A Year In Review - 2018

This whole ‘year in review’ idea am from Joanna on her Happiness blog.  I haven’t visited her site or really any blog in quite some time but this is an idea that I plan to do as often (annually) as I can.  It’s just a bit of a review of what happened over the last year and a list of questions.  The questions, over time, and their answers should be telling on how I’m changing.  I’m writing this without looking at the previous answers so they won’t bias my answers now. 

Responsibilities and the New Computer

I'm going to post my 'year in review' later, but I've finished writing it already.  Two things came up in that post that I realized I needed to share here.  One is for you (whomever you are that's reading this) and that's updating you on the computer.  It's here, it's great.  One is for me and that's starting to consider financial planning.

Thankful Updates

In my last post a month ago I went over three major 'in between' moments that I was stuck in.  Well, I need to update you on all of them.  None are strictly good, but none are strictly bad either.

First is my health.  I saw the neurologist and he was happy with the Depakote results.  He says to keep taking it and we'll check back in 6 months.  At this point, I'm fairly sure I have a long term solution to my migraines as I still haven't had one.  Oh, I still get headaches and some really bad ones, occasionally I'll get some light sensitivity and even rarer some sound sensitivity.  But it's never the combination of symptoms that equates out to a migraine and has never included that confused, "can't think straight" feeling.  So screw the weight gain, I now take Depakote every night and am happy to swallow two of those fucking horse pills (seriously, they're huge!).

Between Past and Future

There's always that funny time between what I've always known and what I'm charging off toward that really excites me and scares the living hell out of me in equal measure.  Here and now is one of those times on many different fronts including my health, my career, and my computer.  I've been at crossroads before.  I've bridged this same gap before and even done so on these same issues.  But I don't think I've ever done them all at the same time.

It's about Trust... and Pride

My computer is all fucked up again.  You know, for a guy that likes computers... for a a guy that used to work as a computer tech and got paid well for it... I'm starting to think that I'm just bad at this.

I think to really prep this, I need a recap of my computer lore.  This won't go into to much depth but as I have to read through a bunch of posts just to remind myself of my computer journey, I figure you loyal readers will have to have the same journey.  My first computer was back in junior high school.  I guess technically it wasn't mine and instead was the family's computer.  But it was mine.  A shiny brand new several thousand dollar Commodore 64 with a tv/monitor and all manner of accessories. After many years of wonderful service (and being replaced a couple times) it was replaced with an Amiga 500.  that was a beast of a computer.  It was also the bowing out point for my parents as they realized what it would take to 'keep up' with computers.

Joys and Home

I said in the last post that I would write about some thing that make me happy.  I wanted to do that so that I'd more or less get happy after thinking about that damned nightmare.  But while I was looking for a header image (I really like that nightmare image!) my brother called me out to help take the remains of my car port and toss it in the backyard (more on that later).  So while this was supposed to be a post about making me happy, it's now just going to be a halfhearted attempt at that and then a talk about Home and what that means moving forward.

The Nightmare

I don't often share my dreams or nightmares as they rarely make sense.  I don't buy into dream interpretation beyond the most basic forms.... bad dreams correlate to stressful situations, good dreams correlate to calm situations.  So most of the time when I wake up from a dream, I take just a moment to consider it, then let it flow out of memory.  I recognize if it's a good or a bad dream, but that's about it.  But this was different.  This was a nightmare.

President Trump

As I start writing this post President Trump has been in office for 1 year, 197 days, 2 hours, and 27 minutes.  I can honestly say he is almost exactly what I expected him to be as President.  A political neophyte who had no idea what he was going to do once in office and therefore hasn't done much of anything beyond make a bunch of noise.

My Second Home

I first visited Chicago when I was in the 5th grade.  It wasn't my first trip to a big city as my family had vacationed to both New York and Los Angeles before, but it was my first memory of a big urban metropolis.  It was breathtaking and amazing.  And that sense of awe hasn't ever gone away or faded in the least little bit.  I specifically remember going to China town and having my first sit down experience at a Chinese restaurant.  Pepper Steak. Yeah, I wasn't exactly adventurous back then food wise, but it was still amazing.

They Ain't Getting Better

This is just a quick update on my migraines.  The title kind of says it all... they're not only NOT getting better, they're getting worse.  I last updated you on June 11th as I was tapering up and down on topamax.  I had taped up to 100mg a day under my neurologist's direction and had decided to go back down to 75mg a day under my own choice.  Well, 75mg wasn't really any better.  Like every dose of topamax it was different, but not better.  I did have fewer migraines, but they were far worse than my 'normal' migraines.  I have to put the air quotes on that as I still don't really have a 'normal' migraine.