Sunday, October 30, 2016

Who Am I?



For my birthday this year, my dear mother purchased for me an Ancestry D.N.A. kit. Yesterday while I was at work, I received an email informing me that the results were in and I found out some interesting stuff.

For all of my life until yesterday, I had been under the impression that I was a small part Native American, one-eighth to be precise. I know nothing about my father, but my mom had told me that his grandmother was full-blooded Native, so I was interested to find out about myself, chiefly that.

Here’s what I am made of:
Asian <1%
European 99%
That’s it. It gets more specific, which I will get into below, but clearly there is no Native blood coursing through these veins. Somehow, I was disappointed.

Here’s a more specific breakdown of my ethnicity:
Asian= South Asian, explicitly India. So, dot, not feather. Maybe that’s what my mom meant all of these years.

European= Great Britain 54%, Scandinavia 16%, Europe East (Poland, Slovakia, Romania)14%, Ireland 7%, and an 8% mixture of the following; Italy, Greece, Finland/Russia, Europe West (Belgium, France, Germany), and finally <1% European Jewish.

So, overall I’m equally Asian and Jewish, but mostly European. What does this all mean? Well, nothing really. It would explain why my dad had blonde hair and blue eyes (per legend). I’m just a mutt like most people in America. So that’s that, I can’t think of too much more interesting to write about my new-found heritage, other than it’s nice to know.

In other news, I stayed up until 6:30am which is by far the latest I’ve been awake in years. After work last night there was a bonfire at my place in celebration of my roommate’s birthday, which was in June. I realize that sounds suspect, and it is, but it was another reason for sober folks to get together and hang out. Late, oh so late, the last two standing made the decision to go to Mickey’s Diner for coffee and conversation. I had five cups which pushed me nearly to the point of biliousness. It was fun.

I went home and tried to sleep which happened in stuttered shifts over the next few hours until I finally gave up and came to the coffee shop to write. More coffee, it’s what my body craves.

Today is my only day off this week and my big plans are laundry, working out, and grocery shopping. This may have been the least electrifying sentence I’ve ever written, and it’s where I’m going to leave you until next time as I have had enough coffee and it’s time to start the day. See you soon.

Saturday, October 29, 2016

"Laser"



For the first time since my trip to Hazelfest, I went out last night and did something fun. Now I could count every Wednesday night at the Green Mill playing Bingo (a sport at which I believe I dominate) but that’s more routine now than novelty. It’s still fun, and I love hanging out with my sober friends, so I really had a “blast” last night when a bunch of us went out for food, games, and Laser tag at Pinz in Oakdale.

To clarify, I do have fun on more than one occasion per season, I separate this adventure because it was new, and farther away from home than I’m used to. I haven’t even been free from the grip of the D.O.C. for a month yet, so being out late still kind of scares me.

Thirteen of us gathered to celebrate a few birthdays in the month of October. All of us are in recovery, and most I know from my homegroup in A.A.

On occasion, I use the L.A. Fitness in Oakdale because it’s closer to where my cousin lives and sometimes we lift together, so I was familiar with the location. What I had never seen was even so much as a single car in the parking lot, so when we pulled in I was astounded to see the place all lit up, and lot full. Anxiety +1. I had picked up a friend along the way, and we walked into the place which was swarming with children, discontinuous strobing lights, and a cacophony of sounds, all alternating direction and intensity. This would have been a nightmare for me a year ago. But I just walked on through and took it in. There was a large game room which contained everything from air-hockey, to whack-a-mole, to ski-ball. All of them promised a big payout of tickets which could be traded for valuable prizes. Past the game room was a bowling alley. Or perhaps two of them. One appeared to be of the normal style, and the other of the “cosmic” variety: black lights, disco balls, and yes, laser beams.

What we didn’t find was the restaurant which was located all the way back by the front door. So, we meandered back, taking in the sights and the sounds yet again. We found our group and took a seat, and placed our orders while waiting for the others to arrive. I found a place to never get chicken wings: Pinz. They were overcooked, odorless, tasteless, and I couldn’t pawn them off on anybody. So I paid my $30 tab for the two orders, and took a friend out to explore the game area.

To protect her anonymity, I’ll call her Penelope. Penelope and I ventured into the unknown where I behaved exactly like a kid in an arcade, and earned a gold medal in Air Hockey, but a bronze in Street Racing. Without probably showing it, I felt comfortable with Penelope in this crazy environment, and I had the thought that I would probably murder her soon.

Maybe that last sentence threw you off just a bit, and that was the intent. Sometimes I don’t transition well, and I needed to get to the part where we all shot each other with laser beams in an enclosed battlefield. This was a first for me. Somehow nobody had ever shown me this delightful sport before, and I think I’m in love.

We wanted to play just with our group of 13, instead of with strangers and kids. We wanted to be able to swear. We paid up and waited for our opportunity to do so. Our time would consist of two separate ten-minute games, played back-to-back. The goal: Red Team destroy Blue Team; I was on Red Team. Penelope was on Blue Team, and I did murder her several times, and she murdered me, as well. It truly was a cardio blood-bath as we ran around and around, ducking, dodging, and shooting our way to victory. Or loss, I have no idea to be honest. I wanted to keep playing well after we had all left the building, but I now have something to look forward to for another time.

One small note, at one point, I believe I was able to duck out of the way of a fast-moving laser beam. I’m not sure if there exists any footage of this feat, but I knew what I saw. We all know what we saw.



Thursday, October 27, 2016

A Conjugal Visit Between Me and a Monkey



You people are just a bunch of weirdos, that’s the only explanation. Some days I’ll pour my heart into a post that I think will get a good response, and I’ll see later that only 50 people have read it. Of course, over time, that number goes way up. But at lunch today I wrote a mere few paragraphs about a famous narrator getting a colonoscopy, and the statistics went through the roof. So, what the hell is it?

Most of you who know me well, know that my sense of humor is rather crude, and I rarely let that show in this blog, because the overall theme is rather serious. I feel as if I’ve dropped the ball in that aspect, and for that I apologize. This blog has been the Mr. Hyde to my Dr. Jekyll, or whichever of those two is the funny one. I don’t know if either one of them is funny or what show they are even from. All I can think is that they are birds, but I think those might be Heckle & Jeckle. Birds? From now on I promise to include all, not just my relevant and considerate thoughts and opinions, with the assumption that your judgement of me will not waver from wherever it may be now.

I’m at Nina’s Coffee Café now, and I have found a few friends that I am going to chatter with until I leave for my meeting so I will pick this up in the morning.

Morning. To finish the idea I was working with above, I had a thought this morning that the reason for the high number of reads for that Attenborough post could be as simple as the title. Everybody is interested in a rectal exam, and David Attenborough is purely fascinating, and combining the two made for a perfectly clickable title. It may just be that simple.

I’d hate to waste yet another post on my crazy thoughts, so I’ll share with you a little story. You may recall a post I shared recently entitled, How to Pee in which I walked you through the process of “dropping a U.A.” for my parole officer. As I have said numerous times over the years through these posts, I am always afraid of a positive result even when I’ve been sober for years. So, when my Parole Officer called me on Monday morning, I froze in my tracks. Fuck, I had just talked to her last Thursday, there’s only one possible reason for her to be calling me now; I failed the test.

My hand was hesitant to accept the call, and as the phone chattered away in my palm, my whole life unfolded in my mind, even the inevitable revocation hearing at which I would confidently be slung back behind the bricks. My next two years would be spent sewing underpants together in some terrible MinnCorr factory or even worse, I would be part of the MyPillow family, making head cushions right here in the U.S.A. Short story, I was fucked.

Cautiously I pushed the answer button. That didn’t work, so I held down the button, and slid my finger toward the middle of the screen until the icon changed color, indicating that it was now ok to let go, a maneuver I am still unaccustomed to. Succcess! I was almost baffled that I answered in time. And sure enough, the voice on the other line asked for me. I said, “He’s not here right now.” Which was a half-truth. No, I didn’t say that.

All that drama in my head was for naught. She merely wanted to reschedule our appointment from Tuesday to Thursday because she had a sick kid. Of course, I passed my drug test, I don’t get high or drunk. False positives are virtually impossible these days, especially the ones that get sent off to a lab for analysis. I think it’s rational to be afraid of going back to prison, but quite illogical to think it’s going to happen because of me obeying the laws and keeping my nose clean.

Sorry about the title, I thought more people would read this. I hope for the future of titles; I didn’t cry wolf.

And Counting

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