The furnace is working, for what it is worth.
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I did the homework for today, forgoing sleep and a warm bed (I layer, so even in the very cold, I sleep warm and can kick a foot, arm, or most of my body out to cool if (when, and often) necessary). I did most of the work, but could barely rise after taking a bit of a sleep session. Taking the quiz was not good, I was slow from lack of sleep and exposure (cold does that). Then, I found out homework was not due until Monday! Argggghhhhhhhh! Oh well, I have most of it completed. And, when I came back, the cave was warm. The furnace has been fixed? restarted? who knows. If I can keep it together a few more weeks, I will be done. I was not even able to wake up early enough to make it to physics though, so I did not make it to office hours. I worry about that, a lot.

I must be honest, one of the reasons I want to live as inexpensively as possible (if I am starting a few hobbies and collecting a few guns and magazines and such), is to save up enough for my funeral. I know I will not live long. My high blood pressure and diabetes are oddities, not well controlled by medicine, but abandoning medicine all together will only aggravate that. My hope is to have 10K saved in a year or less just for that purpose. Though I think the V.A. could pay for my funeral (cremation if possible), the way they have been acting, I think they would just say my death is not disability related and refuse to pay. I cannot depend on them and so I will not. I might have 5 years or more, but I am looking at a more practical 1 to 3 year lifespan remaining to me. I will enjoy it as I may though, if I definitely want some money saved for that eventuality.

Often, I feel like I am staving off death. The scene from “Blade Runner”, where the anti-hero puts a square nail through his hand to stave off necrosis in his hand, and his death really, is what life so often feels like for me. School has helped me do that, acting as a square nail if through my mind, but it has become too painful to continue. Fighting this level of exhaustion while trying to run the gauntlet has become a living nightmare, never mind the normal doubts and troubles from this type of work. Just getting out of bed the last week has become a huge chore, again. Staying awake more than a few hours at a time is even a chore more and more frequently. Computer games can help with this, when I am finished with school. They extend my hours awake, if my functional real life abilities decrease from that. The games allow me to stay up 12 hours at a time, or more sometimes, but the rest of my life falls into decay, to put it more simply. With the games, I never actually need to go anywhere or do anything physical other than stay awake and consume something occasionally. I can grind levels or quests with minimal effort, even doing the easier quests or leveling when concentration and such decrease even further. The problem with them is that they are addictive.

Like I said though, two more weeks and I can take a breather and by then I will know whether I need to begin packing fast and heavy or whether I will have to wait for my lease to be completed in August before moving. I am dying, quick or slow, but much quicker than most. I have to hope “sooner” for anything I wish to do. Other than missing school in ways, I do not regret leaving. And, to be honest, I do not regret heading to death. I feel like I have been alive for centuries, millennia even. I feel so very old, so brittle, so battered, bruised, wounded, and heartbroken, that no pain of death of the sort I face, even 2 or 3 days of thirst, will make me reconsider. It is nearing time, if God wills it. Then again, maybe I will just suffer another agonizing age of decades before I go. Who really knows? I pray for neither, actually, though. Then again, God built this corpse to last, if I am weak within it. My feelings and sensations have little to do with the veracity of this body. A curse or a blessing only He knows. I only pray that I may live with and in grace, and die the same, in God’s time. A little rest will be nice, in any case, when school comes to an end. Perhaps I will be able to rise for church a bit more often. God’s house is always a comfort for these old dry bones, tired withered weakened heart, suspicious unsure mind, and spent soul.

But, not to worry. On the way home, I grabbed a few beers. I will goof the rest of this day, sip some Bud, and ponder nothing else. Even when all seems dark, it is not. Even at the end of a road, there are others ways to go. And even in the shadow, one can find a stone upon which to strike a match and enjoy a cigar or pipe. Who can fault that? *laughs*