0005 - fishes, things that are other than we think, stress
I didn't know what to write for this entry but then it became very long while I was not looking.
Part of me really doesn’t feel like writing today’s entry, but at the same time I’ve sort of been thinking about it ever since I woke up! I’ve spent all day wondering what to write about, but of course no clear idea presented itself.
You see, I failed to realize that today was my first day back to work, meaning I would have considerably less free time. I started this word-vomit experiment during vacations. I could take all day to write a post if I wanted. It’s not really all that bad, though-just that I need to work out what my new schedule is going to look like.
(I chuckle to think how in one of the last entries I said that “my current schedule was maintainable in the long term,” lol. It seems I failed to think of the future.)
Anyway. It’s now the evening, 8 p.m. to be exact. The kids are asleep, and my wife is attending to some work stuff. All things considered, it is actually quite an appropriate moment to write.
Well… Enough beating about the bush.
Something interesting I learned today is that in some circumstances it’s actually correct to use the word “fishes.” From what I understand, it’s acceptable when referring to multiple groups of fish (a group of groups) and mostly used in scientific contexts. For example, you would use “fishes” to describe the different groups of fish in the animal kingdom.
I actually realized this while reading a book with my son about “the kingdoms of life.” There was a page explaining the different branches of life on Earth, and I was surprised to see the term “fishes.” Here’s a screenshot in case you don’t believe me
Initially, I thought this might’ve been a typo or something, but the book was made by the Smithsonian, so a typo of that sort seemed quite unlikely.
It’s such a simple thing, really, but it goes to show how you can always learn something new. More than that, it shows that things aren’t really as rock solid as we think. I remember when I was learning English in school, how often I would trip up on fishes, so the term is pretty well established in my mind.
Whenever things like this happen, it always makes me wonder what other things in our life we take for granted but really aren’t-which things we think are one way but are actually another.
I seem to remember1 there was an issue of the great Dinosaur Comics where the T-Rex wonders how it can know which parts of its knowledge are actually wrong, and then concludes that the only way to do this would be to review all the knowledge one has accumulated, which might in practice take as long as the act of accumulating it, and that once we reach the halfway point in life it’s impossible to do because there just isn’t any time left!
Such a clever observation! But of course, it presupposes that we can retrieve all our knowledge on command, which we really can’t. Imagine you started listing all the things you knew. You would likely soon encounter the situation where you don’t really know if you’ve already written down something or not, and will then start going in circles. Also, adding things you remembered to topics you’ve already visited might be hard.
All that was to say that it’s nice when the universe presents you with the opportunity to revise your ideas.
…
My mind is starting to feel sleepy now. It seems I’ve lost all my practice at writing at night! A long time ago, when I started my blog in 2023 (holy crap), I used to almost exclusively write before bed. I used to put my son to sleep, then write, then fall asleep. I guess it’s just a matter of getting used to it.
Oh! That reminds me that yesterday I mentioned I wanted to get back into meditating. Well, today I downloaded Insight Timer on my phone and ended up using it twice throughout the day! Of course, as many probably know, the first day back meditating is always the best. After that, one starts losing motivation or energy, and things just fall apart. I would tell you that “this time is different, this time I’m really motivated,” but the truth is that I’ve told myself the exact same thing multiple times before. Still, that is no reason not to meditate :)
Hopefully I can stick with it, at least for a bit. This morning I was really stressed for some reason, and sitting down for some minutes before starting to work was really helpful (I’m grateful to my wife for actually pushing me to do it).
I’ve been really stressed lately. It’s funny because I tend to think of myself as a pretty chill person, but the truth is that this past year I’ve just been stressed a lot. And it’s not like my job is especially terrible or there’s anything in my life that one would consider a valid source of stress or worry.
My job is quite relaxed, actually. I play with LLMs all day (in a research context), and I rarely have a deadline. I also don’t work on any client- or customer-facing software. But still, I get stressed about random stuff. Often I don’t even know what it is that stresses me.
It’s also a weird stress. It’s more like I just feel bad, sick, rather than it feeling like anxiety and worry (which I usually associate with ruminating thoughts, of which I presently have few). This stress is often accompanied by intermittent feelings of bleakness/depression or irritability. Thankfully, these two have been much better these past few months, something I attribute in part to the fact I’m writing a lot more and also virtually stopped using social media.
That’s the reason why I’ve been trying to convince myself to meditate lately. Hopefully it will help! And since we’re on it, I also need to exercise more 🏃♂️
I’ve thought that another contributing factor might be my consumption of caffeine. I don’t drink that much, but I’ve always felt like it doesn’t sit well with me. I get jittery or anxious if I drink too much. Once, I drank two cappuccinos in one sitting (I was having a great conversation with my father-in-law), and I swear I spent all day feeling like I was going to die. I was having cold sweats and stomachaches. It went away by itself, but that feeling of “being sick” is always there whenever I drink coffee, albeit to a lesser extent. The sensation might actually be better described as a feeling of “being poisoned.”
However, if I don’t drink coffee, then I’m extra moody all day, so not much help there. In the past, I’ve managed to entirely stop consuming caffeine for some weeks, and there has been some improvement in my feelings of anxiety, but not as much as one would expect. Still, something to consider. Or at least consider dialing down my consumption from my current three cups a day to maybe just one?
(how weird is it that we drink the poison of a plant for recreational purposes? If you think about it, it’s no different than licking a poisonous toad)
… Well, I said I was falling asleep, but then something happened, and now I feel like I’ve written too much. I should probably stop here for today.