If At First You Don't Succeed.....

Then Sky Diving is not for you as the joke goes.  

I find myself doubting what I know intuitively to be right.  It creeps in and I find myself doing my heavy analysis bit to check, recheck, invert, recheck, send it into another dimension, recheck and recheck again.  

I know that these comments and requests aren't all that they appear to be.  That's at the heart of the matter, it's a three dimensional game of chess in many ways or perhaps cards.  I dropped the trump card last time and that has done a lot to temper this second letter but now I re read this for the nth time I see things that can only be there for the wrong reasons.  

Regime change is an interesting thing and it requires a certain amount of knowledge which he doesn't possess.  It always looked as if he was being manipulated and this second letter proves it.  The first one pretty much pointed to it as well.  What is interesting is that the wording has changed and the attack point but it still doesn't add up.

It's taken me a while to just work out what I need to do on this.  In reality, that is nothing but a change in ploy is now required that allows me to deal with this over months not days.  They've take their time to respond and so I shall take a similar time. I might acknowledge the letter though even them, maybe not.  What's the point?

It's all messy as you like and not of my making.  It's just annoying and takes up too much of my time when the outcome is likely to be the same as the last time. The John Cleese phrase in Fawlty Towers "You started it, you invaded Poland!" flashes through my mind to pull me back to the reality of the situation.  This is now the third attack and whilst the first was shocking, the second really was devastating both business and personally.  This third one strips down to a few key elements and the traps are baited, because answering them leads to another form of action opening the door to prolong things.

You know it is a trap when you look behind what these questions actually mean.  Using probing questions to provide information that they are not entitled to is also an alarm bell.  Trying to establish figures to enter into their spreadsheets can wait.  

Oh well, I know what I can do now as their precedent is set in terms of timing and their strategy / game plan is becoming clearer through the obfuscation of the first letter and the probing nature of the second.  As luck would have it, I don't actually need to answer any of it as it concerns no one but me.  

Disappointing Isn't It?

 I'm pretty fed up at the moment with this chap still writing through a solicitor.  It's a typical thing when someone's made a big mistake that they cannot let it go.  I can see his point but as I used to say to people, "I'd like to see your point of view but I can't get my head that far up your arse!"

It's now making me a little depressed as rather than just walking away, they are firing off stuff at me that isn't really important at all and just causes me stress and isn't necessary but more than that, I now see that some of this is from another hand another person as he isn't the sort to think or act like this of his own volition because it is a series of little traps and frankly, stuff that shouldn't even matter unless there was something else behind it.

So I am coming to the conclusion that there needs to be a new line drawn in this and it will be to turn this around and go into offence not defence from now on.  I need to go back to my Sun Tzu Art Of War thinking and act quite differently to the reactive way I have had to so far.  I need to start treating this on my terms not on his.  He has nothing to give so he'll need to try harder.

It's just so annoying that people act like this but I suppose he's got nothing else to think about and needs to go through these dying actions.  I think that the worst part, for him, is that he's lost some real friends and allies but has probably gained some Worm Tongue or Tongues who are making him do their bidding.  I cannot help him anymore, all he did was betray my trust and became disloyal, back stabbing and undervalued the work I had done on his behalf.  Now hiding, he snipes back as if he is in the higher moral position, in the right and on the moral high ground.

Dear reader, he 'should' know me well enough to realise that it's not going to be tolerated for much longer given the brutal attack originally instigated.  This second approach is disguised on a bit more conciliatory but hides its true intent between the lines.  It's an old trick - he forgets, despit me having told him many times in the past, that I used to this stuff for a living.

Yay, It's Another Circuit Around The Sun!

 Yes, It;s my birthday and having been quite depressed for a while, this morning I have cheered up a little bit.  

I have to say getting another solicitor's letter was just so annoying and distressing but of course, having read it, there's not a lot that I can do about it anyway - just "buyer's remorse" I put it down to.  Actions have consequences and so these are the consequences and they're not my actions despite them trying to project them on to me.  

I will spend the day just relaxing and hopefully be fully chilled out about it all later. Nineteen years though since the presentation of my Bladder Cancer.  A lot has happened and I'm glad that I am still here and able to live my life.  Many are not that fortunate unfortunately and some of the people I knew back then are no longer with us, I count myself lucky that I am not one of them.  

Here We Go Again

 Another Solicitor's letter FFS.  Not so bad this time but still a thundering nuisance nonetheless.  I could do without it but have to deal with it I suppose.  For someone who wants nothing to do  with me, it's almost the opposite.

Oh well, just another thing to deal with that I don't need at this time.  Amazon excelled themselves yesterday too.  I ordered something to expressly arrive today as I was out.  Apparently it was handed to the resident or in my case on the doorstep!  It was a high value item too but luckily it was there when we returned last night.  Talking of which two strange drivers - one who was overtaking everything on suburbans roads and the other displaying no lights and driving a little erratically - the sort you drop back from and they had been harassed by the car mentioned previously but there was something wrong with the way they were driving and as we went past some temporary traffic lights they managed to drive both nearside tyres at some speed over a raised curb island.  It did make a bang and as I suspected both tyres blew a few yards further down so they had to pull over.

It was late and twilight and they were over to the curve so I passed and drove on - "aren't you going to stop?"  And the answer was "No" - twenty or thirty years ago perhaps but you just don't know who is in the vehicle and they weren't driving it properly so could be drug or drunk I don't know but the last thing is to go and help out.  Hopefully they have breakdown insurance and I imagine they'd need new wheels too the impact was that heavy.  I'm not a young fit man anymore and you just never know who these people are.  

Nineteen Years

 Always, at this time of year I get a bit cranky.  It is 19 years today since I found blood in my urine and so that is one of those reasons. My father died on the 3rd July and it is my birthday on the 4th.  There are other things associated with these 3 or 4 days too so unsurprisingly I get a bit down.  

I feel particularly rubbish this morning as I stupidly had a few beers last night and that hasn't helped me one bit.  I must learn to just not go to the beers when I am feeling low!  It only makes matters worse.  I know this, I'm old enough to know better too! 

Nostalgia And All That Jazz

 Writing my biography is an interesting exercise but it is actually throwing up what I obliterated some years ago.  I was prone to reviewing and playing over in my head all the scenarios of things that had happened and was very bad at this constant analysis and reanalysis of situations that had happened because my mind does that, it's a whirr of computational what ifs and I always felt that was why I did what I did as a living.

I one day realised that all this stuff in my head whizzing around being worked on in multiple layers in a parallel type computational way was actually getting me nowhere, no where at all and that really was a problem and somewhere in the blog is the moment I lay down in bed and set fire to my memories and stopped dwelling and what-ifing.  My mind was then free of all that stuff.

Writing my biography has actually brought back some of that (not all I hasten to add) but some key moments in my life.  Well what I felt were key or pivotal.  Maybe not at the time.  These junctions in the road are interesting in an academic sort of way as you can do the "What If?" test on them but I found myself doing that this morning and I must stop it.  In my head are perhaps 8 to 10 moments in my life where I could have done something but didn't, I opted for what I knew, the place of safety and certainty and there's the regret.  I very rarely make a move or decision that I haven't thought through, I rarely do things on the spur of the moment and that is what I can feel being a regret.

Interestingly these are all relationship things.  I could have made a different decision and who knows what would have happened?  Your head and heart now say that something incredible would have happened, something with a romantic and rose tinted view of the world and yet if I really, really thought about it, I'd tend to doubt so.  With the romantic, idealised view there, of course things could have turned out differently and have been all Disney and perfect.  But you and I know that isn't true.  My analytical mind also realises this but that little ego voice likes to thinks that it would have worked out fine, Much better.  

I suppose it is alright to dream a little and in two cases I can conjure up a life that would be massively different from right now.  The fantasy plays out in my head and that's where it will stay but not for long.  Now's the time, after it is written down to get rid of it.  These are not in my biography but written down in another document that could be inserted into it.  I don't think that they should be in there.  I think some could be as it was part of my life and my journey.  

Aimless Wanderings Of My Mind

What a strange year it has been so far. I really feel a little lost and not sure what I am doing or going to do with myself.  It is not as if I have not got things to do of course but they aren't uppermost in my mind and procrastination seems to halt my need to do things on that list. 

I'm writing my biography for my family history files and I think it is that recording of things past which makes me reflective.  I really shouldn't do "what if?" but I think that you cannot always stop that as you pour out your memories you are bound to get the twang of missed opportunities, lost loves, opportunities that didn't come to fruition and just the amazement that things didn't go in another direction when you analyse what happened to you.  It didn't make the biography but on three or more occasions there were some interesting things that happened that could have panned out differently and on each I dodged advances that I am sure would have led to amatory endings.  I am glad that as I write down these experiences that I did the right thing but you are always left wondering whet might have been?

But is it just that I wonder?  It feels more than that.  A general reset perhaps.  Being retired (or should be) is actually a strange phenomenon to me as I've always been doing things and I suppose I still am a bit but there's that guilt feeling of getting up and saying or wanting to do something and achieving nothing.  Maybe that's what it is like because you don't need to achieve anything?  Perhaps there are other things to be done?  

The business has dragged on for 8 years now and I am getting pretty much annoyed that it hasn't been sorted out yet.  It has certainly exercised my mind recently with the chap leaving and then threatening me for his own actions!  That took it out of me too.  Who threatens legal action over their own mistake?  Then there's the ongoing testing nightmare = it has taken 9 months longer - again to get here.  Considering I had a working version of this in my hands 7 years ago it's been unacceptable but we are where we are.

There's other stuff going on in my head, I think mortality is one of these.  Another friend died yesterday after a long illness and he had gradually gone downhill over the last 2 years or so.  I am trying in some way to get things in order and history is written by the victors comes to mind in writing my biography which is around 60,000 words which is impressive and we are only getting to the middle bit which I left.  That too probably fills me with regret because I look back on the times we had, character building, fun, hard work, triumphs and disasters and realise that I really didn't want that to end the way it did and we go our separate ways.  I feel bad now, worse than I did then which is pretty interesting to note about leaving.  I was the instigator and whilst there were triggers, it had built up over time and I suppose yo wonder whether giving it one more chance (and there had been a number of these) would have really sorted it out?

There's guilt that my ex looked after me through the darkest period of my life with Bladder Cancer and she took me to and from the Hospital and I am grateful to her for nursing me through and looked after me during the dark dark days of treatment which were, I can tell you, or you can read the 2006 and a few years after, unpleasant and challenging.  And yet, I went through all of that and wanted to live to see my children grow up, get married, have children of their own (if they so wanted) and so that has come to pass but what is missing now I don't really know?

Last night I sat outside, gosh it was hot day 30C I would say but the evening was cooler and I grabbed a few glasses of wine and then I felt bad about that!  Sometimes I question why my mind does that. It is quite acceptable to sit out in the garden, a little music playing and drinking a few glasses of wine.  Perhaps I am worried about drinking again, that it is a habit that I should give up?  I don't know.  Maybe today I'll work out what this is all about.  What I do recognize is that when I feel like this often big things happen in my life.  Unfortunately they are things like major job changes or direction changes, illness or separation - I really don't want any of them but that's what worries me when I "go like this" it often means that my mind knows the answer but isn't sharing it with me yet.  

Not Watching TV So Much

 I can only imagine the backlash that's coming for the BBC after Glastonbury this year.  I haven't watched any of it.  In fact it's probably been 10 years or more since I just got fed up with it being a Party Political wankfest and not about the music.  I'm sure the fringe stuff is OK, there's bands we know appearing and let's hope it does their careers, such as a musician can have one, some good but there's something rotten at the core of all of this.  

It was always the case that people who couldn't hold down a real job but managed to make it big in the music or acting world then grew so "popular" that they felt we needed to know their opinions on things and be told which way to vote (that's backfired spectacularly this time with Labour coming to power - the mess made has meant the 'luvvies' have found one of their many reverse gears and accelerated out of the spotlight.  

I think I called this out in 2020 when people were doing their virtue signalling clap for the NHS or turning their profile picture blank for BLM and so on.  The band wagon rolls on and on and there always seems to be the gullible who join in thinking that it matter or that anyone gives a sh1t.  What happens is that we see you for who you are and you are exposed for who you are.  The irony is lost on people who are at a festival condoning people who murdered young people, like themselves, at a festival?  No?  Maybe it's just me that thinks that.  But I didn't watch it because I knew what it would be like.  Of course the BBC and their viewers are "shocked" )switched into sarcasm mode for that).  Really?!!  Really?!! If they had an inkling, all they need do is record it and take out the political bits but it's the BBC and it's actually what they think too despite their hands up protestations and it is all wearing very thin indeed, this tissue thin veil of impartiality has been destroyed over and over and they just ought to call themselves the Socialist Broadcasting Corporation or the Guardian or the Morning Star, something like that.

I have avoided the TV for months now and only come into the living room to watch the odd thing.  Clarkson's Farm for example and Formula One but I tend to play that on my iPad in another room.  I'll pick out some YouTube commentators and dip in and out of some online podcasts but that's it now.  Of course, it is all coming out now that pressure was put on popular programmes to promote vaccination - so if they did that, what else are they pushing? 

I am trying to keep away from the TV, cut my intake of alcohol too, which is doing OK.  I am losing weight but I need to check that my diet is doing that and I'm not ill which I know sounds strange.  I'm losing weight and I am pleased about that and I am consciously eating to lose weight but now that it has accelerated and is quite noticeable.  I suppose it should be as I've been eating like this for 3 or 4 months now and I think that the gradual weight loss is now more visible eight loss and my belt for example is in another notch and clothes are loose on me and yet, I cannot get into the clothes from 3 years ago?  Anyway, it's a "monitor it" and see.  I feel fine if not a little flat and I am noticing that my body and joints all feel good, my skin is also feeling good too so perhaps things are OK and it's just me worrying too much about it.

If I can keep this up for the summer I will be pleased but I need to keep off the Beer (liquid bread) and any carbohydrates too.  

Reflections - Recollections May Vary

 I am writing my biography covering quite a bit of my life and then I noticed that the middle bit was missing, meeting my wife (ex) having the children and all of that good stuff.  I worked on the beginning and the end and missed the middle entirely so I am working my way through that.

It's actually interesting (only I would say that) as it is of course quite personal and it is, even for me, an emotional roller coaster because now, writing and thinking about it, the errors and the wrong turns, the choices and the consequences are plain to see I think.  I don't suppose that hindsight, the exacting science that it is, might have changed any of it because, here we are and there can be no other outcome but it is interesting in a way to look back.

I wasn't expecting the strong emotions that are going with it, or perhaps I should have as I missed out this documenting the 30 to 40 years part.  It's quite interesting to look back though and when I saw that I'd written 50,500 words without the middle bit I was a bit surprised.

So the middle journey part is going to be unfolding over the next few weeks and it will be emotional as there are special moments in there and of course good and bad memories.  I re-read the eulogy I gave for my father at his funeral, now 13 years ago next month.  If I were to be half the man he was, I'd be pleased.  

If Not Now, When?

 Will enough people wake up in the next year or so? I do hope so and I do hope that they work out what is being done to us, the people, in our name.  Let's face it, these ideologues haven't got a scooby on how to do anything, they are joke domestically and goodness knows what the world makes of our "Leaders"?  Surely most people would think that a fair system should exist but these closet Malthusian, Fabian, Marxists can only have read books and never have existed in the real world.  We now have assisted suicide and infanticide nodded through and goodness knows what their next move will be.  Perhaps they'll take us back to Apocalypto or pre-Christian times and we can have blood sacrifice all over again?

They always have been spiteful and their treatment of children's education is surely a case in point that they want everyone to be dumb as f*** and slave to the state.  But here we are in Britain, being very British about it all at the moment.  I think we are possibly one of the most tolerant nations (sorry Canada) in the world and we allow things to go on, being polite, drinking our cups of tea and tutting about things but how far will this stretch?  How often can you poke the bear before it wakes up, slashes out with its claws and eats you in a few mouthfuls?  

Tax, the way these guys wield it is theft.  Taking more and more to spend on causes that no one agrees with, feeding a state that grows fatter with each devoured fiver.  No, it needs to stop and the "leaders" need to wake up blinking in bright sunlight to how truly hated they are and how totally out of touch too.  They have to use rent-a-crowd to do any TV these days or go to their blinkered strong lands but that cannot last for ever, they will have to face reality.  Their promises are collapsing around their ears and the Emperor's Clothes will be exposed for what they are.  There's only so much that people will take and I wonder at what point it will kick off.  It seems near but not imminent.

The doom and gloom of high prices and only just making ends meet surely must begin to brew up into some sort of action.  Perhaps by October when the figures really start to show the monumental downfall of a once great country and we begin to compare ourselves to Venezuela will it sink in that the politics of envy, spite and tax and spend will play out.  I live in hope.  In the meantime, let's hope that none of them can go to a Restaurant, A Pub or anywhere where they are recognised so that they wake up to how hated they are.

Attending A&E Last Night - Brings It All Back

 I dislike Hospitals quite a bit, I've never liked them and their smell, the haphazardness and herding cats feel to queuing and waiting - the waiting is the worst surely.

I had to take someone in last night and after 3 hours or more possibly more they finally got seen only as they were about to discharge themselves - having had a procedure, they were bleeding and needed to get checked.  Now it brought it all back as it will be 19 years next week since I found myself bleeding and commenced a long journey of Bladder Cancer and all the fall out from that, good, bad and indifferent.  We get there eventually but not how you thought and hey, I'm still here which is a good thing.

So yes the same sort of thing and I went into the A&E and it was packed and I'm sure it doesn't need to be - so much going on and some people were just packing up and going home after waiting so long that they probably felt better by then.  Miraculously from being another three or four hours he got seen straightway when he said he was going to discharge himself as if he'd waited this long following triage it couldn't be that worrying for them?  Seen straight away, I got him home gone 1:30 possibly later and got to bed at 2.

There's a lot of people didn't look like they needed to be in A&E but that's the way it works now.

The radical answer?  We all know the radical answer but no one has the balls to go do it, they just give it more money and boost the non jobs and say they've fixed it.

Anyway, 19 years, it was an awful time that week and in fact the few days afterwards then the wait then the operation in double quick time and you can read the rest at the beginning of this blog!  

Townies

 I used to be a Townie then we moved out of London when I was about 10 years old and generally I've lived on the edge of the countryside and now in it, which is great.

What's p1ssing me off is that all this demonizing of cars is a bit rich when you live, where we live, for example down a private unmade lane.  As you may know I tried to get busses but it doesn't work around here,  I have to walk half a mile (easily that) to a stop.  Anytime between 8 in the morning and about 6 at night all is good, the busses seem reasonably frequent and then today, a Sunday, no busses.  So what exactly are we meant to do?  It's a 45 minute walk to the nearest station and it's about 30 Degrees outside.  So all of this bollocks from the Townies about cycling or using public transport actually doesn't work in about 90% of the rest of the country.  

 I used to like getting home at midnight and seeing a bu that would take me somewhere near my house but now, I'd have to wait until 6 am I guess :-)  We need cars due to the distances and terrain, there aren't always footpaths to walk on along the main roads etc.  No services Sundays and Evenings - bonkers, I drove through town last night and it was dead, hardly anywhere was packed and barely any cars or people.  Oh well, that's my whinge for the day as I will now have to drive everywhere today as usual. It would be nice to get a bus into town, have a few beers or go to an event and get a bus out but it isn't going to happen ever and the townies will complain that we are driving around in our 4 wheel drives.  It would be fun to see them try and cycle down here where I live!  

Is It Me? If So, Is It Only Me?

 I am having some strange thoughts and my attitude to things around me is shifting.  I feel I would rather be anywhere else but where I am right now and I feel a disconnection with stuff going on as well as disbelief at what is happening in our society.

The recent Abortion changes, today's Assisted Dying (suicide) Bill and the horrendous Tax regime which works on taxing you more because the last time you did it, it made things worse!   The present Fabian , Marxist ideologues have learned nothing from their past, not one jot.  There's a disconnect between the people and these supposed servants of the people in as much as they don't service the people, perhaps the diametric opposite.  Then there's the increase in the State, more non jobs, more quangos more jobs for the boys, fat pension, and my personal favourite, that I have fought all my life against which is praise, reward and promotion for those who actively fought against the project (lets call it) you and everyone else failed in everything they did and rather than lose their jobs they were richly rewarded whilst we, who did the right thing, got shat upon!

Petronius Arbiter, a Roman courtier during the reign of Nero, wrote:

"We trained hard . . . but it seemed that every time we were beginning to form up into teams we would be reorganized. I was to learn later in life that we tend to meet any new situation by reorganizing; and a wonderful method it can be for creating the illusion of progress while producing confusion, inefficiency, and demoralization."

The NHS for example is constantly reorganized but is the same, it just gains more weight, becomes ever more sluggish and inefficient.  The same for all Public businesses.  If any were to compete in my world of the private business they would be bankrupt in a month or two.  They are all insolvent and no one cares.  Then you see these people are "Honoured" in the King's Appointments etc.  Sir this, Dame that and you know damn well that the vast majority of these people fail at every level and get richly rewarded for it.

So what's my point?  Well it's that I've got to the point of not caring what they do any more because, I can't beat them, I can't join them, they make me angry and annoyed and what for?  I'm too old to fight them now and not enough people are awake anyway.  I do think that there is a ground swell at least in terms of the political parties which may shake up the system (well at least until they get in power and taste the rich rewards for the power they wield but maybe not for the people they wield it for).

We seem to be "very British" about all of this. We tend to let it happen and I imagine there comes a breaking point but I have no idea how near that is.  I've fought my fights and to be honest, I now feel old, I found that where 20 years or more ago I'd relish the fight, would be self assured in my own stance and actions, my own abilities but now, with that awful threat of legal action (baseless as it was) it really has knocked me and reminded me how good people can go bad, how illogical and selfish they can be and how downright rude and despicable too.

So I've been spending a lot of "me time" recently, sitting in the garden, thinking and pondering but also trying to get back to just enjoying the surroundings and the birds and animals in the fields around me.  Enjoying the sun, the breeze and the endless rustles in and around our hedgerows.  I think that's where I am drawn to but of course, there's work and I wasn't expecting to be working right now, I was hoping to be retired.  The same old work related problems of course do not help.

So I am trying to switch away from this sordid war mongering, joy grabbing bunch of politicians who are woefully inadequately ready for government and distance myself and break away.  It's probably the wish to leave this present world and go to my new world that I want and yet I am dragged back to the old too often.  Added to that the depression and gloom associated with it, and the booze if I'm honest, and I struggle to pull myself from one place that I know is not good for me to a place where I can escape it all.  I am certain that these moods are top down problems and it isn't just me.  What I do hope it that I can open the door, get to the other side and not have to come back again which possibly accounts for my recent death thoughts too for it's the transition allegory of rebirth.  Anyway, that's what today looks like.  

The Long Metamorphosis

 It struck me that humanity has turned in the past 50 or so years.  Lots of things have conspired to bring us to this point where people are generally brought down by all this crazy impositions on our lives by people who we entrust to do the right thing and actually work for us!  Not vice versa, they are our servants but they've sort of tricked the gullible into a master servant arrangement.  They aren't very good at their jobs, they lie (all the time) and are snake oil salesmen frankly.

Then the people themselves turn on each other and the tension is ramped up as if over winding a main spring and trying to release it without the proper tool.  There's racial tension, there's money tension.  Soon there will be employment problems to add to it too.  All the time the state gets bigger, 4 million public servants, " public sector employment stands at 5.87 million people as of June 2023, representing approximately 17.9% of total employment. This includes jobs in central government, local government, and public corporations. The NHS is a significant component, employing around 2 million people." it costs around £1.1 Trillion and is up around 70% from Covid times.

Someone once told me that we ran the whole British Empire with 40,000 Civil Servants.  No AI, No Internet, Telegraph messages.  Impressive.  

This huge sector doesn't actually do anything to increase GDP (if we are to take any measure) and it takes around 160 days for each person in the UK to work just to cover these costs.

And they don't do a good job, the cult of "World Beating NHS" is long dead and tired only Politicians believe it and the public note that it takes longer to get anything done now even with all the extra staff and money thrown at it.  They don't have the courage to do anything and are in all probability in it for themselves and it doesn't affect them.

So I was wondering whether we will come to a pass here where we stop being nasty to each other, cruel, despicably behaved, fighting and war mongering, unpleasant to each other and will we finally rip apart our Chrysalis and pump up our beautiful wings and be at one with our planet and each other? A great awakening?  Perhaps we need more time, perhaps we aren't ready for it yet.  I think slowly the slumbering giant is waking up but perhaps not in my lifetime?  Maybe it's part of the eternal struggle but to be better than we are is surely a goal we should strive to reach.  Our evolution is probably too early on to achieve it as we are at the moment.  Wake up humanity, arise and be the best you can.  I suppose you all need to wake up and emerge together to make it happen.  

Calm But Still Not Right

 I find that the last few days have been calmer and I feel much better in myself.  However, I'm still not right and realise that I haven't been for years if I think about it.  Something isn't right and deep down in dungeons of my brain and deep inside my body I can feel it.

I really dislike going out anywhere and I would be quite happy to just be around the house and garden but that isn't going to happen and this "business" isn't going to run itself anytime soon and so that also drags at me.  I've just taken a short break from doing social media postings as I just can't think of anything to post - I imagine in a day or two that will change too.

I find people (not all) to be somewhat illogical or no longer feisty and full of character they don't seem to see what I see and they don't have the opinions that I do although they do parrot what they see and hear.  Back in the day we used to get a newspaper every day at one time and at weekends get two on Sunday.  A cup of coffee and a sit down to read cover to cover was something you did and yet still had time to do the massive garden we had, decorate the house and so on and I worked really hard too so coming home from work I'd have some food and then go and do two or three hours decorating work ready to be up at 6 again to go to work!  I can't do that now.  I can barely get the enthusiasm for anything.

Back to being informed - TV was for specific things and when it could be trusted to give you something like the facts and not their opinion was OK.  It was there for a little entertainment a bit of sport and so on.  The newspaper gave you the in-depth look at the world.  We both worked and we worked hard at work and play.

Today there is a stream of information available to you and that's OK but there doesn't appear to be the individual thought or analysis of that data..  There are lots of AI fakes, news but angled in the way that news outlet wants you to hear it and there is very little analysis or questioning going on.  I tend to have a low tolerance level for these things.  We have a government of naive, never run a business or a project types who have little grasp of the bigger picture.  They aren't even detail people and they certainly have no grasp on the need to encourage entrepreneurship.  The magic money tree has long since run out of money and the leanings toward more public sector and public expenditure without the money to pay for it from businesses being taxed so high they squeak is not the way to guide themselves out and "Go for growth" which they say they are doing.  Nasty socialist ideologies go down well with some people and if you rob Peter to pay Paul, you can always rely on Paul's vote.

The Keynesian socialist approach looks doomed already but no one seems to notice the economic data coming in and realise it isn't the bed of roses painted it's a forest of nettles and Venus fly traps.  Oh well.  That probably doesn't help my mood much either :-) 

P1ssing In The WInd

Sometimes it feels like that when you get absolutely no reaction from the stuff you are doing for other people.  I suppose I shouldn't be shocked about it, just resigned to it.  You publish something of interest and no body is interested, fair enough I suppose.  It just seems like a lot of effort to me that just goes to waste.

I'm going through hundreds of items for the App launch and it's just dragging now.  Well it's been dragging for 7 years but that's another story altogether I suppose.  Where are people's sense of urgency these days it's as if all the stuffing has been knocked out of the populace, everyone appears weary and tired and not bothered.  Perhaps that just me?

So how do we remedy this?  I have no idea but our Chancellor will read our fortune to us today and I'm not sure anyone has got a grasp of how deeply in the brown and smelly stuff this country is in?  The trouble is no one believes a word they say.  To anyone with half a brain, there looks to be something very wrong indeed with the way that they are approaching things and the socialist rule book is being opened at the part where it states that you can now tax your way out of the hole you've dug for yourself.  You cannot go for growth if you are stifling it and just because you have cheques in your cheque book doesn't actually mean you have money in the bank!

The collective sharp intake of breath will potentially be heard around the world.  

Like Many Things In Life You Move On Past It

 The more distance between the nastiness of a few months ago and today, the more I feel less stressed and move on to the next thing on my list of stuff to do.  I'd forgotten how much planning and actually doing these tasks took.  It takes up my day but I am not over doing it like I would have done in the past.  I'm just getting things lined up as infuriatingly I am waiting for the odd little bits of information to complete things.  Like links to websites so I can generate QR Codes and tested links.  Wording for the adverts, I've got all the words and like Eric Morecambe might have said "I've got all the right words but not necessarily in the right order!" 

Those little details will take time and so I am preparing everything ready to go and then I will spend a lot of time posting adverts, uploading directories, making videos and uploading and indexing them etc.  The late changes mean that the work I had already done needs to be redone as the layout has changed.  

I still have a concern that there'll be some sort of crazy stuff go on from this bloke.  The worry is that he's angry and irrational and is in denial I think about his own actions.  It's like me crashing my car and blaming the wall and not letting the facts get in the way of a great story "This wall came out of nowhere and stepped into the path of my car!" And, strangely, that is the sort of twisted logic I am dealing with here.  It's my fault that he lost his mind and threw all his toys out of the pram.  You cannot mitigate for the irrational and bizarre but there you go.

So, I am getting on with it for now and just having to navigate through all the work that is coming up in the next few months.  Hopefully I will be able to keep up with the workload.  

Second Guessing What Someone Else Is Going To Do

 There is only so much planning and risk management, identification and mitigation one can do.  I have this worry that I've not covered all the bases and that something else is going to crawl it's way out and deliver more grief.  Grief that I don't want nor deserve.

Worrying about it doesn't really assist either and I know that and my mind knows that but will it just stop and draw a line under it?  No, the little voice is giving it large and I really do need to switch it off now.  I can do no more, I have examined everything that I can and mitigated what I can.  I cannot mitigate the unmitigated!  Second guessing isn't going to cut it and so I just need to run on and counter whatever (if) might be thrown next.

But it is getting to the point that there isn't really that much that can be done about it really.  I'll just have to carry on and see what happens.  Everything else is covered I think.  

It Doesn't Take Much To Knock You Off Normal

 And by that I mean how I currently feel.  I am trying to get the business back on the straight and narrow and with all the threats and unpleasantness that has gone on, even though none of it is of my making, I feel the breathe of condemnation about the decisions I am making to keep the company going and to recover from the desertion and then subsequent attacks about how I run the business.  

It's in my mind really, that the attacks weren't really justified and weren't based on reality but it is still unerring double checking everything and wondering what someone else, who no longer has any connection to the business thinks about it!  It's nonsensical really.  Why should I care about what someone who has deserted the business, thrown their toys out of the pram and then accused me of (well) all sorts of stuff thinks.  

Such is the way my brain works that I actually need to play all these scenarios out and makes sure I've covered all the bases I can possibly think about.  It's tiresome and probably overkill but just in case I think I need to do that.  

I have to take certain actions if I am to launch and run the business and I don't care what he thinks - I actually don't think he thinks and just reacts and digs his hole deeper and deeper until there is no way out.  He doesn't really have a say in the business at all so what am I worried about?  Well you know what they say about cornered wild animals.  That is what I am worried about and it isn't logical or planned it's primeval.

Oh well, most things are thought through and so I hope that perhaps we can make progress and leave this nastiness behind us now.  

Visit A Brewery? What's Not To Like?

 Apart from I'm driving so no or very little beer for me.  It was too expensive to stay locally and so I am driving and wouldn't you know it, it's raining in June!  Oh well, we are indoors most of the time so hopefully it will be OK.

It's the Harveys Brewery in Lewes so it is a bit of a trek but better than last  year's outing to Amberley Museum which saw us stuck in traffic for hours both there and back :-)  As I used to work in the industry it will be like visiting an old friend and Harvey's beers are lovely.  I'll have to wait until we get home to have a beer except I don't have any in the house.  That's following a good few weeks of drinking beer most days which really isn't that good for me.  That's one of my biggest problems really, I'd have a beer every evening if I could but it is no good for your health and is "Liquid Bread" in terms of weight gain.   Tastes great though :-(

Anyway, a day out and a break which I seriously need.  The last few months have been really bad for me and I'm just getting out of the dumps that I was put in.  Looking forward to a break in proceedings that's for sure.

Getting Over It - Just What The Doctor Ordered

 If you know how I work and how I function, then it will come as no surprise to find that I am now in a position of true power and by that I mean, I now know what I need to do to get on with things and press on with getting the business back on an even keel after the stormy waters of the past 8 months and especially the last 3 months. 

The first attack was all in and pretty nasty I have to say and he may come back again for a bit more but he should be licking his wounds and wondering what the hell just happened to his strategy.  Me?  I've now gone though hell and back in my own head because I fully doubted myself and have had to break it all down and rebuild piece by piece what just happened, why it happened and what it means.  But here is the thing, it is a huge wall of noise but as it was so all encompassing but utterly disjointed at the same time, a pack of lies and half truths and a blunderbuss rather than a sniper's bullet.

Picking through all of the stuff from the accusatory and vexatious nature of it, to the shaking my head disbelief that someone I've known for close to 10 years could actually turn on me in such a horrific way.  The trouble is, it's business but not to him it isn't.  

Anyway, I have concluded that if they are going to go for another bite then it is going to have to be something technical and I have raised the drawbridge but offered to parlez but not heard back.  His threats to legal action will not be looked on kindly if he tries to take court action without first having attempted to settle this directly.  I have made that offer, to speak directly or through a mediator but herein lies the problem.  In all the accusations and bluster, the banging of shields and personal slurs, there's not one point of contention shown that either hasn't been answered or are the direct results of his own actions.

So here I am now, getting over this set back and with a strategy to move on and to put this in to the past.  It's like having a good friend just ignore you and then bad mouth you to everyone for no cause but their own inexplicable actions.  I think he is ill but he never wants to see or talk to me again so it kind of precludes me from even asking about him via people I know who know him.

It's a mess alright and one that I still look at blinking and wondering what on earth brought this on and why the volcanic eruption to it as well?

Now, Please, Can I Get On With My Life?

 I don't get why people want to interfere in what I do.  More so if they have extracted themselves and practically divorced themselves from me and burnt their boats, bridges, roads, paths and everything as they went.  They don't quite understand that after me being concerned over their well-being and then to have them launch the most horrendous ad hominem attack on me, I have now arrived at the position of:

"YOU ARE DEAD TO ME!"

I can think of no other way to put it after everything you put me through after years of what looks like them using me.  Yes, they could be ill I suppose, that's what I told myself but it still doesn't excuse unacceptable behaviour.

So yes, I fully expect to hear from this individual again and I will once again treat it with respect but robust responses.  If I never hear from him again, it will be too soon!  They've torched their way off and let's hope they stay there.

Gosh That Knocked Me Sideways

 The shock of the letter, the ferocity and vexatious nature of it, out of the blue has given me three months of stress and anxiety that I did not need, mild panic attacks and seriously doubting my sanity and myself.

Yesterday I felt a lot better and not so paralysed about it all and today I feel lighter and the weight has lifted somewhat.  I've done loads of research, tested theories and checked my working, my knowledge of commercial and contract law and finally, I have explored all the possible avenues I can think of for any comeback or further action towards me.  What was clear in the letter was that it was written in anger and in a revenge fuelled way.  Doing so opens emotional arguments and not fact based ones.  Facts take a back seat.

What is annoying to me is that it even got this far.  It should never have seen the light of day and it should have been stopped by those who purport to know better.  It was devised to give me maximum stress and doubt and it did that because that's what it is intentionally written to do.

 I like that I took those days off to think about it and to not think about it too.  The problem I have encountered is my drinking has gone through the roof and that stops tomorrow, I need to walk away from that stuff and whilst it is summer and a beer is nice, out there by the sunset seat and fire pit, it cannot be 4 to 6 cans of beer per night every night!  That's not sustainable either from my body's point of view nor financially.  It is so easy to do, to go at the end of the day and drown your sorrows and reflect on what's going on but this isn't the way.  

I now have a clear action plan to follow and have an idea in my head what I need to do, action plans are also written down, ready to implement.  The only worry is now will he come back for a second bite at the cherry?  There's little or no room for that and almost everything I can think of has been documented and mitigation is ready to be implemented.

Three months it's taken, goodness knows what this has done to me through all the stress and uncertainty and I imagine he will be going through the same now.  A good thing to do is to get all the anger out and I have some wild notes that I wrote at the time to get it out of my brain and on to paper which I can destroy shortly.  It clears your mind of the emotional stuff and focuses in on the facts, figures and reality of the situation.  It also reinforces your analysis of the contents and nonsensical parts of his argument, the distortion of facts, facts that have now been copied and returned to counter his untruths and finally, the coup de grâce written in his own hand which destroys all the arguments put forward.  

A good thing that I keep and reference this stuff and there are a few more items I have too should it ever come to it.  That letter should make the whole thing go away.  But on top of that, offering for talks and mediation as a way forward to defuse all of this provides a way forward, should they want it but if they aren't thinking straight still, perhaps not.

Anyway, the good news is that I am feeling that much better about things now and finally I am over the cycle you go through with this stuff (Kubler Ross) and whilst my INTJ brain is good for this stuff in a business sense, in a personal sense it doesn't function as well as it should.  I actually knew the answer straight away though but had to work through all the angles and scenarios to prove it to myself.

So, onward I hope and upward I'd like to think too.  

Progress - Actually Doing Some Work For A Change

 Quite pleased with the last few days as I have been cracking on with setting the business up and implementing some risk management strategies, some corporate  paperwork and getting on with the sales and marketing side of things.  

There's always plenty to do and I have been balancing out the work, breaking it into chunks and getting on with it.  AI is great for thinking or discussing things and most useful to assist in closing loop holes and assist in document formation and things like agendas - its all starting to get real.  After 7 bloody years it should do too.  How can you deliver something that late and not be severely embarrassed by it I just don't know.  

Anyway, that's where we are, I am actually doing things, taking breaks and not staring at my screen doing nothing so that's a start.

Flash Back Time Again

 I was sitting here working away and suddenly I was back to when I was 18 driving through Wandsworth going to college in my (not so) trusty 1963 Ford Cortina.  Those were the days, you could drive all around London, the City everywhere and park and at weekends I always used to drive up there to go to work then on to see my first serious girlfriend driving back on a Sunday night through the Blackwall tunnel as fast as my poor little car could go - which was all of 60 with a tail wind downhill! She lived in Chingford, I lived in Orpington, both our grand parents lived in the Chelsea area so we would go and see them too.

Lovely days now I look back on them and these little flashbacks are "interesting" as suddenly there I am in a situation I recall with people I haven't met in - well - fifty years or so.  I can picture them and hear them talk to me too.  Names drop out of my head and I wonder whatever happened to them?  

I don't hold on to many friends, I have a few people I still keep in touch with and a small handful of friends and even then those relationships aren't the same since I got divorced and went my own way.

Not to worry though eh?  I was also just reminding myself how many people I have met have treated me like a statue to their pigeon and generally shat on me from a great height.  Too many people treat you like that don't they?  I suppose if you are nice to people that's the reward you get. 

There's A Huge Lack Of Scientific Thinking These Days

I know that I've always stood out as being cold and calculating normally (95% of the time) applying logic and some sort of process to analysing what I see, developing ideas, working out different strategies and outcomes, that sort of thing.  

I know it infuriates some people I know as they tell me something I don't immediately react.  I am not great at seeing that someone wants some reassurance or comfort or that they are telling me something that I need to act human to!  So if I hear things I rarely react in a way other than gathering information mode and that really sets some people off.

It matter not what it is but let's take politics and the actions of the Chancellor and the way that they are trying to tax their way out of problems.  It doesn't take a rocket scientist to work it out, take the Laffer curve or industry data to get you started on working out what is going on.  The Laffer curve sort of says the more you tax the less return you will get and high net worth people who are able are leaving for other sunnier climes to avoid the crippling taxes foisted on them from people who don't understand how business works or indeed how increasing taxes and the like proves to de-incentivise people.  

The regime launched last October that punishes entrepreneurship, working, taking on employees and so on is bound to work its way through and figures recently for example the huge return of company vehicles to the leaseholder and the huge drop in new car and an sales should ring alarm bells surely?  These are huge increases in returns and decreases in sales and no one is adding 2+2 to work out why?  They say that we are doing well?  Really?  Highest energy prices in the world for some wet dream of zero CO2 to which as a country we probably generate 1% of the world's total.  The Steel works priced out by the huge costs of energy and the inability to source locally but that's OK we ship it in from around the world instead.

The incomprehensible attack on Farmers, Fishermen and the absolute base of our food and well being.  They don't get that either.  Why are they so blind to facts and figures?  Could it be that none of them know how to manage anything (it is it's rhetorical).  This ultra slow train crash government have no idea what they are doing.  Because they write it on paper or learned it from a book they think it's policy and it magically happens, no one has to work for it!   

I just stare on incredulously at them and wonder why they are so cretinous, so stupid and given all the information I can gather about them, so blind to cause and effect.  It's beyond belief, it really is.  I know it's not just the UK but we must take Gold Medal for stoopid! 

Not Said Much About Bladder Cancer Have I?

 If this blog proves anything it is that Bladder Cancer is (mainly) survivable if you catch it early enough and you change things to give yourself the very best chance.  That life goes on and is the same mixture of good, bad, downright ridiculous, humourous and all the ups and downs we suffer and enjoy in our chequered existence.

I have the occasional flash back and I still have remnants of the claustrophobia and general distrust of the modern medical profession.  Don't get me wrong they sorted me out and cut out the cancer and treated it and along the way I saw the very best and very worst of it all.  I found out I have this Vasovagal syncope which occurs when the part of the nervous system that regulates heart rate and blood pressure overreacts to a trigger.  Mine is if they try and clear a cannula or back pressure a catheter or try and put a cannula in.  No matter how often I say it, they don't listen and out I go!

It took close to 17 years start to finish and the ups and downs along the way have been just that, stuff that happens.  You get tired and worn out, you forget and overdo things.  You struggle with silly things, weight, supplements, diet, drinking (or at least I do) and many other things and for me, I tend to overdo things to extreme sometimes.  I go all in on a particular diet, a set regime and then I drop it and perhaps come back to it.  I'm human but also I'm a little bit obsessed with things when my INTJ brain sets to work.

I've got into silly ruts, gone high and gone low, been full of life and alive and gone to meet Black Dog.  Far too often I think the Black Dog has visited me.  It's something that I have struggled with all of my life, I over analyse, I don't live today often enough, I procrastinate, go into risk management mode and generally, I seem to be aimlessly wandering at the moment.

Not sure what it is although deep, deep down inside I think I do.  I worry too much even though I know I shouldn't and the older I get the more things trouble or annoy me. 

I'm alive, I'm a Cancer Survivor and I owe it to myself to be a little bit more grateful.  Not sure if I owe that to anyone else, perhaps my consultant who by prompt action and skilful intervention saved my life.  Maybe you do owe those who looked after you to live your best life.  

I need to reflect on this a little more - other people getting me down because of their faults (not mine) are dragging me down.  I shouldn't let them should I.

Well, That's A Lot Better Day

 Gosh, getting old takes away much of your confidence doesn't it?  The recent nonsense really did knock me sideways and it was taking up my days and making me anxious and doubting my own sanity.  These things feed doubt into your mind and all the confidence I had was punched out of me.  I wouldn't mind if it was me that set all this in motion or caused it.  Both actions taken were bolts out of the blue and pretty much unpredictable.

So now, I am pretty certain that the penny has dropped on their side and that they will soon realise that they have painted themselves into a corner.  Despite the awful way in which they have behaved, I left two openings for them to recover if they so wish.  I cannot make them do that, only they have the ability to do so.  I cannot imagine it will be easy having played all their cards at once and left themselves with little to room to manoeuvre.

All out attack is a strategy but it doesn't always work out how you think it will.  I recommend the book 'The Art Of War' by Sun Tzu - which has served me well over the years.  A 2,500 year old book it has some very useful lessons.  Some other lessons include (think it was Bonaparte) "Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake" I may have paraphrased that but it is also quite useful watching people digging themselves a deeper hole as they go about whatever they are doing to you at the time.

And so, a little peace and sanity have descended over me this weekend.  It's not that I have forgotten what I know about how people behave but more that it deeply affects me now.  I have ended up in this position (running a business) by default, by doing someone "a favour" if you like and as you know, being kind and nice to people gets you screwed over.  Happened all my life, probably happen again and I shouldn't be surprised I suppose.

The other lesson from a few years back was the greed and also self fulfilling prophecies that you come across in business, especially start ups.  Greed is where people can only see the £s and $s and the "riches" that the business promises but lose sight of the undeniable fact that you actually have to work for the money and work bloody hard it isn't just going to drop into your lap and if you don't pull your weight then you are going to be left behind with a broken dream and not understand why you failed (again).  The self fulfilling prophecy is often encountered too, where a previous experience is recounted and has been burnt into their minds and blow me down, if they don't make the same mistake as before almost masochistically and then complain that it happened again when it was entirely of their own making.

After A While, It All Clicks Into Place

I watch a YouTube channel presented by a Barrister and it's pretty interesting stuff.  I've had years of claims and counter claims experience and a few scars to show for it.  What's refreshing is that after some months of not being right and feeling pretty miserable I needed this wake up call to realise that it is the way some people go about things and not me.

Here's the video and it's worth a watch and a like and subscribe - there are some very interesting things and not just only in this video. I certainly enjoy Dan's candour and I like to watch what the "legal take" is on some of the things you hear.

So, this video suddenly re-enforced the opinion that the recent pretty awful letter was indeed just that, a nasty tactic to get me disturbed and worrying about something that has had me annoyed, worried, losing sleep, analysing, strategic planning and more.  I should know better having faced this sort of nonsense most of my working life but, now, I'm not working (well I am but that's another story) I should be retired but some people want their cake and eat it and want you to make them more cake so they can have that too.  All the while they are just being plain nasty.

I finally stopped worrying about this disgusting letter I received and made my mind up that it was, as I had suspected, a ruse.  It actually now makes no sense whatsoever, it doesn't actually say what it wants resolved and it doesn't stop short of being abusive and almost threatening.  So watching this video really did clear up all of that for me.  

What I do not understand though is why the very first letter is an all out assault and not something stating what needed to be resolved.  Such a powerfully arrogant, nasty and downright insulting letter actually paints them into a corner, there's no possibility of discussion or mediation it's his way of the highway and that's it, they are cornered.  Why play all cards at once, stick the "frighteners" on and leave no way out for either party?  It seems a bad call to me.  There's now no nice, clean and agreeable way forward.

Anyway, glad I came across this video at this time.  

 

Distraction As A Technique To Getting On With It

 I am still seething about the way I was treated and I still don't know if it is over.  I am hoping that it will be and that it disappears or if it does raise its ugly head again it will be in the form of a grovelling apology.

I've put myself full on into building up the business marketing strategy and having tested this morning I can see we are pretty much there now.  Some hard work to do with the launch but it will just have to be hard work won't it?  The next thing is to tackle my anxiety and this shaking which is annoying and a little concerning.  I'm sure it is stress related to what's going on but I just need to monitor it and keep an eye on it.  I dislike it as I can see my hands tremble and that's not good.

I've got to try and get back on top of all of this and I am hoping that the business will prove successful and if it does, then some of the worry can go away.  Work is proving the distraction I need but of course that's related to the whole shenanigans going on too.  

Still I'm Not Feeling Great

 Without doubt the betrayal of trust and sheer vengeful nastiness aimed at me not only caught me off guard but still makes me feel quite sick even now I feel anxiety and stress caused by this awful hideous attack on me.

How anyone can go from being quite fair and reasonable to the diametric opposite is just beyond me, unless he's ill of course and then. perhaps, that might account for it.  If he isn't ill and this is his alter ego then it proves that you never really know someone.  However, how dare he do this and what on earth is he thinking after 9 years I've helped him try to achieve his dream.  He hasn't always been good listening to advice, hence we are somewhat delayed as I prediced if he followed his instincts.  You can't tell non business people what the impact of their decisions are going to be even if you tell them directly.  

I am pressing on and yet I feel the shadow of his presence hovering over me, willing me to make a mistake.  In clearing off he's left me with a business to try and run and he spent month and months doing nothing and now sends sniper shots!  Yes, makes me feel nauseous all the time about it but I hope that maybe when we go live, if we make some money we can move on from here.

I've just got to work through it I suppose.  IT's not nice though, not nice at all!

A Little Me Time Helps I Think

I say "me time" meaning that I was at my Lodge yesterday afternoon and met up with some old friends and it takes your mind off of everything really.  It helps to be thinking about other things and I was presenting a talk too so I was able to concentrate on something else for a change.  It's been months of trying to work out what to do and how to do it and having sh1t thrown at me to have to deal with.

But, here we are and I'm feeling better today than I have done for a while which can only be a good thing.  There's time off now for some months to get on top of things and then it will all satrt again in September.  

I am just going to soldier on for the moment and see where we get to with all of this.  I'm hopeful that things will start to get back to normal as I really can't see if there's any sh1t left in the pile to throw at me.  I really hope not I am far too old for it and it makes no sense.  Why are people like that?

Anyway, feeling better and hopefully things will settle down a bit now.

Should You Wish For Revenge? Let Karma Do Its Thing? Or Forgive?

 It is a difficult thing this because as I have grown older my wish for revenge (if that is the right word) has diminished, I may think it for a while and then I let it go and think that Karma will actually sort this all out.

I have to say that I am pretty livid about recent events because I suppose it isn't logical and generally, that's how I am excepting recently which my brain has decided that high anxiety is the permanent state 😃 and I find myself swept up between moments of outright anger and frustration, then a period of calmness, then reflection and yes even forgiveness for perhaps this person I have known might be ill or having some sort of breakdown or being controlled by other forces unbeknown to me?

In the bad old days I'd have plotted something for this chap that would have pulled the rug out from his feet and he'd be left bewildered as to what had happened and would not have connected it with me or his actions, it would have been something out of the blue, not physical but certainly something mentally shocking to them.  It's something you learn about when you are at work to protect yourself and your projects.  It's almost like a war or boxing strategy where you let them come on and think they are winning and then boom, they're not anymore.

So I actually feel sorry for this bloke rather than revengeful.  Perhaps Karma will level things down but at the moment I am still quite angry and upset about what he's done to me, it's made me anxious and nervous and a little worried as to what the hell he is going to get up to next.  Shouldn't worry about stuff that you have no control of of course, but you try telling my head that!

So Here We Are - Back To Earth Again

 It helps to write things down I find and so I wrote about the past few months and the treatment I've been receiving from someone who has leech like taken my time over the past nine years and then betrayed my trust in him.  Enormous trust too.  I like that they think that my contribution is worthless and that they can dictate what I am to do under threat that if I don't I'll be in trouble.

So, I wrote it down and looked at all the angles and I did a more thoughtful piece as I had done a angry rant a few days earlier.  I always used to write when angry and get it out of my system and actually it often threw up a few home truths to be used in responses.

So I worked on it and provided balanced views and ideas and actually it helped yet again to review a possible way out for him and me.  I was unsure about it all but the more I analyse it the more I come around to the view that what ever he may throw at me going forward can only be an unhinged response - there's nothing in the accusations to worry too much about I think.

So today I am a lot calmer than I have been and I am thinking more strategically in terms of what I can do about all of this.  The main thing is that I let it run its course now.  It has a life of its own and his attempts to derail it have come to nothing so far.  I can't do much about it anyway but at least I am nowhere near as stressed as I was earlier this week.

FFS Why Am I (Knowingly) Allowing This?

 I'm a reasonably smart cookie I like to think.  I used to work in a business that was at sometimes quite contractual and not particularly nice but "It was business" of course.  I know that people can be arseholes and I realise that they don't care about me but yet it affects me that somoene whom I've known for quite a while would turn on me.

Yesterday was really horrific, I felt dreadful and for why?  I don't know, the world closed in on me and didn't let me operate closing down my brain and my body.  It was a meltdown of sorts and I knew I should have done something but also knew that it would have been bad for me to do.

Having blitzed through that, working my way through and making myself be active rather than sit in a self induced sulk with the black cloud over my head I find myself back thinking about it all and it depends how I look at things as to how I feel about them.  I find that the thing that I cannot comprehend, the thing that isn't logical or makes any sort of sense is in fact the thing that is troubling me.  That is why.  Why pursue something in such a way as to play all your cards at once, to go "all in" and have no back stop, no trump card, no get out of jail free card?  Why would you do that?  I would always have a plan that had a back door in it or many avenues of extraction because you don't always win, because often the first attack is parried and so you have a strategy surely.

I cannot see what his strategy is.  It's a strange mixture of attacks from different angles but none of it is joined up, none of it is coherent, cohesive if you like.  The bottom line is that all these attacks and all these strange parables actually have no reflection or bearing on the reality of the situation.  Diametrically so, the arguments are as a result of their own actions some time ago and that's the strange thing.  If you took a calculated decision, some time ago and set that out and then acted on it, who's decision is it?  Who metaphorically pulled the trigger so to speak and for what purpose?  Once that action had been executed and put in place the reality slowly dawned that not only was it incorrect but it was also pretty terminal.

Now, I would have left myself an opening right there.  But oh no, rather than throw hands up and say my mistake, apologies, make up and move on.  They want to fight and make it my fault.  They are doing the Celebrity Lister shouting that it's someone else's fault.  

That's the thing isn't it, not just the betrayal in the first place, not that they've painted themselves into a corner, not big enough to own up to it, they explode with anger and resentment towards the very person who would have rescued them had they only humbled themselves and asked.  The bottom line here is it is affecting me really badly and yet I know that it shouldn't do that.  It's not my problem, it is firmly theirs but call me old fashioned if you like but it does affect me that they would choose to be like this when a phone call would have sorted this out all those months ago.  Not for want of trying on my side, they would put the phone down or just not answer.  

I must stop doing this to myself, it's all in my head and because it is (or was) a threat, it engages my INTJ brain to work out all the various paths this could take. 

What Is Wrong With Me?

 I'm back in the past again with my head.  This morning I was getting ready to go to a freind's funeral and checked the route and saw there was a lot of traffic and that there were delays of around 40 minutes it said.  Instead of planning a different route I suddenly came over all shaking and was at my claustrophobia worst, worried about getting there on time, being stuck in traffic, not being able to park and so on and the death spiral started so that I was just a mess.

What on earth was all that about?  I made my excuses and was going to go lie down in a darkened room for the rest of the day but my partner said that the best thing I could do would be to get out in the air, it's a lovely day and so I've spent hours in the garden sorting out her sunset bench and the fire-pit arrived a short while ago which sets it all off nicely.  

Of course, I've damaged my hands a bit strimming the lawn, mowing it, raking and so on, laying paving slabs and jet washing the bench.  It looks good and I feel that I have achieved something excepting my hands are in their arthritis gloves for a short while to help me recover them from all that lifting.  I do feel better, she's right but I couldn't have felt any worse frankly.

I hate that this stress and anxiety is being caused by someone who doesn't deserve to live rent free in my head.  The threat of something else happening to me, planned by him is not helping.

I have two meetings with friends on Friday and Saturday I hope that I am over this awful shaking and worry by then.  My hands have been shaking now for a few weeks not uncontrollably but visibly noticeable.

And Now I Am Angry

 So many emotions that I really don't need right now.  With all this stuff going on I find that now, today not only do I still feel a little sick (back of the throat nausea) but I am now very angry.  I've gone through the Kubler Ross cycle a few times LOL!

But here's the thing.  Wrongly accused, spitefully libelled and treated like something you stepped in isn't particularly nice after giving nothing but good vibes and being diligent etc.  I recollect that one thing I will not have done to me is to call my professionalism into question.  I once told a prospective employer to shove his job where the sun doesn't shine after he treated me as if I were some child at an interview.  Well the look on his and their faces when I told them that if they were going to treat me, a very senior engineer like a dickhead and some unruly youth and "keep an eye on me" then they could stick the job up their arses and f**k right off!  That shut them up and I picked up my stuff, walked out of the door and down to the reception area where the guy who had arranged the interview was sitting so I told him that he'd better go and see them as I'd told them where to get off.

It felt SO good.  What was funny was that my father and brother both knew these people and both said good, well done, they were all the sorts that were up their own arses.  I don't need sh1t like that.  And I don't but at the moment, I have some non-business type telling me how to run a business, what I should and shouldn't be doing and that's the least of it.  Well he can jolly well go and f**k off and when he gets there he can f**k off some more.  Not big enough to say it to my face and not clever enough to have presented the evidence to back it up, he can go and p1ss right off.

Oh I do like this, it's getting the anger out of my system.  I hate cowards and I hate idiots and I hate that they snipe at you from a safe place but haven't the guts and balls to face you.  Sometimes I hate humans for being so sh1tty.  

When You Think Things Through - It Falls Into Place.... Eventually

Choral Evensong at Rochester Cathedral yesterday was a good time to reflect on the past five or six months and to return home with a calmer, clearer mind.  

What it actually meant was I once again returned home, sat on my own and let my brain compute the various scenarios and work its way through, perhaps for one last time, where I am at and what can possibly happen now.  The result is that I have done exactly what I should have done given the horrific attack on me and that is to offer to meet and to work through the other party's problems.  They are only MY problems, if I let them be, for not one of the actions leading to this have been mine, none of the aggressive stance is mine either.  I returned a copy of a document that completely invalidates the assertions and diffuses the entirety of it.

Any interference, and he has tried to do that, has been firmly countered as he cannot conduct company business or do anything on behalf of the business as he does not have the authority to do so.  So, interestingly it boils down to that in many ways in that he is no longer a sleeping director, has no authority and no control which makes it interesting.

There's a last throw of the dice I think he may want to try but if he does he destroys everything, a nuclear option that may not be worth contesting, life is too short and I can't be bothered if he does that.

It is funny that these people value your worth as nothing but believe they hold the 'God Card' and their efforts are miraculous and omnipresent, omniscient and omnipotent LOL.  On review, I can confirm that it is anything but and in fact it's been a drag on the business and still is really.

Anyway, I may be viewing the world in rose spectacles at the moment but I am pretty certain that the vast majority of the accusations can go away from whence they came and my peace offering remains on the table to be grasped or otherwise ignored.  

So, Is That It? Anymore To Come?

 Now, the limbo period where you wait to see if there are any further attacks incoming.  It's stressful but I suppose I ought to have the attitude that no news is good news but when you are dealing with irrational behaviour you never know what they'll get up to next?

Having dealt with the outright hostility by offering to sit down and discuss it, I hope I've defused some of the vitriol and vexatious accusations levelled at me.  I don't need this especially as it is unfounded and not of my making at all.

I suppose that in reality it has affected me quite deeply.  Betrayal does that but it isn't the first time and I suppose it wont be the last.  People who you think you knew turn on you or fade away never to be seen again.  I've spent time with all of them, been by their side through thick and thin, bailed them out (I really don't want to know quite how much money I'm owed - it is substantial) and invested my time with them only for them to just melt away and now I'm lucky if I hear from them once in every few years or maybe bump into them at weddings and funerals.  

It is disappointing and I suppose human nature to be so self centred and selfish.  I like the words from the Royal Family when they used the phrase "Recollections may vary" which is very much how it is at the moment excepting, I've got it in writing direct from the author and it's the trump card so to speak.  Having sent the copy of that back with my response it should make it all go away if you were sane and sensible that is.  If you are bordering on insanity and not being rational I am sure it is like a red rag to a Bull.  Let's see?

What I hate about this all is that it's not my actions, not my hurt feelings, not my ill thought through strategy and it's all unnecessary.  Just come and talk.  He won't though as he's worked himself up into a lather and it's personal.  It's not personal, it's business and that's the point, it's got nothing to do with business, it's all to do with ego, bruised as it may be, muddled thought processes, lack of understanding of the way things are done and a complete misunderstanding about how the business functions, how it makes money and the practicalities of running it day-to-day.

It's upsetting though that after a very long time working together, this has happened. Oh well, onward and upwards. 

FUD - Fear, Uncertainty & Doubt

 What are they going to do next?  It could apply to just about anything these days.  For me it is a case of exactly that, what are they going to do next?  When you are dealing with rational, logical people, you tend to have a good inkling what they will do next.  When dealing with irrational, hate filled emotional and off the rails types, then you wonder just what is coming your way.

I'm hoping that they are just going to go away but that depends on whether they have understood what their position is.  They've already made a painting into the corner move and that's the trouble, that in doing so, they've left themselves no room to manoeuvre or negotiate out of the problem they themselves have created.

Dealing with these types is dangerous as you just don't know what they are going to do as it is often illogical and so you cannot prepare for it.  It's like a fight in a Pub.  You don't know what is going to happen and there are often "afters" that impact the innocent.  If I see anything like that (it is rare these days) I'm out and gone before it kicks off.  At present it feels a bit like that.  I don't know if or when it is about to kick off, if indeed it ever will now.

Based on the previous behaviour it seems to me that I'm dealing with full illogical, revenge, vengeance anger.   There's no science in this, no logic, no particular reason.  He may be ill of course and that would perhaps explain it.  Like a cornered animal these are dangerous times for me.

I can't believe how badly this has affected me but I am much older now and I don't really need all the hassle.  When I was younger I'd thrive with this sort of conflict in a sort of gladiatorial manner.  I really don't feel that great and I find myself shaking sometimes.

As someone stated, "The process is the punishment" and so it proves to be.

Calming Down, Re-Focusing, Rational Thoughts etc

 Bloody hell, the last few weeks have been horrible and there's uncertainty and some trepidation that having kicked the problem into the long grass and hopefully disposed of it, the irrational accusations, for that's what they were, could easily raise their head again.

Such is the nature of people who set off without a preconceived plan of what they are trying to achieve continue to paint themselves into a corner and like a wounded animal it makes them desperate and dangerous.  If you conceive a plan where the outcome you want is the destruction of your fellow colleague and to grind him under your heel to dust and humiliate him then you'd better be right, you'd better have all the facts to hand and you'd better have an escape plan.  But, if you go all in through malice and vexatious intent then you will be blinded by your own anger and be unable to understand the complexities of the war (for that's what it is now) you are about to unleash.

There's no way out you see when you run a campaign on anger and without a clear strategy about what you want to achieve and how you are going to get there.  There is also the fact that you blindly believe in your case and your cause is just and perfect in your own judgement.  Heaven knows why it was felt necessary to go all in and then double down leaving no way out when the truth of the matter was demonstrated by their own hand!  Forgetting a key piece of evidence was folly and stupid and now that it is in full view, it destroys the whole reason for the min campaign.  There's no ability to retreat and there's no real chance to reconcile even though I have provided that avenue for you.  It's a big climb down and a huge loss of face but ignoring my entreaties over and over again will just add up to further painting yourself into a corner.

I imagine there's now a difficulty in having to deal with me after having abused and accused me of various things, professional stuff and that's one thing I have always maintained.  Thinking that I wouldn't have the documents to back up my position was another miscalculation on your half.  But I can see you not wanting to do the right thing and come and sit down at the table and discuss these things and retracting your falsehoods and attempting to restart.

Why do people do this?  Why do they make a rod for their own back and practice self immolation?  What on earth is the point of getting so angry (and so wrong) that you destroy all hope of reconciliation or retraction and leave yourself with a trail of destruction in your wake surely you must know that it can only lead to your own downfall?  I suppose not, people let their anger overrule their logical brain and sacrifice everything for nothing.  A shame after all these years but I cannot be my brother's keeper and I am unable to stop the little voice in his head taking him over and resulting in an outcome diametrically opposite of that which he probably felt he was going to achieve.  Sad but he has wounded me after all these years.  

I doubt I will trust anyone else in the future which is my take away damage. 

Another Shock To The System

 A Facebook posts announces the death of someone I know, not well but knew on first name terms and enjoyed his company and had a laugh with.  Shockingly he died this morning and it was announced as these things are these days on social media and it was a shock as he wasn't old and whilst he had a little ill heath he wasn't at death's door etc.  

Reading the comments I was then really shocked as someone else I knew better than this guy also died earlier this week and I hadn't heard anything about it until I read the comment.  He and I had a few interesting times up in London at various meetings and he was a special sort of character who appeared gruff and hard as nails on the outside but once you got used to his strange ways and his sense of humour you realised quite what an interesting and sharp witted man he was.

You never know do you?  It's like my friend who died in the early days of lock-down - only a young guy and I'd only been speaking to him a day or so before and gone, you never see them again do you?  It's sort of strange that you can be chatting to someone and you (and they) have no idea it will be the last time you'd interact with them and they'd be gone.

How strange it feels to write that they are no longer here and you'll not see them again.  Two in a week.  

Polling Day

It nearly didn't happen here as our Council leaders wanted to defer the vote.  I wrote complaining and got a good response from my councillors and a less than good response from the leader of the Council.  Taking away the democratic right to vote is a step too far but the way we are heading in this country at the moment.  A lot of people don't see anything wrong, many didn't know, so many don't care but these people are meant to be our servants and talk about power and pontificate over us.  Let's see if today, people who do care will demonstrate how much it really means to them.

I'm jumping the gun here but there needs to be a shaking of the ground and a reset - I have my local council wedded to climate change and carbon neutral but they don't tell you how much extra that costs.  We all know who pays and it's us, all the time.  Gone are the days when they looked after the local service for the residents.  They play party political games - watching their council meetings online is like watching playtime in a kindergarten. 

Let's see if people are awake and will vote to change things.  I'm not particularly upbeat as we've heard it all before and people don't always do what you'd expect.  It's a very sunny day here so maybe that will encourage voting.

Will the incumbents get a bloody nose?  You kind of hope so if only to get a good feel for the mood of the country.