Lockdown Diary - Monday 29th June 2020

It's Monday again and the weekend is gone.  For a variety of reasons, much of the time I feel I am just treading water, time is passing and my life is either stuck in the slow lane or, more likely in stasis, going nowhere. Fast. I am attempting to change things but progress is slow to non-existent and I am both restless and impatient. Not a great combination, though thanks to meditation and yoga I am more chilled than I used to be.  Allegedly that's a good thing.

I didn't sleep too well last night, very restless owing, in part at least, to one of those strange dreams where you're looking for something which you need to find urgently, but where just as you think you've found what you're searching for, it changes into something else, and the search must continue. As futile as Sisyphus' efforts in the myth named after him. After such dreams I always awake with a sense of unease.

Organised and set up for yoga just before 10 a.m. and Zoomed in.  Another great 75 minutes despite the ache in my neck and left shoulder. It remains the best possible start to the week.

Need to make a couple of NHS calls today: one on behalf of my wife and one to the hospital about my operation, or at least the drugs I'll be taking up until the op.

I'm also going to listen to yesterday's Freak Zone on the Sounds app. I'm going to make a regular date with this each week as it is still one of the best places to hear new music across a broad spectrum of styles, current and past. First though, I need to get these calls made and read the gas and leccy meters.

I've finished listening to the latest Freak Zone: not one of the better ones, but I did pick up on an early taster from an album due out in the second week of July by a band called World Sanguine Report. They sound like a cross between Tom Waits and early Nick Cave: I will need to check out the album when it's released.

As part of my mission to make the most of my Mondays, I decided to watch the first lesson in the Idler three-part course, 'A Brief Introduction to Anarchism'.  A good start and suitably thought-provoking, touching on some of the things I'm thinking about at the moment.

After that I decided it was time to catch up on 'Ulysses'.  I didn't have time to read any yesterday and so decided to make a bit of a push forwards today.  I'm now in sight of the end of the chapter, which also is the last chapter in book I. 'Proteus' is almost entirely Stephen's thoughts as he walks along the beach at Sandymount. Every so often his thoughts are interrupted, or more properly re-directed, by events happening on the beach around him. Apart from his thoughts about visiting his Aunt Sara, for the most part of the chapter his thoughts are very intellectual, touching on philosophy, science, poetry, history, the Bible and more. Only latterly, in the warmth of the June sun, do his thoughts wander to more earthly delights.  The contrast between the description of the real events before him, the beach, the sea shore, and more, is marked.  At times you can easily follow his thoughts, in fact his train of thought, especially when events from earlier in the day bubble to the surface. Joyce's language in describing the strand and the features of it, bring forth the smells of the sea, the sound of seaweed crunching under foot, the feeling of sand giving way beneath his feet. At times his descriptive powers are breathtaking. In the face of such genius, why even try to write?

...and before you know it, time to make dinner again, this time with son #3. Bit of a debate about veg, but soon sorted and prep under way. The usual gathering to watch another episode of 'Altered Carbon' and then the inevitable clearing up before heading bedwards. 

Sticking with 2020 and an album I've spoken about a lot.  The second track I've chosen from this album too. From 'Primitif', this is Jack Hues with 'A Long Time'. I love this song and the album just gets better and better the more I listen to it.

[[Pop trivia: Jack Hues is stage name. His real name is Jeremy Ryder. Jack Hues is a homophone for the French phrase, 'J'accuse', a little play on words.]]

[[]]