12 july 2024
Sports / running
The hardest part today was honestly to get out of the door. I was tired, I
didn't want to go, and I seriously sat for a good fifteen minutes staring in the
void asking myself if I'd rather "have done it" or "have given up on it". I
still put my shoes on, went out, started running, almost gave up after 3 minutes
("... at least I tried"), powered on, did the full 25 minutes.
It was, incidentally, the third time I did 25 minutes, which means that Monday
is 28 minutes, which will be my personal record. I'm reasonably confident I can
do it, because after 25 minutes, I do have some reserve. Problem is: my brain is
utterly not convinced of that around the 18-minute mark, so that's another place
to have to push through. I do not enjoy it.
Brain has also Not Helped as there were a lot of runners on my path today, and
they all looked, like, light, and I was feeling so fucking heavy. Urgh. Also the
weather was super humid, not super pleasant.
But hey, went out, did it, have another 25 minutes and 2.4 km in the books.
Work was so-so most of the day, was pretty unfocused - still managed to get a
few reviews in, and I did finish the day by finishing the investigation I wanted
to do (and I think I even have a reasonable-ish solution for my problem), so all
in all okay. Had a jigsaw puzzle break this afternoon, that was lovely.
Game night was nice, did manage to not drink too much and not eat too much
chocolate, but I'm still super-full. I probably shouldn't eat a whole portion of
take-away anymore... it just doesn't fit. Made scofflaws, that's definitely a
strong contender for one of my favorite cocktails... and it mixes in a glass,
not in a shaker, which is actually more convenient when making several at a
time.
Writever
The word for today was "Queer".
"You mean, they were living with a single partner?
Most of them, officially, yes.
And they believed in binary genders?
It was the prevalent view at the time, yes.
And they were pairing exclusively with people of the other gender?
Exclusively, no; by a large majority, yes.
How queer."
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11 july 2024
Moment of pride today: I did manage to debug an issue with SSH on my own without
having to pester anyone. And that's good, because the only issue that I had was
an expired key (oops).
Other than that, fairly quiet day - I took care of a bunch of "meta-work",
including filling in my perf self-assessment for the past quarter, so yay. I'm
very happy that I had good notes last quarter - made said assessment much
easier. That's good incentive to continue trying to have good notes! (And not
give up on the whole thing whenever I fall off the wagon.)
Writever
Writever word for today was "Share".
The problem with trying to replicate services that worked reasonably well in
the 21st century is that some things really don't translate well. Car-sharing
did assume that people would refill the tank before leaving the vehicle; but
antimatter stations are not exactly common enough for starship-sharing to make
any kind of sense.
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10 july 2024
I think I did manage to setup vim to autowrap text at 80 - my config was
apparently missing a "t" in the format options. So there, now it works, I'm
happy \o/ the little things, really. Also the internets were REALLY CONFUSING on
the matter.
Therapy
Therapy today was kind of weird (spent most of it very dissociated), but useful,
because I'm still tired, but I do feel like I stepped out of the hamster wheel
for a moment. Took me a while to come back, but at the same time I had enough
observer online to be able to see in which order things were happening, which
was in itself fascinating.
Also best quote ever - I was wearing my "don't fight your demons, hire them"
t-shirt, to which P. quipped "you need a 'don't fight your demons, let them
rest' t-shirt". And yes, yes, I absolutely do.
Sports / weights / strength
Went to Paula after therapy, it stays consistenly good. Today we did some 40kg
dealifts again, some front-carry, rows with 12.5kg kettlebell, and some bench at
20+kg. It was good, I'm tired everywhere, works as intended. She gave me some
breathing technique tips though, which were useful. And apparently my bench form
is great, which made me happy :)
Made some banana cake! It's like banana bread, but in round shape so that it fit
my timing constraints :P
Wrote an AlphabeticalZürich:
https://alphabeticalzurich.wordpress.com/2024/07/10/auzelg/
Writever
There, NOW I'm up-to-date again on Writever - I'll try to not slip that much
again this month. And it's even up-to-date on
the full month page!
Writever July 8th
The word for the day before yesterday was "Solidarity".
The TRAPPIST colonies, strongly condemning the acts of the Gliese planetary
system state, and expressing strong support towards Earth and the Solar
system, call for an immediate and durable cessation of hostilities.
For Earth, we stand in Sol-idarity.
Writever July 9th
The word for yesterday was "Travel".
I don't think I'd want to go back.
But it used to be that, to feel fully "on vacation", you traveled for roughly
a day. Whether you were traveling 900km at 150km/h, 6'000km at 1'000km/h or
400'000km at 50'000km/h... you were still essentially traveling for a day.
Teleportation made travel times moot, and maybe we have lost something there.
Writever July 10th
Today's word is "Interstices".
Humans say that the greatest trick I ever played was convincing the world that
I did not exist. I beg to differ: it was convincing the world that idleness
was a sin.
I have so much more opportunities to sway people my way, in all these
interstices of time where they used to daydream and are now trying to fill at
all cost.
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09 july 2024
Books
I finished Welcome to the Hyunam-dong Bookshop by Hwang Bo-Reum and it was
lovely. I realize that "slice of life" may actually be one of my favorite
genres; and this one is the population of a bookshop. And, well, just lovely.
I just decided on the next one: One of Us Knows, by Alyssa Cole. It's been
a while since I read a thriller, and that feels like the right mood right now.
I need to update the CSS so that my titles are not so stupidly huge compared to
the rest of the text. Also I should configure my vim better.
Ariane 6 should launch this evening
(https://www.esa.int/Enabling_Support/Space_Transportation/Ariane/Ariane_6_launch_how_to_watch_and_what_to_look_out_for)k
I think I'll try to catch that!
Did indeed catch the launch - that was good! Two funny things: the infographic
talking about A?ores (rather than Açores), and the plug for the Lego Ideas
Ariane 6 set that briefly crashed the Lego website.
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08 july 2024
Sports / running
Did my 25-minute run this morning, 2.41km. I went via the road over the river
rather than turning earlier, so that I could avoid crossing the street towards
the end of the road - I think that was a good idea. It felt harder than on
Friday, probably because yesterday and last night were not necessarily optimal
conditions for exercising today. But, eh, went out, did it.
Had a fairly productive day today - did some reviews, sent a couple of patches,
and spent the afternoon poking at the problem I have been trying to understand
for a couple of days - and finally cracked it.
Also went to choir this evening - I enjoyed it more than last week, possibly
because having seen the songs last week helps... and also I got my voice back,
woo!
Unclear why I'm feeling somewhat deflated/sad, though :/ Maybe I just need to
go to bed, so let's do that.
Writever
Late again, and I didn't catch up to today, but at least I wrote yesterday's,
for the theme "Questioning".
It must have been weird in the Before Time, needing to choose your studies
and your career and your partner.
Sometimes, I yearn for that freedom. But removing questioning also avoids
mistakes; or, if it does not, it avoids the associated guilt. We seem to be
happier that way. Although maybe that's the Mood Optimizers talking.
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