Blowin’ It

I’m not doing too well with getting back on the video training horse. I just don’t feel like it lately. I can’t let that persist, of course, but I’ve just been a bit rundown and exhausted of late. I don’t know exactly why.

I don’t have a good post for today either. I thought I had something niggling in the back of my mind, a Whensday post, but no…no, I’ve lost it. I can’t remember even what it might have been. I guess it wasn’t important.

So, I’ve been looking into podcasting instead. Don’t know why — I can’t stand the sound of my own voice, I don’t have anything interesting to say (as those of you who follow this blog for some reason can attest), and I don’t know the first thing about doing it. But like everything else, when I get curious, I pursue.

Ah, well. Today is another heavy reporting day at work. The kids and beloved spouse are off from school today so they can sleep in a bit. And it’s the middle of the week; the stretch toward the weekend begins.

Happy Humpday, y’all.

Weekend in Review

Friday, I got new contacts, if that matters to anyone but me. I wore ‘em as much as my bleeding eyeballs would tolerate. They do wonders on the vision correction side, which is pretty great, but they do funny things on my eyes – move around a bit, and seem to come off the eye a touch now and again. I don’t know if that’s normal or not, but I have an appointment again in two weeks and I’ll be sure to tell the optician I’m seeing about what I’m experiencing. Of course, I’m not interested in waiting another two weeks and going through the fun of a refit, but I’d like to have everything right. So I have to call today to see what’s up, what’s normal, what needs correcting…etc.

I managed to get Chapter Six of the WIP re-written, and will only take a quick peek to make sure it’s clean enough without much editing to go into the permanent file. I’m very excited about that, and was able to use a lot of what I’d already written. What I needed to rewrite wasn’t all that hard to do. I did it all over the weekend, most of that on Sunday.

Still, I’m having the worst time getting started on this thing and keeping it going. I don’t know why. I have no clue why. I have a lot of work left to do. I have to get this thing out to a few brave souls to read. I have to make some sort of cover to attract attention. I have to format it for e-publishing. And I have taken almost a year to get this far with it all. I hate that. I don’t want to be that slow.

I don’t like pressure at work, and right now I have a lot of it. I have six open projects and I’m late on all of them, and that stinks. Nevertheless, I’m learning a TON about this stuff, and I’ve even contemplated moving things to a new technology…like there’s time for that. Still, I’d rather not spend so much time learning to do something so I can implement it RIGHTNOW in this job. I’d like to get ahead of the bus before I get shoved under it, y’know? Ah, well.

I think most everything else is all right. I need to get this stuff with the contacts finalized, but that’s for another day, I suppose. And I’ll finish that book pretty soon. But, for now, I’m going to enjoy having relaxing time and marathon TV show weekends.

Oh, Congratulations to my buddy Onyx Nightengale, aka Courtney, and her husband Matthew. Wedding Day was Saturday, and we here wish them all joy and happiness in their union. We can’t wait for pictures, but that will probably have to wait until after the honeymoon.

What did you all do this weekend? Anything fun so I can live vicariously?

Weekend Blahs

Well, I had one boring weekend. I felt so run down and dragged out, I didn’t do much but sit around watching marathons on Netflix and checking my email and Google Reader occasionally. I couldn’t even get the kids to give me their Christmas lists. Yeah, it was a slow weekend ’round these parts. Nothing like product writing occurred at all this weekend, to be honest with you.

But I’m not apologetic about that, because the odds of my finishing this stupid thing before the end of the year are slim to none now anyway. Nevertheless, I feel terrible later about these things for some reason. The fact is,  I’ve had something on my mind from work and it’s bugging me. Still, the book’s not going to write itself. I have to force myself to do it, but that seems…forced.

The only other major problem I have is the uncomfortable chair I have at my desk. I can’t sit in it for long and that’s problematic for writing a novel. So there’s that, but that can’t be address for…some time.

And my sandwich hits seem to have run their course. I didn’t have anywhere near as many hits on Friday despite the use of the word “sandwich” in my post title. Ah, well. All good things, right?

How was your weekend?

-JDT-

Food Court: GUILTY

It’s been a long, long time since I’ve visited the mall. Matter of fact, I’ve never visited the one right here by our house, despite its proximity.

I’m not a mall person. Not anymore, at least. I was at one time, to be sure. I loved hanging out at the mall, walking around window shopping, spending an evening or a weekend day passing time and spending money as available. And I LOVED Christmas shopping at the mall. One of the things I looked forward to most about the season was the fun of mall shopping for gifts during the holidays.

A lot of things have changed about me since those days, though. My weight is one of them. My age is another. My energy level is a third. But the biggest change I’ve experienced since my last mall excursion is my patience and tolerance for people.

I have none now.

In my youth, I was fit and strong and imposing. Downright threatening, some said. I didn’t mean to be, but the way I carried myself and the way I looked. I think I had a grumpy face and big, muscular arms. I also trained in the martial arts and didn’t really feel threatened by much. Today?

Yeah, not so much anymore.

For one thing, EVERYONE looks bigger than me. And I feel CRUSHED by the masses of humanity. I swear the oxygen in the place is scarce because of the throngs. I couldn’t go three feet with out rubbing shoulders with another human, and that is NOT the kind of person I am. AT. ALL.

So, when we waited in the mall for our car to have its new shoes put on (which took a ridiculously, stupidly long time), I thought it might be nice to get my parched family a drink at the food court.

I knew the place was big. Knew that going in. But when I stepped out of the store and looked into the river of humanity crashing and rushing about ahead of us in the mall, I turned and just stared at my wife. My face said it all, I think.

We started down the corridor, passed and bumped and pushed and tried like hell to keep an eye on the kids. My son seemed to be enjoying himself and watched me out of one eye to keep up. My daughter’s tiny hand was crunched into the sweaty palm of my loving spouse. We paddled downstream and I made a crack about trying to find a place to get a drink, when I noticed this HUGE sign arching over the walkway saying “FARE”. And on each of the letters, which were in pastel colored circles, the edge said “Food Court”.

“Maybe we should look under this area marked ‘Food Court’,” I quipped. Ha! Aren’t I funny. “I mean, it’s probably a good place to start.”

“We can do that,” Fal said, and grinned.

We walked in, under those happy, welcoming letters. And you know what I saw?

I saw this place to our right, with a line about sixty yards long leading away from it. Then I saw more mall. Lots, and lots, and lots. I moved us to our left – it seemed the best of the available directions. We walked and walked and walked. My back screamed in protest. I got jostled and rumpled and ruffled and rattled. I kept swiveling my head to see where my son was. Finally I just grabbed his coat and held onto him. (He’s not old enough to be embarrassed by me yet.)

Fal finally stopped. “You know what?”

“What?” I puffed.

“I think I just want to go back and sit in the auto center waiting area. I need to rest my feet and my back. And I can live a little longer without a drink.”

I turned back toward the oncoming crush of human debris. “You sure?”

But she’d already started back the way we’d come.

There was no Food Court under that Food Court sign. Nowhere. Not anywhere.

I never got that soda pop either.

But hey – the car has new tires.

The next day, I felt as if I’d been beaten. I was tired all day, a  little achy, and sore-ish in my legs. My back b!tched all night about the work. That’s the farthest I’ve walked in a long time, I’m sure. But it still accentuates how much I need to get started exercising.

I also need to get out more so this isn’t so creepy to me. But that’s another topic for a different day.

-JDT-

Copyright 2011 DarcKnyt, All rights reserved

Freaky Friday

Well, we had some freakish events around here the last couple days.

• I might, MIGHT, have figured out what’s wrong with my back, completely by accident, without spending a nickel. That, if true, would, as the kids say nowadays, rock. I’ll let you know as time goes on whether my theory pans out or not.
• My loving wife took a horrible and frightening fall in the kitchen on a wet floor on Thursday. Panic, screams, lots of heart palpitations. She’s sore. No indication yet whether she needs to be looked at or not, but we don’t have any health insurance regardless, so … yeah. If you pray, pray for her. She’s sore but not in agony. Broke a couple of toe nails in the spill somehow too.
• Summer reared its ugly head for what will hopefully be the last time here on Thursday too. We sat tight in the air conditioning while the heat and humidity flamed outside. Ugh. Nearly ninety with high humidity. On the upside, there was a lot of wind during the day and last night, a lot of rain too. Today is supposed to be about twenty degrees cooler. (That’s Fahrenheit; for my friends using the metric system it was about 31 here yesterday and will be about ten degrees cooler today.)
• I watched a movie called “Suzanne’s Diary for Nicholas” with my wife over dinner last night. It’s based on a title of the same name by James Patterson, who also acted as executive producer. I’ve never read any of Patterson’s novels, and if it’s the SAME Patterson (who does crime thrillers, I thought), he ought NOT to venture outside his genre again. Ever. What a stinker.
• I didn’t get much Slurpin’ done needless to say. I decided to get all my procrastinating done and out of the way early, but it ended up taking up most of my day. Ah well. That’s what tomorrows are for.

So, any big plans for the weekend with you?

-JDT-