QE Results for March

No more hallucinogens 4 me

In January I wrote a blog post entitled Queer Eye, My Daughter, and I where I related some of the experience and pleasure I had binge-watching the two season of the show with my daughter over the holiday break, and in doing so basically laid out a self-improvement (or self assessment, at least) plan for the year.  The plan involves taking an honest inventory of where am in life with regards to five categories, as I see them, as exemplified by the men on the Netflix show Queer Eye.  And so, an honest assessment on my performance for March in the five QE categories:

KARAMO: "Culture, Confidence, Put yourself out there". I remain at 4.5 stars. I wrote 200 pages, displaying a little obsessive-compulsive grit by nailing the last eight of that number on March 31st late at night. For whatever reason, I've decided 200 page writing and a hundred miles running a month are the goals. As far as fiction goes, I worked on a new project, an old project, and a Generation Dead novella.

Business took me to Seattle for a week, and long hours and long travel made the attainment of those goals a challenge March is also a month filled with the birthdays of people I love, including myself (I turned a half century) and both of my children. Sadly, the bucket list concert I mentioned last month was postponed due to a band illness, but Kim and I still went to Boston for a day to celebrate our daughter's birthday with her, and we did an overnight in  Vermont to celebrate our son's birthday with him. It was Mardi Gras in Burlington, and so I took the photo above of a very entertaining joint performance of a band called Brass Balagan (who I swear played a Sun Ra song) and puppet theater group Big Nazo. I loved how interactive the performers with the audience, especially very small (and very fearless) children who wanted to dance with them 

Also, Break My Heart 1,000 Times/I Still See You came out in France:

Mémère and Pépère would have been proud

TAN: "Make an effort with your personal appearance". I remain a two. Wearing my new clothes outside the house and getting out more, generally, but as I write this I realize I'm wearing a t-shirt that is--no joke--twenty-seven years old, and was purchased to a fit me that was forty-five pounds heavier than the me of today.

It is really, really comfortable, though.

BOBBY: "Create and maintain a physical environment that promotes productivity, creativity and inner harmony". A 3, although we finally replaced the leaky shower head in the main bathroom and I somehow managed to repair a Bose speaker that had gone mysteriously silent. But March took me out of my home base physical environment a great deal, so it was hard to realize any actual improvements

ANTONI: "Make nutrition healthy and enjoyable, cook for others". I'll take back the half point I lost last month for a 2.5 as I did most of the meal prep this month, at least when I was home. I ate out a great deal this month--business trips and lots of birthday dinners--but still kept it pretty healthy. I'm still adhering to a slightly relaxed form of Austerity (see Secrets of Weight Loss, Revealed), which at this point might mean it is now a lifestyle habit as opposed to a time-bound change.

I also finally was able to have one of these, which has long been lauded to me by people who would known as one of the premier craft beers 

It hit me the same way as the hirsute guy on the can

After my battle with Oumuamua (detailed in this True Tale of Terror) I have cut back my drinking of alcohol to next to nothing, and so this beverage really did take the top of my head off as pictured on the can (and moments later I was watching the alien/robot invasion pictured above).

JONATHAN: "Take care of yourself physically" I'll remain at 3.5.  I ran 102 miles, which includes the three mile run I took to push myself over the top, a run taken while still under the effects of the beverage pictured above, which probably wasn't the smartest thing in the world. 

I'm fortunate to have been able to reach that mark, though, because I lost a whole week with some sort of chest/head cold (my massive head was fully clogged the day we were supposed to go to the bucket list show, so perhaps it was a blessing it was moved to September). I didn't run all week, and writing was a chore, but it could have been worse--last year around the same time, Oumuamua was making its way through my personal galaxy and I was wracked with such pain I could barely move. I did "take care of myself physically", though, because A. I did something I almost never do, which is take an actual sick day from work to rest and recover and B. I didn't try and run again until my cold symptoms moved out of my chest and became "neck-up", which according to Dr. Google (that quack) might actually be a very beneficial time to run because of antihistamines, etc. 

This puts me at a 15.5 overall for March, an odd month with a great deal of disruption, both positive and negative. A quick side note, Karamo was speaking at a theater near the restaurant where my daughter worked; she'd been hopeful that he'd dine there but no such luck. We have yet to watch season three.

I'm going to split my reading/watching/listening post for March into three posts as I somehow managed to do an impressive amount of each activity--probably because of the sicky week where I wasn't running or writing much and all the travel.

Speaking of reading, please consider purchasing one or several of my books at the link below. The fools at OMZ Press continue to offer the kindle edition of Generation Dead for $2.99, as though I didn't pour my very soul into that book.

Spend way too little for Generation Dead HERE

Thanks fer yer bizness!