Done yesterday (20091222 Tu)

[mdlbear]

1222 Tu
  * up 6:30; W=197.6; drugs, nose, teeth; bath.  BP=116/70; P=62
  * don't eat breakfast or make coffee - prpbable labwork.
  * started on FSA receipts.  January receipts located.
  * 9:45 Awsare -> enlarged prostate (3cm) ; scrip for Doxazosin 
    Results back from x-ray: no bone spur.  BP "good" according to nurse.
    Sure enough, labwork.  Last done last January.
      urine: normal; hemocrit: normal
  @ International Prostate Symptom Score (pdf) (my score: ~22)
  = note that you can make base-64 digits sort properly thus: 
    0123456789ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ_abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz~
    The only character not commonly allowed in identifiers is ~, but it's ok
    in URIs.  Or one could use - between 9 and A at the expense of 
    compatibility with the standard hex digits.
  @ Ten eReader And eBook Predictions For 2010
  @ The Nook Can't Catch the Kindle - BusinessWeek
  @ A Holiday Guide to E-Readers - NYTimes.com
  @ The Top 10 tech trends of 2009 - CNN.com
  @ Ten ways to traverse deep space - 21 December 2009 - New Scientist
  @ Apple's Mistake
  * 6:00 Avoiding
    *- AHA: Avoidance due to *excess caution*.  If I don't do anything, I
       won't screw it up.
    *- aha: some avoidance due to *depression* rather than anxiety.  
       I avoid things that are depressing to think about.,
  * bed ~11:30; S=3328; first dose of doxazosin

Hmm. A pretty good day, I guess. OK, a very good day in terms of things accomplished: I started on the FSA receipts (didn't get very far, but hopefully I have some momentum now), got a diagnosis for my very recent urological problems (enlarged prostate), got some lab-work done (everything looks good except the triglycerides, as usual) got a start on The Next Sub-Project at work, and had a couple of good insights. But it didn't really feel all that productive.

And I know that a single dose of something that takes at least 3 weeks to work isn't going to fix the problem all at once, but...

Hopefully the momentum will keep me going.

OK, the insights:

• You can make a set of base-64 digits that sort properly and can be used in URLs and filenames in two different ways:
  "0123456789ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ_abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz~"
"0123456789-ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ_abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz"
• I avoid a lot of things because of excess caution. If I don't do anything, I can't screw it up. (I think I mentioned this a couple of days ago.) It's closely related to avoiding things because I'm not sure of what I'm doing.
• I avoid a lot of things because of depression, not anxiety. I'm not actually afraid of them, they're just depressing to think about, and depression makes me apathetic.

I'm getting better, but it's rather slow.

Lots of good, fun links up there in the notes.

Comments

[donsimpson.livejournal.com]

I suppose you could use the dash and the tilde, and not use the underline?

Excess caution is one of the big enemies. I was reading an essay on some blog recently, about our failure-phobic culture that discourages the mistakes needed for learning and progress. It's been a while since I read Art and Fear, but I think it's covered in there, too. There _are_ times when extream caution is needed, but it's good to stop and ask if a specific case is one of them.

I have a lot of trouble with depression apathy myself. I'm usually fine once I start moving, so I try various anti-procrastination tricks like dividing the task into small parts I can handle.

A recent remark of yours about walks with others and alone reminded mye of my old short list of what I needed: Art, Love, and Solitude. The best solitude was in places where there was no sight or sound of the works of humanity.

[mdlbear]

More programs have problems with dash and tilde than with underline -- the Unix shell, for example, recognizes both of them when they start a "word".

I can't easily get away from the works of humanity without a lot of driving; I usually settle for having either a garden, a pond, or a river on one side of me when I'm walking. But you're right about that.