Read in 2020 (Part 2)

 

Ligotti's My Work is not yet done is another slim volume,  this time one comprising three shorter stories. Ligotti is always interesting, though he does tend to feel repetitive after a while. That said, despite some niggles that approach that feeling, I did have an unwholesomely fun time.

     The titular first story, comfortably the longest, is the most familiar one and readily the easiest to entice a reader with: a disgruntled employee is aided by a dark supernatural force and takes vengeance on his employer and co-workers. It's an alright story, and other than the really quite satisfying vicarious thrill one gets when reading the parts where vengeance gets enacted, there's not much that is memorable here. It's part and parcel of Ligotti's style for me. For some reason alot of his writing slides right off of me.

     The other two stories 'I Have a Special Plan for this World' and 'The Nightmare Network' are both of a different caliber, and though regrettably short, they do stick in the mind a bit longer, even though the stories' ideas are abstract, and the execution, of 'The Nightmare Network' in particular, unconventional. I you like dark and weird fiction this novel is one to pick up.

This book is a short collection of the stories comprising the 'King in Yellow' canon, as written by Robert W. Chambers, together with about 6 other of his stories of a more romantic nature. Those were actually  surprisingly good, and quite beautiful, 'The Street of the First Shell' in particular.

I've long wanted to read everything concerning the King in Yellow ever since I saw season 1 of True Detective, and so then imagine my disappointment that there's only 4 original stories, all depressingly short, and all rather more circumspect and vague about the whole 'Carcosa and the Yellow King' -thing than I would've wanted. There's hardly any lore to speak of, really. There's very little information on 'the play that drives men mad', the city of Carcosa or even of the eponymous king. It seems Chambers' Yellow King fame is mostly due to Lovecraft's borrowing of some of the names referenced here for his own mythos, most of which was then yet to be written, and which; those references, then was made into a kind of extended universe by gaming hobbyists and lore-scribes years and years later. They're not bad stories, mind, I was just expecting so much more, and so I couldn't be anything else but disappointed.

     The next one then I was warned about before going in; repetitive, formulaic and inconsequential, 'read one, you've read 'em all', volume 1 of the Complete Tales of Jules de Grandin.

And of course, surprise surprise, I hugely enjoyed it. Expectation, or lack of it, changes everything.

I mostly picked the 5 volumes up because of the cover art, and because I love publisher Night Shade's collected editions in general. For Seabury Quinn Nightshade collected his 93 stories of the occult detective Jules de Grandin over 5 volumes. One introduction later and I had doubts about the whole thing, because the introduction advises that any new reader of these tales would do well by spacing out the stories over the course of two years, a short story a week or so. Which advice naturally does nothing less than dispirit one about quality of what one is about to read. And so, suitably having my anticipation for any further reading crushed, I couldn't end up anything other than just being thoroughly entertained.

They are repetitive indeed, but it's a comfortable repetitiveness, kinda like watching Midsomer Murders, or some other old, venerable show, where relaxation, if not actual joy, is derived from familiarity. Weekly meetings with people you've come to know, and enjoy the company of. Poirot mixed with Sherlock Holmes, with a 'monster of the week' premise. Occasionally supernatural, sometimes mere human devilry. Every time I picked volume 1 up I was looking forward to what was in stor for me.

My favourite in volume 1 is probably 'The White Lady of the Orphanage' which was one of the human culprit stories, but which was so nasty and gruesome that it managed to stick out from the rest.

     Here then, is another form of comfort food, the good old Warhammer fiction. Again I didn't read as much as I'd have liked, and I still don't have an individual copy of Wulfrik (so I can't show that one), but I did read some interesting stuff nonetheless.

These three are connected in interesting ways. And though I've already talked about Luthor huss around here, and it doesn't merit much more attention, the other two do.

  After finishing the Luthor Huss book I remembered that I still had a book lying around that also had him as a major character. And since his own book didn't delve into what I really wanted to see from him; his role in the bringing of the reincarnation of Sigmar to the Empire, I was hoping that the Marks of Chaos omnibus would end up more satisfying (, at least in this particular regard, as Luthor Huss was a damn fine book all on its own.) And though yes, we indeed end up in the company of Huss and the man called Valten during the course of Marks of Chaos, it doesn't really end up being the main event.

Marks of Chaos is also what you call a Heretic Tome, one of those novels of the Old World's middle period, where the Black library still allowed their writers to go for whatever they wanted, provided they crafted their stories around by the existing lore. And that's why the Witch Hunter's Handbook is here, courtesy of the Ink-Stained Beard, who managed to track down a rare copy just to gift it to me.

What a great chap, isn't he?

The story of Marks of Chaos is the story of Karl Hoche, who is recruited into the ranks of the Untersuchung, which is then promptly dismantled and declared ex communicado and 'order heretical' by the Witch Hunters under control by Lord Protector Thaddeus Gamow. The same Gamow who, together with another crucial player, Karen Schiller, is mentioned in the introduction of the Handbook and referenced throughout. In this it's really cool to see how close these things work together.

Karl Hoche has to go on the run and works in isolation to untangle a web of deceit and subterfuge that is being played out around him.
I admit, throughout the story I was constantly lost as to what was really going on. There are so many elements at play, and Karl himself is so out of the loop that he frequently ends up in locations where crucial events have already just taken place. This does create an interesting atmosphere and a growing conviction that there is a massive conspiracy afoot, and that Karl might just be the only one able to stop it all from playing out, working as he does just at the fringes, hunted by both sides.

And that's only the first novel in the omnibus.

It's the second that delves into the matter of Luthor Huss, and it is here that we get what we're after; the depiction of a zealous cleric, a firebrand in opposition to a stagnant church, and the man granted a vision of Sigmar reborn. Like Mark of Damnation, Mark of Heresy sticks close to the lore as it wa set out at the time. It's a good story, but incompatible with what Old World fiction came to be. Sadly it also has but a smidgen of the power that Chris Wraight's Luthor Huss novel has. It's interesting to read, but sadly outpaced and outdated, and with an ending that promises more to come, but which promise sadly enough is reneged on. James Wallis didn't return to Karl Hoche's plight, his adventures left off the page and up only to the imagination.
It feels as if I'm giving the a wrong impression here, so here it goes; I enjoyed reading the Marks of Chaos omnibus, and if by some chance you get it (which is honestly very unlikely), it's a decent read.

Read in 2020 (part 1)

     I had some trouble reading this year, and I didn't get to read even close to as much as I would've liked.

But as you can see, it's not all a loss. By the end of the year I was back up to more normal reading speed and what you see above was mostly read then, and though there's a few of those that I'd still like to review, most of these books will just have to content themselves by just being given a quick run-down here. I've also decided to split this one up over several posts. Blogger is incredibly glitchy these days...

Though it was at the time still the most significant read yet ahead, hindsight has proven it a slightly underwhelming experience. But, Scott Bakker's Aspect Emperor cycle, despite my misgivings and minor quibbles, did manage to constantly surprise and engage.

     The story of Kellhus' march towards Golgotterath in order to liberate the world from the greatest evil it had ever seen ended up being one of the boldest stories ever told. And that's not hyperbole either, sure you might not like it, but damn me if that last book doesn't quite do the unthinkable. (well, I say unthinkable, but I swear to you that I saw it coming, even though it all didn't quite go down as I thought).

     It's really quite an impressive bit of drama. Exceedingly dark, stomach-turning, and ever more fucked-up the longer it went on. Was it satisfying? I still can't tell.

     I do however still feel that the last two books should be revisited and thoroughly edited by its author. The strained relationship between Bakker and Overlook has unquestionably left its mark, and it's a damn shame. Where the Judging Eye and The White-Luck Warrior fit together seamlessly, in themes, execution and style, both The Great Ordeal and The Unholy Consult give off different vibes, and are inconsistent in both execution and writing quality. But whatever one can say about it as a whole, the Aspect Emperor's ending is unrivaled. Unconscionable and ruthless, and still haunting, even ten months later.

And then of course, there is this one:

     My feelings on Gravity's Rainbow haven't changed, and my opinion on it is still the same. But I will always doubt those that say they unreservedly love it. Closet-pederast or just lying about having read it? Who can tell? I'm using harsh words, and though there are of course many ways that one can enjoy this novel, there's also just a few too many moments where it just straight-up crosses the line.

On these three I have not much to say right now, except that I've been working on some reviews for them. One of the main goals I have here on the blog is to give every Warhammer Horror story its own review, which in itself isn't too difficult.

     But, I'm worried I've left it all too long to do them any justice, and writing these days remains a daunting prospect.

I also finished off the next two issues of Vastarien, and am now only 1 issue behind, sadly, that issue isn't in stock right now, so I'll have to find a second hand copy somewhere.

     As usual these were a mixed bag, mostly good, but there was also some really pitiful stuff. Some of these, mostly the stories at the back of each volume, are unmitigated self-centered, self-pitying shite. But what do you want? You're reading stories about death ideation and suicide, with themes that are fundamentally selfish and individualistic, and you only come seek these stories out if you've already been taken over by your darkest thoughts.

     But, there's a marked shift in the subject matter nonetheless, the ideas concerning the world and our place in it, our identity or lack of it, death and all its attendent symptoms, seem to be slowly pushed aside by issues concerning gender identity. It fits of course, there's a natural correlation between gender dismorphia and self-hate, and so I don't begrudge it its inclusion here. But I can't help but have my hackles raised whenever I read about it. At any rate, there's still good enough stuff to be found to endeavour to seek out the next (magazine) issues whenever they arrive.

Speaking of...- well no, that would give it away wouldn't it? The Wasp Factory is my first encounter with Iain Banks, and it certainly won't be the last. I've been meaning to dig into his culture novels for ages now but there's always something else that demands my attention.

     I had actually given this book as a gift to a friend some years ago, who has a proclivity for disturbing fiction, and though I frequently have a hankering myself, for some reason I held off on buying it for myself.

     And now that I've finally read it for myself;... yeah, it is weird and quite disturbing. But it is also rather beautiful, written in a unique voice and way more thoughtful than I was expecting.

     The story follows an eccentric boy living together with his father on a small island just off the coast of Scotland. When he's not doing chores, young Frank spends his days hunting small animals, crafting totems and safeguards from their remains in order to protect his home from all who would do it harm.

When he begins getting phone calls from his hospitalized brother, with promises of that one's coming escape and a visit back to the island, Frank's reasons for preparing seem well-founded.

     It's of course definitely not as simple a story as I'm making it out to be here. I'm hiding and glossing over alot. Despite the slim page count there's a lot of surprises, a few of them quite grisly, and the read itself is a compulsive one. I've remarked on the author's voice already but it bears repeating. Iain Banks is one I should maybe have read more of already, but there's always something else. Either way, The Wasp Factory is a very interesting novel and one of the few on this list you could recommend to absolutely anyone. It's a special read. A blend of mystery, coming of age drama and thriller. Go pick it up.

Gravity's Rainbow

I'm going to go and keep this one very short. I did not like reading this book at all and I want to talk about it even less. But as I am pretty compulsive, I need to write down something on it, even if it's just a little bit. and so, naturally, as these things go, the page blooms words.

Over the past few weeks I wrote down a whole hell of a lot on Gravity's Rainbow, most of it very negative, and I've deleted most all of it already, as I've come to the conclusion that I'm just not someone who can talk about it for a few reasons:
     I don't have anywhere near enough background on the facts in the book, how much of them are true and how much of them are not. Regardless, there are a staggering amount of anachronisms in the book, or so it seems to me, most of them involving drugs and drug-use during the second World War, a product of the time, and apparently also the drug trance, in which it was written.
     I am not a native English speaker, so when I'm uncertain about something I tend to give whatever I'm reading the benefit of the doubt, and despite that I think that to do so for this book would be likewise wrong. I also think it's more than likely that some of the book's much lauded humor went over my head or just came across as crass to me, precisely because of this lacking background of native English. It's also obviously dated and will be more so in time.
     I tend to read books for themes and though there were certainly some of those that were interesting to me, the esoteric, the mysticism and the metaphysics especially were fascinating, pretty much all of the rest of them were very much not. There's a huge focus on male genitalia and though it's easy to see why this is, the iconic shape of the rocket is very much a phallic one, it can be overwhelming. There is a crazy amount of sex in this book, most of it very explicit, some of it flat-out obscene, and there were a few that just made me upset with the book as a whole, to such an extent that my stance of giving every book I care to dedicate my time to a fair review, or even just to give my take on it, became impossible.

Simply put, I don't want to talk about it. And yet, here we are.

The central plot points hinge on the creation of secret rockets by the Germans, a secret British agency trying to find them, and one man's strange ability to seemingly predict where a rocket will strike through means of sexual climax. 

There are four parts to the book, and the above premise seems to go out the window by the third. But then, the premise is mine, my attempt to describe the entire plot in as little lines and time as possible, and though these things are there, to dilute the novel so would be wrong.
     Above was also the first time I termed the book a 'novel', and I've avoided doing so because it is also wrong. This is not a novel, and is instead a setting, a set of themes interweaving in and around characters interacting, conflicting and generally, living forwards (most of them). None of it is straight, not the progression, not the truths, not the ending, not anything. Characters inhabit multiple names, seemingly. Characters see angels, ghosts and signs, and all kinds of supernatural trappings are spread throughout the story. Technology rears its head and every reviewer and essayist will espouse the writer's virtues in getting it down so truthfully, and so correct, but, really, it doesn't matter in my opinion, the truth is not something to be sought after in a book like this, and that is despite my worry at the blatant misrepresentation of a drug culture 80 years gone. The first seems pointless, but it's the latter that sticks in my throat, as bizarrely as it distorts landscape, characters and events into something really quite unlikely. The world is a different place under chemicals.

My main problem is that for all the praise the book deserves, there is just so much more stick that it also deserves, which it just doesn't seem to get. 

My main impression is that Gravity's Rainbow is quite a vulgar reading experience. My second is that it fully deserves a second read.

Update

 Just to show I'm still alive.

Review: Luthor Huss

And yet another excursion into the Warhammer Heroes range, and would you know it; for once I ventured into the ranks of the goodies.

In Middenheim, one of the great cities of the Empire, Witch Hunter Lukas Eichmann has been investigating the machinations of a new cult. Another day, another misbegotten heretic creed, and it seems as if there's no end and no point to the stamping out of heresy and corruption. Over the years Eichmann has grown weary of his duty, and the faith that once gave him unshakable purpose has diminished with the never-ending tide of human weakness. Now, the desperate confessions of dying cultists are pointing him away from Middenheim onto a new trail of darkness.

In the heart of the Empire, in the borderlands where humanity's vies for dominion with beasts, at the edge of the massive Drakwald forest, a young girl's hopes and dreams for a normal life are brutally crushed with the coming of a plague of undeath. With no hope of survival, with everyone dying around her, Mila Eichen takes up sword to rage against the coming darkness. But as death closes in inescapable with ravening teeth, the undead horde is smashed aside by faith and steel.

She is saved by the wandering priest Luthor Huss, a dour, uncompromising man of faith unlike any she's ever known, and with her life in ruins she follows him as he barrels from battle to battle, to crush the enemies of mankind wherever they are found. Soon they find themselves inexorably drawn towards lands where humanity holds no sway.

Because in the depths of the Drakwald something monstrous is stirring. In answer to an unseen design the beastmen have begun to march. And as everywhere the dead rise to kill the living, and as in the cities, the corrupted and the mutated are compelled to cast off their disguise, to respond to a secret summons, it slowly becomes certain that Chaos is on the move, and that it has made plans for the men who rally against them.

     I really enjoyed Luthor Huss. It's a novel that pretty much epitomizes what the Black Library puts out, and it is probably one of, if not the best novel in the Warhammer Heroes range. Chris Wraight is a solid writer and though nothing he puts out here is truly extraordinary, the story, writing and in particular the characters are put together well and delivered with skill. Huss himself is an interesting character and a rather unique one at that. He is in fact a saint, one of those characters who genuinely are able to channel the divine might of their god, whether that is the Emperor in 40k or Sigmar in the Old World doesn't really matter, wat matters is that it's a very rare thing to see and read about, and it gives the story a much different flavour than what is usual for these books. But even though he is a holy man, he can be one harsh bastard at times. He has a complete contempt for human weakness and at times doesn't seem to understand it, and he has a divinely inspired oratorical gift which allows him to raise up from the gutter the downtrodden people of the empire and to turn them into raging zealots as he so chooses. It's a strange and frequently disturbing thing to behold and Wraight depicts it well enough.

     And as for any problems the book might have, apart from some tiny lore-errors that bothered me personally (like why the hell is Morrslieb yellow? or what the hell is that whole Well of Souls business at the end?...), those're pretty much a matter of personal taste depending on the reader in question. Some people seem to think it's too slow, others that the book focuses on battles too much, yak yak yak blablabla.
     To any one reading these books I offer this bit of advice: your expectations are too high. These are corporate-mandated novels: the page count is limited, and there are certain things that they can not deviate from. The story and the lore can't expand too much, and there's almost no leeway for experimentation.
     Now, true enough, in the recent year specifically, the Black Library has gone out of its way to actually encourage creativity in its novels, but you can bet your ass this certainly wasn't always the case, and a lot of these older books, written during the post-2006 years of Black Library will read the same way.

     These days the individual novel is out of print but can be found in the Heroes of The Empire Omnibus from the Warhammer Chronicles range, which also collects the Kurt Helleborg and Ludwig Schwarzhelm duology plus their own short stories, all of which are also very good, though in grim-darkness they are miles beyond the rest of the Old World fiction, which can be a little jarring.

Also included is Luthor Huss' own short story the March of Doom which is awesome, and which I had totally forgotten reading already until I remembered that I also own this little booklet, where I had already read it before.

It's a very short little tale which follows Huss as he and an army of zealots march to relieve a town from a siege by Beastmen. It's a bit like the main novel except here there's almost no real plot to speak of, and instead the story puts a little more emphasis on how messed-up the lives of the people who follow Huss are. Messed-up, a shadow of what they once were, and yet also lifted up into a level of grace reserved for saints and madmen. It is fascinating to see how Huss thinks of them and it shows why that he pretty much is a perfect representative of Sigmar: Fighting for humanity, cherishing so much of them, but demanding that they fight with all they have.

 This little story is a must read for pretty much anyone. It is just fucking great.

Try not to fear.

Pain is fleeting.

Then his smile truly broke out.

Salvation, I tell you, is eternal.

Review: Wulfrik

So, a week ago I finished the first book in CL Werner's Warriors of the Chaos Wastes Omnibus, a trilogy of standalone novels set in the Old Warhammer World. The individual novels aren't really connected directly, so it's not an actual trilogy, but they do share the common theme of focusing on a few characters, well-known or not, from the Old World's Chaos faction. Now, Chaos, or the Ruinous powers, tends to be flat-out, over-the-top, and always horrifically evil, so these novels are a safe bet for when you're just out to have some fun.

You see, I just finished Gravity's Rainbow and I just wanted something easy, something quick and engaging, something as far away from the so-called 'literature' that everyone seems to want to put on a pedestal, no matter what its many, many flaws.

Yeah, I didn't like Gravity's Rainbow. I understand it is important, and I can distinguish some of the really good stuff in it, but it just did too much awful, awful shit for me to ever like it or even recommend it. Maybe I've got blinds on or something, unable to see genuinely awesome writing and structuring when I see it, or maybe it's just that I don't like page-long descriptions of oh-so-loving acts of paedophilia. But anyway, I'm very much of track, Gravity's Rainbow's for another time to talk about, or not at all, I haven't decided yet.

Wulfrik ended up being a nice, quick read, not without its flaws but enjoyable and interesting enough. Unfortunately I don't have a copy of Wulfrik yet, so I had to crack the spine on my Warriors of the Chaos Wastes omnibus to read it.

Cursed by the Gods for his arrogant boasting, Wulfrik the Wanderer has been set on a never-ending quest to seek out the world's strongest warriors. to vanquish them in mortal combat, and to offer up their skulls to the Dark Gods he so foolishly challenged.

A mighty warrior even before his curse, Wulfrik has been gifted with a magical longboat capable of travelling through the dark Daemonrealm that links all places, better to seek out his new offerings, and a gift of speech, allowing him understanding of all of the Old World's tongues, and a powerful magic, leaving anyone challenged by the mighty warrior unable to deny him a chance for combat.

Renowned as he is, hated and feared in equal measure, the wild warriors of Norsca flock to his command, eager for fame and riches, for an awesome death worthy of the attention of the Gods.

But before his hubris brought his doom down upon him, before the gifts, before the curse, Wulfrik was just a man, a man with hopes and dreams, and with a chance for love.

Always desperately seeking for a way to appease the Dark Gods, to cheat them if he can, in order to return to the life he'd envisioned for himself, Wulfrik listens to a sorceror's promises of an escape from his plight, and sets out on an epic quest to undo the Gods' awful curse.

     Wulfrik was originally part of the Warhammer Heroes range, a series of novels detailing the origins for some of the Old World's most famous hero characters, and as such the novel kind of has a foregone conclusion. Maybe this is the reason why the prologue is one of those that I hate seeing in any story; you know the one, where we're actually being spoiled to events much, much later than where the novel actually begins. Maybe it's something that Werner felt he could get away with "Everyone knows how this is going to go, so why not show them our protagonist in his direst straits at about 80 percent into the novel." I don't know, I don't like the technique, its meant to wow the reader with excitement and spectacle so the author/ director can dial it back and take his time setting up his story in earlier chapters without having to worry much about boring the piss out of any regular viewer/ reader.

     It's not as if there's no action at the start even, where we find Wulfrik and his crew of the moment hunting Yhetees in some frozen place somewhere. And this honestly would have been a more than decent opener.

     Either way, foregone conclusion or not, Werner crams enough elements into the story to make it pretty much constantly engaging. Most notably there are Fire/ Chaos Dwarfs, a faction that has been sorely underused in the setting, and who were awesome to read about, endowed with a ruthless ingenuity and a culture built off of a mesh of steampunk and daemonism.

     As our central characters pretty much all hail from the Chaos branch there's constant scheming going around with various characters working against Wulfrik for their own ends, all of which revolve pretty much around Hjordis, Wulfrik's love interest and princess of a sizable Norscan settlement.

     The book moves fast and is fairly engaging throughout, and if there's one complaint I could make then it's that the ending ended up feeling a slight bit abrupt, where a few progression leaps seem to happen where events are skipped over that we should've maybe seen happen.

     This might have been an attempt of Werner's to keep his protagonist likable, keeping the truly unconscionable evil shit off-page, showing the aftermath of certain events rather than showing us the point where Wulfrik goes irredeemably too far.

     At the same time though, I wish we could've been given 'that scene', or at least that there had been a decent foreshadowing leading up to Wulfrik's decision, but as it was it felt a bit as if there was a part missing. It doesn't detract from the ending, and it might even add some proper alienation to Wulfrik's character, as we don't get to understand Wulfrik's reasoning, but we only get to see the aftermath of the violence, and it is jarring enough to finally put him beyond the reach of the reader's immediate comprehension and right into the status of a legendary character worthy of the forces of Chaos.

Small Update

Hello there,
     I just wanted to come and say hi and say that this Blog isn't defunct, but that it's just being pushed to the side a bit while I bury my face in the sand.
     I'm not writing anything and though I'm reading, it's all going at a snail's pace. Which, as should be self-evident, is very slow indeed, as snails can't read, or at least I don't think.
     This pace is down to a few factors, of which an unhealthy predilection of mine; to run away from issues and problems rather than facing them head on, is the main one, the problem, I mean. Gaming is such an easy way to make time pass, and to avoid looking at one's own life, one's own path, one generally has to spend time in/with it, rather than spending that time in worlds infinitely preferable to one's own. At least, preferable for as long as the remove is present. These worlds, whichever they are, are preferable for as long as they can be accessed at will, to be exited at nill, not all-encompassing but safe, at the remove of a television screen, a button, a thin layer of self-deception.
     Another problem is my chosen go-to book of the moment, which turned out to be quite a monumental cock-up on my part, as if I didn't have enough post-modernism with just Infinite Jest.
Now, if Gravity's Rainbow had the style, the build-up and the humour of Infinite Jest this really wouldn't be a problem, but the odd fact of the matter is that this book, this pinnacle of post-modern literature, is in reality a piece of excrement. It is out of control, at points thoroughly disgusting, throughout mostly boring, at all points too self-involved and on the whole it thinks it's way more clever than it's actually being. It's a book that I don't think would be publishable today. There are people who revere it, sure, and I admit that there are moments that I think are brilliant, particularly those scenes and circumstances where there's an almost mythical quality to what is going on, but on the whole I'm of the opinion that the bad far outweighs the good. I'll be finishing it, and I will have to kick myself to start writing down something more substantial than what I've set down here when I do, but for now my short opinion on this one is that it is garbage.
     Another factor is an over-reliance on medication, both prescription and that in a bottle, to take away any and all introspection. I'm having some help for and with this, but it's a day by day thing and progress tends to be slow.
But there is progress, and things are starting to look up. Long ways to go yet, but I'm getting there.
For today that's enough introspection, and it's time to go back to work.

I do have to say though, it felt good having a quiet sit-down and just writing this stuff down. See you around.