Progress Update.

It’s not like I’ve been idle this week, I just haven’t gotten to spend as much time on the The Old Man as I would like. But, at the end of the Second Week of the edit process, I can at least report having made something that looks like progress. Ideally, I’d hoped to make the half-way mark, but that’ll have to happen this week.

After all, 33% isn’t that bad.

Electrics.

Let’s look at this past week. I spent most of it working in the shed getting my electrics set up. I now have all the outlets wired, the workbench lights wired and the wires run all the way to the two overhead lights. The issue there is that although I bought two light fixtures, I can’t find either one for love nor money.

Jump Start.

Another issue that slowed me down was on Saturday. Although I got the better part of two hours to work uninterrupted in the car one last time while the girls sold Girl Scout Cookies at Walmart, come time to leave with a full trunk of groceries – and a special treat for me, which I’ll get to in a minute – the battery was almost completely dead.

It didn’t take too long for the roadside assistance to show up and get us going’ Less than an hour, I’d guess, from hearing a series of clicks instead of a freshly started engine. The problem was that we got home so late that, having thrown some dinner together, eaten it and cleaned up, it was well after seven. By then I didn’t have the energy to face a full on edit session.

Up Next…

A.I.P. Diet Plans.

Firstly, this upcoming Wednesday is the start of Week Eight of the elimination phase of my A.I.P [Auto Immune Protocol] diet. So far, it’s been pretty successful. I’ve had no migraines at all and the two small instances of eczema I can’t regard as ‘break outs’ and have really only served to remind me why I’m doing this.

The first thing I intend to reintroduce is, guess what?

Beer.

Hence the extra treat for myself that sat in the trunk while we waited for our jump start.

Now, I know that beer isn’t exactly the healthiest of substances, but I’ve been without it for seven weeks now, and, gosh darn it, when I finish week eight I’m going to reintroduce it.

I also know that here in the United States of Lousy Beer, anything and everything can make it into your pint. There’s an easy remedy for this though: pure beer.

Ingredients.

While checking canned chipotles for my wife yesterday – who broke her A.I.P. elimination phase a while ago and is reintroducing faster than I plan to – I noticed that each and every can has tomatoes in it too, which she hasn’t reintroduced yet.

Almost everything we pick up these days has ingredients included that don’t fit with the diet as we’re implementing it, and we’re not exactly stringent.

Also yesterday, I went through the ingredients of Kraft Mac & Cheese with my eldest daughter and, not including the chemistry set they throw in just for good measure, I counted off twelve ingredients that aren’t kosher for me right now and which would take twenty four weeks for me to reintroduce before I can have that to eat!

Making it harder, alcoholic beverage packaging isn’t required to include ingredients, although most ciders I pick up here are at least honest enough to admit they pollute their brews with sugar.

There is a magic word though.

Reinheitsgebot.

It’s the old German purity law that states that the only ingredients that can be used in the production of beer should be water, barley and hops – not yeast, because that was just a magic natural element back in 1516.

And, since I’m permitted water, I’m only really introducing two new ingredients, not including the alcohol.

What About The Writing???

My plan was to get to the fifty-percent mark before this post, and I’m twelve percent short of that. I don’t know that I can make that up this week, but I’m going to set a stretch goal of getting back on target with three-quarters complete by this week’s end.

It’s going to be a tall order, but if I make it by 0900 next Monday, I’ll only have to wait two more days before I can celebrate with a beer!

Mmm – beer…

Have a great week everyone!

Categories: Revision, The Old Man, Work Update