Jago · Spencer

For all that the solving of this mystery is apparently beyond me.... I refuse to let my inner confusion cloud my superficial self, indeed my outward appearance is....

Right you can tell how hopelessly out of depth this little problem has me, I mean I’ve resorted to rhyming (and not that well at that) the last resort of a desperate man, so a challenge absent reader, if I know you, a proper clue– a riddle I can get my rather blunt mental teeth into.... and if I do not which seems unlikely, perhaps an even larger hint

Right well I’m off to confer with Watson

Toodaloo

Holmes        
Jago

mystery, enigma, a puzzle within a puzzle...

dear absent reader it appears that you have read, and commented, and left....all without even leaving a clue to your identity....

and now i find myself cowering with stage fright, and curious as to who you may be....

and with that dear absent reader i raise my glass and depart, for i really  have nothing more to say.

onward and upward

jago

no one reads this, which rather begs the question why i'm writing it. Granted it's been a year or so since my last post, so had i ever a loyal readership they would no doubt have run for the hills, or at least ventured to greener pastures. a loyal readership? i'm kidding myself. i never did, nor is it likely that i ever shall. i reiterate no one reads this....which brings me back to why i bother...

Therapy ? the ability to write foir the sake of writing? the bizarre hope that somewhere out there, there might one day be someone who smiles however briefly after reading my words....oooh how gooey and sentimental was that, c'est la. i am who i am.

For whatever reason, after a long absence from the wonderful world wide web, i have returned, most absent of absent readers.

And that is it for today and likely many more a day, i could write of all the lessons i have learned  about myself,  how i failed for the first time in my life to obtain something i wanted that was in my grasp, how it broke something so deep inside me that is took nearly a year for me to piece myself back together...how i have discovered far too many regrets in a life that has spanned less than 25 years.

but it would take too long, it would likely bore or sadden you absent reader, and it is after all the past, what matters is that i am happy, beardless, and ready to see what happens next, hoping of course that i will enjoy it.

fare thee well oh absent one

`Jago

Last Friday i finished my exams....

Yep, it's finally happened, four tireless (i think i'm allowed some poetic license)  academic years have come and gone and left me washed up on a new shore.

Anyway the truth of the matter is that i find myself currently at liberty, free to do about anything i can think of and can afford....and there, absent reader, is the rub, the truth of the matter is, as my finances are somewhat strained at the mo, i find myself sitting at home twiddling my thumbs, which is rather boring when all is said and done...

The answer, of course, is that i must get a job. and soon. and i shall, i shall, ....though you might want to allow me a liberal interpretation of the word "soon"

And that's it from my wonderfully interesting world, four years of delving into arcane world of philosophy and i am left with the twiddling of thumbs,  :-) and of course the ability read the works of great minds and have an inkling of what they mean, by what they say, or seem to say. Which might actually turn out to be of some use as i make my way down the windy river of life.

But seriously, at the end of the day, and somewhat to my surprise,  i think i've enjoyed it, philosophy rocks! yay!

There is little to add, but to mention my beard has decided to make a rather fabulous return, and i hope to attack it with a razor "soon", certainly sooner than i make any attempt at gaining employment, i think the best description of my current state is "scruffy". But then, a right to scruffiness is an essential one for any, and every, student. And by allowing myself to  lose control of my  facial hair i am making a stand, defending that "right", and doing my bit for the society of which i find myself a part.
                    
Or i'm just plain ol' lazy and haven't got around to shaving it yet, which whilst you will accept is the far more likely rational behind my bristly face, i think "your honour" that there is reasonable doubt, and the case should therefore be thrown out of court by the scruff of it's (bearded) neck.

anyway back to the twiddling of thumbs, or not, i think i might even get a little pro-active and do something....

200 words on my second essay, rectification of backward trend. felt the pressure today, always a good thing, likely to actually start serious work tomorrow...after the usual week long build up. no surprises.

life is.

i'm fantastically bored...which like pressure is conducive to work, and therefore, in the current circumstances, also a good thing.

my diet is,...not good

that is, my eating habits, i'm not actually on a diet, merely not eating the healthiest of foods. fairly irrelevant to my ability to think/work, but, absent reader, who am i to know what interests you.

FYI: i also happen to be smoking too much, and exercising too little, but why not?  i am after all a student, when else will i be able to wallow in my vices....oh and the beard is gone...

Enough!  as you can no doubt tell,  i have nothing to say, in such cases a wise man would likely say nothing, then again i'll happily admit to not being wise...after all.... Socrates did :-)

Right, well it's been a while since my last post, the result of my failing to do any real work up until this point...but that's changed...well kind of...i mean i wrote down some notes outlining my second essay...fun...especially considering the lack of the same with regards to my first essay....well i never claimed not to be backward. oh yeah, and then there is the prehistoric man look, by which i mean my steadily growing facial hair, which has yet to meet it's prophesised doom... yes ye beard remaineth....so basically, i've been avoiding the need to mention that the only thing i have successfully done since my last post is...(queue drum roll & fanfare) procrastinate...which, i might add, seems to be the only thing i have mastered since coming to university.

so i've sat at home catching up on TV shows (primarily NCIS), and rarely venturing beyond the front door...which means that i avoided paddy's day-  the celebration of which it seems is still underway...don't get me wrong i have nothing against getting hopelessly drunk dressing like a leprechaun and painting myself green...but i really can't go out and have fun with all my essays looming overhead...and then there is the fact that i look quite Neanderthal like, not really ready for the public arena.

anyway my voluntary confinement, seems to be leading to a case of agoraphobia, which i hope to beat by having coffee with a friend tomorrow, aside from that and the ever present need to do some work, the only other plans i have for the week are to see "300", which hits the cinemas on friday...oh...and remove the hair from my face....

right, well i think i'd better be off and staring out of the window, not that there's a view you understand, but it's the principle of the thing.

i hope, absent reader, that your week is off to a better start than mine.

i cannot remember the last time i shaved...and it shows.  no longer do i fall nicely into the category of the great unshaven masses, it seems that now i am graduating to the ranks of the "bearded", an echelon of people who i have previously assumed contained only  geography teachers, geologists, members of biker gangs, gap year travelers, and of course, vikings. Well....no longer, i  now have empirical proof that the bearded elect also contains those who are simply to lazy to shave....in this case my own humble personage.

seriously...i grew a "beard" once before. i was innocent to the ways of this mysterious world at the time, traveling with a friend in south america, it was not a success, i believe the best description of my efforts would be a throat beard it made me look quite quakerish....no longer! it seems that i can now grow facial hair..."like, actually on my face man"

suffice it to say, this wonderfully hairy state of affairs, is likely to be a fleeting one,  not that i have anything against beards per se, indeed some people gain by them, but i really don't think that i'm one of them....pity really life would be so much easier if i needn't shave....ahhhhhh. but some things are not to be, shaving is a necessary fact of my  life....and therefore it seems,  an unavoidable fate...so this will have to be a case of once more unto the breach and all that ....

today was to be a day filled with hard work and i think i would have relished it as such....but i committed the sin of remaining up all night reading trash, which means i really doubt my ability to do much constructive on the essay front, i won't say tomorrow is the day....i've grown bored of missing my own targets....but i am beginning to feel the pressure...which will helpfully motivate me...i hope...

my essay still not yet started...my supper not yet eaten...and i've started talking to myself, fun fun fun... or perhaps  mad mad mad is more fitting...which is a thought i love that song, you know mad world...beautiful, anyway suits my mood to a tee (?)[i mean which is it? "tea" or "tee"]

no thoughts at the mo.... i'm attempting to numb my mind in preparation  for writing the essay which i have decided i will start tomorrow. admittedly  i decided the same thing yesterday but...this time i...err....really mean it. honest. :-)

anyway, time to make supper.

Instead of doing my essay....i'm sitting and thinking, the tv on in the background and an ebook on the screen of my computer... and i had such good intentions.... anyway the opening scenes of the of the book are set in Iraq...which is relevant to my sitting and thinking...

Saddam Hussein was handed over to the government of Iraq, who in turn decided he was guilty of various heinous crimes and then proceeded to hang him...rather abruptly....and the thing that got me thinking...is was it Just.

Why do i question the justice of the execution of a man who terrorised the world? well i guess the main reason is contained within the following question, why was he tried by the interim Iraqi government, sorry, why was he tried by a fairly unstable interim Iraqi government? i find myself wondering in which of all possible worlds would such a government, faced with a choice of imprisoning or executing such a man, choose not to execute him. i mean, he ruled Iraq for 24 years, he was a rallying point, locked up he would have offered the stability of Napoleon whiling away his hours on Elba.  Because of this, he could not be allowed to live. and a man who is tried on such political grounds cannot be tried in a just manner.

You note that i do not claim that he was not guilty, i only question the nature of the trial, and i ask myself was it really just, to try him in such a manner. and i do object to his execution, especially the manner of it, i think we erred... and that history shall judge us harshly.

More innocents have died since we invaded Iraq than before, who bears the responsibility for their deaths? who should face trial? where is the justice for hanging a man for the death of a few, when, we the west are responsible for the death of so very many more. perhaps Stalin was right, something i find disturbing, when he said  A single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic. Saddam was responsible for more than a single death, he has died for that...yet we seem oblivious to our own crime. and i wonder at the justice in that.

As to our continued presence in Iraq, i think we owe it the people, who have died, to remain until Iraq is stable, however long that might take. it is our responsibility, our mess to clean up.  let us lessen neither the deaths of all those innocent civilians, nor the sacrifices of those who have so bravely laid down their lives in our armed forces, by leaving more of a mess when we finish, than when we began.

           

            Muddled thoughts from a muddled mind, good night and sweet dreams.

                           

                                                                     jago

so, the first ever post in my journal, it should be groundbreaking, or at least interesting....you'd think having set up this account, i might be met with some inspiration, ha, no such luck. i'm sitting at home in front of the television, which is on mute,  listening to the rain drumming outside. fun. ha

in fact it's been an incredibly dull day, and i'm seriously considering going to bed.

i've got a bunch of essay's to write over the next couple of weeks and i've got to decide which one to start tomorrow ...well, so that's only a little more interesting than listening to the beat of water on the window downstairs, but, at least it enables me to affirm my own existence, Descartes style, i think therefore i am....

one of the essay's i've got to write is all about how we view the world, what makes it real to us, specifically  whether we convince ourselves of an objects existence primarily though touch or sight. it's more interesting than it sounds...i think. I mean, my initial reaction was that it would take both in equal amounts...but i think i'm most convinced something is real if i touch it, i can imagine seeing things that  aren't actually there, but not touching them....who knows, it's gonna be interesting... i guess....don't ask the relevance...the more i think about it the more  i'm begging to doubt that it is possible to know that anything/ anyone exists outside of my mind...i believe they do, of course, but actually know....less and less sure. which thinking about it would likely make my lecturer's day...he's an idealist (like George Berkeley....not a flower child) so maybe thats the relevance....i'm being brainwashed....great!

anyway think i might sign off, have a hot milky drink and hit the sack, my eyes are drooping my bed beckoning, and my brain, as you can likely tell, shutting down, hopefully temporarily.

so, good night i go to sleep perchance to dream

jago