Publicat la 2 iulie 2017

De scris. Descris.

Am remarcat o marcă de instrumente de scris care te duce cu gândul la o descriere, dar al cărei nume nu te îndepărtează de instrumentele pe care le produce.


Acum am de scris. Așa am convenit: vorbim mai puțin și scriu mai mult.

Cam dificilă această situație în care eu trebuie să vorbesc mai puțin. „Mai puțin înseamnă mai mult”, atât în sensul minimalismului arhitectural, cât și în situația de față: să tac mai mult.

Un deziderat mai vechi, dar aplicat lamentabil. Am ajuns să tac când nu era cazul. Ajunsesem să tac atunci când ar fi trebuit să vorbesc, poate, mai mult.

Ar trebui să fiu mulțumit, având în vedere timpul ce mi s-a oferit pentru a fi dedicat scrisului. Dar ceea ce se presupune că ar trebui să aștern pe hârtie vine tocmai din conversațiile cotidiene, din aduceri aminte și din dialoguri de idei întrețesute, din sentimente, culori, mirosuri și sunete.

Mirosurile și muzica, cu sau fără versuri, percepute, înțelese ori pătrunse, dau avânt degetelor pe tastatura virtuală sau fac să alunece vârful dur al peniței cu păstrungă — și cu acel cerculeț mic, mic la capătul crestăturii — pe coala albă de hârtie sau pe cea crem a carnețelului de notițe pe care îl port în buzunarul din spate al borsetei din piele neagră.

Fără ele rămâne doar imaginarea lor.

Dar cum poți să-ți imaginezi un parfum? Cum?

Parfumul lui Süskind ar putea oferi răspunsul…


Emoția nu mai este aceeași. Nu mai poate fi aceeași.

Dar timpul se scurge în două sensuri, indiferent la singurul sens dat de ceasornicarii care au preluat această curgere de la umbra intangibilă a discurilor solare.

Timpul curge în favoarea celor care au un scop. Și tot el se scurge pentru cei care au lăsat fără voie ceva în urmă și la care nu se mai pot întoarce.

De la ea am aflat o vorbă a lui Lao Tzu despre viață și moarte care se potrivește cu această viziune asupra timpului:

Life and death are one thread, the same line viewed from different sides.

Așa și cu timpul.

E ca un drum cu sens unic. Putem privi înapoi fără a ne mai putea întoarce, dar putem privi înainte către țelul propus.

Dacă ne-am propus unul, vom merge motivați. Altfel, vom merge fără tragere de inimă, împinși de alții prin zonele aglomerate, ținuți și trași de mână de prieteni sau, poate, de binevoitori.

Keep walking!

Da, este sloganul unei băuturi spirtoase faimoase, dar este și îndemnul pe care l-am primit, îndemn pe care simt că trebuie să-l transmit, la rându-mi.

Ba nu!

Este îndemnul pe care trebuie să-l urmez! EU!

By Andrew Wooldridge

My latest game is a beat-'em-up. I grew up on Double Dragon, Streets of Rage and Turtles in Time, and I wanted to see whether that style could be rebuilt in three.js without a single sprite sheet.

Play Sister Circuit

The story

It's 2089 in Port Solace, a city of forty million owned outright by Aurex Dynamics. Juno Vega's little sister Mika is a gifted hacker, and Aurex has taken her. Her mind is the only one compatible with VANTA, the company's neural-link program. Juno breaks into an Aurex warehouse, steals the prototype VANTA-7 combat suit and starts fighting her way north to the Aurex Spire.

The suit talks. Its AI, ECHO, coaches Juno, teases her, and halfway up the city learns something about where it came from. I won't spoil it, but the last two boss fights aren't really about the corporation.

Pixel art, made in code

Like every game in the collection, this one has no image or audio files. The fighters start as a simple 2D skeleton: a pose is a dozen joint angles. A small rasterizer fills each limb pixel by pixel with an outline, three tones of shading and a little dithering, and the frames are baked into a texture when the game boots. Enemy colour variants, a boss's angry second phase and Juno's glowing Overdrive mode are all palette swaps on the GPU.

The streets are real 3D sets: rain-slicked storefronts, a maglev train, a lantern market, container docks, a bio-lab and a penthouse in a storm. They're drawn at 240 pixels tall and scaled up chunky, with a neon glow and optional scanlines. A separate skyline scene sits behind them for parallax.

How it plays

It has everything I remember from the arcade: four-hit combos, launchers and juggles, grabs with knees, throws and suplexes, enemies thrown into other enemies, and pipes and katanas lying in the street. The suit adds special moves and an Overdrive meter. There are seven stages and seven bosses, from a gang boss with hydraulic arms to a sword-wielding android with a counter stance. Between stages you spend the credits you've picked up on suit upgrades in a safehouse.

It plays on phones too, with a stick wherever your thumb lands plus four buttons, in portrait or landscape. Keyboard and gamepad also work.

Go get her back.

People say to me, Brendan, they say, you’re dissatisfied with Massachusetts’ leadership and say you want bold action, but you won’t say what you mean by that! What exactly do you want?

Well, I’m so glad you asked! Here are some things I would put forward if I were running for Governor.

We are in a climate emergency but our response hasn’t been urgent or bold. When climate disaster strikes, we’ll need to spend a lot of money to fix things, so let’s fix some things on the front end instead! I actually don’t think this should count as bold leadership as much as “the bare minimum required of competent leadership.”

• First and foremost: close Hanscom Field. It is unconscionable in a climate emergency that we operate an airport for private jets at public expense. If rich people want a private airport, let them build, staff, and maintain it. And then tax it at an incredibly high rate.

• Make all public transportation free in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Electrify the commuter rail. And run rail links from Worcester to Springfield. It’s absurd that the third biggest city in the Commonwealth is the only one of the 23 most populous cities inaccessible by rail. Ideally this line could stop in Amherst as well. Once again, it’s absurd that the flagship campus of the UMASS system is inaccessible by rail.

• This should do a lot to get unnecessary cars off the road in Massachusetts, but we can do more. Tolls should be put on 93 and 95 as well as on the Mass Pike. (I’d like to have special transponders for folks with mobilty or other physical challenges who have to drive that allow them to pay reduced tolls or no tolls at all.)

• Solar panels on every building owned by the Commonwealth. And on non-park property owned by the commonwealth as well. There’s a big solar array at the Framingham service area on the pike Westbound: where are the rest of them?

• Massive subsidies to get homeowners and other property owners off fossil fuels. Nobody should be burning oil to heat their home in 2026, and people using gas need to get off it. But we can’t leave this to individuals. The heat pump programs in effect are a start but are still out of reach for a lot of people. And why no solar subsidies?

• Masshealth for all. I’ve lost confidence that we will ever be able to get the federal government to provide health insurance for all citizens, but Massachusetts can and should be a model for how that can work. I’m not suggesting we abolish private insurance right away—let people who want private insurance pay for it. But we have a moral responsibility to offer no-cost health insurance to everyone in the Commonwealth.

• Proper ventilation for all public schools, K-University, in the Commonwealth. Keep everyone healthier and thereby improve attendance for both teachers and students and thereby have everybody get more out of school. I am actually dumbfounded that nobody is proposing this easy, common sense win for education.

• Raise the minimum wage to $30/hr.

• Baby box like they do in Scotland. Free period products like they do in Scotland. Free childcare like they do in Scotland. Hell, basically just look at Scotland and do as much of the stuff they’re doing as possible.

“Okay,” the liberals who don’t actually want this stuff will say. “But how are you going to pay for it?”

Well, first of all, this is a canard. Ten years ago, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and the City of Boston combined to offer General Electric Corporation 275 million dollars in public money to entice them to move to Boston, which, by the way, they never did. People like Deval Patrick were working to try to get hundreds of millions of dollars tax money funnelled to the IOC when Boston was bidding for the Olympics. The point is that when government wants to do something, it finds the money, and “we can’t afford it” is just a dishonest way of saying, “that is not something we want to do.”

But sure, I’ll play—we can institute a progressive income tax instead of the current flat tax. Single-payer health coverage will also save a lot of money—even just looking at the Commonwealth, it now employs people to adminster Mass Health and people to administer private insurance policies for Commonwealth employees. Getting cars off the road will mean fewer accidents, which will generate cost savings from a reduced need for first responders, tow trucks, and cleaning crews. It will also improve air quality, which will help people stay healthy and lead to less sick time, fewer hospital stays, etc.

Big ol’ tax on second and third homes. People who own vacation homes and empty tax-dodge condos in luxury high rises can afford to kick in some more for the public good.

Tolls and congestion pricing will add revenue, as would repealing the law that requires construction sites to have a police detail, a law that Massachusetts cops say is absolutely essential to public safety but exists almost nowhere else.

I’m not a public policy scholar. But I know these things are doable because they’ve been done elsewhere. And if any of these policies look like an unachievable dream, that’s an indictment of the United States, not of government policies that actually benefit ordinary people.

Life sort of went crazy this year. I’ve been doing art when I can, but:

• My dad died, yielding a trip across the country to settle his affairs. I was there for over a month, and drove home.
• I’m in the process of the world’s longest divorce. There’s not enmity there, just a different set of needs and wants from life, but extricating oneself from an almost 20-year relationship in healthy, no-hard-feelings kind of ways takes a weird amount of time and effort.
• I need to sell my house. There is painting to be done (so very different than on canvas or paper or wood!), repairs to be made, and “beautification” to be done before we can sell. Regretfully, the market in my town is saturated, and also, have you looked at things like interest rates and general economic stability lately. Sheesh.

All of this has made sitting down to paint, draw, or even doodle a bit more challenging.

But! I’ll soon be posting some photos – that, at least, was an accessible option while traveling. I recently started a foto.app account, so I’ll be hosting them there – the gallery is far easier to navigate than a blog-style posting. I’ll still be posting here, too – probably cross-referencing and whatnot.

I’ll be consistent someday, too. I hope. :)

Publicat la 2 martie 2017

Mă gândesc de cele mai multe ori la scris ca la o artă. Ceea ce scriu eu aici sau prin alte părți nu este nici pe departe artă, ci un alt mod de a mă exprima, un mod de a face uneori ceva cu timpul liber.

Multă lume scrie pe blog. Anii trec rapid, iar evoluția tehnologiei, în special în zona echipamentelor de calcul și a comunicațiilor, a făcut ca accesul la instrumentele necesare să fie din ce în ce mai ușor.

Și uite așa m-am abătut de la subiect — nu că aș avea o direcție foarte clară, dar intenționam să mă orientez spre scris — către tehnologie și marketing.

Revin.

Scrisul ar trebui să fie, poate, treaba absolvenților de litere și a pasionaților de literatură. Dar sunt și alții care vor să scrie sau simt că prin scris se exprimă mai bine decât prin alte metode de comunicare.

Rezultatul? Uneori remarcabil. Alteori apreciat.

De cele mai multe ori rămâne însă o simplă pagină de jurnal în nori, așa cum sunt și blogurile mele.

De multe ori mă întreb ce caut eu online. Ce rost au blogurile mele, în afară de a-mi satisface nevoia de a mă exprima în scris? Folosește cuiva ceea ce scriu?

Ceea ce am scris pe site-ul profesional, deși modest, am observat că a fost util unor navigatori interesați să-și completeze informațiile pentru câte un proiect sau să-și găsească turbina potrivită.

Astă seară, ascultând o selecție rock, mi-a atras atenția o piesă a formației Styx: Man in the Wilderness.

Voi sări peste traducere, deși știu sigur că un prieten îmi va reproșa că folosesc engleza în textele românești. Ba, mai mult, chiar voi cita aici și câteva versuri.

What kind of man have I become?

All of the years I’ve spent in search of myself

And I am still in the dark

Sometimes I feel like a man in the wilderness

Sometimes it makes no sense at all

Can’t find the meaning of it all

Ei bine, am zis „câteva”, dar m-am lăsat purtat de val.


Valuri. Undeva pe țărmul Atlanticului.

Mi se pare ciudat cum, uneori, dintr-o multitudine de posibilități apare ca din senin tocmai cea care are legătură cu propriile gânduri sau frământări.

Cam așa am remarcat și piesa de mai sus, din selecția pe care o ascultam în timp ce făceam cu totul altceva decât să caut o piesă anume.

E ca și cum acordurile sau versurile unei piese ar intra în rezonanță cu gândurile.

Poate e doar o coincidență.

Dar ce este aceea o coincidență? E oare ceva mai mult decât ne sugerează definiția?

Eu așa cred.

Cum se face că un eveniment, început la un moment întâmplător, poate avea anumite caracteristici care se potrivesc perfect cu un anumit gând dintr-o serie întâmplătoare de rememorări, conexiuni mentale și aduceri aminte?

Iar acestea sunt, la rândul lor, declanșate de un alt gând sau de un eveniment oarecare.

E oare posibil să fie atât de multe coincidențe?

Poate că, privind totul de la nivelul la care ne poziționăm, putem interpreta aceste intersecții ca pe niște coincidențe.

Dar, imaginându-ne că fiecare eveniment este o frântură dintr-un șir lung de evenimente succesive și continue, intersectate cu o mulțime de alte evenimente, am putea stabili o rețea de „coincidențe”.

O rețea ca o plasă de pești.


Și asta doar într-o proiecție plană.

Extrapolând într-o perspectivă spațială, tridimensională, vom obține o rețea de o complexitate inimaginabilă, asemenea creierului uman.

Deși eu mi-o imaginez mai degrabă ca pe o rețea mai rarefiată, nu atât de densă și compactă.

Și mult, mult mai extinsă, depășind cu mult orizontul nostru vizual.

O însumare a tuturor acestor rețele individuale.


Iar asta e doar perspectiva tridimensională, cea accesibilă modului nostru de a raționa și de a observa lumea înconjurătoare…

Și totuși, revenind la ideea de la care am pornit:

scrisul ca artă.


Se pare că subiectul „scrisul ca o artă” nu își găsește locul în această postare.

Sau poate că tocmai l-am găsit.

Pentru că, până la urmă, și gândurile sunt niște rețele. Iar scrisul este unul dintre modurile prin care încercăm să le facem vizibile.

Poate că blogurile mele nu sunt create pentru a adăuga o anumită valoare.

Ele sunt niște înșiruiri întâmplătoare de gânduri.

Ori de gânduri întâmplătoare.

There was a refreshing cool in the overcast morning air today, and the dew was chilly on my bare feet. I know better than to think it will last or that there will not be more hot weather; however, it gives me hope to feel the cool mornings and to hear the windchimes blow early in the day on the soft breeze, something they do not do during the heat of summer.

Autumn is coming, even to Southeast Texas.

#life

After a semi-writing break in September I’m back to my writing schedule: three posts a week, two on the following week, repeat. While taking a break is always good for writers the main problem is trying to get back into the writing habit. But it’s easy to overcome that.

First, make short posts with a paragraph at most or a sentence at least. Second, write your solutions as if you’re talking to a loved one face-to-face. Finally, don’t push your writing brain too hard. Take it slowly, one sentence at a time, until it becomes a habit again.

Hope that helps. Let’s go October!

#writing #advice #solutions

When one begins contemplating whether to share their anomalous experiences publicly, there are a number of questions it is wise to ask and answer prior to sharing. The first question is, of course, Should I? And there is no right answer to this question, as it is deeply personal and private for each person. But to those who are enthusiastic to open up and share, I strongly suggest caution and patience, for there are risks in such sharing that may not be immediately obvious, especially if blinded by the desire to reach outside of oneself in an attempt to find validation, understanding, or peace of mind.

For example, one's reputation is probably the most immediate personal aspect at risk. By exposing deeply personal experiences, such as those involving the anomalous, one will certainly be judged by society at large, including by family, friends, employers, coworkers, acquaintances, strangers, and so forth. Different people have different thresholds for how much or how little they value their privacy and their social reputation and capital. This is not a protest against sharing the anomalous, but a caution to pause and consider what it might mean for the reaction of others who encounter an inner truth and, in turn, for the person who shares it. For in the eyes of others, especially those who cannot relate, these two things are one and the same.

Another example is the potential harm the sharing may cause the people close to them, such as spouses, best friends, parents, children, and so forth. Even if one doesn't care or worry about how the sharing might affect them directly, it's still wise to pause and consider the possible effects on the people they care about. Our modern, highly toxic society is filled with piranhas scanning the web for prey—fodder for their subscribers and views—and the personal story becomes blood in the water.

One more risk is that of digital permanence. The internet does not forget, meaning that when the potential chaos and social media feeding frenzy has finished, that personal exposure never really goes away. Years, even decades, may pass, and the story once shared, and the names and words associated with it, will forever be enshrined in the growing digital footprint of humankind.

As I mentioned, I'm not encouraging others who have anomalous experiences they wish to share to remain silent, but I am suggesting that some pause and deep thought be given to it—for themselves and the people they care about.

The question of “Should I?” is the important first question, but it certainly isn't the only question, because any question about should must also ask why.

#Intermundia #Excultio

---

By D. Bowman | Nomina Numina is a journal of my reflections, moments, and meaning-making between worlds. Reply by email.

Last time I read the longevity talisman as a portable eclipse: the sun above, the crescent below, and a line of stars between them, a sky the wearer carries on the body. This time I want to look at the two red arcs that curve down on either side of the moon. They are writing.

Look first at the letters. They are all the book's cipher characters, the same ones that fill its pages. The six-pointed star is A, and the sign that looks like a Greek phi is P. That P also tells us these are words spelled out in full, because a Greek alpha or omega has no P in it.

Read the left arc from the rim inward and it spells ALPHA. After the last A comes a little knot of crossed loops with a separate curl above it. That is the scribe's sign for et (“and”), the ampersand from the cipher key, and it sits between the names of spirits in the running text in the same form.

The right arc opens with a short trail of dots and then reads AGEMO, which is OMEGA written backwards. One small mark in the middle is faint, so I hold this reading a little less firmly than the left one. Still, no other word fits the letters.

AGEMO is how the book itself writes the name. In the blessing of the circle, where the text calls on the holy names one by one, OMEGA appears as AGEMO and ALPHA as APHAL, its letters shuffled. I wrote about this habit in an earlier post: the author was not content with the cipher alone and reversed or scrambled the sacred names on top of it. On the talisman the same hand writes ALPHA straight and OMEGA backwards. I do not know why the two arcs differ. The spirit names get the same treatment, and they will have a series of their own later.

Alpha and Omega, the first letter and the last. In Revelation it is a divine title, given in the first chapter and again in the last, and the Heptameron, which the Triangular Book seems to build on, has Alpha et Omega (“Alpha and Omega”) in the formula our book adapts for its blessing. The scriptural reading is the obvious one.

I have a second reading, and I offer it only as a suggestion. This figure draws an eclipse, and an eclipse has two ends of its own. The moon's path crosses the sun's at two points, the nodes, and an eclipse can only fall near one of them. French astronomers of the period called them la Tête du Dragon and la Queue du Dragon (“the Head of the Dragon” and “the Tail of the Dragon”). The book opens with its emblem, a winged dragon with a second small face at the end of its tail. On a figure of an eclipse, in a book badged with that dragon, the beginning and the end may also be the dragon's head and tail.

Next time: the three small gold letters at the foot of the figure. Two of them are clear. The middle one still has no agreed reading.

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JOURNAL 5 octobre 2026

Aujourd’hui on a aidé midori à rassembler les affaires de shieko. Elle ne veut rien garder sauf les photos et les petits cadeaux qu'elles se sont faits. Avec hayame elle se sent mieux chez elle, elle ne se sent pas prête encore à rester seule. On est allées tout donner à une association qui aide les jeunes femmes à la rue parfois mineures, on a fait aussi un don collectif au nom de shieko. Ne vous inquiétez pas pour nous, on se tient debout on s'aide on se voit quand c'est difficile. On va pas céder. On va pas faiblir. On va s'aimer encore plus fort.

Mon frère a téléphoné au juge qui lui a redit qu'il n'y a pas de crédits. Mon frère lui a même proposé de financer les frais de labo. C’est impossible et puis il y a aussi que ça a mobilisé trop de monde déjà, bref pas d'argent pas davantage d'enquête, même si la vraie famille le demandait et il a insisté sur vraie. Je ne commente pas ça. On va manger parce que la vie continue et que on va pas se laisser dépérir.

…

On va dormir, demain matin on se lève à 5:30 on travaille toutes. Midori aussi a décidé de reprendre son poste les médecins lui avaient prescrit 20 jours mais elle préfère pas, elle est très courageuse. On est là de toute façon toutes, on ne se séparera pas. On a un lien très fort maintenant et ça nous rend fortes. Ça n'a pas été facile de mettre les vêtements de shie dans des sacs mais il fallait le faire. Midori ne peut pas rester vivre dans un musée du souvenir. Elle a gardé les affaires de toilette et de maquillage, les papiers personnels, elle va les envoyer à sa mère seulement ce qui la regarde, de toute façon elle avait la plupart dans son sac... On a éprouvé une espèce de soulagement quand ça a été fini.

Mon frère a pris contact avec le temple pour qu’ils fixent la date de la cérémonie funéraire. La mère de shieko ne viendra pas elle ne veut pas nous voir.Son fils a réussi à la convaincre que tout était notre faute.

Le flic m'a envoyé une gentille lettre pour nous huit avec un mot personnel pour moi et une lettre formelle de condoléances à midori. Il a tout compris, lui, mais il ne peut pas faire plus, il le regrette énormément. Il a déposé sa demande de mutation. Je vous remercie au nom de la communauté pour tous vos messages, j'ai tout traduit on est très touchées.

#Shieko

On entend, de la chambre ou du couloir, la boucle morbide des nettoyeurs de l’abattoir, à plus ou moins vingt heures le passage du train des gens voyageant vers le Nord, et de quelques autres qu’on ne peut prévoir, chargés de vrac ou de gros caissons.

Dans le carré, mais débordant, un relief en demi-cercle de collines à larges flancs où des maisons disparates s’accolent au fil du temps, se touchent, tandis que les immeubles de standing, aux points les plus hauts, n’en vieillissent pas moins qu’elles. On note, du côté droit de l’œil, deux réservoirs d’eau, non loin d’où meurent les bêtes, quand à gauche il ne peut voir la tache bleue d’un groupe scolaire, sa laideur, ni la forme plus heureuse d’une villa en fortin. Sensiblement à la hauteur de soi, la portion du milieu est semée de bâtisses nouvelles, encore d’un gris ciment, sauf une, rose de porcelaine.

Sur les bords de la ravine, d’autres maisons s’étagent entre des manguiers. Dans l’un d’eux loge une colonie de hérons (Ardeola ibis) qui semble ne plus migrer, gardant par intérêt ou peut-être fidélité les bœufs dont on déterge, tout près, le sang. Jaillissent les éventails de plusieurs espèces de palmiers, dont l’inévitable Élèis de Guinée. [Quand l’œil regarde face à soi], le maigre stipe d’un aréquier divise l’image.

#Fenêtresurville #Didascalies

The chair is finally complete! It would seem that it was being assembled for Tiger's enjoyment all along.

Cairo's a big ass city, blessed not with one Ikea but two, one on each end. The one closest to me ran out of the chair's cushions a long time ago and wouldn't be restocking till next month. The other one had the cushions in stock, but when you order from Ikea's website, they only deliver from whichever branch is closest to you (...the fuck?). So I went ahead and trekked across the city to nab the damn thing myself and get it over with—And boy, it really is a big city. Felt more like making an out-of-town daytrip.

All I need now is a nice throw blanket and small pillow to make the setting complete (not sourced from Ikea as a small act of rebellion against the over-Ikeafication of spaces—says the man whose home is filled with close to 20 Ikea things).

#studio #cairo

I got around to trying the shoes on this weekend. I knew they were too big as soon as I saw them. I tried anyway because they were marked as the correct size. Unbeknownst to me, Vibram has changed its base pattern. I am saddened.

This new pair is simultaneously too long while also being extraordinarily difficult to get my feet into. The size difference is enough that my toes barely go into the toe section. My pinky toe does not make it. My heel shifts up and down as I walk. And my instep is not properly located. Because they have both narrowed and reinforced the opening so that it has zero give, I don't think I'd be able to get past the opening in a size down. It's really frustrating.

They've also made the shoes more narrow. There is no logic in doing that as it defeats the mechanics of someone who has spent years walking in such a manner. They weren't uncomfortable side-to-side once on, but using a shoehorn was a pain in the... posterior foot region. I think a size down would be too snug. Plus if the opening is never going to give, that would just get very annoying.

I am unsure what to do. I could possibly cut a notch into the opening of the smaller shoe, but that probably isn't a sound idea. Perhaps I could manage to cauterize the opening somehow, or stitch it. If it didn't work, it'd obviously make them non-refundable.

The thing is, that specific style is the only pair of boots or shoes that is comfortable for me to hike or walk distances in without taking a really painful toll on my body. The other styles I have just aren't made for it. Plus the shape of my feet has always made shoe buying a challenge. They've always been very petite, wide, and with extremely high arches, but now with my natural toe spread... I might be fucked. I don't walk in other zero-drop shoes because my feet tend to slide all over the place in them.

It's not the end of the world, but it's definitely a non-enjoyable variable in mine. I will figure something out at some point. Going back to “normal” shoes just isn't an option for me.

I've been awake all night, so I guess I'll take a nap for a few hours while the sleepies are hitting me. I really hope I can find a workaround. Other than that, it will surely be a most marvelous Monday. Let's see where and when today's dreams take me.

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