All posts by Duf

Saturday morning I set my alarm so I could get to the vet for Elsa’s appointment to have the raised mole/blood blister thing looked at.  The vet wasted little time getting her in.  She said I had two options, they could use a needle to test the cells of the growth and we could act from there or just have her cut it off and have it tested.  I wanted the growth gone so I immediately chose option two.  20 minutes later Elsa was back with a shaved spot on her shoulder with a stitch or two holding things closed.  She seemed surprisingly fine which I was glad to see.

On Saturday afternoon I headed down to help Monique with trimming some trees at their place.  Her dad is getting older and since I have all of the trimming tools I was happy to help.  Compared to what I used to deal with, what they needed done was not bad.  On the way to do the work I actually met up with Cindy to give her some mail that had some importance.  If I am not mistaken I think it was the first time I had seen her face to face since January, which seems crazy.  It was a good interaction which made me happy.

The trimming work turned out to be more involved than I first imagined.  I knocked down the stuff that required my 10 foot ladder but Monique was busy too.  I gave her my power pruner and she went to town with it.  I originally thought I would be able to get all the debris to fit in one load in the truck.  In reality it took three very full loads to get it all out of there, which I dumped in my fill pit at home.  Despite it being yard work it was not that bad since the two of us were doing it together. When I was done I got to hang with Monique’s niece some more which was so much fun.  She was showing me various toys, books and puzzles.  She can say my name and seems to genuinely like me now which warms my heart.

On Saturday night I had a last minute live stream that went on for close to three hours.  There was a lot of non-EUC talk, including a lot of discussion of male/female dynamics.

My Sunday was pretty chill.  Late in the morning I picked up the third and final load of trimmings from Monique’s place.  She was nice enough to prepare a breakfast plate for me.  As I loaded the trimmings into the truck she watched Elsa for me.  Monique and her mom really love Elsa.  The more Elsa is around them the less nervous she is becoming which is sweet.

Sunday night I planned to go ride around Victoria Park to check out Halloween decorations.  When I mentioned my plans to Monique she expressed interest so she wound up coming with me.  She rode her bike while I rode the wheel.  It was cool seeing the decorations which were quite extravagant in some cases.  The other good thing was there was hardly anyone there so we didn’t have to fight through tons of pedestrians and vehicles.  We almost had the entire place to ourselves.  Monique had seen the X-mas decorations there before but never Halloween, she seemed to enjoy it.

I was off work Monday.  I felt like I had a pretty great day.  I started it with getting an actual haircut, something I had not done in almost 10 years.  Instead I have always just shaved my head or tried to do a fade cut myself, which never turns out well. I went to Sport Clips and got the MVP treatment which was nice.  After the haircut you get your hair washed, a scalp and face massage and then they hit your shoulders with a percussion massager.  The woman did a much better job than I have ever managed myself.  I think I will add professional haircuts to my new normal rotation.

I went straight from there to meet my buddy to go play some pickleball in East Naples.  We played four very competitive games that I was lucky to win.  I can tell the snowbirds are returning as each week we have been playing there are more and more people over the lunch hour.

When I got home I decided to finally do my range test on the Begode T4.  This was a range test I was nervous about as I was not quite sure how well the wheel would do taking me out to Ave Maria and back.  It turned out to not be an issue as I got back easily.  Unfortunately as I was taking the picture you see here my camera got blown over and damaged the mic cable which unknowing to me trashed the audio for the rest of the ride.

There was a hilarious moment I caught on video where this flat bed truck was driving through a flooded out pathway.  The visual was pretty amazing.  I also tried out the newest Nobleman gear that was sent to me to evaluate, a set of gloves and a vest with tons of storage and a reflective back.  I thought the gloves would be uncomfortable in the heat but they had ventilation that made them quite comfortable.  I will be using them more often.  The ride went well, wrapping up what was overall an enjoyable and satisfying three days.

Yesterday I got another call from Wyoming.  My heart fills with love whenever I see a call coming from the 307 area code.  Luckily this time it was not the grumpy paralegal I spoke to last week.  Instead it was the actual assistant district attorney named Jasmine.  Immediately I could tell I was dealing with a more sunny disposition.  Dare I say she even sounded cute.  She called to tell me that they received my bank statement and that everything was all good now.  She explained why the letter was sent and how it was not specifically targeting me, which I never thought in the first place.

I pointed out to her that contacting people so many years after a citation took place isn’t great, especially if proof of payment is required as banks only retain record for so long.  She said if proof can’t be obtained usually there will be a phone conversation to talk about it.  I thought to myself how that was exactly what I was trying to do with the other woman, which she had no interest in listening to.  But knowing that I was in the clear made proving my point less important.

Jasmine was very pleasant throughout the entire conversation which further disarmed me.  It just goes to prove that sugar is always better than shit when it comes to accomplishing your goal.  I do have another letter coming to me today which should be my final proof of payment.  This ridiculous, anger and anxiety inducing event that started way back on Christmas Eve of 2015 has finally come to a conclusion.

Yesterday I had a pickleball double header, playing both at lunch and last night.  The first time I tried doubling up sessions in one day a couple months ago I was in bad, bad shape afterward. I feel pretty unaffected today which is awesome.  I think it’s a combination of playing more and my back hurting less.  Since my chiropractor appointment the pain has definitely improved.  I try to do some of the stretches and exercises he showed me when I can, it seems to help, knock on wood. It’s a good thing because I am supposed to play today at lunch as well. I rode one of my electric unicycles to the courts last night to play, adding additional fun to the session.

Tonight I am going to skip the bike ride so I can get the weeding done.  The reason is I have an appointment at the vet for Elsa early tomorrow morning.  The other day when I was petting her I felt a small bump.  At first I thought it was a hitchhiker or burr that she picked up outside but I couldn’t pull it off with my fingers.  I then was concerned it could be a tick but it really didn’t look like one.  I soaked it with alcohol to make sure.  So I’m not sure if it is a raised mole, blood blister or something else but I would rather be safe than sorry so I want it checked out.

During the afternoon I offered to help Monique and her dad trim some of the palm trees they have behind their house.  I have all the tools to make the job go relatively quickly. After that my 3 day weekend opens up.  I of course have things to keep me going around the household for the weekend but I want to make room for fun, as always.

Last night I decided I wanted to get the mowing done to make my upcoming 3 day weekend less chore filled.  With the amount of daylight in the evenings in mid-October this is becoming less and less viable.  I wound up completing roughly the last half of the mowing via headlights and floodlights.  In addition to it being dark it was chilly.  Our first real cold front of the season has blown in which I love, however the temperatures around 60 combined with a steady wind had me quite cold, even with wearing a hoodie.  The warm shower last night was welcomed.  I dont think weeknight mowing is going be a thing for much longer.  Luckily this colder weather should also put the brakes on the growth rate of the yard. The picture is from the seat of the tractor.

As I have talked about repeatedly over the past year plus, my time being out of a relationship has given me a lot of opportunity to reflect, learn, and analyze some of my patterns, weaknesses and failures that have lead up to this point.   I have realized that in many cases my efforts to fix, please, and help were actually counter-productive in the overall scheme of things.  I think I failed repeatedly in maintaining a steady keel when others escalated arguments.  For arguments to escalate it requires two willing participants.  I should have not been willing to provide fuel for those fires.

I also have realized that there are certain personality traits in women that are absolutely a no go in terms of my ability to have a successful relationship with them.  I never really thought about these type of things in depth. It used to be, she’s attractive and seems nice, let’s roll with it without much more consideration.  There is much more I think about now as I don’t have the time or energy to invest in something that has basic incompatibility from the start.  I want to attract, not chase. The latter is a road to nowhere.

I had a fun Tuesday evening.  On my way home from work I picked up Monique.  We had plans to go play miniature golf, something she had NEVER done in her life.  I picked her up on my way home since the place we were going to play was relatively close to my house.  When we got to my place I took care of Elsa and walked the backyard a bit with Monique.  I showed her Kathy’s grave in the chicken yard.  Monique really liked Kathy and was sad when I told her she had passed.  I also showed her my garden area which has some healthy looking red and romaine lettuce in it right now.

On the way to play we decided to grab dinner at a nearby Chinese restaurant that I had never eaten at before.  I didn’t know that Monique liked chinese food either.  We both got the same thing, shrimp and broccoli and enjoyed it.  This place was not designed for eat in dining.  There was literally one table with chairs in the customer area.  We saw a constant line of people walking in to pick up orders they took with them.  We both liked the food.

The mini-golf course we went to had recently opened so I didn’t really know what to expect.  The place was nearly empty with only one group of four on the course besides us.  Like I said, Monique had never played mini-golf before but I only gave her minimal instruction and let her have at it.  Her accuracy was surprising, her major issue was hitting the ball too hard at times but more often than not her shots were right on line.  As far as mini-golf courses go, the difficulty of this course was not extreme, which is good for someone new.  I had a lower score on the first 9 holes but on the second nine holes Monique actually did better than I did which was amazing, including a hole in one on the 18th hole which was a trick shot arrangement.  She really seemed to be having fun.

So as I was filling out the scorecard on some picnic benches after the game I noticed they had a corn hole set up. I asked Monique if she ever tried that before, she had not.  So we started tossing the bean bags back and forth.  They had a total of 5 bean bags so we alternated turns.  Once again, despite never doing it before Monique had some surprising success.  On one of her turns she got all five bags in the hole, something I could not replicate despite us playing for probably around a half hour.  We were the only people left on the property and wound up being there damn close to their 10PM closing time.

When I took Monique home I helped carry some stuff in.  Leilani, Monique’s adorable little niece came out.  I have been trying to slowly win her over for months, at first she was scared of me and would run away. However over time she has become less apprehensive but last night was the first time it felt like she truly trusted me.  She wanted me to play with her.  We looked at books, played with her cars, practiced counting to 10 and a bunch of other fun/silly things.  It was very cute. I felt truly grateful that she now trusted me.  I got home late and went to bed even later but woke up this morning not regretting the lack of sleep, it was a fun Tuesday evening.

Yesterday I finally got the April 2016 bank statement that clearly shows that Yellowstone Park received and cashed my $500 check.  I sent the proof of payment to the lovely woman that I interacted with last week.  I included a note of sarcasm dripping thanks with the attachment which you can see below.  I can only hope she takes a moment to reflect on how she handled our interaction and possibly be a little less rigid and more willing to listen going forward.

Hello Miss Unhelpful. Please refer to my attached bank statement from 4/16 that indicates the $500 check was cashed by Yellowstone on March 30^th 2016 as I indicated.  As I requested, can you please provide some sort of documentation that you acknowledge this fine was indeed paid and the case is now closed so I can keep it in the event it is ever needed again.  Thank you so much for your help in remediating this matter.

It’s one of those days when words aren’t necessary.

On Friday evening I again hit the road for my 10 mile bike session.  I wound up turning in very close to the best overall pace and time that I can recall since I added this to my routine back in early 2022.  With all of the negative health hurdles I have been dealing with this year it felt good to post numbers that showed all hope is not lost.  After getting back home I immediately headed outside to handle the weeding because daylight is an increasingly rare resource now.

This was my first time utilizing my new Apple Airpods.  Up until now I have been using a conventional over the ear headphones when listening to music out in the yard.  The problem with this is if I want to wear one of my wide brim hats, the headphones cause a significant issue.  The hat won’t fit over the headphones so I use the hat tether to try to cinch it down to my head.  It looks ridiculous, is uncomfortable, and doesn’t stay in place for long.

Up until now I have avoided getting air pods because in the past ear bud style headphones were painful to my ear, perhaps I have an odd shaped canal.  I hoped this was not the case with air pods.  Luckily, I felt no discomfort during the roughly hour I spent weeding the yard.  They will be a nice addition to my arsenal of tools to combat the misery of certain outdoor chores.

Saturday morning Elsa was confused why she wasn’t coming with me .  I had an appointment to get my new tires installed at Costco.  I arrived when the shop opened at 9:30, the time for my appointment.  I walked into the lobby and there was already a line of 8 people, wtf.  It turns out all of these people had no appointment and were just trying to do the first come first serve deal.  Luckily since I had an appointment I just skipped all these people and handed them my keys.

They estimated an hour and a half for the work.  I had some Costco shopping to do but it obviously would not take that long.  Instead I brought my T4 with to ride around to kill time.  It was a nice ride that reminded me of how I used to approach riding when I was early into the hobby, just explore.  I rode around for the full 90 minutes with no particular destination, it was enjoyable.

So I waited for the truck to be officially done before going in the store to shop.  It was a shit show.  When I entered they warned us that the credit cards were not working, you could only pay with cash or check.  Of course I don’t carry a checkbook so I did a quick inventory of my cash.  Luckily I was carrying more than normal so I figured I would be ok.  The lines to check out were staggering long when I went in, I dreaded checking out.  I caught a stroke of luck when leaving.  The cards started working and I somehow found a line that I was through in 10 minutes.  I never have that sort of luck typically. The new tires on the truck look really sharp, I am pleased with how it turned out.

On Saturday afternoon I spent 2-3 hours cleaning inside.  I did the bathrooms and counters but then also shampooed the rugs and steam cleaned the hard floors.  It had been too long since the floors had been cleaned thoroughly.  I was glad to get the task done, a clean house feels like a better house normally, to me.

On Sunday morning I was supposed to play pickleball with Kerri and two of her friends.  However Kerri called me early to say she had a flood in her place, something let loose overnight leaving an inch of water or more in certain areas.  I would up spending into the early afternoon trying to help her remediate with my floor drying fan and carpet cleaner which came in handy to pull water from a soaked area rug.  I got to meet her dog who was super sweet.  She reminded me of Nicki in a way.

When I got back home I wound up on a tech support call for an issue at work that popped up.  It took over an hour to get ironed out.  Of course the big event of Sunday was the Eagles/Cowboys game that went down Sunday night.  In the first half the Eagles dominated, at one point being up 20-0. However in the second half the Cowboys made adjustments and got the game tight at 20-17.  The Eagles needed to score again and eat up time.  They did both.  The had a long drive that had much more running than passing, scoring a late touchdown to seal the game, upping their record to a league best 6-0.  I’m not used to such success from the Eagles early in the season since the prime Donovan McNabb/Andy Reid years.  I’ll take it, happily.

You know back in 1650 the phrase “Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice shame one me” was coined.  Despite the phrase being well over 300 years old it is no less valid now than it was then.  No one wants to be a fool.

Yesterday we got past a big hump at work, completing an annual procedure that used to be handled exclusively by my buddy Don who retired in February.  It was a team effort to replace what he did solo but it looks like we got through it successfully.  Considering it involves roughly 1.4 billion dollars, it’s sort of important.  In retrospect I am glad I did not book the trip to LA, I would not have been able to go because of the delay in this process thanks to Hurricane Ian.

Yesterday I received a response to an email I sent to the Wyoming District Attorneys office a couple days prior regarding their attempts to squeeze $500 from me a second time for the Yellowstone drone incident that was settled in early 2016. The response I got back made it clear she was not understanding my point regarding how one of the two fines was already messed up because the wrong case id was used when paying them, hence I assumed the same thing happened with this $500 check.  After a couple back and forth emails I decided to just call and speak to this woman in person.

Within the first 30 seconds I knew I had a real peach on my hands.  She gave me attitude from the get go, claiming my point about another case number had nothing to do with my fine.  Repeatedly she cut me off as I tried to explain which of course turned off my nice guy switch.  This became a loud, heated argument that I am sure others in my vicinity in the office heard.  She refused to try to process what I was telling her and why it mattered.  The call ended with her hanging up on me after she said someone from the attorneys office would call me back.

I was pissed as you can imagine.  I immediately called my bank again to press them on getting the documentation I need to prove the check was written and cashed by Yellowstone in 2016.  The rep said he could verify the check was cashed by them on 3/30/16 and it appeared on the April 2016 statement.  He began the process of getting this document sent to me which hopefully happen in a couple days.  I wrote one final email back to this miserable woman, because I wanted her to think/listen the next time before she assumes she knows a situation. The email I sent is below:

I was thinking about going to practice a little volleyball with Kerri last night (the woman I play pickleball with) but the plans got canceled.  I wound up spending a good portion of the night trying to catch up on House of Dragons, I had managed to fall three weeks behind.  It’s a weird thing, despite cutting down dramatically on the stuff I record to watch later I still have a sizeable backlog of content to get through.  I have already talked about how it seems I hardly ever have time to go into VR or play WoW anymore.  It seems like just sit around and veg time is becoming a more and more scarce commodity in my life.  Last night I welcomed the opportunity to unplug the brain for awhile as it is crunch time at work this week.

Tomorrow I am making my first ever visit to a chiropractor, a guy I actually have known for years as we used to go to Powerhouse Gym together.  I have always avoided chiropractors as the sound of bones and joints cracking as they get adjusted has always bothered me. My mom went to a chiropractor for much of her life and always felt better afterward.  I am going specifically to see if I can be given some sort of stretches or exercises that can stop the lower right quadrant back pain that has kept increasing in intensity over the last 6 months. I have not seen Tim in years, possibly a decade or more so it will be good to catch up.

When I got home last night and took the dogs out Sadie seemed to be feeling pretty spry.  Of course she was still extremely gimpy but she was acting playful and even tried to “run” which I discouraged.  I think the combo of the various pain meds she gets plus the additional exercise and more limited food she gets when she is at the house does her good.

I took her back to Ali and Shugs place last night.  Her and Elsa rode side by side most of the way in the back of the Tesla, it was cute.   We hung around at their house for a little while but with the hour long drive back we couldn’t stay very late.  Elsa loves Ali and Shugs so much.  She even was being friendly with Shugs dad and girlfriend last night as well which was a pleasant surprise.

Late last night I had inspiration for my latest YouTube short which I personally think is one of my best so far.

It’s sort of ironic because unlike last time I was single, where I lived and died on dating apps for the most part of that year, this time outside of maybe a two week period, I have avoided them completely.  I thought dating online would be perfect for someone like me, the exact opposite turned out to be true.

I also realized that at this point I have officially been single for the longest period of time since I was 17 years old.  The pros are definitely catching up with the cons in certain ways.

Yesterday we had an employee inservice day where the entire organization gets together to go through various presentations and education.  It’s an all day affair that had highs and lows.  I was stationed with my laptop to monitor communications and deal with a few ongoing projects we have.  It helped me break up some of the monotony.

Last night was the last night for Sadie to be staying over and unfortunately it was the least restful for me.  I woke up around 2:30 AM to see Sadie standing near the bedroom door, I assumed it meant she had a bathroom emergency.  She went outside and peed but it definitely was not an emergency.  When I went back to bed my mind had flipped back into active mode.  I laid there for what felt like forever trying to fall back asleep.  I’ll be running her back up to Babcock tonight.

I made a request to my bank to see if I could get an image of the check I used to pay my fine back in 2016 to Yellowstone.  Unfortunately they said they only keep check images for 5 years however they should be able to get me the bank statement that has that check transaction on it which should be good enough to get the DA from Wyoming off my back, hopefully.