Story Journal Microblog

by dozens

The most interesting / story-worthy thing that happened to me today was ...

2024-11-28 ¶

Had a good Thanksgiving. Friend of mine mocked me, "I don't celebrate genocide." I don't either my dude. I celebrate friends and family. Went down to the lake to skip rocks with the kids. Two usually very mischievious kids were playing so nicely all night long. Turns out it was only because they absolutely trashed the upstairs bathroom though. Squeezed several tubes of toothpaste all over the walls. Plastered a whole roll of toilet paper to the wall in the shower. Who knows what else. Reputations intact. Little gremlins. Otra volunteered to give the other kid a bath. Later, neither of us could really figure out why: they don't have any experience with kids, nor bathing them. But they were trying to be helpful. They ask the kid, Do you usually get your hair washed? And the kid goes, Yep! And the kid hangs their head forward with their hair hanging down. Instead of backward which I think is what most people would do. Otra gets a cup of water and dumps it on the kid's head. Kid squeals. "I was not expecting that!" Shampoo happens. And then Otra fills up another cup of water to rinse the suds. But they don't check the temperature. And they dump a big cup of freezing cold water over the kid's head. The kid squeals again, but not in delight this time, and they cry and cry and cry and cry. Happy Thanksgiving!

2024-11-27 ¶

I asked my partner, hey I know we joke around about it a lot but do you actually think I really am on the spectrum? And they go, well. If a 1 is mildly autistic and a 10 is very autistic ... You're not a 1!

2024-11-21 ¶

I saw a hummingbird!

2024-11-20 ¶

Apparently the public school board here is both comically corrupt and improbably inept, and also entirely crippled and impotent due to its own tangled bylaws and convoluted self-governance. I went to a political rally, I guess? of Concerned Parents who are launching a PAC. Not a Super PAC, but just a Really Good PAC. I went because my friend—in addition to being a Concerned Parent themself—is also a long time professional political campaigner and activist, and is the one creating the PAC for this group, and they were giving a little speech, and I was there to support them! The gathering was at a large brewery down by the college campus. There were several little meetups happening. It must be a very common event space. We had the back corner reserved. The staff said they'd turn off of the music for us for the speech portion of the event, and they did, but only for like, 45 seconds or so, and then they turned it back on. Which in my mind was just kind of rude, and worse than just leaving the noise on the whole time. But the speakers shouted, and the attendees crowded in close to hear, and it was fine. The goal of the PAC is to groom some candidates, educate them and give them tons of money and resources, and then run them for office and unseat the current board. Present were a couple of politicians: one successfully got onto the board a couple years ago and then was some how ousted from their position by the rest of the board? One of them ran for the board a couple years ago and didn't make it. They told me, "You wouldn't believe the stuff that happens behind closed doors. It's not as bad as House Of Cards, but almost." Dear lord! Exactly how many prostitute murders has the public school board committed and covered up?????

2024-11-19 ¶

Big blizzard coming through. Went into town to pick up some canned food because we expect to get snowed in and maybe lose power for a couple days. Jump on a zoom call to play table talk games with the Lantern Light crew, but sure enough lose power about thirty minutes into play. Sad! Looking forward to cozying up for like, 12 hours of no power. But then the owner of the cabin we're staying at says no, when the power goes out, it usually stays out for a couple days, up to a week. More than we bargained for. We can get down off the mountain if we leave right now before the storm has a chance to get really bad. Scramble around throwing stuff into backpacks. Drive through icy roads, blinding snow. Stay behind a semi truck and drive in its wake. Couple of trees are down in the roads already. One I can carefully drive around. The second is actively being blown across the highway. Swerve to avoid it. Take a small log to the hood anyway. (It's fine. Left a few small scratches, no damage.) Make it over the pass. Weather calms and conditions improve as we descend into the city. Make it to our friends' house. Whew! It's late, everybody is already asleep. Let ourselves in and head down to the guestroom. Guess we're staying in the city for a couple days!

2024-11-02 ¶

Went for a walk down the Primitive Road and went farther than we've ever gone before! Once again. And this time found a labeled and maintained trail: "Diaper Run 0.75 mi." Went down Diaper Run, unsure what we might find. What we found was not diapers, but the rocky, sandy lakeshore. And a huge, vibrant rainbow. Let the dog off leash to run around and he went full tilt bonk. Barking at the water as it lapped up on shore. Jumping off rocks. Carrying sticks.

2024-10-26 ¶

Twin Falls, Idaho is situated right next to an improbably huge, deep gorge carved by the Snake River. One minute you're in town, and the next minute you're on the edge of a massive river canyon. It is truly startling. I've never seen the Grand Canyon, but I hear it's really the one thing that truly doesn't disappoint when you see it in person. And based on the breathtaking majesty of this tiny little canyon, I don't doubt it. Apparently Eval Knieval tried to jump it in the 70s, which is absolutely bananas. He didn't make it. The earthen ramp allegedly still exists on somebody's private property nearby. Final piece of Twin Falls trivia: guess how many waterfalls there are in Twin Falls? That's right, three! One of them is called "Twin Falls," and there are two others.

2024-10-25 ¶

So one of my best friends is going through what we call "A Tough Time." She just survived Stage 3 colon cancer, which I don't have to tell you was quite the Ordeal, both for her, obviously, and also for her three small children. And then she immediately started making plans to leave her husband, who has undiagnosed and untreated PTSD and substance abuse problems, and has been getting progressively physical with the family, and so far has refused to get any help. (His behavior has been poor, and now he is experiencing the consequences of his actions and descisions. But he is not a bad guy. He has demons, and issues to work through, and I hope this is his rock bottom, the wake up call he needs to finally start to get some help.) So she up and left whith the kids while he was at work, and went to hide out "in the mountains." I don't even know where they were. My role was to watch their dog, because my friend, she of course included the cat and the dog in their exit plan. That role morphed into, well if you need a safe place to stay in the city near the kids' school and also near your work, then why don't you stay at our place? I mean your dog is here already? This plan works because our mutual friend has a remote lake house in the mountains of central Washington state where we have been given permission to stay for "six months to a year." We set more strict boundaries with our friend, "you can stay for six weeks." And then we packed up the car, and now we're driving cross country. This whole situation, and its solution, happened not because of anything we did, or that happened to us. But because of the people we have met over the years, and the relationships and bonds that we have formed with them. Funny how we bump into people at the right place and the right time, and then we go spiraling off through life together forever intertwined.

2024-10-24 ¶

When my back wasn't working right, I was only able to put on my pants while lying down in bed, or carefully while seated. So, I shifted my weight this morning while sitting on the toilet to pull on my britches and CRACK! snapped the toilet seat in two! WTF?? I finished getting ready and dropped my friend—who stayed the night—off at their office downtown, then scooted on down to the hardware store and got a new toilet seat and installed it. And I guess I'll recommit myself to my cardio routine?

2024-10-20 ¶

I like feeding my dog an Enrichment Dinner every day where I give him his food in some kind of puzzling or interesting way. Last night for example I put his food in a paper bag so he'd have to kind of fight his way through the bag, or otherwise figure out how to get at it. That was the plan at least. What I accidentally did instead was just drop the bag and spill the food all across the kitchen floor. Which I guess was kind of engaging anyway since. Just not the experience I had planned.

2024-10-15 ¶

My friend decided to leave her husband so she took her kids and went to hide out somewhere in the mountains, and now I'm dogsitting this huge pointer. He is sweet but big and strong and curious and energetic.

2024-10-07 ¶

I started weening off my antidepressents

2024-10-06 ¶

milestone: went for a jog, first time post-surgery. 30 minutes very slow on the treadmill.

2024-09-17 ¶

Went for a rare weekday evening hike up in the hills. This is probably the earliest you can go in the season and still see a little bit of fall color. Grabbed my Argus and planned to shoot some film. First nice vista I saw, I framed my shot, adjusted all the manual settings on the antique camera, and pressed the trigger. It didn't sound right. Kind of hollow and tinny. Then I tried to advance the film, and I could tell the advancement wheel wasn't catching anything. At this point I was confident enough to open up the camera to look, and yep. Sure enough. I hadn't loaded any film in the damn thing. So I carried the empty, useless camera up and down the mountain, across a creek, and over some boulders. Climbing a steep hill, I heard a low groaning. Then I saw a large black shape in the trees. It was bending a large tree down to eat something from it. Judging from the size of the tree it was moving, it must be huge. Bear, I announced. And we turned around and started walking back the way we came. Once we were a little farther away, I wanted to get a better look at it. So I waited and peered through the trees. It emerged, too close for comfort honestly. But it wasn't a bear after all. It was a large moose and a second smaller moose. Maybe its calf. I looked forlornly down at the useless camera hanging from my neck and regretted my forgetfulness. Then the big moose seemed to notice us for the first time and it took a couple steps toward us. That was a great big nope. Way more people are injured each year by moose than by bears after all. So we backed away and left the moose behind. Hiked back over the boulders, across the creek, and up and down the mountain back to the trailhead. By the time we got back to the car, the moon had risen, and it was a beauty. A full super harvest moon. As we watched, the earth eclipsed a small chunk of it making it look just kind of flat and dented across the top. And I felt thankful that I hadn't ended up flat and dented myself, trampled by a moose. Next time I'll remember to actually put film in my camera before taking it into the woods.

2024-09-10 ¶

My package arrived today. I wasn't expecting it. Last time I checked, it was still in transit from Hong Kong to Alaska. The uconsole from clockworkpi, either a very large handheld or a very small computer. Some assembly required. I felt joy while putting it together, like building lego sets as a kid. The instruction booklet was very sparse; I ended up watching an assembly video by some person on youtube whenever I got stuck. The build on this thing is great! Strong, sturdy metal casing. The keys feel nice. Sadly, because I wasn't expecting it yet, I don't have the batteries to actually turn the thing on. Ordered them last night, they should be here tomorrow. Looking forward to it. In the meantime, it is sitting on my desk, looking cute and inert. I'd love to use it as a small auxiliary irc screen while computing. And build / play some pico8 / tic80 on it. It's just really heckin cute.

2024-09-09 ¶

I saw a kitty!

2024-09-08 ¶

There was a small child with a small fishing pole. He was fishing in the small pond across from the large pond. As we approached, he caught a small fish, pulled it up onto the bank next to him. His free hand flew to the side of his head in astonishment. He cried out, and an even younger child ran from the large pond to the small pond. They exchanged some words. They were out of earshot, but I guess based on what happened next that the older kid told the younger kid to throw the fish back in the water. The younger kid clutched his hands and looked sternly at the older kid, and said no. Pearl walked closer to them and said, "Did you catch a fish?" The older kid said, "Can you help me?" And at the same time, the younger kid swung back and punted the fish high up into the air and back into the pond. It was truly one hell of a kick. The older kid saw this and looked back up at Pearl in astonishment, as though for confirmation that that really just happened.

2024-09-07 ¶

Went for a sunset "hike" tonight. (It was a flat gravel and dirt path around the perimeter of a meadow.) The loop was about 60 minutes. The whole place is enclosed, and you're allowed to let your dog off leash. Sweet boy did really well! Stuck close by. Did frequent check-ins: he would run ahead and then look back to make sure we were okay and then come back. Was polite to other dogs and humans. There were a lot of cows nearby in the next pasture over. They were big and black and were mooing. A small creek ran through the woods and across the path next to the meadow. Some dogs were running and splashing in it.

2024-09-06 ¶

I went to the grocery store to pick up a few things and when I got inside everybody was coughing a lot and I thought to myself, great, everybody here has got covid. And then I start coughing a lot and I thought to myself, great, now I've got it too! And then somebody came on over the loud speakers and said that there was pepper spray in the air, so if you are coughing, sorry, but there isn't anything they can do about it. I finished grabbing my things and went to self check out. And as I was wrapping up somebody a little bit more professional sounding came on the speakers again and repeated the message, saying somebody had gotten pepper sprayed outside, and the wind blew the pepper spray into the store. It made me cough a few times, but mostly I just looked around at everybody and thought everybody would be a lot more comfortable if we had all remembered to bring our masks. So let that be a lesson I guess: always keep your mask on you in case your grocery store just happens to be full of pepper spray!

2024-09-05 ¶

Went to play D&D with the original crew for the first time in over three months. Milestone! I got a dozen vegan donuts for the group to celebrate the occasion. I mostly felt fine. Felt a little lightheaded right before intermission. While they put the pre-schooler to sleep, I laid down on the couch and then felt better. And then finished the game and felt fine! Really felt good to see everybody and play again.

2024-09-01 ¶

Went out for a walk tonight, kind of wandering aimlessly around the neighborhood with my partner and our dog. Rounded the corner as a small guy came hustling out of his yard behind us and said, "Hey do you want a pizza box full of peaches?" Turns out he was just a friendly neighbor who has an enormous and very productive peach tree growing over his yard and the roof of his garage. It is technically his neighbor's tree, but they don't take care of it or pick up any of the fruit. So he had been up on the roof of the garage today collecting all these peaches up there, and also all the ones from the lawn. "I have so many of these, I've been trying to give them away to everybody that comes by. If you know anybody who likes peaches tell them to come here and I'll give them a pizza box full of them." Partner teared up. Peaches are their favorite fruit, and they haven't really had any this year because they spent the whole summer taking care of me during my surgeries and just haven't had the time or energy to go shopping for fresh fruit. (We've been living off meal delivery kits for months.) We all introduced ourselves, and now we're friends with the Pizza Box Full Of Peaches guy.

2024-08-31 ¶

I've been training for weeks, slowly building up my stamina and my strength, with the goal of improving my health, and then using that good health to celebrate by going to the phish show. I bought the tickets months and months ago, and wasn't sure I'd be able to go having just had my surgery, and then the complication from my surgery. I had to very carefully manage my expectations. I had a four day pass, but let go of all expectations of going all four nights. Or even for all of one night: the plan was just to go. If I felt good, I'd stay, and maybe go a second night. If I went and didn't feel good, then I'd leave. The first night, I didn't go because I had felt a weird pinching in my back and didn't want to push it. I rested all that day. And the second night, I went. It was really good, but I couldn't relax or get into it. The whole time I was distracted and second-guessing every sensation. Is this a headache, or is it just loud? Is this fuzzy headedness an aura, or is there just a lot of pot in the air? And I couldn't dance or move my body the way I wanted to. And once I realized all of that, the spell was kind of broken. I stayed for the first set. Heard the best Wolfman's Brother I ever heard, and a great Run Like An Antelope to close out the set. I paid for it though. The whole next day I had a mild pre-headache kind of feeling. So I'm selling the balance of my 4 day pass. I hope whoever gets it really enjoys the remaining shows! And in the meantime, I look forward to feeling "normal" again after the six months I've been told it will take for me to feel that way.

2024-08-28 ¶

Partner texted me from the backyard because they couldn't get into the garage to go run their errand because there was a grasshopper on the doorknob. They are frightened of insects, no matter how small or harmless. They said they were trying to get it to go away by throwing leaves at it. I suggested that they try to find a stick instead to knock it away, and then put on my shoes to go out and help. I went outside to see that they had found a nearly six foot long tree branch to knock the offending insect off the door. My services were not needed. Poor grasshopper didn't stand a chance.

2024-08-25 ¶

Another milestone today: went out to the shops and did some shopping. Walked all the way around costco. Picked up some powdered protein and some other health and nutrition stuff that's supposed to keep me healing up well, building new muscle and bone and tissue. Went to two open houses this weekend. The first one was a god-awful ultra-modern eyesore down at the end of the block. And I gotta tell ya. For as much as I hate those houses from the outside, I hated it just as much from the inside. They stick out like a sore thumb. They just don't go with the rest of the houses in the neighborhood. And inside, the layout is pretty awful. Terrible use of space. The second one I went to though, it was nice.

2024-08-24 ¶

In 2020 our favorite neighborhood restaurant closed down because of the covid-19 pandemic, and it remained closed until the summer of 2024, long after other restaurants had reopened. A milestone of my recovery has always been to walk down to the place, enjoy a nice dinner, and walk back home. Tonight, we did it. The food was good, the ambiance was great. The booth was a little uncomfortable, and the walk was a little difficult. But I did it. Feels like I'm well on my way to normal again.

2024-08-22 ¶

I found exuviae of a cicada. And also two dead adult bodies. The shell was clinging to the chain link fence by the elementary school. The bodies were on the ground on the sidewalk. I have certainly been hearing their singing in the treetops. Terribly loud things. But I never see any evidence of them. I have few memories of my early childhood, but the cicada brood that one summer when I was 4 or 5 is one of them. They were everywhere. My kindergarten teacher wore the shell of one as a brooch. I wandered the backyard with a bucket and managed to fill it to the top with shells. When my mom discovered I had brought it into the house she ordered my to remove it right away lest the baby's asthma act up. The family dog was constantly chewing on the adults, waxy papery wings always dangling from her lips. The adults covered the trees and the sidewalks. I remember trying to sneak up on one, a big fat adult on the sidewalk, only for it to leap into the air with a buzzing rattle of its wings and land a few feet away. And I continued stalking it thusly until it flew all the way away. I love the sound of the cicadas. It is always delightful to me to see one. It reminds me of being a child and in love with the world.

2024-08-21 ¶

It has been two months since my initial surgery. I feel like my head is above water finally. Of course, I felt like this before, two weeks after surgery right before my csf leak. So it feels good, but I remain wary. I am able to sit up and stand up for most of the day. I recently tried sitting at my desk, but that didn't feel good for extended periods of time so I'm kind of staying away from that for the moment. I have been enjoying long walks in the neighborhood. About an hour, me and an audiobook. I've been taking the dog out on walks. He's old now and just likes to go slow and sniff things. So we go around the block a few times and then I drop him back off at home so I can walk properly.

2024-08-20 ¶

I put my walking canes away this morning. My first one is an old wooden cane that I got from Rite-Aid when I was in my 20s, one of the first times I had difficulty walking for an extended period of time. The paint is flaking off it and the rubber foot is worn. I had placed it on the bed runner probably a couple months ago in case I ever needed help getting into or out of bed. And it has stayed there ever since. My second cane is a metal folding cane that I got recently when traveling by plane for a funeral. It is very convenient to be able to fold it up in small spaces. It also has been hanging out by the bed for quite a while. The truth of the matter is that while I have been dealing with the effects of my brain leak, the actual back surgery has been a resounding success: I still have no pain whatsoever in my back or legs. I haven't used a cane to walk in over a month. So I picked them both up and hung the handles over the rod in the closet behind my suit, the one I have for funerals and weddings and other formal events. And hopefully there they shall stay.

2024-08-19 ¶

My dog is kind of scared of stairs, always has been, and is hesitant to go up or down them on his own. I think it's on account of his growing up on the streets for so long. He's never fully adjusted to some 'indoor' things. He always needs a little reassurance, a pat on the head, a soothing voice in order to get started. So that's what I was doing, encouraging my dog to come down stairs. I had just pulled on some ankle height athletic socks and was heading downstairs to put on my shoes and go for a walk. I had taken two steps down the smooth, hardwood staircase when my dog whined behind me. I reached back with one hand to give him a pat and then my stockinged foot slipped on the step and I skidded two or three steps down to the landing. I stopped my fall with one hand gripping the railing and the other hand planted on the wall, and did a quick inventory, waiting for any back pain. Miraculously there was none. I carefully righted myself, getting my feet under me again, and slowly, carefully continued down the rest of the steps to the living room and sat down. Upstairs my dog started whining, abandoned and trapped at the top of the staircase with no human to help him overcome his fear. He eventually gathered up his courage and came down on his own, but seemed to go extra slowly, taking each step one at a time, whining nervously the whole time, as though when he saw me fall down those couple of steps he understood the peril and the danger, and knew that the same could happen to him if he wasn't careful.

2024-08-18 ¶

Went for a walk by the zoo. There was a person (a zoo employee?) in the enclosure clapping his hands and calling, "Pumpkin! Taylor!" And then two elephants came out from behind the fence and into the enclosure with him, and somebody closed the gate behind them. Now I know those elephants names. Or at least what that one person decided to call them.

2024-08-14 ¶

I went on a date tonight, to dinner and a show. Okay dinner was fast food drive-thru. But it was hot, and good. The show was the final one of one of my favorite summer series, a tag-team lecture on unrelated topics. It's always really good. The premise is, there are two different experts on two different unrelated topics. And at the end there's a Q&A with the lecturers where the audience tries to draw connections between the two topics. I foolishly bought season tickets right before my surgery, and was then unable to go to any of them while I was hospitalized and recovering. I got good enough grades yesterday at my check up that I felt confident enough going out tonight. It was mostly great. I felt a little fatigued and headachey by the end. But it was a three hour outing, which is a lot for me considering I basically haven't been out of the house—or even really out of bed!—since July 4. Hopefully I can do more and more things like this and eventually start to feel like a normal person and like my old self again.

2024-08-13 ¶

Went to the doctors today. Six week follow up on my initial surgery. Got good grades! Cleared to drive, and to do some light exercising. Knock on wood, I'm feeling pretty good about my progress.

2024-08-12 ¶

I got to play around on my pinebook pro today after a couple of weeks (months?) of it refusing to boot after I messed around and tried to install postmarketos on it. Turns out all I needed to do was remove the case and flip a tiny switch on the back from "don't boot" to "boot." And then, hacker voice, I'm in! Installed some stuff, uninstalled some stuff, updated some stuff, configured some stuff. You know, just hacked around or a while. Installed dillo (with gopher and gemini plugins) and links2. Installed mpv and yt-dlp and watched some streaming twitch.tv. Good times!

2024-08-10 ¶

Opal said a very inept salesman knocked on our door and then immediately left. How quickly and easily he admitted defeat. But no, it was no salesman. I forgot I had told my buddy Kyle, my former teacher, that he could have the extra copy of a book that I have lying around. I had put it out in the mailbox and then promptly forgot that he would be swinging by. Clever chap that he is, he found the book right away and then took off. Then later my old D&D group dropped off a box for me on the front porch. I couldn't get it at first because I'm not allowed to pick things up. It was plain cardboard but covered in handmade drawings and pictures and maps and all kind of cool stuff. Inside there were a couple books, a couple games, some tea, some peaches from K's back yard, a gag t-shirt. A very nice get-well-soon package. It was very heartwarming and I got real sentimental as I went through the items. It was very thoughtful. I miss hanging out with them a lot.

2024-08-09 ¶

I've been working on increasing my activity levels per my doctor's orders. I already had a little twtxt log from before (and after) my surgery to track my pain levels and how many drugs I was taking. It's called "pain.txt"! So I repurposed it for activity logging and wrote a little awk script to run reports on it. So I can tell you that yesterday I did about 2.5 hrs of activity. Mostly walking. And today I've 3 so far. Included in today's activities is a walk down to the library to return a book that I kept for so long while in and out of the hospital that it had gone lost. Luckily they waived the replacement cost and the late fees once I returned it, and I was allowed to check out the comic books I had on the hold shelf: a Penguin (Batman) book, an anthology of Brazilian comics, and something called Space Mullet? I don't know. Sometimes I just browse the On Order page of the graphic novels collection and just spam the Place Hold button on everything that looks halfway interesting. Then we walked down and stopped by the Dog Park to let the dog have a romp. There was a guy who was super tweaked up circling the perimeter of the park (on the outside of the fence) calling incessantly out to the dogs. "I like you! I like you all! You're gonna make me cry! I have to go though. I like you so much!" That dude was high as fuck and also REALLY liked dogs.

2024-08-08 ¶

My lazy readers broke last night, snapped cleanly right in two right at the bridge. Luckily, when I first bought them I bought two pairs. One for me and one for my partner. They never really used theirs, so I just rolled over and grabbed theirs from their nightstand. And now I can continue. For the unaware, lazy readers are simply a pair of glasses with angled mirrors so I can lie flat on my back and still see "forward." They have been a total life saver during my recovery, when I'm supposed to lie flat all the time, and have allowed me to computer or read a book or watch television comfortably and naturally while on my back.

2024-08-07 ¶

Got my MRI results back today. They were pretty good! They think my leak is shrinking and healing. And I'm supposed to be gradually increasing my activity level each day, thirty minutes at a time. So that's cool.

2024-08-06 ¶

I went for an MRI today. It was my first time out of the house in about two weeks. My first time anywhere by myself in about a month and a half. I ordered a car and listened to Hozier sing about taking his whiskey neat. And then I arrived at the imagining lab. The last time I was at this location, I vomited into a trashcan in the lobby and left. I didn't recognize anybody from that incident. But I wasn't confident that somebody didn't recognize me. The technician took me back. I was allowed to keep on my ring and my bracelet because they are non-ferrous. But my shorts had a small zipper that I had forgotten about. So I had to put on a pair of provided disposable shorts. They looked kind of like two giant, conjoined pillow cases. And I could have fit every pillow in my bedroom and probably also from the guestroom into these shorts. The technician started to load me into the machine and handed me some headphones for noise protection and for comfort. "I have spotify," he says. "I can play whatever you want." "Why don't you pick something out for me?" I says. "What do you like to listen to?" He did not like this proposal one bit, refused to accept the responsibility. "No, what if I pick something you don't like, and you have to listen to it for like, 15 minutes?" I accepted his counter-proposal of an alternative station playlist. I slid into the machine and Hozier started singing about taking his whiskey neat.

2024-08-02 ¶

I spent all week lying in bed after a bit of a relapse. Following a surgical complication. Following my surgery. But this weekend I started to spring back finally. I had started drinking a cup of coffee every day. I've been caffeine free for I can't even tell you. Five years? Eight years? But there are three things that allegedly help with a cerebrospinal fluid leak. Limited activities (lying flat), lots of fluids, and caffeine. I read a few papers. One suggested that it (caffeine) might help in the same way that it seems to help migraines. Another said that in a study with rats, only long-term caffeine helped. And that acute treatment actually has a negative effect because of constriction of the blood vessels going to the brain. I can't tell if it helped me or not. It made me feel good, but I'm pretty sure that was just, you know, the effects of the caffeine. Anyway, I had a cup every day for about three days. And then I stopped.

2024-07-26 ¶

This morning there was a box of brownies on the floor. They came in the mail. Sigo had left them there because they didn't want me getting into them yet, and knew I couldn't bend down to get them. Cruel! Later I went to the hospital to follow up on my headache yesterday. My surgeon told me to lie flat this weekend and ordered an MRI for early next week. The technician removed all the staples in my back. She said I wouldn't even feel it, but it pinched a bit, stinged a little, each time she removed one. But now I'm a real boy again with no artificial parts holding me together. Which feels kind of weird and reckless now if I'm being honest. You mean to tell me that there's nothing holding me together but my own scar tissue and weak flesh? That seems irresponsible!

2024-07-25 ¶

I got a really sudden, really severe headache after sitting up at the kitchen table for about 30 minutes. I just wanted to write some thank you notes for people who were kind to me during my surgery and recovery. I decided I needed to abandon my activities and go lie down to see if being horizontal would make it go away. I paused only long enough to fill up my water bottle. But even so, by the time I got to the top of the stairs I was teetering on the edge of a fullblown episode like what I had when I was experiencing a CSF leak. It's hard to describe what it feels like. Calling it a headache doesn't do it justice. There is a large component of it that feels like cranial pressure, like my head is in a vice, and also like somebody is driving a spike between my eyes. But it also feels like a general loss of cognitive function, like my brain is shutting down. Like a stupor, and confusion. And dizziness and weakness. But I made it to my bed and lied down and then it got better and went away.

2024-07-24 ¶

I took a good look at my incision while changing my bandage. The staples—twenty-five of them; I counted!—are all puckered and rippling like a zipper hoodie that went through the clothes dryer and shrunk a little bit. Or rather, the flesh under them is, I suppose. But the incision itself looks great! All closed up already and pretty well healed.

2024-07-22 ¶

My partner of +20 years, the love of my life, who knows absolutely everything there is to know about me, got really embarrassed and genuinely asked if I prefer to be called my full name or its common shortened version. We exclusively address each other by pet names. They have called me by my given name probably 3 or 4 times over the decades, and then only under duress. They honestly didn't know what name I prefer to go by in public.

2024-07-21 ¶

I was walking around the high school and saw two white fire trucks parked up ahead where on one side of the road is the school soccer field and on the other side is a bunch of houses. I was worried that when I walked by I would see an old grandma getting wheeled out of her house on a gurney or something. But when I got up there, instead I saw eight firefighters on the soccer field. (I could tell they were firefighters because of their outfits—navy pants and navy t-shirts—and also their proximity to their trucks.) They were playing ultimate frisbee on field. Four vs four. And they were having a great time. Every time there was a pitch or a score or a good throw or a good catch, one of them would yell, ULTIMATE!! I wondered if they were on call or something, or just out having a good time. And I wondered why they needed two whole trucks to take them to the high school field. But by golly they were all having such a good time.

2024-07-20 ¶

Today marks one month since my initial surgery. And two weeks since my complication and second surgery. And tomorrow is one week since I was discharged from the hospital and allowed to go home. Time keeps marching on. I keep getting better.

2024-07-14 ¶

I am suddenly and rather quickly discharged from the hospital. I had been told it was likely to happen, but had adjusted my expectations very low because hospital operates on hospital time: everything seems to take about 1.5 days to carry out once a decision is made. But suddenly it was time to change into my clothes and pack up all my stuff. Got home, got right in the shower, ate a meal, got in bed, and took a nap, pet my dog, and am feeling very much like myself again. I feel like I'm right back at post-op square one again. But I'm happy to be here and done with the spinal leak, hopefully for good!

2024-07-13 ¶

I am unhooked from all my cables and tubes. It feels liberating to be untethered. And also in control of my own toilet activities. I am cleared by physical therapy and occupational therapy to get up and walk around a little bit. I do a few laps around the ICU every couple hours. First time standing up in nine days, feels kind of surreal. And also difficult. My legs feel weak, and my back feels weak. I use a walker.

2024-07-12 ¶

It's been well over a week since my last bowel movement, and the pressure at this point is pretty much the main discomfort I'm having. Which is saying a lot, because I've just had two spinal surgeries and an excruciating spinal fluid leak treatment. I'm a high fiber vegan: I have very regular bowel movements, usually one to three times a day. So missing just one or two days is kind of a lot for me. And now, after over a week of no movement, I have constant pressure, cramping, disinterest in eating. They've been giving me stool softeners and gentle laxatives this whole time every couple hours with no results. I've tried using the bedpan a couple times at this point. And if you've never tried to shit yourself in bed while lying flat on your back, well I can tell you that the experience feels very unnatural and uncomfortable. Attempts produce nothing but a little gas, which provides minimal relief. My ICU nurse eventually gives me a suppository, which means he administers some medicine by lubricating a small capsule with a tapered end and pushing it inside my rectum. He says, "I definitely felt it! There's a wall of poop in there!" He tells me to cross my legs and try to hold it in as long as I can, at least thirty minutes. In the meantime, they move me out of my room which has for some reason reached a sweltering 80 degrees (26.6 C). I'm set up in my new room, it's roughly an hour later, and I can start to feel a new and greater pressure, and I request the bedpan. I have been told that I mustn't bear down too hard or I might injure myself because of my CSF leak and my spinal incision. So I try to be chill about it and just let it happen if it's going to happen. But what follows is not chill at all. Soon it is completely out of my control. At least I'm not flat on my back this time: I've been through two days of "sit up therapy" so I raise the head of the bed a little bit. Soon I'm sweating and groaning and gripping the bed rails mostly on my back with my knees up and my legs spread and I feel exactly like a television actor's portrayal of a woman in labor. The pressure is still building but I'm still trying not to push because I don't want another CSF leak or to pop a suture. Then there's an alarming—I swear audible—pop as the blockage is pushed out, and a rush as the back up comes flooding out. At this point I am merely an alarmed passenger trying to hold on and ride it out. I don't stop pooping for what feels like a really long time. The relief is immense. It abates for a moment and I think I'm done, but no. Here comes round two. I have never pooped this much or for this long in my life. Nobody has. This is a world record poop that elevates me and separates me from the rest of humanity, and I feel closer to god because of it. Finally it stops. I feel shrunken and hollow. I call my nurse for help. They come in and say, "Hey, how'd it--WOW THAT IS A LOT!" The next couple days are spent trying to achieve equilibrium, because in the meantime my body is still chock full of laxatives.

2024-07-11 ¶

While I've been in the hospital, our car broke down and has to be in the shop for "at least a week." Luckily we live really close by. Petra is able to bicycle back and forth to go sleep, check on the dog, or get stuff from home as needed. Unfortunately, it's literally 100 degrees outside. Fortunately, we should get a rental from the dealership tomorrow.

2024-07-10 ¶

Doctors decide I've had enough and remove the lumbar drain. I get a day of rest. I sleep a lot. I spend the next couple days recovering from the treatment. There's no real way to test whether the leak is stopped other than to try getting up and see if it hurts. So they sit me up by degrees: 60 minutes at 15 degrees, 60 minutes flat. 60 at 30, 60 flat. Then 45, flat, 45, flat. I've been lying on my back for so long that sitting at 45 degrees irrationally feels like I'm going to pitch forward and tumble out of my bed. I don't have any difficulty with the inclining, so I must be healed!

2024-07-07 ¶

Install a lumbar drain to treat the leak. This involved poking through into my spine and inserting a tiny flexible tube and hooking it up to a valve so they can drain off spinal fluid as needed. The insertion sucks because the tube has to pass through my nerve bundles which are already agitated. They move me out of the ortho wing and into the intensive care unit, where I can get the round-the-clock fluid drain regimen I've been prescribed. The big idea of the drain is that the system is pressurized like a full garden hose or a water balloon. And if we can actively drain off a little spinal fluid to depressurize the system just enough to stop (or lessen) the active leak, it will start to close up and heal on its own. The cost of this procedure is that draining spinal fluid is extremely painful. It's what landed in me in the ER after all. And now I have to endure manual draining every 60 minutes around the clock. It takes about 15 minutes at best, but I have to have them stop and pause 1 - 2 times throughout the process because the pain is too much to bear. This treatment will last 3 days, and it is terrible. Can't sleep, can't eat. Constant severe pain, because it doesn't just stop once they finish draining. Can't get enough morphine or oxy to get any relief.

2024-07-06 ¶

New surgery. Full general anesthesia again, open me back up to irrigate and clean up the incision, and to look for a cerebrospinal fluid leak. Because that's what we assume is going on. Can't find the leak anywhere, so it must be located around the corner on the other side of the spinal column from where they are able to access. Close me back up real good with glue and staples.

2024-07-05 ¶

Petra takes my mom to the airport to send her home, and then takes me to the imaging place for an MRI to investigate my leaking and my persistent headache. That headache feeling after starting to use my robot sucker boy progressed into a blinding, immobilizing headache, sweating and vomiting, and a feeling of just … shutting down. I thought I was going to pass out, or was maybe dying. Anyway, so I walk into the imagery place, am barely coherent enough to fill out paperwork, and promptly vomit into a trash can in the lobby. This wins me a quick trip to the emergency room where I was admitted to the hospital.

2024-07-04 ¶

Went to the neighborhood Independence Day Parade. It is always small and cute. I like it because it is local and free: there are no corporate sponsors. No Amazon, Chase, etc. This year the neighborhood Euchre club walked again. But the Bridge club was conspicuously absent, cementing the former's spot as reigning card game. Visited the former neighborhood ice cream shop's new location over by the parade route. Cute, good location for them. Not as charming as the original location though. Walking down the block eating my ice cream cone, I saw a young boy, maybe 6 years old, come running out of the cafe across the street, and run straight into a little traffic bollard. It was the thin, white, kind of flexy kind. So it gave when he ran into it, and then bounced back and pushed him straight down into the ground. He was fine, seemingly embarrassed more than hurt. So I felt fine laughing. Also I have run into poles and bars and all kinds of things myself plenty of times both as a kid and as an adult. So I feel I've earned the right through hard won personal experience. A gaggle of preteen girls near me on the other side of the street guffawed and snickered. One says, "Who runs into a pole?" And one of the others sheepishly admits, "I do it all the time."

2024-07-03 ¶

My wound vac filled up alarmingly fast and I ended up needing to go to the emergency room. It went really well, and really quick. We were seriously in and out in probably less than 30 minutes? Unheard of. That didn't stop me from having a little panic attack over it though. Got all headachy and sweaty and my heart was racing. Had to go lie down afterwards.

2024-07-02 ¶

I ended up having to go back to the hospital for some repairs. Turns out I likely popped a suture somewhere deep down in the hole. So the gave me a little robot buddy to wear and carry around with me for the next week. It will apply constant weak suction to site to drain it and keep it dry. Like a really weak leach, or a really weak robot vampire. I'm happy with this so I don't have to go through my entire stock of supplies, so I'm confident it will stay clean, and so I don't have to worry about going back to the hospital again or to the emergency room going into the July 4th holiday and weekend.

2024-06-30 ¶

I just accidentally dropped the roll of toilet paper. (I can't bend down to pick stuff up because surgery) Luckily, I had a second roll of paper nearby in case of this exact situation. But then I dropped it too. Against all odds, I had a third roll within reach. This one I was able to hold on to. And that is precisely why you always have a backup plan for your backup plan.

2024-06-29 ¶

My friends came over for dinner last night. They brought their one year old, who is really smart and really funny. She did some singing and dancing and was in general a real cut up. I gave her the storybook I've been meaning to give her for a while. And her mom, my adult friend, gave me some activity books for while I'm on restrictions. That was nice. I've already worked a few crosswords from it.

2024-06-24 ¶

One of my best friends has a kid who is turning 12 next week. I was supposed to take him to soccer practice tonight, but I'm currently unable to drive. Nor could I sit for 60 minutes once I got there to hang out and watch. On account of having just had spinal surgery and all. So I wrapped it up with newsprint and twine and sent it along with Petra who stepped up to take him in my place. I was at Zine Fest last year and saw an old coworker of mine from the library who is now doing art and comics now full time. He had a really cool graphic adventure choose-your-own-adventure book that he wrote and illustrated. I grabbed it, thinking of kiddo. And tonight he got to unwrap it! Apparently he ran up to his room to read it when he got home and said, "They sure do know how to give good gifts!"

2024-06-23 ¶

If required, I can just walk for 60 minutes in my house. Just pacing the upstairs hallway back and forth. No headphones, no nothing. Just taking steps.

2024-06-22 ¶

Grabbed a hand mirror and stood in front of the bathroom mirror and removed my drain and changed my dressing. Feel more human now without tubes coming out of me.

2024-06-20 ¶

I had a double discetomy and laminectomy. Ended up staying overnight for observation. Apparently the surgeon came out into the waiting room afterwards, mopped his brow, and said, "That was hard!" My nerves were so agitated that every time he got close to where he needed to be, my legs started kicking. Woke up though with no back or leg pain. Aside from the incision obviously. What a miracle!

2024-06-19 ¶

My surgery unexpectedly got moved up from next week to tomorrow morning. So suddenly I feel like I'm on a sitcom when it's time for the baby to come and the dad is scrambling around yelling, "Where's the bag? Where are my keys? Wah!" Earlier I had started dipping my toes into the more programmatic capabilities of remind(1), which I've been using as my main calendar / todo list since the beginning of the year. There are a lot of follow-up dates and milestones and stuff following the surgery. And instead of just handwriting them all out, I created a SURGERY_DATE variable and computed all of the trigger dates from that. So when the date changed today, I just changed that value, and my pre-op and post-op appointments all updated automatically. Sure do love a calendar domain-specific language!

2024-06-18 ¶

My bicycle tube exploded during First Friday Jazz at Son Of The Son Of Lawrence Park. Totally shredded. So I went to the local bike store and got a new tube, but when I got home and looked at the tire, it said to use a different size than the tube I had. So I went back to the bike shop to swap it out, but the bike mechanic said that they don't really make tubes that size anymore (27 x 1 1/4), and that the one I had was a compatible size, so I was good. I sheepishly said okay thanks, and left, and went back home. I put it on the wheel but it wouldn't hold air. My new tube came with a cute little puncture hole in it! So I patched it up good and put it on, and started pumping it up. And then it exploded right in my face as I was pumping it! Just like the old tube did. It was kind of scary, but also it was over before I really knew what was going on. So it was mostly frustrating and disappointing. And my ear is still ringing. I've been trying to change a tube for a week and a half now. This is a very elementary task, but I can't seem to accomplish it. I checked the tire and the wheel, but there must be something sharp or a jagged edge or something that I missed. At this point I think I'm just going to take it into the shop and have the guy do it. This is something I can delegate and outsource.

2024-06-17 ¶

if i had known that a bidet only cost ~35 dollars and about 10 minutes to install, i would have gotten one a long time ago.

2024-06-16 ¶

i bought a bunch of medical supplies and stuff for my upcoming back surgery. and i voted. democracy! then, a beautiful picnic in the park with friends. ate grapes and strawberries and hummus and crackers.

2024-06-15 ¶

I don't know whose idea it was to allow the Aurora Police Department—one of the most Black people killingest police agencies in the USA—into our neighborhood Juneteenth Parade. But there they were. And somehow the Aurora Police Department "Police Recruitment" vehicle fucked up their place in the parade and just parked on the side of the road at the start of the parade for pretty much the entire parade. Including when the group walking for justice for Kilyn Lewis—the latest black man killed by APD, just last month—walked by. A woman holding up a t-shirt with his face on it turned around and displayed it to the cops after passing them. And they chanted "Say his name! Kilyn Lewis!" by the car, and waved their "Stop Killing Us" signs. And then they and the rest of the parade moved on. The car stayed still until the rest of the APD group, near the very end of the parade, rolled by and the car joined them and finally rolled away.

2024-06-12 ¶

Saw some wild dolphins and sea lions on a harbor cruise. Our tour guide was named "Max with an X" and had done almost 2.5 thousand tours.

2024-06-11 ¶

The best vegan burritos in OB apparently come from a counter top inside a liquor store on Valencia. Got a vegan fish burrito and we ate them on bench overlooking the ocean while two hippies behind us talked incessantly about eating mushrooms.

2024-06-10 ¶

Saw Vampire Weekend at a really cool outdoor amphitheater. It was about 70% as good as their 2019 tour, and included a long, extended country-western swing Goldrush medley during which Ezra invited an audience member up on stage to play cornhole for money and then gave him 3 $100 bills in an extremely patronizing and insulting fashion.

2024-06-09 ¶

Flew to San Diego. Learned that getting wheelchair service at the airport can take 30 minutes or longer. Met a bunch of internet strangers on a rooftop bar. My first meal was a giant California burrito from a lousy looking place in a strip mall that I chose because it is named after a cozy little Mexican fishing village / surfing destination where I attended a friend's wedding by myself because my partner got E. coli and got severely ill.

2024-06-08 ¶

I decided to get back surgery.

2024-06-07 ¶

I was surprised when my favorite neighborhood restaurant finally quietly reopened after they closed at the start of the pandemic four years ago!

2024-06-07 ¶

I rode my bike to the park to listen to some cool jazz. I locked it up and a couple minutes later my front tube EXPLODED. Blew the tire half off the rim, and shredded the tube. People got a little panicked and looked around for a gun.

2024-06-07 ¶

I was at the doctor's office and there was a woman in the waiting room with a pigeon on a leash. The doctor told her, Sorry, Ma'am, no birds allowed in the practice.

2024-05-30 ¶

I put on my sunglasses as I was crossing the lobby and a delivery guy was approaching the entrance and yelled out to the people behind him, "We got a blind man coming in hot!" (I walk with a cane.) And he made everybody step aside as I walked out. I sheepishly said thank you, and got into my car and drove away.