Tunes on Tuesday ~ The Blues Brothers
I wonder if ‘shake a tail feather’ is a good chat-up line?
The Blues Brothers first came into my orbit as a live street performance in Walt Disney World in Orlando. I wonder if that place is still open? Please try to follow along.
Even I am a better dancer than Dan Aykroyd, although that’s no claim to fame.
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jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
Santa Monica Pier
strange place to run out of gas
Airports, ‘Planes, and Automobiles
it doesn’t matter where you’re going
it’s who you have beside you
it always seems to be dawn or sunset
This morning I’m heading to Newcastle upon Tyne airport for the first leg of my journey to Cancun in Mexico. Given a fair wind I will arrive some time tomorrow morning ~ after layovers at London Heathrow and Miami International.
If I ever get very bored and depressed with life I may write down every airport I’ve ever been to ~ that isn’t going to happen anytime soon. This trip I’m staying at a fabulous 5* hotel, and I do not expect to be bored at all.
When you travel, always travel in style.
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jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
I don’t think my car to the airport will be anything like this
Random Jottings ~ Vacations
she had going to the wrong place,
with the wrong, man down to an art
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the trouble with real life vacations is there’s no background music
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women in bikinis pose, and sometimes that posing is an invitation
or so some men would like to believe
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‘I promise you I’ll make the sun shine every day…..’ he said
after that it rained a lot
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it’s unlucky to go back to work the day after you’ve been off
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never throw a message in a bottle into the sea
you could get arrested for littering
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it’s good to be bad on vacation
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jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
my favourite place to vacation
is anyplace by the ocean
Cancun Trip
if at first you don’t succeed, try something else
gently relaxing
You may be aware that here in England we’re suffering from 28 days of very strict coronavirus lockdown, which comes to an end on December 2nd. Except that’s not the end of it ~ when this period of miserable self-isolation ends we will be entering an indeterminate period of lockdown by tiers. Wouldn’t you know it, the whole of the North East of England is in the strictest tier 3, which is almost as bad as the bloody terrible state we are already suffering.
Of course the whole country is in an uproar, and I do not blame anyone for complaining in the bitterest terms. Prime Minister Boris Johnson won’t be able to get elected as a dog-catcher after this. And as for the sanctimonious twerp of a Health Secretary Matt Hancock ~ as his name says what a wanker.
Except, I’ve found an escape clause. There is nothing to stop me from going to an airport as long as I don’t stay overnight, and there’s nothing to stop me from boarding an aeroplane.
So, at 11:15 on Sunday December 6th I’m flying to Cancun, to stay in the utterly fantastic fabulously expensive, all inclusive, Royalton Suites Resort and Spa. How cool is that? Two weeks in the sun instead of two weeks of miserable lockdown in the cold, grey North of England.
Any volunteers to be a travelling companion can apply in the comments section.
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jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
it’s tough at the top
Coronavirus Tiers
in solitary confinement there is no tomorrow
Trump has got nothing on what the British Government is doing to its own people
Here in England the government has divided the English regions into 3 tiers of lockdown restrictions; supposedly to help control the spread of the coronavirus. Tier one has a medium level of restricted freedom, no worse than you’d get in the average police state. Tier two has a high level of control on the population, not much worse than East Germany had for years. Meanwhile tier three has a very high level of laws, regulations, and rules that take away the freedom of the people.
As I expected my town is firmly in tier 3, along with all the rest of the North of England, as far south as Leicester, Lincoln and Nottingham.
This means that none of us northerners can meet anyone socially, unless we already live with them. Anyhow all the bars, cafes, pubs, hotels, and restaurants have been shut down, by order. So have every single one of the other places you might want to go for a day / evening / night out. But you can go to a funeral, as long as the numbers attending are 30 people or less ~ does that include the deceased?
Oh, and we can only travel go to work or school, providing we don’t use public transport.
The good news is that from December 2nd I can take a long walk. Nice. But there will be bugger all else to do here up north.
Sanctimonious Southern Bastards is about the least rude thing I can say about the people who drew up these fucking stupid tiers, laws, regulations, and rules.
There might be one other piece of bittersweet news. If the airlines are flying from here it looks like I can get on a flight to Cancun ~ except I might not be allowed to stay away from home overnight. Who knows what the fuck is going on?
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jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
Prime Minister Boris Johnson
just another adulterer
Don’t Worry, Be Happy
happiness is what we find at the end of the road
Right now, this minute, I’m damn happy. I have walked away from the person who was making me miserable, and you can make no more positive step on the road to happiness than that.
Not the Bob Marley original, but a happy version nevertheless.
Don’t worry, be happy.
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jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
most folks are as happy as they make up their minds to be
Scenes on Sunday ~ Road Trip
keep cool ~ drive a Mustang convertible
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jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
California, a Mustang
and the girl riding shotgun
it doesn’t get any better than that
Baring My Soul
to let go of the past, we first have to accept it
just one of the cars, just one of the hotels
For more than five years I was in a dysfunctional relationship with a woman I believed I cared for very deeply. Just about everything you can imagine being wrong, was wrong with that friendship ~ if that was what it was. And I was too willfully blind to see it. Call it lying to myself, or ignoring the obvious facts, or just call it denial. The plain truth was that because of my own unrealistic expectations, I was on a down-bound train to some very personal hell, and my conscious mind did not want to know.
My subconscious mind, my inner child knew all right. I spent years being miserable, torturing myself, and looking for some easy escape from my pain. I started to write this blog…. No that is not true, she found me through this blog, in March 2014, (or maybe earlier). What happened was that the things I started to write here changed. My posts became darker, filled with pain and angst as I tried to find some relief from my feelings. I went back to drinking, and every time my feelings got the better of me I would get the better of a few bottles of booze. I even tried therapy ~ although I never told my therapist the truth of it.
The worst thing I did was to invest more and more of myself in that one-sided relationship. I visited California often, and took my friend on great road trips, including to Wyoming to see the total eclipse of the sun. We went to some very expensive new-age seminars in Sedona AZ and Albuquerque NM. We found some great restaurants in Orange County, and breakfasted on the Queen Mary in Long Beach. I would send flowers and gifts on every possible occasion. And. I couldn’t see that everything I did made it worse.
Perhaps because I was going crazy during the coronavirus lockdown, but a couple of weeks ago I admitted to myself and others that I was in deep, deep trouble. Then I finally admitted why, and found the sense to tell my Californian friend that we needed to say goodbye.
I know that she is still in my mind, and will be for a while. But I have an Angel at my shoulder, and as long as she is watching over me I will stay free of the chains that once bound me.
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jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
alone again, naturally
Going Crazy and Lonely
I don’t know what to do about feeling strange
take a sunshine vacation perhaps
I believe that lockdown is getting to me because I’m feeling strangely depressed, can’t sleep, don’t want to eat, and can’t talk with anyone. There is another reason I can’t talk with anyone, because my voice is just a squeak today. Ah well, all things being equal I’m going to Cancun Next week.
That’s if I am allowed to travel, and I hope I am because I’ve bought the flight tickets and booked the hotel. I hope that life can get back to normal soon.
I trust that everyone is feeling much better than I am today.
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jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
airports are even less fun than they used to be
Air Travel
flying anywhere is mostly sitting around and waiting
waiting at John Wayne, what a great name for an airport
Given that I have an hotel booked in Cancún it seems like a good idea that I arrange to get there. It’s a series of flights and layovers that make up to a long journey. Newcastle to London Heathrow, to Chicago O’Hare to Cancún International. Even British Airways and American Airlines can’t get me there the same day I leave here. Another hit on the credit card that gives me the most points. And the only number I need is the booking reference NO**QB
Sadly there is no way I can get there via John Wayne.
Now all I have to work out is how not to be spending a couple of weeks alone in a fabulous resort hotel.
I am open to suggestions.
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jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
a nice place to relax
