33 days out and don't feel so cranky. Except my paper got rejected and I'm not up to the revisions within the deadline as I'm not going to be at work for a few more weeks I guess. Finally doesn't hurt to breathe hardly at all but I can't quite yawn yet.

Son had tubes put in his ears today. It's because my wife couldn't produce breast milk and we thought it best to do cow milk till 2. Eventually I plan to get rid of milk as it's terrible for you.

I recently also read The Dark Tower, Till We Have Faces and The Great Divorce all by CS Lewis. Till We Have Faces was excellent and I wondered how I couldn't have known of it. Turns out Lewis also thought it was his best but it was never popular. A big theme in it was jealousy. The Great Divorce has a lot about people finding ways to refuse to admit they're wrong. Holding on to erroneous thoughts. I'm not a christian but I have always liked his writing. The Dark Tower starts out great with the Stinging Man but I thought took a wrong turn in making one of the people from their reality into one. I see why he didn't finish it.

And I read two books....The Nethergrim and The Skeleth by Matthew Jobin. Not terrible. Not quite as childish as the covers looked. Not quite. Think I need to take a break from that sort of thing though.

Now that I've been off almost 5 weeks, I feel about ready to start writing. Maybe my x-ray tomorrow will show my sternum not healing correctly. I'll leave that as just a vague hope. Starting to feel good enough that I kind of am enjoying being at home. Need to write about things that actually matter to me and do it in a selfish matter. Write something that will increase my own version of 'spirituality". And make real characters. That's always been my problem. Distinct characters.

B. loves Lewis and I borrowed those books from her. Like her so much better than her sister actually. Her sister was a mess though I surely would have put up with her till I died if she hadn't cut J and I from her life. I guess people a lot of people would think B is a mess also. I think very highly of her.  Wish I could find her a man that would appreciate her. She is 37. Hate to think she will never have children. She would like too.

Also spent quite a bit of time the last few days messing around with synth1. Drum presets and trying to locate some other really good presets. Making the sounds may be better but you really just need some main truly good presets as your starting point. At first very very happy with the drum sounds. Thought it better than what I'd ever done before as I've always neglected drums. I've really lost it musically though. I stopped improvising. In part because something went wrong with my midi. Just programming the notes probably doesn't work as well. But... I still have the esq1 on analog and I haven't improvised anything special there. I did spend a couple days really trying to make sounds with it and ultimately wasn't super impressed.... But I know it can sound good with many tracks....

Was thinking it's like the artist who starts out wanting to express something that is in him and eventually he just becomes preoccupied with the process and doesn't really have anything left to express. I don't hear the music off in the distance as I fall asleep anymore. Original songs don't play in my dreams anymore. There's nothing anymore I want to use music to explain to the world.

23 days out. Feeling quite cranky. So sick of laying around. And my heart continues to really pound. Not happy really with my progress, though I suppose I'm progressing.

Teh Dragonbone Chair by Tad Williams
This is so absurdly long winded. There has been so very little to happen. I give up at 75%. This is just a chore. I was thinking maybe he'd become a better as he went along. Also was waiting for the Sithi. This is just writing that's been churned out. He heard he needed to get his 500 or whatever and he made sure to churn them out.

Hollow World by Michael Sullivan
Sci fi is dying. Very hard to do it and be any good. This did have some nice ideas about the future. Plot was quite silly. Certainly better than Tad Williams though.

Dawn of Wonder by Jonathan Renshaw
Pretty good. Boy at school for marshalls that are sort of like secret agent men I think in the middle ages. Vague magic. First book was quite long. 900 pages. I enjoyed. Good read while going through my ordeal. Wish the rest of the series was already completed. He really puts in some good philosophical points while keeping it a page turner.

Having trouble finding a good book lately. I'm so not at my best right now for thinking or anything. I'm thankful I've had a decent number of visitors. Mainly B like 3 our or 4 days, the sister of S, who whatever the fuck happened I don't really know. Some kind of jealousy. Hopefully B will never do something ugly like that. So sick of that sort of thing. The thing is to see how a person treats other people and based off that she really does not appear to be that sort of person. Not remotely. Seems a very good person. Not a miserable misanthrope jealous of other's happiness or whatever.

I have no inspiration. What I had in the past was based off of unhappiness. And that just isn't the way to get it done. Now I'm not really unhappy. Just cranky about physical pain and laying around for close to 4 weeks now. So sick of TV/movies. Getting tired of music even. I think. I don't know.
Get nauseuaueues if I eat much. Find myself turning to thinking about sex as I'm really running out of ideas lately. Hurt too much for hard thinking. Feeling quite cranky that my wife is a foot shorter than me and outweighs me by 40 pounds. No point in complaining about it to anyone. No point talking about it at all. It wouldn't bother me so much except I'm stuck sitting here in the this recliner and just out of things I can do. Can't go do sports, or projects, or even go for a walk. Can't think hard, so being creative is out. More cerebral, anti-page turner books are beyond me mentally right now. Can't go to work. Can't even sit outside and relax because of the locust swarm.

12 days out from open heart surgery. Today I feel like a functioning human being again.

Favorite series:
Lev Grossman
Robin Hobb
Mervyn Peake
Brent Weeks (night angel)
Dave Duncan ( A man of his word/a few good men, also the Great Game)
Wrinkle in Time
Narnia
Tschai
Gene Wolfe
Drizzt

Also really like Anthony Ryan, Aldous Huxley, Tolkien, Kundera, Robert Tressel, Richard Adams, Christopher Buehlman, Charles Bukowski, Dickens, Leguin, Lovecraft, Murakami, Stapleton, Sheri Tepper, TH White, Paar Lagerkvist......