National Meatball Day!

Mood:

This holiday was actually on Wednesday. They're like little balls of awesome!Although, some can be large. I've made some beef, lamb, chicken, and (I think) turkey ones before. The lamb meatballs were interesting. I think it was a Greek recipe. There was mint and cinnamon mixed in them. The chicken ones were for a Japanese corn soup recipe. Meatballs can be good in spaghetti, which is how I usually have them, or in a sandwich. Some are just great by themselves with their own sauce.

I'm starting to get back into my walks again. Yay!It's been a while. I've felt sick off and on for a while, and that's sapped my motivation to get out there.Anyways, I'm doing both 2-mile walks again. I hope to increase it to 3 of them in the near future. 

The weather's been kind of wild lately.So, every time I go it's like an adventure. During yesterday morning's walk, it was incredibly windy (we lost power overnight because of it) half the time. There was a mist-like rain every so often, and then it'd downpour. At times, it was nice and sunny with no wind or rain. I guess it also makes it exciting. I had put my hair up in a bun beforehand, so it wouldn't get in my face. Ended up having some tendrils come out anyways, but at least it wasn't all of it in my face. Tried to keep the hood to my coat up when it really started to rain, but it flew off. I probably looked like a mess...Today's morning walk was just nice and sunny. It's cooler, temperature wise, than it looks out there.

I'm also back to doing my sit-ups on a regular basis. I'm starting off with 10 twice a day, again. A good starting point. Trying to stick more to the way I want to eat, too. As close to 1200 calories a day as I can. I normally spread those out between 5 meals. My range that I set for myself is 1200-1600. I won't go below 1200. If I want to splurge every once in a while, I might allow myself up to 1800. But, no more than that. For a while, since I was feeling lousy and sick, I didn't care as much. It actually feels good to get back to it.I don't feel really hungry most of the time. Except for when I wake up, but I think that's normal. In order to have my meds more balanced, it's best for me to have 5 small meals throughout the day, too. They even say it's best in general for people with IBD. Still hope to, in the future, talk to a nutritionist about what I need more of. And, then I'll jumble things around again. I know I've had malabsorption issues (particularly with protein), so I'm trying to have things as balanced as I can for now. Doesn't mean I should load up on calories until I talk to someone about it. I've gotten back into tracking it with My Fitness Pal's app, as well. They apparently don't like the amount of calories I've had so far this week. Saying it's too little.

I also rescheduled that appointment with my gastroenterologist. It was going to be March 17th, but apparently she didn't tell her staff that she'd still be on vacation at that time. They called a little while ago, telling me to reschedule. So, this time it's for April 4th, and pretty early in the morning. Especially early for me, since it's kind of a ways out there. I asked about getting a later time, and they said the next one that's in the afternoon is in June. She wanted to see me last month...So, I don't think that works. I'm having some more issues that I might bring up through an email to her. Her staff will probably get it, but at least they'll know. I don't mind them helping me while she's gone. Not sure what they can do about it, though. I can't really do one of those nasty tests she wanted me to do with this 'problem'. Not sure they can do a sigmoidoscopy, either. It'll be my first time, and I'm nervous about it.I want to be knocked out for it, but I'm not sure if they'll really do that. She also wants me to do another blood test in the middle of the month. She didn't ask me to do it last month, because she wanted to make sure the prednisone was out of my system. That way she can see if it helped at all with absorbing azathioprine. She seemed doubtful when I talked to her last. She said she'd talk more about remicade and humira at the appointment, if the tests come back the way she expects them to. I might have some things to bring up, too. 

Also, my ears have been hurting a lot lately. They started hurting around the time I felt the most sick last month. I have a strange Eustachian tube problem, where my ears have too much wax and fluid. Sometimes just the fluid moving around really hurts. It can make internal noises, too. (It makes some really freaky sounds.) Of course, I'm the only one that can hear it, since it's just fluid moving. It's unusual, but I'm told by doctors to use Q-tips in my ears every day. Of course, in a careful way. I usually use a kit to clean out my ears once a month, but haven't for a couple of months. That might be my problem. Also, weather and pressure changes can affect it. So can getting water in my ears. When it's really bad, I lose my sense of balance, too. I'll have to clean it out and see if it gets better. It feels like my eardrums are going to burst or the ears themselves are going to rip apart, though.I can usually hear extremely well after I clean them.

Finished reading Asklepios, yesterday. Seemed like a very abrupt ending. They left so many things up in the air. Makes me feel like the mangaka was forced to end it early.There were a lot of twists in the end, too. Interesting to see who was actually on Buzz's side and who wasn't. And, one person wasn't exactly who he claimed to be. They even ended with hints that Pare might still be alive. Caligula, one of the most ruthless knights, was saved by Buzz. He still considers him a heretic, and he has made it his mission in life to kill anyone who's deemed a heretic by the church. So, when he found out he was saved by him, he immediately tried to taunt Buzz into killing him. He thought it was too much to be saved by the 'enemy'. He also lost an arm and a leg after his canon backfired on himself. His remaining arm was injured so badly, he couldn't use a sword beforehand. (He tried to shoot an arrow at them, but it didn't work.) I don't think he could hurt them after what he's gone through. The last scene with him, was that he had just escaped the room they were letting him rest in. He was crawling slowly through the woods with the help of a small knife. Kind of sad. The church also officially stopped calling Buzz a heretic.

I'm really liking One Punch Man so far. It seems like a normal 'superhero' sort of show. But, it's very unique in humor, interesting characters, the way Saitama acts, and both Genos and Saitama's powers are off the charts. Saitama more so than Genos. Saitama is so powerful, he sometimes underestimates it. Both Saitama and Genos decided to take the 'Hero Exams' in order to join the Hero Association. Genos got perfect scores in both the written and physical exam. He ended up being S-ranked. S-ranked heroes are the highest ranked. Saitama didn't do very well on the written exam, but was too good for the physical one. He broke most of the machines. So, he ended up being C-ranked. Yet, the people who assigned them ranks believe he's probably S level. He just didn't care much about the written exam. His attention span is really short, too. So, the organization will keep a close eye on both Genos and him. Saitama's not sure what his superhero name should be. Probably will end up being 'One Punch Man'...Not sure about Genos. He's a cyborg, and has become Saitama's disciple. Saitama reluctantly agreed to it.

I'm looking at more ways of promoting my novel. Smashwords has some interesting guides for that. I was going to print off some fliers, and put them up in a bunch of places. (Including around our neighborhood.) But, I'm really low on black ink. I'm also curious about other ways, for the time being.I don't have to do the fliers right away, anyways. I think I have to plan where I want them a bit more, too. I did ask those 2 congregations if they could promote it in their newsletters. The one I really don't care much about anymore, hasn't responded. The other one said they'll promote it on their facebook page instead. I'm cool with that. At least people that I know from that congregation will have a chance to see it. They also linked my official facebook page for that novel in their post about it. I'm not expecting a reply from the other congregation.(Just thought I'd ask both of them, just in case.) Also, I noticed that a lot of their members are in Israel right now, so I'm not sure if they even saw the email yet. Oh well. I might fill out a Smashwords interview thing. They say it helps some authors get noticed more. You get to choose the questions, and can even create some of them. Sounds fun. I might add hyperlinks to the novels in my forum signatures. I think I have the first novel hyperlinked in a couple of them. 

I managed to play my clarinet for 2 days in a row.Still doing 45 minutes of it. If I end up doing it more often, I might make the practice time 50 minutes instead. It felt good to play again. I'm also trying to go over pieces more until I get the spots I mess up down. I used to go over pieces so much that I got sick of them. But, I think I need to go back to that sort of thing. I don't think I'll improve much if I just play straight through a piece, and then immediately move on to the next. I'll probably continue to mess up the piece in the same spots. After playing the ones I mess up on correctly, I can start honing it in more to perfecting the whole thing. 

I started drawing out designs for symbols that represent each short story in my 2nd novel. (There are 12 of them.) After I'm through with them, I'll put them up on deviantART, and then make a Youtube vid with them. I'm a little stuck on symbols for a couple of them, but I'm sure I'll figure something out later. Some are really easy. Like a ribbon for the story, Ribbon. Or, a mask for Faceless. I'm also trying to decide if I want more than one symbol for each story.

日本語

 Studied compounds for 散, and started studying the kanji 残. In general, 散 means scatter, disperse, spend, squander. 散光 or さんこう (sankou): scattered light. 散在 or さんざい (sanzai): to be scattered, straggle, be found here and there. 散財 or さんざい (sanzai): expense, waste of money, extravagance. 散策 or さんさく (sansaku): walking, strolling, roaming, wandering, exploring. 散々 or さんざん (sanzan): thoroughly, completely, utterly; severely, harshly, terribly, miserably, wretchedly, badly. 散発 or さんぱつ (sanpatsu): sporadic, scattering. 散髪 or さんぱつ (sanpatsu): (having a) haircut, hair-dressing. 散布 or さんぷ (sanpu): scattering, sprinkling, spraying. 散文 or さんぶん (sanbun): prose. 散歩 or さんぽ (sanpo): walk, stroll. 散漫 or さんまん (sanman): vague, distracted, loose, half-hearted, diffuse. When 残 is pronounced as ざん (zan): remaining, leftover, excess. As 残る or のこ.る (noko.ru): to remain, be left. I also practiced a bit on JapaneseClass' site. Next time I might do more of the chapter tests. Haven't done them in a while.

Youtube:
An interesting Pandora Hearts amv. The series has Alice and Wonderland elements, so the song fits: