You have the worst luck of anyone I know
Blog kitt decided around 23:54 on 18 August 2015 to publish this:A college friend made this comment to me at the end of our senior year.
You have the worst luck of anyone I know.
I'm sure he meant it only as an observation, and not as an insult of any kind. I recall laughing off the comment, thinking that it wasn't true. I wish I had been more cognizant of my life and its quirks, as I wouldn't have brushed off the comment as quickly as I had. At this point, I completely agree with Mark. Yes, yes, I do have the worst luck of anyone you know.
That I have been as successful as I am despite this is likely a testament to either my oblivious nature, my refusal to acknowledge the shitty luck, my acceptance of the shit luck and determination to keep going, or the fact that I used up every ounce of good luck when I chose my parents and genes at birth.
Given that the last one is pure chance, let's just go with it.
Okay, I think I know what you're thinking, "it's not that bad, Kitt," and you'd be right, it's not that bad.
I have a good life (so far. I recognize just how much out of one's control a life is, and am grateful for the grand dice roll at the moment of my conception), but, yeah, I have a lot of little shit things that happen every day in overwhelming numbers. Individually, none of them are of any consequence. In aggregate, it's a mountain of shit I endure day after day.
Examples?
Actual conversation: "I have been pulled aside for randomly searches in airport security lines 22 times in a row. That's 22 separate flights." "Really? I've never been pulled aside once." There are people who have never been pulled aside by tsa for extra screening. I am the 12 sigma case on the OTHER side. I am nearly always pulled aside. They will take one person from a group of 20 and it is always me.
I left in the morning, same time as every morning, for a 20 minute commute. There was one morning, I had a meeting, unlike any other morning for months. That is the morning I hit every red light on the commute for the full cycle, with a bonus accident and construction dude waving a SLOW sign for everyone but me: I get the STOP sign. That 20 minute commute took 45 minutes to drive 4 miles, and I missed the important meeting entirely.
I am nearly hit by cars walking across the street, in the crosswalk, with the walk sign (not the flashing light, the walk sign) more times than anyone living outside of New York City. Happens about twice a month. Walking. Green light. Walk sign. Big metal objects hurtling towards me.
Flights are delayed when I am on them. So much so, I travel only through cities with family or friends in them, so when my flights are cancelled (happens more with me than anyone else you know), at least I can visit. We missed our honeymoon flight by 1 minute, stayed with the in-laws on the first night of the honeymoon. That is my luck.
Elevators go out, escalators, too, when I need them. I'm good at climbing stairs. I know where most of the stairs are in the buildings I am in frequently, since I need them. I suspect I'm one of the few people who know the A, B, and C stairwells in the Shopify building.
Companies run out of my favorite X, just before I show up, for many values of X.
Insurance fraud people have hit my cars over the years more times than I care to admit. My cars have been broken into more times over the years than I also care to admit.
I used to keep a list of all the small bad things that happen to me in a day, along with a list of all the good things that happen to me in the same day. I concentrated on looking for the good things. There weren't many in comparison to the shit things, maybe a 9 to 1 ratio bad to good.
And then I stopped.
I realized that I really don't care that I have bad luck. Okay, the worst luck of anyone you know.
It happens. Some people breeze through life with delightful karma. I don't. I am a walking Murphy's Law bomb going off all the time. Part of me rages at the unfairness, part of me is grateful for the trade off of luck for smarts.
I get frustrated a lot.
I want the world to throw me a bone, because, come on, stop throwing this shit at me, I'm tired, I want a break. I'm tired of being knocked down, screamed at by large men calling me a bitch because I wouldn't excuse their bad behavior, having to go to the police to file complaints of people threatening me. I tired of all the crappy small things that, you know what, do make this a hateful place. I'm tired of the health problems of those I care about. Hell, I'm tired of my own health problems, and those have thus far been survivable (knocks on wood).
And while I worry about becoming a hermit, a recluse, and hiding from the world, because, you know, it's easier to disengage than it is to keep taking on the crap, I know that I'll keep trying. I'll keep moving forward. I'll keep looking for the good stuff. I'll keep ignoring the bad stuff, even when it's overwhelming, because that isn't the life I want.
I don't want to have the worst luck of anyone you know. I'm ostriching on that one, as, as far as I know, this is the only life I have.
Might as well keep trying.
Beacon 23
Book Notes Instead of being asleep at 23:25 on 18 August 2015, kitt created this:
Having read Howey's Wool, Shift, and Dust, I know I like his writing, both his style and his scenarios. So when Beacon 23 popped up in my Amazon recommended list, I was immediate intrigued.
Howey writes in small books, mostly long chapters or such, and serializes them, releasing them weekly to biweekly-ish (as in "fortnightly" and not the way you're thinking of you're thinking "semiweekly"). Sometimes the serialized books are bundled into a single volume, sometimes not.
Beacon 23, relatively new, is available in 5 parts. It is a quick read. The basic premise is that there are gravity wave beacons that send out location information about hazards in space, the way that lighthouses would send out local information about land. The narrator lives solo on/in one such beacon.
Over the course of the five parts, we get his history, and we get the saga of his life. We read about his struggles, against his past, against his inner demons, against the loneliness, and his fate.
It's a great read. Highly recommended.
No lick
Blog kitt decided around 23:05 on 18 August 2015 to publish this:I'm reading the book Beacon 23 by Hugh Howey, and, really, can't help but laughing out loud when I read this passage:
“No lick,” I tell her, wiping my cheek. I’ve tried to train this out of her. “Never lick me again,” I say, shaking a finger at her. She sits and cocks her head to the side. “Last time. Never again. No licking. I mean it.” Her tail swishes the steel grating. I pat her head.
I swear she can read my mind, and yet somehow she doesn’t seem to hear a word I say. I scratch behind her ears and ask, “These are just for decoration, aren’t they?”
She licks my hand. I don’t know why I even try.
Totally reminds me of Annie.
Lick lick lick lick lick oh god stop with the licking lick lick lick lick lick lick stop it lick lick lick lick fuck dog lick lick lick lick lick lick lick stop lick lick lick lick lick lick lick.
Might be time for another dog.
Beyond Exile
Book Notes Written with a loving hand by kitt some time around 19:52 on 18 August 2015
Okay, having finished the first book of, well, apparently a three book series, I went ahead and read the reviews of the next two books. The ending of the first book was so stunningly unsatisfying that I was nearly jumping at the chance to read the next book, Beyond Exile, to have some closure. So, I bought the next book.
Many of the annoying things with the previous book had been worked out by the time the author was writing this one. The jarring history that shouldn't exist in one's journal because the knowledge is assumed, is gone. We are on the journey with the narrator, so experience his life with him.
Much better.
The story continues exactly where the previous one left off. There's a helicopter crash and the narrator has to travel by foot for about 300 miles through zombie-infested backcountry to return home. He receives some unexpected aid, meets another journeying-solo man, and discovers some fantastic technology.
We also learn the source of the zombie in this universe. While I appreciated the closure, the particular suggestion is eye-rolling, which makes me giggle, given how preposterous the idea of zombie-ism is in the first place. That I'm willing to think, "okay, this scientific explanation for why dead people continue to function and crave living flesh," but, "this explanation isn't valid" is amusement-inducing.
I enjoyed this book more than the previous one. Yay for the narrator. Boo for bureaucracy.
Veiled (Alex Verus)
Book Notes Instead of being asleep at 21:28 on 15 August 2015, kitt created this:
I really like the Alex Verus series, by Benedict Jacka. It might be because of the broken hero, or maybe because the realistic results of various choices. The book reminds us that we make decisions as best we can at the moment, and they don't always turn out to be the best one in the long run, but they are the best at the moment. This series, about Alex Verus, a diviner mage living in London, pretty much exemplifies this concept. Best decision at the moment, hope for the best, so much outside of our control.
This is book six of the series.
There are a lot of explanations in the book about this political structure and that bit of history. There were times where I was thinking, "Ugh, more explanation than I really needed." Given that I read relatively fast, I didn't mind the history lessons, but the fact that I even noticed means there were a large number of them. The history lessons not withstanding, there was enough intrigue and mystery and ACTION that, again, I enjoyed this book.
Though, now that I think about it, this book might not be able to stand on its own... It's a good continuation of the series, but not really a book to pick up to read. If you're reading the series, this isn't the first of two to cause stopping (my rule, two bad books in row in a series and I stop reading the series), but it's not a stand-alone book. Read books 1-5 first.