I hacked off my fingernails and now my nails are Crapple keyboard ready (even though this is my last day of having to use this damn keyboard). The cooler’s thermostat stopped working yesterday, but Tom managed to fix it. Now if our shit could stop breaking, we can maybe get on with our lives.

We launched our first Beanie Baby listing on eBay.

I realized that there’s no urgency in weekly MD backups between now and when we launch our own site because I can just back up from Word if I get banned from MyOpera.

I was taking melatonin supplements and doing well there for a while by getting up between 8am-9am, but then my fucking allergies had to go and wake me up at 2:30 and fuck up my schedule. This is because I couldn’t get back to sleep right away and had to take a Benadryl to settle my nose down. So it was close to noon when I got up today. Oh well, more alone time for me since I should be up well past Tom’s bedtime. Then again, I’m PMSing, sluggish and out of vitamins, so maybe not.

The worst thing is the disturbing dream I had last night. I wish I could believe it was just a dream and not a warning of bad things to come, but for someone who’s prone to dream premonitions, it makes me rather nervous. Tom and I obviously ran out of money and hit the streets. We were in a large room at one point where rows and rows of cots were laid out. Of course we had to be next to a bunch of loud Mexicans, but I at least enjoyed being able to understand most of what they were saying. “How long can we be here?” I asked Tom. “A week? A month?”

Tom shook his head unfortunately and said, “You have to be on the streets for a week before you can get another ticket.”

Then in another scene from the same dream, we were somewhere else and I was trying to discourage Tom from trying to get us an apartment, saying that while I missed my stereo and wished I could take a shower, I liked our newfound freedom, pointing out that we no longer had to worry about losing what we no longer had to lose. So let’s get another ticket.

In reality, while it’s true that you can’t worry about losing what you don’t have to lose, there’s no way I would choose the streets over a place to live, even if it was a tiny, rundown apartment surrounded by nothing but freeloaders who feel the best way to show their gratitude for their welfare checks is by driving their neighbors crazy. We could only be faced with homelessness due to circumstances totally out of our control, and even then we still wouldn’t choose the streets if it was our only choice, but death instead.

Tom said it sounded like a disaster dream instead and not a homeless dream. But what difference would it make whether we lost the place due to a disaster like a forest fire or to lack of money?

In the end, if God wants us dead, then if He doesn’t have us killed in a car accident or something like that, I guess He could pile much more than we could handle onto our shoulders to get us to off ourselves, but I hope He could never hate us that much. That’s just the thing, though. He’s hated others worse than us, so why not? I still totally believe without a doubt that He loves some of us, He likes some of us, and He hates some of us. And we’re probably a 7 on His hate scale with 10 being the most hated.

Later…

Much to my utter amazement, my teeth are noticeably whiter after just 3 peroxide rinses. Sure tastes like shit, though. Even after rinsing it with this bleachy water. Yeah, Jesse put bleach in the tanks to purify the water and keep things from growing in the tanks. Tom noticed the difference too.

So anyway, Andy and I had an awesome two-hour talk!!! Wouldn’t want to make a habit of it since, as we both agree, we’ve come to hate phones, but it was great to catch up on what he’s been doing over the last decade. I’m all the more glad to have an online blog so he would already know what’s been going on with me and we didn’t have to make it a four-hour talk just to get caught up.

I felt both a pinch of guilt for walking away all those years ago like I did, as well as very glad to be talking to him and having him back in my life again. I wanted so badly to reach through the phone and hug him!

I will admit that a part of me did wonder if he may be out to simply try to push God on me and annoy me in any way he could by chewing in my ear, nagging me and whatever, but he didn’t do this at all. And I didn’t get the impression his ultimate goal was to dump me as a punishment. He seemed genuinely glad to talk to me and to be a part of my life again.

There were two things he told me that can’t go online, and I keep all my friends’ secrets, even if they piss me off.

He told me of the different places he lived in back in Arizona, before leaving Arizona for good in the spring of 2007. Yeah, I was both shocked and not shocked to learn this because I know how much he loved it there. He misses it, but he just can’t take that kind of heat anymore, so he let his mother talk him into returning back east, promising to give him his inheritance then if he did. That was the condo. They’re actually apartments turned condos, and his mother lives next door. She cooks him dinner every night, and once a month Andy takes her out to dinner and picks up the tab himself. The payments are only $436 a month and all utilities are included. He’s super lucky! Though I myself would hate to be back east or anywhere else that gets snow. He has a two-story condo with two bedrooms.

So now I know the Tempe hit wasn’t his. If it wasn’t someone I don’t know, that leaves Evie or the black bitch as a possibility. Probably Evie since I know she lives in Tempe but never saw a Tempe listing for the other one.

As he said, he’s not rich, but he’s been getting by comfortably.

After enjoying swimming in Stevie’s mom’s pool, and after 3½ years with Laura as a roommate which he eventually tossed out, he’s lived alone ever since and prefers it that way. He won the fondness of Stevie by providing her with copies of demos she’d lost over the years and she was very grateful to him for that.

Ah, the beauty of having ADHD. I’m really buzzing with joy over my chat with Andy that I’m having trouble focusing. ADHD makes focusing on things hard no matter what, but when I’m very happy or pissed, it makes it harder.

So where was I? Oh, yeah. Andy wanted out of the restaurant business, saying he felt he became a shitty waiter and just hated the shit that went with it. I know what it’s like. Those few months we worked graves at Denny’s in Chicopee, MA in 1990 was no fun. I liked the extra money, but that’s where the fun stopped other than the free food we got and getting to pull pranks like the time we put the container of Russian salad dressing inside the bigger container of blue cheese dressing. What a mess that would have been to clean! No wonder my life was so shitty then with all the shit I was pulling on people, cuz as Andy and I agree, what goes around comes around. He assured me that karma really does apply to my perps. That’s a comforting thought to know for someone who’s always felt her perps got full protection from above and were never made to pay for a damn thing they did to me. I hope he’s right and that it’s not just wishful thinking since we can never know what’s going on in their lives. Bad things also happen to good people who are behaving and not bothering a soul, so when Tom first got laid off I had to wonder why. What had we done to deserve that when my worst “crime” at the time was bitching about Jesse letting the dogs bark?

Back to Andy, who asked that I call him by his first name whenever we talk from now on, though I can keep calling him Andy here. It’ll take some getting used to, but I promised to do my best to remember to call him by his real name. He feels Andy sounds too faggy and too little boyish. He has no problems with his gayhood, but well, you know how some people are.

Andy worked for various temp agencies, got sick of that, then finally went into business on his own, fed up with working for others. I didn’t know this, but my dad sold his dad a restroom cleaning service business that I was too young to remember. I guess this was around the time he was first diagnosed with heart problems.

I just got up to check my teeth again and to see if I saw them with a different perspective this time around, but nope. They really do look whiter! hugs Andy But I don’t have periodontal disease (at least I don’t think I do) like he does. My gums are ok. It’s my enamel that’s no good. It’s very soft and that’s why I just think the word “cavity” and I get one. It runs in the family. Everybody ends up needing dentures, and I sure could use them myself.

So his father left one of his brothers (I forgot which one) the restroom cleaning business he bought from my dad before he died of Parkinson’s disease. Fed up with one dead-end job after another, he asked his brother what he needed to do to launch his own business. It took him 3 years to start making money, but he did it! Both in Arizona and Massachusetts. He didn’t need a license for his business, but he does have to pay taxes. He basically went around to various companies and made them a bid low enough that they couldn’t pass up in order to get started, then asked for a $5 raise in a year. He cleans private bathrooms at various businesses. Mechanics are his favorites, cuz then he can barter for service for himself when his car acts up. He doesn’t have to have a set schedule either. He just shows up during business hours on the day he’s scheduled to hit a certain business. He said be prepared for a lot of rejection if we try to do this ourselves, but eventually we’ll succeed.

I discussed it with Tom and it does sound like something we may consider someday depending on what happens over the next few months. California is way worse off than Massachusetts, and remember, we’re way out in the boonies. So it wouldn’t be very convenient for us or worth the effort until the economy picks up. It’s really, really bad here, and the area is laid out much differently than where he lives. Like I said, though, it’s definitely something to keep in mind, depending on what Tom gets for a job if he can ever get one. If they want to throw a $15 job at him or his program works out – the one I can’t talk about – then we’re not going to want to throw that away.

He read about my sleep disorder and believes he has the same thing. I’m not so sure, though, only because he can keep a schedule. He’s just keeping one that’s not quite what he wants it to be. He said he can’t bring himself to get up early and doesn’t get out to work until noon. But what this particular disorder is all about is that my schedule creeps forward 1-3 hours every day or so until it’s completed a 24-hour rotation which usually takes 2-3 weeks. Then again, who says there can’t be varying degrees of the disorder? Mine didn’t become what it is today overnight. It was a gradual thing. It started becoming a problem around 1990 but didn’t really start getting out of hand till the late 90s. It’s not something that happens overnight. Hopefully, he’s not heading this way himself, or else he’s going to have to apply for disability because he will not be able to keep a schedule and work outside of the house if he is. Believe me, it’s not about laziness, it’s not a crutch, it’s not a lame excuse. It’s a genuine problem, and as soon as I’m insured again a million years from now, I do intend to go to a sleep clinic, get it officially diagnosed, then fight to have my disability benefits reinstated. If I got all the back payments owed me, Tom and I would be buying a house for damn sure!

Oh, and his newest hobby is gathering cans and bottles from public trashcans and recycling them for deposit money. He said it’s also become an exercise regimen for him. He’ll park his car, then spend a couple of hours walking as he collects the cans and bottles. He’s losing weight and is now under 230 pounds.

He also sold weed for 4 years in Arizona to supplement his income during the times the temp agencies had no work for him, and thank God he didn’t get caught! He agreed, saying that Arizona has a mandatory sentence that’s just insane.

Massachusetts, along with a few other states, has universal healthcare. I didn’t know this either. He had to have hemorrhoid surgery and because he’s low-income he didn’t have to pay for the really good doctors he had, and some people who have to pay for their healthcare may resent that, he said.

Then he really shocked the hell out of me. Well, he did and didn’t. As I learned firsthand, these things do happen. I just didn’t think it would happen to him. Since it did, I'm surprised he wasn't more understanding of my past plight with the freeloaders because of his experience. I mean why would he defend the sickos, saying that when he read my story it was all “what they did to me.” But as I always said, if what happened to me can happen to me, it can happen to anyone. It’s definitely not something that only happens on TV.

Well, he went to jail for one day and then did one year on probation for sexual assault and assault and battery. Actually, they dropped the sexual part of it since they couldn’t prove it, and even though they couldn’t prove the assault part either, he still got screwed by this 22-year-old who didn’t like having his advances rejected.

They met in some bible class. The guy thought Andy was 25, but Andy assured him he was 47 at the time. The guy asked if he could join Andy in his car and make out a bit and so they did. Then when the guy’s hand started to head towards his dick, he stopped him and said, “No, let’s not go there. Let’s get to know each other first. How about we go for coffee or something?”

But the guy refused.

Three or four more times over the next few months, he would call Andy begging to come to his place for sex, but Andy would tell him the same thing; that they should get to know each other first. Now, as Andy said, he was very angry at this time. He hadn’t been clean for long and so he wasn’t used to not having a vice on which to vent his anger. I don’t remember exactly what it was that pissed him off. Something about going to the guy’s place and saying something to some other guy there who was mowing the lawn about him being with the guy, then the guy informed him that that was actually his uncle. I guess the guy got mad at him for whatever it was he said, and then Andy got mad as well, saying, “Well, how was I supposed to know he was your uncle?”

Then later on on the phone, still pissed off, he threatened to kick the guy’s ass and said, “See that blue car over there?” He didn’t know there was really a blue car near the guy’s place. The guy nervously asked how he knew there was a blue car near his place and Andy screamed, “Cuz I’m in it and I’m watching you!”

Three days later - he has no idea how they got in as the lock was never tampered with - three cops are in his bedroom at 7am sharp ready to haul his ass to jail. So they take him to the Pearl St. jail, then into court. Andy now has sleep apnea and he needs to sleep with this machine so he was terrified of having to spend the night in jail without the machine.

So he got bonded out on $40 after being assigned a public defender. Then some lawyer from Boston contacted him, saying he wanted to take his case. He said he’d normally want 4K but would accept 2K. In no time, he would become just as sorry as I did that he trusted this lawyer and didn’t go to trial. Just like with me, they talked him out of a trial, assuring him that he would go to prison if convicted and have to register as a sex offender. His lawyer ended up doing nothing he promised he would do, and he didn’t realize at the time that the system is all about money, not justice. The more people who don’t go to trial but end up on probation, the more the state makes. He’s just very lucky it didn’t happen in Arizona! He’d have gone to prison for years if it had.

But the year of probation was bad enough since all he did was threaten the guy and not actually harm him. As he himself pointed out, people make threats every day. So we both understand his frustration. He also said the judge never gave him a chance to explain his side of the story, believing every lie the other guy told, and looking at him like he was a disgusting, dirty old man while the guy lied and said he grabbed his crotch and beat him up. So between probation and other fees, he lost $2200. This is how we hit upon the subject of karma, saying he’s sure that someday the guy that screwed him will be out 6K. I hope he’s right!

I’m getting pretty tired and that’s all I can remember right now as far as what we talked about. Andy was right in saying my entries have gotten longer and more interesting lately, LOL.