Saturday 14 February 2015

Confessions of a Gobshite

I have just been accused of being 'indefatigable' by an obscure music journalist who was asked to reproduce a rather wordy email to be sent to a large group of people, because he is the only one with the mailing list and the 'Mailchimp' facility to send them all out.

When I saw him and thanked him for his efforts yesterday, he simply said, "You don't half go on, don't you?" and I had to justify my gobshite by reminding him that the words were the shortest I could use to describe something totally visual to a group of people who may have never seen video-mapping before, and from whom I was asking quite a lot of money as sponsorship and funding. In short, I could not make it any shorter. He was given the text on the strict instruction that he was not to alter a word of it, for fear of nobody understanding what the hell it was all about.

When he left, it occurred to me that he may have dictated my missive word for word, rather than simply copy and paste it, otherwise he might not have been so bitter about the small task we asked of him. I said as a finale that - in any event - I was renowned for my bollocks, and he would just have to put up with it, whether or not he understood it.

His reviews are virtually incomprehensible to anyone who has not already heard the music, and quite often people call up the venue to ask what the band is like that is booked to play that night, and the bar-staff resort to reading out his one-paragraph description of them verbatim. When they have finished, the caller will usually say, "Yes, but what are they like? What genre do they fall into?"

The other little bit of complicated friction developing between us is that we are both seeking funding for similar events which - by chance - are set to fall at the same time, using the same technicians. The difference is that his project is seeking funding from the near-dry and stretched Arts Council (too much opera) and ours from private and corporate sources. That's it.

He describes me as 'indefatigable' probably because I am the gobshite who runs a risk of dominating the forum that exists to discuss all these matters publicly, and I seem to have got myself involved in many areas this year, but I only dominated the forum for a short while because nobody - or hardly anyone - was using it. Stir it up and people will begin to contribute to it, and this is just what is starting to happen.

He doesn't even know the extent of the other politically fraught areas that I am involved with, because these are private, personal areas which will probably have a lasting effect on my future for the next few years, and he doesn't understand the ramifications of dealing with other people's hopes, fears, jealousies and resentments that may spring from them.

In the middle of the night I often wake up with a sense of fear and foreboding caused by all of this, but usually by the morning and following two cups of coffee, I get my energy back. It occurred to me that by juggling one scenario against the other, it is a way of driving out the demons, or - more accurately - it is getting one set of demons to fight the other so I can get a bit of sleep.

I used to have a strong physical work-ethic, but since my corporate form began to show signs of deterioration I have substituted it for a more amorphous, organisational one. Actually, theres nothing amorphous about it. Herding cats is all to do with putting things into sharp focus.

Talking of sharp focus, I have just borrowed a friend's 24 Megapixel SLR camera to do some of the donkey-work for one of the projects. All I have to do now is learn how to use it - along with learning how to use the Adobe Photoshop CS5 software which I have just installed so I can edit it.

I have a meeting with an electrician this afternoon to discuss the LED switch-over at our establishment, and this has to be done on one of the days that one manager is not working, because he is dead against LEDs for fear of destroying the ambience of the place. This man's self-confessed OCD condition means that he is dead against anything which may produce the perception that everyday objects around him are slipping away from his control, meaning the dreaded word, 'change'. Never mind if the switch-over will save us 70% on electric lighting bills.

He is just one of the pieces of jigsaw in this simple but huge picture which can only be described as 'political', even though most of them fall into the category of 'mental'.

Oh, and I have to make a Valentine's Card for Green-Eyes (step-granddaughter) as I have done since she was about 5. My favourite Valentine's Greeting ever:

Roses are red,
Violets are blue,
I've got a knife,
Get in the van.

There. That's off my chest. Have a good weekend.


25 comments:

  1. Well you aren't laconic that's for sure.

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    1. I have been a two-fingered typist since I was about 10, so I am pretty speedy now. I can type as fast as I can hand-write. It's a pity I can't think as fast.

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    2. I can type faster than I write and I think even faster. I cannot comment on your thinking speed, however it hasn't appeared slow when responding to my comments on some occasions.

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    3. It's the speed of understanding the ramifications of vocalisation I am talking about. It's one thing to think of something fast and another to stop yourself from saying it in time.

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  2. If you are being kept awake by your worries, might it not be a good idea to ditch them?

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    1. What a brilliant idea. I should just retire and go to live in the country. End of problems.

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    2. I don't know why I hadn't thought of that before.

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  3. Ah, Tom, you have to read my Italian truck driver coffee joke. It's reply 8 to a post titled AGCLOP dated yesterday.

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  4. Ever thought of taking a sleeping pill now and again and getting a really good night's sleep - or dropping all these projects, retiring and getting yourself and HI off into the deep countryside with a big garden and a couple of dogs?

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  5. I'm a bit of a gobshite too. I say what I'm thinking then think 'I hope I didn't say that out loud' A quick look round the room proves that I did.

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  6. First, Happy Valentine's Day.
    You know you love all the irons you are switching up and around in the fire; you probably even love your demons you are producing. Carry on with a bit more confidence (real or imaginary) and the demons will leave. No room for them, you see.
    Or else, retire to the country.

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    1. PS--I just missed my face in your panel. Did you delete me?

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    2. I don't remember ever having your face in my panel, but I have never deleted anyone except Rachel, and that was only for about 5 minutes until I calmed down.

      You are the third person to be unrealistic enough to actually believe I could retire to the country. What kind of damn lives do you all lead? Am I the only one who is scared of spending their old age in debtor's prison?

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    3. No, no, retiring to the country was offered as the insane alternative to doing what else you enjoy, which is stirring up the tempest with your ever flashing fire irons.
      I tell you, I have been removed. I was before Birgitta and after John.

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    4. Oh, I see. If you have been removed, it was not me who did it and I still get your posts. I don't seem to choose who is on that list, or in what order they appear. I will try to correct it anyway.

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