Friday, February 27, 2009

Experiences

I like how my good friend put it...

It seems like a lot of my life's experiences are sort of deviant from the norm... 8-O lol

Sitting on a chair and the chair could collapse and resulted in my being in a state of temporary total disability...

Running my dissertation study all the way into the cuckoo's nest and getting back to finish my data collect right after I am discharged from the club meds...

As well as some others along this kinda fashion...

So she put it... my life's experience...

"experiences not necessary for normal people..." 8-O lol

Yet, shall you ask me why I kept on running into things not necessary for normal people to experience?

God knows... and... I really hope God exists at this point...... 8-O lol

New phase

The tension remains as I continue with my scheduling of 4 smokes a day... 4 of the Marlboro light 72s more exact...

In addition to more restricted cognitive capacity, something new I am observing in recent day is the sense of fatigue, lowered energy level together with the irritability I have already reported... all of these could be plausible indications of depression.

Considering that nicotine could serve as stimulants, it does make perfect sense for the sudden and gradual decrease of nicotine level to bring up the severity of depression kinda symptoms.

Granted, existing literature seems to have found a higher propensity for female patients with depression to encounter worse withdrawals, including depression symptoms, when comparing to others during the process of smoking cessation.

Yet, I am not going to jump right into the conclusion that I am going to go in the dire of depression and stay there...

Things change and I am not gonna give myself a label so that I can live up that labeling that I get myself assigned....

In addition, although the sense of fatigue and lack of energy has gotten stronger recently, when I was hanging out with my good friend yesterday, I was happy and relaxed and didn't really have the time to be worrying about them sense of fatigue... On the other hand, it might have something to do with the fact that we walked about 70 Manhattan blocks the entire afternoon... in other words, so they say, exercise helps...

Thursday, February 26, 2009

72s and withdrawal

My good friend came into town to spend some time with me today....

Given the amount of withdrawal symptoms I had to go through yesterday, I was fairly afraid last night that we might not have a good time together because my withdrawal symptoms might be worse since less and less of the accumulated nicotine is present in my system....

As I have mentioned in an earlier posting, the withdrawal symptoms were still pretty bad earlier today up to about 12 o'clock--- at which time when much of the tension starts to clear away.... up to the point when I took my smoke for the early afternoon.... and when I actually got a real buzz out of da second smoke for the day... (and... ain't it so nice to be able to actually get a buzz out of a smoke? lol)

I had gotten the 72s or the shorter cigarettes instead of them normal size cigarettes.... as an attempt to cut down on the nicotine consumption...

Interestingly, the decrease amount of nicotine intake did not seem to make the withdrawal symptoms much worse...

More accurately, the severity of the withdrawal symptoms seems to have decreased quite a bit later in the day today when compared to those of yesterday or earlier this morning....

Hopefully, things could get stabilized by the end of this week so that I could start planning on cutting my smoking down to 3 a day....

Hallucinations

I think it was two days ago....

One day, as I was getting ready to go to sleep right after I took my last smoke of the day, this voice all of a sudden started to repeat itself in my head....... and loud...

"Stop smoking... stop smoking... stop smoking...." and on and on and on....

Just when I thought that the tension induced by nicotine withdrawal was taking its toll and left little room for psychotic symptoms...

Right after that smoke...

My psychotic symptoms came out preaching me to quit them smokes..... 8-O lol sigh...

Light and heavy

I started to have this strange feeling since around 5-6 o'clock yesterday...

It feels as if I was having cold sweat.... and my it feels as if my forehead and arms are colder than they are supposed to be...

Then, when I was going to borrow the vacuum cleaner earlier on and as I was in the elevator, this strange sensation intensified....

Gradually, the tension started to clear up.... and the majority part of my head and body feels mostly light... although there are still parts of my head and body that feels really tense or tight....

Wednesday, February 25, 2009

what da talking about?

If anyone wonder... what da talking about these past few days...

I guess... the dasein moments formal smokers who got hit hard by withdrawals knows.... involving quite a few of the following....

http://www.quitsmokingsupport.com/withdrawal1.htm

The state of the head

Today is the second day for me to smoke 4 cigarettes only in a day.

Other than the tension I feel all over my body, the longer I stay without a smoke, the crankier I become and the worst my mood is...

If you think that the tension was simply some physical discomfort, rethink it again...

The matter of the fact is that... when I was feeling my body is all tensed up... it is not only the body that experiences discomfort... rather the "tensing up" also seem to take up a majority amount of my cognitive processing power....

So, before I went out for my second smoke at around 1 o'clock this afternoon, 5 hours after the smoker's first cigarette.... I was supposed to get some stuffs done before going to get myself replenished with nicotine....

So, there was a script in my head.... or, in my mind, I expected myself to arrive at a classroom, collect payments from students, and, asked the students to go to the office to pick up their receipts after class...

Funny enough, as I arrived at the classroom, the real life scenarios did not match up with the scenario I foreseen based on the script I have in my mind....

Although the real life scenario did not impose more work on me, interestingly, it made me feel far more stressed out... simply due to the fact that the real events have deviated from my expectation...

Eventually, I took a detour and went out to take my second cigarette for the day....

After a drag or two, magically, the tensions were alleviated, the sense of crankiness decreased and I was able to smile again....

It was then did I realize that...

The state of my head right before I smoked was almost similar to a state of anxiety or panic attack..... I had no control over no nothing at all...

It was as if the entire world was coming down.... all them little events deviating from the expectations....

The smoke... or the nicotine replenished through smoking... somehow worked as a non-prescription grade kind of anti-anxiety medication..... which asserts its power literally in split second....

p.s. if my writing sounds a bit incoherent, it might have something to do with my trying to finish this posting before my take my last smoke for the day. To be honest, the head is so tight and the cognitive capacity is so limited that... I could only think of one thing or one word at a time... insufficient mental capacity to process anything more...

hiding out

As the withdrawal is driving me up the wall, after I got off work today.... I thought to myself...

I need to go hide out in my room.... clearing myself from all forms of human contacts.... before I do anything else under the influence of nicotine withdrawal....

Since the really bad physical withdrawal is deemed to last for a couple more days, I also had this plan in my head that I was to take my day off tomorrow to stay away from all human contacts and to spend one more of the miserable day on my own studying them math equations... the first time in my life planning anything as such...

Then, this good friend of mine contacted me and told me that she is coming into the city tomorrow at noon and will be stay with me over night.... which, apparently, annuls that plan of mine to hide out and be on my own....

Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Another day in nicotine withdrawal

Today is yet another day for me to be in a seemly eternal state called nicotine withdrawal...

So far, I have smoked only 3 cigarettes today....

The first was the smoker's first smoke in the morning.... at around 8:00 o'clock...

Despite the sense of discomfort, I was able to make it till about 1:00 o'clock, 5 hours later, to take the second one...

It was not until around 7 or 7:30 did I take the third cigarette of the day.... over 6 hours after....

Within the 6+ hours between the 2nd and 3 rd smokes, I actually did quite a bit of reading on maximum likelihood estimation, attended the class on item response theory, went to do some grocery shopping, and, came home to do my swinging exercise...

Since I started to be in a constant state of withdrawal, sometimes, time seems to be going much slower....

Yet, I find the following two things to be fairly useful in helping me killing time...

The first is the act of trying to following equations such as following.... and, of course, when my head is capable of concentrating despite of the withdrawal...



The swinging exercise I do is the second activity that seems to help me putting the sensation of withdrawal away....

At the same time, although I have been trying to go to sleep early, I seem to have some trouble falling asleep recently... which makes me wonder whether this has something to do with the potential neurochemical imbalance introduced by my cutting down on the nicotine intake...

Eating mucho mucho mas is one other intensified propensity of mine... I guess this goes along with the common experiences shared by quitters...

In general, I think the severity of my withdrawal symptoms is gradually going down....

The funny thing about them withdrawal symptoms involving the sense of tightening sensations is that... my head would be so very tense and I would feel that my head is really tense that there doesn't seem to be room for my hallucinations and delusions when the withdrawal is bad.... 8-O lol

In addition, during the day time, strangely, I hardly sense the psychological or behavioral kinda withdrawal symptoms... However, when the night falls, the desire for me pick up a smoke absolutely gets far stronger.... such observations seem to coincide with the fact that I used to smoke far more in the night when I am along in my room....

I am also fairly happy about the fact that I would have smoked for only 4 cigarettes by the end of today...

In addition, there will be 2 more smokes left in this pack for tomorrow... which means... this pack of cigarettes would have lasted me for 5 days... Something I possibly might not have done in my entire life... for a pack of cigarettes usually could last for no more than a day... not to mentione 5 days.... 8-O lol

So... as I was walking back home... with antenna over my head searching for other smokers' in the vicinity so that I could get some nicotine replenishment through second hand smoking....

I thought to myself...

How could I approach the day after today?

And, I thought... for the sake of my mental health, I think I am going to switch to ultra-light and stayed on the 4-cigarette schedule for a few days more... maybe till the end of the week...

From then on, I could further work on cutting down to 3, 2, and 1 smoke a day... till, eventually, hitting that big 0....

Monday, February 23, 2009

Nicotine... From bitch from hell

In stead of using patches, I decided these two day to try to cut my smoking down to 4-5 cigarettes instead...

Coming down from a pack a day, I assume this is much more appropriate...

The physical withdrawal though... is driving me crazy....

The sensation of the tightening of the entire body... from head to toe....

The feeling that my head is all flaky.... the similar kind of flaky feeling I would feel when my psychotic symptoms are going overboard... which makes it diffuclt for me to use my head...

And, the dangerous amount of irritability...

All work together to drive me into a major league Bitch from Hell...

The second smoke I had for the day was at around 1:40....

After I supplemented my body with nicotine, I immediately felt so much more relaxed and was able to use my head for a while...

Then, as I tried to do some more reading involving a whole lot of math.... including scary looking thing, at least for me, like what lies below...



You see... to begin with, it is difficult to teach an old dog like me new tricks...

In addition, with the symptoms of withdrawal, I simply couldn't use my head at all...

So, I had my 3rd cigarette for the day just now...

And... it made me feel more "normal" and it seems like I could get back trying to study the texts again...

It was then did this question pop up in my head again...

"If there is anything I could change in life, what would I change?"

So I thought... and, possibly, for the first time in my life....

Perhaps, if I could turn back the clock and if there is anything I could change in my life... I would not pick up the first cigarette I smoked in my life... as long as there is nothing worse I have to pick up in exchange.... 8-O lol sigh...

Sunday, February 22, 2009

Man from the moon by Petru Mihut

To the left is the painting titled Man from the moon by artist Petru Mihut.

Loving the purpleness in this picture...

g(f(x)) cont..

Then, I guess it was yesterday... again... when I thought of how my symptoms .... or... how my coping mechanisms gradually lead to shift in my modus operandi and my worldview...

Given the grandiosity is an important part of my delusions or one major component of function f(x) is grandiosity....

A major component in g(x) is this thing called "not taking myself too serious," which is included to help attenuate the impact of the grandiose nature of my psychotic worldview.

Although my coping mechanism g(x) has been helpful, it has been causing some internal problems recently as I am making myself trying to apply for a faculty position...

Coming from this g(f(x)) worldview and the outcome of my reality check based on it... I am sensing this extreme sense of cognitive dissonance having to BS about how I have any understanding of psychology etc while I don't no jack about no nothing.... (and, of course, with the only thing I really know as... at the end of the day, I am but a 800 bl gorilla in the room..) 8-O lol

g(f(x))

This thought came up to that head of mine recently....

If there are people who could really read my mind, what it be like to be someone who could read this delusional mind of mine?

In other words, given f(x) represents what is in fxck-up mind...

g(f(x)) represents what is in the mind of people who could read my mind...

Since f(x) is a function of my world, delusional or not, would g(f(x)) contains any trace of my ordinary delusionality at all?

Then I realized...

g(f(x)) is what they labeled as Folie à deux while its formation doesn't even require one to be able to read a psychotic mind like mine... 8-O lol

On a second thought... I had this other realization...

g(f(x)) could also simply represents how I live with my f(x).... so does it mean that I am both the imposée and the simultanée of my folie? In other words, it is that folie part of me that is making me folie? 8-O lol

Then and again... I thought...

Reflecting on how it feels to be facing my delusional kinda dasein... to be g(x)... tough...

Friday, February 20, 2009

Little painting

A little happy painting I have been working on this past week or two...

From Ratprincess Drawing

I want a cigarette

Forgetting about things smoking related?

To be honest, every time I hear this song and since the very first... I hear Beyoncé singing... "I want a cigarette"...... owing it to my ESL status 8-O lol

This also reminds me of my ingenious psychotic propensity to perceive information the way they are NOT... 8-O lol

Withdrawal

I had some really bad nicotine withdrawal symptoms yesterday.... among which, the worst, tension headaches...

The headache was so bad.... and real bad...

The strange thing is that... I actually was able to live through the majority of the day not thinking about cigarettes...

So I think... this might have something to do with my feeling that I am getting overdosed on Seroquel.... Essentially, I lived through day by day feeling more and more detached from the surrounding world... One key element of da sense of detachment I am speaking of is... feeling unable to use the environmental cues to help retrieving information in my long term memory.... and it feels as if there is an invisible wall resting between me and the outside world...

So, in addition to walking around in my neighborhood having the feeling that I am not really there, somehow... these two days, as I was moving around, I actually have been able to not remember me myself as a smoker and somehow it was very difficult for me to remember what it felt like to be a smoker...

It is also as if I have developed some strange kind of situation-specific amnesia--- rendering me able to forget smoking related memories... and I hope it could continue to remain so...

At some point during the day, as I walked outside for some more coffee and fresh air... I saw smokers around... and, for reasons unknown, I could not retrieve that sense of membership as a smoker no more...

Strange state of being I would have to say because, in my previous attempts, I would continue to have the "habitual or psychological" kinda withdrawal despite the lack of physical withdrawal...

This time... the worst parts of my experiences so far are physical withdrawal...

to be or not to be and what..

Recently, I am seriously considering this thing called cutting down on smoking... if not quitting...

If I could quit successful, may God bless me so that I don't have to quit again... 8-O lol sigh

So, I cut my daily smokes down to about 10-11 cigarettes a day on Wednesday....

Yesterday, Thursday, I put on the patch at around 11 o'clock.... only to find myself tormented by the unbearable tension headache from 5-6 o'clock on...

The tension headache was so bad that I was started to feel noxious at some point... It felt so awful that I wish I could change for a new head without the tension that was killing me more and more...

So I took my patch off since it felt as if the amount of nicotine being released to the blood stream was not enough...

Then, I decided to go hang out and had a drink or two...

Some time later... I came to the realization that...

OMG... the tension headache was mostly gone... though did not disappear...

So was I told by this friend of mine...

"Why don't you try for a while to be having a drink every other night until you could get done with your nicotine withdrawal?"

This is quite some interesting kinda suggestion.... for... given my propensity to be obsessive compulsive.... comparing between having one too many a cigarette and alcoholic beverage on a daily basis.... which is lesser expansive and less evil?

Since neither one seems to be a good option, what kind of bad habit shall I pick up? 8-O lol

The Axis of Awesome's "4 Chords"

I was shown this video-- The Axis of Awesome's "4 Chords".

Find it brilliantly funny.... lol

Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Hedda Gabler

I went to see Henrik Ibsen's little miss Hedda Gabler today...

Regardless what they say and I have no intention to keep track of what them critics might say....

I walked out of the theater feeling... what a powerful play....

Sitting all the way in the back of the rear mezzanine, I can't really tell you how the actors and actresses have performed...

Yet, walking out of the theater and walking down Time Square along Broadway...

I thought of the little missy Hedda Gabler...

A pretty little spoiled brat who was unhappy about her life...

Having what other people might think of as everything... though still sort of short of perfection... Little missy is far from being content...

To whom, to be overpowered.... "Over my dead body..." So she would say...

Yet, aren't we all Hedda Gabler in our own particular way....

As I walked on, I thought of the interesting contrast between where I was last year and where I have been today...

Last year today, I was locked up in the psychiatric ward overlooking the beautiful Hudson River with a walker as my walking aid (since they don't allow the use of canes inside)....

Today, I took myself and my semi-functional back-- back to Broadway to see little Hedda Gabler in the play...

Then, I thought of the feeling of emptiness Hedda was speaking of...

I thought... we all are presented with the choices at certain point...

Poor little depressed Hedda, I thought...

How unfortunate that you have chosen to go into the dark side while it might actually make you feel better shall you stay on the sunny side of the road....


Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Overdosed?

I think I might be starting to get overdosed by Seroquel recently...

For the majority of the time, I walked around feeling more and more disassociated from the world... the surrounding.......

While there usually is nothing going on in my head, other than hallucinations and delusions.... there are ever fewer activities going on nowadays...

Except for... for reasons unknown.... I have been having some difficulties falling into deep sleep...

More accurately, it would be like I was half awake and half sleeping.... while dreaming at the same time...

I also had this strangest experience recently....

One night, I went to bed at around 12... finally fell asleep...

Then, around 1 o'clock, I woke up and was wide awake... hearing in my head in Chinese...

"There are ghosts... there are ghosts..."

One reason this experience stood out so much was that...

I have been waken up by pains and spasms before...

Yet, never in my life have I been waken up by my hallucinations and delusions in the middle of the night telling me that there are ghosts.... 8-O lol sigh

Having to wake up early to work, I actually had to take one of da Clonazepan... while wondering to myself... Am I really overdosed?

At the same time, it actually might be a good thing that I am afraid of ghosts for the more delusional I was, the less I was afraid of da thing called... ghosts... And, when I was REALLY delusional-- institutionalizable grade kind of delusional--- I actually thought that I was befriending all creatures in the spiritual world.... 8-O lol sigh

While, at the same time, yours delusional couldn't help wondering... could it be someone playing with my head? Sort of along the line of thought insertion kinda thinking... 8-O lol sigh

Timberline Lodge by Cindy Mangutz

To the left is the painting titled Timberline Lodge by Cindy Mangutz.

This picture reminds me both of Whistler/Blackcomb and Chamonix.

Sunday, February 15, 2009

Christmas by Valerie Mainwaring

For all that I am not and I have not...

I find comfort in others' creativities including arts...

A nice painting titled Christmas by a British painter... Valerie Mainwaring...

Isn't it so very funny that, the longer we live, the more we tend to focus on what we have to lose?

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Fluss im Winter by Irene Brandt

Cute picture titled "Fluss im Winter" or "Winter River" by Irene Brandt.

Just

To be honest, I don't really fancy being evil...

Just... might be the only thing I seek.... for I have unfortunately developed a sense of distaste for injustice...

How could I blame myself for seeking a sense of just when exactly one year ago...

I almost got blown away by the coldness in the air inching away like a big bad bug... while the upping of dosages helped nothing much....

Perhaps, it is not I seek to be evil...

Rather, I simply don't want to go back to be an insanely good girl like that... two days away from the one-year anniversary of my getting back to the ER and 4 days away from my being, once again, locked up... while, tomorrow, would mark the aniversary when my psychotic symptoms told me to delete the original Ratology Blog...

I don't want to be perfect and I will never be perfect... 8-O lol

I will make mistakes and I will amend it...

And...

If one thinks that I am going overboard in correcting my modus operandi... the matter of the fact is that I am like a toddler learning to walk... and literally as well...

If one thinks I am letting my past influencing my worldview too much... the matter of the fact is that much of our interpretation of the current state is dependent on our past experiences... so they say... script, mental model, schema...

Live through it before one comes to preach me how I shall react....

And... as the song goes...



(Good excuses though.... at least, for myself... unless if you consider depression as a better excuse?! Ya, in the face of schizo... don't undermine da affect... 8-O lol sigh)

Evil?

This friend of mine said to me today...

"You are evil...."

Evil am I or am I not is not my own judgment...

At times, I would simply say that I am pretty talented in mirroring... sort of like a parrot..

Simple application of psychological principle... what you see is the projection of thyself... 8-O lol

It does make me feel happy that...

No longer do I need to be good... although I intent not doing nobody harm...

I want to be evil... speaking out my thought and pretending not that I am some nut-case grade kind of good girl... brain-washed by da delusional paranoia... daring to have in mind nothing more than good thought...



Some might think this as the manifestation of over-justification, for me, what this says is that...

Despite the fact that symptoms never cease...

I am less delusional... 8-O 8-O 8-O lol

Sunday, February 8, 2009

Monica Moser's town

What a beautiful town... like the one you would see in the fairy tale... by Monica Moser...

Friday, February 6, 2009

Conversion disorder revisited

After what happened these two days with my mobility issue, on my way out to work today, I put my back brace on with the eating pad attached. I also spent that two dollars of bus fare to get to my workplace 10 Manhattan blocks away....

So, I got to work on time...

I arrived at work with not too much of them spasms...

At some point during the day, someone told me this funny story....

Someone saw two guys helping me into a car yesterday and they came asking him whether I was abducted.

Some funny side story there...

Yet, what happened yesterday was left to yesterday....

Today, I got myself well-prepared....

In addition to a pair of jumper under the jeans, three sweater and a heavy shirt plus the heavy winter coat... plus a pad heated for 20 seconds in the microwave...

I could move around with more elegance...

I actually made it home with negligent numbers of stops....

Since I was locked down inside by my body last night (instead of due to my head, once for a change), I went hanging out tonight, instead.... while, in my head, I couldn't figure it out... a logical reason for the drastic difference in my mobility over 1 day..

I could attribute it to the 3 hours plus exercise I did after I got home yesterday...

I could attribute it to the warming up of the weather...

I could make myself belief that all is logical and there is nothing more needed to be said...

Yet, it just doesn't make sense....

It absolutely doesn't make sense... the drastic differences in how I walked yesterday and how much more smoothly I am moving today...

This is crazier, actually, than my hearing voices and having delusional thoughts... the differences between how I am today and how I was yesterday...

Sort of traumatized by the perceivable inconsistency... I would say...

It makes no sense... and, to be honest, it is far more fxcked up and illogical than I could take and I was ever asked to take...

And, the term conversion disorder came up to my mind....

I thought to myself....

Why don't I just attribute the whole 9 yards to conversion disorder?

The labeling of conversion disorder makes the drastic differences so much legit and so much easier to accept... what is otherwise unexplainable.... and regardless what conversion disorder really means...

For the first time in my life, I find myself seeking comfort in a label I once tried so hard to evade....

Nice label... conversion disorder... so I thought and feel still... for... assuming myself to have conversion disorder... no longer is it my burden to figure out what exactly has taken place.... and, it makes me feel so sure.... because... it can't be real...

I don't know what it be like for you... to live through a day when both feet dropped while facing minor mobility problem for the second day... for me, somehow all of it just makes me feel so much more cognitively dissonant than I could take and it just can't be real... 8-O lol sigh

Thursday, February 5, 2009

In my head

I don't know why but this strange experience I had earlier kept on coming up to my mind...

So, I was in the cold moving towards 120th street around noon...

Nowadays, in ordinary days, the trip between 110th to 120th street could take me up to less than 15 minutes.

However, the 10 block distance took me over 40 minutes today....

Somewhere along the trip, as my feet dropping no more.... for I simply had no more control over my feet... when the only means for me to move forward is to push my thighs so as to move my legs forward...

My head was working and it would like to tell my body to move. However, the body apparently was having problems in carrying on the request...

So, as I was taking one of them inevitable stops, I had this funny feeling... it was as if the body and the mind all of a sudden came into a state of separation....

I stood there with my head seemed to be all together and its presence seemed to have gotten somehow blown up unproportionally...

My head seemed to be looking down at how the body is not moving forward as per its request.... Consequentially, this feeling or thought emerged... a combination of intrigue, curiosity and surprise about the strange kinda dasein moment.... 8-O lol

In retrospective, I wonder... what was in the mind of my head?

Could it actually be wondering... "How on earth could I function better than the body?" or "How on earth did the body, in such as short time, get its own mind?" 8-O lol

From the way I was

These past two days has been a trip for me.... sort of funny yet not so very funny in a way...

Essentially, the condition of my back went all the way down to the worst state it had ever been in... and all it takes is less than 10 Manhattan blocks... all it takes is for me to try to walk from 110th to 120th street and vice versa to put myself into a state called "freezing my ass off till I become out of walk"....

I am not going to be taking much about the specifics of pains and spasms since I think I have done, so far, enough of them mumble jumble about them big bad bug kind of walking style as well as how bad it feels to have pain going from cervical down to lumbar....

One thing I could tell you is that... it would have been an interesting documentation if I could have captured myself on videotapes because, so far as I am concerned, a videotape as such could have shown you many different ways of walking like a disabled... including the state within which when I tried to move forward with both feet dropped.... similar kind of experiences that torn the following pair of my shoes...





The closest thing I have on tape is the clips I took back in the summer when my body decided to go back to do them walking... disabled style...





So, after I tried to do some lifting and bending down yesterday afternoon, my back started showing some signs which told me... swinging activities needed. Then, as I walked into the cold on my way home, the familiar thing called pains and spasms started to get worse and worse... to the extent that I was moving 2-3 steps at a time...

As I got home, I started doing some of them swinging activities... in pains... and a whole lot of pains stemming from cervical, thoracic and down to lumbar. Yet, something interesting about these pains is that... the pains migrates slowly... At certain point, it might be the knees that hurt so very much while, other times, the pains would come down to the ankle. The pains would also come down to you hands and you would feel the fingers hurt... hurt...

However, after I exercised for over an hour, the level of pain went down substantially and I was able to walk around like ordinary human being.

Following is one of the clips I took during my swinging activities yesterday afternoon... while I have uploaded 6 clips on youtube, which capture the entire exercise... going from a really sucked kind of state of being to much better kinda state...



I had thought that, after yesterday's exercise, my walking should be better today. Unfortunately, due to the temperature that felt like in the teens, my walking became far worse than yesterday... at certain point, I could barely move my feet and could only sort of push myself forward inch by inch...

After I got home, something told me to take the Chinese medicine that is supposed to help regulating the flow of xi, qi, or chi, including ingredients such as 桂枝 湯, 桑枝, 牛膝, 續断 etc, before I went back to do my swinging activities....

After almost 2 hours, I started to feel that the flow of energy seemed to be smoother... and that's when I stop to take a break.

Following is one of the clips I took during my exercise. The entire session is divided into 12 clips.


Although I am feeling much better now, I will be going back to do some more of the swinging activities after this posting.

I am posting these along with these notes with the wishful thinking that someone out there could tell me how on earth could my walking deteriorate so fast within 10 Manhattan blocks and what the heck was happening during these activities to bring me out of the extreme state of immobility... 8-O lol

One thing I would say is that, after a while, strange things seem to be strange no more.... although, deep down in my heart, I still can't stop longing for an answer about how things works... or a mental model...

Tuesday, February 3, 2009

Lesser evil

Yesterday afternoon, as I was walking back home from my grocery shopping... down that familiar Broadway...

All of a sudden, the world surrounding me seemed unreal....

It felt as if I had never seen the neighborhood before...

Everything seemed so very there but not there... present but absent.... or me, rather...

It was as if I was experiencing temporary outage in accessing information in my long term memories...

Eventually, that strange state went away.... and I was able to get back feeling alive again in the here and now...

Then, Today it snowed.... while yesterday the temperature actually reached 52....

Such a drastic change in the weather...

Could that strange state of my mind simply be a reaction to the approaching snowstorm and the cold front? (At least, this seems to be a better alternative to a belief that someone else, regardless who that someone was, took over my head and looked at the surrounding through my eyes.... 8-O lol)

Think about us

On my way home, I went to get a cup of my late day coffee....

So was I recommended... think about us sometimes...

Good point....

So I decide to take a few moments.... stopping all things at hand and thinking of all the nice people I know...

So... the reality is that... after I stopped for quite a while to think of the people that I have known so far...

I come to the conclusion, again, that...

So fine a life... to know so many a person so very nice...

And, I thought of what I said to this friend of mine the other night...

If there is anything I have gained through my era of disability in both body and mind....

I have been given the wonderful opportunities to see the bright side of life and the stunning beauty in people, if not, simply, mankind.....

And, what about the dark side?

Can't quite find the reason to dwell in the dark side in the face of the sunny side.... (it is preference... or a decision... I guess... when there is a choice...)

Coffee-induced hallucinations?

I heard this piece on the news back a few weeks ago...

Coffee-induced hallucinations? Caffeinated coeds hear voices, study says: Scientific American Blog

One thing I remember is something like... too much coffee might induce hallucinations while them people like me with the propensity for hallucinations also tend to need more coffee... I guess.. to wake them up.... 8-O lol

For me, I think I have a somewhat legit excuse... I am no longer on antidepressant and no long have Zoloft to jump start yours truly in the morning.... 8-O lol

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Sunday, February 1, 2009

Adib Fattal's cities

To the left is the artwork by Adib Fattal titled "A Village with a Hanging Bridge.

This picture reminds me of one of the cities mentioned in Calvino's Invisible Cities.

Please check out his website for more his paintings with a splash of middle Eastern style...

Facebook again

This friend of mine asked me today...

"How come I can't find you on facebook..."

"Because I am not on facebook..."

All of a sudden, my not being on facebook gives me the same feeling as when someone else asked me today...

"Do you have a cell phone number?"

"I don't have a cell phone..." 8-O lol

Girly songs

Just got introduced to these nice girly songs by my friend.... 8-O lol


Eartha Kitt

I Want To Be Evil



Just An Old Fashioned Girl



Je cherche un homme




I Want To Be Evil
Eartha Kitt

I've posed for pictures with Iv'ry Soap,
I've petted stray dogs, and shied clear of dope
(I've petted stray dogs, and I never mope)*
My smile is brilliant, my glance is tender
But I'm noted most for my unspoiled gender


I've been made Miss Reingold, though I never touch beer,
(I've been named Miss Perseverance year after year,)*
And I'm the person to whom they say, "Your sweet, My Dear."
The only etchings I've seen have been behind glass,
And the closest I've been to a bar, is at ballet class.

Prim and proper, the girl who's never been cased,
I'm tired of being pure and not chased.
Like something that seeks it's level
I wanna go to the devil.

Refrain
I wanna be evil, I wanna spit tacks
I wanna be evil, and cheat at jacks
I wanna be wicked, I wanna tell lies
I wanna be mean, and throw mud pies

I want to wake up in the morning
with that dark brown taste
I want to see some dissipation in my face
I wanna be evil, I wanna be mad
But more that that I wanna be bad

I wanna be evil, and trump an ace,
Just to see my partner's face.
I wanna be nasty, I wanna be cruel
I wanna be daring, I wanna shoot pool

And in the theatre
I want to change my seat
Just so I can step on
Everybody's feet

I wanna be evil, I wanna hurt flies
I wanna sing songs like the guy who cries
I wanna be horrid, I wanna drink booze
(I want to be horrid, I want to make news)*
And whatever I've got I'm eager to lose

I wanna be evil, little evil me
Just as mean and evil as I can be


Just An Old Fashioned Girl
Eartha Kitt

I'm just an old fashioned girl with an old fashioned mind
Not sophisticated, I'm the sweet and simple kind.
I want an old fashioned house, with an old fashioned fence
And an old fashioned millionaire.
I want an old fashioned car, a cerise Cadillac,
Long enhough to put a bowling alley in the back.
I want an old fashioned house, with an old fashioned fence
And an old fashioned millionaire.
I'll stay weaving at my loom,
Be no trouble to my groom,
If he'll keep the piles of money mounting.
In our cottage there will be
A soundproof nursery
Not to wake the baby while I'm counting.
I like the old fashioned flowers, violets are for me -
Have them made in diamonds by the man at Tiffany.
I want an old fashioned house, with an old fashioned fence
And an old fashioned millionaire.
I'm just a pilgrim at heart, oh so pure and genteel.
Watch me in Las Vegas while I'm at the spinning wheel!
I want an old fashioned house, with an old fashioned fence
And an old fashioned millionaire.
I'll ask for such simple things when my birthday occurs:
Two appartment buildings that are labelled 'Hers' and 'Hers'.
I want an old fashioned house, with an old fashioned fence
And an old fashioned millionaire.
I like Chopin and Bizet
And the songs of yesterday,
String quartets and Polonesian carols.
But the music that excels
Is the sound of oil wells
As they slurp, slurp, slurp into the barrels.
Our little home will be quaint as an old parasol,
And instead of carpet I'll have money wall to wall.
I want an old fashioned house, with an old fashioned fence
And an old fashioned millionaire.

Je Cherche Un Homme

Je cherche un homme, un homme, un homme
Un Pierre, un Paul, un Jacques ou Tom
Peu m'importe comment il se nomme
S'il est un homme, un homme, un homme

Je n'exige pas un Apollon
Qui sait briller dans les salons
Ni un type fort comme un Samson
Pourvu que j'aie un mate un bon

Il n'a pas besoin d'?tre un milliardaire
Qu'il soit beau, non, ?a m'est ?gal
Il n'a pas besoin d'?tre une grande lumi?re
Star du cin?ma ni prince royal

Je cherche un homme, un homme, un homme
Qu'il s'appelle Pierre ou Paul ou Tom
Pourvu qu'il donne son maximum
Je cherche un homme, un homme, un homme

Doesn't have to be prince or movie star
A Texas oil man or a french marquis
Doesn't have to be handsome as a picture
An ordinary guy's all right with me

Je cherche un homme, un homme, un homme
Qu'il s'appelle Pierre ou Paul ou Tom
Pourvu qu'il donne son maximum
Je cherche un homme, un homme, un homme
Je cherche un homme, un homme, un homme