Monday is Okay: So Far

After a tough couple of days, it’s almost 10:00am on Monday morning and everything is okay.

Stomach issues are normal for gastric bypass patients. At least that’s what everyone tells me. Every once in a while I am going to zig when I shoulda zagged and my new little redesigned mini stomach is going to let me know about it. That’s all the last couple of days were.

I’m on vacation today and tomorrow so I slept about an hour late (ahhhh). When I went to sleep yesterday is was feeling okay. No pain but maybe a little gassy discomfort. I didn’t hit my water or protein goals until maybe half an hour before I fell asleep. I feel good about that. I thought I was going to fail on both counts. I did miss my exercise goal and I’m upset with myself over that, but given the circumstances it’s okay.

This morning I woke up without any pain or issues. I was a little nervous that something might crop up, but I did my 30 minute fake jogging in the cellar (pronounced “yogging” with a soft “j”) and I ate a normal protein bar breakfast. It’s been a couple of hours and all is still well.

Is that optimism I’m feeling? Maybe. It might just be me wanting a grilled hamburger and fries for lunch. it could be either one

Background Noise

Daily writing prompt

What do you listen to while you work?

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When I am working from home I almost always have some audio something or other playing in the background. I think of it more as background noise than anything I am actively listening too. When I am in the office I sometimes try to do the same thing with headphones on but somehow it’s harder for me to do that. I feel like I need to be more aware of what’s going on around me when I’m with my staff. Sometimes I give in and pop in some ear pods and add some background noise.

That’s not the question today though. The question is, what do I listen to? More often than not it’s podcasts. Podcasts recapping TV shows I’m actively watching, guitar playing and guitar gear podcasts, podcasts about playing in bands, podcasts about photography, podcasts about politics. Lots and lots of podcasts.

Given all of the posts here lately talking about music, you’d think I would listen to music while I work. I do sometimes, I just find it more distracting. Every now and then though I feel the need to put on an album or a playlist and let it run. I can’t give a percentage of podcasts vs music or anything. I don’t think about it that analytically. It’s just podcasts most of the time and music some of the time. That’s all.

Fascinating story, eh?

Bad Stomach Evening

Remember that post from earlier where I was talking about bad stomach issues? They cleared up quickly enough back then, but they came roaring back after the little protein bar dinner I had.

It was really bad for a couple of hours but I think it’s clearing up again. My one question to my little re-wired stomach pouch is:

What the fuck, bro?

My evening is a pretty screwed up mess, you know? Here’s hoping it stays away and I can rejoin society. I was planning on sunrise-over-the-ocean photos tomorrow but now I’m afraid to even think about getting off the couch. It’s just me and Doctor Who season five for now.

Four and Five of 50

I have mixed two songs this afternoon. They are the fourth and fifth songs completed for this year’s 50 songs in 90 days challenge and you know what that means, right? It means I am 10% finished! Math, babie! That’s how you do it!

Neither of these songs are terribly good, in terms of writing and recording and performance. This first one is probably the better of the two. I had some fun putting lead guitars on this, even if what I ended up with is brutally sloppy.

This second song is just a great big pile of meh.

Five songs down, 45 to go. No one said they had to be good, they just have to exist.

Good Progress

I feel like I have made good progress on a couple of fronts today. First, my stomach is still okay. I had a protein bar for lunch and I have some french fries in the air fryer right now. Not the Golden Crispers from the comfort food post from earlier this morning, but a different type of Ore-Ida frozen french fries. Not as good, but close. We’ll see how we feel after eating a little bit of actual food.

The second progress front is guitar! The 50/90 Challenge and all that stuff. I put rhythm guitars onto two songs, and lead guitars onto two different songs. I played my Les Paul. If I get a chance later I will do some more and play my SG. Variety is the spice of life, after all. I’m also hoping to mix a tune or two before the day comes to an end. We’ll see about that. For now, season five episode two of the new Doctor Who series. Hey, check it out! Prince Daemon Targaryen from House of the Dragon is The Doctor and Nebula from Guardians of the Galaxy is the companion. This might end up being my favorite cast.

Guitar pictures!

Bad Stomach Morning

I wrote (twice) about having a tough day on the stomach front yesterday. By the time I got through lunch I was okay and everything seemed back to normal. It hasn’t quite stayed that way though.

Last night the gas started coming back not long before bedtime. I was drinking lemonade at that point, which more or less debunks my it-was-the-grape-juice theory. It felt different at first, but as the night wore on it revealed itself as more of the same. Fortunately it didn’t keep me awake and I was able to sleep.

This morning was when things started going sideways. When I woke up I had stomach pain. Real pain. Maybe a six or a seven on the scale from 1-10. Yesterday it was more like discomfort. Today was actual pain. There was nausea too. I felt pretty bad. I spent some time in the bathroom but that didn’t help. I was afraid to eat or drink anything. I grabbed a pillow and laid down on the couch. There was a part of me that was nervous that this would be my third experience with whatever it was that made me go fetal, groaning in pain, for hours at a time. It wasn’t though. I laid down for about 45 minutes. I think I dosed off.

When I came to the pain was gone. I won’t say I was 100% better. More like 95% better. Almost but not quite right. I had 12 ounces of water and my morning pills and I was still okay. I waited 15 minutes after drinking (doctors orders) and then had a small protein bar. Things were still good so I had one of my usual breakfast protein bars and things are still okay. That was 45 minutes ago and nothing has changed. In 15 minutes my one hour of waiting after eating (doctors orders) will be over and I will try to drink a little zero sugar gatorade.

So that means I had some trouble on Friday night, Saturday morning, Saturday night, and now Sunday morning. Fun fun fun. Here’s hoping I’m through with it. I am probably going to stay with protein bars for lunch rather than make something complicated. Simple is the way to go today, I think. Let’s see if I change my mind over the next few hours.

Comfort Food

Daily writing prompt

What’s your go-to comfort food?

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Wow! This is a major question. I could go really deep into this. I won’t, really, but I could.

Pre-Gastric Bypass surgery in May 2022 the answer here was all junk food. Anything with chocolate would qualify for the win. Sour cream and onion potato chips could do it too. Chocolate though. Candy bars, cookies, ice cream, anything with chocolate served as a comfort food, and served extremely well. My weight topping 450 pounds was evidence of that.

Today, post-Gastric Bypass surgery in May 2022 is a much harder question to answer. Not because I don’t have an answer, but because my diet has changed constantly over the last year and two months. Immediately after the surgery the answer was water. Shortly after that it changed to hot chicken broth. Eventually it became an actual food, scrambled eggs. Things have gotten weirder and weirder since then. At various times the answer could have been one of a number of protein bars. Atkins Pretzel bars, Atkins Cookie Dough bars, Quest Cookie Dough bars, Quest Cookies and Cream bars. All of those had there moments (and some are still really close to winning today).

The current answer though, which might be a surprise I guess, is Ore-Ida Golden Crisper frozen french fries. These things are absolutely heaven and at this point in my life I don’t think I can live without them. Love and thanks and respect to the folks at Ore-Ida for coming up with this culinary masterpiece that I can crank out in the air fryer in almost no time at all.

2023 50/90 Challenge Day 19/90

I didn’t record any guitar tracks today, but I did get a nice chunk of work done, which sets me up to record guitars tomorrow.

I had four songs that were just a couple of eight bar phrases done with MIDI instruments. I worked all four of them into full song forms. Now I have something to play guitar on tomorrow. Nice, eh?

I also mixed two songs. I posted one earlier. Here’s the other. This is in the running for my Record Every Month submission for July. I kinda like this one, even though there are slight timing issues literally everywhere. It’s short and sweet and the chorus isn’t bad, even if the guitar leads are.

That’s three songs mixed. Only 47 more to go. I am 6% of the way finished!

Cross Post with Bluesky

I just posted this on Bluesky… not that anyone is really using Bluesky at this point. The user base is small to begin with (invites only) and the staff has been seriously screwing up the content moderation end and making some majorly boneheaded, racist, and sexist moves. It’s really taking the fun out of things.

Doctor Who, the original series. Season two, episode nine. This is the last episode in the second ever dalek story arc, and it’s the first time I have heard a dalek say the word, “exterminate.”

Life is pretty much complete now.
@robj1971.bsky.social

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