To "Sir", with love.

Today on my way into work, I shared the elevator with two thirty-somethings and as they departed on different floors, they both told me to "Have a good day, sir." I know I am no spring chicken. I stopped getting carded a long time ago. But I apparently have reached the age where it is just expected that I be treated with respect.

I mean, as far as the organization I work for goes, my elevator mates are peers. I am not management. But by virtue of either my age, demeanor, or both, I am not coming across that way. It's good as far as it goes, but I sort of always want to be respected for who I am as a person and what I do, my efficacy and knowledge, not my trips around the sun.

That said, I do have to say that being respected does feel kind of nice, especially because in my intimate relationships pre-Kathy there wasn't a lot of respect happening.

Fly Lady Update:

Loaded up the spice rack I got today and sorted through some clutter in my computer room. Things are getting done...eventually.

---

Lulu.

Pressure

But you will come to a place
Where the only thing you feel
Are loaded guns in your face
And you'll have to deal with
Pressure.

— Billy Joel

Portia has been steadily making things harder and harder for me as we try to get this divorce thing behind us. Without going into specifics, just when it seems she couldn't do anything more to make things more difficult than they already are, she finds a way to make things more difficult.

The funny thing is, I am handling this a lot better than I would have previously. Make no mistake; I am not dancing around like Gene Kelly in the rain over the proceedings. But I know that just a few months ago I would have been losing my mind over this.

One of the things that ACA teaches you is to let go and let God. And sometimes that's easier than others. But if you get yourself in the habit of doing that on the smaller stuff then you can begin to do that with the larger stuff. My relative serenity is scary to me at times. But it's welcome nonetheless.

And besides, from watching The Adventures of Superman I know that if you can endure enough pressure you turn into diamond. I don't think that show was scientifically approved, though.

Fly Lady Update:

I got my spice rack organizer today and my packet organizer for the kitchen. Circumstances conspired to keep me from loading them tonight, but I am excited. I am sure the spice rack won't hold all my spices, but it's a start.

---

The above-mentioned Mr. Joel.

What I feel like.

Fly Lady Update:

One of the things that makes cleaning hard for me is that it's something that I cannot force myself to do and power through like work. I have to feel like it. So if I am sick or tired, I usually don't feel like it. This is one of the many reasons that working overtime for me is a mixed blessing at best.

I wish I knew what allows me to get into the mood for doing this stuff, because when I try to force myself to do it when I don't feel like it, that's when accidents happen. So with a near crushing injury and a near electrocution, just imagine what my weekend would have turned out like if I wasn't in the mood for doing what I did.

---

Roberta Flack.

You won't see me.

Fly Lady Update:

I was cleaning the floors in the kitchen Sunday when I suddenly realized that my refrigerator door was dirty. I am sure this sounds strange to you, that it had to dawn on my that my refrigerator door was dirty and needed cleaning. But in order to not drive myself crazy seeing everything I have to do or would want to do and overwhelming myself, I stop seeing things. Then, as I can handle them, they "reappear".

I'm getting better one step at a time.

---

Anne Murray

Knock on wood.

Fly Lady Update:

Well, I nearly accidentally killed myself this weekend. Friday, I didn't get anything done except see Tina (as Portia relented enough to allow her to attend something we had previously planned). But Saturday and Sunday? Oh, Mama.

I mentioned that I bought a five-tier bookcase as part of my organization efforts at my house. However, when you buy it on line, such an item does not come assembled. So I spent the better part of Saturday assembling it.

Even thought it is particle board, it is still heavier than snot. And the instructions say it is a two man job. Yet, I lifted all the pieces and did all the assembly myself, with the help of a computer tower turned sawhorse. I tried a couple of times to drop the thing on myself, but I managed to fail. That was first near miss.

I then installed a motion-activated light switch in the laundry room. I had already done one prior in the hallway and was pretty positive that I knew everything I needed to do it again. However, in my zeal to just hurry up and do it, I neglected one thing I had remembered the first time I did it: turn the power off first.

Fortunately all I felt was a little current. However after that plus laundry, I was done for Saturday. On Sunday I cleaned the kitchen in the afternoon after spending the morning struck down by a headache and then afterward installed a timing switch for my front porch light, again almost forgetting to turn the power off. (What is with me and electricity these days?)

So, yes, Virginia, I didn't blog this weekend. But I did get a lot done without killing myself or shorting out my wiring, knock on wood.

---

Amii Stewart

The Case of the Blatherskite Blogger

THE CASE OF THE BLATHERSKITE BLOGGER

INT. COURTROOM - DAY

Berger: Your witness, Mr. Mason.

Mason: You just heard Mr. Berger point out that you did not produce a blog for Friday, Saturday, or Sunday, did you not?

Me: Yes. I did.

Mason: Furthermore, Mr. Berger suggested that because of that fact, you were in violation of the Laws of Blogging, specifically the one that says "Blog with reliable frequency."

Me: That is correct.

Berger: I object. If your honor wishes to have my examination of this witness repeated, I think the court reporter would be a better choice to do so than Mr. Mason.

Judge: I should think the prosecution would welcome having its points reinforced. Overruled. Continue, Mr. Mason.

Mason: Thank you, your honor. If it please the court, I'd like you to read the passage marked from the Laws of Blogging into the record.

Me: "Be interesting, creative, and real, but never let blogging become more important than real life."

Mason: I should like to present defense exhibit A, a copy of what the witness has been doing this whole weekend.

Berger: No objection.

Mason: If it please the court, take note of the volume and difficulty of the tasks performed by the defendant.

Berger: If the court also please, take note that there were several periods where the defendant rested, periods where he could have and should have blogged.

Mason: Could have? Yes. Should have? [pause] Your honor, by the very passage read by the defendant, given that he needed to rest from his labors, it was more important that he preserve his physical and mental well being than to blog. And with that, we move that all charges against the defendant be dropped.

Judge: I'm inclined to agree. Mr. Berger?

Berger: Your honor, the law clearly states blogging must be of a reliable frequency.

Judge: But when two aspects of law oppose each other, as they do in this case, it is my job to decide which one prevails and I believe Mr. Mason's argument is a sound one. I'm granting Mr. Mason's motion. The defendant is free to blog. Case dismissed.

Me: Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Mason. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go.

Mason: Go? Where?

Me: Home. I have to write my blog.

Music sting, fade to black

---

Mason: If you pick someone to lie to, Mrs. Granger, never choose your doctor or your lawyer. In both cases, it could be fatal.

All my exes

Both Stella and Portia have been in recent contact with Kathy. I think it a little strange that my exes keep talking to her. Perhaps they're trying to turn Kathy against me. Who knows? But Kathy is a different kind of woman than they are and I am different man than what I used to be, thanks to ACA.

But if Wilma or Winnie contact her, I quit.

Fly Lady Update:

I didn't even get to make potato encrusted flounder last night. Big weekend though this weekend. Building the shelves.  Finding a home for all the loose books. Getting rid of ones I don't want. Doing a big clean on the kitchen. Installing a programmable switch to turn the porch light on for me. Very excited. Let's see how I do.

---

♪ All my exes are infectious... ♫

Ash Wednesday

I had to eat with dignitaries from another branch of my company today, so instead of eating at my desk as I usually do, I ate down in the company cafeteria. As we were walking to our table, I noticed a smudge on a woman's forehead and for a brief moment did not realize why it was there.

Today, of course, is Ash Wednesday, which given that I remembered yesterday was Mardi Gras or Fat Tuesday makes my forgetting bewildering, as I was trying to decide yesterday if I was going to sacrifice something for Lent.

I don't keep Lent every year, or even most years. But I have. And it has been interesting experiences when I have. The first time I kept Lent, I gave up red meat. I ate a lot of chicken and fish. I made it through with some strain. But trust me, I was ready for Easter dinner when it came. That Easter dinner was the last time I dined out anywhere with my mother, especially since some of the buffet made its way home. My mother tended to operate under the assumption that rules are for other people.

One year I gave up soda for Lent. That was a little harder. Everyone tells you when you give up soda that you'll feel better. Well, maybe they felt better when they gave up soda. I was miserable. And it isn't even caffeine withdrawal as most of my sodas don't contain caffeine, at least by the label.

One year I gave up going to my then favorite comic book related forum. It was for a one-time big name in the comic book field. And I really liked the place. But I found, oddly enough, that I did feel better not going there. Not participating there somehow improved my mood. It was not much longer after Easter that I decided to quit it of my own volition.

This leads me to this year. I was considering giving up cookies for Lent, but with the stress that I am under, I felt that I needed to hang onto my pre-sleep security blanket. So I will not be making a formal Lenten sacrifice this year. But I figure, with the changes Kathy and I will go through merging households, we'll both sacrifice plenty.

Fly Lady Update:

I worked late and so didn't get any decluttering of the house done but I did make potato encrusted flounder with horseradish using some fish in my freezer, as part of my eating out of my freezer this month. And even though I have been eating out of the freezer, I still have plenty in it. *sigh*

---

Here is "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God" otherwise known as the theme to Davey and Goliath.

He has "issues".

It's all purple today.

Fly Lady Update:

My shelf and my CD rack came today. I racked the CDs that I had and for a second I must have felt what neat people feel. It actually sort of made me happy to be able to put them away.

I was trying to explain to Kathy about why making room for her is so hard for me and she guessed correctly that there are issues behind it. One thing that gets in the way is that nearly everything means something to me, so throwing things away is hard.

Also, being the son of a garbage man, I was raised that throwing away things that are still functional was regarded as wasteful. So I am trying to give things away as part of the decluttering.

But I am also learning that I am worth nicer things than hand-me-downs and rigged devices. Evolution isn't easy

---

This song has nothing to do with anything, but I like it and I can't think of anything that goes with today, so here it is. Kyu Sakamoto singing Ue o Muite Arukou (I refuse to call it Sukiyaki).

The birthday boy.

Today is my stepson Rick's birthday. Many happy returns of the day.

Fly Lady Update:

Going to stop at the comic book store for a longbox and then work on the couch and table, which are perennial catch-alls.

---

Greetings from space!

Curses

I don't believe in curses.

Coming from Cleveland, I suppose I should. Cleveland sports history over the last fifty years or so is littered with unmet expectations and heartbreak. Red Right 88, the Drive, the Fumble, the Shot, Game 7 versus the Marlins, the Decision, Willie Mays's catch... You get the idea.

Well, I have experienced enough of life to know that curses are simply the by-product of suggestion plus selective perception of events. To apply this to the Cleveland sports list I just gave you:

The Cardiac Kids (who were fortunate to even be in the playoffs that year) were playing on one of the coldest days ever for a Browns game, John Elway is John Elway, football drives of over eleven plays often end with a turnover, Michael Jordan is Michael Jordan, Jose Mesa had pitched a lot of baseball by game 7, LeBron James is an ego-maniacal jerk, Willie Mays is Willie Mays.

And so, it is with this in mind that I say my laptop is cursed.

I mentioned in a previous blog post that Stella gave me something that she demanded be returned. That something was my laptop. While the laptop has been good to me, shortly after Stella demanded it back, I broke several keys on it. I recently got it repaired, only to spill something on the keyboard yesterday and break it again.

Now mind you I use a laptop every single day for work, as I have for years. I have eaten in front of the work laptop and traveled hither and thither. I have never once harmed a key or spilled anything on it. And yet, in less than a month I have killed the keyboard of my personal laptop twice. Twice.

And so, I have decided that, despite the non-existence of same, this laptop is cursed. I am going to have the keyboard replaced again and then give the laptop to my sister, as I think the curse is not on the machine but on the combination of me and the machine. All of this leads me to one conclusion: in my heart, I'm still from Cleveland.

Fly Lady Update:

I said I would try to make up for days of inactivity on this front and I did. There is a papasan chair in my bedroom that, like most surfaces other than the bed became a collector of stuff. I went through it and mostly cleaned it. I need the bookshelf that I ordered and a longbox from the comic book store to finish it off, but that was a major step forward. But wait! There's more!

As I said, I was trying to make up for not doing any work on any of this, so I also thinned out my dresser. That may not sound like much until I tell you that I am giving away about thirty t-shirts to charity and I still have an almost full dresser. This was an enormous task. And I have also ranked the shirts so that if I get new ones, I know from where to start to look to get rid of old ones. It's been a day.

---

Screamin' Jay Hawkins (also from Cleveland, or at least born there).

I love a rainy night

I was talking to Kathy this morning and I mentioned that it was a gray, drizzly day today after raining last night and she gave me her condolences. However, I told her that it was no problem at all. While I love living where it is warm and the sun shines more often than not, I grew up with overcast skies and plenty of rain. I am not only used to such weather, when it comes to rain, I actually like it.

Storms have always fascinated me. I like the electrical show of lightning. I like the rumble of thunder. I like hearing chimes dance in the wind. Lightning is a personal symbol of mine, raw natural energy. In a way, bad weather makes me feel good. So I guess I do love a rainy night.

Fly Lady Update:

Failed to do anything Saturday, but I have actually done something today (Sunday) and in my next post I'll tell you all about it.

---

Eddie Rabbit

I've got work to do, part 2

I worked late at my job again Friday followed immediately by getting up early to ship said work to a client. So no blog yesterday.

Fly Lady Update:

Nothing got done because of work. Hopefully I can make up for it today and tomorrow.

---

Same song, different group. The Isley Brothers.

I've got work to do.

I spent most of the day at work yesterday. It was probably the day I got more different things at least partly accomplished which, while a source of pride, is indicative of being an adult child of an alcoholic.

We tend to be hyper-responsible. This means we try to meet all commitments and take more commitments than is advisable. I feel pretty crappy today, and that is why. I could really use some rest, but duty calls again.

At one point when the Not Yet Ex Wife actually liked me, she called me Du, which everyone down here thought was after Loretta Lynn but was (at least according to what she told people) because I was dutiful.

Fly Lady Update:

Got my new rack for DVDs in the mail Thursday. I didn't have a chance to load it, but that progress. I also applied for a lost title so that I can sell the little red car. I won't get the new title before Kathy arrives, but I have done all that I could..

---

The Average White Band — Work to Do

Accentuate the positive

Kathy and I came a little close to having a fight yesterday, which given that it was Valentine's Day is very very sad. Between my deal with my not-yet-ex-wife, a business deal, and other machinations at work, I'm having a rough time right now and I am being a little negative. This, in turn, is bringing Kathy down. Meanwhile I took umbrage at being called negative. In reflection, it's because it's true.

I don't think that I am a negative person, but it is fair to say that lately I am, in fact, negative. I could go into justifications for it and explanations of it, but they really don't matter. I just need to take a deep breath, relax, and let it go.

I'm writing this more as an apology to Kathy, because I am sorry.

Fly Lady Update:

Other than cleaning the toilets as part of the daily clean, nothing happened today. I stayed at work too long. But I just found out my safe for my important papers is on the way. So hooray for that.

---

Aretha Franklin showing her inner Ella Fitzgerald

I'd like to get to know you

In clearing out a bunch of old papers, I came across a personality test I was given by one of my employers. I read it through and found that even now, fifteen years or more later, it was spot on.

The first thing I found was that I was both very frank and very consistent. Somehow the test I took was geared to gauge how honestly I answered the questions. The other things it suggested was that I was not particularly receptive to change, that I am a bit anti-social, that I am an introvert, and that I am very, very sensitive.

I was surprised in fact to see how sensitive I am. However, given what I said earlier about taking everything personally, it really shouldn't have surprised me. In the end, I had the same dilemma with the personality test as I have with all metrics of self-awareness: "Okay, I know who I am; now what am I going to do about it?"

Fly Lady Update:

I changed the tack today and instead got rid of a bunch of extra plastic food keepers in the kitchen, paring it down to a usable number. I still don't like throwing perfectly good things away, but I have seen what a difference decluttering makes. Progress.

---

Spanky & Our Gang.

And the shoe drops

A few days ago you may recall that I mentioned my agreement with the not-yet-ex-wife had blown up in my face. After weighing my options, I decided to sue for divorce outright. She was served today and in response, she is keeping Tina, my granddaughter, from coming over. My hope is that she get over this pettiness, but I am prepared to live with the situation if she doesn't. I need to be divorced even more than I need to see my granddaughter.

Fly Lady Update:

I gathered many important papers and cleaned out the filing cabinet of detritus to house them. This also cleaned up part of the dining room as well. Progress.

---

Henry Gross. It's a song about losing a dog rather than a granddaughter, but it is sufficiently maudlin to fit the mood.

Little Band of Gold

Kathy and I were looking at wedding rings the other day. (Yes, we're that far along already). The place that we were looking at offers a service that will take your own old gold and incorporate it into your new jewelry. I thought about using my old wedding band to make my new one, but Kathy was not feeling it. Her reasoning is that my old ring is symbolic of a failed relationship. And I can see where it could be seen that way. But it isn't for me.

To me, that ring is a symbol of two things: my ability to achieve beyond my apparent capacity and the importance of love in my heart. I bought that ring on time payments over a year in a time where money was extremely tight. I sacrificed in order to buy that gold band and the diamond solitaire and wrap that went with it. I kept a promise by buying the ring even as the woman for whom I intended to wear it did not.

Yes, I bought the ring for Wilma and not Portia. Portia ended up resenting wearing "Wilma's" ring. Again I understand it. I don't subscribe to it, but I do understand it. I do wish that Portia had mentioned it before I married her rather than holding it over my head for many years afterward.

At any rate, I don't think about Portia leaving me when I think about the ring and for me I don't think it holds any bad luck. But I do understand Kathy wanting a clean slate, and so it too will be sent on its way.

Fly Lady Update:

Bought CD and DVD racks and a five tier bookshelf and did some cleaning and organizing in the kitchen. I also have been trying to eat out of the freezer this month to reduce the number of items in it. It appears, however, that I have purchased quite a few freezer items. I could probably do this for two months. Wow.

---

Went looking for a version of the song to put here and found that it was recorded once by the Bee Gees.

It was originally by James Gilreath, but the version I know was by Bill Anderson. However I can't find a video of that version. Sonny James's version sounds closest.

Let's Go To Heaven In My Car

Fly Lady Update:

Getting close to fifteen years ago I wrecked my car. My friend Fred loaned me the money to buy a new one with the car as collateral against the loan. I mentioned it in a previous post. The car has been sitting in my driveway for over two years, as it was very old and I had since purchased a different one.

Well, as I mentioned earlier, Kathy is going to move down here and she will need a space in my driveway. So I cleared the car out of any valuable items ahead of selling it. As with any decluttering exercise it was a bit of archeology and heartache.

I found a few things I didn't know where they were. I found the Bible my late friend Jim gave me when he sold me the car. I read that Bible a lot as my marriage was falling apart. I found printed copies of my scripts that I tried to sell (and came this close).

Much as with my late dog, this car has seen me through a very difficult time in my life. Good byes are hard, especially when it's forever. Even if it's just a car.

---

Brian Wilson

Tomorrow

Let's just get this part out of the way first:

Fly Lady Update for Friday:

Zip. Zero. Nothing.

Now why. I had to work late. I worked until midnight. I was not happy about this. But tomorrow (or today) is another day.

---

Everything's going my way

If you've read the blog recently, you will find the title of this post rather strange, but to recap, my not-yet-ex-wife blew up our agreement to divorce and I am having to change many things at my home including throwing many things out to allow Kathy to move into my life.

And yet, it's true. For a while now, it seems that things I initially find as setbacks end up being to my ultimate benefit. When I was trying to purchase my house, I agreed to a price that was higher than I wanted and I would have had to strain to pay. But what happened was that the financing I arranged would not pay a dime above appraisal and the appraisal came in at exactly the price point I had originally wanted. The seller, wanting to be rid of the property, came down to the appraisal.

Speaking of buying the house, I had originally wanted to wait a year before seeing if I could purchase a house, but the landlord wanted to sell and so since I hate moving, I applied to buy the house without any idea if I could. Turns out I could.

I mentioned in this previous post how my mother's death enabled me to have a relationship with my father and how my marriage failing and post-marriage relationship failing led me to ACA.

Well, this week I received some setbacks that I am not at liberty to discuss but I have just found that they too are leading to something better than I had originally planned myself. It's amazing what can happen for you if you just get out of your own way.

Fly Lady Update:

No excuse and no reason. I just didn't get anything done yesterday. I will need to definitely make up for this today and this weekend.

---

From Oklahoma.

Stop, children! What's that sound?

The Van Buren Sound.

No, it's not the band who sang Incense and Peppermints (which, by the way, was the Strawberry Alarm Clock). Nor is it a body of water near Kinderhook, New York, the birthplace of President Martin Van Buren. Nor was it the noise said president made when his finger was pulled. No, the Van Buren sound is an implement of torture disguised as a medical treatment and a part of my life for the last five or six years.

For someone my age I am blessedly relatively free of medical ailments. However at one point about five or six years ago I was having painful waste elimination. So I went to see a urologist. He stuck a scope up my business and determined that I had sustained an injury that was scarring up and narrowing my urethra. So I had an operation that amounted to a Roto-Rootering™ of my urethra.

Problem is, the repaired area would continue to scar until closed again unless something was put in place that would keep the scar tissue flat against the urethral wall. That something is a Van Buren sound. Basically, it's a long metal rod that is inserted in Mr. Happy, keeping the opening stretched open. The frequency of these insertions was every two months, then every three, eventually backing off to my current once a year. And today was my lucky day. Plus as an extra special bonus, I got a prostate exam. Yay, me.

Needless to say, this is not exactly my happy place.

Set of Van Buren sounds at Amazon.com

Fly Lady Update:

Nothing. I take the evening off after this procedure. Do you blame me?

---

Buffalo Springfield with the title song.

Special bonus song, Incense and Peppermints.

I made it through the rain

I was watching a televangelist the other day. He was talking about how if you're on your way to what God intends for you than even the bad things and setbacks are to ultimately work in your favor. He sighted his own example of his father's illness and eventual death resulting in him having to take over said ministry and become the successful preacher that he is.

It seems to hold in my life as well. I am a black man (I'm too old to be African American) and I have long held that my ancestors getting kidnapped and enslaved was for the family bloodline probably the best thing that could have happened. Life in Africa was and continues to be hard. My life today would be far different had I been born in Africa.

My father and I have a relationship now, but I would not have gotten to know my father as a person had not my mother died. I adored my mother and visits home were spent primarily with her. Moreover my mother had a tendency to overwhelm a room. My father said little, not because he had nothing to say, but because there was little room to say it. This is not at all to say that I am happy my mother is dead. It's just to note that had my father died first, I might never have gotten to know him as I now do.

My marriage falling apart was the impetus to get into therapy, which eventually found me in ACoA and finally making progress on things I never before understood about myself. I have a friend who is an adult child of an alcoholic whose life hasn't fallen apart and because of that does not want to hear about how paternal alcoholism has made life worse. This person will not even entertain ACA because he or she has not received the gift of an unmanageable life. And for me that's what it was, a gift.

Fly Lady Update:

I put the dishes away and cleaned the kitchen a little on Tuesday. I had to work later than I had planned and didn't have the time I wanted to devote to the housecleaning. But I at least made a little time. Just need to keep getting back on that horse.

---

Barry Manilow

Super Bowl, man

Yesterday was the Super Bowl. Some team beat some other team. Madonna danced around.  And a few new commercials came out.

You might not be able to tell, but I actually follow NFL football.  But if my team, the Cleveland Browns, aren't playing, I don't care.

I'm close to fifty years of not caring now. *sigh*

Fly Lady Update:

Donated the clothes today, but Monday is kind of busy, so that's about it.

---

Look! Up in the sky! It's a bird! It's a plane...

Throw It All Away

Today is all Fly Lady, so...

Fly Lady Update:

I cleaned out the closet in my computer room today and I moved my clothes in there so that Kathy can put her clothes in the master bedroom closet. When I moved into this house years ago, clothes that I didn't wear with frequency were put in the computer room. A lot of the clothes were from my life back north.

I tossed a lot of flannel shirts, which have little use down here. I tossed some dress shirts that I don't like the look of. I tossed some shirts and pants which, alas, I don't fit anymore. And it took me on a walk down memory lane.

I remembered my life back in radio with Wilma and in Internet service with Winnie and how different my life was then. It was quite emotional and quite difficult going through everything. I several times found myself wanting to save a few things because of the memories. But I will always have the memories even without the triggers.

But the strangest thing I noticed was that I kept a lot of things that I had no idea why I did. So I gathered them all and tossed them. I'm not at the point where I feel better when I do this, but at least I don't feel violated anymore.

---

Zero 7

He's been working and slaving his life away.

I am writing this at work. Yeah, it's Saturday. And yeah, I am at work. In the evening. The situation called for it, so here I am. Of course, I get this from my father. Besides being an alcoholic he was a workaholic. In a little bit of irony, I was talking on the phone to him on the way in. I told him I was coming in to work some overtime and he remarked that he worked overtime any chance he got. No fooling, Sherlock.

I am not mad at my father about it. He had four kids to feed and kids as you may know cost money. So he worked any overtime the city approved, he worked a second job when we were kids, and he salvaged copper, aluminum, car batteries, newspaper, and anything else the recycler would take. And if I had that kind of responsibility, I'd do it to.

But my stepson is an adult and I can do for my granddaughter without working myself to death. And the thing I have learned as I have gone through a year this past year where I worked Herculean overtime is that money doesn't matter so much if you're too tired to shop and too sick to use it for anything other than doctor's bills.

So I have made a pact with myself to keep the overtime I work to the absolute minimum this year, because life is worth more than money.

Fly Lady Update:

Well, I did some work in the living room and the kitchen, but beyond that I made myself a special affirmation MP3 designed to penetrate deep to my subconscious. So far, judging by today, it works pretty well. But we'll see as the month wears on.

---

A bunch of Animals. (True fact: I sung this on stage in college, ripping my shirt off at the end of the performance.)

Computer world

Little things can change our lives a lot. A year ago I didn't even have a laptop computer and now, just 365 later, I have adjusted so much to having one that I am feeling a little lost without it. But it's nice getting to know my desktop again.

I am actually quite proud of this computer. I built it myself. I bought all the parts for it from Tiger Direct as part of something called a bare-bones kit. You get no operating system and nothing is assembled except the power supply in the case. But other than installing a CPU cooling fan, I had done previously everything else one has to do to build a computer from scratch, including installing a motherboard and CPU. So this was merely putting everything together.

It's nice and peppy compared to my work computer. I remember the days when people's work computers were faster, newer, and more tricked out than their work computers. Now at work I find myself wishing I was using my home computer. But, as a friend points out, in this economy I should consider myself lucky I have a job.

At any rate, the reason I bring up missing the laptop was that it sat next to me in the living room, which made my posting a blog post as simple as thinking about it then doing it. Now I have to get up and go to the room where the computer resides. I know, such an agonizing ordeal. But it is contributory as to why I haven't been Johnny on the spot in terms of posting entries. Fortunately, it shouldn't be too much longer I am without my laptop. Yay.

Fly Lady Update:

Really didn't do anything yesterday but will make up for it today with work on the kitchen, the living room and maybe even consolidating the closets.

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Interpol and Deutsche Bank, FBI and Scotland Yard.

Trust

I just sent the laptop off to be repaired and as usual my lovely ACoA tendencies showed up in full force. The repairman that I chose to use to fix my laptop's keyboard had a website but no physical address, which worried me. He came over to my house and picked up my laptop. He had me fill out a paper indicating that he was going to work on it and that he received my money. But he didn't give me anything that showed that he actually had my laptop.

Being the son of two paranoids, I began to panic that I had just given a computer to a guy who was just going to walk away with it never to return. I asked for a receipt and the guy looked at me like I was from Mars. He wrote down on the back of his business card that he picked up the laptop and left me with that.

While I don't think that asking for a receipt was out of line (it protects him as much as it does me), it was clearly born of my distrust of pretty much, well, everyone. It was another instance of my mother's trying to protect me crippling me instead.

Fly Lady Update:

Didn't do any flying today. I think I will go put the dishes away out of the dishwasher once I am done, but I didn't get anything else done today. I will try to make up for it on the weekend.

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The Cure, Trust

Water Music

I forgot water Wednesday yesterday. I was ill and preoccupied, so I didn't pay much attention to what day it was. But I had juice Wednesday, so the basic idea (a respite from soda) did get accomplished.

Fly Lady Update:

Tina and I worked a little on the kitchen yesterday. Again, being sick I didn't put a lot into it. But any movement forward is not movement backward, so there's that.

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Handel with Water Music, naturally.