event horizons - part iii

thursday:

working through a daze after officially hearing about the restructuring, staying late because i was so excited about sorting out the cross platform custom authentication issues i was dealing with

getting home to a warm awkwardness, going to clean a bit at the new pad which gave us plenty of time to talk; the new place is fantastic, but the previous tenant's stuff is still there so that was a wasted effort

yesterday:

a lot of good sleep, could've used more.

i'm deeply impressed by the potential for pornhub's masterful device design, it's gonna be great for charging phones at festivals!
oh, 2015: when "stop or you'll go blind" became "stop and you'll be sitting in the dark".

speaking of festivals, i have a deep and desperate need to dig.

a good morning, including my teammates taking advantage of my unlocked computer to invite everyone for donuts. i'd just gotten paid*, so i used the excuse for a pleasant walk to draw cash and buy vegan desserts from pushap which everyone thoroughly enjoyed. then the CTO came over and asked me if i was willing to move with my current manager, who i'm sure i've mentioned before is one of the best i've had. so that's confirmed :)

i'll be sorry to no longer be working directly with sasquatch, though.

* finally! i was worried my payment would be late and so we had to slum it the whole week to make sure we had cash for rent and the movers

we're definitely getting more and more into the spirit of pirate fluxx :)

it was a long afternoon (i worked two hours later than i was supposed to) completely absorbed by the complexities of what i originally believed would be fairly trivial. i could only leave once the mission was complete, which gave me an opportunity to chat with my boss without anyone eavesdropping - i appreciate his candidness in those situations. i also appreciated learning that big junior will be moving to another team.

steaming green dinner, nursing a beer, comic publishing (and managing the forgotten fourth panel all by myself), purchasing great games through humble bundle and struggling to rank muse and placebo albums.

today:

a much better morning, i purchased origin of symmetry and finally, five years later, read through the transcript of an interview i agreed to with a journalist / researcher connecter to tpj. looking back, there are a few things that i definitely didn't need to mention and it's mortifying to see how much of my speech she garbled. clearly she couldn't understand my accent. having said that, there were plenty of me-isms that i recognize and am a little embarrassed about. at some point i will clean it up and publish it.

i'm supposed to be preparing and packing and stuff today. but we'll only be able to start tomorrow morning because the new apartment's not quite ready yet. one thing i urgently need to do today is find is a slip of paper with my new SIN - i need that to update all my services with my new address and i seem to have misfiled it :S

event horizons - part i

the rest of sunday:

mostly resting, a lot of grinding through stupid security issues with openshift (but i'm finally ready to get started) and a great haircut.

monday:

it's tough to get enough sleep when you can't breathe properly
a morning full of fail - backing up my keepass db but not realizing i had a key file attached... which was also backed up! but not with the correct name, so we wasted two hours trying to find it.

very serious pirate fluxx

pc speaker fail: checking out midnight rescue, putting on my headphones and only realizing a minute later that i was actually hearing the sound considerably softer than everyone else.
major vm networking fail wasting hours that i simply didn't have

braindead in front of the telly, trying out shitty comedians (notably, snoop dogg's female comedian special started so badly we couldn't bear to continue) before finding a not-bad [oh, crap. thanks netflix for no longer showing what i've recently viewed] [oh, jay mohr - funny for a girl], the stepdog shedding sticky-roller fail

the itch! this healing is taking ridiculously long...

an asshole who wants to buy the bluetooth keyboard i've been trying to sell for ages motivated me to get my sms relay operational. i have a feeling that after the moving stress of [this] weekend i'll be grinding out some real progress.

tuesday:

gd and i both slept better, but i woke up a few times from disturbing dreams with an unsettling internal shiver that might well be anxiety. in the morning, i saw the face of cabin fever and understood why so many montrealers commit suicide at the end of winter... climate change is making the winters destabilizingly erratic and pushing them further back year by year, and when all you want is spring it just seems like the universe is teasing you. meanwhile, i haven't been snowboarding enough so i want more winter which infuriates everyone, and i actually had to remove my gloves for a minute in -19 weather to prevent overheating...

...

thought for the day: even if electronic cigarettes are harmful (all the evidence being to the contrary), they're significantly *less* harmful than smoking tobacco. if you take the "follow the money " approach to things, the only people who would benefit from smokers staying with tobacco due to safety concerns are the tobacco companies, who we all know are *completely* ethical and honest in all their dealings. playing the "better the devil you know" card is a cheap ploy.

...

more upgrade frustrations, no development until the afternoon. a very controlled run to walmart, more an excuse for a walk and fresh air than anything. great fluxx, then finally sorting my computer out (more or less) around 3pm, then over five straight hours making significant progress in three different directions but not doing nearly enough to rescue my sprint. leaving around 8.30 with a mixed sense of satisfaction and doom.



wednesday:

lots of strange dreams that i can't recall, a super slow wakeup.

thought for the morning: western women have every right to be freaked out by hijabs, they're used as part of the suppression of femininity and it's incompatible with western values. i saw a bit of honor diaries the other day: if you can accept that kind of shit (genital mutilation, child brides, honor killings etc.), there's something deeply wrong with you. if you think it's okay because it's cultural, then your culture's gotta go. or maybe "gotta grow". i guess that'd be good too.

sorting out the mess, but learning that our team's being collectively punished for the loss of productivity caused by my upgrade... later learning that that wasn't the real reason, there was a restructure looming - suddenly i found myself urgently trying to sort out official vacation authorization

mind-melting debugging attempt that dragged out until the end of the day

mortified nation is inspiring, intriguing and cathartic.

obsessing over open

yesterday:

6am, waking up for the case of the missing inhaler, unable to return to sleep and eventually getting up to head over to comfort gd after she learned that the doctor she needed to see doesn't get to the clinic until 10am after she needed to get to work, when she'd been instructed the evening before to arrive at 8.45.

...

dear google, you're supposed to be the greatest when it comes to searching: so why is it that whenever i desperately need to find an email use your mobile app, it can't be found? yet when i enter the same query into my desktop browser... whoop! there it is.

...

it's hard to be excited about contributing to an open source project when 99% of my effort is directed to setting up my dev environment so that i can run tests locally that are only failing because nobody bothered to document how the meta-comments are handled. i feel like my inability to find the project owners in real life and slap them upside the head is only contributing to the problems our entire industry is plagued with.

passing out from hunger and exhaustion while reading while waiting for gd and her friend to be ready for lunch. awesome copper branch bowls! wasting away while gd did some emergency shopping.

straight into bed for a wild nap and a half, waking up, chatting with my mom and putting on austin powers 2 while making dinner (it took me that long to do the dishes, chop and steam the veggies and mix it all up), then trevor noah's you laugh but it's true, which is interesting, amusing and decidedly cathartic.

[a sore tooth to go with my healing itch to go with wondering if it'll be possible to fix things with k-twang*]

today:

3am dragged out of bed to shower and switch bandaids
a night full of weird dreams that bled into a semi-awake state, so in and out of confused consciousness. a beautifully relaxed morning, slowly but surely chopping down the chore tree.

* i almost sent k-twang an apology this morning, but the more i looked at it the more i felt like i was simply placating... everything i wrote about his wedding was absolutely valid and correct, even if it wasn't nice and could have been (slightly) less scathing. i will not apologize for my honesty, for responding reasonably in the face of someone i cared about forcing me to make sacrifices to feed his and his not-yet wife's egos. he's bloody lucky i found out in time to back out, because if i'd arrived in south africa and *then* found out he might well have found himself in a hospital.
no, i do believe that they owe me an apology - which i don't expect they'll ever see. do i need to be the bigger man to keep family together when they're particularly inconsiderate family? should i be forgiving because it's not his fault he was badly raised? to what end?

---why i'm moving back to south africa:
his description of western loneliness is on the mark, in south africa you're forced to pay attention to other people and your surroundings, and when you realize that most people in the west are basically walking dead with so little to complain about that they create weird problems - sometimes very large, very real weird problems - it's hard to get a handle on your new environment. both professionally and personal security-wise i'm glad to be in canada, but it's very tough to make real connections with people here because almost everyone in north america is conditioned to keep their heads down, avoid eye contact and look out for number one. there're a lot of wonderful people here, but it's such a controlled society that they're desperate for simple, honest contact and they often don't know what to do with it when they find it.
i don't know how coherent that is, but at the end of the day south africa has a very social culture. i believe that the all-round craziness brings people together and sets better priorities and perspectives.

---getting rid of cyclists: great attitude!

ooh, look - moderate muslims ARE capable of taking action! that inspires hope :)

utah homeless problem is being eradicated: it's nice to see that someone did the math and came out with a win for everyone! welfare needs to be done right, though, it's unfortunate that this is a rare situation.

story point estimation: no, i didn't think this would be that exciting either, but a method that considers environmental factors and spits out reliable results? estimating software development time is a nightmare, and this looks properly helpful.

good beehive design: honey on tap.

free online cartoon streaming!

con-end drum

sleeping well, being woken up half an hour before my alarm to a whispered worry (fortunately, it looks like we'll be fine but our finances are a little tight this week)

a very, very cold morning and it only took one asshole taxi driver to ruin it by ignoring his instructions and simply not picking us up... and of course, i got on the metro just as it broke down. and then later received a call from the taxi rank to inform me that the guy who finally picked us up needed to be paid because he couldn't accept credit... 2015, no? at least gd handled it.

lunch vegan confusion forcing me to speak french

a talk on bootstrap because there wasn't anything more interesting, a really interesting talk about unit testing, then a "for me" talk about game dev: a bit disappointing, and the man behind me who wasn't listening but was coughing a lot really irritated the shit out of me

elementaryOS impressed

rushing home, shopping on the way

an evening of christopher titus - man, that dude has fantastic payoffs! - and the intense agony of thirteen slowly healing nevii excisions. no, tiger balm is *not* good for the band-aid irritation. oh! gd's right, it *says* not to use it on irritated skin.

realizing just before getting into bed that i actually can't afford to snowboard this weekend, which is fine because i have a list of other stuff to do. and sleeping late is on that list.

booking

passport? the bureaucratic run-around. leaving gd to handle the rest and arriving late for the second talk. interesting security talk, discovering nexmo, awkward public-speaking talk with no authority about project management

learning that gd's passport's on the way! ^_^

good lunch, good presentation but sleepy even with the coffee...

fun api horror stories, followed by falling asleep to boring symphony best practices that are all available online

awkward drinks, then being accompanied to my metro station by a guy i didn't really feel like talking to

pampering, the nap, the crazy nevii itching

booking tickets! taking a while to find cheap ones, but totally worth it ^_^

contributing to a node project from windows demands dedication - i eventually threw in the towel after starting from scratch. i'll have to wait until monday when i have a linux box again.

crossing eyes and dotting tees

saturday:

stupid AM being reminded of just how crappy a design my respiratory system is; a stuffed sinus and blowing my nose only making it worse and swallowing leading to choking...

... so much focus on my breathing that i didn't need to actively wake up at 5.20... an easy morning taken one step at a time, leaving a little late (at dawn) with the words "dawn patrol" infusing me with a sense of accomplishment

i knew it would be a great snow day, but *damn* the bus was packed, and delayed :/

first run slow, and my neck was a bit tender for the first few even as i started to warm up and speed up. it was so cold after the fourth i had to run inside to de-ice!

a great set of speedy runs, not feeling adventurous enough to do the snow park alone. *i* find that weird and silly.

i understand now why i need a go-pro: not for the action so much as for the pictures i would take if only it wasn't too cold to remove my gloves

a woman skiing her husky? very cool.

- down the fluoride rabbit hole -

[it's not healthy to add it to the water supply, but it's not *as* dangerous as some people make out]

a beautiful afternoon, really relaxing at breakneck speeds with enough adrenaline and close calls to be whooping for joy! i really should have a partner in crime, though.

calling it a day for coffee and wired, taking it easy

not letting the music from the back of the bus bother me, the beggar with the big story following me to his disappointment

getting home to an angry, hungry gd and two wasted pizzas

sunday:

not the best morning, but not the worst either

midi 6: the final straw, finding a nice place with zero vegan options instead (but they did have almond milk latte)

serious shopping (with a hilarious but unrepeatable embarrassing moment)

lunch, horseman's visit and him giving us a ride to the cinema

the incident of the tumbling popcorn

jupiter ascending: stunning visuals, interesting conceptually and fantastically cool as far as tech and fashion and alien design go. having said that... the 3D wasn't done well, the dialogue was often shameful, the sound mastering was an absolute disaster, the basic premise and a lot of the story elements were remarkably amateur, and overall there was a general sense that something was "off" and it was nigh impossible to suspend belief and be immersed. in short - fun, but far from being a great theatre experience. if you're going to watch it at all, though, the big screen's definitely the way to do it.

the case of the broken ladder, and i think i understand why so many people here die utterly alone. self-absorbed apathy is bad.

futurama

monday:

a full range of morning, a frustratingly unproductive few hours at work then rushing home to comfort a scared gd along with my stepdog before going to see the doctor.

gd's doc is the sister of a guy i'm friendly with at work, everything seems okay and we have our first ultrasound image and a recording of the heartbeat! very exciting ^_^

triple taxi fail in the freezing cold suggesting that i *do* need to get sorted with a car2go / communauto account

great dinner, an early night after being surprised by a reminder for an early osteo appointment

tuesday:

5am garbage day mission

deep dreaming and almost impossible waking up from it

taking a big risk to pass a smoker on a narrow icy path so i wouldn't have to keep breathing it in

i only understood why i needed the osteo appointment when i left and realized how much better i felt

searching for an atm: wasting time when you're in a hurry to find something that you couldn't have known that you'd walked right past, and seeing it only on your return after withdrawing from a machine with a penalty fee

finally! a Getting Stuff Done morning, including more open source contributions (or not, the automated testing failed) and cancelling my dentist appointment in french.

fluxx for lunch, oddly enough enjoyed more than lunch money

focused afternoon working hard and smart, ultimately successful to the point of elation in spite of a significant distraction by a mysterious system failure

getting home to a super relaxing evening

yesterday:

confoo! which means going to bed early to get up stupid early to register before breakfast (which i wouldn't eat). rough dreams.

worst hotel / conference entrance without any signs, getting the wrong "p" in "jp", the missing keynote so i could've slept in

first talk good, second one pirate!

edible lunch, then horrifically dry and excessively detailed italian talk

a surprisingly interesting look at accurate story point estimation

team building by a woman who really doesn't understand male engineers and who actively rejected work ethic from a list of guiding principles (everyone i spoke to appreciated mine*)

* 1. do what you can with what you have; 2. make it better; 3. be flexible; 4. don't be more of an asshole than you need to be; 5. you are not your results.

lightning talks were mostly meh but with a couple of gems

another relaxed evening, finally sending in my first health insurance claim and being blown away by christopher titus' norman rockwell is bleeding.

this morning so far:

half-asleep waking up early for passport form filling, grateful that the -11 snowstorm was relatively warm and cozy

and then there were links

hackers win - and nobody talks about it much?

safe x-rays for everyone!!
and spinal cord implants ftw!

for me, just reading this article on willpower has already paid off.

i don't care if she's talented or just another tabloid favourite - good for her for making healthy food accessible!

could elysium health be the real deal in anti-aging?

nope, still disappointed that an idea i pitched to a myopic potential investor in 2003 is becoming a reality now; the things i would have done if i'd ever had enough capital...

rape is bad enough, but the legal processes actually make it worse.

are you gluten sensitive? are you sure?

we all know that people have different sleep patterns. don't we? this apology from a teacher is heart-breakingly on point.

aircraft safety vs the media's representation of it: chill, it's sensationalist bullshit. as always.

u.n. watch had some interesting / disturbing things to say about 2014:
ten worst UN decisions in 2014
ten biggest UN watch moments

at least the american pastor who helped uganda create kill the gays law will be tried for crimes against humanity/

spooky good

it's hard to sleep well when your nose and throat block the moment you lie down, and the dry air makes it worse

middle-of-the-night worries about cash and realizing i need to postpone my dental work and take care of my insurance claims already

relaxed friday morning feeling, slowly making good progress. awkwardly meeting the germans, exciting lunch money and a slow afternoon that included a walk to walmart because if i'm going to think and plan i may as well do something useful and healthy (walking in the freezing cold) simultaneously.

the day being killed early by discussing a disruptive gaming platform i've been thinking of for a year or so with an enthusiastic hac and saskwatch - it's gratifying to see my ideas bouncing around and leaving marks!

stepping out of the metro to great vacation news and turning around just before i got home. my bonus couldn't be coming at a better time! once stabilized, i want to get myself off this whole credit thing...

delicious (imo) dinner failures and that 70's show

good stretching and neck exercises before bed with only a minor neck concern, feeling weird with so many bandaids on my body, ready for a day  in the snow!

bandaids on the retrograde

saturday:

godzilla! most of it, but we were both too tired to continue

sunday:

a long night's sleep, BBM morning and slowly getting up, chatting with mom and reading

resting (kind of) in front of mankind

rabbi visit, art supplies and animal abuse: a dog tied to a pole in a -15 degree blizzard is animal abuse - and of course, 911 doesn't respond and 311 takes an hour to. we unfortunately didn't catch the asshole responsible because they left as we went inside to call, but it's nice to know we weren't the only passers-by making an effort. whoever can do this to another living being deserves a slow, painful death.

supermarket shopping and gd's homemade veggie burgers ftw, a little more godzilla, then picking up a friend of gd's and meeting another at p.m. for an evening of excessive, entertaining talk and even more excessive eating.

a few episodes of that 70's show, inspiration causing me to stay up until 1.30am researching open-source peer-to-peer social networks and locating an unavailable album (aphrodite's child - 666) that someone stole from gd many years ago

monday:

snuggling on a cold monday morning to build up the willpower to get out of bed, starting the day with an a perfect circle / aphrodite's child power combo and gearing up for a run at the gym

a long day of struggling to get basic shit done, ending on a bittersweet note. the half hour run at lunch was great, though, even if its main focus was good form

sweet potatoes and superhumans

comic publishing and bits of a weird movie and stretching and getting to bed...

tuesday:

... *relatively* early. my left knee feeling slightly stiff.

nightmare fleeing from a little murderous brat with insane engineering skills, a mobile minigun and a bunch of thugs - i'm sensing a persecution theme

dragging myself out of bed for garbage day, spending a great morning with gd and getting excited about trying out shadowrun with her

arriving on time for a long day, somewhat unfocused but making strides even if they weren't in line with our sprint objectives, big junior laughing at me wasting time due to shitty environmental variables out of my control, leaving quite late

...

i need a word that describes with sufficient venom the exasperation caused by supermarket managers who don't order stock according to its popularity; something that succinctly sums up the experience of living within ten minutes' walk of three large supermarkets that don't stock (or consistently fail to stock enough of) what we want (or reasonable alternatives) and taking a metro after a long day to an area with three different supermarkets, all of which are either sporting empty shelves or a distinct lack of "health-food" items that aren't stuffed with cheese or meat.

the fact that the staff everywhere seem to agree that the situation is ridiculous but simply shrug helplessly is only icing on the cake. which i'm starting to be sure they wouldn't stock if we were into that sort of thing.

...

ramen? ra-men! a honey badger documentary, some meh superhumans and an early night exhausted

yesterday:

cold shivers irritation, mostly restless

a facebook feed disturbance forced me to read a long status in good hebrew that irritated the crap out of me until the payoff

metro with gd, a shitty day filled with frustrating IT bullshit and big junior being a jerk with a smile on his face

solid boxing class, finishing hard and feeling good, a great night going by too quickly (but time for an awesome quinoa dinner and jim jeffries being a right bastard and uncomfortably hilarious)

today:

getting to bed late, lots of forgotten dreams but ending with obscure matt groening style cartoons while gd made me seriously over-snooze again (i regret nothing!), at 9am sharp they switched to random koalas waving noncommittally

rushed morning, but starting off on the right foot a) by deciding to win no matter what and b) by finally getting my dev environment sorted out; the early afternoon was spent in a flurry of renewed enthusiasm as results poured in

the sudden, dark realization that i'm going for a private consultation at the dermatologist and that's probably going to cost me when i really don't have cash available 

still not used to taking boots off in offices... quite embarrassing...

super efficient, expensive laser mole removal but the doctor gave me a good deal and took off twelve instead of just the one i'd come for

pacing in a snowstorm chatting with my mom, shopping with my mouth full, lazing with gd in front of that 70's show

and feeling guilty about it. now... to friday!!!

up (and down) in arms

tuesday:

oh, garbage day. waking up early to dress up and rush out into the street at -28, knowing that the garbage men might be here in a few minutes... or a couple of hours...

waking up for garbage day in the middle of a dream in which k-twang's parents had invited us over but had left him the house and he'd invited friends over for a huge house party. they tried repeatedly to do nasty things to me and i managed to turn the tables most of the time. then there was a chase on the highway, i somehow watched / followed a biker riding over a construction vehicle and launching himself down to the highway below. then i saw k-twang deliberately instigating an accident or joining one that had just taken place, and unintentionally getting himself really hurt

finding my mom's envelope! writing on the metro (it feels like it's been forever). chatting with newk'd and being proud of how far he's come, simply avoiding talking about his breakup

a heavy-thinky day with loads of new discoveries, broken by some very serious lunch money sessions.

dinner and louis and comic publishing

wednesday:

a long night of sleep and dreams

nerve damage tension

should've used an established unit test framework, but mine's pretty good nonetheless

a fantastic game of lunch money

a long afternoon with some really dumb moments... overall successful and bureaucratically positive

boxing solid even without a warmup and after three weeks of injury and illness, feeling really good afterwards

then sitting badly on the metro. of course.

stan lee's superhumans is awesome.

thursday:

crashing on the couch and being unable to move to the bed at 2am is not awesome.

a good night's rest, a sufficiently early morning to make a dermatologist appointment (suspicious mole, and my previous referral expired)

overall a very good morning

the slow realization that i've been working two tasks simultaneously and so am not actually behind on my schedule 

lunch money taken to a new level: booking a meeting room. also in the news, exploding kitties HOLY SHIT.

an afternoon of IT struggles ending just before the end of the day with the discovery that our production software would be completely useless without extra cache optimizations and that points to the whole silex / symphony / doctrine combination being absolute shit [turns out it's pretty good, we were timing out for software that hadn't been installed]

kickboxing: seriously sweating and it's not summer. hard work, and moving super slowly afterwards

dinner in front of the boob tube, going to bed feeling great after two days of gym and looking forward to a friday - waking up a couple of hours later with strained, useless upper arms

yesterday:

stupid and slow, mostly positive but ultimately late for work

a day full of hardware problems, making frustratingly slow progress and taking a step backwards for each step forwards

good indian takeout and minds switched off and feeling good about my neck exercises and posture and going to bed early

today:

slow start, resleep, godmother coffee

too-long supermarket mission and disappointment (though the baguette was worth cold hands)

a few episodes of that 70's show and walking out to surprising big grins and stares from strangers

awkwardly being dumped with an interesting woman originally from pretoria, returning home and soon being sent off shopping; there's nothing like paying for two heavy bags, dressing up and walking 100m before realizing you've forgotten something important...

godzilla!

up

staying up late last night to sort out my computer, removing the software i was hoarding - completely coincidentally after watching obsessions

a night of deep sleep and deeper, lucid dreams; a late morning because the best way to restore willpower is to sleep in love's arms after your alarm has gone off

walking through a -29 windy blizzard feeling grateful for my mask and my new mittens.

being forced to answer a call from the dentist in french while at my desk, getting complemented on how i forced my way through

a walmart mission against a cold wind to pick up a battery for our audio remote, standing in line and overhearing a conversation about how good ear candles are. ear candles are DANGEROUS.

the frozen synapse tutorial is pretty cool, the single player campaign begins really well

gd finding her birthday surprise a week early, i KNEW i should have brought it to work...

work permit error corrected, freaking out only a little bit when i thought there might be a problem

post-work shopping expedition, brilliant dinner and watching up (cute, amusing, not my favourite but waaaay better than frozen)

a little bit more frozen synapse (i suck) before bed

friendship plus relaxation therapy

yesterday:

easy laser experience with a different woman who a) told me something i should've been told before about shaving pre-laser (shave *above* the line you want) and b) seemed really excited to learn about l-carnatine (AVOID!!!), b12 (CONSUME!!!) and whey protein alternatives

some good crash and tekken time, then moving awkward, heavy furniture through deep snow at -25 celcius

holy fuck, this was a job for professionals not two men, one with a pregnant women at home

...

and a series of broken telephone messages became a lie that ended a friendship; i could have responded better, coming home to a long discussion about reflexes, and realizing that i still need to deal with my polygraph demons. and that our "friends" are stupid.

today:

waking up in a treasure hunt panic, ransacking our apartment and still dealing with last night's leftovers

signing the transfer for our new apartment! everything's groovy, although we decided to move at the end of the month so as not to get complicated with money, especially as the last month has had some heavy hits

big shopping when hungry and a difficult discussion about poetry slams and their timing and priority

crashing on the couch with a mouth full of ice cream, waking up to a comforting chat with my mom and then chilling in front of obsessions - that show really puts things in perspective...