January 2019 in 2010s

THURSDAY, JANUARY 31, 2019
Stupid cock with a loud car still can’t go a day without visiting mommy and daddy but I’d say it’s definitely not living here. It just left for the night (at 6). So now it doesn’t have to make its own dinner.

Chatted with Aly earlier. She’s on the edge of the polar vortex I’m so glad we’re nowhere near. Wow, -40 degrees in Wisconsin? OMG!

Still having some itching and especially burning down there and I’m not sure why. On a list of no-nos for those with lichen sclerosis are hot chocolate and cocoa. Well, that’s what my Sugar Babies K-cups are so perhaps that’s part of why I was on fire earlier. Damn, I’m so fucking sick of my crotch torturing the shit out of me so much of the time! It’s better than yesterday, though, and I didn’t have any Sugar Babies today.

So I guess Ray realized he accidentally gave my message a thumbs up and decided to give it a thumbs down today which I replied to with a 😂. I expected to be blocked at that point but I wasn’t. Doesn’t the grumpy old fart know he can do that?

Really hoping we don’t need a new car anytime soon but the car’s ‘check engine’ light keeps coming on, suggesting something could be wrong with the transmission. As Tom said, transmissions aren’t worth fixing on older cars but if worse comes to worst, we grab a used car for three or four grand to tide us over for the rest of the time we’re in the state.

Right now my schedule is really pissing me off. I totally believe that it was not only cursed upon me not only to stop me from making money but also to make my life harder. Looks like I’m going to have to reschedule my dentist appointment though I should hit Dr. A with no problem. The question is whether or not I should in the first place. I’m thinking I might message her a week beforehand if I’m still stable and ask if I can bump her appointment up to June which is when I would have normally seen her and when my next round of blood work is due anyway. But then maybe I should go and show her my groin rash because it keeps trying to flare up as fast as I treat it, so as much as I fear medication, I’m wondering if that’s the only way to get rid of it for good. I would still worry that it’s just going to keep reoccurring so IDK.

I don’t regret the guinea pigs much at this point but I definitely regret the rats because they’re just so fucking timid. Just so, so timid. I knew better too, so why the fuck did I go and get them?

Tom was saying that in order to help him cut back on eating he’s sort of playing a game where he has only so many days to ration out only so much food. I told him he oughta pretend he’s on probation and part of its terms stipulates that he must do 10-20 minutes of programming a day or else his ass gets hauled to jail. I’m serious too, LOL. While I’ll never be on probation again, think of all the things we’d get done if we had no choice but to do it or run!

I’ve totally lost all control of my own weight. I try to take it as easy as possible on the food, and I could walk and walk all day, but the weight is definitely mine for life.

The problem is everything is bad for me because it’s either high in cholesterol, high in sodium or not good for LS.

I was so tempted to message a friend of the black bitch’s in Arizona from the Nicole account, pointing out all the ways she and her friends messed up when pretending to be from the police department, but she would only block that account, preventing me from tipping her off when it’s time to read my story, assuming she’s even alive then. She’s only four years younger than me.

Also, I absolutely cannot go to jail should they set me up. Not only for obvious reasons but I didn’t have the health issues in my 30s that I have now. Now I need daily thyroid medication which they would conveniently happen to take weeks or even months to give me, and I doubt they would give me anything for my LS or the glasses I need just to see where I’m going.

Went out walking earlier. A large woman with an old chihuahua stopped and chatted for a few seconds on Tandy and so did a very frail woman further down the street, telling me to hurry up and get my walk in since it’s going to rain tomorrow. Yes, it is! Looks like we have a rainy few days coming up, something I have mixed emotions about. The roof could leak, the place will smell of old wood since I think the attic has water damage, and the humidity will make my lungs tight because they’re not used to humid conditions. But I do like the rain otherwise and we certainly need it.

Had a weird dream that made no sense at all. I started off in a large room where a few full-size beds were laid out side by side. I was supposed to spend the night in the bed on one end by the door leading to the rest of the house or whatever it was. I was to sleep with this young woman. Nothing intimate or anything like that, it’s just where I was to sleep that night.

The girl was in her early to mid-20s and was petite with straight long dark blond hair and light eyes. As the few others that were in the room mingled about, we laid on our backs chatting with a small dog she had between us, and I smiled and said, “This is nice.”

She squeezed my hand with affection and then the girl was suddenly searching for running apparel on her laptop. I asked why she was looking at running apparel since she wasn’t into running and the girl said, “No, but you are. I want to get you something as a token of thanks.”

I told her she didn’t have to do that and showed her how solid my calves were. She poked and prodded them with her fingertips, inspecting the muscle.

Then the girl got up and packed some stuff into a bag because she was going out somewhere. As she was doing this, I said something about her cutting off the bed space and not leaving me much room the last time we slept together, so what should I do if she didn’t leave me much space that night?

“You do nothing about it because it was my space to begin with,” she told me.

Then she took off and I studied the room and decided it was ordinary-looking but stylish. I thought to myself that I might hang some things on certain sections where the walls were bare.

Then the bed turned into a car which I backed out of the spot the bed had been in and drove to the other end of the long room. So about 25 feet. Then I was worried that maybe I shouldn’t have moved the car and that the girl wouldn’t like the spot I moved it to, so I racked my brain trying to come up with a good excuse for moving there in the first place.

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 30, 2019
Why are my numbers so bad lately? Been watching my sodium yet now my diastolic number is on the rise. It was a little over 80 but now it’s often between 90 and 100. My weight is up a couple of pounds too, and I can’t seem to get it back down. Oh well.

The car is now done and Tom even found another problem along the way where there was a pinched hose that was preventing antifreeze from going where it was supposed to. I’m just glad he was able to do it himself as I knew he would be! Saves us hundreds of dollars.

Speaking of something that costs hundreds but may be very worth it once we get ahead again, I was thinking of getting laser hair removal. As a woman ages, she gets hairs on her upper lip and plucking and waxing hurts, and of course you don’t want to shave them and get coarse stubble either. Nair thins the hairs but doesn’t remove them completely. The question is whether or not to buy my own laser treatment device or leave it to the pros. The pros would cost much more, of course, and it would take a minimum of four sessions, but at least I know it would be done right. Would love to have my underarms and legs done as well but that would really add up in cost so I’ll just focus on the ladystache.

Our little project junkies got new carpet today. This was an indoor project so I didn’t have to worry about hammering or power tools but there would have been a lot of door slamming as they were going in and out of their vehicle to get stuff. Fortunately, I slept through it.

So much for thinking that the rats and pigs wouldn’t hang together if I kept the rats out of the guinea pigs’ tube which I usually only give them when I’m sleeping. The rats were pissing it up on the very top level, so I washed it out and gave it back to the pigs, but sure enough, the rats quickly joined them. While it’s nice that they can get along, I had to separate the rats again because they were stealing too much food being the hoarders that they are. So they can’t live together. But it’s nice to know they can hang out together during cage cleanings.

Couldn’t find anything new to watch on Netflix other than the usual reality TV, documentaries and foreign shit with accents I’d rather not deal with and strange words with different meanings. What the hell is a “bonny” evening?

So I jumped back on Hulu since our 30 days aren’t up yet and watched a movie called Kidnap and it was very good. Not very realistic in some ways but good. Even though Hulu’s player sucks, if you watch something straight through, it’s okay. I would still like to find a mystery or drama series I haven’t seen that’s not a reality show or documentary of any kind WITHOUT any reference to God or racism. I’ve had enough of the religious and political crap.

Anyway, I’m pretty tired today because I slept shitty. Woke up warm a couple of times and then the fire truck that Tom told me went down to the end of the street woke me up when my earbud slipped out. Oh, how I miss the days of only needing to sleep with a box fan! But even if we were back in Phoenix with the acoustic sound-blocking shit we had in the master bedroom windows, it wouldn’t do me much good because box fans are so much quieter these days. Everything inside the home gets quieter while everything outside gets louder. So even if I wasn’t right on a busy street, they wouldn’t be enough. The best I can hope for in the next place is just needing Alexa to play white noise and being able to do away with the earbuds altogether. The only time I can skip out on them here is when I’m sleeping at night.

Really itchy down there today for some reason and I don’t know why. Something I ate?

TUESDAY, JANUARY 29, 2019
Day 1 of replacing the water pump is going well. Apparently, it’s buried so deep that he had to remove a lot of other parts in order to get to it. He said he would have been worried to find that it wasn’t broken after all but once he inspected it he could see that it’s clearly messed up.

I remember thinking how frustrated I would be if the doctors told me when I first went to one 5 years ago that everything was okay when I suspected I had either a dead thyroid or diabetes because then I would continue to wonder about my symptoms. How I would come to wish to hell that that’s exactly what they told me!

Anyway, he worked on and off for 4 hours and it should take him 2-3 hours to finish the project tomorrow.

Went out walking for the second day in a row but went by myself today. I saw Bob and Virginia sitting out front on what turned out to be a shorter walk than I planned on because it was sunnier than expected and I was a little warm in my long sleeves. So I doubled back and only Bob was there at the time. We chatted for a minute and then I saw him again when I went to pick up the mail. He was tweaking Virginia’s walker as they were preparing to go out for a quick walk. She can get around the house without it but just uses it for support when she’s out, Bob said.

I wrapped saran wrap around the upper level of the cage to help curb some of the bedding the pigs kick out when they get all playful and run around chasing each other like they love to do while chatting happily, but now that the rats can go up there, I’m a little worried that they’ll destroy the mesh once we get around to putting that on because they’re more destructive than guinea pigs.

The rats are strange. Not only are they horribly timid but they’re little kleptos who keep running up and down to steal food from the pigs when they have plenty of their own. The pigs can’t get down to the lower level and they have no interest in doing so anyway. They’re big and clumsy so going down the ramp at the angle it’s at would be extremely hard for them. But the rats, being the clever little bastards that they are, take food where the pigs can’t reach it.

What’s even stranger is that the pigs aren’t drinking water. They ignore their water bottle and they also ignore the bowl of water I placed in their cage in case they’d rather lap it up that way. I know they get plenty from all the lettuce they eat and they seem to be very healthy, but it’s still weird.

I couldn’t get into The Ted Bundy Files so I watched a crime documentary called Abducted in Plain Sight and OMG! The girl’s parents, who also got it on with the perp, weren’t just gullible and naive. They were downright stupid! They should be in jail for neglect, and damn the twisted system for not dealing with the perp decades sooner than they did.

“Nicole” gave Marie a piece of my mind as to how she wishes her luck but can’t deal with her rollercoaster moods, played with Stacey S for a bit, and told one of Maliheh’s friends that she owes Jodi an apology. LOL. I know. I’m bad. ;-( Asked Stacey if she’d gotten over her “crush” on Jodi.

No loud car today that I know of. Coincidence? I guess that remains to be seen.

I had a brief dream about Kathleen that I vaguely remember. She kept calling me Princess. Speaking of her, if she doesn’t call by April or May, and I certainly don’t expect her to… Why? Why do some people seem to really want to be your friend, ask for your number and then never call? I can see 20-somethings doing this, but a 65-year-old? Just wondering what’s in it for her and what she felt she got out of doing such a thing. Kathleen seems like the last person to do such a thing but then so did Stacey, even though she and I were in a totally different situation.

In another dream, I was with my mother in the first Longmeadow house we had. My mother’s whole demeanor seemed different. Instead of being the tense bossy bitch she would be, she seemed very mellow and relaxed.

There was a huge storm and after we were sitting upstairs in her room chatting for a while, I went downstairs to find that only the kitchen had flooded. There was about 4 feet of water but only in that room.

I ran back upstairs and told Mom that the storm was getting worse and she asked if I thought she should call to be evacuated by emergency workers. I told her to go ahead while I looked out the window at the other half a dozen houses on the dead-end street. All of them were pitch-dark except for one on the end. There were lights on in that house and I saw one window go dark.

The dream ended with me telling my mother that someone was home in that house.

MONDAY, JANUARY 28, 2019
I absolutely love my new garden fairy! She sure is heavy, too. When I was browsing similar items and looking at reviews where some people share photos of their purchases, there was a different fairy someone had painted. I thought wow, what a cool and fun idea! So I picked out a set of paints and brushes that will total $11. I’ll get it when I accumulate enough Bing points. Love this points game! I’m sure they’ll do away with it or make it much harder to get points now that I’m hooked on it. All good things come to an end. :-( For now, I’ll enjoy it while it lasts.

Carolyn did respond to my message and says she doesn’t think the car guy ever moved. Oh, I think he did for a while. When he’s here he comes and goes multiple times a day. He’s an obvious slacker with enabling parents. He always seems to be perfectly single too, and I bet I can guess why. Plus, there would be no car there in the middle of the night during the times I wasn’t hearing from him much.

Looked back in my journal. I thought he became a problem in January of 2016 but it was actually 2017. He moved out in November of that year and only recently returned as far as I can tell. Decided I’m not going to bother to pursue the matter, though, because that’s just how the world is no matter where you go these days. Adult communities have become very mainstream-ish that I’m surprised they even still exist. I may hate to hear it when he goes by but this is pretty much all I know and is what I’m used to. I honestly can’t imagine a quiet place! Besides, even if they did something about it, there would just be something else.

Written the following morning…

I ran over to the other side of the circle before midnight and was surprised to find the car wasn’t there. I was up past 1:00 so I would have heard it if it came in. Once again, I don’t know what to think. Haven’t heard it since I got up but I didn’t get up until 10:30. I’m sure I’ll hear it at some point. They’re obviously having insecurity issues and clinging to their parents who don’t seem to be in a hurry to wean the little bastard off.

I thanked Carolyn for getting back to me after I asked her how long after their complaint before the car disappeared and that’s when she told me she didn’t think he ever left. I’m home more than they are and up in the middle of the night half the time so I still think he did leave around the time we both complained.

I also said it was too bad this park wasn’t big on enforcing its own rules. She said she agreed… different rules for different people.

I wonder if she’s referring to how they got complained on for overgrown corner bushes while we didn’t when ours were a bit neglected. Just something I sense but can’t say for sure, not that it matters. But our place looks shitty most of the time because there are so many plants and so little time for Tom to tend to them that I’ve suspected she may not so much as resent us for it but maybe be a little annoyed. I think their biggest reasons for pulling back where I’m concerned is partly due to Ray’s mouth but mostly due to the fact that we’re very different. They’re conservatives with a different set of values and beliefs.

I finished Law & Order SVU on Hulu and am now done with them and their god-awful player. Saw a movie on Netflix last night called Deadly Switch and next, I’m going to check out The Ted Bundy Files. At least that shouldn’t be chock-full of references to race and racism. I still firmly believe that while some people are truly a victim of racism, the vast majority of complaints are either exaggerated or made up in a day and age when people know that playing the race card usually works and gets them what they want. I also think that sometimes it’s just pure paranoia because they have been shit on in the past that they sometimes think they’re being discriminated against when they’re not.

The worst thing going on right now is that Tom has to take the next two days off to fix the car. We’re falling so far into debt that he decided to spend $100 to fix it himself rather than take it in and spend $500. The thing is that you’re not supposed to work on vehicles here so we could end up getting complained about, though I’d say it’s unlikely. He’s done car work before and no one’s ever said anything. This is when it’s a good thing we’re in a park that doesn’t care what people do. There are pros and cons to being in a lenient park just like in a strict one.

Anyway, Tom is going to be replacing the water pump on the car. It’s now leaking so bad that none of the different stop-leak products he’s tried is helping and he doesn’t think it’s going to make it until next weekend. Hopefully, he’ll make it home okay! He’s got AAA if worse comes to worst. I hope not, though! We owe so much fucking money now that our tax return is going solely to bills. We may never get to vacation again while we’re here, but since we should be out of here in less than a decade, that’s okay since we’re going to end up in the kind of climate we would vacation in, anyway.

I also created a bogus Facebook account under a name I drew from a random name generator. I’ve already backed up my Revenge story there privately so all one of us has to do, depending on who goes when, is make them public and then tip off a few people.

My main reason for creating the account, though, is to see what my account looks like to those who are logged in and not on my friend list. They took away the ‘view as’ option because they found security issues with it. Tried logging out and saw virtually nothing. Says I have over 18K pictures now stored on there. That’s a lot!

“Anyone ever call you rude?” someone asked me on Ask right after I answered a question pertaining to race that I knew Aly would disagree with. I automatically thought it was from her but then Cam started answering questions and I could see that he got asked the same thing. Still could be her, though, trying to throw me off her scent.

SUNDAY, JANUARY 27, 2019
Sent my complaint anonymously to the office about the fucking punk that has been roaring in and out several times just in the three hours I’ve been up. They’ve got one week to get him out of here. When that fails to happen I will take things a step further. I asked the Twenties how long it took between their complaint and when he actually left but I have a feeling they’re going to ignore me again.

How fucking stupid can these people be, though? Why would they think they wouldn’t get kicked out again? Do they even care or do they actually like to make trouble for themselves? They’re just like the freeloaders in Arizona were, thinking that after they behave a while they’ll be able to get away with shit the second time around because people will either suddenly not mind or they’ll throw their hands up and say “fuck it.”

I’m tired of having to fight for peace every single fucking place I go!

The mesh for the cage arrived and it’s a really beautiful shade of pale pink. We’re going to look into what type of epoxy would be safe for the animals so we can secure the side guards to the pan. Still don’t know why they didn’t make the thing with sides to begin with. The problem is that they’re able to push bedding, hay and whatnot underneath the tiny gap between the pan and side guards which makes a mess. Wrapping the mesh around the base of their level will only prevent what they kick up when they run around from getting flung out.

The rats are proving to be horribly timid but I knew they would be.

My very heavy fairy came today, a day early, and she’s beautiful! Keeping her indoors while at this place.

The other night I dreamed I was at the beach I spent my summers at as a kid or at least a similar one. I was out walking around at night and marveling at how peaceful and quiet it was. The only thing I heard through an open window as I walked between cottages was the sound of a toilet flushing.

Last night’s dream was a little scary, though. I was watching a news report about a strange storm that actually sucked sea levels down about 50 ft. I was watching a clip of about 20 people who were stranded on a giant round rock way out at sea. I guess sea levels dropped in just a few minutes because they had originally been at the tip of it which was all that protruded from the water when the water level went down. Due to the shape of the rock, they couldn’t climb down to their boats. The scary part was watching someone lose their footing and go tumbling down the rock and then spiral into the water below. It seemed so real and vividly clear! Definitely the kind of dream that makes me wonder about other dimensions.

SATURDAY, JANUARY 26, 2019
Got our new 9-week-old male cinnamon hooded rats which I’ve named Fuzzy and Woody. I also chose their names from a random pet name generator, but they may earn themselves nicknames like Blitz earned the nickname Funny Face after I get to know them a while.

When we went into the store we were greeted by a very helpful young woman. The place stunk and my lungs were a little tight for a while, but I like this small chain better than PetSmart and Petco. They had female Berkshires, hoodies and also a hairless rat which is an absolute no-no. I hate hairless animals. I contemplated a Berkshire and a hooded but then she showed me the males. They consisted of cinnamon hoodies and white rats. At first, I was going to get a hooded and a white rat but while I put my hand in the cage and no one bit me even though they could have, the snowy rats were really timid. So we ended up with two cinnamon hoodies which are hard to tell apart, depending on the angle and lighting. I’m sure they’ll get easier to tell apart as they get bigger. When they’re side by side in good lighting it’s obvious that one is lighter than the other. That’s Fuzzy. Woody is the darker one.

The girl said they were from an accidental litter and very timid. They do indeed seem timid but I’ve come to learn and accept a long time ago that I’m just meant to have timid rats. Ever since Tinkerbell, that’s just the way it’s been with only a couple of exceptions. I’m sure they’ll get better with time and age but I don’t expect them to end up being some of the best rats we’ve ever had.

They’re adorably cute and it’s nice to have intelligent animals again. I hate the time, money, mess and smell but it’s worth it. The guinea pigs, rats and fish are all on different schedules. Nocturnal, “dayturnal” and “noturnal,” LOL.

We grabbed them some food, and on Amazon, we ordered a couple of large glass canisters for their food as well as some pale pink mesh that I plan to wrap around the base of the upper level where the pigs are to help cut down some of the mess they kick out.

We eventually plan to introduce the rats to the pigs to each other but want to give them a little time to get adjusted first.

It’s nice to know when they were born; November 27th. The big chains usually don’t have that info.

Said hello to both Geri and Bob on Friday as I was going to pick up the mail.

Still can’t say for sure whether or not the loud car guy lives here but I think so. He’s definitely got to go too, because I’m so fucking sick of hearing that thing. Like I don’t have enough loud vehicles to listen to as it is.

The Twenties haven’t responded to my message so I don’t know if it’s because they have something against me or they’re pissed at me for telling Ray off but I don’t care. I’m glad I reminded myself that I don’t hold back if I have something to say and that I said what I said to him. What was strange was that first he gave it a thumbs-up, then a thumbs-down, and then a thumbs-up again. I’m guessing that was by accident? It’s easy to do. Kind of surprised he didn’t block me.

I don’t think I’m going to be able to tell when those who aren’t on my friend list or following me see one of my public stories, after all. One story said, “3 Facebook Followers” and I’m assuming that means those who are following me but not on my friend list. Then again, Christiane is a follower who’s not on my list yet her name appeared so I don’t know if the 3 followers weren’t really followers or not. I’m not sure if you can follow someone on Facebook secretly or not. My guess is no.

Interestingly enough, a Dixie T showed up in the “people you may know” section and I immediately thought of the Dixie I recently met. If it’s her, she only has one friend who, coincidentally, lives in Loomis. The account appears to be new. She doesn’t even have a profile picture. Sent them a message, so we’ll see.

I forgot to mention that she said she doesn’t like it here either and agrees it’s noisy and she said she didn’t know she would have to have water delivered. I guess she doesn’t like the taste of the tap water either. We just get bottled water.

Yesterday was a bit of a rough day because my heart was surprisingly racy. It raced on and off for most of the day, spiking between 110-115. It was very uncomfortable and even a little scary. I can see where the anxious feeling in my chest may not be connected to the medication, but I sure wonder about the racing heart. We know for a fact that it has affected my heart before for sure so I’m skipping my meds all weekend, placebo effect or not. Again, if it works, I’m going to do what helps whether it’s just a placebo or not. I’ve definitely been better today either way.

Tom told me about some ideas he has for his game but still doesn’t know when it’s going to be available in the App Store. He’s basically going to start with a simple matching game and each one will have a different theme.

FRIDAY, JANUARY 25, 2019
Part of me wishes I’d never told Aly I found her other Twitter account. This way I could always know what she was really thinking about me. I shouldn’t care as I have to be me, but I’m curious just the same. I’m sure I’ve said a million things by now that offend her that she doesn’t have the heart to tell me directly.

Although it will be a lot later when I finish this entry, right now it’s not even 10 and traffic has been annoying as hell. No loud car yet today, though, and boy do I have an interesting update where that’s concerned!

Yesterday I went out to dump some trash and saw Jon and Carolyn doing what they do best… Working in their yard. They were quiet about it, though, and their yard looks lovely compared to ours. Almost everyone’s does, LOL.

As usual, I did most of my talking with Jon. Carolyn isn’t as chatty as he is. At least not with me, anyway. That’s cool because I like Jon better. He has a good sense of humor. Those without at least some humor are boring. First I was telling him about losing the rats and getting guinea pigs and how we’re thinking of getting a couple of new rats. Then I asked if he noticed the increase in commercial planes over the last few months and he said not really but what’s pissing him off is the loud car (he pointed towards the back of the circle), saying he’s underaged and all that. That’s when I was like OMG, so I’m not alone on that one? I’m not the only one who’s incredibly annoyed by that insanely loud car, underaged or not?

He said he once complained a couple of years ago and every time he hears him roaring out at 6:30 in the morning as he did for several mornings, he thinks of filing another formal complaint.

I told him I complained anonymously online a couple of years ago and he disappeared shortly afterward leaving me to think it was either an interesting coincidence or they actually took my complaint seriously. He said they won’t do anything about whatever you complain about if you call or email them and that you have to fill out an official form and have it witnessed and all that. Then maybe it was him that got the cock booted and not me. Either way, I was relieved when the scumbag finally left, although it would be nice if he stopped coming in every single fucking day whether he’s living here or not.

Jon said something about a new legislature that was passed that will cause anyone who gets complained on to be fined or something like that. He’s sure he’s living here again and I thought that a couple of times as well but now I’m not so sure. Yesterday morning I never heard him. I only heard and saw him when I was talking to Dixie, which I’ll get to in a little bit, at around 3. Then the bastard left a couple of hours later. Haven’t heard him yet today, but since I suspect he’s working again, I’m sure he’ll show up later on.

After filling Tom in on our discussion I told Jon and Carolyn on Facebook that I was ready to complain along with them and we could witness each other’s complaints. But this morning I told them that as annoyed as I am with the damn thing coming in every day, I’m not so sure they’re living here. If they were, it was only for a very brief time. Haven’t heard back from them yet.

He said the woman that lives there is Melody and she has a bad attitude, but her husband Al pretty much goes along with her shit and all that. The son is either a loser who’s a slacker and mooching off of them and the parents are enablers or that is one seriously devoted son. Somehow I doubt it’s the latter. Those are the kinds of parents that would either encourage or at least put up with their kids having such loud vehicles, which is all about forcing attention and acknowledgment on others. I don’t need a BA in psychology to get that it’s all about bad attention being better than no attention as far as they’re concerned. I don’t know if this cock is narcissistic or feels neglected and that’s why he’s an asshole but he doesn’t seem to be neglected by his parents so I’m guessing he’s just a conceited little punk that thinks everyone owes him and that doesn’t give a shit about others. He has absolutely no respect and consideration for others and I’m not surprised that he has appeared to be perfectly single since he first became a problem 3 years ago. Some people actually like to annoy others.

He also said something about how the house briefly going up for sale twice and being pulled off the market was some kind of ruse to make money. Not sure how that would make money but I thought they pulled it off because they were greedy and couldn’t get what they wanted.

Whatever the case is, it’s sad that this park doesn’t give a shit and won’t reinforce its rules. They’re letting their fucking mutt come and go through a doggie door, which isn’t allowed here, and I wish someone would confiscate it and turn it over to Animal Control. I haven’t seen it in ages and it’s not like it barks outside our place so that’s not my main problem with them. My problem is they’ve had underaged people living with them two or three times and one of them is intruding upon my peace. If they want to live like they’re in the mainstream, then why did they come here?

Really wonder how many complaints it would take before they got kicked out. Couldn’t help thinking of Tammy’s park. If what she told me is true and not exaggerated in any way, then they wouldn’t stand a chance there and would have been booted a long time ago.

I told him that although I haven’t heard it recently, the other thing that pisses me off is the motorcycle that sometimes comes tearing in and out in the middle of the night that I thought was on the dead-end behind us, but he says he thinks it’s coming from the house that the contractor lived in which is next to the loud car house, as I call it.

Now here’s what he told me that I don’t like and that totally fucking figures. I told Tom this would happen, too. They’re getting quotes for putting up a garage, so that’s something I’ll have to listen to for the two or three days it takes to install a single-car garage. I hope to hell it doesn’t wake me up if I’m on nights when they do it!

I learned why they’re such project junkies and that’s that they’re trying to up the value of their home. I thought they were going to be here forever, but as Jon said, that won’t be the case unless he gets hit by another truck and doesn’t make it, haha. Let’s hope not!

Tom and I never saw the point in spending money just to get the money back so that’s why we’re not going to worry about upping the value of this place since it all evens out in the end either way.

They’re a little too project-happy but otherwise really nice people and I hope that the fact that I just sent Ray a piece of my mind won’t offend them. I left a message on my wall saying that I mean absolutely no disrespect to anyone who may be friends with anyone I don’t especially care for (without naming names) but needed to get some things off my chest. I was going to wait until we moved but since the guy is probably well into his 80s, I can’t guarantee he’ll be alive to hear it at that time. Besides, it’s my right to speak my mind, and I can’t always worry about how others are going to take things. Sometimes you just gotta do what you gotta do and not worry about others. I swore long ago that I would never let anyone hold me back or intimidate me from saying anything I have to say. So yeah, I told him that whatever he said to Jon and Carolyn (and who knows who else) was wrong. If he had a problem with me, whatever it was, he should have come to me. Don’t know what his grudge was and I don’t care but I fucking can’t stand gossipmongers.

There’s a woman named Dixie now living in Mouth’s place. She’s a slender woman with dark eyes, bad breath, and teeth too perfect to be real. Seems really nice, though. Not sure if it’s just her or not but she pulled up to me in her SUV as I was returning from talking with Jon across the street and asked if I had the code to the gate. At least I thought that’s what she was asking me at first. She gave me her number and I called and left a message saying that I checked in my purse but didn’t have the code. I Skyped Tom and he said he had it written down in the car, and as I also told her in my voice message, he couldn’t just run out and get it so she would probably have to go to the office. I said I didn’t drive so I had no use for the code myself.

Then she came by again when Tom was just pulling in and what she really needed was help with was programming her clicker. Tom told her that ours is programmed right into the car. Dixie then thanked us and said to let her know if I needed to go anywhere and that she could drive us around wherever. That was really nice of her.

Could have used that kind of kindness when I was single once upon a whole different lifetime ago. The only one plenty willing to give me rides back then was Nervous, who was in my dreams last night. As I got older and maturer, I came to feel bad for using him for rides like I did even though I think it’s safe to say he got payment enough for it just with the time he got to spend with me. Anyway, I went out to a restaurant with him, Fran and Andy in last night’s dream and we stay there late. Eventually, he got up and told me he needed to go because he couldn’t be up that late and I gave him a hug goodbye, realizing it was after midnight.

I also met a woman named Elaine who moved in down by where Dixie is. If it’s the house I think it is, they have a loud SUV. It’s not quite as loud as the car but it’s annoying enough. Hell, even FedEx is blasting music when they come around. I swear the world only gets louder and louder. Even read an article recently about how the world is getting noisier and even hospitals aren’t as quiet as they used to be. Yeah, I believe it. I can just imagine how libraries have become as well.

I swear Elaine started to say something like, “My only complaint…” And then she turned toward the back corner of our place before someone distracted her by waving to her so I don’t know what she was going to say. I don’t know if it was about us or something in back of the house or what.

I said hello to Bob the other day and he said Virginia is getting stronger day by day.

Didn’t know this till now but I love how Facebook shows who views our public stories. Definitely going to share more things publicly since that’s interesting to see but mostly cuz I’m curious to see if the drama queen shows up.

After 110 calories and 25 minutes on the treadmill, I had to get off because I was getting light-headed. Yesterday I felt a little wound up like I might be flaring and my heart was doing triple digits. I feel slightly jittery today but nothing too serious and hopefully it will stay that way. But what I did feel was the kind of feeling I’d get before the meds become a problem. God, I hope I’m not heading in that direction, but I haven’t had the chest “stabbers” in several days.

I’m excited about tomorrow! I called around and found that Incredible Pets in Sacramento has a bunch of young rats of both genders. Hoping for my favorite, a cinnamon ratty, but I like all rats as long as they’re not hairless.

The other day I also had a dream about “walking” some strange bus with a group of people, including Mariska Hargitay. I had my own house and lived alone. We’d gone somewhere for the day as a group and were about to drop everyone off. The bus didn’t look like anything you’d see in real life. It was much smaller and had wheels in the center of it sort of like inline skates. Because we were in a crowded area I said I thought we should walk the bus toward the main road where it was less crowded. So we all carefully walked it like you would a bike towards a less populated area and I thought of how I would thank Mariska for being there for me when I got dropped off. I guess she and I had a personal chat during the day.

Another dream I remember from last night was being out somewhere walking late at night. I came upon a store that was being burglarized. I knew it had been broken into and that some guy was ripping them off not just because it was after hours but because he had a funny mask on his face that sort of resembled a pig. He spotted me and I froze. Then I sprinted away and began to run like hell through a grid of streets. Pretty sure someone else had been someone close getting into their car and also witnessed the guy, so I was hopeful that the thief’s attention would be on him instead.

THURSDAY, JANUARY 24, 2019
On the treadmill right now as I do this entry which will start off with the usual complaint… Noise. OMG, I heard 5 planes in just 10 minutes when I timed it, one of them being a small plane. The mornings are absolutely horrible! Didn’t seem as bad yesterday but this morning it was one after another for over an hour.

It seems that since he started working at this place we’ve been compensated for all the years we struggled financially, not that we’re not still in debt. I wish to hell I could believe I’ll be compensated for the health horror I’ve gone through here with nothing serious for a good long time and also compensated with spending our final years in a wonderfully peaceful, beautiful home.

But almost all my adult life has been spent dealing with noise so that one is really hard to hope for. If it’s true, though, that the more noise I have to deal with now means the more peace I get later on, then that is going to be one seriously peaceful place we’ll end up in! I still have my doubts because almost anywhere you go these days is noisy. Even if we don’t have all these planes overhead, we’re still going to get traffic, landscaping and other shit. It’s like I’m always compensated for what is lacking in that particular area. I don’t have barking and screaming kids here so it’s like it must be made up for with other shit. So even if we ended up where traffic and landscaping were less of an issue, that could mean more planes and more problem neighbors happily sawing away with their power tools and whatever other toys of annoyance they may possess. Our neighbor would be the one, like Tammy, to have their mutt barking out the door of their lanai. It’s like there’s always something.

Maybe if we do get close to any body of water, the main source of noise will be boats. I was looking at a home for sale by a canal in Florida and I would think that boats run up and down it regularly and that some would be audible enough. Obviously, large ships couldn’t pass through it but other things could. We hope to have our own boat at some point but don’t know what kind it will be, be it an inboard motor, outboard, whatever. It’s different when things are your own, though, because you have control over your own stuff. I can’t tell those with loud vehicles not to ride by the bedroom tonight because I’ll be asleep.

As for all the planes here, I can’t get anyone to listen to me much less to do anything about it. No matter how much I tweet to the airport or file online complaint forms, I am ignored.

Surprisingly, I haven’t heard the loud car yet today but it came and went early yesterday morning and then in the afternoon, as usual. When they came in around 3 and still hadn’t left by 6, I was again getting worried that they moved back in, but they left shortly after that.

Again, that is one devoted son! Or is the correct word clingy? We’re living in strange times, that’s for sure. Everyone’s quick to preach independence… Get your own place, get your own job, get your own vehicle, get your own everything. Yet kids are living with their parents older and older these days. Used to be everybody left home at 18 like I did and visited their parents once a week or less, and it isn’t when they leave home or how often they visit I have a problem with, it’s me having to know about it that bothers me. I don’t force my noise on others and I just wish I could get the same fucking respect. Hope the punk with the loud car has someone at home when they leave, even though I suspect they’re single. What a great way to announce your departure to potential burglars! Same thing I thought about the welfare bums blasting in and out with their fucking car stereos in Pheonix.

Something occurred to me earlier in regards to the mutt that would be barking its ass off two or three times a day when it would be out walking. It occurred to me that I haven’t heard it in a while. I don’t know if that’s because it was in one of the houses that moved or something happened to it, but it makes me wonder if my influencing had anything to do with it disappearing. I mean, what are the odds of the thing suddenly disappearing given how long dogs live? There are too many loud vehicles these days for me to influence them all but it gives me a little bit of hope then I can get rid of some of them. It definitely does seem like while I can’t actively wish them away, the anger and frustration I feel as they continue to annoy me seems to affect them.

“Blame the brown people,” a Mexican character said on Law & Order SVU when the cops came to his door. Then Ice T pointed out he was just as brown.

LOL, nice try, asshole. But sadly, this degree of race card playing doesn’t happen only on TV.

They weren’t kidding when they said that potatoes aggravate LS. Wanting to use up the rest of the potatoes before they went bad, and knowing how much Tom loves them, I made mashed potatoes and they came out so damn good with the perfect balance of margarine, milk and garlic salt that I ate tons of it. I paid later on with itching and especially with burning. If it weren’t for Tucks I’d be lost! This was after doing well enough for a few days that I didn’t need to Tucks myself like I usually do at the end of my day so I don’t wake up itching.

Everything is bad for me somehow. Everything. It’s frustrating as hell because now I can’t just shop for whatever when ordering groceries and it makes things harder. I have to avoid potatoes, canned soup, frozen pizza, greasy foods, and things high in cholesterol and sodium. I rarely eat bread and not much pasta either.

Walmart really fucked up the last two orders by getting things wrong and being out of stock on a lot of things. They’re very irresponsible. Safeway isn’t perfect but I think next time around I’ll order from them. Will focus mostly on fish, fruits and veggies.

I really should try once again to get some weight off not for appearance’s sake but for better health, and mobility, and of course my clothes would fit better too. But how? HOW??? Older people have slower metabolisms with or without thyroid disease and it takes so few calories to maintain and even fewer to lose. If most of us could simply stand the hunger for so long, then most of us wouldn’t be fat. I even prided myself on being one of the “smarter” ones who long since stopped bothering to try as I’m A, not likely to succeed, and B, not likely to maintain that success should I succeed in the first place by some miracle. But sometimes I wish I could lose even just 15 pounds or so. It isn’t only the hunger that prevents me from bothering but I worry about my medication as well.

Now why did my shoelaces come untied? Got to stop this thing and tie it.

Okay, that’s 16 minutes I’ve done so far. I wish this thing had a pause button so the counter wouldn’t start over.

Once again we’re contemplating getting rats for the lower level of the cage. The only negatives to that would be that it would up my responsibilities because rats take more time and care than guinea pigs with the way they like to run around loose and the way they’re attention whores that are much more social than guinea pigs. The pigs would probably like running loose as well but they’re not nearly as smart and I would have a hard time getting them back. A rat will return to his house eventually on his own. Even if the guinea pigs weren’t so stupid, they’re on the upper level so they couldn’t just go home. Gotta admit their stupidity is kind of cute, though. They’re dumb in a silly way. The only thing they know is to squeak for food.

The rats would need to be downstairs so they could come and go. Rats are also notorious pissers that would go about marking their so-called territory and are smart enough to figure out how to get into shit I don’t want them getting into. Ever since having to remove the side paneling between the dishwasher and the cabinet under the sink, there has been a little opening in which even an adult rat might be able to wiggle through and we definitely don’t want them getting back there. The clever little shits could probably figure out a way around whatever we put there to try to block it.

But even though it would be more work, time and money, I can’t imagine not having rats until we get a dog and if we do, it won’t be till he retires because I can’t always be available during the daytime to take it out. With a dog, I doubt I’d want anything else but maybe a betta.

Just did a little research and rats should actually be able to live with the guinea pigs so they can go up and down both levels of the cage. The pigs will probably just stay on the top but there will be water bottles on both levels if they don’t. I watched an adorably cute video of them interacting with each other and then I remembered that I have seen videos of them together in the past. I don’t know about putting adult rats with them but if the rats are babies to begin with then there shouldn’t be a problem. We’ll try it, assuming there are any left in the state. It seems everyone’s either out of them or no longer sells them.

Hopping off the TM at 20 minutes. Will walk more later.

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 23, 2019
Training these dumb but cute pigs as best I can but here’s a clear example of the difference between their bravery and Butterboy’s. Butterboy’s no longer scared of the colorful duster when I’m dusting the area by his tank. Meanwhile, the pigs will keep running from the same old shit no matter how many hundreds of times they see it proves to be harmless.

Since these guys are kicking up enough shit onto the floor even with the cardboard walls we created, I decided to remove them and just vacuum the area every other day or so. I saved the pieces of cardboard in case we decide to put them back but I figured that if they’re going to make so much of a mess anyway, why block the flow of air to the air cleaner when they can have better ventilation and we can see them better this way, too?

I gave Funny Face, as I’ve been calling Blitz, extra attention today since he’s way more skittish than Rockefeller.

Since they can’t climb like a rat can, I lowered the shelf which lowered the ramp as well. Even a feeble guinea pig should be able to navigate the ramp with the way I’ve got it set up. The question is whether or not they’ll want to. I “showed” them how to do it.

Well, apparently Rockefeller wants to because he’s up there now, so I just saw, in the tube that I put there. I was hesitant to leave anything they could hide in inside the cage all the time because I thought that would make them more skittish if they could cower in a hideaway all the time rather than have to get used to being more exposed. For now, I’ll leave it like it is. They only have a hideaway on the shelf, not downstairs.

What is it with guinea pigs and raspberries, though? Guinea pigs eat fruit but for some reason, raspberries are an absolute no-no for them.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 22, 2019
“My dear devoted son, thank you for checking in on us twice a day like you have been for a while now and enjoying being fed while you were at it. But we’re two grown adults perfectly capable of taking care of ourselves just like you are. You don’t need to check on us twice a day or more and you can afford to feed yourself with your job. Get out there and enjoy life while you’re young and you still can instead of hanging onto your parents. Meet somebody and do some fun and interesting things in your free time. It may be hard at first but now it’s time to wean you off of us and get you more independent.”

How I wish the mother of the fucking loud car cock would say this! But just like I knew it would, it returned for free food and whatever else it could get in the middle of the afternoon yesterday. It’s in getting free breakfast right now because God forbid it should dare to make its own with its own food paid for with its own money for however many weeks or months they work this time around. It’s in later today, though, and I’m guessing it’s going to leave any second now and then it will be back at the end of my day.

They’re far from the only annoyance here. The planes were absolutely horrible yesterday and there is plenty of other loud traffic. Today I’ve got the sound machine that I sleep with because I just don’t want to hear it. They weren’t just roaring overhead in the morning but in the afternoon as well. Two tweets to Sac Intl have gone ignored as did my other complaints. They just don’t give a shit who they annoy. The sound machine I have going now is pretty loud yet I can still make out the faint rumble of planes. If I didn’t know they were there I probably wouldn’t notice but since I do it does stand out.

Skipped my meds today because I was a little wound up yesterday. Placebo effect or not, if it works, it works, and I’ll fucking sit and pick my nose on YouTube all day if that’s what it took to keep that horrible feeling away!

There are at least two women that I know of running for president and one of them is a black woman. Or maybe she’s mulatto since she looks “barely” black. She’s fairly decent looking for her age and when I did a quick Wiki check on Kamala Harris, I thought she would be great for the country regardless of gender/race. She’s from Cali, married, a year older than me, no kids, and seems to stand for everything Tom and I stand for… equality, freedom of choice, etc.

Do I think she stands a chance? No, because she’s a woman and we live in a country where women love men and men love men. But then I think yes, because she’s black or at least part black and even if some people won’t admit it or can’t see it, I still see every indication to believe that most people in the US do favor blacks. I totally believe that’s why Obama was elected.

But then I would have said both yes and no to someone like Trump as well. Yes, because it’s got a dick between its legs. No, because he’s a hater and the only thing that still gets a lot of hate in this country are gays and lesbians.

I asked Tom if he thought Trump will get reelected and he said he has no idea. People are crazy and you never know what crazy will do, he said. Oh, I totally agree!

Tom deposited Campbell’s check on the phone which was just so cool! He forgot to check this morning to verify if it went through but it seems like it did. I reminded him to check when he gets home even though I suppose I could check. It’s just that I’m so shitty with numbers that we’ve always let him handle the finances. Just like I handle the housework because his idea of dusting is very different than mine, LOL. I told him when he retires I’ll keep cleaning and he can cook for us.

Now I don’t know if I’m going to get another period or not. I would still think that sooner or later I’ll get one but it’s like my body tried and tried really hard to kick one off and it couldn’t quite do it. Therefore, the PMS symptoms have backed off. They’re not completely gone but they have lessened.

Hulu’s player really sucks. It doesn’t remember where we left off and has other tech issues. He said that when he tried using it in Microsoft Edge on his Windows computer he heard only the music and sound effects but no voices.

Last night I dreamed I was out in the living room working at my desk and the return vent was closer to the desk than to the couch. I looked down at it and saw a mouse peering up at me and thought that I’d have to tell Aly that it was now my time to need a glue board. The mouse, however, seemed bigger, fatter and braver, like it was a pet mouse. I reached for my phone to take a picture of its adorable face peeking through the grille, but all my phone did was play a recording of prank phone calls I’d made 30 years ago during which the mouse managed to pull itself up into the room and disappear somewhere.

MONDAY, JANUARY 21, 2019
What’s the point of playing white noise through noise-canceling headphones when you can still hear loud vehicles loud and clear? sighs with frustration At least they’re good for planes and landscaping and moderately loud vehicles. The insanely loud ones, including motorcycles, can’t be drowned out unless I blast white noise or music super loud.

At just after 6 this morning the loud car came in and then left a few minutes later. What’s the punk going to do when its parents are no longer around to run to 50 times a day? They fucking came and went as early as 7:15 yesterday morning to around when I crashed in the early afternoon. One time they turned around and came right back like they forgot something. It does look like they may have gotten a job to be coming in this early on weekdays and not returning until later in the afternoon, but I wish they would get more of a life once and for all! My God, get a girlfriend, get a boyfriend, have a kid, get in a fucking fight with your parents and disown them for all I care…just do something to prevent yourself from spending so much of your free time here! Do you want to be a slacker and a loser all your life?

Cock probably feels rejected in general and therefore the type that would compensate by forcing its attention on others through other means, e.g. loud vehicles. I’m surprised they don’t blast music too, but someone has been lately and I’m wondering if it’s whoever moved into the house next to Jim.

I tried doing my influencing thing by imagining the car going faster and faster with the cock unable to control it and then sending it crashing into a concrete wall or something but I’ve never been able to actively make something happen. It’s always when I least expect it that my emotions cause either negative or positive effects on something or someone. It’s kind of like with the dream premonitions. I can’t control what I dream about that may ultimately end up coming true.

If a couple of dreams meant anything, though, then we’re out of here in September of 2020 but I honestly can’t see us leaving until he retires and he can’t possibly retire by then. On his next birthday, we can get a sense of what we could get if he retired early but he almost certainly is going to need to work until full retirement.

Had anxiety yesterday for 4-5 hours and hoping for a better day today. It may only be a placebo effect, but I didn’t wait long after taking my meds to have my coffee. So far so good. Made sure to tap more often and hit the treadmill after I showered and ate. Burned about 152 calories in just over a half-hour. I also did some Bowflex exercises.

At around 8, the planes should be dying down for the next 12 hours, though I still hear some scattered flights throughout that time. I’ll do some cleaning then too, so I can play Alexa “everywhere” without the rumbling of planes. Or at least without as many. I tweeted a piece of my mind to Sac Airport but I’m sure I’ll be ignored just like the 2 online complaints I filled out were.

Last night I dreamed that I wanted to stop dying my hair so I dyed it gray so that the gray growing out would be less noticeable. In reality, I think it would be just as noticeable because I still have a lot of brown in my gray.

SUNDAY, JANUARY 20, 2019
Campbell’s did make good on their word after all and sent me a $20 check. I was surprised. I really thought I would just get coupons or something like that.

We decided on Saturdays we would change the pigs’ cage and we would replace half of the fish’s water on Sundays.

I gave the pigs some tubes to hide in which they love, of course. But I don’t want them to always have places to run and hide and be less and less used to having us walk up to them in their cage so I make a point of removing the tubes when I’m awake. They can hide in there when I’m sleeping.

Because they’re so dissimilar in so many ways, it’s hard to believe guinea pigs and rats are related. But if it’s got two upper teeth and two lower teeth, it’s classified as a rodent.

I was glad to read some good news for once and that’s that they’re going to bring back Unsolved Mysteries on Netflix. I was really into that show in the 90s. I assume it will be with all new cases, of course.

Went to Sam’s yesterday morning and today we’ll be going to get some car parts and other places as well.

The year was 2020 in my dream and we were moving. I told someone who asked when we moved in that we moved in in 2013 as we did in real life. Only we were leaving a dumpy 2nd-floor apartment. Not this house. :( Still hope it means something as well as the dream I had where we moved in the month of September. I don’t see how we could move before he retires, though.

I also had some kind of dream that involved returning from vacation with my parents. It had been a fun vacation but I was glad to be home.

My mother was talking to some woman about a blog they had as Dad and I unpacked. The woman was saying something about being worried it would be shut down. Right as my mother went to tell her that all she had to do was claim a family member used it too, to prevent it from being shut down, I informed her of this as well.

Then Tom and I were going to bed in a hotel room when he plopped down on the bed and fell asleep as quickly as his head hit the pillow. I looked at him and said, “I guess I’ll take that side then,” and headed to the other side of the bed. As I walked around the foot of the bed I could see several large monitors on the wall by the head of the bed. I knew they had to do with entertainment and internet access for the guests.

Then I had a dream I had just stepped out the back door of either a house or an apartment with a woman who was a lot taller than me. She seemed to be someone who was more than a friend too.

Suddenly, we heard some guys’ voices that had entered the front that we might have known. The woman immediately put a hand over my mouth and moved me along with her to the side of the door so we could eavesdrop on what was being said without being seen.

SATURDAY, JANUARY 19, 2019
After reading that earaches caused by earbuds can be due to compressed wax, I doused my ear with alcohol and peroxide. It worked, too. No earaches in either ear so nothing woke me up since I could use the earbuds. :-) Still getting backaches, though.

A car came in with music loud enough to hear and drove into the circle and past Bob and Virginia after 11. Adult communities definitely aren’t what they used to be. I remember Al saying they had the door open all day and didn’t hear a sound when they were clearing his sister out. Well, he’d certainly hear things here at night with the door closed.

I heard a few planes since getting up at 10:30 but OMG, the planes drove me crazy yesterday morning for about an hour and a half. Ironically enough, there has been less of the loud car since the planes are back to the usual shit they’ve been up to since September. It still came in but it was later in the morning and only stuck around for a few minutes.

Anyway, finally fed up with all the planes and curious to know why they’ve been flying over us so much these last few months, I called the airport and was given another number to call. When I called the number, a recorded voice came on saying to give them the number of the aircraft I was complaining about. Now how the hell am I supposed to know the numbers of all these aircrafts? I suppose that’s their method of deterring complaints and having to deal with them. I’ve complained online twice but was ignored both times. So yeah, they’re going to do what they’re going to do and they don’t want to hear any complaints about it.

Amazingly, the cream I got is doing wonders for my rash. I was surprised to notice a difference after just one use.

Aly said she finally solved the mystery of Kim being yelled at for going up and down the stairs on one leg. It isn’t that she’s hopping up and down on one foot but she’s holding the railing with one hand while dragging one foot along the way. I would still think she would be way too heavy to do that and that it would be rather awkward. Why would anyone want to do that? What’s even stranger is that she claims her doctor told her it was normal. I think Kim is just totally beyond delusional as hell. Always has been. Always will be.

Someone asked Aly on Ask how long her longest relationship was and she said 2 years. She told me 9 months. Maybe she was just too embarrassed to admit it if the answer she gave me was the truth.

She tweeted about Cam’s family getting together at some mosque and then creating a Jewish-Muslim lunch or something. I knew her BF was Jewish but is he also Muslim? Or perhaps he’s got relatives that are Muslim? Either way, I’d love to see her tell them she’s bisexual and see how fast they turn against her like the Muslim family she was a nanny for did. She doesn’t want to believe that most of them are very hateful and intolerant, if not deadly. No matter how many news reports there are of them killing by the masses and even their own family members for loving the “wrong” person, she always defends him. I guess that’s simply our politically correct society for you. I just would have thought she would be intelligent enough to see their true colors but if she can’t see Molly’s, why would she see theirs?

FRIDAY, JANUARY 18, 2019
When I was checking out the islands of Long Island Sound that I could just make out along the horizon from the beach we spent our summers at as a kid, one of them was Little Gull Island. It’s only an acre from what I read and the only thing I could see on it from Google Maps was a lighthouse. I remember the foghorn we would hear from time to time. I wonder if it was coming from there. Can the sound of a foghorn travel seven or eight miles? From the looks of it, that’s how far that Island is from Old Colony Beach.

I saw a 30-minute video shot by someone who I guess was rowing toward the island and was surprised to see several seals on the island’s rocky shores. I was like, seals? Seals? I don’t remember ever seeing a single seal at the beach but maybe they avoid people and stick to the islands that are out of the way and uninhabited. They’re so cute either way.

Thank you, God, for continuing to curse my sleep, if You even exist. And why? Because I don’t have to get up to an alarm 5 days a week? Is this your compensation for not having to do that?

Yeah, I pulled the earbuds out in the late afternoon because my ear was irritated again. I would feel this sharp cramp-like sensation, maybe due to the pressure or something. It was okay when not lying on that ear but I tend to do that quite a bit. Over the years I got in the habit of not lying on my bad ear, thanks to my parents who I wish I could resurrect long enough to beat the shit out of for having the so-called “professionals” mess with that ear so they could have a “normal” daughter. Really, why did the doctors agree to such a thing? How could they have possibly felt it would help me as they claimed? Well, it’s done anything but that because I’m also feeling these intermittent sharp cramp-like sensations on that side too, only it’s on the outside. What’s left of the outside has been a little more sensitive lately and I don’t know why. I guess too much nerve damage from all the surgery I was forced to have as a kid. It looks horrible and is definitely noticeable. It’s changed shape as the lower part of it “withered” and “sunk” after the frame was removed there’s no way I can wear earrings because that lobe is higher than the other one and they make earrings look lopsided. Some of the dangling ones aren’t as noticeable but for the most part, earrings are out of the question.

Anyway, that fucking car woke me up and shorted my sleep by about an hour or so. I’m not overly tired but I am going to take the day off from working out, anyway. Can’t swear that it really was that car since there are tons of loud vehicles these days, but I’d say it’s a pretty good guess. It’s insanely loud and has a very distinct sound.

sighs with frustration How much longer can I just shrug and tell myself that that’s just life? Sooner or later I’m going to get fed up enough to do something about some of these people who feel the need to get attention at my expense whether they realize they’re doing it or not. Okay, so the damn cock can’t possibly know he’s waking up a light sleeper who can’t keep a schedule. But does that really make it okay? Does he being the norm and me being the exception make it acceptable?

While I’m slowly getting more and more fed up and unable to adapt for whatever reason, I can’t help but wonder…is this bastard also compensation of sorts? Has something up there increased his visits since the commercial planes have backed off? Well, I would rather the planes even though they were way more frequent because they didn’t wake me up. This fucker is going to shorten the number of days/nights I can go without the earbuds since he’s apparently stopping in for breakfast and then dinner at the end of the day. I don’t get this at all either. It’s working now but it can’t afford to buy its own food and cook its own fucking meals?

When I would go to bed at around midnight, I could go without the earbuds because traffic didn’t usually get loud until around 8 at which time I would usually be up by having crashed around midnight. But with this fucker coming in at a quarter to 6 in the morning and leaving between 8 and 9 at night, this means I have to sleep with the earbuds more often and irritate my ear some more. It’s either suffer the pain or get woken up. Again, it’s like something up there is causing the pain and may as well yank the earbud out of my ear and shout, “No! If I wanted you to sleep, I wouldn’t have made you such a light sleeper and curse you further with CRD!”

So today I’m a little tired and trying not to beat my head in the wall over the fact that this is the way it’s always going to be. It’s just not likely to get any quieter anytime soon. Probably not in our lifetime anyway, and I can’t beat the shit out of every driver of every loud vehicle. Also, if we ever do have a place on a less traveled street with a bedroom further from that street, since all it takes is one vehicle to ruin a good night’s sleep, that’s years away from now.

Yesterday my lungs were tight enough to have to use my inhaler and for a moment I worried it was related to my medication even though I knew it wasn’t and that it was due to all the rain. I also worried I wouldn’t be able to handle Florida with how much it rains there but Tom thinks I’d be okay because it doesn’t go back and forth so much there like it does here in the winter. I hope he’s right and that it’s not the pigs either! I also doubt it’s the meds because I don’t have other symptoms along with it like I would in the past. No “mindfuckers,” jitteriness, runs, or weight loss. Oh no, just the opposite. I’m up a couple of pounds and hoping it’s just water. My boobs aren’t as sore but I still feel PMSy. Backaches and a little water retention. I’m hungrier, too.

Tom says that since he can’t cut back he’s going to start working out big time to see if he can lose weight that way. The only problem is, as I told him, there aren’t enough minutes in the day for him to work out that much! LOL

I burn about 200 calories if I walk an hour. Therefore, I would have to walk 2-6 hours a day to “trick” my body into thinking I had only 1000 calories. Not going to happen. Besides, it doesn’t quite work that way. When we first moved in here, I was doing those 90-minute HIIT routines that are supposed to burn 1000 calories and that didn’t do me any good. So since I can’t cut back either or spend half the day on the treadmill even if it did work that way, I realize my only hope is to “play the scale.” My average daily gain is 2-3 pounds but I have to be up no more than 1 pound in order to be down the next day. My average sleep loss is just over a pound. So I would have to eat when I was ready to as usual at the beginning of my day but then I couldn’t eat again until the scale fell back to where I was only up 1 pound since getting up which can take many hours. The only tricky part is knowing when to stop eating for the day so I have enough time for my weight to fall to where I’m only up a pound when I crash. I doubt I’ll do this, though, as it still requires going hungry most of the time and ending up lightheaded and grumpy. Besides, extra weight goes with most older mammals as does gray hair, worsening vision and a whole lot of other bullshit. Exercising is still a good thing no matter what we weigh.

I’ve been having more sodium lately and it’s reflecting in my blood pressure numbers so I’m definitely going to focus on that, which is much more doable.

Because I sometimes still use the skier even though I don’t use it nearly as often as the treadmill, we might get this flexible phone holder that you attach to the edge of a table or a shelf. The desk is right by it so I could attach it to that or part of the skier itself for when I want to go ski blogging. It would also be good for in bed as I could attach it to the headboard shelf. The skier is what I mostly want it for, though.

Also found a blood pressure monitor wrist cuff that also detects irregular heartbeats. I’m curious to see if it ever detects one these days.

Definitely not impressed with Hulu’s player. It doesn’t remember where we left off and the buffering bar doesn’t go away unless I minimize the window after backing up a few seconds if I miss something or want to see something again. So we’re probably going to drop Hulu after the 30 days is up. I’ll make sure I finish Law & Order by then.

Really getting sick of all these memory issues. Like forgetting to empty the dryer’s lint trap.

Since the cock had to wake me up in the middle of a dream, I remember it. I was living in an apartment building and watching TV. Some kind of documentary. I was surprised to find a guy who lived in the building featured on one of the episodes, though I don’t know what it was about. I then realized it explained why he hadn’t been home as much lately.

Then I was listening to music and it was like I was a kid again even though I wasn’t. I was thinking of the second house we had in Longmeadow and I was tired of circumstances coming up to yank me out of it. I guess I was stuck somewhere else for some reason and was beginning to feel like something didn’t want me in the house.

As I continued to sway back and forth to the music with my eyes shut, tears threatening to squeeze through my lids, and a fan blowing on me (I guess it was summer), I imagined I was back in the house and not wherever I was.

THURSDAY, JANUARY 17, 2019
Ended up feeling okay yesterday and waited the required half-hour before having coffee after taking my meds. Hopefully, I’ll stay okay today and the tightness in my lungs is only because of all the wind-driven rain we’ve had which certainly sprouts mold. Been a little worried about the roof but so far so good.

The earbud was irritating my ear again so I removed it just to get woken up by what was probably that loud car. That’s when I put it back in and was fine until I got up at 8:30.

Cock isn’t living here again, after all. By some miracle, maybe while I was watching a show, they slipped in unnoticed early Tuesday morning. They didn’t go by the bedroom, so that was probably why. When I did hear and see them leave a short while later, I thought they were here overnight because it was so early. They might as well live here if they’re going to come and go 2-3 times a day as they do.

Yesterday they came in at 5:50 in the morning and left 40 minutes later. Until I’m on days, I won’t be able to get a sense of if they’re working or not. It’s hard to believe they would get up that early if they didn’t have to, though. When they lived here they didn’t usually leave until after 9:30. If that was them that woke me up, then they can’t be working full time unless they woke me up at the end of the day. I didn’t look at the clock so I don’t know.

Just like I hate it when Tom makes excuses for and defends anyone I complain about, I really wish he would stop playing down and denying the noise here. This place seriously and totally makes Phoenix seem comatose. No joke! No exaggeration. He tried to tell me the other day that I’m just more “sensitive” now. Oh, come on! Like I wouldn’t have noticed if traffic was this loud in the past even if we weren’t so close to the street. Never before has there been this many muscle cars and other loud vehicles on the road, nor have I ever lived where there were so many motorcycles. The traffic issues in the past were loud car stereos and engine gunning. We can still hear some of that here but 90% of the traffic we hear in here are loud motors.

Set up my new jewelry holder and it’s much better! It’s a much more efficient and versatile holder and I don’t know why I didn’t get this particular design to begin with. The only thing I would have to do is maybe remove some necklaces to get at the ones closest to the stems off the T’s but that’s no big deal. It has a white base and a nickel finish. The gold looked nicer online but it was twice as expensive so I went with nickel which is still pleasant enough. Tom can use the copper carousel to hang wires on or whatever else he might think of.

Really hope the rash cream that should be coming today helps because it’s itchy and spreading!

Here we go again with another migrant caravan. When I read that I said, “Oh no, not again!”

Do some people actually want to make trouble for themselves as well as for others? Do some people actually like being tear-gassed? Defiant little fucks like this that will literally harm themselves and even die to spite others are the scariest kinds of people of all. These are the kinds of people who have no limits and will go to any extreme possible to make their fucking point.

There are numerous people who have come from other countries, including my bestie’s BF, in a perfectly legal manner with nothing but good intentions, and that’s fine. But if there’s one thing and one thing only that I agree with the orange nutjob on it’s that most illegals are up to no good and we’re the ones that have to pay for it. Why would you come here illegally if you had good intentions in the end? Illegals do nothing but burden our resources, drive the crime rate up, and steal jobs from those who are from here. Enough is enough! I wish the Border Patrol agents could replace their tear gas with bullets but as I said, some people will stop at nothing. If they suddenly knew they would be shot, they would still defy our laws just to piss people off and make a point.

I just dread the day we break down and start paying for their needs, including housing them in jail. Our tax dollars shouldn’t go to criminals (and you are one if you come here illegally). What about our needs and expenses? Who pays for those?

Sooner or later, though, we’re going to start letting them in and footing the bill. That’s just how this bleeding-heart country is. :-(

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 16, 2019
When I heard the loud car leave at 6:30 in the morning I said to myself, “Oh no! Just oh fucking no. They’re living here again!”

But I knew damn well they would be back sooner or later. I know how these manipulating rule-breakers work. The Phoenix freeloaders taught me well. They get caught at something, they behave for a while, then they see if they can get away with something a second time around and hope that no one will notice or bother reporting them.

The only positive to the cock leaving that early in the morning is that it could be a sign they’re working again. The 2 or 3 months I knew them to work when they last lived here, they’d leave at 6:30, return in the afternoon, and then go out again for 2 or 3 hours. On weekends it would come and go at least 3 times.

Then tonight, as I was finishing up on the treadmill, I saw it leave at quarter to ten. Using one of my old paper journals to start a car log. On days I’m sleeping on weekends I’ll leave it in the kitchen for Tom to log whenever he sees it. Leaving that late could mean they didn’t really move back in, but this car has been active anywhere at almost all hours of the day and night. Could return any second but I’ll know if it does. If I see that they are in fact living here, I’ll complain after a month. I just wish they’d stop coming and going so fucking much either way! Ironically enough, my earbuds started working again so I was protected from anything that went on while I slept. Who knows how many times they were in and out today?

My groin rash is a contagious fungus that I could have gotten from the fungus that’s been in my toenails forever now or from several other causes. I’m sure being fat doesn’t help. When I ordered groceries, I got antifungal cream for both my groin and my toenails. I didn’t realize this thing was contagious so I’ve set aside a hand towel for drying my groin which I’m applying alcohol to periodically. Could also be caused by friction from working out as much as I do.

Now for my worst news. I did okay until the end of my day when the anxiety really kicked up. If this really isn’t the medication, and experiments have shown it isn’t despite the coincidental timing of how it started after starting the medication, then I either have the worst case of perimenopause in the history of womankind or something really went wrong with my brain chemistry. I would still like to think that if worse comes to absolute worse, it will go away when he retires in half a decade but each year that I have this, I lose hope even though some things really can last for many years before they go away. The facial muscle twitches I had from the Navane lasted for decades. It’s been way better for the last few years or so. The thing is I don’t have that many decades left in the first place, which to me is kind of a good thing with all the problems I’m racking up.

I just read that researchers now believe that the brain firing too many neurons is what causes anxiety. But so late in life? That’s the part that seems the weirdest to me. Don’t you usually develop these things a lot younger? Depression, bipolar, schizophrenia, multiple personalities… Don’t those things usually start in the teens and 20s?

Placebo effect or not, an effect is an effect, so I compromised with myself. Instead of skipping my meds, I skipped the waiting time.

Anyway, I said there wasn’t a single good thing about aging other than the wisdom and maturity we acquire. Well, I was wrong. There is something good in it and that’s that each year that I live puts me one year closer to no longer having to deal with life’s bullshit. Can’t know if anything worse may be waiting for me on the other side if that other side exists, though.

I managed to sleep well last time around and dreamed of watching squirrels hatch from these eggs. I thought they were adorably cute and was telling Tom that I wanted to hug them.

Next thing I knew we were standing by the edge of a pond. There were several scattered ponds around us with gently sloping grassy fields running in between. There may have been a couple of other people around as well.

I watched how one of the squirrels jumped from the edge of the pond and flew into the middle of it.

Then I either thought of retiring or how we actually were retired. Not sure on that one but I think I was looking forward to when it would happen.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 15, 2019
Good to know Christiane wasn’t swallowed up by the Austrian avalanche after I messaged her, primarily in German. She said those people were “off the track.” She heard about the fires, too. Must’ve been an unwanted reminder of my existence for Nane, LOL.

Interestingly enough, my boobs aren’t as sore as they were before. It’s almost like my PMS is reversing itself. I still think I’ll get another period sooner or later, though.

My groin rash is driving me crazy. It’s definitely not connected to the LS. It’s more fungal or heat-related. They say body size doesn’t matter but somehow I get the feeling being so fucking fat doesn’t help. There’s simply no way I could ever lose weight and keep it off, though. I’m way past those days at this point. I would have to be seriously ill or have a disease with the opposite effect of Hashimoto’s.

Pussy itches every day, too. Without Tucks, I’d be clawing myself to death. Trying that on the groin but doubt it will help. Only hydrocortisone seems to really help but you’re not supposed to use that long-term. If I could, I could kill it and keep it away. As soon as I stop treating it, it worsens. How bad would it get, I wonder, if I never treated it at all?

Ended up being more anxious than usual yesterday but today I’m fine, thank God. I guess it was just because I hate that time of week. I hope that’s all it was, anyway!

I wish I could come up with fresh story ideas. I have the time for them and great tools at my fingertips yet no ideas come. The few that do, don’t last long and they’re basically spinoffs of the same old shit I usually write. Maybe I ought to take the beginnings of some of my stories and give them different endings.

I’m amazed that I slept well because my earbuds broke. Ordered a couple of cheap pairs for sleeping, one from the same company in red, and one from a different company in pink. They were both $12.

The only dream I remember was returning to a beach with Tom, Christine and maybe someone else. It seemed like we lived in the area. As I was walking from the car down to the beach, a boy of around 10 walked by and I thought he looked pretty tough for his age. I wondered if he could take me despite being shorter.

Then I headed toward the shore and stuck my toes in the water. I thought to myself how it had really warmed up in just the few days we were gone. I dove into a wave and found I didn’t surface as fast as I expected too, assuming I had gotten “caught in a swell.” Pretty sure I eventually broke through the surface. I seem to have a lot of dreams like that where I dive into a pool or an ocean and I can’t get back up. Or at least not when I think I will.

MONDAY, JANUARY 14, 2019
My bestie finished The Wrong Sister and liked it. :-) It’s always a pleasure to have her read my stories and I appreciate her pointing out some of the stupid mistakes I make too, LOL. Just sent her Renting Ginny. That was written once upon a time when I didn’t know the true meaning of the word anxiety.

When I feel borderline, I mark the calendar with a hollow circle which will be filled in solid on days I’m more than just borderline. I’m a little borderline now but I’m hoping that it’s just because it’s coming up to the start of the week. Sunday nights and Monday mornings are definitely my most hated time of the week.

Felt a little better after some pork chops and wine. I may need daily wine indefinitely. According to my research, a glass of wine a day shouldn’t hurt me. It can actually have benefits, especially red wine. It’s only if you drink heavily every day for a long time that you risk damaging your liver. I’ve never been drunk and I’ve never wanted to be. Just getting a buzz on is enough for me.

They raised the fairy I was going to get with my Bing points by $5 so I decided to hold off on it and see if they lower the price later on. For now, I’m going to get a few envelope openers since ours is getting blunt, and a new jewelry holder that will be more efficient. It consists of three separate T’s made of nickel and the tallest one is 19” high. What I like about this design is that I’d have a handy place for bracelets as well as necklaces. My carousel one is basically only good for necklaces. Some of the bracelets are too wide for the hooks.

Tom cut and placed pieces of cardboard around the sides and back of the guinea pigs’ cage to keep them from kicking shit out, and secured them with zip ties after punching holes in the tops of them. He also printed a couple of mini rakes to rake up anything they kick out in front so it doesn’t have to be vacuumed every day. We didn’t want to box them in too much because then we couldn’t see them and it would prevent good air circulation as well.

They’re definitely warming up to us more even though they’re still pretty skittish being prey animals as they are. They’re now taking food out of our hands. Blitz also seems to be growing faster than Rockefeller and now they seem similar in size. Even so, Rockefeller has been nibbling on Blitz’s ears, something they do to establish dominance like rats do their boxing thing that almost looks like they’re playing patty-cake.

Planes are moderately annoying tonight and Tom said that on and off there was loud traffic while I slept. Yeah, I don’t doubt it. Seems I might have heard something when either the earbuds slipped a bit or I had just gotten back into bed after getting up to pee.

This may look weird as hell but I took a spare pair of pantyhose and cut the legs off after tying a knot by the crotch. I’m going to use the top part of it as a hairnet, not only for my hair of course but for the MP3 player, too. Maybe if I bundle the wires and the player on the top of my head and then secure it with a net, I won’t get wrapped up in the wires so easily.

Starting to get a little crampy but I’m still not seeing red. Wish I would and just get the damn period over with so I can relieve the soreness in my boobies!

Had a dream where we lived in a house in which there were other identical homes along the street we lived on. We were getting ready to sell ours and I was worried that the outside sidewall just above a lower level (maybe above a garage?) was too damaged. I was at a neighboring house when I stepped back to see over the lower roof at the sidewall in that section which looked a lot like brown floorboards and said, “Beautiful,” as theirs was smooth and unmarked with nothing attached to it.

In another dream, I saw about half a dozen people I knew in a restaurant I was just “passing through”, including Becky H. I told them I wasn’t hungry and started to leave after greeting them until a waitress approached me saying they left me a meal as they too, left in the other direction. I sat down surprised and appreciative, gazing down at a plate of Alfredo and cheesy broccoli. I immediately suspected it was a present from Becky because she’s always been a real foodie.

In real life, she’s heavier than me and she definitely doesn’t work out or count calories, LOL. She doesn’t mind, though. She’s one of those who would rather live it up even if she may not live as long and may be inviting health problems along the way because of it.

I try to find a happy medium. I’m not going to stop exercising because I like the way it makes me feel and I like being as fit as I can be for my size and age. I’m also not going to stuff myself because I don’t like heartburn or want to open myself up to diabetes and higher cholesterol/blood pressure, but I’m also not going to set unrealistic goals and expect to get skinny and stay that way. I’m 53, not 23.

The dream I didn’t like was where I was thrown in some Mexican jail after mouthing off to some cop down there. Not sure what I said or how long I was to be in jail, but knowing that the wheels of justice likely turned much lower down there than they do here, I figured I would be there indefinitely. Therefore, I was contemplating not eating or drinking so I would die in just a couple of days or so. Not a fun dream at all. :-(

SATURDAY, JANUARY 12, 2019
Decided to post a random picture on my Twitter health account every time I take my vitamins so I know I’m not taking them too soon. If I forget if I’ve taken them, I can see if there’s a pic for the day and the time it was posted as well.

Went to Rite Aid for a few things and then we changed the pig’s cage and cleaned the fish’s filter and heater. The guinea pigs don’t have a circadian rhythm and will sleep a little, then get up, and back and forth. The fish definitely tends to be more active during the daytime, though.

It was a nice day today at 61° so we went for a brief walk when we got back from the store.

I haven’t had any chrome nail polish for centuries so I got a few bottles at Rite Aid in pink, blue and silver.

Now that they finally added some sound files to the Hawaiian course, I’ve taken three or four lessons so far and haven’t gotten any wrong yet. :-)

I also did Duolingo Stories in Spanish last night and German tonight and was surprised to beat my Spanish score if only by a little. Really didn’t think I would do that well with the German! Did I really learn that much of the ugly stuff? I guess I did, mostly thanks to Nane and a few others.

It’s been a surprisingly quiet day and night so far. Last night the planes were back to getting on my nerves. Not as bad as they were last year but they were getting there.

I don’t remember much in the way of dreams lately but it seems I woke up to a woman’s voice telling me something about great suffering ahead. She wasn’t speaking in a concerned tone either. She sounded menacing and evil. It creeped me out enough that it woke me up and I really hope it doesn’t mean anything. Haven’t had any anxiety today or yesterday so that’s good. I’m a little worried I might have a cavity by my bridge up top. No more crowns, though! If there is and she tells me it can’t be filled, I’m going to tell her to just pull the damn thing.

Signed up for a free month of Hulu and was glad to find two additional seasons of Law & Order SVU that I haven’t seen yet.

YES!!! Just got a message from my PCP saying that at this point she prefers me to continue with lifestyle changes instead of starting blood pressure medications. She said my blood pressure readings are good in the morning and she’s afraid with medication it may get too low and I may get dizzy. She concluded by telling me to just continue to check my blood pressure 2-3 times a week and bring the readings with my machine to my next visit.

I have absolutely NO problem with being told I DON’T need medication. NO problem, LOL.

I think I’ve now gone the longest I’ve ever gone without feeling even remotely horny. I miss those days. But they’re never coming back any more than my old figure or vision is so I suppose there’s no point in thinking much about it. It’s just part of aging. I think I’m just one of the few that would be more honest about it. I think women tend to be more open about these things while guys will tend to kid themselves and others. Or at least try to.

FRIDAY, JANUARY 11, 2019
My tits are getting sore and I know I’m going to get a period any minute now. Tits don’t lie. Been having backaches as well.

On the bright side, I’m happy to say I haven’t felt anxious today. I don’t know if this means anything or not, but when I first got up, I thought I might be in for a bad day. Shortly afterward, I sat down in a chair and after I did my tapping routine I said, “I don’t know if there’s a God up there but if you think you’re going to torture me with my own mind and body because there’s nothing else going on at the moment to whip my ass with, you’re wrong. Dead wrong. I’m done with this shit and I’m not going to take it anymore.”

Since then I’ve been fine. Is it good or bad, though, this nightly ritual where I have a little wine? And when I say “nightly ritual” I mean whenever I happen to be at the end of my day. I guess it can’t hurt. It’s just sparkling water spiked with hints of flavored wine. Only 5% alcohol as are wine coolers and spritzers. At least the ones I’ve had, anyway.

I’m also happy to say that they finally added some sound files to the Hawaiian course on Duolingo, although the course is still far from complete.

I slept shitty last night. Coincidentally or not, I forgot to put the bamboo plant on the headboard shelf before crashing. First I woke up just because and then the MP3 player died which I forgot to charge. So traffic woke me up several times, mostly the fucking garbage and green waste trucks. My ear was getting irritated from the earbud as well and to think that traffic is going to affect so much of my life for the next 20-something years makes me want to scream. Car stereos, yes, but traffic, for the most part, has never been an issue until I came to this fucking state.

Why do I always have to end up in the noisiest places and always get the flukes and extremes? What were the odds in Arizona that the house next door would be city-owned and rented to welfare bums? What were the odds that the duplex in Oregon would face the back of a duplex with a mother and daughter team going back and forth at all hours of the day and night? These are just a couple of examples, too. We just couldn’t have happened to end up on the other side of the circle or on a dead-end, could we? It wouldn’t exactly be peaceful there but it would be better than where we are.

My groin rash seems to be virtually immortal. Fortunately, it doesn’t itch that much because as soon as I get it under control it flares right back up. I’m tired of all these rashes I just can’t kill! The question is whether or not it’s lichen or fungal. It seems to be common regardless of body size. I know stress can make it worse and I was definitely stressed out yesterday and the day before when I learned my numbers.

Just when I was regretting the pigs and wondering how much of my lung tightness they could be responsible for, which I’m now pretty sure is connected to the weather changes and me being stressed out yesterday, they’re definitely warming up to me. Still probably always gonna give me a run for my money when I go to handle them but they’re definitely more comfortable sitting with me and don’t struggle as much as I’m picking them up.

What’s a little strange is how Rockefeller does all the talking. He was funny because as soon as he heard me come out of the bedroom when I got up early this afternoon, off he went. Blitz, on the other hand, is still pretty quiet. He’s not as brave as Rockefeller but he’s not as timid as he was before. These are probably the only noisy animals I enjoy and they don’t drive me crazy with their squeals and squeaks.

Along with cleaning the fish filter and heater which gets bits and pieces of debris trapped in the suction cups and other parts of them, we’re going to cut cardboard pieces to place at the sides and back of the pig cage so they can’t keep kicking out so much bedding and making a mess.

He’s going to be going to Sam’s Club tomorrow morning like he does every other Saturday. Sunday we’ll probably go out and pick up some things from Safeway. If not, we might go to Walgreens or Rite Aid or who knows where.

Watching a Netflix mini-series called Haunting. They’re said to be true stories but I have to wonder how they prove this. Either way, it still makes for good entertainment.

Been hearing way more planes tonight than I’ve heard so far this year. Please, please don’t tell me we’re going to go back to that shit! Just let me have my nights!

“You don’t think you’re fake?” someone asked me on Ask.

Hmm… Someone I’ve talked to that’s two-facing me? Someone who knows of me? Totally random?

I hope my friends really are my friends. Just can’t help but wonder if I blocked that person, would “that” person be Aly? She suspects Jase has been trolling her there so maybe it was him. People connected to Aly tend to be trouble. That’s why I hesitated to associate with Cam at first. They could turn on each other tomorrow and I could be trolled the next day. These days, though, it’d be much easier to shake him (or anyone else) off as I’m not nearly as public as I used to be.

THURSDAY, JANUARY 10, 2019
His Family:

Marge (the queen), his mother. She married Raymond who died in the mid-90s.

Ray, her oldest son has been dead for just over a decade. His wife was Nora. Kids: Pam, Jackie and Ryan. Grandkids: Jennifer.

David, her second child whom I forgot to mention in my VM. He’s married to Evie and they have a son and daughter, Parker and Nickolena.

Mary (Miss Perfect), her only daughter, married Dave.

Steven, her youngest. He married Carol and lives in the Fresno area. They have 2 sons, Matt and Chris.

Other relatives, mostly cousins, are Cindy, Johnny, Maria, Opal, Neva, Sandra, April, Bonita…

Find A Grave. It hit me all of a sudden yesterday that there was such a site and so I ran his mother’s name and found that Tom was right in suspecting she died years ago. Bitch died in February 2015 at the age of 91.

I finally decided it was time to give a few of his family members, without telling him about it, a piece of my mind. I was unable to locate Steven, Miss Perfect and Dave but I found several others, including David and Evie and their kids as well as Ryan and Jennifer. I sent them all the same message. I spoke from the heart and everything I said was 100% true too.

Here’s where it got strange. I immediately got a friend request from Jennifer and then Ryan. LOL. Jennifer and I even exchanged a few messages. I don’t think she had time to read my message before she replied but I don’t know how with it she is to begin with. She was just a little kid when we last saw her. Ryan is definitely mentally ill and has been on disability all his life.

Anyway, Jennifer asked where we were living now and I told her. Then she sent a friend request, saying she has a son now. Like I care? rolls eyes I told her no disrespect to her whatsoever (she didn’t do anything to us after all, and the only point of sending messages to multiple family members was to up my odds in at least one of them seeing it), but I couldn’t add her. I didn’t think to look up Sandra J, but I also found Cindy, Pam, Jackie, April and a few others that I’m pretty sure are related. The point is that once one sees it, the whole damn family will hear about it which is what I want. I especially want Miss Perfect to hear about it.

I went and blocked everyone I messaged.

The fact that no one in the family, especially Mary, never took the time to look us up and at least tell him that his shit of a mother died, tells me enough about them right there and stamps out any chance of me feeling any guilt for speaking my mind. He may not be reachable but I’m easy to Google and anyone can look me up on Facebook. All these years they could’ve reached out to us just to say, “Hello. How are you two doing?” but they never gave a shit. Ever.

I am seriously considering deactivating on Facebook for a number of reasons. I mostly have no need for it. There are only two more people I wouldn’t mind finding. But I don’t know Rosemarie’s last name, and if I haven’t found Steve by now, I’m not likely to ever find him. So what’s the point of keeping my account? To keep on seeing the same old political bullshit and food posts that only make me want to eat?

At the same time, I’m not sure I want to abandon everyone because I do have my cousin there and some Valleyhead sisters as well as a few good longtime cyber friends that might worry if I were to disappear.

I thought about telling Tom about the messages but I don’t want to worry him. I know how paranoid he gets at times. Personally, even if they all apologized, not that all of them owe us an apology, what would be the point in reconnecting? Tom doesn’t do social media and it would only be a matter of time before I would think they would want us to visit. Of course we would never step foot back in the state that did the horrible things it did to me, among other reasons.

The part in quotes is the message I sent.

“So Queen Marjorie died four years ago, I just learned, huh? The old me would wish her final moments were anything but kind to her but the present-day me feels nothing but contempt, disgust and even pity for a mother who chose to abandon her own son simply because he needed help one too many times. And after he did so, SO much for her while the rest of the family, excluding Mary and Dave, sat on their booties and did absolutely nothing. We lost thousands of dollars buying parts for all the projects Tom did for that woman at HIS expense. She always promised to “get him later” for it but later never came. The way that woman so easily and casually used anyone she could and then dumped them when she found them a “burden” or that she couldn’t benefit from them was utterly APPALLING but not nearly as appalling as her apparent conditional love and concern for her own son and his wife.”

Truly Spiked & Sparkling alcoholic beverages don’t taste that great but they warm me up and relax me. At least somewhat. I’ve really been on edge since learning my numbers that a part of me wishes I didn’t know what they were. Ignorance really can be bliss at times.

My lungs have been tight and I don’t know if it’s connected to the medication, the guinea pigs, the weather, or what. I just know I’ve been a bit more on edge these last couple of days and I worry that I’m on the verge of another vicious cycle of anxiety and will be at its mercy with absolutely no defense whatsoever. Once the adrenaline kicks up in my chest, I have never been able to find anything yet that will stop it. Not anything I do, take, eat or drink helps. I can calm a racing heart but I can’t kill those waves of anxiety once they start stabbing in and out of my chest. That’s when my thoughts tend to get dark and I start to feel hopeless. Like I said a million times, if there is any God up there that plans what happens to us or at least allows it to, what a cruel, torturous thing to do to someone!

Oddly enough, though, I felt better after 20 minutes of “ski blogging.” Plus, I’m having a little wine. Decided to ski blog since it’s been a while since I’ve skied and that way I don’t have to speak louder over the hum of the treadmill. Tom had just gone to bed, even though I’m sure he wouldn’t mind. Especially lying close to an air cleaner that’s always running which would drown me out.

I’m also not happy that after being delayed a day - ONTRAC is always late probably because they couldn’t get in the gate - the guinea pigs are too small for the playpen. Fucking Rockefeller busted right through one of the squares. I forget that they’re skinnier than they look. All that thick soft fur makes them look fuller than they are. Rats can collapse their rib cages and maybe that extends to guinea pigs as well. Hopefully, when they’re full-grown it won’t be an issue. It’s a nice pen otherwise. Cut my hand setting it up, but am wearing the highest quality Band-Aid I’ve ever worn, LOL. It totally fits like a second layer of skin.

I love how they squeak when they hear me coming or they want lettuce, but I’m just sick of the scaredy crap I’ve had to deal with for the most part for over a decade now. When are we going to have a pet that runs to us instead of away from us? When??? The only one here that seems to truly like having me around is Butterboy. I totally believe without a doubt that if he could breathe the air and walk on four legs, he would definitely be happy to see me. He would probably follow me around the house and gladly sit with me. He’s a surprisingly friendly, alert and intelligent fish. He just has that air about him that says, “Hello there. Nice to see you” when I walk into the room.

The guinea pigs don’t mind being held but not without a fight first. From my experience and from what I’ve read in pet forums, it’s common for guinea pigs to run when you go to pick them up. But once you’ve got them securely held, they’re fine.

Still nothing from Campbell’s and now I wonder why they really wanted my address. I definitely don’t need coupons for their cans of plastic anxiety soup, so I wonder what they really had in mind. To try to sue me for bashing them? Good luck with that, Campbell’s.

I was browsing YouTube when I randomly stumbled across a video on water fasting. This woman claims she did it for 21 days and that the first couple of days she was hungry as hell and felt weak and cold. It’s not only supposed to be a quick way to lose weight but is supposed to be good for your skin and hair and detox your digestive system and things like that.

But I still see the same problem I see with any other diet. Once you start eating again, the weight returns. You pretty much have to live a good part of your life on a diet if you want to lose weight and keep it off. If you can do that, you’re amazing. If you can’t, you’re human.

The Revenge series was going slow, so I moved on to something else. Watched the movie The Strangers on Netflix and it was great.

Amazingly, I didn’t hear the loud car at all yesterday but just after dark it came in and left a few minutes later. Probably to pick up rent money or food from its enabling parents. So, so glad that at least the planes haven’t been driving me as crazy!

I was going to use my first Bubbly account for generic things and the second one for things I would rather Aly not hear if she’s checking every now and then but was unable to log into my original account. Personally, I’m not finding Bubbly much fun anymore, so I don’t know that I’m going to bother using either account.

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 9, 2019
Went to the lab yesterday and was able to request Shannon. Took her a minute to remember me, but I slowly came trickling back into her memory as we chatted. She had no trouble drawing a vial from the crook of my elbow since I hadn’t just gotten out of bed with not enough time to guzzle water beforehand.

When I got up at 10:30, I took my meds, fed my pretty fishy and piggies, then found my lab results had been sent just 4 hours ago.

T4 - 1.4 (normal)
TSH - 7.50 (slightly high)
T3 - 3.2 (normal)

Call me emotional, dramatic and a bit immature, but I couldn’t help but burst into tears of both delight and dread when I saw the 1.4. I was surprised. I was expecting 1.3 and a TSH around 11.

It’s pouring now as we await the playpen.

LOL! I just got up, stepped into the hallway to comment to Tom in his office about how hard it’s pouring now, and Rockefeller heard me and “called” for me. At least I think it was him. Blitz is still quite reserved.

Ah, rain stopped as suddenly as it started but I can hear it rolling off the carport and patio roof now. Oh, here it goes again, just not as hard.

And that damn car? It came and went yesterday morning around 10, returning just minutes later to spend the entire day here. Didn’t leave till 8. Haven’t heard it since getting up so it’s probably here.

Just got called for a second serving. Damn, these things are serious lettuce whores! I forget just how much of the stuff they can inhale. Gotta double up on greens. They eat way more than rats.

Anyway, other than trying not to think about the inevitable return of my anxiety, even though the particular type that’s been plaguing me on and off for the last couple of years is now looking like it’s not connected to the medication, I messaged both doctors at 1 with my results. It didn’t take long for Dr. A’s to appear as “reviewed,” but Doc O hasn’t gotten to hers yet.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 8, 2019
Was reading someone’s journal on Prosebox that mentioned shopping online at Cannabis Cowboys. They’re in Canada and so is the site. They seem to have all kinds of things for all kinds of physical and emotional ailments, and while some of them seem interesting, I’m not sure I would have the guts to experiment with any of them. A glass of wine before bed is one thing but I would see this as medication with potential side effects. Plus, I can never know what may not be good to take with the medication I’m on although there really isn’t much that can’t be taken with Levothyroxine; just usually not at the same time.

I’ve also seen in Andy just how bad marijuana can fuck up one’s brain. If I think I have memory issues now…

Going to the lab in the late afternoon and worried about my results. Today was one of those days I woke up deciding my skin and hair were too soft for me to be that hypo. But then there are times I worry my TSH is still high because of how good I’ve been feeling with absolutely no skips in just over six weeks. I worry also because of the way 50s usually brings my TSH down to 16, not 33. So I’m afraid my thyroid might have died off some more which would mean that if it was in the teens I would have to up my dose which would absolutely terrify me. I have suffered so, so much on and off these last four and a half years that I don’t want to do anything that might rock the boat.

Each week that I go without anxiety, I wonder a little more if the Amberen may have had more of a hand in it than I realized. I only tried it because they claim it has no side effects and I only found one or two complaints of increased anxiety.

My HR spiked to 110 yesterday morning, but it was likely because I’d just gotten out of a hot shower. It’s been averaging between the high 70s and low 80s which is wonderful. :-)

I don’t think I’ve ever had pigs this timid before and I’m really starting to believe there is as much of a pet curse on me as there is a noise curse. Ever since losing Tinkerbell. I’m not sure I believe in the afterlife but it’s like she’s out there and she knew she was queen and is jealous of any furry pet that might steal my heart.

Ah, but Tinkerbell, sweetie, if you’re out there, you will always be my number one!

Seriously, this is just ridiculous! I’m surprised I haven’t been pissed or shit on as is common when rats get scared. Rockefeller does make happy talk when Tom reaches into the cage and pats him, so he definitely likes him. He’s getting a little easier to handle but they still act like we’re going to kill them when we reach for them be it to pat them or to handle them. At least they’re eating well. Tom said they were playing this morning before he left for work.

We ordered a playpen for them and some lattice balls with bells in them that cats play with. I’ve seen videos with guinea pigs playing with them and it definitely seems like something they would like if they could ever loosen up and get more playful. The playpen has panels to create a walled-off area. There is no floor to it. But this way they can have more space to run around an hour or so each day. It wouldn’t work for rats because a rat could just climb or jump right out of it. I thought this would be a good place to sit with them since I’m small and where they could play with the balls. Even though they have a good-sized cage, the balls would roll easier on the carpet than on their bedding in the cage.

We also restarted the bedding subscription but we’re only going to get one bail a month.

That loud car has come around every day without fail. Yesterday they were only here once and for 15 minutes but still, why can’t this loser visit his parents once a week like most people?

Just when I think the planes are going to start driving me crazy again, I only end up hearing a few. I wasn’t up that late last night, though, and I’m sleeping in the early mornings so they could be worse than I know. I’ll find out soon enough if they’re back to being as annoying as usual.

Started my 8th book since joining KU. Definitely going to stock up on Willow Rose books after reading the few I downloaded after catching up on the Jon Athan books I wanted to read.

Started Revenge last night which is an eight-book set and is estimated to take nearly 46 hours to read. It’s about a black girl (I guess I’m a hypocrite for pointing out her race, LOL, which I hate when others do) who gets gang-raped by 10 rich white guys. She goes to medical school so she can seek revenge without leaving a trace. Definitely my kind of book as I love revenge stories.

Last night I had another one of those Valleyhead reunion dreams. I was showering before dinner in a community bathroom with several toilet and shower stalls. I chatted with Marie briefly after getting dressed and placing a couple of strange dolls in a chest or a box. Then I quickly texted someone and headed in search of the dining room. I asked this guy for directions to the dining room and he started giving me a hard time about it. I said something like, “Yeah, yeah, just tell me where it is.”

But then I found it on my own. It looked like a nice restaurant more so than a dining room. They had large tables and long booths with regular waitresses.

I saw people I recognized, including Kate Jackson, who was still young and hot. On one side of the booth sat three or four people with fewer people being on the side Kate was on. Those on the more crowded side were figuring out how to make room for me when I said, “Maybe I just won’t eat.”

But then someone suggested I sit by Kate, so I happily slid in next to her. Kate hugged me and gave me a kiss on the top of my head and I thanked her for being there for me earlier. I guess we had a private chat and I was grateful to her for it.

SUNDAY, JANUARY 6, 2019
Stumbled across an article on why the Keto Diet is worthless, and I agree. There are no magic foods or food combinations for weight loss, otherwise most people would be thin. It’s all about calories and I’m way past the point in life where my calorie intake has to be so low that I just couldn’t stand it short-term let alone indefinitely. Even if I could be 30 pounds lighter at the snap of my fingers, I’d never be able to keep it off. I’d rather just use common sense, keep active, and accept my aging body as it is and as it was meant to be. As long as I’m not severely obese, I’m okay with myself and with not trying to be something I’m not meant to be.

Finished watching Inside the World’s Toughest Prisons. While I’d hate to be in prison anywhere, Norway is the place to be if you have no choice. They’re single-man prison cells are like hotel rooms and the place isn’t filthy and overcrowded like in Costa Rica, for example. The prisons have no bars, have their own supermarket, you can’t get anything longer than a 21-year sentence, and the staff is encouraged to be friendly with the prisoners. Their attitude is that if you treat people like animals, you get an animal and that’s what you’ll be releasing back into society someday, and I totally agree. I mean sure, some people are born animals no matter how much dignity and respect you treat them with, and I personally wouldn’t like the idea of my murderer living in such a nice prison and being treated with the same kindness you’d treat a guest in a hotel with, but they definitely have a point. It’s why most abusers were abused, after all. People do tend to follow the examples set for them.

They also believe it’s pointless to make their punishment any rougher because being there in the first place is punishment. Right on again. Back when I was in jail I wished they would just let me do my damn time, even though I knew I didn’t deserve five minutes of it, and quit with all the bullshit along the way like the deliberately cold showers, cellmate shuffling, and barely edible food.

“We don’t want to make it fun for anyone,” one male DO had said.

Oh. You mean just being forced to be there and away from our homes, loved ones and pets were supposed to be “fun” by itself?

On the 4th episode of You and liking it very much. I was wondering when Joe was finally going to kill Benji and kind of hoping he would too, LOL. Didn’t care for the uncalled-for and unnecessary comment about Benji being the so-called “poster boy for white privilege.” You know, the one that doesn’t exist in 98% of the country? Do they realize just how offensive such comments are to those of us who have personally been victims of reverse discrimination? And yeah, there are more of us than anyone wants to believe.

Why do people have to refer to one’s color in the first place anyway? I’m tired of race always having to be pointed out whether it’s black or white. Can’t we just say “a person” or “a woman” or the person’s name and leave it at that? Really, enough with the race references! My husband’s name is Tom. Oh, he’s white, BTW. Now, did I really have to point that out? Is it necessary that people know that as if his color somehow defines who he is as a person?

Guinea pig update: The pigs are continuing to be super timid and I really hope I didn’t make the wrong choice when picking them out. I’m seriously coming to wonder if I’m meant to have timid animals as much as I’m meant to live in noisy places. It seems so. I just can’t catch a break when it comes to pets! The damn fish is way braver than they are for God’s sake, but the fish isn’t a warm, soft cuddly animal. In this state, only Tinkerboy and Sugar were friendly and sociable, then Sugar had a stroke. Hopefully, they’ll come around a little more, but I don’t know. Rockefeller was more curious today and started to come up to me, but he would quickly chicken out. They’re not quite taking food out of my hand but they started nibbling on some hay and lettuce as soon as I put it in the cage earlier today.

We had to run out and get a couple of roller bottles because these idiots were overdoing the swivel heads and wasting water when they’d get drinks.

Earlier we ran out to Safeway and got some things for them as well as stuff for us during what’s been a very wet and windy weekend. Let’s just say I haven’t had to deal with landscaping and motorcycles but just some loud traffic. Still, I wish I could jump in Butterboy’s tank and have my world be 78°, too!

Stage 1 is in the lead once again at 6 to 5. It might be a tie again when I do my end-of-the-day BP reading.

Aly’s other Twitter account is public again and Molly keeps changing handles.

SATURDAY, JANUARY 5, 2019
After waking up feeling a bit PMSy based on a little bit of soreness in my boobs, a couple of extra pounds in what seems to be water, and increased hunger along with a few scattered backaches, two little piggies went home.

We arrived at Petco as soon as it opened to increase our chances of them having guinea pigs in stock. The first two we looked at appeared to be brave and full of pep. They were munching on hay while “popcorning,” something guinea pigs do when they’re happy. I liked their colors but didn’t like that they were mostly hairless. I’ve never liked hairless animals of any breed. Even though they seemed to have great personalities, no one wants to have an ugly pet. Or at least what they personally don’t find pleasing to the eye.

Nearby were a couple of much-shyer American guinea pigs with the short fur I wanted. They were hiding in their burrow and weren’t too thrilled to be fished out of their tank but I have had some guinea pigs start off on the shy side that warmed up to me within a week or so. So hopefully I didn’t make a mistake in choosing appearance over personality. They have nice soft fur and one is a little older than the other. One has a mix of brown and white while the other has black and white with some brindle mixed in. They’re both males and were $40 each.

We got some vitamin C drops for their water as well as some chew toys, hay, and regular food. They’re on the top part of the cage. If they seem to be able to get up and down from the upper shelf, then I might open them to the lower level as well. Some reports say climbing ramps is good exercise for them while the guy in the store said that multi-levels aren’t good for them because they can’t bend their backs in the way rats can, and that much is true. They’re not nearly as flexible as rats. However, I think they can maneuver the ramps but definitely not climb the walls like rats can.

Unable to come up with names for them I picked their names using a random pet name generator. So the little guy is Blitz and the bigger guy is Rockefeller. I’m letting them get settled in while periodically going into the living room to pat them and sometimes pick them up. They’re still very timid and Rockefeller screamed at me once, LOL.

Lots of rain and wind today, especially wind. It’s just cold and miserable overall and I really wish we were someplace warm! We’re enjoying our time together, though, and just hanging out doing this and that. We replaced some of the betta’s water and now we’re doing our own thing.

FRIDAY, JANUARY 4, 2019
I am so SO fucking sick of the loud Subaru visiting not once but twice a day. You may as well live here if you’ve got to see your parents that often. I wish to hell this attention whore of a cock would get in an accident and total the fucking thing! I really do. For 3 fucking years now I have listened to this thing come and go hundreds of times and I’ve had enough! I know, though, that no matter where I lived there would always be some source(s) of annoyance. For the 5-6 more years we’re here, there’s no way this little fuck will give up that car, and I wouldn’t be surprised if there were more motorcycles each year.

Another thing I was surprised to hear after so long was Bob sawing but fortunately, it didn’t last long. Really hope he doesn’t go back to that shit on a regular basis. Just because we’ve been neighbors for over half a decade and have come to know and like each other doesn’t mean I want his noise penetrating the walls of our place. I don’t push my noise on him.

Almost done watching the complete collection of Forensic Files. Think I’ll try this Bird Box next that everyone’s been raving about. Plus, there are new episodes of Inside the World’s Toughest Prisons and I want to get back to You as well.

My HR has been amazingly low whenever I take my blood pressure, ranging between 75-81. Usually, I’m 85 or higher. I asked Tom if I should be worried and he said that when I usually check my HR, it’s because it’s high, so I’m probably like this more often than I realize. I sure feel good! I dread the day the anxiety returns but it always does so I know this calmness won’t last forever.

BP and HR readings so far… Systolic, diastolic, HR:

Jan 03, 2019. 02:06 PM 132 83 77
Jan 03, 2019. 02:19 AM 122 85 77
Jan 02, 2019. 12:27 PM 135 85 78
Jan 02, 2019. 12:13 AM 129 90 80
Jan 01, 2019. 10:35 AM 145 83 81
Jan 01, 2019. 01:05 AM 129 81 76

Not liking how there’s a sticker on my new medication bottle saying it’s the same medication I’ve been taking. The last time I saw that sticker was when they gave me the JSP brand and a week later I was anxious as hell which was just too coincidental. Yet I don’t see anything different. Still looks like Sandoz. Same shape and I’m pretty sure it’s the same color too.

Last night’s guinea pig-hunting dream wasn’t very promising. I would prefer an American guinea pig for its short hair. But in the dream, I went to the bathroom in this pet store and then returned to find the guy who worked there chatting with Tom and holding a box with two Abyssinians that were very light gray in color with some white. I asked if he had any Americans and Tom said, “I asked him that.”

The guy said he did but I’m not sure what he said next.

The planes haven’t been bad this morning but the loud car has already made its first of 2 or 3 trips in. Who the hell not only visits their parents this often but at 7:15 in the morning? So yeah, I think they’re doing some work for them because how else can the cock support himself?

Later…

Turns out that Virginia did have a heart attack when they took her away in the wee hours of Christmas Eve. She’s been in rehab ever since and is expected back home Monday. Bob said a guy was coming to install handlebars in the shower.

Poor thing! How sad and scary. Makes me definitely rethink getting old once again.

Christiane replied to my message wishing her a happy New Year. She said she’s going skiing in the Austrian Alps. Now let’s see her surprise me with a message for once, but you know what? I’m sure I’ll never hear from her again as long as I don’t message her first, and I can’t see myself doing that again in the future. Like I said, my one and only New Year’s resolution is to ditch the one-sided friendships and ignore those who don’t want anything to do with me.

What else is going on in the neighborhood? Not as much landscaping today but the loud car was here for 3 hours and I’m guessing it’s going to return any minute. I really need to try my influencing thing or some kind of spell to get rid of them. While I certainly wouldn’t want it to kill them, they need to be incapacitated for a while. Totaling the car wouldn’t do much good because someone that desperate to be heard and noticed is just going to turn around and replace it with something just as loud. I’m sure their parents will be happy to help too, as they seem to enable them to live such a slacker lifestyle to begin with.

I was looking at affordable, or at least hopefully affordable, waterfront mobile homes along Florida’s coast. It’s definitely going to be hard to get something in our price range that isn’t too old, too small or both. I would prefer to look out over the ocean but there are other water views that would be pleasant to see from a lanai or something like that with canals and lakes. It’s Florida, so there’s water everywhere. Don’t know for sure that that’s the state we’ll end up in but that would be my guess.

Went through some of my collectibles today and will definitely be getting rid of some older pieces. Cheap little plastic pieces and pieces that are chipped or broken or that I’m just sick of. Twinkle, my 22” fairy elf is now in the trash as I’ve definitely had enough of her after 15 years or so. 17 years, to be exact. Just checked my old journals. Funny as I got her almost 17 years ago to the day. Definitely a cheap, poorly made doll but she served her purpose. I removed her outfit before dumping her which wasn’t her original one but something I got from the Goodwill. Hillary can wear it and probably a couple of other dolls too. Not sure I really want to get rid of much of my collection unless I had to but I don’t expect to display most of it in the next place, wherever it is. I’ll just store them in plastic bins.

Tom is going to prep the cage when he gets home in case we do find a guinea pig or two tomorrow, and I sure hope we do! The trays, which are a bit big and bulky for me to handle, need to be hosed down. I attached the water bottles and a spare hammock. At the store, we gotta get hay, GP food, vitamin C drops, and wood chews.

Whenever we find one, I really hope it’s friendly and not timid. The thing is that guinea pigs tend to run and try to hide when you go to pick them up from their cage even long after they’ve gotten to know you and seem to be quite comfortable when they’re hanging out with you. Piggles in Phoenix used to do that and I found it annoying, and as funny as this may sound, it was also a bit insulting. I couldn’t help but take it personally after treating him like a king. Same with the last trio of rats. They were constantly acting like I was regularly beating the shit out of them. I do miss some guinea pig traits, though, like their happy chatter when being patted, squeaking for food…

THURSDAY, JANUARY 3, 2019
Heard a couple of planes this morning but nothing major yet. I’m sure they’ll be in full swing again soon enough just like I’m sure that loud car will zoom by the house in about three hours. They’ve got to be working for their parents somehow. They obviously don’t have any other job yet someone’s got to be paying for wherever they’re living, their cigarettes, and that fucking car.

While rats are the cutest and the smartest of the rodents, I don’t have the energy most days to give them the attention they demand and there are no guarantees that I’m ever going to get my energy back to where it was. It’s a fact of aging… Weight and blood pressure go up, energy goes down. Still hoping the blood pressure medication will give me more energy, whenever I start it, but I can’t know that for sure.

Mice, hamsters and gerbils may be cute but they’re out of the question because they’re messy, smelly and stupid.

Okay, that makes five planes in less than an hour and I’ve had enough, so on goes the air cleaner. Will probably ask Alexa to have sleep sounds play a random background sound as well since traffic, mowers, blowers and other shit is going to start in about an hour anyway. Just asked her. She chose “Fountain.”

As I was saying before I was distracted, due to lack of energy for rats and not finding much good other than having something cute to look at in mice, hamsters and gerbils, I was thinking of getting my second favorite breed of rodent which I’ve had many of, just not for a long time - guinea pigs! Not sure if we’ll get one or two but we’re going to check out some stores this weekend.

I’m already getting excited about the idea! I thought a guinea pig might be nice because they don’t require as much energy and attention but they’re smarter and more sociable than mice, hamsters and gerbils. They have some traits about them that are both better and worse than rats. They make better cuddle buddies compared to the very animated rat, but they shed way worse than rats which is part of why I prefer short-haired guinea pigs like the English or American guinea pig. I’ve had Abyssinians and Peruvians and while they may be cute, I would still prefer not to get a long-haired guinea pig. The fur gets tangled, and their turds and bedding can get matted in it as well. I kind of miss the sounds they make, too. I work far enough from where the cage is so their screaming wouldn’t bother me. They don’t usually scream unless they’re hungry anyway.

As long as we don’t get one that’s overly lazy like the last one we had, it should be able to climb the ramps to the upper levels of this cage easily enough. They just couldn’t climb the walls of the cage the way rats can. They don’t have the agility and the thinner bodies rats have or tails to help with balance.

So I thought a guinea pig would be a good compromise considering my current energy levels. It would also probably be gone by the time we moved.

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 2, 2019
Ran out to Walgreens yesterday and it was just a degree above freezing. I’d kill to be in Hawaii or Florida or someplace warm now! I’d especially kill to live in this particular spot I noticed when looking at Google Maps at the park my parents lived in which I visited twice in my twenties. I wasn’t kidding when I said they lived high off the hog while I struggled, once having to steal tampons just to plug up my fucking bleeders.

My parents’ old place is in an absolutely gorgeous location, and some of the homes have spectacular views of the ocean. There was this one spot I would kill for because it’s not only at the end of a dead-end, but you have woods on one side and the ocean on the other. Being on a dead end doesn’t always do you much good if you’ve got a busy street running behind you. The street in front of us and on the side gets a moderate amount of traffic but the one in back gets an enormous amount. The park they lived in is also much smaller than this one so you’re not going to have as many residents, delivery trucks, visitors and caretakers coming and going. You also don’t have as much landscaping noise because they don’t have trees that lose leaves and make a mess as we do here and they pretty much mow everyone’s grass almost all at once. Here it’s up to each individual owner to take care of their own lot. There, the residents mostly only care for things like if they want to plant a rose bush outside their bedroom window or something like that. Even garbage day would be so much quieter there! Because I’m in the middle of such a maze, I have to listen to them wind in and out of so many circles, streets and dead ends. There they would just come and go like everywhere else I’ve ever lived.

When I would be at the beach at our summer cottage in Old Lyme, Connecticut which was just six cottages from where the sand starts on Breen Avenue, I would look across Long Island Sound and wonder exactly what was out there on the New York side about 10 miles away. Well, thanks to Google Maps, I could actually look and see and finally settle that curiosity. I could have done this years ago but only thought of it last night. So I looked and found out. There’s a lighthouse across the way and also some houses which it’s definitely safe to assume that only rich people can afford. There’s a place called Plum Island too, that few people if anyone seems to live on. I guess they mostly do animal research there.

What’s amazing is how much everything looks the same at the beach. The cottages haven’t changed much and I was surprised to find the vacant lot diagonally across the street from our cottage still vacant. I would have thought they’d have built something on it by now.

Anyway, I would LOVE to end up at the end of a dead-end with only one neighbor but I know that’s just a dream. It’s like something up there totally wants me to be in the middle of as much chaos as possible but like it or not, I’m used to noisy places and if that’s what’s as meant to be as it sure seems to be, then that opens up a lot of options for us since 98% of the places would be noisier than that dead end. Who knows, though? If we were suddenly in a place like that and I really am as cursed with noise as I’ve suspected I’ve been for a million years now, then whatever is cursing me would just have some insanely loud boats or planes going by all of a sudden for me to have to listen to. Also, even if we could afford it, there’s no guarantee that the place we want would be for sale to begin with. I would still take a fifty-year-old place in that spot rather than a brand-new one in the middle of a circus. It would be so ideal! We’d be so much more out of the way of things yet wouldn’t have to drive 45 minutes to get to civilization. Yesterday was pretty quiet but I’m sure I’ll be in for tons of landscaping and traffic today. So my noise-canceling headphones will definitely get used.

I would always totally support anyone who wanted to go on a diet and all that, and from what I’ve read on Prosebox, it seems the top two New Year’s resolutions are to either quit smoking or to lose weight, especially to lose weight. To each their own but I still don’t see the point in nearly killing myself for such minimal results that are only going to come undone in no time. I just can’t see myself having 1000 calories or less every day indefinitely and then not being able to eat much more in order to keep the weight off. I’ve learned through time that striving to be healthy is much more important than being skinny. Even Nurse Jennifer pointed out that the numbers on the scale aren’t exactly an indication of one’s health and she’s right. I’d rather keep my 30 extra pounds and just eat sensibly (and enough) and keep active. That way I shouldn’t gain any more. Most older people are heavy for a reason, though. If they could just lose it and keep it off, they would.

I misunderstood how the live health site works. I thought I could talk to a therapist instantaneously if I was alone when a panic attack hit but no, you still have to schedule an appointment. You can talk to a medical doctor right away but not therapists.

Tom reminded me that it’s totally up to me whether or not I want to schedule a video therapist appointment, see Stacey, or not see anyone at all. He insists I don’t worry about the time and money.

I think for now I’m just going to schedule the shrink later on this morning and forget about the therapist, video or not. I honestly don’t see what more they can do. As Dr. O said, I can’t just “talk this out.” The anxiety. They’ll always be there if I change my mind later on. Right now I’m just dreading the day the anxiety returns. I’m also worried about my upcoming lab results. This Friday will be 6 weeks on 75s, and even though how I feel is what matters most, I worry about my numbers being too high. It would make me anxious just seeing my T4 hit 1.4, but at the same time, I’m worried my TSH is still high.

Just scheduled the shrink appt. I think it’s pretty sad that it takes 8 fucking months to see one. I expected April or May, not August 29th.

I created a second Bubbly account since I ended up regretting telling Aly about it since I have no way of knowing if she’s curious enough to follow me there. Especially since I’ve learned that if you’re not logged in it won’t trigger the listen counter. The funny thing is that when I got the welcome email, I was the first of three people it recommended I listen to, LOL. These days I prefer people only to know what I tell them directly and I feel like I can speak more freely with this other account. There’s always the chance that Aly or Kim could be browsing users and happen to recognize my voice since I’m not using colorful pictures they would normally associate me with. If they do, though, they do. Until then, although I may never know if they do discover it unless they tell me, I feel like I can be more open.

Open about people like Aly. It’s quite a coincidence that while she says she no longer feels a need to protect tweets on the Twitter account we’re connected on, she goes and protects her other account. Now, why do I have a feeling it’s because she knows I’m following her there? She probably didn’t do it as soon as I slipped with the band name I shouldn’t have known cuz she figured that’d appear too obvious if she did.

Fine, let her say nasty shit about me that she doesn’t have the guts to tell me face-to-face in a manner I don’t see it in. Still wonder if I’m one of the ones she was considering toxic and in need of getting rid of, and while I prefer us to remain friends, if she dumps me, she dumps me. There won’t be a third reconciliation, though, if she does. She hasn’t given me any indication that she’s back to considering me as “not having anything to offer as a friend” or “bringing her down,” but she doesn’t always say what’s on her mind either. We haven’t been arguing about anything but who knows what she’s thinking? All I know is that if I’m making any New Year’s resolution at all, it’s that I resolve not to bother with those who don’t want to bother with me. You dump me, you lose me forever. End of story. And no looking up and reaching out to people from 20-30 years ago to say hi that never do the same to me. Let’s see someone else look me up for a change!

Tracking my blood pressure on ccctracker.com/aha and it seems to be an easy and convenient tool that even Tom created an account to track his as well. I like the way it also lets me record my amazingly good HR lately, and highlights the numbers with different colors, depending on if you’re normal, elevated, stage 1, stage 2, or in crisis. I can also create a PDF file to print copies for my doctor in March.

Had a dream involving a couple of younger ladies and I’m guessing I was young, too. Many of us, including myself, were suddenly displaced due to an apartment building either closing down or becoming inhabitable for some reason. A flaky girl with hot pink hair promised to let me stay with her before some kind of event that was going on that night. Not sure if it was a holiday or maybe it was just Saturday night and everyone was in a partying mood. It seemed like we were at some kind of outdoor mall. The weather was cold and crisp and there were many shops and eateries that people were milling in and out of.

I eventually lost track of the pink-haired girl who was supposed to give me a place to stay and ended up talking to a quieter, more conservatively dressed blond girl who said I could stay with her if the pink girl didn’t come through. I was so grateful that I promised to clean her place and give her a foot or back massage anytime she wanted. She didn’t say anything to that though I got the feeling that she liked me and was almost glad the pink girl wasn’t likely to make good on her word.

Deciding to make one last-ditch effort to locate the pink girl and find out what was going on, I told the blonde girl I would check this particular store out and then let her know if I could learn anything.

The blonde girl thought she should be the one to go in and see if she could find out any information, thinking the pink girl would be more likely to be more honest that way. She asked me for my favorite kind of gum as an “excuse” to enter the store.

I guess pink girl must have bailed because next thing I knew I was in the passenger seat of the blonde girl’s car as she drove down a dark and nearly deserted street.

Again I thanked her, saying it would have been too cold to be homeless that night.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 1, 2019
Citrus Heights, CA Age: 53

It’s been wonderful starting the new year off without all the damn planes but I’m sure they’ll be back in a day or so. Especially if it wasn’t just a holiday thing. I don’t know, maybe they built another airport closer to us. I’ll find out soon enough because they’ll be back at it late tonight or early tomorrow morning if it wasn’t just about the holidays.

Saw Nurse Jennifer yesterday and she wasn’t the one I thought I was going to be seeing. She’s an Asian woman I haven’t seen around the place before. Saw a couple of other nurses I recognized since I’ve been there 50 million times already but this is the first time I’ve seen Jennifer. She was a nice lady. She too, weighs about what I weigh and doesn’t look it because she’s active and fit.

She looked at my beautiful spreadsheet with my not-so-beautiful numbers and agreed my morning numbers aren’t too bad but my afternoon and evening numbers are high. Anything over 140 is worrisome and I have a lot of readings in the 140s-150s. 120/70 is optimal, 130/80 is our goal, but 140/90 is definitely high.

She gave me a sheet of paper with tips on reducing blood pressure and the best way to take BP readings, most of which I already knew.

I asked if high blood pressure could be causing my fatigue and dizziness and she said it definitely could because the heart has to pump harder which makes you tired, and because things can’t circulate properly, this can leave you dizzy. I could also have issues with the crystals in the inner ear.

The doctor, who won’t be back until Wednesday, must have known I would be coming in with shitty numbers because she decided I should go on a low dose of lisinopril. Tom was with me and he had forgotten the name of the blood pressure medication he was on before losartan that caused him to cough all the time. But as soon as he heard the name, he knew that was the one that made him cough. I’m so glad I took him in there with me! Jennifer did confirm that coughing is a side effect of lisinopril.

So I asked if I could try losartan instead since Tom hasn’t had any problem with it. He’s actually on the 2-in-1 that has a diuretic along with the BP medicine. I told her I had a medication phobia and that while it would be scary either way, it wouldn’t be as scary if I tried that instead. She said she saw it listed that I have a medication phobia.

She’s going to run it by the doctor and I’m guessing she won’t have any problem with trying me on losartan. Really REALLY hope it helps with my fatigue and dizziness!!! Polly said it helped hers and she’s been on blood pressure medication for years. It’s just that I woke up tired and dizzy, as I do most days, and my blood pressure was almost normal at that time. So does that mean there is no connection or what? I guess I’ll find out soon enough but not until the end of the week.

Wasn’t impressed with Excel or Google Docs spreadsheets so I made my own in Word and will be keeping a record of just my morning and nighttime readings.

For now, I’m going to enjoy the 77 days that I’ll be appointment-free!