The Song Fight Bulletin Board

Hey guys, what's up?

It's been a busy week for me. Last Sunday night, I sprained my ankle. Tending to it ate up the rest of my evening. After going to the doctor and spending the rest of the day hobbling around on crutches, I felt too wiped out when I got home on Monday evening to do any recording. Tuesday, I recorded bass and drums for my "Cut It Out," and then finished it with a new vocal take on Wednesday morning, just as it was due.

At the same time, my wife got really sick Tuesday night, and stayed that way until last night. She described it as stabbing pains in her stomach, accompanied by bathrooms trips every couple of hours. Wednesday morning she called in sick and told me, "Well, I guess I better go to the doctor." Allyson hates going to the doctor, so when she volunteers, you know something's wrong. They gave her some meds and told her to drink a lot of club soda or tonic water.

Finally, I posted several weeks ago about the death of my friend Reesa. Due to some friction between her husband and her blood family, no formal funeral was ever scheduled. Tomorrow afternoon is a memorial gathering for all of her friends - probably the closest thing we'll ever get. There will be some people there whom we haven't seen in a long time, so I'm kind of looking forward to it, but that feels kind of weird, to be looking forward to a funeral. I don't know...

By the way, crutches suck. I miss walking my dog.

Question of the Weekend: What is your preferred method of winding down on a Friday night after a really long week?

Dude, you didn't answer your own question, unless you wind down with crutches, which is kind of weird, or you're sharing Allyson's meds.

Sex, drugs, and rock n' roll.

Alcohol and video games.

Friday nights we have a standing date with a couple from Decatur. It started as a way to watch True Blood, and then Game of Thrones since Tabby and I don't have HBO. At the moment, we've moved on to weekly Pathfinder game. It's pretty great, since we always have a nice dinner together before TV or gaming and the whole shindig is definitely just as much about having a nice time with friends as anything else.

I took the after noon off after a car trip to a client to meet with people not even involved in the process I'm analyzing. Hate that. But my wife had a procedure yesterday morning which will hopefully reveal not bad things, and so today we walked in the rain, had two Weiss beer and a fabulous meal, walked home and now just kicking back. One kid is in San Francisco and the other still out with a friend. I haven't wound down like this is a really long time, so we're taking notes.

This was a really long week for me. I finally ended up rewriting a subsystem in my project that had been plauging us for a while (having been written in a hurry on one platform and then shoddily ported to several other platforms over its lifetime). The new system is of course cleaner, smaller, much more stable, but also somewhat incomplete.

Right now I'm watching movies, for work. Fortunately they're movies I'd been meaning to see anyway.

I do not wind down. I'm too hard to wind back up.

I like to log into Songfight and read about other peoples various illnesses and injuries

Those of us in the restaurant industry have the pleasure of having a completely backwards work week, Thursday being our "Monday", and often times a Monday-Tuesday "weekend". Often times my schedule is completely at the whim of how many tests the college students I work with have this week, or who decided that they HAVE to drive to some foreign land to see lady gaga or some other such nonsense. Either way, after walking 4-5 miles a night, up and down stairs, balancing trays of food, I need to relax/unwind after work quite heavy, and quite often.

1.) my obvious first suggestion, one nice smacky of the wacky tabaccy. However, you don't strike me as one who partakes/is allowed to for work... So I will go on.
2.) remove your shoes as soon as you get in the house, slippers are optional. Change into "street wear" (or pjs if you get home around midnight like me) changing out of work clothes into something comfortable always helps me.
3.) talk about my day to a willing or unwilling listener. Vent/ask advice/talk smack/funny stories/gossip etc. Talking about my day helps me put it behind me.
4.) food. Nuff said.
5.) Internet/tv/magic cards/video game/book/any activity where I am sitting or in bed, and my mind can focus on one thing (or nothing) for a while. For some reason playing guitar/recording/practice is too much work though.

That's about it from me.

Come to think of it - Friday is the day I usually snort cocaine of the backs of my hookers rather than the front. You do need that rest from conversation from time to time.

on Friday nights, we like to try & get the internet connected. But ok, seriously, there's a "doggie social" on Friday, where everybody lets their monsters loose in a room, and they learn how to interact with dogs & people. Our dog gets "told off" A LOT by other dogs. Pinned by the throat, & held down until she quits being so nuclear. It is immensely satisfying.

qotd: The same method I always use to wind down on a Friday night after a long week, Jon. I try to take over the world.