The Garden

Hasegawa Tohaku, The Pinewood (Right Screen), 15xx

Unlike last year, there has been no low. The weather has been good and consistent - until, of course, I drafted this. I'm the James Dean of the dole queue and I am perfectly content. Except for this persistent writing-block, which has reduced me to forcing a post a month. For some the year crawls, I almost experienced two Fridays in a row. As the days grow longer, I await summer with excitement.

Maybe Misery / Faster / Of All The Things We've Made

Screenshot from Der Untergang, 2004

You're an interesting species, an interesting mix. You're capable of such beautiful dreams and such horrible nightmares.


My mind oft races at night. For your consideration.

Take Five

Abstract Composition, Edward Wadsworth, 1915

I've taken some time out from writing. I have the time and the material, but have been unable to write. The same trouble I had at the start of November. There are 20 or so posts stretching from last week to August which lie incomplete. I've put aside B-17: The Mighty 8th, and made a concentrated effort to write. So far, I've only rewrote the sentences above this.

Three things have occupied my time through January: the £100 worth of DVDs I bought on Amazon, visiting the job centre every second Tuesday, and going to job interviews.

Staring at The Sky, Staring at The Sun

Foggy Sunrise (#2 of 4, Resized), 01/07/06 0209 UTC

Having extensively revisited my old language project in November, I started writing in the language to see and hear the "finished" product. I wrote a complex sentence describing this.
At the same time I was listening to Vangelis' The City - the last sentence reflects the opening track. I'll try and upload the language support materials whenever they get up to standard. Make sure you have UTF-8 on.

Hau-Canja Naiša

Ruwsaibatkan mërgäzë n Nhökën

Gëlsän šäjwävrën, räslän hektren

Hëšräh volanejou vähfön

Ŵajšan šolerou sjirövlën

Ta xiraga airöwysou

[out of date, IPA removed]

Music For Your Tape Recorder

How does one reconcile the fact that I only bought 3 CDs this year, and yet managed to hear all the below listed? *cough*

Since there was no Christmas Top of the Pops this year, and everyone got along fine without it, see below my soundtrack of the year:

Some Are Workers, Some Are Not

Container Terminal (Cropped), Prij, 12/10/06

Aside from the many unfinished drafts I haven't finished, I was planning to get back into writing this month. To cut a long story short, in the words of Tony Hadley; I had to get a j*b. That was what I was going to write about on Tuesday, but put it off for a day. The roller-coaster is detailed herein:

On the Friday 8th I had to go to the Amazon.co.uk warehouse and apply for a temp job running through December. I think I overdressed for that. Having been accepted, I started on the 10th at 0600 (to 1400) - we were assured newbs are never normally trained on the that shift. We were assigned roles after a presentation, based on our performances in the 5 tests on the previous Friday. I was an 'RF Picker' - we carry handheld scanners, go round the floor collecting requested items, putting them on the library carts and returning them to Collate where the order slips are handed-out. It's considered better than packing, since you get to move around.

The Nightfly (Until The Sun Comes Through The Skylight)

In the summer months, my propensity to sleep a lot doesn't pose much of a problem. In those months I have a maximum of 18 hours in which to sample direct sunlight.

Now we're back in the near-perpetual dark and grey skied months of winter. Last weekend, between 1615 on Friday and 1200 on Monday, I experienced no sunlight (direct or indirect). I can't say any psychological or physical disturbances manifested themselves as a result of the lack of natural light. The constant memory of watching sunrise does pop into my head frequently, and my speaking of the summer Sun as if it was a friend may or may not cast doubt on my claim to a sound mind.

If it wasn't for the deplorable weather, I'd be watching our other major celestial body rise.

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Photo: Prij, Sunrise on June 5th (#24 of 27, Cropped), 05/06/06 0255 UTC