I have no idea how I haven't caught COVID yet.

Seriously.

Most everybody I know has had it at least once. But here I am... chugging along with negative after negative...

Maybe I'll finally succumb in Wave Seven. Or whatever.

This morning I woke up more exhausted than usual. I made a conscious decision to not put on my watch because I just wasn't in the mood to be snared by time constraints today. It's Friday. Whatever happens will happen.

Then, as I was attempting to navigate the ice minefield that was tossing my car around like a ping-pong ball, I saw that I was wearing my watch. And I was like... how did that happen? I have no recollection at all of putting it on.

It's such a habit that I apparently did it without thinking.

And it reminded me of a conversation I had with my "Bible Study for Non-Christians" group last month. We alternate studying the Old and New Testaments, and 2022 was an Old Testament year. We spent the first half of the year working our way through passages in The Twelve (books of twelve minor prophets of the Hebrew Bible). My favorite being The Book of Micah. It's a short book but, in my mind, an important one for a number of reasons. Including... oh yeah... a prophecy of the coming of Jesus from Bethlehem 700 years before He was born.

It also has a passage about how people descend into a daily evil out of habit, not conscious thought.

Like putting on a watch.

My head has been wrapped up in that all day, and I don't quite know how to let it go.

We've become so polarized as a society that love/hate is assumed. There's no room for subtlety or shades of gray.

As an example... after the passing of Barbara Walters I was asked about her and said I "...wasn't a fan." Which was somehow interpreted as me hating her. I then had to explain that I didn't hate her, didn't wish her dead, appreciated her being a trailblazer for women in journalism and inspired women to consider journalism, and also liked that she advocated for women's issues. And even though she had some good interviews, she also had some truly shitty interviews. Setting aside some of the idiotic softball questions she's asked people (the whole "...what kind of tree would you be" fiasco is just the beginning), her 2000 interview of Ricky Martin showed what a disgusting, abhorrent piece of shit she could be. So disgusting and abhorrent that she eventually had to publicly express regret for having done it.

And the list goes on and on.

You don't like something... you love it.

You don't dislike something... you hate it.

And there's no in-between.

But there should be. You should be able to dislike something or someone without being labeled a "hater." Getting back to Barbara Walters... I just didn't think enough about her to have that strong of an opinion. Hate? Really? I try not to hate anybody, but if I were to admit to hating anyone, Baba Wawa wouldn't even be on my radar. She wouldn't even occur to me in that context.

I mean, she did give us this absolute GOLD...

And this...

The old addage "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all" has entirely new relevance today. It's not because you shouldn't talk shit about people... it's that if you even hint at anything negative, people will escallate it toward hatred very quickly.

And Lord only knows that we have more than enough hate in the world right now.

The first article I read in 2023 was this one: Bring back personal blogging. And it's interesting to me because every new year I debate whether or not I'm going to keep doing =waves arms= all this. The question has been especially wearing on me during the pandemic when I'm just not doing anything worth blogging about.

The article itself has some very good points though.

Social media, for all its popularity, simply doesn't have the community building that blogging did back in the day. I've made a lot of friends via blogging, and a handful of them are closer than many of my in-person friends. My guess is that this is because in-person friendships rely mostly on how often you see them, where blogging friendships rely mostly on how often you keep in contact with them. Even if you meet up with them in-person from time to time, your relationship goes beyond presence.

On April 18th, Blogography turns 20 years old.

Back in the day, I'd hold a week-long Blogiversary celebration with contests, new merchandise, and everything. Just look at this video from 2008 when the Grand Prize was me flying to wherever in the world the winner was so I could deliver prizes and have a party...

And so I did. I flew to St. Louis and had a great time!

I can't imagine doing anything like this now.

I mean, sure I still meet up with old-school bloggers from those early years. I met with one back in 2021, another in 2022, and will meet with another in March (proof positive that the article is right about the communities we built). But that's a far cry from all the "Dave Events" that used to happen... or even the larger gatherings like TequilaCon.

But it's this past community that still exists which makes blogging something I'm not quite ready to give up on yet.

So... here's to twenty years of blogging... and counting, I guess?

Wishing you and yours all the best in this New Year.

It seems a little pointless to be recapping all the things I did in 2022 when I didn't really do much except work. Didn't go anywhere notable. Didn't do anything notable. It's an entirely different ballgame than it once was. Thanks to the charity I worked with folding and the pandemic raging, I'm content to stay at home watching TV and hang out with my cats.

Which has me wondering if I'm just done traveling now... even when COVID is dead and buried. IF COVID is ever dead and buried.

I mean, an occasional vacation would be nice... and I still have dreams of visiting some places in the world (maybe)... so a few flights will be in my future, but nothing like what once was. Some years it seemed like I was gone half the year. Pretty sure those days are gone.

Oh well.

Fortunately, the US Government hasn't banned TikTok yet, so I've aways got that to keep me entertained...

Until 2023 then.

I don't celebrate Christmas. I haven't in decades.

Back when my grandmother was alive, I put on a good show over it, but since she died there was just no point carrying on pretending. Sure, I still ended up taking my mom to the odd local Christmas event in town or asking if she wanted to tag along on a work trip to Orlando so she could wander around Walt Disney World at Christmas (her favorite time to go), but that was for her. Not for me...

And now that my mom is gone, I really don't have to pretend.

I make my annual pilgrimage over the mountains to have Christmas dinner with my family-friends, toss out a few presents for the kids, then trip right back over the mountains for a post-Christmas nap.

Which, to be honest, is ultimately the best part of Christmas for me now... a nap.

I have never understood making fun of somebody for hard work.

This past Summer I was in the grocery store very early in the morning where an aisle was blocked off so that a guy could mop it. As I walked past, there were two women (old enough to know better) who were trash-talking this kid because they wanted something down that particular aisle. The guy, who was thankfully unperturbed by their rudeness, offered to get something for them if they could hold on a minute. Which they couldn't, apparently, as they walked off in a huff.

I thought of this today when I was at the grocery store where something had spilled, and they had it sectioned off for cleaning. And it got me to thinking about all the hardworking people who have to put up with people's shit over what they have to do to make a living.

Now I'm wondering what, exactly, the alternative is supposed to be. The majority of people take the best job they can get. That may end up being a shit job they don't like, but it's what pays their rent and puts food on the table. So what else is there? And why is it that the best they can get worthy of ridicule or abuse?

Somebody has to do the job, after all, and if it's a job which is that distasteful to you... can't you just be thankful that it's not something you have to do and move on with your life? And you just know that a goodly chunk of the people being abusive assholes had their job handed to them on a silver platter or, also a big possibility, have never worked a day in their life.

And can you imagine their reaction if a dirty floor didn't get cleaned up?

When I had big fun at my colonoscopy five years ago, I was disappointed that I'd have to wait ten years for another one.

Oh... I'm totally lying. The procedure itself wasn't terrible at all... it's the prep for the colonoscopy which is absolute agony. You essentially have to completely clean out your bowels over four days of special low-fiber diet followed by liquid diet and something which reams your colon out by causing constant diarrhea. I made the HUGE mistake of scheduling my previous colonoscopy the day after Halloween, which meant I was passing out candy in-between sitting on the toilet.

Then I found out that since I had "pre-cancerous polyps" removed from my last colonoscopy, my doctor wanted me to have another one after only five years. And today was the day.

Except I actually had two things I needed to have done, which gave me a choice... have the colonoscopy with light sedation today, then come in on Friday... OR have the colonoscopy with NO SEDATION today, and have my other stuff done after. Since the worst part of the colonoscopy (the prep) would have to be done either way, I decided to get everything out of the way in one go instead of having to take an extra day off work.

The prep was, as I remembered, horrendous.

The colonoscopy with zero sedation? Not as horrific as you might imagine. Though just about any experience after colonoscopy prep is going to seem like a walk in the park.

There is some discomfort as the doctor drives the scope around your innards... and it hurt a bit when he was going around a corner of my colon... but I have to say that it was fascinating being fully conscious and watching it unfold in real-time on a TV screen while I was chatting with the doctor. I think it was fun for him too, as I am incredibly funny and charming and he had a much better time than if I were fading in and out of consciousness. We talked about all kinds of things... like how fantastic my prep was because there were no seeds or fiber in my colon... and what he was doing and looking at with each step of the procedure. It was... despite minor pain... a great experience.

PLUS I was able to stroll right out of the recovery ward. After putting my clothes on of course.

I then walked over to have my labs done and go my second appointment (which was not nearly as much fun). If I didn't have the second procedure, I could have just drove home. No waiting. No bothering a family member or friend to drive me.

And so... yeah... next time I have to have a colonoscopy, I am going to skip the sedation again. I don't know that it's for everybody (especially if your pain tolerance is low) but the benefits are just too good to ignore.

The great news is that my colon was clean as a whistle. No polyps (pre-cancerous, cancerous, or otherwise).

No idea if I have to get another colonoscopy in five years or ten years. Hopefully I will have forgotten most of the prep ordeal by then, because right now the memory is fresh and I never want to go through it again.

Regretfully I did not think to write a Bullet Sunday entry before I started my colonoscopy prep.

Needless to say, there won't be a Bullet Sunday post, because I am not blogging from the toilet. See you next Sunday.

Having nothing you can say about something when there are plenty of things you could say is pretty much my idea of hell. But keeping the peace over being mired in drama is my idea of paradise. And so... looks like I'll be holding my tongue. Again.