Been playing heavily modded morrowind for a couple of weeks now. Best game ever. More or less.
This has resulted in not much piano playing. Been playing tennis like Ken Rosewall except 9 inches and close to 100 pounds bigger, so still a bit of power. Reading The Banished Craft by E D Bell book 3 now. About a world where dragons and humans have been split apart. Pro-vegan book. First I've ever really read.
Got back into running for a couple of weeks or so now. Just doing 4/2s at 8 minute miles so far. Just twice a week. Juggling I can do 6 or 7 three ball patterns and I can do 4 ball sync fountain for like 5 to 10 seconds.
Second child is due in 3 weeks. I continue to get no support at work. First child seems to be a strange combination of very smart and... really not, just like someone else I know.

Health is good. Sleeping well. Have been mostly avoiding gluten and feel better for it.

It occurs to me that I have to have uncommon friends. By that I seem to mean that they must be a bit nuts. Otherwise things just don't make sense. Perhaps, simply with friends as with lovers, we seek that which feels familiar.

"Lovers" is really not a word I use.

And so my friends are kooky. And this can be a problem, just about always. But well what, make friends with someone that's "normal"? Meh.

So then, so it goes.

And read The Boy From Tomorrow by Camille Deangelis. About two children who can communicate across 100 years. Brought a tear to my eye. Reminded me of my idea, not just a story idea, but something in the real world I desperately wanted, someone to just talk to far away as I lived hell. I of course could not find that in the real world. I found just more hell.

..also loving this Castlevania show on netflix. Which is unusual for me. Never watch TV shows. This is so dark. Destroying mankind. Evil religion. Good stuff.

Pretty much have Nyman's Heart Asks for Pleasure memorized. Now just need to spend a few months improving it. Have first 3 pages of beet's 7th 2nd movement mostly memorized in a way that I can play it with some sight reading glances. Now using metronome to try to get the hang of the third page where the left hand is sort of really 3/4 and the right is 2/4. Sort of. That may take a while to really sync them up. And I really haven't memorized the 2nd page sufficiently. Also still working on pathetique 2nd movement. Have forgotten 4th and 5th page and that's how it goes. While working so hard on Nyman's of course I then forget the previous thing which really I didn't memorize that great in the first place but it will eventually stick. And I really need to brush up Rach's c sharp prelude eventually. And I have unmemorized the the 4th page of moonlight easy movement. Oh well. I haven't been serious at it for very long yet. It will stick eventually. And if I'm glancing at the sheet music I can play this stuff not too bad...

Successfully made potato cakes for the first time. Next will add minced broccoli and garlic. Potatoes are my thing now. Really avoiding wheat. Although I do add a bit to the potato cakes. But really avoiding pasta and bread. Feel better this way. Better energy. Better digestion.

Quitting chocolate. Haven't liked my sleeping lately.

Cleaned my disaster of a mancave/library for first time in many years. Bekah helped. Jeff coming also played a role.

Successfully modded Skyrim for the first time. Way harder than it should be but some issue with my gaming computer of not being recognized as an admin lol. Etc.

Getting very close to juggling 4 balls now. Hardly ever practice it but finally just took some very soft balls to work and practice there a bit. Considering I never practice at home it's pretty good that I can do like 8 to 12 or so throws sometimes.

Thinking to put aside non-dominant forehand because actually I like how a one handed backhand feels better than a forehand anyway. I'll just have to practice it until it gets better. Going to focus on just the drive. Mixing it up with the slice is holding me back. Though I definitely won't do as well in matches without the slice.

Trying to become a d and d dungeon master despite having never actually played the game lol. Watching vids. Reading the books isn't enough I think. Bekah wants me to. And I think it will be very good for my sad writing aspirations.

Trying to learn Nyman's Teh Heart Asks for Pleasure First. It's a bit different and just strangely ...counter-intuitive and so it took 4 days to get the first 2 pages. But pushing yourself at such things is good. Feel like I'm a better player for it. Today did the first two lines of page 3 which are just very strange to me. They just don't follow much of any seemingly musical pattern. Took like at least two hours. Maybe 3, to slowly play (and memorize) those two lines. The first line took the vast majority of that time. Just very weird and I can't imagine something any harder to memorize excluding random non-music junk. Feel like I've broken my brain now. And my body for that matter but I think I'm just not feeling great today.

I really could have just spent another week on Pathetique 2nd movement. And I'm sure I will have forgotten it a bit when I come back to it. (I'm too exhausted to play more now). But it's a given that you memorize something, then forget it and rememorize and each time it should stick a bit stronger.

So I need to "brush up"/rememorize that and a few others. Almost finished (memorizing) 2nd page of beethovens 7th 2nd movement also. That's the one I love how it sounds. Nymans I barely like. But if I can mostly finish it in a week or so that's not too terrible to stand.

Fundamentals of Piano Practice by Chuan Chang
Good book that I'm 30% into. Probably best book I've found. Talks about 5 kinds of music related memory. Says I don't need to do a bunch of Hanon and scales and Czerny. Good.

Teh Verdant Passage: Prism Pendant by Troy Denning
First in a series. Light d and d reading. I like this stuff. I need to write it. My friend wants me to be our d and d dungeon master. So reading up. Enjoyable.

Great Pianist on Piano Playing by James Francis Cooke
Very old book that I'm 36%. Interesting to hear about how this stuff was 100 years ago. Piano is somewhat timeless. I like the idea of playing music that has been around a centuries.

Playing the Piano for Pleasure by Charles Cooke
33%. emphasizes building a repertoire. OK.

Ton of mostly piano related book samples.

So it was approximately Sep 9th that I decided I would work really hard for three weeks at left handed forehand, piano, perfect pitch and juggling four balls. I was motivated by Archie Dan Smith's book where he talks about a supposed 3 week rule and also the importance of avoiding interference. Since then I've read a lot of books about how best to practice. And no one else is talking about interference or any 3 week rule. In fact the best book goes on quite a bit about interleaving which is pretty much the opposite, where you purposely change things up. So I halfway along I stopped doing it like Smith advocated.

For the left handed forehand: Again I stopped worrying about interference and played tennis. Additionally as much of a novice as I am at this shot I don't have to do it a ton to improve. But I am being patient and continuing to work on this shot. Not giving it up. The main issue is not hitting it hard enough. But for low balls I'm getting close. For high balls I'm close to terrible. But two days ago I played a match against a good pusher (GM) and split sets and then won the tiebreak 10-2. I hit left handed forehand about 80% of the time instead of a backhand. Though because he's a pusher I was mostly hitting my right handed forehand once I got past the return of serve. (He does have a good first serve).

Juggling: Only practiced a little each day. Just my right hand with 2 for two plus weeks. When I started doing the left hand with 2 I found that the right hand is now a bit better than the left. So I have improved. But just a little bit. I just haven't put adequate time into this. It's just a matter of making sure the toss goes up in the right direction. Not terribly interesting.

Perfect pitch: I decided knowing the intervals is just more important. I quickly was able to discern 2nd minor, 2nd major (chopstick), perfect fifth (vaguely asian), and octave and seventh and major third. But just 3rd major and minor I'm terrible at. And I can see the same issue is there with perfect 4th and perfect 5th. And  the solution seems to be just playing a bunch of 3rds, etc on the piano. But when I sit down at the piano right now I want to focus on actually practicing the piano so putting this on hold.

Piano: Definitely have improved. Though I can see getting fatigued with trying to play everyday. I want to try to more or less continue that. I want to perfect the following repertoire:

Moonlight Sonata (can easily sight read but falter here or there on the memorization)

Rach's Prelude in C sharp minor (used to know and with just an hour of practice almost have it totally back except the very ending)

2nd movement of Beethoven's 7th symphony (the proprioception is difficult. The big jumps on the second page. Getting frustrated with how often I still hit the wrong note. Have only memorized the first page and a half because I'm really working on the proprioception.)

Dark Eyes Richard Benda (I have been able to play the first page or so for many years but trying to play without looking at hands is very difficult. Going to take a long time to manage that I'm sure.)

Scarlatti sonata in F major 118 (Haven't begun it yet. Wanted something baroque not by Bach that will help me with my technique and really like how this sounds.)

Pathetique Sonata 2nd movement by Beethoven (Can play first page so far).

Big thing is I'm learning proprioception whereas I used to just memorize and look at hands. Goal now is to play all this by memory without looking at hands. It's much more enjoyable when you don't look at hands, etc. Once I get the proprioception pretty well I expect I will speed up. I can hardly expect it to take just 3 weeks.

Make it Stick by Peter Brown
70% in. This is about the best way to learn/practice. Best book on the subject. Most important concepts are interleaving and retrieval (self quizzing). Don't mass practice, instead interleave. Jump from thing to thing. This gets it past the short term memory and into the long term. Don't just endlessly loop a passage for an hour on the piano. Loop a passage for a bit. Then another and so on. And then circle back around. Let it leave the short term memory and then... retrieve it. Bring it back using your memory. Every time you bring it back that way on your own it becomes stronger. People consistently have the illusion that mass practice works better. But for long term improvement interleaving works far better. In tennis hit a serve against a backboard followed immediately by two grounds strokes. Catch the ball and repeat. You have to be able to recall the different shots to mind quickly.

First Learn to Practice by Tom Heany
Useful book about music practice, had some additional ideas that combined with Make it Stick I have a basic piano practice routine. Something important is don't spend too much time just playing pieces from beginning to end. Common sense stuff. But very useful. Made notes elsewhere.

Elric and the Sleeping Sorceress by Michael Moorcock
A good blueprint for successfully writing something damnit. Go retrieve such and such magical artifact and use it to defeat some nemesis. Simple short stories in fantasy fiction setting. Got to find the time.

Thank god my friend Bekah seems to finally be better. Had a very typical manic episode it seems. Lasted the average amount of time. Financially ruined but no ruined relationships and she's not physically hurt. I must say though that seeing this and knowing that her brother is in his 30's and still lives at home really brings home that there is something seriously wrong with the other sister. Has helped me deal with the vicious thing she's doing though I hate to make it sound like there is anything positive to gain from the ordeal Bekah has suffered.

So my friend has now been admitted three times. The second was 23 days. This third time she refused to go to that place or the best place. A third place wouldn't take her for a reason that sounds more like they just wan't to get rid of her because she's incredibly difficult. She has now ended up someplace 3.5 hours away. I'm getting afraid she's not going to get better. She isn't just confused. She's like a different person. Very angry. You can't disagree with her. You can't even ask questions. I'm afraid she's going to end up divorced and homeless. And not really much I can do.

On to books.
Did I mention Empire of Silence? By Christopher Ruocchio. Soft science fiction in first person like they are very much telling a story. Vague Dune similarities. Prince but he gives it up rather than be forced to become something he abhors. Homeless for a while then works his way up through as a gladiator. Very much like Brent Weeks Night Angel in that regard. Now using his communication skills to communicate with the alien menace. And thus ends book one. Pretty good.

Did I mention the Vorrh by Brian Catling? I stopped 70%. May return. Someone said it was like Gene Wolfe. It's got some mystery going on and is pretty inventive. More impressive than Empire of Silence but not much of a page turner. No real heroes anywhere in sight. May finish someday. What's it really about? A weird guy with just one eye in the middle of his face who's fantastic in bed. Weird stuff going on in a forest. I don't hardly know what it's about.

6% into the On the Historicity of Jesus by Richard Carrier. Because of biological father who wants to convert me to Southern Baptist. Father is not a terribly intelligent man. Nor mother. Perhaps I'm much less so than I think. But still good lord, where did I come from? This book is depressing in that the evidence for his actual existence is terrible which confirms that people are stupid. Well it's depressing because I'd like to stay on good terms with my dumb father and I suspect sooner or later not being a christian will be an issue. Anyway I already knew the evidence for his actual existence was terrible. Wish I could be a christian but I can't just clap my hands and believe in things for which there is no evidence no matter that I wish I could. Or do I?

The Magician's Apprentice by Raymond Feist. It's like the prototype of the modern fantasy fiction story. But far less dark than what usually sells nowadays. A bit like TH White's The Once and Future King. But it's enjoyable. Very much so. 50% and will finish eventually.

12 Rules For Life by Jordan Peterson. A bestseller. I read the first rule about keeping your head up. He rambles on a bit much. Well way too much. Had a great beginning and a seemingly nice idea but kind of false advertising. Unlikely I will get around to finishing.

Muscle Memory and Imagery: Better Tennis by Archie Dan Smith.
This is a weird little book that cited some other good books and articles. Says really work hard at something for 3 weeks and you will more or less have permanently improved. This is certainly somewhat true. A year later I can still juggle three balls as good as ever after having worked at that for.... a month? Lots of things I like the idea of being good at. His talk of consolidation I think is important. Changing the way I practice the piano now. (much more repetitive). Disagree with his thoughts on interference. The paper he references is talking about a finger tapping sequence for only 6 minutes a day. Only partially applicable to other activities.

The Talent Code by Daniel Coyne. Meh. This guy's writing style is very annoying. Long winded and tries to pad it by adding stuff that isn't interesting at all. But occasionally something worthwhile. 57% in. Important subject.

Talent is Overrate by Geoff Colvin. Worse than Coyne. Thinks business people are something more than just lucky. Just started and may not get far but the subject is important to me.

House of Cards by Robyn Dawes. Reading because of my friend. Like Robert Whitaker pointing out American psychology is an absolute mess. Just started. Depressing. Not sure what to do for my friend. Ultimately her husband decides and he's not a reader, though a nice guy.

Peak: Secrets from the New Science of Expertise by Anders Ericcson. This is far far better than the previous related books. 37% in. This fellow is the real deal in the degree to which he has spent his life analyzing experts. Muscians, etc. Though his deliberate practice rules aren't that great.
1. Get a really good teacher (incidentally points out studies proving business people just got lucky)
2. Push yourself to do things you can't currently do
3. Have well defined short term goals
4. Think hard about what you're doing
5. Recognize your mistakes, the adjustments you need to make
6. Improve your mental representations
7. Constantly modify and improve upon existing skills

Not a great list of rules. Anyway only 37% in and has a lot that is good though. Read about developing perfect pitch in children. As a result I've bought an app called Toned Ear. Maybe it's impossible at 45 but it's always been strange to me not having it, so attempting.

Also decided to work on juggling 4 balls. I can handle working hard for 3 weeks (which Ericcson has made no mention of, just Archie Dan Smith did without reference but it's common sense! More or less...) So three weeks of just the right hand juggling two. Then 3 weeks of just the left hand juggling 2 and then perhaps put together.

Additionally working on left handed forehand 4 days a week for 3 weeks. It's not terrible. I mishit it often and can't hit it anywhere near as hard as my right. But I can see improvement pretty much every time. So I'm going to stick with it for 3 weeks. Anyway a two hand backhand is hurting my back and I really dislike the grip change for a one handed backhand on the return of serve. I am now really crushing the ball with a continental grip on my dominant hand one handed forehand. Really improved when I went to an open stance. It's like my wrist flexibility improved. Used to be so awkward to hit topspin with continental grip in an open stance. Now isn't.

And being highly repetitive with Beethoven's 7th on the piano. Just the same one page everyday until I really truly got it. No time spent fooling around with other stuff. Though it gets boring I just keep playing that one page and really consolidating it. Really learning to not look at my hands. Feel bad for my wife hearing it so much.

My friend Bekah was basically just dropped off at the ED while she was out of her mind so when I found out I jumped out of bed at 3AM to stay with her. I assumed her family or husband would come back that morning. Nobody came back to 4pm. And by that point she been wrestling with security and restrained. I couldn't even get a hold of her family. They never answered my messages. So I ended up having to sign the paperwork and having to testify in court in order for her to get admitted (since she had been combative). And now, she isn't speaking to me. I don't know why. She told my wife though she isn't mad at me anymore, just needs some time. Still wants to go camping next weekend with us.

So... I don't know. She is speaking to the people who just abandoned her. But not me. Story of my life. But oh well. Not too upset now. Just waiting for her to speak to me to find out what she was even angry at me for. As I really don't know. She was totally out of her mind in the ED. I don't like that her whole family just doesn't speak to people when they are angry about something.

Something from Skinny Puppy's Remission. I imagined a version of myself that was like undead. Skeletal. And then I picture a place. That is dark. Something like an afterlife. Or purgatory. Some place after death. Soul Cairn from Skyrim has that murky darkness. Mostly empty. I had forgotten the sound. Similar to a thing I imagined. Like on the edge of something like a massive waterfall. Not necessarily water. A torrent like something. A combination of this background torrent and a desolation.

But it's eternal. Perhaps. And that is good. And it's a meaning beyond the absurdity of office job, food, etc.

But I wanted to write stories about it. And it's really not the basis for stories. I see some fan fiction about Soul Cairn though.

Went back to the soul cairn in Skyrim. This comes the closest to that place I have seen in my mind for so many years. I have the music playing in the background. Replaying Skyrim for it. Almost didn't find it.

My friend, Bekah, is going to be admitted to the hospital for some kin of mania. It happened 8 years ago before I knew her. I was hoping if it ever looked like it might happen again, I could help and stop it. But I have hardly seen her since she started feeling bad. Just her husband, who is very nice but I think not terribly bright. And with her parents tonight driving back from Georgia, where S just moved. S who was my close friend for so many years and now hasn't spoken to me in over 3 years. No particular reason ever given. I was very very worried about her going down there. But then Bekah said she was better. And hasn't seemed to want any advice.

I don't think this is how it should work. But I think this is what they want. I suspect they are wrong.

My tennis is its best ever. Except that I can't take the heat. 92 today and couldn't make it 3 sets of doubles lol. Could play 5 sets of singles (against most people) if it was 20 degrees cooler. Gasquet forehand. Federer backhand. Laver serve. Trying to get back into endurance running. Hoping it will help me stand the heat. People 20 years older can handle it better. Yes, I had open chest heart surgery. But surely I can make it back. Decided to run despite the agony looming over me. (Kidney stone that was pushed back up into my kidney where it has sat for 4 years so far.)

Driving home from tennis started cramping. First the muscle on the underside of my jaw. Then I sneezed and my abdominals. At home cramps in my back. Feet. And I was hydrated. I guess I could have done more though. The cramping as I drive down the highway is a bit dangerous. Totally devoid of energy the rest of the day. But not ready to give up tennis in the summer. Only in my 40's.

Dune and partial Dune Messiah by Herbert. Really enjoyed. Always loved the Lynch movie. Book follows very closely. I can understand what a let down book 2 was, but that's exactly as expected. It's simply realistic which is what fantasy usually isn't. But Herbert had a realism to him.

Tried Thomas Covenant by Donaldson again. Gave up when he committed rape. Somehow I forgot that from before. Perhaps was seriously skimming previously. Before gave up because he was such a whiny bastard.

Warbreaker by Sanderson. I liked it and .... what was it even about again...???? Oh yes. Gods. Breaths. Enjoyed but find it not even worth describing now. A few people come back after death. They can then do one miracle which will kill them. In the meantime they will die if they don't take someone's breath each week. Other people can take breaths and have special powers they can use without dying. Yeah just too complicated like most magic systems by Sanderson. Needs to stay more mysterious.

30% into Sapiens by Yuval Harari. Going on about how we were better off as hunter gatherers. Meh. Otherwise enjoyable.

Have been reading David Foster Wallace. I used to turn my nose up at writers that commit suicide. But some of these people are hooked on medications and when they get out of whack they do unfortunate things. But being hooked on the medications doesn't mean they are without wisdom. Anyway liked that he's intelligent and talks about tennis. So I read some of his essays. Don't know that I will read Infinite Jest. Ultimately I didn't discover anything special. Just tennis musings combined with a bit of a brain which was nice.

As to Zelazny's Amber I am pretty sure part of my like of it was that I had an audiobook version read by Zelazny. Just one of the books in the middle. The way he read it made it so damn cool. But I have now read the first 5 or 6 books and become disillusioned. Somehow it didn't keep its "promises".

Just read the Anubis Gate by Tim Powers and thought it extremely good. Don't know how I didn't know of him. Going to read more by him. Time travel and a very detailed early 19th century England with plenty more, Byron and Coleridge and Egyptian gods and gypsies. Really good.

Started Beloved. The characters are so damn good compared to fantasy fiction. But I've seen the movie a couple times and it seems to follow very closely...

I wrote while I wasn't being athletic because of my broken toe and basically stopped once it was better and I was back to tennis a few times a week. Why? Not laziness. Just so disillusioned with my stories. They aren't very good. Feel like I need to start over but I haven't somehow started.

Also I finally got a piano again after 15 years. Just about memorized moonlight sonata so far which I had previously only been able to sight read. But memorizing is so much more enjoyable. And some other things. First page of Bach's famous toccata and fugue. Fur Elise. I really missed it. Could just happily play and play with no time left for other things. The internet changes things. I can tune it myself now thanks to amazon and youtube. I can easily find good free sheet music and immediately hear a recording of anything. Would have made things very different back in 1988.

But starting to feel unhappy that I'm not writing. Wondering if I should try to salvage what I was working on. Or just totally go back to the drawing board while trying things a bit different. Thinking to make the lead more heroic, more "Gary Stu". Avoiding any mentions of ever having been a child. And writing more linear with a bit less outlining. Ending up with a ton of junk that needed extreme editing actually really lost my interest, finally.

I haven't written anything in the last week. I was away to Seattle for "work". I did read Thomas Disch, The Genociders, which is about how earth is turned into a one crop garden while other life is exterminated. Tad bit depressing. And Frank Herbert's The Heaven Makers which wasn't as depressing as the MC was very intelligent and sort of prevailed. About how immortal aliens are behind the scenes controlling our behaviors in order to make movies.

And now 1/3 into Zelazny's ten volume Amber. Which I had read a part of before. There is something about it I liked before. It has a certain feel. But also I listened to a part of an audio version where Zelazny was reading it and it really made it better. I vaguely recall being in New Mexico at the time. But maybe I wasn't. I don't know. Something though about it like while at the same time something about it don't such that I hadn't already read the whole thing despite being a voracious reader of fantasy for many decades. Too much intrigue /mystery where the motives seem largely pointless. (To rule Amber). And I ask myself, would I be happy to have written this? And the answer is no. But over and over such is the case. All the best writing I find myself thinking this. I wouldn't have bothered and that's probably why I haven't bothered. And I think perhaps it's a sort of nihilism about life. So much of the stuff of life I can't get into. And so I don't write.

But Song of Solomon. That was a book that I would have been pretty happy to write. I can't at the moment think of anything else really. Some short stories. Death of Dr. Island. Chun the Unavoidable. But that's different.

So I have to think more about this. Read more Morrison. More magical realism.

I don't know perhaps I would have pretty happy to write most of the first two Fitz trilogies.

Played really good tennis today. Using only an australian grip. Including hitting a lot of non-dominant hand forehands. Two hours of doubles. The worst player was a retired lady who used to play pro. Played Goolagong. And I hit a non-dominant one hand forehand. And two hand backhand. A one hand backhand slice. A one hand backhand drive. And hit it all OK. The left hand forehand needs work. Hit with the former pro exclusively left handed for 20 minutes afterward.

In Seattle there was a grand piano that I played a lot. Synthesizers are just not the same. I am going to buy a piano. Haven't had one in more than a decade. Want to get back to being able to have prelude in c sharp minor by Rach memorized and others. I miss memorizing music. Weirdly I wasn't good at that with the cello. But as it's almost always just one note at a time, it's so much easier to sight read. But memorized music is so much more enjoyable and I'm sorry but the piano is more enjoyable.

Wrote about 20,000 words in a bit less than two months for two stories. Half will need deleted. And the going is a bit slow because I'm just not sure what I'm really doing. Feel like it's too dark. And also going through the motions somewhat. And probably too worried about middle ages authenticity.
Thinking about starting another story where I really try to make it even less dark. Though I feel like it has less and less to do with me as I make it less dark. I feel the life I have experienced has made it almost impossible to write.

Have been reading Book of the Long Sun by Wolfe. Ian Mortimer's 14th century england. Murakami Men without Women. And Morrison's Song of Solomon. The last being the stand out. So good it made me wonder what the heck I was really writing myself. Murakami was very depressing. Long Sun is good. I think gods and magic really need to go together.

It makes me something like sad that here I am 45 years old and I have never successfully completed even a short story when I have wanted to write for 30 years now. I think I'm more or less about in the right place finally to do so. I think. Still haven't finished anything so who knows. But I feel like I ought to put it down, what was going on, as I spent a lot of time over the years trying to understand why I just couldn't seem to do it.

I have no idea the importance of each of the following. Some combination of:

1. I wanted to write something amazing. I wanted to change the world. I kept rejecting anything short of amazing. I should have set my sights lower and perhaps as I went along I would turn it into something at least intelligent while still enjoyable.

2. I had these strong feelings attached to some images/feelings in my head. They were vague though and not remotely a story. I kept trying to turn them into a story and as I went completely losing the original motivation. I simply needed to focus much more on the nuts and bolts structure even though it meant I wasn't feeling the original inspiration and it had instead turned into a simple problem solving exercise. It's not about that intense artistic feeling. That inspiration. It's about persistence and day to day problem solving.

3. I have been quite unhappy most of my life. But much less so in recent years. Really once my situation improved it still took time for my mental/emotional state to catch up. Anyway, a story for the most part, usually amounts to bad guys doing ugly stuff to good guys. Inventing that sort of stuff in your free time when you already have real life bad guys doing stuff to you is really quite hard.

In a lot of ways it can be difficult to create bad guys anyway as evil is ultimately quite banal. It can be hard to want to focus on making it and all that.

4. For so long I just flat out couldn't stand just sitting down with myself and writing. I felt like I was missing something. This was in part because I didn't have enough in the way of friends when younger. Didn't have enough just hanging out with my friends. Maybe exacerbated by who I am somewhat. That I vaguely had this feeling of this great fun I was missing. I couldn't stand to just sit by myself as my life passed me by. Finally I have had enough of those good times with friends and I see that as nice as they can be, ultimately time just spent alone can be really nice too. Or something like that I guess. Not exactly. I recall as a young child playing with match box cars all alone and making good cars and bad cars. It was the beginning of being a writer. They fought. I was alone. I enjoyed it. And I hadn't had all that fun hanging out at that time. So, I don't know. Something negative happened. I don't know. Somehow I needed fun with friends that was missing from my experience.

Something else may come to me later. So at least in the age of microsoft word, I can create bad guys and good guys now. It's not some horrible thing to just sit here and do that. It's like I've done all those other things enough now and my life situation is positive enough. Finally. At 45.

So now, the nuts and bolts. Bad guys and good guys who are more or less evenly matched. Enough so that the match is interesting to read. Nuts and bolts stuff. Pacing. Finding the right words. Hopefully something more. Hopefully something much more. At this point I have a ways to go I think. I have to write and as I write figure out the characters abilities, the magic system, the world. I can't just throw together a good outline first. Too many choices I can't decide about. So I start writing and I have to rewrite a lot. For example, I realize I've made my one character too powerful compared to the bad guys. I have to weaken him. And on some level it feels like a silly thing. Contrived. Also it's all been done before. And perhaps in this age impossible to get published probably anyway.

But I have a brain. And I can sit down and enjoy writing daily now. Finally.

https://www.soundclick.com/widgets/song.cfm?songid=7917805
I sure wrote a lot of music like this. Not good enough to promote. Not really remotely. Although some in a weird way are way better than this. But they're all weird or a bit amateurish. Or not any good. The good ones are too weird. There are some not weird ones that I feel like just aren't quite worthy of promoting for other reasons. Bad drums, etc.

But still. Some of it's damn good to me. And I feel like it's a little sad no one will ever hear it. Probably not the only one who feels this way.

Anyway, set up now, to get back to it.

I have been trying really hard to write for 3 or so weeks. I was taking the attitude of just making it a daily ritual where everyday I try to write sentences that are actually publishable.

So I wrote a scene that occurred in a graveyard. And then what? Then the character goes back to the city she came from and so then I have to create so many characters and so much. I have to stop and world build. And then I go back and more or less completely rewrite that first scene. And still there is so much world building I need to do that I can't decide about. And it seems like for fantasy fiction, I have to do it first otherwise I will just have to rewrite things.

World building is hard. I had a creative writing teacher (met him playing tennis) that it's better to just start with writing fiction.

So in trying to world build I run into a problem for me. That I couldn't stand to create villains. It's enough to have live with them in real life, let alone go create my own. That is an issue I've had before. But so much of writing is simply about that. You have to make up the good guys and bad guys. Usually. Just has to be done.

Anyway, I feel like I keep trying to write and then I stop. And right now, I am thinking I should stop with the story I was working on and instead try to write some very simple short stories instead, where I concentrate on making good guys and bad guys and hopefully get used to creating villains even though I already have dealt with more than enough in my real life. I worry this is the same sort of thing I've done before (stopping the story). But as long as I'm still continuing to write fantasy fiction stories, I guess it's not like what has happened before.

So then, switching to short stories. Simplistic stories with good guys and bad guys and magic.That's all. Maybe my confidence will grow.

I want to fix the evil in this world. So when people do evil things to me I want to understand why. Of course such people generally do not want to speak to you. So you're left not understanding why, at least not for certain, not exactly. You can guess. Jealousy. Misjudgement. Perfect selfishness. Unable to face that they were wrong for some reason. Desperately trying to conceal something else... But you can't know for certain. And it can be a puzzle you just keep trying to understand. Trying and trying. And so you spend so much time thinking about this ugly thing. And some of that time is spent feeling a combination of amazement and moral outrage.

Sometimes you just have to accept that you will never really know why. You don't have adequate information to work with. And stop trying to solve the puzzle.

It has been 2.5 years since last contact with S and it still really really bothers me. I'm sure that because she refused to speak to me and instead texted for months is a big part of it. I had too many negative things previously happen to me that way because I searched for mentally unstable people to be friends with long distance. The negative texting thing is just a horrible nightmare to me. And it seems like maybe that's exactly why she did it. That she wanted to hurt me as much as she could. Maybe. I maybe she didn't understand. I don't know. And that's part of the problem.

Maybe though I need to face that there is another problem. Which is that I found her to be the most attractive women I had ever known by a very long way. I can find the usual women attractive. The barbie doll types that are interchangeable. And, well, in other words they aren't really that attractive actually. They just have regular features. So what. But S was totally unique. There is just no one else remotely like her. I think that she would be considered kind of unattractive by most.

Understand that when we were friends there was never anything inappropriate. We were just friends. I thought it didn't matter that I found her so attractive. But, perhaps it was why we were friends in the first place. Why I liked being around her so much. And I think I must face that it must be partially why I'm still so unhappy about her suddenly refusing to speak to me when I became friends with her sister. Her sister (and her sister's husband) are actually far better friends. But I am not entirely just this rational sentient creature. I have an animal side and my animal side, I guess, is unusual.

There is only one of her on this planet it seems. Truly a unique creature that can't be replaced. And just the only one, I guess, who just "does it" for me. If I had been single I would have wanted to date her for sure. And I'm pretty sure that would have been some kind of hell. I am just totally ensorcelled by her. And she is mid 30's and never had a boyfriend (or girlfriend?). And there was something going on there, that she would have had such an issue with me being friends with her sister.

I can make it without her. It's just like a part of me has died I guess. But I'm mid 40's now. I may not live so much longer anyway. So I can make it. Maybe it's even for the best. But it's 2.5 years later and I'm just as upset now as ever.

How unfortunate to have had such feelings for such an evil person. That is definitely a flaw I have. The reality is that her sister is a sort of angel while she is a sort of demon. That is not an exaggeration. They are extremes. So I did send a message to her through her sister. I feel better about matters now. She prefers to keep things ugly forever. No one thinks it makes any sense. It's sad. It serves no purpose except that she is sadistic and petty. This is the most hurtful thing she can do in response to me being her sister's close friend. And if she ever spoke to me again it would mean I "won" the battle over speaking/not speaking to me. 

How intelligent am I really that such a person meant so much to me? I am of course part animal. This is how "did it" for me. I wanted to see her improve. Become more self aware. How much better to take an intelligent woman and convince her to work out some, lol. Not that that's the same.

But that doesn't entirely explain it and I hardly can see the point of explaining it. We were friends a long time. Why turn that into something ugly forever. All those memories. Her sister thinks she is irrational. My wife thinks she is mentally ill. Her dad thinks she's childish.

Read On Writing by S King. Really liked it. Straight and to the point. Mostly. Useful.

Read Daily Rituals: How Artists Work by Mason Currey. Interesting. Has caused me to start getting up before work to write for at least an hour. Getting up at 5:30 or 6 to write for an hour is OK and doable for me now. Though once a week I will have to get up at 4:45. As I do anaerobic exercise I want to sleep in more. Except for some tennis I will avoid anaerobic exercise.

Reread first 17% of Lyonesse by Vance. In some ways he's very impressive and unique but in other ways it's really not good story telling. Little dialogue. Just kind of meandering along. Almost like a history summary.

Reread first 6% of Bleak House by Dickens. For some reason I really want to be able to say I read this. He's such a highly thought out writer. But good lord this is terrible. Trying to at least make it to 10%. I seem to not be able to stand to continue around 5 or percent. So far what has happened....? There's some lawsuit that has gone on a long time and some orphan girl who is really nice and has lived a bit here and there. Not treated terribly but not super well. Not much for so many words.

Read some short stories from a Shadows of the New Sun: Stories in Honor of Gene Wolfe. Highly forgettable.

41% of Wind and the Willows by Kenneth Grahame. Surely Tolkien was greatly influenced by this? ...Yes. He was. And it's enjoyable in the same sense that the Shire was.