A rebel without a clue.

Pilgrimage Pt.15. Three bassoons playing a mighty sound. A bass and two tenors. Hugely funny. Well not when it is super snores at just about 4am. Hank the orange ogre is the leading instrument of this particular trio. But the rhythm is abrasive and never sings me back to a grave like sleep; I slept through my own memories of completing tasks and feeling open, yet on awaking I felt closed from self engagement. Truly. I feel mental this morning. I got up to discover all my walking clothes are still wringing wet. I'm not walking to Conques. There is no way I could with a rucksack and another bag of soaking clothes and wearing denim; rain loves denim. I now plan to get to Conques and get a sleeping roll for my tent; from June the weather is meant to improve. Christian the German walker who returned with snapped ligaments managed €5 per day camping. Either I give the clothes that are adding to my weight to charity, send them back or throw away. Bernard the Priest states you can leav...

Pilgrimage Pt.14. Late last night I changed my mind. If I can't just about walk straight on again today weather permitting I'll see how the bones and the damp feels Friday before deciding to walk to Conques or use a hackney. I've still got all of the emergency sterling fund that mother gave me without me asking; haven't had chance to exchange it. The Way of St James recommends Hospitalité Saint-Jacques: and I'm going to relax in Estaing, 320m: without a bleeding nose coming down from 1400m and snaking over many more petit Marilyns. So far all I've had for petit dejourner are a dozen Agen Prunes. I was helped on my way to my donativo so popped back for le cafe au femme et créme! Everyone else seems to be going forward to Golinhac, but they didn't go over the hill between Espalion and Estaing. I can't manage another afternoon of being wetness. My feet are getting trenchfoot from everyday's rains. It is another seventeen kilometres, up hill a bit, in...

Pilgrimage Pt.13. The weather has no meaning. It is meaningless to weight it down with personifactions. But the rain fills me with a deep longing for more yellow mellow circumstances. It is what it is. Something I've eaten has come straight through me; Delhi Belly. Not sure what it might've been but there were plenty of flies at Relais St Jacques ... the food itself is usually 100% so maybe the water could be a possibility. It is a relief this didn't occur when I was marching this morning and before I climbed the hill between St-Côme and Estalion. That was tough climbing through the black stone quarry soaked. I'm not bothered about statutes of Notre-Dame really. I wonder if rural France never saw anything of the Revolution at all? There seems little to have changed since 1789 except motor cars; the diet must be identical? The food can't be a reason for these tidings. Booked into to a gites occupied by a strangely inanimate Argentinian and Germanic caricature. I s...

Pilgrimage Pt.12. So muddy. I feel like a soldier in the winters of the trenches. Set off walking before petit dejourner at 7am. Wanted to come away from the snow and mist I hit St Chély d'Audrac and the heavens open again. I can't walk a second day soaking wet so I stopped to have breakfast. The day is cruel until a man in a van comes to Relais St Jacques who carries bags down for the lightweight walker. I hitch for to Saint Côme d'Olt. If I had set off any later in the matin I would've arrived soaking again! Wow! A quick look around the church in St-Côme then rejoin the GR65 lighter by €15, but drier by far more. I went forward around 15kms so I still walked over 15kms and arrived in Espalion. One stage further but no less torture; the rain lingers, but is more on and off than constant. I still come down into Espalion cussing St Jacques and all his many demons. Chasing me up another twisting and sodden excuse for a path. Now the rain is steady like you get at ...

Pilgrimage Pt.11. I think more of the wolf in sheep's clothing as an obstacle to overcome through self examination. He had no knowledge of what I was seeking but my mind allowed him to enter my subconscious and bring forth demons. He is at least a day ahead of me now. This morning I was ready to leave the Chemin Faisant by 7:55am. A breakfast with people leaving by train to jump forward some 300 kms in seven hours; catching three connections at various stations: that also is a Way. Walking though Lasbros my thoughts turn to Lord of the Rings as I am walking passed a feature known as Barradou. The two Germans I saw this morning, who I assumed to be French, I left behind at Le Gare Au-Au, but as I approached Chapelle de Bastide the cheats were already ahead circulating like the Kaiser's Raptors. Onwards at a steady 5.6kms per hour I am covering the distance respectably. ... 'fucking weather, ha!' What happened to the weather. The wrath of god was upon the moor. Fr...

( https://www.evernote.com/shard/s315/sh/1bc417a5-1063-4e75-abf1-d666dd8e4bdb/4cc30b703f7a6b84898a78b9c7fe1550) I need to clear out of this town as soon as the dawn has broken. All I needed here was those functional things we take for granted when we have occupational responsibilities. Saved three madam from Quebec the indignity of Gites Calypso. A man with a badly tattooed arm, a collosal 'I've never even been in a boat' faux sailor's air and huge wowser. How easy is it to see vagueness in out of the way places? The self same vagueness England's pubs exhibit. So far I've managed only a couple of beers at meal times. Last night I ordered a half bottle of Vin a la Maison. It was to wash the food down and was insignificant. Having eaten my fill at the Hotel Aubrac for lunch I will abstain from anything else until I cross the street, duck into the Rival store and pick up my provisions for 35kms tomorrow from 8am. The first part of the pilgrimage is concluding with...

Pilgrimage Pause Pt.2. Washing day. Real nothing day. Bought a couple of things I'll need for camping after I reach Conques, including a purposeful multiple knife: Victorinox. Last expensive day too. Next location only €8.50 per night. This town is quiet at 12:30 as everything closes for the afternoon, but for a change the sun is out so it feels like a great day to stay put. Spent a tidy sum on dinner last night as everything is otherwise closed on Dimarche. Been to the pharmacy for foot cream, voltoron gel and contact lens solution. Did a wash first thing and now everything is back to clean for another four days muddiness. Meant to rain on Tuesday and be about 10 degrees centigrade. It is a surprise that the weather here on the Aubrac Plateau is exactly like the UK. It's a kilometre closer to the sun so that must, by degrees, makes it feel like the UK. All the flora and fauna is identical too. Like an island in south central France. If anything we are still in early spring he...

The Way of the Wolf Part. 1. Our host, over dinner, told us the tale of the local wolf, who had been murdered centuries ago, and was blamed then, and forever, for any evil deed that only a man would commit, thoughtlessly, on his fellows. A tragic tale of a scapegoat used as a means of escape for one barbaric act. After the most complete five courses of lovingly created fayre, and locally made cheese and bread, I spoke directly with him of my last days horrible chase and how I felt haunted and lost upon the frozen mountain trail. He saw that I was in a state of considerable agitation and in need of help. It was then that he told me that he was a good spirit put there on the junction of the roads to help those needing support, guidance and friendship to take the correct steps towards discovery of their path. The transformation of a man to a wolf then back to a man. The humped back, silver toothed jongular driving me to meet my fate with snow blizzarding along our path; hiding our fo...

Pilgrimage Pause Pt.1. Aumont-Aubrac Today was considerately easier going for me. I set off after petitdejourner alone and promised I wouldn't spend any of today's leg in anyones company. I have learnt already this is my walk and must do it my way all the way at all costs. After a superb communal supper I went to bed on the top (in a bunk bed) for the first time along the way. Hank the buffalo was below me and the German couple from Konstanz were in a double bed nearest the window; without any curtains so you could only sleep dusk until dawn. I slept peacefully until Hanks snores brought me out of slumber around half past five. I tried to block out the pulses but it was impossible. Eventually I got up and packed ready for breakfast and the continuation of the Camino. After two successively fast paced and relentless days it felt that Sunday mustn't be as forboding so I could just get somewhere and feel a little more like a whole bodied man again! I walked passed the chur...

Pilgrimage Pt.10. The test of all tests. Driving snow across from the west as we climb up to our 2/3 point enroute to Saint Albans -Les Sauvages - must stop. Considerable wet. Rushed up the side of the mountain to peak at 1292m. Come to the auberge to relax and reheat prior to the final leg of a grueling 33kms. Needed sustainance definitely. Beef stew and roast potatoes and salad leaves. Readying for my body to assimilate the energy. With all the exerting came a snow blindness. Everything was tinged with a ring of pink. Now the weather has changed and a thaw is on. Snow balls bounce off the back of my head as we duck beneath the spruce coming out from Les Sauvages to Chapel Saint Roch. Onto a road we're making excellent coverage of my left third toe; a blister and we arrive at Chapelle. After nestling towards the final few kilometer wondering who am I trying to compete with? There isn't anyone to beat. Feel a little pushed by a Frenchman in shorts. But Sunday will be a gentl...

Pilgrimage Pt.9. No snow is good. A minor sprinkling to the north; from my window I cannot see the direction of travel. Awoke at day break more or less and feeling a little more smelly. The wicking base level does the job required but over a few days I'll smell more rank. The mushroom sauce was simply cream, garlic, salt, pepper and the meat glacie with these midget mushrooms was a great complement to a satisfying steak. I had planned, it being Friday, to look for females in Sauges, but then I realised I need all my energy for the long distance to cover today. No way as dramatic as Friday, but still a steady climb of 300 metres over 30 kilometres; Samedi. I retired around 9pm without a beer. I wrote to Glenn and Nick and sent a few text mothers way. By 10pm everyone doing le Chemin was snoring gently. The light crept though my eyelids by 5am. I turned a few times drifting in and out of sleep, but now at 6:50am I am abluted, packed and ready for petit dejourner at 7:15am. The str...

Pilgrimage Pt.8. Needing to stamp my Créanciale with the fussy old lady I leave at five to find café noir and log on to the matrix. She is very helpful, via a French couple translation, I must fill in my information on my Créanciale prior to leaving France. I had no time to even read what was within the companion piece or the Créanciale itself. I'm wake at 6am and after packing, breakfast and ablutions it is already 8am when I set off for l'eau, compote de pommes and banane and the Chemin St Jacques. That was my third stamp. I leave her with the dignity of kiss on each cheek and to discover a café to engage with those back in England. A discussion with my room mates for tonight explains that Aubrac is famous for its beef in France. I can understand that once you see the miles and miles of rolling grasses with hardly a house in sight; Sauges has a population of 2,000 only. So I am happy to discover that the café I drink and communicate from is, from 7pm, ...

Pilgrimage Pt.7. On the journey I have only seen one ghost. The wife of Charles proprietor of L'Acrobate, Corinne is the only one who is still breathing alive but is dead behind her eyes. There may be was a semi-ghost back in Montbonnet but it was unclear as I drank my Verbena tea. A simple bed and breakfast for €17 in Privat. On reaching the top of the Aubrac plateau coming into Sauges I am surrounded by cows swaying and ruminating to the chimes of antique alpine bells; in distinct brown and white they provide le fromage du Pays from the tender unpolluted dales. For the first time in my life I have climbed beyond 1000 metres. From leaving Monstrial d'Allier I climbed beyond 600 metres rapidly; in the fridgid hale and bleak swirling winds. Twice I reached the tipping point of water and mud. Both feet! But over a crest I hear school children as Sauges is before me. I descended from on high to the center ville of Sauges my body begins to react to the constant tread of size e...

Pilgrimage Pt.6. New experience of chitterling sausage and gratin dauphonoise Saint-Privat d'Allier. It was zero degrees here last night. I felt it. The room was snug but only just. Le toilette froid. Patric snores too. Will take today steady. The small blister on my left foot, third toe, has reduced. But I expect to know about it tonight. Hey that's what our shod feet are made for! Blisters! This morning, as I rolled my sleeping bag, I questioned the German I am sharing with if my current French diet is a bad thing: for the walk he states the body requires fats. Maybe he is right. Fat is bad for a sedentary life watching Jeremy Kyle. Breakfasted on pain, fromage bobi, confiture buerre doux Brest, orange presse au café noir while Charles, my Saint Etienne supporting host, plays an oldie but goodie: Age of Empires; expansion while I take in my second café noir. Ouvert. The clouds drap across the top of most of the mountains we must assault this morning and there is also a 60...

Pilgrimage Pt.5. Bonjour I've just walked 15 km in 3 hrs carrying a 15kilo rucksack. One last hill until Montbonnet. No one has overtaken me but I have passed dozens. My dog taught me well. Arrogance? I left Les Capucin this morning around eight and began the steep and steady route Saint Jacques as it rises straight behind Le Pu(y) to the south west. I was huffing and puffing with that first exertion beyond compote and café. I was able to stop and look back at the cathedral and statue this morning without having walked to death yesterday beyond a couple of significantly inexpensive tourist attractions: four euro. It is a great vista to view the terracotta tiled roofs and the bell tower rising towards the nineteenth centuries crowning glory in this town. By now I am sweating happily into my stride. The tempo of my exerting is soon over as I hit the smooth rhythm that always defines my stamina, once the initial assault is complete. We pass a number of quite facinating natural monu...

Pilgrimage Pt 4. Just got up. Packed. Ready for breaking my fast. I had a glass of gros Manseng wine last night. Some local cheese and two beers from local brewer. Slept from around 10 until 6(5 in UK). Now I am awaiting my morning coffee from a mademoiselle. The wonderful smells of freshly baking croissants and thick lucous French coffee. Paradise is here in combustables. Buerre a la Brest au Breton. Starting this breakfast to gentle voices French. Offer me coffee in which a spoon stand up and I know I am a francophile. But they are another form of madden head shake: les femmes. It is a holiday weekend. The same one I flew from in Brittany in 2000. Back in France without the other mechanical fears. My tears fall for joy and kava. The marching of prisoners, aka pensioners, who now fear death without redemption. Off they stride passing my temporary window. Sitting on the left side of the Chemin I can consume unto equilibrium. I am in need of l'eau et au banane for my journey. T...

Have been forced to pay a little too much for an open and light weight sandle built with walking in mind. Probably less than the uk. My feet will now survive the evenings with a chance to freshen up. Looking for some lighter sock, which I was unsuccessful finding, I found a string of three very interesting shops. First a bric-a-brac with reflections of the Chemin Saint Jacques amongst some novels and a surprisingly sexy selection of early 1970s chanson. Then a fromagerie with at least two fromage de la Pays. Very local. Very lovely. Like a cave aged Lancashire or Wensleydale. Finally when I had little chance to find the sexy sox shop I stopped via the couvert marche and was assaulted with a fantastic wine merchants offering local produce too; including this local biere. Auvergne produces Whisky using Armanac casks too. An interestingly northern British town curiously between Paris and London. Just bumped into Thomas who has been walking and sight seeing all day. I am still feeling the...

Checked in. Spoke to an attendant about where I'm going and for why. Chucked my bag with oversized and watched it passing through the scanner to be seen next in Paris. Passed Security. Rapidly felt down 'where are you going today? Is it business or pleasure?'. Paris/Pleasure. 'please remove your boots'. Seismic security. Reaching departures. A quick purchase of a new cover for the Kindle with the broken binding. Bottle of water and £20 later: need food at some point that isn't trash our over priced mass market. Unrealistic. Accept the inevitable.

I've been to this station before but I didn't see it. I was blind. Really a different era. I'm not blind anymore. No rushing threatened by my own ignorance. The cigar shaped building of Terminal Two is a UFO north east of gay Paris. Vending machines are filled with the same Mars Confectionary. Selecta bonfide universal. We just got going on the flight when I opened the page on "On The Road". I had read a short introductory section or two then I felt the pressure of our steady descent towards the out house that is Terminal Trois CDG. Reminds me of Cairns or someother non-existing frontier zone. Airports, unlike train stations, make me feel I list sinking for lacking both a head or a soul. I spot a Relay I last saw that at Bermondsey Underground some years ago. It sells all the magazines a rampant person without a head or soul could flick through. Magazines are a 21st Century reflection of the early 20th Century trapped forever chained to the 20s consumer culture...

German, Swiss, Argentinian and many many French. Relais Saint Jacques. Le Pu(y). The long day is over the rest of me begins again. Speaking to many many people happily for a breakfast over pain and confecture : abricot and fruit de la boisson. Café and peace. In the dark I climbed the steep slopes watching for any appearance of the cathedral, showered in incandescent light, the incline was great and brought my body, without a map, directly to the doorway into my bastion for this only night. Free. All given for free. A man awaited me two hours past the curfew and helped me with smiles and nods towards the bed. Divinely ordered and clean. Perfect. No headaches. No nightime fears. No worries of flea bitten ungrateful soreness. I sit considering those black and white polished cobbles up the side of this ancient volcano and feel something better for yesterday's cloudy straining against the perpetual interlocking of modern transportation. Striding up the pumace stoned relic. To the lor...

Strange One http://open.spotify.com/track/11MxDt Qynu0r3e8QsCkxh2 Can't even get a burger in England without it being a stress for everyone involved. Have they never waited before? People going on holiday never get on a holiday. Life is a choice. Relinquish the angst and enjoy a Whopper(tm); sin queso. Waiting to catch a plane is like being plunged into a hell of brands and consumerism. Walls full of any smell but not homo sapiens and toxins to fill lungs and veins with the life controls. This bullet kills. Shoot it at yourself; pay less for the pleasure in duty-free. The burger did the job. 1000+ calories to burn between here and Lyon; saltier than the dead sea; borax mouthed man. But hey! I am away in an hour. Pissy English forgotten in the contrails; flying south.

Pilgrimage. Pt1. Tuesday morning. No broken bones or random fractures or bruises. So no repeat of 2010, September. The twentyfirst has arrived: nice. Snoopy joined me at 5:30am, but I am awake. A long tiring day will be before me until I reach my destination around midnight French local time. I packed most of my equipment last night and combined weight is just over ten kilogrammes. This morning I made sure there is a little sterling in my general current account to cover June's expenditures; leaving me to worry about July and August when they arrive; and not before. Nothing concrete will fix until Wednesday morning, after the 7am mass in Le Puy-en-Velay, when I hope to collect my general credencial. Tuesday will be a relaxing, mind opening journey. The passage of time will be the becoming of me. In the aspect of my existence you will think of me and think of me kindly. Blessings will support my enterprise as free particles warming the sides of a cup coffee bring fruition and ter...

Bloody beer tourists. Guys who tour every boozer, are very loud, perfectly tedious and only know about axle grease, football and birds (burds). Order with blinkingly empty eyes, wider wondering, any drink that they can associate with pallid Carling or full fat Smoothflow(tm). Down the scales of pointless crazing noises you go moving onto the next expectant lifeless corpse. Ballacks, I ain't.

Eurovision comments abound on Facebook and I hide them, 20 in a row, from me in 2013. It was Terry Wogan who made for me that show; a man with a cutting edge of wit and a delivery, that many might over look, but most would aspire to mimic forcefully upon a listening audience. Yesterday I met with Janice and Fabio to discuss my future, our present, and our reflections on the UK in its divisiveness, where they consumed a 'panini' - bacon, brie and tomato with loosely defined salad 'garnish'; limpid, tattered and torn; the rotten sodden ends of bruised and abused rocket, chard and lamb's lettuce with a heavy mustard vinaigrette. I saw the second reused potatoes burnt into a chip similarity and quarmed for a proper two stage fried chipped potato; not forever baked or boiled potatoes used o'er and o'er again. GP and reuse is the route of all food enterprise and production; it gives them an edge from which they could throw over broiled, boiled and stewed veget...

Rain. Grey. Gray. Regret. Slouch. Slunk. Sunk. Remorse. Rebound. Sink. Skint. Bereavement. Undertake. Coffin. Stiff. It really is me verses alcohol again. Shambolic. Coffee and sugar. Demerera is unrefined but still toxic. Not sure. I reached a land of no return last night. I realise I simply have zero in common with Wetherby. The people here have no idea about life outside the four walls of various pubs. They are really dead people and I can't be like them anymore. I cringe at Carling drinkers. I guess happiness is something else than the driving nonsense that the UK sells. I find the vapid conversations going on in cafes a trauma of Britain. Scooter Works isn't like this at all; oh Lower Marsh. If you have anything: I can do anything. I have always done anything never something. I have no demands, expectations, requirements, just a want to meet people and be useful. I have no use to myself, but that mustn't be the summary of my 41 years. I am learning to see life di...

It's always I, me, mine But never they, them, theirs. Why so? Unitary and solo Standing back feeling hollow. Watching the Swallows, Martins or Swifts swoop Declining level ripple seed Splashing; dividing time. From morning to morrow While from the furtive breeze They borrow lives; temporary, Until the water bloats. And they flee in another Looping gliding hurry Troubled; the river boils, Creeping upon its own flotsom. Moment movements Ousted; fin de siécle, Jettisoned fragments Pushed beyond recall.

I can't be the model of your expectations. Why is it impossible to just let me be whom I am. I never question anyone about all the basic stuff. So many people are convinced that you have to be a certain way before they will accept you or see you as an equal. Why? They don't know what they want more than anyone else; they don't have any keys to the kingdom. A brain filled with money, job, marriage, two week holidays every year, work Christmas parties, BBQs in the back garden, etc ... Is a brain without choices? All the choices have already been made that will ever be. Without consciousness our essence and being is devoid of truth or reality. You don't like me because I have a different, difficult and uncomfortable point of view. I'm happy that you have found happiness in the normal expectations, but that has never delivered me to any promised land ... We will now go our own way, never to meet again.

Kevin delivers the mail on the south side of the street while Snoops growls, snarls and barks at this daily intruder. No harm ever comes of the larger than life barks he demonstrates behind number 42's double glazed, wood effect, window panes. Up the north side he delivers all the needs I have prior to the 21st and grateful I am. The postman, in his sardonic fashion, is disappointed with our dog. His venom is stayed, but Snoopy doesn't understand that the man in red is not a threat. It may be that Snoopy responds to some mental extensions that proceeds balloon-like from Kevin? I calm Snoopy and explain that the mailman isn't any threat, but this doesn't resolve his desire to warn off. Our dog; he knows more than we can ever understand.

I have a recurring dream in which my father is very alive when he should be dead. He won't admit he's dead and no one in the dream will believe me when I tell them he is dead. He has the same incandescent fury I recall of my youth, but I try to kill him and return him to the place he went to in 2001. I think those in my hallucination feel I should be grateful for him being resurrected in this place;created, but I can not help the moment of the dream. It is usually a complete surprise that I find him quite alive and openly accepted. Everyone in the dream seems unaware of his cadaver reality: strewn dustlike between the devil and the deep blue seas. There is a peace between him and the others in the room, but at the moment I perceive this unreality the abhorring of his usual expression turns overtly on to me. It becomes me vrs. everyone, including him, and there is nothing I can do but turn a vicious murderer and return him to the hell he struggles to escape from. Perhaps the n...

Yes I was frivolous in my life. What ever I wanted I told myself I could have. There was nothing to hold me back. Somehow my mind told me I would be fine accepting the fate of this ordeal. In 2007 I finally went bankrupt. I hadn't felt a purpose in my life from around 1999. I had truly drifted without a clue. Briefly I left these lands for sondrie londs down in Brittany, Sweden, Czech Republic, Australia, Spain I took myself. I lived the crazy life, but my record was playing at the wrong speed. I know I fulfilled nothing long lasting in what should've been a brave escape. I feel my immaturity laid me bare. I was hunting for something I never perceived lingering in the blind spot of my sight. The years grew between regular 9 to 5 and bankruptcy. Between 1995 and 1999 I worked consistently. Then I left for Australia. I returned never to connected directly with that expectation from society in modern Britain, but the debts mounted as I felt I must conform to my peers, mother, fath...

From the right hand side a greyed out man woman became my voice; a rainbow stripped momento of Oxford Dons. Stating something I was subconsciously thinking. Someone struggling against anonymity in hell sent Harrogate and sixty years feeling a need not to be the drifting within an inert body. Having the same deathly battle on their hands: mother and father destroyed another young and afraid face. Glenn and I assailed Harrogate on a very cold, winter and damp May day. I was reminded of a July Saturday in London where the temperature plunged to seven and Scarlett and I were battered beyond our meagre senses; I rolled into a copious puddle and sprained my right ankle. The same ankle I went over drunkenly on in Newcastle upon Tyne back on 1993. Another year where realistic and positive weather eludes the English. Anguish of bleak clouds rolling heavily drawning dreading o'er our fragile pates. In the end it was a quiet day and eventually a deep blue shone down on the Stray and upon our ...

This morning I know the world is mad. I'm sat in McDonald's consuming a burger and a big mac. My first meal today. Waiting for Glenn to join me in Harrogate and battle against the maddening crowd of undone souls. Even the children of this world are mad. They are blank of realising. Something corrupt is present. Witless like the trembling mad. What vanishes into nothing within their something creates anything but truth. This indoctrination of sounds, sights and smells isn't what it appears to be. It is all false. My choice brought me to eat here, but maybe it wasn't a conscious choice. Between the Station and here I saw nothing real. The cenitaph consoles us who are terrified by the cacophony of galavanting mad. The stones permit this hell infernal and doors stand back while plastic bags proclaim a want of empty symbols and misheard drums. Why did this happen and how was I also caught by it for many many years. The cycles and patterns are a web that splays us formulated ...

As I look across the valley I can see the wind ruffling my hair. Swinging in the March breeze, hung from the neck, I see a body limp and raggedy, urine stained and empty of life. Around the circling swaying body stand a number of heavily wrapped individuals. Covered up against the unseasonally cold weather with only their eyes peering out towards the dead deed lingering on the hastily constructed gallows. From a twisted contrived bending crumpled ancient hawthorn the body swings pendulous; marking the passing of life and the gathering of the dusk. They start to drift away, leaving the empty shell as a warning for any others who pass this way of the punishments and summary justices preserving their society; but I am now free. Singular and discorporated. My body no longer the chain binding me to the corrupt and insidiously moralising society that only spoke to me through broken teeth with blackened bile dribbling from the whimsical, half smirking, sinister lips.

Well there are only a few days left until my pilgrimage begins in earnest. I've been keeping away from this blog to put a little room between my convulsive negative feelings, dwelling within my past and struggling with my turgid mental system. I am feeling enthused more than I have been for a very long time; by looking forward and with help from the various positive inputs, since the pilgrimage idea popped into my head, including Prozac, planning, therapy and karma. I am making a conscious effort to think differently. All of this may be helping; but I think I am stating the obvious. In the last month I have been helped from an unexpected source and I am completely thankful of my brilliant and selfless cousin; a being whom has a million senses open and aiding with a fundamentally true understanding and he has supported me with real brotherly love and engagement. On Wednesday, during my analysis visit, I felt it would be useful to try to explain how I perceive the world: so I tr...

After my first nights sleep, when I was woken up without any bed clothes, I stepped out to fix my trip to Piran. Buon giorno: sorted €5:40c, and now I am officially in an Illy caffé house in central Trieste. I have taken a photo of James Joyce walking over a bridge on the grande canal (well a bronze!) First ever Italiano cappuccino. I notice that the modern Italians are coffee crazy! Last night I ate some awesome cheese and pancetta. Pancetta del calabrasi and a matured local cheese. Some bread a few glasses of Merlot and Aperol Spritz aperitivo. Some thing like a Friulian tapas style food along the way. Then bed. I was aware that they all talk so much. From that chattering mouth what must they be talking about. A commanding style of pristine hair and immaculate clothes here, but it's atypically Italian I feel. I will myself to walking up to Castello; it is very windy day today; dusty too. I am less uncertain today than I was yesterday. Will I camp in Piran? Plans? 5 days t...

Eyes full of irritating pus gunk. Slept fitfully waking with crusty eyes. Self prognosis suggests bacterial conjunctivitis. Sun was out this morning but it is hiding a little. So shorts might not be the obvious attire. Quick coffee then a walk. Man having a discussion with the fishmonger in loud voice. So everyone can hear what is being discussed. Politics. Business of the day. Not real. Not real at all. Steven Smith off to do his driving theory test. Was out for a couple early for Jonesy's babies head wetting last night. Everyone in shades of grey, blue or brown. Not a bright contrast of colours except for Lloyd's Nike red and green. Not sure I can do much more of those contrived events. Nice to bump into Simon Handley, though and I am very happy for Mr and Mrs Jones; Westy is weary: he's a baffooning gibbon. I linger. Second coffee. Alerting me: perhaps! No rush today. Louis Armstrong playing his jazz in the coffee shop. Gravel voice. I don't really enjoy Ladyday. Tha...

I got off the bus once the traffic slowed to a stand still. We had only come as far as Bardsey and I felt I would be here on the A58 for hours yet. I had to be at work for 2pm at Coors in Headingley for my evening shift. I called ahead to explain that I was going to be late. It was a pleasant afternoon at the end of August so I jumped off the bus and I walked all the way to the Oakwood Clock so as to catch a 12, 13 or 13A into town. It was the first time I had ever walked most of the route to Leeds. This was before Snoopy came along in the early noughties. I knew I had a short time back at Coors before I wouldn't return; I would leave Coors tearful as half of me was going to miss those I worked with. This was either 2003 or 2004 and I had started counselling with a lady called Jean Booth. I used to go to her house in Oakwood every week. It was useful to talk to her. I was referred to her through occupational health whom Coors had onsite. I would get breathless, I had trouble walkin...

The stones of the Town Hall groan under the pressure of age. I took the bus. Nothing could stop me disappearing today? As I waited and waited the time questioned my decisions. Some subconscious feed provoking my torturous ego. There I was barely coping and overwhelmed with overt thoughts of my insignificance. All the plans within me coming unravelled as the things I need fight against that I have become. As I look up at the blank faced yawning gape of the bus driver as the routine X98 pulls up to alight the pensioners Wetherby welcomes I am straining to vanish. For a number of years I have been numb to what happens around me. It happens; I hear it, but it leaves me emptied of life’s essential beat. Rat-Tat-Tat. Have I become so distanced from the reality of these conversational needs that the booming voiced chorus delivers in waves of banality. I repeat that I am a ghost. I can't imagine when this happened as I was unaware of my own death. This Thursday I am sat hear...