2021-12-05 — Wrong Side of the Bed

I don’t have a clue what happened. I woke up, and for some reason patience did not wake up with me. I don’t know why. Nothing out of the ordinary had happened. Sure, hopes and dreams of mine have been hit broadside rather recently, but that doesn’t explain today.

I got up like normal, but then everything just went sideways. I was groggy. My brain wasn’t working. When it came time for exercise, I’d ordered a heart-rate monitor to help me with my exercise, so I could keep tabs on myself while trying to get my cardio in via circuit training (trying to maintain a target heart rate through the circuit training). But that little device just wouldn’t work. I spent probably 45 minutes trying to figure out what was going on before I finally gave up and decided to send it back.

Spending all that time got me off my routine, and being impatient for some reason, I was quick to be frustrated with the malfunctioning doohickey, and… yeah. My completely malfunctioning brain made it hard to get anything meaningful done with my np or tax work, but I did it anyway and did make some progress.

Once daylight rolled in, I went out to the Dodge Durango that’s parked out back and went to put in the oil dipstick tube. The old one had broken in half, which would let in dirt and debris (living on a dirt road makes that more of an issue). It was a nightmare. Sideways went sideways, and I fought it and fought it and fought it, and finally got it in after spending probably two hours on a two-bolt job (the dipstick wraps around the back of the motor against the firewall, and you have to do everything by braille, not to mention the fact that the first bolt needs to be put without your arm being in there to actually put it in. I figured that out because it was the only other option I hadn’t tried. So with the camera in one hand and a long extension in the other, I crossed my fingers and eventually managed to get the bolt in the hole and actually get it threaded the right way without cross threading it.

Ugh. It was an absolute beast.

Then I checked the fluids and found no coolant in the radiator. Why? It was functional without problems when I stopped using it for work what… 8 months ago? It’s mostly just been sitting back there, so it shouldn’t be low on coolant. I guess that’s the next thing I need to figure out on that one… what happened to the coolant.

After that, I went to work on my Dodge van, thinking I might post it for sale today and get it out of the fleet. I was going to diagnose the misfire and see if I could figure out a shifting issue that happens about 60 mph, post it and get it on its way to a new home, but that effort got stopped short when that job went sideways as well, with me realizing that the radiator was cracked.

Joy.

So I spent a good little while cleaning it off and getting epoxy to try to seal up the busted part. It’s a beater van, so I don’t want to spend a bunch of money on a radiator. Cross your fingers that it works. I’ll find out tomorrow morning if the effort was at least temporarily successful. Usually it takes about 24 hours to fully cure, so I’ll give it a test drive in the a.m. I’m just selling it as a beater car, so patched up stuff won’t be too surprising when I tell people.

After that, I got the courage to jack up the BMW and do the lower radiator hose job. I was hopeful because it all started out relatively well, I was able to drain the radiator and get the temp sensor out without too much trouble, and though not easy, the top of the lower radiator hose came off reasonably well.

But the bottom. Wow. Double wow. It was on part with the Durango for sidewaysness. Good gravy. BMW uses quick connect fittings with coolant hoses (which can be really nice), but this good gravy. The bottom connection was on so tightly that I think it took close to two hours (just guessing) just to undo a single “quick connect.” I tried and tried and tried and tried. I pried. I squirted with PB blaster. I cut, carved, mangled, sawed.

Finally, it came. I half expected the radiator to be broken (it doesn’t appear to be, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it actually is). It took so much effort and so much force, and I watched the radiator bend and flex as I struggled and fought. My hands are all torn up, scraped, and bruised. It was a nightmare.

After it was all together, the temperature sensor started leaking. I pulled it out, and the o-ring looks old. I tried a different o-ring, but it wasn’t the right size, so I flipped the old o-ring the other way, and even though it had a little cut in it, the leak stopped–for now. 🤞

Amazingly, the only job that didn’t go sideways today was my taking the top off the transmission on the bulldozer. It wasn’t necessarily easy, but it was more logistics and just going slowly and learning what I needed to do. It wasn’t about anything going wrong.

Gratefully, I was able to get the top plate disassembled and pulled off, revealing lots of rust on the inside of the tranny and giving a better view of the cracked case–which turned out to be worse than what I’d thought and hoped.

The welder will come over sometime this coming week and look at it, and we’ll see what can be done.

I ended up cleaning out my work van a bit in the process of doing everything–not completely, but I had to pull things out anyway, so I figured I might as well get it at least a little straightened up, so I did that.

I also spent some time with the GMC Terrain trying to diagnose the climate control issue, but there was no dice there. I think it’s a software issue. The AC has worked just fine recently but it decides when it wants to work and when it doesn’t, and nothing I can do will get it to show any sort of consistency (e.g. do x thing, and it’ll work).

So it was home, watching some tech videos while I ate dinner, and now here I am. 8:19. Sunday is over, back to Monday, and I’m tired. Hoping that whatever depleted all my patience reserves will be magically bring them back, as I have no clue what happened. It was like someone flipped a switch in me.

Daily Accountability

• Bed last night at 8:30: 8:35! 😎
• Up at 3:30: 😎
• 5x5s: 😎
• Exercise: Ish… I took the time, but it was wasted on that heart rate gadget… no actual exercise.
• Cold shower: 😎
• Meditation: Not in dedicated terms, no.
• Breakfast: 😎
• NP Work: 😎
• Tax Work: 😎
• Lunch: No… had an early dinner, I guess you could say. Was around 4ish, I think.
• Work done by 6: N/A
• Dinner: 😎
• Only truly healthy foods: Did decently well. Still finishing up the OJ.
• No Wasted Life: Some YouTube videos that were more entertainment than beneficial–more an escape from a rough mind.
• No Distracted Driving: I did well today. Just said no. Didn’t drive much, but just said no to using my phone.
• Faced a Fear: 😶 Ugh. I realize now I forgot to do that and make a video today. 26 days left. Haven’t made a video in over a week now, I think.
• Tamed the tongue: No. Not even remotely. I’d been doing so well, and it was like all my progress in patience and tamed tongue and all of that just… vanished, like I was back in the bad days of losing it. I didn’t lose it lose it, but I certainly got angry and let the sailor out a bit.
• Bag of veggies: Dinner had a lot of veggies.
• No Downers: I’ve been doing well with this, gratefully.

So… overall… progress on the no distracted driving. I worked really hard trying to choose patience and not anger. In the beginning, I was mentally battling, talking to myself outloud, reminding myself it was a choice, and why on earth would I choose anger and unhappiness when I could choose patience and happiness.

I battled, and it was good battling, but eventually, I just… didn’t have any more battle juice left, and I just got angry and stayed angry until things stopped going sideways.

I think part of what happens is that I realize how much anger I have buried that’s related to the loss of the things I wanted and my feeling like I’ve wasted my life. I don’t know that for sure. I don’t know if it’s uncovering hidden anger or just I’m angry, and so the things I’m unhappy with get amplified through the anger, or a little bit of both.

Honestly, I think there’s a lot of buried pain and anger with that situation, and that’s gonna metastasize if I don’t get it cut out quickly.

(sigh)

😕

I made progress in the effort. That was good. The end result was the same. Frustration. Anger. Sailor. But I did work hard and managed to delay that sailor and the anger.

Time for bed. It’s 8:28.

G’night, ya’ll.

Lift the World

~ stephen