Now that I have my jobs for the year out of the way I am chipping away at my intention of tidying up my Internet presence. In order to do this the first stage is to edit my blog archive and add tags but more importantly to change the photographs on them. A lot of the older blogs (mostly the ones that originally appeared on MySpace) need embedded Photobucket pictures replacing so that I can delete my Photobucket accounts, and replace any broken links such as YouTube videos that have been taken down. Reading through the old blogs is a little weird; it’s as if I’m reading about someone else. I am currently in March 2009 and my relationship with Mandi is still in its infancy, Emily is a child, and I am yet to make a mark in my chosen career. The blogs aren’t even written daily although they start to appear on a more regular basis.

It is going through the old blogs that has made me more determined to kick myself up the arse a bit next year as I do feel that time is running out for me now. I keep finding references to projects that are still on my to-do list even today and some that I don’t even recognise. To find what the children’s story was that I was writing in 2009 will require a serious excavation of my notes and drawers if I have kept any evidence of it to start with. Maybe I should have thought of the PayPal button a lot longer ago than I did, because then I might have at least ticked a few things off my list.

My life was completely different in many ways back in 2009; so much so that I’m glad I started writing the blog so that I can go back and remember events. Sadly I didn’t keep detailed notebooks and desk diaries like those that I do now so I don’t know what half of these things mentioned in the blog are. When I refer to ‘the book’ for example, or a line I found today in which I pitched an idea to Trent FM. What I pitched to Trent FM I can only wonder about as they were only a ridiculous ‘same six songs, all days long’ station that no longer exists. These days I keep a box file of scraps of paper and Post-It notes containing abandoned ideas that will perhaps one day be revisited, and these scraps are all dated so this will never happen again.

I had only been with Mandi for four months at the time of the old blogs and I note that one of the biggest changes in my life was on the horizon and the impact on Mandi would not occur to me straight away. Mandi didn’t meet a workaholic writer, broadcaster, and all-round media Jack of all trades, master of none in November 2008 – she met someone with ambition in that direction. I wasn’t even working in radio at this point, that wasn’t to happen until 2010, which is when things changed somewhat. This is why I can understand why Mandi gets pissed off with me for not spending enough time with her, because the person she met and fell in love with had all the time in the world to spend with her so when I eventually started to build up my profile neither of us noticed at first.

I can only imagine where I would be if I hadn’t met Mandi, or indeed had met her but it hadn’t worked out. We met online and I had previously had a handful of disasters on that score so was prepared for Mandi to be a far different person in real life than she was on the Internet. Mandi has supported me on my slow but moderately successful climb up the ladder which of course I am grateful for considering I had such a late start, or rather a four year enforced break while I was married. The true Sliding Doors question for me to contemplate is how much better my life would have turned out if I had never met the woman I married and ended up more of a prisoner than a husband to. It makes my skin crawl just thinking about it to be honest, and although I am no longer in touch with her and wouldn’t know where to find her, part of me wishes I could have one more conversation with her to enable me to tell her what is happening in my life.

===

My daily blog can be delivered straight to your Kindle for 99p a month (link)

Listen to The Sunday Alternative here

My Sherwood Radio archive is here, why not listen and donate?

All donations received via the PayPal button above will be used to fund creative projects such as podcasts, short films, documentaries, comedy sketches and a whole lot more. You are under no obligation of course, but thanks in advance if you do drop something in the pot.