The holiday is almost over.  I say almost because we’re doing Thanksgiving today since this is my year with my son.  It’s okay.  As long as family gets together for food.  This has always been an average holiday for me anyway.  I enjoy most of the sides and desserts, but I really don’t like turkey.  So, the feast doesn’t have the same appeal as Hanukkah latke day or Halloween candy.

I’m also burnt out on the feast concept.  The short work/school week was filled with preparing food for a feast.  This is always a challenge because you inevitably get a ‘too many cooks in the kitchen’ situation.  I’m not much of a chef with this holiday, so I’m practically useless.  It also comes with a sense of tension that you find in preparing for any big event.  You want it to be memorable and a success, but you wear yourself down to the point where you might not enjoy the outcome.  Plus side, I got to see several graduated students, which was a great end to the work week.

Honestly, I’ve been exhausted all week.  A big factor is that I haven’t been sleeping the best and the weather shifting to rain set off my sinuses.  Starting to think I have asthma too, which seems to be another parting gift of Covid.  Breathing always gets tougher when the weather turns rainy and frigid.  Makes me worry about when it comes time to shovel the snow.  Only time will tell there.

Another reason I’m tired is that I spent all of last weekend finishing a project:

ALL PAPERBACKS AVAILABLE!

That link should go to my Amazon author page where you can click on the paperback option.  I did it for Legends of Windemere, War of Nytefall, Life & Times of Ichabod Brooks, Quest of the Brokenhearted, and Bedlam.  I announced this on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram already.  You wouldn’t believe the response I’ve gotten since people were asking for this . . .

That would be absolutely nothing.  I know this is something that had to be done, but I still feel a little scammed here.  There have been plenty of times I’ve provided a version of a book or done something highly recommended with no payoff.  It’s up there with people praising characters and stories while admitting that they haven’t even bought a copy of the book.  This is a big reason I’ve lost some of my ambition and keep questioning why I still bother.  Empty lip service doesn’t give a person hope or push them ahead.  It does the opposite because the words have no actions behind them.  In the end, a person who keeps running into this type of support won’t be able to accept real support because they’ll think it’s fake.  Just something to think about here.

The rest of the weekly goals weren’t too bad.  I finished the January posts once I finally got the energy.  Only managed to use the bike once due to errands and having to clean for the weekend.  Homework and meetings limited the father/son time until now.  Black Friday shopping went somewhat smoothly, but it got pricier than I expected.  Think I gave the credit card company a freak out because I had to explain that it was indeed me making the purchases.  At least they’re watching out for me.  We’ll see if I get to sleep in tomorrow since we have a full house, including a munchkin who wakes up with the sun.

I managed to go over the outline for Darwin & the Demon Game, but I wasn’t able to rewrite it.  The weather changing made me feel like I had been hit by a bus and my sinuses were killing me.  Took me all day to simply read through the three pages since I kept needing a nap.  I covered the original in notes of where I can shore up the plot and expand on some characters.  One was important, but got killed off too early.  Not sure if I’ll work on it throughout the week or save it for next weekend.  Depends on how I’m feeling and what else I want to tackle.

Only other accomplishment was touching the Phi Beta Files notebook.  It was only one character and I struggled because I couldn’t remember what I wanted to do with this group of rivals.  Freaking out a bit that I took too long to get back to this idea and I can’t remember enough to continue.  Might have to use next weekend to make progress and get it back on track.  Doesn’t help that I went hunting for another story idea and the notebook is nowhere to be found.  It was the Keys of Ether monsters, which I can’t find anywhere in my room.  That means I lost 100 monsters and every piece of plot information I had on this one.  Got a bad feeling that it went missing during the move from Florida, which means it’s been gone for about 13 years.  Then again, I vaguely recall working on it when I was up here, but it’s missing now.

Not sure how much planning I should make for this week.  It’s the first of four where I don’t have a day off.  That’s going to leave me fairly tired.  Add in the inevitable rush of tests and assignments leading to the Holiday Break, which I’ll be juggling as a TA and a parent.  This is why I’m not going to tackle Darwin & the Demon Game until that long break starts.  Maybe I should only aim for the February posts and making progress on notebook work.  That sounds more doable, especially since my anxiety has been giving me some issues.  It’s only rearing up at night and first thing in the morning, but it’s definitely making an impact. Sleep has been broken some nights and I’m paying for it.

Television-wise . . . I finished ‘Warrior Nun’ Season 2, which was fun.  Decided to try an anime called ‘Overlord’ again.  Think I made a post where I used it as an example of how not to do an OP main character.  Figured I’d give it a shot and look at it as a story where there is no real tension.  Just a blunt power fantasy.  I’m a little further than I made it last time and I’m enjoying it a bit more.  Guess I was taking it too seriously or looking at it the wrong way last time.

Goals of the week:

1. Thanksgiving feast today
2. Try to sleep when I can.
3. Homework with son.
4. Outline for Darwin & the Demon Game.
5. Touch on Phi Beta Files.
6. Bike at least twice this week.
7. Get a haircut.
8. Make sloppy joe’s on Thursday.
9. Try to get anxiety under more control, especially at night.