Advent has begun

With the arrival of the 1st of December we open the first door of the Advent Calendar and taste the first seasonal chocolate..... fight it people..... it's a TRAP!! ... it's that 'do you take the red pill or the blue pill' question. Once that chocolate is in your mouth there is no turning back, you are well and truly locked into the festive season..... do not eat the chocolate and you can carry on in blissful ignorance... in total denial.... la la la la

MY SCORE SO FAR
Christmas chocolates eaten............ nil
Christmas cards sent...................... nil
Christmas presents bought............. nil
Christmas trees up.......................... nil
Christmas decorations up............... nil
Christmas movies watched ........... one.... Bastards!!!

That's  me, I refuse to accept that Christmas has arrived until I am pushed out of the door and told not to come back without her present. It's not that I don't like Christmas, I love it, I love the songs, I love the smells, I love the sights, I love the atmosphere surrounding everything... I even love having the in-laws round for lunch BUT I like my Christmas to last from around 21st-22nd Dec until 27th-28th Dec..... and that's enough, you can get too much of  good thing, I do not want Christmas in my face in August, then slowly and steadily being drip Fed brain-washing adverts telling me what to buy, what to eat, what to drink, what to wear and what music to play to make it a perfect Christmas, anything less and you've failed to provide your family with perfection and you should be seriously punished and have your children removed from your care immediately.

You should be pitied, ridiculed and labelled as a bad consumer and a bad parent because Christmas isn't Christmas unless it's a corporately inspired Christmas. Yes, that is what they want you to believe, that is why more people suffer from depression at this time of year, why burglaries and muggings go up.. my neighbours are already curtain twitching because they know that sometime in the next three weeks a get-away car will be parked in our road while the petrol station around the corner gets knocked off by an armed gang, yep the neighbours are having their seasonal 'be the fist to report it' competition, if I spot the gang I'd probably tweet about it before calling the cops.
Soon the cards will be dropping through the letter box, spewing Christmas cheer and goodwill to all men all over the hall carpet... Well bugger off it's too early, I still have the absolute hell of the shopping  nightmare to go through before I can even consider dishing out an iota of goodwill to all of those faces, twisted in anger, fear and  anguish racing around the shopping centre's buying bundles of tinsel, baubles and all manner of seasonal tat, bags full of 'Stuff' that no one wants... they have reams of wrapping paper with bows and ribbons.... most of which will still be in some cupboard 5 years from now.... and food shopping in the supermarkets..... I get shivers just thinking about it.... tv brainwashing at it's best, panic buying over the ingredients seen on one of the hundreds of Christmas recipes shown on every channel on the three month lead up to Christmas.... the followers and disciples of the advertising prophets, practising their faith in the many Temples of the Consumerist Religious Order.

STOP IT... THAT'S NOT WHAT IT'S ABOUT...

Don't worry, I'm not a religious man, I know Christmas is a Christian festival and it's all about the son of God coming to earth to save mankind from himself.... Well if it was true, it didn't work did it, science has again and again disproved the so called holy scriptures but still the faithful trot along to church and put their hard earned money in the collection tins for some of the richest organisations in the world and give thanks for.... for what, for if God was real all you could thank him for is abandoning mankind to his own greed, for allowing hundreds of millions over the centuries to die in wars started in his name.. for wars were always about religion... 'were'... now they're all about who controls the oil. As for the Islamic extremists, I can not keep my abhorrence........

STOP IT... THAT'S NOT WHAT IT'S ABOUT NEITHER

What Christmas is about to me is 'family', giving thanks... to each other, for each other... family is more than blood, everyone you want in your life (and some you don't) are your family... Christmas, to me is time away from the chores of survival to sit and think about, meet with, call up and be with your life's family... past and present... near and far... friend or foe... they are all in your life to teach you something and watch your back so be thankful. So now that you know what it's all about....for me, that is..... find your own friggin excuse....

 

Now where's that advent calendar.... I need Chocolate!!

Thomas Elliott Campbell (My Dad)

I promised this post a while ago but have found it a difficult one to finish and I think it will be one that I'm constantly editing...... but here goes.

Sadly I lost My Dad in January of this year Dad was not a famous man out in the big wide world. He did not break any world records or win the Nobel Peace Prize, in fact he was a very humble man but in the small mining community where I grew up, if you asked anyone if they knew Tot Campbell they would have a story to tell of his exploits. Like many others of his generation he was an honest, proud working class man. A man of integrity with strong personal ethics, beliefs and principles. A man who was prepared to stand up and defend those beliefs and principles at all cost . A man who has bequeathed those strong ethics and princples to all of his children and I am proud to have them as part of my biological makeup.

Dad was born in November 1932 and used to enthrall me with tales of his childhood during the second world war. Dad was very good at football and in 1946 played on the most successful Camden Square School football team in the history of the school. In 2011 the team of '46 hit the local press again by organising a team reunion and they were all there, including the coach who had just celebrated his 100th birthday.

Also in 1946, at the age of just 14 dad left school and went to work down the local pit. Where he worked until he was forced into early retirement following the pit closure in 1991, which was all part of the Tories great plan to kill the unions and begin the reversal of workers rights. It was a career that almost cost him his life when he was seriously injured and buried alive for several hours when the roof of the coal seam he was working on caved in. We were the first in our street to own a colour TV which Dad bought with the compensation from the accident. He was a devout Labour supporter and if you cut him in half you would have found the letters NUM running through his core. He always gave back to the mining community which he loved so much and was so proud to be a part of, he sat on several committees throughout his life in an effort to help and enrich the lives of the people within that community.

 

Dad enjoyed the simple pleasures in life, the fellowship and banter of good friends, sunny afternoons on his allotment, family days out with a picnic but most of all he loved his life with Mum, he met Mum when he was just 16 years old, Mum was 14 and they remained a devoted couple for the next 64 years until she was cruelly taken from him just months before their 60th wedding anniversary. A wound that never really healed.

So farewell Dad, I take comfort in the knowledge that you are finally back in the arms of your soul mate and..... 

 I am proud to have been called your Son.

Choices

This week, I and all of my colleagues received a rather hastily drafted letter from work announcing that the local travel authority, Merseytravel would be beginning the long process of procurring brand new rolling stock for the Merseyrail Network. The reason for the letter being hastily written is because Merseytravel released a press announcement the following day. The press announcement was a lot more informative than the letter when it came to the subject of job losses and basically translated to.... The position of Guard will no longer be required. Shock... Horror... Outrage... Fear.... I heard it all at work as it slowly sank in that we, the 98 guards at Birkenhead Central traincrew depot as well as the guards in our Kirkdale and Southport depots would all be out of a job in the near future. There was a lot of talk at work about what the future will bring and how the Company will attempt to absorb and redistribute around 200 displaced staff into different roles within the company.... they won't... even I can do those maths.
So what are my options? well I always intended to take early retirement at the age of 60 so that I can enjoy life while I am still fit enough to get around, climb mountains, ride a bike and even laugh without pissing myself. So realistically the timing could be perfect for me as I hit 60 in around 7 years which is a similar timescale to the demise of the current 507/508 units and hence the final guard's position. So providing the Company are willing to offer some sort of redundancy package for people willing to leave early, I could actually walk out of the door at the same time that I planned but I could walk out carrying a swollen financial package instead of walking out with my hands in my pockets........Then What? .....
I could look for another full time position of enslavement and start all over again as the grey haired new kid on the block but then what is the use of taking early retirement.

or I could work part time perhaps as few as a couple of days a week .. but I feel thats like walking a dog on an extendable roamer lead, allowing the dog to run so far and feel like its on the verge of freedom before being yanked back to reality with a neck breaking jerk.

or I could leave this land becoming one of the many thousands of UK citizens 'swarming' foreign borders to gain a better return for their pound like the economic migrants so hated for heading to England for a better life.
This is my favourite choice to date. I could load up the adventure bus, point it towards the sun and head off in search of like minded adventurers gathering for the final chapter of their lives in a far flung corner of the globe in a real life 'most exotic Marigold hotel'.


Whatever I choose for the end.... it is still a new beginning.... and a whole new adventure

it's been a while

It's been a while, well it's been more than a while.. I started this blog two years ago as a self-couselling tool to sort out my head and empty it of negative thoughts following the life changing kangaroo court I had to endure at work which resulted in myself being branded a heinous cyber bully and social pariah àmongst my peers. This judicial farce was quickly followed by the deaths of several family members in rapid succession, the most devastating being my beloved Mum whom I still miss very much to this day. The blog did what it was created to do, it kept my sanity intact although it was very touch and go at times, bearly hanging by a thread. Grief fuelled depression, paranoia and self loathing had become the three constantly chattering voices in my head filling my thoughts with darkness and despair whilst my smile toward the outside world never wavered.
That was 2013 and I am pleased to say that I sailed gently through 2014 with a genuine smile on my face and the odd full blown belly laugh (something I missed greatly), more so out of work as there was still a slight paranoia about who I could and couldn't trust at work.
However now is 2015 and so far I've been struggling having lost my father in January (I will write a separate post dedicated to my dad) we then lost my wife's dad in April who was more than a father inlaw to me, he was an old workmate too. My sister is having some sort of mini breakdown I think and is refusing to return any sort of correspondence or contact with the family. 

My blog however saved me from that journey into the darkness, allowing me to write down all of my most raw and intimate feelings in short story form or just an openly desperate and angry rant. This eventually cleansed me through to my soul. The darkest and most personal of my scribblings were held in draft form and later deleted, never being posted but that was all part of the healing process. I would read them over and over again picking fault with my thought process and applying logic to the insanity just as a counsellor or psychiatrist would do in reality. It worked and the voices in my head eventually began to recede. I kept on scribbling about anything and everything, for every post I published there would be two resigned to the waste basket. The writing stopped at the same time as the voices disappeared completely, there was no further reason to write.

So in summary, I think 2015 may become another blogger counselling session.

I recommend everyone to try it.... especially all of you insane buggers out there