…of nothing happening.  My bad, yo.

Hold on, stop reading for a sec, ok? I gotta grab more coffee.

Ok, back.

Last night’s House got me thinking. Really, it’s remarkable any episodic television program can get me thinking for more than five minutes at a time… the current frontrunners for persistent pondering are House, Breaking Bad and X-Files (but the last one is just because we got the DVDs and I’m watching the characters evolve from the very beginning). Even crazier, it got me thinking about two different things at once!

One: getting to know people.  Without getting spoilerific, Chase is surprised to find out that he’s handsome.  Specifically:

House: Girls kiss frogs in the hopes they’ll turn into you.
Chase: Pfff.  Come on, I’m not that good looking.
Wilson: You… sort of are.

Awesome scene. They’re speed-dating, and House bets Chase $100 that if he loses the accent, doesn’t mention he’s a doctor and actually insults the women, he’ll STILL get over a dozen requests. Unsurprisingly, this bet costs Chase $100.  Later, on a whim, he just flat out asks a nurse if he can borrow her car.  There’s a moment of tension, and then it cuts to Chase bitching to Thirteen “And she just gave me the keys!” Chase is angry and actually disturbed to find out how hunky he is and that none of his relationships were about deep connections, and out of left field Thirteen becomes the voice of reason, pointing out that deep connections can happen, but getting to know someone is difficult, doubly so if the person is trying to impress someone else. The pondering was: Exactly how difficult is it for two people to really actually know eachother if either one or both of them is trying to hide who they actually are in order to start the relationship off right, or even at all? The answer: Pretty difficult. I’d explain more, but this leads into the second pondering.

Pondering the two-th: The PotW is a blogger (played by former Milan runway model and 70’s burnout Laura Prepon) who blogs absolutely EVERYTHING in her life. Everything. Everything. Her fluid levels during angry make-up sex everything. This bugs the crap out of her boyfriend, especially when they have an argument and she blogs about it and says ‘Eight out of ten people agree with me!’, and when she asks the Internet’s advice as to what sort of heart surgery she should get. She. Blogs. Everything. Points are made by various characters that a) you actually can make very close connections with people without ever seeing them in person, b) it’s sometimes easier to discuss serious issues with people you’re not personally connected to, and c) eventually it becomes performance for the sake of performance, the nadir of reality programming. I blog about some stuff that bugs me, but I really try to reign myself in because a) the people who bug me often read this, b) if I blog WHEN I am actively bugged it comes across way harsher than I mean and can lead to cementing of feelings and viewpoints that are only being temporarily exacerbated, and c) eventually this will come back to bite me in the ass, just like everything else I’ve ever done ever.

I admit it, I have complained and bitched to people online about my problems (I think anyone sufficiently nerdy enough has done the same) but I try to never do it publicly, and I try to do it when the GPPBBTTTHHHH*headdesk* of the moment has worn off. I get other viewpoints and perspectives, then I go through the “Man, sorry for complaining guys, I’ll never do it again” phase, dump everything into a hole and swear off the Internet.  For, like, ten minutes.  I’ve ragequit certain parts of the Internet, and a few times the Internet itself, but it never lasts, and the people I YAGE’d all over welcome me back when I inevitably return.  I have, against all available logic, made deep personal connections with people I’ll likely never meet, and likewise they with me. That’s probably the main advantage of Interpeople vs. real-life people: It’s hard to ragequit real life, then come back with smiles and pie a week later.

There’s also some stuff on there re privacy and the sociological development of groups and societies, but I’ve already been typing this for WAY too long.  On to the funny shit!

Things That Make Me Happy #255

I’m the governator / of the West Coast / and we got to, got to, got to go

Things That Make Me Happy #256

My wife just Gchatted me to tell me I got my tax return.

Things That Make Me Happy #257

And she also got her cheese-making kit.

Things That Make Me Happy #258

I LIKE CHEESE.

Things That Make Me Happy #259

When my daughter throws a gigantic tantrum because, instead of Mini Wheats or butter-toast, she wants 100% Bran cereal.  And actually eats it.

Things That Make Me Happy #260

Last night, my wife made the absolute best popovers I’ve ever had.

Things That Make Me Happy #261

Discount Haagen-Daas.

It can be described best as “It’s just a little slimy! It’s still good! It’s still good!”

Anyone born before 1990 should be laughing their asses off right now.

True to form, February dragged it’s steaming, stinking carcass out of the back door, leaving the fresh-smelling posie-sprouting carcass of March in it’s wake.  It’s still a carcass, but it’s way more pleasant to have around. I wrangled an old unpaying client into a new and well-paying client, got a deadline for one of my major side-job productions, we got our tax return submitted, I’m back on full-timey hours, and last night we jugged the mead and got the apple-elderflower wine started. The end of March is going to be missed due to catastrophic consumption of delicious alcohol.

I am making progress on changing or at least moderating the bad behaviours I’ve built up over the years, and Throkky has, against all recursive-negative-thinking-expectations, been extremely helpful and understanding. I like to think I’ve been a low-maintenance hubby for the last decade or so, and maybe clocking a little bit of high maintenance for the near future is allowable (I hope so, sweetie!) Since she’ll be ending up with a better-functioning life-partner (back-scaling from Topper v3.1 to the short-lived but wildly-popular Topper v2.0) it should all even out in the end.

I suddenly find myself in a good enough mood after blogging to want to talk about something else, but I don’t have much going for topics. Funny stuff I post to Facebook or Tumblr, and serious stuff I try to ignore. Uhm… go X-Files?

Things That Make Me Happy #251

Shopping for new shoes. *looks around* Shut up!

Things That Make Me Happy #252

Discovering songs I downloaded years ago, but never listened to, which kick ass. The Offspring has a surprising amount of good (if simplistic) music buried in their newer, crappier radio-sickening stuff.

Things That Make Me Happy #253

Music with clips from movies in it, particularly ‘Disco Sex Trash’ from MLWTTKK, and American Head Charge’s ‘Fiend’ and ‘Feel The Curtain’.

Things That Make Me Happy #254

How butthurt the Brits were over the Olympics.

The U.K. press has come to the conclusion that all Canadians are vile, petty people whose arrogance and peurility helped make this one of the worst games ever. Not to mention that we failed to make it snow properly. And it rained. Which is all our fault. Lord knows, it won’t rain in London in 2012. Also there was a technical glitch in the opening ceremonies. And, as we all know, what makes or breaks an Olympics is the technical precision of the opening ceremonies. The Russian paper Pravda ran an editorial by a Brit saying just that. The Russian President cancelled plans to travel to Vancouver for the closing. This, he claims, has nothing to do with one of Russia’s worst showings ever, especially the limp hockey performance. And there was the tragic death of the Georgian athlete on the ice-track, this blamed on Canadian ambition, rather than the demands from international luge and skeleton associations for a faster track every Olympics, or the IOC types who requested and approved the track.

Today is the last day that I will be working at drastically-reduced hours here at the office, and it’s also the shortest pay period of the year (nine days).  The paycheck I receive today will not actually cover ONE end-of-month bill, let alone the six or seven we’ve got going on. March, at least, has an 11-day pay period and a 12-day pay period, at normal hours, so that will seem like we’ve fucking won the lottery after the last few months.

I woke up at 4:44 this morning (I know because I compulsively check the time whenever I wake up)  after a fairly prolonged and irritating dream about taking part in a rather casual robbery of a mall-entrance convenience store.  I inexplicably stashed the wad of $50s onto one of the shelves behind some knickknacks, and tried to come back later to get it.  Mall security arrived and I was forced to flee (without my pants, for some reason) and then spent the rest of the dream firmly believing that I was going to jail.  Throughout this dream, I also saw snippets of security camera footage so I knew I wasn’t actually ON camera, but I knew they had seen my face, since this was the mall right near my office, and I shopped there all the time.

…

Do you think my money worries, and a dream about robbing a nearby convenience store have any connection?

…

Naaah.

At least the other dreams have stopped! I’ll take botched robberies any day.

Things That Make Me Happy #249

Watch a hockey game, and take out the cheering and the commentators, and you’re left with the slap of the sticks on ice, the slap of the pucks on the sticks, the skates digging and gliding… these are sounds not made by anything else under nearly any circumstances.  I absolutely love those sounds.

Things That Make Me Happy #250

The rather amazing differences in search results between ‘rubbermaid’ and ‘rubber maid’.

That’s how many page views my blog has had as of this morning… 2012. Nostradamus could not be reached for comment.

Seether had a lot of really good songs, which is the only reason I feel upset when people rag on them for being douchemetal.  That’s the problem with a lot of the doucherock and douchemetal bands these days: they almost always started out as really, really good bands. Nickelback was a hard-rocking hard-touring bar-band, and then Chad’s hair got a record deal and they because someone even Paris Hilton could make fun of. Seether is in the same boat, these days… sorry, guys. You and Saliva can go share a stage with Scott Stapp and reminisce about your early days.

We got a half-inch of snow this morning. Then it rained. Now I am watching school kids run around in t-shirts. DOUBLEYOU TEE EFF CANADA?!?1?!

I finally found the perfect song for my Repo Man mashup. Aw yeah.

The only two people who consistently read my blog make it very difficult for me to self-censor.  I should make a blog just for my wife to read, and one just for my sister. I’ll let them figure out what would be on the other’s.

Speaking of which, thanks for the [Ba] [Co] [N] shirt!

Things That Make Me Happy #244

Reading my wife’s forum.  I’ll give you a quick sample:

“Fuck you! I’m fucking ignoring you, you fucking twatwaffle!”
“Fine! I’m fucking ignoring you, too, you BITCH!”
“Stop responding then if you’re fucking ignoring me, you cuntskidoo!”
“I DID stop responding! You just responded to ME, you crapspackle!”
“Only because you responded to ME, you assberry!”
“I’m going to make a whole new THREAD about how much I’m ignoring your drama, you whoresock!”
“I’m going to post every PM you ever sent me as PROOF that I’m better than you, you sparkleslut!”
“EVERYONE!!! Hey, everyone!!! PAY ATTENTION TO HOW MUCH WE’RE IGNORING EACHOTHER!!!!!”

Things That Make Me Happy #245

Ethernopian coffee.

Things That Make Me Happy #246

Terry’s Taxidermy and Mounted Animal Nature Trail.

Things That Make Me Happy #247

When a veterinarian friend of mine says something like “I got anal gland juice on my jeans!” and I realize I’m not a veterinarian.

Things That Make Me Happy #248

When my youngest daughter wakes up and says “Hi Daddy! You sleep? Shhhh! Mommy sleep!  Watch tv juice? WANT TOAST!”

It’s like being down with the sickness, except I’m completely awake. Surprisingly, staying up well past midnight and getting up at 6am to put movies in the VCR can really put a crimp on recovering from a cold bug. I’m trying to cure myself with extra-strong coffee right now, but it odesn’t seem to be having much of an effect, and is only countering the sleepiness enough to bring me up to ‘tired’.  At least I’ll get a lot of rest this weekend. Looking forward like crazy to just hanging with the kids.

I’m trying to get back into updating this thing every day.  Blogging in one pent-up headsmash once per week isn’t nearly as effective, and doesn’t give me much practice or room to ramble.

I need a new USB key.  I have gigs of music on my laptop and I keep forgetting to burn a disc to transfer them to my work computer. How cheap are USB keys these days?

The IOC claims Lindsey Vonn’s name as their intellectual property. When reached for comment, she exclaimed “WTF!” before rolling on the floor, laughing her ass off.

I have just been alerted that my youngest daughter is trying to smuggle all of the toothbrushes out of the bathroom. In her diaper.  I have no idea for what purpose, though… maybe she plans to set them free in the back yard, so they can return to the wild.

I need more Swedish metal.  Does anyone have any good suggestions? (The first person to say Sigur Ros gets a penguin crammed up them.)

Bender is great, oh, Bender is great. Bender Bender Bender!

Why do the Presidents Of The United States Of America rock harder than most modern ‘hard rock’ acts? Seriously, the hell? Go check out my Tumblr and listen to Headin’ Out.

Things That Make Me Happy #242

SCIENCE!

Things That Make Me Happy #243

Every social networking site recently merged, to form TwitOnMyFace.

There’s something about the world of music that has troubled me for quite sometime. Let’s start of by establishing some basic precepts.

1.) Live shows are important both for the performers, and for the concert-goers themselves, who get to experience something that mere reproduced sound can not.

2.) Musicians and entertainers are entitled to fair compensation for all pertinent activities, and they are, in fact, paid to perform live shows.

3.) While theoretically piracy and downloading might impact an artists sales, bootlegging and audio-visual recording of live performances does not.

Why, then, do bootlegs, both audio and visual, get such an awful rap? I’m only going to watch them for bands I already like, and I will still buy (or not buy) their music with the same regularity.  I will still go see their shows (again, or not), regardless of whether or not I see a video on YouTube of them kicking ass on a stage somewhere.

Bootlegs allow for something special: the preservation of live shows on a format more reliable and enjoyable than just hearing about it from someone who was actually there. Without bootlegs, those performances enter the consciousness of a precious few, and then die with them. Having someone in the back with a hand-held minicam with a decent microphone allows thousands of others who could not have seen the show ANYWAYS to take part, for free.  No-one gains money, and no-one loses money. It is, financially, a non-entity event with an economic impact quotient of zero.

A few months ago, there was a bootleg of Spacehog performing at some outdoor venue. Royston had some sort of throat problem, and it was sub-zero, since everyone’s breath was extremely visible.  The sound quality on the recording was top-notch, and their rendition of ‘In The Meantime’ was significantly harder and more crunchy than I’ve ever heard before. Royston’s throat problems lent him an almost heavy metal screech, and hearing the audience sing along to the chorus lifted the song tremendously.

Then it got taken down, for being an ‘illegal bootleg’, and I’ll probably never get to see it again.

How in the name of Zeus’ butthole is this a defensible position?

Le sigh.

My brain continues to try to sabotage my sanity by sneaking into my dreams and fucking with my sense of reality (or, I suppose, unreality).  Two dreams in three nights have had me waking up shaking and almost in tears, and I realized something about that this morning: it hasn’t happened in this manner since last February. Maybe my wife has a point… February begins with “F” for a good reason.

Yup.

Things That Make Me Happy #236

Bootlegs that HAVEN’T been taken down by inexperienced recording firms.

Things That Make Me Happy #237

My son’s new mp3 player. He’s learned what a Graphical Equalizer is, and then went to go look up sound, frequencies and hertz with the Encyclopedia Of Science And Inventions I just moved into his room.

Things That Make Me Happy #238

Learning about Abraham Lincoln…

Things That Make Me Happy #239

…from rock bands.

Things That Make Me Happy #240

When I make chili, and not only do all kids eat it, but all kids have seconds. It’s freaky.

Things That Make Me Happy #241

When my daughter says “Oh, Daddy, just shut the hell up for a minute.” With a big smile on her face. Wonder where she picked that up from.

OK, I started writing this on Wednesday, which was yesterday, and I had three (3!) separate instances of thinking that it was Tuesday, when it was in fact Wednesday.  Now that it’s Thursday, this joke doesn’t work anymore, but I still had this in my Draft folder, so screw you, I’m using it.  Mitch Hedberg would have been proud.

What, you don’t get THAT reference? Ok, here goes.

“I wrote a letter to my dad - I wrote, “I really enjoy being here,” but I accidentally wrote rarely instead of really. But I still wanted to use it, I didn’t want to cross it out, so I wrote, “I rarely drive steamboats, dad - there’s a lot of shit you don’t know about me. Quit trying to act like I’m a steamboat operator! This letter took a harsh turn right away…”

Better? Good.

I got this all set up yesterday, figuring out which # of things that would make me happy I had to fill out, but I was in such a godawful state of stress-induced rage that I just kept glaring at the screen, unable to think of ANYTHING that made me happy. So, I just hit “Save”, closed it down, and glared at AutoCAD instead.  At least AutoCAD knows it did something wrong.

Today, feeling much better. Well, mentally.  My back is still absolutely killing me, right around where my kidneys would be.  I fell like I got pushed backwards and bent my spine over a fire hydrant… I bet no-one out there knows what that feels like.

Seriously, no-one at all.

Anyways, where were we?

I want an entire house made out of bubble wrap.

Things That Make Me Happy #230

Bubble wrap.

Things That Make Me Happy #231

Frisky Dingo on Fridays.  I don’t get to watch it (MAN, it’s on late!) but it does mean I can find ways to watch it online.  Really, I’ll be surprised if anyone else out there likes this show.

Things That Make Me Happy #232

Hoarders. Specifically, it makes me and my wife happy that we’re not on that show.

Things That Make Me Happy #233

Realizing that garlic salt makes an acceptable popcorn topping.

Things That Make Me Happy #234

When my son asks for more carrot sticks and less granola bars in his school lunches.

Things That Make Me Happy #235

Having a vegan dinner, and not one person noticing that there’s no meat.

I ended up calling it ‘Paywatch’, the long-running series where I, your quietly dignified protagonist, awaits his remuneration with stoic resolve.  Or, to put it another way, “I didn’t get paid”.  In the end, I was forced to take a personal day to deal with a lot of stuff with my family and my home, and, of course, I got a call early that morning from a co-worker. “Hey, our paychecks are here!” Regardless, I still had prior obligations. BUT I got paid.

True, it barely covers the mortgage since it’s a short-pay-period check with drastically-reduced billable hours, but at least it keeps the banks away from my ankles for one more week. Next week, they might get a few nibbles of my succulent flesh, but I’ll deal with that when it happens.

By the way, stoic resolve is a really, really inconvenient way to live your life.  Not because it’s so problematic to ME, but just because the rest of the world generally chooses to misinterpret it in many different and interesting ways, and it sort of flies in the face of the philosophy to try and correct everyone everytime. I can only hope history judges me kindly (although since history will be doing that in the FUTURE, I get a little confused and try to call it fustury.)

Things That Make Me Happy #223

George Special Dry Skin Cream.  I heard about it from my mom, and I bought a tiny tube to try it out.  At first it squikked me out because it is quite greasy and takes a while to work into the skin, even if you only use a little.  It wasn’t until two or three days later that I realized: I apply it once in the morning, and I’m actually good all the way until I get home.  With handwashing, typing, mousing, hands-in-pockets, and more handwashing, I don’t need to reapply lotion at all, whereas with my Aveeno, I have to use it five or six times.  Half an hour of greasy hands is a small price to pay for this awesome, awesome stuff. Buy it.

Things That Make Me Happy #224

Memories of Marmot Mountain… which was dynamited down to make room for a Chapters Book Store, a Petland and a couple mediocre restaurants.   Obviously, it’s the memories of the pre-blasting mountain that I enjoy.

Things That Make Me Happy #225

Occasionally, I also enjoy Chapters Book Store.  Not often.

Things That Make Me Happy #226

Rain in February.

Things That Make Me Happy #227

Taking kids through the carwash. (Inside the car).

Things That Make Me Happy #228

Watching my son bike to school.  My arthritis-riddled son.

Things That Make Me Happy #229

The number 229.  I don’t know why.  It looks neat.

My Two Steves

o no, don’t worry… it’s the name of a song by eminent musical god Steve Burns. Around out house, it’s hard to tell who likes him more: my two- and three-year old daughters, or my slightly older wife, who refers to him as “Secret Boyfriend Number Three”. Secret Boyfriends One and Two have funny accents, though, so they ranked higher.

I’m still waiting for his second album, ‘Deep Sea Recovery Efforts’, which was due out in late 2008.  I can only assume that he’s fiddling around with electronic doodads and walking up to complete strangers and yelling things like “I KNOW STEVE DROZD!” and “BLUE WAS JUST A F***ING CARTOON!” and “NO, I DIDN’T RUB SLIPPERY SOAP ALL OVER MY BODY!!” and “STOP SENDING ME NAKED PICTURES OF YOURSELVES!”

The last two were probably aimed at stay-at-home moms. He’s a lot of secret boyfriends.

I urge everyone to go out and buy ‘Songs For Dustmites’, his first album, right now.  Maybe, if he makes enough money from those sales, he can FINALLY put out that damn second album.  He’s also got half a dozen free songs over at www.SteveBurnsRocks.Us , including some from the first and second album, so you can Try Before You Buy.

Also, stop sending him naked pictures.

Things That Make Me Happy #219

The YouTube video of him playing Black Sabbath songs with the Starlight Mints.

Things That Make Me Happy #220

When my two-year old eats all of her breakfast without making a mess… while the older kids do neither of those things.

Things That Make Me Happy #221

When said two-year old also is the only one to HELP me make breakfast.  She opens the fridge, gets the milk, puts the bread in the sink, drops apple juice on the floor, and hugs my legs while I am trying to operate a toaster.  It may not be helpful in the strictest sense of the word, but the emotional and psychological help is inestimable.

Things That Make Me Happy #222

Mini Wheats.

“Put Up Or Shut Up”

I say this because so many people in the world go out of their way to make life difficult for everyone else, usually because person B does something person A hates.  Person B isn’t doing anything WRONG, no matter how much Person A thinks they are.  When Person B asks Person A for proof they’re doing something wrong, Person A just changes the subject. In my office right now, Person A has been saying for three years we’re breaking the law at one of our developments, and every single time we ask them to prove it, they just change the subject.  A different Person A has been insisting Persons B that I am related to have no right to their property, and whenever Person B says “Prove it!”, Person A leaves and just starts up again the next day.

There oughta be a law against it.

Things That Make Me Happy #216

Tonight: I make meatballs.  I need to find a way to sneak bacon in.

Things That Make Me Happy #217

Seeing the “Slap Chop Rap Chop Remix”… on television.

Things That Make Me Happy #218

New House tonight!

…

This Day In Blogging History: 2008

Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable
that we have to alter it every six months. ~ Oscar Wilde

Art produces ugly things which frequently become beautiful
with time. Fashion, on the other hand, produces beautiful things
which always become ugly with time. ~ Jean Cocteau

When his wife asked him to change clothes to meet
the German Ambassador: If they want to see me, here I am.
If they want to see my clothes, open my closet
and show them my suits. ~ Albert Einstein

It’s the things that aren’t accepted as conventionally beautiful
that I find more attractive. ~ Mark Jacobs

There’s a heck of a starter, eh?

Now, this whole blog post started from an article: Bus Driver Kicks Off “Freaky” Goths. Pretty quickly, the discussion on my fora settled onto three things:

1.) The leash meant that the two goths were forcing their sexual fetish upon everyone who could see them.

2.) Being a goth is not a choice.

3.) It may or may not be a hate crime, depending how pedantic you can be.

Now, as someone who married a “freaky goth” (and then, sadly, domesticated her… sorry, sweetie!!) I am clearly on the side of “What the hell was the bus driver smoking?” I also very quickly became almost the ONLY person on that side, as everyone else proceeded to slam the goths for dressing like idiots, offending everyone’s sensibilities, and engaging in sick fetish play in public.

It saddened me, because the entire forum is pretty much a shrine for geek culture, including what things geeks find sexy, how ‘normal’ people treat geeks, and even an entire section on how to purposefully ‘wierd out’ normal people, either by action or inaction. It’s all right to do that as long as you wear the mantle of ‘geek’, but as soon as your outfit includes black leather and a collar, you become sick and irresponsible. I had to back out of the conversation simply because I was in danger of pulling a muscle with all the *facepalming* I was doing.

Amusingly, no-one else thought that belly-shirts, low-rise pants, or other naughty and overtly sexualized outfits were bad at all, despite the fact that they are worn in public and are WAY more forceful upon the eyes and sensibilities of the helpless public than, say, two people who are sitting quietly and happen to be attached to eachother by a thin metal chain.

This is the first really blatant act of hypocrisy on this forum, which I guess is pretty good, considering I’ve been there for eight months, but I guess goths are an easy target. “We may be geeks, and we may be wierd, but at least we’re not as bad as THEM!!!” *fingerpointing ensues*

*sigh*

The best man at my wedding had green hair, for Gord’s sake…

This Day In Blogging History: 2006

Attention to all the people who find my blog “Inquisitive”, and would like to tell me about being a park ranger, or give me advice on investing my money into penny stocks:

FUCK OFF AND DIE

Seriously… to darreljones2541388358, christopherbenson9725, and all the rest of you… we don’t go to your blogs. Please invent some sort of filter that keeps you off of blogs where the posters are intelligent enough to ignore you. Maybe a spellchecker… if you get less than 1% errors, assume the blog is being written by someone who isn’t retarded, and move on.

Unfortunately, this is all so much screaming in the wind because there’s no way to get rid of spammers, mostly because the people in charge don’t really want to. They provide valuable search-enigne fodder and ad-click revenue. Spam is the corporation’s best friend, and my undying nightmare. In honor of this, my pictures of the day will be as scary as I can find.

This Day In Blogging History: 2005

… in our continuing battle. I had thought the battle lost when I was forced to miss work Tuesday and half of Wednesday. Allow me to recap.

Monday found me feeling good. I was ok in the morning, having gotten enough sleep. I was ok in the day, kicking ass and chewing bubblegum on my lakeshore resort project. I helped Steph do some grocery shopping, I got a lift home, I put the groceries away, and then I was suddenly gripped with severe abdominal pain. I was up till four in the morning… uhm… near the bathroom. I had thrown up lunch, breakfast, and even some popcorn from Sunday night.

Tuesday I was aunable to eat anything. I was hot, and shivering because I was cold, and laying on the couch trying not to put any pressure on my midsection. I had a massive headache, and I was also very very near the bathroom, since I couldn’t stop throwing up.

Wednesday morning I did Steph’s paper route, since she was laid up with her ear infection. This was apparently not a good thing since immediately after there was a great deal more blood coming out of me than was usual (which means I had started bleeding some 12 hours before, but the timing was still scary). I went in to work in the afternoon, since I like getting paid and being able to afford rent and food, but I was alternately hot, cold, tired, and feeling fine. That night I had a little bit of dinner (Rice Krispies) and was not too too sick, but I was up a lot with pain.

I was at work all day Thursday, but boy that sucked. People in my office, or just walking by, could hear the sounds my stomach was making. After looking up a few things online, (mostly involving the words “black” and “blood”)I decided that my doctor could go f*** himself, and I went to the walk-in clinic after work. (My doctor made an appointment with me for next Wednesday at 11am. Seven damn days away.) I went to the clinic, and I was informed that I most likely had an ulcer, which got infected when I had the stomach flu, and was hemorrhaging blood into me. He told me to drive right down to the emergency room for some blood tests. I told him that since I didn’t have a car, I’d walk, and his jaw just dropped right open.

“You can’t walk down there! You shouldn’t be walking anywhere at all!”

I responded by informing him that I walked to work all week.

“You what?! How could you be walking to work when you feel like this? Why are you working at all?”

I informed him that I needed the money, and I didn’t feel so bad that I couldn’t operate a keyboard. Besides, I did my wife’s paper route Wednesday morning.

“You did what? Jesus, I should hit you for being so stupid, why would you do that? How did you even do that with this going on?”

I explained to him that the philosophy I was raised on, “Shut up and tough it out”, combined with my Scandinavian heritage, caused me to work even harder when I was sick. Illness just makes me stubborn, and I redouble my efforts so that, from an outside perspective, there’s no change in my productivity. I have too much stuff to do. I thought he was going to hit me then. He ordered me to “take a god damn cab” down to the hospital and get my blood tests, then “call your doctor and MAKE HIm tell you the results, and if this keeps up, go to his office and DON’T LEAVE until he treats you”. The guy at the clinic, a really nice doctor by the way, was honestly angry at me and my doctor for letting this happen.

Anyways, the upshot of it is, I have a bleeding ulcer (which has mostly stopped bleeding). I missed a day and a half of work, and it seems Kyle caught my stomach flu, which is still hitting him a LOT milder than it hit me. Everyone at the office is moderately sympathetic, which is good, since they don’t mind I missed work for a good reason. However, those little pills I got from the clinic are MIRACLE drugs, and my stomach feels 90% better.

On the downside, my cough is getting worse again. People used to say, “Chris, if it wasn’t for bad luck, you’d have no luck at all.” Nowadays, that should be revised to say, “Chris, if it wasn’t for bad luck, you’d… hey, what are you doing… hey, get away from me with that baseball bat… hey!”

*krunchkt*