READ MY WORK

Ideas Above Our Station
new collection of shorts, one of which was written by me,
http://www.route-online.com/routev7/page.asp?idno=292

Nine Stop Trip
even newer collection of shorts, all of which were written by me,
http://chipmunkapublishing.co.uk/shop/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=65

Man is a sponge.

Profound no?

What I mean by that is that we're are constantly awash with things that influence every aspect of us, our moods, views, health etc.

Recently I've felt like a puppet with a few dozen different bastards all pulling my strings at once, as if just about everyone has some kind of control over how I feel, what I think and how knackered I am, except me.

Food and sleep, of the lack thereof, the breakdown of emotional relationships, both mine and that of my parents, all these things have dragged me down and down.

Now it simply is the case that this is how our lives work, we are subject to influence whether we like it or not. You can't very well stop interacting with everything completely, (well obviously you can but the Samaritans have talked me out of that three times over the last couple of weeks.)

Instead you can only chose to limit the negative influences as much as possible, (by ignoring your ex with whom you have to live for another six weeks!) and maximise your exposure to the positive.

Over the last few weeks I have found that by far the greatest positive influence, even more so than, dare I say, my beloved cannabis, has been that of friends.

Other people can grind you down into nothing but equally they lift you right back up again too.

I have a rock of a buddy here in Leeds with me, a stand up guy who I take for granted and rarely mention on here but he's the man none the less

There are also, of course, all my most excellent friends from the blogging community. I love you all and thank you for all the support and kind words you've thrown my way recently via comments and emails. You're all brilliant

I've also been lucky enough to find myself back in contact with a couple of other friends from my past recently, the rekindling of who's relationships could not have come at a better time for me.

There's my good buddy in Cali who emailed me out of the blue to great effect, easy now my mentalist friend, and then there's an old work colleague of mine who just happens to be the coolest person I've ever met.

This second is in New Zealand at the mo but thanks to the miracle of modern technology we've been sharing scars and work, (she's an artist as you'll see below.) There's nothing quite like someone who really gets you y'know?

Now my ex wasn't big on me having close female friends, (though there were no guns involved so I can't absolve myself of responsibility,) and subsequently I never spent as much time or had as much contact with this mate of mine as I would have liked.

As it turns out of course my ex had several all too close personal male friends of her own, hence the split leaving me free to do as I please.

ANYWAY...

In the interests of celebrating my friends who mean so much to me and have been such a great help to me recently I wanted to share with you all some of my mate's work which I just can't get enough of, so here's a shot of a work in progress plus a few close ups on some of the detail:

Amazing aint it? Comment and opinions please and any prospective buyers, agents, media types etc please contact me through my email, (find on my profile,) to be put in touch with the artist herself.

Secondly I need a favour from all you lovely blog reading people.

My buddy has also been sending my photos of her time in NZ including this one:

Now she tells me this is a beautiful and elegant looking statue with a great Moari legend behind it. While I dig the story and the meaning I have to say that I find this photo to be one the creepiest things I have every seen in my life!!!

I'm not entirely sure why, but it just scares the shit out of me. My good buddy insists it's beautiful though and so this is where you guys come in.

Comments please, CAST YOUR VOTE!

is this statue:

a) HAUNTINGLY BEAUTIFUL (running total: 2)

or

b) JUST FUCKING HAUNTING! (running total: 1)

Answers below please and if there's enough of a response I'll tally up the votes and announce the results in a few days.

(C'mon, look how spindly it is! It's as creepy as fuck and you all know it! I know that's cheating but it's my blog so tough )