Here we are at Week 570.
It’s been a shit week for me. Not much change there then!!
But as well as all the day to day shitiness, I’ve been having computer problems and this only emphasises what I fucking hate about them. I know nothing. I don’t want to know anything and anything that I learn or need to remember is so fucking soul destroying that I forget and I get a tiny bit peeved with myself!
…That’s an understatement. I want to kill people!
But when I think on it, I wouldn’t do anything to change the way that I am!! I’d still rather be ignorant about certain things.
I’ve always had the same problem when something bores me to distraction, what should stick doesn’t. Up until June last year, I had a twice yearly pile of shit that I had to pass. Basically, it was all the same questions. I have done the same course sixteen times and not once did I get all the way through. Sometimes it took me six goes to correct a multiple choice question with four answers!
This may be a bit controversial and I’ve mentioned it on many occasions, but I blame ‘1984’ – Not the year, I had a belting time!! The book. That was the first book that I remember boring me so much that I wanted to hurt myself. I reckon that from then on, I have a low boredom threshold with very little tolerance – My mind just says, ‘Nup!! Ah’m I fuck!!’
I resent computers.
I resent that we have to use them.
I resent their systems.
I resent having to remember every password for whatever the fuck.
I resent them changing a system that you have purchased.
I resent that the fuckers who own these companies have more money than a horse with a dodgy stomach can shit.
I resent speaking to condescending wankers when you need another computer or you need one fixed.
But I do love working on the site, so I’ll need to suffer in ranting fury!!
Me and Gerry or should that be Gerry and I.?? Were commenting back and forth regarding a posting and collective nouns. Weirdly, due to this, I found a cracking acronym. I’ll come to that but just give those who need a kick up the hole, a kick up the hole!
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, comments cause inspiration!
Anyhow, I’d been looking for a stronger term for all the reality wankers. (Those that need a kick up the hole!) All I could come up with was show-off. But our Australian friends have a brilliant Acronym for them, ‘FIGJAM’
Fuck I’m Good Just Ask Me.
I will pass this onto as many folks as I can!!!
Gerry stated that he enjoyed collective nouns but found them difficult to drop into conversation. I realised that they’re only really used in English exams.
And in a nod to Leila, I have a list. Not of correct ones, that wouldn’t do at all, but ones that makes sense to me.
Here’s what I have so far, please indulge yourselves and be as depraved, or even better, truthful as you can. I’d be very interested to see what you can come up with.
A rug of Guinea Pigs.
A truth of politicians. (I’m sure folks will realise that I’m being ironic.)
A parasite of lords. (That could work for royalty)
A frenzy of Lawyers. (A nod to their spiritual animal)
A boring of new parents.
A FIGJAM of reality stars. (I didn’t know this but found it when I was looking for an alternative for show-off – Fuck I’m Good Just Ask Me.)
An irritation of toddlers.
A sociopath of teenagers.
A world domination of cats.
An establishment of Jeffrey Epstein’s paedo pals.
Give it a think and let me know.
…Moving on.
At the time of writing this (3rd Feb.) I noticed that it was the anniversary of Buddy Holly’s death. (Big Bopper and Ritchie Valens also.) I decided I wanted to play a tribute. Maybe ‘Not Fade Away’ would have been more appropriate but I have always loved the beauty and simplicity of this song.
Okay, onto this weeks stories.
We had three new folks who we welcome. We hope that they have fun on the site and that they continue to send us their work. We also have a returner and a well established writer of the site. Normally I’d say here that our initial comments would follow but due to the computer problems I’m having, I’ve not been able to access that particular system, so I’ll wing it as I go along.
First off on Monday we had our first new writer, Ross Hetherington. His story was called, ‘The Cats Game’
This was an imaginative, unnerving and lyrical story from a writer who has a brilliant tone to his work.
Next up was our second new writer, Manoela Torres. Riptide is full of imagery, and wonderful little asides and revelations of character(s). It deals with slight envy turning to jealousy which leads to a tragic conclusion.
On Wednesday we were delighted to see the return of Stephen Silvester. His story, ‘A Telephone Call’ was a tale of love and grief. The setting and the ladies are perfect for the unfolding situation.
Matthew Roy Davey had story number eight published on Thursday. It was Ends This was a thought provoking story, we all know about this horrific time in history. Check out this writer’s back catalogue as he always does interesting work. (‘Summoning The Toads’ is a particular favourite of mine.)
Last up was another newbie, Robert Reece, with, ‘Solaritude.’
This story focussed on despair, rebellion and suicide.
That’s us for another week. Just the usual reminders, keep on commenting. And if you are a shy wee soul who wants to comment but is scared, let me say, in my countries beautiful and lyrical tongue…
‘Dinnae be a fearty-baws, we’ll no bite!!!’
And please folks, if someone has commented, at least say ‘Thanks’.
To finish off, I just wanted to pass on that when the inventor of ‘Tupperware’ died it took them four hours to bury him. They couldn’t find a coffin lid that fitted.
I’ve been wanting to play this song for a long while. I reckon this is one of the most underrated songs from this group. They have done many belters and a few stinkers but I enjoy this one!
Hugh
(Gary Moore also did a cracking version)
literally stories 
Hi Hugh
You had me laughing about your hate for computers and FIGJAM! Lol. That sounds like something my father would have labelled upper management with.
I hate all the updating, virus protection, and the constant obsolescence of Windows (so you have to pay). Got so sick of that bullshit. The last time I had to pony up for a computer I went with a Chromebook, and life has become simpler.
I like George Orwell a lot, but I haven’t read 1984.
A murder of crows… Is the one that came to my mind. I think it’s because they hunt their arch enemy, owls in flocks. Crows will find a way to survive. Google just informed me I’m wrong again. It came from the 15th century when they got labelled for scavenging battlefields. I’ll have the three day corpse special with a side of eyeball, please.
Great and entering read!
Christopher
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hi Christopher,
I hate and am always suspicious when we are forced to do something. It may not seem so and we supposedly still have choice but we are being forced to do so much due to so called technology and the benefits. (??)
Take a mobile for example – The multitude of apps that we use to navigate our lives have slowly evolved. (I still have never owned a mobile and I hope that I never will)
But how much information and observation is taken from them??
HAH! That does tie into the ideas of ‘1984’. So no matter how much the book bored me, I tip my hat to his foresight and perception!!
Thanks as always my fine friend.
Hugh
LikeLike
“Great and entertaining read” –have to work on proof reading again.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hi Christopher.
Confession time!
I could have edited the post for you but I liked the idea of another comment!!!
Stay happy and inspired my fine friend.
Hugh
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hugh
Considering all the hell a certain site has put you through, you haven’t missed a beat. The Buddy Holly crash happened a month to the day after I was born. I do not how far the other guys might have gone (though their deaths were no less tragic), but he might have been bigger than Elvis because he wrote his own stuff and at twenty-two already had a pile of self written hits (good ones too) that only Dylan and the Beatles would surpass any time soon. Still the Valens’ movie, La Bamba (sp) is much better than The Buddy Holly Story (though Busey was very good as Buddy).
Technology is an aggravation. Used to be that you could buy a TV, plug it in and push the button and open a beer. I had to set up my brother’s new “smart TV” yesterday. He gave up. It took an hour and a half.
Progress.
Right.
Take care and thank you for your rage!
Leila
LikeLike
Hi Leila,
I’ll need to invest in a DVD player one of these days. If Gwen walks out on me and the TV gives up, there is no way in hell that I would spend anytime trying to set another one up!
…Unless I’d won the lottery. I’d try and if I couldn’t I’d attack it with my Tomahawk and Blow-Torch. Then I’d buy a different one try again and attack it again! I’d do this until I was bored. (More likely that I’d run out of money!!)
I really do need to listen to more Buddy Holly!!!
Thanks so much!
Hugh
LikeLike
I feel for you Hugh – partly because here in LS towers we’ve been witnesses to the ongoing struggle. Hang tight as they say – it’ll be sorted one day.
I haven’t read 1984 but I’ll be honest the reason was that our religious studies teacher in school said don’t read that read Brave New World instead and I had a crush on the teacher – nuff said.
Group nouns are fun and some of them are charming but I do think we should have more honest ones for the folks we have to put up with these days. A bullying of lorry drivers (that’s after a couple of long motorway trips. It’s a shame because they used to be called knights of the road, now they are just bullies who want you out of the way because they have such a tight schedule.)
dd
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hi Diane,
Thanks as always.
I think one of the problems with lorry drivers is at one time they could drive for as long as they wanted. But now, as you say, they are trying to cram so much distance before they have to stop.
Don’t get me wrong, the drive as long as you want caused its own problems…But nothing a wee bit of speed couldn’t sort!!!
Thanks so much.
Hugh
LikeLike
Hi Hugh!
Gonna keep this brief right now because I too have been having computer issues with leaving comments on LS for some reason. My lucubrations keep getting kicked back at me (or out into the universe).
Whenever I start to resent the domination of the technology predators, I try to remind myself that these billionaire people and all who are with them or like them do not live good lives. And I mean they don’t live good lives for themselves. The first thing is they can’t trust anyone. There is no one on the planet who doesn’t look at them as nothing but a bank account, and they know it. They look like they’re having fun but their humanity is far more puny and sterile than the average bum or whore on skid row, and that’s no joke. Their way of life is both soul-killing AND soul-destroying. Having all the yachts, the mansions, the easy lifestyles, does not make for a good person NOR for a good life. It makes for a soft person, an arrogant person, a rotten person, a bad person, a weak person, a person who is of their time only, a person who many “worship” but whom no one loves. And they don’t love anyone either, and that’s the worst thing of all.
When the only thing you love is money, you aren’t loving. You’re devouring, taking up space, being a monster with knowing it but while knowing it, too. A sad state of affairs!
“THE LOVE OF MONEY IS THE ROOT OF ALL EVIL.” – Paul the Apostle
Dale
PS
Great musical selections this week as always, thanks for sharing!!
PPS Thanks for talking about the inspiration of the comment process…For me the comments are just as interesting as the stories (often), and (sometimes), more so!…
LikeLike
Hi Dale,
The thing about us moaning about wealth when we know that there is very little we can do about it is that it’s always been there. But in this day and age we see more and more about the distribution. We see those poor souls who haven’t a pot to piss in and we see those who I would drown in a pot of piss!!
It’s disgusting. I would say that I wouldn’t like their consciences but those fuckers don’t have that human attribute!!
Yep, comments in all their forms have inspired me to write stories and many of the Saturday Postings. Folks should use their own and others a lot more.
Stay happy and healthy my friend.
Many thanks.
Hugh
LikeLike
Thanks for FIGJAM, Hugh – one to treasure.
Re Group Nouns: A Parliament of Farts.
I always liked my late father-in-law’s saying: ‘Crabbit as a bag o’ weasels.
‘Everyday’ is also a favourite of mine, prone to sing it when no-one else is around.
great post.
mick
LikeLike
Hi Mick,
I’ve always believed MPs to be wither liars, thieves or paedophiles.
And if they say that they are none of those, they’ve just proved that they are a liar!
This one doesn’t make sense and I don’t know where I got it??
Mad as a bucket of Badgers.
Thanks as always my fine friend.
Stay happy!!
Hugh
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hugh,
Don’t get me started, although that’s your Saturday job. How about computers in cars? So, recently I bought a used 2017 Japanese car. Instead of keys, that worked perfectly well for starting and shutting off cars for over a century, it had a ‘fob.’ Having it in your pocket allowed the car to turn on or off with a push of a button (roughly the energy needed to turn a key). The entire operation of the vehicle had changed with computer assisted gadgets to little or no advantage to the driver, who will so be superfluous.
A Fabrication of Automobiles? Which got be off on useless ‘collective nouns’ again. Looking around a writers’ conference last week A Hodgepodge of Journalists; A Hocus of Bloggers; A Pocus of Playwrights, and A Throb of Poets presented themselves before I could run away. — Gerry
LikeLike
Hi Gerry,
Cars went down-hill when parts weren’t mended, they were simply taken out and replaced.
The only electric car that I would like would be the one that runs over that wee Greta person!!!
‘A Throb Of Poets’ has made me smile!!
…Not sure why though!!!
Thanks as always my fine friend.
All the very best.
Hugh
LikeLike
Good post and roundup. Buddy Holly made a lot of great music, and you chose one of the best. A consternation of computers.
LikeLike
Hi Dave,
My collective term for computers is just a rant of swear words and obscenities!!
Buddy Holly was taken far too early.
Thanks as always my fine friend.
Hope all is well with you and yours.
Hugh
LikeLiked by 1 person
Oh man. Peter Green – what a brilliant guitar player. That song almost had me in tears. Almost.
LikeLike
Hi Steven,
It was the newer Fleetwood Mac work that got me into their music. I have to admit I’d heard that song a few times in my youth before I realised what it was.
Thanks so much for your comments – Much appreciated!
All the very best my fine friend.
Hugh
LikeLike
If you have not hear these Buddy with or without the Crickets, worth a listen
Tell Me How
Peggy Sue
Not Fade Away
I’m Looking For Someone To Love
Think It Over
Love’s Made A Fool Of You
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hi Doug,
He was something special.
I’d add ‘Rave On’ and ‘True Love Ways’ to that list.
Thanks as always for the comment.
All my very best to you and Sharon my interesting friend.
Hugh
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hi Hugh,
I’m glad you have a finger on the proverbial pulse of our society – there are so many things I would rather not deal with, not see, not hear, and in general just wish they would go away. I admit I have one of those phones and a lap top, but have never owned a TV, not that it makes much difference, since you are bombarded with adverts and nonsense daily on the other devices. Having younger friends helped me navigate this consternation of computers, I try to have a limited and simple and ‘relationship’ with them – to keep the monsters at bay.
Talking about computers in cars reminded me of my father – whose work was repairing cameras – and how difficult it was for him to make the adjustment even when only some parts were electronic. Luckily he retired before the fully automatic digital camera took over. His workmanship never ceased to amaze me, how he could repair a badly damaged 35mm camera with patience and skill to its original state.
Thanks for the nod to our music heroes, Buddy Holly and Peter Green.
my best , Maria
LikeLike
Hi Maria,
The simple relationship with computers is what is my problem at the moment. I only know what I need to know to allow me to do what I want – Nothing else. I haven’t the energy, capacity or fucking interest for anything else!!
Your dad was a skilled professional tradesman. Most of those folks have been replaced with fitters. I baked for many years and that was at the time when you weighed out, doughed up, proved and fired the bakery goods. You had to know how, when and when! Now most of the products come in frozen and are put into a programmed unit to do all of that. I am no longer a baker, I’m a dinosaur.
Most of this is ‘progress’ which does take away jobs. But the whole AI movement is very worrying!!! Who can believe what they see now-a-days?? My pal, when we were teenagers, asked me if I read a newspaper and I said I did. (I still do) Even back in the early eighties he stated to me, ‘I also read a paper but all I believe is the date…Which I check first. This time we are in bombs out the idea of a photo never lying. Images can be lying, situations, figures, ideas, ideals every fucking thing can be a lie!!
…I don’t think I’m paranoid – Just suspicious!!!!
Thanks so much for your interest and comments!!
All the very best.
Hugh
LikeLike