One Damn Thing after Another (Blog #227)

I haven’t done squat today but am worn out. Well, I did go for a walk and also went to Walmart to buy groceries. But otherwise I haven’t done much. Still, something has zapped my energy. Maybe it’s the junk hanging on, the change in my diet, or allergies and the weather. Regardless, I think God meant for us to hibernate during the winter–crawl in a cave with the bears, snuggle up, and snooze right through Christ’s birthday. I mean, the lord doesn’t seem like the type who’d want a piñata or any sort of big fuss made over him. But seriously, just imagine sleeping all winter–we could wake up refreshed in the spring, say, “Happy Belated, Jesus,” and pick up where we left off. Personally, I’d really enjoy that, even though it’s obviously not going to happen. A mere ten hours from now I have to wake up to get ready for therapy, then it’s just one damn thing after another.

Whenever I eat the way I’m currently eating, there comes a point at which I start getting light-headed. For the most part it’s not dramatic, simply something I notice when I first stand up or bend down. Well, it’s been happening today, this sense of dizziness whenever I change positions, and it’s starting to bother me. The internet says the wooziness is due to a decrease in carbohydrates and mild dehydration. So, despite the fact that I’m already drinking so many fluids that I’m going to the bathroom every fifteen minutes, I guess I’ll up my water intake. Also, one of my friends said to try salt because salt helps with fluid retention, so I’ll give that a whirl too.

Stuff like being low on energy and getting light-headed always freaks me out. Like, I should probably go ahead and see if the retirement center has a spare room, maybe even pick out a casket. God forbid I ever have something actually wrong with me. All that being said, I know I often bitch and joke about my health issues (if they could even be called issues), so I’d like to take this opportunity to acknowledge that although I have a few things I’d like to see improve, my body is actually knocking most things out of the park lately.

For example, for months I blogged off and on about body odor, but I haven’t had an issue with it in weeks. Whatever it was finally worked itself out. Also, since starting the diet a couple weeks ago, I don’t think I’ve had a headache one time, I’m not coughing up green junk every morning, and I can actually feel my hip bones! Anyway, I guess I have a tendency to look at all the things that aren’t working, so I’m trying not to forget what is working.

So, way to go, armpits–I’m proud of you!

This evening, in an effort to be a dutiful son, I helped my dad change a few light bulbs. However, while I was changing one of three bulbs in the light in my dad’s bedroom, the entire fixture flickered, then sizzled, then burned out. Well shit, I thought. Since other electrical items in the room also went out, it quickly became apparent that a fuse had been blown. Of course, something like this should be easy enough to fix–just walk out to the garage, flip a switch, and you’re back in business. But is that what happened tonight?

No, no it is not what happened.

Since our fuse box isn’t labeled, my first mistake was thinking my dad and I could easily make a chart of what does what. With this plan in mind, I called my dad on his house phone from my cell phone, marched out to the garage, and started flipping switches. Did that turn anything off? Did THAT turn anything off? I practically had my dad doing laps around the house playing What Light Bulb Is Off Now? (I’ll take The Laundry Room for a thousand.) And whereas my dad isn’t in the best shape and was breathing hard, he was a trooper–we were on the phone for twenty minutes. Well, we got most of the house electrically mapped out, but we couldn’t get the fuse for his room to come back on. Finally, it dawned on us that the light fixture itself had not only crapped out, but had also burned some wires in the process. So that’ll be a project for later.

About two paragraphs ago, my mom told me the link I posted to last night’s blog wasn’t working. Since a similar thing happened once before (on my birthday), I assumed it was the site’s security certificate, which is what allows for the more secure website prefix of https and not the oh-so-ordinary http. Anyway, for the last hour I’ve been chatting online with someone in India whose responses were coming so slowly that we might as well have been communicating by carrier pigeon. Unfortunately, things got worse before they got better–at first my site simply wasn’t working–then it was redirecting to an asbestos company–then I couldn’t sign in to post anything new. “But don’t worry,” the guy said, “it’ll all be working in 4 to 48 hours.”

Okay–uh–thanks for your help.

Nothing was made to last forever.

As my friend Matt said when I told him what was going on, “Technology is great when it works.” Well, thankfully, it only took thirty minutes for everything to go back to normal, which means I’ll be able to post this tonight and not have to wait. Honestly, I don’t know why shit like this happens. I don’t know why our bodies, light bulbs, and websites stop working at times. I guess nothing was made to last forever, to always operate smoothly without any hiccups. Earlier tonight I listened to a lecture by Joseph Campbell, the mythologist, and he said that the question we have to ask ourselves is whether or not we’re going to say yes to life the way it is and not the way we want it to be. This reminds me to take everything as it comes (one damn thing after another), to be grateful that most things work most of the time, and to label both the good and the bad as “just life.”

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

"Sure, people change, but love doesn't."