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My Day

Dear Diary! Today was not an interesting day again. Usual morning, in the afternoon I was studying, then my mom came in my room and said to me: “We are going to the gym now”. So we went to the gym.

In the gym, I didn’t feel so good. I had a new PB on the low-row. Otherwise, I was feeling kinda weak… In the end, I was working out for about one hour. After the gym, I quickly went to a friend of mine, who lives near there. He’s a player of my volleyball team. He just got injured this Monday (two days ago). He told me, that he probably just pulled a muscle, so it’s not too bad.

Afterwards I headed home, got back to studying, had dinner, studied some more, and then watched a few episodes of “The Mentalist”. And now I’m writing (to) you.

Feelings Stage

Today I was feeling better than two days ago, but not as good as yesterday. This morning (afternoon), while studying, the memory of my breakup with my ex-girlfriend popped into my head. Now, it’s not that uncommon, that I think of her (or rather have some memories of her), but this moment always hits pretty hard. It always blocks like all thinking, and then I have to be cautious, not to let my mind run amok. Today, I dealt with it, by changing the music, and paying extra attention to it.

Every time this memory pops into my head, I feel bad. Sometimes I think, I should not have broken up with her. But then I (try) to remember, that I wasn’t really happy with her. (This sounds really mean, I don’t mean it that mean)

Then she’s in my head, and I usually wonder, how she’s doing (with the break up). I hope she’s doing good. It was basically the last time I spoke to her… It was like 3-4 months ago, but yeah. I wonder if (or how often) she thinks about us (or me for that matter)… I guess, I’ll never know.

A friend of mine told me once, that she thinks, that men usually feel worse later, and women more like right after the break up. I wonder if that’s true.

Usually, people say, that writing/ talking about things makes them better or something like this. But I gotta say, I don’t really feel like that. (At least right now.) Now it’s just all more open and active in my brain, so the bad feelings feel way more real/ intense right now. But who knows, maybe that’s the best long term strategy(?).

Why so Sad?

Now that I write this, I think, this feelings based approach is maybe not the best, because like this, it always ends with a sad touch. But hey, I’ll think about it!

So, in order to end this on a positive note, I gotta write something good to end this day. Just gotta figure out what…

I think, one good thing that happened today, was that I just finished the second chapter (of three) in my studies. Ah, and of course, my brother made Fajitas for dinner, which is always nice.

That’s it for today. Maybe I have more to write tomorrow. See you then!

My Day

Dear Diary! Today was an even less spectacular day than yesterday. Basically, I woke up, ate lunch, watched some episodes of “The Mentalist” and studied, ate dinner, studied some more, and watched some more of “The Mentalist”.

In my honest opinion, I think I’m kinda addicted to watching series. Or rather, to not studying. I know, maybe I have just some bad discipline, but it’s concerning me a little. Today, I didn’t do as much as I wanted to, but hey, there’s always a tomorrow.

I started with a special way of studying and watching at the same time. As we know, I have to learn some definitions and “sentences”/ lemmas and I’m trying to remember them with flash cards. So I started with the scheme, where: Any time, there’s a time-jump in the show, I have to repeat like 7 flashcards. And I gotta say, there area a lot of these time-jumps.

Also, Sometimes, I feel as if I don’t make any progress whilst learning my definitions. But when I see the good colors on “anki.com” I get a little dopamine. And that’s good. (Speaking like an addict. haha)

More Thinking about You

I had one more Idea, of how to write it, so it would be interesting to read.

Idea 3: Progress updates
This would be, I try to change something about me, or pursue a goal, on which I then daily report. Now, while writing this, I realized, that it would have to be something, which I can do daily, otherwise a diary would not make too much sense.

The bad part about idea 3 is, that I don’t know, what I would change about myself… But Who knows, maybe I find something soon…

So for now, I guess, I still do (try to do) an approach of idea 2 (feelings and thoughts based).

Confessions from Yesterday

Yesterday, I said, that I would write more about my feelings and/or thoughts. Point being: I did not do that yesterday… which is kinda ironic.

Yesterday I was feeling kinda down. Lately I was feeling down a lot. Most of the time it’s not the worst. It’s mostly like, I’m not motivated to do anything. Like anything at all. For example, when I’m asked, if I want to go out with my friends, I don’t want to. On an unrelated note, I thought, I should drink less, so that’s not too bad… But my not-drinking is for the wrong reason, which in turn makes it also somewhat not-good…

I don’t really know why this is… I suspect, it’s (at least partly) because it’s winter, hence less sun, which is always kinda depressing. Also, since I’m studying a lot, I spend a lot of time alone. Which is always kinda lonely. Now don’t get me wrong. I don’t really mind, to spend a lot of time alone. But there’s a limit; obviously.

Usually, I can figure out how my mood is, from observing, what music I listen to. Right now, it’s quite uplifting, so It’s not too bad. And the days are getting longer again, meaning: Summer is coming!

Good night

Now that’s a depressing note for the end of this day. But I don’t really have anything uplifting up my sleeve. So

Don’t be too sad, and I’ll see you tomorrow!

My Day

Dear Diary! My day really starts at lunch, but you know that already, so I won’t write that here. After Lunch, I had an appointment with my physical therapist. I go there, because my knees aren’t as good as I wished. I mean, I always had knee problems (for the first time, when I was like 12/13 years old). Then the problems disappeared again. But I’ve been playing volleyball lately (for the last 7 years) and now they were worse again. But I’m making progress. I’m nearly ready to play again. It took only 1 year to recover…

Enough of my knee problems. After my physical therapy session I headed home and started studying. I managed to read about two lectures. After my study-session, I had dinner. We had some mixture of potatoes, pasta, cheese and beacon (all in one pan) which is always nice.

After dinner I had to go to volleyball practice. Sadly not as a player, but as the coach. This took quite some time, but it also was kinda fun. As usual I did not really prepare any drills but had more of a vague idea of what should happen. They said, the practice was good. Now I can live with that.

Thereafter I headed home, and got back to studying. I solved exercises, for about two hours, then I watched an episode of “The Mentalist”, and now I’m writing (to) you.
I guess, I’m gonna finish this entry, watch one more episode and then head to bed.

Thinking about you

I was thinking a little bit, about writing in my diary. In the sense of: What should I write here? I never read a diary, so I was wondering, but I haven’t got an answer ready. But I had a few ideas. Mainly:

Idea 1: What happened this day
This would be, as it is currently. I believe this to be the usual way that a diary is written. Then I thought, “why would anyone read this?” and to be honest, I don’t know. This then also begs the question “do I really need anyone to read this?” And my answer to this is: Not really. I mean, it would be nice, but in reality I’m doing this for myself.

Idea 2: What I was thinking about/ feelings
This is the more personal approach. I think like this it would be more interesting, but is it really? I don’t know for sure.

I once saw a YouTube video, where some woman bought a diary off of amazon and read it. She said, that it was really interesting, since it was like, you were in the head of the person writing the diary. And I must say, I think this is quite cool. At least it sounds kinda cool.

Now that I think about it, I’d guess, most people writing diaries, write about their feelings and so. Otherwise, why would it be private?

So I guess, I’m transitioning now. I believe until now, I was mostly writing in the style of Idea 1, but I guess I’ll change that now (slowly). I don’t know, how it will turn out, but we’ll see. I still want the “My Day” section, but maybe a little shorter. I guess we’ll find the/ a correct way.

Outro

On a separate unrelated note: I thought, I need an outro, or something of this sort. Always at the end of the day, I get to the point, where I don’t know what to write, and then it’s this awkward transition to saying goodbye. To change that, I think, a small and simple sentence to sum it up would be nice. Like in the movie “The Truman Show” (which I did not see), he always ends his shows with

Good morning, and in case I don’t see you, good afternoon, good evening and good night!

and I think, this is a really good (and catchy) outro-like text. So something like that would be nice. (I’m not entirely sure, that I use this quote in the correct context, but to me this seems right.)

What should it sound like? I think, an uplifting good bye, maybe a thanks for reading (probably not – since, I always think it’s weird to write something like this), a see you tomorrow. A pun or rhyme would be catchy I think, so maybe something with that.

But now, dear Diary, I’m feeling tirey.
See you tomorrow!

My Day

Dear Diary! Today was not an eventful day. My morning was as usual. In the afternoon a friend of mine asked me to play some Trackmaina (racing game) which I agreed to. At first, I told him, that I’d quit at around 3:30pm to go to the gym. But then, I hadn’t achieved the time I desired (in game – I was too slow) and my gym schedule got shifted back like 15 minutes. Some time later I got it, changed, went to the toilet, and then I realized, it was already too late. My gym closes at 4pm (on Sundays) so I wouldn’t make it in time anymore.

Then I called the same friend again. We both have some friends in common, which sent us Christmas-cards some time ago. Both of us are somewhat (really) lazy, so I knew, ha hadn’t answered them [haha].
We then wrote 2 cards back together. One card was a serious one, with a good picture of us. The other one, was a joke card, where we put distorted pictures of them and wrote silly jokes on the back. I’m curious, what they’ll say, once they get the cards.

Later, for dinner, I had potatoes. Since I don’t like potatoes just as they are, I usually put some dressing and cheese on top of them, and then make a potato salad out of them. Completely different meal.

After dinner I was studying for some more (but not as much as I had hoped). I still got quite far. I also calculated, that if I can do a weeks work in two days, I’ll be finished at the right time.

That’s about it. Not much more happened… In the next few days it’ll be about like that. So I think I’ll start to read the “Tao Te Ching” soon, so I have something to talk about. With that being said.

Good Night!

My Day

Dear Diary! Today my family and I visited one of my mothers best friends. She lives like an hour away from us. She just moved in with a friend of hers and now they share an apartment. I also realized, that women generally have prettier apartments than men [haha]. It was really nicely decorated, like with lots of paintings, Christmas decor, and so on.
Her apartment was in an older house. They had 2 stories, which is always nice. They also had a hammock, which I thought was really cool. I used to have one of those, but not anymore ):

Factory re-utilization

Anyway. Nearby her apartment used to be a machine-factory. Some years ago, the owners (as well as their business) moved to another city. Then the people living there, were wondering, what to do with all this empty space. At first, some wanted to move in, but that’s not really viable. Then they came up with a really good idea. Namely: Nowadays you can rent some smaller parts of the big factory, and have your very own shop/business there. There were lots of smaller shops like:
– a brewery
– a climbing hall
– some restaurants
– a child day care special
and lots more. It was really nice. She told us, that in summer times, a lot of plants would flourish and it’d be a lot greener. Unlike now, when it’s all cold and grayish.

Neat puzzle

My mom’s friend also showed us some puzzle. You start out, with some oddly shaped pieces, and a board. On the board, each field had either a Month, or Day written on. (For example the first three squares were “Jan”, “Feb”, “Mar”; and the last few were “28”, “29”, “30”, “31”.) Then, the goal of the puzzle was, to solve it in a way that only the two correct fields were visible. For example, today “Jan” and “4” would have stayed visible after solving.
This means, every day a new puzzle to solve. Apparently this is possible with the given set of pieces, which I think is really cool. 365 different puzzles in one puzzle.

Otherwise, not a lot happened today. I studied for a little, but was mostly too tired to focus. I also read one more lecture, so tomorrow I have to read one more, and then solve some exercises.

Dear Diary! I don’t know, what to write here, so …

My Day

Today was nothing spectacular (mostly). I woke up this morning, at 7am, because I had a nightmare. This was unusual. I don’t really have nightmares.
I dreamed, that I was Patrick Jane (from “The Mentalist”) and saw Red John (the main enemy from the show) approaching. I was unarmed and then fight or flight kicked in. Not really though… I just froze up, and couldn’t do anything. Now I was stressed, because I knew, he’d try to kill me. Not the best experience, you know. This lasted till I woke up (no shit – ironic). I quickly realized, that it was only a dream. But you know how it is. My brain was not really getting it, and still thought I was Jane, so I tried (just like Jane) to calm myself down. I’m not sure, but I think I even tried to hypnotize myself to calm down. So my brains impression of Jane was not too bad, I have to say.
This cycle happened like 3 times. Realize I’m not Jane -> try to calm myself down -> get tired -> think I’m Jane -> back to the beginning. In hindsight this is really funny. Not so much in the moment though.

Sooner or later I finally got back to sleep again and then my usual morning/ daily routine kicked in. Get up, eat and start to study. Then, at 3:15pm I went to the gym, for the first time this year. Which is already a good achievement.

In the gym, I had a first. I was squatting. At first I had 80kg on my shoulders for 12 reps. This felt good, so I tried 5kgs more on each side. The next set felt okayish. I only got to 8 reps, so that’s okay. Last set: once again with 90kgs on my shoulders. First four repetitions felt good. Then in the fifth i realized, I leaned too much forward. But I wanted to do at least 8 reps. I go down for the sixth, and… Damn. I can’t do it any more. Just throw the weight off.
My first real set till muscle failure. I don’t feel too bad about that. It was not to bad to get the weight off, since there were bars, for this exact reason. I tell you: without those, it would not have been fun!

Back from the gym, I went shopping with my brother, since I / we wanted to cook pulled beef/pork burgers. When we drove off, we both heard something crack. We weren’t sure what it was. Maybe we just drove over some icy-snow which then cracked. But when we arrived at the store, the car smelled like rubber, which is hardly a good sign. We ignored it, so it’s not too big a deal; mhm.

Once back from shopping, I already started cooking. My sister was baking a cake, and watching “Leverage” on her tablet. (Some TV-show.) I then asked to watch with her (she had headphones on), to which she agreed.
Now I can admit it. I didn’t really like this show [haha]. One guy was trying too hard to be cool, one girl was doing unnecessary cartwheels, when the nerdy guy showed his computer-room some weird *beep-beep boop-boop* sounds were played (which – I don’t know whether it was just the song, or because of “computer goo beep” – was really annoying) and so on.

But my main problem was, that the “bad” guys, were bad through and through. This is something that annoys me with a lot of shows. “Why?”; I hear you ask. Don’t you think, it’s way more interesting, if both / all sides have their good points? At least I do. And also, to me it seems like bad writing, if the bad guy is only bad for the sake of being bad, and he hates poor people, and he’d do everything just to get a little richer, and so on and so forth.
I don’t know… Maybe it’s just me, but (to me) this seems like lazy and uninteresting writing…

Anyway. Back to cooking. Well; you can hardly call it “cooking”. Just cutting some pickles, onions, tomatoes and salad and putting the meat into the oven. Half an hour later, I could take it out, and we had to pull it. I thought I was good at pulling meat. But then my mother and sister helped me, and of course, I was the slowest.
But then the eating part. The best part of them all. I definitely was not the slowest there. And I gotta say: It was really tasty. Some good moisture, some vegetables and most importantly: good meat. What more would you want?
Another upside: Hardly anything to clean. Not too much pans. Really a wonderful dish.

After dinner, we played a round of Uno (Card game) since my sister was over with her husband. It started out really good. I was down to only one card like three or four times. But I couldn’t close the deal. So i got 2nd last.

No-one wanted to play for another round, so I went upstairs in my room and studied a little more. In the afternoon, I was reading the lectures, and just before, I solved (or tried to solve) some exercises. I could solve 4 out of seven, I know how to solve two more, and that leaves only one unsolved. Which (I think) is really good. This took me only about 3.5 hours, which I’m also happy about.
My plan is, to get through one sheet about every two days. Up until now, I did even better than this. But every exercise gets just a little harder. So soon it’ll take like 8 hours for one sheet. Or at least that’s what I’m expecting. I’ll tell you more, once I know it!

Before, I couldn’t focus any more on studying, so I wrote you – my diary entry. Hopefully my focus did returned a little. I gotta learn some vocabulary / definitions… If this doesn’t work out, I’ll just watch some more of “The Mentalist”. It’s more fun anyway :/

But before that, time for a midnight burger snack. Luckily, it had one left over.

Well, that’s it for today! I’ll see you tomorrow!

Dear Diary! I don’t know, how to start a day in the diary. So for now, I just do it with a plain old “Dear Diary”. Maybe, someday I’ll find something better. I sure hope I do!

My Day

Anyway. What’s happened today? Nothing much. I woke up, ate, and started to learn. Also, yesterday I felt kinda down, so I didn’t feel like writing with my friends – or anyone else for that matter. This also meant, that today I had lots of messages to answer.

Kitchen Stories

Today, I wanted to cook a Lasagna. (I have to cook like once a week as chores for my family.) I prepared, as I usually do, and took some meat out of the freezer. And wouldn’t you know it? Already the first problem. Not enough meat. Given that it’s the 2nd of January, almost every store is closed (since it’s a holiday where I live). What a nuisance. Now I had to go an extra mile just for a little more meat… At least I could go with my brother. Shared sorrow is half sorrow – I guess(?).We arrived at the store, entered and took a good look at the meat-section. Shit! No ground beef here. What do we do now? Turns out, they had meatballs. It’s not the best, but better than no meat at all. Well then: Meatballs, it is.

Later in the afternoon, I started with cooking with my sister. We made a deal, that if she helped me with the Béchamel sauce, I’d make the rest of the Lasagna. While she started on the Béchamel, I was cutting onions, carrots and then started with the Bolognese. I smashed the meatballs, so there were no meatballs in the sauce, but yeah. More damage control than anything else. It’s definitely not the best combo, I tell you that. 30-45 minutes later, both sauces were finished and ready to be packed.

Now we gotta layer the Lasagna, put it in the oven, and then eat; finally. We only need some Lasagna pasta (the hard part between the layers). OH NO. It’s a disaster. We searched everywhere, but there were none… What do we do now?

On a separate, but unrelated note: It turns out, Spaghetti with 2 sauces is also pretty nice. It’s almost like a real Lasagna. But you can’t always have what you want; C’est la vie

Well. I guess I’m not going to be a Chef. Eh – not too sad about that. I have better qualities anyway

That’s it for today. Sadly, I don’t have more to tell you. But I’ll see you tomorrow. Good night!