No sleep last night...

The first time the current chemo cocktail was administered to me, I snoozed through pretty much the whole procedure, and then proceeded to go home and sleep soundly all night long.

Yesterday, if I did doze off during chemo, I can't imaging it was for more than 20 minutes or so, because I ended up spending a lot of time on my Kindle Paperwhite. And yet last night, I hit the rack at around 11 pm, and try as I might, I really don't think I got a wink of sleep. (That said, I may be wrong, who knows? Perhaps I dozed here and there, but I was not aware of it. In any event, glances at my wristwatch were no more than 20-30 minutes apart.)

So, somewhere around 3 pm, after having recited my repertoire of memorized poems, I set about memorizing something new—the cards of the Major Arcana in a tarot deck.

Why? Because it never hurts to have additional "locations" in which to place stuff you might want to remember later.

I linked each card (The Fool, The Magician, etc.) to both a person and one of my major system words, so that the sixth card, for example, was a mental image of Steve McQueen, leaning against a red AC Cobra (a fast-looking sports car) on which the word "Chariot" (the name of the card) had been painted, sipping a cup of tea.

I've reviewed the list of 22 cards this morning while the dogs were in the back yard this morning, and did pretty well. The two that I missed were the two whose mental images were not all that memorable, which got fixed right quick.

The steroids from yesterday ought to make me feel pretty strong this weekend, but I'm going to have to make sure I don't overdo things.

Cheers...

Par ballon monté

I bought a book online (Par ballon monté, by Louis Moland), thinking it discussed mail sent by piloted balloon during the Siege of Paris between September 1870 and February 1871.

It does, but not in the philatelic sense I am interested in.

The book actually consists of letters sent from Paris during the Siege. As I flipped through the pages, I noticed that there was no indication of who the letters were from, or who they were written to, whereupon I decided to start at the very beginning, where I found the answer I was looking for.

Avertissement

L'origine de cette publication est celle que le titre indique. Pendant le siége de Paris, j'entretins une correspondence suivie avec les personnes de ma famille dont les unes, ayant quitté Paris, s'étaient réfugées dans notre pays natale, les autres y résident habituellement. Ces personnes sont d'âge et de caractère différents : il en est d'un esprit très-sérieux ; il en est qui s'intéressent plus aux événements de la vie domestique qu'aux événements de la vie publique. Je devais varier le sujet de mes lettres selon la personne à qui elles étaient addressées.

My translation:

Caveat

The origin of this publication is what the title indicates. During the Siege of Paris, I kept an intimate correspondence with members of my family, some of whom, having left Paris, had taken refuge in our native country, the others ordinarily live there. These persons are of different age and character; there are those with a very serious intellect and there are some who are more interested in the events of domestic life than in the events of public life. I had to vary the subject of my letters according to the person to whom they were addressed.

Despite having nothing to do with stamp collecting, this may turn out to be a very interesting book.

Cheers...