Oh dear.

I laughed so hard at this I nearly couldn't breath . Its been a long time since I've had a laugh like it.


https://twitter.com/_youhadonejob/status/428648679936122880/photo/1

Travelling again.

This week I'm in Manchester again. It's the third week in a row that I've been here. It's a good job I like travelling so much or it could get to be a real bind. I'm lucky that The Brother is prepared to look after the kitties when I'm away or else I'd be stuck.
Anyway, at least with all the travel and course delivery I get to meet new people which helps raise the old mood somewhat. I'll be in London next week which will be a change as most of my delivery is up North or Scotland. I occasionally get to Belfast but never enough.
Speaking of Scotland and Belfast, next month I'm going to Edinburgh for a couple of days to meet up with the folks I used to write training material with. I'm looking forward to it so I hope it isn't a let down. They're a decent crew so it will be fine I'm sure.
Just reading through this it seems there is an awful lot of "I" going on. It is time to stop being so self-centred and to start writing about others and the wider world instead of it just being me, me, me all the time.
With that though it's time to stop until next time when with luck the subject matter may be a little more uplifting and less angst-ridden.
Peace and Love. ttfn with a kiss on the bottom x.

Blinking awful.

The weather is dire, wet and windy with snow forecast. I don't know what happened to those crisp dry Winter days we used to get but it seems lately that it will never stop raining or blowing a hoolie.
Days like this make me yearn for somewhere warm to spend the dark months. Any one from Las Vegas, San Diego, Palm Springs or Yuma would suit me. That is my plan as I've said before. If I'm spared, when I retire I would like to spend the Summer months in the UK and the dark miserable Winter months in the South West of the USA.
We'll see if that pans out, because I really need to get out of this backward looking rut I find myself in. It is not good for me to look back all the time and wish for things that can't be. I need to look forward and hope for things that can be. Positivity has never been one of my strong points so it will need a major overhaul of my attitude to life if I'm to achieve happiness again.
Wish me luck.  ttfn

Feeling restless

Once again I'm in an hotel room on travel, this time in Manchester.
I'm starting to get restless and beginning to wonder if I should try a change of direction in my life. The trouble is I don't know which way to turn. Everyone I see around me seems to be in a relationship of some kind. The only single people I see are either very young, very old or very odd. The whole population seems to be bobbing along quite happily whilst I'm stuck on my own with no direction, no-one to love me and no prospect of finding anyone to do so.
It gets very wearing being all alone all the time even when there are others around, I feel isolated in my singleness and really don't know how to escape from this condition. I have given up hope of Madame coming back and don't feel that on-line dating is for me. The problem is anyone who looks at me sees a sad old man and will shy away before making contact or just talk on a superficial basis and go away again.
I would like to be attractive enough so that people feel that I'm not an old perv, that I'm just an ordinary guy hoping to find someone who will want to take on a 55 year old singleton with little to offer apart from wit and charm.
On the attractiveness front, I despair of ever losing the weight I've put on over the last 18 months since my main source of company is the club and I feel obliged to drink when I'm in there. Even if I don't go to the club I sit in the house and comfort eat so my attractiveness quotient is reducing by the day.
I can see no light at the end of the tunnel and am monumentally pissed off with everything.
ttfn.

So...

...I'm not happy or sad just empty. I have things to do, places to go and people to see and nothing should be making me feel this way. I just feel in limbo, it is very strange.
Love and Peace x  ttfn

3 am 11/1/14

This is a 3 o'clock in the morning post. In 2003 I thought I'd finally found happiness and that everything was going to be fine. It isn't.

Up my game

Having read a fair bit of G.K Chesterton and P.G Wodehouse of late I have decided that I really must up my game on this writing and blogging lark. Those two aforementioned gentlemen were geniuses (genii?) at writing humorous, informative, entertaining and enlightening books and articles on many and varied subjects whilst keeping us entertained with the Father Brown and Jeeves & Wooster series of stories.
I fear that I will never be able to even think about thinking about reaching that level of literary brilliance nor achieve a readership anywhere close to that which they reached out to over the years. Far from being discouraged by this though, I will use them as beacons of hope that one day I might just hit the right note and write something that people will want to read and encourage others to do likewise. In order to do that of course I will have to actually finish a tale and put it out for others to see. With that in mind, starting tonight I am going to spend an hour each day writing The Story and other tales that come to mind so that I can finally produce a work which can be read by anyone who wants to. How to get it out there once it's finished is another matter but I'll cross that bridge when I come to it, my first priority is to get episode 1 of The Story finished. Wish me luck, bearing in mind that I'm a great procrastinator and this challenge involves not being that way.
I'll let you know how I'm getting along in due course. ttfn

A trip or maybe two.

I've booked my travel and accommodation for a couple of days in Edinburgh to meet up with some former colleagues and have a chin-wag. That should cheer me up.
I'm also thinking about a trip to Glasgow for the Celtic Connections Festival this month if I can work out who to go and see and co-ordinate things with my pal in sunny Kirkintilloch.
Since I doubt I'll be able to afford to go far this year some short trips to visit with pals is probably a good idea to keep me interested until I can save up enough to go back to the US. I was hoping to go to the East Coast sometime around Easter but I think it would be more sensible to wait and go West, either to San Francisco or back to Vegas next year instead.
I have made a policy decision not to sit around and wait for life to come to me. Rather I will get out into the world and stop being such a recluse. I need to get some weight off so that I feel a bit better about myself on that score but otherwise I must fight the urge to wallow for yet another year and no matter how low I feel and how much I yearn for things I can't get back I must knuckle down and remake a life for myself.
On the losing weight front, I have now gone two days without alcohol or snacking on unsuitable foods. If I can keep it up and not back slide whilst I'm on travel I will get down to a sensible size and feel all the better for it.
Anyway, enough rambling from me for now.
Peace and Love x ttfn

Day 1.

Today is day 1 of my cutting back on the intake of alcohol and rubbish food, wish me luck.
I hope to plan better meals and snack less whilst staying out of the club through the week. I have boxes of junk to sort and The Story to write so my evenings when I am not travelling can be fully occupied. In fact, even when I am travelling I can occupy myself with moving The Story forward instead of sitting in strange bars drinking beer.
I intend to lose, and keep lost enough lard to allow easy access to clothes which are currently languishing in my wardrobe as I'm unable to make the buttons and buttonholes coincide.
I'm sick of being obese and perpetually on the drink, I may feel a little lonely at first but if I keep myself busy all will be well and I'll feel much better both physically and mentally. As (if!) the weather improves and as the lighter nights approach I will start walking and once Summer appears I'll get back on the bike which will all assist in my girth reduction.
I'm now off to stir my spicy chicken casserole and have a cup of tea before finishing off the Sunday papers and maybe writing a few lines of The Story.
Peace and Love. ttfn

Obviously someone reads this tripe.

From the stats some people obviously do read what I write on here. I don't get much, if any feedback on what those who do read this think of what I say so maybe it is such tripe that I may as well not bother.
I am getting to the point that I think I may as well just give up. I'm not entertaining enough so if I want to get my thoughts out of my system I think I'll just write a journal for myself and give this up.
Maybe it's just a phase I'm going through just now but I don't see the point of writing if there is no interaction.
Stuff it, I'll keep writing for my own benefit.

2 days into...

...the new year and I don't feel any better than I did 365 days into the old one. Life is no different, the same issues cloud my mind all that has changed is a 4 at the end of the date instead of a 3.
I wish I could be a bit more optimistic, there really is no reason not to be, it is just a personality trait of mine that I am a gloom-monger. I don't want to be, I wish that I could be one of those sunny dispositioned people who jog along and always look on the bright side. I have always been one of those "light at the end of the tunnel is a train coming" types and I don't know how to change it. Maybe some toast will help.
Anyway, I was out both Old Years Night and New Years Day and at the end of each session I was still left disappointed and lonely. Everyone seemed to have someone to go home to and once again I came home to an empty house, well not quite as the kitties were here to greet me but for all intents and purposes an empty house as those two are not the best conversationalists I've ever met.
What to do? I ask myself. How do I move on from this mental trough I find myself in? I go from optimism at the end of the year to pessimism at the start and have done for as long as I can remember. I need to break this chain and would like something positive to help me do it. Trouble is I don't know what or when or how to change my attitude and move forward away from all the needs and desires that are holding me back so that I can be happy with what I have and stop yearning for that which I can't.
All of the above seems so familiar to me, I must have said or written these or similar words a hundred times and no answer will come.
Ah well, let fate take control again I suppose because I sure as hell can't help myself out of this current trough, I'll have to just hope for the best. ttfn