Wildewire

Homophobia bothers me ("no shit Sherlock"!). LGBT people are a convenient scapegoat for everything everywhere from economic woes to natural disasters, but I am perhaps irrationally most disappointed by black homophobia. I expect black people to know better than to jump on the band-wagon of persecuting a group because they're different. But I know that is ridiculously naive: look at the history of the Jewish people and how they treat the Palestinians in the land they stole from them now they have the power to do some of what was done to them to someone else. That Christianity fuels so much black homophobia is equally galling. I do not presume to challenge let alone denigrate anyone's religious beliefs, but even the most cursory glance a the history of Africa (and Asia and South America etc) reveals "bringing the "Christian" message" as an excuse for the most inhuman atrocities. Yet it is homosexuality that is presented as an evil import from ...

On Monday, I move into  new offices in the city centre with two colleagues, to properly launch the project I started in 2011. The rent is cheap, the offices are minutes from the central station and run by two guys with a vision and limited experience- we (and other tenants) are committed to supporting them in return for the low rent. Our approach (to culture-based community development) is to develop an association of freelance creative professionals able to offer a range of skills for specific projects whilst keeping a small and versatile admin group to maintain the organisation between projects and secure funds and resources for future activities.   We start by offering admin, fund-raising and project management services to organisations and then by pitching projects that match our own skills sets, we develop by identifying freelance professionals with additional skills who are willing to work with us. We contact Associates offering them work, if they don't want to/ can'...

Having blocked him on Facebook, I thought the guy I'd been dealing with recently would have got the message, but two text messages yesterday smashed that illusion. The first was worryingly petty and irrational, whilst the second was a grovelling apology for the first that sought sympathy for his emotional state. My response was to clearly and firmly tell him to leave me alone, to stop trying to tell me what 'my problem' is and for him to expend that energy on himself. He tried to attack everything he thinks he knows about me and to present me as a failure in all aspects of my life. He attacked me for the failure of our relationship, completely failing (again) to acknowledge that the problems we encountered surfaced when I finally accepted that he had no intention of fulfilling what he said he would and reacted to that. To read his messages, you would imagine I had put HIM through months of hellish abuse. There was something in his observations about how I seem to let ...

Well, the potential suitor proved not to have matured with age and was blatantly attempting to string me along - or was fooling himself, about seriously contemplating a move to Newcastle. The number of 'slips' he made wasn't even funny by the end. I was as clear as I could be consistently telling him I didn't want a "long distance relationship" and listed the reasons they have never worked for me and are not attractive to me. I made it clear that if sex was the sole motivation it would not satisfy me- I can get sex in Newcastle whenever I want it pretty much, why should I wait for the occasional visits of a peripatetic partner? He visited last week end and it was soon clear we were on different pages. The weekend visit is the worst experience of the Long Distance Relationship in my opinion as so much tends to get crammed into a short amount of time usually when both really need to chill. On the Saturday I was made to wait for hours whilst he was "doin...

Lots of things are 'about to happen' for me, which is quite exciting. Perhaps most of them won't come to fruition, but it is an interesting feeling to be experiencing so much "dandy potential". On the work front: I have persuaded two colleagues who have been suffering wage-slavery at the hands of ...'inadequate' bosses that their lot would be better working collaboratively as freelance independents, with me. They agreed and a project I have been developing for over a year finally received the "partnership funding" we required to release the grant we were awarded last year so it can get going this month. We've started negotiations with a client who approached me for fund-raising and business development support and who have cheap offices for rent in the city centre. We're also galvanised to revisit the project we did last year: Centrelink  to both complete the project along the lines we described in the final report to funders AND to s...