Madness

      There was a time, not long lost, that madness was simple. The man screaming at the moon was mad. The man eating his own face was mad. The man who held views other than those held to be true by the establishment was mad.
      However, times have since changed. Madness is no longer clearly defined. As mental illness has become better understood the concept of insanity has become outdated, forgotten even. For what is madness? Is it simply believing a tale too strongly? Then is a cult a group of people who believe a tale more than they should? At what point do these people become members of a religion comprised of sane people?
      A person with schizophrenia may at points believe things which they have no cause to, while at other times they know these to be delusions. Is this person sometimes mad and sometimes sane? And who has not at some point believed something they know to be false? Is a mad person is simply someone who does not act rationally then surely all humans are mad.
      The truth of the matter is madness does not exist. As science has advanced the space left for insanity has shrank, to the point it no longer belongs in this world. As with dragons and demons, madness is now a legend of a bygone age, one we are best off leaving forever.

Acting crazy

I love the arts. Music, painting, drawing, dance, writing and many more, but none more so than drama. I really love acting and would like to do it for a living when I'm older. Of course acting for a living is a bit like reading playboy for an education, it seems like a stupid idea. The reason it seems like a stupid idea is because it is one. But to be fair not trying to do what I want to seems like more of a stupid idea.

Last year I finished my drama GCSE a year early (got a B) and since then I haven't really done much acting. At least not conventional acting. As I'm not currently with any theatre group I have to get my acting fix through stranger outlets. Specifically random improvised theatre. Which mostly means changing regular situations strange and generally comedic through acting, normally with an unwitting public audience.

The best example I can think of happened last summer. I was on a residential activity course and they obviously didn't have well planned evening activities as we were doing an egg drop. Someone had drawn a face on the egg and a minute or two later I decided to yell at him (the person who drew on the egg, I didn't yell at the egg itself, though you'll soon see that wouldn't have been that strange) something along the lines of "You're going to kill our son!" I of course got a few strange looks from around the room. I kept trying to convince the father of the egg (for some reason I thought it would make sense for me to be the mum) not to go through with the egg drop. When the time came to send my son up for the drop I think I actually tried to kidnap him from the father. Once he was dropped and of course destroyed as our protective device was rubbish I went more or less into shock. This is when the performance really took off, as another character joined. He hadn't been asked to join, but he really got into it. He took the role of a lawyer who had to deliver the regrettable news that the egg wasn't really my son, it was in fact the son of a chicken. I of course didn't take this news too well, especially when told that the case regarding the right of burial had already gone to court, with the "true" father winning. Apparently the courtroom was made up of poultry, so I never really stood a chance. The whole performance went on for about two hours and brought many cries of "What the hell?"

The reason I bring this story up is that one of the spectators unwittingly gave me one of the greatest compliments an actor can get. She asked the person playing the part of the lawyer if I was insane and actually believed what I was saying. He replied with "Either that or he's a really good actor." Actually convincing someone that I believed what I was saying was a great feeling.

Of course the question remains: Am I a good actor, or am I just insane?

For people interested in seeing more public improv comedy can go to http://improveverywhere.com/missions/

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Nail polish, rotting vegetables and bullets

Everyone has quirks, otherwise life would be boring. But there's a point when someone has so many quirks that it stops making life interesting and starts making it a bit strange. Or completely and utterly insane.

I passed that point many years ago. So let's review some of my quirks.

• I have many collections, mostly of things that I have very little interest in. These include: Stones, miniature clogs, china birds, stamps, china skulls, bells, items about ancient Egypt and a bunch of other stuff that I can't remember right now.
• At home I wear blue crocs, a tie, a denim jacket on top of a leather waistcoat and no shirt.
• I sometimes eat up to 10 large raw carrots in a row, often causing my gums to be in considerable pain.
• I have part of one of my trouser legs pinned up on my wall at school.
• I can often remember parts of films or TV shows that I haven't seen for years word for word. In the past when I've been bored I have watched the whole first episode of Futurama in my head.
• I have my nails painted each Friday.
• I sometimes space out to the point of hallucinations while listening to Pink Floyd.
• I want to be shot before I die (preferably not directly before).
• I keep rotting vegetables in my bedroom. I have a carrot in a jar that's been there for about 2 or 3 years. My current project is a munchkin (a mini pumpkin). It's starting to smell pretty bad. Also, I've named some of them.
• I fancy Johnny Depp. Then again, who doesn't?

That took me five minutes. Given longer I'm sure I could think of many more. At this point I think they're less quirks and more severe personality disorders.