Long time no news. Had to take care of my back problems, and that took quite a while and caused me to miss two concerts I really wanted to attend. Bummer. On a more positive note, I ended up having to take the train to work instead of driving (driving in slow-moving traffic is killer to my back and I wasn’t able to do it for quite a few days) and now I’m doing it out of pure pleasure.
Feels just like college days again, it takes around the same time as driving (at this time of the year at least, in the summer things are much different), but I get to read and enjoy the scenery during the train travel, something which I found out I sorely missed!
Christmas shopping was a mess though, having lost two weeks with the no-driving situation and so I ended up doing it in the middle of the hordes of other shoppers –which sucked big time!–, but in the end I managed to get everything done and wrapped up with a few days to spare (even if I had to end up skimping a bit on what I had planned to get people. Oh well, it’s the thought that counts).
Christmas this year is not a very cheerful occasion for me (and I’ve actually been scolded for this, go figure!), but I must say I did enjoy sending my friends their christmas cards –very much indeed. I sent them right after I got back from London, in the very first days of December, so people who wanted to send cards back to me already had the address when they got around to it (moving has more drawbacks than one thinks off at the beginning).
Having delayed the traditional viewing of the Nightmare Before Christmas (I was foolishly waiting on a miracle which, obviously, didn’t happen), I must say it was a delight to do it this evening, especially after installing the most expensive cable I have ever bought (my old HDMI cable was screwing up the DVD-to-TV signal rather badly). The picture quality in my system is now at it’s top and I am indeed pleased with it.
By now I’m actually able to sing along to almost all of the songs from the movie and it was really rather fun to curl up in the sofa, with a nice fresh pot of Earl Grey and let me get carried away to that most strange place. Good times!
Oh and this morning I felt like trying to run (more like jog, actually, I’m not that fast a runner) to see if my back could take it already and I was pleasantly surprised that I was actually in pretty good shape. I ended up doing about 10Km (twice up-and-down the Estoril beach walk)! Listening to Iron Maiden’s “Live After Death” (one of my most recent purchases on CD) helped. That album still has it after all these years. Pure energy!
I’m also trying to stay active in other fronts and so I’ve released another episode of the Undercover Songs podcast. Thirty-six episodes (thirty-seven if you count the pilot) and counting…
And I miss my shows. The Writer’s Guild strike is messing things up pretty badly. I find myself missing “Men In Trees” for crying out loud! And it was just nasty, leaving things on such a cliff hanger. The guy is lost at sea, how long can he last if the story doesn’t move forward?! :-)