7 (And 6) – 40

Last week I completed my 6th 40 hour fast.  There was nothing particularly significant about it and I didn’t bother posting.  Today (9am), I completed my latest (7th) 40 hour water fast.  I took an extra day off so I could eat with my family on Mother’s Day (last Sunday).  So, Monday, at 5pm, it was back on the wagon…
This one was difficult!  I’m not sure why.  It just was.  I wasn’t feeling well going into it and I felt pretty bad through most of the day.  (Yesterday was the full water fasting day.)  What does that mean?  Well, I have issues with my inner ear which I believe is caused by my CPAP (Continuous Positive Airway Pressure) machine.  Basically, I snore and this machine pushes air into my nasal passage to prevent / reduce my snoring.  The problem is I also have other sinus issues:  I’ve had a runny nose since I was about 12 years old and I had a deviated septum straightened when I was in my late teens.  (The procedure was supposed to help with my constantly runny nose.  It didn’t.)
Because the CPAP machine requires me to wear a mask, I tend to sleep on my back most of the time.  This means the machine blows my “snot” / mucus back into my inner ear and I irregularly get a packed inner ear and then feel dizzy.  My relief tends to come from sleeping on my left side, but like I said, most of the time I “have” to sleep on my back.  So, I have pills for my dizziness and other pills for my congestion.  Both, increase tiredness, and together, they can make me “foggy” and tired.
That was a long way of saying I didn’t have a great day yesterday!  (LoL)
But I made it through and I get to eat today and tomorrow before I start again at 5pm…!
Actually, I guess I know pretty well why this last one seemed more difficult than others…
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On This Day In:
2023	Necessities
	On CNN Interviewing #45DonaldTheLiar
2022	Threat Calculus
	7 (And 6) – 40
2021	Questioned By Life
	If There’ll Come A Time (Never My Love)
2020	Trying To Grow Pearls?
2019	Instantly Turned
2018	Sitting
2017	No Right Way
2016	Still Ticklish
2015	Maybe Sooner Than You Think
2014	The Path Of Mastery
2013	Love’s Ignorance
2012	Here’s To Enjoyment
2011	Not Just The Facts, Ma’am

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Recovering

Yesterday our electric power went off for about 12 hours.  We believe it was due to high winds blowing down a power line somewhere, but of course the electric company (PG&E) never call you and tell you what caused the problem.  Anyway, Hil (my wife), Sarah (my younger daughter and youngest child) and I sat in the living room simply chatting by candle light.  It was quite entertaining, in a family bonding kind of way which you normally only see on the Hallmark Channel.  (LOL)
When it came time for bed, we brushed our teeth and did all of our preparation by candlelight.
Now, I snore.  More accurately, I SNORE LOUDLY.  I also have sleep apnea, which means I stop breathing when I sleep.  This condition is common among those who are overweight (and I am) and I use a machine called a CPAP (stands for “continuous positive airway pressure”) to blow air into my nose to keep me breathing (and it also prevents snoring).   So, no ‘leckie, no breathie, but lots of snoring.
We went to bed around 10pm and by 12:30am, my Hil had waken me about a half dozen times and finally was on the verge of tears:  “I just can’t sleep.  You have to go in another room.”
“Another” room is the living room at the far end of the house…  So off I trundled down the hallway, sleeping bag in tow.  (Insert mental image of Linus with his blanket…)
With sleep apnea, a part of your throat gets blocked, air is cut off, you can’t breath and (if you’re lucky) you startle yourself awake to start the sleep cycle / wake over again.  In my case, which is only a moderate case, I stop breathing about 70 times per hour.  A little over once every minute.  Thank god for CPAPs!
Sometime during the night, PG&E fixed the outage and I was awakened by a glaring light shining in my face.  We had left the end table light turned on when the power went off.  So, I pulled the cushions off the floor and put them back on the couch and folded the sleeping bag to be re-shelved later in the (real) morning.  …And I trundled back down the hall to get back into bed.  The clock said it was just after 3:10am and I normally get up for work at 4:30am.
To make a longer story shorter, mask on, snoring stopped, sleep resumed.  Wake up late and call into to work to ask for a day of vacation (annual leave) to recover from an exhausting night of trying to sleep.  As it’s New Year’s Eve, there isn’t much going on, so the boss says she’ll see me next year.
And to make “good” use of the day, I turned to my latest discovery  —  Netflix!!  Yes, I “know” this is not a “real” discovery, but us dinosaurs are known for being slow and lumbering…
Movie Review:
Today I watched “I, Frankenstein” staring Aaron Eckhart as the monster.  This is one of those movies where you should NOT watch the preview immediately before watching the film.  If you do, the film is ruined because it is then almost 100% predictable.  I am an Eckhart fan and have been since watching his performances in “The Core” back in 2003 and “Battle: Los Angeles” in 2011.  Anyway, he is not bad in this role.  It’s not a defining role like Downing’s Ironman or Bale’s Batman, but this movie was obviously set up to be a series starter in a similar genre to the “Underworld” movie series.  There are competing immortals locked in an eternal war and along comes a third party, in this case, the Frankenstein monster.  A human, created by a human, but without a soul.   Blah, blah, blah…  Lots of unrealistic fights made possible by pretty good special effects, but in the end, only a so-so movie.
The movie bombed at the box office, and worse, doesn’t seem to have found a niche following, so it seems unlikely to be the money spinner the producers had hoped for.
But, is it really that bad?  No.  It is an interesting twist on the Frankenstein mythology and while it’s by no means a great movie, I did enjoy it.  If you can accept the premise that Adam (the name given to the monster – first man created, get it?) is virtually indestructible, then the unrealistic fights are at least visually entertaining.  While there doesn’t seem to have been much money spent on the bad guys (the demons), there is a fair amount of CGI on the good guys (gargoyles who protect humanity) and their special effects are pretty decent.  Again, this comment is not directly addressed to this movie as much as it is expressed as an IT person who goes to movies of lots of genres JUST to see the CGI / FX / technology.  For example, there is a large stained glass window broken and some of the glass lands on an altar / table.  When the table is moved, the reflections in the glass shards change.  Regardless of the rest of the movie, I think that’s pretty cool!
So, final review – it’s an okay movie with an interesting twist on an old and familiar story which has some decent special effects.  Given the minimal cost of seeing the movie on Netflix, I’d say it was worth watching and if it remains available, I’ll probably watch it again.
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On This Day In:
2022	Best Wishes For 2023!
2021	Best Wishes For 2022!
	A Toast To Innocence (Same Old Lang Syne)
2020	Best Wishes For 2021!
	Tomorrow Starts A New Year (Here Comes The Sun)
2019	Best Wishes For 2020!
	World Views: End Of 2019
2018	Best Wishes For 2019!
2017	Best Wishes For 2018!
2016	Best Wishes For 2017!
2015	Better Red Than Dead
	Tomorrow Starts A New Year
2014	Recovering
	Best Wishes For 2015!
2013	Best Wishes For 2014!
2012	My Creed
2011	It Probably Isn’t So

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