Why on EARTH have I suddenly got ads about G*d and Baby J*s*s appearing at the top of my blog???

Weird!!!!

What brought that on??

Yes, Ruth, he's trying REALLY hard to show how much he loves you - but - be honest - do you give a ****????

And what are the omens saying????

AAAAARRRGGGHHH!!!!!!!

(Too much like a year ago for comfort.... and I have had 2 (proper, ie lots of gin), martinis!!!)

PS Except, of course, I didn't have the lovely Sam waiting for me....

PPS Although admittedly, I didn't have 3 under 16 brats holding me back...

PPPS And what is this about the special 'top'? Some way of restoring the self esteem of post-mastectomy subjects????

PPPPS Sorry, that was bitchy, but I still have both of mine and I wish I was generating that amount of attention...

PPPPPS Sorry sorry, that really IS the gin talking!!!!

Another good night, with lots of dreams. I remember waking up and looking at the clock at 4 something, then going straight back to sleep, and when I looked at the clock again, it was 6:13.
It’s tempting to say ‘it won’t last’. How can I turn that around, to say, ‘enjoy it while you can’? The counsellor on Thursday asked, do I ever think ‘It won’t last’ about the bad times? And of course I don’t, not really. ‘This too must pass’. Where does that line come from? It sounds like an oracle.
The secret of life, the ‘ultimate answer’, has to be something like that. Like the great god’s message to his creation : ‘We apologise for the inconvenience’ (‘So Long, and Thanks for all the Fish’, Douglas Adams). Or the four noble truths. Something so simple and banal, on one level, that it’s overlooked, that it has to keep being reiterated. That we start again, every day that we move forward from this point, that we keep trying.
We all want to have a clever answer, something which will help us to bypass all that stuff, a magic bullet. But maybe this is it. Just that you get up every morning and get on with it. And if you’ve tried it a million times before and it hasn’t worked, but you know in your heart it’s the right thing, you try again.
AH, BUT – (there’s always an ‘ah but’) – how do you know it’s the ‘right thing’? Maybe you ARE just bashing your head against a wall, trying and trying and trying and never getting anywhere. All you have to follow is your instinct. Joseph Campbell said: ‘Follow your bliss’. But that could mean anything. Where is the Tao? It is here and nowhere.
All this is just patterns our human consciousness tries to impose on a random universe. Except that the universe is not entirely random of course, and neither is human consciousness. There are patterns, but patterns which are never laid down in stone. As in Godel’s theorem, there cannot exist a set which has no exceptions, including this one. (I’m paraphrasing there, and have probably got it completely wrong, it’s a long time since I read this stuff). All generalisations are false, including this one. All systems contain their own contradictions.
Enough philosophising. It’s a beautiful morning, and the cats want feeding.

A year last weekend since I was in Rome (and strolling round the Colosseum at midnight with the Crazy Frog… sigh…)
Which means it’s a year on Wednesday since we got the kitten.
I’m still here… and so is she.
A year of intense emotions, intense work, intense writing (but minimal publication), decisions deferred (or taken by default.)
The cracks have been polyfillaed, papered, given a lick of paint.
Progress??? One step forward, two steps back.
Regrets??? Don’t ask.
Life goes on.