Author: albarclay

“I think I should be clear at this point that I’m not going to let you put it in my bottom.”

The look of annoyed resignation led both to me feeling a little bit sexy and simultaneously a bit too perceptive. We were having a great conversation. So yes I called the interaction before I found out why it was so great. It seems I’m a bear right now. Big overcoat, big fluffy beard. Rupert Bear had Adventures in Barnes. Fair enough. I’ve been sorting through incredible amounts of nasty old crap energy today left behind by an old friend’s dad. Nice to see that I’m still a prospect within that.

I met a therapist. Not the guy who made the show, FYI, don’t go jumping down the wrong alley etc etc fnarr fnarr.

I hadn’t had time to dump the badness as I usually do after clearing bollocks for people, so I was using booze post show. I still had fingers filthy from sorting through old books. Had to go wash hands thoroughly in the pub post show, midway through the interaction. Booze never clears anything, it just kicks things down the line. We all know that. But we all do stupid things from time to time.

I’ll do some proper work now I’m home but I’m giving this to you live, kids. I’m writing the evening before clearing the evening. (This sentence is the final one post edit before I go and do that aaaaaaaaaaahhhh here we go … … *he actually went back over it?! unprecedented … …

“You say you pull shit out of people? How do you process that shit once you’ve pulled it?” (My language not his. He wasn’t sweary. He’s got the jargon. He does this for a living. THERAPY KNOWINGZ.) We are talking about energy. Whatever that means to you it’s probably right.

“Ritual.” I tell him – truthfully – that I improvise some random bollocks that satisfies me and the other people involved if need be. Every time. Cuz I do. I’m stealing from so many pantheons in my rituals. There’s my interpretations of ancient Neolithic stuff, attempts at Celtic, solid Greek pantheistic with the obvious dead Roman copies, an attempt at understanding our native spirit culture, Japanese animism that I’m gonna know so much better very soon, cheap Buddhism, Christian red in tooth and claw with all the schisms and mutterings … so many more, bring ’em motherfuckers, I’ll eat all your beliefthings. Nom. I will continue to do so. BURN INCENSE BURN. The only religion I deny is Dawkins. What delusion to specifically be sure there’s nothing.

He’s a professed Christian, coming onto me in the pub. “WHAT LOVE WHAT LOVE WHAT LOVE WHAT LOVE WHAT LOVE WHAT LOVE” to quote Moby. There’s enough I can touch from his pantheon (or should I call it a monotheon aha aha fnff fnuff blrrrgh?) But yeah avoiding the categorisation bullshit, there’s enough I can touch from the things he is Christianically comfortable with to help him make sense of the random energy-moving shit I do in terms of Holy Spirit or Prayer or what have you. Gnosticism. Blah.

Normally I never tell people I move energy around as I’m probably moving yours stealthily and it’s a shit conversation anyway. “What the fuck are you talking about?”. It’s a stealthy and so far largely unpaid cottage industry. Shhh. But Jethro was with me this evening. Can’t hide from the skinner. Who knows what he’s said to whom? I can’t let that boy down. We are each other. He’s the man who flayed back all the layers of protection in the woods when I was burning burning burning.

The reason I was up in Barnes this evening was to watch another one skinned by the skinner, doing a one man show. He even brings Jethro into it, with a very well judged impression.

This one… Tom … he’s made a clown show about the loss involved when your parents pay for an institution to bring you up so they can keep shagging. It’s full of cock. It’s full of rage. It’s full of joy. It’s looking at the culture that makes Rishi and co seem like aliens to anyone half present in the world. He’s not pulling punches. He’s not throwing them either. He’s letting all of us see his hot mess and hoping we appreciate and love him and hate the mess of abandonment. I did. 

Not because he’s blessed in the Saltburn “Murder on the Dance Floor” way, but that’s part of it all. Let it all hang out baby. He knows his blessing as he knows his curse. In response to the quote at the top of this blog? He would have made a counter offer.

I’m happy to be home. Night night darlings.

Here’s a link to the show. It’s in Barnes. Then it’ll be Edinburgh. Then THE WORLD. Ah ha ha ha ha ha ha haaaaaa. Go see it. Or don’t. You can choose.

I’m really not the guy from Radio Shack. I was round Sarah’s again this evening trying to get this telly up and running. It took me about an hour before I worked out where the “on” button was. Now I’ve got the thing refusing to bring up any menus and instead saying “No Teletext” no matter which button I push and I hated it so much I told her I was gonna rain-check. I’m glad I didn’t flog the damn thing on eBay as it’s fucked.

Now I’m home. It’s 11pm. It’s raining and my sash window is bleeding cold air in behind me. In the street below someone has decided now is the correct time for a pneumatic drill. He’s holding down the button longer than people normally do. Guddaguddagudda and I want to go downstairs in a dressing gown and say “Do you have any idea what time this is?” but my hair isn’t grey enough and I’ve got a chin. So I’m just waiting and watching as slow vans full of traffic cones roll through the horrid evening. I suspect it’s gonna be a bad one tonight. A London night. Roadworks and shouting. At least they might stop the traffic.

Meantime my WhatsApp has started buzzing off the chain trying to help organise the funeral for my mum’s boyfriend. He’s the guy whose body I went and sat with the other day. A powerful force for good in the world, a complicated presence in my life. He was very much himself at all times. An authentic voice. I want to try and help his funeral be something that reflected his remarkable life. He was put in charge of mum’s funeral and we were all so traumatised it was a total mess, and contributed to alienating me from mum’s friends. I never really knew what happened to them. It’s sad. But here is his life, and his very real achievements, and a chance to put aside all the “you’re not my dad” stuff. He was still a maverick, the same sort of age as pa, but with a less catastrophic set of lifestyle choices. He made old bones, with the inevitable crumbling at the end that comes with such longevity. The last few years he wasn’t really sure who anyone was, and I found it hard enough to be with him that I likely could be accused of neglecting my duties.

So. Lives. Sic Transit Gloria Mundi and all that. The drilling has stopped. The cold persists. Lou is whacked out from heat in Goa and I’m so so envious. Just one day of being so hot I can’t think. That’s all I ask…

There’s been a popular meme today shared and rehashed by innumerable people. The wording changes but the idea remains the same. Essentially : April Fool’s Day – The only day of the year that people engage critical thinking when encountering information online.

Dog Opera. A Victorian Barge for politicians to escape the blitz. A pterodactyl photo from a bird watching hide. Apparently ITV’s This Morning rehashed an old Antiques Roadshow April Fool from the 1980’s. Attribute huge value to an object and then smash it on telly to freak out a presenter. Apparently on April 1 1992 they put signs in LAX welcoming passengers to Chicago. There was a famous spaghetti harvest reported on 1960’s BBC news. As a kid I remember all sorts of silly things in the papers and on telly. Now it’s a little harder to parse as so many people have lost the ability to understand the passage of time and how science works. Just yesterday my nephew tried the old “It’s a theory of evolution” thing and I had to try and explain what “theory” means in scientific terms. Literate human beings with functioning minds have forgotten the time and input that have led to many things that many of us now take for granted. They see us take it for granted and they think they are being clever by announcing that the things we take for granted are wrong. Flat Earth, Creationism, Nephilim etc etc. In fact, one of the April Fools I saw this morning was about Nephilim. And an old friend of mine thinks they built the pyramids. He hasn’t ever been involved in a huge group project so can’t believe what numbers and ingenuity can achieve.

Of course it is moronic to just absorb what you’re told. But it’s even more moronic to tell people they’re dumb for taking for granted that the world is round or that there’s Nothing out there or that God has a specific name and list of intentions. It’s the “sheeple” type language used in all this conversation that makes me want to hadouken all the exponents of alternative narratives. It’s always wet with smugjuice and usually from brilliant right brains who have been made to feel dumb by the left brain dominance of the territory that has been called “clever”.

Within this horrible made up world of cabals and satanists and maneating liberals there’s never any particular mission or thing we can do to help. It’s more about the person telling you knowing it than it is about a call to action. The purpose of it appears to be about being seen as knowing a thing. Back to the playground. “I know something you don’t know!”

Any of these April Fools jokes could be substituted for whatever gumf your old mate is banging on about. Like my old mate and the nephilim.

But the meme has a point. We all keep absorbing things like sponges. Which news outlets are not carrying bias? The only way to work out what’s going on in the world is to get out into it, and to get out of your bubble, but there’s a lot of ground to cover and it can be exhausting.

I’ve done neither today and I’m fine with that. I got Bone Daddy to send me a Tantanmen 2 and I wolfed it down while watching the world go by past my window. Tomorrow I’ll go back into it. Today I had a bank holiday.

Ahh my dear brother and his progeny. I’m afraid I’ve given them ammunition. Not with intention. But I so rarely have time with them that it is hard to judge which subjects are discussed and which aren’t. We had a great time regardless. Didn’t eat a lamb. Catherine went to a farm and now she won’t eat lamb so we had battery chickens who had lived in a box from cradle to grave with their feet dissolving instead. They’re fine as she didn’t feed them by hand once.

He’s got a rabbit. Appropriate for the season.

Nicholas is in his twenties right now, and streams himself playing Dead by Daylight named for a David Gemmel character who was in his seventies. Druss the Legend, the aged axeman who had to coordinate the defences for one last major battle. I left a book lying around and it clearly had an effect on Nick. It’s a very good version of the “one last job” trope in a fantasy setting. It’s weird seeing an ingenue like Nick associate with the character but then I found the Gemmel book when I was roughly his age. Legend. It’s a great piece of heroic fantasy, and Druss is a memorable hero who holds the line. It’s Thermopylae in fantasyland, with an old axeman at the front. But you aren’t gonna make a living by streaming unless you are shithot at editing and extremely charismatic and well connected online. He’s none of the three, but could prove us all wrong just as I eventually proved my parent-driven critics wrong but at what cost at what cost?

Now I’m home with an absurd sausage dog who is pining for his keepers. They’ve all gone to a concert. I didn’t expect to get left with it but I have.

He’s cute. We are just establishing how to be friends. He’s still pining, but he’s getting used to the fact it is just the two of us now. Before long he’ll be chilling out with me. But I figured I’d write this while he was establishing that they definitely aren’t here anymore. Timed it pretty well. He’s just started trying to clamber on me. I think the two of us will be in dialogue for the rest of the evening.

He’s come to sit on me now. But he’ll be off before long to bark at random things that might be his keepers.

Peace and quiet at home. Things don’t have to be achieved every day, particularly not on Easter Saturday, the middle of everyone’s favourite bumper weekend when the evenings get longer at last. Jesus is dead but tomorrow he’ll pop up again and give us all chocolate. Or is that Monday? It’s Monday I think. “On the third day”, and Good Friday is when he tied himself to the tree for wisdom and we all eat buns. But tomorrow we eat lamb because he’s the lamb and his flesh is biscuits, no it isn’t literally biscuits, yes it is literally biscuits, HERESY! GET THE TORCHES!

It’s all very jolly.

I didn’t achieve much. My concession towards being functional was to fry up a jar of pesto with red onion and chorizo and whatever else I could find in the fridge that needed eating, and to feed it to mister Hook and myself with pasta. He’s snoring in front of Band of Brothers with planes. I finished Mass Effect 1 – about seventeen years too late – and thoroughly enjoyed the difficult decisions you have to make. There’s lots of pithy morality in games from back then, but that was more or less when I stopped playing games as they were taking too much time. Now I can nip back in as the addiction part of my approach to them is in check. It’s not yet eleven and I’ve stopped for the night. I’ll never get as far as present day games at the rate I’m catching up and the hours I’m giving to the hobby, but with Lou in India I’m letting the teenage me have a bit of rein.

I forgot it was Easter Sunday tomorrow. I want to go for a long walk, but it’s one of the only days of the year I see my brother’s progeny. I might see if I can do both but I’m not banking on it. Only a week or two before I go on my little weird jolly to far off lands. I’m obsessively checking the weather out there. Won’t be much hotter than here. Hey ho.

Ahh and my body feels slow at the moment, just … shut down from long winter. A good prolonged active period will be a tonic. The curiosity of a very different culture will be enough to keep me on the front foot.

Good Friday, and I realised that the remote for the telly I dropped off today still had the batteries in it and they had dissolved. No life out of it at all. I’m hoping the problem lies with the remote control and not the tv set. I couldn’t switch it on even though the red light was showing. There’s a new control ordered on Amazon and I’ll be back to my friend’s place on Saturday or Sunday to see if that fixes it. Bum.

I thought my friend was teetotal these days so was disappointed to see that they’ve fallen off the wagon. Afternoon pint was almost impossible to refuse especially considering my proclivities and the fact that the weather is attempting to be spring. I managed just a single before heading to Richmond Park for a yomp, and a good walk easily counters the sluggishness.

It’s a proper body of land, Richmond Park. One of those places that we can thank the monarchy for, as I suspect it is their ownership of it that stops the plastic humans from putting buy to let flats on it. If there’s ever a populist movement to chuck out the monarchy and it gains traction you can be sure it’s because these pencil pushers who inhale when they’re laughing are after the incredible chases and deer runs we still have, to turn them into plastic. The narrative will be about tax money paid to them or other such things overlooking how our weird old institutions are the only thing keeping tourists coming to our failed state despite the added red tape we voted for cus we hate people who don’t look like us. The reality will be a land grab.

Tanya and I pushed out through the sludge and it made me think about Kumano Kodo at this time of year and the fact that it looks like it is basically a conveyor belt of men with cameras called Hubert Geschnaffelton V. It has been snowy there. Will it still be slippery? I’d best pack rainproof. My walking boots will stop me slipping off the edge, and even though Hubert has someone driving his luggage to the spa he’s staying in, if he can make it, I can make it blindfold.

Still I’m starting to pack my bags. This is unheard of for the normal version of me but I’m determined to prove all the internetties wrong as they tell me my itinerary is not possible because I’m not booking through an official tour group etc.

Nice evening yomp today with willing and swift company. I’m gonna aim for Box Hill on Sunday. Still not a hard walk but I’m building up gradually.

Dentist again and there’s a list as long as my arm of stuff that needs doing. I’m rubbing together the farthings as in my profession it is better to have gaps in the credit rating than in the smile. I’m not happy about it though. So much to do and much of it is pricey.

Home now though and enjoying a week where all I have to do is admin and tidying. Tomorrow another old piece of technology will be going away to someone who wants it. It’s hard to keep the direction of stuff outwards. Especially when old things sometimes find their place. My Camino rucksack. Bought for walkies, very well roadtested. Much loved. I finally found it today and I’m glad to have it. Packing will be easier by far for this short hike I’m doing in Japan. I won’t even need a sleeping bag. It’s the opposite of difficult, just very busy and hard to find official accommodation because of a plague of middlemen. It’s a holiday that I’m making awkward for myself on purpose. That’s all.

The cold has snapped again in London. Huge rainstorms and squalls off the river, peaceful sunny stormeyes in between, reminding us that we have done too much damage to be able to predict the seasons, even in temperate countries. Despite your drooling idiot schoolfriend who has inherited some idea that climate change is all invented by the rich liberals so they can eat more babies. The internet is making us more and more stupid, all of us. Those of us who were already stupid have gone to plant level in less than one generation. Wibble.

I’ve been pitching for some low level voice work around spirituality and psychedelics, which is on brand. I’m thrilled, as more and more stuff is popping up with that unforgivable AI drone. It seems things can still be done properly despite the noise. Likely it’ll land.

I’m looking for a scallop shell to tie to the end of my pack, and I’m thinking about what to bring on this walk and why. I’m doing it in reverse. It is mostly tourism these days. Sluggish Americans with cameras telling me it’s impossible to walk 8 hours in a day up hill and down dale. I’m not there to make friends. Maybe I’ll switch back into “Antisocial Joe” like I did on Camino where I derailed invites to sit with the group and tried to make out I spoke no English until they worked out I did, made it impossible not to, and gave me the nickname I was proud to carry. “I’m sorry, I’m not going to sit with you. I’m working through some things right now and want to be on my own.” “It’s Antisocial Joe!” This is why Putin wants to blow up America.

“They’ve been getting shorter recently, your blogs.”

I saw a friend. He called me out. I’ve been very very tired this month somehow. March can do that. And sometimes the strands of thought only have so much length. I mostly have been stopping when I run out of immediate thinking. My habit is perhaps flawed, writing just before bed, as my brain function peaks in late afternoon these days. That’s when I make interesting connections and have clear thoughts. Come night and I’m largely stymied, not really able to think beyond immediate experience. This is why I’ll often write about being in the bath, when five hours earlier I fought an army of intelligent badgers on Mars. I’ve already forgotten the badgers. Immediacy is all I’ve got left.

Almost April so I’m gonna have to do some more booking for Japan tomorrow. Maybe finally send invoices ahead of the trip. And dig out my driving licence or reorder it. I didn’t want to spend the money I’ve earned before I left. I want the option of eating food that is better than instant noodles, so I’ve sat on loads of invoices. Tomorrow might be a laptop day.

Walking is a thing suddenly. I need to walk lots in the next few weeks. Any of you who like a hike without much fanfare attached to it, I’m gonna be swinging up random hills and looking at old stuff in order to remind my body how to shift it without aching. I’m off pilgrim for a tiny amount of time, mostly I’m tourist, but I don’t want to find myself in pain on the trail. Everyone keeps telling me how hard it is and I honestly don’t believe a word of it. They’re primarily internet commenters so they arguably won’t be very physical. I could probably beat all of them in a wrestling match.

But yes, I’m not working much so if you fancy a walk I’m right there with you. Just message me to arrange it. Bits of work might come, but mostly this is downtime. I’m ok with that and walking is free. There’s plenty to see. It’s better in company.

Today was about visiting. More days like that please. I’m still recovering from very odd sleep the last few nights and seeing friends helps me ground. Eclipse season is creeping into the nights. I used my occasional membership of Chelsea Physic Garden to wander there in the pre-spring morning, but there’s no yomping to be had in that garden. I need some yomping practice.

Wow. Today hit me like a rock. I wasn’t drinking last night. I didn’t set an alarm as no work this week. I thought I’d probably wake naturally at about half eight. My blinds were open.

I woke from absence at noon. I was in deep dream and this life had no relevance to the person I was inhabiting. This is double strange because I usually have a hand on the tiller with dreams and I was lost utterly but woke with recollection. Full moon eclipse on me after a number of promises to myself and suddenly I’m sucked into other realms and incarnations. There was nothing of danger or unpleasantness in it. But I must have needed to utterly stop all functions and recharge in the moon.

Occasionally I’ve run into dreampeople I’ve met in the real world. Usually they’re just lost or I’ve found them on purpose. Very rarely they’re doing the lucid thing too but they’ve had to learn it and they think they can “Inception” people or somesuch – (that’s not a thing). I’m definitely the guy who could beat Freddie Kruger in how I skip through dreams with awareness, and avoid the pitfalls. My dreams are a safe place and have been ever since my grandma taught me to lucid dream to stop awful nightmares and screaming wake up every night for so long as a tiny child. Dandy lion taught me lucid dreams. I think I wrote about it years ago.

But yeah, last night and this morning I was flat out, still buzzing but with no control. My last memory of dream was clearing out spiders for The Donmar Warehouse, but a version of it that looked like Wilton’s Music Hall. I was working in dream theatre. But as we know, spiders know webs. I got momentarily caught in a dreamweb. I was discharged with no injury and feeling strong enough to do what I need to do.

The full moon intentions are big, so the recalibration sleep makes sense. Tonight and onwards I’ll likely be back to lucid so it’ll be nice to see anyone who wants to pop in. Meanwhile it’s just gone midnight. I’m gonna make a camomile tea with a slug of Derbyshire sugarwhisky. It’s a sleeping pill and it gets through whisky that should otherwise be burnt. Means hopefully I won’t rocksleep until noon again.

Eclipse season, and it’s a full moon in Libra tonight. My sign. A spring moon so always a time to think about new beginnings. With the eclipse it is also a time to think about what we are doing to block ourselves. That’s been my contemplation today. There’s plenty of little blocks I’ve allowed to creep in, and perhaps the talisman of this moon is a useful one for taking the final steps beyond such things. Coming as it does on my down day, after the lovely Scene and Heard run but before I have to start worrying about the next job.

I’ll sleep with the blinds up tonight I think. It might be a bit breezy but good to get the moonlight and to think about intentions. What I’m going to try and drop from my habits, what I’m going to try and encourage in. Today I was pretty sedentary, and I’m going on a tough walk shortly. I’ll need to be getting myself out into the springtime if I’m not working. And I had too many beers last night post show. Bad for the bank balance and for the energy levels. Midnight is past. I don’t deserve to be tired after such a lazy day, but sleep is calling and bed is warm and I’ll definitely sleep.

I think I’ll write a little list before I go to bed. A spot of ritual. Something simple but a clear call out to the things I’m blocking myself with. It’s helpful to know the name of the things you want to defeat. The death season is ending now, with the 23rd behind me, so I can leave the ghosts of the past in the past where they belong and look once more not just to my beloved now, but to a projected future. Let’s see what can be manifested.

Happy full moon season, happy rebirth, happy spring. It ain’t hot yet but it’s coming.