The past few months I have indulged in a lot of hobbies. Firstly refurbishing computers which I hadn’t done for a few years. Then setting up linux systems and recently trying the freeBSD operating system. Also every week I have done a plein air study. Now I am drawing still lifes which I enjoy. Drawing has always been my strongest skill rather than painting. I can paint but it comes less easily which is why the studies are being done.

Writing in general is taking a back seat while I spend time reading. I am taking notes though of overheard conservations and general thoughts. My reading has been pretty busy. I finished the ‘Romance of the Three Kingdoms’ which was epic. When I studied Taoism almost twenty years ago I never understood why the master was so into politics and world events. But seeing the older Taosit masters in ‘Romance of the Three Kingdoms’ they were highly adept at all political and military strategy. Zhuge Liang (not sure of the pinyin exactly as his name is spelt old pinyin in Romance) he was the pinnacle of military strategy and all things political. As well as versed in the art of Chinese Divination. He fooled many of his adversaries with profound strategy.

Now I have started reading ‘Dream of the Red Chamber’ which so far is pretty good. I am reading some Rumi as well. I also read the full documentation of freeBSD which was a treat. It is so well done. So what is freeBSD? It is an OS optimised for server storage. It is not as polished as Linux. Linux has a lot of fall backs. For example radeon graphics cards are supported intermittently with gaps for support so Linux has a pretty good handle on getting the system to play nicely with all of these gaps. Though I found with freeBSD there was no soft landing at times.  

Currently I am getting some routine health checks and vaccinations for travelling next month. I hope to get some inspiration while away. I have found while my mind is rather all over the place that poetry has been a good option. Just to see what is in my minds eye. My daily training has been good. I have trained every day for over seven months. I really enjoy it and it helps me relax. I hope to get some more writing done but I don’t like to force these things. The mind is particularly good at taking the long way round and finally getting there after viewing some new scenery.