Yesterday was the shortest day of the year. Or, to see the cup as half full, to vampires, it was the longest night of the year.* There was a conjunction between Saturn and Jupiter that a lot of people were excited about (I saw some pictures that were dubiously awesome . . . kind of like when you see hot photos of Amy Adams and you go, "Nuh uh, she doesn't look that good." Sort of the opposite of the time I met Hilary Swank and thought, "Damn cuz, she's super hot," but no one ever believed me), so I went outside to look.
I couldn't see either planet, or any light to the Southwest that might have been them. But I went on my run anyway, and stared up at Mars throughout, ruminating on the thought that I've seen Mars in the sky every other night this year, and that hadn't been a thing in any years past. Here, at the end of the longest year in anyone's memory, I sometimes wonder what the me of last December 21st/22nd would think if I told him I went running, at night, in December, or I wrote, what, three hundred thousand words this year? Or that I've seen the Capital One commercial with Taylor Swift in it over eighty times now and only now got the "Cardigan" joke in it.
I like to think that 2019 Me would be proud of 2020 Me, and say, "You can do HOW many push-ups in a row?" or "You've written HOW many short stories this year?" instead of the usual, "You've eaten HOW many pizzas all by yourself this year?" or "You've crapped yourself HOW many times?"
Just occurred to me that those two things might be related.
I'm at the library today again. It's a little tradition with me, isn't it, to sit down, start up my laptop, and immediately blog before doing any of the responsible things. For the first time, I've brought my water bottle with me up here, because none of the other people I've observed that brought food or drink have gotten a hard time, and I guess I'm a hypocrite. But I come here often enough, I ought to have learned all the employees' names by now, and it's clear that they're not going to admonish anybody drinking, talking on their cellphone, not wearing their mask, or rubbing one out in the corner by Nonfiction.
When I first came in, I saw the deaf guy I occasionally run into here. He was wearing a black hat instead of a red one, so I greeted him warmly. He actually said something to me, which hadn't been the case before, but I couldn't understand any of it. It occurs to me that he probably does a hell of a lot of lip-reading, and COVID has absolutely effed that up for him. Poor dude.
I got a pretty darn good writing session in today. I could actually have stayed another hour, but I decided to head back early so I could go on my run before it got too late (it's already pitch black out there, though, which is disheartening for only 5:40pm).
Sit-ups Today: 100
Sittys In December: 2460
Push-ups Today: 111 (a special number)
Pushys In December: 2181
I went to publish my Christmas Rish Outcast just now, and I realized that, in skipping ahead to the Halloween episodes, I had had two Episode 185 and 186es. It screwed everything up, and I spent a good waste of time re-saving the episodes, re-doing the cover images, and trying to get them re-uploaded. I don't know if that will mean the links no longer work, but I've done what I can. Just support me on Patreon, okay, then we wouldn't have to go through this.
Words Today: 1933
Words In December: 21,786
*Guess I could write a story how December 21st is a holiday among the undead. But I won't.
P.S. You may ask yourself, "Rish, how have you seen that Taylor Swift Capital One commercial almost a hundred times? Are you some kind of sick nutjob?"
To which, the answers are: That commercial plays every time I stream an episode of "30 Rock" and I'm near to the end of the series. And yes.
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