Listless Days of January

Maybe it is the miserable weather, maybe it is all the depressing stuff in the news (President Trump and the car crash known as Brexit), maybe it is just the time of year, but so far this year I just haven't been able to get into any kind of rhythm.  I'm back in that state of mind where I just can't settle to any particular thing, which is undoubtedly why my posts here have been all over the place.  Perhaps my inability to settle into any kind of routine simply reflects my wider feeling of detachment with regard to work - I feel like I'm in limbo as I count down to my mortgage being paid off completely.  I really don't want to be doing my current job any more, but I feel obligated to stick at it, just to play safe financially, until I'm mortgage-free.  That said, last Saturday I had one of those moments of absolute clarity, when I admitted to myself that there is absolutely nothing about the job that I enjoy any more, nothing which even gives me a sense of professional satisfaction, and that there is nobody I work with that I'd miss if I walked away.  Clearly, I need to start making plans for when the mortgage is paid, so that I can make a clean break from work.  If only I could figure out a way to make money from what I do online, it would be easy.

Anyway, to get back to the point of this post, I thought that, as I can't actually settle to write anything specific, I'd instead tell you about what I plan to do, post-wise, in the near future. (I'm also hoping that by saying I'm going to write these things, my sense of obligation will force me to actually make the posts).  Despite my general feelings of listlessness, I haven't been entirely idle since the start of the year - if nothing else, I've watched a fair number of exploitation movies, which I'll hopefully be writing about here in the foreseeable future.  Most notable amongst these are a pair of sixties British 'shockumentaries', West End Jungle and London in the Raw, which I was given on DVD at Christmas.  Both DVDs also featured a terrific selection of extras, including a number of rare short films on exploitation themes.  There's also a 1970s Italian police thriller, The Cynic, The Rat and The Fist, in the queue to be written up.  I'm also trying to draw up a schedule of further scuzzy exploitation pieces to watch in the coming weeks, which will, hopefully, provide more material for posts.  Away from exploitation films, I still haven't forgotten that model railway locomotive I'm meant to be restoring: I was planning to do some more work on it last weekend, but a bout of severe idleness intervened.  I'm also inching forward with putting together that new compact model railway layout to run the locomotive and other ongoing projects on.  Speaking of these ongoing projects, I'm currently awaiting delivery of a couple of old baggage vans I bought on eBay the other day.  All of which should provide me with more material to post about in the future.