Various things

The shop
Things are going well enough at the shop. Business is OK, but two of the three employees are gone for the next few weeks, and one of them is out for a couple weeks after that. To fill in the holes, I've hired another guy who's friends with Isabella. (The employees are Jesse, Isabella and Ellen. The new one is Lou.) Lou makes videos for a living. His clients include Harvard and the punk band Dropkick Murphys. He's perfect for the shop.

Isabella mentioned the other day that if you Google for the shop's name, my blog comes up in the first few hits. I'm going to avoid using the shop's name, just so people aren't draw here to read about the sad private life of a comic shop owner.

Politics
I really, really, really want to be 100% behind Obama, but this week, he has done the old Democrat trick of swerving right just before the election. The problem is that he's done it on issues that should just be non-negotiable.

Last week, he indicated that he will support telecom immunity in the upcoming FISA bill, if it could not be removed. This week, he announced that he would expand Bush's faith-based charity initiatives, which are completely unconstitutional. And this is all on top of his backing of the death penalty in some non-murder cases, siding with Scalia and Thomas in the losing side of the Supreme Court case Kennedy v. Louisiana.

So, I feel much better about voting for Ralph Nader again.

The house
Karrie and I are getting along well enough now, but the house is falling apart.

Last week, the long-suffering hot water heater sprung a leak. I turned off all water and gas to it, so we were without hot water for a couple of days. After some phone calls, I was able to get a plumber from down the street to come in and replace it. I bought a tankless, on-demand gas water heater. It doesn't get the water as hot as I like it, but it's so much more energy efficient that I can't complain.

We (condo association -- us and Maria, our next-door neighbor) have been talking to plumbers about other chronic leaks. The solution to the one from our bathroom into hers, by unanimous declaration, was "wait and see." My solution is to rip it all out and remodel the bathroom, moving the tub and toilet into the smaller room where just the triple sink is now. If I have someone else do it, the quotes are $12k to $15k. If I do it myself, I'll be ripping out walls and making the place generally unsafe or unlivable for a while.

Meanwhile, we have carpenter ants in the house. So, we need to solve the leaks, spray for the ants and then hope the place doesn't fall down.

My health
I just wrote and deleted a big section here about my various health issues. Suffice it to say that there's a lot going on. I see a light at the end of the tunnel, but it's faint and far away. And even when I get there, it'll not be sunshine, but a couple very yellow florescent bulbs that greet me, I am sure.

Work
I've been given the official "shape up or ship out" warning at work, and I'm really trying to get my shit together. Of course, Monday morning I slept in until 11, despite going to bed at 8. I'd had a busy weekend, was sore everywhere, and felt practically tied to the bed. I didn't make it into work until 12:30, which wasn't appreciated. I think all my leeway is gone.

I need the job, so I just need to get moving.

One problem is that there's something I am allergic to where I sit now. I'm constantly sniffling and coughing. I don't know if it's something in one of the fabrics around, or the fact that the next guy over comes back from his smoke breaks smelling like an ashtray, but I know it's annoying to those around me. I take a bunch of allergy and sinus medications, use a Neti pot and do other things to mitigate the problem, but it's not enough. And every time I snort a little, the guy in the cube over (not the smoker, a different guy) sighs loudly. Yeah, it sucks dude. I know.

I am James' aching pancreas.

As usual, I went to bed last night around 1 a.m. And, as usual, Max tried to get me out of bed for the first 20 minutes of every hour or so after 5.

At 9, he finally succeeded. I wandered down and played with his train set for a while, at his insistence. Then I had to fix the Scooba so it could do some floor-cleaning. I needed to meet someone at the shop at 10:15, but every time I moved toward the bathroom, another problem came up.

I finally got a shower about 10:15, and then ran around looking for clean clothes. Each day, a different article of clothing seems to elude me. This morning, it was both the T-shirt and belt.

Running out the door at 10:30, I called and told the person I was running late, but was on my way.

Oops. Forgot to take my pills. Run in the house and up the stairs; take pills. On the way, I see that the Scooba is once again trailing its little squeegee behind it like a tucked tail. So I go digging in the junk drawer for glue. Among take-out menus and other crap is an envelope with a bunch of folded up crap for Max's pre-school. I go to throw it in the recycling when something tells me to look at it. Inside is Max's birth certificate, folded into quarters with immunization records and permissions slips.

I take it in the living room and throw it at Karrie. "First: Put this somewhere other than the goddamned junk drawer. Second, where's the fucking glue?"

I guess I could've used the glue on myself at that point, as I'd become suddenly unglued. I stomped out of the house and got halfway down the street again before I realized I hadn't taken my insulin yet. So, I run back to the house, up the stairs, apologize to Karrie for being a bastard, and shoot myself with a needle.

I run back down the stairs and out the door. I get around the corner, and I wonder how late I am now. I check my pockets, only to find no iPhone. So, I run back and grab the phone. By now it's way late, and the breakfast meeting I'd meant to be 10-11 now took me from 11 to noon.

So, I caught the 12:05 bus to work and now I am at my desk. I'm feeling cranky and crashy, so I check my blood sugar, as I should. It's 259.

The doctor said that going off the Metformin and Actos would relieve some brain fog. It has, but my life is still completely disorganized. The problem now is that I realize how disorganized it is, but I am too busy, tired or cranky all the time to do anything about it. And, oh yeah, I've gained 20 pounds from the insulin.

Joy.

We're completely disorganized at home, as you can tell. I can't find clothes because they're scattered among 6 different laundry baskets around the house. Max's birth certificate was in a junk drawer, along with a receipt for plumbing work I've been looking for since September. I have no fucking clue where the glue is.

The meeting at the shop was with one of the employees and was basically about how she fears for her job since we're so disorganized at the store, and she feels frustrated because she feels like she's the only one who's working on it, and her efforts get destroyed by the time her next shift comes around. (She's completely right, by the way.)

My work life at my regular job, needless to say, is equally disorganized. I have a lot of ill-defined stuff I need to be doing, but I can't even get my shit together to do the well-defined stuff.

I'm envious of the dads who do it all and make it look easy. You know who you are. I see you biking to work, and playing with the kids Saturdays at the park. I see your well planned life and business casual.

Then I see the dozen pills I take in a day, and the mess that is my home office. I hear the complaints from my neglected wife, son and dog. I feel the spasms from my neglected back, or the mood swings and blanket of tiredness (more like an anvil of tiredness wrapped in a blanket) that covers me, randomly during the day.

I am fucking jealous. I wish I had a perfect life. And yes, much of the problem is of my own doing. And yes, I am better off than 99 percent of the world. Those realizations only add to the self-hatred and guilt I feel.

No, I'm not like this all the time. Only about 10 or 15 percent of the time -- or maybe 50 percent of the time that I'm actually mindful of what's going on. If I had better drugs, I could squeeze that number down, which is what I have been doing.

But like all problems, treating the symptoms only helps if you use the time you gain away from the symptoms to help solve the root problem. I haven't been doing that. It's about damn time I started, I guess.

The diabeetus sucks

I'm switching over from my previous multiple-drug combo (Metformin, Glyburide, Actos) plus insulin to an insulin-only routine, so my blood sugars are all over the place.

A few minutes ago, I was dozing off at my desk, feeling overly warm with some cold sweats, so I went to the bathroom, where I felt the same while on the john. When it passed, I got up and came back to my desk.

Coming back from the bathroom just now, I was hobbling because of my back pain. Suddenly, my right foot had a pain, so I started limping. Then my right butt cheek start to cramp. I nearly fell down. I made it back to my desk without anyone seeing my temporary palsy. Taking my blood sugar, it's at 190. (Probably down from a higher number earlier.)

George Carlin, hero

George Carlin, one of my personal heroes, died this weekend, at the age of 71.

The Nation has a great obituary, as does Harry Shearer at the Huffington Post.

I'll leave you with this:


... and this:


... and, finally, this:

Why gas is so expensive

I've tried to tell this to people, and explain how more drilling for oil isn't the answer, but I didn't know all the details.

Here's a good explanation of how deregulation caused the California rolling blackouts of the year 2000, and now, $4-plus-per-gallon gas. (Of course, the oil companies deny that this is the case.)

Just posted on the Hub site

I just posted this in the forum of the Hub Comics site, and figured I'd re-purpose the content here.

Guardians of the Galaxy

Hello everyone!

I haven't read any of the new line of cosmic Marvel stuff -- Annihilation, Silver Surfer, Nova, Quasar, et al. And, as usual, not having read any of them had kept me from jumping on board.

When Guardians of the Galaxy #1 came out, I was interested, and threw it in my "to read" pile. I didn't realize it was connected with the cosmic stuff, and didn't notice that it was written by the same buzzworthy team of Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning.

When number 2 came out this week, I read them both -- and liked them a lot! While the story ties into all that has come before, it stands alone, as well, as an excellent jumping-on point. Abnett and Lanning's writing is funny and real. (And when you can say that about a comic with a talking Russian astronaut dog and an anthropomorphic space-ranger racoon, it says a lot. And the art is great, as well. The scripts of the first two books revolve around the debriefing of characters after a mission, interspersed with the action, throughout. This is an excellent device, but I could see it getting old if overdone.

All in all, GotG is a worthy read. The characters, stories and interactions are very human-scale, despite the otherworldly cosmic dangers, and these issues have made me want to go back and read all the rest of the cosmic Marvel stuff from the last couple years.

Luckily, they have them in trades. :)

Everybody Must Get Stoned

The doctor has taken me off my various diabetes medicines, and fully on insulin. He said the Metformin and Actos might be making me feel foggy during the day, which seems to be true.

I feel a little sharper, but I'm also feeling drowsy and a little spacey -- probably from the Flexoril and Vicodin I'm taking for my back.

More later.

My Fandango Hulk review

I wrote this review for Fandango, since they bugged me about it after having purchased my opening-night tickets from them.

I've seen a few bad reviews of this film. The connecting thread of all of them was that the reviewers had never read a Hulk comic in their life.

With the references to both the old TV show and the continuity of the comic book, alone, this movie would have been great. But add in the well-paced, non-gratuitous action sequences, the solid acting by everyone involved, the quiet chemistry between Liv Tyler and Edward Norton -- used artfully by the director -- and you have not just a great comic-book movie, but a really good film.

If you're expecting the sly humor of Iron Man, you'll be disappointed. But you need to remember that comics characters, like any other fictional creation, have their own milieu and attitude. While Iron Man's is that of a billionaire playboy, Hulk's is the world of a misfit ex-scientist fighting his personal demons.

The only commonality is that stuff gets blown up.

A couple more things

Go see the Hulk!

Seriously. The new Hulk movie is great. It's fun, has very well paced action and great chemistry and unspoken moments between Liv Tyler and Edward Norton, and the acting is all top-notch.

There are many little winks to the comics (setting up LOTS of possible characters and storylines) and especially to the old TV show that we all love. There are lots of great cameos, and the cinematography and music are also top-notch.

It's not as quirky-funny as Iron Man was, but it's a great movie nonetheless.


RIP, Tim Russert

It is sad to see anyone die, and I am sure his family and friends will miss him. He obviously had great love for his father, who inspired several of his books.

However, Russert was a shill, and one of the worst of the he-said she-said BS journalists who put lies on par with the truth just to show "both sides."

My condolences to his family and Rest in Peace, Tim Russert, the man.

But good riddance to Tim Russert the 'journalist.'

Pirates!

This past Wednesday was Union Square Main Streets' June "Second Wednesday" event: Pirate themed. Here are a couple quick pics of the shop's participation.

Ellen and Isabella dressed for the occasion, and took Jesse's lack of costume out on him in typically horrible ways.


Isabella just happened to have a couple Jolly Rogers hanging in her room, so she brought them by, and we hung one outside the shop.



We had a blast; the weather was not too warm, and lots of people showed up in costume, so I'd say it was a complete success.


Personal crap

On a separate note, my back is doing better here and there. I'm extremely stiff in the mornings, and in pain almost all day.

I went to my ortho doctor, who X-rayed and told me that everything structural is OK. He gave me some pain medication that's not really strong enough, but the more alternative therapies have helped more. For example, the acupuncturist in Union Square has helped a lot, and I found a massage guy who does something called RUIT -- Repetitive Use Injury Therapy or Muscle Release Therapy. Basically, he stretches your muscles, with pressure, for two seconds at a time, moving the pressure along the muscle all the way.

The difference I felt from the first session was amazing. He also showed me some other stretches to achieve similar results, and to get the injured muscles back into shape.

And in my previous entry, I mentioned the troubles Karrie and I are having. Things are moving forward and slowly getting better, but are far from healed, I think.

Slightly better

Last Thursday, I went to see Dr. Kornack, who did the back surgery on me in 2003. (Was it that long ago?) X-Rays showed that all the bony stuff is still in the right place, if a little condensed. He thinks it's probably a muscle-tendon thing where maybe I pulled some scar tissue somehow.

If it doesn't get better in a couple weeks (weeks?!!) I'll go back for an MRI, I guess. Until then, he gave me some pain meds, and it's helping me concentrate a little.

If you're a reader of Karrie's blog, you may know things are rough in other areas as well. Let's just say that I am an idiot, and have some problems I need to deal with. I think our marriage will survive, but it'll take some time and work. I absolutely want it to survive.

Everything else is the same. I could use a good six months off, I think -- maybe at a fat camp or the Biggest Loser campus.

Oy.

Today's another sucky day.

I'm writing this from my iPhone, so it won't be high art.

My sciatica has been getting me again the past couple weeks. I've been stiff and sore -- painful, actually. Half the time one or both of my legs are numb.

Unrelated, I'm fairly sure, are the tics and twinges. Besides the restless legs, my wrists and neck have started tingling and twitching in a similar way. My right shoulder is three months into some sort of RSI, as it's had a sharp pain in the center mass off and on during at least that long.

You should see me all twisted up, stiffly hobbling cubicle to bathroom, contorting in back pain and attempting not to pass gas every step of the way. (I was mostly successful.)

The shop is doing as well as can be expected. Better, actually, considering it is owned by perhaps the worst businessman to ever step foot in a comic shop. And that's a high bar. (Or a low one, if we're talking limbo.)

For example, I have twice misplaced an envelope with about $500 cash (nightly deposit). I haven't found the second one yet. It's around my office somewhere. I hope.

And here we are, in a post-democratic America, watching the race and gender sideshow that hides the fact that the Democratic candidates are now to the corporate right of Reagan, making the Republicans, who're barely to the left of Mussolini, seem almost reasonable.

I can't fucking believe this world, and I'm losing the patience to attempt to persevere.

Ugh.

Is my T-shirt making you nervous?

Today, I'm wearing one of my favorite new T-shirts. As you may know, I have many brightly colored tees. I particularly like the orange and green that I painted my store. So when I found a XXXL "Arkham Asylum for the Criminally Insane Inmate" T-shirt in prison safety orange, I was on cloud nine.

Wearing it into Starbucks this morning made me realize that not everyone is going to get the joke. :)

My other new favorite tees were both picked up at the New York City Comic Con a couple weeks ago. If you're a geek, these shirts don't need explaining. If you're not, don't even bother Googling the references, because they won't be funny to you. "Horton Hears Cthulhu" was a Friday buy at the Con, while I didn't pick up "You had me at Klaatu" until Sunday, after seeing someone else wearing it.

I hope to have these two in my shop as part of a cool T selection, soon. Sadly, the Inmate shirt was sold out except for the 3XL size. (Sadly for you, but KICK-ASS for me!)

 

Bite us, "irreducible complexity" idiots

More than 150 years ago, Darwin posited, based on the shape of a specific species of orchid, that there should be a moth in Madagascar with a 12-inch tongue. Now, it's been found and captured on video.



(Blatantly stolen from my friend Jan Kujawa's blog.)

Inertia

Once again, I am at the shop late at night, and I just can't make myself climb the hill to go home. I have to be here early for the Wednesday shipment, and I have work I need to get done at home, but I'm just dreading leaving, for some reason.

It doesn't help that I am glued to the TV, waiting for the final verdict on the Indiana Democratic primary.

I still think we should impeach the current administration, and every day that this race goes on is another day we ignore the problems with the executive branch we have now. (Not to mention the free ride that John McCain is getting.)

Well, I need to get off my ass and get up the hill, so I can be back down here at 7.