Building work...

Ages years ago I built a rehearsal room and recording studio in my garage. It does the job brilliantly, in fact the whole of The Bophins New Swag was done in there.

It's great to have a musical man cave my bands can use whenever they want, but being a guitarist and IT person I fit that stereotype of not being great at DIY. Also, my brother and I have a genetic disposition to being terrible at that sort of thing. The stories we could tell about the family home back in the day....

So, when it came to do the all important outside wall, I bought in a proper builder.

Being a proper builder he ignored my instructions and missed the concept of soundproofing by building the wall on top of the fake floor and leaving a big hole at the bottom.

My neighbours are great though. We stop at 10pm and no one has ever complained. If you have the windows shut and TV on you can't hear a thing, but we do sometimes have people out by the driveway listening in!

So today 3/4 of The Bophins are going to take down the outside wall and build it again where it should have been.

That's a bass player, guitarist, and singer. What could possibly go wrong?! I'll let you know!!

I think another day of Chris Cornell to work to should be fitting. Such a talent, and I don't really want to comment on the specifics. The saddest part is not ours but with his children and family. As a friend once said of me "You're cursed with a cheery disposition" and I'm always thankful for that, I live in constant hope and always look forward to what's going to happen next, but I work partly in mental health and it's a constant struggle for many, and many who hide it really well. I hate this concept that you shouldn't talk about mental health, that it is some sort of weakness. It's not, it's natural. We're bought up with dreams of greatness (whatever that means) and being told we're special and can do anything, then most of us are pushed into 9 to 5 with bills to pay, never quite enough in our pockets, and it leads to a built in sense of failure. None of us fail. If you manage to get up, to do something, if you have friends, passions, then you've won. All that other stuff means nothing, and others assumed opinions of you mean nothing. Call me a shit guitarist, I don't really care. Compared​ to some I'm shit, compared to others I'm great, but I don't compare myself to anyone, I'm just me and I'm happy with that.

I'll leave with one thought before I go accidentally drill through my fingers (apparently I scream like a girl when I play with the electrics and forget to turn them off first):

There's always someone you can talk to. We are never truly alone. I talk to strangers all the time, and almost without fail they're happy to chat. Reach out if you need to, no one would ever judge or think badly. We're not designed for this world we've created and we all need to find our way, it shouldn't be alone.

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