The world is pretty much shite right now, isn't it? Abortion bans, a clusterfuck in Afghanistan, fires and floods and climate change, and a global pandemic that's been hanging over our heads the past year-and-a-half like a body-ache-inducing raincloud and doesn't seem to be going away anytime soon. That we all live our lives without crawling under our bedcovers and never coming out is legitimately surprising.
Me, I take a philosophical approach to keep up my spirits. There has never been a point in human spacetime that has been anything close to ideal. By comparison, living in much of the world now, in 2021, is pretty much as good as it gets. And even if it weren't -- what are you going to do? You only get one life (probably), and it's going to be over relatively soon. How much of that you do want to spend in despair?
Also, I think chanced into good brain-wiring so I don't get depressed. That's a good way to keep your spirits up too--luck. I'm definitely not immune to negative feelings -- I get annoyed easily, I worry myself to sleep (or not to sleep, I should say) far too often, and I feel glum sometimes, of course -- but I don't have those omnipresent feelings of worthlessness and sadness that I hear sufferers of depression describe. Regardless of what the exterior factors are in my life, I'm usually happy -- or at least not unhappy. That's probably a better way to put it. I spend the vast majority of my life in neutral. But neutral is not bad. You can live a satisfying and meaningful life in neutral.
Anyway, enough waxing philosophical. A few bullet points and then that's a post.
- I bought a bicycle today. I debated getting a really nice one, as I've been tinkering with the idea of getting more into cycling (it's a good old man activity), but I decided on a significantly less expensive option. For now, I mostly need something to tool around the neighborhood with the kids, and there is no reason to drop a couple thou on that.
- Lil' S1 got a new bike also, and I think Lil' S2 is next. He already has a bike, but it's Lil' S1's old bike, and it's kinda beat up, so I think S's parents are going to buy him a new one when they come to visit next week. The boys have gotten really into riding bikes. It's cool, but we don't live on the best street for it. Our house is on a hill, and traffic isn't heavy, but it's not nothing either. I get worried (I'm a worrier, remember) about them around cars. But at some point you have to let them go out and play on their own and hope for the best, right? I mean, it's ridiculous how overprotective parents are today (myself included) compared to what parents were like when I was a kid.
- I'm apparently going to have a small stake in a healthcare tech company very soon. A friend who's a doctor is working on a scheduling/routing service to homecare patients. He asked me to join to help them with the math behind improving efficiency. It's right up my alley, so I happily agreed. I don't have a big stake (between 5%-10%), but there's virtually no risk for me, and the time commitment is not very burdensome. I look at it like a lottery ticket. Maybe it will go nowhere, but maybe I'll be cashing in down the road. I do believe in the idea and the people involved, so that's good.
- My computer battery broke, and my old laptop (on which I'm typing this) is very buggy and clunky, so instead of Scrabble and crossword puzzles, I've been doing a lot more reading the past week. I finished up John McWhorter's Nine Nasty Words: English in the Gutter: Then, Now, and Forever. It took me a while to get into it -- I set it down for a month or so a quarter way into it -- but once I did I really liked it. Now I'm reading Carole Hooven's Testosterone: The Story of the Hormone that Dominates and Divides Us. It's phenomenal so far. The title might not scream "can't-put-it-down-page-turner" but that's what it is.
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