P.R.F. Prosebox 8/9/2019 in Book Six: Trying to Hold On 2019

Good morning, good afternoon, or good evening; you’re joining us here at P.R.F. Prosebox this entry being put forth on Friday, August Ninth, Two Thousand Nineteen. I wanted to start this entry with what I hope will be seen as a cute photo (those who follow me on Instagram or Facebook have already seen it). I waited to share it because I wanted to get my wife’s permission first. Thursday morning when I was leaving for work, I looked back at My Girls sleeping in bed and Nala (who usually isn’t cuddly with Wife) had decided to give it a try.

There was no such picture for this morning, lol. Last night Wife wasn’t feeling well again so I was doing stuff around the house for her/us instead of working Super Puppy’s energies out via walkies and play time. So Nala was super hyper (and bitey and barkey) last night. Thus she was not allowed to sleep on the bed. And what is really cool? As much as I hate putting her in the kennel or “separating her” when she’s getting super energy… it does help. I feel bad about it because I don’t want to “punish her” for having a personality. I don’t want to make her feel that it is somehow wrong to be who she is. But at the same time… if she’s working herself up, getting more and more hyper and unable to find a way to calm herself down? I also think it is important (for everyone) to give her that “stimulation time out” to help her collect herself.
I’ll book mark this with the first photo of Wife and Nala I ever took :)

For work today there are really only three priorities for me.
(1) My boss will be engaged in a difficult, likely not winnable, trial on Tuesday requiring me to cover all of his other hearings. Which means my week next week looks as follows:
Monday: Juvenile Court Day. 8 Juvenile Court Hearings keeping me tied up from 9 a.m.m to at least 3:30 p.m.
Tuesday: Covering for Boss and Doing My Own Work. 12 hearings including one in a different county requiring a 30 minute drive. My schedule has lot of “double booked” and I’ll be racing around from 9 a.m. until about 4 p.m.
Wednesday: Fortunately, nothing. A day to catch up. Which is good, because I’ll need it!
Thursday: 5 Hearings, should be finished with the day after Noon.
So Primary Priority is preparing for Tuesday of next week.
(2) Second priority is preparing for Thursday the 22nd. Oh, holy festering Fenrir teet! 25 hearings and a trial. Let me say that again. TWENTY FIVE hearings AND a Trial! So, yeah. The 22nd looks like a mystical magical portal into a hell dimension. So… I need to focus on how to take care of that shit.
(3) Clean my office. I know I say it all the time but… it is getting bad. Though that “bad” is making a good point to the staff. Yes, there are a lot of cases going on. Yes, there are a lot of Juvenile Matters, Sexual Assaults, and Domestic Violence occurrences in this community. And it is good that they see the piles of paperwork because… they know I’m a hard worker… that isn’t why the piles are important… I think it is important to have some type of visual representation as to the “unseen” problems of the community. Children in bad homes are invisible to most. Sexual Assault victims are, for good and bad reasons, kept mostly out of the public eye as long as possible. Domestic Violence is one of those crimes people intentionally turn their head from. So… it is important to have something that says “This is a genuine problem we’re not going to ignore.” That being said… I do need to get it organized!

So those are my three priorities for today! At least at work. At home? Give Nala a walk, finally pay for Prosebox Subscription, Schedule Video Game Time with MBFITWW, and try to encourage Wife to listen to more of the Attachment Book with me.

Random information:

I’ve not been making Healthy Decisions as much as I would have wanted to this past week; but I haven’t been making unhealthy decisions as much either. I had a little bit of soda and a half glass of wine on Monday… and I took Nala for a big walk on Tuesday and Wednesday. But other than that? No exercise (boo) but no Soda, Alcohol, Video Games, or Masturbation. So… using almost all of my At-Home Time sober, engaged with the dog or Wife (which usually means sitting around with her watching the television), and then going to bed.

It is what it is. Neither that good nor that bad. I admit that I wish my life with Wife wasn’t so much “watching TV together” and I admit I do miss going downstairs to play video games.

And now I want to share excerpts from an opinion piece found on [THIS] web address.

As the nation mourns another mass murder in El Paso, Texas, by a shooter allegedly motivated by his hatred of Hispanics and their so-called “invasion” of the United States, Fox News host Tucker Carlson looked into the camera and with a straight face told his audience that white supremacy “isn’t a real problem in America.”

He called it nothing more than “a hoax, just like the Russia hoax. It’s a conspiracy theory used to divide the country and keep a hold on power.” What? Americans are dead. How dare he.

I was aghast at Carlson’s latest rant. Just when I thought the deliberate gaslighting by Trump apologists couldn’t get any worse, it reached a new low on Fox News.

His statements aren’t just grossly irresponsible and patently false. They are also an insult to all the victims, their families and the communities who have suffered at the hands of white nationalist extremists, many of whom have seemingly been emboldened by President Donald Trump’s rhetoric and that of his sycophants, like Carlson, who continue to give him cover.

When a mass shooter leaves behind a racist diatribe using terms like “Hispanic invasion,” mirroring language the President and right-wing news outlets use repeatedly to demagogue the issue of immigration, the impact it has on extremists cannot be ignored. During a Trump rally this past May in Florida, the President laughed off a supporter’s shout of “shoot them” when discussing what to do about illegal border crossers. Trump didn’t condemn the horrific comment – the President of the United States cracked a joke. It was just a matter of time before someone took it seriously.
…
According to a Washington Post study, counties that hosted a Trump rally in 2016 saw a 226% increase in hate crimes. The Anti-Defamation League says extremist related murders increased 35% from 2017 to 2018, “making them responsible for more deaths than in any year since 1995.”
…
Is Tucker Carlson calling Trump’s FBI director a liar? Wray warned in April, “the danger … of white supremacists, violent extremism or any other kind of extremism is, of course, significant,” in response to the Department of Homeland Security’s decision to disband an intelligence unit focused on domestic terror threats and shut down programs specifically directed at neo-Nazis and other far right groups.

I remember when my fellow Republicans criticized President Obama for not calling out radical Islamic extremism strongly enough by name during his tenure. Where are those voices now concerning attempts to dismiss the threat of white nationalist extremism under President Trump? Their silence is deafening.

I suppose it should come as no surprise to anyone after what has been going on this week that I am very ready for the work day to be over (and it really only just began). Despite the fact that my weekend will involve shopping (not a hobby of mine), the very idea that I may get to sleep properly, spend time with my own hobbies, and perhaps not be inundated with the wretched darkness of humanity for a few hours is an exciting one.

That being said, as I work… my brain does that which it, seemingly, always does. I’m sitting here, reviewing next week’s hearings, making notes and planning… but it is not occupying all of my brain. So the parts that aren’t occupied quickly scurry to the “long term memory” section and start pulling books off the shelves and reading them aloud while postulating how each story could have branched differently with different choices.
Example: I’m reviewing the records of a Juvenile Case scheduled for 10:00 on Monday. I highlight the name and time, I review the DHS records and recommendations, I write my own notes in the margins to make sure (if needed) I say the right things during the hearing. But all the while, I feel this scratching in the back of my mind, like a demonic imp trying to use a Brain Wall as a Scribe Tablet. The imp, today, is scrawling Remember J Mac? That was weird, eh? She was a high school friend that went to the same college as you and became a lawyer. A redhead, in fact, that fit your preferred body type. You never pursued her because she dated your room mate and then your good friend. But you know how those Valley Graduates can be, right? Most girls in your high school would date different boys in a certain friend group trying to find “the right version” of Good Boyfriend. But you never even tried, did you? She was probably interested, too! Remember how it was just the two of you hanging out before your now-Wife called to come over? INTERESTING, don’t you think? Have you ever considered that there are probably a million multi-verses where you wound up together?

All of this simply going on in the background, not consciously. Consciously, I’m focusing on my work. DHS Reports, Children who need me, Services being offered. But in the back of my mind, that damned imp. Scratching stories, whispering theories, questioning the What Might Have Beens. Little bastard. Stuff like that happens too often to me. That concept of my brain not being “fully engaged” so things go weird. Like… when I’m playing video games sometimes. It is why I’m more likely to drink heavily or masturbate to pornography when I’m playing a video game. IF the video game is deeply engaging or brand new… not a problem. My brain is curious, it is focused, it is zeroing in on the sounds, sights, story, game play mechanics, all of it. But if it is a game that requires grinding (like where I am in Borderlands 2)? Fuggetaboutit! I’ve played that game so often that I’ve literally played the game in my sleep. Like… started playing the game, fallen asleep, discovered that I still managed to navigate my way back to the Safe Save Point before falling so deeply asleep that I dropped the controller. Because I’m in a hunting phase of the game. I need (desperately) to find fucking Jimmy J3NKN5. APPARENTLY* the hardest damned thing to find in the fucking game! So… yeah. That is why, typically these days, playing Borderlands means I’m also drinking or watching Porn or watching YouTube or watching Netflix. So I can try to occupy my brain. And even there, the Imps are out. Playing the Multiverse Game or the Guilt Game or the Shame Game. Damned… brain Imps.