Patience

'If I am a bit narked with you it is because I do not understand your suddenly very tenuous relationship with facts. If it's not inaccurate retellings of the Book of Enoch, it's the repetition of crappy memes with dreadful pseudo historical rubbish about masks! If it's not fake footage at Stanton Bernard, it's an alien face in the woods that any idiot could tell was fake... And then, having lied to me and got me angry, you have the nerve to come back to me later to say that you have 'cheekily' made up a quote from me, by which you mean to say you lied again, only this time not to me, just about me! And like a mug, I try to be helpful and actually give you a quote to stop you making shit up! And you wonder why, on seeing clouds that look like clouds and act like clouds, I am not impressed by your claims that they are UFOs! Really?'

Fair to say I completely lost it with him this time.

I have never been so irritated by my old friend. Then I felt terrible and reassured him that I care for him, but do I? Or is it just our mutual memory of friendship I'm holding on to? We agreed to leave it there for a while, but I feel a bit guilty. R just raises his eyebrows and tells me I'm being manipulated, but he's always quite harsh on the subject of old friend. We have all had our less than honest days, why am I so riled by this?

I guess it's just been building up. I can't help wondering if old friend isn't utterly broke and trying to work social media, become a presence, monetise it; crop circles then orbs, then the Angel Metatron and Prophet Ezekial becoming his spirit guides (Mettykins and Ezzypants, he calls them) and now clouds being UFOs.

I have grown up surrounded by alternative beliefs, they don't freak me out and I don't dismiss them out of hand. Crazy or not - and often not - the people I knew who espoused these beliefs were at least dedicated; if they wanted to talk to me about the Book of Enoch, chances were they had read it. If they were ghost hunters, they wandered round haunted houses, camcorders at the ready. They did the work, and though others might not call it research, none could deny the effort involved. Extended pareidolia is so easy.

Plus it is just possible that I am not the most patient person on the planet...