Mitch Winehouse, crooning and more summer madness

So I was right. Mitch Winehouse now releases an album. On the back of his daughter's success. Am I being hypocritical here? I mean, I've written a book on the back of my mad son. Is it the same? He'll probably earn far more than me, though. However, money was never the issue. Or fame. Or vicarious 'life.' I wish him luck with the record but do we really need another crooner?


What I do get irritated about though is Mitch's denial of Amy's mental health problems. He invariably harks onto her 'drugs' issues, without ever consciously debating the reasons as to why she uses drugs in the way that she does. And booze. She's hasn't released an album for four years now. Isn't it about time, considering just how 'well' she is?


Zach spent a week with Beth. He had fun. He went to the beach. He spent time in a pub where he met up with a couple of Polish guys who spend their annual holidays in Tel Aviv; they love it there. Beth was working full time, as was the rest of the family. So, considering his money, Zach came home early. The weather's good. The days are long. The nights shorter. He just broke up with the girlfriend. So I'm only ever slightly concerned. You know, the summer haziness.

I wonder whether the summer haziness affected the Cumbrian who just murdered twelve on a spree in the Lake District. Reports said that, worried as he was about his fragile mental state, he went along to the local hospital looking for help but that he was rebuffed. Does this, if it is true, really surprise me? No, not really. What, after all, are hospitals for? It's not the first time, and won't be the last, that someone who really knows better than those in triage that there's something fundamentally and seriously wrong with his mental state and who begs for aid be turned away. How many times have I written about this already? How many more times will it occur?


So Mitch is plugging away and relishing more newsprint, now fixed on him, while Amy does - what Amy does. And we watch while the glittering sun sheds its dangerous light on the vulnerable bi-polarity of the mentally ill and only hope that it doesn't give way for despair.