I’m scared of how much time I have left.

Shepard: If I may, Admiral, I have a personal question.

Hackett: Speak freely, commander.

Shepard: Why me? Why put me in charge of all this?

Hackett: Because you’re the only soldier in this whole damn navy who knows how to kill Reapers.

Shepard: You just have to be smart and hope you get lucky. Anyone can figure it out.

Hackett: Your dossier says otherwise, Shepard. You stopped the batarian slavers on Elysium all those years ago. What you did… the people who survived that ordeal still thank you by name.

Shepard: And because of that, you think I qualify to save the galaxy?

Hackett: Shepard, let me tell you something that I’ve learned the hard way. You can pay a soldier to fire a gun. You can pay him to charge the enemy and take a hill. But you can’t pay him to believe.

Shepard: I don’t follow sir.

Hackett: When you went up against Sovereign, there was no good reason to believe you’d win. But your crew didn’t seem to care – they went along anyway. Your trip through the Omega 4 relay? That was a suicide mission if there ever was one. Yet there your crew was, standing beside you, proud to serve! Why? Because they believed in you. Their leader. That’s what I need now. Where we’re taking them is liable to get pretty hairy – and I know you’re the one who will get us to the other side.

Suppose that’s what it’s going to take, Shepard: the ruthless calculus of war. Ten billion people over here die so twenty billion over there can live.

Are we up for that? Are you?

YEAH LET'S DO THIS.

My gums hurt. Had 10 shots today to clear a gum infection. Apparently good brushing doesn’t work against this, so there wasn’t a way I could have prevented this.

Suuuucks because my gums hurt.

Also, got Terraria from Annabel. I’ve seen a few coworkers get totally sucked in – not sure if I want to make the commitment yet. (Like I could say anything – I’m so absorbed with Soul Calibur again.)

Also, with this whole birth control hand-waving and arguing coming ’round again..

I’m just super curious. People keep trying to push for “Women’s Rights” but the only arguments I’ve been seeing recently are ones that underline that it’s financially cheaper to support birth control than to pay for the resulting crime that throwaway kids will inevitably create.

If that’s true, why don’t they just say it as it is? That’s not a Women’s Rights argument. That’s a financial/security argument. I think it’s valid if there are results – just don’t know why people have to lie about it. Wouldn’t it be a better sell if you just told the truth? Maybe that’s just me.

I haven’t seen a really good women’s rights argument. I keep hearing, “Men get no repercussions from sex, shouldn’t women be free too?” I don’t really liken myself to being a prude or a whore, so I don’t really understand either case. Making it to be a huge thing isn’t something I care about, and making it to be a little thing is kind of weird, too.

My beef is more along the lines of people not understanding the ramifications beyond themselves, and what will probably affect them too. I don’t like the idea of lowering the bar for dumb people. It’s one of the principles on which I actually agree with Asian culture on.

I practiced Peace today:

• Didn’t blow my cool with the asshat sales-pusher dentist. I’m really surprised about this, mostly because it didn’t take that much effort. It felt pretty natural, and I liked that.
• As a secondary point, I’ve always felt that I might turn into a rager that would flip out for no reason, like them. I was pretty afraid of this – that something might be wrong with me in the long run. Now that I feel like I can keep my cool with the worst of people consistently, I feel like I can put my feelings aside easier and focus on what needs to get done.
• I still feel incompetent sometimes, in the grand scheme of things. But at the very least, I don’t feel powerless, and I don’t feel as pressured. Mostly something I want to recognize as a growing achievement, so I don’t lose myself.

• I asked the important questions. Scary Idea. There was resistance at first, but she admitted well enough (refer to: car ride.) She told me to forgive. I told her I didn't know if I could do that right now. I forget this is a legacy issue. She has a lot of pain from both him and his dad. Out of all this,  I got more tangible answers. To note: Traffic makes for good conversation time.
• Looked for the perfect place to dance. I'm scared. I found a place.
• Started reading the books that Annabel gave me. I realized I didn't want to read them out of pain. I didn't want to know people that were like me, because I have baggage and I didn't want to know about more baggage. Now that I can focus more, and think about the merits of reading about their struggles/lessons learned - it's easier to digest and things are easy. Things are useful.

Day 3 - Did not practice. Accepted this as failure and moved on.

Day 4 - Practiced very little - mostly reached Breakthroughs, and recognized them.

This is the lull past every crashing wave.

• Asked indirectly but did not receive (reference for self: Mr. Coffee conversation.) Accepted this, because it only takes one yes.
• Asked directly, and received noise (reference to self: Post-Dinner.) Not sure what any of this means. If anything, seems like he's lost his way. Felt bad and unbalanced.