Let’s try on an MAJOR direction change. Let’s see what happens when I talk (and make videos) about what it is to be a man. Lately, I’ve been seeing a lot of crap on what it is or means to be a real man, from leftist, DEI, fourth-wave feminist and Right-wing red pill morons out to make a buck on your insecurities.

I can feel that depression rolling in.

The last week has been a grind. Since Sunday I just haven’t had the energy to do much, it could be my body transitioning to Ketones or it could be that I’ve lost my direction and am kinda in a ‘What Now’ situation. So…

What Now?

Unlike last week, where I had three of the four weekly blog posts written on the Monday, this week, I’m kinda struggling to get them done, mostly due to the fact that not much worth talking about has happened. Warmer weather brings people. More people more problems. Living above the Arctic Circle means predominantly colder weather most of the time. I like colder weather, it doesn't bother me. I’m cool with it…

My energy crashed hard yesterday. Normally to relax I’ll just lay back and chill. But yesterday every time I would wake up an hour later feeling worse. You know that feeling, when your brain just won’t engage, like the bulb is slowly dying, or burning out, getting dimmer. You know it’s about to die, but you keep the light on because you don’t have a replacement.

“Hwæt! We Gar-Dena in gear-dagum, þeod-cyninga, þrym gefrunon, hu ða æþelingas ellen fremedon!”

That brings us to now. I have been recently reading books while also listening to them via Audible. This, just works for me, as I can get through lots of books in a shorter space of time.

Last week I started uploading videos to YouTube. It’s been a long time coming. I would plan a video and then not shoot it because I couldn’t figure out the style I wanted to shoot it in. I started with last week’s Journal vlog. With that, I did a voice-over and just filmed a bunch of random shit to show while I spoke, out of character, into a microphone. I hate that voiceover.

So yeah. It’s my birthday. Let’s talk about that. First, I don’t celebrate my birthday. I haven’t since I was 17 or 18. I just kinda grow out of it. Didn’t see the point of it. I was born on this day in 1977, okay… What now?

It’s been 155 days since I gave up alcohol. More on that in this Post. On Saturday, after work some colleagues and I went out for a drink. It was a Birthday. After work, we Sabered a bottle of champagne, as it’s tradition.

A Condescending Post About Light. Something popped into my head last night. An idea for a photography video, but as this kind of video has been made a million times before I figured, fuck it! Make it for idiots. The idea is to be as condescending as possible. Like everyone I’m talking to has no idea what I’m talking about.

Here we are again, nothing to write about except having nothing to write about. Or, maybe, yeah. Hang on. Yesterday I decided to start making YouTube videos. One will go live today at 14:00. It’s just a quick and dirty, spur-of-the-moment, just make one, upload it and see what happens kinda thing // Video.

Why am I not making videos for YouTube? I mean I could come up with a few reasons but they’d all by pointless excuses that ultimately just comes down to fear. I hate that.

So, I started writing a a post yesterday that ended up becoming something more, and longer, than I had expected it to. I seem able to write for the sake of writing these days. Whether or not it’s any good is for you to decide. That post will be published here on Friday 11th.

That guy behind the bar, the one serving you a drink, is an actor. He doesn’t always behave like this. If you were to bump into him in the street he’d most likely not remember you, because it’s not really him you saw behind the bar, but an alternate personality that he created to make your experience one you’d remember. For him, it’s an act.

After the last few days screwed up my schedule, I’m now actively trying to get it all back on track. Up early, read, work on my blog (like right now), go for a walk etc. Is this structured life a good thing? Maybe or maybe not. But if it works, it must be good, right? If it works it works. As a writer, I think that structure beats inspiration hands down.

Lessons from a Whisky Distillery Tour. Yesterday was the tenth anniversary of the [English] Cotswolds Whisky Distillery (website). In my opinion, the most consistently good English Whisky. I don’t think I’ve ever had one I didn’t like on some level. First and foremost, I want to thank everyone who organised the trip that allowed me to go on my first distillery tour.