The Adventures of Dysfunctional Dan

Last week was the half term holiday and the weather was kind so I was able to spend some time out and about. Today I thought I’d share some of my adventures and experiences. I do a lot of walking these days. I love being out in the countryside and if I haven’t done a reasonable amount of activity during the day I find it really hard to sleep. In April 2016 I bought a Fitbit and have hit my daily step target of 10,000 steps every single day since then, regardless of the weather and even on Christmas Day. On one such walk last week I leapt over a stile. It’s a route I take pretty much every Saturday. The stile is broken so it does require quite an effort to get over it- a jump is the easiest way to do it really. As I landed I found myself unwittingly in the middle of some sort of vigil for the poor guy who was found dead in that spot a few days before. So awkward. I did my best to portray my sympathy in a smile and then had to walk on. It  was a truly cringeworthy moment. Spen...

I noticed the other day that I had all my old blog posts saved on my computer. I started reading them and it brought back the memories of how much I liked blogging. I’ve been posting bits irregularly for the last six months or so but I’ve decided I want to get back into it properly. The plan is to post something here every weekend, though it may be more or less regular than that depending on what I’ve got to share with you. I seem to become ever more self-enclosed. I hardly ever tell anyone anything about my life, be that what I’ve been feeling or simply what I’ve been doing. On a rare occasion I might feel strangely open and end up telling someone something I’ve kept entirely to myself, even if it’s a mundane thing. The other person never realises the secret they have ended up hearing. It’s probably not a healthy way of living but it’s how I get by. I’ve become so fearful of being judged that I don’t let people have anything to judge me by. I just keep quiet and out of the wa...

One of my favourite TV shows, Sherlock, has just finished airing it’s fantastic fourth series. I thought it was superb and lots of people enjoyed it too. But as ever the internet was full of people moaning about it. It’s odd how negative our world has become, especially on social media. Why do people feel the need to focus on the negatives and spend so much of their online life complaining about things? I find it a strange and miserable way of living.  It’s all social media’s fault of course. Before Twitter, Facebook and co I think people were more positive about things. If you didn’t like something you might mention it at the time but only the few people you happened to be with would hear it. Social media really has a lot to answer for- immediate thoughts and unchecked news are ruining the world politically. I imagine a different state of affairs. What if everyone only talked about the stuff they liked? It would be better for them mentally and indeed everyone else. The good...

Fidel Castro has died! Those were the exact words of a tweet from Donald Trump. What has amazed me about the aftermath of the Cuban leader’s death is the way so many people have used it to try and make a political statement. First, context. Fidel Castro was a Cuban revolutionary and dictator. He ruled the country from 1959-2008 when his brother Raul Castro took over. In the fifties Cuba’s government was corrupt but a revolution led to Castro turning the country into the only communist state in the West. This led to huge problems during the Cold War and nearly led to nuclear destruction in the Cuban Missile Crisis. He ruthlessly ruled the country but it’s now in a stronger place than it ever was. That’s the thing about Castro. He was a dictator and did some really horrible things. But as dictator’s go he wasn’t  that  bad and took down a crime ridden government and I think most people would agree that Cuba has got a lot out of having him as leader. Basically, it’s compli...

It’s been a tough week online for the comics industry. The brilliant comics writer Chelsea Cain was tweeting about her disappointment at the end of her  Mockingbird  series, canceled by Marvel. She shared an alternate cover for the final issue: Then the abuse came. This is Chelsea’s take on it: Overnight, I had lost thousands of followers. (I’d gone to bed with about 8500.) I had gained a thousand new followers. I had been tagged thousands of times. Comments were coming in, fast and furious, every second. I’d never seen anything like it. I saw a few of them – a lot of support, a lot of people yelling at one another – a lot of people mad at me for being too quick on the block button or too critical of comic book readers or being too feminist. A lot of them just seemed mad at women in general. I deactivated my account. I got up. I walked my dogs. You might not believe that in 2016 this sort of thing happens. It does. Here’re a completely real screenshot of just one pe...

You may have seen the news of gorilla Kumbuka escaping from his enclosure at London Zoo. The male Western Silverback got out into a secure keeper’s area and was quickly tranquilised. The public was never in danger and the situation seemed to have dealt with very well by the London Zoo staff. The events have led to an organisation called the Born Free Foundation releasing a statement saying “it could have ended very differently” and was a “startling reminder” of the risks of keeping wild animals in captivity. The organisation wants to see zoos phased out, something which I disagree with. In terms of their opinion of the events of the London Zoo incident, it seems frankly wrong. It was extremely unlikely that it would ever have ended any differently thanks to the zoo’s safety procedures. The animal never escaped into a public area, the public were evacuated quickly and the gorilla was tranquilized and moved back to his enclosure remarkably quickly. It seems clear to be that London...

You may have seen, intentionally or not, the latest news about Kim Kardashian. She was in Paris and was robbed at gunpoint. I’m not full of sympathy towards her. OK, that’s not entirely true. I have sympathy in terms of the fact it must have been a traumatizing experience and one I wouldn’t wish on anyone, even someone I don’t like.  I really don’t like Kim Kardashian. I struggle to think of one redeeming feature for her. Everything about her is image and that’s not what life is about. She has become a millionaire on the basis she is good looking. I don’t even view her as good looking because it’s impossible to tell what she would actually look like without the various fakery which makes her look like she does. She doesn’t appear to have any personality whatsoever. She chose to marry perhaps the most arrogant man in the world. I could go on.  It puzzles me that she has become something of an idol to so many girls and young women. They want to be Kim Kardashian and that’...