Sis is angry with Mom. Mom is angry with her. They are, as they have done for decades, growling at one another. Accusations sometimes come out about what’s going on. Sis thinks Mom is being obstinate. Mom thinks sis is being mean.
Growing experiences from the new living arrangements are certainly expected. Both are intelligent and know this. As with so many things, there are components of making these adjustments. It’s one thing to intellectually know something, yet something else to intellectually understand and accept it, and still requires some emotional and physical facets to adjust to make it all work. It’ll take time. Patience and anger will rise and fall like waves beating on the shore. The adjustments will be found.
I dreamed I was at Mom’s house. We were all younger, and this was all pre-Frank. Mom’s beau never showed in the dream. Lots of others did. All four sisters. Wife didn’t show. Many, many friends throughout the years came and went.
The first stage was a big party. Mom and my sisters were present for that. Then they left, having had to go away somewhere for a day or two. With them gone, the party got bigger and crazier. Heaps of food were being consumed, along with beer and wine. Music and laughter boomed. Then the party wound down. I began cleanup. One other, a generic skinny old gray white guy, was there helping. Then he disappeared. As I walked around, cleaning, where the heck did he go? Then I found him, asleep in a chair that was flipped over. Well, let him slept, I thought.
Meanwhile, so many leaves were present.The levels astonished me. Drifts and piles of leaves were everywhere in the house. A gray and white kitten went through them, playing, then pranced outside through the open back door. I followed, peeking out to ensure it was a safe place for a kitten. It was a fenced yard with pea rock at the bottom. Tiered with cinder blocks, plants were in neat, ordered arrangements. I identified green peppers, tomatoes, lettuce, and realized, this is my sister’s garden. I then left the door open for the kitten to go in and out and resumed cleaning, taking a vacuum cleaner hose around to suck up leaves.
My friend woke up and apologized for falling asleep, explaining, “It was just a long day.” He began helping. At that point, Mom and my sisters arrived back home. There were still leaves to clean but they were hungry. I looked for leftovers to give them. My older sister asked for coffee, and I began making a bot. Mom asked if I’d checked the mail, which I admit, was the furthest thing from my mind, and then continued asking people, did anyone get the mail?
That’s where the dream ended.
In the waking aftermath, the dream amused me more than anything. I thought it about life and change, and considered it very heavy-handed of my Dream Neurons to present so many leaves, thinking they represented the days gone by and the leaves of change.
It’s Thirstda! I’m glad about it because The Neurons kept telling me that yesterday was Thirstda. I accused them of being out of sync and reality deniers, much like Trump. Man, they fumed with indignation after that, sputtering about how wrong it was for me to compare them to TACO, who is deeply and grossly embedded in an alternate reality, in The Neurons’ opinions. “We’re not like that,” they kept telling me until I finally acquiesced and gave a half-warm fake apology about being sorry for comparing them to Trump. That mostly shut them up but they still sulked for a while.
Today’s numbers are 11/13/2025 and 60/64/56 for month/date/year and current/high/low temperatures in F. Wind is busy teasing the poor trees and leaves into mad waving and racing. It’s the kind of wind that has me checking to ensure nothing has blown away. Papi came in after I’d spotted him huddled hard against something, head down. Soon as I opened that door, he bolted in. Then he gave an angry look back, like he was swearing vengeance against the wind, and launched himself into a hard house gallop. Besides the wind, it’s sunny now, but it did rain and more rain is s’posed to be dropping, even if it doesn’t look it now.
I know I mentioned it before but I will reiterate, having my gallbladder removed has left me feeling amazingly better. I sleep better, have more mental and physical energy, with better focus. I feel less angry, anxious, and emotional, and less troubled and more confident about the future. I’m wary about what I eat as I slowly re-engage a wider range of offerings while keeping the fat down, and monitor my body’s response. I do miss being able to fully exercise. While I’m jogging, I’m restricted from lifting more than 20 pounds. Pushups and planks and wallsits are all out for now.
I had two terrific dreams last night that I recall. Both had me laughing as I recalled them. As I finished working over the dreams, I want into thinking and writing my novel in my head and ‘lo, the muses came and gave the writing neurons some sweet little details to insert. It’s great when things like that work out. I’m eager to get into it later today.
Today’s music is “Blind Spot” by Bruce Springsteen.
I’m not certain why The Neurons have “Blind Spot” in the morning mental music stream. The clue might be in that chorus. “Everybody’s got a blind spot that brings them down, everybody’s got a blind spot they can’t get around.” Was I thinking of blind spots? I don’t know. It appears that the reason behind The Neuron’s song choice is…ahem…hidden in a blind spot.
You saw that coming, didn’t you?
Well, the Trump Epstein Shutdown of 2025 set a record but ended. Now we’ll see what happens with the Epstein files. There have already been some interesting emails leaked up about Trump’s involvement. May the leaks become a flood.
Hope peace and grace find us soon. Meanwhile, coffee is giving a pep talk to The Neurons about the need to be alert, active, and optimistic. Here we go, once again. Rock on. Cheers
Okay, this is a first world rant. Part of the first world blues I’m always singing.
My recurring prescription drugs are supplied through Express Scripts. And it works great. Except when it doesn’t. It didn’t this week.
I received a message from them to give them authorization to start an autofill on one of my prescriptions. I logged in and did as required. Another message came in: you have one item in your cart. Please complete your purchase.
WTAF?
I didn’t ‘complete the purchase’. I gave them feedback. Asked them to call.
Which they did. It was Kelly. She explained why she was calling in a chipper, professional voice edged with a little nervous quiver. I explained why I was annoyed. How I felt the system was telling me to do two different things. She then began explaining to me why my interpretation wasn’t correct. Nothing she was saying aligned with the messages or my experience. Reaching the point of irritation and recognition that nada was getting changed, I thanked Kelly and prepared to hang up.
“Well, do you want me to take care of getting the autofill restarted?” she asked.
Well, I thought I’d done that when I logged in and clicked on a button to start autofill. “Yes, please,” I answered. Kelly talked through the process of what had happened, what she was doing, and…
Her tone faltered. I sensed that she saw exactly what I meant in my complaint. Then, she finally said in a low voice, “Sometimes this system doesn’t make sense.”
Vindication!
I smiled.
“Is there anything else I can help you with?” Kelly asked.
My smiled stayed. “No, Kelly. You have a great day and a great week.”
“Why, thank you. You, too.”
With that, we said our goodbyes and I basked in my tiny, tiny victory.
Ferrari red, it’s a wide, low vehicle. My wife is my passenger. We’re backing out of a garage. The passenger mirror hits the garage door frame. My wife gasps. I grimace. We finish leaving the garage and see that there is a Ferrari Testarossa mirror-shaped scallop removed from the garage door’s frame. I get out and check the mirror while my wife grumbles. The mirror is there but is upside down. A twist and I fix it, good as new. Nothing wrong with it, which amuses me; the mirror is stronger than the materials bracing the garage door. How funny is that?
We drive for a while at a fast but sedate pace. Then…in a jumbled shift, I’ve driven the Ferrari onto some kind of large transport. It’s like a train without a track, with a living room, kitchen, etc., and the mad chaos of eighteen people, including children. Many of the others there are known to me as actors and musicians, Oscar winners and Hall of Fame rockers. I’m amazed to be with them but also think, “About time.” A young blond Helen Hunt is present, herding three children running around. She’s managing but tells her children with a wicked smile and a gleam at me, “Hang on, children, Mommy has to drive this as fast as she can. It’s going to be hairy. Do you want Mommy to drive fast?”
“Yes,” the children all agree in repeated shouts while I’m agape, accepting, this is what I signed up for but I didn’t know what I was signing up for.
“Okay,” Helen Hunt says, “here we go.” She has a wooden stirring spoon her hand and is standing in the center of a room, children around her, toys strewn across the carpeted room. “Zoom,” she shouts, and thrusts her wooden spoon up.
The vehicle rockets forward. She waves her spoon and it rocks left, right, left. The children are laughing. I’m paralyzed in amazement. But we’re moving.
A conference among others is called and I attend. “Where are we going?” David Niven asks. “We’ll know when we’ll get there,” replies Bruce Willis, and a third who I couldn’t name tags on, “But we have to move fast.”
I offer to drive my Ferrari. It’s faster than this vehicle, so I can pull it along and we’ll get there faster. This is given serious conversation. I’m eager to do this but all decide, hold off for a while, let’s see what progress we make.
I go into another room and sit in a chair. A noise warns me, something is going out. “That’ll bring the ants out,” I think, looking down at the floor. Sure enough, as expected, a phalanx of black and red ants rush across the tiled floor. They’re going to be a bother if they go in the direction they’ve begun so I use a foot to divert their path. More obediently than cats, they turn in the new direction, and some wave thanks to me, because they understand why I diverted them.
David Niven finds me. “There you are. Come on, into the Ferrari. We need more speed. See what you can do.”
In a dream shift, I’m in the Ferrari but I’m alone. Others are hooking up the vessel and then shout, “Go.” The Ferrari is now black, I notice, and wonder when the color changed. Yet, I know it’s my Ferrari. I smashed the gas pedal and take the car up through revs, up through gears, snaking the car around traffic along an undulating and busy Interstate. Looking back, I confirm the vehicle is still being towed. I’m impressed that there’s no wind and little impression of speed. I feel in command, in control. This is a breeze, I think, speeding toward some brightly lit collection of skyscrapers looming larger on the horizon.
I was thinking about Mom. She wasn’t doing well in June, August, September. Not answering texts and phone calls. Falling a lot. Not mentally sharp.
Frank was alive and caring for her then. But a few weeks before his penultimate accident, he told Mom, “Pretty soon, I’m going to be too weak to take care of you.” Then Frank fell in October and passed away a few weeks later.
Looking back, as Mom recovers now, I can see how his decline affected Mom’s decline. I’d always believed that would happen. Their life together wasn’t sustainable. Both were aging, their health and energy declining. I discussed it with them but they wouldn’t change their ways. Change is hard. Then it’s forced on you by powers beyond your control.
Frank fell. Died. Mom went loopy. Was removed from her home and placed in a new situation. Now she’s doing better.
Lesson learned? No. Just more realization about life and change, and the creatures we are.
Trump’s agenda has lost popularity. Democrats swept the mid-terms. Hope this is the start of something more.
Maybe it was the destruction of the White House East Wing and the construction of that ballroom while the government is idled by the longest government shutdown in U.S. history, the ongoing Epstein Shutdown of 2025.
The smirker-in-chief, with his smirking BFF, Jeffrey Epstein, of the Epstein Files.
Perhaps Farmers have become convinced, or people employed in factories where productivity is declining, or people in danger of losing their homes because they can’t afford them any longer. Perhaps it’s the measles outbreaks and the loss of SNAP benefits, or Kennedy’s vacuous guidance on medicine that’s contrary to established facts.
Perhaps it’s because he capitulated to China on tariffs, showing that he is TACO. Maybe it’s the Epstein Files or ICE’s cruel, illegal raids, or Trump sending National Guard units in to U.S. cities to intimidate U.S. Citizens, or the fact that prices are going up, not down, in general, or that Trump is using the U.S. military to attack and kill unarmed civilian combatants at sea. Or maybe it’s because of Project 2025, Trump’s continual overreach, or open and widespread greed, or the fact that he’s enshittifying the United States at an incredible pace and scale. I don’t know. But people Voted Blue.
Through the fog creeps Thirstda, November 11, 2025. 52/57/48 are the numbers for the day: present, high, low. It’s a remarkably narrow range, with fog and clouds gaining the lower hand over the sun’s position as an influencer.
Mom continues to improve and impress, according to sis. Had her first PT session today and did great! Wife, on the other hand, is not doing well, in her words. Not surprising for me. She and stress aren’t good friends. Her anxiety climbs and she becomes physically challenged with a great deal of pain. She’s working through her protocols to cope. As for me, other than physical limitations and restricted diet, I feel fab. Didn’t do much yesterday except nibble on crackers and binge on a series called “Suspicions” with short naps. Found I wasn’t comfortable sitting at the desk, as that strained my abs, so the planned typing didn’t come about. Tried other places and positions but all felt wrong and I didn’t have enough to push through. Part of this is because my wife gave a steady stream of reminders not to do too much. I didn’t want to add to her stress, so I backed off.
I also ate too many crackers, I think. I had some vegan, gluten-free vegetarian broth. No flavor, at all. Really disappointing, so I went back to the crackers. We had picked up some TJ’s garlic-flavored naan crackers, water wafers, and something from Costco, potato crackers seasoned with seaweed. I didn’t think much of the water wafers, but my taste buds highly rated the other two.
Plans today are to catch up on writing, reading, and blogging. I finished reading my last two books, both fiction on my travels. Gravity’s Rainbow is available at long last. Yes, I confess, I haven’t read the classic. Found it in the library system and put it on hold back in July. I began reading a terrific (so far) historical fiction book by Amy Stewart called Woman Waits with Gun. Ironically, I’d purchased it at Half-Priced Books in Monroeville on the 2023 visit to attend my nephew’s marriage in Pittsburgh. I know this because the receipt was inside. It sat in the TBR stack by the bed until I came back from Pittsburgh. I’d just finished a romantasy and a crime thriller and needed a read, and ‘lo, there it was.
Over on streaming land, we are into the latest season of “Slow Horses” and “Down Cemetery Road” and are ready to begin “King and Conqueror” and the latest season of “Diplomat”. This is augmented by “The Graham Norton Show” and rewatching “Would I Lie to You”. I cut the last short because laughing and coughing really rile my incisions.
Today’s music is out of dreamland again. The Neurons, looking over my shoulder as I reviewed my strange and amusing dream, came up with “Rocket” by the Smashing Pumpkins, in the morning mental music stream. That was sort of funny on their part, as I’d been dreaming about being on a spaceship. I’ve gone through this before, dreaming of being traveling in space, then awakening to bafflement about where I am.
Another of my dreams was very short. This was about kittens gamboling on me, mewing until I got up to feed them. I thought there were two kittens but when I put out the food, four more appeared with sharp cries, “Me, too!” I rhetorically responded, “How many kittens do we have,” as one more little grey fluff of floof waddled in. That was all the dream offered.
I’ve been looking at news but don’t have many thoughts on it at this point. Trump is being Trump, as far as I can tell, with all the mendacity, greed, and arrogance that implies.
Hope peace and grace find their way out of the fog to you. My body is suggesting it’s time to lay down again. Think I’ll do as it says. Cheers
I encountered two hotel trends which displease me during my recent travels. Yes, here is your warning: this is a first world rant.
When I was making reservations, I specifically sought a place with a bathing tub. The hotel said they have tubs. My wife has medical issues, and a hot soak in a tub helps alleviate many symptoms.
Guess what the hotel didn’t have when we checked in our room? Yeah, no bathtub. I spoke to them about it. Can we move to a room with a bathtub? Alas, only one room in the hotel’s entire offering has a bathtub.
Say whaaaat?
That hotel, the Courtyard by Marriott, told us we needed to change rooms. They’d made an error. The entire second floor had been promised to another party. We could stay in the room but not use the elevator. Whaaat? So, we left that hotel and moved into the Hampton Inns.
It was much better. Guess what the room didn’t have? Yep, no bathtub. The hotel only has one room with a tub.
Whaaat?
My wife and I had already been aware of this trend toward showers only in hotels. This was the first time it slammed us directly in the face.
I will predict that as this trend spreads, a counter trend will kick up: we have bathtubs! They’ll be advertising the presence of tubs as they once boasted of air conditioning, cable TV, HBO, and free Wifi. Time will tell, of course.
The other disturbing trend was the lack of a ventilation fan in the bathroom. There’s no switch to throw to circulate the air, help clear the air when the room is steamy, or, ahem, help us cope with body functions, if you know what I mean.
According to brief research (I queried search engines), the reasoning behind this: reduce costs. Aesthetics.
Twozda, November 4, 2025, has pounced on us like a kitten hunting a leaf. 51 F in Ashlandia, rain clouds hide the sun. Rain is expected to visit off and on throughout the day. More leaves are surrendering to time, filling the ground with fading, decaying colors.
Mom continues to be lively back in Pennsylvania, according to sis. Which is thought by all of us to be good. Thought I’d share this photo of her from her 90th birthday. Yes, that’s a kitchen knife in her hand.
Mom, 90 birthday celebration, October, 2025
Today’s music is owed to a dream. This was one of those long, movie-like dreams my mind spins to entertain me while I slip. In this one, I was part of a group of young people. We’d found some books, then realized there was significance to the books, and then, ‘lo, a book was missing. We knew who collected the books, so we thought we’d recreate the journey he took to collect the books. Maybe that would reveal the missing book. We were traveling by train and car mostly, and yes, the travel took us behind the old ‘Iron Curtain’ into previous nations controlled by the Soviet Union. There was romance and comedy along with suspense. It reminded me of the 1980s Dabney Coleman film, Cloak & Dagger.
Anyway, my amused reflection of the dream triggered The Neurons into offering songs about spies in the morning mental music stream. After considering different music, The Neurons concluded that Carly Simon and “Nobody Does It Better” is the best choice.
Dick Cheney died. I was surprised. Thought he’d died in the 1990s. I knew he’d been re-animated to be Veep under Dubya, but I thought that spell wore off once he was removed from office. He was only 84, which also surprised me because he often seemed very old. The tributes will pour in for him. They’ll gloss over what he did to help forge a path to our current mess and speak of his service to the nation. Few will mention how extremely wealthy and powerful he became as part of that service. He did speak out against Trump in the 2024 elections and endorsed Kamela Harris. Just noting that.
Speaking of Trump, the Trump created Epstein Government Shutdown of 2025 rolls on. As someone else predicted, Trump became TACO and yielded somewhat on SNAP. Judges ruled that he must pay it but I think it’s most likely he’s doing it due to voters turning against MAGA politicians who worried about losing their seats, which might lead to the House flipping in 2026. Like others, I think Stephen Miller strongly influences Trump, and that having people die from starvation, even if in red states, is okay with the Regime. Death from starvation will make people more desperate and pliable, is their reasoning. That reasoning then goes, those folks will be willing to work for lower wages and can probably be pressed into service doing jobs that migrant workers used to do. Yes, the Trump Regime is trying to create a class of low-wage slave labor, like we had in ‘the good old days’, and thus help ‘make Amurica great again’. Sickening. Bet Epstein is smirking down on Trump, or up on him, depending on your thoughts about the afterlife.
In a Truth Social post, Trump said Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits “will be given only when the Radical Left Democrats open up government, which they can easily do, and not before!”
There’s the TACO we know! Breaking the law, breaking the law. Not taking responsibility. Blaming someone else, as he always does. And screwing We the People.
Analysis I’ve read said that not paying SNAP will disproportionately affect his beloved MAGA base. Of course, in Trump’s altered reality, SNAP recipients are all scammers, people illegally in the United States, or people on drugs. The Trump Regime dismisses the idea that income-challenged families and individuals, the disabled, and children depend on SNAP. That administration is deliberately, maliciously, and dangerously warped.
Off I go. Hope grace and peace spring out from their hiding places and embrace us all. Till then, I’ll coffee up. Cheers
