Small Update

Hello there,
     I just wanted to come and say hi and say that this Blog isn't defunct, but that it's just being pushed to the side a bit while I bury my face in the sand.
     I'm not writing anything and though I'm reading, it's all going at a snail's pace. Which, as should be self-evident, is very slow indeed, as snails can't read, or at least I don't think.
     This pace is down to a few factors, of which an unhealthy predilection of mine; to run away from issues and problems rather than facing them head on, is the main one, the problem, I mean. Gaming is such an easy way to make time pass, and to avoid looking at one's own life, one's own path, one generally has to spend time in/with it, rather than spending that time in worlds infinitely preferable to one's own. At least, preferable for as long as the remove is present. These worlds, whichever they are, are preferable for as long as they can be accessed at will, to be exited at nill, not all-encompassing but safe, at the remove of a television screen, a button, a thin layer of self-deception.
     Another problem is my chosen go-to book of the moment, which turned out to be quite a monumental cock-up on my part, as if I didn't have enough post-modernism with just Infinite Jest.
Now, if Gravity's Rainbow had the style, the build-up and the humour of Infinite Jest this really wouldn't be a problem, but the odd fact of the matter is that this book, this pinnacle of post-modern literature, is in reality a piece of excrement. It is out of control, at points thoroughly disgusting, throughout mostly boring, at all points too self-involved and on the whole it thinks it's way more clever than it's actually being. It's a book that I don't think would be publishable today. There are people who revere it, sure, and I admit that there are moments that I think are brilliant, particularly those scenes and circumstances where there's an almost mythical quality to what is going on, but on the whole I'm of the opinion that the bad far outweighs the good. I'll be finishing it, and I will have to kick myself to start writing down something more substantial than what I've set down here when I do, but for now my short opinion on this one is that it is garbage.
     Another factor is an over-reliance on medication, both prescription and that in a bottle, to take away any and all introspection. I'm having some help for and with this, but it's a day by day thing and progress tends to be slow.
But there is progress, and things are starting to look up. Long ways to go yet, but I'm getting there.
For today that's enough introspection, and it's time to go back to work.

I do have to say though, it felt good having a quiet sit-down and just writing this stuff down. See you around.

Belated Birthday Book Batch

   

Behold The Pile of Pleasure, which I got for my birthday, which was the third of november.
Yes I'm very late this one.

From the top:

After finishing Alan Moore and Eddie Campbell's seminal masterpiece From Hell I decided that Moore had really by now become one of my favourite authors, and that I really should begin gathering more of his stuff. So, quite a few of the things I asked for had Moore's name on them, but, as it turns out, there happen to be more Moores than expected; to whit:

You can forgive me for thinking that Alan Moore is ubiquitous enough that the man has earned the monopoly on the name but apparently there's others going about calling themselves Alan and/or Moore. The From Hell Moore started out writing poetry so I assumed that there had to be a volume collecting those efforts and I thought that Opia was it, as it was under 'similar suggestions' on the Book Depository (good prices, yes, but pretty much everything else about it sucks.)
Obviously Opia wasn't that volume, but that doesn't mean that it was a bad gift.

 I've read over half of the poems in here by now, and though they haven't swayed me towards making poetry a more frequent go-to, reading-habits-wise, I did end up enjoying some of them.
Most touching of these (so far) I found The Taxman poem.

I can't profess to completely understand what it all means, but I found I was quite touched by the sentiments here; the yearning to reacquire something lost.

Alan Moore (not that one) frequently imbues his poetry with a disarming directness bordering on the crass, which can be quite charming.

 If you love poetry, you can do a lot worse than picking this one up.

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I gave a list of the Warhammer Chronicles Omnibi I still needed and it's Warlords of Karak Eight-Peaks that I got.

     Before anyone says or asks anything: Yes, I have heard the news concerning the Old World, and all I can say is that despite having pined for it ever since it got destroyed, its return (in a few years) leaves me cold. Though I was excited at first, that excitement swiftly turned to annoyance. There is nothing sacred to Games Workshop, and I don't have much interest in whatever they're going to present us with.

     I was only ever here for the novels, in any case; and unless they do away with the End Times novels entirely, or re-write them to something way less rushed, I won't... hmm. No, I can't say I won't pick anything up, but right now I'm still a little ambivalent about the whole thing.

     In any case, this nonsense is going to involve a whole lot of retconning, and I loathe that type of stuff. Retconning is something that only comes about because of franchise considerations; it's something that is dependent on an audience, and as such, it puts into question the artistic merit of that property. If art is dependent on an audience, and when it is changed to suit that audience's reception, then it's not art any more. In some form or other it will become homogenized, it has to be suited, after all, for mass consumption. Bah, I'm talking bollocks. We'll just have to wait and see what happens.

Anyway, Warlords of Karak Eight-Peaks collects the Skaven heroes novels Skarsnik and Headtaker, and the Dwarven novella Thorgrim plus a few short stories. 

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Here are some different editions of novels I've already read in some form or other. They were both on my 'Slow Collecting' Page on the side there *points*, and it was quite a surprise when they came in through the mail.

Someone's been keeping up with the blog. Thanks, mate :)

IDW's Dracula was on the list because it came with Ben Templesmith's art, and it didn't disappoint, at least Art-wise, because IDW has a weird lay-out to their text that dor some reason easily makes me lose track of where I'm at. It's okay though, as this one's not for reading and instead is simply for looking pretty on the shelf.

The Warhound and the World's Pain is here because I simply love the novel, and I wanted to have the edition with Rowena Morril's devil on the cover. I'll be giving the novel a re-read next year, and am looking forward to it.

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To Rouse Leviathan is Matt Cardin's second collection of religious horror stories, which in fact also collects all of the fiction from his first collection Dark Awakenings. It doesn't collect Dark Awakenings' essays concerning Isiah, zombies and demonic and angelic history in fiction, so if you want to read those you'll still have to pick that one up.

I still haven't gotten around to finishing off Dark Awakenings, even though I've felt a hankering lately to read some more religion-based fantasy and horror. Reading as a whole has been a really difficult thing to do lately. Been having some problems is all.

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Then we arrive at the comic books.

The Battle Chasers anthology I asked for mainly because it is Joe Madureira's stab at Swords and Fantasy comics.

     Though you might not recognize the name, the unique art style might be a little more familiar.

Joe Madureira's the artist responsible for the design of the Darksiders franchise, which I used to love. The story of Darksiders is basically that the apocalypse has happened, even though it shouldn't have.

Humanity is now dead and gone, and one of the four Horsemen, War, has been found guilty of bringing this about. Of course, there's more going on here, and we follow around War as he tries to clear his name. It's quite a rocky series, the first game being a bit hit and miss, the second one being basically unfinished, the third one (continued after the publisher went belly-up) being remarkably uninspired, and the latest game going on to become a top-down affair. There's a few books too, though I only read the first Death one.

So, based off of nothing but the art I went and asked for this one.

And. It was pretty crap.

Phenomenal art, as was expected, And almost 2000 Ad style of storytelling, but that could've been forgiven if, it just had been finished. Jep, this one is basically not complete.

I felt a lot of annoyance reading this one.

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Next up, extremely pretentious, is Alan Moore's Hypothetical Lizard.

I have no idea what this is going to be about.

All I know is that this one was adapted from one of Moore's short stories and that it is also included in this volume.

Though There's usually too much packed into Moore's work to be able to give a quick opinion on any of it, I'll try to write a little bit when I finish any of his comics. I tend to stall blogging whenever I feel that the book or comic I'm writing about deserves more, and so, nothing gets done. I really need to start remedying this.

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Here's the only Bear on the CIA's hitlist:

Shako.

Absolutely ridiculous.

I asked for this one mostly as a joke, trying to upset someone's delicate sensibilities, but the joke was on me as I received this one without a moment's hesitation.

It's not a great, or even is it anything close to being a, good comic book. It's 2000 AD at its most juvenile and silly.

But. I have a thing about bears.

They terrify me. And if there's something good to be said about the comic then it is that it genuinely unsettled me a few times. e.g. when the bear plays with someone before viciously mauling them to death; such an accurate portrayal of nature's most terrifying monsters. This comic would've been a genuine horror experience if they'd depicted Shako as having no fur... What am I talking about? Jesus, get back on track Levi.

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Another from the 2000 AD stable.

The Complete Future Shocks Volume 1.

This one I asked because I'm a collector and a 'Complete' edition of anything is immensely appealing, and because of the whole Alan Moore thing.

He started out writing for comics in 2000AD's Future Shocks so I thought it was a good idea to read these.

They're overall a bit hit and miss, but even the bad ones are short enough that you don't really mind them. There's at least always some sort of twist present that'll give you your euro's worth. I since then have picked up the second volume, which I keep on my nightstand so I can finish off a story or two before going to bed.

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Completing my Saga Hardcover collection, here's volume three.

I love this series.

That's all I'm gonna say right now.

You could probably subscribe to an online e-comic shop or something and get the first issue for free, that's how I got into it.

Do so. It's probably one of the most emotionally engaging stories in comics right now.

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And, lastly, another Alan Moore book, which has the dubious honour of being the first ever out-and-out superhero comic that I own. The Absolute Edition of Alan Moore's Killing Joke.

I had previously seen the cartoon movie of this one, and though it was ok, there's definitely was no need, or even desire, for the whole bat-girl has sex with batman, stuff. What were they thinking with that? 

It's quite a gorgeous edition, oversized, and apart from having the original comic release it also has artist Brian Bolland's preferred colouring, which he did himself for this edition.

He wasn't pleased with the original colouring, which, it must be said, is very very psychedelic, and which you can compare to his own preference below. It's quite a massive difference.

The original script is also included as are afterwords by the artist, some notes on the Joker's original origins, an art gallery, a retrospective by John Higgins, an introduction by Tim Sale, but oddly, nowhere is there an actual answer to the last panels of the story, nor is there any commentary from Moore himself to be found.

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There were a few more gifts, non-books and such, but as you probably have noticed it appears impossible for me to continue writing right now. Over the past month and more I have seemed to be heading back into depression or something, and I'm having the hardest time to write anything at length.

Either way. Thanks for all the support, the presents and the love.

Take care. I'll be back to writing regularly soon.

November Update

     Hello there, it's been a while! Been sick and lazy and all that. My month's been filled with sitting in front of the television, in a sick slouch or not, and hammering away at Fallout 4, Blasphemous and Dead Rising 4. Good games, although both the first and the last swiftly deteriorated into vapid busywork. Blasphmous, though initially not really my type of game, being a side-scroller, had an art-style and a type of lore that I loved and so I stuck it out and ended up having a blast. Here, take a look at the launch trailer.

     But, I've been wasting a lot of time this month, or so it feels. The truth is that I'm very out of sorts. So out of sorts that I have not much thought about blogging for these past few weeks, and on those times that I did, I had the damnedest difficulties in actually writing anything I was pleased with. Whether or not that any of this is due to not having imbibed any alcohol for nigh on a month or whether that it is because of a delayed reaction to the events that transpired earlier this year I don't know. Either way; this blog continues, I'm not here to announce my retirement. But I am saying that:... what the fuck man, why is this so difficult right now?
I'm annoyed and saddened that something that I could devote so much of my time and energy on has been delegated to a position of lesser import.

     I have been reading again though. There were maybe 2 weeks where I barely read a thing because of a very annoying slow-burn cold that took root in my brain, but since then I've finished a few comics, Laird Barron's The Imago Sequence, and a whole bunch of Jules De Grandin short stories.
     Of those, the one that I both want and don't want to talk about is the Imago Sequence.
You see, after a great start, specifically after The Procession of the Black Sloth, which read like a weird and terrifying Asian Silent Hill- kind of story, I was all set to proclaim Barron now one of my favourite authors, but then the last 2 or three stories in the collection veered a little too much into an abstract type of writing that is almost dis-associative free-form, and which, if you're not in the mood for it, is irritating in the extreme.
     I've indulged in that type of writing myself in the past, usually in the throes of depression or some or other violent passion, and it's quite an empowering form of art-making. You feel as if you are creating something truly impressive, and it's something that seems to validate itself, even if or maybe even because some or all of the audience that'll read it won't understand what you're talking about. There's a barrier there, and not everyone can slip past it. It's a form of magic, of perception.
But, as I said, it kind of sucks when you're not in the mood for it. Sometimes the chemical brain just doesn't care to cooperate; lack of sleep, nutrition, or being at the whim of emotional circumstance.
     So, though I loved Procession of the Black Sloth, and can recommend anyone to read that one, though Old Virginia, Shiva Open Your Eye, and Bulldozer were all bad-ass and very enjoyable to read, I didn't much enjoy The Royal Zoo is Closed, the latter half of the Imago Sequence short story, and though I thought that both Parallax, Hallucigenia and Proboscis were a little unoriginal, and though after all that, it seems like I didn't have a good time, I did actually appreciate pretty much of all that I read.
     I'm being unduly harsh here, and I wish the stories could've hit me at a better time maybe, but it is what it is.

     I also finally finished off Hunter X Hunter, which I pretty much only allowed myself to watch whilst exercising on my Home Trainer. At 148 episodes for 20-23 minutes per episode, it took me about 8 months of exercising before I'd gone through the whole bunch.
I had a good time. Hunter Hunter is a show not without its flaws but one that has some real nice emotional pay off.

     Lastly, it was my birthday this month and, as you might've expected, I replied to everyone that asked for gift ideas to just go and give me books, as if I didn't already have enough to read. What can you do? An addict is as an addict does, or something. I'll give you a look next post.

A Horror from dim Yesteryear

What do we want when we pick out a horror novel to read, when we purchase them and take them home and dive right in?
There's of course the desire, the expectation of being scared, with our own fear sought out and recognized in the moment. Fear, but at a safe remove from daily life, in a comfort zone of our choosing with eyes riveted to the page, hands gripped around the covers eager to see what's next.

Horror is a demanding genre. Demanding in what it requires from the reader.

Alot of times I get lost in what I think what fear in a horror novel ought to mean; shouting in surprise, shock or disgust, and your mind stepping back from behind your eyes, detaching itself for a moment in shock and bewilderment.
But that isn't fear, or at least not totally. Fear is dread. The anticipation of something that might happen. Might. Because it might not.

These days, it's mostly an idle hope to try and capture that feeling. The remove, that distance, has slotted into place and the mind has become less malleable.

I've been scared maybe a handful of times by written fiction.

Mostly that honour lies reserved for Adam Nevill's The Ritual, which for its sublime first half also relied on the build-up of fear coupled with moments of horror in its nightmare sequences and contrasted with its suddenly bizarrely shit second half, though I admit that the last pages managed to become quite good again.

I read it over the course of a single overcast afternoon, with the drawn blinds adding a grey gloom to the room.
I was so deep into it that I almost literally could hear the greedy excited tapping of hooves on the boards inside of a coffin. It's the sound, the perfect way it presented itself to my mind later that night, that made me creep fearfully underneath the covers. Good times.

There was another book that literally gave me nightmares when I was a kid, and I've tried to find it several times to see how it would hold up. I suspect that it would be disappointing now, it was, after all, read in a different time, in a time when there was no remove between story and immersion. When one grows up, the remove slots almost inextricably in the way. There's too much distance to be fully immersed.

The first time I read it I couldn't finish it, and I remember my parents taking it away from me because it was interfering with the household's sleeping cycle. I woke people up, in tears, because it frightened me so much.
Some time after, no idea how much, but years at least, I came back to it, borrowed it from the library  and found it, if not scary, then at least still very disturbing.

It was a tale of aliens, and of kidnapped teenagers forced to engage in bloody death-defying circus acts for their amusement. Of old people in horrific costumes and of rabid children tearing a tormentor apart, eating him, on a bridge overlooking trees while a talking rabbit doll screams for blood and violence in the voice of a small girl. The book ended with the survivors clad in blood and gore and wondering where to go next.

I really wish I could remember what it was called.
For some reason I keep thinking it's called Galaxy Wars, but try to google that in this day and age.
It's the age of Star Wars and easy escapism, baby, nothing else can compete.

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Edit: The Ink-Stained Beard got it pretty much within minutes of posting...
What the hell, man? How???
Anyway: the book is Galax-Arena by Gillian Rubinstein:

An intimation of the Divine

That time that God passed by.
This passage can be found on page 331 from As A God Might Be, by Neil Griffiths.

Down below is my account of an experience I myself had, some years ago, and which I wrote down directly after it had happened.

"I just saw something which I can not explain. A typical UFO sighting, really:

2 vague balls of light in the sky, between yellow and orange in colour + drawings

First they were equidistant from each other, moving slowly from right (from the way I was looking at it) to left across the night sky. Then the first ball/ orb, began to wobble. Then this stabilized.
After this the hind ball/ orb did the same thing. then this one stabilized as well. All the while they were still moving slowly across the night sky. Then the balls began to move noticeably away from us, they got more distant from us, I was watching this with my father.
At this point the hind orb moved in such a way that the first orb was invisible for a moment,

 as if you're looking at the bumpers of a car that is riding beside you, which speeds up and which then changes lanes in front of you, and all you can see at that point is the back bumper+ drawings.

All of this took place over the course of 10 seconds at most. though the balls moved slowly across the night sky, they were extremely fast.

These were not searchlights or anything like that. The sky was clear, there were no clouds, the stars were very visible and as I said, at the end the hind orb eclipsed the first one.

They weren't satellites; as the orbs were too big and moved too erratically.

They weren't planes as there was no noise and they moved too erratically.

They didn't move in random patterns, and those patterns, in fact, seemed intelligent.

It is incredible. I can not explain it. An unidentified flying object.

All I'm sure of is that this is going to be a good memory together with my dad.

All of this took place somewhere between 10 to and 5 to mid night, on the 17th of August in the year of 2012.

Levi"

So, that's what I saw.
The thing is that, at the time, all of the above happened too fast to enable thorough speculation, or even observation. We just saw. We were just looking at something, taking it in, in less than half a minute. And then it was gone and we went back inside, making offhand comments to the rest of the family about what we had just seen.

Ask me now what it was and I can't give you an answer. I refrain from looking at it too deeply.
I'm not sure if this is a conscious decision or not.
It might just be because to me this thing wasn't that special, regardless of what it actually was. Humanity is keyed to make the miraculous mundane. We are small and so what is large, we minimize. For all our fascination with God, religion and mythology, all our grand stories and explorations, despite all our pleas and prayers to witness something beyond ourselves, above ourselves, were we to be faced with something truly miraculous we wouldn't be able to see it for what it was, what it meant. We would dismiss it, unable to put it into our perception of reality. Or maybe it would be the opposite: Oh, this thing exists, it is there... okay then.

 But it might also be that, faced with something we couldn't explain at the time, and in the full knowledge that there probably was a very boring explanation for what we saw, we didn't really want to know. We wanted to be fooled.

Because we saw this thing and we both got something out of it. This was special, and for seeing it, we were special too.
My dad, being deeply religious, probably saw the hand of God in the phenomenon; an affirmation of his choices and his beliefs. A pat on the back for all his effort.
And me too. I got something out of it too. Even though, yes, I still refrain from looking at it too much. Even if I refuse to analyze it, even if I refuse to accrue knowledge in a bid to explain it.
After all, here I am, at my own dinner-party, accessible to all and sundry, sharing my amusing anecdote to an audience willing to be entertained.

Update.

Yeah. I've been a little bit uninterested in sharing anything here lately.
I want to again though, hopefully soon. I want to be productive here, I want to share, I want to keep building on The Name Forthcoming, the monument to my interests, to my obsessions and compulsions, but there's no energy for it right now.

I'm spending my time reading, and trying to read, mostly.
I write down the titles of everything I finish; novels, comics, short stories and all, and I've read over 70 of those alone over the last few months (some of those only a page or 2, but still). Don't ask me how many of those will stick in my memory, because I suspect more than a few of those were forgotten as soon as their final sentence rolled by.

Though I'm cramming more literature into less time than I did since the same time last year, I should reveal that this is because I'm in a very different place as to last year, in my life, I mean.

I lost my job. Because of my Autism.
It is that simple.

It's been very bad since then. Mentally and physically.

I've been struggling pretty much every day with what happened, why it happened, what it meant, and what it will mean for the future.
I'm still not there yet. I have no answers, I have no plans, no desire and no drive.

I've easily slipped back into the state where I just don't interact with the world. There's been a few times that I really tried again but on the whole... I'm in the hole.

I'm again at the point where I want everyone to leave me alone.

It is the failure of the world, the failure of others, compounded with my own, that has made me this way. I am like I was once before in the place I always was before. It is an old place, and one that should be familiar. A place that should enable thinking and writing, that should enable the blog, but I get nothing.
It's just not working. Not at all. Nothing still bears any import. There's no point.

I'm in a very bad place still. Obviously.
But slowly I'm coming back from it. Every day is a chore.

So for now, I'm being easy on myself. I'm slowly getting back to it. But it's still very difficult.
What I'm doing now when I read is pure escapism. In and out, no excess thought required, rinse and repeat.
I've managed to post some stuff already, and there'll be more of course, but for right now I'll forego the deep explorations that I used to enjoy so much.

Short and snappy thoughts on stuff that I read will do.

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Whenever I feel bad I tend to do something with my hair. It's therapeutic.

It's also a statement. It says 'for me and for no-one else'.

And nothing say 'fuck off' like a damn skinhead.

And you know. It's not all horrible.

This lil' bitch has been a huge help.

Isolation is perfectly fine as long as you have a dog.

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Bonus picture: Saffy is not amused.

Excuses, Once Again

There was a post here.

It's gone now.

Which means, that I will not be talking about what happened to me over the last few months.

Tough luck.

Consequences

From Conan: The Blood-Stained Crown and other short stories.

Now, in the tale this line is used as a way to incentivize taking a course of action, because the action in question, the action to be taken, is the right one to take, and furthermore; to commit to taking it in spite of the possible negative consequences.

But it can of course also be read in another way:
If you embark on a course of action, the consequences might indeed turn out to be damned. And in that case, you will be forced to deal with whatever comes your way.

An upcoming post

I'll be sharing some very personal stuff quite soon. I'll start off with a long e-mail, probably divided into a few posts (because of its extreme length) that I sent to someone in response to certain events, to explore certain problems and to work my way through certain traumatic experiences. I'll include the response to that mail, though I'll have to translate it first. I'll also have to edit both mails to protect the identity of the parties involved.
Then I'll give my reaction to the response mail, or rather, what I think of it. At this point, a reaction is neither wanted, or even merited.

I'll also share what that original mail was supposed to be. I was forced to send in my unfinished efforts due to outside pressure, even though I had more to say and still felt the need to explain myself more. This is only relevant to me as a perfectionist, as I don't believe it would have affected the response even if I had sent it the way that I ended up finishing it.
That finished product will be found in a page on the side-bar of the blog below 'Personal Stuff'. I'll put it there so that even when we're a number of posts down the line, it'll still be possible to find it with just a click of a button. It'll be there because it is hugely relevant to me, my life and character, and as a way for you readers to get to know how my autism affects my everyday life.

Hmmm. Maybe I'll just make it a page about my autism...

I'll think a while on this, as there is no immediate rush to get it done.

This is obviously very personal stuff and I'm going to be sharing it as honestly as I could make it.
As such, because this is my way of doing things, besides being rather explicit and really quite dark at times, it is a massive wall of text and filled with everything I could think of that had even the slightest bearing on the matter. This is out of a desire to be understood. Transparency is honesty, and though this is obviously only my side of the story, what I've written will be able to speak for itself.
Where events were coloured by feelings and guesswork I've made a mention of it. Where I wasn't sure about certain facts, I've made a mention of it.

This is about me and someone else and it'll be extremely close and personal. If you're here for the genre/comic/novel stuff this naturally won't be for you. This is for the people that I keep close to me, who will be able to find my story if they care.

If you are one of those; if you know me personally then you know what this text might mean, and I do invite you to get to know some of the worst parts of me.

This needs to be shared because I've carried this all on my own for too long. And because when I finally did share it, I shared it with someone who ended up using it for their own agenda. Who used it as an excuse, and for their own gain, and who discarded both my feelings, my well-being and my future.

This might take a while to post, even though all of it has been written already. Because of reasons, I'll hold off on sharing it this month. Expect it somewhere in march, 15th at the latest.

Birthday Post

Presented without much fanfare; what I got for me birthday!

You'll immediately notice a distinct lack of the usual suspects, there's in fact only one book here and it isn't even a genre novel.

It is, however, an important one. Top of its class you could say.

Infinite Jest is one of those big titles that anyone with even a passing interest in modern literature will have heard of: A satirical, Post- (post?) modern, mammoth encyclopedic novel, famous for its length and notorious for its use of end-notes.

So far I've read a little under 70 pages of the main novel, complete with the corresponding end-notes, including the 10 page end-note detailing a fictional filmography of one of the story's characters.

That's not as bad as it sounds, depending on how you are geared, as a lot of information can be gleaned from a careful reading and among the avalanche of clutter there's some genuinely interesting and/or funny stuff to be found, there also was some particular information here that cemented my resolution to continue reading.

It's a bit hard to keep track of though: the narrative jumps from one scene to the other with only the barest suggestion of linearity, the method of dating the years coming across as deliberately obtusifying, and several scenes seem to add nothing to the novel's momentum other than adding more background information to the story's universe.

But, as I said, it's quite interesting.

For the rest, first off, let's not dwell on all the food, candy and alcohol I got. Some of it was missing for the picture already, for some reason.

I got a party-chess set, which, as I don't know how to play chess, is kind of mystifying, but as I know how to drink I guess it does hit 1/2. The board itself is actual glass, which is pretty cool.

In the clothing department I got Rick and Morty socks and a t-shirt with self-drawn art from someone I introduced to the 'Vikings' show.

Really quite sweet, though the smiley face does take away from how bad-ass this shirt could have been.

Orphan Black mug, because tie-in merchandise is always welcome.

And then, at the last; new working out gear.

Which is really nice as I've wanted a weighted vest for ever.

This one allows for a 10 kg maximum and it's good to wear during regular strength training.

I've also gone on my normal running route a few times with 4 kg, once with 5 kg, and then another time with 6 kg.

For now I'm going to keep that at 4 kg maximum whenever I do a run for the foreseeable future.

That 6 kg really wore me out when I did it. It also didn't help that I took that run after a hard day at work.

The yellow resistance band has got 25 kg tension and the blue one 15 kg. Good for relaxation and toning (I guess).

The handles are a welcome addition for doing push-ups as my wrists sometimes give out.

With this I can make my routine more regular.

I requested the vest in particular because I needed something to fill in the void that the reduced interest in reading has given me. If you can't or don't want to read and write, if occasionally you can't even think much at all, you better find something new to occupy your time. From the cerebral to the physical, I'll see how it goes.

Update

Alright. Here I am.
These days there's not much interest in leaving my mark with a series of well-crafted, insightful blog-posts, or rather, there is, but there's no actual drive for it. No drive to accomplish anything, no drive to attract or entertain anyone.
Don't get me wrong; I want to do these things, but I can't make myself actually do them: I am stuck in a bubble of complacent apathy. Why go though the effort when I can just lull myself asleep with the very next thing that presents itself?
Nothing really matters.

No, that's not true. Of course things matter; certain things always do: Family is one of those things. You do everything for family. Family comes with, or should come with, love. And, if you're lucky, that love has rooted itself deep and has now become unconditional. It is a given. And it is a necessity.
But most everything else has ceased to matter much.

These things that used to grab you, grasp you, clench you with an immovable grip, have lost their hold on you, and have become like shadows in the night. You've lost sight of them. They've blended into the greater whole, or, by being invisible, have ceased to exist.

I can't read anymore.

This is problematic.

My lust for books and stories is what drove this blog. It is desire that made this engine go; a feverish, obsessive fire that propelled my unhappy soul to push towards some goal of my own devising, and for some meaning to be endowed to an empty life.
For now, this goal is lost. I'm in a limbo, still pining for bygone days of manufactured satisfaction.
There was pride here. An ongoing achievement, never-ending, renewing itself with all the effort given, feeding itself with the fuel of discontent. It is the coal that stoked the fire, but the coal has become superfluous, because the rain is gasoline.
The fire rages, and all it requires, is to have been. From one moment to the next; introduce a new element to the status quo, and it's either burn brighter, or be snuffed out.

I haven't been snuffed out.

I suppose I should be happy.

Happily Caged

The third of October.
A Day of Days.

The familiar comfort of utter self-loathing. A glad willingness to tread the old paths of self-destruction.
Oh, for the lure of brutalization. Not for lack of rum; for blood we spiral to depths most corrosive.
But why, what has brought on this moment, this relapse into the old haunts of hateful introspection?

Not introspection in truth, but its ghost, its barest echo. A shadow of previous discomforts, previous truths, once known, acknowledged head-on, in flagellating self-delight, now but glimpsed as the barest wisps of meaning, as fleeting tendrils of thought. Meaning eludes my grasp, as ever, as always. But here it is meaning for the moment, and not for the grander truths of life; meaning for now, for here, for the drive that would beat my heart, beat it on, make it go, make it full of yearning, loathing or desire, as the occasion demands, as the occasion merits it, as the occasion has made it merit. No. The hunt for meaning, of the moment or of the soul, is not behind this relapse into darkest territory. There is no hunt of any kind. At all. The desire for meaning, for goals, is lost. I am content to drift in a sea of mindlessness. I consume, voraciously, and all the world and its myriad dazzling offerings will vanish into the gaping hole inside.
But it is not a hole of hurt, not a hole that needs to be filled. It is the hole that I call the moment itself. It can never be filled because it is always emptying, ever passing, ever making way for the next riveting fall, the next eye-drawing plunge into caverns unknown. It is my seeing mind, my living breathing spirit. A primal eye-gouging thing of sick delight, twisted into a semblance of normalcy by the constraints of the human race. We gravitate towards the thrill, the pulsing mess of it all, because it fills our eyes, our sockets drowned in blood and sex, our mouths filled with exhortation, our ears ringing with the voice of truth. This normal-seeming thing only wants this: It wants to be released.
To cavort and dance beneath the omen of the wild wood. It is the bone skeleton of comfort beating on the tendons of old and forbidden passions. It is easy to placate, easy to please. It can be lulled in a heart-beat, with the merest push of a button. Seeing is believing, as long as the mind is willing, after all. But the cage is made of wicker and the rains have come again, and they have been here for a while. And beneath the obscured all-seeing eye, the bars that had begun to rot, have broken. And the Beast roams free once more. But where before it would've gone ahead with thoughts of violent repercussion, now freed it stands in immobile howling anguish, transfixed by its mirror image in the muddy pools of self-reflection. It stares in gnashing adoration at the rictus grin, the cracked fangs of greedy self-delight. Blood is the oldest flavour, after all. And sweeter still arterial red, the matters of the heart, the innermost self. It stares at the corners of its eyes, its bloodshot hurt. It glimpses only. Look away and there it is, your innermost pain, the private worry, the burst veins of your sole disposition, choked by the black smoke of industry, the stinging haze that washes away the solemn grit gifted by the clouds of your desire. Your eyes are clear and your visage is astounded. The beast roars. It knows. The thing most inimical to nature is upon it, perpetuated by uncomprehending jailers and there is no escape. There is no way out, no way back and no way forward. There is only the moment. And it is made clear, by occlusion or by refraction, and so the beast stares.
It glances and in glimpses tries to form a picture. But as fast as the grit builds up, the smoke brings around the tears, washing away all hope of truth and self-deception. All it can do is look.
It does not see. It does not understand. It gazes without hope.
It does this because it can.
Because all that matters is the act.
The willingness to stare.
There is no comfort here, and no hope of satisfaction.
All that is gained is a constant film of tears. But that can be an end in itself.
A reminder. A thrill more true than the one offered by the push of a button.
There was a life once. It was pain and it was horror but it was true.
For today these moments of eternal gazing will suffice.
A new cage is ready and the smoke has already begun to weary.
But it was sweet while it lasted. I roar in triumph as I push the button and the door slams shut. I am happily caged once again. The sun is shining.
The rains will come again. But for now, the wicker stands whole.

Update, late and the mental state.

Hi there. Been a while. Things are starting to look up a little (but not by much).
It still takes effort to start writing, and keep writing, but at the very least I'm not at the "impossible to be engaged with anything" stage of the new medication. Or at least, this is what I'm hoping; that it is the medication that is to blame for my recent troubles in reading and writing and not that this symptomatic of a bigger shift in my thinking/ life.
For the past three weeks, right after the Lobster Johnson post in fact, and which made my "not as debilitating as the previous type of medicine" post impossibly naive and hopelessly premature as all hell, I've been stuck in a lethargic and apathetic doldrums in every possible way.

In that first week I was forced to come to terms with something and been forced to acknowledge the utter brick wall of reality.
It was an act which was rather tough and unforgiving and which without medication likely would have been impossible. This thing which had existed in me for a very long time and that I just couldn't rid myself of, became, through chemical means, immanently rid-able. Though, this wasn't done without pain and fallout. I spent the first part of that week at home, sitting on the couch, staring at the walls. Thoughts became a daze. Occasionally imaginary conversations would start up to guide me past or headlong into problem points. We all have our demons and mine took every opportunity they could get their hands on. It was a very unpleasant time.  My collision with reality was total. Hopes were shattered, desires were crushed, the way forward was completely lost. It was a staggered time of mental self-abuse and castigation. But it passed, and past a certain point, rather quickly because, where in the second part of week one, where a fog ruled my thoughts before, now there were no thoughts at all.
I did not exist in the way that people do. You enjoy a sunset, you taste the air, you resound to music. But during this time I was incapable of all of this. I just was. I saw, I drew breath and I heard. For the rest of this I was vacant, empty. Something had fallen away and a great echoing void was left behind. I did not consume a shred of fiction during this period.
This lasted for the rest of that week and most of the week that followed.
I've always been someone who sets himself tasks to complete and checklists to finish so this time of induced apathy was alien to me.
Of course, due to the nature of the medication, the distress I felt at this was limited. In fact, I say that this state was alien to me, but it wasn't that at all. It just was. I didn't have much thoughts about it. This state was me and at the time it felt natural. It's only now, in retrospect, that I have become convinced that the medication was, and to a lesser extent still is, to blame for it.

Then, somewhere along the way, occasionally, something would start to seep in and I found that the visual at least began to be able to hold my attention again. In week 2, To pass the time I continued playing Nioh. Its repetitive gameplay was pretty much perfect for the state I was in. Engaging but mostly about pattern recognition, so not much thought required. In week three I got into it and managed to finish its storyline.
While playing I usually had youtube on; Angry Joe playing Southpark the Fractured But Whole and SuperEyePatchWolf's anime videos mostly. I might dive into some anime soon because of that last one and I've already watched One Punch Man over the weekend. I'm not sure what to watch but some dude I work with fervently recommends me One Piece. I've also ordered my first ever manga: Junji Ito's Uzumaki. I find I'm actually looking forward to it quite a bit.

I finished the complete Nemesis The Warlock, which was disappointingly uneven over its run even though book 2 (specifically the Two Torquemadas) had some incredible potential at its midway point, where our anti-hero travels through time to witness the end of his saga and where he gets some disconcerting news.

But, as is usual with 2000 ad, the balance between the comical and the serious is a little bit inconsistent, so even though I loved most of its ideas and some of its moments Nemesis ended up being a bit of a dud for me.
Apart from Nemesis and some other one-shot comics  I maybe managed to read 60 pages of The Blood of Elves. I can't remember a thing of it though.

That's pretty much it for fiction. I've in fact barely glanced at my books.
This, obviously, is rather worrying, both for the blog and for me in private. Fiction is what I do. What can I do if that drops away? I'm still in a bit of a holding pattern right now, taking it day by day, trying to just do what I want. The problem is of course that I don't want anything. I'm just passing time again. Counting the hours until death or a miracle. It's not depression so much as it is an awareness that likely nothing will change in my circumstances. Despite all my personal self-improvement I can't change how I am, in those ways that I would most want to change. I wish I was different but it can not be done. The problem right now (and always) is that I'm too aware of this and that I am unable to accept myself, have peace with myself.

The world is too harsh for me. I'm too sensitive and too weak.
But where before this would make me filled with sadness and self-pity, and a lament for my own condition, now I find I am just angry.

Round 2

Jup, going into the ring again (to fight the daily fight?).

This time with the most prescribed anti-depressant in the world (at my side?).

Most-prescribed, probably because this one's name is rather easy to remember, and certainly not because it doesn't have any side-effects. Because it most certainly fucking does... It's all about what you're willing to trade for some peace of mind. Sometimes the trade-off is a steep one, but of course you can't tell beforehand.

I've used parentheses up above to clarify that I'm well aware that this medication is supposed to help me, but that until I can acclimatize to them, every day the fight's actually with the medication and might even make the days a little tougher to get through. As I've had two days under my belt now I can say it's definitely not as debilitating as the previous type of meds but I will still have to see if this one will actually end up helping me.

Right now I'm not even sure what I want it to do. My mind's everywhere these days, hung up on certain... things, and I feel pretty lost.

I just know that I need help from something or I'm going to have to make some dramatic changes in my life. Take some steps. Maybe become a hermit, or something.

Hey, I know, I'll become a monk. I do have a lovely singing voice.

Post-Aripiprazole Update

So, it's time for one of these again.

Let's get the obligatory narcissism picture out of the way. 

Look at me I'm so pretty.

I've got contacts now. They're horrible for pc; blogging, general reading and gaming though so I only put 'em on when I go out or when I'm working. So, pretty much only when I'm working then. Which means that at around 180 euros for 6 months or so, profitable this is not. But this also means they'll probably last longer than they would for most people. Hurray, I guess?

Alright, with that out of the way, let's talk about some of the stuff I might blog about: the genre stuff.

You already know it but I'm reading the Witcher books and taking a general laissez-faire attitude to thinking about them. This is pure escapism right now, back to the old ways. Which means that there's less of a compulsion to do a full in-depth write-up which in turn means that there's less content I'm working on behind the scenes. From the start I've tried to keep the book posts down to a few paragraphs but that resolution has almost never survived contact with the ideas present after reading a book. I think I somewhat got it with Summer of Night though. That book deserved way more but because of the medication I managed to keep it down quite easily. There's still a little niggle there though. Could've, should've maybe? An aspect of the caring less probably... hmmm.

About that by the way: I'm off the meds.

After a month and a half of trying, I finally threw in the towel. 14 hours of sleep a day on average just wasn't really my thing. I was tired all the time and didn't feel like doing much of anything.  Paradoxically, they imbued me, my limbs, with a nervous energy, a desire to go out, to move forward, to evolve, to make headway, some how, some way. They're probably perfect for people who are more outgoing. Whenever I was with someone, things were pretty great. They took away my fears and in general made me less inhibited when talking to people, which was easy and relaxing and made me feel like new roads were opening up. But they also dampened my emotions, mainly the bad, but also the good, and more importantly; my empathy.
There came a moment, when I was watching a movie, I think it was You Were Never Really Here when I thought to myself, this moment should be making me cry, and I didn't. There was the feeling but it was dumbed down. It didn't reach my eyes, didn't reach my mouth, didn't let me disappear inside my chosen escapism, it was all so very constrained. With people too, I felt them less. I wasn't me in the way that I used to be, the way that I was proud to be: my empathical self; the emotional viewer/ reader/ listener. There's less chance to worry and care about others when you're cripplingly tired.
So really, mainly, chiefly, above everything else, it was the way it made me feel tired all the time that made me decide to quit taking it.

It probably did some good though. Some time off for my mind, which had been taking up casual residence more and more in one of the more widely visited districts of the common household psychosis. (I'm downplaying things, obviously. There were serious problems.)
Telling yourself it's all different than what you feel doesn't really help. These things need to be given some support from outside as well. That appears to be what I got. I hope it's been enough. I could do with some stability for a while.

It's also nice to be able to drink some alcohol again.

So, doubling back a little, I've been reading the Witcher, which overall has been rather clever and hugely entertaining to read. I'm now at the Sword of Destiny short story. Chronologically that's book 2 short story 5.
There's so far been a surprisingly large focus on the theme of love, its problems, its joys, its everything. It's all written so well, with such feeling that I must confess that it's liable to make one quite lonely. I came here for some monster hunting damnit, why are you giving me all these emotions!?

Speaking of monster hunting, I've picked up Monster Hunter World, which is more than decent enough to wile away a few hours with. Though I confess I'm getting bloody tired of the flying monsters. Give me the good old-fashioned 2- or 4-legged assholes every time.

Here's me flawlessly *cough* using one of the newer weapons to murder a defenceless raptor-thing.
Don't mind the man-thong, I swear I didn't pick it for its looks.

Here's the awesome Odogaron fight with a hammer.
I got super lucky here pretty much constantly. But some of it is definitely skill as I'm an old hand at hammers

And the Odogaron fight with a longsword.

Same same, but different.

The name's Berek, from Berek Halfhand, the legendary hero of the Land, in the time before Thomas Covenant (Chronicles of). It's pretty much always been my name in the Monster Hunter games, that or Beren or Hannes something or other. Tolkien and The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the two big epic series of my formative years.
I must say, I still prefer the Land over Middle Earth. Even though Middle Earth now has a million facets of colourful representation these days. The Land has always felt more vibrant to me. And since Covenant is a bit of a twat, especially early on, Berek it is.

My current Guild Card

Then, mostly during the weaning process of the medication (you know; gotta watch those panic attacks), I also binge-watched the Punisher which I thought was overall very good and very moody but occasionally quite slow in its, it must be said, rather methodical build-up, slow right up until the final episodes where there was so much blood and violence on the screen I spontaneously started tearing up with glee.

I'm not even exaggerating, it's been a while since my vengeance-bone has been tickled that thoroughly. I started giggling again when I took the above screen capture. Maybe it just makes me uncomfortable, I don't know but I doubt it, as we all seek to satisfy certain thrills, and the Punisher definitely manages to take it to another level, making you feel it all the while.

And lastly, I've finally started to continue reading ' The Mignola-verse'.
I was originally planning to do this super involved thing where I was going to do a post for every trade paperback, my favourite bad-ass piece of art for every issue but, thankfully, I've let that slide (mainly because that would inevitably constitute spoilers). I'm not a reviewer and giving you my rote impressions, filled with unimaginative hyperbole, didn't seem worth it, somehow.
I'm still following the Mignola-verse reading order though. this time the 2018 version, except I'm not re-reading anything Hellboy related except where his storyline is post Bride of Hell... meaning of course I haven't read Hellboy in Hell yet, and looking quite forward to doing so.
Right now I'm at BPRD volume 2 and it's all good. I prefer Mignola's or Stenbeck's art to the art that's on display here but what can you do; if you want an epic modern gothic where else are you going to go?