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Living in this World

The hardest thing to do in this world is live in it

That’s a roundabout quote from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, years ago. When I first heard it, I thought it a silly quote, but it didn’t take long for it to dawn on me just how true it is.

If we’re not destroying ourselves with toxic gases, we’re either blowing each other up, or shooting one another to death. We’re trying to take what isn’t ours, show our ‘superiority’, claim dominance, declare independence, publicly display our dirty laundry, turn blind eyes or threaten and control the masses with spoken or unspoken words.

In the midst of all this ridiculous chaos, everyday normal folk, folk like you and me, have to live in it and with it. We’re bombarded with all of this doom and gloom day in day out. We’re brainwashed into seeing just how bad it is to actually live in this world.

I think today I started to believe it.

Apparently, in December, we came to within a hair’s breadth of being eradicated out of existence. A massive meteor exploded over one of the oceans, away from prying eyes, but not that away. It has recently been discovered, so someone’s seen it. It was probably deemed unwise to tell us about it before the event; or maybe it was fed out to some of us but not all, and was swallowed up with some other gloomy scenario; or maybe there’s only so much bad news we can constantly be drip-fed.

I said I think today I started to believe it. I then thought again.

The world is a big place. The events we are being bombarded with are small in comparison. Even trivial to take things to the extreme. Next week something else will replace them, equally so important that we must be told about it every five minutes.

It’s no wonder our minds are warping when we’re given the ins and outs of every little detail from one side of the coin, and told not to share or discuss it on the other. Or we aren’t given the full facts, and then allowed to let our minds wander and fill in the gaps. Or we’re told what is right and wrong to think. All subtly, obviously. Major negativity needs to be subtle.

My. My mind has wandered. I blame the headache. In this country, smoking in the workplace is banned. Some of my colleagues think that doesn’t include e-cigarettes, so they smoke them in the office, even though they’ve been told that too is banned. I can’t stand the smell of them. They give me headaches. I mention it. I see blind eyes turn.

Toxic gases. Selfish people. Two sides of the coin. One world.

The hardest thing to do in this world is live in it.

But live in it I must.

I refuse to be swallowed up in the charged quagmire that I’m apparently living in. I focus on the positives I can find, when I can find them. Headache or not. I take myself off to my Place of Peace and Tranquility when I get the chance. I wrap myself in words; in imagination; in colour; in art; in creativity.

Someone negative will say I’m living with my head buried in the sand.

I say to them I’m living in my world. And my world may be flawed, it may be little, it may be confusing, but it’s fantastic. My positives outweigh any negative that is thrown at me. My light grows brighter in my world, and sometimes it’s good to just let it out.

Let it go.

And that goes for the negatives too.

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Let’s see where this ends up

Waffling.

The art of rambling incessantly about something or other in a meaningless or drivelful way. To prate on about nothing, in depth. Hardly a barn burner for discussion, yet a bingle of words that hardly divagate, even for a fugacious moment.

Might I be a hodiernal hoddy-noddy? Hunting-and-pecking out a post, hardly luculent in detail, and more of a lollygag for a Saturday post.

Still, an ogdoad and half again of unnecessary words on the subject.

I never thought I’d get here.

***

Words used in this post:

Drivelful – made up (I mean it’s a made up word, it doesn’t mean made up)
Prate – talk foolishly
Barn burner – a very exciting or dramatic event
Bingle – a collision
Divagate – to stray or digress
Fugacious – transient or fleeting
Hoddy-noddy – a foolish person
Hodiernal – of today
Hunting-and-pecking (Hunt-and-peck) – typing with two fingers
Luculent – clearly expressed
Lollygag – spend time in an aimless or lazy way
Ogdoad – set of eight

***

A wordy Six Word Saturday post.

Six Word Saturday

I must now take a nap.

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Letters To The Universe… The First Edition In December

Dear December,
Nice to see you again, but haven’t you only just left from last year?

Dear December Weather,
I don’t know where I’ve gotten the idea from, but surely you should have a Wintry Christmas Card feel about you now, shouldn’t you? I mean soon, we may all be sending Christmas Cards with images of grey murky days on them instead of the wonderlands we normally see (together with the robins and baubles and so on!).

Dear Autumn,
I’m sure you weren’t this late last year. I mean some trees still have their full leaves on… and I’m not referring to the evergreens here, either! It’s no wonder the weather (which I’ve addressed in a previous letter) isn’t its normal self.

Dear December,
Are you sure that you are here again, and you haven’t just ‘hung around’ hiding somewhere to take us all by surprise when we least expected it?

Dear December,
Me again! I’d just like to inform you that I haven’t yet seen a single robin this time around… not even on a Christmas Card (as referred to in a previous letter!).

Dear Christmas Decorations,
You are brightening the place up immensely now, I must say, and you are very welcome now that December has come around once again. It doesn’t seem that long ago that you were all being taken down, but that’s December’s fault by springing up on us so suddenly. I am a little concerned that if I blink, I may see you being taken down again in record time, but that appears to be something I just have to get used to now.

Dear Twelvetide,
I’m sorry, but I have only just heard of you. I mean, I know of you, being the Twelve Days of Christmas and all that, starting on December 25th, but I’ve never heard of you before referred to as Twelvetide. Although it does make sense.

And Finally, Dear Christmastide,
Yes, I’ve only just heard of you as well, although Christmas Time and Yuletide are more familiar variations of you which I have heard of. Also, I’m slightly confused as some see you as identical to Twelvetide, and others see you differently. Mind you, I’ve always thought of the Twelve Days of Christmas as leading UP to Christmas Day, so what would I know???

Thank you for reading,

P.S. And here endeth the latest collection of Letters To The Universe, all based on observations or lack thereof! I think I’m going to have to start opening my eyes more, so I can actually take in a lot of what is going on around me, rather than letting a lot of things simply pass me by. Time is passing by at great speed now, so it seems a shame to get to this point of the journey and start missing the view.

Dear Blogland… have a fabulous weekend and wonderful fun-filled week next week.

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Reduced Power

Eagle-eyed visitors may have noticed something recently that isn’t that apparent to those who are less eagle-eyed. Although having said that, those with eagle-eyes could be excused for missing it, all things considered.

You may have noticed in the last few posts simply words, no pictures, no featured images.

You may not have noticed either, considering out of the last three posts, only two of them contained words, and one had merely a picture. And this post too, is rather text heavy and slightly light on the old picture side.

We’re running on reduced power here at Beyond the Sphere at present. And yes, I’m well aware that some people will quip that there really isn’t much change there then (thank you person at the back there!) but I wanted to post my exc reasons.

I’ve been kidnapped by aliens, you see, and infected with some alien lurgy… and have very patchy internet in the cargo hold of their ‘luxurious’ space cruiser. When Mars gets in Earth’s way, there is no signal strength at all.

The clock going back has affected my equal librarian sending me completely out of whack with my immediate surroundings. Not that I could argue I was totally in whack to begin with, but right now I’m here and my whack is waaay over there.

After the work on the Bathroom was finally completed, I had dozens of teeth extracted, and I’m now in the process of having thousands of feelings. Yes, I did type feelings there, and although I meant fillings feelings came out. As they do. And when having a filling, I feel you really don’t want to feel feelings. Apart from the numbness wearing off hours after the operation(s) it(them)sel(f/ves). See. Equal Librarian. Out of whack. I blame Mars.

Something’s in Retrograde. I can feel it. I don’t know what, but I can just tell. Maybe it’s ‘cos I is upside down.

I also have a sniffle. Some may describe it as Man-Flu, but not I. ‘Tis a sniffle and it only hurts when I blow my nose. Which seems to be like all of the time at the moment, and with my nose being just above my feeling-filled mouth, I have a lot of different feelings to deal with in that area.

And they say men don’t talk about their feelings. I’ve waffled on about them incessentantly during this pictureless waffle. Ah well. Sometimes no pictures can be a blessing. You should see the shade of red on my hooter.

Not as red as in Mars red, which to me has always been more of a brown but who am I to argue with science, but almost as red as the red squiggly lines which highlight the words which Spellchecker thinks I have spelled/spelt incorrectly. Obviosuly, I haven’t, but Spellchecker doesn’t know that.

So, there we have it.

My exc reasons for working on reduced power at present. Obviously (well not obviously, obviously), normal service will be resumed as soon as possible, and posts around here will return to their usual technicolour greatness.

Alien spaceship wifi and missing whack withstanding, I shall be replying to comments and visiting soon. I feel like I’m always saying that.

It’s true, you know. It’s good to talk about your feelings.

I shall see you in the next post / comment reply/ YOUR blog soon!

Feel Good now!

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So then, where has he been?

That, as they say’s the question. Ahem.

Apologies for the grammar, but it is Six Word Saturday after all.

Well, it was.

Since I last posted / visited, I have been up to umpteen things which have kept me away from blogging. They still are (keeping me away), but I am trying to break through that particular wall and get back into this blogging malarkey. I do pay for it, after all, and I have only recently renewed. So, blog I must. Not that I wouldn’t if I hadn’t paid, but paying gives just that little more of an incentive. Especially when you don’t have two ha’pennies to rub together. Which I do / don’t. Frequently. Erm, don’t have, not rub together. Oh, I’ll just move on.

It would seem since my last post I have forgotten how to blog. Must be a consequence of something, I suppose, but with a memory like mine I could put it down to that. Perhaps forgotten is a wrong term, and lost my way a little is more like it. Not that I had a way to start off with, so that isn’t right either.

Don’t you just love rambling streams of consciousness posts? Not that this post was intended to be one, I hasten to add. It’s just turned out that way.

Come one! This is meant to be a Six Word Saturday post. Sigh.

OK then. Where have I been? Where to begin…

I may have been abducted by aliens. It would have happened on Monday, as Tuesday I remember looking at my reflection in the mirror and thinking ‘ugh’. I did think something else at the time, but that has slipped my mind for the moment, and it isn’t really relevant to this post either.

I couldn’t have been abducted by aliens on Monday now, thinking about it, as I remember it being rather warm, and I have a feeling aliens do their abductions when the temperatures are rather more pleasant.

I think we can safely say I wasn’t abducted by aliens.

I know that this week I have been engrossed in copying computer files for one of my programs that I use to create art onto another drive that I have as I was running out of space on the drive that the program was originally installed on. And breathe! Sorry about the lack of punctuation there. After moving the files, the program didn’t work, so I had to move them back, where it didn’t work again, so then followed a series of deinstallations, installations, reloads, reboots and red faces. It was still warm after all.

That seems to be working now, so there is one reason why I appear to have been AWOL.

There’s the slight possibility that I may have been trapped in the Bathroom. Regular readers will know that this used to be a regular occurrence, but it hasn’t happened for a while. The Bathroom has been rather well behaved for some good time now, but with the ominous arrival of a new Bathroom dawning on the horizon, maybe the existing one is just exerting its strength one last time or so. That remains to be seen.

I could have been photographing ducks. I seem to do that a lot, and in this weather, they don’t tend to swim as fast as usual. In fact, thinking about it, they’re mostly dozing on the banks so they’re not swimming at all. And not very interesting to photograph when they’re half asleep, so I don’t think I have been photographing ducks. I could have photographed the geese on the Lake this afternoon, they seemed to be in a very frisky mood for some reason, but I was just too hot and rested in the shade, wanting to curl up and doze with the ducks.

Perhaps I’ve had my haircut. No! Don’t faint! I haven’t. Really, I haven’t! No. It isn’t time yet. I’m just saying that perhaps I had my haircut. There’s a lot of strength in the word perhaps.

I think on the whole, this week especially, I’ve been feeling the effects of the heat. I don’t do heat very well, and haven’t really at all this week. Even the shade has been warm, which was a bit of a blow around the Lake. And talking of blows, even the breeze has been warm. There’s just no escape! Good job I hadn’t had a haircut, and my hair kept the super-powerful rays from the Sun away from my tender scalp. And to top things off, we have two massive moorland fires which are proving tricky to control, one of which is on hill that serves as the home of the main TV transmitter in this region. That’s all I need, no TV when its too hot to do anything else!

Seriously, though, I’m hoping the wildfires are brought under control very soon, and safely to boot. And the twit who started one of the fires gets a jolly good stern telling off. Some people just don’t think, do they?

So there we have it.

We’re still none the wiser as to where I’ve been, and I’ll probably still be there for a few more days yet. I’ve still got my Superhero Diaries posts written and ready for scheduling, so they’ll keep things ticking along presence wise, until I get back to proper blogging once again.

July is now fast approaching, which means its World Watercolour Month once again, so I must try to get at least one painting done for this month-long splosh fest* .

I will try to post and visit during the course of my madness, but can’t promise.

And I WILL reply to those comments, some of which have been waiting for a reply since the Battle of Hastings in 1066.

Keep cool!I know I’m trying.

(Now that’s a loaded sentence… hehehe!)

A lengthy Six Word Saturday** post (a link should appear here to Debbie’s site, should I remember to add it!)

  • And I will do more than one watercolour. I simply must!!!

** Yes, I know it’s posted on a Friday, but I can’t help that. I could have scheduled it, but it’s just too warm. This heat has a lot to answer to.