The Not Happy Thread

Not yet. I am awaiting to see a specialist, as I have suspected PCOS. One of the many fun comorbidities with that would be type 2 diabetes.

 

Frankly, to this, I recommend taking things a day at a time and easing yourself into better habits.

Every day, one cigarette (or whatever it is you smoke) less, one beer less, one youtube video less.

Every day, a step towards a goal or hobby, and 10 minutes more of sleep.

Really, can't help you more, but, you're 21. I know you must have heard it hundreds of times, but, you do have time to change.

Do it. Not a night and day lifestyle change, but, a slow, gradual shift towards being a healthier and happy person that will reflect itself (insanely) in x days, months, years.

Just my two cents.

 

Thank-you, everyone.^

I'm no expert and I don't know you personally, but I know from experience that I'll go through sugar withdrawal symptoms up to a week later. Obviously not if I just eat one candy bar or something, but if I don't take care of myself for even just a couple days and eat junk, it takes my body anywhere from 5-7 days to straighten itself out. I can't speak on blood sugar levels or anything to that degree; I would seek medical advice, as somebody else mentioned.

I guess what I'm saying is that sometimes our bodies are sensitive beyond what we did today or even yesterday, especially if one lives a certain lifestyle for a decade or more.

 

I hadn't done much writing the past week or two. Work and stress pretty much stamped it out.

 

Yep. I did manage to go healthy last summer, buying plenty of fresh fruit and veg each week. Not sure what happened. I think I got a bank account...which meant home deliveries, and my health went out the window with it.

 

I'm trying to be more green by buying glass bottles (2.19 for 750ml) instead of plastic (99 cents for 5 litres)!?!?

Is it any wonder that we have a planet wide plastic pollution crisis with shit like this happening!

 

Put some kind of return system in place where you pay a deposit on the container that you get back when it's been returned. That way, after the initial investment, reusable, recyclable packaging would cost the consumer less given that they're paying predominately for the product instead of the container it's kept in.

 

Where I live, we recently banned takeout styrofoam boxes. Most places switched to plastic. But we're also phasing out plastic bags so that you can only get them if you're handling raw meat for example. I usually bring my own bag for small purchases. For big ones, I save the plastic bags at home to re-use as garbage bags. Slow steps, I guess.

 

Don't get me started on plastic. Japan is touted as being oh-so-very eco-friendly because of our relatively low carbon emissions per capita, but the place is a disaster. The other day, I stopped in to the convenient store and purchased a single can of soda (Red Bull, if you must know). The cashier was fairly eco-conscious in that she asked me if I needed a bag for it rather than just putting it in one, as is their habit. Then she asked me if I needed a (single use, plastic-wrapped) plastic straw for it. Normally, unless I'm quick, I end up with both, which I carry three feet to the trash and throw away.

This is the machine used to put a single-use plastic wrapper on your umbrella before you go into a store, so it doesn't drip:



This is three 20g packs (.7oz each, x3) of cured ham (like prosciutto). Three little plastic trays, each with enough meat to add to one sandwich, each individually sealed, then wrapped together with another sheet of plastic.



And here is the single-scoop, small ice cream cone I got from Baskin-Robbins last night:



That's not a lack of environmental consciousness, that's out and out war on the ecosystem on a cartoon villain scale.

 

An Amber alert. Goddamnit.

 

This article makes me very distressed.
For some odd reason, the first picture doesn't seem to bother me. The second one I can't look at.

Spoiler

https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/news/environment/shocking-picture-of-dead-dolphin-wrapped-in-discarded-fishing-nets-released-to-raise-awareness-of-ghost-nets/05/08/?fbclid=IwAR0gobqHxueczpWRaXD1hPczhYQkrqMJA9OXV-_JSGpejcEwT-AsBFzxaAs

 

Was up past my bedtime and nailed my second invader in as many weeks.

Spoiler: Don't look

Exemplar, not my latest playmate. Who was around 4cm long.

I bug-bombed a week ago, and I wlil conitiueo to bbug-bmooomb everyarew dayyyyyy if needley beee, dman the nevrere damanaage.

Damamnite!

 

There's a thunderstorm going on, and it's way past my bedtime.

 

My mind is ready for another flash fiction or poetry contest, but not much seems to be happening in the "Writing Contests" section.

 

The Short Story contest voting will wind up in about a week and the new contest will open for submissions. Prompts going up to December are here, the next one is "Do NOT open the box." Flash is on a roughly similar schedule, and the medals were last seen at a customs checkpoint on the Bangladesh/DPRK border.

 

Not just unhappy, scared:

Earlier this week I was out in my backyard pulling the Virginia creeper off the wood fence between me and my neighbor to the west. (Do I have to explain why it's useless and destructive and has to go?) Now, the fenced part of my backyard extends maybe four or five feet closer to the alley than his does, as I don't have a garage. So as I was dealing with the Virginia creeper, I noticed that on the other side of the fence, in the open angle of his property adjacent to the alley, there's a silver maple sapling growing among the rose of Sharon bushes. About an inch in diameter, leaning against my fence, and a couple of feet from his garage.

"That's got to go," I thought, and I was tempted just to get the pruners and take care of it. But it is on his side, and I figured I'd better ask first.

So this afternoon I noticed him out on the apron of his garage (which faces the alley) with a hatchet, chopping away at a chunk of wood. Good time to ask him about the silver maple sapling, right?

We chat a little about the sand cherry tree that's dying (sadly; it was pretty in the spring) on the other side of his garage approach. Then I say, "Did you see this silver maple sapling next to the fence? It really needs to come out. I can do it, or, as long as you're out here . . . "

"Oh, no," says he, "these bushes [the rose of Sharon growing in the fence angle] have something wrong with them, and I'm taking them out so that maple can grow."

"But--- it's a silver maple. It'll undermine the fence. And the "Johnsons" [made up name for the neighbors to the west of him] lost their garage because the silver maples grew up into it and they had to tear it down."

"Aw, it won't get that big. Maybe in 2o years it might, but not till then."

My jaw was dropping. He's got a silver maple in his yard that has caused him all sorts of trouble and he's that willfully ignorant about how they grow?

"But," I pointed out, "it's right next to my fence! It'll destroy it! And the roots will grow into my vegetable garden."

"Well, I like it. I'm keeping it."

"Uh, well, it's small, could you dig it up and move it?"

"No, I like it where it is."

There was no arguing with him, and I had something heating on the stove. But as I was finishing cooking my supper, it hit me that my incoming water line is like a foot from that "innocent" little sapling. I know how maple roots go. I have enough trouble with the roots from the Norway maple in my own yard on the other side of the garden. If that sapling is allowed to grow, it will not only take out the fence, and suck all the moisture out of my garden, it will also break my water line.

Damn. I don't want neighbor trouble. I get along OK with this neighbor and his family, and we chat from time to time, but the relationship is not what you'd call warm and open. I could probably get the borough code enforcement people to make him take the sapling out, since the mature tree would also interfere with the borough water line. But I don't want to be that kind of a turkey.

But I also don't want thousands of dollars in repairs that I can't afford.

I'm praying (yes, literally) that he'll have a change of heart, and that when I remind him about the water line he'll relent.

If not . . . I might have to sacrifice a little of the hardscaping on my side of the fence to make sure the roots don't get into my yard.

As if I didn't have enough to take care of . . .

 

Buy a massive German Shepherd.

They’re really handsome, king of dogs, terrifying other dogs and worm-type men. Sometimes I draw myself with a German Shepherd.

A future project, I hope.

 

I want my next dog to be an Irish Wolfhound, that way I can ride it through town, causing peasants, plebs, and pedants alike to shudder at the sight of my forbearance and seek solace at the skirts of their soft nurse.

 

Like it caught whatever is afflicting the rose of Sharon bush next to it? Hmmm.

 

this is the first time, in the year since I've started my job, that i've felt beaten up. mentally and emotionally beaten up. physically drained. all week. I've cried at work and at home and at the gym and due to stress, busted a blood vessel in my eye (the whites of my left eye was red so i assumed thats what happened).

I'm just glad this week is over...

i'm getting me a personal pizza and a smirnoff and call it a night.