Little things

This is an example of what passes for excitement in Kingsbury. Watching the new people next door finally landscape their front garden is pretty up there but the main event last week was a detective job based on a hobby I've had almost all my life. Passing along the North Circular I saw a foreign car for the 2nd time with a custom plate DERRICK. Having the book of international plates I was unable to find any of 7 characters but drove at 50 plus to see the car had a little number 1 on the right which was totally unfamiliar to me. So I read the book and soon picked out Sweden have a number at the right for the month of issue (I forget what they do for December as it goes from 0 to 9) and that was unique. I then emailed another member (yes, there's a plate collector's club) and he confirmed Sweden now can use 7 characters. Had I not driven like a maniac in the cause of my interest that would have remained a mystery for some time.
Like when I saw ROBERT and assumed it was from somewhere else, then saw it parked miles away from where I first saw it and saw it was Polish. The only Nissan Cube in the country I saw parked in Richmond (C2 UBE) and then it was parked in Finchley regularly. I have, in a city of 7 million people, seen the same car a few times on so many occasions it's truly amazing. One had a plate ZOO 32. Believe it or not, this corresponds with a Dutch import plate, though it was made to look British. But only valid a week. So a year or two later I saw the offending blue Honda Civic again with the same plate. The actual reason is mainly since we had the London congestion charge many people made fake plates to avoid the charge. They are totally untraceable and the police aren't the slightest bit bothered or aware they are even fakes. I know as I told them and gave an address. A neighbour has a friend from Thailand who visits every year and he's had the same fake plate for 3 years he drives across the world and has not only driven it here with no question but crossed borders from Denmark, Germany and Thailand to Britain. The plate is actually closest to Swedish but not exactly like any in the world. Amazingly if the police stopped any of these cars they'd be walloped with a huge fine but they have all got away with it as I see them around year after year.

Being Saturday I can now say last week was 100% predictable. Not an event out of place good bad or indifferent. I haven't finished one project since others choose to delay replying to vital questions, and every other job is out of my hands on the pleasure side. With the fixed structure I live within (like Wormwood Scrubs) there is little room for variation. When I went out all over I still came back empty handed. It didn't change a thing, besides add the odd event to my list. In 2006 my record was probably the local PC world...

I'm past caring, it was a lesson that it really doesn't matter in the details. What would you be more impressed by, a night out or a night spent writing an article? My reasoning is every Joe can have a night out but few can write an article or paint something worth exhibiting. I have no children. I could have, three or four, but the women were not for me. Once or twice it may have happened anyway and all that would happen would be I'd have a financial drain all my life and probably hardly see them, and be connected to a woman I never even liked. So let the proletariat breed like rabbits, if I have children it'll be when someone I want to be with for life marries me and not before. However nice it would be it's not an achievement or status symbol, but people with kids often shun their single friends and parade their kids outside the school gates as if they made them cell by cell in a workshop after years of study. Well every living organism can reproduce, it's not an achievement!

Other than that, I'm forced to learn philosophy as when you have 2 hours with nothing but a TVshowing crap and a computer to keep you occupied you mind wanders to why and how you are stuck in this abysmal position. Then you learn general principles and even though not one makes you happy at least you end up removing the guilt associated with failure. If you fail an exam you cocked up. But if you fail at life life cocked up. Business is very controllable. You have skills, sell them to whoever will take them, buy a house and pay the bills. Very organised. But pleasure? It comes and goes as it pleases. Why on earth do people meditate or take drugs? To try and control it. I meditate, but even that isn't a reliable route or everyone would do it. Sex is the most reliable, but that depends on other people, in my case women, so in fact is the least reliable remedy of all.

What on earth is the use of all this information besides to help others, as I use it for? OK, that's a good reason but I am in the eye of the storm. I blow away others' problems but mine remain untouched by the wind of change. A poet without even trying...