Made it to May. Things are better now and will get better in future.
Kind of a cloudy, bleak start to the morning. I got to bed much too late after getting home late, but I still awoke around 4:30 AM or somewhere around there and laid in bed until 6:30 AM drifting in and our of sleep. I do think Iโm sleeping better these days with the windows open and I do have hope for summer, despite for my critics and haters. Truth is I feel like a shit this morning, I didnโt get enough sleep and Iโve been achy ever since mid-last week, particularly my right arm but I canโt find the tick bite.
I was thinking it was 20 years Iโve been going to Save the Pine Bush Dinners now. Back when it was only $10 for dinner, now itโs $20 but I ended up taking home a bunch of lasagna. Fewer and fewer of original Save the Pine Bush members are still around, the Erastus Corning years are so far gone. Seems hard to believe that two decades has gone by now. Two decades from now, Iโll be 62 years old. And hopefully have that off-grid cabin up in woods somewhere. Itโs been twenty years since my mid-years in college, 21 since I started exploring the Albany Pine Bush in depth. I do dream of that day when Albany and all the problems of the city with all itโs pollution and grime are just a distant memory.
It was a great dinner, Al Hicks gave an excellent presentation. Makes me almost want to be inspired to be politically active again. Rode my bike down Madison Avenue and caught the 18 home. I probably should have ridden all the way to the dinner rather then take the 910 over there, but I was lazy and didnโt feel like riding up the State Street Hill at rush hour, plus I wanted to try out that that new express bus. Wasnโt as fast as I had hoped. After the dinner, after dark, I rode back downtown. That Madison Avenue Bike Lane sure makes riding along that route pretty easy and much safer, even after dark with my lights. I complain about a lot in this world, but I sure like my bike and the bus service to get around the city. Someday I want to move back out in the country, but not in New York for the reasons I write about so much Ina repetitive at time fashion. Still, I really feel a connection to small cities and towns I visit, and Iโd love to work and do business in such a place, though Iโd want to live out in the country and have acerage and do those rural things, some of liberals find so disapproving and bad. But for now, I have weekends in wilderness and deep rural places far away from the peering eyes of libtards.
I got home at 10:15 and was up until after eleven. Iโm never up that late but was wired from the coffee . Even after having two brownies and lasagna, salad and garlic bread I wa a bit hungry when I got home so I fried up some onions and some of the light red beans that I cooked up into a mash yesterday morning. This morning was reheated coffee with banana-carrot-oatmeal-flour pancakes. The banana gives them them so much flavor and helps hold the oatmeal, carrot and flour together. Topped with frozen blueberries and syrup.
Got my remaining Hoopla borrows for the month. Itโs May now. I had five books โ โ half of them audio books but I wanted to make sure I got my ten borrows for the month of April before they expired. Audio books are great for bike commuting, they kept my mind thinking and moving forward as I ride back and forth to work. Of course, the thing today will be to stay awake while Iโm riding in as I am so sleep deprived after the dinner last night. Truth is the Pine Bush doesnโt help me, if anything it makes my thoughts more disorderly with my frustration with politics these days.
I concede the past few weeks on my morning blog posts Iโve really let me OCD show through a bit too much. I really should try harder to get clean. But after so many years of the secretive life, I kind of want to be truthful at least on my blog, in many a kind of silly way. I know it only raises peopleโs heckles and gets me mean and nasty comments and harassing emails. I wish I could be more truthful to myself and world around me, but I do struggle to figure out what thoughts are rational, what are dreams, and what I should be fighting for or against.
Truth is thoughts are only thoughts, and sometimes I just put words together as I like to clang them together. But also, I know OCD is a serious disorder, they say itโs the seventh most serious condition one can suffer form outside of heart attacks, breathing disorders, schizophrenia, and a few very other severe things. I should try to get clean, try counseling again, but maybe not that creepy guy in the basement in an run-down office building in the outskirts of city. I really worry that shrinks will shrink my mind. Still, I donโt want to give up so much of what is me. What can I say, I have some controversial views that really anger some of my more liberal followers. How dare you โ is the reaction I so often get from people on my posts. Maybe itโs a good thing Iโm forcing people to think.
The key at this point is just to stay alive. I am so close to living the life I actually want to live if I put in a few more years in with the state. Itโs really not that much more time. Iโve come so far, becoming a unit director, overseeing a small but important department. And Iโm doing great work, new initiatives bringing together code and data. Things will get better, I tell myself. I havenโt checked my investments lately, but I keep adding into the pool every week. Those days of finally saying good bye to Albany forever arenโt that far away.
That said, Iโm just glad to be out camping and traveling again, to get away from my critics and haters in the wilderness. Why do I get so bent out of shape by a threatening email and blog comments from people Iโve never even met before. Why do I fear every monster in the dark corners of the internet even if I know they probably arenโt like that in real life. I should just delete and ignore the trolls.
One of the latest fad diets is intermittent fasting. I would argue itโs a lot like the popular keto diet that says you can eat unlimited bacon as long as you cut down on the carbs. In other words, donโt really try, have your cake and eat it too. Ignoring all that saturated fats clogging your arteries and larding up your arteries.
Muslims during Ramadan often doing fasting part of the day. They usually though break their fast with a calorie dense meal. The thing is Iโm not sure if there is an actual net reduction of calories or that health and weight actually improved. Delayed calorie intake doesnโt guarantee you wonโt take up more calories later in the day.
I guess if your problem with excessive calorie intake is one of snacking all day long, setting an eating schedule can help. Fewer hours to eat in theory means less eating. At least thatโs the idea of intermittent fasting. Still I donโt agree as delayed calorie intake doesnโt mean less calories or better health. Moreover, to the contrary I tend to think intermittent fasting encourages low blood sugar which only encourages excessive sugar and therefore calorie consumption when a fast is broken.
Whatโs a better idea โ the opposite of intermittent fasting โ eating all day with a focus on smaller, healthy unprocessed foods high in fiber with some occasional healthy omega 3 fats and protein. Fiber and more fiber. Things that are naturally filling like lentils and spicy foods. Staying away from artificial sweets except for a rare treat. Go for the apple or banana or grape if you crave sweet. But never stop eating that fiber from things like carrots, celery and broccoli. And drink lots of water.
There are two species of rabbits in New Hampshire, the eastern cottontail and the New England cottontail. The eastern cottontail is not native east of the Hudson River and was introduced to New England in the early 1900s as a game species. The New England cottontail is native to the region but has seen dwindling population numbers over the last several decades throughout its range, mostly due to habitat loss and fragmentation, and is currently listed as a state-endangered species in New Hampshire.