I struggled to finish the first episode of Chief of War starring Jason Momoa, last night. It was ultra violent in places to the point of showing us visceral disembowelment and people having the skulls smashed in. You know what, there’s historical accuracy, then there’s historical accuracy.
This is not a show I will be finishing.
Watched: The Diplomat S3 (⭐️⭐️) 📺
I had such high expectations for season 3 of The Diplomat given how season 2 ended (on a cliffhanger). But, have to say, all the usual snark and drama has been overshadowed by way too much sex. This season has turned into a very bad British sex-farce worthy of a Benny Hill episode. I mean, I understand that having sexual tension between certain characters is a must these days, and can really change up a show.
But, dear me, when it devolves into us seeing naked butts thrusting skyward for five minutes solid, you can get distracted quickly from the message that the world is, once again, on the point of annihilating itself. Several sex scenes in one episode become tedious quickly.
So much so that, by the end of the last episode I was, quite frankly, bored and couldn’t care less.
I’ve had an amazing number and array of jobs over the years, starting with what I guess is a rite of passage for any kid born in the UK pre 80s — that of paper delivery kid. Like many, it was my first real job that I got paid for by someone not a family member. A job I took very seriously at the time, never missing a day regardless of what the weather threw at me.
I loved that job, being up at an ungodly hour before the rest of the world, being out on the streets on my bike riding like a crazy, despite the weight of newspapers I had to deliver. I got so good at doing my one paper round that I ended up doing 2 back to back, and eventually did the Sundays as well. Earning myself enough to buy myself things I had only dreamed of.
I kept those paper rounds right up until just before I left home and signed up to join the military. Supplemented by then, with a job working behind the cheese and cooked meats counter at Littlewood. Which saw me through a very long angsty summer of discontent at home. I was ever thankful to get out of the house every day, and also get paid for escaping.
And then … then I joined the Women’s Royal Air Force and trained to be an air traffic controller. Me? Can you believe it? The naive little kid had enough brains to scrape in under the radar (do you like the pun?)
I did several years in the military and not all of them in the fish bowl tower directing traffic. I worked a lot more in Operations and Intel till burn-out finally took it’s toll. And despite good references and taking a spot in Civil Aviation, I only lasted months in the real world working at West Drayton. The stress was something I was trying to escape from.
At this point I was ready for a different less stressful job and life, and so, after a couple of years back at college retraining in a number of disciplines, including computing, I had a lucky break and found I had a skill I could make my own. I became a compositor for a design and publishing company. Moving into a whole new direction, one that gave me the opportunity to upgrade my skill set again, with a move down to London. Where I worked for several months as a nobody publishing assistant doing all the scut work.
What came next, as a result of putting in the hours, was my dream job and move. Suddenly, I found myself working in New York. I worked there, in publishing, for 3 years before finally, due to my dad’s cancer, returned to the UK.
I’ve been luckier than most landing in the right place at the right time to have been able to do some amazing jobs, and meeting some fantastic people along the way. And my time in the States? Will be something I’ll treasure and remember for the rest of my life.
So if you get a chance to do something new, and different, don’t hold yourself back with self doubt, go for it. Jump in with both feet and give it a go. Even in failure you’ll learn something and you’ll have experiences you would never normally have had otherwise.
I know I did.
𖡼.𖤣𖥧𖡼.𖤣𖥧
Watched: Murderbot (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️) 📺
It took me a long while to get into this one. I have to say that, after the first episode I was ready to abaondon it and, well, actually, I did in that my Apple subscription ran out and I waited till just last week to renew it.
Maybe the break was just what I needed because we’ve just binge watched the rest of the season. And — I loved it.
I’ve had an internal monolog running in my head since I was probably 3-4 years old. I know I spent a lot of those first aware years—between 3 and 5—firing questions at my father almost non-stop. Asking him why this, or why that. Questions he always patiently answered. And, despite my best efforts to seemingly thwart him, he always had an answer for me. Whether any of those answers were scientifically correct was neither here nor there. If I wanted to know why whales had holes on the top of the head, my father had an answer for me.
Our routine got so that he started calling me, Miss Why. He would come home from work, and we would share dinner together—this mostly because at the time I refused to eat all day long till Daddy came home, and I insisted then on eating what he ate. This phase lasted a very long time, throughout the three years we lived in Hong Kong I think. What broke that particular streak? Him having tripe (sheep’s intestines and stomach lining) and onions for dinner one night.
Of course, there was no way this stubborn 5 year old was eating that.
And so, at roughly the same time I started full time school, I stopped having dinner with my father, and started eating with the *other* kids, my siblings. And, in doing so, apparently, turned my torrent of non stop thought into firing endless questions at them.
You may ask me why I never spent my day firing questions at my mother and the answer could probably be because, as a small child, I spent a lot of those early years going everywhere with her. And, in doing so, we talked all day long about everything. Our conversations always, without me realising, being her teaching me and, in her own way, answering questions before I even asked them.
That inquisitive internal monolog hasn’t quietened or for one second stopped (other than, quite possibly, in deep sleep). I’m still asking questions like, “What do ants do when it rains?”
These days, without siblings or parents to bombard with questions, I use my writing as an outlet, plus scribbling furiously into a daily journal like my life depended on it. And, in a way, I suppose it does.
𖡼.𖤣𖥧𖡼.𖤣𖥧
