‘Tis the season…I guess.

Let me preface this blog by saying that I have NO regrets about moving to Wisconsin. I love my wife more than anything, and for the most part, there is nothing I would change about my life right now. At least, nothing that has anything to do with Wisconsin or my decision to move here from San Diego.

That being said, I am not a huge fan of the cold or the snow. But, even my wife, who has never lived anywhere but here her entire life, is fond of saying “I don’t live here for the weather.” The cold and snow have a way of sapping everything from a person. Their warmth, their motivation (and often their ability) to get out and do anything. And so it is with me. I have lost all momentum for fitness. I burned myself out on the gym, so I looked for alternate things to do. I found martial arts again, but between work, illness and small children, I have been one time in a month. And I will likely not go tonight. I’m hoping that after the holidays that will change. Things will settle down and I can start going on a regular basis. Even then, I feel stifled. A “regular” basis amounts to one night a week on Tuesday. We’re hoping to get Sydney into it starting in January, so that will also open up Saturdays for Family lessons. At least, when her dad’s plans don’t interfere on his weekends. So, I will only be able to really count on every other Saturday.

Eh, I’m probably just whining and bitching. But hey, it’s my blog, so I can do that.

Anyways, on the creative side, I’ve been doing a little here and there to keep the “muscles” loose. I doodle a lot, and think about stories. I even managed to finish a short one recently. A fantasy/horror/action yarn about a girl assassin. I sent it to my wife to read, and am probably going to see if others want to be “casual editors” on it soon (let me know if you are interested). That makes three complete short stories in the last year. Not bad for me, all things considered. I also have a few more in the works, and of course, there are the other, larger projects that I occasionally revisit for short periods. Eventually one or more of them will get done, most likely.

The D&D game has taken a hiatus for the holidays, but I’m eager to start up again. The DM has set things up in a way that promises to be very interesting. Online gaming has been strictly the DCUO MMO Beta. I have to say, I love this game. Graphically, it makes City of Heroes look like Super Mario Brothers. And since it’s only a beta test, there are occasional updates to the game that are changing how it looks and plays, which is cool because they seem to be on track to building a really good MMO, despite the fact that it’s concurrently designed for the PC and the PS3. I keep eying the new WoW expansion, and am dying to see how it is, and to play again. Perhaps in the Spring I will suspend my CoH account, and re-up my WoW account, once I get the expansion of course.

I have my final court date for custody of Faith in just a couple of weeks. After that, it’s over. One way or another, I will (hopefully) never have to deal with the issue again. Faith will either be with me or her mom for the next three years, and then she is an adult, and able to go where and do what she wants. In the meantime, it will be a matter of either sending or receiving Child Support payments, and buying plane tickets for Summer visits. All things considered, I have my preferences, but I will be content with whichever way it goes. At least I can be sure that my daughter knows I did what I could for her, and that I was never a “deadbeat dad”, despite what her mom would like her to think.

Work is going well. At least in that I still have a job, and based on my 3-month review, it looks like I will for the foreseeable future. There are busy days and boring days. But overall, I’m happy. Like I told my boss when he asked, I may have days where I’m not all that happy to be here, but I NEVER have days where I seethe and inwardly HATE being here. I’ve had plenty of jobs like that. So, this is pretty nice, all things considered.

And that is my life in a nutshell. Working, playing, writing, doodling, and loving my family. All things considered, it could be (and has been in the past) much worse. But really, it couldn’t be much better.