Winners never quit, quitters never win

Like most good Americans, I take several drugs, prescribed or recommended by my doctor. Prescribed are: two beta-blockers, a statin, a cholesterol absorption blocker, two anti-depressants, and a smoking cessation drug, Chantix. While each of these drugs has its idiosyncrasies, the best of these is Chantix.

I've been taking Chantix for almost 8 months now. From Pfizer, the miracle workers who brought us Viagra, Chantix is packaged in two different cardboard folders: the "starter pack" that has a 7-day blister pack of increasing dosages for the first week, and three 7-day blister packs of full-strength, and "continuation packs," which contains four 7-day blister packs of the full-strength product. Notice how cleverly they have circumvented my prescription plan's one-month-supply prices. Out of any 48 consecutive months, only 3 of them have only 28 days. But I'm not writing this to quibble about the rip-off.

About a week after beginning my Chantix regimen, I discovered that I cared less and less about smoking. It no longer particularly bothered me if I went several hours without a cigarette. At work, even under stress, if I thought "now is a great time to run out for a smoke!" and didn't actually get up and do it right then, an hour or two might pass before the idea would occur to me again. Down to about half a pack a day from two-and-a-half packs a day.

Also, about a week after beginning my Chantix regimen, I discovered that I could fly. It was in a dream, of course, but it was exceedingly vivid - lavishly colored, intricately detailed, beautifully choreographed. My exhilaration was gradually replaced by dismay, as I awoke to dreary reality. For the next several months, my dreams were impossibly lovely. Even a few nightmares were made bearable by their sheer beauty. Not all of the dreams were flying dreams, although many were; there were the usual money/sex/wish-fulfillments, too, but all made gloriously intense. I napped a lot in those days, and woke remembering all of the wonderments. If this had gone on much longer, I would have done my best to turn into a fairy-tale princess and slept my life away.

Finally, though, these dreams became less frequent and substantial. Reality began re-asserting itself, proving to be better than dreams on a few occasions. But still, every once in a while, I get a real humdinger of a dream - a technicolor extravaganza of epic proportions, leaving my waking self actually jealous of my sleeping self.

Chantix's brochures list "sleep problems (trouble sleeping, or vivid, unusual, or strange dreams)" among possible side effects. I certainly don't consider what has happened to me to be a problem. Instead, it is the reason that I'm still taking Chantix, and still smoking about half a pack a day. Gotta keep on dreamin'!

The Case of the Vanishing Vodka

I told the Nurse this morning that I had noticed that every clear liquor bottle in the house seems to be empty. The special Stolichnaya Vanilla vodka I got in duty-free because I wanted to see what kind of wonderful black russian I could make with it was empty, standing behind my two (unopened) bottles of Kahlua as if nothing had happened. It certainly didn't evaporate, because I had never had the top off of it. Other bottles, too, like the little pepper vodka and lemon vodka souvenier bottles that my developer, Lilya, had given me from her last trip to visit her sister in Kiev, were standing, empty, feigning unopenedness on the kitchen windowsill. I didn't even bother looking in the cabinet under the sink, which should have almost full bottles of various alcoholic beverages that rarely get used, NEVER go bad, and should be there on the once-every-few-years occasion that I need or want them. He tried to laugh it off, something like "Well, I made a deal with myself to not BUY any more liquor," but he really was ashamed. Good. If we absolutely have to, we can become the type of home where liquor simply is not allowed through the door, but why should my chocolate mousse (triple sec or grand marnier), turkey tetrazini (extra dry sherry), or certain cookies and cakes (rum, whiskey, whatever) suffer? But really, who the heck am I kidding. If I REALLY expect him to stop, we DO need to become that kind of home where liquor simply is not allowed through the door. The deepest truth is that I don't expect him to stop, so why change? Maybe I'm just not ready to put that particular foot down. Or afraid to... and so it goes.

Gym Class - A little stroll down Memory Lane

My family moved from Wisconsin to South Jersey over Christmas break in 1973. From that time on, through the rest of my public school internment, I refused to get "dressed" for gym. I would have played their stupid games, allowed myself to be pelted with dodgeballs, if I could have done so in jeans and a baggy t-shirt -- it wasn't about my lack of physical prowess. It was about the locker-room. I had already learned all there was to know about how middle-school-aged boys could find a flaw in someone and peck at it until it bled copiously, like chickens in a barnyard. I already knew I was a bit chunky, from my baby-fat boy-tits to my girlish thighs. Clothing provided a kind of protective camouflage which the glare of florescent locker-room lighting would not. I truly don't remember if I had been uncomfortable dressing for gym in Wisconsin, but I had done it. In Wisconsin, though, gym had been all calisthenics and track; in New Jersey gym was all about team sports that I had never played before -- touch football, soccer, and softball. The Jersey kids were tougher, aggressive in protecting their team structures from outsiders. Because health class (sex-ed) and gym shared a line item on my report card, for a couple of years I could squeak by on the balancing power of my health class grades, but I finally failed gym in my sophomore year in high school, forcing me to have two gym periods as a junior. I used the yellow pages, scraped together $35, and made a doctor's appointment. Dr. Sugar's examination was thorough, and there was nothing physically wrong. When I told him that I required a note excusing me from gym class, he refused. I told him that that was the reason I had come, that I was immovable, and would neither pay nor leave until I had accomplished my goal, and he reluctantly relented, writing a note that let me sail through the next two years of high school without worries: "Please excuse Richard from gym class, as he has a mental block against it." Instead of gym, I had extra study halls my junior and senior years. Several years later, I read in the newspaper that Dr. Sugar had been arrested for prescribing pain killers and other fun drugs to patients that didn't actually need them, and I thought it was strange that he had made me sweat for a simple gym excuse.

Mea Culpa, Mea Culpa, Mamma Mea Culpa

I know, it's been so damn long since I've blogged. I didn't set out to be a major disappointment to myself, or to you, my faithful readers, but it seems life keeps intruding on my time. I have spent some of my time wisely, though, so I may have learned a little bit that will eventually make this blog better.

Since last I typed:
1) I bought a fancy-schmantzy expensive Woodworking CNC gizmo, the CarveWright(tm). Off to a very bad start.

2) I started taking some art-glass classes, with varying degrees of success.

3) My Grandmother and Mother have both taken long vacations.

4) I've embarked on a dental-health plan that will culminate in a beautiful smile (I hope,) and will encourage me to take better care of myself overall.

All of this, and much more. Should prove to be occasionally interesting blog-fodder. Let's see what happens...

1.5TB, and I've got nothing to wear

For a short while, about two years ago, I was dreaming in stereo. Vivid, colorful dreams, with great soundtracks. I'd wake up, disappointedly realizing that I was back to the drab, and I'd write down what I could remember of the songs from the dreams. Two of these songs I was able to flesh out to the point where they seemed to be ready to be recorded. Don't worry, I am well aware of my limitations! I can't read or write music, and I can't carry a tune. I've listened enough to music, though, to have some very limited understanding of song structure, and what makes two or more notes sound good together, or not. I had this fantasy that I'd somehow manage to write up the tunes for them, using some kind of tonal representation that I'd be able to convey to someone who actually could write music, and my name would wind up in tiny print parenthesized on the label of a platinum single, or a Scissor Sisters album.

Like most fantasies, this one was eroded by reality into a couple of mildewed text files burried on the hard drive.

Also from dreams, I'd sometimes wake up with wonderful story ideas -- fully formed outlines for the arc of a great novel, or an article worthy of publication in the finest journals of our day. These ideas contained well-worded nuggets of universal truths that would illuminate and astound my growing legion of readers, my brilliance changing hearts and minds as I'd lead them into the utopian paradise formed from the gossamer of my world-view.

These, also, are somewhere burried on the hard drive. I can't even find the files. I need a better system.

You can feel the intensity!

Put me in, Coach, I'm ready to play.

Fed up with FedEx

There is nothing more frustrating than waiting for the phone to ring. It is an eternity in limbo, a season in purgatory. I have absolutely no control; I'm at the merciless mercy of another. When faced with these situations, I tend to nap, hoping that the unwatched kettle will boil sooner.

eBay's "Buy it Now" button has been good to me. No more waiting for auctions to end, sniping or being sniped. Just click, click, click, and it's on its way. eBay and PayPal, together, are the fulfillment of the American Dream: the magic of the internet, the miracle of a cashless society, the acquisitional greed. But every dream has its nightmare.

The Gospel According to Tom Petty tells us that the waiting is the hardest part, and He's really hit the nail on the head this time.

Every delivery method has it's own personality, and a tracking system, some more reliable than others. My favorite system is the United States Postal Service, Priority Mail. At the USPS tracking is a joke, and I do have a sense of humor. I always have the merchandise in my hand before they've updated from entered into the system to in transit. But balancing this against a super-quick turnaround time and a reliable delivery person, tracking becomes a non-issue. UPS, the sexy boys in brown, is my second favorite. Each UPS driver is a brunette twink from a William Higgins film, and the summer shorty uniforms accentuate their positives. Their tracking system is accurate, and I've managed to train the drivers to leave packages on my back porch if I'm not home to fantasize about them personally.

Which leads me to FedEx. Their tracking system is precise and unforgiving. They are willing to leave flatwork tucked inside the storm door, but anything else becomes a battle of wits and wills. A battle I always lose, because they cheat. I'm not sure I've ever even seen a FedEx driver. I think they are all ex-military people, probably special-ops types, Marines and Navy SEALs. Their specialty is stealth. These highly-trained professionals can silently tag an inner door without disturbing a cathair tumbleweed, or a napping Tom Kitten. By the third notice, I've always given up the fight, and have made arrangements to drive the fifty-seven miles to their nearest Home Delivery substation to pick up my treasures myself. I've tried staying awake for their arrival, but that doesn't work either. Any distraction -- a call of nature, a ringing telephone -- and I've lost the battle and the war. I have sat from 8am to 7pm on my front porch, catheterized and high on caffeine, only to find that their tracking system indicates that they were unable to make delivery at 11:47am because "customer was unavailable." By the time I get back down to the door to examine it for evidence, the delivery attempt tag will have magically appeared, stuck on the inside of the squeaky storm door.