Thirteen in NoJoMo 2016

Let’s start with today’s prompt…

Nervousness. Write about what last made you really nervous.

You know, I don’t really know what makes me nervous anymore. I’ve been through so much, I really don’t know what more there is that could really embarrass me.

There’s things that happen that once would have been a big source of shame that, on account of my condition, I really can’t control. Does my disability make me a bad person? Umm, maybe. Probably me from a decade ago would have been completely unable to understand it, because I did really think there wasn’t much I couldn’t do if I really needed to.

When I left radio in 2005, I was very much at the point where I was saying, “this isn’t working.”

Would I end up going back to school?
Would I end up on the Gulf Coast trying to do my part in rebuilding after Katrina?
Would I be dead?

If you’d told me I’d end up married to someone much younger than I, and very afflicted with MS, I’d have thought you were nuts.

Same goes for if you’d told me that Donald Trump would be elected President. (Hell, that would have been true two years ago.)

So, what inspired this prompt?

Tomorrow I’m off to Georgetown School of Medicine for consultation about potentially being used as a research subject in whatever they’re doing for multiple sclerosis research.

They can do whatever they want to me. If some short-term discomfort can make this nightmare end, okay, I’m willing to try.

So, that’s tomorrow. Up-and-back on Amtrak is a long day, but at least I can do that now.

Hell, me taking Amtrak at all would have evoked the “you’re nuts” response.

Facebook seems to be especially-good at bringing up bad memories, too. Today saw pictures of my destroyed apartment back in 2009. This is the first thing I wrote after the storm.

So, yeah, I’ve slacked off again, but I have a good fucking excuse this time....

When the remnants of Hurricane Ida turned extra-tropical, and became a Nor’easter, well, Norfolk (and me, personally) got hit pretty hard. It’s been a wild few weeks, and my apartment still isn’t fixed. My dollar damage was just below my insurance deductible, but.....

Four days without power
A week without hot water
Two weeks without laundry in the building

I ended up doing work at the radio station in the middle of the storm. They lost several machines during the power weirdness, and I spent time getting them back running. They’re still using a spare computer of mine as their mail server. What else was I going to do? Not like I had anything to do at home.

Still don’t know when my bedrooms are going to be fixed. Plaster down. Mildew. Stained carpets....

In brighter news, we’re going to see the Saints play the Redskins this weekend. In DC. It might snow.

Can I catch a break sometime?

In the midst of all the chaos, I did, however, finish up the two year project from hell at work. Ironically, a disaster recovery project.....

Notes:
I have to take two buses to do my laundry, so that last complaint is vetoed! :P The rest of it does suck, though. [donut] 12/1/2009 8:47:41 PM