The Cantina Staring Back At You From The Abyss

[Friendly Frog]

Yeay for continued power and book-gifting!

Boo for Monday. Bleh.

Had a mixed weekend in which I managed to smash my injured foot into some unyielding junk and met up with a friend I hadn't seen all year yet. We had a nice time.

Ankle is actually swollen this time, that doesn't happen to me often. So ice it is, and at least that seems to working but I'm growing really tired of limping all week long. And feeling useless but that's not just the ankle's fault...

Chewed a little on my Sisyphus but didn't get to finish. Hopefully more later tonight.

 

[E.F.B.]

Yay for exercise (For real though, anything is better than nothing.) and meet ups with friends! Boo for swollen ankles!


Morning, Cantina. Dad seemed to have a pretty good birthday. He enjoyed his cake and the sparkler candles we got, and enjoyed Skyping with his family. He also slept in a little more normally this morning so I got a least a few quiet hours to crack my story document open. Maybe the random routine change last week was some kind of birthday anxiety. It's really hard to tell with him.


This afternoon is my consultation with the oral surgeon for my eventual tooth implant. Hopefully, I can make sure they understand that, for insurance purposes, this needs to wait until the fall so that my insurance will roll over before the final step happens, ideally in early next year. Feeling a little fluttery tummy simply because it's a different location and different person than my regular dentist. But like I said, it's just a consultation. I'll get one of those fancy x-rays/CT scans that go around my head and then we sit down and talk. Probably going to ask Mom to come in with me for the sake of planning and also making sure no questions, especially financial ones, get forgotten.

I also need to price some yarn because I ran out on the blanket I started. The downside of designing my own blankets is I've yet to find any tips on how to calculate yarn yardage before I start. Surely there's some math out there that would use the size of the blanket, yarn, and crochet hook and give some idea of yardage. I just don't know how to find it. That's why I figured I'd just start the blanket and then figure how from how many rows my current skeins lasted how much more I'll need to finish this thing.

Okay, I have a couple hours before I need to leave the house, so I'll go get some writing done.

 

[Cobalt Jade]

E.F.B. I remember old knitting and crocheting instructions used to give yarn needed in pounds/ounces. Not very helpful to me.

Two days off! My husband hurt his foot and insists it's getting better so won't go to emergency medical. I admit I'm getting tired of him thumping around on crutches. I pointed out they might give him a boot thing, but he wasn't interested.

 

[Unimportant]

I also need to price some yarn because I ran out on the blanket I started. The downside of designing my own blankets is I've yet to find any tips on how to calculate yarn yardage before I start. Surely there's some math out there that would use the size of the blanket, yarn, and crochet hook and give some idea of yardage.

I don't think it's possible to get a precise formula because some people crochet 'tight' and others 'loose'. This is the best I could find that gives what looks like good ranges.

 

[Brightdreamer]

Hooray for good b-days and consultations!

Boo for imprecise patterns and puffy ankles!

Monday afternoon, and a gray, cool day reminds us that spring may be in the door but it's trailing a lot of winter in on its boots.

Shopping existed, as did lunch. Also topped off two empty diesels.

Sibling may actually get her own car down to the tire place for the stud swap tomorrow. I hope to encourage this by any means necessary.

As for Dad... Mom and I are starting to suspect that what we're seeing isn't so much acute illness as another step down the inevitable slope. So long as we can keep him mobile enough to get to the bathroom, that's all we can do at this point, I'm afraid.

 

[TheoreticalJoe]

*Walks in and sits down at the Cantina Counter*

"Whiskey. Neat. And make it a double."
At the bartender's arched brow I elaborate, "I have confessed some things to a maiden fair, and now...we wait."

The bartender pours two doubles and places them in front of me.

"Amen to that."

 

[MaeZe]

Want some popcorn while you wait?

 

[Brightdreamer]

Hooray for confessions and popcorn!

Monday evening, and I did exactly nothing with the rest of my day.

Might try Sisyphusing later, but I think I'll have better luck tomorrow; I need to be keeping an ear out for Dad while Mom's watching her show. (I'd sit out in the living room, but the bird often takes that as a cue to be loud.)

Just got a paper cut moving some stuff, so I think that'll be my sign I'm not going to be doing a ton of typing today... Even the paper is fighting me.

 

[E.F.B.]

E.F.B. I remember old knitting and crocheting instructions used to give yarn needed in pounds/ounces. Not very helpful to me.

Ugh, yeah. The fiber of the yarn could change the weight dramatically, so how would you know how much to use if you were substituting? I'm glad patterns today tell the yardage instead.

I don't think it's possible to get a precise formula because some people crochet 'tight' and others 'loose'. This is the best I could find that gives what looks like good ranges.

And then there are the people that I call "yarn yankers" who aren't just stitching loosely, they actually like to yank the loop of their stitches up high before completing the stitch, thus making their stitches taller than those of us who crochet the normal way. I found out about this habit the hard way when I was trying to make a one-skein shawl and couldn't match the designer's gauge swatch no matter what I did because her stitches were, apparently, abnormally tall. Finally, I Googled for reasons why this might happen and a Youtuber explained that some people yank their stitch loops up taller, and if you replicate the extra motion, you'll meet their gauge. I tried it, and voila, my gauge swatch matched the designer's. Had to force myself to do that extra motion for the entire pattern to make my shawl come out the right size.

Thanks for the link! I'll give that a try.


Welcome, new person!


Morning, Cantina. My dental implant consultation went well yesterday. It was quick and easy aside from filling out the paperwork. I must have missed an email or something because I wasn't aware there was paperwork to do online, so I had to sit in the waiting room and do it. Once that was finished, they did the x-ray/CT scan thing and then the oral surgeon analyzed the images. It was a little freaky how clear the scan images were. One of them almost looked like they'd taken my skull out of my head and photographed it, it was that clear. Apparently, the main purpose of the appointment was for them to determine where my big jaw nerve is and, therefore, the size and depth of the implant. Pretty straightforward. I'm scheduled out for November now, early enough in the month that it'll heal well before Thanksgiving dinner.

The one moment of drama was that a wasp somehow got in the examining room. I'd seen one in the window of the waiting area, but then it flew to the high ceiling and I lost track of it. I actually think it rode my pants leg or shoe to the examining room because that's where it appeared to take off from when I was sitting in the chair. Thankfully, it wasn't aggressive, but it flew around the room and landed on the assistant's coat and she freaked out a little because she's allergic. My oral surgeon was brave, though, and she got it with an alcohol wipe, wrapped it in her glove, and put it in the trash. They might want to check the exterior of the building for developing wasp nests.

Today, I'll try to get some writing done before it's time for a grocery run. Looks like the TV will be on soon, though, so we'll see how well I can focus.

 

[Brightdreamer]

Hooray for good appointments!

Boo for hitchhiking wasps! (They can stay outside and do their beneficial wasp things... no need to venture indoors.)

Tuesday, late morning, and Dad's still having some issues getting to (or rather from, this time) the bathroom. The wheezing kicks in when he stands up, and he just visibly runs out of steam at the end of the walk/shuffle. I'm starting to wonder if somehow his core muscles - the ones that help with both breathing and standing up/mobility - are weaker than they need to be to do the jobs of breathing and standing and mobilizing simultaneously, which is why the wheezing and shuffling only kick in after he stands up (and why the health care guys didn't hear anything off in his lungs when they examined him). In any event, the plans to get him into the bath today are probably going to be downgraded to a dry/sponge bath type thing. We also need to be more proactive about making him do breathing exercises.

I'm hoping to get Sisyphus worked on - have a slight new angle that I might be able to squeeze a plotless little vignette at least out of - but a lot is going to depend on when I'm needed to help deal with Dad.

--

Early afternoon on Tuesday, and I have not worked on Sisyphus.

I did, however, have to run out to the store because idiot me forgot the deli soup that I use as a base for potato soup. (And had a brief panic moment in the store when I'd forgotten to put my cards back in my purse; fortunately they were still in my pocket and I wore the same jacket I wore yesterday...)

Then I had to haul the carts up the lane, because the recycle bin can't fit in my car. (Also collected mail. The county is still convinced I have a cat or dog that needs licensing. Where the frell are they getting their information? I might buy a cat toy at Xmas for my aunt's pets, and I bought one cat dish to serve as a spoon rest/stuff holder on the stove. I have purchased no cat food in literally decades and have never in memory purchased dog food. Unless snake plants are registered with the AKC these days...)

So, yeah. It's being One Of Those Days.

I bought myself a bribe to make myself finish Sisyphus, though. Hopefully bribery will work where everything else has failed.

Tick tock goes the Sisyphus clock... or time bomb... potayto, potahto at this point...

--

Narrator: "But she did not work on Sisyphus later that day. Instead she made dinner, washed dishes, and started laundry."

Mergh. Hope to get a little done soon, here, but it'll just be a little as it's a work night and I have to keep an ear on laundry and on the audiobook for Dad (we started late; Mom had to change wraps on his legs and such, which always takes longer than it seems it should).

After checking and rechecking for possible drug interactions and finding none, we decided to try giving Dad an allergy pill tonight - or half of one, at least. He's okay sitting, but every time he gets up to go to the bathroom he wheezes and his nose drips terribly and he runs out of steam until he barely makes it. So if it's not in his lungs, and this is a terrible allergy season by all accounts... we figured it was worth a shot, anyway, as it's something we might be able to do something about (as opposed to other possibilities which are not anything we can do anything about). If it works on him like it works on me we should see a difference overnight, even on half a pill. (I've done that before, half every twelve hours.)

I have most everything ready for work tomorrow save topping my water bottle. Will check on the second load of laundry in about 40 minutes; not worth it until the dryer's done anyway, and it still had a ways to go last I looked. I don't like leaving wet laundry in the washer overnight, but it can chill in the dryer if it has to.

 

[E.F.B.]

That's so weird that they think you have a pet. Are they seriously tracking people's purchases to try to make this determination? If so, have they ever heard of gifts? It's a thing that people do...


Morning, Cantina. Yesterday, Dad's schedule seemed a little more back to normal. Sleeping into the morning, up for a little while, then nap in the afternoon when he actually got bored of flipping channels. And, gasp! He once again volunteered to use the Flexitouch! Today, he's gotten up early for some reason, despite staying up late. Here's hoping he'll get bored of flipping channels later and either go take a nap or at least get on the computer so the TV can go off for a while.

Yesterday, I got a message on Etsy saying "hi" and I responded with a "Hello, how may I help you today?" in the hopes it was an actual customer. According to my fellow sellers, it's always good to respond that way because 50% of random "hi" messages are real people who just don't understand messaging etiquette, or possibly even struggle with computer use. Unfortunately, it turned out to be the other 50% which are scammers trying not to immediately go to spam. This one was one of those "I want to buy your shop!" messages. Yes, they want to buy my shop, not an item from my shop. This is a known scam. Thankfully, Etsy has recently managed to program the seller inbox to recognize certain phrases and it automatically put the message into the spam box for me. It didn't used to do that, so this must be a recent improvement. Good job, Etsy.


Anyway, that interaction got my brain in Etsy shop mode, so I ended up spending most of yesterday doing some shop improvement and continuing to plan and design this year's collection. Today, I'd like to get back to writing, so my earplugs are in to block out TV noise. Better go get to it.

 

[Friendly Frog]

Buy your Etsy shop? Weird. How does that work? They want legitime shops so they can defraud customers and hope you get sued instead or something?

In other news I can finally walk normally again! Now just have to make sure I don't overtax it.

 

[Brightdreamer]

Boo for scammers and walking taxes!

Wednesday afternoon, and it's raining again.

Work existed.

Dad's doing decently, possibly a little less wheezy. Will probably set him up with an audiobook later; not sure if it even matters if it's the rest of the one we didn't finish last night or the new one, he just seems to like having stories read.

 

[E.F.B.]

Buy your Etsy shop? Weird. How does that work? They want legitime shops so they can defraud customers and hope you get sued instead or something?

That's the only thing I can think of. I don't know who would fall for it because why on earth would you sell your shop and then be stuck with a bunch of inventory that you have no platform to sell on anymore??? At least the scam where they pretend to be a customer who needs your email address for some reason makes more sense.

 

[MaeZe]

I just had 4 fillings and none required anesthetic. I love my dentist. She's my age and it will be sad when she retires some day.

 

[MaeZe]

That's the only thing I can think of. I don't know who would fall for it because why on earth would you sell your shop and then be stuck with a bunch of inventory that you have no platform to sell on anymore??? At least the scam where they pretend to be a customer who needs your email address for some reason makes more sense.

Maybe they ask for some money up front to help with the transfer before they pay you. Or they could take your store without paying and try to force you to pay a ransom to get it back.

But if I had to make a serious guess, somewhere in the process they get your bank account and credit card numbers along with your passwords.

 

[Friendly Frog]

Mad. One hand you gotta admire the scammers' never-ceasing invention of new scams. On the other hand you'd wish they'd invent new ways to go and sit on something sharp and stop bothering the rest of us.

 

[Brightdreamer]

Mergh... I really, really need to work on Sisyphus tonight, but every time I start, family insists on intruding on my time.

Maybe tomorrow. It's a shorter work day tomorrow... even if I have to shop my way home.

May have a tiny window between Dad's last bathroom trip and bedtime. Not nearly enough to get close to any sort of finish line, though.

 

[E.F.B.]

Speaking of scammers, I learned last night that now they're even using supposed "wrong number" texts for scams too. It can be a human who will eventually try to turn the convo to get information from you, which I knew about, but I didn't know they'd use bots to "wrong number" text you just to get you to reply and suss out that your number is active. Dang it, scammers, why don't you use some of that creativity for good? Become white hat hackers and scam evildoers like human traffickers or thieves. Gaaah.


Morning, Cantina. Yesterday, Dad did his thing of getting up way too early for no reason at all (Google says wonky thyroid levels can increase anxiety, soooo, yeah) and then staying up all day just watching TV all day long (and then falling asleep on the couch but refusing to go take a nap in bed until almost supper time) so I had my ears plugged up the vast majority of the day in order to get anything done. It also rained all day long, so I was cooped up indoors. Wheee.

Dad at one point put it on a channel that was playing this 2010 kids movie starring The Rock, called "Tooth Fairy". Rant coming:

I. HATE. THAT. MOVIE. For one thing, it's just plain stupid. I enjoy many of The Rock's family-friendly roles, and he was trying, but the story and writing were just bad. Also, 2010 is the year I graduated high school and I was dealing with a lot of anxiety back then. My parents and I had driven down to Florida and back for graduation activities and the night we got home was my birthday. Dad had gotten Tooth Fairy on DVD as a present because he thought it would be funny, but I just thought it was dumb and then I ate the wrong combination of cake and pizza and barfed after the movie ended. It's not a good association. But it's been 14 years, and I don't exactly sit around dwelling on that memory or talking about it, so Dad doesn't remember that I have bad associations with that movie. He apparently also doesn't remember that we gave the DVD away because none of us wanted to watch it again. I didn't feel the need to make a big deal of my loathing of it, so I kept my ears plugged and made sure not to pay attention. At least Dad now seems to remember that it wasn't all that good, so hopefully, he won't want to watch it ever again.

/end rant

Anyway... I managed to get some writing things done yesterday despite the noise. And in another positive note, I discovered sound settings on the TV that increase the audibility of voices and decrease the volume of explosions, action scenes, and other loud noises. Yaaaassss. Where have you been all my life? (On the TV, apparently, I just didn't know this existed.) I tweaked them and BOOM, they work like a charm! I played the end of of Star Wars Jedi: Survivor without getting blasted out by the action between cut scenes. (The story was so good! I hope they don't take 6 years to make game III...) Maybe now Dad won't have to turn the sound up so ridiculously loud to hear speech. Hopefully, it'll also keep us from giving the sound remote such a workout when we watch movies.

Today, Dad slept in a little more normally, so I got some writing stuff done, and also got on the stationary bike for an hour. (I usually aim for a half hour minimum, but sometimes I feel energetic and keep going.) The desk we got for it so I can write and bike at the same time was definitely Worth It. I don't think there's anywhere to go today, so here's to more writing.

 

[MaeZe]

Speaking of scammers, I learned last night that now they're even using supposed "wrong number" texts for scams too. It can be a human who will eventually try to turn the convo to get information from you, which I knew about, but I didn't know they'd use bots to "wrong number" text you just to get you to reply and suss out that your number is active. ...

This is odd because I got a wrong number call a couple days ago and when I said, "You have the wrong number," he tried to keep on talking. "You have the wrong number, no one by that name lives here, Goodbye." And I hung up.

Most people would have said any number of things but they wouldn't try to keep on talking like you were lying about who lived there. If I get another similar call maybe I'll wait to see what they're going to try.

 

[Brightdreamer]

Hooray for helpful TV settings!

Boo for bad movies!

Thursday afternoon, munchin' on a latish lunch after work and shopping. May eventually get an audiobook goin' for Dad here, but I also have a review to write up.

Yes, I also need to Sisyphus. Will try that later tonight, when I'm slightly less likely to be interrupted.

As for Dad, he's still wobbly and a bit tired, but if nothing else the allergy pill seems to have knocked out his perpetual nostril faucet, and he's not wheezing at all like he was. We don't know if it's coincidence or not, but I'd just as soon keep him on the allergy pill for a while.

 

[Trying To Be Good]

I have an action scene in a very rough state, and I'm looking to provide feedback to others and then have my rough alpha thing glanced at.

Just so I know if my first attempt to do action is remotely working at all, or if I should give up.

I don't have a mind's eye, I can't read action. I'm a blind person trying to describe color here!

But like, if my novel doesn't have action... It's going to really struggle to appealing to people! I'd have to cut out the romance parts or things like that, and try just having that be the slightly popular carving.

---

Not sure where to post my excerpt. I was thinking Other or Thriller.

Am I allowed to critique in one place and post in another?

---

I have a second account and a second site I write erotica on. I've spun off parts of stories there and they did okay. Even the middle point of my Detective novel where the guy is just angry and lost and lonely.

I'm considering restarting my fantasy story from the middle and from the perspective of a woman. Someone with no idea what is going on and who is scared. However, I have to ask around, or redo 50 times, or copy-paste someone I know to do women correctly.

EDIT:

Hooray for helpful TV settings!

Boo for bad movies!

Thursday afternoon, munchin' on a latish lunch after work and shopping. May eventually get an audiobook goin' for Dad here, but I also have a review to write up.

Yes, I also need to Sisyphus. Will try that later tonight, when I'm slightly less likely to be interrupted.

As for Dad, he's still wobbly and a bit tired, but if nothing else the allergy pill seems to have knocked out his perpetual nostril faucet, and he's not wheezing at all like he was. We don't know if it's coincidence or not, but I'd just as soon keep him on the allergy pill for a while.

I leave for a million years, I come back and you're still doing horray and boo. lol! Never change!

This is odd because I got a wrong number call a couple days ago and when I said, "You have the wrong number," he tried to keep on talking. "You have the wrong number, no one by that name lives here, Goodbye." And I hung up.

Most people would have said any number of things but they wouldn't try to keep on talking like you were lying about who lived there. If I get another similar call maybe I'll wait to see what they're going to try.

5 bucks says a woman who dumped him or something like that.

 

[Friendly Frog]

Speaking of scammers, I learned last night that now they're even using supposed "wrong number" texts for scams too. It can be a human who will eventually try to turn the convo to get information from you, which I knew about, but I didn't know they'd use bots to "wrong number" text you just to get you to reply and suss out that your number is active. Dang it, scammers, why don't you use some of that creativity for good? Become white hat hackers and scam evildoers like human traffickers or thieves. Gaaah.

Wut? Gaaah indeed.

Just got a guy on a second-hand site demanding my phone number so he can talk to me. (not asking, just 'gimme and I'll call you tomorrow') Dude, no. Duuuuude, nooooo. Even if I thought it was totally legit, I don't list my phone number for a reason so many reasons. Also, you're French, I am not. There is no way this call is going to be useful to either. My French in writing is so much better than my flustered stammering in French. Use the darned chat-function like everybody else.

Dad at one point put it on a channel that was playing this 2010 kids movie starring The Rock, called "Tooth Fairy". Rant coming:

I. HATE. THAT. MOVIE.

Ooh I hear you on bad associations with movies. It took me many years to re-watch 13th Warrior because I accidentally broke dad's vintage record player when we were watching it the first time. We finished the movie with me still in tears and the guilt was horrible, even after I managed to get replacement for all the bits I broke, which took over a year. And I had actually liked that movie.

Anyway... I managed to get some writing things done yesterday despite the noise. And in another positive note, I discovered sound settings on the TV that increase the audibility of voices and decrease the volume of explosions, action scenes, and other loud noises. Yaaaassss. Where have you been all my life? (On the TV, apparently, I just didn't know this existed.) I tweaked them and BOOM, they work like a charm! I played the end of of Star Wars Jedi: Survivor without getting blasted out by the action between cut scenes. (The story was so good! I hope they don't take 6 years to make game III...) Maybe now Dad won't have to turn the sound up so ridiculously loud to hear speech. Hopefully, it'll also keep us from giving the sound remote such a workout when we watch movies.

That is an awesome setting. I didn't know that existed but I am so going to hunt for that the next time I watch TV.

This is odd because I got a wrong number call a couple days ago and when I said, "You have the wrong number," he tried to keep on talking. "You have the wrong number, no one by that name lives here, Goodbye." And I hung up.

Most people would have said any number of things but they wouldn't try to keep on talking like you were lying about who lived there. If I get another similar call maybe I'll wait to see what they're going to try.

Heh, try having a medical center printing your number on their folders instead of theirs. You'll get people just like that. Good times, those. But I probably told that story at least twice here.

Not sure where to post my excerpt. I was thinking Other or Thriller.

Am I allowed to critique in one place and post in another?

You mean in the Share Your Work forum? If so, yeah, it's quite okay to critique in one subforum and put your own writing up for critique in another. As long as you critique something to give back to the community.

 

[Brightdreamer]

Hooray for good things!

Boo for bad things!

And that shows just how much focus I have in me this Friday afternoon, which does not bode well for my planned Sisyphus blitz. If I can at least get one scene of something to come together at all, I'll call that enough of a victory.

Weather is sunny. Work existed.

And Dad might be hallucinating again; he had an Incident earlier while I was at work, and a bit of a "look" to him none of us like. But he doesn't seem to have other symptoms of an infection like he did last time, so Mom isn't sure it's worth her while to call Dispatch Health again without something more concrete to put her finger on. Since the one thing that we know changed is the allergy pill, even though there's absolutely nothing about hallucinations as an interaction, we'll probably lay off that.

Got a bad feeling about this dip and whether it's the dip... and there's frell-all I can do about it.

--

Later, and - predictably - no Sisyphus words have appeared. Hopefully some time later tonight (it's Friday so I can theoretically stay up late), but I'm thinking more likely tomorrow.

Dad hasn't had any more Incidents, and the "look" has faded, though he's still tired. We're pushing him to drink more, which is about all we can do. This just does not feel the same as the last time. (I'm still not entirely sure there isn't some sort of bug or allergy involved.) But we managed to get him to the bathtub tonight, which needed to happen. He was tired enough to need a ride back in the wheelchair, but still, you take what you can get. Just being clean has to feel better.

Once we've got him settled for the night, I hope to try wording. May even crack open a Mountain Dew Zero to get me more time between now and snooze, though I'm pretty much immune to that level of caffeine anymore, I'm afraid.

 

[E.F.B.]

Just got a guy on a second-hand site demanding my phone number so he can talk to me. (not asking, just 'gimme and I'll call you tomorrow') Dude, no. Duuuuude, nooooo. Even if I thought it was totally legit, I don't list my phone number for a reason so many reasons. Also, you're French, I am not. There is no way this call is going to be useful to either. My French in writing is so much better than my flustered stammering in French. Use the darned chat-function like everybody else.

Yeah, never give out your phone number. I know there are some older people who still prefer to verbally speak to someone about orders and the like, but these days, you just can't do stuff like that. And demanding a phone number is completely inappropriate no matter who it is.

That is an awesome setting. I didn't know that existed but I am so going to hunt for that the next time I watch TV.

I found it by Googling my brand of TV for instructions on how to find the special audio settings. On our Sony TV that we bought in 2015, the setting is called "Voice Zoom" to increase voices and ambient sounds, and then there was also "Night Mode" that increases the clarity of sounds at lower volume levels. I upped both of them and it made a major difference.


Morning, Cantina. Dad was *supposed* to get his fasting bloodwork done yesterday, but flaked out despite me and mom getting up early to try to make it happen. "I'm diabetic, I can't do fasting bloodwork!" says the man who, for much of last year and earlier this year, was only eating two meals a day because he was sleeping in till lunch. But noooo, he has an anxiety kick and suddenly has to start staying up all day long for no reason at all just to sit and watch TV (and probably an attempt to self-sabotage getting fasting bloodwork done, tbh) and suddenly he can't wait to eat EVAH. *headdesk* Y'know, that shaky feeling that you're getting might actually be anxiety, seeing how Mom checked your blood sugar before you left the house and it was fine. Just saying. But noooo, there's nothing wrong with him, he doesn't need help for his anxiety, and he doesn't need this blood panel done.

But wait! Before bed he saw blood in his urine. Again. Meaning it's not going away by itself. And yes, he did have a panic attack and he does need the panel done. What Mom is going to try to do is ask the doctor for a referral to a lab that's closer to us than the doctor's office, and easier for Dad to get into. In all fairness, Dad's doctor's office only has ONE armless chair in the general waiting room (why, though? America has an obesity problem, shouldn't y'all make a way for larger people to get to the doctor?) which is the only chair Dad can sit it due to his size, and there are no armless chairs at all in the lab waiting area. This creates multiple hurdles if the place is really busy because he can't and won't stand up and wait for any length of time. So, yeah. Better to try to get him in somewhere else. If he'll cooperate...................

A little good news is that he at least let us still go out and get some shopping done that needed doing instead of deciding it had to wait until afternoon or something. So, we're all prepped for Easter Sunday meals.

Some annoying news is that he was *about* to go take a nap yesterday afternoon and give the TV a break, but this one neighbor kid has a motorized dirt bike and his parents apparently created a dirt track around the perimeter of their tiny property for him to ride it. In loops. For hours. Going VROOM VROOM VROOM VROOMITYVROOMVROMM the whole flipping time. And when did he start this yesterday? AT THE EXACT MOMENT DAD WAS ABOUT TO TAKE A NAP. So Dad couldn't take a nap and got back up. Dang it, kid. I'm about to file a noise complaint because this is stupid, not to mention I looked up our county's noise ordinance and this simply isn't allowed. Edit for clarity: Our county's noise ordinances state that you aren't supposed to be running any on or off-road vehicle that makes noise loud enough to be heard across property lines for more than 5-15 minutes. We can hear this in the house with the windows closed and this kid often VROOM VROOMS constantly for an hour to, occasionally, FOUR HOURS at a time. I don't want to poop on his parade, but they need to put a muffler on that thing, it's obnoxious. Make it quiet and he can ride that sucker till the cows come home for all I care...