Life is good!

Falling Punkin seeds!

2012-01-25T10:50:00.003-05:00

I agreed to do a "Drop your pants" event for the WLS support group as a DJ.
I am not charging them for the event and don't really feel ready to do something as a DJ, but I'm going to do it none the less.
I have gone through so many changes in the past year or so, that my head is spinning.
I am not the same man I was a year ago, or even a few months ago.
I still have flaws, including the inability to say "no" when asked to do something I don't really want to do. It will be a long night. I will have to carry, set up and tear down my system, and find the energy to do it and stay upbeat the whole time. This is not to say that I won't do my best, but I'm not really up to par at this sort of thing.

I've spent hours and hours, days and days, weeks and weeks, working on my house. I've kept it in the front of my mind for all this time. I go through rooms in my head while I'm driving the bus and I work on ideas to fix things, improve things, etc. , until I am so worn out. I am obsessed with getting this place sold, and making sure it's up to my standards. I am finding it difficult to walk away from it.
I also am having trouble not changing my mind and taking it off the market.

My weight has been steady. I haven't gained or lost anything in about a year. I did lose 3 or 4 pounds the last time I weighed in, and I will continue to do that, but I am now pretty much where I will be for the rest of my life, unless I become more active.
My energy level has also improved, although it's been much lower than I would like it to be.
I am not depressed per the definition, clinically. The number of changes in my life justify any feelings I've been experiencing for the past two years or so.
I am finished mourning, but still remember things to this day. I will always remember what happened, and will never get over it.

I started the other blog and realized that the act of starting it was an accomplishment in itself. Because of this, I haven't written anymore of it. Funny how that works....

New blog

2012-01-06T17:51:00.002-05:00

I started the new blog, but didn't advertise it because I didn't want it to be very public.
It turned into something I didn't expect and I want to follow it to see where it goes. It will be a place I can express myself and my opinions at that particular time, without worrying who's feet I step on.
If it goes public, it may not be so popular. That's OK. I explained in the very first post that I need a place that I can unload my ideas, no matter how crazy, in order to quiet the voices in my head and allow me to think a little more clearly.
My first post was more of a list of rules for the blog, and a series of disclaimers. They seem to be very important in today's world.
So, I hope it stays private and I hope it helps me.

I am not sure I mentioned here, but I decided to make a list of ingredients that are in the WLS for dummies book and start trying the recipes one after another in order to find new things to eat and to regain control over my weight again.

I am having trouble with energy levels, and the surgeon and his team haven't been able to offer any suggestions. I still think it's related to the statin pills I took a few months ago. I felt great up until that point. Now, my fingers and joints ache and I can't play my guitar. I talked about all this before.

So, as I continue to move forward in my life, I hope to be able to do so without falling over from exhaustion.

If you are interested in reading my new blog to see what insane ideas I have, let me know in private and I'll think about aiming you in the right direction. Email:

imovitz@aol.com

New Year revolution?

2012-01-02T08:31:00.002-05:00

I am trying to decide whether it would be worth my time and energy to start a new blog.
I'm trying to limit this blog to the subject of weight loss surgery, but as you can read, that hasn't happened in the past year or two. You can go back to the archives to see why I started this blog. It was a selfish move on my part. I really thought I had something to offer, and I did.
But now, I no longer feel like a weight loss surgery patient. I have gone through so much change that it's time to wean myself from this blog and start something new.
The problem is that most blogs concentrate on one subject. I feel like a politician sometimes: You know, when a reporter asks a politician a question, and they go off on some tangent and say what they want, rather than staying on topic?

Being eclectic in my thoughts and wanting to write them down here messes up the original purpose of this particular blog.

Is there such thing as a catch all type of blog, where I can just say what's on my mind? I'm sure there is something like that.

I may come back here once in awhile because I am still a WLS patient, even if I don't feel like it anymore.

I'll set up a reference to my new blog here in case you want to cruise over and see what's on my mind. I can promise nothing at this point.

I use this blog for a number of reasons, many of them as a way of procrastinating from doing some of the things I should be doing instead.

Happy New Year!

Dream building

2011-12-30T12:36:00.000-05:00

This was one of those terms from high pressure sales training. The idea was to drive around, or look through magazines, or watch TV, etc. and find the things that you thought you couldn't afford, but wanted.

A big fancy house, a new car, toys, jewelry. Whatever would motivate you to ignore all of the pitfalls of selling, and concentrate on buying something that was supposed to make you happy.

Then, you would find a picture of your "dream" car or house, and post it somewhere that you could see it anytime you wanted.

In other words, dream building was doing what you had to do in order to make your dreams come true.

The problem I found with using this type of motivation, was that I was not motivated by greed.

Even if I had the money to buy a Mercedes Benz, I wouldn't buy it.

Now, I found out that there were some things I wanted, and I've already gotten most of them. But, I've never gotten to do the things I really wanted to do. So, I'm going to list some of those things here and see what happens:

In no particular order.

I want to learn how to fly, and actually continue to fly after I finish learning how.
I want to play my guitar again, and work with some great musicians again.
I want to write some songs. I want to record those songs and I want people to listen to them and like them.
I want to be able to buy and play a Hammond Organ with Leslie speaker. I would love to play in a club somewhere.
I want to finish my amplifier project. Currently, it is on hold until my friend gets settled into his new apartment.
I want to see Israel.
I want to be able to take the time and have the money to drive across the United States. Then, I want to be able to drive through Mexico and Canada.
I want to see Hawaii, and maybe live there for a little while.
I want to design something that everyone finds useful.
I want to either write myself or have ghostwritten for me, my books. I have several ideas and would like them to become a reality.

These things for the most part, are selfish things. I didn't add anything that I wanted for my kids or grand kids, and those things will remain in my head and not here on a public blog.

My basement work is finished for now. I will not go down there to work, except to finish a few loose ends.

My next projects are to iron and smooth out the curtains upstairs. I may install a few more rods, and may even go out and get more curtain panels. There are some other projects here that will require physical effort rather than mental and I will tackle them over the next few weeks.

I wanted to start looking online at Florida, but didn't get to that yet. I took some walks instead to think about what it was that I really wanted to do in order to focus my efforts in the right direction. I think I have a clearer picture now.

My visit with the Bariatric team today went well. I lost about 3 pounds since last month and that is where I want to be. I noticed some of my clothing was easier to wear. Walking, carrying boxes, climbing the stairs, and keeping myself busy to keep from eating helped a lot. The doctor ordered a few blood tests to make sure my fatigue wasn't an indication of something more serious. I also got an RX for a B-12 shot. I always liked the way I felt after getting one of those years ago. I would like to see an increase in my energy level again.

My pain in my hand may not be so easy to get rid of. The doctor seems to think it might be related to my years of playing guitar, but I am not so sure. His solution might work too, and I will think about it but won't write it here. Right now, my fingers are frozen, even though the temperature here is 70 degrees. It's not poor circulation.

So, one more day until the end of 2011. I still here people saying "two thousand eleven". I wonder how long it will be until they go to the abbreviation and say "twenty eleven"?

Happy New Year!

Tired, but truckin!

2011-12-28T07:28:00.004-05:00

Da love seat! Wanna buy it?

The hand made water bed. 7 drawers underneath, with a book case headboard. All made of Poplar with a cherry stain. It was constructed so that none of the pieces were wider than 2 feet. This makes it very easy to take apart for moving. The Blanket was made by my wife while waiting for my son to arrive back in 1985.

Da Couch to go with da loveseat!

I was looking online at the photos of the house that the agent took. To me, they look terrible. I hate bringing it up, but I'm afraid I'm going to have to. I can't imagine selling the house after seeing those pictures. Google 6294 High Street, East Petersburg and you will find it listed among multiple companies.

The guy's camera turned up the worst color I've ever seen in a photograph. He staged the rooms very nicely, but he also took all the wrong angles, bringing out the worst in the house.
The problem is also that I am living in the place and haven't been able to do everything I need to do in order to make the place look perfect.

Oh well.

Monday and Tuesday, I was working on the basement area. I was able to empty the back section of the storage area. I repacked all of the boxes there, getting rid of 3 more 45 gallon bags of trash. I now have about 5 full size boxes ready to bring upstairs to be stored until I move. I have several smaller boxes too that were labelled and packed. I cleaned the areas that I cleared and got rid of old boxes and stuff that had that "musty" odor of the basement in them. That improved the aroma nicely, although I now have to get those boxes off the porch or that room will soon smell as bad as the basement. See the problem? I am only one person. When I ran out of energy yesterday, I had taken numerous trips up and down the stairs, but hadn't gotten everything moved for the trash. I just transported it to the porch until I had more energy. I guess I need to be 35 or 40 years younger to do it all!

I took the photos and paintings off the wall upstairs as well and boxed them. The walls are bare! UGH!

I found a box full of stamps, postcards, and albums of stamps and postcards. I took an hour to sort through and pull the ones that had writing on them. Some of them date back to 1900 and are from my wife's family. It seems that they travelled a lot and as they did, they sent these postcards for the kids to collect. Well, my wife collected them! There must be 2000+ cards there! For some reason, they thought that collecting stamps would be a great idea and investment, so she has cancelled stamps from all over the world and all throughout time. I'll bet I could find a stamped postcard that Jesus sent if I looked hard enough. My daughter decided she wanted the postcards, and as a bonus, I will give her the whole huge box of other stuff too. No, I didn't find an upside down stamp of the Wright Brothers first flight. Maybe I missed it?

I decided to try to give away my TV system to my daughter. I don't want to waste money when I re-locate on sitting and watching the damn thing. I am too addicted to it as it is. I love the thing, but have caught up on almost all of the TV series I missed in the last 20 years or so. The movies today are good, but I don't need to see them in order to be a better person. I can keep up with the news through the internet, and I plan to upgrade my phone next year anyway.

I emptied out some of the frozen food over the holiday. My son and his family now have sausage and butter. I did plan to take the freezer, but now am not sure. I may be able to change my eating habits so that the freezer in a refrigerator will suffice.

At this point, I am concerned that there won't be anyone at my destination that will be able to help me unpack the truck, so I want to get rid of anything that I can't carry myself. All of the boxes are just fine, but furniture may be a problem. I was planning on buying a mattress when I got down there, and not worrying about a real bed. That means I still have to get rid of the king size waterbed I have now. My music equipment is also small enough for me to move myself, even though there is a lot of it.

I have long been a fan of keeping things simple, but haven't been able to do anything about it until now. If I stay in this house, I will continue to get rid of almost everything but what I need. I hate clutter. It's too hard to clean around clutter. I understand how things accumulate, especially after observing how my grandkids got inundated this Christmas with presents from all fronts, not just me. My kids don't have anywhere to go with all the stuff. My daughter's garage is now housing boxes floor to ceiling with little room for the car. My son is living in a single wide trailer with 4 kids.

I have an almost empty house, and if I don't sell it, I will stay right where I am. That is one of my plans. If the house doesn't sell, I can stay here and get a job to pay for expenses. If I live bare bone basic, I can keep costs down and use this place as a base, and travel when I want without worry. I may fix the place up, but it will be on my terms.

3 of my plans require me to move out of this area, by the way. 2 of the plans require me to stay local. One of the plans is the right one for me, but there may be a variation based on reality.

The easiest plan is to stay put. I can get a full time job to pay the bills and become a working stiff. The mortgage payment is low enough here for me to want to stay. I couldn't live in an apartment for much less without giving up a lot of freedom.

I won't bother posting the other 4 plans here. They are well thought out, but who knows what will happen?

What's next?

Time off?

2011-12-26T17:05:00.005-05:00

Jackson and me

Jazlynn trying out her new lipstick!

Lillian and me!

The for sale sign has gone up.

M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore, MD.

My phone isn't as new as it could be. I will wait until next year to get an Iphone. So, my pictures are OK, but not great. My battery was also low, so I only took 4 pictures of the stadium.

My friends and bus riders came over on Friday and dropped off the perfect sized boxes for me to use for packing. They had a dozen large, but not too large, and a series of smaller boxes. I put them together on Friday afternoon. I was able to put all of my album collection into several smaller boxes. This made them very easy to carry instead of loading them into large boxes. I gave away one of the boxes of albums that I know I won't listen to. Probably about 35 albums there. That still leaves about 150 so I won't run out of music anytime soon.

Saturday, I did something I have never done before. It took all of my effort to do it, because I am just not into change and I felt some real nervousness and fear of the unknown. I knew I would be OK, but I didn't know what to expect from myself. I know the last time I tried to take some time for myself, I had a panic attack and it ruined my weekend. I wasted a lot of money too.

This time, however, I was OK. My friend had two tickets to the Raven's game, and his wife didn't want to go, so he sold one to me. I split fuel and paid for the ticket, and we had a ball. I froze my ass off, but it was still fun. I don't know if I will ever do it again, but now I know I can, and that makes it OK. I ate well, and was able to take my vitamins on time because I carried them with me. Never the less, I was exhausted by the time I got home and I went right to bed and slept about 14 hours. Climbing the stairs to the top level and then coming down and back up a few times along with the cold took it out of me.

Sunday, I took a drive to York and then on to MD. to see all the grandkids and give them their presents from me. I got lots of hugs and probably some germs too, but that's OK. I have a week off to recover. I slept well again last night. But, I did have to get up once around 1am to solve a problem that I had been working on. The solution just came to me and I knew that if I didn't do it right then, I might forget it by the morning. Strange how that works.

So far, during this particular vacation, I have been able to pace myself and stay on track in order to get a lot finished. I worked steadily this morning and throughout the day. I was up and down the stairs numerous times, and collected 3 bags of trash as well as cleared out a whole section of stuff in the back of the basement. I will be taking pictures as I go. I vacuumed the darkroom, and put down some more baking soda to absorb more odors. The windows are open and the fan is running, so that will take some more of the "basement" aroma away. Less dust, fewer smelly books and newspapers, pictures, paintings and other assorted stuff wrapped, labelled and boxed.

As I've said before, this whole situation is throwing out some mixed emotions. I hate getting rid of my wife's stuff. But, I refuse to carry stuff that I will never look at of have a use for. There is a lot of stuff that I am giving to my wife's relatives so they can store them until they dissolve, but things that I know have no monetary or sentimental value, are being trashed. Either way, I will never have to see or think about that stuff again.

I have a blanket chest filled with thousands of pictures, and other memories, and that will be what I give to my kids when I am gone. I may or may not look at the stuff in that chest, who knows?

Regardless, it feels very good to know that the things I take with me when I leave here will be what I want to take with me. There were too many years of moving boxes that we never opened. I can now safely say that I have opened every single one of those boxes. I've looked at everything, and thrown away tons of stuff, but kept all the memories in my heart and head.

Oh, I've lost a few pounds the past few weeks. Not enough to notice, but my long johns fit better. I will continue to adapt myself to the new life I have chosen and hope I am allowed to slowly move forward.

Movement forward

2011-12-14T19:29:00.002-05:00

The house is really starting to look better. I am feeling as if a weight has been lifted, yet I know that this is temporary and things will probably go sour soon. This is not my hope, it's a fact. I've been doing some things and leaving others alone. I just can't seem to do it all.
The important stuff is being left behind, and I just can't keep up.

The Christmas holiday is a week away. Then, I have to plan to take my trip to Florida in preparation for my move.

I have several back up plans, and things should work out if I don't run out of available money.

I've accomplished so much. I wonder if I will ever be finished?

Oh well, bring it on. I'm ready for the next thing, whatever that may be.

I can't make music

2011-12-05T04:09:00.003-05:00

I woke up at 3am with my mind in full swing. The negative part of me was in a panic. The positive side was still sleeping.
This happens a lot. I wake up too early, and have to calm my mind down in order to get enough sleep.
This morning, I decided to get up and do something instead of just lying there feeling sorry for myself.
I made a decision that is causing the panic and have been making decisions like that for a few months now.
I decided to sell the house and move to Florida. I have no idea where in Florida, just that I want to go there. They have music, and other jobs that I can do. I may not have to drive a bus anymore. That alone would make me happy. But, I have nagging questions that keep popping up at 3am. They threaten to make me go off the deep end. 3am is a terrible time to be alone.

The questions that keep challenging me:

How much stuff do I need to live?
How little do I need to live?
Will I be damned to Hell if I throw something out?
Will my wife come back and haunt me if I throw something of hers out?
Will my kids disown me if I throw something out?

These are all irrational questions during the day, but not at 3am.
Some people can live with no possessions at all. But in America, the one with the most toys wins!

This works in weight loss too. If I don't eat hearty, does that mean I'm living in squalor or poverty? Am I less than human if I eat what I should, and not be gluttonous?

So, the unknown journey begins for me. Oh, I've been down this road before, but never by myself.
There are some things I have that for some reason, I don't see. I pass by them thinking that they are important and should be left alone.

I have a black and white photo of my father in law. It is in a frame, and hung on the wall years ago when he lived here. Now, it sits in the basement on a back shelf. For some reason, every time I go past it, I put it aside rather than throw it away or store it in some box to be dealt with at a later time. There are many things like that here.

This week, starting right now, I am going to start filling trash bags with stuff like that and throw it all away. Maybe in a thousand years, some archaeologist will dig it up and think it is an important find, but for now, it's just another thing I don't need to carry with me.

I have a junk man that comes around when I call. He will take anything I need to be gotten rid of. I also still have 100 or more 45 gallon bags that I can take to the curb after I fill them up. I don't know if I can fill them all, but when I leave here, it all has to be gone and I don't want to take it with me.

My daughter has taken a pile of stuff, and now has no time or desire to take any more of it. My son has no interest at all. My wife's relatives have told me they want some things, and I have them separated for them, but if they don't come get them, they aren't going to get them. I will call them this week.

So, after all this time of collecting "stuff", the time has come to let it all go. I don't need anything that has been stored in a box or on a shelf in the basement since 1992.
I've scoured Ebay, and Craigslist to see if any of it has value. None of it does.
The musty odor of old books will soon be gone from the basement. The books upstairs have fared better because it is dryer and warmer. But, many of them will not go with me either. I've read them all at least once and maybe more than that. I could list them on Amazon and maybe get a few dollars for them, but my time now is too important. I need to work on my new life, and get rid of the old life as fast as I can.
I have sold a lot of stuff and will sell some more before I leave. But some of it isn't worth selling.

I will be donating 500 hangers to Goodwill. Maybe they can sell them, use them, or give them away.

I'm pulling the bandages off very quickly that have covered wounds that have been there for many years. Yes, it hurts like Hell, but the pain is temporary, I hope.

People are afraid of going crazy, yet, if they go crazy they won't really have anything to worry about. I won't go crazy, but I may suffer a bit more.

Let's see if I can survive this move.

Seriously? A common slang term used today.

2011-11-23T14:53:00.002-05:00

Everytime I think I have the grief thing conquered, it comes back to bite me.
My plan was to start packing things up today. I've been planning it all week.
The problem I am having is slowing me down, not stopping me.
I keep finding memories.
I have been going over this in my head. I need to organize things, pack some of it away, throw some of it out. I need to sell some of it, and maybe give some of it away. I think I covered everything.
The problem are the memories.
I didn't remember that I packed a pile of them into drawers of my wife's night stand, and in her drawers under the bed.
Today, I found them.
I have boxes all ready to go. They are just the right size for me to pack, seal, label, and carry without too much trouble. They are just the right size that I can fill them up and not be too heavy. I've seen people pack the really big boxes, and then have them fall apart because they were too heavy. I've learned from my mistakes. My boxes are good, well made boxes!
So, I opened a drawer and found a canvas bag from the funeral home with all the cards from people offering condolences. There were newspaper clippings of when Donna was a child and got her picture in the paper. There were old photos that I totally forgot about.
There was a bag of scarves, hats, and even wig shampoo. There was a knit shawl that someone called a prayer shawl. They made it for her, prayed over it, and gave it to her. She had it with her when she died.
There were cards for many occasions, including some from the grandkids to me. There were pictures made by the grandkids for her that hung in her room at the nursing home.
So, instead of just throwing it all into a box and packing it away, I had to read it all and grieve. It wasn't very time efficient, but it was cathartic.
Now, I'm going to take my afternoon nap, and dig in after I wake up and do it some more.

My holiday will consist of going to see my sister for Thanksgiving. I plan to do some food shopping on Friday, and maybe go out to hear a band if I can find one. I will have to force myself to do that, but I know it will help me to feel better.
I plan to continue to pack things up, clean a bit more, and hope to see some progress by the time I go back to work next week.
I also plan to play the guitar a bit to see if I can find the music in me again. My finger still hurts like crazy, but I will try anyway. Maybe I'll create a new type of music that consists of strumming a chord, then screaming in agony!
My amplifier project is still on hold, but I do have it all lined up for when it gets started again.

My blog title (Life is Good!) isn't helping me too much the past few weeks. I just can't seem to break through to the other side and start climbing up again. But, I'm not giving up... ever.

Delete this post? Nah!

2011-11-19T21:01:00.002-05:00

I deleted my last post because it was not what I should be writing about. It was a rant about someones ideas and not mine, and that's not right.
I realized too, that I stopped reading my posts right after I edit and post them. I have been writing this way for a long time. I should re-read them once in awhile just so I can learn from them.
But, most of them recently have been written just to get ideas out of my head so I can move on.

The pain in my finger is still there and this morning when I went out to shred leaves and finish one section of the yard, the pain in my knees and joints became noticeable. In fact, I was able to work through it, but had to readjust my movement to compensate. The pain is just in my joints, and not my muscles. I can tell the difference. I was so tired when I finished, that I came in and took a nap for two hours.

I was planning on taking a walk tonight, but am too sore. I did take a drive this afternoon to enjoy the last bit of sunlight. It gets dark way too early now.

This coming week, I have a very strange bus schedule so I will try to concentrate on starting to pack and organize things that I don't need. I decided the past few days that I am going to make the move whether I am ready or not. Tomorrow, I have an agent coming over to help me decide what to sell the house for.

All of the work I've done should make the sale easier, and I hope to make enough to pay the mortgage and have some left over for the move. One of the things I have thought about is my continued bariatric support. I will try to find a team where I go, but even if I do find that team, I will come back up here once a year for my yearly blood work and checkup. Next year's appointment will mark the 4 year milestone for me.

I am hoping the move will help me to work towards the final 50 pounds. I gained some over the past year that I want to get rid of, and I think becoming more active and working to re-integrate me into society will be the spark I need to burn off the rest of the weight.

So, next week, I will divide my time between taking pictures and posting to Craigslist the furniture I want to sell, and packing things into two piles. One for getting rid of, and one for taking with me when I move.

I really want to try to get rid of almost everything as far as furniture is concerned, because I want to experience the feeling of doing it all again. I have some sentimental stuff that I will keep, such as photographs, but I am going to look through everything and see if I can't just sell it all and start again.

I have a friend who is a believer in the afterlife and she says that my wife's spirit is in some of the furniture and will follow me where ever I go. She tells me that's why I sold both cars last year and bought one that my wife had never been in before. So, if I take my wife's blankets with me, her spirit will follow.

I guess that means that I shouldn't take my mother in laws stuff with me unless I want her to continue to haunt me! :)

Oh, I forgot to mention that I bought a book to read at the suggestion of my dietitian. It's called "Weight loss surgery cook book for dummies". There are actually two books from the dummy collection dealing with WLS. The cookbook is one and the info on the surgery itself is the other.

The cookbook is very interesting. It covers everything from the beginning as far as what you need to know about food and eating. It is a nice refresher since it is very basic and not preachy. I am told that there are lots of good recipes in the second half, but I am still only a few chapters into it. I am reading it slowly so I can remember what I read. I know that there are many different kinds of WLS, but they cover the basics for the 2 most popular, roux en Y and the lap band. They really have standardized the rules for most everyone, so it's a good read.

The pain goes on... venting

2011-11-06T10:42:00.003-05:00

I'm too nice a guy to go back and yell at this yahoo doctor for prescribing me a NSAID when I just get finished telling him I can't take them.
Damn!
The pill worked too. It took away the pain for about a day and a half. But, I can't take them without messing up my pouch.
Damn!
He did refer me to the doctor that I needed to be referred to. I am hoping to line up an appointment sometime next week. The bad thing is that he is located in York and it will be tough to make the trip in between bus runs.
I am looking to find out just what is wrong and if there is a way to improve things, or cure it. It is doubtful that the pain can be cured, but I will take whatever I can get. As long as it allows me to play again.

"We were all put here for a reason"

The above statement is a lie. We were put here as part of a grand experiment. We all have different backgrounds and this is an experiment to see how we react to the same problems.
How am I doing so far? You have to ask the Scientist who started the experiment. Personally, I don't think I'm doing all that well.
Oh, I've accomplished a lot of things, but I would like to be a little more cognizant of my surroundings.
I would like to remember things I need to.
I would like to feel something other than a broken heart, anger, disgust, hate, sadness, guilt, and pain. I know I will eventually, but I want things to change now! Of course.

Regardless of all these emotions above, I am making progress. I don't feel these things when it comes to my Bypass surgery. I feel good about that. I don't always follow the schedule, but I am getting better at it. Baby steps?

Did I mention that I hate Daylight savings time and everything related to it? I would rather they leave time alone. It's bad enough that I have to get up every morning at 4:30am. Just leave it alone!

This morning, I got up after watching the heads up display on the ceiling go goofy. It kept changing from 1am to 2am to 3am and back. Whoever was running the national clock didn't get it right until 4 am. I have several battery clocks in the house that I have to manually change.

So, I get up and start working on things. My goal was to install a cheap piece of carpet that I got for the back bedroom. In order to do that, I had to clear out the rest of the music equipment, vacuum the dust and dirt on the floor, and roll out the carpet. I decided to not bother buying any padding for under the carpet. I don't really need it for sale or for playing music. I just need it to cover up the glunk on the floor (glue + gunk). So, here's what I did:

While I was heating up my breakfast, I took a load of wash down and got it started.
There was a box on the floor that I tossed down a few days ago. I picked it up and put it where it belonged.
There were towels in the dryer that were finished a few days ago. I took them upstairs and put them on the bed for folding later.
The trash can was full so I traded that out. I also took out a few boxes that had been waiting for the next time I went to the trash. Of course, the recycling went out too.
I brought two gallons of water in from the porch. One was to make coffee, the other to make a gallon of crystal lite. By this time, breakfast needed to be warmed up. while running it through the microwave, I turned on the TV and set it up to go to "on demand".
I ate while watching one of my shows.
The wash was finished so I went downstairs and transferred it over to the dryer.
I came back upstairs and did the dishes.
Then I started a record (Yes) to listen to while clearing out the back bedroom. It took both sides of the album and half of the next album to clear out the back bedroom.
I ran the vacuum through the whole house and finished up with the now empty back bedroom.

I still have to bring up the now dry wash, fold it along with the towels that are already on the bed, and put it all away.

I took a short break to write this, and may lay down to take a refreshing nap.

I don't know if you know this, but they use a chemical poison to make the carpet stiff and fresh. It makes it look great on the showroom floor, but when you unroll the carpet, it is released into the air. I can't remember if it was arsenic, or formaldehyde, but you should always unroll the carpet with the windows open and leave them open for a day or so to air the place out. I will do that and also put a fan in while closing the door. The carpet is covered with plastic now, until I'm ready to work it. Professional carpet installers get sick over time because of that practice. You might see some of them wearing masks, which is the smart thing to do.

Anyway, when the room is finished, I will return the music equipment and try to do more organization so it's neater. You can't imagine how many cables and cords I have to sort. It's a necessity to have them all because of the variety of connections that need to be made.

I should have the carpet in by this afternoon, and the room ready for the equipment by Tuesday.

The next two weeks, I plan to make plans to do a whole bunch of things. What the great Experimenter in the sky's plans are for me, I don't know.

How crazy is that?

2011-11-04T09:05:00.004-04:00

I have been in pain for a long time. Most of the pain was in my heart. Not my physical heart, but the other one. That is the one you can't do anything about but live with it.
To a physician, this looks like depression, but I can tell you that it's not. I know what depression feels like and this isn't it.
I will get over this heart pain soon. I am almost out of the woods.
But, I am allowing myself to feel it for a little bit longer.
I have been contemplating extremes. I always do that when I am working on a problem. This allows me to see each edge of the problem so I can work on it and solve it completely.
An variation of "extreme" would be if I were to walk away from everything after closing my bank account and cleaning out my limited retirement account. This would give me enough cash to go somewhere else and start over. This wouldn't work for me because I am too honest and there are so many checkpoints in the States, that my problems would follow me and I would end up no better off than I am now.

The other end of the extreme would be to ignore all my current problems and go for broke in some get rich quick scheme.

The true extremes are life or death, but those are only parameters, not realistic. I can't control when I die unless I consider suicide, which is something I won't do. I don't have any control over "life". I will live as long as I am supposed to live.

So, I will happily stay somewhere in the middle of the two extremes. I may get close to the edge, but it won't be for long. I have no desire to live with "blood pressure raised" situations all the time.

The other pain I have is physical. Have you ever slammed your fingers in a door? If so, you know the kind of pain I am in. After taking that damn statin drug, I had pain like that all over my body. It took several weeks for me to feel better. My whole body still aches just a bit, which could be related to the drug or it could just be old age creeping up on me.
But, the little finger on my left hand feels like it got slammed in a door. The other fingers and thumb are fine. Same with the right hand. It is fine.
So today, I have a doctor's appointment with a new doctor. He is associated with the new hospital and I am hoping this guy works out and is progressive enough to leave me alone and just fix my problems, and not hassle me about cholesterol.
Update: I just came from the new doctor. He gave me Celebrex, which turned out to be a NSAID which is a no no for gastric bypass patients. I will now have to call him and tell him that. I didn't realize at the office that Celebrex was a no no. I told him I couldn't take hard shell pill, only capsules, but I guess I didn't get through to him about the nsaids. Oh well, throw away another doctor.

I spoke with a beautiful woman the other day. She had physical beauty, but also was attractive to me in other ways. She is intelligent, and able to stay focused, which is rare. She also remembers things. I meet many people and have trouble with memory. Always have been that way. Some people can meet you and remember everything you spoke of a month later. Unless you are a close friend and I deal with you on a regular basis, I have a tough time with memory.

So, this woman helped me to focus on myself for a brief moment. She helped me to express my true feelings just for a minute. It felt good to be able to do that without feeling self centered or conceited. It felt to me as if I had allowed one door to close in my life and was getting ready to open the next door. I always move slowly, and cautiously, so now I am ready to open the door.
I am grateful to her, and she probably doesn't even know what she did for me.
The mirror she provided will allow me to move to the next step. I think I will send her flowers or something.

This weekend will be a bit chilly but will be clear. I am going to have to take a long walk to try to sort through the stress my financial life is now causing. I am again running out of money. I just got notification from the welfare department about wanting information so they can determine if they need to tell me to give something back to them. I wasn't aware that I had gotten anything from them. I turned the first letter over to my lawyer, but she hasn't gotten back to me.
As with all government forms, this one leaves much to be desired. It is all but unintelligible. The information they requested could only apply to someone who is very rich and can afford to hire accountants, and lawyers. I will compose a letter and send it in with the form and hope they don't decide to do anything stupid.

OK, what's next?

Powerless

2011-10-29T12:35:00.002-04:00

I have had some insane dreams over the past year.
I've expected nothing less, since my life has changed directions so drastically.
I went from being too fat, to losing everything. Well, not everything.
The fact that I am on my own is one of the reasons I have had these crazy dreams. Maybe you don't realize how important it is to have friends to talk to in person. At least, it's important to me. I do talk to people, but not in person.
Every weekend for the past year, with very few exceptions, I have been a total recluse. I rarely get phone calls on the weekend. I do get texts if I initiate them, and I do a lot of surfing on Facebook. Sometimes, I do IM's on Facebook, but not many other places.
My inner voice is always talking. Sometimes I am able to ignore it, but then the damn music starts playing and a song will repeat over and over. So, my dreams become the place for me to defrag everything that is going on in my brain.
Recently, I have been watching old TV shows as I've stated in previous posts. I study people and it is good for me to see how others handle their problems. TV today is much better at handling things realistically, and that helps me to figure out what I need to do.
I do a lot of emoting during these shows as I try to rid myself of the pain of the past two years and move into the healing process. I am making progress.

I've been writing down my thoughts and trying very hard to finish everything I need to do here in the house. They predicted snow today and it is an early snow, and a heavy one.
About an hour ago, the power went out. The silence in the house was deafening, but the sound of the ticking battery operated clocks brought me to realize just how loud this house is. I can't hear the clocks when the power is on because there are so many things plugged in and they all make noise. Not a lot of noise, but it is there none the less.

Some thoughts came to the front of the brain when the power first went out:

What the hell was I doing in a snow storm? I had planned on being in Florida by now, playing music for my living.
My CPAP machine won't work without electricity.
Everything is electric. What happens if the power stays off?
No microwave oven. Everything I cook is done using the microwave. I did an inventory of what I could eat in case the power was off long term. I have plenty of protein bars in the fridge, and could use the gas grill if I needed.
No TV, or other electronic media. My laptop computer stayed on because it has a battery, but the main computer went down.
I would have to go out to the car in order to charge my phone. As soon as I lost power, one of my local friends started texting me. Soon, my daughter and three other friends were texting me.
I went through the house and unplugged everything that I don't use on a regular basis. I found I still had a speaker system plugged in and it was making noises that I wasn't happy about. I also went into the basement to check the breaker box in case it was just my house.
I got my under armor shirt on, as well as a hat in case it got cold in the house. I am much more comfortable with them on now.
I took pictures of outside the house and did a quick tour to make sure the wires were still connected to the house. I also surveyed the neighborhood in case a tree fell locally that I could report. Everything looked normal, except for the snow on everything so early in the season. The snow will be gone in the next few days because the temp will go up again and there are no predictions of more precipitation.

The fire companies are out all over the place with trees and wires down, so the power may go out yet again.
So, today, I will stay home, but I may go outside as soon as I see the snow slowing down. I want to get my workout by shoveling the driveway and sidewalk.

Today, since I knew there would be snow, I had planned on staying inside for the most part. The snow is very wet and heavy, so it is not good to walk in. It would be like walking in a heavy rainfall. I have my shoe spikes in case I change my mind, and I can deal with the wet if I really put my mind to it.

OK, what's next?

Working in a coal mine, going down down down...

2011-10-27T20:17:00.003-04:00

I found a gelatin capsule with Glucosamine/chondroitin. I hadn't taken it since before the surgery.
But the damn statin drug made my fingers and I needed something.
I ran out of fish oil about 3 days ago and I noticed I started to feel better for some reason.
So, I went out and got the stuff above and the fish oil, and started taking it again anyway.
I'm hoping the stuff will take away enough pain for me to start playing guitar again.

I also started working on a recipe book in my head. I doubt it will ever see the written page, but it's a good exercise for my brain.
I have another idea to write down some of my experience as a bus driver as far as safety and good driving habits are concerned, but that one will not make it either. They both sound better in my head than they ever will on paper.
I have several other ideas for books that will only be written if I am a total invalid and have nothing else to do except write. It just ain't gonna happen. I have too many other things to think about.

I have friends and family that have problems much greater than mine for the most part. I run those problems through my mind while driving and come up with some solutions, but usually keep them to myself because they do sound better in my head than they do coming out into the world. I do tell them sometimes, but they usually get shot down.

My son has some problems right now that I have no idea how to help him. But I know that I can't do anything for him other than to pray and listen to him. If I did help, he wouldn't grow and move forward. He was doing so well, but he screwed up and now he is paying the price. I personally hate making mistakes, but have learned to live with them so far.

I had some things I was going to write about tonight, but I'm very tired and won't be able to think clearly in a few minutes. Gonna head to bed.

Life and death!

2011-10-24T08:09:00.002-04:00

So, I'm sitting on a hill in my school bus this morning behind a small car. In front of that car is a fully loaded 18 wheeler. This guy did 25 mph the entire way down the road I was on. The road is an open 2 lane with full visibility and the speed limit is 45, so I figured he was from out of town and I gave him a wide berth.
Now, he was stuck on the hill with nowhere to go. He couldn't figure out how to shift his gears in order to make it up the hill, and every time he tried to go, he stalled and had to jam the brakes to keep from sliding back down the hill.
In the meantime, there was a line of vehicles, including several school buses behind him. I run scenarios in my head all the time when things like this happen. I think about what I would do if his brakes failed and he started rolling backwards. He wouldn't be able to slow himself down and the truck would just roll backwards faster and faster until he started taking out whatever was behind him, until he would finally stop with multiple cars, trucks and buses mangled.
Then, it came to me that this was a real possibility. There was a small car in front of me, and that stood no chance against this truck. I saw that car (we're back to reality now) put the car into reverse, and start moving back from the now sliding truck.
I looked behind me and since my bus is bigger than the average car, no one behind me could see the situation. I had nowhere to go. If I jumped out of the bus, others would still get hurt. If I tried to slow the truck down when it got to me, I might have been able to save others, but I would surely get hurt.
When you watch TV shows, there is always music and multiple angles to view so that you can figure out what is going to happen next, and you can watch it from a safe distance. Reality isn't like that.
About this time, a woman comes around the passenger side of the truck and starts waving to us to move back. The problem is that we can't do that because we are all in line. There is nowhere to go.
So, I waited for her to get near me, and I roll down the window and tell her to stop traffic ahead of the truck so we can get around it. She does that and I am able to get around the truck and go on my way.
I pop the blue tooth into my ear and I call 911 and report what I consider to be a dangerous situation. The dispatcher takes my information and tells me that she will pass it on.
I leave the scene and go home to write this.

I got home 10 minutes ago and I'm still shaky. I was in a no win situation this morning, and I won anyway. In all my 38 years of bus driving, I have hated every second of the 15%, and wished I could be somewhere else, doing something else.

They say that you can train to avoid 85% of accidents. The other 15% you can't. But, you can minimize you risks by being prepared.

This situation was impossible to avoid. But, by the grace of God, it didn't happen.
I've since checked the online fire radio and haven't seen anything, so I am assuming the truck made it off the hill and everything turned out OK. The thing I am almost certain about, is that the truck driver and his woman passenger had no idea how serious a situation they had gotten into by not being prepared. They will likely continue on their trip laughing about how stupid the roads are.

I have to drive the roads with idiots like this everyday and I thank God I make it through without hurting anyone or getting hurt myself.

I am almost to the point of hanging up my CDL and all the years of training because I am scared to death of people like this.

Mindless idiots behind the wheel.

It's my turn!

2011-10-14T10:03:00.003-04:00

I have written "It's my turn" sometimes in anger.
Sometimes in frustration.
Sometimes as a threat, or more accurately, aggressively. I don't make many threats. I am a gentle person.
I've made the statement as a way of trying to convince myself that it's a fact.
I've said it so many times in the past two years, and every time I say it, it's for a different reason.
I want it to be true.
I have done without for so many years.
It seems that every time I get ahead, there was someone else who needed what I earned more than me.
Now, I am trying to live up to the statement "it's my turn".
I am trying to be worthy of myself. I am trying to not feel guilty for buying myself the good socks instead of the cheap ones.
I have bought a few things that I wanted rather than needed, and have felt guilty.
I've done things that I didn't get to do before, and have felt guilty.
I've said things that I wouldn't have said before, and I felt guilty.
I've been quiet when I would have spoken up before, and I've felt guilty.

I now find that I am not feeling as guilty as before.
I guess I am now coming to grips with life. There are choices to be made, and I am making them.
There are things that should be done, and I am doing them without feeling guilty.
There are things that I don't have the time or energy to do, and they are being let go, and I don't feel guilty.

I have been working on two different things:
Thing one
Amp design and build.
I have to say that it's a pleasure working with someone who's main goal isn't to destroy whatever I am trying to do.
I am making decisions, and we have an open discussion, where I am not wrong all the time.

Thing two:
I have been talking to others who are alone in their present life and are experiencing much of the same situations that I am. I am finding myself actually thinking about their situation and instead of telling them what to do, I am seeing things from their perspective. I am able to ask questions, or make a statement that will really help them to look at their problem from a different angle. I am not trying to tell them what to do, or telling them that they are wrong. I am allowing them to live their life and just reflecting back to them what they just told me so they can see the situation from a different angle. Maybe, that will help them.

My favorite counselor during my trials and tribulations with weight loss and the loss of my wife, has evolved. I am no longer able to see them because they are moving on with their life. That is a good thing for them, and I am hoping they are happy. It might even be a good thing for me since it's time for me to get back on the horse and go out and have contact with other people. It has been a long time since I socially interacted with anyone, other than through my DJ/MC work, that I of course feel a bit apprehensive.

I am still dealing with all the problems I had before, but am learning to go more with the flow.

We hide the truth inside our pants!

2011-10-09T16:09:00.005-04:00

Bill Cosby said that once in a tape I heard. It was broadcast on WMMR in the early morning, right after midnight. It was the last line after a series of supposedly profound statements in the form of poetry. I could explain further, but it is probably a waste of time.
I used to accumulate and collect one liners, and sometimes more than one liners so I could use them in conversation to make me appear "cool", when in reality, I did better without them.
The truth is, (not inside my pants!) I felt very uncomfortable interacting with people. You see, I had trouble because I would hear someone say something, or observe them doing something, and would be processing that information, trying to figure out if I needed to respond. If I threw out a one liner, then I would be free of that obligation.
I also had trouble because I couldn't send good information while receiving other information. If someone was talking to me, I had to think about what they said, how they looked, etc. I didn't have time to form a proper response. I could either take in the information, or send out some of my own. I couldn't do both.
Today, I am a bit older and have a lot more experience. So, I am able to read people better. I've also heard most of what people say and already know the proper response. So, I don't really need new one liners, although mine are a bit dated.
I look for new things all the time. That allows me to try to keep the brain working. I also get lazy and tend to fall back into the old patterns when I get tired.
Fatigue plays a big part in my life today. I get tired, so I cut corners when I can. I pace myself much slower and stop long before I'm worn out because I am afraid of running out of energy at the wrong place and time.
I also don't seek out social situations because I really hate playing the games. I really don't want to break new ground right now.
I had to force myself to go out the other night. I went to see my friends play in an area where they had a "Pub Crawl". The place was packed and I almost turned around and left, but I managed to stay and found one of my buddies. I let him take the lead so I wouldn't have to interact with anyone.
I saw several women that I would have liked to start a conversation, but I decided against it because I still don't want to play the game. I stayed sober (not hard to do since I don't drink) and saved money.
The music was good and it was a nice evening out. I was able to leave early enough so that when I got home I hit the sack and slept late the next morning.

I am working on two things right now. One of them is to redo my diet plan and see if I can get back on track. I am staying pretty much the same weight, and have recovered mostly from the cholesterol medicine, but I still have pain in my little finger. I am going to get that checked out.
I am also working with the dietitian. He sent me a bunch of information that I will plow through in the hopes that I can get inspired again.
I am working on another project in order to try to make some money. A friend and I are going to be building our own amplifier. The first one will be a prototype so that we can fine tune the amp to sound the way we want. After that, we will purchase several kits, build them, and try to sell them for a profit. I'm praying that this will be what I need to do in order to survive the next 20 years or so. Time will tell.

In the meantime, I made up a sausage stew/chili to try to stock up on food for the winter. I want to use up all of the containers I have with at least 3 different types of meals. This will allow me to have variety and to be able to portion out the meals. So far, I have 8 quarts of the other chili (ground beef added), and 7 quarts of the sausage. I have more beans available to prepare in the next few weeks and am going to try to do one more batch, this time using beef cubes and heavy on the veggies.
I am using my laptop to write this today, and am sitting outside in the afternoon sun. The old laptop has lots more pictures from the past that I haven't been able to transfer to the Mac yet. I just don't know how.

A clean mind, a dirty room.

2011-10-02T14:35:00.003-04:00

Me in my room in 1972. I had a fishing net hanging from the ceiling. It changed the whole mood of the room. The bed is a double that was my Dad's. That was our first bed. I took it with me when we got married and moved. It was already 30 years old when we got it.

When I was a kid, my Mom would get mad at me about twice a month, and then send me to my room to clean it from top to bottom. I couldn't come out, of course, until it was all clean. I didn't figure out until a few years after that she got mad at me so that I would clean the room, not because I did anything wrong.
I would go in there all upset and angry, and then dig into it. I would go through every drawer, every nook and cranny in the place and throw out whatever no longer interested me.
Some things, I would keep because my parents gave them to me. Or, they would have other value, such as, I liked them or used them on a regular basis.
I learned how to clean things out without throwing it all out and ruining my life. I also felt better after it was finished because it was now clean. I would dust and vacuum along with trashing things.
My room was my home and I was proud of how I kept it looking good.
I would also rearrange my furniture when I could. It was tough because sometimes I had a very small room. In our second home, I had two beds. They were twin beds and I always slept on the same one. I could never feel comfortable sleeping in the other one, even though they were the same. I didn't have much room to move things around.
My parents never came into my room to check on things, or if they did, I never knew. The room was always the way I left it.
When we got married, I expected things to be the same for us as it was just for me. I expected things to be put away, and everything to be clean and neat.
Boy, that was a rude awakening.
Right after we got married, we had nothing. I had to get a job and I worked a very physical job, so I was tired when I came home. My wife was going to school at first, and then she went to work. So neither of us had time to do much as far as doing a super clean job on the place.
I remember tearing things apart and cleaning them. Donna pitched in also and soon we had the place as clean as we could make it.

Donna was going for her checkup because she was having trouble breathing. The doctor couldn't figure out what was wrong, and I got the opinion that he really didn't know what he was doing. So, I called a hospital in Philadelphia where my Mom died. They had taken good care of her there, but she was too far gone and they couldn't do anything for her. I thought they could do something for Donna.
They couldn't. It's a long story for another day, but after I did hours and hours of research in the library (before computers) about her condition, I determined they couldn't do anything for her in Philadelphia, so we actually snuck her out of there so she could come back home. I also pretended to be a medical records transporter and "stole" all of her medical records, x-rays, and blood test results.
We took all of this to her family doctor, and he was able to determine that she was really OK for now and that made us feel much better.
Donna had this problem recur over the years, and it wasn't until just recently that we learned it was a form of radiation burns to her lungs, and pleural space that was causing fluid to accumulate in her pleural cavity, affecting her breathing.

Just after I got her home, I went through this very strong feeling of loss. It was the first time in my life that I realized that we no longer had our parents to depend on. My Mother had died, and my Father remarried. He and his wife moved out of our home in Levittown and into an apartment. If I ever wanted to go back home again, I couldn't. It was no longer there.
This hit me very hard. I had no idea what was wrong, but I couldn't function. I didn't know what depression was back then. I didn't know anything back then.
Donna thought it was our relationship, and probably thought about leaving, but she stayed and supported me. I eventually came out of it, but I can still feel the desolation of that time.
I had accumulated a lot of junk back then that I didn't need anymore. I got out of the depression by going through my stuff and getting rid of most of it. I had some collections of things, and I really didn't get any pleasure from it anymore, so I got rid of it.
I couldn't convince Donna to get rid of her junk too, and we carried it with us through 7 moves. This is the stuff I am getting rid of still.
I just took 4 suitcases out to throw away. They were in the attic crawl space. I thought they might be used for equipment storage, but they were coated with the goo of time and I decided it was time to throw them out.
I found a file box loaded with cancelled checks from her parents up there too. I had thought that I got rid of them before, but I think they just grow back. They are so old that I might not even shred them. There are about 30 rolls of wrapping paper still up there that I will probably leave alone. I also believe there are two more suitcases, but they will stay too for now.
I piled about 12 boxes outside for trash along with the suitcases.
I am gathering up stuff the regular trash won't take. I have a friend who will pick that stuff up to take to the waste authority directly. I'll have to pay extra, but at least it will be gone.

Over the years, we collected lots of things in the anticipation of becoming financially successful. Then, we could buy our large dream home and have shelves full of nick nacks, antiques, and great things to look at. It never happened. We just continued to collect things, storing them in boxes.

I have an entire box of plaques from Donna's company. She received these awards every year for doing something or other, and they just kept giving her these plaques. Along with all the driving awards I received, they got stored. He plaques are just blocks of wood now, with a bit of lacquer and decoupage. My awards are paper suitable for framing. I also have a ton of little lapel pins. They fill up the drawer in my night stand.
Donna' plaques were too numerous for me to hang up anywhere in the house. I did try one time to put them on the basement wall, but that was kind of silly. The walls weren't painted then, and putting nails in the brick/cinder block just wasn't a good idea.
My father in law also had a pile of plaques and awards that were framed. They were stored in a box on the floor in the darkroom, so he they had no value to him either.

It feels good for me to touch these things. They had no value to Donna, but they are a part of her accomplishments, and I feel that. I was thinking of taking them to the attic and using them on the floor over the insulation to help keep the house a bit warmer this winter. I wonder what new owners would think if they saw that?

Donna's essence is still here. I can still feel her in the house. But, she is fading and soon will be gone. She died in a nursing home in Harrisburg, not here in the house, but both of her parents died here and they still haunt the place.

My stuff is getting ready to be packed up and sent to a storage facility. I will go out next week and get prices. I will then box everything I don't use and transport them to that facility. The house will then go up for sale. When people come to see it, there will be very little here that will give it our personality.

I remember the series of emotions involved with moving. I experienced them every time we moved. This will be the first time I go through it alone and it worries me. But I will survive. I go through the dread, the fear, and the excitement of moving to a new place. I go through the overwhelming feeling when I look at the amount of stuff I just can't live without.
I look at all the wires connected here. I look at the daunting task of cleaning a new place. I look at getting there and knowing that I don't have everything I need to live and have to go out and buy something.
I also think about employment. My job doesn't pay enough for me to live very well. So, I will have to compromise and lower my standards.
I hope my new place is secure. I hope it is quiet. I hope the heat and AC are comfortable. I hope the place isn't a dump.
Let's see what happens next.....

Breaking Bad, and other great shows!

2011-09-25T10:58:00.003-04:00

There were so many TV series put out through the pay channels that were so good. Unfortunately, I didn't see the need to pay for TV other than for basic cable. So, I missed them all. The Sopranos came across to me through their blurbs on regular TV as too vulgar, or just using vulgarity as a way to lure people into watching the show. So, I didn't watch. I now know that they had an excellent show and may decide to load it up on Netflix when I run out of other shows to watch. I seem to prefer TV series now to individual movies. I have been a bit obsessed with watching them for the past year or so. I usually load them up when I eat. I also watch in the evening when I am too tired to do anything else. My fatigue has helped them and not me. I also think my depression has helped them too. It's much easier to escape into a TV series (a well done TV series) than it is to deal with the "real" world. I am really, really, bored with the real world. No matter how hard I work at it, I am still being buried in bullshit. It all started when my wife got sick and I discovered I could stream movies directly to my new HDTV. Over the years, I had to watch what my wife wanted to watch, and that meant no Chuck Norris! I saw some of the teasers for "24", but since I got up at 4am most days, I couldn't stay up late enough to see it. After hearing about one particular episode, I couldn't figure out how they could detonate a nuke and still keep the show going. So, I vowed to watch the series from the beginning to see how they did it. Way back in the stone age, if you missed a show, you were out of luck. When re-runs came out, it was great, but there were many shows you couldn't see because they decided they weren't worth it financially to re-run. Now, you have access to many of the shows, good or bad, that you missed. There were many shows that I considered excellent, or at least worth watching again, that I am glad I got to see. So, I started escaping.
I made a list of shows I wanted to see all the way through, and set about doing just that. I still haven't loaded up the Sopranos, but I'll get to them. My favorite books to read back when I was a kid, were science fiction. Heinlein was my all time favorite, and I have been blessed to be able to claim I have read everything he ever had published. When I found an author I liked, I would search out all of their books and set about reading them all. I did the same thing with music and record albums. My mind is filled with adventures that I will never get even close to experiencing. Real life is boring. Real life is painful and sad. It is not exciting. When the Scifi channel came about on cable, I thought "Yippie!". I was disappointed. Their first efforts were so bad it was laughable. Over time, however, they have improved their programming, and actually brought out some very good material. It wasn't all space monsters, or unbelievable natural disasters. "Warehouse 13" is a great show. It lead me to do a bit of surfing and I found a show called "Heroes" which is among my favorites. I just finished "Lost". It was a long series that was written like a video game with all kinds of obstacles, and lots of intrigue, whatever that is! It kept my interest and I'm sad that it ended. It actually ended several times, with resolutions to the character's problems coming, but the show went on anyway. It kept me guessing, and I liked that.
"Life on Mars" was a short series that reeled me in after a very slow start. It was under 20 episodes, and I was concerned that they would just leave the story hang instead of finally revealing the secret to the plot. They did resolve it, however, and I am satisfied. Another thing that I have been doing for many years, and I really should write a whole post just on this topic (maybe I will), is this: The first year after we married in 1977, I went through a period of time where I almost lost my wife to her cancer. It was a very rough time for us. I dealt with it by going through a very strong period of depression. I realized I couldn't go back home, and I would be lost without my wife by my side. I was lost and alone in my feelings. So, I decided to examine every portion of my life and see what I needed to do about it. Everything I was used to doing during my daily routines was examined.

When I got up in the morning, what did I do first and why? Was there a different way to do it? Was there a better way to do it? These were the kinds of things I looked at.
How did others handle life, and can I learn anything from them? I have always been a voyeur in that sense. I am not interested in looking into bedroom windows, rather, I want to see how people do things. Crowd watching has always been a favorite pastime for me.
Could I do anything to change my life for the better?
Did I really need everything I owned? I did a lot of clearing out of clutter back then, even though my wife did the opposite. I found my mind cleared up with fewer material things in my possession. Of course, I had things I couldn't part with, and things I had to keep for various other reasons.
Why did I buy the car that I bought?
Why did I want more things and better things?
What did I learn from my parents? Did they have all the answers?

And the list went on. So, I've found it very helpful to me now to return to those days of examination to determine what I need to live, and what I can do without, or with less. For example:

I love HDTV and the new access to all the great shows. I have found them useful in my recovery. But, I can see myself getting rid of the TV and the extreme expense of Netflix and Cable and not missing it.
I love computer access. I am still not sure if I can do without Facebook, email, and the vast database of the Internet. Rather, I wonder if I can survive by going to a wifi spot rather than being connected all the time? The cost of TV, Netflix, and the Internet could drop my yearly expenses by quite a bit. I would still have my computer, but I would probably have to sell it and get another type of portable machine to communicate. I still have two printers (one is an all in one that I haven't used), but I wonder if I even need those.
Phone? I got rid of my house phone and don't miss it, but could I go back to a bare bones basic cell phone?
I have been seriously considering quitting music altogether. I have about $5,000 worth of equipment that I couldn't get $5,000 for. I would take a loss, but wouldn't have to deal with all the gizmos and gadgets. My music has been with me all of my life and I wonder how big of a step it would be if I sold everything and gave it up. This one question is the biggest one I have to consider.
How will I make a living? This one has so many variables, that I can either just go out and get a job, or go through them and end up being happy with what I do for a living. The first way is the easiest, and probably the most practical. The second is really what I should do and by far the hardest thing I would ever do in my life.

So, there I go.

I lost my kids to moving out.
I lost my Father and Mother.
I lost all of my grandparents.
I lost my wife and her whole family.

And...

I lost weight and have kept it off.
I gained my life back again.
I now have choice available to me.

So, what do I do next?

I have to keep moving forward, no matter how strange it is.
I have to keep looking for answers, no matter what I find.
I have to make decisions for myself and no one else.
I have to live life, no matter what it brings.
I have to believe I am here for a reason, even if I am just a placeholder. So, I have to keep on moving.

I will keep on writing about my journey through life as long as it's relevant to me.

The Pain! The Pain!

2011-09-18T15:41:00.004-04:00

I try to follow a general pattern because I've done it all before.
I do this with my food intake since I no longer have anyone around me that I have to please, except myself.
So, I showed up around 7:30am, which is late for me. I usually get there around 7am., but the past few years, I have been working with an amazing partner who has been organizing things to make it much more efficient to get things done.
He showed up around 8am. During the time I was there alone, I received help from some of the stronger people there. They helped me to carry the sound system out to the stage.
The canopy we use behind the stage as well as the table were already there.
When I first started doing East Petersburg Day years ago, things were much different. I did much of the work myself. I got help from a few very helpful people, but much of the grunt work was mine from beginning to end as far as the stage was concerned. There were also many restrictions which have since been removed, so things have gotten easier, if you can call a 12 hour + day easy.
So, with that work out of the way, I assisted with the cables for the speakers, and set up my DJ outfit. Then, we were able to start playing music over the sound system to entertain the workers while we waited for the crowds to show up.
I used to pick and choose each song, but have stopped doing that for the most part. I now run two CDs, one for the left player and one for the right. I just let them play while I help with other things.
We walk the entire park to make sure the sound is everywhere.
We take pictures, as you can see above.
We talk to as many vendors as we can to make sure they have what they need. We also gather information about them so we can tell the people about them. This is part of what they pay for. I try to give as positive and informative information on the microphone about each and every vendor at our event.
To be a bit selfish, I decided a few years ago to patronize everyone who advertised in the ad book as I could. I used many of the services offered. My landscaping work, plumbing, etc. were all from advertisers and vendors. Even my Chiropractor was a vendor at East Petersburg Day a few years ago.
As the day goes on, I did the MC work, introducing the Police Honor guard, the singer of the National Anthem, and the Mayor. I did all the other announcements throughout the day. We had several events going on at the same time, and it sometimes got confusing, but I don't think anyone is going to shoot me for forgetting them.
It started to rain just as the Lititz Academy of Dance came on to do their thing, but they kept dancing in the cold rain and mud, and the crowd stayed to watch them. Many people had umbrellas, surprisingly, even though the weatherman said there was only a light chance of precipitation.
I had a chair that I got to use only a few times. Mainly I was on my feet the whole day. I had trouble climbing up the stairs onto the stage and only did that when I absolutely had to. I probably took about a dozen trips up and down. The Crestor makes me hurt when I'm actually going up and down the stairs, but it doesn't linger. So today, even though I am tired, I am not overly sore. Now, if I had to go up the stairs again...

Since I am the one with the camera, I usually don't get the chance (or want to) to have my picture taken. I did ask Ken to take one picture of me and he did a good job. Of course, I was sitting in the chair at the time!

It's 4:05 pm right now, and I am resisting taking a nap because I know I'll sleep until 9 tonight and then be awake all night. I went food shopping this afternoon, and will take it easy the rest of the day, even though I should cut the lawn.

I spent some time this morning uploading pictures and videos to Facebook as well as making comments to make sure everyone I could think of was mentioned that contributed to the success of the event. I did not get to take pictures of the opening ceremony since I was onstage, and I didn't attend the teen dance, which was after the fireworks. I parked the car across the way at the church, and had to walk all the way around with very sore knees since they had the short cut blocked because of the fireworks.

They had activities for dog lovers too that I didn't get to see. It was raining and they were on the other side of the park under the pavilion.

There was one picture I didn't take which was a group shot at the carousel. Since I was in it, I couldn't take it. It will be on Facebook soon. The fire company also took several photos of the park from the top of their ladder truck. I hope to see those pictures too.

Tomorrow is the time I will start my new plan. Let's see what really happens....

EPD 2011

2011-09-16T18:44:00.004-04:00

Note: This post has now been edited. There are some minor changes in content.

The calm before the storm of emotions. I always get it the day before a big event for me.
East Petersburg Day has been a big event for a long time for me. Maybe not for everyone here, but it hits me pretty hard.
I always feel elated afterwards because of the success of the event. There are many people involved, and many of them do way more work than I do. I used to give it everything I had, but now, I pace myself.
I try to do the best I can with the energy I have.
I am still very sore and tired from the Crestor. It is lingering on. My fingers hurt, especially since the temperature dropped.
I was going to practice guitar, but I think I will just survive on what I did before. My heart still isn't in it.
A big event like this also brings back thoughts of my wife. She never participated in the event, even when I asked her to come along. I was always disappointed. It broke my heart that she couldn't be as excited about my work as I was of hers. Even so, I miss her.
A few years ago, she brought over one of the grand kids there that she had agreed to watch for the day. Donna was so exhausted, that she could hardly make it across the field. I had to take over. I stayed with her until she could walk again, then I went and got the car so I could take her home.
Donna was still able to do some things with the grand kids, and she was grateful for that.
I usually go over to the park on Friday evening in order to offer my help, but this year, I am going to stay home. I am so tired and sore.
I will be going over there tomorrow around 8am, and stay there until I am no longer needed, which used to be around 11pm. This year, I am hoping to be home around 7pm.
I am not doing the teen dance since they hired a DJ. It's amazing that I should even worry about it.
In all the years I have worked there, I've done it gratis. I've never asked for or accepted payment for my work. I did it for myself and to prove to my wife that I am worth more than she thought I was.
There have been folks who refuse to donate their time and demand money for the work. I don't understand that. Oh well.
I have some extra money for tomorrow so I can eat. I will not follow my diet for the most part. I will probably buy a sub or hamburger, and will drink lots of water.
I will be behind the stage for most of the day. I will go up on stage to announce the Honor Guard, and Mayor, and will do most of the advertisement microphone work hidden from view.
I will push the "play" button for the recorded music, and may get up to play a few songs onstage, as mentioned above.

I have been seriously considering quitting music altogether. I have never been without it, and wonder if I can actually live without it. I can always go back to it if I change my mind. Maybe I should become an actor, write a book, or do something else that is creative? Hmmmm...
My mind is on other things, and after this event is over, I will put my body into action on those things.

I will be changing doctors over the next month. I will no longer accept pills as a solution to my aches and pains. Also, no more attempts to defeat my depression. I am no longer depressed. I am anxious to get back into the world.
I will be cleaning out all of the closets upstairs. I will pack everything up and move it into storage in the basement. I want to finish everything up in case I get the chance to move.
I may paint the closets. I still have paint leftover, and have a few more areas to touch up.
I need to caulk the porch areas, and may even try my hand at repairing the back bedroom door. Anything I do that is basically labor without parts, will improve my living conditions as well as make it better to sell the house. One less thing to do.
I will be selling off all of the music equipment I no longer need or want. I will keep only what I plan to use. It's strange that I have music equipment stored all over the place. I am going to try to organize it and keep it all in the same place, but don't know if that will work.
I am still trying to be creative, but need to finish all the cleanup in order to see things clearer. So, I will be taking long walks and maybe take my laptop along with me so I can write a bit. I also have a very nice recording unit that I can use to talk out my thoughts if I can. I've found for the most part that I have better luck typing things out than talking into a recorder.
I am on the fence about the new songwriting program I tried. I like it, but wonder if I will ever find my muse. I may buy it sometime down the road, but for now I will pass.
I am working on a business plan to make some money to replace my school bus driving income and ease the financial situation. I know I won't do well in an inside job, or some other "normal" work environment, so I have to go into business for myself.
I am still thinking about the snowbird thing. Now is the time to try to do it. I am considering taking a week off and going South to see just what is there and if it fits me. In order to do that, I have to make sure my bus route is taken care of. That's not going to be easy. Lots of prep work.

It's still nice to be alive enough to complain about the pain of hard work. It's also nice to just be alive.

Truckin' without drugs!

2011-09-12T08:13:00.001-04:00

At one time, my goal became to ignore all holidays, and people gatherings and just live my life.
I was going to ignore Christmas, New Year's, the 4th of July, etc..
I went to visit a friend the week before Christmas, and wanted to find a place were we could just sit and talk. I thought it would be nice to go to a mall because they had food and drink there and lots of places to sit.
I had forgotten it was the week before Christmas and it was one of the largest malls on the east coast.
I can't believe I was that stupid!
I found out I can't ignore the holidays because they are a major part of American life.

So, I now limit myself and isolate myself when I can. I never liked being part of a crowd, and always felt on the verge of panic whenever I was among lots of people.

I didn't feel that way when I was onstage playing for a crowd. I don't know all the reasons why.

I read lots of books when I was a kid. Many of them involved traveling to places on other planets, or exploring the wilderness. I thought about going to those places and the excitement of all the adventures.

I still dream about them today.

One of the ways I was able to become an explorer and yet still be safe, was to hike with my wife. We would go to trails or parks with trails, and spend hours walking, talking, and taking pictures. I have thousands of pictures on my old PC laptop of those trips.

I miss doing that. The past years and a half, I've stayed very close to home, and I haven't taken any pictures other than the house and East Petersburg events. I realized that this morning after thinking about the destruction of Lee and Irene.

My two favorite rail trails are pretty much inaccessible and probably damaged heavily.

If I want to take a drive, I would have to go South, way South just to be able to drive without running into roadblocks and detours.

Anyway, I figured out that in order for me to get back to some sense of normalcy, I am going to have to get back to "exploring" again soon. I have taken drives, but they were more for my sanity than they were for enjoyment. And, I didn't take any pictures.

Donna and I would go to the disaster areas and take pictures. I still have shots we took going down River road along the Susquehanna during the ice jams. Huge blocks of ice washed up onto the road in the middle of the winter.

We took pictures where ever we went. I haven't done that. I have to do something about that.

We've been talkin bout Jackson, ever since the fire went out!

2011-09-09T20:24:00.004-04:00

My conversations with myself, especially when I am being self centered, greedy, and selfish, are about escape.
What would I do with money, if I had it?
Where would I go?
How would I design and build a house?
What charities would I donate to?

My favorite thing to think about is the second question followed by the 4Th question.
I talk to others that I would like to go somewhere warm. I want to be warm all the time. I don't want to spend time indoors. I want to live outside as much as possible. Ideally, I would like to live outside all the time, and sleep under a canopy or tent. I am not a fan of bugs, or crawly things, so I would probably want to sleep inside somewhere.

I like the idea of being able to have two places to live. The "snowbird" concept appeals to me. Live in Florida from October to April, and then go North for the summer. South doesn't have to be Florida. It could be another Southern state, but I want to be somewhere that likes music and allows me to play and sing for a living.

I am pretty upset by the appearance of two tropical storms that hit Pennsylvania. Usually, we can joke about storms and not even notice them because they occur elsewhere.
This time, however, we got hit by both.
Irene came through and scared me to death. There were no limits to the power of that storm. It was supposed to be high winds, and heavy rain. We got very high winds and steady rain, but it wasn't a lot. The wind was the scary part of Irene.
I am glad I had the tree outside the bedroom removed last year, because I am almost sure it would have come down. I've never heard winds like that before. I never want to hear them again.
Irene did do damage, but not as bad as expected. Oh yes, there was damage, but we've had thunderstorms in the summer that did the same type of damage.

Then, along comes Lee.

After all these years of named storms, I had never had one using my name.
Hurricanes are supposed to be named for females, but everyone I spoke with or observed, looked at Lee as male. I don't know why.

Lee never made it to hurricane status. It became a tropical storm and then was downgraded pretty quickly.
The thing about Lee is that "she" moved slowly and dropped amazing amounts of rain. So much rain that she caused major flooding. I found out this morning that the nearest official rain gauge measured 9.2 inches over a 24 hour period. Top this off with the rain from Irene, and my basement flooded a bit.

Pennsylvania was the main state that was affected by Lee. We are the ones on the news right now.
I've been prepared for rain storms since 1992 when we had a flooded basement around New Year's Eve because I didn't know anything about rain gutters or channeling water away from the house. I researched the subject online and fixed as many problems as I could afford back then. All of the problems except one.
I didn't waterproof the basement. Now, I did waterproof the walls of the basement, but didn't do anything about the floor.
It turns out that we have a high water table. It is closer to the surface than other areas. So, when it rains a lot, the water rises through the floor of the basement. Our floor is concrete. There are invisible cracks in the concrete and when the water rises, they expand to become visible and water seeps in. When the water table drops, the water goes away and the basement dries.
I have a sump pump that takes care of the water, but that means that I can't store things on the floor or put carpet down.
Since I channeled the water away from the house using the rain gutters, I haven't had a flooded basement since 1992. So the only place for water to come from to do damage is through the floor. I've had prices quoted which make it very expensive to waterproof under the floor. It would also require major work on the basement. I'm not willing to do that, so I will deal with the occasional hurricane.

I had pondered moving my music equipment downstairs last week so I could practice in a big room, instead of the closets I call bedrooms. I'm glad I didn't do that.
I had a few cardboard boxes down there that I was going to start filling with stuff.
They got wet.
Two of the boxes had books in them.
They got wet.
The water stayed to one side of the main floor, and because the floor is angled properly, the water flowed slowly to the hole in the floor where the sump was. It really didn't help to sweep the water along, but I needed the exercise, so I went down and swept it along every few hours.
I set up fans and ran the dehumidifier also.
I moved the books and boxes, but the aroma of wet boxes still lingers. I will have to do a very thorough cleaning of the entire basement over the next week or so to get rid of the odor.
The water was clear and odor free, so I am not too worried about mold. I will clean with bleach however to make sure.
I have the windows open to help air the place out.
My exercise the past few days was sweeping. Today, I ran the mower. I was amazed at how easy that was. I really thought the mower would get bogged down in the heavy grass, but it didn't.

I have to say that I was very lucky to only have a half inch of water in part of the basement. The next door neighbor did get lulled into that false sense of security and had carpet and furniture in his basement. he had two feet of water, and much of it was not clean. He has a drain in the floor and the sewer lines got full and backed up into his basement.
I did all the work myself and my hands and fingers are really sore, probably a leftover side effect of the Crestor. I wore gloves to keep from getting blisters. Another neighbor didn't wear gloves and his hands are now a mess.

I took a drive today along my bus route in my car (school has been closed for two days now) and observed major roads along my path that were washed away by Lee. I will have some real problems navigating my school bus because the damage will take some time to fix. There will be lots of traffic jams to deal with.
I watched TV tonight and they showed a whole town underwater that wasn't too far away from here, In fact, this morning, I watched video of areas from here to New York that were completely underwater. Marietta is where we go to jam. They have lines on the walls of the bar that show where hurricane Agnes flooded. Those lines have been crossed by Lee. Elizabethtown, just 15 miles North of here had 15 inches of rain. Mount Joy, Manheim, New Cumberland, are now under water. Literally!
Hershey Park and Knoebel's Amusement Park are under water. The zoo at Hershey park lost animals in the flood. The park is accessible from all 4 directions, except now, you can only get there from one direction because bridges and roadways are washed away.
A man was swept away and drowned in the storm a few miles from here (Manheim) in a stream that came across the road. During normal times, you wouldn't even know the stream was even there.
They are comparing this storm to "Agnes" which occurred in 1972 and caused similar damage because of the amount of rain. I was younger and braver back then! Now, I think about all the work I did to this house in the past year and how I would feel if I lost it all to a storm named after me.
It's good to think about things such as the questions written at the top of this entry. It's nice to dream. It helps me to sort out reality from fantasy.
I've been immersed in a show called "Lost" where the people are stranded on an amazing island with lots of secrets and dangers. Reality is much more boring.
Life is still good, even if it is a bit scary.

It was a dark and stormy night!

2011-09-05T18:02:00.004-04:00

Tropical storm, Lee, never made it to become a hurricane.
It's legacy will be large amounts of rain along with tornadoes.
It's interesting that everyone is referring to the hurricane in the male, rather than the female.
We are dealing with the rain from Lee as I write this.

I started and stopped taking Crestor this past week. I started at the suggestion of my family doctor as well as my surgeon, and stopped after I was unable to stand up after squatting to pick something up. The pain in my joints, knees, and fingers was intense after only a week and a half.
Never again will I take any statin.

I was able to do the car cruise this past Saturday, but wasn't much good for anything after that. I did have fun, however, playing all 50's and 60's music as a DJ, and seeing the great collection of cars. We had a 40 foot large blow up screen playing American Graffiti after the sun went down.

I downloaded a trial copy of a songwriting program to maybe help me to get unstuck and finally write a song. I have no ideas in my head right now. They are all buried deep down inside waiting for me to find my muse to help bring it out. If I can't write something using that program, I should hang it up completely and never think about writing again. I know that I can do it, so stand back and watch me work!

I decided to clean out my closet in the bedroom as well as the rest of the room. I will clear out the clutter, and pack stuff away.

My goal this fall will be to close up the back bedroom. I want to be able to close the door for the winter and not use the room for anything. I may buy some carpet or maybe the fake wood flooring, or I may not.

I want to set up one area of the house for my music. I want to get all my stuff in one area so I can sell off what I don't need, and catalog what I do so I know where they are. I have plenty of containers for storage, and I finally want to get organized and label everything.

I found out that if I am busy working, I don't eat as often. That seems like a pretty stupid thing for me to not know, but I really didn't notice before. I will start to use that to eat more healthy with less grazing in order to take off a few more pounds over the fall and winter. The less time I spend in the house doing nothing, the less I eat.

I started driving the school bus again. My mornings are pretty much the same as last year. I have to write up a turn by turn sheet so I can take off a day or so now and then. I had a perfect year last year. I have done that for many years with only a few days off over the years.
My afternoons are much longer. I have to take a second trip up to Lititz due to the hours of the one school. The last student goes all the way to the southern end of the county and I get home around 5:30 instead of the 4:00 I used to do. I don't mind, but I have to watch what I drink so I don't have to stop for a bathroom break.

I readjusted my protein bars, eliminating my need for carrying the sucrose pills. The protein bar has a little more sugar in it than my old bar, and if I eat it while walking, I don't get the blood sugar drop that I had before.
In the meantime, the rain keeps coming down.

My fridge is playing the drums!

2011-08-29T19:37:00.002-04:00

Sounds like it's time to buy a new one! It's making all kinds of funny noises.
I guess it doesn't like crystal lite!
I've been filling my time working on stuff that I didn't need to write about here, so I haven't written for awhile.
I am now taking Crestor to lower my cholesterol. This is on the advice from my Bariatric surgeon. My family doctor, I don't know so well. He means well, but can't understand that I get joint and muscle pain from statins.
I've tried them all. But, he says this one is different.
The pain creeps up on me, and by the time I realize I have it, it is way too late. I feel like an old man. Everything hurts, and it hurts to do anything. So, I lay around instead of walking or working, and I eat because I want to get up and go out but I hurt so I don't.
I really don't give a damn about my cholesterol. I will live for another 15 years, and then die. No big deal. I don't want to waste away to become a vegetable. I want to die when I'm ready.
No senility for me. I just want to fall over dead from a heart attack, when it's my time to go.
I am not ready to go yet. Too much to see and do before then.
I lost the weight, but the cholesterol stayed with me.
So now, I will crawl out to the chair and watch some more TV.
And I've only been taking the damn pills for just over a week now.
sheeeshhh!

Tunnel vision and Future shock!

2011-08-18T08:11:00.007-04:00

The end of summer always depresses me. I guess it's because I always hated going back to school.
When I was a bicycle riding kid, we used to explore by ourselves new and exciting places. I covered miles and miles riding. Everyday, we would map out a new place to go and then head out for a nice long ride. It was my first taste of freedom.
Levittown, PA. was a safe place for bike riding because traffic was usually limited to the main roads, and there were always low traffic areas to go. The people who drove through the various sections lived there, so there were few cars to deal with. To cross a main road, there were places you could go where traffic was limited also, and easy to navigate.
There were parks, canals, and quarry lakes too.
Hills were also fun for us back then when we had much more energy. There was one hill in a section called "Magnolia Hill" that we measured with our bicycle speedometers (odometers). It was just about 3/4 of a mile long. We would trudge up the hill to the top. Then, we would turn our bikes facing down (it was a gradual grade) and glide, not pedal all the way to the bottom. We would time ourselves and check to see how fast we were going at the bottom. We spent many weeks doing that.
The great thing about Levittown, was that we had public swimming pools close by. We would get up in the summer mornings, and take our long rides, come home for lunch, then head over to the pool to spend the afternoons. They opened at noon, and closed to the general public (teens under 12, I think) around 6pm. It was "adult" swimming after that. It was a rite of passage for us to be old enough to swim after 6pm.
So, it didn't matter how much I ate back then. I was burning calories like there was no tomorrow.
Meat and potatoes, no junk food, and lots of sweet sugared iced tea!

My Mom probably loved the fact that it was safe to let us go exploring and then swim all afternoon. It gave her time to herself at home and she knew we were OK.

Going back to school meant not being able to ride as often, or swim anymore. Our physical activity became limited and we were forced to sit still for long periods of time. Phys Ed was generally boring, and intimidating, particularly if you were uncoordinated. I always hated team sports, and failed miserably at them. The school always smelled funny, and was too hot or too cold. I grew to enjoy the outdoors.

So, these same emotions followed me through adulthood. I still hate having to sit still for too long. Working doesn't allow me to be outside and moving. Little or no exercise due to the fact that I have to "earn" a living doing things I don't like doing. I haven't been able to break that pattern, but I have found way to compensate, most of which have been fattening.

What happens when you put a dumb animal between two piles of their favorite food? They starve to death trying to figure out which pile of food to eat first.

This is not what has happened to me, but I still feel like a dumb animal.

I have been confronted with "opposites", rather than two piles of my favorite food.

Whenever I start to feel good, I am bombarded with a series of negatives that prevent me from moving forward.

The statement "I am afraid of failure, and I am afraid of success" explains how I feel. Both halves of this phrase freezes me in my tracks.

I haven't found the solution to this problem. How do I overcome fear of success and failure?

In the meantime, I am succeeding far more than I ever thought I would. Yet, I feel like crap anyway. This has always happened to me, yet I am still here. I plan to be here until I'm finished with whatever I'm supposed to be accomplishing. I sometime envy those who know why they are here, and can move forward without delay. Me? I get stuck.

With my wife gone, I sometimes feel like it's all a waste of time. I do things, but there is no one but me to see them completed. There's something missing from my life, and until I find that again, I will continue to have those feelings of emptiness.

Future shock occurs for me in so many ways. Technology has advanced so quickly, that it's hard to keep up. I was taught to take care of things to make them last a long time. Yet, even if I take care of my computer, HDTV, or automobile, they will become obsolete in a very short time.
I have old friends who have failed to embrace the beauty of technology, and I wonder if I could ever let it go and disconnect and still be happy.

It is so nice having a thought and being able to look it up online and find out about it right away.
Being in contact with people all over the world and never having to leave my home area to communicate is amazing.

So now, I pay a lot of money to stay connected, and throw away perfectly good electronics every few years instead of keeping them until they wear out. I still have my LPs and old school stereo hooked up. I listen to the analog radio signal almost every day that I'm home. But, I play the digital laptop music player too. I have 40,000 songs to catch up on!

If I were to buy a bicycle, and ride all summer instead of working, cooking, cleaning, and taking care of the house, I could recapture some of the good feelings of my youth. I would also probably get run over, die from living in a dirty house, or end up on the street with nothing but a bicycle.

One last thing, and then it's back to finishing up the painting:

My guitar provided me with great pleasure back when I earned my living playing it. I was 11 when I started, and it was everything to me back then. I had stopped riding my bicycle by then, and it replaced the high I got from riding nicely.
I have tried to get that passion back many times. Most recently has been been in the past year. But, I haven't found it yet and wonder if I should just let it go. I feel as if I have something to contribute to the world and music is one way to express it.
I pick up the most beautiful guitars I have ever owned, plug them into awesome amplifiers, and just can't find the inspiration to play them more than a few minutes at a time. They feel good in my hands, but the true feeling isn't there. Music is pure emotion, and I've been suppressing emotions for so long that I wonder if I will ever get them back.

Another year older, and deeper in debt....

2011-08-12T17:12:00.004-04:00

Thanks Larraine! I have that song rolling through my head tonight, over and over! :)
Sunday marks the one year point when I lost my wife. It is not the only time along this crazy path that I remember.

I knew she was sick long before she told me, but this time I stayed quiet because I really thought she would pull through at first. I guess I should go back even further and tell you that I was able to tell Donna that she was pregnant both times before she even knew it. I've been in tune with her for a long time, even when we had our troubles. So, this time, I knew she was sick. When she told me, it hit me that this was the last time, and that she wouldn't recover. I told her that night that I would stick with her to the end and that we needed to talk about her wishes, which we never really did. I don't remember the exact date, but it was long before she went into the hospital. So, her entry date of February 8, 2010, was about 6 months after I knew she was sick.
I tried to get her to go to the doctor sooner, in fact I was trying to get her to go for almost a year before she finally went. I suffered as silently as I could over the years, knowing things I couldn't talk about. I believe my silence helped to cause my overeating problems. The stress had to come out somehow.
So, my wife was sick for almost a year before she went into the hospital. She had a really rough time, but the hospital decided they couldn't do anything for her, and signed her out, but not before arranging for her to go to a "specialty hospital" In York.
That hospital was terrible for her and anyone who visited her. It was always noisy, and the coverage was lousy. She would ring for assistance and wait for hours. Instead of getting better, which was the goal, she got worse. They finally told her there was nothing they could do, and she was shipped off to Harrisburg to a nursing home.
This was a blessing in disguise because no matter how my wife treated the staff, they returned with love and caring. They were so patient and understanding with me also.

I swear, I lost a few years of my life during this time. Donna went into the hospital in February, celebrated her final birthday at age 57, our 34th anniversary, and died August 14, 2010. She made a few requests which we followed, but left so many unanswered questions.
In the Jewish tradition, people are supposed to mourn for a year, and then unveil the grave stone marker and move on with their lives. I know I am not being exact in my description. If you want to know more, look it up. I am not Jewish anymore, and she was never a practicing Methodist Christian while we were together. I don't really know the rituals for her version of religion, so I am going with what I know.
I will say a prayer at her grave this Sunday, and then consider my obligations to be finished and move on. That doesn't mean I won't miss her. This doesn't mean I won't think about her. But, I will no longer feel obligated to her. I will no longer be married to her.

"Till death us do part".

I have considered doing something symbolic, but don't see a need.

In the meantime, I have to paint the porch walls and then I will be finished with what I am going to do to the house. I may tinker with things if I get bored, but I won't be spending large amounts of money. This is significant to this post because I have taken a whole year to purge the house of all the clutter that has accumulated in 34 years of marriage. I guess you could consider this symbolic for me. The amazing thing is that I have finished this major work on schedule.

Next week, I will begin my musical career instead of working on the house. I will begin to live again. I am going to travel into new territory. I've never been there before.
All by myself.

Shhhh! keep this a secret. Don't tell anyone

2011-08-09T14:30:00.005-04:00

I am writing this here for myself. I feel better when I write stuff down and tend to do what I write, although the John Lennon quote about life is sooooo true.
Here are my plans. The Hell with what life wants to do.
In the next two weeks:

I plan to finish the painting by this Friday. Porch, and bathroom. Oh, and that little piece of ceiling in the basement stairwell.
I plan to play my guitar until I have a whole evening of music to present. Then, I plan to go out and book some events.
I plan to start my diet plan again and stick to it and a walking schedule, rain or shine every day.
I plan to disappear for a vacation for at least 3 days. Just me, and no one else. Shhh, keep this a secret.

So, now is the time to start doing just that. TTYL.
Update:
I didn't finish the painting as I had planned. I am working on that now. So, my time has run out, and unless I quit work, I won't be able to take that vacation. Oh well.

False start

2011-08-02T19:41:00.002-04:00

I started keeping track of my food intake per the dietitian's instructions.
Then, I woke up on Friday morning and something popped in my back and all my plans went back to the beginning.
I was able to eat fairly properly, but the pain was so bad that I was not exercising, and not sleeping very well.
So, I can only deal with one disaster at a time, and the diet has suffered.
I had planned on starting to cook most of my meals myself instead of eating the steamer meals (Maria Calandar), but I just couldn't do it.
I suppose it would have been easier if someone was here with me to help out, but I am alone.
I've been on the ice and heat treatment for my back, as well as going to the Chiropractor, but have been sidelined since Friday.
I was able to go out yesterday for about an hour to have dinner with my Son for his birthday, but that was agony and I was glad to get back to the couch.
This afternoon, the pain started to decrease, so hopefully, I will get back to work in the next few days.
I have another Chiropractor appointment tomorrow morning as a follow up and look forward to that. I hope I can drive to and from.
So, I lost a week.

Too pooped to party!

2011-07-26T19:41:00.002-04:00

I have been complaining for years about not having time or energy to do the things I wanted to do because I was always doing the things I had to do instead. I'm still in that mode, but I have a different attitude now.
I feel good about getting things done.
The problem is now that I'm older, my fingers hurt and I'm too tired to play my guitar when I actually have time.
Right now, I am tapping out this blog two fingers at time. The rest of the fingers are in a drawer somewhere recovering from holding the long handled paint roller all day.
I put two coats of paint on the garage floor and I need to touch it up tomorrow. I also need to cut the grass, and have another dozen other things that have to be done too.
I promised myself that I would finish all of this clean up, paint up, fix up stuff so that I could put the house up for sale next month, so I still feel good.
I am reviewing music in my head all the time since that is the only part of me that doesn't get sore after working all day. I used to do that all the time, but my fingers didn't hurt this badly.
Oh well.
Yesterday, I couldn't do anything because my back was too sore. I felt good today, and will probably not feel so good tomorrow. But, I will plow ahead to get finished with what I started. I will post pictures, both before and after. I am proud that I have been able to get this much work done on my own. I am lucky to have had the help that I did also. They spurred me on to start working again.
So, tonight, I will go watch Wolverine on my blu ray, HDTV until I can't keep my eyes open (probably about 9pm.), and then hope to get up in the morning and start work again. I think the iron pills are working!

Humid, hot, and bad back!

2011-07-25T10:24:00.002-04:00

Yesterday, I went South to take my Daughter out for lunch. It was her birthday, and this time I was surprised to be able to take the whole family out. Usually, I don't get to spend time with my son in law, but he came along and I was glad to see him.
The drive down was pleasant. I decided to use the AC in the car instead of opening the windows. Even in the hottest of weather, I ride with the windows and the roof open. I love the open feel and the air rushing by.
We went to a high end Pizza/Italian restaurant and I ordered an individual brick oven pizza. It was huge and cut into 4 slices. I ate one slice, and got a box for the rest. Afterwards, I transported a crib mattress up to my son in York County. I got to spend some time with him, talking about his situation and trying to help him sort it out without giving him any money. I got home around 7:30pm and felt good about the day.

I went out to the garage this morning with the intention of starting to paint the back wall and floor. I still might get there.
But, my back has other ideas. Let me back track and talk about the past week.

I was so blessed to have friends help me get some work finished. They came over and painted the kitchen. I did some of the work, or worked elsewhere, but they did the majority of it. I helped out in the garage where I put down chemical de-greaser and scrubbed and scrubbed, and rinsed.
I worked on this stuff every day last week. I also was down in the basement painting the stairway walls and ceiling. And, I actually "Mr. Cleaned" the basement tile which covers half of it. I used the same heavy duty long handled brush I used in the garage as well as a sponge mop.
I expected more of the cleaner, although it did get up some long term stains. The floor still looks old and worn out as it actually is, but it's cleaner. I had considered using a polish, but decided to let that go.
So now for my purposes, the basement is finished. I still have an area above the top stairs that needs paint. I should be able to do most of it, but don't have the fancy ladder to get the trim. It's not all that important. I will tackle it this week.

There is a small square on the back wall of the garage that had a shelf on it that I didn't paint. I will do that as soon as the humidity and heat abate. That should be tomorrow.
Today, I went out to do the garage, and my back had other ideas. I usually don't have to worry about my back, especially since having the surgery and starting up with the chiropractor, but today, I am sore. So, I managed to take everything up off the floor in preparation for painting, and came back in to write this.
I know if I try to paint, I will be too sore, so I have to do something else productive.

In addition to everything I've been doing in fixing up the house, I've been doing all the other things that one does in order to live.
I sat the other evening and went through yet another box of photos. I found some I thought I lost and sent some digitally to one of the people in the pictures. I was able to empty out the box and transfer the photos to my trunk with all the other photos. I would love to have an HDTV that covered the whole wall hooked up to my computer. I could sit and review all of the pictures and cry all night while remembering the good times!

I managed to do my food shopping too, but haven't gotten everything I need for the next month. I'll do that later this week.

I started to plan in my head the bathroom renovation. It will just involve painting, but I have some stuff to move, and some stuff to re-think whether I need or can get rid of.
I am also planning to start packing things I don't need on a regular basis. I plan on renting a storage unit. That way, they won't be clogging up the space when I put the house up for sale.
I'm going to do some stretching to see if I can get my back working again.
Stay tuned, the heat wave is due to break soon allowing me to do some outside work.

More photos.

2011-07-19T22:02:00.003-04:00

For some reason, I couldn't add these to the previous post, so here they are. Just showing off the beautiful blue painter's tape!

Just to add to this. It is one day later.
I haven't had time to take pictures, but this morning, the friends came over and finished what they started. They did the trim and ceiling in the kitchen, and also finished the basement stairway walls. I have one piece of the ceiling to finish and then I can move outside. While they were working, I took the one child with me and went to pick up more paint. I decided to paint the garage floor after all.
The job looks good enough for me to put the house up for sale. I also spoke with a friend tonight to get advice on how to cool off the porch. It turns out that I won't be able to do that cheaply enough or on my own, so I will leave that alone for now.
And, don't tell anyone, but I am thinking about taking a drive...a long drive... a really long drive....maybe to Vegas. But, don't tell anyone. I don't gamble, but that part of the country is soooo beautiful.

Exercise is over-rated!

2011-07-19T21:37:00.003-04:00

Above: Basement walls
Garage floor
Kitchen looking at the back door.
Garage floor, looking at porch door.

I finally broke my pattern of inactivity, and I wrote about it already. Let me add some pictures to the mix.
I like the feeling of being able to do a workout while getting something done too.
Yesterday, I cut the grass in the hottest part of the day.
Today, I painted part of the basement stairway walls, and helped scrub the garage floor as well as cleaned the garage out completely and filled it back up when it was finished.
It was really hot out there and I could feel it, but it didn't slow me down like it did when I was fat. I sweated because I was working, not because I was fat.
I stayed hydrated too.
The house was full. I had 3 of the school bus family over to help finish painting, and two young neighbors helping me in the garage.
I did the painting myself before they all came over.
Imagine the garage floor covered with oil, dried kitty litter, and fluid stains since 1992 and before. That's what I cleaned off over the past week.
Imagine cleaning out tons of stuff off the garage floor from large items to small ones. Then, sweeping the dust and dirt, then rinsing the floor, and adding a bit of dish detergent (dawn gets grease out of your way) and scrubbing with two long handled brushes. Then, rinsing it all off, and doing it again. Then, rinsing it all off, and using brooms to move the excess water off the floor. Then running a fan to help dry it, while organizing the stuff to bring it back into the garage when the floor dried.
Tomorrow, the school bus family will come over in the morning and finish the kitchen. You can see from the pictures that there is lots of blue tape, and areas that need to be finished, such as the ceiling.
The original paint was so worn, that I couldn't begin to tell you what color it was. The new paint is "cabin" white, but in the pictures the sun shining in the window makes it look yellow. It isn't.
I will probably paint the garage floor gray since it looks good to me, but not really as clean as I would like. The fancy acrylic floor paint is too expensive, and gray will be just fine.
The basement walls were tough to do because of all the strange angles. It is also the tallest ceiling in the house and very hard for me to reach straight up and still get paint on the walls. I will work on it again but not tomorrow. I need to take a break.

I found a place that still has Nautilus equipment and I want to check it out. I loved using that years ago because it worked so well. Once I learned how to use it, I made amazing progress. I read a book about the inventor of the equipment, and trained with an expert. This was back in the late 70's I think when they first came out with it. My back was hurting from too many hours of driving city bus, and the machines firmed up the muscles to take the pain away. Of course, it didn't hurt that they had a real whilrpool and sauna that my wife and I spent lots of time in.

I think I am finally on my way to recovery. Let's hope so.

Time is what's happening as music is played.

2011-07-17T10:09:00.003-04:00

There is a business site that I visit from time to time. He sends out emails too with new products and updates. In his subject line, he write strange statements. Some of them are political. I can see that they might be taken the wrong way by the opposing party and cut down on his business, but so far, he doesn't seem to be having problems. The statements seem to be set up as attention getters, rather than as actual statements of his political leanings.
I personally think it's a good idea. I am tired of reading the same old subject lines.

There were teachers over the years that made profound statements in an effort to make us think, such as the one in the title here. Personally, they made me think that the teacher wanted us to think they were really smart.
I've found over the years that using big words does make you sound as if you are smart. I use them sometimes, and then I stand outside myself and wonder why I used them. I don't usually use big words, but they just seem to show up on their own.
I've also found that I am much more forgetful than I used to be. I don't seem to remember things from the past the same way too. That is disturbing to me. I would like to think my memory is accurate if not exact.

This is one of the reasons we write things down. Because, our memories aren't perfect. Somewhere in the house (remember, I've been packing, re-packing, and cleaning) is a box with all of my bariatric paperwork. I was given lots of things from the clinic, as well as my blood test results from the past 4 or 5 times. Right now, the location of that box alludes me (gee, a big word!). But, I will find the box, and I will compare test results to see the differences up or down. That is, if I remember to do so.

Now, all winter long, I was waiting for this wonderful warm weather. The thing I didn't remember back when I was freezing was: With warm weather comes humidity. That makes the warm or hot weather uncomfortable when living inside. If I am outside, I can stand direct sunlight for quite sometime, but prefer the shade. And, I really like the breeze that comes along every once in awhile.

I enjoy the rain storms much more now than I did. The clouds seem to be much more interesting when a "severe" thunderstorm moves through. We have had an active year as far as high winds, small tornadoes, and lots of rain. For the year, this area is up about 10 inches over a "normal" year, so I don't get nasty stares when I go out and "play" with the garden hose. I used to wash my sidewalk in the city almost every night. Not because it was dirty, but because it was relaxing. Now, the birds gather round when I play with the water. They are probably looking for worms and a chance to get a drink.
I watered my brick wall last night. The direct sunlight hits it about 5pm, and heats it up like crazy. Then, when the sun goes down, the bricks transmit that heat into the house. The temperatures in the house can hit 85, even thought the outside temperature is 75. When I wash it off, this cools the bricks making it a little more bearable.

I had some help the past few days, which filled the house with kids, and life again. This was just what I needed to get back on track. My kitchen will be finished by this afternoon. I will do the work myself, although the majority of the work was already done by the visitors. I will pull the refrigerator out and paint behind it, and then will do the ceiling. What would take a "normal" person an hour, will take me all afternoon. That's OK. I have all the time in the world. I do want to get it out of the way and move onto the last few projects.

Yesterday, I started out feeling like I had been awake for days. I was weak, and light headed. I decided to plow through the feeling as long as I could. The job I was doing was one that I could walk away from if I couldn't finish. I could come back to it whenever I regained my energy. I tried to listen to my body and discovered that I needed some food, and lots of liquid. So, I got a beer and some pretzels, and that did the trick (a protein bar, followed by a quart of crystal lite lemonade). I pushed through the feeling after that and started to wake up.
My job consisted of covering the garage floor with de-greaser, scrubbing the area with a long handled plastic brush, and rinsing. Then, I had to repeat it 3 times because there was a lot of grease and gunk. This made the floor of the garage look much better. I still should do the rest of the floor, but for now, I only did half. I also should buy some floor paint to finish the job (The fancy acrylic stuff is too expensive for now. If I stay in the house, I will do that instead).
The scrubbing was tough and I worked up quite a sweat. I also had to make sure the water got rinsed out fully. That took about an hour to make sure the acid was diluted enough when it hit the lawn. I had to sweep the garage floor a lot to get all of the stuff out. My arms are very tight this morning which will make the painting a lot harder than it should be.
I listed several items for sale on Craigslist, and sold them in between cleaning and painting. I still have a few items left, but I can live with them for now. If I move, some of them will stay here for the next owner to deal with.

So, it's been a good weekend. I started the clean up marathon on Friday, and will finish sometime this week.
I have some real work to do in the bathroom in order to get it ready for paint.

There are several holes which need to be filled and sanded. I have a magnifying mirror with large holes in the wall barely hanging on.
I have a new toilet seat which is easy, yet unpleasant to install.
I have adhesive strips to go into the tub to replace the old ones. I will also do an extra good scrub down of the tub. Nothing will restore the finish, but at least I know it is clean.
I have to move some stuff out of the bathroom that have been there for a long time.

This is a good time for me to re-think where I want to go with things. I will just be refreshing things, rather than spending money on replacement. If I stay, I will work towards doing a remodeling next year. Same thing for the kitchen.

I had an estimate to start on the landscaping of the house. If you recall, I stripped the entire yard of the large trees, and the area around the house of the huge bushes that were blocking the windows. The first phase will be the area in front of the house along the eastern wall. 8 bushes will be installed, and the area leveled and shaped. The bushes are slow growing and won't cover the windows. The company doing the work will come back every year for each new phase until the entire yard is finished. This alone makes me want to stay in the house long enough to see it through.

To live here all these years only to be forced to move out just when things are getting finished is a tragedy. I worked so hard over the years to make sure things were done so the family could live comfortably. Now, the family is gone. This is what makes it the toughest for me.

My health is a living thing. It gets better and worse depending on things I can do to fix it, and things I have no control over.

The house has been a work in progress since 1992 for me, and before that for my Father in law. It now seems that neither of us will ever see it finished.

If the economy gets better and jobs become more plentiful, an old guy like me will be able to make a decent, honest living, and will be able to afford to stay here and finish what I started. If not, who knows?
Evening edit: It seems I am a bit more tired than I thought I was. I'm taking it easy tonight. No painting unless I force myself. On a side note: I wonder how long it takes to get over the death of someone? How long will it be before I stop grieving, and start using it as an excuse?

Hot, Hot, Hot!

2011-07-13T10:44:00.003-04:00

Summer heat!
It used to really bother me when I was fat. Now, it's more of a nuisance. I can work outside, and work up a sweat without problems.
Yesterday, I cut the lawn. I did half of it, then took a break, and did the other half. I always stop halfway through and re-hydrate, even when I don't need to. This is a trick my first physiologist taught me. If you take a break, you trick your body into thinking it's finished, and your physiology changes. Then, when you start up again, your body has to play catch up and it works a little harder, burning a few more calories.
I can feel that happen. When I get up after the break, I walk like an old man for the first few minutes. Then, I get my "sea legs" and pick up the pace.
I've also found that wearing the proper clothing helps a lot. If I wear gym shorts, and a moisture-wicking material top, I work better. Wearing jeans or regular heavy duty shorts is harder.
This morning, I took a walk wearing a tank top. My "farmer's" tan was blazing. My arms are very tan, but my shoulders have been covered up, so they are not. I was only out for about an hour, so I don't expect to get burned. The tank top is cotton, and it now feels uncomfortable. I will change it to something that doesn't cling so much when I sweat.

My preliminary blood test results came in. My diet guy called me to review. I won't go into details other than my fatigue problem, but suffice it to say that all numbers not related to fatigue, were in the normal range. Normal has never been in my vocabulary, medically speaking, until my surgery. I feel great! I will never tire of hearing that word when it comes to my health!

My iron levels were low, and the supplement increase is working, although he tells me I won't notice much change for awhile. The process is slow. So, I will keep plodding on, hoping to regain my energy level soon.
He did tell me that fatigue can mess with things, such as sleep patterns, which can complicate things even worse. So, as an example, if I'm feeling tired, it could cause me to not sleep well, which makes things worse.
So, putting it all together, my fatigue is caused by:

low iron levels.
excess stress of losing my wife and all that entails.
depression, caused by the above, and any previous problems from before.
The current stress of not being employed enough to make a living to keep my house and pay my bills. Gee, maybe that's money problems? Yeah, I think so.
Fear of returning to my previous state of being fat and unhealthy.
Life itself!

That last one sums it up. I am dealing with the low iron levels. That's the easy part.
Next, I have to improve my diet.
I have to improve my exercise program.
I have to bring in more money.
I have to sell the house. In order to sell the house for the most money I can get, and to make me feel better, I have to finish what I started. That's the toughest part for me.
In short, I have to fix the things I can, and deal with what I can't as best as I can.

This past week, I've had a friend come over a few times and help out. This has been more help than you can imagine, even though he hasn't done that much. Just having someone here working while I do something else, is a help to me.
He was able to clean out the one side of the garage for me two evenings ago. I had cleaned out the garage for the most part, but it needed to be done again.
He got the right side, and moved my toolbox and everything else that was there to another area. He put tools back into the boxes, then cleaned the trash off the floor, and swept. While he was doing that, I was inside the house. I did the dishes, vacuumed, and emptied the bedroom closet of all the stuff I've been storing there. I had sorted out the costume jewelry from the real stuff, and now have that packed and stored properly so that I will be able to move it easily, or sell it as I decide. I now have room in the closet for real things that should be there.
I am close to having the house organized, although there is still a long way to go. If I am able to spend some full days working on it, I will be able to get it finished before the end of the summer.
Yesterday, I moved the car out of the garage, and swept the rest of the dirt out. Then, because of his work, I was able to spray some dish detergent (cuts all kinds of grease!) on the floor, and scrub much of the grease and oil off, making it a lot cleaner than it was. It will look good if I sell the house.

I have plans to clean the floor in the basement in the next few days. I've also asked my school bus kids to come over and help me paint the kitchen.
My daughter stopped by yesterday afternoon. She had taken her kids over to Dutch Wonderland for the day, and both kids were exhausted. This was the first time she saw the house since the carpets were cleaned. I asked her about it, and she told me the house smelled better and the carpet was much brighter. I live here all the time, so I can't smell the odors. It was nice to know that the place didn't stink anymore.

So, what is it now?

2011-07-08T19:55:00.002-04:00

Before I start, I wanted to say that I do re-read my stuff in order to edit it. I notice that I tend to write in sections. That is, not everything in this one post is related. I tend to say what I want, and then move on to something else. I have been using the blog to complain more than anything recently. Once I get that out of my system, I can talk about the more positive stuff. I usually write at night now, and am too physically tired to really do much else. I usually hit the sack right after I finish, although I think I would like to go out and get drunk rather than sleep right now! So, here are my additions for tonight:

I now understand the allure of the reclusive lifestyle.
However, if I continue this life of a recluse, I will soon learn what it is to live as a homeless man.
I'm not sure if I really want to experience that.

I've had a real urge to do nothing at all.

I don't feel like exercising, for fun or any other reason.
I don't feel like playing my guitar.
I don't feel like working at a job I know I will hate.
I don't want to go out and socialize.
I don't want to see anyone at all.

I've been fighting this feeling for an unknown amount of time. It may have been days, months, years, I don't really know.
I also know that if I don't fight this without medication, I will never conquer it.
I think a lot of it is justified.
Some of it is my upbringing, and I've been fighting that since puberty, when I realized I was smarter than everyone else, including my parents! We all get that way when we hit puberty. It's not until later that we start to understand the reality of the situation.

I think a lot of my funk right now is the fact that my health isn't what it should be and I'm in a holding pattern with the doctor, dietitian, and medical center.

I hate waiting.

It shouldn't be too much longer.
Oh well, enough bitching.

This week, I called upon a young man who is local and asked him to help me out with some work around the house. I took him on a tour of the place, telling him what I've done and what needs to be done. He agreed to help me, and has been over a few times. I told him he could come over whenever I was home and help out, or he could just hang out and keep me company, which he has done. It gives him a chance to sit in the comfort of my central AC. He is taking online college courses, and it gives him a break from school work too. It's good to have someone over to the place. It helps me to not feel so guilty about not being able to get everything finished.

I am still making great progress, but of course, I want it to be finished NOW! :)

I started to listen to my LPs this week, and Ben brought all of them upstairs for me. I have about 200, and it saved me the trouble of running out of steam before the task was done. While he was doing that, I sorted through 3 storage bins, and re-organized my music equipment to make it easier to just walk into the room and play. I was originally going to move it all downstairs to the basement, but I just don't have the energy, so this is the next best thing.

I would like to transfer some of my albums to digital, but haven't gotten the time or energy yet. And, that's more of a hobby, than a necessity, so I'll hold off for now. My record player works just fine. I have been listening to Chicago, and started with album 1, and am up to 3 right now, in addition to other artists. I am going to sort out the albums that I know I won't listen to, and get rid of them soon. I have a bit of the hoarder in me when it comes to albums, but this will help me to break that pattern.

It's amazing, that the human mind can remember so much. I can glance at an album, and pretty much remember all the music on it. Some albums, I bought because friends suggested them. Some I got at a yard sale and haven't ever listened to them. I have some that I feel are a part of me, and helped me become the musician that I am today.

So, I probably know the lyrics to 12,000 songs. No wonder I can't think clearly.

I've found a few more songs that I want to learn for the stage, and have been picking up tips and tricks from various observations of other musicians who are earning a living playing guitar. That to me is the best part of starting this up. I feel better when a song is finished and I can call it mine. Performing is the best part of the process.

I'm hoping to start the process of changing over to the new medical practice next week, so things should get better for me.

I am glad that I have the energy and good enough health that I can complain about all these things. I'm just hoping I don't go crazy before I can enjoy my weight loss.

The end of suffering

2011-07-03T18:40:00.002-04:00

That is what I am hoping for soon. I don't know what I'll do if I don't get off this descending ride soon.
I am taking steps to climb out, but the road is very slippery.

This past week, I finally gave in and fasted, then went to an alternate site for blood work. I hope to hear something soon, although with the medical team switchover, who knows?
I called a friend Thursday evening and told him to get his butt over here. I then put him in my car and we went to Marietta to hear an open blues night. I have been there before and the music varies from really good, to the opposite. I met up with fellow musicians I have known for several years. I decided I wanted to play, but really don't know any Blues songs. So, I borrowed a guitar anyway, and played "Summertime". It is from the musical "Porgy and Bess" and it's been sung by many artists over the years. I haven't heard it being played by others recently because it is so old. Anyway, I nailed it as always, although I'm not quite sure how well it went over. I did receive applause, and a compliment from a nice looking lady.

A side note here:
Most people have butterflies before a performance in front of a crowd, especially if they haven't played for awhile, or if they aren't prepared. I didn't feel anything. I knew I could play, and that's what I did. I have gotten those butterflies before, but I don't really feel anything much anymore.
I tried to play the guitar today, and just never got to it.
I have been totally isolated from the family this week, except for occasional texts from my daughter. We used to go to my sister's for the holiday cookout, but that either doesn't happen anymore, or she doesn't want to invite me.

Last night, I went to hear a guitarist at the park. We have entertainment every month for the community, and it was fun (check out my FB page of look up East Petersburg Day on FB). I wanted to hear this guy because he is playing for a living. My critique of him here is not meant to be nasty. I am looking at his performance through a microscope so I can learn from it and grow. I know what to do, and watching others helps me to re-enforce my opinions.

He had trouble with his eye contact. I have this problem too. When I play, I am sharing the deepest part of myself through my music. It is sensitive to bare that part of my soul, and it shows up in my eyes. You will see many performers closing their eyes, or wearing dark glasses. This guy looked up to the ceiling a lot. I saw that as something I need to work on.
He also sang each song as if he was a slightly drunk lounge singer. Kind of reminded me of the parodies on Saturday Night Live.

His guitar playing was excellent, although he sometimes overdid it. He had some real moments of genius with his guitar, but it was obvious he had played these songs many, many times, and was getting too complacent with them.

Whenever you play for an audience, they are hearing your song for the first time. You may have heard it hundreds of times, but they are hearing you for the first time. You have to remember that and perform it as if you are doing it for the first time too. You have to be serious in your singing, and have to do your best. If you joke around, you will start to bore the crowd after awhile.

I learned a lot over the years, and things like this really stand out to me. I guess I should write a book about that too. I also know that I probably won't ever do that. I am full of useless little tips like this.

I spent way too many hours the past week watching TV. I have caught up with most of the old series, saw some really outrageous stuff, and gotten hooked on the final section of the soap opera known as the Casey Anthony trial. One of the worst Defense lawyers I've ever seen. I could do better than him, although the Anthony situation hasn't given him much to defend. They are pretty dysfunctional.

Today, I spoke with a fellow ADDer and much younger member of the community. I asked him to help me to finish some of the work around the house and he agreed. I don't know if he will be able to help, but I'm going to try to use him.
He is doing an online college course, and is doing well, but hasn't worked for over a year because of one problem. His appearance.
He has long hair, beard, various tattoos, and visible piercings. He also dresses in that style, which includes chains, long baggy pants. He is a nice guy and won't change his style for anyone. He is getting to the age where he will learn that is it easier to start looking like the rest of the world in order to get ahead.
I'll let you know how that works out.

My energy level is starting to get under control. I know now a little more about when the fatigue will come on, and can rest when I want. I still need the blood test results in order to get it under control. I'm hoping they have suggestions that fix this.

I want to finish what I started with the house, get back into a workout schedule, and start playing my guitar for money.

Guardian angel!

2011-06-27T21:41:00.002-04:00

I forced myself to get out yesterday and take a walk.
I suppose I am staying in to punish myself for not following through with my plans to play guitar and sing again. I don't know.
Anyway, I took a drive wearing my workout shorts. These are the "gym" shorts that a man shouldn't wear for anything other than a workout. They just aren't equipped to handle a wallet, keys and the stuff you need to drive or go out in public.
It's not that they are indecent. They just are a little less "formal" than cargo shorts, or regular shorts.
I digress, as always.
I drove right past the trail because I realized I was wearing them and continued down the road. I came to Farmdale, and decided to head to another trail that was more challenging, and less used.
Drove right past that one too. I made a loop and headed back home.
I made it as far as the first trail, and turned in and parked.
They have a fire school next to the trail and there was a motorcycle training course going on, so there were lots of vehicles.
I could see many of the cars were there for bicycle riding too, because of all the racks on the cars.
There is a bench a few hundred feet in on the trail so I decided if I wasn't feeling just right, I would take a break there and turn around and head home.
I said hi to a beautiful dog, and his humans, and I moved over when I heard a bike behind me.
The guy on the bike said hi, and I recognized him as a fellow school bus driver. In fact, this guy was the one who talked me into switching to my present company.
He is a talker, but was interested in riding some more, so I wished him well.
Anyway, he rode to the end of the first break, turned around and came back to talk some more.
I ended up walking while he rode, and let him do much of the talking because I felt like I was being trained! He was gliding along on the bike, and I was walking at a very brisk pace. I kept up the pace all the way to the 1.5 mile mark, and decided to let him go.
One thing I realized about halfway down the trail was that I didn't have anything to drink with me, and I didn't have my glucose pills either because they didn't fit into the pockets of my gym shorts.
I was really afraid my blood sugar would drop while I was too far away from the car, so I turned around and started a much less strenuous pace back to the car.
My blood sugar did drop, I could feel it, but I was able to pace myself and things balanced out so that I was able to get back to the car and back home before things got too far out of hand.
I won't make that mistake again.
It felt good to get out, and I did play my guitar through about a dozen songs today. I was able to work out changes and chords on most of them. I couldn't do the one I really wanted to do because I was too tired and it has some complex chords. The nice thing, however, was that I was able to "hear" most of them, so I just might be able to do it the next time.
Anyway, I like the gym shorts for walking because they don't restrict my legs at all, and I can set a much faster pace without being as distracted. But, the next time I leave the house wearing them, I will make sure to take a kit with me.

A bit of a comical side note:
The glucose pills are huge and made of a chalky type material. I don't know if it's compressed powdered sugar or what. I don't take them unless I am exerting myself for a long time and feel the need for them, so they stay in the tube container, sometimes for weeks. As I walk, they bang around in the container, and even though they are held fairly tight, they tend to break down. So, when I open the container, I end up with powdered "sugar" all over me. It drives me crazy.
I went into the Weis today to do some food shopping and asked the pharmacist if he had any other type of glucose, such as the gel in the tubes, but he didn't.
Tomorrow, I will go out and do some shopping to see if I can find the tubes of gel. I hope they aren't expensive.
I am going to try and get out more too. It feels good.

All this from a 1000 square foot house!

2011-06-26T08:36:00.003-04:00

I have a private blog that I write just to vent sometimes. I wrote this and decided to edit it and post it here. If you've ever wondered what it was like to live with a hoarder, here is a bit of that experience.
My wife was a clean person. She just couldn't get rid of anything.
I have gone on a reverse binge, and gotten rid of things instead of selling them at a yard sale. them just so I can get free of the pain of the loss. Anyway, here is the rant:

There always seemed to be more stuff.
I remember a time when I wasn't able to walk from the front of the basement to the back because there was so much stuff. I tried to stack everything neatly, but after awhile, it was just impossible.
Now I can.

It's exhilarating. It's horrible.

Now, I can go, all the way around the basement from left to right, front to back. I can go in a squared circle.

This project started 5 or 6 years ago. I had the help of my son. He helped me to carry large items up the stairs. We made dozens of trips. I got into the habit of bringing something up the stairs every time I was down there. I piled stuff up along the driveway on the grass. The driveway is about 35 feet long, and by the time I finished with the first load, I had a pile that ran from the garage to the street.
I made a deal with the trash guy to pick it all up in one trip. He came by and my son, the two trash guys, and I started filling up the truck. He ran his compactor every once in awhile to allow more stuff to be loaded.
When the pile was gone, the truck was filled. The trash guy told me he had to go to the dump just for my stuff.
The next week, he came back, and we did it again. My son and I had brought out another trash truck full of stuff.
Things from the basement, garage, and other parts of the house went to the trash truck. Twice!

I got a paper shredder. I started to go through the boxes of paper that we had collected and started to shred documents.
I ran the machine every night for two weeks, for about 45 minutes each night until the shredder overheated. Anything that had our name or any personal information on it got shredded.
I ran the machine until it finally quit running. I had to throw out the machine and buy a new one.
Before I could get a new one, however, they had a great shredding event in a parking lot nearby. This is where they brought in an industrial size machine mounted in a truck. Anyone was welcome to bring anything they wanted to be shredded for free.
I filled up 3 large boxes and a large trash bag with paper and took it to the event. I stood in line for about 20 minutes and they took it all and then it was gone!
This was all done about 5 years ago, as I've said. This past year, after my wife died, I found more paper and shredded for another two weeks. Since I started the great shredding project, documents from 1965 to the present were shredded. My wife had saved all of her old checks, and bank account records from the time she opened her first account!

I was able to empty out the garage enough to be able to paint it. Then, amazingly, it started to fill up again. I had tried to throw things out before, but my wife would find them at the curb, and they would be brought back up.
The basement started to fill again also.
There was a lot of stuff that my wife wouldn't let me throw out, but at least I had gotten the process started.

Last year, when I knew that my wife wasn't going to be coming home from the hospital, I started to go through everything in the house in order to fill up my time. It was a very emotional time for me, but I started to collect things and throw them away.
I also gave things away, and sold some things.
Every week, my goal was to fill 3/45 gallon bags and take them to the curb. Since there was no one at the house to object, and I knew that if I kept the stuff, I would have to carry it all with me, when and if I ever moved.
Since the bags are fairly large, I could fit all kinds of things in them. I had some heavy duty bags too that didn't tear easily, so I was able to put things in there that really shouldn't be going to the dump. It was easier for me to do that, than to load a truck and take it all at once.
I also considered renting a 40 foot long trash bin for a month, but that would have required me to work much harder than I thought I could.
3 bags a week allowed me to open boxes and look through them.

I got to relive old memories. This was very cathartic.
I was able to make sure I wasn't throwing out something that either I or my kids would want to keep.
I was able to find lots of things that had just been thrown into a box that I could sort and repack. For example: I gathered all the photographs and repacked them into shoe boxes. They fit just fine and we could go through them when we wanted. I now have about 5 shoe boxes filled with old paper photos.

I found many things I didn't know I still had, but a lot of it still went into the trash. I got rid of things that I knew I would never need or want. I didn't save something just because I might need it some day.
I took my wife's clothing to Goodwill. I took 19 of those 45 gallon bags of clothing to Goodwill. I am still finding clothing even though I am almost finished.
So, all totaled, I have bought and used almost 3 boxes of trash bags. Each box had 150 bags in it.
This isn't including the regular trash such as food containers, that I take to the curb every week.

This past week, I started working on the shelves in the basement. I took a box down, put it onto a 6 foot table I have, and then I would go through the box. When I finished, I would break down the box and put it onto a pile.
I now have 12 more bags of trash to go to the curb. I also have 4 large boxes filled with broken down boxes. Imagine a box that the 46" HDTV came in filled with boxes. Times 4!

Once I get all the big stuff upstairs I will be able to start cleaning. There is lots of dust, dirt, and who knows what. I'll attack the whole basement with a vacuum cleaner after I hit it with the broom. Then, I'll probably wash down the walls and floors with bleach or disinfectant and water. That should help clear the air a bit. Years of cats, dogs, moldy boxes, and humans have taken their toll.

This whole experience was something I needed to do myself. I have very strong emotions running through my soul right now. I can feel the ghost of my wife glaring at me, telling me I'll be going to Hell for getting rid of all her stuff.

Everyone who loses a loved one, or goes through a traumatic experience, does something different. My way of dealing with it all is to get rid of it so I can clear my mind.
A clean basement means a clear mind. The place will never be spotless. The work will never be finished. There is always something else that needs to be done here. Even if I were to win the lottery tomorrow, I couldn't pay workers enough to do all that needs to be done here.
That's a strange feeling. Obsessive hand washing syndrome? Sort of. But, I won't feel like this much longer.
Donna will always be in my heart. I will never forget her, or the experiences we had together. I don't need pictures or stuff to remind me of those experiences.
I am ready to move on.

June 22, 1976

2011-06-21T10:40:00.004-04:00

Tomorrow is our 35Th wedding anniversary.
I will not celebrate it. I don't know what I'll feel. I suppose it will just be another day.
I am still grieving my wife's death last year, but things have improved a little since then.
Life has been going up and down as it always is, but I feel the downs much more than I did when Donna was alive. No one there to share the downs with. No one to share the ups either.

I gained back some weight and am concerned about it, but it's not as bad as before. I know that I can knock the weight off by regulating my food intake and exercising more. I am still drifting a bit and need to put my feet down and start walking again. I am stress eating and it's not easy to stop doing that.
I feel like I'm in a brain fog and need to talk to someone medical about it. I may not wait until my doctor starts his practice in July. I need to fix the problem now. I believe I will make the switch over to the Osteopath soon.
I worked on about 15 songs yesterday. I found out that my fingers hurt too much to play the Martin acoustic, so I'm going to start playing my electric guitar to do chords.

Some of the things I miss:

Donna and I used to take long droves because she didn't have the energy to walk or do anything. So, the drives were good times for both of us. I got fat, but I got to spend time with her, just her, and we didn't have to fight about life. We could just take a drive.

She liked to see if there was anything new on the drives we took. You see, we went to the same places, following the same routes. We would get into the car, and the choices were simple:
Short drive, or long one.
North, South, East, or West.
I made her decide every time. If I didn't and went the way I wanted to go, she would complain and I hated to hear that.
We took the same basic route every time, no matter which way we went.
If we went North and long, we went up to see Centralia, then all the way to Shamokin Dam, and came back by way of the river. There was a Burger King we always stopped just above Centralia where we would take our bathroom break, and sometimes get something to eat. There was also a Cracker Barrel that she liked.
North and short went to Mt. Gretna where we might take a short walk on the trail.
South was to Lock 12 in York County by way of the Susquehanna River's River Road and back up the same way unless she wanted to go through York.
East was actually more North, but we would go to Middle Creek. West was towards Gettysburg.

I took one of those drives a few months ago. I never had a GPS before, so I was amazed when the thing showed me a different way from Centrailia to Shamokin Dam. It was so beautiful, going through the mountains, along streams, and past small towns and villages. I had to pull over a few times because I couldn't see...something in my eyes. I wished Donna could have seen it. She would have loved it.

I took similar routes all the time because it seemed tough for Donna to accept change. I sometimes would take a turn to go off the trail, but would always retrace my steps so she would be OK. We would talk about places we wanted to go, but never got there because of finances, so our drives were our vacations. They were cheap and it was what we could do.

Unfortunately, I am now stuck in that same pattern. I can't wait to get back to the safety and comfort of my home. I have trouble deviating from my path and staying out longer than I should. I picked this up from Donna, and really would like to get rid of it. I feel trapped. I will find my way out, count on that.

I remember when we got home, no matter when, Donna would get something to drink, usually tea, and then sit on the couch and watch TV or read the paper. I still have her blanket that she would drape over her, even in the hottest part of summer.

We didn't talk as the years went on. She disagreed with me about almost everything, and the pain of being wrong stopped me from standing up for myself, so I coped by keeping things light, and stayed away from touchy subjects.

Donna fell in love with me for my idealistic ways. I had lots of energy back then, and was always doing something exciting. If I had followed through with my training, I might have been a Doctor, or emergency room nurse, who knows? All I really wanted to do was sing and play guitar. What I ended up doing doesn't pay the bills, but I got to spend time with our kids. I saw them grow up, and I treasure that.

Donna valued money. It was her way of measuring achievement. Since I didn't make a lot of money, she looked upon that as a failure. I didn't see it that way.
My kids were the most important part of my life. But, I always assumed that Donna would be there to support me when I screwed up, even if she thought badly of me.
Now, I don't know the difference between doing well, and screwing up. I am lost for now. I have nothing to work for. I always worked for someone else. I didn't matter that much.

I could use a guardian angel right about now. I need a hand up, not a hand out. I am searching for answers and reasons to keep on going along this path.

No, this isn't suicidal by any means. I am referring to the difference between a free style life, and a more organized life.

In other words, should I follow the straight and narrow path and get a "real" job, or should I take a chance and leave the "normal" lifestyle and pursue my dream?

So, in addition to these small quandaries, I have to decide how I will deal with people. I also have to decide whether to sell the house, or keep it. I have emptied it out for the most part, but still have a long way to go.

I have been writing this blog for:

I started out being so excited for my new life, that I wanted everyone to feel as good as me. So, I wrote it to brag and hope that others felt the same way. If they didn't, I hoped they could.
As time went on, I began to tire of trying to convince others that I knew what I was doing, and started using the blog to complain or express my thoughts so that someone might consider me as something special. I wanted to be someone who really knew what they were doing.
Now, I am grieving and using it for the most part to vent and get rid of the stress of my present situation. It's an outlet, although not a perfect one. I still would like to spend time talking and listening in person. And, I wouldn't mind a bit of one on one conversation.

The voice in my head keeps interrupting me, so I don't always think clearly. When I write it down, sometimes, the voice is silenced, allowing me to get my thoughts organized. Thank God for spell check, and the ability to cut and paste.

So today, as I drink my second cup of French Press coffee, I need to:

Finish working on my songs.
Build my new BBQ grill. I bought it because it was under $100 and I miss being able to make a real steak with veggies on the grill. I also make killer chicken. I do have to go out and buy a new propane tank since I gave the old one away last year.
Empty off the porch, sweep and clean it.
Clean out the bedroom. Too many boxes need to be organized and stored. All over the house, not just the bedroom.
Call the new doctors and get that process started to switch over my records.
Call Comcast to see if I can get them to help me set up my network. (I may just call a friend and pay him to do the work).
Scrub the kitchen floor. It really needs to be cleaned. Donna used to do this until about two years ago. Then, I had my future daughter in law to do it. I would pay her. It was just one of those jobs I couldn't do.

I have accomplished so much. The problem is, can I live in a dirty house while I follow my dream of playing and singing again.
This is one long post. I have one more thing to say, and then I'll start working on my list and a dozen other things I didn't include, like working on the yard.

On more thing:
When I got married, it was with the understanding that we would work together to make things work. I didn't know anything about marriage, only that it meant that there was actually someone who loved me enough to stick with me no matter how screwed up I was.
There was the understanding that we would both work together to get all the things finished that needed to be done. We would give up what we had to in order to make sure our partnership survived.
We always argued with the understanding that no matter what, we would never leave each other. That was the one thing that kept me sane.
All of the jobs in the house that needed to be done, were shared. If she was home, she did it, If I was home I did it. We sometimes did more than we had to just so the other person could have a break.
As the years went on, I did more and more at home because I could see that Donna couldn't do it. I did things that I could do to make things easier for her, but there were many times that I just couldn't do it anymore and needed a break. Many times, I didn't get that break. That was mostly towards the end, and I didn't always understand why she didn't help. I feel badly about that because I didn't see the obvious many times. That hurts me, but I also know that I did what I could. The pain is overwhelming sometimes.

Now, there is no one to do anything but me. I remember seeing bachelor pads that were dirty and sloppy. I would rather live in a clean house, but I don't think that is an option if I want to get anything finished that matters in the real world.

One of my options is to hire a maid which I can't afford, but may do just to catch up.
Another one is to store stuff that I don't use in the basement and close off the parts of the house I don't use in order to make my chores as simple as possible. I like the idea of having all the room I have now. The house is OK, and I've been here a long time. There are variations on this that I will work on.
Sell the house, pay off my few debts, and move into an apartment or part of a house. While this will save me money in the long run, it will probably cause more problems that I don't want to deal with.

So, I think I will stay here, and face my troubles head on, as I have been doing.

Alone

Happy anniversary, Donna. I love you and miss you.

Life is good!

Iced tea and Father's day!

2011-06-19T19:30:00.003-04:00

I got lots done this weekend, but not what I wanted. So, while I am too tired to do anything, and to stop myself from downing some Drambuie which would ruin the rest of the evening, I decided to write a bit.
I have increased my iron intake to a daily 29mg. I bought a new bottle since the old one expired last year. My team is in the process of moving to the new facility, so they are pretty much out of touch. I can wait.
I cancelled my endoscopy/colonoscopy for a few reasons.

The instructions they gave didn't match up with my roux en Y and I don't feel as confident.
My insurance doesn't cover the whole thing and I really can't afford to pay for the difference this year. I don't have a credit card, and my credit is generally ruined for now.
I am thinking about changing over all of my care to the new hospital.

I am pretty sure this is a review of what I've already written about, so I'll move on.

Here's a super recipe for iced tea that we used when I was a kid. Read it before trying it please, especially if you have already had the surgery:

4 or 5 tea bags
1/2 to 1 cup of sugar
boiling water
ice cubes

Boil the water, and pour over the tea bags after putting them into a 2 cup size mixing cup. Add the sugar and mix slowly so you don't spill any.
Allow the tea bags to steep for a few minutes.
Fill a 2 quart pitcher with ice cubes.
Carefully squeeze the tea bags and throw them away.
Pour the boiled mixture into the pitcher, and add cold water to fill. Mix and serve.

This was the way we drank Iced tea when I was a kid. Can you imagine what it would do to me if I made it this way now?
Back then, we didn't have any artificial sweeteners except Saccharin, and that tasted terrible. If you drank 300 cans of soda every day for 30 years, it could give you cancer!

So now, on Father's day, it brought back memories of those days when it was OK to drink with real sugar. I will be making up some iced tea using sweet and low sometime soon, but will use a gallon bottle for the same concentration of tea. In other words, I will use 4 bags for the whole gallon. I can't wait for the memories to come flooding back!

My music is coming along slowly. I had to get an audio snake yesterday from a friend out near Gettysburg, and I really enjoyed the ride. But my fatigue is frustrating because when I got back, I had to lay down, and I wasn't good for much the rest of the day.
Today, I went to another friend's house to get some connectors set up properly. I have some limited skills in that area, but this guy is a friend and an expert. I took a box of stuff down to him and a storage drawer cabinet that I'm not going to use. All of this is stuff that is in good condition, but it's just taking up space, and he can use it. We trade goods for services all the time. I've enjoyed that much more than trading cash.

One of the problems over the years is that I will purchase something that I need, but it needs to be modified in some way in order to function. If I don't pay the extra money and do that, expensive equipment just becomes large paperweights. I have been working to correct that over the past year. I now have an almost brand new power amp that has proper connectors so that I can use it in almost any situation.

I am in the process of getting all of my equipment organized so that I can sell off what I don't need, and learn to use what I do need for recording, and performing.

I have 35 songs that I am going to start working on tomorrow, if I don't get sidetracked with the 35 other things I need to do first. There's no one else here to help, and if someone were to come over to help, I would have to stay with them to supervise and assist. I have a long way to go, and hope to get out playing within a month in order to bring in some much needed cash.

Just got a call from the guy who is supposed to finish my porch so I can finally paint it.
More work to be done.

YESTERDAY, TODAY, AND TOMORROW

2011-06-17T13:38:00.004-04:00

The bike in front of me has a dog all decked out and riding with him. I see lots of neat stuff like this!

This little girl made it a priority to come to the back of the bus every day she rode just so she could wave to me.

My last school bus driving day was yesterday. I finished up before 10:00am, and came home expecting to hit the road running.
Wrong!
If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans!
I wanted to do stuff, but I was so tired, it wasn't funny. I took a nap, ate high protein all day, and drank lots of liquid.
Then, I looked at my iron pills and realized they expired last year.
Who knows? Maybe that was why? Who knows?

Sigh....

I'm so tired of being so tired.

I found out yesterday that the team at Lancaster General is abandoning the office one by one. The guy who was giving me diet, vitamin, and mineral information is going over to the new practice. This is great because the guys knows what he is doing. The bad thing is that I will have to wait until they get settled before being able to go there myself.
I am still due for blood work, but if I get it now, I don't know if I will be able to get the results as well as be able to transfer the information over to the new practice.
I am patient, but this is not a great time for me to have to wait.
Anyway, today, I feel better.
Since I woke up at 7:30am (I'm usually up at 5!), I have done a lot of things.

I was able to boil 7 eggs so I can eat them with salads of my choice.
I am running the sheets and another load of clothing through the wash.
I listened to Ten Years After "Undead" album. I have been listening to old LPs for about two weeks now. Some of them, I've never heard before. I am able to work while listening. I am also trying to find songs I want to sing and play.
I went through songs on my old computer (I have about 14,000 songs) to try to find songs I've never done before but are well enough known that people will identify with them and want to listen. I picked out 19 songs, recorded them to disc, transferred them to my IMAC. Then, I went online and copied lyrics. I transferred them to the word processing program, saved, and printed them.
I have relative pitch (not perfect pitch) and am able to hear most of the chords. Over the years, I've played thousands of songs and know the chord structures and patterns to look for. I can usually figure out the exact chord the original song used so I can duplicate the sound.
I found and brought up an old toaster oven. I cleaned it up in order to use it instead of the oven. No need to overheat the house or use the large oven for one small meal. I will be planning some casseroles in the future and hope to be able to fill my freezer with great tasting/healthy food. For now, I did a little pizza. Yes, I cheat once in awhile.

This afternoon and evening:

I will try to take a walk. I've been having a tough time leaving the house. I will force myself.
I will finish up the wash and put fresh sheets and pillowcases on the bed.
I will play my guitar. I want to work on some of the songs I printed. I may have to start up the AC. It's getting kind of humid in here.
I want to clear out the master bedroom. I've been packing some things that I want to organize, re-box, and get to the basement shelving.

Tomorrow:

I will cut the lawn in the morning if it isn't too wet.
I will try to take a drive to get away from the house for a bit.

I think I have been over thinking things recently. My mind is working overtime, and I wake up (still) in the middle of the night with all these horrible thoughts of the things I have to do but don't have time to do. I am overwhelmed and have to work through it.

Let's see what happens....

Storms abound, or are they crying "wolf"?

2011-06-12T19:22:00.002-04:00

Below is a blog written by the new bariatric Doctor at LGH. He is a younger guy with a lot of enthusiasm and I wish him lots of luck. I will probably not go to see him, because I would rather stay with the guy who did my surgery. He is moving to another hospital closer to my home. I have been considering switching all of my care to the other hospital for various reasons. I won't write the reasons now because I am tired and have something else I want to say before I run out of steam.
Anyway, the cookbook reminds me of a lot of the things I have forgotten, and that is a good thing. I can use the inspiration every now and then.

Blog cookbook!

I have been looking for support from the post people who are further out than myself so I can plan my future health wise. I want to know what to expect, and have a ton of questions. I'll let you know if I find what I'm looking for.

A group of post people spent the day at Hershey Park and had a ball, and met some of their milestones, namely, actually being able to fit onto the rides. I have thought about doing that also, but am still not sure I won't end up dying, thereby ruining everything I worked so hard for. I still don't feel up to par and before I hop onto a ride, I want to know just what is wrong with me.
I will make a real effort to get my blood work done next week.

I have some things I am in a panic over, and I know that if I don't figure them out and fix them soon, I will be losing everything material wise that I own. The job market sucks and I really don't want to waste the rest of my life working a job that I hate doing.

The storms that have gone through the area have actually worried me because I don't have anyone here to back me up. If something happens, I am all alone. I don't like that feeling. But, there is also nothing that I will be doing to change that any time soon, so I will live with the fear.

My dreams have been vivid and disturbing recently. I do feel as if they are helping me to sort out some of the problems I am facing. Now, all I need is a good kick in the butt, and some actual support.

I have been toying with the thought of taking a drive across the country right after school is finished next Thursday. I have been doing some test maps on Google, and looking at lodging near locations I've always wanted to see. Here are some ideas I've stored:

Fly to Seattle, L.A., or Las Vegas. Rent a car and drive back slowly.
Drive the entire Lincoln Highway. This would prove to be impossible for now because there are several different routes that are considered "Lincoln Highway". The route has changed many times since it was new. This would also take quite some time and planning. I will put this one on the back burner for now.
Drive to Vegas. Stay in a hotel for a week and visit all of the casinos on the strip. I don't gamble, but if you've ever been out there, you know there is so much more to do than gamble. Drive home by a different route. Vegas is also close to 3 areas that I've wanted to see. The lake, The Dam, and the Grand Canyon.
Fly or drive to Orlando and go to Disney World. I've never been there, but after looking at how large it is, and how confusing planning is, I would rather put that off until I have someone to go with. It seems, I would come back more tired than anything because of the huge amount of information I would have to take in.
Drive to Key West and veg out for a week. This one, right now, has the most appeal to me. I like driving my little red car, and it was made to drive with the windows down and the roof open. It's a shame I don't have anyone along to share the experience with. That's the main reason why I have been hesitating to actually take the trip.
Taking a trip to Chicago. There is a place there I have wanted to see ever since I found out about it in 1983. You wouldn't know about it, so I'll keep it private. No, it's not the Playboy Mansion, although now that you mention it....

I have also thought about visiting some of my Facebook friends. I've met several that live in areas of the country I might want to consider relocating to, and a visit would kill two birds with one stone.

I have flown before with my CPAP machine without problems, but that was before 9/11/01 so I don't know if that would cause problems today. I also wonder about my vitamins being carried as well. I know what a pain it was way back when to have the airline store the bags instead of bringing them as carry on. This is especially bad if you have to transfer to another flight in between.

I have also considered booking myself locally into a resort motel, or even a cheap one and pretending to be a tourist. Or, maybe just going to Baltimore's Inner Harbor, taking the train to DC and seeing things I've wanted to see there. The Wall, and as much of the Smithsonian as I can. I've been to a few of the buildings, but not all. I've been inside the FBI, White House, and seen many of the monuments, but there is so much to see there, and I can now walk in the hot weather without problems. Might be fun, and I would work off a few calories.

Oh well, I could also stay home, work on the house, play my guitar, and get a job. Hmmmm.... choices.
Life is good!

Things I don't like to do anymore, and thoughts!

2011-06-06T10:27:00.002-04:00

Life under the little top! The circus that was supposed to come to East Pete was caught up in the tornadoes in Western PA last week. They lost their tent and actually had people in it when it collapsed. Several people were injured and one seriously, so they weren't going to show up.
A very astute marketer in another circus was out in Missouri with the floods, and storms, and came back home. They saw the problems the one circus was having, and they contacted the venues they were scheduled for and were able to book themselves instead.
They didn't have much time to prepare but they showed up and did a decent job with what they had. They went over well with the kids, and had large crowds for both shows.
I still don't like circuses, or clowns, but they will be coming back next year with their full show.

Now for some lists:

I don't like the coffee/protein drinks that come in the little bottles. They look like Starbucks, but they sure don't taste like it! If you are still new to the post party, you would be better off buying an extra large cup of Dunkin Donuts decaf, letting it cool in the fridge for a few hours. Then, add a scoop of powdered protein. I still like chocolate. It really makes your protein taste decent.
I no longer watch that TV show called "American Pickers" where the guy travels all over in his van and searches through junk piles for treasures that he can fix up and sell. I realized that he is just another form of hoarder, and I am finished with hoarders.
I am having trouble eating eggs by themselves. It's not because they are hard to digest, or anything like that. It's just that I've lost my taste for them. I can eat them with a salad as hard boiled, but hot eggs... well I need to take a break from them.
I found out that I don't have any problem eating broccoli now. I hated it before. I have to get therapy!

The big thing:
I am getting tired of going to support group meetings. In fact, I am almost finished identifying myself as a post-bariatric patient.
I have had trouble before because after awhile of going to the support group meetings, I became and old "pro". So instead of getting advice about what I am going through, I was offering advice. It was the same advice over and over. I actually followed my own advice, but that didn't help me much.
So now, I am looking to distance myself from anything bariatric in nature, and start thinking of myself as a normal human being with a much smaller appetite.
When I go out to eat now, I have a cup of coffee, or glass of water before the meal. I sip a little and then just let it sit. When they come through to "freshen the cup, I just put my hand over and stop them. Or, sometimes, I just let them top it off. No one knows that I am a post if I don't want them to.

I started taking CO Q-10 after doing some research and asking the dietitian about it. There are no firm studies that the stuff can hurt you and there are slight indications that it might help. I have this iron deficiency thing, and maybe it will help me absorb more iron to build up my strength again.

I went to the circus and then that evening we had our concert in the park. The people who play guitar and sing in this area are, for the most part, extremely mediocre. They don't do anything special, and they usually don't play very well. But they do well enough for people to like them. As a guitarist myself, I hate to say it, but I can play circles around most of them. I have been trying to play, and I realized the other day why I won't play. It's because I don't want to play the same old music I played when I was a kid. The trio that played Saturday evening played songs that did just that. They are younger than me, so the music to them is somewhat new. But there wasn't one song they did that I hadn't already played to death.

"The first 300 times I heard the song, it was good. Now, it's getting kind of old." Know what I mean? Wasting away again in Margaritaville!

How many times do you hear a song before you can't stand to listen to it one more time? It doesn't mean that the song isn't good. It just means that it's time to put it on the shelf for another 40 years or so.
Islands in the Steam
Proud Mary
Anything by Van Morrison
Neil Young
Tom Petty

Some of us can apply this thinking to other areas of our lives in the same way. I am now very tired of driving, even though I enjoy driving. But, I've been doing it professionally since 1974. I don't want to do it anymore.

I envy people who can just keep doing something for their whole lives and not get tired of it. It would make life so much easier if I could have started working for one company 37 years ago and stuck with them all the way through. I could retire with a pension, or some savings, and go sleep on a beach somewhere.

By the way, I don't ever think I'll tire of eating the right food in the right way. I won't give up on that at all because there are so many different ways to prepare food, and I now have my health back so that I can complain about everything else!

I still enjoy my solitude here. There will be a time when I hope to have someone to share my thoughts with again, but maybe we can keep separate residences?
I set up my stereo this weekend and will be playing some of my old records looking for new songs (for me) to play. The last time I listened to records was in 1981, so it's about time to play them again. If I could stop driving professionally for another 30 years and start up again, I think I would get some enjoyment from it again, but I don't think you'd want to ride with me!

I now know some of the reasons why I can't play my guitar, and I will be confronting those "demons" directly. It's a process that is ever changing for me. I don't feel the way I did last week, and I hope to feel differently next week until I start making money playing guitar and singing.
I want to sing all new songs. I want to write some of those songs. I want to record them and I want to perform them in front of people.
By the way, I hate snakes!

Life is Good!

Memorial Day weekend

2011-05-29T17:40:00.003-04:00

It's 95, (but it's a dry heat!). October, 2005 in Las Vegas. We decided to take a walk around out hotel. We went around back of Excalibur, then next door to Luxor. The mountains in the distance were beautiful, and the hotels were stunning too. Donna was hot and tired here, but happy to be outside.
That's my son in the striped shirt. He wanted to see the pool, and the hot females. I did too. Unfortunately, all we say were normal, every day people. The pool was only about two feet deep, and boy was the air hot! BUt, it was a dry heat!
Shona and Eric got married out in the desert near the place where they tested the moon rover. It was an amazing place. I was over 300 pounds then, so I didn't feel too good in that dry heat!
This is a reflection off Luxor (the pyramid) of the Excalibur. I was lucky to get this shot.
These pictures were found by me on a disc that I had given to my wife. She had taken it to work to show it off. It came home in a box after she died.
Now, for the rest of the story:

With my fatigue problem, things are moving slowly. But, I do need time to work through problems and to finish up things I've been doing the past year, so I'm not depressed about it. I just slog along slowly but surely.
I didn't get invited out for the holiday, and that's a good thing because I just don't have the energy.
I asked a friend to help me move a drafting table up from the basement Friday night, and I transferred the TV and accessories over to it. It's a very old piece and has no real function, so I thought I would give it one. It allowed me to center the TV in the living room, and it raised it as well. Now I can get a big dog and not have to worry about seeing over him/her when she wants attention! I will also be able to organize the room better now. Before, the TV was in the corner, and this interfered with the organization of the room.
I will be working on setting up the stereo too. I have a turntable, old AM/FM receiver, power amplifier, and speakers that I've been wanting to do for some time now. I should be able to shake the paint off the walls when I finish.
I also want to drill a hole in the floor and send all the cables through the basement instead of running them across the carpet. I didn't get to that yet, but might just do it this weekend sometime.
I rotated the mattress today. It is a California King size, which is much bigger than a regular kind. This sucker is very heavy! The handles ripped on one side after I tried unsuccessfully to flip it over. It is very hard to flip because the ceiling fan gets in the way. It will take two people to flip and I didn't feel like asking my friend to come over again. I managed to vacuum both sides of the mattress as well as the base of the bed. I changed the sheets. The whole job took over two hours because of this damn fatigue.
I relived some memories in the basement this afternoon by going through the last pile of boxes. There were rolls of contact paper from when my in laws lived here (pre-1992). That stuff has lost all semblance of usefulness, yellow with age, and sticky from the glue running.
I found old Christmas cards, lots of useless pens, some novelties given to my wife from her various customers over the years. Most of it went into the trash because they no longer worked.
I turned on the AC this weekend too. Today (Saturday) it was on all day, but yesterday, I only ran it at night. My brick house collects heat during the day and gives it back at night. I wanted to get ivy or some other clinging vines to cover the wall where the sun beats down ruthlessly, but Donna didn't like that idea. I think I might just do that this year.
So, there are still many things that have to be done here, and I'm looking forward to completing them, but I am also enjoying the journey.

Ugh, more painting.
I need to get the carpets cleaned. Whatever I end up doing, I won't put any more money into replacing anything until I am sure I can stay here. Or should I say until I'm sure I will stay here. So, a good cleaning is all I'm willing to do.
The porch still needs to be finished.
We will be having a heat wave this week, so I will probably not go out and prepare the mulched areas for planting. I had everything pulled out last year, and covered the area with heavy plastic and mulch to kill anything so I could start new. I need to pull the plastic up and do some work to the ground before deciding what I want to do.
I still have a bunch of furniture, and other things I want to line up, take pictures of, and sell or throw away. I'll whittle away as time and energy permits.
I have to go job hunting. I have my blood work scheduled this week, and a colonoscopy/endoscopy scheduled for the day after I finish driving, so any job would have to wait until after that (June 22).
My guitar has been played, but not as much as I want. I have been wanting to write out a business plan also to try to see if I can move towards working for myself.
After a long walk this morning (Monday, Memorial Day), I decided to not spend any more money on the house, except to finish up what I started. I still need a few curtains, and maybe some more (ugh!) paint, but I'm going to leave the re-carpeting until I am working full time again. I had considered writing down a list of things that have to be done, but I already have lists all over the place.

Life keeps going forward and that is good!

Setback, but a move forward. I'm not Superman!

2011-05-24T17:37:00.002-04:00

Get a Dunkin Donuts extra large coffee in the morning.
With 2 sweet and low.
With cream
Add one small pump of Mocha (yes, I do add this), if you can trust the counter person. I do watch them.
Make sure it's hot!
As you sit in your school bus waiting for the time to catch up, and after an hour is up (an hour after your meal, remember?) Take a sip.

Yummy!

As you drive and come to traffic lights, stop signs, or as you pick up your kids, take another sip.

When you get home, you still have quite a bit left in the cup, so put it in the fridge with the lid on of course.

Repeat again tomorrow. By that afternoon, after you finish with the kids, you have two cups left in the fridge with cold coffee.

Combine the two cups. Add two scoops of protein powder (is there any other flavor but chocolate? I think not!), a little extra decaf (cold) to fill the cup. Stir thoroughly, replace the lid, and enjoy! You get your liquid, some great cold coffee, and a protein boost.

Life is good!

Hey Larraine! I have been following your journey even though I haven't commented on your blog. I wish you luck. I can understand your frustration. I wish I could tell you there is a lesson in all this, but I don't want to be shot. I think you will survive. I'm rooting for you!

Next:
I had a bit of a problem that I couldn't solve myself. I sometimes wish I were Dr House so I would know what was wrong and could fix it myself, but I'm not even close. I do have better bedside manner than him!

I thought it might be a bit of depression catching up with me, but this was different. I know I've had problems that I couldn't do anything except live with them, but this really knocked me for a loop.

I've been experiencing fatigue. I just thought it was because I haven't been sleeping well, but it just kept getting worse.
I do get low blood sugar from time to time, but that is usually fixed quickly with a sugar pill, or eating something. It felt different.

I went to my grand daughter's birthday party Saturday, down in Maryland. I slept well the night before, and felt good going down there. I played with some of the kids, and had a good time. I left and headed back up feeling a little tired, but still OK.
I got home, took a nap, and then headed back out to York to see my friend play for a benefit party. I stayed until 8:30pm and then headed home.
On Sunday, I felt like I had run a marathon. I had no energy. I wasn't sore or anything like that, I just didn't have anything left. I forced myself to go out in the morning to BJs to get supplies, and then later in the evening to the supermarket. The rest of the day was spent watching TV because I had no energy.
I have been wanting to go job hunting, but I was worried that I wouldn't be able to work because of this crazy fatigue. I thought I was just getting old, but how could I take a job when I couldn't even work two days in a row?
So, today, I finally decided to call the dietician at my Bariatric center. It takes a lot for me to make calls like this, so I went for a walk to build up courage.
I made the call while on the walk, and told the guy what was going on. He checked last year's blood work results, and asked me how much iron I was taking. I told him I went from one pill a week to two. They are 18mg each. He told me he thought it might be anemia, and suggested moving this year's blood work up a month, and increasing my iron intake to a daily pill.
I had read of this problem somewhere else, but I can't remember where. I never thought it would happen to me. But, I need to get my energy level back up. If I use up vitamins and minerals like this, I won't be able to function very well in the work place. I don't want that.
I need to be alert, awake, and able to work in order to feel good about all this.
So, I started to increase my iron as of today. Let's see what happens.

On a side note, I started eating Fiber One cereal to increase my use of wheat and gluten in prep for a Celiac test. The dietician ruled that out as a cause of fatigue.

Iron can cause constipation, but I have not had that problem at all since I increased my fiber. In fact, I feel much better than I have in a long time.
Now if only I can win the lottery....

Living in the past, looking for the future, now!

2011-05-21T09:18:00.004-04:00

My First custom made Amplifier. A Weber "Larossa", built by Jamie Thompson.

My First custom made guitar. Dave Pushic Custom. The top is Purpleheart, the sides and back are various types of Maple. The fretboard is Pau Ferro. All gold plated hardware, and no plastic anywhere on the guitar.
Joyce and Lee. My duo from 1972. I am holding the Gibson SG I spoke of below.

When I was a kid, I had to play the guitar. I started out by playing a badminton racket until I got my first guitar. It was a $5.00 import from Japan, which meant it was junk. But, it was a guitar and I couldn't let go of it. I got a set of light gauge strings on it so I could play chords. The action wasn't adjustable and the neck was warped and I didn't know how to fix that.
Every week, I would learn something new and practice until the callus' on my fingers were like rocks.
I finally saved enough money to get a real electric guitar.
It was a sweet Daphne Blue Fender Mustang. It really was a great guitar for the price. But, I didn't have an amplifier, so the only place I could play it and hear it was in my bedroom where it was quiet.
My father took an old TV apart, and built me an amplifier using the TV's 12 inch speaker, and the super small tube amplifier and mounted it into a box for me. It sounded terrible, but it was an amplifier.
Over the years, I got newer and better sounding amplifiers to improve my sound. The guitar I owned was amazing, and I played it until the frets wore out. I didn't know I could have had them replaced, so I sold it and bought another guitar. This one was another classic, a 1971 Gibson SG deluxe. I had this one modified, and also played it to death. When I sold it, it had a cracked neck, and looked like a truck ran over it from use, not abuse.
The amplifiers I had were all very loud, if nothing else. Their tone ranged from really bad to beautiful, but I never studied them or learned how to make them sound great. I just plugged into them, and played as loud as I needed.

The years went by, and I arrived at a point where I wanted to recapture some of the glory of the past. So, I started out by purchasing things I once had, or getting some of the classic guitars and amplifiers of that time. But, I found out that it wasn't what I wanted. I also found out that it wasn't the instrument, but the musician playing the instrument that makes the sound.

This applies to many different parts of my life.

It's not the instrument, it's the musician.

I now have some of the finest tools ever invented by man.

But, it's up to me to make them work.

Next thought:

I think I've written about this before, but I needed to get it out of me head, so please forgive me for repeating myself.

In the past 5 years, I've lost many people who were close to me. My Father, My Brother in Law, My Wife, My favorite pets (4 cats and 2 dogs), and my big belly. Yes, my belly had a life of it's own.

The only one I don't miss is the belly.

Life is good!

Boxes, boxes, and more boxes! Venting!

2011-05-14T14:53:00.004-04:00

The picture above is of an L shaped section built when the house was new. The boxes in front of it are empty. They are boxes that would hold my guitars should I ever sell them, or other electronic equipment for that matter. I have had need of these types of boxes many times over the years since I did a lot of buying and selling on ebay. I will be breaking these down and taking them down to the curb for recycling in the next few weeks.
The room above is a functional darkroom that has been used for storage since we moved in. There is little or no need for a darkroom in today's digital world. If the shelves were taken out, it could be turned into a powder room, it is about that size. It has full electrical hookup as well as plumbing that could be adapted. The shelf on the floor next to the paper was used by my cats as a litter box. I cleaned it out today. Not a pleasant thing to do.
This shelf unit is outside the laundry room.It was used by us over the years for storage of stuff and overstock dry food products, such as boxed and canned goods. It was filled to overflowing. I found nothing in it that I wanted to keep or that would be worth listing on Craigslist. I bagged it and took it to the curb yesterday.I haven't taken an after picture yet, hence the few things that are left there.

The story of my life is being re-lived through the boxes and bags of stuff I have thrown away in the past 3 years. I go through every box just to make sure there isn't something I want to keep or pass on to the kids, so things move a little slower than if I just brought the whole box up and tossed it.
I still find things I want to keep. I found a hundred old photos today that I had forgotten all about. I also found a whole box that belongs to my daughter. They are her memories with pictures, report cards, and the like, so I will pass them on to her.
I found a full, very heavy box filled with old stamps, postcards, and envelopes that were first day of issue cancelled stamps. I will list them on Craigslist in case someone still collects them. I am pretty sure there is nothing in there of real value, other than to a collector.
I found some old machines. An old style record player from a school room somewhere. A portable typewriter, a film projector, and a slide projector. I gathered them up for later. I don't know what I'll do with them.
Old crocheted blankets, worn out with holes that my wife just couldn't bear to part with. Stuffed animals that smelled really bad.
Broken things, pieces of things.
For God's sake! She couldn't throw out any birthday cards. I could open an antique shop with nothing but birthday cards! The problem is that I've been finding them in almost every box I've opened. There is no organization. They just pop up everywhere. None of them are really special and very few of them have personal messages worth saving. Just a "love," followed by a signature. I've filled bags with old birthday cards. Those poor trash men having to carry those useless bags to their truck. I carried 5 bags up the stairs last week and down to the curb, one at a time since they were too heavy to take two. I have 6 more bags as of today, as well as 6 large boxes for the "archives", not to mention the many large and small pieces that will come up that don't go into bags.
I will be asking friends to come over and help me get a few large items up in the next few weeks.
Now, I have to finish what I started as far as the basement is concerned. Once I am finished getting everything out, I have to clean the place. Sweep, vacuum, then scrub the floors. Fun, Fun, Fun!

I am fast running out of money and the panic is beginning to set in. I like being able to make my own decisions about my life, but it seems that privilege will be taken away from me if I don't get some income soon, other than what I have driving bus.

My Bariatric Surgeon got fired last week, and I cried when I found out. The guy is top notch, but there was a problem with the hospital he worked with that wasn't his direct fault and he got canned. My fellow patients held a rally in his support, and I found out that he would be opening up a new office soon. So, I hope to transfer over when he does and continue my care with him. I'm also hoping that many of his staff move with him.

Oh, I got a call from my Gastro guy after my blood tests. They told me I had to start eating Gluten and wheat products again so they could test me for Celiac, since my blood test came back negative. I have been living without those foods for 4 years now for the most part. I still cheat now and then, but it's tough to start just eating them after not being allowed. I will have a Endo/Colo osotmy in a few weeks after school is finished.

What a week this has been. Life is good!

Celiac Sprue again?

2011-05-11T07:56:00.003-04:00

I received a call from the nurse about the blood tests I took about a month ago for Celiac Sprue. This is a prep for a colonoscopy/endoscopy I'm supposed to have in June.
The test came back negative. Now this is a surprise because I came back positive when I had my last tests about 4 years ago. I was told I had to stop eating wheat and gluten foods, and go on a strict diet. I lost 27 pounds before my WLS and I attribute some of this to quitting bread, bagels, soft pretzels, pasta (especially pasta!), and cereal.
A diet without these things, makes life much more difficult. After reading, asking questions, and much research, I determined that I could have a slice of pizza once in awhile, as well as a little bit of pasta without ruining my diet, or killing myself.
I have never had symptoms or any outward indication that would lead me or anyone to believe I had Celiac, such as malnutrition, weight loss, fatigue, pain, etc.. All I had was the test results from the doctor and the endoscopy/biopsy results.
So, I cheated a bit, but pretty much stayed away from the gluten/wheat foods.
As time went on, I branched out a bit, but haven't had a bagel in over 3 years! It was shear torture I tell you!
Right now, they are checking to see if it's possible that the tests I had and the most recent one were/are wrong. But, last night, I went out and bought a box of Fiber One cereal (no sugar, 2 grams of protein, and the most fiber you can get in a cereal!) and had a bowl with a packet of sweet and low. This morning, I feel great!
Fiber from wheat is wonderful for the body as far as I'm concerned. I never would have talked about this when I was younger, but now, it is worth it.

Fiber, the non-soluble kind that you get from wheat germ, absorbs all the liquid that your body considers bad for you. Some call it poison, and it is for the most part, but it's not just that.
Fiber lower blood pressure because your bowel movements are easier.
Fiber eliminates cholesterol that we don't need. The body needs cholesterol in order to hold itself together, so the excess we get in an American diet, is reduced by eating the fiber in this form.

There is a need to increase liquid intake when you get fiber because of the extra absorption, but I'm already drinking quite a bit. I will drink more now just in case. I've increased my intake of veggies, but still don't get enough in my diet to replace the wheat/gluten that I cut out a few years ago. The addition of the fiber I ate last night before bed, has paid off very nicely this morning. Like I said, I feel great!

On Saturday at the park, there was a hand made pretzel stand handing out free samples that I politely refused every time she went by. They were very small samples, and probably loaded with fats and sugar to make them taste wonderful. But, they were very small and one piece would not have killed me. The next time I get the chance, I'll accept a sample without fear.

I am still going to stay away from bagels and such, but won't get too upset if I occasionally have a half with some cream cheese and lox.

I bought a half quart of milk, and kept having to throw it out because I just don't drink milk. I will add fiber to my chili for a bit of crunch, and maybe have a bowl of cereal a few times a week. I've been looking for variety in my meals and this will be a welcome addition.
If it works, I should be seeing a decrease in my weight, and should feel better within a week or so. I'll let you know.
Oh by the way, drinking and eating at the same time has been a no no since I had the WLS, but the small amount of milk I add to the cereal was OK last night, and shouldn't cause too much trouble. I used about 1/3 of a cup of milk. I can heat the cereal to absorb the milk if I have to, but don't think it will be necessary.

Ouch!

2011-05-05T21:01:00.003-04:00

I had a wake up call tonight at the monthly support group meeting.
I hadn't really thought about it, but they were talking about personal support groups. These are the family and friends who know about your surgery and help you get through the process.
I started to think about it, and realized that the only real support group I've had for my weight loss, was professional. I have had no real personal support.
* My wife, as much as I loved her, never supported me in this journey. She never supported me in any endeavor that I've tried. She died last year, and I've had time to reflect and realize this.
* My Son just abandoned me because I stopped giving him money. He was so caught up in his own personal problems, that he never really supported me.
* My Daughter has been very helpful to listen to me, but really didn't talk to me about my surgery, either before or after.
* My sister is a health nut, and is even involved in physical fitness training, but stopped talking to me for reasons she never stated. I don't know if she was angry with me, or what.

I do have friends who have called me on a regular basis. They are moral support for me. They remind me that I am a human, but they don't discuss my WLS.

So, in the beginning, I was charging along on my own with the help and support of the Bariatric Team, and several psychological counselors. After surgery, I went to support group meetings, and kept all my appointments with the Clinic. I saw counselors on a regular basis. One of them also had the surgery, so I felt she had special understanding of my situation.
I stopped going to support group meetings because I was supporting people rather than being supported. I needed help and didn't know how to go about asking for it. I tried to voice this at several committee meetings, but didn't get my idea across.
So for the present meeting, I was quiet and listened, rather than talked or asked questions because I really didn't have any questions.
I listened to other talk about their support team, the love they received, and boy did that hurt.
I have written a lot about the weight loss surgery on this blog and also through emails and letters I've written to friends, so I really can't say I didn't get support. But it sure feels like I'm really alone.

My surgeon resigned at the beginning of this month for reasons that were hidden by the hospital administration. He has been the main part of the support team for 3 years now, and it's not right for him to leave so soon. This type of surgery requires personal contact with the patients much more so than other types of surgery. This doctor has been very accessible to all of his patients from the beginning. He has patients who have followed him from his previous practice which was outside Philadelphia, quite a distance from here.

Our meeting have always been standing room only. I estimate over 100 people at each meeting, and I believe it would go on for hours if it wasn't regulated. People ask amazing questions and they get answers. That's one of the reasons I decided on this practice for my surgery. Dr. Brader was another reason. This guy invented some of the techniques that are used nationally for other surgery. He is personable, and knows what he is doing.

So, I am going to try to build a new support system by going to the clinic and demanding help. I need to get back on track.

Busy progress, but still a long way to go.

2011-05-05T08:08:00.003-04:00

Life keeps moving forward, and my posts don't seem to be about WLS as much now because I am living life again.
Too many uses of the word "life"?

This weekend, I will be doing the East Petersburg first Saturday event. We have a car show. They promise to have around 500 vehicles there. Last year, they had 300+. What a great variety.

I will be playing MC and DJ in between musical acts. There will be food and other stuff too. The weather will be perfect, not too hot, not too cold, and no rain.

I am going to bring my guitar with me and try to get the guts to play a song onstage in between sets. I really want people to see that I am something more than just an annoying DJ/MC.

Saturday evening, after the event, I will be going to Adam's county to support my friends in "The Howling". They were going to break up when one of their key players moved out of the area, but his job fell through so he stayed. They added a really dynamic female vocalist and I've never heard her in person, so I hope I have the energy to make the trip.

I've been cutting the lawn in between rain storms, about every other day. Great exercise, but since I wear flat bottomed shoes so I don't mess up my good ones, my feet have been hurting. It feels like I've been walking on rocks. The feet feel bruised. My chiropractor made some suggestions and I will try them to see if they help.

My diet hasn't changed in the past month but because I am more active, I am dropping my winter weight. I've lost about 4 pounds in the past month. I still have problems running out of steam very quickly, so I have to pace myself. I am still careful in what I eat, but I cheat a bit too.

On the home front: I shredded 4 bags of documents that I found in a bin in the basement. They were old bills from 2002 on back to 1998 or so. I thought I took care of all the papers a year ago, but I was wrong.

I started breaking the old boxes down and will put them out to the curb soon. I've gone through a half dozen plastic bins and started sorting out the "archive" stuff that will go to the family, and the stuff that belongs to me that I want to keep. I will probably borrow or rent a truck to transport all of it at one time down to my wife's cousin who wants all of it. She has lots of storage and since the family history is important to her, this will add quite a bit to it.

I found some old books to add to my collection that I probably won't keep. I got rid of at least 1000 books last year. I had read them all, some of them twice, and now have another 1000 to discard. I either give them away, or throw them away depending on what they are. But, I know that I won't need them ever again.

All in all, I feel as if I've made some real progress clearing things out, or organizing them in order to clear them out. When they are gone, I will feel a bit of relief, some regret, and even sadness since they've been with us for so many years. But, it's time to move on.

I have some friends who want to sell their beautiful Log home. They built the place in order to spend the rest of their lives there, but decided they want to live simpler. They have collected items from all over the world. Their walls, shelves, and closets are filled with physical memories. I could spend hours just looking at stuff there. I can't imagine the amount of work they will have when it comes time to clear all of that away. I know it won't all fit into a smaller home.

To me, the home is the most beautiful place I've ever seen. It isn't much larger than my home, but it's up on top of a hill in a secluded, wooded area. The home is made from Pine logs, and the inside walls are filled with amazing knots in patterns. That's why they call it "knotty pine"! But, over the years they filled the walls with stuff and covered up the fact that it's a log home. If I lived there, I think I would keep it very simple and not cover the walls at all.
There is a huge stone fireplace that goes floor to ceiling in the center of the living room, and they have a bridge going from the two upstairs bedrooms across the other side of the room. The walls upstairs are slanted and give the impression of living in a very nice tree house. Even the doors are not rectangular, but angled. They have a full basement and a chute that goes from the second floor to the basement laundry area.

Outside the house, is a trail that goes all the way around the neighborhood, and they routinely have deer and other creatures walking by.

They have problems in the winter with the angle of their driveway, but that wouldn't bother me too much. A tractor can clear the snow away, and they have a parking area at the bottom if the tractor won't do the trick.

Oh well, I can dream about it, but I don't think buying the place from them will happen.

My next steps will be to make sure I finish what I start and move to the next tasks which will be the (UGH!) painting. I still have to finish the stairway to the basement, the bathroom, kitchen, and new outside walls to the porch. The garage floor could use a re-coating, but I may just scrub it down with detergent and stiff brush.

Life is Good.

Shortening Powder

2011-04-28T21:04:00.003-04:00

I was going to attend a course at the Bariatric center called "Back on Track", but I got socked with a huge medical bill. The hospital spends insane amounts of money on an inefficient billing system, and they print up so many useless "informational" brochures, that they have to charge extra for all their procedures. I've harped on this to them and on this blog before, so I won't waste my time talking about it again.
But, a $2000.00 medical bill for a simple visit and 4 tubes of blood is crazy. After the insurance company paid their share, I still owe them $540.00. There goes the money for the course.

In June or July, I will go to the lab to "donate" another 15 tubes of blood for my bariatric checkup. That will cost me another $500 or more, after the insurance covers the rest.

But, as things go, or should I say, as money goes, I will not being able to cover my mortgage soon. So, it may be better to sell the house and move. Said all this before too.

I still feel like I'm moving forward because I'm arranging my thoughts and getting set up for a change.
I just realized how tired I am so I'm gonna hit the sack.
Life is good.

Editing complete. It seems I was complaining quite a bit last night. The truth is that I see such a huge amount of waste in the system. When I was first married 34 years ago, we had Blue Cross/Blue Shield. The doctors back then accepted what the insurance company paid them and didn't bother us with the extra. Now, it seems the hospital is just plain nasty. Every office I go into has piles of useless high quality brochures. They have the internet now, so why bother wasting money on them?
There is also the tons of paperwork required. Most of that is now computer covered, so paper has been cut back on or eliminated.
But, if you look at the doctor's office, you see 15 employees, other than the doctor. They are all there to do paperwork required by the government, or caused by the government. This is one of the many reasons medical coverage is so costly.
I went to a doctor in the late 70's when I was living in Chester County. I had a fever and felt lousy and had no where else to go. The doctor was in his 90's (he died soon after this) and very highly regarded.
This doctor had an assistant with him and a receptionist. He looked at me, asked me a few simple questions, then he took my pulse using his actual hands. He told me he was going to give me pills to help me, and then he said goodbye. The nurse gave me a packet of purple colored pills (not a bottle). These pills weren't even labeled! She told me to take one a day for a few days and I would be fine. They charged me $25.00 for the visit.
The pills were amazing, and I felt better the next day. Now, why can't they do the same thing today?
Nuff said!

Spring has sprang

2011-04-24T10:59:00.004-04:00

Notice the violets all over the lawn. They disappear soon and are replaced with dandelions.

After I used the lawn roller last week, that is, the day after, I felt like I was the incredible Hulk!
My muscles in my arms and particularly my torso were so tight. I felt like I could walk through walls! Grrrrrrr!

Every spring, I experience the lousy cold weather, the teasing warm spells that disappear way too quickly. The rain, rain, rain. Monsoon season hits us hard!
Today is the second warm day in the past few weeks. The temps are already at 70 and moving up rapidly. The difference between this warm day and the first is that this one will be followed by another warm day tomorrow. The last one fell away so fast that it made me wonder if I was dreaming. The storms moved through with a tornado warning (we escaped with just rain) and the cold weather returned with a vengeance.

Today, my mind and body want to crawl up on a lounge chair in the back yard and sleep the whole day away in the warm sun.
Instead, I will work on little things around the house.

I installed the screens into the front and back door. This is a strange ritual that I have been going through since we moved here in 1992. The old style storm doors require that I loosen several clamps that hold the window onto the door. Over the years, the clamps have worn and some of them are no longer usable. Today, they have screens that are already on the door and all you have to do is lower the regular glass and there they are.
A few years ago when I was clearing snow from the front walk, I slipped and put my arm through the glass. Winter attire saved me from anything other than embarrassment and anger for doing something stupid. So instead of replacing the glass with glass, I found a place that would do Plexiglas. My Father in law did the back door that way because the dogs he had back then were prone to try to jump through the glass. The nice things about this is I don't have to clean the glass other than to wipe it off. It has lasted for a long, long time.
I opened all of the windows in the house and basement, and turned on the ceiling fans. Hopefully, this will air the place out a bit.
I also took pictures of the outside yard. It has greened up in the past two weeks from all the rain and little sun. The spring bulbs have come up, and some of them are already dead. I have pictures. If I'm here next year, I hope to remove the bulbs to give to a neighbor, and do some more smoothing of the lawn. I'd really like to change the whole look if I can.
I have a pedal board that I need to populate and try out. For my non-musical friends, this is a board that hold effects pedals. Each pedal creates a different sound that should enhance my guitar playing. I will attach them all to the pedal board so I can transport them easily and safely. There are "all in one" pedals that have all the sounds I would need, but they are very complex and I want simplicity. I want to concentrate on my music and not on the gadgets. I was able to choose the ones I wanted and not bother with others I didn't. The board holds all the pedals securely and comes with a carrying bag for easy transport.
I might play after I get it set up, or just go for a walk. The lounge chair is looking mighty tempting.....
So, I will be cutting up Velcro and connecting cables and such while I watch or listen to TV.
Today is a holiday for some folks, and I am not cutting the grass so the neighbors who celebrate Easter won't be disturbed. I really do want to cut the grass today, but I will wait until tomorrow.
I made a list of must do things to do this coming week, and if I accomplish them all, I will be proud of myself. I am still working on my own, but soon will need some help with the bigger stuff.
On a side note, yesterday I bought several Chicken dinners from my fire company. I took all but one down to my daughter's for her to enjoy. I ate one and got a bit queasy. It had too much butter (fat) in it and didn't go down too well. It did taste good however.
My gastric bypass came back to haunt me!

Making more progress

2011-04-21T11:00:00.004-04:00

These are Plastic containers, most of which will be sent to my daughter or my wife's relatives for the "archives". They contain memories, but nothing of value other than sentimental. Pictures, old school stuff, maybe some books, etc.
The stuff behind the ironing board (you never know when you might need an ironing board!) are empty tin cans, leftover cups that don't match anything else in the house, a can opener that doesn't work, and lots of stuff that one might need someday. I have been picking at it for two years now. Oh, I have a box of Ball jars for canning. They must be 30 years old and never used. I might set them up for target practice someday. Or not.
All of these cardboard boxes are empty. The plastic containers used to have clothing in them, but now have old blankets that I haven't been able to bring myself to throw away. They are no longer useable. I have a box cutter somewhere, but I put it down and now can't find it. I will get a sharp object and break some of these down over the next few weeks. This area will be completely clear when I finish. Read below for more information.
These are the boxes I have cleaned out the past 2 weeks or so. I am keeping them for now because they are mainly the same size and will be stack-able.
This is the darkroom. If you read my posts from last year, you will know that I had a family from my school bus come over and help me clean it out. This room was full from floor to ceiling, and had little or no room to move around.
The brown bookcase is removable, and I will use it, along with a second one before I finish. If I am able to stay in the house, I will remove everything from this room. All of the cabinets, right down to the wall. I will probably turn it into a bathroom since it is the right size. It already has plumbing. The orange thing to the left is a slide projector, and the gray thing on the floor is a Super 8 movie projector. I also have a Brownie Camera out of the shot. They can be dated back to when I was a kid.

For the full story, read below:

I was watching TV this morning and came upon a show about the 7 deadly sins. I don't usually follow this type of broadcast, but they were talking about "Sloth".
I have heard the word before, but really didn't know what it meant.
They were nice enough to give several definitions, enough so I could get a good idea what the word meant.
Sloth can be laziness, or idleness. It can mean that you lose touch with things that are supposed to be important and you just give up. Depression might be a good description as to how you are supposed to be feeling when experiencing Sloth.
Of course, they went on to say that some believed that a demon was in charge of the sin, and when you gave in to it, the demon inhabited your soul, calling for an exorcism to get rid of him/it.
Well, now that I know about Sloth, I decided to think about it whenever I get complacent.
I don't give in to religious fanaticism, but this term is a good description of how I've felt for a long, long time.
I deserve to be depressed. I lost so much in the past 5 years.
I never gave in to the depression, but it sure has slowed me down.
Now that I've given it a name, I will know how to fight it better.
When I am too tired to keep going, I will go a little further.
I still have to pace myself, but when I know I am just goofing off because I can, I will try to think about sloth and instead of just watching TV or surfing the web, I will get up and do something.
In this post, are pictures of some of the progress I've made in the past month or so.
I started saving boxes. Empty boxes. I am not going to become a hoarder and never get rid of them. I am going to use them to document my progress.
I will caption these pictures above, since I can't figure out how to spread the pictures throughout the post. You will have to read all the way down to here in order to know why I would post pictures of empty boxes.

These boxes represent two things:

Purchases I've made to replace broken things. Or, new purchases in the past year of things I've wanted for years but were never allowed to get because the kids came first.
I've gone through the boxes, and consolidated, given away, or trashed the contents.

The empty box means there was something in it that fell under those conditions.

Some of the boxes were never opened since before 1992. We have moved many times over the years, as I've said before. With each move, we packed things well, but never had time to open some of these boxes. Or, we didn't have anywhere to go with the contents. There may be boxes in that collection that haven't been opened since they were packed in 1976. I'm not sure. We got married in 76, and moved into our first apartment in September of that year. Who knows?

The next door neighbor worked for a company that made boxes, and he brought us a pile of them with Reese's logos on them. There were two different sizes. I liked the smaller ones because they were easier to pack and lighter to carry. Those are from 1988.

When I finish with all my re-packing, I will have several kinds of boxes:

Worn out or empty boxes that I will break down and trash.
Storage boxes filled with things that I want to keep. I will try to organize them so they are all close to the same size, so I can stack them.
Storage boxes with things to give to my wife's relatives for their "archives".
Boxes to give to my kids with things they would want or not.

I took 6/42 gallon bags of trash to the curb last week and this week. This is my battle against Sloth!
I wonder what I will do when I run out of things to trash? At this rate, I won't ever run out!
On a side note, the house that burned down next door has been emptied out. They had a restoration team take everything out of the house. Furniture, clothing, stored items, appliances. They filled up 4 trash bins. These bins are the kind that come on the back of the huge trucks and are dropped on the driveway. They are 6 feet high, about the same wide, and 30 feet long.
I estimate that if I had gotten a bin for my stuff, I could have filled up two of them myself, instead of taking bags to the curb. That wouldn't include furniture or appliances like the washer, dryer, etc.
Last year, I estimate I took at least 3 bags to the curb every week. That would be at least 150/42 gallon bags just last year. I didn't mention the stuff that didn't fit into bags that have gone too.
So, even though I feel like sloth is creeping up on me and threatening to overwhelm me, all I have to do is look at where I was, and where I am now to see that.....
Life is Good!

Breaking records

2011-04-20T20:21:00.003-04:00

Well, almost.
I cut my lawn this afternoon, and then went next door and did their lawn. That's the house that burned down last month. The owners haven't been seen since a few days after the fire. They are living somewhere else.
The grass was growing, and I needed the exercise, and then maybe someone would think I was being helpful instead of self centered. In reality, I was being self centered.
I walked over to a meeting tonight at the Borough hall. The East Petersburg Day committee has expanded to become the East Petersburg Event committee. We used to do just one day per year. We would go all out and celebrate the community with a prayer breakfast, parade, 5k run, and then have field entertainment along with live music.
The past few years, we have had changes in personnel and have expanded quite a bit, adding firework in the evening, a Saturday morning farmer's market, and a 1st Saturday concert in the park.
This year, they are going wild. They have something scheduled almost every month all summer long, and a blues fest in October. There is a car show planned, a circus, a fire equipment expo, among many other things.
I feel proud to have been part of the event that lead to all of this. Our community is really shining now.
I will do the MC work for most of the events, and will help out with DJ music and be a stage hand when needed. I'm not sure how I'll fit in, but will be there until I figure it out.
Next month I will be recording with a friend helping out so I can get an idea of what I need to do in order to improve my music. I am hoping I have the energy and will power to write a few songs that have been clogging up my brain.
As far as the kayak is concerned, I will have to wait until next weekend because it looks like it will be cold and rainy all weekend.
I am pretty tired right now. Tomorrow, if I can, I will try to roll the lawn again. The first effort was tough, but seemed to help smooth out the lawn a bit. Maybe this time will do the trick.
More later...

Making progress

2011-04-17T18:42:00.002-04:00

If you've ever put a 1000 piece puzzle together without doing the edges first, then you know how I do things.
I roam all over the place, getting things done, but it's usually not what I started out to do. Yesterday, I started out to do the curtain rods in the kitchen, and ended up taking most of the morning because I did so many other things too.
I have many plans and will do them as I get to them, but I don't know when.

I am probably going to be unemployable soon. I feel as if I'm losing my hold on reality.

Despite how I feel, I've made some real progress this past week and I plan to take advantage of the warmer weather to continue to make progress.

When I was fat, hot weather was horrible. My layers of insulation made me overheated all the time. Walking around in nice clothing was a disaster. I was always too hot.

When I got married in 1976, I weighed 155 (5'7") and was active all the time. Working up a sweat felt good because I was comfortable getting a workout. As I gained weight, I didn't have to work as hard to work up a sweat. When I was my heaviest, I sweated all the time, and was out of breath most of that time.
Now, it is a mixed bag because age has been factored into the equation. I am not as fat anymore. I don't sweat as much, as before, but I get tired much quicker than when I was younger. I can forge ahead if I can get some sugar into my system.
I keep hydrated, and it now takes quite an effort for me to work up a sweat. I do get winded, but can keep going for quite some time. I still haven't tried jogging but am getting closer. I walk along at a very brisk pace compared to before.
I walked with a friend on a rail trail this week, and we measured about 3 miles round trip. But, he strolls rather than exercises. So, all in one day, I walked with him, cut the lawn, and then took a second walk of about a mile at my much faster pace. The next day, I crashed. I took a two hour nap in order to start feeling alive again.

But, I am making progress. Today, I took a drive, and stopped off at Muddy Run State park in the southern end of the county. They have a rather large lake. It is very shallow, and they have boat rentals. I found out today that they have Kayak rentals so I spoke with the owner and got enough information to know that I should be able to rent one and be reasonably sure that I won't drown myself by trying my hand at it. There is enough of an area that I can paddle around and still be close enough to the dock in case I get tired. If I want to go for longer trips later, there is plenty of space to do that too. He estimated a round trip at a leisurely pace should take about an hour and a half. It is very scenic too. My wife and kids have rented an electric rowboat there many times.
I wasn't sure how I would feel about going there again because there are so many memories. I can see my two dogs walking with us across the bridge, over the water to the trail. I remember walks around the lake with my wife, although we never quite made it all the way around in one trip. We walked different parts of the trail every time we went.
Muddy Run was a good place for us to stop to use the restrooms and sometimes get something to eat after a nice, long southern drive on a Sunday. We took the kids to the nature center there many times, and fed the geese and ducks too.
Today, after I spoke with the owner of the boats, I went to the other end of the park and took a walk up the hill. It was pretty steep and the few extra pounds I have slowed me down. My jeans are too tight now too, so they really felt uncomfortable and hindered my progress. I got a bit out of breath, but I pushed on to the top. Then, I took my time coming down and around to where I started. The wind was blowing and it was chilly, but the bright sunlight made the day very pleasant. I much prefer looser pants for walking and look forward to when I can wear my shorts again.

This coming week is the Easter holiday, and my bus driving week will be kind of strange with different schools having different schedules. One school has school next Monday due to a snow make up day. The rest are off. I will take advantage of the time off by trying to get more work done on the house as well as getting more exercise.
My diet is back on track, although I still have to become a bit more strict. I cheated a bit this weekend.
Let's see what happens....
Life is good!

When the rain comes...

2011-04-12T18:32:00.002-04:00

It went up to 78 degrees or higher yesterday for the first time all season. The temps have been moderate, but colder than I like for quite some time, so it was great to open the windows and get outside for a bit.
I pushed the mower, or should I tell the truth and say the damn thing dragged me around the yard? I actually ran the mower back and forth through the whole yard, even the areas that hadn't started to grow yet. I felt like one of those obsessive people that have to walk up and down every aisle at the market, even though they don't need to. I need the exercise. The lawn was just as rutted and bumpy as I remembered it.

I also did lots of other things. One of them was to go to the dentist to get a checkup and cleaning. I need to get a tooth fixed and scheduled that for the end of this month.
I came home with a stiff neck, so pushing the mower added to that. The stiff neck is from the stress of sitting in the chair and trying to look calm as an adult should look. Doesn't work. It doesn't fool anyone, and my body still tries anyway.

Last night, I went for a walk just to see if that would loosen me up a bit. It did help, but I was a lot slower than I usually am, and I only covered about a mile before I decided to call it quits. Just after I got home, the storms hit.

The house was 79 all day inside into the evening, even with the windows open and the great breeze. I closed all of them except the one next to my bed, and ran the ceiling fans to cool things off. The storms dropped the overnight temp into the mid 50's, so the house cooled down a bit too. I refused to turn the AC on because I had waited all winter for warm weather.

I had some upsetting dreams and it woke me about 2am, so I hit the bathroom and then tried to go back to sleep. I did fall asleep around 4, and the alarm woke me for the first time in a long time. I usually get up 5 minutes before it goes off.

I drove my bus route, came home and was greeted by a friend to take a walk. It was raining lightly, so I grabbed an umbrella, and we headed out through the neighborhood. After one loop, I told him I was sore and we could try again on Friday, and I went in. He is a slow walker, and just starting out, so it's more of a stroll for me than a real walk, but it does get me out and I enjoy his company.

Well, I really was sore and tired. I came in and took a nap, for an hour and a half! I was awakened by a text from my son, otherwise, I would have slept through noon. I guess I was tired.

The roller coaster continues.

I decided tonight that I was going to gather up the ingredients I need to make another batch of chili. I will use red kidneys this time, along with ground beef and hot sausage links. I cut the skin on the links and pull the sausage into balls and cook them that way before adding them to the mix. I have lots of frozen veggies (spinach, mixed vegetables, and broccoli) along with my tomatoes and spices, so it should be a great combination. I will start cooking tomorrow.

My goal over the next 2 weeks, as far as eating is concerned, is to eat high protein meals made by me and to save the microwave food for times when I am too tired. I would like to get back to basics at least for a little while. It may get a bit monotonous eating the same things all the time, but I did it before, and I want to lose what I gained over the last year, and then continue on to my original goal.

I went down to 202 (my lowest weight post) and am now up around 225 (gained since last year). If I make it to 202, then I want to at least break the magic number of 200. I have pants and a belt I bought that won't fit me until I get below 200 and I hate to waste good clothing.

Unless I get up at 4:30am every morning, I don't have time to make eggs with Canadian bacon as a meal, and oatmeal by itself is not a meal. It lowers my blood sugar unless I eat some protein first. I don't eat cereal because of the celiac, although I do cheat now and again with other meals.
So, I usually make up a microwave "steamer" meal. I eat the protein in the meal first as I'm supposed to, but the meals aren't the best thing for my diet.
So, lunch and dinner will be my own cooking (mostly pre-cooked) and breakfast will have to be worked out. Anyone want to eat chili for breakfast?
I see the Bariatric doctor in July, so I should have time to get back on track by then, along with the help from the "Back on track" program that I start next month.
In the meantime, I am still using walking as my main exercise, and painting, cleaning, and fix up to supplement. I plan to start jogging in bits and pieces during those walks, and gradually expanding my distance.
My personal goals are to investigate warmer weather for this fall and hopefully into the winter so I can be outside as much as possible all year round. I still hope to play my guitar for a living.
Let's see what happens next... Life is Good!

Falling behind

2011-04-10T09:27:00.002-04:00

The Back on Track program starts in May, but I need it right now.
I'm falling behind in many things. Oh yes, I am making progress in many areas, but I am getting lazy, or should I say that I am giving in to my laziness.
I am almost 30 pounds up now from last year. I started gaining the weight when my wife got sick. I was hell bent on being selfish and just working on my own personal gains (or losses) when she told me. I lost it. I started eating processed food, and not walking or exercising.
Later, I used my energy on cleaning the house which may have involved some physical labor, or weight lifting, but for the most part was just simple grunt work. It required just plugging away until I got too tired, or bored, or was finished. I should get into the gym, or start my long walks, that I have been planning for a long time now.
So, now, I need to get back on track. I am on my own here, and I am not doing what I want, even though there is no one here to stop me but myself.
I see myself failing, even though I am doing things other may not have been able to do.
I try to see myself succeeding, but I am so tired, scared, and confused.

The world has always spun way too fast for my tastes. Too many things are going on, and I can't stop watching them, or wanting to learn about them.

All of my skills are self taught, with a few minor lessons reading, watching TV, or from watching my father when he used to work. I can do things if I concentrate, but there are some things that are beyond my abilities or knowledge.
So, I walk around the house, dressed up in my ADD, and do things. As I clean out one room, I find things that don't belong there, and I take them to another room, where I do something else, until I finally get back to the first task a few minutes later.
I am a fan of organization mainly because I don't have any of it.
So, every room in the house has some thing finished, and some not.
I tried taking Ritalin to stay on track, but it gave me the shakes and I couldn't get anything done other than sit at the computer and write. The problem there is my hands shook making it impossible to type more than a few letters before making a mistake and I had to go back and correct that mistake.
Right now, I am typing this because my cordless drill died and needs to be recharged. I managed to get the computer room cleaned up, the old curtains removed and trashed. I took all the hardware off the windows, and got 2 of the 3 brackets installed before the battery died. When I finally finish this window, the curtains that have been there since at least 1990 will be gone. That has to count for something.
I spent too many hours sitting in front of the TV this week. I kept looking at all the things that needed to be done, and the things that have to be done on a regular basis, and didn't do much of them. I did all the normal things like dishes, and laundry, but the floor in the back bedroom still has glue on it. This room has glue on the floor too. I think if I started doing both rooms today, I could finish them by next weekend, if the fumes didn't kill me first.
I have to cut the grass, either today or tomorrow. I have not done that yet. It's not really long, just uneven. The first cut of the season is always the most rewarding. It makes the lawn look good. With all the rain we had, you would think the grass would be longer, but it isn't time to wake it up yet. Tomorrow, the temperature is set to go over 80 for one day, so the grass will pop up after that. I like pushing the mower, even though it is busy work. I can put my mind in neutral and just walk back and forth with my ear plugs in. I measured it after my WLS and it came out that I was walking almost 4 miles when I finished. It involves lots of stopping and turning, so the aerobic benefits aren't there, but the physical is sure there. My yard is bumpy. My ankles sure get a work out! I was going to try to get a roller to level out the yard, but didn't yet. Another thing to do....
I took out 4 bags of trash from the garage this week, along with some larger pieces that the trash men were nice enough to take along with them. I bagged some things that shouldn't have been bagged, but I just wanted to get rid of it without having to take it to the dump myself.
I have several cans of paint that I have to take over to the hazardous waste site sometime.
I have several places to work on. I will go down to the basement soon and get rid of more stuff. When I leave here, I want to take as little as possible.

I think I allowed my ADD to lead me through this post, and I'm going to leave it alone for now.

Writing it all down

2011-04-08T11:50:00.002-04:00

Last night, I went to my first support group meeting in almost a year. I did go to one other meeting right after my wife died, but haven't been back until now.
The lady speaking was a former nurse, who is now working for Bariatric advantage, which all the WLS people should know about by now.
The interesting thing about this lady was, she is also a post op WLS person, almost 9 years out!
I actually learned some things from her that I didn't know before.
It is interesting about how different parts of the country, different doctors, and teams have their own ideas about how things should be done. I was under the impression that many of them were in agreement about procedures.
As far as I know, there are about 25 different types of surgery for weight loss. They used to call it stomach stapling, but over the years, they narrowed things down to two types of surgery:
1. Lap band
2. Roux en Y

Now, some doctors are opting for a third type of surgery. She only mentioned it in passing, so I'd have to do some research to find it, and I'm too lazy to do that. I imagine it is listed on the Bariatric Advantage website if you want to check it out. You can go from there.

They are also talking about doing a similar type operation just to cure diabetes. We all know that our type II diabetes is essentially gone after our surgery. The doctors are talking about the operation just for that and not weight loss. Interesting.

When I walked in last night, I felt like a rock star. I got more hugs than I've had in years. Many of the people there knew about the ordeal with my wife, and expressed condolences. I like those type of condolences!
One difference between going to a regular meeting and a WLS support group meeting, is that everyone changes, and you have to try to recognize people every single time. They all lose weight. They all get into better shape than the last time you saw them. Wow!
We wear name tags when we get there, and have colored ribbons based on how much we lost. The pre ops want to hang out with the post ops to find out all their secrets, so we become celebrities the farther out we are from our surgery. I should become a saint or prophet next year! :)

The practice has changed too. They have an amazing support team in place, and they are all becoming very good at what they do. They started out good, but have smoothed out many of the problems.

* They now have a pharmacy of sorts. I can get everything there from vitamins, to protein bars. They have all the stuff they recommended that I used to have to search for. I bought two boxes of Strawberry short cake Pure protein bars last night. I haven't seen them anywhere else. And, they were reasonably priced. I will be calling them and ordering everything I can next month ahead of time.

* They now have an in house shrink. She will be holding a class that I will probably attend soon, called "Back on Track". It's a 10 week course, and you already know what it's about from the title. It's made for post ops that are 3 or more years out.
I had heard about this program last year, but it wasn't available to civilians. The counselors were still learning about it. I hope it helps. I need some help right now.
I don't know if the insurance company will cover the expense, but I hope they will.

In the meantime, I recorded a song using my computer and new Martin guitar. I just pressed play and sang into the computer. There were no enhancements. Check out my Facebook page or shoot me an email and I'll send you a link.

Comedy of errors, or am I being haunted?

2011-04-02T21:09:00.002-04:00

I went to Virginia today.
I came back home, not really accomplishing my goal, which was to meet a new person and give them my old TV.
Why?
Well, it seems I am being haunted, so anything I do is foiled by a ghost. Let me make a list of what happened. You decide:

I programmed the address into my GPS. The problem was the address isn't listed yet because the complex is brand new. So, the tomtom can find the general area, but not guide me to the exact location.
I backed up the tomtom with map quest. I entered the exact address, and printed out the map and directions. The problem is that for some reason, the print out only had the town name and zip code. There were no street names. I'm sorry, but I have been having a very hard time remembering things like street names recently (for the past 57 years), so when I tried to recall it, I had no luck. I even drove around the area for over an hour hoping that it would spark my memory. I stopped and asked some people too. They guided me to apartments and condos, but there must have been a million of them.
I programmed the person's name and number into my cell. But, when I went to call them, I got a wrong number. When I looked at the number, I realized I programmed a local number instead of the proper number. So, when I got to the general location, I couldn't call to ask for directions. How many strikes is that?
I forgot to pack my afternoon vitamins, and a protein bar. I had planned on visiting, then heading out to find a motel halfway home so I could veg out with my laptop and take my time going back home the next day. Oh, did I forget to mention that I forgot to take my laptop?

The ride was 180 miles long, and my tomtom wasn't a happy camper. It decided at one point to not show me which way to go, and I ended up driving through downtown DC. It is an amazing place, but not when you're trying to drive through it.
I called a friend halfway there and asked him to try to find the person's cell number online, or to try to contact them on Facebook, but he had no luck.
I still haven't spoken with the person, OK, OK! It's a lady. Give me a break. It could have been a nice day with a nice lady....a date if you will. But, I screwed it up, or rather, my wife came back and caused all these things to happen.
I had conversations with several people on the phone during the ride, and I stopped off at a Wawa and got a wrap and a bag of sun chips. I stayed in VA. until almost 2pm after arriving around 11:30am, but never got a call back from the lady. So I guess our relationship is off to a bad start.
The ride to and from was very nice. I won't let anyone get me down. I'll just move on. I did get to drive my little red car almost 400 miles including the meandering around looking at street names and apartments. The Acura got 33 mile per gallon!
Tomorrow is supposed to be a very nice day. I am going to try to get a good night's sleep and head out early for a long walk on the rail trail. I may get to see my grand kids too since they are in the area.
Life is good!

Pilgrims

2011-03-31T21:23:00.003-04:00

There are times over the years where I have had trouble understanding a situation and no one was there willing to explain it to me.
It was either because I had never seen the situation before, or I just didn't pay attention.
I always felt that the only way to learn something was to experience it, and then read the instructions to re-enforce things. That way, I actually learned something and remembered it later.
I think I have used that many times over the years to help other to understand what is happening when they might not have gotten a full view of something.
I tend to over explain things,a nd I do it on as simple a level as I can, just in case someone is not up to par.
Einstein talked about this, and someone actually wrote it down. He said something to the effect that if someone had a theory, they should also be able to explain it so that almost anyone could understand it. The people didn't have to be mathematicians, but at least they could have a grasp of the theory.
I've found that many people my age go back in their mind to the past, particularly that time when they were teens and had lots of peers and friends that they left behind because they were leaving the nest and starting their lives.
So, a few years ago when the internet was younger, I started my search for closure. I thought about people from back then that I lost touch with and through research, found them again.
I have found all but a very few and have touched base at the very least, and actually spoken with them.
I have been able to understand some of what I missed back then, and filled in enough of the holes in my past that bothered me so much. I have done the same for others who have asked, and even done it with some who didn't ask.
I wrote long letters to many of them.
I feel as if I have done what I can to close up the holes in my heart, and finally start to move on.
But those people, and those times will always be the best time of my life. I will always go back there in my mind and dream about what we did and said, what we felt, and what we experienced together.
Listen to this song and you'll know what I mean. Henry Mancini wrote it. The Carpenters perform it.

Life is Good!
Sometimes

Sunday night before the new week.

2011-03-27T20:27:00.002-04:00

The so-called stress that we have here in this country could be a good excuse for me to blame my fatigue.
All the pressures of life the past year could be responsible.
I don't really think it is a physical cause, other than the fact that I've gained a few pounds from not getting my exercise or eating properly.
I am not going back to the old habits. I just have not been as strict.
Last week, I walked about 12 miles total, which is more than I have in a long time. My feet were actually sore.
This next week, I'm hoping for warmer weather and more energy because I want to walk more.
I have some things I really want to finish, and some that I really want to start.
I listed a bunch of stuff on craigslist and even managed to sell them too. I shipped one item out today and will deliver another item next weekend.

I dragged the back bedroom carpet out to the enclosed porch. I went out there today and boy did it reek! I'm going to drag it down to the curb and hope someone takes it, or maybe the trash men will take pity on me.
I went to find a box to fit the item I shipped and realized I have way too many empty boxes in the basement. I have a ton of stuff up here that I should either throw out, sell or box, so I will start to blend the items together, the boxes and the junk.
I have to organize an area where I can write down lyrics that are going through my head. I have a place to play my guitar and sing, but nowhere to write. I learn songs by listening to someone else doing them. I learn the lyrics by writing them down and singing them over and over. I learn the chords by hearing them in my head. But, I've been having problems remembering as well as I used to, so it's becoming a real chore.
I am going to separate my laptop from my IMAC so I can use it other places. I plan to take it with me when I take drives so I can stop and write things down. I tried using a hand held recorder, but that doesn't work with me.
And of course, I have the things from the previous blog to accomplish. I believe they are all related, and I also believe that they will all come together soon.

In talking with a friend this weekend, I was surprised to hear them say that they have trouble getting things done when they are alone. They say they also let things sit sometimes because they just don't feel like doing it.
It's funny, but just them saying that to me without being prompted, made me feel better. I thought I was the only one who couldn't get things finished.
Because I heard this from someone else, I will be able to work harder now and get more done. That's just the way I am.

This weekend, I asked someone out on a date. I didn't mean to, but I did. This blog is about me. It is in no way a reflection of the lady's response. She said "OK". I've never met this woman. I only know her through Face book, but I like what I see. Do I have to put in all kinds of disclaimers here? I read her comments, I see pictures of her and her family. I see her profile, and I like what I see.
I have thought about asking other women out, but don't think it is appropriate through Face book. Or at least, I didn't.
I'm not sure it's such a good idea for me to start "dating" again so soon after my wife's death, but I have to start sometime. If it doesn't work out, that's fine, as long as I don't run out of the place screaming, things should be OK.

So, next weekend will be a mini vacation for me. I am going to try to book a room halfway between here and my destination on the return trip. I will look for a place to relax, but may just grab a place that allows me to carry my laptop and write.
Let's see what happens.

ZZZZZZzzzzzz

2011-03-25T09:45:00.003-04:00

I've had an entire week of feeling too tired to do much.
I have done things. I took several 2+ mile walks.
I've gathered trash, and done paperwork.
I've kept the house clean.
I went to a new supermarket to see what they have.
I've had an evening of friendship and prayer.

Yesterday, after a 2 mile walk, I came home, ate, and then took a nap because I couldn't keep my eyes open.
Last night, I took another nap at 6pm.
I slept for about 45 minutes the first nap, and an hour for the second.
I went to bed at my normal time and slept through the night.
I feel a bit tired this morning, but have vowed to get something done today.

I could blame the fatigue on the "magic" blanket, but I feel as if it has been helping me. Other than the dreams it has been causing, it feels comfortable on my skin. It is instantly warm, rather than initially cold as the goose down blanket is. This is one of the reasons I never liked top sheets. They feel cold initially before they adjust to body temperature. The crocheted blanket is made from more natural materials. I don't know if it's wool, or some blend, but I like it.

I've started to increase my protein intake through protein bars I've found online. They are made by "Pure Protein" and have a variety of flavors, all good. I've been buying them by the case at BJs, but they were out of them when I last went there. Also, BJs has limited their selection to just one flavor.
The protein bar has 200 calories and only 2% sugar, so it's well within my dietary limits. You can't tell that it's so low in sugar, it tastes much sweeter.

I've also started to increase my liquid intake also. I am drinking an extra quart bottle of crystal lite every night before bed. It doesn't make me have to pee in the middle of the night and satisfies my need of wanting something to eat or drink while watching TV or winding down the day.

So, I've left some things go this week, but it seems I needed the time off. I am so lucky to be able to have the time to rest when I need it. Society today throws so much stress out there, that if I were working full time, I'd probably drop over right now. I would feel guilty taking a day off, but I'm able to drive the bus and still find time to rest when I need, and work when I have to.

Thank God for the break.

I am writing this to tell you that I went back in and edited this entry tonight. It seems I really am tired and had some blaring/glaring mistakes. I don't know what my fatigue is from, but I am fighting through it. I still have to pace myself in order to be a safe school bus driver.
OK, now for the next entry....

High Street and Lows

2011-03-21T12:03:00.004-04:00

Looking across my yard as the fire is being put out.

Back of house.

So, I'm on my way home from an amazing 4 mile+ walk on the rail trail. I'm coming up the street and I see black smoke near my house. The first thing I think is "someone is burning trash" which is illegal in our area.
As I get to the house next door, I see that their house is on fire.
I stop and look and see the side of the house near their kitchen with bright orange flames.
Now, I have been de-sensitized by watching all the garbage on TV and movies with all the horrible disasters. Something was different about this.
There was no horror music. The only sounds I can hear is the crackling of the fire, breaking glass, and popping noises.
I noticed that the smoke was going straight up, and it was very high.
I saw someone on the front lawn with a cell phone, so I knew that she was calling 911 for help, so I drove my car home in order to clear the street for the fire equipment.
My driveway is on the other side from the fire, so I walked back over (I couldn't run because I had just completed a 4 + mile walk) to the front of the house. A lady was trying to go into the house through the front door.
I yelled to the lady to not open the door because I was afraid there would be a back draft and she could get hurt. She asked me what to do.
I told her to bang on the door and go carefully around to the back of the house and start yelling.
In the meantime, I kept looking to see if I could see anyone inside.
Other people showed up and I told them to yell from the front which they did.
Things are a bit hazy, but I remember thinking how fast the flames were spreading and as big as the fire was, it might spread to my house.
I went back to my house and tried to get the garden hose set up, which required a trip to the basement to turn the line on, then go get the hose and attach it to the spigot. I took a look at the side of the house and decided it wasn't safe. So, I got my camera and started taking pictures.
In the meantime, all the emotions of the past year hit me and I became a total mess.
I couldn't think, I couldn't react. All I could do was watch.
By this time, I went back to the front of the house since the fire company arrived, and I watched them set up and start to fight the fire.
I decided to get out of the way, so I walked back to my yard and took more pictures. Then, I remembered I had a video feature on my camera and I set that up and started it running. (see video below. It is uncut and the voice is me trying to call my son while recording)
I also took a picture with my cell and sent that out to my kids.
During the course of the event, I lost track of time, but I remember seeing two neighbors trying to get into the house to try to save one of the dogs. They had to turn back because of the heat.
The house is a frame structure and the fire spread so fast that it was surreal. One minute, it was at the kitchen, and the next, it was all the way through the house. It also took out the garage which was about 6 feet from the house. The vinyl siding just melted, and left insulation exposed.
The car was burned on the right front, but the rest of it was spared.
I could feel the heat and smell the burning wood, and hear the crackling of the fire, which didn't sound at all like the movies. The odor is still in my lungs.
The people lost everything, but they are safe. The lady managed to save one of the dogs but the other was killed.

Garage after.

I didn't sleep too well last night and had to take a nap this morning. I left a note on the neighbor's car window offering what little help I could.

I was hoping to write a more positive blog report today. I was able to sell my blue car, pending pick up tonight.
I mentioned the walk, but I also took a cleansing long drive on Saturday. It really helped to get away for a little while. I need more time away.
I am making progress on the house, and will try to walk again tomorrow. I have sore feet today.
My thoughts and prayers to the family next door.

What's really important?

2011-03-16T10:09:00.002-04:00

When I was a kid, we used to "dream build" by imagining what we would do if we had a million dollars.
Of course, now, we would have to have at least 10 million dollars, but the idea is the same.

Is there real value in money? I don't know because I've never had any worth talking about.
Is there value in health? Yes. I know that for sure having been on both sides of the fence.
Is there value in owning things? Yes. I value many material things. I would miss them if they were lost, broken, stolen, or taken away from me.

Is there value in family? It seems we don't appreciate that as much as we should. People related to me by blood are for the most part, not really happy with how I turned out. People who became family through other means are pretty much the same. So, for personal experience, I'd have to say there is not much value there.

Is there value in friendship? Yes. I think that rather than being able to choose my friends, I have been chosen. I have been honored.

So, if I had money, what would I do with it?
Money to me means freedom to be able to do all of the things I want to do rather than doing the things I have to do.
I wouldn't want to become lazy and just lay around on a beach all day. But, I would probably change things a bit to allow me to travel and see the world.

I would be able to take the time to "walk the Appalachian Trail, or something similar to that. In order to hike the entire trail, a person would have to be able to take at least 6 months off from what they normally do. For me, it would mean not being able to work. Since I depend on work in order to live, I couldn't do that. If I didn't have to work, I could take the time, if I chose. So, it's more of an ideal situation rather than an actual thing. Walking the trail could mean sailing around the world, or taking off to a 3rd world country to help others, or volunteering somewhere here in the States. Or, choosing how and when I worked, instead of having to work in order to survive. I wouldn't have any problem working at Burger King for low wages if I knew I had enough money to be comfortable when I wasn't working. I don't think I would be idle.

Before I found Bariatric, I read about the "Fat man walking". I believe I wrote about it on this blog way back when. This guy basically walked away from all his responsibilities by walking across the country in order to lose weight he had gained since leaving the military. He left his wife and kids behind and just started walking. He tried to write about it in order to offset some costs, but ended up screwing up the life he left behind. He lost his family, and really ended up looking like a fool. And, he didn't really lose the weight.

If I had the money (security), I would walk across the country. But the difference between him and me, would be that I would plan the trip. I would not be leaving anything or anyone behind. And, I would be walking towards a goal rather than walking away from a problem.

People today are looking for heroes. They are trying to see something in others that doesn't exist.

Another guy I saw recently had a gift of having an amazing voice. He could make anyone feel good just by talking. But, he had so much emotional baggage, as well as a substance abuse problem. He was on the street for a good reason. He needed medical and psychological assistance.

But the hero hunters found him and handed him way more than anyone could hope to have. He got his "million dollars" handed to him. He screwed it up too because he wasn't prepared or (maybe?) worthy of it.

The way I see it, there are always people who need help in some way. If they reach out for it with the goal of using that help as a "hand up" and not a "hand out", then they should be helped. Of course there are people out there who will always need help and they aren't a part of this discussion. Those people should be helped no matter what.

I have problems and could use some help. But, I won't run away from my problems by walking away from them. I won't ever take help from someone without expecting to use that help as a "hand up" in order to get back on my feet.

How someone got into the situation isn't as important here as what they intend to do to get back to where they should be.

I may not want to get back to where I should be. I may not deserve to be helped. I may need to be left alone in order to figure out where I need to be, and what I should do to get there. This is why I am not doing something like walking away from my problems.

Some time down the road, I may walk away from my problems. I do think about the extreme solutions. I really don't think I'll ever get that far.

Life is good!

So, what would I do if I had the money?

I would get out of debt.
I would get a "real" bathroom and a "real" kitchen for my house.
I would hire someone to help me clean so I could spend time working on my life instead of working for my life.
I would hire people to help me finish fixing the house instead of trying to do it all myself.
I would take a real vacation. I've never had one that lasted for more than 4 or 5 days. I've always come back from them feeling worse than before I left.
I would host a party. Can't afford to do that now.

Would I buy a fancy expensive new car? No. I am happy with the ones I have now. I might even keep both of them instead of selling one to help cover expenses.
Would I buy a yacht? No, but maybe a kayak.
I might buy a motorcycle, but only because I enjoy riding and would like to do that more.
Would I buy a condo at the shore? No, I might rent a place so I could vacation there when I needed time off.

Oh, do I need time off right now.

Would I quit my job? Yes. I like my job, but it doesn't earn me enough money to continue to live here much longer, and I can't take off from it in order to go anywhere. I am also not as confident in my skills as a driver as I used to be. I don't want to hurt anyone, or be hurt myself, so I wouldn't want to drive for a living.
I would like to find a village somewhere that I could live where I don't have to drive to get around. If I needed a car, I could rent one, or take a bus, train, or donkey.

When I was young, I thought about the possibilities of owning a large house/property and making lots of money. Now, I would rather have the time alone or with close friends. I'm no longer interested in the rat race, or working for someone else who has these unrealistic expectations. I work to live. I don't live to work.

The answer?

2011-03-14T18:58:00.007-04:00

Since I started writing this blog: (maybe not in order. My mind doesn't work like that!)

I've re-mortgaged the house in order to consolidate monthly payments.
Watched my wife get sick and die very slowly.
Tried to counsel my son.
Tried to counsel my future daughter in law.
Lost my father to alzheimer's.
Lost my brother in law.
Lost both of my dogs.
Lost all 4 of our cats. (The dogs were mine! The cats, not so much)
Seen what 3 quarters of a million dollars worth of medical bills look like.
Held more cash in my hands (actual cash) than I ever have in my entire life.
Held power of attorney for the first time.
Had major surgery.
Been diagnosed with Celiac Sprue (I am being retested for this in the early summer because they don't think I fit the profile).
Lost more weight than I ever have at one time, and kept most of it off.
Bought a car just because I liked it, totally oblivious to the fact that it's a very impractical car.
Had a guitar designed and built just for me.
Had 2 amplifiers designed and built for me.
Bought a TV that I can actually see without squinting.
Gave away all of my clothing because they were too big.
Bought all new clothing.
Bought winter underwear that was comfortable and warm for the first time.
Bought shoes that are comfortable and warm, and will be comfortable and cool in the summer.
Cried more in 6 months than I have for the previous 56 years.
Said "yes" more than I have in years.
Said "no" more than I have in years.
Came back early from a vacation.
Rented a car bigger than a shoebox.
Had total control over my life for the first time in my entire life.
Prayed more than I ever have in my entire life.
Been alone more than I ever have in my entire life, and not gone crazy.

What's next?
I have no idea but here is some of what I plan to do:

Finish painting the house.
Get rid of all the rest of the extra junk. The house will only have what I need in it.
Start jogging.
Walk at least 10 miles in one trip.
Kayak at least once.
Go to Florida for at least a week, maybe two.
Write 15 songs.
Write a book.
Lose another 40 pounds or more.

So, what did you do the last 3 years?

The line

2011-03-12T15:10:00.002-05:00

I wrote about milestones last year. They were specific points in time that allowed me to see that things have changed.
These things were important to me because my way of thinking changed when they happened.
Milestones are very important to children, but as we get older, we don't always feel the emotions involved, or actually notice the change because we become de-sensitized over the years.

Imagine what it will feel like the first time I have to ask a woman out on a date after losing my wife last year, and being married for 34 years.

Obviously, if you're human, you can imagine something like this as being similar in feeling to being a teen and asking a girl out for the first time.
I haven't experienced those emotions for a very long time.
Will My body and mind be able to handle it? I could drop dead from a heart attack!!!!

I am going a bit overboard here, but you get the idea.

Now, while you read this, think about the changes that have happened to me (or you!) as you contemplate major surgery just because you're fat!
How may changes will you go through that you haven't considered or are not ready for because you've decided to go through with it?

What will your partner think? How will they react? Will they actually tell you how they feel, or will they keep it inside? What about your parents? Friends? Boss?

These changes for the most part, are worth everything you go through in order to lose the weight. All of the stress of the choice you make, is worth it, no matter what.
Right after I had the surgery, my wife of 34 years died. If I can make it through that, you can make it too. Believe me, it isn't fun, and my heart is broken. But, I will survive.

I know fellow WLS people who went through the surgery around the same time as me and have had to go back for more surgery for other problems, but I don't think any of them would have the WLS reversed.
I know that not everyone is happy with the hanging skin, or the absolute attention to proper diet, exercise, and the discipline required, but they are alive and for the most part, healthy again.

Will I win the battle?

I fight with that question every day. Some days, I get up and feel like I'm 10 pounds heavier. I retain fluids, or I lose them rapidly. Strange things like that keep me from doing certain things to keep from being embarrassed. That's OK, because I will eventually conquer the problems, or learn to deal with them and move on.

So, now, I come to the title of this post. Everything above this was dealing with an ending to milestones, and a beginning to the line.

Approaching the line.
Crossing the line.
What's on the other side of the line?
Why is there a line?
What is the line?

OK, maybe you don't have a line. But, I'm guessing you do. If you have been contemplating WLS this line has been bothering you for a long time, and it isn't just about being fat. It's part of your every day life.
That is why I'm a big fan of counseling after the surgery, as well as being part of a support group.
Our being fat isn't a "glandular" problem. It's between our ears.

We haven't learned how to eat properly.
We don't exercise.
We don't quit eating when full.
We are more concerned about others than we are with ourselves.
We don't care about ourselves.

Pick one, or all of the above.
So, we all approach the line and decide what to do. It's scary to go across the line. It's scary to even approach it. It's easier to just keep doing the same old thing rather than to take the leap and cross the line.
Personally, I am afraid to succeed just as much as I am afraid to fail. Think about that, please. To me, they are the same thing.
I will shy away from the line every time! So, where does that leave you if you were hoping for an answer here?
Well, I crossed the line. I was so far down, that I went into my bedroom one day, and prayed to God to either kill me, or make me better. That was the only way I was able to cross the line.
I didn't do it on my own. Believe me, I'm not a fan of religion. I was given a hand to help me cross the line. I'm glad the decision wasn't made to kill me!

So, the line could be fear of failure, or fear of success.
The line could be fear of the unknown.
The line could be fear of death.
The line could be from experiences from the past.
It could be from laziness, or comfort.

I always wondered why some people never had a line. I know of people who make a decision and go for it, no matter what. I'm not like that, but maybe someday I'll try it.
Or not....

I now know what is on the other side of the line. I know it isn't success,or the end of the story.
My problems are still with me, but, I am still here too.
I know that I will probably be fighting the rest of my life. I still have the line in front of me. It's not just one line. It's many lines:

I have been comfortable living in the house I've been in since 1992. My kids were raised here, and I've worked hard to take care of it all these years. I have been going back and forth whether or not to sell the place. I can't live anywhere else cheaper. The mortgage and expenses are controlled or at least predictable, so I know what to expect. It's comfortable. It's comfortable. But, is it the right thing to do? The other side of the line is scary. If I sell the place, what will happen? I don't have my parents to advise me, or to tell me what to do. My wife is gone, so no counsel there either. My friends have given opinions on both sides of the fence. So, the choice is mine. The line is there.

In my entire life, I've never had to make a decision on my own. Never! If you read the beginning of this piece, you will start to understand that this is just like asking a a girl out on a first date, but without the safety net. I've never been without that safety net until now. Phew!

I have played guitar since I was 11. I am good, but do I have anything left to offer? Will anyone want to listen to me? Can I make a living playing? Will my health allow me to abandon the "normal" lifestyle and finally pursue a dream that has been with me since I first started playing?

Who knows if I can do it all? Can I continue to be healthy and lose the rest of the weight I need to lose? Can I afford to live if I abandon the normal life of working for a living? Can I do what it takes to do all these things necessary for survival?
The fear is in me. It's almost tangible.
Many of the things I wrote about when I started this blog, I didn't do. They were dreams back then, but I just didn't follow through.

I didn't get to go to Hershey Park. I wanted to buy a season pass and spend my spare time there, just walking, and riding the rides. I didn't do it. I haven't even been there yet.
I wanted to kayak. I am not sure I will get to do that either.
I wanted to take some really long walks. I have taken some as long as 4 miles. But, I need to go 5-10 miles to really feel like I've crossed that line.
I want to jog. I don't need to run a marathon. I don't have anything to prove. But, I want to feel what it's like to jog. The runner's high? I'm not sure I want to go that far. If I injure myself while running, it will mess up my exercise plans.

One of the lines I find interesting, and I have crossed a number of times, is the ability to ignore a schedule. One thing in particular has been to start walking after dark. I live in an area where I can walk safely after dark.
The line occurs because "normalcy" require us to wind down at night before bed so we can get a good night's sleep. We work hard every day, so we can sleep at night.
I used to work at night as a musician and sleep during the day. I used to walk at night because I was so pumped up from playing that I couldn't sleep. There were times when I was a kid, that I would go over to the track at the junior high school and run until I dropped. It was strange to run all out when you couldn't see, not worrying about running into anything. It was exhilarating!
I don't drink, so going to a bar at night really isn't fun for me. I don't like watching sports on TV, or talking to drinkers. I don't like being alone, or trying to order something from a bartender when I have so many restrictions. I won't take up drinking just to be around people.
So, one of my next lines to cross will be to find a female to socialize with. I will ask her out on a date, and hope that she is the one so I don't have to cross over any more lines.
Yeah, I know I'll have lots more lines to cross.

Milestone revisited!

2011-03-07T20:08:00.002-05:00

How far I've come since my initial surgery.
I've decided to write a new blog so that I can concentrate this one on bariatric, and the other will be my venting outlet.
I have reached many new milestones and passed them.
This summer, I plan to start running. I am already almost doing that because I am walking so fast that I feel as if it's the logical next step. I want to run on the trail so that I can save my feet from the asphalt surface. Other parts of my legs will suffer too if I'm not careful.
I plan to start playing out as I've talked about many times already.
I still haven't made it to Hershey Park. I still haven't taken a real vacation. But, that isn't the fault of the weight loss. Life happens.
I have been looking at Kayaks. I have a close friend who kayaks with his wife and I may just try to hook up with them for one of their jaunts.
I am physically and mentally ready for the next step. I am not financially ready, however, and I want to try to keep that from becoming a problem.
Who knows what will happen next? I am surprised every day!

The blanket

2011-03-06T05:25:00.002-05:00

Back when my wife was pregnant with our first child, she was working at a Hotel.
They had a very nice medical benefit's package. When the doctor told her that she should take it easy during the last 6 weeks of her ordeal, her employer told her she could take a leave of absence and the insurance plan would cover her pay. Then, he would allow her to take the following 6 weeks after the birth, if timing worked out that way. 12 weeks total.
My wife cut back her hours instead, and was able to work until just before her labor. This allowed her to take almost all of the 12 weeks after she gave birth.
While she was at home, she decided to keep her hands busy by crocheting a blanket. Since she didn't have one single color of yarn (I can't spell skein!), she just picked up the next skein of yarn when she finished the last one.
Her work of art turned into an amazing creation.

Side track:

When we were growing up, we always had single beds, which were so small. So, one of the things we talked about was getting the biggest bed we could find when we got married.
I was able to find a king size water bed with full wave mattress for $100.00 in the paper. I bought it for it's sheer size. If you don't know anything about them, a king size water bed is bigger than a king size regular mattress bed. We didn't know this at the time, and didn't find out until we tried to buy sheets and blankets for it.

So, we had a king size blanket that was really too small for the king size water bed.
Hence, the reason for my wife to make her own larger blanket.

Back to the story now:

The blanket sometimes used more than one skein of yarn per row, so Donna tried to match the colors as best she could. But, with time, she was running out of options, so she just used what she had. We really didn't have the money to spend on new yarn, and I didn't see the purpose to buy more yarn when we still had some. I didn't mind the color mix and neither did she. I believe she used 19 skeins altogether, although my memory is weak about that.

When finished, the blanket draped over the bed very nicely, from top to bottom, and side to side. It more than covered the bed, so we had something that finally fit the huge bed.
We did buy a new mattress with baffles in it soon after we got the bed, but we kept the beautiful blanket as our main cover for a long time. It was a loosely woven blanket, so there were holes in between the stitches, but it kept us warm none the less. It stretched with us, and never shrank, even though we washed it many times. It was a real bear to hang to dry, however, because it stretched so much, and was so big.
Over time, some of the stitches came loose and had to be repaired. There were also some small holes that formed. But the blanket stayed comfortable for us.
The dogs slept on it. The cats slept on it. The kids slept on it. We slept on it and under it. It was part of the family.

When we later got rid of that water bed and had a new one made for us, the blanket made the transfer right along with us.

Through the years when I got too fat, I was always too warm, and Donna always too cold. I would get leg cramps from the heavy blankets that Donna used. She added an electric blanket when we got rid of the water mattress and replaced it with a regular mattress (Called a California King). I decided to finally spend some money and bought a goose down blanket. It was very light, and sooooo warm. I used to push or fold the other blankets over so that I didn't have to sleep with them. Donna had her half dozen blankets, and I had just two. The goose down, and the tutti frutti colored blanket. I also hated top sheets, so I would push the sheet over and sleep under the blankets.

This covers the time from around 1979 when she started making the blanket, until March of 2010.

Donna went into the hospital in February 2010, and never came home. Sometime in March, I decided I needed to get the best sleep I could, so I arranged the bed to my liking. Everything before that time was a compromise (and one that I would gladly make again if she were beside me). I took all of the blankets off the bed, except for the goose down. I threw out the electric blanket, and stored the crocheted one after washing it.

When Donna died, I cleared a lot of stuff out, but kept the blanket in a laundry hamper next to the bed.

There it stayed until this past Sunday night. I changed out the sheets and decided to put it onto the bed. Actually, that's not true.

I did have it on the bed, but it was folded in half and only on Donna's side. I don't sleep on that side, even though I can sleep anywhere I want now.
It was just this past weekend that I decided to unfold it and sleep with it.
It smelled wonderful, and felt so soft. I didn't even mind the extra weight because it stretches so nicely.

This is where the story goes off the deep end a bit:

I usually have good dreams. Even when I have bad ones, I can remember afterward where they come from. That is, what part of the recent events caused me to remember things. My brain kind of "de-frags", mixing and matching events that occurred, sometimes out of order. I dream accordingly, so if I see a good movie, I live in that movie while experiencing events that actually occurred during the past week or so.
When I wake in the morning, things usually seem a little more normal for me.

Well, as soon as I started sleeping with this blanket, things have gone all out of proportion. I have had some very wild dreams, and even what I would refer to as nightmares. The events from the past week are still sorting themselves out, but there are other things that don't seem to fit, or they fit badly. Good events turn bad and so on.

I have been having this problem since I started using the blanket. I haven't had a good night's sleep. I am waking up after each nightmare and having trouble getting back to sleep.

I decided that am going to keep sleeping with the blanket until it is finished unloading all of it's memories. I believe this is all part of the grieving process. The crazy thing is I thought the grieving was finished for now, with only minor interruptions in my life. Apparently not.

So, the journey goes on. I will keep using the blanket until one of us wins the battle. I hope it's me. I don't think the blanket can take care of the house if I'm not here.