Once again, here I am

So much has happened, but my heart hasn't been into the writing of it. However, I want to stay in contact with this blog. And damn it all, as so often happens once I get to this point all my ideas flee my head.

I think I need a nap.

I took a nap. Some time passed between those last two sentences.

Diva is once again living with her birth mother in Spartanburg. Her bedroom here has been transformed. First of all, Cory did a spiritual cleansing (and physical cleaning) of the space.

Wait, who's Cory? you ask. I have previously referred to him a C. He's the young man who started my whole gay journey, the one who moved in with us at age 17 when he came out to his mom and she kicked him out of her home. He has lived here off and on for the last almost ten years. And oh yeah, he has moved back in as of the 31st of August. Just a week or so after Diva left, coincidentally.

So, Diva's room: it got cleaned and cleansed, then Superman and I painted it blue. It's never been blue before, not since we've lived here. It's been green, pink and purple, yellow and purple, but not blue. After the distructo-child lived there, poisoning it with her hatred, that room needed a big change. It looks damned good, if I do say so myself. Cory lives there now. Diva knows she no longer has a room here, which hopefully will encourage her to NOT COME BACK!!

Now, for Sproing. He's in jail. Big people jail, not kiddie jail. The first day of school for the kids here was the 17th of August. Sproing skipped school that day and, unbeknownst to me, went with a friend of his to the home of another acquaintance and burgled the house. They broke in through a window and stole not one but two Play Stations (PS4s, I think). Plus the peripherals like cords, controllers and a couple of games. That was a Monday. That Thursday a couple of detectives from the police department came by to ask if I knew anything. I had seen the things, not knowing from whence they came. So the detectives went to the school and "interviewed" Sproing. He was taken to the county detention center from there and I haven't seen him since. He's been charged with second degree burglary and grand larceny (>$2000 but < $10,000).  I requested that he be kept there rather than let out on bail. The judge set his bail at $30,000. So there he sits.

Actually he is supposed to be in court tomorrow on his charge of credit card fraud for stealing almost $900 from us. I'm not going to worry about it. If they need him there, they'll have to walk him across the street from the detention center to the court house. I'm not sure when he's to appear for the new burglary and larceny charges. I'm not the victim on record for those.

And here's the thing. For a long time I've had hope for that kid. He's relatively intelligent. Stupid as shit in the unwise sense, but smart otherwise. He also talks a good talk. He's been stringing me along all summer, promising to look for a job and making a show of it, but not really doing anything. He said all sorts of inspiring things about starting school and being on track, etc. He had a conference with his guidance counselor the second day of school. They made grand plans for him to graduate next January, just half a year behind schedule. He sounded good. But the day before that discussion he had seriously broken the law.

He betrayed me. Or I allowed myself to be hoodwinked and thus feel betrayed. Diva has been a hot mess for the longest time and I have little hope of her being a responsible citizen, but I thought Spoing had the stuff to deliver.

So I am D O N E with him. I'm angry and hurt. I spoke to him on the phone a couple of times the first week he was incarcerated. He wanted me to arrange a meeting with the judge to try to work something out so he could be out on bail. HA! I said No. He's been there three weeks as of today. Funny, it seems like longer. Hmph, probably feels like longer to him, too. GOOD!! Anyway, I wrote him a letter yesterday and sent $20 (in a Postal Money Order only) for his canteen account. I called the jail to ask how I could visit him, and the nice lady said I had to be on an approved visitor list; he has to add me, but he needs to know my name, birth date, phone number, and drivers license number. Yeah, he won't know that one. But I asked about sending him stamps and envelopes so he can write to me, but she said nope. I can send money and he can buy those supplies in the canteen. So I sent some money. Which he'll probably spend on chips and soda. Anyway, I'll call in a few days and see if I'm on his visitor list. I'm about ready to talk to him again, but have only recently reached this point. Superman isn't ready to talk to him yet.

If he ends up staying in jail until (or past) January 24th, he won't move back home. That's his 18th birthday, and after he's 18 we aren't legally obligated to providing a home for him. Since he confessed to his involvement with the burglary I guess he'll plead guilty unless he gets a public defender who convinces him otherwise. The stolen goods were retrieved from this house, though, where he said he'd hid them, so I don't think he has a defense. Anyway, if convicted I predict he'll spend at least 12 months in jail, maybe more. He's in the county jail now. After conviction, though, I don't know if he'll stay in the jail or go to prison. As I was recently informed, there's a difference.

I never thought I'd be having this discussion about one of my children. It turns my stomach.

So the house has been peaceful for a couple of weeks since Diva left. Twitch is here still, and Cory's here now. They are so much more calm than Diva and Sproing! My life has, for now anyway, eased somewhat. The stress level is much lower. I'm still in shock, or something like it. Don't think I'll relax until both of them turn 18. Diva hits the big "adult" on 4 December.

In the meantime I'm not sure what I'm doing. Working on Diva's room was helpful. Actually I got to go through all her stuff. She'd left everything at the home of a friend when she left for Spartanburg, and Superman retrieved it from there. We had it here for a few days before we were "able" to get it to her. I cleaned out a lot of junk. Seriously, empty shampoo and deodorant containers? I had Cory go through her shirts to get rid of what he thought was unsuitable. I wanted that done but wasn't quite able to do it myself. Now it's all NOT in my house. I went through Sproing's stuff too. He has significantly less than she did.

The next project is to make changes to his old room similar to what we did to hers. Not sure what color(s) to paint it. Diva's room is light smoky blue on three walls, slightly darker on the 4th wall. We might do something like that with the colors for Sproing's old room, or paint it one color. Do any of you have suggestions? I won't go with purple again, not that I don't (or didn't) like that color, but after Diva it has some negative associations for me. Also no red. I don't do red, not in large swaths like that.

I'm rambling. I want to comment on Jay's suicide, but I'm not sure what to say. It hurts. Hurts more this week than it did last week, for some reason. As I said to a couple of other bloggers, it's a tragic situation all around.

I've had trouble this week getting anything done. Tuesday was somewhat productive, but yesterday and today I haven't done jack. Can't seem to get myself out of bed. I finally showered at 5:15 yesterday evening. Haven't bathed today. I did get dressed, though. Yay me. I made a list Tuesday of things to do yesterday. And there it sits, waiting for me to do something. Maybe tomorrow.

And that's about all I have to say right now. Writing this blog post has been the most productive thing I've done today. I'm gonna call that a win.

Thoughts on depression and not being so depressed

So I was talking to Superman this morning while I was painting the firewood rack in our backyard. We were talking about my increased motivation and the lessening of my depression. I said that I'd had brief episodes of feel-good-motivation-to-get-stuff-done (hereafter referred to as "motivation") surrounded by lots of mope-and-not-getting-much-accomplished (hereafter referred to as "depression"). I feel as though I've been depressed for probably 30, maybe 35, of my 52 years. That's total periods of depression interspersed with days/weeks/years of feeling pretty good and motivated, mostly in bursts of days or weeks, not months or years. Superman remembers it a bit differently, that I was motivated more often than depressed until about seven or eight years ago, which would be when Diva and Sproing (who are now 16.5) began to get really difficult, and when Twitch was in the worst of his teen years. Now that the kidlets are in the worst of their teen years (and have been for at least four years) things are still bad. Refer to, oh hell, most of my blog archives, since I started this blog in 2007 when I was already in the dumps.

I painted the firewood rack this morning. I asked Twitch to do it last week and he just never got around to it. He had lots of excuses. Excuses are his speciality. He's a lazy son of a bitch.

Oh, and did I tell you that Manny is back?  We sprung him from the repair shop on Friday, IIRC. $550 for bail, or repairs in this case. Damn. Ron the mechanic said I really need to get this oil leak fixed, too. It's in the lifter area, evidently the gasket on the lifter head leaks. There are other oil leaks, but he says probably 90% of the oil is coming from there. That repair will probably cost at least $400.

Manny's clutch appears to be fine, it was the bracket holding the clutch and brake pedals that broke, causing the clutch to slip badly. This is what Ron the mechanic says. I really don't know much of what I'm talking about. I don't know the difference between a broken clutch and a slipped clutch. I do know that he's shifting just fine now.

And I feel the need for a trip. I'd love to go to western PA again to see Light, but I could be happy with a weekend camping trip in the mountains, perhaps a day driving the Blue Ridge Parkway.

It's late, I'm tired, and all sorts of other things. So goodnight, and I'll see about writing more before too long. I'd like to blog at least once a week rather than the once or twice a month I've managed recently. Motivation, people!!

A little bit more then lots of rambling

I took my computer to the repair place today. Probably won't hear anything until late tomorrow at the earliest. So here I am struggling along on Superman's laptop. I miss mine.

Diva saw the doctor. She's sick, but not with the flu. They did a nasal swab. Diva was all like "WTF?" when the nurse came at her with the long one-sided Qtip lookin' thing. I was good and didn't even laugh at her or nuthin'. She had a fever of 101 at the office. We didn't have a working thermometer so I wasn't sure what kind of fever she had. The doc prescribed a course of antibiotics for her. I feel sorry for the poor Diva. She obviously feels like shit. I picked up a new thermometer at the drug store when I got her medicine, and this evening her temp was 102. I gave her some Tylenol PM (the generic version) and she's sound asleep again. I got her some fruit juice and Gatorade and encourage her to drink a lot. Which means she'll wet the bed profusely, which sucks, but she needs to wash this ickiness out of her system.

Light has been in communication this weekend. She and her boyfriend have terminated their romantic relationship. Thing is, he moved into her apartment a few months ago and doesn't have anywhere else to go or enough money to get his own place. So now Light no longer lives with her boyfriend. Now she lives with a roommate who just happens to be her former boyfriend. She said they are on friendly terms, thankfully, which is the only way this roommate situation will work. I met the guy. I like him. But evidently they aren't good as sweethearts.

Light also told me that she'll be graduating either in May or August. I didn't realize she was graduating so soon. I'm so used to her being in Pennsylvania in school, it seems like that's where she belongs. I'm sure she is ever so ready to be done with school now, though.

While at the doctor's office with Diva this morning I got the results of my blood work. I had my annual physical last week with accompanying blood work. My cholesterol numbers are better, not that they were bad before. My glucose was a little bit high, but the nurse did an A1C check while I was there today (it was supposed to be part of the blood work, but didn't get ordered or something) and my A1C was only 5.5!! It's supposed to be less than 6.0, and a few years ago it was hovering at 6 or slightly above. My doctor had me coming in for blood pressure and A1C checkups every 4 months. When I changed my eating habits a couple of summers ago and started losing weight, my bp and A1C numbers went down. Duh. It's what the doc had been telling me to do for years! Last A1C about 4 or 5 months ago was 5.8 if I remember. Today was 5.5! Yay me! No, I am not diabetic. Doc says perhaps I'm pre-diabetic, whatever that means, but it is NOT "diabetus." With my numbers improving, it looks less and less like diabetes. So it's all good.


And now in interesting stuff from my inbox, I present a very expensive house. With what they're calling a "wrap around pool." Call me old fashioned, but to me, a wrap around pool is really a moat. I mean, what else could it be? Perhaps the moat doesn't encircle the palace house entirely, but in the olden castle days of yore not every moat completely circled the structure, right? Especially if there were geological structures that prevented bad guy access to the place, then the moat didn't need to go all the way around. Like for instance a cliff or very large rock beside the castle probably would work as well as a moat right there. So imagine this: a castle surrounded 25% by a steep cliff and 75% by a moat. Trust me, it'll work.

OK, this moat circles the castle. But not all moats did, right? 

Back to the more mundane. I have pictures to share. Not the ones of palaces and moats, but ones I took myself with my camera that I can't find the battery charger for. I can take the SD card out and load the pics to my computer.... wait, I don't have my computer. Shit. I also can't take any more pictures until I figure out how to charge the damn battery. If only I could find the box the camera came in. I bought it in April of this year after the disastrous canoe trip down the Juniper Run when I took my old camera swimming with me. Twitch was living here in my office, using my desk (OK, it's actually his old desk that I took over from him when he moved, but that's beside the point). So I doubt the camera stuff is in the bottom drawer of that desk, which is where I think it ought to be. Maybe it's on the little desk we moved into our bedroom when Twitch moved back home last December. That desk has accumulated a LOT of stuff on its surface. I'd show you a picture, but my camera isn't charged. Actually, I probably wouldn't because it's embarrassingly messy. Anyway, I might try excavating this little desk tomorrow and see if I can find the camera peripherals. Since I'm looking for the camera peripherals I probably won't find them. I'll find many other interesting and useful things, but not what I'm looking for. That's the way of the Java. 

But what I came to tell you is that I have pictures of the room we've been painting. This is the room that Twitch most recently occupied. It was my office before he moved home in December. It's meant to be a formal dining room in the overall design of the house.  We are tentatively planning to move our bed in there when we finish painting it so we can clean out our bedroom and do these major upgrades to the master suite. So right now I don't know what to call that room. Office/dining/bed/guest room? We painted it yellow above the chair rail and gray below. And I intend to put yellow vertical stripes on the yellow field. The yellow was supposed to be cream, but it's a bit yellower than the paint chip implied. Paint does that, I forgot. It's a pleasant yellow. Sproing says it looks like the color of Blue Bonnet Margarine. (I think that's the brand he indicated. We use dairy butter, so I'm not too familiar with margarine brands.) We have many partially empty cans of yellow paint from other projects, and I know there's a very light yellow that I hope works well against the not-cream margarine color. I've painted a test patch of the Blue Bonnet Yellow and need to get out my contrasting yellows to give it a try. My goal is a very faint contrast yellow on yellow, vertical stripes of approximately 12 inches. Coincidentally and conveniently, the paint stir sticks available for free at Lowe's are 12 inches long. Ain't that a treat? 

Superman and I were very efficient this weekend and got that room all painted. We'd done the priming a few weeks ago, just over the very dark blue/gray that was there before. When it was Light's room she painted half of it as a dark storm, the other half as a light blue sky with lighter blue or white sponged over the sky. We didn't need to prime the light parts. The dark bit needed three coats (maybe it was only two) of primer. The whole thing is yellow now and looks all kinds of solid. Nice. No light blue/dark blue bleeding through the yellow. 

It's late, I'm tired, and I don't know if this still makes any sense. Or if it made sense to begin with. 

OH, wait! I have more blood work news to relate. I'm anemic. My new doctor (actually a Physician's Assistant - PA) (because my old doctor, who wasn't old, retired this summer and I'm still in mourning over that) wants me to have a test... EGD? Yes! Thank you Google. It's an esophagogastroduodenoscopy. How cool is that!? I don't know how to pronounce it. Aka an upper G.I. endoscopy. I know how to pronounce that. Anyway, the PA, Jillian, wants to make sure I don't have any internal bleeding. I just had a "scopy" of the other end this summer, so that's been checked out. The procedure is scheduled for Wednesday the 6th. I'll need a driver, and can't eat anything for 5 hours preceding the procedure. (Alliteration, for those English majors out there.) But about the anemia thing, I've been cutting back on my meat consumption and I suspect I just haven't been getting enough iron in my diet. I'd much rather have to eat more leafy greens or take iron supplements than have internal bleeding or esophageal cancer, you know? I'll be sure to update you on this esophagogastroduodenoscopy, though. (Damn, that's fun to type!) 

The anemia would explain why I've been so tired lately. Anemia and staying up too late. Yeah, I'm going to bed now. Goodnight. 

Sunday again: ramblings and updates

Early Saturday morning I woke from a dream in which it was late Sunday. You know how reality is ephemeral when you begin to wake up? I didn't know what day it was.


I saw the doctor about my floater. It's nothing to worry about (probably) but he wants to see me in three months to check on it. He had his bright shine-in-my-eye light and what looked a bit like a jeweler's loupe that he used to see inside my eyeball. He saw the cat hair/spider in there and exclaimed "That's a big one!" (pause for snickering) He said it'll probably become less noticeable as time goes by. I'm glad I had it checked out. Also, he dilated my eyes. I have specifically put in a standing order for cloudy days when I must have my eyes dilated, but alas, that day was bright and sunny. I survived. The vision in my right eye (not the one with the big floater) has deteriorated again. Seems it's about as bad as the left eye now. Meh. I need new glasses.

Since Twitch moved out (to Charleston, where he now has a job!) my old office which was his bedroom is once again vacant. Light had that room before she left for college all those years ago. Six years it's been now! She painted half the room a dark and stormy blue, and it's been bothering me since I started using the room. So yesterday Superman and I painted over the dark with Kilz 2 primer.  Man that lightens up the space! Makes it seem bigger, more open. I haven't decided what color to use on that wall, but I'm looking into something very light. I want to use the room for sewing and crafts also, and the walls need to be light and close to neutral to prevent the wall color from influencing how I perceive the fabric colors. Gray, white, or beige don't do it for me, you know? So I think perhaps a pretty cream or maybe a very light blue. We'll see.

Interesting quotes seen on my Kindle:
"The unanswered in science is solution-ized with research." - from a book description. I didn't buy that book.
"If wishes were horses, that accounts for all this horse manure." - Barbara Morganroth, If Wishes Were Horses
"When whiskey talks it rarely counsels prudence." - Anthony McDonald, Matches in the Dark: 13 Tales of Gay Men

I woke up very early this morning, before 5 I think. Couldn't get back to sleep. Poor Superman had trouble getting to sleep in the first place, so he got up and read something boring to put him to sleep. Didn't work. When he came back to bed I sort of woke up. I don't know if got back to sleep then, or if I've been awake since then. Anyway, I'm very sleepy now. Think i'll take a morning nap.

Things I find interesting

I share "thoughts for today" with you occasionally. Many come from A.Word.A.Day. Today's Word.A.Day is honcho. Here, let me show you.

A.Word.A.Day

with Anu Garg
honcho

PRONUNCIATION:

(HAWN-choh) 

MEANING:

noun: One who is in charge of a situation; leader; boss.
verb tr.: To organize, manage, or lead a project, event, etc.

ETYMOLOGY:

From Japanese honcho, from hon (squad) + cho (chief). Earliest documented use: 1947.

USAGE:

“The three head honchos are the recipients of the Best CEO Award.”
Cool Heads and Calm Nerves at the Helm; The Business Times (Singapore); Aug 12, 2013.

Explore "honcho" in the Visual Thesaurus. 
A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
You can out-distance that which is running after you, but not what is running inside you. -Rwandan proverb
And I've included the thought for today which I find to be very true.
Honcho, it turns out, is a Japanese word. Huh, that surprises me. I thought it was Spanish.

I am home with Diva today. She's behaving herself well. Yesterday she acted like a mean bitch, but today she's doing well so far. I've had her doing some work, though not a lot. I don't have the gumption to drive her harder right now. She's reading Elie Wiesel's Night in her English class. I have a copy, and my plan is to read to her from the book later in the afternoon. She doesn't read very well. I could have her read the book herself, but she will bitch about it (probably) and either won't do it, or will pretend to do it and not get anything out of it.

I read some of my favorite blogs today. It's been a while since I read most of these blogs. I love reading what sort of things my blog buddies are up to. Why don't I do it more often? Maybe it's the depression thing. Or perhaps it just takes too much time. Yeah, I've been sitting here for a couple of hours reading blogs when I could have (should have) been doing other useful things. I have stuff to accomplish today. Sitting on my fat ass reading blogs isn't one of them.

Twitch moved out!! We (Superman and I) drove him to Charleston on Saturday, left him in a cute little apartment with a couple of other young guys, friends of his. Operative word is "left." Not French gauche left, but abandoned left. "Left without him." Oh, it's good to have one fewer character living in this house. One of the things I want to accomplish today (this week) is to move the rest of his stuff out of the room he's been staying in and move MY stuff into it, to reclaim it as my office. This is a glorious thing. Though I think I'll paint it before it gets crowded up with my junk. What color? Don't know yet. We have LOTS of extra paint hanging around the house, cans we've used for other things. We have a lot of ugly green paint, and I don't want that. We also have some pink, some dark purple, and a few yellows. I'm thinking yellow would look nice in there. Maybe pink, but probably not. Pink can be nice, but it's easy to overdo the pink.

Superman is coming home for lunch soon, so I'm gonna get this posted and heat up some of the left over chili that's taking up room in my refrigerator.

Hodge Podge

We had a weekend. Good? Bad? It depends on one's perspective.

My poor darling Diva got sick Friday night. Really sick. She basically turned her stomach inside out. After she had lost everything she had in her stomach she kept retching for hours. She was up almost all night. Superman sat with her until about 1:30, and I stayed with her until 3:00. She had been on a chair in the living room, but at 3 she crawled into her bed. I asked her if she wanted me to stay up for her, or if I could go to bed. She said "Go to bed, Mommy." It was so sweet and sad! But she got Superman out of bed before 6:00. And this was all before the air conditioner was working. We all felt icky and sticky.
Diva update: I took her to the doctor this morning. She tested positive for strep. She is now taking an antibiotic and hopes to feel better soon. But right now she just feels icky. Her head is throbbing and her throat hurts. I'm trying to encourage her to rest, but Sproing keeps trying to engage her in conversation, activity, or argument. It's time for another dose of Tylenol now...

Saturday morning the poor dear had a fever. I didn't take her temp, but she felt very hot. We got some Gatorade for her. She had trouble drinking because her throat was so sore. She slept almost all day. Sunday she felt a bit better, drank some more, but her throat and her head hurt. This morning she still has a headache. The fever is gone, though. I'm calling the doctor in 45 minutes when the office opens.

Twitch came home from scout camp on Saturday. He had a wonderful week. He is a senior patrol leader for one of the patrols in his troop. He is well on his way to Eagle rank. At 17 now, he only has until mid February to complete all the Eagle requirements. On his 18th birthday he turns into a pumpkin. Or an "adult," and is no longer eligible to earn scout ranks. Last week at camp he completed the work for two badges required for Eagle. He was in a great mood, had a terrific attitude when he got home. He's been kind and helpful ever since. This is nice!! The older he gets the more pleasant he is to be with. Now if we can just get Sproing and Diva through puberty and the teen years...

Other stuff happened this weekend, too. Can't remember if any of it is noteworthy. Laundry is not noteworthy at this time. Neither is reading the Sunday paper. I painted a little bit in Sproing's room. The walls are nasty. I got a first coat of primer on the wall in one corner. Made a mess. Dripped paint on his bedsheet. Oh, well. My hands and feel are both speckled with paint. I managed to get the spots of paint off my face this morning in the shower. Besides that, I can't think of anything else worth mentioning. And frankly, this entire paragraph doesn't say anything worth mentioning, so you might as well not read it. Oops! Too late.

Yammer

Nothing much to report, so I'm gonna ramble aimlessly for a while

• We survived the weekend. Superman is putting down flooring (laminate, sturdy stuff) in Light's bedroom. She comes home from her first year at college next Friday. We need to finish fixing up the room before she gets here and moves all that other junque into it. We'll probably not be able to SEE the floor until she moves back to the dorm in late August.
• Friday evening was the elementary school's Spring Carnival. I sent baked goods to sell in the bake sale. I DID NOT attend! The wonderful Superman took the kids and a good time was had by all. Including me. Who stayed home. Happily.
• Thursday was the day I needed to do all the baking for the school carnival. I delayed and ignored and averted until 'twas well after midnight when I actually baked those damn cookies. They were good, of course. By the time I was finished baking, then had to wait for the cookies (I also made a pan full of cake-like bar cookie things) to cool enough to put them in individual wrappings, it was too late to go to bed. Does that make sense? I had to make sure the stuff got to the school, so I just stayed up. Superman was able to take the box of goodies to the school when he took the kidlets, so that worked. Then I went to bed.
• And also on Thursday I bought myself a new sewing machine. The old one, very old, needed some repairs and maintenance. I took it to "the place" and the fella said a cleaning and tune up would cost at least $65, and it may need some parts, too. However, there were a couple of new machines, discontinued, on clearance. I got a fairly nice machine for $150. It does more than the old one did. I haven't gotten it out of the box yet, because on Thursday I was supposed to bake, not sew. Superman only last night brought the machine in from the truck. The table I use for sewing has been in Light's room since she left for college all these months ago. Since her floor is being installed, the table is now in the middle of the living room with stuff piled on it. There isn't a comfortable place to set up my new machine. So it is still in the box. Now that we've survived the weekend and I'm not required to bake more cookies, I might just get to play with my machine.
• But not today. At least not while the kids are at school. Because today I did something worthwhile, one of those chores that has been waiting on me for a while. I finished painting the trim in Light's room. She painted her room last summer, but never got quite done with the trim. I have of course intended to finish the trim since she left for school in August. Now that Superman has most of the stuff out of that room, I figured the time wasn't going to get better. I'd already masked the trim, it was ready to paint. Has been for MONTHS. So today I did it. Good for me.
• And because Superman has so many projects he needs to work on around the house, the house decided it wanted even more of his attention. S was in the backyard this morning when I was washing out the paintbrush in the kitchen sink. He knocked on the kitchen window to tell me he heard water leaking under the house. Leaking a lot, evidently. And it stinks. I called Superman. First I asked him how his day is going. He said busy, but fine. OK, it's safe to tell him. If he'd been having one of those days from hell, I'd have waited to tell him about the leak. I told him. He sighed that deep depressive sigh of a homeowner whose house is falling apart on him. Do you know that one?
• This is one of those things about me. When I think I don't have anything to talk about, I can nevertheless ramble on THIS long!! People who know me well are not surprised. Yet I'm always amazed. Is it denial? Or inattention?