Crutches and Kalimbas

Losing Days, but not Time

I didn't create a post yesterday, due to the nature of the day, and the time that just wasn't available to me to do it.  Or maybe I did create a post, and I really can't remember right now because of how tired I am.  Nobody should ever be this tired and expected to function nominally.  Nobody should ever be caged.  Instead, here I go again on my own.

If I did miss yesterday, I lost the day, but still have the time to write down my feelings, having experienced them, and thus allowing me to reflect on them.  Except for doing it now allows me the super power known as hindsight to guide me on the journey.  I suppose for those reading at the various intelligence agencies I'm now apparently writing to, this is my first betrayal as a writer to you as the reader.  The concept that I've held myself to for these over time is that of an unfiltered barrage of thoughts, holding true to the notion that none of you can make me happy, so why would I give you the power to make me sad?  And using that notion to support the idea of unfiltered commentary, because if it offends any of you, it's held within my own Terms of Use to myself to simply not care about that.

With all of that being plated, arranged, and sent out with the server, I shall now begin to prepare and the main dish.

Stress -- a word that does a great job of sounding like its definition.  It's a word easily stuttered over because of the emphasis on the letter S, a relatively soft sound, interrupted immediately by a very hard T, falling off immediately into a soft R, and while the letter E tends to be soft, since it falls between two soft letters, it almost interrupts the pattern and flow to the point that it becomes a hard E.  It's almost like the word is fighting against itself, and causing the thing in which the words is meant to denote, just in the way that the letters are arranged.

What are you doing, Dave?

I was sitting in a theater with some friends, about to see a film "Mission Impossible: Fallout" and a previous for "2001:  A Space Odyssey" came on, looking like they were going to be showing it on the big screen again.  It led with the orangish/redish light that represented the visual construction of HAL's personality.  And I started to fall.

My heart rate jumped from calm to pre-heart attack in a second, and my breathing became irregular.  The preview played, and I did everything I could to reason my way around it, telling myself it couldn't be, because nothing was to be worried about.  I thought of being in space, void of interaction and friction, and closed my eyes, and felt myself starting to calm, only to open my eyes, see everyone else, and feel as though I was surrounded.

I told my friend, whom I went with, that I might have an anxiety attack.  He told me he'd move if I needed to leave, and I was very grateful for that.  I was hoping that by telling him, the episode would dissipate, as though the embarrassment of having to share that was the tribute required to make it go away.  But it persisted.

Even into the movie, where things started off relatively calmly, until the first close-up gun shot rang out, and startled me so bad that my heart seemed to be kickstarted by the shock of having been inside my own mind, only to be jolted out.  Throughout the remainder of the movie, during times of extra suspense and thrill, I found the anxiety dip into non-existence, only to rise again during calming discussions on plans.  I triaged the issue into being a chemical imbalance, where adrenaline would fix it.  So all I had to do was try and keep my adrenaline up as high as I could throughout the entire movie.  It worked well enough, but still distracted from the intent of the film -- to entertain.  I was just so grateful to be back in my car afterwards, I can't say I was entertained, even though I thoroughly enjoy going to the movies because of the detachment from reality it provides to me.

They also provide fuel for my subconscious to draw on for my dreams, which I've already illustrated to be very vivid, detailed, and sublimely helpful to me and my sanity.

Synergistic Mathematics

When one arm lifts a weight, and then the other arm lifts a different weight, you might think that together they can lift arm1 + arm2.  However, that never proves to be the case.  Instead, you find yourself with something like "botharms = 1.2(arm1 + arm2)" where together they can lift more proportionately than either arm on its own.  It's a very strange thing to consider, but it has some value to be recognized.

Work has become a thing involving synergistic mathematics, not because that sort of math applies, but because it's the only form of math that is conveniently present enough to come close to the strange calculations and assumptions being presented to me.

As an example, we were told that we have two main projects to work on, and project A requires 25% of our resources.  Project B gets the other 75%.  However, Project B has the greatest import to the company, so it gets the most focus, along with the more resources.  That's to say that the quality and quantity of the resource is higher in Project B than in A.  Now, if we were to measure how they had compared over time, it would show that Project A has actually had closer to 20% of the resources.  That seems to lead to Project A actually now getting more focus, despite Project B requiring the resources.  And with this new plan, Project B should get done faster.

Despite my attempts to show why that won't be the case, I've been told to conceptually agree with it.  And so the only form of math I can think of, without incorporating the chaos of String Theory, is synergistic mathematics.  And hope that someone, a slight shift of who works on what and how often will someone make up for the difference.

I'm not fooling myself -- I just can't apparently do anything about it.

High-Fiving the Sky

I allowed my knowledge of needing to perform more cardio get to me, and I only ran for 20 minutes, instead of my typical 10-11, but only got to 1.83 miles, where in the past I would have been in the 1.93-ish area around that time.  Knowing I couldn't go hard for 10 minutes and sprint out the rest made for a less-enthusiastic run, and less-than-nominal results in the end.  But that's okay, because I still went to the gym, and still exercised.

And it came right after a discussion with a family member about the aliens on the plane.  I found out that aliens on the plane was something they were dealing with, and the discoveries they had made, along with my own, led me to a place that made me feel a little more level-minded about the whole ordeal.  Without giving up too much of that kind of information, I can say that I'm feeling more mentally calmed.  That may also be a side effect of the lack of sleep I'm currently staving off.

My gym activity after all that wasn't as vigorous either, having been a bit of a repeat from Monday's, since I started doing biceps then, and last night really destroyed them.

My arms were so dead and tired after doing biceps that doing things for my back seemed less possible.  I actually gave up in the middle of my third set on my second of five back workouts, because I just didn't have the energy left.  After discussion aliens, having a good cry, playing with my 3-month old nephew, and driving for a couple hours, I was beat.  I was also starting my workout at my bedtime, so my mind and body had already started to become a bit lethargic... like Waldo.  I am feeling rather sore today, adding to the strain of still not being asleep.

The take-away is that I did it.  I went to the gym, despite the horrible inconvenience, and while I'm tired now, once I make it through the day, I will sleep tonight.

And that sounds like something to look forward to.

-Your Semi-Retarded Friend