Ken Loach: Kes

I saw it two years ago; tonight I watched it again. This time I wasn’t disturbed so much by all the quarrels the characters were having, but I still found it most of all depressing. Masterly executed, very moving – but in the way which makes one despondent.

Had to watch a Burnistoun sketch a little later to get over it.

 

(originally published probably on Wordpress)

William Boyd: Any Human Heart

All these quotations are by the narrator, Logan Mountstuart.

--------

Every life is both ordinary and extraordinary – it is the respective proportions of those two categories that make life appear interesting or humdrum.

(p 5) 

I’ve had a quite dull, boring life full of routine. I’ve had a quite variable, unpredictable life full of change. Depends on what parts of it you look on.

--------

It’s true: lives do drift apart for no obvious reason. We’re all busy people, we can’t spend our time simply trying to stay in touch. The test of a friendship is if it can weather these inevitable gaps..

( p 140) 

 

I find it amazing that I still keep in touch, however irregular, with my old college friends, and with Tommy whom I haven’t seen for four years.

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The confirmation of the worst news does, paradoxically, clear the mind: at least the way ahead is obvious and people know what they have to do.

(p 206) 

It felt like that when I was diagnosed with cancer: no more false hopes, just concentrating on what could be done about it.

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Only sporadic bouts of masturbation testify to the fact that the libidinous side of my brain has not shut down entirely. What sick Victorian cleric dubbed the practice self-abuse? Self-help, more like, self-support, self-solace. Auto-eroticism keeps you sane.

( p 284)

In fact, the first OED quotations of the expression in this sense date to the beginning of the 18th century, but Mountstuart’s sentiment is correct. Masturbation does keep you sane (or, at least, saner) when you can’t have the real Mackay.

--------

Those were the years when I was truly happy. Knowing that is both a blessing and a curse. It’s good to acknowledge that you found true happiness in your life – in that sense your life has not been wasted. But to admit that you will never be happy like that again is hard.

(David, p 395) 

 

Ay, reminiscing about my college days and my years in Scotland can sometimes be bittersweet in the extreme.

--------

I don’t feel old, although I must confess the signs of ageing are everywhere.

(p 404) 

 

It’s odd how one feels closer to people who are much younger than to one’s coevals, although one has inevitably much more common with the latter . . ..

 

 

 

(originally posted probably on WordPress, or maybe on Tumblr)

 

 

Anki

Unemployment has its advantages. For several months I’ve been trying to cut down my Anki flashcards backlog, only managing to get (in a sort of two-steps-forward-one-step-back way) from 1,ooo+ cards in April to 600+ in mid-September. On 26th I got under 600, pushed on every day, and today I’ve eliminated it completely.

Time to start dealing determinedly with my other backlogs.

 

(originally posted probably on WordPress)

Beagan lag

Neònach. Cha do dh’òl mi cus o DhiMàirt, ach bidh mi a’ cur fallas dhìom nam chadal uaireannan fhathast, bidh fradharc ceòthach orm sa mhadainn uaireannan fhathast – agus as dèidh dhomh dìreach trì pinntean san taigh-seinnse is biadh aig an taigh a ghabhail feasgar an-diugh, bha agam ri dùsal a ghabhail mar an ceudna; rinn mi a’ mhòrchuid dhe na bha agam air fhàgail ri dhèanamh as a dhèidh, ach gun dìorras. ’S mathaid gu bheil mi beagan tinn, leis an teothachd air tuiteam cho luath …

 

(originally posted probably on WordPress or maybe on Tumblr)

Nederlands

Not so long ago I wondered whether I shouldn’t discontinue learning Swedish, beginning to suspect I just didn’t have the time to keep my Gaelic and French on the level already achieved while adding another language.

Today I began learning Dutch, basically just because I like how it sounds. I must be crazy.


(originally posted on WordPress)

Third time unlucky

When I was 35 and giving my notice to my then employer, I had three reasons, the second most important of which was no longer being able to stand the commercial radio blaring there.

A few jobs later, when I was 43 and giving my notice to my then employer, I had two equally important reasons, one of which was no longer being able to stand the commercial radio blaring there.

Several more jobs later, now I’m 51, I gave the other day my notice to my employer, primarily because I was no longer able to stand the commercial radio blaring there.

Of course, there were other reasons. I couldn’t properly get to grips with the machine they’d moved me to from my initial one; the jobs at the new one meant being all the time either frustrated by glitches or bored when there were none; I had to be on my feet all the time in the factory’s uncomfortable shoes; there was even a nascent guilt from half the time producing plastic products; . . .

. . . but at the end of the day it was the radio which one day turned into the last straw. Maybe the next time I should ask whether radio’s permitted on the premises before I even accept a job.


(originally posted probably on WordPress)

Malachy Tallack: The Valley at the Centre of the World

Then, the loneliness had been offset by busyness, by pride and by hope. Now, it was offset only by routine.

(about Mary, p 41) 

I was fairly lonely in my homeland but at least I was interested in what was going on around me. Here in my self-imposed exile, I just keep going on, thanks to inertia and defiance.

--------

After all, the point at which one becomes old is surely the point at which anticipation is overwhelmed by hindsight.

(Alice, p 188) 

Related to the above. Back then I was aging; now I’m aged.

--------

There was also the strange, simple fact that her life was no longer a shared event. Anticipation, it turned out, was more difficult to sustain alone. A sense of purpose, of direction, was more difficult to sustain alone. She had lost, almost entirely, that sense of moving forward, of progress. She had lost her own sense of narrative.

(Alice, p 188) 

That’s one of the hardest aspects: you can’t talk about the things, good or bad, which are important to you, because you don’t believe the people you would like to tell them to would care, and you’re still not in the stage where you’ll bore any stranger just to get them out of your system.

 

So you just blog, even if nobody reads it.

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It wasn’t up to him, he said. Nothing was ever up to him.

 

[….] He seemed so passive; not just today but always, as though his whole movement through life had been guided by decisions that were not his own. He was pushed this way and that, like a fictional character controlled by a malicious author.

(about Terry, p 322)

Story of my life. After all, I was brought up to be like that.

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So much of his life was dictated by habit, he sometimes thought. Habit, punctuated by the uncontrollable and the unpredictable.

(David, p 326) 

In fact my attempt at emigrating to my homeland was the only major attempt in my life to do more than just protect the status quo against unfavourable changes in circumstances making it even worse.

(originally posted probably on WordPress)

 

Hermiting again

I’ll savour the softness of summer
I’ll wrap up when winter blows

(The Waterboys: In Search of a Rose)

Since the 18 May I was in a pub daily (with the single exception of 5 Sep, when I finished work at 10pm and knew I’d have to be there again at 8am the following morning). Indeed, since the 10 Sep I visited what has become my favourite howf twice a day. But I’ve stopped that on Monday, managed to persevere, and today I finally haven’t gone there at all. In a sense a salutary effect of having quit my job I suppose.

And it actually wasn’t as hard as I’d thought it would be, although admittedly I was helped by the fact that after Tuesday’s pleasant, serene night there there were two when I had to sit down next to the door, with the consequent draught each time it opened.

Nevertheless I think that before I go to sleep I’ll reward myself with a dram of Glenlivet. 


(originally posted probably on WordPress)

Zen and multitasking

In his The Way of Zen, Alan Watts mentions several comparisons between the Western and Eastern attitudes towards life, philosophy, society and so on. It occurred to me there was one thing he hadn’t mentioned, maybe because it wasn’t so pronounced at that time: While the ‘Western’ corporate society perceives the ability to multitask as a prerequisite for a successful life, Zen claims that the way is the exact opposite: being able to fully concentrate on the one thing a person is doing at the particular moment.


(originally posted probably on WordPress)

Richard Morgan: The Steel Remains

It probably wasn’t a good idea, but he hadn’t been having many of those since he got back anyway.

(about Ringil Eskiath) 

Ever since I went into self-imposed exile where I’d once lived I seem to be simply carried on by inertia, old habits and past experience. Hardly having any goals I’ve hardly any ideas about achieving them, let alone good ones.

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She missed her home, with an abrupt, almost painful pang, now that she thought she might never see it again.

(about Archeth Indamaninarmal)

I love to see pictures of Scotland on the internet, in particular those of places I know first-hand, but occasionally upon seeing one I need to make an effort to prevent tears flowing from my eyes.



(originally posted probably on WordPress)

Addicted to a beer garden

Funny how sometimes one can get addicted to an alcohol-related habit, rather than to alcohol itself.

For almost three weeks now I would go after 2pm to a nearby pub’s beer garden, have a few pints, come back to my digs for a meal and some time at my laptop, then return to the pub to have a few more pints inside. But of course one can’t go on like this forever.

So I decided to stop my afternoon beer garden visits and only go to the pub at night. Today was the first day. Now I have enough beer and vodka in my digs to fight alcohol withdrawal, yet I’ve been listless all day simply on account of knowing I had to wait until the evening before going to the pub.

I’ve survived, but I still can’t wait to be there.


(originally posted probably on WordPress)

Kingsley Amis: Lucky Jim

This ride, unlike most of the things that happened to him, was something he’d rather have than not have. He’d got something he wanted, and whatever the cost in future embarrassment he was ready to meet it. He reflected that the Arab proverb urging this kind of policy was incomplete: to ‘take what you want and pay for it’ it should add ‘which is better than being forced to take what you don’t want and paying for that’.

The other day my sister asked me why I liked the book so much and I replied that it was on account of its cynicism, later enhanced by the fact that it was one of the first books I've read in the English original. A few weeks later another important reason occurred to me, however: Jim, like me, finds mere coping with life so demanding (in particular as regards social intercourse), that he has no energy left for ambition. This theme, without being expressly stated, runs throught he whole story. Whenever he achieves something, it's usually largely by simple good luck.

It's amazing how distractions one wouldn't have noticed in one's early days become absolutely shattering when one … grows older.

I've known - and loved - the novel since adolescence, and read it several times since then. It's interesting how the older I am, the more compassionate I feel for Professor Welch, because the more he reminds me of myself. Including the growing slowness in thinking, in reacting.

(originally posted probably on WordPress)

Paul Flynn: Good As You

Frankly, a disappointment. The author does warn the reader in the Prologue that he can only tell the story of gay liberation in Britain as he subjectively saw it unfold and I don’t blame him, but his likes and experiences are too different from mine. His is the world of clubbing, pop, big dreams, soap opera and so on; mine is the one of loneliness, depression, defiance, books and so forth. Suffice it to say that Peter Tatchell is mentioned nine times, while one of the ten chapters is basically all about Kylie Minogue.

Still, I did learn a lot: for instance the importance of Manchester in British GLBT history, and the fact that characters in soap operas can be as influential for the mindset of a TV-watchers as those in books for the mindset of a book-reader. And of course, it would be strange if there were no passages I could absolutely relate to, like:


Part of coming to terms with being gay is accepting that all your previous belief systems collapse.

(Greek Pete) 

Absolutely. Some say that a man’s mentality is basically completely formed by the beginning of adolescence, but I’m sure my frames of reference have changed almost beyond recognition during the years I was coming to terms with my sexuality.

[….] that subtle new ways of recalibrating the phrase ‘I am gay’ would have to be found in the perpetual motion of identification that accompanies coming out. Nobody tells you that you’ll have to do it over and over again, boring yourself with answers to a carousel of the same questions asked over and over for the first five years, before you’ve worked out subtler ways of short-circuiting this ritualistic moment in which your sexual fancy becomes other people’s property.

Quite so. You think you’ll tell a friend and the next day everybody’ll know, but no, you have to come out again and again … and again … and only gradually you learn how to do it right.

[….] the terror that sits at the heart of some homophobia – that we are only here to steal your brothers, husbands, cousins, sons [….].

I wouldn’t know about blood relatives, but I was always well liked by women who knew I was gay, probably because they felt they could be relaxed and open with me – with the exception of wifes and girlfriends of my (straight) male friends, the majority of whom were quite obviously jealous of every minute these friends might have spent with me without being ‘watched’ by them.

Programmed in my subconscious from very early on was the idea that I’m not safe.

(David Furnish)

But then this goes almost without saying for us gays of a certain generation.



(originally posted probably on WordPress)

Alone in an echo chamber

They tell you, to quote for instance Lexico (formerly Oxford Dictionaries Online), that an echo chamber is an ” environment in which a person encounters only beliefs or opinions that coincide with their own, so that their existing views are reinforced and alternative ideas are not considered”.

What they don’t tell you is that, contrariwise, if perchance you do have a particular opinion which differs from that of the other ‘members’ of the echo chamber, you only encounter views which don’t coincide with your own.

So that I’m following all these people who, like me, lean politically towards centre-left, are comparatively well educated, support gay equality, are anxious about climate change and so on and so on … and there doesn’t seem to be a single one who would, like me, support Brexit, and I only see it criticised.

Funny, in a way.


(originally posted probably on WordPress or maybe on Tumblr)

The Union and the Carpenter

Funny how from early April to early July I would visit the Union almost daily and the Carpenter only very rarely, and then all of a sudden, without ever intending to and for no apparent reason whatsoever, I began frequenting the latter and never returned to the former. The staff is equally good in both places; maybe I became subconsciously fed up with the Union’s piped music and clientele.


(originally posted on Tumblr or WordPress)

Hats Off

Just listened again – after a few years – to the whole Hats Off to the Buskers album by The View and still think it’s the best debut album ever released. (Well, there’s Traveling Wilburys Vol. 1, but that wasn’t a real debut album for any of the Wilburys involved).



(originally posted probably on Tumblr, or maybe on WordPress)

Citation: Georges Simenon: L'Étoile du Nord

Jamais il n'avait pensé avec impatience à la retraite.

(concernant le commissaire Maigret) 

Moi non plus. Je n’aime pas devoir à travailler mais j’ai peur que sans travailler je ne pourrai payer le loyer pour vivre seul dans une chambre.


(à l'origine posté sur Tumblr ou WordPress)

Oliver Burkeman: The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can’t Stand Positive Thinking

"For [Ernest] Becker, mental illness is a malfunctioning of the internal death-denial machinery. Depressed people are depressed because they try but repeatedly fail to shield themselves, as others manage to do, from the truth that they are not, in reality, cosmically significant heroes – and that pretty soon they’re going to die." 

(p 182)

(originally posted probably on Tumblr or maybe on WordPress)

Mark Haddon: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

(All by the narrator, Christopher John Francis Boon.)


I decided to leave him alone because when I am sad I want to be left alone.

(p 21)

It takes me a long time to get used to people I do not know.

(p 35)

I don’t like swimming because I don’t like taking my clothes off.

(p 77)

I like it when it rains hard. It sounds like white noise everywhere, which is like silence but not empty.

(p 103)

And then I Formulated a Plan. And that made me feel better because there was something in my head that had an order and a pattern and I just had to follow the instructions one after the other.

(p 132)

And then the countryside started and there were fields and cows and horses and a bridge and a farm and more houses and lots of little roads with cars on. And that made me think that there must be millions of miles of train track in the world and they all go past houses and roads and rivers and fields, and that made me think how many people must be in the world and they all have houses and roads to travel on and cars and pets and clothes and all eat lunch and go to bed and have names and this made my head hurt, too.

(p 161)

These are just the best ones, there very many more which made me think “yes, that’s precise”!



(originally posted on Tumblr or WordPress)

Back to basics?

I’ve finally run out of patience with my new HP that I'd no doubt abused here earlier, and bought an Asus - a trademark I'd been satisfied with before. So it’s 'back to Asus', strictly speaking - but in a sense back to basics too: I'm not transferring my files wholesale as usual, only moving those I really want to keep and deleting the junk I've accumulated over the years.

As for the new machine, the first impression was disappointment, because unlike the picture it didn't come with a numeric keypad, but the speed is what I was used to before the HP, and that's what matters.

 (originally posted probably on Tumblr)