Category: IRL

Tablet life, v1.00001

I won a new tablet at a social a couple weekends ago, a Samsung Galaxy Tab E Lite. What a mouthful. I really haven’t used it for much yet besides learning that mobile games are still garbage even on a bigger screen.

I’m currently toying with the concept of using it for blogging (I wrote this and the previous post on it), though I’m legitimately surprised at just how bad I am at typing on the thing. I’ve needed to go back and correct at least every second word, often more than once. Maybe it’s because I’ve had a lot lf tkme to get usdd to it, but I dkn’t type nearly as pooorly on my tkny pjkne.

I purposely didn’t correct that last sentence, in hopes of really driving home my point.

I was likewise shocked to learn how terrible this tablet’s camera is. That was what finally got me to do the research and learn that this is a tablet originally released in 2014, so it’s barely newer than my piece of garbage Kobo Arc 7. It came at the right price, but man… I was hoping for a slightly more pronounced upgrade.

Ah, I shouldn’t complain. The thing works, and that alone puts it miles ahead of the Kobo. But I still don’t think I can reasonably use this for blogging.

Woes of the Impulse Buyer

As part of being a responsible adult, I set myself a 2018 budget for video games. I know they’re my largest non-essential expense (if you don’t consider internet essential), and that I am more than willing to say “I shouldn’t buy this, but f**k it” when a new game catches my eye.

Having already factored in the purchases of Pokémon Let’s Go and Super Smash Bros Ultimate in the coming months… I’ve hit my allowed spending limit. Dang! I mean, I actually have $9 left to spend, but close enough. There are several indie games on Switch that are calling out to me, and they’re all significantly more than nine bucks.

Anyway, the point is that I’m not going to buy them. Unless they go on sale for under $9. Or someone randomly gives me money as a gift (which I don’t count toward the budget). But aside from those very specific situations, I will stand strong! I must! And now that it’s down in writing for the world to see, I’m basically forced to hold myself to it.

“So,” you ask, “what was the total budget for the year anyway?”

I’m not telling. I’d rather leave it up to your imagination. But if you go over the monthend wrap-ups and count up all the games I played that were released in 2018, you could probably come up with a pretty close figure!

Migraine Watch: Sept 5 2018

“It’s happening again… I can feel it happening. As I try to scribble out tome small thoughts, I can feel the transient aphasia onset. I’m trying to fight it, but it’s very, very difficult even to get through a sentence. I’m not looking forward to trying to figuring out what this paragraph once my brain is gain to working something or other.”

Don’t know where this came from, but I’m a little upset because the lasting migraine wasn’t that long ago. This latest one came literally out of nowhere, on a fairly quiet Thursday afternoon. Completely normal day at work, I come back from lunch break, and realize that I’ve been re-reading and trying to comprehend the same sentence for like two minutes. I grab my stash of ibuprofen, pop one, and let it happen.

It was a bad one, too, because the aura lasted pretty much the rest of the work day. That meant almost two solid hours of me being literally unable to accomplish anything due to the fact that I simply could not think. What a waste. And I needed to get as much done as possible, as I’ll be on vacation the next week. Yeesh.

But yeah, the usual “workday migraine” symptoms of forgetting how to read, write, and speak. Having issues seeing. A little bit of numbness in the face area. But I have no idea what could have triggered it. Things have been quite good lately, so maybe it is a dietary thing? I hadn’t really been eating enough the last couple days, so that may have been a factor, but it’s not something that’s been consistent with other migraines.

Anyway, basically just went home and straight to bed. By the time I woke up, any “actual migraine” had passed and I was on the home stretch of lingering headache. So really, aside from being useless at work for the afternoon, it was a pretty “good” migraine. Still not closer to uncovering the cause, though. Total bummer.

I hate healthy eating

You know what? I friggin’ hate yogurt.

But this is no surprise to me. I’ve never liked it ever since I was a kid, and I still don’t. Regardless, I’m eating the stuff nearly every day now, having replaced my daily sandwich with a cup of plain Greek yogurt and blueberries, but it’s not getting any better. It’s not growing on me and I am not acquiring a taste for it.

Eating healthy in general blows. Maybe it needs more than a month to take, since I’ve made a pretty massive shift in my eating habits all at once, but I’m already sick of it. Replacing candy and chips with nuts and legumes is presumably good for me, but I haven’t lost a pound and I don’t feel any better either physically or mentally. All I feel is the salad-shaped hole in my life that used to be filled with junk food.

I’m highly considering going back to processed junk and fast food. It’ll probably be way easier just to learn to accept being fat and out of shape.

Migraine Watch: August 2, 2018

Another migraine this evening. Not really sure from whence it came, but it did. I haven’t got a damn clue what triggered it, as life has been fairly good lately. If there’s been any one thing stressing me out, I hate to admit that I’ve been feeling intensely lonely as of late. Has it been weighing on my soul that heavily? My sleeping hasn’t been great, but it hasn’t been so bad that I feel it’s affecting me. I’ve heard that sharp changes in diet can trigger migraines, but I’ve been eating healthier than ever before over the last month, and I have a hard time believing that a positive change like that could cause my brain to feel like it’s self-destructing.

Anyway, it really did come out of the blue. I was sitting on the couch after dinner, playing some Picross, when I suddenly noticed that my vision was starting to blur more than usual. I popped on my glasses, but they did nothing to help. I tried to deny it for a bit, but it was obviously the aura of an oncoming migraine, so I quickly made my way to the bathroom and popped an ibuprofen. I then abandoned the Picross and decided to just shut off all the lights and hop into bed.

That’s when my left leg went all tingly. Over a short period of time, it made its way up my body, through my arm and finally into my jaw. I would say the tingling lasted maybe twenty minutes at most, and by then I could tell that my vision had corrected itself, even in the dark. Though at this point, I could feel the pain in my head begin, and being curled up in bed became an extra boon, because I suddenly caught a terrible case of the chills. Overall, a varied and somewhat long-lasting sequence of auras, but fairly normal and not nearly as scary as the times when I have completely lost my vision or ability to comprehend language.

I’m writing this about an hour after the aura onset, and all the extra symptoms have gone. Now it’s just a relatively mild throbbing in the right side of my head. Significantly less crippling than it could be, so I’m pretty glad I downed that pill. All things considered, this is probably about as well as a migraine can go. I really just wish there had been some clear link to any previous attacks, because I’d love to know what’s triggering these migraines so that I could cut it out of my life.

Remembering the Cottage: Part 2

Happy Canada Day! To celebrate, let’s go way back and take a look at something that was an integral part of Canada Day for me for many years. Yes, that’s right, it’s finally time for the long-awaited Remembering the Cottage: Part Two

I have been slowly writing this article since 2007, which is not the longest that I’ve ever procrastinated on writing something, but it is a concept so close to my heart, so important to the foundation of who I am, that I feel terrible for not having finished writing it at some point in the last eleven years. During that time, many details have certainly been forgotten and memories jumbled up, so this is definitely not going to be as historically accurate as it should be.

To help illustrate, in the time since I posted Part One: two generations of Nintendo consoles passed; Obama’s tenure as US President began and ended; smartphones replaced flip-phones and human-to-human contact; I purchased two homes; I met a girl who I dated, married and divorced; and I bumbled my way into a job that eventually led to what darn well better be my career at this point.

I don’t know how long this article is going to go on for, but if the previous part is anything to go by, it’ll be a whopper. You all know the story anyway, and if you don’t, maybe go check out Part One and then come back. So let’s just skip the formalities and head right in, yes?

Continue reading Remembering the Cottage: Part 2

Migraine Watch – June 11, 2018

After a long day of work and E3 excitement, I laid down on the couch at the end of the day to watch some YouTube before going to bed. I was drifting off a bit, and noticed that my arm was going all tingly. I naturally assumed it was because I had laid on it funny. But then the tingliness moved up to my face, and that’s when I knew that a migraine was coming.

I mean, it’s not like I had been resting on my face in a way that would make it go numb. Right? Is that a thing that can happen?

Anyway, I managed to beat this one to the punch again, as I immediately turned off the TV, popped an ibuprofen, and went to bed. As the tingling faded, I could feel my brain try to scream out in pain, but it was too late, the medication had worked. While it was still a little annoying and made me take a little longer to fall asleep than expected, all was good and I slept soundly through the night. I had a little residual pain the next morning, like you do, but nothing that would stop me from going about my usual day.

As for causes? Honestly, I’m not sure. Work has been a little stressful lately, and I’m definitely feeling worn out from class, but neither one feels really overwhelming. Diet and activity levels are about the same as ever.

It may have actually been the garbage stream of the Playstation E3 showcase, which skipped back two seconds every seven seconds, making it actively stressful to watch and difficult to follow. Or maybe the fact that I was watching it on my phone with one earbud in, with The Bachelorette on in the background and my parents talking rather loudly about the show. Sensory overload, too much for my brain to try to take in all at the same time, and then it just crapped out a couple hours later.

Hey, I don’t know. I’m not some kind of brain doctor. I’m just keeping these logs to try to figure out what my migraine trigger is. And to document the more exaggerate auras. This instance of tingly arm/face was actually pretty tame. I was weirdly disappointed.

Isolation

I have a Legend of Zelda coffee mug at work, and it’s been there for some time. Most co-workers don’t bother to comment on it, though I’ve had a few remark “That’s a big mug” or ponder “How do you drink from that?” when they see it.

Recently I’ve had two co-workers actually say “Oh, so I guess you like Zelda, huh?” to which I cheerfully agree, because obviously (but I would love to have an ironic coffee mug). They both then followed up with “Is that still a thing?” To which I utter a weak affirmation and then hang my head and realize that I’ll always be alone here.

Faded but not gone

Remember a couple years ago when Pokémon GO came out and the world went absolutely bonkers over it for like two months and then you never heard about it again?

Would you believe me if I told you that there are still tons of people playing it?

Yeah, maybe it’s not in the news any more, but Pokémon GO has definitely still got a very respectable player base. I’ve been back into it over the last couple months, and have even participated in the two most recent Community Day events, which is where I learned that people are still playing this weird little phone game.

Community Day is a bit of a misnomer. It’s really Community Three Hours, and the event is always based around a different Pokémon. During the event period, this Pokémon appears very frequently, has a higher chance of being shiny (a very rare palette swap), and probably gets a special move for battles. Going out on Community Days was an eye-opener, as while visiting popular spots around the city, I was shocked to see droves of people walking around poking at their phones like crazy. Some were wearing team colours, many had cords attached their phones that disappeared into their jackets or pants, and some just looked like normal people (like me). But they were all there to get their Pokémon on.

The greatest thing about these Community Days and all the people they bring is that I’ve finally been able to play in a few legendary raids. I mean, you can do them on your own, but you will never win, so it’s really a waste to even try. I’m not going to start associating with these people online through Discord groups or anything, but if they show up for four minutes and help me catch a rare thing, then sure, I’ll play nice for a bit.

Anyhow, that’s my two cents for the day. If I were more social, I’d be even more excited about all this, but that’s not me. It’s just fun to see other people enjoying a dumb thing that I also like.

A tale of two clocks

Every night before I go to bed, I set not one, but two alarms for the next morning. One is my phone, and the other is a more traditional analog alarm clock (but with beeps instead of bells). I do this because on more than one occasion, my phone’s alarm has gone off in the morning, but mysteriously didn’t make any sound, which renders it completely useless. So I like to have a backup juuuuust in case.

The reason I’m telling this story is because this morning, having that second alarm totally saved my bacon.

See, on Sunday morning we had a power outage for a few hours. And by “we” I mean “my building” because I looked it up and there was no news report, so it couldn’t have been too widespread. Anyway, this outage turned off my PC, which I normally leave on all the time. I didn’t bother to turn it back on, because I didn’t use it at all yesterday.

This was almost my undoing, as I always plug my phone into said PC to charge overnight. However, when the PC is powered down… That’s right: the phone won’t charge. And I should have realized it too, because I specifically noticed that my phone did not make the plugged-in chime when I plugged it in. Being that it had only 1% battery life when I went to bed, it died overnight and did not sound my alarm in the morning.

And that’s the story of how I was saved from the embarrassment of sleeping in by having a backup alarm clock.

(But it’s really the story of how boring I am, as this is the most exciting thing happening in my life.)