The Psychedelic Lady

So we’re finally here at the tail end of 2011. A year which has seen us frail and feckless humans stagger from crisis to crisis, lurching drunkenly through the year. Annus horribilis would not, in my opinion, be an inappropriate description. Riots, civil unrest, violence and economics once again threatening to destroy modern civilisation, it’s been a bit of a shit one if I’m honest. But as ever there is always the faint and guttering light at the end of the tunnel that is hope. Hope that next year will be better, that next year we’ll do things right, that this will be the year we’ll all pull together and make the world a better place. Inevitably that won’t be the case, but it’s nice to hope. Hope keeps you going.

I expect that, as I write this, a lot of you will be donning your glad rags for a night of revelry, drinking, debauchery and the fabrication of embarrassing moments that, come the dawn of 2012, you’ll want to pretend never happened. As for me I’ll be spending the evening in a darkened room, treating tonight like I would any other night: whiling away the hours until bed through a form of procrastination that I have elevated to a high art. It will also be the first time I’ve spent new year’s eve sober in nearly a decade, I’m sure this will prove to be a spectacularly novel experience. In the intervening period between now at the tolling of those twelve strikes at midnight it’s time to draw a line beneath December’s Pictonaut challenge.

The picture for this month was an image by Sho-u Tajima called Not That Kind of Girl. For this month’s wordascopes it was given the name of The Psychedelic Lady. It proved to be one of those wordasopes that, although I had ample idea as to what I wanted to write about, was a real pain to translate into the written word. I only finished it at about 6pm tonight. It certainly needs a good going over to tighten up the prose, but this is a luxury that time does not currently afford me. I’m not totally happy with it, especially not the ending, it kind of just peters out into a drab, shitty, nothingness. Admittedly a drab, shitty, nothingness with some fairly nice descriptions, even so it’s still a bit naff. But as I am wont to say “It’ll do.”

Once again there’s a trio of stories for your perusal from the Pictonaut stalwarts. They all involve drugs at least on some level, but they’re all very, very different beasts.

Ali George – People change

Andrew Blair – The ramblings of a drug addled mind

The Rogue Verbumancer – A man seeks answers

Tonks – A Perfect Moment

Tomorrow will see the beginning of the first Pictonaut challenge of 2012, so until then I wish you all a happy new year and a night filled with so much alcohol that come tomorrow you wish you were if not dead, then at least in a coma.

Remember to check out #pictonautchallenge for updates, information, and links.