Category: Family

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Okay I may have pissed a friend off

I think my friend wanted or needed compassion and reassurance. I failed him utterly, and I feel bad about that.

We were having a text conversation about Trump and Covid-19.

He was, I think upset about allegations that Trump is withholding resources from States whose Governors hadn’t kissed the ring.

While that might be true and I have no reason to doubt it, and said so, given Trump…

I was perhaps too cold and calculating, Maybe he needed someone to say it’s gonna be okay.

I probably misread the situation…

For me this Covid-19 thing was blatantly obvious back in January.

Look at the data: China closes an industrial center, but doesn’t stop air travel or domestic travel. Travelers from Wuhan arrive in multiple countries either as carriers or not yet sick. Airports are contaminated and a viral outbreak begins.

The logic is this. Once the first carrier arrived in the US, we were going to see deaths. I jumped past all the fear, confusion, mis-information, and panic to Triage mode.

In a coldly logical manner I accepted that deaths were going to be high, (making the assumption that China was not entirely truthful, otherwise why close a major industrial center?) and that the entire world would be affected. From that perspective – I’ve accepted that we were probably unprepared, and that resources would be limited.

Those resources would therefore logically be allocated based on need (raw numbers of infected and dead), not want. I accepted that we would not be able to create what we didn’t already have in less than a couple of months and that our production ability would be hampered by the disease taking it’s toll in a global environment.

A vaccine would be at least a year out if not more.

Politicians or governments wouldn’t be able to do anything but shit themselves, while waving their hands so that they looked like they were doing something in the eyes of a largely ignorant populace.

Their efforts would be to maintain political power. If they survive, their hope is to come out on the other side looking like effective leaders so they can keep their power.

To me, this is all completely logical. It’s the way things work in our world. I neither condone or condemn it. I simply accept that it is a fact.

It’s like water is wet, fire is hot, wind blows, the ground is hard, and Scientists are usually ignored until shit hits the fan.

I call it realism. But perhaps it’s a sign of something darker that I’ve been all my life.

Does this make me a bad person? Does this make me broken?

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I suspect we’re about to become dogless.

IMG 0210The last of the dogs is OLD, I mean really old.

He’s had by my count 2 big seizures and with each one he gets weaker.

On the plus side, he’s had a good life, at least since he came to live with us.

We think he was abused and for our part we’ve been able to give him a loving peaceful home.IMG 0004

Here he’s been spoiled, cuddled, loved, even though he’s stubborn as hell, and now he’s nearing the end of his life.

It’s sad but part of nature. 

This guy came from a household that didn’t pay him any attention, and possibly may have abused him. 

In this household he learned to play and that toys were for him. He learned that people loved, and wanted him, and that he didn’t need to be afraid, even when he messed up.

He learned that printers can be barked at when they start making printer noises and spitting paper at him. He learned that his people would laugh at his antics and tell him he was a good boy.

After many years in this household he’s nearing the end of his life.

He’s gone blind, and over the past month or so, has lost a lot of weight. 

He’s learned that when he needs to go outside, his people will carry him up or down the evil stairs setting him gently on his favorite patch of the yard, or on the top deck where he can go inside under his own power. He’s learned that we’ll still tell him he’s a good boy and give him treats.

Up until the past few weeks or so he’s been his usual happy self, but now he’s sleeping a lot and not particularly interested in much. 

Sound like a Grandpa you know?

I’ve been looking for a job using my laptop in the living room so I can be near him when he wakes up.

He gets upset if he wakes up alone. I think he wakes up not knowing exactly where he is.

All I have to do is speak to him, reassure him that all is well, he’s safe, and someone is guarding him. Typically, he’ll breathe a sigh of contentment get a drink of water, and go back to sleep

He’s snoozing now, chasing bunnies in his sleep. That’s a good thing, at least in his dreams he has a chance of catching them. He was never fast enough to catch them in his youth, but he loved chasing after bunnies and squirrels.

I’m melancholy about his ending and can only comfort him. Well, that and share a bit of my breakfast bagel with him, which he highly approves of.

It’s tough letting go of someone you love. I’ve always thought of my dogs as people not lesser beings. Generally they’ve picked me to be their human, not the other way around. 

It’s been a honor to have been their person. Even in the heartbreak of losing them I’ve been happy to have had them in my life.

I’ve decided that there will be another dog or two in my life. I’ve also decided that I’m going to get rid of used rugs, (placed on the floor to keep the elderly dogs from slipping on the hardwood,) the well used dog beds, and many of the toys. That will give the new dog(s) a fresh start in their new home, a place which they can make their own.

Oh, it won’t be for months at least. I’m not going to be ready to open my heart again until it’s healed from losing Red.

A friend of mine says that your dogs that have passed will send you a new dog who needs you as much as you need them.

I hope he’s right.

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Now, can we get back to business?

Trumpnews.jpgIt’s been a week hasn’t it?

Trump delivers a very nice state of the union address. Regardless if you hate him or love him, it was up lifting, positive and heart warming.

Nancy Pelosi demonstrates her frustration and disgust with The President.

Trump is acquitted.

(I’ll bet Nancy was throwing stuff after that vote)

pelosipissed.jpgAnd Trump’s “Victory Lap” was embarrassing.

Mr President, you need to keep your list of enemies private. That way, when they disappear you can shrug your shoulders, maintain plausible deniability, and assign your shittiest investigators to “determine” what happened. On inconclusive results you can say, “I don’t know…”ultimatebs.jpg

When you’re handed a victory, you should just say something like, “It’s as we’ve always maintained, this was a purely political stunt. Now that this matter is cleared up I & the Whitehouse will be able to get back to work.”

You see, that would freak out your enemies far more than letting them know they’re your enemies. They’d never know if or when you were coming for them.

You might want to ask President Putin for some pointers… 

That’s not to imply any collusion between you and Russia. It’s simply acknowledging that President Putin was a spy and there’s no doubt in my mind that he knows how to deal with enemies.

For that matter you might consider hiring some Southerners. My Dad once told me, “If you have a run of really bad luck, look for an enemy.” Which is to say that Southerners have long known how to smile in the face of adversity and then just when their enemies are least expecting it. They put the knife where it can do the most good.

Just a couple of thoughts for your next four years.

OH STOP!

We all know that Trump is going to be The President four more years. The Candidates from the other parties are… Uh, well, Pitiful! Based on what I’ve seen I wouldn’t vote for any of them to wipe my ass.

To be sure, I’ve been looking. For once in my life I’d like to cast my vote not for the lesser of two evils, but for someone that I actually believe in.

You know, someone who’s honorable, dignified, logical, has great personal presence, and who’s in the game for the people, not them self.

I don’t give a shit what color they are, their sexual preference, or gender.

Full disclosure;

I actually agree with some of Trumps opinions and policies. I also agree with some of the Democratic policies. Please remember; I have maintained for years that neither party has all the answers and extreme polarization is not serving the best interest of the American People.

Do I like President Trump? Uhhh rarely. Did I vote for President Trump? Nope. Did I vote for Hillary? Absofuckinglutely NOT!

Had Hillary become President, I’d have seriously considered becoming a citizen of Russia. At least then I’d have known what I was in for.

To her credit though, She apparently knows how to deal with her enemies. Albeit she’s sloppy. The trick is to be able to keep your hands clean. That’s why there are professionals for these sort of things. Erase the drives or tapes, THEN have a terrible fire! Didn’t we learn that with Richard Nixon’s infamous 18 minutes?

The problem with being Machiavellian or implementing Vlad Dracul’s way of governing is that you can’t nibble on the barrel. You have to go all in. You’ve got to commit totally.

As it turns out, few people have the stomach for it.  Which may be why world governments aren’t more fucked up than they are.

I actually see that as a sign of hope. Hey, gotta see the positive where you can…

In other events:

I thought going into this week that I’d extricated myself from a company whose website I’d been maintaining for years.

Uh, NOPE!

I don’t know if it was their intention but they really fucked me up. On the plus side it confirmed that I was on the right course and made the right decision. On the down side every email, & text really pissed me off. Honestly, I had expected it to be difficult because I’d  been too nice.

breakuptxt.jpgI gave them months to prepare. After spending 4 hours on the phone Friday & Saturday with the hosting company it appeared that their website was fully and completely their own. Then, I’m guessing that they got an estimate from a couple of web designers and shit themselves.

After that, they came back at me, trying to guilt and manipulate me into maintaining their site. 

The problem is, that each message pushed me into a rage. So I lost a number of days because I just walked away from the computer and couldn’t look at anything digital. 

I went so far as to shut down all the tech just because I was tired of being needled. Phone, computer, even my apple watch. I do like the simplicity of my good ol fashioned wind up watch.

You’d think that would be a good thing. No Tech for days on end…

Well, yes and no.

Yes, because it’s remarkably quiet and there are fewer distractions.  

No because when you turn the tech back on, your shit explodes with all the missed messages and you’re stuck scanning and deleting all the BS in one long irritating session. (Next time, I’m going to have a whiskey or two while dealing with it.)

After spending yet more time writing a polite email explaining that I wasn’t interested in teaching them HTML, CSS, and JAVA. Wherein I attempted to describe the basic mechanics and suggesting that they use a pretty nice tool they already have, that’s completely graphic and requires no knowledge of HTML. The whole time I was writing this polite email, I was receiving texts that read like those you get during a bad breakup or divorce.

Anyhow, after sending the email, they sent me a snotty response. “Fine,” I thought, “They finally got it.”

The next day they try again to engage me, it almost felt like they were trying to trick me into helping them.

I was walking around the place asking myself, “Was I not clear? Did I write above their reading level? What part of ‘No’ don’t they understand?”

Then I realized they didn’t want to understand what I was saying.

They wanted it to be personal, painful, and ugly. In effect it was a form of bullying. So I just blocked any communications from them. (Thank you Apple!)

I have other things to do. One of which, is living my life on my terms not the whims of others. To do that, I need to not be pissed off all the time.

In retrospect, I should have turned them loose years ago. The very first time they complained about the price.

That’s a lesson/note to self for the future, “If someone bitches about the cost when you know you’ve lowballed it… Walk the fuck away! It’s a losing proposition.”

Today, I’m feeling better. Oddly, I’m not missing them or their bullshit in the least. Go figure!

Now I’m ready to tackle some things I promised real “Friends” and can do so without being annoyed by people who claim to be my friends only when they’re ramping up to ask me for something.

Job Search:

I was trying to rewrite my resume when all the bullshit above was going on. I simply gave up. I’m going to be using the weekend splitting time between it, writing in general, and keeping promises.

There has been no activity at all on the resumes that I’ve already sent. I’m getting down to the wire and fingers crossed I’ll still be able to pull my ass out of the fire.

Hope everyone has a happy weekend.

I’m sure as hell going to try!