Camping

The reality and romance of camping have always intrigued me. Often the romance wins out and off you trot and then after a couple of nights of no sleep and basically roughing it you return to four walls and a solid roof in a foul temper. Camping like drugs isn't for everybody. I've done camping, from sleeping out in the small back garden in a canvas bell tent, blue on the inside and orange on the outside. You touched the fabric in the morning and you got soaked. You then gravitated to camping with the cub scouts in tents that had last been used in the Boar War, big fuck off turquoise affairs that housed about a hundred. Then as you got older you forgot how little sleep you got and you purchased the micro tents, the throw up tents, the ultra lightweight wild camping with go faster guy ropes and ultimately it was all futile. Camping just reminds me of being grumpy, permanently grumpy. More grumpy than when I am in a house which is really saying something because it seems to be a constant at the moment. Camping is an addiction because even now as a 53 year old grumpy middle aged male I still think of the kit I have up in the attic and yearn for a space where I can pitch my tent and just look at the stars or the roof of the tent listening to the noises outside. There is something about being in a tent that makes every noise into a bear or a psychopath. You cross your legs, not daring to go out for a pee just in case you bump into that psychopathic bear.  You want to make a fire but are scared of setting the forest on fire, you set up your little camping stove for a brew and the matches or the gas runs out. You eat beans out of a mess tin and then think why the fuck did I just do that? You wave and acknowledge other campers but don't get any further because you don't want them to know that you are an absolute incompetent. You pack up your stuff after two or three days, I've never gone longer than that and then you head home and think what the hell was that all about. Was it worth all the effort. The twinges in your back, the smell from not braving the communal shower block, the hunger, the lack of sleep. I hate camping, I love camping. When are we going again?  

Cheer up, it might never happen

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-48063982

The World is angry and stressed says this article on the BBC website. Well no shit Sherlock. After Christchurch and Sri Lanka the World is angry and stressed. Well you do surprise me.  I'm always a wee bit sceptical about these polls, they never seem to interview enough people. In this one the telling words are these

"Of some 150,000 people interviewed in over 140 countries, a third said they suffered stress, while at least one in five experienced sadness or anger."

Of some 150,000 people in over 140 countries. Doesn't sound too accurate does it? That's an average of 1,071 peeps in each country. 

The Top 5 Countries with Highest Positive Experiences are Spanish Speaking and in Latin America. The Top 5 Countries with Highest Negative Experiences have either been ravaged by War or Civil War. Did they interview people in Palestine or the Gaza Strip I wonder. Syria? I can't imagine that they would have many positive experiences.

Greece had the most stressed population in the world with 59% saying they experienced stress on the day before the poll. 

"The concept of a democratic society, such as the one our country enjoys today, began in the Greek capital some 8,000 years ago. The city of Athens is sometimes referred to as the cradle of Western civilization." from the New York Post which is interesting because around 55% of US adults said they were stressed.

I haven't downloaded the Gallup Report which you can do here  for two reasons. I don't want my information processed, transferred and possibly stored on servers that reside in the United States and I don't really care about other peoples' happiness. I only care about my own.

Eyes Down for a Full House Cont!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/cymrufyw/47929266

One little duck

You don't give a fuck?

I'll give you two fat ladies

you sizeist git.

Unlucky for some anaye

eich bod wedi gwahardd y Gymraeg.

Empire?

You still think that Wales is part of the Empire?

What gave you that idea?

Oh the big fuck off Castell facing you

Oh I see where you get your vision from

but you do realise that within those walls

are guerrilla warriors who will speak Cymraeg

until their dying day, whatever you may say.

You don't want to see my legs 11

it won't be your lucky 7

No 85, we're staying alive

doesn't matter how ineffectual the law is.

Hang on there's a knock at the door

it rhymes with four

It's PC

Number 49

About time gentlemen please let's have your glasses. 

Further Reading & Listening

https://sharkfishinginwales.blogspot.com/2017/11/you-gorra-siarad-saesneg-if-you-wanna.html

https://davidredbutton.podbean.com/e/get-some-in/

https://davidredbutton.podbean.com/e/sports-direct-dot-com-store-language-policy/

Trouble in Tregaron

A Ken Frane Mystery

by

David Williams

Buy me a coffee

“That’s odd” remarked Frane to the Taxi Driver pointing to a candle in the window of the cottage. Dewi the Driver suddenly turned ashen.

“What’s the matter?” said Frane noticing the blood draining from his face,

“Corpse Candle Guv”

“Wossat en?” Frane had reverted to Valleys speak.

“That’ll be £17.50 from Lampeter”

Frane hands the Driver a £20.00 note and waves away the change.

Frane gets out with a suitcase that he confiscated from lost luggage many moons ago.

“So, what’s the corpse candle then?”

Dewi leans over and says “There are many country folks who still believe in the corpse candle as a forewarning of death; it appears in a house and lights the way to a place of burial”

Keeping the Grave Away

Keeping the grave away

by drinking gravy

how do we deal with mortality?

not very well I'll wager to say

do you think about death as much as me

or do you post positive affirmations for all to see?

I just can't get the images out of my mind

as they lower me into the hole

by a crane, cradling my behind.

head first, wicker basket, splosh

"let's away to tea

did he have much dosh?"

The eulogy read

in the pissing rain

said

"Unemployed for much of his life

a loony, a nutter, a bum

he was also quite partial to a tot 'bach' of rum

he claimed to be teetotal

but he was a wily old chum

given the right wind and a full tum

he would turn round and call the whole world 'scum' 

he thought he could write

no readers, no reviewers, no friends had he,

So I am surprised today

to see the whole cast of 'Glee' 

We've had to bus in security

and add an extra field

this is more like Glastonbury than a graveyard

was there more to him that met the eye, 

this awkward old card? 

He tried to be kind but

 it was interpreted that he'd lost his mind.

Being soft was a weakness

that got you not far

that's why so many of that sort

ended up propping up the bar.

When you finally realize what the world's all about

you're too old to give it another shout.

So we return his body to the earth

near to the sea

tune in next week

for 'Zombies that surf'

Further Reading 
https://sharkfishinginwales.blogspot.com/2015/01/i-dont-go-to-funerals.html

https://sharkfishinginwales.blogspot.com/2014/01/sex-death-in-wales.html

https://sharkfishinginwales.blogspot.com/2018/08/winter-is-best-time-to-die.html

Appetite for Apathy

My appetite for apathy

is plain for all to see

I'm like the Bodhisattva

sitting under his Bodhi Tree

The DWP think I'm just lazy

The mental health team know I'm crazy

Girls and women think me hazy

I'm just fine, "call me Daisy"

I've been sat here for three years

the cat on my lap called Brexit

just purrs and purrs and purrs

it's covered in WTO agreements and furs 

I'm watching rallies for Leave

and rallies for Remain

but because we're British old chum

no civil unrest, never the twain. 

During 'Mindfulness' we're taught not to swear

but I'm fucking Welsh so I don't fucking care

my mind refuses to settle, anarchy up in my tree

deep breathing, "It's not bloody working, I told you see"

Chaos is the name of the game

World Wars and Blood Letting, let's have more of the same

You can go on all your marches and shout

"Not in my name"

You can give it all peace and love

and caress that soft white dove

but you and I know

it will either be Johnson, Mogg or Gove.

It is then that I must cease my appetite for apathy

I must grab my staff and my bow

I will join the Welsh Guerrilla Fighters

and sow and sow and sow

The seeds of Welsh Independence have been planted deep

This Brexit malarkey has kick started mission creep

We wont put up with Eton fops with Beatles mop tops

We want the cream from the table no longer the sops

So the next time you see me sitting, staring out to sea

pat me on my head and give me a treat

and I'll show you my big fat feet 

tattooed on the heels 'Fe Godwn ni eto'  

Reefer Madness

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanpsy/article/PIIS2215-0366(19)30048-3/fulltext

Oh come on Sharky Fishy folks, you knew that I would be writing a post about this because in the words of the Consultant Psychologist, I'VE GOT LIVED EXPERIENCE. Don't worry, even though I found God in prison or perhaps he/she found me I don't buy into black and white, binary thinking on this subject. Let me tell you, it wasn't the Cannabis, it was my un-diagnosed mental health condition that led me into a prison cell. It was the black and white thinking previously, the intrusive thoughts of Pure OCD that found me self medicating with 'da herb'. I got to say, I was having a good time before I threatened to explode an invisible bomb under my jacket in a bank in Hilversum, Netherlands on August 8th 2005. The bombs that went off in London on the 7th July triggered a mental health incendiary device in my fractured mind with the assistance of very strong cannabis. I remember going into a coffee shop and asking for something to inspire the creative juices, you see even back then I was a pretentious sod and thought I could write. The patron went to the fridge and brought out a coin shaped flattened piece of bud with the weed logo imprinted into it. I think it cost me something like 15 euros or it might have been 50 euros at the time, I was too high to care what anything cost for God's sake. He emphasized that I would only need a fingernail full in a joint for effect and what did Dai dewdrop by ere go and do?! 'crumble fucking crumble innit'. The substance in question was called 'Scuff'. It was strong skunk and once you get the taste for that stuff then there ain't going back to the living room dabble of the literary cultural elite.

If we were able to smoke in surroundings and environments that were conducive to relaxation, where ambient music and chilled art were aurally and visually relaxing. This is what they have tried to create in the Amsterdam coffee shops but when you are hiding from the police in a South London tower block the effect that your skunk joint could have on you could be radically different.    

Shamans used marijuana way back, when they moved from Siberia on to Turtle Island so mystics and wise persons have been using it WITHOUT ill effects for centuries. It is the conditions in which we use and go on to abuse that has to be addressed. Weed is nature, it grows from the ground. It is not manufactured in laboratories, well at least it never used to be. It is not weed that is the problem but Capitalism. It is the people who wish to make a quick million bucks from your choice of escape route from reality. Reality is Capitalism, Capitalism leads to oppression and repression, people smoke and do drink and drugs to escape the oppression and repression and the circle of life continues. In hindsight was my charade in the bank a futile cry of despair against Capitalism? 
Who are any of us to tell anybody else what to do and what not to do but whenever this subject raises its head I always like to chip in because there is never a high without a corresponding low. As a Manic Depressive, I should know.