CarlHoliday

Let's get this out of the way first, my grandfather may have been born in Kansas and his parents may have been married in Kansas, but I still do not like Kansas, except for the service plaza on their turnpike. See, I can't hate them because hate is an all out, total rejection, but these guys have nice service plazas. Rest areas are another situation entirely as they range from "I not even peeing in there" to "this is rather nice for a public toilet." According to Wiki, Bunker Hill has 1.4 square miles of land on which reside 101 people (2000 census), giving you a population density of 73.2 people per square mile. Interestingly, 100% of the population is white, but Hispanics or Latinos of any race make up 6.93% of the population. Don't you just love statistics, especially those government ones. The clerk at the truck stop last night was a "god blesser." I did not offend him by saying "I doubt it." That would've only confused him. Besides, it was dark and I still had my sunglasses on. I've had my sunglasses on since Ohio when the frame broke on my regular pair. Luckily, the sunglasses sort of work okay at night. I can see, but if Mr./Ms. State Trooper stops me, I'm up that proverbial creek not only without a paddle, I won't have a canoe either. I have to get my blood tested today. There isn't a place in Bunker Hill to do it; with 101 people, everyone would have to be sick at least one or two times a week just to pay rent. There is a place up the road in Hays, significantly larger than Bunker Hill and home to Fort Hays State University. Hopefully, the place I think can help will help. I thought the "state-of-the-art" place in Kentucky could help, but they were too wrapped up in procedures and policies to help a person in need of a simple blood test. It's not like I was asking for a blood transfusion because I hadn't been able to find a victim to satisfy my perverse need to drink the blood of another human. No, take a little blood. Use the machine if you want. They did that in Bountiful, UT. Works just like a diabetic blood monitor only it gives its results in INR. If my INR is too high, I have a greater risk of bleeding to death, probably internally. If it's too low, that clot in my leg will get bigger or another clot will form somewhere else. I hope they'll help. Now, all I have to do is get the big truck into Hays and not run into any "NO! trucks" signs. Oh, and I hate Microsoft. Last month the updates to my computer included the famous blue screen of death with every shutdown or restart. Vista was extremely helpful by saying it could solve the problem online, but never seemed to get around to it; or maybe it did and didn't tell me, Vista seems to be like that. This month Windows Media Player isn't working properly; properly as I see it. Since, I'm not a techie in any sense of the word (I have trouble not cross-threading screws), I can't say for certain was is proper and what isn't. All of a sudden when I click on an video sample on the internet, nothing happens; well, something happens, but it doesn't start the media player. I'm thinking they've changed my security settings, probably for my own good since what I click on is trashy gay porn, anyway. I also hate my laptop. Suddenly it doesn't like my wireless mouse and I've been using the laptop's mouse pad with it's handy-dandy "I'm going to move the cursor over here because that's where the mouse is pointing;" or, even more dangerous, "I'm clicking this while you move the mouse over there because, while I know you don't what to look at what's there, I might be interested." That's why I bought the wireless mouse to begin with, so I wouldn't have to deal with a mouse with a mind of its own. I didn't want to buy a wireless mouse, by the way. I wanted to buy a wired mouse, but they don't make them anymore; or if they do make them, they don't sell them where I buy my stuff. Well, let's see, Kansas, Microsoft, and laptop, that pretty much wraps up my hates for the day. Yes, I really do hate Kansas. They're not as bad as Nebraska or Iowa, but they're way down on my list. Oh, have you noticed? There aren't as many birds this year. In fact, in a lot of place, it seems there aren't any birds at all. I get around a lot and it just seems to be a particularly bad year for West Nile Virus.

Okay, so I didn't do an entry for day or so. I was busy and tired. I also broke the frames for my regular glasses. So now I have to live in darkness, even when it's dark outside. My clinic is ordering new frames so they can put in the old lenses when I get home (hopefully next Friday). I'm typing this without my sunglasses and I can see my laptop. The letters are a little small and fuzzy, but you do what you have to do. Yesterday I was supposed to have my weekly blood test, but I foolishly went to a "state-of-the-art" facility and they wouldn't accept the letter I have that has worked in Fargo, ND, Rawlins, WY, Youngwood, PA, and Anderson, IN. Please note these are all "Northern" cities. I went to a diagnostic clinic in Williamsburg, KY, operated by Adventist Medical. This letter clearly states what I need, but these sweet, dear people couldn't handle a physician order that wasn't handwritten, like a prescription. It had to be handwritten. But, you see, I understand their dilemma. They go to churches that have to believe everything single word in the Bible is the truth. They are so fixed on following rules at their church every Wednesday and Sunday, they can't deviate even a tiny bit outside of their religion. Their parent organization has rules about doctor orders and what a doctor's order looks like. A letter with a doctor's signature that describes the test required and the diagnosis simply wasn't sufficient. Part of the problem was the doctor didn't put my birthdate or social security number on the request. RULES! They have to follow the rules, no exceptions, no going outside the box. Then I noticed all the Christian stuff all around. The Bible quotes were bad enough, but the receptionist had a picture of her daughter display for all to see. Her daughter plays softball, but that wasn't the problem. The frame holding the picture had these words around it: LITTLE MOM'S SPORT. The "liitle mom" in the picture plays softball. Not only is unhelpful mom pushing her daughter to be heterosexual, she's practically demanding she have unprotected sex. I wanted to gag. I'm not getting a blood test here in Conley because I'm stuck in the company yard and can't get out. I had to take some safety tests and get my truck worked on. I'm ready to go, now, but don't have a load. And, no, I haven't written anything. I want to, but I also don't want to get interrupted.

Funny you mention that because the previous night I delivered a load of frozen pizza to the Wegman's D/C out by the Rochester airport and then spent the night at a truck stop in West Henrietta. I probably drove right by your house, but didn't know it because you didn't wave. Carl

And you were thinking, "Whew! He's forgotten to do an entry." Sorry, but I was busy finishing Chapter 16. It's all done and sent to my editor. It should be up before the weekend. Then I had to drive here to pick up my next load. They seemed quite anxious for me to get here, but I've been sitting in the dock for an hour and nary a pallet has thumped onto my trailer. Actually, it's the forklift the does the thumping. At least it's not hot. There's a nice breeze blowing and enough clouds to scare the sun away. Avon is a nice little town with a lot of those turn of the century houses yuppies enjoy rennovating. This is the kind of town HGTV or This Old House might be in right now filming a remodel. Avon is also the home of Cool Whip. I bet you can guess what's going to be put in my trailer. I've got three days to get to my destination. Sorry, but there have to be a few secrets. I'll probably work on The Pet for the next week or so, or until I get Chapter 2 completed. Then I'll start work on Chapter 17 of The Artists.

What can I say but THANK YOU for caring. There aren't a lot of people out there who care as much as you do, so keep up the good work.

Okay, I tried to make an appointment with my shrink, but he won't be in town the next time I'm home. So, I guess I'll have to monitor the situation and decide what to do when I start heading home. Actually, I'm kind of surprised I went to the effort of making the appointment, but I was going to do this entry and realized it would look kind of silly to say I was going to try. It looks a whole lot better to say I tried, but failed. I'm putting off leaving as I have to drive through Cleveland, not my favorite city, what with Dead Man's Curve on the other side, one of the few places in the entire interstate system where an interstate highway makes a ninety degree turn. In my putting off, I wrote the third section of Chapter 16. It was probably one of the darkest pieces I've written in a long time. It is quite bloody and someone dies, but there is a bit of humor in there, too. I tried for a GOTCHA! and hope it comes across. Kind of leading up to it was a dream I had last night that involved a murderer who might have been stalking me. I say might because he was definitely shooting other people around me, but seemed to ignore my presence. It was almost as if he was putting my death off until the last moment. The past few days, well, since Wyoming when I came across the Sand Creek Massacre Trail sign and looked it up in Wiki, I've been thinking a lot about death. Then I did a little research on the Sand Creek Massacre, like Wounded Knee and Mi Lai one of our military's less reknowned moments. It's kind of numbing what a few guns and bullets can do to old men, women, children, and babies. And, yes, a few of the soldiers died, but it seems a lot of their wounds were from friendly fire. Get in the way of a bullet and it doesn't care what uniform you're wearing. In a short discussion with myself yesterday, I figured out these entries were acting as a sort of mental lift to the day ahead. So, I guess you going to have to put up with me for a while longer, or at least until I can talk to my shrink about changing my meds as I am definitely bouncing between happy and sad. This can't go on. Either I change my med dosage or I end up on the side of the highway somewhere.

Okay, I

I take the mood stabilizer Valproic Acid because of the cyclic nature of my depression; it

I don't know about the lip piercing, but the eyebrow definitely sounds so cool (I can use that word because I'm old and was around when cool became cool). I always imagine lip, chin, and cheek piercings as being leaky prospects. Of course, a lip piercing may not actually involve the interior of the mouth, but I can imagine a tiny dribble of caffeinated beverage on your chin leaking from that lip ring. I suppose now you'll be looking forward to a double nipple with gold chain to your navel or quite possibly lower? And, watch for infection!

Another day, another buck-fifty in the kitty. Today, was okay. Busted my ass helping to unload my trailer. It's part of the deal. The customer is a major account and the drivers must help unload. This means picking up boxes that fall off of pallets that are stacked to the ceiling, picking up boxes that are stuffed between pallets, and generally helping the forklift operator with the unload. We don't get paid to help, by the way, which is only logical in the greater scheme of things. And, I got my blood test. My INR was 3.1, which isn't within the 2-3 range, but isn't horribly over. We'll continue as we have been with 7.5 mg of Warfarin on Mondays and Thursday and 5 mg all the other days. Only five more months of this, I hope. I'm depressed. There's no other way to describe it. I've been dealing with this shit for four years now and, well it's been bad before, real bad, badder than it is right now, but I'm sinking into unbelievable sadness. This is definitely the cause of those thoughts that are cycling through my head right now; and, yes, they slipped out a couple times today when I saw and passed an opportunity to cease being. As long as I keep passing them, eventually things will get better. It's either that or I'm going to have to call the shrink and get stronger medicine, which might hinder my ability to drive. I just have to hope for a bounce. That's what I need right now. A bounce back to normality or a little bit higher. I'll be leaving tomorrow taking a load headed to Rochester, NY. It doesn't sound like fun. Those old Eastern cities have alleys and loading docks not designed for 53 foot trailers. I can only hope the receiver built a new warehouse some where out in the burbs. I am working on Chapter 16 of The Artists. It's going slow. My sadness exacerbates my inability to put thoughts into words.

I got as far as Tremonton, but I'm supposed to be in Logan. I was supposed to be in Logan at 3 p.m. today, but obviously that didn't happen. My boss is really pissed. I'm pissed, too, but for an entirely different reason. The trailer I picked up had a flat tire. I tried to fix it and eventually got it filled with air on Tuesday, but this morning when I checked it before leaving it had gone down to 55 psi. So, I contacted our over the road maintenance people and they sent me to a tire shop in The Dalles, OR, which didn't open until 8 a.m. In total, I lost 7 hours on the front end of this load. Then I said I'd be in Logan at 10 p.m. tonight, but I ran out of hours and had to stop in Tremonton. My boss is going to be pissed, again, tomorrow. On a happier note, I think I'm getting suicidal, again. I just can't stop thinking about how things would be so much easier if I wasn't doing them or worrying about whether they got done at all. If this continues, of course, it may actually lead to be having to stop driving, again. I definitely don't want that, but I don't know what else to do. I think it has a lot to do with the amount of stress I allow to affect me and the negative way my mind handles it. What I should be doing is trying to find someway to lessen the stress other than formulating plans for doing myself in; or, putting myself away. I've always thought of that as a preferred means to leaving this present life without actually killing myself. Do some act that is either perceived as insane and leads to hospitalization or do something definitely illegal and enter the criminal justice system. I'd prefer hospitalization, but it's next to impossible to end up in one of those places unless you do something horrendously illegal and are deemed to have acted in an insane manner. That would take too much planning. On the other hand I could consider just acting out attempting suicide. That would probably ensure a short stay in a facility and if it was done in some location far away from home, I might not be able to make it back. That could lead to essentially dropping off the radar screen for however many years it took for my crazy mind to actually do itself in. Oh well, it's late and I need to get some sleep before my boss yells at me for not being in Logan, which I said I would be. It'd probably go a lot better if I cared, but I don't. I don't care about a lot of things these days and that might be my biggest problem. I'll have to think about that some more. No Harold and Bernie tonight as my mind is running out of steam.

8 miles over? Let's see, you were driving out of state plates; California right? And a convertible, from California right? And you had a lot of guys in the car; road trip from CA to wherever. I'm surprised you didn't get stopped more often.

I can't use Home without quotes because there is a Home, WA, and I don't live there, although I have been there. It's a nice, little community on Key Peninsula. If you're interested, check out the interesting Wiki entry on Home. I'm home for only two days because, well, I was getting tired out there having to find a lab to have my blood tested. The last place was the county hospital in Rawlins, WY, because they don't have medical clinics. They're probably going to bill me a horrendous amount just because they're a hospital and everyone is now being billed extra for the new emergency room. So, yesterday I did nothing. Today, I was going to go fix my son's computer, but he told me his friend came over and determined the silly thing was a virus infected piece of toast. Well, his friend seems to know a bit more than the average person so we'll go with that and he gave my son one of his extra computers. My son and I, also, decided that we'll try to scatter my mother's ashes on 9/20. I'm hoping for a sunny day as opposed to a cold, damp day. Stormy Mountain wasn't named that because it was a sunny, cloudless day when someone looked up that way and wondered what they'd name it. The Adventures of Harold and Bernie Harold wasn't a Harry. His father, mother, Uncle Harry, and numerous cousins tried to make him one, but he cried so much they simply gave up and called him Harold. Bernie was Bernhardt after his maternal granduncle, but quickly became Bernie because kids laughed at him too much. They also laughed at him because of his lisp and the strange way he wiggled his butt when he walked. Bernie was a lonely child. Harold went to a private school and graduated second in his class, which got him into a very prestigious, yet small, private college where he excelled to gradute, sadly again, second in his class. He went to a not so famous graduate school and became a CPA. Bernie went to public school and was ridiculed for his lisp and wiggle. He was pounded regularly by less intelligent, but more physically dangerous classmates. For a time, his nickname was "Blackie" for an ever present black eye. He graduated somewhere near the top of his class and went to a state university where no one cared if he lisped or wiggled. His BS in Computer Science led to an MS. Harold was hired by the most prestigious accounting firm in the city of his birth, even though he turned down numerous offers from around the country. When asked Harold would say, "I saw the world in college and was not impressed." The very same prestigious accounting firm hired a headhunter to find Bernie. Some at the firm were a little put out by his lisp and wiggle, but he was the best at what he did and was willing to move to their city; famous for its seemingly perpetual gloom. So, who were they to complain? Complaints brought attention. They'd all worked happily in their little cubicles and added attention was the last thing any of them wanted. Besides, it was a little lisp and the wiggle wasn't that pronounced. to be continued, maybe

Sounds kind of idyllic such that you might expect to see Clark Gable or William Powell driving by in a 1934 Oldsmobile L-34 convertible with Mirna Loy or Claudette Colbert sitting in the passenger seat. Actually, it's a lot of neon and tourists. I got my load going west, but it doesn't pick up until Monday afternoon. So I drove over here to sit until tomorrow morning when I also need a blood test. According to the AT&T online Yellow Pages, there's a diagnostic lab in Greensburg where I can get my blood drawn. Then it's back down the road to Youngwood to pick up something going to Oregon. It's going to be a rush load as I have to be on the other side of the country Friday afternoon. That's about 2,700 miles in just under five days. It's doable, but I won't be doing much writing. Which is kind of good because I did work on Chapter 16, at least I got it started. I also wrote the first chapter of my next long story which I'm tentatively calling "The Pet." It's the same one I was talking about in my last entry, only now it's getting serious and needs to be put down on paper. Basically, it is about 19 yr old Darik was involved with a subversive group that was going to use an atomic device to blow up the embassy of their sworn enemy. Unfortunately, they got caught and all were killed except for Darik because his father is the President of the planet's Guild of Selectmen. Darik was saved to embarrass his father, but dear old dad has been in politics a long time and came up with a solution, a fate slightly better than death. It has always been Darik's dream to travel to a foreign planet and live an extraordinary life. Well, guess what! This truly has a chance of being a rather nice story. There are even going to be kiddies. But the dark side is always there and it shows up in the first chapter, which might turn out to be the goriest. Honest, I really do want to write a nice story without a lot of blood and gore. Actually, they're called kits and they usually show up in pairs, but triplets or quads are not unheard of. I'm going to work on both stories, but The Pet won't be coming out until I've written a few more chapters.

Wow, with a subconscious like yours you should try writing. Spaghetti sauce seems to do it for me. Last night all the baddies came to roost, including my father who's been dead for over thirty years and hasn't made an appearance for years.

Seriously folks, I thought I had this thing beat. I thought everything was going to be peachy again, you know, like it was when I was simply delusional or before that when I was too scared to open my closet door. It been down hill since then. I was feeling pretty good last weekend and earlier this week. I was doing pretty good, too. Everything was coming up roses. Well, somebody has to fertilize the roses if they're going to look good so we're in for some heavy shit. I'm down; there isn't a better way to say it. I asked my boss and he approved my time off (just two days) starting next Friday, the 29th. So where do they send me? Yeah, Manchester, PA. It's close to York in case you don't know your PA from your MA. Next they're (my boss is off this weekend) going to say there aren't any loads going west at this time. That what they said last time; no loads going to the West Coast. I suppose all those trucks out there on the highway heading west were empty. I have Chapter 15 ready to post, but haven't had the time to do it, nor the motivation. I haven't worked on Chapter 16 at all. I pretty much know what I'm going to say, but I haven't typed a single word. There's this new story running around in my head right now. It's a Sci-Fi about a young man, late teens or early twenties, who is captured by the secret police planning to blow up or do some kind of serious damage to the embassy building of the Sylene's who whupped the Humans in a battle for Darit. The young man's father just happens to be the President of the Planetary Guild of Selectmen and he is given a choice life in prison on Darit or become a hostage on the Sylene's home planet of Mmemn. This has been mostly just a distraction to keep my mind thinking about something other than being totally depressed.

I'm not quite certain how far west because it was late last night and I was too tired to venture into that wonderful city. I have to venture in this morning because I need a blood test. I've picked out a clinic and hopefully they'll be willing to help a trucker in need. What I really hope is there'll be parking for the big rig somewhere close to the clinic. I don't have a lot of time to drive all over Fargo looking for a place to park the big rig so I can get some blood drawn. Last night as I was driving across North Dakota something strange happened. I was somewhere west of Dickinson when I came up to the top of a hill and off in the distance on what must have been the horizon there was a huge, strange looking, dark orange object. At first I thought it must be a giant water tank or possibly some sort of petroleum tank because there were a lot of oil wells around. Then I went down in a valley and couldn't see it any more. Having nothing better to do than drive the big rig down the road at the impossibly slow speed of 62 mph, I began to work up some theories on what the big orange thing was. Of course, I was also working on various scenarios for Chapter 16 of The Artists (Yes, I finished Chapter 15 and will be getting it off to my wonderful editor later this week.) when I came to the top of the next hill. The big, dark orange thing was even bigger now making it easily identifiable. It was the moon. Full moon, actually. And, then I began to think about the moon. Like I said, there's not a lot of activity going on in the big rig allowing for a lot of self-conversation. You'd be surprised the number of arguments we get ourselves into sometimes. Anyway, it's full moon time, again. If you're in customer service, the retail or food service industry, criminal justice, or any other occupation that places you in contact with people on a daily basis, you know about full moon days and nights. It seems all the crazies come out and, if you're one of the unlucky ones, come to you to show you how crazy crazy can be sometimes. I was feeling a bit crazy myself, but then I am taking medicine to make me not so crazy. Yet, I'm feeling pretty damned good right now. In fact, I think it was the day before yesterday, I was driving across Montana so it could be either day, when I experienced this incredible sense of peace. I've never had this feeling before so it was quite a shock when I began to delve into it. Then it got to be a bit scary because you see for the first time in my life I was at peace with the universe. I realized that I was okay with death. I know, THIS GUY IS THINKING CRAZY THOUGHTS! But, you see, that's because it's full moon time and you can do that, especially if you're leaning a lilttle toward crazy anyway. I'm not saying everyone should go out looking for this sense of peace because it really gets you where it matters. Right now I think this feeling I had was a lot like when I used to meditate, but, of course, I wasn't meditating while driving across Montana. Anyway, I needed to get that out and now I need to get ready to get down the road. I have to be in Roscoe, IL, tonight, so I can be in Indianapolis tomorrow afternoon.

Moses Lake is an odd little city in the middle of the Columbia Basin. It is also an actual lake; technically a reservoir when Crab Creek was damned in 1900 for irrigation purposes. That original reservoir is much bigger today because of the Columbia Basin Reclamation Project. I spent the night here and will be heading east within the hour. Back in the mid-Eighties I applied for a typesetting position here with a small webpress, but didn't get it because they hired a guy from Wenatchee. It was a shame, really, because I would've liked to have lived here. I'd like to bitch about something, but I'm feeling too good to do that. Last night a the warehouse where I picked up my load there was this kid. I don't know, at least 16 but certainly not over 19. Think of an ideal Nordic boy named Sven with that tight blond hair that is short and thick, wisp of a moustache and goatee, clear blue eyes, too loose sweat pants that he had to keep pulling up over an ass to die for, and the flash of abdomen and chest he gave me; the skin was lightly tanned and I couldn't make out any hint of hairs heading south from his navel. Was the flash on purpose or was it just something he normally did? Oh, yes, he'd been working very hard and his cheeks were flushed. Beside the sweat pants he was also wearing a black hoody. On top of everything else he was so damned cute he almost made me forget about the slender warehouseman I'd seen earlier in the day with a light, two day old beard barely covering his pale, clear skin. The other warehousemen were Filipino/American adults, one was a grandfather, and mostly spoke Tagalog. (I used to work with someone who spoke that language regularly and got used to the sound of it. What was really interesting was her telephone calls to one of her friends from "home" who was also tri-lingual [English, Tagalog, and Spanish]. There'd be this string of Tagalog interspersed with a few Spanish words, and then, Nordstroms or Rite Aid would pop out and it'd sound so weird.) So, this extremely cute white kid in amongst all these older warehousemen was quite startling. He was so out of place that I suspect he was a summer hire, maybe the son of the owner or possibly the shipping clerk who seemed to have a bit of Scandinavian blood in her, too. Chapter 15 is coming along, finally. I figure I'm about two-thirds through and should have it out by next weekend, depending on how my job goes. If I have to haul ass, or get super frustrated, the writing will stop. That's just the way it goes.

A big THANK YOU goes out to everyone. I can say I was a good boy and stayed in bed resting my bad leg. I took the dog out a couple times and got the mail, but that was about it for my birthday. I tried to ignore the fact I am now 59. Today will be a blur of activity as I get ready to go back to work tomorrow.

I've always considered 13 to be a lucky number for me mostly because I was born at 11:30 p.m. Another thirty minutes and I'd have been an August 14th baby, but that was not to be as my mother had been in labor since the 10th of August. I've heard labor in an agonizing experience and I'm glad I didn't have to go through it. Depositing my seed in the proper recepticle was a lot more fun, even though at the time I was probably imagining it was Robert Redford who was the receiver. Don't ask me why, but I've always had this thing for Robert Redford. Even today I find him to be an incredibly beautiful man who I wouldn't mind snuggling up to. So, today I'm 59. I never believed I'd live this long. My father's side of my genes is not known for long-lived men and I've lived longer than all of my known predecessors, which is an accomplishment, I guess. This past year has not been fun and when you think about it too much, there was probably a long of stress put on my various physiological systems that could lead to an early death, except that's impossible because I've lived longer than I'm going to from here on out. My mother died. I was not there. I couldn't be there. I couldn't bring myself to be with her after the last seizure knocked her back to 1970 something. My mother's death led to a near suicide, actually a couple. It''s a good thing I really don't want to go, otherwise I would've. I have this unnatural bright, cheery attitude that makes me believe everything is going to turn out okey-dokey if I don't try too hard to make things right. After a few months of rather intensive therapy, I was deemed safe to travel America's highways again. I was diagnosed as being Type II Bipolar, which simply means I'll never end up in the state hospital as being a danger to myself or others. My lows can be horrendous, but I can't quite pull the trigger (there is a reason I don't have a gun in the house). My highs are fun and I laugh a lot at the silliest shit, but I don't try to fly like Superman. Now, with Valproic Acid I'm stable. I still get low, but not too low. I get high, but not too high. It's somewhere in the middle where life is okey-dokey all the time no matter what is going on. In fact, my life could crumble around me and everything would be okey-dokey. Kind of scary if you think about it too much. And, now, I have a DVT in my calf and I'm taking Warfarin to keep my blood from making too many platets and to keep the ones I have from sticking together. I have to carry a card stating that fact in case I get in an accident and the EMTs and ER docs wonder why I don't stop bleeding. Luckily, the DVT should be gone in 3 to 6 months and I won't have to take Warfarin after that. We've figured out it is the Valproic Acid that is the culprit. I can't take aspirin with it. So, when I go off the Warfarin, I'll have to change mood stabilizers so I can go back on aspirin. (I had been taking at least 2 a day before starting Valproic Acid.) So, it's been a fun year and I'm hoping next year will be even more funner. If certain things work out like I want, there's a chance that next year could turn out to be the most funnest in a long, long time. Chapter 15 of The Artists is coming along. It's going slow, though. Friday I go back to work, so if you're out there on the highways and byways of America watch out for my black truck and wave as you drive on by. With my rig governed at 62 mph, I don't pass anyone except the gray hairs in their motorhomes, grandma on the way to Wal-Mart, and sixteen-year-old girls. (I haven't quite figured that one out, but sixteen-year-old girls seem to be very, very timid when driving and timid drivers do some real scary shit when the big black truck comes up behind them.) Take care, be safe, and remember to tell someone you love them.

You should live here. In our little city our cops are extremely busy with drug busts, gang activity, and other serious crimes they barely pay any attention to traffic problems. The only time a speeder is in danger is during daylight Monday through Saturday when the three motorcycle cops are out running radar, the one gray community service van is out photographing speeders in school zones, or you're so blatant a cop has to stop you just to protect his own ass. In our town, the posted speed limit is actually the minimum speed you're expected to go; everyone, including the cops, truck along at ten to fiften over the speed limit all the time, unless they're following any of the numerous gray hairs who commonly drive ten to fifteen below the speed limit.

Today's blood test came back with an INR of 2.2 meaning the Warfarin is at a therapeutic level in my blood, which also means no more Enoxaparin shots in the belly. Yaay! Yet, I'm distracted. So far I've written just over a page on Chapter 15. Not a lot, but you see I'm distracted. CALL 911 IMMEDIATELY IF YOU EXPERIENCE ANY OF THE FOLLOWING: Severe and extraordinary, Chest Pain Shortness of Breath Dizziness Headache Any of the above means the blood clot or a piece of it has dislodged and moved to my heart, lungs, or brain, which normally results in DEATH or a close proximity thereto. I'm just a bit distracted. I've seen death by embolism. It is not a pretty sight. Of course, death by anything isn't something you want to see, but an embolism lodged in a critical artery is not something anyone wants. It's surprising how quickly tissue death occurs, followed by organ death, followed by the Big D. Chances of this happening are pretty slim. The percentage of people experiencing embolic death once treatment has begun is fairly negligible, but it's still out there. It's a distraction to go from being fairly healthy to having a death threatening condition. Maybe I should concentrate on what my GP said, "If you're going to have a DVT, yours is in the correct vein. There are more dangerous veins." That's encouraging in a way, sort of, but the way life has been going lately, I'm having a little difficulty being encouraged. So, I end up being distracted.

I'm a bit down right now and not because of the depression. During this last time out my left leg swelled up like something I didn't want attached to my body. Well, it was a pain, too. So, yesterday afternoon I called the consulting nurse at our clinic and told her my symptoms. She said, "You need to go into urgent care at 3:00 when they open because they might need to do an ultrasound." Ultrasound? Yeah, of my left leg to check the blood flow of the veins. Needless to say, the nice young woman found a clot in the popliteal vein. I'm on 7 days bed rest. I'm on Warfarin. Plus, I'm giving myself twice daily injections of Enoxaparin for the next 4 to 6 days. They're given in my stomach. One thing about this experience is having people really concerned about me suddenly dying which isn't all that likely, but is a possibility. One nurse told me that in twelve years she's never seen a patient die, which is kind of good news. Anyway, I should be doing something, but I'm kind of down right now. I have to go in for another blood test in the morning. I've got a lot of blood tests ahead. Life is such a blast sometimes.

Seattle's always been magical for me, too, but then I'm from there. Yeah, too bad about Detroit; that Big Insurance Company Field team always seems to do the wrong thing for visitors. Nice to know the chapters are coming, again.