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!

Sunday, July 18, 2010

Keeping Mum


A KINDLY GANG-MEMBER from Da Local Baby Gangsta Crew let me have some drugs on tick today. I paid half and owe half. I only had money to spare because all plans for today fell through, leaving me at a loose end, exceedingly "peeved", to put it mildly and in need, so I thought, of a chemical emollient. (Not an exfoliant, that gets off hair. An emollient. That soothes.)

O man the effort I put into today. All for nothing!

I was supposed to see my Mum. I got up, crystal clear. Cleaned myself up as best I could, physically speaking. But to be frank I just looked like a heroin addict on a daytrip.

I had checked train times and prices etc etc etc. I had the option of going in and out of London or taking a long couple of bus rides across town. The bus rides seemed cheaper and got me to a station further up the right line.

So I took this bus. Got to station. All was silent. The ticket machine utterly refused to take my £5 note. Not that it was bulimically constantly regurgitating the thing. I think this machine was anorexic. Its mouth refused even to open.

By the way I know someone who used to work on the Eating Disorders Helpline in Norwich who said that without exception bulimics verbally spewed and spewed, while anorexics were barely willing to open their mouths and thus said barely anything at all... Isn't that fascinating...

So anyway this ticket machine refused my money, which hardly bothered me. I chucked 10p in the Permit to Travel machine. This meant I was covered if an evil ticket inspector chose to pounce on me like a barn owl on an unsuspecting harvest mouse... as frequently happens on London suburban trains. If he queried whether or not the machine was in fact working, I would just tell them to check CCTV. Britain does not have the oft-stated 4 million cameras (surely it's many more than that now as that figure's a decade old) for nothing. For once I might use one to my advantage. I do not trust ticket inspectors after having the most almighty altercation with two on a platform having been told my ticket, which I'd checked in advance was good for it, was invalid on my chosen route. Something, incidentally, which tended not to happen before rail privatization. The worst ever move by the Tory party, in that particular line of activity. I got my money back and a grovelling apology. I always do. Or did. When I could be bothered with such things.

Anyway long story short, I got to the interchange station to find it surprisingly quiet. I hadn't taken the train, I'd walked because it was so near the other one (but wrong for the bus). I thought I'd let the train take the strain. In the end my feet did. And this station was empty with almost unreadable electronic notices saying something I could not understand. It transpired the entire line was down, and if I did want to see my Mum I'd have to take two trains in the wrong direction, with no guarantee how long they might take.

Full of misery and fury I phoned her and said this is impossible. So we had to leave it for another day. Such a shame as Branzy my step-Dad wouldn't have been there earwigging in every word. In other words we might have done something else except discuss 25 topics I don't care about, skating merrily over life's surfaces, yet barely scratching them.

I went directly to the nearest cyder-selling shop and got two White Stars. Well I wasn't gonna need this money for train fares any more. Poured them into Lucozade bottles to spare myself disgusted glances. Jumped on bus. It was well over an hour till I got home, and then I phoned that heroin dealer who "kindly" ~ if you wanna call it that ~ provided that lump for half price.

If I don't cough up tomorrow I get a bullet through my brainbox!

Anyway all this just goes to show, I'm stone cold sober and it still goes mammaries up. Oh what a day ...



Illustrated: selection of ultra-modern British trains. Especially the top one.
Very top pic: HM the Queen mysteriously riding public train (no wonder she looks glum)...

Saturday, July 17, 2010

The tubby little dormouse!

THE HAZEL (OR COMMON) DORMOUSE Muscardinus avellanarius is the only species in this tiny tubby rodent family native to the UK.


Adept at climbing...


... and often to be seen scrambling about hedgerows in the most impossible-looking positions...
(perhaps they get tips from Cosmopolitan magazine)


They love blackberries!



Going for a clamber in the shrubbery...


They are the tiniest tubby rodents we have, after harvest mice.
And doesn't this one so enjoy being captured and held!


They're most active in autumn, fattening themselves for the Big Sleep ahead...


The dor- comes from the French dormir ~ to sleep.
They build tiny nests and sleep the whole winter through...


They do sleep so deeply ~ more like a coma ~ these normally ultra-alert rodents becoming utterly insensible...
... and a canny photographer might show...


... how daffodils are obviously their first choice for a bed-down...!

WISHING Y'ALL A CHEERY WEEKEND!


Friday, July 16, 2010

"Disordered"

I FOUND OUT that I suffer from something called "Racing thoughts".
Now this is why self-diagnosis is such a minefield. Because if I didn't know better, I'd assume "racing" thoughts are ones that appear quickly one after the other. Not so. My experience is the same as the wikipedia definition, where the head becomes full of music, voices, snippets, logos and mottos and swirling about. Like a radio tuned to several channels at once.
Wikipedia:~
Racing thoughts may be experienced as background or take over a person's consciousness. Thoughts, music, and voices might be zooming through one's mind. There also might be a repetitive pattern of voice or of pressure without any associated "sound".
It is a very overwhelming and irritating feeling, and can result in losing track of time. Sometimes racing thoughts are accompanied by an elevated pulse, including drumming in the ears.
Generally, racing thoughts are described by an individual who has had an episode as an event where the mind uncontrollably brings up random thoughts and memories and switches between them very quickly. Sometimes they are related, as one thought leads to another; other times they are completely random. A person suffering from an episode of racing thoughts has no control over his or her train of thought and it stops them from focusing on one topic or prevents sleeping.

They don't make me feel anxious or irritable. To me, they're like free entertainment. They can even be exhilarating.
I also relate to the statement about a repetative pattern of voice... without associated sound. That's the milder version.
These are a symptom of bipolar disorder, anxiety and supposedly some obsessive-compulsive conditions and in their severe form are said to be exceedingly oppressive.
I mention these because they came back to me lately. The other night I actually lost track and thought my mobile phone was on speaker, because someone was blar blar blar-ing away at me.
I'm glad I actually know the name of this phenomenon, which, incidentally I'm sure is mostly not drug-induced. I like the kind of drugs that block things out. And those are the only kind I take now. Not psychedelics. Not crack. And certainly not that nasty cannabis stuff. Last time I toked on that rubbish I was hearing paranoid voices for several hours, which was highly inconvenient.
I was reading over personality disorder criteria. I am not flattered that the nut-nut nurse implied I might be on the anxious-avoidant or dependent "axis". I am diametrically opposite in many ways to such people. For example, I would never pass over to somebody else a decision affecting the course of my life. My family, who know me best, would frequently call me stubborn. That is the exact opposite of a dependent personality, who would give in to others' wishes as a matter of course.
The only personality disorder you could bundle on to me is the borderline type. (And the least flattering diagnosis, apart from "psychopathic" or antisocial personality disorder.) I've been told I have this twice, and what sets off alarm bells is the fact that both these individuals also have (actually, had, such a diagnosis ~ one committed suicide in January.
Here are the criteria:
1.Frantic efforts to avoid real or imagined abandonment. Note: Do not include suicidal or self-injuring behavior covered in Criterion 5 [I don't think so.]
2.A pattern of unstable and intense interpersonal relationships characterized by alternating between extremes of idealization and devaluation. [I wouldn't put it this way; but I have had a pattern of getting into over-intense frienships, and having read further, yes you could say this "criterion" applies. Though I wouldn't word my experience this way. You could say many if not most people feel such ambivalence.]
3.Identity disturbance: markedly and persistently unstable self-image or sense of self. [Absolutely. When I was younger I had almost no concept of who I was.]
4.Impulsivity in at least two areas that are potentially self-damaging (e.g., promiscuous sex, eating disorders, binge eating, substance abuse, reckless driving). Note: Do not include suicidal or self-injuring behavior covered in Criterion 5 [Drugs; food. Used to eat under 1500 cals a day as matter of course.]
5.Recurrent suicidal behavior, gestures, threats or self-injuring behavior such as cutting, interfering with the healing of scars (excoriation) or picking at oneself. [There was a period when I used to cut up with broken glass, but it only lasted a year and I don't do it now.]
6.Affective instability due to a marked reactivity of mood (e.g., intense episodic dysphoria, irritability or anxiety usually lasting a few hours and only rarely more than a few days). [Definitely some mood disturbance, sometimes to suicidal extremes. And often it is highly "reactive". Isn't everyone prone to be put in a bad mood when things mess up? Not all my moods are as brief as this criterion suggests.]
7.Chronic feelings of emptiness [Absolutely.]
8.Inappropriate anger or difficulty controlling anger (e.g., frequent displays of temper, constant anger, recurrent physical fights). [I frequently feel irritated, but try to keep it under my hat.]
9.Transient, stress-related paranoid ideation, delusions or severe dissociative symptoms [I don't think I'm anything like as para as I used to be. Some of those "racing thoughts" experiences have a dissociative quality, because they are heard rather than thought. I still suffer depersonalization and derealization, that is feelings that self and world are unreal, but not as hallucinatorily intense as in former years. ]
Personally I don't think I have any personality disorder. I know something is "wrong" with me. (Well, I don't feel "right".)
Further to yesterday's post, I feel an uncanny need for self-protection and care. Sorting myself out might be a nice place to start. I have access to doctors, so I may as well use them.
But I think psychiatry is a religion, involving its own world view and set of values. Doctors function as priests with nurses in roles parallel to monks and nuns. Psychiatry's holy trinity is pharmacology, counselling and the DSM IV-R diagnostic criteria.
I don't think I'm mad. But I'm absolutely sure that the world is.


Illustration: bubble reads "are we confused?"

MAD WORLD: TEARS FOR FEARS VERSION



EAMMON: DON'T WANT YOU BACK
I like this tune


Thursday, July 15, 2010

Self-pity

SELF-PITY. From time to time, we all presumably indulge in this.
But how much is actually pity, empathy, love ~ the pity we might feel for relatives and partners of those killed in disasters in the news, or to the parents of young men, barely out of school, who are gunned down or stabbed in senseless disputes over nothing?
It is traditional to claim we don't want pity, as if pity were patronizing at best or a smear or slight on a person at worst.
Is not pity love? A type of love, at least. To be able to pity oneself, then, one must love oneself.
How many times do we genuinely feel self-pity? Isn't it actually self-loathing and hatred and horror and distaste we are more likely to feel to ourselves?
Or plain old guilt?
I have had flashes of self-pity. Pity rather than loathing. The kind of pity you might feel for a down-and-out on the street. And it felt like a whole new world. Like I actually loved myself. That I was special enough to care and be cared for.
Those two characters in my head who never match and meet for once came briefly to a truce.
I felt that somebody loved me. And I felt worry and concern, and wondered why I do the self-destructive things I do.
And it felt good. And it hurt.

Wednesday, July 14, 2010

Reading materiell

TODAY I found a bookshop with several shelves of foreign languages. The German section was all mixed up with Dutch and Scandinavian. C'mon ~ German doesn't have struck through Øs or Ås with little halos on top!
Every single volume of slightest interest that I didn't buy I made careful note of inside the paper bag my methadone came in. Author, title, price... I'm the character Oscar Wilde was speaking of when he famously remarked on the price of everything and the value of nothing...
But prices aside, I carefully checked everything on display. What I wanted more than anything was something nonficitonal and rivetting. For a novel to hold my attention it has to be really special. Otherwise my attitude pretty much goes: this isn't even TRUE, yet you think I should be leafing forever onwards through your tawdry tale? The only novels that have grabbed me in recent times are thrillers. When I heard you could make £20k writing romance and that top writers knock out five or more a year I bought one for 20p. I seriously could not make it past page one. I have an idea (amongst so very many) for a crime series. Who knows, I might one day even put pen to paper (or digits to keys)... As it is I'm mired in my present project which is slowly ongoing. My characters are so real to me. Their story HAS to be told....
Anyway I perused carefully through this not-too inspiring selection of German books and came away with a Collins Gem German dictionary for £1. It's tiny but I quickkly realized on getting it home that my vocabulary has outgrown it. My favourite German word, klitzeklein which means teeny-tiny wasn't there, because the book is too klitzeklein itself!
Most of the novels were translations from English, whcih seemed the biggest waste of time. I want to know I'm experiencing something unique. So I chose a thriller by Volker Klüpfel and Michael Kobr called Seegrund which means Bottom of the Lake. Paragraph one I understood perfectly... because it was somebody speaking English! But I found I also understood paragraph two just as well. This is seriously freaky.
I was about to take my purchases to the till when I realized that behind me was another mixed language pile of children's picture-books. And here, finally, the book I've long been searching for ~ an illustrated encyclopedia of science. As well as all types of animals and plants, we have the Solar System, the sun, the stars, asteroids and meteorites, comets; the weather, the human body, some amazing star maps and the cutest photograph ever of a family of golden bears crossing the ridge of a waterfall, Mummy Bear glancing back to make sure her babies aren't tumbling over the side... This is the book I've longed for ever since I took up German again. It gives all the basic vocab on everything. It's dead easy to read and beautifully illustrated. My best spent £2 in a long, long while!
Though I still feel full of unaccountable gloom whenever I stop, I'm determined to keep on running so my misery won't bite me on the bum and eat me. Perhaps there's no magic cure for depression, but at least knowing that you're accomplishing something, even if it is just learning to speak over again... That does help a little.
Now I must ping. it's nearly 4am. I'm only awake due to my broken sleep cycle.
Apart from books, my best news is THE HEATWAVE HERE IS OVER! Normal cool weather is resumed! I couldn't be happier.
Wishing y'all a cheery day :-)...
PS Chogstable the nightingale is trilling and tootling his klitzekleine head off in the cherry tree outside, the feathery swine!

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Yesterday, all my troubles seemed...

YESTERDAY MORNING I was drunk and maudlin. By drunk, read "alcoholically intoxicated" ~ not falling over, puking, fighting with lamp-posts. By 11am I'd had 2 or 3 of my special cocktails, which are based on cyder at 7.5% in 500ml cans, so you can do the mathematics yourself. 6 cans a day is the amount of alcohol advised by Her Majesty's chief doctor in a WEEK. Then again I'm cynnical. Very cynical in fact ~ about this "a couple of big glasses of wine a day is doing your body all manner of wrong". You may see a junkie making excuses. And yes I do believe I drink too much. But I think the Government's recommendations on dangerous levels are ridiculous in the extreme. I'm totally against altering the drink-drive limit (making it even lower) ~ if it ain't broke, why fix it?
While we're on the subject, I also believe the amount of Calories nutritionalists let us get away with is ricidulous. MOST of the world survives on 1000 to 1500 cals a day. I've been to India. Only the Indian police are overweight.
I've eaten in their equivalent of a truck driver's caff, where you get a ball of rice smaller than a tennis ball, with perhaps ~ at most ~ as much fish as would fit into a small sardine tin. This came coated in a thin batter so it looked more than it really was. This is considered a working man's lunch. Oh and I forgot, three tiny bowls of dips ~ pickles, chutney and sauce.
Incidentally, the Indian food I ate, betweeen Goa, Bangalore and Chennai (aka Madras) was nothing like the fragrant delicately spiced to raging hot array of dishes on sale in British curryhouses. What I experienced was more like ultra-hot Mexican ~ ie mostly chili-spiced. I don't recall ever eating anything resembling "curry". And no tikka masala, jalfrezi, balti or anything of that nature. All that food comes from the north. In Tamil Nadu they sold lots of Thali (pronounced Taarlee ~ without that burred R, you Americans!) , which is usually vegetarian and involves a great many bowls of things to mix and match dipping-wise. Another speciality, and this cost about 5 rupees a portion, each portion being cupcake sized, was bhel-puri. Which is sold at stalls. There's about four variations and it's really nice.
Indian takeaway food in India was what would here be considered "Chinese!" Though no attempt was made to decorate the stalls and restaurants with Chinese characters, red lanterns/etc. And it wasn't called Chinese food at all. It was just greasy stir-fried noodles and it was the best Chinese takeaway (if you wanna call it that) I've had ANYWHERE. And you know how much I like my Chinese.
If you wanna know the exact location of the shop I'm afraid my ex who I always called "Libra" here, went out, but we were staying at a cheap hotel that literally backed onto the tannoy at Chennai railway station. So it's walking distance from there. And well worth doing an Elvis-style expedition to get some (you know: I'm talking about the peanut butter sandwich story or whatever it was Elvis Presley had flown across America from his favourite diner just because he loved it so much. Though judging by the state of him towards the end of his life I find it difficult to believe it was only one ...
Now: what do you wanna hear? Me maudlin drunk. Well that had to do with my realizing the total death tally these past twelve months is at least FIVE probably SIX. I am not sure, as I do not care to ennumerate. Two heart attacks, two suicides. Another alleged heart attack... (Come on, you leave rehab, have a mysterious heart attack that very evening and it's not crack? Gimme a break. But that's the received version. It was just a somehow hitherto unnoticed heart complaint that decided to manifest just after leaving drug rehab...)
As far as Pinky & Perky go, I've not been in touch with anyone since the funeral. To be frank I don't think I was particularly missed on the day. I would have been tolerated like a particularly noxious, wafting fart that nobody would admit to. What I didn't post was that this group of friends involved a person with whom I was once in a close substitute mother-son type friendship (she used to tell people we met I was her son) and that person... well makes the situation less than simplistic. She invited me. But that doesn't mean she wanted to see me.
After the event: not a single phone call. For all she knows I could have been hit by a truck on the way. And I'm not (probably) telling this one the full facts. I don't trust her not to pass on a revved up bitching version to Pinky.
Yeah don't I have wonderful friends. Ex friends. I apologize.
Pinky and Perky were people I used to see every week but through this other person, with whom friendship has withered on the vine. So do you get it now? that my feelings were mixed from the start. That to go there would be... slightly weird. And as I said, to be frank I'd rather write personally to Pinky, not an apology for not being there. I doubt she very much noticed. But to put my own written eulogy (is that the expression?) My feelings on the life of Perky, who had so very much life it's hard to believe she's actually gone...
Apart from that, I bought two huge bags of gear on special offer. About 1.2g+ for £35 (usually bags that big they won't discount, unless you buy several). I had two or three hits and knocked myself unconscious the entire day yesterday.
Early that morning, I met somebody on the street and asked after the local dealer who drops off one minute from my house. I encounter people waiting on him all the time and I still haven't had an introduction. Every time, the situation falls through. Or I'm told by someone else that his gear's shyte. I've heard a lot of times that his gear has been shyte which is, I spose, what put me off bothering with this intro.
Anyway: long story short ~ I fessed up to this friend of mine/acquaintance/whatever you wanna call him about the Funeral Scandal (as it is labelled in my own personal mythology).
And he said to me "does it have little black bits in it?" and I said "what you mean minute black specks that cook down so the hit looks black?" (ie not "tea leaves, which are big floaters of something inert that you only find in drought or ripoff gear ~ these little bits look like a fine powder, as fine as cheap preground white pepper or black talc, if you can imagine that)... anyway he says yeah he knows someone who took the bus one stop and woke up in Trafalgar Square. Another started fighting with his best mate. Whenever it's taken, chaos ensues. I don't know what this weird black stuff is, but it's obviously pharmaceutical. And it's not heroin. In druggie language you could call this "B+" that is it's B (brown heroin) and strong enough to pong of brown, both in the bag and while cooking up, and the smell of brown heroin base is unmistakable. (Nothing like vinegar, incidentally. Vinegar is what Mexican tar and some China white heroin smells of.) The plus, whatever it is, is some pharmaceutical agent, probably either a benzodiazepine like Rohypnol or a barbiturate like Seconal or Phenobarb, or methaqualone ("quaaludes") or both.
What it cannot be is sleeping pills crushed down. Bearing in mind that a small pill weighs 200mg minimum and a large £20 bag weighs 600mg and I'm using a third of a 600mg bag at a time usually (ie "two points" or a fifth of a gram) ~ how much sleeping pill is going to fit into that? Nowhere near enough to knock me out for the day, no matter what the potion. So whoever's adulterating this stuff surely has access to illegally-manufactured knockout drops, probably from China or Central Asia. That is knockout stuff in its pure form.
One of yesterday's bags was the Midnight Black, the other just ordinary heroin. It's the second kind ~ just heroin ~ that I've had today ~ so I feel crystal clear!
The very fact that I've more than half the gear left over says how strong it was. Ordinarily I could get through a gram-and-a-bit in an afternoon, if I wanted to.
My head is not in a particularly good place. I wander about stricken by guilt over times when I was four and crushed a ladybird. And other such nonsense. (This is depression.) I tell myself this is depression to console myself. Perhaps recognizing some of the psychological tricks and mind-games of the condition gives me an edge over it. Not much of an edge, but something.
And that, my friends, is that.
Now I have to go. I have to think of something to post in German..!
Have a good day everyone :-)

Monday, July 12, 2010

Sweating like a swine all day

AND THE HEATWAVE CONTINUES! Temperatures here are far from impressive on the Euro-scale. A week ago it was 34C on the plains of Austria. Yesterday it it was FORTY ~ that is 105F in Switzerland. But it's still 31 or 32, 32C being 90F with deathly humidity.
I was sweating so bad earlier on that my hair was running with water. I had to keep wiping my "reading glasses" (I need to wear 'em all the time but vanity STILL makes me pretend in certain situations that they're only for reading) yeah anyway these stupid glasses, which I only wear because I had a psychotic breakdown (nothing but outright paranoid psychosis could disturb the balance of my mind enough to make glasses-wearing seem acceptable)... What am I saying? These glasses, they were basically so splashed with my own sweat at one point I couldn't see through them! I had to run in the shower to cool down. I'm next to a constant fan but it's a fan heater with heat off, so as fans go it has a power of about 1/10.
Well this is a load of blah, innit?
I feel miserable as sin. I am constantly knocking back alcoholic "cocktails" in the form of the cheap and nasty white cyder British street drinkers usually opt for, mixed with tropical juice, which results in a rough home-made alcopop. It's quite nice actually.
My body feels ill. Constant diarrhoea. Diarrhoea is said to be a sign of inner turmoil (don't cackle!) I mean it's sposed to be a be a form of crying.
It's strange, with all my years wishing I was dead and manifold examples I could give that would make your hair stand on end of things I have done, not so much directly suicidal though I have tried to top myself. I woke in a white haze thinking "wow, is this what it's like to be dead?" then I realized I was freezing cold and very wet, wearing about 20 layers of clothes and the white infinity was nothing more special than the side of my bath!
Yes I tried to drug myself and drown and I floated!
Well after years of all this, and frankly believing that suicide was a way of doing the world a favour, I have finally seen the chaos it leaves behind.
Which, to be frank, has started to make me feel a bit suicidal.
O how can I write stuff like this? I always knew my blog was the saddest placed on the bloggosphere but new depths of self-indulgence are being plumbed. Does anyone really wanna hear this? Is anyone interested?
I wish I could say my life has hit some kind of turning point but it never will. A Muslim Fundamentalist outside the public library once told me that if you do yourself in by stabbing yourself, you'll spend all eternity in hell stabbing yourself with a knife (and I thought God was "merciful") but hey. Hearing this just made me clear that if I ever did do myself in I should use soporific drugs plus a big shot of heroin to put the final boot in. An eternity ODing on heroin I could just about deal with.
When I was younger I wanted so much to live. Even when depressed I didn't genuinely want to die, not most of the time, which is why depression hurt so much. In recent years I hit a far worse state because I literally gave up on life in just about every conceivable way. I was a shambling wreck, a shadow where a person used to be.
My family seemed to think this was some great tragedy but they love me. (I don't know why.) I once read something in a cod-psychology book, that stated that the depressed tend to fall into two categories. Those who feel unloved, and those who feel unlovable. Well that is me ~ the second one. And if you're reading this blog and you still wonder what makes me tick it is that statement.
My counsellor keeps banging on about low self esteem. Well why the hell should I esteem myself? And what is this crap that tells us we're all inherently wonderful people. Most people are selfish, shallow, egotistical, hedonistic, impatient, disrespectful... need I go on. Actually I was talking about myself there. The old chestnut about three fingers pointing back, that's one of the truest aphorisms (is that what they're called) sayings. Yeah. It's one of the truest sayings I've ever heard.
The only two bits of news that have brought me any genuine joy in the past decade were:
1: Earth to be hit by giant asteroid and all life wiped out. (Yipee!)
2: Jesus Christ returning soon.
I think if I have to go for Jesus or an asteroid it has to be Jesus.

REVELATION 21

3 And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God.

4 And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.

5 ¶ And he that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new. And he said unto me, Write: for these words are true and faithful...

21 And the twelve gates were twelve pearls; every several gate was of one pearl: and the street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent glass.

22 ¶ And I saw no temple therein: for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it.

23 And the city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it: for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof.

24 And the nations of them which are saved shall walk in the light of it: and the kings of the earth do bring their glory and honour into it.

25 And the gates of it shall not be shut at all by day: for there shall be no night there...

1 And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb.

2 In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.

3 And there shall be no more curse: but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it; and his servants shall serve him:

4 and they shall see his face; and his name shall be in their foreheads.

5 And there shall be no night there; and they need no candle, neither light of the sun; for the Lord God giveth them light: and they shall reign for ever and ever.


I wanna take a dip in this river of life. And obviously I would like to see those famous Pearly Gates. Also I could do with a nibble on one of those leaves.

If anyone needs healing, I do.

20 ¶ He which testifieth these things saith, Surely I come quickly: Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus.

21 ¶ The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen.



Saturday, July 10, 2010

Ladybirds!

BIGGLY-BUGGLY FRIDAY ON SATURDAY

Sometimes known as ladybugs in the United States, though internationally biologists prefer the name "lady beetle" because these little critters obviously aren't birds and the term "bug" is considered vulgar...
Whatever you wanna call them, these tiny beetles from the family Coccinellidae are the cutest of all insects, passing through distinct stages in their tiny lives...


Some ladybirds are yellow...


Some are completely spotless...



A funky black-n-cream design... here snacking on some colour-co-ordinated aphids...


Ladybird passion...


Wow look at this. Adds new meaning to that expression "jiggy-wiggy"...


Ladybird lady with clutch of tiny eggs...


Ladybird larva in yellow with black dots...


Terrifying-looking black and red larva savaging aphid...


This is called the pupal stage, just before the larva turns into a ladybird proper...


In a fully-grown ladybug, the candy-coloured outer shell opens up...


... revealing delicate inner wings that are surprisingly huge...


Taking off...


Designed by Volkswagen!

My own funeral

MY ALARM shrilled me awake at 7am; I was up by 7:20. Did all the bits I had to e.g. picking up methadone.
At 10:30 my dealer rang me but I ignored him. At 11:00 I rang the dealer using my harshest voice to demand "a decent one, coz they've been getting smaller and smaller" (dealers like to try it on ~ they wanna see how much they can get away with. I had been punishing him by going elsewhere.)
He said yeah yeah and he would be "fifteen minutes" (ie ages), so I took my time getting to the place. At 11:15 I was at da place. Then I sat on a lawn reading my 1943 Kathleen Speight edition Teach Yourself Italian, which I so wasn't in the mood for, but I'd left my German book at home. (I can actually enjoy this German book without constant recourse to a dictionary (though I'm not claiming to know every word) ~ what a wonder that is! I was knocking back white cyder and puffing on cigarettes as I learned to conjugate my verbs. At about 11:45 the dealer showed.
Home by midday. I had one hour clear.
I checked on my clothes, hanging dry from my windows on coathangers (I've nowhere else to dry them). Then I rushed to cook up my hit.
The my first attempt was far too pale in my opinion, though a goodly chunk of "brown" had gone in. The dealer had made good on his promise and sold about six or seven "points", as we say, for £20. (Those are points of a gram ~ five points being half a gram.) Well as I say it looked too pale, so I added more and re-fried. I'd put about a third of a gram into the spoon. With vitamin C it dissolved into half a millilitre of tapwater. The resulting hit was midnight black.
I took this half-millilitre of death-black liquid, dropped my clothes (which also gave relief from the oppressive heat ~ only 31, 32 degrees C but this morning so humid, I looked like I'd showered with my clothes on.)
Afterwards I was trying to remember where I'd banged the hit in, but I couldn't. But it went in directly...
... and knocked me out cold.
Next thing I knew it was 1:45 hours. FIFTEEN MINUTES TO GO. There was absolutely no way I was gonna make this event on time, and crematoria will not put funerals on hold just because some stupid junkie took too much gear to get there on time.
I rushed to the shower and washed my hair. This only took three minutes but when I next checked the clock it was two o'clock.
Knowing I'd missed it I slumped back in my chair of living death and was instantly unconscious. I woke up at 2am.
Y'all can have a go at me if you like. I feel the weight of your disappointment already.
My second thought, after "what the hell have I done to Pinky?" was "what will I say on my blog?"! You see your opinions matter very much.
As I saw it I could:
1: obfuscate ~ give an oblique account of the day. Not lying, but making it seem to the uninformed reader that I'd actually been, even though I hadn't.
2: lie. But the day I start telling lies on my blog is the day I should give up blogging
3: tell the stark truth
So I'm sorry, but this is the truth.
I missed the funeral because I was too stoned on heroin to get there. And there you have it.
Trust me, you won't be any more disappointed in me than I am in myself.

Thursday, July 08, 2010

I CALLED up my friend who's unofficially organizing Perky's funeral tomorrow, I was stressing about where it was, who I was going with, how I would get there and what the hell to wear. I do have a suit, but it stinks of 10,000 cigarettes having hung on the back of a door for three years. Also I don't have a shirt to go with it. Or a tie. Except for a bloodstained old school tie I found on the street and have used as nothing other than a heroin tourniquet...

I was told: just come as you are, wear normal clothes, that's the type of date it's going to be. And I was saying, Yeah but I don't want to turn up as my regular scuffy self and show everyone up. And I was told: You'll be fine, you'll be fine. Then I said: Well shouldn't I dress as if I'm going to the doctor's?~ and she said: Yes! That's exactly right!

So my sartorial stressings are sorted, at least. I presently have a huge bucket of clothes soaking in the corner. (I hand-wash.)

I said I'd Google the address and bus-routes for the crematorium, so I'll have to ping off and do that in a sec.

O man I how am I going to get through tomorrow. All the drugs in Burma wouldn't do it for me. What am I going to do? What will happen? How will I cope?

I've never been to a funeral before. Not a friend's funeral.

The only ones I've attended were my Grandad's and my old Aunt Dot's.

How I'll handle seeing a coffin that I know contins a body that used to be inhabited by the most marvellous, wonderful woman who brought so much (and the most classic Turnip accent you've ever heard) to so many ... How I can look on this coffin and think of her laid out inside so lifeless and still, staring blankly into the dark; this person who was so full of life and is now about to be chucked into the furnace and burnt to ashes ~ how can I possibly do this?

I don't know how.

I don't know.

Of course I will survive. But what about poor Pinky, so cruelly left alone? A woman who, despite the most gruesome, grotesque, horrendous life you could possibly imagine ~ in childhood and in adulthood ~ has survived and lived as best she could. A woman who has endured years of psychotic illness. Nobody can comfort her. For there is no comfort. And no hope. (At least none to be seen.) To pretend otherwise would be to descend into clichés and platitudes and I'm not into them.

I cried this morning. I actually cried. And I never cry over suicide or drug deaths. These are personal decisions or inevitable consequences of life ill-lived. So how can I cry over the inevitable?

Perky's death was far from inevitable. It is wrong, so wrong. And that's the difference.

Wednesday, July 07, 2010

Suicide II


I'M not really in the mood to write this, but I painstakingly posted these facts in German so I have to do it in English too.

In January a someone I know threw himself in front of a train and died.

I had known him for years. Originally I met him in a mental hospital, where he was undergoing alcohol detox. He had borderline personality disorder and always seemed cheerful enough, though he was always on antidepressants and, towards the end of his life, bipolar meds as well.

He was depressed because he had to have an operation. Also he had been taking that legal high mephedrone, probably in large amounts. He ended up in a mental hospital (again) and was, according to someone who really knows the meaning of the word "really psychotic". This is why I suspect this nasty drug had something to do with his death, because in all the time I'd known him he had never, ever seemed "really psychotic".

So anyway, he's dead.

He was best friends with a lesbian I know who I'll name Perky. Her and her girlfriend reminded me of Pinky and Perky. When we met Perky we were so happy. Although she had recently been discharged from hospital having had psychotic depression, she was funny, witty, lovely to be around.

Better still, she came into the life of the most damaged person I have ever met (and I've met a few broken people) ~ that is, her "Pinky".

Pinky and Perky were together for seven years. I was so happy for them because at last Pinky had found somebody who respected and loved her. Someone she could trust.

But when John died, Perky was devastated and quickly got admitted to hospital.

She used to spend three days every week with John. They were very close. Pinky, you have to understand, has multiple severe psychotic and personality disorders. She is the epitome of a "vulnerable adult". So Perky probably NEEDED somebody like John to talk to. A voice of reason. Despite the "borderline personality disorder" label, John was an intensely reasonable man. And then John killed himself.

Six months later I got a call from Pinky sounding utterly distraught. She mentioned nothing about Perky. All she wanted was a good heroin dealer. Now I know why. She scores off the same person I do, so I couldn't help her ...

... then last week the ugly truth emerged. In a fit of depression, "Perky" had swallowed enough methadone and psychiatric medication to kill an elephant.

So now poor Pinky is left alone. And I don't know what the hell is going to happen to her.

I'm so angry with Perky for having done this.

The funeral's in a couple of days' time. I'm not sure I want to go.

Tuesday, July 06, 2010

Songwriter

I'M WORKING on a hit record. Here are the lyrics. As you can see, I've made every effort to avoid pop clichés... I'm thinking of phoning Andrew Lloyd Webber or Elton John and asking whether they couldn't come up with a tune for this masterpiece.

Here goes:

LOVE WAS BLIND

You didn't call on the phone
and I'm here all alone
and it cuts like a knife
coz you're out of my life

yeah yeah yeah
those words you told me
come back and hold me
babe warm me, I'm cold me

turn off the light
we can rock through the night


yeah, oh yeah yeah yeah

tonight is the darkest night
but you are my star-light
from sunset till dawn
I'll honk on your horn

but you're out of my life
and it cuts like a knife
I was too blind to see
it was all about me


no no no
my my baby don't go
I'll hug ya and hold ya
and whisper things i never told ya

it was all about me
I was too blind to see

(repeat chorus:)
and you're out of my life
and it cuts like a knife
I was too blind to see
it was all about me

ooo-wooah me me me
yeah me me me
yeah me

baby get into me
forever we'll be...
together in luurve
it's a beautiful night

in luuurve
in luurve yeah yeah luuurve
I love ya baby
love ya baby
oh baby
love me please

please call on the phone
coz I'm still all alone
and it cuts like a knife
coz you're out of my life ...

(fade-out)


I'm having a crisis of confidence over who should perform this. Although obviously I'm rock star material myself I'd really like to hear this belted out by a diva of unrivalled melodic powers... But WHO? Whitney's voice has gone thanks to all that crack... Mariah Carey's a bit old now and her whispy wobbly style annoys me... Celine Dion: NO! Christina Aguilera ~ no way. Lady GaGa?... What could she wear? She's done a song called telephone, but she could illustrate that highly original lyric "cuts like a knife" with one of those "dagger through skull" joke shop headbands... oh I know what about Beyoncé? I don't particularly dig her but she sells... Oh I don't know. I know nothing about music. IDEAS PLEASE!

AS WELL AS FLATTERING CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM AND MELODY IDEAS. I've already got a tune going round my head going dur-dur-dur durdur durdur DUUUR...! Maybe that will do..?

What do you think?

Monday, July 05, 2010

Oui, oui... c'est le French keyboard!


I HQD q go on ,y nezly instqllled French keyboqrd; just for the fun of it qnd found it ,ore inconvenient by fqr thqn the Ger,qn; zhich is the sq,e qs the English but zith Y qnd Z szqpped round:///

Enough of this. Have a close look at the letter placings above and you'll see that QWERTY has gone out the window in favour of AZERTY(!) Numbers cannot be imputted without the shift key as the top row is partially devoted to accented characters: éèçà; the keys to the right of P when tapped before a vowel adds a circumflex: âêîôû; M sits where our semicolon usually resides and the @/' key is ù/% in French.

Très confusante!

And all I have to ask you after hacking your way through this is:

Comment ça va?

Sunday, July 04, 2010

German Keyboard!


HAVING irritatedly spent the last month or so laboriously copying umlauts äöü, ÄÖÜ and ess-zed, the weird blobberous ß thing, by sucking them in and out of my mouse, I have finally added German and French keyboards to my machine.

The weird German quotation marks that look like double commas I have yet to find. I believe even the Germans have given up on these.

Mz biggest problem now is that I am tzping in a strange foreign accent, as on German kezboards Y and Z swap places!

Which is resulting in biyarrelz Polishßflavoured tzpos all over the place.

Several common punctuation marks appear nowhere to be found. Central European characters with cuckooßclock vowels appear in their places. Even the opening bracket is where the closing one should be...

This is going to take quite some getting used to...

ßs are now everzwhere, because essßyed is where mz old hzphen used to be...

... and what on earth has happened to mz beloved "swung dash" Iäve absolutelz no idea...

And all I can saz now is "auf Wiedersehen!"

LINK: international keyboard styles

Saturday, July 03, 2010

Water Voles

FURRY FRIDAY ON SATURDAY


Formerly known as water-rats, these are actually a species of vole, and are more closely related to hamsters than rats.


Unlike wild rats they rarely bite when cornered, and are really furry and cute:


They live in burrows in river-banks...


Aren't they beautiful?


Ratty from Wind in the Willows was actually a water-vole...


Water vole numbers are dwindling sa their habitats become increasingly threatened...


Of course water-voles love swimming...


If you keep your eyes open next time you visit the countryside you may well see a sight like this


If we don't look after their habitat, these beautiful furry animals will soon become extinct...


Friday, July 02, 2010

Rip van Gledwood II

STILL UNWELL... yes, Rip van Gledwood II. Yesterday, I slept literally 20 hours with only piss-breaks.

I can't even talk about going to bed last night, because it wasn't last night, it was yesterday daytime and I wasn't in bed. I slumped in an armchair at 11am and slept all afternoon and evening through and stirred myself at some point in the early hours around 2am, when I peed like Niagara falls. Then immediately back to sleep. And sleep. And deeper sleep. My phone was full of missed calls so I know I slept very deeply indeed. Finally, around 5am I woke up. Urinated again. Slept two hours more.

Then, after 7am Friday morn, I considered myself "up", so I wandered to my bedroom and lay down in bed, where I slept "properly" (ie not hunched over) till after 8:30.

All in all that's past 20 hours' sleep. 22 hours perhaps.

This is what I hate about my sleep: it strikes me down like some manner of disease and I wake up not refreshed but sluggish and unwell and wishing I had not bothered getting up at all.

Well I'm awake now. And I survived. And a new day dawned 16 hours ago, meaning I missed Chogstable's dawn chirping, though a bird whose chirrups and trills bore striking resemblance to Chogstable's melodic twirly-whirling was trilling its head off earlier when I went off for methadone and sweet chili chicken pizza. Chogstable is my personal nightingale. He's not, of course, my pet, because he doesn't live with me. But he chirps his feathery little head off just for me every night, the tiny entertainer!

Now I'm weary once more and for lack of anything more inspiring to post thought I'd brocade you with this dullardly tale. I hope your last couple of days were a little more inspiring plus ~ of course ~ I wish THE CHEERIEST WEEKEND TO Y'ALL..!

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

Copyright 2011 by Gledwood