The Real World

Every week, I have a video call with my boss, and she has her two-year-old son say hi to me. This week she told me that he will often point to her laptop and say "Mark," and she has to tell him I'm not there right then. She told me she thinks he's mesmerized by seeing me on the screen, like I live in the laptop or something. 

Part of me finds it startling when people notice or remember me, especially a toddler. But I'm more intrigued that he thinks I live in a laptop. What an interesting concept! I imagine it being like the pictures in Harry Potter newspapers, where they don't stay there all the time. What would it be like if I lived in the internet? Could I go anywhere in the world, be in any movies, meet any celebrities, literally immerse myself into the study of any topic? What a fascinating idea!

In fact, I kind of feel like I live in my laptop(s). Every day, I sit at my desk to do my state job for five hours, and then I switch to my personal laptop to do my BYU-ish job for three hours. On top of that, I sometimes have to work on Faith Matters projects as well. And then of course I blog every Sunday. And occasionally I have reviews to write for The Impulsive Buy. (Sadly, there haven't been any new Valentine's or Easter products to review this year.)

Actually, maybe living in a laptop isn't so great. There is so much beauty and wonder in the actual world!

For Presidents' Day, my parents and I went on a drive up to the Bear River Bird Refuge near Brigham City. It was my third time there. We didn't see a ton of birds this time, but we still saw some. Even without the birds, it's a lovely drive, being near all that water. It's distressing to see all the phragmites, an invasive plant that sucks up water. I think it would be fun to ride my bike there sometime, but it would probably be extremely buggy. 

This is the only picture I took, because it's awkward to take pictures from a moving vehicle, and my window was covered in rain

And I love moving my body; I love cardio. I went swimming three times this week, running once (only two miles), and biking once. Biking is significant, because I don't use my bike very often; the last time I did was the Labor Day triathlon. I don't like shifting gears, in part because I never remember which lever goes up and which goes down. Last year I labeled the levers, so it's easier to shift. Yesterday, as I was heading up steep Eagleridge Drive, I shifted into a low gear, and I thought, "You know, I think I could keep going uphill at this gear." So I decided to bike to the top of the Summerwood neighborhood in Bountiful, which is one of my default winter runs, but I had never biked there before. And I made it! Parts of it were really hard, but I still made it. I climbed 983 feet in less than three miles. I know people bike more impressive routes all the time, but I was pleased with myself for doing it for the first time after not even using my bike for five months. 

There are various things that annoy me about biking, but I think there are three main ones:

1. Inconsistent temperature. I'm too hot going up, but too cold going down.
2. Less of a workout. I'm not exerting myself when I'm going downhill, whereas with running, I'm working the whole time. If I'm going to devote an hour or two to exercising, I'd rather get more out of it.
3. Safety. It scares me to go fast downhill, and a bike crash would be more devastating than a run crash. (And the fact that "run crash" sounds bizarre shows that it's also less likely to happen.)

Oh, and while we're talking about virtual versus real worlds: most of you know that I have been using Microsoft Image Creator to make AI images based on various dreams I have had, and I have put some of them on Facebook. But here are some additional ones that I haven't posted before. I could tell you the stories of the dreams, but I think it's more entertaining to let the pictures speak for themselves: 

...yeah, AI still has a lot of bugs

One of my recurring dreams is that I'm in a play and I can't remember the script

And this one is not based on my own dream, but on one of my all-time favorite YouTube videos. The video is not remotely related to cats, but AI still added one, which is a bonus!