HR has been going wonky again. It’s more that it’s been beating hard than fast. I don’t smoke, I’m active, I’m relatively healthy, so hopefully it’s no big deal. But yeah, when it’s quiet and I sit still, I can hear it resonating throughout me. I don’t feel anxious, though sometimes it doing this can make me anxious. It just doesn’t seem normal even though I’ve already mentioned it to my doctors and my tests were good. Still, the constant thump-thump-thump is both annoying and unnerving.

Poor Aly, though. While I’ve been having a fun weekend, she was in the hospital on a slow-drip IV dispensing Ibuprofen. They can’t get her fever under 99 until the fibroids are removed. She’s likely to be hospitalized tomorrow which sucks not just for obvious reasons, but she had just gotten out of medical debt.

Love my pink silicone popcorn popper so much that I decided to get a purple one and slowly build up a little colorful collection. Magenta’s next!

Also got new toothbrush heads for our electric toothbrushes that were surprisingly cheap but seem to get the job done well.

Lastly, we got colorful silicone pot scrubbers, filters for the air cleaner, and 15 different fake toenail designs for Suki/Gia.

Those poor Twenties. They must’ve been woken up when the punk came in early yesterday. Because there’s no better place to spend 6:38 in the morning when you’re in your 20s than with mommy and daddy, right? rolls eyes The way the little shit sometimes comes in this early makes me think even more that he’s sleeping in his car.

After eating the same things for a while, it was nice to get some variety yesterday. First we went to Sam’s Club to get our usual stuff (mostly my fruits and veggies) and I got these chips to try that I’ve never had before. They’re made with sweet potatoes and have chickpeas, peas, rice and black beans and they’re really good. Tom’s had chickpea chips before. He tried one of his Indian coworker’s but found them boring. I guess chickpea chips are popular in India, though.

Then we went to Safeway because I wanted lobster macaroni but they didn’t have it so I settled for lobster cakes. They’re just so-so.

Then we went out a third time to Rite Aid right outside the park where I got my mini bottles of Merlot and Rosé for $3 and a $1 wall sticker that looks cute on the bedroom wall. It’s a transparent tracing of flowers with scattered silvery gems.

So in between my pounding heart which was in the upper 90s when I was relaxed and just over 100 when I was moving around (it’s surprisingly low now at 76), it was a fun day. Sometimes it’s those little things in life that help to break up the monotony of the same old routine I go through during the week.

Because I’m so blind we connected my laptop to the 43” TV, and wow! We don’t need a traditional living room setup anyway because we watch TV on our computers while eating or unwinding. He’s using the 32” one. In the next place, we’ll make it look better by mounting them to the wall. Text is definitely easier to see and TV and pictures are almost too big but it’s wonderful! Love how I can see so much more at once. Before, I could only see my top row of Pinterest boards and only 5 of them. Now I can see 7 per row and I can see 2 rows at once.

Tom has been working on his next app and as I told him, I don’t mean to sound discouraging or negative but I just don’t see us making extra money that way. I think there’s too much competition and it’s like winning the lottery. But he said no, it’s not because he’s not trying to make a million bucks but just a few hundred or so a month to make retirement comfortable. I still don’t see even that but hey, if it’s what he loves to do anyway why not at least try his best and have fun while he’s at it?

Wow, Ralph’s house is already up for sale. The loud car he hasn’t driven since he first had his stroke is still there, though. It’s been covered with a tarp. Really thought I’d have to listen to three or four months of projects before it went on the market but more than likely it will go to a flipper who will take the honors of annoying me with projects for months before it goes to someone I hope to hell doesn’t have a loud vehicle.

Molly, or at least what I’m pretty sure is Molly, looked in on me on Prosebox. When I suspected she came in, I ran and compared her Twitter times to that and sure enough, she was around during the time I got the hit. I know from Aly that she has an iPhone.

Even though she hasn’t done anything to me for quite a while and she may have changed at least a little, I still don’t like her peeking in on me. I don’t know why it bothers me. It just does. She was only in for 19 seconds, probably looking for her name or Aly’s. She has me bookmarked, too. I don’t know what else her interest in me could be about. She already made her so-called amends, apologized for harassing me in the past, and then we moved on. So then why is she looking in on me? There’s nothing she should be interested in since we’re not friends and were never friends in the past.

I was surprised to see that she and Kim are following each other.

There’s a part of me that thinks it’s silly to continue holding any grudges after all this time and to just let the past go and say, Aw, so what if she reads me? At least be polite if not friendly if she contacts me.

But a bigger part of me is still angry with all the shit she and her mother put me through and just doesn’t want to forgive her even if Kim actually did worse to me in some ways. Molly at least didn’t impersonate people like crazy and create one bogus account after another to harass me. Yet there’s just something about Molly I can’t forgive. I really would prefer not to have anything to do with her and that includes her not looking in on me.

I found a free script that blocks IP addresses only it’s a Java thing and Prosebox doesn’t support that. As a test, I dropped my dream blog link on Twitter after inserting the script. Then again, I know she’s reading my tweets. I’m amazed she hasn’t followed Aly and me over on Curious Cat.

Either way and as I told Aly, I’m probably going to drop my public Twitter accounts because I simply don’t need them. So that will be two more places she can’t follow. I’ve made sure my Facebook account is private and made my main PB account FO. That much I’m okay with doing since I’m just not as into socializing as I used to be. Instead, I’ll share more from my newest bogus PB account, Hula Dancer, where I don’t allow contact and therefore socializing. This one I created with a time-sensitive email that Aly can’t look up. The email is not connected to my name at all. Thankfully, Prosebox doesn’t require confirmation.

If Aly were to stumble upon the account totally by accident, she should know it’s me even if I change names. I really think that’s how she found the other one. I stopped using it for over half a year, no one hit it, and then she did? That couldn’t have been a coincidence. She likely knew about Digital Expressions before it shut down too, and I’m sure she knows about Dreamwidth, so it’s a good thing I’ve become more private because I know I say a lot of things that would offend her. She’s ultra-sensitive so instead of having to watch every single thing I say, I just keep most things private. Besides, I’m supposed to be journaling for me. Not an audience. But I’m more willing to share if it can be anonymous and kept from those I know. I blocked all of Aly’s known accounts, but luckily she never really cared for PB as opposed to MD, so it’s unlikely she would stumble upon my other account there. I’ll be sure to use different titles and not post from multiple accounts at once. Might use that paraphrasing tool as well but that might be going a bit too far unless she does start using PB and finds it by accident or googles some of the text in the copies I send her, if that’s something that can still be done. I’ve actually set this account to public, so she doesn’t need to be logged in.

Been combing through the list of users but you’re talking nearly 500 pages of usernames to go through, so I’m searching keywords I’ve known Molly to use. I think I finally found her account. Should have figured she would use something like "girl power."

Happy 62nd birthday to my dear hubby! Unfortunately, the birthday boy has to work. Will be surprising him with the roses I sculpted when he gets up.

Didn’t sleep so great last time around. Nothing woke me up that I know of. I just kept waking up. So I’m a little tired today and don’t know if I’m going to go out for my walk. I’ll get enough physical activity around the house today doing laundry and things like that.

Really hope one of the dreams I had isn’t a sign! I had a period starting. I’m almost at the 9-month marker and would absolutely hate to reset the clock yet again! I don’t have any PMS symptoms, though. No water retention, no bloating, no sore boobs, no extreme hunger.

I also had a dream my mother was alive and we moved to Arizona with plans to stay there for a while and then move to Florida.

Then I was back in our Maricopa house only there were people sleeping in the smaller bedrooms for some reason. As I passed the bedroom furthest from the master bedroom one night on my way to bed, some guy was lying on a twin bed in that room. He got up and started mumbling crazy shit.

In the next dream, I guess I was some kind of party girl because I was hanging around with a group of people and we were drinking heavily. I was in a room with either a really long bed or a bunch of beds side by side. I was lying in one of the beds chatting with the others. I looked toward the window where I thought I saw these blinking lights and said, “Why are the cops here?”

Then I realized there was something wrong with my eyes and the flashing colors were actually coming from me.

Then I got up, not caring that I was stark naked, and began looking for my beer bottle (I hate beer in real life) among a cluster of other opened beer bottles sitting on a table. The dream ended with me trying to figure out which bottle was mine.

In the last dream, I held a DVD of some movie that Stacey had lent me. I knew I was supposed to leave it outside my door after I watched it and then tell her on Facebook to come and pick it up. I went browsing through a DVD collection I don’t have in real life in search of a movie I thought she might like and thought of what note I would enclose with it and whether or not I wanted to actually see her when she came to pick it up.

54° this morning and just 78° tomorrow. WTF is wrong with this place? We should be doing triple digits! Tom thinks the reason we’ve been overrun with skunks at night is due to the mild summer we’ve been having.

Just got in a few minutes ago from my half-hour walk. I walked between 5:30 and 6:00 so there would be enough light to see well, the skunks would be in bed, and there wouldn’t yet be much traffic. Went with a hoodie over a T-shirt and started off chilly. By the time I reached the RVs, I was warm.

Exchanged hellos with Jim once I got back to the house and he was coming around the circle. He looks pretty damn fit and healthy for a guy that’s getting close to 90.

Tom and I were talking about how things change as we age. He was saying that while things are always changing at least somewhat, he too, felt like things were changing so fast in his early 50s, but then they stabled out in his late 50s. At 50 he felt just as strong as when he was 20 but now he isn’t as strong.

His wife has always been fitter and now she can tease him about being both fitter and stronger. I am definitely naturally muscular and I definitely build additional muscle easily. Been this way since my early twenties.

Right now I’m worried that I’m going to suffer skin issues almost every day for the rest of my life. He feels confident that I won’t, so let’s hope he isn’t being naively optimistic. I’d rather skin issues than anxiety, but can I just have a break from everything for a while?

I was better down there but then I started getting burning and itching again, so maybe there is a connection with potatoes. Tom said he thinks if I have them once a week I’d be okay. It’s having them every other day that’s too much. That much I can agree with.

He looked down there and said it just looked red but didn’t see any bumps.

I guess the first of the democratic debates was last night. Didn’t watch it because I’m just not into watching that sort of thing but the only thing I don’t like about Democrats is that they’re so pro-illegals. They put everyone else first and foremost before their own. I hate to say it but I think that since it doesn’t affect me directly, I’d rather women lose their rights by closet case Republicans and for gays to lose rights than for us to be allowed to be overrun with illegals that could harm us in many ways. But that doesn’t make me a Republican any more than I was ever a Dem. I’m independent. I say equal rights for everyone that’s FROM here and no catering to illegals. If you’re caught here illegally you should be deported. Yet while it seems that most people have a serious problem with two people in love marrying each other if they’ve got the same parts between their legs, they also expect everyone to welcome illegals with open arms and a big bright smile on their faces as well. Oh, yes, we’re expected to happily feed, house, and provide medical care to thousands and thousands of illegals and refugees at our tax dollars’ expense, no questions asked.

The planes were quiet last night. They seem to be a back-and-forth thing.

Cock must have slipped out quietly and the buds stayed in place enough to protect me from it because this week its habit is to come in around 9:30 in the morning and stay for about 12 hours. Sometimes I wonder if his coming around so much lately is a spite thing. Like their way of saying to the neighborhood, “See, he’s still coming around and there’s nothing you can do to get rid of him. You can stop him from sleeping here but you can’t stop him from visiting.”

Some people really don’t have respect or consideration for others and they seem to get worse with time. If Larry lived in the same town as when my parents were in a park, and if he had a vehicle this insanely loud, they would never want him visiting with that shit. Ever.

I’ve lost a few pounds because I’ve been eating lower-calorie foods but my body has its threshold and won’t let off any more weight. That’s okay. I feel wonderful as opposed to the crap I used to eat, and even better when I don’t have sugary treats. I was such a TV dinner whore for so long that if someone had told me I would teach myself to cook, even if it’s just simple things anybody could make, I’m sure I would have laughed. I just had no interest in it. I’ll still indulge a little on weekends.

The one thing I’m definitely still doing wrong is overdoing the cholesterol. I really shouldn’t be eating meat since I’m not on statins. It’s just that without meat, I really lose a lot of variety that way.

For a fleeting moment, I considered going back to my full dose of medication 6 weeks before labs, figuring Dr. A would only want to resend me to the lab in just a couple of months. But then I remind myself of two things. One is that the dosage experiment I’m doing won’t tell me anything unless I do it at least 6 months, and two, Dr. A’s not my mother. All I have to do is say no to anything she requests. I’ll still give her a heads-up on the portal before labs in September so she doesn’t have her nurse calling me about why my TSH is a bit high.

Most importantly, I’ve been feeling so much better overall! So why change that? Why rock the boat and do anything that could risk changing that? Especially since I’m not endangering my life.

I watched a video tutorial on sculpting roses and decided to pull out my sculpting clay and tools and finally put them to use. Sculpting roses is fairly easy. I baked the two rosebuds I sculpted earlier and I’m going to paint them in a little while.

Outdoors:

We took the bikes out late last night and sure enough, as soon as we reached the top of the hill a couple of hundred feet or so from the house, there’s a skunk in the middle of the road. It stopped and looked at us and I wasn’t sure if it was going to approach us, turn and run away, or dart in front of the bikes so I turned around and we made a few rounds around the circle. When I saw another one about to jump out in the middle of the street down past Bob and Virginia, we went home.

Never before have they been like this. They’re everywhere! This is my sixth summer here yet I never was deterred from going out late at night due to being overrun by skunks. Again, it’s like something doesn’t want me out there. First it used my health to keep me home and now it’s skunks. Go figure. That’s okay, though. I still have the treadmill.

Sleep:

Today I slept okay but yesterday the bud slipped and something loud woke me up. But that’s okay as I only have 5 more years of this shit, right?

I just wish I could remember my dreams better! Lately, it’s like I have a faint idea of something that I dreamt but then it’s gone before I can fully grasp it enough to put it into words.

Programming:

Tom now has the flippers to his pinball game able to flap.

Pets:

And the new bedding verdict is in! This paper/wood shaving mix is definitely the way to go for the pigs. Yes, they are able to make more of a mess when they run around since the stuff is lighter and fluffy but the Roomba can handle vacuuming it up easier than the big chunks of paper. Just did a partial replacement and the biggest thing I like is how it handles piss. With the paper bedding, you get clumps stuck to the base and you have to really gouge it up with the dustpan. Not with this stuff! I should be able to stretch 2 bales to last a month, so $20 a month for them. So gonna get a subscription going! :-)

I’m now testing the lower level of the rats’ cage with this stuff to see how much they kick out. It may not be suitable for them but time will tell.

Also, using this bedding on the pigs would eliminate the need for the hand vac and playpen since I can work around them with this bedding. The liners would be good for if we run out before the next bale arrives. I don’t think they give a shit whether they sit around at home or in the pen since they’re not explorers, as long as the rats can’t chase them. Gonna reshape the pen at some point into a fun climbing jungle gym for the rats. I’ll make a point of handling the pigs every other day or so, so they stay used to me and aren’t home 24/7, day after day.

Thoughts:

Thought about it some more and the biggest potential problem with rural would be barking. I know damn well, especially in the west, they’re all going to have large dogs that aren’t allowed indoors. Yes, I would take Jesse’s mutts over the traffic here because they couldn’t wake me up. But that in itself was still incredibly annoying and to need to have sound machines on all the time just to drown it out. As we saw in Arizona, even being in the middle of a 10-acre ranch you could still hear some dogs. So since I don’t expect we’d ever get a piece of land that big if we chose rural since we don’t want to venture too far from civilization, barking would probably be our worst problem there assuming we didn’t get sonic boomed which is worse and comparable to the traffic here. I would think, though, that in an area that has many 1-3 acre lots, the barking would be maddening. While the most important thing is keeping ferociously loud sounds away from the bedroom, I would still like to have as much of my cake and eat it too as possible by not having to listen to shit like that all day long. I hear landscaping every day and while that’s annoying it doesn’t go on hour after hour. So both volume and frequency matter.

Sweeps:

Is entering the expiring sweeps for the month worth the spam and congratulations on other people’s wins? Yeah, I guess so. I’ll get to the 250 or so expiring ones in a few days.

Writing:

Still looking forward to Camp NaNo but still finishing up my last project. That will be done at the end of the month for sure.

“No problem, I understand,” would have been nice to hear from Aly when she wanted to chat when I wanted to charge the phone and do other things. Instead, I’m being made to feel guilty for not always being readily available. I do my best, so it would be nice if she was a little less clingy and without certain expectations whenever she has free time.

Got up in the early evening and read the letter on the counter from the park.

I knew it. I just knew it.

Sometimes I sit and think of all the things he knows that I could never figure out and how much smarter he is and how I wish I could be as smart, but you know what? Sometimes I am. Sometimes I’m even smarter. Yeah, I TOLD him they’d repave.

He had said, “Naw, they’re not going to do that because the roads are smooth.”

“Yes, they are,” I insisted. “They’re not going to leave these roads looking like a patchwork quilt (the squares they dug in and then filled back in when upgrading the fiber optics) or with all the colorful paint markings they left all over the place. This park’s too obsessed with looks not to resurface these roads.”

Well, they’re going to seal-coat the entire park. They enclosed a map with a different color marker tracing different streets depending on the date they’re to be done. They’ll be working on and off from the 15th till the 24th of next month. Our area is on for the 18th and luckily I’ll be on days at that time and our area won’t be split between two days like those who are on the edge of their designated sections.

Unfucking believable, though. Been here six years and they’ve worked in the roads five or six times already. Lived in the Phoenix house for just as long and they only tore the roads up once.

Then there was their little “reminders” note. No feeding the wildlife, keep your pets on a leash, etc.

Yeah? How about no tearing in and out on motorcycles in the middle of the night? How about management not playing favorites? How about doing something about some of the complaints you get instead of spiting people for it? Really, I’m sick of this underage punk that lives here but doesn’t sleep here. I’m serious, too. Just because he doesn’t sleep here doesn’t mean he isn’t living here. He is. No idea where he’s crashing at night but I wouldn’t be surprised if he was sleeping in his car. I think his sleeping here was where Joy had to draw the line. He comes in in the morning and leaves at night. Really think this kid just doesn’t want to work and his parents are paying for his food, smokes, and that fucking car which is like oxygen to the little bastard so that he doesn’t have to get a job, a place of his own, or take on any kind of responsibility. He sure hasn’t seemed to have any of those since his stint in the Army and divorce in 2015, from what I could learn snooping around on FB.

As far as the paving goes, since I’m going to be up that day, I say let them go for it. Sure, it will be annoying as hell but since it’s only for one day, let them spend money at our expense to make the roads prettier, and most importantly, smoother for bike riding. Really looking forward to that electric wheel someday!

Loving this translation job! It sucks that I don’t get paid even though I get extra bells and whistles, but it’s a great practice exercise. What I do is I set Google Translate from Spanish to English. Then in Spanish, I write what I think is the correct way to say whatever the prompt asks and watch it appear in English. This way I can verify that I’m correct. I’ve got a pretty good accuracy rate so far but my grammar isn’t always great.

Had a sore throat all day yesterday but fortunately, it’s gone now.

So the block on my phone is completely worthless since South Carolina made it in today. That explains how Tammy got in after I had blocked her when her brats came between us. Oh well. Maybe they’ll give up once they realize they’re not going to get an answer from this number.

I don’t smell anything since trying the new bedding on the pigs yesterday but they’re making a bit of a mess, even with a 7-inch base. They’re kicking some of it out when they run around. It occurred to me that I should have put one of the disposable liners underneath. That way, instead of their corner bathrooms sticking to the base of the cage, it would stick to that.

Fuzzy is so adorable with the way he runs to me and stands up to be picked up when he’s done burrowing under the sheets which he likes to do same as most rats. Just as cute is when he gets on his “flying perch.” I stick my arm out straight with my elbow bent and he hops onto my elbow as we “fly” down the hall to get a piece of cheese on the way to his house.

No more night walking for me. If I go out at night it’ll be on the bike. There are simply way too many skunks. It seems there are more than usual. Most of the time I don’t see any but lately, I haven’t been able to go out without seeing two or three and that’s just in the small section I cover. Tried to get pics of one without going too close but it didn’t come out.

Saw something else small scurry across one of the streets that could’ve been a rat.

Other than having to dodge skunks with poor vision, it was nice out. A little warm but still nice. The air was alive with the smell of laundry, Jasmine and barbecues. Not so much in the way of barbecues, though, since 10:30 is getting a bit late for that.

Another Robocall came in. Still not sure how it is they’re slipping through the block but this one was in Florida. Didn’t realize I could just ask Alexa where a certain area code was. No need to look it up myself. At least the calls have dropped from 3 a day to 1 a day.

Trying a new type of bedding for the guinea pigs so I don’t have to deal with changing their liners every other day. This one is a mix of wood shavings and paper. Usually, we get just paper bedding which is supposed to absorb odors better and be better for their health since the wood shavings can be dusty. But it was only $10 for the same size bale as a $16 bale of paper bedding. If this works out It will be less work for less money. Yes, I could do everybody with the paper bedding but that would cost a lot of money. I don’t want to do something just because we can afford it. I’ll probably stick to paper bedding for the rats or maybe do their lower level with the mixed bedding. We’ll see.

I also got them some apple-flavored treats and of course the pigs aren’t interested. The rats are, though, since they’ll eat anything.

After thinking about it, I decided that an electric wheel for the bike would be a worthy investment. Not just for the hills here, but I could use it in Florida as well. It’s usually pretty windy in Florida and riding against the wind, even on level ground, can be a challenge. So I think it would be a good thing to have no matter what.

I got a single sippy cup that I wanted to try before getting a set of them. They’re cheap. I’ve been looking for sippy cups like the one I’ve had for a while now with the built-in straw but realized I was searching with the wrong keyword. I was looking for sippy cups with attached straws when I really needed to search for sippy cups with built-in straws. They’re great to put by the bed so that if I wake up thirsty I can grab them without spilling water all over the place. So now I have two of them. :-) I was just hesitant to get a set even if it wasn’t much more money because the reviews were so mixed. Some people were saying they were wonderful while others were saying they were flimsy and horrible and that the cap wouldn’t stay on. Everything looks great to me so all I have to do is see if they hold up in the dishwasher which some people said was a bust.

I also grabbed another jar of Tucks for me and a matching rainbow jewelry set for the doll that has earrings, a necklace and a bracelet. Since I pulled off a couple of her toenails and the French manicure she had was incredibly boring anyway, I’m going to eventually get a set of 15 different toenail designs.

Went to Rite Aid a couple of hours after I got up and got my Merlot and Rosé minis as well as a peanut butter Twix bar to try. Definitely don’t like it as much as the original so I had some of the sour cream chips he got instead. He can try the rest of the PB Twix.

The fish has started using the tube Tom printed out for him.

Made tilapia with a baked potato, broccoli and cauliflower for dinner. I used a 0-calorie butter spray so the whole thing was only about 200 calories.

I later made the best batch of homemade mashed potatoes ever! Perfect mix of margarine, milk and garlic salt. I used the highest speed when whipping them.

Had a dream I was discussing celebrities with someone. When they were trying to figure out the name of a certain celebrity, I told them who it was, saying I knew their name because I had a friend who was into the show they were on.

Then someone said that somebody was going to be performing in their hometown and how excited they were, and wouldn’t I just love it if they would come to my city too?

No, I said, because I preferred YouTube in the privacy of my own home.

Made myself a bunless mushroom burger with watermelon for dessert. Chatting on Facebook with Anne now and doing a handful of other things. Laundry, dishes, writing, etc.

Definitely gotta stick to the inside of the park when I’m walking at night. The skunks usually stick to the perimeters of the park. The perimeters are good in the daytime because you don’t have to deal with traffic as much that way.

I was surprised by how much I could hear the freeway when I was out earlier. And of course, the fucking planes. They didn’t turn out to be that annoying last night but in the morning as well as tonight they were. I was totally dismayed to learn the airport added a new route. Great, more planes flying over my fucking head.

Sadly, not a single person on Facebook cared to download Tom’s test app but Aly did. He’s thinking his next game will be some kind of pinball game.

Just when I thought blocking robocalls was a success, since I didn’t get any yesterday, it turns out it was a bust. It might have cut most of them down but I got a call from the 304 area code, which is West Virginia, and after double-checking, I found that I did indeed have that area code blocked. So I don’t know how they managed to weasel in.

Slept okay, but not great. Traffic didn’t wake me up because I used the bud, but just the stress of sleeping in the daytime disrupts my sleep. If we weren’t right on the fucking street, then maybe not. sighs 5 more years.

Tammy shared a meme saying, “Never fuck someone’s life up with a lie because they can fuck yours up with the truth.”

Then she added, “And the truth will soon come to light.”

I asked who she was talking about but I don’t expect an answer. I doubt it’s got anything to do with me because she would have told me if she was upset with me. Plus, I haven’t lied to or about her. Then again, neither did I when it came to Lisa back when the nutjob went ballistic on me a decade ago.

Sometimes a part of me wishes she would get pissed off enough to dump me, but she’s just not the dumping type. If she was, I would be free to let the girls have it which would certainly feel good, not that they would ever own up to anything. Without her, though, I wouldn’t have the connection to the bitches or have to hear about them from time to time.

I know this is an incredible waste of time and that the message is unlikely to even be seen much less replied to, but since Alyssa’s been on my mind, I couldn’t resist but reach out to her again. This time I was a little more truthful about my intentions, not that I was lying to her before. I told her that I just really liked her and was drawn to her personality and all that, and yes, she’s attractive even though my interest in her is not physical in any way, and that I hoped we could be cyber friends of sorts and say hello every now and then.

I also let her know that I understood that I was once a former patient, however briefly that lasted, and that we came from totally different walks of life and all that, etc. As I said, I don’t expect a reply but every now and then life does throw a surprise my way.

Instead, I get to hear from Anne. Jobless, emotionally unstable, not very intelligent Anne. Why is it that it’s so easy to get attention from these kinds of people? Is this normal? I mean do they reach out to just anyone? Or is there something about me that’s attracting the Annes while repelling the Alyssas?

Saw 3 skunks on the 15-minute walk I went on last night. This is why I’m a little hesitant to take the bike out at night. Even with good lights, I don’t want one of those or a possum darting out as I’m barreling down the hill.

After a temporary setback with privacy policies, Tom’s app is out! Going to be a little disappointed if no one on Facebook downloads it. It’s free, it’s simple, and it’s just his first test app to learn the ropes. I suppose not everyone has that much extra space on their phone but still. It won’t kill people to DL it and check it out. :-)

Still no news on my biopsy but she did say it usually takes a couple of weeks. I’m also still worried there isn’t going to be anything they can do for me in the end. I would seriously rather be told, “Hey, you’re going to die,” rather than, “You’re going to suffer or at least be very uncomfortable for the rest of your life.” I really would.

I’m a little tired today but that’s what I get for not sleeping with the earbud. Traffic woke me up not once but three times. Figured I’d take a chance because I didn’t have much to do today but I’m definitely going to sleep with the bud next time around so I don’t get too backed up in sleep. Oh, to one day be able to live where I don’t need to sleep with earbuds! But I really do believe we’re going to be here until he retires so I might as well get used to it for the next half a decade.

Decided not to do that 5-hour walking experiment. That’s just ridiculous and way too extreme. I’ll stick to the standard half-hour a day, 5 days a week. I’m big like most older people and that’s okay. :-)

Heard some planes late last night as well as a few in the late afternoon so I wouldn’t be surprised if they were annoying tonight. They only take so many days off, unfortunately.

“We won’t shift our noise from one community to another.”

Yeah, right. Well, that’s exactly what they do and I’ll definitely get on them about it from both my public Twitter accounts until they either get fed up enough to do something about it or block me. I’ve had it with this plane shit. There’s no need for them to be flying over us. They didn’t start doing this until last fall so there’s no reason they can’t go back to flying where they were flying before. It’s not like they have no alternative, so there really isn’t any reason or excuse for this.

The only dream I remember from last night was being served by some woman at a buffet somewhere. I think we were out of town. It was either really late or really early. I was trying to get a tiny bit of a certain food included with whatever I was getting, but the woman wouldn’t give it to me.

“What if we pay for it?” I asked her, and then she agreed to serve it.

Okay, robofuckers, I just blocked every area code in the country except for CT, NE, FL, OH and CA. Well, I did block FL. Just not Tammy’s area code. Most of the calls do seem to be originating from the East. I checked some of the latest area codes and they came from Florida, Tennessee, North Carolina and Maryland. I think I saw Mississippi and Arkansas as well. I was getting an average of 3 a day, so we’ll see if this helps. With good friends in Nebraska and Connecticut and Tammy preparing to move to Ohio, I didn’t want to block those States. I’ll block Tammy’s area code once she’s out of there.

Tom had to pull his app TapQuickTap off because there was a problem with the privacy policy. I was just about to tell people to go look it up, too. He fixed the issues and resubmitted it so hopefully they won’t reject it. Could be a day or two before it’s back up, though.

I hope I’m wrong and that I’m pleasantly surprised in the end but I just don’t have a good feeling about this. I just get the feeling it’s not meant to be. Just because you may be good at something and deserving of it doesn’t mean it’s necessarily meant to be. I just don’t think anything up there wants us making extra money on the side. If it did, he would be paid the national average, especially for this state, and I might be able to hold a schedule and work. He thinks the apps will eventually generate a few hundred dollars a month and while I think he’s being naively optimistic, it certainly can’t hurt to try!

I have declared my CampNano project, Gone. 5 days until cabin assignment, 11 days until writing begins. I’m ready to start but at the same time, I still need to give my last book its final read-through.

I was chatting about the mama’s boy with Carolyn and she agrees it’s frustrating, they make comments every time they hear his car, Joy does show favoritism, it’s so wrong, and she keeps praying they move away.

Ooh, the power of prayer! Yeah, that’ll work. Just like that woman suffering from postpartum depression I saw on an episode of Deadly Women who was told by her priest to pray her depression away. Instead of getting medication, she goes home, finds prayer is a joke, and ends up killing her entire family. So damn the person who created the God fantasy and brainwashed nearly everyone into buying that crap!

Although…there are still certain things that make me wonder. Sometimes I really do wonder if something could be up there. I just don’t know that it’s anything I would want to call a friend. But when the same things happen one too many times, be it a good thing or a bad, I do wonder.

Anyway, I heard the bastard leave after it came and went yesterday, so once again I’m not sure that he’s actually living here. Well, he’s living here, he’s just not always sleeping here. I hadn’t even been up a few hours when I heard the bastard three times. I just can’t always tell what direction he’s going so I don’t know if I heard him come or go the last time. I just know that his asshole parents will be here as long as we are and then we’ll hope the loudest car in our future neighborhood can’t wrap around three sides of us or get as close. There’s got to be some reason Joy’s been protecting them and that can only be because they’re friends. Can’t think of any other reason she would protect them. Just too lazy to do anything about their shit? She doesn’t strike me as the lazy type. They gotta be tight. I still don’t think Kristy knows that Joy’s covering their asses either.

Speaking of Kristy, I saw a picture of Carolyn with what looked like Kristy but when I asked if that was her, she didn’t answer, which pretty much was my answer. Sometimes people’s lack of an answer is enough to answer my question. That saying about silence speaking a thousand words often rings true. Poor Kristy, though, trying to get Joy to do the right thing while being left completely in the dark while she’s at it, not knowing she’s submitting people’s complaints to their very protector.

Been loving the absence of planes this last week but I know it won’t last forever. Last night was amazingly quiet. No planes of any kind, no helicopters, no nothing. But every time summer sets in, it gets unseasonably cool. Today and yesterday have been really hot at around 100°, but tonight it’s supposed to drop to 57° and only get up to 86°. I’ll go out for a quick jog at about 9.

Through experimenting, Tom and I have been finding out what seems to work the way we hear it does and what doesn’t. Neither of us buys that protein fights hunger. There just doesn’t seem to be a connection there.

He thinks it would, but I don’t think it’s true that the more calories we burn, the more we lose, but I’m about to find out. See, I think it’s all in not consuming that many calories to begin with. Remember, I did those HIIT routines for 90 minutes where you burn 1000 calories and it didn’t affect me at all. This was right before I was diagnosed. I don’t think, for example, you can eat 2000 calories, burn 1000 calories, and “trick” your body into thinking it only ate 1000 calories. I think you have to not eat those extra 1000 calories in the first place. But next week I’m going to burn 1000 calories every day and see what happens. When I don’t actively count calories which is pretty much never these days, I naturally have about 1500 to 1800 a day.

I’m not going to do HIIT routines. I’m going to walk at a slow but comfortable pace for 5 hours while I do the things I usually do on my laptop. Maybe not all at once, though. If I walk at 2.5 MPH, I can burn about 200 calories.

The older I get, the more I bitch about losing pieces of myself like pretty much everyone does…my vision, my memory, my libido, etc. Well, when will one of those “pieces” be my appetite?

This is the first day since the biopsy that I have less irritation down there.

Oh great. Now Molly’s inserting herself into mine and Aly’s conversation on Twitter. Figured it was just a matter of time. rolls eyes I’m going to ignore her for now. I thought about protecting my tweets but I want to keep rejection as a last resort. Reject Molly and she’ll be more determined to get at you. She’s changed but then she also hasn’t. Looked in on her own tweets last night and it’s still the same old obsession about Roman. Shows me she still has the same stalking tendencies I’ve always known her to have so I would prefer to keep things amicable and not get on her shit list.

I had another dream Alyssa was in where I was prank calling her on what I knew to be a landline number of hers, not that I would ever do such a thing. We ended up going out to dinner together and I was thinking how glad I was that I didn’t make too many prank calls that would cause her to change the number. Then I wondered if she had any idea that I was the one behind the calls.

Just got back from our first trip to the pool this year on this beautiful dry 103° day. The dryness will be the only thing I’ll miss when we move. There was just one other woman there. She said hi to us but that was it. Good. I don’t care for chatterboxes anymore than histrionics.

Far from Home is now done! It’s 25079 words long. Will spend the rest of the month doing the final editing of the 57-page novella.

Had I taken the time to read the Eucerin sample I got from my dermatologist, I would have known it was body wash and not lotion. No wonder it was runny and sticky!

I was going to pierce Suki’s ears with a safety pin but I didn’t even need that much because TPE is so soft I could just push the earring right through. So now she has pink gemstones in her ears. When I switch to Gia, maybe she can have the purple or blue ones.

Last night was the first time the burning and itching down there woke me up. So again, when the sleep curse can’t use traffic against me, it uses me. Really worried the irritation isn’t because of the biopsy and that my case is hopeless.

Yesterday, I heard what sounded like the mama’s boy coming in at 6 p.m. and then leaving a half-hour later. Then I could have sworn I heard him come in at 9:30 and thought he might have moved back in. If he stayed here overnight last night and left at 6:30, I’m sure the Twenties would have been pissed to have been woken up. Fortunately, my earbuds saved me. Kind of surprised I haven’t heard him yet today.

I almost wish the bastard would move back in because then maybe those who were afraid to come forward will finally be fed up enough to complain and maybe Joy will then feel overwhelmed enough to actually do something. I mean, what is she going to do? Spite half a dozen people if that many complained, for example? In reality, though, no one’s going to complain and if they do they’re going to be retaliated against.

Unfortunately, his app hasn’t gotten any downloads yet.

Will we be married for another 25 years? I wonder this at times but I kind of doubt it. I think somewhere between 20-25 years, though, so we should still have many years ahead! I know I’m always going to have something but I just hope he stays healthy till the end.

Alyssa’s been on my mind since I recently dreamed about her. I don’t know why she pops into my mind at random as she does and why I still feel this longing for her. Hell, it’s been half a decade! Not a sexual longing but just to be around her, to have her as a friend, to chat with her at times, to go out to lunch together occasionally. There was just something about her I really liked and felt comfortable with. She was very personable and kind even if she wasn’t the greatest doctor for me. She was liberal and I could tell we thought a lot alike.

She finally shared a picture of her baby. Not herself, but her husband holding the baby. I was right. It’s a girl. I had a strong feeling for some reason that it was. They don’t mention the name, though.

I’m happy for her but is there anything this woman can’t get? I couldn’t help but feel a pang of sadness for myself. I still don’t regret not having kids, not that it was ever my choice to begin with, and sometimes I’m glad I don’t have to deal with bosses and coworkers, especially when I don’t feel well, but seriously. Some people really seem to have it all! That’s the whole point, I guess, that gets to me at times. From what I can tell, she’s got great parents and comes from a decent family. She’s got money. She can keep a schedule. She’s tall. She’s got a husband who can obviously perform. I’m sure she can sleep with that husband every night, has a great career, and got to have a kid. It’s like whatever Alyssa wants, Alyssa gets.

But If I were suddenly young again, could I get someone I really lusted for while keeping a schedule and choosing the career of my choice and whether or not I had kids? No, of course not. Gay or straight, great personality and intelligence or not, I’d get the biggest sexual misfit there was. While I was dealing with that, I would have a nothing little menial job, if even that, and the rights to choose to have a child, if that’s what I chose, would be up to others or to circumstances beyond my control.

The only two things I don’t get are how the hell she finds time for the kid with such a demanding career and what it is she sees in her husband at least from a physical standpoint. He’s just so incredibly boring. He may not be fat or anything but he’s just this dark blob of nothing.

I just wonder why it is that I was never “allowed” to be normal? Do things really happen for a reason? Or did I just happen to end up this way? It makes me feel like something up there feels I don’t deserve to be normal. Why couldn’t I always sleep with my own husband? Why couldn’t we have had a normal, fun, healthy and exciting sex life together? Why couldn’t I have felt the same degree of lust that I felt for some people I could never have? Why couldn’t I keep a schedule? Why couldn’t I have the guts to drive? Why couldn’t I have a career of my own? Why couldn’t I have been the one to decide whether or not I had kids even if I’m glad I didn’t? Why is it some people can get it all? Really, what could possibly be all that wrong with Alyssa’s life? What could possibly be abnormal for her? What could she possibly want that she can’t have besides maybe a billion bucks? What realistic ordinary thing could possibly be denied to Alyssa??

Do she and her husband ever fight? Will their sex life fizzle out with age like ours did, not that I could have sex anyway due to my LS.

If things aren’t random and we’re basically given a script to play out, why was I chosen to be so unique? Why was I denied so many things that almost everyone else can get or do? What was it about me that made whatever’s up there decide I should be one of the ones to sit out on the sidelines and watch normality play out from the outside in? Why do I have so many health problems? Thyroid, ear, TMJ, rashes, sleep issues, a weight problem I have no control over, etc.

I still worry that I do indeed have LS and there won’t be anything they can do for it but give me the usual temporary solutions that can’t last forever. It’s like with my groin rash. I treat it and it comes back.

If I could get up the nerve, even though it would leave me badly mutilated and hurt like hell, I might wish I could cut off the skin in hopes of healthy or at least pain-free skin growing back.

I made my dream blog public a few days ago just to see if it would start getting any hits, and if it has, I can’t see them.

The weather has been quite mild so far this summer which is saving us money as far as the AC goes but not exactly helping the pool.

I wrote everything above late last night. Tom’s app is now in the store. No downloads yet, though.

The drama queen has done a great job of making up for the girls’ lack of “daddy in heaven” posts every single fucking day. sighs and rolls eyes Been going on for days now. Do some people want to remind us of those we would rather not think of or remember?

When I saw how much the fish liked hiding in the little basket Tom printed to put around the end of the filter so he wouldn’t get his delicate fins and tails sucked into it when I was cleaning it, I asked that he print another one. Haven’t seen him in it yet.

I quickly stopped by next door yesterday when picking up the mail. Virginia looks great and Bob looks like he usually does. They confirmed our suspicions. Ralph has died. So unfortunately that house is going to be on the market soon enough.

Found that using the voice typing tool directly in Google Docs on my laptop works just as well as on my phone. Google’s speech-to-text has always been better than Apple’s so I’m not going to be using my phone nearly as much anymore. With all the robocalls I get, the interruptions would definitely not be appreciated anyway. This one also starts right away like on my phone. The Mac’s takes several seconds to start. If given the choice it’s still much easier to do on my laptop because it’s easier to edit there.

Although I’m ever so slightly wound up now, probably because it’s Sunday night, I’m still continuing to do better overall. I’m just not sure if it’s more due to the pill cuts or getting closer to menopause.

What’s not good is my crotch. Still have burning and itching and still worried there won’t be much they can do for me. What the fuck’s God got against my womanhood in general, anyway? First I was denied a normal sex life. Then I was denied rights to my own reproductive system. Now this shit.

Happy 25th anniversary to us! Haven’t done much so far today. Changed the pigs’ liner with his help and went to Rite Aid. Then we went over some details with the app which we expect to launch today.

Forgot to mention that the two stitches she put in me are dissolvable, unlike when the other doctor did it and I had to go back to have her remove the one stitch or so she put in. So that’s one less appointment I have to worry about.

The pinching sensation is gone and I only ended up having a slight bit of spotting on the liner I wore. Let’s just say I would have been really bummed out had it not been from the biopsy and I saw that.

Crashed at around 8:30 or 9 last night just to be woken up for a few seconds when the fucking cock went zooming out at 9:30 after spending 7.5 hours with Mommy and Daddy. Doing what? Watching TV? Again, living here but not sleeping here. He really doesn’t seem to have done anything with his life since leaving the Army and divorcing 3 or 4 years ago. But I think that no matter how much Joy may have their backs, she can only cover it so much and him being here 24/7 was generating more complaints than she wanted to deal with. I just wish even more people would complain! I think the more that do, the less she’s likely to retaliate than if she just gets a few complaints every now and then. Either way, it’s pretty obvious that they’re going to be here as long as we are.

Took me an hour to fall back asleep when I woke up again at 1 a.m. after having a nightmare of sorts about having an asthma attack in the apartment of one of the characters in my books. Ah, but the dream people have spun some potential story ideas for July’s NaNo while at it! :) Given the clarity of last night’s dream, I wonder if I was seeing into another dimension. I was a lot younger and living in this apartment with a female detective. I can see the place in vivid detail. What was funny was that Alyssa was my mom. She had me when she was really young. My dad was black so she was married to a black guy just like in real life.

Maybe I’ll do some basic story that’s not exactly silly but that doesn’t have much drama or much of a plot to it and that I probably won’t end up sharing since most people may find it boring. It’s just to be doing NaNo, and I like their tools and how I can keep track of my word progress there. I still have a couple of other ideas that have been on the back burner for a while so I won’t rule those out completely.

I also had some dream about my memory issues frustrating me. There was some woman who left me a voice message that I had to call that might have had something to do with my health somehow, be it physical or emotional, and I kept forgetting to return her call.

Lastly, I also dreamed about telling someone I wasn’t sure I was going to work and then Tom said he was hoping I would because he wanted to get one more car while we were here, LOL.

My appointment turned out to be both good and bad. Good: She doesn’t think it looks cancerous down there. She said something about cancer being raised and bleeding but I have nothing like that. Just very red and irritated-looking.

Bad: I’m not getting better. A study of 6 patients on Tacrolimus were all cured after a year but I don’t think I’m any different than the last time I saw her.

My records from Dr. Hottie finally made it to her but the biopsy she did simply stated something about an enlarged hair follicle. Yeah, she may’ve been a hottie but she definitely wasn’t a great doctor. She misdiagnosed me on a few things.

Anyway, since I’m still burning and itching, she recommended a biopsy to be absolutely certain it really is LS and that they’re not missing anything that could explain why I’m not responding to treatment. They’ll contact me in a couple of weeks with the results and on how to proceed from there. For now, I can treat it with Tacrolimus, hydrocortisone and Tucks as needed. Just not on the biopsy site.

This biopsy went much easier than when the hottie doc did it. Amy applied a numbing cream before shooting me. Hottie just shot me straight up with nothing. Now that the numbness has abated it sort of feels like something’s pinching me there but nothing that’s got me running for the Ibuprofen as of yet. Not much bleeding either. Once again, though, the pool will be delayed. I’m not even going to work out today.

Grabbed an Eucerine sample on the way out. I know Aly likes it but I find it too greasy.

Will probably get permanent pit removal someday but not the Mona Lisa Touch.

An ambulance was pulling away from next door right as I was glancing out front at around 8:30 this morning. I stepped outside to see a lady pig in a cruiser sitting in front of our place and another cruiser just past where the ambulance had been. My first thought was that Virginia was taken away but their SUV was in their garage and I later heard someone dragging the trash bin in back after it was dumped. Maybe she just didn’t go with them this time.

Tom just went to get the mail and saw them cleaning out Ralph’s oxygen equipment, so my guess is he’s not coming back. I had a feeling about that too, what with the way the paramedics were coming around so often. I won’t miss his blasting TV at night but I really hope the house doesn’t go up for sale while we’re still here since that could very well mean getting someone with a motorcycle or other loud vehicle that comes and goes regularly which would be worse. Again, old people just aren’t what they were in the 80s and before. These days they’re almost as annoying as the young folks.

The smart plug my rainbow lamp was plugged into that I use in the bedroom when I’m working at my desk in there went out, so we ordered a new one.

Getting robocalls multiple times a day now and it’s really getting old. I keep blocking them but they keep calling from new numbers with new area codes. it’s probably because of the sweeps. I haven’t entered any in several days but I think at the end of each month when most of them expire is when I’ll enter.

Tammy read my journal yesterday about the gift card and said she could use it so I emailed her the code. I don’t see why it wouldn’t work for her. She hasn’t said anything about it either way and she almost never reeds or at least replies to my messages so I can’t ask her unless I ask on her wall or tag her. I don’t know what’s up with that. Maybe she just hates messages as much as I hate live phone chats.

I’ve really come to hate my nieces. All of them. Even Tammy isn’t always happy with the shit they do. I realize they’re young and there are worse people in the world than them, but between Lisa’s paranoid, accusatory and downright psychotic behavior, and the others being such narcissistic, selfish, rude bitches, I want absolutely nothing to do with any of them. Tammy herself knows that once I cut ties with someone or they cut them with me, that’s the way it stays. Never again do I want to hear from the girls and you know, I’m glad they dumped me, mostly over my posts about how being obsessed with the dead causes us to miss out on the living and me thinking it would help them not to “get over” it but to move on to more positive things. We all get stuck in negative ruts at times, after all. But yeah, I’m glad because now I don’t have to watch what I say so much because these overly-sensitive bitches can’t handle things and have the nerve to call others out on their posts while they can post whatever they want and to hell with who it annoys.

Becky and Sarah didn’t block me but I blocked them. I don’t need reminders of their existence when we all interact with Tammy. Having to hear about them and Lisa every fucking time I chat live with Tammy will be enough.

Even though I never really knew Etta and I wasn’t there, I can see why she’d throw Sarah out without warning. They ever think that maybe since both aunts can’t stand them that maybe the problem is them? Somehow I doubt it. Just can’t picture them feeling guilt, remorse or being able to own up to their own actions. “I’m sorry” probably isn’t even in their vocabulary. It was because of Tammy that I didn’t share my true feelings with them before blocking them. Like they’d get it anyway much less agree? I’ll wait and vent if Tammy dies first…maybe.

All this extra walking is doing wonders for my health and my overall sense of well-being. I feel great both physically and emotionally. Even my blood pressure is lower. Sometimes I think it’s still sad that I can never get under 150, but I try not to let it get to me. I am what I was meant to be in this day in age. I lost a pound and a half and I’m sure I can lose another pound or two, but then my body will hold its weight automatically.

Aly didn’t reply to my message until the end of my day in which case I didn’t bother to reply because I was getting too tired. We swapped messages today, though. Her GYN couldn’t see her yesterday so she went in today. Probably just an infection although it could be fibroids. It’s nothing serious either way. I just hope she soon gets a break as well so she too, can enjoy months between appointments instead of weeks. Yes, after seeing Amy tomorrow who I doubt will tell me anything I want to hear, I should be appointment-free until September unless I do decide to see the shrink in August. So far that’s not looking likely, though.

Had a dream that we were in the car going somewhere when Tom quickly skidded to a stop because some people were blocking the road. There were two vehicles that got in an accident or had car trouble, and one car was blocking the outer lane which we were in. When we got out of the car I was worried there might be a fight but all was peaceful.