Category: health

i mean, like, it’s getting there

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I’ve got one scene left to revise in my third draft, and despite all my great notes with their wonderful additions and new directions and ideas and such, I’m not sure they all fit, or could fit, without monster rewrites and possible storyline changes, at this point.

Still, it’s a good start, and I will endeavour in the new round to go through all those notes and take whatever will really work, will add to the story and make it better than it is, and put it in.

That’s going to be a major task, I’m sure, and I’m starting to worry my end of year deadline isn’t going to be one I can reach.

I finished The Mungk on time last year; it was a novella.

This is much more ambitious and has taken up considerably more time and effort.

I imagine the next will be that again.

A book a year; maybe I’ll have all my work done before I’m eighty. Or even ninety. Ninety-one, perhaps.

I’ll retire on my ninety-first birthday. How’s that?

And then I’ll fucking die.

If I make it there first.

Target: 1300 words
Written: 2869 words, novel: Bad Neighbours

Read: Captain Paul, Alexandre Dumas
Comics: Tomb Raider: Sphere Of Influence 1, Tomb Raider: Takeover 1, Tomb Raider 37-38
Music: Welcome To New York, The Rolling Stones

lord almighty

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The times, they are a-changin’.

And my body is freaking out with high blood pressure.

I wish I knew why.

Target: 1300 words
Written: 1395 words, novel: Bad Neighbours

Read: Solar Lottery, Philip K. Dick
Comics: Tomb Raider 28-29, Tomb Raider Journeys 11-12
Music: Weird Tales Of The Ramones (Discs 1-3), The Ramones

guilt

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I mean, I’ve got a lot of it.

I try not to have it. I know people that look like me have done all kinds of horrible shit, and indeed, due to stupidity or selfishness or ignorance of the world around me, I’m sure I’ve done more than my fair share.

I haven’t been a great man. I’m still not, as far as I know.

My life has been defined by trauma – not real trauma. I was never beaten or raped or witnessed a horrible crime. I have PTSD from bad employers, but who doesn’t?

My trauma seems inconsequential; it’s not warzone PTSD or survivor’s guilt.

It’s knowing that every day, things get worse. Brain beaten, bit by bit, until my brain feels like a hockey enforcer with CTE, even if it might not look that way.

But it’s all excuses, or so I’m told. Avoidance. I should feel guiltier, they tell me. I should feel the weight of two thousand years of straight white male oppression.

And I do.

I don’t know how I stand it.

I don’t know how anyone stands it. I sit at the bottom of this world, like Atlas without the muscles, squished, guts oozing out my sides, eyes literally popping out of my skull like a sausage being run over by a Mack Truck.

And yet, somehow, still alive.

I feel it. I feel it all.

I feel the world’s pain, its anger, its suffering.

And I’m not sure how much longer I can stand. 

Target: 1300 words
Written: 2287 words, novel: Bad Neighbours

Read: World Of Ptavvs, Larry Niven
Comics: Tomb Raider Journeys 5-6, Tomb Raider 23-24
Music: Weezer (White Album), Weezer

whirlwind trip

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Off to Trenton. Off to grandbaby.

She’s about to go into JK. Jesus Christ.

Life is draining away at an exponential rate, isn’t it?

Target: 1300 words
Written: 1339 words, novel: Bad Neighbours

Read: East Wind: West Wind, Pearl Buck (not my usual fare, but I really liked this - bring me into a world, I don't care what genre or style, and this did that)
Comics: Tomb Raider & Witchblade 1, Witchblade & Tomb Raider 1, Tomb Raider 1-2
Music: We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions, Bruce Springsteen

hangover

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Haven’t had one of these in a while.

I guess draft beer still has its kick when you drink a half-dozen heavies.

Well, back to bed then, and a good dose of aspirin.

Target: 1300 words
Written: 1607 words, novel: Bad Neighbours

Read: Magician: Apprentice, Raymond Feist
Comics: Grommets 4-5, The Sacrificers 11, The Holy Roller 8
Music: We Are The Same, Tragically Hip (most underrated album?)

hipfest

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I mean, I had fun, but I wanted it to be so much better. The others were going on about how great the guy was, but I found the band super loose, and the singer was mucking up lyrics (and moving around entire verses) wholesale.

I’m not sure the hangover is worth that.

Sorry, dude, Gord Downie, you ain’t.

Target: 1300 words
Written: 1127 words, novel: Bad Neighbours

Read: Magician: Apprentice, Raymond Feist
Comics: Napalm Lullaby 5-6, The Sacrificers 10, Grommets 3
Music: Wayne's World Soundtrack, Various Artists

thirteen again

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Would that I was. Fresh off reading the Bible all the way through, about to have my first drink, my first drug, my first real make-out session (my first kiss happened in grade one with a girl named Jessica, who ironically, was not my childhood sweetheart – that was Shelley, who my parents tell me is now some kind of super junkie, so, uh, I guess I had an early type), my first summer love, my first experiences with weed, mushrooms, acid and sex (not all at thirteen, of course, though it was a close thing).

I was told how smart I was; they made it sound like natural talent, so I never felt like I needed to learn how to put effort in. Things came too easy, and that fucked me later on, when they didn’t, and I didn’t know how to buckle down and study.

Classic fixed mindset, that didn’t shift until my mid-thirties.

I backed up that insecurity with bluster and bravado.

Bullshit.

And now, thirty-five years later, I still fight the demons of youth.

I’m not a junkie, not yet. I’m quite possibly an alcoholic, though I’d disagree with the sentiment, given that I’m rarely drunk and don’t actually have more than about a six-pack in a week.

I just like it, okay?

Leave me alone, dad.

Fuck.

Labatt 50 was my first sip of beer, and goddamnit. It sucked.

Target: 1300 words
Written: 1140 words, novel: Bad Neighbours

Read: Magician: Apprentice, Raymond Feist
Comics: Napalm Lullaby 1-2, The Holy Roller 5, The Sacrificers 7
Music: Wave, Patti Smith Group

home again

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I was praying for peace, but, uh, yeah. Nope. Sofi’s not well (hopefully overkill from the week gone), and coming home to no Isis, and Raiden (her twin) being weird.

It’s hard.

Why doesn’t everything suck so much all the time?

Target: 1300 words
Written: 1344 words, novel: Bad Neighbours

Read: Hammered, Elizabeth Bear (finally, some progress)
Comics: A Righteous Thirst For Vengeance 11, Deadly Class 56, The Sacrificers 1-2
Music: Washing Machine, Sonic Youth

fire tower

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Well, well, well. I guess my working out has paid off a little, if not in pounds lost, but in strength and endurance.

Maybe it’s turned some fat to muscle, or something like that.

Either way, I made it to the top of the Temagami fire tower with little rest, no chest pain and actually, didn’t feel too bad of a burn in my legs, despite the roughly two hundred steps (and a ladder) it takes to get to the top.

Nice.

At least some shit is working out for me.

All progress is progress, even if it’s only a little bit.

(And everything’s progress, because time, learning and change do not end – we only choose to ignore the lessons, and to stem the tide, which is about as fruitful as trying to stop a tsunami by standing in front of it and holding your hands up.)

What a world.

Target: 1300 words
Written: 1559 words, novel: Bad Neighbours

Read: Hammered, Elizabeth Bear (I'm enjoying it, but tiiiime, man)
Comics: A Righteous Thirst For Vengeance 4-5, Deadly Class 50, The Scumbag 12
Music: Van Weezer, Weezer