My life's Adventure

Talked to M yesterday at the self help group

I phoned for S at the self help group to see when I might be needed to fill in for her with the network for self help groups. I might have to attend a meeting as her alternate. This network is growing and developing. I am making the network's web site and this work is going well. I did four hours on Tuesday morning and 2 hours Wednesday afternoon. Instead of S I talked to M. S was out at a conference.

I have known M for about 14 years now. I don't think M and I have ever met in a private home. I met him in evening sports at the local major psych-hospital. Because I had been imagining my dad's long time collegue during my psychosis in 1989 and 1988, and making up things about him I knew I had to deal with that 14 years ago when I was locked in a back ward. I thought then of M as related to me as J is to my dad. Of course, this algebra of relations never really worked out that way. M and I are only coworkers in a limited way and only this year is that true. Technically by being on the board of directors of M's workplace the self help group I have been M's boss. But I have never profited financially from this relationship nor hired or fired any one at that workplace/self help group.

Yesterday on the phone, I talked to M about the new creative writers group they have at the self help group. I shared some resources with him. I told him about my wife's project and my own and how we are doing this book publishing. He has printed an entry in the groups newsletter this month about the schizophrenia section of www.meetups.com that I started. There are only 12 members world wide of this section of meetups but as M said yesterday maybe it will catch on.

Just taking my meds hope to sleep soon

My medications are slightly sedating. I take them only before going to sleep. I generally take them at 11 PM but this is changed if I stay up through the next morning. I only take 6 mg per day of risperadol.

I have participated in tests into injectable risperadol where I was also checked for heart disease and diabetes. The measurments taken during this experiment were sent via modem to London UK.

There was another experimental drug I was offered which would fix my sexual disfunction I chose not to participate as this problem was not serious.

I am preparing for emergencies and purchased five flashlights of different types including solar and head worn flashlights. My wife and I each have pocket first aid kits that can be attached to belts. I also have family St. John's kit that has almost never been used, but has been ready on numerous intercity bus and car trips, as well as, being around the house for years. I also have a home made kit which I carry in my knapsack. We also have two medicine cabinets with various drugs and ointments. We have an electronic temperature measurement device and also a glucometer. I guess all we need now is a stethoscope and blood pressure cuff.

We also have an anatomoy colouring book, two or three first aid books, books on the brain and diet, a book on sexuality, and various periodicals on schizophrenia. I also have book for communicating medical information to people with low literacy abilities.

Besides these books I have a small ten to twenty book shelf of books for each of the basic university subject areas. I have also specialist literatures for Geography, Law and Math, Natural Sciences and Sociology. I have bought these books from book stores, book clubs, second hand book stores including charity shops and I have also for the past 6 years bought books on-line most at Amazon.

V and T buying house

V and T are two friends I visit every week. They don't have mental illness and are the first friends I had outside the mentally ill community after my major hospitalisation. As I have been working successfully these past three years I have always known them. V is a boss at a small business. T his wife is a retail worker.

Recovery is no secret here

I credit two things for my recovery. One I made friends and focused on schizophrenia for about five years in a self-help group just for those of us with schizophrenia. This led me to participating in organising self help and consumer survivor groups and the development of my social and political skills. These certainly helped me get through to working again and feeling good about myself around other people. I was just this morning doing some paid work for a consumer/survivor group as a web master so this self help movement has also led me from getting help, to volunteering, and now to working in this movement. It also helped me get busy with school and other paid work so I would not drift off into a fantasy world anymore. I also had to be taught to be clear about what a fantasy world is and when I was going into my personal fantsay world and how to avoid staying there.

Two by focusing on this disorder I have been able to read more books about schizophrenia and learn more about this illness and then go beyond that over the years studying addictions, depression, anxiety, general psychology and more recently the mentally disordered offender. All this has helped me learn about myself and those who I know with severe mental disorders.

I woke up and hit the books

I woke up at 9 PM. I hung out with my wife a bit. Then I hit the books. I read about experiences of being schizophrenic and not using natural science explainations but sticking just with the subjective in narrative research into schizophrenia. Certainly we are people with motivations, emotions and goals like other people. This was the methodological point in the book by Larry Davidson titledLiving Outside Mental Illness in chapter 3. I am presently entering bibliographic details of all the library books I have on loan, into one of my other blogs so I can later copy and paste from there into my writing.

Up early for my exam a little frazzelled

Well my plan was to wake up at about 10 PM and sleep at 10 am yesterday. But instead I slept at 3 am and woke up at 2:14. So now some 19 hours later I am a bit tired. Not the best way to write an exam. But I have been scan reading the casebook for two hours this morning.

Financial pressures eased a little this morning but by the end of the day we will be broke again. Most of this spending will be on consumables except for some clothing.

At work one other co-worker is also a student at my school. He studies sociology and political science and business. He will also be attending summer school. Another co-worker I met on Saturday is a law student at our cities law school which is a different university. He is writing three exams this week. He found out I have schizophrenia because of my big mouth and the fact that he remembered the article in the paper about me graduating in 2002. But he said he would be quiet about it.

Staying up before exam

I know sleep is important. I slept 11 hours today waking up at 2:14 in the afternoon. I am now up until my exam at 9 am Monday morning. I am slowly reviewing notes for my ecommerce law course. I don't feel confident because I feel I have personal issues with the professor. But these are only my opinion of him. I have learned quite a bit in this course. I also did well with the mid-term essay. I usually do very well on law exams. I could write a perfect exam and score an A in this course still. If I did this it would change my choices to more business law courses as soon as possible.

I might study the anti-terrorism act this spring term starting May 18th.

Sugar needed after two days of work.

After two days of walking for long periods I think my blood surgar is low. I ate some jelly beans and my wife made supper. We ate fish sticks potatoes and veggies.

Tired from walking

I figured it out talking with my mom who was concerned that I was tired when I called her tonight. After explaining my sleep plans to prepare for my exam and while adjusting this with my mother's love I realised the obvious I am tired at the moment not because of lack of sleep but because I have worked for two days and my job is physical, not excessively demanding but still physical none the less. I am just tired with mild excertion for 12 hours per day at work. Mostly it walking around doing patrols.

back to work after three weeks away.

I have been away from one job for three weeks now. They just did not have any open shifts I could take. Now I have two days work in a row. Then I have a day off then I write a school exam on Monday. Then I will see about more work next week or have a few more days off during the week. I have gotten no pay in this last pay period for two jobs and waiting for a web master pay cheque this week and it is Friday now with no sign of the cheque.

Scored well in legal research course

Well I got my grade for my legal research course. I did alright and there is nothing really to worry about with my grade. It wasn't quite what I was expecting but still a great mark. It did not bring my average down much at all because it was the same as my average which was a few tenths of letter grade higher before this course. But I had hoped for higher.

My other law course has its final exam on Monday. It will be an open book exam and I have printed out my notes for this course and put them all in a three ring binder about a week ago. I have reviewed all the notes a few times now. Now I am just re-reading the course casebook. I am not too worried about the exam. I will know what to do and should do better with the exam than I have done on my consumer law exam. There is also a little room for opinion and new law writing ideas as there are two policy questions, and this is after all a new area of law. So I will need to form my opinions based on legal issues and sub issues. I am hopeing to also score well on this exam.

About a week goes by without vitamins

I don't usually do this... report medications use on the Internet in public. Many people I know only as other Internet users in other words virtual associates or other consumers I only know in virtual reality, report there quitting medications or starting them or whatever. I find that too like crisis reporting too personal and never really like to respond as I am not a doctor and medications are serious business. I do often share my knowledge of medications when people put the question like "What is this or that drug like?" "Can this drug be used by pregnant women? etc..

But I am not a medical professional far from it. Mainly because my marks at school in science were not always the best even though I have a degree in statistics and the graduate program at our school in statistics has a bio statistics option. But I am no doctor. Besides I used to get along better with computers and musical instruments and in some ways me studying law is like many people who become lawyers I am a failed doctor.

Now my post after that long winded disclaimer. I have not had my vitamins for about a week now because of our finances. Vitamins for me are sometimes an extra in our budget. As they are not a proven therapy they are an extra. I still get most of my vitmains from our lacto-vegetarian diet. Last week we bought 100$ worth of groceries rather than me spend say 12$ on vitmains for a couple of weeks.

I feel a little less stressed out without vitamins but that is probably a result of huge amounts of sleep I have had recently and not having very much work to do, either school work which is extremely stressful or any paid work which is only a major time constraint in one job.

Like studying at school, work at school is very deadline oriented. My security work is time constrained too but once one is at work it is not all that stressfull.

Dropping into school today

There is a study group at school today for one course. I am probably not going to this but I am dropping in on professor F to have her sign a permission form for a fourth year research course where we will study homelessness. I have also been invited to a luncheon about women and homelessness by the National Anti-Poverty Organisation(NAPO) for May 10th.

Then this afternoon I am volunteering at City Hall on Accessibility issues. I will be reviewing our committee's work plan for this year.

Then in the evening I relax and play a role playing game with friends. I am then staying up until 4 PM Thursday and working Friday and Saturday as a security guard.

I actually didn't study today

I was worried that I didn't have time off studies given that I am always reading. I didn't read much today almost nothing besides a little of the newspaper. But today I mostly worked on my 486 Linux laptop project and although I learned about doing an X install I did not read any of the many books I have out from the university library.

I sold L a monitor tonight

I don't know about L's mental health. I sold him a 14" monitor tonight after his broke down. I know he is poor and is trying to sell books for a living. He is publishing J's book. Her book should be here in a week or two. 50 copies of her solo poetry book. She hopes to buy us a house with the profits. I hope we make our money back.

I am waiting for R to drop by with some money for the HP CD writer plus 8000.

B's girl friend is in the hospital for schizophrenia tonight. He met her in an on-line chat. He has been using the net less these days.

Slept 14.5 hours

I went to sleep last night at about 9:30 and slept to about 12 noon today. I don't think recently I have ever slept so much. I did my union appointment today and then watched hockey with a friend, R. R bought my old Cd writer today and will pay me 50$ tomorrow. We are so broke and I am waiting for a pay check.

Yes we have free medications in Canada but that doesn't pay for my vitamins and I am out of niacin.

I am spending some time now late at night reviewing our emergency preparedness. I am going to buy some more solar powered flash lights on-line. Speaking of shopping on-line I let myself be outbid at ebay on two PCMCIA cards so that I can save money for daily expenses.

Live and Learn!

Journal writing

I have read a few books including self help books, spiritual books and activist books that suggest keeping journals. In self help and activism one needs to keep these journals secret that is personal journals.

On the newsgroup alt.support.schizophrenia some of the posters study computer cryptography to make secret diaries. I started a yahoo group for those of us who fit in the intersection of being posters to alt.support.schizophrenia and study cryptograhy. We did not get anywhere with that Yahoo group.

I spend some time this week writing in pen and ink in a daily journal of activities. I also do my accounts with pen and ink everyday. Besides pen and ink using loose leaf binders and agenda books I keep logs in computers and on-line in blogs. I have two other blogs but I won't share them here as I am trying to remain at least slightly unknown here.

This blog has had over 1500 visitors now. Enjoy reading I know I enjoy writing and reading.

Computer studies

I spent about 6 hours yesterday with an 486 computer. I don't need to do this computer work but felt I was learning something useful. I also learned a lot about Linux software this way.

I was also near the end of the week able to do two more hours of my telework job web mastering for the self help network. My pay cheque is in the mail now for that work.

I bid on a number of different PCMCIA cards at ebay. I think this may be a dated statment but I have always liked minaturized electronics. I will spend some time this Saturday night/Sunday morning working on computers and perhaps studying code.

One of my friends M has been suspected of having schizophrenia but decided against treatment years ago. He told me I should send less email to him and his friends and spend more time reading about software code. He is sort of a cranky right wing kind of guy. Not a crank per say just cranky. We disagree on the views of society we have. We can still get along socially and joke around quite a bit. He is no boss. He is a former student of my school.

ran out of niacin/sleeping in afternoon

Yes things are normal here. I did though run out of niacin this weekend. This is not a big deal though. I also stayed up from being awake at 4 PM Friday to 4 PM Saturday so I did another 24 hour day. I slept at 4PM today after a shower and woke up at 9:30 PM so only about 5.5 hours sleep. I don't feel grogy though and feel well rested. I will be slowly turning my clock forward all week until an early morning next Saturday for my paid work. My goal for Sunday is to stay up from now until 6 PM.

R, J and C over

R, J, and C were over tonight. L was also here visiting my wife. We watched hockey and then Dungeons and Dragons the movie.

Learning to teach

I attended a colloquium today. It was given by J a seasoned professor who enlivens the department. I spoke up to defend a point he made about computer instruction. At the same time I have been helping to promote computer instruction this past term.

I met with J and we talked about her conference in cultural studies. It might be fun to attend I said. It is May 1st.

I am starting to review the course material for my exam on the 26th.

I borrowed a couple of more books from the library focusing on participatory democracy and also unfair enrichment. I took back a book on electronic warfare and also a book on intelligence agencies. I know when I start studyng war I am getting into trouble with paranoia.

I need to study more law and focus on the studies I should be doing that match the course I am taking or planning to take or have taken. Epistomology is the thing to help me focus.

E in hospital

E is in the hospital and has been calling me everyday. R is working hard at the music store. I am again getting R something from ebay.ca. W has not called for weeks now. I called S and we chatted about my web work and my leadership in the self help movement. I am meeting for coffee with J today. J is not mentally ill. She studies cultural theory and post-modernism. She invited me to a cultural theory study event on May day. I might though attend an anarchist event on May day, the traditional workers holiday.

Booked work for next weekend.

I was slightly worried about job security with one job but my scheduling boss called and I booked a 12 hour shift next weekend. This gives me time to prepare my sleep cycle for an early morning for work. I will have to cancel our social night next Friday. But tomorrow we should be able to get together.

Up early today

I am up early today. I slept at 3 AM but woke up at 7:30 AM. I took my vitamins for the morning. I am running out of niacin and will need to get more this weekend.

Hockey added to routine

J and I watched hockey tonight and the past few nights. We ate pasta tonight. I budgeted for a big grocery shop this weekend. I chatted with distant family and my cousin and his wife had a baby boy last weekend. A cousin on the other side of the family sent an email newsletter with family news to us all today.

Volunteering

I did some human resources volunteering I guess reflecting my status as an experienced worker and student of human resources. I was really burnt out after this and needed to do some quiet reading to relax so that I can now go to sleep.

just taking my night meds

I got my clock moved around. It moved a bit faster yesterday because of the hockey game. My wife watched the Montreal Canadians win thier game and the TV was loud so I couldn't sleep until 10 PM. Also we made Easter dinner. So while I was only going to stay up till 6 PM yesterday as I stayed up till 4 PM on Saturday I slept at 10 PM last night and woke up at 10 am this morning. This gave me a headache. Tonight I know I'll be up till 1 am or so.

I have some union work tomorrow as a volunteer in the evening. It looks like I am selling a school book for some extra cash tomorrow evening.

Also Thursday a retiring professor is giving a talk about teaching in the math department. He is a good guy inviting me to speak to students at a fund raising showing of the film a Beautiful Mind last year. I talked about those lost people out there who might be geniuses.

Discussing finances with my brother

It is difficult sometimes to let my family know about the government rules concerning our finances. We are expecting an interest rate cut this week in Canada. This will mean some of my debit will be cheaper. Also I want to look into buying a condo for my wife and I. The disability program where we get most of our income allows ownership of a house as exempt property in terms of assets otherwise assets are limited. The ODSP act is on the web and I read parts of it today to try to see how we would get a condo. But to talk about this and explain it to someone who doesn't know this systems is difficult it is also hard enought to talk to those who also know the system because they have made up their minds on how it should be interpreted.

The new government took off the life time ban for committing fraud on this system. Now it is just governed by the criminal law. That life time ban put in by the draconian previous government caused at least one death of a pregnent disabled women and she died with child. I want to charge the previous premier with murder but haven't pursued it fully. I have written the premier to let him know my intentions.

I am selling a school book I didn't use this term for some extra cash tomorrow. It happens to be a copy of the 2004 criminal code of Canada.

Up early in the morning

I slept at 3:30 in the afternoon and am now up at 1:30 and have been studying. I read a little of Terminal Identity a sci-fi and cultural theory book. I then read yesterday's newspaper the Citizen. I will not help the Citizen carrier this morning. I also read another chapter of Count Zero by William Gibson. I am just now printing out copies of my studies blog for my binder. This way I will have all bibliographic details of my recent research available with me because I carry this binder around everywhere.

I am installing Win98 on one computer.

C and J and R again.

C and J were over again. C has depression and has quit smoking years ago. J maybe has schizophrenia and depression. He was in trouble with the bus company in municiple court. The city owns the buses. The good news is that his charges of not paying fair and causing a disturbance were dismissed this week. C and J are a couple. They stayed for about four hours we watched some hockey on TV and they read a bit of my security books. R dropped by later to return my hat. The other R reported that her work as health consultant with the self help network was completed and that a new consultant would be taking over now. That means my web work will be reported to someone else.

I need to do four hours of web mastering today

I set today a goal of doing four hours of my web mastering work.

I also set a goal of reading parts of about six or seven books. So this second goal has six or seven parts. I completed one of those parts just about half an hour ago. Breaking time into smaller parts and goals into smaller parts is helpful and keeps me progressing fast and effectively. I learned to do this in a hospital rehabilitation program in 1990.

Still taking vitamins

I started this vitamin regime in 1980 at the advise of a private psychiatrist after he had me read Mark Vonnegut's Eden Express. I was a big Kurt Vonnegut reader before this but rarely read him after that. I was confused about reading in those days and confused sexually too. I was also confused as a writer and math problem solver and proof writer. The only thing I could do right in those days was eat, sleep, and do accurate data entry.

I continued the vitamin therapy for about a year and when I discontinued had trouble with the criminal law. No one was hurt or anything stolen but I probably made people afraid and my brother came to view me as unpredictable and possibly violent. I restarted the vitamins again after my rehab program around 1990 when the socialists got into power and funded our self help groups and have been taking them steady as far as I can remember for a few years now. They seem to relax my body when I take them. Sure I flush up and get itchy with the niacin but it seem to improve my concentration.

Between 1989-1995 I knew two other people from our self group with schizophrenia who also took vitamin therapy. One of them G seemed obessesd with vitamins and has since died. The other fellow was a patient representitive on the Canadian Schizophrenia Society Research Committee and really pushed the vitamin therapy at us but failed to show certain social traits and solidarity that I felt were needed in recovery. Recovery is more than pills.

worked on the holidays

I don't have any teaching work right now. Nor do I have any security work scheduled for awhile. I need the holidays to be free from the constraint of work pressures.

I emailed the other R with my web work report today. I worked for an hour this morning on the web site for our self help network organisation.

But that's it for today tomorrow is another day. I am going to sleep in a couple of hours at the end of a normal morning. I hope to awake around dinner time.

I will do more web work tomorrow morning in the wee hours again.

My next work related activities will be Tuesday when I will interview job candidates for the union.

I am doing well with all this free time. Just reading and relaxing for hours on end. I have been reading more about computers. I am also reading anti-terrorism stuff for my law courses and of course this helps in my security work too. Life makes sense these days and work does make work sense.

Fellow Union member is a freindly normy

J is very friendly and has been a great non disciminatory friend. He has no mental illness and we only get together at the union meetings and protests. Last night he told me he had gotten a Blackberry and joked that he was trying to out gadget me. He said he had also gotten a very modern digital video camera.

I worry that I am too into gadgets and ignore people too much. But I am also a people person and the technology sure makes me a more effcient person.

I was thinking of getting us a video camera but I don't think we would really use it much. My wife does not like being photographed so much. The other day I used my digital camera indoors to take pictures of the cat. I then emailed them to friends and family and was told that the camera was not taking very good pictures.

I am going to email a different J a tune my brother wrote and performed and sent to me Wednesday night. She is also a normy and invited me to a school event on May day.

But back to J. He makes an effort to help the poor and not discriminate against us. Things like body oder and other things some people find offensive in poor people he has told me he knows not to say things or react to in a negative way. He does get a little depressed and has taken some Zyban for his smoking.

V can also be very positive and upbeat and he has depression sometimes. R is not always positive in tone and he must have a more serious depression as he has actually been in treatment. R is schizo-affective in diagnosis. Oh well it is strange to look throught the lens of mental illness at all one's friends. No harm meant if any of my friends are reading this. You're all great people to know and hang out with.

Radical union meeting

We had a radical union meeting tonight. It went well. We did a lot of deciding things. We have oral reports but not very long. We tend to discuss things a lot. It is not like group therapy but it is like it too because we sit in a circle and talk. I bring my laptop to keep minutes on but another worker actually typed them tonight.

I am getting an advance cheque for my web master work. I have a few tasks planned for this 16 hours of work and may begin some of the email work for that tonight/this morning. Also the web site I am building may need a redesign so the colours work better. I would like to try to design for the colour blind as well. I know the blind can read this site as this design has been checked by at least one blind person in another web site I built.

helping R with his computer

I helped R download and install Netscape 7.02 Canadian English edition. I also seemed to be able to eliminate the addware on his computer. We spent about 7 hours together last night.

R is coming over

R has been working hard. He had a ten hour day yesterday at the music store he works at. J is drining some beer tonight after two days sober. E has not called in two days which is good behaviour. T and V and M canceled our game tonight so I invited R over. R is still learning the Internet. His friend W has not returned numerous calls.

I just turned LEAVES on.

Read some of the other blogs here at schizophrenia.com

Over the weekend I worked on my eMac a lot. I read some of the other new blogs here.

Told some others in the consumer movement about this blog!

I just emailed the web address of this blog to my self help group, R who is also a government health consulant and G and J who both are involved on peer to peer depression support. I also emailed the address to an old high school friend N who is a doctor in New York state these days.

I also emailed a consumer, K in Finland about Linux and he and his wife are asking for my help with their computer learning. I am not sure if he is reading this blog. I met him on the schizoph email list.

Tuesday was busy but no busy

I read for six hours on Monday night.

On Tuesday I did some human resource work making a short list of candidates for a survey analyst position with the union.

My wifes book just passed the proof stage with a few small corrections. Her book should be for sale by the end of the month.

I got the union money situation moved along a bit and booked our room for this month.

I met with another disabled student and we had coffee. She is very proud of my school achievments and told me that. I also had coffee with a union office staff worker and we talked about our life partner's music abilities.

I spent about 4 hours this week installing software!

I am becoming a programmer again. I have been studying programming the Palm and also programming in C++.

I spent about two hours trying to install Debian Linux 2.1 on an old Thinkpad 360SC. It was extremely frustrating and I stayed up late doing it and then slept a lot and had a broken sleep last night.

Tonight I read about palm programming reviewing the first two chapters that I read last week, of a book on palm programming. I then installed a POSE and unpacked the SDK files onto my Fedora machine.

I have nicked named this machine LEAVES. The machine is an IBM 325 PC server with dual Pentium II 300Mhz processors. Maybe this acronym stands for Linux Educational Application v. Enterprise Solutions. It used to be part of a super computer I build and called Lamda after the Lambda moo which was legal example we studied in LAWS3501 last winter. This example of a community dispute in an on-line community came from Lawrence Lessig's book Code: and other laws of cyberspace. This same example is in Rob Kitcin's book Cyberspace.

I now want to install a POSE on my windows laptop because I just installed GCC and an IDE for GCC on this WinXP laptop.

But for now I must sleep and attend a University President's committee meeting tomorrow. Well actually later today but I am up late in the morning.

Concerned about global security

I am getting concerned about global security. Our own food security is not bad and our peace security is good but could use some work. I also need to develop my physical body more so that I can possibly function more as a police person if I so choose or am lucky enough to get that work. I know our own police in this city will not be hiring new officers this year.

Bought a watch and a computer part.

It is no secret that I am enamored with computers. Yesterday, I bought a PCMCIA LAN card for an old hobby computer project an IBM Thinkpad 360SC. I bought it on ebay.ca. We also bought my wife a Swiss Army watch on sale on line at a department store. This store has in the past tended to sell faulty stuff on-line. I bought two of these watches at varying levels of expense and they were ok so probanly the one we got my wife will be fine. It is a sport model.

Heart to heart talk today.

Yesterday we cleaned up the floors together. Today we cooked dinner together. I also cooked last night. We talked about our love life. My wife feels she is fat and ugly. No she doesn't read a lot of women's magazines.

Relaxing day to read

School is basically over and I am reading more today. I also emailed some law professors to see if one of them could supervise an independent course this summer. I maybe able to research disabilities and the law.

Cleaning up today

I want to clean up my office and the living room today. My wife has been meaning to clean the floors too.

We agreed to buy air conditioning this summer. The department store does not have the machines yet. We will be lucky to buy one. We need some form of air cleaning because the neighbours are complaining about the tabacco smoke in the hallway.

Got some statistics software from school today.

It helps to surf the math department web pages. I found out today I could get a copy of SAS for use on my home PC. I went to school for about 15 minutes to pick up a copy and installed it on my laptop. This will help me study for a SAS certification.

I am going to email a few professors now. My wife and our friend are in the living room I am in the office.

R and J peacefully having a few beers

R and J are just sitting in the living room watching Agnes of God and have been drinking a six pack together. They are totally peaceful. I was surfing ebay.ca on the living room eMac and bidding on Xbox games for R. We lost but will bid again for tomorrow. R paid for the monitor and gave me some money to pay for an X-Box game.

End of month/beginning of month

Our rent should be paid today and our investments should be paid. But most of these are done automatically at the bank. I just need to make sure there is enough money in the account. This should be a tight month as my TA work is done for the term and my consumer self help group work may be done too. I am waiting to hear back from the ERN to see if they need and can afford more web work. They originally contracted for three more months at five hours a month for 12$ per hour and also the web site is not done yet. But the original contract was to end at the end of March.

R and W coming for dinner

I invited both R and W for dinner. My wife is making Greek leek stew. She is getting her blood work done this afternoon for her clozapine. She is picking up an extra egg plant for dinner tomorrow. R is paying me back for the monitor tonight. W is paying me for the DVD player.

T & V bought a house

T and V bought a two bedroom bungalo this week. They have a good month to move in. V is a handy-person type of guy. T is a horticulture student and worker. They should have fun. I typically visit them once a week to play a fantasy role playing game. We also talk adult type topics like work and politics. They are cool because they are working and relatively normal people. V is a native and I was one of the best men at their native wedding a couple of years ago. Today is T's birthday and I have been emailing her ecards and stuff.

Today is sort of a day off for me. Yesterday was the day of my last class for the term.

Reading and using computers

I am using my Mac today. Yesterday I read some of William Gibson's Count Zero on the bus with my Palm. I read chapter 1 in Al Steven's Teach Yourself C++, 7 ed., yesterday.