Good luck with those. I must say, having one in the house, it is probably better to get them house trained quick.
On the other hand, they can help you get more plays of your collection.
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The five year old model is much more keen
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The thing is, unkess you’re trying to say that you ‘know how they feel’ cos of your thing (which Im sure you’re not), they’re probably likely to as sympathetic aa the next person.
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Btw, had my first jab on Friday. On the way to become super-Pfizerised. Yay!
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My chassis is now 44. Here’s what I think about that:
I read somewhere — and the person who wrote this was not a mountaineer but a sailor — that the sea’s only gifts are harsh blows and, occasionally, the chance to feel strong. Now, I don’t know much about the sea, but I do know that that’s the way it is here. And I also know how important it is in life not necessarily to be strong but to feel strong, to measure yourself at least once, to find yourself at least once in the most ancient of human conditions, facing blind, deaf stone alone, with nothing to help you but your own hands and your own head. - Primo Levi
[Herne the Hunter and Robin of Loxley]
Robin: “I’ve lost my aim!”
Herne: “Then aim again.”
Robin: “To what purpose? To what end?”
Herne: “There is no end and no beginning. It is enough to aim.”
We’ve had another one of those collective shitty years but I am certain the feeling of strength is present. Even if we missed the target. Because we ready before we aim before we loose. When we ready we bend the bow. Bending the bow requires strength. I often exist on that memory of strength as it echoes from when it was enough to aim.
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Happy birthday
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At dawn, when you have trouble getting out of bed, tell yourself: “I have to go to work — as a human being. What do I have to complain of, if I’m going to do what I was born for — the things I was brought into the world to do?
Marcus Aurelius
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I hate Historic morning people.
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By all accounts, he actually WASN’T a morning person - he talks in his Meditations about the struggle to rise etc.
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They’ve got a pill for that now.
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My downstairs neighbour kept me up until 4am this morning.
While lying there in bed I kept telling myself, “you can call in sick tomorrow.”
I got up at 7am as usual and went into work. Well, into the next room anyway.
Yay for a blurred home/work line.
I’m being petty and blasting obnoxious bass.
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Today is my first day of Grade 22. I have to be awake at 6:45am (about 2 hours from now, more or less), and I am up now because I’m nervous.
Which is ridiculous. I’m 42. What the heck do I have to be nervous about? It’s a 3rd year English course called “Literary Theory” that sounds dry-as-dust but could be interesting (although the fact the central text we will be analyzing is King Lear does not inspire great hope), and I suspect I will be the dumbest person in the room by a wide margin, but that never worries me. I’m almost always the dumbest person in a room.
I will probably also be the oldest person in the room by a narrow margin (most of my profs so far have been very close to my age, or a few years older, rarely more). But again, who cares?
Except here I sit, stomach upset, unable to sleep, and typing to all you good folks. So obviously something is bothering me more than I think it should.
… what if they don’t like me?
sigh
Forty-two, going on eight. Story of my life.
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ba dum tisch!
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Because at least two of us will look at you and say “darn kids”. 
I tend to share my wife’s opinions on literary criticism (she did the English degrees): when you’re talking about what’s in the text, or things you can find out about the author, that’s great. When you start off with your thesis (e.g. “all works are Marxist allegory”) and then make the text fit into it, or when you write not about the text but about what someone else said about the text, it loses much of its interest.
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What kind of people do you hang out with? 
But the older you can at least identify the feeling. The younger you would just have been anxious and not known why. The older you knows the class is going to be great and the people are going to be nice and of course they will like you–at least you do once your thinky-brain switches on after a cup of something wakey-wakey.
Without even needing to be socially anxious (I am only rarely), whenever I have to get up early, I wake 2 hours before because I am so afraid I might be late. Only half of my fear of flying is fear of dying in a plane crash, the other half is being late and missing the plane. Rational thought? Never comes into that.
Also 42 is the best age. You’re still 29 but also 42. I mean what’s not to love about that age? 
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Better people than me. Kinder, smarter, funnier… I do my best to surround myself with folks that are a constant source of inspiration.
Plus, I have a very low tolerance for really dumb people. Not like, uneducated (that’s fine) or ignorant… but willfully stupid and unwilling to learn. Weed enough of those out of your life and you’re left with a short list of really brilliant people, in my experience.
Class was fine. Professor seems sharp and engaging, material seems challenging (which is good!). I, sadly, will have to bring my “Norton Anthology Theory & Criticism” with me to class every day… which is a good 3-4kg? It’s heavy. And I bike, so I’m gonna feel that weight.
Two folks in class who I think may be an issue (really loves the sound of their own voice), but if it’s only two I’ll call it a win.
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On the other side of the English Class coin, I’ve just finished grading 30 of the 160 student essays turned in for the first round of assignments, and 7 of them were plagiarized to some degree, with a few terribly plagiarized essays.
Like, directly copied from SparkNotes and pasted into a Word doc, complete with ADVERTISEMENT stuck in between every few paragraphs. It was supremely disheartening.
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Ah but were they properly referenced?
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Incompetent copying 
… I mean the least they could do is try to fake it good.
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