HAMSTERS & HEROIN: Not all junkies are purse-snatching grandmother-killing psychos. I'm keeping this blog to bear witness to that fact.

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DIARY OF A SLOWLY RECOVERING HEROIN ADDICT

I used to take heroin at every opportunity, for over 10 years, now I just take methadone which supposedly "stabilizes" me though I feel more destabilized than ever before despite having been relatively well behaved since late November/early December 2010... and VERY ANGRY about this when I let it get to me so I try not to.

I was told by a mental health nurse that my heroin addiction was "self medication" for a mood disorder that has recently become severe enough to cause psychotic episodes. As well as methadone I take antipsychotics daily. Despite my problems I consider myself a very sane person. My priority is to attain stability. I go to Narcotics Anonymous because I "want what they have" ~ Serenity.

My old blog used to say "candid confessions of a heroin and crack cocaine addict" how come that one comes up when I google "heroin blog" and not this one. THIS IS MY BLOG. I don't flatter myself that every reader knows everything about me and follows closely every single word every day which is why I repeat myself. Most of that is for your benefit not mine.

This is my own private diary, my journal. It is aimed at impressing no-one. It is kept for my own benefit to show where I have been and hopefully to put off somebody somewhere from ever getting into the awful mess I did and still cannot crawl out of. Despite no drugs. I still drink, I'm currently working on reducing my alcohol intake to zero.

If you have something to say you are welcome to comment. Frankness I can handle. Timewasters should try their own suggestions on themselves before wasting time thinking of ME.

PS After years of waxing and waning "mental" symptoms that made me think I had depression and possibly mild bipolar I now have found out I'm schizoaffective. My mood has been constantly "cycling" since December 2010. Mostly towards mania (an excited non-druggy "high"). For me, schizoaffective means bipolar with (sometimes severe)
mania and flashes of depression (occasionally severe) with bits of schizophrenia chucked on top. You could see it as bipolar manic-depression with sparkly knobs on ... I'm on antipsychotic pills but currently no mood stabilizer. I quite enjoy being a bit manic it gives the feelings of confidence and excitement people say they use cocaine for. But this is natural and it's free, so I don't see my "illness" as a downer. It does, however, make life exceedingly hard to engage with...

PPS The "elevated mood" is long gone. Now I'm depressed. Forget any ideas of "happiness" I have given up heroin and want OFF methadone as quick as humanly possible. I'm fed up of being a drug addict. Sick to death of it. I wanna be CLEAN!!!

Attack of the Furry Entertainers!

Attack of the Furry Entertainers!

Tuesday, February 02, 2010

Too much information

YES, TOO MUCH. For anyone who wants to give advice ~ what I want a computer for is to wordprocess (obviously), surf the web on mobile broadband (obviously) ~ and to be able to handle photos, audio files (e.g. a voice recording of me blabbering on) and video recordings in high quality from camera/camcorder/whatever. All I want to do is store this stuff safely on CDs or DVDs (or Blurays ~ as if!) or in the case of photos ~ as print-outs or on memory sticks.

But from what I can discern, "Windows 7 Home Premium" will do all this. There's a Wordpad facility that has been called Word Lite (and I don't need advanced wordprocessing features ~ my stuff is simple paragraphs, one after the other. No columns or tables or varying type faces or sizes) what I do need is a British English dictionary. I get slightly peeved at being told that to "honour a traveller's cheque" ought to be "honOring a traveLer's cheCK"..!

Photos/etc go through Windows media centre. Is all this right?

I looked at those beautific Apple book things. Ya know ~ the ultraskinny laptops. They are said to be the size and thickness of a copy of Tatler magazine (and no other!) ~ do you like the way I made it look ultra-widescreen? They're not really that glamorous... Before I knew anything about the competition, this is what I thought I wanted... But they only have 2gb RAM ~ which is OK but not huge ~ and no DVD/CD drive, though the ones without them are configured to take a portable plug-in DVD. And Macs cost £700! That's more than $1000US. I have found numerous "ultra portable laptops" (ie not ridiulously tiny but very light) ones that can beat this at 2/3 the price so sorry Apple ~ not good enough.

I looked at everything: desktop, all-in-one, laptop, notebook, powerbook, Blackberry (well they do surf the web, though I wouldn't have a hope in hell of inputting on those minuscule keys...), Apple Tablet or whatever it's called (no!). I can't live with a massive desktop ~ it has to be portable because unless you own your own home and have a laptop safe, when is a laptop ever safe? At least they can be placed inconspicuously or hidden more easily than a giant bells-and-whistles home PC. Some of the huge desktops were lovely and if I actually had a proper home I might even consider one. In about 20 years' time...).

If anybody has any more sensible advice (and all the advice I got was sensible) I would very much like to hear it. Remember I want to do wordprocessing, internet and media.

I know on which fronts I am willing to make sacrifices for cost or practicality, but I won't say them here, because I'm interested to hear others' viewpoints...

I hope this technotrauma comes to an end soon as it is doing my head in. Whoever thought chosing something that is meant to be your technological best friend could ever be so thorny? Yukk!



My head is full of noise... I have to go!

9 comments:

Elaine Denning said...

http://www.apple.com/ipad/

Have you seen the video?

Anonymous said...

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Syd said...

I much prefer my Mac laptop. It is compact, is great for photos, word processing, and has had no glitches which is something that Windows seems to be full of. I think that Macs are definitely worth the money. JMO.

Gledwood said...

No I haven't seen the vid... I have been told by someone who uses them that some websites aren't really configured for Apples... does anyone know what if any glitches are in Windows 7 Home version...?

Baino said...

Windows 7 is still pretty new but supposed to be better than Vista which didn't capture the market. I know macs are expensive but you win on memory size and functionality. If you're storing pics, you need a BIG drive or an external drive. We have a terrabyte external to transfer our photos onto. It didn't cost much surprisingly. If you're looking for cheap and cheerful, look at DELL, they come fully set up with a light version of Office and ready to rock and roll. They deliver to your door and you can opt for a 12-24 month service deal. My DELL desktopis 7 years old and still going strong although we only use it as a test machine now to make sure that Websites work in all browsers. Good Luck.

Vincent said...

Mac's are beautifull and very user friendly machines but unfortunately in Europe, where people are willing to pay, they are so much more expensive than in the USA. I think you should get a windows laptop.

You do not need a big one for what you want. With 1-2GB of RAM (memory) you will come a long way and it is definitely sufficient for word processing and internet. If you want to do sound and/or video processing you might want more. The harddisk (storage when laptop is turned off) could be 80GB-500GB depending on how many movies you're gonna make. If you get a dvd burner you can do with a smaller harddisk.

CPU speed does not need to be much for word processing/internet. 1-2GHz will do the job.

Bottom line is that you do not need a high end (or newest possible) system at all unless you want to make hollywood movies.

You want them to have a dvd/cd burner, WiFi (sometimes gets you free internet access at places like Starbucks), maybe blue tooth, a build in little camera.

Now, judging by what I have learned from your blog during the past years, your budget will be minimal.

I think I'd recommend you get something like a small Asus Eee pc net book and buy an external dvd/cd burner. At the moment older models come a lot cheaper. They are small though but maybe affordable. Also easy to take with you. Other manufacturers make similar models. In the shops, ask for a "net book". I think it's the best choice for you mate.

ALl the best,

Vince :-)

Vincent said...

PS: Don't bother about Windows Vista or 7. If it comes with Windows XP it's just as good. Many people these days still love Win XP.

And btw: There is a FREE office suite called Open Office that has an excellent word processor 95% compatible with MS Word. I use it myself (it's available for Apple OS X and Windows and others).

Vincent said...

PS2: And if you want to try and get into graphics manipulation, there is a free online one that runs in a web browser here:

http://www.pixlr.com/editor/

I actually use that to manipulate my blog piccies when needed and it saves me forking out the dough for programs you have to buy.

Anonymous said...

Another good program for graphics (just as good as Photoshop, is GIMP and it is free with a lot of plugins available. If purchasing one of the later laptops, go with one that supports 64 bit Windows 7 as it will be slightly faster and will handle everything you want with ease. Choosing the 64 bit operating system will not limit you to 3 GB of memory as with the 32 bit ones, which means you can add in as much memory as the motherboard can support. The more memory you can have, the better the performance will be.

Good Luck

I WANT OFF METHADONE AS QUICK AS HUMANLY POSSIBLE!

METHADONE ~ A FATE WORSE THAN DEATH







Heroin Shortage: News

If you are looking for the British Heroin Drought post, click here; the latest word is in the comments.







Christiane F

"Wir, Kinder vom Bahnhoff Zoo" by "Christiane F", memoir of a teenage heroin addict and prostitute, was a massive bestseller in Europe and is now a set text in German schools. Bahnhoff Zoo was, until recently, Berlin's central railway station. A kind of equivalent (in more ways than one) to London's King's Cross... Of course my local library doesn't have it. So I'm going to have to order it through a bookshop and plough through the text in German. I asked my druggieworker Maple Syrup, who is Italiana how she learned English and she said reading books is the best way. CHRISTIANE F: TRAILER You can watch the entire 120-min movie in 12 parts at my Random blog. Every section EXCEPT part one is subtitled in English (sorry: but if you skip past you still get the gist) ~ to watch it all click HERE.

To See Gledwood's Entire Blog...

DID you find my blog via a Google or other search? Are you stuck on a post dated some time ago? Do you want to read Gledwood Volume 2 right from "the top" ~ ie from today?
If so click here and you'll get to the most recent post immediately!

Drugs Videos

Most of these come from my Random blog, which is an electronic scrapbook of stuff I thought I might like to view at some time or other. For those who want to view stuff on drugs I've collected the very best links here. Unless otherwise stated these are full-length features, usually an hour or more.

If you have a slow connexion and are unused to viewing multiscreen films on Youtube here's what to do: click the first one and play on mute, stopping and starting as it does. Then, when it's done, click on Repeat Play and you get the full entertainment without interruption. While you watch screen one, do the same to screens 2, 3 and so on. So as each bit finishes, the next part's ready and waiting.

Mexican Black Tar Heroin: "Dark End"

Khun Sa, whose name meant Prince Prosperous, had been, before his death in the mid 2000s, the world's biggest dealer in China White Heroin: "Lord of the Golden Triangle"

In-depth portrait of the Afghan heroin trade at its very height. Includes heroin-lab bust. "Afghanistan's Fateful Harvest"

Classic miniseries whose title became a catchphrase for the misery of life in East Asian prison. Nicole Kidman plays a privileged middle-class girl set up to mule heroin through Thai customs with the inevitable consequences. This is so long it had to be posted in two parts. "Bangkok Hilton 1" (first 2 hours or so); "Bangkok Hilton 2" (last couple of hours).

Short film: from tapwater-clear H4 in the USA to murky black Afghan brown in Norway: "Heroin Addicts Speak"

Before his untimely death this guy kept a video diary. Here's the hour-long highlights as broadcast on BBC TV: "Ben: Diary of a Heroin Addict". Thanks to Noah for the original link.

Some of the most entertaining scenes from Britain's top soap (as much for the poor research as anything else). Not even Phil Mitchell would go from nought to multi-hundred pound binges this fast: "Phil Mitchell on Crack" (just over 5 minutes).

Scientist lady shows us how to cook up gear: "How Much Citric?" Lucky cow: her brown is 70% purity! Oddly we never see her actually do her hit... maybe she got camera shy...

And lastly:

German documentary following a life from teenage addiction to untimely death before the age of 30. The decline in this girl's appearance is truly shocking. "Süchtig: Protokoll einer Hilflosigkeit". Sorry no subtitles; this is here for anyone learning German who's after practice material a little more gripping than Lindenstraße!































Nosey Quiz! Have you ever heard voices when you weren't high on drugs?

Manic Magic

Manic Magic

Gledwood Volume 2: A Heroin Addict's Blog

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