Sir Grump Munch

March 19, 2007

Back to Work

Since the last entry I've been working a lot (from home), which is cool. I am on my way to being a decent human being again, paying my rent and other bills, building back up a bank account which is at a low not seen since the lean days of college, NOT living on credit cards, etc. That's what happens when you don't work for six months, you spend a lot of money even if you're not trying to. Otherwise I've been doing a little skateboarding, pissed away a few hours on the internet, read a good novel about Vietnam, hung out with a nice girl named Angela (including a day trip to Bloomington), and given the cats a lot of kisses since I see them all day now.

My apartment is coming along, finally got the spare bed...actually a futon...for the guest suite, so come on down! Need to take some new photos of the place now that it's mostly-decorated. Aaron Draplin paid me a visit this last weekend, had an excellent time with him but that deserves its own writeup. Ryan "Colonel Cornhaul" Simonson will be paying us a visit first week in April, will be glad to see him too. Liz S was our first visitor to the new place (last month), flew down from Chicago, I rented a car and we spent a lot of time driving around and taking photos. She's got a new camera (same as mine, D50) and is loving it, check out some of her great new photos on Flickr.

I'm thinking I should go back to shorter, more frequent updates instead of this once-a-month laundry-list diatribe where I try to remember what happened five weeks ago. Honestly the best way to keep up with what I'm doing is to look at my photos on Flickr; they're updated a lot more frequently than my site and give some idea of where I've been going, what I've been eating, who I'm hanging out with, and even sometimes what I've been working on.

I'm just starting to feel a bit lonely for some of my friends. I miss them all but especially Vanessa, Liz Rench, Rene, Jean, Liz S and Aunt Lottie. I also miss my mom, my grandparents, my cousins, Tal, and way too many other people to name. Ryan too but I'll be seeing him soon. Been listening to a lot of beautiful, sad songs, Richmond Fontaine, Townes Van Zandt, John Delafose. Watched the TVZ movie again yesterday and shed a few tears for the man. American Movie does it to me too, that ending with the old footage, it's too much to bear. I made Draplin watch some of Jai Ete Au Bal and hopefully got him pondering Cajun and Zydeco music a little bit. Speaking of TVZ, there's a new biography out that I want to pick up and I found a great interview with his son JT Van Zandt online, really good reading.

I'm also a little depressed because I've got a medical issue that is slow in being resolved and is making me miserable until it is. Obviously my lot in life could be a lot worse, but I have a cyst (makes me cringe just to type the word) on the side of my head (temple), and it's grown over the last 6 months or so to something unsightly and embarrassing. It started out almost a year ago as a zit, one of those bastards that's deep-down and kind of hurts. I squeezed the hell out of it, but got no results. Fast-forward in time a while, it seems that doing that created some kind of goddamn thing under the skin and it's grown and needs to be removed. I didn't notice it so much at first but since getting back from my trip most everybody has noticed. Since I didn't have insurance for the last few months I haven't been able to have it looked at/removed, now I've finally bought myself some insurance and went into a doctor, who told me I need to see a dermatologist. Called up a bunch of dermatologists, the earliest any can see me is over a month off! What the fuck is wrong with our medical system? (rhetorical question, I know). Almost makes me want to fly to Mexico or something and have it done out-of-pocket, "medical tourism" I think they call it. I've thought about trying to operate on myself "Rambo-style" but I'd just fuck it up and probably kill myself or at least not end up solving the problem. I'd take a goddamn Frankenstein scar over this though, at least scars have character. In the meantime, I hate going out and seeing people, it's all I can think about and makes me really self-conscious. Hope to have it resolved soon before I throw myself out the window.

That's about all I feel like writing at the moment. Looking forward to the Cincinnati scooter rally in about 10 days, should be a beautiful ride up the Ohio river to get there, and it's a really fun rally. Can't wait to see some of my Chicago friends there too. I will probably write another entry in a few days once I've posted the photos from Draplin's visit and can link to them. Thanks for playing along.

Posted by pj at March 19, 2007 11:13 PM