up to design the cover for the novel as she has turned into the most accomplished tattoo artist you ever saw and her drawing is… what’s the word now…

Special! That’s it. Truly special. I’ve never seen a nineteen-year-old with that level of artistic skill and talent.

“Ah!” I hear you say, “You’re bound to say that being a proud grandad.” To which I would say, “Good point, well made.” But in this instance it’s much more than just grandfatherly benevolence. Just wait until you see the cover. I’ve always swore blind all my life that I’d never have a tattoo but if I ever change my mind then Erin gets the job.

So things are rather good here at BH and long may that continue. I need to pace myself better so that I don’t end up a burnt-out wreck again, but if that does happen then I know where to find relief.

And a damn good pint of Guinness.

It’s Been a While

Like the title says, it’s been a while. Quite a long while actually, between blog posts that is. The last one was on the 15^th of July. A shocking 5 weeks ago. So a blog post is well overdue, and here it is.

I’m not going to make any grovelling apologies, I’ve stopped doing that, we’re all busy these days so why should I beg for forgiveness? It’s my blog after all. Life often has a subtle knack of getting in the way of things.

So what has happened since last we convened on the Blessham Hall Blog?

Plenty.

I’d better let you know from the off that I have a hospital procedure on the horizon as I’ve been having a little internal trouble for some time now. Is it serious? Don’t know yet but fingers crossed it isn’t. Yes, I am a tad worried but what will be will be. Que sera sera, as they say Austria. Or is it Belgium? I can never remember.

So that’s looming large and is occupying my mind a great deal.

You’ll be pleased, though, to discover that the first draft of the next Blessham novel is now over half way written. Obviously I’m not going to give too much away but I want you to know that I haven’t had this much fun writing a novel since The Pheasants Revolt, which is my very favourite of all my books. I have to stop writing very often to allow myself some titter-time. If the author can laugh at his own work then it’s a good sign, I think.

Joe is slightly out of his depth at the part where I am in the writing process and the poor little chap is in a somewhat fearful state of mind. Incidentally, talking about Joe, I was in conversation with someone who is currently reading Ah Boy! and she described the character of Joe as ‘adorable.’ That made me very happy.

Anyway, work progresses. But I’m not setting any time constraints on myself for the following reason:

I’ve been abominably ill these last few weeks.

It’s true and whilst I’ve not been shy about documenting my health struggles on this here blog things have been pretty grim lately. Apart from my hospital issue the fibromyalgia has been an utter bastard to the point where even walking around Blessham Hall becomes a tearful effort. Good days, bad days and all that but I’m getting so pissed off with it.

I’m also seeing a mental health professional again for the first time in a good long while. I’m not losing my marbles but I am still struggling with the passing of my Mum earlier this year and there are several other external pressures affecting me and it’s left me in a bit of a vulnerable condition.

Thankfully, I’m married to the most wonderful human being and she is as supportive as they come. I reckon I’d be lost without her. I know I would.

I also suffered an insect attack a few weeks ago and was bitten a good many times on my legs and ankles. Now, mozzy bites are nothing new to me, I get them every year, but these were something else. They all went purple in colour to the point where it looked like I was covered in Ribena stains. Horribly painful but the most shocking part was that I honestly believe that some of them were spider bites, which is quite horrific when you think about it.

But, by slathering hydrocortisone cream all over myself and ingesting antihistamines by the handful I have, mercifully, seen a huge reduction in the discomfort and swelling brought on by those multi-legged gits. It’s not been a fun time I can tell you.

On to happier things though.

Substack for example.

I have my first paid subscriber and I am elated. That someone believes in my work to the point of wanting to pay me for doing it is one of the best compliments I ever had. I’ve never claimed, personally, to be a good (or even average) writer and there have been a few unkind folks who have pointed this out and derided my output, but now I feel a sense of affirmation that I must be either improving in my craft or at least in some way entertaining. And I can’t ask for more than that really.

I am one of those authors who reads other people’s work and then say to myself, “I wish I could write like that.” But then again, I’m not Terry Pratchett or Douglas Adams or Tom Sharpe or anyone else. I’m Alan Stevenson and I write bawdy slapstick comedies and, yeah, I’m content with that. So I’ll just say “nuts” to the naysayers. Come and tell me how bad I am when you’ve written seven full length novels yourself.

Also, while we’re talking about Substack, I have been pretty consistent with my output there. Tuesday and Thursday are my Substack days and there’s some pretty decent literary fayre on there for everyone to enjoy. I’ve been on that platform for a year and a half now and there are over 140 posts to read including poems, short stories, essays and a serialised novel. Go take a look HERE.

What else has happened?

Well, for one thing, Ange and I have realised we aren’t getting any younger and have started to make the most of the rest of our lives as best we can. That means having day trips, small holidays and some serious quality time together. We had a run over to Heysham in the car earlier this month and it was gorgeous. Ok, yes, I struggled to walk and was in tremendous pain but I was also in the company of the woman I love and I was as happy as a lark for a day. We ended the day with sausage and chips on Morecambe sea front. Ok, so it wasn’t a Michelin starred restaurant overlooking the bay of Naples but to us it was truly delightful.

Other than all of that life goes on. Some days I write and some days I don’t. I did, for a few weeks, go through quite a dark patch where I considered throwing the towel in but then I got that paid subscriber and suddenly things became a lot brighter.

I’ll endeavour to leave a shorter gap between blogs posts next time but please do understand that life gets in the way sometimes and we all have our limitations.

See you soon x

Fool Time Score

Fool, now there’s an interesting word. As a noun, it means a person who lacks judgement or acts unwisely. An idiot, basically. As a verb, it means either to deceive or trick as well as to waste time or act foolishly.

I think I’m guilty of being both the noun and the verb recently.

I’m a fool to myself, speaking of the noun. I keep setting time targets for myself and then broadcasting it either via this blog or Substack. And then I look like a total berk when I don’t make good on those targets.

Take my blog post from the 9^th June. You may recall it; it was titled Switcheroo. It was a well written, little piece that fizzed and zinged with positivity, that I concocted in a mood of joie de vivre. I was feeling triumphant from writing a whole chapter of my next novel in one day and became so full of exuberance that I made all sorts of claims and promises in that post that I was going to get the novel finished in the space of a few weeks.

Foolish of me.

Here we are several weeks later and I’m just on the cusp of finishing chapter 7 of that book. Nowhere near what I had crowed about on June 9^th. Nowhere even remotely near.

Now, I’m not saying that the writing itself has been a struggle as I am convinced that this is going to be one of the best Joe Wilkie books yet and I am enjoying the writing process immensely. I truly am having so much fun with this one.

It’s just that I haven’t gotten all that far with it. Life, as you know, has a habit of getting in the way of things and my life is no exception to the rules. Yes, I could blame poor health, yes I could blame commitments and yes I could blame my own reticence and idleness at times. The stark naked fact is that I simply shouldn’t have made those claims in the first place.

Because now, I look like a fool for saying them.

As a verb, it’s even worse!

I feel like I’ve deceived my readers by making such bold statements. I’ve fooled people into thinking they’re going to be reading Joe’s next adventure in the near future when in reality it might not even be this year.

I mean, I’m doing my best and I’m hopeful it’ll be released before Christmas but the truth is I just can’t promise that and I shouldn’t have given people the wrong idea when I said it would be ready by Autumn.

Ok, it might well be ready by Autumn if I get my foot down but then again it might not. I just can’t say for certain.

And to think, I convinced myself and all of you that I thought it possible that I’d write three chapters a week. I’m a fool whose fooled.

So I’m sorry everyone. I’m not going to make any more bold promises or set myself time-based targets that are just unrealistic and unfeasible. Instead, I’m going to knuckle down and write my ass off as and when I can and instead of focussing on the release date I shall focus on producing the best book that I can. Quality over quantity must now be my mantra when it comes to the daily word count.

I think, as a writer, I should be aiming for more mystique and less foolishness.

Incidentally, a fool is also a kind of pudding. It’s pink, fruity and not very healthy. Now, who does that remind you of?

Forging Ahead

An ultra-quick blog post this week because I’m rushed off my little tootsies.

Right then, three week ago I promised you a progress report at some point and here it is. In a nutshell, I haven’t made as much progress with the next novel as I would have liked to have done but I have made good progress none-the-less.

There are now 5 chapters in the bag (first drafts) and I am so chuffed with the way the story is panning out. Joe is coming out with some absolute pearlers of his limited vocabulary and Lady Stark-Raven is as mad as a suitcase full of semolina. I think she might actually be losing the plot. It’s ok, I’ll reign her in a bit.

There are several new characters in this book including not one, but two, antagonists and a rather fetching young woman who has quite an effect on our hero. I wouldn’t go as far as love interest because Joe only has eyes for Meg Morrison but this new lady has certainly caught his eye.

The antagonists are perhaps the most unusual thing about the new characters. I really do wish I could go into deeper detail about them but that would be unwise of me at this juncture. What I can promise you is that it is my full intention to get this book into your hands at some point in the Autumn.

I don’t want to set myself any more time goals or targets; I just want to get the bloody thing written.

There have been a few calls and pulls on our time recently but that’s just this wonderful life getting in the way. We all have our responsibilities. However, on a health front I do have some rather good news. My weight and my BMI are both down and my blood pressure is absolutely bang on. I had my annual medical with the nurse yesterday you see and I was so pleased with myself when I left.

Another amazing thing, which must be due to the weight loss, is that the nurse managed to get blood out of my left arm at the first stab. I usually come out of these sessions looking like a second hand dartboard with puncture wounds all over my limbs. In fact, pretty much on every occasion for the last five years or more, they’ve had to extract the blood from the back of my hand, which, as you can no doubt guess, ain’t none too pleasant. But no, yesterday, straight into the left arm and three vials of my most vital of fluids were filled to the brim in no time at all.

And there was one other thing that came out of my medical that I have no explanation for. I was measured for height and it seems that I am one whole inch taller than I was at this time last year. And the nurse checked and rechecked a few times but there was no denying it, I’m now officially, on record, as being six foot tall. For years I have struggled with the shame of being five foot eleven inches. Now I can hold my head up high and call myself a strapping six-footer. Well, maybe not strapping. Overlapping perhaps. But a six-footer all the same.

Right then, that’s all the news from Blessham Hall. Back to that 8^th novel.

Speak soon xx

Add It To The List

I know, I know, don’t remind me, it’s been nearly 3 weeks since the last blog post on the 9^th of May but I haven’t been idle, believe me. I’ve written some utterly sumptuous and hilarious Substack posts in that time and I’ve made a pretty good start on the next Blessham novel.

Blessham novel? I hear you say. Shouldn’t that be an Ingleby one next.

Well, yes, by rights it should be but I’ve decided to throw convention out the window and follow my heart and right now my heart says Blessham. I had got a sizeable chunk of the next Ingleby book, featuring Archie and Aggie Stone, done, which was somewhere around the 15,000 word mark but I’ve shelved it for now.

I don’t know, I just wasn’t feeling it and the comedy wasn’t as good as its wonderful predecessor – Mutch Wants Moor, which, lets face it, is probably the best comedy novel ever written. And I want to do justice to the Stones as I have a very strong connection to them. Ahem!

I will come back to that one at some point but for now I feel the call to go back to the charming village of Blessham and when I’ve got that out of my system then it’s another visit to Ingleby. Ok?

So why is today’s blog post so named?

Without whinging I’m afraid I’ve got another ailment to inform you about.

Diverticulitis!

No, I hadn’t heard of it either.

It’s a digestive problem where small pouches grow on the wall of the colon and if they become infected they can cause a lot of pain. I think mine must be infected because some days I feel like asking the doctor for a colon transplant. Other days it’s just a gripey little nuisance but there’s not a single day goes by without it causing me some level of grief.

But, as I say, I don’t want to whinge about it because whinging gets you nowhere; only on everyone else’s tits. And my own tits are quite enough, thank you. No, I thought I’d just let you know the state of play. I had to endure a fair amount of ignominy before the doctor arrived at his diagnosis; something I wouldn’t wish on anyone. Let’s just say that he was anything but gentle with me!

The brute!!!

I’ve sought a second opinion since and I’ve been asked to produce a sample of my leavings which has gone off for analysis and I’m seeing another doctor about it on the 9^th of June. Hopefully there won’t be any need for internal photography but that’s a distinct possibility.

I just hope they have warm hands this time.

Apologies to those of a nervous disposition if this is all too much information but we’re all grown-ups here aren’t we. And if you’re not a grown-up then you really need to seek your parent’s or guardian’s permission before you read any further.

Actually, it’s not that bad is it?

Anyway, what I thought I’d do, just for a jape, is to make a comprehensive list of my ailments, both past and present dating back to the root cause of them all. It may make interesting reading and I think it will be cathartic for me to get it off my chest.

Right then, here we go. These aren’t exactly in chronological order because I’ve forgotten the chronological order but it goes something like this…

It all began in 2003 when I contracted the SARS virus when for 24 hours my soul hovered between this world and the next. Seriously, it was a close thing.

Since then I have or have had…

Encephalitis
Myocarditis
Pericarditis (no point having only one carditis, is there?)
Depressive Anxiety Disorder
Fibromyalgia
Bell’s Palsy
Cervical Spondylosis (literal pain in the neck)
Vertigo
Meniere’s Disease (hearing loss)
Re-occurring constipation
Pneumonia
Diverticulitis
And I once put an axe into my foot but that was an accident (or was it an axe-ident? Geddit? No? Ah well, please yourselves)

Quite the list, isn’t it? And they’re just the ones I can remember. There may be others.

Truth of the matter is that SARS made an epic mess of me and I’m still in a long-term battle because my body took such a pasting. The only one’s I can’t really blame on the SARS, for certain, is the spondylosis, pneumonia and the axe! Maybe the constipation as well but I’m still divided over that one.

Do me a favour will you; if you ever see SARS walking down the street please feel free to kick him in the nads for me. Of course, that’s not the reality. SARS is not a physical embodiment that one can deliver a swift toe to the goolies to. It’s much worse than that.

SARS stands for Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome and is a variant of the coronavirus, which is something you may have heard of. Basically a cousin of Covid-19. And I know exactly where and when I got it. I just can’t pinpoint the so-and-so that passed it on to me. But when I do…

…nah, no use crying over spilt milk.

Instead I make the best of my life, which I have to say has improved manifold since 2011 when I met my wife, soul mate, best friend and love of my life – Ange. She can’t make the illnesses go away but by heck does she support me through them. And lets not forget she’s had some pretty serious health issues herself in the last couple of years. It’s reassuring to have someone that caring in my life. I don’t know what’s going to be next to add to that list. Hopefully nothing but life is full of curve-balls and me and my lovely will face them together.

I’ll leave it there because at this precise moment Ange is baking a carrot, apple and sultana cake and I want to be there when it comes out of the oven and salivate over it for half an hour or so whilst it cools down enough for poor little Alan to have a piece.

Hope to bring you a Blessham update next time.

Until then x

Disc-Oww Inferno

Done gone and put my back out, haven’t I? And done it in the most pathetic way as well. I’d like to say that I did it whilst outrunning an avalanche on only one ski or that my parachute got twisted and I hit the ground hard but lived to tell the tale. I’d love to say that I did it whilst carrying a child from a burning building or that it happened whilst attempting to lift my own body weight at the gym.

It would be great if it were something exciting or dramatic but no…

I did it getting out of the car.

The worst part is that I’m not even sure what happened exactly. We pulled up in Morrisons carpark on Monday morning, I opened the car door, stuck my leg out, went to stick the other one out and the next thing I knew I was walking like Igor and in a state of total panic.

The problem is, you see, that my back tends to go out in two stages. The first stage, that I’m in now, is like a painful warning shot that much worse is to come if I don’t watch out. I can still function but in a limited capacity. The second stage is a full-on prolapsed disc that renders me incapable of even turning over in bed without screaming for about a fortnight or more.

Thankfully, I’m at stage one still and with careful management it should put itself right and I’ll be back to myself in roughly ten days or so.

If I’m not careful and it goes to stage two then I’m in a world of trouble and you won’t be hearing from me for a while because, let’s face it, it’s incredibly difficult to type whilst lying flat on your back. And that’s just about the only position I’ll be in if it happens.

Now, here’s the thing – I haven’t had a stage two since April 2016. There’s been a couple of stage ones but mercifully it’s gone no further than that. So as you can probably guess I’m on tenterhooks at this precise moment.

And if it does go to stage two there is only one solution and that is a visit to the chiropractor, which is an ordeal in itself. What about painkillers you say? Pah! A waste of time, effort and a perfectly good glass of water. The only pain relief that would touch it is probably banned by the W.H.O, the U.N and most countries in the Western world.

No, it has to be the chiropractor. Only he/she can end the misery of a stage two.

I have a kind of love/hate relationship with chiropractors. I hate them when they’re pulling me about and twisting me into the kind of positions normally only achieved by Judo masters and I feel like screaming for them to stop but then all of a sudden there’s that wonderful little ‘click’ and the pain is gone. When that happens I love the chiropractor to the point of offering to wash their smalls for them.

Of course, the chiropractors charge for putting you through hell, don’t they? £50 a pop these days I’m led to believe. Last time I went (2016) it was only £30. Well worth it though I suppose. The sense of relief when I leave the chiropractor is beyond profound. I feel like I’m sixteen years old again, although that feeling only tends to last about a day before I remember my actual age but for a while there it’s nice to be a spring chicken for a few hours.

The most annoying thing about it all is that its entirely my own fault. I did it to myself many years ago aged just twenty-three. I was working in a warehouse and it was my job to load pallets onto a lorry with a forklift truck. On the day in question I had a metal pallet on the forks upon which were two gigantic leaf springs for a HGV suspension. Whoever had prepared them hadn’t done a very good job and as I went to load them onto the lorry one of the springs slid off the pallet.

Not to worry, though, I was young and fit and strong, wasn’t I? I’d have it back on the pallet in no time at all – this thing was about 75kg by the way. So I dismounted, put on my heavy-duty gloves and grasped the leaf spring in both hands and lifted with all my might.

They heard the scream from five miles away.

I’d prolapsed one of my lower vertebrae and I had never experienced pain quite like it in my few short years on this Earth. Thankfully, it was right at the end of the working day and I went home in the misguided belief that a Radox bath and an early night would soon put it straight.

How very wrong I was.

The next morning my entire body had about as much movement as a cheap ironing board but considerably less structural integrity. I was in sheer-bloody-agony. There was nothing for it but to ring in sick and get my sorry ass to the GP.

The GP gave me some painkillers; codeine possibly, and advised me to go to an osteopath. I’d heard of osteopaths but weren’t sure exactly what they did. I was told there was one on the High Street who was very good but I couldn’t get the treatment on the NHS and would therefore have to pay. That was fine, I’d have paid every penny I ever earned if this chap could make me walk like I hadn’t soiled myself.

The year was 1989 and it cost just £5 for the osteopath to sort me out. Oh, admittedly, I nearly fainted as he performed his best Hulk Hogan impression and bent me into positions that would defy any self-respecting contortionist but then, eventually, he pushed the heel of his hand hard into my lower spine, there was a loud ‘click’ and he said, “How’s that?”

I could have French kissed him, tongues and all. I was cured!

During the years between 1989 and 2016 I only had a stage two on three occasions. Once when I was raking leaves off the lawn, once when I bent down to pick my Yorkshire Terrier up and once when I went over the handlebars of my bike.

Now, three times in twenty-seven years might not sound a lot but believe me, when it goes to stage two I cannot do anything except sit and cry like a lost kiddie in a supermarket. Honest to God, that’s it; that’s all I can do. So three times was three times too many in my opinion.

So here I am, in the midst of a stage one and taking the very greatest care not to do anything remotely physical so as to avoid a stage two. But if it should go to stage two you won’t need me to tell you about it as I shall be noticeable by my absence.

Watch this space!

A&E and Me

I make no secret of the fact that I am the National Health Service’s biggest fan. Seriously, for all those that criticise it do you realise just where the hell we’d all be without it? Up Excrement River without an oar, that’s where!

The NHS saved my life in 2003. Literally! I was about one degree higher in body temperature away from shuffling off this mortal coil but the skill of doctors and nurses pulled me through. And that’s before I get to the bit about how they have looked after and treated my wife in the last few years when she has had both a heart attack and cancer.

In short, they’ve been bloody marvellous.

So, please, do yourself a favour, if you want to slate the NHS then don’t do it to me or you’re liable to get a lengthy diatribe in its defence.

I went a bit quiet last week and did very little in the way of actual writing. Now, there’s a perfectly good reason for this and it’s a bit of an old chestnut, I know, but I wasn’t very well.

Tuesday afternoon my face went numb and I was greatly alarmed gentle reader. I thought that perhaps the Bell’s Palsy was making a return or perhaps it was something a lot worse – you know what I’m talking about. Anyway, my fab-u-la-tastic wife thought that it warranted a trip to A&E to get it checked out and so off we went once more on that well-trodden road to Airedale Hospital.

I say well-trodden because in the last 10 to 12 years or so I have made more trips to A&E than any other person alive. So much so that I believe I should have my own private seat in the waiting room and some kind of loyalty card for the vending machines.

And yes, there have been times when I’ve had to wait an eon to see someone but I realise that its only because the poor staff there are absolutely snowed under. When we walked in on Tuesday I counted exactly 48 people, including myself, in the waiting area. I took a seat and we waited with them.

It took a full six hours before I was sat in front of a doctor, although I had been through triage and had my blood taken etc much earlier. After a discussion and examination with the doctor he concluded that the nerves in my face have been compressed by my CPAP mask at night and this was causing the numbness.

I breathed a sigh of relief but also felt like giving myself a jolly good kick in the pants for having the damn mask too tight in the first place. That was a week ago and I am still experiencing some numbness but nothing as bad as it was last Tuesday. To cut a long story short there was a fault with my mask that I hadn’t realised which has now been satisfactorily resolved.

But it did get me thinking over the Easter weekend just how many trips I have made to Airedale A&E department. Actually, its not called A&E anymore, is it? It’s just called “Emergency” now but I still call it A&E because I’m an old stick in the mud and I don’t like change when there’s no need for it.

Anyhoo, about those visits to Airedale A&E. There have been a great many. The first of which was in the Spring of 2013. I was chopping some fire wood and without going into too much detail I successfully managed to – bury the hatchet, as it were, into my right foot.

Ange hastened my to Airedale and I was seen quickly, stitched up, bandaged and on my way home again in no time at all. And I learned a valuable lesson that day which is this – don’t try chopping wood wearing only Crocs.

Since then I’ve gone and sat in that old familiar waiting room for things such as:

Pneumonia
Chest pains (twice)
Bell’s Palsy
Vertigo
Violent stomach pain (which turned out to be constipation on an industrial scale)
A bad knee
A bad arm
A bad back
And a great and varied host of other minor offences

Sometimes it’s been a quick in and out and sometimes it’s been a more prolonged and drawn out experience. It just depends how busy they are on the day. Although, the pneumonia one led to me being put on a ward for the best part of a week whilst they pumped me full of nuclear strength antibiotics.

And the thing that has stood out the most for me in all that time is the tremendous patience and complete unflappability of the staff. From the first point of contact at the reception desk right through to the doctors, nurses, radiographers and everyone else.

I’ve had X-rays, MRIs, CT scans and had more blood taken than a black pudding factory and it’s always been done with the utmost care and the most remarkable professionalism. Never, I say again never, have I ever felt not in safe hands there.

So, now you see why I am such a champion of the NHS. They do an immeasurably difficult job with nowhere near enough funding and they do it with smiles on their faces and tenderness in their hearts.

As for the rest of last week, I spent all day Wednesday in bed catching up on all the lost sleep I’ve missed and Thursday I was as limp as a two-day old banana skin although I did manage to shuffle down to the chip shop at teatime although the walk back felt like I was trying to conquer Everest. I just barely roused myself on Friday to do a bit of catching up on my journal and some laundry but that was about it. As for the weekend it was pleasant (and chocolatey) enough but I still had less energy than Rip Van Winkle on his day off.

Monday was nice as I did a bit of canal boat steering which brought back some genuinely happy memories and proved that however crap my body is these days; I’ve still got it at the business end of a tiller!

Here’s hoping this week will prove to be far more productive and please join me in raising a glass to our glorious NHS. Long may it continue.

Rude Awakening

We all have a favourite pet peeve don’t we. For some it’s people who speak with their mouths full, for others it could be something such as a person leaving a light on or not shutting a door when they come through it or even not putting the lavatory seat down after they’ve been.

Well, I think I’ve identified my own favourite pet peeve and it is…

Rudeness!

And the reason that I hate rudeness so very much is because it is becoming more prevalent in Western society than ever before.

I know that rudeness is not a new thing. People have been rude for millennia; but rudeness that was once often seen as unacceptable is now the absolute basic norm.

And I’m getting so pissed off with it!

Someone was very rude to me on Saturday night. We’d been for a meal to celebrate our granddaughter’s 19^th birthday and had a lovely time. The food was gorgeous, the staff were brilliant (Efendy, Skipton, you must try it) and a good time was had by all.

There was myself and Ange, Erin and her boyfriend Billy, Becky and Paul and Ange’s brother Steve. And it was great. We had a laugh and a few drinks and the atmosphere was superb.

After the meal it was decided by majority vote to go for a couple of drinks at the Sound Bar, which is a smashing place that I’ve mentioned before on here. Unfortunately, when we reached the Sound Bar we were dismayed to find that they were closing early for the night. Undeterred we crossed the bus station carpark and went to the nearest pub (The Fleece, Skipton, don’t try it) and entered therein.

There was some kind of agonisingly loud disco going on, which was ran by a filthy-mouthed man in a Dolly Parton wig, make-up and a dress who was masquerading as a woman. The music was excessively loud and the first thing that caught my eye when we went in was two very drunk forty something women clinging onto each other for dear life whilst belting out the words to Living on a Prayer in a hopelessly tuneless fashion that resembled, in both sight and sound, a pair of violently rutting elephant seals.

Not a particularly auspicious start. But worse was to come.

Why, oh why, oh why do some people think that it’s ok to accost you as if they’ve known you all your life when they’re drunk. I know alcohol removes inhibitions but why do they have to get in your face with their fag ash and Kopperberg breath and a thin sheen of perspiration from their ungainly efforts on the dance floor?

I ask that question because that is what faced us as we stood at the bar waiting for the half-asleep bar staff to serve us.

The people in question were a heavily set woman who seemed to have abandoned all notions of grace and poise and a shaven headed f**kwit who clearly thought he was Skipton’s answer to stand-up comedy. And it was he who was rude to me.

To cut a long story short he called me “Gandalf.”

Now, here’s the thing.

I know I look like Gandalf or even Dumbledore.
I don’t really care that I do; I’m comfortable in my own skin.
He called me “Gandalf” about four times and, despite his obvious merriment, it got less and less funny with each hackneyed attempt.
I didn’t know him from Adam.
I hadn’t been rude to him.
I’ve heard it a thousand times before.
Rudeness is the lowest form of wit

I can take a joke. Believe me, nobody can take a joke better than me. But to go up to someone you don’t know and call them names just for cruel fun makes you a total and utter c**t in my eyes. It wasn’t so much that the idiot said it to me; I would have been offended for anyone else who had to endure his boorish, drink-sodden effort at being funny.

And you could also tell that in his eyes he was being somehow novel and fresh when in reality, as I’ve pointed out at number 6, he wasn’t the first to say it and he almost certainly won’t be the last.

But me being me, I let it go.

I know plenty of blokes, and women too, who would have put him firmly on his arse with a well-aimed straight left or uppercut. Me? Nah! I’m not going to sit in the back of a police car explaining my actions and ruining my (and my granddaughter’s) evening just because of some piss-wet-through rummy who thinks he’s Ricky Gervais.

I didn’t even give him the luxury of a response.

I mean, don’t get me wrong, I could have given him a heck of a response. I could have said, “F**k off you fat-faced, bald-headed, beady-eyed, pointy-nosed, sweaty, B.O reeking pimple on the ring piece of the universe.”

I could have said that.

But I didn’t.

And do you know why?

Because that would have been stooping to his crass little level and I’m not like him. Yes, I probably do look like that character from The Lord of the Rings but I have a damn sight more class than he’ll ever have. I also like to think that one day he’s going to say the wrong thing to the wrong person and end up in the AMU of the nearest hospital.

Actually, now I think about it, the landlord really ought to have a word with him. He cost the pub the loss of seven drinks that could have been sold if we hadn’t all left the awful place.

As we made our way home I had mixed feelings. Part of me was glad that I didn’t rise to the paralytic oaf but a small part of me was wishing that for once, just this once, I should have smashed his smug, gurning face in. Not just for my benefit but for everyone else as well because I recognised in him all the obnoxious traits of the serial piss taker.

I wasn’t the first person he’s insulted that way and I won’t be the last. The drink-addled alacrity with which he approached me was nothing new to him. He’s done this before. He really does need decking but I’ll let someone else do that. Someone really unpleasant hopefully.

But rudeness itself is all around us. It’s everywhere you go. Drivers are incredibly rude these days, children and teenagers seem to take rudeness to dizzy new heights, bosses and colleagues are so stressed that being blunt is often the only recourse, I see and hear people being rude to shop staff and waiters for no good reason and there is countless man hours’ worth of rudeness online.

And it’s got me thinking a lot about it, so yesterday, just as a small experiment, I put a post on Threads that said, “Why and when did abject rudeness become the norm?”

I got one reply from some guy who said, “Ever since the internet made people brave.”

Damn it he’s right. There are millions of so-called “keyboard warriors” in this world who love nothing more than slating other people and being as rude and offensive as possible. And it’s ok for them because they have the safety net of not knowing the people they are attacking or even have the remotest chance of ever being in the same room as them. They insult and offend via distance and it’s just about as cowardly as it could possibly get.

And that’s the norm. You can say what you like, so long as you don’t cross certain boundaries (although some do) and make all manner of unsubstantiated remarks about other human beings. I tell you; Western society is going to the wall. Notice I didn’t say Western civilisation? There’s nothing civilised about any of these people.

Keyboard warriors? I’ve shat ‘em.

I’m giving serious thought to backing away from social media all together. With the exception of posting about what I write. That’s how wound up I feel about rudeness right now. It’s there every-bloody-time I go on Facebook or Instagram or Threads (I don’t do X, Musk is also very rude) I see some crap individual having a snidey little jibe at someone else. And I hate it!

To be perfectly honest with you, this has been building up in me for some time now and I think that clown on Saturday night was the last straw. I don’t need to put myself in situations like that anymore whether it be online or in real life (social media is not real life by the way) or anywhere come to that. I’m a 58-year-old man with a decent brain who loves books and intricacies of progressive rock and I need, nay crave, more intellectual stimulation and conversation than standing in some naff, crowded, noisy pub listening to Bon Jovi at a billion decibels and being told I look like someone from Tolkien’s epic masterpiece.

To summarise, I’m not rude to other people and I ain’t gonna take it from them anymore. I won’t get violent but I am a wordsmith – be warned!

Rant over.

Thanks for reading.

The Power Of A Chat

The amazing and wonderful woman I am proud to share my life with (Ange) has been having some reflexology sessions as part of her recovery treatment from breast cancer. I must confess that I don’t know an awful lot about reflexology and may have perhaps dismissed it in the past as quack medicine. But minds can change and mine certainly has towards reflexology. If it helps the woman I adore then lets crack on with it.

The reflexology session lasts about an hour and so whilst Ange is in there I go to a place called the Sound Bar, which, if you’re interested, is situated right next to the bus station in Skipton. I like the Sound Bar although I do think it’s trying a little too hard to be cool. It really doesn’t need to.

It’s called the Sound Bar because…

It is a bar
It sells music in both vinyl and cd formats

Also, they have regular gigs and performances there and they play some pretty decent music while you’re having a drink or a vinyl/cd safari. Plus, the walls are decorated with all manner of Rock n Roll memorabilia. It’s kind of like stepping back in time to the early eighties so it is extremely retro in that respect.

Anyway, I like going in there and it’s a very rare occasion that I don’t come out of the place with at least one new record in my hand; often several.

And so, last Friday I found myself in there again.

There were only a few people in at that time and so I bought a pint of Guinness Zero and had a quaff before perusing said vinyl. There was a lady seated at the table next to mine, maybe in her early seventies, holding a Yorkshire terrier and drinking a latte. I smiled and said, “How d’you do?” to be polite and then I took a generous swallow of my non-alcoholic stout.

To cut a short story even shorter we began a conversation about music and we discovered our tastes ran along similar lines. We talked of bands we’d seen and whilst I name dropped Wishbone Ash and Uriah Heep, she countered with Hawkwind and Smile. For the uninitiated, Smile was Queen before they were Queen. Wow!

We talked of many other things; grandchildren being one, and I felt quite proud to tell her that Erin at 19 years old is rather fond of Fleetwood Mac. We also talked about dogs and pets in general. I had a Yorkie/Jack Russell cross many years ago (Suzy) and so we found another shared interest.

When I’d first sat down I noticed that there was a certain air of melancholy about her but as we talked her mood seemed to lift. I finished my pint and excused myself as I wanted to look at the records.

My vinyl safari lasted about fifteen minutes or so and I came away with a copy of Foxtrot by Genesis in excellent condition. Feeling rather chuffed I bought another Zero and sat down again. The lady was still there and was now drinking a glass of lager; it being after midday I suppose.

We got to chatting again and she asked me about my walking stick. I gave her a potted history of my health problems and then she told me something that really stopped me in my tracks.

She told me that very recently she had been diagnosed with dementia.

I didn’t quite know what to say at that juncture. Here was a total stranger telling me that basically life is about to get a lot worse for her but still saying it in a chatty and conversational way. Now I knew the reason for her melancholy countenance when I first arrived but the thing is that without us having that chat I wouldn’t have known about her condition as she was so talkative.

Now, I think I realise what was going on.

She was unburdening to me about her diagnosis. Having formed a sort of connection through a shared interest in music, grandkids and dogs she had felt able to tell me about dementia affecting her life. And the amazing thing was that even though she’d told me that she did seem a lot happier than when I’d first met her a mere half hour ago. Relieved almost.

We chatted a little more about Led Zeppelin and Genesis and then she said that she had to go and meet her daughter to whom the little dog belonged. I said something like, “See you later!” which is a bit phatic really. Unless she’s in the Sound Bar the next time I’m in there it’s highly unlikely.

I wish I’d told her that I hoped she would be all right or given her some words of comfort and encouragement instead of those three vacant words I had employed. I was cross with myself to be perfectly honest.

However…

Since then I’ve had a different opinion. It didn’t matter how we finished the conversation, what was more important was the fact that we’d had one in the first place and it had made an improvement to her day. And that, I suppose, is the moral of this story. We should never shy away from engaging with our fellow man or woman. A bit of a chat about music, dogs, art, literature, football, gardening, tea bags, bog snorkelling or whatever the hell else you have in common can make a massive difference to that person’s day.

I realised that our little chat had been a powerful thing and, even though I never even asked her name nor she mine, I like to think that I made a bit of a difference to her.

Ange arrived about ten minutes after the lady had left and had enjoyed her reflexology session immensely. I told her that this woman I’d never met before had confided her dementia diagnosis to me and part of me wished she had been there at the time as she is the most understanding and sensitive person you could ever hope to meet and would have been a much better sounding board for such things – I’m not a great conversationalist at the best of times.

But I’m going to try and do better in the future. I need to make more of an effort with people and take the time to chat with strangers. We all should. You just never know what it might achieve.