Sep 16

 The week has passed by in a slurry of sleep.

Supposed to have been working on the stuck can't go anywhere problem this week, only to turn up and have this that and the other to do. Oh no. A client is down. Can you check if it's actually down and why.

It's down because the thing I told you last week to do - fix the memory, because otherwise the issue would happen again and cause everything to stop - you haven't done. Oh. Says Andy. Yeah. I saw the reminder I made myself at the weekend but didn't do it.

So then I waste time repeating myself, fixing a problem that was already diagnosed, and generally fucking the day up chasing laziness on your part. In the end I fixed the problem myself rather than wait for it to fail again. Fix registered. If you want it changed, you can go do the fix yourself.

Small potatoes really. But indicative.

And for me. Struggling with just getting work done. A reason to bother. Et al. It's not good. This is work on its "best behaviour" trying to convince me its a good thing.

Meh.

It's fine honestly. There are far worse fuckups and transgressions than that that go on.

I find that no matter the organisation, how fancy they are, how big they are, this kind of background ineptitude is a constant. I've worked for some of the biggest. And let me tell you. They suffer similar lapses of any kind of awareness or competence. Everything, in my experience, is a rolling clusterfuck that barely keeps shit together, and paddles very hard to make it look a lot smoother on the outside, than the chaos that goes on in the inside. People. As it turns out. Are kind of shit at doing stuff.

I worked late on Wednesday just to get to a finish point on the stuck can't go anywhere problem after being delayed by a bunch of other stuff, and also, flagging myself during the afternoon and taking a nap.

My state is barely functional. Better than it was. But still pretty poor. The constant daily diet of anti histamines are definitely taking the edge off. (Well, I say anti histamines, but it's a guess. I also take my asthma meds - a shot of steroids. And anti inflammatories. And to be honest all of those are probably good at defying my bullshit). My "first core sleep", around 5 hours or so on this before bed diet is way better quality, and a I stir with way less fog and glued eyes and bullshit. It seems to keep my head mostly clear. This is either genuine allergies at work being kept down to a minimum, or, my immune system being throttled so it doesn't go nuts on me long covid style as I sleep. Which of those it is, is impossible to say. My money is on the latter however.

Exhaustion is still a thing however. Hard to do stuff. Anything. I think half of it at this point is mental. And half is physical. And sleep. Sleep is just so dysfunctional at the moment. My exhaustion et al means I never get a wake up call. My body is never ready to stop sleeping and go. If I let it. I would just sleep round the clock. I will myself out of bed. No doubt the mental meds add some sauce onto that. They do make you sleepy at times, and it becomes very easy just to slip into naps. I could never do that before. Now. It's as easy as closing your eyes for 5 minutes and you disappear.

For the first time in a few weeks I went for a walk with Hazel. She requested a walk would be good. And with a gargantuan effort, the next day I got up, dressed and out before the sun went down. And we had a walk. It was nice.

On the drive over to pick her up I got a tingle about how nice it was. The perfect time of day. Driving. Dusk. Pretty skies. Cool temperatures. Listening to the radio. Driving along not in a hurry. This seems to cause a tiny glimmer of happiness in my undead corpse. I get a faint tingle of peace. It's like remembering something you haven't done in decades. It's the tiniest of things. And never lasts long. But it is there. Bizarrely, I think contentment to me at the moment is driving with the sun recently set, windows down, chilling, no appointments, no deadlines, just feeling the air swirl past. There is something faintly magical about it. I don't like the day. Never have. It's too awake. Too bright. Too full of people. Too full of noise and normality and rush and clock watching and blah. There's a change that settles over the world when the light starts to disappear. People rush to get home. Hide inside. Eat dinner. Close up. The world becomes quieter. Far less people. No rush. You can start to hear for miles. And as that happens I feel like I expand into the emptiness. I relax. Slow down. And just listen to the heartbeat of the world. Without the people. Night it also good. But. In recent years I've lost my tight affection for it. Once upon a time night was where I was at peace. I don't go and sit out at night hardly anymore. I am less exposed to it. And I feel the cold more. My eyes aren't as good. Ares is not here. Athena is sleepy and old. Dusk now feels better. And summers have become miserable waves of temperature. Too hot and muggy at night to enjoy. Or flips to too cold to sit out properly at night. Nights have become awkward. But still. I like them. Far better than the day time.

I think over the years the mental scars have only underlined that tendency with me. The daylight is a time of misery. Of dealing with bills. And offices. And bureaucracy. And phonecalls to sort shit out. Deadlines and getting things fixed. Of queues. And anxiety. For me. It's a negative space. Dusk and night is the reverse. All that commitment bullshit fades to zero, put on hold til tomorrow.

These days of course my days are pretty care free in that respect. I don't do shit no matter the time of day. Ha. But the scars remain.

I thought idly yesterday would I want to be able to get some of my youth back. What if someone offered me the chance to turn my age back to say mid 20's. At first glance. Sure. Health back. Stamina back. Oh my god everything would be so much better. But then I stopped. Going back to my mid 20's would probably mean I would need to work more again. More time left to live means more money you need to have. And. It would end up the same pattern. Giving up the best years of your life for a pittance of pay, before you know it, all those years are gone, you have a sum of money in your hand, and a burned out rest of your life.

So the question then really becomes. Would you like to relive your working life ?

No.

I would not.

To be sure it would probably be better this time around. More money at my back. Less worries. But still. Would it make that big of a difference. I don't think it would. I suspect the whole sell your body for money pattern would still be the main theme. Been there. Done that. There is no joy or sense of satisfaction there. Just monotony at best. Passing time to earn money to live. It's not a life. It's an existence. A survival strategy.

I'm not saying it's different for anyone else. This is the whole existence for most people. For me. It's not worth it. You survive. What other choice do you have ? But it's not good. Or happy. It's just one long low level burble of shit. Buying crap you don't need. Struggling to pay what you have to in order to keep going.. so you can work some more and repeat the exercise. If you're that way inclined you can intersperse it with a vacation. The true opiate of the masses. The vacation. Stuff yourself in a tin can with several hundred other people. Go sit on a beach 1,000 miles away. Then after a week. Resume your shit. Really ? That's what it's all about ?

No thanks.

Or just plunge your head in the sand, have kids, and get lots in the necessities of keeping another generation alive and well so they can grow up to have the same shit opportunities you had. Another generation of shit. Well done. But your biological mechanisms will give you some rewards for following your properly prescribed genetic destiny. Forwarding on those genes. Good job. Have some oxytocin. Have some dopamine. Good biological life form.

Fab.

It's pointless staring into this pool for long. There is no bottom to it. No meaning. Just rules that show you how you got there. There is no plan. No win. No happy ending. It's just chaos colliding together forming life and iterating. It's rather unfortunate - and self defeating - that life has along the way spontaneously given rise to a sense of purpose and meaning and all that. A glitch in the biological matrix. Thinking like that is only going to make you miserable. And prone to not forward your genes. And make you a weak link. Don't think about the meaning. The meaning is anti life. Literally.

Life is ridiculous. A no win scenario.

Eh well.

Have a cup of tea. Munch a biscuit. Do something pointless. It's all pointless. So make it something that maybe you kind of like. Or at the least. Helps pass the time.

So cheery.

Or be kind. Always room to be kind. You never know. Helping someone else might make their life less shit. Worth a shot ?