I've kept up the running, and have pushed out to 32nd Ave. I'll probably go out to 33rd in the next few days. I think the current route is about 1.3 miles, and I probably walk another .3 as a cool-down at the end.

Haven't kept up the other parts of the workout quite to the same degree, but as noted in the subject, it's been a busy week.

Last Saturday we had some friends over and played a 'friendly' game of Tribes, which is a prehistoric social game designed by Steve Jackson and David Brin. Apparently they're working on a new version, and we had a playtest copy to try out.

To say that the game was grim would be charitable. Our tribe had an incredibly bleak 20 years, which eventually had us plunging to cannibalism, the deaths of two adults (myself and another) and a third player running away from the tribe to escape death.

It was fun, but I was a bit let down because the game basically hit a stalemate where combat was the only option, which struck me as a massive flaw in the game design. I'd have preferred we call the game there rather than stick it out, because, frankly, if there's a social game where some players have to stop being social, it's not really a good game anymore.

Still, a fun concept, and after looking at the math involved, I'd like to try it again. There are some possibly largely unbalanced points in it.

Sunday I rested, not running and sleeping in. I downloaded the Puzzle Quest trial on XBLA, which subsequently sucked me in enough to buy the full version. I've since wasted many hours over the past week essentially playing Bejeweled.

On Monday while running, I was struck by an amazing thought. In the past whenever I've run, I've always been struck by how chilly it is. Perhaps because I was moving faster the air going by was cooling me down.

Of course, that's not true. Well, it probably is true to a degree, but no, the reason my hands are always freezing when I run has little to do with the weather.

So my low blood pressure strikes again, this time to bring discomfort to my digits. Not really problematic, but a combination of amusing and annoying at the same time.

Also while running, I've been wearing my backpack, because it's the only thing I have which can hold my iPod such that I don't have to carry it. (Well, and my keys). It's not really much weight, but I probably should get an armstrap at some point.

Thursday was probably the biggest day of the week. I got up early and cut my hair. Here's me contemplating my new do:


While doing the cutting, I figured that cutting your own hair isn't really something you can do by a half-measure. Once you start (especially with the buzzing or shaving), you kinda have to go all out.

Still, it was rather quick, easy, and painless, so I'll probably keep doing it from now on.

And after that, I went and got my driver's license. Or rather, I attempted to do so. This isn't something I've been particularly enthused to do, because I have little wish to actually drive in California. I do plan to do a fair amount of driving in Washington, but we've gotten to the point as a culture where your personal identification is tied to your license to drive. Really dumb, but is necessitates that where I live (California) be mandated to determine whether or not I may legally drive, even if the vast majority of my driving will come in Washington.

Go in, wait in line. Find out I can take a shorter line becuase I made an appointment. Wait in shorter line. Realize that they're not actually checking appointment times, good because I was a bit late for mine, but making me wonder if they'd care if I just came up that line anyway.

Fill out form. Get number. Do vision test. Get picture taken. Do written test. Wait in line to get graded.

It's a funny thing about tests and waiting. 36 questions, and I can miss 6 and still pass. I'm feeling iffy on a few of them, because I didn't review all the little bits of the driver's guide, but I figure upon finishing that I'd missed three or four at the most. While in line, I'm second guessing myself and wondering if I'm up to five or six or the dreaded seven wrong.

Not really sweating, mind. Apparently we can take three tests before we have to come back another day, but it'd be a bit annoying to have to come back again.

Hand my test in. Guy grades it.

Wait, no red marks? He writes A+ on it, hands me a piece of paper as my temporary license and sends me on my way.

It's the first time in years I've taken a test, and I really enjoyed the feeling of getting everything right. Sure, not a hard test, but that alone made me want to go back to school. It's a nice feeling, getting a good score.

While looking around for programs for my Mac, I found this, which is completely useless, but also totally awesome. Perhaps the best dashboard widget I have.

And I'm rather eagerly awaiting my trip back north. Just a few more weeks.

I've been wrestling with atheism and agnosticism, and where I fall in there.

Oddly, I'm having a momentary spike of my ever-present fear of death because apparently I'm losing sensation in my arms.

Anyway, off to sleep. Or at least to lie in bed and ponder my metaphysical self.

We went out to eat tonight and I fainted. This marks the third time in the past few years where this has happened, but the first time it's happened outside of a dentist's office.

I would think that by now I'd be able to notice the signs and give people a warning, but it's like this slow fading out where time just kinda pauses and then starts up again with me wondering where I am.

In this case, I was wondering why I was on the ground with a couple frends and a larger number of elderly Chinese people staring down at me.

In the 30 seconds or so that I was out, Jesse had already called 911 and was talking to them about a possible ambulance (not needed.) Aya stopped me from getting up a few times and was quite concerned about my head hurting (I'd apparently hit it on the way out of my chair.

Afterwards, the sense of weakness, cold sweat, and really strong desire to just drink something sweet pervaded. Unfortunately, we were in a Chinese resturaunt, so my options were limited on the last. I picked at a bit of rice and some veggies as my appetite returned, then went for some protein.

The cod with black bean sauce was excellent, and I'll need to get it again. Sometime.

The conversating preceeding the fainting moment leads me to believe it's not entirely physical, but there's a psychological element at play. Essentially, if my thoughts get too close to certain aspects of the inner workings of my body, I'll faint.

I'm not sure that's exactly squeamishness, but it kinda fits the times I've fainted or felt like I might faint.

In this case, the conversation started with Rob complaining about how poorly protected our eyes. I suppose my eyes are a bit of a touchy subject. They're not great, and I've had two operations on them, and I really don't like to think about losing my sight.

As I joked with Aya a number of month's ago, Rob is going to kill me. This is apparently just the first step.

This does spark up a few thoughts. From what I understand low-blood pressure in and of itself is rarely life threatening (although I'd be quite worried from a large cut). High blood pressure would probably worry me a lot more, becuase it's usually an indicator of a shortened life span.

Still, fainting gets eveyrone scared. Constantly asking if you're okay and such. I suppose it's the very instant nature of it. You can see it and react to it.

It's tremendously embarassing. People asking if I'm okay over and over again, despite my insistence that I'm fine. I'm not fine, at that moment, but hopefully by repeating it the whole thing will go away that much sooner. I tend to consider myself in rather good health, and it's a moment where that's apparently failing.

I think because of that, it's really scary. There's this whole loss of control, where my body just fails to work for a little bit, unable to do the basic processes needed to keep going. I often have to wonder how much further would it need to go to just... stop?

On the bright side, if dying is anything like fainting, it's likely to be hardly a bother at all. Not that I want to die, far from it, but if it's going to come, please let me barely notice it. (And, hey, if my next thought it "Why the hell am I on the floor?" so much the better.)

I've come to feel that this low blood pressure thing is a very definitive part of my life. I've been wrestling with a story about it for a number of years. But given how personal and close it is, writing it is especially difficult.

Even writing this post has been difficult, given how the thoughts tend to exacerbate the problem. Even now, I keep getting distracted and looking away every sentence or two. I'm trying to force it out so it's done.

I probably should have used this writing time for NaNo. Ah, well. It's time for bed, now, even though I'm not entirely sure I want to try and sleep. Even now, almost twelve hours later, I'm still feeling a bit shaky.

Whoa, whole badge of birthdays.

Today (roughly, depending on time zone):
karenhealey, who I notice for once isn't on AIM, so I can't wish her a happy one directly. Of course, given her time zone, it's been her birthday for a good percentage of a day already, and I expect she's done with work teaching Japanese kids how to cuss in English or whatever it is they have her do and is now partying like her... 25(?) year old self should be.

AND! (since it's a two for the price of one day)

miserxy, who I had a lovely conversation with a couple weeks ago after a good many months of no contact whatsoever. We need to make sure that we stay in closer contact from here on out.

But wait, there's more. Since I'm liable to miss these things given the chance, I'll take care of the amazing birthdays that hit... tomorrow

ardweden, who I have not had the chance to chat with in a good long time, which is sad because I always enjoy doing it. Fer instance, she graduated over ACen weekend (which was much earlier in the summer), and I don't think I've spoken to her since. Lame, right?

AND! (four for the price of two over two days!)

obaba, who I always enjoy reading LJ posts from, but I'm not actually sure if we've ever had a conversation.


Clearly the common trend here is that I don't speak to the wonderful people on my friends list nearly enough. Of course, a semi-objective look at things reveals that friendship drift in such a case is likely a bit inevitable. Ard, Phoebe and I knew each-other back in our Improfanfic days, and Impro is dead, pretty much, and not likely to return. I moved on to YPP, Phoebe's moved onto som excellent scholarship and comics blogging, and while I did some browsing of Impro earlier and felt that twinge of nostalgia for the group-writing aspect. Not just the parts I co-wrote (a good number of them with Phoebe, which is a bit surprising in retrospect because our styles aren't really similar at all. She's got a much more poetic sense of prose, while I'm likely to just drop short bits of dialogue. It was a bit like trying to meld a silk dress and a jackhammer. Impossible, really, but somehow we made it work.) but also the back-and-forth as we swapped around story ideas.

I know we can't really go back. Although I get the vague sense that the epistolary novel Phoebe's working on has some similarities, but also considerable differences. On the whole, it's probably going to be a stronger piece of writing, but won't have the same communal effect. I'll be interested in reading it to see.

With Y!PP, the community problem went in the opposite direction. Instead of dying, it's gotten so much bigger so that there's a bit of information overload. And also after nearly three years of playing, there's a bit of burn out.

Partially, I wonder if I've not yet found the next "group" to be with. But then again, I don't quite have the sort of time which allowed me to integrate myself with Impro or YPP or the RAAM community even before. Then again (and this is especially true for my Impro-writing college days) I'm not sure if I should have taken the time back then, instead of, oh, integrating myself with some real communities which could have enabled stronger scholarship. I might be working on (or even would have completed) my masters by now. As it stands, it's in some vague point in the future.

Ah, nostalgia. It's an odd combination of both wanting to retrieve the past while also wishing to change it. Neither is possible, so we need to shrug our shoulders and move on, making the best of what time we have left. While I periodically feel like I've been treading water for the past five or ten years (huh, largely since I started working on the Con, go figure), for the most part I'm pretty happy with my life.

An update on the state of the Jeff:

In early September, I'm moving to San Francisco. I've tentatively picked September 7 as the date of my move. I need to make some hard decisions between now and then about what to take with me, what to store (at my grandparent's) and what to get rid of. Ideally, a lot of stuff will be in the third category. I have a bit of a crisis of conscience regarding my couch and chair. I love them and want to keep them, but taking them increases the costs of moving dramatically. Other than that, it's mostly small stuff which can be handled in a trip or two. Possibly using my mom's minivan for one of them (higher gas costs, but it can carry a lot more than my little Honda.)

I still do not have a girlfriend. But I spend a lot of time on stuff that's just an excuse, not an explanation.

I am writing more. Which is to say I've done a few paragraphs of Sammy Austen in the recent past. I currently have the file open and wrote a whole sentence today. I'm currently trying to fool myself into believing that it's an Impro. Planning-wise, the story may have gotten a bit more complex during some brainstorming I did. Which is good, because I think it makes for a stronger piece, but it also means it may end up a fair bit longer than I originally anticipated. We'll see.

I am not writing enough. I need to get myself into more of a habit. And I think it'd be a good year to try Nano. Which means less of the useless activities which take up writing time. Such as...

I'm watching a fair bit of anime. I've got Giant Robo and Rune Soldier, which we're going to try and finish before I leave. I'm going to lose some access when I move, though, because I won't be able to tap Chris's or Wooko's collections. I'll try to finish Midori Days before then, but I may need to get my own Netflix account for other things. On the fansub side of things, I'm enjoying Nana and Ouran High School Host Club and have started Welcome to the NHK, which fits a nice post-Haruhi void. It's got elements of Genshiken and Paranoia Agent in there, too, which makes it slightly odd and discomforting, but it's still good.

I'm also reading. I've been on a fair manga kick of late. I picked up a number of volumes at Otakon, and Right Stuf had a sale on Viz items recently, so I ordered a bunch more. Given that I need to actually reduce the amount of material I own, this probably wasn't the wisest decision.

I haven't played Baten Kaitos in a number of weeks. Which means I probably should, if I want to finish it before I leave.

I haven't been working out enough. Part of it is because Chris hasn't been around as often lately, but it's more that I'm lazy and easily distracted. Hopefully my prospective roommates in SF will be willing workout partners. And hopefully I can find a climbing gym in SF that's as cool as Edgeworks.

The future state of the me is up in the air. SF is on the plate for the next year. It's a bit of an experiment; previously all times I've moved have either been for school or for family. I've never really done one on my own. If it goes well, I may try moving around a bit and living in other areas with friends. Boise's a possibility. I've considered going back to Phoenix for a bit, too. And I could try some time further east. I'd also like to try living in a foreign country. New Zealand and Scotland are high on my list, but I could be open to other possibilities.

I may also want to try teaching English in Asia, still. I'm not sure if I've got a good chance with the JET program, but there are other options in Japan, should I like. There's also the CET program (I could live in Shanghai!) Korea may not be bad, either.

Heh. I've rambled. This shouldn't have been about me. Happy Birthday, everyone!