The Rapacious Creditor

rainy days

2011-06-12T18:36:00.000+01:00

it's raining here in the UK, a storm blown in from the continent with lots of rain. Its been an odd year so far and I seem to be taking each up and down pretty well, which is good considering my ability to escalate anything beyond it's natural magnitude.

I lost my job of course in march, this was inevitable due to government cuts and not too painful as I have a pension I can fall back on, having retired once before. I then plucked up courage to try for a position as a mountain guide and pending the results from my assessment last week I will start that soon. This is a dream come true for me and one which I never ever thought would transpire, and the asking for it came about from the serenity prayer "Courage to change the things I can", which is a true statement if ever there was one.

The physio for my shoulder following the operation seems to be reaching its zenith in terms of impact and hopefully that will end soon. All in all the shoulder is a lot better now and at least I can move and sleep.

I have started a new web business also, which is in it's early days, but I am hopeful of it flourishing. The website provides a portal for people wanting to work as an interim "whatever" and where prospective employers can view candidates. I have high hopes for it and the apartment in Rome it will fund the purchase of.

Some bad news is we lost Tilley our dog last week. Tilley is the one in the picture. She hadn't had a good start to life, then we found her and she fell in love with My Beautiful and never let her out of her sight. She hated all other dogs but was great with people and she was so pretty. About 3 weeks ago we noticed she was losing weight and off her food and sure enough cancer had ravaged her body. She gave loads to us and taught me a lot about living in the moment, especially around food. I miss her terribly as does My Beautiful.

I was at Intergroup today and learned of the death of a fellow member from drugs and drink. He joined before I did, was very dogmatic in how to apply the programme, became a founder member of the god squad, and went round telling everyone they needed god, that is until the church he attended told him as a born again christian he could no longer be a drunk. To which he responded by going out and getting drunk for the next few years. He slipped around for more years than I can care to remember, working all the time and trying to stay sober, which at time he managed for some lengths. But there was always the inevitable. He was a nice man, who tried hard to make it happen and the world is worse for his loss.

It made me think about why people don't make it. There was something in this young man that strived a little too much to ensure that people believed his message, I guess more for him than them. A little like whistling in the dark or "act as if". It seemed more important than actually staying sober. Certainly church attendance, belief in god, god himself, long association with the fellowship didn't seem to help any. There was sporadic and incandescent attendance at meetings and I guess there is a clue, attendance at meetings and attitude, and acceptance. At the end of the day this really is a simple thing to achieve, just decide not to pick up a drink one day at a a time, and then keep doing that. Determination and persistence seem to help along with constant identification with others in meetings. It is so simple. So simple thousands seem unable to grasp it and there is the conundrum of the disease.

Take care all of you and have a good week.

at least that is over

2011-05-11T10:47:00.006+01:00

I have just arrived home after my operation to release a frozen right shoulder. I am right handed so you can imagine what an incapacity having the whole of your right side numbed is, and I am talking writing and typing here for those whoes minds are on a lower plane. So this will be short. The op seemed to go well apart from the anaethetist who had trouble getting the needle in for the first local sleep drug. For such a person to be struggling should have set alarm bells ringing but by that time I was telling god to look after My Beautiful, should he require my services on a full time basis.

After coming round I was having a little problem breathing which became much worse and rapidly so. It turned out that the nice anaethetist had frozen the nerves that operate the muscles that pump your lungs up and down and I'd also got what they said was a mucus plug in my left lung. So all in all it wasn't great but they sorted it. Beautiful arrived at the hopsital to take me home, just in time to witness the coomotion of all the docs and nurses trying to get me to breath, whioch wasn't good for her.

I went throught the NHS as I believe in it and we pay for it, but the NHS sent me to a private hospital. I have to see the building and food were way beyond the standards I would have found in the NHS hospital. I am not sure about the level of care though, it was very high and very professional and I have had similiar in NHS hopsitals, I have also had much worse in NHS hospitals and it begs the question if one hospital can do it why not all of them.

I have had some wonderful messages of welcome on my return to blogging and that was nice. To White Rabbit all I have to say about the offers from SB is Max Moseley. Need I say more. YOu would not be dissappointed as I am sure Max wasn't.

On a lighter note I saw the images of the two children of Andy and Fergie arriving for wills and kates wedding. Now I pay for these two and I am entitled to an opinion and all I can say is that it was real good of them to dress up in funnyhats and dresses for the occasion. I wonder if any of the servants proffered an opinion before they left for the day, if they did all I can say is that in breeding is alive and well.

and another thing!!!

2011-05-06T08:55:00.002+01:00

SB just wouldn't leave me alone so I,m back posting. You wouldn't believe the type of enticements she was offering, I can't go into detail, but enough to say that I am back posting.

Well it's been a while since i posted and there is not one ounce of guilt or regret. Just lost the habit of posting and got diverted by a few other projects that took up time. Nice to see some familiar tag names, I hope you are all well and I just know that you will all be heaving a sigh of relief that I have posted again.

Whats been happening??

The job finished, the UK sank deeper into the proverbial and people trusted the politicians even less. I've had a frozen shoulder which gets operated on next tuesday.

There has been lots of time for reflection and realisation. After been sacked along with everyone else the first thought was find something else to do, something that pays. Then a quote form Walden kept coming back to me "most men lead lives of quiet desperation" and I realised I was just walking back in to the same trap I walked in to when I was 16. Then an opportunity came up and I thought lets have a go. So I have jumped from the thought of a standard 9-5 job and decided to become a Mountain Guide. I'm already a volunteer park ranger so it isn't such a stretch. I've been accepted for assessment by a trail tour company and if I pass that then the next step will be to get a lot of people lost in the mountains.

I cannot describe how excited I feel at this prospect ( the guiding, not the getting people lost) I am very, very grateful to My Beautiful who just said, go for it, do it.

Life is good. I hope it is for you.

Take care all of you

2011-01-18T07:26:00.002Z

The year seems to be well underway. Work wise we all received our redundancy notices last week so we now know the outcome. I have had an idea about a workers co-operative which seems to have met with some acceptance so I will be working on the broad details over the next few days.

I went to the Region meeting last Sunday and the topic of Conference was discussed and what if any was it's importance. Conference does seem disconnected from the everyday member. Whenever I hear conference spoken about it is always with a sense of preening and privilege and pride. Yet group conscience meetings, and that's what conference is, are never spoken about in the same way. The language of conference is also a little elitist, with questions constructed in a manner that does not allow the uninitiated to immediately understand the meaning and reasoning of the questioner. It seems that a great expense is laid out for something that returns so little to the vast majority. The number of times that meetings have changed because of conference decisions can be counted on a couple of fingers in the time I have been in the fellowship.

And yet there does seem to be a place for conference, even if it is only to keep the board in check. A objective, conference in GB has been sadly lacking in, in recent years.

Another topic raised is the fellowships lack of money. Apparently, if i were not for literature sales we would not be solvent. The question comes to mind what are we spending money on if we need book sales to remain afloat. Surely, the correct way to conduct our affairs would be to cut our cloth accordingly. That is how a business would conduct its affairs.

Surprisingly, the number of members in the fellowship who attend UK meetings is just 30,000 which is not many when you consider the population. If it was pro rata with the US it should be 10 times as many. Yet alcohol is said by the health system to be the second biggest killer in the country. Makes a person wonder why the meetings are not held in sports halls rather than dingy little rooms in the bowels of a church.

Happy New Year to you all

2011-01-02T14:51:00.002Z

A happy new year to you all I type on my new laptop as I sit on the settee watching a run through of last year cataclysms. The laptop wasn't for xmas it filled a hole and frozen shoulder which has prevented me from typing words at my desk.

I have no idea what the year will bring except unemployment, for how long remains to be seen. I will also be taking My Beautiful to Paris in February for her 50th birthday, so that is something to look forward to. I think it will be a year of challenges and opportunities, often those are the same things.

Keeping balance will be important as will keeping a sense of humour.

A good thing to look forward to is spending time with my wifes father who has just moved next door to us. He's an interesting old character with a wealth of experience to tell me about. It will be nice seeing how our year unfolds.

To all of you out there I hope the year is kind to you and your loved ones.

Take care.

Days pass by

2010-12-17T16:45:00.006Z

The days have been passing by here in England. Snow has taken its toll of getting the day to day mundane things done. England never has, and I guess never will, get the hang of snow. The first snowflake brings the country to a halt, we seem ill prepared to deal with the effects of snow, or perhaps ill prepared to accept the changes we should make because of snow.

I've been attending my meetings and feeling that I am part of the fellowship which is nice. There has been no axe to grind or resentments to feed so life has been stable on the alkie front. Its a nice period to have, one which I know will change at some point, for better or worse who knows. But just relaxing back into the comfort of AA has been good. I have been working with a sponsee on step 6 and talking about how the decisions we make affect our lives for years to come sometimes forever. And that if we make those decisions based on being liked by people we are apt to trip up and end up resenting or worse drinking over what we perceived should have happened and didn't.

We are just off to next door to look at the couples house as they are leaving and we will rent it from them so that My Beautifuls father can live next door. It will be almost a year now since his wife died so the timing will be poignant. It will be good having him close by and good for Beautiful to be able to spend time with him on a daily basis. Its something to show gratitude for in the midst of job losses, illness and fear for the future.

We are both fine and getting on with our days, love is in the air constantly and that is both comforting and a blessing. So I guess in the scheme of things we don't have anything to grumble about.

Take care all of you and have a good weekend.

Whiteout

2010-12-04T17:55:00.004Z

I have been away from the posts for awhile, work and a little illness keeping me from the keyboard. It has given me some time for reflection on the state of the world and all that is of it. The haves continue to have more it seems. The organisation I am being sacked by has just appointed a new chief exec for the last dying 12 months at a salary higher than the PM's, equivalent to £600 per day, although she will be paid for 5 days per week she will only be working 2. The rest of us are eagerly awaiting our gruel allotment and to be told when we will be shoved out in to the cold.

My illness was a strange one. My Beautiful brought home one day and lovely little cough, with which she proceeded to spray liberally around the house countless little pockets of infected air and surface and goodness knows what. She coughed so much, it was disturbing my watching of the telly. Anyway, true to form, she didn't keep the delight to herself and succumbed last Friday. I think by the time I had got IT, it had mutated into a rare and unique form of new unidentified virus that no human has had to suffer before. I was gallant and strong so much so that My Beautiful as well as feeling guilty became worried that I really was ill, as I had stopped complaining for a whole two days. That friends is a measure of how ill I was.

We have had snow here and as always it brought the country to its knees. Conquerors do not need to develop weapons of mass destruction to conquer England, all you need to do is develop a snow making machine and we are done for. We have had a lot, not as much as some of you have probably, but a lot for us poor brits. Its melting now and so the next bit will be floods, fire and pestilence will surely follow.

Take care and have a good weekend

Old

2010-11-17T21:34:00.003Z

I was fifty one years old yesterday. To be over half a century old seems to me against all natural orders. To say I am shocked, and surprised would be an understatement.

And that is all I am going to say on the subject of being fifty one.

Have a good week young un's

Criticise the old

2010-11-14T07:56:00.003Z

Mary's recent post prompted some thoughts of my own on longevity and sobriety. It was also prompted by recent shares at the beginners meeting I have been attending for these last few months.

There is as most of us know an unspoken rule in AA that you do not mention how long you have been sober, especially if it means saying years in to double digits. I've never seen this rule written down anywhere nor heard it mentioned in a meeting as part of the opening format but it is there. I think for myself it stems from an inability to state the plain truth without feeling as though a person were preening and also courting the resentment of younger members. In other words it's about humility, or lack of. Steps 6&7 spring to mind here. Its about being able to state the simple truth, without that affecting who I am or how I see myself . So, you will find that my sobriety date is placed at the top of my blog and that I am some way past 22 years of sobriety.

Now I never set out to be 22years and a bit sober, never even thought about that, but one day at a time as they say, that's the way it has turned out, and I guess that's the same for most people.

For some reason this seems to rankle a certain section of our society, mainly in truth people who have maintained sobriety for a few years, or months or even weeks. This group it seems have no compunction in saying sobriety isn't about how long you have been sober, we are only sober for today. Which IS true. But then they always tag on a little more and complain that they are feeling got at for not having, indeed wanting a sponsor. Not having DONE the steps,whatever that means, but they are content with step one and not drinking, but feel that people are getting at them when those people share about trying to practice the steps in their lives. They don't do that and no one has the right to tell them to do that or make them feel guilty for not doing it.

I agree that in these parts the birthday share did get out of hand, mainly propogated by people hwo had a deep desire to be liked. So when a person had their birthday, they went on tour from meeting to meeting, spreading words of wisdom and receiving untold plaudits, mainly from the same people, and consuming vast quantities of chocolate cake. It did get out of hand and has I hope been curtailed somewhat.

As an aside, the best birthday share I ever heard was of a woman who was celebrating 6 years sobriety and was known for her depressing shares. As she came to the end of yet another catalogue of misery, it never changed, she stated quite matter of factly, that the only pleasure she had left in her life was the bottle of beer shandy she drank every saturday night. A silence as deep as a coal mine fell on the meeting and was only broken by the secretary opening the meeitng for sharing. At the end, we celebrated the womans grip on total abstinence by singing happy birthday and eating chocolate cake. Such is the stiff upper lip of the British, never let the truth get in the way of doing the right thing.

To wrap this up, before it becomes a diatribe on the ills of the "Young". There was a time, when I first came in, that you paid attention to those who had more experience, not because you wanted to but because it was good manners and you had been brought up that way. So I sat there and listened and thought they were stupid old farts, who had lived their lives and what did they know about today. But they were, invariably older than me, had stayed sober far far longer than me, seemed to know more about the fellowship and AA and not drinking than I did, so I kept my thoughts to myself and my mouth firmly shut. I did what they said to do, because that was my duty, I owed these people respect, they had after all saved my life. I may not have liked them, may have even resented them, but my upbringing, the time I was born in, had taught me never to eat with my mouth open, only speak when you are spoken to and always respect your elders.

So I did as I was told and twenty two years and some months later of a very, very happy life, I still am.

Have a good weekend and take care.

Lunchtime Bash

2010-11-04T07:24:00.002Z

This lunchtime I am off to the head office where my admin girls are having a lunch time party. They are all leaving, the organisation and as a thank you to everyone who they have worked with have set up this little Doo.

Its a nice thing to do, they are nice girls , so I guess that fits. They are the kind of people who will always talk to you, always listen, do a good job, but not take life too seriously. So it will be nice to see them off.

Yesterday I spent the afternoon with a client who has an outdoor gear business. They are really nice people and it is good to work with them. I think as well that they may really have something going. Towards the end of the meeting they aslked me if I could help them on a more formal basis, ie, non exec. I was very flattered and would love to be involved. I asked them to go away and think about remuneration etc and what they could afford or how. They asked if we could have dinner one night and i think that would be a great idea. Somehow I feel everything before in my life has been leading up to this. I hope I am right.

I guess over the water you are all coming down from the mid terms. Do you really have elections every 2 years!! I could think of nothing worse here. I hope you all got what you wanted, whatever that was. Unfortunately, for me, Christine O D does not seem to have reached the finish line, which is a pity, I was hoping to see more of her. She looks just like the kind of woman who would give you one hell of a beating in the bedroom and leave you completely exhausted. Just the kind of thing you would pay good money for in other circles.

Lastly, here is, in my opinion, the nonsense that is spewed forth by the European Court of Human Rights. It concerns a man convicted of axing an old woman to death who then comlained he was not given the right to vote in elections and this infringed hi human rights and a court ruling that he should be able to vote. Listen to his argument in the interview with the clearly incredulous Andrew Neale. If I ever wanted to have a good argument put in front of me for the death penalty this is it. I am sure that there are lots of legal stuff and precedents that work against the death penalty, but people like this really are low life. A fellow blogger who is in the legal profession may have a more informed view and I would certainly bow to that, but emotionally, they should just throw the switch on this man. Follow the link

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-11686283

Have a good week all of you and take care.

Primary Purpose

2010-10-31T06:19:00.002Z

Saturday I passed my final assessment to become a National Park Ranger. I cannot believe that I have done it and what is more I scored top marks. My Beautiful took me out last night for a celebratory meal and then on to watch the facebook film which was enjoyable.

Next weekend I will be going out on patrol on my own, which is fantastic.

Another odd phone call was received the other night, this time the person said they were from a local meeting, although I have never heard their voice or recognise their name. Same as before the call was teminated abroptly by the caller when questioned about why they were phoning.

I'm fairly certain this is the primary purpose mob, and its starting to piss me off quite honestly. Not the phone calls but the prospect of these people taking over the fellowship and me having nowhere to go.

I have been to one PP meeting in the early days, because I believed it was not for me to judge unless I had direct experience. It is not AA as I know it. It is someones interpretation of what AA should be about in their opinion.

I think it is restrictive and the motives are not the motives of the fellowship. At present I am unsure what to do, the meetings are small in number at the moment, but they are growing and this seeming recruitment drive is a disturbing new development.

If anyone across the water has experience of the Primary Purpose Groups and wants to share their thoughts, whatever that may be then I would welcome them.

Take care all of you and have a good weekend.

The Anorak has come out.

2010-10-28T18:21:00.003+01:00

I have just found Google Analytics. My life, such as it is, is now complete. I cannot tell you how much joy this service brings to someone bordering on aspergers and mild tourettes. I have spent the whole day playing with this thing and cannot wait to see the results tomorrow. I may get up at 00.01 just to view.

You can tell My Beautiful is away can't you. She's gone to her fathers with shield and sword to fight the wicked solicitor who's tree is knocking over a wall.

Which also means tonight I will be gorging on fish and chips, with mushy peas, both heavily ladened with salt and vinegar, enough to make the taste buds wince, bread and butter and lots of tea. I will eat this whilst watching the Hound of The Baskervilles with Peter Cushing. Not the best I grant you, no one can beat Basil Rathbone for doing Sherlock, but pretty good all the same.

If you are reading this My Beautiful, I will be in bed for 9.30 after eating a salad. I have just made all the above up, just to make me sound more interesting and the man about the house, which we both know is Oscar the cat, who has been sick again.

One of those weeks

2010-10-22T19:02:00.002+01:00

Its been one of those weeks as they say. Monday I went to the meeting at work to be told that all those saved on friday from losing their job, would now, with the rest be losing it again by march. Its an odd way to treat people and then to be asked to keep up the good work seems just a trifling insulting.

Rest of the week

1. Last friday I also slashed my thumb with a stanley knife whilst trying to lay carpet tiles. The medical centre 20 yards over the road refused to help, even to call a paramedic. Eventually I managed to call, which was difficult as I was having to keep a lot of pressure on my thumb to try and staunch the bleeding, as I had, it turned out, slashed through a vein. Eventually after passing out and ending in hospital I was given 4 stitches and sent on my way.

2. Monday sacked again, thats twice in 3 months.

3. Wednesday started a bonfire to clear the garden. Spotted long piece of wood and lent it against the steps to snap it in half with my foot. Did the karate chop with foot, one end of wood sprang up and smacked me in the mouth, leaving me dazed, staggering around a bonfire and a gash in my chin, which gushed blood. I didn't bother with the medical centre this time just staggered around holding my chin and calling myself a fuckwit.

4. Wednesday afternoon. Spotted odd shaped thing in the bonfire, bent down to pick it up. Thing was red hot, what a surprise!!!, and burnt a hole through thumb and finger. Spent next 20 minutes with hand in water cursing myself. Went to meeting and spent whole meeting with hand in a bucket of water and the odd thing was, no one asked me why.

Now I know that I am not a genius, but Im not moron either. (what's that) Only a moron would put his hand in a fire!!!. Well I grant you its not the sharpest thing I have done recently. In fact I seem to have become Buster Keeton, or is that laurel and hardy.

Anyhoos as SB would say its been one of those weeks and no one must laugh you mother *******.

I hope you all have a good weekend.

Take care ( from an expert)

An Odd Phone Call

2010-10-19T07:53:00.002+01:00

I had an odd phone call the other night. On answering a man asked if he was speaking to me and that he had found my details in the "Where To Find". He told me his name was the same as mine and then asked if he would be correct in assuming I had been around for a long time. Yes I said becoming sceptical. He then said would he be right in assuming I thought that scoungers on benefits should get a job and that wa spart of the programme, and would he be right in saying that I was sick of hearing about drug addictaion, food addiction and any thing else that was not to do with alcoholism being talked about in the rooms, and would he be right and syaing that AA as I knew it was marginalised and I was becoming more and more isolated.

I said that the only reason someone would use the Where To Find book and get my number out of it, is if they wanted to get to a meeting, that was the only reason someone should phone me.

With that he put the phone down. I checked the number and it was withheld. I guess this was a recruitment drive by the Primary Purpose Big Book Study. This people are starting to cut a swathe through AA in the UK. It will all end in tears and death for some, mark my words. I have seen this think before, yes, I have been around along time.

True the message has become watered down, but better to change the message inside than try and destroy the very thing that changed us.

Last friday I was told I was to be kept in employment which was nice, 125 people lost their jobs that day. Yesterday, Monday, we were all called in to be told that as of March next year the company will be reducing down from 300 to 100 so another 200 people will lose their jobs and that by the following december the company will close. I think its the gradually unremitting degradation that is getting to most people and it is showing in different ways.

Its a sad difficult time for all, the kind of times when a persons true character shows through.

Have a good week all of you.

I Wish I Could Talk To My Father

2010-10-08T07:08:00.003+01:00

I've been thinking of my father lately. He died in 81 after a long illness with cancer, he was 58 and maybe me turning 50 has increased my thoughts of him. I wish I could sit and talk with him, just about the things that are happening in our day. I guess what I am saying is that I would like to have got to know him, other than a father, more as a friend.

For many years I blamed him for how I was brought up, anger may even be the word. His death propelled my drinking in to new highs, or is that lows, it was how I dealt with the aftermath. My mother, fearing what the neighbours would say, forbade us to mention his illness whilst he was alive, and even he never knew the facts. Its a stressful way for a 22 year old to live, for my 28 year old brother it proved too stressful and he took off, only returning near the end. So ours was not a house of emotions, which didn't help the drinking much.

After he died I spent eleven years not mourning, but blaming him for all my problems, how I saw the world. It's not a recipe to follow in recovery and led to clinical depression, which apparently, according to the psychologist was caused by the emotional abuse as a child. Something I blamed him again for. Then one day I stopped blaming him and started to love him, it wasn't a conscious decision it just happened.

I guess he did the best he could, and I only see that now with the perspective of my age, have I as a father done any better? no is the answer to that. But the more I think about my childhood, the older I get, the more I see that it wasn't my father who was the big bad wolf, it was my mother and brother, who worked as a team for themselves. Here's an example from later in life.

My ex wife, tried to stab me, puncturing my clothing three times, I managed to escape and get to my mothers. You would think this would be a place of safety, somewhere I could be protected. When my mother heard my tale, she responded by saying that I best be careful when I returned home that night. You really have to stop and think about that sentence and what it means.

These days I have little to do with my mother and brother, the card at christmas and birthdays is as close as we get. I'm ok with that, but lately I have been wishing I could sit and talk with dad, just talk about stuff. For I realise now that the one who cared for me most, was the one I thought cared least.

Take care all of you and have a good weekend.

The End

2010-10-01T09:13:00.002+01:00

The management of my organisation, having had everyone apply for their own jobs over the last 3 months, called everyone in to a meeting yesterday to inform us all that the organisation is shutting and everyone will be out of work.

The amount of resentment this news has created can not be underestimated, to make people suffer the stress of applying for their own work and justifying why they should be kept on, then the day after the submissions had to be in to be told everyone will lose their job is without doubt one of the worst pieces of management I have ever come across.

Singing for supper

2010-09-24T08:13:00.002+01:00

People I work with are having to apply for their own jobs at present. In england we call this singing for our supper, you may call it the same. After years of doing a job and not being told you are doing anything wrong, they now have to prove they are good enough to keep doing the job. So it comes down to a piece of paper written by you and saying what a fantastic person you are and you are so much better than all your colleagues. Its not the english way, we don't do self aggrandisement, nor kicking our colleagues in the balls. There's a lot of tension about.

Im off to a meeting tonight, giving support to a meeting thats beginning to hit hard times. It happens, meetings ebb and flow, often for no apparent reason. My initial view was that maybe the meeting should close if its not getting the people. Then I heard about what an old timer had said, that it should close, it was a bad meeting, started by bad people and for a bad reason. Well that changed my mind, now I will throw in all the support I can. There are meetings I would never go to, because I think they are bad for my sobriety, but I would never, ever go around saying this, and if I needed a meeting and it was the only one available, you would find me there.

There are no bad metings as the saying goes. So hopefully, the meeting will survive and start to prosper again.

This weekend I have nothing doing, so its relaxation time, pottering away on the computer, trying to learn the intricacies of Dreamweaver.

Take care all of you and have a good weekend.

Brothers

2010-09-16T17:40:00.003+01:00

Above is the Milliband brothers, currently vying for the spot of leader of the opposition for the next decade or so. They don't look like brothers, don't even sound like brothers, maybe someone should interview their mom, just in case we have unauthenticated brothership here. They look, and act, like a bedroom set from MFI. For people who do not know about MFI, think of the worst kind of chipboard furniture in one of your out of town sheds. That's MFI, needless to say as soon as the financial proverbial hit the fan, MFI exited stage left, along with all the wardrobes and bedside cabinets. Only to re-surface as the "NEW" (don't mention the failed old new) labour.

See here's the thing. Me and my brother, we don't see that much of each other, wedding and funerals, we send cards containing the same amount of money to each other, which seems pretty pointless. We have different interests, I have no idea what his are, but they sure aren't the same as mine. I' m the cultured one, I once went on a skiing holiday, hated it, but I went. But and here is the thing, we look pretty much the same now we are getting old, we sound the same. have similar hang ups, except the booze of course, only me got that one. So why do Ed and David Milliband sound so different.

It's a good question to ask, maybe someone should ask it.

On a different note all is good here. The government is gradually cranking up the pressure on the public, bit by bit another part of the nation( read the north) goes quietly away and dies. The mp's are currently shooting from the hip at anything that could possibly save them money, tax payers, the public, workers, consumers, motorists, unemployed, nurses, police, firemen. Fortunately they are leaving the bankers alone, which is nice because we were a little beastly to them back in 2008-2009. Which was wrong, because as it turns out its them that make all the money, so those of us that don't ( everyone else) should be thankful.

We are off to a wedding tomorrow, two love birds who found love in the happy club are getting hitched in an old stately home. Who says it doesn't get better. If they have as much love and happiness as me and My Beautiful, then they will be very happy.

Have a good weekend all of you and take care

Whisky Galore

2010-09-09T20:15:00.004+01:00

Whisky Galore, one of my favourite films, well it would be wouldn't it.

Well we are back and as I write this the onions are gently frying and the potatoes gently simmering for mash and onion gravy in front of the telly.

We had a wonderful time, the world changed for a while and that was nice. I wanted to show you what it was like so click on the title and that's where we have been and it hasn't changed one iota.

We relaxed, walked, caught fish, yes finally and we climbed a Monroe too.

Now we are back in to life as it is and who knows what can happen. I'm glad to be back in touch with my blog, its been a long break, but one I enjoyed, and thank you SB for keeping an eye out for me it is so nice of you and that makes me smile about unmet friends.

More posts to come as soon as Ive got the photos sorted.

Take care all of you, especially you SB

Our 30 pieces of silver

2010-08-13T20:31:00.003+01:00

We are off on our annual holiday to Scotland tomorrow morning. We will be spending 14 days on the west coast up near the very top of britain at Cape Wrath. I always thought Cape Wrath was in the US, but found I was wrong. Perhaps you do have a Cape Wrath there too, who knows. We will walk and fish and climb some mountains. Talk, eat, cook,( hopefully the fish we caught), write and reflect on the time we are living in.

Today I received the letter from my organisation telling me that I may not be employed for much longer that my work is at risk of being made redundant. There is very little I can do about it, mainly because we as a nation have become like sheep and willingly walk in to the slaughter house, I am just as guilty as my fellow countrymen. The people who have, and made the mess in the first place, now have more. The people who did not have, and just did as they were told, now have less. It’s a world where right is not paramount, where greed really is good, where the majority are reduced to figures, numbers on a piece of paper, that are then used to justity the haves gaining more and the have nots receiving less.

The picture is a photo of one of my heroes. Jimmy Reid was a trade unionist, communist, labour party member and like Arthur a great orator, perhaps one of the last great orators. He rose to prominence when the government of the day, ( a tory one, just like today) decided to close the shipyard he worked in because the people were not profitable enough. He objected and fought the closure in such a principled and dignified way that the yard stayed open and eventually it led to the governments fall.

In 1972 he became rector of Glasgow University and as was customery he gave an inaugral speech to the student audience. It became one of the great speeches of the century, by a common working man, to the youth of the day. It was so influential the New York Times printed it in full and allied it to the Gettysburg Address. The speech is as pertinent today as it was then, that is a measure of how far we have come as a society and as human beings.

To read it, to hear his voice again brings tears to my eyes and a lump to my throat, because we threw away what he tried to give us and sold our soul, for a colour telly, a holiday in spain and a new car with air con.

Here is the speech in full, I hope you read it, and I hope it moves you,

"Alienation is the precise and correctly applied word for describing the major social problem in Britain today. People feel alienated by society. In some intellectual circles it is treated almost as a new phenomenon. It has, however, been with us for years. What I believe is true is that today it is more widespread, more pervasive than ever before. Let me right at the outset define what I mean by alienation. It is the cry of men who feel themselves the victims of blind economic forces beyond their control. It's the frustration of ordinary people excluded from the processes of decision-making. The feeling of despair and hopelessness that pervades people who feel with justification that they have no real say in shaping or determining their own destinies.
Many may not have rationalised it. May not even understand, may not be able to articulate it. But they feel it. It therefore conditions and colours their social attitudes. Alienation expresses itself in different ways in different people. It is to be found in what our courts often describe as the criminal antisocial behaviour of a section of the community. It is expressed by those young people who want to opt out of society, by drop-outs, the so-called maladjusted, those who seek to escape permanently from the reality of society through intoxicants and narcotics. Of course, it would be wrong to say it was the sole reason for these things. But it is a much greater factor in all of them than is generally recognised.
Society and its prevailing sense of values leads to another form of alienation. It alienates some from humanity. It partially de-humanises some people, makes them insensitive, ruthless in their handling of fellow human beings, self-centred and grasping. The irony is, they are often considered normal and well-adjusted. It is my sincere contention that anyone who can be totally adjusted to our society is in greater need of psychiatric analysis and treatment than anyone else. They remind me of the character in the novel, Catch 22, the father of Major Major. He was a farmer in the American Mid-West. He hated suggestions for things like medi-care, social services, unemployment benefits or civil rights. He was, however, an enthusiast for the agricultural policies that paid farmers for not bringing their fields under cultivation. From the money he got for not growing alfalfa he bought more land in order not to grow alfalfa. He became rich. Pilgrims came from all over the state to sit at his feet and learn how to be a successful non-grower of alfalfa. His philosophy was simple. The poor didn't work hard enough and so they were poor. He believed that the good Lord gave him two strong hands to grab as much as he could for himself. He is a comic figure. But think – have you not met his like here in Britain? Here in Scotland? I have.
It is easy and tempting to hate such people. However, it is wrong. They are as much products of society, and of a consequence of that society, human alienation, as the poor drop-out. They are losers. They have lost the essential elements of our common humanity. Man is a social being. Real fulfilment for any person lies in service to his fellow men and women. The big challenge to our civilisation is not Oz, a magazine I haven't seen, let alone read. Nor is it permissiveness, although I agree our society is too permissive. Any society which, for example, permits over one million people to be unemployed is far too permissive for my liking. Nor is it moral laxity in the narrow sense that this word is generally employed – although in a sense here we come nearer to the problem. It does involve morality, ethics, and our concept of human values. The challenge we face is that of rooting out anything and everything that distorts and devalues human relations.
Let me give two examples from contemporary experience to illustrate the point.
Recently on television I saw an advert. The scene is a banquet. A gentleman is on his feet proposing a toast. His speech is full of phrases like "this full-bodied specimen". Sitting beside him is a young, buxom woman. The image she projects is not pompous but foolish. She is visibly preening herself, believing that she is the object of the bloke's eulogy. Then he concludes – "and now I give...", then a brand name of what used to be described as Empire sherry. Then the laughter. Derisive and cruel laughter. The real point, of course, is this. In this charade, the viewers were obviously expected to identify not with the victim but with her tormentors.
The other illustration is the widespread, implicit acceptance of the concept and term "the rat race". The picture it conjures up is one where we are scurrying around scrambling for position, trampling on others, back-stabbing, all in pursuit of personal success. Even genuinely intended, friendly advice can sometimes take the form of someone saying to you, "Listen, you look after number one." Or as they say in London, "Bang the bell, Jack, I'm on the bus."
To the students [of Glasgow University] I address this appeal. Reject these attitudes. Reject the values and false morality that underlie these attitudes. A rat race is for rats. We're not rats. We're human beings. Reject the insidious pressures in society that would blunt your critical faculties to all that is happening around you, that would caution silence in the face of injustice lest you jeopardise your chances of promotion and self-advancement. This is how it starts, and before you know where you are, you're a fully paid-up member of the rat-pack. The price is too high. It entails the loss of your dignity and human spirit. Or as Christ put it, "What doth it profit a man if he gain the whole world and suffer the loss of his soul?"
Profit is the sole criterion used by the establishment to evaluate economic activity. From the rat race to lame ducks. The vocabulary in vogue is a give-away. It's more reminiscent of a human menagerie than human society. The power structures that have inevitably emerged from this approach threaten and undermine our hard-won democratic rights. The whole process is towards the centralisation and concentration of power in fewer and fewer hands. The facts are there for all who want to see. Giant monopoly companies and consortia dominate almost every branch of our economy. The men who wield effective control within these giants exercise a power over their fellow men which is frightening and is a negation of democracy.
Government by the people for the people becomes meaningless unless it includes major economic decision-making by the people for the people. This is not simply an economic matter. In essence it is an ethical and moral question, for whoever takes the important economic decisions in society ipso facto determines the social priorities of that society.
From the Olympian heights of an executive suite, in an atmosphere where your success is judged by the extent to which you can maximise profits, the overwhelming tendency must be to see people as units of production, as indices in your accountants' books. To appreciate fully the inhumanity of this situation, you have to see the hurt and despair in the eyes of a man suddenly told he is redundant, without provision made for suitable alternative employment, with the prospect in the West of Scotland, if he is in his late forties or fifties, of spending the rest of his life in the Labour Exchange. Someone, somewhere has decided he is unwanted, unneeded, and is to be thrown on the industrial scrap heap. From the very depth of my being, I challenge the right of any man or any group of men, in business or in government, to tell a fellow human being that he or she is expendable.
The concentration of power in the economic field is matched by the centralisation of decision-making in the political institutions of society. The power of Parliament has undoubtedly been eroded over past decades, with more and more authority being invested in the Executive. The power of local authorities has been and is being systematically undermined. The only justification I can see for local government is as a counter- balance to the centralised character of national government.
Local government is to be restructured. What an opportunity, one would think, for de-centralising as much power as possible back to the local communities. Instead, the proposals are for centralising local government. It's once again a blue-print for bureaucracy, not democracy. If these proposals are implemented, in a few years when asked "Where do you come from?" I can reply: "The Western Region." It even sounds like a hospital board.
It stretches from Oban to Girvan and eastwards to include most of the Glasgow conurbation. As in other matters, I must ask the politicians who favour these proposals – where and how in your calculations did you quantify the value of a community? Of community life? Of a sense of belonging? Of the feeling of identification? These are rhetorical questions. I know the answer. Such human considerations do not feature in their thought processes.
Everything that is proposed from the establishment seems almost calculated to minimise the role of the people, to miniaturise man. I can understand how attractive this prospect must be to those at the top. Those of us who refuse to be pawns in their power game can be picked up by their bureaucratic tweezers and dropped in a filing cabinet under "M" for malcontent or maladjusted. When you think of some of the high flats around us, it can hardly be an accident that they are as near as one could get to an architectural representation of a filing cabinet.
If modern technology requires greater and larger productive units, let's make our wealth-producing resources and potential subject to public control and to social accountability. Let's gear our society to social need, not personal greed. Given such creative re-orientation of society, there is no doubt in my mind that in a few years we could eradicate in our country the scourge of poverty, the underprivileged, slums, and insecurity.
Even this is not enough. To measure social progress purely by material advance is not enough. Our aim must be the enrichment of the whole quality of life. It requires a social and cultural, or if you wish, a spiritual transformation of our country. A necessary part of this must be the restructuring of the institutions of government and, where necessary, the evolution of additional structures so as to involve the people in the decision-making processes of our society. The so-called experts will tell you that this would be cumbersome or marginally inefficient. I am prepared to sacrifice a margin of efficiency for the value of the people's participation. Anyway, in the longer term, I reject this argument.
To unleash the latent potential of our people requires that we give them responsibility. The untapped resources of the North Sea are as nothing compared to the untapped resources of our people. I am convinced that the great mass of our people go through life without even a glimmer of what they could have contributed to their fellow human beings. This is a personal tragedy. It's a social crime. The flowering of each individual's personality and talents is the pre-condition for everyone's development.
In this context education has a vital role to play. If automation and technology is accompanied as it must be with a full employment, then the leisure time available to man will be enormously increased. If that is so, then our whole concept of education must change. The whole object must be to equip and educate people for life, not solely for work or a profession. The creative use of leisure, in communion with and in service to our fellow human beings, can and must become an important element in self-fulfilment.
Universities must be in the forefront of development, must meet social needs and not lag behind them. It is my earnest desire that this great University of Glasgow should be in the vanguard, initiating changes and setting the example for others to follow. Part of our educational process must be the involvement of all sections of the university on the governing bodies. The case for student representation is unanswerable. It is inevitable.
My conclusion is to re-affirm what I hope and certainly intend to be the spirit permeating this address. It's an affirmation of faith in humanity. All that is good in man's heritage involves recognition of our common humanity, an unashamed acknowledgement that man is good by nature. Burns expressed it in a poem that technically was not his best, yet captured the spirit. In "Why should we idly waste our prime...":

"The golden age, we'll then revive, each man shall be a brother,
In harmony we all shall live and till the earth together,
In virtue trained, enlightened youth shall move each fellow creature,
And time shall surely prove the truth that man is good by nature."

It's my belief that all the factors to make a practical reality of such a world are maturing now. I would like to think that our generation took mankind some way along the road towards this goal. It's a goal worth fighting for."

Have a great weekend all of you and take care.

How to be Lucky part 2

2010-08-11T16:47:00.003+01:00

Today I along with 19 others who are only a small part of the chosen ones who may or may not be shoved in to the pool of unemployment, attended the seminar on "How to be Lucky". I have voiced my incredulity at such a choice of seminar title before, it seems to be a little crass to me.

Anyhoos, on with how to be lucky. Its all about the mind you see, how optimistic or pesimistic you are. Oh and also about the vocabulary we use. Under no circumstances must we mention the elephant ( loss of job, wages, house, family, dignity etc). If we have to mention such a terrible thing, we shall call it something innocuous like, shifting down, reevaluating ones priorities, downsizing, and the worst OPPORTUNITY WINDOW.

You see its all about what we can control. Those of you readers who are part of the happy club, will now be shaking their heads and muttering the words un manageable, un manageable. But I digress, we have to focus on what we CAN control says the lady being paid £1500 for 2 hours work. To do this we have to recognise our responsibility and ACCEPT it. ACCEPTANCE is the key. ( For those readers who have led lives of quiet contemplation and never ripped the doors off the kitchen units, lost you car because you could not remember where you left it, lost whole days and weeks of time because you cannot remember it, been thrown out of the matrimonial home, lived on a bench,drank - thrown up - drank some more as if it was perfectly normal, the word ACCEPTANCE is pretty key to me, for one thing it stops me from going off the deep end, I just thought I'd make that clear, you may not have identified with the feelings, thoughts or words. If you did identify, then you are either a member of the happy club, or should be a member).

Back to acceptance. How can we accept things, and what should we accept the woman asks. Silence came the reply. Lights , powerpoint slide, action. This says the woman is how we need to accept pointing to the screen, on which the words spelled the legend

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can and the wisdon to know the difference. Only she had mixed up some of the words.

Of course she is right, of course she is. The amazing thing is that my organisation paid this woman £1500 to tell me something that costs me £1 a night and is always with me on a small piece of card that cost me 10p.

Its amazing what the fellowship can provide for us and how if we choose too we can apply the programme in ALL our lives.

Take care all of you and have a good week

Bringing it all crashing down

2010-08-10T06:54:00.002+01:00

I have the ability to bring all that is good in my life crashing down around me. Let me rephrase that. I have a tendency to bring all that is good in my life crashing down around me.

I was reminded of this particular talent whilst watching the film "Dammed United" about the football manager Brian Clough, popularly known as "The greatest manager England never had". This man had real talent, bordering on genius and he produced the goods as well, two European Championships, back to back, numerous league titles and good football. Yet a glittering career ended in alcoholism, relegation and death.

Thinking on this it struck me that we are not that different, in fact, none of the fellowship people I know are that far removed from Brian. Take me for instance.

Belligerent, dogmatic, hard working, successful, there come a point in any part of my life when for reasons as yet not clear to me I will bring it all crashing down around me. It is often a process which starts some months before and include rationalisation, grandiosity, superiority, inferiority, resentments, anger, fear and pride. The climb to the top of the hill, or out of the gutter never brings out these characteristics, it is always once having reached the top and savoured the promised land that the devil in me rises and without thought for others, all must be destroyed. This often brings with it humiliation and scorn, which makes me wonder if these public figures are the real reason that I follow this cycle. Look at me. look at me!!

It is a cycle too and that makes me wonder if there is a natural cycle to my mind, one that gets bored with the banality of success and needs to feel again. Perhaps, and this is more probable, it is my lack of maturity, which at 50 should now be fully developed, but which clearly isn't. The choices I often make are based on defective assumptions about me and the world, hence the margin of successful outcomes is much reduced. Maybe this lies at the heart of my ability to bring all around me to a point where it resembles the ashes one sees the morning after a bonfire party.

Oddly, last night we read and shared about Step 4 and never before has any of the above really ended upon the page, when I have done that step. But I wonder, maybe there is some deep down psychological foul up that promotes me from hero to zero on a regular basis. I wonder if the cycle is natural, can it be broken?

Have a good week all of you and take care.

Job Cuts

2010-08-06T16:28:00.003+01:00

They announced today that my organisation is to see job cuts of around 30% meaning 125 will lose their jobs. There are no specifics yet, but it will be a grim time for all. The last day at work for these people will be just days before christmas. It will mean hardship for the young with families especially. They will be sending letters out to all those who will be threatened on the 12th of August. For those not thoroughly English the 12th is a significant day for the English country gent. It marks the beginning of the shooting season so the timing of the letters is pretty poignant. The letters will arrive at their home on the 13th, which is a Friday, so its unlucky for some.

Talking of luck. The organisation has named the wholesale sacking of a workforce "The Futures Project" which is a paradox seen as those chosen will have no future. They have also employed consultants at great expense to run workshops for those been affected by the loss of their jobs. The workshops are named " How to be lucky"!!! You couldn't make this stuff up and get it published in a comic. But I swear this is all true.

I'm enjoying my meetings and sharing well. There seems to be a connection with my inner self that was not there before. I don't know whether it is the uncertainty or an apathy of the futility of it all or maybe just acceptance. I sat in the car park this morning waiting to go into the meeting and I thought to myself I am 50 years old and I am walking into a room to be told I am no longer required. I felt like a kid at school who'd was in trouble for breaking a window with the football. It cannot be right to be a grown man and feeling like that. I must do somehting about it all.

Tomorrow I am off to see the footie we play Lincoln City at home. Lincoln is a nice place with a lovely cathedral that was the setting for th Da Vinci Code, other than that it has nothing going for it. Just like Rotherham.

I watched the "Dammed United" and a documentary about their manager Brian Clough, the greatest manager England never had, and he was. He propelled his team Nottingham Forect to great feats never nefore seen, European Champions twice running the first ever to do it. When he went to Notts it was in the bottom of the second division and no hopers. Drink got him in the end and he brought it all crashing down upon him, eventually dying as a result of his drinking. He was a great man and achieved more than most. He was also an individual and not afraid to speak his mind, which got him in to hot water with some and endeared him to others. I am in the latter camp. Here he is.....http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-Glr_pdPF0&feature=related

Hope you have a nice weekend.

News Item in the local news paper saturday

2010-08-01T09:49:00.003+01:00

News In Brief: Resurfacing at crematorium

Sounds like it could be a Thriller!!!

Hope you are all having a good weekend. The bathroom is almost there now, some more pics soon.

Takae care

Still Here

2010-07-28T07:54:00.002+01:00

Its been a while since I posted. The bathroom renovations have been taking up time and our office at home had to be dismantled to take part of it, computers and desks to a trade show my Beautiful was taking part in. I haven't had the computer for over a week and it felt painful at first, but then after a day or too, I didn't miss it, found myself doing other things. This could be a slippery slope.

I've had some good news yesterday. I went to the eye hospital and the consultant said the new medication had arrested the deterioration in my eyesight and that he was pleased with the progress. I have to see him in another 4 months and then they will see what needs to be done.
This is great news for me, I haven't slept very well thinking about the outcome of the visit and the possibility that my eyesight may not be able to be saved. I slept well last night for the first time in a couple of weeks.

We were looking at tradition 7 this week at my step meeting. The main share a sponsee of mine talked about how we should be self supporting in our group officers as well. The group needs a Secretary, GSR, Literature, one man is currently doing it all. It was a good point and one I have never considered. The discussion went on to working for a living rather than spending time on benefits. Being on benefits has become a badge of honor in the fellowship round these parts. It never used to be that way. When we discussed this at another meeting I happened to mention that for me it would be scrounging to claim benefits, that I would rather be employed. That's how I have always viewed it. I was pounced on by one person, who happens to be on benefits and told a story about another member who hadn't worked in 20 years but who had helped many people in recovery. I sat there thinking, " he needed to get a job, that's what he should be doing."

I don't think that claiming benefits when you can work is part of the programme. There is no chapter to the benefit office in the big book, but there is one titled, "To the employer". I think that gives a clue as to how we should work the programme. There are people who through terrible circumstances are unable to work, but these are few and far between. I've worked with people who are blind, deaf, dumb, in wheel chairs, have lost children or partners, have terrible illnesses, even dying, so I don't think we have any claim on not working, just because we cannot handle drink.

It also seems to fly against the practice of attraction rather than promotion. How attractive is it to a newcomer, if the whole room is on benefits. I guess its attractive to the person who wants to be on benefits, but not the workers. This wearing it as a badge is something new, I don't know if the coming economic storm is starting to put fear into the claimants as the benefit system is one that will be looked at very closely, maybe they are getting scared they may have to work.

That's it from me for now.

Take care all of you and have a good week.

The latest installment (of tiles)

2010-07-17T19:44:00.003+01:00

Here are the latest pics. The marble is from Vietnam which is good because thats where we had part of our honeymoon. Its been a little like puling teeth with blades of grass the last two days, lots of cutting and not much progress along the walls. Beautiful has been resplendant in her work clothes, tile adhesive and marble dust smudging her gorgeous features.

More pics here

hope you are all having a good weeekend

Onwards and upwards and sideways too.

2010-07-15T19:59:00.003+01:00

Things are progressing as they say. The tiles are lemon marble which has a nice grain and is one hell of a pain to cut, hard and soft at the same time. Go figure.

Hope you are all well.

Hi Ho its off to work we go

2010-07-12T21:05:00.005+01:00

Well we started the refurbishment of the bathroom today. It has only taken 5 years to get round to, which when you think that my business was luxury bathroom installations, is pretty good going.

I'll keep posting pics along the way. Here is what the bathroo looked like before we started to day, in fact it has looked like this for 5 years, so as they say patience is a virtue. Its been like a busmans holiday and enjoyable so far. Its taking my mind of of all the negative news that is around, even the world cup final managed to get a negatice reception.

Any ways, enough for now. I hope you are all well and taking it easy.

As you can see I havent got the hang of uploading pictures yet. Apologies for that.

Stuff

2010-07-05T17:25:00.002+01:00

Its pretty tough here at the moment. The governments cuts probably mean I will lose my little job, but more importantly hundreds of thousands will be losing theirs. On top of all that the cuts mean that investment in the economy will cease thereby increasing the pain on the most vulnerable.

Its a real mess and thats for sure.

Im going to meetings and finding them same as usual so thats good. The stress of the coming storm may start to tell though and I think this is worrying my beautiful, who will worry that I might run off again and have a nervous breakdown as I did last time. Im trying to keep things balanced and talk about how I feel.

This last weekend I went on an activity first aid course which I found very good and surprisingly enjoyable being with new people. I passed which was a good thing.

Im away next weekend on a navigation course for my ranger badge and Im looking forward to this too.

Ive got a couple of ideas for businesses as I think it is important to keep busy for me. I've seen to many stop working altogether only to shuffle off this mortal coil a few months after.

Weve been seeing a few films lately, Larry David in Whatever Works, I think he is my new hero. Weve also seen the bloom brothers who I want to start dressing like.

Thats all for now. the steps are working as is the programme and who knows what the future holds.

take care all of you and have a good week.

For White Rabbit and all other English men

2010-06-27T19:17:00.003+01:00

Lest We Forget

Bastards

2010-06-19T19:57:00.002+01:00

The tory/lib dem pen pushers have just shafted my great city and denied it £105M of funding that would have provided much needed jobs. The irony, (and it hasn't been lost on anybody in the city) is that the person wielding the knife is none other than their own MP Nick ( I wanna be taken seriously ) Clegg, erstwhile leader of the lib dems and holder of the honorary title of deputy leader and gullible lightning rod for the tories. he promised to stand up for Sheffield and Yorkshire and sold us down the river at the first flutter of Cameroons eyes.

I can assure you this Nicky old boy, you will never, ever, ever represent this great city again, you spineless piece of shit.

Have a nice weekend everyone and take care

Max

2010-06-16T18:03:00.005+01:00

Quite often a member of the fellowship springs to mind who I haven't seen for some time. This happened the other day with a young man called Max. I was walking along the street in town and passed a beautiful church yard where people go for peace, quiet and solitude at lunch. It isn't isolated, but does have a spiritual feel about it, that you sometimes find in churches but very seldom in church people. You can view it here.

At times I will sit in the church yard and munch a sandwich, watch the day go by, then trot off to a meeting just down the way. I was doing just that one day a few years ago, eating my lunch and enjoying the autumn sun, when I was joined by Max, a young man, who had gone several rounds with several substances including booze. He was dry and sober and in a relationship with a fellow happy club member. He hadn't had a drink for several months. I liked Max and found him to be genuine and decent. He became the secretary of a meeting not long after getting sober, being supported by a couple who seem to specialise in putting people forward for jobs in AA. I think it stems from wanting to be liked and also wanting to be seen as powerful. After a few months the post became too much for Max and he had to resign which gave his confidence no help at all. The last time I saw him he was sat in a meeting in clothes which had dozens of zips all over them. His hands moved from one zip to the other, opening and closing, each one, then patting the zip. He took all his belongings out of his bag and then put them back again, then returned to the zips. This carried on all meeting without a break. It was clear he was in trouble, mentally and emotionally. I lost track of him then and didn't think about him again until last week when I walked past the churchyard and he popped into my mind.

On saturday, who should I bump in to but his old partner. She informed me that Max's mum had phoned her last week to tell her Max had died, he'd been in and out of rehab and in and out of dry houses, but never made it. He died in a hostel for the homeless. He was 39.

Can Someone Explain To Me

2010-06-14T07:44:00.004+01:00

Can someone explain to me in simple terms why we must have our lives and economy decimated because the banks screwed up. I mean in real simple terms.

How I see it is this. The Toms who earned gazillions and worked in banks basically played pass the parcel with a load of debt made to people, who never ever had a chance of repaying it, until none of the geniuses on gazillions could remember who had what and who owed what to whom, and how did this whole thing get started. Now the Toms were so smart, having realised that they didn't know what they were doing, invented a language so that no one else would know what they were doing.

Explain this to your friend who has just lent you a £or $.

Yeah that £$ I owe you I sold it to Johnny, he then sold it to fred and mary, who then sold it to harry lisa whatchamacallit and someone else whos name escapes me, I think they then sold it to some french men and americans, but maybe it was the canadians, they all sound the same, not to mention the japanese and chinese, and I wont even begin to explain how you tell them apart. Anyway the upshot is I don't owe you the money anymore they do.

So the Toms goes to the big Toms and says I dont know where the money is. The big Toms realising chicken has come home to roost, keeps quiet and pays everyone more bigger bonuses then turns round to the government and shows them his empty pockets. The government being bright honourable intelligent people and also friends of the Toms say OK what we will do is we will give you the money and even though we havn't got it we will work soemthing out. The government, lets call them the Jerrys, get this money from some where, ( if we are all broke, where is all this money coming from?) and give it to the Toms, who being so pleased at what they have done, pay themselves even bigger bonuses.

Now the jerrys have to pay the money back they borrowed to pay Toms. But they dont have any money so they say this. I know what we will do we will say to the people that they owe the money, its their debt because we had to pay it back to the banks so that all the peoples savings would be safe. The Jerrys then say we are going to have take your job away because you have too much debt, ( what was that about savings) and also there is no new schools, roads, hospitals and the taxes are going up and anything else we can think of.

So here is the question. Why didn't we just let the banks go bust and if people had savings in them, why didn't the government just pay those people their savings, think of all that money in the economy!!!

Why do I have to pay for the banks....................please tell me cos i dont understand

Wandering around in the doldrums

2010-06-10T16:58:00.004+01:00

I went to the meeting the kid would be at the other night and he didn't turn up, so the problem never raised its head. I've been thinking about all the advice you posted. I've come to the conclusion that as said before we are a people separated by a common language and you have your ways of doing things and we have ours and neither is right or wrong, it just fits the time and culture and people.

I shared about how important time is in recovery, that I couldn't be 10 years sober after a year, but that didn't stop me trying. If there is one piece of advice I would give, it would be don't drink and let time works its magic. Don't be in to much of a rush to hit the grave.

I've been glued to the toilet pan with a bucket in front of me for the last 24 hours, I know that's not an image you want, but that's how it has been. This thing has been with me now since before Christmas, every month I start throwing up and lots of other stuff. They did some tests and found nothing, but I'll let them have another go.

My Beautiful is coping really well with the loss of her lovely mother, there is always a part of the day that brings tears, and that's just how it should be. We have quite a few pictures of her mum and dad scattered around the house and its nice. Makes it seem more like a home.

The world cup starts tomorrow and Ive just watched the news and seen a n English man say he'd booked hotel rooms for the whole cup and intends to be there to see England lift the cup.. I think that its a good definition of faith, especially if you are thinking England will win. In the supermarket the other day I noticed pallets of beer stacked high in cartons of 24 cans. Each carton had a picture of the manager and the captain Rio Ferdinand ( an English name if ever I heard one ). The irony of it is is that Ferdinand damaged a knee on the first training session on reaching South Africa and we wont be seeing him any more. Such is the un-manageability of life for football managers, football captains and the printers of packaging materials.

Have a good weekend all of you and take care.

2010-06-04T16:48:00.002+01:00

Its been a good week here. My slowing down in life is having a real beneficial effect on how I view things. My mid week meeting is in need of a new secretary, I'd love to take the post but it means obtaining a key midday each week and work commitments stop from being able to do that. So we are rudderless at the moment, except for the GSR picking up the pieces. No one ever seems to be sponsored in to service any more its a real shame. The meeting is a beginners meeting which should mean that a person should have a minimum of 1 years sobriety to fill the post. this is something I believe in as I have seen too many people shoved forward by people whose only aim is to be thought of as influential and it almost always leads to a drink.

We will be carrying on work with the bathroom this weekend and I have a ranger training day on Sunday which I am looking forward too.

The economic situation is still in that strange LaLa land where nothing yet has really happened except people have been getting worked up about increase taxes for the rich etc.

It was a real shame to hear of the shootings in the Lake district, we seem to be getting a speciality for rogue gunmen in the UK. I don't know why this is but the devastation that is caused is enormous. I can't work out what it says about the gun culture, except that guns seem to be a bad thing full stop.

My team lost at the weekend and true to form we failed to rise to the occasion, which is a historic way for us. Sad really as the whole town was up for it, just the players that weren't bothered. Perhaps it was enough to just play in the national stadium.

Were off in to the countryside now to walk for a while and then have a picnic. The sun is so lovely, its been a long winter, now forgotten, soon we will be moaning about the heat.

Take care all of you and have a good weekend

Looking for Advice, Me that is.

2010-06-01T16:28:00.004+01:00

Got a real problem coming up. I've been asked to share at a meeting where I know a child will be present. there has been some controversy about this in the last few weeks around the local AA. Kid is 10 yrs old and mother is maybe 8 months sober. She's living with the secretary who is 2 years sober!!. Excuse goes like this. Mother can't get child minder, can't afford it as on benefits. Mother needs to come to meeting, meeting is an open meeting and therefore child should be allowed to stay IN meeting!!! their words not mine. Last time I saw mother and child in meeting mother shared how horrible she was to the child, but things are getting on top of her and she doesn't know if she can stay sober. Kid starts pleading with mother and crying begging her not to drink.

Where I stand. I think that children do not belong in meetings, open or otherwise. I think that if a social worker got to know about it, it could be construed as child abuse and the mother and I suppose the meeting members could be in trouble. This seems so wrong on so many levels. Does not feel right. Its a new one on me, in 22 years I have never known anyone have to bring a child to a meeting, there are always ways.

I'd appreciate peoples thoughts and yes advice on this. Before I go and set fire to reputation for being a decent bloke I may have.

Two Disasters in 24 hours --- Can I cope

2010-05-31T09:42:00.005+01:00

Two disasters within 24 hours is more than any man can cope with surely. Above is a picture of a football player. He is not of my ilk as is clearly demonstrated by the delighted look on his face. He is of the opposition who won fair and square against a poor Rotherham United at wembley yesterday. We just did not step up to the moment, some players were conspicuous by their absence on the field. I guess the occasion, playing in the final which would propel the winners in to a higher football league was just too much for us. There may well be an inquiry, perhaps the manager may have to look at himself, he seems to have a track record of falling at the last fence. I don't know, it makes you wonder why we do it, why we support the underdog all the time.

Here is the second disaster. Not the sparkly eyed guy but the annual (is it annual?) humiliation of Britain's Entry in to the Eurovision Song Contest. This event is to Glee (The Show) what sugar frosting is to wedding cake. The contest takes Kitsch way, way beyond Kitsch. The only successful thing ever to come out of the contest was Abba, more specifically the blond out of Abba, but that's a whole different post. It is a night full of toe curlingly cringing campness, with such lack of style and finesse that it becomes so unbearable to watch, you just cannot miss it. Anyways we also do bad in this thing. This year we had the pens of stock and waterman to write the song, these are the people who gave us Kylie and "I should be so lucky, lucky lucky lucky". What could possibly go wrong. We came last with 10 points, better than Null points, but crap all the same. The observant people not of these Isles will have noticed that whenever we have a chance of being good at something, war etc we are always English. Whenever we are bound to be crap at something we are always British. It's an all inclusion thing. If Andrew Murray was any good, he would be English, even though he has a Scottish accent. But as he is crap, as are all British Tennis players, he is of course British. And who should we be the ones to deny him citizenship.

So to remind our selves, The English that is just what we are when the hour cometh, here is something to savour. It is especially for The White Rabbit who will understand exactly what it means. To those of you who don't get it, this is England, the country at its finest, an age that has left us and a people who the high paid stars of today would not be fit to wipe the boots of. Enjoy White Rabbit.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RE-wKAooU20

Those in Glasshouses!!!

2010-05-29T17:33:00.005+01:00

The election is over and now the electorate have begun to feel the precise length and girth of the shaft we will have to take.

The chappie in the left is David Laws. He was the Shadow Treasury minister for the Liberal Democrat Party. This is the party that has sold its soul to the devil in exchange for perceived power supporting the tory right wing. Actually the party is a scapegoat, tethered to the tories so that all the blame heads the lib dem way and no one will ever, ever trust the lib dems again.

Anyways a nice man is David, so it seems. Clean cut, stayed out of trouble, especially in the recent scandals over MPs expenses, when all the little piggies were caught with their snouts in the trough of public money. He is determined to clean up politics, stand for decency and honour and integrity. Here are some of the things he said in his first treasury speech a mere 5 days ago and just 18 days after taking office.

"It is important that those at the top of Government and the Civil Service set an example".

and

"That will not be an easy task, but we are willing to be judged by those tests".

Very laudable indeed and quite right after the nation was subjected to the distasteful spectacle of the last parliament. What we needed and wanted was people we could trust who would not lie and abuse the system. David was our man, white, anglo saxon, protestant work ethic and was not tainted by the hypocrisy of all those other mps who had taken as much as they could get from the public purse. You'd take him home to meet your mother wouldn't you, want your daughter to marry him, nice fellow like that.

Fast forward 48 hours and the headlines in the Telegraph paper a tory news hound.

The Cabinet minister charged with rescuing the Government’s finances has

used taxpayers’ money to pay more than £40,000 to his long-term partner.

Oh dear its David Laws with his snout firmly in the trough and trying to get away with it. And he's lied to parliament about it. but it gets worse, because who is hi partner?? Here's a pic

of them together

Nice, but wait, isn't that a man David. yes it is he says, but I've kept him in the closet so that I would not be asked about my sexuality.

So let me get this straight.

1/ You've been taking money dishonestly from public funds. === Theft

2/ You lied to parliament when asked about your expenses. ===Lying

3/ You've made your partner hide away because you are ashamed of being gay and your career was more important than the feelings of the person who loved you. ==== I cannot even begin to list the adjectives....... but I will have a go....... wanker, toerag, tosser, person of no integrity, did I mention wanker.

Now you are clinging on to power, despite all your high falutin protestations on how we all should live. Its taken less than a month for this government to be ensnared in slime like the last one.

Britain. You have what you deserved another rotten government.

Have a good weekend all of you and take care.

ps. please say a little prayer for Rotherham United who play in the play off finals tomorrow and if they win will be promoted to a higher division. Pray for them to win of course.

Stuck in the Doldrums

2010-05-25T07:46:00.005+01:00

I like writing my thoughts down it saves me having to bore other people by talking about them. It's an odd time at the moment the journey we set out on isn't going according to plan. We are like a boat that has set off from the safety of the harbour and puttered of in to the horizon, filled with hope and good intentions. Now we are out of sight of the harbour we have become stuck in the doldrums, tacking this way and that, coming across small squalls of bad weather, the sails flapping away in vain as we move neither forward nor backward. We can see dark clouds on the horizon and blue clear skies away to the east, but can neither summon up the resolve nor the energy to sail under blue skies. The dark clouds offer a portent of an approaching storm, fear stirs in the belly, but oddly the mind sees it as a release. Better something happening than nothing, then the energy that has pent up inside can be let loose. Oddly the blue skies offering the accepted promise of safety and happiness seem less enticing. Wheres the excitement in calm waters, how can the energy be released then.

But it is the blue skies I crave for after the inevitable release of energy comes, at first as a trickle, the odd little jibe at a friend or loved one, the picking of old old wounds long gone but not forgotten. Then culminating in the explosion, which can be verbal, physical, self destructing but always full of pride, ego, self centredness. Fear in other words. Fear of the dark clouds, of the shadows in my mind. Fear of not measuring up, of a life wasted because it was always "could have been".

Have a good week all of you. Take care

Spring is here

2010-05-15T09:10:00.002+01:00

Its a beautiful day here in Sheffield. The sun is shining and the sky is powder blue. My former employer received a police caution yesterday for harrassment, so hopefully that resolves that problem.

Today we start on the refurbishment of the bathroom. Well we really started this 5 years ago, but couldn't make up our mind what we wanted. The bathroom was badly damaged when the builders were working on the roof, they dropped a soot filled ceiling into the room, which was tiled in white, so now we have white tiles and black grout.

We,ve had the new suite delivered a few weeks ago, now I have to get the tiles. We've chosen lemon marble, which has a nice range of colours and patterns. I'll post some pics, before and after as we go through it. The first job is to build the integral cupboard that hides under the bedroom staircase and is accessed from the bathroom. Then we have to board the walls for tiling and away we go.

I debating whether to move the soils stack (sewer connection) as it sits at the front of the house now and doesn't make the facade very inviting. This is part of my perfectionism, something that I have to watch. It will be a big job, digging up the pathway and connecting in, but something tells me that its the right thing to do.

Last night we went to Bakewell a small town in Derbyshire. The meeting there was good, someone shared a 13 birthday which was nice. We saw some old friends that we hadn't talked to for a while and that was good too.

WE need to go shopping today. There is nothing of nutritional value in the house, no fruit and veg, nothing. Its odd but for the first time in my life I have a need for fruit and veg, I have actually missed having them. I guess that is the influence of My Beautiful, who is a veggie and always eats sensibly. Such is the stuff of love.

Something ocurred to me last night. I often hear told to a newcomer in meetings that their most important meeting is the second one. It occurred to me last night that the most important meeting is the NEXT one for all of us. (Please discuss)

Take care all of you and have a good weekend.

New Masters

2010-05-13T18:54:00.006+01:00

We have new masters now that the election is over, a blue with a hint of yellow is in the air as the con lib pact gets underway. It will be interesting to see what that means for the economy, and jobs etc. One of the things the conservatives want to do is cut public spending to pay off the huge debt the country has after bailing out the banks. So here's how it goes. Those in work will get spending cuts and those not working will continue to get the benefits they have always been living on. So in simple terms, those of us who work will get the shaft, whilst those who don't work will continue to be supported by the rest. No change there then. Lets stimulate the economy by throwing out of work the very people the economy is stimulated by.

Its been an odd week so far. I have a new prospect of promotion after I went through a 4 1/2 hour interview. I have no idea how I did, so the result will really be a surprise to me. This weekend we went dwon to Wells where My Beautifuls godson attends the Wells Cathedral School and sings in the choir and was being confirmed, by the bishop no less. The pic above is of the cathedral which is wonderful scissors archway which had to be fitted to stop the cathedral tower from twisting. Its a magnificent pice of craftsmenship. The people at the cathedral were really nice and down to earth and full of smiles and laughter.

The cathedral is a beautiful place all Harry Potter Hogwarts, with people in gowns. The godson is a lucky fellow and deservedly so as he has had a tough time of late and the school seems to be transforming him.

Here are some more shots of the cathedral

Radio Beautiful

2010-05-04T17:16:00.002+01:00

Here is My Beautiful talking on a national radio station about her products, recently at The Outdoors Show at the National Exhibiton Center.

Beautiful is the second item in.

http://toc.dl.hipcast.com/deluge/ee7655e7-6f00-4947-dfd2-d00449ddb7db.mp3

A little cooking for you

2010-05-01T19:59:00.004+01:00

Just a line or two whilst I wait for the roast potatoes to be done and the cauliflower to be cooked. There is nothing like a nice roast chicken, particularly if you have roasted it yourself. The one above has just come out of the oven and now sits under its blanket of foil, sans two wings and a slice or two of breast, I grant you. Who can resist the temptation to tear off a lump or two as soon as you smell that wonderful aroma as you pull the pan out of the oven. I like mine roasted simply, with some salt free french butter spread over the skin and squeeze of half a lemon, the squeezed half then thrown in the pan and the other half of the lemon pushed inside the bird. Two cloves of garlic shoved under each shoulder which you get to eat, all blackened as they are, when you take the bird out.

Let it rest awhile, in the meantime finishing roasting the potatoes, mashing the parsnip and bringing the peas to boil, cauliflower and anything else you may want adds to the dish.

Gravy, from the pan or the tin it does not matter to me. You have a meal for a king and some pretty good meals in the days to come. Chicken salad, chicken mayo, chicken soup ( which I am going to try and make again this time). All this from a free range corn fed bird.

Delicious does not get any better.

Hope you are all having a good weekend. Gotta go now, chicken awaits.

Goings on

2010-04-29T19:08:00.003+01:00

The meetings have been a bit weird this week. One on sponsorship was chaired by a man who doesn't have a sponsor and hasn't had one for what must be 15 years. He was there with a young woman who thanked him profusely for all the help he was giving her and was sure the fellowship would not be able to exist without him.

Then a man spoke about how he didn't have a sponsor and was 4 years sober. The first sponsor he had got drunk and the second demanded he do things, like the steps and stuff and no one was going to tell him what to do. As far as he was concerned length of sobriety didn't mean that person had anything to offer and as far as he was concerened there was no one good enough in the area to sponsor him.

Did I mention that neither of the above worked, but collected benefits instead.

Yesterday I got an email asking me to go for an interview with my new employer as it were, they want me to interview for a promotion which is nice. Especially seen as I was supposed to be slowing down.

I'm just listening to the Archers on radio 4 as I type this and an old biddy has just pulled a young bit of stuff. And all this in the country, heaven knows what will happen next. If you want to listen in click here

This afternoon I watched On Golden Pond. I've never seen the film the whole way through so was very surprised at how much I liked it and how much I learned.

Hope you are all having a good week

Tonights readings.

2010-04-25T23:08:00.002+01:00

I was asked to read out something from the Big Book at this evening’s meeting. These are the two passages I read.

Big Book 3rd edition
Page 542

Story No. 11 (He Who Loses His Life)

For me AA is the synthesis of all philosophy I’ve ever read, all of the positive, good philosophy, all of it based on love. I have seen that there is only one law, the law of love, and there are only two sins; the first is to interfere with the growth of another human being, and the second is to interfere with one’s own growth.

Big Book 3rd edition
Page 473

Story No. 2 (Promoted to Chronic)

I realize that all I am guaranteed in life is today. The poorest person has no less and the wealthiest has no more-each of us has but one day. What we do with it is our business; how we use it is up to us individually.

I feel that I have been restored to health and sanity these past years not through my own efforts nor as a result of anything I may have done, but because I’ve come to believe-to really believe-that alone I can do nothing. That my own innate selfishness and stubbornness are the evils which, if left unguarded, can drive me to alcohol.

These two passages are a blue print to life that I can aspire to. I have learnt through the love I have for My Beautiful that love really is the only law. Everything I do is wrapped up in this one tiny four letter word. It can be good or bad, its absence can cause untold damage to me personally and to those around me. Its presence only serves to lift up further the heights which we scale on a daily basis. If I have no love for a fellow human, that means there is hate or worse indifference, and what does that do to my heart, my soul. It darkens, hardens, withdraws from the world, and that leaves me afraid and alone. Where do I look to when the world turns on me as it does on a regular basis, in my mind? Yes, I need that love of my fellow human to nurture and protect me. And they too need it from me as well; by giving it away I receive.

As a drinking drunk I lived a life of fear, drawing back from all the challenges a day sets for us as humans. The act of opening a door is tinged with the promise of explosive reactions to the past and the future. Never is it just about today, as it should be. How many moments of delight have I missed because I was afraid to be me. How many friends have I lost because they never knew me, I never gave them the chance.

I have met the enemy, and it is me.

Take care and have a good week all of you.

Don't take it away from me

2010-04-17T07:09:00.002+01:00

I've just read a post this morning and it prompted some thoughts about my fellowship in the locality where I live.

I got sober in a small steel and coal town. I had no experience of AA before that, no one in my family had been, nor were there any alcoholics I knew of. I was rapidly crumbling, ruining my life and the life of those around me, so I had to do something. I was working, and financial responsibilities meant I had to get up each day and pitch in, try to stay out of peoples way, try not to drink.

So one night I turned up at an AA meeting and eventually stopped drinking. Emotionally it was hard to finally get to grips with the programme of recovery. I was a whiny sort of drunk. Whining about my life, about what people had done to me, never what I had done to them. When I was still drinking, pretending I wasn't, and whingeing the old timers would say to me, "stop drinking, then things can get better". No words of succour, just plainly spoken fact. I don't know if they were hard, they just told it how it was, no frills, no beating about the bush. Almost everyone worked back in those days. I very rarely met a person who was not trying to hold down a job, wanting to meet their responsibilities. I think this helped people get better quicker and produced a higher quality recovery. There were a few people who came from rehab, but back then rehabs in the UK were few and far between. They came in packs, usually bussed in, sat silently, then left in packs, bussed out. I couldn't see what the advantage of rehab was, over the route I had taken, and many many others with me. Maybe I should have paid more attention back then I don't know, but all my attention was focused on staying sober and rebuilding my life. So I guess I didn't notice at first what was happening.

It started with the leader figure from rehab. This would be a person who worked at the rehab and was an alcoholic and a member of AA. They became a sort of head figure, whatever they said or did must be right, this was reinforced by all the rehab people repeating the things this person said. The problem with such leaders, all leaders I guess is that, being an alkie, working in rehab, going to meetings with patients, does not make for a rounded view of the world. It makes for a narrow tunnel view of one persons world.

The change really started to make itself heard with these weird sayings. "Keep coming back it works if you work it it wont if you don't" and such like, generally accompanied by some even weirder hand gesture. The steps stopped being talked about and the reading changed from How it Works, to A vision for you. They wanted the jam, but didn't want the work. The packs from rehab started banding together and then you got "well in so and so we do it this way". There was no need to work now, but a real need to learn how to fill in the forms to get state benefit for as long as you could, years. Then came the new way of introducing yourself. My name is whatever and I'm alcoholic addict. Whats that then "alcoholic addict"? Note the "I'm an" has disappeared, removing the personalisation to some unattached other place. And what is the addict bit to do with. Maybe I will start saying my name is findon alcoholic chocaholic, or how about alcoholic plumber, or alcoholic lunatic, or some other such nonsense. It just doesn't make sense doesn't fit. Not surprisingly the steps now get very little mention. Its all about someone else fixing. Its someone else's responsibility, here you are I have ruined my life and that of those around me so make it better for me, whilst I learn how to fill in these forms.

I feel a little marginalised in AA now and that is my fault. I said nothing and over the 22 years the creeping average of all this stuff has reduced the programme to demanding that someone else is responsible. I don't know when it happened, but one day I walked in to a meeting to find a group voting to let the secretary stay, because it would be good for them as they had just started drinking again the day before and it took courage to come to the meeting and admit that. Everyone in that room bar one other person had come from rehab, didn't work, knew how to fill in forms. The other person was in the fellowship when I walked in, was as hard as nails, had taken plenty of knocks and never drank. Always worked, always had the same message and was as incredulous and angry as I was.

We would sooner have people like us and they die than have them hate us and they live. That's the message and its wrong. What happened to doing your time, what happened to focusing on getting sober. What happened to keeping your mouth shut and listening. When did staying sober no longer become the priority, but going abroad to conventions was, or going out to a night club in a gang was or handing out a chip for x months or years was. Where does it say that if it is your sober anniversary you are to go round town and give birthday shares at each meeting, with cake. When did the birthday become more important than sobriety. When will anyone ever read past page 164, or the remainder of ch 5, if they know it exists.

The message a newcomer gets to day is like one of the new pubs that have sprung up in recession. Made to bring the family in, its all cosy, like home, no stress, no requirements to engage. Just come in and pick what you want off the menu and leave the rest. Eat and then leave.

Have a good weekend all of you and take care

Politicians

2010-04-15T21:06:00.009+01:00

I don't know if any of my friends over the pond, as they say, have been aware of the British political scene over the last 18 months or that we have just entered and election period. Which reminds me. I am not writing this as I am in purdah, as I work for a government agency and as such cannot hold any views publicly whilst in an election period. So, even though it is my fingers typing, I am maintaining impartiality by tyipid witn my euys shtu... ..

OK,, that's that over with. Now unless you have been on the moon for the last 18 months or in parliament, that mother of all democracy for the few, you will be aware that British politicians of all hues, red ( labour), blue (tory), yellow ( liberals) have been caught up to their armpits dipping in to the till of public money. This was of necessity to provide them, or their family, or relation, or illegal immigrant servant, with the following state funded items. Second homes with a value in excess of 1/2 million pounds, castles, porn films, food, xmas decorations, duck houses, moats, plants, potted and unpotted, swimming pools, employment for family members, whether related or not and a variety of other crucial items. The public have been justifiably upset by this, but the politicians said we were too stupid to understand and that they understood that.

Four of the miscreants are to be hauled up before the courts for claiming money for mortgages that were non existent. Their defence will be paid for by the public. You read that right first time !!!!

So how to vote...... Well the tories will as ever look after the tories, all the rest of us have to work out is the precise length and width of the shaft we are about to have inserted and then assume the position, should the tories win.

Labour being populated by a bunch of oiks who have never done a days work between them, with the odd notable exception, will of course promise everything and deliver nothing except inept policies designed as a smoke screen so that labour politicians can line their own pockets. How does a labour prime minister on £170K per year afford a £4M house and a few others beside. Anyways I digress, suffice to say that labour is full of chavs who cannot believe how gullible the public is nor how much public money they can squander.

Then there is the liberals. Nice people, very PC, but we all know would be useless in government, we do not know why this is, it just feels right.

So what criteria wins the vote.

Politically they are all the same except liberals. Labour and tory will promise everything, then when in power deliver nothing except to themselves and their mates. Liberals will never get in power so cancel themselves out. So the common man in the street does not benefit from any of the 3 main parties based on political, economic or cultural criteria.

There is one criteria however that does produce a satisfactory result for everyone... for a time, anyway. Women. or rather how good looking the women are, and sexy. I know this is not very pc, but well the system is not working so we have to try something different. So lets look at the women.

Tories first.

I rest my case. You would not under any circumstance attempt to scale this mountain.

How about labour.....

Ditto the tories really, maybe after a skin full, but in the morning there would be one hell of a regret.

How about liberals then......

Well, you know we might be getting somewhere now. At least you could stay for some toast at breakfast.

But wait, there is one more party, who have the added benefit of making you feel superior to the rest of the world. No not the BNP or Nazis., but the green party. Just look at this.........

I mean just think..... guilt free, nice breakfast OK veggie, but still.... and you could take her out in the day. Plus everyone thinks you are great.

So its green party then... Just have to hope we do not get invaded, being vegetarian aint gonna help methinks.

Have a good weekend all of you

Thank You All of You

2010-04-13T17:09:00.003+01:00

Well today marks a full 22 years without a drink. 22 years ago yesterday I was hitting 3 customers with a stainless steel rod ( chrome plated, mind you), in an attempt to get them to buy a robot. This on an exhibition stand where hundreds of people were watching. I didn't care about that though. How could I, I didn't even know what I was doing or where I was. Such is the times drinks are made of.

Only through the grace and hard work of my manager did I stay out of prison and miraculously keep my job. That still bewilders me, because I would not have kept me on, no sirree.

The boy of 28 came in to the fellowship, beaten, unquestioning, shamed, guilty as charged.
Have I grown in to the man I see before me now. I don't know, I really don't. The more sober years I experience the more I realise how little I know about me, the world and the programme of AA. I truly mean that.

In the 22 years I have been sober I have been blessed to know friends who helped, whether they realised it or not. Thank you Ian W, where ever you are I hope that you are well and if you ever want to come back and stop drinking again, whatever I have is yours to take, because you were one of the first to give it to me.

There are so many people to thank, the sponsees, Simon, Andy, Mark, who won't read this. Sponsor Shaun who won't read this. Good friend Steve who wont read this. Clive, Ann, Ellen, Roger, Phil (deceased) and many more who have no idea about this blog and how it helps me and them stay sober. To all the people in Blog Land Steveroni, PG, Mary, Daave, Scott, Zane, Fireman John who maybe understand more than most. Syd, Lou, who experienced alcohol from a side I could never imagine, but I see their grace and fortitude and marvel at it. To White Rabbit and my beloved delicious SB, I have no idea if you can understand, could ever understand, but seeing your comments, reading your blogs and most importantly being accepted by you, tells me I am part of the human race, I am a human being and I cannot tell you how important that is.

There are so many more people in the flesh, on the page and in my memory that there are too many to mention.

But there is one who is so special it makes my eyes well up as I now type. My Beautiful accepted me, wanted me and loves me for all my faults and that is the most precious thing of all that sobriety has given me. Some one to love me and some one to love.

Take care all of you, have a good week and thank you.

Restless

2010-04-12T08:40:00.002+01:00

I'm pretty restless at the moment, unable to settle my mind or body. It's not a state of being that I like to be, although if truth be told I spend a great deal of my life at this end of the spectrum.

This last weekend I spent at a beautiful old country house owned by the national park I am training to be a ranger for. It was a weekend of training, learning about the park and its history, the ranger service, and also how to deal with the public, especially in confrontational situations.

These type of weekends are not pleasant experiences for me. Meeting new people, interacting with them, opening myself to criticism, all bring out the worst of my insecurities. It was made doubly worse, by a stomach upset that I have been having for the last 4 months. The upset means I basically spend most of my time in a bathroom with explosive results for a full 24 hours. It's not an understatement either, it really is explosive. I will be seeing the doctor today about it, as it clearly is not going away.

During the weekend we looked at a footpath access and the teacher needed to show an example of what can happen if access is too narrow. So she chose me to walk through it. I realised as soon as I squeezed through that she chose me because I am a little (more than a little) overweight. So did all the others. The teacher told a story of how someone had written on an access point "Not for fat people" and it made them realise that they had to cater for larger people. Everyone was laughing, I laughed too but was dying inside. My weight is starting to become and emotional issue now and is upsetting for me that I have become the butt of peoples jokes. Later on we conducted role play around confrontational situtaions. Mine did not go well with the man playing the member of the public become angry and jabbing his finger in my shoulder. I felt as though I had shown I was unworthy of being a ranger. I did get the exercise wrong and was too quick to start laying the law down. In england rangers have no actual powers they can only ask and advise.

I also realised I had taken a great resentment against the man playing the public. He was an experienced ranger. It suddenley struck me that he was playing a role and that it was wrong of me to take a resentment against him. I had instantly personalised everything, which is what I always do. The whole weekend is giving me things to think about.

My Beautiful came back from her fathers this weekend with a twisted ankle. She fell in the very same spot her mother fell, which initiated her time in hospital. I wasn't pleased about this and was angery with her father because there is so much clutter and rubbish in the house that there is hardly anywhere to walk. He is extremely selfish and this makes me angry. A resentment is starting to build towards him and I have to watch that. He is 83 years old and has just lost hi partner of 60 years. I need to give him some space, even if it is in my head.

This week I am in court suing my old employer for unpaid expenses etc. I don't think I would choose to do this again. Do you want to be right or do you want to be happy springs to mind. The pressure is starting to mount, I wake up each morning thinking about it now, and in truth it is starting to dominate my thoughts. I will be glad when it is over, even more glad if I win. If I lose I have no idea what my feelings will be.

Tomorrow I will be 22 years sober. It seems unreal that all that time has passed. I never set out for it to be this long. I just wanted not to drink for a day and it stayed like that which I guess was lucky for me. I'm grateful to the people in meetings, all help in their own way and I am very grateful to My Beautiful for teaching me a sfoter way of living, even if I don't practice it much.

Take care all of you and have a good week.

The devil is in the detail

2010-04-09T18:01:00.003+01:00

My Beautiful has had a tough year so far, what with her mother dying, looking after her father after and getting a new business up and running she has had a load on her shoulders. I decided it would be nice to get away from it all, have a little luxury and pampering, so for easter I treated her to a luxury spa break at a luxury country house hotel.. This is part of one of the great country houses in England. It has the added bonus of having a one Michelin star restaurant as well. As we like our food and our luxuries it ticked all the boxes. I booked for 3 nights with a spa treatment for each of us and two nights eating in the Michelin restaurant. Total cost for both of us £1400 without any drinks. For those in USofA thats about $2100. So it was not cheap by any standards but what the heck, I wanted luxury and no hassle. As is usual I sent an email stating that neither My Beautiful or I drank or ate alcohol and that Beautiful did not eat meet. This is my standard practice and as expected I received an email back saying they had noted our special requests an it was not a problem.

We arrived on easter friday and were shown up to our room by the house manager. The bed was so huge you needed a step ladder to get in, how cute is that, and it was a 4 poster. On the dressing table stood a complimentary easter egg and a large bottle of champagne. " Did you get my email about no alcohol" I asked pointing to the champagne. " Oh yes" she said. The champagne did not move, nor did it leave the room when she did. I decided to let it ride. Lets not spoil the weekend for Beautiful.

Unluckily for the hotel, I used to own a luxury bathroom company. The bathroom left a deal to be desired. The taps on the cracked basin twisted round when operated, the toilet bowl rocked, and there was mould in the shower. For £400 a night I expected a little better. Anyways, let it ride, this weekend is for Beautiful.

Next day we went to the spa and had our treatment which was nice but not worth the money they were charging, but let it ride.

We spent the rest of the day exploring the Yorkshire Dales which was nice and then returned to get ready for our Michelin Star meal. If anyone has not come across Michelin, these are the top restaurants for foodies. You pay for it, but the food and service is worth it. The maitre D has spoken to us the night before just to clarify our special requests, no alcohol for both no meat for Beautiful. Again that evening he clarified it and pointed out the dishes to avoid. We chose our dishes and were shown to our table. The first dish to be brought was a complimentary dish, not chosen by us, it was meant to cleanse the palate in preparation for the meal. It contained a really pungent grapefruit and a green foam. About one inch in diameter you ate it with the tiniest spoon I have ever held. I had just taken one very small mouthful, when the waiters suddenley appeared and whipped our dishes away, informing us they both contained alcohol. We had both eaten some, I know that it was not deliberate, a mistake, but I was so angry, afte all we had told them. I asked to see the Maitre D. He came bearing excuses and profuse apologies. But the damage was done and as they brought a replacement dish, we got up from the table and left the room. I cannot emphasise to those who do not understand about alcohol how important how big this is for me. The Maitre D tried to stop us. I told him we would eat out that night and that I felt it was a simple thing to get right for an establishment that charged £400 per night. On our return to the hotel that evening we informed the house manager we would be leaving in the morning and asked that the hotel manager see us in our room at 8.30am.

He turned up next morning, with apologies and no excuses. I showed him the bathroom and explained about the spa. He asked if he could get us alternative accomodation as our holiday had been ruined. We said we would return home. He said things would be reflected in the final bill. I told him to send the bill to my address and then I would see how I wanted to proceed from there. So far we have not received a bill. I want to make it clear that at all times the hotel people were courteous and never once made an argument of defense. They just fell short in the service they provided, which at £400 a night, should have been exceptional. Its not that exceptional service is unusual to us, we have stayed in some of the top hotles in the world, eaten in the best restaurants and received excellent service and never a problem. Likewise we have stayed in £20 a night travel motels and received clean efficient rooms with helpful, courteous staff.

It may seem churlish, an over reaction. But this IS life and death to me and where do you draw the line. A mouthful of alcohol, a rum truffle, chicken in red wine. Why is a mouthfull not as dangerous as a bottle? If the alcohol has been cooked out isnt it safe? Then why use the alcohol in the first place? For the taste? Taste of the alcohol? Now why, when it is death to me would I want to taste alcohol?

Here's the power of alcohol over my life. My first thought after it had happened, was not, how would my Beautiful feel No, it was this. I need not say anyhting about this to anyone. I dont want to give anyone the chance to point a finger and say I have had a drink.

Thats why it is so important to me. I don't mess a round with this. Its far too strong for me to take on.

I hope you are all well, where ever you are and that you are with your loved ones.

Take care and have a good weekend all of you.

Happy Easter

2010-04-02T07:36:00.001+01:00

Been having trouble posting on this dammed thing lately, keeps deleting my posts. So quickly, all of you happy eatsre and take care.

If you all read this it will be a miracle, so send word to the vatican and my computer can be sanctified, whatever that means.

The 70's

2010-03-12T21:48:00.008Z

I may well be going to upset some people with this post. Not that I will be abusive, or personal or negative, most of you know by now, that’s not my way.

No. It will come with recognition, look for the similarities and not the differences, as they say.

Let me pose a question. Do you remember the 70’s and if so is it with fondness and perhaps a longing to hark back to those days? The questions was posed in my mind after reading a post from that most elegant of ladies who posts here where SB talks about Jeff Buckley’s cover version of a Thin Lizzy track. Now yesterday I spent the day in a convention held in the bowels of Sheffield City Hall, a place where I spent a good portion the first half of the 70,s, before booze, women and money came along.

On a particular night at the hall my friend and I watched Joan Armatrading, with good old Val Singleton, cooing in the wings, be the support act for Supertramps Crime of the century tour, then of course Supertramp and the first time we had ever seen a video screen. When the concert ended at 10.30pm everyone went down to the Crucible Theatre to watch Phil Lynott and Thin Lizzy play until the early hours. Three world class acts in one night in one city. It was a great night, one to remember.

Who else did I see there? Rick Wakeman, Argent, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Mahavishnu Orchestra, Santana, Tangerine Dream (Thrown out for making a noise), Greenslade, PFM and many others.

I was normally dressed in denim. Jacket, jeans maybe a denim shirt but sometimes a granddad shirt that I had bought from a charity shop and dyed black. Of course you had to be bathed in Denim, or best of all Brut33 aftershave, or even better Patchouli oil, which made my father accuse me of being on drugs, even though you didn’t shave. I was so cool, and I weighed about 9st 8 Lbs with everything on. I spent my time on record shops, listening to evermore increasingly ethereal music, Ravi Shankar (saw him at the octagon, didn’t understand a word), the classical, (once went to buy Dvoraks new world symphony, only to find they only had someone elses, so I bought that instead ( it sounded nothing like Dvorak, honestly, some people).

On Saturday afternoons you listened to Alan Freeman on Radio 1 and his countdown to the charts. Have a listen here; go all the way to the end, to hear what swinging UK in the 70’s was like. You also listened to Barry Manilow, but you kept that real quiet.

Looking back then I was sort of a babe magnet, no don’t laugh, I was. It’s just that I was Soooo naive, I never knew it, or that it was happening. Even when the nurse at my first job at 16, locked the surgery door, hitched up her dress and took my blood pressure in a way I now know was not strictly as taught. I kept pulling my hand away, thinking, she’ll be mad with me. And mad she did get, just before she threw me out. There was a lot of throwing out in my teens, mainly of me.

Of course back then we had Starsky and Hutch and The Muppets on TV. The Muppets was the best, totally wasted on kids. Farrah was running around, but we all secretly liked the one with the dark hair, because she reminded us of that English teacher in school and by the way if we ever got caught playing pocket billiards in class we were going to be toast. Of course I was married to the girl in Abba. The blonde one of course, the one that went nuts later in life. No one ever remembers the other one, she could have had a beard and no self respecting young male would have noticed with the blond in that white jump suit. Mothers didn’t need starch back in them days. Especially for the bed sheets. Still she had to vie for my attentions, and that of the rest of the teenage male population once this advert came out. We had no idea why, but this advert, well lets just say, you didn't stay in the room with mom and dad after this advert had been on.

What about the cars. This may seem a little like a time warp for you US people, but we in England generally are 20 years behind the US in development, unless of course its war, then you can’t push us to one side to get a toe in. I digress. The Austin Allegro , with the vacuum wiper blades, that speeded up when you went faster and slowed down when you went slower. Which was really useful in torrential rain, when you couldn’t see out of the windscreen. The washers were worked by a foot pump that you pressed like a maniac. Men could be seen driving round, lurching backwards and forwards at the wheel. It was the pre cursor to the famous scene in Waynes World, that’s where they stole it from. All those head bangers who were really just trying to get a spurt of washer fluid on to the screen.

They were the days before beer, before McDonalds, you think in the US that you colonised us real easy, but we held out until the 80’s before the Dbl sausage and egg mcMuff. There was Berni Inns where you got a nice steak and the great Blue Nun. The French thought they were clever with all those fancy names, but we knew class when we saw it. There was also Wimpy bars, which I have to say were better than Macaadees, because they sold real food, on plates. Food our parents would not let us eat. That along with Vesta Chinese food made in a factory in Birmingham, Pot noodles, ditto but Nottingham, and fish fingers, ditto but Grimsby.

The days lasted longer, the sun shone more and I had no idea what I was heading towards. Girls of course were starting to really get in to the heads of young men. Of course we never did anything, well not with the girls, (back to those bed sheets again)!!! It was an innocent time. Look at colour photos back then and the colours were more vivid, more real. I heard that Kodak, (remember that advert with Alexis Korner), pushed the colour in the 70’s and that’s why it looks so vivid, but maybe we just were more adventurous in our clothes and styles back then.

I taught myself the Pepsi advert so that I could recite it whenever it came on at the cinema. (We didn’t have movies until the 90’s).

Lipsmakinthurstquenchinacetastinmotivatingoodbuzzincooltalkinhighwalknfastlivinevergettincoolfizzinpepsiiiiiiiiiiiiii

There you go a well misspent youth. I’m still waiting for someone to offer a thousand pounds to anyone who can recite it, and up I would step. But I’m still waiting, as may well be Caroline Bailey, who I never turned up to date, I wonder if she is still there.

Of course the good life stopped in 76. The country went to rack and ruin, mainly because we had a bunch of trade unionists who had never done a days work between them running the country. Still come 79 we would have the first woman Prime Minister, all soft and feminine, what could possibly go wrong there.

Looking back it was a good time. If you recognised any of it, then forgive me if tonight after drinking you Horlicks and putting down the Catherine Cookson you got out of the library, you have a small tug of yearning for a youth well spent and days that we can now only dream of and appreciate.

Have a good weekend all of you, especially the old ones. Take care.

Three cheers for Sam

2010-03-04T08:14:00.002Z

I’ve been training in a new system these last few days with my colleagues, one of whom, Sam, is the nicest most balanced person you could ever meet.

He is probably mid 30’s going a little thin on top and has a slight stoop. He has a young family and he supports his local football team. He trained as an accountant but like me has moved across to consultancy. He likes a joke particularly at himself and is very open when he finds something incomprehensible.

Each day at 11.30am he takes his wallet out which have credit cards and fuel cards in it. On one side of the wallet is a picture of his children, on the other a picture of his wife. They look happy and maybe I detect a smile cross his face when he opens the wallet and sees the most important reasons he lives for.

He sticks a finger in to the back of the wallet and draws out a small silver blister pack and puts it on the desk in front of him. He does this quietly, but without being self conscious. Its just something he has to do, simple, as a person would take out a pen from a pocket. No big deal. He pops a small pill out, I can’t tell you what colour but maybe its yellow. Then pops it in his mouth and puts the pack back in his wallet and the wallet back in his jacket pocket.

I like the man, he has a nice way about him and seems to have priorities right. He has Parkinsons, which is not treatable in a sense that it will go away, but by taking a little yellow pill and I guess some others, its progress can be slowed down a little.

Here’s the thing. He knows what lies before him and that it is inevitable, unless there is the miracle cure, but that’s unlikely. The thought of what lies in front would terrify me, never mind most other people who are of a stronger disposition. Yet it has not stopped him working, or enjoying life. As he says, I’m OK today.

I’m sure that he has bad days, don’t we all, but he doesn’t seem to show it. He just puts one foot in front of the other, gets on with it and doesn’t whinge about the cards life has dealt him.

He is a great example of humility and acceptance. I hope I will have many more years to know him.

Take care all of you and have a good week

MEN !!

2010-02-27T19:17:00.002Z

I have been out ranger training today. We were doing some conservation work, digging up rhodedendrons that had got out of hand since been planted in the victorian times. There was a mixed group of people young and old, men and women.

I noticed that myself and another 50 ish man had elected ourseolves tenderers of the bonfire. It struck me as a really man thing. All the young men and all the women were cutting down trees and dragging them over, doing all the hard work. Me and my colleague were having deep technical discussions about air flow and chimneys. We kept piling the stuff on in ever more complicated ways.

We were just big kids who had been given an excuse to set fire to something. Its odd the attraction fire has for men I think. There is soemthing primordial about it. Something that takes us back to a time we can only just connect with.

Its been a good day. My Beautiful is featured in this weekends FT. Thats the Financial Times a paper of great repute. I am so proud of her. Its a good piece and is recognition of all the hard work she has done. Coming after the last 2 monhts, it is a welcome relief from a time of pain.

Have a good weekend all of you and take care

How Important is it

2010-02-23T17:58:00.002Z

Since my last post, until yesterday, I have been unable to blog because my service provider made some changes that blocked Blogger.com

I've not been too bad, but it has started to irritate me a little. Anyway, after searching around the net I found a forum page where, bloggers were complaining about the outage and someone came up with a fix. Lo and behold I'm back.

It has been a test of my compulsiveness, how much I have been obsessed by it. Which isn't too much that it has given me sleepless nights.

I am also suing the former employer and this has not caused too much anguish either. Maybe because I believe I am in the right and can see the logic and reasonableness of my argument.

Maybe also, my even keel has been because I have been firmly focussed on making My Beautiful happy. Her mother has just passed away and I am now going to ensure that for the rest of my days, Beautiful is happy as can be. Seems to be a good thing to do and one which stops me thinking about me.

I've been reading all of your blogs now and have commented on a few so hopefully I will get up to speed.

Take care and have a good week

Nothingness

2010-02-16T05:48:00.002Z

There's not a lot going on in life at the moment. The higher power seems to be giving some respite at the moment from the recent emotional events. My head keeps tripping in and out of obsession as it usually does anyway, but I seem to be handling it a little better at the moment.

I pick up little head vendettas against various people. Old work colleagues, members of the fellowship, non existant friends. But they don't seem to last too long so I guess its OK

I was out Ranger training at the weekend with a young lady. She was nervous to be in the wild places, which was OK. As we went around we talked about ourselves, getting to know each other. This sometimes happens with rangers and is always welcome to me. Some rangers just walk and not talk, which is pretty boring, especially for 8 hours. Others as on Sunday engage in wide ranging conversations. Being a ranger is not just about knowing where you are or how to save somones life. Its also about engaging and interracting with people, so conversation is pretty important.

We were talking about how we change over the years and I told her about my programme of self improvement I am on. I didn't tell her about AA, but I did tell her about how I started to come out of my shell.

To stop myself from being so self conscious I went on a roller coaster. I had always refrained from going on these things, lest people see I was scared, or heard me scream and they laughed at me and I was humiliated. I knew that this was a childish ay to view things, so one day I went on one with my then 8 year old daughter. Boy I was scared. I screamed, my eyes had tears in the,. I laughed out loud. I realised I was scared and that was what you were supposed to be on roller coasters. Scared.

When we got off, we all laughed and said how good it had been. From then on, I was never afraid to laugh, or be scared or be me. It was the beginning of my rehabilitation. I was entering the fourth dimension of recovery. Emotional Sobriety.

I never realised how long the journey would be, that it is never ending. It's a process of teaming and ladeling, refining the already refined, until purity is achieved, when we stand, naked and secure in the world, because we are who we are, as we were meant to be.

Have a good week and take care.

Before the Steps

2010-02-11T10:35:00.001Z

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about recovery, what it means to me and which parts are the most important to me.

I used to say that sobriety and not drinking were the most important aspects of my life and that nothing was more important than not drinking. I’ve been reviewing this unwritten law this last few weeks, and I have come to realise that sobriety is not the most important thing in my life. This may seem like heresy, it certainly would have to me a few months ago.

The most important thing to me is the life of My Beautiful wife. If that was ever in danger and I could save her by taking a drink, then I would have no hesitation. If a man, (why is it always a man?), held a gun to My Beautiful’s head and said, “You can save her life by picking up that glass of alcohol and drinking it”, then drink I would.

I recently had a good friend in the fellowship who took her own life, why I do not know. She had been sober for 10 years or more, had a job, a home, friends. Yet she reached a point where dying was a better option. I know that there are mental health issue probably at work here, but if she needed release for a while, why on earth not take a drink, get hammered. At least she had the chance, however small of coming back from a drink. She had no chance after hanging from a rope for a few days.

So there are more important things to me than sobriety, otherwise I would not place them before sobriety.

I had spent a little time around the rooms, got myself a sponsor, believed in God, shared in meetings. But it had not kept me sober, I still drank again. Odd isn’t it, all that time, doing all the right things, yet I still went back out and drank. Drink was more important than sobriety then. When I returned from that drink and a narrow escape from jail, the first thing I did was stop drinking. I mean stopped totally. No pubs, no booze in the house, no money to carry to buy booze, drive a different way home so as not to pass the pub. The next thing I went to the very next meeting.
Not the next meeting I could get to, the next available meeting.

In hindsight these two actions became the foundation cornerstones of my recovery. Before the steps, before the big book, before sponsors and sponsees, before service, before a higher power, I stopped drinking and went to meetings.

The next corner of the foundation was that I decided that no matter what the day brought good or bad, I would not have a drink. I made a conscious decision, on a daily basis, not to have a drink. At first this required effort, determination and application, but after a while it became part of my day, part of me. It was second nature as firmly cemented into the foundations as the other two, stop drinking and get to meetings.

The fourth foundation stone was work. I have never not worked, even though there have been days when I would have gladly run away from all of life. But a sense of responsibility and yes respect for the world and myself, kept my nose to the grindstone. This was just as well as, left with time on my hands and a falling self esteem I would have surely gone mad, ended in prison or drunk.

Over the last 22 years everything I have has been built up off those four foundation stones. Dealing with daily life has meant change and to change I needed a change mechanism. The programme of recovery practised by recovering alcoholics provided me with that mechanism, a route map of where to go and what to do. At first I thought it was about drinking, but it is so much more than that. It is the very essence of a life well lived. A life of fruitfulness, changing, evolving, making today a better day than yesterday. Hope is always there when the programme is been used, for I know that no matter what the situation today, hindsight will allow me to look back on this day and see the lesson I was taught. There is always a lesson, often it is to treat someone with more care, or care less about how someone treats me. That makes for peaceful days and restful nights.

My understanding of the programme continually evolves as my experience and perspective develops and changes. What was yesterday is not always suitable for today.

Life is not a linear journey. It is ups and downs, circles and waves and at the centre is the most important part of the programme love. Love for another and love for myself.

Take care and have a good week.

For a graceful, elegant lady.

2010-02-06T18:56:00.004Z

It’s been awhile since I last posted. I guess this has been out of respect for My Beautiful and her mother. Her mother, Peggy passed away on the 28th following a lengthy stay in hospital. Peggy had been admitted to hospital following a fall at home. Sadly, Peggy never recovered. She was 83 years old, which I guess is a good age to live to. She was a wonderful woman, full of grace and elegance. And she had a mischievous side, which made her laugh and clap her hands whenever Jim, her husband and My Beautiful’s father was caught doing something he shouldn’t have been. They’d been together for 60 years, which is testimony that a marriage is something lasting. During their last days together I was struck by how much they loved each other, stroking hands, kissing, making sure each other was alright. It was, and is, a great example of love, one which I hope to follow with my Beautiful. I know now where Beautiful gets her love from and why she spreads it wherever she is and to who ever you are.

They’d travelled the world Jim and Peggy, meeting in the south west of England where the land is full of mysticism. It was new age before the words were coined, and still is to this day. Eventually Jim pitched up in Africa farming and asked Peggy to go out to see him. A journey that took 6 weeks by boat and land. She’d packed all her belongings, but bought a return ticket just in case. Can you imagine that happening today, anyone travelling for 6 weeks not knowing whether or not it would work out. They married of course and a little later along came my Beautiful. From what I gather, it was an idyllic life in many ways, the farm, the beauty of the area, the wilderness. It was remote, but then to a degree, back then we all were, whether we lived in a town or city or a wilderness with lions and tigers and elephants to play with. Eventually they returned to England to be near their daughter I suppose and settled down in a small market town in the north.

I hope Peggy was happy with how her daughter’s life turned out, I certainly have everything I hold dear in my life now, to thank her for. I’m sure she is at peace and watching over Jim and Beautiful. It was a privilege to have known her and I realise now that she taught me much. I will miss her but never forget her.

My priority now is to look after my Beautiful and after seeing how two people who have been together fro 60 years can do it, I have a lot to live up to and a lot to learn.

Things are on the up for me personally. My new career is turning out to be enjoyable, it’s good to meet so many different people who I can offer help to.

My old eye hospital sacked me a few months ago because I missed one appointment in over 10 years. A friend from the fellowship had kept hounding me for some years to switch to the Sheffield Eye Hospital which I duly did. I went this last week to see the consultant who informed me that the old hospital had mis diagnosed my eye problems and this also meant that the medication was wrong. And then he dropped his bombshell. He said matter of factly. “We’ll get you on the right medication for a few months and keep a close monitor on the eyes. Then if all goes well we will operate and you’ll have no more problems.””

“Does that mean you can save my sight” I asked.
“I’m pretty sure we can” Said the doc.

I'm also thrilled that the Home of sculptor Henry Moore has asked my Beautiful to go and talk to them so they can sell her work and also maybe commission her for a piece for the gallery.

Have a good week all of you and take care.

Findons Law

2010-01-24T18:41:00.003Z

I've been spending a lot of time in the bathroom these last 24 hours. I think I may have picked up a bug whilst visiting My Beautifuls mother who is in hospital. I am not the best of patients so its been fortunate that Beautiful was away caring for her mother who has been in hospital since just before Christmas.

My meetings are getting further and further apart, partly due to the fact that because of my eyesight I cannot get to evening meetings whilst Beautiful is away and partly due to inertia from me. For some reason going to meetings at a time when my mother in law is so ill, does not seem appealing. I really dont want to sit there while someone tells how dificult their life is because they have to catch a bus in to town to pick up their benefits.

The snow has not helped much. Its not cold now and the snow has finally gone, but it is wearing having to cope with a few inches of the stuff, whilst the whole country grinds to a halt.

I am having to sue my old firm for unpaid expenses, which is causing some sleeplessness, particularly as it is only for a small amount. But I keep shouting out " Leave It" when it enters my mind and that seems to work. It has become a matter of principle. "Do you want to be right or do you want to be happy" I hear you all say. But sometimes, you just have to stand up.

Yesterday I was out Ranger training with the national park service. I had to plot a route and then follow it. Supposedly!! When I set off with the ranger who was leading me for the day, he went in a completely opposite direction, then we became lost in woods, getting stuck in knee deep bogs. After a couple of hours of this, I was on the verge of saying to him, perhaps we should just stick to my route, when he announced that in the recent past he had spent 2 years in various mental institutions after trying to hold up a bread shop, whilst naked except for a red and white striped wooly hat. ( The hat was correctly positioned for such an item of attire. He was not entertaining any modesty.) It made me laugh as Findons law once again had proved infallable. The law states that any nutter in any given situation will always gravitate towards me.

Thats it for now. Beautiful has just returned, so I am looking forward to spending the evening with her. I've decided that my aim for the rest of my life is to look after her as befitting the precious diamond that she is.

Take care and have a good week all of you.

Pacing.... pacing

2010-01-17T20:33:00.003Z

Here’s the problem. Or one of the problems to be more accurate. Focus is what I need, focus and persistence. There is a growing list of projects that I want to undertake. Most of them are allied to my dreams of greatness and acceptance. The list comprises as follows

1. Write Novel…… Several first pages and even a chapter have been started
2. Write walking Guide book…..Draft of first page completed
3. Publish National Park website to earn loads of money from advertising……
website name purchased
4. Invent survival communication system for walkers etc….. Several found today on internet.
5. Become Park Ranger……..training actually started on this and continuing
6. Pass exams to become bookkeeper so have second job in old age ,…..continuing, but a pain
7. Take stunning photos……..lots of camera gear owned, lots of good photos taken……..none on walls

So you see lots of dreams, lots of day dreaming, but not much in the way of action.
The one I would really like to do is the writing. That is why I originally started this
Blog, to discipline myself into writing on a regular basis. The trouble is I just don’t
believe I have the skill nor the, how shall I say this, the status, yes that’s the word
the status. Why should a man born in a council house be able to publish a book?
let alone write one. This could go back to the day I told my father that I was leaving
the steelworks to become a photographer. " Don’t be so ridiculous" he boomed,
"what makes you think the likes of you could be a photographer" There and then
ambition and escape died and I was fed back in to the mill to become just like all
other men in a steel and mining town.
The frustration is becoming unbearable. How shall I achieve something other than
this nothingness. Write god damn you. Write.
Sit down and start typing and keep typing. On a daily basis. Its just like not drinking.
Do it one day, one paragraph, one line at a time. But what should I write about. Try
me, write about me. First. Small steps. Write about a walk. Whatever it is do it and
make sure I finish it. I must finish something.

150 Years old today

2010-01-10T08:57:00.004Z

Fish and Chips are 150 years old today. Friends across the water may not know what fish and chips are, or how important they are in the British psyche.

Fish and chips are made from Cod and potatoes. The cod tends to come from the North Atlantic, landed at ports around the country. The potatoes are predominately grown in Britain and varieties such as Maris Piper are most popular as these have a floury texture which is good. Waxy texture potatoes produce greasy chips which is bad.

The dish is sold from small family establishments, called chip shops. The traditional way of serving fish and chips is wrapped in greaseproof paper, then a clean sheet of paper, then an insulating layer of newspaper. The news paper has been replaced today by plain clean paper. The dish is always served hot, straight from the friar.

The fish is coated in batter, often made of a secret recipe. The chips are thick cut. Both parts are then deep fried in beef dripping ( beef rendering), vegetarians are usually unaware of this. The hot fish and chips are then either served, (wrapped) by folding in paper and taken home to eat or (open) served in an open envelope of paper or a polystyrene tray to be eaten outdoors. The usual accompaniment is Mushy Peas. Garden peas boiled down so that they sit in a sweet green sauce. Salt and vinegar is added liberally.

The dish costs around £4.50 today that’s $3. When I was a kid I could by a bag (portion of chips) for 1 shilling, that’s 5p in today’s money. In Yorkshire the dish has also become a fine dining experience at fish and chip restaurants around Leeds and Bradford, where you can eat it with a silver service. Waitresses dressed in black with white pinafores and white doily head dressings, serve the dish on fine china, with English silver cutlery. The dish is accompanied with slices of bread and butter and a pot of tea.

Most people my age believe the best way to eat the dish is out of an open envelope made of newspaper, with lashings of salt and vinegar. Held in the hand on a dark cold night walking home with your loved one. Eating the fish and chips with a small wooden fork and then drinking the residue salt and vinegar at the bottom of the envelope, which has become flavoured with the fish and chips, the beef dripping and the old newsprint. It is one of those taste experiences that never leaves you and always takes you back to the old days.

Contrary to popular belief fish and chips are more healthy than many other take away foods. They contain less fat and less calories than a big mac, burger king, kfc or a pizza.

The dish is a great British institution and if you visit us, be sure to have at least one portion during your stay. To pick the best fish and chips, look for a chip shop with the longest queues, preferably out of the door. Try and eat them at night or on a Friday or Saturday lunchtime, this is when they will be cooked with maximum freshness.

Honesty

2010-01-07T19:24:00.003Z

Just how honest am I in my blog and how honest could I be. It isn't a question I am asking you friends, its a question I am asking myself.

There has been a slow creeping mundanity apprearing over the last few months. Im feeling the need to let go. Reach out to the next level of me.

Im going to think about this over the next few days, but it may not work out the way I think it will now.

Snow Snow Snow

2010-01-05T20:05:00.003Z

Its been a Christmas and New Year of snow so far. We brits don't know how to handle snow. A single snowflake brings the whole country to a halt. The latest fad is for companies and organisations to send people home from work early. This is now a well co-ordinated activity. Public transport is the first to shut down, meaining everyone else who has just been kicked out of work has no way of getting home, except by foot or in lines of traffic stood for hours. It always amazes me. I have worked in Gdansk and Stockholm in winter and there was not a single minute of disruption.

Anwyas, the new job goes well, when they aren't sending me home that is. So far I have a laptop, phone, printer, blackberry, satnav. I have no idea what I am going to do with all this stuff, especially the satnav. I havent needed one for 50 years to get around the world and i cant see the need now.

The photo is of Padley Chapel A 14th century chapel that used to be part of a manor house. Dont get ecited, 14th century building are quite common in England. The special thing about this is that King Henrys men found to priests hiding there on day. They were hung, drawn and quatered, whilst still alive. Happy days

Happy New Year to you all.

The Last Day

2009-12-31T05:55:00.001Z

What have I learnt this year. Looking back to the post in 2008, there are many similarities.

My love for My Beautiful has grown deeper, something that always amazes me, it continues to grow and strengthen, knowing no bounds.

I start the new year with a new job and a new career.

There has been much more level living this year

I am more relaxed, willing to take the world as it comes, I even dance in the house!

Problems with my heart that turned out to be muscle damage, but made me think!!

A 50th birthday in New York, a treat from My Beautiful, no man could want for more.

The spiritual side of the programme becoming more cloudy, but still important. I’m not sure who God is these days, but I know something out there is looking after me.

Greater contentment

Stable meetings

The windmills are still there but I’m not tilting at them so much.

The death of friends in and out of the fellowship, a reminder that nothing is there forever, so live for today.

Shaking of the halfwits who disturb my piece.

Another year sober

That’s it I guess. Seems pretty mundane and I guess that’s how I like it these days. Who knows what 2010 will bring, more revelations and more mountains to climb.

I guess the lesson of this year is not to sweat the small stuff and take life as it comes.

Have a good holiday all of you and a happy new year.

Take care

Have a good Christmas Everyone

2009-12-24T13:00:00.002Z

Im off to meet my Beautiful at her parents where we will be staying this Christmas. Her mom is in hospital after a fall earlier this week. Her dad is also having some treatment for prostate cancer in the same hospital so its all go at the moment.

We'll be staying over a while, which will be nice for her dad and mom as we will be able to support them better.

Its still been snowing here, not as much as in the US, but we still grind to a halt. The other day I was chuntering away at myself as the local council had not put salt down on our road which is steep and compacted with ice and snow. The salt bin at the bottom lay unused. Whilst complaining like hell to myself, it occurred to me that I had nothing to do at the time so I could salt the road. Which I duly did, the whole length and the pavements (sidewalks). I really enjoyed it. After I emailed the council to tell them and ask them to fill the bin up again. It felt like the old community spirit.

Whilst reading about the snow I saw a piece from a local councillor who was compliaining that the gritting trucks had not been out early enough and this had caused chaos on the roads, making people late for work and getting home. In this day and age he said its ridiculous that we have to struggle through snow.

I dont know why but something then made me look for news items about Choma in Zambia, the home of My Beautiful. I found a news article where a local coucillor was complaining that up to two people a week were been eaten by crocodiles as they collected water. He was asking if the goverment could do anything. There cannot be many councillors in the world who have a problem like that, and there cant be many people who have to face a crocodile and imminent death when out shopping.

Here is the link to the item http://www.lusakatimes.com/?p=22289

It sort of puts everything in perspective.

Have a good christmas all of you, enjoy it with your loved ones and maybe even the neighbours.

Men are happier

2009-12-22T11:43:00.001Z

I like this

Men Are Just Happier People-- What do you expect from such simple creatures.
Your last name stays put. T
he garage is all yours.
Wedding plans take care of themselves.
Chocolate is just another snack.
You can never be pregnant.
You can wear a white T-shirt to a water park.
You can wear NO shirt to a water park.
Car mechanics tell you the truth.
You don't have to stop and think of which way to turn a nut on a bolt.
Same work, more pay.
Wrinkles add character.
Wedding dress $5000.
Tux rental-$100.
People never stare at your chest when you're talking to them.
New shoes don't cut, blister, or mangle your feet.
One mood all the time.
Phone conversations are over in 30 seconds flat.
You know stuff about tanks.
A five-day vacation requires only one suitcase...
You can open all your own jars.
You get extra credit for the slightest act of thoughtfulness.
If someone forgets to invite you, he or she can still be your friend.
Your underwear is $8.95 for a three-pack.
Three pairs of shoes are more than enough.
You almost never have strap problems in public.
You are unable to see wrinkles in your clothes.
Everything on your face stays its original color..
The same hairstyle lasts for years, maybe decades.
You only have to shave your face and neck.
You can play with toys all your life.
One wallet and one pair of shoes -- one color for all seasons.
You can wear shorts no matter how your legs look.
You can do your nails with a pocket knife.
You have freedom of choice concerning growing a moustache.
You can do Christmas shopping for 25 relatives on December 24 in 25 minutes.
No wonder men are happier.

OK I give in. America, please tell me

2009-12-20T07:31:00.003Z

You know that I love you all over there, well perhaps not Dubya and his clan, and I have to say old Obama seems to be slipping down the slippery road from where we stand, shades of our Tony there me thinks, all words and little positive action up to now. Has anyone ever made the connections between Obama and Osama, I mean what is the probability of two very unusual names like that ending up linked with the same country, one man looking for the other, and only one letter difference. Anyway, I digress,

You all know that I was recently treated to New York and very wonderful it was too. Whilst there I bought some books one of which was, Mouth Open Wide, by John Thorne. This is a cook book and also observations on American taste buds. I have just read a whole chapter on Grits.

It was extremely interesting and utterly un informative. I have no idea what Grits are. I have images of what I think they are and I have to say they do not sound too appealing, never have.
To me they sound like Grape Nuts. I do not know if these have any connection whatsoever with grapes or nuts, in fact I have no idea what Grape nuts are either. But Grits sound like they fall in to this category.

Grits sound hard, like the bit of stuff you get in shoes. They sound grey and crunchy, even uncrunchieable (no such word, but it is very descriptive). They sound like a hospital remedy for constipation. " Here. Eat a bowl of this. We're gonna scour the walls of your digestive system. Make it all nice and clean. Fruit will whizz through after a bowl of this."

And why "Grits". They seem to be made of corn. so why not "Corn". Which makes me think maybe they are like porridge. Thats sometimes grey although it is more mushy than crunchy.

Enough of Grits. What about Tamale. What the hells a Tamale. I figure yellow with a red centre, looking like a piece of bone marrow. And very, very greasy. They are sort of squeezy, the bright yellow outer has a consistency like polenta and the red inner which is a spicy meat concoction is mushy and oozes grease. But they come in a can? Can this be true, have I read this right. What sort of greasy, squeezy finger food comes in a can.

Or then there is a Corn Dog. I am thinking hotdog but vegetarian style. You know the veggies cannot just let go, so they invented all these horrendous substitutes for the food they really want to eat, but they just cannot let go of the carnivorous connotations. "Nut Roast" , "Vegetarian Sausage"I can't think of others off the top of my head, but I know they are out there. So a Corn Dog looks like a hotdog, except, and this is where the imagery goes a little awry, the inner is filled with a long thin red, maybe yellow tube of indeterminate povenance. It comes in a long bread finger roll and you squeeze mustard and ketchup on it.

Thats another one Ketchup. You call it Catsup, I think. Maybe I have got this completely wrong, in which case please forgive me. But Catsup??? Well, we are in to the realms of following the cat around the house with a newspaper, as he gips and yips whatever it is that he wants to get rid off. So Catsup is way, way off base, as I think you all say.

Root Beer. Is this what we call ginger beer. Not ginger ale which is completely different from beer. So what is Root Beer. They mentioned it on the Odd Couple, I watched it last night. Great film.

So I have read a book in plain english and have no idea what on erath it says in parts. Maybe this is why the afghan war is taking so long. The Taliban all call things by a common language, whilst we, the British and the US, because lets face it, we are the only ones there. No one else can think up a reason to be there. The British and the US are separated by a common language, which must make for mistakes.

" Hey Brit"
"Yes, old chap"
" Yeah Brit, pas the catsup will ya"
" The catsup, old boy"
"Yeah. Like I said, pass the catsup"

" What the hell are you doing with that cat"

Emergency Snow Measures

2009-12-18T07:12:00.003Z

From todays newspapers.......

Government Convenes Disaster Comittee for Snow

The south east of England was blanketed in 1/8 inch of snow yesterday prompting the convening of the emergency disaster comittee.

As commuters struggled to negotiate the steps down to Tower Bridge Tube station a newspaper vendor admitted that he could quickly go out of business as no one was buying newspapers anymore, because they could not hold the paper in their goretex climate change approved mittens. managers of the tube also admitted that 2 out of the 3 tube drivers employed by London Underground had phoned ina sicky this morning citing unspecified but remarkably similiar symptoms. "This snow is going bring the country to a standstill"

Prophetic words indeed. Just as he uttered that prophecy Lianne Watson skidded 3 inches as she tried to negotiate the central roundabout joining the M4 at Swindon, this caused Graham Tolleyhead to run in to the back of her causing tailbacks that finally brought the whole of the south east to a standstill. Later Tolleyhead admitted that he had been driving whilst using his mobile phone, drinking a cup of coffee and smoking a cigarette. He said that if he had not taken his eyes of the road to look at the little yellow snowflake Icon on his dashboard turn to red to indicate a drop in temperature tur 3 degrees, he might have seen the car in front stop. A policeman called for incar signs to be banned as this was clearly the cause of the accident.

The local government sent out their secretary Tracy to purchase more salt for the roads and pathways. At least afurther 3 packets were needed they thought to last them through the wiinter. Unfortunately Tracy became embroiled in a bitter row with Diane from customer service over who was going to be the number one record this christmas and also with Duane from gardens and parks who asserted that Slade did actually exist and it was not a soap opera from the 70's

Barney Goodman head of highways admitted it was going to be a long hard winter for everyone and urged people not to rish out an panick buy salt and other condiments fearing a stampede like last summer when the sun came out on August the 13th, the weathermen having got it wrong again. Sales of calamine lotion soared that day which was a shame for the suntan lotion industry. This said the secretary of state for education is exactly why we should go back to basics in reading riting and arithmetic.

The weather bureau was telling anyone who would listen that they had got this one smack on the nose and meant that their 1.9 billion pound computer was godd for more than playing chess. The previous day weatherman Michael Sturgeon had forcast sun, rain, wind, sleet, cold, hot and importantly snow, in many places all of which were unspecified at the time. This he saidf was state of the art forcastiing.

Over 3.5 working days will be lost today due to the snow. those 3.5 people who have been supporting the vast majority of the benefits systems claimants will have to work an extra 30 years to make up the shortfall.

The British Prime Minister said "Once again Britain has proven to the world we are ready to take on any thing or anybody. 1/8 inch of snow is not going to beat us down. In a few days time the country will be back up and running as normal. We are british and whilst clearly climate change is now upon us more snow will mean more powerstations and more snow shovel manufacturers. This is jobs for britain proving our policies work"

A wonderful article. You cant beat us brits, each year we are totally surprised that it snows and each year the first flakes brings the country to a standstill. Its the way we do it. New York.... you are just amateurs.......

Slept surprisingly well last night !!!

2009-12-17T07:34:00.003Z

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Resentments, Resentments

2009-12-16T21:44:00.002Z

Do you know I get sick and tired of being resentful against virtually anyone who does not match up to my oh so high falootin standards.

Its coming up to christmas and all I can think about its some useless manager who I no longer work for and what I would like to do to him, just because he tries to do bad things to me.

I am 50 years old, 21 years+ sober ( theres a laugh) I I am still shackled to this pathetic purile stuff.

Dont...... DONT...............FOR THE LOVE OF GOD ............DO NOT ...........give me advice

I want the pain, the sleepless nights, the sore eyes, I wanna scroll through every entry in google of his name looking for his number or address, I wanna set fire to him, trash his car, ruin his life, ruin his families life, Jeeeeeeez just listen to me. After 20 years this is it sanity.

I am as crazy as a wasp caught in a honey jar. When, when when will I ever learn

Toss these fuckers off my shoulder, shake em off my life, the has beens, the wasters, the the hte I cant think of anything else

Just one night, just one, thats all I ask, just one without there been anyone else in the bedroom other than me and my beautiful and the dog and the cat. I mean isnt that enough for any man, especially when the cat sleeps on my side of the bed and the dog blows off all night.. Isnt that enough for one man to handle. Alan fucking D%^%^$E(^)^ can go fuck himself.

There thats that done.

Hope you are all having a good week

Take care

Its been an odd week

2009-12-13T20:45:00.000Z

Its been an odd week. I have been doing some consulting for my friend at the fish factory. He needed to know what was going on, but from someone with no axe to grind. He also needed some one who was well versed in the manufacturing standards and principles the company follows. It’s called Six Sigma and was developed by Motorola some time ago. Practitioners of Six Sigma are stratified in ability and experience by the colour of a Judo belt, starting with yellow, then green, then black then master black then champion. The fish people have just finished a green belt course. I’m a black belt, which means I lead projects etc, so we fit each other perfectly. I gave my first report on Friday, there were a few surprises, hopefully changes will lead to positive things.. I’m back next week to look at another plant.

It is nice to have their confidence; it bolsters the ego a little and reminds me that I have worked hard for my success and reputation.

Jane’s funeral was on Thursday. It was a humanist ceremony, celebrating her life. I liked it. I also learnt a lot of things I did not know about Jane. She is resting in piece now. I still have some anger towards her for leaving us and I catch myself thinking about her at points through the day and calling her a silly sod for doing what she did. I’ll miss her that’s for sure and once again I have been taught a lesson in life when I least expected it. At the funeral I was stopped by someone I haven’t seen for years. He’s sober, but not working, living off benefits. We spoke about Jane and he said that we were alright. Meaning nothing like that would happen to us. I said “Just for now” and he seemed incredulous at the idea we could do something like Jane. I guess he had learnt nothing from her service or her death. I wanted to say something, but just let it go and moved on.

On Friday I saw Jane’s ex at a meeting. We sat and talked about Jane and what it meant to us. It was an odd experience, because this was someone I had sacked from a job some years before.

Today I have had to rip out a kitchen unit and take tiles of the wall to get at a leak. I was cursing the plumber, but when it came too it was the person who fitted the kitchen 3 years ago that had punctured a pipe with a screw. That person being me!!!

I repaired the pipe, and was so knackered after I had to rest and have a bath. Time,age is catching up.

I have just been reading “ Mouth Wide Open” by John Thorne. I bought this in NY on my recent trip. Its not your usual cook book, more a journal about food, cooking and daily things. He was writing about his grandparents house, how old it was. I thought of ours. Its over a hundred years old, which is nothing special here. But still breaths its age now and again, like today. We’ve upgraded most of it, put in new wooden sash windows, rewired it, new heating doors etc. We have a glass box for a kitchen which is nice and modern. The bathroom needs doing, but we just don’t seem to get round to it.

On Saturday I had my interview to be accepted as a Park Ranger. I was and I am thrilled. I start my training in the new year.

That’s my week. I have no idea what this next will bring, but I hope it will be good.
Have a good week all of you and thank you all for the kind words of support and prayers for Jane.

Say a prayer for Jane

2009-12-02T18:22:00.006Z

Regular readers of this blog will possibly have noted that I often lean towards the black in terms of mood. Looking back over past posts there is a fairly even sprinkling of blogs relating to deaths, illness and general pessimistic view on life.

It isn’t that I am a pessimist, quite the opposite in fact. I exude optimism, laughter and whistles like a tube of Everfresh toothpaste. All, sky blues and greens and white stripes and a feeling that makes your lips smack together and your gums assert their existence.

But death does seem to touch me deeply. More than, I suspect, it does other folks. It is the loss, the future opportunities now gone unspoken. The lost last words, the passed moments. It is more poignant when the dead are young. Then, it is the promises, promises from God we were all given at birth that are broken. Perhaps this is why I don’t like to hear the promises read in meetings.

It sounds churlish, but it does seem easier to celebrate the passing of a person who has died aged 89, than it does one at 57, or 47, or 38. I feel all losses deeply, maybe out of some emotional schism within me that needs to be healed. But I would not have it any other way. It is the side of me that is capable of extreme kindnesses, which balances the other side of unbelievable cruelty. So forgive me if I often sound morose, I’m not, Its just that I am attracted to the losses we have in our lives and the holes they leave behind.

Today has been an odd day, one of downs, ups, downs again, and down again. It isn’t one I would want to repeat in a hurry.

It started back on the 25^th, when I handed in my notice to the firm I have been working for, giving them 3 weeks notice although I only needed to give them one. But I reasoned that I’m in no hurry to start my new job and lets try and be helpful. Well, it didn’t go down to well; they created as many problems as they could and generally yanked my chain. It has to be said that they aren’t high on the trustworthy scales. Anyway after 7 days I though why am I bothering. So I went to see the client I had been working with for them and said good byes, offered any help I could and parted on excellent terms.

This morning it all came to a head with my employer and to cut a long story short we parted company this lunchtime, but not before the director dealing with me threw a childish fit. But that is his stuff and not mine. I acted in an adult and responsible manner. However, a little deflating considering how thoughtful I had been.

Next a phone call from someone connected with the food industry, which is the industry I am noted for my work. Heard you are at a loose end they said. You’re right what we want for a few weeks, come and park your boots at out table and we will see you right.

Now how is that for God in your life? Someone thinks I do a good job and is willing to put themselves out for me. I was as high as a kite.

I was so excited I went to a meeting. It was here that the world caved in. Someone told me that a good friend of mine, who had phoned some weeks ago and I hadn’t got back too had died at the weekend. I cannot describe how this makes me feel. It is too painful.

Jane, I never knew her second name, was a beautiful person, who could be so full of life. She was the first gay person I ever really knew. I once tried to make a pass at her and she looked at me incredulous and stated in a matter of fact way that we were friends. And that we became. Good friends. We didn’t see each other every month, but we kept regular contact and had the odd curry after a meeting etc. She shared all about her love life and I mine, not the physical details, but the emotional and the love. Love for Jane could be a minefield and there were a few partners, she never seemed to find happiness. Jane had a dark, depressive side and this would rear its head at times. I last saw her at a meeting and she came and hugged me and sat beside me holding my hand and looking at me. It was odd, because this wasn’t Jane at all. We left the meeting promising to keep in touch more often. When she called I was too busy to take her call and never found the time to get back to her. I have no idea what kept me away from that call, I guess it was important at the time, it just wasn’t important enough for me to remember now.

Over the last few weeks Jane hugged and kissed her way through lots of meetings, making amends to people and thanking people for their help. It was an unusual thing for her to do. Jane wasn’t a tactile person, no lovey dovey, just honest friendship. Apparently her dark mood deepened in recent weeks and people who knew her were becoming worried.

On Monday just gone she was found in her garage hanging by a rope. She was 44 years old.

She took her own life instead of a drink. I wish she had taken the drink

Back in chilly blighty

2009-11-24T03:46:00.004Z

Well, we’re back.

I have to tell you all we had a fine time in NY. Stayed right in the centre on Park Avenue, easy access to everything.

We got there on Saturday, I think, I lose track, with all the time zone changes. The weather was raining, at first I thought it was, but then we realised it was very low cloud. In the evening as it was our first night, we ate at a seafood restaurant in Rockerfeller Centre, right by the window, watching the skaters on the ring. It was so magical. Sunday it was blue skies, warm. We walked around the city, looking at this and that, getting our bearings. Went to a meeting called the Mustard Seed on 12th, this was the meeting my sponsor got sober in 35 years ago. It was a nice meeting and the meting room was a treat to see, we don’t have our own premises in UK much, so it is unusual to visit a room where all sorts of stuff is on the walls.

Monday was birthday boys big day and I got to do whatever I wanted. We walked down 5th Avenue and Soho, in T shirts would you believe, in the middle of November, it was so warm. Just looked at all the places and went in shops, had coffee, looked at galleries, went to a meeting, generally took it easy. In the evening we got dressed up and Beautiful took me to Daniel Bouluds restaurant. We took a taxi and the doorman opened the door for us. The room was just like a set out of Mad Men, all American and easy going, wonderful women, men in suits etc. Had a wonderful meal, it was only after that I realised Daniel Boulud had 3 starts to his name.

Tuesday was Beautifuls day. We walked through Central Park in the morning to the Guggenheim and spent all morning in there looking at the Kadinsky exhibition. I love this building, so easy to be in, so perfect for its purpose. At lunchtime we went to Dean and Deluca, got a fabulous Sushi lunch and ate it in Central Park then after we went to the Couper Hewitt to look at all the new design products. It was a little disappointing, especially the main exhibit which was based around renewable products, but which was really people inventing ridiculous things to do with trees etc. We went to another meeting just around the corner in the evening and it was a bit of an eye opener. Held in a lovely church, a large meeting where people said hello to us. The shares were about money and how they were dealing with having this TV series or that other deal etc. At the beginning they had passed the hat round twice as the Intergroup was strapped for cash and three people objected. Oddly the three were the ones who shared about their money. I guess there are lessons all round when you look for them.

Wednesday and Thursday a little more exploration. We came across some people filming Law and Order, a TV series I think. So stood and watched for awhile. At some point people started to shout and wave at someone behind me, but when I looked no one was there. Then a man came over and asked me to move, apparently I was in shot as they say. I can’t believe it, for a moment I was a movie star and never knew it. On Friday we walked around a corner and straight in to Barry Humphries, a great star over here, you may not know him in the states.

Saturday we went out to Ellis Island and found it very interesting. We tried to search our names in the records, but it seems as a family we weren’t that adventurous in the old days. In the afternoon we went to look at what is happening to Ground Zero. We had stood a top the WTC 14 weeks before the hit, so it was hard to imagine the actual size of the buildings when looking at the hole in the ground. It seems amazing what they are doing there; I hope it will be fitting. The fire station on site had a wonderful tribute to the men who gave their lives, so many and such a loss. The loss hasn’t just been in lives and building either. All the time we were there we could feel a difference in people. At first it was difficult to pin point, it just felt at odds with what we had experienced before. Not just at GZ but all over NY. Gradually the feeling crystallised. There was a hardness about people, less police on the streets. No more yes sir, yes ma’am. Now it was yes or no. We wanted to go in the stock exchange on Wall Street. I asked the security guard where we went for visitors. Without looking at me he said, “ No tours since 9/11” That was it, no sorry sir, no I’m afraid we no longer do tours etc. It was like that all over.
In MOMA the tour guide headsets stopped working when I told the girl at the desk she just shrugged her shoulder and put them away. That was it. Shop people, no please or thank you. Never did anyone say thank you when we purchased something and if we asked a question we got the briefest of answers, as though we were an interruption. It was such at odds with our visit before. At first I thought it was arrogance because of what had happened. Then I realised it wasn’t arrogance, it was fear. For the first time in their lives, the world had intruded. They were like the big kid in the school playground who just got pushed over by the little kid and everyone laughed. It was heartbreaking to see, the fun, the innocence had gone. Now all they had was a F*^K You attitude, this is how we are doing it from now on in. That’s the real legacy of the terrorists. When the Irish blew up Manchester and killed all those innocent people, next day the remaining shops had signs in the windows telling people they were open and that people should by the goods whilst they still lasted. “Buy now whilst stocks last” they shouted. One shop had a sign saying “ Buy now whilst shops last”. It became a famous sign and lifted the spirits. The UK had endured 30 years of maiming and killing at the hands of the Irish and so had developed the ways of dealing with it, I hope New York gets there sooner, but without the terrorism as a teacher.

Our last day we wandered around and I took lots of photos of the Seagram Building, my favourite in the whole world. It is just exquisite in every detail. At night we walked in to the filming of Wall Street 2, but no Mickey D to be seen. We went to a nice meeting and after had a wonderful Italian meal.

So that was it. No one does it like you do and that’s just how it should be. The sights, the food, the people, the culture. It’s all there, larger than life. Last night we slept in our own bed, with the rain poring down. The UK has had terrible floods with more loss of life, nothing much has changed. On my return I found that I have been offered a Business Advisor role by a government agency, which I have accepted.

So at 50, life starts anew.

Have a good week all of you and God Bless America

A life well lived

2009-11-11T21:42:00.002Z

This is my last blog for a while. We are off to New York on Saturday for a week, so with Irony, I will not be able to post to all you people in the USof A as I need to be much further away.

Today I, along with my brother attended the funeral of Robert. Rob, his brother Peter, myself and my brother all grew up together. Rob is the first to pass away, so it is a significant moment.

Rob as a kid had a major heart operation, which they said would need to be re-done in 40 years time. They performed the operation on Monday, and whilst the original problem was still Ok they found something that had been lurking their since birth. Rob never made it off the operating table. He was 57. He left a wife of 35 years, a daughter and grand daughter, all of whom he loved dearly, as they loved him.

I picked my brother up to take him to the church, and he said that there would be quite a crowd, as Rob was a man liked by all. When we got there, there were many, maybe upto 200 people waiting outside for the cortege to arrive. A large part of those who had come to pay their respects were steelworkers. We all worked in the steelworks in those days, Rob was the last one of the 4 of us left their. He was still working there when he went in to hospital, which is some achievement in a steeltown, with few works left.

In the service Robs brother Pete, spoke of the childhood days, playing football, subbuteo, pea picking on the farms. He talked about how they as brothers started to travel in Germany, loving the culture and the beer. He talked about how Rob could always be the maker of a party, no matter how long he had known people. He talked about, how at 55 they had been driving home one day and called in to a strange pub, in a strange town and heard some even stranger music, which they both grew to love. It was called Trance music, they played some at the funeral and It was the most incongrous, out of place music a 55 year old would pick, but that was Rob.

Towards the end a poem was read out. As I listened, tears filled my eyes and I turned around to see 110+ steelworkers stood still with tears streaming down their faces, not flinching, heads held high, looking straight at the coffin. And we just cried.

Tonight at the meeting I listened to a woman talk about how she had been to a school to give a talk about success. She talked of Obama, Mandela et al. She talked about her own book and how successful it had been. She talked about her own success and how good she was.

I thought about all us hardened steelworkers and our tears, and our lack of shame at those tears and at our dignity. I thought about why we had all cried and it was because Rob had touched all our lives in such a fun and positive way, and we had lost something dear to us.

Success isn't what that lady talked of.

The meaning of success? A tear of rememberance and thanks at a life well lived.

I have posted the poem below.

Have a good next few days all of you.

Do not stand at my grave and weep
I am not there;
I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow,
I am the diamond glints on snow,
I am the sun on ripened grain,
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you awaken in the morning's hush
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circled flight.
I am the soft stars that shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry,
I am not there;
I did not die.

Step 12

2009-11-07T16:56:00.002Z

Have I had that spiritual awakening yet. Well, there was no flash of light, no hand from the clouds, no one even suddenly appeared from nowhere and told me a pearl of wisdom that would change the world.

I did stop drinking though, and more importantly, I did stop having a desire for drink. Now that happened the very day after I had my last drink. One minute I could not function without drink, the next I had no desire. So go figure!!

Of course the desire did return, but 16 years later, when I was feeling self pity and wimpish, but the next thought was get to bed you imbecile, remember the last time you had a drink. You nearly ended up in jail.

But there has been an awakening. A gentle dawning of the spiritual side of life. For me it takes the form of being at one with the world, in step, seeing the very best in life. It is a desire not to cause mayhem, not to alienate, not to be railing against the world. It is sense that I am OK and I don't know why but something out there wants me to be OK with me. The realisation that the world existed for a couple of years before I hove in to view and it will continue after as well. Maybe that's it, time is the crucial part of the awakening. Not just age but experience, suffering, pain, mistakes, triumphs, joy freedom. Maybe the awakening is a result of and a cause of all that is good in my life today, but the price to pay is a belief in something greater than, but unseen. It's handing it over in total and unadulterated faith.

This did happen, and continues to do so, but only as a result of these steps. That's important. as a result AND it keeps on happening as I keep studying and applying the steps.

I used to think that carrying the message, meant running over to the newcomer and making him have my phone number, WTF and starter pack. Tick that box!!
That is part of it, but isn't the message also how I behave, conduct myself, the things I say and do. What is it that is important to me and what I leave behind. Do people think as I do sometimes about others, well I wouldn't want their sobriety, I'll walk a different way. I hope not, but I guess some do. I'm not exactly inundated with people asking for my advice on how to live.

How to live, now theres a conundrum. OK here goes.

First and foremost. Don't drink. Not for any reason, no matter what the provocation or occasion.
This is a total abstinence program. That means booze in food as well. And sitting in pubs. Why if you don't drink. would you want to sit in a pub. Why???
Unless your partner, drinks, then don't have booze in the house. It is that simple.

So no drink what else is there. Get to meetings and share, meet people, get in to the middle of the bed. Make sobriety and your meetings the focal point of your life. Make them part of your life, not a part. Before the books, before service, before sponsorship, before church, before twelve stepping, before telephone service, I stopped drinking and went to a meeting. In that order. Dont drink - Go to a meeting - Everything else.

Work- My God in these parts if you mention work in a meeting its worse than mentioning God or the Steps. The drink was affected my head, not my legs, as an old timer likes to repeat.
Work gives me something to do, other than go to meetings, learns me to live with other people, puts food on the table and gives me self respect. On Thursday I sat with an engineer who has lung cancer. He was at work, bloated as hell from the drugs, but work to him gave him a sense of purpose. Now he's got Lung Cancer. Not some pissy little thing like self centred, self pitying alcoholism. So dont tell me you can't work. Its bullshit. You're just bone idle. Get off your ass and look after yourself. Stop scrounging.

Take care of your family. They've been through hell and you just did what you wanted to do, so don't give them a hard time. Put food on the table, mow the lawn, take the kids out. Don't under any circumstances join the professional AA brigade and put losers like me, before your family. Its not right and not healthy. Your family have stood by you. It may end, things do, but if it does, do the right thing and make sure they are provided for and dont whinge about maintenance, settlements. Just do it.

After all of this, then you can start running people to meetings, sponsoring half the town, doing service at 8 meetings a week not including intergroup, region and national.

But most importantly of all, and this is the most important thing of all. When that drunk walks in to the room, reeking of booze, with soiled trousers and a belligerent attitude, you sit beside him and hold the cup to his lips so he can drink the tea, without, whisking it all over the room. You hold his hand, even though you may feel people will think you are strange. You tell him that for you AA worked and that today, you don;t want a drink and you are happy.

This is my message. You may not agree with it, but its all I've got.

Have a good, sober weekend all of you.

Food - Glorious Food

2009-10-31T06:50:00.001Z

Food has played a part in some significant times in my life, often the event was good but sometimes it has bad connotations.

My earliest food memory is dropping a peach of the end of Blackpool pier. I had never tasted nor even seen a peach before. The way my mother presented it to me confirmed then, that the peach was special and a luxury, which it probably was back in those days. I was knelt on a seat, looking over the edge of the pier at the brown sea below and the thing slipped out of my grasp and plummeted in to the sea. I started to cry and was told off by my mother for wasting the exotic fruit and told off by my father for crying. Such is the stuff of summer holidays in childhood.

Mum steak and kidney pie, chips and gravy. Now that was a meal worth waiting for. Thick gravy packed with meat and held together by an even thicker pastry. The chips cooked to within an inch of their life, not golden, but walnut brown. HP sauce, the only one, drizzled liberally over the whole plate, which steamed wonderful aromas up into my senses. It is probably one of the best meals I have ever had, better than any Michelin starred restaurant.

Three slices of toast, two fried eggs, tomatoes and baked beans. My standard breakfast when I started working in the steelworks. We all sat there, in our overalls, eating our food and talking about what we would be doing that weekend. The best time was Saturday morning, when we talked about the evening to come. Usually there would be a dance to go to, Saturday night was for the ladies, so the whole gang would be meeting up in a pub, the men all dressed in fine expensive suits, the women, natures beauty, all soft and sweet smelling. At breakfast we would talk about where to go, who was coming. We’d talk about the week we’d just had. There was no thought about the future, no mortgages, no children, no responsibilities. Just the lads about town. A great time.

Crayfish in seawater with dill. Eaten in Café Opera in Stockholm Sweden. I had gone to work there for 6 months. My first time abroad. A boy from a council estate in Rotherham, an ex steelworker, now in Sweden because I was good at my job. I hadn’t drunk for 4 years and was starting to be able to appreciate good things in life. I was also becoming more adventurous in the things I ate. Never in a month of Sundays would I have eaten such a thing a few years before. Courage to change the things I can could mean more than just stopping drinking.

My first Michelin starred restaurant meal. Fishers in Baslow. Fine dining at the highest level and me with my Beautiful. The meal was exquisite, not because of the food, I can’t remember what we had, but because of my Beautiful. She sat there in the midst of all those extravagant surroundings and eclipsed it all with her poise and beauty and elegance. Dining isn’t about expensive food, it isn’t about exotic locations, it’s about who you are with.

Pan fried scallops with garlic. My signature dish and the first piece of real cooking I did. Refined over the years, it is now a fine dining experience, to be savoured together of an evening.

Fish, chips and mushy peas. Every Friday when we had the business, I bought all the workers this meal for lunch. We would sit there, on rubble, scaffolding, in demolished rooms and eat this meal out of paper wrapping, with tons of salt and vinegar. Laughter, some ribbing of the apprentice, football, women, clothes, any topic and every topic was discussed. Then someone would make the tea, cigs would be lit if we were outside and we would sit there, kings of our own realm. Happy, joyous and free.

Have a good weekend all of you.

Rigorous Honesty

2009-10-24T08:33:00.001+01:00

A recent post by Mary Christian at http://marychristineg.blogspot.com/ and a main share last night from yours truly prompted some thoughts.

I sit in meetings and listen to people share about whatever it is in their lives. Occasionally they will mention the steps, although the 12 and 12 is becoming less well known in these parts as the Big Book brigade gather momentum. Their credo, that EVERYTHING you need is in the BB, becomes louder and louder as more of them totter in and out of the rooms. They focus on the black bits of the programme because I guess you have the illusion of control then.

I tend to share at most meetings, having not yet reached the age of sobriety when I can sit at the back, eyes closed and never share, but look omniscient, and probably have a nickname along the lines of Findon the silent. This is something I aspire to as it seems much more interesting than just talking. If I talk people can gauge how well I am, but if I stay silent then that has the aura of mystery and possibly wisdom of a degree that mere striplings in the programme would find slightly threatening.

Last night, having no speaker arranged the secretary asked someone to read from the BB. A page or so from “The Family Afterwards” was read out and then having no main share the meeting was thrown open. It was a small meeting only 6 people so after a brief silence I started to talk. I talked about what it was like for my family when I was drinking, the rows, the pain, the trashing of numerous kitchens. I talked about the family when I had finally put the booze down. About how not much changed in some ways, the distance between each trashing of the kitchen just got longer. The emotional damage to my children and then wife was greater and that in recovery I guessed it was not supposed to happen, but it had. I talked about making amends to them after the divorce and how now they have no contact with me and that I have settled that in my own mind and accepted that is how it shall be from now on. I shared that I have a right to be happy, not at the cost of others no, but I don’t have to be unhappy at the cost of myself either. Which is how it had always been for me.

I shared about how it was now in my family. About how difficult I can be to live with. How my Beautiful has hard time trying to second guess which Findon will be in the house today, this hour, this minute, this second. It must be hard for her, because it’s damn near impossible for me. I talked about how being me often left me feeling regretful about me. How I miss out on so much because of the whirligig in my head that constantly whirrs round and round. And how those around me are also affected by how I live my life and that too often that is for the worse and not the better.

I shared about how I am a person who is capable of extreme kindnesses and unbelievable cruelties, and there can be nanoseconds in between the two. I talked about proposing to my Beautiful on the Ponte Vecchio, about always telling her I love her, about the little love notes I leave hidden in books and under little used crockery. That I am loyal and trust worthy. That I work hard and am successful at what I do.

I finished by saying perhaps they thought, someone with 21 ½ years of sobriety of working a programme should not be talking like this, that I should have this thing sorted, rather like the person who 2 weeks sober told a group that they had just finished doing the steps in 8 days and now they were recovered.

But in a way I have more questions about life now than I did back then at the beginning. This is how it is for me. This IS me. That’s the point I suppose. I no longer feel the need to BE what I think I should be. If people want to say, and they do, that poor old Findon, his life is such a mess, obviously he has never properly worked the programme, then let em. Spend a day in my shoes, wear my hat and see how well you do, because I sure as hell don’t want anyone else’s.

It feels much better being honest about how life is for me than whistling in the dark pretending.

Have a good weekend all of you.

The Ten Best moments of my life

2009-10-19T09:06:00.005+01:00

Syd posted his 10 best moments in life. Never one to miss a trend I thought I would hop on the back of the band wagon too.

1. Playing the cornet 9 years old at the school concert. The wind blew the music off the stand of the piano player teacher and me. I carried on and he had to try and catch up. The whole school stood and cheered.

2. My first visit to the Peak District National Park

3. Getting my first job

4. Finally putting the drink down

5. Getting my first real sale

6. Realising I had a value

7. Meeting my Beautiful

8. Listening to my Beautiful as she opened her first one woman show and being so proud of her

9. On bended knee, on the Ponte Vecchio in Florence, asking my Beautiful to marry me. She said yes and everyone cheered and clapped

10. Seeing My Beautiful walk down the aisle on our wedding day and realising how much we loved each other. I knew what true love was at last.

Sobriety in the fast lane

2009-10-14T20:05:00.003+01:00

Recently heard at a meeting from a person just back, after spending 6 months getting sober and then throwing it all away.

" The answers lie in the Big Book. That's all I need. I just need to follow exactly what it says in the Big Book. I've just completed the steps in 8 days. Now I need to get on with life."

She hails from a Primary Purpose Big Book meeting where people are not allowed to read the white parts of the Big Book.

To read the white bits, takes time and effort and understanding and many, many mistakes. The white bit, in my opinion, is where the spiritual side of the programme resides. Where's the rush?? God can wait for us can't he? After going back to drink, is a person really capable of passing judgement on how well they are 8 days after completing the steps.

Maybe I'm a slow learner, but for me I am still learning about the steps. Or maybe I have been wrong all these 21 and half years. She says she is "recovered", the rallying cry of the PPBB. Then why go to meetings, why continue to take the medicine. If I have a cold, I take as much medicine as I need to keep going and get over it. Once I am recovered, I stop taking the powders, pills and lotions. Isn't that what recovered means. Of course the rallying cry comes from one sentence on one page of the BB. Yet they never repeat the sentences about annual inventory, or never being cured.

No what we have is people whistling in the dark to keep their spirits up. The sadness in it all is that they have been seduced by a couple of people who could not give themselves to the programme , but KNEW they had the right way and that way was to do exactly what it said in the book, nothing more and nothing less. Controlling what they do maintains their being recovered.

This sounds like my drinking to me. I will just take £5 out , then I can'tt get drunk. I'll stick to beer, then I can't get drunk.

The white bits are every bit as important, maybe more so, than the black bits in the BB. As is a persons right to find their own way through.

Boy we're smoking at the moment

2009-10-14T09:44:00.002+01:00

Life is just great at the moment. Since all the upheavel with my heart, life sort of went on hold. But the docs have resolved all the problems, I've started exercising more, eating better, taking more of an interest in leisure things. Beautiful is creating a great business and I think feels really supported by me. The love is just flowing right through our life at the moment, which makes being together even more of a smiling day.

I've settled back down into a regular pattern of meetings and am enjoying them, I'm also managing to stay out of the politics. Work is chugging a long and a new project has popped its head above the horizon, which may be of interest to me.

No thought of a drink, no thought of running away. Just wanting to stay in the moment we have now.

Its wonderful. truly wonderful. I am very thankful for all that I have been given.

Take care and have a good week

Change

2009-10-06T13:09:00.002+01:00

Change is always happening, on a minute by minute basis sometimes. I've recently finished a project for a client where we spray flavour on to prawns and then put them ina bag. The flavour we spray is prawn flavour. The irony isn't lost on anyone. It seems that with intensive farming and flying prawns around the world to be processed and then around again to be consumed, the old prawn loses any flavour so we have to put it back. A long way from the fresh prawns of the past. But then I guess not too many people were able to eat the shellfish.

The next project is to automate the processing of Salmon. Farm raised of course. At present many people are employed in processing the fish, but prices are going down and down, so automation and no people are the order of the day. This is what I do for a living. I robotise things so that people don't have to go anywhere near the product. It's sad and exciting in equal measures.

My life has changed so much since I put down the drink, in ways I never expected. Happiness is one of the unexpected things along with contentment. Be excited about the unknown is still a little ways off, but I am getting there. But the more I get older the more I realise what I have always being looking for is right in front of me. I just didn't want to see it, because how could it have value if it had been in my life forever.

That's all starting to change and I guess in 5 years time, God willing things will be different again.

I'm off up to Scotland to look at salmon now so have a good week all of you

Take care

Lou. You take care of yourself and be easy on yourself now.

2009-10-01T15:05:00.001+01:00

Step 11

2009-09-27T03:31:00.002+01:00

Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God

This "seems" like a hard step for me. Prayer and meditation are aspects of my recovery that if truth be knownst are not exactly everyday occurrences. OK prayer may be there, but it isn't' there as a form of development. It is often present as a ritual or perhaps a safety net. Because prayer is mentioned so often in the 12 and 12 and the BB, I must do it or else I'm not fulfilling my steply duties. I think it is the effort required that is the stumbling block, that and the complete lack of understanding regarding meditation. How does one meditate? What does on do?

Empty my mind of all thoughts, is that meditation? Contemplate the nature of God and the Universe. Sit in silence and darkness and listen for his still voice. Chant. Listen to Gregorian music and "believe" it will happen by osmosis. What does one do?

Now here's the thing about prayer and meditation, I do, do it. It just doesn't take the form as described in the book. Well perhaps that is too simplistic. The process and pretty much all the time, the outcome, does not take the form as described in the Big Book. I pray, occasionally, mainly for God, whoever you are, to keep my beautiful safe and also to stop me from screwing it up.

But boy do I put all my energies into meditation. This I am king at. I can take a person, someone who I have a really good resentment against and I can focus. Like a laser beam I think about this person and what they have or in my mind, what I think they have done, to the total and absolute exclusion of all else. To the point of obsession, even to the point of sleepless nights and physical pain. For days the meditation will control my whole life and often the lives of those around me. Anger will spew forth like a volcano, eruptions will be sporadic and have no visible attachment to any real time events. Only when the meditation has completely robbed me of any semblance of balance, let a lone serenity, will I be satiated. And exhausted I collapse in to the arms of God, my Higher Power, spent and drained. It is then I hear the voice of reason, perhaps God. It is then I relinquish control and accept what is.

So you see, I am good at meditation, but like much of the news these days, it is firmly focused on the negative, the me, the selfishness. Why it is so easy to welcome negative anger, resentment and emotions with open arms and so hard to develop an attitude of live and let live is beyond me. I think that the positive requires a much firmer action of the mind for it to take hold. The belief that the negative is more powerful than the positive is to my mind wrong. Once attained, the positive is all powerful, blocking out any negative thoughts and emotions. But the positive requires daily work, action, belief and a live and let live attitude.

Have a good weekend all of you.

The Prodigals Return

2009-09-23T07:17:00.002+01:00

Well I'm back, having completed the Limestone Way. I took four days to complete the trail abd walked a whole lot further than the designers of the route laid out.

It was a little scary at the beginning, once Beautiful had driven off I was all on my own. For someone who likes his own company, it was a surprise. I guess the thought of walking all that way on my own and of staying in strange bed and breakfast places made me a little aprehensive.

I didn't want to fail but was unsure I would succeed and I didn't want to meet all those new people, that was the scariest bit.

But once I had started walking, one step at a time all that left me and I began to enjoy the walk. The first morning I had 3 people from the happy club in my head and boy I told 'em !!! Then I started to laugh and let go, occasionally people would pop up in my thoughts and just as quickly go away. I thought a lot about my life with Beautiful and how fortunate I am and blessed by God to have such a woman in my life. I thought about work and how it really is not that significant in the scheme of things. I stood at a stone circle and thought about the people who built it thousands of year ago. The area is pock marked with old lead mine workings from an era now gone. You realise that we are just a blink of an eye in comparison to all time and that the things we consider important are so transitory that in years to come, no one will ever be able to understand what these important things were for. Just like the stone circles.

I enjoyed the walk and was glad to be back home in my own bed in my own little world.

Have a good week all of you.

Limestone Way Respite Care

2009-09-16T07:00:00.003+01:00

I'm off on a bit of a walk tomorrow. Its the first long distance footpath I have ever walked. The Limestone Way is 47 miles long and winds its way thorugh the limestone country of the Peak District National Park.

I decided to do this as it's time I started setting other goals in my life and also working out how to get on with me!!

So 4 days walking on my own, unaided, staying in B&B farmhouses, is a bit of a challenge, especially after the old ticker has decided to play up recently. But the doc said exercise and so it is. I'm not so unfit that this is a serious challenge and if it becomes clear that things are not going well, I just have to phone Beautiful and she will come and pick me up.

So I set off on Thursday morning and return Sunday. Now I know what Livingstone or Shackleton felt like, (yeah, sure you do, very similiar expeditions all round!!).

Yeah, well maybe, it's not so similiar, but who knows where the first step may lead to.

Take care of yourselves and have a good weekend. Talk to you all next week.

Hopefully!!!!!

2009-09-13T09:42:00.003+01:00

It's been a tough week of sorts. Health issues have again raised their head along with a situation at work where someone abused me verbally. Lot's of emotion and feelings have flowed around the days. I haven't spoken about it much to people other than my Beautiful. I have lodged a formal complaint at work, but it seems I work for a company where profit is greater than the individual. So I guess it's a good thing I've decided to go.

All of this is having a detrimental effect on Beautiful. The stress of living with a person who is constantly embroiled in some emotion or another is starting to take it's toll. It's something about myself that annoys me, letting go can be so hard to do.

At the meeting friday we spoke of step 9 and about not re-feeling resentments and past hurts. I guess its what I have to work on.

I have a meeting with my directors on Monday to discuss what has happened. I will say my piece, keeping to principles and not personalitites, whatever the outcome is, I'll let the cards fall as they will and move on.

Last night we went fishing, we still haven't caught anything, although we do have more gear with which not to catch anything. But it was enjoyable all the same. Today we will be walking in the national park with friends, I'll talk things over with my buddy who is a similiar to me as anyone I've known, and hopefully I'll sleep well tonight.

Hope you are all having a good weekend. I haven't read any posts as yet, so I'll get round to you all tonight.

Life can be like herding sheep sometimes, but once you get the hang of it, it's OK

2009-09-05T13:51:00.004+01:00

I’m taking it easy at last. It’s a nice feeling, especially after my foray in to the health service, which I have to say is the envy of the world and quite rightly so.

This week we went down to see a prospective client for My Beautiful’s new business; they were so excited by her new invention that they signed up there and then.

I was so proud of her and so happy for her too. Beautiful has worked very hard all her life and she has had artistic success a plenty. She is generally acknowledged as one of the top people in her field, is on permanent display in the Victoria and Albert Museum of Design in the UK, and has had exhibitions around the world including NY, SF and Boston in the states. But this is the first really commercial product she has launched and it’s a starting to take off.

I have now decided that doing the work I do has gone on long enough. 23 years in the same industry is more than too long. Added to that my failing eyesight and the need for change is here. We have already started but my mind is now made up, which makes continuing to work a bit of a bind at the moment.

So I’m taking a more softer approach to life, easy does it, as I have just been reading in John Does books. Patience and tolerance seem to be key words and that’s what I’m going to be focussing on. It may need a lot of practice before I get it right, but hopefully I’ve got plenty of time.

Have a good weekend all of you

Denial and Growth

2009-09-02T21:31:00.005+01:00

I recently went to an out of town meeting. It’s a nice run over the hills in an evening and as my Beautiful drives I get to look at all the scenery. The area is famous for bohemian living in a sort of Northern Grit type of way. Watch the video above as it gives a very good and accurate representation of the area and people. It was produced for the local tourist board!!!

I think someone who is a regular blogger may have something to say about this.

The people here and where I live, me included that means are quite a stoical lot. This was amply demonstrated when we got to the meeting. The meeting takes place in the entrance hallway of a small church. The church has a rare and finger tingling sign placed above the organ. It says, without a hint of fear, “Should you wish to play this organ please feel free. But please switch the lights of when you have finished”. It makes no reference to ability, competence or a sign saying do not touch. I have yet to pluck up the courage to sit and bang out the start to Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition.

The meeting started on time as is the custom in these parts, one thing people are known for is punctuality. The main share was very good but half way through was interrupted by the piercing sound of a smoke alarm going off just above her head. This brought her share to a stop whilst a debate then started in the group, first to clarify whether it was that alarm that was causing the pain in our ears, secondly to establish whether it was a smoke alarm or carbon monoxide alarm and if it was either would we burn to death or be poisoned. It was then agreed that action should be taken and an elder of the group, stood up, looked carefully at the alarm and pronounced it to be a smoke alarm. News of which brought a sigh of relief. He then proceeded to remove the battery from the alarm, thereby ridding us of the inconvenient and piercing siren that was causing an interruption in the meeting. At some point someone suggested that it may be a good idea to check if there was indeed a fire. There being only two doors in the room, each was opened and it was established by a sniff of the nose that no such conflagration existed.

At no point did anyone, before, during or after the alarm went off suggest that we vacate the premises in an orderly manner and congregate by the gravestones outside.

I was struck by Step 2 Came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

That and the word denial.

They play life hard in the Pennine meetings and a little thing like a fire would never stop a meeting.

It’s been a good week so far; hope the same is happening for you.

Step 10 Ongoing Inventory

2009-08-27T06:45:00.004+01:00

Like a shop keeper, I have to keep a tally of goods in stock, goods moving and goods unsold. I want to always maintain a good stock of the things people are buying, and these may change with time and perception. The shopkeeper needs to be rid of the things people do not want or have become tarnished with time.

Step 10 is like this for me. Having found out the exact nature of my being and what I need to change to achieve a better life, more in harmony with my world it is now important to maintain this course of action and where necessary improve on it. Like the 1969 moonshot 95% of the time I am going in the wrong direction, but by making many abd frequent tiny corrections I will achieve my goal, of a happy, serene life at one with God and the world.

A review of the day, during and after is a very useful tool for keeping me on course. I learn by reviewing the areas where I stumble, and, if I am humble enough to accept the lesson, I modify my behaviour to avoid making the same mistake over and over again. If I have wronged someone then let an amends be quick and sincere, this avoids festering resentment within me. But I need to be careful that I do not don the hairshirt. Disagreeing with someone in an adult manner, is not wronging them. I must be wary of being a doormat. True amends is a strong liberating force, not a green light to all and sundry, including myself, that its open season to have a pop at me.

Making the review, forces me to grow up. Things that need chainging are changed. Amends that need making are made. But please, no Uriah Heap, snivelling. I do not apologise for walking the world. This is not self flagellation.

This is the hardest part of Step 10. Growing up. So, the person did not agree with me, that doesn't mean I need to fire bomb their house, or bad mouth them behind their back. Forget it, stop dwelling on self pity. Move on.

By doing that I can keep the channel open to God in step 11. If I am consumed with resentment, anger, hatred, self pity, the channel is closed and I am left with the feelings that are destroying me.

I do not want that, so I practice Step 10 as a true inventory of my own stock.

Happy Anniversary

2009-08-22T06:20:00.004+01:00

Happy anniversary My Beautiful. Six years ago today you walked down the aisle with your father and in front of a host of friends and family we became as one. It was a beautiful day, full of laughter, joy, peace and the promise of a wonderful life ahead for two people who had found each other in what others would have seen as the darkest of circumstances.

A meeting really is about love and fellowship, for that is where we met and that is the nursery where I love and our hidden, innermost selves, blossomed. It demonstrates that life is beyond my wildest dreams, I never thought a person as Beautiful, poised and elegant as you would be interested in a plain, council estate roots, steelworker like me. But at that moment God put in to my head that I was OK, being a child of God and all, so ask, what’s the worst that could happen. That was nine and half years ago and yet seems like yesterday, such is the love I have for you.

Seven years ago tomorrow exactly I took you on a surprise trip, you had no idea where you were going and I guess that is a measure of your trust in me then, something no one had given me for years. You didn’t know I had a secret or that you had been embroiled in a plot of secrecy without even knowing it. We went to Florence that day, a city I had always wanted to go to, a city of love and culture and beauty, all the things I thought were epitomised by you. When we arrived we went straight to the hotel and dropped our things, I was excited to get to the Ponte Vecchio, having seen pictures of it all my life. You probably thought I was being wonderfully childish in my wide eyed delight. We walked, no rushed, through the city, past the Duomo, along by the Ufizzi and then on to the Ponte. It was just as I had imagined, with the shops and the people stood on it looking at the river, a little piece of medieval Italy in modern day Europe, only the Italians can do that. I dropped my Guide book and knelt down to pick it up. My heart thundered just like it did when I asked you out for dinner that very first time. Like then, I was so excited. I took from my pocket a small leather tooled box it had the word Florence and that days date tooled in to it. Yet I had not stopped to buy anything. For the last six months I had worked in secrecy with Christophe, one of the finest jewellers in the world and a colleague of yours. When he asked you to help him in some work he was doing by letting him measure your fingers, he was working for our plot. The ring he made is of 3 parts, stainless steel, because that is what you are known for in your work, throughout the world. It is your world that it represents and a little of my steelworks background. The second was platinum, it represents me, being one of the most precious metals it reflects what you had become for me. The stainless steel and the platinum represent our independent lives. But there is a third a small delicate circle of gold. The most precious, most sort after by man. This represents our life together, an interdependence of two individual humans. He did amazing work on the ring.

I took it out and still on bended knee asked you to marry me. You said yes. I was in small bubble, no traffic, no people, just you and me and happiness and fulfilment and a sense of at last being whole. That is what you mean to me. We hugged and kissed and suddenly I was aware that people were clapping and cheering, a couple took our photo and shook our hands, you cried and we kissed some more, right there on the Ponte Vecchio

It was the greatest day I shall ever experience, full of excitement and fear and adventure and hope and anticipation and happiness, but most of all love. It held the promise of the years to come and I have never been disappointed. And isn’t that what life should be about.

Thank you my Beautiful for being my wife, for being you.

I Love you.

You never know whats round the corner

2009-08-15T09:11:00.004+01:00

Yesterday was an odd sort of day. It started off all nice and slow with a hint of anticipation of the coming saturday, as we are to buy our first set of fly fishing tackle that day. I've been looking at tackle catalogues and websites constantly for the last week or so, isn't that just been like a man!!

I had to go to one of my offices in the afternoon for a meeting with a potential new supplier. Boy, this man could talk. For 2 hours he bombarded us with words, we were beaten in to submission, thats obviously his technique. It did make me a little late setting off back home though and I was afraid I might not get there in time for the meeting. So it was footdown and drive like a mad man. Thats when it started to go a little wrong.

About half way home I started to get a chest pain, I've had them before over the last few months but they've always gone away after a few minutes. This one didn't it continued to grow, down my arm, up into my neck. By the time I got home it was persistent and painful. I walked over to the doctors, which is a couple of yards from me and asked to see a doctor. " Have you got an appointment?" " No. But I have got a chest pain" " We,ve got no free spots left today" " I've got chest pain" Fortunatley a proper human being happened to be working behind this woman and they immediately went to get a doctoe, appointmemt or not!!

In the docs a few questions, then he started to get all excited, picked up the phone and asked for " a blue light immediately". Next Im on the couche and hes spraying stuff in my moputh, taking the blood pressure. Beautiful arrives looking all worried, The paramedic arrived in seconds, oxygen mask,ECG, more spray, then an ambulance, hospital,, more ecg, then a blood test and a wait for 6 hours for the second bllod test. I was in A&E so saw some of the friday night clientele I also saw the doctors and nurses at work. THEY ARE SO YOUNG, they look like a bunch of kids on work experience from school. But they dealt with all the drunks and weirdos, including me, with grace and dignity treating everyone the same, with respect.

The test showed no heart attack which is good. I have to go back next week for further tests to find out what the problem was. I was so grateful to everyone and felt proud as well that we as a country decided in the 40's to have the National Health Service. I don't know what it is like else where, Iknow there is a debate going on in the US, but I will tell you this, I had a doctor in my neighbourhood I, a paramedic, an ambulance crew, 4 nurses, a doctor, blood tests, drugs and more tests to come. No one mentioned an ability to pay, no one turned me away. I am so proud of our NHS and the peole who work in it.

Beautiful and I are off to buy our fly fishing gear this morning. Then we will have a practice and tomorrow go for our first fishing trip. It's what life is all about.

Have a good weekend.

The Hills are Alive

2009-08-08T04:04:00.004+01:00

It’s 03.45 in the morning here in England. It’s not unusual for me to be up at this hour, I learned long ago that if I am awake then I might as well get up and do something, rather than lay there and work myself up into a state about why I cannot get to sleep. It’s been a funny week. My Beautiful started her new business recently with me doing the books and trying to keep my nose out. Keeping my nose out is a pretty hard thing to do for this alkie. I’m always sticking it in and getting it chewed off. This happened yesterday when I was having my morning bath. I love to bath, always have preferred them to a shower, no idea why, maybe because I used to pass out in them when I was drinking. Anyways, there I was do nothing in particular when My Beautiful walks in with a cup of tea for me and starts to talk about her new website. She’s had it professionally done, but we still have to put up the content. I had a suggestion, but she didn’t like the idea. That’s when it went Whooooooosh, the inferiority/superiority meter in my brain. I was off, shouting and condemning, still laid in the bath, with soapy eyes etc. For the next 45 minutes I sulked. I knew that I was wrong, about everything, but just could not say the words. Eventually My Beautiful came around the desk in the office and gave me a hug and I apologised.

Yesterday morning we went out for a walk and had a conversation about the same topic. I have to admit I have learned something and taken it in over the last 24 hours. We had a discussion, calm and adult like. I saw Beautiful’s point of view and realised that it was the right one, changed my stance, and we agreed do things Beautiful’s way. We then carried on walking hand in hand, all Mary Poppins like, I could hear the orchestra as we crested the hill.

Talking of Mary Poppins. It’s the one film I want to go and see at the cinema. Over here, you may have them over there as well, we have Mary Poppins weekends at cinemas. With a special showing at midnight on Saturday. Everyone gets dressed up as a character out of the film. There is a predilection for the men to dress up as one of the nuns, which is my leaning too. As the film starts all is quiet as people wait in anticipation, pop corn clutched to breasts, fake and real. As the opening music builds, you can feel the tension as seats start to chiggle as if on the grid in a Le Mans start. As good ole Julie crests the hill and issues forth the first note, the whole cinema stands as one and sings “The hills are alive with the sound of music”. The best bit is all the men in nun’s outfits. Now that’s what I want to do. Better still I’d like to take Fr Justin a Benedictine monk I have known for years. What could be more innocent than taking a monk to see The Sound of Music? What could possibly go wrong!!!

Have a good weekend all of you.

End of the line

2009-08-03T06:29:00.006+01:00

This weekend I met with a sponsee, I have three, to discuss steps 11 and 12. The conversation started with a discussion about recovery and AA. My sponsee stated that it's not about drink anymore for him it's about living. I know where this has come from. He's building a network of support, friends in the fellowship, that he can call on in need and be around on a general basis. It's a good thing to do, we all need friends. This sentiment that it's about living and not drinking is quite prevalent amongst his new circle. It is not one I agree with. My experience of people who have followed this line, is that they follow it right out the door and start living, because " It's a bridge to normal living". At some point that "normal" includes having a drink as normal folk do. " One can't hurt, I haven't touched it for a long time now". I've seen some come back in, some I've bumped in to in the street, they always want to get away or explain why they can handle booze now. Normal people never have to do that!!. A number higher than it should be, have died. That's whats at the other end of that bridge about living.

I told my sponsee that I disagreed with him. For me, this kind of intellectualising of the programme is very dangerous. It's a very simple programme and the first part of the first step makes the priorities clear. Alcohol and my powerlessness over it is my number one priority. I am an alcoholic. First and last. What I do, my name, the things I enjoy, are just labels. In the past I've made alcohol a lower priority and it nearly got me in jail. Don't get me wrong I enjoy life now, have a full life now. I travel, dine out, have a home, love and be loved, work, read, fish, sing, dance, in short, I squeeze as much out of life as I possibly can. But these are all peripheral to the central core. "I'm an alcoholic, and just for today I will not take a drink. God thank you for being with me and for caring and loving My Beautiful and I". That's how I start my day, have always started my day. Sadly, I don't think he could see the point. Alcohol isn't a problem in his life now, so to him, he no longer needs to give alcohol the status he once did. I left it by telling him to be careful and to read some of the stories in the back of the BB and talking to new comers, which he'd failed to do at the meeting we'd just left, even though I had asked him to.

We went on to discuss steps 11 and 12, about prayer and meditation. I explained about keeping clear, the channel between me and God and about maintaining the conversation between us. That's what it is for me, a relationship that requires a constant attention to the maintainance of it. It isn't a straight jacket type of relationship, it's comfortable and always there. Wetalked about Step 12 and carrying the message. He completely missed the fact he'd just failed to do that in a meeting with a new comer. I guess a " bridge to normal living" means he no longer has to do that. We finished the steps and I congratulated him on their completion and suggested he just read them on a daily basis as part of his meditation time. I thanked him for his time and the lessons he had taught me. He thanked me for my time and said I had changed his life, which was nice. He asked if we could continue, I said yes and suggested we look at the traditions. He left me to spend time with a woman who likes to spend time in bars, a man who has never been able to maintain a period of sobriety and a man who has just come back from a sex trip to Amsterdam.

As I walked on I wondered if I had done enough in our 23 months studying the steps. I concluded that I had done what I could. I carried my message, it's the only one I have. Whether someone chooses to pick it up is not my responsibility.

For me, it always has been, is and always will be about alcohol. Life today is a byproduct of that.

Have a good week all of you.

Step Nine - Repentance and Redemption

2009-07-29T07:42:00.000+01:00

For me Step 9 is the culmination of a process within the programme that brings about redemption and restoration. The realisation and acceptance of what I am and what I have to do happen in steps 1-3. The dismantling of self, the letting go of pride and ego, the breaking of this twisted soul, the beginning of a release from the bondage and prison I had placed myself in took place in steps 4-5. Having being broken, stood bare for the entire world to see, the rebuilding process began on a new foundation. Steps 6-8 took away fear, the remaining pride and ego, self pity and self centredness and replaced it with a sense of the world and those about me. More importantly I realised the true meaning of a Higher Power. If God loved me, then I must love God, myself and everyone. Love is a verb. It is about doing.

Step 9 requires me to make amends and restitution to those I had harmed except when to do so would cause them or others injury or pain.

Steps 6-8 prepared me for this process by giving me a strong faith in Gods love for me and a dependence on His will for me. The first time that had happened within my life. There was no fear as to the outcome, the response of the person I was making amends too. That was out of my hands and in truth it mattered not how they responded. What mattered was that I had removed any fragment of self, self seeking, affirmation seeking, and the need to be liked. This is about true repentance. Until repentance and contrition were evident then the future held what the past had reflected. And that was a death sentence for me.

I faced each individual, for that is how I believe amends are made, face to face, no half measures of letters or phone calls. I want to see the whites of the persons eyes, not because of what it may tell me about them, but because it will give them the opportunity to look at me and think or say, “Yes, you did that to me.”
I apologised for the harm I had done and offered to make restitution where required. If money was involved I paid it back plus interest. If property was involved I paid money or replaced the property. If reputation was involved I offered sincere apologies and asked what else I could do for them.

At no point in the process did I justify my behaviour. At no point did I mention or criticise harm they had done. I never blamed them for anything. Even if, in the past there was reason for any of the above, the steps so far had brought me to cleaning my side of the street. Having done that, what they did no longer had an echo with me. There was no resentment, no anger, there was just the future to look forward too without the baggage of the past.

Having made the amends it is not for me to move back in to the persons life, unless they want it to be so. My work is done. I can now look to the new future.

It IS an act of repentance. In Gods eyes his most beloved creature is one who, having sinned against Him and his fellow man, turns back to God and repents to cleanse himself. I have been redeemed in Gods eyes and restored to my rightful place in society. Only now can I receive the full flow of Gods love and rest in the knowledge of his protection. The world has become a less fearful place to me.

Dancing with a Gorilla

2009-07-23T10:02:00.001+01:00

We had a wonderful time in the Dales. The break started with a great storm, wind and rain lashing down on the drive to our lodgings. The rivers were bursting with the water raging down from the fells, turning them into a thick chocolate shake. The next day the rain had stopped and we did some walking in the limestone country around the village we were staying in. We walked along an old roman road that passed through a roman legionnaire’s settlement. I always have to marvel at the fact that we stand where Romans stood all those many centuries ago. It’s a fact that still amazes me. The fly fishing was great. For once, expectations were met by reality. Our tutor had picked a private stretch of water to teach us. Stood in the river, with the waders coming up to our chests and casting the line, was all I had imagined and wanted. We are both hooked and will take this up as a passion. Of course my Beautiful caught the biggest trout, but you should have seen the one that got away from me!!!

The time we spent was relaxing and rejuvenating. It made me think about the last few weeks, where the dark clouds had gathered overhead in my life. I was full of pent up frustration and unsettled resentments. Beautiful was tipto-ing around me, waiting with breath held for the explosion to occur. Just before we went away I sat in a meeting and heard a lady of long sobriety talk about how her life had become full of tussle and strife. She’d realised that what she was doing was trying to make life follow her plan. She said that her life had been like dancing with a gorilla, once she had engaged the gorilla in dance, the dance was only going to stop when the gorilla decided it didn’t want to dance anymore. Boy, how that registered with me.

I had walked up to life on the dance floor and decided life’s waltz needed to be a polka and life didn’t like it. Of course once we had embraced I was left with no alternative but to keep dancing. The only thing was, I kept trying to get the gorilla to dance to my tune. Once I had stopped trying to do that by going on holiday and concentrating on other things like the fishing I started to dance to the gorillas tune and he soon got fed up and left me alone.

It’s been a real salutary lesson in humility. I need to focus on what my higher power wants from me, then I won’t be tempted to get on the dance floor again and dance with the gorilla.

I want to thank you all for your support. It’s really something, when we can register another’s feelings all around the world. Don’t you think there is something spiritual in that?

Gone Fishing

2009-07-17T11:05:00.003+01:00

Me and My Beautiful are off to the Yorkshire Dales for a few days walking and fishing. I want to thank you all for your support lately, it has really helped and the clouds are staring to lift. Hope you all have a good weekend

Cane and Abel

2009-07-12T06:13:00.002+01:00

I'm very confused at the moment. Not with my sobriety, that's like a rock, but with my dealings with life. It's even difficult to put in to words, which is why I'm not posting as much. I just don't seem to be able to work this living bit out at the moment. Every new situation seems to elicit the wrong response with me. I can neither be supportive or critical in the correct way. The way I speak to people about any given subject, the way I feel about things, all seems to be at kilter with how I perceive it should be. And yet I just don't seem to be able to change. There is an undercurrent of anger, but I have no idea where it is coming from. I can see the pressure cooker starting to rumble on the stove and I am utterly powerless to stop it blowing. I have prayed and feel the need to pray more to release me from this destructive mode. It isn't just me that I want to destroy it's all around me as well. It is as though my brain is saying " You've had it real good lately, been really supportive. Now lets screw it all up like you know you always do". But some other part of me is resisting, maybe that's my soul, I don't know. Life has always been like this for me and I don't want to go on like this, so it could be that, these feelings are my inner self struggling not to ruin things. Like Cane and Abel, the two sides of me are finally battling for supremacy. I just have to hope and pray the right one wins.

Step Eight

2009-07-04T17:05:00.004+01:00

Well, I guess all my fellow bloggers over the water are enjoying a nice cup of tea and celebrating Independence Day.

The point of Step Eight is pretty simple. Make a list of all the people I need, want and have to make amends to. It isn’t any more complicated than that.

The list I made was like many a shopping list I have produced every week. The listings were mechanical in nature having come from my Step 5. But when studying steps six and seven it became clear that there were others that needed to be added. These names had not being missed deliberately or even through ignorance, but rather more importantly, they had appeared because of a growing sense of the right way to live, brought about by the lessons contained in six and seven.

A growing confidence of my own security in Gods hands also meant that humility enabled me to remove any obstacles of obfuscation, fear or selfishness when thinking about the people who I would have to face and make the amends.

I did not draw up a league table of amends, the worst in the premier division the least worst in the bottom division. There was no gradation of sins. I think this point is very important for me. It showed me that self preservation and the need to be liked had no part in the process of restitution and repentance. Like wise there was no rush to Step nine no headlong striving to get the thing over and done with. Step eight was but a part of the process of bringing me in to alignment with my higher power. It was but a stepping stone.

Time and geography played a part when looking at the list. There were some whom I would see next week or next day even. Others could be seen when on business trips and visits to family. Some would require requests to meet. Others would have to be tracked down, as time had eroded the connections we once had. But no excuses must be made to avoid putting that name down on the piece of paper. There must be no half measures here.

So the list was completed, my mind and resolve firmly set. I was in Gods hands, the outcome was in his and what ever the response from the recipient was, my only response could be apology and amends (or restitution as I prefer to call it).

Step Nine beckoned and with it a sense of purpose and release. I was at least becoming a part of the human race. That is the reason why it is so important to carefully complete step eight and take time to fully understand the reason for it. It is impossible for me to make true, heartfelt amends if I have hedged my bets on the people I was supposed to put on the list.

The hidden beauty of step eight for me was when I realised I didn't care what people thought or reacted, so long as I was behaving in a correct way, it didn't matter. I was safe in Gods hands now. That's step eight's beauty, the realisation that I am Gods creation and all he wants is a relationship with me, which must mean he accepts me as I am, warts and all, as we say over here. Now it really would be arrogant to throw all that back in his face. That I have no right to do.

Have a happy independence day. And don’t forget, we are always ready to accept you all back. Once you’ve paid for the tea.

The perfect lads night out.

2009-07-01T22:48:00.000+01:00

Once a month me and the lads go for a night out of food and fun. The original idea for the night came to me whilst trying to keep one of our erstwhile brethren in the fold. Sadly, even though he never knew they were all for him, he no longer graces our presence. The other purpose for the night was so that men in AA could go out, and learn to have fun, be with other men and not be self conscious.

This night we were conned by one who we should never listen to in to trying a new Persian restaurant. The night did not bode well……………………..

On entering the restaurant I noticed it was a little quiet and the three tables that were being used seemed to be populated by loving couples or a small group of girls ( which, I realise could also be loving couples). So for our group of men to descend may not have been exactly what the owners wanted. Now I've never had Persian food before and in fact cannot remember when a country was called Persia (I think it is Iran now which is not the most stable countries nor is its cuisine as it turned out).

The waitresses were the prettiest I have come across in a restaurant and were very polite. We ordered a range of starters all of which included yoghurt, lettuce, olives, tomatoes in some sauce and an unidentifiable brown paste. These disappeared quickly and then the main course appeared. I had the mixed grill, which consisted of chicken kebab, lamb kebab and steak kebab along with obligatory yoghurt, lettuce and tomatoes. The lamb and chicken were inedible, so I played with the steak. When the waitress took my almost full plate away, she didn't ask why I had left most of the meal, which I thought was very professional of her. She continued in this vain as she removed a further 3 almost full plates from the mates. The sweets were nice though. So the moral of Shiraz is go straight for the sweets, although they did not have any Persian Ice cream after offering this to us as the house speciality which is a bit of an own goal.

So out we come and stand chatting for awhile. Along comes a lad much the worse for wear after having a good night at the pub. We stand and watch as he wobbles down the pavement, lurching left to right. Unfortunately one of the left lurches was too close to a house wall and he chose this precise time to flick his head round to the left as well.

Now the house which hadn't moved an inch decided to connect with his head. Flattening him on his back with such speed that he didn't even have time to let go of his phone. We stood looking across the street at him wondering how long it would be before he got up. It became clear that he wasn't going to do that so we wandered over for a chat.

It was a one way conversation, much the same as it is with any of the youth these days. We asked questions and he grunted monosyllabic unintelligible answers.

Obviously we could not leave like that so we phoned an ambulance. Whilst waiting for this he suddenly sprang to his feet, blood gushing from a now evident head wound and told us he was ok he was going home. Off he wobbled only to get to the corner when the evening took on a whole new shape.

Another chap appeared and our youth decided this chap was doing something he didn't like. Next thing the new chap is running up and down the street being followed by the youth who wanted to hit him. Next new chap says youth has a knife, (we never saw one but weren't that close to tell). Before things got out of hand, (my mates euphemism, for something already spiralling in to a street brawl) the ambulance arrives and call the cops. Within ten minutes there were 4 cop cars and sixteen policemen and women trying to separate youth and shouting man. Another bloke had also managed to get involved and then we noticed that in the middle of all this a stray dog had managed to make itself the centre of attention and was being accused of vicious behaviour by the shouting man. Then to my delight the street was lit up by the helicopter. It all started to calm down and we asked if we could go on our way.

Just as we were about to leave I noticed the stray dog been stroked by a young policewoman in full uniform (the police woman was in uniform not the dog!!). This I think will be an image that will stay with me for some time. Once again a memorable night, not for the food but for all the other goings on a round it.

It's been an emotional week

2009-06-27T05:00:00.002+01:00

The problem with work is that other people do it too, well actually that could apply to life in general. People will just not do either what I want or what I expect. It is incredibly annoying and frustrating.

It is very difficult to write about the past week as it involves so much emotion at present. My torso feels knotted up, slightly nauseous. Emotionally I am swinging from acceptance to anger. My mind is constantly turning over the last week’s events, creating blame, confusion and fear within myself. It is not a good situation, although I notice that I have slept reasonably well, which is unusual for me where emotional upset is concerned.

Notice that I say emotional upset, yet this is all to do with work and work people, some whom I work for, or with. Should such a function as work be able to produce such turmoil within me, a person who has been working a programme of emotional stability and growth for over 21 years. Or is it unreasonable and immature to expect me to be immune to such emotions, especially when centered around work.

I would love to be able to detach from work. Once the 5.00pm finger ticks that’s it, no more work, the mind flips over to my Beautiful, home, leisure and friends. Perhaps this is a wrong way of looking at life. Can it be compartmentalised into constituent parts of work, home, self, loved ones, others. Should there be Chinese walls between each area of my life, work and home, and nether the twain may meet.

This is how I would like it to be I guess, but it doesn’t feel normal, not to me anyway. Does that mean that I place work far too highly and this is in reality a people pleasing, affirming, ego and pride way of feeling important, giving rise to feelings of grandeur and self importance which have become the very reason for my being.

Once again it just shows that I find life very confusing and my ability to deal with it on an emotional level is well below that of a child, who simply gets on with the moment.

Have a good weekend