Behind the Wall of Sleep

A problem I've had for some time now is lack of sleep, both getting to sleep and staying there. It's not uncommon for me to wake up at five am, a good two hours too early, having only got to sleep around half two.

This is especially bad on Sunday nights, where the all-encompassing feeling of dread of the week ahead often leaves me sat upright and reading through the night. Last Sunday, it was John Lydon's autobiography 'No Irish, No Blacks, No Dogs' that was getting another read-through. Come Monday morning, I inevitably look like Captain Black, and I tend to have some sympathy with his mission of destroying the earth too.

Having heard my plight (i.e. constant moaning) enough times, a friend of mine suggested I neck one of these 'proper knockout' prescription sleeping tablets he'd picked up on a trip to the States. He assured me one would have me drifting off to the Land of Nod in a matter of minutes.

Now, first of all, I've always been a bit reluctant to take any kind of regular medication that wasn't essential to staying alive. A year ago or so, I did try a course of anti-depressants in an attempt to combat regular panic attacks and general feelings of hopelessness and despair. After about six months and no change, I decided such traits were part of my personality and I'd just have to deal with it. A concurrent course of Cognitive Behaviour Therapy was also a dead end in this respect.

In terms of sleeping tablets, a bigger worry was that they would work and therefore I'd become reliant on them. This was why after being handed the pills, I had several weeks of sitting on the fence about whether to take them or not.

Secondly, I'm aware of the risks of taking drugs that haven't been approved, but desperate times, desperate measures etc.

So, last Sunday I decided to go for it. The heat had meant I'd slept little that weekend, so it seemed I'd need all the help I could get to ensure I wasn't found slumped on my keyboard at work, a pool of drool over the 'enter' key.

Result: it worked. In bed at midnight, asleep maybe 20 minutes later, woken by the alarm at 7am. That the rest of the week so far has seen me back to my usual patterns of sleep, it's put the issue into sharp focus. Carry on being knackered half the time, or succumb to chemical dreams?

Bass Culture

Like, I would imagine, a lot of people who like to write about music, I've been in bands myself. I was the bass player - one of those shuffling, weird types who hang about with musicians.

Unlike some bassists, I wasn't someone who couldn't play guitar too well and elected to go with two less strings. I've never even really tried to learn the guitar, outside some very basic chords - I can just about pick the verse to Everybody Hurts by REM on a good day.

On Saturday, the BBC show "I'm In a Rock and Roll Band" cast the bassist in the role as 'sideman'. How dare they! So, with that in mind, here's my top five bass heroes, who mean more to me than any guitarist or singer.

5) Dave Allen (Gang of Four, Shriekback)
One of a rare breed - a Cumbrian musician who made it (file alongside British Sea Power, It Bites and Lee from 911). Dave Allen was dossing around the dole before being recruited by a bunch of theory-heavy art students in Leeds. The funk in Gang of Four pretty much all came from Allen, and it's hard to imagine how their brand of agit-pop would have worked with a more atypical post-punk bassist.

By 1981, burned out from touring, he left the band, who never really recovered, despite replacement Sara Lee being no slouch herself. Forming Shriekback with Barry Andrews (once of XTC) and Carl Marsh, he was part of some blistering songs, personal favourites including Malaria, Hand On My Heart and Gunning for the Buddha. Nowadays, you can read his thoughts on the music industry on his excellent Pampelmoose blog.

Favourite bassline: My Spine Is (The Bassline) (Shriekback)

4) Bernard Edwards (Chic)
Some months ago, a drummer friend and myself were looking to get a band together. We met up with several guitarists and, as you do, initial talks in the pub turned to influences. My friend and I both expressed an admiration for the work of Chic, which was generally met with looks of mild disdain.

Well, they can go fuck themselves. Much as disco isn't a genre I have too much time for, Chic rock. For one thing, Edwards, Tony Thompson (drums) and Nile Rogers (guitar) were all staggeringly fab musicians and producers. I remember well the first time I heard Le Freak on VH-1, when I was 16 or so, watching in awe at how dexterous Edwards' hands seemed to be.

On top of his Chic albums and singles, Edwards and Rogers also did excellent work with Diana Ross, Sister Sledge and Sheila and B. Devotion.

Favourite bassline: Everybody Dance (Chic)

3) Barry Adamson (Magazine/Visage/Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds)
I was lucky enough to see the reformed Magazine in Manchester last year, and it reaffirmed what I had thought for some time: Barry Adamson is one cool cat.

A Moss Side native, Adamson made his mark alongside Howard Deveto in Magazine, a band who could have been huge but never were. More so than the notes Adamson played, it was always the sound that hit me most. His playing sounded huge and I've spent many an evening fiddling with effects pedals trying to get something even in the general area he managed.

After Magazine split, he spent some time working with Nick Cave before branching off into soundtrack work, including for David Lynch. Most notably, Moss Side Story was the score for a film that didn't actually exist.

Oh, and a vaguely embarrassing note, it put a stupid grin on my face that he now uses a Fender Jaguar, the same as me. Ahem.

Favourite bassline: Talk To The Body (Magazine)

2) James Jamerson (The Funk Brothers)
For people of my generation, whose parents grew up in the 60s, Motown was inescapable. Like the Beatles, you knew who Stevie Wonder, the Four Tops and the Supremes were from the radio and tapes played in the car.

Back then, I only really appreciated the amazing voices, but as I began learning, my hearing seemed to tune more into the bass more and on Motown, it's a habit that's rewarded. What always staggers me is that for a guy who must have played on hundreds of sessions, he managed to think up so many amazing lines. If I could play like anyone, it would be this guy.

Sadly, Jamerson died before his talent got the recognition he deserved in his lifetime. The documentary 'Standing In The Shadows of Motown' does a great job of telling the history of Jamerson and his fellow Funk Brothers and I would urge anyone with any interest in pop music to check it out.

Favourite bassline: I Was Made To Love Her (Stevie Wonder)

1) Peter Hook (Joy Division, New Order, Revenge, Monaco, Freebass)
The first time I heard Joy Division was 'Year Zero'. Many people clocked onto them through the intensity of Ian Curtis, but what hit me first was the bass. I'd never heard anything like it and somewhere something clicked in my head.

And that was that. Within days I'd got my first bass and tiny amp. Not that it was easy: the first few months were spent in a struggle to make the thing produce some kind of rudimentary tune. The breakthrough was when messing about I discovered the simple three note riff that underpins most of Digital by Joy Division. A few days later Transmission followed and I was away.

Sure, these aren't technically amazing basslines, but the intensity shines through. Hooky made me want to play the bass, though I never tried to cop his style or technique. Some ten years later, I was stood next to him at a bar in Salford and felt way too intimated to speak to him, though I reckon he probably gets enough people telling him he changed their life as it is.

Favourite bassline: Twenty Four Hours (Joy Division)

Someone, Somewhere in Summertime

Summertime heat really doesn't suit me, at least not when I'm stuck in a city. Most of the weekend past I've been a sticky mess, cursing the temperature and taking constant cold showers to try to retain a vague feeling of humanity.

On Saturday, I was round a friends house and we sat in her garden, drinking (vodka for her, beer for me) and a certain topic came up. See, speaking to my mother a few days previously, she had told me that my best friend from infant/junior school (ages of 5-11) was set to become a father and a husband in the next six months or so. It wasn't a surprise as such - I've seen him once in the last 14/15 years or so - but it did bring home how much it seems people of my generation (whatever that means) are moving on with their lives.

My friend and I, aged 30 and 29, are both basically single and childless. Neither of us have any intention of becoming a parent and we realised before long we might be the only ones left. Does that mean there's something wrong with us? Obviously the whole 'act' of creating life is fab and wonderful, but why does the idea of having a son/daughter to raise in the world fill me with intense horror? When I was, say, 14 or so and expressed these ideas, I was always given the stock answers "you'll change when you get older" or "when you meet someone, you'll feel different".

Well, I'm 29 now, the same age my parents were when I was born, and I've met someone (and even fallen in love) but my feelings never changed. I'm not sneering at people who do have families, I just wonder if there's something wrong (not the correct word, perhaps) with me on some level that I don't have the drive to bring life to the world.

Yesterday was mainly spent sponged on the sofa with little energy to move except to the local co-op to buy bottles of orange Lucozade. The most creative thought I had all day was musing on where to buy a decent electric fan. From somewhere in the haze, came a wish to be next to the sea: down by the Solway, Santa Monica or Pärnu, I couldn't help feeling that a nice sea breeze would have been perfect.

Maps and Legends

Mark Twain knew what he was talking of when he said "A lie can make it half way around the world before the truth has time to put its boots on". I was reminded of this by the latest farce of nationalistic pride to sweep the nation.

It's been well covered in many other places, but to recap: Croydon police sent out memos to several pubs advising them how to curb anti-social behaviour this summer. One line mentioned banning football tops. This is already policy in a fair few bars in Manchester, at least. However, this got warped by a certain tabloid rag into a ban on England tops during the World Cup.

In no time at all, a Facebook campaign was launched stating that England tops were to be banned to avoid offence to immigrants and the like. Yes, that old chestnut. Mercifully, I refuse to engage with any social networking sites, but it would appear it's still going strong despite all evidence to the contrary. Indeed, it would seem the truth is struggling to tie it's laces on this one.

I've never quite understand patriotic fervour in any big way. 30 years ago, two people got it on in a town in the North of England. Nine months later, this screaming jaundiced mess was dragged into the world. I didn't get much of a say into any of that.

Yet, I'm grateful for the incredible luck I had in where I was born. Sure, I can moan about just about anything but I also recognise I live in one of the wealthiest countries in the world. There is no real chance I am going to starve to death or do without the basic essentials needed to survive.

If any, it's these things we should drop to our knees and thank blind luck for being born in Britain. Instead, tens of thousands of people express rage against other people for a reason that doesn't actually exist.

On the flipside, I can understand patriotism in some forms. I've been to Estonia several times, and can appreciate why they express their nationality so much. It's a young country, and it's people have had many years under the rule of others. It makes sense that they need to embrace their new found freedoms.

But here? I don't see it so much. Unlike Estonia, there's no 'real' English people in any ethnic sense that I can make out. I can't understand who the English Defence League are looking to defend against. If we're going to celebrate Englishness, then let's make it because the vast majority of us get to live with a roof over our heads and clean water coming through the taps.

Model Worker

Despite a deep set resentment towards the whole 'work' thing, I almost pride myself on having never took a day off sick in my six years as a wage drone. Never been late, either.

I'm not sure why this is but despite waking up every morning with a groan of 'fuck, fuck, fuck', I always manage to get out of bed and to the bus stop. Perhaps I should blame my mother, who always kicked me out of the house to school throughout my youth, ensuring I only missed five days in seven years. It must be that Methodist work ethic: it's a small mercy she just passed that on, and not any of the actual religious side of things.

Related to that is that despite my work-shy, dossing ways, I always ensure the work gets done on time. Principals mean that I won't mess up some other poor sod's day by being a lazy bastard. In the same way, much as I would love to spend my days at home eating chocolate bourbons and watching episodes of Monk and Ironside, I won't do so unless I have the money to do it off my own back. I've spent time on the dole, and it's no fun at all.

Part of my spotless attendance record is that I'm lucky(?) enough to never really get sick. Bar a bout of tonsillitis when I was 23 (and I was unemployed then anyways), I've never had anything worse than a bad cold. And while I can be a bit pathetic when this happens, it's not enough to keep me away from my desk. Unlike some people, who'll claim it as flu and enjoy an extended weekend. At times, I'm almost jealous of them.

All this reminds me why I never liked the magazine "The Idler". I read through a couple of copies once and it seemed to me to celebrate a certain kind of middle-class laziness, for people who had enough money to get away with it. While I embrace being an idle get, I know it requires a certain kind of style to get away it when you also have to work to pay for rent and beer tokens. For example, the simple act of me writing this right now would suggest that I'm busy at work to unsuspecting others.

This was a lesson I learnt in my sixth form days. During free periods, we would be expected to study. Fuck that, thought I, I'd rather stare into space. One particular teacher would wander round, check what we were studying and test us to ensure we were working, the bastard. Therefore, I took one of my geography textbooks, learned three pages and kept the book open at that point. So when I was picked up on my apparent slacking, I was easily able to explain population patterns in post-war Europe.

My slacker idol was always my grandfather. An odd choice when you consider he spent the best part of 50 years working down a coal mine. However, by the time I entered the world, he was long retired and had resolved to spend his remaining days (all 20 years of them by then), lounging on the sofa and studying the racing form in the Daily Mirror with occasional trips to the pub/bookies.

Some people try to use their retirement to travel the world, do the things they always wanted to, etc etc. Granddad basically sat on his arse (in my lifetime, he only left his hometown once that I can think of) and played tricks on my mother to amuse my brother and I. Now, everytime I slump into my sofa with a bottle of beer to watch 70s detective shows, I salute his memory.

When Saturday Doesn't Come

With the football season now concluded, the worry for me is that the subsequent weeks are all going to blur into one. What's to look forward to when there's no game at the weekend? Something, perhaps. I'm examining options to try and actually do something this summer, instead of just sitting in my flat with the curtains closed, cursing anyone enjoying themselves.

What I should do is focus on writing something and sending it away. A tremendous fear of rejection has always hung over me, stopping me from even trying. Not that I would even know how to go about such things. But there's a growing feeling in me that I need to know whether I can actually do this whole writing gig. Is not knowing better than the possibility that I can't, and the last 20 years of hope have actually been for zilch?

Back when I played in a band, I used to try and find musicians who were older than me when they 'made' it. Easy enough when you're 23 or so, slightly harder as you approach 30. I guess the advantage of being a novelist, poet or whatever is that your age generally isn't held against you.

For no reason, two sections of the population that incredibly irritate me at the moment:

1) People who fuck about at cashpoints, staring at the options like they're written in ancient Greek. Then they choose to have a statement printed, which they proceed to dispose of without even looking at it. Arseholes!

2) People who get on a bus and then ratch around their pockets or bags for change/a ticket. You've seen the bus coming - why didn't you get ready beforehand? Pricks!

Space Flowers

In addition to it being Friday, I received some good news yesterday. Mitch Poole, PR bod, rang up to let me know the Wild Swans would be traversing the M62 in July to play a gig in sunny Salford.

This is obviously a wonderful thing. You can read a piece I put together on them last year here: http://www.noripcord.com/features/wild-swans-interview

Needless to say, I'll be doing all I can to get everyone I know down to the show. It's rare that I will go all-out to support an artist these days, but I have a strong belief that Paul Simpson (singer/songwriter) is one of the great talents of his time and am always keen to introduce his work to other people. The two Wild Swans gigs I attended in Liverpool in July and December 2009 were fantastic and I'm hoping they get a good crowd to create a great vibe.

Part of the reason I wanted to get into journalism was that I wanted to write about things I love. When I was eight or so years old, this was football and computer games: my dream was to work for Your Sinclair magazine. The crushing reality of both studying and working in the industry was enough to put me off for life, and I value that No Ripcord essentially has little or no editorial interference. We are allowed the freedom of our opinions and writing styles, to which I tip my hat to Mr David Coleman (also, many congrats to him on the birth of his first son).

My point is, a band like the Wild Swans inspire me to write articles, for what it's worth and I'm sure many people will offer sarcastic thanks to them. I want more people to hear their music as I feel it can touch and have meaning to a large audience. If by writing the above article, or this, one person goes to a gig or buys a CD on a whim and enjoys it, then I can take a great deal of satisfaction from my efforts.

Season Cycle

It struck me this morning that we're already a third of the way though 2010. It doesn't seem so long ago that the year started. I fear I'll go to bed tonight and wake up to Christmas.

This hasn't been a great year for me personally, so far, and summer has rarely been an enjoyable time for me (barring 1999 and 2005, I can't remember a good one) and recent developments in the political world have left me with a bad, bad feeling. I won't go into politics too much as a) I don't have the intelligence to debate any points on any meaningful level and b) many other blogs cover the ground I would in a much more articulate fashion.

However, I do wonder who the popular right-wing press will turn on now that Gordon is gone. Will they turn against their golden boy if improvements aren't seen soon? More likely, Clegg will take the flak for being seen as some kind of diluting force. I can't help but believe he's lost of a lot of voters with this move and it will be interesting to see how that translates into opinions and votes at any future election.

I do have some sympathy for Brown. The man clearly struggled with the media circus politics has become. I was wary of the whole TV Debate idea from the start, feeling it would promote image over content in the same way the Nixon/Kennedy debate did (TV viewers thought the handsome, dynamic JFK won, many radio listeners believed Nixon came out on top). I've no doubt Brown cared deeply about his job, but in the end, the biggest stick used to beat him was his discomfort with the public: something I can sympathise with.

With the country going through the first major political change of my adult life (I was 16 in 1997), I wonder if it will act as a spur to change in myself. I've half-joked to people that I should fear for my job (in the public sector) if big cuts are brought in and the truth is, I wouldn't particularly care if my job was axed.

It reminds of reading through old articles about the Clash. A lot of journalists resented them for their wish to progress and evolve, for not wanting to keep re-writing Janie Jones or White Riot, great as those songs are. What made the Clash great was that when they wanted to try playing jazz, or reggae, or blues, they did it. I need some of that spirit in my life right now: when I get home tonight, I think I will listen to Sandinista! all the way through.

Living in a Different World

It must be around ten years ago that whilst over-enthusiastically running down some stairs, I landed in a way that ensured my right ankle swelled up to freakish levels. A sympathetic friend was going home for the weekend and handed me his PlayStation to keep me entertained, given I wasn't going to be doing my usual disco dancing down the student union. He also handed me a copy of Final Fantasy VII, noting that "it's not really my thing".

I had been a gamer since the age of six or so, when we got a Sinclair +2 in the home, enjoying games like Rambo, Chase HQ, Tracksuit Manager and the like. By the time I was 18, however, I'd began actually leaving the house now and again to go the pub or rehearse with my first band. The only games we played were the Championship Manager series, over many bottles of dirt-cheap beer from the local Aldi store. Glamorous days.

FFVII pulled me back to the allure of games, though. Previous favourites of mine had included titles such as Wing Commander or Frontier, games were you felt you were living in the future. FFVII had a similar effect in transporting you into an entire world, full of characters with their own stories and tragedies. Even now, I'm not that much of a RPG buff: I find medieval style settings and elf/orc/goblin type characters tedious at the best of times. What grabbed me from the start back then was the setting: sure, there was monsters and magic, but it was all around human characters in a Blade Runner style city (at least at first).

Throughout the Internet, you'll find countless breakdowns of the meaning and background, as if it were some vital piece of literature. I'm not sure I subscribe to that level of fandom, but I will argue the point that back then, it struck me as a wonderful piece of art. Firstly, there was the story, which appeared at first to be the usual boy/girl, fight-the-bad-guys affair, but develops off into tangents on the ideas of memory, fate, nature vs science and others.

Secondly, there was how huge it was. It took me about 78 hours to complete it and by the end, I didn't actually want to finish. I'd become so involved with the characters that it felt like it would be a pain to have to say 'goodbye', so to speak.

From that, I was hooked back on games and as I graduated and entered the real world, they provided a handy escape. I worked through the Final Fantasy series until XII, which did nothing for me and was the first I'd not bothered to complete. I think the series lost something when you could no longer name the characters as you wished.

I've not played through FFVII since I first completed it: perhaps I'm worried, especially now, that I'd find faults galore and it wouldn't hold up, like when you watch your favourite TV show from childhood and realise it was actually a load of crap. Yet now and again, you meet someone else who fell in love with those characters, that world, and you both laugh at the stuff Cid Hawkwind said and try not to admit how upset you got at the end of the first disc.

Transporting

After a weekend in which I actually managed to do something productive (an article for No Ripcord knocked together) and discover a brilliant song (Twilight Cafe, the only hit for Susan Fassbender), reality bumps hard at 7am on Monday. Move yourself to go again indeed.

I think it could be a little more bearable if not for the shower of bastards called Stagecoach. For the last two weeks I have dutifully waited for the 7.16 bus, only for it to turn up at 7.20 or later. This means I'm late for a connecting bus. Just to rub it in a little, on my return home, the bus I want to catch is always just too early. Many a time I have watched it speed past as I'm a minute from the bus stop.

It's all so trivial, I know, but when your life is pretty dreary, these things matter. If nothing else, it does make you understand why attempts to get people out of their cars and onto public transport are always bound to fail.

What is Beat?

In a sulking mood due to the results from last night alongside the impeding end of the football season, I feel I should write about something positive. It is Friday, after all, and perhaps it'll get me in the mood to finish an article for Noripcord.com this weekend. So I've decided to write a little of one of my favourite bands, the Beat.

That's the English Beat, for any American readers, my favourites of all the bands to emerge from the Two-Tone movement of the late 70s. A few years ago, it would have been the Specials everytime, but the last 12 months have seen me finally investigate the Beat's albums outside of a compilation album I picked up about ten years ago. It could be a result of me being a bit older and less enthralled with the sheer energy of the Specials album, but the Beat's cleaner edges and better lyrics have worked their way closer to my heart.

In 'Rip It Up and Start Again', Simon Reynolds almost dismisses the band as a 'politically correct' line-up (half black, half white) with two pretty boy singers backed by the 'pasty faced' Andy Cox (guitar) and David Steele (bass). True, Dave Wakeling and Rankin' Roger were attractive young men, but Wakeling was a top notch singer/writer and Roger was no mug either. Cox and Steele were also excellent musicians - Steele in particular linked up wonderfully with drummer Everett Morton.

What most do remember about the Beat was the presence of 'Saxa', a 50-something, pipe smoking Jamaican who'd played on records during the first wave of Ska. An incongruous sight next to a bunch of young lads from the Midlands, but his playing added refinement of the rough-and-ready early sound.

It was the early sounds, from their debut I Just Can't Stop It, that scored all their hits in the UK. It's one I listen to mostly when I need to fire myself up: the pace never really lets up except for the cover of Andy Williams' Can't Get Used To Losing You. My own favourite moments are the paranoia/naracassim of Mirror In The Bathroom and the nervous shuffle of Twist and Crawl (best lines: "Is that really blonde hair?/Why don't you play fair?/You could be in 'Mayfair'").

Reynolds described the follow-up album Wh'appen? as 'energy-sapped', a verdict way off the mark to these ears. With the two-tone sound yesterday's news, the band had to move on. That said, the singles All Out To Get You and Too Nice To Talk To (the latter on reissues only) could certainly get a dance floor moving. The best songs, such as the sublime Dream Home in New Zealand, tapped into the feeling of the times: tension and fear were high and their plea for 'unity' on Doors of Your Heart comes across as sincere and heartfelt.

Though their moment in the sun in their homeland seemed to have passed, America was taking notice and their third album Special Beat Service reflects this. It's full of pop arrangements, though not to any detriment of quality: testiomont to the skills of the players, now aided by keys player Dave Blockhead. It skips across styles with ease, from dramatic pop (I Confess), jangling guitars (Save It For Later) to reggae (Spa Wid Me) and calypso (Ackee 1-2-3).

While it received little notice at home, not even making the top 20, the album cracked the top 40 across the Atlantic. With huge US success apparently on the horizon, Wakeling did the sensible thing and quit during a tour with David Bowie. Along with Roger, he did make a commerical breakthrough in the States with their band General Public (alongside Specials bassist Horace Panter, Dexys Midnight Runners drummer Stoker and helped out by Mick Jones from the Clash) before running out of steam.

Cox and Steele, meanwhile, waiting for their moment before recruiting singer Roland Gift to create the Fine Young Cannibals. After a few decent-sized hits in the UK, they ended the decade as possibly the biggest band in the world as Good Thing and She Drives Me Crazy topped the Billboard Hot 100. Rather than work on a follow up, they decided not to bother. I kind of admire them for that.

Space

I think I've been living on my own too long sometimes. Since the summer of 2004, I've been used to spending the vast majority of my free time on my own, and this is great for the most part. After all, I'm reluctant to interact with people at the best of times and living on your todd is a great way of controlling your environment, which is specially handy for an nervous chap such as myself.

What it can lead to, however, is a sense of high anxiety when I'm expecting a visitor, especially when it's the first time they've called round. Everything in my flat is arranged exactly to my requirements: sofa facing TV in the corner, stereo speakers facing sofa and handy amplifier acting as table to rest my bottle of beer on. Plughole nearby to keep the laptop going.

So when somebody comes round, it can upset the balance. It might not make sense to you unless you are the same but as always, the anticipation is worse than the actuality. Spend two hours fretting about somebody else flicking through your CDs, then you end up digging them out anyways when they say they haven't heard of Swell Maps. Paraylsed with fear in the seconds leading up to them ringing the doorbell, then shuffling around getting drinks and trying to act the good host minutes later.

Tonight it's the election, and I feel I should probably write something, if only to put my own feelings down for posterity, yet there's not much to say except I have a horrid, sickening feeling in my gut that the Tories will get in. If so, I will drink myself numb on Friday night and babble to myself about leaving the country.

Time

After a four day weekend spent not doing much, though enjoying some rare good company, it would be typical for me to return to work and moan on about how crap my life is, how my jobs sucks and blows etc.

However, early this morning a good friend of mine rang to inform me that a colleague of ours, who I would also consider a friend, is suffering from cancer. Having gone into hospital last week to have an appendix removed, tumours were discovered and the prognosis is bleak.

Naturally, this has happened in my life before - I've lost friends and family to cancer and other causes - and as then, what it does remind me is that any ideas of natural justice/karma are bollocks of the highest order. This is a man who has worked non-stop since he was 16 and was three years from retirement and being able to spend more time with the family he loves, including the recent addition of a grandchild.

But none of this matters: life is cruel and random and despite all his good deeds/work, it seems unlikely the baby will have many memories of granddad. Having never known my own grandmother due to cancer, I can appreciate what a tragedy that is, especially when the person is a good a man as he is.