Disordered Thoughts and Curmudgeonly Ramblings
It’s budget day! The one day of the year when being a single, childless, mid-thirties, fully employed, tax-paying, caucasian male doesn’t actually pay off.
You don’t think that maybe next year you could include some kind of stimulus payment for people who quietly contribute to the economy without demanding child-care, educational support, unemployment benefits or family payments? Just a few dollars? Please? ;D
I’ve been feeling so run down this last week that I’ve pretty much been neglecting everything – both online and offline. I didn’t even make it to the local dawn service yesterday – something I normally never miss – because I couldn’t drag myself out of bed.
On the subject of ANZAC Day, this photo of mine has had over 9,000 hits today, all of them coming from various utility pages on Flickr. I guess they must have put some kind of gallery up, but damned if I can find it.
Hmmm, over 9,000?
Sorry 🙂
I fell over yesterday.
The reason that I see this as being at all blogworthy is that I almost never fall over. I trip over things with depressing regularity, but my sense of balance is so good and my reflexes so sharp that recovering equilibrium before hitting the floor is pretty much a given. It’s been almost ten years since I last thumped into the ground, so tripping over my own feet on the walk home from the train station last night is quite notable.
The reason for this remarkable record is – somewhat paradoxically – the fact that my ankles are rather sub-par in the whole “keep the rest of the body upright” department. As the result of an old injury they have a tendency to occasionally go on strike without warning, sending me plummeting groundwards while walking, running, or just standing around discussing Wittgenstein. This constant threat has honed my reflexes to the point where I can instantly recover my balance in all but the most dire of circumstances (the last time I fell was because I was in a room packed with junk and there was no room to maneuver).
Last night my left ankle collapsed so catastrophically that all my efforts to recover proved inadequate. I went down (somehow) on my right side, thudding into the concrete pavement, skinning both my palms and lightly bruising my arm and leg. I did however manage to roll into the fall, with the result that when the dust cleared I was sitting neatly upright and able to exclaim a loud “CRAP!” before getting up, dusting myself down and continuing on my way.
Of all the days to fall, yesterday was a good choice. Autumn has finally rolled in and the day was nice and cool. As a consequence I had got my heavy, wool coat out of storage for the first time this year and it absorbed a lot of the impact. Had I not been wearing this most excellent accessory I’m confident I would have scrapped quite a lot of skin off my right arm and been in substantial pain. As it happens I’m just aching a bit, which is easily dealt with.
So, let’s see if I can go another ten years without going arse over feet again 🙂
Some final commentary courtesy of The Drowning Pool and America’s favourite Televangelist Benny Hinn…
There’s a theory that says a new century doesn’t really start until something shocking happens that shakes people up and completely changes their view of the world. The 21st century for instance didn’t actually begin for the western world until September 11th 2001. Similarly, the western world’s 20th century began 100 years ago today – April 15th 1912 – when the Titanic sank below the waves, taking the Victorian belief in man’s triumph over nature with it.
I don’t know if the theory could be considered “right”, but it’s interesting to think about.
Everyone’s going to be talking Titanic today, so that’s all I’ll say on the subject.
Idiot clients aside, I had quite an interesting Friday. For a while we’ve been employing a programmer from Brazil and as of a few months back we’ve been sponsoring him for a permanent residency visa (or whatever it’s called). Last week it finally came through, and by way of thanks he took us all out for lunch to a Brazilian barbecue restaurant in Subiaco.
Brazilian barbecue is pretty awesome. You sit around the table and they continuously bring you giant skewers of meat. If you want what’s on the skewer you signal so by turning a coaster-like piece of cardboard to the green side, and they chop some off onto your plate. If you’re not interested in this particular skewer you turn the coaster to the red side. They also load down the table with salads, sauces and sides, and the sides and skewers just keep coming until you’re too bloated to move.
Particularly good was the chicken wrapped in bacon, the cheese bread, the deep fried banana and (of all things) the barbecued pineapple. The Guaraná Antarctica was also great – like Red Bull mixed with Passiona – I may have to to track down a supplier.
It was a great way to spend a couple of hours, although by the end of it we all just wanted to go home and sleep. If I did have one criticism it was that the beef was rather rare – call me a philistine but I’m of the man cook meat with fire school of cookery and prefer my food not to bleed all over the plate while I’m cutting it.
I shall attempt to arrange a return visit with my carnivorous friends as a matter of urgency.
Now (as a complete non-sequiter) back in 1999 when Dave Faulkner and Kim Salmon were choosing a name for their musical collaboration and the album produced thereof Google was barely in spark in Larry Page and Sergey Brin’s eyes. This may explain why they selected “Antenna” and “Installation”. Fast forward the the hectic teens of the 21st century and you try Googling information on “Antenna” and “Installation”. I can guarantee you won’t find anything concerning Australian music until about page fifty.
The reason I mention this is for years I’ve been trying to identify a song off that album. I knew the name “Ten Four”, and knew that it was by an Australian collaboration that called themselves something like “Aerial”, but had absolutely no luck tracking it down. It wasn’t until a few months back that I began an intensive series of Google searches to try and crack the mystery once and for all.
I eventually (obviously) did it, but it took several hours of typing in various combinations of keywords and reading through reams and reams of pages about Australian musical collaborations. Making things even more complicated was the fact that the song isn’t “Ten Four”, it’s “10-4”, which again makes things more complicated than they have to be.
But now I have it! The information that is. I don’t have the song because it doesn’t appear to online anywhere. It’s not on YouTube or any other video sharing site I’ve tried, and the iTunes store doesn’t even acknowledge that Antenna ever existed. I rather suspect I’ll have to track down a copy of Installation on eBay if I ever want to hear the song again.
Ah well, such is life.
Gotta go clean the bathroom now. That qualifies as “such is life” as well…
Now this is a really good read….
Schrödinger’s Rapist: or a guy’s guide to approaching strange women without being maced
It basically sums up why I don’t approach unfamiliar women under any circumstances. My social and non-verbal communication skills are so terrible that I’ve always assumed that any woman I see (or rather, who sees me) will assume that I’m some kind of monster, and so – out of respect – I go out of my way not to inflict myself on them.
It’s nice to read some confirmation that I’m not completely mad after all 🙂
I was raised as a Catholic. I no longer consider myself a Catholic – not least because of the many insane and often downright evil things the Church has done (and unbelievably, continues to do) – and these days consider myself a theist-leaning agnostic. Basically, I believe in a deity, and believe it is possible to have a fulfilling personal relationship with said deity, but happily admit that the existence of said deity is completely unprovable and thus I could very easily be completely mistaken about the whole matter. As such I refuse to judge anyone on the existence or non-existence of their religious or spiritual beliefs, so long as they’re not going around using their faith as a justification for killing, raping, or otherwise being a complete douche (or trying to convert me I suppose – I don’t try and convince them that I have the answers, I expect the same courtesy in return).
That all said, if I didn’t make it to church at least once over Easter my mother would probably disown me, so I headed up to good old Saint Columba’s on Saturday night for the Easter Vigil.
As Masses go, the Easter Vigil is pretty cool. It’s easily the most pagan of all of the Catholic Church’s ceremonies, having absorbed a lot of the “start of spring, return of the sun” symbolism from across old Europe. When it’s done properly it’s also really theatrical and dramatic – which is perhaps the most important aspect of big, collective religious ritual.
The symbolism of the Mass is the resurrection of Christ from death, symbolised by light and dark respectively. All the lights in the church are extinguished and everyone collects outside in the darkness where a fire is burning (unless the Priest is skimping on things and can’t be bothered – back when I attended church regularly one of our Priests use to just light a candle instead, which annoyed me no end. Bonfires have been lit at the start of the northern spring for thousands of years, a candle has no ancestral continuity). The fire is blessed, and then a big candle (the Pascal candle if you want to get technical), decorated with the the Chi-Rho symbol is brought forward. The Priest ritually inscribes the wounds of Christ on the candle, invoking some of the most mystical poetry of the Church with each cut…
Christ yesterday and today,
The beginning and the end,
Alpha and Omega,
All time belongs to him,
And all ages,
To him be glory and power,
Through every age and for ever,
Call it Catholic brainwashing but even today – with the fire and the darkness and the crowd standing in dead silence – that still sends a shiver down my spine.
The candle – which will go on to symbolise Christ by being lit during every service for the following year – is lit from the fire, then the flame from the candle is passed out to the congregation, who are each holding a candle of their own. The candle bearing crowd then return into the church, and the Pascal candle is carried in in procession with the Priest intoning “Christ, Our Light!” three times, at which point – ideally – someone standing at the fuse box flips a switch and all the lights in the church crash on in a blaze of glory.
Regardless of what one thinks of the theology, when done well it’s mighty impressive.
Then there’s the reading of the Exsultet – a quite long, although very poetic prayer. It’s another bit of the vigil service that I always enjoy, as (again) it’s quite mystical and ritualistic, but it’s also happy. So much of the Catholic faith is sad and guilt ridden, going on about how everyone’s a miserable sinner, but for once this is the Church cheering about how it’s saviour kicked (theologically speaking) death’s arse and came back. It’s a moment of pure celebration and joy, which is not something the Catholic Church is generally very good at.
I’m tempted to include the whole thing here, but it’s quite long and up on Wikipedia anyway if anyone’s really interested, so here’s just a snippet…
The power of this holy night dispels all evil,
Washes guilt away, restores lost innocence,
Brings mourners joy,
It casts out hatred, brings us peace,
And humbles earthly pride,
Night truly blessed when heaven is wedded to earth,
And man is reconciled with God,
Now, this Saturday just gone the whole fire and candle thing was done quite well, although they decided to do the Exsultet by candlelight and not switch on the lights until afterwards. The Exsultet itself on the other hand was a mess.
It was sung, and sung to the most god-awful tune I think I’ve ever heard – two bars based around a descending scale over and over again. And with a four line chorus – sung to exactly the same two bars (repeated twice) – inserted every four lines. It drained the words of any poetry or feeling, sounded like a funeral dirge and took a good ten minutes, although it felt much, much longer. It was torture – by the end of it I was ready to set my hair on fire just to make it stop.
After that things went as they normally do – although it’s the first time I’ve set foot in a church since Pope Ratzinger re-translated the liturgy so I kept getting the responses wrong (when someone in a robe addresses me with “Peace be with you’, it’s a Pavlovian reaction for me to blurt out “and also with you” – not this new-fangled “and with your spirit” or whatever the hell else it’s meant to be).
The service finished up just before nine and I headed home, having not quite got my yearly fill of ritual and mysticism this time round. I wonder if the Buddhists down on Guildford Road are up to anything this time of year… 😉
Saw a sign for a building company today – Stonehenge Constructions.
So, they build everything out of rocks, keep changing the plans and take hundreds of years to finish the job?
😉
Most years I do something wild and wacky with the site for April Fool’s Day. This year I simply haven’t had the time. So, I’m afraid, there’s nothing to see here.
If you do want something wild and wacky however, can I recommend OMFGDOGS?
Oh, and Wikipedia is having it’s usual fun.
Apathy is sad.
I have a list of things to do as long as my arm, but can’t seem to get motivated to do any of them.
I just sit around surfing the net and watching TV.
I think it’s some kind of psychological hangover from my failed holiday – the brutal come down from all excitement and anticipation, combined with anxiety about the amount of money I’ve lost.
I hope I’ll snap out of it soon, but in the meantime you’ll all have to forgive me for being a dull, inactive, inattentive bastard.
Forever alone!
So, the other day I was talking to a friend (you know who you are 😉 ) and the subject of valentines day came up. They mentioned they were having a rough time with it because they were single, then backtracked and acknowledged that I was single too, but that I’m “single by choice” and so it’s not quite the same thing…
Well. The thing is I’m not single by choice, I’m single by no choice.
I’m austistic. Now, being autistic has about as many different effects on people’s lives as there are autistic people, but the major debilitary effect it has on my life is a near complete lack of social instincts and a general inability to pick up on those mysterious channels of non-verbal communication that all you neurotypicals take for granted.
This is not terribly unusual for us autistics, and there are ways around it. Intensive study, social counseling and general life experience can help. Hell, the last one is the sole reason I can fit into society at all. But I wasn’t diagnosed with aspergers syndrome (my particular flavour of autism) until my late 20’s, by which point it’s hard – not to mention expensive – to try and undo years of damage from living in a society that’s essentially completely alien to you (and not realising why everything is so damn hard).
So, as a result of both my neurological state and years of unintentional abuse from a world that makes no sense I just don’t know how to do the whole relationship thing (and please note: in the term ‘relationship’ I include everything from living happily ever after with one’s soul mate to a quickie in a nightclub toilet stall). I don’t know how to approach someone, I don’t know how to talk to them, I don’t know how to indicate interest, I don’t know how to recognise any interest that may be being directed at me and, if I did somehow manage to recognise it, I have no idea how to reciprocate it. That kind of thing is just not in my skillset – and it would have to be in my skillset, because it’s not in my instinct-set either.
Now at this point some may scoff and make noises about how I’m overthinking things and I should just relax and let things happen naturally. Well, I’ve been doing that for over twenty years and no dice. The thing one has to realise is that the autistic brain just doesn’t work the way a neurotypical one does. The automatic systems that do all the heavy-social lifting stuff, quietly and in the background, are either unreliable or missing entirely. So social stuff is work. Hard work. And work that you need to be shown how to do, because you’ve got absolutely no idea where to start. The vast savannah of all possible behaviours is laid out before you, and you don’t have even the most rudimentary map to show you what path leads to the tourist lodge and how to avoid the lions.
There’s also the fact that not only am I congenitally socially incompetent, I’m also massively underexperienced. By your mid-thirties you should have basic social interaction – let alone social interaction of a more intimate nature – pretty much sorted out. You can make judgements on what to do and what not to do based both on your inbuilt social instincts and your years of experience. Well I don’t have those years of experience. Social interaction is hard enough without the added pressure of making some kind of rookie mistake that everyone else has been avoiding since their teens.
Add it all up and the stress and difficulty is just overwhelming. As a result I’ve more or less resigned myself to not experiencing the relationship component of life, and given up trying.
So, I’m single by no choice. Does this mean I sit around at home in the dark wailing in loneliness? No (mostly). I may not have a choice about being single, but I do have a choice about how I can deal with being single. I can wallow in self-pity and complain about how unfair it all is, or I can pull myself together and focus on the good stuff in my life. Good friends, good food, good music, a stable society, a safe place to sleep at night, socialised health care, access to funny cat videos on the internet, etcetera. It’s not always easy, when work or life or the state of the world are stressing me out it can be soul-wrenchingly hard to come home to an dark apartment and an empty bed, but on the whole it ain’t so bad. I can at least laugh about it and spend my valentines day’s considering how much money I’m saving not having to spend $20 per stem on hothouse roses and overpriced chocolates 🙂
