I POSTED A PICTURE

 Finally (I had to put that link in!) I got to put on a new dress today and posted a picture on flickr, but here it is so you can carry on reading (lucky you!) I've only dressed for photos seven times since returning from Ireland in mid-June. That said, my menswear is now so limited that I actually dress as my preferred gender almost everyday, but that doesn't include any padding or a wig - I'm a sort of  21st Century Schizoid Man 'woke' chimera, not a fire-breathing hybrid of scary things like in the video above! There's some mixed metaphors! Which leads neatly onto ...

Health-wise, it's a rubbish time for me, but I'm interacting with my GP to try and find out what is going on. It might be my thyroid; if not then tests suggest a lifestyle change will be necessary to avoid the real risk of diabetes. That's aside from my eyes, for which the GP has suggested I get back to my optometrist as medics don't have the equipment to look into my soul, or even its windows. But that's just boring ... other things are happening, unfortunately not ones that I can really speak about here, suffice to say that seven years after retiring I'm getting back in the saddle again, if only part-time.

Much more exciting 'though are the coming months. Later this month I'll be off to Ireland for a few days before welcoming Gia (aka Robert) to stay at the flat I have nearby for six weeks before we both head off to Ireland for Xmas/NYE. Then it'll be 2027 and who knows what that'll bring (Ireland for me certainly in April/May).

My garden has had to look after itself this year - I mowed when I got back from Ireland and then again last week - three months between cuts in the summer is unheard of and with just three days rain here (two of which were earlier this week) in the same period. The best thing around are my cyclamens that have been naturalising over the years. The original ones were three corms that had been growing at our first house - they must now be at least 50 years old), but they and more recent ones bought (15-20 years ago) have spread themselves at my feet and so I follow Yeats' entreaty and tread gently when I'm near them.

Earlier this week I had an outing to the fleshpots of Deal (well, it is a seaside town and we can't all live in Brighton). It was so much quieter mid-week and I even took some snaps of the beached boats - to me they are icons of our inshore fishing, here mainly for crab or herrings. I remember years ago reading complaints that they were so untidy with all the weeds growing around the haul gear ... God save us from tidy people with tiny minds. 

 

Music: to bookend 'Finally', I must have mentioned this before now. It dates from 1975, but  I've only known it for a couple of years, courtesy of BBC Radio 3. It requires a patient calmness, probably a few decades of age, possibly a twilit room, to listen to its 24.17 run time. An unknown 'down and out' near the Elephant and Castle, London, provides the words, Gavin Bryars provides the rest. While in 1975 Punk may have come in, later its youthful angst moved on, but this remains: Jesus' Blood Never Failed Me Yet.

This morning I checked this blog and realised that some people might not know of Gia. She's an old friend who's been on flickr for many years but recently has stopped dressing as the guy she is close to likes bearded men! We really got into communicating after she spent 3 weeks en femme in Venice, back in 2013 (I think it was). When I referred to 'close', her guy actually lives in northern Norway whereas Gia is from California. She used to be near Mt Shasta, but sold up recently and moved to her brother's away from those summer fires (the Calfire website was one I used to visit often when the forests were burning). Anyway, she is in Norway now and when her Shengen allowance is used up she's coming to the UK and we'll be visiting Pamela and M in Ireland at Christmas.

Also, as BBC R3 announced this morning ... it's Steve Reich's 90th. The name may not mean a lot to those who don't listen to modern minimalist music and I do tend to have a preference for Philip Glass, but for those who endured the agony and ecstasy of the Gavin Bryars link, here's something quite melodic from Reich: Duet for 2 solo violins and string orchestra.