I’d been on with AI trying to get some apps installed and also to see if there was anything i could do to improve the sound quality of my speakers or to see if my speakers were somehow inferior as the sound on my old HP sounded a little clearer.  I finally accepted that my speakers were as good as it gets for this computer and I gathered that most computers in this price range would have a similar sound, so the old HP speaker difference must have been a special case, and, perhaps, in part, a function of my imagination.  But all that AI work meant tenseness in my neck even if I had my mouse lower than it was, so the nerve in my neck was acting up a little, although once I quite using my mouse so much, after a little while, the feeling improved a little.  I’d woken up thirty minutes late, squeezed in a couple cups of coffee before ten, switched to tea, and stuck with the tea, skipping my Dr. Pepper and the caffeine that goes with it.  I thought, maybe I can have a Dr. Pepper around one, still, but I still wanted something hot to drink, since soda tends to help me relax, but, in a way, also dilutes my focus.  In the long run I’d probably be having a Dr. Pepper around 11 or 12 and then switching back to tea and then, when it came time to watch TV, switching to soda.  This  meant that my consumption of Dr. Pepper and seltzer water was going to drop a lot—which was fine, and saved me a little money, and, I think, made it possible for the soda I drank while watching TV to have a little more of an effect.

    Well, several keys on my computer quit working, suddenly, and I had to get a new computer—which threw me way off for a couple days.  The night before last I didn’t sleep  more than about forty five minutes, if I was ever actually asleep.  The next day I spent a great amount of time on getting my new computer ready for me to use, and, finally, yesterday, having had only two cups of coffee and one Dr. Pepper, I slept most of the night.  Now I was back at my computer, having decided to get off it around 4:30 or even 4:00, and watch TV until 10:00 or so, and read for thirty minutes or so,  which left  me with about nine and a half hours of sleep—if I got to sleep, and slept alright, which, at this time, wasn’t guaranteed.  My neck injury was a real problem, so my Dad had given me a narrow table I could put beside my chair for using my mouse that was about six inches lower than the table my computer was on, which meant I wouldn’t have to put my neck and shoulder in such an awkward position when scrolling or otherwise using my mouse.  I could still feel it, now, as I typed, but I was doing everything I could, and the combination of making a more deliberate effort to keep my neck and shoulders relaxed, quitting earlier in the day, and using the new table, had to work.  I didn’t see why it wouldn’t.

    You prayed for me!  I did—I didn’t really know what to pray about, so I prayed that my creator would look out for her and protect her, that she would love me with all her heart, and that we would be together in a life to come, if not in this life.  I suppose I might’ve prayed for her to be happy, that she wouldn’t suffer too much—but I didn’t think about that on this particular prayer—I suppose, because, when I think of her, I imagine someone that is happy.  I’d also come to the conclusion that I might not be the greatest artist that ever lived, and that, besides, if that were to happen, then I would get there by doing my best to be happy, and living this life in way that others would want to emulate.  This realization seemed to come with my neck injury, and the impossibility of writing jazz and classical music—along with a general absence of motivation, for that, at least at this time.  Now that I’d backed off physics by at least a couple hours a day, I had more time on my hands, and I was finishing earlier.  So, just as, in the past, when I’d quit trying to study and create all the time, and I’d just been watching TV, with little attention to whether or not I was on track to become the greatest artist that ever lived—with attention, instead, paid to my state of mind (even if I was losing my mind)—I was thinking, now, that just being me would lead to great things—that doing “just that” would get me noticed in heaven, that simply being good, here, and happy, would make me, in heaven, the talk of the town.

    You didn’t pray for me.  It’s true, I’d forgotten to pray for her because I’d been so wrapped up in my own stuff.  I had gotten ready to watch TV by taking a hot shower, and I’d had, for the first hour, cold raspberry lime seltzer water instead of hot tea, and I’d felt much more relaxed and comfortable in my own skin.  But when it came time to go to sleep, I couldn’t sleep.  I don’t know if the shower made me think I was getting ready for a new day—and woke me up somehow, which is something, I hoped, would not continue to happen—that i would adapt, and get used to the new routine; it also seemed to have something to do with trying out sleeping naked again after a very long time, and discovering that, well, I couldn’t stop thinking about sex, and the fact that I had this bed all to myself.  So at some point that night, I can’t remember when, now, I put my boxer briefs back on, which helped, I think, to put me more in, “I need to go to sleep mode,” as opposed to, “I should be having sex mode.”  So, I’d decided to stick with my boxer briefs, for now, but I’d also decided to continue taking a shower, and hope I get used to it, as the relaxation benefits were noticeable.

    It was so hard to be happy watching TV, and tea didn’t exactly make me any happier.  Alcohol was out of the question, but I imagined having a glass anyhow, and it seemed that all that would do, given my state of mind, was make me angry and possibly go on a rant—even if nobody else was there.  Alcohol and I, in this life, anyhow, were a bad combination, and even a small amount, at this stage of my life, could lead to a horrible outcome.  So I quit thinking about that.  I thought, instead, maybe I’ll try taking a hot shower before I start watching TV at night.  That would shorten the amount of time I had to watch TV a little, and, hopefully, I’d feel refreshed, and more relaxed.  I remember, around the age of 20, living in the North Carolina mountains with my grandmother, for a few months, and reading romantic literature at night.  I was reading some letters by the poet John Keats, and, in one of them, he mentioned how washing up, as if preparing for the day or as if he was going somewhere, I imagine, refreshed him, and made it possible for him to go right back to his studies, and his work, and continue, even longer, and how he was pleased by this.  So, I thought, maybe something like that will work for me—except I’ll be trying to get away from the activities of the day—and just watch TV.  But I thought maybe it would be worth a try.  I prayed a little, too, to be happier while watching TV, since, in my opinion, watching a little TV every day is important.  If these were the old days, it would be like sitting on your porch, or sitting around a fire—essential relaxation time.

    I’d changed my mind about the speed of light and relativity, etc.  As eternal beings, it seemed to me we always, instantaneously, know the alphabet, and how to read and write, and so I concluded that all souls, and all we will ever discover, on earth, is available to us, and it always has been, both in the preexistence and the afterlife.  Therefore I concluded that we’ve always known the speed of light, that our knowledge of the 4D measurement has always been with us, just as we’ve always known the alphabet, and we always will.  I thought, too, if we forget about the experiment, we could turn to an acceptable AI and get the answer.  As such, I thought, “All will be revealed,” such that, all the mysteries of science would be revealed in the next life, that only our creations would be genuinely “new,” and that, furthermore, when it came to other languages, etc., I concluded that if we needed to speak it, if we were with someone that did, and wanted to, then we would be able to speak it, instantaneously, as if we’d always known it, even if we never learned it.  I decided all this to be true—that it made a little more sense than thinking we would constantly forget and relearn things, since, as I saw it, we always knew the alphabet, for example, and, therefore, we must have already known everything else we needed and wanted to know, too.  And if we chose to go back to a time without computers, then, for a time, we would do that by choice, and, having decided, as a community, to do without, we would.  But whatever knowledge we already had about computers, and the future, etc., would remain with us, and, when, as a community, we decided we needed a computer, and the internet, well, the technology would be there.