Work
I had that pitch submission deadline last Friday, and phew! I haven’t worked against a deadline in a while. I want to do more of this.
Life
I’m two days late to writing this week note. I’m not sure why - I had a lot to say and I couldn’t do justice to it, so I just kept putting it off. I forgot that I can make separate posts about the things I want to spend more time on!
The first half of last week had lots of people. Bengawalk and Studio 345’s walkability assessment part 2 happened. A friend of the partners was in town for the weekend and we hosted them. On Monday I spent time at a tiny water park with the family!
I don’t know my father very well (he’s hard to get to know) but I thought I knew his talents and interests, because he spends a LOT of time on them that you cannot escape - like electronics, or speakers, or passenger cars, or the stock market, or right wing jingoistic nationalist propaganda, or cashew nuts. But I didn’t know he enjoyed Pool! Most interestingly, he was very patient the first hour of playing with the rest of us and he put in some effort to explain things to us. I was so touched.
Okay, writing all of that down sounds horrible. Yes, that is the bare minimum, but the bar is on the floor. You have to understand that ̶I̶ ̶a̶m̶ ̶u̶n̶f̶o̶r̶t̶u̶n̶a̶t̶e̶l̶y̶ ̶o̶n̶e̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶t̶h̶o̶s̶e̶ ̶p̶e̶o̶p̶l̶e̶ ̶w̶i̶t̶h̶ ̶“̶d̶a̶d̶d̶y̶ ̶i̶s̶s̶u̶e̶s̶”̶ I have not been able to have any kind of real conversation with my dad since I was 9. I have made my peace with the (lack of) relationship I have with him, but it’s good to know that he has some capacity for patience and care.
Health
I... it’s been ten days and I haven’t had a headache!! Touch all your wood, gold, teeth, etc. I haven’t worked out either but I have been walking around a bit, so that’s been good.
Muscle pain, joint tightness, general fatigue, etc has been a 4 out of 10. Present and real but quite manageable, and I’d like it to stay that way.
Learning
I feel like I’ve hit a plateau with the Mandarin. Most of my new vocabulary doesn’t have anywhere to go because the vocabulary box has a limited capacity and is currently full. I need to access and create with it in a different way, somehow.
I’ve been spending some time organising how I do things. I used to use Todoist way back in college but the number of tasks I had to do (coupled with my failing body) significantly overwhelmed me and I burnt it all with fire. This time, it feels much more manageable. I’m managing a large house (with two employees and hygiene and nutrition), caring for cats, and working for myself. My time commitments to paid work are going to increase significantly in the next few months and I’m glad I have the time and resources to finally set things up the way I want to before it happens.
Media
Reading
- Okay, I’m finally done rereading all of Dungeon Crawler Carl. God, what a ride. This is one of those books (like The Locked Tomb series) where even the idea of engaging with fan fiction feels so off, because I’m afraid to taint the source material. Repeatedly shilling it over the last two years has finally made Pranav pick up the book (yisss) but he’s taking wayyy too long for my liking. I spent literally ALL of Sunday and Wednesday reading. Am I proud of myself? No. Was it worth it? Also no, but I had fun!
Around the Web
Here are some of my favourite long form pieces from around the web that I brought up to the friend I was hosting this weekend.
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City in a Bottle: Most people know that Bangalore was originally a cantonment of the Madras presidency for the British army. But did you know that that led to the establishment of a very solid, foundational industry of alcohol manufacturing, and that is what the city was all about before the tech boom? Man, I love long form articles from caravan and I love this city. It’s great when they both collide.
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Greeshma Kuthar has written a nineteen part article series on how the west coast was the hotbed of the RSS movement. Such a good read to understand the deep-rooted nature of saffronism in my family.
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Someone on mastodon (sorry, I can’t find the toot!) shared this lovely article on what flowers in hair means to those who have so little space for self-expression.