I've started morning sitting again after a two month break. The superficial excuse to stop was the heat. It's really hot, I don't want to sit. But that's really not a reason to stop, at least not in my room where I have the means to keep reasonably comfortable. I just didn't wanna.

I think I needed the break. I recall I was having trouble with practice in general in the first half of the year. I'm sure that played a part when I woke up one morning as daily temperatures were rising and air conditioner days had begun and decided not to sit. But then not sitting continued and it became habit. Instead I'd turn on the MLB baseball game airing live the previous evening in the States. That's another bad habit distraction; having baseball on every morning. Not sitting meant turning on the game earlier instead of in a later inning. Don't judge me. ok, maybe a little.

After two months, the hell heat started to weaken in late August and I woke up one morning and decided to sit and it just snapped back into place like I've never been gone. It was no big deal either way. That's just the way I approach the practice.

A part of me may have wondered whether I was doing something wrong. Why wasn't I bothered when practice got weak? Why didn't it bother me when I stopped sitting? Was I not at all worried that I wouldn't or couldn't get back into it? That's just not the way I approach the practice. I'm very laissez-faire about it. I just don't put that kind of pressure on myself for whatever reason. It's counter-productive? I'm lazy? Whatever. I don't believe in being hard on myself. I don't even know what it means to be hard on myself. That's possibly a character flaw.

An'ther hell hot summer done. I've mentioned it before. They've been a feature of Taipei summers over recent years, possibly, if not probably (if not definitely), an effect of global warming. I stopped going for rides in the afternoon because of hell heat. I thought of switching rides to mornings, but that never happened. Too busy watching baseball :p

Hell heat is sweltering, suffocating, oppressive; and going outside means going directly to somewhere that has air conditioning. No lingering, wandering, meandering or taking the long way home. Bangkok was like that when I was there 20 years ago. I've never felt it anywhere in the U.S.

Unfortunately there apparently has been recent government encouragement for public establishments to set thermostats higher to save energy. It used to be that you could step into any indoor space and be greeted with an immediate, refreshing, arctic blast of air-conditioning. Some places are still like that, but more and more places greet you with unsatisfying, lukewarm, tepid air-conditioning. I don't know if it's a city or national government directive, but I wouldn't vote for them if I could figure out how for the next elections.

The hell heat may have broken, but it's still subtropical summer hot. A lot of people still find this uncomfortable, but I'm alright with it. It still means having a fan on me all the time at home, even all night. None of that oscillating shit.

I guess that is a change from before, either indicating a hotter climate or me becoming more sensitive with age. I used to get uncomfortable with a fan blowing directly on me for extended periods of time. Not in this heat. Before at night, the fan would oscillate and the timer would turn it off after three hours. Now it blows and blows all the time. All the time, it blows.