Daily Archives: August 11, 2015

Feeling really crappy

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I won’t lie to ya… I ain’t doin so well right now.

For one thing, my computer has decided it just plain can’t run my browser any more. If I try, the screen goes black, and I have no choice but to reboot. I can do anything else, it seems… But not the one thing upon which all rests these days,nbsp; namely web browsing.

So as you may have deduced, I am typing this blog entry into the WordPress app on my tablet. Thus is a lot slower and a lot more work than typing on my full sized keyboard on my full sized computer, and I might go get my Bluetooth mini keyboard to help bridge the gap.

It’s almost as good as typing on a real keyboard, but you need someplace to put it, preferably someplace table-like.

And we don’t have those here, as such.

So I am stressing out about whether or not my precious computer is dying. My one saving grace is that it has displayed these symptoms before, always in the summer, and they have gone away and stayed away for long periods of time.

To have my computer die on me is unthinkable. It is both where I work and where I socialize,and I sure as hell can’t afford a new one.

The other stressor making me miserable today is trivial in the grand scheme of things, but sure as hell didn’t help : I spilt my root beer.nbsp; I had a njce tall glass of diet AW root beer that I was really looking forward to drinking, and as I was making lunch, I knocked it over and spilled it all over the kifchen counter.

So notvonly did I waste all that root beer and thus deprive myself of the pleasure of drinking it, I got to spend the next 10 minutes cleaning it up, ice cubes and all. All that ice cold root beer mocking me as it chilled nothing but my fingers.

Sometimes it is the little things which hurt the most.

Oh well. All this will pass. I still feel kinda grumpy and mad at the world, but I will get over it. And life will go on.

Really, today’s twin tragedies just brought my current mood to a head. I have been feeling cranky and depressed lately and I don’t know why. Just part of the long long healing process that is recovery, I suppose.

I suppose my student loan business is a stressor too. I logged into the student loan website yesterday to check on thd progress of my application, only to find that there hadn’t been any because it turns out that I have to print out this stupid form, sign it, and send it to Victoria before the process can really begin.

Ink on paper, in this day and age. Billions of dollars of business is done entirely electronically every day, but these prople need ink on paper.

What’s worse, in order to access disability money, I have to fill out this simply massive form to prove that I am disabled. Apparently, the fact that I am receiving full disability benefits from the exact same government which will receive said form is not good enough. They need me to prove it again.

The left hand doesn’t even know the right hand exists.

I don’t have a printer, so I have asked dear Felicity to do the form printing for me. Her mother has a home office, and she can print them out there if she gets her mother’s permission.

So that is, I suppose, another thing pulling my mood down somewhat. I am sure it will work out, but discovering that I had missed a vital detail when I filled out my student loan application the first time (actually, there were a few other small things, but whatever) was a shock and filled me with that all too familiar feeling of stupidity at having missed something important.

Being somewhat scatterbrained and absentminded, as well as extremely inward-looking and outward-oblivious, there is always a very real possibility that I have missed something very important. Some detail that is super important but my tendency to do things with more energy than precision failed to grasp.

And I know that sometimes, irrational exuberance gangs up with desire to escape (or be “done”) in causing these errors to occur. In such a state, going back to see if you missed anything seems absurdly unnecessary.

But thw worst part of it is that there doesn’t seem to be a possibility of change. It’s not like I set out thinking “I am going to do a really half-assed job of this!”. I try as hard as I can to do a really thorough and diligent job, and a lot of the time that is fine, but now and then, it isn’t, and I feel like a helpless, hapless fool.

(—)

Aaaand I am back from my appointment at the sleep center, and let me tell you, my bad brain day just keeps rolling along.

I got there a couple minutes late, only to realize that I had forgotten to bring the memory chip from my CPAP device, the reading and analyzing of which was the entire point of my going there.

I thought of just slinking home right then and emailing Marielle to reschedule. But that would be shameful and cowardly of me, and I am striving against the tendency, so I went in to face the music.

Only to find out that my appointment was not for today, it was for Thursday. Or at least, that’s what the spinny receptionist said. I have reason to doubt her perspicacity. She thought I normally come on Fridays (nope), and that my previous appointment had been on a Wednesday (nope nope, they have all been on Tuesdays. Wednesdays they would conflict with therapy. )

So at least this time, I was stupid in two ways that canceled each other out. I thought I was going to have to sheepishly admit that I had forgotten the chip. But it turns out, nope!

I really hope I am better brained when I wake up tomorrow.;

I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.

The last episode of TDSWJS

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(SPOILER ALERT : The thing in the title. )

That stands for The Daily Show With Jon Stewart, of course. That’s what ended last Thursday.

For various reasons, some practical and some, I am sure, emotional, my roomies and I didn’t end up watching the final episode of the Daily Show With Jon Stewart until tonight, the Monday after.

I wasn’t looking forward to it. I get super emotional during the final episodes of shows I like. The final episode of Cheers damned near killed me with the verklemt. Final episode of Night Court was even worse. Hell, I even remember being traumatized (in a good way…. hell. a great way) by the final episodes of M*A*S*H and All In The Family.

So I knew that watching the episode would be rough going. That doesn’t mean I anticipated being miserable the whole time, or even part of the time. It just means that I know I would be going through crate upon crate of feels, and for better and for extremely worse, I barely go through a box a week normally.

Really should seek out catharsis catalysts more often. I am so bound up and frozen inside. I always end up stronger and happier as a result. Spring can’t come soon enough in this cold and lonely heart of mine.

Anyhow, I went in to the episode expecting a hell of a lot of emotions. And I was not disappointed. Seeing all the correspondents come back (and I mean all, even Michael Che), hearing him give an awesome speech about bullshit, and holy shit, the power of Bruce Springsteen is not diminished … it brought up a lot of emotions in me.

But the amazing thing is, there was very little sadness. I suppose that’s obvious in retrospect. It’s a comedy show,after all. And Jon is not the sort of person to wallow in bittersweet tears. So there wasn’t going to be heartbreaking montages or some melodramatic turning off of the studio lights.

For one thing, the show isn’t ending. Technically.

But like I said before, as much as Jon, being a Sagittarius, doesn’t like responsibility and is uncomfortable with open and non-ironic shows of emotion, he was still a huge part of many people’s lives and we will miss him so very much.

We never asked your permission before we fell in love with you, Jon. And we’re not asking for your permission to go right on doing it no matter what.

We love you and we’ll miss you. Man up and handle it, you magnificent bastard.

My Moon sign is Sagittarius, so I grok not wanting responsibility. Even when I have been the guy in charge, something in me inherently resisted the idea of being the “authority”. I don’t really believe in authority in the formal sense. I am far more comfortable when everything is loose and relaxed and only minimally hierarchical. Responsibility is so restrictive. Why can’t people just get along and be cool?

But the Sun always rules, and my Sun sign is Taurus, and we bovines have very, very deep feelings about responsibility. When you have the power, you have the responsibility, and whether or not you asked for it, wanted it, or like it is immaterial.

You have the baby. Your job is to see that the baby is taken care of. It doesn’t matter whose baby it is, it doesn’t matter whether or not you ever wanted to be in charge of a baby, it doesn’t even matter if you just plain hate babies.

Well, okay, that matters because it probably means you are a horrible, horrible person, but still.

So while I have a natural aversion to responsibility, if I end up with it, I will execute it with care, caution, and diligence.

And, of course, humor, wit, and wackiness. I mean, you might as well have fun.

So anyhoo, I enjoyed the final episode and it didn’t make me sad. In fact, I am rather amazed at its ability to be both an extremely appropriate and wonderful sendoff while also continuing to be funny and soul satisfying as well.

I feel like I got a lot of necessary catharsis from the episode itself. I am not claiming that I am not sad about Jon Stewart leaving TDS, and I can only imagine it will get a lot worse once the residual levels of Jon Stewart have completely left my bloodstream and I start hankering for a fix of JS, knowing it will never again come.

But I feel like the nature and execution of the final episode was so positive and loving and wonderful and life-affirming (yes, I went there) that it will make the grief more tolerable. It is a magnificent last impression for a show that has been the same for almost seventeen years, and if you have to go, going out on the highest note you can is the best way to go, every time.

I will do my best to leave space in my heart for Trevor Noah, even though he will face the same challenge as Larry Wilmore (replacing a beloved figure and the inevitable backlash that creates) times a million and ten. I have stuck with Larry even though I miss Stephen Colbert something fierce (as shown by the childlike joy I felt seeing him in the last ep), and I am sure I will hang in there with Trevor Noah as well.

But it will never be the same. It can’t be. You can’t go home again, there will never be another Casablanca, and The Daily Show With Jon Stewart was something unique and special, a melding of man and (production) machine, and while it’s always possible that the Trevor Noah version will be as good, it can never, ever, ever be the same.

And that’s okay. At this point in my life, I have outlived a lot of show I loved, and came to the conclusion that instead of mourning the episodes that never will be, we should be glad that the vast and mysterious monster known as Television gave us so much of the episodes that were. The episodes we still have, and will always have.

You can’t go home again. But you can visit, and remember.

And that is, more or less, enough.

I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.