Blog Soundtrack:
“Still Sleeping” by Oddisee
“Iambic 5 Poetry” by Squarepusher
“Spoken Roses” by John Foxx and Harold Budd
“Septentrion” by Fila Brazilla
“Good Disease” by Aim and Stephen Jones
“The Other Ship” by Nightmares On Wax
“Dark Waters” by Nikola Sati
“Forget Me Not” by St Germain
These are the songs that I’m listening to while I’m currently writing.
So…. what’s up, Blog Readers? Apologies for the 4-month gap between posts. I really don’t have any grand life events that delayed me; I just haven’t put keyboard to screen.
Physical Stuff
I’m around 190 pounds – about the weight that I want to stay around. I’ve been in the 188-199 range for about a year now, so that’s cool. No real tricks to it, other than staying consistent with drinking water, keeping pops to 1 a day (if that many), not eating fast food and junk foot a bunch, and not eating really late.
Sleep is still inconsistent but I have been averaging 5-6 hours a night now, instead of a broken 4-5. Hopefully, I can get to the 6-7 range in the next few weeks.
After multiple attempts with scheduling, I finally have a General Checkup scheduled for May 2nd. This will lead to me also finally getting my supposed-to-be-yearly heart ECHO out of the way. My biggest issues I’m going to bring up at my checkup are the continued foot tightness/pain and the weird pain in my right hand and wrist. The feet have been a LONG-time issue; I would love to go a few days without them protesting. 😉 Other than that, I’m just going in for routine readings (height/weight, blood pressure, heart rate, etc.). We’ll see how things go on Tuesday!
Louisville – Bad
This time of year, Louisville is in the national scene for the Kentucky Derby. However, about 2 weeks ago, we entered the national scene for something far worse. On the morning of April 10th, at the Old National Bank (just east of Downtown), a former employee entered the bank and started shooting. 5 people were killed, 8 others were injured (including 2 officers). The two officers – Nick Wilt and Cory Galloway – were the first ones on the scene; Wilt was shot in the head (still in the hospital but is improving), while Galloway was shot in the side (treated and released).
I’m not going to do the Gun Debate on here. But scenes like this are ridiculous.
Louisville – Good
On much better notes, the Kentucky Derby Festival kicked off last weekend, with “Thunder Over Louisville”, a 6-hour air show and one of the largest fireworks displays in North America. Normally, it’s warm (if not hot!) but this year, it barely got to 60 degrees; this, combined with the shooting, kept the crowds smaller than normal but if I had to guess, probably 300,000 showed to the waterfront (no official tallies have been released, yet). This year, I worked at MetroSafe, from 5 PM – 12 AM, helping monitor interstate traffic, especially right before and right after ‘Thunder’. I also had a co-worker join me; his 1st Thunder at MetroSafe, my 2nd, and 4th total (we also had our weekend crew at our office, with the TOC Supervisor). It was slow (very few incidents) but steady (a lot of traffic, total). I would like to watch Thunder and the Air Show in person next year (missed 5 of the last 6) but it depends on work and if anyone wants to actually go to the waterfront.
This week, starting today with a Marathon and Mini Marathon, kicks off Derby Week: a week of festivals, parties, and activities before the the biggest horse race in the world: The Kentucky Derby. I live about 5 blocks from Churchill Downs, so our neighborhood is starting to crank up the traffic and the overall vibe. I like it!
Nerdy Stuff
I finally finished playing Pillars of Eternity on PC. It took me a long time to decide on a main character class – I went with Paladin, but Druid is also very good. It was very fun game, especially after finishing Act I of III. I’m now working my way through Baldur’s Gate II: Enhanced Edition. What I’m doing is playing the multiplayer version, but creating all of the characters manually. It reminds me of Icewind Dale II but with better graphics, mechanics, and quests. I’m nearly 1/2 finished; I generally play 1-3 hours a weekday, 3-6 on weekends (when free).
I am still in 4 Dungeon & Dragons campaigns.
My Friday campaign (I play a Tortle Gunslinger/Artificer) meets every 2 weeks, 6 PM, for about 4 hours. We are Level 9 and are close to hitting a mid-story Boss Fight, with us taking a few weeks/months off afterwards. My Tortle “Abel” is perhaps my favorite character; he’s got an interesting backstory involving a Green Dragon and a decent arsenal of guns.
My early Saturday campaign meets at 12 PM, every 2-3 weeks, for 5 hours. In this one, I play “Took Took”, a Kenku Soulknife Rogue. If you are familiar with the X-Men franchise, Took Took is similar to Psylocke, except he’s a flightless raven. We are Level 4. Our main story, so far, is to find a missing Prince in a shrunken world. I really like this one because the DM streams it on her Twitch channel – look up ’emeraldlynx135′ and her campaign, “Malice”.
My late Saturday campaign meets about once every month, around 6:30 PM, for 2-4 hours. I am a Water Genasi Tempest Cleric (think ‘Thor’, but more healing) names “Trajen”… or a few other names. This campaign is a spy adventure: our group is trying to bring down a terrorist group. While I like playing a Cleric, I had a bad time getting the right spec: Tempest Clerics are generally loud, while War Clerics (my spec before) are loud AND bright, especially if you’re a half-Angel (‘Aasimar’).
My 4th campaign meets on Sundays at 4 PM, generally every 2 weeks (but our life schedules are all over the place, so ‘every 2 weeks’ is generous), for 3-4 hours. I play “Jaxil (‘Jax’)”, a Half-Drow Divine Soul Sorcerer – basically, a Sorcerer that can cast Cleric spells. We are looking for keys to unlock 13 tombs, set in a Wild West/Egyptian-like world. This campaign has been hard because we lost one player and I’ve been fighting burnout/exhaustion for a while, so until recently, I’ve been debating about leaving the campaign. However, we should be getting a 3rd player soon, so we’ll see how things go.
In August, I am going to my 1st ever GenCon! I’m very excited! I bought the 4-day pass; I’m going to try and get into as many game plays as possible.
Other Stuff
- I applied for a Remote Game Tester job online. However, I’m beginning to wonder if this was a scam. The ‘application’ – from Linkedin – was general questions, like “when are you available?’, ‘What processors and RAM do you have?’, and ‘Do you own more than one PC or gaming device?’. It was mainly for a 2nd job. If I don’t hear back from them in the next week, I’m going to assume I didn’t get the job.
- I am going to (remotely) do ‘A Mile A Day In May’ with a long-time good friend Amanda. You can run, job, or walk a mile, each day, with support from a group; in this case, a FB group. The easies time for me to get in a mile is right after work; I normally walk 5-6 blocks to catch the bus home, so I can just wander around Downtown a little bit before I head to the bus stop. Should be interesting!
- A friend (actually, a few friends) mentioned how her views on marriage, sex relationships, and other body issues should not have to conform to ‘societal norms’. It got me to thinking similar things: at nearly 45, I shouldn’t “have to”: a) be married, b) have kids, c) have to fill out a resume just to possibly have lunch with a woman, much less keep things casual. It should also not be taboo to want/have casual sex with a willing, consenting adult, or to be single at 38 or 39, or to not want to be married at any age!
- Speaking of that, Tinder and Bumble borderline useless.
- One of the best times I’ve had in 2023 was a birthday party at a friend’s house. There were probably 20 or so people there. It wasn’t a raucous, call-the-cops party but it also wasn’t boring: I met some very interesting and fun folks there. Thank you for the invite, ‘Sparker’!
The Nexus 