It's in the stars, next July we collide with Mars.

That one you may need help with.

Went round to Ashes place.  I was due to take pudding so I invnted

Toffee Apple cake

You will need:  1 bramley apple

1 Bramley applee

Cinnamon

4 oz muscovado sugar

4 large eggs

11 oz butter

 9oz caster sugar

9oz SR flour

Oven to 160C

Get a mandoline.  seriously.

Line the bottom of an 8 inch cake tin with non stick parchmentslice a layer of apple onto it using mandoline.  Then sorinkle thickly with muscaovado, then another layer of apple, then 2 ox of butter dotted around, then a bit more musco.

Cream caster sugar and the remaining butter, add eggs 1 at a time, then the flour.  adjust to soft dropping stage using milk.

Cover the layer with half the cake mix, then put another layer of apple on, sprinkle with cinnamon then more musco.  then the rest of the mix.  

Bake until the middle feels like the edge.  while still warm turn upside down onto a plate then take off the tin and the paper.

So that was the pudding.  Ash had bought some terrscotta tiles and we used these to bake pizza.

Two other lads there, using the same film as sources I will call them Parker and Brett.

Parker is a friend of Ash from way back.  In fact Ash was once his boss.  He was a little cool about my description of Ash which was naughty.  Parker basically looks like Daniel Beddingfield and sounds like the Big Brother voiceover guy.  He is a really nice guy, married, kid.  Never floated my boat.

Brett is another incomer to the group.  He too married one of the local flange.  He is ... well if you needed help to build a shed, or catch chickens, or help organise a group of young people, or ...well Brett is the guy you would ask.  Generous and honest.

Anyway wee all made pizzas.

Ash had set out the ingredients, we assembled them and then baked them.  Ash won several more inkypoints for having anchovies.  Oh god I love anchovies.

Anyway we all chatted, even about politics and no-one shouted and it was nice.  really nice.

Brett left early.  Parker and Ash and I got talking about my situation.  Probem is I am fine with the whinging but when people start urging me to make decisions for myself....I have never acted in self interest.  Not purely.  My whole life since adulthood has been about helping others, supporting others, living for otherrs.  I have been miserable but I had a plan.  Now I have noone and people say do something for yourself, look after yourself,

I do not know how.  Or why.

So I diverted and gave a small class in making origami frogs.  Our efforts below.

Anyway shortly afterwards Parker left.  Then after a few minutes so did I.  I gave Ash a very chaste hug goodbye, brotherly style. 

He can cook.  His cupboard contains anchovies.  

aaaarrrg.

As ever my emotions are all mixed up.  I feel like shit.  But any outreach triggers a predictable longing for company. And me being me I get things all mixed up.  Textbook transference.  Or honest feeling.  How should I know.?

Got hoome and have no tonic.  drinking gin and dr pepper.  oddly sort of works.

Trust in me, just in meeeee...

I have trust issues.
This is something of an understatement of course. I do not really trust anyone at all.
It is difficult to explain how this works but I can trust some people to some extent in rigidly defined roles. If the encounter has rules in it and preferably a punitive framework for deviance from those rules then I can happily relate.
The more freeform the interaction the more I avoid it. So for example I can socialise with people at work over coffee. But I cannot go to a party or a pub with them. If I am forced to from the minute I walk in I will be looking for the route out.
Within my life I am habitually secretive. I never volunteer information. I also do not seek out comment from others about any aspect of my life or appearance and should such be proferred I make it plain that I do not want it, with varying degrees of politeness. I find people knowing what I am doing or where I am going very distressing. For a while I maintained a facebook page but it was basically like being raped every morning. I still have it but it is blank and maintained solely to police any mention of me and to force others to remove photos and mentions of me.
This makes living with me very hard. Mrsinky knows she is forbidden to put things about me on facebook. She puts her whole life there...its a problem. She cannot understand how I can talk to her mother for 20 mins and divulge no info. Its easy. I never volunteer information and if asked for some normally lie or tell a misleading truth.
Tonight mrsinky got thrown into my world of wierd. She let my parents kniw, by accident, that I had a tattoo done. I flipped. This meant I felt i couldnt talk to them anymore because I had no interest in any of the likely conversations and they would all end with me shouting.
To make matters worse I was due down tomorrow.
I know I have been unreasonable. But I need to control the threat that people pose and it is the only way I know.

A New Year full of old stuff

I have not posted of late. This is because I could either post or live.
Gosh that was dramatic. Picture me in full Elton John flounce mode if it helps.
As I may have mentioned I have a problem with socialisation. I am in effect a high functioning sociopath, or suffer from something similar to schizoid affective disorder, depending on your viewpoint.
To most people, people are a source of comfort. I am told that meeting other people and spending time with them, sharing food and drink, and living space is a source of comfort and pleasure. I say I am told because to me this is like someone describing the more outre reaches of quantum physics. I recognise it may well be true but I lack the ability to understand it myself. For me people are a threat. More people are more threats.
Mrsinky was describing a beauty prcedure to me the other day. Eyelash tinting. It involves being in a room with someone else and closing your eyes. I am so impressed that she can do this. I could not. I could do it with wolves. Or wildcats. Or mountain gorillas. In fact in mountain gorilla circles its simple politeness. Those animals are rational, predictable, trustworthy. People are not.
So take me. Add the only two people I trust, my mate and my child. Add a festival i find utterly repugnant. Then add the fact that those two people need that festival to be happy and social.
Since the 19th Dec. I have been playing a role as host, cook and gamester. I have welcomed people into my home, cooked lovely things, talked and joked, and generslly given mrsinky and foal a nice time, I hope.
I am exhausted and miserable. My stress levels are so high I am constantly on the brink. I need a holiday. I am more tired now than before the break. I hope in this next week I can get some of that.
I have been to the gym today. I am supposed to do this every day but this was the first since the 19th. My pain levels are high  and my shoulders are...well not behaving. I have much work to do.
I am trying to be positive. Honestly.
But my state of mind is fragile.
I hope that you, dear reader, have fared better. Good night, and may your God go with you.