Category: Rants

Winning Or The Modern Day Lack Of

Charlie Sheen is winning.  Manchester United are winning.  America is winning.  President Obama was winning once, not so sure now.  Many countries are winning wars.  Wars on crime, corruption, bureaucracy, waste to name just a few.  People win races.  Space races, arm races, leg races, races to the top, to the white house and to the moon.  If everyone is winning, or is capable of winning something, where on earth are the losers?  Everywhere.

Winning and losing used to be used in specific areas, sport and war.  In the U.K winning at sport is now considered a bad thing.  So much so that many schools do not allow kids to participate in sports where there  is a winner and a loser in fear of psychologically marking the child for life.  It has been conclusively proved by Scientific winners that losing a game of netball at the age of 8 often leads to a life of crack addiction, petty crime and prostitution.  Where as stateside they are the polar opposite.  They do not appreciate any sport which can result in a draw.  There must be a result.  Which is why the average rounders baseball game takes three and a half years on average to complete.

The winning of wars has became somewhat since Vietnam.  In a war, where if you believe America, both sides won(isn’t that called a draw in other realms) has become even more farcical in recent conflicts.  On Friday the 2nd of May 2003 George W.Bush declared that the allies had in fact won the war in Iraq.  What he failed to do was tell anyone else about this development.

It is apparent that just about the whole universe has forgotten what winning actually means.  It doesn’t matter if you pretend it doesn’t happen like us Brits, or that you claim it’s happened already, much like the Yanks you are wrong.  The condition of victory deems that someone must lose.  We have lost sight of the valiant loser. We are so terrified of the word failure we now live in a state where we pretend it doesn’t exist.  The fucked up thing is that we now have a large proportion of people who live there lives trying not to fail rather than trying to live.  Whereas true honour comes from trying, of being able to look yourself in the eye, and being able to say that I gave it my best.

No News Is Good News

War, death, famine, murder, earthquake, hurricane, crisis, death, war, sex, crisis, tsunami, murder, war, death.  I am a grown adult and I live in fear of the television.  I used to enjoy turning on the tv at ten o’clock to watch the news.  I used to feel that there was some value in staying up to date.  The trouble is nowadays, after 30 minutes of sheer misery I feel my will to live ebb away.  I now try to avoid the news like you try to avoid the most depressing person you know at a party.

It’s apparent that there is one constant in the universe and that is war.  No news broadcast is complete without pictures of men in uniforms firing tinny sounding guns and the prerequisite upper-middle class toss bag standing in a flak jacket with mic in hand talking about how the fighting has ‘flared up’ somewhere.  As a matter of fact fighting never flares up, it is always there if the damn country is at war.  Your Grandmother’s arthritis or her hemorrhoids  can flare up but fighting most definitely does not.  Meanwhile they provide you with the latest information about the statesman/madman/General who is either on the run or making television broadcasts which make them look like loons.  By journalism law they have to close with a statement where they suppose that the tyrant/dictator/leader hasn’t got long left and the war will be over soon.  And they are right as it is over until the next time you switch on the news.

Another thing which gets my goat is the over use of the word ‘tragedy’.  To me if something is truly tragic it is something that could have been avoided.  A freak occurrence if you will.  Natural disasters are deeply distressing, but they are a fact of life.  The loss of life caused by an Earthquake is in part caused by the fact that we as a race have built dwellings over Tectonic plates.  The loss of life caused by war is a result of human stupidity.  In an average news broadcast you will hear the word tragedy or tragic regarding any topic ranging of an air crash to Wayne Rooney missing a penalty for England.

Crisis is another of these overused words.  If the news is to be believed everywhere is in one kind of crisis or another.  Whether it be economic, political, socio-economic, geo-political, financial, existential or deferential.  It appears that there are no longer any rules as to what actually constitutes a crisis.  You can even be crisis-stricken which makes it sound somewhat similar to rickets.  The amount of time given to discussing the financial crisis as if it is an unexplained phenomena is astonishing.  The fact that some people have spent more money than they have earned is quite bloody understandable to the average Joe as every human being has credit card bills and bank loans and mortgages.  We do not need to hear the same long-winded arguments involving as many acronyms as possible in a blatant attempt to ensure that the viewer passes out through boredom.  I don’t care what the G8 or 7 think.  I don’t care what the European Commission of Agricultural Arm Wrestling needs a bail out, a bail in or a shakedown.  I don’t care what’s happening with the FTSE index because it’s not even a word.  And honestly the next time I hear the word ‘recession’ I shall attempt to swallow my television.

When I was younger I always enjoyed watching the local news stations more.  They still droned on in newsreader monotone about quite depressing events but there was always the fact that I knew what was coming.  The very last story would be about the remarkable recovery of Dolly the Breakdancing sheep whose leg had healed with the help of a famous donator and now was going to be the subject of a reality tv program, win the lottery and get the chance to record a segment for comic relief in Africa.  Perhaps not all of that is true but the point is there was always that final story to lift the gloom.  That’s my hope.  That one day the news stations out there will return to trying to lift us when they leave us.  Rather than leave us stewing over the fact that this piece of rock we live on is only getting worse.

What Doesn’t Kill You Only Makes You Stronger

If the above statement was true I would be Mr Universe.  However it is not and I am not.  It’s shitty world we live in when the only comforting words we can ever find for troubled people are meaningless idioms and metaphors.  As a race, when did we suddenly lose the ability to be sympathetic or understanding.  I have heard my fair share, and of course at appropriate times I have found myself  participating in this bullshit pass the parcel system of comfort.  And you know what?  I have learnt two things.  The first is that it doesn’t actually help.  And the second is that it doesn’t actually help.

The human mind was never built to compartmentalise.  It is not a natural function.  Yet in the vast majority of societies it’s what we are expected to do.  It defies belief.  If you divide the circle of emotions into two groups, honest and dishonest you can instantly discover what a lying bunch of hypocrites we are.  In the honest group we could put anger.  Anger very often makes us speak our mind.  Sadness or melancholy too.  Frustration.  Disappointment.  And many others.  The truth of the matter is that we are discouraged in our efforts to be honest.  It is no longer necessary in society.  It is better you stay silent and not cause a scene, or get yourself fired or some other equally deserving punishment for someone who tries to say it how they see it.

By choosing the kind of life where you have to withdraw and bottle reality up you are rejecting humanity.  The joy of this life comes from the fact that we are alive.  What separates us from animals is the fact that we have this wonderful range of emotions and when we do not accept them we are rejecting the fact that we are really alive.  So say it loud, and say it proud just say whats on your fucking mind.

Mosquitos Are The Arseholes Of Satan

Ever had one of those nights when you are hot and sweaty and can’t sleep.  Just when the weight of your eyes become too much and they start to close you hear it.  At first it’s barely perceptible, so you strain your brain and try to focus on the sound. ‘Bbbbbbzzzzzzzzzzz’.  As it dives past you.  It’s dark.  Your partner’s sleeping.  So you resist the urge to try to kill the mosquito.  The trouble is now you know it’s there.  Every twitch, quiver or bead of sweat crawling down your body makes you think that you are being eaten alive.  It’s hard to separate fact from fiction.  You feel something moving on your forehead.  You try to wait to be sure.  It’s too much to bear. ‘SLLAAAPPP’.  ‘What the fuck are you doing?’

The miracles of Mother Nature never cease to amaze me.  The sheer torture which a lone mosquito in your bedroom can create is incredible.  It’s so small and visually harmless that it seems unfeasible that it can create such a night of terror that you wake up feeling like a serial killer.  The optimist inside me hopes that we are all part of an ecosystem.  That we all have a job to do on mother earth.  However it doesn’t matter how deep in my soul I delve I still don’t see the point of the humble fucking mosquito.  In fact I think the world would be a better place without them.  I am certain they are either a mistake of God, or Satan is reincarnating accountants and lawyers as this horrible bloodsucking shits.

When your eyes are open to the trite nature of the universe you find it hard not to see other examples of such pointless biology.  If you buy into this concept of intelligent design ask yourself how intelligent is designing an insect which sucks people’s blood and transmits disease.  It’s not intelligent.  It’s stupid.  Or what about the Blobfish.  Go on google it.  It looks like an arse which has been turned inside out.  How functional is that?  I honestly don’t see a point to it unless you want to induce vomiting in a human.

It’s not just nature world which contains a fair degree of pointlessness its people too.  Why on Earth design a being and give it the knowledge that one day it will die?  You are giving the creature a perfect excuse to be miserable for the rest of its life.  Why give this being a need for systems?  It’s as if it was created to live and die inside a self-created cage.  Why not give this creature freedom?  Probably because we wouldn’t know what to do with it.

I hereby declare war on the humble Mosquito and all its kin.  You are proof that evolution doesn’t work.  Therefore I shall exterminate you for the benefit of mankind.  And then I shall be declared a hero.  And ordinary folk will raise statues in my name.  And then I shall be dead.  Just a name carved in stone.  And that is alright by me.

Coming Out The Closet

One of the weirdest aspects of trying to be a writer is the moment when a new acquaintance discovers your hidden, dirty secret.  The first thing they usually say is ‘wow, you’ve written a book.  What’s it about?’.  To which I reply ‘the death of a pet, a conspiracy and a period of social disruption.’.  Then there is a pause whilst they try to compute what exactly this means before replying something like ‘so does it have any vampires in it?’.

Perhaps I am mildly exaggerating, nevertheless the point is a valid one.  The moment you tell someone you have written something or you want to be a writer creates a moment of awkward reassessment despite the fact that many moons ago artistic aspirations were admired.  Nowadays it seems that people believe that if you want to write you are either mad or just bat-shit mental.

It is even worse when the thing you have created is not typical of now.  If your novel doesn’t contain wizards with their wands out, or gay vampires or women eating chocolate in their knickers or a lawyer in a race for justice or a policeman in a race for time or some other more acceptable 21st century template for success then you are even harder to understand.

Personally I find these moments extremely embarrassing and stumble through my answers certain of what the people I am speaking to are thinking.  The most amusing thing is that they try awfully hard to be pleasant and almost everyone ends up asking the same question.  “So are you going to try and publish it?”, to which I usually reply “No, I am going to eat it.”.  Bizarrely it never even raises a smile.

The urge to write isn’t dissimiliar to being as mad as a barking cat.  It’s a compulsion which sits inside the body and can flare up at any time.  It grows and shrinks during your lifetime.  I wrote the first draft of my novel, some 75,000 words in less than four months.  It is almost an addiction.  It is part of a person’s character.  If ever you find yourself in this situation, don’t be afraid of this person who is sharing part of their soul with you.  After all, most crazy people aren’t violent.  It’s only their thoughts which are.