It's okay to not have tight plans

 It's taken me a long time to realize this.

But unless things are really really pressing, it's okay to not have tight plans and schedule. Like instead of putting your life on a scheduled routine, it's also okay to have a list of things to do, and timebox them within a certain amount of time. If they get done, they get done. If they don't, they probably didn't need to get done. This gives you the freedom to explore, relieves you from the bondage of planning, while still giving some sort of structure to your life and your plans. Controlling your schedule while not submitting completely to it is the best way to deal with things if you're having issues with being unable to catch up.

How to feel at home, anywhere

Inspired by this.

1. Shopping. Get the groceries that you normally do. Rice, zero calorie seltzer, dal, bread, eggs, and bunch of Asian spices for me.
   
   
2. Be in bright places in the afternoon, make the room cosy and bright. Have it have ambient soft lighting in the evenings.
   
   
3. Own the favourite smell of yours, and spread it in your new abode, so it smells like home <3
   
   
4. Carry portable artworks and colorful, vibrant, patterned textiles that reminds you of good times.
   
   
5. Put music/audio on that reminds you of home, and puts you in your place of comfort
   
   
6. Get on a routine, your usual or semi-usual routine, to remind yourself that you are still in control of your own self and your chores.
   
   
7. Indulge, and luxuriate. Take things slow. Don't rush. Appreciate the place. Own it, live in it. Make it yours.
   

Lots of people to hang, so little desire to

I've acknowledged in these very pages how I considered myself a social, extroverted person but Seattle might have changed me. And how Sk is the only person I hang out in a regular basis in this city of gloom. Sometimes I do feel lonely, and blame it upon myself, imagining that I don't have social networks and connection in this town, and I'm all by myself.

Which is a whole load of smelly crock.

I actually know a lot more people than I regularly reach out to hang with, and could know even more if I bothered to make the connections. In terms of family I have three people right here and now, plus sk, plus my comedy friends, plus PG plus A plus the whole Nepali friend group, plus other married Nepali friend groups I promised I'd reach out to but didn't. So what if they never got back at me either, they're married and settled with a house, and they'd probably not expect me to want to hang with them anyway. I should be the one to reach out to others. But I haven't. Because Seattle changes you.

Now maybe I do want to hang out, expand my group every so often. To get there I should be proactive about the whole networking thing. I will be. Sure, promise.

My (fake) thoughts on the latest scientific achievements

So, you've come to this blog to read my thoughts on the latest scientific achievement or discovery that's been all over the news that all the venture bros are flippin' excited about. Welcome!

You are right that the incredibly exciting scientific discovery or invention, perhaps even a revelation, that has caught the world by surprise is as big as they're making it out to be! It's going to upend how human society has worked at a fundamental level. Up will be down, down will be up! North will be east, and South will be West! Wild things! The future is going to be completely different and unpredicted.

This solves all of our current problems! Poverty? Bam! This discovery solves that! World hunger! Solved! Warfare! Not. A. Problemo. Anymore! Corruption? Gone! Just like that! That's how impactful the achievement is, and we must thank the scientists and engineers who worked to make it happen!

Yeah maybe the text was differently worded than what I imagined?

I thought,
hurray,
A new person
and opened
about my
interests
in television
and cooking
and then
the
texts
stopped.
Then for a moment
there was a possibility
maybe they
didn't
get the text?
But nay,
the possibility
is long gone now
And it's possible
my text
sounded very different
to the receipient
than it did to me,
that's how
the world is, innit
where everybody
lives in the bubble
of their own
cultural context
and the shared knowledge
of words, and meanings
and memes, if I may
is lost
among the cacophony
of
individual
group
identities.
The world is richer,
it's possible
but now
it's a tower
of cultural babel
where nobody
understands
anybody else.

Frequently asked questions about the bananas

Q: Are bananas the tool of capitalist oppression?
A: Absolutely, and we will be considered victors only, and only when, we finally defeat all the banana sales and transportation in the entire world.

Q: Can you eat bananas if you grow them yourself?
A: Not if you grow them where they don't like being grown! You are allowed to eat bananas grown only in tropical and sub-tropical climates!

Q: So if I'm in the right climate zone, and I plant my own bananas, am I allowed to eat those in our post-capitalist society?
A: Nuh uh not so fast you feudalist pig! You thing you can take advantage of servants and serfs and child labor to pick 'em up for you so you can feed off their labor? Not at all! You're allowed to eat, only if you grow them, in the right environment, and climb the tree by yourself to pick the bananas. That is the only way to ethically consume bananae in our socialist utopia!

Q: But what if I'm unable to climb the tree?
A: We do consider the fact that not everybody may have physical ability to climb the tree. In that case, only a socialist collective member, who's actively involved and aware of labor rights issue, and the dynamic between them, the laborer, and you the value-extractor, is allowed to pick the bananas in your stead. Additionally, they must be provided at least 20 minutes of rest before and after, two square meals, and air-conditioned lodgings before and after for the act of labor.

Turns out I can't take ceramics class after all

 Turns out I can't take ceramics class after all. I missed the summer session because I was too late to find it as a possibility. And now Fall quarter is not possible because the classes run through mid-September to mid-December, most of which I will be away from Seattle for Dashain-Tihar and hopefully my EuroTour, about which I wrote in the earlier post. SO yeah, yet another quarter goes by where I don't get to do something interesting because I'm not fully rooted, but that's alright. For the time being. I gotta be better at stuff like that.

A bunch of travel plans, some cancelled but some working

 I planned for a couple of hours to go to Cook Islands, yesterday. It didn't work because I'd have to leave in a month or so. Then maybe, I figured, I could take the Amtrak coast liner or whatever to LA, crash at a friend's place, and fly back to Seattle. Nope, because my friend who I was counting on crashing with doesn't have a stable living situation. But you know what I am excited about? Going to Europe, which has become ever more likely. I'm thinking this winter, in December, from DC to Amsterdam. The money right now is 450 which is absurdly affordable (might end up being cheaper than my flight to the East Coast and back, which is a big deal!). Thinking of using Amsterdam as the central location, and travel all across Europe, to Prague and Budapest and uh Italy and France. Probably going to be staying at backpacker hostels because yeah Europe can be priceyyy, but depending on what the room bookings are like in the off-season -- after all central and Western europe is quite cold and rainy in the winter-- might even end up staying up at real hotel rooms.

Am I excited? To meet my family, yes. To visit, visit Europe? Hmmm, mayyybe? Truth be told, I've never actually had a real desire to go to the continent, and the cute urban vistas that wow everybody just don't do it for me, you know? Like maybe I've seen 'em too much in tv, or because I hung out so much in Kathmandu, but I get no buzz off medieval architecture in small towns.

Sooo yeah, hoping that works out.

How you know the girl you invited to for your birthday will not be coming

1. She stopped replying to your messages right after you sent the invitation
   
   
2. She looked at you a bit confused when you asked her, as if she didn't know who you were
    
3. She was not as amused by the carrier pigeons as you thought she would be
   
   
4. She responded to your postcard with a signed return postcard that said "with lots of love"
   
   
5. Her response arrived in heavy colorful paper with gold trims that had words like 'her highness' and 'unfortunately'
   
   
6. She said she'd just remembered a joke, but couldn't tell it to you when you asked
   
   
7. OO no, so sorry, I have my thesis defense at that time, she said, despite not going to school.
   
   
8. "Can I bring my family?"
   
   
9. "Isn't it your third birthday this year?'
   
   
10. "Oh sorry I have to go rioting that day"
    

Late to get up, afternoon nap, tv watching, guilty all day long, hummus and pancake lunch, rice and japanese curry with veggies for dinner, tax and HSA situation just figured out [Mon 31]

 Because I'd gotten to sleep so late in the night before, I almost missed work, but definitely did miss the first meeting of the day. Napped a bit during the day, and then a lot in the evening.

All day long I tried to read and write but couldn't because I felt so drowsy and tired.

Had hummus and pancake for lunch.

watched tv a bunch in the evening, skipped the walk because of other things.

At work figured out I'd been overpaying my taxes, and added a bunch of money I couldn't technically have in my HSA. Need to work on fixing that.

Cooked some japanese curry and rice, air fryed a bunch of frozen vegetables, and that was my dinner.

Went to bed still quite late, since I'd napped during the day, but at a respectable time compared to the several days preceding.

Fifteen things you might find at a bad restroom

1.  A whole load of shit, obviously
   
   
2. Unwanted babies
   
   
3. Drugs, syringes, etcetera
   
   
4.  The sandpaperlike brown toilet papers that should have been turned into kitchen towel
   
   
5. Pools of piss
   
   
6. Fish on aforementioned pools of piss
   
   
7. Sharks
   
   
8. People having bad sex
   
   
9. Turtles
   
   
10. Fox News playing on the tv
    
    
11. Snakes
    
    
12. Cockroaches, lots of cockroaches, I've seen 'em!
    
    
13. Equipment for human sacrifice
    
    
14. Beddings and kitchenware
    
    
15. Breaking Bad Bathtub
    

Eight times Mark was really wronger than Jeremy

1.  Jeremy, as much as an stupid inconsiderate oaf he is, was always better to Sophie than Mark was ever to her, save for the original honeymoon period.
   
   
2. Mark's Love Bombing APril in Series 9 when he was really really out of his mind, and sure Jez gave him bad advice, but Mark wasn't in right state of mind...at all...at that time.
   
   
3. Mark's book-publishing fiasco. Even Superhans was better than him, let alone Jeremy!}
   
   
4. Sales-marketing merger, why Mark was so deluded and out of touch with what was happening at work is unclear to me.
   
   
5. Jez was also so much more considerate and understanding to Dobby than Mark ever was.
   
   
6. This is a risky opinion, but maybe Jez understood Jeff better than Mark did.
   
   
7. The fact that Jeremy keeps in touch with therapy/life-coaching more consistently than Mark, despite them both needing it is hilarious
   
   
8. Besides the "we've been rumbled!" comment by Jez, he was quite astute as a salesman than Mark ever dared to be.
   

Clubbing, partying is hard

SK and I went to Barboza on Friday night. As I have said in the past, Barboza is a place with high variance, it can be really good, or it can be really bad, and on Friday it was quite good. A pair of cute little girls wanting to dance with us all night long, and us having ignored because we were having such a good time.

But the next day, and the day after, maaaan, my body was so goddamn tired. I had a 'hangover', and that was after half a cup of beer, and the lack of sleep, every muscle in my body wsa sore. A terrible experience. Wish I could have done it better, but that's not how it went.

Clubbing, partying, going out is hard now, and my body can't do that sort of stuff anymore. That's the only conclusion one can have now. What. Do?

As a sign of how low things have gotten, what excites me the most is the tingly bodywash from Trader Joe's

 Incredibly boring life has gotten, it has. One of the more interesting things happening in my life has been the tea tingle bodywash, which gives me a tingly cool feeling downstairs when taking a nice shower. The one downside of it is that there's not enough later, it doesn't spread. So now I use two bodywashes: one for the body, and one of the bottom, for the tingle. Which means that I'm using four liquid products while showering now: two bodywashes -- the regular for the body, and the tea tingle for the bottom, shampoo, and the facewash. Oh not to mention the moisturizer that's put on right after. I've got a morning moisturizer...which includes spf30, and evening moisturizer, which doesn't but makes my skin feel really really soft. And that's the most exciting thing to be happening to me right now.

Tubi is not the worst platform

This is supposed to be a compliment these days? Turns out it is. I've been watching a lot more of Tubi app recently after Netflix took away the free usage I was getting from AK. I don't mind the platform honestly, they've got Inbetweeners, Peep show, Scooby doo and some great movies that I'll never watch without being prodded and pushed or getting high. Hmm should work on that maybe. Right, anyway, besides their aggressive marketing which has been sending me emails every other day to remind me to finish watching whatever I was looking at last, and their less-than-stellar user interface, they're a pretty decent app, no problems. The ads are a bit of a pain, but even those I can live with.

Treading water blah blah blah

The last weekend was particularly lazy and unproductive, even by my standards. The clubbing took out all of Friday and Saturday, for the recovery, and Sunday wasn't particularly nice either. Didn't get much done at all. And on Monday I tried to make up for all the time, being overwhelmed and pushing myself further into the pit.

Only thing working out: I started cooking once again. TO begin with it's just Japanese curry with veggies, but a slow start is still a start, with an intent to get somewhere and the motivation to drive it.

The random fantasy stopping me from sleeping

The other night,
When I couldn't sleep
I saw her,
a random person,
generally speaking,
somebody I'd met twice.

That I was in her city,
and she showed me around
I was set
to be married
to somebody else.
Nothing weird
happening.

At the airport,
after I'd bid my family farewell,
we hugged, I saw
and the hug didn't end,
you must come again I heard,
depends on what she wants, I said,
and we were hugging
still
and she sobbed
I was bawling
on and on and on
and there was nothing
in between
us
I'll come visit you,
she said sobbing
I don't know
I said
crying
If I'll meet you|
we just cried and cried and cried
the two of us
until the tears dried out
we hugged some more
our crusty cheeks rubbing
and wistful sighing
and nothing more.

Best batch of Kombucha made, and tried

My best batch of Kombucha, or one that's really close to the best, was had on Saturday. Several days before that I cleared my fridge and fermentation cupboard of old projects and got them all going. Among them was a bottle of kombucha in the fridge that had a little bit of grapefruit juice added. I put in some priming sugar in a bottle, poured the kombucha, and let it build fizz for a few days.

It didn't get fizzy, but the sweetness was just right. The vinegary hit, the fruity aroma, the tartness, and the mild sweetness was just perfect. KU and NA are over in Seattle, and I took it to see them, and tried it with their family. The younger members of the family, who've tried kombucha before, really enjoyed it, that's for sure.

Am I tired of watermelon since our roadtrip?

 I'm usually a big, big fan of watermelon. I've written about the fruit, or rather the bowl of nectar, in detail in the past.

This season though, besides our roadtrip where one wouldn't be wrong to say I overindulged in the glorious red fruit, perhaps to the level beyond, I haven't had much interest in it. It's possible eating several pounds of watermelon every day, increasingly fermenting one at that, over a course of a week may have gotten me a bit satiated with the miracle gift from the gods.

Which is a pity because it's so good, so so so good, but this proves everything must be done in limit, even overindulging in one's favourite fruit. Or the top three anyway.

Relly need to get around cleaning the bedroom

 I have yet to get around to cleaning my bedroom, which has been a total mess for weeks and weeks, and I keep reminding myself there's no urgency, there's time, etcetera, but eventually the day's gotta come, or it'll be a sty for a porky porky pig. There's no way around it, intentions and desires don't count for things like these. You either clean or you don't, there's no try or plan.

Working on losing some of my tummy weight

 As I was going through photos from my Nepal trip, something struck me: that I was letting go quite hard, indulging in wild thing food-wise. No wonder then that my double chin turned all of a sudden into a triple-chin, I gained at least a few pounds to my average weight, not to mention an inch or two on the waist. All because 'I was on a vacation', and that it was okay to indulge sometimes etcetera.

In any case, now I'm working on some of the tummy weight I got over the trip, and uhhh it's not working out, it'll have to be through real workouts if anything to get it worked on. Walking is good but it's not really pushing my heart to the limit, and the caloric intake is just flexible enough that if I walk a bit more than usual one day, I'll have eaten way more than the necessary the following day to make up for it.

SO yeah, it's time I got to my pushups etcetera, no way around it.

At home all day long, minor writing, getting projects prepped, visiting family, trying my goodies, nice home-cooked dinner, great mirth and enjoyment, trouble sleeping, travel plans [Sun 30]

 Was home all day long, didn't do much. Wrote some, cleaned some, got all of my fermentation projects setup, and got some of the packages ready for taking as gift. Made hummus out of my last bit of fermented dal, and it was okay, ate it in sandwich form.

Started talking to a new friend from the UK, we're having trouble figuring out the app for the prefect communication, bummer but whatever.

In the evening got all my goods ready: a bottle of massive chhyang, kefir, and kombucha. I could have walked to belltown but took the train, which fucked me dearly as it came in and departed a minute before the predicted time. Then I missed the bus I could have taken to make my journey considerably shorter. Got to ND's place, which is opposite of AR's place, and met family from Nepal.

Lots of laughing, eating, making fun of each other, etcetera. They graciously tried all of my goodies. The entire family of five appreciated etcetera. Because I had work early in the morning, headed out 10.15 when the younger brother dropped me in his car.

I should have slept but couldn't for unknown reasons, so I was ambling about really trying hard to force myself to sleep. And in the middle of all of this I was planning travel into Cook Islands, New Zealand and Europe, eventually Europe made the most sense. This is also when I was making LA travel plans that was soon abandoned because my friend who I'd be crashing with wasn't available.

Fell asleep very, very late.

Pancake and achar lunch, recovery day, volunteer-interlaken walk with Sk, listening to music at the park for a while, some writing, cheese toastie for dinner [Sat 29]

I woke up at 7, went back to bed and got up finally at 10.30-11 because my body was exhausted from the dancing from the night before.

Spent the entire day recovering and getting my body reset. Had pancake and achar for lunch, that's as authentic Nepali as one can possibly get.

In the afternoon went to Volunteer-Interlaken park with Sk, on the way back we stopped at the Volunteer park and listened to Orchestra music played by some Emmy-winning musician.

Did a bit of writing in the evening, not that much, or any. Put couple of slices of bread in the air-fryer, cheese pieces (cheddar and mozzarella) between them and let the cheese and bread be friends in the heat. That was my dinner. Didn't feel like eating much.

My plants are climbing, my plants are climbing!

My pothos plants have grown large enough, after what, a year(?) of being bought from Amazon that they've started climbing the walls. This is the most exciting stage in my plant-parenting, besides the pothos growing into a giant! I got to use the plant hooks I bought from Temu, to train the climbers into the right way on the walls. Don't know if this will go as I imagine it will, but it already looks impressive, so excited for how this progresses!

I want to write technical posts professionally, but don't know where to start

I want to write like Julia Evans. Short, informative technical posts, explaining complex topics, or exploring new technologies, or telling the story of a technical journey, which in simpler words is telling people what problems came during the course of work and how they were solved.

I told my manager about the situation, since he's suddenly started getting on my back about the importance of communication, and he told me to start with the topics I want to write on. But...like, I don't know what topics I want to write on. How do I even get to the place where it's easy to identify topics to write on? That's an interesting, challenging problem in itself, and the problem domain I work at professionally is specific and small enough that I can't generate enough topics for the larger reader populace.

So I'm lost, confused, frustrated about my inability to get into better technical writing, and not becoming a good technical writer. A thought leader, a thinkfluencer, I don't want to become those necessarily, but I do want to be known as somebody known for their good technical communication skills and their writing. The ideal situation would be if I was hired for new positions based on my writing abilities.

All the projects are back pretty seriously on, y'all

Okay I realize it's just a listing of everything I'm doing, and I don't mind, because that's not happened in a long time. Here we go.

First, the kefir project is coming out splendidly. The texture has been amazing, the flavor has been improving somehow, and I've kind of perfected the ratio of sugar with the exact time the milk needs to stay out of the fridge. I mix the outputs of different batches in the end, and that might be of questionable quality and first consideration, but actually it adds to the complexity of the brew.

Chhang is still happening, I'm rebrewing the two batches I have on-and-off. Waiting for the right time to go to the Asian store to buy sweet glutinous rice and start another batch, that's going to be exciting too.

Kombucha started as well, and I know in the past I've really really messed up my kombucha batches in Seattle, and blamed the starter culture for it. I have no doubt the starter culture was to blame for the slowness in the process, but I was responsible for reducing the airflow in the ferments, thus encouraging alcoholic fermentation too. So this time I'm bubbling air into the mix like using the air pump through a hose, and pumping in the air. That'll make the process faster, and reduce the the booze that forms. Also should get rid of the off flavors once things start moving quicker.

I'm also reprocesing the old batch of kombucha that was ready to finish, it needs a bit of an 'oomph', so I added sugar and bottled it, ready to go, almost a gallon of hard-hitting kombucha. Like I'm really quite shocked, surprised how good it is.

There's also a small batch that needs to be carbonated, added a bit of finishing sugar to it. So yeah.

The bean sprouting projects are of course going pretty decently, I'm learning at a rapid pace.

Next step is to get back into solid-state bean ferments, tempeh and kinema and the likes, that's when I'm more comfortable cooking with the stuff I already have. The last batch of Kinema was..very...pungent, and I'm not certain I want to get back into that situation.

I need to get my (literal) shit together

This has been a series of silly trivial posts but the days are hot, it's the weekend I'm not feeling completely well due to reasons related to the topic of the post. I deserve this.

I've had bit of urgent need to run twice this week, something quite unusual for me because the last time I remember having tummy problems of this specific nature was last...October, and that was due to unrelated reasons.

It's possible the root cause is spicy chili peppers, or the fact that I'm eating a lot lot of bean sprouts. Not that bean sprouts are inherently bad or anything, it's just you need to be prepared to handle the consequences of eating them later. Lots of microbes going inside me, in the gut, making me healthy and strong, but also giving the urgent need to go to the loo.

So yeah, perhaps I need to make sure I'm doing sprouts and spicy food in the evening, and not timing such meals to coincide the resulting runs  with my walk in the park.

Once again I have lost the ability to eat spicy food

 I wrote this title yesterday, when I had no idea of the situation of my tummy today, when I didn't have my shit together once again this week, thanks to the chilli powder I'd used in my sprouted sandwich.

Anyway, it's become quite clear to me that I've lost the ability to eat spicy food. The other day when I did, my stomach itched and tumbled and I had the run at the most inconvenient time. And today...the same thing, a repeat.

Not like I was the Michael Jordan of eating spicy food to begin with, I'm more of a hobbyist spice-eater, but even then this summer has seen me cooking less and less traditional Indian and Nepali curries. Which means eaten less spiced, and spicy foods.

What a pity, I enjoy the slight heartburn and the warmth given by the chili peppers.

Sprout sandwich for lunch, tummy troubles after walk interrupted, evening at La Dive and Barboza, surprising fun, disappointing people, hang and smoke at Sk's, sleep late [Fri 28]

 I'm writing this on the Tuesday after. For lunch I had the Sprout Sandwich. My tummy was in a less than ideal place, I think partly because of the sprouts but it's possible I should have looked at the cheese better because there could have been issues there as well. By sprout sandwich I mean mozzarella, sprouts, tomatoes and pesto sandwich.

In any case, went on a walk with Sk in the afternoon, got terrible tummy troubles, came home halfway through, and the best we can say about the whole thing is, I got home safe and sound with no accidents.

Cleaned up the place, showered and shaved for a bit, and in the evening we headed out. Spent a couple of hours at La Dive, which Sk identified correctly to be a great date spot, I had verbalized it the exact opposite way. We tried going to a couple of different places after including Cha Cha's which had far too long of a line to be worth it, and Havana which was empty as a tech company office in 2023. Eventually we tried Barboza for the second time of the night, and it was fun.

We got one drink each, terrible terrible drink, the worst effing drink I've ever had, it's become much clearer to me since why I quit drinking.

Besides that the music was popping, the people were generally nice and amenable and there were like these two girls by our side who I think were trying to talk to us or dance with us all night long. After a series of confusing things, when one of the girls who I thought was super-cute told me to 'do my thing' but I asked her what she meant and ran away, we were tired and I needed to piss so bad so we bailed out of the place around 12.15, spent some time at Sk's place smoking up and really flying, and I came home. At this point I should have slept but I didn't and somehow went another 2-3 hours without any sleep. Don't know what's up with that, it's possible my body detects foreign substances and doesn't let me go to sleep in their presence.

Mung bean sprouts are tricky things, I tell ya'

 Mung bean sprouts are difficult to deal with, they grow too quick, aggressively, they go bad early. They will smother the other seeds if they're packed too tight, so if you don't spread them out far enough half the seeds will be like old men and the other half will barely have sprouted. And the hulls of the sprouted ones will start fermenting before other seeds have their chance to get their pants out. So doing a big container sprouting for mung sprouts isn't a good idea it turns out. Lentil sprouts, on the other hand, much better idea, comparatively speaking.

Next project: make sweet mung bean soup for the summer, a dessert of sorts, with coconut milk and brown sugar. Can be eaten hot or cold. And cold will be the way I'll go, obviously. Mooncakes too, not hard to make, with added sugar and butter and salt. Such a tantalizing idea, exciting, I'm looking forward to consuming mung beans in other ways besides dal and in sprouted form.

Yucky mung bean pancakes for lunch, ride to Roosevelt, missed picnic, meati not found, amazing chik'n burger and cookies for dinner at next level burger [Thu 27]

 Alright, so it's the Tuesday of the following week, and I can point out to the disappointing events of this day that made me kinda' slow down with the posting in this blog because things didn't go my way at all.

In the morning the excess of mung bean sprouts that weren't doing anything productive was bothering me, so I turned the remaining one into pancakes. They turned out to be...quite horrible, all things considered. The second and third batches were relatively better but that's a low low bar to cross over.

In the afternoon I went to Roosevelt Sq, in North Seattle to attend a picnic. Except midway through something flipped and I didn't want to anymore. So instead I went to Whole Foods which was supposed to be carrying this new mushroom-based meat alternative called Meati. Which I couldn't find there either. Diss on diss on diss. So instead I bought two massive cookies at whole foods and ate them at the food court.

I was about to leave when I saw other people eating vegetarian/vegan burgers at the burger place at the food court, so I ordered a Chik'n burger. And waited for 25 minutes because turns out they were swamped with orders. My hunch was right, I've written about Chik'n burger on this blog, and they're kind of the perfect material to make selleable burger-like materials. It was yummy and spice and darn good. Full review coming later, whenever.

Took the train home and didn't bother writing or nuthin' because things had been quite disappointing throughout.

Seven times Tracey Jordan showed everyone he was the smartest

1. That one time he outwitted Liz and the production team by pretending to be illiterate to really lower expectations for him.
   
   
2. When he went away to hide in 'Africa' which was actually a studio on a warehouse to get what he wanted from the production team.
   
   
3. Him setting up Kenneth the page with the woman, he was clever to take the personality of the charming bumbling southern boy so she'd like Kenneth for his voice
   
   
4. His negotiations with Jack early on when they just met
   
   
5. When he worked on designing and producing the porn-based game nobody else had come up with but he did by working really really hard on it, reflecting the journey of Mozard in Amadeus a bit
   
   
6. "How you doing, Good" "Good, good" "Oprah does good, you're doing well"
   
   
7. When he messed up management's attempt to find a new castmember by spreading the call for auditions far and wide to overwhelm their search.
   

So what are you gonna do?

So what
should I
tell them,
I am asked,
to which
I say,
whatever you want,
the life is yours
and it is
yours to mess-up
Be wise
with your choice
and careful
with your decisions
don't be swayed
by turns and twist
short and urgent
think of what
things might happen
in the long long term
and you do
want to
explore the world
and figure things out
understand yourself
and what you want,
so ask yourself
where you want to be
and where you don't
and put yourself
on the path
that takes you
away from
where you don't
want to be.

Tomato-sprout sandwich for lunch, a hella lotta writing during the day, Volunteer-interlaken walk, leftover rice bowl dinner with egg TJ's cooked chickpeas furikake and fried garlic [Wed 26]

 In the morning I had tomato and dal sprout sandwich for lunch. Toasted four slices of bread in the air-fryer with water thrown in, cut the sprouts and tomatoes, mustard, horseradish, mayo on the bread, plus big crumbles of feta on the bread, and it was a satisfying healthy meal that didn't take a long time to make.

Went to the standard volunteer-interlaken walk, except this time around I was confusingly tired for no clear reason? Perhaps because I didn't take my vitamins in the morning?

Came back, wrote a tonne of posts on this blog, basically got all of March done, and made rice bowl with leftover rice, TJ's frozen chickpeas, furikake, fried garlic, and achar. Yum, yum yum. A fried egg thrown in there and it was heaven. Staple, simple meal, the old time way.

Had trouble sleeping in the evening because of family talks about a situation in the evening, but also there was something important and due in the evening and I couldn't go without properly fixing it.

On the pain of a batch of a very messed up batch of pancakes

It was beans
Moong beans
Sprouted
And blended
And added with
flour all-purpose
And a little bit of
-- or it should have been --
a lot of
baking powder,
because  friend told me
it's good.

I got
overconfident,
that one's on me.
Put an entire
panful
of pancakes
without doing
a test run.
Too runny
the mix was
not enough
to hold together
and so
The first two cakes
were more of
gruel, than otherwise.
Bitter, bitter,
oily gruel
For I had
Overdone the
Powder of baking.
It
looked
disgusting.

I tried again,
added more flour
and a bit more waster
and eventually,
things got alright
kinda,
they were still
bitter, thanks to the powder
but they were solid
and round
and well cooked.
They didn't have
the texture
of gruel,
the biggest win
there ever was.

It was painful
eating the gruel cakes
with the spicy sauce
but one must suffer
to learn better,
and so I did.

Jambu and the big blue house

Not a day went by without Jambu walking across the bright blue house a dozen times. He took the roundabout way to the shops, he had his online taxi stop right in front of the house, and went on walks for no other reason to look at the house.

What was about the house that was so interesting? Jambu didn't know what was pulling him towards the new construction. There was no romantic interest, the young man had wracked his brain trying to remember if he had seen anybody in there at all. It looked occupied, but no inhabitant had been seen. The architecture wasn't particularly unique or interesting, and the color, while it may have been unusual, didn't deserve the interest. Perhaps it was the novelty of having a new building in the neighborhood. After all, the newest house beside the building in the neighborhood had been built over two decades ago. The city had changed, neighborhoods had popped up and sprouted towards the skies like mushroom after a spring rain, but this part of the town, the old settlement remained unchanged. Except the alluring new house.

Up late so late due to earlier night sleep, pancake leftover lunch, bus to and from Hau Hau, enjoying the rain, decent reading and writing, sprouts and noodles salad for dinner, timely sleep [Mon 24]

 Got up on time and out of my mind because there was barely 4 hours of sleep thanks to sleep problems from the night earlier. So attended a couple of meetings and went bad to sleep until 9 or so.

For lunch I had the pancakes from the day before, with trader joe's sweet and spicy Asian sauce. Note to self: do not overheat egg-based pancakes or else they get rubbery.

In the afternoon I took the bus to Hau Hau, and back from there. Did a decent bit of shopping, though unfortunately didn't get the glutinous sweet rice that I was looking for. Took the bus because it was going to rain, and also 12th down that way is not a specially fun walk.

It was raining on my trip back, had to walk for couple of minutes from the bus to home in the rain. Enjoyed the rain for a while. It had been so long! It wasn't much, but a welcome respite form the killer heat that had been bothering us in recent times.

Got decent amount of reading, and writing here done.

so lazy for dinner, so made sprouts sadheko with shin ramyun. It was spicy, not as crunchu as I remembered, but pretty decent.

Went to bedroom by 9.30, asleep at a very decent and respectful time, don't remember when.

That was the sweet day of mine!

Printing posters online, gotta make a collage from google docs

I need to print posters for my apartment because that's what I've gotten into, and my apartment walls look kinda empty. Need to find cheap-ish places to print custom posters. Found a website in shortrunposters.com. Sketchy-looking website, but feels fine otherwise. Whatever.

To print a poster I need material to print. I've got images from the generated pics from AI work from last months. And texts from all the various hindu myths I'm reading. They need to be combined. Photoshop is overkill and I don't know how to use it. What do?

Oh that's right, I'll use google docs! In sheets you can literally specify the size of the canvas you want to start with. And it's all as easy and resizing and changing text colors and fonts!

Done, and done! Hurray!

Thank Subway gods I didn't shit my pants today

 My story begins yesterday, when I went to Hau Hau market and brought a jumbo, which is a MASSIVE jar of spicy chili crisps in oil. It was more price effective than the tiny jars I bought in the past, and I'd have to buy more jars anyway, so the large jar was completely worth it.

In a move that could be considered a misjudgment, I had rice earlier today with the chilly crisp (among other things). Yeah, that was spicy. No I didn't remember the spicyness after having finished my lunch.

Then in the afternoon I went on a walk, much earlier than normal because it was cool outside, and I wanted to make sure the walk was not missed today.

At about the halfway mark my tummy rumbled, but I persisted. I used my trained sphincter muscles to subdue to bowel movement, and for several minutes on, nothing serious happened. Got back to volunteer park, didn't even consider using the restrooms there because why bother?

On my way back, the rumblings started to get more violent. The pressure needed to resist the downward force generated by my body increased. I was stopping, pretending to check my phone, but really trying so hard to not shit my pants as I walked.

I needed to do a realistic assessment of the situation. Ten minutes away from home, seven if I tried real hard. Maybe even five. Can I make it, I asked myself. The answer was, there's a possibility I might.

Which is the wrong wrong answer. One of the many wrong answers to that question.

Had to make a quick decision. fortunately I was on the 14th street, crossed a block to go to the 15th. Thought about going to Safeway but it was too far away. Subway was the only place that was close by. But they said no public restrooms there on large notice outside the door!

I sat down on the stairs for a moment. Checked my phone. What were my options? There weren't many. I'd make the jump.

Went in to the subway, bought a cookie for less than 90 cents (really good price, right? i should check the store more often! I've been paying couple of dollahs for those in fancier places!) and asked if they had restroom access for customers. They did. Got the key, went to the restroom, and shat my heart out. And shat and shat. Such. A. Big. Relief.

The cookie was quite tasty too, by the way.

What a close call, yikes. Big yikes.

Dehydrating again!

Quick one, since I've been procrastinating all day long on it...

I wrote yesterday about how my sprouting was going well, but I had encountered the issue of consuming the sprouts in all their various forms since mung bean sprouts can be pretty...okay. And that I'd made pancakes out of them.

In a very unrelated and desperate move, the dehydrate function of my air-fryer was used today, and all the mung beans were dehydrated at 175F for several hours until they were crispy and ready to shatter. I was considering powdering that too, but a step too far for me, that one. Powdering my dehydrated goodies has rarely worked. The dry sprout will now go into my dal, and we'll see how things move from there.

But I'm dehydrating again, just like good old days of Seattle, that's gotta be exciting things ahead for me!

On the cacophony of hot summer Seattle afternoons

 somebody
just shut down
the loud noises
outside my windows
on summer afternoons
when the pane
must stay open
for fear
of turning my room
into an oven
but oh the sounds
they drive me crazy
with their sirens
and bangs
and godfucking
loudspeakers
at midnight and beyond,
and one wonders
how anyone
ever manages
to stay in peace
in all
this
cacophony.

take
a
long
breath
bud,
I remind myself
things will be okay.
Let's go on a walk.
Walk.
that fixes everything.

Y I K E S

 for no
reason at all
my heart palpitates
and not
in the good way.
the only response
that I know
is
distraction,
forget what's happening
inside of me
and outside
and focus on
something that is
eventually
inconsequential
hoping
the palpitations
go away
just
like
that.

what a load
of bullcrap
i say
everytime
to no end
and for what?
the pattern
repeats
over and over
but will it
ever be over?

now you know
why i am
addicted
to the internet
and why
social media
is not my friend.

Seed sprouts going well, need to up the game, though

Started yet another round of sprouting lentil seeds and mung beans.

Have turned a batch into two servings of pancakes, and a dinner out of salad after mixing with dry noodles.

I will also make sandwiches out of the sprouts obviously.

Want to try to ferment/break down the the mung mash and see if the amylase enzyme can be used to do anything productive.

But I really really need to find a winning use case for the sprouts, and frying them in rice is not it because the roots get really stringy and sticky.

Also the roots are kind of annoying and we need to fix that situation.

Right now the sprouted plants are too root-bound and not enough on the shoots because I'm growing them tight in large jars. They're not clean and straight, all curled up. The next stage is to grow them single-layered in a nice flat container, and let them be leggy, so I can throw out the roots. Also the hulls are kind of annoying, they're almost pure cellulose, and none of the washing and cleaning has been able to get rid of them, need to find a cleaner method to fix that.

Lot more happening here, will update progress as it happens.

Seven times Jerry was so callous and mean in Seinfeld

1.  Remember the virgin, who ends of with JFK junior later, but how awful they were to her, primarily Jerry who broke the rule of confidence between himself and his partner?
   
   
2. How about that time he broke up with the girl who was otherwise incredible and nice and cool, except he felt emasculated by her large hands, and found them too be too masculine, more than his own hands?
   
   
3. Oh and the time he cheated on Courtney Cox's character, he just ambles about, starts dating this girl and basically forgets about her, until she discovers there's another girl. Sure they may not have been exclusive necessarily but the way she reacts at the discovery of the other girl suggests actually she was under the impression they were!
   
   
4. He knew the woman was Milosz's wife, and that he'd sent her over to fix things up, but he was ready to take it on if she was okay. Sounds wrong!
   
   
5. What the hell was wrong with him, when he broke up with the incredible girl who previously dated Newman, only because Newman and her had broken up previously, for him to think if she wasn't good enough for the mailman, she definitely wasn't good enough for him!
   
   
6. How can anybody forget the time he intentionally sabotaged a mutual friend's relationship with her husband so he could finally date her long-term after waiting a long time, despite being well-aware he was not the sort to date somebody as nice for long!
   
   
7. And what was wrong with the girl that everybody was thankful he was seeing, and he just got weirded out and broke up with her even though she was perfect on paper because he had a weird feeling there was something wrong with her, despite not being able to figure out what it was exactly!
   

Early morning walk with SK and mk, talk to friends in East Coast, mung bean pancakes for lunch, the killer heat disables me basically, mozz-tom-pesto pressed sandwich dinner, can't sleep at night until vey late, very latenight dinner [Sun 23]

 Went to Volunteer-interlaken walk with MK and Sk at 10 in the morning. We skipped the golf this morning because I went to bed really late at night and didn't have the energy to do much. We walked by the cafe near volunteer park and noticed the line was very long, makes sense they wouldn't open rest of the week because they don't need to. Can make all their money in the two weekend days!

Talked to N, and NG from east coast for an hour each, so that was a solid chunk of time talking.

Pureed the mung bean sprouts, added two eggs, and a little bit of all-wheat flour and turned that into pancakes, had that with cottage cheese and spicy sauce from Trader Joe's. What the hell does one do with so much cream cheese I need to figure out. Massive mistake in buying the raw material.

It got really really really hot in the afternoon, I was basically non-functional and relaxed and drank water, couldn't read or write or anything because the heat was intolerable.

For dinner I wanted something light because I didn't feel hungry at all due to the heat. So I made mozzarella-pesto sandwich once more for dinner.

However I couldn't sleep at all, and was distracted by people texting and calling me, so until 1.30 in the morning I was still up, which is bad because work starts at 6am. So I got up and ate a very big serving of fried rice from the day before. It probably helped me going to sleep.

Yummy pressed moz-tom-pesto sandwich for lunch, self-walk to arboretum-interlaken-volunteer, it's berry time!, tired, long nap, fried rice with eggs and the rest, relaxed day, Unicorn with Sk, lazy night in, home by midnight, sleep late [Sat 22]

 Had mozzarella-tomato-pesto sandwich for lunch, because I had way too many tomatoes that are about to go bad, and also how am I not done with all that mozzarella yet is not clear yet.

In the early afternoon I went to Arboretum, Interlaken park and volunteer park, and got too tired, and hurt my legs for no good reason. I think it was the sun and the killer heat that sapped me of all my energy.

The good part of the walk was that berries season is here again, so I ate half-dozen of the berries on my walks, so that as good.

Got back, read for 30 minutes, slept for 3 hours, and felt so very relaxed. Bad idea, because it'd fuck up my sleep cycle.

Made fried rice with eggs for dinner, the eggs being from the day before.

At 7-8 in the evening, went to Unicorn bar with Sk, chilled, he got 2 drinks, I got one 0% beer. We wanted to explore many other places but got lazy and high, went to his place to do it again, and never went out. Sk played fifa at home.

Came home at 12, but somehow couldn't sleep for the next two hours, probably because of the 3-4 hour nap in the evening.

Random observation from the other day

You know, some friends, you ask them what their plans are next weekend or the weekend after or couple of days from now and they're busy and otherwise occupied, they'd be happy to meet you but at a different time, and then when you tell them, yo i'm at so-and-so bar, can you come in thirty minutes or less, they show up in thirteen, what's up with that? Strange, no? Discovered during our Unicorn talks yesterday with Sk.

Egg and tomato curry with rice for lunch, get my temu orders, relaxed walk to and from Volunteer park, not much writing [Fri 21]

 Made some of the tomato-and-egg curry Chinese-style for lunch, because I have too much tomato and eggs at home, and I was tired of eating whatever else I was eating. Also the tomatoes at home really really need to be finished.

In the afternoon I got my temu orders, in retrospect they're mostly a disappointment, except I guess the moisture works.

Didn't get around to writing much, but played a couple of games of age of empires.

Went on a walk to Volunteer Park, read a bunch in the evening, slept without going out. Didn't feel bad or miss out on anything.

We didn't even make it beyond the closest bar, part 38 or something

Because this weekend was crazy crazy busy in Seattle SK and I figured we had to go out and about and so we went to Unicorn the local bar at about 8 in the evening. Yeah, the first mistake because it's already too early for a bar. He got two drinks, I got zero % alcohol beer but I was slightly high from a joint at his place earlier.

We talked and noshed, and there was a really pretty girl across the table from us with an interesting top who I should have talked to, it is her I refer to as Celtic divinity in one of the earlier posts, but they went away, and we just fizzed out. On to another bar, we decided, but Sk needed more weed. So we headed way of his apartment. i need a sweater, I said, because it was too cold, and I need a light jacket or something to be comfortable out.

We went to his place, smoked some more, ant this was about 10 in the evening. We promised we'd leave in 10.20 latest otherwise we'd never make it back. I told him multiple times I was down to go as long as we'd do it quick because otherwise I'd get lazy.

He played a bit of fifa.

And the next thing we know, it's 11.45 in the morning, there's not much happening, and I go home because I'm tired as hell, it's late at night and I need to sleep.

That was it, we went to a bar at 7.30 and back home by 10 even in the wildest weekend in Seattle for what is probably going to be years and years.

Yeah, we're boring, so very boring and old, what's new?

Leftover ramen lunch, haircut finally, room clean vacuum and steam, phone talks, grilled cheese early dinner, accidental drunk again, just enough writing [Thu 20]

Writing this at 11.19 PM yes it's late to go to bed, but I've been...not in the best senses today okaay so gimme a break bud!

For lunch I had leftover ramen. Work was generally productive, though I do wish I'd be significantly more productive generally speaking.

Had call with various friends and family members during the day, including DD who's trying to set me up with her second cousin but it never works out somehow, ever.

Got a shower after work, went to get a decent haircut, took second shower of the day.

Cleaned, vacuumed and steamed my living room, it feels so so good now, forrealies.

Didn't write enough posts because I was so busy during the entire day.

In the evening I tried some of the leftover rice wine because I had to clean out the container and figured there was probably no booze left in there. Wrong! So much booze, I got a bit tipsy in a good way and didn't get anything productive done for the rest of the day!

Rebrewing some of the rice brews

I did something wild with my rice-wine brews.

The problem I was trying to solve was this: squeezing out the liquor from rice is a labor intensive process that leaves lots of rice leftover that goes to waste, plus wasted alcohol in the rice.

There is lots of sweetness available inside the rice grains that never gets used because it's deep within the grains.

The solution? Make a liquor smoothie! Blitz it all! And that's what I did with the remaining two gallons of chhyang.

But because I'd be blitzing lot of rice stuff, I had to add significant amount of water to dilute the whole drink.

Diluting the drink would make it less flavorful and make it less alcoholic. The solution? Put it outside to let it ferment more for a couple of days!

So I'm refermenting two batches of rice wine.

Unfortunately for me, the two batches are acting extremely differently, one has alcohol settling down at the bottom of the container but the liquor is clear, and the other has alcohol on top but the alcohol is cloudy.

Unclear what's happening, but I'm keeping an eye out for further changes, and will really really hardcore blend the one where the booze is turgid because that's the first time it's happened for me.

Work in progress more updates incoming.

A bit of a loner I have become, and that is welcome for the moment

 I have become a bit of a loner, possibly, as I haven't been hanging out with a wide variety of people on a weekly basis. Talking to and seeing people daily went by the wayside a long time ago, and these days, meeting and hanging out to people on weekends is getting rarer. Sk is one of my rare human contacts.

I don't specially mind though. Because I need a kick in the...head, I guess...to push myself over to the next phase of my life, to be outgoing, or whatever I need to do, being limited in social outings or interaction will certainly give me the thirst, desire to make important decisions in life that I might otherwise not have because I was too comfortable with everything else going on.

Also it opens up so much time for writing and exploration and reading and walking and hobbies obviously.

Still, it'd be nicer if there was a large group of people that invited me to parties and to hangout on a regular basis, obviously. I'm not crying even when there's none, though.

I could see how some people would find this arrangement, specially if it lasted for months or years and with the absence of my family and friend support group, horrible, and turn into social outcasts or awful people.

My second temu order is here!

 Was here. The day before yesterday. Most of it was plants stuff, the ph meter works maybe, the light meter is kinda' useless because all it tells me is 'dark' and 'bright', and the moisture meter is the only one that gives the semblance of even working. It's helped me figure out if I'm only slightly overwatering or massively overwatering my plants, and what the hell is up with the bird of paradise plant (turns out it's wet in the bottom, dry on top).

I haven't tried the plant ties, or the hooks to hold the pothos to walls, I don't expect them to fail particularly.

The one big fat failure I'm kinda really pissed off about is the brook holder stickon. It just wouldn't stick on the wall and fell down way before I put on the broom. Thinking of using one of those other stick-ons to hold the jig together on the wall.

I had really low expectations, and my expectations weren't undermet.

Where the hell does one find hydroponic seeds anyway?

 I couldn't find hydroponic seeds for my aerogarden-type system in the nearby hardware store because apparently it's not the right season. Target is not selling it, temu is not selling it (yes, eyeroll) and ace hardware isn't selling either. Amazon's probably got it but I ain't got no prime nomore, so that's not a viable option at least for the next six months.

In all the hydroponics planning, the difficulty in finding the seeds of the chilli and cherry tomato plants was not one of the considerations. What has life come to.

By defeating your ego, you control the primary weapon of desire

Desire, by itself, is not unwinnable.

It is when it arms itself with potent weapons that it gets to its full power. And among them, Ego is its prime tool to control its targets.

The goal of ego control is..there are many, but by defeating your ego, you control the primary weapon through which desire gets hold of you. You will desire, but not for your self, not immediately, not to make you feel better, or to undo others because they embarrassed you or something. It will appear rather frail and skinny, anemic even, without being pumped up by ego. Easily defeatable in its entirety, desire will thus have become.

So yet another to keep your ego in check is to take a hole of your desires through this roundabout way.

Seattle summer, burning bright, just give me a little bit of a respite

It is hot
Oh Seattle
Summer
Burning bright
Give us mortals
A bit of a respite
Go hide
Behind the clouds
Or give us
Thunderous rains
Let the winds
Chill and blow
And get gloomy
For a day
or two.
When I'm out
The shadows are
My friends
for
My skin burns
When the rays
Of sun
touch me
yet oh shadows
So cool and mellow
they make me
want to keep going,
let there be
a bit of shadow
to the whole season,
I pray to thee.

Eighteen random things, you WON'T BELIEVE number thirteen

1.  Sugar
   
   
2. Leeches
   
   
3. Going to libraries for the express purpose of taking photos there!
   
   
4. Interior deigning
   
   
5. Anoushka Shankar
   
   
6. Unexplained feeling of nostalgia to past you never lived in
   
   
7. Ants on plants
   
   
8. Someone nobody likes because he's awful to everybody around him
   
   
9. Plane ride
   
   
10. Paul Krugman? Paul Krugmn!
    
    
11. Expanding galaxies
    
    
12. Set theory
    
    
13. Desire to create something new, that ends up creating more problems than it solves
    
    
14. The one with The Moon as his hair clip
    
    
15. Fluffy sweater on that girl at the bar yesterday who could have been of the Celtic divinity, the girl I mean, though the wool could have come from a divine beast too, it's possible
    
    
16. Murchunga
    
    
17. Beans
    
    
18. Rebranding a popular brand to one that everybody hates and nobody's heard of
    

The stupid AI beat me and I'm not happy

It was
The game of empires
And I was the great
Indian emperor
With hordes of
Elephants and horses
And camel archers
And the bravest
Of hand fighters
At my disposal.
And an unlimited
Supply
Of all resources,
Thanks to the
Great bounty
Provided
By the gods.

I don't need,
I thought
Military tactics
And strategies,
My great many
Resources
Are enough
To overwhelm the enemy.

My adversaries,
On two sides of the map
And controlled
By an intelligence artificial
Sent their spies in
Figured out my tactics
Simple as they were,
And charged at me
From either direction.
My forces, armed as they were
With the most
Expensive of weapons
Were no match
For the enemy's
Superior numbers,
Tactics, and logistics.

And I lost,
Pretty quick into the game.
Alas.

Oh yeah, it's THAT time of the year again

It's time for the Capitol Hill Block party! Which means there's going to be two days of nonstop music playing, three or four different stages in the couple of blocks around me. Day AND night! Fun! I've never been, but it's long and loud and the people are rowdy and drunk and kinda' horny and needy and it's not the stage of life I'd enjoy being with. But at least there's people who're having fun and I get to feel like I'm in the middle of everything, so hurray!

Other things happening in Seattle this weekend: Taylor Swift concerts, two days in a row, massive massive crowds expected at the Stadium. Then the Canadian team is coming to play some game or other on the other stadium, which means even more people! There's paramore, which is a popular band though nowhere near as popular as TSwift, they're also playing in town over the weekend. And oh, some sort of massive conference is happening around the same time I'm told, so this town gonna be poppin'!

Pity I'm going to be part of barely any of it. but still, kinda exciting right?

SPC market, a trip to, and a review of

 I went to SPC market, the Indian store that was beyond South Jackson that recently moved to Madison Ave.

It was...alright. It's small, not terribly wells-stocked, but they have all the essentials. Not too overpriced, but they're not well-organized either.

If I were them, I'd add more variety of offered items, organize the store better and make it nicer, and offer a larger variety of pre-cooked foods.

Oh yeah, I didn't try that but they offer pre-cooked food over there as well.

So I'll go there when I need to buy bhujia or Indian raw ingredients and the likes. Not a place for regular grocery shopping though. For that I have my Hau Hau market, which I have actually not been to this year, not yet.

On the one major downside of not being on social media

 This is embarrassing, I'll keep it short.

The major downside of not being on social media is a serious disadvantage in finding new friends or partners. First your social options are severely limited to people you already know and interact with physically. And the latter is limited too since I'm not like out and about all the time. Secondly, it's become clear to me that people get to trust somebody new based on their social media activity and judge people on social media content. When I'm not on Meta properties basically, that's a massive red flag to lots of folks, and they don't consider me seriously. That's a massive loss for me. But ugh. If that's the cost of maintaining my sanity and self-control, so be it. I can't, can't can't get in. Nuh nuh nuh. If that's the price, I will pay it. Fuck you fuckrbrg.

Overfeeding on news on China

I've been consuming far, far far too much news on China. It's gotten almost to the point of obsession. Their demographics, economics, growth rate, employment rate, commercial real estate situation, the real estate in general, how the government might get out of the current hole, what the things to do the opposite of the right thing would be, how they could make it even worse, and so on and on.

The good news is the news consumption on Ukraine has died down completely, ever since Prigozhin the tease bailed out of his grand coup anyway, what a tease, almost a month ago. Way more self-control on that aspect, but not so much on the new topic.

And it's this desire to have things happen, but not to me or near me. Ideally exciting interesting things, good or bad, happen far far away, where I will never have to bear the consequences but I can still watch history play out in real time.

It's a lame hobby, I know.

And it's gotten really tiring too, if I'm writing about it now it's already gone way beyond the point of acknowledgement, to actively dealing with it.

Still, there are legitimately interesting things happening and yeah me knowing or not knowing doesn't matter one whit, but!

Price of haircut has gone up by a lot and I'm okay with it

 Got a haircut today, I look nice! For the first time in my life, possibly, I told the barber to do whatever she wanted, and not just make it as short as she would be willing to. The sides are slightly longer than I had hoped, and the rest of the head is not short at all, but I look nice, and not like one of those people who can't be bothered to get a haircut often so they'll just get a haircut every six months or so and get it trimmed as short as legally possible. Like haircut is a part of self-expression it turns out, and ignoring it entirely doesn't make it go away, yeah?

In any case, they used to charge 20 bucks, and I'd add 5 bucks to make it 25, which was way way wayyy cheaper than anything else anywhere nearby, and about the same price I've paid for the last twelve years of my stay in this country. Today they asked for 25 buckaroos. And I happily paid that, plus five extra because this is still by far the cheapest, the cut was pretty decent, and they try really really hard to be friendly and talkative with their customers. I was not as amicable as I could have because....there was not much to talk about, was there, considering how infrequently I go, but still they tried and it was awkward and the extra tip was an acknowledgement of the weirdness.

Yeah everything's going up in price, and I'm proud to support hardworking vietnamese immigrants, folks like myself who are underpricing themselves to get a foothold in the tough world out there.

Hopes of chance re-encounter

It is true,
Old friend
Maybe just a classmate,
Whose names
Rhymes with carseat
That our encounters
May have been random
And completely by chance
And always unacknowledged
Though aware on all sides
I am sure,
that I pretended
They were not a big deal
but when I go
On evening walks
all by myself
or with one walking friend
I do
Secretly hope
To see you
And run into you
To call you out
And acknowledge
the whole ridiculous
Situation.

It doesn't matter
If it goes nowhere
Just the fact that
We,
Two random
bits of stone
tumbling down the river of life
Have tumbled
Into each other
Once more,
Seemingly out of nowhere.
It ain't a miracle,
But it's something for sure!

I make a massive ramen bowl for lunch, lots of writing, volunteer-interlaken walk with Sk and Mk, latenight PB sandwich [Wed 19]

Made a massive ramen bowl for lunch. By which I mean a 20-item ramen soup with two eggs, homegrown green onion and so many other yummy things. This was also the time I discovered my big white bowl is so massive, I can dump my large boiling water into it without spilling over.

Wrote for basically all of February, but didn't get around to completing posts for this day and the day before, because after you've written 35 posts, you're kinda' spent and don't want to write for an hour or so it turns out. And in that hour lots happened. Etc.

In the evening headed out to Volunteer park all by myself. Only after getting there did Sk reach out to ask if I wanted to go on a walk. Too a round or two of the park, and waited for him. Read couple of pages of Doniger's Redeeming the Kamasutra meanwhile. Took a round of the park and couple of rounds of Interlaken. Discovered...or more like, stumbled into a new trail at Interlaken. Kinda' confusing but lotsa fun.

Thought I wouldn't have to eat in the evening, having eaten half of the massive bowl of the ramen and what not, but turns out I was still hungry. So I ended up making a peanut butter and brown sugar with banana sandwich into wee hours of the night just so I could go to sleep.

Phonecall with a new friend, mozzarella tomato sandwich for lunch, watering plants, heavy writing, walk keeps getting delayed until it doesn't happen [Tue 18]

In the morning wasn't feeling like working and thought of calling day off but didn't end up doing it because ack worth at least giving a shot right, I thought.

Had phonecall with a new friend in the morning, at first it was hard to stretch it out but it got easier as time went. Not a terrible call all things considered.

Kept working until later than usual. Made mozarella tomato pesto sandwich for late lunch.

Watered my plans in the afternoon, and wrote a decent amount.

Thought of going out for walk, but it was too hot, and then got distracted by something or other, until the walk didn't happen at all. I've noticed all my summer walks in July end up like that. Like I claim I want to go on a walk but something or other comes up and it never happens. Such Bs. Ahh.

What else? Don't remember a think from later in the evening, even though I'm writing this only two days later. Got that one photo ugh. This was definitely one of those 'zip by' days where everything is a blur. Could also have been the smoothie I just had but probs not.

Roti-tarkari lunch, exhausted for some reason, daylong nap [Mon 17]

 I'm writing the journal for this day the evening of the following day. I didn't write anything on this day because I was really tired and fell ill for some reason and didn't feel like doing anything.

Had roti-tarkari for lunch, closed the shutters of my room, listened to podcast, and slept until the evening. Got up in the evening, had some fruits, read a bit, and went back to bed. That's basically all I did the entire day, worked and slept. Which I guess is what 90% people do anyway, but this is a rarity for me, particularly in more recent times.

Samurai ramen and chinese baked goods with WC, chhyang processing, Greenlake chill and hang with comedy friend and friends, latenight home, objectionable things seen [Sun 16]

 I didn't write anything on Sunday because I was too busy, and then too tired by the time I got home in the morning.

Skipped golf in the morning because BC didn't want to go.

Went to Chinatown on the train, talking to NG and giving him career advice now that he's going to the UK for grad school.

Waited for 20 minutes for WC at this Japanese restaurant while on the phone, but their wait was 1hr-2 hrs, so we decided to go somewhere else. Unable to find a good place to eat, we ended up at Samurai Ramen where I had tofu rice bowl for lunch. It was alright. I don't want to say I could have done better, but if I had tried it's possible.

Later we went to the Chinese bakery I'd been earlier with AKy and spent like 35 bucks on yummy items. WC and I tried a bunch of them right on the park by the gate, then he dropped me home. I squeezed out a bottle of chhang real quick, packed the cookies and picnic blanket and took the train to Greenlake.

At Greenlake I met N, her husband who was my comedy friend, and their grad school friends. Great fun conversations were had for a couple of hours, the bottle of chhyang was easily finished. Plans were made to hang out again, and I was exhausted. I'd gotten there at 3.30 and by now it was 8.30.

Took the bus to UW, where I saw a man openly pissing on the street, yuk, does public urination and nakedness rules not apply to the homeless I wonder, and other homeless people being gross at the station, took the train home, and probably slept or something. I remember being really really tired, which can mean either I slept real easy or real hard.

Ghiu-bhat lunch, apartment gets arranged finally, so much writing, volunteer-interlaken walk with Sk, derry girls and dinner at Sk's [Sat 15]

 Ate ghiu-bhat-achar for lunch, because there was bhat left but not much else, and man I've been feeling so tired lazy and hott to cook anything good in the afternoons.

In the morning, took care of my plants and finally re-arranged my living room to look nice. All it needs now is a nice couple of rounds of vacuuming and steaming and it'll me squeaky clean and comfortable. Just very very hot to be functional in during the summer ugh.

Got 10 posts for the month, and about 30 journal posts for May written. Which means I'm only about a week away from writing the journal posts for all the missing months, Feb Mar and April. There's a slight but real and titillating possibility I might be able to backdate a lot of regular posts just to 'make up' for the lost months despite committing to not do that. Because if it's so easy, why not? At the rate of 20 posts per day, that's just like two weeks. An incredible amount of writing no doubt, but first that doesn't have to be any good, and second if it makes me look better in front of the future self, could be totes worth it.

In the evening Sk and Mk came down to my apartment, we walked to Interlaken And Volunteer parks, as has been the standard for weekends. On the way back I stopped at my place and picked up couple of pieces of supplies including chhang, went to his place where he made dinner and had chhang and rice, a bit of a smoke and watched Derry girls until wee hours of the night. Left only during the last episode of the last season when the awkward conversation between friends came up and I couldn't take it anymore.

Hey you, it's me, how is it

Hey you,
It is me,
How is
Hope you are doing fine
I am fine too
How is your job, bt dub
Yeah mine's also a dud.

How many sibs have you got,
And what do you like to eat
What's your opinion on booze and pot
How about fish and meat?

Oh and what do you do for fun
and where are your friends
I went on a trip, the other day
and on weekends I go on a long run
Oh you went to the party
When are you thinking of getting a license
Me too, I think that youtuber makes zero sense
And oops now, we're running out of time

Talk to you later, bye bye bye
Until then we'll have to find
More topics to explore, oh my
Not that they matter, the answers don't
Something has to, surely
But it's unclear what it is that really does.

How about next week, same time, same day
come up with a list of topics, yeah?
More often, maybe not right now
Perhaps let's think of it over the chat.

Here are the ten solutions to all the problems and everybody else is just too stupid to figure it out

FYI.This is sarcasm.

1. Make rich people pay more taxes! That way you can use that money to make lives better, and more upwardly mobile for poor people! Why doesn't everyone use this weird trick!?!
   
   
2. Increase the cost of fuels to include the externalities they have on the planet! If it costs five times as much, so what, people would stop using less of it! IF it increases the cost of everyday items, it just means everyday items were being subsidized!
   
   
3. Don't let anybody get rich! Rich people are bad, as is commonly known. So if you tax people enough so they don't get rich, they'll never be bad! And you can use that money for the good of the society!
   
   
4. Force companies to do whatever the employees say! What's so hard to understand that? Companies are made of people, and people pay taxes. Ergo, if you want taxes, you need to empower people. Companies work for people, not the other way round, so have all companies run by their employees! All problems solved!
   
   
5. Punish greedy companies! Companies don't need so much profits! Have them stop making profits, and give them to poor people or employees instead! The whole society profits!
   
   
6. Free education for all, everywhere, no questions asked! Lodging and boarding included! Do I even NEEED to say anymore?
   
   
7. Free healthcare for all, and free medication too! Everything is covered, and no procedure is excluded. ALL SOCIAL ILLS DONE!
   
   
8. No more houses. No new construction for 50 years! Nature heals, evil companies don't profit, normal people are able to afford houses, existing homeowners can rely on them as good investments. It's only good side-effects people, why nobody does this is beyond us!
   
   
9. Rent Controls. Everywhere. Fix rents to today's money for 25 years. Done. Evil landlords suffer but who cares they're already swimming in money, poor people get great deals, and society becomes the ultimate utopia.
   
   
10. No immigration. America is for Americans, AMIRITE folks!?!
    

Greenlake surprised me with its shockingly young vibe

Silly stuff, the content is exactly what the title says.

I expected the demographics of Greenlake picnickers to be young families and the elderly, turns out there were way wayyy more younger single people that I had anticipated. A bit of a bummer cos' had I known that I'd have visited the place more often than I have in recent times.

My walking route of Volunteer-Intelaken is on the more...older...and elderly side, and there's not many people in their twenties or early twenties. That was my projection for the Greenlake, because why would it be any different? Turns out I was wrong, pleasantly for a time, and then with a bit of a disappointment and regret.

I discovered Danielou is a shishya of Karapatri Swami, and it's okay

 Alain Danielou who is the author of Hindy Myths and Gods, a book I've enjoyed quite a bit, who quotes a certain 'Karapatri' quite liberally in the book, turns out he's the Swami's discipline, and was initiated to Shaivism by the swami. One the one hand, ugh, but on the other hand, the material is solid, the guy is respected by serious academics, and we do happen to be on the same side of the divine following. Like his arguments are all quite reasonable, and his work extremely reasonable and approachable. But still. Interesting to know he was of the faith. 

Also a bit of a bummer he just passed away three months ago. He was around when I started reading the book! I could have corresponded with him!

Ugh.

I don't know who or what is making the ominous-sounding speaker announcements on my streets, but it's not good

 There's this awful guy, or organization, or system that goes about in a vehicle of some sort making pronouncements and announcements over speaker system in a voice that sounds very...dystopian, like pretty much exactly out of 1984. It's hella annoying because they're not considerate about the time of the day they make the announcements, and it's unclear to me if the noise is even worth the public disturbance. Like i they're trying to convert people into their religion, I'd rather not be bothered thank you very much. If it's notifying people about their expiring parking spots, yeah okay I might be a little bit more understanding.

Either way, I'm getting to go sick of it, and hadn't really noticed them before. Something needs to be done. Ugh.

Sleep issues are here again and I might know what's up finally

 This is very much related to one of the previous posts where I complained about summer lethargy and the need to go to the library to avoid the associated laziness. Well...it's come with another cost, which is completely and totally fucking over my sleep cycle. Because it's bright and hot in the evenings at 10, I can't go to sleep on time. Which means I can't get up at 6 fully refreshed. That means I'm bad at my job and also not relaxed the entire day. Which means I will nap in the afternoon, also thanks to the heat, Which means I'll work in the evening to make myself feel better, Which means my evening sleep gets further messed up and the cycle continues.

This has been the issue for many years now, way before my blog started, but I've been documenting this for a long time and now it's clear what's causing it: it's the heat and the brightness. And the solution to it is to just sleep on time, force yourself, and to cool oneself during the day by going to places with AC. Like a Library. Easy solutions, wonder if they're going to be actually implemented.

I don't understand why (transfer)Wise won't let me send money and save moolah versus BankOfAmerica

Had to transfer a good amount of money internationally and decided that BankOfAmerica was not offering me the best of deals. Looked around to find transfer(wise) was offering me 4% exchange rates even after fees and everything, I signed up, gave my passport photo and selfie and put my debit card details, and they still won't work! Must have tried a couple of times at least, and for some reason or other it keeps on failing over and over. So very miffed because I don't want to use BankOfAmerica for international transfers anymore, but if this other service is not going to be on my side, that what does one even do? Really mad, can't figure out why it's not working and of course them being a modern app/banking site there's no customer support of any kind to help me figure out and debug through issues, so yeah I'm a lost customer just like that.

Modern businesses man, don't know what they're doing, but there's definitely a lottt of niche to make lot of money by providing better service. Online services have forgotten that they're 'service' first, and 'online' second. What. A. Pity.

Need to find good places for eating out in the summer

 Because ramen is not a good summer food it turns out!

And Japanese curry, or spicy burgers, Indian curry, they're all better as warm-weather foods and not something you want to eat out on a hot summer day at a restaurant patio. And yeah the temperature of the food you're eating does matter, apparently because it'll make you sweat and feel that way for the next couple of hours, and do you really want to be getting protein and spice sweats when you're already sweating your gonads off due to the heat heat? I think not!

Now to find a gazpacho, or some other cold soup, restaurant, and we're golden!

New therapist, who this?

My work started with this new app for therapists, and added two extra sessions compared to a maximum of ten that we had until last year. Really happy because that means I can get a monthly appointment, and talk on a more regular and scheduled manner. Got an appointment for, and started talking to a new therapist, who lives nearby and she seems like a cool enough person. Good first session, not particularly annoying, and all things considered things are looking good for the future. Just that I did feel kinda gloomy for the rest of the day after talking to her. But uhh that may have been unrelated, or maybe I was so very tired, who even knows.

The oppressive summer heat is slowing my productivity, maybe it's Library time!

I have been known to complain about oppressive heat in the summer, but this time around it's different, the heat is not even crazy yet, and I keep nodding off or just relaxing and not wanting to do anything. It turns out that if it's way way too bright and hot and hot fun outside the body shuts down all functionality and decides it'll do something good only when the circumstances are a bit better. Which is not good for my work work situation: just as I was starting to perform well actually, I'm slacking there again which starts a cycle of guilt and overcompensation and running behind, burning out and back to square one. And of course this has also meant my writing, blogging, reading and walking has all been thrown out of schedule. Not good, not good at all.

The solution to all of this I discovered in the first year in this town: just go to the Library which has AirCon and is open until quite late in the evening. The one downside of that is my personal laptop cannot be taken there, but I could go there just to sit and read my kindle. I should definitely do something like that, because I'm extremely lethargic at home in the Summers.

Long-ass sleep in the morning, pesto-tomato-moz sandwich for lunch, so much writing and age of empires playing, backache, Seinfeld, back to Kefir processing, latenight tv [Fri 14]

 Got up early, since it was Friday I didn't have any meetings so I slept until pretty late in the morning.

For lunch I made pesto-tomato-mozzarella sandwich that I've had in the past. Except this time it was usual toast...the toast being toasted on the airfryer: dump a tonne of water, set the temperature hella high, disable the air fryer setting and let the heat and steam do its magic. The bread is crispy on the outside but not dry in the inside.

After work I wrote a lot, played age of empires a bunch, didn't feel so good since I lost a very long and protracted game with AI. Well didn't lose lose, but just took forever to win and it was frustrating.

In the evening I wanted to go out for a walk and hang with friends but because of the backache, and uh general laziness I didn't do that.

In the afternoon I started kefir processing once more. Two batches of kefir were started, the one from couple of days ago was put into maturation chamber. Very soon I'll be starting on the other ferments too. Now that I have things in much better control.

Instead just put on the tv, Seinfeld on netflix, and chilled. And wrote.

Before I went to bed, read a bunch of Hindu Myths and Gods book.

Rice and TJ's tarkari lunch and dinner, lots of writing, apartment clean, Volunteer park and back, latenight tv and sleep in living room, backache [Thu 13]

 For brunch I cooked white rice mixed with brown rice and had it with several achars, egg and the prepackaged tarkari from Trader Joe's. I keep having this realization so often that it's become a personal trope at this point but when I go back to eating white rice after a while, the feeling of relief and satisfaction is unreal. So so good, and I couldn't even taste the brown rice despite there being lots of it!

During the day I wrote a lot lot, and then went to Volunteer park and back, despite having an awful backache that started in the afternoon.

For dinner I had whatever I ate earlier in the day as my second meal, and cleaned my apartment.

In the evening I watched tv, and slept in the living room relatively early. Got up and went to sleep a bit after midnight.

Divinity and my backache

 My back ached
as if
I was wiser
Beyond my years
But not in brainpower
Just the bone structure.
And I wondered, what now,
What will become of me
If in my early thirties
My back and hips
have already
Stopped being my friends
How will I ever
Get to do the most wonderful
Things in the world, that I desire?

Are we, after all
Limited by our circumstances?
Are we forever bound by the karmapasha?
Can we ever
Live
Beyond our original
Destiny?

If
Ever there was
The reason
TO believe
That Man
is made, in the image of the divine
Then,
To doubt the free-will of Man
is
To doubt the free will of divinity.
And if there is divine
And it is beyond the all-expansive, non-existent brahman,
Then to exist
Is to be divine
And therefore
have an option
In changing
One's
Own
Destiny.

We may come
With original destiny
But nay, we are not
Bound by it
We must break
The chains,
That bound us
With expectations and possibilities
And explore
What's beyond

Why I write poems

Here is the simplest reason
On why I write poems.
And it is thus.
For sometimes,
Quite so often as of late
I want to get my thoughts out
And words
Get in the way
For my thoughts
Don't arrange themselves
In words lines and paragraphs
In neat little phrases organized
For proper reading
They come to me
In bits and pieces
All often disjointed
Ready to jump,
Into reality.

And because the words
Don't come out
As fast as the thoughts flow,
Constipation.

Which is why
Despite being
A skeptic shall we say
Of the poetic form
I write poetry.

For it is
The quickest way
For my thoughts
To get
Into yours.

What happened now?

Just write something, that's what I say to myself
As my books convert, ready to go into the second device.
I have a hundred books and a billion words
On gods and devis and ancient ways of our people
The golden question, as always
Am I ever going to read them?

I've cleaned my living room, now it looks to be mine
My back doesn't hurt anymore
A promise as been made, to oneself, to read
The good books instead of online bullshittery
The questions remains,
Am I ever
Going to live by my words?

I've promised, to myself and friends
There will be  podcast, I swear guys
On gods and myths, and the stories of our past
But if I'm stuck
Just writing bullshit in here
When will I
Get to do all that?

I've made a pretty important decision regarding 'backfill' of the first four or five months of this year

 It is this: no more trying to backfill for the regular material for the previous months of this year. I didn't write 'em when I should have, they're gone, no point wasting future over what has long past gone. If I want to maintain proper schedule, then I gotta start being more disciplined, simple as.

What will happen is the journal posts for those gone months. So I'll be backposting the journals for Feb, Mar, April and May, and chug along towards the future. That will likely but not certainly mean that this year could see fewer blog posts here. That's okay. If I don't want that to happen, I'll post more frequently every day. Otherwise, oh well. There's no point in basically backdating daily posts and make the lost months look like I was way more productive that in reality.

That's it. Those 120 posts will come anyhow, hopefully within the next week, and regular posting will commence.

Mustard and its various forms in cooking: and how I need to ferment mustard greens

 We eat mustard seeds. Mustard powder. I use mustard oil too for Nepali foods, yum yum yummy. Mustard greens are a common staple of many cuisines. Preserved mustard leaves are one of the most popular preserved foods across a large variety of Asian cultures. Fermented and dried mustard leaves are one of the yummiest and portable foods one can take across the oceans should the need be.

It's such a great plant with so many different possible uses. We are glad for mustard.

This comes in because I was watching Chinese Cooking Demystified on preserved mustard greens, and then ended up watching more videos on fermenting mustard greens, and that's probably going to be my next project.

Bringing in plants from VA

 I brought plants from VA, written about that already but this is the update about how they're doing.

The Chinese money plant has been planted in parts in seven different pots sharing them with their original inhabitants, and is doing well generally. New leaves coming up, old leaves growing better, haven't seen signs of browning or drowning. It'll likely survive and in another month or so start thriving.

The two or three kinds of spider plants are going gangbusters. Gang.busters. They're upright, full of might and growing stronger and stronger. Couldn't have asked for a better situation.

Pothos plants are...alright. I don't know how to transplant pothos, or maybe they take time to adjust to their new surroundings, but they've started rooting and throwing new leaves but I wouldn't say they're thriving. They're surviving, haven't dried out and gone dead and that's the best we can hope for. By next summer they'd be doing really well probably.

Monstera is not doing well. The two leaves haven't browned but wilted and it's unclear to me if they're still synthesizing for the plant or nah. I can see tiny protrusions from the branch, signs that the plant might be trying to send new branches and leaves, but it's been like that for two months now and nothing exciting has happened. There has been no major rooting incident either. This is not at all a surprise since this plant was the most damaged during the journey but it's also the prettiest of the ones I brought. Wish it works out, preferably within ghis season.

I got reasons to think the plants will work out. The ones brought in from Sb did, and they struggled a lot more. Possibly that I'm giving the plants a lot of attention might be why their growth is hindered.

My place is a mess and I'm kinda okay with it

 My place is a bit of a mess, it's been 10 days since we came back from our road trip and my kitchen has been cleaned completely but not the rest of the house and yes it is yucky and yes I need to clean it but whereas in the past it used to be debilitating and I'd be unable to do anything before cleaning it, I've put that aspect of myself under control and have learned to go on with it despite some things not being perfect. Not that I enjoy living in this (relative, I swear it's not gross) filth, but I'm okay tolerating it and fixing it in small steps while the rest of my life goes on. One thing at a time. One battle at a time. I need to pick my battles well. And fight them one area at a time, in small chunks.

Setup therapy sessions again

 Oh I remember it now, the app or service that my company started with this year to setup therapy sessions. It's called Spring health and it does seem quite easy and convenient to use, haven't had my first session yet. I set up the first session for Monday, not because I was feeling gloomy or anything (this year has been kinda wild, I feel guilty and have other negative-ish emotions but the gloomies have gone completely? have I really gotten better at dealing with emotions or is it the lavender, or my walks or what is it, what is it people!) Just that I needed to talk to somebody and vent everything that's been going on in my life and the ridiculous tradeoffs I have chosen to make or am in a position to make. I don't know, I want flexibility but also control of my life, and as things are going one might win over the other. Or I might get those at the cost of my persona happiness. So many goshdarned variables and none that work necessarily in my favor. Such fucking adult problems dude. The biggest problem is risk-averseness obviously and with that comes a set of choices pre-built. Make sense and I would be okay giving up risk-averse if not for other...variables...bugging me...to do things.

Right. Anyways. I've setup therapy sessions to talk to a professional about these exact things. Should be good!

Have no fear, US economy is here

 Have no fear, the US economy is here!

US Economy is growing at an extremely healthy pace for an economy this size. The dollar is stable and killing it, despite what the adversaries might hope happens to it, inflation has come down to manageable levels, there is no fear of recession any time soon and the employment numbers are extraordinarily good. Plus consumption has gone up, real wages are way way high, high interest rates are killing hot-air businesses built on lies and showmanship, and car prices are down.

Only thing is the high interest rates have kinda' made housing buys impossible, but if the rates go up and the governments see no other way o deal with it but force the localities to allow free construction, and remove construction tariffs, it's a long-term win for the country!

Annoying dental office payment policy

 This is about the Faifax Oral surgery place in Virginia, which has several branches across NoVA, where I got my wisdom teeth removed.

Apparently it's their policy to charge people fully for their dental surgeries and treatment, and then file for insurance. Whatever amount insurance covers, they refund it back to the patient through paper checks several months later.

It's so inconvenient to wait and track a cheque coming in from a dental place several months after you've had your procedure. Not to mention getting thousands of dollars charged on your card in not possible for everyone and could severely hurt somebody's credit.

Crappy policy from a place that had great service otherwise. I know collecting form insurance is a big deal, but I'm not happy about this. It feels...dare I say it...unclassy! Declasse...french!

Oh yeah, need to remember to pay the taxes

 I didn't pay my taxes on April 15 because I was in Nepal and didn't have the necessary documents. I asked for an extension and got it, and now need to pay the taxes ASAP. Like as soon as possible as possible. Planning on doing it by the end of july. That is it. I gotta stop delaying it now that I'm actually paying taxes and not getting money refunded.

Twelve things about the office you may not have noticed in your dozens of rewatches

1. Did you know that Michael Scott portrayed as a pretty awful character in the show?
   
   
2. A lot of people might think Pam and Jim are the best, but there are some situations where they are shown in not the best light! It's subtle and you might miss it, so try to figure out which episodes they are!
   
   
3. While Dwight is generally annoying and bossy, some scenes and episode also do a subtle overlook of his kinder, kindred spirit which you might miss out on if you're not paying attention!
   
   
4. We know Michael ends up with the love of his life in the end, but did you know he dates several very attractive women in the show? Yeah, surprising right?! A lot of people miss these details!
   
   
5. It is true Kelly is annoying and dangerous, but sometimes she can be really sneaky and smart! Like the time she blackmails Ryan! Try to find seven other times she acts similarly!
   
   
6. Ryan is obviously the best character in the show and the show is about Ryan's life in a bizarre workplace. But did you know the showrunners didn't intend it to be that way and the character was just a small part of the ensemble the creators never consider to be a major player? Talk about missing out!
   
   
7. This might have slipped under your radar when you were originally watching the series but Michael is a great fan of pun-related sexual jokes!
   
   
8. Some people say Toby is the scranton strangler!
   
   
9. Dwight and Pam got pregnant for the first time because Michael gave Jim the broken condom when he was leaving for NY to meet Pam.
   
   
10. Oscar the Accountant is gay.
    
    
11. Andy Bernard could be too, for all we know. Nobody knows for sure.
    
    
12. Creed is really old, and if you've looked at the deleted scenes, his parents are even older!
     

What to do next

Is this a poem
Or just strangely written prose who even knows
It doesn't matter all I care is to get my feelings out.

Here's the situation
I'm in a state of great confusion
With little to guide or show me the light
I need somebody to tell me what is wrong and what is right
And not just in life, in the abstract sense, non no no
A religious reader I'm looking for not
What I need is a confidant and a friend
Somebody to see my position and tell be the right way ahead
Of the conundrum I've put myself in
which is
which of my principles should I give on in.
I don't have too many of them to start
But the very few I do have led me to a path dark
I still believe them and abide them there is no doubt
But as a matter of expediency some must be thrown out.
Do I give in and get on social media,
And lose my sleep day and night
For a platform I don't even know how to use right
Or should I give away my other flexibilities
And limit my possibilities to meet people to a minimum
Perhaps I could
all of  a sudden
Be an outgoing of a man
Dancing fencing and prancing
Meeting new people every week day and night?

Or perhaps I go along
With things as they are
and give up on my rule
To not spend money
To not become the son
Of the culture i was born in
I want control, I want choice
But if I don't have other way,
I might have to surrender all of those
Without even thinking twice
Not the best of circumstances I am in
But don't want anyone to disappoint.
Competing interests and people
I'm working for
In such a conundrum I have found myself never.

ugh.

Unravelling of an asshole

 It has been concerning yet highly entertaining to see the public unraveling of that fascist ahole who all Indian dudes seem to worship for some reason or other. Oh we know the reason, we know the god-emperor's politics and views on matter and we know the internal politics of the Indian state. But right, the unraveling I just hope somebody smart and capable can sue to pierce his corporate veil, which is totally fair since he treats his companies interchangeably like personal property and employees like peasant-servants, and see him pay through all the pores of his body. Squeeze those dollahs out fool squeeze them out.

You can choose to break social rules and conventions. You will pay the price. And it won't be in dollars or rands.

Prime day shopping

 I shopped big on prime day. Slickdeals had discounts showing up and I was bored and I'm really so tired of the orange site and reddit because it's the same old stupid people repeating the same words over and over and over, and it gets a bit boring and annoying after a while ya?

Right, prime day.

I bought: two packs of 30-each of calmaid. About 10 pounds of premium nutes. Hydroponics supplies. Hydroponics system. All delivered within two days of the original order. So much more projects for me. Didn't need need any of those technically but as they say in Arrested Development, when you have it, you have it, so I have it.

Some very innocent rhetorical questions WHY WON'T YOU ANSWER THEM

Where are the aliens hiding?

Are you hiding them?!

Is it all a grand conspiracy?

Are all the minorities and women a part of it, against us hard-working men?

Does the world want our king rat to fail because they want to destroy us?

Why did you introduce deadly viruses and diseases into medicines?

Does driving less make you look gross and make you ill and kill you?

Does not eating meat turn you gay?

When are you declaring the civil war against white people? Cos' we're ready!

Why won't you just prescribe natural things and always want us to take fake things?

IS GMO the devil's way of getting back at us?

Are all of you insane or mentally challanged?

What's inside your pants and why won't you give me detailed descriptions of it?!?

Why don't you ask THEM why they're not the superior race?

An ode to that little cafe by Volunteer park

 O you little cafe
With a large backyard
You lie in the middle of nowhere
Right outside the forest,
We know
You are
Just for the neighborhood
And you are barely open
I've had a cookie at you once
It was alright
But I'm told
You're more for
The ambience
And the community.
Hells to the yeah.
Lovely, lovely little cafe.