On Cheering Up ......or Exploring the Farthest Outposts of Insanity

Before I maunder on about my current attack of total Madness I want to tell all of you how touched, comforted and impressed I am at your sweet efforts to help me through my perplexities.  Thanks to Messyminny for suggesting how I can solve my font size problem.......I will try it out on this very post....(yes, it worked!)...if it works you should  be reading this in comfort....,if it doesn;t work, get out your magnifying glasses.  And bless all of you for commiserating with me.....you will all get an extra  star in your crowns for your good deeds.

I am still in a strange state of disconnectedness.  In my bio I tell of having led several different lives.....I am beginning to suspect I have moved on into yet a third one .......I have no name or description for it yet.  

Looking back down the long path of my life I find myself seeing it in a variety of different ways........in one I am the hero and blessed being of my bio.....in another I am a monumental failure, fuckup and fool and I can make a good case for that one being true.  I find that it hardly matters though......that is the past......and here I am, relatively healthy, with who knows how many years still to go and without a clue about how to get through them.  No wonder I am depressed.

I must utter  a quick squeal of delight and thanks to a friend who sent me an email to cheer me up today.....believe it or not it did cheer me up a bit.  You will laugh when I tell you how come........she warned me to brace myself for the absolute worst......the possibility that the idiot, Romney might actually be elected.  Believe it or not, I have already accepted that as fact and have resigned myself to it, adjusted to accepting total chaos reigning from then on.  Having accepted that, I realize that I cannot possibly sink any lower into feeling bad so I think I am actually feeling a bit better.    

I have decided not to worry about stuff which may not happen within my lifetime..........like the total Decline and fall of the United States of America due to rampant  STUPIDITY.  Unless.......horrors....this is like Hamlet when he contemplates ending it all and then is brought up short by, ...."perhance to dream......ay, there's the rub"...........Unless, I am instantly, and without a moment to rest or catch my breath, reassigned to a new lifetime here  on earth (could that be what they have been calling Hell??) in which case, I am not sure what I will do....I have not made plans for that.......gosh....I wonder if one has any rights of refusal and, if so, how many before one is forced to accept the obviously already  blighted lifetime you are being forced to accept.....hmmmmmm....hell and  damn......something I never thought of to worry about......sigh.


I did a really weird thing yesterday and it put me into a state of I don;t know what.  In order to explain this one I must take you back with me to High School where I was snatched from the relative comfort of my dear old childhood friends in Philly and thrust, alone, fat, ugly and friendless into a hell on earth 3000 miles away.......high school here in LA.  The only way I got thru those years was to develop a wild, impassioned, secret crush on the school hero, star of the football team and fella handsome as all getout. Needless to say, we never even met nor spoke, but  the passion at least tethered me to earth during those awful years and kept me from drifting away from the world, ending up entangled in branches and doomed to slowly deflate and expire in some prickly tree on another equally hostile planet.  I have thought of him often in the years since and wondered if he were still alive and yesterday, dammit,  Google made it possible for me to satisfy my curiosity.  I found his obituary from 2007 (which answered my question directly), and learned that he made it to the age of 80, left a wife of 60 years and 4 assorted children.  Damn.  I suddenly realized that I had no chance left to ever corner him in a dark alley and seduce him.....not that that was my best fantasy, but the first that came to mind.  So here I am.....another dream shattered.  There really is nothing left for me since, for some reason, even Mark Harmon has recently lost his charm and appeal and can thank his lucky stars that he is no longer in danger of being stalked by a crazy 85 year old fan in an electric gocart.   He will probably never know how lucky he is unless one of you tell on me (just as my high school crush never knew how in danger he was of being accosted in some dark alley and smothered in sloppy kisses behind the dumpsters.((I didn't know much then beyond huge hugs and sloppy kisses)).

So here I am, really without a dream to call my own and only the joy of blogging and the blessed folk of the blogosphere  to light my way.  Don't worry......you are all safe from being dragged into a dark alley and smothered in sloppy kisses......In BlogLand I am really quite harmless, honest.

What D'You Do If The Glass Is Neither Half Empty Nor Half Full......It Is Bone Dry

Ugh, ugh, I know I should blog, I really do want to blog......actually I think I have to blog or I will forget how....or worse yet..... people will lose the will to check in on me from time to time.  So what does a person do when there is not a crumb of thought in the so-called brain that is worthy of being cast out there for human consumption?

(Omigawd, I notice that I just cast my beloved folllowers in the role of a flock of Mrs. Moon's chickens......scratching in the dirt for worms and grubs, etc.....I swear that is NOT the way I think of you.....honest.......what a dreadful choice of metaphors.....aaarrrggh.  You should be able to tell from that what a low and pitiful state I am in.  Please forgive.)


I just did get a workable idea.  Perhaps I can use this opportunity to ask for help in solving a puzzle that has  been perplexing me for lo these many weeks........how in the hell do you enlarge the blog font permanently, or at least till you change your mind down the road?  One of the reasons I do not  blog more frequently is because it has become a monumental chore since I decided that the type size was too small and needed  to be bumped up.  Yes, yes, I do click on the font size icon and it obeys......briefly. Then, the minute my back is turned or my attention is distracted it sneakily restores the old font size.  If I happen to be scrutinizing the words I type that is not so bad...I can catch it in the act, but if I am gazing at the ceiling in a frenzy of deep concentration while my fingers are flying wildly across the keys it can be disaster.  Whole paragraphs have to be scratched and rewritten and  ooooooh......I hate it when that happens.


I know most of you out there have the answer to this one so please don't trample one another in giving me the answer.  But you have no idea how grateful I will be to get it.........I might just offer a prize for the first or the best answer.......or would that be disgustingly low class?  Anyway, while I decide on that conundrum  for myself and ponder what I might have to give that anyone would want, hasten your words of enlightenment for this poor soul who continues to be at the mercy of the Formatting Tyrant.

On other fronts, I can report a further state of befuddlement which is threatening the very foundation of my belief system.  As some of you may remember, about 6 or 8 months ago I flung myself into the shark infested waters of the Stock & Options Market.  Until this past April I was considering myself a pretty smart cookie as I watched my manipulations increase the balance in my account and somewhat smugly planned on what I would do with my ill gotten gains.   Then, suddenly and without much warning (though it should have been obvious to me that such good fortune could not continue indefinitely) the market tanked and sank about 6% taking with it most of my lovely profits.  I remembered, too late, the rule...."don't forget to periodically take some of your profits off the table."  After a bit of hand wringing I bravely sucked it up, studied some more and began to approach things from the bear market side.  
That theory was sound, except that it took a while to learn  the proportions of things from that angle and, my maneuvers were not robust enough to counteract the continued deluge to the downside.

  I did capitulate a bit and took some of my losses, just to get rid of some of that red ink which offended my delicate sensibilities and resigned myself to waiting out the down move before giving up on my brash plan.  Recently, I have noticed a strange phenomenon..... when I do almost nothing the situation seems to improve.  At the moment, I am close to being back even and am now torn between closing out all my positions tomorrow and considering myself a lucky damned fool, or cautiously proceed with what I continue to learn to see what the next few months bring.  I can hear all of you out there screaming, "get out....get out" the way the audience used to do in the old movie thrillers.  The trouble with that is,  what else is there in the world that could get me out of bed at 6 am or at all for that matter, and what in the hell am I going to do with all the time I now put in studying and learning some of the intricacies of this new world........ and worse yet......what in the hell am I to do with my new vocabulary of strangles, straddles,bull put spreads and iron condors.......oh, the pity and perplexity of it all.  I guess until I find some other path to stimulate my interest I may just hang around here stubbornlystudying candlestick charts and identifying  dojis, haramis, shooting stars, inverted hammers and hangman symbols.


At least, you must agree, it keeps me off the streets......

Psssst ! Shhhhh ! If anyone asks, You Don't Even Know Me.....

Be Advised.......I am going into hiding, so, if you love me, don't let them find me and take me away.


The men in the white coats, that is........


I totally lost it today, in front of witnesses, no less.   And one of the people who saw me actually beating my head against the wall (the truth is she is the one who drove me to it)  happens to be an OCD neighbor who is relentless in taking action when she decides something is amiss.  For instance, for the past 2 years or so, she has been keeping a written log of all of the hangups and/or heavy breathing phone calls she  has received (sometimes as many as 6 a day she claims) convinced that the culprit is another neighbor down the street who once  made the mistake of using a naughty word in casual conversation with her.   (No, it was not even the "F" word, but no matter.) and even more damning, he has a scraggly beard and obviously is not to be trusted.    After collecting what she felt was enough evidence ( ? ) she has finally taken necessary action and reported these offenses, verbally and  in writing (longhand) , to both the phone company and the Police, causing the totally innocent but suspicious looking (to her) neighbor to be visited and grilled by a  Detective from the Vice Squad (or Special Victims Unit or something).


After dealing with my neighbor for 40 years you would think I would have  better sense than to expose myself to the risk of being labelled "Dangerously Insane" and reported  to the Authorities.  I realize I screwed up badly this time.   I have been secretly beating my head against the wall for most of those 40 years after each encounter of unspeakable frustration with said neighbor and today I just could not restrain myself till  she left and I was safely alone.    Oh, the shame and horror of it all.  The worst part is,  there was another witness.....my caregiver, Florence, who tends to accept my madness and strange  behavior as part of the job but would find it hard to deny, under oath,  that she did, indeed, witness me muttering darkly and banging my head loudly against the kitchen corner post for at least a full minute before I regained some modicum of control.   So, if said neighbor (whom we will call "X") pursues her merciless course I am sure she can have them issue a subpoena which will force Flo to testify against me, unwilling, but helpless in the face of legal machinery grinding away........groan....

I can already visualize  the men in the white coats coming up the walk carrying cattle prods and strait jackets.  There is not a moment to lose..........I would not do well in an Asylum........I have packed Gussie and a spare T-shirt into a cat carrier and am going underground.  

I will write when it is safe.  And remember, if anyone asks, you don't even know me ........

I Could Never Top This So I Am Plagarizing

  I have been trying to think of some cheery bit to post today but have failed miserably so far.   However, the funniest post on the web  belongs to Dr. Grumpy  today so the  best favor I can do you is to send you over there.........I am still holding my sides and wiping away the tears.

Enjoy.

 

 

Great office moments

posted by Grumpy, M.D. at Doctor Grumpy in the House - 8 hours ago 

 

www.drgrumpyinthehouse.blogspot.com

NothingCheers You Up like When a Pain Goes Away

To all you faithful followers I am happy to report that the cats and I have a crawled out of the deep black pit...at least for the moment.  
Tenks Gott.

The miseries I have been suffering from this week have finally subsided and most of my gut-pains have gone away.  The same is true of my guilt and horror when I feared I had acquired Salmonella from noshing some of raw egg mixture when I was making matzoh balls for my chicken soup)  

Of course, this remission did not just happen....I had to take extreme measures (aside from lots of Pepto Bismol and  herb teas) To really effect a home cure it was requisite that I  make an appointment to see the doctor.  As soon as my innards heard that.....well......like your car when you go to the mechanic, they decided to shape up ASAP.   

......to make a long boring story much shorter, by the time I saw the doctor I was nearly well and did not even scream very loudly in protest when, after checking me out, he declared with great honesty, that he did not know for sure what was wrong with me.  ( I was thrilled when he said he doubted very much if the raw matzoh balls were the culprit and blamed it all on a probable attack of my IBS.)

But, the best part has been, with the reduction of the pain and agony, my depression has lifted.....it feels so good to not be hurting so bad that I had to banish my depression,.....at least for a little while.   

Maybe one day soon I can even publish a decent, cheery blog....keep your fingers crossed, but don't hold your breath. 

Love you all.

Does A Pill A Day Keep The White Coats Away?

As all my devoted readers must know, I have been in something of a slump lately.

I wouldn't  bet on it, but I think my melancholia began early this year when I received notice from my supplemental RX insurance that the anti-depressant I had been taking for the past several years would no longer  be covered and, if I wanted to be stubborn and keep taking it, each pill would cost me in the neighborhood of  $6.10.  Needless to say the very idea of having to pay over six dollars for a pill to un-depress me immediately depressed the hell out of me and I rushed to fling open the nearest window and scream, "Like hell I will"  or "no,, I will not! or  some such useless, wimpy protest.

After doing some research I found that the old anti-depressant I had been taking prior to this one only cost pennies per pill and, as I recalled, it had  been perfectly satisfactory until my Psychiatrist had suggested changing to this newer, supposedly improved one.   I really had not noticed any improvement in my condition one way or t'other ......hell when one tends to get depressed one gets used to  being up one day and down the next......but I had  been taking the new one obediently until this monstrous notification  arrived.

  Whereupon I decided that  bankruptcy caused  by excessive drug charges would definitely be more depressing than any change of medication.  (I no longer see the Psychiatrist, by the way,  since I deduced that he was enjoying my company and witty conversation during our sessions much more than I was benefiting from them and paying those rates to amuse HIM made no sense whatever, even to a crazy person like myself.)   I consulted my Internist and we decided to try the old medication and see how I did.   A few weeks, then a few months passed and I did not notice any ill effects so I figured I had gotten away with it.......now, I am not so sure........  however, I refuse to believe that a $6 pill will improve me enough to make it all worthwhile so I will continue to search for some other cure for this melancholy state.   Meanwhile both you and I will have to put up with this morose,uninspired and downright  boring  individual who seems to be occupying my body lately.  

Fortunately, it is  a rather mild melancholy, except when exacerbated by idiotic remarks from so-called friends.  Today, for instance, I had lunch with an old friend who has irritated me often when I happen to mention my increasing difficulty in seeing due to my macular degeneration.  I swear that if one more time she says says offhandedly, " But why can't they just give you better glasses?" I will be driven into a frenzy causing me to disembowel her with a butter knife......today was very close......instead I held my tongue and ended up with wretched indigestion because my poor system could not possibly digest even the simplest lunch along with all that restrained bile.  Either I will have to stop having lunch with her or someone will have to systematically rid the San Fernando Valley of butter knives.  (Actually, I think someone has already started on that project because one can be hard pressed to even see a hint of a butter knife anymore......,can't one?  Come to think of it.....why in the hell were butter knives even invented??????  What an idiotic waste of materials, effort, table and drawer space.  If anyone has a copy of Mrs. Beaton's, the answer is probably in  there.  In fact, if any one of you reading this  DOES have a copy I think I may have to offer some kind of reward......I personally have never seen a copy though I have heard of them and, like fairies or unicorns, do believe they may exist.....


Omigawd........I have totally lost control and am rambling wildly, aren't I?  Yes, I am......don't try to save my feelings by denying it.....


Thanks for staying with me this far.........I do prize loyalty highly. 

And, who knows.....perhaps tomorrow my melancholia will depart.......let us all hope that something  better will  be left in its place.


Luv ya' all.,