New location for the 2013 version:
http://kevinmorice2013.blogspot.co.uk
The draft posts that I have decided to keep will move across there as and when I decide to publish them.
Monday 31 December 2012
2012 in numbers
So here are how the numbers break down for 2012.
And here is the 2011 version for comparison.
Since I got back in the gym at the start of the year I have managed to get most of this back on track.
Running
Worst! Year! Ever!
Might as well start with the bad. Even when I was sprinting I would clock over 650 training miles a year. In 2011, despite barely running after July I still logged over 780 miles. In 2012 I am at just 252 miles total, with 110 of those on the treadmill. 26 miles (over 10% of the yearly total) have been in the last 9 days of the year.
Last year's 124 miles of racing was my lowest ever. Until now. This year I didn't even break 37 miles of racing, all in triathlons. Less than a third of the distance I was racing when I was covering it as quarter mile at a time, less than I covered in just 2 races last year.
Biking
Major change for the positive on this one. Previous years have been 388 (2010) and 255 (2011), but 2012 has seen me ride 1,598 miles. Averaging nearly 31 miles a week. Over a third of those (688) have been on the exercise bike in the gym at work and another 166 have been on the mountain bike that I got this time last year. In races I somehow put in 161miles. Doing two standard triathlons (Knockburn and Huntly) account for 50 of those. But even including that this is another big increase in the numbers.
The increased time spent biking doesn't cover the drop in running but it did at least minimise the impact.
Swimming
My unofficial plan for the year was to average a mile a week and swim 52miles in total. By the end of August I was averaging 1.2 and I changed my target to 60. Then with the snapped collar bone I had to miss a lot of swimming and at the last TPT swim session of the year I took my total to 52.01miles for the year over 71 sessions. So I am going to call this a success based on the original target and the step up from previous years.
I still need to sort out my turns as I am losing a body-length on every turn against the tumble-turners. That is about 8% each length on a short course swim.
Session totals
Lots of short sessions in the gym at work this year mean this number is back to 'normal'. It took a while to get moving this year but I am back up to 250 sessions for the year.
The raw number is a bit of a fudge though. As the average time of a 2012 training session is less than 70% of previous years, even with the 3 hour bike rides counted in. The short swim and gym sessions are keeping this number high but majorly cutting total training time.
1902 miles total. Big step from the 1068 of 2011, but again a fudge by trading bike miles for run miles.
Blogging
Actually I have typed parts of 33 blogs this year. I just haven't published a lot of them this time round. Some of this is changing over the holidays as I tidy them up or move them to my new 2013 blog. (http://kevinmorice2013.blogspot.co.uk).
Weight
From the crazy lows of 69kg in August 2011, I have managed to stabilise my weight again. Since July this year I have been sitting at 77kg give or take a couple (76kg post-ride today). Still nearly half a stone lighter than I probably should be, 10lbs under my "ideal" BMI. But no longer at the dangerous or freakish levels and even though I have moved it around from 75-80 through the year it has been a general trend for improvement, even when I have been getting lighter it has been through increased training load and when I have been getting heavier it has been trading flabby bits for useful muscle. I even managed to adapt my diet enough so there were no wild changes when I had to sit around doing nothing for 8 weeks with the snapped collar bone.
In general my diet this year has improved on average but with having one bad day of take-out or eating out almost weekly. My diet this may have to change again if I can get my running numbers back up. The current healthier diet does enough calories for what I am doing but won't cope with my planned training load for 2013.
Other numbers
1 broken bone, requiring 2 trips to A&E, 2 to surgery and 8 to clinic appointments. Resulting in 1 surgical intervention (eventually) to fit 1 titanium plate and 8 screws to hold together the 4 pieces.
Also 18 visits to 2 psychiatrists. Finally done with them though.
27 trips to the cinema on my new Cineworld movie pass. Some great (Pitch Perfect, Skyfall, Avengers, Dark Knight Returns), some decent (John Carter, Argo, 21 Jump Street and Magic Mike were all worth the trip) but too many of them were truly terrible (Hobbit, Prometheus, Hunger Games, Lockout, Amazing Spiderman, Bourne Legacy, Savages). Hope next year is more of the former and less of the latter.
And here is the 2011 version for comparison.
Since I got back in the gym at the start of the year I have managed to get most of this back on track.
Running
Worst! Year! Ever!
Might as well start with the bad. Even when I was sprinting I would clock over 650 training miles a year. In 2011, despite barely running after July I still logged over 780 miles. In 2012 I am at just 252 miles total, with 110 of those on the treadmill. 26 miles (over 10% of the yearly total) have been in the last 9 days of the year.
Last year's 124 miles of racing was my lowest ever. Until now. This year I didn't even break 37 miles of racing, all in triathlons. Less than a third of the distance I was racing when I was covering it as quarter mile at a time, less than I covered in just 2 races last year.
Biking
Major change for the positive on this one. Previous years have been 388 (2010) and 255 (2011), but 2012 has seen me ride 1,598 miles. Averaging nearly 31 miles a week. Over a third of those (688) have been on the exercise bike in the gym at work and another 166 have been on the mountain bike that I got this time last year. In races I somehow put in 161miles. Doing two standard triathlons (Knockburn and Huntly) account for 50 of those. But even including that this is another big increase in the numbers.
The increased time spent biking doesn't cover the drop in running but it did at least minimise the impact.
Swimming
My unofficial plan for the year was to average a mile a week and swim 52miles in total. By the end of August I was averaging 1.2 and I changed my target to 60. Then with the snapped collar bone I had to miss a lot of swimming and at the last TPT swim session of the year I took my total to 52.01miles for the year over 71 sessions. So I am going to call this a success based on the original target and the step up from previous years.
I still need to sort out my turns as I am losing a body-length on every turn against the tumble-turners. That is about 8% each length on a short course swim.
Session totals
Lots of short sessions in the gym at work this year mean this number is back to 'normal'. It took a while to get moving this year but I am back up to 250 sessions for the year.
The raw number is a bit of a fudge though. As the average time of a 2012 training session is less than 70% of previous years, even with the 3 hour bike rides counted in. The short swim and gym sessions are keeping this number high but majorly cutting total training time.
1902 miles total. Big step from the 1068 of 2011, but again a fudge by trading bike miles for run miles.
Blogging
Actually I have typed parts of 33 blogs this year. I just haven't published a lot of them this time round. Some of this is changing over the holidays as I tidy them up or move them to my new 2013 blog. (http://kevinmorice2013.blogspot.co.uk).
Weight
From the crazy lows of 69kg in August 2011, I have managed to stabilise my weight again. Since July this year I have been sitting at 77kg give or take a couple (76kg post-ride today). Still nearly half a stone lighter than I probably should be, 10lbs under my "ideal" BMI. But no longer at the dangerous or freakish levels and even though I have moved it around from 75-80 through the year it has been a general trend for improvement, even when I have been getting lighter it has been through increased training load and when I have been getting heavier it has been trading flabby bits for useful muscle. I even managed to adapt my diet enough so there were no wild changes when I had to sit around doing nothing for 8 weeks with the snapped collar bone.
In general my diet this year has improved on average but with having one bad day of take-out or eating out almost weekly. My diet this may have to change again if I can get my running numbers back up. The current healthier diet does enough calories for what I am doing but won't cope with my planned training load for 2013.
Other numbers
1 broken bone, requiring 2 trips to A&E, 2 to surgery and 8 to clinic appointments. Resulting in 1 surgical intervention (eventually) to fit 1 titanium plate and 8 screws to hold together the 4 pieces.
Also 18 visits to 2 psychiatrists. Finally done with them though.
27 trips to the cinema on my new Cineworld movie pass. Some great (Pitch Perfect, Skyfall, Avengers, Dark Knight Returns), some decent (John Carter, Argo, 21 Jump Street and Magic Mike were all worth the trip) but too many of them were truly terrible (Hobbit, Prometheus, Hunger Games, Lockout, Amazing Spiderman, Bourne Legacy, Savages). Hope next year is more of the former and less of the latter.
Saturday 29 December 2012
Huntly Triathlon
So this one needs to be tidied up and published before the end of the year.
This was far and away my best race of the year, and probably my best race at least since Inverness Half Marathon back in 2011.
So breaking it down. Pre-race I was about as relaxed as I have been. The entry list was public and the while there were some people I really wanted to avoid, they were all going to be in different heats, wiht the heats spaced out by over half an hour each. There were also plenty of people to hide behind while I was setting up in transition.
First time I have used the pointy hat for a race. That get's a mention early as it changed my transition layout a little. Also having had real problems with cold toes on all my previous standard distance races I decided to ignore my own advice and left some socks in transition. I managed to get set up next to a few people I knew and was able to chat away and set up without stressing.
The usual chat about "how are you going?" was around and I had a good idea beforehand that I should be capable of a decent time. My first standard race was at Huntly in 2010 and had taken me 2hrs 49min 52. That broke down as 31:23 for the 1500m swim, 1:24:45 for the 40k bike, and 51:50 for the 10k run. I knew I wasn't running as well, but I also knew I could both swim and bike a decent amount quicker so I had decided to aim for an ambitious PB for a standard of 2hrs 45.
The swim went brilliantly. For most of the year I have been in lanes with people who have fibbed about their times, which results in a lot of overtaking and slows everyone down. This time out I was in a lane with 3 others, 2 of whom I knew from racing would go about my speed, possibly slightly faster. We were the slowest lane in our heat so we were against the wall, but we were next to a faster lane so got a slight tow off them every second length.
Also in the lane next to me were the two girls that I thought would give me the best overall races. I expected them both to get away a little on the swim, and possibly a little more on the bike, and then even in my bad running condition I would chase them down. Being in the next lane meant I could see how much progress they were making and we were almost at the finish before either of them lapped me. I was getting a nice tow off two of the guys in my lane and I was out of the water in 28:26, just a minute behind the girls, and over 3 ahead of my 2010 time.
My first transition was fairly tidy. No disasters, and worth the time to dry my feet and put the socks on.
The bike was a revelation. I expected to go faster than previously on this course but I didn't quite factor how much of a difference it would be. The first half of the course flew by and I was catching people all the way. At about the halfway point on the course it gets a bit lumpier and turns into the wind. At this point I passed the first of the girls, which was a bit of a shock. By two-thirds of the way round the bike course I had caught 5 minutes on my swim coach. I began to worry that maybe I was pushing too hard on the bike but I felt ok and was spending plenty of time on the tri-bars and turning my legs over easily enough so I decided to keep the pace up.
I came into T2 having biked 1hr 17:38. Over 7 minutes faster than 2010. The pointy hat really does work. (Although the socks, the weather and 900 extra training bike miles might also have contributed slightly). I was almost 10 minutes ahead of my 2010 time. So I went out on the run feeling fairly good. I could afford to drag myself round the 10k in anything approaching an hour and still set a PB for the course. And even dropping 5 minutes on my previous run time would still get me in under the target I had set.
The run course at Huntly is two loops. But on each loop there is also a long out and back section so you are running towards anyone up to maybe half-a-mile ahead of you. This means that on the way out you can see who is suffering and catchable, and on the way back you can see who is looking good and chasing after you. There were a lot of the former, and only one of the latter. On both laps I was picking off a lot of struggling runners, (including my other target) and the only one that was catching me was the target girl I had passed on the bike. This was a bit annoying as normally I can easily run away from her, but I was making plenty of places, and I trying to work out how fast the gap was closing and how long was left I thought I might manage to hold her off.
I was really starting to struggle by the end and was cramping badly as I tried to pick up the pace for the last mile. Annoyingly I was caught just at the last turn with less than 400m left to the finish. But I came in with a run time of 51:04, somehow 46 seconds faster than my 2010 run time.
Overall time was 2hrs 39:13. 6 minutes quicker than I had hoped for. Nearly 11 minutes faster than my 2010 time. Happiest I have been with a race for a long time.
Still some time I can make on the swim, maybe as much as 2 minutes if I can sort out my turns and there is easily 4 minutes on the run if I can actually run it instead of struggling to jog round. So next year's target is 2hrs 35. It will be 5 weeks after my half iron-man (still to be confirmed) so should fit in with my season.
This was far and away my best race of the year, and probably my best race at least since Inverness Half Marathon back in 2011.
So breaking it down. Pre-race I was about as relaxed as I have been. The entry list was public and the while there were some people I really wanted to avoid, they were all going to be in different heats, wiht the heats spaced out by over half an hour each. There were also plenty of people to hide behind while I was setting up in transition.
First time I have used the pointy hat for a race. That get's a mention early as it changed my transition layout a little. Also having had real problems with cold toes on all my previous standard distance races I decided to ignore my own advice and left some socks in transition. I managed to get set up next to a few people I knew and was able to chat away and set up without stressing.
The usual chat about "how are you going?" was around and I had a good idea beforehand that I should be capable of a decent time. My first standard race was at Huntly in 2010 and had taken me 2hrs 49min 52. That broke down as 31:23 for the 1500m swim, 1:24:45 for the 40k bike, and 51:50 for the 10k run. I knew I wasn't running as well, but I also knew I could both swim and bike a decent amount quicker so I had decided to aim for an ambitious PB for a standard of 2hrs 45.
The swim went brilliantly. For most of the year I have been in lanes with people who have fibbed about their times, which results in a lot of overtaking and slows everyone down. This time out I was in a lane with 3 others, 2 of whom I knew from racing would go about my speed, possibly slightly faster. We were the slowest lane in our heat so we were against the wall, but we were next to a faster lane so got a slight tow off them every second length.
Also in the lane next to me were the two girls that I thought would give me the best overall races. I expected them both to get away a little on the swim, and possibly a little more on the bike, and then even in my bad running condition I would chase them down. Being in the next lane meant I could see how much progress they were making and we were almost at the finish before either of them lapped me. I was getting a nice tow off two of the guys in my lane and I was out of the water in 28:26, just a minute behind the girls, and over 3 ahead of my 2010 time.
My first transition was fairly tidy. No disasters, and worth the time to dry my feet and put the socks on.
The bike was a revelation. I expected to go faster than previously on this course but I didn't quite factor how much of a difference it would be. The first half of the course flew by and I was catching people all the way. At about the halfway point on the course it gets a bit lumpier and turns into the wind. At this point I passed the first of the girls, which was a bit of a shock. By two-thirds of the way round the bike course I had caught 5 minutes on my swim coach. I began to worry that maybe I was pushing too hard on the bike but I felt ok and was spending plenty of time on the tri-bars and turning my legs over easily enough so I decided to keep the pace up.
I came into T2 having biked 1hr 17:38. Over 7 minutes faster than 2010. The pointy hat really does work. (Although the socks, the weather and 900 extra training bike miles might also have contributed slightly). I was almost 10 minutes ahead of my 2010 time. So I went out on the run feeling fairly good. I could afford to drag myself round the 10k in anything approaching an hour and still set a PB for the course. And even dropping 5 minutes on my previous run time would still get me in under the target I had set.
The run course at Huntly is two loops. But on each loop there is also a long out and back section so you are running towards anyone up to maybe half-a-mile ahead of you. This means that on the way out you can see who is suffering and catchable, and on the way back you can see who is looking good and chasing after you. There were a lot of the former, and only one of the latter. On both laps I was picking off a lot of struggling runners, (including my other target) and the only one that was catching me was the target girl I had passed on the bike. This was a bit annoying as normally I can easily run away from her, but I was making plenty of places, and I trying to work out how fast the gap was closing and how long was left I thought I might manage to hold her off.
I was really starting to struggle by the end and was cramping badly as I tried to pick up the pace for the last mile. Annoyingly I was caught just at the last turn with less than 400m left to the finish. But I came in with a run time of 51:04, somehow 46 seconds faster than my 2010 run time.
Overall time was 2hrs 39:13. 6 minutes quicker than I had hoped for. Nearly 11 minutes faster than my 2010 time. Happiest I have been with a race for a long time.
Still some time I can make on the swim, maybe as much as 2 minutes if I can sort out my turns and there is easily 4 minutes on the run if I can actually run it instead of struggling to jog round. So next year's target is 2hrs 35. It will be 5 weeks after my half iron-man (still to be confirmed) so should fit in with my season.
Friday 28 December 2012
Pins and needles, and more pins
Caution: Gruesome photos and a couple of xray's enclosed.
So I have dragged this out over a third post now.
http://kevinmorice2012.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/big-bang.html
http://kevinmorice2012.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/no-pictures-yet.html
So the last one leaves off with A&E at Dr Grays sending me home with some drugs to wait for a phone call. So from the saturday evening until Monday I was left waiting for them to decide if they wanted to operate or not. I eventually got fed up of waiting and called them, there answer was that they thought it would heal on it's own so go home and then pop in to the ARI fracture clinic in 4 weeks to see if it is fixed.
After 4 days on the monster drugs and the swelling going down it was obvious that something still wasn't right. I went in to ARI and they took another pair of x-rays and asked me to come back in on the Monday so they could decide if or when to operate.
So here is a photo from about a week after the accident. Some lovely bruising, and if you look closely you can see a lovely lump where the two major pieces of bone overlap.
And below is what that it looked like from the inside. In addition to the two major pieces I had what is called a butterfly fracture. This is when the two major pieces snap in a way that causes a third triangular splinter (it looks like a butterfly wing if you sketch it) to get broken out, and a fourth very small chip. Mine had the added complication that the large splinter had spun round and the very sharp end of it was pressing on some nerves in the brachial plexus.
The chip was enough to get me on the not-quite-an-emergency list for surgery. So I had to check back in to the hospital on Tuesday, 10 days after the accident. This was apparently not a major issue. Having missed the chance to do it on the first day (Thanks Dr Grays!) they felt it was better to let some of the bruising go down to give them more room to work.
Tuesday was an interesting day of filling in forms and reading books but I was then sent home as a car crash had skipped a few people onto the really-is-an-emergency list and they stole my theatre and surgeons. So I was set home till the Thursday. Second time lucky though and they did manage to fit me in late on the Thursday.
The knockout drugs for surgery these days are GOOOD!! From asking if I was ready to me being asleep was about 2 seconds. And the next thing I remember was waking up, feeling a bit stiff and pained but generally ok. And obviously my first thought was to take a picture for facebook:
It was under the dressing for 10 days so here is the first shot of it when I had to change the dressing. No stitches on the outside, and no sign of stitching so I don/t think it was the disolvable ones. My guess is that it was superglued and butterflied.
So I have dragged this out over a third post now.
http://kevinmorice2012.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/big-bang.html
http://kevinmorice2012.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/no-pictures-yet.html
So the last one leaves off with A&E at Dr Grays sending me home with some drugs to wait for a phone call. So from the saturday evening until Monday I was left waiting for them to decide if they wanted to operate or not. I eventually got fed up of waiting and called them, there answer was that they thought it would heal on it's own so go home and then pop in to the ARI fracture clinic in 4 weeks to see if it is fixed.
After 4 days on the monster drugs and the swelling going down it was obvious that something still wasn't right. I went in to ARI and they took another pair of x-rays and asked me to come back in on the Monday so they could decide if or when to operate.
So here is a photo from about a week after the accident. Some lovely bruising, and if you look closely you can see a lovely lump where the two major pieces of bone overlap.
And below is what that it looked like from the inside. In addition to the two major pieces I had what is called a butterfly fracture. This is when the two major pieces snap in a way that causes a third triangular splinter (it looks like a butterfly wing if you sketch it) to get broken out, and a fourth very small chip. Mine had the added complication that the large splinter had spun round and the very sharp end of it was pressing on some nerves in the brachial plexus.
The chip was enough to get me on the not-quite-an-emergency list for surgery. So I had to check back in to the hospital on Tuesday, 10 days after the accident. This was apparently not a major issue. Having missed the chance to do it on the first day (Thanks Dr Grays!) they felt it was better to let some of the bruising go down to give them more room to work.
Tuesday was an interesting day of filling in forms and reading books but I was then sent home as a car crash had skipped a few people onto the really-is-an-emergency list and they stole my theatre and surgeons. So I was set home till the Thursday. Second time lucky though and they did manage to fit me in late on the Thursday.
The knockout drugs for surgery these days are GOOOD!! From asking if I was ready to me being asleep was about 2 seconds. And the next thing I remember was waking up, feeling a bit stiff and pained but generally ok. And obviously my first thought was to take a picture for facebook:
They kept me pretty heavily drugged through the night but I was able to get up and dress myself on friday morning. They let me have breakfast and lunch. Sent me for some x-rays of the plate (below) and then let me out.
It was under the dressing for 10 days so here is the first shot of it when I had to change the dressing. No stitches on the outside, and no sign of stitching so I don/t think it was the disolvable ones. My guess is that it was superglued and butterflied.
So from there I have been in rehab, with loads of exciting physio.
Below is the latest x-ray. It is from December 3rd. It is a slightly different angle (serenity view for any medics in the audience) from the previous x-rays, so you can see the shape of the pin and the remaining smaller chip is more obvious.
So that's what the outside looks like by Xmas. The bruising is all cleared up and the scar is still fading, and if you know what you are looking for you can see the plate. I can also feel the screw heads if I poke around it. Still aches a bit but not enough to need painkillers. Hopefully a final clinic appointment in January for it.
Sunday 23 December 2012
A Beautiful Mind
What a strange film. I have put off watching it for a decade, for a number of spurious reasons. I don't really like Russell Crowe, I think Paul Bettany is either brilliant or terrible but never anything in between, Jennifer Connelly can't appear on a screen near me without me wondering when the Henson puppets are coming, Ed Harris is great in everything but criminally under-used... Anyway, it is sitting at number 198 in the IMDB top-250 films of all time. And I have seen 171 of the others so I wanted to cross it off the list.
I am not Schizophrenic or hallucinatory. So a lot of the movie is not directly comparable. But in order to make their movie a bit more palatable they also give Nash a lot of Asperger's symptoms which are very similar to what I have, although much like Big Bang Theory do with Sheldon they are somewhat amplified to make them more filmable.
I could argue about the mistakes they make when trying to explain game theory and Nash equilibrium. I can even explain the mistakes in a concise enough way that it fits into this post. But I can also see why took the shortcuts to squeeze it into a single scene I their movie. And I can't see anyone reading this and caring about the maths.
But back to the point. Some of the points of the film are very reminiscent of what I have been through the last 2 years. So I want to talk about them.
The pills are very much as portrayed. They do fuck up how you function to such an extreme degree that even basic logic processing becomes difficult. And cutting out the higher end functionality of someone smart is distressing in itself, more so than the symptoms of the illness. Not comparing myself to Nash but I am smarter than the average bear, and the effect the pills had on that, and on my memory, was terrifying.
"I find that polishing my interactions in order to make them sociable requires a tremendous effort. I have a tendency to expedite information flow by being direct. Often I don't get a good result. " I could have said that. Although I would probably have been more direct about it. Nash's solution in the film is to find people who can deal with his directness and discard others. This used to be my approach. It is surprisingly effective.
His eventual solution to his mental problems, having had everyone else push him to try their solution, is to discard everyone else's failed techniques and to tackle those problems in his own way. Not with the drugs or the therapy or any of the recommended techniques. He simply chooses to be a different person and then applies his own mind to that purpose.
So, what should have been a couple of paragraphs seems to have turned into a full-blown post and has even dragged me away from the one I intended to finish and hit "publish" on this morning. But it has brought me to my point.
I decided a while ago that I like who I used to be. And to be honest I don't like a lot of the person I have had to live in for the last 17 months, but I have continued to tolerate him in order to survive in my current situation. But I am past done with him so I am going to be the old me again. This is going to suck for some of you because a lot of people didn't like the original me.
I am going to say the things I think, without tying myself in knots trying to figure out if the listener will like them or not. Anyone who can't deal with that, it is their problem. And if you think that is selfish then; tough, it probably is. But I have to live with me and you don't. And I am done living every minute with a person I don't really like.
I am not Schizophrenic or hallucinatory. So a lot of the movie is not directly comparable. But in order to make their movie a bit more palatable they also give Nash a lot of Asperger's symptoms which are very similar to what I have, although much like Big Bang Theory do with Sheldon they are somewhat amplified to make them more filmable.
I could argue about the mistakes they make when trying to explain game theory and Nash equilibrium. I can even explain the mistakes in a concise enough way that it fits into this post. But I can also see why took the shortcuts to squeeze it into a single scene I their movie. And I can't see anyone reading this and caring about the maths.
But back to the point. Some of the points of the film are very reminiscent of what I have been through the last 2 years. So I want to talk about them.
The pills are very much as portrayed. They do fuck up how you function to such an extreme degree that even basic logic processing becomes difficult. And cutting out the higher end functionality of someone smart is distressing in itself, more so than the symptoms of the illness. Not comparing myself to Nash but I am smarter than the average bear, and the effect the pills had on that, and on my memory, was terrifying.
"I find that polishing my interactions in order to make them sociable requires a tremendous effort. I have a tendency to expedite information flow by being direct. Often I don't get a good result. " I could have said that. Although I would probably have been more direct about it. Nash's solution in the film is to find people who can deal with his directness and discard others. This used to be my approach. It is surprisingly effective.
His eventual solution to his mental problems, having had everyone else push him to try their solution, is to discard everyone else's failed techniques and to tackle those problems in his own way. Not with the drugs or the therapy or any of the recommended techniques. He simply chooses to be a different person and then applies his own mind to that purpose.
So, what should have been a couple of paragraphs seems to have turned into a full-blown post and has even dragged me away from the one I intended to finish and hit "publish" on this morning. But it has brought me to my point.
I decided a while ago that I like who I used to be. And to be honest I don't like a lot of the person I have had to live in for the last 17 months, but I have continued to tolerate him in order to survive in my current situation. But I am past done with him so I am going to be the old me again. This is going to suck for some of you because a lot of people didn't like the original me.
I am going to say the things I think, without tying myself in knots trying to figure out if the listener will like them or not. Anyone who can't deal with that, it is their problem. And if you think that is selfish then; tough, it probably is. But I have to live with me and you don't. And I am done living every minute with a person I don't really like.
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