Bruno's passing.

On 5/17/2018 one of the best and pure creatures I have met passed from this form of life. He died on a short walk, suddenly and quickly, without warning. I have been in great pain since that day and not a day passes without me looking for him still. I do not know my next move, where the next leg of my journey will lead me. In short, I suppose, I am somewhat lost. I am without direction. I think I will head into the Dine' lands or up North somewhere. We had a good run and I miss him dearly. I now have a greater emptiness than I have known in quite some time. My youngest son graduated high school a week later and leaves for the Army in only eight days. He is more ready than I for him to go. I also want to spend more time with my eldest son, but where to start? Do I rent a place and move with him, if so, to where? I could take him on the road with me, but I fear he would not have as good a time of it as I do. I feel he would do better with a more concrete environment. I do not claim to know what is best for him, but I do wish the best for him. Now, at whatever turn, my journey is a far lonelier one. A trip of less color, less flavor. Far, far emptier than before.

Bipolar Disorder

Some people know that I have Bipolar disorder, some do not. I hope to be able to give a little insight into my life. My reasons are mostly selfish, I would imagine, but I suppose that it gives me a tiny bit of an outlet. I will warn new readers that I do use "colorful" language so if you are offended by such lower speech, kindly fuck off. Thank you. I was diagnosed at 26 with bipolar disorder and have spent every year since under the treatment directions of various quacks, uninterested soulless zombies, outright assholes, and certified nut jobs. I have been on a lot of medications.....a LOT of meds, none of which I care for with side effects ranging from loss of time/memory to loss of penis/interest in sex ( by loss of penis I mean simply that an erection was NOT happening! It was like trying to push a wet noodle into the vagina). Needless to say that particular regimen of dick-killing drugs was ceased right quick and in a hurry. It was bad enough to be a fucking nutter, I at least wanted to stay somewhat a man! I have been married twice, neither ended well. I was in total fault with the first marriage as I was coming in to my full psychotic break episode 1 time. Soon after I was hospitalized for a lengthy "break" from society. Then an even lengthier stay after that, then another..... I will give more insight into my past in later posts. For now, I will discuss...well, now. I have since moved from the Great State (Texas), to a rather beautiful region in Central, lower Upstate, NY. Confused? Not surprised, but that is how the area is described. It is also called the Mohawk Valley after the branch of the Iroquois Nation that the settlers decided to drive out, suppress and general be a real dick towards. I live at the beginning of the Southern Adirondack Trail. All in all, a very nice area...if you do not mind the human idiots that dwell here. (More on that subject later also). It is really a beautiful area with four actual seasons as opposed to the two seasons in Texas-Hot and FUCKING HOT!!!! Now for the meat of this post-the symptoms! I have been going through a tad bit of a rough spot as of late. I am finding it difficult to keep my anger in check. Ok, not so much "anger" as unholy nuclear hellfire hurricane RAGE as can only be found in those not solidified in reality. (This is where I begin to piss and moan) I have in my life some people who attempt to micro-manage my life and tell me just what I should and should not be doing....with every little fucking thing. Mind you, these people have NO idea as to what a mental illness truly is other than retardation. (No, not because they are retarded, though I often wonder...). However, these people have the gall to tell ME about being fucking crazy! I hear things such as, and these are quotes: You don't need those meds, God can cure you! (Funny, you sure as hell took a LOT of cancer drugs to get into remission, I guess God took that time to vacation...), You should get out more, stop being so introverted. You can get cured if you want (because mental illness is simply an attitude problem), Why do you think you are that way, who told you that you had that illness, you seem fine to me. I suppose all of those doctors were in agreement on my diagnoses to simply try to piss me off.... Anyway, you get the idea. People who are not "of the same mind" as myself, really should just shut the fuck up unless they are trained professionals or are asking questions in order to learn something about me. This is exactly why I do not often tell people about me having this disorder. I do not like being this way. It has cost me much in my life, chiefly a wife whom I loved and three children, who I will always love. Sure, the manic phases are great fun, unless you think that spending every cent you have is unpleasant! It is a good feeling, those "highs". The lows do suck, a great deal in fact, and death is often on the mind. Not suicide, just death. You know, the whole "I don't want to die, but I ain't keen on living either" stuff. Not that I have refrained from the attempt..a time or three. The times that I was low enough were not little cries for help. No, I did it right, as they say. I was shuttled into the hospital the first time with no pulse and they were unable to get any reading at all for my blood pressure. Yup, I arrived D.O.A. and left all upright-like and alive. I was legally deceased for over three minutes. Whatever, big whoop. Do I regret not dying? Well, I don't really know. I don't give it much thought. I did try it a few more times, all with mixed results. I will not describe what occurred as it is not relevant to this jumbled rambling. The last time, my dog stopped me. really, he knocked a very impressive amount of hard-core narcotics out of my hand as I was attempting to pop them into my mouth. He gave me one of "those" looks. So, we sat up all night in the company of each other. We have not been apart for more than 12 hours since that night and that length of time only once. He goes everywhere I go and I would have it no other way. Well, this crap has gone on long enough and I have accomplished nothing other than to cement that I have ferrets in my head. This is, I guess, the beginning of a description of my symptoms and how ineffectively I deal with them.

Until next time......

Face, meet brick

It has been a while and I need to vent or go on a shooting spree. Or an arson adventure. Or nuclear destruction run amok. I am currently treating a very ill snake. This would be not so great a chore, IF I had a vet I could reliably contact and visit. You see, our back-water are of the universe has only one vet that is trained to treat reptiles within a three hour one way drive and she works on a circuit, she has no office of her own. Hell, I even took a snake to her in a pet store utility room once. She is a capable vet but she does not return calls within a time frame that could actually SAVE your animal. So, if I wait, most likely my snake dies. If I treat the animal myself, I spend all the money I would have had to use for the vet visit and still may not save the animal. I chose to at least attempt to treat the snake rather than d fuck-all and have him die. I purchased the drastically over-priced ultra sonic humidifier and what medications the U.S. allows one to purchase over the counter, which is almost fucking nothing. I know why people resort to witchcraft to treat ailments in the U.S. It is because meds you can purchase over the counter in every other fucking country on Earth must require a prescription here in the states. God forbid the pharma-fucking-ceutical companies not make an extra 80 cents! I could even take this stress in stride except I have already lost one snake this year and had a tortoise with a few health issues. I do actually know what I am doing with reptiles, I have been working with exotics for more than a few years. I have even had to recently remove a growth on one of my boas. What the HELL is going on with my animals!! Is it this apartment?? Is it cursed or leaking some toxic fumes that slowly causes reptiles to go belly-up? I am ready to fucking scream! I want to smack my face against a brick until I lose all consciousness. I also lost an elderly snake last year not too long after she birthed a litter of babies. She had on-going issues with cysts on her face. She had been to see the same elusive vet I now search for and we removed and treated her face then. After the births, they popped up again and caused a lot of breathing issues with her. She came to us as a "damaged" snake with the cysts arising on her already badly scarred face. I am ready to explode.

This shoulder sucketh.

I go in for surgery on the 24th to try to lessen some of the issues with left shoulder. Yippie.... Nothing like having a doctor tell you he is going to "shave some bone off." I hope his razor is sharp. I am actually looking forward to it as the pain is preventing me from picking my nose properly. I am ready to have this fricken pain gone. It is in fact, what is keeping me awake right now listening to fricken Michael Bubble BARF! Charity is also awake otherwise I would have some music on that did not suck as bad as my shoulder. I would rather take a kick in the balls than listen to this crud. It is funny watching her cat, Willow, messing with the printer as she works on some photo shoot ads. Oh yeah, back to the shoulder, apparently the bursa in my shoulder decided to leave causing two bones to rub together and they pinch a nerve several times a day making me almost piss myself. It is an old injury I received years ago and have recently (a few months ago) re-injured it by flinging my wife's cats out of windows.
The snakes are doing well. I got SCREWED this year on several snakes. The hazards of doing buisness by phone across the country. Of of the more costly "deals" I made cost us even more for a vet visit and meds. I think that poor old snake is slightly retarded. At least he ate today! It has been a month since his last meal. That is not unusual for a snake, but still worrying. My bigger female seems to be keeping her food down. I am happy about that even though she crapped all over my boot the other day. Big snakes have BIG turds! Thing saint bernard poop. It is better than walking into the room at 4a.m. and smelling a regurgitated rat laying in the hot spot of the cage baking at 95 to 100 degrees. All the problems with them aside, I still would rather be doing this than just about anything I can think of and it is something my wife and I can do together. She and the kids have been doing the lion's share of the labor lately, thank you jacked-up shoulder. I hate seeing her do the things that I should be doing. Pisses me off.
We have a bloodhound that has come to live with us. Everyone calls her Lilly but me, I call her stupid. She is about as smart as a half rotten potato but she can smell a mouse fart in a hurricane. That mutt has some sniffer on her and it leads her around most of the time.
The Tree may be looking at back surgery in the near future. Something about a bionic spine??? I hope it helps her.
That's all I got to say about that.

Been a while

The day is fast approaching. THE day. Me who thought I would never marry in the first place, is doing in a second time. 13 days away and I still don't know what I'm wearing. I do thing that Bruno will be the ring bear (raaaawwwwwwrrr!) and Marshall is my best man and Taz, my betroths brother, will be standing up there with me, perhaps to catch me if I run off or pass out. Her father is preforming the service, thank God it's not a shotgun wedding!
While I am not so much nervous, I am concerned. I lost my mind during the first marriage and have yet to find it. I hope to do better this time around, both with my future wife and our kiddos. Every one's life is a book. Mine is rampant with miss-spellings, run-on sentences and story lines that jump around and have nothing to do with the previous chapter...or the previous sentence for that matter! I hope she can keep up with this crayon-wielding 2 year old.
Our friends from Texas will be miss greatly. Hmmmm, maybe we could use mannequins or blow up dolls in their place.....
Oh, and she FORBIDS me from wearing a Tigger costume, there went plan number one!

A rare morning commonly found.

Bruno and I were up and out before sunrise, as is usual, for our morning walk. We went to our usual haunt, the river. I will fall well short of describing the moment, but I feel I must try.
It was peaceful. The uncommon peaceful type moment that will stay with one throughout their lives and be judged against all other moments like it. The cold wind was blowing gently in our faces as the Canadian geese a mere few feet away, went through their morning routines of conversation, flapping and trying to impress the fairer of the sex. Lesser scaups dove and landed, their white feathers standing out against the dark water. The Village roosters,(crows), tried to wake the world as song birds warmed their singing voices. As the sun rose over the mountain I realized that I had, at that moment, no worries, no cares. I just "was". I was there, with my pal, Bruno, enjoying a peace that while rare, is all too common here. I noticed that even the usually impatient Bruno was sitting still, watching the water flow lazily by us, caught up in his own silent thoughts. He too, looked to be at peace. All was right in the world. It was a moment that, if shared with all the humans of this conflicted and confused planet, would put a cease to all ill will and hatred and worries, if just for a short while.
I wonder if a hundred years from now if another boy and his dog will stand at that same spot, watching the same sun rise on a peaceful, cool spring morning?

Joe

I would like to share a chance meeting that i had with a fellow in one of those horrid gathering places of mass consumerism a few weeks back. Understand That I am not stereotyping this guy or being a racist, his accent really was this thick and he knows it and says so. I am going to try to type his part as close to phonetically as possible so you too can get the flavour of his accent.
I was waiting for my Tree to get off work when I spotted this elderly fellow sitting on a bench. I nodded and he returned the nod. I came back a few minuets later and sat next to him and thus begins the meeting. His name is Joe.
Joe is an Italian immigrant, somewhere as he says, in his 80's for a while now. He is the veteran of our Air Force and served during Viet Nam. Joe is full of life and stories as I was to find out. With an impish grin and very little pause, he dives right in to a story.
" When-a I was-a in Japan, they had-a me drive a truck-a to a place. Now, I'm-a no truck-a driver, I no know what-a fuck is-a going on, but hey, I do it! Now the trucks, they have-a call sings, you know-a; a=alpha, t=tango and so on. This-a is my first-a time to do this, so I have-a no idea what I do-a. This-a guy, he stop me and ask, are you 124 Charlie? I say-a no, my name is-a Joe! He say, listen here-s you dumb fuck-a, not-a your name, what the truck's name. I say, how the hell should I know the truck's-a name, I never been introduced before!"
After a few laughs from me, he explains how "back then" you could buy a woman for $5.00 for the whole night. He then tells me this short tale and trust me, i cannot do it justice.
"Me and -a my friend from Kentucky was-a at this bar with this guy from-a the Boston whose accent was-a terrible! There was-a this woman there who my buddy bought-a a beer. She starts-a rubbing between my legs and-a I move her hand-a away. She move-a it back-a. Next thing I know-, she in my lap-a! So I says to my buddy, Hey Tom-a, get-a this yougly bitch-a off-a my lap-a!!! The other guy, he say, What the fuck-a he just say? I say Get this yougly bitch-a off-a my lap-a!!!!! He say, What the fuck-a is the yougly??? My friend, he say, That when ugly is-a not enough to describe-a how-a ugly she is. Now, back-a then, my English is not so-a good, not-a like now, so I-a not know how you ugly so I say it yougly. It was-a all over base very soon. A few months-a later I was transferred to Greece. I'm-a sitting ata bar when this-a guy, he come in looking real rough. I say, Hey fella, what's-a happened to you? He say, "I had-a this date last-a night and man! was she YOUGLY!! I says, "you just come-a from Japan? he say, "Yeah, how-a you know? I say never you-a mind!
As I said, I cannot do these stories justice without telling them in person and even still, it would not be NEAR as funny without Joe telling them. I would love to record a conversation with him. Eventually his wife walks up and Joe's face was afire with love that comes from years of waking up next to a beautiful sunrise, and his sunrise is his wife. She too is an Italian immigrant. She looked to be maybe half of Joe's age and a real looker!! Go Joe!!!!! I don't know what his secret is, but it sure works for him.
I hope to meet Joe again, though I doubt that I will. Meetings like this are once in a life time happenings. I type this more for me than for anyone else, so I will remember Joe, and the life that still burns inside of him. To remember his many stories, of which I only shared two short ones. Live long Joe, and keep telling your stories!