Daily Update, June 26, 2023

    I finished posting yesterday's daily update over breakfast. After reading comics, I started revising the story. Then I remembered the short story that's related that I worked on and opened it up. It had a lot of stuff from the critique site that I had tossed in and hadn't tried to put into my own voice or make it match my understanding of the events and characters, or anything. I started revising... and barely got the first scene done, and that took until a fair while after lunch. It was partly a lot of revisions, but also the spell check is malfunctioning, and part of the malfunction makes it hard to accept and reject changes like the editing tracker wants. Still, I'm making progress. I'm wondering if I want to do this with others... part of me wants to go back to my version before, but part of me thinks some of their suggestions aren't all bad. I'll see what I end up doing. {Smile}

   I had dinner with Mom and read to her before that. First, I read scripture and thoughts about it. Next, I continued with the last from her niece's long family Christmas letter from 2021. Then I read a short Christmas card from her nephew. After that, I read from _Memories 1960's_, showing her the pictures, and reading the captions. I read all the pages left, but not in order, because it started with sports, and that's not the way to get her interested in what I'm showing her. Also, it didn't end with fashion, and that's one of her favorites. Then I picked out the next book, _Authentic Everyday Dress of the Renaissance_. I showed it to her, read the blurb on the back, and showed her the pictures on the front cover and the inside of the front cover. After that, I read "Africa Declared Free of Polio," from _100 Uplifting Short Stories for Seniors_. The Africa Regional Certification Commision declared it when Nigeria became the last all Africa's countries to meet its standards to be declared free of polio.   Then I finished with the June 25th story, or rather poem, "Summer Heat," about taking things slow and easy when it's hot in summer. It was from _366 Stories for Bedtime: A Tale for Every Day of the Year_. Mom enjoyed both what I read to her, and the pictures I showed her. {Smile}

   I did my walking, arm swinging, arm resistance, arm weight training, and head exercises right after lunch, before I got into City of Heroes: Homecoming. Yes, that early. I even did the arm swinging in the new pair of foot positions. I feel accomplished with my exercises today. {SMILE}

   I read comics in the morning and hopped into City of Heroes: Homecoming after lunch and revising the stories. I started with a minimum of paperwork, and looked around the only friends I saw online did not respond when I messaged them, so I looked around, and quickly noticed a fellow who wanted to tag along with a mid-level character. I had one who needed to work through some contacts, so I offered to get her. He took me up on it, despite other things going on. We finished out one contact, and discovered the other I really wanted to do claimed my new friend wasn't heroic enough. Yes, new friend; we even established the contact that makes staying in touch easier.  So, I ran some other stuff that he could do. bowlofdro said hi and wanted to join us after a raid. However, my new friend was ready for a break just before bowlofdro got back to me. I hoped he'd be happy to run heroic stuff, and he certainly was! So, we ran two or three missions before I left to read to Mom, and spoke of doing more later, maybe. {Smile}

I hopped back into City of Heroes: Homecoming later than I expected. I found bowlofdro still on, and with Soothing Darkness. However, bowlofdro realized how late it was and hurried off to get some sleep before his job. Soothing Darkness and I teamed up, and she picked something we'd both been working on. However, the only person who was interested was running the pair of high-level Task Forces first. Meanwhile, I spotted my new friend from this afternoon asking about a badge I'd told him about that helps if the character tires easily. I asked, and soothing Darkness was happy to help, especially since she didn't have the badge either. I took them around to the stuff you just had to visit, then set up a single mission you run for it. we had to restart that after my new friend had to change their alignment for it. Then Soothing Darkness needed a break, but then we ran the mission and they got the badge it gave. Soothing Darkness got the big badge then, but my new friend hadn't even begun the next badges, so we got my new friend started on them. They left for bed just after the fellow interested in the thing Soothing Darkness had wanted to do came free, so we went to do that next. Perogies came on and said hi while Soothing Darkness was seeing if anyone else wanted to join. He did, as did two strangers. We ran that story arc, and it took me up until I thought I'd better write this already. I did, and did some paperwork too, though not the reading I often do. i still ran late, so I'll post this tomorrow. {Smile}