I may have mentioned this before, but it just came to me this afternoon.
When I was 6 we lived in Dunoon, in the West of Scotland. We lived for a short period in a nice bungalow. There was an old woman who lived at the bottom of the road, Mrs. Mowat. She was an artist, and was around 60 or so when we met her.
I used to visit her in the afternoon, and drink Orange Barley drinks, and watch her paint. We would talk of all sorts of things, but she would mainly tell stories of her past, and the area we lived in. She was a nice old lady, and apparently remembered my brother and I, as we were mentioned to her daughter before she passed on.
Just a nice memory to get me through this crap afternoon…
Would you like to swing on a star?
Carry moonbeams home in a jar?
And be better off than you are?
Or would you rather be a mule?
A mule is an animal with long funny ears
Kicks up at anything he hears
His back is brawny but his brain is weak
He’s just plain stupid with a stubborn streak
And by the way, if you hate to go to school
You may grow up to be a mule
Would you like to swing on a star?
Carry moonbeams home in a jar?
And be better off than you are?
Or would you rather be a pig?
A pig is an animal with dirt on his face
His shoes are a terrible disgrace
He has no manners when he eats his food
He’s fat and lazy and extremely rude
But if you don’t care a feather or a fig
You may grow up to be a pig
Would you like to swing on a star?
Carry moonbeams home in a jar?
And be better off than you are?
Or would you rather be a fish?
A fish won’t do anything, but swim in a brook
He can’t write his name or read a book
To fool the people is his only thought
And though he’s slippery, he still gets caught
But then if that sort of life is what you wish
You may grow up to be a fish
A new kind of jumped-up slippery fish
And all the monkeys aren’t in the zoo
Every day you meet quite a few
So you see it’s all up to you
You can be better than you are
You could be swingin’ on a star
I’ve been ill for a few weeks now, and finally went to the doctor. Back on the Asacol, and signed off work for 2 weeks. I’ve been doing a lot of nothing, just sleeping and trying to get better. Have also started a Macrobiotic diet, as found in a book by Virginia Harper. The diet is very bland most of the time, but once I get over this flare up, it gets a little more interesting.
During my nap this morning I dreamt that sleep is a big grey brick made of some soft material. Every time you sleep you take a slice off, shortening the brick. You take a slice equal to the quality and duration of your sleep. I assumed that once the brick was gone, you died.
I’m not sure what to do with that, but as JR said “wow, profound”.
Good luck to Mr. Armstrong in the Tour next year… I’ll be rooting for him:
Cycling legend Lance Armstrong is coming out of retirement to try to win an eighth Tour de France in 2009.
The American, who will be 37 on 18 September, recovered from cancer and claimed victory in the Tour a record seven times before retiring in 2005.
He said: “I’m happy to announce that after talking with my children, family and closest friends, I have decided to return to professional cycling.
“It is in order to raise awareness of the global cancer burden.”
He added: “This year alone, nearly eight million people will die of cancer worldwide. It’s now time to address cancer on a global level.”
Armstrong famously overcame an aggressive form of testicular cancer before embarking on his remarkable run of Tour de France victories.
Since his retirement in 2005, he has run respectable times in the New York and Boston marathons but much of his energy has been spent running the Lance Armstrong Foundation, a charity dedicated to combating cancer.
I’m doing a bit of re-shuffling of my life. Nothing major, just trying to get priorities straight in regards to my work and play.
I’m slowly shutting down gaming accounts for various online games. It’s tough. Take World of Warcraft, for example. I’ve spent almost 3 years (on and off with large breaks) building up the characters. It’s almost like giving up on an old friend, but I’ll do it. The thing about the game is that it is addictive, but you really get nowhere, there is no end. No spectacular death with a high scores screen. It’s almost like an online life, and I don’t really need it to keep me amused.
I’ve also been wanting to focus a bit more on music. The well seems to have dried up, and I’m not producing as much as I used to. Hell, I barely even pick up the guitar these days. The dribs and drabs I have produced are just gathering dust on the hard drive. Occasionally I’ll work on something and stick it up for a select few to hear, but it’s not really getting me anywhere. I mean, I don’t expect to make money from it, but would rather people get a chance to hear it, and if it someone likes it, then fantastic!
My friend Casey has also been tossing me scraps of web/design work. Mainly working within WordPress, but the occasional straight up HTML/CSS job does come along. I’m currently working on a project that includes 10 blogs that need a bit of work to be complete. Through consultation with my PHPGuru JR, I’ve learned a bit about PHP, and more about the innards of WordPress. I hope to continue in this side business, since it does pay. But the balancing of the workload is tough. Which brings me to my last point…
I’ve started reading more about this GTD (Get Things Done) strategy, mainly through the lifehacker.com website. Learning of tools and tricks to help me organise the way I live and work has been helpful. Things like cleaning up the desktop, and including only the things you need to get the job done. This includes cleaning up the icons and programs on your dock (in OS X) and actually using the “stacks” ability. At first I hated stacks, but now that I’ve created my own, and gotten rid of clutter, I think they are useful. It also inlcudes basic things like creating To-Do lists, and turning off everything else until your list is complete. I don’t really have the time to do this, so I set up a list, and break it up into manageable sections. I will work flat out on one section, check it done, and then move on. Workflow has increased, but it still needs more discipline. Basically I need to turn off my ADD/Mental Diarrhea and focus. But with things like Twitter I can at least keep them slightly under control. But I do bore easily, so that’s something I continue to work on.