Back to reality

Definitely not ready for going back to work tomorrow.

I'm well rested, sure ... but I'd like to be in better condition than I am right now.

I have improved (I think!) since starting to avoid orange/citrus from Thursday but ... Still got the damaged bits and areas that look like I've been dragged around at high speed by something going over concrete. Yep. Still a bit sore.

I think I was on to something with the citrus but then again, I've said that before. I don't think it's a problem solely with wheat, or I'd have still been worsening seeing as I've not gone totally away from wheat. The anti-biotics haven't completely got rid of the problem, although I think I needed them anyway to clear out some nasties. (Lost a couple more pounds too). One correlation with citrus is that I had quite a few glasses of orange juice on one of the occasions when my breathing flared up.

My breathing hasn't completely cleared, although it has improved. I suspect the dusty environment here might be contributing to that problem. My left ear has improved though, although it still looks nasty. Right eye's still poorly though. I can see just fine, it's just the skin underneath the eye.

It is having an effect though, under the skin. Kinda like being bored of it now and wanting the problem to go away. It's been with me for far too long now and it's depressing to think I may have made it worse by going on the orange juice. Since coming off that, the road rash seems to be reducing although I do need to help myself out by not poking at it all the time.

Hopefully time will tell. Or I'll be back at the doctor's place before too long hoping for more answers.

We shall see.

What else have I been up to this week ?

Music. Lots of it. Itunes tells me that since escaping work on the 12th, I've listened to 1159 tracks, at least once. And I'm listening to more now :-) I've added a huge amount to the library lately and I'm not quite through listening to it all yet. Still another 131 tracks to go, including the whole of the new Bat For Lashes album.

It's currently the Torchlight II original soundtrack, which they made available for free a little while ago. It's not bad, it's atmospheric like most soundtracks. Can't say I'll get the game, I got the first and didn't play all the way through the storyline.

Gaming. Not done as much of this as I thought I might. I dunno. Games just aren't grabbing my attention like they used to. I'm enjoying watching people play games more than I'm enjoying the games myself these days. I'm 10 hours into the new XCom game but haven't felt the urge to go back in. Perhaps I'm on too easy a difficulty level as it doesn't seem to be challenging. Perhaps I'm comparing the new constricted maps to the earlier randomly generated massive maps.

I've mostly been FTL'ing - great game. I've beaten that game once but not for a little while. Now there's challenge, with a lot of fairness alongside too. If you're interested in the genre and haven't checked it out yet, here's another link. It's definitely my Game Of The Year.

So if not gaming, what have I filled the hours with ?

Lots of telly, lots of book.

I've managed to catch up enough on the telly treadmill (what comes from recording 3x 1 hour episodes per weekday for later watching) that I can be a little more relaxed about watching it without running out of space :-). Walking Dead had a promising start to its third season and Hunted is not too shabby.

Bookwise, I've read the whole of The Hydrogen Sonata by Iain M Banks. Not quite sure what to make of that one. It's not his best Culture novel, that's either Excession or Surface Detail. There's a hefty case of So What ? in here. But - it's a pretty decent book nonetheless and doesn't take away from the Culture sequence the way Matter did.

I'm now back to Lucifer's Hammer. I've read that one before but it's a high enough quality book that I'm happily reading it again.

And ... where exactly did I leave Lucifer's Hammer ? Oh - the comet had struck and the Chinese and Russians have wiped each other out with nuclear fire and it's over to the Americans to keep things going. Watch out for cannibals ...