Time passes

It's often given as a measure of 'how far I've come' whenever something goes wrong and I manage to get through it. Back at the start of the year, one of the real turning points for me was after so much else had gone wrong, we got snowed in with no power for a few days, and it even surprised myself just how much I rose to the challenge. I always say whenever things are hard to get through that time just goes by regardless – whether you're happy and looking forward to it or dreading every last second, the time will just tick by and the world will keep turning around you, so long as you just keep breathing in and out all things will eventually pass.

It was the release of Civilization V on Friday, one of the games that I mentioned in my pre-order post a while back; it was the one that I had the free map for via Game. The disc came on Thursday, but since this is the digital age of bonus exclusive, digital and encrypted content, the game wouldn't even let me install it until midnight on launch day. Midnight GMT, that is. Why they felt the need to display that when we're not actually in GMT for British Summer Time, I don't know, but either way, it was only an extra hour to wait.

An hour later and we had stage 2 of the problem, with the game refusing to run. Eventually after several reinstalls and driver updates, I gave up at 3am, and got up just 5 hours later when my mind refused to switch off of the problem solving mode it had drifted into in my semi-sleep. Fortunately though I had managed to stumble across the solution, so at long last I've got the background noise back that I've been bemoaning the lack of over the past few weeks. Really, its been a lifesaver.

The problems rapidly shifted to the foreground though, since an outing was needed to get a parcel posted, only already a week late. In a nice bit of synchronicity, I was only actually able to get it posted at last because I could use the padded envelope the game came in, so one thing rolled nicely into another on that count.

Things were... bad, though. Hopefully for the last time, since this week I should be starting some new pills to help eliminate that, but still. The outing itself went perfectly and I got my achievement, will hopefully make a friend's day tomorrow with post and I've made another one of the baby steps towards normality that everyone seems to think is so valuable. What's stuck with me though, instead of the 'good' parts, is the way that I felt before it, the sense of impending doom that took so much to conquer that was attached to something so utterly mundane as driving for 2 minutes to post a letter.

I've laid all the foundations so that hopefully, just by getting by and breathing in and out, the wheels have been set in motion to drag me along forward to the place I want to eventually go. It's all I can do to just keep at it, knowing that the time will be there regardless of whether I am. Sometimes, when it comes to posting parcels or solving computer errors, things work out. And sometimes, for reasons that we can't influence as time marches on regardless, they don't.

Onwards and upwards

I received a very... helpful email this morning. It was from play.com, responding to my third complaint (submitted 6 days ago) and finally passing on my code for my free horse. If you had been paying attention, you may have noticed that my last entry said a similar thing. It would appear that that one was in fact the ORIGINAL email, promised to be sent within 72 hours, finally arriving after 23 days, and this one was just them finally getting back to me after complaining about it repeatedly. Needless to say, I'm not exactly impressed by my first time shopping experience with them, and I don't think I'll be going back. But then... Gran Turismo 5... they DO have a nice pair of very shiny black cars...

I got another package in the mail today, one of my games arriving a day early! And unlike my experience with other retailers, I've got a nice email sitting in my inbox already promising my lovely map of the Americas, all ready to install the second I've got the game set up. But then, that leads me to my next problem, and my next reason for grumping – the bloody game won't even install itself until midnight and the official launch date. I'd accepted that I wouldn't get to play it until then due to the fancy high-tech copy protection, but not even able to INSTALL it? Meaning that at midnight, I can finally put the disc in the drive... and spend the next 2 hours getting it configured and patched, and faced with the choice of leaving it til morning or pulling an all nighter. Considering that the last couple of nights my mind's seen fit to keep me awake til after 5 anyway, the latter option might just be more appealing...

I've still been technically 'continuing my progress' towards my grand dreams and schemes, and even today I could say that I've made another big step towards making it all real. But I don't know, maybe its just the winter drawing in and depression taking a bit more of a hold on me, but it all feels just that extra bit further away. In the early stages its all about the purity of the dream and focus on the changes that achieving it would bring, but the longer I have to dwell on it the more holes get picked in the practicalities and the further away it all seems to be. I'm pretty sure I've done everything right in setting it all in motion, now just like everything else I have to wait for that little seed to take hold and grow before I can get to the eating the metaphorical fruit. When you're dreaming of home-grown apple pie though, you don't tend to consider how much dirt you need to get under your fingernails to get there.