September Rain

It’s September and it’s raining.  Honestly, that’s the only reason I’ve called this post that.  It looks like it’s a bit windy out there, too.  From where I’m sitting, I can see a sycamore tree out of the window and the upper branches are waving around a bit.

After being off school since March, The Boy goes into Year 6 tomorrow, so it’s going to be a little strange.  Not only that, but I’ll be walking him to school as part of my mental health therapy (the “getting my arse out of bed at a reasonable hour and getting some exercise outside” part).  The walk there will be accompanied by The Boy’s usual stream of consciousness rambling about gaming and YouTube videos about gaming he’s watched and the walk back will be accompanied by Moose on the Primordial Radio breakfast show.  Which is nice.

Not sure whether it’s just that I’ve not left my proverbial “comfort zone” in months, or that the therapy and the 40mg of fluoxetine (that’s the same drug that’s in Prozac, for those of you in the USA or who are brand-fiends!) I’m taking every day are working, but I’ve not really had a proper spiral in a while.  Certainly not really done much in the way of brooding.  Then again, I’ve never really been one for the whole “woe is me” stuff.  In my case, it tends to be much more bad moods, foul temper and angry ranting (which apparently are major signs of depression, but not ones that tends to fit into the normal narrative of the condition, so tend to be sidelined and glossed over, which could well be an indication as to why male mental health problems tend to be under-reported, since it fits in far too well with the “aggressive male” stereotype that permeates our society).  Still got the twitchy leg syndrome thing going on, no matter how much sleep I get.  Since “restlessness” and “unable to sit still” are both mentioned in the mental health survey I do every week before each therapy session, it’s obviously a sign that my depression and anxiety are a thing.  In fact, my right leg is currently rocking backwards and forwards as I type this, all curled up on the settee in the living room in front of my PC.

Which I built myself, by the way.  Still inordinately proud of that.  I built my own PC from scratch.  Ordered the components online or from a shop in an industrial estate on the edge of Bradford (CCL Computers, if anyone’s interested) and put it all together on the kitchen table.

And it works.  Even months later.

In mental health related news, since that’s really what this blog is about and since it’s kind of a therapy goal – to get back to doing things I used to enjoy before The Head Squirrels took up residence and trashed the place, I’m now planning the fourth edition of the newly returned Wyrd Ways Rock Show.  It’s going better than I expected.  I was aiming for a new show every other week, but it seems to have gone much more on a weekly schedule.  The upshot of that is that I have more space to play new bands.  So if you’re in a Hard Rock or Metal band of any type, get in touch via the Contact Form and send me some music along with some details about yourselves.  If I like that I hear, I’ll play some of it on the show.  If I get enough new stuff coming in over a long enough time, I’ll also resurrect Shock Of The New as a regular feature.

In order to help with my attempts to get a new career started (by getting certification in things like ITIL and CompTIA A+ and so on), I’m in touch with one of the teaching agencies I used to work with.  At the moment, I’m really only interested in short term stuff where I don’t have to do any planning or assessing.  Because of COVID restrictions, I seem to be on the list for something along those lines at Wakefield College.  I was also sent details of something in Stretford (or so I assume from the pay rate), but I really don’t fancy a 70-odd mile round trip to the other side of Manchester for that one.  Sounds like I just need to do the safeguarding quiz and get a copy of my last mortgage statement as proof of address to be up and running for stuff like that.

That’s tomorrow’s job, I think, once The Boy is at school and I can concentrate properly.

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