May Rambling #1: Depression; and ABCW's Leslie gets married

My April was much better than my March, but between blog connectivity problems (more anon), and back pain that kept me out of work for a couple days, followed by four days out of town for work training, which compressed other tasks, I didn’t a chance to update the April Rambling since April 17. Moreover, I discovered some links from as much as two years ago I was GOING to use but they fell through the cracks. Meaning that I’ll do another one at the end of the month. Always said that if blogging got too hard, I would not do it. And this, comparatively, is the easy post I need right now.

An article about depression I was going to include in a different blog post. Some of the earlier posts from this blog I liked too. The blogger also linked to the TEDx talk Andrew Solomon: Depression, the secret we share. “The opposite of depression is not happiness, but vitality, and it was vitality that seemed to seep away from me in that moment.” When I imagine many people’s understanding of depression, I think of that famous scene in the movie

30 Day Challenge: Day 10 – Favorite Outfit

It occurred to me that this picture has many of the elements of my “favorite outfit”. To wit:

HAT: always wear a hat or cap outdoors for protection from the sun. I find most hats don’t fit me. My head’s too big, and I don’t mean that metaphorically. I had these two porkpie hats, but they’ve gone MIA; the wife put them away for the winter and I haven’t seen them since. I’ve discovered that adjustable caps with a platic band don’t fit me either; they tend to sit on top of my head like a crown. By comparison, caps with a cloth adjustable ban DO tend to fit me.

SUNGLASSES: always. I like to wear the yellow ones for reasons explained here.

LONG SLEEVES: even in summer, unless it’s going to be 90 degrees F, in which case, I slather on the sunscreen. Again, a precaution against severe burning.

PANTS: solid color, usually black or blue, almost always long, as opposed to shorts.

SNEAKERS: almost always these, rather than shoes, when not at work or church, usually Chuck Taylor, and at least once a week, the red Chucks. People LOVE the red Chucks; every time I’m wearing them, at least three people compliment me.

When I was on JEOPARDY! a dozen years ago, I was wearing my red Chucks during the warm up games. but when I was selected to play, I changed into new, uncomfortable hard-soled shoes, much to my fellow contestants’ disappointment. To this day, I figure if I were wearing my red Chucks, I would have been more relaxed and therefore would have played better.