I never intended for it to work out this way, but my first day back at work coincided with the first honest go of my health project and the first day of November. The heavens align this way, I’m told, or perhaps we humans try to find patterns where there aren’t any.
I warned everyone yesterday to expect a fog of grumpiness to roll across the website’s daily posts over the next few days, but I didn’t expect to still be under the worst of my daughter’s migratory head cold. In fact, my preventative Otrivine and early turn in last night did little to abate a fresh onslaught of achy vocal chords this morning. I already pity the world for having to look at me, now I must extend an apology to anyone with functional hearing. My voice has returned to pubescent cracking all the while each utterance comes at the cost of a sharp pain right above my Adam’s apple. Perhaps there is some silver lining – I’m resigned to a whisper at this point to mitigate the suffering of exerted effort, and I think I’ve discovered why my daughter started whimpering at night when she coughed.
I hope that preamble is enough to excuse me from the full responsibility of my ideal morning routine, which is a key area I wanted to bring to habit. In truth, I fought every inch for a stalemate this morning, but still fell short of success. I woke up at 4:00 a.m. as planned, and I managed to quickly get the hygiene out of the way, but after that the exhaustion started creeping back in. Last night was more tumultuous than normal, between my own personal cold or my daughter justifiably coping with hers. On a more adorable note, I did wake up once to find her standing next to me as I slept. Until now it’s been crying whilst laying down on her mattress.
On the diet side, I was able to keep my carnivore promise, and I maintained a non-sugary beverage intake, but I didn’t feel up to measuring any baselines as I had planned or knocking out the morning’s tidying, meditation, or exercise. Weren’t those the reasons I delayed by two days to begin with? In the latest honest conversation with myself around 6 or 7 a.m., I realised the obvious – it might take the NHS' recommended 7-10 days to get on the other side of this, but that’s too much of a setback to consider. So, I resigned to, as we say in the South, “keep on keepin' on,” and get on with what I could. That will give my pride a bit more cushion when I do the long-term reflection in a month. At least I’ll have earned the right to say that though it was rough, and not perfect, I dug deep enough to at least get out of bed and try.
And today’s not quite over yet. I can still pick up a few more points by hitting that newly established 8:00 p.m. bed time, sans blue light and screens. That will give me a better shot at tomorrow and a more interesting read for everyone over my self-consolation. On the bright side, I hear that even if I fail, they give out loser’s trophies now. And at the end of the day, who actually reads the shiny plaque at the bottom anyway? They glimmer just the same.
New Projects on the Horizon
Stay tuned for a bit of discourse on more short term projects I’m considering. Unbelievably, I’ve had a wealth of people asking for some technology help lately, with programming, website building, automation, design, statistics, or just learning or building something fun. To make life easier, I might build out these courses so I can point future request-hungry friends and colleagues to a common place. That way when called upon we have material to mull over together. But don’t worry – despite my dressing this with discontent language, I really enjoy it and teaching in general. Plus, it helps me justify keeping the Zoom license to my wife.