A new year. New things in the works as well. Some beginnings and the odd green shoot breaking through the crack in the pavement. I am a bit knackered generally speaking at present. I have made some new music connections and I do hope they will grow survive the frost. Its been a long time since I tried anything really new. Lots of thoughts racing around my head that are not too much to do with anything but are quite distracting and even disturbing at times. I do wonder how people manage to filter out the distractions as I find with time passing I am more and more easily drawn off course than I ever was before. Also my ability to stay focused and enthusiastic for any length of time seems long gone. I am fine when I am working with others in the main, but alone its now a real battle. Is it simply a a lack of novelty or something more than that? The first song I recorded this year is different as the lyrics were provided by a friend. Its been a long time since i did that sort of collaboration. It seems to have worked out OK though as a few people have played it already and shared it. Its a relatively simple tune and was an experiment which seems to have succeeded. So perhaps a few more collaborative efforts could be in the pipe line. [media]

[media] Hi, hope you are all keeping well, wherever you may be today.

Strange days. Strange thoughts and much else. Obsessions and echos from the still small voices in my head. Nothing new but perhaps the voices are a little more persistant than they used to be. Keeping out ot of trouble is difficult at times when your mind wants to wander elsewhere and your body wants to follow when perhaps it shouldnt? Lost in an unreal world of reflection and illusions that the light creates when it fractures into component colours. Sometimes light does not reveal the truth of things, but quite the reverse. The hue is a distraction that hides the shapes of things, though there is no shade.

[media] Well, it been a bit of a week. My anxiety levels are creeping up and there does not seem to be much I can do about them, other than just try and chill out as much as possible. Yep, its hard work for sure. I guess there are a lot of other people who are feeling much the same right now of course. I have been trying to carry on doing stuff. I have tried doing a little drawing and sketching to get my mind into a different place and it helps a little but the bizarre intrusive thoughts are quite overwhelming at times, as they often are even at the best of times. I have had a good crack at all the usual techniques for this over the years so I do have ways of trying to keep the demons tied down sufficiently. But I feel trapped. Actually I am not really as I have open spaces to visit and space to do stuff but I really do miss social contact with people other than my partner. We are people with very different interests and under normal conditions that actually works quite well for us. But right now its not. I do phone calls and video chats and stuff and that helps but it is often not really enough I find. There is a big difference between being face to face with someone and seeing and hearing them on a screen. Its looking likely that we will not be seeing anything remotely normal for 18 months or so. Perhaps by August, the pubs will be open again. At least some of them. Its not likely to be the sort of places that I have played music at though as these do not allow for social distancing sadly. Also its difficult to tell if any weird symptoms are the bug or just anxiety and other stuff. I have had headaches which might be stress or hay fever or maybe just not sleeping well. My back has been playing up a lot and making it very difficult to use the PC so one way and another its not going too well. I find myself getting very irritable too.

[media] Well how about everything. To start with there is the environment. I have an old diesel it does about 55mpg. I only use it when necessary these days, though sometimes that includes keeping sane I cant really afford to replace it when it goes to meet the great mechanic in the sky. Its main function used to be to transport the Delta ladies and their instruments and sundry doodads to gigs. Last year since Vicky moved on down the road apiece much has changed. I am just about getting my head back together now and waking to reality sort of. It may be though that the band wagon is not necessary in the longer term. I still cannot get my head around leaving the EU, I cannot see any possible advantages and it has adversely affected many people I know. I am not going to discuss it further here though. I await the promised sunny uplands, but I am extremely doubtful. It has depressed me a lot though. Without doubt I am concerned about the direction the current government is taking in many matters, and to say it is unsettling is very much an understatement. Its not quite giving me nightmares yet but its getting there. It is ideologically unsound. Populism gave you Hitler and Mussolinis as an end product. Yes we should be worried. Why? Because everything is now so polarised. Also, I am troubled frankly by the thoughts in my head. The difference between what I desire and what would be good for me as they quite different things. Its a very slippery slope and I could easily fall and then where would I be. Today has been difficult, the world is mostly shades of grey and even food tastes of nothing. There are days like this and the thing to do is mostly try to keep plodding on as best as one can. I have been working on something in the studio room for a while. It needs a vocal next. That will be the difficult part through the lyric does not scan too well but needs to work with the tune. Will it work? Stay tuned to find out. I should be feeling a bit more positive as a new creative project has popped up that should be very enjoyable later this month. Today though I am mostly alone with my thoughts. Even when there is someone else around it is possible to be alone or feel isolated. At these times irrational thoughts flood my mind. There is no quick fix that I know of. Maybe tomorrow will be different? I have of latebut wherefore I know notlost all my mirth, forgone all custom of exercises; and indeed it goes so heavily with my disposition that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory, this most excellent canopy, Shakespeare