Scars, Star Trek and Spirals

The word of the week is irascible.

Feb 3 – Slashed Hours

My three( or two )day work weeks begin now.

Leaving lots of time for writing and doing other things. Well, mainly writing. I've little interest at the moment in anything other than putting words together and finding a more fulfilling job – both monetarily and personally.

Meaning books, gaming, socializing and most other optional activities have gone by the wayside. Which is strange, as I used to enjoy the deep diversions that PC gaming or reading a story series gave me. Now, the more visceral visions of reality have sapped my desire to deviate daily and I sometimes find myself wondering when the last time was that I played / read one of my many, many PC games / books.

Maybe this summer; I’ve a lot to do until then.

This makes about as much sense as sidewalk cat today...

On a different note, I was lightly mauled( slightly savaged? )by a sidewalk cat today. I’d headed out in the afternoon, all chuffed for a relaxing tea and to prep for writing this week, when I encountered said cat as I’d done many times before. This time, for no reason, he decided my hand would make good practice for killing small animals; it was all over in a few seconds. I walked quickly to Moka House, where I washed and wrapped my shredded skin, then headed home – my hand felt oddly cold due to the copious amounts of blood I was losing, but a tentative examination after first aid showed no deep or major wounds.

Thankfully not all that deep, but definitely ouchy...

It was not a good start to the week and really threw off my night. I’ve no idea what set off the cat, even being a cat person, so all evening I wondered where I’d managed to tick off the universe. Obviously, I did little writing; I was neither capable of typing not desirous of attempting to do so, even by voice. 

Just… bummed out. By a random cat, no less!

Feb 4 - Novel progress!

Shaking off yesterday, I got to work writing today.

Reviewing notes, making more new notes, going over critique suggestions and corrections… a very good portion of today was productive and that made me quite happy. Being able to devote an entire day( one of three this week! ) to JUST working on my novel was fantastic and brought back the same feelings of creative progress as I had writing the novel’s first draft a year and a half ago.

It’s not all easy going, though. There was an accident some months ago with my notes, where salt chemicals were spilled all over the entire pile of papers, soaking through many pages. So whenever I handle them, I have to wear impermeable gloves, which really makes things awkward. Especially as I have to remember I can’t touch my face or rub my eyes when I'm tired.

But then, nothing worth doing is ever easy, right?

Feb 5 - Loneliness Is An Addiction

Why am I more observer than participant?

I’ve thought for a while that I may have some asocial tendencies, but lately I’ve wondered if there’s some other category I fall into – asocial people are indifferent to socializing in general and tend to be more monastic.

For me, I tend to spend a lot of time alone.

Whether that’s time alone in my head or in person, it amounts to the same thing. I’ve pondered if that, for me, it’s a combination of being ‘new’ in Victoria and being a writer, which tends to lead one to observe things happening rather than interact. When I was in Ontario, I was out with friends on a fairly regular basis, but even that changed fairly regularly over time: it went from boardgaming in high school to video games in university back to roleplaying and then… not much. 

The cycle of work, bar socials, repeat wore on me, I think, and helped spur my move to Victoria. Now that I’ve been here for over half a decade, I have a little perspective on things and can see that while I didn’t repeat the work / bar cycle by any means here, nothing has really taken its place.

Previously, I’ve mentioned that people need at least three spaces in their lives: work, home and somewhere that’s neither of those two things. For me, I’m distancing myself from work and there’s not much of a home life, being single… so that leaves the Somewhere Else still to be found. So far, I've not found coffee shops or park benches conducive to being able to relax and write, while pubs are definitely out too.

For some reason, the phrase ‘Loneliness is an Addiction’ popped into my head this week. I’m not sure why, but the connotations of that phrase are intriguing. Related to depression in general, one can easily wallow in the aspects of loneliness, something I’m familiar with from years past; it’s easy to do.

Fortunately, I’m neither depressed or overly lonely, but saying that doesn’t always keep the feelings at bay. For me, I’m caught between an unfulfilling present and an uncertain future which I’m making every effort to see as bright and attainable. It’s the equivalent of seeing the light at the end of the tunnel blinking at you in morse code, sending you a message you can’t quite decode...

For me, all I do then is close my eyes and keep walking forward, trying not to stumble.

Feb 6 - How NOT to do business

Tech support is a family sideline of mine.

For many years now, I’ve had my parent’s PC set up so that I could log in and deal with whatever minor emergency had cropped up that day. It was convenient and quite a lot easier than physically going over to their place at the drop of a hat, given that most ‘fixes’ were quite simple.

The software I’ve used to date is LogMeIn, which up until a week ago was free and worked very well. Yet all of a sudden, this year the company decided to abandon its lowest-tier customers with a mere week’s notice that they had to move on or buy an ‘introductory’ year-long subscription for a substantial cost.

When it comes down to it, I wouldn’t have minded paying SOME kind of fee, with a little notice. A week’s notice is not time enough to make an informed decision and so myself, along with thousands of others, were left adrift for our remote access needs.

Fortunately, there are a few other alternatives, albeit none of them working as well as LogMeIn or with as many features. I ended up installing the dully-named Remote Utilities, which is a free bit of kit and does all that I need. I imagine they’ll still be around in a few years and even if they decide to charge a fee at some point, I hope they’ll give a LOT more notice than their competitor LogMeIn did – there’s a lot of angry people out there, for no reason really, which I find amusing in an age where customers can form communities at the drop of a hat. 

LogMeIn is finding itself ending up on the short end of a large stick of negative opinion, which won’t help their company much.

If they’re remotely in tune with the community, they’ll find a way to regain our trust.

Feb 7 - Dang

My taxes aren’t going to be all that great this year. 

I was hoping that since I earned so little in 2013, that I'd get a decent return( ie. a couple of paycheque's worth )and my initial calculations showed this. However, plugging in the actual numbers this week resulted in a five-fold( yeah... )reduction in my return amount - but at least I'm getting a return, right?

 

Taxes are strange that way. Everyone feels as though they are entitled to getting money back, but few people understand the WHY of how the system works, even in general terms. Myself, I dealt with taxes peripherally for years and picked up quite a few tips, as well as doing my own family’s for the last decade… but I don’t consider myself all that knowledgable. 

Which is fine, as simple tax returns don’t need experts; if you’re rich and / or have a lot of business taxes to do, definitely get yourself help. In the main, people expect to get money back and when it doesn’t work out that way, frowns follow quickly.

Be grateful for the positive, don't spend your chickens before they hatch and all that. What I should be doing( instead of lamenting a loss of money that was never really there )is planning on what island I'll be buying for a writer's retreat once my books take off.

That's definitely positive thinking.

Feb 8 - Star Trek Continues!

The second episode of Star Trek Continues premiered tonight online – oh yeah!

For those who haven't yet seen the first episode, Pilgrim To Eternity, you can find it here – it’s incredible to see! Below is Episode 2: Lolani … 

Scoot, go watch them both and tell me what you think. I’ll tell you what I think:

I can’t wait for the third episode to show up!

Feb 9 - For a Laugh

Today, I really needed a laugh.

My bike tire went flat on the way to work; nothing new there. I took it across the lot to SportCheck to have the tube replaced and picked it up after work: all done, no biggie.

The tire went flat as I stepped out the door on my way home – again, nothing new there.

It was admittedly no fun walking home in the cold rain / wannabe-snow-droplets when I’d expected to be cozily eating dinner much sooner. It sparked a bit of a down spiral tonight, where I felt rather out of control of many things: my personal life, career, day job, writing aspirations, finances… you name it, my mind sounded off about it all being beyond my ability to have any control over it. All from a simple flat tire; the brain’s odd that way and usually I’m able to ignore such subconscious ramblings of mine.

Thing is, when they contain a fair amount of truth, it’s much, MUCH harder to ignore them.

After a late dinner and an even later chat with a great friend back in ON, I still hadn’t made a dent in my blog. The weather system moving in across lower BC here is a doozy,  making my head pound rather nastily to the point where I needed need some heavy-duty Tylenol to try and keep it from becoming a migraine. Which didn't work; as the heavy rains moved in, my head felt like bursting from the inside - not a pleasant sensation to deal with.

Needless to say, I wasn’t in a great mood tonight and so again, I needed a laugh. Which I found quite by accident in the artistic scribblings of a subway commuter:

That helped, letting me hoping the week to come will see a lot of progress with my novel!

It’s funny: reading my blog this week, it seems as though it was written by someone else. Someone with a more positive outlook on things, who doesn’t let life’s little( and large )bumps get them down. Which is amusing, as I’m obviously the author of both my blog and my own life, yet I am able to surprise myself when what I’ve created takes a totally different tack from how I’m feeling inside. Which I think is fantastic; who wouldn’t want a pick-me-up to arise from the words spilling out of their own mind?

PPS - the blog's done after finishing Monday morning, a little before noon. My head's still killing me, but I definitely felt better completing it in the AM than trying to struggle to a semi-conscious finish last night.