coolerbythelake

So . . . this is continuing!! There is more!!!

Today I just got another check from the government - this one from the U.S. District Court of Columbus, Ohio, in the amount of $32.45. What the effing eff. I bought an iPod Nano off of eBay 8 years ago - in 2006!! - and because I got ripped off and reported it to the US Postal Inspection Service, I'm still getting money back. They caught this guy and made him pay.

So, $69.58 + 26.24 + $32.45 = 128.27

I don't recall how much money I got back from eBay, but . . . I think I got all of my money back now (unless I actually came out ahead).

So, I guess this just goes to show, that if you want to make money off of eBay, there's more than one way to do it. Also, I guess it goes to show that the wheels of justice do grind slowly, but they grind exceedingly fine.

i always liked this song.

A friend from the nidge is now apparently homeless. The same person that I wrote about before (he had stayed at my house). He went from place to place to place over a month or so, never for very long. If you look at where he stayed over the past year or so, his tenure at each place grew shorter and shorter. Trying to fight off homelessness . . . it is weird to see the arc of it like that.

A group of us got together at a cafe last saturday to see what all we could do. Some people have let him stay at their place, others aren't really willing to, and some just lament some of the choices (and lack thereof) that got him here. The concensus seemed to be that we'd all be willing to chip-in on anything like clothes for an interview, money for a security deposit, and other things like that . . . people weren't willing to have him stay at their place for longer times. We also know how prideful he can be about things, and so we would be willing to offer help in researching support resources for him if he wanted help with that (he had gotten upset at people who mentioned various community resources because he said it insulted him - that mentioning of these things inferred that he hadn't looked them up before). How were they to know? Why not just say, "Thanks - I have tried those, and it didn't work out."? That would be fine to say.

While the attitude he showed wasn't so endearing, we also think that he's just battling depression. When you see things like this . . . sometimes it's like the person who is talking isn't really the person, it's the depression. So it makes it easier to somehow to let things like that roll off your back.

There was one of us who was there that seemed to still be particularly trusted by our now homeless friend. He agreed that he would send the note. We just want him to know that we aren't going to 'unfriend' him - that we do care - we just aren't sure what to do. Aren't sure how we can best help.

Anyway, I'm not sure what all else to say about it. It sucks, but I can't have him stay at my place again. In talking with another friend, she was just hoping for some kind of wake-up for him, but not in a "hit rock bottom," kind of sense, but just that he would realize what he really had to change, that some of that stubbornness would go away so that he could do what he needed to do to get things going. He's smart. He can be charming. He has crazy good computer skills. We don't know what to do . . .

. . . as for me, things have been remarkably good other than that. My job is going well, I feel like I have a better support network of people around me than I've had in a long, long time, and I've been doing lots of yoga which has me feeling better, too. I know that's not much to say, but it's enough considering that I haven't posted here much lately.

Hope everybody out there is swimming along well enough. Be well. Eat some cheese.

My friend Chris shared a thoughtful post about hackers dealing with depression.

http://dustycloud.org/blog/on-hackers-and-depression

To me, he's one of the few people who, when he writes can make me think and feel at the same time. It's worth a read, if only to support him in his dealings with depression, to maybe make you feel less alone if you deal with depression, or to help you understand a friend or loved one who struggles with depression.

Cheers, and thanks.

Sorry to let you down, blog!

I had a good Thanksgiving with my mommu. I got down fairly early on Wednesday, and though that night was tough, we hung out a lot and it was a pretty enjoyable weekend. The first night there she seemed very anxious - the most anxious I've ever seen her, actually. Her hair was disheveled and she seemed kind of hunched over. At dinner, she didn't even look at me very much. I think living by herself has been difficult, and perhaps she was also just nervous about me coming home for some reason.

If going home after the loss of a loved one is difficult, this is how it was difficult. I tried to not press it too much, and just tried to be there with her.

We talked about personal things / how we were each getting along some, but we also just hung out. We watched the entirety of Season 1 of Homeland together. We didn't mean to, but we both just got into it, and kept wanting to watch more episodes. It's a really good show.

We also got to meet my brother's fiance's family. Holy shit, yeah, I hadn't mentioned on here that my brother got engaged, but - yes. Tis true. The last week in October he found out that he got a new job, got engaged to his girfriend, and they both did an iron-person event. It was quite a week. Her family seems like a good family, as much as you can tell by eating lunch with someone, anyway. And we really like my brother's fiance a lot. We're just really happy for my brother. And really happy that we'll have another cool member in the family.

From Wikipedia:

My Mom called last night and left me a message saying that she did something today, and that Dad said she should mention it to me. I was having dinner with a friend from ADP before seeing Batman, so I wasn't able to pick up. I texted my parents, and told them I would call them today.

I gave my Mom a call while I was on my lunch break, and she told me about a discussion that she had with a woman from her water aerobics class yesterday. The woman was saying something about Sally Ride, and how she liked what Sally did, but thought less of her when she found out she was a lesbian. My mom asked her why that mattered, that Sally Ride being a lesbian doesn't change what she did. I guess that the woman thought it was a choice, and that she has known people who used to be gay, but weren't gay anymore. My mom thought that it's likely that those people weren't ever gay to begin with.

I don't recall all of the other details, but she seemed more mature and matter-of-fact about it than I recall her talking about these things in the past. She seemed self-assured - that this anti-gay bigotry was clearly just this woman's issue, and wasn't something that was up for debate in her mind. Not forcing it on the other person, though - more just wondering how someone could still think that way.

My mom told me that, when people ask about her kids - if they are married - she tells them that one of her sons is gay, and that the other was just a bit slower with dating. I didn't know that she was so open about my being gay, so I'm glad that she told me. It was pretty cool to hear.

This past weekend I volunteered at the Pitchfork music festival - I've done it a couple of times in the past, each time doing something different there. This year I was one of the people who put wristbands on people who were over age 21.

I didn't actually have to check their IDs - there was another guy who did that. At first it was kind of slow . . . I think the guy I was paired up with had some kind of mental impairment. He seemed like the kind of guy in school who would maybe have gotten teased a lot because he always talked too loud or something like that. He would check people's IDs and then tell them something about the year that they were born. A lot of people were born in the year that Mary Lou Retton won a Gold Medal in the Olympics while others were born in the year that Ben Johnson was busted for using steroids. A lot of his recollections had to do with car models that began or ceased production in that particular year.

Most people didn't really seem to mind. Or else they didn't really understand what he was talking about. I just kind of let him go. :)

For a while I would see the people who came up to me - see their faces - but after a while it just became a sea or wrists. I worked very quickly. There was such a huge variation in wrists. Some people (even some men) had wrists that were so narrow that the band would loop over itself. Others it didn't seem like the band was going to make its way across in one go. I tried to make sure that the band lined-up on the tape side so that I would, "spare the hair," as one guy put it. Another guy was made fun of by his friends because his arm had virtually no hair.



They all came and went so quickly, but I didn't want to be "that guy" to comment on everyone's wrists. A lot of people said, "thanks," though. So I would smile and tell them to, "enjoy the show," or some such.

The ID-checker stopped providing birth-year factoids as it got busier. He would just call out, "Good!" once he confirmed the validity of the ID, and that a person was of age. There were people from all over - Mexico, Oklahoma, Kansas, Belgium, California, Washington, New York, Ohio and Indiana.

I wrapped up my shift and met up with some friends who bought tickets to the event. I didn't think I'd have enough energy to make it through the evening, but I'm glad I stuck around. Sleigh Bells and Grimes were both excellent, and it was good to relax in the grass with my friends after being on my feet for much of the day.

I finally finished paying off my bills for my prior kidney stone-related visits to the ER. Although I had insurance at the time, it was poor insurance, and I wound up having to pay about $4,000 out of pocket just for visits to the ER. Who knew that a CT scan was billed (before discounts) at $3,000? It only takes about 5 minutes to do a CT scan - how can it cost so much?

Fortunately, my recent visits / procedures were / are covered by my better insurance.

So, I've set up a plan to save up money over the next three years so that I can move out of my place. I mentioned this to my parents today, and they asked where I would move to. I told them that I'd plan to live in the same neighborhood, but just a different place. Something above ground and with an extra bedroom to house visitors when they were in town. I'm giving myself three years just to save up money.

I've created a budget spreadsheet to make sure my goals are reasonable, and have set up a recurring transfer of some money into savings.

On Friday I had a few drinks with two guys who used to be the Ubuntu-Chicago group with me. One of them said that he had $30,000 in student loans when he got out of school. That's so horrible. I hate that school is so expensive, so out of reach for people. That going to school can financially cripple someone even before they get a chance to get started in life. The expense of college has always perpetuated inequalities, but now it's even worse.

When I was out of school, I eventually got a full-time job making 31,000 per year. That was a lot of money to me. It still is a decent amount of money. But if you are making that much money and have 30k or more in student loan debt . . . it seems like it would be hard to keep your head above water.

On Saturday I went with a friend Ernest to see Snow White and the Huntsman, and then hang out with some gay dudes up at T's in Andersonville. Snow White wasn't horrible, but didn't seem very remarkable, either. This was the first movie I've ever seen with Kristin Stewart in it, and I had only kind of seen the memes that say she has only one facial expression - so I kept checking to see if she would smile. She did smile once, but otherwise . . . yeah, maybe she's not the best actress.

It was good to hang out with Ernest and the others, though. We made our way over to SoFo for a couple of drinks after we were at T's. It was a nice night out, and we had a good time talking in their outdoor seating area.

Today I've mostly been studying for a PHR exam that I'm taking next weekend. In studying for this exam, it occurs to me that I don't really need it that much. I had originally gotten certified when I worked at ADP because they thought it was good for us to have the cert. Now that I'm at my current job, I don't feel like I need it so much, but it's still a "nice to have" so I'll give it a try again.

I missed this announcement when it came out, but I think this is good news.

The FDA will have to approve it, of course, but apparently it is likely that they will.