If I am short or snappy with anyone.
I have a lot of anxiety right now and it’s making me grumpy and overreactive. I’m trying to deal with it but please know that I appreciate all of you who read this blog and read my stories on AO3.
Even if it might not seem like it sometimes.
Thank you and please take care.
Not for everyone. I recognize that. Some people live long, long lives, like Norman Lear who turned 100 this past July. Some people live longer than they want to in pain, suffering for it. I get that.
But….
I have this former co-worker. I am friends with her on social media only now as a few years back she moved to Florida with her mother to be closer to her brother’s family. Her dad had passed away a few years before and due to some injuries my former co worker had, she had stopped working. I’ll call her “Beth”.
Originally Beth and her family were from New York. They were a traditional Jewish family that attended Temple. Beth moved to California with her then husband, who I will call “Ben”. Ben was an accountant and a pretty good one so he moved to California to be part of a pretty well-known accounting firm.
Beth took a job with the insurance company I worked for at the time. She was a secretary to one of the attorneys.
Unfortunately for Beth and Ben they moved here in late 1993. On January 17, 1994 we had a significant quake that did a lot of damage to the condo they were living in. Beth wanted nothing more than to return to New York.
Anyway, eventually, Beth loved California. I am not kidding. LOVED. It devastated her later when she left and to this day she posts about how much she misses it.
Beth’s parents decided to leave New York (and her brother) to move to California too to be closer to their beloved daughter.
Beth and Ben had a daughter, “June”, and not long after that, they ended up divorcing. After years of living in California with her daughter and her devoted parents, Beth’s father died unexpectedly of a heart attack.
It was only a few years after that, Beth, her daughter, and her mother moved to Florida to start a new life. Beth’s brother, divorced with a son himself, also had moved to Florida.
Years have past.
June is an adult now and starting a life of her own. Beth met a new man and recently married him this past August. They are very happy together.
I never knew Beth’s brother, Oscar, other than through social media posts Beth did and posts he did that tagged her. They were a loving, close-nit family. I always enjoyed their posts about their summer pool parties, their holidays, etc.
Earlier this summer Oscar married again to a woman he had been seeing. I loved their wedding pictures. And Beth’s and her new husband.
Two days ago, Oscar died on the way to the hospital of a massive widow maker heart attack. In front of his new wife. He was just 62 years old. This has hit me unexpectedly hard.
M’s dad died at age 55 of a widow maker. My dad’s best friend had that same heart attack at 56. I am way too familiar with it. So someone who was full of life just hours before is gone like that. And it troubles me and makes me quite sad.
My dad died at 69. To me that was way too soon. 30 years ago. My mother lived basically 29 years without the love of her life. I miss him every damn day. Every day.
So for Oscar, yes life was short.
Some people do not fear death. I do. I fear it for myself. And I fear losing more of those I feel I cannot live without. Yet it happens. And there is noting any of us can do.
For anyone wondering I seem to be on the mend
I stayed out of work today too but plan to return tomorrow, Wednesday
My nose skin is dried out and cracked but not as stuffed so that’s a win. I have no real appetited (I can taste and smell fine) so I’ve lost a few pounds, My throat is still sore. But for the most part I am definitely improved.
Something Stupid is finished, hooray! I literally had to force myself to write the last chapter yesterday as I definitely wanted to procrastinate.
Normally if I was following my own spreadsheet I would be working on the next chapter of Our So Called Life. But since I am getting super close to being finished with The Ghost and Mr. Spock I have decided to skip the update on OSCL for now so I can have another story completed. When we last checked in with The Ghost and Mr. Spock, a magical Christine broke Jim’s curse and he was alive again. Should be an exciting update.
I’ll be getting ready to post the first chapter of cheating Jim after that.
In many parts of the US right now (and Europe too I believe) it’s boiling hot. So far where I live we have been quite lucky to have a regular, normal summer. Which for us in July is mid-to high 80s most days. It cools off into the 60s at night. August and September are usually our beastly months so I anticipate 90s and above for both of those months (we often go that high in October as well).
I’m gone again for a few days this week. Friday the 29th would have been Ma’s 96th birthday had she lived. We’re off to do one of her favorite things back when she was able, which is to go to a casino! HA. I’ll be masked up the whole time as I swear I am literally the last one who hasn’t gotten Covid around me. Should be fun. Fear not the last two Christmas in July stories are already written and ready to go live on their days.
As is the first three flashes for August. I think I have two of those left to go as they will appear each Monday.
This is a good thing as I have a bunch of stuff already planned for August too. Family barbecue August 6 (nieces, nephew, their families). Going overnight up the coast August 13th to one of our favorite restaurants that we haven’t been to in a million years called, Jocko’s in Nipomo, CA (a tiny little town in Santa Barbara County). They serve big thick steaks (this should clue you in that I am not a vegetarian ha). Then I will be gone a whole week to Vegas for the Star Trek Convention. BUSY BUSY August.
The overtime is coming to a close I think. I may have a few hours left of it but I think the worst of it is over. The extra money was nice and I will miss the money but not working all the extra time.
You didn’t get a lot of extra Christmas in July stories and I do apologize for that. But I do hope you liked the ones you did get. Those that follow this blog get exclusive access to those flashes as I won’t be posting them to AO3.
Back from my trip and here are some pictures for your enjoyment. Tonight it’s off to the cousin’s house
I am working diligently (or attempting to) on the final chapter of my 5 Things story. It’s about half done and I’m working on the sexy times part or about to, anyway. That will be my next update before the next chapter of The Mysterious One.
In other news I am rewriting the first two chapters of the Jim cheats on Spock story, Not too Few Regrets. I started it as first person but decided to go back to third and I intend to change the title. It’s going to be angsty obviously when i start posting it again but I want to get a bit done before that happens.
Still have a few Christmas in July’s to write but I am in pretty good shape there.
Sister just feels like she has a cold though still testing positive. Next week we go to Morro Bay for a couple of days June 30-July02. She thinks she will be good to go so the three of us are planning on it. Me, M, and Sister.
Over time continues. I did get an extra $200 last paycheck and an extra $400 this latest one so there is that. Given the prices of everything and my upcoming trip to Vegas at the end of August I’ll need it.
Last night we actually got a touch of rain and it’s 90ish today. Many parts of the country have it worse weather wise than us so I am not complaining! Yet.
If you are looking for something to read of mine, I will suggest Potions. I can’t link to it at the moment but if you find my “Stand Alone Series” it’s number 21.
I leave you with a picture of M’s world famous red, white and blue margaritas, this was from Memorial Day this year.
It’s been a while so I thought I’d get some pictures up of May here in So Cal. How long will this last considering we are on mega water restrictions? Who knows.
In other news, I am going to be working a lot of Over Time at work on a project for a few months so that’s going to cut even more into my writing. Sorry to say.
Someone commented recently about me working on Spirk fic on AO3 for pretty much a decade, which is close to true (9 years in August) and though they were complimentary it also got me thinking. How long is too long? I don’t know.
A year ago, Mom died.
On May 16th last year, we had to move her from the bed she’d slept in for over 25 years to a hospital bed in her room because we were unable to get her in and out of her real bed anymore. She was too weak. Up to that point for weeks, we had bathed her, cleaned her, dressed her and put her to bed. Cancer is a bitch, as I am sure most of you unfortunately know.
Still the 16th was a shocking day, though we knew it was coming. She no longer would eat and barely would take a few sips of water. The hospice people started giving her morphine that day and she never really came out of it to full consciousness after that. She was on oxygen. Each day I would go over to my sister’s to see her and I hope she knew I was there.
On May 20th, the nurses told my sister I should probably come. So I did. She didn’t pass that night, but we spent time with her. She never liked to be touched or hugged or comforted that way. She was raised in a rather cold Irish Catholic family and that’s just the way they all were. But she let us that last night. We stroked her hand and told her we loved her.
I went home that night when the night nurse came. I returned the next morning, May 21st. We kept the oxygen on then only so the priest could come for last rites (they call it the anointing of the sick now). When he finally arrived, we went through it with him.
After his departure, they turned off her oxygen, and it really was very quick after that. Not even an hour. I was in the room next to her when she passed. It was both easier than I thought it would be and torture at the same time.
It’s hard to believe we’ve already had a year pass. Today we are bring flowers to where her ashes are buried and then spending the rest of the day celebrating her long life as she made it very close to 95 years.
Anyway, thank you for listening.
I don’t know the date anymore, but it was several years ago, that M and I returned from a trip to find that sister and Mom had purchased for us our first “Smart” TV from Walmart and left it for us in our house. It was pretty small as far as those things are concerned but we only had a small space in our IKEA purchased entertainment center.
We’ve wanted to upgrade for a number of years now but we had the same old obnoxious entertainment center. This year we decided to get a new one, entertainment center, that would accommodate a bigger Smart TV. So M finally ordered one and we’ve been procrastinating ever since. Today we packed away our DVDs/BluRays and gaming systems so that we could finally put together the new one and get the old one out the door.
It’s a big project but we want that new TV and want this old entertainment center that’s been around since the 1990s, no not kidding, gone.
It reminded me though how many movies and television shows I actually own! Probably thousands of dollars worth. When and if the dang thing is ever finished I will post a picture once we get the new television.
Anyway that’s what’s going around here on a Sunday.
Spirk (with a small dose of Pinto) 