Month: January 2025

And so. Daytime I’m just here. Night I’m chilling. Sending tapes and winning when I can. A strange existence but focused. A cat definitely helps.

I’ve aligned with and written about cats many times. Fundamentally simple creatures on one level, but the Egyptians were right to revere them. There’s something they know. We all know that they bristle for ghosts. They see things.

I went to my bro Rupert tonight. We made friends over summer, he pissed me off with simplistic thinking, I pissed him off with simplistic thinking, we both accepted that the world is huge and impossible. We stayed friends because our mathematics track, we just notice and value different things. Neither of us are eugenicists. We’re just looking to a happy world through our prism.

Now I’m home. The last hour has been entirely about playing with Boo, who has evidently been wondering what the hell has happened to this flat she organised with Brian Lou and Al all ready and willing to play with her forever. It’s just me now.

These cats, they intervene for us on levels we can never fathom. Don’t fuck with cats.

Even in Baldurs Gate 3, and I’m shameless about the fact I’m playing it in my spare time. My bard can talk with animals. The cats are all narcissists. It’s hilarious and wonderful and just another example of how Larian worked hard to make every option workable. This game… I honestly don’t know how it could ever be bettered. I look to that possibility. But… I messaged my friend who voices one of my favourite tanks. She’s a barbarian, and my Dungeons and Dragons character is always a barb. 100% committed, powerful yet vulnerable, open hearted. She’s in my main party even though I used my rpg knowledge and game mechanics to get the most incredible sword for my githyanki fighter. It’s bound to githyanki, and technically it should be vorpal and thus instakill on a natural 20. But it’s still absurdly good. But I prefer to have Karlach because she actively makes me laugh – her reaction just now when Minthara went into fine print about Wyll’s infernal contract, after I totally sorted her stuff out… I laughed so hard I had to put my Steam Deck down.

But yeah, I’ve been looking at tax and hiding in computer games when it gets too much. I think I’ll have a very hard thing finished by the end of the weekend. But it has made me shit at social occasions. I’m glad I took the time to see my bro. I’m sad I missed a lovely friend’s gig. But I don’t want to be out in boozeland right now.

And I’m lucky to have a small black cat looking after me.

Boo became fascinated by my bootlaces today. I was getting dressed up. Three piece plus V neck jumper. But I’m not putting on those horrible smartshoey things we all had to polish at school. I’m very much at home to rocking an intricate suit with worn walking boots. I once was told “You can get the measure of a man by their shoes and their cufflinks.” I was told this with sincerity. The person who told me thought it would lead to me selecting excellent cufflinks at all times. It backfired. I see it because I’m looking for it, people like my old ally, looking at you from the ground up. I love that they see a fucked old pair of Brashers first. Then a beautifully tailored suit and waistcoat. And cufflinks made of Scrabble pieces. The “measure” of me is quite rightly not swept up in signalling. Spend too much time thinking about that sort of thing and you forget who you are. Constructs usually either intimidate or annoy me.

But Boo is very much Boo and she was shadowing me as I was dressing up. I was booked to go to Mayfair, fine dining and then drinkies. Yum. I have many suits. I chose an old friend of a suit, a modern one, one I have recorded many self tapes in. I’m comfy when I’m smart. I often wear fine suits at festivals. “You’re not at work now mate!” “Thank you. I kind of am. This is costume.” Festivals were work for decades and will be again. My disruption uniform is smart. And boots.

Boo just wanted my bootlace. We had been just random playing for a while before I started playing dressup. I was attempting different combos to make sure It wasn’t gonna freeze my arse off. This weather is beast.

Inches before I left the flat I realised I couldn’t find my keys. I went to the kitchen. Not there so I turned and SO NEARLY put my whole weight onto a Boo who had snuck up behind me in quest of those fascinating bootlaces.

She’s not injured thankfully. Her paw got between me and the floor. Twinkle toes here transferred weight in time, but it was a near miss and we both know it. I have since firmly touched her paw with no objection.

Her obsession with bootlaces and sneaking up behind us coupled with her apparent belief that it is impossible to step on her, it might leave to me joining the hordes of “shoes off in the house” people. Usually if I hear that rule I find it interesting just as an insight into the rulemaker. They’ll justify it a million ways but it’s pretty much inevitably a control thing. But now I’m considering it about a cat. I’m over fifty finally. I am become part of the establishment complex, oh yes. All will do my bidding. Feel the shoelessness.

I won’t do it yet. I hate imposing. I’ll get some sort of shoe rack before I arbitrate for my guests so at least it’s easy for them. But I can feel it coming. Boo is still pissed off with me, but also she is absolutely dead set on lying in pathways. It’s like she’s got a deathwish. I’ll be that guy, for Boo. I’m pretty careful, and I’m rarely not remembering about the cat. But I can think of multiple very dear friends who might step their full weight on Boo as she lies in the way.

Such a good meal. Such a posh meal. Everyone should be allowed to have a ridiculous meal from time to time. Our waiter was a clown, which both added and subtracted from the experience. He was having a better time than we were, but was simultaneously ill informed and pretending not to be. For the cost of the meal, it was like getting the work experience kid, but I’m not annoyed enough by him to name him or the place. It takes a lot for me to name and link a place for being assholes like I did the other day with the Swan’s Nest Hotel in Stratford and their £8 hidden parking charge. (It’s on the website, sir.)

So good to hang with a friend of mine that has been consistent for such a long time.

Now I’m gonna have to make peace with Boo for my galumphing.

Last night’s dream was one of those dreams that feel real, that you have to unpack when you remember it, that you have to help yourself remember it was just a dream.

It was dawn, in London, in my bed where I was sleeping. Boo didn’t exist in my dream. I woke up to a sound and I looked out of my bedroom window. There I saw the mushroom cloud.

Playing it back in my mind, the bomb I saw must have landed in Sydenham. Logically for survival purposes it would have to be sevenoaks. It was already mushrooming, exactly two fingers in the plume, but I wasn’t feeling any wind yet.

My weight and breath in my dream dropped down immediately. This is my crisis response, it’s why I’m useful in events. I get more ordered and much calmer when things go to shit. Dream Al went into his bathroom, closed the plug and ran the cold tap. Then he found his iodine and flooded his thyroid with non-radioactive iodine, while gathering essential handy tools and dried foods into a small pack. Most people not in blast radius die from casually absorbing radioactive iodine. Step 1: Flood your thyroid.

Then dream Al filled every available lidded receptacle with water, loaded up with edibles and nothing else but keys and got into the car to get out of London and drive “north”, and maybe top up the fuel and liquids at a local petrol station that hadn’t got the memo. No idea where dream Al was going. He was just getting out.

In my dream I was already in Bergman and driving “north” knowing that that was where Lou was, weirdly. I was trying to phone Lou in “north” before service went down totally, getting out of town laden with food and water and testing the edges of what still worked when Boo woke me up suddenly. I think the plan I had was to go to the Isle of Man somehow via Lou in “North”, even if it involved stealing a boat. Not a good plan, dream Al. The iodine and water was a good start, but driving THROUGH London to go north? Sure it felt like I would have been one of the first, but there’s half an hour between me and Finchley. Could have easily ended up stuck in angry nuke crowds.

I’m glad it was a dream, obviously. Lou being “north” puts it a bit closer to a future prediction than a dream as she is absolutely south in Brighton right now and that would have been through the bomb.

I’m curious though. It has been decades since I’ve had nuclear dreams. I used to have them all the time, growing up in the cold war. They’ve come back. Putin wants it back. It is his engineering that has created this shitstorm. Trump is pliable. Putin knows this, and angled for it. Now Trump is saying North America will go to war with NATO over Greenland, forgetting the first two letters of NATO, obviating the whole fucking thing, so Putin can say “See, I told you they were fascists!” and he can have Ukraine like he had Crimea and Trump can think he’ll get similar territory in some sort of reciprocal deal but the USA never held the territories so it won’t work. Maybe Panama… That’s a bit like the Crimea. But – this is fucked. Putin put in the idea he shouldn’t leave the White House. All this manly man rhetoric. “If they vote you out you will leave?” Trump didn’t believe he could lose to Biden, that’s why he overreacted. This time he’ll move quickly to try and change things and leave the USA with what they voted for forever and fuck it maybe that’s what they deserve. We can’t properly cope with the meaning of all this without the benefit of time. It looks like a fucking mess but who knows? Maybe my dream was just a dream. Maybe this idiot will subjugate his country to Russia and no shots will be fired. It just feels like when he realises how hard he has been played he’s gonna kick off and boom means boom.

Boo just started shouting. She wants play. This is better than thinking about all these fragile tiny boys and how they have put profit in front of people for so long.

I’ll play with Boo a bit, and then off to bed. If the bombs fall I probably won’t survive. But I haven’t had those dreams since I was a teenager. Here we go again. Really? Yes. Why? Male ego. Surely that’s not a big enough problem to destroy civilisation? … … … … … Ok yah it is.

Damn. The oldest surviving written work, Gilgamesh, translated from cuneiform tablets, talks of how a misguided leader is destructive when he is a leader just for being a leader. He has to go on a long journey and exhaust himself and fuck up multiple times before he can go back to where he was and look at it and see it for what it is, and therefore see the people and lead for and with them instead of just leading with his ego despite them.

I might order a big pallet of mineral water. Then I might be able to weather the lawless stage in London after the bombs. If I was in charge of the doomsday clock I’d be clicking it closer…

But hey, in the eighties we were wrong to worry. War Games was a great fiction, nothing more. Yeah? It’ll be fine. Just look at the balanced personalities we have in positions of power in the major nuclear countries. Not to mention the fact that Iran have been enriching uranium for years and probably already have nukes which is why they’ve been behaving like such arses for the last few years. Ugh. I’m feeling more and more like this is the end of times for our comfortable civilisation.

My love goes out to LA, to the fire. What hell, to lose your home in an inferno. Lou has experienced this and now I’m hearing of it again again again unseasonally and yet in January, objectively the month one goes to LA – the beginning of my blog journey, warm sunny winter in a place where they aren’t looking at you closely enough to see that you’re an alarming mess on the inside. I fixed myself there thanks to this blog, to Brian, Jake and Siri, Lyndon, Laural and Mark with their dog room in Larchmont, and Vince in Venice who, for a glorious moment had illegally filled someone else’s empty home with bunk beds and created a temporary community where good people rented US phones for cheap, good advice was given to visitors, community happened stealthily and you could get a battered Chevy for $100 a month if you spoke to the right human. I had been angling to get use of Matt’s Harley, knowing it was gently rotting in a garage after Season 2 of his fronted show didn’t materialise. Tragedy. I would’ve gladly kept that Harley running…

I miss that town. I was there as the mischief. I did a good job of it, breaking rules, pushing boundaries, having fun. I hope the fires get under control. Too many lovely weird people there. I want them to be happy and safe.

And I’m home.

A slightly drinky script-reading in a pub in Soho. Robert the owner is a writer and his friend has started to institute readings in the little upstairs room. Alice got an opportunity to do her latest film script up there and like a legend she took it. I’m a big fan of Alice. We worked out how to work with each other a long long time ago, and now it comes as shorthand. We both persisted with one another in the early days and learnt from each other. It’s a proper collaboration.

Six of us sat and breathed life into this characterful and curious tale. Ghosts, stalkers and post natal depression. The male gaze, and the violence and entitlement that often comes with it. Plus female technocrats, ancient spirits and the emotional disconnect of the army.

I was in the army house at Harrow. Wrote a drunk blog about it once that was found and shared among the people it referenced. I haven’t gone over it, just know because one of them who I don’t detest made it obvious when he was matching names to descriptions. I shrugged, at the time. Fine, this blog is always just the work of a moment, and my opinions shift and change as I grow. I absolutely defy the myth of consistency. We have to be able to shift, even if journalists think they have scored a point if they realise someone has adjusted their stance. The myth of consistency is part of what has squished the world into almost impossible polarities. I long to hear someone in power say “Yes, you are correct, I did say X but now on reflection I have developed my thinking and have realised I was misguided. I now firmly hold the opposite stance for reasons reasons reasons. And I will stand by my new position unless facts come to light that prove I need to rethink.”

This is why I’m not a politician. You have to lie to make the fuckers trust you.

Nevertheless, I play an officer class army bloke very well because I’ve observed the shivering detritus of the early education of the donkeys who led those lions. There are many disconnects, sure. The most disconnected of them weren’t the ones who went into service anyway – the burnt ends ended up estate agenting while the ones with heart did some service, sometimes very deeply. There are some good humans shuffled in with the jokers.

I won’t play the part I read, if the film is made. Way too old. Was there just to support my friend. She invited a casting director and by the sound of it that potential contact was too pissed off she wasn’t asked to cast it herself that she didn’t stay to talk with any of us who were there to help. I despair of meeting casting directors. Met one finally last year dressed as a Wrigley’s Limited Edition Watermelon Gum that joined a key to blow up Camden. But usually I’m too socially awkward to make it satisfying.

Maybe she’ll think of me negatively now because I was miscast and knew it but was there to support someone I admire. I really hope not. I kinda wish she had taken the time to tell me so, rather than just feeding back to Alice and leaving. A curious meeting primed to negative would have been better than just leaving with a negative. Still, we can only do and do and do. And our people find our people, we hope.

This evening in a little Soho pub, eight practitioners came together and made a little bit of light. Some people let it kindle them, others were a bit clogged.

Now I’m home with the cat and all of this seems almost as trivial as it is.

I took Lou back to Brighton. Just got home. We went and hung out for a moment with Tessy. Tessy is vast compared to this little black ghost that haunts me in Chelsea, although much of her bulk is fluff.

It’s barely ten and I’m already flat out in bed. Sent some work emails today, made some calls… The machine is now clicking back into gear.

The roads were dense London to Brighton and then Brighton to London. In both directions there were the drivers who try and race you. Driving home after Christmas. I always just let them win, but they often attach to me when they see me nipping through traffic. I’m just doing it for expedience, not testosterone. I’m no Andrew Tate, constantly worrying about how my behaviour affects people’s theories about the size of my penis. I had to pay attention in the outskirts of London, both ways.

Lots of driving but I’m home happy. Thankfully I had good company down and plenty to keep my mind occupied on the way up. Radio 4 played a blinder. I’ve run out of podcasts, but there were two good articles back to back and then I haven’t listened to the news for ages so I was very happy to hear about how the chinless eejit Mark Rylance plays in “Don’t Look Up” is currently behaving as if people in this country give a fuck about his awfully informed opinions. He will make waves, just because he has a platform (on fire, but he bought it). But this noise is in the same vein as “they’re eating the dogs, they’re eating the cats, they’re eating the pets… of the people that live there.“

My dad said, before the internet, that people are getting dumber and dumber as information is getting easier and easier to share. I don’t know if we can get much dumber without just toasting ourselves. The whole “where are the great statesmen?” thing has been replaced by “I wonder if we can find a leader who is smarter than a dead fish.” I wonder if we will hit peak stupid? Not any time soon, when the shouting Wotsit blunders back into The White House in two weeks, with the likes of chinless cheerleading for him, and nothing but a gaping yes man our side of the pond, one with no courage and no convictions, who also happens to be politically different to the orange one, and thus will come under fire. Justin Trudeau got squeezed out by tariffs. Things are gonna get really fucking nasty. Like actually nasty. Chinlessness will be celebrated. Notional penis swinging will come back into fashion. Oh god.

So we have to build the light, protect it, keep it fed. I’m a bit tired right now, but I’m up for being part of it. Gotta pull back before springing forward, etc etc.

Early bed.

I’ll miss Lou and her silly musical kids show.

I’ll enjoy being here on my own too though. Just have to keep it positive.

Every time I drive myself back from Stratford these days it is in atrocious conditions. Once again, mist like the end of the world, shovelfuls of rain smashing into the windscreen. Lots of slow cars holding tight in the fast lane. I finished The Coming Storm. This contemplation of so many of the ways in which we can explode thoughts to fit our instincts. It’s very good. No solutions, but plenty of context. It’s a podcast on BBC Sounds. Gabriel Gatehouse. Gotta be interested in pattern matchers.

This morning I woke up in my pleasant room in Swan’s Nest Hotel. I came from my friend’s place with a driveway. The hotel took my numberplate when I checked in so I wouldn’t get accidentally charged for parking, being a resident (so I thought). I could’ve left my car at Avonside or in any number of places a bit further out. But they had a car park as part of the high charge for the room, thought I in my foolish innocence. Sometimes it’s nice to lean into the luxury I told myself when I booked the expensive room instead of staying at my friend’s place just round the corner.

Last night I had a steak in their restaurant. I was thinking of paying for breakfast when I returned my key. I bought some drinks at the bar. Lots of my money is now their money.

I wrote about this on Google reviews, and I’m putting it in my blog as well, because I was genuinely angry and surprised that when I went to check out she charged me EIGHT POUNDS FOR PARKING. Totally unexpected. I was so shocked I froze.

“It’s on the website,” she shrugged, like you say “it’s in the terms and conditions.” I booked through a third party website. It’s code for “We got you.” She was playing hardfront immediately as well, like she was in the right, not an extension of this unethical hidden charge. Obviously people kick off all the time with this, and with good reason, or she wouldn’t be all front. I knew I hadn’t got any charges, it was just me trying to dot the i that caused me to formally return my room card. What a fucker.

I paid it. But honestly what a pile of crap. They need to put up signs. They definitely need to tell us about it when we check in. It is an absolute swizz, it is wrong, it is terrible business practice, squeezing extra money from residents by surprise. For parking. On a weekend. It’s short termist unpleasant thinking. I hate them for it.

I went for lunch with my friends here when I was working over the road, I stopped occasionally for drinks too, I thought I might start staying regularly – I’ll be back up in town in February and in June as I’ve already got tickets for shows with friends in. I’ll never darken their doors again because of that £8.00. It’s the principle of the thing. They need a management overhaul.

I went over the road, the other side of the river from that vile place, into more familiar territory. Had a yummy breakfast and coffee at wonderful Bardias, went over to Avonside to see friends (and park for free), said farewell to the town for the short term again. I’ll be back before long – not at Pirate Central – there are thankfully some wonderful places to stay in that town that aren’t fleecing you.

I’m still really angry about just eight pounds. It’s totally disproportionate, but the fact I wasn’t informed before, coupled with the absolute lack of fucks given at reception. Nobody likes to feel like they’ve been made a mug of. The major thing is that I loved the place right up until that lady at reception pulled that at the very last possible minute. It’s like being stabbed by your mate. I hope they get lots of use out of my eight quid. Grumble Grumble. Silly fuckers.

Quite a lot of red wine before the show last night. I’ve been staying at an old friend’s house, in the spare room. She’s married, got two kids. It was lovely to see her and I was an excuse for a bottle of wine but it went right through me. I went to bed eventually, somehow. Woke up feeling crusty and immediately drove to Leamington Town Hall to support her. She protests there every week. Palestine. Just an hour in the freezing cold. I got stuck in.

I remember using the word “genocide” in a car to my half brother, somewhere in France. Rupert jumped on it. It’s a loaded word, sure. I asked him when he thought Israel would stop. “Well that’s the interesting thing,” he said, before talking generally about the roots of the conflict without answering the question. It’s still being styled as retaliation, although I think the figures are about 500 to 1. My friend read a list of names of children killed, with their names. Including Israeli children. The organisers of this protest are Jewish. Lots of names.

I stood hungover and shivering and occasionally people honked, occasionally they swore. Caring is hard. In the light of something like this it is much easier to shift it. “What about…?” Hostages. Israeli dead. “What about if I don’t change anything?” Doing fuck all is comforting, as I can testify after about ten days of playing Baldur’s Gate 3 with Brian.

Coffee after and then I could feel myself crashing. I love my friend and her family, but sometimes I like to have a door I can shut for good. I knew she would be hosting me if I stayed. So I told her I was gonna drive home, and booked a room at Swan’s Nest. It’s just over the river from the theatre. I checked in, went up to my room and passed out.

A few hours later I was normal again. I followed my beaten track into this town. My first time here since Othello. I went to Bardias, got my coffee on a discount as they remember me. Went to The Duck, and brought a picture of Colin, my friend’s husband who used to be up there and was taken down. The landlord agreed to get it back up. Glad I could help with that.

I walked past my old cottage. A little pang. I’ll be back.

Now I’m in my lovely hotel room. Just had a shower, wandering around with no clothes on, spreading out. I’m glad I got one night with a friend, but I needed to commune with myself.

I’ll probably be up early, go and get one of my Stratford breakfasts. See some friends before I go. I’m not gonna sink into being here though. This trip is money out, not money in. This town again though, that company again. A real pleasure to breeze through and remember what turned out to be one of the happiest jobs of a long career so far. Twelfth Night was gorgeous as well, and this production is very funny but responds to the deep vein of grief in the writing.

It’s so cold and dark in the world. I can’t work out how to switch off the extractor fan. But I’m happy to have this little strange room, and I got a lovely curry from Thespians and they discounted it automatically as well. I like this town. I’ll sleep well in it.

9pm and I’m standing outside the RST. I’m looking rather winsomely at the door that was mine until quite recently. I’m walking down the little bits of embankment that were my daily constitutionals.

It hadn’t occurred to me that it would be odd to be here in this building so soon after Othello and not to be about to do some work. I’m watching Rhys. Like Lodo, Sebastian is backloaded so he’s having to keep himself tight. Something went tits up in the audience today near me. They’ve kept to the usual interval but now they are keeping all of us out of the auditorium and quietly rolling in stretchers. I think she’s okay. But this is a big old theatre. Things happen. They have to respond. The interval is much longer than it ought to be, and everyone has to be in the foyer while this lady turns into a crab. I can wait. I’m enjoying the show.

Twelfth Night. I’ve seen it more than dream, been in it more than dream. Malvolio forever, always too young. Then recently Belch and Antonio. Arguably better casting.

It’s a tight show, as must be expected with this company. It’s the RSC. I’m part of this year’s company. We aren’t fucking about.

Ok the lady has been wheeled away on a stretcher so we can go back in now. I hope she’s okay. Well done to Viola and Orsino, playing that gorgeous intimate scene “and so they are alas that they are so, to die even when they to perfection grow”. Considering I could preserve this show in an apocalypse, I’m enjoying the telling. There’s JAZZ in the flow of it. Friends in the weave of it.

I’m happy to be here, on a company comp as I was organised and booked it when I was still in possession of my magic RSC staff pass. I’ll be back on the same basis for Hamlet. I bought loads of tickets for friends to come to Othello and one of them is still angry with me for being hard to pin down. I’d sooner avoid bothering my friends if I can help it.

They’re gonna start the second half.

I went in, loved it. Bed now. trying to title this is more or less the extent of my capacity. xx zz etc

Up naturally at 5, who even am I? I even fixed a couple of things around the house. Sure, I also logged in and cast Command: Drop on some kickass posing githyanki warlord so now I’ve got his silver sword thing. Not too much fannying around though, it was a lovely day. Invoices to send and stuff to worry about – I’m gonna really start wanting to know what the next long job is before long. The short job economy is kicking back in as it forever does, I’ve made room for it, of course. There are even some invigilation shifts on the horizon but I know how I want to be making my money and it isn’t giving papers out to international business students. It butters the parsnips though. And I do like buttery parsnips.

Now the New Year is past there are no more excuses to be a dreadful layabout.

I’ve been sitting here with Lou this evening, up in this lovely flat, missing my mum. Funny how that grief still comes up. It was her boyfriends birthday – the guy who died recently – on the 1st. His corpse, her memory, the time that has passed. It all weighs heavily at this time of year even if I distract myself successfully with the waifs and strays Christmas. Now there’s nothing to distract me, so it can cut that much harder.

At least Lou is with me, I have company on this cold dark evening. And Boo is raising merry hell. She comes up to the nut bowl, and carefully removes a single hazelnut. Then she bats it onto the floor and hockey-pucks it over to the rug, which she then folds round by rolling. Then she stashes the nut under the rug, like a squirrel but I don’t think she really understands that hazelnuts are food, they’re just things that roll. I’ll occasionally go and retrieve all the nuts, I don’t think it bothers her, she’s more involved in the process than the result. Like a lot of my favourite artists.

Brian’s new sourdough making craze is catching. I just took out the first loaf that is partly mine. We measured it together and folded it together. I forgot it in the fridge for a bit and it went a bit funny shaped but its a good loaf and I can see how everyone got obsessed with doing it in lockdown. Breakfast and snacks are sorted for a few days and I have the satisfaction of having made a food.

We read a film on zoom this evening, there’ll be a few industry types at a rehearsed reading in a few days and I’m only there to help out – my guy is half my age, has a full head of hair and a six pack. Happy to read him to help my dear friend who makes movies. Always good to keep the tools oiled. Something is coming.

And if it doesn’t, I know how to make bread now. And I can butter it.

We woke up in a storm. 2025 showing intention? 2024 flushing? We shall see.

Lou had a day off and wanted to go to Neasden Mandir. With all the years she’s spent in India she occasionally needs a fix of it.

I have never quite gelled with Hinduism, which is unusual considering my poly view to most world religions. I’ve never been drawn to a Hindu country in this life, and I’m not sure if there are many previous tracks that way. Buddhism – particularly Japanese Buddhism – felt very familiar to me immediately. So did shinto, so do many of the strands of animism left in the west, the things we’ve had to piece together from negative retelling and takeovers by colonising faith structures. I’ve travelled through these places before but not through the Hindu. I found some power in Ganesh, a solid frisson of recognition in Shiva, although I’m convinced he’s a woman.

The Mandir is a huge temple in London. BAPS Shri Swaminarayan Mandir, a molded edifice full of devotional Hindu. A beautiful if modern place of devotion for one of the oldest thriving world religions. A place with history of thought and care and peace. And it is beautiful. I circuited round, observing the rules as best I understood them, feeling mildly constrained as it felt like there might be secret rules that are only known to “insiders”. It wasn’t my gang. With shinto my instincts really helped me and I just seemed to KNOW what was the way and what wasn’t. With this temple I even sat wrong. Not my gods. Still, Ganesha is equivalent to my lady untier of knots, Hanuman has much in common with the tricksters I’ve come to know, haida ravens, even Bacchus. Shiva and Vishnu are the clearest tropes to explain what I have come to understand in the balance between creation and destruction, and how destruction IS creation just as creation IS destruction and round we go. But I can’t attach my imagination to the humanified molds. And to really consume the knowledge, it’s too much in this lifetime, I’ve already eaten about 5 major religions and I’m still pushing Joseph Campbell’s connective thoughts into the magimix of my brain to see what eventually drips out into the glass. I guess Campbell is a human I admire, so in those terms it is a little less odd that many of the devotional shrines contained people. I can admire people, but I’m not gonna fucking worship them, no way. I know people too well, love them too well.

It was a good contemplative start to the year, and I’d recommend it unless you’re monomaniac and likely to be freaked out by a different culture or what you have decided is a “wrong” way of contemplating the infinite. You can largely work out what’s what by observing the other people there. Lou and I were the only ones invited to the £2.00 “Learn about Hinduism” exhibition. We both politely declined. We went across the road though to the sattvic restaurant.

So many carbs, but we got stuck into an “all you can eat” vegetarian sattvic buffet. Chana Massala, Saag Paneer, Aloo – the regulars – some hot stuff, lots of carbs. A healthy first meal. Some years ago I would deliberately go to KFC on New Year’s Day, so that every meal after my first one was better than my first. I’m glad I’m not doing that sort of crap these days. It was a glorious first meal of the year.

We got home and listened to a meditation, but I’m not that far down the line. While Lou sat cross-legged I found myself emptying cat shit out the litter box and taking the bins out. Practicality.

Now it’s 9pm and I kinda want to go to bed. Brian is in New Zealand so it’s just Lou and I here for a bit with Boo. Gonna start this year slowly, and without any big promises wouldn’t it be nice to keep taking care of myself, eating well, taking care of the things beyond our ken?

“This sweetcorn methi leaves a taste in my mouth that is really similar to the one I get with Ayahuasca.”

Grandma is reminding me of the promises I made to myself a few weeks ago.

Happy start. Happy forward. Much to do. Much light to find.