Month: January 2020

I used to be good at this shit.

Posted by

I used to be able to write awesome reviews with no effort at all.

Didn’t cost me a calorie.

Now I’m struggling with the first sentence of three different concert reviews, two of which I have written but f*ck knows where they are. I think they’re stuck in some kind of kittycyberspace. I must admit that writing in Norwegian might be one reason my creative juices are stagnant but it’s a crap excuse cos it’s supposed to be my mother tongue… right.

Listening to old Laibach to see if that will help. And I do mean old stuff. Enjoy!

Life with a tech savvy kitty

Posted by

This is Lea.

Lea is my rescue cat who was hit by a car twice, survived against all odds, and is now the weirdest and cuddliest cat ever. But just to me. She hates just about everyone else.

Lea can take off for weeks at a time, but when she’s home, she prefers being on my lap at all times. Which can be rather challenging if I’m working on my computer and she’s all I WANT CUDDLES. Sometimes she’ll be satisfied with just lying here. If I go somewhere, I have to remember to turn off my computer otherwise she’ll happily chat with anyone listening or update my status on Facebook (best case) or make system changes that aren’t always easy to fix (vertical screen is one of them).

She’s also a kitty with a mind of her own, especially when it comes to music.

As I am now dipping my toes into music journalism again, it means that I have to listen to a lot of different music from my computer. Editing concert photos and listening to new music is a form of multi tasking that kinda works for me.

I’m just not sure how to read her actions on these?

Lea snoring while I edit photos from Ministry @ Vulkan arena last June, listening to Wandering Stars. Or rather, snoring but twitching her tail.

I’ve been tipped off about an interesting Norwegian band called Sølvkre, which kinda reminds me of Nine Inch Nails’ instrumental work. This is Lea’s response to Ghosts.

I left Ghosts on and this is what I came back to. Culprit had hidden.

I am slightly concerned that she’s getting ever closer to cracking the code of net shopping. When I get a parcel in the post, I never know what I’ll find when I pick it up (also because I sometimes order stuff and chemo brain blocks it out so I get surprised by someone sending me a pressie!!!!).

Does your cat order stuff? Is the whole Paypal one touch thingy a really bad idea?

Chemo brain is fun

Posted by

Not.

But it’s very interesting.

I read about it, and thought it was pretty weird and insane that people could get it up to four months before they actually had their first chemo.

The problem with chemo is that you don’t realise that it’s gripped you in its talons until you’re so dazed and confused that you hardly know what month it is. In hind sight, it probably hit me around June – two months before I started? And it’s still got me gripped – hard.

Chemo brain can’t be explained to someone who hasn’t been there. It’s not just about being forgetful. It’s about your mind turning into a great big void, a giant vacuum, and there is nothing there. Your thoughts are the frailest of whisps, and if you’re lucky you might catch one for a milli second but probably not long enough for you to actually complete or comprehend that thought.

Explaining it to others is useless. Best case you get the condescending “Oh, I’m like that sometimes, it’s an age thing”.

No, this is not an age thing. It’s not something that happens sometimes. It happens all the time, every single fucking day. There is no rest or respite from it.

Giving me books is not only stupid, it’s a fucking insult after having had this for almost three years. When I say that I can’t read books, it means just that. I can’t read books. My brain is unable to do all the complex functions that reading books demands.

Asking me “Do you remember…?” is also a fucking insult. No, I don’t remember. I can answer that before you finish your sentence. I don’t remember squat. I’m happy if I wake up and know what month it is.I might have told you something yesterday and I’ll have forgotten.

If you ask me a favour, and I ask you to remind me, it’s not to be rude, it’s because there is no way in hell I will remember our conversation three seconds later. It will be gone into that vast void which might be interesting to explore at some point but I doubt it.

Oh, and if you add insomnia into the game, it all adds up to social anxiety in addition to the rest of the fun long term side effects I have.

At least I’ve found some words again. They eluded me for so long, I felt deaf and dumb and mute hence the long lapse in blogging.