| I haz video! |
[Oct. 15th, 2009|04:25 pm] |
I have a video blog. Its more politics and such. Its called "What the Heck?" Here's the first 3 episodes. 2 yesterday, 1 today. I know, cam sucks. I'm working on that.
Episode 1
Episode 2
Episode 3
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| More bad Kharma |
[Sep. 23rd, 2009|04:41 am] |
| [ | mood |
| |  worried | ] |
My car was stolen early Monday morning. I didn't find out until Monday afternoon. When I called in, it had already been recovered.
The damage isn't that bad. There's a dent and white scrape on the passenger side, which I could care about.
The door handle on the driver's side is popped. I can't open the door from the outside. I think Dad and I will take the inside of the door out tomorrow, and see what it needs. It may just need reseating, or it may need replacing. We'll know tomorrow.
Who did I screw over so badly to get this kind of bad Kharma? Did I kill someone's dog or something? |
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| To sleep, perchance to dream... |
[Sep. 19th, 2009|08:17 am] |
I know, suckass quote, but it conveys how I feel right now. Sleepy.
Mary is fine. The tumor is benign. Its about the size of a small pickle chip, and not in a dangerous spot. The brain area around it is pretty quiet. So sometime after the holidays, they're gonna go in and take it right out. No fuss, no muss, 3-4 days in the hospital and home again.
And I finally slept more than an hour at a time. Think I'll be going back to sleep a little later. Missed alot of it this week. I can stop worrying now. |
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| I don't know what I'm gonna do... |
[Sep. 17th, 2009|06:40 am] |
(x-posted from blog)
I don't know what people have heard, but last month my wife Mary was diagnosed with another brain tumor. After 19 years of being tumor free, a new one has grown.
The last time, everything happened so fast. She had some headaches, then she passed out on me. 2 days later, she was being wheeled into the OR. It happened so fast, I didn't have time to think at all.
This time, we knew about it sooner. Of course, this increases the chance of her surviving it a lot. But its also given me time to dwell on it. To think about it.
I haven't been sleeping much these last few weeks. My mind has been going a mile a minute. Its all I can think about anymore. I've lost 45 pounds since I found out. That's not a bad thing, but it is when you're not dieting.
This morning, about an hour and a half ago, I lost it. I was taking a shower, and I started thinking about losing her. And I just lost it. I started crying. When I was able to compose myself, I was curled up on the floor of the shower in a fetal position, being blasted with cold water. I'm still freezing from it. But all I could think about was losing her.
I can't lose her. She is what I live for. I think I understand now how my Grandma felt when Poppy passed away suddenly. I remember hearing her say "I'll see you soon, Howard." I didn't think anything of it at the time, as I was wrapped up in my own grief. 17 days later, exactly 21 days after Poppy, she passed away. She couldn't live without him. They were married for 52 years.
I know if I say something like that, one of you will make a call to the police and lock me up on a suicide watch. I know one of you will because you all care about me. and I greatly appreciate that. But I understand finally how Grandma felt. Because I don't think I can live without Mary. I can already feel the cracks in my heart, and we don't even know what will happen yet.
Sorry, having some trouble seeing the screen right now. My eyes are watering up again. I can't stop thinking about this. |
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| Serious business time. |
[Aug. 31st, 2009|12:24 am] |
| [ | mood |
| |  stressed | ] |
Mom had an accident on Saturday. She was sick for 3 days, as in can't get out of bed sick. And then on Friday, she tried to get out of bed to go to the bathroom, and she fell. Dad, knowing he couldn't get her back up, and knowing I could do it, but I'd wind up hurting her bad, called 911.
She's in Milford Hospital now. She has a severely dislocated hip, and a severe bladder infection. Along with all of her other problems, this is almost as bad as it gets. The only thing that could be worse is if she broke her hip. Fortunately, she didn't. Although it was thought she did early on.
She's on meds that are making her really loopy. She was lucid today, but she had some zone out moments. She tried to give me my allowance. (Ok, you can laugh. I did.) Right now, the plan is that once the infection is nailed, she's going to go into a rehab center for 2-3 weeks. Then hopefully home. Thank the Gods she has really good insurance as well as Medicare A and B. A hip replacement is being discussed, but she had cobalt treatments years ago for a fatty tumor, and that weakened her bones alot.
Selling the house is out now. Dad and I discussed it today. We talked about Mary and I, as well as Dee and Arian, moving in there. Dee and Arian probably would not be until next summer. Mary and I could be as early as Samhain (Halloween to the non-Pagans on my friends list). I'm not looking forward to this, but what I want in this case doesn't matter. Mom and Dad have been there for us so many times, its about time we were there for them.
I have been a complete spazzoid for the last 2 days. Anybody who knows me knows how close I am to my Mom. I first heard hip, and maybe broken, and I freaked. The thoughts of "She's going to have to go into a home, and that will kill her. Followed a short time later by my Father" went through my head. Took me 14 hours to get ahold of my brother. Finally talked to him a 1:30 in the morning. I think I've had maybe 4 hours sleep since Friday.
Prayers and kind thoughts would be greatly appreciated right now. |
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| New Blog Post |
[Aug. 7th, 2009|05:12 am] |
New Blog post up. I'm finally back into the writing mood.
Weird Reality 2009
Yes, I'll get it onto my own site soon enough. Just give me some time. |
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| Finally moving off LJ |
[Jun. 26th, 2009|11:35 am] |
Finally going to make the move off of LJ. Been wanting to do this for a while now, and I'm finally getting off of my butt and doing it.
I hope all of my friends will come by and say hello. Comments are on approval basis for the time being. Expect some controversy, but not too bad. Just my normal opinionated self.
The welcome post is just up for now, with the rules. But I expect the first post to be up in an hour or so.
http://weirdreality2009.wordpress.com/ |
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| Into the breech once more, dear friends... |
[Jun. 12th, 2009|04:29 am] |
| [ | mood |
| | Screaming inside | ] |
| [ | music |
| | Queen - Who Wants to Live Forever | ] |
It's 4:30 in the morning, and I can't sleep.
Nor can I eat anything. I just keep throwing it all up.
And I'm not sick.
You all know about Mary's problems. well, its almost 19 years since she had a single tumor. Not one. Yes, she's had some shunt revisions, because of failures and such.
19 years is now gone.
Mary started having some minor headaches. And she had a Dr. appointment coming up anyways, so she mentioned it to him, and he suggested an MRI, just to be sure. He called us today. He saw new tumors on the MRI. He'll have a referal for a neurosurgeon tommorrow. So we should probably know something next week.
The last time this happened, I was 25, and my health was pretty good.
Now I'm 44, and my health sucks.
I don't know if I can be her rock again. I don't know how I'm going to be able to do this all again.
But I can't lose her. Because I can't live without her. I almost lost her last time, and I just can't go through all that again. |
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| Blah blah blah |
[Jun. 6th, 2009|04:52 am] |
| [ | mood |
| | depressed | ] |
Thursday was my 44th birthday.
What has changed in the last year?
Damn little.
Still no hope for the forseeable future on the job hunt. Not even getting called back for interviews anymore. No hope there whatsoever.
Health issues still there, and because of no insurance, unable to be treated. I can't walk 100 feet without being in serious pain. The "I need to go lay down for 6 hours so I can function" kind of pain.
Everything else, the same.
There are some days, I wish I'd just have a heart attack or something, just to stop the pain. But then I think about Mary, and push it all aside. She's what I live for these days.
I dunno. I'm just really depressed. |
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| Its time... |
[May. 14th, 2009|01:22 pm] |
Its time to finally talk about this. I have Mary's permission, and its taken me this long to even think about talking about this.
Its now May of 2009, and in a few days, it will be 2 years since we moved out of my parent's house. What I'm going to discuss started there.
In August of 2006, Mary and I started having problems with our marriage. It was little things we let snowball into huge things. But we put off dealing with them until we moved out of my parent's house, so we were away from them and didn't have problems from there leaking into our problems. We moved into Jeff and Sharon's place in May of 2007.
That was a mistake.
Not because of anybody there. Because of us. We traded one set of problems for another. We wound up not only with our problems, but everyone in the house's problems as well. And when Jeff and Sharon imploded, or exploded, whichever you prefer, it made things that much worse.
In the begining of September 2007, Sharon suggested we might want to move, because of all the problems there. We talked about it. And we realized if we had any chance of saving our marriage, we had to be alone. Just the two of us. For now, at least. So we moved out. And it wasn't the friendliest of moves. Actually, it was rather hostile. (That has since been resolved, thank the Goddess!)
So we moved to here, in Bridgeport. We isolated ourselves. We didn't see our friends, we didn't see anybody. Just my parents. We cut ourselves off from everybody. We were able to focus on rekindling our relationship. And we did. We both feel like we're back to where we were 10 years ago. But now, we're looking forward to our 20th anniversary on September 30th, 2009.
I'm sorry if we lost any friends over this. I'm sorry I didn't say this sooner. But it had to be exactly the way it was, or Mary and I were finished. And both of us are too stubborn to throw away that many years. I hope we can rekindle some of the friendships we had. But Mary is the most important thing to me, and I to her. And we're not going to let anyone stand in the way of that. |
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| I haz a plan!!! |
[Apr. 12th, 2009|04:29 am] |
| [ | Tags | | | politics | ] |
| [ | Current Location |
| | home | ] |
| [ | mood |
| |  hopeful | ] |
| [ | music |
| | Kid Rock - Forever | ] |
This is a bit of a political post, and I hope I don't insult any of my friends.
I have a plan for solving the illegal alien / undocumented worker issue.
Just FYI: "Undocumented worker" digusts me. That makes it sound like its someone who is working "under the table." No, they're illegal aliens. Let's get the terms right. calling an illegal alien an undocumented worker is like calling a crack dealer an unlicenced pharmasist.
The plan takes several steps.
Step 1: Legalization
In this step, all illegal aliens will be voluntarily registered. When they do, they will no longer be an illegal alien, but a "Step 1 Alien". When they register, they are fined, say 3000 dollars. Now, this fine does not have to be paid immediately. No does it actually have to be paid in money at all. It can be paid in community service. In addition, all Step 1 Aliens MUST complete the following:
A. 3000 hours community service.
B. Certified English as a second language courses.
C. Beginner, Intermidiate, and Advanced Citizenship courses dealing with rights and priviliges, laws, and American History.
This must be accomplished within 5 years of date of registration. At which time, the Step 1 Alien will be eligible to take the exam for citizenship.
Step 1 takes exactly 1 year to complete.
Step 2: Restriction
The borders of the United States are tightened. As this is already starting to be done, there will be little impact. The Mexican Border fence will be completed. There is NOT to be a fence for the Canadian border. I see no need for one, as we have such a good relationship with Canada. The sea lanes are to be tightened as well, and harbors.
Step 3: Removal
Immediately at the end of Step 1, and from there onward, any illegal alien captured is immediately deported. No waiting in a camp, no long tirals, nothing. 24 hours, and then deported to home country. The only exceptions are asylum requests. The Asylum system is to be revamped as to be more compassionate.
I believe this may resolve what is a crippling monetary dilema on our ecconomy, and bring over 12 million new taxpayers onto the tax rolls, becoming productive citizens.
Thoughts? I won't take anything personally. Other than laughing at my spelling mistakes. |
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| Some good news for a change |
[Mar. 23rd, 2009|03:19 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| | ecstatic | ] |
| [ | music |
| | ICP - Tilt A Whirl | ] |
The weekend was exhausting. I overdid it, and I'm in massive amounts of pain.
But...
THEY FOUND THE CAR!!!
It was recovered late Friday. I just got it back a little while ago. Here's the damage, and my opinions on it.
Popped and missing ignition cylinder - We can fix this.
Right front bumper and fender have a paint transfer, as if the backed into something - Could care less.
Broken rear trunk tailight cover. Just the plexiglass cover, not the light - could care less.
She's running a bit rough as well. I figure I'll do a full tune up, and some fluid changes, and I should be fine. The right rear tire was low, but it seems to be fine now.
It looks like it has been sitting for the whole month. They put 50 miles on it, and still had 3/4 of a tank of gas.
I'm just happy to have it back. And my brand new folding table is still in the trunk!!! |
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| Its finally happened. |
[Mar. 19th, 2009|07:01 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| | worried | ] |
My recurring nightmare has finally happened.
Here's the situation as it stands now...
My nephew's psychological state has been degrading over the past year. His schizophrenia has taken over. He went from chewing my ear off for an hour and a half on the phone to not even being able to have a 30 second conversation. He went from being smarter than I am to not being able to tell the difference between a garbage can and a toilet. He's 16 now.
Last night he had a massive episode. It was like turning off a light switch. He was fine one second, then the next, he was a monster. He was watching TV, and his father asked him to turn up the volume so he could hear it too. My nephew stood up, walked over to his father, grabbed his father by the shirt, and threw him across the room, slamming into a bookcase. Then he lost his bowels and bladder in the living room and laughed about it. My brother said he could see his son's eyes go black.
The Sheriffs took him away in cuffs to the hospital last night, and had to call an ambulance for my brother. It was initially believed that his back was broken, but its not. He's home now, but very sore.
The hospital tried to have Freddie released this afternoon. Thankfully, my brother's girlfriend got the call. She laid into them. She's afraid, rightfully, that he's going to kill one of them, and have no memory of doing it. My brother is running through the hoops right now with DCF to get him the help he needs (long term care), but he may have to do something he doesn't want to. He may have to press assault charges in order to do it. And that's tearing him up inside. He's afraid they're just going to toss him into prison.
That's where we're at now. This is tearing me up inside. I see my Goddess-son slipping further and further into madness, and I can't help him at all. This was my rocket buddy. We used to go flying together all the time. He's the reason I got back into flying them again. And I can't help him. We really need everyone's prayers right now. |
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| VICTORY, THY KISSES ARE SWEET LIKE THE SWEETEST WINE!!! |
[Mar. 16th, 2009|04:15 pm] |
After nine long years, we finally won!!!!
http://www.rocketryplanet.com/images/pdf/ATFE-03-16-09.pdf
This doesn't stop them from appealing, or changing their rules, or going to Congress to legislate this. But its a great thing.
Basically, in 2000, the BATFE classified APCP (ammonium perchlorate composite propellant), used most commonly as hobby rocket propellant, as an explosive. They ignored all the science, and offered no scientific proof of their own that it was. After lawsuit and appeal, through now three different presidents, we finally got a win. The whole ruling has been thrown out.
"Specifically, the defendant (BATFE) did not adequately explain why it came to the decision it did in light of contrary evidence in the administrative record submitted by the plaintiffs, which tended to show that APCP can burn at a rate lower than that which the defendant designated as the threshold, and "which, if true, . . . would require a change in [the] proposed rule."
The ruling also declared the BATFE's decision was "arbitrary and capricious" and vacated the decision to classify ACPC as an explosive under U.S.C. § 841(d).
I started jumping up and down and laughing. No more Limited Explosive Use Permits (LEUP), no more useless and expensive explosives magazines to be forecd to purchase.
I sure hope they learned their lesson. The will not push the NAR and the TRA around. We have science on our side. We have the will to pursue this to the end. We have the finances to pursue this to the end. |
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| Paperwork paperwork paperwork |
[Mar. 16th, 2009|02:57 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| |  awake | ] |
| [ | music |
| | Loreena McKennitt - Bonny Portmore | ] |
Well, all the paperwork is at the insurance company. Except the title, which we need a replacement one for. The title was in the car. I forgot to take it out after the court case. Its ok. As long as they get it eventually, they said. its not going to slow anything down.
So now we wait.
Had trouble with unemployment the last 2 weeks. Last week, they made me file for a new benefit year, even though I'm on the 2nd tier expansion. Pushed my check back from Tuesday to Saturday. I had to wait until Wensday to file it, because of the last number in my SSN. Also stupid. This week, its because of that, the system said I didn't file a claim last week. Umm... *taps on the glass* excuse me, but I have the check sitting here right in front of me. if I didn't file a claim last week, how could I have gotten a check. When I called in, the lady was real nice. She told me that this was a system problem, because of the filing of the new benefit year. Very dumb.
NAROCN 2009 is this weekend. My contribution is almost done. The program. Fortunately, the printer is the club president, and he can run the printing off on Friday, if needed. Should be put to bed by Tuesday latest. All I have to do after this is "sit my butt down at the registration table."
Went looking for my suitcase today, and found something in it. My NERO stuff. Not really costuming, but scarves, belts, sheathes, pouches, and armor. My old leather hat is trashed. So trashed that I just tossed it. So were a few other things. Did find my tabmail shirt. Yeah, I made mail with soda pop tabs. I'll take some pics of it at some point. Really looks good, and very light. Maybe I'll get some yarn and weave it in, to make it silent. Think I'll go try it on. Need to make sure it still fits. Who knows, maybe one day, when my back is fixed, we'll go back. But that's probably at least 2-3 years from now. |
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| Car update |
[Mar. 13th, 2009|11:29 am] |
| [ | mood |
| | chipper | ] |
| [ | music |
| | Sammy Hagar - Heavy Metal | ] |
Well, somewhat of an update.
At this point, we're just waiting on the insurance payment. Of course, there will be more paperwork to do, but probably by this time next month, I should have a car.
I went down to Granger's, where I went the last time, and talked with Eddie, the guy who sold it to me. Real nice guy. Still loud, but a nice guy. Was BS'ing with him, and told him what happened. He was surprised that it hasn't been recovered yet. I just wanted to take a look, and he's got a nice Pontiac Bonneville there. I think its a 95. Don't know the mileage. But it looks to be in great condition for 3500.
We'll probably get 2 grand - 2500, and we'll finance the rest with him like we did last time.
As I was talking with him, he has a favorite phrase. "We'll work something out." Gotta love a guy with that. He even said "I don't care if you're f'ing unemployed, I've done business with you before, you're good for it. if you saw some of the people I've done business with..."
I like this guy. |
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| Things just keep getting better |
[Mar. 12th, 2009|03:45 am] |
| [ | mood |
| | relaxed | ] |
| [ | music |
| | Kid Rock - All Summer Long | ] |
You all know I've been out of work for quite some time.
Well, I was starting to get worried. I'm on the last federal mamdated "expansion". That means 8 weeks left. By Beltaine, (May 1st for the non pagan out there), my benefits were going to be over. In anticipation, I've been doubling the work hunt. Really pushing it. And I've been really stressing out over it too.
And what did I find out not 5 minutes ago?
From the press release...
"Governor M. Jodi Rell announced today that the federal government has notified Connecticut that it meets the criteria for an Extended Benefits (EB) program that will provide 13 additional weeks of unemployment compensation to those who are out of work."
I should have known.
I gotta stop stressing out over all of this. They're going to keep doing this every 3 months, at least for the rest of 2009. They HAVE to. Because jobs keep being lost in record numbers. Connecticut's unemployment rate is the highest now.
I'll find something. I know I will. I just have to relax and let it happen. |
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| The fates are kind |
[Feb. 27th, 2009|07:28 pm] |
Turns out there is theft insurance on the car.
May take a few weeks to get it all done, but we should get another car out of it.
Looks like I'm going to have to rent a carfor the convention next month, but I'll get a partial refund for it.
Oh, and does anybody want to see what a flying lighthouse looks like?
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