Second Start

I have decided to slightly repurpose this blog.  I still want to talk about Dangerous Ideas from the Wood, but I also want to talk about my music and things I have found in life.  For seven years I maintained a hyper-reflexive personal blog with a readership of around fifty, but the cost of providing such a direct insight into my mind has begun to outweigh the benefits.  So I'm going to continue blogging here, but it'll be different because this is very public and has an overt agenda of promoting my writing (and music).

Last night I went to see Buffy Sainte Marie play in Wolverhampton.  You could say that some of her music is a bit AOR cheesy, especially if you made the judgement based on her most famous songs (Love Lift us up Where We Belong, Soldier Blue etc.) but if you can look past that layer of production and pop music naivety it's really good stuff.  Her songs about uranium and native american rights are great.  She played for ninety minutes and did nothing but valuable songs.  A very good gig.  We were easily the youngest people there.

Universal Soldier


He's five foot tall and he's six foot four, 
and he fights with missiles and with spears.
He's all of 31 and he's only 17,
He's been a soldier for a thousand years.


He's a catholic, a hindu, and atheist and a jain,
A buddhist and a baptist and a jew,
And he knows he shouldn't kill,
And he knows he always will kill,
You for me my friend, and me for you.


And he's fighting for Canada he's fighting for France,
He's fighting for the USA.
He's fighting for the Russians and he's fighting for Japan,
And he thinks he'll put an end to war this way.


He's fighting for democracy and he's fighting for the reds,
He says it's for the peace of all.
He's the one who must decide who's to live and who's to die,
And he never sees the writing on the wall.


But without him how would Hitler have condemned him at Dachau?
Without him Caesar would have stood alone.
He's the one who gives his body as a weapon to the war,
And without him all this killing can't go on.


He's the universal soldier and he really is to blame,
But his orders come from far away no more.
They come from him and you and me and brothers can't you see,
This is not the way we put an end to war.

That was the first time in my life I have seen a standing ovation.

Our train out wasn't until 5:24am so went and tried to find somewhere to sleep.  We tried for a large park near the town centre but there was CCTV everywhere and the police did a slow drive by as we were sizing up the fence.  So we abandoned that and decided to sit it out at the station.  On the way back we saw a deep bank of dogwoods on the central reservation of the inner ring road and we were in there like a flash.  So long as we didn't stand up we were completely hidden.  We pitched the tent and slept for four hours before packing down and catching our train.  There was a fresh snowfall while we slept.

At Birmingham New Street I said goodbye to my girlfriend.  She was headed for Japan and won't be back for six weeks.

Six weeks is long enough to finish this novel, so long as I don't get distracted.  I'm on my fourth macro-structure.  At first it was a collection of short stories.  Second, it was going to be a set of short stories crushed together with time multiplexing.  The third idea was so complex it collapsed under it's own weight.  Now I am working on using the story A Perfect Life (the original DIftW) as a framing device.  Through the woman's perfect life we encounter all these other stories.  I've got the first 10k words arranged, with 30k/40k more in the bag waiting for homes.  My target is 80k, or however long it needs to be.  Let's see where I get to.