Author: robertjames1971

I'm wicked tall.

End of an Era

When was it, two days ago? The Daily Prompt asked about things you were hoping to do for the first time and I (slightly sarcastically) said I was hoping for the first post-pandemic band practice with all four band members present?

We had something on the books for tomorrow (Thursday) night but I was nervous because our facebook messenger chat had been silent. I sent out a message, are we still on? The drummer and the bass player responded. The three of us have been able to get together to play a few times since lock downs started easing up. It was our singer who was never able to join us.

Well, our singer responded to the chat today and told us that he’s sorry but he feels it’s time to leave the band. I don’t think any of us are surprised, but we’re all a little disappointed. He’s good people and playing music with him, and just hanging around with him was always good fun. I am going to miss it all.

Now we have to start looking for a new singer. I’m not looking forward to the search, but I am looking forward to the end result. Does that make sense?

Thanks for the good times, Greg. It’s been a pleasure.

(Not Quite) Daily Haiku for You #59

As is often the case, a bad morning commute can resonate with me for hours and hours. I just can’t get past the annoyance. Hence today’s morning commute haiku which follows so closely after another post bitching about the morning commute.

Sorry.

Why did I listen
To the stupid GPS?
Time lost for all time.

Two Hours and 10 Minutes

The distance between my home and my office building is 40 miles.

The drive to work today took two hours and 10 minutes.

Un-friggin’-believable.

I followed the traffic avoidance route generated by the Waze app. I feel I may have been in err, as it turned out.

Anyway, here is the house I am going to buy when we hit the gajillion dollar lottery some day. It’s near Minuteman National Park in Concord, MA.

Good Neighbors

Daily writing prompt
What makes a good neighbor?
View all responses

I put up a post called neighbors a couple of days ago. If I had looked ahead I would have known.

What makes a good neighbor? There are two answers to this. One is slightly more important than the other, but they are both incredibly important.

First and foremost, they need to be quiet. Simple. All but one of my neighbors are quiet. One likes to have pool parties on the weekend and they always include loud music and sometimes they include very loud karaoke, which is quite painful to experience. Other than that, they are fine, and they always shut it down by 10:00pm so it never becomes more than a slight annoyance. They are okay neighbors, but we’re asking for good neighbors.

The second requirement is harder to detect. I need my neighbors to not be fascists. I need them to not be nazis, whether in or out of the nazi closet. I need them to not be maga. I can’t handle having trump assholes living near me. The idea makes my skin crawl. I don’t know if any of my neighbors are fascists or fascist collaborators or even just fascist sympathizers, but it’s a 50/50 chance, right? The very thought of it makes me want to puke.

There you have it. Too simple little steps on the road to being a good neighbor. Amen and thank you very much.

Blood Sugar

November 13, 2015 was the worst day. It was the day Harry was diagnosed with type one diabetes. He was so sick that it was terrifying. Fortunately he recovered quickly and we went from being utterly terrified for his life to learning all we could about maintaining his health. That included all sorts of information on the signs of both high and low blood sugar. We learned that high blood sugar had few outward symptoms, but at some point it becomes life threatening. Harry’s initial problems were due to a sky high blood sugar levels.

Low blood sugar has more obvious symptoms. In extremes it is just as life threatening, but there are more signs of issues at much lower levels. They include shakiness and light headedness. Not long after my gastric bypass I started having quick moments of light headedness myself. I never got a specific reason why but among the possibilities were low blood pressure and low blood sugar.

This weekend I had a moment where it was clear that I was having a low blood sugar moment. I felt exactly the way the staff at Boston Medical Center told us low blood sugar would make you feel, and exactly the way Harry described when we asked him how he felt during a low. Light headed and shaky and weak. I had something to eat and felt better after a few minutes. Today, just before lunch, it happened again. It wasn’t as bad this time and again, having a bite to eat improved things quickly.

So my question to the universe is: Is this going to be a thing now? It’s just another reason to not forget to eat. I need to keep what’s left of my rewired, bypassed, tiny little stomach pouch from getting too empty. I can handle that. Bring it on, I guess.

(Not Quite) Daily Haiku for You #58

Today’s haiku is brought to you by low blood sugar. My step son is diabetic and we learned all about potential symptoms of low blood sugar from the hospital staff when he was first diagnosed many years ago. Twice in the last week I have had the symptoms of low blood sugar. Hence this haiku…

Is low blood sugar
going to be a thing now?
Carbohydrates, please.

Happy Patches Day

On this date in the year 2010 our family adopted a cat for the first time. Her name before she was picked up by the MSPCA shelter was Panic but they changed it to Panache. We changed it to Patches and she was the best neurotic cat who was afraid of everything and who would vomit almost daily you could ever dream of adopting. She was an amazing cat and we all loved her like crazy. She passed away on December 27, 2022 and we were very sad. Speaking for myself, I still am. I miss my little nutjob of a kitty.

Firsts

Daily writing prompt
What could you try for the first time?
View all responses

I am going to try to come up with some new things for this answer. The prompts have been similar to this recently and old answers apply. In the interest of originality I am not going to re-use things like learning to fly a plane or becoming an astronaut. Can I come up with some new things to day dream about trying for the first time?

Here’s one that is hopefully attainable and may actually happen tomorrow. I would like to have a post-pandemic band practice with all four band members in attendance. We’ve had three attempts since our last gig on February 1, 2020, but they were all missing one guy. There’s a plan in place to try again tomorrow night but there’s been nothing but radio silence for the last week and I am starting to worry about disappointment. Cross your fingers, folks.

Here is one that could happen but might not but it’s a lot of fun to fantasize about. I would like to visit Europe for the first time. My step kids have gone a bunch of times. My step daughter lived in the Netherlands for the better part of a year. Jen and I tried to go to the UK once but the plans fell through. Her mother and step father were able to go and they had a great time. We both want to visit the lands of our fore-fathers, Ireland for me and Scotland for her. We also want to travel the continent. As in everywhere on the continent.

Okay, that’s two. Can I come up with one more? Schoolhouse Rock taught us that three is a magic number, yes it is. It’s a magic number. How about this… I want to drive across country. The epic West-to-East American Road Trip of legend. Do we take the northern route or the southern route? What stops do we add to the itinerary? How about all of them. That would be pretty amazing.

There, three things I’ve never done that I would like to try for the first time. Here’s hoping that at some point in the (preferably near) future I’ll be able to try them all.

ADDENDUM: The tentatively schedule band practice is THURSDAY, not tomorrow. Tomorrow is WEDNESDAY. Why am I convinced that today is Wednesday when it is Tuesday? I even sent a message to the band’s Facebook chat asking if we were on for tomorrow, as if tomorrow were Thursday when tomorrow is Wednesday. Ugh, I think it’s going to be a long, confusing day today.