Early awake, insane writing, leftover lunch, long walk and two grocery trips, super88 and atlas market, kombucha batch, roommate catchup, simple rice dinner, schitt's creek, caught up [Sun 31]

 I write this at 11.55 of the same day, this is great, and I plan to have my shit together going forward. A little less sleep in the morning is fine, I'll get it covered over the rest of the day.

Got up at 8, napped a bit, listened to a bunch of podcasts.

Wrote a lot, and I mean a lot lot lot in the morning, so very proud of myself, it seems my mojo is back.

Took a nice long shower, heated water for kombucha and put in 24 teabags brewing for a couple of hours.

For lunch I took my roommates' potato rolls, a nice slice of American on one and a large chunk of salted butter on the other, and got them toasted. On the side, warmed my egg-bean curry with parmesan cheese. Put the curry inside the bread, and had the yummiest 'pav bhaji' of sorts. It was so filling, I didn't feel hungry for the following nine hours.

Packed my bag, got ready for the freezing cold winter day, and set out to the Atlas Market in Malden, it's a Middle Eastern Market. After walking for an hour, bought a jar of harissa, a large tahini, and a disappointing Turkish soda, thought of returning home. Discovered super88 was only 5 minutes away, dropped by the grocery store as well.

Spent a solid 45 minutes in the store, meant to get veggies and fruits, and also msg like I said in the previous post, but I completely forgot about it. Instead I got a jar of gochujang, a jar of sambal sauce, a jar of hot chilly sauce, a nice jar of furikake, a nice large packet of sorghum, the grain, some rice vinegar, and a KN95 mask, for my upcoming trip to Philly, to double up with my existing mask. The total bill was 25 bucks, which was slightly more than I was expecting for shit I didn't need, but no complaints, I haven't been to an Asian market in a really long time.

Got back home, unpacked everything. Caught up with roommate BB who was back from his weekend trip to ME. Bottled my batch of Kombucha in 15 minutes, using the optimized technique I talked about late last year. Only problem now is, I've been adding extra water to the jars since the big pot doesn't contain enough liquid to fill up the jars. Thinking if it might be worth it to work with two batches, or two pots. In any case, a new batch of kombucha should be ready in two weeks!

Caught up with BB and PK, watched the reminder of the second episode of the Tiger woods documentary. Had a simple rice and egg dinner, with a tonne of spics I brought today. Saw two episodes of Schitt's Creek, talked to roommate PK who had gone to AP's for the day. Called it a night to write six posts here, brushed, and been writing here since, with like a pause for meditation, glad I'm doing it again. Tomorrow's looking good, as long as I don't give myself too much benefit of doubt sleep-wise.

Actually, super 88 market is much better than I remembered: On Malden's Super88

 I went to the super88 asian Market in Malden earlier this evening. It was the first time I'd been to that place in a couple of years -- I'd been choosing to go to Chinatown over the place. I'd forgotten how large it was, and all the variety of food items they sold. The price is not that much more than Chinatown, but the options are so much greater, and the size of the entire place...it's massive. It's more comparable to the Lotte Market in VA than the tiny Chinatown stores.

It should have been expected, after all, there's obviously going to be more space, and for cheaper in a strip mall in Malden than in Chinatown. Still, for some reason I was under the impression that Chinatown stores would be more...authentic...cheaper...nicer. Realized today that wasn't necessary the case. The variety was impressive, they have items from so many different cultures, all kinds of grains and veggies, and oils and really anything you can think of was there. I didn't even have to search for anything, all I cared for was in front of my eyes.

Of course all the choices and options made me greedy, and I got 35 bucks worth of things I mostly didn't need at all. While missing the one item I DID need, the thing that I'd gone in for. I bought like various sauces and spice mixes, all of that, but forgot to get a packet of msg, which my roommates had asked me to bring the next time I went to the Asian market. The real reason was my hands were too full...I chose not to use a cart for some reason, and didn't feel like going to another aisle, in addition to completely blanking out on why I was there.

I also didn't get any veggies or fruits, things I have never missed from those markets. They taste amazing, and if you're strategic about what you're buying, cheaper than you can find anywhere else. But this evening, my backpack was small, time was limited and the hands were full, so they were ignored.

On the other hand, I saw all the seventeen different varieties, shapes and textures I'd heard you could buy for tofu, but never really paid attention to before today. Tofu sheets, tofu noodles, silken tofu, soft tofu, sliced tofu, spiced tofu, tofu fluff, everything they had. Meatwise they're also quite abundant but I don't look in those aisles anymore.

It's a pity the place is an hour away on foot each way, and it's not a particularly scenic walk either, or I'd go there a lot more often. Like Chinatown is at least an hour away on public transport, plus the cost and hassle of using trains and buses -- even ignoring the public health concerns. I've been feeling nausea in the trains as of late, yet another argument in favor of walking. And of course, healthwise, you couldn't do better than walk for two hours for groceries.

The Malden super 88 is quite good, I should go there more often.

10 things that are predicted to happen as covid ends

Who's doing the predicting? Me, mass media, and a bunch of other people. Whatever, don't ask me tough questions and go with the flow, stfu.

1. People will be marrying at a much faster rate.
   A year's worth of held marriages, plus the ones that would happen over 2021-22 anyway, plus the escalated timelines because people are realizing the world is not the safe predictable place they thought it was, and the couples that were forced into cohabitation thanks to the lockdowns etcetera, and I predict there's going to be a LOT of weddings this year. Which will further put pressure upon the remaining single population, and the rates are likely to go THRU THE ROOF.
   
   
2. People will be boinking at much increased rates
   We've talked about this in passing in a previous post. Much like the roaring 1920's, people will be out and about, dancing partying, getting together and bopping around, much more so than regularly. The lack of human contact, and the ability to be in close proximity to other people, plus the pressure of physical intimacy thanks to all the weddings happening will create a much joyous environment.
   
   
3. Online gaming will see increased participation, even after covid is over
   Covid has created new gamers out of hundreds of millions of people, and they're not going to back down from their regular sessions. Gaming culture will become normal, and it'll be as big part of the pop culture as television or movies are.
   
   
4. People will go back to restaurants and bars with great vigor
   Food delivery won't be able to maintain its current rates as people realize the aura and service of restaurants is quite nice, and cities are actually great. People will eat out a lot more than they have ever done, and drinks will become fancy, experimental, and also wild. It'll be the introduction of a new era in music and partying.
   
   
5. Cities will thrive
   This goes against logic, as people are actually fleeing the city centers right now. In very short months people will realize that actually the pandemic made an argument in favor of the cities: if a global pandemic that took millions of lives couldn't create a long-term disruption in the urban life, nothing is ever going to do it. Besides, the suburbs are lame to isolate and quarantine, and the great thing about being a human being is other people. While the rents in cities may fall, this will lead to the middle class just blossoming, the richie riches having abandoned it, and again a new culture of innovation and social progressiveness will thrive.
    
6. Pets will become more common
    This is already happening everywhere as lonely quarantiners and people in isolation have been adopting pets in large numbers. This trend will only grow as people realize that to connect with other beings means to connect with other animals as well as other people.
   
   
7. Alternative family structures will gain greater foothold
   The market will get tighter, childrearing possibly more expensive, jobs more difficult. As a result, people will realize stable relationships involving more than two fully-employed people make more sense, to start a household as well as for childrearing. Three-income households will eat the smaller households' lunch, which will put more pressure towards similar structures.
   
   
8. Remote working will become more accepted, but physical working will be more appreciated
   The current trend of remote working won't disappear obviously since people have realized the benefits. However, since people want to be around others, particularly young people, and have a reason to talk to and make new friends, cities will become hubs to attract young people, like always. A physical workplace to work with coworkers, nice work bar, etcetera will come to be seen as a benefit. Workplaces without physical workplaces will be deemed cheap and not serious.
   
   
9. Dating apps will see a great fall in the number of users
   Desperately desiring human contact, increasingly large number of young people will choose to go offline. They will get out of social media, or the internet entirely, as much as possible, and most definitely prefer irl meeting and dating over the online version. Various organizations and tools will exist to connect people looking for partners, offline-only. People will connect over voice or in-person, instead of texting or videochatting.
   
   
10. People will be more conscious of environmental and public health issues
    Obvious thing is obvious. TO avoid a similar situation going forward, people might decide to keep around masks, or their hygiene habits for the long-term. Global climate change, and other issues will be given higher priority, and much larger investments will be made towards research in pandemics and epidemics, and ways to control them. Medical research will make great progress.
    

Yet another productive year wordcount-wise

 As one might imagine, this is a shameless attempt to fill in the wordcount so I can get to the 124 wordcount for this month without having to backdate, fair and square. It's not cheating if I'm doing something shitty I've always done.

This month was comically lame and unproductive in terms of my fiction writing, or motivation, writing of any kind really. I should have known better, planned better, got my shit together quicker, but that's not how it worked out. Alas. But still, here we are, right on time, only three more posts to go after this, two requiring some level of brainpower. The wordcount goal is all over the place, but that's not the major concern, this is a celebratory post.

This is going to be the 121st post of the year 2021. Which means that this year has already been productive in terms of counts of posts than every other year except 2010 (and the past two years, when my bout of productivity started, they obviously don't count). What that means is, even if something happened and I stopped writing the instance after finishing this, it's decently respectable, productivity-wise.

The goal is not the wordcount, or the psotcount obviously, they're terrible measures of productivity. But one's got to start somewhere, and the regularity by which one posts or writes could be taken as a proxy for how motivated and driven I've been feeling, and this month shows that...while I haven't be motivated and focused in the traditional sense, my habit of writing does eventually make it through. I cannot go without writing for two or three days, I've internalized that I have to write, it's become a part of my life now. The last month also saw me lag on the daily writing thing, but one can blame various reasons, there's no doubt in my mind I'll be back at it starting tomorrow.

Let's go back to the big picture. Two years ago, I'd never have thought I"d be able to keep at something for so long. And get caught back up after giving up for a month in between, and for several weeks due to the pandemic. And sometimes skip weeks almost, because of one reason or another. So in terms of grit, I'm proud.

Discipline, in terms of doing the same thing in a timetable everyday and sticking to it, hasn't been where I need it to be. Meditation needs to be taken more seriously, be a higher priority, just as writing is right now. It shouldn't come off as a burden, but a part of my life, to become a better person, to be more at one with myself, aware of the physical reality.

Need to be more in touch with the worldly things, be mindful of my surroundings, than live in the imaginary illusions of my mind's creation. Feel the feelings, smell the smells, see the things there are to see, just live, out large, unafraid, uncaring, a freed man at last. Need to get out of the mind's prison. Idk what it is, we'll see.

It's time to freak out, see the previous post. Jeeez.

What when the pandemic ends?

 Oh shit.

The pandemic is going to end sooner or later at this rate, and I'm not prepared for this. I'm not prepared with my life, in terms of getting it in order, not prepared in terms of long-term planning towards where I want to be in the medium to long term and how I want to get there. Most definitely not prepared in if and when and whom I want to be with, people-wise. Or where I want to be, the city or the suburb, or the country life, east coast or west coast, or somewhere just out in the wild.

I'm not prepared in terms of closing out my hobbies and catching up new ones. Not prepared with my creative outputs, organizing them, and planning to produce something for common public consumption. Most definitely not prepared...and this is a big one, which will come fast and swift and it's going to be a little shocking and surprising every time it happens but of course there's only one way to go... for my close or not so close friends and acquaintances and well-wishers to get married or make long term partnership decisions, and move to boring places and have babies and plan for the next twenty years. I'm not prepared for what lies ahead.

The pandemic came at a point when I was in a middle of a pretty big transition, I said in late 2019 that 2020 would be MY year, a year of change and growth, a year where I take myself where I need to be, take destiny in my hands finally. And I did...for the first two months or so until everything happened and I went back into my cocoon so very afraid, unprepared to just take in the background pressure of life in addition to the overwhelming stresses of the pandemic. As the obvious stress of the pandemic became more normalized, the other issues sort of faded away, lets wait for the pandemic to end, I thought, lets wait this out, who knows how long it will last and it'll be a stupid idea to make solid decisions while this is still with us.

Well now it's looking like things are going to be normal, more or less, in the next half year. There will be safety considerations obviously, but we won't have to put our lives to pause. In fact, a lot of lives might experience a 'speedrun', because people are so freaked out by the unpredictability of the universe and human existence, they will try to 'counterbalance' it with stable reasonable institutions like marriage, having babies, and doing stable boring things, think about the long term. Even if they would otherwise not be working towards that. Which sucks because I'll be reducing my age by a year at least, and they'll have gone through more than one year of psychological age in the same period, so my compadres of the same age will be ahead of me by at least two years. Minimum. More in terms of what they will have achieved and how they will have positioned themselves.

I'm woefully, scarily, disappointingly under-prepared. If life is a battle, I'm shaving my eyebrows to get rid of the unibrow while the rest of my platoon is sharpening their arrows, ready to charge at the enemy. And I'm not ready to put on my armor because...that's not where I want to be. Right now. And also the armors have all been taken up and the one armor that I do think is cute is kinda' thinking of going somewhere and also it's unclear what's happening, nobody knows, I'm not freaking out yet. But I might be freaking out over the next one year, so be warned.

Lets hope this doesn't crash and burn.

The vaccine

 The talk of the goddamn pandemic has died down in this blog in recent months. Because it's become such an inseparable part of our daily life there's nothing to talk about it. We're not meeting friends, we're not eating out, not partying, not going to work, travel's stopped. Life has paused, even when there are a large number of rulebreakers, the truth is that we are all mostly doing our part because we don't want the disease to take our sense of smell and taste forever. Besides, dining-in is mostly banned, and poorly looked down upon, and people are afraid that if you ask them to go out to eat, you might be testing their resolve etcetera. So these have been quiet months, and the pandemic isn't mentioned because it's such a looming part of our lives.

But! This is the good news now! The talk of it might be increasing in these pages in the near future. Because there's vaccines coming in. At least half-dozen people I know have had their first shot of the disease, about a similar number have gotten both the shots. And the vaccines are coming closer now. They're saying if things work out well, we might be getting vaccine by late April, May, for the regular healthy young adult crowd as well.

And it's not just here, India's apparently been sending them out to Nepal, my parents and grandparents have a good shot at getting those shots in the next three months. Sure, it is not advisable to be out and about immediately after taking it, and we should be careful to wait out the potential variants and mutants that might be resistant to the vaccines, but we're going to have a decent late-summer and Fall finally. This global disaster, the nightmare we have lived through is going to be over, finally. Hopefully.

That's one thing to look forward to in these otherwise dark times.

Friend sbk's father is planning to get the shot in the next month or so, and then another month of waiting, plus some time for making sure there's no problematic side-effects, and they're thinking of bailing out from this company in a matter of two or three months. A bit funny because his original plan was to be out last March -- he even put on a bet with roommate Pk for a lot of money -- but the pandemic delayed things by a little bit. A year exactly. Of course the money's not going to be changing hands.

In any case, the other side of the pandemic, the vaccine and the speeding up -- or perhaps slowing down -- of life and events is that people are getting married, forrealz. Sk for example, is on track to hitch the knot in a few short months,  a scary-sounding prospect for me because none of my friends have made the journey yet. Well...not officially, in terms of the cultural social aspect yet. For everybody I know and care about, it's the next obvious step after being in a relationship and moving together, not just necessarily for the ease of immigration documents for all the sides.

So the vaccine is coming, it's coming soon, and I'm getting nervous, because I may reduce a year from my age for the lost year, but it appears that the rest of the world is moving on. What fools. FOOLS!

Sound sleep, cold weather, buckwheat pancake discovery, hibernation mode, talk with N, more sleep, no writing and meditation [Sat 30]

 I write this the day after, and there's only six more posts for me to complete this month, it's the last day, which means I've got to 'cover' only two posts, what an achievement it has been, it's hard work but I've made it. An hour and half of concentrated writing, and we'll be done! This is the opposite of what I wanted to be doing this year and the first month of the year, but when you all have is lemons, you cannot work towards making a cheesecake. We shall enjoy and cherish the lemonade!

So I got up at 6am, and thought about getting up, caught up with a few friends, texted a bunch of people. Hoped that my sleep schedule had magically fixed itself and that I as up for good. Decided to take a nap for a while...and got up again at 10. Talked to family and got caught up on everything happening back in the old country.

Took like two hours to make lunch, of buckwheat pancakes. The trick is to make the batter thin and flowy, so all of it is cooked, the heat quite low so there's no aggressive air bubbles, and the pancakes quite small so there's no 'fracturing' like parched land. It takes forever, so it's a better idea to cook in a large griddle or pan or whatever, instead of the regular cooking utensils, I discovered.

Had the pancake with the tomato-bean based veggies, and yummm! That was the exact situation I'd imagined in my head. Everything is preserved, nothing is unseasonable and unexpected. The garlics I could grow, I could eat this meal every day for years, and it would be quite possible as well since it was all made of canned goods. A perfect pandemic preserved food, maybe not super duper healthy in terms of...idk, freshness, but I'm a big fan.

Watched The Crown after lunch with PK and ND, puttered around a bunch, maybe did I meditate, question mark? Sat down to write, get at least a day's worth of writing done, couldn't. Called couple of friends, including I and N, in Philly, had conversations at length. Thought about leaving the house, then saw how cold and miserable ND was after coming back from work, decided against it. Napped for a while. Got up in the evening, had lots of water and related items, talked to ND and PK, and napped again. Got up, couldn't go back to sleep until like 3am, which was fine because I'd had enough sleep.

Came to a realization about sleep and drive and meditation and writing and motivation. That it's all inside me, I can make all sorts of excuses, about sleep, about chemicals, about hormones, depression, sadness, weather and what not, but these variables are in play for everybody. To put myself out there, I need to make myself different, and that's in the ability to succeed despite the poor hand I've given to play, not because of my ability to complain. There's no way about it. There's only do or do not, there's no trying. I mean half-assing is doing it too so.

The point is, I need to be living by the checklists, and be more serious about daily writing and meditation. I cannot be counting on myself to be writing like dozens of posts every couple of days, and consider myself to be an accomplished journal-keeper that way.

Leftover lunch, slow but planning work day, cold weather, hang with the gang, no writes and meditation [Fri 29]

 I write this on the afternoon of the Sunday the 31st, so much motivation today, must be because of all the sleep I've had, and the guilt of not having written in a long while. Sleep has been on-and-off, whatever, but the motivation is back so glad about that. Even the shitty weather cannot take me down now.

But this is about the Friday, the day before yesterday. I got up super duper late, because I had trouble going to sleep. The truth is I didn't want to go to sleep at all, since there was some napping done or something on thursday, and since the weekend was coming up so close, I figured I'd spent my nights just chilling and what not. And so I kept playing games, talking to my international friends, and just extending the length of the wakeup. It was so ridiculous. Just before I went to bed, since I was so tired and my body really wanted me to sleep I thought of writing poems of the loving kind for a few people I care about, and see how that goes. Sent a message to somebody about if they cared about those, and they said yes, which was a little unexpected, this whole talking to people, flirting with them, if you can call it that is a bit strange, uncomfortable, so much uncertainty sometimes it feels like I'm an alien trying to figure out how humans work and then realize that's not true at all actually I know how to deal with people quite well in general, it's just that I'm a lazy fuck and to give myself lots of benefit of doubt sometimes I say things that'll make people think I'm like pathologically disadvantaged, which is shitty I guess, but as long as I'm ahead, whatevs.

In any case, the whole day Friday I spent on my bed, laptop on my laptop, talking to people, chatting, strategizing, but not actually coding or working on anything. It's important to strategize also since you don't know how your exiting approach will deal with the future changes in your platform. So thought a bunch and came up with a decent strategy. But didn't leave my bed for the entire goddamn day, it felt so good ohh man.

For lunch I had the leftover quinoa from the evening before, and the vegetable sauce. Still have it hanging around until now on Sunday, it'll be done soon, and then I gotta make something again, alas.

The rest of the day went by pretty quick. napped for maybe two hours after work ended because it was so cold and my body was tired due to lack of proper sleep. Brushed and was planning to go  back o sleep again, when roomies let me know SRP and JS were coming over, ND was around as always, BB had gone to Maine on Thursday.

JS and PK, and SRP had the food they got from Man-O-Salwa, first-time for PK, they really devoured it, discovered the amazing food of the place, oh man I missed it a little bit. I skipped dinner and had nuts and cookies etcetera instead. Because I didn't feel like making anything or cooking stuff. SRP made a lot of alright jokes that I thought were funnier than they were because I took some gigglies as well, didn't feel it though because it was the weaker kind, but really relaxed, body was ready to go to sleep.

Didn't do meditation the entire day, save for a short period in the evening, and didn't write anything either.

Went to sleep at 1 in the morning. Slept pretty soundly. Got up at 10am the next morning, which was amazing.

Beans and lentils in tomato sauce, is actually a well-tested solid base apparently

 Okay so I got distracted during my wild writing thing situation, and ended up watchin g thirty minutes with the paul rudd's hot ones video. What a goddamn standup down-to-earth reasonable decent guy that man is, ehh. Conan o brien also needs to interview Aisling Bea, because irish connection, paul rudd connection, and Aisling's really been going places doing things, she's made it out, broken through she deserves it. Any day now though I bet.

This is about something I discovered out of laziness over the last year, also thanks to the pandemic and the refusal to go to grocery stores due to health concerns, but now it's become a part of my regular rotation of things I make. It's easy to make, goes with a bunch of other carbs, and quite hard to get wrong. Plus so very healthy, and extensible to accommodate other ingredients.

What we're talking about is the 'bean chilli' or 'chickpeas in pasta' sauce, situation. You basically take a can of tomato sauce or tomatoes, and put them in the pan, with a large sauteed onion, lots of garlic, olive oil, and ginger if you wish. Let it cook for half an hour, maybe fourty five minutes closed, and then open up the lid slightly to get the air out and have the sauce thicken up. Once it's the desired consistency, add a can...or two...of beans, chickpeas, black beans, white beans, whatever your heart desires, and a couple of boiled eggs. That's it.

To make it fancier, you can add grated cheese before warming, so the cheese melts in and gives this amazing texture. Or instead of -- perhaps in addition to, if you so desire -- the chickpeas, you can also put in lentils, of any kind. Red lentils, for example, they cook in really easily, softening up takes maybe twenty minutes of boiling, you add it to the tomato sauce and you have a thick gravy texture, add a couple of beans, some tofu and what not, and you have an amazing sauce that will go with literally anything. The texture gives it some 'heft', all the beans and lentils add proteins and healthy carbs, the ghee butter and olive oil you've surely used throughout the process make it hella healthy and filling. You do need lots of garlic and onions, possibly other fresh herbs and addons because they add the complexity and flavor, the onions add great texture to the dish, without which it sorta' becomes gloomy unidentifiable mess.

The other great thing about this is, you can put in all the effort in the world you want to, or none at all. So you could be making chickpeas and beans and lentils from scratch, or you could use canned everything, just wash all the items, heat up the tomato puree and dump it in there, the puree which you could also be making yourself, or buying off the can. I've been using all canned stuff, because I don't have the time and energy to do everything for scratch, it doesn't add much flavor or texture to make it all by yourself, but if you've got the inclination to go that way, go for it!

To be or not to be, that's the question: people being with people

The other day we were doing a 'clip show' of sorts of the last several years in Boston and Nepal of ours lives, together and separately. But specially all the experiences we've had in our current place

Roommate PK brought up the story of one of the people we hung out with A, and our other friend S, who used to be regular guests in these lands in the days of the yore, the time before the pandemic. They were going out for sometime, and always showed up together, all was fine hunkydory. Roommate PK related to us the story of how they might have first met, and the interactions of the first few meetings.

They were invited independently it seems, they didn't know each other despite sharing the same workplace. Or maybe they'd just found each other. But they got an opportunity to talk and know the other at our place, in the large parties roommate SM was organizing. People played cards, got drunk, high, talked loudly, ate so much, crashed at night, that sorta stuff.

In any case, that evening of cardplaying, A was apparently being super friendly in terms of helping S play her hands, basically guide her from her...back...And telling her what a wonderful game she was playing, patting her, etcetera, and giving her cards, and exchanging money, all the time, which was apparently super confusing for a lot of parties involved including S because everybody else thought they must have had something going on or he wouldn't be so...aggro... but apparently...there was nothing happening, they were just talking etcetera, and it was all kinda' unexpected. To conclude though, they worked for the same place, had the same extended circles of sorts, and ended up together pretty quick.

So lets ask ourselves, how much is too much, and when do you call people off, what's a creep, must one be so...out there to be with persons of one's interest, or are the creeps far and few in-between, and they're the ones talked about because of their extraordinary approach to other people. Perhaps we relate this incident in this occasion because it worked, the dozens of times it might not have worked nobody talks about because they're just shouted or slapped away, and nobody mentions it because such things happen too easily. In this particular example, what if S hadn't ended up with A at all, we wouldn't be talking about this, it would be a case of a person getting too drunk for their own good, misreading the situation, and learning later of the consequences. So perhaps being a total creep is not the best approach. Obviously.

Where does the limit lie then, one wonders, because clearly liking people from far away, never letting them know of your feelings, hoping the universe eventually conspires to get things right but again never actually taking an action towards that, is not the ideal example either. Because that would be extraordinarily stupid. And it hasn't worked for many a man. What's the in-between situation, one wonders, maybe it's kindly and respectfully letting someone know ohh by the way I like you, and in a romantic slash sexual way, and by the way here's a buttload of poems, of the sexy-romatic type I wrote for you, ohh you like them and you think that maybe we should meet up soon, huuuh I wonder if that means you're like a really good fan of poetry in general, because it would be quite stupid to misread situations, and obviously one wouldn't be the sort to do that, just to avoid being the butt end of the conversations like the one mentioned above.

As it happens, one's going to end as a butt-end of rude jokes either way, it's better to give the other person a benefit of doubt, and still have control of destiny, than just sit around and hope for the best. Ask out, and ask often, and cull your relationships mercilessly. People and relationships that only cause pain and suffering are worth nobody's time, even though in the future they might amount to something better. Don't count your unhatched eggs, instead put the eggs you do have, in the incubator. Ohhh boi.

Yes, I hibernated for two days, but gimme a break it was really cold

This has been a topic that's been covered in great detail in the past. I've been the butt of many a joke in this regard, and this is one of those things I consider to be my umm what's that, a chink in my armor perhaps?

It's about napping a lot and sleeping during the cold scary evil dark days of the winter, when there's not much to do, the weather's so cold outside of course you're not going, your friends are not going to come to your place either because nope nope nope not going out in the winter, that's what they're thinking as well, and the work's over, it was so slow anyway because the winter mood has caught up with everybody and you had a bellyful of rice, so what are you supposed to do now? Struggle in the cold and waste your time on some stupid meme website, or watch netflix as your head hurt, or do you give in and sleep because it feels so much warmer, so much nicer?

The next thing you know, you're up after seven hours, for a cup of water and to use the loo, you tell yourself you're up for good now, just gonna take a five minute nap and be out and about, oooh this blanket is so warm and comfy you never noticed that, wow this is amazing, and slowly very slowly at first your eyes shut down, you settle down into the contour of your bed, your breathing eases, you're aware but only barely, not any more than 30 minutes you tell yourself.

And then it's eight hours later, and you've been sleeping for the last fifteen hours you take a nice warm shower, you tell all the sleeping is done for you don't want to waste anymore time doing that, alright, but deep inside you, that's what your body wants, to sleep more, to be in that comfortable blanket and just..doze off. You resist, you must resist, but how long can you hold on for, realistically.

The last two years were kinda' my first serious pushbacks against this and they went pretty well all things considered, I barely slept like really wildly. This year's been pretty amazing, the worst thing that happened to me earlier this month was a lack of sleep, now I've been sleeping soundly until the late hours of the morning, but not at any other time.

This weekend has been touch because it's soso so cold outside, taking a walk when it is -12 makes no sense unless my goal is to, maybe prepare for the arctic walkathon. And yes, discipline, order all of it matters, but so does the physical reality, and the reality is that cold is so bad for the human body, when your head hurts like hell, it's a way of your body letting you know that whatever you're doing you need to stop, and get back to regular scheduled programming because listen here body, this is not good, alright, I won't tell you why exactly because maybe I don't know it either, but I'm not liking this, so you listen to me or I can't take the responsibility of whatever bad thing might happen.

But now that I've had many many hours of sound sleep, my motivation appears to be back, I've been writing nonstop for the last two hours, and it appears two more hours of writing are needed and I'm not afraid at all, bring it on world, lets see how you can get me, is what I'm thinking. Maybe this was all for the better, my body's attempt at resetting all the negative energy that's built up over the last month.

I slept a lot, which was great, I intend to not do that now.

The days of killer cold are here, sigh

 It is not proper form to write sigh into words, you're supposed to show the reader the sighs are happening between the words instead of like literally writing it out aloud, if I may, but there's nothing better to do.

The days have been rough, the four or five days of the past. My walks have come to a halt. And for good reason. The temperatures have been between negative sixteen Celsius to negative negative six, at the highest. Today we're going to go as high up as negative six, and it'll be one of the warmer days. It's been snowing on and off for the past week, and in more recent days the snowing has stopped as well because it's so cold the air can literally not carry any precipitation up to the clouds and fall down as rain, it'll just freeze on the ground or the sea.

It's so cold, even with the heater running always and a blanket, you can still feel the cold, you can see clouds of mist coming out from windows and chimneys...it's not smoke, it's just exhaled humidity coming out of people's mouths that's being frozen into white light particles instantly once it touches the outside air. If you took a bucket of boiling water and splashed it outside, it would turn into a fine mist of snow in an instant. That's how terribly cold and pathetic it is.

We were supposed to be getting some snow, up to two feet according to roommate PK, Monday and Tuesday, I was looking forward to that. Because at least with snow outside you have a justification of not going out on walks, not leaving your apartment for days, the streets are unploughed slippery and dangerous. Not so it appears, apparently the snow will turn into water late in the day, and there might be some sticky snow, but that's all there will be.

The good news is that the days are longer, there's sun until 5 in the evening, and by the time one wakes up in the morning it's alright quite bright outside. So the dark days of gloom are not an issue. It's just that...one almost hopes, desires the cloudy dark days because at least they were warmer, with the lack of cloud the Earth loses the blanket that stops heat from escaping and we are stuck in the frigid wintery wasteland of Boston.

And despite all of this, despite everything, it could still be tolerable, if...If...the winds were more friendly. IF the windchill was on your side, if it was still, a tight fluffy jacket layered with something else and a nice cap on the head would protect you from the cruel world outside. But no, with the cold comes the biting cruel wind that hurts your head, numbs your nose, freezes your eyelashes and gets this 'throb' in your head, as if it's so cold inside, your brain wants to explode. The chill deep in the bones is there, as always, only an hour or two sitting in the warm will fully thaw you into normalcy.

The Norwegians say there's no bad weather, only bad clothing, apparently. How are you supposed to dress yourself up for this brutal windy weather, without turning into a giant ball of immobile puff?

There's going to be more content on this, stay tuned.

Yes, I'm complaining about masturbation jokes, yes this is a shade

 Sure, I'll giggle and laugh at your masturbation jokes the first few times. You'll say you know you know I'm just trying to be funny, the trouser I was dumping by manjuice on during my teens was obviously not so crusty as to stand up on two legs, I mean yeah it did sorta bounce when I threw it around but nobody was wiser in anyway, it was just jokes and young people crap, it's all a joke, etcetera.

But really, I'm not happy about it, I'd rather not know your journey into teenagehood and adult years, the course of self-discovery, your innovation in optimizing how you could get there the quickest, the socializing you had had with your friends that was around it, and what a horny mofo you were in your teens. Again, I don't want to know about all the places you masturbated, and the risky times you almost got caught, and how oh so funny, maybe the servant boy sleeping in the same room was probably masturbating in the same trouser of a cumrag you used, that could almost be reanimated.

Call me old fashioned, call me names, tell me I'm being so prissy, as somebody who went to a boarding school surely I must have heard or seen or done worse. And the answer is no, I didn't care for it, sex and religion are two things that must stay within people's bedrooms, even if they're so disgusting that the other person might giggle because the tale is so strange and awkward and they're kinda' high, this would not be a good material for a standup comedy.

And the reason is this. It is literally everybody's story. Which would be good under normal situation because that'd mean they'd identify, but no it just means people think of their embarrassing times, the occasions they've been inconsiderate jerks, the troubles they must have caused to the adults then, and it comes rushing in because they're the adults now and very soon in the foreseeable future they're going to be the adults who'll have to deal with their progeny's cum-soaked, crusty trousers, and that'll just break their hearts. How time flies, they'll realize, the future is uncertain, the roles are now reversed now, and they'd rather be the young innocent fool than burdened with the harsh truth of reality. And they can't maintain their innocence because of the incessant jokes about it. Alas.

Yes, I'm quite old fashioned that way.

Sex jokes are funnier than teenage masturbation jokes. Sex is a shared experience, happens when people are more or less on the precipice of being fully cooked, there's so much more agency and awareness, people are more comfortable with their bodies, and know what they want. The foibles during sex are human foibles, they reveal our insecurities and uncertainties, and make light of those. Teenage masturbation jokes are about immature humans doing stupid things, unaware of any of it, and trudging along in their belief that their secrets are safe. We can make fun of the stupidity and crassness yes, but it's not comedy, it's the tragedy of sexual repression, the unwillingness to have honest conversations about our bodies and sex and masturbation. They're a reflection of the societies we come from. And it's an ugly look, I'd rather not see.

So yeah I've been writing teeheehee poems lately tehehe

 As you, and by you I mean nobody because this January month was brutal, nobody to read, nobody wanting to write and good riddance it is over, because now we can all focus on things we really want, which is peace and crap, things like that, basically getting shit done, anyway, as you noticed, dear reader, I've been posting poems of the loverly kind in here lately. Just two, and two more are in works, to send to somebody specific or as generally in one's backpocket it doesn't matter too much, but I've been writing them, after feeling inspired. Wish one could say the same about writing here ahahaha.

In any case, I sent 'em to a couple of friends for guidance and consulting, ye gods could I make this sound any more unsexy and unromantic I'm disgusted by the language I'm using already, and one absolutely gushed over and thought it was incredible, the other one said ooh yeah yaayy it's great, who'd you like write it for and I told her it was none of her beeswax so can you please help me edit it and make it better. And she jumped, jumped at the opportunity, oooh yeah I've been wanting to tell you this could be so much better, you should make a few changes here and there. And I asked her to do them for me, she said she wasn't free for the next two days, but I should set up a google doc and remind her. Which was very generous for her, because I'd have lazed out and said it didn't need editing, it was the best, etcetera.

The good thing is that she used to edit poems for money and class credits, and was a legit poetry editor, so there's a qualified person who knows what they're doing helping me out. On the other hand, I'm the sorta' dorky loser who brings in a semi-pro or even a professional to edit their love poems. Kinda' gross.

The posted poems haven't been edited by the pro, we'll see how agreeable I'm to the the changes, and we're going to be working from there. Possibly, I'll be posting both the versions.

Are people impressed by poems these days? Does that makes one's heart tingle, or when one says wow that's really sweet, no no I really liked it, the face with hearts for eyes emoji, does that mean they're being polite and not really into it or into you for that matter, or maybe they are but there's nothing more to say because what is it that you really want, and there's not too many places your interpersonal situation can go with the pandemic and the physicality and the world around you, jobs and the fact that at least one party involved may or may not have other close intimate relationships going on, which is not a problem for at least for one other party involved because it is none of the beeswax, nobody should be worried about or be micromanaging anybody else's personal life. And I'm not a skeevy trashbag obviously, nobody is, we're all little children stumbling around, trying to figure out what's right and what wrong. We'll find peace, we'll find happiness, and company with people we care for dearly eventually, the journey could be longer for some compared to others.

Tis' will end well!

Hurricane busybee

I have fallen
into the whirlpool
of You,
and I never
learned
To swim.

I fear the
Skeletons I may find
and the sharp things
that'll come hurtling from behind
All swept up
in company of me
dragged in by the
Hurricane busybee

And when the storm ends
One wonders what remains
Oh but I'll be fine, you say,
whatever destruction there may lay
the clouds will fall apart
the Sun will shine,
and we'll all get up to a brand new day

Oh but as the wildfires birth new trees,
as only after a storm does a desert green,
as new shoots compete and thrive
over the charred remains of dead wood,
the flowers of feelings will bloom
bright,
The brightest the ones that can rhyme right(?)
It won't be just a brand new day
It'll be a brand new world,
Brighter and sweet-smelling than ever
In a hurricane
You can drown or you can thrive
And the flower that's the best, that'll be me
Inside by the whirlwinds of
Hurricane
Busybee.

It's not like I am IN LOVE with you...

You don't
live
in my heart.

You wish.

It's just that,
there's an
empty space,
in there,
quite large,
deep in my heart,
which I think
is
so clearly
meant to be
filled with
Sweet.
Memories.
With.
You.

You know?

Lazy podcasty morning, I organize and present at meetings, lost lunch, hidden evening during house cleaning, socializing with ND and PK, Quinoa dinner, hindi movie, hopes of a better future [Thu 28]

 It is 11.52 of the same day, the thursday of the 28th as I write this. I've gone through the whole gamut of emotions productivity-wise today. Earlier in the day I was wondering if I should completely abandon writing or doing anything that makes me happy or gives me long-term joy and go back to the ways of the lazy slacker, who does whatever they want, and not really motivated by anything. Not that there's anything wrong with it, or I'd be judgmental about it, it's just there's no excuse for that anymore now, you know. On evenings I smoke the gigglies at least I can tell myself oohh it's because of that, I'm feeling this and it's just hangover, whatever it's fine I'll cover up during the weekend when I'm sober. But I'm sober now. There's no excuse, which puts one in a tighter spot.

So I've been writing for an hour and a half at this point, if I do two more posts, I'll be only two behind the regular posting schedule, this is something I promised to stop doing last year, but then this year's been the worst in terms of motivation to write and succeed as a writer of any kind, so one must give sufficient benefit of doubt to oneself. In any case, something to consider is to half-ass things throughout the day. Sure I've been halfassing quite well in the night, but I should really half ass in the morning too instead of not assing at all. Why not, the time of the day shouldn't matter.

So before that we were watching Phir Hera Pheri during and after dinner, with PK and ND. Roommate BB has gone to Maine early this week. So funny movie. Before that I was cooking quinoa, which I screwed and it came off as sticky and sorta not fluffy, which is in great contrast to the last time, I'm thinking I put in too much water and moved it too much. It appears the best strategy is to let it be and fluff it up after it's completely dried out.

Had yesterday's curry, kimchi, and the quinoa for dinner.

Before the cooking, I took a nice shower after hiding in my room for two hours after lunch. During the time I spent on time-wasting sites like reddit and other tech sites, but I've realized that I'm finally done with reddit for good. With all the bs about the stonks and how people have taken the wrong lesson out of it, it is clear that my politics is not in alignment with the users of the sites, and it just makes me mad, so I'm like out for good. The only reason I've been checking is for the MA covid numbers, but that's not the only place where one can look for numbers. They've been going down quite fast anyway and in a month it won't matter.

The cleaners really did an amazing job, the floors, appliances, even our pantry was well organized, it felt good, though we should have been doing it on a regular basis by ourselves anyway.

The entire day was again full of meetings or planning for meetings, or talking to people on the chat, didn't do much coding at all, hoping to do something tomorrow. Also, got like 150 words in my personal journal at work, which is an achievement. I'm thinking the more I write there, the more I write here, so I should really go back to being more productive in that journal as well.

Didn't have a good lunch, it was lame, I think I had fruits of some sort, maybe bread, and cookies. So lame. I've been eating too much sugar, need to control the intake.

Got up at 7.30, listened to podcasts until it was time for work, signed into the app right at 9.00, which was also the time for an important meeting. Organized three meetings and presented in quite a few, I'm starting to come up as an important figure in the workplace. Feels good man.

Early up, late to work, long meeting, cookie lunch, snowfall, good meditation, Wegmans groceries, call with friend, long cooking murahi dinner, feeling unproductive [Wed 27]

 I write this on the evening of the next day, it's 11.38, and I have felt extremely guilty about having screwed the pooch for the last month with nary a guilt and just getting on. Yesterday was a good meditation day but I abandoned it completely. I've castigated myself nonstop for the last several weeks, maybe I need to get my butt straight and actually do something about it. What the hell is with my motivation anyway.

So this day I woke up at 7.30, listened to podcasts, talked to international friends in the apps, just chilled and cleaned up, until 9 in the morning, when there was a meeting. The entire day was full of meetings, and when there was no meetings I was making diagrams. Also did I say that I held a meeting that lasted for three hours, throughout which I spoke nonstop? My voice was sore, but it felt like I was being productive, and also I realized that becoming a manager is where it is for me career-wise. It's going to be hard work for sure, but something I can tolerate more than the bs stupid work I take on currently.

SO for lunch I was too tired and lazy and I'd spoken so much there was no energy and also my head hurt for some reason even though I'd gotten so much goddamn highquality sleep whatthehellbody what is up with you, you don't let me be productive, you don't let me work, ugh. Since things were happening quick and there was little energy inside of me, I finished a small packet of those butter cookies that roommate PK had brought home from his in-person work thing the evening before. I knew that was gonna happen, which is why I'd told my roommates that the cookies weren't gonna be round for too long.

It snowfell the whole day, so lame, the snow didn't stay for long, but the day was dark gloomy cold and annoying. It was the same today, but at least it was in the mid oughts in celsius. Tomorrow it's going to be negative seven average in the Celsius. Ye gods.

In the evening, after work I was finally able to disentangle myself from socializing or technology, spent thirty minutes meditating all by myself, which felt really good. I need to be doing that in the mornings, so the entire day is full of energy and potential. After the meditation I was driven enough to go to wegmans for some basic groceries. Did like twelve bucks worth of groceries, five bucks of oats, some salt, a really large expensive onion, garlic, green onions and literally one piece of reed chillis, Why not.

Back home I cooked up the onion and garlic real good, dumped a can of tomatoes, let them simmer for like an hour or whatever until it really thickened. On the side I cleaned up two cans of beans, fried them a little bit, and dumped them into the sauce mix. Also boiled a half-dozen eggs, peeled 'em and put them with the veggies. It was a nice stew of sorts, the beans gave it nice texture and added protein, the egg was great too. A bit too sour, and too thick but whatever.

The original idea was to eat it with buckwheat pancakes, but I was too lazy and tired for that, so I heated up some murahi and that was my carbs. Talked to IA about a bunch of things as I ate. Watched a little bit of Suits with the roommates, felt so unproductive, but still wrote a couple of posts, until well into the night..

Slept at 12.30.

So much of Bollywood comedy is farce, and it's so great

 This evening we were watching Phir Hera Pheri at our place, ND had come over and we wanted to see something outrageous and fun. She put on the film it was riproaringly funny, I kept asking why they were acting that way, how come the villains stopped chasing our guy when he'd just stop in the middle of the road, stare at the sky and tell them to look, wonder at the beauty of the clouds, the birds flying etcetera. The music stops as they look into the sky, to see nothing exciting. Our hero's made a run for it, the music begins playing and the villains resume the chase, on cue.

Nothing makes sense, it's all a comedy of errors, all farcical, which is in part why it's so funny. These are not heady, one doesn't need to worry about or consider the implications doesn't need to be thinking two steps ahead, it's not a requirement to get each and every part of the joke. It's not one of those movies where somebody might go, ooh did you get the joke, and you ask wait what joke, and they tell you that so and so character was played by so and so actor, who's father was also an actor whose popular character was so and so, and the whole scene was a parody of that actor, an homage of sorta. And you go aaaa but it kinda' pisses you off because you shouldn't have to have those variables being juggled to be entertained. It should be simple verbal or physical comedy.

That's exactly what the film is, a total goof-fest, filled with very obvious visual and physical jokes.

The characters don't matter, besides the main cast of four, the plotlines are all contrived, and ohh there's so many of them, all quite contrived. They're all setups to the final confusion where the comedy of error collapses, where the house of card build upon layers and layers of lies falls flat, in a clean manner like that animation from the card came from the late nineties and you get to watch the amazing animation of cards falling around. The point of the win in the game is the animation, the point of watching these movies is to view the final chasing scene, and always always, it's a riot, a rip-roaring ending to what is often quite an alright movie.

The logic doesn't matter, throw it through the window. The song and dance is a sideshow. Look at the chase, look at the faces of the actors, their physical actions. How much fun they're having in performing, in making you laugh. They're not being hammy, there's no pretension of any deeper meaning or lesson. You need to laugh, and they'll get it out of you, no matter what.

The word 'masala' has often been used to describe a certain kind of bollywood/hindi movie, I sort of take offense to that, the implication being that the substance is not strong enough that they need to pimp it up with the spices that will often overwhelm the flavor. But that's not the point. It's not really a valid criticism. That's like arguing Doritos have to many spices and not enough...vegetables. You're not being sold a vegetable. It's a snack, it'll fill you up real good.

And your tummy's going to be hurting the next morning.

Mine still is, from all the laughter. Hope I didn't burst my pancreas.

The lazy guy inside me that I'm afraid of

Look, I understand that inside me there is a greedy, gluttonous lazy hippie. I understand that free time is probably my enemy. That if I’m given too much free time to contemplate the mysteries of the universe, I’m afraid of that inner hippie emerging. There’s a guy inside me who wants to lay in bed, and smoke weed all day, and watch cartoons, and old movies. I could easily do that. My whole life is a series of stratagems to avoid, and outwit, that guy. That’s why I keep myself moving forward with food and travel and work. It goes back to heroin. If heroin, or delicious delicious food, is the Number One thing on the to-do list every day, there probably won’t be a Number Two thing on your Things To-Do list, you know?

- The great late Anthony Bourdain

I'm afraid of that guy, the hippie inside me that Tony talks of. There is no Heroin, but there doesn't need to be. Social media, the internet is the heroin of our times.

I understand that inside me there is a lazy, greedy hippy, who wants to eat cookies for dinner and sleep all day long. He wants to giggle at youtube videos and smoke weed all the time, and do nothing else. I understand he will do anything, go to any lengths to avoid doing anything that gives him a slightest of concern, or involves even a hint of unpleasantness. My goal in life is to befuddle that guy, confuse him, to keep him too occupied with everything else, to distract him from going back to his habits, so he's tired, the only thing that he can do is to sleep, at night. He wants to get up from the bed at 1 in the afternoon, he wants to sleep at 4, talk to people on the chat and on the phone, anybody that'll talk to him, cute girls mostly. And he doesn't want to learn or progress or grow. He just wants to stay and wallow and cry and laugh. He's a lazy mean muthafucka, somebody who'd be quite unpleasant.

I don't want him to be in control of me.

Everything I do, every new initiative I take, every project or task I put upon myself is an attempt, yet another stratagem to outwit that guy. He eventually figures out 

It's not easy, really it's not easy, people tell me I'm a high-functioning procrastinator, somebody who gets things done without wanting to. They say I'm productive. But not really, my productivity is an illusion, a collection of several failed attempts to escape from this trap of the lazy stoner, somehow presented as one whole piece of output. All I want to do is run, go to a place that guy can't find me, and breathe a sigh of relief. I want to meditate, focus, be with myself, truly and have an understanding of what I really want, no distractions or that layer of 'fat' or 'fog' that takes over my brain and heart when I feel like there needs to be something done. The same fog that's been distracting me from this blog in the last month, the same one that's disrupted my regular workout, reading, checklist and meditation schedule.

Yet I fight, every day is a battle. It is, it's not easy, but I try very hard. He has lots of allies, he does. But I try. I keep pushing back. Every day I feel like this blog is a total waste of time, I should just give up on it and move on. But I won't. Because this is my battle call. I won't be defeated. I won't give up. I'll fight that sonofabitch till the last dying breath.

It's looking like I'll end up getting the promotion in the next few months, fingers crossed

 Because I've been talking more often, designing documents, presenting and generally coordinating with coworkers. They've been asking if I enjoy the sort of thing I do, and the answer has been yes, yes, unequivocally yes. So now I'm feeling like I deserve it, and it's being communicated to all the parties as well.

Motivation as you can see is low, laziness is high, it's all due to the weather, the political environment, maybe it's something in the food, but ultimately it's always me, always inside me is the person who just wants to sleep who wants to do nothing...wait I'll stop right here with this nonsense, this is good shit, something Tony Bourdain used to say, I'm going to put this in a different post. Let me blabber about something else.

Maybe it's the season. Maybe it's that time of the year for me, you know physio or emotionally. Maybe it's the hormones, I dunno, could be, can't be sure. Perhaps it's the lack of vitamins cos I stopped taking 'em for a long time. Or maybe motivation is like a shark, the faster you swim the faster you want to go and you gotta go. When you stop, you want to float, float float float, until you cannot swim anymore, and then you rise to the top of the water. Deddd. Dead as a fish.

Back to what we were talking about, I want to be working towards my promotion more seriously, if this round doesn't work out, money troubles are going to arise, relationship troubles will appear, and then things might be problematic. If I had a partner, kids, and family I mean these things would happen, right now they're unlikely to. Because I'm a freebird. But they could, you can never say never, shit I need to complete my documents for greencard and I haven't because the motivation has been so low, that's why, it's all the stress and anxiety and disappointment associated with not working towards my life's basic goals, not living up to the promises I made to my coworkers and to myself, to my family. If I can't do that how am I ever going to be writing a book, or writing a good blog even. January has been a total wash, and the sole reason is me, and only I. Nobody else is to blame. At this rate, the promotion is not going to come because I've given up this month it seems on anything that is going to be rewarding or great, and the greencard situation is the important one, so is the project I promised to take. Why haven't I worked towards those? Perhaps I should start with that.

I like to blame the politics, the weather and all of that, but no ultimately it's just me.

In any case, I can fool delude confuse everybody else, perhaps even myself, and I might get this promotion, but this habit cannot be sustained, I need to improve as a worker, as a human being. My work ethics need a step up, my peace of mind needs to come from the inside, it needs to be wise and bright, not lazy and external, full of distraction. Distraction-driven peace of mind is temporary, it is transitory. The permanent peace is the one you inculcate from meditations.

Muri lunch, lots of desserts, sticky snow, skipping writing, early to bed [Mon 26]

 As usual got up at 7.45-8ish, but didn't do anything impressive or exciting stayed in bed till it was work hours and beyond, signed into work at 9.

Full day of meetings etcetera, these things get tiring yo.

For lunch I had murahi with eggs, scrambled, and lapsi achaar.

After work finally got the energy to walk out, but it was snowing, succ succ succ, and then thought ehh it's fine but the snow was too wet so it got all over me. Talked to jd about meditation and therapy and all of it, solid two hours of conversations.

Came back home, had a bunch of desserts that roommate PK brought from home. Had an apple or two for dinner, in addition to all the cookies and weird things. Watched several episodes of Suits.

Was tired annoyed, head hurt, went to bed at 10.30, completely abandoned on writing the day-end journal.

I am wounded in the most ridiculously inconvenient part of my body, no not that you pervert

 It's my gums. I'm thinking what I may have done to harm my gums because these feel like external protuberances originating from when I ran into something solid and wood. I hope it's really not internal actually, it would be terrible to have to go to a dentist or to the doctor's at these awful times.

The good news is the numbers are decreasing, the absolute numbers are at 3000 a day down from 8000 which we saw a few weeks ago, and the rates are below five percent. These are early December numbers, if we are as patient and careful for the next two weeks or so I'm hoping we can go down to triple digits in terms of absolute numbers. With everyone vaccinating, and the summer season arriving soon, people won't be congregating inside houses and buildings, outdoor eating will be open again and we can hope the numbers will never rise again. Then I can comfortably go to the dentist and the physician and any sort of medical professional.

So anyway back to the terrible ache in my gums, i don't know how it happened but it certainly created annoyances for me to eat and go to bed last night. Fortunately it seems to be healing, but not soon enough as I experience and remember the pain at the most inconvenient times.

I've been brushing my teeth with great discipline every day, flossing not too irregularly as well. It's heartbreaking confusing confounding disappointing, what other adjectives can I use really, hope this is over with quick.

The stock market literally trades meme stonks what can anybody say just chill and enjoy the bullcrap

 Tesla was a meme stock has been for a while whose biggest product that it's successfully sold are the overpriced shares. Closely followed by regulatory credits. And hype and the meme economy.

Over the course of the pandemic, as companies started shutting down, people got unemployed and the economy began seeing the impact of the most harmful global health crisis modern humanity has seen, that has caused millions to die, been more deadly to the United States than the first world war, the stock market kept on climbing and climbing and climbing, without justification or logic, without a pattern or any fundamental factors. Or any rhyme or reasons. As they say the stonks only go up, and that's what the hedge funds do.

So degenerate gamblers at random internet forums decided to take matters to their own hands and drive the stonks even higher, without care for their profits, investigation and action by the SEC or potentially bankruptcy and began buying stocks for companies that should have no good reason to be popular in the market to climb to unbelievable levels. The shares for gamestop, a retailer selling game CD's and dvd's is like 2000 percent higher than it was two months ago. On no material changes since the last time. The stonks just go up, no logic, rhyme or reason

It's happened in the past over the summer, and of course tesla itself is the classic example of a meme stonk. What I'm more interested is the long term impacts this will have on people's savings, 401k, allocation of stable funds, and if it might hurt even more careful savers and investors, since various weighing indexes will have to account for the meme stonks. Just like Tesla got included in the s&p500, what if a random glassware company shines ahead tomorrow, or even gamestop, who's to say they're any worse than a stupid credit farming company that's run by a stupid vapid salesman who pretends to be a salesman and is really quite popular with people having more money than intelligence or wisdom who nevertheless consider themselves to be the epitome of culture and knowledge and smartness. Perhaps that's who the world shall belong too, and the rest of us shall all be beggars. Maybe all the movement of money happening is just between various groups of rich white dudes. Who knows.

It's concerning but not sure if I need to be worried in the long term. Also I've bought a tonne of Apple stocks because Stonks go up and also with their new processors they're going to be making and selling a hell lot more computers. I used to think Apple devices were overpriced for what you could buy versus windows, you were paying the Apple premium, but with their own devices out in the market at the heart of all consumer electronics, Apple has shown that not only are they the best in consumer preference, but also the best value for money in terms of performance, so you're not paying the Apple premium anymore. Which means anybody like me who's looking to buy a new device will consider Apples seriously, something that was a ridiculous concept in the past. Yes, apple's already sold a billion iphones, but it could sell yet another billion in the next five year or a decade. We can hope and wait. And thus, I'm all in on the company.

The podcasts have been really killing it as of late, wonder what the future's going to be like

So I was listening to the Conan O Brien podcast earlier today, ended up listening to it twice, since I went to Wegmans and didn't have anything light to put on.

They were talking about how podcasts have become so massive, all the performers, comedians and improvisers have started their own shows, and podcasts have become launching grounds for content in other media. Think headspace, which started as an app with audio content and is now a show, duncan trussel magic hour which was a podcast and a strange one at that for many years until netflix picked it up as a show. So many more, apparently it's a great way to show to the producers with the big wads of cash that you have a prebuilt audience, a proven business model and that the content is not just fanciful ramblings of writers and creatives on coke etcetera.

I'm down with that. While on one hand maybe that increases the threshold for the common guy to start making a new show, it also encourages everybody to start making their own podcasts and shows, and cross-contamination of various media is always an interesting exploration of old technologies and new ones, and how the pandemic will have shaped our media ecosystem. Earlier in the pandemic we talked about how the podcast listening had gone down since nobody was commuting anymore, but it appears people are listening to them more than ever since they're so bored and there's too much content on various tv apps, and also all the famous smart funny people have their own podcasts.

The office ladies podcasts was an absolute killer too, so funny and on point, and so was hdtgm. And the scrubs podcast, which I'm not the biggest fan of, it's got ups and downs, was a solid solid one as well. michael scott paper comapny podcast has been solid, and so have been a bunch of other miscellaneous pods that've been out.

Maybe I should start one too, like the one where I talk to women. Only problem would be to find women to talk to me, we'll see how that's gonna go.

Mike Birbiglia on Conan's podcast was absolutely hilarious, he was working a bit too hard it felt like but who cares, he absolutely killed, whatever worked he had put into it paid off in several multiples. And Paul Scheer was on 3 Questions with Andy Richter, that was a good one.

Taskmaster podcast, yet another unexpectedly great podcast. I've been controlling my consumption of the series, youtube in general because productivity has been through the floor, it's been drilling deep into the magma, core of the earth, and all because I'm absolutely obsessed with the tv show and the funny comedians. the website won't even work on my phone, and I'm not in front of my computer for often enough to make a difference.

Are the days going past to fast? Something to start worrying about?

Yet more good news: I know how to meditate unguided, kinda maybe

 So yeah that's been happening, the guidance is starting to grill my ears whatever, or maybe I feel pressured anxious whatever. For the last several days I've been meditating on my own, with the pattern set by the headspace guidance. It's been working, I can feel in my body the stress sorta melting away. And also the biggest achievement has been when going to bed I follow their sleep things, but without listening, all on my own, and I have a tough time keeping my eyes for even like five minutes, It's insane how much better I've gotten with going to sleep in such a short time. Suspiciously good actually.

And there's a theory in there, after yesterday. For the first time in a long time I slept after 12, went to bed at 10.25, and then slept at maybe 10.35. I got up at 2.30 and then did I use the restroom or not, it's unclear, in any case at some point I did go to the loo, and maybe had trouble sleeping? I don't know it's unclear but sleep was disrupted more than usual which leads me to believe my body is absolutely set on me sleeping at twelve, not being productive at night and is unwilling to budge. What a stupid suckass fucking everything I've been trying to do, just against my drive and motivation and focus you know all of it.

Yeah anyway so the selfmeditating has been working so well, for managing anxiety at least. Only thing I need to begin working on is focus, productivity, happiness, creativity, those other things, mood management almost. And then mindfulness, that's the most fundamental sorta situation I want to be at, always aware and mindful of my physical surroundings, not being distracted by my feelings and emotions, not lost in the illusions and palaces of my own mind. That's the target. We're not much close to that, but at least there's the right direction, so things aren't terrible, don't worry guys.

Is it about the free time, is it having undisturbed block of energy and concentration, without being distracted by sounds or notifications or roommates? What's stopping me, why has the energy or the drive been chilling lately? And what's up with being so lazy in not following the rules I set up for myself in this blog? It shouldn't be this hard, it was my choice to write in this blog, and I should be having fun doing it. Shouldn't be a chore. It's so weird and annoying. There's nothing sapping my energy and yet I feel...tired...despite having all the vitamins and going on walks and managing the light situation. Weeeird.

The other school of thought is, that late Jan/Feb is just like this, for everybody, the SAD starts hitting the best of folks in the best of times, and there's nothing anybody can do about it. The best one can to is trying to fight back, as I have, so we haven' completely abandoned our goals and dreams. The target of coming up with a novel is further away than ever, but as long as the words are put on the page, and there's some expectation of being read, things are okay.

Back to the meditation situation. It was supposed to help me. It has. But. I've sorta' abandoned it to begin with, so writing's not going good because the meditation's being abandoned. And I've been brushing late and making bed late, so that's though, more to come on that later.

God this winter sucks, the pandemic is sucking ballz, can we have good things come in soon, pretty please errybody?

No work is being done at work, and that's a good thing

 As the one reader of this blog who hopefully still reads it will know, I do technical sort of work at a company that does very boring things. My job description would put even the post empathic listener to sleep, it's nothing to be proud about.

And I don't work much on a regular day, it's like they expect me to do something, I delay it and dally it and they say ohh why don't you do it, and I'll say yeah yeah I'm doing research and then later, ooh yeah something came up can you help it, and very soon they've done all of the work and I'm giggling like a maniac and even then I've half-assed all of it. It gets done eventually, two weeks for a piece of work that should have taken a day and a half at most, and it doesn't even need working on anymore because some other team in a different country discovered they had the requirements all mixed up. Who comes out ahead in this case, that's obvious.

Lately though we've been having so many meetings at work, it's quite comical. My day starts at 8, 8.30, and meetings go on nonstop until 12, after which I'll run out to get some lunch or just chill on my bed, and back to meetings, no time to be distracted and go on youtube etcetera even. And it's really hard to like zone out from meetings all day long you know, they expect you to say something sometime and you have to remember what was said in earlier meetings to show them that you're still a part of the team.

So, everybody's treading water lately, that's what my teammate said in a chat a couple of days ago, and that's because there's no time for us to do our nerdy work since meetings are everything. And that's fine because everybody knows about it. This is perfect, as I'm being more productive not doing anything in the meetings, than not doing anything in my freetime, because this is what's expected from me. I can listen and talk, I can do that till all eternity. It's actually the expectation of me moving my fingers and noggin when I start freakin' out man, really start freakin' out. And it's good now, all's well.

As I led towards in the earlier post, this means I should become a manager, a technology manager who makes freak tonnes of monies, while not doing any technical job, making the nerds do the shit work while I uhhh drink my bubbling nonalchoholic champagne and talk to other managers about managering. No work will be done by me technically, but meetings will be productive, and the nerds will be doing things.

The only problem is, it's unclear if my job will let me go towards the managerial direction in the foreseeable future, seeing as I haven't even risen above the starting job description in all these years, which kinda' sucks but there's nowhere else to go. i want to manage people, jeez why is it so hard to understand, I can talk argue identify  opportunities and negotiate, just pay me the monies for that, to mange the nerds, but we'll pretend like I'm one of the nerds, and that's how my base pay will be set. That way I'll be rich, you'll be a productive company, and the nerds who seem to looove loove loove working will get all the working of their lives.

At least I'm killing it at work

So I skipped writing entirely yesterday, which even for my super duper low motivation days, is quite an achievement. On the bright side I went to bed at 10.30, and oh boi what a sound sleep I had. Sometimes I just don't understand my body. One week I have trouble sleeping, I lay in bed for hours and hours without being so much as to get a wink, and the next week I have trouble keeping my eyes open, the problem is that I can't get early enough in the morning.

So the productivity, as defined by my interest and commitment in posting here, and doing things I enjoy regularly has taken a hit, yes. I like to lie in my bed and do nothing, watch tv. Even walks have started becoming hassle, but I take them anyway because what else is there do this in these awful terrible times ugh.

The goddamnfucking pandemic, why won't it just end, there's end in sight at least, so we can look forward to that, but how one wishes it just disappeared one day. It's just sucked out the energy and motivation from the best of us, alas. We need to do something about it. Not like ignore common sense, guidance and instructions by smart people, but like idk, pray to the raingods or something to that effect and have whatever deity caused this be punished like mad harshly.

Anyway, so lets get back to the topic at hand, which is that despite all the low motivation posts, and the laziness in getting up and complete abandonment of commitment to other things, at least work is going well and I'm not completely and totally slacking off. Yes it's all been meetings as of late, but meetings is where I thrive, preparing for them, talking through them, organizing them, bargaining and negotiating with people, and coming to results. I'm a born manager I realized, love managing people and earning rewards etcetera.

That's the strange but obvious realization I JUST came up with, something my parents realized when I was six. You love talking, they told me, everybody really, and you're too lazy to get anything done, you'll thrive in one of those jobs that needs a lot of talking. Like a professor, or a haakin, or manager of some sorts in a big company, that's what you'll be good at, they predicted.

Nostradamiii!

Because I talked at a meeting of my own organization for three hours, nonstop, just blah blah blah blah blah, I did that, this is how we do this, and over there, and this, and now that, so on and so forth, nonstop, it's wild really how much I can talk, and be proud of it, and make it look like I'm working. If things get done, ahh well.

A manager's job is the best because your job is to talk and convince people have show things, and not have to worry about doing them. That's somebody else's job. I guess if there's like dark times ahead, you need to be concerned, but yeah that's always a bad situation.

Short, fat & not even funny: a balding brown guy's first ten years in America, a collection of essays

This would be the title of my first book I'm thinking, a collection of essays about the first ten years of my life spent in America. They'd be mostly humorous essays, stumbling from ordering food at restaurants to talking to people to miscommunication and friend breakups and crashing in people's couches for years to an end. And my total inability to make white girl friends, or to retain them.

Who would read it, maybe I could push it on to my friends and family, if I got two hundred copies sold that would be hopefully enough to pay for the editor and the initial print run. It would be shitty obviously, self-publishing with Amazon, but my content would be out in the open finally for the world to consume! Why anybody would ever want to consume the so called book would be a questions for the great minds.

Perhaps somebody like me, a brown person who doesn't consider himself too out there and interesting will have a glance at it and underestimate it, rolling his eyes and groaning at the ambitious title. He'll flip through the pages -- how it will have made to the shelves of the bookstores we will never know -- and see if there's anything worth looking at or if I'm yet another tryhard loser. Ah a slightly funny incident here, an anecdote there, worth the twenty bucks most certainly, he'd think and buy it. As a joke of sorts. Not the kind of book to recommend to anybody.

He'd read through the fifty thousand words in a matter of days, and be really loving it. He'd tell his friends and family that he really misjudged this book and some new author, it's actually quite good, might want to take a look, a couple friends of his would check it out, and like it as well. And they'd have finished it over a matter of a weekend. One of them will write a goodreads review of it, in addition to posting it on social media and sharing it with friends and family at large.

Eventually it'll gather some steam but I won't know it because I"m not keeping track of the sales. I've made my original investment, I'm happy about the moolah coming in. Six months later amazon tells me I've got some royalty checks, I look at it and freak out, maybe the number's wrong because by that logic I'll have had to sell at least five thousand copies, which is quite an unbelievable number in this day and age for an unknown writer. But it's the truth, and the number only keeps on rising.

Eventually the book will have gathered a couple of hundred mostly positive and some glowing reviews on goodreads, the most negative reviews will call it boring, but nothing worse. It'll get reviewed by small Indian newspapers, and papers from Nepal who'll have heard of it through the grapevine.

Very soon I'll have family and friends who I did not force to buy copies of the book tell me they read the book and it was good. By the end of it I'd have sold hundreds of thousands of copies, and been on several recommended bookslists.

I won't be a celebrity, but I'll be known and respected, and taken seriously as  a writer. This will open up avenues for me to try become a real writer.

White Tiger the movie, a review

 It's a great movie, better than I imagined it would be. Amazing actor, the guy who plays the servant, the guy who plays US-returnee 'master', Rajkumar Rao -- the husband to-be from Queen -- has been sorta typecast at this point, but this one's a well-made movie that stands true to the original book. Good book, better movie, great job all.

The actor playing the driver, Google tells me his name is Adarsh, has either an amazing character at his hand that will undoubtedly be used in so many movies hereon, or is an actor of great talent, on to achieve great things. His portrayal of the 'servant class', the way he moves, acts talks, the sly shift of the eye, movement of his hands and legs, they were so accurate, so realistic, I felt uncomfortable. A little voyeuristic, but also uncomfortable of inhabiting the same universe as his. If you can't identify with any characters, and don't know any characters from a movie, it's pure fiction. His acting made it like it was real. No good. But so good in a different way.

Priyanka Chopra plays...a US-returnee who thinks she can change the country, but also is gradually compromising on her morals until she can't take it anymore and returns to the US, leaving her husband to their driver-cum-servant. One could well imagine her heading out to a bar or on a blind date in the US after her divorce, looking for a guy, only to find Nick Jonas and marrying him. I'd buy that character story totally.

The master-servant relationship is an interesting one, as it was in the book. Talk of homo-eroticism is brought up frequently when untangling this interpersonal interaction. The servant does after all call his former master, who he brutally murders towards the end of the story by the way spoilers if you haven't read the book, his 'ex'. What are we to make of it? Does that mean he saw his master as his ex inside his head, or as partners while he was serving, or did something happen the narrator is not telling us about, that he is unaware about his unrealiability. 

What is the nature of the master-servant relationship?

There's many other questions the movie raises, without clearly answering. The same issues are brought up by the book, which is quite faithfully portrayed though not as faithfully to make one squirm in discomfort since I have distinct memory of sexual exploitation of poor young men by landlords in the village. Thank god the movie does not touch that.

It's a pretty good movie, runs 2 hours 20 minutes, worth watching.

Early wake, day busy with meetings, I get productive at work, yogurt and fruits lunch, to the brewstore,pembertom farms, filling rice, suits, more writing [Mon 25]

 I write this at 10.57 of this very day, the day's not even over yet and I've got the journal entry out already, despite still needing to write four posts after this, and a meditation session.

So yesterday I made a checklist after what seems like an era, and intend to start following it soon, maybe starting tomorrow? The motivation is coming back, the energy is there now. It's like maybe I've not been eating well or something, something has been not working right, and the energy is being recovered. You know?

So I got up at 7 sharp, consciously snoozed it thrice, out of bed at 7.40, listened to the podcasts, various, and waited for the restroom until 8.20, and then working at 840. I know it's still lazytimes as I didn't brush or make bed until later, but things are improving, and early waking is the sign of progress. I'm looking forward getting my shit back slightly together again.

Got out of job at 4.20, after having written 120 words at work. The workday was so full of meetings, didn't get to do anything besides making a pretty chart that people didn't appreciate much either. Took a nice long shower after work, and then suited up for the brewery store trip. To fix the pipe diameter issue.

Easy trip, the brewstore people didn't even charge me extra money for the larger pipe. Decided to pop into the Indian store a few blocks from there to see what was good. Spent like half hour looking for something to take, got a packet of bhujiya and achar, stood up in the line for maybe twenty minutes realized the store didn't care about customers, abandoned my goods and left.

Across the street I saw 'pemberton farms' a high-end natural store. Amazing, amazing place. Everything's so expensive but shit looks nice. Spent maybe a good twenty minutes in there, in the end got us a nice bar of Maine butter and 88% dark chocolate. Didn't yet dare buy the 12$ a bar chocolate that was single-source because yikes, maybe I'll take a breather before that. What if I don't like it. What if it's a disappointment. What if I like it too too much.

Fell in love with the cashier, got nervous when she asked me something, fumbled around all confused and embarrassed and she giggled -- or rather laughed derogatorily probably but I'll interpret it in the way that makes me feel better. God that store has cute cashiers, I need to make it my daily destination for walks.

Got back, told roommates about the cashiers, they made fun of me. They'd had rice and chicken, I had the rice with seasame oil, tahini, kimchi, soy sauce and  lime juice. Yum yum yum, so good. Rice is so filling if you have it when you're very very very hungry.

Watched like five episodes of Suits with absolutely no concern for what might happen to the future of writing and other things.

Brushed, got ready for bed and here we are now, two posts in. The rest of the night will involve me writing four more posts and a bout of meditating, and it's done. We'll be in a good place.

Hope to get up for reals at 7am and write at least a little bit. Need to make mornings productive once again.

Leftover lunch, fruity dinner, PK's friends visit, finally some serious self-guided meditation [Sun 24]

I write this at 10.35 of the next evening.

Have had chats with SST recently and ooh that person, they're the throbbing beating shining pie of my eye, apple of my heart, separate but together, different but the same. Weird but so normal. Every time we send chats -- and this happens a few times a year -- we are always into how much in sync with one another. What a person, that, what a person. Exactly like Donna from Suits I told them fifteen minutes ago, exactly the same.

In any case, back to the events of the day, sunday.

Earlier part of the day was spent being anxious about not having the work stuff. Did some serious meditating around afternoon, after which the stress got a lot less. Didn't write much the entire day though did write a tonne in the evening.

For lunch I reheated the leftover ramen from the previous night. I'm usually not the sort of person to keep ramen soaked up and out in the open and eat it the next morning, but in this case it was mostly green veggies, I put in so much effort I had to eat. It was glorious. So filling. Yum.

In the afternoon did a really amazing self-guided meditation, all the weight from the shoulders was lifted, I was a different happy man. Good stuff, need to do it again soon. I am still cheating on the headspace meditation series, but that's because I didn't need it this day.

Later, PK's friend N and AP came over, we had some discussions about stupid things such as tesla, the market conditions, gc, all of that. Which reminds me, I should be freaking out about gc right now, because that's the future and I haven't worked on it at all.

For dinner I had fruits, and nuts. Got hungry but decided to screw it.

Wrote a lot of half-hearted lazy posts before going to bed, at 12.30. I need to get off my ass and pull up the writing schedule to earlier. One way to solve the problem might be to stop watching suits because it's taken over my life almost. I've been watching multiple episodes every day with the roommates, and they love love love to make fun of me, on how much I love the series.

Some resons productivity has gone down and what to do about it

this is some hardcore freewriting nothing to inspire me or guide me just to kill the time, get the postcount up there and get done for the day so I may sleep a goodnight's sleep, that's the only thing we can hope for now since motivation is down the drain I wonder why thinking it's work-related I promised something and haven't been able to deliver not really exactly my fault since I haven't had the time to work on it at all, kind of a bummer but that's where we are, I'm so very pissed at how meeting heavy work has been and the seven multiple things I've been juggling and worrying about, and now that's affecting my holidays and free time, living in my head rent free and taking my meditations away from me, this is not pleasurable,, i need to work harder smarter and quicker, this needs a good resolution.

when do i even stop, what's the good amount of work to convince myself that the post looks beefy enough i gave it a fair shot, nothing more to do, after all this is all for the post count is it not, for this is not helping me improve my writing, there's nobody reading these anymore and if there is come forward truly let me know if you're reading this and i will give you twenty bucks to the first person who shows me these words because I'm that confident nobody's reading me, even the future me, at least a year from now on if I remind myself that I wrote this and come read this, then if nobody's claimed it by then I'll give myself twenty bucks, these shit words are unreadable and almost by design, it's shouldn't be that way but the anxiety caused by work performance combined with the lack of free time to actually work at work and then the fear of getting things wrong, disappointing people has taken its toll on me, thought that the blog would be greatly therapeutic but where are the good effects bub, where are the good effects.

now that i've blocked all the shitty websites from my devices, tata youtube tata twitter facebook any other related website, my productivity will go sky high i just know, need to eat well and sleep well and I'll be kicking it like a villain for sure.

there's nothing to gained by wasting my time in those soul and time sucking metally draining emotionally consuming websites, or the junk food for the soul and the mind, as I call them, need to cut down on the junkfood of information, get working out and leave with peace and quiet, meditation and mindfulness are the only way to go, I must submit, totally submit to the world of peace and awareness. That is where the future lies, the bright successful future of my desire, and just like that I'm at five hundred words, wasn't too painful was it.

Just some complaints

 The weather's too cold, the pandemic is too bad, the people too lazy, the town too annoying, the energy levels too strange, work too busy, meetings too much, food so tough to make, sleep too regular, wakingup too hard, walks too boring, acquaintances too needy and annoying, the world too disappointing, the times are tough, what to do this is so gghhh.

If nothing else, I should just gather in a large stockpile of frozen foods and breads from Wegmans and fill them in my belly for the next few weeks.

The news from nepal gets worse by the day. There's no youtube content worth exploring.

I want to go to restaurants again, oh I miss them so. It's not working out. It's annoying I'm so tired of the pandemic and everybody being locked up. Not just that but the color of the world is brown and grey and drab, it's starting to take its toll.

The content production machine that barely works, aka my brain needs some fuel and quality input, or else it's garbage in and garbage out. Since there's only been garbage coming out in recent weeks, you can say a lot about the weather around here in recent times.

Even just sitting at a Starbucks or some coffee place, a library even and working from there would be a welcome respite to how things have been, the world has been shut down for far too long.

The vaccine can't come quick enough.

Pancakes, Boston walk, chillin' in the city, hang with the house, no motivation [Sat 23]

 I write this on the evening of the 24th, the Sunday. I'm not feeling super duper motivated, as has been the case for many days weeks and months recently. Not gonna make this too long because it sucks.

Woke up early, spent some time making oatmeal pancakes, had them with the maple syrup and vanilla syrup. Chilled for a bit, wrote a lot.

There was a cleaning service lady who came to our apartment to give a cleanup quote. It's 150, and then an optional 100 per month if we want to do that. I suggested to the roomies perhaps it would be a better idea once we got the deep clean it'd be a good idea for us to keep cleaning the house regularly instead of. Whatever is happening write now.

Wasted a lot of time just dickin' around. This has been the tale for the last many weeks. I'm changing, eventually. The rules have been brought in, walls have been raised. Now to execute completely, it's coming.

Went out on a walk to Haymarket. On foot to Lechmere, the shuttle to North Station from there, and walked to Haymarket. Had a buck in my pocket,  bought nothing. Written in detail about this elsewhere.

Walked to Post office square to look at the old workplaces, then to downtown crossing and chilled at primark for a bit. Took the red line from there to davis, 89 to home. Made a nice ramen soup with a tonne of fixins and bok choy, finally finished the bok choy what an achievement.

Talked to R a bit, watched the tv with them, back in my room doing who knows what. Meditated in the evening, wrote a bunch, went to bed.

After 12.

It's getting a little out of hand, the low energy situation, the lack of motivation. Thinking it might be related to diet, since sleep's been fixed. But even on days I'm full it's not that much better, wonder what's happening, will need to fix it. We'll see.

Later.

No good news from the homefront

 Except the one where ten Nepalis climbed k2 in the middle of the winter, well done to them finally something somebody is good at against everybody else.

That's it.

The political situation is so fucked from all the sides. The courts have given up. The shitfarthole mini autocrat is trying to compromise all the existing shitinstitutions. They're already not robust, he's trying to kick them into the puddle. And then using the remaining rotting flea-ridden instruments as weapons against his enemies. Of whom nothing good can be said either. The one with speaking issues is an example of what a two-tongued snake is, he knows things are going very wrong but is waiting for an opportunity to turn into his personal favor, so he's trying to leverage this situation into power for his own self. His party is a hollow ball of stinking fart and they seem to have nothing else to do than to pander to his crazy lust for power.

The rest of the main joker's party, the ones he's fighting against, are totally inept in addition to the obvious corruption and ideological vacuity. That has come to play since the country is in a pretty big constitutional crisis right now and all they care about is fixing their minor quibbles, which if fixed, they wouldn't even bother with trying to get the more legal aspects right. Because law and order, the ones they designed, are for the other losers, not for them.

The old-timey goon has started using the language of violence again because he finds himself in a vulnerable and impotent position. And why not, he's been ridiculed and made fun of, this has been a total emasculation of the once feared clown. He cannot seem to do anything, he doesn't inspire anybody, nobody takes him seriously anymore. Even if, and when, he's using fiery rhetoric, it's not taken seriously since it's not like he's had the history of backing his words with actions. It's possible, likely even, that sort of rhetoric might lead to violence but here's the thing, even the stupidest toadiest the most desperate derpiest of their cadres and followers have come to realize the truth. There's nothing underneath the words. It's all emptiness. Much like the words themselves, nothing carries any heft.

How this clownshow can power itself anymore after running out of steam is a matter of wonder for all.

And the covid situation has been totally ignored and abandoned. People are beginning to ask why covid has suddenly fucking disappeared from the country while test positive rates are above twenty/twenty-five percent on people getting tested to leave the country, and old people are dying in droves of cough and cold. I really really really didn't think people could be this outrageously stupid, not in Nepal no. Americans were proud and haughty enough one would think, to think so, but not Nepalis. I consider myself corrected.

Having any sort of hope, even the lightest glimmer, is a mistake. Abandon ship. Abandon ship.