i survived “whamaggedon 2024” by never having heard the song “Last Christmas” by Wham… just to be sure, i went to youtube, searched it out, and listened to about half of it, just to make sure… i’m still not sure i’ve ever heard the song. it’s forgettable, and i have a brain injury… 🤷
the panto has been going unimaginably well, in spite of the fact that we had to have a substitute musician (greg powers, a guy i have known since high school) play the “baphoonium” part (part euphonium, part bassoon) on the trombone, because the bassoon player got sick and the euphonium player had another gig.
my “xmas” was about what i expected: other people getting way too excited about giving meaningless gifts to people they don’t really care about, in a desperate attempt to feel like their lives mean something to someone other than themselves, while completely, i might even say DELIBERATELY oblivious to the fact that their actual lives — and the actual world — is being deliberately DESTROYED around them, while they try to find reasons to celebrate. whee… yippy… 😒
“friday the 13th” has never been a particularly “unlucky” day for me…
until today. 😒
today, before i even woke up, moe was asking me to take kestrel outside to pee, because she (moe) wasn’t feeling well. apparently, when i was outside with the dog, moe’s “not feeling well” included a bout of diarrhea, and she was in the shower when i came back inside. i ended up taking rye outside, as well, while moe was “preoccupied” in the bathroom. eventually, moe felt a little better, and put the two younger dogs in her car, so that they could go chase sheep around for a few hours, but, then, it turned out that moe had left the dome light in her car on overnight, and drained the battery… which, usually, wouldn’t be a problem, because we have a battery-charger/tire-inflator gadget (which we used extensively, during the recent wind storm), that will jump-start the car… except that we loaned the gadget to a neighbour. so, moe called the neighbour, and got the gadget back, but it’s totally drained (because the neighbour used it to inflate all four tires and jump-start his mother-in-law’s car), so moe plugged in the gadget, but, being completely drained means that it’s going to take a few hours for it to recharge, so she decided to jump start her car with the pickup… which means hooking up the pickup (because it, too, has a battery that runs down for no very obvious reasons), and jockeying it around so that we can hook up the jumper cables… and, while she was hooking up the jumper cables, the positive wire on the pickup battery came loose, which meant hooking it back up while being careful not to touch the wire, to avoid getting shocked… and then, when moe’s car was running, i was backing the pickup into its normal parking spot, but, because of the fact that i was wearing my reading glasses (and not my “seeing” glasses), i was a little too entergetic with the backing part, and backed into the trailer… and then, when i was DISCONNECTING the pickup, the wire came loose AGAIN and then the tool, which i was using to tighten the wire to the post to which it is affixed, fell apart and i only just barely caught the loose part before it fell down inside the engine compartment…
i mentioned to moe that it might be in our best interests to engage an “au pair” for the dogs, since her not feeling well put me in a state of panic. i’m not sure how she feels about it, but it’s out there.
and that’s not to mention the fact that, in the past 4 days, i have received FIVE “monthly” orders of soylent (normally, 24 bottles), which i have been disputing ever since the second one arrived, but, because of the fact that i’m apparently discussing it over email, with a “large language model artificial stupidity” program (😒), i haven’t been able to solve the issue, or get them to acknowledge that there IS an issue, or issue me a refund for the orders i DID NOT MAKE, or cease the soylent deliveries… and that’s not to mention the fact that i have LITERALLY NO WHERE TO STORE that much soylent. 😒
around noon, today, i was accosted by bandits while i was pumping gas in issaquah. the ONLY reason i did NOT lose anything is because they started out by being INCREDIBLY creepy, and doing things that i KNEW were NOT the kinds of things people who were in the situation they claimed to be in, would do…
i had just finished pumping gas, when two guys drove up in a black SUV, and started trying to get my attention. the guy driving did most of the talking. according to him, they were from dubai, and didn’t speak much english… then he started GIVING me his jewelry, and kissing my hand, and saying “gift, gift”… a large ring with a square of “diamonds” was first, then a “gold” chain from around his neck. what he said wasn’t immediately clear, but i got the impression that they wanted to trade the jewelry for cash, so that they could buy gas, but i don’t carry cash, so then they tried to get me to go to an ATM.
i don’t know much about jewelry, but i can tell you that the ring he handed me was NOT the “gold” that he claimed, nor was the “gold” chain he took from around his neck. they were just not heavy enough. 😒
the whole thing was INTENSELY creepy, and the guys seemed to be in a huge hurry, which, naturally, made me very suspicious. i said, no, i can’t take this, and turned around to put the gas fill hose away, and when i turned around again, they were gone.
there were two or three other people pumping gas, so there were a lot of witnesses, which is probably why they didn’t hang around… which added to my suspicions… but it was only after i had driven away, and was on the other side of issaquah before i realised that they were trying to rip me off.
i was completely wrong concerning the quality of the panto performances this weekend… i anticipated that the “dress rehearsal in front of an audience”, would be “somewhat less than a controlled shit-show”, and it was essentially perfect: the band got all of the correct music cues, and responded to them perfectly, the cast gave the music cues perfectly, and had all their lines memorised, and, by the second show on sunday, we (the band) were already discussing ADDING music cues for events that happened, but DON’T have cues listed in the script. i, literally, do not know how we went from as much of a disaster as the rehearsals seemed to indicate, to a show as complete and polished as it turned out to be, but i’m definitely NOT complaining. at this point, the show can only get better, and i look forward to seeing how that manifests in reality.
i finally moved the last of my stuff out of moe’s office, and into their new places in my re-organised office. the remaining stuff is either stuff that moe adopted (i.e. she’s going to use it in her office), or stuff that goes into freecycle. i still have a bunch of cable-management stuff, some of which i’m going to use, and a mixer in a box, at one end of my new “closet desk”. ultimately, i want to hook the piano and the synthesizer to the computer, and to the stereo, through the mixer, but it hasn’t happened yet… although it is now a lot more LIKELY to happen than it pretty much EVER been previously.
it is now, officially, panto panic season: we open on saturday, and we haven’t had a single rehearsal where we have gone through the entire play without stopping, we are still waiting for 3 pieces of music TO BE WRITTEN, we haven’t had a single rehearsal with anything close to the “entire” band that will be playing, one musician is currently sick, and isn’t sure he’s going to be able to make the first few shows (although he IS COVID negative, so far), and there are two musicians who are scheduled to play, who have never seen the music…
and yet, somehow, we will most likely pull a more-or-less finished show out of our asses, possibly as soon as the second show, saturday, and maybe even as soon as the first show on saturday.
we have a “dress rehearsal”, in front of an audience, on thursday, and, i’m guessing it’s going to be somewhat less than a controlled shit-show.
rye has continued to improve. he saw a specialist, yesterday, who confirmed that his liver values were off, but on their way back to normal. it’s a lot more likely that he will live until his 14th birthday, at least, than it was a few days ago. 👍👍
rye is feeling a lot better today… he ate breakfast, and is barking when he feels as though he’s not being included… which is frequently, since he is still tethered to an IV infusion pump.
