Nothing out of the ordinary happening, so no new thoughts to write about. I'm trying to bring my latest cracksmoking work project to fruition, which amounts to writing code 2-3 days a week and being distracted and unmotivated the rest of the time. That's okay; it's getting done.

My body is off in some wild calorie-consuming mode, and I'm still losing weight. I'm down to around 150 lbs., surprising both me and my doctor; she gave me a few changes that (when I get around to most of them) will hopefully balance out the stuff causing it. I've been telling people my body will find some equilibrium point, but that was twenty pounds ago, and I'm starting to feel I should have more mass than I do. It's not like I'm doing anything except eating real food--no junk food, and very little refined sugar. Plenty of meat, veggies, and fruit, and some cake and cookies.

I've been exploring my own states of mind. Like Monday, I felt fine during the day, and then started to feel down in the evening, and a bit isolated and alone...then I realized that was silly, because absolutely nothing had changed from six hours previously, when I was perfectly content. So then I was feeling vaguely down, but not particularly, and it didn't bother me much.

Those states of mind come out on the motorcycle, where so much depends on your level of confidence and relaxation. It doesn't work that way in a car, because in a car, you're operating a machine: there's you, the little human in the center, and you're twiddling the controls and the machine responds. But on the motorcycle, you are a part of the machine. You can't just sit there and fiddle with a motorcycle's controls and expect to pilot it safely and effectively. You have to pay more attention to what you're doing, and you have to get your body involved, leaning at the right moment, bringing the bike back up, constantly altering your speed to match the road, staying relaxed and smooth. It's immersive in a way that doesn't make any sense with a car. On my best rides, and I can use this to get into the proper focus, there is no separation between me and the motorcycle: Chris, the motorcycle and the road all merge into one completely connected sequence of movements and actions and reactions, very much like aikido at its best. All the individual pieces disappear, and there is only clutch-shifting and eyeing the lean-in point and picking a line through the curve.