Day 291: Cook off

Been a busy old day today. Down to the station this morning for a train to Leeds for the cook-off for the new menu, clumsy shuffling me taking photos of the dishes for the spec sheets, someone has obviously mistaken me for a competent photographer - so day in Headingley trying to remember to take my lens cap off, not to set fire to my camera, also eating all the burgers and pizzas and mac ‘n’ cheese, then a quick stop in the Leeds city centre site, then a rammed rush-hour train back to Sheffield to go and work the close in our pub.

I am spangled now. I was doing all right and then I went up to the cellar at half ten and found three beers that needed cleaning, a load of empties that needed taking out before the delivery in the morning, a lift with the previous morning’s delivery that hadn’t been unloaded, and more empties in the lift room downstairs. And I hadn’t brought up the Belgian crates from downstairs yet, like I’d promised. And then cleaning one of the lines I splashed line cleaner all up my new jumper, bleaching the colour out of the wool and ruining it. I’d so liked that jumper the only two times I’d worn it.

And now tomorrow I need to spend a couple of hours of my day off editing the photos to send them across, which isn’t ideal. But on the other hand I’m being paid for it, and I wanted to do it, and said I would, and I got some nice shots of the bar for their and our social media, and as much free food as I could eat, and a day away in Leeds.

OK, maybe it’s tough being grateful for spending a day in Leeds. But the rest of it is all good.

Going bed now. Just realised it’s Wednesday tomorrow and I haven’t watched a film to review yet or done any work for it or even found a film that is available somewhere to watch.

That’s fine. Not a problem. I got this. I always got this.

...... 

Peter Brady, by Screeching Weasel. Perfect pop punk: wry, wild, and raw. BOY, I've really learned a lot today. One: You act your age. Two: Don't try to be something you're not. Three: You find out in advance what restaurant your mom and dad are going to, and go someplace else!

Day 289: Middling

Day has been fine. Fair. Middling. Absolutely acceptable. Head was gooped up and mushy this morning, but slurped coffee and slouched around until I came awake. Played a bit of a new free-to-play PlayStation shooter that everyone is raving about with Alex and Mike, we got shot accurately and often, which was impressive to say how much the three of us were flailing around madly. I imagine it was like having to hit a gaggle of burning piglets. Charging every which way, bumping into walls, flinging ourselves off ledges. Still, the enemy players managed to repeatedly make short work of us. Well done, enemy players, well done.

Spent the evening editing photos for work’s social media, after filling my camera with shots over quiet shifts last week. I put my kit lens back on, mostly at 18-24mm ish, after months shooting with only my 50mm prime, and it was great to experiment with the wider angles. My camera, as I think with all DSLRs cheaper than about a grand, is a cropped sensor, so it only captures the centre of the image - so with a 50mm lens you’re really zoomed in. It’s great for a can of beer at work, a close-up of someone’s face, but for anything wider you have to stand down the other end of the pub, which isn’t ideal. There were some nice pictures came out of it all, and it’s always good to know I’ve got the next week or so’s posts lined up. It’s just another stress when everything is getting on top of me to know I’m going to have to take time out of an already busy shift to figure out something to photograph, line it up, edit it, fiddle with computers and phones. Everyone in the company, friends of bar staff, have been saying how good the pics are, but how my brain takes that is now there’s an expectation that I have to consistently live up to, which expectation is obviously unfounded and it’s only a matter of time before they all discover what a revolting fraud I am.

Idiot brain. But anyway, good to have a load of pics on my Google Drive and for that pressure to recede for a week or two.

Other than that, had a day of chores, washing and the like. Played guitar, did the exercises I am currently working on, little 1-2-3. 2-3-4 patterns up and down the major scale, outside and inside string picking, strumming specific numbers of strings, that sort of thing. Basic, boring stuff, but it’s my homework, so I’m doing it. And then a bit of improvising over a blues shuffle with the minor pentatonic in positions one and two, which I’m too embarrassed to do with the amp on lest my neighbours hear how much of a beginner I am, but it’s still lots of fun.

Work early tomorrow, best get off now. Ta ra.

……

Music: Nothing’s Real but Love, by Rebecca Ferguson. You know what, I didn’t know this was a song by an X-Factor finalist. That’s because I’m not a complete loser, like you are. I don’t waste my time with that rubbish. I just play videogames inexpertly against teenagers and work in a pub. But this song is good! Nothing is real but love. Cups. Shoes. Payment protection insurance. It’s all made up. In our heads. But love is what moves the cosmos beneath its shifting illusory forms. Maybe a shame it takes a reality television star to remind us of that, but whatever. Take grace where you find it, I say. Byeee!

Day 168: Triviality

My leg is itchy. I have an itchy leg. The computer’s fan is whirring. The traffic is going by outside. I’m home, I’ve been sat up for hours editing photos. The initial idea of buying a camera was to have something that I’m patently not good at, something to do just as a hobby for myself, to have fun with, as a counter to the stress and perfectionism I feel with writing. But of course I’ve very quickly assimilated the basic rules of photography, started taking it way too seriously, rapidly run up against the wall of my own limitations, and found myself fundamentally disappointed in my lack of talent, in the same way I am with writing, and with everything I do.

Which is so dumb! I’ve had a camera for less than a year now. I barely ever take it out. And my pictures aren’t bad at all. Most of them are bad, but I guess most of most people’s are like that, and there are usually a few from a day out that I end up liking after they’ve been edited. And that’s not cheating; maybe there are prodigies who take gorgeous shots every time, like prodigies who can play classical piano before they’re out of nappies, or who can sit and write pure poetry straight onto the page. But for the rest of us mere mortals it’s always a numbers game - creativity involves a whole lot of creation, and a whole lot of sifting through the rubbish. You vomit out rivers of puke every day, and then you wade through those rivers looking for diamonds. That’s just the job. So get over yourself and pull on the wellington boots and stomp into that sick

I’ve been feeling icky and greasy and gross again today, spotty and ugly, sweating in old grey clothes on the train. But I’ve tried to not pay that any mind. So what? I’ve said to that negative voice. Oh soooo whaaaat? Who gives a fuck? Maybe I’m the grossest person alive. Maybe not. Maybe I am. But what difference does it make? Is worrying it might be true going to do a single thing to change it? No. So might as well just get on with living. Put warm compresses on my eye to try to head off an infection. Unpack my bags. Do social media for work. Put a pic on my own Instagram. Edit photos from the trip.

And now do my teeth and go to bed and get up for the open tomorrow. Just get on with it. Stop letting something as trivial as thoughts hold me back. Fuck those thoughts. They’ve got no power here.

Day 116: Mirror

There are children playing in the mirror pool in the centre of Bradford. The fountains shoot high into the air and the sun is low and the families wait with pushchairs while the children run into the water shrieking. One little girl in purple shalwar kameez wanders serenely, golden sunlight in her hair, and the shallowness of the pool and the reflections on the surface give the impression that she is walking on water.

I am with my mother and uncle, we are going to the galleries, exploring the old mills, wandering round the ostentatious Victorian brick buildings lining the streets. We view the Hockney exhibition, rascally and bright and vivacious. We eat carrot cake in the bookshop cafe in the old wool exchange; sit looking out over the balcony discussing Corinthian capitals and gerrymandering and Trump. All conversations lead to Trump, inevitably. My uncle buys a book about the apostles. I buy No Logo by Naomi Klein.

We spy opportunities for photographs on the backstreets, but the sky is grey and the lighting flat; then we move away and the sun comes out and the shadows leap. We climb a cobbled hill and my mum says her head is "bleugh", she's not taken her medication, we feel selfish and tell her to go at her own pace, everything is OK. We walk past white girls gossiping on red bricks walls, unemployed white men gobbing on the floor, Asian kids playing with tennis balls in the shade. A group of Asian lads come up to us to ask how we're doing, to shake our hands, to wish us a happy Eid. We had planned to find a good spot for curry but Mum needs her medication and I'm beat from work and so we turn instead for home.

Winding in through the suburbs of High Green and Grenoside and Hillsborough I see the Hallamshire rising out of the trees on the hill in the distance, and I feel that bittersweet sadness of returning home. Work first thing tomorrow. Saying goodbyes to family. Darkness drawing in. But no escaping into whisky glasses or spliff smoke; stand instead inside the sadness, let the lonely wolf of my heart howl.

Another day down. Tick it off. Find strength in this, and carry on.

Day 108: Photographs

Something different today. Word-sketches based on the photographs of Steve McCurry, whose work I adore. I was feeling flat and uninspired, so I looked through some pictures, opened my notebook, loosened my brain, and let the words spill out.

The door cracks in blue ointment as brusque feet splosh in plodding rain. Inky reflections run universal, a space opera splayed on tiled water, sandals slop in marching lanes. A chequered brick bracketed wonder, the wall sighing, lugubrious rain slowly flows. Drifts, dollops, sadness clinging, a loony god measures one more crying day.

- - -

The glassy luminance of a pale river. Banked greenery distantly settled. Depths of marble spread buttered castaways, sunken treasure in rising paths. Spire sparkles, heaven's glory spilling forth. Plaza houses, river paddles, minted teas by dusky banks. Cracks in glory billows breathless air in clouds rocked with gold. The air sharp, tangy. The fisherman goops in delicate joust.

- - -

Dark pupils pierce a frame of razors, wet gangles crisping locks fall coiling, massing bed of opals upon the ground. The father bent with steadfast hands of working day. Ears jut jugbowls resting on shoulder's haunch. The hair falls in glinting daggers to snitch-snitch of busy clippers, mellifluous pupils silent stare. Tight pendant weight. Necklace choker. Mother's hand cracked chestnut stone of ages. Child sat still with panther's poise.