Better, part try?

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I don't speak a trace of French or even other romantic languages anymore.  At least it wasn't part doe.  Never mind.

I am feeling better.  Still a bit tight, all around, weary as well, if better in all ways, again.  I will be awake until I am not.  I will read, watch music or movie vids, or even do little tasks here and there, as things work out.  I simply won't push this way or that.  I won't dig, aim, or try.  I just don't have it in me to do so.  Batteries have to recharge before I can even begin thinking about thinking about things.  Then, of course, I have to... well... think about things, formulate a plan, create order, provide direction, then wait for the window of opportunity to appear.  Even then, a window of opportunity is not a guarantee of action.

Have you ever met someone of "the faith" who... pretty much didn't believe... pretty much anything?  Ah, right, yeah... the flood?  Oh, well, just a story.  Virgin birth?  Just an allusion.  Allusion?  Something.  Sin?  Well, yeah, but not really.  Just take even literal things all as stories of morality, and then try to play nice.  They seem to laugh off much.  And, yet, when they find you do believe?  They fear YOU?  Really?  How does that work?  Don't fear God, or sin, or hell, but fear someone who believes in that?

Seems the pope is like that.  You know... that doesn't work out.  There is a dissonance there that absolutely doesn't make sense.  I can't help.  Free choice.  I am pretty sure that if they say those things are false, and fear me or priests who also believe, that they know, deep down, but are hiding from it.  For... any of a number of reasons.  But they know.  They just want to avoid knowing.  At one time I would have pursued, a bit.  Now?  I just let them go there way.  Just by being present in how I understand truth I have done all I may for them.  I'll check.  If I am no longer welcome I will find another place for that need.  It isn't a problem for me, I think it is for some.  So be it, if necessary.

Well... on to something or other.  Wow... just 22:00?  Weird.  I am really out of sorts.  Time and sleep and such just isn't... my internal clock is just not keeping up.  Later or good night, definitely good evening.

Not as good as "better".

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Instead of just a gentle removal and remittance of my innards, this time there is the sense that my offal was placed between to large cutting boards, which were then struck until right before anything burst.  Then, all whole, my pluck was returned, if and again, akilter.  Nothing is quite where it seems it should belong.  I have had worse, even in this regard, just not recently.  All good, I finished what was wanted and needed.  Suffering can go in the bucket for those in purgatory.  I am not sure if that is the least I can do or all I can do, but it is what I know to do.

A day or two of rest.  Catching back up on dishes, no fancy cooking until that is done if only using a cast iron piece, which is in a permanent state of seasoning use and reuse... save for the mushroom ketchup.  Which will probably go forward sometime this tonight.  You say Wednesday, I say Thursday eve.  Or so I heard some wisenheimer intimate recently.  Ace?  I can't remember.  I resemble wiseguys.  Not sure I truly am one, just not that good... or bad?

If I have been stepping on toes lately, don't take it too personally... mostly.  When I push beyond a certain level I tend to get a bit... out of sorts.  Not that I'll backtrack, necessarily, just that some things don't always need to be said, or written.  When I am raw to bone, words may be loosed that I may have preferred to not loose.  Though if you are sticking your nose in, or otherwise twerking in places you shouldn't, a little sting might be in order.  All I am suggesting is that I am not absolutely sure my notations were wisely reasoned.  Oh, I'm not worried.  If you wish to throw stones for it, aim well.  If also, expect absolutely no allowance for that so make it count, thus fatal, probably on the first toss.  Do us both a favor or keep to your private pouting.

The goal, for now, is to limp back up to speed, then begin digging into the cave.  I would like to order a full size dumpster, so as to begin clearing the cave of... much.  I don't know if a regular one will work, for what I have in mind, or if they would prefer a construction based one.  I'll attempt to make contact tomorrow.  Then, through October, I'll begin stripping out boxes and furniture which I don't use and would not be taking with.  The goal is to reduce my holdings to what could be compacted into a smaller moving pull-behind or truck (if it could pull the Xterra).  Bleh.  I won't be able to do that fully, but some things can stay... things which are currently useful.

Next month is about ripping into my possessions and house and sorting, storing properly, tossing, or putting into a pile for further consideration.  I hope to have the kitchen and bathroom in shape to have a plumber in, perhaps even installing a outdoor faucet on the driveway side of the house.  But definitely getting the sink working and the plumbing righted.  If that goes well, and affordably, as I get to the rest of the cave, I may, over the winter, hit the en suite finally.  Two bathrooms is nice, but an en suite is truly divine.  I'd like to have that working for my last year or two here.  Plus it adds value... if that means anything in this economy.

Oh, yes.  But, first, I absolutely have to rest and heal.  I have pushed and shoved trying to get this done.  I still don't know if I was fighting phantoms of mind or body, if the ailments were real, or just what caused so much grief and why it was so difficult.  I only know it has worn me down to nubs and turned me into a form of suffering.  I am sure punching bags could commiserate.  Bruised, battered, tired, and just way off the beaten track.  I'll get better, always do.  Later.

Yeah, but I think I broke something.

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Me and my big fat tests.  As late as I got back home, with what I had to do as well as trying too cool off, the only way I was going to make it back to town was to not sleep.  So... I didn't sleep.  And I made it back in to town.  Not always do both happen even if the first is a success.  I got right in at the shop.  They are rather honest.  I should get my oil changed more often, if it isn't as necessary as some suggest.  I'm pretty heavy on the pedal too, so, I just don't get that.  With the inspection done as well, the tax office was smooth.  Mostly.

Yeah, I put the decal on.  Right away.  Wow was I pushing it.  Some year I would like to have this done spot on.  I think I did do that one year.  Last year?  Maybe.  I was quitting tobacco.  That can do it to a guy.  But... done.  Everything that was killing my nerves is done.  For now.

If I have been feeling rough, now I feel a bit worse, though through the numbing effect of having been struck from on high.  I didn't even know the Big Guy knew 'hammer time'.  *Bam*  When I can relax and cool I'll go lay down.  Wonderful.  Well, terribly wonderful.

After I catch back up on this and that, I need to get medicines going.  I am definitely out of potassium.  I never did get the change of dosage on the carvedilol.  And I should set up an appointment next next month.  Also, back to house cleaning.  I really am getting some squaring away going, and mostly staying on top of it.  It's a mountain that, if I climb, I mean to stay firmly atop, save for skiing the moguls.  Bleh heh heh hehehehe hehehehehehehehehe  *cliff*  ARgh!  I've had worse.

I almost stopped in for an eye exam.  I will soon.  Then to order at least two pair.  I'll give the doc a shot, and that one place.  Bifoculs, but the inviso ones.  Yeah, it's... about that time.  I'd love to have the surgery, then just go with readers, but... yeah.  Maybe though, in time... or not.  Alaska makes me want it, but might kill it, or not?  Gah!

Good day and night.

Note from the doc.

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Something about something.  Blood work included.  Oh, he seems upset.  This doc, the last, the one before that, on to all but the first who thought there was nothing wrong at all, have been saying something about death, and dying, and on and on.  I swear, they need to give these people something for their nerves.  I outlived the one who couldn't find his a... my health issue, with both hands.  I am grateful, as it means that particular quack isn't practicing anymore.

Late but true.

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As an arrow.  If late from the quiver not late for the target.  As much was done as was possible by reason other than my will, ability,  or stamina.  First the shower, of course.  Then unloading the vehicle, as much as possible.  Then to loading every last bit of recycling to go.  A good thing as more boxes had arrived as well as the ones which had not gotten broken down that first time.  Along, of course, with the styrofoam.  Quite a haul was taken in.  Light as a feather, strong as... well... styrofoam anyway.  Don't hide behind it in a gunfight, or even as protection from being flocked or stoned... no, not the new terms.  Look yea back, in time, or such.

That was just to get out the door.  Which didn't happen until... hmm... perhaps 15:30?  I really wasn't sure what would happen.  Oh, and on the way out, I called about another lamb.  Not sure any are available, but it is being checked.  Yeah, I really do like lamb.  It is somewhat dear, if much better, less expensive, than store bought, and in my opinion in all ways.  I haven't found such sweet lamb since a brand a store that has since changed hands twice used to carry.  I can't find it anymore, so...  But this will do quite well.

Then to recycling.  I love driving, so that is never a thing.  So long as I don't have a tight schedule.  After that?  Ah, right, since I was coming around by my service center, used to be Midas but is now independent... but same guys... all good.  Right there.  I figured they wouldn't have a spot for me, but no reason not to stop in and check.  I was right, though set things up.  Tomorrow, at 9:00, I am told.  I could have asked for 14:00 but I like to test things.  Yeah, I'm an idjit, sue me.  We'll see.  Then on to the cleaner.  They have a program, free month, sign up for your favored wash, as much as you want, for about three times the cost of a single wash.  Yeah?  Heck yeah.  I was thinking of asking them if they had some program.  Funny how things work out.  That was right next door to the tire shop, so after that I got them rotated.

Finally on to the store.  Milk, cream, and butter... some fruits, pears and grapes... and two sorts of lettuce and two heads of cabbage.  Yeah.  A few other items to make dressings and mayo.  I prefer light olive oil for those things and aioli.  Ugh...  Oh, and mushrooms for a archaic form of ketchup... as per the following vid.  That was that.  I did what I could, and more.  I am toast.  I chose white mushrooms instead of brown due to availability and more because white mushrooms are higher in potassium.  Not sure if I will do this tonight or tomorrow.

Not lazy.

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Simply not well.  Not at my worst, though it doesn't take that.  All it takes is 20% off my game and I'm pretty much in dirt nap territory.  Thing is, I don't die any better than I work or live.  I don't feel horrible, or good.  Better than even my "Better" post, for as little as that means.  I really have to get to things today.  Time is running out, tick-tock, and on this front, time is required to mean something.  So... In I go.  Urhm, if I can get up, if I can shower, if, if, if.

Yeah, I get it.  I have written and said that it doesn't matter how I feel.  And it doesn't.  But this isn't about feelings.  This is about not functioning.  My job, should I choose it and I do, is to force an animal the size of a black bear to do a bunch of stupid pet tricks while it is in pain, hungry, and trying to hibernate.  You may be more associated with your flesh.  I am a junior partner.  I pushed it beyond it's limits one... thousand... times too many.  Now it jumps when it wants, not when I say.  Heck, it can lock me away, for it's or what it thinks is my own good.  Yeah.  I had it on the cutting bleeding edge once.  And, really, it still is, given all.  It just isn't interested in playing the fool for other fools, knows it's limits given the new paradigm, and like a mule will stop when it must.  Though perhaps if it simply isn't sure.  So... I have to negotiate this.  I have had a treat day in a while.  I may... negotiate on that.  Perhaps even an up-front, and pay when the job is done treat.  Yeah.

It looks like a nice day.  I just need to shower, unload and reload the vehicle, and get in.  Get done, today, what I can.  Then back in tomorrow and so on until it is all done.  I think I can.  I do.  Plus I really do want it.  Even my body wants it.  Just stuck.  I think I can get out.  Later.

Eating mistakes.

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A mistake?  A group of them.

First, I didn't have the correct seaweed.  That should be easy enough to fix.  I know a couple of places which might carry it, and I need to be in town, shopping among other things already.  If not, I have found what I need at amazon.  Next, I didn't do the right things, according to this or the last video.  There is an order, a temp range for various things... I messed it up.  As well, I did not add enough bonito.  Too much would be a bit brutal, too little was simply weak.  Beyond that, the beef, when I cooked it in the fat, I cooked it too long and/or too high.  Confit is an experiment, mind you.  Further, I am well above sea level, meaning all recipes have to be shaken out a bit more than usual.

Even so, to be honest, I wasn't terribly disappointing.  I believe, with a bit of work, this will do well.  I do not know that I will ever come to love this.  I may always see it as eating my medicine.  And, yet, even if that is the limit, I am good with it.  However, if I can make it a pleasant meal, I would be pleased to have an enjoyable, low-carb, source of potassium... and actually a good source of a lot of good things, if at the price of fairly hefty hits of salt.  Just a dab will do.

If nothing else, I really do enjoy tinkering with a new idea in the kitchen.  I'd sure like to figure out a recipe that would fill this out, and do right.  By the way, I have tried cooked daikon.  I believe I will stick to raw.  It's okay, just not my thing.  Just an update on a recent notion I presented.  Now, cooked daikon is not horrible.  It just isn't a draw.  I ought to check the nutritional content.  Perhaps, it too, could be an eaten medicine, or simply a solid source of specific nutrients.  I sure like it raw.  I love regular red radishes, but there is so little.  A daikon radish is like a giant red one.  Sliced into sticks, I finally get enough of the radish taste I truly enjoy... just not cooked.

Later.

Miso hungry?

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Not so much.  The title gives it away though.  Miso, a Japanese, Asian in general, soup.  There are several ways to make it.  From "scratch", with a specific sort of miso base, bonito (shaved dried fish chips, which my cats are starting to like), dashi kombu (a specific sort of dried seaweed), and for me this time dried shiitake mushrooms.  Now, this doesn't actually make a soup, it makes a stock.  As well, there is a form of this which is all incorporated into small granules or pellets which, all on it's own, will produce the stock.

What you add to the stock will depend in part on what you might like with it and what will go with it.  I, personally, have no clue, currently.  Another form of seaweed will go in, the shiitakes are an add, and I am going to try something different, some smaller dices of beef.  That might fly like a lead balloon and yet that is how I do.  I won't use tofu.  I despise tofu.  However, I might try milder fish, seafood, various vegetables, and... who knows.  I may well end up not liking it.  If that isn't the full point in this case.  Why eat this?  Potassium.  Not just a hit, but a fist, or face, full of it.  It can be high in salt, but that is probably less the issue than potassium, and can be mitigated a bit.

Better.

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It still feels as if my innards were removed and put back in, but sideways, if at least by someone competent at the task.  I have slept enough to feel better about that part of the problem if getting much beyond that might be a bit of a trick.  I did get the trash collected and out.  Just two bags, perhaps I should have just waited until next week.  Still, it was together, and I got it out to the bin with intent, so I just carried on.  Whether I got it out in time is to be known soon enough.

A shower, shortly.  Dishes are completed, mostly.  Dishes are almost only ever mostly done.  Even when they are all done, if I plan to used a particular pot, pan, device, or object such as a gravy boat, I may need to wash it, or them.  Never ever are dishes completely done.  However, at this point, they are merely dirty in place if they are needing a wash.  A shower, a trip to town.  Once I unload then reload the vehicle.  First task will be to drop off the recycling, then get a cleaning, and then check on an oil change and inspection, or get that lined up.  Whichever way that goes, then on to tire rotation... or shopping.  Too much to do to plan beyond a certain point.  I can't do taxes until I get the inspection, so... today, tomorrow, whenever, but best be soon.

So hungry.

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She makes me this way in more ways than one.  So close at times we...

The pain is soft.

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There is that.  I have rested well, often, long.  Cool, dark mostly.  Even with the sun out today, I think, it just... it was a soft sun.  Having to fight through the cool of fall the sun simply seemed mild.  No worries.  I have, from time to time, broken on through even in the winter.  Just not now.  I do have to do things this week though.  Have to, no choice, if it kills.  And, so, I will.

I reset the dishes and have been doing batches of them, off and on.  It wasn't, mostly, cooking, eating, used dirty dishes.  A couple of them were pots which had simply been sitting for a long time, seriously needed cleaned.  Another large batch were tins, round tins with lids.  Those have rusted after a couple days of sitting.  I am not sure they will work out.

I had hoped to use them for pemmican.  If they rusted with just a bit of soaking and washing, they may rust shut fairly quickly.  Even if I put wax paper around the pemmican, as planned, having to tear open the tins would make them rather useless.  I'll see if there is a work around for that or if those are just shot.  I'll also need to find 'tins' I can depend on.  While I am hoping to get around a hundred pounds of jerky, I'd like fifty pounds of pemmican.  Along with other foods, those things will carry me a long time.

I suspect, if I have a decent supply of some things, and can find a bush pilot I can trust to run me supplies from time to time and has access to my cache, or some of it, what I have currently could last me a good two years without any other foods.  Though the goal is to get licenses so as to be able to hunt and fish typically the first year or two, as required, and then switch to sustenance licensing.  Though, to be honest, even if I could get all the meat I need, I'd still need fats and I'd still want beef from time to time.  Jerky isn't as good as fresh but it would do.  And I'd always need supplies.  Would rather have them flown out, even at a premium, a few times a year, than have to go to town.  Yeah...  I think so.

All theory, for the moment.  And, yet, I think it's doable.  If the world wants to go to hell, let it.  I still wish I was further along in my plans.  Hillary has a serious shot at the presidency, and then you'll regret it.  Though you might well be glad the was wasn't built.  Yes, she is that dangerous.  And every idiot who thinks the different between the two is little is only fooling, or trying to fool, themselves.  She will go after gun rights, she will go after the family, she will go after men, she will go after justice, she will endorse minorities right into their criminality, she will include islam to the harm of Christianity, Judaism, and secularism, and she will finish ending this nation as a nation of laws, reason, logic, and all such.  Trump will most likely damage it, just not near to that level.  And if he honestly resets immigration and builds the wall?  That will cover some of his losses.  Hillary has no way to cover the damage she will do.  Nothing she offers is good for America or Americans.  Yeah, I wish I was out of here already.

Later.

A new read.

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While I have many books I could read, I was... called.  Dante's Inferno.  Why?  No clue.  I even tried to avoid it.  Not having the book, I had to find it, then add it to my basket.  I may have tried to remove it, or actually removed it, a time or two even.  And, yet...  The compulsion was grand.  Even though I thought it would be just another silly book.  Perhaps it will be.  I am only two chapters in.  Got it late this week, had too much else happening, thought it might disappear into a pile somewhere.  Yeah, while feeling a pull, almost a command, I can't say I was all that interested.  Actually, I often fight such draws.  Sometimes I win.  Still might.

I read it long ago.  I probably remember... things in, or of, it, rather than passages.  I read it before I started with Shakespeare or even finished the whole of the New Testament.  I am guessing somewhere between seven and eleven years old.  I have had doubts about my readerships, and okay.  I have no absolute evidence.  The only thing, for myself, I am sure regarding is that my foster father tested my knowledge of the bible.  That was, in his belief, because he wasn't sure I understood the King James version.  That test wasn't the first year I was there, my eighth grade, but I believe my second year, as a Freshman.  The fall of my freshman year, or early winter.  I had finished the N.T. two years before, which would have been in the seventh grade, or ~12... right?  Actually, make that 13, I was held back a year because my brother and myself were barely a year apart and didn't do well together.  Yeah...  I had not read all of Shakespeare, never did.  But I probably read eight to ten of his plays, with some solid understanding.  Remember, I had already had to fight for my life and had already had sex, choosing my first lover when I was five.  Yeah, I... understood a bit better, if not, of course, fully.  Marriage, a job, things like that, are well above where I was, but not so far above as most of my peers.

I should be honest.  Even reading things now, I don't always fully understand.  Though, too, I realize that if I don't understand, many others, regardless of what they say or write, also don't understand.  Fair enough.  I'll take that.  I do my best but my best is not good enough.  I read the notes in The Inferno.  I hope they are more sure.  I do not know that.  I am guessing I could find very solid dissonance among the various experts, varied so deeply, radically, that I could if I so chose completely write the notes off, if then I might have to do a great deal of research, possibly to include learning the language it was written in from the period... which would also... be problematic, as there are just as great of debates regarding the meanings of words and phrases as there are about the interpretations of translated meanings of things in the book.  So... you know... I'll just abide it, unless I disagree.  Perhaps, then, maybe, I might seek elsewhere.  Ugh.

The bible?  I have read the N.T., I think, about six times (cover to cover).  As to exposure otherwise, I have been in church through most of my youth and some of my adult life, so have had solid exposure to sermons and readings.  And yet... it is a living book.  It's truth is singular, I'll grant that.  But neither man nor other can know that singular.  As well, I think the bible can speak to a moment, even if it doesn't make sense always in context, or out of it, or when fully read... or partially read.  It's an amazing book, one which I think the Holy Spirit can guide through.  Not an ouji board sort of thing, but a true spiritual thing, from the God of Abraham, moving the reader through the seeking in the Word.  But I won't always pretend to know.  And those who do... I, at the very least, expect a very humble approach to sorting the meaning.  Don't tell me what you were taught by men who were taught who were also taught, none knowing save the Source, for sure.  Humility, not certainty.

Why this book.  I don't know.  I was very powerfully called to it, right over my sometimes bored indifference, ill health, and my want to do other things... real things.  I have, to a degree, given up on most books.  Bleh.  Just... scribblings of mad men.  I can do that with the best of them.  Perhaps not poetry, if I think very little of poetry.  An art for the lazy and indolent... and giants.  I'll keep going, see if there are any peanuts ahead.

No real sense to the post.  Just... couldn't sleep, read a bit, was pondering why this and that... trying to make sense of things that may have no rhyme or reason.  Later or good night.

Sleep is fantastic.

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I simply had to stop fighting it.  No real choice, though I could have maintained a miserable wakefulness and even then, when I inevitably would have crashed, had a sense of defeat, shame, and guilt.  I decided not to go that way.  If for no other reason, there is nothing I haven't tried and there is nothing that worked.  In essence, I had no choice.

As soon as I woke I turned the furnace up, set the thawed steak out and salted it for frying in an hour, and then reset the dishes.  I figure an hour after dinner and the dishes should be cool enough to finish.  For now, I am enjoying sunflower seed hors d'oeuvres.  I would have coleslaw but that never quite made it to production.  Actually... sunflower seeds on/in coleslaw would be quite good.  Why?  Potassium, at least in sunflower seeds.  If they were right about how much, these things are heavy duty potassium sources.

I am not sure what else might happen.  The sun seems to be out.  The mountains are snow-capped.  Though perhaps they have been for a while?  The curtains are open, with the sheers in place.  Nice.  It's been a while.  It got so warm at the end of summer that opening, even with sheers, was, to me, unthinkable.  The cooling has been so off and on that I simply haven't gotten into a pattern.  But as the season ends, and it cools, but before it becomes too cold, I hope to enjoy the sheers and some access.  Ah, everything starts today, now, isn't it so?  And so it has.

A fistfight, in my dreams.  I did not start it.  My eldest foster brother was having a fit.  Pampered?  I don't think he was pampered.  But he was favored.  And he was used to bullying his way to what he wanted, and getting it.  I... don't do that.  Especially when the matter was not of my choosing and I don't have control beyond.  Gosh I miss fighting.  I may have learned to hate it.  But that was having to fight from no choice.  To be honest, fighting sucks.  But there is something about it, a draw, especially as you become truly good at it.  The last time I fought, a man attacked me from behind, hitting me three times to the back of the head.  Even then I pulled my punches... and hospitalized him in three shots.  I am still glad, to this day, I realized my might.  Deadly force has to be in play for me to take the safety's off.  Though I won't necessarily punch.  I have other ways if it isn't a "gentleman's" gig.  I may not hit at all, not in the traditional methods.  I won't be fighting, I will be killing... two different dances.  I can kill two men at a time, at least, one with each hand.  Thankfully, that isn't something I need consider mostly.  Then again, maybe I have gotten too old and weak to flippantly destroy?  I wouldn't bet on it.

Oh, right.  Anyway.  If I can eat, wake, or wake then eat, then digest, and get going, I am hoping to set up the vehicle, do the dishes, and hit some more laundry.  After that, or on breaks, I may do more organizing of boxes of stuff.  I am, even if I have fallen, staying up on things.  I am a bit amazed.  Yes, much work to do, but it isn't caving in as I go comatose.  And the sleep has been amazing.  I am not even getting too sore from it, at least not yet.  Which probably means I am rolling as needed.  Which means it is merely, truly, a need for sleep from pushing the body, and not so much of a health failure.  While the need for extra sleep is due to health, it, I don't think, is from deteriorating health, I guess is what I mean.  Though some of it is because I have only been sleeping five to seven hours a night for... a while.  I often write eight hours... I fib.  Sue me.  Whistling past things, or such.

Steak?  T-bone today.  Loverly.  To be honest, I might start ordering more ribeyes.  Those have the perfect keto fat to protein ratio.  One per meal day puts me pretty much on track.  One might be all that is needed if I go with inch and an half cuts.  When you are the size of a bear you really can't cut foods.  Imagine having a work horse and feeding it what you feed a donkey.  While I may not do all that much work, I still have the size.  Teasing such a body leads to failure of control.  I like t-bones, I just like ribeyes even more.  I have finally learned how to pan fry.  There is some trick in there, if to be honest I think experience is the only real way to learn it.  I could not teach another how to do it.  Perhaps they could watch and learn to replicate.  I don't know the trick, I just know how to do it.  For years I flopped at it every time I tried.  Then I didn't have a grill I liked for a long time, so had to pan fry.  I ate many failures until it just... worked.  I still prefer to grill, but that is a bit of a production.

I found more information on confit, so thought I'd share.  More so because it offered a notion I hadn't considered... serving sized portions, put up in the fat, deboned after cooking.  Yes, I think I may do just that.  Besides, I have a bunch of smaller containers that have no other truly good use.  Would be perfect for this.  I really am enjoying playing with my food.  PBS?  Yeah, well, it offered good info, and you already paid for it.

[The early part is hunting, if you want to get to the cooking process part, skip to 5:30.  Oh, and as well?  I sometimes do, sometimes don't, spice the meat while it is cooking or in prelude with a marinade overnight.  You don't have to salt and spice (cure overnight), especially for shorter term use.  The cure will simply increase it's longevity... perhaps... probably.  I think refrigeration, like... increases longevity multi-fold over a great increase from fat storage, so...]

Oh, right.  Later.

Up, but I saw my shadow.

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Well, and I am only awake because my mom called back.  I phoned last night.  She is sounding good.  Apple butter, more pickles of various sorts, I think she had tomato canning finished for the year.  I was lamenting housecleaning and she suggested that if I thought one was bad I ought to try two.  I should have just told her that an allergy to dirt doesn't count and friends with benefits doesn't count.  :p  Now I remember why I am always in trouble with her.  Wise guy.

A long sleep in spite of napping long yesterday.  And I still can't quite dig out.  It is raining, cool, and dark.  I can't quite kick out.  Ribs are becoming sore from sleep, but I can't pull up and out.  Oh, well, and I did see my shadow.  Or was it one of the cats?  Though perhaps that counts anyway, if that is what they are doing.  Which is why I am glad I am my size and they theirs.  They hunt, even so.  Even so the sneaky little rolling furballs can't usually sneak up on me.  Mostly dead and I am still a terrible hunter... predator.  Sometimes I even sneak up on them.  But then I love watching cats leap.  Yeah, wise guy.

Well, back to bed.  I am hoping to rest up well enough to do some work this afternoon.  The emptying and refilling the auto is the first thing, then dishes, then a shower and something edible.  Mother said ham and cabbage was a good mix too, I may try it.  Something very simple for tonight.  Though if you want something with just a bit more snap, make a white gravy while at it.  Either flour and milk, or cream and milk.  I do the latter for obvious reasons.  Though if you like it thinner, a bit of cornstarch and milk would do as well.  Lots of ways to skin a cat, wise guy.

Later.

When all else fails?

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Do.

In my case, on this day, I cook.  I had heard about something called crackslaw, which went by various names and recipes.  To be honest I thought most of them were overdone.  Simplicity, for the most part, is my friend.  Once an occasional is it good to construct something elaborate.  That simply doesn't work on a daily basis and for many reasons.  Although, if work is done ahead of time, layers of flavor can be built and stored for an allowance of minor luxury within simplicity, give or take.

Instead of two or three hours of fussing, and a ingredient list a mile long, I... thought about the main ingredients... that being hamburger and cabbage... and I considered what would add simple easy flavor.  As it turns out, frying hamburger (better to fry in cast iron, in my opinion, and a cast dutch oven better than others... or at least cast with a lid), get it half through, then add chopped cabbage.  Season the hamburger initially as you like.  I prefer a bit of salt, pepper, a small dose of typical italian spices, plus a teaspoon of hot pepper flakes.  After the hamburger is half done, add the cabbage, put the lid over it, and let it finish.  Easy.  Very good.

I have a ton of dishes, again, from this and that.  They have been washed twice and merely need to be rinsed, dried, and put up.  That probably won't happen today.  Not much else was done.  I could barely stay awake.  Then I realized it has cooled enough that I really did need the furnace.  The cave was holding right at 66, where I turn the furnace down to for the summer.  And, while that is fine for night, sleeping, it is simply too cold for daily running... at least as the high.  I've turned it up enough to be awake.  Hopefully turning it up first thing tomorrow might allow me to get on some things.

Later.

Why?

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Dreamers never know and dreams never say, or prove.  Either they are true or not.  If true, look for love, and the greatest of worms, perhaps wurms to some of you who understand more, to begin their cycles.  I know not, nor care, in this moment of time between here, then, never, and always.

Yeah, no.

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I woke at 8:00, thought I'd be getting up.  Rolled in for a second and popped out at about 11:00.  Yeah.  And with all the ambition of a bear hitting hibernation.  I am just now setting a pot of coffee on.  I think I reviewed news and daily posts.  Yeah, sure, the horde is being pushed and paid to antagonize.  But there is a large enough section of them who have nothing better to do.  Their current living depends on government largess and continued degradation of their population... whether that latter is fully natural and self-selected, imposed, or offered to the gullible doesn't really matter at this point.  Choices have been made, up and down that line of politics and social behavior, consequences are coming.  Those who think to profit by it, or use it to stall other considerations or reconsiderations are hopelessly out of step.  So be it.

The allies on the right are building.  The left is as tight as it can be, and has been for a very long time.  It is a vast majority, the other side has always been the vast majority, so felt it didn't need to organize.  Some still don't see the need, such as the GOPe.  Most of us realize it might be too late, but that the only way to even have a chance is a right sided convergence.  It is beginning.  It is starting with things like Gab, Vox and friends, and many friends indeed.  Not just in America but also in Europe.  Our governments not only don't represent us, they present as the enemy.  Now, either the government is right or the majority of Americans, and I would even suggest Europeans, are right.  Which it is you'll have to decide for yourself.  I, for my part, believe the people to be correct and the governments to be corrupted to the point of evil.  Any government that tries to wipe it's own people's out through immigration, multi-culti and other oppression, and all else, is a failure.  The one real job of a government, no matter how that is enacted, is the protection of it's people, literally the people who pay and elect it.  It is NOT for the good of "all mankind" to the degradation and endangerment, murder and rape, social cultural and legal oppression, of those who vote and pay for that government.  Pick.  This election is probably the last one, without major changes, where Americans, who have been American through the creation of said nation, will have enough of a population base upon which to choose representation.  After this election, if nothing is done, foreigners will have majority vote.

Bits more.

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Not what I had hoped.  I simply couldn't get my mind wrapped around dealing with the vehicle.  Instead I did a bit more work in a few areas, did a bit of bandaging where needed, tinkered, read, and watched some shows.  Nothing fancy but not a complete stoppage.  I am trying to wrestle through.  With the sun being down longer and longer, with showers having moved in, with the cool, dark, and all else, I simply can't seem to push through heavily.

Oh, but more dishes!  A bit from the meal.  More from digging through a corner of the room off the kitchen.  A bunch of "tins", a couple of pans.  They were clean when put there, but out in the open they got dusty, and a few other pieces as such.  I will eventually have the dishes, pots, pans, and such clean and up.  Do people wash things that have been sitting for a while?  Or do they just wash them when they go to use them?  I truly have an impressive kitchen cooking, baking, and such collection.  Some of which has been tried and didn't work, or does but better has been found, or works just isn't used often.  Of course, there is always room for more.  As I suggested, I have begun collecting ingredients and devices to produce miso, for example.

I have had people look at me strangely when I suggest eating miso with a beef, chicken, or pork base.  I don't think many people understand some basic things.  First, the reason many Japanese eat miso with fish and seafood is because that is more commonly and cheaply available.  In the interior of the US, by a goodly distance, good fish is too dear.  Even fishing, unless you live right beside a river that is a good spot, is rather expensive.  Beef and the other meats simply make both more practical and fiscal sense.  Sure, people love to eat gold.  I... don't mind eating silver, or more copper... figuratively speaking... but I can't do gold, and wouldn't if I could.  If I was wealthy, I would hire a cook of a humble nature, to cook more as my mother did, though with a focus on my preferences.  Frugality, humility, but solid foods, from raw, and even of a more simple design.  Feasting every few months is a good thing, though, too.  My problem is I get carried away with things, in the kitchen, from time to time.  Then again, when you buy meats by the animal, it is much less expensive.  Which allows some luxury in other areas.  Cooking from raw is much cheaper, if more involved, more technical, and costing much more time.  Oh, and then there are the dishes.  But eating out is really bad for you.

Yeah, well?

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Terribly slow.  Dishes, sure.  Then I changed out some bulbs... going led.  Added a fixture.  I may actually do my first minor wiring job, of a simple light fixture.  What I did today was just the cover for a fixture.  This, that, and a few other things today.  A shower just now.  Little things.  I'm sort of shot.  I don't think I'll make it to town.  However I might get the vehicle cleared and put recycling in so as to be ready.  I would also like to call and get an oil change appointment.  I don't want to have to wait in a long line to get in.

I don't know what I did to my right shoulder.  It feels like I tackled a brick wall.  I might have made it through but I seem to have left my should alignment somewhere inside of whatever I hit.  Meh, I've had much worse.  And I know this, it gets better pretty quickly.  God built me like a tank.  I just wish I knew what in the world I do to wrench even this body, parts of it, sometimes.  I've taken huge hits playing football.  This is leagues above that, and more like I was doing the damage.  My pain is merely collateral.  If I was a mechanical/structural engineer I'd... check the foundations of my home.  Maybe I bumped it in my half sleep.  *grins*  Yeah, wouldn't want to play with me in a dark ally.  People, even things, get broken.

Hmm?  Don't know.  I'll keep at it.  I am sure I can have the vehicle unloaded and reloaded.  With the shower taken and dishes out of the way, another shower tomorrow will be easy enough.  If I can wake early, and shower quickly, I might be able to be out of the cave before I begin collapsing... maybe stop at a coffee joint for something I need and maybe even something I shouldn't have.  Damn but a treat sounds good.

Bouncing like a rock.

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Around 8:00 or 9:00, or... maybe 10:00?  I hit something.  A wall, a mountain, a time-out zone?  I went down with all hands and no clue.  Couldn't even catch the time.  A good sleep.  Here it is, nearly noon, and I am back at it.  I don't know how much of the day can be salvaged.  Then again I am not horribly worried.  I'd love to do it all in a day but that might not be possible.

I'll give myself an hour to wake, perhaps have a bite to eat.  But what?  Then it's in to the shower... ah, but first I have to do a small load of dishes.  Actually, I'll do those first, then take a seat to wake.  After the shower I'll put the Xterra out, pull everything out, put the recycling in, then take another break.  I'm simply not able to push through, easily.  Depending on the time, I'll think things through at that point.  Being ready to go would be great for an early start at it tomorrow.  Or even Monday.  Or... whenever.  Though if I can get in, get the recycling out, get the vehicle cleaned and waxed, in and out, do the shopping, and either get the inspection or tire rotation...  But if I could do it all I would be exceptionally happy.  There is the tax office too.  I just don't know, at this point.

If I can finish these things this week I will be ripping into the living room and this room next week.  Much has already been done if even more wait.  There will be as much sorting and storing as tossing.  Oh, and maybe yet this month I will call about a dumpster.  I will only keep it for, perhaps, a month... until the snow hits... with weekly pickup, if I can get that going.  Just old chairs, boxes of junk, and various sundry that just should go, should have gone, some of it shouldn't have been brought.  With Alaska becoming a near certainty it's best to begin clearing and cleaning.  Though, as suggested, even if I stayed I would have needed to do this, and wanted to do this.

On the good side, as it cools, and if I can keep up the pace on cleaning... a big if I know, but I seem to be going places this time, more leg to it... I will be able to sleep in the spare room while I rip through my bedroom.  And, if I can get that well and truly stripped, taken down, organized, and while it is still empty I can begin working on the bathroom.  Yeah.  I may keep falling off the wall, like a three-legged bug with only one antenna and a partially destroyed shell, but until the rest is gone, I'm going to keep trying.  Here, Alaska, the wilds anywhere, it's all the same.  Hunger is a powerful force.  My body, leaned up by lack of access and hardened by lumbering or wilderness living, will begin functioning a lot better.  Or not.  I've just not seen failure even when everything then, and more so now, suggests I should not have seen a few years, possibly even steps, out of the Navy.  I've been dead for decades, by all rights, and yet here I am.  Best to get out and do before I get stuck in here.  I don't mind dying, simply not interested in dying on my knees, toothless, under a dictator lizard queen.  I'll go my own way, I do believe.

But... first... this little set of tasks, then some housecleaning and keeping.  It's good for the constitution, focus, and will get my gear sorted, reduced to manageable and reasonable groups, and ready to go.  Good day.

I needed that day off.

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In part I was stressing over the driver license thing.  When you already live in such an imploded world, the threat to make it smaller is a large suggestion.  I am planning to move for it.  It is just more convenient to be able to drive as I arrange for that.  My doc believed I did not understand.  At this point, wherever I live this will be on my drivers license now.  Unless I can figure out how to clear up the diabetes thing, as I have in the past, monitoring will be required.  The feds, more or less, took over and forcibly connected all drivers license information, limits, and such.  Oh, I knew.  Moving to Alaska isn't about that.  However, moving to a place where other forms of transportation are used means scratching that itch.  There is no licensure, yet, for paddle boats, dog sleds, or horse back riding.  At least not as private transports.

The rest of it, however, still needs to be done shortly.  The taxes aren't expensive, and actually I just pay a small amount, more for paperwork, being 100% service connected disabled from the Navy.  I can't, well... won't... complain about that.  Grateful, I am.  The women at the plates office hate that someone escapes them, or maybe just hate me?  Or do they just hate all of use who offer them way too much in pay and benefits for them to dare to like us or treat us with respect?  Every time I work with that office I realize why revolutions also aim at bureaucrats.  Grating insolence that, for my part, is not deserved.  Do they have to deal with jerks?  Probably.  But they should learn to treat the different people as they wish to be treated at the very least.  Middle aged women who have divorced, though, often realize that they gave up a lot and got nothing good, and now hate men for it.  Or never did even catch a man and know they have no chance.  Even us older guys won't do more than deal with them as... cogs.  Hope dies a terrible death for those who wanted it all and got what they were told they would get from the start.  Yeah, that tat looks like shit when you have arm flab.  Whatevs.

The other office, though, the ladies have always been good.  Easy to work with, generally at ease, even kindly, respectful, some of them.  At worst pure business.  Which is fine.  I don't need it sugar coated and wrapped.  I just expect not to have raw aggression pointed at me for no good cause, especially someone who has a job that is paying too much, offer too good of benefits, especially to a woman who just as likely didn't follow the rules and marry, then stay with, a man.  Her problem, shouldn't have that kind of a job.  Their kinds of job are what are clogging the arteries of this nation.  Dump them, fed right down to city level.  Get rid of the glut.  What will they do?  Learn to dig holes or find and keep a man... not be shitty little bureaucrats, overpaid and sassy, who simply annoy and destroy the economy on top of it.  Get your shit together, ladies.  For one way or another it is coming.

Grumpy much?  Just some.  All I am saying is, if you are going to be a beggar, don't be shitty with customer support and public relations.  Though this fake economy they have helped to perpetuate is collapsing.  When they don't have retirement, or medical, or any of that?  When their jobs go away because everyone else has been impoverished through the fake economy they have helped perpetuate?  Yeah.  Hungry and angry doesn't mean anything to a brutal world.  So, yes and no.  As I said, the one office is good to work with.  Take a lesson from that.

I didn't go down until midnight thirty.  The thing is I took yesterday easy.  Rest if no nap, all day.  Mostly.  Shows, tinkering on the blog and in the web.  Small bits of work.  A bit of cooking.  Lots of attention to the girls.  I really do enjoy their company.  But when I am busy they can be overlooked.  Then again cats like to be overlooked until they need not to be.  Even so, a little more attention is a good thing.  They may not be literal children.  But they are what I have to offer love.  The right and good kind.  That's it and they are all that remains in the way of such.  I've had my chances.  I've lost those opportunities.  So... the girls get what there is.

I woke at 4:00~4:30.  It rained last night, but isn't so cold that I needed to close the windows.  Fresh rain air is always good.  I'm just a bit sore, mostly from the lot of work I have been doing and for some time now.  At least it's a lot of work by my standards.  I have a few more dishes and a new set of container bowls to wash and then a shower to take.  I didn't get the car cleaned out.  I'd like to do that, then get the stuff for the recycling center loaded.  I have a lot to try to do today.  I will probably call in, see if there are or will be openings.  I'm not as worried about tire rotations as the oil change and inspection.  The cleaning would be really nice first off, though, if possible.  Then taxes and shopping.  It's a small list, with none of it being too radical.  Being up early sure makes getting it all in more possible, if by more I mean just mechanically more possible.  Still, it really might happen.

Later.

I couldn't.

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As such I didn't.  I did do most of the dishes.  There are a couple of bowls, and a few things from lunch... breakfast...  I had hoped to push through.  It simply didn't work.  I am hoping for a nap.

I am keeping up.  I simply can't get going.  I called about the thing that worried me the most, my driver license.  I thought I had to renew every year.  It turns out that I simply have to have the doctor send in the report.  They do have that and I am all set to go, until next year.  I do have to visit the doctor every six months, I think that is what I was told.  The other things?  Tomorrow?  I don't know.  If I can do something this afternoon it will be to clear the vehicle for a wash, stop by for an oil change and inspection, try to get a tire rotation, then to the tax office for that.  Yeah.  I don't know if it will all get done in the day.  I'll do what I can, arrange what I can't, and... go from there.  Oh, and shopping if I can.

Something I recently purchased was tried.  I have never worked with dehydrated mushrooms.  The instructions suggested soaking them in four inches of water (I didn't, just a few inches), bringing that to a boil, then covering and taking it off the heat... letting it steep for 20 to 30 minutes.  I really wasn't sure, at any stage, what I could really expect.  If you have eaten dehydrated hamburger, or some other things... sometimes it's good, sometimes it really isn't.

I reserved the liquid, which I will reuse each time I do mushrooms, then add to any stocks I make, along with mushrooms right out of the bag.  This time I let them steep for 20 minutes, strained, then fried some of them in butter.  I think they could steep longer, but, amazingly, they were rather good.  Shiitake mushrooms, fresh, are extremely expensive, at least around here.  Dried they are much less expensive.  And, really?  I think they are nearly as good.  A great add for soups, stocks, and stews... surprisingly good enough to fry and eat on their own.

More of my order arrived.  I did break the boxes down immediately and have them ready to go.  As I do things, get things, or such, I am trying to stay on top of it.  Even dishes.  I want those done the day of use.  If that isn't possible, I want them at least soaking, and maybe given that first wash and set to a second soak/rinse.  I am trying to stay ahead in areas I have beaten back.  No just setting something, somewhere open, and carelessly.  Either putting it away, tossing it, or sorting it in a staging area that is in the works or designed for decision making.  It isn't perfect...  Well, actually... if perfection means success, than, yes, it is.  I don't know how long I can keep it up.  I just know this is where I want to go and what I want to do... how I want to do it.

I have used the dry shampoo again.  It really does work well.  It even helps with that behind-the-ear grunge that can creep up on you.  It dries that area and the powder cleans and clears it.  The hair smells neutral to good when the powder is fresh, the cocoa decent.  This will make my crippled little life a little better when I fall.  Just common decency and personal care when I can't lift that extra bit and take a shower or such.  It's a bit humbling, but then such is life even for kings, the rich, and all else.  A little trick to... make it easier... gratefully accepted.  I will need it.

On to either a nap, a show, or... something.  Good day.  God bless.

Not there yet.

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I brewed tea but haven't gotten to it yet.  I haven't even figured out my proposed itinerary.  Something, something, then...  Dishes, actually, first.  Perhaps a bite.  An egg or two?  Hmm... I have fresh eggs, I could soft boil a few, or more, for the week.  That sounds like a plan, to go with tea.  Perhaps a draught of kefir to start it all off.  Then dishes, a shower, a bit of a rest, then... then I can begin figuring out the rest of the day.  I just can't focus through much.

What is it I need to do?  Check dmv, take the vehicle in for an oil change and inspection and maybe a wheel rotation, perhaps a cleaning first?  Okay, I'll skip order.  I just need to know what has to be done.  Those things, plus property tax management... vehicle registration and land taxes, though those sort of depend on each other so are done almost as one.  Styrofoam and the last of the boxes... so far... need to go to the recycling center.  And a bit more shopping.  I actually only missed a few items, but miss them I did.  Should be a fast thing, and I won't even worry about that unless I get all else completed.

Order?  Hmm... I would prefer to get the recycling in and out first thing.  Then attempt to have the tired rotated and then the oil change and inspection.  Ah, but first I need to call the dmv.  Once these are done, then...  Probably taxes first, then to the dmv.  If that all is done today, then on to shopping if I have the energy.  If I can't get that all fit in, I'll do the remainder tomorrow.  Of course, that is all after breakfast, tea, and a shower.  I feel so tired though.  It's going to be a struggle.

I hope I get these things done, and today.  I can then take a few days down, while doing minor tasks, and then push on to more serious efforts.  I can't really mess with the kitchen too much more.  I can hit the living room, this the computer room, and my bedroom... well and the bathroom again.  All that and laundry.  Ugh.  The thing is, I am really catching up and getting ahead, and maintaining that lead.  I think it might be doable.  Later.

Late and early.

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A terrible mix.  I couldn't sleep until after midnight, if because cooking, then letting things cool enough to be put up, was the cause.  Midnight thirty, and maybe change, before I went in to sleep.  As I recall I don't recall much after that.  I stumbled through dreams and pain.  Odd dreams I can't, immediately, lay memory bare regarding.  Dark things and places, dark times and portents, and the fall of many men who many believed would not fall.  I once, even as a heathen... sometimes worse... wondered even so if men were just weak or stupid.  I finally decided.  Why choose one when both can be had for the same price.  Being clever will get one to hell just as quickly, by selling out to global interests, against one's own people, faith, culture, just as quickly as not knowing, or seeming to understand, mass immigration by a military aged mostly male population IS war.  Betrayal is not a thing God approves.  Nor is blatant ignorance when there is no call for it... if there ever could be a call for it.  You can't say you are against colonials and then turn around and BE one.  Evil.  As to peace?  The one to be wary of is the one who says he comes in peace, to sue for world peace.  And his minions.

Anyway.  Sam started in about wanting out at around 5:00~5:30.  She has been acting very strange lately.  Perhaps she knows warmer weather, warm and dry enough to be outside, is coming to an end for the year, and is just trying to get out?  Or maybe, even fixed, she is in a bit of a heat?  I don't know.  It is annoying.  I always fear letting her out while I am still mostly asleep and going back to bed.  I am, honestly, not sure how well cats do and to what temps.  Though an older cat, just like an older two-leg of any type, will be weaker to extremes.  Well, and I don't wish to find out the hard way.  After her mewling, almost howling, getting back to sleep was tough.  I did, for a couple of hours, but lightly.  Ah, and in that time I dreamed of a man I met in the service, as I was being discharged.

He had been in a really bad accident.  He was riding a motorcycle.  I don't think he remembers exactly what happened.  His body was a mess.  When I met him, one of his arms had just been removed from a cast.  It had been broken in several places, but they were clean.  The cast worked.  His left leg, I think, had a spiral fracture and was in a mobile traction device.  I think they were doing surgery to it from time to time, pins and plates and whatever else.  Even looking at his leg, sometimes, and he would panic.  Pain haunted his visage often, even without proximity.  He was using a colostomy bag.  I don't know what it was, whether they couldn't or didn't keep up on it, but it smelled.  Even part of his liver had been damaged, and he was down to some bare portion of it.  He was a good man, so it wasn't an issue to deal with the odor.  And company seemed to help his disposition... so long as you gave his leg and other appliances a health birth.  Why remember?  Ah, because there are people who really do have it worse.  I have some doubts he will ever... be the same.  I have some doubts he lived long.  One can only hope he was able to ween off the painkillers.  And, yet, without knowing, I hope his body healed, and then his mind found peace, and that he lives well and happily to this day.  The fear, in his eyes, if someone new and/or somewhat carelessly approached his leg... the eyes, the immediate sweat...  It is terrible to live in that kind of fear.

Needless to say, waking at about 7:30 was a bit of a blessing, even if I am a bit bedraggled.  Better to be a bit rough and awake than to some recall being written through the mind and eyes through the odd magic of sleep and dreams.  Not sore, this morning, just... a bit rough.  Spent, not bruised or battered, mostly.  My organs seem to be complaining for who knows why.  Even so, and aside from the dream and cat which might end up murdered if she keeps up her neurotic destruction of my sleep and peace, I don't mind being up.  Am glad to be awake earlier.  I even hope to continue it.  When I can wake earlier I just feel like I have more of a day and more of a chance to get things done.  Of course I do, but... then again opportunity means nothing without action.  Bleh.

Not bad.

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Dishes, at least the group before dinner, was finished.  Not much from dinner, I think.  A fork and a bowl I had used to store the chopped beef while the pork bits were slow cooking.  Little other projects, a couple of shows, the girls are in.  I took a small amount of the pork when it was done, and crisped it.  Then I did the same with the beef.  With high fat foods, just a dab will do you.  I doubt if I ate more than, total between the two, fifteen bites.

I am just waiting for the fat to cool enough to cover the meats, each in their own bowls.  I was pleased with how they worked out.  I added no salt, or other flavor, while they cooked.  I prefer to add that either as I cook it for more general spices or herbs, and salt at the table.  When crisped, they really were good.  I suspect I can crisp, or not, and just add a few bits to a soup or stew, or crisp and eat as it, or add to frying cabbage or such.  As well, cooked and stored in fat, then in the fridge, they will last a goodly time.  With the beef, chicken, and pork set up this way, I have a fairly quick supply of food if I haven't prepared, am too busy, too tired, or too ill to do otherwise.  Heck, in an emergency, I could take these along on a long road trip.  In ice, or even not.  Fat will insulate the meat from going bad for a decent amount of time, if ice would extend even that.

I'd like to bottle up a couple more half gallon jugs of eggs soon, too.  And begin learning how to make sauerkraut here at home.  I have a 10 liter crock specifically designed to do that, along with the weights.  I just didn't have the time to do it this week, so skipped buying a bunch of cabbages.  It's on my to do list.  I'm just not sure how to store it when it is done.  Keep it in that container?  Part it out into quart jars?  I'll have to learn that.  I'd prefer to part it out.  Then, when I get to half way down the kraut, I can just reset the crock.

I did a great deal of work today.  I might not have gotten to town, but... I did really well.  I have so much more work to do.  But I am moving along so well.  If I can keep at half this pace I suspect I can have the cave looking almost presentable in another month or two.  If I get the kitchen, bathroom, and back entryways sorted, I may see about having a plumber come in, put in a faucet, sort out the drain under the sink, and see about other drain problems.  It would sure be nice to be able to use the sink, reliably, again.  The tub is okay.  It is hard on the back and can interfere with other plans.  Having to do the dishes in order to take a shower so as to get to town can... impede progress.  I just don't always have enough energy to do all that hoop jumping.

Well, okay.

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I got the bigger shelf together.  Yeah.  It was bigger than I had quite imagined.  I should have measured but, you know, sometimes you just... do.  Or is that just me?  It'll work.  It is exactly what I wanted, generally speaking.  It is like adding a small walking pantry.  In one sense, even if I will have to tinker a bit to fit it where I wish, I am glad it is larger.

These new wire racks are easy enough to assemble.  And no single part, or groups, are all that heavy.  The work comes with doing exact settings on four posts while keeping the weight of the shelf balanced, and so as not to let the shelf dislodge the keeper pieces.  If you haven't done it, the process can't easily be explained.  If you have, you know exactly what I am talking about.  Especially with a forty eight by twenty four inch shelf.  Tricky.  Which actually, in it's own way, is more taxing than simple brute-strength tasks.  At least for me.  But then, duh.  Ogres are born that way.

I noticed the pope seems to have gotten stirred up about the concept of a god of war.  Oh, yes, I know when the dork in a dress is talking at me.  So much for his "native" side.  Hey, pope, your Roman is showing.  If he had any real connection with his "homelands" he would know that peoples around the globe, other than Christians, have bumped into everything from angels to demons, and some say Christ Himself paid them a visit.  What does he think those people do?  Just forget meeting things divine, spiritual, terrible, right, evil, or whatever but beyond their ken?  They know something happened.  They call these things as best as they know.  Without knowing the God of Abraham, without some texts, context, even social and cultural norms based on these things, they can only know them as gods.  The same with any pagan people.  Who were, most likely, quite beset by dark things in their days of stirrings.  For they had no resistance, no means of dispelling.  I have even had a Navajo shaman call me Coyote and refuse to speak more.  They fear, and for God damned good reason.  So... go pout in your pseudo-religious, but truly secular and worldly final moments before you meet what you don't even seem to have faith in.  You say you fear holy priests who are serious, and fear?  You should.  And, more, you should take their council.  It seems you are lost and blind.  I pray you see before you have no choice and at great cost.

Some things done, no decision.

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I kicked out the dishes easily and quickly.  There were more than I thought, and then I found more, and... then some more?  Gah!  I swear, I think I'm good and there one is.  After that I put the cart together.  At just over, say, three and an half feet tall, mostly wire with a few bars and wheels, that thing was heavy.  I didn't realize when ordering, but it weighs forty or more pounds.  As to duty capacity?  I am thinking you could use this for pretty heavy items, such as vehicle axles and transmissions, and other heavy gear as such.  I almost feel silly having my toaster oven, and an half dozen other minor kitchen items on and in it.  It would be like hauling a dozen AAA batteries in a dump-truck.  Overkill.

I may put the shelf together.  The thing with the shelf is that there really isn't quite a spot for it yet.  Then again, the box itself takes up a good bit of space.  Thankfully it is on wheels, so I don't have to put it together in place.  I may, if it ends up being a bit questionable regarding weight in usage, remove the wheels and figure out a way to put on feet, then level those.  Leveling is so important and yet so difficult for some things.  I really could use a bit of help with the fridge and oven.  I can't believe they didn't level the range/oven.  Or maybe they did, but a bit of movement from time and this and that and it is out of spec.  Annoying.

Oh, after the cart was assembled, yeah, there was a place for it and items to fill it.  It takes space, but offers a much cleaner, more kempt, feel and look, and function.  There is still much to do out there, and everywhere.  But it is being done, bit by bit.  I still have some hope of getting most things into a place, then maintaining much more solidly.  Some might think this won't be required in the wilds.  I would suggest this is much more vital out there.  You have little.  What you have is almost all vital or you would not have towed it out.  You must keep it, keep it handy, but keep it clean, arranged, and functioning... as much as possible.  Well, and improvisation will be primary to even that, if the two ideas work hand in hand by necessity.

I simply could not get to sleep.

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Why?  It wasn't heat.  I don't think I was too tired, yes that can be the problem.  I really don't believe I over-worked yesterday.  The weather wasn't changing.  It wasn't too cold.  All I know is that I did not drop off until 4:00, after by a decent amount actually.  I was up by 10:00.  But that won't last unless I can figure out how to sleep earlier.  Maybe a fluke?

I may not be going to town today.  I'll see before too long.  I would like to put the kitchen cart together, and set it up.  Then, maybe, construct the taller shelf for out there.  Between those two, I should, pretty much, finally have a functional, accessible, space of kitchen gear, supplies, and such.  Though I still have to move a few items out.  If I don't go to town, I do hope to take care of a few things here.  Though, if I don't go, I would rather have a slightly lighter day.

The cart will go together first, then dishes, then either a call and laundry or the same call but fix myself to get back in to town.  I just don't know which way it will go.  I'm feeling good, for the little sleep.  I am simply not all that active, energetic.  Then again, that doesn't mean all that much.  So much to do, and yet not as much as was on the list yesterday.

Oh, if I happen to get both the cart and shelves together, I can break those boxes down immediately and take them in with the styrofoam... if I can fit it all in.  Yeah, probably.  I have learned to hate boxes, having them just sitting around.  Maybe, if I tear them down right when I get them, and find a place in the garage for them, I'll keep up on them much better.  Hate. boxes. a. lot.  They multiply, I swear.

Oh, I did put together the dry shampoo and took a baking soda bath.  So far?  The shampoo seems to work.  I don't know about multiple days, and won't.  If I leave the house, I want to be showered.  If I stay in the cave for a longer period of time I will test it for longer, much longer.  As to baking soda as a dry bath?  Not so much.  It did nothing good, that I can sense.  If anything I think it made matters worse.  I may try baking powder.  I think that would dry parts off, for a bit.  I'm just not sure it matters.  I'll give it another shot, when I have the time.  Or several shots.  But I am also going to be looking for other dry bathing suggestions.

Whether lazy, ill, busy, or without enough water for any reason...  If you can be hit by any and or all of those at once?  Good to keep some things on hand.  It might not be perfect, or an exact replacement.  But if it can see me through, that is the intent.  Oh, I didn't add any essential oils.  I may, or may not.  I actually made a double dose.  I may split it and try several different scents.  Or not.  Bleh.

Later.

Trying to cool down.

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It was warm, even hot, today.  The troubled sleep last night added to the effort.  It was tough to get going but I did, if late.  Cooling down is taking a bit.  In part because I simply could not fast.  Too much work.  It required that I eat.  At least I didn't break down, in town, and buy a sandwich.  Roast beef sounded good.  The beef part would have been fine.  It's the bread that would have been murder.  Food in, even if needed, turns the furnace on... my internal furnace.

I do believe, since I am still awake, that I will look over the recipe for the dry "shampoo" and give that a whirl yet tonight.  I figure it can't be worse than going to bed with the oils from sweat after a hot somewhat heavy day.  As well, I am simply curious.  I might even give the dry bath method a try, just a quick sprinkle and dance.  I love tinkering, if nothing else.  I can't do much else, much of the time.

Oh, I forgot something.  A gift for a friend.  I like to see some things happen.  I support some things.  I think I said I would, beside all that, if I said such for those reasons.  I many not get along with women, or even always men.  I do like to see them happy, together.  If it is right.  Yes, a spot to give them a moment.  They've had it.  Now I'll pitch in a bit.  It's good to see, know.  Probably again next spring?  I'll see about it.  No, he probably didn't even consider it.  Probably wondered about some of my questions.  I don't always say why.  Druids rarely do...  Druids?  Wizards?  Fools?  *grins*  Yeah, I like to see them, man and wife, having time to be... kids again.  The time is coming when they will have all that time they want.  But while that time is coming, time too is going.  Let them have some time off when they can enjoy it.  Even if she is still mean.  :p

I'd best get cracking on those things, so as to give it a shot and be to bed, hopefully, in time to be at things tomorrow.  As many things as I have planned, I may end up in town two, maybe three, more times just this week.  Then, perhaps, I can settle down and begin fasting again.  Ugh, but it is some serious efforts going on.  And with sleep twisting...  Bleh.  Good evening, and night really.  Amen.

A day of good effort.

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I broke down the last few boxes from here and there.  Those were put in the back for on to town.  I got the things together that needed to be returned.  I completely forgot my list.  All good.  I think I got everything and change.  I didn't get going until late, 15:30 or so?  I wasn't sure the package stores would be open.  My next worry was whether the recycling area would be open, so... of course, I hit those first.  It all worked.

Then shopping.  If found some low-carb almonds on sale, and sunflower seeds.  A few other things not on my list were grabbed.  If I happen to see a sale, and it is things I will definitely use, I may just go for it, except for perishables... or ones that can't be frozen.  Yeah, I really tore through the store.  I even bough cocoa in case I didn't have any... for the dry "shampoo".  Yeah, why not give it a shot.  I like the idea.  I won't get a batch together tonight, or I'd try it.  But soon.  As well, I will give the baking soda bath a shot.  Look, if it's between something that helps, even a bit, and nothing... I'll take nothing... assuming I can even do that.  Some days just eating... heck, just getting out of bed... is a trick.  Sure, I am doing better.  But better, for me, is not better for you.  Or... maybe I will toss it together tonight.  I've worked pretty hard.

After that store, on to another, the one that might be a source.  Well, there are some things there.  There are even things I wasn't looking for, specifically, but which I am pleased to know... such as kefir cultures.  If I mess those up it is probably a lot cheaper, in milk, to just buy another batch.  All I'm saying.  I did find brie, but no other cheeses I was hoping to find.  I forgot to ask, though... I don't think they would know, perhaps say.  It's hit and miss, I guess, anywhere.

Oh!  While dropping the boxes off, I saw a bin just for styrofoam.  Since I have to be in to town again tomorrow, I will get rid of those as well.  There were a few things I missed, I just found the list.  So, if business runs smoothly and quickly, perhaps there will be time for a bit more shopping.  DMV, property taxes, recycling, but first for an oil change and inside car wash?  If I can get the inside cleared, and if I am running early enough.  Ugh.  Yeah, well, I'll keep at it.

I've got to admit, I get the strangest feeling in town.  Being it is dames I generally interact with, it's often a respectful hate thing.  Some of them are pleasant though too.  Guys generally tend to be more positive in their reactions.  Unless they are a certain type.  Or even the clean cut type who seem to misunderestimate me.  The woman at the last checkout was refreshing.  She seemed genuinely pleasant.  We bantered pleasantly without... any cues or teases or games or...  Yeah, that's how I like to deal with women I don't otherwise know.  Nice enough looking, but she would consider herself too young.  And, for my part, I have places to go and things to do.  A woman would be a little heavy to add to it.  And the most a woman would do is slow me down long enough to tie her up, then off we'd go.  Not something, here, now, I am looking for.  If it happens, cool, not looking.

Back home, unpacked, this and that here and there.  Brutal.  Tired, my lower left, if still mid, back has a kink in it.  Just from going, really.  Nothing I lifted was enough per a time or over time.  And, yet?  Beautiful.  I love turning my body into a minor wreck, with plans to keep at it for probably two to four more days, and thinking... yeah... I can do it.  And possibly being right.  Later, or good night.

Ah, well, yes.

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Not going fast, or in the direction I had hoped.  I saw the kitchen, thought I could do just a bit more.  So I did.  It went from looking as if I hadn't done much to... well... looking much better.  More to do.  And, yet... nice.  I washed the dishes, the few from yesterday.  Washed, rinsed, dried, and put away.  Yes, of course, the girls were fed.  Their litter was cleared and cleaned... pretty much a daily thing.  Then I swept the kitchen.  There is still much to do, but... I am getting there.

Can I get to town?  Yeah.  I think so.  Not for what all I had hoped.  Just shopping today.  A few items have been added to the list, which I will explain.  However, shopping will just be the standard products plus seeking sources for a few specialty items.

I will be cooking tonight.  Hmm?  I like the idea of confit meats.  Having the chicken cured, slow cooked, then stored in fat, is proving to be a handy thing.  If I really end up hungry, but hadn't figured out a meal?  Just a few pieces of that and I am back in good graces, between bodily needs and will to work.  I am thinking I would like to do similar things with port and beef.  No, not all of what I have, of course.  Fresh baked, grilled, and fried is favored.  But when all else fails, and since I haven't gotten canning going regarding meats, this will do.  Even with canning, this offers a slightly different take, plus is much more fat-friendly.  So?  So beef and pork roasts will be cut up... okay, they won't be cooked tonight.  I will, however, begin a short curing process with them.  Salt, perhaps a light italian herb blend sprinkled in, and some time in an airtight container over night... or more.  Then a rinse, maybe a bit of a double soak and drain to pull more salt out, then... later this week, a low slow cook in fat, then store it in fat.  A few, or as many as needed, chunks pulled out as needed.  Either just added to stew as is, or seared then added... or seared and simply eaten.  It lasts a good long time, especially when refrigerated as well as fatted.

I really am enjoying playing with my foods.  I am learning a great deal.  I am constantly having to rethink things.  In time, I hope, I will really have some recipes, and techniques, down.  This is what allows someone to live, even thrive, when many others would fail.  It isn't one technique or method or food or... it's being able and willing to figure out how to make it work, how to go beyond native notion, how to eat that stinky food that stinks but lasts and is edible... or could be.  Though, too, it is fun.  If even a pseudo-cold blooded creature, like a great white shark, plays with it's food, why shouldn't I?  I, usually, at least kill it first.  (Currently, the only live things I eat are probiotics, if that would change if I had access to certain culinary venues.)

Oh, right...  I have difficulty with showering as often as I would like.  Between time and energy, sometimes... I, just... well.  I have been considering research on this matter.  Not just for self-care when I am so busy or ill or whatnot... also for when I head into the wilds.  Camping, as with prepping and being ill, they all share limits, if for different reasons.  To find a method which serves one might well serve the other.  So, even if you aren't ill or into camping, perhaps you get a little hung up on too many demands and too little time.  So, here are some things, and a little poking of fun while at it, which might help me... and maybe you.

A washout.

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I didn't know, until this morning, what Sam... my eldest cat... was on about.  But she messed up my sleep for a large chunk of the night.  I thought she just wanted out.  The thing is, it's been too cold, or could be, to let her out for too long.  So I don't let her out at night unless I am awake to let her in.  Jumping on the bed, yeowling like a banshee, just fussing and distressing my poor body.  No, it wasn't good, really left me a bit out of sorts and sore this morning.  Trying to sleep angry just tends to have me sleeping in the wrong position, and tense, thus sore.

After my first pass through the place, I see the problem.  They were out of dry catfood.  That is probably the first night in a year or three they haven't had cat food of some type available to them.  So... I didn't care.  A little miffed, actually.  I added food, with Sam right on my heels and... she turned up her nose... wanted to go outside.  Brat!  Whatever.  Not as harsh as having kids, and a wife, but...  I get the point.

I'll do the dishes up right away, then a shower.  As I am drying a few calls.  Being up this late means I need to move to even hope to get some of this done.  Way too much and far to little time.  Still, I can get to some of it.  Probably.  Even if I am really tired and my head feels as if it was removed and put back on backwards somehow.  Too tight, too loose, off the mark, maybe several on those and more.  Hmm... anacin can be my friend.  Bleh, nausea too?  I think so.  Stupid cat.

Well, have yourself a good morning and fruitful day.  I believe I will begin a longer fast today.  Three days is the goal.  I think, think I say, that my keto is good enough that I can do it.  If not I will fail, or at least land face first in the mud as I attempt thing.  I will need heavy cream to succeed in this, for sure this time.  A dose of it with tea or coffee per day, and a dose with bone broth.  If needed, so be it.  Later.

Not much more. Pleased as is.

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With most of the boxes broken down and ready to transport; the dishes mostly done save for dinner dishes... which are soaking; trash and recycling sorted and out; even heated several pieces of chicken confit for a later dinner.  I have a list for tomorrow... shopping and sourcing list.  If I find a smaller round of brie, I may bring that home.  I also want to see about dehydrated mushrooms.  Fresh shiitake are simply too expensive.  However, dehydrated... if I can find US sourced... seem to be much less expensive.  They are not simply tasty, but as I mentioned are high in potassium.  I still want to add that to my diet when possible.  No carbs to worry about.  If I can find dehydrated white mushrooms as well, I'll get those.  Yes, a list... actually a list of lists.

Beside shopping I need to do several bits of business.  I need to check at the doctor office, make sure, this time, they sent in the form.  Then check with DMV to make sure they received it.  Yeah, they are screwing with me that much.  If all is well, I might consider handling that bit of business.  Then taxes.  Though I may need an inspection.  It's odd years until a vehicle is a certain age, then it is every year.  It might be to the every year stage, or creeping up on it.  Time will tell.  I had hoped to order another lamb, that may not be possible.  One will do.  And it's not like I don't have enough meat.  Between beef, pork, and lamb, I am doing quite well.  Still, a lamb is sort of sparse.  I'll... think on it through the week.

I hope to keep working in the kitchen and living room... and wherever.  Sometimes I can work in a straight line, sometimes to do something correctly I end up working in the basement, or living room, bedroom, or wherever.  The cave really is looking up.  Food is working out.  Not sure if I can fast AND work, but I am going to try it.  If I can do it it will further tighten me up.  I'm still beefy, but inside, I can feel muscle being created, and what is there being honed.  Comparatively, I have become brutally strong in a hurry.  I hope for more, not sure it's possible.

Finally, this week, I am also hoping to begin making beef jerky.  A package of three to four pounds will be brought out at a time, thawed, marinated, and then allowed to dry out.  Until it is well and truly done, and then only if I feel I have the energy time and such, no new package will be brought out.  It will be slower than trying to gun it, but it will lead to far less risk of waste.  My goal is to put up between sixty and an hundred pounds of jerky... at jerk weight.  I thought about freezing it, but I don't think that is wise.  Once frozen, I have some suspicion that thawing it would be a mistake, and start a timer.  While unfrozen, but air sealed, it will last long enough for my needs.  Alaska, in a year or two.

I really am pulling through.  Days are slipping a bit, but slowly.  And, in part, based on the change in the season and weather.  I'll keep at it.  Good night.

So very odd.

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Most of the boxes, the ones which aren't being reserved or currently in use... mostly... have been broken down.  While I was stacking trash out I also took the flattened boxes to the hatch, and in.  All that work and... It looks just as clustered as it did before.  Lots of trash out, lots of this and that.  Oh... there are exactly six more boxes I can now tear down.  Quite a lot of work, to be honest.  Not heavy work, mostly.  

Laundry?  I think I'll skip.  I think I am done for the night.  Maybe those last boxes.  Perhaps a shower.  I am not even going to cook.  I just don't want to do much more.  No, I am not completely worn.  Nor, today, would I like to finish the job.  I have things to do this week, I am hoping to have some energy for tomorrow.  If I get my business tended tomorrow, or by Tuesday, then I would like to tear into laundry.  Dishes are up, so no problem there.  The kitchen is in slightly more disarray from tearing into the box corner.  I always find more than just boxes.  Some things to set up, some things to toss, mail to shred.

I just can't believe it really doesn't look any better.  That was a lot of boxes, packing material, and other mail and package detritus I took out.  I still haven't figured out what to do with the styrofoam, I doubt if it is recyclable.  I will check before I go watch a movie.  If it must be torn down and thrown, I think I have some room left in the garbage bin.  Even if I have to do it part by part, putting in some each week for the next few weeks I should be able to be rid of it fairly quickly.  I generally don't have enough trash per week to justify putting it out.

The living room, oddly, is looking much better than the kitchen.  It was mostly just empty boxes here and there.  What remains needs to be sorted.  Ugh.  I'll keep at it though.  The piles are shrinking, everywhere, then disappearing.  A bit at a time I really am catching up, even if it doesn't exactly seem like it.  Perhaps, even with cleaning, organizing, and straightening, it has to get worse (or appear so) before it can get better.  It is good to be working again, though.  Now to get back to fasting.  Might start tonight.  Later.

Plans work sometimes.

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Yes, dishes are done.  More of the boxes, most, have been finished, as well as more sorting of other... stuff.  There always seem to be more.  To some degree, I am having to shuffle to find, sort to get to breaking down, and more and more.  It's not as if I can just do... whatever.  Often I have to sort, hand through, stack in the new place, then get to it.  Well, and there are boxes everywhere, in several rooms anyway.  Some I kept for incidental use.  Though as I have gone through other boxes I have found better boxes to keep.  So, yeah.

It is amazing though.  How much I am doing.  If I have to admit it sure doesn't look like I have done all that much.  Trust me, I have.  It's not a brag.  It has been hours, probably running on two work days, of sorting, tearing down, piling up, moving, storing, and on.  Perhaps not at speed, but at a good pace.  I am a bit surprised I have been able to keep up, keep at it, at the pace and volume that's been in the works.  Just in incidentals, not including the stack of broken down boxes, or the boxes of various sizes I am retaining, or the coolers from various foods and medicines (which I really don't know what to do with), I have sorted through two to three garbage bags of packing (in spite of storing the paper packing, which I like to reserve).  So, yeah.  A lot of work.  On top of cooking and dishes, mind you.

Beautiful.  I really do like ripping through and opening things up.  If, as I mentioned, it doesn't look all that much clearer, yet.  It makes me want to put the box stack in the vehicle, get the trash out, and figure out what to do with the coolers (styrofoam).  Some of those would be good to have, there is simply a limit.  The thing is, I need a minor break.  Maybe a movie length break.  I have limits, I just do.  I have reached the limit.  I am hungry though, now.  Hmm... no idea what to make though.  Ugh!

My mornings are moving.

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I am holding fairly well.  I have been waking early for quite some time.  The change is slow, an hour ever few days to week.  I still have days and nights in there order.  This morning I woke somewhere between 8:00 and 9:00.  Closer to 8:00, I think.  I feel good, if concentration seems to be an ongoing issue.

I didn't finish the dishes last night, but I did get them all in and going.  I reset things this morning, and will wash them when they are cool enough, then rinse and dry them quickly.  Or that is the plan.  Then a shower.  Then back to boxes, organizing, and getting trash out.  I am not working extremely fast or well.  I do seem to be progressing fairly well in spite of that.

Not just the kitchen.  The living room... boxes being sorted, paperwork being reviewed and shredded, space being cleared.  The girls like having more room to get through.  Though changes are always a little unnerving to them.  If they could understand, I would suggest I need to do this so as to get a puppy.  No, I won't be getting a puppy, I just like teasing critters.  But they wouldn't understand that, so no game.

Bit by bit the cave is coming back together, to some level of order.  A clean place really is nice.  Though, just understand, even the best of housekeepers... it's a losing game.  And I am not among the best.  I am barely among the worst, and that is when I can do it.  Breakfast?  Ham and eggs?  Maybe.  To be honest, I think I'd like soft-boiled eggs.  Even if the eggs I have are old, I might see if they will work.  So long as they don't float.  I am hoping, this week, after dinner Monday, to begin a three day fast again.  I think I am in the place for that, again, finally.  Later.

A bit more.

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I did get most of the boxes broken down.  Not just in the kitchen, but on into the living room.  Not all of them, simply most of them.  As well, while doing the boxes I started the liver dinner.  Between this and that, I rounded out a mild be reasonable day of work.  I'll do a quick check of what dishes could be added to the group in the last soak.  It should be easy to wash, being fresh just from dinner tonight.  And I might just push through to wash it all finally, rinse, then dry and put away.

How was the liver?  You know?  I think I did almost as good as my mother.  Perhaps she used a specific type of liver, probably more onion, but the gravy and the cooking of the liver were spot on.  I am still... needing practice.  And, yet, I will say I think, if she still ate liver, she would be pleased with the meal.  I was very happy with the liver from the butcher.  Perfectly cut, as to thickness.  Some of the pieces were a bit big, and next time I am going to ask if they can put that much in three packs.  But, really, it was very good liver, cut perfectly, wrapped fresh, frozen quickly.  No complaints, just some customization.

Oh, how did I cook it?  Well...  I began softly sauteing the onions.  I had bacon fat in there from earlier.  I was gentle but firm with the onions, getting them past translucent then on to a golden brown.  I then removed those, and the fat.  I just wasn't sure about cooking liver in pork fat.  Just... no.  Butter.  I did dust the liver in actual flower.  Then fried them at medium high for a minute on each side, delaying putting them in until the butter and pot were rightly heated.  *sizzle*  You know you have it with that.  After the liver was cooked, I removed that, put the onions back in, added a bit of flour to thicken, as well as milk, then reduced and thinned with more milk, back and forth, until I had the consistency I liked.  Then I added more milk, put the liver back in, put the lid on, turned off the heat, and let it steam and meld a bit.  I only added a touch of salt at the table.

As far as I am concerned, I know how to do liver and onions, and would like to do that from time to time.  If you only eat liver, heart, and other offal if available per animal, even if the liver offers three meals through a year, that is a good and right mix of foods for health, in my opinion.  Neither waste nor gorge?  Perhaps.

No laundry, not tonight.  I am hoping to get to that tomorrow.  As well, perhaps, more work in the kitchen.  Nothing major.  Simply a bit more neatening, perhaps the construction of the cart, and appointing objects to it.  If I can clear the space I need for it.  The taller wire shelf rack too, if I can make the space for it as well.  It's not that difficult.  It just takes time, focus, and some energy.  I'll do what I can.  I am pleased with the day.  Good night.