I hope that you are not breathlessly waiting for the second part of my three-part series on lifehacking. I hope that you never wait breathlessly for anything on this newsletter—it’s unhealthy.
I am still interested in writing about the lifehacking culture and how it relates to this blog. I am also trying my best to write at least one post a week. I want to write the next two pieces in a way that will require some actual research and several hours of time over a couple of weeks each. Time not including writing and editing the post itself. I hope that no is disappointed with missing out on my hot takes about Timothy Ferriss. I think that I have a nice post in its place.
I am a dreary complainer on occasion. Especially in this newsletter. I could (and probably should) change the name to The Kvetching Korner, The (Mostly) Weekly Complain My Way Out of Doing My Challenges Gazette, or Yer Week in Whining with Jeremy D. Nichols. But I sincerely believe that I have a bit of a treat for my readers today—a post where I talk enthusiastically about something related to the challenges. Apparently I am allowed to enjoy trying and learning new things. Working on my challenges does not have to be greeted with the enthusiasm of a march to the firing squad. This project that started as a bit of fun quickly devolved into drudge work because my brain can never let anything stay fun for longer than a couple of days. I should probably have been some kind of traveling salesman or some other itinerant profession, because of the constant pulling up of stakes and change of scenery, but travel also gets tiresome and joyless in a couple of days. Welcome to my brain, an ouroboros of novelty seeking and the crushing anhedonia that follows. Dammit! I swore that I would not complain at all in this post. I promise, no more complaints—The Kvetching Korner is finished for the week.
You see, I’ve been having a bunch of fun with my challenges this past couple of weeks. I have been writing at a slow but steady pace. But enjoying it. Really enjoying writing for the first time in months.
I have started a new and (so far) fun guitar learning website. I actually feel like I might be able to play a whole recognizable song very soon. And by very soon, I mean two or three months from now. That’s not crushing my challenge goal by October 2, 2020 pace, but I cannot care about that. It is sapping the joy out of this blog and out of my life. I had all but given up on the guitar a couple of weeks ago, and I am having fun with the lessons and music. Fun, you know, fun? I have to remember that that is why I want to learn guitar—to have fun with it.
The thing that I am most enjoying right now is learning to draw. Strike that. I am not enjoying learning how to draw, I am enjoying drawing. My foster sister and friend, Mary is a very talented pen and ink and pencil artist. As I was thumbing through Instagram on August 1, I saw one of her amazing drawings with #drawgust below it. I had not drawn consistently for weeks; I decided to make a drawing every day this month and post them on Instagram and Facebook. The drawings would come from this 1913 drawing book that I bought for one dollar on my Kindle.

Hey y’all, that owl is really good at drawing owls.
I would do the drawings in the order in which they came in the book. Here is the first set of drawing examples:

I love how staggeringly steep the learning curve is between the second-to-last and last steps.
People seem to be enjoying my scribblings, and more importantly, so am I. I will post a few of the drawings today:

The first of my drawings, a dangerously wobbly pagoda.

This only mildly deranged toy horse.

I accidentally made his face too small and his head too big, so I call him Charlie Kirk.

The toy animals seem to be the favorite drawings. This toy pig is my favorite.
At the end of the month, I will have a post where I show all of them. In the interim, you can always follow me on Instagram or stalk me on Facebook—all my posts are public, so it shouldn’t require too much actual stalking.
Thank you for touring my little gallery with me today. As a bonus, enjoy this little sheep:

Ce mouton s’appelle es Gerard.
I love you all, and I will see you next week.
By the way, I probably seem a bit lovey-dovey and uncharacteristically cheery, don’t I? I just remembered that I just took three oldish low-dose weed mints that “don’t do anything” right before I sat down to write this. Well, when you combine three of them, I guess they do something because I am high as a kite, but not in a sloppy way. Just in a “things seem good” kind of way.
I’ll take it.
Thank you, as always, for reading.
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