Time shifting again because meds

I’m trying to get my sleep schedule more diurnal because I have things to do Wednesday. So Tuesday I get to stay up all night/day so I’m awake when I need to be. The gabapentin is working for the neuropathy and the tinnitus, I don’t get leg twitches from neuropathy when I sleep, and the tinnitus is down to a dull whistle (I bet you thought I was going to type “roar”). But it makes me stay asleep too long so that I’m on what is basically a 26 hour “day”. With the gabapentin I get to sleep pretty quickly and basically just stay unconscious for over 9 hours, and basically stoned and unresponsive for another hour. So if I can stay awake until 1800 or so I’ll sleep until 0400, which is good for a week or two of daywalking.

I have to help the lady do her unemployment tomorrow, so I need to be awake when I do that. With my sleep schedule as borked as it is, I would not be awake when I was needed to do the data entry for her unemployment if I didn’t stay up at least until 1800 today. If I stay up until 2000 I’m even better. But I have to stay awake t leastuntil 1800and I’m already getting loopyfrom lack of sleep. And I thikit might be affecting my coordination a little.

And that became funny because Mrs. the Poet decided she wanted to wear the sports bra that takes 4 hands and two engineering degrees to get on and tucked in properly. And I’m 2 hands and degrees shy of requirements. So it was funny to get the bra over her head and around the boobies. Hysterical and not in the historical meaning of the word about women bereft of intelligence and sense, but in the funny until your sides ache sense. As in I get them in from the bottom then have to push them back down from the top, then left and right to get them in their individual stretchy pockets that they’re trying to escape from by still going over the top or out the bottom, because boobies are a non-Newtonian fluid.

Seriously, the East German powertools need painting, the hamhock needs cutting shorter so the lid will close on the crockpot, and I need to buy some allergy meds because I’m having trouble seeing through the goop in my eyes. And loopy, don’t forget I’m getting loopy because I’ve already been up 20 hours and I’m getting too old for this $#!+. So this is where I’ll end this post.

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Medication update

Not much to talk about tonight, just tracking the effects of the gabapentin on my various ailments and injuries.

I’m almost free of nerve pains after bedtime now, which is good. I’m not free of pains which is not good. I still get pains in my feet that are not the result of nerves not working to design specs, but appear to be from trauma from walking around. I’m also getting pains from muscles that don’t work right.

The really good news is my tinnitus is literally fading away, to the point that regular sounds feel way louder than they used to. When I get up regular sounds are like when I tried the hearing aids tuned for my hearing curve before the pandemic. The tinnitus comes squealing back as the day progresses, but those few hours without noise are heavenly.

That’s pretty much everything today, except there is a buttload of NASCAR and Indycar racing this weekend that I’m going to be glued to. I saw the CWTS race this evening including some scary wrecks when two cars running together had the lead car dodge and the driver of the trailing car not see what’s coming and pretty much shear off the right or left side of the truck down to the door bars. Actually the truck that hit the left side wasn’t too bad, one wheel and a little front sheetmetal. But the truck that hit on the right side was terrifying, everything was gone or broken.

And I’ll see you guys l8r.

Eagerly waiting the time to take my new med

We got the new med today and I get to take it tonight, as the medication schedule requires this one be taken at bedtime because it induces drowsiness. Unfortunately it also causes racing thoughts and other ADHD symptoms that I’m having because of rebound from my previous med. Also we spent over $200 at the grocery because bare pantry, fridge, and freezer and no food.

And I still can’t think straight so rather than force myslef to find words I quit now.

Too much in my head, back to the car build

Yesterday was too much in my head to write properly, today I’m in my car instead.

As I was refining the design in search of further levels of performance I was getting further away from its identity as a Model T-based hot rod, to the point that it was no longer identifiable as based on a T-bucket. I had to get back to something that looks like a Model T, that looked like a hot rod. So the radical cockpit-in-the-nose design had to be shelved in favor of driving from the driver’s seat of a car that looks like a hot rod. It will still be a single-seat car with a huge fuel tank in the middle of the car, I’ll just be sitting in the normal position for a street car in the US. That means where the engine used to go will be available as a small trunk for carrying clothes and toiletries for driving to the races. It also means that I can tweak the aero in the nose for better cooling, less drag, and more downforce at the cost of less volume for clothes. Now if I was really bucks-up I would make a fuel tank to match the available space in the nose and carry luggage on the passenger side of the car except I really want the fuel load in the middle of the wheelbase. Since the fuel load is pretty much the largest variable in the car equation it makes sense to keep it as close to the center of gravity of the car to minimize the changes in handling on long trips. I mean we are talking more than 210 pounds of fuel from full to empty sitting next to the driver (me). The one thing that concerns me is I’m sitting next to more than 30 gallons of gas! OK it doesn’t concern me that much, just a little. And I’ll probably put the battery over on the right to balance out the lard butt in the driver’s seat when racing with the gas tank mostly empty. The tricky part is getting gas in the tank without overflow going all over the interior making the driver stink of gas, or E85 as the case may be. I have never smelled spilled E85 as the nearest station is outside where the bus goes, and I don’t make a practice of hanging out at gas stations without a bus stop. I keep checking and I don’t see any near me that also sell E85. Closest one with a bus stop is over in Richardson.

And you know what, I’m all written out now that I’m unmedicated. I really can’t wait until I can start taking the new med that doesn’t have the sexual side-effects but still keeps me from being depressed.

Gotta go pick up refills on my meds

Yep, I’m outta happy pills, although in my case it should be “slightly less unhappy” pills. Because while they are effective they come with a buttload of side effects that work against their intended purpose. In my case engaging in sexual activity is highly beneficial in countering my depression, and one of the side effects is an inability to do that. And that inability is not gender-specific, it works equally well(?) against females as it does us guys. But without is worse than with even with the side effects, so whatcha gonna do? Be a lot depressed without or a little depressed and also unable to have sex with? I know my choice.

As always, getting back to the possible variations of the TGS2, I discovered there is no factory available manual transmission for the Pentastar V6. That means the only transmissions I have to choose from are the 845RE for a front engine bucket, or the 62TE for a mid engine bucket. A manual would require making a flywheel to mount a clutch and also drilling the crankshaft for a pilot bearing, then making a bellhousing to fit the bolt pattern on the back of the block that also fits the choice of transmission. While not impossible it does exceed my fabrication facilities.

Some good news on the TGS2 front I found a picture I can use for designing the rear frame if I can find the length of the valve cover as it is a straight-on front view with the mounts visible.

Or I can just find the size of the oil filter and scale from that, or use both and get really close to reality.

Interesting perspectives

Today is Day 2 of my anti-depressant med and I have had an epiphany. When I thought I was happy before, I was just Not Depressed as much. Seriously, compared to last week this feels positively giddy. WTF?!? I could have been nearly happy all these years if I had been on the right meds? Forty-some years of my life wasted being depressed because I couldn’t take that damned pill? Because seriously, this is what I used to call “happy”. I am so (bummed, angry, pissed) or I would be if I wasn’t so damned “happy” right now.

Another thing is I’m sitting in my office in front of the AC and sweating like a pig doesn’t. Pigs can’t sweat, did you know that? Anyway AC is blowing directly on me and I’m damp all over. Ambient temp outside the direct blast of the AC is 83°F in the office so that might have something to do with it.

I’m still trying to figure out how to get the body on the Sprint-T around the diagonal braces that run through the cockpit from the top of the rear hoop to the bottom of the front hoop. Every other part of the frame is outside of the body except those two braces and the body would just plop right in without them, but because they are the required (by the SCCA) diagonal braces for the roll over structure, and because leaving them out would compromise the torsional stiffness of the entire frame which is kinda the reason for the entire project (T-Bucket made for handling). I was thinking of cutting the body apart and using flanges and screws to hold it together to get the body around the braces, but that would be ugly if I used enough screws to make it rigid. Not to mention a pain to mock up and install. Especially the mocking up part. That would be at least two installs and removes before paint and powdercoat with at least one installing every screw to make sure all the holes line up. I have also considered using a bolt-in brace instead of welding it in…

And of course this also applies to the Mini Sprint-T only more so, the body I’m using can’t be cut apart because the kerf from the cut leaves a huge gap in the body after it’s installed, unless I use a crap ton of body filler before painting. But I have to install the body after painting, to prevent overspray on the interior and the frame (which are a different color from each other, and from the body) because the frame goes over the body except for those braces I mentioned in the previous paragraph. Anywho it’s like one of those puzzles with the marble inside the carved wooden cage that can supposedly be removed and replaced even though it’s bigger than the holes in the cage and the cage is all one piece of wood. If I had a vacuum-forming machine and a way to make an accurate mold then I could make multiple bodies and cut them apart so the seams would overlap and be invisible, but I no longer have access to that equipment.

Well it looks like I’m starting to ramble around a bunch of different subjects, so Imma put this baby to bed now.

PSA, Opus