When it all started I thought that I will spend this time in the most useful way. But now I understand that most of the time I do nothing. And that is bothering me a lot.
When it all started I thought that I will spend this time in the most useful way. But now I understand that most of the time I do nothing. And that is bothering me a lot.
Lady Onogaro (August 22nd, 2020)
I find that I can't concentrate into serious reading. Have watched a half-dozen series on Netflix. I think we are all feeling aimless and distracted. It reminds me of the day after the World Trade Center was blown up in 2001. After rushing to contact son and daughter, and retrieving my wife from a town part-way from Manhattan to our home, there was nothing to do. Nothing to do...the company had shut down most activity in North America, and sent technicians from Belgium to the US to get some of the New York banks working again, but I was managing a development team -- no help in getting bank interfaces connected. Nothing to do for a week.
Daughter reminded me that this COVID-19 is like a "9-11" that has run for six weeks, and might continue for another month. It is a long grind.
AzJon (April 18th, 2020)
Right you are, Welch, aimless. That is the right word! I can't concentrate on reading and proper thinking because of the whole situation the only thing I can do with ease is playing computer games. Luckily I can upgrade my account with ease via https://skycoach.gg/wow-boost/raids spending far less time than I used to spend 2 years ago.
Hope that the working vaccine will will be invented some time soon. *fingers crossed*
Last edited by Hazaddum; August 7th, 2020 at 05:54 AM.
The situation has thrown light on just how poorly equipped we have become to face extended periods of inaction. It has been reported in the scientific literature that boredom encourages creativity, and indeed during lockdown we have seen a great deal of uplifting creativity, although perhaps only representative of a small proportion of the inactive population.
It also shows how many of us are ill at ease with quietness and our own company.
In other words, and simplifying, the pandemic has shown us that something is missing in our psyche that is likely due to effects of modern living styles.
Just mostly my opinion, with a little expert opinion mixed in.
I don't think it's entirely fair to judge people's general ability to live in isolation and avoid boredom based on how they handle isolation along with the increased stress of a Pandemic.
For me at least the added stress sucks away most of my creativity and motivation. Pretty sure I'm not the only one.
I would also argue that as we are inherently social animals there is added stress from having limited or no social interaction for extended periods and that very few people are able to withstand that kind of stress. Unless the draw faces on volleyballs and name them Wilson.
Some American poet, I think it was Thoreau, and an Antarctic explorer (Scott, I think) experimented with long term isolation. The net result was that both found that we human beings are social animals. We need socialisation -- some more than others obviously. Some of us have and will fair better with social distancing and isolation than others in much the same way some have a higher pain tolerance than others. Neither tolerance to pain nor isolation can be judged.
What I have seen is that those who are socially involved on the internet with discussion groups or forums such as this are able to cope better. The simple capacity to electronically express and share thoughts and interests, feelings, beliefs, and information becomes a surrogate form of socialisation.
azkid (August 3rd, 2020)
Didn't mean to come across defensively, sorry. Just wanted to discuss the odd circumstances of this sort of isolation. Certainly interesting how differently people handle the isolation, stress, boredom, etc.
Following up on some posts I see I made earlier in this thread.
I have canceled both Amazon Prime and Netflix. Turns out I'm not really that interested in watching movies or TV content. I get Internet from the cable company, but without any TV, and I live in a kind of black hole for reception. A couple of times a week, I look through my DVDs and sometimes watch something. I'm part way through season 2 of Twin Peaks right now. I also watched a VHS tape for the first time in years. I didn't really expect the player to work, but it did. It's lucky that I hadn't kept batteries in the remote, or they would surely have leaked all over by now.
I read a fair amount, although not that much at a stretch. I've taken out Robert Burton's The Anatomy of Melancholy again, determined to get through the rest of it this year. Only 300 pages left. But I tend to be in the middle of several books at once, including some lighter reading. Although the "Anatomy" is not really all that melancholy.
Online chess, yes, a fair amount of that, mostly at slower time controls amounting to correspondence chess. Since many tournaments have been canceled, and many more probably will be, I was hoping that more tournaments would move online. The World Open this year was held that way, but I had to work that weekend. And the New York State Championship is coming up, but it's a bad weekend for me, although not impossible. But I'm getting in some games.
Lots and lots of drawing. Leaving aside the question of whether I'll ever be any good at it, I think it's helping me appreciate what real artists can do. It's frustrating, challenging, and absorbing.
Walking every day, usually for just over an hour. I seem to be lighter and faster than I was. I live in a good area for it, especially when I go very early in the morning, with few others around.
It's not exactly a pastime, not being something I do every day, but I've learned to cut my own hair. Should have done that years ago.
Oh yes, and I'm still working full time, not from home, either. So that certainly fills in some time. I'm taking the week after next off, though. Not going anywhere, but I have plenty to do that amuses me. I'll see some friends, and we'll decide whether we want to go to some of the few places that one can go, or just sit around and talk. And I can read and draw on my own schedule, not fit it in around work.
And of course, there's spending time on online forums talking about one's hobbies.
"If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing badly."
G.K. Chesterton
I’m less alone than usual these days because my wife is nearly always with me. I used to go out on my own, to the library say, but these days, never. It’s the same with her. I need solitude to write, so my output has nosedived.
House chores have dramatically increased filling my time this month, so there's not much time for boredom. I bought a used mason's scaffold to get up high. The seller wasn't wearing a mask when I arrived, but we were distant. This week, a guy came to the house with his thickness planer to shave 35 years of stain off 400+ feet of mahogany facia boards that I pulled from the house. He wasn't wearing a mask; neither was I. We were somewhat distant, but I did forget half the time. My son wore a mask and goggles 'cause he was downstream of the planer's sawdust. Anyway, I'm not bored. I write my postcards and letters when not working on the house. And cook.
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azkid (August 24th, 2020)
My online French classes begin today via Zoom. I'll still be watching my 3 and 5 year olds during this, but I sent a polite email in French to my professor, already pleading for forgiveness for any disruptions
I run and rollerblade when I can, play/write songs, and clean the house (aka shoveling during a snowstorm.) Painting and new carpets upstairs soon, so that will block out several days. I didn't garden as much this summer. We did more flowers than veggies, but everything looks nice still! Next year I want to redo the bed along side our house and fence our yard in. One thing at a time, Emily...
Can't get to the shooting ranges to actually get more practice so I've been pulling out some of the guns that I haven't shot in a long while and doing full strip downs and parts inspection. Surprisingly I've found very few real issues and so it's been more like giving them a Spa Day.
The latest projects have been a couple old 22LR that I've owned since forever. Once is a JC Higgins (Sears brand) model 42 that was made by Marlin and was made in 1959. The other I got right after getting married in late 1967 or early 1968 and is a Savage Springfield model 187M.
The old JC Higgins Model 42:
The Model 42 is a bolt action magazine (7 round) fed rifle with a 20" barrel. I remember walking the woods in the Cactoctin mountains with it going "hunting" but never really killing anything. I never carried any extra ammunition and most days returned without even firing a shot. The day would end by setting up a target against the massive wood pile and emptying the magazine.
The Savage Springfield with my Savage Model 1907 pistol that was made in 1913:
The Savage was a more advanced model; a semi-automatic. With the Model 42 you had to manually work the bolt to eject a spent cartridge and load a new one but the Savage ejected the spent cartridge and loaded a new one in an unusual motion. When you pulled the trigger o fire the gun the bot flew back, pulling out any spent cartridge but it stayed back until you relaxed the trigger that allowed the bolt to slam forward loading the next round. That mechanism produced a distinct sound of Click the Clack as the action worked. The Savage rifles that used that mechanism were generally called "Click/Clacks" or Gill guns from the openings just behind the firing chamber that helped expel the hot gasses and the dirty powder remains so common with the ammo of the period.
Instead of a magazine the Savage was tube fed. A long tube below the barrel held 15 rounds of ammo and an inner tube with a spring and plunger kept pressure on the rounds to push the next round in place to get loaded.
The old rifles are quite different from many modern ones with the wood stocks and long barrels and much heavier weight but the basics, magazine or tube fed, bolt or semi-automatic are still the norm.
The two rifles had their Spa Days and except for one minor issue with Savage that mysteriously cleared up spontaneously are pretty much ready for when I feel comfortable getting back out to a shooting range or ranch country.
But then...
I was just kinda surfing YouTube and there was a video of a young guy teaching his little sister how to shoot a 22lr rifle and they were using one just like the very first rifle I ever shot. I hadn't thought about that in many many decades yet the memory of that day suddenly was as crystal clear as if it really were just yesterday rather than well over 60 years ago. I was probably 10 or 11 years old and the gun belonged to either the father or big brother of one of my friends. It was summer and we were at his farm and the rifle was new and we were going to be allowed to shoot it but first we had to learn how to handle it safely; how to safely carry it, how to put the safety on and how to switch to fire mode, how to load and safely unload it, what to do is there was a problem and the all important rules. Only when we could repeat and demonstrate all those things were we allowed to shoot.
The rifle itself was another Sears model, a JC Higgins Model 28. Like my later Savage it was tube fed and was a semi-automatic. The charging handle (the handle that you use to manually cycle the bolt) was on the left side. Since that was the first rifle I'd ever held it seemed normal at the time. We spent most of the afternoon shooting at a cardboard box way at the other end of the field and it was exciting and utterly wonderful.
Memories. Fleeting but sometimes...
Sure enough, I found one for sale and for sale at a dealer I've had good luck with in the past. A little more online research and I learned just how unusual a find that was. That particular model had only been made during a six month period in the second half of 1951. A few phone calls and emailing a copy of my Curio & Relic license and photo id and the JC Higgins Model 28 was headed my way. Hopefully it will get here mid week and I'll begin to give it a Spa Day.
There's one remaining mystery though.
On this particular rifle there are what seems to be canine bite marks on the stock.
I bet that one of you good folk recognize this rifle and can fill in the rest of the story about those bite marks.
Last edited by jar; August 24th, 2020 at 08:05 AM.
it is great idea
The stinkbugs are back with a vengeance with the temperature change in my region. Their low-pitched airplane-like buzz as they fly across rooms inside the house (how do they get in?) will be a distraction for a little while. At least they're herbivores and have no interest in my blood. I will have to gather some plastic bottles and LED lights to make traps...again.
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