All I Have to Say on Rep. Weiner

Looks like the House will have more to say.

Pic and idea conveniently, if not shamelessly stolen from Ace of Spades.

Health and Attitude

I’m missing church for the second Sunday in a row and am not pleased with that.  Having lived with chronic illness for so long, the pain and discomfort bother me far less than the inability to do something I enjoy. For me, church isn’t a chore or a bore, but a place to get spiritually recharged by the Spirit and have a lot of fun.

Fun, you wonder?  Yes, I have fun at church. I love discussing the scriptures and practical principles of the gospel.  While there are a lot of people I’m fond of there, that and feeling the Holy Ghost are the main reasons why I go. I’m something of a purist when it comes to faith, so I do not mean to belittle my fellow Latter-day Saints – enjoying their company is a wonderful experience in its own right.

Heh, I wanted to write about how bad health doesn’t have to equal a bad attitude and I got sidetracked. It is a Sabbath day after all and still has my focus on God. Looks like I’ll be listening to conference talks, audio versions of the scriptures, and hymns here at home today.

But back on topic, or at least finally starting the topic!

I’ve felt physically terrible this week, more so than the usual thanks to the shingles flare up and aftermath. A lot of things I wanted to get done couldn’t get done.  So did I have a bad week?

The answer is no, not really.

Some people might think that strange and I admit it amuses me intellectually that there can be such a divorce between emotional and physical health.  Our current pop psychology influenced culture is so focused on victimhood and our medical culture on pushing off real ailments as being mental disorders that it has become an alien concept. Having had CFS for over twenty years now, I long ago recognized that I could enjoy things and be happy without feeling good physically. Thankfully, I listened to the old saying about taking pleasure in the simple things in life and took it to heart.

I do have my bad days like everyone else and loneliness is ever a challenge for those who are disabled by illness. But it doesn’t take away my capacity to enjoy things or appreciate how beautiful the world is. Once you allow yourself to feel the good on a regular basis it does wonders for your life.  When my life was first derailed by Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, I can safely say I didn’t see it that way. Anger, sadness, and bitterness dominated my soul.  But I’m a problem solver by nature and while I could never “solve” the illness, I did come to an understanding of what I could control.

That would be my attitude. Attitude matters in every facet of life and a bad attitude makes for a miserably difficult life. A good attitude makes for a happier, if still challenging, life. Even pain can be reduced by distracting yourself from it and there are good things that can do that. Helping others, reading something that makes you think, watching a movie that makes you feel good, exercising faith in God, and the simple joy of communicating with others for fun are all examples of things that are positive distractions.  There are many more.

At the moment I’m typing this, I hurt a lot through out my physical form. My body is being temperamental from my sinuses to my bowels and the itching isn’t quite gone from the shingles outbreak that has faded. I can’t go to church, which I enjoy so much. But I’m in a good mood.

Little things this week added up to having a good week for me even as I was frustrated by health induced limitations. While a tough month financially, I got through it and actually had discretionary funds for some bargains. My finances have improved enough I can afford to subscribe to Netflix again, get work gloves for when I have moments of physical ability to trim trees and bushes (rare, but I enjoy them), and obtain some used books I wanted badly. I even managed to get out and do some home teaching, get seeds for the garden, and groceries. My efforts to start writing again have born some fruit as I’m finding it easier to write blog posts. All are little things in life.

Gratitude.  That’s what is needed for a good attitude.

There is a LDS hymn, Count Your Blessings, that goes:

When upon life’s billows your are tempest tossed,

When you are discouraged, thinking all is lost,

Count your many blessings; name them one by one,

And it will surprise you what the Lord has done.

To survive the difficulties of life, you need to be grateful for the good things in it you have. That may not be easy to do. In fact, I’ve found it takes active effort to recognize them.

Are you ever burdened with a load of care?

Does the cross seem heavy you are called to bear?

Count your many blessings; ev’ry doubt will fly,

And you will be singing as the days go by.

I can testify to the benefits of appreciating the little things in life. While I may not be getting any of the big things in life, a lot of little things do add up to something greater. Sadly, I can’t carry a tune in a bucket, so I’m not singing my way through the days. But I can do other things depending on how much energy I have on a given day – and choose to do those things. They carry over into the days I can’t.

In the end, I’ve chosen not to allow my health to keep me down. It is an active choice using my God given agency to take action (yes, I’m listening to Elder Robert D. Hales talk from October) by being grateful for and attentive to the little blessings in life. I am grateful to the Lord for what I have received.

I didn’t expect to give a testimony in this post, but it is fast and testimony in sacrament meeting on the first Sunday of each month. During these special services, members are encouraged to take the pulpit and give their testimony, or expression of faith. So I suppose it was something I was supposed to do even if I couldn’t make it to church.

When Too Many Rules & Regulations Kill

This is obscene.  Watching someone die for an hour because you won’t violate the workplace rules is morally and ethically wrong.  People will say he was killing himself so it didn’t matter, but the guy chose one of the slowest and easiest stopped methods he could. If that wasn’t a desperate cry for help, I don’t know what is. Oh and it was shallow water to boot.

I can’t help but think union rules were involved in the formulation of the regulations, given that this is San Francisco. The firefighters who were on scene are subscum. Wait, I take this back. That’s an insult to the lower varieties of scum. Their failure to act was truly evil.

This is also an object lesson of why one shouldn’t put faith in their government to save them or do the right thing. Sadly, the body was recovered by a civilian who swam out.  That says a lot about the direction the country is going, especially if you look to California as a model for the future.

Judging the Judge

Not talking about politics, but about the Taurus Judge handgun.  The idea of creating a short revolver that fired .410 shells for self defense sounded appealing when I first read about it, but the initial testing results I found on the Internet were not impressive.  To be effective, you needed to fire .45 long Colt out of it, not the shells and that kind of removed the reason for the firearm’s existence.  But it is a popular firearm and has branched out into carbine form lately.  Now specialty shells are being made for it and I’d hoped it would live up to its potential.

So Box of Truth revisited the Judge recently for further testing with a 3” barrel and the new rounds.  You can check out the results for yourself.  Me, I wasn’t impressed.  Maybe there is no potential to live up to after all.  For that size of a hand cannon, there should be more penetration.

I’ll stick to my .40 S&W Ruger P94, even if it need some work on its sights.

Muddlin’ About

Finally over the bout with shingles for the most part and a little frustrated with having even lower than normally low levels of energy. My hands have been too shaky to paint miniatures or work on plastic models, so that has rankled a bit too.

Just finished watching Citizen Kane for review purposes and once again was blown away by what a great film it is.  I’ll have to watch the documentary on the second disc, then do screen captures from both. It is a nice change of pace from the fantasy and science fiction I’ve been writing about and well needed.

Also received a Frank Herbert omnibus with Whipping Star, The Dosadi Experiment, The Santaroga Barrier, and Soul Catcher complete and unabridged in it.  Only read Soul Catcher many years ago and am looking forward to reading about the Bureau of Sabotage in the first two novels.  Glenn Reynolds mentioned the concept of it in a post over at Instapundit earlier in the week and I had to look it up.  Fortunately, I found a cheap used hardcover on Amazon and got it today.

I suppose I should write something positive about some of the good manga and anime out there soon, but I feel like procrastinating on that. It is too easy for me to get burned out on a genre if I have to deal with it for a lengthy amount of time.

Only Now Are They Getting It

There has been no economic recovery.  People need to get that through their heads.  The stimulus was based on the mad idea that you can spend your way out of debt when you have no savings to fall back on. Needless to say, it failed utterly.

Via The Drudge Report, CNBC has a headline that tries to downplay the content of the article.  What Drudge had up is the quote of the article that should have been used.

We’re on the verge of a great, great depression.

Duh. We’ve been in the opening stages of one for years now.  Smoke and mirrors can only get you so far and it looks like people are finally tumbling to the disaster that is already upon us. Take the latest job reports for example. Captain Ed at Hot Air has a good summary of what is going on with that.  Instead of 177,000+ jobs added to the private sector, 38,000 was the figure for May.

It isn’t surprising that the stock market is down from the latest data. What is surprising is how long it took for them to start noticing there was a problem. But I wouldn’t be surprised if they buried their heads in the sand again.  Look at the tone of the first article begging the bears not to rock the boat. It strikes me as desperate.

A great depression is the best case scenario, in my opinion. We may be seeing the eventual fall of the Modern West.

It Appears to Be Shingles, Again

Or how I despise the Herpes Zoster virus.

I’d preferred an allergic reaction, but now that I’m hurting like a band around the chest I recognize the symptoms.  At least it is a light case of it compared to the last time – that episode really hurt. It may be that the pain management I do is helping as well.  So I will have to ride this out, since I hate what prednisone does to me.

Now most people would go to the doctor over any little thing, but I don’t unless I can’t get an illness to end (exempting CFS, of course).  Bronchitis, pre-pneumonia, and sinusitis I’ve had so many times that I’m a pro at dealing with them.  That and antibiotics barely working on me anymore makes the choice to endure rather easy. Not to mention it doesn’t waste more tax payers dollars than necessary.

The itching is at a minimum, at least!

As much as I hate whining, perhaps it would be wise of me to document my health issues for posterity here on the blog.  Somehow, I doubt I’ll be consistent on it. Spreading negativity isn’t my idea of fun and it is inconsiderate of others. But hey, there aren’t that many readers, right? Have to find a silver lining somewhere…