I don't blog much these days, the past few months have been quite different compared to when I first came here. Gone are the heaps of snow, graffitied walls and dead silence, replaced with dozens of cars, sunny weather and screaming children, yes the Summer is indeed here and it's...all right.
As I've said in previous blogs, I knew the Summer was going to busy on Gotland and since I live by the seaside there was no way to escape it. This place is one of the biggest tourist destinations in Sweden and I have prepared myself for the hundreds of people that come here from places like Germany, Norway, Denmark and Holland.
Everyday I would look out of my bedroom window and see and empty carpark with a beach and a swingset and I always wondered "...tourists come HERE?" I couldn't understand the hype of this place until around June, when suddenly flowers were blossoming and wildlife was everywhere. It was then that I realised that this place was no ghost town, this place was full of life!
Progress wise, things have slowed down a bit as was expected - however, I've managed quite well, indeed..very well if I do say so myself. I'm extremely proud of how I've coped with the amount of people right on my doorstep and I understand how the people who live here feel in the Summer. These tourist do tend to invade the local's privacy to an extent and you can see it on their faces that they're not too pleased about it, but the tourism and that cement factory is what keeps Gotland afloat (no pun intended) so it's the nature of the beast.
My walks have been cut down a bit, but I'm happy just to get out of the house really. They can last for 30-60 minutes but not really much more than that, I do feel quite vulnerable here this time of year but like I said, I'm managing.
The tourists are certainly...interesting. They don't really bother anyone alot but we have come across some posh cunts, ignorant twats and overexcited teenagers who act like they've never seen a beach before which is actually quite amusing. They're on their holiday so who am I to put a dampner on it? I just find it funny. Lisa does too, infact she overheard a conversation that went something like:
"Where do you think the people that live here work?"
"Oh I don't know, probably in that factory."
"Ah yes, most likely."
When Lisa got home and told me that conversation I just laughed at their stupidity and ignorance.
Last week was Stockholm Week...I don't know what it is, don't ask, but for some reason a bunch of people from Stockholm come to the island and party for a week. Lisa has told me about this a few times in the past before I came here...she doesn't really like the partying Stockholmers much at all, she says they're..and I quote:
All assholes
Have I ever told you how much I love her? Haha.
Yeah, some came to Slite and kept the whole town up with their "hilarious" antics. One of the more interesting things that did happen that week though was a car show..or something. We're not entirely sure what it was but, a shitload of fancy cars, old and new, drove around Slite and probably most of the island, we videoed some of it and are working on a project to do with that. That was pretty cool.
In other news I'm still Eurovision crazy, Lisa and I, on a whim, decided to buy the past 3 years DVDs and CDs! I know...mental. We liked them, not as much as this year's though, infact we watched the first semi final of this year's last night and we were blown away! We love it! I guess all couples have their little things that they love to do or watch together, it's all fun.
I'm still shit with people, even family, heck, even friends. I just don't know how to act or what to say and I'm stumbling quite a bit on my words. My memory has been extremely poor lately aswell, maybe I'm getting like my mum but I don't know, I'm getting distracted by small things and they overpower what's happening around me. For example, today was weird, I was on the laptop checking my Facebook and things and I asked Lisa if she could find my phone for me, anyway 5 minutes later I close the laptop and get up off the couch only to find that my phone was in my pocket, I thought this was strange...but it turns out that while I was checking my stuff on the laptop, Lisa had found my phone passed it to me and I'd put it in my pocket myself, I couldn't remember anything about this at all. These things are happening more and more frequently. We do have a theory about why this is happening though.
If you've read my Autism blog then you'd know all about my obsessions, particularly the guitar. A couple of weeks back the power supply to my FX pedal decided to...not work and for days we tried to find one online but Sweden are completely out of stock and importing one from England would be extremely costly so fuck that. In the end we have decided to wait for it to get in stock over here and that's where we currently are with that. It doesn't end there though, I believe the increase in memory loss and other odd behaviour is down to "guitar withdrawals" I know it sounds crazy but it's the only solution we can think of. Now, I don't have the shakes and I don't have crazy eyes, but I do feel that there is a feeling of emptiness in me that I can't explain, it's a bit of a sad feeling for me and I just wish I could play my electric again! I just feel extremely stressed without it to be honest, it was the one thing that really calmed me down. Along with the mental stress there's also the physical implications of not playing electric guitar, my wrist doesn't feel right, my fingers are starting to soften and my elbow is a bit sore. "Why don't you play your acoustic?" Well, I do, alot...but it's not the same, my strumming and picking technique is different with both electric and acoustic so it can't really be helped. It'll sort itself out in due course I'm sure.
One thing about my Autism that Lisa and I have discovered is that I have the ability to remember what key a song is in on the guitar without listening to it for an unlimited amount of time. Okay, that basically means that if you ask me for instance what key a song is in, I wouldn't have to listen to that song there and then, it's in my mind and all I need is a guitar or a piano to tell you what key it's in. Complicated I know, especially for people who don't understand keys, chords, notes and rhythm, but in the music world it's quite rare to have that ability. Wooo!
Well, I couldn't think of anything else to talk about (thank God, this has gone on long enough lol). Sorry for my all-over-the-place style but, it's just some thoughts that I figured would be good to jot down, I do it for myself mainly, like a diary, but I often get messages from people telling me they've read it and then we have a conversation about whatever subject matter I tend to delve into here. It's nice to see that people are interested and even if they weren't, I'd still write. Maybe this could replace my electric guitar for the time being? Maybe.
'Till next time...
