As kind of a crazy thing, I haven’t given a live presentation in fifteen years. But last week I was asked to give a two-hour talk about writing and editing, and after that I decided to create this video presentation on YouTube, titled, Almost Everything I Know About Writing. It’s a 33-minute long presentation that’s based on the introduction to the original presentation, and if you’re interested in technical writing, I hope it’s helpful.
“Do that thing that will charm you, that will make you say, ‘Yes, it’s the real me.’ Do that, and you’re alive.”
(I don’t remember where that quote comes from,
but I like it.)
“Remember, remember, the fifth of November.”
~ from the movie, V for Vendetta
Coach Billy Donovan called Dosunmu “fearless’’ once again.
“My motto is just fear God, so I don’t fear anything but God,’’ Dosunmu said. “When I go out there and compete, I trust in what I can do.”
~ a quote from this page
After several days of intense programming, I thought I'd take a break for something much less serious: Funny bumper sticker quotes and sayings. :)
These are a variety of funny/joke bumper stickers quotes/sayings that I've seen over the last year or two. A few others were sent to me by friends who know I like a good bumper sticker ... well, as long as it's not on my car.
Continuing along with my great diverticulitis adventure (or, “How I spent the Spring of 2015“), yesterday I took another trip to the ER, had another CT scan, and to my great surprise I found out that I don’t have diverticulitis, but instead I have something called Epiploic appendagitis:
A note from June 7, 2015:
“So, you want to go out with me, right?”
“I have to be honest with you,” she said, suddenly looking serious.
“Uh-oh. I’ve heard that before.”
“No, not that,” she said, with a little smile.
“Okay ...”
“I have MS.” Long pause. “Do you know what that means?”
“Yes, yes I do.”
“In order to understand a man, you have to understand his past.”
~ Columbo
It’s noon. There’s a knock on the door. I open the door.
UPS guy: “Hi, I have a package for you.”
Me: “Um, hi. Gosh, sorry I’m still in my pajamas, and I haven’t shaved in a few days, and don’t look at the apartment, it’s a real mess. It’s because blah blah blah ...”
“We don’t judge, sir. We just deliver. Have a nice day.”
“When you practice as though this were your last moment, you will have freedom from everything.”
Shunryu Suzuki, not always so
June 13, 2016: The possibility that I have a tumor that could kill me any day has made many relationships different. Some people check in daily, “How you doing?” Other people have disappeared almost completely. I guess everyone has to deal with it in their own way. I just try to follow the Shawshank advice: “Get busy living or get busy dying.”
Possibly because of the mast cell disease, I have had a Vitamin D deficiency on and off for many years. Per the latest blood work it’s really low right now, which may be why I have been having muscular weakness, bone pain, and difficulties concentrating. This list of symptoms of Vitamin D deficiency comes from this healthline.com page.
This nih.gov article states that Vitamin D helps to stabilize mast cells. I always thought my Vitamin D levels were very low because of mast cell disease, but maybe something else caused the Vitamin D problem which made the mast cell problem worse, dunno.
“Man is drawn between two paths: One drags him downwards towards fulfillment of desires and sense gratifications, leading to bondage and destruction; the other guides him upwards towards purity and realization of his inner Self. Desires fog his mind and veil his true Self. It is the mind alone which leads to bondage or to liberation. It is his reason which either controls his mind or allows itself to be dominated.”
~ from the book, Light on Pranayama
Farewell! If ne’er I see thee more,
Though distant calls my flight impel,
I shall not less thy grace adore,
So friend forever fare thee well.
Farewell, alas, the tragic sound,
Has many a tender bosom torn,
While desolation spread around,
Deserted friendship left to mourn.
Alas! and if we sure must part,
Far separated long to dwell,
I leave thee with a broken heart,
So friend forever fare thee well.
~ part of a poem i heard on Northern Exposure
“You have no responsibility to live up to what other people think you ought to accomplish. I have no responsibility to be like they expect me to be. It’s their mistake, not my failing.”
~ Richard Feynman (one of the great physicists of the 20th century)
Summer, 2017: No telling what I was doing, but I just found my toothbrush with the silverware in the dishwasher.
Some time later: I realized that things like this were the result of uncontrolled mast cell activation disease (MCAS/MCAD).
For the last several days in dreamland I’ve been working in a large, beautiful log cabin. Along with a group of cohorts — I can’t call them coworkers — we’ve been giving a series of presentations to a group of visitors.
Before my presentation this morning I went out into the audience to talk to a couple of people I had recently met. They were talking about their plans for next weekend, and invited me to join them on Saturday.
Just after this I turned around and saw that one of my cohorts had scribbled a large collection of new notes on my blackboard. Yes, a blackboard with chalk, not a whiteboard with markers. I would later think about this, and wonder if it was influenced by a Columbo episode I watched recently — the one about the architect who likes classical music and kills the millionaire cowboy who likes country-western music. The architect also teaches at a local college, and he and Columbo spent several minutes wiping off chalkboards during one scene.
So I walk up to this cohort who has written notes all over my chalkboards like a mad scientist. I read what he has written, and he asks, “What do you think?”
When I first read the text in this image, it brought a few tears to my eyes. When I used to get up and make coffee, our dog Zeus used to come into the kitchen and make stretching moves like this. I came to think of this morning ritual as him saying, “Hey, how you doing? Did you sleep well? What’s on the agenda for today?”
~ image from this facebook page
Day after day,
Love turns grey,
Like the skin of a dying man.
And night after night,
We pretend its all right,
But I have grown older,
And you have grown colder,
And nothing is very much fun any more.
And I can feel
One of my turns coming on.
I feel cold as a razor blade,
Tight as a tourniquet,
Dry as a funeral drum.
(start destroying a hotel room)
Don’t look so frightened,
This is just a passing phase,
One of my bad days.
(Every year I have a day or two where I go to the dark side, and these lyrics from the Pink Floyd song “One of My Turns” describes the feelings of those days very well. February 5, 2020, turned into one of those days.)
