Not Too Late

Phoned John & Maureen just now, it having been my sister's birthday yesterday. She's now an unlikely 71 years of age. Unfortunately the list of problems she's facing in regard to her health is a daunting one, and it's not looking any better with time. John, who's an even more unlikely 82, was complaining that he's the one who looks after the house and I can sympathise with his irritation. But I remain hopeful of an upturn in Maureen's fortunes, even this late in the day.

Yes Sweat

Got back on the elliptical trainer this evening for the first time since early June. Didn't try to do too much - following strict instructions from the Missus. But what I did was enough to remind me of just how much it's possible to sweat even in a moderate work-out. The answer, in case you don't know, is a lot.

Will find out tomorrow if I've done any damage regarding my recovery, but so far the signs are good. (Apart from two cramping feet. But no one said it would be easy.)

Radical Action

With mighty help from Fuad the wiring around all the electrical stuff connected to the tv has been reconfigured and a faulty DVD player removed. The machine in question has been replaced with a smaller blu-ray player, recently acquired. I'm told these things are going out of date, but I own enough DVDs to warrant owning one, and I've been the proud possessor of Crimso's 3 CD and 1 blu-ray disc set Radical Action (To Unseat the Hold of Monkey Mind) for some time now without having the wherewithal to enjoy the video of the 7-headed version of the band in radical action. Now I can enjoy it and, having glanced at the first few minutes before taking Fuad & family out for a celebratory nosh-up, I know that enjoyment will be deep and certain.

It's a bit of a mystery to me why being able to see the music I love actually being played enhances the listening experience, but it always has done. Something to mull over as I intoxicate myself with the disc in question in the week ahead.

Starting Gently

Noi was keen on getting out to the track this evening for some brisk walking, so that's where I went to exercise rather than the gym. Perhaps it's not such a bad idea making a gentle start to resuming some kind of regime of exercise and it always feels good to accompany the Missus on these little outings. Plus there was the pleasure of getting out into the night air as opposed to the artificial confines of the gym.

But having said all that, I know I have to get back to some real workouts or lose the last remnants of whatever fitness I built up in the first half of the year. And now I know that a bit of brisk walking hasn't done me the slightest harm, at least as far as I can tell for the moment.

Recovered

Today was entirely discomfort free in relation to my back and left leg. I didn't feel even the shadow of a twinge attending Prayers, at work, or at home working at the table. I regard myself as officially recovered, which means that at some point over the weekend I'll be going to the gym. A bit foolhardy, eh? But you only live once so you might as well make the most of it, say I.

(And in case you're wondering how grateful I feel about feeling well again, let me just say very.)

Not Funny

I found myself distinctly puzzled today on reading an article about some chap called Arron Banks who has got lots of money and seems to be quite famous back in what used to be my homeland. (I'm finding myself increasingly in denial with regard to the idea that I have any homeland at all, but let's not go there.) It seems he's generated a bit of rather silly controversy by tweeting something not terribly pleasant about that young lass who's become the face of the Extinction Rebellion (as I think it's termed. Sorry about all the vagueness - I'm sort of out of touch with the world in any number of ways.)

Now according to Mr Banks, regarding what he had tweeted that so upset folk: It was a joke .. you lefties have no sense of humour. I can vaguely see a point here. It's awful to say this, but there are possibilities of seeing darkly macabre humour in all sorts of situations where you don't really want to admit the possibility of anything funny there at all. King Lear is, of course, a disturbing master class in doing so. I can further see why someone's comments might be fuelled by a desire to cause outrage and that this might itself be seen as humorous, again in a disturbing but genuine way.

The thing is, though, that I didn't find anything particularly outrageous in what the guy tweeted. It just seems too petty for that, but, more importantly, and to me more obviously, the comment just wasn't funny, a crucial point that all the commentators appear to have missed. I mean, I know what's funny. I know how to make an audience laugh. I find most aspects of life funny. I love wit. I love bad jokes. I love stupidity. But Mr Banks's line, Freak yachting accidents do happen in August... fails every test of being funny I can apply to it. Imagine nattering about the girl's voyage with someone and dropping in the Freak yachting accidents bit as a sort of bon mot. It just doesn't fly.

I've come to the sad conclusion that the poor chap just doesn't have an actual sense of humour. I wonder if any of his chums have ever thought to let him know the bad news?

Not Stopping

When things get too much it's useful to just keep busy without thinking too much or looking too far ahead. It's a kind of surrender, but the odd outcome is that things do get done without any distinct intention or definite purpose. They just sort of happen.

Holding Up

Deeply grateful that we managed to get back to our usual Far Place yesterday in just 6 hours, 20 minutes. It could have been worse. My schedule today required me to be especially alert and I'm happy to report I came through in what seems to be one piece. Tomorrow is another day, as they say, and the possibility of dividing into a number of pieces cannot be dismissed. But disintegration has its attractions, I suppose.

In connection with which I've just decided to put The Portable Nietzsche, wonderfully edited and translated by Walter Kaufmann, on my list of books to read in the immediate future. I've had my trusty Penguin edition for some time, and dipped in extensively, but never gone cover to cover. Not entirely sure what this has to do with my imminent disintegration, but I reckon some kind of subtext might be underpinning these loose jottings, just about holding things together.

A Bad Dream

It's probably going a bit too far to say that the dream I had this morning was a bad dream. It wouldn't rate highly as a nightmare, but it was unpleasant, to say the least, involving feelings of annoyance, irritation and anxiety I'd rather do without. I woke up from the dream, I'm happy to say, at 8.50 am and was immediately able to push those negative feelings to one side, though whatever relief I felt that it had all been just a dream was tempered by the fact I'd had the dream at all.

The odd thing about it all was that what happened in the dream was so contrary to the reality of my lived experience for many years now that I felt, and feel now, puzzled as to how some part of my brain conjured up an entirely false narrative. The dream featured a show I was directing, some three or four hours before actual performance. The cast for the most part were all there, and obviously prepared, but not the four 'leads'. I gave a little speech explaining the desperately important final rehearsing necessary, noting that with the key people being missing we were unlikely to be able to deliver a good show. Then I settled down to wait for the four absentees, somehow knowing that I was going to be let down. One arrived, and I knew immediately he was weak on a key speech. Then I woke up.

Now I'm used to anxiety dreams about shows in which I am the one who's underprepared and doesn't know what's going on. But I can't recall ever having the kind of dream in which the performers themselves have let me down. And one very good reason I can immediately think of for this lack is that in reality this just doesn't happen. Indeed, in recent years I've been spectacularly blessed by the manner in which performers have somehow delivered despite the many pressures upon them, especially the pressures attendant upon time leaking away. Possibly the dream was a warning against taking all this for granted? But I prefer to think it was a way of reminding myself of the incredible good fortune I enjoy of working in the circumstances I do with the people who share those circumstances.

I think back now to 26 July and wonder, Just how did we do all that?, a question I find myself happily asking every year around this time.

A Sort Of Relief

Eid al Adha 1440

Just got back from Prayers at the masjid at Sungai Petai, followed by a cuppa with Hamzah and Aiman at the Old Town White Coffee just up the road. We have a day of visiting ahead, so I'm putting Foucault at his thorniest to one side. Quite a relief, to be honest.

20.55
Somehow I've contrived to both eat well today and finish The Birth of the Clinic. It helped that the food offered was excellent and I stopped trying to understand Foucault. Reading his account of the development of medicine as a wild prose poem proved far more satisfactory than I expected, whilst the mutton biriyani  put together by the Missus was just as satisfactory as expected, which was highly satisfactory indeed.