#family

Busted Up & Busy

galby68, , , , , , 18 Comments

Welcome back to me…to my own blog…once again!

I feel like I need my own Yoda. Someone who will hear me say weak assed things like “I’m going to try and write more consistently” and remind me

Luckily, I verbally hedge my bets with that approach, so…no broken promises!

As alluded to in the title, I’ve been busy. Work keeps me pretty occupied. My workdays are a frenzied pace from start to finish, leaving me pretty wiped out at the end of them.

I still try – there’s that hedging again! – to get out and do some delivery driving a couple evenings a week. It’s only a couple hours per night, a couple nights a week, but it seems like an eternity when you hate doing it. The reward is getting worse, too, which makes it harder. I finished a two-hour block last night – after the Silver Fox hyped me up when I was ready to pull the plug and bail – and my average rate was $25/hr. That’s down from around $30/hr, which is a hefty percentage.

My parting thought as I bellied up afterward was “Might as well pay me in pesos”. But where two hours’ earnings might not matter, 10 or 12 hours over the course of a month is an extra car payment, so that’s not nothing. Especially as I scramble to make my goal of paying Angela (my car) off by the end of November.

So, I needed the hype. Especially since I wouldn’t have left my home at all yesterday without it.

Nonetheless, it leaves me too burnt out to write much.

I did get a break from the hard work last month when my family met up in Sunriver for our yearly vacation. Sunriver is right outside of Bend, Oregon, so there’s always plenty to do.

Mostly, this time I just ate. Mind you, I swore I was going to spend time writing each day. I’ll save you a scroll through my blog post library: that didn’t happen.

Why would it, in the High Desert outdoor playground that is Bend, Oregon? Well, that’s where the busted up part of this post’s title comes in: I fell down.

Again.

And it was bad.

The best I could piece together was that I slipped on a cat hair tumbleweed as I walked into my apartment. Cat hair + laminate flooring = a suboptimal traction situation.

I’d been down to the local watering hole for a couple beers – two, literally. I just wasn’t feeling it, so I hoofed the 10 or so blocks to Safeway for a six-pack and snack to nosh on at home while I watched a movie before bed.

The movie – or the snackage, for that matter – never happened. As soon as I set foot in my place, it was lights out for Xtopher.

I wish I could say it was something more glamorous or exciting, a mugging, defending a stranger from danger or even a dalliance gone bad…but it was just my natural clumsiness. My friends tried to nudge me toward a more exciting, albeit alternate, truth – the aforementioned mugging, DB even suggested I’d been roofied after hearing my story – but I could not oblige.

I was actually too harsh when I said “natural clumsiness”…knowing physics and geometry, ok, remembering what I do of my high school and college courses on the subjects, what I was doing and how I ended up adds up to cat like reflexes.

You see, if I was walking in the door and slipped on something, my feet would have gone out from under me, leaving my fallen body laying head first into my unit. Certainly the final resting spots of what had been my bag of groceries supports this. Me, on the other hand ended up facing the door, which could have happened – if I had ended up on my back. But I didn’t, I wasn’t just facing the front door, I was also facing the floor.

That’s where those cat like reflexes come in. Not only had I fallen backward instead of forward, I’d also flipped midair to land on my face.

Fairly literally, by the way.

I can’t tell you the exact order – likely due to being mildly concussed by the whole ordeal – but I know I hit my chin hard enough to break my front tooth and open a cut on the bottom of my chin. I remember pushing myself up once after being unconscious long enough for blood to pool around me. That I know because when I did push up, one of my hands went out from under me and I went back down on my face.

I think that’s where I got the four splits across my forehead. Well, not so much across (because that would blend with my age based creases that I do not call wrinkles) as perpendicular to my eyebrows. However, it could have been where I split the cartilage in my ear open. Remembering two falls and having wounds on three planes of my skull further suggests a concussion.

Since I’m a typically stupid guy, though, I didn’t go to the ER for almost 24 hours, so likely is as close to a diagnosis as I could get on that concussion.

Likely concussion, broken tooth and six gashes on my head…and bruised ribs, probably from the initial impact, that’s my damage.

All because I was too bored at the bar to stick around and decided to come home.

At least my ribs were only bruised.

Until the following Sunday, that is. I’d started feeling well enough to venture out of the house and met my parents for breakfast. Afterward I was tired – from getting up early on a Sunday, eating a heavy breakfast and the actual work of walking my injured ass over to the restaurant – so I layed down on the couch to rest. About 30 minutes of blissful dozing later, I sneezed…probably a tickle from cat hair drifting through the air. That’s what I’m going with.

Ah- Pop-Pop-Choo!

That was some pain. I couldn’t take a full breath. Hell, I couldn’t get up off my back!

After another 90 minutes of shallow breathing my way through the absolute WTF worst pain I can remember, I decided I needed to go back to the ER. The pain from getting off my back almost made me forget the pain of the prior hour and a half. It for sure eclipsed it.

Back at the ER, broken.

I wasn’t at all surprised to hear that. They were somehow surprised I hadn’t recalled them telling me how to sneeze until my ribs healed on my earlier visit. Um, hello? Concussion?

I was actually surprised to hear I hadn’t broken my sternum, just a rib on either side of it. I still think I did…while they were being surprised that I’d broken my ribs sneezing, I was being surprised that them hearing my history of micro-fractures hadn’t mitigated their surprise and prompted a referral for a little nuclear medicine to double-check my sternum. Not that it was worth pursuing, anyway…there’s nothing they can do for broken ribs, so why bother?

So that’s how I ended up spending a week in Sunriver and spending most of my time eating versus biking, hiking or paddling around the high desert.

I think I was three weeks post-fall and two weeks post-sneeze when I got back home. I returned from vacation feeling about as healed as I was feeling before the sneeze.

Progress!

That’s just the condition you want to be in when you move homes, right? But sure enough, I stopped on the way home from the high desert to pick up keys to my new place.

While it is just a short distance away, right across the park from my old place…it was a long time coming. I’d started thinking I wanted to move at the end of last year. I started looking with a mind to move at the end of my current lease: the end of March. Knowing where I wanted to be, my current building, made it seem easier to accomplish but ended up taking nearly a year!

It’s silly, living in a world with people who can own a condo and let it sit empty for two years because they thought the damage a prior tenant did to the floors made it un-leasable. One of the other residents is a realtor who knows both the owner of that unit and me and tried to put us together. The guy took my contact info and just…nothing.

Another unit had an active listing and never replied to my inquiry. It’s still empty, but the listing is gone now.

There was a third unit whose owner I spoke with in January. She wanted to list it February 1st but needed to find a property manager first. In two weeks. I didn’t want to move until April 1 to avoid paying double-rent, but offered to rent her place March 1 if I could rent from her – I loathe property managers. She passed. I get her dis-ease being a first time landlord…but I know eight residents, two of whom are Board members. Someone finally moved into the unit on September 1st.

Idiots. Am I not stupid enough to be rich…is that what’s stopping me from wealth?

The last weird obstacle to my move wasn’t really an obstacle at all, so we’ll call her an honorable mention. It’s the Silver Fox’s neighbor – or would be, if she lived in her condo. She doesn’t, though. She lives in the West Hills, where she moved…closer to 10 years ago than five. And her unit has sat empty for every damn one of those years. Assuming she doesn’t have a mortgage, she’s still paying $10000-15000 a year on HOAs and taxes. That’s cumulatively $100,000! I don’t want to live next door to my best friend, so I never pushed it. Not that it would have mattered if I did. I refer to that kind of wealth as “fuck you money” because they do not take instruction from anyone else.

But I made it! Persistence paid off, even though the reward was moving with broken ribs. When I told my landlord I was leaving, it was because of the crazy neighbor quotient in the old building. Crazy neighbors in four of 18 units is too high, even if it only worked out to an average of three crazy people in the building at any given time.

Little did I know that the cause of the broken ribs should have been the reason I moved in April: a broken HVAC. I told my landlord about it in March and he made an unsuccessful bid to have it repaired. I was heating my place with an inverted 4” terracotta pot over my gas stove in March and April. In June, July and August I became an expert at timing the opening and closing of windows each morning and evening to maximize the overnight cooling.

But the lack of air conditioning – or even air movement – has kept poor Myrtle in a constant state of shedding. Hence the cat hair tumbleweeds.

Ironic that the reason I should have moved this past Spring indirectly became the reason I ended up moving with broken ribs.

Cause of (near) Death: ProChristination.

Busted Up & Busy

Randumb Gambitches #4

galby68, , , , , 7 Comments

Off-Leash Families

Crotch Goblins. This is how a friend of mine referred to the children of one of her friends. Now that I think about it, I think she told me that’s what her friend calls her very own kids.

Regardless, I can’t unhear it or unthink it now.

Crotch Goblins. How delightfully graphic. It’s also malleable enough to be mistaken for an affectionate nickname. Entirely unlike the nick that I’ve used for kids for decades: STDs.

Whatever you call them, I’d just like to share what is apparently uncommon knowledge with parents everywhere: leave them in the suburbs, will you? I live in the city so I generally only have to deal with people’s progeny once they’ve at least reached a legal drinking age. I still have no use for them at that point, but at least I can drink around them (to make them more tolerable) without feeling like I’m ginfluencing them.

I’m tired of coming across these entire families where none should be. I accept the fact that because of our current houseless problems in Portland, I have to engage in the mental exercise of judging whether the sidewalk excrement I encounter is the result of a lazy human or a homeless human. That’s really all the concession I care to make regarding my urban life extras.

When people bring their children into this environment, it’s unnecessarily taxing to grumpy old Xtopher. First, I have to weigh whether the parents are selfishly dragging their kids along on an urban adventure they wanted to indulge in but we’re too cheap to pay a sitter for or if they are simply bad parents all-around. Bright side: I would never know or even think about it if they’d just left the kids in the subs. Y’know? This is hard to have a “one rule fits all” point of view on since the Oregon Zoo is walkable from my home downtown, same with OMSI (the Oregon Museum of Science & Industry), which is a frequent field trip destination for the area schools.

Fun Fact, if you’ve ever seen this film:

Then you’ve seen one of OMSI’s main attractions:

But I’ve drifted slightly off topic, I’m just showing you that I know that the People’s Republic of Portland has some built in “fun for the whole family” allure.

However, that does not extend to my breakfasts with the parents. I am the appropriate age child for parents to bring to town. When my mother shushed my cursing at breakfast this morning and reminded me of the destination for the plate of waffles – a child accompanied by three adults at the table behind me – that prompted me to say “That meal is an open invitation for fucking diabetes!”, well…that was too much.

With the exact amount of contrition the situation warranted, I pivoted to “Fine, ducking diabetes! But if they are so concerned for the well being of their Crotch Goblin, maybe don’t bring them to a dive restaurant that is literally alongside the railroad tracks down by the river.”

Am I being unreasonable here? I mean, the guy at the other table behind me finished a beer as I was walking in, ordered another as I sat down and a couple sips later, executed an admirable three-point turn on his scooter so he could go out and smoke a couple ciggies before his breakfast came. This is where top-tier parents choose to bring their precious child?

Then, when they left, the foursome completely blocked off the aisle between tables while they failed at putting their jackets on, completely trapping a server who had gone to drop off food at the next table over. What should have been a 20-second task turned into something like trapping an opossum in a cat carrier. The look of panic and deceleration in this poor server’s eyes. The mother was completely unaware of how her “nurturing” was negatively affecting those around her or how it would likely impact people for years and decades to come because she’d just taught her kid that the world can wait for her to get her shit together. I’ve never hoped that someone end up in a “put your own air mask on first” scenario, but now I can check that off my never have I ever list. But you know this family would fail that simple set of instructions.

Sorry, I might care more about the well-being of your offspring than you do, but I will only demonstrate it at the ballot box. If you bring them within my verbal splash zone, don’t expect the water to be filtered.

Likewise, if you bring your family of four into town, you need to manage that situation. People walking their dogs in an urban environment have to leash their fur babies. I’m not suggesting you leash children, but in the last week I’ve had to navigate a sidewalk with one too many family hazards – the correct amount is zero – twice and I’m kind of done with it.

The aforementioned dog owners? Fine – and they usually have their dogs trained to walk beside them, or at least are present enough to their dog’s behaviors to be able to follow their fur baby to whichever side of the sidewalk their nose drags them. I rarely see a dog sniffing out the latest pupdates on a tree or light post on one side of a sidewalk while their owner stands oblivious on the other side of the sidewalk waiting with the leash cordoning off the throughway.

Honestly, with dogs on s sidewalk, the biggest hazard are the people who have to stop and pet them and ask them “who’s a good boy?”. Why? Because their hit of unconditional love costs everyone around them free access to a sidewalk. Can you be needy elsewhere, please?

Speaking of a group usually referred to as “needy”, then there’s “the least among us”. Those poor – usually drug addled – folks who reside on the city streets. The Urban Campers. They’re a blight and a reason to exercise gratitude simultaneously because it could happen to any of us. For them, I will tolerate the oblivion that makes their existence tolerable to them. They don’t literally bother me – aside from the mental game I mentioned earlier – so I forgive their disruptive presence.

But these fucking families navigating sidewalks and crosswalks? Pass.

At their best they can manage an organized excursion, albeit at a glacial pace. I’ve seen it, but it’s truly rare. Usually, the best I can hope for is a chaotic form of forward progress. The entire family scattered across the sidewalk traveling at different velocities and, to the casual observer, completely unaware of one another.

This would never have flown in my family. My mother did not just develop an interest in how her child’s behavior affected those around her this morning. No, I was raised with that same consideration. My parents kept me on one side of the sidewalk so we weren’t in the way of other pedestrians. There was certainly none of this laissez-faire parenting that results in enough distance between family members on a sidewalk to mistake them for strangers.

Mind you, now I’m an adult, so I can decide on my own whether some Stupid American warrants my consideration or not. A not-shocking amount of those people do not. That’s a fair middle ground, too, when dealing with me: overt disregard. When it comes to managing my own behaviors, if I’m changing them for a setting, the last thing you likely want is me sharing my opinion on your presence. Maybe you brought your Crotch Goblins into town to learn about life, get some culture. You probably aren’t expecting or open to my hot take about your parenting style or whether you are fit for the job in my estimation.

I told you that my overt disregard of your family was a good result. But, seriously, do everyone a favor and leave the kids at home if they can’t behave as well as a dog on a city sidewalk. Easy-peasy.

Randumb Gambitches #4

Grim ‘Rona

galby68, , , 2 Comments

That’s as close to a portmanteau as I can promise y’all at the outset of this post. But even though I dodged it while it was all the rage – just like my refusal to watch Game of Thrones when everyone else was watching it – the coronavirus finally landed at my doorstep.

The weekend before Thanksgiving.

Because the universe likes to play for extra credit, it arrives on the first day of my vacation.

But I shall not be reapt, so Grim ‘Rona is what you get.

And you think I’m bitter. What kind of force of nature plays that dirty. So petty.

Like I said, in true “This could only happen to grumpy l, old Xtopher” fashion, it happened on a national holiday week, so I spent Thanksgiving alone, which should make the universe happy.

I’ll make a joke about dodging a Grim Reaper’s best efforts, but in reality, this was a shockingly low key event. So much so that I didn’t even think to take a home test until Sunday. By then my symptoms were nearly a memory.

Two days. That’s all the longer I suffered. I joked with my doc when we spoke that the side effects from my second vaccination were worse. Those lasted a full, miserable week. My symptoms consisted of two nights of fever and the dreams that too often accompany them and a cough so intense, I’d have believed I had consumption over COVID.

I’m also willing to chalk those dreams up to being my own pharmacist those first couple of nights. I’d been taking DayQuil that Friday afternoon, thinking I was just getting a cold. That evening, I switched to Tylenol. Then NyQuil around 8 pm.

None of these doses seemed to last through the window their directions prescribed. There was a lot of overlap in the efficacy potentials…which could explain what happened next.

I was in bed at 830 that first night. I may have (most certainly did) back up my NyQuil dose with a Tylenol PM before turning in. I left my radio on versus setting a fader to shut it off after an hour or two like I normally do. That ended up being the catalyst for a truly lost weekend.

Seriously, it was the radio, not the drug cocktail I had on board at bedtime – that was supplemented every time I got up. Remember, Friday nights my local station plays a program of 80s and 90s music from 8-midnight so I was thinking that would ease my fever tortured mind.

Nah.

I slept like a champ. My consciousness was still drifting in and out, but my body was dead to the world. My mind would come nearly to briefly and overhear my parents talking outside my bedroom door in hushed tones.

This absolutely did not happen. It was an excellent throwback to my childhood illnesses, though, where id overhear those hushed tones from the hallway and swear my parents were discussing things like what to do with my room after I died or whether the other kids were dumb enough to fall for my parents just pretending I never existed versus explaining a dead sibling to them.

That happened to everyone, right?

I also briefly experienced a moment of near lucidity where I was listening to the DJ who does the station’s Sunday Brunch radio program from 7-noon on…Sundays. I thought “Damn! I slept all through Saturday!” before drifting out of consciousness again.

So that’s where my brain was when I finally acknowledged I needed to use the can. I remember thinking it was super dark for 2 pm on Sunday when I saw the clock on Myrt’s automatic feeder. Also acknowledging a moment of gratitude that I was sick on a weekend of shitty weather. When I came out of the bathroom – yes, I washed my hands – I had to stop and look out the windows because it was such a dark afternoon.

It was 2 am Saturday morning and I’d been asleep for less than six hours. But I’d managed to convince myself it had been closer to 42.

Lucky for me, I thought to pop another Tylenol PM as I crawled disbelieving my back into bed.

You cannot imagine my surprise when I woke up at 730 Sunday night and realized moments later I’d only been asleep an additional five hours. I may not have been able to believe I’d been asleep less than 12 hours at that point. But I felt rested.

To celebrate, I took a dose of NyQuil, went back to bed and slept another five hours.

The rest of the day felt like the week after setting my clocks back an hour on the Fall Equinox.

On meth.

But one more night of that nonsense and I finally mustered the wearwithal – or is it wherewithal? I never know, but “wear with all” seems to make more sense than “where with all”, so I’m sticking with it regardless of what spellcheck thinks of that decision – to take a COVID test.

Not shockingly, it was positive.

More shockingly – and in true what-the-literal-fuck-ness that my life requires like oxygen – I immediately started to feel better.

Like, symptoms gone.

I wondered if the combination flu shot and MPOX vaccination I got at my doctor’s office on Tuesday could have created a false positive. I actually requested a phone consult to ask just that question. Sure enough, Monday afternoon my doctor was talking to me in that measured tone of his that he uses while trying to get me to accept both reality and his credentials as a medical professional versus asking questions like how far from the bottom of his class he graduated.

I don’t feel bad. He’s highly compensated and it’s a legitimate question.

But his calm tone lured me into believing that I should accept the Rx he had called in for me for Paxlovid. He assured me that if nothing else – given my weak ass symptoms – the Paxlovid was likely to reduce the chances of me drawing the Long COVID card.

You’re sure this home test couldn’t just be like a false positive on s pregnancy test?

Instead of answering that question, he asked me if I had someone who could pick up my scrip. Well played, doc…we’ll played.

Fortunately, the Silver Fox was in town.

Through that afternoon., when he had to leave to pick up his son at the airport for the holiday visit.

Despite my pharmacy’s efforts to derail his plans to leave by telling him my Rx wasn’t ready and then never following up as he seethed in the waiting area for 45 minutes.

Paxlovid might reduce the risk of Long COVID, but someone should really warn you that it leaves your body like too much garlic.

My mouth tasted like I’d been chewing iodine tablets like candy. The aftertaste was tangible. I was actively secreting this foul taste from my salivary glands.

When I woke up the morning after my first dose, I regretted the cozy night I’d spent sleeping in a sweatshirt under my weighted blanket.

Well, not instantly, mind you. It hit me – literally – when I crossed my own scent chemtrail on the way back to the bedroom after taking a whiz on Tuesday morning. In a fit of bad judgment, I tucked my nose into the collar of my crew neck to double-check and my legs buckled.

Not my wisest moment.

But I stuck it out. Five days, two three pill doses per day. All the smells to make you ungrateful for not losing your sense of smell or taste as a result of COVID…but I took every damn one of them. And you know if anyone is gonna not fall in line with the “helps reduce the risk of Long COVID” that it’ll be me.

So there’s that to dread not look forward to.

I have to say, if I had to lose the COVID lottery, I feel like I still won my figurative ticket money back. Sure, it might have hit me on my vacation causing me to isolate for five days and then mask another five on my nine days away from work. Yeah, it meant not spending the holiday with my favorite people who have no choice but endure me.

Most regrettably, it deprived them of the holiday tradition of heckling me while I make them gravy for their Thanksgiving meal.

Seriously, they insist it takes me 45 minutes, but you know how women (and bottoms) complain that sex only lasts three minutes when you know you go well into double-digits?

Well, this is the inverse phenomenon.

Gravy doesn’t just happen, beloved family.

But I’m sad that this year it didn’t happen at all. Next year, I’ll take twice as long to make up for it.

Unless I die.

But as I learned in Thanksgiving, if I die it won’t be from COVID, because…not COVID, just fat.

Grim ‘Rona

What A Difference A Day Makes

galby68, 12 Comments

I got paid yesterday. The first paycheck as a Core employee for the company I’ve been a Contractor for since February.

Since I’m motivated by money, this was a big deal to me. Working in Payroll and Finance, with close partnerships in the HR and Benefits departments, I made sure to get set up right, right out of the gate.

Ten percent direct deposited to my savings bank.

Ten percent to the 401k, more than maxing out the company match.

The rest direct deposited to my household spending account.

In November when the next Offering Period for our Employee Stock Purchase Plan begins, I want to slide another ten percent into that – assuming the stock doesn’t blow up this quarter. Employees buy at a 15% discount, so it’s always a good return, but with stock prices depressed across the market I admit that I’m sad I couldn’t participate in the current OP.

Anyway, after setting myself up in what I deemed an optimal scenario, I was happy to see that the direct deposit to my household spending account still covered my rent in one pay period. I’d been worried.

There was also some concern over my direct deposit set up. My household bank is a credit union, which is famous for randomly declining purchases. This usually happens with online purchases, but in the back of my mind was a worry that this would be the time they reject an ACH deposit.

This is my life, after all.

That secondary worry could be in part because of my secondary account. It’s an online bank, so things are a little different with them. “Different” meaning some organizations just won’t do business with them. I’ve found that out the hard way a couple of times. Once while trying to set up automatic payments for my car loan and again when setting up direct deposit with Robert Half-Ass.

Both bad scenarios. So when my alarm went off at 7 on Friday morning, I logged right into my credit union’s app. No easy feat with my old and still-sleepy eyes. But I was greeted with relief. Relief that increased by a full factor when I switched over to my online bank’s app.

I’d also been overdue in my rent this month because of the timing of my start as a Core employee and the final pay shenanigans over at Robert Half-Ass. But my landlord is pretty chill – and I think appropriately grateful for having a consistent tenant.

Anyway, because of that relationship with my landlord, getting him trued up for August was a priority. Ergo, by 7:01 my household account balance was $4.

That was depressing. Not as depressing as the immediate realization that my paycheck two weeks from yesterday was going to have to go to September’s rent to avoid being late.

Ugh. If I’m going to have a bank account like a poor twenty-something, could I please have the body to go along with it instead of this decaying bag of fat water I’m stuck in?

Sure, just get on the Peloton and stay out of the bar.

<looks around> Did you just hear something?

But in a display of one of my favorite things – an Attitude of Gratitude – I admitted that I still had my savings. On top of that, I have Angela, which means I can make money doing deliveries any evening I choose.

Very lucky, am I.

All of that is a very long introduction to the text I received from mom later that afternoon. She and dad were calling a breakfast meeting. It’s funny because I’d been B-reeling how to reach out to them to tell them I missed our weekday breakfasts when they come to town for doctor appointments.

Smash cut to this morning when I sidle into the Dockside and sit down in the center of my side of the booth without realizing there’s two menus and setups on my side. When mom points it out, my first thought is “Weird”.

Don’t get me wrong, most of my thoughts are weird, but in this case it was the actual adjective, since we’re never a foursome. The Dockside peeps know this.

This is what I’m thinking about to the point of distraction. Which caused a delay in my normal defenses when mom joked that they had invited someone they wanted me to meet.

I blinked a few times to mentally switch gears and catch up. Then I announced that my brother was joining us and ten minutes later, he obliged my prestidigitation.

Ten minutes after that my mom announced she couldn’t wait any longer and pulled two envelopes out of her purse and dropped one in front of each of us.

Then she switched them around.

And then back.

Our names were on the envelopes, making that scene imminently enjoyable.

Yes…grandpa’s probate finally closed! I’d talked myself into the likelihood that my uncle had either fled the country or mom and dad decided to use the money – their money, not mine or my sibs’ – to move into town.

You can tell my brother and I are related because neither of us opened the envelopes.

After another ten minutes or so, mom called us out on our withholding. Inside the envelope was a handwritten note:

Wait, that’s not right. Lemme try again, I know I kept it…

From $4 in my checking account yesterday to holding a check with as many zeroes over the course of breakfast at a greasy spoon? Like the title says…what a difference a day makes.

My hands were actually trembling. My usual wit-on-tap was tapped out. There, in that corner booth of a Portland-infamous diner a rare thing occurred: I was speechless.

Mom wanted to know what we planned to do with the money and I had no answer. I’d been looking forward to them sharing enough to allow me to pay off the credit card debt I hate carrying. No one was impressed when I tried to float that answer as acceptable.

I do know it’s not quite what I’d wanted to put down on a condo when I was kicking that around last year, nor would I buy in this market. It is nice to at least know what I’m not going to do with this windfall.

I’ve been sitting on this for a few hours now and I still don’t know what the right answer is. This is pretty life changing money when received in a fairly out-of-the-blue envelope. I think I’m going to lean into something that came out earlier in this post and transfer 75% of it into my savings account once the funds are released. That’ll leave me enough in my household account to pay my bills off and take a respectable chunk out of what I still owe on Angela. My savings account has à la carte investing, so it might not be a bad idea to put it there and just…not know what to do with it for a while.

Gotta go, can’t see through the tears in my eyes.

What A Difference A Day Makes

Conspired & Expired

galby68, , , , , , , 9 Comments

Someone once said about the wilderness that everything in nature was trying to kill you.

Another someone said that it isn’t paranoia if everyone really is out to get you

Well, readers…I am where those two potentials intersect. I’m going to leave you to look up sources yourself, because I have a short tale to tell.

For years, my dad has – as is his way – quietly espoused the virtues of soup. More recently, the Silver Fox has hijacked that same bandwagon – as is more his way.

The other week, The Fox and I bellied up at Tanner Creek for a dinner and some drinks. His – and potentially my one day – neighbor and I ordered the radicchio and apple salad, which we both love. The Fox opted for…soup. He does this occasionally, he likes soup.

Fine.

I can take that low key degree. He’s no soupaholic after all. But just before his soup arrives, the chef comes out and says hi to us. We’re all three chummy with her, so we expect a drop-in if she’s working.

Cookie: Did they tell you about the special?!?

She’s glowing – which as a newly in love person, isn’t big news. This night, however, it’s because said special is a soup.

The Silver Fox is beside himself. Losing more marbles over this disclosure than I thought he had remaining in inventory. Immediately, he orders it.

Me: You ordered the other soup, are you switching?

Him: No, I’m ordering a second serving!

I could see he was shocked I would seemingly suggest two were too many soups.

Him: I don’t care. I love soup!

Yeah, yeah…a septuagenarian right of passage, it seems. Although, one he seems perfectly willing to pretend has been a constant in our dining out universe.

It hadn’t.

Cookie: Our soup of the day is gaslight.

Not to be outdone, mom and dad show up a few days later on the calendar for lunch. They have cleaned grandpa’s “non-perishables” out of his cabinets. I notice because when I climb in the back seat, there’s a ripped paper bag still trying to be full of canned goods sitting next to me.

After commenting on the condition of the bag, knowing the embarrassment of paper bags at grandpa’s and wondering why someone wouldn’t double-bag canned goods, they are proffered to me: the favorite child and also the least likely to take an interest in my own sustenance.

I demur, despite the box of Kraft’s finest nestled into the pulpy gash.

After lunch, they take it up again. This time, I feel it’s my responsibility to teach them the consequences of being too polite. No part of me thinks they thought it mentioned “Hey, let’s bag this shit up for the oldest disappointment boy!”

So when they insisted, I decamped the backseat and too the bag. I looked positively homeless or hapless walking into my building with this bag of canned goods cradled in my arms like a stolen child.

Later that night, when I unpacked the bounty, I felt guilty and sent this text to mom.

Yeah, I’d taken a bag of soup out of my dad’s backseat.

The guilt!

Of course, that passed the next day when I made the purloined Mac & Cheese…

November of 2017?!?

Turns out that was a box of Kraft Karma & Cheese!

I’m not complaining, I figure this event has two benefits:

First, balance. As much as the older generations cling to their passion for all things slurpy, I reach back to my Mac & Chz like Linus and his blanket.

Second…resilience. My toddler-in-college diet hasn’t killed me yet and 5+ year old Mac & Cheese didn’t manage the task. For all I know, this is what kept grandpa going until just weeks shy of his 100th. Obviously, I’m not done suffering meant to be here. I’d like to see a cockroach do as well against that aged box as I did. It would die before ever getting it opened…and I ate the whole damned yellow-dye-#7-including thing in one sitting.

Come at me, karma!

Please?

I shouldn’t tempt fate or beg…you just know that means I’m going out Elvis-style – sans drugs, of course! I’m a good boy.

…and since I’ve mentioned all of that, I may as well tell you that I’m 40% of eating my way through those soup cans! With my dad and The Fox as role models…I never stood a chance against them!

Conspired & Expired

Touched…Appropriately

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As I mentioned in my last post, another year of my life recently expired. I believe I may have also mentioned that January has been a crap month.

Where. To. Start…

Let’s see, for those members of the TL/DR club who don’t get the above references or click on the links: my car, Angela, spent a week in the shop getting a surprise two-day repair completed. A week. The repair was $2500 and the extra time in the shop cost me another $1500 in driving income. Additionally, I forked over several thousand dollars to Multnomah County for unpaid business taxes that I was unaware TurboTax did not file. Note to self: start a GoFundMe.

In the middle of all of that, my grandfather died. We’re saying he pulled a Betty White, kicking it just seven weeks shy of his 100th. In my mind, I’m choosing to believe he either A) likes older women and wanted to keep his afterlife opportunities with Betty open; or, B) was taking a shot at teaching his family one final life lesson about getting our hopes up since I think we were all looking more forward to him becoming a centurian than he was. Either way, well played, gramps.

He died on the ninth and my birthday was on the twenty-first. We buried him on the twentieth.

You know where this is going…

When the year starts off like a twisted version of a John Hughes movie plot, it can’t be a good harbinger. Is this the theme for the coming year…Sixteen Fifty-four Candles?

If that’s the case, then this year better end up with something like this

Sidebar: The burial was pretty sweet for as fucked up a thing as death is. Back in the 70s, in a fit of post-divorce adulting, grandpa bought two cemetery plots – one for him and the other for his mother. Well, in ‘74, his older brother passed himself away committed suicide and grandpa gave up his plot for him since his wife and kids basically disowned him after that final act. His thought was that he’d pick up a neighboring third plot at some point and they’d all lay there together until the next asteroid. Well, after his mom died in ‘7…8? – maybe ‘76, I’ll lean on that old memory trope as a scapegoat – he pretty much forgot* to do it. So my dad and uncle decided to have grandpa cremated and then buried over his mother’s grave. Aaaaw. Now the three are together, almost as planned.

It’s a good thing he was cremated, too, because in a fit of communication breakdown between my sister and I, we listed several of grandpa’s non-epic-mid-century furnishings for free online – don’t worry, we’re selling/trying to sell the epic stuff. Sis took CraigsList and I went to Facebook Marketpkace. The breakdown came in regards to grandpa’s bed. When sis said to list it for free, I assumed she meant with the mattress, since the other two bedroom sets were similarly listed.

Wrong.

The spare room beds were used for days each year, while grandpa’s bed was used daily a lot more. But I listed it as a headboard, frame and mattress…and someone was happy to take it for the low, low price of $0.

Lesbian someones.

They picked it up one day before the rest of the crew arrived. When the fam eventually did arrive, I tried to steer them into grandpa’s bedroom for a nice surprise. When they didn’t bite, I told them. My sister went and looked – I don’t think she didn’t believe me, but it was still funny that she chose then to go down the hall.

Sis: Where’s the mattresses, did you move them to the garage?

Me: (laughing) No…they took them.

Sis: They did?!? Chris! Why did you let them have them? They were so old and gross.

Me: <cough, cough> Things grandpa’s last date said! <cough>

It was then that I told her that the takers were lesbians.

It may help to know that for a couple decades, I openly referred to my grandfather as The Grand Dragon for his backwards thoughts on minorities. While everyone else in the family seemed content to write that off as “the way he was raised” I couldn’t. Especially after coming out myself – something I feel the need to state as fact since there’s almost literally no evidence at all to support it aside from a moderate and only randomly occurring lisp. I wasn’t convinced he would change, but I wasn’t going to give bad behavior my tacit approval by granting him my presence. Lo and behold, the man shut up. I have to credit him with that, whatever prompted the change in behavior.

Me: Good thing we had grandpa cremated, because if we hadn’t, you know he’d be spinning in his grave right now!

Mom: (out of nowhere) Christopher!

Damned Mom Ears.

Ok, back to me!

My family didn’t go full Sixteen Candles on me – probably because I mentioned the fact that this timing was drawing potential attention away from me, but since it wasn’t a big birthday, that was…ok. My sister suggested she and her hubster take me out for drinks after we put grandpa in a hole the service and that I should invite the Silver Fox – yes, that’s what my family calls him, too.

Then they showed up to the service with my mom and dad in tow. Apparently, dad wasn’t feeling super the morning of the burial, so they came together. Fortunately, he rallied and we all went for drinks after, with The Fox meeting us.

That’s plenty for me. I joke about wanting attention. It’s only a joke. Let’s not remind me of what my traitorous mirrors refuse to let me forget.

But my sister being the nurturer that she is, brought me a lil something to commemorate the occasion

Plus a couple of beers from a local brewery where she lives – but photo evidence of that is not available for whatever reason. Now, it would help to know that she put on her Hints From Heloise hat during our vacation after seeing the white paint scarring my Angela’s bumper – she’d been attacked by one of the posts in the Silver Fox’s parking garage. Unbeknownst to her, I had listened to her and gotten the Magic Erasers as she had recommended. They worked great…and then I apparently forgot (see above) to mention it to her, so now you’re up to date.

On top of that, and either because of the timing of my birthday and grandpa’s service or just because he’s awesome, The Fox had enlisted Diezel’s help in a Sunday night dinner to celebrate my birthday. They took me to Farmhouse Kitchen – which was highly recommended by another blogger Dr Maria – and we filled up on ridiculously good Thai food. And drinks, of course, who’s style made me wonder if this restaurant chainlet was owned by a K-Pop group.

I mean, seriously…a drink in a disco ball glass. But it was amazing. I just tried to not think about the poor bastard who has to wash these glasses! And just take in what you can see of the decor in the background…I told you it looked like a tax shelter for a K-Pop band!

Plus, cake!

Obviously, I’m well cared for by my friends and family. And remember from the above- referenced post that I was too busy with family stuff and driving that I didn’t have the bandwidth to check in on the birthday goings-on on the FB, which I felt bad about. Turns out, there was no need for guilt as I’d forgotten that I’d made my birthday private sometime during the pandemic…if you’ll allow me to lean on the old brain trope once more. Last time. I promise. Today.

Despite hiding my birthday on social media, I still got several calls from friends and former colleagues – that I ignored, because how dare they! – and texts from acquaintances. Not to mention this lil package that showed up late one night last weekend.

It was from The Kids. At first I thought it was just some cute Christmas treats, but then opened the card. It was a Sorry For Your Loss card and just said the sweetest things. Made me all mushy inside. They’d also included a very flat, very smooth stone that they suggested I rub my worries out on (don’t go there, Diezel) and a $20 to have a couple of drinks on them.

Can you fucking believe it? I was certainly surprised.

So much for the pity party I had planned to throw myself. Fucking awesome friends…where do they get off? The gall!

Now, I feel like I should do something to live up to the attention I’ve had heaped upon me…maybe some Xtopher New Year resolutions – yes, I have my own New Years. Hmmm…I’ll have to think on that.

*Side-sidebar: Things grandpa didn’t get around to doing in a century of life; A) purchase third burial plot; B) notarize his will. So this is fun times, but now you know my proChristination comes hard-wired into my genes.

Touched…Appropriately

Cue The Go-Gos…

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And before I begin, congrats to the Go-Gos on their recent inauguration into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.

For as much anticipation taking a year off of vacation and travel created for us all, I have to say that my own came and went without much fanfare.

In October.

Which was great on a couple different levels. First, I got to deploy all my snark when asked if I was participating in Octsober. Um, it’s a family reunion-slash-vacation, so that’s a big

The second great thing – and just to be clear, I’m enumerating things beyond seeing the foursome from Texas that I call my extended family. Truth be told, they are the only other family. Anywho, the second great thing was the timing of it all. We’d originally planned this for late June-early July of 2020. And then 2021. But the parentals ultimately decided to exercise their right to cancel/reschedule on the last day they could before everything locked in 30 days out. With COVID and Delta being what it was, they made a good call.

October was the reschedule. For whatever reason, the original date lined up with my youngest brother’s 45th birthday. The fallback encompassed my sister’s 55th. This, of course, brought up my unresolved – and equally heretofore unknown – issues around 70s and 80s coffee commercials. Y’know, the ones with the butthurt housewife that’s upset when her husband orders a second cup of coffee with his dessert. They even spoofed it in Airplane!

Why don’t we ever do family vacations around my birthday?!? Surely not because it’s in the middle of January and everyone is knee-deep in their resolutions.

But the real coup d’etat on the timing was the timing! October isn’t the summer anywhere in the northern hemisphere, nor is it yet fully winter. In the Oregon high desert, that means the resort town we meet up in is itself deserted.

Also, there are no crazy temps either way. Sure, it got down to the 30s at night, but the days were high 50s-low 60s. It was awesome. Light sweater weather during the day, at worst. Then at night it was cold enough you could leave the window open a crack to get that crazy cold air deep sleep going.

Plus, the parents were on the main floor. “Age Rules” being what they are, that means that in addition to playing the TV at the same volume as their ages, the temperature was set the same way. If I didn’t open my window, I’d have woken up looking like a Costco rotisserie chicken!

All of this really bubbles up to the reality that after 4 pm, all there really is to do in Sunriver in October is eat and drink.

Well, that and watch the neighborhood deer.

What? You thought that seeing my family would be the best part of this story to me?

Don’t get me wrong, my enjoyment of my food and beverage consumption was greatly enhanced by my family’s presence. Not just because they are my blood. No, because the extended family foursome I have are Texas residents, so you know one of them was unvaccinated – and proudly declaring her natural immunity from the COVID she survived. Given her Instagram stories, I can safely guess this was from spending her pandemic galavanting around the western side of the country.

Still, I am of the opinion that she should have been vaccinated. I expended a great deal of emotional energy during the vacation trying to not lecture my 20-something first cousin on this topic. Helpfully, we seemed to be seated quite near one another at every damn meal. Well played, family. Well played.

Our usual meal routine for family vacations is that breakfast is a drop in event, we’re on our own for lunches and dinner is a family time. Generally, each person gets a cooking night but since working folk might pop in or out during the vacation according to their schedules, occasionally couples can pair up.

Me? I’m always fucked. I mean, destined to cook alone – the one time I brought someone, his grandmother died the day we fucking arrived…the nerve. I mean, lesson learned. Not that the family minds my solo-cooking misadventures, particularly since their favorite pastime seems to be harassing me while I cook. Can’t blame them, though…I can generally be relied upon to do something entertaining while cooking.

Hey, in the grand scheme of things, two small fires out of all the vacations we’ve taken is a blip at most. Right?!?

There are food related vacation traditions involved, for sure – beyond my minor conflagrations.

The ‘Phew generally orders pizza for his night. And that’s usually the day we arrive so we can ease into it.

The lil bro usually grills burgers.

The bro-in-law usually grills steak.

Mom makes spaghetti.

Dad…well, dad takes us all out to dinner. Then, per family tradition, argues with his brother about whether he can chip in. Short version: he can’t. Long version: we all had another round while they debated.

And, me? Well, since I love cooking but hate cooking for myself, I go all out. I’ve been known to pack not just a favorite knife – turns out, my LTR ends up being cutlery – but even a 10 lb pork loin and most of the ingredients for a molé or a paella pan or what have you. Hey, I’m not starting a fire cooking Mac & Cheese, ok?

You might notice the Texas Foursome was not listed. Not a bunch of cookers in that group. The mom isn’t super domestic, so they come by it honestly. Since there’s usually more people than nights, this usually isn’t an issue, though. Myself, I think this was the first time I’ve stayed the full duration.

This time, my COVID cousin brought along her fiancé. It was my first time meeting him, but it seemed everyone else had met him before briefly at some family function I missed. To his credit, he took up steak grilling duties for one meal – which my brother-in-law regrettably but graciously abdicated. I mean, who wouldn’t cede grill master duties to a Texan?!?

Poor guy. He asked how everyone wanted their steaks cooked and then served us all saddles. I know the pain of going from zero to 60 on cooking. The fires I set are obvious. His was more subtle – merely cremating a cow carcass. Why he gets a pass and I get harassed…well, further evidence of how nice my family is.

Or how much more they…like me?

That all being the case, I still found myself using my extra family time relaxing into cooking for pleasure. I had planned a beef stew over polenta dinner, with an ancillary black bean chili type dish.

Texans, remember? I knew there’s gonna be extra nights. Plus, with COVID protocols being in effect, I was pretty sure dad wasn’t getting a reservation for 10+ anywhere.

I got my stew inspiration from a cook at the restaurant on my block. The recipe served 30, so I halved it. There was 12 of us that night – the ‘Phew brought a girlfriend for the night – and everyone got one serving. Yikes.

My hecklers’ fantasy moment? Making polenta. It’s pretty easy…boil some stock, stir in the polenta and then stir as it does it’s polenta thing. I made the full restaurant recipe, but chose the wrong pan. I chose a 4-quart saucepan and needed at least another quart of space, although in retrospect, I’d have chosen a 6-quart sauté pan so I had more surface area for the liquid to cook off.

So, I fucked up the polenta. Think of it as me being a gracious host and serving low hanging fruit to my loving tormentors.

Remember, to make up for it, I had a second meal up my sleeve!

Plus, my mom pulled her favorite “I have a gay son”/Thanksgiving trick on her cooking night – handing me the spatula. So I cooked up a bunch of spaghetti.

Then, in a fit of “don’t end up like me” life lessons, I made a breakfast date with my 20-something first cousins from Texas and made a date for a breakfast cooking lessons. That sentence was…ouch.

The menu? Frittata and home-style potatoes.

I told them around midnight – it was more of a dropped gauntlet than an invitation – to meet me in the kitchen at 8 the next morning. Then we drank for a couple more hours.

She looked perfectly put together.

Surprisingly, my youngest cousin was already there when I arrived. I’d set my alarm for 745 and brushed my teeth and threw on a ball cap.

When I expressed my surprise, she was all, “What? You said 8!”

For my part, I mumbled, “Well, we’re batting .500”…you know I was still drunk if I was credibly attempting sports analogies. I started in on how easy frittatas are – I mean, do you want to make more than two omelette ever? – and how it can be something you just throw together with supplies on hand, put under the broiler and then slice up like a pizza and throw on the table.

Easy-peasy!

Guess who showed up right about then? That’s right…COVID cousin!

I told them my default frittata: cubed ham, cubed cheddar and broccoli florets. Pro-tip: you can buy the ham pre-cubed and use frozen florets. Aside from that, you’re big decisions are what herbs you want to use. Garlic powder, maybe a red pepper flake and “anything green” were my loose guidelines.

I put COVID cousin on frittata prep and showed my younger cousin the potato ropes. Since we were nearing the end of the vacation, my sister – tasked with provisioning the pantry for each of these vacations and affording my uncle another opportunity to hone his “let me chip in” argument – was in high “use everything up” mode. To that end, I instructed my cousin to use the remaining potatoes.

Short cut for home style potatoes: quarter them and nuke them for 3-4 minutes to soften them up. Then cube them and throw ‘em in a sauté pan with some oil and…whatever spices you have handy!

Why? Because the M.O. for this Homo in the kitchen is “Because I can!” Pretty much everywhere else I’m my life I seem to can’t so this is cathartic.

Keeping with my traditions of affording my family opportunities to harass me while I cook and simultaneously making a near-critical-slash-comedic error, the 6-quart sauté pan I chose for my cousin turned out to be too small for that many damn potatoes.

Fuck my fucking life. On top of the ongoing Struggles of Xtopher, I forgot to get a frittata spread pic. Ugh. Will these humiliations never end?!?

But at the same time, this minor crisis allowed me the chance to show my cousins how to roll with the culinary punches. I’m no Julia Child – despite my default childish behaviors – but I’m all for her “no one needs to know what happens in your kitchen” confidence. If they walked away with any of that from my struggle of tossing 4 lbs of cubed potatoes in a 6-quart sauté pan…my work as a twice-their-age cousin is done.

Since they are in their 20s and I haven’t seen any home cooked meals posted on their Instagrams, I’m gonna guess these confidence boosting lessons will need a <ahem> booster shot.

Cue The Go-Gos…

Small Comforts

galby68, , 2 Comments

We all need them, whether we acknowledge – and even more importantly, appreciate – them or not.

Doris Day parking.

Someone paying your coffee purchase forward.

A rain break when we forgot our hooded jacket or umbrella.

Chocolate.

A familiar face in a crowd.

Or, in my case…warm socks.

Yeah, turns out that’s what really does it for me.

As we leave winter behind and look toward spring’s arrival next week, I’m reminded of all the times I cozied up at home with a big, fuzzy pair of socks. It’s a great cure-all, especially after downing a couple in a tent on the street outside of a favorite bar – while it rains and cold radiates through your shoes and up your legs.

It’s a chilling, but necessary evil to maintain some sort of mental health self-care these days. But luckily, these days are becoming warmer!

Another thing that struck me as I was cleaning up my pics, deleting things I didn’t need and putting others into folders that make them no easier to find in the future, was that the women in my life were much better at providing this small comfort to me than I was at accomplishing it for myself.

Go figure, once again women are better people than men. Thank gourd mankind is not limited only to the male of the species or we’d really be rogered, but good.

Case in point: here are some $25 Keen socks that I bought myself five years ago. Wool, tech weave, lifetime guarantee…

…holes in both big toes.

Compare that to these Gas Monkey socks my sister gifted each of her male relatives a few Christmases ago.

Stop judging my chankles. Chrisism: chicken ankles.

Knowing my sister, she’s not dropping $25 on a pair of over-marketed hoopla socks like her frivolous brother. She’s got the money to, but she’s more shrewd than that. These were three-packs, and I bet she got them for $20 or less.

She’s proud of her ability to find a deal. I think this perfectly highlights the Hunter/Gatherer difference between the sexes, too. I find something and jump on it because it looks good. Or good enough. She, meanwhile, looks around and finds the best option.

Maybe it’s not fair to state that as an absolute difference between the traditional caveman era gender roles. Maybe she’s just smarter about her love languages than I am – and mind you, I’m just talking to myself when it comes to love languages. My sister is kind of Oprah, by comparison. At least where socks are concerned.

And then there’s the Crocodile Dundee of warm socks and love languages: my mom.

‘At’s not a warm sock, *this* is a warm sock! – Crocodile Momdee

She used to work at the local Kroger, Fred Meyers, which is an early inspiration for the present day Target and Walmart concept of adding grocery departments to their Big Box everything-but-grocery stores. Only Freddie’s did it the other way: grocery to everything else.

Anyway, over her 20 years there, all us (adult aged) kids looked forward to our annual Christmas stocking stockings. You see, as part of their Black Friday offerings, they did a crazy half-off all socks from some crazy early hour until the store’s normal opening time.

Mom stocked us up.

Because that’s what moms do.

The pair pictured above were part of one of my Christmas care packages during the time in my life when I lived away from my hometown. I remember these particularly well, since they came with a very mom-usual card:

For Those Cold Texas Nights…

Aw, mom.

So…yeah, my Texas misadventures were back in ’93, which I think must be pronounced 19-friggin‘-93. Meaning these socks that were maybe $9.99 regularly priced, that mom likely got for $4.98 and paid $4.49 for after her meager employee discount have lasted me 28 years.

Twenty-eight-motherfriggin‘-years!

The secret quality control ingredient is mom.

Jesus, I’ve had these socks over half of my life.

And these stupid socks that people who love me have bought me over the years make me feel as loved and cared for as anything I’ve ever been told or shown. Even knowing they’ve probably long forgotten the gesture, I remember it each time I go to my sock drawer and pull on a pair of chunky heavy socks for an evening in.

It really is the little things.

Small Comforts

Valentimes Part One

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Yeah, I posted Valentimes Part Duex before I posted Part One. Also, I’m posting Part One after the big day. I’m not offering a defense of my timing, either way. It’s my blog and…

So, there.

Anywho…I’ve given between 3500 and 4000 rides since I started driving for Lyft about 18 months ago.

There’s been fewer than expected drunks.

More than anticipated Tinder “dates” – and you’d be surprised how many people pay extra to spring for a Lux ride to take them away from said “dates”…

Rides to funerals and memorials.

Countless healthcare and essential workers during the – sadly – ongoing pandemic.

A couple of unapologetic bastards conservatives.

Trips to or from the E.R. Too many, in fact.

Side note: how sad is it that our effed up healthcare system makes it necessary to take a goddamned Lyft to an E.R. instead of calling an ambulance?!?

And exactly two women who made me cry either during or after their rides.

Goddamned widows. Rubbing my perpetual singledom in my face.

I was actually okay at one widow.

Specifically, the one whose husband died a few years back. He sounds like he was a great husband, I heard their love story – which lasted 41 years.

But he sounded like a fucking badass, too.

Not because he drove a vintage black Mustang convertible.

Nor because they were high school sweethearts.

Or clearly wealthy. Particularly because his widow seemed like she was continuing to live a modest life after his death in honor of his memory, suggesting that the pleasures of their lives together were similarly modest.

The more exciting adventures I learned about during our ride were short bursts compared to the simple daily joys she described.

Their first date. Birthdays. Humble chivalry.

These were the things neither of these people took for granted in their relationship. They didn’t use one another in pursuit of the next big thing – either as an excuse or a means.

Her story was one of a satisfying life together. Inspiring to me in its endurance, something that I fear too few even aspired to in today’s value system.

The second widow was actually the first. Hearing her story made me think I should write a Valentine’s Day post. But it was the second widow who made me realize that the universe wasn’t going to let me off the hook.

Writing a book about my dating misadventures or fictionalizing my own ideals of relationships in my No One Of Consequence book series wasn’t going to cut it.

The least I could do is write an account of true love, even if it was only second hand.

Widow Number One earned her title when her husband had a major heart attack on Valentine’s Day last year.

Strictly going off visual cues, I’d say she was late 70s. I was taking her to work. She was looking like she’d be her own badass, and ended up being a heroic example of living a life for me.

Fret not, I picked her up in the South Waterfront neighborhood, which is pretty high rent. Ok, it’s fucking high rent, so she wasn’t working at nearly 80 because she had to.

Turns out, she doesn’t drive at all. Her husband used to take her to work before he died. Luckily (?) the pandemic closed the office down before her bereavement leave put her back to work. Now, she only had to go to the office once a week to ensure things were running smoothly. Normally, she figured she’d take the bus, but…pandemic + late 70s = bad combo.

She was enjoying Lyft, though, and the way she said that made me suspect she was enjoying it as a throwback to her husband taking her to work. I’m pretty sure her return to the office after this all ends will include at least an occasional escort to work.

She told me that when she was going through her husband’s things, she found several Valentine’s Day cards he’d made for her. I thought it was weird that he’d kept them, not her. But as she continued on, I realized these were unused cards.

That got me.

On top of being the kind of guy who encouraged his wife to work a part time office job after their kids left the nest, then celebrated her success when her search for post-child rearing purpose earned her a promotion to office manager after several years – she told me proudly that her employee number was 13, so she’d been there a while.

This is the guy who found his own post-retirement fulfillment in driving his wife to and from work to support and nurture her happiness.

This guy spent his in between hours working on his art. He was a post-career artist. Why would I be surprised that this guy made or was in the process of completing future Valentine’s Day cards for his wife?

Putting myself in that mindset, I got it. It wasn’t about making a card instead of buying one. It was about making one that appropriately captured the depth of feeling he had for his wife. Something that expressed the gratitude one must feel toward the person who accompanies you on the journey of a literal lifetime.

You might not always get that on the first pass. She said these cards were, of course, beautiful and I could tell that finding them had touched her very deeply. But I could easily stay a while in that position her husband must have found himself in – even now: not fully being able to express how this woman made him feel. Abandoning a card because it wasn’t good enough for his wife. <sigh>

But it shows how attitudes and behaviors have changed over the decades. I don’t think I’d have to defend the additional statement that a lot of those changes might have been for the short term good, but long term bad of the individuals.

And I can’t even get a return text.

While you’re here: If you haven’t yet and are curious about the writing works I mentioned earlier – Dating Into Oblivion and No One Of Consequence – check out my author page: https://www.amazon.com/Christopher-Galbreath/e/B07PLNKTHB/ref=dp_byline_cont_book_1 for a view of my work. All books are available in paperback or e-book formats – and the e-books are cheap and the pages don’t fall out as I’ve heard from one of my supportive blogging buddies! It’s also a good way to keep up with the blog, since they post to my author page as well as here. I can’t say the same about the consistency of my Facebook author page…

Regardless, thanks for stopping by!

Valentimes Part One

I Am Unresolved

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But, still…one (this one, anyway) does like setting and achieving goals. Especially if they are fun or don’t require too much work.

That said, my goals are a mixed bag of those two…adjectives? Qualities?

I dunno.

Nonetheless, here’s a brief accounting of the goings down to date:

1) After Chadwick Boseman died last summer – suddenly, to out of the loop fans – I started putting pressure on myself to get my mind sorted on the Coming of Age test that my doctor had been pestering me about for several years. It’s cute that he thought getting ahead of my fiftieth for the test would provide results. He plied me with mail in poo test kits on every visit for a couple years, trying to sell me on “new and improved” collection methods.

Bless his heart. He’d only known me a couple of years at the time and was unfamiliar with my stubbornness.

When T’Challa died, I finally pulled one out of mothballs my pile of unread mail and stabbed a floater before sending it in.

Of course, I failed.

Since it tests for trace blood and I have ROH (randomly occurring hemorrhoids), duh…blood.

When he calls me with the results, I’m talking to a doctor that finally knows me.

I’m going to write you a referral. When they call, *please* answer your phone.

Hehe.

I replied by asking how many years he’d been chasing me about fondling my feces, which amused me way more than him.

It’s not funny, it’s just funny.

Anyway, my colonoscopy is the week after my birthday. AKA: at the end of this month.

2) At Christmas, after my mom unwrapped a bird feeder from her Secret Satan Santa, I remembered what I’d forgotten: I wanted a bird feeder for my Juliette balcony. Mom directed me to the shed, where there was a hummingbird feeder they had decommissioned some time ago that I was welcome to.

I’d posted about the minimal effort required to install it – basically a trip to the local hardware store.

Side Note: my local hardware store is the one that Anastasia Steele (what a douchey name, but what does one expect from such a masturbatory story?) worked at before becoming involved with the titular character in Fifty Shades of Grey.

Anyway…I finally got around to that. Now the waiting game begins.

She’s a meany. But I’m sure she’s nice enough to invite any takers into her Red Room.

3) And no Resolution List would be complete without a diet or exercise entry.

Diet is not that entry. Although, after reading about the prep for the impending ol’ tooter rooter, I’ll consider that diet.

But I’d seen the latest greatest resolution challenge floating around on social media – something about 100 Days of Motion or some such nonesense. While I consider goals to be a great thing, realistic goals are the ones you attain.

Somehow, 100 Days of Motion for this old bag of bones didn’t seem likely. Unless, of course, one counts getting out of bed as a sit up, on to or off of the couch a squat or some similarly unlikely rationalization a success.

I don’t.

Nonetheless, I committed to being more active, minimum bar for success set at five days per week.

I started with three sets of weighted exercises at home – my only real option in Lockdown 2.0 – and had at it. Any movement feels good after months of rather unfocused but still highly effective neglect. So I was satisfied…and increasingly motivated through my own accomplishments.

Then I did a mile of stairs in my building.

It was the end of the second week – which seemed reasonable. But my body informed me otherwise.

I mean…it seemed so reasonable. Then I walked weird for a week. Nevermind the reality of wheezing my way up and down six flights of stairs dozens of times in a mask.

In a fit of frustration over my soreness and lack of saw ownership, which would provide me the ability to cut off my legs, I ordered an e-stim massage unit for a little relief…I hoped.

I have a friend – who I will allow to remain anonymous – that has one he uses for personal massages. That particular endorsement doing nothing but sending my nuts fully back into my torso whenever the topic comes up, I also had one from Bubble Boy.

Not that his was much better. He’d found playing the part of “cowboy” to my “bull” (Ha, I wish) taxing after falling asleep with his attached to his rear a couple of days before one of our assignations. Not that his rear needed a workout, but the results of his nap on a high setting gave me hope for a therapeutic result on a low setting.

It most certainly did the trick! Not bad for a $30 solution to my million dollar baby problem. Here’s a video of the above situation if you want to see ol’ Chicken Legs McGee twitch…

I’d also seen a former colleague hosting outdoor fitness classes, reminiscent of my uber-fit days in Seattle, when I’d wake up at the crack of dawn and go to a boot camp overlooking the Puget Sound and then grab a doughnut before 7.

Anyway, she was doing Saturday morning classes (at a non-crazy hour) for $10 and I thought maybe I should participate. I missed the first week, but the second week I took my Jabba-esque physique out for a trundle. Hell, for all I knew, it would kill me and spare me the colonoscopy.

Upside.

Here is my post following the completion:

And I should be back next week. I was gratified that my former colleague bemoaned being 43 as we caught up, trying to decide “how long it had been” while also laughing at how long it had been. That’s aging for ya, it’s kind of amazing. Additionally, with her being probably exactly middle-aged for a woman, that lent itself to the majority of the participants being only slightly younger than me. So I felt comfortable.

On the other hand, the single attendee who was young-young was someone I was fairly certain that I’d chatted with on asocial media several years back and maybe only unfollowed this past summer. It’s hard to tell with masks and all, but I recognized some thigh tattoos and distinctive guybrows.

I’m pretty sure he didn’t recognize me – or my less-than-impressive thunder. Because, of course the class I went to so that my clothes would fit better started off with midriff-baring downward facing dogs. While that’s a position I would enthusiastically put him into, no one needs to witness my shituation in that same posture.

All that said, the class was great – despite the humbling nature of the endeavor and one errand exertion related fart – and I will be back next week. And I can still walk, thanks to my e-stim buddy.

4) And I nearly forgot this one: I raised my weekly Lyft goal by 50%. When I’d originally set it, my goal was just to minimize street parking expenses, since I don’t have a garage. I usually made that goal, but now that I’m not doing any part-time office gigs, I’m on the street whenever I’m not driving for Lyft.

Honestly, I normally blew that goal away, but officially resetting my goal to the 50% increase was daunting.

So far, mixed results. I’m averaging my new goal over the first weeks of the new year, but I have only achieved the goal itself two out of three opportunities.

There still work to be done. And 49 chances for success!

So that’s what I’ve got going so far this year…I still have my new InstaPot as an open/unopened goal to tackle. I’m sure anyone who follows me on social media will be assaulted by result pics know as soon as I start executing on that goal. I’d like to put it into weekly use…it’s just finding those recipes that will produce leftovers I’ll actually eat or that can be cut into halves easily.

It’ll happen.

How are your resolutions going? Tell me in the comments…

I Am Unresolved