I’m mostly doing this for the sake of completion now, but that’s not a small consideration. It’s late Saturday night (past 2:00 a.m.) and I’m sure the details are going to be hazy if not completely erroneous. It’s okay. These next few entries will probably lack the expounding my usual lockdown journals have. This is also okay.
Tuesday, March 16 was mostly uneventful. It was a normal day at work, and by normal I mean I was behind on stuff and stressed out from trying to finish the cancer center story, which you know I didn’t submit until Friday. This tells you what kind of week I had, really. Stressed about it Tuesday. Submitted Friday. Ugh!
It was not normal in one way. My supervisor was off for the second day in a row. I forgot that it was spring break, so a lot of the parents in our company took at least a couple of days off. This took some of the stress off, but honestly I wasn’t productive enough not to feel any at all. Bleah.
“Why are we here? Because we’re here. Roll the bones.”
Uncle Bezos delivered another Rush Blu-Ray this weekend and I’ve got it playing as I write this. It’s their concert video from the R40 tour in 2015 and it is killer. I think a lot of the footage was in the Cinema Strangiato theater film I saw two years ago but this is also okay. What a performance.
I also worked on a couple of proposals, already in progress. I keep thinking I’m done with them, and they keep coming back for more work. I’m not sure what I’m doing wrong here, like if this is just the process at work or if I’m not communicating what I need from people in order to make them happy, but there seems to be some kind of disconnect.
I admit too that I’m finding my patience tested, and I haaaaate admitting I’m running out of patience. It’s a virtue in any life. In a teacher’s life it’s one of the things separating the right from the wrong, and I generally have it in abundance. This is not to say I’m virtuous; rather, it’s to say I chose the right profession when I chose the classroom. My job today doesn’t require nearly as much patience, so I should really never run out of it.
“All this machinery making modern music can still be open-hearted, not so coldly charted; it’s really just a question of your honesty.”
Oh. I also spent some of my day coordinating our office book discussion group’s first reading selection. That was actually kind of fun. Over the weekend, I emailed everyone (there are five of us) with a little survey: Is there a genre you won’t read? For our first book, would you prefer to read fiction or non-fiction? For our first book, if you had to choose, would you rather read a classic or something current? What are some books you fairly recently enjoyed? Will you most likely read a physical book or an e-book?
The responses were fun to read. It got me pretty amped to facilitate this group. So Tuesday I compiled the responses and asked participants to submit one or two titles of books they’d be interested in reading: fiction, published in 2020 or 2021, no fantasy or horror or erotica or psycho.
I texted the other Jennifer to say I was listening to Guns n’ Roses’s Chinese Democracy, and album I was surprised to learn has aged well. It was late so she didn’t get back. I texted a few friends (Jennifer, Sharon, Crush Girl) to ask if they got their stimulus checks yet. I was the only one who had. Mine went in late Monday.
My late breakfast was a boneless chicken plate from Rainbow. The leftovers were lunch. I thought I’d skip dinner because I wasn’t very hungry, but then I stayed up too late and had to eat a couple of quesadillas. The lazy, microwave oven kind. They were delicious.
I was so tired I actually turned in at a decent hour. Still stayed up too long playing Mario Kart 8. Honestly I felt like I deserved it.
Leave a comment if you need someone to connect with. Pandemic daze is not done. I know I’m still living in it!
I can’t lie. Sometimes when the supervisor is on vacation, the typing fingers they pay to put stories together behave like they’re on vacation too. Even when my brain commands them to focus.
Monday the 15th was a little different, though. I realllly wanted to have some work to show, since I feel like I’m behind on everything. I really tried, too, but some of it just wouldn’t come. I had enough non-creative work to keep me busy, and I did well on that stuff. It just wasn’t the stuff I’ve been mired in.
Such a crazy way to make a living, I tell you. And I can’t complain because it’s what I always wanted.
I even started with brain food. Two heads of broccoli, blanched for breakfast. It was yummy, but I was a bit peckish all day beginning the late morning. The broccoli just didn’t do it for me for some reason. So for lunch I had a bowl of angelhair pasta with some canned sauce.
I couldn’t force the work, so I didn’t drag it out. I clocked out (figuratively) and went to bed at the end of my scheduled work day, rather than stay at my desk and try to make something something come out.
I got up late. Like nine-thirty. And tried to make kulolo with my leftover ingredients and it came out terrible. Didn’t set as firmly, didn’t taste as good. Dang it. I kind of tried to wing it, but clearly I don’t quite have the concept down. I thought I might share it with some friends in the office, too. There was no way. This just wasn’t worthy of sharing. I’d have to try again, perhaps over the weekend.
I had lazy quesadillas for dinner. Mostly because I wanted to get the stupid kulolo going. It takes two hours in the Instant Pot.
Jennifer texted me photos of her birria lunch from that taco truck I went to on my birthday. And a link to some new orphan otter photos. Very cute.
That failed kulolo experiment got me to bed ridiculously late considering my recent sleep deprivation. It was terribly irresponsible. And it would lead to a very draining week. Because I am a doofus.
If you need to connect with someone, perhaps this doofus is the person you need. Leave a comment if you’re pandemicking alone. Don’t do that. Get my contact info.
I got up Sunday morning with only like three and a half hours of sleep because it was Pi Day. Hawaiian Pie Company does this annual mystery pie sale on March 14. You order the pie ahead of time and you don’t know what’s in the box until you open it. I ordered one for me and one for the office, and my pickup time was ten in the morning.
So while I was out, of course I grabbed breakfast from the Taco Bell drive-through. I also hit the ATM to get the rent and the a 7-Eleven to get a money order.
I read the news, did a crossword, and ate. Then it was back to bed for a few hours.
I went to the office to get some work done, stopping for gas on the way. I realized as soon as I got there that I didn’t have the stupid pie.
I was hungry, so I picked up a plate lunch from Grace’s on my way to the office. Figured I had to go home and come back anyway, so it didn’t matter when I did it. I ate as I updated software and edited a photo for a coworker (Photoshop works better when I’m in the office). I did a few other silly tasks I won’t get into.
Software took a long time to update, so after I ate was a good time to get the pie. I peeked. Chocolate chess pie. I’m glad mine wasn’t that — it looks too chocolatey for me. Mine was (I think) an apple pie. I haven’t cut into it yet.
Although I was mildly disappointed by how much time I spent at the office on a Sunday, I was pleased I got stuff done.
Came home and stayed up far too late. I don’t even remember what I did except I think it was usual late Sunday stuff.
Crush Girl and I texted a little. She didn’t recognize my photo as kulolo. So we talked about it a little. She later sent me a photo of what she was cooking. I think hers was better than mine.
Not much of a Sunday, really, except I think I got decent relaxation and was fairly productive. Still didn’t do any of the reading I really want to get to. Weekends are too short!
Don’t let go. The end (or at least an end) is in sight. And if you’re floating through it untethered, hit the comments. I’ll send you contact info and you can reach out in texts or whatever. I also have a few Clubhouse invites if you want one. iPhone people only, for now.
It’s very late Sunday night and I can’t get my brian to settle down, so I’m going to flick my fingers at the keyboard and see if anything meaningful comes out. And if it doesn’t, hopefully just the activity and exercise will be enough to put everything at ease.
I only got a few hours of sleep Friday night, but I was determined to call the folks, whom I hadn’t spoken to since the day I left their house after sitting their dog. Something like two weeks. It had been on my list; I just didn’t get to do it because I’d been getting out of bed so late.
So I gave them a call and told them I’d received my first shot. We didn’t chat long. Just reestablished contact, you know? It won’t be too long before I’m going over regularly again. I think we can all feel it.
Caved in to carnal desires and got breakfast-slash-lunch at Young’s, which makes it the second time in a week I ate a huge mess of Hawaiian food. It was delicious.
Worked some crosswords while I ate, and read the news. I might have done some journaling. And of course I took a nice, long nap. It was rather heavenly.
The big project for Saturday was kulolo. I had a simple recipe from the IP group on FB. I had the ingredients. It’s basically grated taro, brown sugar, and coconut milk. I had a can of coconut oil cooking spray, which was a genius idea by the guy who developed the recipe (as I later told him) and that’s pretty much the dish. Combined the first three ingredients, sprayed a couple of aluminum foil mini loaf pans with the fourth, and stuck it in the Instant Pot for two hours.
It came out quite good. It’s a little sweet for me, so I’ll adjust the recipe, but it looks, tastes, and smells the way it’s supposed to, and I’m more than slightly pleased. I’m pretty sure I’ve found the potluck contribution I’ve been seeking. I envision bringing it in muffin cups in cubes or thick slabs.
While it was steaming under pressure, I played a stupid number of games of Tsum Tsum. I was close to the end of a timed event I really wanted to complete. It didn’t take as long as it should have, because I scored a lucky jackpot of coins (more than 71K after one game), which pushed me over the edge to my goal. Yay.
I’d brought home some kulolo from Young’s so I could do a side-by-side taste test, and you know, I like mine better. It has more of a caramelly flavor.
I have enough of the mixture to make another three or four mini pans, which I will do Monday. Not sure how long that stuff keeps in the fridge. It’ll be too much to consume by myself, so I’ll be passing it along. Perhaps to some friends at work.
Didn’t do too much texting Saturday. Sylvia to ask if she knew why the pau hana was canceled Friday. She didn’t. Stacia to respond to those silly signs in the Buzzfeed piece she sent me. Jennifer texted me some photos of gin and whisky in the Sake Shop. I’m still working on getting through everything in my cabinet, so I’m not in the market for any new bottles, but it’s nice to see what’s out there because I’m pretty much done with getting liquor from supermarkets.
I texted Crush Girl a photo of my kulolo. It was late, though, so I knew I wouldn’t hear back from her until later.
I might be a zombie Monday, because it’s creeping up on three o’clock Sunday night and I haven’t brushed my teeth yet. Ugh.
Hit me up in comments if you need someone to connect with. I’m serious. Don’t be a naked mole rat. I understand the temptation to burrow oneself into a cave. I’ve done it myself a few times in recent months. Just don’t.
That Thursday late-night flurry of productivity meant I got very little sleep, most of it not very good. The Darth Vader machine has a tank of water it heats up so the air it forces into me isn’t dry. You can adjust the level of humidity, and most of the time you get it how you like it and just leave it.
I should probably do some research, because I don’t know what causes, once in a while, the moisture to recondense in the air tube itself (oh; I guess it’s just cooler air at night. Duh?). When this happens, the moisture is forced in tiny amounts along the tube, and when there’s enough of it, it collects in the mask and drips on my face. Unpleasant.
I’ve looked on some forums, and some of the veteran Darth Vader wearers have a slang word for this occurrence. Washed out? Something like that. So I got Niagaraed Thursday night and, not even aware I was doing it, I took the mask off and fell back asleep.
Which means I wasn’t in the best shape Friday morning. I felt good enough about the work late Thursday that I kind of rode that, though, and my mood was pretty good.
These stories I write have to be approved before we publish, and not just by my supervisor (our communications director). In the case of the college of engineering story, approval comes also from the development officer responsible for the college, a coworker. She gets approval from the dean, the college’s communications person, and the donor.
This is an overall positive. As a representative of my organization, I have certain priorities in how I put the story together. As a writer, I have others: good, clear writing, yes, but also how the one story reads as part of our larger body of published work. Nobody has ever told me not to let our stories sound alike, mostly since nobody reads all our work so they probably wouldn’t notice, but it’s important to me we don’t slide into ruts.
The donors have their own priorities. The dean has his. The dean’s communications person has hers. Oh, and our webmaster has his, too.
It comes back to me with everyone’s notes, and I get to reconcile the edits while also keeping the quality of the writing where I want it. Because honestly, mostly everyone else (my supervisor not included) cares more about what I write than how I write it. So I get to correct gender-non-specific language and match pronouns I didn’t use with their correct antecedents. Also: lower-case everyone’s overly ambitious capitalization.
This took up my morning hours, but we got the story posted. I wrote the social media copy. Our e-communications guy shared my copy on our social media platforms and emailed the links to our immediate contacts. The immediate contacts forwarded the links to their contacts.
And this is a considerable part of how I earn those breakfast burritos.
I can’t remember what I worked on in the afternoon but it was equally engrossing. The workday passed rather quickly, even when they canceled our planned virtual office pau hana without explanation. Darn it. I shopped for ingredients Thursday night for one item on the schedule, a make-along St. Patrick’s Day cocktails activity. Already had all the alcohol, but I needed fresh mint, club soda, and coconut water.
We haven’t even hit the JetWay yet
I was tempted to watch Ted Lasso again in my downtime after work. I totally could have, too. However, reluctant to become tired of it, I instead re-watched the first two episodes of Forever, that great series with Fred Armisen and Maya Rudolph on Prime. I recommended it to a friend recently and I had it on my mind.
Took a long nap after that, then ate shredded pork tacos for dinner. I made all that pork shoulder in the Instant Pot with several dishes in mind, yet I pretty much just used it for tacos and for eating right out of the food storage container. I also needed a few gallons of drinking water, so I drove to the Foodland and took care of that. Since I was there, I got a small chocolate shake from the McD’s drive-through.
Despite all the rain and the late hour, that parking lot was hopping Friday night. You can totally feel people getting antsy. Restrictions on this island our loosening, and people are throwing themselves into long-forbidden activity, and it’s affecting the whole vibe of this town. Perhaps a bit too eagerly.
I get it. I feel it too. The flight attendant has asked everyone to remain seated until the plane comes to a complete stop at the JetWay, but the aisles are already full of people eager to get off and beat everyone to baggage claim, even though they’re still going to have to wait the same amount of time as the rest of us when they do.
I’m more than a little nervous about this.
Contextualizing
Sharon texted me late to ask if I knew why the pau hana was canceled. It led to some other unrelated work conversation. Faye texted to ask if this guy Derek is my classmate. He is. We were good friends. JB and the writing partner got back to me with updates on their parents’ vaccinations too.
Crush Girl and I texted sporadically through the day. She was good company as I struggled to stay focused on very little sleep.
My moods have been all over, but I’m grateful for so many things. Steady employment doing something I enjoy. Good coworkers, some of whom have become good friends. My family making it this far without getting infected, and my parents getting their shots. Friends all over sharing what’s going on in their lives. Some of it’s not so good, but I’m grateful for their sharing.
If there’s a dearth of this kind of connectivity in your pandemic experience, hit the comments and I’ll send you some contact info.
Late Saturday night, writing about, um, Thursday? Yeah, Thursday.
I got something like six and a half hours of good sleep Wednesday night, and my body and brain felt it. I really really really really really really really need to remember this. My relationship with sleep is so troubled and tenuous that I often (very often!) kind of just give up on it. I mean, it’s always on my mind because how could anything causing me so much stress and trouble my whole life not be ever on the brain?
Still, going to bed at a decent hour often means getting the same amount of decent sleep as going to bed at an ungodly hour, and if this is the case, why worry about when I go to bed? I mean, that’s the silly, stupid, unhealthy reasoning. It’s wrong. And it’s bad.
The roast beef and turkey sandwich I had for breakfast-slash-lunch was so good and so satisfying I did it again Thursday, except I ordered the house special: the Machete. It’s a ridiculously large sandwich with a lot of meat and other stuff, and it’s delicious. I need something sorta in between the “meaner” sandwiches and the “meanest” sandwich.
In the morning, I worked on the student profiles I’m behind on. In the afternoon, I worked on this article about a large donation to the college of engineering. It wasn’t coming along well and the deadline snuck up on me, but I got it in.
The other Jennifer texted me to say her hair’s falling out again. Ugh. I try not to think about her illness because it makes me so sad, but I don’t think not thinking about it is being the friend I want to be. So I said, “Well that sucks.” And she said, “Guess I gotta dig the Barbie wig out.” And I said, “You should get a Mia Wallace wig.”
Pulp Fiction and Quentin Tarantino generally are two topics we have the longest history with, going back to the year everyone in our newsroom saw Pulp Fiction in theaters. We all saw it over the summer and when the new school year began we were all in agreement it was one of the greatest things ever.
Except I actually texted “You should get a Mia Wallace wig” to a female coworker. Oops.
The coworker was confused. Duh. I re-sent the text to Jennifer and followed it with, “(I accidentally texted that to a coworker. She was very confused.)”
I got the cry-laughing emoji back. Very rewarding.
The day she went in for her double mastectomy, several years ago, I texted her in the early morning: I would be thinking of her all day, and all day I would only be listening to the music of the Hooters.
It comes from the same place, only I don’t think she was as amused that time.
I texted Desi to ask if her parents have been vaccinated yet. It led to some talk about some of our favorite books growing up. She’s always down for book talk. It’s a trait I don’t appreciate as much as I should.
I asked the writing partner the same thing.
Cathy and I texted a little about where we want to travel when we’re allowed to. She wants to see Mrs. Wong in Tennessee, of course. I was thinking of heading the other way: somewhere in the Pacific with white sand, clear water, and strong wifi, with dingy bars whose floors are covered with tracked-in sand in the afternoons.
Stacia texted me a Buzzfeed article with some funny signs. Yeah, I’m still the funny sign guy even though since I haven’t been anywhere for a year, I haven’t seen any signs to share. I didn’t think I’d find them very funny, since I was sure I’d seen them before, but no. These were new, and most of them were the kinds of signs, outside establishments, requiring someone to place letters advertising the weekly specials (for example), and they did make me laugh. Mostly because many of the signs were either intentionally silly (“Nobody ever reads this side lol”) or mischievously vandalized by people switching letters around (“Get your shongles shit today”).
I can’t decide which I like better. I wish I were responsible for a sign like this so I could stretch my creativity and exercise my wit, such as it exists. I also wish I were brave enough to vandalize other people’s signs.
Crush Girl and I texted a lot Thursday. Good stuff, too. Silly stuff, and not-so-silly.
I think for dinner I had shredded pork tacos, then a couple of late quesadillas. Because around 11:30 in the evening I was full of mossy brain energy and thought it was a good time to get some work done.
I can’t lie: it was great. All the synapses were firing in sync, and I did some good work. I submitted two proposals to development officers and prepped the engineering article for posting even though it hadn’t yet been approved. I think I finally shut the laptop at like 2:30.
It was a good three hours, I tell you. It doesn’t feel like work when it feels that good. I can feel the self-expression even in something that has nothing to do with me. The expression is in the quality of work. I feel like my signature was all over this stuff even without my actual name.
Teaching used to be this way. Pretty much every period of every day. It’s why I did it for so long even though it was slowly killing me, physically.
“It’s sad and it’s sweet, and I knew it complete when I wore a younger man’s clothes.”
So despite everything I wrote at the top of this page, I went to bed far too late. I’m an idiotic doofus.
Hit the comments if you need some connection with an idiotic doofus in the pandemic insanity. I’m here if you need someone. Srsly.
It’s 3:30 in the morning late Thursday night so this may have to be short.
I don’t remember anything about my sleep Tuesday night. I remember I got up Wednesday and had three hot dogs with mustard, ketchup, and sauerkraut for breakfast. Hebrew Nationals, reduced fat. I’m sure I could tell the difference if I had them alongside the regular beef franks, but as it was I couldn’t tell.
Got some of the easier work taken care of, then had my one-on-one with the boss. You could tell she was being patient with me but the patience was running out.
It rained like crazy for a second day in a row. Power went out in the Kapahulu area. I put nearly five pounds of pork shoulder in the Instant Pot and it was a race against the power outage.
You know what? I’m too tired to do this. Going to bed and continuing this later. To remind me:
rain
pork / tacos
early(ish) to bed
book review
kindle
It’s nine in the evening Friday night and I have no interest in writing anything I meant to write. I kind of just want to go quickly through the day’s non-events and send this to the cloud. I’m tired. It’s the weekend.
We’ve had ridiculous rain. It poured a few hours ago for about an hour but it’s quiet now. Wednesday was crazy. Parts of the island were really messed up, and it’s worse on Maui and Kauai.
That review of On the Horizon took much too long, but I let books pile up read and unreviewed a lot last year and the year before (films, too) so I’m trying to make myself review everything before I go to the next book. In this case, it caused me not to read my next book for almost a whole month. There are problems with this system.
Last night I finally peeled the cellophane off my Blu-Ray of Rush: Beyond the Lighted Stage, which I saw a couple of months ago via Netflix DVD. I wanted my own copy because it’s so terrific.
I don’t know if I can say this about more than two or three artists, but I actually love this band. I don’t mean I love their playing or their music. I mean the band. The feelings that swell up in me when I watch this thing are pretty much love. And it is such a well-made documentary.
Prying it out of this stack of CDs, DVDs, Blu-Rays, and paperbcks on my desk (it’s not a huge stack; it’s just varied), I found my missing Kindle. So now I’ve finally reviewed that book and found my Kindle. A lot of reading is in store this weekend, especially if this weather continues, which it’s expected to do. 98% chance of rain today. 99% Saturday. 86% Sunday. Bring it.
Breakfast Wednesday was a couple of hot dogs with ketchup, mustard, and sauerkraut. My very late lunch was chunks of pressure-cooked pork shoulder, mostly popped into my mouth as I tore it into shreds after it cooked. My very late dinner was a couple of pork tacos with red cabbage and extra-sharp cheddar.
Crush Girl and I texted very briefly in the evening, about the weather. I got several texts from coworkers for something non-work-related. Something fun. Jennifer texted me an update of the new orphaned baby otter. They anmed her (the otter, not Jennifer) Quatse. Sylvia and I texted about getting our shots. I told her what it was like for me, and she went for hers. Cathy responded to my Tuesday text to talk about her parents’ vaccinations. Cathy got her first. The other Jennifer recommended a book she’s reading and I bought it immediately.
I turned in early, like before 2:00. The weather encouraged it.
Leave a comment if you need someone to connect with. Texting, DMs, IMs, that kind of thing. I’ll send you my details.
Tuesday was a little rough. Woke up after not enough sleep. Spent almost the whole night without Darth Vader. Just fell asleep unintentionally listening to a podcast, woke up unrested an hour or so before the alarm, and got that last hour with the mask.
I felt disorganized and not quite overwhelmed, but like I was about to lose control of my workflow. Things kept coming in and I felt like even when I turn things around quickly, they’re never quite good enough, so this feeling of deflation just took over and I found it difficult to try very hard. It’s stupid.
Called the supervisor to let her know what I was dealing with. She helped me talk myself through it, and I spent most of the rest of the day going through the past week’s emails to make sure I wasn’t missing anything, and to organize my running to-do list. It helped, but I still didn’t really get much done.
Picked up a late breakfast from Machete’s, a sandwich shop on Dillingham. Roast beef and turkey on wheat. It was delicious and exactly what I wanted. Before my not-very-productive workday was through, I drove to Young’s to get the Hawaiian plate I have for breakfast, lunch, and dinner on occasional Saturdays. I was ravenous, and it was a late lunch and late dinner.
Actually did a little bit of work, then some journaling. Made a late run to the grocery store. My one new thing this time was about three pounds of cut, peeled taro root. I’ve cooked taro before, when I was splitting a CSA box with Mochi Girl, but this was my first time bringing some home from the supermarket.
Kulolo is the plan. I’ve decided lomi salmon is too labor intensive to be my go-to potluck contribution. Kulolo is a lovely desert most people don’t get very often, and I’ve never seen it at a potluck. I think it could work.
I was lethargic as heck all day and I don’t know if it’s the sleep deprivation, some of that tummy anxiety I’ve been feeling, or the shot. Spent a lot of time vegging in bed.
I wrote a few very late emails for work. I am a little stressed about not having produced much this week.
I texted Cathy to ask if her parents were vaccinated. Yay. Both have been fully taken care of, and Cathy has had her first shot. Texted the other Jennifer to see how she’s doing. Crush Girl and I texted sporadically through the day about early meetings, my favorite lei shop, and rain.
I’ve avoided writing about this because I’m not sure how I feel. In a moment of boredom about six weeks ago, I ordered a Nintendo Switch Lite from Amazon. There were some problems, so I sent it back and ordered a regular Nintendo Switch. I haven’t had a current-gen gaming platform since my Sega Dreamcast in fall 1999.
I’ve had it a little more than a week, and it hasn’t taken over my life. Picked up a few games, one of them on the recommendation of my one friend who works at Facebook, but so far I’ve only really played Mario Kart 8. I must say it’s pretty dang fun. My crappy wifi can’t handle online play, so I think this is one reason I won’t get zombied by it. I imagine the real fun is playing against others online.
What’s a better way to waste idle time: scrolling through Twitter, IG, and the Washington Post, or Racing Baby Luigi around a theme park on a toy scooter?
It’s raining like crazy this week, and people are suffering enormous damage to property from some insane flooding. I’m pretty much only being rained upon, thank God, but I feel terrible for people in the flooded areas.
Get those animals out of the muddy muddy, childen of the Lord.
Ôfstân is the new album from a Dutch band called Kjeld, which appears to be a common surname. It’s black metal, and the reviewers seems to love it. So far it just sounds like black metal to me: good for the background while working, but not especially interesting or compelling. However: Ôfstân appears to be Frisian for “Distance,” which is a cool name for a metal album. Also, I need to find out if the band sings in Frisian, because that’s pretty interesting by itself. Honestly, they could be singing English and right now I wouldn’t be able to tell. Black metal vocals are nearly as impenetable as Italian opera.
Anyway, I have it on now and I’m not really impressed. It’s not bad, but I can’t find any reason to like it yet.
Hit me up in comments if you want someone to connect with. I got bandwidth if I’m not drifting Baby Luigi around an S turn.
“Why are you so tense?” asked the nurse, filling a syringe from a nearly-fresh vial.
I looked her in the eye over my Oakland Athletics mask. “I am not going to complain to a hospital nurse about what a long year it’s been,” I said. “You’ve had a longer year than I have. But yeah. It’s been a long year for us all.”
She patted my arm and said she understood. Counted to three. Jabbed me on three and it was done. She told me to stay put for fifteen minutes and then check out.
My phone was in my pocket, and others waiting for their fifteen minutes to be up were all absorbed by their own phones.
I closed my eyes and said a short prayer of thanksgiving for this thing in my arm. And immediately thought of these past twelve months. First about my own isolation from friends, family, and coworkers, but then about half a million Americans dead, including the parents of at least three friends.
I thought about the ridiculous, utterly inept leadership by our federal government and the governments of certain other states.
Yeah. I’ve watched the national news religiously since this thing began, added to my already copious amounts of online news, and I’ve seen the weeping widowers and the speechless adult children, crying over lost parents.
And I just cried. Sat in my (astonishingly wide) stacking chair and let the tears flow into my mask. Another nurse came over to ask if anything was wrong. I said I was just emotional. She’s had a longer year than I have, but it’s been a long year for us all. She nodded quietly and moved on.
Then, of course, I got on my phone and wrote this down for Twitter.
I was still crying when I got to my car. Still crying as the rain came down in 55-gallon drums over Pali Highway.
I thought I might pick up dinner on my way home, perhaps stopping somewhere in Kaneohe (ooooh…KJ’s?) but I simply wasn’t in the mood. Got to my neighborhood, though, and kept driving, kind of angrily. My car loves to be driven angrily. It takes turns so well, and since it’s a stick it makes all kinds of noise as I downshift and accelerate into the many S-turns in my ‘hood or whip it around a corner.
Baskin-Robbins was in order. I thought of more gourmet options, of which many have sprung up in this town, but I was already back in Kalihi, and something normal seemed much more appropriate. Scoop of Jamoca; scoop of cookies and cream. In a cup.
When the going gets tough, the emotionally crippled get ice cream.
I wish it didn’t help, but it helped. So I picked up Korean food from Peppa’s in the same strip mall and went home.
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I was running on not enough sleep Monday morning and I don’t remember what I did for work in the first half of the day. Proposal stuff, most likely. I picked up a turkey sandwich on wheat from Subway for a late breakfast. Took a short nap for lunch.
Most of my department (marketing and communications) had a meeting with our planned giving office, working on some new ideas and discussing philosophies with that department’s new leader. It was a good meeting, and I like that my own ideas of storytelling click perfectly with the new leader’s. We’re going to get along well.
And then it was time to drive to Kailua for my shot. Except for the crying, it went well. Everything happened exactly as described in the email I received, and people were friendly and helpful.
I have an appointment for the second shot in three weeks. Christe eléison.
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I’d been listening to Extreme all day, the day I’m writing this, but was in the mood for something a little noisier and less familiar for writing this evening. I’m spinning So It Goes by Demoniac, a Chilean progressive thrash band I never heard of until moments before sitting down to write this. It’s been great for keeping the fingers typing and the words flowing. There’s too much good music out there I’ve never heard of. It’s a bit discouraging and saddening.
Everything is saddening these days. I’m so emo I don’t know what to do with myself lately. Music is helping, though. A certain joy I get very few other places flows through me when I put on a new band I’ve never heard and it turns out pretty dang good. Before I switched to Extreme, I had this Danish band Iotunn on repeat, beginning sometime Saturday. The Encyclopaedia Metallum calls them progressive power metal, but I hear a lot more black metal in their sound. Difficult to nail down since they veer from style to style. Pretty enjoyable, though, and soothing driving music.
I have other things to vent or wax poetic about, but I really want to write my review of On the Horizon this evening because not having it reviewed is keeping me from reading my next book, and it’s 1:25 in the morning. So I’m going to shift mindsets and do that, probably with Demoniac still playing. I usually don’t care for jazzy bass-playing, but it totally works in this band.
Oh I forgot to talk about texts. Crush Girl and I texted a few times. She responded to my Critics Choice Awards text from Sunday evening, and I texted her from my car right after my shot to tell her — actually anyone who might sympathize — how I was feeling.
There was more royals talk in the Suzanne-Julie-Cindy group text. I again kept out of it. Jennifer sent me a link to another orphaned baby otter photo. Adorable.
Leave a comment if you need someone to connect with. We’re getting shots in the arms by the millions, but we’re not safe yet. Don’t be alone if you don’t want to be.
Sunday’s a bit easier to remember since it was just yesterday. I got about five and a half hours of sleep, two of them good, the rest bad. Then got up for a little and went back to bed for another couple of hours of good sleep. This is not a good way to live.
Worked a few puzzles as I thought about the rest of my day.
Boring puzzle minutiae follows. You’re warned.
Across and down
I subscribe to the New York Times crossword puzzle. You can subscribe just to the puzzle without subscribing to the magazine, as tends of thousands of people do. It’s a silly, mostly meaningless hobby for most of us* but a genuine revenue stream for the Grey Lady, and for this reason it also puts a lot of resources toward making it worthwhile. I just renewed my subscription for my fourth year and deeply wish I’d subscribed years earlier.
The puzzles are online, with a pretty good web interface. Although nothing beats solving on paper with a Pilot V5 extra-fine steel-tipped pen, solving online is quicker and much, much better for the solver who’s still learning to solve. The interface includes a timer, cumulative statistics for this week’s times (broken down by days of the week), and my personal best times for each day.
As you know, the puzzle starts easy Monday and gets progressively harder through Saturday. Sunday is the big puzzle, so it’s difficult that way, but the solving difficulty is usually the same as Thursday.
Until I started solving digitally, I was solving Mondays in twelve to fifteen minutes. I confidently solved most Tuesdays in fifteen to twenty minutes. I was about 50-50 on completing Wednesdays. I very seldom completed a Thursday, and considered myself lucky if I could get two good sections for Friday and Saturday.
Now, completing a puzzle is expected, no matter what day of the week it is, although I’m still learning. February was my first month ever completing puzzles for an entire calendar month. This is what my stats page looks like now.
T stands for this week. B stands for best. A stands for average. Ignore the B time for Friday; that was a glitch and I’m super annoyed about it. My real Friday B is nine minutes and change.
There are a couple of cheats. When you employ them, you break your solving streak. The puzzle tells you, when you’ve filled the squares, whether or not you’ve solved it. If you haven’t, you can keep working, and if you find and correct your error, the streak is still alive. This is why I sometimes differentiate between my “successful” solves and my “clean” solves. Clean solves are correct when I type that last letter. If I have to find and correct my errors, it’s merely successful.
For cheats, you can “check puzzle” which turns red any bad letters you’ve typed. You can also just “check square” and “check word.” If you’re at a total loss, you can “reveal square,” “reveal word,” and “reveal puzzle.” I hate when I have to reveal square! I really dislike having to check puzzle, but I accept I’m still learning and this is going to happen sometimes.
I’m just suuuuuuuper happy to know I don’t check puzzle as much as I used to. It’s usually two or three puzzles a month, usually a Saturday or Sunday.
My subscription lets me look back at all the puzzles I’ve done, including the ones I left unfinished. In my first year, that was most Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. I can complete these puzzles whenever, which I’ll often do on rainy bored days.
I also have access to the entire archive of puzzles. I don’t know how far back the archives go, because until recently I seldom went backward. The daily puzzle and the occasional rewind to finish unfinished puzzles was enough for me, especially with the Spelling Bee added to my daily routine.
But I’m solving the puzzles more quickly now, so for the past few weeks, I have gone back to work on old puzzles. This is March, so when I’m itching to do a puzzle, I look back to March 2020. I didn’t leave any puzzles unfinished. I actually don’t have to look; I did all the puzzles in 2020 and most of the puzzles in 2019. So now I’m back to March 2018.
This is what my archive looks like for March 2019.
Yellow squares are successful solves. Blue squares used cheats.
This is my archive for March 2020.
That blue square on a MONDAY drives me crazy! Aaaaaaaaack.
And this is what my archive looks like for March 2018, the archived month I’m working on this month.
I floated my pointer over Saturday the 17th so you can see that subscribers have options to download the puzzles for solving in crossword apps, or saving as PDF so the puzzles can be printed and solved on paper, with a Pilot Precise V5 extra-fine steel-tipped pen. Which I never do.
Thoughtful readers like anyone reading this probably ask why I don’t just solve the NYT crosswords in the local paper, especially since I subscribe to the local paper. It’s because the local paper’s puzzle doesn’t have a web interface. You have to save the puzzle as a JPG, print it, and solve it that way and the resolution of the JPG is crap.
Also: the NYT puzzle in syndication is six weeks behind the puzzle in the NYT. Yep. For years, this was fine with me, but since I’ve actively pursued improvement in solving these idiotic grids, it’s not great. Whenever I had questions about a puzzle, I’d have to look six weeks back in the crossword puzzle blogs (yes; that’s a thing) and I’d have missed the conversation (also a thing). Solving in real time is critical for participation in what I will very loosely call a community.
I pay a lot of money in total for content, but there is a very real chance that, if forced to pick only one, the last subscription standing would be the NYT crossword. Although I might cheat and subscribe to the NYT if it includes the puzzle. Because news junkie.
I know you, gentle reader, are thinking I must be done with this completely unnecessary detailing of my puzzle solving habit. But wait: there’s more.
The Washington Post puts an online copy of the Los Angeles Times puzzle on the games page of its website. In real time. The LAT isn’t quiiiiite as good as the NYT in puzzle quality, but it’s way, way up there. I mean, you’re pretty much looking at puzzles by the same contructors, only maybe these are the ones not quite making the cut at NYT. I honestly don’t know what professional constructors do when they spread their submissions out, but since the NYT is the standard, I’m guessing most of them submit there first.
It’s a great puzzle too, the the WaPo’s web interface isn’t as good. It also has a timer and the same cheats, but it doesn’t keep track of your stats. There’s one other tiny difference I won’t name because I’m trying to get over it.
No; I’m not quite done. The WaPo also runs its own Sunday-only puzzle, and I think it’s also free on its website. This one’s always by the same constructor, and he’s one of the best. Creative. Clever. Challenging but accessible. He has very high standards for keeping crosswordese out of his puzzles. The WaPo only keeps the most recent six Sunday puzzles online, though, which is a pain.
Lately I’ve been a little hyperfocused on the NYT, so I haven’t done the LAT or WaPo puzzles this year. I kind of wander away sometimes, as I’ve done recently, and then wander back.
Okay I’m done for now.
Street food cred
Since I did the Sunday puzzle Saturday evening, I worked a Saturday puzzle from archive. It was most satisfying.
Packed up and went to the office, stopping at the same Korean street food joint I got dinner from last Sunday. It wasn’t as good, and I knew it wasn’t going to be. I was just kind of determined to try something different, and I prefer my wings unsauced, which is what I got last week.
Still good though. And yes, I got the gimmai again. And learned how to say gimmai, thanks to the proprietor.
I sent another draft of the athletics proposal to the development officer, updated some software, and did a little bit of housekeeping. It was good time alone in the office. Oh, I also printed up the material I needed for my shot Monday and filled out the forms while listening to my Sunday podcasts (Meet the Press and This Week with George Stephanopolous). I hate filling out forms.
Came home, did some writing, ate some leftovers, watched the last two episodes of Ted Lasso, and zoned out. Turned in around 3:30. Argh!
I wanna text you up
There was some texting in the Suzanne-Cindy-Julie group text about the Oprah interview but I only participated passively. I had zero interest.
Texted Crush Girl to see if she’d seen the Critics Choice Award winners. I knew she wouldn’t respond Sunday, and she didn’t, and it was fine.
Hit me up in the comments if you need someone to connect with in these (hopefully) waning weeks of this pandemic. Don’t pandemic untethered.
* HOWEVER: “Why do we love puzzles?” “It’s a way to control the chaos.” (Kelly Macdonald and Irrfan Khan in Puzzle (2018))
