Month: March 2026

Day two of the Oatmeal cleanse. I’m officially not about this life. It is helping me recognize how much I actually enjoy food that tastes good. I get to enjoy a little of that tomorrow and a bit more when I visit Tulane later this week. That visit is the first of a handful of college visits for my youngest as he settles in to deciding where he is going to college. Tulane, Hawaii, Idaho, and Northern Arizona have officially offered scholarships. There have been conversations with Northern Iowa and New Mexico, the former being the result of his brother playing there and hopefully becoming a leader on the field this year. Note: I don’t think he’d ever admit it, but, beyond following his coach, I think the kid went to UNI in part to play in a dome. He’s never done that as a home player and it is kinda cool.

But this is about food, not football.

I’ve come to terms with the reality that I have high blood pressure and need to monitor it constantly. That means less salt than the average bear, which often translates to less taste than the average bear. This is the reason for the cleanse. I’ll be repeating this behavior every six weeks (in theory). Staring six weeks into the future means staring into the end of the semester and the beginning of summer. That’s a fun exercise. The summer is filled with opportunities to get healthy and to eat a lot of different things. I’ll need to start considering how to balance my eating and keep the pressure down. The goal here is to lower the pressure and create a lifestyle where I get tasty food and it stays low. Yeah, I want all the smoke.

Some Thoughts:

1. Absolutely Bonkers Headline of the Day: “Gulf allies privately make the case to Trump to keep fighting until Iran is decisively defeated” So they really want this thing to spiral? I don’t see how this ends well for the region. What happens when Iran is put down? Who is in charge then? Do we not think people are going to stay mad?
2. Also this: “Army reviewing after helicopters hovered alongside Kid Rock’s swimming pool as he saluted” Why does Kid Rock matter?
3. And this… “Charlie Kirk highway got vetoed in Arizona. Elected officials are citing politics” Because of course they are. If these guys don’t get what they want, they complain and play the victim.

The recent cancellation of Starfleet Academy fell into the realm of politicization, but the reality is the show sucked. It had a handful of good actors working their way through a Gaia Violo storyline that was, and I am trying to be fair, lame. Shows have long tried to push stereotypes and tropes as shortcuts. It helps us visually understand characters and even who to cheer for. However, this is a case where Violo overplayed their hand, leaning so heavily on this theme of unity among difference and the classic High school trope sets that it felt old as opposed to new.

Starfleet Academy is, allegedly, about the first group of cadets to attend Starfleet after a mysterious and terrifying condition called “The Burn” occurred in 3069. So we are talking way way way past Picard even. I put the Burn on Alex Kurtzman and his team of writers. It was a terrible concept by a writer who seems to have lost his way since splitting with Roberto Orci. All down hill from there, as they say. Anything post burn appears to have been on the path to terrible. Even I gave up on Discovery long before they uncovered they cause of the Burn. I still know what happened. I was still let down.

I have not stopped being let down. I’m not alone either. Star Trek stopped being sci-fi, according to Andy Weir. He’s one who would know.

Some Thoughts:

1. Absolutely Bonkers Headline of the Day: “Drones breach restricted Barksdale air base; no details on source or response” Say what now? You’re telling me we got buzzed by a drone swarm on our home turf and nobody knows who did it or where they went? Hot mess incoming.
2. Sundays are for cleaning… I gotta clean out my body too. I’m doing a two day cleanse of eating nothing but oatmeal. This is based on a study that shwoed such things lowered BP as a result of attacking metabolic syndrome. I’ll let you know how it goes.
3. When is a blog merely a diary? Is it always that?

TBH, too much wine before blogging.

This is not to admit to drunkenness. In fact, the issue is a sore tummy, which has me not wanting to work anymore today. At least I crossed one story off my list. I’ll drink to that this evening. It is odd how much drinking has been integrated into my life in both a relaxing and celebratory fashion. I do drink the casual glass of Cava quite often. That is the wanna be spaniard in me. I do also miss the chill of Spain and of Spanish beaches where the sand stretches and the waves lap gently, and the water is as clear and blue as aquamarine crystal. I’m also not going back there for some time. We’ve moved on.

I too, moving in slow motion today, must move on to…

Some Thoughts:

1. Absolutely Bonkers Headline of the Day: “Elon Gust and Dame Judi Drench among storm names sent to Met Office” Just wait till Jon Oliver finds out about the option to mail in storm names….

What is Balance?

When you look at it from a ten thousand foot perspective, the vision changes. If you spend 12 hours in one day playing games and 12 hours the next day working hard on a project, is that balance? What role do the multiple facets of your life play in balance and how do the external pressures factor into this idea of balance? Is balance about how you feel or about how the people in your life feel about you and about what you are doing?

When I think about living a balanced life it is definitely a conversation rife with questions. I am not feeling like I live a life in balance. I feel like I have too much to do and all I want to do is take time off and play games. I feel like walls are closing in on me and I need to sacrifice things and the only thing I ever sacrifice is myself. I feel like nobody is less important in my life than myself, but that doesn’t jibe with the amount of time I spend playing games and calling it self-care. I feel like I am breaking the things that matter most in my life and carrying anger that should not rightfully exist.

I feel like shutting down. Constantly.

Nothing there feels like balance. It feels like me falling off a cliff.

Some Thoughts:

1. Absolutely Bonkers Headline of the Day: “Panicked travelers hear a new message from airports: Don’t get here so early” Cue spit take.

I’m wiped out.

I cannot say where it came from, though the Lady Talis has been also been under it for a few days. We are both struggling with low energy and I personally feel like this is the worst possible time. I have deadlines. I have to get back on track mentally and physically. I need to be in a space where I am focused on what needs to get done over the next two months and not wasting time and energy trying to get started over and over again. Story of my life right there. I tried to get going today, but slumped on the keyboard, eventually retiring to bed where I watched an episode of Invincible before passing out.

I will get there. Somehow.

I need to reframe this energy crisis into an opportunity. Everything is about putting time on task and allowing myself to focus and lock into one thing at a time, which I am not very good at as of late.

Some Thoughts:

1. Absolutely Bonkers Headline of the Day: “Iran has been blocking ships it sees as tied to the U.S. and Israel from the strait while allowing limited traffic, and Tehran appears to be charging fees for safe passage.” See, this is what happens when you let bros run the military. You wind up realizing that bros have no idea how to deal with real ones who’ve been doing this for a century. They’re being bombed daily and still managed to accrue zero fucks.
2. Earlier I said I had deadlines. It is worth knowing that a majority of these deadlines are coming from people who owe me money for work I did some time ago. So… pay this man.
3. What a difference a fan makes. I’ve learned this lesson in my 90 degree office with a faulty AC. Adding a Vornado changed the game for me.

Looks like my youngest may have punched his ticket to the FBS. He is sitting on two verbal offers with the opportunity for a 3rd. We’re going to Tulane next week to sit in on a practice and see if that verbal becomes contract. Hawaii has offered, and New Mexico is coming out to see him practice this spring. Other schools have reached out from the FBS but no traction there yet. Still, having them helps move the needle in terms of getting him to where he wants to be.

To quote NCSA, “Because a verbal scholarship offer is made by the coach and not the athletic department, it is not binding. Instead, a verbal offer is more of an agreement that the student-athlete will attend the coach’s school and sign a financial aid agreement, which includes financial aid papers and a contract. At any time, a coach or the student-athlete can back out of a verbal agreement, if they so choose.” Equally important to note is the fact that, “When a student-athletes makes a verbal commitment, it serves as a signal to other college coaches to stop recruiting them.” So even if a student commits, it is not entirely binding. You are only bound once you sign that financial aid agreement, which is the college version of a contract.

I don’t know if we sign on this visit. It feels like the visit is more about them seeing him than the other way around. Likewise, the kid cannot sign with them until the early signing period. So that means he cannot officially sign any paperwork until early December of this year. Any commitment would need to be verbal. Sadly, any visit to, say, Hawaii, would need to be an official visit, because we cannot afford that ride. Tulane has offered 15 other safeties that we know of, and Hawaii has offered 2. So, there is still a chance he is not at the top of the list for Tulane or Hawaii, but based on published offers, he is at least in the top 3 for Hawaii.

This is the system we work with. There is a lot of power given to these schools and little given to these students to be able to control their own futures in the face of schools’ abilities to pull verbal offers. I wish it was different. Heck, I wish they took the time to really consider what they are doing to these potential athletes.

They won’t

Some Thoughts:

1. Absolutely Bonkers Headline of the Day: “Jury finds Instagram and YouTube liable in a landmark social media addiction trial” We knew it would be true. The real question is, what does this mean? Do my kids get money? Or is this just more lawyer nonsense?
2. Also this: “Perfect homework, blank stares: Why colleges are turning to oral exams to combat AI“
3. And this… “Teens get probation after using AI to create fake nudes of classmates” I mean, what did you expect? Once upon a time kids used to write nasty stuff about people they “couldn’t get” in the bathroom stalls. The technology has improved and the tendency has not gone away.

I tried this 90-day journal, and man what a failure that was. I cannot even tell you when I began the journal other than to say it was within the last two or three weeks. Four maybe? See, that right there tells you what you need to know. I still have it. The “plan” is laid out with a list of things I ought to be getting done. It also is not being used in any way shape or form other than to take up space on my desk. Oh, and as a dust collector. I have a lot of those. It wasn’t until this mornign that I shoved it into a drawer, shuttering my futile hopes that I’d foiund some new and innovative way to not suck at getting things done in an orderly fashion. I bought two journals, actually. The second wouldn’t fit int he drawer, so I’m waiting until post-blog to put this one away. I might, actually, be clinging to a little bit of denial with this one too. I know I won’t even open the box it came in.

I keep trying to figure out how to prime the engine. I know that once I get going I do a fairly good job of staying motivated and productive through the end of a project, which leads to another short out and restart. I’m like that car your dad was fixing all those years but never actually ran for more than a few minutes at a time.

But when it ran…

This should not be happening with my life logically more than half over. I should be shifting into retirement mode and not worrying about having to be ramping up production. However, I do not live that kind of life and, as a result, am going to have to work even harder over the next ten or more years to even get to a place where I can cruise out the rest. Mistakes were made, but damn were they fun ones.

None of this addresses the fact that I cannot seem to get it going. It is harder and harder these days, and I have no one to blame but myself and y own tendency towards distractions and escape… Kind of like how I’m about to escape these last ten minutes.

Some Thoughts:

1. Absolutely Bonkers Headline of the Day: “All 5 fundamental units of life’s genetic code were just discovered in an asteroid sample” Still want to cling to the theory that aliens don’t exist?

I think…

that when children are required to leave the home they start to learn valuable information and lessons, like the fact that all of those interesting services they rely on but don’t actually need to think about suddenly need to be thought about. And paid for. The more places like Netflix and Crunchyroll et al crack down on use in different places, the fewer of my kids will be able to bum services off us. We’ll still cover phone, but that is about all. Those little things they don’t think about start to add up. Trust me, I know. I pay the dang bills to the tune of over 2K a month before we get into Electricity, Mortgage, and Water. Sure, kids today will hack into whatever they can and find the free version of dang near everything, so that is a bonus for them. My kids survive largely on youtube and instagram-type social media. These are things that require internet access. How much do you wanna bet that the next one to move out chooses to forego getting internet and instead links all his devices to his phone?

I think…

we are in a really bad place globally. Maybe it will all work out and through some backhanded means, the USA will come out of this Middle East thing on top. However, it doesn’t feel likely. I was recently reminded that DNI Tulsi Gabbard publicly claimed Trump planned to go to war with Iran back in 2020. So, this is all pat of the script. She came out forcefully against the idea back then, but he’s her boss now, so… I guess all of it falls under a “since we know what we know now” type disclaimer that all government folk (all folk really) use when they decide to do something they said they definitely would not do. In their minds they are liars but instead responding to evolving conditions. Frackin Liars.

I think…

College sports are always going to be about money and labels. My kid’s former coach, Ed Lamb talks a lot about the label theory. He says teams look a the label or sticker on a helmet and make a judgement call. Fans do to. Point of fact, my son got offered at Tulane. I didn’t know they were in the CFP until then. We don’t know what we know, and the teams with the money want to keep it that way for fans and for recruits up to the point where they will occasionally sign and pay players to bury them–keeping them off opposing rosters.

I think…

I am done here.

Some Thoughts:

1. Absolutely Bonkers Headline of the Day: “Iran trolls Donald Trump using his late mother Mary Anne Trump’s quote” The alleged quote “says, The quote “from late Mary Anne hoped that Trump would never venture into politics; otherwise, it would be devastating for everyone.” This is what world politics have devolved into. Bodies are stacking and we’re fighting a meme war, people! Seriously, propaganda has always been a thing, but this is next level.

I’m starting this one early in the day. I did this the last few days, mostly for a feeling of completion in a time where I feel like I am spiraling (spinning my wheels, to mix metaphors) towards some low order sense of oblivion. I seem to be focused on getting to the part of the day where I am sitting with my partner and playing Upwords. This is the daily touchstone. Anything leading to or from that feels less like solid ground. I don’t know why. I suspect it is because of the amount of change and travel and uncertainty all around me that I am mentally holding on to the one thing that doesn’t ever change as a mooring point for my day to day reality. That is supported by the fact that I often don’t even know what day it actually is.

Today is Sunday. I know that because I received an alert that I have homework due tonight. Also another that I have a meeting tomorrow–which the app told me happens to be Monday. What sort of life do I lead that takes that level of deconstructive analysis to realize what day of the week I am on? So, it does truly appear as if my life is in desperate need of a scheduling fix. I need to figure out regular times and spaces for things and stick to it. As we know, sticking to it is an extreme weak point for me due to laziness and a not-so-latent obsession with video games. Yet, if I don’t lock in and find some measure of schedule, I cannot find any measure of balance. The latter is what is going to help me rediscover that kindle of motivation to be more than the saggy man I am today.

Maybe it happens. I hope/want it to happen. If I am following “the way” then it is up to me to make it happen. So far it has not.

Some Thoughts:

1. Absolutely Bonkers Headline of the Day: “Florida hospital sues to evict a patient who won’t leave room 5 months after discharge” There was a guy in New York City who did this in a hotel, but a hospital? Bro, the cost has to be astronomical for this lady… Also, what sort of mental issues are at play here, I wonder?
2. Also This: “College Republicans sue University of Florida’s president over deactivation of its chapter” I am really getting tired of the white victimhood narrative that is shaping American identity. It is old, tired, and absolutely full of shit.

This isn’t a rant so much as it is an admittance that I do not know what I am doing. I’m not one of those people who takes their role models from TV–not for certain things, at least. Everything about being a father I basically made up after a point. I did have a man in my life who served as my dad. He died when I was twelve. He wasn’t married to my mom so much as he was simply the man in her life. Moving through life I realized how common that kind of person was for people and how equally common it was to not have a father at all. Men don’t do what we are supposed to do. I hope that is changing. I hope I am part of the change. That does not mean I am doing it right or even know what I am doing.

It would be nice to have a person to turn to to ask questions and confide in. It would be nice to understand how you’re supposed to be ready for all these moments in life that I’m not ready for. At the very least it would be nice to be able to talk to someone who has been through it in a way I understand. But that isn’t my reality. I’m looking up to empty sky. It will be different for my boys. They’ll have someone to turn to. They’ll have someone to confide in and someone to ask the big questions. Hopefully by then I will have figured out some version of the answers.

Some Thoughts:

1. Absolutely Bonkers Headline of the Day: “S.C. woman buys four lottery tickets, wins four times” As a man who is not doing well with the money, can I get one?