All posts by Duf

I have been chomping at the bit to take down the Christmas decorations this year. Presumably it’s because of the negative feelings the 2023 version will forever hold. Saturday morning I ripped into it. There were things that found their way into the trash, things that only a week ago held emotional significance to me. My transformation over the last year into a person that is willing to depart with material objects much more than in the past assisted in disposing of these things, despite the pain it causes.

Once the decorations were down I continued circling the house putting things back to how they were. As I did so I stumbled across additional items that were hers that I have gathered in a small pile. On Friday after work I had already dropped off what I thought was the last of it. My plan for these few additional items is to just ship them in a box. By the end of the weekend my house was back in order with the chaos and clutter banished. I did a lot of the work with the great room slider pushed all the way open, letting in the cool outside air to help further refresh the space.

On Friday I also picked up a new wheel that was sent to me for evaluation, the Veteran Lynx. During the afternoon Saturday I decided to get the range test out of the way. It didn’t take long for me to question that decision. The temperatures were in the low to mid-60’s and overcast. I wore a hoodie but also chose to wear shorts. Riding at 30-35MPH created an artificial wind chill that quickly made me very cold. During the video I constantly commented on it. To make matters worse I wound up riding on a path that had a small section under water. Riding through it submerged my feet briefly, soaking them completely. It was a pretty miserable 55 miles.

On Saturday night after taking a very hot shower I treated myself to dinner at Carrabas. I always eat at the bar, a tradition I started with Christine. I have been there enough that the bartender knows my name, the beer I normally get and my most ordered dinner item. It was nice.

When I got home I decided to use my outdoor fire pit for the first time. I already had the firewood as originally the fire was supposed to be utilized for something else that was no longer valid. I took a bunch of paper I had left over from Christmas to use as kindling and after a little effort had a pretty respectable fire lighting up the patio. I sat there and ate a cup of ice cream as I thought about the symbolism of burning up all of the things from the last year that do not serve my greater good. There was a lot of things that fit that category.

My New Years Eve started bright and early with a pickleball session. The temps were in 50’s when we started but it quickly felt warmer once the sun got higher in the sky. The Sunday sessions were a couple activity up until this week so there was some explaining to do that was less than fun.

I got around to installing a few accessories I got for Christmas for the Tesla. It included a white console cover to match the white seats and the black out emblem covers that more closely matched the other blacked out parts of the car. Finally I attached a black rear spoiler that makes my Model Y look like the performance trim level of the car. It only took 15 minutes to do it all and I am pleased with the results.

I spent a good chunk of the day rewatching the Zak Snyder cut of Justice League, yea all 4 hours of it. Why you may ask? Why not. It’s one of few DC superhero movies I genuinely like.

I watched the Eagles lose to the Cardinals, at home. At this point it is clear that the team just is in disarray. The defense is porous and the offense is inconsistent. To lose to a 3-12 at home is simply inexcusable. At this point it wont surprise me if the Birds hit the playoffs and are immediately eliminated. It’s a shame , earlier in the season it seemed like they still had some of the magic that got them to the Super Bowl last year.

Any prior NYE plans I had obviously had evaporated earlier in the week. I instead decided to do a live stream, the first one since the last time I had a break up. In addition to the Cayman Jacks I normally drink I also had some champagne to celebrate the occasion. It was a VERY long stream covering close to three hours and 45 minutes. Both personal and PEV topics were discussed, I bounced between them regularly.

New Years Day started much like the day prior with a pickleball session at Talis Park. I played even longer than the day before and enjoyed myself despite there being an overarching weirdness of doing this solo instead of as part of a tandem.

I made arrangements to meet up with my riding buddy Jason early Monday afternoon. He wanted to see the demo Lynx. We met up at the Greenway, one of my favorite places to ride. The parking lot was PACKED, evidently a bunch of people decided to start their 2024 enjoying the beautiful weather while on the greenway. I had never seen it this full.

We had a good ride that had a number of close calls. I almost ran over a bank and into the water after coming down a set of steps awkwardly. I nearly fell into thick mud that was on the mulch trail. Finally, I challenged myself to ride down a flight of 14 steps, something I never attempted before. I had genuine fear at the top as I looked down, imagining what could happen if I lost control on the way down. Eventually I just YOLO’d it, all of the frustration and anger I have been dealing with for a good portion of 2023 helped propel me forward, down the steps. I had a small audience as I rocketed down. Luckily the suspension in the Lynx made the attempt less difficult than I imagined. I breathed a large sigh of relief as I rolled out on the sidewalk below, unscathed. Next time I may try to do the entire rise of 28 steps.

Jason had his own issues where he fell twice after coming off a curb. His suspension seemed a little tight and his technique needed a little work. I adjusted his suspension to a softer setting which seemed to help. We again rode down to the beach. Much like the Greenway, the beach was packed with people, ringing in New Years in a good way. By the time we got back it was about a two hour session. I thanked Jason for the ride as we made plans to do it again soon.

The rest of my New Years day was spent editing video, eating a Wawa dinner and spending more time contemplating where my life is going next. Ultimately peace, happiness, and being content are the goals that I am targeting. (who isn’t?) It’s just a matter of getting my mind in the right place to facilitate that outcome.

I have never been a fan of New Year resolutions. To me if you vow to make a change that is based on a day on the calendar, you aren’t serious about doing it. If you want to make a change, do it now or don’t do it at all. So my resolution which has already started, is to put more priority on what I need moving forward instead of pushing it to the back of the room where it may or may not be tended to.

My critical flaw is being a lifelong people pleaser. This trait is nice if you are the person on the receiving end of my generosity but the problem is when it is allowed to undermine/override things I require to be happy as well. I have known this about myself for decades and yet I still struggle to prioritize myself if there is another person in the equation. It’s something that I will have to continue to fight with to achieve some sort of balance. If one person is doing mostly giving while the other is doing mostly taking it ultimately leads to hurt feelings, conflict and multiple other negative scenarios. I have to reign it in.

This weekend I hope to fix the dishwasher and then turn my attention to getting the house back to normal. Any Christmas related items will be packed away and a number of things that had been changed/modified will now be put back to their original location. It will be a significant effort that will surely contain moments of pause. The good news is I have a 3 day weekend to make it all happen. Maybe when Christmas 2024 rolls around I will be opening the Christmas bins with a sense of hope and excitement that was missing this year.

After my scheduled live stream New Years Eve I hope to emerge into 2024 with an attitude that serves me, instead of mostly others.

So as you may have picked up on, I’m not in a great mood. It’s been a pretty shitty day where I have found my emotions oscillating between a number of states, none of them good. Before I left for work I went around the house and started culling a number of things that were visual reminders of what has ended. The Christmas tree now sits alone in a space that was filled with presents, potential and promise only a few days prior. I pulled and tossed a number of things that were joint decorations, each one delivering a small sting as it went into the trash.

When I got home Elsa looked guilty but I wasn’t sure why. She was jumping up at me as I walked her out the slider to the back yard. Once I got on the lanai I looked back and saw a trail of brown footprints that began in the great room. The brown floor evidently did a good job of masking the pile of dog shit that was there, which I now had conveniently stepped in. I was pissed….

This morning it was raining so Elsa, who is fearful of rain among many other things, would not stay out in the yard to do anything. So instead I am welcomed home to a literal shit show. The miserable clean up took at least 15 minutes until I had the floor wiped clean and bleached. My joy level clicked up further when I saw she also puked in the guest bedroom. To hit for the cycle she did not eat her breakfast and thus far ignored her dinner as well.

As you can tell, Elsa is a very sensitive animal and I have no doubt she is picking up on my stress as well. She also was really attached to my ex’s dog and my ex as well. The sudden removal of their presence is surely confusing for her.

I have been coming across various things around the house that I will still need to return. I am giving it a day or two to make sure I have whatever there is so one final delivery can occur. Sure I could take a too bad so sad attitude about it but that does not fall into line with the “treat others as you would like to be treated” mindset that I try to adhere to as consistently as possible.

My plans for this upcoming New Years weekend have obviously taken a right turn. As of now I am planning to live stream on New Years eve, the first time streaming since the last split. Outside of that I am going to try to stay busy and focus on what I have gained from this new reality as opposed to what has been lost. For almost the entire previous 12 months I have had my focus in other directions. I need to strengthen different and new connections/situations moving forward instead of the rinse and repeat of 2023.

My desire to dig into thinking about 2023 is minimal based on what just went down the last few days but it’s a two decade plus tradition that I am not interested in breaking at this moment in time. Let’s see what my goals for this year were. This is made more arduous since my ex’s name is splattered all over last year’s entry.

I talked about hoping for better health this year. I hoped to play more pickleball. I talked about playing volleyball and I talked about gaining weight. I hammered out all of these things. This time last year my body weight was very low, scraping against 170. Through aggressive eating and working out I topped out at 182 or 183 lbs a few months ago. Unfortunately I have dropped maybe 5 of those pounds due to stress and modified eating habits that my ex enjoyed. Pickleball is now a 3-4 times a week thing and I have been playing volleyball all year without hurting myself in a significant way which is surprising.

I talked about future home improvements but I was still in my old house at this time. I have spent a small fortune on home improvements since moving however getting new cabinets, counter tops, gutters, ceiling fans, and hurricane shutters, just off the top of my head.

I hoped to include more travel this year. The only air travel I did was to Texas and California (it’s a long story not designed to be explained here) Otherwise I stayed in state for the rest of the year.

I talked about realigning my finances and doing a better job of controlling compulsive buying. That is a fail, a hard fail. I have spent more money than ever in 2023, it just was on different things. Between relationships and home improvements I have thrown dollars out at a torrent pace. One of the benefits of being single is I can close that spending valve significantly.

The last thing I talked about was relationship goals. I had come off a year of being depressed and lost. I was for the first time in a long time optimistic at that time with the new relationship I was in. I had a very positive outlook that got disintegrated about a week into 2023. Since that time I had off and on relationships with my ex and Christine the entire year. It was filled with alternating cycles of hope, sadness, joy, and disappointment. I have never had this much drama in my personal relationships as I have this past year and I hope to never experience it again.

Usually I go back and review month by month posts to give you more comprehensive years in review. I am not doing that this year, instead relying on what stands out in my mind as I sit here today.

The biggest change of this year was of course my selling the house I have lived in since 2001. Getting the house ready to sell was a monumental effort that I took on almost entirely by myself. I mentally and literally purged myself from years of things, tossing out items that I once deemed valuable and not thinking twice about it. That mindset has remained 9 months later, I am much more willing to part with things than I once was.

The house I bought is a third smaller, has a tiny piece of land compared to the nearly 3 acres I once controlled and I love it. It’s location has been life changing for me, putting me only a few minutes away from my job and close to nearly everything I need.

I now pay someone to maintain my grass and clean my house because I am at the point where my time is more valuable than money. My responsibilities have been streamlined in order to give me free time to do more of what I want, when I want. It’s been a significant mindset change, for the better IMO.

One of the things I thought I would have lots of time for was my electric wheels and One Wheel. Instead I have seen my riding time tail off, significantly so during the times I was with my ex as she had no interest in learning how to ride. My 3D printing hobby has been on life support as well. My 3D store is almost dead and just have not found the interest to do anything significant on my print farm either.

I have done a lot more drinking in 2023. The discovery of Cayman Jack as my new Zima resulted in me consuming the drink in large amounts, sometimes for fun, sometimes to drown my sorrows.

Along with physical things I have dropped some other things like watching a lot of tv. I used to have my DVR loaded up with enough content for days. Now I deleted all recording schedules and just watch stuff when I feel like it. Even Friday night pizza has become a more miss than hit thing in my routine.

My blog was yet another target for reduction. The negative feelings my ex had regarding it resulted in my making it private for most of the year as well as my being more willing to restrict what I wrote to more sterile subjects to not ruffle feathers. The blog has since once again been made public and will remain that way.

From a work perspective I am doing great. My first full year as the IT director has come and gone without major ripples. My boss appreciates me and I appreciate my employees. At this point I have 6 years and change until I can retire with a full pension and am counting down the days.

To be very honest my brain is not functioning at a high level right now as anything else I can think of is tied into my two failed relationships and I don’t need to expand on it further.

So what the F do I want my 2024 to look like? That is a good question.

I hope my good health and fitness trends that have creeped upwards in 2023 continue to do so. I usually find motivation to push myself more physically when I am angry or frustrated with other aspects of my life so I should be good to go.

Home improvements this year will likely be minimal. There are things that I want to eventually do like update the master bathroom but it is not a must do. I need to see what my tax situation is going to be this year before doing anything else. The capital gains from the home sale are going to make things tricky.

Would I like to travel more in 2024? Sure. Would I like to travel myself? Not really. Other than visits potentially to see friends or family I don’t see much happening this year.

Do I have personal/relationship goals in 2024? After seeing how opening myself up to relationships this past year has worked out for me I don’t really know that looking for one is something I have interest in doing. If the stars align and I manage to fall into something down the road with a quality human being that’s great but I won’t be actively seeking anything out. I am past the age where I need female conquests to make me feel better about myself. I need to feel at peace, whether that is with or without a partner. Going day to day not knowing which end is up is not a way to live, I can attest to that.

I know this recap more or less sucks.

I hope you and yours have a great New Year celebration. You can likely find mine occurring drunk on a live stream.

It’s amazing to me just how much can change in the period of 24 hours. At this point it is embarrassing for me to even admit that my relationship status has flipped once again but it has. I have a lifelong history of being in long term, mostly stable relationships. This year has flipped that upside down.

I have a lot to mentally unpack. I have a lot of questions to ask myself. I have a lot of self accountability issues that I need to address as to how and why things have gone the way they have, repeatedly. I need to mourn my losses while keeping my gaze towards the future instead of the past, as that is all I can control.

I am certainly in a perfect state of mind to do my 2023 recap post…..

As I mentioned yesterday my dishwasher was having an issue where after several minutes of running it would stop and flash an error that indicated a draining problem. Yesterday I did some research and found that this is a common problem and if something as simple as blocked drain was not the cause it was likely the drain pump assembly.

As I have gotten older I have not been as eager to tear into things like this as I once was probably because of a better financial position and putting more value on time over money. The easy option would have been to just throw $600 at the problem and order a new dishwasher but after watching some videos on what is involved in replacing the drain pump I decided to have at it. I had replaced a drain pump in my old dishwasher at the old house as well so I knew it was in my wheelhouse.

Once I got the unit pulled out I disconnected the drain hose and blew into it to make sure there was no blockage. Air flowed normally so I was pretty certain the pump itself was the problem. Disconnecting/removing the pump was not difficult once I flipped the unit on it’s side to get access. Of course there was a minor pond created in the process despite my vacuuming out as much water as possible with the shop vac prior. Once I got the pump pulled I pulled the dishwasher to the side and cleaned up the mess. Part two will be Thursday when the replacement pump arrives. I’m crossing my fingers that I will wind up giving myself a $550 late Christmas present as a result.

My long time good friend Troy just got engaged to his long time girlfriend over Christmas. Troy is a couple years younger than I am. I met him when I first got into the computer industry back in the early 90’s. He was my initial IT mentor at the business. We still laugh about how I would ask him if it was ok to insert the next floppy disk to do a Lotus 1-2-3 installation on a new system we were integrating. I had no clue how to do anything. Luckily I am a fast learner. Anyway, I am very happy for him as he has a good woman that has his best interests at heart from everything I know. I hope they have a long and successful shared life in front of them. Congrats buddy.

With Christmas falling on a Monday this year it gave a less than optimal (for me) scenario where you wind up going back to work the day after the holiday. I normally appreciate having the day after Christmas off so I can spend time getting the house put back in order. Instead this year I had Friday off as well, since Christmas Eve is an official holiday for us.

The four days passed by quickly as they were busy with last minute Christmas to do’s. This year it felt like I was doing more scrambling than normal to get everything buttoned down. Usually I strive to get my Christmas related buying and prepping done around a week in advance. That was not the case this year.

I did get a chance to go out and ride on Christmas Eve, the first time I did so in a number of weeks. It felt good to roll around in the 75 degree weather on my Sherman S. I recorded the ride, posting my first YouTube video in a number of weeks as well.

I had an unwelcomed Christmas “present” this year, the dishwasher stopped working. For a few weeks occasionally the unit would throw an error that I could clear with a power cycle but now it appears to be a permanent problem. The error code it is throwing indicates a water drain issue. I am going to have to pull the unit out to see if there is some sort of obvious problem with the drain but if not a new dishwasher might be a belated Christmas gift for the household this year. Washing all dishes by hand is going to get tiresome very, very quickly for me.

Overall I had a very full and enjoyable Christmas day. I got to catch up with my family via phone where I thanked them for the gifts that were sent. Yea we still buy each other gifts even after vowing to only buy for the kids a number of years ago. Old habits are hard to break I suppose. I also caught a good portion of the Eagles game versus the Giants which wound up being way closer than it should have been.

This last week of the year is looking to be a sprint to the finish. I will be thankful when a more normalized day to day returns.

Well I guess my plan to not post on the blog until the Eagles win again isn’t working out well. (just kidding) I know there hasn’t been much outward presence from me in a little while. I’m happy to report that all is well. My 2023 holiday season has been very, very busy from all angles, so much so that I have found very little time to do much else. I haven’t shot a YouTube video or live streamed in several weeks either. Hopefully as the holiday season passes I will be able to find more normalcy. I have a work project that is going to be commandeering most of my attention for the next several weeks as well.

This will likely be my last post prior to Christmas. With the holiday falling on a Monday we have Friday and Monday off. I plan to fill those days with as many good things as possible. I hope you and yours have a great Christmas.

Here is one quick funny story as my Christmas gift to you. I received a birthday card from my buddy and long time volleyball partner Randall. He and I have had a long history of pranking each other in various ways. My personal favorite was when another friend of mine and I signed a sympathy card the night before we played Randall and another friend of ours in a tournament. As soon as we eliminated them from contention we handed Randall the sealed and signed card, offering our deepest sympathy for his loss.

Well I open the birthday card and it starts playing the infamous Rick Ashley song that is affiliated with being “rick rolled”. I smiled and closed the card but the music kept playing. Ok, I guess once the song is over it will stop. The song concluded and the music stopped, for a few seconds. It then blasted into another rendition of “Never Going to Give You Up”. I tried opening and closing the card again, no dice. I tried closing it harder, nope. I saw a little tab was held down by tape. I removed the tape and pulled the tab, the music persisted.

I originally was going to take a hammer to it but instead tore open the card a bit which revealed it’s true intent, not to wish you happy birthday, but annoy you instead. Inside the card was a handful of glitter, designed to be spread around when the card recipient tears open the card in frustration. Luckily my tear was a little more surgical in nature. I was able to access the main wire and disconnect it without any further glitter contamination. Well played Randall, well played.

It’s been a number of days since I’ve posted here. I have been busy with various holiday related tasks, pickleball, as well as a lot going on at work due to us finally moving ahead on setting up a temporary office on Marco Island to use until the original building that received significant flood damage from Ian is rebuilt.

Yesterday my co-worker/friend bought a new Tesla Model Y, making this the second person to do so using my referral in the last couple months. It adds up to a decent amount of Tesla spiff points that I can use to buy a number of things. I have not cashed in any of them yet.

As mentioned I have begun the process of Christmas gift procurement. Thanks to the wonders of Amazon it is a much less arduous task than it once was. I remember my early Christmas’s in Florida buying things the old fashioned way, wrapping them, boxing and then waiting in horrible lines to ship them. It was miserable. Nowadays a few clicks and you can get most of it done, wrapping and (mostly free) shipping included. Although there are certain areas of society where I think technology can be detrimental, shopping is not one of them.

As this year comes to a close I am finding myself very much looking forward to what 2024 has in store around the bend.

Yesterday Tesla finally had their launch for the Cybertruck, a vehicle I immediately placed a $100 reservation on the day it was announced 4 long years ago. The biggest mystery about yesterdays event was the price of the trucks. When I placed a deposit the dual motor version was supposedly going to be $49,900. My thought at that time was I could sell my Tacoma and replace it with a Cybertruck, giving me an all EV household. Yesterday my thoughts changed.

The announced price for the model I wanted was increased more than 50%, up to just under $80k. All of the trim models saw similar price jumps from their announced prices originally. Well needless to say I’m out. There is no way I am spending that much, it’s insane. In some ways I like the flexibility of having an ICE vehicle and I love my Tacoma. I’ll just be keeping things as is, sorry Elon.

Last night after work I was thinking about doing a night ride but decided against it. Instead I decided to go get some grocery shopping done at two places, Trader Joes and Costco. I had not been to Trader Joes in a very long time. Since I have been in relationships the last 6 months or so I have not had to rely on TJ’s nice variety of frozen meals that are easy to prepare. I filled my handheld shopping basket to the very top, hoping to be set with meals for a month or two.

Going to Costco later in the evening is always a good choice if you can swing it. I got to avoid the normal stampede of people that clog the aisles. It bordered on a pleasant experience, something I do not normally get shopping there. Between the two stops I have most of what I need to see me through to the new year. As I normally try to do, Elsa rode shotgun, sleeping on her dog beds in the back of the truck while I shopped.

This morning I had just added water to the bowl with the instant oatmeal mix. I opened the door to the microwave and somehow knocked the bowl out of my hand on a cabinet. The resulting mess was catastrophic. I had oatmeal shrapnel everywhere, on the counter, the stove, my leg/foot, the cabinets and especially the floor. I found a piece of oatmeal by the front door some 15 feet away. The only good news is the laminate floor is soft enough that the bowl didn’t break as well. I cleaned it up best I could but I expect to have to do another sweep of the area tonight. It wasn’t the best way to start my Friday.

This weekend has several possible paths. We will see which one I choose.