Aly says she has a few friends who do medical transcriptionists and they rave about it due to the flexible hours. She said that since I’m a good typist she thinks it’s right up my alley. This tells me it’s not that obsolete yet and that speech-to-text hasn’t replaced it totally. After I thought about it, I realized one would really have a hard time with speech-to-text if one had a foreign accent and was too lazy to get rid of it. Most doctors aren’t from here anymore and I can tell you that if it doesn’t like the few words that I still have a hard time making sound more generic and less northeastern, it’s certainly not going to have a clue when it comes to Ecuadorian, Indian, or other accents. While I may always believe that if you go to another country you should learn their language and talk like them, it may be a good thing that people don’t.

The above paragraph was written before Tom did some more research and it isn’t good. Unfortunately, it’s not something I can train for in just a few months and for just a few hundred dollars. Looks like you have to take a year of anatomy and then another year of medical terms and stuff like that and the cost is likely to be in the thousands, which we don’t have now. Even if we did, I’d hate to spend anything without a guarantee in the end. That’s the other thing that sucks is that most jobs can’t be done at home and they want you to have experience. I don’t know how you’re supposed to get experience if no one will give you a chance in the first place but that’s just how it is. Aly’s going to ask her friend more about it.

If I can’t do it because of money or whatever, that’s fine. I’m used to not getting what I want in life and it seems I’m not meant to make a steady income any more than I was meant to be tall. I’m just as cursed with that as trying to get a peaceful place to live. Didn’t get up until 10:30 p.m. and the planes have been totally annoying. Big planes, small planes, helicopters… I’ve heard it all. Plus, the freeway.

But I can still make some money winning both cash and merchandise, and apparently I’ve gotten much better at making book sales. I was just starting to get a little disappointed because the sales and borrows were starting to slack off and so I figured there wouldn’t be anything for a while until I found that someone in the UK borrowed Heart of the Forest and has read 176 pages so far. I wonder what makes that book so popular? I guess there’s something in the synopsis that must appeal to people.

Anyway, my only other concern about the transcription job is whether or not I really have the brains to learn what I’m supposed to do. I would think so, but I’m still having noticeable memory issues. When I was learning ASL and Spanish in my teens and twenties, I would usually remember signs and words the first time I learned them. But now it sometimes takes a few takes for things to stick. Plus, there’s the fact that I would be working in a noisy environment. I can throw the sound machine on when I want to focus on my writing but not with something I need to hear as clearly as possible.

My heart went into A-fib yesterday for 5 to 10 seconds and it was unnerving. I hate when that happens but fortunately, it doesn’t happen very often. That’s the “vibrating” one that can put you at risk of a stroke or heart attack, unlike the one where it seems to beat hard for a few beats and that’s it.

Love having the pigs in the kitchen and they seem so much happier too, but won’t decide on anything permanent till the new bedding arrives. Today will be the second part of the kitchen experiment where we see how easy/hard it is to shake the blanket out that they’re on. Then I’m going to try a wool sheet that I hate and regret getting because of how scratchy it feels. With them covered in such thick soft fur, it won’t matter to them.

The ants now have quite a maze going in their little habitat. They’re definitely bigger than when they first got here but several of them have died. I only expect to have a few left by the end of the year, if any at all.

I like the new shampoo and conditioner bars. Now we’ll see how long they last.

The dinner plates look nicer in person. The red one is actually orange. I’m washing them right now along with the tapestry which doesn’t look as nice as it does online. the image isn’t as sharp. I realized our washer has a wrinkle control selection so I’m seeing if that will take the wrinkles out. if not, I’ll iron it. It’s going to replace the elephant mural in the living room but I’m not going to get another tapestry to replace the bedroom forest. I’ll probably just leave it up or replace it with some kind of flower or butterfly stickers.

No anxiety yesterday. Took a full pill today and none so far today either.

Aly finally opened up to me about Twitter and Molly. What’s weird is that she said that the account she and I are connected on and hasn’t used is “complicated,” and she doesn’t know if she’ll gain access to it again. Instead, we’re now connected on an account she’s using for sweeps but not one she seems to share her thoughts and opinions on.

Since she recently dumped a few people she doesn’t hear from very often and has disconnected from Molly, I’m a little worried she might stalk her and therefore me too, but not too worried because I don’t use any sites where I allow anonymous contact. If she contacts me, I’ll just block her and possibly contact Marbridge as well. She didn’t change handles like I thought she did, though.

I get her frustration with being tired of chasing people who don’t seem to care. I don’t know if Tammy literally doesn’t care or if she’s really just that lazy or maybe she even gets off on me wondering what the hell is up with her, but I’m through sending multiple messages that go ignored. Is it really that hard to make a quick reply either by writing or a voice clip? From now on, I send ONE message and I either get a reply or I don’t. No more chasing after people!