I’m at therapy. I need to pee and poo but I’m holding it because I don’t know if the bathroom is occupied or not. I’m feeling very vulnerable and sad and afraid. It is fear that is preventing me from knocking on that restroom door.
Oh, I just witnessed someone else do it. I guess I can copy them next time I’m here and need to use the restroom.
I think I should schedule afternoon appointments. In the afternoon, I’m done with my routine. I don’t have to poo usually, and I’m more awake. Awake!! I feel awake now, but I’m vulnerable. Vulnerable!
Did I mention I’m vulnerable? I gotta pee but now I’ve been sitting here for several minutes. I think I’m just gonna hold it now.
Well this sucks. I should drink coffee in the morning. That would give me extra energy and help hold me over until it’s time to eat. I’m not really hungry. I’m gassy. Just bleh. Bleh! BLEH! Bleh Bleh.
bluhhhhhhhhhh
Therapy is over. I’m home now and I walked 20 laps around the campfire with the big dog. Small dog was too cold as usual, I let her inside early. I don’t blame her. She’s pretty much naked and her hair is really short so I like to let her in even if big dog isn’t ready to go inside.
I was referred to Codependents anonymous. CoDA for short. I’ll go to a meeting and see how it goes.
Also I was challenged by my therapist to exercise persistence in other areas of my life. This challenge came about when I was doing an exercise in which I answer questions about myself.
“What are 3 things about your appearance that you like?”
“What are 3 ways you’ve helped people?”
“What are 3 qualities you have?”
Stuff like that. I’m not sure what the exercise was supposed to be about, but I said one of my qualities is that I’m persistent. I brought up Javascript as an example. If there’s something I don’t know, I keep at it for days on end until I figure it out.
I took a nap. It’s 5:07 now and I only wrote 300 words so far! I’m feeling so behind on my daily routine. I went on another walk with the dogs, and I had breakfast at 1PM. I was way too low on blood sugar to wait until 3. I chomped down on Trader Joe’s dried peaches and chips & salsa.
I’m feeling like jumping straight into today’s music production. I had an idea for a melody when I was walking, but I didn’t have any method of recording my idea. I lost it.
I remember it was an expressive melody. So that’s what I’m aiming for in today’s track.
The expression I tried to add is sounding forced. The dogs won’t go outside to pee because it’s so cold. I’M SO BEHIND!
I’m starting new things before the previous thing is even done. Maybe I need mediation. Fuck meditation! No, meditation is good for me!
Ok, I’ll set a timer for 3 minutes and do the meditation I learned from group therapy last week. It involves calming myself, and visualizing a stream of water. Any thoughts I have in my mind, I visualize that thought as a piece of paper that I can attack to a leaf. After attaching the thought to the leaf, I place the leaf in the stream. The stream carries the thought away, or if the thought is stubborn, it floats in the water and spins in circles in the water. The persistent thoughts stay there as long as they will, then eventually the gentle stream pulls them away.
I’m going to do that exercise for 3 minutes, with my #Jamuary2020 jam 9 ambient music track work-in-progress as a guide.
That was a calming experience. However 3 minutes is much too fast!
Ok, well that brought me a little focus. It gave me focus on what’s important. The music jam is important, but not so much so that I should become stressed about it. The point of #Jamuary2020 for me is to improve my music production skills just a tad, but more importantly, it’s to express myself using this medium.
By that metric, I’ve already improved today just by working with chord progressions, arpeggiators, and LFO controllers. I could call this jam done for the day, and not have to worry about it further.
The calm of the track is nice. Even though it’s 200 bpm, it doesn’t feel like it because there is mostly only one note per bar.
Someone came and went while I was in here writing. They left cookies on the table and took some mail. I can deduce that it was M., given the lack of envelopes remaining on the table addressed to him.
I don’t think I’ve seen M. in two weeks. I miss him. I don’t think he lives at home with our parents anymore. I bet he’s functionally moved in with his girlfriend. They make a cute couple. I sometimes wonder if he’s happy. I at least know he’s doing a lot of living. That’s more than I can say for myself.
Me? I’m just trying to find a reason to live. Right now, it’s my projects that I immerse myself in. It’s the hope that I can monetize my passion for software development and support myself enough to where I can move out.
I went to Union Gospel Mission thrift store today. I found some flash cards, an Uno deck, and a cable modem for a grand total of $7. I will be listing those three items on eBay for $1 each this evening, and seeing if they turn me a profit.
As much as I don’t like shopping, I can do thrift stores every now and again. Thrift stores are an untapped resource in my mind. Most of them don’t sell items online, they simply slap a price tag on each item and put it on a shelf. That’s where I can come in, grab items that I think are worth more than their marked value, and resell them on eBay.
Goodwill actually started selling items online. That’s why you don’t see Playstation 4s in their stores. The high value items like that go straight to their online auction website. Smart.
Like I said, there are a ton of thrift stores that don’t touch online sales, which creates a small market for people like me to grab those valuable items and expose them to a greater audience.
That’s the thought. I did a price check on the cable modem and the flash cards before I bought them. The items sold for significantly more. The real question is can I turn a profit? I did have to invest time and gas into getting myself to the thrift store, so I do have to consider those expenses when I calculate the final outcome. And it’s not like I’m going to get rich off of these low value items. This is just a pilot to see if I can do it. If 2 out of the 3 items turn a profit, I think I’m onto something.
I could ramp up this effort and visit a variety of thrift stores in a day, not just one. There’s a nice route I have in my mind along Sprague which passes me by 5 thrift stores. I think I’ll skip Value Village because their prices are much higher than most other thrift stores. Their store is more like a for-profit venture, not a charitable venture like the other thrift stores in the area.
But yeah, my point is that there is potential here. Making money is all about finding an audience. eBay shoppers is an audience I’m familiar with. I’ve been selling on eBay since 2005!
This could be my independence. It’s a job I enjoy enough to where I can do it every day. I can tolerate selling items on eBay. I can’t say the same for production work or landscaping, or working for my parents.
Oooh, I’m imagining a future where a daily visit to the thrift stores could be a part of my routine. I could get into that.
I received a new assignment from my therapist. In addition to writing down my feelings, I also have to register the scale, 1 to 10.
I’m feeling sad 2 because my car broke down. I’m feeling anxious 7 because x did y in my viscinity. I’m feeling scared 10 because someone said my name and I’m peeing my pants.
I wanna move onto the next thing and list shit on eBay! I wanna write a letter to M! I want to do the next thing!
I’m feeling impatient because I don’t want to write my FEELINGS.
What am I feeling right now? I’m feeling pressure to let the dogs out because they didn’t go out last time I tried to get them to go out. I’m feeling anxious that they will pee or poo on the floor and I’ll have to clean it up. I’m feeling anxious that I won’t be able to check everything off my todo list. I’m feeling guilt because I haven’t done a single thing to make my Suburban more livable in the last week.
I’m feeling extra shame because I have an idea of what I can do to improve the suburban. I can black out the windows using the shiny bubble wrap stuff I have on my apartment windows to block out the sun. I just have to hold a piece of the bubble wrap up to the window, trace the shape, and cut it out. This would take me 20 minutes maybe to do the back 4 windows.
I guess I can take baby steps. The first baby step is to remove the bags of trash from my suburban. The second baby step is to place the shiny bubble wrap in the back of the suburban, so it’s there when I get the urge to cut out the shiny bubble wrap. I already have two pairs of scissors in the suburban, so I don’t even have to worry about that.
Okay. I’ll do baby steps there. First, take out the trash. How convenient, tomorrow is trash day!
I’m feeling anxious that I won’t get my shit on eBay listed. I feel anxious 2 about this. I feel guilt because I didn’t take pictures when the sun is out. My dim apartment lighting is not good for photos!
I suppose I can take baby steps here as well. I can take photos with my battery bank’s flashlight and my phone’s flash. If those pictures are sub-par, I can re-take the pictures tomorrow and revise the item with better photos.
I don’t feel so anxious any more. I guess relief can be as simple as letting the feelings exist.
6:30. I’m so behind! All I did was train today. I think that’s the only thing I have checked off. Let me see…
Yeah, that’s pretty much it.
- Journal (incomplete)
- train (cmplete)
- do one thing to make the suburban more livable (incomplete)
- write letter (incomplete)
- read 2 chapters of a book (incomplete)
- study Japanese (incomplete)
- produce music jam (incomplete)
- code (incomplete)
- eat (incomplete)
- chill (incomplete)
- apply for job (tues & thurs) (incomplete) (POSTPONED*)
* ok so I’m postponing the job application because I have dreams that are more important. Firstly, I would like to work at a web design studio. I am waiting 2 weeks and improving my portfolio before I apply to 7Barrels.
If I can’t work at a web design studio, I’d rather be a full-time eBay seller than apply at a shit job like manufacturing or landscaping or UPS.
Fuck UPS. I’ve applied there so many times over the years. The only time I ever got hired was during peak season when I worked as a driver helper. I’ve had two interviews to be a PT package handler and both times I was not chosen for the job.
Fuck UPS. Fuck UPS. Fuck UPS. I say this three times because I subconsciously don’t want to work at a job such as UPS package handling. Maybe UPS will blacklist my name if this blog post is public, and I won’t have to worry about getting a job at UPS ever again!
It’s not good to burn bridges, says my dad.
That’s cool and all, but what do I think? I think there are jobs that are not meant for me. I think I’m too skilled to spend my days chucking boxes left and right. Give me an Ansible playbook to optimize and make idempotent.
Ok I’m done writing, I’ma go take the trash out and let the dogs out.
I’m grateful for my ability to write 70wpm.
I’m grateful for bananas.
I’m grateful for Todo lists.
