A new one just begun...

Oh dear. Not for the first time, I feel shame. And also not for the first time the reason for my shame is looking at my figure.
However, despite the fact that my body shape does indeed fire up a red faced sense of regret that I haven't managed to continue my unwisely trumpeted health regime as much as I would have liked, it is actually a different figure to which I now refer.
The figure is five.
Five.
Blogs.
In a year.
That's what I managed in 2008. How poor is that? I feel ashamed to even link to proper bloggers from my page - it feels like those Myspace pages you see with hundreds of real famous people listed as 'friends'. I have a lot of work to do before I can call myself a blogger. I'm not even a bl...
Of course I could claim that an unusually high amount of real life has happened in the last year for the KSJk tribe, which is true but it's not really an excuse.
I'm still going to use it though...
Anyway, here's the plan. I'll probably carry on with the whole 'real life' thing, but I'll just try to bore you with it all a bit more often. So here goes. Just you watch.

zzzzzzzz...

Hah. In an unprecedented flurry of activity designed to catch out my loyal reader, I have somehow managed to prod my lethargic imagination into producing this - my second blog in as many days!
Basically I left it so long since the last one that I have much I need to tell you. Well, I don't really need to tell you, and you certainly don't need to listen to me but hey, welcome to blogging...
I still can't bring myself to explain the whole Council/job farrago, but there is one aspect of my new job that I feel able to talk about without white knuckles and red mist coming into play. In fact I quite like it. Sleep deprivation.
Well, it's not really deprivation as such, more like sleep juggling. My new job requires me to work night shifts. The interesting part is that I also have to work day shifts, and a late shift somewhere in between. And all of these shifts occur within the space of a week. I usually start at 7am for a couple of days, then the next two days begin at 1pm, then the final two days start at 11pm until 7am.
The weird thing is that I really enjoy the weirdness of it all. There's something quite exciting about starting work late at night, then coming home first thing in the morning. I might say it is the pleasure of driving past all the traffic going the other way knowing that they still have a whole day's work ahead of them while I have a good day in bed to look forward to. I might say that, but it's not true. More often than not I have a day of noisy childcare and domestic chores in my sights. Yes, I usually am utterly knackered by the time I get home, but there is a peculiar type of energy buzz that you seem to get from driving home as the sun rises. The body gets confused, so decides that it had better do something. Fast. The whole morning ritual of getting the kids dressed fed and ready to go just goes by in a blur, then the housework gets more attention than ever before and before I know it, the morning is over. Then the fun really starts. I sit down. And suddenly all the sleep that I have been storing up somewhere, God knows where, is released and floods into my brain, and I simply have to give in. And this is the best bit, when I get to go to bed. Not because I think I'd better, like when normal people look at the clock of an evening and think, 'is that the time? better be off to bed' - there is no 'better be off' about this sleep, this is 'hope I make it to the bedroom first' type sleep. In fact on a few occasions I haven't made it, and have been found prostrate in the hall, one desperate outstretched hand reaching in vain towards the bedroom door, looking like a petrified Pompeiian victim of the inescapable pyroclastic flow of sleep. Total shutdown sleep. This is not little red light still on, standby sleep. This is pure envirofriendly off at the wall plug pulled out sleep. Lovely. Seriously, you should try it. They say you don't miss your water til your well runs dry. And you really only appreciate a good sleep when you've forgotten what sleep is. It's great. Everyone should work bizarre shifts. The world would be a happier place.

Aaaaaaand.....we're back.

After a slight (6 month) coffee break, I finally looked up at the canteen clock to see that it was time to get back to work and start delivering my finest ruminations to an undoubtedly still completely indifferent world. So, having stuffed my plastic sandwich wrapper into the overflowing bin and replaced my freshly rinsed 'you-dont-have-to-be-mad-to-work-here' mug back in my locker, both my typing fingers are once again at your disposal. Let's catch up...
My last 'status report' would have been at the beginning of the year - Another Year Over - you may want to cast a speedy backwards glance over those witterings, the better to follow these.
The first major change would be that Kayessjaykay Towers is no more. Well, obviously it still actually is, but it no longer has anything to do with me or mine. After a Herculean effort, which did indeed pretty much consist of tipping the entire flat into a skip, the old garret was emptied, sluiced down and liberally painted with 'economy white' on every surface. A willing dupe buyer was duly found and a price agreed. Thankfully the dealings with the solicitors and all the forestworth of paperwork went with the minimum possible amount of stress in these situations (i.e. only 'near' fatal) and incredibly the 7-day aftersale 'here, wait a minute' contractual obligation period passed without so much as a 'here, wait a minute'... So the sticky plaster, string and chewing gum quality repairs to the floors, roof and central heating can fall apart all they want, it's no longer my responsibility. Good news.
And even gooder news is that we have found a new Kayessjaykay Towers. Except this is more of a stately pile in the country, which shall henceforth be known as Kayessjaykay Manor. Yes we now have a proper family dwellhouse, on three levels and with plentiful grounds featuring outlying steadings. In other words we have a loft and a coalshed...
The even even gooder news is that we have once again pulled off the charade of being undercover commoners in the exclusive West End. Only Wester.

Next up, the employment situation. This has seen another major change. As you may have guessed from my tortuous office-based analogies above, I am now office-based. Still in law enforcement however, and thankfully freed once again from the gross ineptitude of the Council. There is most definitely a story to be told about that disastrous episode, but it will have to wait until my eyes stop bleeding whenever I think about it. Suffice to say, I feel useful again.

Now, there is obviously a mountain of other stuff I need to catch up on, but that's for another time. Hey, I need to have something to write about next time. Whenever that is...

remember what?

Once a month.
Not a great average, really. Well, I suppose it is for some people. Like a golfer getting a hole in one. Or a band getting a number one single. Or a drummer getting attention from a groupie. Once a month for all of these would constitute a great average. But. For a self-proclaimed 'blogger', it's utterly shameful. Unfortunately that seems to be all I am capable of producing, which leaves me in reverend awe of my infinitely more profligate blogging colleagues.
A relatively literate male approaching the end of his youth* having lived a reasonably eventful existence to date, including touring the country in a semi successful band, and being a father of two with a career in local law enforcement in a very 'colourful' area of town should have enough tales to tell each and every day. But all my pitiful blog skills can come up with is is the aforementioned once a month average. Sorry.
Aside from the obvious potential breaches of the Data Protection Act, the only excuse I can give for this below par batting average (is that a mixed metaphor?) is that I have one of the worst recorded memories on, er... record. Seriously, it is a great regret of mine that I just can't seem to bring those manifold tales back to life on demand. Especially when my fellow veterans seem to have such vivid recall, and expect quite rightly that I should share once again every detail of an experience from 15 years ago about which I have absolutely nothing to go on.
"Yeah, but what about Dumfries, eh? That bloke with the trousers? Brilliant!"
"Isle of Wight? I cant believe you drank that!"
Erm, yeah... I know... Amazing...
And it's not just the old band stuff that is a problem, when to be honest I could quite justifiably claim the effects of excess as an excuse for absence of reminiscence. Even my more recent, far more sober recollections seem to trickle away like a dropped ice pole on summer tarmac.
"Remember that drug dealer that pulled a knife on you before you wrestled him to the ground?"
"Erm, yeah... well, sort of..."
"Members of the jury please disregard this witness as a hopeless buffoon"...

Funny thing is, there are plenty of things I do remember all too well. If you name an area of London, I can tell you the postcode. Hackney = E1. etc. If you were to ask, I could tell you that Pi = 3.141592653. I remember the reg plate of James Bond's underwater Lotus esprit is PPW 306R. Harrods' phone number is 730 1234. The Parcelforce van that cut me up yesterday has the reg no KE54 AWW.
I dunno, maybe my subconcious just has different priorities from my conscious self. Maybe I need to change my blogging habits. Maybe this should be less 'recollection based' and more 'opinion based'. One thing I am good at is expounding. Offering up my views on any subject whatsoever has never been a problem. So let's see. Give me a subject, and I'll bore you to death. Just don't be surprised if I've unwittingly done it all before.


*(sherrep)

Those who can't...

I think everyone has one. At least, I certainly do, and everyone I've mentioned it to has one. You would be pretty unlucky not to have one.
What I'm wittering about, is that one particular mentor, guardian and guiding light of a teacher that you will always remember. That one educational hero that has had more influence on your life than even television. The third parent. The one who...well, you get the idea.
I was reminded of the value of a good teacher recently, when I had to spend some time in my local secondary school. My current employment, best described as community work with a local law enforcement bias, saw me required to give an input to 3rd and 4th year pupils introducing the concept of 'antisocial behaviour'. Truth be told this was a phenomenon with which they seemed to be perfectly well acquainted, so maybe I should say I was trying to convince them that antisocial behaviour was probably not a good idea after all. A radical concept for some, without a doubt.
I was aware that this experience might be difficult, some even warned me not to to do it for my own personal safety. But still I was ill-prepared for the experience. As I walked through the door, I hit a wall. Not a physical wall obviously, but a metaphorical wall even sturdier than bricks and mortar. This was a solid construction of sheer bloody minded non-co-operation.
The teacher introduced me, along with my colleague who was even less prepared than I was.
"Now, you all know Kay and R, don't you"
There was a low murmur, which as far as I could tell, consisted of every single youth who knew me droning "No". Those few who didn't know me just stared.That was it. Absolutely no chance of anyone saying "Yes" as to do so would be to comply. God forbid.
This set the pattern for the rest of the lesson.
"Do you have a pen?"
"Yes"
"Good. Here's a worksheet for you"
10 minutes later...
"Have you finished?"
"No"
"You haven't even started. Why not?"
"Don't have a pen"
"You said you did?"
"I do. But it's at home. You *****"
etc. etc.
This was one of the more pleasant exchanges. If there was a way they could obstruct the lesson, they'd find it. They had two goals - one was to make any kind of education an impossibility, the other was to make their friends laugh. Usually achieving one meant also achieving the other by default. Occasionally the strength of will surged into out and out abuse. This was the teacher's cue to wade in with her arsenal of threats. This consisted of sending the offender to the office. Unless he refused. Then the deputy head teacher would be sent for.
"Fine, send for him. He's a ***** as well..."
Where this battle of wills (or rather won'ts) would end up I never quite established. But I was later told that out of the entire 4th year, there is not one single boy who has not been excluded or suspended this year.
Which brings me to my point. Teachers are heroes. How they can fight this battle every single day, and still manage to get through to the odd child here and there enough to change their life, is a triumph worth celebrating. As much as I would love to be a hero, I really think that's beyond me. Give me an 18 stone knife-wielding drug dealer any day.

Mind the kerb.

So - New Year, New Me.
What a ridiculous thing to say, I hear you mutter as you navigate your browsers off to Misssy M's blog instead. And although that would indeed be an excellent idea ( she is obviously far better at it than I am, and posts more than once every six months) please bear with me while I explain. Then you can mutter and navigate all you like.
The fact is, there is no new me - nor will there be. But hopefully I can continue my schedule of improvement through evolution, rather than resolution. I don't do resolutions. I never understood why a particular date should be the reason for self-improvement. Self-improvement surely doesn't need an external reason - it should be an ongoing logical development. I mean no-one actually thinks "I think I'll get worse at table-tennis this year", or "Must avoid Nana", or "Right, it's about time I forgot how to drive"
I sometimes think that we are born into life as if it were a newly laid stretch of concrete on the pavement. The important thing is what kind of mark you have made on it before you shuffle off the kerb at the other end after your three score and ten. What is left for those behind to see. Some of us go ahead and skip lightly over the surface, leaving barely a trace that we were ever there. Some of us make an effort to dig our heels in, pushing down at every step, making that effort to be seen, to be noticed, and to be remembered. Then of course some people trip on the shoelace of fate and fall face first right in it. They are called 'celebrities'.
I think I am a pusher. Perhaps not as determinedly clumping down with every step as some, but the effort is there nonetheless. So I do continually try to improve the impression that I make on life's pavement. To enbiggen* my mark on society. To embellish my legacy. Some of my previous attempts at this have been documented here, notably 'running without being chased' and 'self-improvement through violence'. I now have another one. I am learning Polish.
In truth I have been doing this for a while now, in fact I recently completed my first 10 week course, with another 10 about to start. Why Polish? It actually started as an idea through my current employment, as the area I work in has a high Polish population. Generally speaking, Polish people are quite reserved, and keep themselves to themselves. But all it takes is one little breakthrough, and they will be wonderfully friendly, courteous and generous. So I thought it would be a good idea to learn some little breakthroughs. While I realise this hardly makes me a UN Ambassador, even my awkward attempts at saying "Hello, how are you?"** etc have yielded results far in excess of my expectations. Fair enough an early attempt apparently actually came out as "Do you keep pigs here?" but when I get it right, these paltry few words have made me new friends, and in some cases have led to me being able to help those who otherwise would not have known that there was even help to be had. So now I'm thinking the more little breakthroughs the better - for the sake of a few hours a week, maybe just maybe my little dents in the concrete will be just a little bit more visible.

* it's a perfectly cromulent word...

** Dzien Dobry, Jak Sie Masz? (Jeen Dobreh, Yak See Mash?)

Another year over...

Thoughts of the old year, and the new one to come have finally kicked the blogging part of my brain, long inactive, back into life. So I thought I'd catch up on what little I managed to bore you with this year, and look to the future with a promise to bore you on a far more regular basis. Thank me later.
kay ess jay kay
My first ever blog. Just a wee introduction to who and where we are. The whos are still the same, but the where is slightly different. We have temporarily moved to a fantastically posh flat nearby so we can clear out the old Kay Towers ready for selling. As far as I can see, the only way to do this is to position a skip under the window and start shovelling. Nearly 15 years worth of junk is not really the kind of pile you can sweep under the corner of the carpet. But we'll get there, and right now we're absolutely loving living in a posh flat in the posh area of a posh town. The deception continues...
all change
Not such happy news on this one. My situation will almost certainly be reorganised before March arrives. I am now firmly convinced that somewhere deep in the bowels of Aberdeen Council headquarters there lies a very special department, called the "Aintbroke Repair department". Employment in this department is by invitation only. If you show a particular prowess at rearranging, reorganising and generally meddling with things when there is absolutely no need, you're hired. And somewhere along the line, this department got wind of my current job.
"Hey, they're doing well, making a huge difference to the city residents and providing a high level of customer satisfaction and great value for money. We must do something!"
We've tried telling them, we've sat through endless meetings while they try and show us how we will do our job so much better under the new system, all the while seeing in their eyes that they have no earthly clue what they are doing. So unless something very dramatic happens in the next month or so, it will be on to pastures new for me and all my colleagues. Ah well.
Cheers
A mixed bag of updates, this one. A cocktail if you will. On one side I have a success story. As it happens the very person that I had in mind as I wrote that blog reappeared just a couple of weeks ago. And it appears that this gentleman did indeed hear the bell for time, and made his way to the door and back into real life. Albeit a little later than some of us, but he certainly has embraced his new found reality and is doing very well indeed. Happily married with a fantastic new career on the horizon. He told me all this while in a bar, as he sipped his diet coke, before dashing off to drive his wife home. Good man.
However there is another side to this update. Another of the original subjects reappeared in my life recently too. Only this one wasn't chatting to me. I was performing CPR on him after I found him in a dingy stairwell of a high-rise block of flats. Despite all efforts, it seems his doctor was right when he said he wouldn't reach 30. Time was called, and this time he definitely didn't hear last orders.
Para What?
I am still fiercely proud to call myself a drummer. No change there, nor will there ever be. So there.
Who's doing what now?
Well. I was trying to find an excuse for this but there really isn't one. I still absolutely love to run, I just haven't done it in a while. Like about six months. But I will. I'm actually really really getting the urge again. It was always there, but it kinda got drowned out by all the other stuff going on. But the less I run, the more I want to, so I am now desperate to get going again despite the weather, despite working shifts, despite any other excuse I can come up with. Where's me trainers?
self improvement through violence
Another thing I have let slide somewhat, but this time I have an excuse. The dire state of the NHS. No really, I'm waiting for an appointment to get my nose straightened after the last time. Now this may seem daft, to be waiting for my face to be repaired before I can get it dismantled again, but that's how it is. Now sherrep. Or I'll flatten you. As long as you give me plenty time to remember how to do it...
What a drag it is
Disappointingly, I still seem to be ageing. I now have two very young colleagues at work, and this has only served to heighten my awareness of how old I really didn't think I was. There is a look. It is a look I can't describe, but you may have seen it. It is a look that only the young can give to the old. It is a look that says "..." in some unspoken tongue that hits with unerring accuracy every time straight to the brain. In the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy (younger readers may not remember this) Adams (rip) describes an apparatus that can send any man completely insane, by illustrating the true extent of the whole universe, and highlighting his exact significance within it. The realisation that you are a mere nanomicroblip in the whole scheme of things is enough to render any man utterly incapacitated by worthlessness. The look of a young person towards an old person who has just tried to impart some wisdom is like a pocket version of that. Devastating.
So my ageing continues apace. Ah well.
So there it is. This is where I find myself at the end of one year, and the beginning of another. Some good news, some bad, some things I can do something about and some I can't.Pretty much like every other year, for every other person. On the whole, life is good, and I plan to tell you all about it as often as I can, if you'll have me.
See you next year.