Greetings, bonjour, what’s happening

Welcome to Lager Time. My almost weekly edition of poems, stories, thoughts and sometimes music. Bits and bobs I’m working on.

This is the first time I’ve attempted some sort of opening tag-line. Just as I’m thinking of bringing in some changes to Lager Time. Typical me. I’m not exactly what that is as yet but I’m thinking I might need to split things up a bit; in terms of the poems, the thoughts, the music etc. And in these times of inflation, high-living costs, housing shortages, wars, potential wars, potential austerity; I’m sure this is the last thing we all need. Fear not my Lager-dons, it won’t be happening any time soon, though. All in good time. Good time? What does that actually mean? What about is ‘good’? I mean, many things are good, if you think about it? I could say, ‘all in bad time’ because arguably, it is but then again… anyway…

One thing I am going to attempt, probably in the next couple of weeks; is a Lager Time live-stream, probably on You Tube. It’s taken me ages to figure out how to do it (I’ll go into more detail on this in a minute) but I’ve managed to get some half-decent sound, streaming into my phone, so I can be on-mic, perform a few poems, chatting a bit and do a few tracks on my loop-station; all with a bit of lighting to make it look alright. Pretty standard these days, but for me, working this out has been like a morose goldfish trying to unravel the human genome.

Since school, my focus has always been like an erratic-goldfish, selecting penny sweets with his generous science funding. Even way before I was working in the arts, when I worked ordinary day-jobs and I was just doing music as a hobby; I always seemed to be attempting multiple projects, all at once, meaning most of them were never finished; some didn’t even get off the ground. Some of them were decent ideas but half-arsed in delivery. Sometimes, I just didn’t have the means, which was always frustrating as I had the ideas, which just turned bitter. Like making-music for instance. Hence I started rapping, as I only needed a pen and paper. All in all, in terms of ideas I come up with, I’ve probably got a follow-through completion rate of about 8% (which I don’t actually think is that bad, as something is better than nothing)

Whether I like it or not, my skills are limited. My ability to learn new skills are limited. Certain things just take me a long-time to grasp; it’s why I mostly hated school, as I couldn’t pick things up fast enough. We all have limitations of course. I get that. But what compounds all of this; as well as being erratic, I can also be a lazy-prick, often preferring the easy route. I excel at deluding myself that I’m doing what I’m meant to be doing; I know all the loop-holes, mate. I’m like a bored goldfish with a  spreadsheet and an open-return to the Caymen-Islands. Am I going to persevere with this scrip-writing thing I’m currently learning and playing with? Or am I going to write rap bars, to my favourite beats? A process I’m very familiar and comfortable with doing. But it’s all ‘writing’ though, isn’t it Paul? Ticking the writing box. We all know the truth deep down, like a stoned goldfish, watching You Tube videos about chem-trails.

Sometimes, though, somehow, by hook or by crook; I say I’m going to do something and I actually do it. I get there. Sort of. I may well take a long-arse route but I arrive, deshelled but glad I did it; just wishing I was more efficient. This blog, podcast and live-streaming, is part of this bigger idea I had. It’s not quite how I envisioned it, it’s a lot scrappier than I’d like, but here I am, doing something, which is better than nothing, most of the time.

Despite the difficulties of the COVID lockdowns and what that meant for freelancers like me and how I earn my living; I saw it as opportunity to really become independent. I wanted to use the internet, to be able to produce and distribute my own my music; writing, books, promotional content, video and put on live-gigs, like a multi-tasking Goldfish, with a clipboard and a novelty-tie. I’ve done a little bit of all that now; it’s no where near as good as I’d like it to be but this goldish likes cola-bottles, shrimps, surgery-laces, those banging Postman-Pat chews and bare other surgery-delights. I’m slowly learning how I can obtain those without crashing and burning, staring out of the window, cursing myself then placating myself with booze and caloric food, like a Goldfish that’s… na, we’’ll leave it there.

I often think I’m a few steps away from achieving something really good and a few steps back the other way, from the being the piss-artist at the bar boring the younger lads about how I ‘could’ve been.’ I know which one I prefer. All in good that time, mate. Whatever that means.

So that’s it for me and this rant. I was going to include the final part of that Edinburgh series from 2016 that I wrote but alas, you’ll have to wait. I think in the run-up to it all, I did a seven blogs, documenting the process, which you can still read at www.paulcreewrites.blogspot.com – but you’re getting the first and last. Large up any performers who are taking shows up there this yet, especially ones who are doing it with limited resources and off their own backs. And large up the punters willing to take a punt and watch a few of these shows, as opposed to watching one of the many bland, panel-show comedians, who you see on telly every week, doing their live-routines, like me writing rap-bars; take a risk!

Have a banging weekend

Peas and taters

Paul

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