I Want to Play Monster

I want to Play Monster - Neither of these images are what I interacted with....only close to

It is about 10:40 P.M. and I am in bed, very sick from something. I have been in bed, sleeping off an on for a few hours now. I am not deep asleep, neither am I awake. This may have been a Lucid Dream, I really do not know, it was that real. I hear something quietly, slowly, rhythmically thumping against the bedroom wall on the left side of the window at the foot of the bed.

The sound continues, and I know it is nothing, so I say firmly, "Stop it, I want to sleep". The sound stops. Now the bottom of the bed on the side the sound was coming from is being rhythmically pushed and released slowly. At first I think it is my imagination and I ignore it.

After the third push and release I say, "Go away, I want to sleep.", hoping this is the end of it, whatever "it" is. I hear a voice quietly say to me, "I want to play Monster". 

I can't think of any other recent dream, where my attention was so fully caught. I came out of what was a deep sleep, to sense a large something standing at the far end of the bed. It was about six feet tall, plus the horns. Black on the bottom, cream on top, with a skull like face, and what appeared to be deer antlers facing backwards.

It certainly looked capable of, "Playing Monster", ugly and scary all rolled into one. WTF!, I think. What in the world is this thing, and what am I supposed to do with or about it? "I want to play Monster", says the voice again a little more persistent.

Well the hell!, I am thinking. In the first place what are you and how am I supposed to help you play Monster? I am wide awake now, and nothing has changed. I do know one thing, I am not playing "Monster", or anything else with you.

I have an idea. Half filled with disgust, and half wondering what is going to happen, I take it by its right sleeve and say, "follow me". We both step through the bedroom wall into the back yard. 

It is tall as I mentioned, about six feet, maybe more. Built like a man but with black horses legs instead of man legs. Wide across the shoulders and a face that never really comes into focus, but looks like dried bone with movement. On top of it's head is dark fur and a rack of reversed deer horns. The look is good, but the horns are backwards and do not seem practical for what horns are normally used for.

I decide I know where I am going to take it after all. There was no thinking process per say, it just happened. Down the street to another street, then to about fifty yards from the stoplight there is a tunnel under the road. There is a bike path near the exit of the tunnel, a walking path near the entrance, and a walking/bike path above. Across the street is a square mile or so of houses. Perfect place to play Monster. I decide we are going to take a shortcut.

I tell it to follow me and start running to the fence. The "Thing" doesn't move that fast. Surprisingly I clear the fence. The "Thing" doesn't clear the top and to my surprise, it sinks into and through the brick wall fence without breaking loose any bricks.

We run as fast as it can across the street, and through the next fence, across the yard, and through the outer fence. This is much simpler than jumping I am thinking (How casual I am in the moment). We are moving like ghosts. We run down the path to the tunnel, and I stop.

"In there", I say. It looks around and then looks to where I am pointing. "I like it", it says. I explain the layout and why it is a great place to play, "Monster". It agrees and runs into the tunnel out of sight.

I run back to the bedroom much faster than I ran to the spot where I left it. I am getting ready to walk through the wall back into my bedroom when another one shows up. This one acts like a teenage boy, or at least my perception of it. "I want to play, Monster too?", and then asks me where the other is.

I am feeling really sick and tired and just want to get into bed and sleep. I tell it, "It is over there a ways, use your sense of smell and follow its scent". It huffs, then snorts, and shuffles off to join its kin. I go back to bed and fall asleep again. Nothing at all unusual going on here.

I wake up about 3:30, and I am thinking WTF!?!? Was that a dream or was that somehow real? It had to be a dream, but it was at the same time so real. The clincher for me was two things. I am not scared of, "Monsters", in any shape or form. I have never learned of anyone being hurt by one no matter how scary they may look. 

Finally, everything was so detailed, from the soft, quiet bumps on the wall of the bedroom, to the movement of the bed from being pushed and released. The detailed run down to the tunnel and back was precise. Besides running through the fence walls, it could be duplicated. Finally, the second one showing up. Where would that come from and why? Wasn't one enough?

I searched the Web, and the closest I could find was a Wendigo. They are not supposed to be around here. However these two, whatever they are, were not evil, emaciated, or hungry as far as I could understand. The first one, if it was put out that I was not terrified, did not show it in any way. The second one when it showed up, started talking as our conversation was taking place in daylight on the sidewalk, completely normal. I'm thinking Wendigo is not what they are. Close, but no cigar, as the saying goes.

 

It is now four days later as I write this, and every detail is as vivid as if it happened this morning. If there is anything unusual happening at the, "Tunnel", I haven't heard of it yet. As for the, "Things", I prefer the word, "Beings", if they are real and not in my dream, they are happy where they are, playing "Monster". If it is all the same to them, I won't feel bad if I never see them again. Not because I am afraid, but I would rather have my doubts about whether it was a dream or not.

Xubuntu Linux - Still Refreshingly Boring

Xubuntu Screenshot

Xubuntu is an easy Linux Distribution to like, if you prefer the XFCE desktop. The yeh-sayers of XFCE promote its lighter demands on the system. I like XFCE because it fits what I want in a desktop, especially XFCE Version 4.16. I am always willing to trade bling for functionality.

Xubuntu or Ubuntu in general is created out of the Debian Testing Repository which places Xubuntu high on the list for those wanting to be closer to the bleeding edge. If you want to get a little closer, skip the LTS and go for the interim releases that have a shorter lifespan.

Detractors of Xubuntu at a user level, exclaim Xubuntu is boring, boring, boring. I tend to agree with this claim. Xubuntu in the moment or Xubuntu of ten years ago looks and acts as the same distribution. Personally I find this boring-ness refreshing. To each his/her own. I am okay with boring.

Xubuntu may be Ubuntu's most popular flavor out there, so many people are okay with sameness. Because in the moment, my computer is months rather than years old, everything works as expected. The numbers of Linux distributions I can use are fairly limited and Xubuntu is one of them.

If you are on the other end with an older computer, Xubuntu will work just as well for you because it's requirements are not as CPU intensive as some other desktop environments. If your needs are that of a general user, you may find that you do not need to add any additional applications as Xubuntu comes well stocked.

I do not care for Snap packages. I removed them shortly after I added the additional applications I use. This resulted in extra steps for removing Snap packages as some of the software I added arrived in the form of Snap packages. It was only an extra thirty minutes in removal and adding PPA's or adding .deb packages from the websites.

The arguments for and against Snap packages go on forever. They start with memory and end somewhere after losing control of your system, as the Snap package dictates the settings. I am at this end of the arguments. I use Firefox web browser across a number of computers. I have Firefox synced on all of them.

The first time I used Firefox as a Snap package, it didn't look right. I made adjustments so it looked as I thought it should. As I used the other computers which did not support Snap packaging, the settings made a mess out of Firefox. Adjusting the settings on a non Snap Firefox brought me back to square one with the Snap version.

Xubuntu and Ubuntu in general have two releases. LTS or Long Term Support for five years from release and interim releases, released every six months. Needless to say as in the case of XFCE, if you want to try out and use XFCE 4.16 in the moment, you need to use the interim release. Eventually what works well in the interim release filters down to LTS releases, and the rest is left at the roadside.

Ubuntu in general carries a lot of baggage. It has been accused of spying on its users, ignoring its user in promotion of its paid support options, and not sharing system improvements with Debian as much as they take from Debian for their own use.

There are a few other commercial Linux Companies out there and I am sure they all carry their own baggage. Xubuntu and its kin are user supported and in some ways not as directly influenced by Ubuntu's owners. The murky details of these relationships is another matter however.

Sex. Lies, and Politics adorn most conversation these days. Ubuntu and it's siblings are no exception. You can read about Ubuntu on Wikipedia as a reference point and make up your own mind on what is acceptable for your Linux Distribution. That is your own decision and choice.

For information, I added these packages to my install of Xubuntu. You may want more or less or none at all. Zim, FeatherPad, Pan, Brave Browser, Audacity, Celluloid, Cheese, Chrome, Gparted, Gnome Weather App.

Important -- Synaptic Package Manner is on the menu. Synaptic is the go to for me for non Snap packages and for other distributions. Do not use Synaptic to update or upgrade your system. Wait for Software (on the menu) to tell when you have updates. 

I forgot this interim Xubuntu is using packages from Debian Testing. I downloaded almost 500 mg of updates via Synaptic, and ended up reinstalling Xubuntu because the updates where not stable and borked my install. Do not do what I did. Use, "Software" for any needed system updates.

In closing, if you want to be close to the leading edge, want a stable Linux distribution, don't mind being bored with well oiled sameness, you can do a lot worse than an interim  Xubuntu release as your distribution of choice. If you want better stability with install and forget it, use the Xubuntu LTS release.

Gluten Intolerance - The Hidden Illness

I spent over forty years of my life not knowing I was [wheat] Gluten Intolerant. One doctor even suggested I was faking an imaginary illness, and wasting his time. Instant Illness and recovery was a roller coaster ride with no explanation.

Gluten intolerance when I was young was practically unknown. My father had it and was not aware of it. In the last year of his life, his stomach would swell, looking like he swallowed a basketball. He would be in great pain from the swelling.

The doctors in our area at the time were ignorant of gluten intolerance. All the doctors agreed on, was when a patient's stomach swelled like that, they had between six months and a year to live. My Father was no exception to that rule.

Though I did not know it at the time, my first symptoms came in the form of brutal hangovers. Most people have a hangover that lasts for part of a day. Mine would last two to three days.

At first I thought it was drinking too much. I paid attention to the amount I drank and found it was what I drank, not how much. If I drank wine, the next day I would feel pretty normal. If I drank beer, it was a totally different story. I would be sick for a couple of days.

In my thirties came my insta-sick problem. I suffered from extreme tiredness at times. Feeling like I had been exercising for hours and was completely worn out. I just wanted to lay down and sleep. For no reason I would feel like I had the flu, minus the fever. It would last anywhere from a few hours to a few days.

Some family members had thyroid conditions, with two having their thyroids removed. I was sure thyroid was my problem. Thus started my search for relief from the Doctor's, "Nothing wrong with you", declarations.

After a slew of doctors and continuing negative thyroid tests, my thyroid was boringly normal. They also agreed en mass I did not have Lupus. One doctor offered Seasonal Area Depression as a cause, but that only explained the winter months. Finally, I gave up on doctors finding what was wrong with me.

I was cruising into my forties around this time. I started keeping a food, exercise and illness log. Nothing seemed to relate to my feeling bad. Whether I ate salads, vegetables, or meat and potatoes, sudden flu like symptoms came and went. I had a cycles of constipation followed by diarrhea. Joint pain joined my list of complaints. Then another oddity. I dropped floaters and they smelled sour almost like vinegar. It did not seem to matter what I ate.

One day I received a call, and the caller told me after five doctors they found a cause for their mood swings and our shared flu like symptoms. What was Gluten Intolerance I asked? I had never heard of it. After it was explained to me, I thought, well this can't be me, I generally eat wheat cereal for breakfast, sandwiches for lunch and bread with dinner and I am okay.

I gave it a try. After four days of no wheat products, I woke up feeling literally thirty years younger. I did not believe it was possible to feel so good! To say eating gluten free is a lifestyle change is to say climate change is a minor inconvenience.

If you go through constant periods of bloating, constipation, convulsive diarrhea, illness and fatigue, you may be gluten intolerant. There is of course a blood test you can take, but the simplest test is go on a completely grain free diet for a week and see how you feel.

Gluten Intolerance is a real problem, and hides itself as a cold, flu, allergy, and food poisoning part of your thinking process. Gluten Intolerance hides very well. There is always a reasonable explanation of why you feel so poorly. It was thought to mostly affect people of European descent, but as the years roll by, they know now people from every nationality suffer from it.

There is a blood test you can get. The easiest test is giving up every food with grain in it including liquids for a week. Read the label of every food you put into your mouth. If after a week of not eating, drinking, or ingesting wheat gluten in all it's forms, you do not feel like a new person, wheat gluten may not be your unknown issue.

Giving up wheat gluten means reading labels of every food you eat, even your soap and shampoo and lotion. If you wear makeup, you need to read the ingredients of it too. When you eat out, there may be wheat gluten on your french fries or in your mashed potatoes. Almost always on breaded foods, such as fried fish. Cheese and ice cream contain gluten because it is a cheap thickener. If you can not identify the ingredients as you look at it, it probably has wheat in some form in it. Thank the food industry for this.

This is taken my own experience with Gluten Intolerance, so take what I wrote for what it is worth. 

Here are a couple of links for further reading, if this is of interest to you:

Hidden Sources of Gluten

8 Foods to Avoid with a Gluten Intolerance (and 7 to Eat)

Sources of Gluten

In my opinion, the food industry is out of control. Almost all, "Oat Cereals" contain large amounts of wheat. Much of the food we eat has some form of wheat gluten in it. About every third bowl of a GMO oat cereal causes me problems. Soaps and shampoos are a minefield of inflammatory dangerous chemicals that make me sick for the sake of profit.

MX-21.3 “Wildflower” and LMDE 5 High Level Overview

 I have been a Debian fan for about three decades now. Needless to say I really enjoy using Debian. Debian has a problem though. Debian is a great source but  a poor Distribution. Debian distribution is sparsely populated and every time I wanted to do something more, I had to install, tinker and tweak. You do not get spoiled using straight Debian.

Debian Linux does produce some awesome children. MX Linux and Linux Mint Debian Edition are two of the finest. Both distributions are similar with a few minor differences.

Linux Mint Debian Edition does an excellent job at being a Debian version of the original Linux Mint. Everything you find in Linux Mint, you find in LMDE. MX Linux on the other hand is built for users with user input on where the distribution goes and how it gets there.

I have used both until recently when my eight year old desktop decided it was not going to work any more. My new computer is about as new gets and some Linux Distributions do not work well with new computers. Others do not suit my preferences. LMDE and MX Linux however do both.

I first installed LMDE 5 and was happy except for the fact it is a back-up of sorts to Linux Mint. I installed MX Linux a month later and have also been very happy with it, with a few exceptions.

My issues with MX Linux are probably due to my hardware being so new. In the past, when I purchased a new computer, I was limited to the one distribution it would happily run for the near future. Being a Debian fan, this time I have at least these two distributions to use.

LMDE performs flawlessly, while MX Linux suffers from maintaining a few of my important configuration settings. Generally this would not be an issue, except it is for my online meetings. Printing is not so pressing.

My camera is not found when plugged into the USB Port. Neither is my USB microphone. Google Chrome - Meet - finds and turns on my webcam, but sound is not found. I also experience an after upgrade issue of no network printer. Not sure why this is either.

After a system upgrade I have to go into the Audio Mixer and reset my settings. Not sure why this is happening, and it probably will not happen six months from now. Other than these issues, I prefer MX Linux.

Both distributions have most of the software an everyday user will want. MX Linux feels like it offers more tweaks and setting adjustments, but without counting out settings and adjustments on each distro, that is a perspective matter. Kudos to MX Linux for the tool assortment contained in MX Tools.

I use a mix of software, including some KDE software and never had an issue with either distribution. I install applications not in the software store and they work as advertised, never skipping a beat.

MX Linux and Linux Mint Debian Edition are built from Debian which means they are rock solid and tested ad nauseam. Between them they differ on what type of packages used in their respective distribution.

I recommend taking either or both for a test drive on a USB stick. They are both not resource hogs and are quite fast. You will not be disappointed, and you may be pleasantly surprised.

As for me, I am using a modified Xubuntu in the moment. Xubuntu seems to work well for me when I have a new computer. More to follow in another post on Xubuntu. 

Life Dreams to Life Reality

We are "Captains" of our own ship. When we are children we start to visualize leaving the safety of the harbor and moving out to sea to unknown destinations. As we grow, our dream of moving out into the world becomes more defined. We start to define our life.

We learn the basic skills we need to learn to get through our early years and teen years. We want to be a Fireman, Policeman, Doctor, Lawyer, Mom or Dad. We want to go to college, be in a band, and live on Mars. We are going to get married, adventure, live in the woods alone. We contemplate many future lives.

Our world does not immediately start to change every time we change our mind. When we are young and in school, this is okay. Being young and in school is the time of life when we are supposed to be trying new things and exploring new dreams. When we hit our late teens to twenties, things become more serious. We start to distill our dreams into our life.

Current life choices and decisions sometimes get in the way of what we think we want. What your parents have done with their life may be the first big obstacle to overcome. We start to align our dreams to our future life goals.

Being part of a circus and being an Internet star at the same time are extreme contrasts. These both may be achievable, but each takes its own energy and planning to be successful. One of these dreams may need to defer to the other. Dream and life disparity creates muddled results.

We often modify our expectations as we grow. Our dreams start converging with our life path. Going to and graduating from college to found our own business is an goal of converging dreams. Changing what we want sometimes leads to confusion and frustration. We are focusing on and clarifying our future life.

You decide to go to college. When you enter college, you are required to take almost two years of basic classes whether you have an interest in those subjects or not. The reason for this is two fold. First, you are exposed to different areas of areas of life. Psychology, Biology, Math, English and Foreign Language are all part of life. You gain a broader view of your future possibilities.

One day you wake up to an epiphany. You want to become the owner of a non-profit. The world of capitalism, you decide is not for you. You have found a more important direction for your life. But college is all about capitalism. That is how college is built. You are now in a dream/life conflict.

You are going to find some speed bumps in your road, and you may be detoured from your dreams for a time. Your world starts making the changes you want to help make your dreams happen. Your classes are now a two edged sword. How do you take what you are learning, apply it to what you want, and make it work? Do all parts of your dream future fit together cohesively?

When it comes to your dreams, there are a couple of key truths. The longer you hold onto your biggest dream, and apply yourself to it, the more your world changes to make it happen. You cannot expect your world to stop and change course every time you change your mind. What has been done to create your present life will run its course. Be ready for bumps in the road while you focus on making your newest dreams align with your life.

Depending on how focused you are and how you apply yourself, change may be quick. Immediate drastic change will force you to make hard decisions. Align your dreams, follow your goals and you will get there. You can make your dreams reality, if you stay focused and help to make them happen.

Striped Bed Sheets Save You Time

Colorful flower patterned sheets can really brighten up a bedroom. Flower patterns and solid colors reign when it comes to sheet patterns. For me, I prefer to spend as little time changing sheets and making the bed as possible. I use sheets having a striped pattern.

A striped pattern makes putting fresh sheets on the bed really simple. Stripes either go vertical or horizontal, so either way it is easy to align the fitted sheet and top sheet to the mattress. No thinking, no putting, pulling up and turning ninety degrees because you were not paying attention to the little tag, if you are lucky enough to have one to tell the long side from the short side.

Putting sheets on a bed is not a time consuming project. Putting striped on takes little or no thought about which way they fit the bed, and saves a minute to two each time the bed is made and the sheets are changed. In this day and age when many of us are going without sleep to squeeze in a few more minutes, saving a few minutes a day is saving a lot. 

Add all those saved minutes up over a year, add in the lack of frustration over having to pull up, rotate, and pull the sheet [again] down over the box spring, striped sheets make changing sheets a painless task.

During non sleep hours, no one I know goes into their bedroom to admire their sheets. When the lights are out, your sheets could be the most garish colors you can imagine, and it doesn't matter, you do not see them. Consider for the most part, you and perhaps one other person see your sheets, and then for only a few minutes, so why not stripes?

For those few minutes in between, considering the time and frustration of patterned sheets, stripes make sense. Broad stripes, pin stripes, multicolored stripes. The idea is to make one little task a little faster and simpler. Save those beautiful sheets for when company is coming. Too bad all tasks can not be so easily simplified.

For the curious, the sheets in the picture are, "breathable microfiber". The most comfortable sheets I have found to date, and the price is reasonable too.

Norwegian Wood, Truth and Fiction

When I was a young adult and still immortal, I worked in a resort town in California as a Dinner Cook. This small town had one radio station and it played the current week's top forty songs in a loop, sixteen hours a day starting Monday Morning, ending Sunday evening. It was piped through the restaurant. A new top forty loop started 08:00 on Monday morning when the radio station came back on the air to start its week.

One week, the radio station included an instrumental that I really enjoyed. I had no idea why there were no lyrics, and I didn't think it was top 40,  but it was a very pleasant song. The song I found out was by the Beatles, and its name was Norwegian Wood. Once I learned the title, I thought the song had been released some years earlier, but not being a Beatles fan, I was not really sure.

One of my co-workers, Hans, and I were talking about nothing important one afternoon when the acoustic version of the song Norwegian Wood came on over the radio.  I mentioned to Hans, I thought the song was a well done instrumental, and I wondered what the words to the song were. I asked Hans if he new the words to the song.

Hans started singing, "I'm just sitting here, here on this log, drinking my beer...."

I spent a number of years knowing only the first stanza - of an alternate version of the song, Norwegian Wood.

I learned a valuable lesson from that moment. When someone tells you something, it is not always true.