avuncular whoas

it's times like this i wish i learned to play music, because no written word will do

you are running fast my dear friend
my outrageous teacher
and practical guide
with a spark of madness

you've always run faster and farther than you ought
but even now you slip away into the horizon
the mast and sail flattening into an ever diminishing black dot

and this time you sail where i cannot follow

i grieve the joy you take with you
grieve the sorrow left behind

(i will make bad jokes to the air
pretending you are there
that it is your joke
in your voice
and not my pale imitation)

Mark this man and know his kind,
they are not seen overmuch anymore.
Know him as Artist, for that is his soul

but what the fuck do i know anyway?

Damn! We're In A Tight Spot

After moving across country and getting laid off, I've had several years now of difficulty trying to get work. I can count on one hand the number of interviews I've landed. Even when I've aimed low, just can't seem to work it out.

Naturally, not having a regular income combined with significant medical costs has left me quite destitute. I've burned through my sad little 401k, etc.

So, you would think accidentally getting a semi-decent job would be a boon, a benefit, a balm.

Instead it has been a misery.

I've been struggling mightily with this. As you can see, even on a day off my brain has me up at 5:30 a.m., my thoughts skittering after each other in an unpleasant and endless loop.

Why has it been so hard? I'm not sure I can accurately say at this point. I've spent a sickening amount of time trying to figure out why I'm so constantly offended, frustrated, and stymied by the people and the environment. It's so pervasive and so overwhelming that I've spent a great deal of time wondering if perhaps the problem lies with me. Maybe I've just gotten too old and grumpy. Or maybe, after all the shit life has thrown at me, I've finally just lost my ability to maintain. Shit, I've even wondered if maybe I never had my shit together in the first place and now it's just showing.


I'd like to point out that prior to this I've had a lot of success in the work place. It's been noted by multiple people over the years that I seem to have a knack for getting along with "difficult" people and making hard situations work. I compartmentalize pretty well, don't take things personally, and focus on end goals.

So what's going on? Have I just lost all my skills? Is this job so different and stressful that it's a uniquely terrible experience? Is this just another byproduct of having no thyroid and the constant life changes that accompany that?

Honestly, I can only get so far in my estimations before it all becomes too depressing to contemplate.

The people I'm working for offend me. From my perspective, they are not terrible people, but they aren't very good managers. There's an appalling dearth of basic social skills and awareness coupled with an embarassing level of self involvement. There is constant intense demand for efficiency and perfection, but no consistency in what is requested and no tools provided to achieve those requests. In fact, a sure way to get something wrong is do exactly as you've been instructed. And instructed is a strong word there, it's less instruction and more "the thing I told you about briefly but can't be arsed to actually define what I want so I'll just toss it out at you before I disappear behind closed doors and you are Not Allowed to ask me questions about it so get it done so I can reject it later on with no feedback other than: it's wrong."

All of which might be tolerable, if the office itself wasn't designed for failure. Or if not failure, then the sure maintenance of a sub standard environment in which no improvements are possible and nothing can really get better. Do your job correctly and use these tools and procedures, just ignore all the bits that don't make sense or are blatantly incorrect. Use these systems, but we get grumpy if you "waste time" by actually attempting the meager training.

Perhaps it's just my weird personal hang up, but when my ability to actually do my job correctly is compromised or impeded, I get really cranky and distressed. I'm not familiar with the work, don't know what I'm doing, don't have a model or guide, and often can't even use basic logic because these people are illogical.

So, of course, all of that is just my perspective. And I've spent a great deal of time trying to think, strategize, and rationalize myself out of the feelings my perception has created. I'm very disappointed in myself. Why can't I rise above the petty problems of a workplace? Why can't I employ some zen acceptance? Why am I letting this situation bother me? Why can't I make this work?

I haven't had a steady job in years. I should be glad to be making any money. I should be hanging in there to try and get health insurance. I should be grateful that I can take these paychecks and devote them all to debt payment. Right? I should be doing everything in my power to make sure I keep this job, right? I should suck it up and get over whatever this thing is. I should be practical.

I consistently try to understand the workings of things, to get to the core of feelings, actions, motivations. But I am beginning to wonder: at what point should one cease searching for explanations and simply react to the situation? Is there a point where the healthy response becomes "I don't have to know why it makes me miserable, I just need to know that it makes me miserable."

Even thinking that way feels like a cop out, a shirking of intellectual and emotional duty. But I am forced to consider this perspective when the misery of a situation has started to color everything. Perhaps I will never be smart or strong enough to figure out how to deal with this situation. Maybe that means I should just admit defeat.

Ending With A Hint Of Relief

And so this long day draws to a close, with the pain tamped down to a manageable level sometime after midnight.

It's funny because chronic pain can really wear you out, but sometimes you are so relieved to feel better that you can't pass out. It's like your body is all "Oh boy, we don't feel like total shite right now! Paaaaarty!"

Or something. Not sure what a spleen says to a large intestine. Shout out to Handy J and Bef, who both helped me out today. Special shout out to HJ, who continues to grow as a person, much to the benefit of himself and those around him.

KIDS: DON'T TAKE DRUG TRANSUBSTANTION INTO YOUR OWN HANDS.

Warning: this shit is graphic. This is a Russian junkie who decided to shoot up some pills. That's right, he liquified some pills and injected. This is bad for many reasons, not the least of which is the caustic effect acetaminophen and NSAIDs have on blood vessels.

So he ended up at the hosptial with some gangrene. This video is not safe for life, liberty, or the pursuit of a sound sleep. There is some removal here. It's not particularly bloody, it's just, well. . .

You can see bone. Shin bone. It's like a halloween costume.

For some freaky shit click here. I don't advise clicking there. This is what happens when you decide that since you take drugs, you know chemistry/biology/anything.

Here's to tomorrow and better days.

"Never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence." 145, 131

O Yaweh, give me the strength of this conviction. Because earlier today I had some communication and experienced the following reaction.

Oh, I shouldn't take things personally because I have nothing to do with this.

Oh, fokken L, I do have something to do with this shite. Fook.

At first I'm like:

Then I think:

 

Then I'm all:

And I get really:

But finally, I'm like:

Scores in the title.

Is It Something In The Air?

I think I'm in a really weird mood right now.

This is one of those "I've heard this song a million times but today it struck a nerve" moments. It may seem trite, but I know this person and I know this feeling and it hurts in a horrible way. Aches. Twinges. Grieving for something you have yet to lose.

Music is so powerful. You have to be careful how much you let it influence you.

Step one, you say, We need to talk
He walks, you say, Sit down, it's just a talk
He smiles politely back at you
You stare politely right on through

Some sort of window to your right
As he goes left and you stay right
Between the lines of fear and blame
You begin to wonder why you came

Where did I go wrong? I lost a friend
Somewhere along in the bitterness
And I would have stayed up with you all night
Had I known how to save a life

Let him know that you know best
Cause after all, you do know best
Try to slip past his defense
Without granting innocence

Lay down a list of what is wrong
The things you've told him all along
And pray to God he hears you
And pray to God he hears you

As he begins to raise his voice
You lower yours and grant him one last choice
Drive until you lose the road
Or break with the ones you've followed

He will do one of two things
He will admit to everything
Or he'll say he's just not the same
And you'll begin to wonder why you came

Where did I go wrong? I lost a friend
Somewhere along in the bitterness
And I would have stayed up with you all night
Had I known how to save a life

I know better than to be so melancholy. Fortunately, "Sledgehammer" just came on. So I'm sure I'll be bouncing about it a bit. I'm such a twit. Peter Gabriel is so wonderfully direct about his dirtiness. :)

This is the new stuff. . . We go dancing in

Oweeee.....Bay County: Crud Capital of the World

There is something going around and it's really weird. I have a kicking case of sinusitis. I went to the doc yesterday. There are two things I don't mess around about: bladder infections and sinusitis. Got my happy little ass to a clinic toot suite.

Got the standard steroidal anti inflammatory spray, but man---this shit is rough. I feel like I've broken my nose. The pressures, I has it.

What's weird is that there are other symptoms, but I don't think I'm sick. That is, I don't feel contagious, like I've got a virus or an infections. But I do feel like refried shit.

In the continuing saga of Homeless Hawkeye I need to find a place to stay tonight. Because of a bump up in somebody's traveling plans. I'm not nearly as down about it as last time. I would just like to get to spend three consecutive days in a house without having to move.

Which I will get! A house to myself for a couple of weeks. Hallelujah! Praise Jebus!

Somebody just showed me this. It is foul. I had to look up Alligator Fuckhouse. Don't watch if you find things like "Dirty Sanchez" disturbing. I don't really have to mention that I laughed a lot, do I?

PSA: Despite my many ailments, I am not often "sick" in the traditional sense. So beware kids, if I've got it then it has the possibility of being Captain Tripps level destruction. Take your vitamins.

Am I Just Getting Dumber? Or Is Trying To Get Healthcare Info That Hard?

I'm having this Groundhog Day-esque experience. I keep on clicking links that lead to other links that lead me back to the same link.

I have a fair bit of experience in translating from insurance-ese to normal layperson. But these forms and explanations have me lost.

This is so ridiculous. I can't even afford healthcare, but I have to go through insurance companies anyways. People who think that universal healthcare is a socialist nightmare are blind, greedy, stupid, or all three. That's right, I said it.

I would like to state, again, that despite the reforms contained in the Affordable Healthcare Act, it fails at the most crucial point: insurance companies are still an integral part of the healthcare system in the US. As long as insurance companies are negotiating deals with hospitals and providers, then health costs will continue to be artificially inflated and increased to the point of ridiculousness.

Any system in which point of sale cash payment is greater than bureacratic billing, you have a serious problem. It's called racketeering. The disparity between what an insurance company pays for a procedure and what an individual pays for the same procedure is outrageous.

The fact that insurance is required to get any feasible pricing on medicine, routine doctor's visits is at the root of the imbalance. Insurance should be for catastrophic, out of the norm events, not for getting your birth control or insulin or diagnostic labs. Sure, Obamacare prevents the criminally greedy practice of deny insurance based on pre existing conditions. But guess what?---people with preexisting conditions are still penalized. Their premiums are a lot more. You can go broke just trying to maintain coverage to help you stay alive.

The ACHA has just further empowered insurance companies: companies who are focused on profit margins, not on the welfare of patients. Companies who have already banded together to insure maintenance of artificially inflated health costs. Companies who have shown they will throw any customer under the bus if they can get away with it, regardless of the health detriments to the patient.

Obamacare, from what I've seen, is just like giving Viagra to a rapist, then telling him to play nice. The problem is not affordable insurance. The problem is insurance, period. People shouldn't have to negotiate through a middleman to get medical treatment (since they already have to do that with doctors, which is a whole other bilious rant).

I'm not even mad typing this. I'm exhausted. I've been trying to look up healthcare plans for the last two hours. And I keep falling asleep. My brain has gone past tired and into depressed defeat. And even if I get something resolved soon, the way the system is set up I will have to fly back to CA to see a physician.

This system is nauseating. Our greed is disgusting. Our empowerment of the already powerful and castration of the less fortunate is sickening.

Should the world end, we have certainly earned it. Humanity is appalling.

Nothing Pleasant Here

ETA: And then he got me egg drop soup and we watch a Duck Dynasty marathon and everything was fine. 

I fling things into the ether of the internet in the hopes that it will help mitigate circumstances which would lead to real life screaming throw downs.

I've always thought my parents did a good job with raising all of the kids with good manners. Even if we are being vulgar or crude, we are still extremely polite. Lots of "please, thank you, excuse me"--a real sense of propriety among other people.

What I can't figure out is how I ended up the chivalrous one, while two of brothers are real jackasses.

I just lugged two huge loads of stuff from my car into the apartment. Two long boxes of soft drinks (so heavy on one shoulder), huge bags of books---just a shit load of stuff. Took me two trips.

My bro is sitting outside on the front porch when I pull up. He doesn't make a move to help me. Well, he does push the front door open for me, so there's that.

On trip two I have to open the door myself. He's just sitting there.

Okay.

Then I'm unloading stuff inside and his first words to me, as if we were already in mid conversation, are "Man, I really wish I could quit my job." He briefly details that other ppl want to quit too. Because it's Just. So. Damn. Horrible. This from the guy who goes in when he wants, leaves when he wants, and just recently negotiated being able to work from home. Yeah.

I feel my internal alarms go off, as the thermometer on my rage starts going up. I put some things away and wander back to the living room. Guess who wants to comment some more on how angry and peeved they are? Clue: it's not me.

At this point I have said absolutely nothing to him except my initial "Hi" when I got out of the car. It took an amazing amount of willpower for me to not blurt out "Oh, hey, my day went just great, thanks for asking? No, it's a breeze working again with all my defective organ issues. Yeah, I'm totally still struggling with the med induced rage, but my docs have told me to fuck right off about it. Thanks for asking!"

No. Instead I grabbed my backpack and retreated to the bedroom. Shutting the door. I've been in here typing for 5 minutes and Sherlock just asked "Hey, are you alright?"

Jesus Fucking Christ. How the hell did I end up the only chivalrous one in my family? My dad and brothers SUUUUUUUCK on that level. So self involved, so dismissive.

And it's not a sexist/gender thing for me. I open doors for men and women. I have helped out elderly couples in airports, wheeling them to their proper gate (that was opposite of mine). I'll stop and help someone pick up something they've dropped. When visiting my parents, I always go out and help her bring in the groceries.

Chivalry. Graciousness. Awareness. Whatever you want to call it, the quality is sorely lacking in some of my closest associates. Is it any wonder the world is fucked up?

And thus endeth my rant. Thank you, dear interwebz, for allowing me to say this here rather than beating my brother upside the head with a box of soda cans. It's probably a better choice. Maybe.

Black Rage! Black Rage!

--As always, tamping down on my emotions so other people can have theirs, H.

Labor Day Weekend at the Cats, part the first

11:36 AM to 4:49 PM

344 miles

Trip time: 5 hours, 13 minutes

This angers me, as it is over Google Maps estimated time. And I was hauling ass   driving quite well.

Also: this is a silly place.

Ode To A Friend

Nacho is gone now. So quickly the verdict turns from hope to death. And so quickly they provide that death.

Nacho deserved a far better life than the one he got. But he never seemed anything less than happy with what he had.

I am glad he was coddled and cared for in his final few days. I wish I could have held him one last time. I wish I could have been there for him in that terrible, cold, clinical room where they turn things from warm and sentient to cold and insensate. Maybe I could have helped him be a little less scared.

Though Nach was never scared of much. I think he was mostly just tired. And though people always say, "Oh, be so glad you didn't see him at the end. He looked so bad, better to remember the good times."

That doesn't really work for me. I always loved my big orange stinky baby no matter the circumstance.

I'm sorry, Nacho. You deserved better.

On the inescapability of death, the demise of hope, and all our wasted time.
 
Funeral Blues--W.H. Auden
 
Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone.
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.
Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling in the sky the message He is Dead,
Put crêpe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.
He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last forever, I was wrong.
The stars are not wanted now; put out every one,
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun.
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood;
For nothing now can ever come to any good.

If You Have An Ass, I Will Haul It

Departure -- 10:24 am
Arrival -- 3:43 pm