3 Months and change

Get it? 3 months and change. Change as in 3 months and a few days but also 3 months of change. Ha ha ha I crack my self up sometimes. (slap on the back) Chortle chortle chortle.

This last couple of weeks, for the fans who have been following right along, have been yet again 'quite a ride'.
The post I put up yesterday (or tomorrow; not finished as I write this, I keep having to restart it) had me looking at woman kind from some new and some old perspectives. Over and over, as is the way my mind works. I don't know if any of my conclusions are worth a damn but it is better than obsessing on the decline of the newspaper business as is the usual.

Speaking of my small business. I was raised in the proud tradition of Scottish frugality. Aka I'm a cheapskate.  Even if I had lots of money or a big income I doubt much would change in the way I approach my personal spending (nicer car and the house would have a new roof of course). I point this out because I tend to expound on my shortage of cash in this blog a bit more than is necessary. The dramatic effect makes for a fun tention in this writing. Since I have gotten so good at being cheap over the years, even though the money I make selling and delivering newspapers is much less than it was in say 2009, I live pretty much the same way. With two main differences. The county, for the time being at least, has got my health care covered. From November of 05 till October of 2010 I could afford to have a guy fill in for me 2 mornings a week. Now I work 7 days a week. I'd like to have days off but what the hell would I do? Until I figure out a way to have a social life that includes out of town trips working 7 days is fine.

What brought this to mind was the cluster of expenses that had me very stressed last week.

The dentist filled a tooth to see if it would become stable enough without root canal and a crown. The one on the top on my right next to the missing one is in danger of the same thing. She also wants to re-crown about 6 others. This is when I told her that I was not a fan of crowns since after a while you just have to pull them anyway. At this point I have to get dentures anyway so I say extractions are $95 whereas crowns are $500 each, let's go with extractions. She convinced me that root/crown the top right one for the sake of appearance would be best if filling it failed to stop the decay. After all the cavities are filled and that one possible root/crown the denturing process begins. $$$

For the past year or so my favorite audio books have been what they call the fantasy genre. My favorite of these has been The Dresden Files novels.. Stories about a contemporary wizard that works as a detective in Chicago. Great fun. One of the quirks of magic in Dresden's universe is that post WWII technology messes up anytime he or other magic folk get near. I am considering that it may be possible to contract this particular cosmic dysfunction back here in the non-magical world. Maybe contact with the books is to blame. Afterall magic might be a real thing. Every time I go to one of the art events in town I see fairies. ;-) My gadgets especially the electronic ones have been acting weird and screwing up for no apparent reason. When the new iMacs are available I am ready. I've been approved for 0% interest at the Apple Store. The old one has been on it's last legs for quite a while. Crashes are becoming more frequent, fingers crossed that the last crash happen after the new one gets here. Even with 0% it's still a $$$ proposition.

Unfortunately even new gadgets are not immune. My car has taken to locking the doors on it's own with the keys inside. Luckily the windows have been down. Just today winter started so the windows won't be down so often. Time to hide-a-key an extra key.  I decided on the Scion xD because Scion is a division of Toyota. The xD is like the Toyota Yaris in  most ways but is a bit more stylish. Only 2 or 3 of the current econo-bubble cars look like the xD. I bought it new so that my expenses would be stable and predictable for 12 to 18 months (60 months of payments). Notoriously when you buy a new car the set of tires it comes with are the lowest quality they can get away with using. Just good enough to get you off the lot. 20,000 miles is about as far as I have gotten in the past. At 19,000 I got a slow leak in a tire that registered on the low tire idiot light one the dash. I tried putting air into all the tires because they all looked fine. Still the light was on. Just as it was my turn to load the Friday paper one of the other guys noticed my right rear tire was very low. After loading I limped over to a gas station for air. By the time I got to my farthest drop at the state prison it was time for the donut tire. (I put on the spare) Next day at the dealer I was told that the tire couldn't be fixed safely and that I really need 2 tires. The flat one had a rip in the sidewall and one other had "bulging". "We have 2 and only 2 in your size, sign here" the invoice said $397 for 2 tires. WTF? Small cars have small tires. It's an economy car for chrissake!
After driving to half a dozen tire shops I figured out that the xD's "a bit more stylish" means a non standard tire size. I finally found a shop that offered tires in that size as low as $57 each (plus mount, balance etc, no warranty) I settled on two for $294 out the door. They include up to 80,000 miles and an all inclusive warranty). I had to do the Saturday run on the donut tire no spare and one tire with a "bulge". Finally on Saturday afternoon I got my stable and predictable for 12 to 18 months 2 of 4 tires. I expect the other 2 to go at any time.

Just to make things a little more stressful my time at the tire shop made me too late for my haircut that day. I had been waiting a week and a half to get in with my hair gal. I really have been enjoying wearing my hair longer. It is not easy to find someone who has a feel for the way I like it cut and doesn't try to slip in something more contemporary. Besides Beauty on the Bluffs has just a too cool name ans it 3 blocks from my house. Crap, I am going to have to pay for the missed appt then hope she has a time for me later.

It's not all bad and/or frustrating.
A really good thing happened this week.

14 months later KMC finally came through with a new biPAP machine to replace my ineffective CPAP machine. How this all came about is another clusterfuck story about how Kaiser is all about profiting and not about cures. I'm out of rant for today so on to the good part. I had been getting less and less actual restful sleep in the last few years. I thought the CPAP machine was fine. Too many mornings I'd wake up with the mask pulled up past my nose and mouth or off completely. Or I would just not be able to make myself put it on before sleeping. This meant no Deep or REM sleep for weeks at a time.
The new machine is a whole new world for me. So far.
Already my brain is beginning to recover. Years of low oxygen has added to the confusion and fatigue of no REM. Some damage may not be reversible but it has only been a few days.
I can feel my cognitive abilities getting deeper and clearer.
My senses are reporting more detail. I didn't have to get all the way into the kitchen to detect dog pee on the floor yesterday.
For most of the last 30 years I can't remember a time when any type of activity was preferable to a nice lie down. Several times so far when I would have ordinarily found a reason to sit or lie down I found myself doing other things. Enjoying cleaning the kitchen, changing sheets and other housework before would only happen after several cups of coffee.
In recent years I could tell that I had had real sleep because on those days my libido would kick in. The past few days I keep sensing something from down below my belly. It kind of sounds like "What is the Poon Tang you speak of?"
Best of all, well maybe the libido thing is best, anyway, I think my sense of humor is coming back. Humor and cracking wise has been such a big part of my life since I was a kid that I can do it out of reflex when needed. Like when in front of an audience. Teasing and giving someone a hard time is just a pattern once you learn it. What I have missed so much is the humor that comes from deep inside me. My sense of the absurd coming to the top of it's own accord. Often dry as toast.

It's way too early to tell for sure. With everything else I have been extra absent minded and light headed with a kind of dizziness. Let's hope it is just some adjusting going on. I really really hope all this good stuff is really happening and I am not just fooling myself. It would be nice to live a life again.

Today's weigh in 326.5
down 1 since last time
down 27.2 since June.

I have no explanation, I had expected more loss. I have been eating less in general and virtually no sweets or other carbs. I started going to Physical Therapy for my butt pain so am getting a little exercise. More than before. I have taken to meal replacement shakes because they are convenient and I feel full for hours. I still don't have hunger pangs but as I become more generally alert I find myself seeking out food for boredom eating. I've gotten all serious junk food out of the house but extra bites of real food aren't good either. The "shakes" I got at Costco are the right price but contain fructose and other carbs that are not good for my purposes. After some research I found that while whey protein is the most popular basis for shakes used by dieters and bodybuilders it is not cheap. Soy protein is also popular but has problems of it's own. The other main sources of protein used in shakes are eggs, almonds, peas, a few others and Hemp seeds. Hemp seeds as it turns out are one of the highest in protein and includes an impressive array of vitamins and amino acids and are low in carbs. Evidently you could live on these seeds alone if you had to. What I like is that even though the powder cost $13 a pound plus shipping the unhulled seeds cost just $2.99 a pound and are higher in fiber than the hulled seeds. When the shipment arrives testing begins. Coffee grinder to pulverize the seeds is at the ready. Lower carb not artificial sweeteners are ready to be tested as well.

My first 2 goals in dieting were to get back down to the weight I have been for the last 20 years or so. I did that. The next goal I knew would be harder, to get down under 300. Each week I'll need to increase efforts till the next 5 or so go. That should get the ball rolling. The physical therapist has been very helpful. I should be back at the regular gym soon.

Whine, It's what's for dinner

Revealing observations of my most personal feelings and experiences for all the world's strangers to see is kind of nerve racking. However thoughts and feelings are transient. A mystic might say that scooping up the thinks I do, is like pulling a bucket of water from a flowing river. The act of scooping changes the river, yet it remains the same. The thoughts can never be returned to where they were and so become forever changed, context changing.

Interest in my whiny diatribes is at an all time low. After reading many pieces on the dieting topics I know that it is a dry read. I try to keep perspective because it is the reasonable thing to do.  I also have observed that when someone takes off into "testifying for the cause mode" it quickly gets off putting. I try not to do that but sometimes . . . for example, I have added a video on the lower part of the column on the right. Statins did serious damage to me, boring or not I have a right to testify. Another thing that I don't know that I can do anything about is that some of my more insightful keystrokes happen in the middle of an otherwise dreadful episodes of me feeling sorry for myself. sigh-grumble-puke
Anyway on to this week's keystrokes.

Last week I got sidetracked talking about the mess that is my home. I kind of lost my point. The idea, that is still evolving, is that these new levels (and kinds of) of awareness that I am experiencing are throwing me off a bit. The ways I am reacting are interesting and sometimes frustrating. This refresh of my normal sensory/cognitive overload plays right into my increasing suspicion that my brain works differently than the standard model. (announcer voice) More on this as the story develops.

I have been putting it off but trying to type while sitting, has gotten even more tediously painful. The pain upon sitting comes quicker since I took a walk the other day. I had been doing my stretches and felt kinda good so I went up the street to the bluffs and took a stroll. I was okay at the time, refreshed. The next day sitting at the computer for 5 minutes had my butt yelling at me. To make it worse the super cool seat cushion in my car got a big hole ripped in it. The manufacturer is great about warrantied replacements (at those prices they should be) still, week or so to get a replacement is going to be hell. I will solve the mystery of the painful tuchus eventually but for now I devised a way to type lying flat on my back. Not ideal to facilitate more lying down when one of my goals is to be more active. Not being able to vent some of my excess thoughts by typing them out in a free stream of consciousness way was really not good. The other thing is that; for many years my bedroom was a sanctuary of calm and peace. No TV or distractions like that. For the longest time I didn't even have pictures on the wall. They too were a distraction. It was good. I also banned food from my bedroom. Now I have a monitor mounted right over the bed. I haven't been able to use the TV in the regular way because of the tuchus matter. So the monitor is hooked up to the media PC and the ROKU box. I get all of my TV, facebook other media lying flat on my back. It is certainly not unpleasant and with the extra time without weight right on the troubled area it may be able to heal some.
I went to a physical therapist yesterday. He has me doing special leg muscle streching exercises. I'll just have to do them for a while to know if it helps.

Like I said before when the words can flow freely writing is easier and more rewarding. I hope I will be able to inject a little more humor into what I type. It's better for my attitude and has to make reading easier. Fingers crossed.

I am writing this in advance of the Wednesday weight in. I skipped it on 9/19 for 2 reasons. Posting too often is tiresome for the kind people on facebook that cheer me on with 'likes'. Also some things have gone down that are distracting me from the dieting (for one example see previous post  (I mean) rant below). I will be surprised if I lost weight this time. Let's see.

Today's weigh in 327.5
down 1 since last time
down 26.2 since June.

Teeth in my head 24
down 5 since last july
down 8 since  . . well, overall

Dental Theatre of the Absurd

I have been going to the dentist off and on since May in an effort to get my teeth back into good working order. The greed soaked obscenity that is our healthcare system at least has a few workarounds for those in real need. Dental care is an even harder clusterfuck with fewer short cuts. My meager earnings are about $1200/mo. less than they were 3 years ago for the same time on the road, responsibilities and set of tasks. I am stuck with options for low income persons to fill my healthcare and dental needs. This is tedious and time consuming. Strangely, I may end up with better care over all since the bare bones nature of the county system leaves little room for unnecessary care. Kaiser, (my previous health care provider) I have come to know, is very focused on keeping you stable. If you are over 50 and in one of the 'high risk' groups they pay little attention to solving problems. The county Drs, many of them in training, are more ambitious and want to solve problems. The gov't way of cost control makes their solutions more practical, if awkward to get to. This could change either way at any point.

I was in a similar fix 20 years ago and went to a low income dental clinic out in Lamont (gotta keep the farm workers operational). They fixed me up for $100 a visit. 10 visits got me what would have cost thousands elsewhere. (Don't get me wrong poverty sucks. Paying my own way is much better) Since that time I have spent thousands more of my own money on root canals, crowns and unnecessary bullshit like "Crown Lengthening". As the linked article says it is often done by a general dentist. I was sent to a special kind of oral surgeon called a periodontist, not to be confused with an endodontist that does root canals. The scam at the Plan I was on at the time was that all the offices I went to were owned by the dental plan. It had some good points, tooth extractions were just $25. Deciding I need a tooth extracted the regular dentist feeling just a tiny bit of resistance on his special dentist pliers sent me to a special clinic to have it done. The extraction was $25 but the endodontist (no wait, he was a periodontist too I think. Dr Black and he looked just like Boris Karloff) only works with you knocked out. Anesthesia cost $400. Returning to my regular dentist he insisted I have the hole in my jaw where the missing tooth had been, filled with a compound that seemed to consist of powdered bone and magic. It was supposed to make it all into bone for just $300. None of the official dental websites even mentioned this procedure except as part of implanting implants. He was not happy with me but I declined. Likewise nothing the periodontist did was included in the plan. $625 x 2 but he was kind and gave me a discount of $200 off each procedure. Was I supposed to feel like I saved $400? The necessary stuff that dentists do is valuable and they deserve to be well paid. It is all the unnecessary stuff and manipulation that pisses me off.

I had gotten a Groupon deal for a teeth cleaning for just $19 so I went. It was a nice office, not like the cheapo places I usually frequent. They even had you fill out your patient info on an iPad. Woo woo high tech trendy. The cleaning also include a "free" exam/consultation. Everyone in the office was extremely pleasant. The dentist himself was . . . I haven't had a dentist in a long time that liked to look you in the eye. Briefly at the start of a visit sometimes but after that they talk from someplace behind you even when trying to explain something to you. This guy had an amazing chairside manner. Very smooth, kind and reassuring. He looked at my teeth and made the observation that I had had allot of "heroic dentistry" done over the years to save and crown allot of teeth. His recomendation was, since my mouth was such a mess anyway, to pull all of my teeth and put implants in where the canines are, upper and lower. Then he would fabricate special dentures that clip onto the implants. No sticky stuff (Dentu-Grip), just take them out at night and for cleaning. No heroic dentistry from then on. Easy peesey chewing pleasure for the rest of my life.
I was given a bunch of dental gifts all wrapped with cellophane and ribbon in a very nice coffee cup with the Dr's name on it. I was ushered to the appointments counter to get the process started. I asked about what kind of insurance. How did the insurance thing work with this? There was a little back and forth when the lady said "even the best insurance will only payout up to $1500 a year". "That will all of this cost"? "He won't know for sure what is needed until he gets to each step in the treatment. $25 to $35,000 usually." Woah, in my little world of living simply I don't give much thought to the way the 1% and other money & material stuff obsessed people live. Suddenly I felt like I'd stumbled into a black tie affair wearing only my old robe and slippers. I thanked the nice lady for the fine gifts and slunk away.

Just like everything else that happens to me it got me to thinking. First I googled the procedures and found out that dental implants are a fairly common thing these days. 2 or 3 patented appliences are the most common. Just like the obscene cost of many medical procedures and appliances this one that should cost less than $1000 for each tooth often costs many times that.  I said that I don't give much thought to the way the 1% and other money & material stuff obsessed people live. This is only partly true, I buy lottery tickets just to have the right to fantasize about what it would be like to not live month to month and spend money on otherwise unnecessary things. Even if $35K was pocket money to me there has to be a better way. Besides, waste is waste, suddenly having too much money is no reason to discard a lifetime of being a cheapskate. In my search I discovered the world of medical/dental tourism. For less money (often much less) you can spend a week or two in a place like Singapore in a dental clinic that is more like a luxury hotel, doing tourist things between parts of the procedure. (in my fantasy medically approved concubines are also included in the price).

Back to my real life. I remembered that my own mother had all of her teeth pulled before I was born. She and several other people in my life had a full set of dentures and didn't make much a big deal out of it. Daily cleaning and maintenance as apposed to what I had been doing. Flossing most days and brushing then every few years going to the dentist every couple of weeks for months.

I made an appointment to go back to the dental clinic in Lamont. It had changed. Being an expert at what low cost dental offices are like, I was surprised at the level of what might be called corporate indifference. The workers were polite and competent enough I suppose. After getting X-rays the Dr insisted that I rinse with mouth wash before he would look into my mouth. Okay, makes sense I guess. Then I noticed that all the workers and the dentist himself wore surgical masks. All the time, not just when with a patient. Then it occurred to me that no one had introduced them self or had name tags. Creepy. Was there an outbreak I should know about? I never found out for sure, I think the Dr was just a germophobe. Dr who? I submitted my previous year's tax form to see if I qualify for low income rates. I did. I was not given any indication as to what it was going to cost or given any kind of treatment plan. I was told to come back for the first of 4 deep cleanings at $75 each. Deep cleanings are a fine procedure but not really much better than the regular $25 cleaning except for it's effect on the Dr's bank account. (one dental funhouse I went to a few years ago insisted on the deep cleanings then followed up with a thing where they forced a piece of rope impregnated with fluoride between my teeth and gums) Deep cleanings are completely inappropriate when the idea is to lower the cost to low income people. After trading a dozen emails with the home office I finally got a treatment plan in the mail.

By this time I had been to a different institution set up on the same premise, as a medical/dental clinic for low income persons. This place was a whole different world. It was a nice new office. All the staff were bright eyed and helpful. Introduced themselves and had name tags. I paid $70 for my exam at the place in Lamont. To avoid paying that same $70 again at the new place I asked for a copy of my X-rays. I was charged another $15 for a copy and I had to go back out to Lamont to pick them up. X-rays are no longer done on film. They are a digital file like the pictures you take with your phone, only at super high resolution. They were printed on a laser printer at life size and useless to the new Dr. She had a whole new set taken. This exam cost me $35.

The treatment plan with the discount was just over $1800 and was less than half of what it would cost otherwise. 6 extractions, a crown or 2, fillings and a partial denture. It was to start with a regular cleaning but I said "ya know I need to count my pennies, I'll call you when I'm ready".

This is where the maze of getting decent care at low cost begins. I had asked about dental coverage when I applied for the county medical plan. Since rotten teeth can cause a risk to your medical health, extractions are covered. Nothing else. Perfect, this gives me a place to start. Back at county medical my medical Dr had just graduated and being assigned a new one was months off. Luckily seeing a Physician's assistant can be done in a few days. The PA filled out a form that I took to the main financial office where I got a different form to take to the outside provider. That provider? You guessed it. The people who run the office in Lamont also have a very popular office in Bakersfield. This office is in the part of town where low income black people live. In Lamont I was the only non-Hispanic that I saw. It was like that at the new place on Brimhall too. Just like with Hispanic people I have no general feeling about black people except that some of the women are hot. But that is true of any group of people. My only caveat has nothing to do with race or national orgin; in general poor people are depressing to spend time with. There are exceptions, like me for instance. Well, sometimes.

As you may know I work nights and sleep till noon or so. What with all of my health issues and whatnot morning activities have proven to be untenable. It was going to take 3 months to get a scheduled appointment. You can be a walk-in but have to show up at 7:30 AM and just wait, perhaps all day. The form was only good for 30 days. Sigh. I could get an appointment in Lamont in 28 days so back I went. This time I had a different Dr. I guess I had given them the impression in all those eMails (over 20 back and forth) that I was not comfortable with the gay (flamer), neurotic, germophobe Dr I saw the first time. Really it wasn't that he was a flaming gay nut job, I usually like those kind of folks. It was the fact I never saw more than his eyes. Guess I'm the neurotic one.

This Dr was a very competent Muslim woman that got right in there and pulled my upper right canine surgically. Then 2 dead roots in the lower right went a month later. By this time I had wised up and made 2 appointments for September. Last Tuesday was the big one. On the upper left side I had a bridge that started in the back and covered 4 teeth. Well, 3 one was already missing. She cut the bridge next to the back tooth that was still good. That part of the bridge is now a crown. The 2 at the front end of the bridge were so rotted that the bridge just fell off. She then extracted the remaining roots. It went smoothly. No real pain then or after. I returned last Friday. The remaining tooth is just behind where the canine had been. It has a crown and may be savable with a new crown after removing some decay etc. She was disappointed when I told her I was going elsewhere for the other work. The county medical was only covering the extractions. She had been nice and did a good job so I didn't elaborate the criticisms I have of the place. I told her the other place was closer to my house. It kind of is. It will be cheaper (I hope at least $600 cheaper than before). And that it takes days to get an appointment not a month. The appointment my re-exam at Brimhall is next Wednesday. Fingers crossed.

This shows the teeth I have remaining in my head.

As you can see one catch in my great plan is that at no place do my remaining back teeth meet other back teeth. All of my chewing has to be done with the front teeth. I knew this would happen but failed to realize that the front teeth regularly do no chewing at all. Only biting. Very quickly the roof of my mouth just behind the front teeth became sore and tender from food scraping against it. The open wound where the teeth are missing is tender too and traps food particles. that will all toughen up in time.

The thing that also surprises me is how much I like food that has gone through the food processor. After leaving the Lamont clinic on Tuesday I went to Costco with a wad of gauze stuck in my mouth. For $25 I picked up a Mini-Prep® Plus 4-Cup Food Processor. I have never had one before. They always looked like a hassle to use and clean. I was right too. However this one is a nice gadget. I think the plus is the way one button spins the blade clockwise and the other one is reverse. Most don't do that I think. All I know is that with the food all in tiny pieces all of the aromas are released. The flavors are all right there too. It is amazing. I love soup because it such a blast to the senses, it's like that. Coating your whole tongue and mouth. It should help digestion too. I know I'll get tired of it at some point and the extra step of processing all my food will get tiresome but for now it's new and fun and tasty.

The Brimhall dental clinic did offer a pay as you go deal. I should be able to pull that off. Since my income is somewhat based on sales if sales lag I can just make the appointments farther apart.

Godawfulmess

Since thoughts and impressions come to me in sometimes random rotation, this post may have more than one topic. Also since I can only sit for a few minutes at a time each new paragraph may have it's own personality. We'll see.

Of the many things that stopped the blogging portion of this process last month one was that I just didn't like where I was going with the posts. I had the idea of using this form of social network to get some back and forth on what I have been finding and perhaps some sense that I am not alone in my project of self change. Perhaps an oxymoron. I got wrapped up in who was responding and the number of page views. This week China is in the lead (what's up Ukraine?). Writing the piece on my old high school buddy was more satisfying than any of the stuff about dieting. I do have a different friend from high school days that needs to be documented. His story is much more intense. I should talk to his family for some of the hazier details but even if I did that it would still be mostly my own recollections. Some of the truth I know and would have to tell, while not damning in my mind, is not PC. It's not like he's going anyplace. The time will be right when it's right.

Part of what prompted me to start a weigh loss program was dissatisfaction with more than just my body size. Many aspects of my life are simply not satisfactory. When I stopped eating the way I was, perhaps it was removing the tranquilizer effects of the food, but my thoughts became clearer. Even my view of reality came into better focus. This tracks with the opiate effect of the glycoprotein gliadin found in wheat that I read about. Whatever the cause, seeing my day to day life for what it is, got to be disturbing. Godawfulmess pretty much describes my home. I am not a picky person. The gentrification that many of my peers are attached to holds no meaning for me. I do however enjoy and feel the benefit of tidy efficient surroundings.

A few years ago when the Drs decided I had allergies (another false lead from main stream medicine) I was compelled to re-decorate my bedroom so that room is usually close to tidy (an overflowing laundry hamper doesn't count). As much as I am feeling better in general I do have a kind of malaise, verging on depression I suppose, then there is the pain I typed about in the last post. This makes housework a challenge but I did make some headway on making my bedroom even more to my liking. The kitchen has been clean from time to time. I have too many pots and pans and gadgets to do much without a total renovation but, like in the bedroom, I made some headway.

I don't use the living room for much so last year I sold the furniture I had but didn't like. It would just be an empty room except for my beloved dining table, a bookcase and the other tables that match the dining table.  Besides this there are more gadgets, the equipment for the hypnosis show and a mountain of other clutter. Under it all the nice wood floor has a coat of some kind of grime. Some of the stuff could go into the garage but that has it's own clutter problem based on the junk on the driveway in front of it. Again malaise and dealing with a pain that seems to get worse if do anything blocks much progress. It seems the hour or two just before work, like now, is a good time to get stuff done. This requires logistics since the stores with cleaning and repair supplies are closed at this time of day. Huff.

At 1056 sq ft my little house has 3 bedrooms a living/dining room, kitchen and laundry area where the dogs live.  The bedroom I use for my office is cluttered but functional. The largest bedroom has a massage table and is somewhat decorated but also suffers from a mountain of stuff. The immediate problem is the one bathroom. With all these functional rooms little space was left for bathrooms in post WWII housing. (the detached garage has it's own sq ft and it's own bathroom, kind of).

When I moved in in 2001 my great friend Steve helped me make the tub into a shower. He questioned why I'd want a shower instead of a tub since a tub is so nice to soak in. When I told him that your basic residential bathtub isn't large enough for a fat guy like me and water at the same time; it didn't seem to register but he was kind enough to help anyway. It was quite the project but after the shower was in and working my interest in making the whole bathroom nice and new just wasn't there. Ironically after not visiting with my friend for quite a while he was over for a visit in March just when the 1947 faucet handles in the sink began to leak. We took the offending val apart and drove to the hardware store only to find that they didn't have the parts we needed for the valve. Later investigation at the industrial plumbing place and after that on the net reveled that my valve was so old it was not listed anyplace and would have to be replaced. After weeks of looking on ebay and elsewhere I found a replacement that fits my personality, taste and budget of $60 or less. Like this but cheaper. It even came with matching towel rack thingys.

Like I said I am not a picky person and having just one valve (hot) is easy enough to work around. I keep telling myself it can wait till I have the (not time, I have time) whatever, to finish the whole bathroom. For the longest time the toilet has been held down by just one bolt. That bolt is failing and the flange in the floor has rotted away so I have no choice but to start the project. I would like to have company over to my house but these conditions won't encourage repeat visits. That means the one in the garage needs to be made functional so I can fix the one in the house. That toilet works but the water runs all the time. I wasn't able to figure it out so just turned the water off. Along with more general alertness is a marked increase in cognitive abilities. I should be able to figure something out. Now just to do it.

I really really appreciate my alone time but wish I had a way to freely associate with other people as well. What ever happened to boarding houses? You keep to your self if you want but have company at meal times. There are common areas should the need strike for a TV watching companion. That's the ticket, a boarding house that serves low carb diet food. Wait a minute, one thing this blog has done is let me put my going on and on about food and health woes in one place. I only bother a few people with my whining in person these days. Rooming with a bunch of underfed fat people? Ech.

Today's weigh in 328.5
down 3 since last week
down 25.2 since June. 

Check-in.

Sorry that I've been away. I have so much to tell you. This last month has been  . . . 31 days.

Mostly I haven't posted because every time I sit, after about 15 minutes this pain settles into the muscles around the top end of my femur, near the hip joint. Then what seems to be the head of my femur or maybe the ischial tuberosity (specifically the ligaments that attach there) begin to send off a pain like being pinched in a big vice that gets slowly tighter and tighter. This makes me fidget in my seat till I have to stand up. Well what ever the problem is it changes after I am standing, to a slightly sharper pain in the group of muscles just below my hip joints. So standing is not so bad. I can move or walk. Too much walking or moving and the whole thing gets worse.
This phenomenon isn't all that extreme. I got a special cushion for my car seat so the 4-6 hours of driving everyday only gets weird towards the end if the route. The rest of the time it has been of varied strengths but, always there, for weeks now. Getting up and down and lying down way too much because that is the only place that the pain is quiet is driv'in me nuts. I can't sit in front of the TV either. Grrrr.

I'm working on several solutions besides stretches and exercises and Dr appointments. Something will have to catch sooner or later. If I was rich I could do this tedious waiting thing near a beach and be bored there too. Better here with Muffin & Lit'll. I'm dancing in my seat, gotta go.

This week's weigh in. 331.5
No change.