February Sweeps - Day 385

I was editing audio of my most recent Ben Parks story today, and in it, I sneezed.  Twice.

Pretty much everybody in my family has these gargantuan, almost-explosive sneezes, which are the polar opposite of the cutesy lil "Eeep!" sneezes librarians and fairy princesses and child prostitutes have.  They're body-wracking eruptions that always red-line my audio.  Sometimes they feel dangerous or sound like sea lions exploding.  I remember a couple of Christmases ago, my brother sneezed one of those wall-shaking sneezes and I asked him, "Are you ever afraid that one of these times you'll burst a blood vessel in your head and that'll be it?"  And he said, "Yeah.  All the time."

So, out of curiosity, I did a Google search: "Can you sneeze yourself to death?"  

And it came up with various results, suggesting that, while uncommon, it is possible.  More common is people slipping a disc in their backs, bursting their eardrums, or defecating uncontrollably.  It also gave me other, related question prompts, including, I shit you not, "What would happen if you sneeze, burped, and farted at the same time?"

I didn't have to click on the link to know what the answer would be: "Everyone in the world would cease to exist."  A no-brainer, really.

I've said, a hundred times or more, that the worst part of doing my stories is the audio editing.  It's the lengthiest, most dull, least-creatively satisfying part, and it requires a different kind of concentration than just writing does, one that is like homework instead of play.

But in editing the first . . .  chapter? segment? section? . . . of "A Sidekick's Errand" today, I surprised myself by really enjoying it.  I was tempted to just release the story on the Outcast, even though my plan was to wait a year or so (the last story was released in December of 2019).

Still gotta make a cover for it, though.

Oh, I meant to blog about this yesterday, but I got too bogged-down in talking about the "Drivers License" song (which actually has no apostrophe).  I went ahead and published "podcatcher," so if you want to read it, it's available HERE.  I'd like to run it on the show, but hey, I'd like to run a lot of stuff on the show (honestly, just putting in the metadata and uploading the cover feels like a monumental task sometimes).

Sit-ups Today: 166
Sit-ups In February: 2129

I waited until there was only an hour left before the library closed, and I headed for the car.  And the engine wouldn't start.  Somehow, my battery was dead.  I tried to jump it with this neat portable battery recharger my mom bought . . . and the recharger was also dead.  I'm grateful it happened at home, during the day, and not when I was out somewhere, in a snowstorm.

So, I took my dad's pickup truck to the library, only managing to get 549 words before they started to flash the lights.

Push-ups Today: 138
Push-ups February: 1960

I went straight home, hoping to fix my car's battery before it got dark, but the lil recharger wouldn't turn on, despite having charging the hour I was at the library.  I got the jumper cables from the truck and tried, but had no luck starting my car. There was so much acid around the battery, however, that I wasn't sure if the battery needed replacing or if there wasn't a connection anymore.  So, I scraped off as much as I could, and later, my brother-in-law used this little brush thing to clean it better . . . and the engine started right up.

He told me to drive the car around for half an hour, but not to kill the engine, and I tried calling Big at home again, just to have somebody to talk to while I drove around, but he didn't pick up.  I listened to that "drivers license" song a few times, trying to learn it*, before finally just coming home and sitting in the car until the half hour had run out.  I killed the engine, tried to start it again . . . and it wouldn't even try to turn over.  In fact, the light wouldn't come on when I opened the door and the door wouldn't lock when I walked away from the car.

Guess I know what I'll be doing tomorrow.

Words Today: 764
Words In February: 14,534

Okay, if you've read this far, I guess I'll tell you what the link really said (re: what would happen).  If you sneeze, burped, and farted at the same time, it said the only result would be that you'd feel quite a bit relieved.

*I found out there's a "Clean" version and am trying to decide which version I like better.  It'll probably take a few dozen more listens to decide.