Songs on Saturday II ~ London Beat
senza una donna, e quanto è lontana, e sono senza unna donna
A very cool, tough, strong, grounded, together, harder, tougher, sensitive, wiser, self-confident, and self-aware guy doesn’t need a woman to make him happy. Not much.
Not so long ago a woman almost broke me, physically, mentally, emotionally spiritually. Luckily I’m over her now. But not much
Please listen responsibly.
~
jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
she hurt him with her lovely eyes
Medical Tests
medicine is a pseudoscience of uncertainty and probability
Today I will be out.
I’m going to Newcastle upon Tyne for a series of medical-type tests;
- A long, long Q & A session.
- Lots of measurements including body fat, BP, and pulse rate.
- Electrocardiogram (ECG)
- Full-body MRI scan.
- Brain MRI scan, (wish me good luck with that one).
- Heart and body MRI scan.
- Neck artery ultrasound scan.
- Dual-Energy x-ray Absorptiometry scan.
- Full blood work up.
- Urine tests.
- Treadmill heart monitoring
All in all I’m told it should take about 5 hours.
All followed up by 14 days of heart monitoring using a patch.
Ergo, if I’m not around later you know where I am.
~
jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
most men like most nurses,
most of the time
Songs on Saturday ~ Fleetwood Mac
even seven would not be too many…..
Seven wonders….. why is it that most legendary, mystical, and magical things all come in sevens. Except the three witches of course ~ maiden, mother, crone.
I remember this from the days of my youth, when Stevie Nicks was second only to Debbie Harry in young boy’s dreams. And just who is Sara?
Please listen responsibly.
~
jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
not all witches are unattractive
the cat is called Pyewacket ~ a minor demon
she walked on eggshells
you don’t lie to the person that you love
~
skilled liar
she was carnal
and I truly adored her
I never knew the real woman
she walked on eggshells around me
why do I adore a false chimera, an avatar?
~
jack collier
jackcollier@talktalk.net
and she never tells the truth
Keto Diet Myths
Jack Spratt could eat no fat
his wife could eat no lean
apple, butter, and sage pork chops
Some confuse the Keto diet with the Paleo diet, and while there are some similarities, in reality they are radically different, and you will be on one or the other for completely different reasons. The Paleo diet is all about a healthy way of eating that should normalise your weight. Other benefits of the Paleo diet are improved heart and circulatory health, less inflammation, and it also helps people with type 2 diabetes, and / or staves off diabetes.
The Ketogenic Diet is something else all together. It’s also a low / zero carb way of eating, (less than 50 grams of carbs per day), but the key thing is that it’s a very, very high fat diet. Among the principal benefits claimed for the Keto Diet are that it helps with diabetes, polycystic ovaries, and it also staves of cancers, Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, drug-resistant epilepsy and acne. But mainly, the Keto diet is about weight loss.
I have read that one should not begin a proper Ketogenic Diet unless you have proper medical supervision, because the whole point of the keto diet is to completely change the metabolism of your body, especially the way the liver works. Instead of turning carbohydrates into glucose, your liver must turn fat into ketones. Thereby your body will become incredibly efficient at burning fat. You will see a massive reduction in blood sugar and insulin levels. Once you start this diet it will take your body 3 to 5 days to reach the point where it switches from using sugar to using ketones.
One danger of the keto diet is ketoacidocis, where excessive ketone bodies accumulate and you will get a dangerously toxic level of acid in your blood.
On the keto diet you don’t eat carbohydrates, (less than 50g a day, say a bagel), and only 10% to 20% of your daily food intake should be protein. The rest of what you consume is fat.
Eat; high fat meat like bacon and a good steak, cocoa butter, lard, goose fat, olive oil, palm oil, coconut oil, almond oil, avocado, coconut meat, fat-rich nuts and seeds, green low-carb vegetables, butter, hard cheeses, wild caught oily fish, liver, eggs, dark chocolate, hard liquor without a sweetened mixer…..
Do not eat; any grains or anything made from flour, like bread, refined sugars, mayonnaise and the like, starchy root vegetables like potatoes and sweet potatoes, corn, squash, fruits, fruit juices, peas, beans, peanuts, anything marked ‘low fat’, beer, wine, flavoured and sweet booze….
The keto diet can be dangerous causing; low blood pressure, kidney stones, constipation, nutrient deficiencies, Beri Beri, heart and circulatory disease, dizziness, low energy, mood swings, upset stomach. The keto diet is very antisocial. The keto diet is utterly unsafe for anyone who has problems with their pancreas, liver, thyroid, or gallbladder.
Some say the keto diet is a great way to lose weight fast. And that it helped with their diabetes. All I know is I wouldn’t try this without consulting my doctor and a dietitian.
~
jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
you can drink this with a little spring water
Food on Friday ~ Muffins
I’ve been told some people are obsessed with bran muffins
Now I’m not certain what’s going on, but several of the cooks whose blogs I follow have posts about muffins this week. I looked it up, thinking it was National Muffin Week or something, but no, it’s seems it’s just one of those spooky coincidences that keeps happening for me right now.
National Muffin Day in the USA is actually February 20th.
Two interesting things; #1 here in England we do not eat a lot of English muffins. #2 I didn’t know there was a second meaning for the word muffin, or stud muffin at any rate.
However, be all that as it may, here are some cool muffin recipes, which I may have to reprise on February 20th, or not.
First up this week we have Heather Christo’s delicious looking almond poppyseed muffins, and being from Heather they are allergen free, vegan, and gluten free. All I know is they look very yummy.
Almond Poppyseed Muffins
Andrea at Cooking with a Wallflower has a recipe for ube mochi muffins. I have to admit the only bit of that I understand is muffins, but these little cakes look fantastic and I would be interested to try them.
Ube Mochi Muffins
And I thought I should include a recipe for ‘space muffins’ for those of you who would like to ingest their marijuana. Personally, I cannot see the attraction, but then I have enough of a problem with booze.
Cannabis Muffins
Now for something else completely different we have these pizza muffins from In Dianes Kitchen. Now that is a good idea for a pre-prepared snack or for something to take to work for lunch.
Pizza Muffins
Erin Clarke, at Well Plated by Erin has a cool collection of healthy muffin recipes. I very much like the look of her unique muffin recipes, especially the gingerbread apple muffins. How interesting.
Gingerbread Apple Muffins
Our last collection this week is from delish magazine; 52 muffins to make your morning a little more enjoyable. From this great collection I’ve chosen to feature the chocolate lover’s chocolate chocolate-chip muffins by our friend Averie Sunshine.
Chocolate Lover’s Chocolate Chocolate-Chip Muffins
~
jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
Distant Love
it hurts not having her close
it would hurt worse not having her at all
~
and I loved her
she wasn’t here
yet I adored her
even from afar
and I desired her
wide oceans apart
distant yearning
to possess her
I still love her
enchanted amour
~
jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
dancing to tunes of love and hope
Truth and Openness
there is a magic in truth, and honesty, and openness
eclipsing the truth
Everything I write on this blog, at least everything I have written recently is the brutal truth. I don’t hold anything back, to the best of my ability I tell you exactly what is in my heart. The post I wrote yesterday, Why I’m Still Alive, is a case in point. I could have dressed that story up, made myself look a little better, perhaps garnered more sympathy from you. But, why would I do that? If I am going to write anything at all about myself it has to be true, and not just part of the truth, but the entire truth. There are some caveats; I am not an Ernest Hemingway nor a Philip Roth, and the format I’m writing in is a blog, and a blog post needs to be fairly short and pithy. But over and above all that, this is me, and everything I write is coloured and edited by that simple fact.
Also, but only to a certain extent, I choose what to write about. Some of my posts I just know I have to write, and they flow onto the screen without any conscious thought, those posts arise fully formed from my deepest subconscious mind. Ergo, they have to be true, because I’m not even certain that the subconscious knows how to lie.
Why write this painful stuff at all?
Because it’s therapeutic, because I like to know what you think about me and the things I have revealed to you, because if I didn’t write this stuff it would go around and around in my mind like a rat on a wheel. It’s cathartic to write the brutal truth. If I lied, or told less than the truth, then you would know, and most likely you would respect me less. However, how easy it is for people to believe the lie.
How easy it is to make people believe a lie, and how hard it is to undo that work again. ~ Mark Twain
Most liars can’t remember all the lies they’ve told, and if they’re lying by omission what they have said and what they haven’t said. It’s easy to for me to remember the truth, but if I ever lied I’d have to keep referring back to old posts.
A liar should have a good memory. And a liar’s worst enemy is someone else with a good memory. ~ Quintilian
Some say that everybody lies all the time. And that a little white lie never hurt anyone. All I know is that all lies are toxic and destructive, especially lies of omission. Trust me, I will always tell you the absolute truth.
~
jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
thou shalt not bear false witness
Bitterness and Resentments
let today be the day I stop being haunted by the ghosts of the past
black lonely desolate
There are some thoughts, emotions, beliefs, and people that I no longer want to be part of my life ~ especially not this different life I am living today, the different and better life I have known since The Full Wolf Moon. I look in the mirror and the eyes that look back at me are far to hard and brittle, too guarded, too untrusting for the man I wish to become. Some of that is the product of my whole life, and some of it comes from what was a dysfunctional relationship, where I felt that I was giving far more than I received in return.
Truth be told, relationships are not supposed to be like that, if it’s going to work well a relationship between a man and a woman should have balance and harmony, what we are pleased to call ‘give and take’. And, truth be told my bitterness and resentments are my own, they don’t belong to anyone else, and nobody else could have created them in me. Like each and every single thing that happens to us, my negative feelings are things that I did to myself. Nothing happens to us unless we allow it, up to and including being the victim of a natural disaster. Nobody forced you to live in an earthquake zone, or where there are wildfires, and nobody forced the passengers to get on the Titanic.
Specifically my bitterness and resentments were created by some relationships I chose to enter into, and then I stayed in those relationships long past the time I should have just walked away without looking back. Some people are toxic, and while people may change, the memory of that toxicity will live on…..
I do not want any of that in my life, so how do I change it? And I have no fucking idea about how to turn that around, to lose the bitterness and resentments, to lose the memories of toxic and dysfunctional relationships, to begin to innocently trust again. I’m trying to find a way, and there’s nothing there.
All I can do is tell my conscious mind that I want a lighter and more innocent set of thoughts, emotions, and beliefs. I want to only ever remember the good things about relationships past and present, I want to regain my sense of trust, my feeling of fun, my joy in the people I know. I want to be in a place where I truly accept, understand, nurture, and cherish those I profess to care for. I want my unconscious mind to pay attention and change my own hard-wired feelings and beliefs for something far better.
Some say, once bitten twice shy. And fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me. All I know is that I would rather be an innocent fool than a guy with very hard eyes.
~
jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
a new dawn
a new hope
Why I’m Still Alive
when all that’s left are the empty promises
the sun was going down on my life
Christmas had come and gone. I couldn’t remember the New Years’s at all, time had slipped from 2019 to 2020 completely unnoticed by me. It was January 7th 2020 and I had been smashed and broken to another low rock bottom. My life was a slow-motion freight train wreck at the end of the line in a place called Hell. My mind was numb and empty, my soul was tortured by demons of my own making, my body was suffering from a lack of food and too much booze. Part of me wanted to die, part of me hoped I would die, and a small part of me entertained dark thoughts of painless suicide. Walking into the cold North Sea would kill me, but that would mean I had to get out of bed, leave the garret, and walk the hundred or so yards to the beach. That was never going to happen.
But something happened. Call it sheer bloody mindedness, call it being protected by a guardian angel, call it the universal unconscious helping me, but I did something positive. It took a while.
First I got myself out of bed, went to the kitchen counter and poured a half-full bottle of vodka down the drain. Thought about coffee, but I knew I’d throw up. Drank some water, threw up.
Bathroom and alcoholic constipation hurts. Stood under the shower in my filthy clothes and stripped naked there, soaped up some. No chance of my risking a wet shave.
Got dry and left the wet towels in the middle of the garret, on the floor, discarded at random.
Combed my hair, got dressed in clean clothes, even clean socks. Looked at the clock, it was just on half-past-six, and I didn’t know if it was morning or evening, nor did I know what day it was.
Collapsed into my armchair, exhausted and shaking. Sat there for a long time staring at the wall, my mind empty, my soul in pain. I could see scuttling things out of the corner of my eye I knew weren’t real, weren’t there at all. Electric shave.
After a long long while I made myself a coffee, felt like throwing up but didn’t. I knew that somewhere out there someone or something was sending me all good wishes.
My thoughts and feelings were being led by demons down a dark road that only led to bad things, so I picked up my tablet as a distraction. Tried to play solitaire, not enough concentration. Instead I read some posts by the very special people I follow. I read a post by Rhapsody Boheme about The Wolf Moon, and the special things that could happen then ~ transformation, renewal, rebirth….. And here, The Wolf Moon was at 19:21 hrs on January 10th, 2020. I resolved to stay sober until then. Before then I would clean the garret, only demons will enter a place that looks like a pig-sty.
At around 19:15 on January 10th I darkened the garret, lit some scented candles, and put some soothing music on the record player.
19:21 on Friday January 20th, 2020 a sense of peace I had not known ever before in my tortured existence, the music playing was The Memory Of Trees by Enya; the simple vocal refrain on that instrumental track is Be Yourself. It was a profound message, and I knew exactly what it meant.
My life hasn’t been the same since. My life is different and better, and improving day by day, hour by hour, and something or someone is still guiding me. If you are suffering as I was, I know that you can have that too. Nobody with even an ounce of goodness in their soul is abandoned forever.
~
jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
infinity came for me and lifted me up
