JacobHDailyEffort

Given enough time, people are more often than not won over by snooker. It's great. Every shot is crucial. Throughout my various house shares, people who originally assumed it was boring end up getting into it, to the extent that I'll come back home and they're watching without me. I completely understand how it looks boring. Hours on end of an undynamic green visual, it's not a far stretch from looking at a two dimensional image. Throw in the overweight, unhealthy looking old men and the most understandable immediate reaction is this is likely to be the most tedious thing imaginable.  But as with many sports, a large proportion of interest derives from internal politics. The characters. Like naming a pet, once you form allegiances the attachment has begun. If you want to show someone who is unaware of how some snooker matches can be different, this year's two semi final's are the perfect example. One semi final containing two attacking younger players, one of wh...

When I returned to work for my team after a period of full-time office work for another team, there was an eeriness to the familiarity. It isn't long until you fall back into the same patterns; how you schedule and break up the day, task prioritisation, certain times for tea and coffee, which work you choose to do more from home and which you do in the office etc. A permanent cerebral imprint compels repetition. I'm acting like I'm saying something novel but I'm essentially saying that we are creatures of habit. My time between teams was only a few months. I am faced now with the dissolution of an almost six year relationship, a fifth of my entire life, and my inclination has already sunk lazily back into its infinite mould. I was 22. I am now 28. Same as it ever was. I make better stir fry's now but they remain stir fry's nonetheless. At least I have more money, although I have little to do with it. I have also amassed a wealth of annual leave accrued, rolled o...

Comforted by the many before me who have experienced the very same and worse, I can now add mainstream torment to accompany my other conventional traits. How predictable. I mustn't grow weary of despair, I've already lost football.  Needfull to say, I haven't grown weary of sadness. Not yet. Signs of life signified by my return to listening to music, the same lyrics now evoke new meaning; And new meaning is a positive sign of life. New meaning implies a broadening understanding. A greater appreciation. You would hope this in turn will bring maturity. Life experiences shape understanding and at the very very least, I now have another one. "I am hanging in the balance of the reality of man, like every sparrow falling, like every grain of sand" - Bob Dylan

I'm thinking that maybe I need to delete my Instagram posts. For some reason at the end of 2021 I got it in my head that it was a good idea to start posting stills from my favourite films, as if anybody cares. I even knew at the time that nobody cared. I was vocal about how it was simply something for me and how I didn't care about if anybody else was interested; it was just a sort of personal collection. Bullshit. It was projected narcissism. I was kidding myself with the same spiel that everybody does about their own social media. If it's just for yourself, why are you posting it publicly? I feel dirty and ashamed. Feeling dirty and ashamed is probably good reason to delete these photos, however I just had a quick look through and I do have an attachment. Obviously that attachment is bollocks. Of course I have an attachment, they are my favourite films. It's not like deleting these images deletes the films from existence. They aren't even anything to do with me. I...

One by one I gradually realise I don't have items I need. Still mirrorless, but I have made some progress on the bookshelf situation, lugging one back from town after work. Consisting only of three miniature shelves, it got the better of me still, as I was repeatedly forced to switch arms whilst being blasted by the sun in my thick coat due to there being no space left in my bag. Posters have made a timely arrival, decreasing the square inchage of gaping void. Although my pathetic fatigue post bookshelf incident means that not all of them are on display just yet. The square inchage of gaping void is indeed decreasing but there still remains gaping void to be de-inched.  Pillowcases to match my burgundy duvet is my latest requirement realisation. I've gone for berry. Hopefully it matches and isn't as ridiculous as it sounds. It's good that you don't have to audibly specify these things in front of people at the shop. "Have you got any berry pillowcases please? O...

Make that 15 out of 19 (it was only one at the cinema). Watched a very cool film called Junk Head. Set in a dystopian future where humans are growing extinct, it follows an adventurer exploring the subterranean mutant world looking for their reproductivity secrets. The film is entirely stop motion and all but a one-man project. An unbelievable feat of creativity and detail. Unfortunately, I can’t recommend the film to anybody because it isn’t available to watch literally anywhere. Tonight’s plan is to watch the snooker at my dad’s so that will make it 15/20. Down to 75%. Progress. The Snooker World Championships has provided a much welcome distraction over the last week, which will continue to see me through for another 6 days yet. Life is a series of ticking off days, waiting for an unspecified better one. Next Tuesday will be the first snookerless day, that week will the next test. Let’s not dwell on that, stay present! Not the greatest entry today. A film recommendation which nobody...

For 14 of the last 18 days alcohol has been rubbing salt into my already problematic stomach. It is difficult to engage in British society without drinking. If it's miserable, that's reason to drink. If it's nice and sunny, that's reason to drink. If there's nothing to do, that's reason to drink. If you are doing something, may as well have a drink. Someone close to you died? Drink. It's habitual more than an addiction. Ceremonial. The ceremony of banality. Despite being a largely scathing and dismissive society, we manage to find a reason to apply this form of celebration to absolutely everything. Nobody appreciates life like the British. Well, its either the British or Buddhists. If it came down to a fight we'd lose that, our coordination and skill would be way out of calibration. You win this one Buddhists. This British drinking insight isn't anything new or enlightening. My main peeve isn't really health-related. It is that I've recently ...