I guess it was inevitable, even though I held out longer than I would have if I were younger.  But dammit, this wave of horniness has enveloped me this weekend, so I have had to surreptitiously rub one out each of the past two nights.  Well, when a man has to, a man has to, I guess.  I just hope I haven't got caught ... and I hope that I have cleaned up everywhere in the bathroom I needed to.  Because if I leave a trace of my, uh, life essence, and if someone sees -- or, worse, feels -- it ... sheesh. ...

If I participated in The Contest on Seinfeld, I want to think I already had won before last night.

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. ...

I'll Be Fucking Everywhere This Weekend

So hey, summer begins!  And I am celebrating by spending money like the dickens.  I will allow myself that this weekend.  It's a holiday!

Yesterday/Friday and today/Saturday I am helping out the broadcast of the Lynx Game.  Easiest set day in my life yesterday/Friday, thank goodness.  I was out and about, but I spent a total of six hours there.  It was an absolute breeze.  And I just need to do stats today/Saturday.

With that, I have the afternoon free.  And after seeing the EPL Play-Up Game tomorrow/Sunday, I will have the rest of the afternoon free then, too.  What I am filling those afternoons with rested on two things, one of which was dependent on the other.  The first thing happened serendipitously: *****y asking me if I wanted to come over and get a handjob from her.  We've been trying to arrange something, and I thought I would text her to see if this weekend would be good, but I didn't want to talk to her until the second (or is this the first in this case?) thing happened, which is PWHL Minnesota, the professional women's hockey team that bought the PHF and then memory-holed its history.  I have riffed a couple times of how pissed I am that PWHL Minnesota had essentially bought, stolen and trashed the history of The Minnesota Whitecaps.  But I set that aside once that team stole Game 2 of their Walter Cup Series at PWHL Boston.  I then was waiting for the result of Game 3, which took place last/Friday night at the X.

If they lost, I was looking at a wide-open Sunday night.  However, they won, which means that tomorrow/Sunday night's Game 4 could be for a championship, and everyone here knows we're starving for a championship.  I want to be in the room where it happens, so once I heard last/Friday night that PWHL Minnesota had won, I hopped onto Ticketmaster and bought a ticket (with exorbitant fees the state has just vowed to crack down on).  They beat PWHL Boston in Game 3 4-1 as well.  If form holds, Game 4 is just a formality, and I will (fingers crossed) see what I believe to be The Minnesota Whitecaps hoisting a second trophy at the Xcel Energy Center Sunday night.

Once I knew I had that to do Sunday night, I thought my weekend plans would fall into place: After the Lynx Game today/Saturday I would either reach *****y or ******e for a HJ, then maybe work on my receipts at a coffeeshop or eat walleye at Tavern On Grand in St. Paul (before they close for good next week), then spend the evening at the local jazz club in town because a guy I ushered with back in the day is opening up for a stand-up show there.  I have never been to this place (although I have been on the premises when it was a restaurant), and I finally think this is the time to go there.  Sunday I would go downtown to watch the Play-Up Game, go home to eat a very early dinner, then go to St. Paul.

Well, unfortunately, *****y changed that.  So with the sexytime for sure occurring Sunday (right after the Play-Up Match), I am going from Minneapolis to a suburb of St. Paul back home and then to downtown St. Paul that day.  That's a lot of driving in my car, and a lot of back-and-forth in particular.  Don't like that at all.  But hey, she wants to wank my dick and I want to see a title-winning sports team in town, and both of them are happening several hours apart tomorrow/Sunday.

To make up for it, I will stay at home for Memorial Day.  Maybe.

All I Wanted Was To Boil Some Fucking Hot Water!!!

So I was feeling sluggish after around lunchtime at work.  I powered through, but after napping in the evening, I realized my body felt like it had this huge build-up of lactic acid.  I remember feeling like this the night before I was supposed to work a Vikings Game, even though it felt much worse then because I really, really didn't think I could go to work the next day.  (I was able to get a power nap in that appeared to help my body fight off whatever I was feeling, and I was perfect, I think, the next day.)

I think one of the things that helped me fight off these, uh, shakes is that I drank hot water.  This lactic acid build-up feeling made me feel cold, and I think that part of my return to full strength was drinking hot water in order to, uh, get things moving in my digestive system.  (OK, I think I pooped a lot before getting that power nap in.)  Couldn't hurt to try it again.  And you know, as long as I am boiling water, I might as well irrigate my nostrils.  Oh yeah -- in case I haven't blog posted about this before, last summer I finally got to see an allergist who gave me this squeeze bottle (not a neti pot) in which I pour in boiled water, this saline solution and this, uh, liquid medicine.  I had used it twice before tonight.  It's a trip to shoot liquid up one nostril, feel it traverse into the other nasal canal, then feel that crap tumble out of your nose and into the sink -- all while hoping to God that you don't swallow that stuff, ick.  I've gotten used to it, I guess, although I will go out on a limb and say it kind of feels like waterboarding.

Anyway, I grabbed the teapot, filled it with tap water, and turned on the stove.  I remember that when I emptied the hot water into the Pyrex measuring cup the first time, I tipped it over so much that the lid from the tea kettle fell over.  I wasn't going to do that again, so just before I was going to empty the whole teapot, I took off the lid.  I totally didn't expect there to be condensation on the underside of the lid ... and that scalding hot water dripped onto the fingers of my right hand.  Dammit!!!

I ran my fingers under the sink, then put my right hand on a few ice cube trays.  (Won't tell my parents I touched them, but don't worry, I had showered just before this, so my hands are clean!!!)  What frightens me is that after I iced my fingers, the pain and heat just seemed to radiate back up to the surface of my fingers.  I still feel them right now, even though it's much less painful and, at least for now, there are no blisters.  But I have to cut open packages at work today/Wednesday, and I'm scared to see how my hand is, and how I feel, once I wake up.  I took two Tylenol to deal with the pain; I might need to take another two in the morn.

Man, all I wanted was to drink hot water to get rid of this oogy feeling I have.  And now I burned my damn fingers.  Hate this, this is stupid.

Political Fundraising Is Costing Me My Dream Gigs

This may be a pipe dream, and so holding onto it may be increasingly pathetic, but I still want to be a sportscaster one day.  No, I'm not doing much to turn that dream into a reality.  What I do do is remain on the periphery.  I still get jobs helping around production trucks, mainly for Vikings Games but I have done the Twins, Golden Gopher football, and the Wild.  It makes me think I haven't completely wasted my journalism degree.  And maybe, just maybe, if I hang around and prove my worth, maybe I can latch onto something permanent.  But like I said, I'm not going out there and grabbing the opportunity by the horns.  No, I'm waiting for someone to ask me out of the blue, "Hey -- have you ever thought about doing this full-time?"

As such I am far from full-time now.  I am at-will.  I can be fired for any reason and for no reason.  And I don't have to be hired back, either.  Now, I have been hired for ... golly, I think it'll be two decades this upcoming fall, and I like to think it's because I'm a good person and a hard worker.  But I'm under no illusions that it could all be taken away without a trace.  I would be totally heartbroken.  But that is how the job, or the gig, is right now.

Traditionally, I have been asked if I can work through e-mail.  Some time before the event -- for big ones it'll be months in advance, but other times I've been asked the week of -- I get an e-mail asking if I am available to work a Game, or several days leading up to the Game.  I usually say yes.  In fact, there has been only two times where I have told the production team I cannot work for them ... and now that I think about it, both assignments I had to miss because I was on a big vacation that centered around my sister: I missed a Twins Game many, many years ago (which may have been the last one I was offered until I worked on back in September) to attend my sister's destination wedding in Siena; and I missed the Vikings' epic comeback Win over Indianapolis back in mid-December for a family vacation to Hawai'i centered around my sister's doctorate graduation.

I have, thankfully, been asked back to work.  Not to say I think ill of them, but my paranoid side always thinks that if I reject them once, they may not feel the obligation to reach out to me again.  But they have despite me telling them no.  Would they continue to reach out if I don't say anything to them at all?

---

I've gotten a bit more politically active after Trump and the Republicans cheated their way to winning power in 2016 (and they did, don't lie, they did, shut up).  After that I stepped up my ... well, I really shouldn't say activism, but I put my money where my mouth is by giving cash to Democrats and Minnesota members of the Democrat-Farmer-Labor (DFL) party.  Citizens United should still be banned, but until we can ban it, we have to use it, I'm afraid.

The downside to willingly handing over money to politicians who need money in order to advertise in order to win and gain or hold onto power is that they bombard you, incessantly, with political appeals.  I have gotten so many of these goddamn things, and now, most of them are from campaigns and people I did not give money too.  Once you donate, you get put on a list, and these campaigns sell those lists to other like-minded politicians (I'll never get a missive from a Republican, thank God) because frequently, that's the only way they keep making money.  Then those fucking people bombard me with political appeals.  I get them by the hundreds each day.  Still.  Even though this isn't an election year.  One night, when I was tired, I decided not to check my e-mail.  That stretched to several nights in a row, and when I finally got around to checking my e-mail, I had a thousand unread ones.  And then I got caught up with too much stuff and yadda-yadda-yadda, I now have 40,000+ unread e-mails on my main e-mail account.  I have an older e-mail account that has, oh, God knows how much.  I am now years behind on both, and as much as I try to unsubscribe, I'm sure at least 85% of the e-mails I get nowadays are from politicians trying to hit me up for money.

I should sit down and go through them.  I really should just delete them all.  But most of the time I'm so distracted with other things that I let it metastasize, and when I do confront my inbox, my eyes glaze over.  There's a fucking blizzard of these appeals, and it's gotten hard, pretty fuckin' hard, to find the non-spammy e-mails ... such as the ones from the productions asking me if I want to work for them.

I knew this was going to happen.  But I wasn't diligent enough.  The first time I missed reading an offer to work was for a Wild Game late last year.  This one was offered via text.  Hey, did you know that when you give money to a campaign, not only do you give them permission to e-mail you to kingdom come, you give them permission to text you to kingdom come as well?  They're not as bad as the e-mails; at worst I get about a dozen a day, and many of them seem to come from the same "phone number," so any new messages from that same source is collated together and presented to me as just one long series of texts from the same "people."  But there still are so many that I ignore them.  I did not see a text from a crew person asking me to do this Wild Game.  I found it months later when I was going back through months-old texts from politicians that I couldn't be bothered to deal with (the e-mails, not the politicians, although they're also one and the same) at the time.  I profusely apologized for not getting back to her.  But I haven't been asked to do a Wild Game since.

I have finally gotten around to doing quick searches that will filter through only any e-mails that have the name of the league and "Minnesota" on them, thereby increasing the chances that I will see only offers to work.  And I found one either yesterday or earlier this week.  Unfortunately, it was for a Gopher football Game back in November.  I didn't see it for eight months.  I want to e-mail the person and apologize to her, but that would be so goddamn awkward that I don't want to jeopardize future employment with the network she works for.  

So just now I did those searches again, and I got another one.  It was for the Golden Gopher football team's season opener against Nebraska.  It's on the Thursday just before Labor Day, just like Minnesota's season opener in 2021 vs. Ohio St.  I was able to work the several days leading up to it.  Back-breaking work, but the money was too good to pass up.  And beyond that, I used my paid time off at work to work the Gopher production.  I was double-dipping.  And I have few regrets.

I thought that I could be offered a similar position this year.  I waited and waited, but I hadn't heard anything.  I believe I was asked a month before that Game against the Buckeyes, and so that was the reason I did a search in my inbox just now.  And wouldn't you know it, I saw that e-mail, unread, from Wednesday, received around noon.  I e-mailed the person back -- oh, around 11 p.m. last/Thursday night.  That's a gap of a day and a half.  That previous Gophers football gig from two years ago?  Someone e-mailed me late at night, and I responded overnight, around four hours later.  I have lost jobs to people who responded to the crewer faster than me.  I hate that, and I directly blame my tardiness in finding and responding to those e-mails on the firehose of campaign donation appeals.  If they weren't there, I would have seen that e-mail faster than I did.  Simple as that.

So I e-mailed the person saying yes, I am available and interested in working.  I didn't apologize for essentially ghosting her.  But I would if it ensured me this job.  But this person had a whole day and a half to find someone else.  Pray that I still get to work this gig.  I need to make some fucking money, man.

This Particular Situation Should Be Answered In An Advice Column

OK, this kind of is an addendum on this blog post, but 1) that blog post really was about not going to see Fleet Foxes on the 4th of July and 2) I am going to take this situation a little farther afield, so I think this should stand on its own.

So yeah, I was kind of regretting committing to the Nickel Creek concert I had some buyer's remorse over, and I was hoping for a lifeline/miracle.  And yesterday/Sunday afternoon, I got one: He could not go because the childcare that night fell through.  He was going to sell the other ticket.

Yes, this was my chance to undo all I did -- get my money back, go to the United Match, all that.  But ... and I do mean this sincerely, there are a couple logical, non-nefarious thoughts that popped into my head that led me to ask this man to undo our arrangement.  First, I know it is quite difficult to sell single tickets, especially when compared to selling two.  I can see a couple wanting to see this concert because their Saturday night suddenly came free.  This guy wouldn't be able to do that if I still had this seat.

Second, and I hope this doesn't sound creepy: I had the expectation that I was going to see Nickel Creek with him.  I don't know the guy, and I'm not really into strangers, and I sure as hell am not looking at this like a date.  But we are in the same affinity group, so we have that to talk about as we're getting drinks or waiting for the main act during intermission.  I am definitely not looking forward to sitting next to some random person.  I know I need to reach out beyond my bubble of trust, socialize, and take a risk by talking to someone I don't know.  But I'm not into looking at the seat next to me thinking that he or she (probably he) thinks that our seats used to belong to someone and his spouse.  That's just too weird, man.  Maybe that shouldn't matter.  But considering the circumstances by which I became aware of this ticket, I think at least meeting up with the person selling it is not too much to ask.  And so if he can't go, I don't want to, either.  Does that make me an asshole?

Problem potentially is, I did not say that, or anything implying that, when I texted him that it might be best if I get my money back and he gets the ticket back because he can now attempt to sell a pair.  From his point of view, maybe my request to take this all back would come off as weird; why would I care if I don't know the person I sit next to when we're both just there for Nickel Creek?  He must think something else is going on ... like I was really looking forward to seeing the concert with him.  Oh God, he must think I'm a creep.  Not to mention that I am actually asking for money back.

Seeing as I want to un-fuck myself, and since he asked that I choose whether to keep or sell back the ticket by this/Monday afternoon, I just transferred the ticket back to him.  And I texted him (at 12:02 a.m. -- I have no boundaries) that I gave back the ticket to him, please give me back my money when he can.  I'll tell you that just before I bought the ticket from him, I suddenly had the idea that this guy could be catfishing me.  I've never seen him; he could be an elderly woman living in Alaska for all I know.  But he had enough of a Facebook trail that I believe he is who he says he is.  And assuming that we are upstanding members of this same social group, I will trust that in the morning, he will give back the money.

And yet I wonder if I'm being a dick for doing all this.  Maybe I should just go to the concert, just because I did all this and I have left a trail of destruction and, possibly, mistrust in order to un-do what I kind of think is a rash mistake.  On top of all that, I'm doing this so I can go watch Minnesota United, who I watched piss down their legs Saturday night to Austin, 4-1.  LAFC is in bad form right now, but they're in playoff position and the Loons are not.  Another ass-kicking could be in the cards, and I decided to put this poor dude through a bunch of crap so I could witness a bunch of crap?

This is like a Seinfeld episode from hell.  Miss Manners, what should I do?

You Need To Say Something, Dumbass Low Talker!!

OK, so I was kind of out of it Saturday/Christmas Eve as we decided to head to a waterfall on the other side of the Big Island.  After getting there, we all kind of agreed that we would go to the bathroom before beginning our hike.

When I got to the men's room, there was a guy standing there -- on the other side of the bathroom door, waiting for the guy in the only urinal there to pee.  Of course he didn't want to leer behind the guy while he was whizzing, but he was giving him more than, you know, six feet of distance.  He actually looked like he was waiting for his friend to finish peeing.  So I said to him, "Are you in line?" to which he said ... something.  Honestly, I have no idea what he said.  He grunted or some shit.  And I was still fighting off the flu; my head was in a fog and all my joints were aching, and so I guess I just ignored whatever he snorted out of his mouth and waited until the guy got done at the urinal.  I stepped out and this little bitch screamed out, "Hey!  I was waiting here!"  And I was all, "Sorry!  I didn't understand you!"  Thankfully, the guy using the stall got done right after the guy at the urinal, so it wasn't as if I was waiting there for weeks or anything like that.

But I made sure I peed really, really slowly.  And when I got out of that stall, and my whole entire time at the waterfall, I was looking around, sometimes putting my head down, and frequently balling up my fist in case I saw that motherfucker walking down to the waterfall with us.  It would just be my luck that that asshole would be arriving at the same time we do, so I had to defend myself in case he didn't want to let this go.  Thankfully I didn't see that prick, but if I did, I was ready to throw down, flu bug or no.

Look, I think he was a goddamn low talker.  If I was cutting in line, speak up!  And get a little closer to the urinal, would you, pretty please?  I don't want you looking over his shoulder, but close that fucking gap so it looks like you need to pee too.  Jesus fucking Christ. ...

ATF Missed Connection Again? You Gotta Be Fuckin' Kidding Me

I was ready to go down to My Favorite Stripclub (Cover Edition) to see my ATF there, ******a.  This place is great because they have a webpage that shows the roster every day, and I believe it's accurate.  And she ain't workin' tonight.  Dammit.  I was going to switch into my porno pants and a t-shirt that says "Elect Hoes" on it and go there straight from work.

This is the second time this has happened.  The first time was the Friday of Memorial Weekend.  And like today, I was checking the strip club website every day leading up to the day I was going to visit to make sure she was working and not on a weeklong vacation, as she has told me she tries to do from time to time.  I thought that is she was working through the week, she'd work through the more lucrative weekend.  I've been wrong both times, and although she doesn't owe me a damn thing, I hate that my plan to see her has fallen through a second time.

Tonight I guess I'll work out.  The community center I go to is in summer hours where they are closed Friday evenings and Sundays.  Saturdays over there may be a madhouse, but I think it's worth it to work out on a Saturday night at least once this summer.  As for ******a, well, I'll try again next Friday.  I'm scared, though, that she'll take Independence Weekend off, in which case I probably will just go some time the week after just to see her, planning be damned.

Fuck Lawn Mowing

Man, all I wanted to do was mow the lawn.  But then I threw up a little in mouth a second time so I had to stop and go inside to get a generic Pepto-Bismol tablet (which got the attention of My Mother, who now sews in the dining room, to get all up in my business about why am I taking medicine), and then I decided to throw away the wrapper in the bathroom instead of the kitchen because My Fucking Mother might ask more questions, but then as I bend down to toss the wrapper in the trash can my left headphone falls off my ear and into the toilet paper in the trash and then as I bend up that left headphone gets caught on the side of the trash can so my right earphone falls off my right ear and when I bend down again to pick up both headphones I hit my head against the bathroom counter.  Motherfuck!

Then after I went outside I had to go back inside -- at least I think so, I don't know -- because the goddamn suntan lotion got into and started stinging my eyes.  But at least I didn't lose my headphones in toilet paper filled with my shit nor bang my head against the counter.  Small victories, right?

Oh, and then once I got done, I had to grab a plastic bag to put all the grass clippings in.  But when I took out the rear bag behind the mower, I didn't, because the goddamn rear chute wasn't open for clippings to go into the rear bag.  I thought it was connected, but it wasn't.  It looked connected when I got the mower.  I thought Father just kept the bag connected to the mower and the rear chute open to the bag, but he didn't.  But it looked like it was because he rested the bag on the mower in such a way that I just assumed that it was all hooked up.  Yeah, I looked at the rear bag and actually connected it to the mower without opening up the rear chute.  Why do you ask?

Gah!  It's the 4th of July.  Here's Soundgarden's "4th of July," aka The Greatest Song Ever:

Best Laid Plans Ruined, Part I

I wanted to check the air pressure in my tires today.  You are supposed to check them weekly.  I don't do that, but since my tire spontaneously popped that one time back in September I am more cognizant of checking.  And I thought I would have the time today because I had to come in a half-hour early.  That would give me enough time to check, go to the gas station to pump air into them if need be, and get home in time to eat and take a nap before my night work.

Did I get to do that?  Nope.

The daily shipment of forms was late by at least an hour, and maybe more like 90 minutes.  And since all the forms that come in have to be pushed out, I had to stay late ... by about half an hour.  Maybe I had a few minutes to check my tires real quick, but come 3:30, everybody comes out of the building to leave, and our campus only has one exit, so seeing two, maybe even three red lights before you could go through that light is not uncommon.  I didn't have time to get stuck back there, especially if I start the car at 3:30, if I need to go to the gas station, so I said screw that and left before my co-workers streamed out of there like it was the last day of school.

I don't know when I can check my tires.  It won't be tomorrow because I work till 3:30.  Friday I leave at 11, but by then the weather is supposed to get stupid humid, so I don't know if I want to linger outside my car for two minutes to check the pressure in my tires.  All weekend my car won't be on a level surface for a long enough time for me to check properly.  So the very earliest I could check would be Monday ... when it may still be hot and humid and it might rain.  Great.  Fucking great.

Expenses Without Receipts

Might as well do this now.  Starting from Tuesday, March 9:

• And we go back to Sunday, March 7, where, because I was given a Starbucks gift card (man, I forget who I got it from), I stopped by there before going into work.  Unlike the last time I visited, their lobby was open, so I got a short mocha and egg bites.  I forget how small and, well, "European" those shorts are.  That size is almost cute in my American mind.  What isn't cute is the parking lot, though; damn, man, they need to fix their potholes.  Oh, and I don't like the store's footprint; it dead-ends, and you have to go around the place to both park and hit the drive-thru.  Great customer service, but bad placement and horrible landscaping.  Charged what the gift card didn't sop up, but I gave at the tip jar: $1.
• Then we go back to Friday the 5th, where, even though I was delayed by one week, I was able to get my shoes shined by Lisa.  My left Doc is on its last legs -- or laces.  I had to pay her a dollar less than I usually do because I needed the rest of the cash I had on hand to go to the DMV, which ultimately didn't matter (I'll blog post about that later) and I didn't have the right ATM card on hand (should blog post about that some other time).  Man, this situation was Seinfeldian.  I told Lisa I'll make it up to her next time.  Total: $14.
• And back on Saturday, February 27, after coming in to work from the afternoon to the evening to take in some overtime, I decided it was time to visit ******a for a well-needed naked massage.  She was great.  Massaged with only a bikini top on.  Baby steps!  Paid her: $80.

Not a whole lot of EWRs.  That would be a good thing, but I'm charging a lot of online porn to my credit card.  I should blog post about that, too.

Good through March 9.

Slow To Start ... Hasn't Gone Unnoticed

Oh yeah, I should talk about this now.

I had a sneaking suspicion someone would bring it up, but it finally happened a few weeks ago.  One of my bosses e-mailed me a reminder that I was supposed to start on time, even (or especially) with these cut hours.  I had to be punched in at a certain time plus or minus "x" minutes from my start time, and then I am supposed to be in a position to work shortly thereafter.

That is the expectation during normal hours, and I have a problem meeting that.  But the combination of the pandemic and the economic fallout from the pandemic have made "being ready to work at the appointed time" all but impossible.  Here are some of the reasons why.

We are now being screened at work; it's just a few questions about how we are feeling.  We are then checked off and given a mask.  However, we are now required to go through a certain door in order to meet up with our supervisor.  For me, this particular door is front-facing.  We have lot parking, but nearly all the spaces out front are taken.  Actually, nearly all of the ones in the back are taken, too, but the nearest one to this door is in the back.  So, I have to park and walk all the way to the front in order to get to the door I have to go through now.

Moreover, even though we are told to punch in not too soon nor too far from our start time, we are not allowed into the building until five minutes before our start time.  So picture this: I have to find parking, stop the car, get all my stuff, walk around to the front and report to my supervisor (or the supervisor manning that particular door), but not too late, but not too early, either.  Pain in the ass.

I still get food that I have to take from home.  Don't need food since I'm working only four hours and I often get fast food, but I need to keep the peace at home or I'll be thrown out.  I need to walk to the work fridge and toss that in there.  That takes time.

And then I get coffee.  Not just anywhere, oh no.  We have two breakrooms.  One of them has this special coffeemaker whereby once you bring up a cup of coffee, this machine grinds beans in order to make a brewed cup for you.  It's much better than the other one, which is just coffee sitting in thermoses.  Totally makes a difference.  Anyway, this is something that I know I cannot do on company time.  So I punch in after I get this coffee (and get creamer too, that's so important).  And I usually am a few, if not several, minutes after my start time when I punch in.  (Getting coffee usually is not an issue, but under a "normal" day I would get it for morning break, when I have time to leisurely get coffee, not when I'm in a rush to show that I'm at work when I'm supposed to be at work.  And even though I still get one break these days, I need my coffee to start the day, so I will not wait till my break, nosiree.)

So, you can tell all the obstacles in my way to get to my desk on time, right?  (OK, I sometimes get drive-thru at McDonald's in the morning before work, and I usually don't get up early enough whereby I don't rush to work.  I admit that I make it easier on myself when I don't get Mickey D's, but I'll call that another obstacle.)  The trouble doesn't stop there; I may be finally punched in, but now the perception that I'm not working kicks in.  You see, stopping the spread of the virus has called for now cleaning protocols at work.  We are now supposed to clean our desk at the beginning and the end of our shift with disinfectant wipes and/or bottles of sanitizer.  Totally understand that, and I agree with that protocol because of the advanced age of my parents.  But I am thorough.  Very thorough -- I wipe down the desk and the keyboard and the mouse and the scanner and the desk height not and the handles of my chair and the monitor and the pens and, even, my personal items like my phone and badge and keys and glasses.  Hey, this fucking virus is a killer.

Oh, and did I mention that I need to log into my computer ... and then bring up all the software I need to work, many of which are veeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeery slooooooooooooooooow... and, well, I need to get out my satellite radio and attach all the wires together, and then take out my headphones because hey, I can't get through a day without listening to something.  And then there's the radio for once Stephanie Miller ends.  And because my hands are so darn sticky from the wipes/sanitizer, I just have to wash my hands; hey, you're supposed to wash your hands when you enter a building anyway, amirite?  Finally, I'm ready!  And, uh, I'm about ten or fifteen minutes late.  So that's all that e-mail is complaining about.

My actual boss (the one who controls my performance review and my pay) followed up, thankfully, with a more detailed discussion where he allowed me to explain my plight.  He understood that when I was cleaning my desk I was following company protocol, he understood that I needed to be fastidious in this cleaning because of my parents, and he believed me when I said I get coffee before I clock in.  So I gave a little and have compromised: I will boot up my computer before I start cleaning, and I will use sanitizer for my hands instead of going to the bathroom to wash them.  Everything else I guess I have to try and hurry up.

It's not helping too much.  Since that talk, which was more than a week ago, I was able to cut my time down so that I'm ready to start keying at, uh, ten minutes after my start time.  That's ... progress?  Good enough?  I don't know.  What I do know is that I haven't heard any flak from either my authority figures or supervisor or co-workers, so if there is any talk that I'm slacking, well, I can say that no one told me.

I'll be able to tolerate starting my day like this -- rushing to work, walking all the way down to the breakroom and back, cleaning like the dickens, boosting the feng shui of my desk and waiting for my computer to start -- by looking a tad tardy to begin work until, well, someone else complains.

Forgot Again

Man, I went over to a stripper girlfriend's place to help her unlock her iPad and I forgot to bring the dongle that would connect my laptop to her device.  And since I couldn't just go back home and pick it up and bring it over to her -- "Why are you going again?  Where would you be going in the middle of a pandemic?" my parents would ask -- I had to give up on today and go back probably tomorrow.

Pisses me the fuck off, and I can only be mad at myself.  I swear I stuck the dongle in my backpack, but instead I put it in my computer bag.  I would have brought my computer bag, but bringing it with me in the morning would have made Mother suspicious.  And now I have to waste a day going back to her place --  a day I had planned on working out, or patronizing a small business by buying their food.  And maybe I shouldn't have, but I got a massage from her, so I spent money today, which means I shouldn't spend money tomorrow even though I planned on it and ... sorry, I got tired of blogging about this.  Let's just say I'm pissed that I forgot something again, and I have to do it over.

Time To Deal With A Goddamn Alarm Again

So I was taking a late shower just now when I heard a beep.  You know, it's one of those intermittent, replace-the-alarm-battery beeps bullshit that seems to happen at an in opportune time, like in the dead of night.

I dealt with this bullshit one winter when both parents were wintering.  I had to play the game called "Where Is The Fucking Beep Coming From?" and realized that the sound of one beep (oh yeah, there were two at this time) wasn't coming from the alarm in the hallway but from the one in my sister's room, spaced maybe six feet apart.

I swear that a human can detect where a beep is coming from, but apparently you can't.  I thought it was in the upstairs hallway; it wasn't.  I dawdled at the top of the stairs; the beep actually was coming from downstairs.  So I grab all the batteries I saved up just for this occasion (save for AAA, and I'll be goddamned if I ever come across a situation where I'll need AAA and don't have them) and went downstairs to begin the hunt.

There is a smoke alarm downstairs, stuck to the ceiling, just outside my parents' room.  I looked at it while it beeped, and once it did, I ripped it down and replaced the 9V, then put it back in.  But goddammit, it kept beeping and beeping.

Turns out that wasn't where the beep was coming from.  I swear that as I was looking at this smoke alarm I could hear its beep go from it to my ears ... but it's not, and that's fucking bullshit.  So I'm frantically trying to detect where this fucking beep is before its next audio bullet penetrates my eardrum.

I finally realize that, in fact, it was coming from the CO detector, which was plugged into an outlet next to Father's old radio setup.  And this time I know it had to be the case because as I heard it beep, the red "ALARM" light lit up.  (I'm smart.)  So I pull it out in order to change the batteries.  But as soon as I unplug it, that intermittent beep turns into a sustained wail that absolutely fucking hurts my ears.  I had to plug it back in so I could be ready to deal with it.  The second time I pulled it out I turned it around and saw that I needed a goddamn screwdriver to open the cover, so I had to plug it in again, go upstairs and get my Swiss Army Knife.  Jesus fucking Christ, all of this over an alarm!

So I pull the CO alarm a third time and I dash into the laundry room because I didn't want to wake my parents.  (Oh, and by the way, throughout all of this, neither of my parents came out to see what was going on.  Did they not hear the beeps, or my footsteps coming down the stairs, or the wail from the CO alarm?  I don't get it.)  I get it open and replace the battery and screw the cover back on and plug it back into the outlet ... and 15 Seconds later I hear a beep.  I unscrew it and believe I put the 9 Volt in the wrong way, so I try it again, and plug it in again, and it beeps again.  Goddammit!!!  What the fuck is going on with this fucking thing?!  I got tired of the bullshit at this point, plus it's late at night, so I took out the new battery (it actually might be old; I usually don't toss used-up batteries until I can get it tested to make sure it absolutely is out of juice) and left the alarm unplugged on the ottoman.

So the battery I replaced the old one with may be old itself.  Maybe, just maybe I didn't plug it back in right (shrug).  I didn't really time it, and if the beep is 30 Seconds apart instead of 15, maybe the alarm has to be thrown away.  It is 11 Years old, after all.  Or maybe I can't understand how this shit works and I'll need Father to help me.

But the beeping is gone.  The ringing continues to ring in my ears, but the beeping is gone.

A New Goddamn Sound From The Old Car

Wanted to use the old car a lot Sunday because 1) I wanted to use Seafoam for the nearly-empty tank and 2) I wanted to park it level so I could finally check the air pressure on the tires.

To the former, I bought a funnel to pour the Seafoam through the gas cap, but when I tried it after work it turns out the funnel was not long enough.  Then I checked the tire pressure.  To the latter, the driver's-side rear was so low I had to pump 19 kpa into it.  So my plan on going down to Roseville to get some roast beef was thwarted.

Instead I hiked it back to one of only two gas stations that had free air.  Luckily, the space next to it was free, so I immediately pumped air into that really bad tire.  It's funny that you don't really notice a tire with no air, but once you squeeze it and see that's really, you know, squishy, it's obvious that it does need air.  (There is also a hairline fracture cutting along the side of the tire, and I wonder if having low pressure long enough caused it.  I checked that tire after I got home, and so far, it looks like there is no leak or puncture or anything.)  I had to pump air into the other three tires, but nowhere near 19 kpa, that's for sure.

So I drive out and I hit what seems to be a pothole.  And then I hear, from the back of the car, a loud, sucking sound.  And from then on, I heard it whenever I accelerated from a stop.  It's like there's a hole back there -- that, or, like, the fuel pump is really getting taxed.  I have no fucking idea what it could be.  Maybe Father's mechanic can check it out.

Oh, after the gas station I went home, picked up some food coupons (though I didn't use them at all -- went to Wendy's for Happy Hour instead, and to pick up their white mac 'n' cheese), returned the short funnel at the other gas station, went to AutoZone to buy a long and proper funnel, then went to Arby's, then went home whereby I finally Seafoamed the old car.  (Yeah, I make myself busy.)  Went out to Caffetto and then Pryes at night, and the car runs smooth and quiet.  Well, maybe not quiet with the loud, sucking sound emanating from the back, but still.

Shit, the car is driving OK besides that, and besides that shaking that started up a few weeks ago.  That goddamn noise hasn't stopped, either.

Because Of A Fucking Ramp?!?!?!

I planned on not spending any money today.  I also thought I would be staying in until the evening because it would be snowing outside.  But after the three inches I plowed last night around 9, we got only another inch.  A total of four, when we were supposed to get eight, even ten?  I'll take it!

My original, original plan was to go out this morning for EPL downtown.  Really was going to brave it if, by some reason, the snowstorm was not as cataclysmic as I thought it would be.  It was far from it this morning; I saw no snow, and the snow that fell after I plowed it I would not normally even shovel.

So I was going to go out!  But wait, I need to spend money!  No -- they were offering free pastries and coffee!  So I can go in, eat and drink, hang out, and once the 9 o'clock games were over, I'm gone -- without spending money!  Great!

Well, that was my plan.  I was going to park in their ramp, which was supposed to be free as well, then leave.  But (and I'll be honest, I kind of lost interest in blogging this, so I am going to begin skipping through the details) when I tried driving up to the ramp, the arm was down.  When I park here, for free, that arm is up.  Why was it down?  I was going to have to pay in order to leave, and my mantra was no money.

And what's worse is that when I backed down the driveway, I got stuck.  Glad I had this new car shovel.  (Used it; when I went to put it in the back [as I was spending money at Arby's -- you'll see what I mean], there was not a speck of water on it.)  But while I was digging myself out, this guy, probably living in the poor hotels a couple blocks away, volunteered to push me out.  I didn't have to be pushed out; I was able to shovel all the snow out of under my car, and frankly, I don't think this motherfucker did any shit.  But goddammit, I felt trapped.  I couldn't just reject his help and then, once he "helped," I couldn't not give him money.  So I backed out of the car while he essentially did nothing and I gave him two bucks.

So now I spent money today, and therefore I need to spend money on another thing today because I already spent money, and that's why I got Arby's even though I'll be eating at my aunt and uncle's place in a couple hours.  And all because I had to pay to park when I wasn't supposed to?  Fuck this.

Goddamn I Hate Motherfucking March Madness

Gonzaga.  Kentucky.  Duke.  I had three teams that I picked that could have gotten to the Final Four if they won their Regional Finals this weekend.  (I had no shot of winning anything in either of my bracket pools.  Unlike what I said on WAF before, I did not realize that I was already eliminated from my frenemy's pool.)  It's been at least three years since I correctly picked a Final Four team.  I can't win any money, so breaking this streak and thus showing I can predict something right is now the only thing I'm living for.

WELL, WHAT DO YOU THINK FUCKING HAPPENED?!  GONZAGA -- DEAD!  KENTUCKY -- DEAD!!  DUKE -- DEAD!!!  I GO 0-FOR-3 -- 0-FOR-3!!!  HOW DOES THAT FUCKING HAPPEN?!?!  WHY DOES THIS BULLSHIT ONLY FUCKING HAPPEN TO ME?!  WHY CAN'T I CHOOSE FINAL FOUR TEAMS ANYMORE?!  AND WHY IN THE FUCK DID I TRICK MYSELF INTO PLAYING THIS STUPID, CRUEL FUCKING GAME AGAIN?!?!?!

And now do I realize that it may have been incredibly stupid of me to bet on this tournament because I am working the Final Four.  I am lying to myself right now, thinking that losing three of my Final Four teams this weekend simply could not have happened.  Because if I truly accept the fact that I swung and missed on not one, not two, but three Elite 8 games and going from having something to look forward to in The Big Dance's final weekend into being done early for the fourth fucking year in a row ... well, I might just fucking throw myself off a bridge.  Seriously, this could cause me to have a real bad fucking attitude, and I don't want to feel that while I'm working a job concerning that bracket.

(Aside: Even though I just had dinner, I spent an hour almost polishing off a whole bag of Doritos.  My rage and depression is seeping out in the form of eating my feelings.  Do you know a whole bag contains 1,500 calories?  And I just ate, like, 1,350 or so?)

I should have just stepped away from gambling for just this one year, so I won't be swayed by any teams that reached the Final Four.  I could have come into this gig with no skin in the game and thus a clean slate on which I could project a positive attitude.  But ... no, I had to think that I could master The Big Dance this time around.

Boy, am I so goddamn wrong.

Goddamn, I hate motherfucking March Madness.

The Dealership Is Gonna Judge Me

I forgot to add in my previous post that the low tire pressure indicator light is also on and is not shutting off.  Once again, the winter is making the car think my tires are low, no matter how many times I put air in it.

It was my plan to put some air in it before I came home from my cousin's place, at which I was watching the Super Bowl.  (Oh, by the way, I thought the defensive struggle was fascinating.  Seriously!)  I even asked them if there was a gas station between their place and mine.  There was, and I went there -- and unfortunately their air machine wasn't working.

And I could have gone somewhere else, but the freezing rain and ice has settled in and not backed off till later, like I had hoped.  There is some serious sliding going on right now, so I don't feel like going to a place which has a free air pump, at least not tonight.

Oh, today I did go online and, somewhat miraculously, I found an appointment time to bring my car in tomorrow/Monday.  (By the way, what happens after you hit 0% oil life is that the car counts the miles under which you passed 0, i.e. "-1 mile," "-2 miles," etc.  And the number blinks, too.  Thanks.)  Maybe I'll go to the gas station before heading off to the dealership to get air in my tires, assuming that somehow the ice has melted away.  But what if I don't?  The low tire pressure indicator light has been on all winter, and not because there air in my tires is low.  Like I said, I have put the proper amount of air in it a couple times this season and that indicator is still on, so it's the car, not me.  And yet, if there is such little air in my tires, or if I don't at least check how much is in there, and the dealership sees that there is little air in my tires, are they going to believe me when I say it's been on all winter, or are they going to think that it came on because I haven't been responsible for checking the air in my tires?  If the latter, will they judge me?  Moreover, should I care?

All this because a gas station from my cousin's to home doesn't have an air pump and because it's freezing rain outside.  Man, my life. ...

Hmmm; This Annoys Me About My Supervisor. It's A Fine Point, But A Salient One, At Least For Me

OK, this situation arose out of a perfect storm of circumstances, and they are so jumbled that I will not describe it with any sense of justice nor clarity.  But I'll write anyway.

So I was at my old department yesterday/Saturday.  Work was slow all week, but it somehow seemed to pick up after lunch, so I was inundated with going through the files.

The rotation of the seats was such that I was at the right-most.  That is right next to the window through which these files are passed into my department.  It is also closest to the scanner.  You see, when this folder is passed through the window, it is quickly riffled through for red ink and tears that might affect the applications as they go through the scanner.  Once they're prepared, it gets sent through the scanner.  Once they're scanned, they're logged in and placed in a hanging rack where we sit.  It's important that the files be scanned so we can enter the data on each application in our software system.  And it's important that we eventually get the physical folders after all the information is entered so, if need be, we could look at the actual form for discrepancies and any pieces of information that are not totally clear on the image of the application.  Got that?

In short, it's important that these files get worked through the scanning process.  Without it, the people working down the line don't have any work.  And for now, and usually on Saturdays, there is only one person dedicated to scanning.  One has been OK for this past week.  Hell, the work was so slow half a person was more than enough.  But especially on Tuesdays, when work is at its most, we need two.  Still with me?

I am still not sure how to do this part of my job.  What to enter and what not to enter -- shit like that I think I have finally gotten down (or at least I have just let it pass, one of the two), but there are still huge swaths of things I have either not done or had done so long ago that it might as well be new to me.  One of the latter is scanning.  One of the former is reading the flow of work and knowing when to key and when to help prepare and scan these folders that are coming in.  Know what I mean?

Oh, and my supervisor had a half-day but was bitching about wanting the full day because I think his kids have a basketball tournament.

Oh, and I usually have my headphones on because I'm bored as shit at this department.  And the Wild game was on.  And I hate this department.

---

OK, so I set the parameters.  But I need to add this: I have been warned in the past not to bury myself in my headphones because, from time to time, someone will call for me, out of the blue, for something.  You damn right I have ignored those warnings, and I'll keep ignoring them.  Why?  See above.

My supervisor has this super-annoying knack to, whenever he needs something, he will just call it out, into the ether, while not looking at my direction.  That is apparently what happened early yesterday afternoon, but since I was buried in my work, I only half-heard him, you know?  I had enough of a spidey sense to rip off one of my headphones just in case he was talking to me.  And he was talking to me.  Oh my goodness, he was: "I told you to start prepping."

Oh, did you now?

OK, one thing that I just popped into my head: I don't remember if he used the word "told" or "asked."  As I am ginning up my memories about this incident, my feelings of embarrassment and anger are also welling up inside me, and in my triggered state, there is one hell of a difference between "asked" and "told," and I hope you can just tell the difference without me needing to spell it out for you.

But my original bone to pick with what he said to me is the first part: "I told you ..."  I understand the need for the work to continue to flow.  I still can't tell when to drop everything I'm doing and go to the preparation station, but that's because I was, you know, actually doing work.  My supervisor and I are probably on the same page on that.  It's what we're there for.  Moreover, I'm guessing that he didn't want to be there.  I've snapped at people while at work before, so I understand that sometimes people will snap at me.  (Hell, it's already happened.)  I'm not leaving this job immediately over this, but I'll just keep track of how many of these angry retorts he says to me over the years, and maybe it'll accumulate to a point where I'll say to hell with this job.

Anyway, I take a large amount of goddamn umbrage with the phrase "I told you."  When one says that, one is telling you that he thinks you need to know he is repeating an order to you.  In fact, you are saying to me that you feeling as though you need to repeat an order to me is as important, if not more important, than the order itself.

Well, shit, I got some fucking news for him -- I don't give a good goddamn that he had to repeat himself.  His petty annoyances of me listening to the radio because I don't want to hear the chitchat he and my other co-workers are saying during the workday don't mean shit compared to what needs to get done.  He can just say, "Start prepping."  He should just say, "Start prepping."  Ideally, he should look me in the eye when he says, "Start prepping," even though that sure as shit ain't gonna happen.  But I don't care if he or any other of my authority figures have warned me before about shutting the environment from my ears because I don't want to hear.  He'll probably have to fuckin' repeat himself a hundred times the next time he wants me to do something.  I don't care how he fucking feels when he repeats himself.  Tell me what needs to get done, and leave your fucking feelings out of it.

And of course I'll be warned about not paying attention to the work environment, and I'll say sorry, I try and be better at it.  Fuck all this. ...

Third Time's The Charm To Deposit A Fucking Check

Parents got a check from our gas utility.  Refund -- Minnesota's cool like that, even though other states may do the same thing.  Anyway, it's my job to deposit it according to my folks' wishes.

I have tried doing that, I swear.  But the first time I went to the bank, I had brought my parents' checkbook so I would know the account number, but I had forgotten the check.  I had left it on the piano.  And the second time I tried to do it, just yesterday/Tuesday, I had brought the check but I forgot the checkbook and thus the account number.  I left it in my computer bag.

Swear to God, I have never had such goddamn trouble depositing a fucking check.  I hope today/Wednesday, after work and before ***e* cleans the house and dirties me with a handjob, will finally be the bleepin' day I can turn in this son-of-a-bitch check.