2004

Glasto

S.needed to get rid of me for a while so she could have her new lover round. She suggested I go to Glastonbury by myself because everyone needs their first experience at Glastonbury to be by themselves while their wife is shagging some random of the interweb. Actually he was some nerdy clone (maths geek) of of Urban75 a now hugely past it transphobic and generally quite abusive bunch of has beens and never weres who lure in newbies just to tear them apart and then ban them from posting. Seen it over and over so many times. Unless of course leader Mike Urban likes you (he liked S) and protected you. So I fell under S's protection. Wow, what a digression.

So on Thursday June 24th I headed to Glastonbury Festival on bike and train. Can't remember how we got a ticket or how far ahead I got my ticket. I'm guessing some planning was involved.

Just before this S had gone away for a few days with her new boyfriend. Her step grandfather - who had also been her co-guardian when she was an adolescent - died. On the 19th I think. He'd been ill for ages. Years of smoking fucked him up and he'd been in Woolwich Hospital for a while now gradually failing. He'd had a leg amputated along the way and finally gave the ghost. S was in the process of boarding an aeroplane to her holiday, with H and the boyfriend, when she got the call. She refused to pick up the call. I'm not surprised by this as according to her there was a history of abuse in their relationship. But I do blame her for running off with some bloke - we had an open relationship in theory, which i agreed to i admit, but that involved openness and transparency. This was anything but. It was all in plain sight, but I still never saw it. She never told me. This was actual cheating. She could have told me, I probably would have accepted it, but doing it like this, secretly and behind my back implied to me she wanted him to replae me. she wanted to sideline me to a position outside the family, and yet still in service to the family, which is what was to happen and up until 2012 I think she was still considering me to be a useful asset to use as she wished. But my independnce and her hypocricy would cause her to break things off at the end of 2012. And yet - there's a bit of me that thinks she lost control of her temper and lost control of the situation, because the break up she threatned in 2012 never happened and I only got divorce papers in 2015 after I put my house on the market to test the value. And even then she never followed through - I had to spend thousands to make sure the divorce finally went through and it cost me tens of thousands and 4 lost years.

What I wrote about my Glasto attendance on my contemporary Blog:

I set off on my bike. Here's me - S behind the camera -

setting off from outside my wife's place of work in Camberwell. I didn't cycle all the way, just the bit to Paddington Station, then the bit from the train to the site - which was 6 or 7 miles IIRC.

Interesting trip down on the train and i was able to completely bypass the queue for the bus by cycling the last bit. However, turned out to be a lot hotter and a lot hillier than I had anticipated. Not then being used to this cycling with a house on-board malarky, I struggled. I dehydrated. I got a head-ache. I felt queasy. All this before I even reached Glasto.However, once there it was as smooth as could be. I found one of the very few remaining spots for a tent, not ideal, but as it turned out, perfectly adequate. I stashed the bike in a left property tent along with my bags, and walked out into the festival, intending to ENJOY! With all capitals, like that. ENJOY!!

 Friday was my first whole day at Glastonbury. The picture below is of the crowd between bands at the Other Stage. I endured Snow Patrol in order to be near the front for Franz Ferdinand and The Zutons. FF were magnificent.Just about the only spot available when I arrived on Thursday, probably becasue of it's close proximity to the bins, the toilets, the welfare tent, the lost property tent, and the BBC News portacabin. Not that any of this worried me, I more or less passed out before during and after arriving at my tent, and as soon as I woke up, I got up with everything I needed right there. And I saw my tent on News24!I had a wander on Thursday - where I took a lot of these pictures. Friday was tightly timetabled to see maximum bands, allowing time for magic mushrooms and a French sausage casserole - or two.

"It rained. My finely tuned timetable was obliterated. See the cider bus in this picture - which remained the focus of activity despite the rain.I had a good day - catching stuff that I knew I could comfortably get to without having wade about in tons of mud. even so, I still managed to get covered in pissy mud that I fell in near the men's urinals!Sat and spoke to a woman for a short time and we compared how exhausted and achey we were, shortly before I launched myself into a packed tent to see Hazel O'Connor performing."

I don't remember speaking to a woman. I guess I'm never quite as insular as I remember years later.

It was during a theatre workshop (yeah, really!) where I saw Michael Evis, who actually smiled at me - probably recognising the signs of a man person under mushroom influence.

so pics were taken on a disposable camera, the last time I ever used one, mostly on the Thursday afternoon. in those days the festival didn't start until Friday, but there were a few things going on on Thursday, including a man wrapping himself in clingfilm as an entertainment experience. No pictures. sorry.

Morrissey on Sunday

Set List:

Don't Make Fun Of Daddy's Voice / Shakespeare's Sister / How Can Anybody Possibly Know How I Feel? / Let Me Kiss You / I Know It's Gonna Happen Someday / The Headmaster Ritual / Such A Little Thing Makes Such A Big Difference / There Is A Light That Never Goes Out / First Of The Gang To Die / The World Is Full Of Crashing Bores / No One Can Hold A Candle To You / Subway Train (into) Everyday Is Like Sunday / Irish Blood, English Heart

I really enjoyed it and never got the sense of anything from this fan comment below: 

"this gig was an absolute disgrace. it was boring and the crowd was vile. morrissey did great but being that the crowds were there to see muse and orbital...where exactly did morrissey fit in? that was the main problem, no one was there to see him apart from julia and one guy who was singing the wrong words.. "

Sunday

After the rain - it got sunny again! The ground quickly got hard, with occasional patches of mud.

 For the last afternoon I thought I'd have a main stage day. I saw James Brown, Supergrass, and Mozza!

James Brown

guess who

Originally I had a Blog on AOL, which I think is now obliterated. I copied the text over to Blogger in 2004. Here's an example entry from October 20th: 

At the weekend I drank quite a lot of cider, and left myself in pain and feeling sick for the last few days. I didn't realise how intolerant I'd become.Now, after two late nights, staying up to watch the two HBO programmes that are just about the only good things on British television at the moment, I feel tired, groggy, and thought processes are garbled and confused.Consequently I'm driving to work. I'm not that groggy - I'm able to drive safely enough. Left work at 7.00, after listening to that Graham Garden / Alan Davies comedy about a dog, on Radio 4. Some of it was very funny.The cats were pleased to see me, mainly as I hadn't fed them in the morning. I ate sausages, cheesy mash and baked beans. Felt so full up I couldn't move.

I lacked respect for myself so much in those days I just ate crap and drank shitty sugary alcohol until I fucked up myself mentally and physically and silenced the bad thoughts. The "bad thoughts" that my brain were telling me I was cged, abused, not living my best life. I was being subjagated by this woman who hated me, into serving her needs. I was encouraged to give her everything but I had to resist. I needed an escape route. I wasn't yet ready to escape but that time was coming.

October 22nd

I failed to get up at 6.00 this morning as I wanted. Got up at 8.30 and left for work at 9.15. Drove again - can't resist it - the car's warm, comfortable,and bulging with 6 of my cds.
Played John Coltraine, Count Basie, King Tubby and Brian Wilson. Brian Wilson really worked for me - in leafy sunny Mile End, driving along. Fantastic.
Only started to feel crappy towards the end of the day. Did some research in the early afternoon. Found out that the accepted cause of the Tupolev crash on October 4th 2001 may not be the complete truth. It appears that the US pressured Ukraine to admit that they had shot the airliner down, but weren't all that happy about doing so. The plane contained Russian Jews travelling from Israel to families in Russia. I think that its not impossible that the US shot it down. This may have been to strongarm the Israelis into shutting the fuck up while the US needed harmony and support from Arab countries.
I can investigate further regarding what happened in Ukraine. I've got names of a few individuals involved. I'll try to work out what actually happened. I need to follow up on reports that the Ukrainian president wanted to lift the plane up out of the water to investigate the cause of the crash, believing that it would show that Ukraine was not at fault, and thereby humiliating the US.
This evening I got stuck in very bad traffic down the A11, along Mile End, and through Tower Hill. Raced with some f****r in a BMW who thought he'd be happier if he was in front of me. Stopped him getting in front of me till I got on New Kent Road, but he passed me in the bus lane. I passed him later on the Elephant and Castle roundabout 

 I stayed up till 2.30 watching Black Books and uploading pictures from our PC.Then I got up late again. Got quite a lot to do - S arrives back tomorrow, and I need to tidy up.
It seems that Geoff Hoon and the wonderful Tony B Liar (groan, I apologise for my much younger self) have decided to back the US forces in Iraq, yet again, with deployment of more UK troops. There were no votes in the Commons this time. In the run up to the Iraq invasion the revolts were getting bigger and bigger. Bliar relied on the Tories to get him parliamentary support for war. I think he knows he wouldn't get support this time. A lot of people are saying it's a politically motivated decision - nothing to do with military imperatives. Bliar will do anything to help his buddy Bush get back to power.

I don't think he need worry too much - the chaos surrounding the Diebold voting machines looks like playing straight into the Republicans hands. If what happened in Florida was enough last time - then god knows what dirty tricks will be performed to get GW in again.

October 26th

 Unbelievably, John Gaunt is making a big deal about a holiday program on last night and has turned in to a debate over whether being gay is like being black!?! This is cos some people compared racism and the black minority with homophobism and the gay minority. Clearly it was just being used as an analogy… Loads of Afro-Carribeans coming on to deny that there is such a thing as a gay black. “It’s not in my culture to be gay”, said one guy. The homophobic blacks are getting really angry too. “What makes me homophobic is when it’s rammed down my throat.” These men (all men) are also saying they don’t want to be associated with gays. But they’ve missed the point.And the argument that gay is wrong and unnatural because if we were all like it there’d be no people left. If we were all women then there’d be no people being bred either, doesn’t mean its wrong to be a woman, or asexual. Loads of people don’t have sex. Should we kill them? Of course it’s natural to have gays – as it is amongst many (or all?) animals. But if all out gays tend to be about 10% of the population, and Bisexuals and people who find themselves other than completely hetero, can be a much higher figure, there is no problem surely? Finally at the end of the programme a black guy rang in to say that he’d read a New Scientist article showing that homosexuality was found to occur in over 250 species, in some study.The upshot is John gaunt has given the opportunity for bigots to air their vile views.

Dream

 BBC London leaked into my dreams and so dreamt about me Andy and some others standing about trying to come up with film sripts. Then I was leaving with some old scool friends and Bill Bailey. I wasn’t interacting and stood in BB’s personal space in a pub we went into. He said “do you really even see us?” I followed him to the toilet, and went to the urinal while he went to a bar strangely located within the toilets, and there were people standing around socialising.
 The Sopranos. Wow. That dream sequence. Tony B went and did a hit on….

John Peel died on October 27th and finally his abusive side came out - with a predilection for young girls. This was to become a common theme moving into the next decades - with victims of celbrity abusers finally gaining a voice to b able to speak out.

Well, that's it. The US election is over. Bush won. Easily. I'd like to know what role the crooked Diebold machines played in achieving this. There's been no word in the press about this, but I can wait.
Watched "The Power of Nightmares" last night. Al Qaida is a fake organisation invented by the US government. How come I'm not surprised?
We had the funeral on Wednesday - went smoothly. I got to wear my new black suit. 

Was this granddad's funeral? Who else could it be? I never liked writing about stuff I found painful so I talked about stuff in the abstract or about huge global events that I felt disconnected from. I'm really not like that now. I was in a shell. I'd created a personality to go out and be me while the real me hid inside. And I guess that disconnection was an inevitable consequence.

November 9th

The attack on Fallujah is on. My government is complicit in bombing civilians who are trying to resist an illegal invasion. Well done Tony Blair. However evil I ever thought you were, you’ve surpassed all my expectations.We managed to obliterate a hospital yesterday. Well done everyone!What is happening in fallujah as described by people actually in situ does not remotely resemble the crap that appears in Western newspapers and on TV.Robin Cook has been making some good points. He said the turning point in Fallujah was soon after the invasion was completed. The people of Fallujah welcomed the Coalition initially with little or no resistance from the people there. But when parents protested at the US occupation of their children’s school, US troops shot several parents dead. This upset the people of Fallujah. Can’t think why. Trouble is Robin Cook’s comments have dropped off the BBC bulletins by 11:00 and are not being discussed at all on John Gaunt.Drink driving is on the increase over here – up from 10 years ago.Death – a member of New Model Army died on Sunday (?).Robert Heaton (New Model Army)" died on 4th – brain tumor.

 November 10th  - saw Nick Cave at Brixton

It’s remembrance time again. Nearly. The debate was on John Gaunt and the usual white van brigade rang up to complain – “What is going on in this once great country of ours” blah blah. It’s over white poppies or refusals to wear a red one because of what is going on in Fallujah. They say “you wouldn’t have been able to say that 60 years ago in Germany” or some such shite. It’s paradoxical of course, because the speaker wouldn’t allow you to say that now if they had their way – why else are they making this point? They say go and live in another country if you don’t like it; and apart from the fact that – actually, this is my country – and the point that, I am considering it anyway – why don’t they go and live in another country if they don’t like free speech? I don’t like the moral high ground taken by these morons – my family fought as hard in WW2 as any other family and we cherish free speech and we abhor violence, especially violence conducted by this “coalition” against civilians in an illegal invasion.

Saw Camper van Beethoven for first time ever in 2004 - November 23rd

S made the decision pre-Xmas that with the tenants gone in Chisleurst, we should not only endure Xmas hell, but use the opportunity to clean up Edgehill. I feel that this mostly fell to me anyway though I’ve mostly forgotten this period – so if it isn’t written down it’s gone.

December 18th: 

 So farwell Blunkett - you fascist fuck. The man was a socialist once, but seemed more intent on punishing the poor of Britain for their lack of opportunities. ASBOs, ID cards, detainment without trial...Unfortunately ID cards still went through parliament. Fascist state - here we come.