Get That Fucking 2 Outta Here: Of Addiction, Acquiesence, and the Abominable Snowman (Just Because I ran out of A's)

Things
Yesterday morning I went back into the doctor. That makes something like four times this year alone. That's more than the past 10 years combined. I really just wanted to talk with him a little about my "diet" and "exercise" and ask a few questions I probably should have asked months ago about my "problem".

I got there early and he took me right away so I avoided my normal waiting room antics and awkwardness. It took him a few minutes to realize that there was nothing wrong with me. I just wanted discuss a few things. Of course the things I wanted to discuss happened months ago and he has no recollection about what I am discussing. He's a real nice guy, little slow sometimes which is a bit frightening for a doctor, but real nice and knows his shit. But what he's telling me is that I just have to do more. Which I know. But I want to know what I have to do. And what he's telling me isn't jiving with either common sense or what we briefly discussed last time. I can tell he doesn't recall what we discussed last time and it was awhile ago so I don't hold it against him, but at the same time it's making this conversation a little more difficult. I know what I'm doing is good, and I know it's not good enough. But I need some help. Need some advice. And I just wasn't getting it. This doesn't bother me as much as I thought it would. Odd.

But now I want to discuss the "problem". Full disclosure: the "problem" isn't really a problem. And it's certainly not like the other "problems". It's just when you' weigh a sight over 350 lbs. and your cholesterol, blood pressure, sugars, and everything else are pointing towards you being perfectly healthy you really need to find something to help with the motivation. I want to lost weight for two reasons, the first being that I've been lucky so far and don't want to push it. The second being that there's this pair of pants I really like that I don't fit in anymore. But seriously...I'm not sick of being fat. I'm scared of being sick. So when the doctor says you have a problem that isn't really a problem but could become a big problem, if you're smart you do something about it. Problem is that since it's not a problem yet what can you do about it specifically? I have no idea if it's something I should get checked every 6 months of every 6 years. Or even at all. And when I ask I don't get an answer, instead I get the "Well we can check it now." Great. I know we can check it now. But do we need to? Doctors aren't very good at answering questions like that so off I go for more blood work.

Now the very nice woman who came to take my blood couldn't find the vein in my right arm on the first (or second or third) try and now my arm is a blood bruised mess. But while she's poking around the cute girl who works reception comes in. So I'm getting stabbed and it's getting mildly painful and the woman is going on about how she thought she had the vein, but now she doesn't and she can't find the vein, and all this time she's jabbing me with a needle. So what do I do? I say, "I've never really understood this. No matter where you poke someone with a sharp object...shouldn't they bleed?" She laughs, and I learn a lesson. When someone is having difficulty drawing blood from you using a sharp needle, don't make them laugh, it just makes things worse...for you. On the plus side I'm pretty sure that at least got a smile out of the cute receptionist and the woman drawing the blood gave up and switched arms.

UNO

Last night I headed down to St.Paul's for the open youth room night. They do it every Wednesday and I don't really need to be there (nor do I often have the time to be there) but I make sure I'm at every single one because it is the only way I can stay in touch with these kids. Most of the time there's only three of us there. Mrs.K, who runs the program, Kevin, an underclassmen, and me, who is so far removed from youth it's almost comical. Lots of nights Adriana shows up, The Boyles come by sometimes. Kevin brings his friend Al on occasion. They are all good kids, and people I'm constantly glad that I know. I often say that I don't know what I would do without these people in my life, but the truth is I do. I'd move on. I'd find other people, maybe people I didn't like as much or need as much, but I know me, I would. But I don't want to. And that's why I've stayed there for so long. That's why when I look around I realized that I've been through the program with these kids older brothers and sisters. Hell I'd been there 7 or 8 years already when some of their older siblings came through. I've watched so many people come and go that when I think about it my heart breaks a little. And I know it will happen again, and again, and again. And I know I can take it...I just don't want to.

Alter-World Vs. The Abominable Snowman

So last night I had a very uneasy sleep. I had grating dreams bordering on nightmares that segued quite effortlessly into long meandering narrative dreams that slipped quietly into dreams of the Alter-World. The Alter-World is a familiar dream world I find myself in quite often. Dreams that take place there tend to be longer and more detailed, very often more mundane but pointed. It is the foreign yet familiar place I talk of so often. There is a house that I spend a great deal of time at, another house I'm reasonably certain I live in. I have no job there that I can tell, no solid connections I have discovered. But there are people, people I know who I encounter, versions of places that exist here as well. Last night's dream started with me at the house I spend a lot of time at but don't live in. I was digging a hole in the front yard. When I arrived in the dream I was already digging, but I didn't leave the house until the hole was done. I don't know what the hole was for but I'm reasonably certain it will be there next time I stop by. I took a bus into the city (I neither got on or off the bus as I can recall, I simply wasn't on it then I was and then I wasn't again.) When I blipped off the bus I found myself standing on a ladder in a manhole looking up at a high curb out front of the shop that was my destination. Transportation in the Alter-World is apparently very unreliable. I recognized right away that I'd visited the building the shop was in before. A few floors up was the apartment I met Jimmy Stewart in, and just across the street was the restaurant where I had dinner with, among others, my deceased sixth grade science teacher and Dominic Monaghan from Lost. I was standing in the shop talking about comic books when we heard a rumble from outside and with a sudden dark shadow crossing over us I disappeared and blipped straight into the mansion near the river where they hold the greatest parties but for some reason there was no one around. It was still raining (same storm I knew although I have no idea the spatial relation between the mansion and the city in the Alter-World, a side affect of the unreliable transportation situation. Blipping and Phantom Busses are notoriously blasé when it comes to the laws of physics.) and it was hot as hell. I was sweating (and coincidentally I was wearing the ill fitting tux that I always wear when I dream I'm at the mansion) and couldn't figure out where everyone was. The wind picked up and patio tables and lawn chairs began to fly through the air. A great roar rose up from the back of the house and a gigantic monster broke through the french doors onto the patio. It took me a moment to realize it was the abominable snowman. Before I could give anymore thought to the meaning behind that I woke up. Things are getting odd in the Alter-World.

Money and Problems
I have two rules about money. The first is never spend more than you have. The second is that you should always carry enough money to get yourself into trouble...and twice that much to get yourself out. I haven't been breaking my rules necessarily, but I've been damn close. In the past eight months I've spent more than you make in a year. I'm pretty comfortable saying that because if you make more in a year than what I've spent in the last eight months you probably have something better to do than be reading this blog. There are two reasons this hasn't hurt me yet. The first being that I saved up a lot of money before this year, and the second being that I make a lot of money.

I have two very expensive hobbies. The first is my Collection. I won't bore you with details of what I've spent but I can tell you that what I have ordered and on commission will add $10,000 to that amount in the next six months. After that I'm sort of out of space and will have just about everything that's already out that I want. I'm not looking to branch the collection out in any other directions. This should cut my spending on that down by about 90%. So I'm not too worried about that.

The second expensive hobby involves go-go dancers. I joke about this one a lot. In fact I spend more time joking about go-go bars than I do in actual go-go bars. But it's still a significant expense. I blow through money when I'm having a good time, and it seems like everyone is around a lot less lately, which just leaves me with a lot more time to get in trouble on my own.

Add to that the exercises equipment I've bought, the work done on my backyard, the work I'm having done in the house and you end up with a pretty tidy sum. I could always make more money if I wanted, but something tells me this isn't a problem I'm going to have to worry about anytime soon. There are things going on. Hands which need to be played out.

Conclusion
And finally, a quick note to the reader who has been so kind as to post comments on two of my recent entries. I appreciate your comments very much, and since seeing your first comment I've been following the entries on your blog and find them to be both interesting and meaningful. Please don't take my lack of comment on your blog as a slight in anyway, it's just that yours is a current that runs far deeper than mine, and I hesitate to comment until I feel I have something really worth saying. But I sincerely appreciate you reading mine, and I will continue to read yours.