Existing, Grollies & Labradors

The weather, or rather lack of good weather, doesn't help. I do feel energised when the sun shines, despite historically being a hater of the sun. It makes me itch you see, because of nerve damage. I dislike being hot, sticky and sweaty (unless I'm making out of course) I find it terribly uncomfortable. I overheat easily, so I prefer to be cold where I can wrap up with layers to adjust to the climate easier. But I have noticed that on dark, damp, gloomy days my mood also takes a plunge into the dark murky depths of depression.

A couple of months ago I started taking vitamin D supplements to help combat this and I didn't notice them working until I ran out and didn't buy any more. That's when I noticed my mood drop and this overwhelming urge to switch all my social media and electronic devices off and drive and drive and drive. Maybe go find a forest halfway up a mountain and hunt butterflies for food and live in a hedge or something. You know, just run away from life.

I know I am not alone in this feeling, that millions of others want to do just that too. That we all watched that amazing program about the hermit that lives in the highlands on land he found, and just set up a new life for himself. But I, like those millions, don't have the gentleman's vegetables to do it. There's always an excuse to not do it.

I had my boys for the weekend just gone and as usual, they were full of energy. So much so, Marshall spent most of it collecting sticks and branches and slowly morphing into a Labrador. Brayden spent most of it falling off of stuff in the park or tripping over air. When they weren't tripping over or playing human fetch they were fighting each other with a certain ferociousness only usually seen at a bare-knuckle cage fight.

Marshall in the evening finished building his solar powered excavator (with a hydraulic centre ram, I may add) which was marvellous as it kind of coincides with van living. It helped him to understand how my batteries get charged up by the sun. Especially as he had to wait until the next day and a bit of cloud break to see if he had built it properly! Thankfully he had built it properly or my own day would have gotten much worse.

Brayden is going through that horrible stage at the moment. That one that makes you swear really fucking loudly at your kid, in the middle of the campsite and makes the whole campsite go quiet and stare at you like you're the worst human on the planet for swearing at your darling little shitbag. That stage where they ask for something, in particular, to eat like: "A cucumber sandwich with all of the green cut off the cucumber and no slimy bit in the middle, butter only on one side, and no crust and cut into 153 triangles." So you oblige because you haven't seen him for 10 days, whilst cursing silently in your head (I think). Only when you present said sandwich to said irritating shitbag he screams like you've just spiked him with a copper rod and then been struck by 23 bolts of lightning. "I didn't want the cucumber sliced I wanted it cut into sticks some big some small and there's a bit of butter on the other slice blah blah blah"

"Don't fucking eat it then" and with a casual flick of the wrist off it went into the sky with all of the other fucks I couldn't give at that moment. But holy titties, I could hear the silence, feel the stares. I turned to the guy on the pitch next to me who was just standing there shaking his head and then said "Dunno what you're staring at. I saw your little prince charming spit a fat grolly into your beer because you wouldn't let him have one of your Pringles. At least my kids know where they stand." Then I took the boys to the shop and bought them ice cream!

Kids know exactly how to press the right buttons to wind a parent right up to the point of nuclear detonation.

I saw a Facebook post the other day that simply said "If you think you're having a bad day, at least you're not hiding in a basement that's covered in rubble whilst missiles scream overhead." I thought you know what, that's a good point. But then in a nanosecond I thought but I'm not in that situation right now. I'm here, with my own problems that I can't face. But if I was, sure as hell I'd be driving my house on wheels to the mountains with 100 butterfly traps in the back...

Anyhoo, I'm hoping that by writing this I'll be giving myself the proverbial kick up the arse to get moving and do something like, I dunno, move? I really should move regardless, as this lay-by stinks of piss every time the sun comes out! Not mine, by the way, I have a toilet!

Another completely unrelated quark of knowledge for you: Petrichor is the earthy scent produced when rain falls on dry soil. The word is constructed from Ancient Greek πέτρα (pétra) 'rock', or πέτρος (pétros) 'stone', and ἰχώρ (ikhṓr), the ethereal fluid that is the blood of the gods in Greek mythology.