Dec 21

 Sleeping very long. Yesterday, I am not even sure. I know that I slept for 17 hours with a break right in the middle of an hour or so to knock up a pollution bloom map. And then went back to sleep.

I would take a guess I am somewhere around a 75:25 split at the minimum. 18 hours down, 6 hours up. But the 6 hours is not in a single block. It's sporadic. Bathroom, water. awake for a short while. Sleep. ( albeit yesterday it was a lot more sleep than 18 hours in a 24 hour period )

I am not getting anything close to feeling awake and rested. Anytime I stop for a moment I get a hard tug towards sleep. Like if you were always super tired. Also on top of this, I am not feeling well. I am just about keeping the nausea within bounds - it's not getting critical, but it's often the background noise which also pushes me into sleep. Living with it is unpleasant. Sleep takes it away.

I am just.. letting it do what it's going to do. So far I have not spiralled into a hopeless depression with it. But it's also not good. Yesterday coming up for air after my 17 hours to play a couple of games with a friend, I reflected that this was a bit like death but with telephone privileges. I am in a state of oblivion for the vast majority of time. And for a couple of hours I have a phone call with the living. Before submerging back into oblivion. An odd state. Someone has died. But you can still phone them occasionally.

I don't have any capability to do shit at the moment. None. Zero. Nada. My friend coaxes me up to play a game or two. And I think that tickles my need to meet someones request, to try and not disappear into a 24 hour cycle, and just see how well it goes. If I was left entirely to my own devices I am pretty sure I wouldn't move at all. I don't think my friend is clueless about it either. In the gentlest possible way.

Whilst waiting for something to heat in the microwave today I made an effort to open the c64 still sat on my sofa. I don't have the energy for it. At all. But I made an effort. Open it at least. So. I did that. 

 

 

Brand new. In 2025. Who woulda thunk it. Finally I have my own C64. In some impossible future where I have wellness and energy, I want to write a game for it. I was chomping through C64 assembly coding a good whiles ago. It's not as difficult as it seems. Or perhaps, at this point in my life, it's now relatively easy compared to what that seemed like when I was a kid. These days there are also some excellent tools and coding libraries that allow you to write most - if not all - of a game in C. Which again, at this point in my life, is bread and butter. Well. It would be. If I wasn't entirely fucked.

Realistically I am never going to do that. I can barely get out of bed and stop sleeping. Barely make myself honest at work. Let alone this.

But you never know. Part of my reality, despite what all my negativity seems to be, is that I keep it in mind that if all things were equal I would like to do X. This is why slowly I set things up or buy things that are projects. Projects I can no longer do. But. It's like placating the bit of me that still would like to do things. Without brutally shutting it down and pitching everything into despair. I am fully aware of the realities. But sometimes. I just like to think that things are possible.

I have a full set of 10mm knights still in their packaging. Awaiting the day that I am better, with energy, and I can mimic the Cry Havoc painting my friend is doing at a 28mm scale. I have a raspberry pi with sensors and an "AI" hat ai co processor. For the day I have the energy to assemble it all. Code it all. And stick my own genie in its box. 

I have my boxes half built. To contain the card game I designed and printed.

And now I have a C64. For when I get my energy back. And make a silly little 8 bit video game.

Until then.

They sit untouched waiting for me to get better. And if that's never. That's ok.

And I know, it's almost certain to be never. All I am really doing is acquiring weird bits of junk for people to sort through when I am dead - and probably throw in the garbage.

Cheery.

But perhaps this also reveals a little of the underlying state. I don't go into this oblivion willingly. I would rather be doing things. I even make efforts - as little as I can - to do things. But I can't. And I have to come to terms with that. And manage it as best I can. And everything else on top.

Christmas day is rushing onwards. I have a vague awareness that I need to get at least a couple of ducks in a row for it. I need to wash clothes. Pack a bag. Pour myself into a car. It's feeling. Difficult. Beyond that. Everything else is ridiculously far out of capability and scope.

One day at a time. Always. One day at a time. Stretching over the horizon. Perhaps one tomorrow everything becomes a lot better. 

In any case. Have a picture from my friends painting. He does lovely stuff. I live vicariously through his painting.