Goose.

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I really didn't ask for it.  I made it quite clear that the gift was not quid quo pro.  I would like to hear how it was served, whether it was enjoyed, and such.  Even that wasn't truly a requirement.  More of a hope that sometime in social or business affairs I might hear back.  No more, no pressure.

Still, tonight I was gifted with a share.  The particular Mrs. who prepared the bird took exceptional diligence in the production.  Tropical and citric fruits were used in the first baking, which both rendered the fat and produced a fruit glaze.  At some point the bird and fruit were parted.  Then perhaps more baking, until the breasts were completed to the point they were to be finished for that sort of cooking.  The rest of the bird was allowed to be completed.  Then, with the fats, the various parts were seared.  With some of the fats and giblets, a gravy was produced.  Now, I am probably getting this and that detail incorrect.  I will simply say that this sort of cooking is... hrmm... rare these days.

As for the finished product?  I have eaten fine meals in my life.  This is as good as any I have enjoyed at the most expensive, and even expensive and legitimate restaurants I have been privy.  This is a meal to write, or at least call these days, home about.  My guess is most people haven't had such a dining experience in... many moons.  The rarity of the ingredients, the level of care in the production, the skill brought.  A gastronomic symphony.  Next year I'm going to have to see what she can do with a rib roast.  *grins*  She shouldn't have tempted me!  Though I don't think anything too bad will come of it.

Doing what I have done, so far, has pretty much wiped me out.  And yet I really want to attempt to get the trash out.  I really want to get that out.  Between tending that and the freezer, life might become a bit more pleasant.

Oh, one more scattering of gifts.  I have ordered ducks.  I know a few folk who I have small debts, as I see, regarding.  And one younger couple who, I suspect, are having to make due.  It's good to gift, so I shall, again.  Food, especially exotic foods if just to sample, but any good food, is a fine gift.  Or, I hope.  Maybe that is just me.  A few here, a few there, one there, and one for home.  I may make that for Christmas myself.  And perhaps potatoes and something green and vegetal, plus homemade cranberry sauce if I can find a recipe I think I can handle.  Oh, and I am hoping do the 12 days of Christmas a bit more reliably this year.  I... I like that.

Later.

Ah, that might be it.

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Remember the freezer?  The one I had to clean out?  Yeah?  Well...  I did clean it out.  Then I added strongly bleached water to the basin, cleaned that out, then put in a sweet solution... and forgot it.  Thankfully there was enough bleach so that when I opened the chest I didn't have rotten water to deal with.  However, I am wondering if that wasn't part of the problem, perhaps the whole problem, with my eye(s).  With weather going from cool to pretty much cold, frozen and in a holding pattern down there, the furnace has been on.  There is a vent near the freezer (reminder, shut that one off).  What that has done is excited the solution, very possibly pumping out chlorine molecules, or some mix.  And, what that has done, is escape the chest and infiltrate the cave.

So, yes, that may have been it.  I realized the potential a few days ago, but had to work my way up to working my way through that task.  I had dishes blocking up where I wanted to work, so that had to be dealt with.  Then I had to eat a bit to work up strength, alone with clearing the other area, oh and clearing the top of the freezer which had turned into a minor catch all as I had previously worked on some other areas.  Bleh.  In any case... done.  I have to struggle through, but, when things are just right or I can tolerate the wrong, I can do it.  This, actually, was a multi-pronged operation, and required both immediate and intermediate focus and resolve.  Seems simple.  I think even for the healthy that isn't always the case.  Add fifty pounds of loadstone around the average human's neck, and you begin to get closer.  If that doesn't end up slowing them down, double it.  Continue as needed.

At some point, people, for the most part, lay down.  They plan their movements with great care, as they can only move occasionally, and at great pain.  So it is with me, always.  And, being unable to look before I leap, for I cannot always see the goal from where I am, mistakes happen.  Add to that the idea that I can't always correct on the way.  Momentum is wonderful, until it's a bitch.  Much like gravity.  It does teach patience, and when even that fails more than not, it teaches humility.  If one is willing to learn.  I only chose those paths because God made it quite clear that I was not going to be allowed to simply die.  You know how parents can be?  When it's God, if He gets on about something, yeah...  No worries, I am finally on board with it.

All that just to clean the freezer?  Yes, and to potentially, probably, take care of my eyes.  They are clearing, in any case.  Perhaps most of the chlorine that was going to be turned to a form of aerosol has been turned, and then absorbed.  Or that was weakening.  I will know in a few days if this was the problem.  Oh, and I should have my freezer back in operation soon, as soon as it dries.  I cleaned the interior with soap and water, after removing the chlorinated sweetening water, inside and out.  Now it just needs to dry.

I've been doing bits and pieces of work, as much as I can, for four days now.  Not a lot every day, but something.  All of the work coordinated, with focus, intent, and aim.  Not a lot of work, but the focus makes it worthwhile, good.  And, I finished the full project and can move on from there.  Now to hit some of the other areas.  I think I can, for a while, perhaps a long while.  We will see.  Later.

Just deserts, cursed, what?

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That used to be how the questions went.  Always unsure.  Oh, certainly, deserved.  True of all.  The bible is rather clear about what we deserve if left to our own devices.  Truth is, now, that isn't the issue.  I've been offered salvation, and to my knowledge, accepted it.

How many dishes are there!

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Ah, right.  I finally got every dirty dish and bowl and spoon and fork and...  I was getting ahead enough that doing everything seemed reasonable.  I suppose, doing that late, as I was getting ready for bed, I forgot.  Still, I have all of my canning jars cleaned and ready for kefir.  The thing is, cool as it is, it's taking the grains a bit longer to build up.  Better to have the jars ready than have the kefir ready with no place to put it.  Actually, on that score, I am well ahead.  I still want to wash the kefir grains again.  I don't think they were all that bad, I am just making sure.  The actual kefir I had was pretty rough, you can tell easily by scent.  But the grains were okay.  As I said, just washing, cycling, and washing again in order to really make sure they are good.  If, when I finish, I have plenty, I may end up attempting to dehydrate a few small batches.  I have heard that is good for long term storage.  However, I would rather check that out on my own, and really find out how accurate that information is, and perhaps test shelf life in that state.

I am not working as quickly as I would like.  Working is working though.  Anything I do, more so if it keeps me ahead of the game, is good.  I'd sure like to figure out how to push through but it just isn't available.  It is getting rather cold, low 20's F.  That might be part of it.  Though it isn't close to all of it.  I'll keep at it.

You know, something I realized when looking into my eyes?  Many of the videos, if not all... you can tell what perspective I am suggesting by the color of the eyes, though height can play a part.  It really is, sometimes, in the eyes.  It almost disturbed me when I realized how that tracked.  I didn't choose this, didn't realize it, didn't actually know what color my eyes were until yesterday.  I guess I'm really, in spite of how it might seem, all that into myself.

I am gaming.  I don't think that is the problem.  I'm not gaming well.  And couldn't work more.  Actually, gaming, if I could push harder with it, might help more.  I believe it is helping as is.  Just not as much as it could.  Though it had been a limit to work too, just not lately much.  I am having a huge problem with one of the earlier bosses.  Two were beat fairly quickly, easily.  But this one...  Well, another partial load of dishes, then to gaming, perhaps putting on a pot of coffee of making a cup of it if there are remnants.  I'll keep at it as I may.

Work is happening.

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It isn't happening as fast as I had hoped.  Dishes are mostly done.  After reading, writing, and waking I should be able to finish the dishes, or half of what remains perhaps.  A bit here, a bit there.  It isn't just dishes.  Laundry today, and continued efforts as to making kefir.  I am washing the kefir grains, as they have sat for a while, then feeding them up, and washing them again, before growing them for kefir production again.  As well, I had to dump all the old stuff and wash out the containers.  Fine, fine.  Oh, when you wash kefir, it is best to use non-chlorinated water.  Thankfully my reverse osmosis system takes that out.

I am hoping to finish dishes, probably do all the laundry, change the cat litter out, then deal with trash... have it ready to go tomorrow.  A shower, maybe a shave, and simple grooming.  If I get those things finished, and there is a chance to get out, I would like to go to town.  Whether for a bit of shopping, which isn't in great demand at the moment, or just for a cheap and easy meal...  I'll save that choice until I am actually heading out.

Tired, a bit off, still kicking and trying.  It's what I've got.  Hmm... coffee.  Must have a cup or three of joe first.  Later.

Eyes.

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As I mentioned, my eyes seemed to be becoming bloodshot.  Starting with the left eye, then, I though, could have sworn, jumping to the right eye.  I have been watching.  Can't make an appointment until next week, or later.  I could, and did, watch.  If both eyes had become bloodshot, and I am almost sure they had, my right eye has cleared a great deal.  The left eye dithers, getting a bit better or worse from time to time.  I may have scratched it while trying to clear sleep from the eye a little too vigorously.  Or Sam or Sassy may have scratched it while trying to wake me.  Yes, Sam especially though Sassy if more rarely, will do nasty little things from time to time.  Although, in general, I believe things are improving.

While I have been looking at my eyes I have been trying to deduce something else.  My mother had suggested that my eyes were hazel(first and third are closest), of the green varietal, or even majority green(top two are closest in this set).  For whatever reason, while wearing glasses, they appear rather brown.  So, while checking health I have also been checking color.  And I have to say, whether it is a true green, though with variations of green, or a hazel, is quite a tricky question.  I have looked at night, in the day, with a flashlight, when I am more awake, or less, and I have to tell you... I think it depends.  Though I must admit, I suspect, at this point, that they are truly a mixed green.

I then attempted to see if there was a genetic proclivity for a race, region, or such.  Not so much, other than European, even if it is hazel, needs to be in both sides of the family.  Which would indicate that my birth mother told the truth, that we are of the Spanish lines, at least in part.  Funny thing is, my birth mother has quite brown eyes while my mother, the woman who adopted me, has eyes similar to mine.  I honestly think both myself and my brother, if in different ways, both adopted, share many features with our mother.  Placement, by appearances, couldn't have been better.  And, while I am the tallest, we all were tall for our given demographic.

You would know that it is the least understood of eye colors.  All good, fits my m.o.  Finally got around to it, if more by accident from incident.  Now I know.

Yeah? Maybe.

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Once upon a midnight weary.

Exciting.

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I haven't gotten to much.  I have eaten, made a pot of coffee earlier, started setting up a batch of kefir, thus started on dishes both out of necessity and beyond.

However, while sitting during a rest I began feeling an urgency, want, need, to begin cleaning, sorting, storing, and working.  It is like I can see a path through both my physical limits and the complexities involved.  Organization is a weakness of mine.  Sometimes I can travel through that without effort.  It's rare.  I may be seeing a path.  And, that path isn't two way.  There is a chance that I could begin organizing... everything.  It won't be fast.  I will have to keep up on new stuff.  Initially it will be weak, merely boxes with labels or written words.  Examples would be "Camera Stuff", "Computer Peripherals", etc.  Then those boxes will begin being stored in places.  I just feel that it might be possible.

I may not get to it immediately, or I might.  I might do it more or less quickly.  I will make mistakes.  I will be weeding things out as I go.  Charity boxes, toss boxes, and boxes for stuff that I am not sure about in a number of ways.  I see it.  It might happen.  One area in one room at a time, until that room is cleared.  Then, perhaps, even taking everything out and cleaning.  Then putting things back, things I want returned.  Or putting some things in other rooms, or taking them down, or... tossing/charity.

It's exciting because I haven't seen such paths, or had any notion that I could do much, in some time.  Since late spring.  No promises.  Could be a fool's gold thing.  I just don't think so.  The notion was too solid.  Now I am hungry for not just the end, but the process.

Oh, and another thought came to me.  I am thinking of calling my friend.  Having him ask if there are any photographers in the building.  Perhaps creating a photography group, maybe planning for an outing.  It would also get me out.  I can handle three to five, if they can walk.  Wheel chairs are doable, but the motor driven devices are too big for what I have.  Nothing fancy, for an outing.  Just a trip to a local park, then maybe a lunch somewhere after.  That, though, is just a thought.  Not only would I get out, I might well learn a thing or two on top of simple practice.  Not sure, just a thought, for now.

I'll finish off some of the dishes, the ones soaking now.  Then a shower.  Perhaps, afterward, a trip to town.  Or not.  Depending on how it seems outside.  I may, if I don't go to town, begin taking pictures of the cave.  Some pictures being more mundane, utilitarian, others attempts at artistic or unusual takes on the place and mess.  Taking before and after pictures.  Incentive?  Recording for when I might not be feeling able to believe it possible in the future.  Simply a photographic project with what I have and can do?  It's not like I am, even now, really ready for much of an outing.

Definitely a shower, if I can get through the dishes and such.  No pictures of that though!  That'd cost you a bundle (mostly your eye-sight, especially if I warmed to you and took them in 3-D).  *wink*  :p  Later.

Another day.

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I haven't been able to get to anything, really, for days.  I'm not feeling rough, bad, sick, down.  I simply am not able to push through.  Both eyes are now rather bloodshot.  Not sure what is going on with that.  I may see if there is anything to be done for that, or attempted, before including the doctor.  OTC eyedrops?  Am I not getting enough sleep?  I'll look around for ideas and notions.

Gaming, blogging, and reading what passes for news is about what I have to do.  Or more, what I am able to do.  I might pull out another roast.  That was okay.  Though, this time, I will cut the cooking time in an attempt at medium rare.  Tastier.  Not much else.  Oh, I forgot to make a call the other day.  I may go ahead and do that today.  If I remember in time, or tomorrow.  Soon, one way or another.  You have to know how that goes.

Hmm...  I'll try to finish the dishes today, then get a shower in.  I might even try to make it out.  Perhaps just to the post office, though maybe on to town for a quick hot meal.  Nothing fancy.  I best get to finishing waking up, get some coffee down, while beginning to figure other things out.  Later.

Notes and asides.

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The roast was slightly overdone, but nothing I couldn't live with.  I seared it heavily first.  The time seems about right for how I used to do chuck roasts.  Perhaps they have been shaving them down and down and I didn't look at the weight closely enough?  I'll alter the time next time, taking the weight into exact account.  Thyme, bay leaves, a touch of sage, garlic, and salted for an hour first to let all that work in.  Just meat, save some stuffed olives I recently laid up.  But that is how I like it.  I'll get four meals of it.

My eyes are red, both of them.  I'm hoping, somehow, that it's just strain.  I need to make an appointment with the doctor soon.  For the main reason, but perhaps for this too.  A few antibiotics, I am hoping, if it doesn't clear up by then on it's own.  I've never had such a thing.  Not sure why I would now.

I'm not really a holiday shopper.  Though this year, it seems, more than others, my email is full of offers.  Just out of curiosity I have purveyed some of the sales.  Nada.  Wow, if this is as good as the sales get, and as limited?  I see much better sales throughout the year.  I thought they were supposed to offer serious sales right out of the box on Black Friday.  Unless I am missing something many of their sales don't even look like sales, certainly not much of ones if so.  Some of them look like street versus msrp.  Some of them, I am absolutely sure, are not sales at all.  Thankfully I don't need anything.  Heaven forbid if anyone is waiting for great sales.  At least at the places I shop often enough to receive notifications.

The last haunt seems to be settling down.  I do think, to a degree, I am mollifying the affect.  She did, sort of, jump out of my past.  Fair enough.  Until I could identify what and why I had a slim chance of placating, managing.  I still get the sense that she doesn't understand, and would not really leave of her own accord.  Whether that is my mind not wishing to let go or truly a haunting doesn't really matter.  Both?  Knowing her name, and why such strong feelings are involved, plus some experience while I am now somewhat more capable of understanding, and having an interest in rightly putting the past to rest as I am becoming less of a ghost myself, in ways, has made this step easier.  I wish I knew more but with or without that, I am needing to let go.  I have suffered enough.

It looks cold out.  To be honest I am not sure it is any colder than it has been.  A smattering of snow on top of everything lends to the notion though.

Not much else for now.  Time to visit blogs, check the news*, maybe a few other things, and wake... or nap again.  Not sure I should be up yet.  Later.


*(though there aren't really good news sights... first Fox fell, then most online news sources have either become shrill "rightists" or fell in line with Fox)

Snow.

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A decent amount.  I can't really get a grip on how much, two inches?  Maybe four?  I just woke and the sun is out making it extremely bright.  My senses can't quite overcome both of those.  Plus, with the sun out, some has probably melted.  Oh, and someone(s) stopped by and shoveled!  Thank you.  I saw it start to come down last night, and thought to get out.  But without a clear notion of how much to expect, when it would stop, and all, I hadn't gotten to it.  Then again I might not have gotten to it should it have stopped, or today.  I am still a bit rough.

Thanksgiving?  That's what the calendar and various things are adding up to as a suggestion.  If, as I wake, I become more sure, I may post something about it.  And, yes, I am quite thankful.  More thankful than not by a wide margin.  What is troubling just offers me something to figure out, really.  Or to suffer.  A bit of suffering isn't a bad thing.  A lot of it has it's place.  Just deserts, an opportunity to grow, or a warning that something needs to be done differently or stopped, seen as these things and pain definitely has a place.  So, yes, thankful.  Even if I can't change the past I might be able to show others how not to do it.  Still, we will all make our own mistakes.  The better trained and prepared the greater the mistakes it seems.

Today?  I haven't a clue.  I do have a roast thawed, chuck roast.  That would make a fine small meal.  Milk, perhaps vegetables of some sort.  First though to wake.  Coffee and time.  I hope you have some mild or grand day for thanks.  I hope you see it and find it and share it.  If you can't, you will be in my prayers.  I will be thankful for you.  Oh, you don't have to understand.  Trust that I do and that it is enough, whether you can see it or not.  Be well and blessings.

The greatest of my ghosts.

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I finally have settled some of the idea of my friend.  A memorial, and as soon as I may, a visit to his grave.  Of course, I am not pleased that I was not able to be there, to see him, before he died.  I am in a place, in life, where I understand that I sometimes have grand limits.  Sometimes, even so, I am able to overcome those, sometimes not.  More, I think he understands, at least now.  Perhaps not while he lay dying.  Now most certainly he does know.

I'll keep at it.

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Whatever else, I keep missing meds.  This time just a day.  Not yesterday but the day before.  I got back on them yesterday.  This time I am suffering for it, but just a bit.  I'm not sure how to keep on top of things.  I do my best and suffer the consequences.

I need to wake, then take a shower.  I'd like to make a call and an appointment today, take a shower, and... maybe get back to work, if I can.  I am sort of loopy, either from missing medicine or getting back on it.  Bleh.  We'll see.

Oh well.  I will keep working at it.  I think until I get used to the dark it will be a little screwy no matter what I do.  Sometimes that has been taking weeks, sometimes the whole winter as I never get used to the dark.  And without an external demand to drive me through it, or the capacity to exact such a mechanism, it's all on me.  Most of you, trust me, if you didn't have to go out you wouldn't.  For a thousand and one reasons.

I do need to get to the store.  I am hungry, more so lately.  I suspect as I, mostly, get back on medicines and begin trying to dig out, my body begins demanding food.  I can go without feeding it, but that just puts me into a lower level of function.  Best to get food.  Not today, probably.  Sometime this week.  Later.

Yes, the ol' clock is running long again.

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At this point I honestly don't care if I am staying up late and sleeping long and late.  Trying to push too hard for a while, and at least being able to make it to the last time/date based thing, that was good.  Now I have nothing, in the immediate future, that is time/date required.  Oh, sure, I'd love to make it to church.  But... yeah.  Maybe not.  Making an exact time is rather harsh, at least for me.  So, for a bit, I will just enjoy doing what I can, when I can.  I might be able to get things twisted back around quickly.  If not, so be it.  I do wonder, though, if pushing has been what has kept me alive.  And yet I also know I can push on everything all of the time.  If I try to move my day around, that's fine.  But then I can't work, definitely not as hard.  If I push to do labor, I can't move my time around (though, I have found, if I push on work, my day will more easily switch to normal mode).

I reset the dishes.  I am hoping to hit a load of laundry or two.  I would like to hit the kitchen a bit.  Nothing fancy, just little things.  Well, and back to working on the computer.  Today, tomorrow, soon, I hope.

For fun I would like to begin tinkering with the camera.  I did play around with the new lens.  I was able to set up autofocus, at least on one aperture.  Sometimes I still need to manually focus a bit (though if my eyes are more correct than the camera is yet to be seen, if I am betting on my eyes... easy enough to figure out if I can get my laptop going with the processing software).  I could do the same, most likely, for several more apertures.  I have ten slots for various lenses/apertures per lens, should I wish.  And, if the lens proves out, it might be worth the minor effort.  It might be worth tinkering with simply to know.  Who knows, one of the other apertures might actually be better, provided clearer pictures.  Hmm... by the way I need to figure out the laptop.  For some reason it tried to connect to wi-fi, and then became password encoded.  I can't remember a password on it.  I know I turned wi-fi off.  So...  Before I can begin using lightroom, thus mess with RAW and begin postprocessing in any case, I have to figure my way into the laptop.  Bleh.

Still, a bit at a time, this and that when I can, and yet enjoying gaming so as not to do too much so that I end up crashing.

Oh, you know what's funny?  Even as bad as I get I can still, and fairly often, do a sudoku puzzle in 9 seconds.  I do that about once a week, though I even hit 12, 13, and 16 seconds even more often.  Usually, on the easiest, I hit ~28-32 seconds.  Just, on some days, and not even on the days I am feeling good, I hit a really fast time.  So odd.

Off to a bit of gaming as I wake.  Later.

Awake and pretty good.

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Not only have I figured out how to begin taking care of myself, and then doing so, there is more to it.  Sun yesterday and today has helped.  Medicines going in, and getting easily back on track.  Getting out.  Taking care of the pile of things that had been stovepiping other efforts, and even each other.  Too much down too small a delivery pipe and nothing was getting done.  And, yet, there is even more.

I did see Death sneaking up, approaching, nearing, call that action what you will.  I usually take that personally.  And, in this case, with health so fringe, it was fair to believe the toll was for me.  Oh, I suspected I would live through it.  As usual.  Eventually I won't, but that is a very long time off.  However, when Death approaches, if it is for me, it means pain.  I don't know if you have ever been kicked in the guts?  If you have, and see that coming and have no means of stopping it, you learn to curl into a ball.  It'll still hurt, just not as much, or in as important of ways.  So, probably reflexively by this time, I curled up hard.  You can't truly harden yourself, but you can protect vitals.  And that is what I did.  But the pain isn't always, or always just, physical.  When Death opens that door, some things on that side flood through, or attempt to visit, as well.  Not all of them are favored, friends, or allies.  Less so the ones who were once beloved, if I have any guilt about their hushed memories.  Or simply know them as friends, allies, or lovers but can't figure out where they once fit, how they died, or such.

As I am improving, after the memorial, while doing more, much of the feared pains have either passed or not materialized.  I am back to living, and some comfort of mind and body.  I'll keep at it, as I may.  I may not get to much.  It may be a serious struggle.  Yet, whatever, I am... enjoying life more freely again.  Still a bit crippled up.  But with no time dependent hoops to fail in the immediate future, I should do just fine getting some things done, in their sweet time as needs be.  Now to figure out where my friend is buried though...  A visit, in my time, will set that to as much rights as I am able.  Later.

Memorials are good things.

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I wasn't sure I would make it out.  Will, wish, want, even need, sometimes, are superseded by the way it must be.  If my body can't be pushed it won't go.  Plus, being ill makes it so tough things are tougher still.  Much as the notion of carrying 50 pounds isn't a cherished notion, but adding a broken arm or worse leg into the equation and...  Even then, sometimes, to survive, one does the deed even with the tough breaks the world deals.  This time I got my way, at least for this part of things.

There were a number of people who have died at the apartment.  Three.  None of whom had a proper funeral.  Money is what it is, and this, and that.  Kin are often just about as old, perhaps older, than those who have died.  There are many reasons why not.  And I don't begrudge, mostly.  But for those of us who aren't family...  So, rolling our own seems about what is left.  And it worked well, as I see things.  A number of us talked.  My friend who still is there couldn't speak.  I wasn't sure, but ended up speaking of him.  He has been my best friend longer than I have known many people.  We have advised each other, and ignored each other's advice, fought, and decided that wasn't a reason to not be friends.  He will be missed.  I keep thinking of him as alive though.  At the memorial, after a bit of various talking by some, I saw something on the bridge he haunted often, and I... just thought it was him.  Odd how that happened.

Yeah, I do feel much better.  I will figure out where he is buried, one way or another, and make it over to visit soon.  I'll invite those who might wish to go as well.  It was good to hear others speak of him.  I didn't really know the other folk who died, but was glad to know that they were being remembered as well.  Now I can deal with it.  I won't let him, like so many others, fade and disappear, until they became ghosts in the machine.  Though I am not sure, with my health issues, that I had much choice.  Though I suspect I truly tried to hide those people, some of them.  That's when trouble really starts.  You should bury the body, not the memory.

All good.  I do feel much better.  I am grateful they held the event, I thank God I made it, and I am pleased I was able to say a few words.  I pray that he is resting well.  He may have made some mistakes, but his guilt brought him around, and perhaps some other things.  I think he really turned around in time and... just chose better.  He was a great friend to have.  He will be missed.  He told me he had begun praying some time back.  And while I couldn't get him to go to church, I understand that.  So many people, and when so ill, tired, broke often, and more with his mobility problems...  I can pray for his soul and leave those things in God's hands.  And with some real hope.  I just need to visit his grave.

Nights and days are going a bit kittywampus with this and that.  But, fine.  I've done... better.  I made it, at least, to this.  I've gotten some of the backlog fixed.  I've started medicines again.  Yeah.  Whatever else, now I can just make it through life as it arrives, not worry about time, but begin digging back into things... as I may.  Good night.

Sunshine, finally.

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I can't say if it has been dark for a long time, or if it just seems that way.  Overcast, along with odd hours until recently, though very few hours of sunshine.  I think a number of things conspired to make the last few weeks seem perpetually dark, and quite dark, which added emphasis to magnification.  Seeing that the sun is out is good, if I am probably going to take a bit to get used to it again.  As I have suggested, I live a thousand years in each year it seems.  So two weeks seems like a lot longer of a time.  Twere the thousand year analogy a truth, a week would be twenty years.  It certainly can seem it.  Anyway, the sun is up and out.  And I will be out in it soon enough.

I am feeling better, but still a bit tired, just internally rough along the edges with slight crimps and cramps on a few internals.  All given though, I feel as good as I feel in knowing the sun is up.  It's a good day, or is heading that way.

While I am out, should that occur, I will do grocery shopping as well.  Fruits, perhaps greens of some sort, more deli meats, and of course milk and cream.  Oh, and some sort of bread.  I love the idea of the paleo diet, I just can't be an absolutist about it.  And some meats are so tied to the tradition of being eaten with some sort of bread that I just can't break out of that.  If someone else would do the shopping, or I figure out how to get a... wait, I may be doing so in the spring.  Access to lots of beef/meat.  Prefer beef, though hog is okay.  I am a meat eater.  The rest, mostly, is for decoration or texture.

Well... on with the day.  Don't worry y'all.  I simply don't, am not ready to, discuss much about much.  I do thank you for your thoughts.  I'll... get around to something before too long.  Thank you anywhile, on the sly.

Yeah, I'm around.

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I just haven't felt like talking.

Oh, I saw it coming.  Thus the gloom in some posts.  I did, in one post, wonder if what I saw coming, maybe two posts in particular, but then I realized for whom the bell tolled.  I am simply not that lucky.  I... think I have mentioned that before.  Then, when I realized, there was naught I could do.  I could not even get up and out and over.  I could change nothing, regarding his health or my function.  I am still only barely able to do much.  I had a backlog that had to be settled.  Still do, really.  If you think watching your own life slip from your grasp, helplessly, is bad... and I know that... watching the life of another slip away is a good deal worse.  More so when you can't even go see them.  Maybe God simply said no.  He has done that before.  Not that I didn't try.  And, yes, I suspected not only what was coming, but that my running through the sands of time would get me no closer.  So it was.

I have learned to eat disappointments.  I have learned to put up with humility.  I have learned to live the life of the fool, the clown.  No matter how potent or capable I have, can, or will be.  It, like life itself, is not always a choice, certainly not as I would have it.  Some burdens, perhaps, are beyond me though too.  Unlike many, I still attempt to bear them.  Like many, that just isn't there always.  Those who have no choice, and can, are the ones who pay.

I did get the geese delivered, the last three.  I don't even know if they...  Yes, I was thanked.  Perhaps my gifts were so much foolishness.  Who knows if folks even enjoy such birds.  I am not sure such a thing is a gift to give.  Oh, I was thanked.  But that is what people do who were raised in, or taught by, a polite society.  An odd gift, in one sense.  Well, it is done.  Returning home for the night, I was able to undo the mini-freezer/fridge.  If nothing else, the item will be good for flash hard freezing items, and a bit as backup.  More so if I arranged a minor solar setup.  Though, yeah... who knows about such kit.

I made it to town to have dinner with the other friend.  There was something going on regarding a memorial for our friend.  It is, mostly, arranged.  I have agreed to be there, and it is at a time where it is possible.  I am not familiar with this form of ad hoc event.  I am capable of going with whatever happens, as I am sure folks will do their level best.  It is good to see others moving ahead with that.  I would have but I don't know these things.  For some rare family, I have been to funerals or such.  Most of my dead have only seen my back.  Not in rejection, just I had to be somewhere else or there was nothing I could do... no time, no way, other commitments, or it was simply too much.  No disrespect meant, just... it's how I lived and survived.  Lean, always moving, buried in...  No, I would not have thought of such a thing, not as a group.  Though I still plan a visit.  Late, but a change.  If also in my strange time.

So, I did what I could.  I am getting slightly better.  I still have a backload to arrange and tend.  And yet, finally, I am digging my way out.

Oh, and I have had so many question whether I am dying.  I am presuming it was because of the gloom of some of my posts.  As explained above, the bell tolled, but for him, not me.  Yes, I saw it, inexorably, moving in my direction.  And, again, not for me... or just enough for me to smack me away from it's intended prey.  Not the first time.  No, folks, I am not dying.  Neither, honestly, do I wish to talk too much about it.  Not quite yet.  Thought I would be good, with all that foreknowledge.  I was wrong.  I've let readers and some principles know.  But... yeah...  too fresh to dig into it.  Maybe the memorial will help though maybe not.  Don't worry, don't...  I'll be back at it in a bit.

Hopefully I can keep digging and pushing.  I can't change what happened, how, or my part of that story.  I can, when I can, do what I can... until I can't.  Later.

Cold dark mornings.

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Not brutally cold, and the sky is beginning to lighten, if it is cloudy on top of all else so just won't really get bright.  It's a trifecta of gloom.

Someone recently suggested that, perhaps, me falling off my medicine was a passive, or even active, attempt at suicide.  Well, no.  It hurts too damned much, the fall is too frustrating, and getting back on the stuff hurts.  The pains in the various stages can be from brutal to annoying.  But they always exist.  Not just this type, or that.  Muscles in the neck and shoulders always go through harshness.  My organs flip and flop like fish out of water.  Further, this never kills me!  No, if I want suicide, I know how to do it without an ounce of hurt, or even if I want it to hurt, I know... well... actually I don't know.  Back when I thought my problem was all in my head, and knowing the head can't actually be fixed, I tried stuff that was 100% guaranteed to kill me.  It didn't.  I do know things that are supposed to work.  I also know I don't control life or death.

My organs have been doing minor flips and flops, but it hasn't been too terrible.  It's different, but along the lines of waking a limb after it has been cut off from blood too long.  This is as mild of such a situation as it gets though.  I am already through the neck and shoulder pains and headaches.  I am doing better.  Just adding in the cold and dark and it gets a bit rough.  All good, considering.  A few more days to a week and I might be... hmm... better.  Perhaps I can begin hitting more daily, or not.  Perhaps soon on that, or not.

My friend has died.  I knew it was going to happen.  Especially if they didn't treat him.  I was not able to get up to see him.  I felt so trapped.  Ghosts have no arms or legs to gnaw off to get going.  Just couldn't get up and ready and out.  They aren't having a formal funeral for him, just a graveside affair.  His sister will keep me informed.  I'll visit as soon as I can.  While this doesn't help, it is actually pushing me to attempt to get out, to visit his grave as soon as possible.  Life was difficult for him, so in that, I don't begrudge him rest.  I just pray he is in a better place, and ask those of you who might think on such things as wise to also pray for the relief of his soul.

I need to get on with my day.  Later.

A debate about civilians, French or any other really.

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Some are suggesting that French civilians should have know how to coordinate themselves defensively, then offensively.  Someone suggested that, at the theater for example, people in the upper floor could have thrown items such as chair, down onto the muslims, distracting them so that the people on the same level could have attacked.  It sounds wonderful.  In truth, given what people are, have usually been, and will be, it simply doesn't work.

People are easily rounded into two groups right off, men as one group, women, children, and the elderly in another group.  One group has some chance at rushing and attacking, the other group has some very weak opportunity at that and capacity for it.  Almost any group of people is going to be at least an half, perhaps two-thirds, of the weaker group.  More, of the men, only a very small percentage have ever faced even a fist-fight.  Those who have faced more might well be burned out, or simply disinterested.  Why would a warrior sacrifice himself, again, for groups of people who have relinquished their right and ability at reliable easy self defense?  Especially knowing that many of those people despise him for what he is, what he has done, and even if he saved them they might well spit on him.

It isn't complicated.  Most people cannot defend themselves and many more wouldn't.  That is exactly why we are in the difficulty we are in.  Me?  In a large arena, I would simply find another way out.  I wouldn't call for others to go with me, or attack if I was mandated by the state to be disarmed (which I am).  I would leave those who can't or won't choose life to their fate.  I have done everything in my life to change the odds and yet the people seem to want to be hunted and murdered, by their state or actors of the state such as immigrants, criminals, or such.

I can't help those who won't help themselves.  God suggested quite the same.  While, in time, the lion will lie with the lamb, it will be up to the lion.  And I doubt if he will lie with them if they choose to be herded to slaughter.  I know this lion won't.  I can be with them, safe from me.  But I won't be with them if they choose to remain a food item.  And I certainly won't go with them, blindly, into that blood-soaked submission.  I don't blame the true sheep.  They are what they are.  But if I can't be armed, I cannot defend.  We will go our own ways until we can be together, one way or the other.

Mostly good.

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Toward the end of the day things get really rough.  Sometimes when waking.  Going back on medicine works that way.  As I have mentioned, it isn't that, always, this time, that I just quit.  I lost track and couldn't remember medicine this time.  In this case, I was trying to get out to see my friend, and tripping over all of the life and other undone work and projects between where I was and where I wanted to be.  It all added up to end up being too much.  That may not make sense to you, or maybe it makes perfect sense.  I think everyone goes through it, just... in their own way, at their own level.  Some things have to be build up to.  First a basic layer, then various mechanisms to 'gain height', then an object or dozen to get off the ground.  Then, eventually, to get into the air and moving.  At any point, if there is a failure, it can be a temporary setback or a catastrophe, where another attempt means a complete new rigging.  My attempt, this time, was ended in disaster.

I am just now, what a week after?, kicking around trying to find my footing again.  I seem to actually be finding it, but in a very minor way.  I have one of the geese placed, but from almost as soon as I received them.  I placed calls last night and contacted two of the other three recipients, so will be delivering one tonight and one tomorrow.  That while trying to contact the last recipient.  I hope to finish dishes today as well.  Then maybe begin clearing the kitchen and breaking down boxes.  I'll get the boxes into the back of my vehicle for the next time I am in town, if I happen to hit boxes.  To be honest, if I can get those things done I will be happy.  If I get most of that done I would be happy.  Well, and a shower or bath thrown in.  I cleaned most of the bathroom in my last work marathon.  I suppose I wouldn't mind hitting it, in a small way, again.  The only way to keep half on top of the bathroom is to hit it heavy, then light, then do that every few days, at least for me.  Mopping next, I suppose, one of the later days in the week.

Cleaning and all that is very similar to creating messes.  It is done in layers.  Little bits, over time.  My problem is memory and sensitivity.  When I am a ghost I can't see things of flesh.  Things that would normally bother me simply don't.  And remembering, even if I can't see, doesn't work.  Though part of it is simply being a guy.  That's the truth, like it or not.  Still, I'll do what I can.  Gimped by manhood as I am.  :p

Sleep was good, woke well.  I'm not feeling too bad, if not great either.  Coffee, eggs, and... who knows.  But not right yet.  Just an hour or two to sit and think, read, and write.  Later.

Hmm, tomorrow.

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Or not then either.  Back on medicine and it's pretty harsh.  I want to sleep.  Haven't been able to nap.  I want to do some work.  Can't.  I have been playing a game, but I keep snapping in and out of sleep.  Sore, a bit confused, tired.  Not grumpy.  There simply isn't much I can do.  I'll keep at it.  It's like I just donned clothing that weighs a ton.

Nap?  Nap.  It might be a bit before medicine works out.  Then again, dropping off and going back on kills some folk.  Someone asked if my failure to comply, or willingness to go back on it full strength was suicidal.  Nope.  And I can't do either, easily, all of the time.  However, when I fall, I can fall so hard and fast that it isn't a choice.  And, when I go to get back on it, I usually try it the hard way first... full bore.  That's my gig.  If that fails, then I back it down and find steps I can take.  It's just how I do.  This time, oddly, I seem to be able to just take it like a man and an half.  It's beating me up, but not too terribly.  Well, and I did alter what I take, changing amounts and types, which has made some of this much easier.

Even so, I have the puppy-dog exuberance.  I want to play, and work, and tease, and chase.  The girls are getting just a bit... put out... with me.  While I can't quite chase all that much, I can sure play if they get too close.  Thankfully Sam enjoys being perturbed.  Sassy is a give or take gal.  If she is in the mood she will throw down right along with me.

I'll keep at it.  But first a nap.  I just hope I can wake in time for dinner.  Tomorrow will be the better time to get the geese out, since I don't know when dinner is arriving.  However, I can make those calls to see when it would be most appropriate to deliver the geese.  Or if they even want them.  That I'll do, then nap.  And, yeah, I did give the dishes another once over.  I think they just need a rinse in a bit, then a hot soak.  I hope to finish them tonight, or tomorrow.

Later, or good night.  Not sure I'll write again.

Alright, good lens.

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Being a total noob at anything, then taking a risk with a used piece of equipment?  Nerve-racking.  Still, sometimes, when enough data pulls clear, and the odds are favorable, a hefty risk seems worth the chances.  When it arrived, as I suggested, I suspected it would probably be a, basically, full manual.  Oh, sure, it does have autofocus.  However, that format doesn't speak to my camera, and my camera is rather limited as to inputs.  There isn't a range of focal lengths or apertures.  Just one of each.  Though too, I had forgotten which button I used to focus.  I remembered after I put the 50 mm prime back on and took a few snappies.  The girls like it, and don't like it.  Girls are girls!

I will work with the autofocus later.  The thing I did get was that, when everything is done correctly, I actually can get pretty good shots throughout the zoom.  I am not sure about stepping through the f-stops though.  That may or may not be available.  However, with proper lighting, through the zoom length, and with the macro (a sweet add to this lens by the way), I can get it to function.  That initial incompetence and ignorance, however, made me wonder if I had made a serious mistake.  Good to see I just set it up, let my nerves untangle and fear relent, then got back to it in a timely manner.  Wonderful.  Yeah, yeah.

After that I had to dig around for the battery charger, for the camera's rechargeable batteries.  I have three batteries, though I ought to buy another.  The body itself only takes one, though I purchased a grip that allows for another battery.  Four batteries and four of the largest/fastest memory chips available, and I should be able to take a lot of photos over a week without recharging if I watch what I am doing.  Each battery is good for ~800 shots, and the cards?  Each 64 gb card holds 1,864 RAW (or 4,660 JPEG, if you go that way).  So, actually, I am card heavy.  Better to buy three more batteries.  Yeah, I'm weird.  I buy so that I can stretch without recharge.  Though too, if it's really hot or cold?  Cut the power by 1/3, or more.  A secondary reason to set up a warm enclosure, figure out how to heat an area up.  Gear as well as body.

Now that I have a few things going, and the world is closing down a bit for winter, perhaps I can tinker with the camera.  With the macro I can begin doing photo essays when I cook or bake or tinker in the kitchen, or on the computers, or such.  Perhaps even use photography to push me toward keeping the cave cleaned and sorted.  Not sure if it will work, not sure even if it does that I would share that part.  We'll see.

Almost nap time.  Later.

Awake, for a while actually.

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Not a bad morning.  I am back fully on medicine, if I can keep that going is another thing.  I have been trying, but it has felt more like I am a puppet with the strings cut lately.  I am not too sore now, so might get to a few things today.  I did get the trash to the curb yesterday but skipped getting the recycling out.  There was only one bag of that and I am done with soda, so recycling won't be stacking up quickly.  The boxes, when I break them down, will be taken in to town, to the recycling center there.  Far too many to get them out with any kind of reasonable speed.

I am feeling good.  It's been a while that I have felt good, with no pain.  I am still tired.  Too little sun.  Tis the season, and long from reversing direction.  The cool is here, freezing temps are becoming the norm or heading that way quickly.  I am planning to get the hoses in and perhaps make a trip to town... Scrap that last.  I have geese to deliver.  I obtained phone numbers last night, and wish to begin making contact and placing fowl with good homes.  Tomorrow, if I can, shopping... or... sometime this week.  You know how that goes.  And, just restarting medicine, plans might need to be adjusted.  Still, feeling well enough to aim at a few goals.

Even if it slows me down, I am sure enjoying the cool and dark.  Summers are just too much.  And while the winter might slow me down (more, in some ways), I am not as alone in that, and I enjoy it more than being slowed via a slow cooking process.  I much prefer to cool/cold and dark to the blistering dry heat of summer.

Never mind.  I'm hoping to get a few things done today.  I think, I feel, I seem, to be heading back to the batting box.  If there are any homeruns, or even base runs, in me only time will tell.  Ya heh.

Food thoughts.

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Beside not having eaten yet this morning, a few ideas about food have been floating in the upstairs goo factory for a while.  Things I have meant to include in posts.  The timing never seemed right, or I got caught up in other ideas.

The first is a new understanding.  I had always thought that sashimi, aka human edible raw fish, needed to be fresh.  Like right out of the water, right when being caught, or very close to it.  I suppose that was true for a long time, especially before refrigeration.  And, I would guess, it probably is the best, if also something most people cannot enjoy.  Most of the world population does not live close enough to large bodies of water to enjoy raw fish before it goes bad.  As such, at this time, the truth of sashimi grade fish is that it is supposed to be frozen.  Caught fresh, frozen immediately after whatever form of cleaning, descaling, or such.  Why does that matter?  It means that, on a more or less level playing field, I can buy a fish, from time to time, with which to create a true sushimi dish.  And there is some possibility that I might trust local shops a bit more to prepare such, if that is easier.  Yes, boys and girls, I like "bait".

Another thing is... scotch eggs.  I have been considering trying these, but...  The first few recipes I reviewed for this food must have been pranks.  There was no indication of whether to remove the shell when the eggs where still wet, and put them into the sausage shell or whether to  hard/soft boil the eggs first, then crust them with the sausage.  So hungry to try those at home, but no good instructions.  It was just a thought, anyway, so I didn't really dig.  Recently I found a more practical means of producing such foods.  A picnic food, or so they say.  Now, hard-boiled or soft, breading the eggs themselves, the sausage as this vid does, or both... many options.  Still, here is one of many examples.

Oh, on this particular one, h/t AoSHQ (well, they didn't originate the thought, just reminded me this morning, still...)

There was something else.  I have simply lost it.  I might figure it out and add it later.  As I mentioned, however, I am hungry.  I didn't eat dinner last night.  That might do well this morning.  Hungry to be sure.  Oh, and if you think of, or are introduced to some odd or different or even slightly spooky food?  Give it a shot.  You only live once... well... you being operative.  Might as well explore.  Explore while risk remains, curiosity is fresh, and opportunity exists.  Later.

Rough, but a better rough?

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Yep.  That is as rightly as I can phrase it.  I keep not taking meds, or dropping off.  Not a choice thing, or ornery inclination, simply... I forget?  Yeah.  I'll start it up again today.  All the dark, perhaps.  The cool is creeping in as well.  I am fighting, I am simply not winning.  Thought that I am fighting means I am not losing, or worse just sleeping.  I may be recovered from the day I pushed a bit too hard.  Then again, I thought that if I got enough done I might be able to get out.  Sometimes that works, not this time.  I am going to hit a few things today.  The dishes, trash, and recycling.  The dishes just went for a hot second third soak for a second wash.  Most of the trash and recycling is out.  I won't even try to get the boxes out.  Instead, I may break those down, put them in the back, and take them to the center in town.  There are simply too many.  I have not been keeping up on those at all.

Dreams of late.  But not just... these have been different.  A lost woman.  But she isn't trying to kiss or kill me now.  It is more like she is trying to, oh, come to some sort of agreement.  She didn't like being forgotten.  She seemed jealous of other women.  A ghost in the machine that is me.  I have been looking for a way to lover her, let her go, and move on.  I don't think most will ever quite know that.  Oh, sure, we, even I, have done that with people.  But not with people who were forgotten to such an extent that their haunting was a terror.  Even the memory of her had been buried.  A child too, unborn or in the process.  I still don't have many details, just feelings, and that she was a lovely woman, girl.  We both had each other wrapped around our fingers.  I had to go through something like this about other memories, and people.  But a woman and child are so much closer than anyone else even can be.

I don't know what will happen.  I just know that we have been talking and holding on in order to become familiar enough to finally let go, but in such a way that I don't simply forget, mostly.  Being as close to a ghost as I am, and what else I am, memory isn't always available.  And yet there should be more than night terrors, anger, doubts, and such.  If I could remember her name I might even take a trip to where she was buried.  I am not sure I ever went.  Being in the Navy at the time, and keeping her off the charts, I doubt if I let anyone know.  As well, I might have been gone, if I don't think so.  Very shortly after, but I was there.  This was required for anything else to happen.  Of all the things, I think this was the most difficult to 'remember'.  Easier in some ways.  I am doing enough better that, when it came do, I just didn't ghost through the memories for a decade, as I did with the others.  Bumping into to their ghosts and running away, or sleeping, or becoming so much more ill that I couldn't deal with it.  More difficult, but being capable of facing it full time, much shorter.  This might work itself out in short order, shorter order.

Yes, a few jobs today.  But I don't want to push it as with last time.  Trash, dishes, and bringing the hoses in.  Tomorrow a shopping trip.  I have been making sandwiches with the deli items.  I have also been growing clove sprouts, which won't be ready until tomorrow.  Just some added greens.  I wish I had the forethought to set those up ahead of the purchase.  The problem with that is, even if I plan to get out, I may not do that as scheduled.  Remember, I have been trying to get out, even to SLC, for a week or more.  Can't do what I wish, not always, and certainly not when I want.  Still...  I am saving the sandwich makings for when the sprouts finish and green.  Just sounds good.  Though I might also buy lettuce and onion.  Crisp and sharp adds that final bit to a sandwich.

I best get on to waking.  Later.

She had been working.

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Given the givens, she can't do as much as she used to be able to do.  And steps are too much.  So she had... enticed, a woman actually, to help.  Her bedroom is now on the ground floor and her house is getting neatened.  As a favor, she cooked dinner for the woman, or women.  A true treat, actually.  So she wasn't able to get to the phone.  I do understand.

I told her, after watching an episode of a show in which the last vid existed, that I thought immediately of her.  She isn't familiar with the show, so I described the principle characters in the scene and how the scene played out.  Oh, she got a kick out of it, and laughed, and cried, and...  Glad I wasn't closer.  All I'm saying.  Though she suggested that only I could get away with such a... notion...  I think she was being more diplomatic.  And yet, I think she really did enjoy the sentiment, somehow.  Anyway.

After all that, a fine discussion.  She is doing better, or as better as better is these days.  With age, medicine is more often discussed.  But too, the good things.  Oh, she knows I love her.  It isn't just because I say so, it's in the voice, and eyes.  Mothers have their witching ways, and like certain of their sons, can see right past the phone and into the eyes.  Indeed.  She always knew I had that too.

It's been a good day.  Some things were done.  I changed the water for the dishes once.  I did a few other things.  But I am sore.  I wasn't so tired, really, just sore.  Mostly my forearms, but not only there.  I hope a bit more rest tomorrow, other then finishing the trash and maybe recycling, also taking out the not as easy to collect, and getting that all to the curb.  I keep trying.  Monday maybe more, and on to some business.  Good night.

Thinking of mother.

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They are the most jealous of creatures.  And a bit of darkness resides in each.  As it is, there are three who can claim that, if only one is called, only two remain alive.  I called a bit ago, just went to voice message.  Odd, though maybe she is working, or driving in heavier traffic, or napping.  Or simply doesn't wish to speak to her sweet Ferg... Doom.  No matter, I'll call later.  Might not be the king of hell, but whoever one is, mother is... mother.

Any of them who watch this might well be so upset. Until or unless they get something for their pain. Witches! Love your mothers, I suppose. Just don't trust her. Even if she thinks she has your best interests at heart, what she will do to get her way is... Never mind. Do note, I still call. Mostly. And watch closely. Mostly laughing at the notions. Mostly is operative.

I can't do a whole lot today. My forearms are absolutely useless. The cramps aren't too bad. But the overworking, then the cramping, have combined left those areas so weak that pouring out of a gallon of milk is a bit of a test. I grew soft being down so long, then truly overextended, given my condition, yesterday. Lovely though. I enjoyed hitting as many areas as I hit, having food in the cave, my camera found and ready for a project, trash and recycling (the easy stuff) out, cat litter tended, dishes set, a load of laundry pushed through, and literally another dozen things, plus a trip to the post office and grocery store. Brutal though. I am hoping to keep doing, and have been if much less and slower today, and then kick back into fuller gear before long. At least once I can use my arms again. Ugh.

I grilled several steaks, and toasted some of the bread along with garlic powder and butter.  Oh, man.  When it has been a long time since I have eaten, and more eaten beef, it is a treasure.  Oh, I've learned to like this and that and enjoy much else.  It's just that I need fatty beef once in a while.  More often if I could eat well, and afford it.  This will do me for a bit.  Oh, I used the bread I didn't care for as to sandwich making.  It worked perfectly in this application, if I won't do this much, so...  At least I won't waste it all.

I see the French are in trouble.  A minority that is better armed than their police, in part because they simply wouldn't or couldn't refuse "immigrant communities" arms that not even their police forces have access to, and that in part because they have nearly completely disarmed their civilians.  Now they are locking the sheep in with the wolves, hoping it will all work out.  As a Buddhist I favor well recently said, there is no sleeping with rabid dogs.  I honestly don't think it matters what the French think of their government, they simply don't have a means of changing it, or expelling the muslims.  Best to start with government officials, but then... they were elected.  Who, really, is to blame?  Not my problem and there is nothing I can do about it.

I will pray that the French come to their senses before they lose their minds, or nation.  Then again there are many lost causes I send prayers regarding.  I know there will always be the poor, and yet I pray for them.  I cannot undo what Christ has noted.  I pray for peace, knowing likewise that there will always be war and rumors of war, especially if what I suggest is my nature has any truth, but even so.  My Lord has stated that to be the case as well.  Though these things, neither, should be a great worry.  Only things to resist, if not to lose oneself resisting.  Only to do what little we can in true faith, and in hope, to the tune of charity.  No more.  No less.  So, I pray.  Secular versus a false faith, and it is obvious which will win if nothing is done, or even too little is done.  Not my concern, in the end.

Up at 16:00.  I'll try to make it a few more hours.  I may call mother, again, shortly.  See if her royal highness has a moment for her beloved child.  *grins*  Later.

Not everything works out.

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The lens I purchased doesn't seem to be panning out.  I checked glass clarity immediately upon opening.  That seemed fine, though scads of photos would be an additional piece of evidence.  After arriving home with the goods and shopping, putting everything up, and settling in, I didn't have the energy to try to new lens.  While waking, though, I was quite curious.

The thing with old glass on newer bodies is that they don't talk.  You have to do some of the leg work.  It IS an af lens, but the new bodies don't understand what they are.  You can program the new lens, to a very minor degree.  The maximum aperture is simple enough, but with a zoom lens... only one focal length can be entered.  Mine, for example, runs from 35 to 70 mm.  So... what to put in?  I did a minor bit of research.  The middle point, it was suggested, in several sources, was the way to go.  Done.  Now... I ran with it.  Nothing was doing anything, which was, sort of, fine.  I figured I would have to work with this lens in mostly manual, all manual I suspected.  And yet I could not get it to perform.  I could not bring it into focus.  I will do a bit more research.  Perhaps the lens did break in transit, or wasn't working when sent.  I will tinker with it for a few more days.  If I can't get anything clean from it, no matter how good it can be or should be, I will simply have to return it.  I may have to find a more local shop for lenses.  Since the economy took a major dump, the local middling college town stopped having (as far as I have been able to find) a photo shop.  The next town that might/should have such a shop is about an hour drive.  I suppose, if I don't have to do it on a timed basis, I might, eventually, be able to make it there.  Just to see the lens before buying, no shipping or returns.  If the clerk can't bring it into focus, take some photos, and then I see those on the laptop (if I can get that right), then I won't buy.  Can't trust anyone, though that isn't new.

I'll tinker a bit more, just not at night.  I'll wait until daylight, maybe even go outside.  I'll compare and contrast with the prime.  I am a noob.  Noobs are teh stupid.  Which is fine.  Ignorance isn't truly stupidity, at least if you work to rectify that.  Only if ignorance is a choice is it a form of stupidity.  Though if someone is too weak to be escape ignorance, they need that mansplained and then they need to shut up.  Only if they can't learn.  If they can, they need to get to it, or again shut up.  Choices.  Can't have both.  Men hammer each other over that, and it works.  Not so with women, or even very many men these days.  Politeness is supposed to trump function, and fail is the obvious cost.  Bleh.  Anyway, I'll tinker.  Might be me.  With a little help, study, practice, and such, I should be able to figure this out in the next few days.  Oh, and I best find the battery charger and get the extra camera battery going.  I have plenty of AA and AAA batteries, which will also work, but that gets spendy and annoying in the long term.  Still, if all else fails, that's why I have those.

All I know is if this fails, try that.  If that fails too, improvise.  If it all fails, reconsider your wants, needs, direction, speed, and all else.  If you have no other choice, then find the way.  If it really must be done, guess what?  It will be done.  If not, then it's just you.  It all seems so simple.  If that is very false.  Ask and you shall receive if God helps he who helps himself.  Both are true, they flavor, modify, each other.

Sandwich time!  I might butter the roll, and grill that, but the rest will be cold.  I think I have mayo, perhaps sparkly Italian dressing too.  Ah, but no lettuce.  I did forget that.  Maybe next time I am in.  Even kale on that ain't too bad, if you don't mind a little chew.  Oh?  No editing.  I'm not quite able right lately.  Later.

A little work seemed to help.

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I have, along with all else, been pushing to move my day into daylight hours, or closer.  With the work that was done yesterday I moved the goal post between two and three hours toward my goal.  Only four to five more hours to go.  And actually I had been sliding backwards on that.

I did more yesterday than accounted.  Some bigger and smaller jobs, three average if averaged.  Not bad, really.  However, today, my forearms are cramping.  It started yesterday afternoon.  I can still do a few things today, just not bigger things.  Hmm, I can find more trash bags though.  Oh, and I found my camera.  So...  I do have stuff go missing, it just isn't stuff for insurance company consideration.  Boxes of trash bags, zip-lock bags, little things like that.  So I'm pretty sure it's small domestic use, or just something a kid finds interesting.  They leave the bigger items, but don't mind borrowing other things.  More annoying, usually, than anything else.  Still, I best not catch them.  And, no, I wouldn't shoot first.  If they tried to run I might well attempt to tackle, which in real terms, might be worse.  Even with solid efforts at not actually harming.  While a thief is a thief, there are... layers, depths, differences.

Ah, I wanted to find my camera, actually, to begin taking pictures, before and after.  Both as a photographic project and as an incentive to do more and keep going.  Will any of it happen?  Don't know.  I do know I have my camera, a decent lens, a secondary lens (which at 35 to 70, with the cropping, is 52.5 to 105 mm (sort of... not quite as direct, and more visual than actual... never mind, just trust me, sort of)).  Well, and that makes the 50 mm prime act more like a 75 mm.  The latter is feet focused, the former has some on camera adjustments.  And the lighting in here is atrocious, which is excellent as a starter lab for low-light work, well and lighting.  Next month or the month after I plan on buying off-camera potential speedlights, with diffusers and a small kit really.  It isn't just the cave I hope to target, but foods as I work on things.  Perhaps a photo journal/recipe card for producing kefir, photos of my favorite little home cooked/made items.  Pictures of the girls being girls.  Even out into my yard, and as it begins to snow.

What makes a photographer good, or possibly great?  It isn't the best body or glass, the snazziest pro classes, or youtube vids... it's take the camera out, learning to adjust for this and that, and snapping until your fingers are sore while pulling from the lot, keeping in mind the shots and how or why this or that proved to tell the story more surely, and how it was able to be captured, then making that repeatable.  After that, there comes even more in-depth technicals, followed by improving storytelling, and back and forth until you die.  If you are ever as good as you can get you might as well quit photography.  It, like all other skills, is always a work in progress.  Or you begin losing your skills.  It's that simple.

Oh, great.  First thing this morning?  Not one but two bloody noses.  I wasn't thinking when I went to gargle after brushing.  You do realize proper gargling requires, at least for me, a closed mouth.  And, you do realize, if you didn't think to gulp air before hand, that closing your mouth with your nose blocked with tp means no blowholes?  Yep.  I held out for 15 seconds, but I must have just exhaled before I started gargling.  No air is no air, no matter how big your lungs air.  *splat*  :p

Later.

Much done.

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It beat me up.  I am both sore and getting tired.  Everything had come to a stop, again, a bit ago.  Today, and really to a degree yesterday, I set things back in motion.  No, I didn't get what I had been hoping to get done.  There is to much for a day, two days, even a week of heavy work.  What I did is what I could, what had to be done, and what will help.

Showering was quite good, again.  Being groomed and dressed, then out, was a gift of it's own.  I made it to the post office where I had a number of items.  I missed one item.  I should have signed for it, but I wasn't in shape to realize I could do it.  Yeah, really.  I will have a few more items next week.

After that I headed to town.  Groceries, mostly.  Nothing fancy.  But I wanted some easy food, but good food, and of course the staples I truly enjoy.  Milk!  I haven't had milk for... a while.  I also found ribeyes on deep discounts, and some other beef.  I haven't been able to afford beef for quite a while now.  I can't buy, won't buy, steak for more than $7~$8.  Heck, last time I checked chuck roasts were at that, and no, I won't buy any meat at that price.  The beef industry is going to have to go through some growing pains.  This isn't Japan.  I found steak for $6 per, chuck roasts for $3.50, and hamburger for $3.50.  I wasn't as happy with the hamburger, but that sure beat the $4.50~$5.50 it has been.  I feel sorry for meat departments.  I know they have taken a drubbing.  Nothing they can do until production ramps up, and that will require things that aren't in their control to balance out.  Drought first, then the exorbitant cost of feed from and added to the drought, then a sell off.  Now to rebuild stocks, all with a government, local and federal often, who are anti-beef.  Hell, ranchers are being treated like terrorists!

Anyway.  Oh, but before all that, of course, I did take a shower.  Then cleaned out the kitchen sinks, taking the dishes into the tub in tub operation.  When there are too many, or it is more convenient, that just works.  I don't know if I can get to them today, but... sooner than the last set it is hoped.  And I did tear into boxes.  More organizing them for an eventual run at them.  I was also looking for my camera.  So far I haven't been able to find the camera, and I am a bit worried.  Where I was almost certain it would be...  I'll look more soon.  Worst case, I turn it in to my insurance company, along with some other things.  I've been avoiding that, but...  I hope I find it.

I purchased a new lens, my first telephoto, a 35-70 (x1.5 due to crop factor) f/2.8D.  No, only available used.  I've actually been spending time looking at new and/or old glass that works well with my system.  Once every six months to a year I will buy a new lens, until I am happy... or die.  I might also pick up, say, a d52/5300, as a... grab, run, shoot, without as much worry about damage.  And it takes all the same glass.  Or, if need be, it's always nice to have a backup.  Much of the gear is crossover, even the memory chips... I think.  Oh, since it was used, and a "value find", I did buy another lens.  both lenses together were less than my 50mm prime, which is less expensive than most even kit lenses.  Yeah, I did my research.  I have a small list, though not all are that inexpensive.  The most expensive glass on my list is about $800, the majority are in the $150~$300 range.  I would say, currently, I have about four or five on my short list.  These are budget (for what they offer), gems in hiding sort of... a three year procurement project.  Those glass will allow me to explore every type of photography in at least a fairly general way.  If I like, then I might go deeper on glass, or a set of that for various specifics beyond the general.  Yeah...  But that is the idea.

Ah, and, yes, I used some of the food I purchased.  I have, for the first time in my life, over the last six months, noticed there is more to an oven than just roasting and baking.  The broiler!  I stopped at the deli.  I tried various roast beef types, choosing home-style easily.  Then added a few slices of various salamis and cheeses.  Stopped at the bakery and bought rolls and hoagies.  Yeah, but I have had so few carbs, or anything really lately, that I just didn't mind.  I turned one batch of the various items into a sandwich, then broiled... almost too much.  I'll need to practice with that.  Mine, on high, is FAST.  Still, it worked.  Oh, and smoked gouda and creamy havarti with roast beef, genoa and hard salami, on a right sandwich roll?  S-a-weet!  And to think I thought about buying a sandwich in town.  No, nothing wrong with that, at the right store.  But I needed this, homemade, mostly, and hot and fresh.  Just something about, sort of, cooking at home.

Well, time for me to begin pulling back and backing down.  Sleep is needed, if I do have to chill just a bit longer.  I hope to get the geese delivered tomorrow.  I just had too much backing up, on top of the limit to my endeavors, to get out.  We will see how caught up and able I become in the next day or three.  It sucks to be a cripple from time to time.  But that's just how it goes.  Good night.

Yet I am.

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So much seen.  So much done.  So many lost.  So much lost.

A fine start.

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So many things had backlogged.  Not just travel and seeing my friend.  The computer construction came to a dead stop, the geese (while still nicely frozen) are just... well... sitting there, and other things simply haven't been attended.  It has been very off this summer through now, though it was getting better a few weeks back.  Then another drop.  Fall shifting toward winter, too much on my plate, too big of bites on my part, it all just added up to another dip.  Even so, these dips are complete losses.  Just... dips, not drops.  I don't have to actually get up from these, merely figure out how to get going again.  Big difference.  Just as frustrating, though a lot less painful to recover.

In recovery, or while attempting it, the want of tobacco hits the hardest.  Nicotine is the only known drug that can give a high or a low and that be based on the will of the user.  Yes, boys and girls, it is a very unique drug.  It is mild enough that it really shouldn't be as addictive as it is.  It is that little part about choice that makes it so darned difficult to quit.  Imagine if when drinking coffee you could use it, by choice, as easily to help wake you as to put you to sleep at night?  In spite of that, there is no real temptation.  Just a blind want that sneaks up on me once to three times a month.  It usually leads to a bit more physical hunger.  Until I realize what it is, it is nearly inconsolable.  But, yeah, no.  That should get easier through time.

After the shower and dry time, I did make it to town.  Nothing fancy.  I had thought to attempt shopping.  I just didn't have that in me.  A bite to eat, then back home, nothing more.  As little as that was, it was fine.  Just to be clean, groomed, and fed... life, a good life, can easily be that simple when you are sometimes forced to live without one or all of those things.  I am hoping to make it to the post office, and then on to some shopping, in the morning proper.  I forgot to take anacin, sort of.  I was almost hoping the pain would cease on it's own.  Not so much.  So, after returning, and more to deal with it as an annoyance, I took a small handful of the things.  It's not like I do that more than a few times a month, often ignoring pain and sometimes serious pain.

I dreamed last night.  I was living in a world in which men and women no longer married, ever.  But it was as if I didn't get the memo.  Everyone laughed at my notions, sort of, behind my back.  Though there was some sympathy, and even joy, that someone could be so simple or naive still.  It wasn't totally cruel.  As in real life, I purchased a home, and tried to get it arranged.  As in real life, I had a heck of a time keeping it sorted.  While buying a home, in real or dream life, wasn't so much about making an offering to a prospective woman to make her a wife as it was about beginning to live the life of the husband type.  The home, itself, is a commitment.  Being a married man is being a slave, to a degree.  A servant, certainly.  And not just in flesh or of coin, but of will and ways.  It means surrendering the wanderlust, some curiosity in "out there", and other such things.

And darned if a good woman isn't worth the cost.  If you can find one.  Also, in the dream, as in life and sometimes on this blog, I have expressed just how much you may have to do, as a man, to keep her.  Animal husbandry and people husbandry... it's not all pheromones and sweet-spots.  As much as anything, it is making sure that all the right actors are in the right places when everything important is supposed to happen.  It is making it so.  It isn't always pretty, or nice.  And yet, it really is, if only when done rightly, what makes the world go around.  As failingly as that happens, it is as good as it gets, when done right.  When done wrong hell on earth can be seen from it, is produced by it.

I am sure, in life and from the dream, that I know the right way.  I won't say I'll hit that out of the park every time, only that I know what I am supposed to do.  And, finally, I am quite willing to do my best at... nailing it.  I am fully on board, if I am not perfect yet.  Working on it though.  Now to find a woman who wants to work on it as individuals, together, then as a family.  Golden.

Well... a bit of reading and goofing, then maybe a bit of this and that in the real morning.  But I won't be able to go anywhere, or do daytime things at a distance, for a while.  I have decades.  And with a good woman more and better.  I can manage a woman and more, with a little help from my friends, and a house too.  If she does her part.  You know, with forty years in me?  I might leave her ready for a rest at my passing.  You know I want to go out with a smile.  And I've never known a woman who hasn't wanted to love me just to death.  Daydreaming, perhaps.

Later.

Ouch!

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No, I didn't get out.  I have been pouring as much gas as I had onto the fire to try to push events.  It turns out I only burned myself.  I never did get my hours right.  Any progress I made collapsed in the last few days.  Medicine is still hit in miss, though more because there is some other problem than just an item issue.  I've fallen and I can't get up, basically.  Oh, I'll be fine.  It just bothers me when I really want/need to do something and knowing that, at least on my own, I might not be able to do it, at least if it is really time sensitive.

I hope to make a call today.  To find out condition.  The other friend was supposed to call, then call me back.  I have heard nothing.

Sleep of late has been that dry harsh stuff that just allows me to get through life.  It isn't the rich settling calming good stuff.  For a month or more I have just simply been getting just exactly the absolute minimum, no matter how long or short I sleep, and nothing more.  Even so, this isn't an actual complaint.  It so beats sleeping for days and not even really sleeping, or staying up for many days but not being awake, then going back and forth in that for months.  Still, it's not as good as what I have generally known these last four or five years.

When I woke I decided to hit the shower right away.  After I dry, I may shave.  Just using the trimmer this morning, I don't feel like trying to mow down the forest with a herring!  Then maybe a trip to town.  I have been eating bits and smatterings of this and that.  I wouldn't want my mom to know.  Canned bread, pickled pork hocks, olives, and omelets once in a while, when I can stand to stand long enough.  Those canned hog brains I ordered recently are even being viewed with a strange sort of fearful curiosity only deep hunger can produce.  I might just run to town tonight, for something to eat, then go back in the morning for shopping and to check the mail.  I think something is in.  I missed one item, don't want to miss another.

Yes, it is rough.  I am not the only one in trouble, if I think my friends are in far more serious trouble.  All of us, this time, have heart issues.  They are in their 70's though, which suggests that there is a way through, as I had suspected.  I really need to call about my friend.  I could drive, I just couldn't find the hospital, then his room, then find an hotel or lodging, and make subsequent trips back and forth to the hospital.  My schedule is off, and even getting going has proven out of my reach.  Frustrating.  But it is what it is. humbling as that is.

Yeah, and I hurt this morning.  Sinuses?  Just a headache?  General ache from exhaustion is there too.  I'm not awake enough, quite yet, to get a grip on what the problem is.  I might take some otc painkillers though.  More that the pain is annoying while I am confused than that the pain is too much.

Later.

Gah!

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Sleep was too off to make it out today.  And there are some other issues.  I have to see about figuring some things out and getting out today.  Medicine has been spotty.  It's not that I mean it to be.  But when things are off, choices aren't exactly available.  What happens, happens.  I did a load of laundry, a few things I wanted, for sure, for the trip.  I need some food, so might head out for a bite.  I will need to shower and shave, though I can shave later.  It's sort of a messy time to try to be doing anything, but especially a random outing with no set plans, a need for an eye on the budget, medicine and sleep still off kilter, all while trying to figure out some other things on the side.  Brutal and ugly.

I am feeling good, and it is all improving.  I am running fairly well for purely survival issues.  Just that adding anything extra is shorting something in the machine.  I'll keep at it.  Hopefully I can head out today.  I am aiming from somewhere between 10:00 and noon.  As well, I will probably only be able to afford to stay a couple of days.  Reality and all that.  I do need to go though.  Yeah, it's a lot easier, in many ways, not to go.  This isn't my sort of thing on top of all the rest.  And, yet, I think I can do it, want to do it, and should do it.  So...  A shower, shortly, a bit of airdrying, then to town for a spot to eat, and shaving when I get back.  Finally, a call in the morning to see about the other friend.  He may have needed a bit more time off anyway, though, too.  Sucks to be this ill.

Later.

E-gaming.

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I don't know how many of you folk play games.  Consoles such as ps 4 or xbox, computer gaming, or the handheld units some of which are interactive with consoles now, sharing some games and usable as controllers, all offer various content with some overlap.  Oh, and not all of it is hardcore gaming.  They have created content for just about everybody.  Yes, your momma too!  No joke, if it is funny, at least to me.  Of course, what they play isn't exactly what true gamers play.  And, yes, there is a difference.

Some believe gaming is an addiction.  And for some people more than others, it is.  Though in truth, most gaming has some element of that.  Some of that comes from having very old aspects to our brain and a very new living paradigm.  Even fifty, but certainly an hundred, years ago, we were struggling to keep food on the table and a roof over our head.  We really were.  Today we have very little difficulty finding food.  Even at midnight, living in a berg that would have been consider the boondocks just thirty years ago, and I can drive in and by fast food or go to a store and buy less processed/ready foods.  It's a different life.

Without the push just to eat, stay moderately clothed, and find shelter, we look for something to fulfill that need and want for a driving factor.  Most of us realize we really can't change, certainly not fix, the world.  Socialists and communists believe that, which is why they are so driven for politics.  If they ever realized the truth, and that even if they do change the world, given who and what they are and how they do things, that change would definitely be for the worse, we might have a better world (and more gamers).  Many of us realize the only thing we might be able to improve is ourselves.  And, if that happens to make the world better, it is more likely to be through example.  Not quitting, not choosing the easy way, not taking what isn't ours, even if supposedly for someone in need.  And, actually, gaming offers considerations regarding self-improvement that civil socialism and communism can't offer.  Verified better scores, expanding a mind in order to explore ways to solve problems, both in game and life, that might not otherwise have been considered.

Of course, gaming can be taken too far.  So, too, can television/movies/reading.  As can even education.  Have you ever met those types who have half a dozen masters and ph.ds but who have never worked?  Further, much of the education is phony.  They just learned how to get the answers for the quizzes and tests, without actually learning the material.  There are those who stick so much to the real world, as well, that they know nothing else.  They are known as workaholics.  Everything can be taken to extremes, and most things will be, if they are satisfying and more available, or seemingly available, than other/better options.

For me, it is something I can do when all else fails.  It keeps me from dropping into a cavern of nothingness.  Medicine has been helping these last few years.  But without something to do, something that isn't to physically demanding, yet gives that feel, I would be sleeping a great deal more than I am.  Regardless what you may have heard, sleep is death.  So, for me, often, games are a lifeline, for the mind.  They even help the body, in some ways.

In any case, over the next week or three, I am hoping to discuss various topics related to gaming, at least for me.  Subjects such as open world versus small and linear, means for producers to raise or lower difficulty and which of those I prefer, among other topics.  To be honest, I don't think there are many who don't play.  Even my mother games!  And, yes, she takes her gaming seriously... if I chuckle at her choices.  Then again, to a degree, that is exactly what I started with as well.  Yes, gaming.  I will be discussing much.  Just... not until I return.  Hmm... I may take a notepad and, for when I'm not at the hospital, so as to work on some of these notions.

I have been considering taking a book of short stories.  I'm not sure if my friend would care to be read at though.  I'll ask him when I arrive.  I sort of wish I had some of the ebooks in physical form.  I meant to do that, but got lost in life and illness.  Some of those, even the end time ones, are pretty good and generally short enough, some of them, to be read in a fairly short session.  Perhaps I could just read off my smartphone ereader.  Reading to someone ill is a good practice, mind you.  Can't talk a lot, and have little else to really do.  Depends on if he can stay interested or at least enjoys the notion.

Later.

Back on some sort of track.

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I can't swear when I actually went to bed.  I think someone called, maybe several people.  Not sure I spoke with any save one call.  I have no idea what was said.  Or I dreamed all that.  If I look at the phone records, I might be able to be sure, though I am not sure it is important.  Not at this point.  I am sure I stayed up until at least mid-afternoon, maybe a bit later though possibly earlier.  Up at midnight yesterday, and perhaps a sixteen hour day.  Good enough as I am working my way through things.

I best call and cancel dinner.  Or did I?  Either way, I need to make sure.  Then I need to get some food down, omelets are pretty good.  A little cheese added, perhaps sliced olives, sometimes plain.  It's good enough.  Maybe a run to town?  And I need to get a shower in, maybe a bath later too.  Plus a bit of packing.  It doesn't take much.  Taking the right stuff means you can take less.  How much, or little, you pack, depends on a lot of things.  Still, even for four days, a very small case should do.  Oh, but the cats.  I best figure that out.

I am not sure when travel will begin.  I would guess that a 10:00 start might be pushing it.  Though time will tell on that.  Sometimes it just happens, when it happens.  First, though, I need to finish waking.  A fresh pot of coffee and something to eat after that, then a shower.  Later.