Day: February 11, 2020

Will No mean No?

Hahaha, remember this guy? Well, I studiously avoided his calls over christmas. As John commented, sooner or later he’d get the message.

This morning he turned up on my doorstep. With hindsight, I’m not really surprised – when god handed out subtlety, this guy was standing next to a house brick.

“I did call you a few times over christmas”, he says. Now, I’m fifty-two years old, I see no point is worrying about my own sublety, not in my own house. “Yes, I got your message but I didn’t reply because I didn’t want to go to lunch with you“, I said. Then I added, “You can’t come in because I am just getting ready to go out“, just in case he thought I’d make him a coffee. As it happened, I was going out. In terms of a time to visit, he’d timed it perfectly, from my perspective.So I sent the guy away.

I was polite but firm. Okay, maybe not so polite 🙂. But I wanted to be loud and clear. This guy, as I’ve said, is not the quickest on the uptake, so I’m wondering whether he’ll turn up again and I’ll just have to resort to “Pi** off and don’t come back“. I wonder if that’s direct enough?

I am a bit incredulous. I mean, if I don’t answer this guy’s calls on two separate phone lines, why then come around to my house? Just to have me to confirm it it personally? Or maybe to check whether both lines were faulty?

Mister Bump

I’m fifty-one. I”ve been married twenty years. It’s been a while since I broke up with somebody.

Once upon a time I did a bit of work for a big computer company. In fact, that was how I came to be living in this part of the world. Of course, while I was working with them, I met several of their employees. One guy in particular had some relation to the project I was there to deliver, so I had almost daily contact with him.

Their structure back then, they had two tiers of programmers. Some were the glory boys, whose job was to develop new products. Then there was another tier of plodders, whose job was to support existing products. It was a demarkation that I’ve never really seen with other clients.

This guy was one of the plodders. I speak as somebody who was strong enough that I…

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Tick Tock Tuesday (11 February 2020) – Apartheid

I thought I’d create a new challenge. It is a challenge primarily for me, because I’m new to this platform, and because you don’t really know me yet, nor I you. As my name suggests, I am recovering from a stroke, and I like to push myself in all kinds of little ways… including getting to know the Wonderful World of WordPress. Although this is something I will be doing, I invite you, if this idea takes your fancy, to play along with me and share with me some of your own selections.

My plan is: each Tuesday, until I run dry, I shall post some piece of art with which I have some connection – which has helped to mould me, which makes me tick. Okay, a piece of art is a bit vague – it might be a piece of music, a movie, a book, a painting, or ???? – so my phrasiology is deliberate. It might be anything – I will play this post by ear, so I’m not sure what I’ll think of each week. And, I’ll keep posting on the theme weekly until I run out of ideas.

My rules? Well, I’m not big on rules! My choice will be something with which I feel a connection. That’ll be the important thing, just having some kind of fleeting affection for something probably won’t be enough, unless I’m using my choice as an example of something bigger.

It will be one choice per week – I’m aware that long posts can be quite onerous to read, and I’m in no hurry to complete this so if I have two ideas, I’ll probably hold the second until the next week.

In that same vein, I’ve created this block as a Reusable Block, which I intend repeating for every post on this theme. The block ends with a full-width separator, so if you want to skip ahead each week it doesn’t really matter.

I probably won’t post any lyrics, or any kind of analysis – if you like my choice, the information will be out there for you. But I will try to briefly explain why I feel a connection to my choice, just to try and enhance readers’ understanding of what makes me tick.

I will tag my posts TTT and I will go looking for other posts with that tag. If you’d like to join in, please do the same, or comment, or pingback to this post, and feel free to reproduce my graphic. Lastly, I look forward to reading about what makes you tick.

I wanted to end my posts about one of my defining issues on a high. A couple of weeks ago, I talked about how a lot of bands used their music as a political expression against apartheid.

Another band which I met in my youth, and has been prolific throughout my life, is the British (Birmingham)-based reggae band, UB40. Whilst I’d not class them as a favourite, there’s obviously something about them, since I have accumulated 32 of their albums over the years! This is one of theirs. but you’ll have to listen to the lyrics to read the political meaning.

I chose this particular video because it was probably my favourite on YouTube. But unfortunately it doesn’t include the lyrics, which for me, make the song. If you wish, you can find them here.