Of All The Times I Needed A Half-Day ...

Getting yesterday/Tuesday afternoon off turned out to be a godsend.  I woke up from my evening nap Monday night at around 11:45 p.m., so I didn't get a wink of sleep through the overnight.  With my body dragging, me spending the morning cutting open packages and dealing with a particularly nasty leaked bag of piss, and seeing my city still being besieged by our own federal "government," I was so looking forward to not working in the same afternoon we were all supposed to walk out.  I was even assigned to data entry, but I didn't do it; instead, I worked on figuring out this new software we are supposed to know in a couple weeks.

And I didn't make much headway into that, either.  No, I was into doing ... nothing.  Well, I take that back; I had a lot of chores I felt I had to do.  I had to:

• use my haircut coupon before it expired;
• get my photo taken for passport purposes;
• buy groceries to hunker down for this cold, cold weekend we're about to have;
• finally drag some stuff out of my storage unit
• and do something for Mother at the bank

Now, come to think of it, I was really busy, and productive.  I didn't finish all of these things before 2 p.m., which was the scheduled time we were all supposed to "walk out," but around 2:30 I shut the door with no intention of opening it unit this/Wednesday morning.  I took a shower and then, while fully naked, settled into my bed because my body was finally tired.

And I woke up around 8:30.  Wow!  Five hours of hard sleep to reset my body.  Felt really, really good, even if this continues to throw my body clock out of whack.  And my "slangriness" has completely left me.  The anxiety over these people abducting me, however and unfortunately, remains.

Nope, The Car's Broken, Probably

No rhythmic crinkling still; the lug nut fixed that.  Still, I am worried about the oil.  Last week I put in, like, 100 mL because, according to the very unreadable orange dipstick, it was low.  I checked after I put in the oil and the level went up, so it looks as though putting oil in helps.

But that dipstick seems to be low whenever I check it these days.  I thought I should check it again, this week, just to see.  And I did that after work yesterday/Monday, and goddammit, the level is lower.  Maybe not low, but it's concerning because, beyond going from downtown Minneapolis to Cedar-Riverside, I didn't really go anywhere in the week or so since I dumped oil in it.

Winter literally is coming.  It'll snow tonight/Tuesday night, and then the cold is coming in and will settle for the time being.  Not ideal oil-adding weather.  So after I came home and ate dinner, I threw in some more oil.  Nothing more than a quarter-quart if that, but if the dipstick is supposed to be an indication of how low I am down to a quart, that line when I check it again should go back up.

And fuckin' A, I immediately regretted it.  What if I put in too much?  That's why I didn't put in half a quart.  I don't want to overfill it.  But I can't underfill it either, so what happens if what I put in is still not enough?  Every car I have to put in oil becomes fucking Goldilocks, for God's sake.  And why in the hell am I putting in oil twice less than a week?  If I have to, that's a sign that my car's going through it way more than it should.  Or, maybe it's not going through oil as fast as I think it is, and I'm just fucking paranoid because I've been traumatized by my cars not working in years past.  Fuck if I know.

I have half a mind to bring my car quickly to my mechanic, again -- just to ask him if there are any oil leaks, and then maybe ask if to teach me how to read the damn dipstick.  But like I said before, they probably are closed Wednesday afternoon.  Plus, the weather is going to be bad then, so I don't know if they'd be in a mood to indulge my anxieties.  Oh, and they might charge me to do that, too.

I'm scared I filled my engine with too much oil, and I'm also scared that my engine will run out of oil a week from now.  Goddamn, I hate being afraid of what my car will do.

General (Car-Centered) Anxiety

I don't know, man ... right now, I'm not looking forward to this week.  Don't have any specifics ... although, come to think of it, my sister during work yesterday/Monday has asked for my car on a handful of days, starting this week, and I wasn't able to open up the car hood and check the coolant tank to see if there has been even more of a drop than I saw on Sunday because it was raining.  I should try and take a look today/Tuesday, but the forecast calls for rain this afternoon as well.

I want to go to a concert on Thursday.  Also, barring a change in plans, Mother has surgery next week.  That's a lot of miles for a car that I am afraid might have some sort of leak in the cooling system and thus may overheat.  It's driving fine besides that, and like I said in my last blog post, maybe there's nothing wrong and I'm just finding reasons to scare myself.  But heck yeah, I am kind of scared.

Now Is This Car Gonna Overheat?

It's kind of critical that my car is in as tip-top shape as possible because of Mother's surgery.  I have gotten quasi-obsessed with making sure the correct air pressure is in the tires, there is enough oil (that's a headache in and of itself), and that the coolant is fine.

And the coolant is now scaring the hell out of me.  Some time ago (and I swear I wrote about this in WAF, I just don't know when, and I can't find it), I thought there wasn't enough coolant.  I tried topping it off, only to overfill it.  I think I blog posted about panicking over doing that, but the only thing I could do about it was to let it sit and maybe there would be a point where it would start evaporating or something.

Well, that point seems to be here.  I had checked the level once in a while, and I noticed a couple weeks ago that the level of the coolant in the overflow tank wasn't clearly over the "MAX" line but hovering just above it.  And yesterday/Sunday, after working the Vikings Game, I checked the level again, and it's about at "MAX."  Yes, I should now be OK that the overflow tank isn't overfilled.  But, obviously it's losing coolant.  I asked the Internet if it's normal for coolant to just disappear at this rate and, well, it's telling me that I should get it checked because it could be a head gasket.  OK, I might be actually do something if I start losing coolant at a faster rate than it is, only because I don't have the time, money or energy to immediately bring it in right now, especially if what is happening is normal.

Still, this is bringing up bad memories of the old car, when, after a certain point, if it wasn't one thing it was another.  This is the Internet (and AI-generated answers, which should be taken with a silo of salt, and that is something I should write about some other time), however, and I sometimes wonder if I'm just looking to find things to scare myself with.  Nevertheless, I need to check the coolant tank a bit more frequently, and that in itself introduces a level of anxiety that kind of hampers my daily life.

Man, If I Lose Work Because Of This ...

Earlier this summer I was asked to work two Games, one back in June and one coming up on Saturday.  I said I could do both.  I was told that the August Game (the one coming up on Saturday) may have a follow-up confirmation, just in case, but in my mind, I already said yes, I could do it.

Flash to yesterday/Monday.  I am getting a tad nervous.  I sometimes have not been given schedules and call times until two days before the day of the Game, but considering how much junk mail comes through my inbox, there is a chance that something I need to see gets overlooked.  So I just did a search in my inbox ... and there was an e-mail from the production company confirming (actually re-confirming) that I can still work on Saturday.  And unfortunately, she sent that e-mail back on the 30th.

I want to think I've built up enough of a track record whereby they know I am trustworthy to do any gig I agreed to two months in advance.  But I also know that I am an at-will employee, and this job I agreed to can be yanked from me for any reason, or for no reason.  It is completely possible that after a dozen days after she sent an e-mail, and with the Game approaching at the end of the week, she could've gotten nervous and gave my gig to someone else.  And I would absolutely hate that, I really would.

Guess I'll know some time today if I have work taken from me because I didn't see an e-mail in time.

Stayed till 7:30 at work yesterday/Wednesday.  I gave myself till 8; if I wasn't done with work by then, I would leave it because I needed to watch The Amazing Race.  Didn't need that much cushion, but it was close.

Because the season finale of TAR starts at 8 tonight, I will give myself till 7:30 before leaving everything and going.  I might have to use all of it, though; I am in The Third Department, and I got a glance at all the stuff my colleague left for me.  It's a lot.  Like, a lot.  Too much, actually.  I will be behind the 8-ball as soon as I sit down, and I don't know if I will get to the stuff that rolls in ... at all.

I'll be honest and say I was getting pretty anxious as I wound down my day.  But I insist that I have to do all the work before I leave.  If I don't, either I will have to stay extra the next day or, in this case, someone else will have to do the work I leave them, and that doesn't seem right, either.

Then again, I wonder how my boss is going to feel for me working 10 1/2 hours again.  Well, he's not here right now, but when he comes back from vacation, there might be hell to pay.  Well, might as well make hay while the sun's shining.

Oh, The Things I Can Talk About From Yesterday/Friday. Let's Start With The Phone

Oddly dynamic day, but rife with stuff to blog post about, and that's great since I've been kind of hurting for stuff to talk about.

I'll go in chronological order.  I forgot to bring my phone to work yesterday/Friday.  I had such anxiety not having it with me.  Honestly, not being able to scroll through things is something I did miss, even though I wasn't thinking about it every minute.  Hopefully that means I'm not totally addicted and gone.  No, I was more worried that I would need it and not have it, specifically that I would get into an accident or the car would break down on the way home and I would need to make an emergency call and of course I would not be able to, and I felt as though yesterday would be the day that would happen.  No, it did not happen, but that paranoia was with me.  It'll always be with me.

The other thing with the phone is that I assumed my boss texted me on it permitting me to come in to work today/Saturday.  There is a hell of a lot still left to do, and considering what usually happens when there's a backload of work (and considering that were allowed to work about to four hours yesterday), I would be allowed to come and work today.  However, I need to wait till he gives me the specific go-ahead.  I am surprised by this, but I still haven't gotten a text from him saying basically, "Yeah, if you want to come in and work today, come on in."  But I assumed that he had already done it by the time he left yesterday.  And that's why I told everybody before I left yesterday that I might be coming in to work today.  (And by the way, I didn't tell anybody that I left my cellphone at home.)  So I'm scared that my co-workers thought I would be coming in and changed my mind, when the whole truth is that I was willing and able to come in today, but didn't because I wasn't given explicit permission.

For all I know, my boss wouldn't mind if I come in today.  But I'm not going to get all dressed and come in, only to be told that I can't because I wasn't told I could.  So instead I'm blog posting this, and thinking about what other stuff I think is crazy happened yesterday/Friday.

Tonight, I Am Glad My Parents Are Home

So I just picked up my parents last night.  So far they haven't commented on all the new scouring pads and steel wool I will say I bought for them but didn't.

My car has been driving a little funny.  And then, on our way back from the airport, the low tire pressure light from my car came on.  Goddammit!  Shit like this always happens when I'm driving to do something important!  I was freaking out; the light went on as I was driving north on 35WN.  But my parents told me we could take the car all the way home.  I didn't think it was a good idea, but frankly, I reverted to child mode, and I trusted that I was going to be OK.  And, now that I think about it here, I was going to be OK.  Because I was with them when this bad thing happened.  It beats being alone when your tire pops in the middle of the highway.

So while I was panicking as all get-out, I drove my car, rarely going above 60 mph, all the way to the nearest gas station closest to home.  We parked at the air pump in case the tires were still good enough to get us all the way home with pumped-in air.  And Father said that, if worse comes to worst, I can take the minivan to work while they, who are retired, get the tire fixed.  But the darndest thing, all the tires looked upon initial inspection to be just fine.  And I broke out my tire pressure gauge to see if any of the tires was extremely low.  None of them were.  In fact, all of them were well above the recommended pressure.  I actually need to let air out.

I need to wake up early and look at the tires one more time in the morning, just in case the tires were lying to me.  But if they're good, the tire pressure warning light lit up in error ... which it has done on occasion, though not any time recently.  A sigh of relief if it is only a bad sensor instead of a flat tire.  And a gigantic smile for me that I didn't have to go through that episode alone.  I had my parents with me, and I am grateful, at least on this one night.

And Now The Black Cloud Descends On Our Nation

I do feel a palpable dread from the correct-minded people of this nation now.  It has animated my anxiety and a lot of my short temper since November, but now that it's finally "here," I feel my sadness, anger an bitterness runneth over.

The thing I am still trying to reconcile is that, if I recall correctly, I felt things were going to be just as bad eight years ago.  Why is everything worse now?  Well, we correct-minded people really thought that our fellow Americans would remember the facts that he was convicted of multiple felonies, was called a rapist by a judge, acted like a petty asshole who talks like someone who has Alzheimer's and thought, "Yeah, I want more of that good shit," or didn't care enough to vote.  Our fellow Americans seem to be OK with liars and grifters and people who break the law.  And all of us who hated what we went through cannot deal with how we'll have to deal with all that bullshit again.

I see a meme on social media likening the second TFG's administration to watching the second plane hit the other Twin Tower.  That's totally apt.  The first time we were so confused as to what's going on.  Now?  We now know what's about to happen.  And we're terrified.

I hope that I have the courage and the resilience to resist more than I did the last time.  It'll be very, very hard doing so with the knowledge that there are Enemies Among Us who prefer dictatorship over democracy, and want to kiss the ass of a con man.  But soldier on I must.

In Fear Of What's About To Happen

I don't want to pussyfoot too gingerly around everything, but I think that when I say I've been in a state of unease since November, you know what I mean.  I think most of my unexplainable anxieties and fears since then has been this existential dread over how delusional and evil other people really are, and how I'm supposed to live once this incompetence and selfishness comes into power in about ten days from now.

I truly, truly believe that there will be a new ... let's just say toxicity that will become a new way of life in America not too far from now.  People will be emboldened now that their guy is the putative leader of the free world, and so I can see assholes drive 100 mph and cut people off on the highway, insult people based on their race and sex and orientation, and make decisions nakedly driven on self-interest.  Not as if they can't already do that now, which only speaks to their fundamental stupidity: They're acting like nice boys and girls now, but once he has the power to pardon them for anything they do, fuckin' watch out!

Because of that, I'm seriously thinking of visiting ******a at My Favorite Stripclub (Cover Division) next week.  If I see her after that, I might run into people who, uh, don't think I have a right to be left alone.  And as for the day itself, I think I will keep to myself -- just go to work, then go home and stay home.  I have to venture out at some point, but not on that day.  Seriously, too dangerous.

My Final Blog Post Of 2024 Is Another Reminder Of Why My Fucking Mother Has Ruined My Life

I was going to neatly tie up 2024 into a bow (well, as well as I can), but My Fucking Mother fucking had to send this shit off the rails with her goddamn anxieties again.

She bugs the fuck out of me while they're here, but it appears as though she bothers me even more when she's in Vegas.  I think that's due to expectations: Since they are so far away from me, I presume that we would talk less.  And I think we do; for example, even though I thought we would talk Christmas Day, we didn't, probably because we talked Christmas Eve.  And that's A-OK with me.

But when she texts me saying she needs help ... goddamn, the thing she needs help with is such a huge energy drain.  It literally takes hours to deal with her issue.  And it's an issue only she believes is an issue.  But I have to help her because that bitch acts so fucking helpless.

She texted me at work yesterday/Monday afternoon: "Need help!"  I get home and call her.  She tells me these real estate forms need to be filled out.  The government wants them, and she's scared as hell that, like, the FBI will arrest her if we don't do it before the end of the year ... even though the stuff she said told her that actually said she had a couple more weeks.  These forms are in English, of course, so she immediately ran to me, only to switch up her tone and just fuckin' saddle me with all this bullshit I need to deal with with an urgency only she has.  So fucking typical of her and her goddamn "issues."

These forms the government wants filled out I didn't even know existed until today.  And I had to waste two motherfucking hours with My Fucking Mother to do them online.  Worse than that, I screwed up one of the forms, and I'm not sure the website on which I did these forms took up the corrected information.  So I think I have to follow up today, some time after work, to see if some AI chatbot can let me know if the "government" has the correct information.  And who knows how long I'll have to fucking waste on that.  It's New Year's Eve, for fuck's sake.  I'm supposed to mark the death of the old year and say hello to the new one.  I don't want to spend it dealing with goddamn forms.

---

This year was bad because I lost my uncle.  I feel bad because I hadn't contacted him much before he died.  I think the last communication I had with him was wishing him a (Western) New Year via text.  He was gone within two months.  He didn't want anyone to talk to him in his decrepit state.  I don't care; I wanted to at least say goodbye to him and tell him I love him.  And I'll be honest (if I haven't stated this here in WAF already): I'm mad at him for not talking to me before he went.

Come to think of it, 2024 brought more signs my body is breaking down.  I saw someone for my knees after work yesterday/Monday.  She said it's probably arthritis, which everyone my age is going through.  Use exercises to get manage it.  I think I heard that before when my physical therapist told me to exercise my back.  I was given a referral for physical therapy for my knees, and there's a chance it's the same person who I met with five years ago.  I don't think the guy likes me, though, so I don't think I'll take up the referral.

Gaining weight, too.  I know I should eat better, but I'm still holding onto the delusion that I can eat what I want and not get too fat.  That's not happening, but I'm not changing my diet.  Oh, and I'm still dealing with trying to do my desk job with bifocals on.  Had a lot of trouble seeing with my eyeglasses in 2024.  My eyes got so strained looking at my computer screen that it began to hurt.  I even take them off and see my screen through blurry eyes.  It beats getting a headache.

Everything else, I guess, is the same, including dealing with My Fucking Mother.  Every fake emergency she makes me deal with reminds me that I got my anxious state of mind from her.  She has grafted every part of her insecurities onto me, and I cannot and will not forgive her for that.

Happy New Year!!!

Christmas Thoughts; Christmas Song Review

As anxious as I usually am, I have to be grateful for things when I encounter them.  This time around I am grateful for the weather.  It's not great, it could be better.  But with the exception of a couple peeks of sun yesterday/Tuesday/Christmas Eve, it has been cloudy, and you know, I do prefer cloudy to sunny days.  More important than that, the temperature lately has hovered around 32 degrees, and it has been above freezing during the day the past several days.

That, and the fact there has not been any snow since that storm we had, means that driving has been perfect and without incident.  My drive to the place I go to late Christmas Eve was completely normal, and you can't say that every winter.  But about the bar: Even though I think I get there around the time I usually get there, I missed the band that usually plays every Christmas Eve night.  Also, they closed at midnight, and I don't know if they did that last year, or the years before that.  It was still OK; I stayed only 75 minutes or so, and I was the last one to leave the bar (never thought I would ever do that), but I think that beats going stir crazy at home.  Still, I usually want to be in that bar when midnight rolls around.  If they close at midnight, that is impossible.  So ...

Oh, by the way, I left close to 5:30.  I missed Hooters, Southdale and Cheesecake Factory.  Oh well.

---

OK, Christmas music time.  In my opinion, Mariah Carey's "All I Want For Christmas Is You" is The Most Popular Christmas Song In The United States Every Christmas.  (That it is the youngest song considered to be a Christmas standard is somewhat of a miracle -- a Christmas miracles, so to speak.)  But what is the second-most popular song?  You could make a case for Wham!'s "Last Christmas," which is the United Kingdom's #1 song for Christmas week for the second Christmas in a row (that is important over there, for some reason).  But here in the States, at least when it comes to the Billboard chart, I think it is Brenda Lee's "Rockin' Around The Christmas Tree."

According to the song's Wiki, Johnny Marks, a guy who wrote two other Christmas standards, "A Holly Jolly Christmas" and "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" (nice), wrote "Rockin' Around The Christmas Tree," and she wanted Lee to sing it even though she was 13.  The song, done way back in 1958, was made in rockabilly style, and the style is both perfect for the song and unique when it comes to Christmas standards.  I don't know of another Christmas rockabilly song, right?  And it swings, too!

Every Christmastime, Carey's "All I Want For Christmas Is You" dominates the top of the Billboard Top 100.  But last year, miraculously, Lee managed to break through and reach #1.  She claimed the record for longest gap between #1 singles; she last reached the top spot October 24, 1960 with "I Want To Be Wanted," a little more than 63 years.  "Rockin' Around The Christmas Tree" set the record for longest time to reach #1 after its original release, about 65 years.  And Lee also became the oldest person to ever have a #1 song, beating 62-year-old Louis Armstrong (his "Hello, Dolly!" went to #1 in May 1964).  She was 78 when it reached the top spot in December 2023 ... and it stayed there for a second week ... and technically, Lee broke her own record because within that week, on December 11, 2023, she turned 79.

There finally was an official video made for "Rockin' Around The Christmas Tree," released in November 2023.  You know, that might be the reason the song finally got to #1:

Merry Christmas, everybody!

Pissed Off And Freaked Out Over The First Snowstorm Of The Season

There have been worse ones, but this one is forecast to be bad -- goddamn, maybe half a foot -- and this has sapped my mental energy since last night.  Last night it was going to be a nuisance, only 2-4 inches.  Fucking thing got amped up, apparently, and I am scared as fuck about it.

It is mainly falling over the course of my workday.  It'll start overnight, be at its heaviest just as I start work, and it might be ending by the time I get home.  So, driving is the first and the worst of my anxieties.  We've had dustings here and there, but this is the first fucking snowstorm of the season, and no one in the world is worse at driving than Minnesotans after the first snowstorm of the season, and I include myself in that.  I'm scared that I'll get stuck somewhere, or I'll drive myself onto oncoming traffic.

But there is so much fucking more to worry about.  That I have to go into the lab and pull out packages that might be leaking piss today gives me even less to look forward to on a day where I'm scared I'm not going to even make it into work.  I don't know if I can use the snowblower if I have to use it because I don't have a backup battery in my garage door opener.  I obviously have power, and I guess I could open it with it plugged in, but I don't know if I'm supposed to, and if I am afraid to, I can't open the garage door, which means I can't use the snowblower which sits in my garage.  Oh, Father bought a handheld snowblower, one of those things that looks like a metal detector but it's supposed to throw snow like a snowblower, except not.  He wants me to try it, and I might have no choice but to try it, but I just looked online at how it works, and I'm not sure if I can do it, and besides, if we're getting the amount of snow I'm afraid we'll get, using this thing to clear my driveway is like using a thimble to dump water out of my canoe.  Oh, and I don't know where the battery charger for this thing is, so I don't even know if I have the juice for it.

I'm scared that the city will dam up the end of my driveway so I can't drive up it.  I hate that I might have to park on the street, walk in the snow up to my house, potentially open my door manually and possibly decapitate myself if it falls on me, or run into the garage through the basement to get my shovel to start shovelling half a foot of goddamn snow, and even more at the end of my driveway.  Motherfuck, I don't need this shit now, goddammit. ...

Thought My Car Was Breaking Down, But Then ...

So I had to change the battery in my car key fob Friday.  Got into my car in the morning, saw the "BATT" warning on the dash, and decided to risk driving to work, Rosedale (although I didn't go; it was crazy on Black Friday), the bank and the gas station.  (No problem; the warning came on each time, but the car started just fine.)  Switched out the flat, circular battery, and I thought all was well.

Well, not quite -- and in more ways than one.  I had to go to my alma mater's Game-watching event even though I had to bug out at Halftime to go back home and take my parents to the airport.  When I was parking my car at the lot close to the bar, my dashboard suddenly flashed a "NO KEY" sign.  I was kind of freaking out, but I switched fobs, and the one I got went through its last battery really quickly, so I think it's not good.

I thought that was the reason for that warning, so I wasn't really worried when I finally decided to leave.  But when I tried to open the door, I didn't hear anything.  I had to literally take it apart for it to finally work.  So, I concluded that the fob was so bad that I had to now use the one I switched out, and use it from now on.

But that didn't work, either.  As I started the car in the driveway, the damn "NO KEY" warning flashed again.  I turned off the car and tried to start it again, but it wouldn't work.  I ran back inside the house to switch the fobs back (I concluded I should do this, but I didn't) and there was no sign.  But after I dropped off my parents at the terminal, I tried using the fob to lock the doors at both Jimmy John's and the Mall Of America, but it wouldn't respond.  I could do the thing where I could open the door if I grabbed the handle, but I couldn't do anything if I wasn't close.  When I got the OK by Mother to leave because they boarded their plane (which was delayed by 80 minutes), I just pulled the fob apart.  I hit the button, and the doors opened, and the car started just fine.

While I was just walking around the Megamall, my mind was racing with what could be going on.  There were two commonalities between the two fobs I tried to use.  One commonality was the battery, which I kept switching between the fobs.  The other was, well, the car.  There is the possibility that the car was going haywire.  And that thought terrified me all night.  Meanwhile, I also was afraid that somehow, both fobs just failed at the same time, and I had to buy a new one.  Last week, I tried starting the car, but it wouldn't.  At the time I thought it was because the fob was in the same pocket as my phone, but with what happened Friday and yesterday, a pattern was emerging that the fob (or fobs) wasn't (or weren't) working.  I got more evidence for that theory when I got home, tried to close the doors using the button, and it once again wouldn't work.  And then I accidentally set off the car alarm.  I was able to open the door and start the car (to stop the alarm) with the battery in the fob, but only if I put the fob right up to the ignition button.

Now I'm freaking out.  But I had only final play before I had to take drastic measures in order to prepare for the Vikings Game and my (abbreviated) work week.  I decided to use the other disc battery we had.  This is an Energizer battery, and it was a package I bought.  When I took it out of its blister, I immediately saw a difference, and probably the difference: This battery was thicker, way thicker, than the battery I was trying to use.  That's when I realized they're not the same kind of battery.  The one I first used came from a package Father bought.  It's not a company I'm familiar with, and I also had a fleeting thought that a bad battery was the cause for all of this.  But it turns out, or at least I hope to Buddha that this is the reason, that the first battery was too thin to reach all the contacts inside the fobs, and that's why the car couldn't detect the fob inside the car.  I popped the Energizer battery in its place, and I could open and close the doors to the car from the front door just fine.

All that anxiety, stress and worry, and it was because of the wrong type of battery.  I'm sure everything's fine now, but my body is still reeling from the trauma, dammit.

Yeah, This Is Feeling As Bad As Eight Years Ago

I don't want to rehash how I was feeling, but it was eerily similar to how I felt tonight, and being in a bar with like- and correct-minded people did not help with my anxiety and fear at all.

One thing I have noticed, however.  The doomsaying I am seeing now, as accurate as it probably is, was something I didn't see four years ago.  Why?  I can't just explain it away by the pandemic ... can I?  I was unable to congregate anywhere public, obviously, but I remember that on the Saturday after Election Day, when Pennsylvania and the presidency was called for Joe Biden, that I was helping to set up the Vikings Game at U. S. Bank Stadium.  I don't think the euphoria I felt then was reflected by any bonhomie on Election Night four days before.  But it was four years ago, so I could be wrong.

What I am hoping is that, like four years ago, the tabulations won't be done for a while.  Things weren't looking great for Biden this time in 2020, but then states began counting mail-in votes and the totals from the big cities started to pile in.  Maybe it could come sooner, and there are significant headwinds Harris is encounter now.  But I am hoping beyond hope that there is a blue tsunami, or a blue-nami, that will save us from ourselves.

With that said, I haven't looked on social media yet, so maybe democracy's already dead.  Who knows?

I Don't Know When To Go Out/Don't Know When To Stay In

Adding to my anxiety as my sister and brother-in-law come back home for a week and a half is that for every workday this week, I spent some time out.  With this headache coming tomorrow/Saturday morning (and I mean that in the nicest way), I could have used an evening just to myself, at home.  But I was out instead -- sometimes because I wanted to (I hit this bar in the outskirts of downtown Minneapolis Monday because it had a Halloween theme; I was going to see the Opening Round of The Big Ten Women's Soccer Tournament yesterday/Thursday), sometimes because I had to (had to go to our bar Tuesday to make sure we could watch the Game this Saturday; and I had to stash my shit because My Fucking Father threw it in the recycling bin on Wednesday).  Goddamn, I was so busy.

Today/Friday was going to be my nothing day.  But then *****y texted Wednesday that she was hosting a party, and considering all the stress I had from My Fucking Father making decisions on stuff that wasn't his and from my sister and brother-in-law coming tomorrow/Saturday, I thought a little sexual healing would be good for me.  But then yesterday's/Thursday's snow came.  It sure was no Halloween Blizzard, but it was a lot more than the trace that was forecast to fall in our area.  Because of that, the Matches that were supposed to be played yesterday/Thursday are instead going to be played today/Friday.  And because I love being an in-person neutral for big tournaments like this -- and because I don't know if I can get my money back -- instead of getting my pee-pee yanked, I'll be braving the cold of sitting at the Robbie Stadium bleachers.  And I'll be tired as hell once I get home ... after I have a late dinner and gas up my car.  My sis and bro-in-law come in at 6 in the morning Saturday.

But hey, the headlight bulbs finally came, and in time.  Maybe we won't need a rental car this weekend after all.  Unfortunately, the long line of what-ifs regarding this stupid decision to have dinner in St. Paul around the time the Wild Game starts remains.

Anxiety (Should Be) Rising

Alright, I still don't know if I'm going out to dinner with family Sunday, I don't know if my parents have decided they're going out to dinner with family Sunday, I don't know if the headlight bulbs will be delivered in time to use the minivan for dinner Sunday, I don't know if I should get a rental car to use for dinner on Sunday (and I have to worry whether my parents are not going to freak out about getting a rental car too, but that's another layer of anxiety), and worst of all, I don't know if anybody involved with dinner on Sunday even cares.  I'm afraid this entire damn family is just "playing it by ear" when it comes to dinner on Sunday, and we can't.

Are we doing this or not?  I don't like that I feel as though I need to be the one to initiate conversation.  Yeah, I might be the one who most knows what's going on, and I had to buy the bulbs, and I'm the one going back and forth between my parents and my sister.  But you know, they can talk to each other.  They can make plans.  They can fret over plans, such as dinner on Sunday, and not just me.

So that's what I'm afraid of: Them not caring, me standing my ground and refusing to invest more energy than I already am, and then Sunday rolls around and we can't go because we can't drive the van at night.  So, whose fault is it then?  I'm worried about everything else about them coming; I don't need this, too.

I Have To Admit -- I'm Really Starting To Resent Them Coming Here

Yeah, it's the disruption, the (kind of) lack of privacy, and, once again, my sister's need to make things all about her.  She gets that way sometimes, but mostly on big occasions where she's the center of attention, and it pisses me off.

The last time she was here she wanted all the suitcases we have stowed in her bedroom out of her bedroom, and she wanted all her bedsheets washed.  Now, I think normal family members would of course do that for her, and wouldn't need prompting.  I am not normal.  I could sleep in dusty bedsheets for all I care.  I just need a clean damn bed.  But no, she wants what she and my brother-in-law are going to sleep in all clean and fresh-smelling, even if they're only going to be here a week and a half.

And I think I touched on this before, but this dinner in St. Paul on Sunday is really grinding my gears.  First of all, my sister wants to use my car, and I'm going to give it to her.  Also, it seems really damn inconvenient for one group of people who are staying in this house to go out to St. Paul and then have the people who live in the same house go out to St. Paul later that same day.  And then my folks told me on Saturday that the minivan, the vehicle I will purportedly be using whenever my sister and brother-in-law want to use my car, had its headlights short out.  I had to buy them on Amazon; they might get here before they get here, and they might not.  And on top of all that, I realized that the Wild are playing in St. Paul on Sunday, and around the same time as the early dinner.  I am not that familiar with St. Paul, and now I have to worry about getting stuck in hockey traffic, too??

Once I realized the minivan had no night lights and I'd have to deal with Wild traffic on Sunday, I obsessed over it all day at work yesterday/Monday -- like, distractingly so.  I really do love my sister and brother-in-law, and I really want to spend some time with my niece, who is the reason my sis and bro-in-law are taking my car on Sunday.  But I hate, hate, hate these dinner plans the more I learned what I have to deal with.  I could feel my body well up with rage and anxiety and dread and helplessness because I feel forced to do something I really, really don't want to do.

And then it hit me: If I don't want to go, don't go.  At first that thought was insane.  I don't see my niece a whole lot as it is.  If I don't see her on this opportunity, I don't know when I'll see her again.  Also, has she noticed how seldomly I see her?  If I make the decision not to go, well, she has to know, and what will she think of me?  But as I kept thinking yesterday ... you know, my sister did raise the idea that I didn't have to go.  And I am such an incorrigible bastard that I might say, yeah, screw it, I'll see you guys some other time, tell my niece I say hi.  Frankly, I'm leaning that way right now.  It is selfish and self-centered of me, but once I started being more accepting of that decision, a weight was lifted off of me.  And I would do anything for peace of mind, even ditching family.

So I texted her my concerns.  I asked her if our parents wanted to go to dinner and she said yeah.  Guess I should have talked to them directly since, you know, I live with them.  Anyway, my thoughts are moot if they want to go; I can't not go if they're going.  Then again, their desire to go to dinner on Sunday may be moot if Amazon can't deliver these headlight bulbs in time.  (Yes, they can go to a store to get them, but Father did that on Saturday, and he's so goddamn cheap that when I told him we could get bulbs through Amazon for less than half the price he got them at Wal-Mart, he immediately went back and returned them.)  My sister couldn't foresee this shitshow, but in a shitshow like this, maybe this isn't a good idea, you know?  But these fucking plans are going through, and I have to be the dutiful brother/son and just fucking fall in line, no matter the stress and stupidity of the whole thing.

It's The Hope That Kills You. It's *Always* The Hope That Kills You

I planned on going to a speakeasy last/Wednesday night, then thought, "Uh, maybe we need to take it easy here, Unforgivable Wetness," and then I had a surprisingly heavy day at work after a week of relatively no work, and then I drove like a motherfucker to the speakeasy for two cocktails, some pasta and a flatbread.

Me being the sports addict, I think a part of my anxiety and my, uh, unrefined coping skills was the Lynx, who had home-court advantage and was playing Game 3 of the WNBA Finals at Target Center last night.  I saw on Twitter while I was at the speakeasy that they started the Game leading 14-5, leading The New York Liberty to call an early Time Out.  I then made sure not to check the score again, if I could help it.

After eating and drinking, I got an ice cream in the neighborhood.  I overheard while listening to the jazz station while driving home that at some point in the Second Half, Minnesota was up by six.  I went home and promptly fell asleep, even though I did want to know what the score was at some point before the night was through because if they had won, I was going to snap up a ticket to (hopefully) see the Lynx close out the Liberty and win Game 4 and thus the championship on Friday.

I somehow woke up at 11:57 p.m.  I grabbed my phone.  The home screen on my phone has a notification from Apple Sports News ... that Sabrina Ionescu sank a Three-Pointer to win the Game for New York and take back home-court advantage.

Nah, I'm not going to see the Game on Friday.  I'll go out to dinner with friends instead.

It's the hope that kills you.  It's always the hope that kills you.

And So The Time Is Nigh. ...

Soon after I publish this blog post, I will be jetting off to the University of Minnesota campus.  Hopefully I will build in enough time to find a parking spot, for free, that will allow me to walk to the pre-Game even I'm volunteering for and then the stadium for the Game itself.  I will take a spot that is up to two miles away from the stadium and that will take me a half-hour to get back to my car.  I have done similar only one other time: For U2's 360 concert at then-TCF Bank Stadium.  It was the right thing to do, and I am going to do it again.

But do you want to know what's on my mind right now, moreso than the anxiety I'm feeling about finding a parking spot, doing my volunteer work, getting to the Game on time and hoping my team won't get upset?  The guy I got into a heated spat with on Facebook over Trump's "assassination attempt."  He got so fucking pissed off he transformed into some ugly creature, not just a different person.  Well, he'll be there, and I don't know how he's going to be towards me.  Will he act like nothing happened?  Will he apologize?  Will he want to continue the argument with me in front of hundreds of people there to watch something else?

I'll just lay it all out here: Ever since we backed away from our fighting, he's been pretty cordial on the Facebook group we're both in.  As long as we (apparently) don't talk about politics, it seems as though he is behaving.  But a part of me thinks that this is an opportunity for him to come to the bar for our pre-Game, walk up to me, and fuckin' slit my throat.  And it'll be inexplicable -- "Why in the hell would he do something like that?"

Yeah, that's what I'm afraid of.

While I look forward to the Game and to meeting up with old friends, some of whom are flying in from out of town and I haven't seen in years, I am kind of going to be glad once the day is over.  I feel "on" right now, with my volunteering stint and making sure everyone knows what they want to know.  I want to be "off" right now, but I can only do that once I get back home.  That won't be a while, and the paranoid side of me is scared I won't come back at all.