Category: Personal (Page 10 of 14)

After a difficult, depressing 2020, 2021 was certainly different: a rough-and-tumble, tumultuous assemblage of a year, starting with sea shanty TikTok and ending with an absent Prime Minister. I, personally, have been through several highs and lows throughout the year and, now that it’s over, I’m not entirely sure how to feel about that.

The Year

I had quite a good Spring. After being jettisoned from my beloved job at the end of 2019, I had struggled to find anything else for a while, until just before my birthday, when I was given a lifeline until the Summer. I was very sad to have to leave that job, although the last few weeks of June were slightly tempered by the fact that I’d spent a week in hospital and been diagnosed with myotonic dystrophy (which was both a surprise and a relief).

Summer was a confusing mess, overshadowed largely by the fact that Willow died at the beginning (but I did enjoy a free August). I didn’t enjoy Autumn much – as the result of working at a new job where it was made clear that I didn’t fit in – but I had an okay Winter… at least until a couple of weeks before Christmas, where I had to battle off COVID-19 for two weeks, only for my nan to die a few days later. Christmas was a sad one, although it did go well enough, considering the circumstances (and I got everything I wanted – thanks, Jesus!)

I’ve spent the last few days trying to be calm. I’m not good at being calm, but I’ve been trying. For the past couple, I’ve been achieving it. This morning I even managed to get up early and make myself a hot chocolate – how’s that for progress?

The Orgasms

Right, back to what I was originally intending to post about. In 2020 I had 113 orgasms; this was down from 2019’s 134 (but 2019 was a better year!). This year I had long periods of not being able to touch myself – being in hospital and sick with COVID, plus some relatively severe periods of depression at points – so I wasn’t sure how many I would have had by now.

Fortunately, I kept a record….

131– the number of orgasms I’ve had this year (as denoted by a ★ in my WHSmith mid-year diary)

That’s markedly more than last year. I am genuinely surprised by this; I thought it’d be less.

35.89% – the number of orgasms in a year, compared to the number of days in a year, expressed as a percentage

More than a third. That’s an awful lot of time with my dick in my hand.

24/11 to 09/12 – a period of time in which I didn’t have any orgasms at all

This was the week (and surrounding days) when I had COVID. I was pretty much knocked out by COVID and, although I had feverish sex dreams during, I barely had the energy to move, never mind wank. I also didn’t do so when I was in hospital, but I’ll talk about that later…

28/06 and 05/11 – dates on which I had notably powerful, effective or satisfying orgasms (as denoted by !!! in my diary)

The first of these being the day after I got out of hospital. It was also, in fact, the first orgasm in my parents’ house (where I was staying) for years. Bonus fact for you there.

27/01, 03/03, 07/04, 01/06, 03/08, 13/12 and 16/12 – the one date on which I had more than one orgasm (as denoted by “x2”) in my diary

I’ve been a busy little bee this year. Buzz, buzz, buzz.

03/04 – a day where I wrote the single word “jump!” after the ★. I remember this one: I was angled in such a way that my jizz did a Dick Fosbury move in the air before coming down to land. Holy jumping semen, Batman!

The Audacity

This marks post number 65 in 2021, compared to 79 in 2020, so I certainly didn’t manage to make 2020 Escape Velocity this year. Maybe next year… we’ll see. As long as I don’t get laid up with a mysterious illness at any point, I’m sure I’ll be okay.

I have an interesting year planned for 2022 – although with caution, as I’m pretty sure nobody knows how ’22 is going to go. Nevertheless, I can pretty much guarantee it will be interesting. Let’s hope it’s actually interesting in a more entertaining way than the last two years have been.

Join ILB in 2022 for more sex, porn and wanking chat. See you there.

So.

My aim to write more posts in December didn’t happen, did it? I’ve been fairly active on Twitter, but (on account of the fact that I’ve been off work for a couple of weeks now) I was fully aware of the fact that I was in possession of the precious time I need to write blog posts, and wasn’t using it to do so.

So why not?

On Monday the 20th, one day before her eighty-ninth birthday, my Nanna died, suddenly and unexpectedly. CPR administered by my grandfather, mother, uncle and auntie – followed by a team of paramedics who arrived 50 minutes later – managed to recover a faint heartbeat, but she had stopped breathing. A few moments later, quietly, she died.

Grief is an odd thing, and it’s become apparent to me quite quickly that I don’t know how to do it. When I turned up at Nanna’s house that morning, I was the only one of my generation who wasn’t crying. Given the fact that I cry at the drop of a hat, and howled like a banshee when Willow died earlier this year, I spent the day abundantly aware of the fact that I wasn’t doing so. As the one religious person left in the family, I said prayers for her, and that was the closest I got.

I feel sad, and I feel the loss, but I don’t feel inconsolable, like my mother is, and for that reason, I also feel a little guilty – like I’m not sad enough. I don’t know how that works.

Additionally, as a result, I’ve been spending a lot more time with my family. This isn’t a new thing, as my family are all incredibly close. We make very little distinction between siblings and cousins, our houses are within the same mile or each other (and we have keys to all of them) and we spend every single milestone together – however minimal. Birthdays and Christmas, sure, but also anniversaries, graduations, Rogation Sunday, to celebrate my grandfather having his foreskin removed… really, any excuse.

But my generation, in particular, have been leaning heavily on each other this week. We’ve barely spent any time apart, and although it seems awful to say this, I’m enjoying myself. Our priority at the moment appears to be supporting my one remaining grandparent (he met Nanna when they were 15, bunking into a cinema – stay classy, South London – and hasn’t really been apart from her since), who now has to spend the rest of his life in the cavernous semi-detached house full of her stuff… alone. We are trying (and, for the most part, managing) to keep him busy over Christmas.

January will be spent organising a funeral. Amongst other things. I’m meant to be planning a wedding, and I don’t even have the emotional energy to do that.

I haven’t been blogging because I’ve been busy, sure, but also because I have very little to say. I wasn’t even sure if I should mention Nanna’s death on here, but then factored in the fact that I should, because it’s an important event in my life and the public needs to know.

I don’t know what the next step is, and I don’t know how I’m going to deal with it, and how I’m going to display the grief (or even if it will feel like I’m doing so enough), but at this moment I’m just going to let it happen.

Because I really can’t do anything else.

We’ve heard a lot about COVID-19. Even if you have spent the last two years living in a cave on Mars with your fingers in your ears, you almost definitely have been bombarded with news about it. There’s a lot of panic and misinformation around it, but if you can filter out all the waffle, there are some very important messages hidden there.

What nobody tells you is how boring COVID-19 is.

Since testing positive two days ago, my entire life has ground to a halt. I’m being careful – self-isolating and all that – but, even so, it feels like I’m doing much less than I would be doing were I at home for any other reason – say, a weekend. It’s Saturday now, and it took me a while to work that one out.

I’m usually really grateful for the chance to spend a little more time in bed, but it’s less pleasant when lying in bed is accompanied by a pounding headache and far too much heat for November. In order to protect my beloved, I have been lying on the sofa at night while they take the bed – notice how I didn’t say “sleeping”. Sleeping on our sofa is physically impossible.

The nights are unconscionably DULL. Lying there, lacking the energy to move or do anything fun, just waiting for the morning to come. Tick, tock, tick, tock. Why aren’t I sleeping? I’m not well, so why can’t I just sleep through it like I do with every other illness?

And yet when the morning comes there is still nothing to do. I’m not a particularly active person usually, but the fact that I could do something – go to town, shop in London, get some food somewhere (even if I didn’t do any of those) – was always an option. Staying at home was just something I chose to do. Now I have to.

It’s so boring.

I don’t know why. I have plenty of things here at home – Nintendo Switch, Disney+, a huge pile of books. But now I’m stuck here, feeling grotski, I don’t really want to do any of them. Lying awake last night I made plans for what I’d do today, but since they mostly amounted to “make a sandwich”, they seemed more exciting then than they do now.

Am I complaining? Probably. I feel awful, but I’m fortunate enough that my reaction to getting COVID-19 isn’t any worse. I’ve had to cancel a few things – a gig I was going to; a hospital appointment on Monday – but, at the very least, I have a bed and a sofa and a computer all available.

And yet, on any of them, every second is an age.

Tick.
Tick.
Tick.