juliebarkley

3 hours ago, spiralpoet said:

It also feels good to have all the others written down on a list..... Like I can see they're there, okay, I can just let them be there. For now. 

EXACTLY. Having them all written down means that you don't have to worry about forgetting them. At least for me, that's a big stressor gone, and it keeps them from fighting for my attention.

3 hours ago, spiralpoet said:

So I picked drums 🥁! For the next 8 days (starting yesterday), 10-20 minutes of drums every day, working on single-stroke roll rudiments & a Tom Petty song. That seems concrete & manageable, and if I do it, maybe it will give me a momentum boost that carries forward. And then maybe I pick one project from the "get this to maintenance list" (probably sprinkler fixing), and go from there. 

Awesome!

15 hours ago, Jarric said:

I really like the randomised approach to this. I think I may try it for my own housework - so often I do nothing when if I just set aside a half-hour slot on a Wednesday and rolled a dice I could get something done. It might not be the most pressing or useful thing, but it'd be better than the nothing I'm currently doing.

Yes, that's basically the idea. If there's a task that has become urgent, then it gets done first. But when nothing seems urgent, or there are things I'm avoiding, rolling against the list ensures that something happens. And if it's the thing I was hoping I didn't have to do, too bad, fate has decided.

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Fought tiredness all day today. Not sure why, as like yesterday I got plenty of sleep. But since I have to go to bed early tonight in order to wake up early tomorrow, perhaps it will benefit me. Did a round of GMB Resilience for arms and shoulders (love having options to choose from), did some reading, and ran a very successful Halloween event. Nothing else got done though.

On 10/22/2023 at 11:16 PM, Stronkey Kong said:

• 7-to-7 -- at the start of today's. I take it back this will be the hardest goal, especially on weekends when I am free to snack in the evenings.

It would be for me too. Delaying when you start eating is WAY easier for me than stopping early.

On 10/22/2023 at 11:16 PM, Stronkey Kong said:

• 7 things -- Haven't started this yet, but I will probably put some kitchen gadgets I don't use in a box next weekend.

Def a good target area - I swear the kitchen spawns creatures of its own devising. And it's so hard to find the perfect spatula or whatever that you end up with a bunch of rejects that never leave the drawer.

Ongoing habits:

Exercise: Nothing at all.

Prayer: Also nothing.

NerdFitness: A little!

Purging: No. Hmm. Ongoing habits need a little love.

Tasks: Start: 687. End: 676. Success!

New shiny things for this challenge:

New People: I responded to someone's post on one of the forums where I made an introduction, and signed up for a post exchange. This may also be a craft exchange of sorts, which is fine - I can whip up a small tatted item in a very short period of time if need be.

Read: Finished up a book and read more of A National Crime.

Long-Term: Definitely need to think on this one.

Was for some reason very tired for some hours after getting up despite adequate sleep. This made it really hard to get going. I eventually got there though - got a bunch of tasks done, got my storytime all ready, wrote up (mentally) and practiced a version of Stone Soup, and got my pumpkins carved. So success on all of the things that I was aiming for today. I have my stuff all packed and ready for tomorrow too. My son's painted Frankenstein pumpkin will be the honorary stone for our tale, and I have a bunch of spiders, foam bats, and other items to give to the kids to add to the "Halloween soup".  Should be fun! I hope I get a decent crowd.

All right, I'm going to take a book to bed and chill for a bit before sleep. Night all!

Make it a travelogue!

On 10/17/2023 at 11:38 PM, Pherales said:

Started work last week, still adjusting to being out of the house ten hours a day.  Life is kinda falling by the wayside because of it.  So basic tasks, getting a grasp of this new and making it normal.

It's a huge adjustment for sure. Dealing with the change in food scheduling sounds like a reasonable first step.

16 hours ago, JuiceeTarget said:

Hey, it's me!

I just hit my library's hold limit again. Our limit is 200 titles. 😅Granted, they are mostly suspended to way out in the future, but still.

16 hours ago, Sepherina said:

Following to support!  

Welcome!

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Two days in one again.

Ongoing habits:

Exercise: Nothing yesterday, and just walking today. My son discovered Pokemon Go while visiting a nearby city, and we kept stopping so he could catch Pokemon and battle gyms and such. Made the actual walk less interesting because we couldn't talk much.

Prayer: I did at least once both days. Woo!

NerdFitness: Yes, both days! Woo again!

Purging: Yesterday I got rid of a game, today I did not.

Tasks: Start: 690. End: 687. I meant to work on this more than I actually did. Still, did at least one both days.

New shiny things for this challenge:

New People: I posted an introduction on two different discord forums, and scrolled through all of the messages so that I could see what was new chatter to engage with in future.

Read: Read some of Barakamon yesterday, and more of A National Crime today. I am learning so much about how our residential school system was set up and worked. I'd mostly just heard snippets of survivor stories of abuse, and it turns out that a great deal of what I had assumed I knew about the origin and running of the system itself was wrong. It is absolutely worth learning this angle, because it shows so clearly how the abuse was able to happen in so many places and for such a long time, what people knew, and what they did. Just basically how the whole tragedy went down, in the contemporary (ignored) words of the government's own inspectors and employees. It's BAD. Whatever you might be thinking, it's probably worse.

Long-Term: I think I need to brainstorm on this one, because I did not do anything either day.

Saturday I woke up unreasonably early, then got tired after a couple of hours and went back to bed. That blew most of the daylight hours. (Days are getting short!) I spent a lot of time on both days checking the new books and watching some YouTube. It was raining, and combined with hormonal cycles I just was very low-energy. But the book-looking is all done now, and the YouTube series I was watching is too. I have last-minute planning for my Halloween storytime to do (need to make up and practice a Halloween version of Stone Soup), and then I would like to get a whole bunch of tasks done tomorrow. And carve my pumpkins. These seem like achievable goals.

On 10/21/2023 at 9:04 PM, spiralpoet said:

• Shift how I think about personal projects, and make progress on one (several?). This is the big one. I realized during the last challenge that a lot of what weighs on me is a very long, mostly unarticulated list or vague set of undone (or partially done) personal projects. There are so many things I want to do (I think?!), and so often I just feel paralyzed or overwhelmed or like whatever I do is never enough. I also tend to get 10% of the way into something, then switch, and then wonder why things constantly feel like they are never done. Um... yeah. BLECH. I want to start breaking this cycle. I also want to actually do (and finish!) some of this stuff rather than just stressing about not doing it.

 

The first three areas, I more or less know how to tackle. Sleep is a wildcard, but at least I know what's worked in the past.

 

The fourth... yeah. That's the big one.  If anybody else has run into this and gotten their head around it.... My current plan basically involves journaling, and an inventory, and trying to identify what exactly are baby steps. I know (think? probably?) I'm going to need a way to hold focus on one thing (three things?) at a time, but for how long? When do I switch? How do I even know what I actually want, vs what are zombie projects that I don't really care about? I've been stuck in this for so long that I am mostly trying to encourage myself to experiment and start to try flailing about. I'm hopeful that tackling this as a project itself will yield something positive, even if I don't know what that looks like right now. 

Um yeah, this feeling of thinking of all the things that need doing and then not doing any of it because it feels so overwhelming and where would I even start and and and.... is very familiar. 😅

A couple of things come to mind.

When you say "personal projects", what do you mean exactly? Is it the maintenance things that need doing in life, like laundry? Things you'd like to get around to getting done, like writing a will or redecorating your bathroom? Or new things you'd like to try, like pickling or knitting?

For the first, you have to care about them to some degree, but you could spend a little time thinking about why they are hard to do and how to make them easier. For the second, it would be really good to figure out what you actually care about doing and pick off one at a time until they are done. Those are the sorts of projects that can get completely overwhelming if you are thinking of more than one at once. And for the third, what excites you most? Do that. For as long as you like. Then if something else appeals more, switch. (Within reason. Don't buy a bunch of supplies for something that you'll never revisit.)

How you approach it also depends on whether these personal projects are things you actually want/need to do, or whether they are things you just feel like you SHOULD do.

Here's how I personally would do it. It sounds a lot like how you are doing it. Modify/ignore as you see fit. (This is assuming non-maintenance projects.)

First, I would make a list of everything that I could think of in the personal projects category. Throw it ALL in. It will be overwhelming and huge. That's okay.

Second, ignore the list I just made and think about my current life priorities. What is going well in my life? Where do I feel like I can improve? What is bothering me the most right now? Maybe I would decide that right now, I am so annoyed that everything is messy in the house and that makes it hard to clean or exercise and saps my energy just to look at it. Maybe I decide that I am super stressed at the end of the day, and I need to set aside relaxing time before bed. Maybe I feel like my food is bad and I'm wasting money on takeout when I want healthier lunches. Maybe I'm anxious to do something with my hands to get me away from screens. You get the idea. This is your motivation right now.

Now, go back to the giant list. You now have a goal and purpose in mind from step two. What on the list brings you closer to that purpose that you most want to do? Do you feel a little lift of excitement at the prospect of having it done? Yay, good sign! Pick that one. Don't worry about the others until this one is done. Maybe pick two if they mesh well. But one is good.

Challenge periods make good periods of time to test things out and then reevaluate.

I wrote you a book; I'm sorry! I hope some of it is useful.

On 10/17/2023 at 10:40 AM, spiralpoet said:

Giving myself grace to mainly chill during week zero, but I've got some ideas for after that.... 

*anticipation builds*

Caught up on your last challenge, so tagging along here too!

Totally get the "hard to do thing when x person is home" and the ordination essay difficulties. Talking about yourself is hard enough, but having it recorded in writing that you can read, critique, and overthink is just so much worse. Especially if there's a feeling that you might be "graded" on something as important and personal as your testimony, calling, and the role you fill in your church.

It's a good plan!

16 hours ago, Kalitraz said:

I like the look of your challenge. I especially like the long-term project item. Building something that will continue to be helpful is a great idea to really intentionally work on. I think I'm gonna steal that one as a bonus for this challenge session. I have some new garden beds I want to build and just got the lumber for them. Gonna be some work to get them set up and winter is fast approaching. I need to read more too, but am a little burnt out on reading due to school research atm so that one I'm gonna postpone (even tho the to-read pile has continued to grow and grow!). Good for you to really seek out new connections. I've always struggled with that too but have also been pretty solitary person. I don't think that one will fit into my goals atm but it is an admirable one and one I want to put work into for myself soon too. I hope you find lots of cool people, or even just a few good ones, to share your interests and time with. I also admire your get rid of a thing every day goal. Clutter is just too easy to accumulate. Here to follow and support. Good Luck!

Thanks and welcome 👋!

For me, the long-term project thing is a combination of the "important but not urgent" box in the Eisenhower matrix, the "automate everything" philosophy, and frontloading work. It can be about saving time on things I am already doing, but more often it is making things easier/simpler so that they will get done at all. Removing decision-making and effort is just as important as saving time/money!

Garden beds sound cool! Are they for vegetables or flowers?

That's a reasonable reason to not want to read for a while. I work at a library, so interesting things cross my hands pretty regularly. I think my to-read list is longer than my projected lifetime.

I've been pretty solitary too in the past and I thought I was happy with that, but the Covid isolation showed me how isolated I really was, and that hurt. Combine that with no significant other and a child that is going to be leaving home in less than a year, and, well, it would be nice to have people to hang out with in future. Plus, one of the good things about small towns is the sense of community, of people knowing their neighbours and the benefits that extend from that. So I need to hook into that network to reap those advantages.

And yes on the clutter. Stuff tends to fill the available space (and unavailable space, if you let it).

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Ongoing habits:

Exercise: I ran through Elements today, with one-armed baby frogger hopping and the swingset move (I love that one).

Prayer: Oh frig. I heard the alarm, I made a mental note to do it, then promptly forgot all about it. Which I should have known I would do. Will do the night one after posting.

NerdFitness: I went through all of the currently posted challenges and read first posts. Will start to read them properly tomorrow.

Purging: A few recipe cards. One of the "for the future" tasks is definitely going to be getting a database together that serves my recipe-organizing needs, because this current system just doesn't.

Tasks: Start: 692. End: 690. I didn't focus on this today, but I did do at least one.

New shiny things for this challenge:

New People: I went out to a local shop called the Crusty Baker to buy something for supper. I made an effort at conversation with the person at the counter, asked about a few products and such. The shop has a nice selection of pies - rabbit pot pie, duck confit, vegan tourtiere (which a library customer tells me is the best he's ever had) - plus an intriguing selection of unusual spices and flavourings, like rose harissa, Ethiopian basil (iirc), cinnamon leaves, and pickled milkweed pods. I left with a broccoli and gouda quiche, a mulberry and pumpkin scone, and three slices of gouda. Must make it back at some point to try their bread and sandwiches.

Also tried to sign up for a ghost walk, which I think is new to town and would be a great way to run into compatible people, but it was already full up.

Read: Read another full chapter of A National Crime. Going to take a manga to bed with me (after the prayers I committed to above).

Long-Term: Worked more on my investments. I really thought I would be done by now, but things seem to drag out. I bought things with all the cash that was available, but a few things didn't fully sell, so I had to put out new orders, and US orders don't seem to be pulling Canadian dollars when the American ones run out (despite my settings), so I have to run Norbert's Gambit to get more US cash. Annoying, as that involves online chat and such, but hey, it'll work out cheaper than if the trading I was trying had worked correctly anyway. And then I can buy my last things, and be done (except for regular maintenance)!

It is raining now and the sound is so peaceful and relaxing. I really should try to get a little more work done, but between the investments and the going out, I feel pretty good about today.

Ongoing habits:

Exercise: Not on the usual routine, as I went on a long walk immediately on arriving home. I never even took of my shoes!

Prayer: I did not, due to work.

NerdFitness: Okay, I will do a little now.

Purging: A single piece of paper.

Tasks: Start: 679. End: 692. I did do one, I swear! I would do more, but I am mentally wiped again.

New shiny things for this challenge:

New People: It would be a bad idea to do this now. In-person was never going to happen today, because work. I have made a plan with my son to go to a cafe we have never been to tomorrow. And I did write a thank-you note to a person who did me a kindness twenty years ago (that was the paper I got rid of today). Back when I was learning to tat in university, I must have asked for advice on a mailing list. So a complete stranger tatted me a little heart, sent me a photocopy of a page of her thread organization system, and wrote up a list of places that sell supplies. It was a nice gift of time and energy to a complete stranger, and now I feel grateful for that old kindness. Probably the email is no longer in use, but it didn't bounce! I tried anyway.

Read: Read lots today.

Long-Term: I sorted out my phone calendar and fountain schedule to match my current permanent hours. This is a thing that's been annoying me for a while. The fountain functions a bit like an alarm clock - it turns off when I should be going to bed and on when I really should be getting up. So not having to forcibly turn it off on the days I have to get up earlier than normal will be lovely.

Work D&D was fun! The person running it has set up a very simple adventure - while browsing to the library, you find a singing book that invites you on an adventure, and opening it teleports you into a dungeon of 2-3 rooms before teleporting you back - that comes with an assortment of 12 combat rooms and 12 puzzle rooms to be mixed and matched for future adventures. The format would be easy to reskin to make, say, a Dog Man or Amulet adventure. I already have a session booked to run One Shot in the Dark (I just have to tweak it to make it a little more young-kid friendly, as I advertised it for 7-13), but this setup makes the prospect of adding in some D&D after that for older kids less daunting. We also had a Zombie Barbie session that I was not running, so really it was just a chill and fun day at work for me. Those are nice.

This is not going to be the greatest start to the challenge.

Ongoing habits:

Exercise: No. But. I knew on getting home that I had to do my Halloween decorations right away before it got dark, so exercise in the regular way was off the table. However, to try to keep the feel of the habit going, I did grab my phone, go to the exercise spot, and do some stretches and a brief bear walk. My exercise yesterday had me trying to do cartwheels, which I laughably cannot, so the stretching was actually really nice.

Prayer: I did not. I was pretty much either at work or outdoors.

NerdFitness: Alas. I did not have the brain energy for it, and I don't have it now either.

Purging: Aw shoot. I probably could have done this!

Tasks: Start: 679. I did some of them while at work. It was a very productive work day where I had hardly any interruptions and got myself all prepped for Halloween. (I also have some adorable pipe cleaner spiders gracing my workspace.)

New shiny things for this challenge:

New People: No, nothing today. I did hang out with (online) friends though, so maybe that can count for the day?

Read: About to do.

Long-Term: Nope to this as well.

So yeah, not the strongest start. I really do need to work on getting to bed earlier on Tuesdays, because the lack of sleep doesn't hit me so much early in the day (I need to muster up energy to get through programs), but by the time I get home I crash mentally. Sometimes I need to take a short nap just to make it through. But even then, anything complex or, ahem, challenging, is deeply unappealing and would probably be poorly done. Which is how today went, pretty much.

Tomorrow I have a training session where I get paid to play D&D at work. I am looking forward to that.

New challenge is ready!

I like the format that I had last time, so I am going to keep it: some habits that I am maintaining/building, plus some goals to work on.

Here are my habits from last time (that will continue, because that is how habits do):

Ongoing habits:

These shouldn't need much explanation, being repeats and all.

• Exercise after my coming-home laundry routine
• Washing and prayer on hearing my alarm (if I am home and able)
• Reading NerdFitness when.... I still don't have a good habit here, but read it!
• Get rid of one thing every day
• Work on at least one task from my task list - this one was new last challenge, but I found the slight gamification of the random item from a list (which I have been doing for years for todo lists) really made the amount of overhanging work less stressful and even something to look forward to, because I didn't have to make any decision on what was being done. Thinking about the stuff, trying to remember it all, and trying to decide where to even start is a quick path to overwhelm for me. Fair warning - this list is going to get longer in fits and starts for a while before it starts to get consistently shorter just because some of the stuff on the list will get broken into smaller tasks by their very nature, and I'm okay with that. It's an illusion (or perhaps an unveiling of the true amount of work); work is still getting done even if the number is rising.

New shiny things for this challenge:

These ones might.

• Look for opportunities to meet/interact with new people every day
• Read every day
• Work on something that helps me long-term every day-ish

Read every day is fairly self-explanatory. It also feels a bit like cheating; I already read every single day at work on my breaks and lunch. But I only read in non-English languages then, and so my English book pile has grown a lot. So if I can persuade myself to read more OUTSIDE of work, that would be a good thing. It's not like I have all these books because I'm not interested in their contents, after all. (Sometimes I will we could absorb information through touch though.)

Working on something for the future is also a carryover from last time (though a mostly neglected one). For the purposes of this challenge, a task in this category has to be something that Future Me will thank Past Me for doing, not in a catching-up sense, but because it makes my life permanently (or at least semi-permanently) better in some way. Examples from past challenges include sorting out my investment portfolio, making an organizational system for work, writing a will, and altering my shopping trolley so that it could hold weight better. All things that I did once and that took some work upfront, but that I am still benefiting from. I don't have anything top of mind for this goal, so I should probably brainstorm a list of options!

Last but not least is the first of my shiny goals. It is the most challenging one. I have lived in my new town for about a year and a half now, and I really don't know very many local people. I also don't really know anyone who shares any of my hobbies, so I have no one to talk to about those things. I can get kind of down about that, but I'm also not really doing anything to change the situation either. So... I should probably put in the work rather than hoping a magic fairy finds me some people I can be friends with. This could be attending a local event, starting a conversation while shopping/otherwise out (which may involve making a special effort to go out), volunteering (the second-best way to meet people after working in town!), or anything similar. There are going to be a lot of days where I cannot realistically go out, so joining in a conversation on one of the Discord servers I joined for hobby-based chatter will also be acceptable. I just don't want that to be my easy way out, with no effort made to meet local humans.

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That's it, that's all! (Though I think it's plenty.) On with the challenge!

14 hours ago, Mistr said:

I finally got caught up on your challenge.

 

Great job on organizing the work tasks. I'm sorry you need to do so much from home because work does not give you the time and space to do what they ask of you.

 

Your new necromancer sounds like fun. She is a big change from the half-troll warrior.

 

See you on the next round.

No worries!

I really didn't want to have to bring work home, but I also don't feel stressed about it, so that is good.

She died today. It was a stupid death; I was working through my very first vault, disenchanting and literally sucking the life from my foes when my health dropped any appreciable amount, then teleporting out to heal.  I did not think that the mature multi-hued dragon in front of me could one-shot me, because I had my basic resistances covered (though I did notice that electricity was showing orange and not yellow like the others). It breathed lightning first thing and hit for full damage. Still not sure exactly what went wrong, because I CHECKED before throwing away the ring that was giving me resistance. But Talthiel II is progressing all right, if desperately short on cash.

Same to you!

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This does not feel like the end of the challenge already! Writeup tomorrow, I guess.

Most of today was spent clearing out two work email folders, and dealing with every single item in them. Sometimes that was deleting. Sometimes it was downloading pictures or other resources shared by fellow staff. Sometimes it was visiting links, or archiving some information in a more accessible place. Holy crap, that stuff takes a lot of time when you don't shunt items aside to "deal with later".

Ongoing Habits:

Exercise: A session of Elements and a long walk.

Prayer: No..

NerdFitness: Yes, two full challenges I believe.

Purging: Some fabric from an old cloth bag that had worn out. I believe I kept it to get measurements so that I could make replacements after ALL of my other lightweight cloth bags mysteriously went missing on a trip to Halifax. So, I took the measurements, and consigned the fabric to cleaning rags.

New Shiny:

Angband: 

Played only one level. Found a new artifact weapon that I probably won't use. Learned that golems are the worst. No notable kills.

BGA: Nothing new.

Work: Start of day: 683. End of day: 683. I actually did feel like working on this, but then didn't. Which hopefully means that I will do much stuff tomorrow.

Long-term: Meh.

I pretty much felt like I was just catching up on things after getting home, rather than making forward progress. 🤷‍♀️

16 hours ago, Jarric said:

Wow, you have been busy. Impressed you've managed so much after so little sleep Tuesday night.

I made up for it today.

4 hours ago, Scaly Freak said:

But if you can Crush and Vampire-drain your enemies... do you really need a melee weapon? 

I do when I am out of mana! Though arrows work as long as both they and my Phase Door pile hold out.....

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Ongoing Habits:

Exercise: I, um, walked to the end of my driveway barefoot to take out the trash, and wrestled with a cat who didn't want his ear medicine.

Prayer: Yes.

NerdFitness: No.

Purging: Uhhhh, no I didn't.

New Shiny:

Angband: 

Did not play at all today.

BGA: Possibly I played a bit of Koi-Koi, but really not much if I did.

Work: Start of day: 686. End of day: 683. But! I made sure I went through all of the Halloween books, so I will be good for my Halloween storytime. (It's not ON Halloween, but I am working that night. This means I need work-appropriate costumes.)

Long-term: Forgot about it until it was too late.

I did a lot of reading and watching YouTube and, I don't know, general puttering. It does not make for a memorable day to report.

On 10/9/2023 at 4:17 AM, Severine said:

You're not boring! I like the updates. CRUSH!

Glad someone is enjoying them!

19 hours ago, Jarric said:

I second @Severine, I've been thoroughly enjoying following along with your updates (and wondering if I'll ever find time to give Angband a go!).

Excellent! If you do, don't get too attached to your early characters - you will die A LOT while learning. Probably less if you have experience in other roguelikes, but they are all a little different. The deaths in town, ie. before you even make it into the dungeon, are always memorable. 😂

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Ongoing Habits:

Exercise: Lots of walking, plus one session of Literal Immortality. Dead hang is harder than I remember.

Prayer: Probably some. Not today though. I was out a lot.

NerdFitness: Ehhhh, probably not, to be honest.

Purging: Most days I did not. Today I got rid of some papers associated with an old game (Realmz). I would still like to play this someday, but I don't think I need the character planning printouts from 20 years ago any more.

New Shiny:

Angband: 

I have had to evolve my strategy now that the enemy groups I am encountering have just slightly too many hit points for Crush to work. Mostly, I'm looking for items that can deal area-of-effect damage, so that I can bring them down just under the threshold (they are often only 20HP or so too high). My necro spellbooks do not offer any area-of-effect spells, so for now this is my best option. I have picked up an item that gives me regeneration, and since the necro's spells not only use up mana but also hurt them in the process, this helps me get back to spellcasting health sooner. I've also starting using Vampire Strike, which lets me literally suck the life of enemies to heal myself. Must be careful though, as that does involve being next to said enemies, who can hit back. It's fun though, to suck them down until they run in fear. They SHOULD be running in fear, bwahaha.

I've also finally, by dungeon level 30, managed to cobble together the five basic resistances. (I could have done it earlier if I could realistically wear heavy armour, but I am a delicate flower.) Every bit of resistance is on a different piece of equipment, which is quite limiting from an upgrade point of view. Hoping to find some better stuff soon. (Including weapons. My weapons suck. My current one is primarily useful because it boosts my INT which boosts my mana pool, and lets me detect treasure, which frees up an inventory slot. Crap at hitting things though.)

I still haven't found a single exciting vault to share, but there was a moment where I thought I was dead for sure. This is a good illustration of why you don't play when you are tired.

I was using Crush to get rid of pesky hounds, orcs, and human adventurers that kept drifting in from a nearby room, while also using Phase Door to avoid a werewolf that I was slowly picking off, as it could hit me way too hard in melee and we've already mentioned the suckiness of my weapon. (There were two parallel hallways I was teleporting between that didn't seem to be connected, but I didn't have them mapped enough to know for sure.) I didn't pay quite enough attention to my hit points when I used Crush, and it must have taken off the maximum amount of HP or very near it. I dropped to 23 HP, was at a speed penalty due to being weak (and also having my strength drained by something), in a hallway where I knew enemies could come in from the neighbouring room (though I hoped they had all been Crushed), when SOMETHING BREATHED from the darkness. Oh god. And it breathed cold, which at the time I had zero resistance to. I watched the breath hit me and the messages appearing at the top of the screen, crossing my fingers but just waiting to see "You die.". Had it been a baby dragon, or a vortex, or any of many other common things at that depth that breathed on me, I would have died. But it was just a cold hound, and maybe already injured since it dealt about 3HP of damage (breath weapon damage is based on the current HP of the monster, so they get less dangerous as you wound it). I chugged healing potions very quickly after that, saved, and set the game aside for the night.

Notable kills: Lagduf the Snaga, Old Man Willow, Uglúk the Uruk, Azog Enemy of the Dwarves, Ibun Son of Mîm, Ulwarth Son of Ulfang, Mîm Betrayer of Turin. I have only just realized that I have not yet encountered Sméagol in either run! He's usually the first unique you meet after Farmer Maggot's dogs, and he's generally super annoying until you are able to kill him because he robs you blind and you can't land a blow.

BGA: I really haven't learned anything new. Good thing this was a bonus task.

Work: Start of day: 662. End of day: 686. I added some more books and removed basically nothing. I have done very little on this in the last couple of days.

Long-term: Nope. Really do need to finish this off tomorrow so I can do something else.

I don't remember Tuesday all that clearly, so I have little to say about that. The only thing I know for sure is that I stayed up WAY too late poking around in Israeli news sources. I wanted to find out how recent events are reported to Israel's citizens, because they talk about different things than international sources do, and that helps me understand the politics of the whole thing better. Fine and dandy, but I picked a bad time and ended up getting only about 3 hours of sleep.

Wednesday I woke up after said three hours of sleep and had a storytime first thing. I read a slightly dark picture book, which went over well, and I got a compliment afterward on doing a really good storytime. I was quite tired by the time I got home though, but too wired to sleep much. Hung out with some friends for TV time, but wouldn't have had the energy to hang out long afterward even if they had been up for it.

Today has been a busy day. I am staying home from my uncle's funeral in order to take care of my three cats, all of whom need to be medicated daily and who all have different food that they try to steal from each other. I'm not normally responsible for their medication, so I was reading notes and remembering how to administer an insulin injection. They were actually all very easy and cooperative. I do not expect this golden period to continue once they catch on.

I also ran around town shipping packages, buying a rather large amount of Halloween decorations and amazing my son by fitting almost all of them into a rather small bag (cotton mesh shopping bags are THE BEST!), realizing that I will be at work during the trick-or-treating time (), getting my Werewolf game running, and doing research on a new D&D character. Whew! All this while nursing an all-day headache I was afraid would worsen. I think I did pretty well.

On 10/6/2023 at 2:31 AM, Severine said:

Anyway, whatever the reason, I have spent the last week or so with my hand/wrist/arm in a very restricting brace that I still have from my previous surgery. I know how important it is to stop the cycle of inflammation and damage and immobilize it to let it heal. I know the drill, after so many years, but I cannot express how much I hate wearing that thing. It makes EVERY SINGLE LITTLE DAILY TASK so much harder. Cooking, eating, getting dressed - you name it, it suddenly sucks. Needless to say, I have been a bit down and discouraged. Typing is also next to impossible unless I want to use one hand, so I am back to using voice dictation software. I didn't have it set up on my new laptop, hence the delay in posting. I finally got the wherewithal to install it and configure it this evening after dinner, which is probably a good sign that I am coming out of my funk. Thankfully I am good at using the software (lots of practice), but it feels like sliding backward and some moments I just feel like crying.

This is the best reason I have ever seen for not posting for a while. I'm so sorry that you're hurt (physically and emotionally). But I'm glad you know what to do to make it better again.

On 10/6/2023 at 8:18 PM, Severine said:

Posting this video

I can relate to some of this. I think if I had to pace myself to learning something I wanted to learn in 1% per day increments I would go a little crazy - I love throwing myself into projects for hours at a time learning a new thing and I absolutely learn best this way for most things. But I am able to form habits and do things consistently when I get the right setup for them. I find them best for recurring things I don't really want to do but need to, like housework, or that I would otherwise forget, or things that really need repetitive practice. The break-it-down-and-do-it-a-little-at-a-time learning I could see for something where motivating yourself to do even a few minutes of work was, well, work. Or that was just really hard to learn for whatever reason.

Ongoing Habits:

Exercise: Still nothing

Prayer: Yes, once!

NerdFitness: Not even a little bit.

Purging: A couple of WarCraft expansions.

New Shiny:

Angband: 

Talthiel's progress is going very well, and has been fairly incident-free and therefore not that interesting to write about. She has picked off a few orc uniques, but most of her progress at the moment looks like this.

Look, a roomful of enemies. *checks their hitpoints* Excellent. CRUSH! *gather loot*

That probably takes a little explaining. At character level 10, she learned the spell Crush. Crush is AWESOME right now. The way it works is that if any enemy in line of sight (regardless of whether you can see it or not) has HP less than 4x your character level, they die immediately. If they have more than that, it doesn't affect them. It costs a reasonable amount of mana and hurts you for 1d(2x you character level) with each cast. This means that for a unique orc who brings a little entourage with him, for instance, I can use one spell to wipe out everyone but the unique, use Narthanc to firebolt them to maybe less that the required amount (this is starting to take more work) and then Crush them too. It's so satisfying to see a whole room of monsters go poof. I am looking forward to getting Disenchant down to acceptable fail percentages (and my mana pool big enough to make good use of it), because while Crush will still be useful in future, it won't be quite so spectacularly useful as it is right now.

Notable kills: Wormtongue Agent of Saruman, Grishnakh the Hill Orc, Orfax Son of Boldor, Boldor King of the Yeeks, Ufthak of Cirith Ungol, Shagrat the Orc Captain.

BGA: I lost a lot more. Not in anything new though.

Work: Start of day: 692. End of day: 681. I intend to keep working on this, but it will show up in the results for tomorrow.

Long-term: Nope.

I did not go to the store because it rained until closing time. I did, however, text a bit with my son to make a plan. And I came up with a good costume idea for next year.

Tomorrow, I must plan my Werewolf game roles for the Halloween game. I have a good idea of player numbers, so time to get the details sorted out on my end. (If you are reading and want to play but aren't already in, drop me a note!)

On 10/6/2023 at 3:07 AM, Severine said:

I have seen this in other contexts, notably my friend who teaches early elementary school (grade 2/3) and the condescension she gets from colleagues who teach high school and middle school. It's maddening, especially since early experiences are so formative and impactful.

Me too - children's authors for instance are often not considered "real" authors until they write an adult book, some authors for adults treat writing for kids as a step back, children's books are rarely considered for major prizes, and so on. I'm sure other fields are similarly afflicted.

On 10/6/2023 at 3:07 AM, Severine said:

I didn't realize you were also in Canada. I am originally from Ontario and grew up in Toronto. Lived in Boston down in the States for just over a decade (American partner) and now back in Canada and living in BC.

Yup, a little bit south of Ottawa!

On 10/6/2023 at 3:07 AM, Severine said:

Sorry to hear about your uncle. I hope you're processing the news okay  ❤️ 

It's been all right. It's a little weird because he's the youngest of ten, but everyone knew he'd probably go first because Down syndrome tends to lower life expectancy. He had Alzheimer's for a while so the most recent memories aren't the greatest, but I've been trying to remember happier times.

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Ongoing Habits:

Exercise: Nothing today.

Prayer: I actually do not remember any alarms. Just refreshed the app again.

NerdFitness: None at all.

Purging: Oops.

New Shiny:

Angband: 

Talthiel is now at dungeon level 6, character level 9, and really hasn't hit any major challenges yet. and really, only one interesting thing has happened so far.

When she got to dungeon level three I decided to bring her back up because she had learned everything in her first spellbook and was going to be ready for the next one. But I decided to walk her back up rather than recalling because, well, it was only dungeon level three. On arriving on dungeon level two, I got a message that it was only level one difficulty - common enough on the low levels - but level SIX for items. Okay, we detour to explore! Took a while of sorting through nothing much of interest (which is also fine, at least my girl is less naked than before), but I eventually found Narthanc lying on the ground and equipped it with glee. My necro is temporarily going to do a lot of smacking things and shooting fire. And while I am happy for her, I'm still a bit bitter that it took Jinjin so very very long to find a half-decent weapon, when he was a weapon-dependant class.

I also discovered the text file for vaults while trying to get a little info on the necromancer class. There are some great names in there, like Mad Alchemist's Lab. I think learning to recognize some of them would bring up some interesting mental images while exploring. "I was exploring a little house, and then I read a Treasure Detection scroll and there were a ton of items off to the west. Turns out it was The Bank from Hell, and I had to decide if I wanted to make a withdrawal...."

Notable kills: Grip Farmer Maggot's Dog.

BGA: I did not learn anything new, but I played for far too long and kept losing at everything I played. My ELO has taken a big hit in the games I play the most.

Work: Start of day: 629. End of day: 692. I did not do a single thing except add all the books I brought home over the last little bit to the list.

Long-term: Nope.

I was spectacularly unproductive today. I did not do a single thing from my list. Other than catching up on the news, I can't think of anything that I did that looks even a little bit like a worthwhile use of my time. I did finally get a good amount of sleep at least. And I do now feel like I want to get to work on some things, which maybe indicates that this restful period of nothingness was needed.

Tomorrow I make a trip to the dollar store to see what I can dream up for my Halloween decor (unless it's pouring rain). I am excited to build a good Halloween decoration collection, now that we live somewhere where people can see them!