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!

Friday, May 27, 2011

Roobarb and Rhubarb

THIS IS FOR 2 PEOPLE: SPINDRIFT, who was born the year before me, and lives in Melbourne, Australia (very near Valerie, the multi-hudred-kilo housewife heroin importer complete with Margaret Thatcher helmet hairdo)...

and LIZZY-D, who is a psychiatric social worker from the wilds of London who has fond memories of Roobarb and Custard and Spiral Tribe...





Rhubarb is a sweet vegetable that looks something like pink celery. It grows at the bottom of English* gardens. To make rhubarb crumble you boil up the rhubarb until it goes soft and not at all sour or bitter. Then it's perfectly lovely. And Mr Kipling makes pretty wondrous Rhubarb and Custard pies...

"ROOBARB" was the name of the original TV series which ran 30 5-minute episodes i 1974. It was never, according to Wikipedia, known as "Roobarb and Custard"








ROOBARB
original opening sequence and theme tune ~ very catchy!



In 1991 the catchy theme tune came back as a source of triphead entertainment for the "Rave Generation". Roobarb and Custard was also the name of a type of pill, reportedly containing MDMA and phenobarbitone....

ROOBARB AND CUSTARD
A mishmash of old tunes remixed with a donk thing. Which I quite like....



ROOBARB & CUSTARD 10 min mix
one of the commenters on Youtube said it sounded like a 3 y/o mixed this...
but still, i like the tunes



URBAN HYPE: TRIP TO TRUMPTON



*Do they have rhubarb in America, or not? I thought it was a very English thing. Now, having clicked my rhubarb link, I'm not so sure....

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

We sure do have rhubarb in N. Z. One of my favourite fruits? Or is it a veg. Love rhubarb crumble, (with custard and cream). My Dad had the biggest plant in his garden, grew like a weed, but don't eat the leaves, they are poisonous!
Kiwigirl

Gledwood said...

O I don't know why I thought they were British. Even the high court in New York declared them a vegetable not a fruit. Or vice versa. I know they're one not the other.

I don't know about the leaves, but the way my Mum used to cook the stalks tasted poisonous!!

bugerlugs63 said...

defo veg; no seeds.
we had loads at bottom of garden (when we were kids) and used to eat it raw dipped in brown paper bag(very relevant) of sugar. O the nostalgia of it.
loved your scab/abcess "story"
I too can get months out of one tiny burn/bite/scratch and have heaps of scars on my forearms that all look like cig burns.
Keep at it though, as it might not have built up enough pressure yet, but could reach its peak in few days! so annoying when they dry ;-)
anyway I only came here to catch up and say Anch & Reg were well chuffed with the mention on your blog, and i loved the vid of your robos . .ahhh <3 I must try do one of my lot.
Anch never had to shoo others away as the only time there were others there was when the 3 pups were 4 wks old and 5 more appeared, She made a new nest for the older 3 and they grew up quickly (no more mummy milk:-() but they instinctively knew to stay away . .they never even tried to go and interfere . . .so sweet & clever.
if you pinch them just lower than the ears at back of neck, making sure you get a good pinch of flesh not fur! then flick them over into palm of hand, they literally "play dead" for as long as ness. Two tiny pin holes, much like tear ducts can be seen, if you cant see them straight away, you soon will, as wee will come out of one and a tiny brown pellet out of the other.
females are generally between 1mm /2mm apart, but males are always so clear. sometimes, yes they are like 3mm/5mm apart which is a "cert" but other times they are close enough to be mistaken as female, little blighters!
now when you say u know nothing about gardening . .this you do know . .you reap what you sow.
you really dont have to know more than that. I am trying not to go on . . .but on the edge of one of our local recs and playing fields, there are loads of trees and neglected areas, where special brew cans, syringes, foil bobbles and foil rolls can be found. One day, one of these den-dwellers, most probably prompted by having mislaid a crumb of "white", totally stripped an area of approx meter sq. some-one took a sachet of meadow flowers 49p along amd scattered them . .guess what grew? ;-) One year (yonks ago) i took a sachet of sunflower seeds for a walk around the town and poked them into some of the most unlikeliest places . . .guess what?
folk were baffled by random huge sunflowers sprouting, cheered me up no end. its so satisfying to watch something grow that you have planted and nurtured (especially from seed) even a window box with ivy, but to find a wild patch outside is better as it gets you out. right i really am going on again now, I did have something else to say but it can wait . . .
its good to read you sounding . . .happier? less depressed?
take good care
with love
x

bugerlugs63 said...

wow word verify was fighth
fight H
need i say more?
no
well shut it then
x

bugerlugs63 said...

ps i meant males r NOT always so clear and now i have a tape measure to hand.
Females 3mm/4mm apart
Males up to 6mm/8mm apart
but males can be as close as 4mm
which is how ive ended up with 18 much loved silky soft robos ;-)
night x
o my word !! word verify; reges!!
the cheek of it
byeeee
x

Gledwood said...

Why is rhubarb always grown down the BOTTOM of the garden??

I once scattered some "baby's breath" on the ground under some conifers near where my Dad parked the car and hey presto they bloomed! Seriously I sewed them just on untilled soil, no little eggboxes full of potting compost, no raked ground or anything... and they still grew.

I'm feeling much happier thanks I didn't want to make a headline posting that in case my mood dropped again but yeah I feel way better

thanxxxxxxx


ps do you see how cultured and tame my robos were? what you won't see is Bashful trying to NIBBLE the sides of the camera, the swine! their nests look so scruffy bc every time I tried to clean them out they went mental and jumped on their wheel for hours at a time trying to run away from their nice clean nonhamstersmelling house... even though I never used anything stronger than washing up liquid, so as not to wash away too much scent, they STILL didn't like it, the tubby swines!!!

Spindrift said...

Thanks for the mention in your blog, really very sweet. I played the theme tune, it has been quite a while. Brought back some memories. I watched some episodes, showed the wife. She now knows banana man and danger mouse and roobarb and custard. Danger Mouse was my absolute favourite growing up. P.S. Loved the roborovsky clip, very cute. I wish I could find somewhere in Melbourne that sells them, I've looked a bit, not much luck. P.P.S. Valerie, near me, I'll keep an eye out. Shouldn't be too hard to spot with that hair do. Keep well Gledwood, safe journey. Paul

Gledwood said...

I heard hamsters are categorized as ILLEGAL VERMINOUS SWINES in Australia.

Valerie gets her hair done on Mondays, Thai massage on Tuesdays, nails on Wednesdays, Swedish massage Thursdays, etc etc etc. I can't remember what she does Friday, Saturday and Sunday apart from enough heroin to kill a family of four lesser junkies. But she wastes every second of the day somehow... always does!

Syd said...

Yes, we do rhubarb pies over here. They are in the fall.

Gledwood said...

Wow, see I knew it!
The New York High Court ruled on rhubarb being a fruit or a vegetable in the 1970s, so I know it's been in America since at least then...

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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