Back in business

I am reviving the blog and the podcast. I mean to post new blog material every Saturday, and a new podcast the first Tuesday of each month, beginning June 2.

There are some serious design issues with the blog, and I'm going to have to hire an expert to fix them, which is going to cost a bundle. There are also issues with the 1,600+ posts I imported from the previous blog. Every one will need to be re-formatted, and the tags dealt with, and the links edited. If I tackle one per day, the whole job will take in excess of three years.

Vocation

I am doing this to re-establish a sense of vocation or mission in my life; some life goal to be the central pillar around which I can organize, and be motivated for, everything else I will do. I have been lacking such for several years.

Life is difficult, and I've had the life-long desire to make it less difficult — for everyone. And I believe I have found the means to do that. I will be the exponent of The Way of Peace. This may not solve all the world's problems, but it's what I have to offer. And based on my own experience, it is the way to assure and maximize my own health and happiness also.

Narcolepsy...

... continues to be the bane of my life. As I probably told previously, the pattern is that I'll sleep for an hour, get up to use the bathroom, and fifteen minutes later feel overwhelmingly sleepy again. Not tired, but sleepy. So it's (been) back to bed; and that pattern just continues, all day, all night.

Nothing gets done, e.g. housework.

In recent months, a mirror-image problem has appeared: I can be awake for 30 hours with absolutely no impulse to lie down.

Often, though I feel fine sitting down, I will feel very weak when I stand up, weak when I walk, and take tiny, tiny steps.

My doctors said, months ago, that the "excessive daytime sleepiness" could be caused by obstructive sleep apnea. Which caused too-little, and poor-quality sleep at night. So, we tested and found that I do have that. So I got a CPAP, and have been using it for several months now.

I have seen no improvement.

As for further testing that would screen specifically for narcolepsy, and the possibility of getting medicated; (1) there is currently a severe nationwide shortage of sleep doctors; it takes forever to get an appointment (This was not the case some decades ago when I was first diagnosed with sleep apnea.) and (2) apparently many of the medications for this condition have severe side effects that many patients can't tolerate.

I get a newsletter from a narcolepsy support organization, from which it appears that many people go through life with this condition essentially untreated.

A renewed sense of vocation may help me stand up on my feet and keep going.

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Here's Leroy Anderson's piano concerto.

I. Allegro Moderato

II. Andante

III. Allegro Vivo