chalkdust

Forget 48 hours. My body violently rejected Sunday’s dinner early Monday evening. Lesson learned. I suppose.

Work was mostly me putting my stories together and not doing a great job of it. I think I’m a little rusty, which of course is no excuse. Especially since I jump writing tracks with some alacrity most of the time. I just couldn’t find my groove, and everything felt forced, which my stories seldom are.

I’m disappointed in myself though certainly not surprised. It happens sometimes and I try not to let it bug me. Since I’m on a bit of a deadline now I’ll feel lousy about it Tuesday if I don’t have two complete drafts. If they’re not complete, I’ll submit them anyway as almost-drafts and get feedback. That sometimes helps.

Breakfast was a couple of pizza dogs again. I keep forgetting to make overnight oats and it’s beginning to bug me. Maybe I should set an alarm. I kind of skipped lunch, then made a pot of kimchi angel hair for dinner. My instinct last time was right: I used a lot more kimchi this time, and it was not an improvement. Distracting. I still think the dish could use another dimension, maybe something fatty, like sausage? What would be a good Korean fatty thing to put in there? Or maybe I should go with something like Portuguese sausage, since kimchi goes so well with it.

I didn’t go for a walk. The knee isn’t killing me but I don’t want to push it. Maybe I’ll try every other night for a while, unless it’s a laundry night.

AJ in SD and I traded a bunch of texts about kitchen implements. It was a nice conversation. I asked her what her favorite kitchen unitasker is, and she said probably her scale. She does a lot of baking. I nominated my ceramic ginger-grater, which is really only good for ginger or garlic, and I have mixed feelings about grating garlic. For dishes needing ginger, though, it’s an amazing thing.

Ali texted me a cartoon that had me laughing aloud. I sent her one back and she had already seen it, a couple of years ago. Seems a lot more appropriate this year, she said. I said darn because I didn’t know I was passing along something so old.

Crush Girl and I talked a little about our weekends. I mentioned Casual, and that got me off on Jason Reitman. I went on a bit of a fanboy rave.

I think I’m permanently going to move laundry to another early morning. Tuesdays were great, but the usual Monday pressures were making it too stressful. I feel a lot better making my big housecleaning evening Sunday night and saving laundry for another very early morning later in the week. I can also enjoy the beach more on those days.

My heart wasn’t in it, so it took a bit longer than last week, but I did attack the Monster in what has become my usual, unpleasant, satisfying chunk of accomplishment. It was unpleasant and miserable. I think I might be nearing halfway through, though, so maybe it’ll start feeling better once it’s all downhill and the end approacheth. Here’s hoping.

I watched another episode of Orange is the New Black. A mixed bag for sure. Piper Chapman, the central character, is super, super, super unlikeable right now. Most of the regulars are pretty unlikeable, actually. I guess it’s inevitable — we are talking about federal prison inmates.

I think about a show like M*A*S*H which I often compare this to, since it has a lot of characters trapped in a small space, but where the the characters in M*A*S*H can be unambiguously noble (they’re physicians, nurses, and a chaplain) against the antagonist of war, the characters in Orange is the New Black are ambiguously flawed: gracious and judgmental, good and bad, fighting their own imperfections as much as a terrible justice system.

I’m not planning to jump ship yet, since I have the Blu-Rays for seasons four and five. However, if I were watching this the normal way, I’d totally get why people might jump off right around now.

Gotta get ready for my day of paid writing (I’m writing this sorta early Tuesday). Which is a good time to remind anyone reading this that if they’re having difficulty connecting in these COVID-19 days, they should feel free to reach out. I’m here for it if you’re down to text, IM, or DM.

Sunday I got up too early, far ahead of my alarm, and knew it would be useless to try and fall right back asleep, so I got up, took my meds without food (they don’t need food but I think they do better with it), and did the Sunday crosswords in the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and the Washington Post. 25:30, 20:29, and 28:00 respectively. The longer time for the WaPo was because the theme was a bit challenging.

Unlike the LAT and NYT, the WaPo only publishes a Sunday crossword, a puzzle once ruled by the late esteemed Merl Reagle and now more than ably constructed by Evan Birnholz, whose creations are always fun and inventive.

I knew I was in for a long solve when the first long answer’s clue was U(N)D(E)R(T)AKING. I didn’t get what was going on until the last of the long answers, and then only after getting through most of the puzzle around the long answers. The clue (H)INDQ(U)A(RT)ERS gave the answer PAIN IN THE BUTT. See, “hurt” is spelled out in the parentheses, and “hindquarters” is another word for BUTT. The PAIN is literally in the BUTT in the clue. So U(N)D(E)R(T)AKING is CATCH IN THE ACT (net as a verb means to catch; an undertaking is an act). Some of the other clues and their long answers:

• (A)PP(RE)HENSION: LIVE IN FEAR
• (P)E(R)F(O)RATION: ACE IN THE HOLE
• (ANIMA(T)I(ON): LOT IN LIFE

It’s brilliant if maddening. And Birnholz sets himself a very high standard for clues and fill, keeping things appropriate for general audiences, and absent most crosswordese, those words or phrases you only know because so many crossword puzzles contain them. A good puzzle if one of my slower Sunday efforts.

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It was back to bed for me, for a planned two-hour nap, but I took an hour to get to sleep, so I didn’t get back up until 3:00. Ugh. I’d planned to be the office at 2:00.

They’re scheduling people to be in the office, people who need to be there at least sometimes, and people who prefer working there. I don’t feel safe yet, although I’ve seen the schedule and it’s very few people each day. So I’ve gotten permission to go in Sunday afternoons when I know I’ll be the only person there.

The work laptop needs its software updated frequently, so I save it for the Sundays, and try to do the work I can only do on that computer while I’m in the office. The remote desktop is just so slow, and it doesn’t play nicely with my home wifi.

I haven’t gotten as much done these past two Sundays as planned, since I’ve had urgent proposals to finish. I was there until 1:00 in the morning two weeks ago; I was there until nearly sunrise last Sunday.

But hey. Nothing urgent this week, so I took care of a bunch of housekeeping and packed up a bunch of the stuff a person accumulates over the years working at the same place. Not knowing when I’ll be working regularly in my cube again, I just brought home most of my office stuff: pens, stickies, binder clips, stress balls.

Updated my software and added Adobe Bridge. The proposals I’m working on require a lot of searching through our photo archives, and although I’ve never used it, I know Bridge is so much better for that kind of thing. One nice thing I figured out right away is you can define a batch action, then drop multiple photo files right onto it. Works a lot like the automations you can create right in MacOS. I defined a “resize” command so I could resize multi-megabyte photos to much, much smaller files. Just drag, drop, and click go, and the files are resized and copied to a pre-defined location, leaving the originals intact.

Useful because I plan to send a bunch of photos in email to a development officer to ask which she’d like to use for the proposal. Now they’ll total less than one MB for all seven photos, rather than the 20-something megs it was going to take.

I loaded up the car and went for a walk. I told you I was going to do it for sure Sunday.

It wasn’t long: from Young Street near Keeaumoku, I went down Young Street to University Ave, then came right back. Only encountered a few other pedestrains and sidewalk hangers-out. I avoided them all, of course. It’s only about a 7,000-step walk (I walk it a lot in normal times, so I’m very familiar), but it was just good to get out and moving. My knee didn’t feel it a whole lot during the walk. I’m feeling it now. Anyway, just over 10,000 steps for the day, for the first time in a couple of weeks.

So the walk was from about 9 to 10, and I got in my car and came right home. Much better than one in the morning.

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I sorta skipped breakfast, as I mentioned. I went through the Jack in the Box drive-through on my way to the office for a burger and onion rings. I could have done without the Oreo shake, but did I? I did not.

I didn’t have dinner until some time after I got home. Finally finished off the brown rice with chicken, kale, and broccoli, and am I glad. That last serving probably should have gone in the trash anyway. My body hasn’t rebelled yet, thank goodness, but bad bacteria can take 48 hours before they do things to you. A friend of mine works in a blood lab and has done research on the nasties that make your body do unpleasant things after eating bad food.

I ate it with fried eggs and canned corned beef hash. It would have been great if the green stuff in the rice wasn’t suspect.

The only texting was with Crush Girl, a few short messages about a favorite pastry she finally got to try. I was pleased for her. I mentioned late Sunday I have a year of Apple TV+ for free, something I didn’t know until I got a message saying I have to initialize it soon or the offer expires.

So I signed up and watched the first half-hour episode of Central Park, an animated musical sitcom. It was pretty cute. I’ll probably check out a few more episodes before I decide what to do with it. Just before bed, I returned to Orange is the New Black season four. I was on episode six, and yikes. So dark. It ends on something of a cliffhanger for a much-loved character. A dark cliffhanger. A less purposeful me would have gone right to the next episode, but I was responsible and just got ready for bed.

I don’t see any urgent proposals coming up unless the cancer center thing comes back to me with edits. This means I can focus on my long-dormant stories. Looking forward to a productive week where I tick off a lot of stuff that’s been on the list for too long.

Whatever you’re up to this week, if you need someone to connect with, reach out here. It’s a stupid thing to keep offering every day but I do it because I’m serious.

Saturday was a bit closer to normal, thank goodness.

I did get up at a ridiculously late hour, as I wrote yesterday. Like 3:00. I had breakfast while I wrote my Friday journal entry. Since it was Independence Day, of course I had hot dogs. I thought I’d fancy them up a little, so I made pizza dogs of a sort. Just put some marinara in the buns with the dogs and sliced some medium cheddar to melt on top.

They were delicious, and an apt way to celebrate the nation’s founding.

I took a little nap, then did a little bit of tidying up. I watched the last half hour of the Silicon Valley series finale. Then I put in a DVD from Netflix: the first five episodes of the first season of a series called Casual, a Hulu original. I was interested because its first two episodes were directed by Jason Reitman, probably my second-favorite director today, after Alexander Payne.

The best thing I can say about it is it looks like a TV series directed by Jason Reitman, which is a very good thing. It’s about a mid-thirties developer of an online dating site who lives with his late-thirties sister and her sixteen-year-old daughter. Or, they live with him, since the sister is recently divorced.

It’s a bit of an exploration of casual dating for all three characters, and I’m only halfway through the first season, but I think it’s a bit like Ang Lee’s The Ice Storm in how it looks at consequences for everyone involved, especially the kid. It’s funny with an undercurrent of deep sadness, which of course I love. Although the central male character is insufferable, I might suffer him because the other characters are so good, and it’s a very character-driven show, at least so far.

I’ve got the second DVD of season one on the way, or I will once I drop this and That Touch of Mink in the box. The rest of the series (three more seasons) are only on Hulu, but thanks to my Spotify subscription, I have Hulu’s basic plan too.

I continued going through my CDs — ripping the ones that aren’t on Spotify and getting them all ready for storage. I went through close to sixty titles and put them in a CD storage bag I ordered four of from Amazon.

I won’t list them all, but some of the CDs I ripped because they’re not on Spotify are Level Heads’ Memento Mori (1988) and the Darling Buds’ Long Day in the Universe (1992), a CD single with three otherwise unreleased tracks, as far as I can tell.

I also started a spreadsheet just to log all my CDs as I put them away. Just title-artist-year plus a column for notes. I don’t want to put them away and then forget I have them, you know? I figure I can skim a list and go, “Oh yeah, let’s listen to that Cocteau Twins album I love but never think of for some reason.”

I had a late dinner — the same thing I had for breakfast! It was really good, but of course I did it just to honor my country. Planned to make a microwaved apple crisp in a mug, but those two meals were all I was hungry for.

There was very little texting. I asked Ali something and didn’t hear back. Then I sent a link to Crush Girl, a news story about something she’s interested in. Charles and I traded a few FB IMs about his new workplace.

Did not go for a walk. I plan to Sunday for sure, though.

Daily reminder: if you’re looking for connectivity, let’s chat. DMs, IMs, and texts work for me — just reach out in this space. The world’s going crazy and we’re going to need to lock back down soon; I just feel it. Also, I only found out recently that sleep apnea patients have greater difficulty with COVID-19 — they’re more likely to need hospitalization. So, great. Now I’m not just being careful for my parents, but for myself. Could be a long rest of 2020!

If montony is an illness, Friday may have been the cure, because I pretty much didn’t do anything all day, a day I took just to withdraw from everything with no consequences since it was a holiday.

I got to bed early, like around 2:00. Then got up kind of early, but then I had breakfast and did a few little things and went back to bed. And most of the rest of my day was alternating between a couple of hours at my desk and a couple of hours in bed, mostly staring at my phone until I dozed off.

It didn’t feel like escapist behavior, at least not in the emotionally numbing way I’ve written about recently. It felt more like convalescing. The nice thing is that the world went on without me but I didn’t miss anything. Slow news day (except for the continually rising numbers, of course, and that misguided speech at Mount Rushmore, which I followed on my phone from my bed between naps). No work day. No sports. No social gatherings to make excuses for missing.

Downside: I didn’t get to sleep Friday night until frighteningly close to eight in the morning Saturday! Holy freaking cow.

It’s 3:30 in the afternoon Saturday now and I mostly feel okay. I’m actually optimistic I’ll be fine to get to sleep at a reasonable hour tonight, too.

One productive thing I did Friday was go through my pantry to assess its status for feeding me now and in case there’s a hurricane. I haven’t thought about it much, but on each of my grocery store trips these past few months, I’ve picked up a few things just in case. Over time, they’ve added up to a decent store of hurricane-ready goods. I can’t believe how much pasta and pasta sauce I’ve accumulated, but also canned pork and beans (which I love), canned black beans, canned kidney beans, canned chili, canned corn, and instant ramen. I definitely have more than the recommended fourteen days’ worth of food, assuming we still have running water.

I also got 30 minutes from the end of my third or fourth viewing of the final season of Silicon Valley, which isn’t quite as good for repeat viewings as the first two seasons. I’ll finish the re-watch today and then put the DVD away for a bit.

I don’t know why, but I also spent a couple of hours going through W3’s HTML tutorial. Just to brush up. The standards change, and I wanted to see if there’s anything I’m using that’s no longer standard. I looked at a little bit of Javascript too. I’ve got a few ideas gestating for that, ‘though I don’t have quite the coding chops to just open up Notepad and whip it out.

Breakfast was hot dogs. With sauerkraut, mustard, and ketchup — almost the last of the Best Foods ketchup I’m so fond of. I took a little taste of the organic ketchup I have lined up to take its place and was pretty impressed, just the way it tasted on the tip of my finger. A lot more vinegary than I’m used to (a good thing), not as brown sugary as Heinz or Best Foods. It kind of tastes like Hunt’s with more vinegar. Promising.

I burned so few calories that I wasn’t hungry again until past 9:00 in the evening, when I had yet another meal of Portuguese sausage Spam, fried eggs, and my chicken-kale-broccoli rice. I’ve been giving the rice a little sesame oil drizzle lately, so even more fat-laden than it sounds.

Somewhere in the middle I did scarf three peanut butter Oreos, not all at once, but single cookies here and there.

The only texts Friday were a few with Crush Girl. We talked a little about the new Hamilton. Very late, I sent F5 girl an IM on FB about her blog, which seems to be misbehaving with comment moderation. That was it. Not by design, but my near radio silence was probably good for me too.

I didn’t go for a walk again, but boy did I make great plans to.

Saturday, which is more than half gone, is a much better day for reaching out if you need a little connectivity. Here I am.

Thursday was a slow day at work. I had stuff to work on but it wasn’t flowing. I had very few emails. The flow was slow but the day went quickly, and I guess my brain is still recovering a little from the sleep deprivation.

Something someone said on a podcast last night made me realize something I was aware of but not connected to: that most of us are living through incredible monotony. Like, I’ve been hearing this from others and understanding, even sympathizing, but not realizing my own life has been monotonous and I’m feeling a little off about it.

One reason I decided on Day One to journal every day of this lockdown was to keep monotony at bay — since I’m writing about each day, I’d recognize it when I saw it. Weirdly, I’ve noticed a sameness but not felt it. Then Wednesday evening as I got stuff ready to take to the laundry, I realized I wasn’t looking forward to it as I have for these past few months. It felt kind of like drudgery, which laundry is almost the textbook definition of, and of course drudgery is almost a synonym for monotony.

I almost didn’t go. I can skip a week of laundry with no real problems if the surrounding weeks are not normal going-to-work weeks. I’d still be okay, but I’d have to hand-wash some work clothes, which I have done and which I don’t especially mind.

But I really didn’t want to do a double load next week, and I had to get out anyway and get bottled water, and with the long holiday weekend, I didn’t think I’d get to go to the beach until next week if I didn’t go Thursday. So off to the laundry I went, and except for the visceral, extreme pleasure of the McD’s fries (which were heavenly), it just felt like a chore.

Even the accomplishments, such as my progress on this horrible house-related task I’ve named the Monster, are feeling routine. I still feel good about the small dents I’m making in an overwhelming project, but the feel-good doesn’t seem to have much effect on my overall mood or mindset.

I’m thinking I need a new project, and I certainly don’t lack for any. This will be my weekend pondering: to consider ways to get out of this humdrummedness in a non-superficial, meaningful way.

Strangely, I’m not feeling especially down about any of this. Nor am I getting very stir-crazy. I think I’m just a little disappointed in what feels like stasis when stasis doesn’t have to rule the day.

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I’m also not ruling out the possibility that the crazy sleep lately has left me in compromised mental health. Maybe my real goal this weekend should be to get my brain and body back to some semblance of healthy.

Toward this end, after the laundry, I went to the beach. It was crowded even at 5:15 in the morning. I had to park on the side of the road away from the beach, something I almost never have to do. There were a lot more people wading near the shore, and maybe a few more people further out where the swimmers usually do their thing, and no more or fewer stand-up paddleboarders than usual, so it was all a little weird.

But I had a good, semi-strenuous swim and it felt great, and I mostly avoided other people the entire time, ‘though I could have done without the old Chinese lady hacking and spitting at the shower after the swim. Ugh.

I picked up breakfast from Pancakes and Waffles — another roast pork loco moco. I need to see if the Subway in my hood is opening up early for breakfast again, because I’d be so much better off with that, not to mention happier.

Lunch was a bowl of raisin bran. Dinner was (again) the Portuguese sausage Spam with fried eggs and the broccoli-kale-chicken brown rice. I have a few more meals’ worth of that rice, so I expect more breakfast meats and eggs in the immediate future.

I snacked on some tortilla chips and fresh salsa, and I had three or four peanut butter Oreos.

I usually save my trip to the grocery store for very late Sunday evening, but I was annoyed about those hot dog buns. Despite my dining habits during the lockdown, I don’t eat hot dogs that often, and I do love them, so I just couldn’t stand the thought of using those terrible buns just to use them. I had to get some decent (if unremarkable) buns before the weekend. I’ll freeze the rest of the lame buns and use them for something else.

The supermarket was pleasantly unbusy, and I got my stuff without having to deal with too many other shoppers. Picked up some bean sprouts, tofu, won bok, and baby bok choi, and Diet Pepsi of course, which was the only other must-get after the hot dog buns.

Didn’t go for a walk but it’s okay because I swam.

I’m watching the final season of Silicon Valley once more before I put it away. Took in the first two episodes before agreeing with myself that this journal entry could wait until Friday breakfast (which I just finished), turning in kind of early, around 2:00 in the morning.

Sharon and I texted on and off all day, mostly about work stuff. Crush Girl and I had a text conversation about a friend of mine, whose father just got home after 33 days in the hospital with COVID-19. The friend’s brother died from it a few weeks ago. Ugh.

That was it for connectivity, but it was enough for such a mellow day. I’ve got bandwidth for more, if you’re having trouble finding someone to connect with. Daily reminder.

When we were in college, when all-nighters — the social kind and the academic kind — were common, V and I used to talk about how you’re always pretty fine the first day. It’s the second day where it catches up to you.

I felt that Wednesday. After all-nighters Sunday and Monday, I was slow and fuzzy but pretty functional Tuesday. Wednesday I was a mess. Got through my 10:30 weekly check-in with my supervisor pretty well. Worked on emails and even reviewed my notes for one of the stories that’s been sitting on a back burner for two months.

Then I was toast. Without going into details that might be incriminating, I mde it to my usual lunch break and was wiped for the rest of the day. Luckly it was a slow day — I think I got fewer emails Wednesday than in any single workday since the Friday before Memorial Day weekend. And most of them had little to do with me directly, therefore needing no response.

So, not much to say about work except that I did very little. There was a late (5:30) email asking for one more small revision on one of the big proposals from last week, but it was a quick fix and I turned it around in just a few minutes.

Spam spam spam spam spam spam bacon and spam

I won’t say breakfast was great, but it was good. And satisfying. I still have a bunch of that broccoli-kale-chicken rice, so I did fry some Spam and a couple of eggs and ate them with that. I think it was my first time trying the Portuguese sausage Spam variety, and it was quite good. Almost as good as Tulip, if not better. Tulip is superior to regular Spam, by the way. I don’t understand why it never caught on here.

Lunch, which I didn’t have until about 9:00, was a bowl of raisin bran. I was in a hurry to get to bed and not very hungry, but I new I needed something in me. Read the news and did the crossword while I ate.

Then it was to bed for a few hours before heading to the laundry, where I am now, having dinner. Big Mac combo. And, um, an apple pie. I was ravenous when I got in here and pretty much scarfed the fries right away.

Taken out of context

The writing partner texted me a reply to something I asked about the stories she submitted to a couple of major publications. Sylvia texted me a photo of the pizzas she made with the flour and yeast I passed along. They look great! She offered to make me one as thanks. Haha. I said no, I was pleased just that she got some use out of the ingredients I was happy to share.

Sharon and I talked about some work stuff.

Crush Girl and I texted about some mundane stuff. It was fine.

If you build it, they won’t come

I can’t remember if I said this, but I’m going to be surprised if any of the major professional sports leagues besides the NBA actually gets to play real games this year. Ditto college athletics. There is simply no reponsible way to pull this off, with so many uncertainties and the news changing every day. I freaking love sports, and I’ve continued to consume sports commentary through the lockdown despite there being no sports. Yet I say with utter sincerity that I hope nobody gets on the field until next year. I think even the NBA is going to shut back down once it launches.

I do not want people dying for my amusement. Which is a bizarre thing for an NFL fan to say, since people have already died for my amusement, but this goes beyond calculated risk. This is reckless.

Kimes and Torre: They Mina business

Since there’s no actual sports to talk about, a popular topic lately has been people who talk about sports. Mina Kimes, a Korean American award-winning investigative business reporter (and Yale grad), has been a rising ESPN star for a few years. Last fall she added the ESPN Daily podcast to her work (her weekly NFL podcast is one of my favorites to listen to as I fall asleep at night). This week ESPN announced she’s going to be one of the analysts on NFL Live. I think some people would consider it a step down, but she’s such a football nerd that she’s realizing a dream here.

She’s not just going to be a female analyst on a daily TV show about football. She’s going to be an analyst, alongside some insightful if not exactly intellectual ex-NFL stars like Keyshawn Johnson and Dan Orlovsky. That she’s an Asian woman doing this means something.

ESPN announced at the same time that it gave Pablo Torre a new contract, making him an even wealthier Filipino American (Harvard grad) journalist and the new host of the ESPN Daily podcast. I am still disappointed to lose Mina’s daily excellence, but my disappointment is assuaged by Pablo’s taking her spot. He’s substituted for her at least once this year and he was great. He’s going to be greater as the regular host.

Seriously, I’d probably have unsubscribed to the podcast if any other likely candidate were named the new host. I might have stuck around for Sarah Spain (Cornell grad) or Randy Scott (Northwestern grad), but it would probably have been on a lets-try-and-see basis.

Howard Cosell (NYU grad, English and law) used to talk (incessantly, really) about what he called the sports broadcasting “jockocracy,” and since he was a lawyer he was sort of in a position to talk about it. I was ambivalent about Cosell as a broadcaster, but sports talk today isn’t what it used to be, and I think he might have done okay in today’s sports talk landscape. I mention him now because this new breed of commenters is a huge encouragement to me. I want to hear smart people with journalism and composition backgrounds talk about sports as much as I want to hear ex-jocks talk about sports. More, actually. By far.

It makes nothing but sense for media platforms to hire people from within the professional sports world to talk about and write about sports. The problem with that is the existing professional sports world is glaringly absent Asians. Not being part of the landscape in sports itself makes it harder for Asians to be part of the landscape in sports talk and sportswriting. So smart, talented people can be unintentionally iced out of the entire profession just because they’ve never been in it.

I can’t even think of who Mina and Pablo might have seen as their role models growing up, if they ever thought about being sports talk TV hosts. Who was there to let them think they might have a shot? There were a few ex-jocks with mixed Asian heritage who found their way into big local markets, like Ron Darling (his mom is Hawaiian-Chinese, and he was born in Hawaii) broadcasting for the Mets, but that’s not the same thing. What Mina and Pablo are doing is enormous.

Remind me tomorrow to say something about Al Sharpton.

And hit me up if you’re looking for some lockdown connection. Reach out here and I’ll be happy to connect via text, DM, or IM.

Looking forward Thursday to getting some progress on some long-idle stories for work and then diving into a self-indulgent weekend of reading, DVDs, and housecleaning.

There’s a chance some of this will repeat or even contradict what I wrote about Monday, because the days have blurred together and i’m not sure where one began and the previous ended.

I had a bowl of raisin bran and stumbled bedward. Got up in time for the (now twice-weekly instead of daily) department Zoom meeting. It went well. I did a few email and made lunch: the broccoli-kale-chicken rice with the rest of the canned corned beef hash and a couple of fried eggs. So bad. But you know the rest.

Went back to bed. Forced myself up in time for the national news and the second local newscast. Then back to bed but I’m not sure if I slept or not. Mostly lazed, I think? Around 11 in the evening I got up to have return some texts, and realizing I didn’t have anything I had to get done before work Wednesday, I had a me-evening. Ate tortilla chips in place of a real dinner, with fresh salsa, while watching the DVD of That Touch of Mink I queued up from Netflix after catching the last thirty minutes a couple of weeks ago. A week ago? Who knows?

It’s a silly movie but genuinely funny. Clever. I was surprised, and mostly enjoyed it, although at 100 minutes, it’s ten minutes longer than my attention span likes anymore.

Overdid it on tortilla chips. Feel a little sick now.

Cleaned up a little, brushed my teeth, goofed around on my phone, and now I’m writing this and hoping to get to sleep by 3:30.

It feels like there weren’t a lot of text messages, but evidence says otherwise. Sharon and I texted about some pretty heavy work stuff. Sylvia texted me from the office to ask about the flour and yeast I left her. Hoku, a former student from my favorite homeroom at Assets, sent me a funny sign he saw on social media (“Wet Piant”). Stacia from work answered my work-related text from the night before. The writing partner texted to tell me she submitted the two stories. Good news.

Crush Girl texted to ask how my day went. This led to a lot of conversation about various stuff. Probably the highlight of a rough day.

Didn’t go for a walk. Considered it, seriously, but opted for the movie instead.

And now is the time when all good men must come to the comfort of their beds. I need to try and get at least five good hours. My brain is oatmeal.

Send me a text or reach out here for contact info if you need some connection. We all need it; I’m convinced.

Ozzy Osbourne’s Ozzmosis (1995) is his worst, by far, of the solo albums up to this one. More about it later, but I think I’m on the seventh or eighth spin. Trying to be fair to it and see if it grows on me. I don’t hate it as much as midway through the first spin, but yeesh. Not Ozzy’s best Ozzy.

I’m (again) writing this much later than usual. Well past mid-day Tuesday.

Monday is almost lost to me. I got a few short hours of sleep, then got up to be available for edits to the proposal. I was in stand-by mode most of the day, although I did make several edits to the document early. Then it was waiting for others to read the document and send me their feedback.

They extended the deadline, sort of. Gave me a bunch of changes. I could have worked on them in the evening, but I was so wrung out I needed to rest. So I didn’t get to work until about midnight Monday night.

For reasons having nothing to do with the proposal itself but my network, I had a lot of problems — the sort where you have to redo work you’ve already done because things crash while you’re working on them. I seriously made some changes five times. Five! Ugh. Finally got it sent to the development officer at about 4:30. I had dinner, then got to work on the Monster.

I worked quickly, so my usual stuff got done in about an hour, fifteen or thirty minutes ahead of normal. I considered not doing it, giving myself the week off, but I couldn’t stand the thought of missing the opportunity to take another chunk out of it.

Didn’t get to bed because by the time I was done at about 6:30, I had an email with supposedly final edits.

But now we’re on Tuesday, and I’ll write about Tuesday later.

Breakfast Monday was the last of the angel hair kimchi leftovers. It wasn’t much, so I’m thinking I must have had something else but I can’t remember what it was. For lunch, I had a few hot dogs with sauerkraut, mustard, and ketchup. The buns I got were terrible. These pricey things that looked (from the labeling) like they weren’t baked to sit on a kitchen counter for two weeks like most supermarket bread is nowadays. They tasted fine; but they were supposedly sliced and they were not. When I sliced them myself, they mostly fell apart. I ate my hot dogs with a knife and fork.

Dinner at 4:30 in the morning was the kale-broccoli-chicken rice with some canned corned beef hash over it. So bad but so good.

Didn’t go for a walk.

It was my first work-related all-nighter since early last fall. Last Monday I was up working until well past sunrise as well, but at least I went to bed before getting up for work. Yesterday I basically worked all night Sunday and kept going through Monday until early Tuesday, then worked Tuesday without a break until about eight, when I did get a few hours’ sleep since I had vacation for the morning.

I’m not complaining about any of this. I’m happy to have a job. I like the work. It’s a challenge, and I feel myself getting better at it. These are all blessings.

Yet I am mentally and physically taxed to exhaustion, so after I finish typing this, I’m going to bed. With my boss’s blessing.

I texted Crush Girl to ask how her weekend was. We went back and forth for a few minutes. It was nice. Sharon sent me a link to an article about seniors who hang out at Zippy’s. Also nice. Jocelyn sent me some infuriating info about schools reopening in an area near her, the school board blatantly calling the shut-down all kinds of conspiracy theory things in its letter to parents.

There’s more but I can’t find it. This is the state my brain is in. So I’m ending here and going to bed. I hope you’ll reach out if connection has been elusive. It needn’t be, unless you need me in the next couple of hours, because I think I’m going be comatose.

It wasn’t the Sunday I hoped for, but it was the Sunday I expected.

Slept okay, despite getting up a couple of times. Both times I had texts from Ali in Boston and didn’t feel like waiting until I was up-up to respond. More Kindle talk. The second time I got up I still had a couple of hours before my alarm, but I felt awake, so I didn’t even try. Thought I’d sneak in an early afternoon nap before heading to the office.

Did the Sunday crossword (it destroyed me). Read the news. Listened to Meet the Press. Had breakfast. You know I had the lefttover angel hair because of course I did. Tried to get a nap, but something distracted me and by the time it was time for me to head to the office, I’d just been lying in bed for an hour, not napping.

Got to the office at three. It was blessedly empty, as I expected it to be. I got to work on this big-deal Maui proposal and it took freaking forever. Shoot. I knew the proposal itself was long, but I didn’t know it was LOOOOOOOOOOOOONG. Around nine I took a lunch break and walked to Zippy’s for a Korean chicken / chili mixed plate, bringing it back to the office to consume in the break room. Would rather have eaten at my desk while I worked the proposal, but we’re not allowed to eat at our desks, and I honor the rule except for the occasional non-messy, finger-food kinds of snacks, like chips or whatever. Dinner was quite good and I guess I needed the break.

I did some multi-tasking, so I got some personal things done too. I’m still putting CDs in storage but importing them into iTunes first if they’re not available on Spotify. I brought some with me, along with my personal laptop, and imported

• Out of Egypt by Painted Orange (1996)
• …Sane by Velocipede (1994)
• White Horse / Adam Again by Michael Omartian (1974 and 1977, a two-album CD)
• Fun, Fun Feeling by Lust Control (1991)
• Lie Down in the Grass by Charlie Peacock (1984)
• Brent Bourgeois by Brent Bourgeois (1990)
• Happy Hour by Dead Artist Syndrome (1995)
• I Rose Falling by Undercover (2002)

It’s kind of coincidence that these are all Christian artists. Certain kinds of CDs are likely to find themselves next to each other on my shelf, but also, albums by Christian musicians are likely to have been released on indie labels or Christian labels that don’t exist anymore, so rights for streaming might be ill-defined or difficult for artists to get back. There could have been six albums by Billy Joel or KC and the Sunshine Band amongst them on my shelf, but major label artists are far more likely to have their albums on the streaming platforms.

It’s a shame, really. The streaming platforms, social media, and crowdfunding platforms make it the best time in history to be an indie artist. It’s a disappointment all these great albums by great artists aren’t available for the musicians’ benefit, not to mention audiences’ enjoyment.

I wrapped up the first draft of the proposal and then finalized another, and was done at about 4 in the morning. Went through the McD’s drive-through in my hood for a late dinner. Egg McMuffin and Sausage McMuffin with Egg. Large Diet Coke with extra ice. Hash browns. I’m sated. And exhausted. It’s creeping up on six Monday morning, and I have to be available for revisions on that proposal because we’re hoping to get it to the donor Tuesday. Yikes.

Sunday connectivity. Ali and I traded some more texts about Kindle stuff. Suzanne and I exchanged one text each about the lychee she wants to give me and I wussed out on picking up from her. Jennifer sent me a photo of another pizza (with a modification suggested by me) and I just responded that it looks great. Gwen asked me if a meme she created refers to something most people should know, and of course it does. I don’t even know why she had to ask. I sent a Twitter link of a video of a family helping a young bear swimming in one of the Great Lakes to get a plastic jug off its head (it’s very cute). Actually it could have been any lake — I forgot that there are a million of them in that part of the country. Anyway, I sent that to a bunch of people.

AJ in San Diego, who works East Coast hours, responded first just to say “poor bear.”

Sylvia and I traded a bunch of texts arranging a yeast-and-flour handoff. We agreed I’d just leave it on my desk at work, and since she has some business there Monday, she can just grab it when she comes by.

Jocelyn and I chatted a bit in Hangouts. It’s her preferred way to message. She lives in Los Angeles, so I think about her almost all the time when I’m watching the news.

Aw geez. When I walked to and back from Zippy’s Sunday evening, my knee was really unhappy with me. Bleah. Argh. Yikes.

I have stuff to say about the two Ozzy albums I listened to Sunday, but it’ll have to wait. 6:05 now and I need to get a few hours of sleep.

I’d be pleased if when I get up, there are text messages from you if you need someone to connect with. I may not get back to you as faithfully as if you were Crush Girl, but come on. You’re not Crush Girl. I’ll return your texts eventually! No, but for real. I’ll do my best.