the archives of my old site. No longer regularly maintained.
Wow! I've just watched Lord of the Rings on DVD and all I've got to say is WOW!. One of the very very few films I have seen that is truly deserving of the hype it received. A benchmark for the integration of special effects into a movie to create a world that is absorbing and believable.
Judgments. Scene: Upstairs seating area at a largish McDonalds just after the lunchtime rush. I'm eating my dinner, on my own, with nothing to read so I'm watching the other diners.
Subject 1: A young woman in her late teens who looks miserable. She looks like a Louise. Louise is well turned out; clean, well kempt and smartly dressed in casual clothes. She's large. Not quite obese but not too far short of it. She sits on her own with her meal in front of her, slowly feeding fries into her mouth one after another. A mobile phone is glued to her ear; she's listening to something but curiously not speaking. She looks depressed. She looks like she has difficulty making friends, possibly finding it difficult to socialise with her peers due to her weight.
Another young woman arrives at the table. Louise's face lights up and suddenly they're chattering away. A third young woman arrives. Louise is obviously not the loner I thought but just a happy young woman who was having a quiet reflective moment whilst awaiting friends.
Subject 2: An older man. His age is difficult to tell. He could be 60 and looking good for his age or 40 and looking old. I suspect the latter. Obviously unshaven for several days, he wears battered jeans with an old sports or suit jacket. A collection of bags crowd his feet looking like they contain his life's belongings. He sits with no food in front of him looking through the contents of one of the bags and smiling just a little too much to himself. Obviously a homeless man cherishing the chance to sit down indoors, I wonder how long he will be able to remain before one of the staff move him on.
An old woman joins him at the table with a tray carrying two meals. She is obviously affluent. He sit ups straight and brushes himself down smoothing out his clothing. The bags of shopping are shared out between them to give his feet more room and they both look through the photographs that were contained in the bag on the table. Suddenly he looks a very healthy 60.
Subject 3: A student. Sitting at a table with the detritus of a finished meal in front of him he holds his course work in his hands in a battered A4 folder. His hair is un-brushed, his casual top and blue denim jeans un-ironed. He watches the room as I do passing the time by following little snippets of peoples lives.
Louise and her friends leave without clearing their table and suddenly he's there. No longer a student but an urban fox rummaging through the rubbish. He finds some uneaten fries and half a burger that Louise has left which he picks apart with his long thin fingers and devours as though he hasn't eaten for days.
Hush little baby... It's 5am and Connor has been awake for the last 2 hours. I've finally got bored of lieing in bed and jumping up every 5 minutes to try to convince him to rest. Well, it'll give me chance to catch up on the blogs I haven't read for a while.
Monday Mission 2.36 via
PromoGuy dot net. I know its late but I've had other things on my mind lately.
1. Where were you and what was happening in your life the moment when you first became aware of what was happening at the World Trade Center in New York City last September 11th? What was the first thing you did when you heard the news? I was sat at my house waiting for a lift to the airport where I was flying to Germany on a business trip. My first reaction was disbelief followed by a feeling of foreboding about the future of World politics.
2. When those truly responsible for the attack are apprehended, what do you think would be the most fitting form of justice? Justice should be done according to civilised, international law. True justice would be to show these perpetrators that we believe in the system and codes we purport to live to and that no action they take, no matter how extreme, can shake us from our understanding of justice and law.
3. This will probably be much like when our parents respond to "Where were you when JFK was shot?"- an event never forgotten by those who were there. But how do you think the history books should present the 9-11 attacks? Should it be included for all future generations? How can we truly convey the shock, the outrage, the emotions and pain of that day to the children of our children? We should record the facts that we know, the reactions we saw and the emotions we felt. Future generations will interpret them according to the beliefs and systems of their time. That's the way it has always been and we could not change it if we tried.
4. No one in that building, in the Pentagon, or on the planes (other than the terrorists) knew that 9-11 would be their last day to be alive. For me, it brought home the reality that I could be gone at anytime, without any warning. Now, I really want each day to have some value. Did the events of 9-11 bring about a change in the way you live your life? Nope. It made me a little more aware of the greater world around me and some of the tensions in it. But I changed nothing about the way I live my life.
5. Several who loved to fly in planes will not step foot in one anymore. Many parents are more protective of their children. A year later, do you find yourself feeling more secure than back then? Or is it just a matter of time before something else happens? I feel slightly less secure than previously because I feel that many world leaders have not learned the lessons that arose from 9-11 so that there will be more to come.
6. The best way for me to honor the those impacted by the attack will be to refrain from any media that day. No papers, no radio and especially no television. Others will light candles, and others will attend special services. What, if anything, will you do to personally reflect on the tragedy? I will live my life. I know how I feel about what happened. I have reflected upon it many times over the last 12 months. Out of respect I will join in the silence to mark the anniversary.
7. One of the visuals that touched me the most were the walls and walls full of hand made "Missing" posters. What image will you always have in your mind when you recall the events of 9-11? Watching the second plane hit the towers live on TV.
BONUS: Who's gonna come around when you break? My wife. With the glue.
No! I don't want a bigger weapon! When I created this weblog, I also created an email address exclusively for the correspondence it may (or may not) have generated. Since then I've put the email address on this page, but it should be protected by a little JavaScript, and used it when registering the site for a few blog related tools. So why am I suddenly receiving huge amounts of spam? Here's an example of the subject lines I've received:
WORK AT YOUR OWN PACE!! (I already do thanks. I get up, I mope around, I look after the kid. Can't get much more "my pace" than that.)
Incredible Health Discovery, lose weight fast vmg (Why vmg? I'm only 10 1/2 stone vmg. Now sod off vmg!)
Lonely but Married people are waiting to meet someone (Well tell them to piss off down the pub where the rest of us go to meet people)
love spell (Really? You're not just selling some crap fake pheromones? Oh... you are. Bugger!)
aardvarkblog ! Get the Mortgage You Want (The mortgage I want involves repayments of £0 over a period of 25 years. Somehow I doubt you're going to do that.)
Look and Feel Young Again! Special Offer! rxrtq (Jesus! I'm only 30 for Pete's sake! And don't call me rxrtq! You make me sound like some kind of Aztec god.)
Married but lonely people are waiting to be rescued! (Don't have much luck do they these married people. First they're lonely and now they need rescuing. Hold up, just let me get my armour and noble steed.)
Dinner's On Us! (You should be more careful with your plates then shouldn't you.)
...... I've written and thrown away about 4 entries since Friday. I've not known what to say. Facing up to what Thursday means to me is difficult. It scares me that I've had an anxiety attack because that is so far removed from the person I used to be that I don't know where I'm going at the moment.
I used to be confident. I thought I was unshakeable. I thrived on pressure and stress, using it to motivate me to get things done. Over the last 6 years that seems to have changed slowly but completely culminating in an anxiety attack.
Briefly, I had a spell of about 30 to 60 minutes where I got increasingly anxious about a lot of different things. I started worrying about not being able to get a job. I worried about not coping with the arrival of my son. I worried about just about anything that entered my head. At one point I started questioning Sharon's motives for wanting to be with me. By this time I knew I was being paranoid and irrational but I could do nothing about it. As I got steadily more anxious about things my chest got tight and I could feel my heart pounding. Finally I ended breaking down in tears whilst talking to Sharon.
The experience has left my kind of phased. For most of the weekend my head has felt like it's full of cotton wool and I feel constantly tired. Concentrating on anything for a reasonable amount of time is a task.
Over the last 72 hours my mood has fluctuated quite considerably. When distracted or absorbed in something I've been OK but as soon as I stop and think it crashes again. I am thinking about speaking to my GP about it but I worry that she will recommend anti-depressants and I really want to steer clear of that.
What I need to do is get myself motivated and start making inroads into the long list of stuff that I need to do. Take the pressure of myself. We'll see how that goes over the next few days.
that's a nice rock!
me:
sex:male
age:30
status:married
children:3
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Barry Diston:Unreleased Stuff
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