No stomach pain and when I do have it it’s very mild to the point that it’s barely noticeable, so that much is good.

I really need to stop bragging about how much better I’ve been doing anxiety-wise because every time I do I jinx myself. I was a fool to think I beat it for good, but deep down I knew it would be back sooner or later. This shit is going to torture me on and off for the rest of my life, isn’t it? Really beginning to fear that now. Especially if it’s more the meds than the perimenopause, something I won’t find out until after I’ve gone a year without periods and I could still have quite a ways to go.

Yesterday I got so anxious that I had to take Lorazepam for the first time since July. My heart wasn’t racing but I skipped my meds today and I’m going to tomorrow as well so I don’t get there. I’m almost positive that if I didn’t skip I would end up with a racy heart and diarrhea. Then I would go from feeling shitty to feeling terrified.

Today I’m better but still not calm. I think the mistake I made after the last skip was that I didn’t let myself get totally better before I took another dose. The day I skipped I still had mild traces of anxiety. At first, I felt better than the last two days yesterday, but as yesterday progressed, it was the worst I’d felt in a while.

So I skipped today’s dose and I’m definitely skipping tomorrow, too. Would really like to know where my numbers were yesterday, but I know my TSH can be high while I still feel bad. The numbers go up right away after a skip but you don’t feel better right away. Just wish I knew what was causing this the most! Peri or pills? It would be a great relief to know that this would be gone forever once I hit menopause, but if there’s anything I’ve learned in life it’s that the longer something goes on, the less likely it is to stop. If it’s not the peri then it’s got to be the pills. I can’t believe I would’ve suddenly up and become this way for no reason at all and that’s it for life. I really hope it isn’t the pills. Again, the pills are for life, the peri isn’t.

Really hope I can stand to take it regularly leading up to the lab so I can get good enough numbers that won’t cause her to send me right back to the lab a few weeks later. I will not, however, let myself suffer just to please the doctor.

After going so long with just a few days of mild anxiety, it was a very disappointing and frustrating setback just as it was to get a period after nearly half a year.

Which do I think is the main culprit? I still don’t know. This feeling seems a bit extreme for hormonal changes but not for a chemical substance. It’s just that that “substance” is supposed to be what our bodies make anyway. I don’t know what to think anymore. Like I said, until I’ve gone a year without periods, I won’t have the answer. It’s like they both make sense but they don’t. Hormones can certainly affect the way we feel but it’s also a coincidence that it starts after I start the medication.

The only thing I’m sure of is that I’m not interested in OD anymore. Too many glitches to be worth bothering with for a place I don’t intend to remain at anyway.

Last night I dreamed I was in Japan. I was in a room with a mix of Japanese and American police officers and couldn’t help but notice how much taller the American police were. Someone said something to me about being considered average height if I were from Japan since the Japanese tend to be shorter and I’m short, too.

In the next dream, I was in a small store of some kind. The store was a bit deep but narrow and seemed to have (light yellow?) painted brick walls. I’m guessing it was a little convenience store or something. I knew whoever was at the register and while I didn’t work there I was standing next to them as they rang up someone’s order. Standing nearby was a tall woman on a phone. Even though she didn’t look like Nane, I knew it was her. She had long dark layered curls and she didn’t seem to know who I was.

In the last dream, my parents were still alive and I had to cancel a visit to them. I learned that Lisa was to visit them at that time instead and I knew she wouldn’t have gone then had I not canceled.

My vibrator broke. It needed charging, so I charged it up, but it keeps going on and off like there’s a short or something.

I wrestled this 80-lb doll that I mostly regret getting onto her stomach to help keep her ass from going flat, though I would rather her backside become deformed than the front of her since it’s the front of her that I see.

Amazingly I was able to get off on her Monday morning. I didn’t think I could but I did. With her sitting against the back of the couch, I straddled her lap and sat facing her as I rubbed myself against her.

This morning I tried different positions but had no luck. Just couldn’t get the angle right. So much for trying to get at least a little pleasure out of something that costs so much.

I got a hilarious idea for my second OD account. Even though I changed names and locations, it still wouldn’t surprise me if some figured out who I was. It wouldn’t be the end of the world if they did but since I don’t think most people will, I thought it would be hilarious to go back in time exactly 20 years ago and share entries one by one with the months and dates matching the current ones except for the year. So I just posted January 31st of 1998 when I was 32 years old and dealing with the freeloaders’ shit in Phoenix. Guess I had just gone bottle tossing and they tried to have me served. The only difference is that the day may not be the exact same day of the week that it was 20 years ago, so it may seem weird to some people reading that it’s almost the weekend when it’s not, LOL. Just thought it would be something fun to do just to see how many people check it out since it’s easy to track there. Not allowing comments on that account, though.

As expected, not a peep out of Palma or Stacey, but at least I know I accomplished my goal since I left Stacey a VM and tagged/friend-requested Palma… They read my messages. Wonder how long it’ll take Palma to delete my friend request, though?

What a night it’s been. Our attempt to go out and eat was a real bust. I cannot believe how many people are out and about on Monday at midnight, big city or not. But we went to the IHOP and were told we had a 15-minute wait just to be seated.

So we took off and decided to go for some fast food. Of all the places that were still open, KFC wasn’t one of them, so we went to Jack-in-the-Box’s drive-thru. But there too, was a small mob of sorts with several cars in a line that didn’t seem to be moving much.

So then we decided to stop at Applebee’s. Sure enough, the place was closing. So we decided to say fuck it and go home. He offered to stop at Walgreens but I knew it would be crowded there too, I didn’t have anything in mind I wanted or needed, and I didn’t want to be tempted to get junk food.

So we came home and I made us the cheddar potato bake we got from Walmart that you just throw in the microwave.

On the way back the pigs were next to us and the fuckers changed lanes without even signaling. I’m surprised they didn’t go through a red light, too. But what bothered me more than these law-breaking lawmen was the fact that Tom seemed annoyed by my complaining about them. Almost as if to say, “How dare you bitch about them despite what they did to you in Arizona!”

The defending of others and lack of defense on my behalf from him really bothers me at times. You know, like when someone’s sister starts almost sounding like she’s defending her beloved ex. The one she never stopped loving. Seriously, I don’t think she ever fell out of love with him. I think she just realized she loved Mark more. She would never have left Bill had she not met someone else. Tammy’s never lived without a man and she never will unless Mark dies first.

Later…

My stomach pain is sometimes nonexistent and other times it’s just barely noticeable. It’s still in that small concentrated little spot right under the ribs and a few inches away from the center of my stomach.

Skipped my meds yesterday and today I feel better than I felt yesterday and yesterday I felt better than I felt the day before. However, I’m still not as calm as I could be and I hope it’s nothing to worry about. Again, until I’ve gone a whole year without bleeding, I can’t say how much of it is on my meds.

Thanks to the traffic, I was woken up for the third time this month. So that’s two pill skips and three wake-up calls with another wake-up call coming Friday when they pick up the trash.

Tom thinks one of the reasons I can’t adapt to sleeping with background noise that isn’t consistent (and believe it or not, the louder traffic isn’t regular enough to be a consistent pattern) is because he grew up having to sleep with a lot more background noise than I did. He’s got a definite point there. Sometimes I still wonder if part of it is compensation for not having to get up to an alarm five days a week and not having kids waking me up either.

Nothing from Stacey or Palma. Unless it didn’t go through, I don’t see why Stacey wouldn’t at least read my message even if I don’t hear from her. Another few weeks and I’m going to be convinced that Palma has indeed stopped posting publicly because no one’s that busy.

Been slacking off on my story and I need to get back to it as well as editing my next book. I’m just tired tonight. I’m slacking off on exercising too, although this doll has given me a bit of a workout! I should at least do my core and do some back flies and ab crunches tonight. Been doing quick random sprints and yes, I’ve lost a couple of pounds, but it’s not like even I can’t lose at least a couple. It’s probably just water, though. Rather than focus on calories, I’m trying to focus more on spacing out when I eat as well as ingredients.

Last night OD was running really slow but tonight it seems a bit snappier. 28 days left! No way I’m going to pay for that site. I like PB way better mostly for its simplicity and the way we can have multiple books. I don’t expect to ever have the search feature I’d like or to be able to customize backgrounds or anything like that, but that is definitely my preferred platform these days.

The teenager who read my diary on YouTube contacted me to say that the first one (she did a series of three videos) now has over 1000 views. Good for her. :-)

Anyway, my book Evil Amongst the Evergreens has now been fully re-edited, redesigned and republished. Six books published and counting! Couldn’t resist sending Maliheh a copy… WITH her name. No reply, of course, not that I have any way to know if she’s getting my messages or not. One of the accounts was taken over but the message didn’t bounce so she must have recovered it.

I’ve got mild anxiety in my chest right now probably because I splurged on sugar today.

No stomach pain today. The old lady in Texas said that when they say severe they mean it and that there’s no doubt about it. She’s had it before. Another person suggested uterine fibroids, but I would’ve thought the pain was too high up for that. It’s funny because she’s now following me just to see what happens with that, LOL. I think she is somewhere in the southeast.

Tom and I were talking about what an idiot Trump is. I see his wanting to reform immigration and keep dangerous cultures out (though Tom insists Muslims are like anyone else and it’s just a small group of them that are crazy). Not sure I agree with that but that’s okay. We don’t have to agree on everything. I agree, however, that he really should ignore Kim’s childish and immature taunts. When we feed the trolls, we stoop to their level. Trolls hate being ignored. Since he’s thousands of miles away, I really think it would be best if Trumpty Dumpty stopped giving Kim the negative attention he so obviously craves.

While I wasn’t being euthanized in my dreams last night, I seemed to be very lonely and depressed, living alone in some apartment with absolutely nothing. No computer, no TV, no radio, no nothing. All I did was lay in bed depressed. It seems I did get up to look out the window, though, and I must have been several floors up because I was looking down at a stormy sea. It seemed to be nighttime, too

Then I beat up Jenny C for some reason in another dream.

Later…

Palma doesn’t appear to have checked in for over a month and her friend count is the same. Don’t know if she hasn’t been on or if she just hasn’t seen my message, but I just tagged and friend-requested her. Would be surprised if I ever heard from her, though. Maybe she’ll even block me like Scot did, but I see her more as the ignoring type than the blocking type if she remembers me, and I think she will.

I also left Stacey a message and was surprised at how self-conscious I felt when I did it. My heart even raced a bit. It was nice to hear her voice again. Do I think she’ll reply on Facebook or by phone? I’d say there’s a 60% chance she’ll leave me a voice message, a 40% chance she won’t do anything.

When Tom leaves I’ve got a lot of catching up to do as far as my voice blog goes. I haven’t done any posts on Bubbly since Friday. I don’t usually do it on weekends.

My dreams told me that I was done with periods but I’ll believe it when I see it. I skipped my meds today because I felt a little anxious yesterday. It’s a good thing I did too, because I can still feel very slight traces of it.

They really are a bunch of idiots at Amazon. I decided to tell them that I wasn’t receiving reviews and they asked for a screenshot of the reviews in question. Stupid idiots.

We’re going to the IHOP in the wee hours of the morning before he goes to work. I’m sure the music will be blasting there too, but at least it will drown out his eating sounds I never cared to hear. I just hope there are no little kids because nothing drowns them out.

We talked about getting a wheelchair for the doll so I could at least have her in whatever room I wanted her in and I could hide her easily that way as well. But the more I think about it the more I don’t think it’s necessary because no matter how I try to lift her I simply can’t do any more than maneuvering her back and forth between a sitting and a lying position. I can’t even transfer her from the couch to the footstool. No way I could transfer her in and out of a wheelchair and onto a bed, couch or whatever. Whenever I want her on the bed I’m going to have to have him put her there. It’s funny because Aly is so sure she can lift 100 pounds if not for long. So could I depending on the way the weight is distributed, the angles, and the length. I really, really don’t think she could lift this doll any easier than I can. If she did I sure would be jealous as well as pissed at myself. Really, I would feel like such a wimp, hahaha. Maybe it’s time to really work my arms double-time on the Bowflex.

The EMDR must have worn off, LOL, because I’m practically crying happy tears at the realization that I haven’t needed Lorazepam (with the exception of one or two to help me sleep for last year’s appointments) since July 5th! You know how everyone has their moment when they realize they’ve either accomplished or survived something? The reality is starting to set in that I might have actually really truly survived the hellish nightmare I suffered from the summer of 2014 to the summer of 2017 and I just might actually be back to myself for good. Or at least for what I hope is a seriously long time.

I don’t even want to think of what my next long-term problem will be or when it will start, and yes, it does seem I have one long-term crisis after another with just a year or two in between. As an adult, I’ve had what I consider to be a crisis 5 different times in my life, and a few other long-term problems that I wouldn’t describe as a crisis but that were very frustrating. Of the 5 times I was in crisis, two were monetary, two were medical, and one was legal. Even though the last crisis was by far the worst, my life was never truly in danger. But the series of killer asthma attacks I had many years ago could have killed me, and the two times I was in a serious financial crisis could have done me in as well. So I would say that three out of five were dangerous or close enough to it.

I can only tell you this… Whatever the next one may be is either going to be a piece of cake compared to my “meds-peri crisis” or it’s going to kill me because anything worse than the last crisis would certainly do just that, that’s how bad it was, life-threatening or not.

Anyway, can’t say that I’ll never get another period again, but I can definitely say that in April, when the Lorazepam expires, I won’t be requesting a refill.

Later…

Tom had just finished helping me dye my hair and I was just about to jump in the shower to rinse it out when he comes back into the bedroom and says, “Don’t freak out but there’s a body in the carport.”

I really thought he meant that someone passed out or died in our carport. It didn’t hit me that the “body” was actually the doll because I didn’t expect her until the week after next. But yes, she’s here! The doll I’ve wanted for 13 years is here and I’m very disappointed. She is OMG heavy as fuck! She’s absolutely gorgeous and very lifelike as well as life-size. No problem from an aesthetic point. She looks even more realistic than I thought she would and she has a great body despite being a little too titsy.

The problem is I can’t lift her to save my life! It’s a huge struggle even for Tom. It’s just that people tend to exaggerate so I didn’t buy all the complaints about these things being so damn heavy. Well, they weren’t kidding! The best I can do is maneuver her from lying down into a sitting position on the couch. I couldn’t even pick her up to get her into my office chair to wheel her into another room if I wanted to. So that much is pretty disappointing. But every time I walk by it’s like, wow! What a beauty!

I took some pictures of her to show Aly. Not sure I want to tell Tammy but if I do I’ll say we won her, LOL. The plan was to enjoy her while we were still here and get a flat-chested one with a tan when we move. No way! Until they can make these things no more than 30 pounds, I’ll pass.

She came with an outfit that fits her perfectly and looks great on her. Sheer baby blue lingerie that really shows her realism because you can see her nipples through the lace on the upper part of the top. I realize now that putting her in a typical outfit would cover a lot of her realism. This way you can see her nipples, belly button, etc.

I put a necklace, earrings and a couple of rings on her, but I can’t find my other toe rings.

She came with a comb that has fat metal prongs but goes through the wig easily. The doll and the wigs are definitely very high quality. The eyes look very realistic, too. If I’m disappointed with something that costs $740, imagine how pissed I’d be if we had spent over 2K! Tom never wanted to send her back unless she was damaged, so she’s staying. Would I undo this order if it was as simple as snapping my fingers? Yes, I would. But since I can’t, I have a very beautiful, realistic and life-size doll to look at every time I walk through the living room.

We couldn’t resist feeling inside her, LOL. Feels pretty realistic to me. The only thing that doesn’t seem realistic is the positioning of the openings. They seem too far forward.

Anyway, right now I have the Suki head on her which looks Chinese. She wears a shoulder-length dark brown wig parted in the middle. Later I’ll switch to Gia who looks Korean but will probably take out her blue eyes and put the brown ones in. She can wear the lighter brown wig with the green and blue colored streaks on the ends. It’s a really cool-looking wig. Hell, I might even wear it just for kicks. The wigs stay on these heads much easier than on the mannequins which had a smooth slippery surface. The wigs don’t slip as easily on the rubbery surface. That’s part of what makes her hard to move too, is that she hangs up on things easier. Between her rubbery surface and her weight, I can’t just slide her into position easily on the couch. She has to be lifted.

I added coral-colored lipgloss to Suki and will add bright pink to Gia. The natural color of the lips is just a light reddish color. I’m kind of surprised that they don’t have removable tongues. Anyway, I have to really be sure to do the lips well because she stains very easily. They should’ve whitened the teeth a bit, though.

She came with a warming stick and I can see why. Even after she’d been indoors for a while, she remained cool to the touch, almost cold. She’s very soft and almost tacky feeling. You can get rid of that by putting baby powder on her. I have to be careful when handling her that I don’t cut the skin with my nails, that’s how soft it is. It’s funny because when I slap her breasts, you hear a hollow sound. When I slap her thighs, it sounds just like when I slap my own thighs.

She also came with a plunger-like thing to clean her out after you screw her, so that’s definitely not anything we would need, haha.

They also enclosed white gloves (I don’t want to cover her pretty hands and nails) and a charcoal gray fleece blanket. What, do they think that will warm her up or something? One of her nails popped off but it was easy enough to glue it back on.

The joints are a bit stiff but that’s nothing compared to trying to lift her. As soon as I tried to lift the box I knew I would never be able to lift her.

At least I can change the damn heads! The head alone is like 8 pounds. They said she’s 70 pounds, but I think she’s closer to 80, maybe even slightly more. I’m learning I’m not the toughie I thought I was, LOL. Anything else about myself I may be giving myself too much credit for?

Still fighting like hell to keep from gaining more weight but again it’s like trying to hold back the tide. I really think I’m going to see the 160s really soon. I don’t know what else I can do to stop it, though. I’m trying to arrange my eating schedule in a different way but I honestly don’t see how that will help because I really do have to go down to a thousand calories or less in order to lose weight and I just can’t stand that. I’m just too old for that shit.

Now here’s the thing I’ve noticed. It’s not that I’m gaining easier, but more like retaining easier. In the past, If I didn’t eat the last 4-5 hours of my day or so I would drop a couple of pounds before bed. Not anymore. The weight is clinging longer after eating or drinking and it’s taking longer to drop back down after a few hours of having nothing. But why? What could be going on with me that’s causing this? It just seems a bit extreme for age/peri.

I’m hoping, however, that the new eating arrangement will at least stop the gaining but I don’t think it will. I think I’m just slowing down the inevitable. I can’t even drink a cup of coffee without jumping half a pound that can take half a day to lose.

Last night I was browsing through YouTube videos and saw a horrible picture. One of the videos I watched showed photos just moments before tragedy struck. One of them was a gay man falling from a tall building that was pushed off and being executed by ISIS. It was a horrifying thing to see. Just totally sick, sad, infuriating and disgusting. How can one human do that to another without feeling a shred of guilt? How can they feel that’s the right thing to do? How can they believe their imaginary God would possibly pat them on the back for it? If it would, then it’s no God of mine.

But then I got to thinking about it… Is there really no one on the face of this Earth that I myself could do that too? Being honest with myself, I realized that while I couldn’t participate in actually throwing them off the building, and I couldn’t stand to watch them hit the ground like a watermelon hitting the ground with a gross, messy splat, I could certainly stand to know that child molesters, rapists and murderers, for example, were meeting a fate like that. Even one worse would be okay with me. Meaning that I would gladly look the other way without saying anything in protest. There are only a few people that I could actually torture and that I would be willing to do certain things to, but cutting their heads off, lighting them on fire or pushing them off of buildings isn’t what I would have in mind. Oh, I may end their existence in the end, but I would prefer a much less gory way. But then I think that humiliating them for the way they’ve wronged me would be much more fun and rewarding than actually taking their lives. Once you take lives they can’t live with whatever humiliation you’ve inflicted upon them and the horrible memories it would certainly bring.

Later…

So the world was more dangerous than ever at 11:58 PM (PT?) last night. But we survived. Wow, huh?

It’s a quiet Friday night and now I’m doing my writing now that my household duties have been taken care of. Well, it’s almost quiet. I hear the buzz of the freeway and who knows when the planes might get in on the action.

Nothing at all from Stacey or Palma and I have a feeling I’m probably not going to hear from either one of them no matter what I do. At first I was thinking, why bother sharing and tagging Palma when she’s almost certainly going to just ignore it? But then I realized it would at least flag her attention to the message I sent if nothing else. There’s still a chance she could have already spotted it and read it but there’s no way to know for sure. There doesn’t seem to be any activity on her account for a month and her friend count hasn’t risen either.

As for Stacey, she may reply with a message by phone but I wouldn’t count on it. I have a feeling she would prefer to keep me in the past as I have been in light of me calling her out on stuff she ultimately denied. I’ll find out soon enough, though. I was thinking I’d call her and tag Palma next week. Most people still have more free time on the weekend so I want to give them one more weekend to check in.

Didn’t have much stomach pain yesterday but today I had a little bit for the first few hours of my day.

Definitely didn’t have good dreams last night. The saddest one was where I guess I was terminally ill or something like that because I was being given a lethal dose of whatever. It was weird, though, because I was outdoors with a bunch of people somewhere. Maybe it was someone’s backyard. Only I didn’t seem to know anyone. I mean I knew the people but I didn’t know the people. The people closest to me were actually made-up characters in one of my books. I felt very woozy at one point and started to wonder if they were killing me in stages, so to speak, with whatever the on-hand nurse had been giving me so I wouldn’t be so overwhelmed.

Then I felt like I couldn’t keep my eyes open and I said I had to lay down. So I laid down on this lounge chair and could’ve sworn I heard someone say something about me not getting back up. Someone else said, “It’s okay sweetie. You can take a nap now and will finish later.”

What she meant by “finish” was the party going on. When I closed my eyes I wondered if I would ever open them again. I felt a slight prick on my arm and realized I’d been given the final dose that would put me out forever.

In another dream, I was in a bank somewhere with about 10 other people and this camera with this weird blinking red light followed my every move. Instead of thinking it was a motion sensor camera, I was sure that it was a gun and that whoever had set it up would shoot anybody who tried to leave the bank.

Then I had another dream where Tom and I were either homeless or the car had broken down and we had to carry some things. It was strange because one of the things was this large plastic doll sort of like an American Girl doll. I said I was going to just put her in the car and Tom snorted and made a gesture with his hands as if to say “What car.”

Instead, since she came with a backpack that could be strapped to a child’s back and since I was on the small side, I strapped her to my back.

In the last dream, I was back in jail and Mary slapped me. Instead of kicking her ass like I would have in real life, I just stood there completely flabbergasted.

I don’t understand this doomsday clock shit they keep tweaking. So the world is going to end at 11:58 tonight? Great! Then we won’t have to worry about getting old and not having anyone to help us. Seriously, the world will indeed end by war but I still think it’s about 100 years away. Once technology gets to the point that everyone can send enough bombs without being able to deflect any coming their way in time, that’s when it will happen. People really will kill themselves to kill others. We wouldn’t have murder-suicides if they weren’t. For now, I still think what I’ve always thought… that actions speak louder than words and that people take threats too seriously. Threats don’t mean shit without action to back them up. Anybody can threaten anything at any time and that’s meaningless unless they actually do something.

Thank goodness for hourly weather updates! I was able to time my jog perfectly. It’s pouring like crazy now and pretty dark out there, too.

They put up a trellis fence around the side and back of the house that’s STILL being flipped and at first I was worried they would enclose it and encourage the new people to leave any dogs they may have out there in a park that’s not likely to do much about it. It’s not enclosed, though. It’s just to add a little more privacy.

My dangling “diamond” earrings came today from China and they’re gorgeous. It’s nice to be able to wear earrings again if I want to without them looking ridiculous. Should have thought to try clip-ons years ago!

LOL, that silly Marie. She sure is quick to move on and like with all her other girlfriends this is the “only one who’s ever really understood her.” I wouldn’t tell her this, of course, but sadly, I think she’s either going to cheat on her latest catch or scare her off with her problems and dynamic mood swings. It seems that where some of us have accepted what happened to us as kids and have vowed not to let it affect our future, she somehow got stuck in a rut for some reason and was never able to move on. Gotta love her, though. She’s still a sister and I’ll always hope for the best for her.

Aly and I swapped story ideas earlier. She wants to do a mindfuck story with a character that has my kind of sleep disorder, so she consulted with me about it. The sleep doctor I saw calls it non-entrained circadian rhythm disorder and it is a definite, definite curse from above if there ever was anything up there. There is no cure for it. I do have some control over it but very, very little. I can control it to a degree for about a week or two if even that. It really depends on what’s going on. Yes, the nights are much more peaceful, especially if you’re a writer, but I would still love to always be on days because that would be much more convenient. I wasn’t kidding when I said that the things most people struggle with come easier to me while the things most people take for granted and that’s like second nature to them are what I struggle with most.

What’s interesting is that at the same time I don’t have a schedule, my schedule is actually more predictable than your average person’s. Tom wrote a program to predict what my schedule will be in the upcoming weeks or months when scheduling my appointments. Right now the current prediction for when I’ll get up on his birthday in June is 1:30 AM and 10:30 PM on my birthday in December. This is based on an average jump of one hour and 15 minutes a day. Amazingly, the program is almost always right on.

The program helps enable me to know went to start pushing or pulling it in either direction if it’s a little off in one direction or another for pending appointments, and if I start early enough, it may only require a 10-minute manipulation. So if I fell asleep at 11 PM the night before, then the next night I will push it to 11:10 PM. Get it? I know it’s very hard for those that don’t have it to even conceive of how it’s possible to not be able to control your schedule no matter what you do and many often go into denial about it much in the way those do that don’t understand that yes, we’re born with one out of 4 possible sexualities… Straight, bisexual, gay or child molesters.

No matter what anyone gets or thinks, it’s something that’s very real and it’s on me. I’m the one that has to deal with it, after all.

Unfortunately, this is the third day that I’ve had that cramp-like feeling in my upper right gut. I’m starting to suspect there could be a connection to my gallbladder, but I’m not worried at this point because according to what I read, gallstones are common. Gallbladder cancer is not, however.

I think it will back off on its own. I sure hope so as I’ve had enough of the medical drama these last 3 years! Now that I’ve been healthy again for over half a year I want to stay that way for a very long time.

I read that it’s more common with women (figures) and that it has to do with these deposits that harden and build up which can sometimes lead to infection. I don’t have any fever or chills, though I still get cold easily. I’ve always been sensitive to cold.

It describes the pain as “severe” but I would call it more like annoying. I also don’t have any back pain which it says you can get along with it. You can feel it more when you take a deep breath and it does seem to intensify the cramp a bit but once I release the breath of air it goes back to being just annoying. It also said it can come and go, sometimes lasting a few hours to a few days. It can become worse after a heavy meal, especially if it’s a greasy one.

Last night I dreamed that Virginia seemed to be angry at me every time we would cross paths and I suspected it may have been because of something I said about her to someone else living in the park.

Then I had a dream that I may have been in some kind of psych ward, though it seemed like I was able to leave at my own will because I was trying to remember Tom’s number so I could call him to have him pick me up.

I mentioned to a large black woman who worked there that I had a disease that affected my memory and I had forgotten both my phone number and his. Then they gave me something that they said would “help make me feel better.” Next thing I know I’m falling asleep and waking up in a pitch-black room at 2 in the morning. I was the only one in the tiny windowless room with its door slightly ajar. Realizing that they gave me something that knocked me out, I got up and decided to go look for my phone, hoping that Tom’s number would be stored in it. I don’t know why my dream self didn’t think of this before but when I exited the room, the hallway was just as dark and I couldn’t see a thing. I then realized that it would only be a matter of hours before he would be there to get me anyway.

I checked the FedEx tracking number they gave me but the doll still isn’t in their system yet. We’re guessing they won’t post any useful information until she’s actually on the plane. I’m thinking it might not even be until she’s in the US. I just hope that we have enough warning so that Tom can know what day to take off from work.

Still texting with Aly who has been staying with her nanny family. I forget that she sometimes does that. Again she contradicted herself. A long time ago she said that obesity didn’t run in her family but this time she said it did even though her parents weren’t that big. She says she’s 120 pounds. Yeah, but she’s only 36. Another 5-10 years and she’ll probably be 30 pounds heavier and unable to lose a single pound.

Another thing I don’t get is how some people say that God is the reason their lives are good at the moment. So then what is the reason some poor kid that’s being abused or starved in some Third World country is going through what they’re going through? Did they somehow do something to deserve it or to ask for it? I just don’t get that. If you’re supposedly so special that you’ve been blessed by Him, what do some of these innocent children do to end up not the least bit blessed?

This is the second day in a row that I’ve woken up with pain in my upper right stomach. Not sure what it is. It seems like it could be a lot of things from what I looked up, but I’m still going with either a pulled muscle or some kind of weird gas pain. It better not be anything serious! Really had enough of the doctors and don’t want to have to see anymore other than for regular maintenance.

I checked Palma’s page some more and determined that her son is now 9 years old. Also, she seems to live in a pretty nice house too. I’m guessing that if she and her husband both make at least 50K a year, then they can easily afford it with a six-figure income.

Aly said she’s now pre-diabetic. She doesn’t have to take medication or insulin yet but she has to monitor her blood sugar and go to the emergency room if it gets too high. This really sucks. Like Tammy, hasn’t she had enough to deal with? Especially for one who hasn’t even hit 40 yet?

I don’t remember much in the way of dreams last night other than hearing someone say hello and then running through the house which didn’t look like this place in search of someone I couldn’t seem to find.

After soaking in the tub with the fairy bath bomb it turns out that the surprise inside was a fairy pendant/charm that you can attach to a necklace or bracelet.

The doll is on the way and I got her FedEx tracking number! So excited! I just really REALLY hope I can handle the bitch.

I worked out on the Bowflex but haven’t yet convinced myself to go out for a walk down to the lake and back. Actually, now that I’m through the worst of the perimenopause I really should go further than that and stay out there a good half hour or so. But between being lazy and having three different pieces of exercise equipment indoors, I only do a 15-minute walk and make up the rest of the time doing something indoors.

Got a cramp-like pain in my right upper gut. I’ve had this before but today I woke up with it and it’s a little steadier. Used to think this was due to pulling muscles when ab crunching. Hopefully, nothing’s wrong with my liver or gallbladder. Part of the pancreas is there too.

So Aly said she talked to a live person on Amazon about her review not going through. Apparently, it wasn’t just me she tried to leave a review for but a few other authors as well. They said something about her account being new and needing time to be approved, while some of the rude trolls I encountered in the forums said Amazon has BOTs looking for links and connections to those leaving comments. This seems like an awful lot of work for Amazon to go through, but apparently, they have become very much against those who know the author leaving comments on their books that they’re checking for links we share to our book pages on social media and any connection to those leaving comments.

What do I think? At this point, I think the whole review system is just glitchy, but I’ll find out more soon when I go to leave a review on the book I’m currently reading.

Last night I looked up free e-books and had fun adding dozens of new books to my library. I like mystery, suspense, thrillers and things like that. I have a couple of true crime novels as well.

I forgot to mention the weird scene I saw yesterday at Target. A little girl of about perhaps 10 years of age was wearing a sundress. Yes, a sundress with absolutely no jacket. Meanwhile, it was in the 40s out. I don’t get that any more than I get why they were selling flip-flops, swimsuits and summer clothes in January. Okay, so we’re in a moderate climate and we may not be like Oregon but we’re not like Florida either.

I’m back to sleeping shitty even though I don’t feel tired. I just have to sleep longer to make up for waking up so much, but yeah, I’m back to waking up constantly. At one point during the night I got up to pee and I wasn’t sure I would be able to fall back asleep first.

I was kind of disappointed to find that the doll is still awaiting shipment when I checked the status on Ali. It’s early Tuesday morning now in China. Shouldn’t she have been shipped out by now? I sent a message to them asking when they thought she would be shipped out because I would really like to know what day she’s going to arrive in order to be able to be available to sign for her. Tom said he would take that day off. He has over two weeks of time off accumulated. I teased him about telling them that he was going to take a day off for his new sex doll. LOL, they wouldn’t believe that one if he did.

As expected, not a word from Stacey or Palma but I still can’t say that either one of them has checked in since I sent their messages. Goes to show, though, that nothing has changed for me when it comes to prayer. Nothing I’ve prayed for recently has come true. The only thing that’s close to being granted is that I’ve only had a couple of anxious days since asking for the anxiety not to return which is by far the most important thing to me. My weight and who I hear from is nothing compared to that.

Being the curious person that I am, I googled why prayers don’t always seem to be granted, and some of those that believe in God say that He hears you no matter what, but there are a number of reasons your prayers may not be granted and this can range from not being the right time or what’s best for you to you not be sorry enough for past sins and not forgiving of others.

Well, if that’s the case then I may as well return to not praying because not only am I still not sure there even is a God, but I’m never going to be sorry for every mistake I’ve ever made and I’m never going to forgive everyone who’s ever burned me either. Furthermore, I have no shame, guilt or regrets for saying so and for feeling as I feel either. If there was a God, first He allows me to have the kind of mother I had. Then He allows me to want a child and a career I could never have before the idea of these things wore off on their own. Then I was never allowed to have a woman I really lusted for before meeting Tom. Then I had to go through the poverty. Then I had to be thrown in jail for something no one should ever be thrown in jail for. Then I had to have the shit terrorized out of me for a few years.

Sorry, but that’s not something I can just “forgive and forget.” I could forgive some of the people that have screwed me with a sincere apology, but not those that had the biggest hand in screwing me over in the biggest of ways. Same goes for God. What He did by sitting back and allowing so much of it to happen is no different, in my mind, than a woman who sits back and lets her boyfriend beat the shit out of her child. He could have prevented at least some of it. But He didn’t. The fact that He willingly chose not to makes me unable to help the ill feelings that I harbor toward Him as well as to others. Again, though, this is only if He even exists in the first place. Even if He doesn’t and even if everything that happens to us is purely random, that doesn’t excuse my biggest perps. So if reacting to the freeloaders’ shit and speaking my mind is considered a “sin,” then that’s okay with me. I would send them the exact same journals all over again. I just wouldn’t be dumb enough to answer any court calls.

On the flip side, whether my life has been happenstance or planned by something we can’t see, I realize my life could be a lot worse than it has been. There are millions of people out there who suffer a lot more than I have and who never find their true soulmate either. So, it’s weird. It’s like I’m blessed while I’m cursed. But either way, no matter what happens to me in the present or the future, nothing can ever undo the past. You can never excuse, make up for or compensate for those that knew damn well what they were doing yet chose to screw me over anyway. Or the possible God that sat back and let it all happen.

We went to Target earlier and I saw a collection of small fake flowers and cacti that I would have loved 20 years ago. Maybe in the next house since I plan to have a more “grown-up” theme of decor at that time for variety’s sake.

I ended up getting a couple of color-changing nail polishes. One is pink and turns purple when your body temperature is cooler or like if you run it under cold water. The other is yellow and turns orange in cooler temperatures. Just going outdoors will darken the colors. It’s been so cold the last couple of days!

I also got a large, colorful bath bomb that says it has a surprise inside. That oughta be interesting, though my guess is that it’s a tiny plastic toy I’ll have no use for in the shape of an animal of some kind.

Didn’t get much else there other than toothpaste and some treats. Decided not to stop anywhere else either. That’s what having money does to you. Once you accumulate so much shit, not much is new and exciting anymore. You don’t feel like you just have to have this or that because you’ve already got so much shit. I don’t need or want any more clothes, jewelry, shoes, knickknacks, perfume, makeup or anything else right now. I’ve definitely got way more than I need, LOL. I just want my doll! It’s early Monday morning in China now so it should be close.

The short story I shared on a site for writers that Mitch recommended to me and that I don’t plan to publish, has nearly 200 views and a handful of positive feedback. No one had anything negative to say yet and someone was kind enough to catch a discrepancy in character ages for me. You have the option of receiving comments and critiques, just comments, or nothing at all. I chose the first option.

The kitchen smart switches have really turned themselves into dumb switches. I don’t know why they’ve gotten so unreliable but I’m having to turn the lights on and off manually which kind of sucks. I guess it’s not all bad, though, as with the switches you just tap them. They’re not toggle switches. We have about four different brands throughout the house and this particular brand (I’m not sure what it is) really sucks.

It’s a shame to see so many things pop up that I really could have used in the past. Like some of the amazing bikinis they have these days. Why couldn’t they have existed when I was young and skinny? And why couldn’t self-driving cars have been a thing back when I was single?

Other than a burst of daily landscaping and annoying planes circling round and round, it’s been a cold but peaceful day.

I noticed a rather uncanny pattern and I wonder if it means anything. I always thought it was rather interesting that the dates that my parents, siblings and myself were born are in two different groups. A group of two and a group of three. The days we were born are 4, 5 and 6, and then 9 days later, 15 and 16. No one has a birth date that isn’t adjacent to someone else’s birth date.

But where the pattern gets really interesting is that so far we have a string of death dates forming a group of three, just like with birthdates. My parents and brother died on the 22, 23 and 24. I then began to wonder if all the death dates, including the two pending ones, are of the same pattern only in reverse. This means that if you go back 9 days from the 22nd you’ve got the 13th. Adjacent to that is the 12th, forming the group of two to go with the group of three.

Can’t find a pattern with years, but here’s another possible pattern with months. I wrote the numbers 1-12 in a circle like on a clock. I made two “clocks.” Only the numbers represent months instead of hours. On one clock I colored in the numbers representing the months we were born which are January, April, June, August and December.

On the other clock, I colored the three months my parents and brother died which were February, September and December. When I colored in the months of April and August and then merged the two clocks, it lined up perfectly when I matched the pattern based on the spacing between the numbers that were colored.

So does this mean my sister and I may die on April 12, April 13, August 12, or August 13?

I had this dream last night that I went to the hospital in labor. I was both alone and terrified. Never before had I had a dream like that and again I wonder about parallel lives. I was so terrified that I woke up. Never did feel any pain in the dream, though.

Then in another dream, Tom and I were thinking of having me artificially inseminated. I wrote about it in a letter to my parents who were still alive, knowing they would likely disagree with it since they’d always encouraged me to skip kids and enjoy life and living. Determined not to be persuaded by anyone, to live for myself and make up my own mind, I was thinking of backing out just because I didn’t want to have to work so hard in that kind of way on something that brought so much noise and so many expenses. I really did value my freedom, too.

I thought of something really cool that Tammy could do with her second sink. I always thought it was kind of silly to have two sinks in one bathroom, but then I realized one could be filled with water and bamboo plants. All they need is water, after all. That would look weird yet kinda cool.

I honestly don’t see the point in the women’s march. I still say that while most men may not be “gay by action,” they’re still “gay at heart,” always favoring each other and preferring each other to women. So I think that as long as that attitude remains, and it is human nature to favor one’s own kind, things aren’t going to change. But I also can see where sitting back and just taking their shit in silence isn’t going to help either.

Most people may be quick to say that violence never solves anything but when you think about it, maybe it does. Maybe sometimes it really is necessary to step on people to get what’s right and the only way to put people in their proper place. Maybe things won’t change with women until we’re willing to enact the same kind of violence and control upon them as they have with us. For example, look how fast blacks got ahead compared to gays. Now they have more rights than whites ever had, even if some people aren’t willing to admit this. Gays always went about protesting and fighting for their rights in a calm and peaceful way. But the blacks didn’t. And no matter what anyone says, ever since the LA riots, the law has tended to favor them in most places because cops and judges are getting sick of being accused of racism. Even today, that’s all you fucking hear about. People will always do whatever works for them in order to get ahead. Right or wrong, it’s human nature to do so. As long as playing the race card works for them, they’re going to keep on doing it. Meanwhile, women need to start doing what’s going to work for them and I really think resorting to violence may be the only way if they want men to stop deciding what they can and can’t do with their own bodies, for example.

Tom, however, thinks violence won’t help and that they’re doing a fine job. There are more women in politics, the military, and just about everywhere, he says.

True, but they’re still not being paid fairly and are still being told how to live their own lives.

So Leslie Van Houten has once again been denied parole. Sometimes I wonder why she even bothers to try. I don’t know that I would bother wasting my time if I were in her shoes.

I do agree, however, that it was wrong of the courts to approve her parole and then deny it simply because Manson died and they’re afraid of creating a so-called new Manson Family. Did they expect Manson to live forever? Besides, any sicko can follow in his footsteps anytime. But you know how the law is, they can do whatever the fuck they want. They’re above the law and nothing is illegal for them. I’ve seen this firsthand. When you make the laws you can break them, too.

Do I think she should get out simply because she was young and under a horrible influence at the time of the murders? Absolutely not. I heard her once say that she doesn’t understand why she’s still being punished for something she did when she was 21. I would agree if she had stolen a car or something like that. But this is one case where it’s good to see someone held accountable for their own actions because there are too many cases of others being held accountable for other people’s actions. I’m seeing more and more of this shit lately and it’s sad. I can see if you influence an impressionable child to kill themselves or something, but we really ARE responsible for our own actions as adults who should be old enough to know the difference between right and wrong no matter what. Yet if I were attacked by some random stranger on the street, chances are excellent that they may get off by claiming I somehow provoked them, especially if they weren’t white. Recently there was this sickening case in the UK where a guy got just 3 years for bludgeoning his ex. The courts claimed she provoked the attack by seeing someone else when in reality she’d already left him, not that this should be an excuse to smash someone over the head with a hammer.

But then the provocation argument would surely cease to exist for those who fucked with me, wouldn’t it? How much you wanna bet no one ever asked or suggested if the welfare bums in Arizona just might have done anything on their part to provoke me?

Okay, enough negativity. As it is, I myself hate it when some of my FB buddies post nothing but negative shit as they often do. Yeah, the world can be both depressing and scary. And yeah, I wonder if violence and vigilantism may not be such a bad idea in some cases, but life is never going to be fair no matter what.

Anyway, we’re not doing much today. I’m doing laundry and just relaxing for the most part.

Damn Amazon and their glitches! I swear something up there does not want my books to get any reviews. Aly left a review but it’s not visible. This isn’t the first time this has happened with reviews not posting so I finally complained to Amazon, assuming I complained in the right place. Amazon is a very complex site and they make contacting them rather difficult. Either way, I’m pretty much counting on not getting any reviews at this point. In fact, I may quit publishing with them because it’s too much work for too little money. It was just meant to be a fun hobby of mine anyway.

So I’m going to be quitting two things, sugar and not writing but probably publishing. the odds of making any real money in writing have always been like winning the lottery just like with trying to get a record contract or something like that. Besides, I learned years ago that you can’t make something be that wasn’t meant to be. That’s okay. I can still have fun with it and I will.

Just like sleeping normally and having a woman I was really attracted to wasn’t meant to be, I learned years ago that I wasn’t meant to have a job or career of any kind either so maybe that’s part of why the reviews aren’t “meant” to go through. I mean maybe something up there is interfering with reviews because the more reviews you get, the more notoriety I would think your books get. It’s so fucking frustrating, though, and I’m so pissed because Aly would have gladly read and reviewed everything of mine. This may have really helped, too. Then again, during the time I had the two books published, I had four-star ratings and still didn’t make shit. So it isn’t about the ratings but about fate. What if I was suddenly a perfect singer who was also young and gorgeous? The odds of this earning me much money are next to nothing.

Although it was fun to try, I don’t think I’m going to get this peel-off nail polish again. It actually takes longer to peel the damn stuff off than it does to remove it with nail polish remover, and the ones with glitter wash off every time I wash my hands.

Today is the sunniest it’s been in a while, so I went down to the lake. It was cold enough to see my breath in the air but otherwise gorgeous.

The doll is still listed as “awaiting shipment.” It’s already the weekend in China so I guess she’ll sit there at the factory waiting to be picked up until Monday.

Last night I dreamed I was waiting in a large waiting room with a couple of detectives. I don’t know if I was a witness or why I was with them, but I wasn’t handcuffed or anything, so I guess I didn’t do anything wrong. It seemed like we’d been sitting in the room forever with dozens of other people when I complained about getting tired and wanting to go home. One of the female detectives insisted I stay, though.

Then I dreamed that Virginia was sitting at a small card table at the side of the road where it forms a T on Oak. She asked us when we expected to move and we both told her we had no set moving date. She seemed irritated and said something about getting people upset by not knowing exactly when we would move.

In another dream, I was at Mary’s place when I felt a fork underneath her carpet. I thought that maybe if I turned it upside down somehow the tines wouldn’t poke through the carpet but wasn’t able to maneuver the fork around through the thick carpet.

Woke up to the exciting news that the doll is shipping from China today. Not only that, but she showed me pictures of the doll and both heads and they’re exactly what I want. They got the right faces, eye colors, and wigs. She’s absolutely gorgeous. Just a little too titsy. Now I just have to hope I can handle the bitch! It’s exciting after wanting this for so long. It’ll be like getting two dolls in one. Maybe even like four in one since a drastically different eye color can give one’s face a different appearance.

I didn’t realize it but she’ll have standing feet. This is fine even though she’ll have three screws in each foot as I don’t expect to see the soles of her feet very easily. Still don’t understand how throwing a few screws in the feet can stand and balance an 80-pound doll but I will soon find out.

While $740 is a lot of money in itself, I got a smoking deal! These aren’t the Bentleys of these dolls but they’re the Caddys. A low-ender without a second head is usually over a grand, so to get a high-ender with an additional head for less than a grand is a great deal.

Realizing that I’m probably never going to get any reviews on my books at this point and that Stacey probably isn’t going to check them out anyway, I went ahead and sent her a message. I just can’t get anybody to leave me one single fucking review but I guess that no reviews are better than bad reviews. I was going to wait until I republished Evil Amongst the Evergreens before contacting Stacey, but again, even if she did at least check my book page out, I can’t see her buying anything. I told her that if I didn’t get a message confirmation from her within a week or two, I’ll call her. So around February 1st, I’m sure I’ll be calling.

I was going to wait a couple of weeks after sending Palma’s message before I shared and tagged one of her memes, but I might wait and at least see if I can see some activity on her account at some point. She has gone a month or so without posting in the past, so unless she’s posting things I can’t see, there’s a chance she hasn’t checked in since I sent the message. I was kind of hoping she would see it and be like, oh no! I don’t want her sharing and tagging me, so I better at least give her a confirmation.

I really think that’s why Scot blocked me; not because I messaged him but because I shared one of his memes. Could be a power and control thing too, but who knows and who cares? I say what I have to say and leave it at that but it would definitely be nice to at least get something from Stacey.

After having to hear landscaping every single fucking day so far this week, I’m really hoping it will start raining and keep things quiet today. Really, I’ve had enough.

Unless she has a legitimate excuse, I’m a little disappointed in Aly. I was under the impression days ago that she was going to tell me she finished the book and left a review. But I guess it’s normal for her to take a handful of days off from the Internet here and there because Kim says she hasn’t heard from her either if I can believe Kim, and I think I can in this case. I sent Aly a text and an email but the rest is up to her.

Today I’m going to finish the housecleaning. I’m doing my least favorite chore which is dusting. Then I’ll order groceries, hit the Bowflex and do my usual editing and things like that.

This is it! I’m SOOO excited! The doll I’ve been wanting for about 13 years is now on its way! Ordered from AliExpress and she came to a total of $740. What’s really cool is that the owner in Guangdong, China is sending a bonus head! They’re both Asian and I’m calling them Gia and Suki. Gia has squintier eyes and you can see four of her upper teeth because her mouth is a little more open than Suki’s, who has larger eyes that appear a little more round in shape.

I only have to hope for two things and that’s that they don’t fuck up the order and that I really can lift what’s going to be a 70-80-pound doll. Not sure if she’s 5‘3” tall or 5‘5” tall because they list both heights, but she’s going to measure 35.4–23.6–35.4. These are approximations. The only thing I don’t like is that she really does have huge tits. Just as long as I can lift her!

The two heads I chose are two of the most beautiful faces I’ve seen of all the various types of dolls I’ve looked at. I decided to go for the face, like Tom suggested, as that’s what I’m going to see the most. We’ll just have to hope I’m as strong as we think I am, but in the worst-case scenario, I can wheel her around in my desk chair.

The Yuna doll was nice but I think she was a little anorexic and that I would have had a hard time fitting clothes on her. These faces are much nicer and even more realistic, however. She won’t be quite as well proportioned as my manikin, but she will be more realistic. Her hips and tits will be a little bigger than the manikin’s but her waist will be a little skinnier. I was tempted to ask for a doll with flatter tits in which they have a black doll featured in but I didn’t want to end up confusing them. Their English is shitty enough.

If they don’t botch the order, one will have brown eyes with a short black wig, and the other will have blue eyes with a long brown wig with streaks of blue and green towards the ends.

It’s pretty damn exciting! Like I said, I just hope I can handle this bitch. She’s actually considered a bit plump for one of these things. But I focused on the face and not only got one great face but two. And all for less than a grand. Yuna would have been just over a grand. Furthermore, I was just on time because they just raised their prices on this brand which is called 6YE. I first noticed them nearly a year ago and while I immediately loved them, they were always over a grand or two.

She’ll be here in 8-16 days! Really would like to know exactly when she’s coming because I’m guessing someone will have to sign for her. I’m hoping Tom will be here when she arrives because the package itself is going to be 92 pounds.

Haven’t heard from Aly in a few days. I guess I will hear from her in spurts but that’s okay. I’m just glad to have her back in my life even if she was a bit contradicting in a funny way. She may have been dishonest in the past but this is the first time I’ve known her to be contradicting. She said she missed having someone who didn’t judge her too much yet that was supposed to be the reason she dumped me back in 2016. She also always used to say how forgiving she was, yet she just admitted she’s not.

I skipped my meds today because I had some anxiety the last couple of days sitting in my chest. Nothing serious but enough to be noticeable and that was enough for me to take a day off. It won’t hurt to do that every now and then. It sure was nice to be able to go straight for the coffee, too.

Last night was the first time I dreamed in four different languages and everything I said was actually correct too, LOL. Someone was asking me how to say grandmother and grandfather in German and I told them Großmutter and Großvater. But then they asked if there was a way to simply say granny or grandpa instead. Oma and Opa, I told them.

Then someone asked me how to say grandmother in Spanish and I told them “abuela.”

Then I was reading a comment I got in Italian, and in the dream, I knew it was some kind of negative comment about something I wrote about my pets. I only remember the word “animali” which is plural for animals. Deciding to play dumb, I told them I couldn’t read Italian.

I also dreamed about chatting with Adonis, and some estranged family member showing up at some family gathering. I don’t know what side of the family the girl was on but it looked like a heavy teenage girl with red hair.

In the last dream, I seemed to be sitting in a row of seats watching or listening to someone as I ate one granola bar after another. My dream self thought that the guy near me must think I was a major pig, haha.

Speaking of eating… I saw a fascinating YouTube video on the negative effects of sugar and I’m seriously contemplating not quitting sugar altogether but cutting way down. It’s said to be more addicting than cocaine according to an experiment with lab rats. It definitely seems that the more sugar you have the more you crave it.

I was surprised at the many benefits besides the obvious ones… Sugar being bad for your teeth and putting you at risk of diabetes and obesity. Quitting sugar is supposed to improve bad breath, eyesight, skin, blood pressure, bad cholesterol and much more like our mood, sleep cycles and quality of sleep while leaving us less sluggish when we’re awake.

The most surprising thing I learned was that sugar can affect asthma as well as brainpower. It affects learning and memory. Furthermore, it’s an inflammatory substance that can lead to inflammation like acne. I wonder if getting rid of sugar would help my rash. I’m soon going to find out! I’m not going to cut back on sugar forever but I’m going to try to eat as little of it as I can for as long as I can stand. I will also be lowering my risk of Alzheimer’s and heart disease this way.

They say that by eliminating 10 teaspoons of sugar a day from your diet which comes to 40 grams, you’ll lose a pound every three weeks. Women aren’t supposed to have more than 25 grams of sugar a day, men no more than 37 grams. I know I won’t lose weight because I just don’t have the metabolism to do it, but I’ll gladly take the other rewards I may reap if I can stand to stick it out.

It really does seem that once so much junk became so readily available was when I started having more cavities and other issues. I know I’m older and that I have Hashimoto’s but maybe I would be 10 pounds overweight instead of 30 if there wasn’t so much temptation everywhere I go.