despite all the amputations

I've said it before elsewhere and often, but this is my blog and I'll repeat myself if I want to!

The Smiths were a band who, from the age of 11 to 16, meant the world to me. To this day, when I listen to 'How Soon Is Now?', I'm immediately transported back to my bedroom in my parents' house - picture this: I'm a borderline pretentious brat and I'm revising for my English Mock Exams.

There has never been and will never be a band who meant - and continue to mean - so much to me as The Smiths did then. Despite the amount of guff that Morrissey continues to spout.

However, my favourite band of all time is The Velvet Underground.

Over the course of their four officially released albums, they expanded the vocabulary of rock music - literally changing the sorts of things that rock bands could talk about, and sonically, changing the musical tools they could use to say it. From baroque art-pop to rabid bludgeoning noise to inner-city portrait chamber poetry to perfect rock-pop songs in four albums.

Plus they wrote the book on how a cool band should look.

But I think the main thing they brought to the party was, they were the first rock band to say NO.

I was talking to my wife about the story that when they first started, they had a regular gig in a New York coffee shop. The manager of the place told them that if they ever played The Black Angel's Death Song again, they would be fired on the spot.

So they did (an extended version at that). And they were.

My wife said, 'but what did the manager expect, saying that to a band?'

The thing is, before the Velvets, rock bands were grateful to be there and they said 'yes'.

I love the Beatles, but they were nice company guys you could take home to meet your mum, even with the drugs and the hair. And probably because they went to the right schools, even the Rolling Stones were viewed as naughty little boys at the height of their drugs-bust infamy.

The Velvets and Lou Reed were legendarily ungrateful, contrarian and curmudgeonly, and the POWER of young people being ungrateful and demanding the stage, saying NO as soon as F*CK YOU, led (directly and indirectly) into all the great musical genres which have followed.

And don't think that NO is necessarily a depressing or difficult word - Lou Reed and the Velvets' "no" was a positive and powerful statement of intent, it was a question as well as a rejoinder, a position of power.

An opening-up of options rather than a closing-down of negotiations.

Lou Reed has died at the age of 71. He's kind of been the poster boy for grumpy old musicians in recent years, and I still can't get my head around the album with Metallica.

But maybe that's my problem - to be his age and still be questing for a new expression of the art he saw and heard in his head - that's something we should be so lucky to aim for.

RIP Lou Reed
2 March 1942 – 27 October 2013

back to more health-related navel-gazing soon!

none so blind

I was introduced to the writing of Douglas Coupland at exactly the right time .

I was midway through my degree and I'd realised I was going to come out more-or-less unemployable, I was living in a house with people who were developing some serious Class A drug habits, and I was winging my way towards a mid-20s breakdown. Because of that, I was ripe for the picking when I first read Generation X.

It's been a while since I've bought one of his books on faith - the law of diminishing returns seemed to set in - but I've got fond memories of Microserfs, Life After God and Girlfriend In A Coma in particular.

The other weekend I read a review of his new book (which got a pretty thorough kicking). It made me go back to another of his old books, Eleanor Rigby.

I read it shortly after it was published and I can't remember thinking much of it at the time. But I did remember the basic plot of a lonely 42-year-old woman who gets a phone call from the hospital, asking her to come and visit a young man who has her listed as his 'contact-in-case-of-emergency', and who turns out to be the son she gave up for adoption twenty-odd years previously. 

Oh, and he's got Primary Progressive MS. 

Re-reading it this last week, I enjoyed the book but the problem with his books is that they tend towards the self-parodic - the characters talk and think like the characters in a Douglas Coupland book, full of hip and zeitgeist-y pop-culture references. And they're prone to wallowing in an endless quest for greater meaning and/or spirituality in Godless times.

My main issue was that the character with MS - Jeremy - was obviously slated for tragic death, but this was offset by his charm and wit. Plus he had the benefit of having VISIONS, and the skill of singing songs backwards perfectly, because he's special.

So anyway on one level, the portrayal of MS is good because Jeremy is so comfortable with his condition, which is always labelled as Primary Progressive MS. But on the whole, I don't know why Coupland chose to make Jeremy a PwMS - what's HIS relationship to it?

 

I'm (naturally?) a bit uncomfortable with MS being used as a plot-device (think about it, it will always end tragically in any kind of fiction).
My favourite bit was this joke, which Jeremy tells to a guy who has just given him a job selling mattresses - at which Jeremy is obviously a NATURAL (see: special):

Jeremy asked, "How many people with MS does it take to put in a lightbulb?"

Ken did not know how many.

"Five million - one person to do it, and four million nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine to write depressing online web-logs."

The terminology is nicely dated (who says 'web-logs' anymore? Ah, the early noughties!) but I think it still applies... *ahem*.

Now interestingly (or not), the book came out in 2004 - which was the year after I'd had what I now see was an attack of MS symptoms, and the attack which set me on the road to my diagnosis. Seeing as I had pretty much all of these symptoms (listed in the book) at some point the previous year, why did I not make the link?

It's strange looking back that I didn't even make a SUBLIMINAL link to the symptoms that were bothering me - I'd had varying levels of numbness for at least 2-3 years by this point.

It's either me being a bit thick, or being so far in denial that I had no idea what was going on in my brain.
---
Searching for an image for this post, I came across the beggaring-belief Eleanor Rigby Hotel - the website doesn't say how many single beds there are here.

Really, who would want to stay in a hotel associated with "All the Lonely People"? Even with "crisp white linen and mellow soft furnishings"?

we are fine

the author on stage, September 2013 - in front of an AUDIENCE and everything - credit: Vinnie Ransome

 So the gig went absolutely fine and I saw some people who I hadn't seen in ages. Three headlines:

• it's been ages since my wife has had to find an 'I'm with the band' outfit - she had no idea what to wear!
• the indie-pop world is considerably LOUDER and much more MUSICALLY PROFICIENT than it was "back in the day".
• bass guitars are heavy. And playing a gig with one round your neck is quite tiring.

This last weekend was the return of the arts festival that the place where I work helps to organise (with other partners in the city).

(I swear I've rewritten that sentence three four times and that's the best I can make it today!)

You may remember I mentioned it last year. Anyway, the event was fine and we've had no adverse comments or complaints YET, and if anything it was even better-attended than last year.

*pats self on back*

Anyway, it's paid for by public money so we have to have a launch event with drinks and speeches and THE LIKE (I'm not important enough to make a speech myself, obviously, but still - CULTURAL ELITE).

Because the events on Friday involved a lot of walking, I obviously took my walking stick.

Which meant that I had FIVE instances (within 30 minutes) of people coming up to me and asking me what had happened.

Now regular readers will know that I'm not exactly shy about it (rightly or wrongly) - if people ask me, I'll tell them. Let's see how it went:

#1 - representative of the major funding body for the festival
HER - so what's happened?
ME - oh nothing's happened, as such. I've got Multiple Sclerosis, I need to use a stick every now and again
HER - [quite nervy and unclear way of asking the same question again]
ME - like I say, I've got Multiple Sclerosis...
HER - [changes the subject]

ENDS

#2 - artistic partner in the festival
HIM - so what's happened?
ME - oh it's nothing new! I've got Multiple Sclerosis...
HIM - [looks a bit teary, gulps for air]
ME - It's ok. Well, it's not, I guess. It is what it is...

ENDS

#3 & #4 - (seperate but pretty much interchangeable) artistic partner in the festival / ex-councillor
THEM - so what's happened?
ME - oh it's nothing new, I just need to use this every now and again [translation: all the time]
THEM - are you sure?
ME - yeah, yeah, it's FINE!
THEM - are you SURE?
ME - it's FINE.

ENDS (NOTE - this conversation is probably still happening right now in a parallel universe somewhere)

#5 - partner who I've been working with off and on for the past 10 years
HER - you alright Steve? What's with the stick?
ME - oh I just need to use it every now and again... And it's really great for pointing stuff out [points into middle distance with NHS-regulation walking stick]
HER - cool!

ENDS

Man oh man.

I don't know if I'd go so far as to say that "Hell is other people" but surely one circle of hell has to be:

"genuinely nice people being concerned about your health in social situations where you don't want to completely bum them out but you also don't want to feel like you're lying to them"

But then - as is increasingly obvious - I'm not much of a writer.

i'm dancing in the show tonight

Long time readers of IASB will know the reason for the blog's title. Even so I can sometimes forget that it contains a (what I would call) MILD SWEAR.

So I was surprised to have a twitter conversation with a representative of a national MS charity, saying that they wouldn't be able to RT one of my last blogs because as a corporate charity, they need to protect their brand. 

Fair enough - I'm the brand and grammar fascist where I work so I can appreciate where they're coming from. 

Anyway - thanks to the MS Trust (amongst others) who did retweet it, swears and all...!

Back in the days when we were playing in various bands and writing songs, I held the valuable position of recordist. Out of all of us, I'd had the most experience of using 4-Track Studios - I know, it seems so bizarre to think that now I've got a 4-Track recorder, a 16 track studio, and GarageBand ON MY PHONE but still. 

Rather than going out and getting wrecked, we would stay in, think up a band name and write and record songs for them as quickly as possible. It was great experience and really helped me to learn how to get good sounds from some cheap and crappy bog-standard equipment. And working within the limitations was a really good way of working.

Listen to the Shithouse Masters for what I think are the best examples of this stuff. But eventually everything Johnny Domino released was recorded in my home, which is pretty cool.

I'd also record things for friends, and one of those was my old friend Brian. He was the mental drummer in one of our old noisy bands but he also had a taste for the twee-er side of Indiepop - the kind that was typified by bands like The Field Mice and the rest of Bristol's Sarah Records label. 

It wasn't really my bag but I used to record their stuff - and as other members came and went, I ended up assisting with arranging songs and playing a variety of instruments. 

Brian was always really plugged into the international network of fanzines and cassette labels (pre-internet, obviously) and through various friends and contacts, that band - Peru - has had a bit of a second life. Two years ago, a label in Canada got in touch wanting to press a CD of songs so I was given the task of 'remastering' them (the guy pressing up the CDs really spanked them so they sound pretty dire despite all my work - but these files sound just peachy). 

Anyway, Brian put together a new line up of the band which has been playing to audiences ever since. A couple of months ago he got in touch to say that they'd been asked to play a festival in Nottingham and their new bass player had double-booked himself. As I'd recorded and played on most of the songs that are in the set, Brian asked me if I'd be willing to fill in. 

I was chuffed beyond measure to be asked, so next week I'll be taking yet ANOTHER opportunity to show off!

And unlike the intense rehearsal process for my appearance at IndieTracks two years ago, we'll be lucky if we manage one run through before the day...

No bother!

damn fine

When two separate evens occur simultaneously pertaining to the same object in enquiry we must always pay strict attention.
- Dale Cooper 

God, I loved Twin Peaks - in the UK it was broadcast on Tuesday nights and I always remember that every Wednesday we'd all pile on to the college bus saying "did you see it? what did THAT mean? what did THIS line mean??" Excellent music, too.

Happy days - anyway, there is a reason why the above quote popped into my head.

Where we live, we have two neighbours - they're both (fairly young) grandparents and they live alone. A couple of weeks back, in the intense heat, they got together to sunbathe and to indulge in some pretty  high-octane flirting.

Now I'll stop you right there! I have no problem with older people flirting and getting jiggy - it was just that they were so awkward and plus they got HEROICALLY drunk while they were doing it. They could've been the youngest, buffest, most beautiful people in the world but still, there's nothing worse than hearing drunk people of any age trying to cop off with each other.

Anyway, we don't judge. And even though we have a child, we're not like Grandma Moses or anything - we don't mind a bit of noise, it's only natural. But the walls are thin and there have been a couple of occasions when it has gotten ridiculous.

CASE IN POINT: earlier this week - on WEDNESDAY (the international party night), they were playing music ridiculously loud to the early hours. They stopped when we banged on the walls (and no-one likes doing that, do they?) but I'm struggling to stay focused at work as it is (as you can tell by the fact that I'm typing this at 4pm on a Friday...).

But the lack of sleep turned me into a basket case the following day and my legs get incredibly immovable when I've had a stressful night.

Aside from anything else they both know about my health and have seen our daughter - so they know what we're dealing with. With all that, their selfishness was the most upsetting thing about it.

So imagine my surprise when I saw this article in my Twitter feed, about how sleep plays a key role in the production and repair of Myelin.

"Disturbed sleep may aggravate perhaps the symptoms of [Multiple Sclerosis], in a vicious cycle"

Now it's not rocket science that rest and recuperation can play a part in maintaining our health and it's a particular type of sleep that seems to be the most beneficial but still, it's interesting so I thought I would share with you.

holiday epiphany

Seven years ago last month, me and Mrs. D got married in Venice - not to be flash or anything, it was just where we went on our first holiday together as a couple, and I think we were even talking about it back then (which was about two months after we started seeing each other).

if we look sickeningly happy, that's because we were!

Even though we got married a year after my diagnosis, we still decided to do it in the middle of the day at the hottest time of the year. And as you can tell from the picture above (aside from the fact that I'd clearly EATEN ALL THE PIES), there was a fair bit of walking involved, around a city which - although amazingly beautiful - is perhaps not the most accessible.

Could we do it now? I don't know - it would certainly take a lot more planning.

Some friends have asked us recently if we'd recommend Venice as a place for them to take their young (under 1 yr old) son. And our initial response was to say no way, but then we realised that we have an additional issue to contend with.

Are we creating problems unnecessarily? It's hard to say, and all pwMS probably do this.

But does it stop us being brave? And should it?

Last week we were on holiday with my family and my brother and his kids - which we did at the same time last year after my relapse, when the idea of holidaying solo seemed ridiculous.

We went on holiday with my in-laws earlier this year which was great. And it's really useful for us to have an extra pair of hands around, but I don't want to think that we'll never go on holiday on our own again.

So the last week we had a really cool time in a lovely part of Wales, Aberporth. The weather was great, and it was really mellow (even with three family members under the age of 8).

Highlights:

• El Salsa - As we arrived in Aberporth we saw a sign advertising Mexican take away so we did a little bit of digging around and discovered that it was a little pop-up eating cart, on Tuesdays only and was dirt cheap. So one Tuesday, me and Mrs D ended up eating delicious freshly-made Mexican food whilst sat on a bench overlooking the Welsh coast. It was gloriously surreal.
  
  
• Epiphany on the shore. This isn't rocket science by any stretch of the imagination, and is probably something you have noticed many years before. But I was standing with my feet in the sea (after letting my feet get acclimatised to the change in temperature, obviously) and I was really aware that the sand was being sucked out from under me. Obviously this is THE WAY THAT IT GOES - it's not some brilliant insight that no-one's ever had before - but it was really obvious to me last week. That the seas move the sand out to sea and back to the land in a constant motion. The earth was being moved out from under my feet by powerful waves.
  
  If I had been more depressed, this would have been a reminder of my diagnosis and of my increased unsteadiness. But now it was a cosmic reminder of the inter-connectedness of everything and an awareness of the fact that I was standing with my wife - who I love very much and who puts up with A LOT - and we were both holding hands with our daughter.

All things considered, life is pretty good and it might not always be so.

We should all enjoy it while we can - and take it from an official miserable bastard, we can all be as happy as we possibly can be in our present circumstances if we let ourselves.

Stevedomino would like to make it clear that he was not partaking in any controlled substances when he came up with his blindingly-obvious hippy-dippy bullshit non-insights. Just so you sarcastic buggers know!

why do we do it to ourselves?

The original title for this blog post was going to be:

Fuck, fuck, fuckety-fuck

So the last couple of weeks has seen me applying for a job for the first time in six years. No real reason, I'm fairly happy where I am currently, just something came up so I thought, what the hey?

Which means that the last couple of weeks I've been reminded what a MASSIVE PAIN IN THE ARSE it is applying for jobs.

First up, there's the application form. If you're like me, you'll agonise over every phrase, even before you get to choosing your referees. And don't get me started on the covering letter / email.

Maybe you get an interview, which is where the real fun starts. Especially if you have to prepare some kind of bloody task or presentation.

So yeah, that's where I've been the last fortnight. And because I'm talking about the arts, there's a ridiculously short turnaround.

For example, last week I was told I had an interview, which I had on Friday - including a presentation which I had to prepare.

No big deal but - to be honest - I was pretty dim as far as managing my energy was concerned in the run up. I had a late night at work on Wednesday, after which I needed to get my shit in order.

Which is why on Thursday I was convinced that I was having a relapse - I lost control of my legs and couldn't control my hands with any kind of precision.

This turned out to be very similar to the mini-relapse I had a few months back. After a good night's sleep, and a fairly low-stress and lazy morning, I went along to my interview.

In a new suit, if I say so myself, I looked the nazz.

With everything else that was going on, I didn't have as much time to prepare as I would've liked - which is why I'm unsurprised (but obviously disappointed) to report that I got an email over the weekend saying that the panel won't be taking my application further.

Why am I sharing this with you?

Job interviews are a MASSIVE PAIN IN THE ARSE anyway, regardless of our particular health issues. And I didn't honestly think I'd got the job - rerunning the interview in my internal insomniac cinema, there were too many, "ooh, I should've said THAT"s.

Don't get me wrong, there were some answers I was really pleased with. But still.

I dunno - I'm just kind of wondering where I go to next. Will I ever have another successful job interview?

Whatever. I'm not in any great rush to work somewhere else, and it's a luxury to be applying for jobs when you HAVE a job. And I DID get the interview.

But I'm still pretty pissed off that I put my family through the last few weeks - not only the application and preparing the presentation, but the touch-and-go of whether I was going to get to the interview.

In conclusion:
MASSIVE PAIN IN THE ARSE

Bah.