Tag Archives: life

Famous last words

Posted on by
Reply

Image courtesy of adamr.stone via flickr.

Alex approached me as I was getting ready for bed last night to tell me that his blood glucose level was low. This was, quite honestly, a bit of a shocker considering how much food we had eaten over at our friend Kari’s house during the course of the day. I realized, though, that I’d had him take his evening shot of insulin when we got home and that he hadn’t eaten anything since so it made sense. It was just weird. In any case I told him that he could go ahead and make himself something to eat because I was about to literally pass out in my chair and I was not in the mood to stay up and cook something for him.

“Oooh!,” he says to me, “I’ll fry up some fish!”

Alex got a deep fryer for Christmas. He didn’t get it from me, and when I saw it on the list of things that he wanted for Christmas that he passed on to his Grandmother I specifically told her that she did not have to go out of her way to get it for him. She did, though, and now he’s the proud owner of a Sensio 13401 Bella Cucina 3-1/2-Liter Stainless-Steel Deep Fryer. While I must admit that having a deep fryer is pretty much the height of awesome if you’re a teenager and you like to cook, this item concerns me for a number of reasons. The obvious one is, of course, the fact that I’m overweight and have had two strokes and fried foods are really not good for me. On top of that, though, I have that whole parent fear of him burning himself while using it or burning down our house (or both). This is an irrational fear, and I am aware of it, but that doesn’t stop me from having it. Like me, the boy is silly and can be highly irresponsible, but as a general rule he takes himself pretty seriously when he’s cooking and he’s never given me a reason to think that he’d do something stupid that would result in injury to person or property.

Continue reading →

It’s my own worst enemy

Posted on by
8

Editor’s Note – As part of my work with The Artist’s Way I am occasionally required to complete certain assignments that are intended to help me discover the things that have me “blocked” as an artist.  Unlike the daily exercise of completing 3 pages of long hand in a journal these stories do not, necessarily, have to be private.  As such I figured that since I was writing this anyway I’d go ahead and put some actual content in this journal for a change instead of letting it fester here unused.  Please understand, though, that what I am writing is not necessarily going to be a rational take on my experiences or any kind of plea for help.  On the contrary, these entries are actually part of a conscious effort to improve myself and my self-worth.

I have been asked to describe one of the “monsters” from my past that has held me back as an artist.  I really had to think hard about this because, frankly, I’ve had more support than not in my quest to be an artist. After thinking about it for a while I did manage to come up with my three, and here are the details on one of them…

Continue reading →

Yup. Still alive.

Posted on by
1

Yeah, August was insane.  This is the first weekend in a long time that I’ve been able to pretty much just chill out at home and not do much of anything.  Unfortunately, for some reason, I had a monkey wrench thrown in that last night with a bout of nausea that turned into vomiting.  I have NO idea what happened there.  The only thing I can think is that I ate a few Weight Watchers quesadilla’s after doing a 50 minute workout with EA SPORTS Active.  Regardless of why I got ill, a few hours after I was sick I felt fine and seem to be peachy keen again today.

Ok, yeah.  I started this post talking about puke.  Where the hell do I go from here?

We’ve wrapped up another Dragon*Con, and all told I think it was a pretty smashing success.  We have some thing we want to improve on for next year for sure, but considering the monumental task we attempted to achieve I feel good about the work we did.  On my day off I hit the dealer rooms and picked up some new snarky shirts.  I also got my kilt belt re-sized (That was a nice ego boost in and of itself.  The leather worker took a big chunk off of the belt to make it fit properly).  I saw some good friends, had a chance to see the William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy panel, and I got to hang out for a few minutes with Felicia Day backstage before her panel on Monday morning (and yes, if you’re wondering, she’s just as nice and funny as you’d expect her to be).

On the weight front I had the satisfaction of knowing that when I left for the convention I was two pounds less than I was when I went to my first one back in 2002.   I noticed a few ladies giving me the once over, and had one woman make what was (to Krystalle) a very obvious pass at me.  Me?  I continue my long-standing tradition of being fairly clueless in that regard and thought she was just being funny when she told me I should find someone to cover for my shift so I could come over to the Marriott at midnight to “get blown.”  She was referring to Jennie Breeden’s annual kilt-blowing get together, but the directness and the way she said it apparently meant more.

I have to be told these things, you see.

Speaking of kilts – I wore my utilikilt the entire weekend, mostly because a) it makes me look good and b) it is probably going to be the last year I’m able to wear this particular kilt.  It’s getting very loose at this point.  Before I had my belt re-sized on Friday I thought it might actually fall off.  Mind you, I’m not complaining about the fact that I’m losing weight at all.  Utilikilts are expensive, though!

In other health related news I have purchased a shiny new pair of running shoes with gift cards I got through the Virgin Healthmiles program and tomorrow I’m going to start training to run a 5k.  Like pull ups, running is something that my weight has always thrown up a barrier to, and it is time I knocked that barrier down.  The 5k I have picked out takes place about 2 weeks after my 37th birthday, and I think that would be a delightful way to ring in the start of my next trip around the sun.

Can’t really say I have much more interesting to say at the moment.  Alex and I have started rehearsals for Night of the Living Dead.  I’m playing the free to play Dungeons and Dragons Online as well as Kingdom of Loathing.  Now that convention season is done sticking our heads back in the sand financially and working on paying down some more debt.  I still have my job, and while our company is doing everything they can to cut costs we’re still not cutting benefits or employees.  All in all, life is still pretty good on my end.

Exciting?  Maybe not.  But adventure?  Excitement?  A Jedi seeks not these things.

And on that extremely nerdy note I bid you adieu.

A few brief notes on health care

Posted on by
2

My son suffers from diabetes.  A little over a year ago he went into a state known as diabetic ketoacidosis.  He almost went into a coma and if we had not gotten him to a hospital there is a good chance he could have died.  When he got out of the hospital he was told to follow up with his specialist, so I called to make an appointment.  The earliest I could take my son in to see his specialist was four months later.

I have been using Prevacid for years to control my acid reflux.  A condition that, if let unchecked, can lead to Barret’s esophagus and, subsequently, cancer.  This is the condition that killed my Father.  When my insurance providers switched at the beginning of the year I was told that my medical provider would no longer cover Prevacid, the medication my doctor wanted me to be on, and that I had to switch to Aciphex.

I have also been using Metrogel for years to control my Rosacea.  Recently my insurance provider decided they would no longer pay for that medication either and I had to switch to another one.

There is no generic equivalent available for the type of insulin my son has to take for his diabetes and my insurance provider considers it non-formulary.  That ONE medication of his is $60 per month.  This does not include his other insulin, his needles, or his test strips.  There IS a generic equivalent of his second type of insulin, but it does not work as well and we will be switching back to the non-forumlary kind after his next appointment with his endocrinologist.

Alex had a problem throwing baseballs and was diagnosed with a condition called little league shoulder.  My insurance company would only pay for about half of the visits that his physical therapist suggested.  After we had run out of therapy his condition still persisted and he still cannot properly throw a baseball without causing himself some pain.   At this point we’re holding on to hope that he will grow out of it.

Should I go on?

All of you people who think this shit only happens in countries where they have “socialized medicine” are fooling yourselves.  Insurance companies get in the way of you and your doctor all the time. They deny treatments.  They deny medications.  They tell you what doctors you can and cannot see, even if said doctors have huge waiting lists.

Is socialized medicine better?  Damned if I know.  What I DO know is that all this bullshit being spouted about how there is nobody between you and your doctor right now is a bunch of lies.

Brain Dump

Posted on by
1

I started writing this post a few days ago.  I figure I’ll just go ahead and append on the end of it with the understanding that, perhaps, my head space is a bit different than it was when I first began this ramble.

Not only do I feel the need to break up the utter and complete monotony of posting nothing but my workouts here, I also have a compulsion to simply talk about a few things.  Get some stuff out of my head and out there in the ether as it were.  As a result this may end up being an incoherent post at times, so I apologize in advance.

Continue reading →

Workout of the Day – June 17th

Posted on by
Reply

65 Minutes Treadmill at 4 MPH (5 minute intervals on level surface followed by 1 minute intervals at 6% incline)

Assisted Pull Up – 190 pound counterweight (5 sets of 5)

Pulldown – 80 pounds (5 sets of 5)

Dumbbell Rows – 25 pounds (5 sets of 5)

Bicep Curls – 25 pounds (5 sets of 5)

100 Pushup Challenge – Week Two, Column 1, Set 1 (4-6-4-4-8)

200 Situp Challenge – Exhaustion Test (80)

I have decided to re-boot my situp challenge  paying close attention to form and allowing the full one second hold time on the crunch.  While I can still do 80 I’m not getting 200 in at this point methinks.

A summary of my strengths

Posted on by
3

As supplied by the folks over at Gallup…

Instinctively, you understand the utility that technology can bring to an organization and are always looking for the best equipment and the best ways to use that equipment.  In addition to your technical expertise, you possess social and emotional talents that are often rare in the information technology field.  Socially initiating and verstaile, your primary social instinct is to intentionally expand the breadth of your social network as you are comfortable and effective in meeting new people.  Possessing high levels of emotional intelligence, your empathy gives you a strong awareness of human emotions that helps you to understand the emotional implications of decisions and actions.  Your positivity contributes to your emotional intelligence as it enables you to be emotionally influential.  You have a  natural capacity for helping others to feel better.  While some might ignore or minimize the value of human emotion, your possess a holistic view of humans and a view of the world that places a high value on all human beings.

I’d be interested to hear how accurate you all feel that is.

Captain Kangaroo was a bloody genius

Posted on by
3

I grew up watching Bob Keeshan play Captain Kangaroo. I don’t remember the show vividly to be completely honest. I believe I had moved on to bigger and better things by the time I started forming real memories. My memories of the show are more impressions than anything else. I found a quote from Keeshan this morning, though, that indicates he may have at least somewhat influenced the person who I became as an adult.

The responsibility of parents is to raise children who do not need parents.

When my son is an adult I want him to not need me anymore.  I want him to call me or shoot me an email every once in a while to let me know what is going on in his life, hell maybe even every day if he feels like it, but I want him to lead his life on his own.  I want him to face the challenges life throws at him on his own two feet, and when life knocks him on his ass I want him to get back up again on his own.  If he can’t I want him to know he can always call on me to help but I want that to be the aboslute last thing he would do – not the first.  Not because I will make him feel like shit about it, but becuase he doesn’t WANT to get help from anyone else to solve his problems.

I have, in the last few weeks, seen two very different examples of how bad it is for adults to rely on their parents to get them through life and I can’t have that for Alex.

Muscle Memory

Posted on by
4
Photo by webhamster

Photo by webhamster

On my way into work this morning I ended up following a tractor trailer that had a flat bed on the back stacked high with wooden pallets, and for a few minutes I was lost in memories of a period in my life where it looked like I was going to end up living the the blue collar world.

After I got back from my largely unsuccessful turn at being a roadie for the Renaissance Festival I spent a few months wallowing at my Mother’s house being largely useless.  When I say wallow I’m being pretty literal.  I slept all day, stayed up all night, smoked like a chimney in my bedroom, and was pretty much an out-and-out drain on her finances and her sanity.  She was constantly on my case to get a job and do something with my life, and I was constantly ignoring her requests and continuing my daily routine of “get up, waste my life, go back to bed.”

One day, however, she knocked on my door at the ungodly hour of noon or something like that and simply said “Come on, Mike.  Get up.  It’s time to find a job.”

My eyes snapped open and the first thought that popped through my mind was She’s right.

Two days later I had a job working as a temp for Skaraborg Invest (USA), Incorporated.

SII was an injection molding plant.  Specifically, we made CD jewel cases.  The job itself was pretty simple.  I monitored the machines as they put out boxes of jewel cases.  I would inspect every sixth box or so that came down the line and make sure there weren’t any flaws in the product.  If there were I’d notify the supervisor on duty so that he could make adjustments.  I would put the finished product on a pallet, load more boxes into the machine, and repeat the process.  When a pallet was full I moved it over to this nifty spinning platform and cover it in shrink wrap for shipping.  At certain points throughout the night I would fold up boxes to prepare them filling.

Sometimes I got to drive a fork lift.  I highly reccomend driving a forklift, or even better standing on the forks of a forklift as it’s being driven, as a recreational activity.  It’s hella fun.

After a while I impressed them with my abilities and they hired me on full time from the temp agency (translation : I showed up on time and sober and wasn’t a complete moron).  Christmas rolled around and as a Christmas bonus they gave everyone who worked for the company an entire weeks worth of pay as a bonus.  This was big money for me at the time, and a pretty sweet reward all around.  This was the early 90’s, you see, and compact disc sales were through the roof.  We really couldn’t make jewel cases fast enough.

Eventually SII announced they were moving to Lake Wales, Florida, to expand their operations.  They offered to let anyone who wished to move over with them do so if they wanted to keep their job.  I quite literally had nothing going on here in St. Petersburg so I decided to go with them.  We spent a few weeks getting the factory ready (note to any of you who do industrial painting : epoxy based paint is evil) and then we moved over.

After a short time in Polk County I started attending the Polk Community College.  It’s this point in my life I reference when I mention the fact that at one time I was working full time, going to school full time, and participating in all of the shows at the college becuase I was on a theater scholarship.  I was pretty much on top of the world.  I was in great shape, had a decent job, was making good friends, and enjoying life.  At the time the job was just a stepping stone towards my acting career.

Of course, as often happens to the aspiring artist, life kind of got in the way of my plans.  I met a girl, we fell in love, and suddenly my highly focused solo life got a lot more complicated.  We moved back to Pinellas County and I went to work for the Home Shopping Network.  I got fired from that job and attempted to make a go of getting a job at another plastics factory in Pinellas county but eventually ended up working in a convenience store.  The girl got pregnant, we got married, and in December of 1995 our son was born.  We were living with my friend Steve in his really small house and I was making six bucks an hour or so working the midnight shift in a gas station.

I caught wind that SII was expanding operations and made a few phone calls.  Pretty soon the decision was made to move back to Polk County.  There was talk of training me to be a supervisor.

At that point I was pretty much convinced that my life path was being laid out for me.  I was going to be a blue collar factory worker for the rest of my days.

Fortunately (although it didn’t seem like it at the time) things didn’t turn out quite that way when I got back to Polk County.  The supervisor position they dangled in front of me wasn’t at their state-of-the-art modern facility but at this piece of shit side project they had running in a building across the street.  They were using a temporary mold to make some kind of flower potting plants they were going to sell at Wal-Mart, and the entire shift was spent pulling these crappy bowls out of the machine and trimming all the excess “flash” from them with a box cutter.  I still have a deep scar on my left thumb from doing that.  This was during a really harsh winter in a building with no insulation and no heat.  The only thing we had to keep us warm was an orange grove heater.  Something like this…

Cantherm EC 200 Indirect Fired Portable Heater

Cantherm EC 200 Indirect Fired Portable Heater

Except ours was about 20 years old.  If you were standing directly in front of it you were blasted by a wave of super heated air that did absolutely nothing in the realm of radiant heat.  You were either boiling or frozen.  There were no other alternatives.

The amount of suck I was dealing with at Blue Chip (the name of the side company) on top of the suck of being a new parent led to me being fired due to excessive absenteeism.  My career in the plastics industry was cut off at the knees.

Which is ok.  A short time after that I got a part-time job working in the business machines department for Staples, which eventually turned into a full-time gig.  That got us back to Pinellas County when I got a lead position at the store in Bradenton, then eventually Clearwater.  My computer experience helped me get an entry level programming job with Auction Broker Software, and eventually (through a long series of events chronicled here) got me where I am today.

But for a brief time it really looked like i was going to be a factory guy, and I really think those years helped define who I am today.  It was, for the most part, mind numbing and tedious work and I’ll never say it wasn’t.  That being said, there was something honestly rewarding about it.  We were creating things from scratch.  We were producers.  It was hard, sweaty, and intellectually unrewarding work but at the end of your shift you could look at the stacks of completed product and say “I helped make that.”  There was something immensely satisfying in that.

I think more than anything those years help me to appreciate what I have now and explain why I’m so shocked over the fact that people seem to just casually chuck off jobs, even with things as bad as they are right now.  There are times when I wish I was doing something else, something more artistic, and there are certainly times when I get a sense of wanderlust and feel the urge to just pick everything up and start over again somewhere else.  When I start feeling that way, though, I remember those years in the factory.  I remember feeling like I’d never amount to anything more than a line man or maybe a shift supervisor and I say “No.  Protect what you have.”

So there you go.  The story of Mike the working man.

All brought on by a tractor trailer carrying a load of wooden pallets.