The month of October continues to be serious at work, working out, and working on the house.
I alternate days of morning walks and afternoon session with the weights with days of morning runs. I continue to ingest increased levels of protein while taking in zero carbs after 6pm. (I'm not a believer in low carb diets. But I'm trying to shock the body with a different approach than usual - hence the zero carbs after 6pm.)
Each night I spend time painting the trim on the house or pulling up more carpeting or cleaning areas of the house. Slowly I am getting the house down to the skeleton where I can start putting it back together.
Person C_T comes over to visit on Thursday night after I have a long day of testing at Pico Rivera. I am tired, but Person C_T and I have a nice visit and we come up with the following plan for the house that is for sale next door. We come up with the plan for when "undesirables" come to look at the house. For example, people come to the open house with their car stereo booming so loud that you can't hear the jets from Long Beach airport, yelling back and forth at each other, and letting their kids/pets run wild during the open house itself.
During the "undesirables" visit, Person C_T goes running out of my house yelling, "He's got an ax!" The next thing out of my house is a women's high heel shoe coming through the open front door with great velocity and landing on the sidewalk and just missing Person C_T. The next thing that comes out of the house is Ray wearing a women's dress, one high heel shoe, and wielding an ax. "I'm gonna get you. Get back here and treat me like a woman!" Person C_T manages to drive off just as Ray swings the ax at Person C_T's new car and misses. Ray then turns to the "undesirables" and says something like, "He kept trying to peek up my dress. And I'm not wearing any panties underneath it right now. Do you want to see?"
On Saturday I get out for the aquarium ride, wash the car, paint some trim inside the house, and then go inline skating. Because the weather is cool and it is not summertime there are not many people on the bike/skating trail. Except a coworker from Northrop Grumman! I stop and meet his brother and their wives and their parents. The coworker says that he'll have to get his skates out and skate with me. After I agree, I skate off into the distance. When I get home I paint more trim inside the house and try to relax a bit.
After 9pm I'm headed to pick up Person J_VKPI and head for a club. Tonight the crowd is down because of the rain, but the music is very good. Person T_U and I hang out along with Person J_VKPI. There are three people tonight (at least) who want to make me offers. The most serious comes from Person G_M who is nice, but he (fortunately) loses a bit of steam when I say, "I'm with someone though he isn't with me tonight". There is a brief appearance of Person M_P who I haven't seen for a long time though Person M_P doesn't see me and we don't get a chance to greet each other.
Person J_VKPI and I are leaving at 2:15 am on Sunday morning. But we stop off at a friend of Person J_VKPI's to pick something up and then we proceed cautiously in the rain back to his apartment. When there, we take my old computer out of the car and carry it up to Person J_VKPI's apartment in the haunted (or spirit-filled) elevator. I do not feel the presence of any spirit at this time. After we dump the computer off at his apartment we bid farewell and I take the stairs back to the street. But I nonverbally say, "Hello spirit. I hope that you are friendly", as I walk down the stairs. I'm collapsing in bed at 3:55 am on Sunday morning.
Sunday is a low key day as I get ready for a long week at Northrop Grumman and a tough workout week. I'm up near 8pm to buy groceries and read the newspaper and watch some racing and some football. Later Person C_T comes over and cooks dinner and cookies for me. I get to do the dishes and the cleaanup afterwards. We enjoy each other's company again.
During Person C_T's visit we watch the Asutralian MotoGP race. Rossi is sitting ins econd place and that is all that he needs to clinch his 4th consecutive world championship and the first for Yamaha since 1992. But he's not about to allow his former friend, who became his ex-friend due to the protest in Qatar, win this race. They trade places a number of times in a wild last two laps with Rossi getting to the checkered flag first. The disappointment in his ex-friend is obvious during the post-race interview. But it was a fun race and almost concludes a historic MotoGP season.