Hello

Hello all! I am here. It’s great to see you - thank you for stopping in. I will be up front about this: not too much has been going on. At some point after writing my last post here I decided that I wanted to take a week off of Mega Man 4 entirely before heading back into the lab and preparing for another run at the leaderboards.

My most recent post was on a Wednesday, so today kind of feels like the end of this week off. During the past week I walked a lot with Podo around Pittsburgh. It’s been beautiful fall weather lately. I’m starting to notice slight changes in his sleeping schedule. The first walk is tending to happen later, as in, he’s sleeping in more. That’s a winter trend. By the dead of winter, he can sometimes sleep all the way until 4pm before his first proper walk. He’ll go out onto our lawn before then to go to the bathroom, but not down the stairs and onto the sidewalk and out into the world.

It’s getting cold enough that I’m starting to go out in my Brett the Hitman Hart hoodie, my current staple hoodie. I always have a staple hoodie going. During the week off I did a big re-organization of my wardrobe, packing away some of the summer exclusives and making the sweaters and pants more accessible.

I’m back to watching American football up until the point where the violence is too much, which then causes an inner dialogue examining the current state of the world and how completely fucked up everything is - a staple of the fall. We couldn’t go apple picking this year - last year’s frost too-dramatically reduced the harvest this year.

I’ve been watching the Superfan extended cut episodes of The Office recently. I’ve never watched all of these. There’s a moderately funny Creed scene cut from an incredibly large number of episodes. That’s my main takeaway so far. They cut way, way too much Creed out of the show’s final edit.

I haven’t attempted to read a book since giving up on Dungeon Crawler Carl. Hmm.

I haven’t watched a movie in quite some time. Hmm.

I mentioned going to a fall party with my gym friends last post. That was really fun. It’s really nice to have friends in my neighborhood that I can just walk over and hang out with so easily. One of my friends made a pumpkin chili, another and her partner made biscuits, I made pumpkin mochi, the host made rice and roasted pork and served warm apple cider. We watched a 2014 animated mini-series called Over the Garden Wall which was basically like watching a movie. It was cute and creepy. I enjoyed it.

My cooking schedule needs a revamp at home. I had eventually settled into a rotation of dinners I was cooking, but what Erika can and cannot eat is changing over time. I need to sit down and have a proper planning and brainstorming session. We’re in an experimental era, particularly when it comes to carbs. We tried millet the other night (it was good, kind of like couscous). We tried forbidden rice / black rice (very chewy, also good). We tried corn grits. Erika reacts differently to different carbs. Our meal rotation needs to be looked at with a fresh set of eyes - that’s one goal for this week.

Another goal I have for this week is to start doing rotator cuff exercises on my workout off days. I need to cement that habit. I’m back on cruise control with the weight lifting, and we need to avoid getting injured. The person who runs my gym went to a funeral on Wednesday of last week, and then during our workouts the rest of the week she kept using the new term ‘bury’. She’d be like, “okay one set left - let’s BURY this.” Over five months I had never heard her use this term. She really makes me laugh.

I’ve been playing a ton of Darkest Dungeon, a game I have extensive experience playing but got sucked into replaying. The only games that I’ve spent more hours playing on Steam than Darkest Dungeon are Slay the Spire and Slay the Spire II. That’s where a lot of my leisure time has gone lately. The music is incredible

There’s also a character class called The Houndmaster. The character’s hound helps de-stress the party during their expedition. Obviously this is my favorite character.

There’s a new season of the Great British Bake Off airing now. We’re rolling with the best lineup in eons now that stick in the mud Pru and her horrendous fashion and somehow-worse personality are off the show. Surely she’s celebrating the 10 year anniversary of Brexit, wherever she is. Her replacement seems awesome. She’s already referred to the spice level in a baked item as ‘savage’. This is promising.

My next laser hair appointment is Friday. After my appointment I have to stop in and cat sit for a gym friend. The Red Sox season may end tonight. More fall staples.

IDK, that’s it. Like I said at the top, I haven’t really been doing much. I’ve been trying to relax more than normal this week to try and recharge, regroup. Let myself stop attempting to be disciplined for a week. I’m feeling good today - ready to restart.

Regardless, it was good to chit chat. I hope you have a great rest of the week. I believe in you!