Stress Week; Happy Weekend
Nov. 7th, 2020 06:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shannon_aI started the week running on fumes. That was due to my hike with L. last Friday and my podcast that I did for Wandering DMs on Sunday. They were both entirely fun events when they happened (which is why I did them), but before they happened they were set points on my schedule that raised a little anxiety.
Here's the funniest bit of why the hike was a little anxious in advance: because we were going to meet up at the Arboretum, and I knew I wouldn't have cell coverage up there, so there was no way to communicate if there was a problem. You know, it was like it would have been for *ANYONE* doing any hike together 20 years ago!
Anyhow, that all meant that last week felt less relaxing than usual, and then we tumbled into ELECTION WEEK.
I've had an adversarial relationship with presidential elections in recent years. I generally figure out how to get the heck away from my computer for the day.
This year, I didn't want to interrupt my regular tech-writing work schedule so instead I decided I would just do my regular work day from 7.30-3.30, and stay away from media. And, that worked. I kept my nose down and pushed through my Blockchain Commons work. It went great until Apple started sending my notifications at 3pm that the polls were closing.
So, after I knocked off work and before I did anything else, I couldn't help but look at how things were going ... and Florida was already slipping away from us. It felt like a repeat of 2016, where we saw Florida, Georgia, and North Carolina all slip away in the early evening, and then the Blue Wall of the Midwest fall in the late evening, naming a malignant narcissistic sociopath to the presidency.
My plans for the afternoon were also spoiled, because I was going to go do yard work for an hour or an hour and a half, but it was raining, so instead I went straight to the next step: I took my laptop and my Fire out to the pavilion on the golf course without my cell phone. There, I read some comics, played some Wingspan, organized the next chapter of The TSR Codex V2, and tried not to think too much about the potential crumbling of our democracy. I stayed out until almost sunset.
When I got home, I called out for pizza, looked a bit more at the results, which were increasingly undecided, got the pizza, then watched Hamilton for the next two and a half hours, the first 20 minutes of which I was joined by Kimberly, before she decided it really wasn't her thing. She didn't even make it to A Winter's Ball / Helpless / Satisfied, the high-point of the first act!
So, Hamilton. I've listened to it any number of times on my computers, my phone, and through Amazon Music, but this was a first viewing. It brought much of the show into better focus, and was wonderful to see.
Part of that wonder was being able to see the marvelous staging of things like the rewind in the Winter's Ball sequence and the Philip Hamilton duel ("Blow Us All Away" / "Stay Alive").
But actually seeing the actors on stage really helps to connect all the dots.
I appreciated the humor a bit more in songs like "Farmer Refuted" and "You'll be Back" and was surprised how much humor there was in other parts of the play. I'd never realized that a lot of laugh lines were just that.
I understand better how Hamilton isn't presented in an entirely positive light: that his "Not throwing away my shot" refrain often feels desperate and dogmatic and that it's very selfish. That seems particularly true when Washington asks Hamilton to return, somewhere amidst "That Would be Enough" / "Guns and Ships" and it's obviously a contest between Washington and Eliza for Hamilton's loyalties, but Hamilton then storms off on his own, not directly joining Washington.
And Burr, wow, he comes across as a stalker. Through the soundtrack alone, it's easy to think he's mostly off-stage, but when you see him actually giving all the narration, it's more obvious how obsessed he is with Hamilton and his success, and the biting nature of much of that narration suddenly clicks into place.
I also suddenly met James Madison as a separate character.
Also, the same actress playing Peggy Schuyler and Maria Reynolds? Ick! Though that "ick" might partially be because Peggy comes across younger on the soundtrack.
I was somewhat surprised to see how much the play really jumps straight from song to song without anything between, but I was even more surprised by the one thing I noticed cut from the soundtrack, which is the letter from Lawrence's father about his death. I'd always been puzzled by the "I died for him" statement in "Alexander Hamilton", and I can't believe that if they were going to cut a minute from the soundtrack, that's what they chose.
Overall, a wonderful experience, and as planned a distracting one.
By the time I went to bed, Fox had called Arizona (in what turns out to have been a premature call that reflected their poor understanding of the remaining ballots, a recurring patterns at the big networks, while internet analysts totally got it right). So, the election was looking a bit more positive.
Still, Wednesday felt like a hazy day as I fought through a day of very scattered, small Blockchain Commons work. I can't say I really recall the evening after that, but fortunately on Thursday it was increasingly clear that Biden would be the winner, because he was running far enough ahead in the vote-counting in Pennsylvania.
Seriously, though, f*** a bunch of Republican legislators in the Midwest who blocked mail-in vote counting prior to election day (and in some cases after it). They purposefully created a multi-day spectacle that put an extreme strain on the entire fabric of America. And they did so hoping to somehow finagle that into an illegitimate victory, where they could reinstall King Don solely based on the votes that they chose to count first.
It was raw political game-playing at its worst, and it exerted a heavy toll on America, whose full repercussions we have yet to see.
On Friday, I decided to head out to Mahaulepu, my most-quiet, least-stressful possible day out (trading it for my usual hiking day on Saturday, not because of the electoral stress, but because the forecast was looking increasingly rainy starting on Saturday, and I wanted to make sure that my relaxing day out wasn't spoiled).
It was great getting out, away from everything, and relaxing, as planned. And, I actually got a lot of work done, mostly finishing up two of my Designers & Dragons updates for November (one of which is already sent out, the other of which is scheduled).
And this morning the networks finally had the balls to make the call. I mean, I feel like it had been inevitable since Thursday, but it was still good to hear.
And the celebrations all over the world, wow. Crowds out on the streets, fireworks and bells ringing in Europe like it was the end of WWII.
Wow.
We'll see what 2021 will bring.
Here's the funniest bit of why the hike was a little anxious in advance: because we were going to meet up at the Arboretum, and I knew I wouldn't have cell coverage up there, so there was no way to communicate if there was a problem. You know, it was like it would have been for *ANYONE* doing any hike together 20 years ago!
Anyhow, that all meant that last week felt less relaxing than usual, and then we tumbled into ELECTION WEEK.
I've had an adversarial relationship with presidential elections in recent years. I generally figure out how to get the heck away from my computer for the day.
This year, I didn't want to interrupt my regular tech-writing work schedule so instead I decided I would just do my regular work day from 7.30-3.30, and stay away from media. And, that worked. I kept my nose down and pushed through my Blockchain Commons work. It went great until Apple started sending my notifications at 3pm that the polls were closing.
So, after I knocked off work and before I did anything else, I couldn't help but look at how things were going ... and Florida was already slipping away from us. It felt like a repeat of 2016, where we saw Florida, Georgia, and North Carolina all slip away in the early evening, and then the Blue Wall of the Midwest fall in the late evening, naming a malignant narcissistic sociopath to the presidency.
My plans for the afternoon were also spoiled, because I was going to go do yard work for an hour or an hour and a half, but it was raining, so instead I went straight to the next step: I took my laptop and my Fire out to the pavilion on the golf course without my cell phone. There, I read some comics, played some Wingspan, organized the next chapter of The TSR Codex V2, and tried not to think too much about the potential crumbling of our democracy. I stayed out until almost sunset.
When I got home, I called out for pizza, looked a bit more at the results, which were increasingly undecided, got the pizza, then watched Hamilton for the next two and a half hours, the first 20 minutes of which I was joined by Kimberly, before she decided it really wasn't her thing. She didn't even make it to A Winter's Ball / Helpless / Satisfied, the high-point of the first act!
So, Hamilton. I've listened to it any number of times on my computers, my phone, and through Amazon Music, but this was a first viewing. It brought much of the show into better focus, and was wonderful to see.
Part of that wonder was being able to see the marvelous staging of things like the rewind in the Winter's Ball sequence and the Philip Hamilton duel ("Blow Us All Away" / "Stay Alive").
But actually seeing the actors on stage really helps to connect all the dots.
I appreciated the humor a bit more in songs like "Farmer Refuted" and "You'll be Back" and was surprised how much humor there was in other parts of the play. I'd never realized that a lot of laugh lines were just that.
I understand better how Hamilton isn't presented in an entirely positive light: that his "Not throwing away my shot" refrain often feels desperate and dogmatic and that it's very selfish. That seems particularly true when Washington asks Hamilton to return, somewhere amidst "That Would be Enough" / "Guns and Ships" and it's obviously a contest between Washington and Eliza for Hamilton's loyalties, but Hamilton then storms off on his own, not directly joining Washington.
And Burr, wow, he comes across as a stalker. Through the soundtrack alone, it's easy to think he's mostly off-stage, but when you see him actually giving all the narration, it's more obvious how obsessed he is with Hamilton and his success, and the biting nature of much of that narration suddenly clicks into place.
I also suddenly met James Madison as a separate character.
Also, the same actress playing Peggy Schuyler and Maria Reynolds? Ick! Though that "ick" might partially be because Peggy comes across younger on the soundtrack.
I was somewhat surprised to see how much the play really jumps straight from song to song without anything between, but I was even more surprised by the one thing I noticed cut from the soundtrack, which is the letter from Lawrence's father about his death. I'd always been puzzled by the "I died for him" statement in "Alexander Hamilton", and I can't believe that if they were going to cut a minute from the soundtrack, that's what they chose.
Overall, a wonderful experience, and as planned a distracting one.
By the time I went to bed, Fox had called Arizona (in what turns out to have been a premature call that reflected their poor understanding of the remaining ballots, a recurring patterns at the big networks, while internet analysts totally got it right). So, the election was looking a bit more positive.
Still, Wednesday felt like a hazy day as I fought through a day of very scattered, small Blockchain Commons work. I can't say I really recall the evening after that, but fortunately on Thursday it was increasingly clear that Biden would be the winner, because he was running far enough ahead in the vote-counting in Pennsylvania.
Seriously, though, f*** a bunch of Republican legislators in the Midwest who blocked mail-in vote counting prior to election day (and in some cases after it). They purposefully created a multi-day spectacle that put an extreme strain on the entire fabric of America. And they did so hoping to somehow finagle that into an illegitimate victory, where they could reinstall King Don solely based on the votes that they chose to count first.
It was raw political game-playing at its worst, and it exerted a heavy toll on America, whose full repercussions we have yet to see.
On Friday, I decided to head out to Mahaulepu, my most-quiet, least-stressful possible day out (trading it for my usual hiking day on Saturday, not because of the electoral stress, but because the forecast was looking increasingly rainy starting on Saturday, and I wanted to make sure that my relaxing day out wasn't spoiled).
It was great getting out, away from everything, and relaxing, as planned. And, I actually got a lot of work done, mostly finishing up two of my Designers & Dragons updates for November (one of which is already sent out, the other of which is scheduled).
And this morning the networks finally had the balls to make the call. I mean, I feel like it had been inevitable since Thursday, but it was still good to hear.
And the celebrations all over the world, wow. Crowds out on the streets, fireworks and bells ringing in Europe like it was the end of WWII.
Wow.
We'll see what 2021 will bring.