As part of my therapy i have to visit public places and try to engage in random conversations.

Well a few weeks ago I went to a nearby pub, and I took my iBook, at first I plonked the bag on a solitary table and went to grab some ale.  On returning some old guy had appeared at the adjacent table and mumbled to me that he was concerned because there was a bag left on its own and he thought it might be a bomb, hoping he was joking I just went “oh, haha yeah.”  So I sat down and fudged around with the iBook, trying to connect to the cloud network that was supposed to be available at the establishment.  Then the old guy started mumbling at me again, not only did he mumble incoherently but he also liked to randomly insert “fuck”, which I find quite offensive when from ppl I’m not acquainted with, (make a note of that.) So he clocked the laptop and started sounding off, educating me about W3C web standards.  Turned out he was some retired teacher or lecturer in the area of I.T.  ‘Cept his brain had obviously gone to pot.

He went all weird on me and said he was gonna do a big favour, despite the fact that my contribution to his life have been zero and that I was trying to ignore him because he smelt rotten.  He continued being vague about this pearl of wisdom or whatever it was he was going to bestow upon me.  He then brought out of a pocket a flash drive and gave it to me, whilst shuffling around nervously, mumbling some more about how the contents of this thing was going to help me on my journey of self-fulfilment.  He continued this for some time, telling me his name was “Toe-Knee”, which I know because he pointed to his toes, and then his knee.

Finally, he departed the pub so I stuck the flash drive in the iBook to have a butches and it was full of warez.  It wasn’t even good warez, it had Photoshop 7 and some old version of office and some crappy anti-virus apps.  What struck me though however was that it was all Windows stuff. despite the fact that I had been sitting there with a Mac.  I was supposed to return this to him once I had gleened all I need from it, despite not knowing who he was or where he lived.  I just left it on the table and left he pub.

And you see, this is why I don’t like “people”.  The general public if you will.  Because, even though this guy was harmlessly dumb and senile, I was shaking throughout the encounter.

This week CBT is heating up, I had to visit some kind of enthusiast group. We chose a local photography club because I have a passing interest and also because this week some slide show was scheduled so I would be able to sit back for the most part.

So I stressed and stressed about it, spun between bottling out and going..what..the..heck about 200 times.  Luckily when the time came to set off I was in the what..the..heck phase.

Hmm, well from the CBT perspective it was quite a success.  Sure I felt pretty hot and bothered and couldn’t relax, but at least I went and managed to get inside.

Rather interestingly the club has been going for over 150 years , unfortunately so had most have the people there.  OMG it was full of pensioners!  I was at least half the age of the next youngest person there!

Still, I’ve been celebrating/recovering from the ordeal by getting drunk.  I now feel sick.

My therapy homework for this week is to spend 5 minutes per day browsing a small store (not a large supermarket). Bet that sounds ridiculous.

I’m not sure I understand Open ID anymore. I had come to know of it as a protocol (in effect) allowing you to identify yourself via your closest, or most prized internet presence. So you can identify yourself via your blog. For instance I have an openid server plugin installed on my wordpress blog, so whenever I see a site which accepts an OpenID login, I simply point to my own blog and because I’m already logged in to my blog via a cookie, most of the time I won’t even have to issue a password. But now it seems that openid identities are being created by people outside of their primary internet presence, using public openid servers. I dunno, but this just seems to miss the point. Or maybe I never knew the point.

The calendar flicked over t0 march today meaning that virgin media’s carriage rights for sky’s standard channels expired.  It’s pretty funny, the channel number for sky one has been hijacked and replaced by a Virgin branded VOD commercial.  Another, Sky News has been replaced by a hillarious pun, the channel is now called “Old Sky Snooze” and is a static message spooling off that same memo signed by richard branson.

It’s all so odd.  It was only a week or so ago that are Telly was still just Telewest and it was all so friendly and inoffensive.

More therapy comes my way.

I was first promised CBT (Cognitive Behavioural Therapy) from the NHS in August 2005, but as we know they love their waiting lists.  It took until last week for them to get back to me and give an appointment.  The first of which I had yesterday and is looking kinda promising.  The pay as you go counselling I had been having I stopped a while ago because it was too much just like a cosy chat, I need someone a bit more aggressive.  I’ve gotten another woman, but this NHS specimen is a total battle-axe, she remind s me of a school head-mistress.  Scary!  Don’t get me wrong, she’s considerate and understanding.  It’s a good mix so i’m positive she might have more luck encouraging me to face my fears.  CBT’s all about exposure and shitz, that you have to force yourself to do the stuff you can’t stomach to condition your brain not to become anxious.

I don’t like it!   But I have to