Sleep, naps, relaxation.

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I am not certain about that last, relaxation.  I'm always a bit tight, internally.  Even if I don't exhibit the signs as some do, in grumpiness or such.  I am always ready, if there is little I can do.  I have enjoyed the sleep.  Cool weather, as Jean suggested, has helped with that.  And, when wanted, I simply took naps as if I had a right to them.  They are wonderful little snippets.  I won't say they have allowed me to feel more rested.  I am tired whether I sleep, nap, jump, or shout.  But perhaps naps allow a more mental, or a slight physical, readiness.  Whatever.  I took naps at my leisure, not trying to burn through the days staying conscious like a good little drone. 

Tomorrow it is back to planning, tinkering, doing, and whatnot.  Being a weekend, it should be an easy intro.  I am not even going to think about what to do, I am STILL on vacation, I'll worry about worrying then.  Just so you know I haven't died, that is what this post is about.

I have finished BioShock 2.  And, really, I think it was a good game.  In some ways it had greatness attached to it.  While not an epic game, it was rather lengthy.  It was extremely well made, written, and voice acted.  For that alone it would get a solid A.  But for the content, creative thought that went into the story and art, and just the oddness, uniqueness, the game gets boosted to A+.  I would give it more but that is all there is.  Simply, I didn't have programming flaws to contend with.  I didn't have to worry about the game working, at all.  I didn't fall through floors, I didn't have to perpetually restart the console, I didn't lose or get corrupted save files.  That is coming from someone, who when I first started playing the game, I wasn't sure I wanted to play it.  It was so... foreign, in concept.  Oh, and on top of that, I was not forced to do things I didn't want to do in order to get all the trophies.  I really despise 'moral choice' games that offer no choice in order to gain all the trophies.  Like I said, all I can give it is an A+, or I would give it more.

I have started Skyrim.  It is, potentially, quite buggy.  They have patched the thing for PS 3 twice or more.  And I still have my doubts.  I remember the games in the title before it.  Even on computers they could be quite difficult.  Memory problems, or something, glitch the whole thing.  I hope, unlike some other games, when a save is corrupted it doesn't corrupt all of the save files.  Whoever programmed that mess should be fired and expelled from his profession.  I have hit my first glitch or two.  After many hours of playing though, well...  And I do give continent-sized games some wink-and-nod.  It is simply impossible to have that much going on and not have some problems, overlaps, and the rest (which should be a clue to "scientific modelers" out there.  This, even with all variables accounted for absolutely, means that in a real model... it is fail.

Skyrim is pretty good, so far.  It is on the edge of too hard, playing at the default (medium) setting.  And the game scripts death to simply drop on you.  Unfortunately it also allows unscripted random to continue as well.  I'll work it out, but it isn't a favorable thing.  A dragon dropping in on my, on a mountainside, where I have to flee to where I can get to level ground in order to simply try (and probably lose at my level, they aren't supposed to drop until 15th level), fine.  I'll try that.  But don't add in a half dozen random encounters on my way back from where I just came with a four independent, potentially lethal, encounters!  Clear those scripts.  Meh, these things fix themselves.

I am learning by reading a bit, but mostly by playing.  I simply can't focus to read much.  When I can, I grab a snippet or two.  But the game is so massive, and the patches have rendered former good advice to the trash bin.  So getting the 'straight dope' takes almost as much care as trying to figure out what these OCD game advisers are trying to say with their garbled fifth grade writing skills!  Hmm, someone is a tadge grumpy today, innit?  *grins*

Hey, back to the game.  Enjoy a wonderful Friday, or just... find a can to kick.  Make it a light one, if a sore foot adds to the wonder of unhappiness. 

How odd. Vacation you say?

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With nothing to concentrate upon I find myself shutting down.  Here it is, 20:15, and I may be going to bed.  My mind isn't spinning it's wheels trying to figure out how to... do anything.  I will simply allow sleep and wakefulness to happen as they will.  I have never been a lay-about, per se.  While my flesh sometimes commands rest, and sometimes I have chosen a bit more sleep if I believed it necessary, I generally rise as soon as I can, spiffy or not.  My guess is that will be true even on my vacation.  Some things will not change, cannot change.

The difference between now and any time before in my life is huge.  I am finally to a place, disability and all, where I can truly rest a bit.  I don't own a house, I have a home.  I am not religious, I am on the path to salvation.  I don't have enough to eat, I have stores of food should they be needed.  None of it is perfect, or finalized, nor will it be until I am laid to peace for my part and within this world.  But the clarity of simply living, enjoying, doing...  I finally have it, here on earth, and in preparation for the big time.  I wonder how much good I can do here, in what time is left?  For I am truly rich in all ways that matter to me, I have been blessed with a unique form of wisdom, and I am a master of my illness in that I live with it not against it.  Even pain and suffering have uses at this point.

I never thought I would bring a bit of heaven to earth.  I didn't think it was possible.  But I tell you, that is what I have done.  Not without Graces, for sure I did not know heaven of my own accord.  Not without leaning on God like a lame man leans on his crutch.  Not without many people bolstering me in ways I would never have imagined.  But... I see clearly that is how it was meant to be and how it will be, always.  Though I do believe, in time, after heaven, we will be given much of that to own.  Children of God, all grown up.  But... that is just a possibility, if a probability.  While I look forward to that day, I do not let one day go without enjoying it here and now.  Almost, in a way, as if I was allowed to go back to the gentler, more ignorant and innocent days of grade school.  By coming back I get to be sentimental about life, but as I live it.  It is interesting, to me, as I think about it this way.

Yes, rest.  I think I shall sleep quite well tonight.  Tomorrow and the next day might find me casting about for something useful to do with this newfound oddity called free time.  I might even try my hand at reading again?  I wonder about model building?  Perhaps a puzzle?  It has been so long since I haven't been so focused on getting to things that...  Well, we will see.  Good night.

The first day off.

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It feels odd not to be pushing to get something done.  Oh, there are things I could be pushing to do.  Dishes and laundry need work, I still need to speak with the people at the hospital about a bill they billed incorrectly, there are dozens of things I could be pushing.  As I said though I need time off from pushing.  Regardless how successful or not pushing is at any time, I have spent months, years, decades, pushing.  Since I was accomplishing little I didn't ever think I should stop pushing, ever.  I have changed my mind.  No, not a permanent stoppage of effort.  I merely need to take a few days off once or twice a month.  I AM getting older.  I have always been ill.  I have never learned how to... simply relax.  I am not even sure that is possible.  But I am going to start giving that a chance.

Sleep for the last two nights has been very good.  Yesterday sleep was broken with a call, but that was fine.  I slept later than usual (in my recent sleep history) for some reason.  Today I woke at 14:00 or 15:00, and easily.  Heck, I'm dressed and ready for... a day of relaxation.  I just don't know what to do on a day of relaxation!  I... simply haven't ever had a day where I wasn't planning something, when I have been aware enough to think.  What... do you do on such days?  I am a bit lost.  Oh, I'll figure something out.

Once the last two pieces of gear, and the year supply of grain arrives, I will be backing down on stocking up.  I will complete the storage, try to arrange it and begin putting it into rotation.  I will begin using the devices for those ends, such as grinding my own wheat and canning meats, as well.  But for the most part, my job will be nearly at an end.  Yes, I may, more slowly, add to stocks as I use them.  And I will look to other needs as time goes by.  There are circles yet to be squared.  And I would like to figure out minor medical training, getting into communications, and possibly welding.  As well as the stock and equipment for those.  But... 

I have read where some in the prep community "feel sorry" for those of us who are like, at best, poor house pets.  The thing is, given my health, I am doing quite well if I will only ever be about that good.  I am not sure what some people expect from others?  Do they expect us to go live in a mountain top commune, like what David Koresh wanted to create?  Seriously, more than having some tools, some food, some this, some that, and the equipment by which to utilize it, there is only so much people can do.  Some of us possibly less than that.  What I have done is a miracle for my health.  It does make me angry at such people.  But I realize they are deluded.  Even if they are as prepped as they think they should be?  It won't be enough.  If these are the end times, or even the end of society as we knew it, there is no way to prep enough.  All of their preps will be as of nothing before the naked faces of the four horseman or their fellow man turned into a mob.  And while I appreciate their zeal, I believe they may have... lost something along the way.

Well, onto my day off.  Yeah, even I grin at the notion.  And while it is true in ways you could never understand simply by looking 'at the numbers'.  If you know me at all, half so well as you may think, you know that this is... a big first.  This is a sea change.  I am not sure if I can handle three days of it, but... that's the... plan.  It's okay to have it as a plan, since I planned it before my days off?  I should have been a lawyer, but I hate the profession.  Yes, yes, I have some friends who are, too.  So shush.  It's the profession I hate, much like a sin... not the people.

Later.

Late, but bearing gifts.

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I simply could not move fast enough to grab edibles and be there on time.  With traffic as it was, and an accident or two to navigate on the way, I was even later.  And, instead of taking food since I didn't think I would, I ended up running into two convenience stores (one did not sell beer due to it's proximity to a school, if that law has changed, company policy is slow to catch up... yeah... I ask questions), I did buy some beer and snacks.  Again, no one ate.  Though it is difficult to eat in a meeting where we are really involved with plans, hopes, dreams, and sorting these things out.  There is a notion that having an half hour social hour before the meeting might be the way to go.

Late, as I said.  Very late, a good 20-30 minutes.  Now our meetings often go three hours, so...  Though that may be changing, with officers meeting either on another night to sort out what will be brought to the general members for voting and further discussion or such.  But bearing jewels (officer jewels for the stations of leadership) and food and drink, plus a KoC flag, softened the blow.  Still, they don't like late comers.  I would have skipped save I had to... show up and at least represent the office I co-hold with another man.  So bearing shame is the price of office at times.  Oh, since the group will provide the flagstaff and stand, I didn't ask for any returns.  That money would have just gone for the flagstaff and stand anyway, so...

I also, again, in the full group, let it be known that I would be more than willing to start calling lapsed members, as the retention officer.  I am hoping, if that is successful though, that we can get a larger room for our meeting.  As is we are in a small classroom.  Ten guys in there pretty much eat up the oxygen and heat the place like a sauna.  In any case, it looks like this will be going forward.  I need to contact one of the officers in about two weeks.  Until then he is quite busy.  Fair enough, and I have marked it in my smartphone calendar.  I have all day of little or nothing.  And while I can't do what others can, I can call men and discuss... whatever.  I have no intention of being a bully.  I hate that type of call.  But if I can be a friend, let them know we could use them and miss their fellowship, and maybe get to know a few of the guys...  I would enjoy that.  Whether they return to the meetings or not.  Oh, and I expect some... awkward calls.  I know what it is to hide myself. 

I see the KoC not as a 'social group' but as the engine for real charitable work.  I see it as a device.  And while I definitely enjoy the company of fellows who I hope are on the same or a similar path, that isn't the majority of it, just a fruit off the tree.  I will do what I can to grow that tree.  I hate to say it, but the Church is, and maybe always was, more for women.  I still need to go more often, true, if that isn't quite the issue.  There needs to be a place for men.  We are doers, thinkers, planners, makers.  We are actionable.  And, no doubt, women not only can be but are, they are in a much more passive... different... manner.  Men need our own pasture lands within the confines of the Church, and this is it.  A place were we can be productive, creative, entrepreneurial, for a common good.  Charity not at the end of a gun, like taxes and redistribution.  And we can choose who receives through means that make sense.  Yes, the engine must be primed, stoked, fired.  Oil must be checked, drive train checked, and finally it will produce. 

Next meeting the recorder will be absent.  He has asked me to fill in for him, so I told him I would.  It was murder getting to this meeting, but perhaps my sleeping patterns will have altered enough that this won't be as much of an issue next month as this month.  I simply couldn't get going, and woke up so very late to boot.  Ah well, I did what I could.  And it was appreciated.

Hmm, off to... tinker.  The meetings always fill my mind with all the business related to charity events, regulating money, making contacts and appointments, and meeting needs as a group, an individually, and personally.  I need time to relax, to come down.  That can take a long time, almost as bad as when I physically heat up.  Meh, it's all good.

Gah! Who turned the sun on?

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No, really.  I was sleeping along quite nicely today when something started buzzing, alarming the heck out me in my nice little slumbering retreat from reality.  It took me a while to wake enough to figure out where the problem, or even what the problem, was.  Ah, my cellphone, on mute.  It vibrates like a... well... a vibrator I suppose.  But it sounds more like a bee, a big one.  Anyway, by the time I did all that, unplugged the thing, got it to within viewing distance and realize what it was all about, the call ended... of course!  It is amazing how hard it can be to figure out how to unplug something coming from such a far away place sometimes... I feel like a newborn babe when waking like that, often.

It turns out I am needed at the KoC meeting.  I had hoped to be there tonight anyway, I have some gifts to deliver.  And, while I had hoped to be there as a long-standing plan, I really didn't think I would be able to make it tonight, as a shorter term understanding.  Still, I called my fellow warden back to let him know I would be there.  Why?  Because.  Really, too, I need and want things that demand of me what I would not otherwise give.  A wife?  Kids?  I don't have those yet.  But I do have this group and Church.  I have been falling down this summer, but... this... I will do this.  It only took four phone-calender warnings and two phone calls to get me to go, plus need.  *sigh*  Yeah, God really has to work with me to get me going.

On another front, I looked over some of what D.C. suggested, including a propane camp grill.  And, actually, with some thought, I think that is workable.  While I don't like not being able to use it indoors, I think with my back walled-in (always walled-in) porch area, with it's own door to the rest of the house and many windows, if it was truly cold and snowy outside I could use that area, with the windows open, for the camp stove.  I also didn't like the little cans of propane.  Those things are monster expensive.  So... I looked a bit and found an 8' hose that would transfer to a #20 tank (typical grill sized tank) and a leader poll that would transfer up to three connections from tanks to whatever propane appliances might require it.  Plus, I looked for a propane lantern.  Okay, that puts the canner back into contention for the next short-term item... if the sale lasts long enough for me to check my finances.  I say short-term because propane would go exceedingly fast in a grid-down, with no way to refill.  Gah!  Double Bah!  and some other stuff.  I am running, but on empty, confused, alone, and cold...  But I think I am getting closer. 

Life is such a nagging thing, no matter how beautiful.  Like a wife, or a mountain top, or anything else that offers great things, there is all the work to make it so.  Still, the vastness of the beauty of love I saw while dead makes it so much easier.  I sort of got a sneak preview, and a lesser one at that.  But I tell you, if what I saw was the lesser form...  This time, I will not be satisfied with it.  I will do my homework.  While I can't get an A+, with the right teacher there is no need.  I still have to do my part, be a saint, impossible without the Grace of God, but...  The work is harder, the way is narrower, the castigation may be the mortal end of me.  All good.  I wouldn't trade even what I saw for everything available on earth, even if they took away all the bad that comes with so much of the "good".  This mortal life, even this planet, only last just... so... long.  There is eternity.  Then again, it isn't about what I could get there or here.  It was the symphony of true love I felt there.  It was knowing good, without a doubt, there.  It was... is... the only home I have ever known.  Which sort of means I am stranded here.   But I can bring a little of that here, within the confines of my fallen flesh into the realm of fallen men in a fallen world, albeit.  Perhaps this, and just being patient with things as they are for me, is a form of pennance?  A second chance?  So I try to relish it.  Mustard, strong, if you please.  :p

Hey, I best get showered and on the road.  Be good, be right, believe that there is truth, and know you can be a party to it.  Never stand in simple or complex Truth's way.  Good day.

All right, time to think.

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I had to check my last order, the year supply of grains and legumes, from Emergency Essentials.  It has been placed.  I haven't heard that it has been shipped yet though.  Which is fine, as long as it eventually gets here.  Just... like I said... I'm a bit itchy about things.  Something(s) is/are terribly wrong.  It isn't my health, although that isn't doing really well.  I have been rather laid up.  No, this is just a sense that things are very potentially about to go very wrong in and everywhere sort of way.  Too many people are out of work.  Too much is going on in the Middle East.  Our government seems to only get in the way when it is wrong and steps out of the way for the wrong people and ideas.  Too many things are hanging by threads.  When one big thing drops, lots of little things and possibly even other big and bigger things will drop.  That is just the way it is.  We haven't seen this kind of intensity since the worst parts of the Cold War.  The stakes are the same but there are too many players, actors, and problems to make a good accounting.

I have been looking at the canners, All-American type.  These really are the best, for many reasons.  The problem is, currently, I have a glass-top stove.  While it is a wonderful device it isn't made to handle that kind of weight and size.  It isn't just the weight, either.  These canners are extra wide at their bases.  This would leech heat into non-heating element glass.  Not good.  D.C. suggested getting a propane burner, or some such, but that would require canning outside.  If I had a place I could build up, at least in the warmer parts of fall, that would be one thing.  As is, it would be a bit of a mess.  The other option would be to build a gas/propane burner system into a minor island.  And that might be of interest, but the hammer is reaching high-noon.  I am not sure there is time.  Squeezed, I tell you. 

For now, I think, the canner is off the books.  As such, though, I may be able to save what I would have spent on that and buy a good grain mill shortly after my mother leaves.  I would get the bike attachment as well.  I had, at first, thought against that, thinking I would then also need to buy a smaller bike.  It seems the previous owners left one of suitable size out back.  While I do have a bike, it is sized for me, so will not fit the grain mill's attachment.  Funny how it all works out sometimes anyway.

I have been enjoying BioShock 2.  Hard mode has become somewhat easier.  But it entails a LOT of saving, careful planning, and very judicious use of goods and services offered within the game.  I still think it is a bit too lean, but that is just me.  I don't mind running a bit lean.  I hate knowing that one of the many required big fights could leave me completely dry, or even some random encounters.  There isn't a "smarter" way to play.  It is just a fact of this game in it's most difficult mode.  Of course, if a fall comes, it will be like that.  Easy access to food is a luxury no American I know has ever missed.  The same goes for clothing, tools, even electronics now.  Poor people have televisions, smart phones, dvd players, hand and console game systems, and cars.  Really?  Did I say "poor people"?  The very people who are demanding more from the rich?  More?  For... what?  Bah!  An interesting part of the game is it sets atheist types, one of the communal sort and one of the complete self sort, against each other.  To be honest, if I must lean, I would lean to individual.  But they are both flawed, terribly.  One is just less flawed.  While the story itself isn't the greatest, other things within the story are superb.  This is a fine thinking man's game in what it offers other than the play.

Well, it's about bedtime.  I hope you slept well.  Good night, Jean.

A few days off.

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While that may see way too funny coming from a guy who has every day off, it holds some truths.  The thing is, while I do very little, much of my life activity centers around TRYING to do things.  Whether I mean to get the garbage out, the dishes done, the hydrant in the ground, the water heater installed, the bathroom cleaned, or even just making a dinner, my whole life is all about the effort.  That little often comes of all that internal push is a whole different story.  I have been pushing to get dozens of things done and I have done many of them.  Not enough, of course, but... that too is another story.

So, for the next several days, I am going to take a break from trying to shove the mostly dead body of mine around like it could actually do something.  I do need a break.  I need some time where I am not worried, pushing, shoving, striving, thinking, planning.  Buried alive but alive.  And sometimes I can move.  Sometimes I can do.  And sometimes, if somewhat rarely, I can still hit the ball out of the park.  But not tomorrow, or the next day, or the day after that.  Then I will be back at the struggle.

The Russians are coming!  Actually, they are already here.  They keep trying to put advertisements on one of my older blog posts.  Why just that one?  I have no idea.  They keep trying and trying and... failing.  Spam-a-lot just doesn't work.  Most of it is a spambot, stuck on stupid.  But I have seen some intelligence behind there.  Someone is... tinkering.  They don't seem all that adept at it, but...  It is just odd to watch, over the years, the behavior.  And why that one post?

I have been keeping my home a wee warmer.  At 72 I seem a bit more functional.  When I tried 68, then 70, they just weren't enough to kick over the 'machine'.  However, when I am sort of wrapped up for the winter, done with trying to do too much, I can kick the furnace back to even 64 or 66... and slog around in my skivvies.  Hey, it's what crippled old retired ogres do.  Saves on wear and tear on clothes from actual wear and washing.  Plus it keeps me homebound and less likely to go out and spend money I don't want to spend.  Now all I need is a massive club to carry over my shoulder... and perhaps a loincloth instead of my standard boxer-briefs.  I'll... get right on those things.

Later.

Done! For my part.

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I did get out today.  I had to heat the house up for a good four hours to get going.  I got dressed right when I woke, so that wouldn't... slow me down or get in the way.  Anything CAN get in the way.  Now, I spent a good half hour digging of the hour and a half I spent in the hole.  The rest of the time was spent trying to negotiate very large rocks under the pipes.  I negotiated, they didn't.  I wasn't sure how much of a hole I really dug.  What I do know is with the care I was having to take with the pick-bar, pick, and shovels, so as to not damage a pipe, and having immovable rocks the size of my all in one printer, I finally had to call if off and just go with what I had.  It turns out I was able to do about three to three and a half inches of fill, at about three square feet.  It isn't the six inches I had hoped but it will do.  I put the rest of the gravel on top, so the thing is sandwiched a bit.  After I finished, I ran the hydrant for the first time, I believe. 

So, back into my home to rest a bit.  Dinner arrived a bit later.  I was telling my neighbor about the water issue in the kitchen.  I took him out, he turned it on, and... it ran like normal!  I was quite pleased.  I asked only that he not start charging for these house calls.  So, no need to mess around there.  I do need to get on laundry though.  And dishes, now that I can, if I can keep this roll going just a while longer.  I would like to wash the dishes, then clean the whole kitchen, then try to keep it that way until my mother arrives.  Well, I can dream.  I know I want to make menudo between now and then, at least.  And a clean kitchen with freshly washed dishes, pots, and pans, is an irresistible temptation for a gourmand who borders on the gourmet.  

My game is going well.  But the hard mode... well... you have two choices.  Go impossibly slow, saving and replaying each and every fight, or simply die and just get 'rezzed'.  I hate dying all of the time.  Actually, I hate games that force that.  I suspect as powers grow that this will improve, but... not by a lot.  And keeping any weapons in ammunition is nearly impossible.  So I end up using a drill type weapon... as a huge club.  It isn't my favorite game on hard mode.  Further, I am not sure I will get the trophy for doing hard mode.  Something seems glitched.  I didn't get either of the last two trophies that I earned.  I have decided to just play it through.  I will know I have done it and will just leave it there.  Irritating though.

Let me see.  A hole dug, gravel put in, the fellow with the back hoe called.  The sink "fixed".  That may have been from me running the hydrant, come to think of it.  Perhaps it allowed a pressure release that allowed the grit to settle back, drain down the pipe, opening the passage.  That sink has never flowed really well, and still doesn't, but it isn't a literal trickle, either.  Some laundry done, more on the way.  A showerhead installed.  Tools have been put up (never could find my small handsized garden rake and spade though).  Oh, and all the grains, plus legumes for nearly two years, arriving shortly.  All good.

Later, or maybe even good night.  I might make a few burritos, then hit it.  With blocks off my mind sometimes sleep is just easier.  I seem to no longer internally be "pushing".

Up and at it.

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Going down at slightly before 8:00, waking between 13:00 and 14:00, I think(?) closer to 14:00.  My mind simply wasn't able to make sense of the big hands on my watch when I crawled out of the sleep psyche.  I don't know what is going to happen today.  I've read blogs, for as much as they make sense to my mind, and a bit of 'right-news'.  Now I simply have to try and wake up.

The hope is to get some digging in, finish laundry, and deal with that faucet.  If I can turn the engine over I think I can deal with all of that in one day.  I just have to be able to walk, talk, and chew gum all at the same time.  I am going to set the alarm for about three hours, just to... try to keep me aware that time is slipping.  Sometimes that is all it takes, like remembering to open a door rather than just sitting there in the rain.  My life is a bit odd.  Imagine a device that can do almost anything.  The problem is it can't see what needs doing, or even gets lost on the way even when travel only takes moments and is only a few steps away.  Now, at some point, performance capacity degrades.  I have no idea how badly that has occurred either.  Heck, I don't even know, literally, if my sentences actually make sense or are correct to anyone but me and maybe a few kind souls who happen to have known one such as me before.  Seriously, I have no means of... self-testing.  And the world doesn't tell a gimp he is a gimp, they tell him everything but that.

Regardless of what I know, what I suspect is another thing.  Watch yourself, little one, for the dragon's tears can merely be salt for the meal... once the liquid has been steamed off.  All I am saying is, don't fret for me, but for thee.  I do pretty good for being skeletonized.  Heck, I even have a little plump to prove it.  It's just that it could have been so much more.  Another reason to look forward to heaven, a place where I will be whole.  A place where I can once again work to my large and full capacity.  A dragon in heaven, you ask?  Many, I tell you.  And lambs too.

Well, a bit of tinkering then... maybe something else.  Work!  Good day, good Sunday.  A holy day, but I know God will understand that if your ass is in a hole, you have to work on the Sabbath.  And... mine should be...  Lordy but I hope the Lord likes a little pun now and again.

Something just isn't working.

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A little after 6:00 and I'm still up.  I won't overstay another day.  That is just plain hard on me.  I seem to do it mostly effortlessly, but my heart... yeah, it takes life away from it.  And the sleep after?  While good 50% of the time, this last good sleep... the back of my throat is still sore from snoring.  Hah.  I bet the girls HATED me.  I let them sleep with me too.  No, it is nearing bedtime.  I hope to get to work today, but I am making no promises.  Simply put I'm beat up, more so than I thought, from my trip to town.  Carrying two or three hundred pounds of good around, driving here and there, just trying to stay awake... yeah... it got me.

Never mind.  I am still going to do what I can.  And if not today, Sunday, then Monday will see the digging and gravel put in.  The rest will happen sooner, I think.

I had meats I had forgotten about.  Pork chops and beef strips plus hamburger from my last grocery shopping trip.  I had meant to break them into smaller packages and freeze.  All but the hamburger was bad.  And yes, I sniff, poke, pinch, and really test meats, especially hamburger.  Not really because it will make me sick, but because cooking it stinks the house to high heaven and I have enough problems.  I cooked the hamburger, pretty sure it was good.  Yep.  And I made an excellent melody of spices to mix in with it.  Usually I use allspice when I want a bit of interest.  And I did again.  But this time I added just a little bit of cinnamon too.  Now, cinnamon is usually to drying for my tastes.  It dries my mouth out something awful.  But the way I did it, it worked perfectly.

Hmm, I best get that in the fridge.  I have decided, rather than to keep looking for glass/ceramic freezer items, that I am simply going to buy the disposable ones.  I quit.  I can find glass ones that are good for everything but stove-top, but they don't come with lids.  Or I can find them that are good for two but not three, or some other pairing as such.  I simply can't find the good old ones they used to make.  Ah well.

Good night.