J'ai SUPERFROID

Right now I'm wearing this t-shirt. It translates "I'm super chilled" though I guess it could also be read "I'm super cold", and I guess different people may have different takes on that. I bought it when I was in fact quite chilled in the French Alps a day or two ago, though I'm about to be wearing it in Rio. Does that make it a whole different class of chilled? I don't care. On the flight here I finished the first book I've read in years, "exit through the wound" by North Morgan, who I know as London Preppy. In the back of the book the publisher, Glasshouse Books, states "Glasshouse books has a simple mission statement. To publish books for people who don't read."

I tick that box.

When I started the book I was unimpressed. Not only was the main character straight rather than gay, yet the same character from london preppy's blog. Some of the work was pure cut and paste from the blog, and there was so much drug use I felt I was at work. But it grew on me. Certain bits have been updated for current consumption, which disappoints, but despite this I enjoyed it and in the end I was just burning through the pages under a narrow beam from my reading light as everyone else on my flight slept.

And on this Iberia flight from Madrid to Rio there are pieces of tape holding together the mirror and ventilation filter in the one toilet I've visited. I hope the engines and fuselage are more convincingly held together, but then this is a Spanish plane and we are deep in GFC2.

The reason I referred to the book is that it reinforces an opinion I've developed recently that I need to stop caring what people think. I have no reason to be self conscious and if people don't understand me they can ask. I don't need or want to explain myself. I'm calling it self respect. And I'm going to be more demanding with it in future.

Which brings me to an issue I've been grappling with for a few years now. A good friend disowned me for personal reasons, his not mine, some time back. A friendship I enjoyed greatly and have missed, and the demise of which I do not and will probably not ever truly understand, though I am certain there is miscommunication, misunderstanding and a deal of emotional content that's difficult to decipher. My mistake then was to allow it to happen and not enforce a face to face discussion, even if the end result were to be the same.

But now I'm giving transparency the flick. If you want to know what I'm thinking, deserve to know it first, then ask. I'm taking no prisoners, jumping into 2012 and running with it, not waiting for anyone to catch up. Keep up or make your own way. Be sure to have fun though. I certainly will.

Gazing into the www sky

I remember as a kid our long summer holidays to the Myall Lakes where we would camp at the edge of the lake, our own sandy beach, our own space. Days were spent in or by the water, swimming, skiing, sailing, windsurfing or just mucking around. In the evenings as the sun set slowly over the lake I'd stare at the stars emerging in the deepening blue sky. I was at the edge of the earth with the vastness of space just an arms-length away. So insignificant and yet so connected at the same time. The potential possibilities of what I could achieve felt infinite.

There was no internet back then. There was no verb 'to google'. Billions of stars then and now but now there is a whole new world that you and I both can explore through the screens we are focussed on right now.

While I may have felt the possibilities were endless then, right now they are ever so much more real. If I want to contact someone - I can. There was a movie that moved me, so I emailed the director and had a conversation. There was something that irked me on a TV show & newspaper article, so I tweeted in response and had myself heard. When I'm not happy with something politically, I can move and shake and do something about it. Easily. And then there's this blog, while a little less fashionable these days, it is my own little publication that is read regularly throughout the world (by some very special people). A very small sandy beach in the huge ocean that is the world wide web.

And while I love watching the sunset and gazing at the stars, for me it is all about the connection. The people who come into my world and share experiences, reflect on them and gain from them, returning to the world a little better for it. Hopefully.

And right now I'm physically exhausted from the people who have come into my world of late. And I love it.