Because I continue to only sit down to post every week or two, another series of otherwise unrelated items:

For the first time ever I am stopping midway through a bookshelf display simply because I’m just not feeling it. I liked the idea initially – creating a scene inspired by The Witcher, with Geralt and Yennefer – but something about the execution right now doesn’t feel right. I’d rather stop, tear down, and start a new one than attempt to figure out what isn’t working, how to potentially fix, and then act accordingly. Given where we are in the calendar, I really should just go ahead and jump directly into my Halloween display…

Heck, if I’m going to put together my Halloween display once I take the half-finished one apart, I should simultaneously just go ahead and put the Halloween tree up. In fact, I visited the local Hallmark store earlier this evening to check out the new ornaments that they’ve already put out, and there are a couple this year that would be great for Halloween use…

I’m continuing my efforts to find a successor to O’Faolain’s as my new preferred hangout away from home. I use the term “successor” very deliberately, because nothing is ever going to replace it. The fact of the matter is that O’Faolain’s was damn near perfect for me. It had everything: the right atmosphere/decor, hard cider on tap, awesome french fries (the most essential requirement,) otherwise decent Matthew-friendly (and Sally-friendly) eating options, TouchTunes-enabled jukebox… it just had everything I wanted in my favorite pub. Each of the three current contenders – The Ashburn Pub, Wicket Door Pub, and Finnegan’s – is lacking in one or more of these aspects. Ideally, my new favorite hangout would be no more than 20 minutes from my house, but I’m going to cast the net a bit wider in the hopes that there’s somewhere else that can top one of those three. Otherwise, it’ll be time to weigh the pros and cons of each and just run with it…

I’ve actually been in something of a funk the last couple days. I don’t think there’s any actual cause for it – it’s just a kind of malaise caused by the current state of affairs and my pessimism/nihilism about the future. These funks started to happen on infrequent occasions a few months into the pandemic, but actually started to subside during the second half of last year when things genuinely seemed to be getting better thanks to vaccines and common sense public health measures, Alas, COVID continues to evolve, with a new variant (BA.5) that the current vaccines and boosters don’t actually seem to prevent you from getting infected with. Despite having had COVID (most likely a different variant) just six weeks ago, I really need to start being more careful again. In fact, another requirement for my new favorite hangout is absolutely going to be outdoor seating – which actually eliminates one of the previously mentioned contenders (The Ashburn Pub…)

Heading back up in Philly in a little over a week to be spend some time up there with Manchild, finally see Keith for the first time in a year, and then see a Phillies game with the family. I wonder if I would experience these emotional funks less frequently if I lived closer to there and could realistically make day trips up there more often… 

Yesterday, I placed an order for the burgundy denim jacket that will become the fifth to be covered in an assortment of patches and pins. I’m actually planning a longer post in the near future about these jackets. They’ve come to represent and mean a number of different things to me, and actually even contribute to my mental well-being. So, yeah, making them the subject of an in-depth blog post seems like a moral imperative… 

Feel the need to state that it has now been two years and eight months since my last haircut. Obviously, much has changed in the interim, but back when I cut my mullet-tail off in the spring of 1995 I really thought that was going to be the last time I would have any kind of long hair. I’m sure that 23-year-old me would be quite stunned to know how long my hair is now…

Finally, in my last post, I wrote about my efforts (or lack thereof) to lost weight since the start of May. Things have nosedived a bit since then. So, tomorrow, I start doing the one thing that I tend to neglect most when I get really off-course in taking care of myself properly: weighing myself each morning and hold myself accountable each day. It’s been over a week since the last time I did so, and the number showing on the scale will almost certainly suck. Hopefully the damage isn’t not as bad as it did when I went off the rails at the end of last year.