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I still haven’t recovered from the weekend and have picked up another bug and Ernie had woken me up after having a nightmare about a lava monster trying to kill everyone in the world (it would have been a blessed relief to have been burned to death at this stage so I was annoyed it wasn’t real) so I was pretty much exhausted. I had to duck out of personal training and Twitch of Fun, but I am still a parent so couldn’t go to bed or throw myself off a cliff and had to go back to the shops for a second attempt to buy school shoes.
Apart from a Solero and a cappuccino at Pizza Express I had an entirely vegan day today. I had porridge made with oat milk for breakfast (so oaty), a vegan salad bowl at the pizza restaurant and an amazing fart-enducing bean and rice meal for dinner. I have done pretty well with cutting down on cow products in the last couple of weeks. I am not being super strict (see the cappuccino - though I may actually prefer oat milk in those- if only Andrew Collings had lived to see this) but I’ve eaten no beef and had minimal butter and it’s crazy how much longer a two litre bottle of milk is lasting in our house now that only our kids are drinking it.
We watched Harry Potter 6: The Death of Dumbledore (they could have avoided the spoiler in that title) and I again questioned why they didn’t use more magic - these fuckers don’t need stairs for starters - but my Harry Potter loving wife had no answers other than to suggest divorcing me.
We went to bed straight after the kids, but read for a couple of hours. I actually used my human eyes to read, rather than listen to the audiobook. I liked it. The good thing about the RHLSTP book club is that it’s meant I have got right back into books. The thing I used to like about holidays (before kids anyway) was that I could get through a book a day whilst sitting on a sun lounger. Yet even though that was a great pleasure to me it was something that I hardly ever did at home. Which is insane really isn’t it? We usually just watch some telly for the last couple of hours before bed, before zonking out (not a euphemism- or at least only a euphemism for sleep) but reading is just as relaxing, but more engaging. I usually am half on my phone when I am watching TV these days.
I am reading (and listening to) The Sanctuary by Andrew Hunter Murray from off of No Such Thing As A Fish. He’s going to be my guest on the book club in a couple of weeks if you want to read the book beforehand. It’d recommend it. It’s completely pulled me into its world and is holding its secrets close to its chest, so it’s gripping. He’s a fabulous writer and as so often with RHLSTP I am left realising how much talent there is out there and been forced to reassess my own (already quite low) opinion of my own stuff. Whilst always having a bit of imposter syndrome (though actually in my case I might just be an imposter who has somehow got away with it, rather than someone who is good at what they do but doesn’t feel like they are) I was sometimes frustrated that my work got a bit overlooked. But having spent a decade catching up on the work of my contemporaries, some of whom have achieved the recognition they have deserved (and occasionally not deserved), but most of whom are producing incredible work that the vast majority of people in the world (or even in the country) are totally unaware of. In the 90s with a bit of spark and hard work and a good wind behind you, you would probably do OK as there wasn’t so much competition, but nowadays there are so many comedians, so many authors, so many TV channels that even if you’re producing top quality work there’s every chance that nobody will really find out about it.
This is not a comment on Andrew exactly - I don’t know how well his stuff sells, but I know he’s had a lot of interest in his work and had production companies fighting over the film rights (this book will make a cracking movie), so he’s very much doing OK - just on the fact that there’s so many great writers out there. I read Janey Godley’s book last week. It’s rare that a working class woman gets a chance to tell her story, but she has such natural ability a a writer and I wondered how many people there are out there who would be able to create amazing stuff like hers if they got the opportunity.
Everyone can write something, even if it’s just a shitty blog which has nothing going for it except for the bloody-minded persistence of the author who refuses to miss a day in twenty years. And reading all these excellent books mostly inspires me to try and do better myself. However good you are you can always do better. If you’re not very good at all then the room for improvement is huge. There’s some positivity if you’re an imposter or feel like you are or if you feel like you and you are.
