Author: admin

I don’t know about other teams, but the Giants are in a world of bad luck. To lose your star QB, WR, and RB all in one game is just wack. The Giants will try to fight on, but dang, it is going to be a struggle. At the very least, I think there is hope moving forward. The line is getting better on both sides and playmakers are evolving. A little more help from free agency in the off season and we will have something to really work with next year,

This year? Nah, that is over. I want to watch us win a few more games but there won’t be too many more to watch at this rate.

Some Thoughts:

1. If left to my own devices, those devices tend to be joystcks.
2. New Superman is bisexual. Bandwagon much? I mean if it wasn’t a big deal then it wouldn’t be a big deal, but to make if focal… Might as well make him asian. No, that’s the boyfriend. It pains me to see stories try to force issues that are not at all related to the story. Of course, when I like it I like it. I thought black Nick Fury was great because of Samuel L Jackson. Had it been anyone else I would’ve been like everyone else and called CAP–the way even I did when they chose to make Robin black/asian in the new Titans show. Using race and sexuality as a coloring for characters just to make them different is not the strategy I feel is good for anyone. It furthers the idea that we need to change existing characters to take away the history of what they were as opposed to making new heroes that reflect our updated and evolved way of thinking.

My war on crickets in underway. I found a mound of the awful-sounding pests and doused them in the Sevin poison. We’ll see how that goes. This was the first mound but it is not the only one. As I begin to peel back the layers of overgrowth I am finding more and more of these hideouts. Today I even spotted what I believe to be a hawk circling my backyard, which argues there may be mice nearby.

Why are there field hawks in the desert? No clue. I have no idea about their habitat. What I do know is my habitat is jacked. I’ve done a terrible job of maintaining the backyard and front yard and as a result the place looks all sorts of junky. I don’t want to live this way and I don’t want to teach the kids the live this way. That is why I am so focused on turning this around quickly and having them pitch in to get the work done. My eldest has a partially torn ACL (again) and is using this as an excuse to not do yardwork. As a result he’s been doing more of the inside jobs while the others are tasked with helping me on the outside. It is a lot of work that needs to be done, and I am trying to get a little bit more done every day. I still don’t have all the tools put together the way I need–I’ll need to work on the new cutter tomorrow. Once all is setup properly it should be an easy matter to tear through the grass. With a little effort I might be able to get two cutters running and be able to halve the work. Maybe even three!

There is so much to be done just to make this place look livable from the outside. It makes me wonder how I managed to let it fall so far.

I’m taking a few days to reset and reload myself. I’m looking forward to getting out of the desert for a couple of those days. The real key is to give myself mental time, physical time, and emotional time away from the grind. The daily can wear on me. When I was younger I really did think the idea of wear and tear was a joke–something old folks and idiots used as an excuse for downshifts in effort. Now that I am on that grind it makes all the sense in the world. The blog ought to be proof that my energy stores are depleted and the brain juice ain’t what it ought to be.

Physically, I need to figure out a plan to take advantage of the excellent weather. I need to be out and moving about every day. I have not done such as of late and it shows. The fat isn’t fading.

Some Thoughts:

1. I’m going to use Sevin as my first attempt to quell the cricket problem. If that doesn’t show results, I will go to the poison store (yeah, that is actually a thing) and get it moving.
2. My son’s cat is all cuddled up beside me. Don’t know what that is about. She’s usually cuddled up like five feet away with a clear line of demarcation. Now she is insisting on head rubs. There is a simple comfort in petting a cat.

The 14u is going pretty well for our team. I’m curious and excited about what to do moving forward with closing out the youth experience for my kid. The best outcome would be that ring for the 14u championship as a 12 yr old knowing he was a vital part of the squad. We have a chance to compete. Here’s the standing thus far:

Team	Win	Loss	Ties	PF	PA
Raiders	5	0		118	34
Liberty Lions	4	0		150	19
Irish	4	0		104	6
Argos	3	0		134	6
Mustangs	2	2		47	71
Jr Eagles	2	2		36	72
Dragons	2	3		75	67
Peoria Panthers	2	2		74	56
Spartans	2	1		47	24
Yuma Coyotes	2	2		21	53
Jr Huskies	2	1		49	8
Force Football	1	2		39	53
Ridge Army	1	3		26	95
Outlaws	1	2		41	61
Elite Reapers	0	3		0	105
Devilbacks	0	2		0	70
Mesa Toros	0	3		0	55

Still haven’t gotten to the Opponents Win and Opponents Opponents Win. Those categories matter statistically. It gives a sense of who these teams really are. With 16 it looks like the best 8 are going to be considered D1 and the second 8 go D2. Ideally we want the 1 seed but the two works just as well. 3 gets wonky, but 4 is not where we want to be. The 3-6 game–if the season ended today–is an interesting matchup for us. I still don’t know who the Eagles are based on who they played. They lost to the Ridge Army and the Liberty Lions. This, coupled with a lack of offense tells me they might be pretenders. I feel like the Ridge Army will be able to elevate their play to make D1. I’d love to play them as well as one of the other undefeated in the next three weeks of the season. We probably get 7 games. I’d love to see 8, but I am guessing the guaranteed 8th is the playoff game.

We expect more than 8. We expect to be last team standing.

As a sci-fi writer I spend a great deal of time looking forward into the near future. I’ve been a terrible futurist as I have rarely looked beyond the next 100 years. This has been on my mind lately as I’ve been watching the future shaped by Asimov’s Foundation and other far flung sci-fi epics. More and more as I try to look forward I find myself wanting to know how we got here. I want to look backwards and explore the beginnings. In essence, I think I want a do over.

I enjoy the simplicity of fantasy. Often people assume a love for fantasy is a love for the magic. For me it is the mythology and the swordplay. I dig magic–don’t get me wrong–but that is not the source of my need to write in that genre. I have a desire to build old worlds and create the mythos that can be carried forward a thousand generations. Perhaps it is my god complex or minecraft or whatever you call the need to create (other than being a writer). This is a thing I want to do and feel like I can do successfully. At least I’ll give it the good ol college try.

Some Thoughts:

1. Still no real cricket-killing plan.

I am presently dealing with a cricket infestation. More to the point I am presently not dealing with a cricket infestation. I don’t really know what to do about the situation. All I hear is the chirping all night and during quite a bit of the morning time. I’ve failed at controlling the yard and made an environment in which they thrive. So, step one is to clean up the space. Step 2 is to spray the crap out of all that I can. I will likely need to lock up the cat for a few days while I do this. Step three: repeat. I need to get this handled because I am tired of living in a trashy environment. I am really tired of living like this and even worse, no one beyond my partner actually seems to care.

As time drift forward so does the blog and so does the purpose of the blog. I don’t know that I’d call it an evolution over time. It has seen better days and has seen a few worse ones. I will say the blog feels stagnant, which is inline with my drained soul and emptiness of the idea well. I need to get rejuvenated, and I don’t actually have a clue how to do that.

I do know what doesn’t work: bad TV. Overworked mind doesn’t help much. Emotional distress? That’s a big distraction. All of these things tend to define my daily experience and that makes for bad writing.

my partner suggested I try to write some short stories to fall back in love with my crazy craft. Having knocked out this novel I feel like the time is right for it.

perhaps it will make the blog better—re-energize the thing. It needs it. I need it. One thing remains true. I started this ten minute rule as a daily touchstone. There is a great difference between a touchstone and a chore. This blog has begun to feel like the latter.

this must change in order for me to find a better way of being.

I now have at least one win in all of my leagues! I am also 1-3 in all of my leagues, which doesn’t bode well for playoff chances. It isn’t that my team sucks. It’s a little of that In At least two leagues, but the key issue is matchups. So, starting this week I’m researching schedule and building for the playoffs.

What does that mean? Well, it means I need to focus on who plays who and when. I need to predict how tight the race will be and who will be out and who will be so locked in that they rest players. Contentious divisions are the best. I need divisions where first and fourth are down to a few games at the end of the season. I also need those players who will be on the field and stepping up.

Nfc teams fit that description. West and east divisions are the prime candidates. NFC east is famous for only the leader making the playoffs and the margin is often razor thin. I’m going to need giants players out there. The west is tough because up to 3 teams will be in the playoffs and it will be a battle for those spots.

The AFC feels settled already. We know the teams so seeding is the real issue. I have been burned by the AFC before. It may be smart to trade off players like Mahomes before it’s too late.

Coming round to the end of the revision period for my novel and my brain is absolute mush. I’m not in any real shape to do much more than offer…

Some Thoughts;

1. Coffeenerdness: Major Dickason’s roast is far and away the best I’ve drank black. I can hardly drink coffee black at a restaurant. I was at Ihop the other day and the coffee was disgusting. However, I will say that if you ever go through North Bend up in Washington, stop by Twede’s Cafe. You may know the name from Twin Peaks. The coffee is actually legit. Best cup I had in Washington.
2. The casting for Titans is on point, as is the perspective. While Batman exists within the show we never see him in costume and it is not about him. It’s about these Robins. All of them. I appreciate how they put their own spin on the situation. The addition of a Black Tim Drake was surprising, but with him being my, well, hero, i’m happy.
3. Brain is fizzing out.

My fantasy world is crashing down around me. In one league I’m losing running backs. In another league my Wide receivers and Tight Ends combined for 11 points. In the 3rd league I just don’t have enough firepower to produce big points. This is going to be the year I need to reach out and make trades, but I am horrible at trades. I don’t even know who to trade for! I think part of the issue is my own failure to put in the time and effort. I’ve been feeling that a lot with the kids lately. This happens in games as well. They play and care so much more than me that they put in the hours where I don’t. Let’s not forget my reflexes are considerably slower as I age. All of this makes for a pretty potent cocktail of fail.

I’m tired of the failing. I’d love to be good at something again. Not sure that is going to happen in the gaming world. I fear I’ll always be just okay from here on out and likely on the spectrum of not good. This, along with the endless thoughts of death (not dying but the absence of life) marks my getting old. I don’t like this version of getting old at all.

Some Thoughts:

1. We get a week 1 do-over in the youth league. The team we were supposed to play had a Covid issue, so we played their better counterpart. We scored 12 points and gave up none. It was a solid win, but it was not the sort of win that announced our team to the league. This week we announce our team to the league.
2. Principle revision is nearly done. I’m mad late with the draft rewrites, but I think that the book is going to be good. It better be good enough to excuse my lateness and give me another shot.