Listening to you-know-who
As the voice of Winnie the Pooh
I melted into a puddle of goo.
“This is bad,” said Pooh to me.
“I know,” I said to Pooh.
“I might very well pass for forty-three,
Yet all I seem to do
Is go goo-goo at you-know-who.”
“You are a cougar,” said Pooh to me.
“Damn true,” I said to Pooh.

Us Two, by A.A. Milne, read by Helena Bonham Carter and Tom Hiddleston. Takes me back to David Bowie reading Peter and the Wolf. <3

Speaking of celebrities, have — if you like — some pictures of Iggy Pop in a dress. No, not from Dead Man. This dress. And here in a scarf or something, playing dressups with Bowie.

Wanting to take more responsibility for things I can change. Giving up feelings of responsibility for things I can’t change. Not exactly giving fewer fucks, but redistributing where fucks are given.

Mum had cancer last year. They caught it in time and it was all out and over quickly, but it was still quite the reminder of mortality. Which hasn’t made me want to rush out and do a million things all at once, but I’m more determined to be satisfied with life — at least under normal circumstances when nothing terrible is happening — than I was before. I’m still plagued by shyness but I’ve been fighting it a bit more, and so far the sky hasn’t fallen in.

Realising that teenage fears still somehow linger. What will they think? Oh, they think I’m ugly and such a dork. I won’t try to do that thing — I’d better just hide back here, away from judging eyes. Shit sticks. But time takes a toilet brush, puts it in your hand…

A sense of less to lose. It isn’t just that time is shorter. Once upon a long time ago I thought I had to be perfect. I’m still a perfectionist in some things, and I would hesitate to say that perfectionism is always bad. But I’ve had the experiences of failure and of being a mess — not poked away in a cupboard, but a mess right out on the floor where everyone can see it. So there’s less of a sense of a facade to be maintained or any kind of record of high achievement to preserve.

The Top Five Regrets of the Dying

Woke at a ridiculous hour of the morning/night. Wondered why. Remembered Henry IV part II showing. Staggered downstairs to check BBC2 livestream. Connected just exactly in time for the sauna scene, now to be filed next to the shower scene from Dune in my scrapbook of un/earthly delights.

Having turned 40, I’ve been trying to make a pre-emptive move against middle-age spread and general decreptiude. To wit, I’ve been running around the graveyard. Nothing like a constant reminder of mortality to promote an effort in the direction of fitness!

This morning I sort of managed five laps, which is roughly 5km — in the heat and high humidity (“in the heat and the rain, with whips and chains!”) I took a short walking break each lap and one sit-down break of a couple of minutes before the last lap. My speed would be more accurately be called my lousy slowness — 1km times between 7 and 10 minutes. But. I did it. I hauled my arse at some kind of running speed nearly all of the way around that boneyard five times. It has taken me about three months to be able to do so!

Did I mention the graveyard is literally crawling with giant millipedes? Very cute. Often crushed. Haven’t stepped on one yet, and hope I won’t.