13 Random for '25

I've got a couple of other things I could post, but I'm going to go a bit random instead. It's been a while.

I've had a couple of trips to the orthopedic surgeon since my 5th metatarsal fracture, the second one just yesterday. I took pictures of my X-rays both times. The break is similar to the first web located one I'd used for that post... only worse. They'd put me in the room with the X-ray displayed before I saw the doctor, and I was thinking for sure I'd be in for surgery from the look and the giant gap in the bone. The doctor came in, looks at it and tells me, “In about 95% of these breaks, I don't recommend surgery...” then he paused, and I was almost certain he was going to say I'd hit the lottery with mine, but he's willing to let it ride as is. He gave me a legit boot, and I kept from using it for the 3 weeks or so in between.

The second trip, to me, the X-rays looked exactly the same, but the doctor said it's growing bone back, see how it's got white there now??? Umm, it's bone, it's always been white!!! He gave me the go ahead to start using it some to walk on, and I've been using a cane. It feels like it's making it ache a little, but it isn't bad. I've heard you're supposed to use it a bit as it heals anyway.

This was kind of funny, in Pokemon GO, when you do a raid it displays various achievement cards I guess you'd call them. A week or so after I broke my foot, I got the card for the longest distance walked the previous day!!!

Since my wife was still recovering from her back surgery in early December, for the first time since I've been working there, I didn't take her to the company Christmas party. I took the younger son instead. It was at the Aquarium of the Pacific again, and I saw on the itinerary that there was going to be a sea otter show, so we showed up for that.

On the way in, they routed us around the side into the back, where they've got the shark pools. This ray was huge!!! The water magnification makes it hard to judge, but I'd say 10 feet across!!! They also had some fish swimming around in the same tank that had a horn protruding from their heads. I asked the girl who was giving the talk about the various displays about them: “The fish with the horns in here, baby narwhals, right???” She said they were. Can't tell if serious or trolling.

There have been fires raging around here, in no small part because of our stupid local and state government. Of course, that means lots of red flag days, which prior to this they've had 3 other times this season. On the day we were coming back from our anniversary trip, those rat bastards called one, ticketed and towed Scruffy and the Falcon before we were able to get home. Cost over $800 for all that, and of course it wasn't even windy in our area. For this one... the first night they were going to be calling it, it actually did get a good wind whipped up. I was sure it was going to break at least one of our trees, but it didn't Of course, I was in no condition to drive. Our neighbor was going to help moving the cars to where they don't have the parking restrictions, but instead drove one to the next street over, where they have the same restrictions. Then the battery in Scruffy was dead. Long story short, my wife drove the Falcon for the first time in ages, and my younger son, who is as of yet still unlicensed, drove two others.

Anyway, this is a picture of the first morning. I start at 6 AM, and it's usually dark out when I do, and by 7 AM it's light. Didn't even realize until they mentioned on the radio, it was still dark out. I stepped out at around 8 and took this picture. I've had a little cough ever since, and a low level wheeze. It was just the first night of it that we had any wind, but that hasn't stopped them from having a near constant red flag alert. They dropped it for a couple of days, but it's back on. Knee jerk, I think, at this point.

Towards the end of last year, the ceiling fan in the bedroom stopped turning on. First, checked the remote battery, and that didn't work. Next, I pulled the wall switch to see if it was getting juice, and it was (I'd not long before added a timer switch for the bathroom fan, and the wiring backs up to the bedroom). Finally, I dropped the ceiling trim ring, and hard wired past the remote receiver. That did the trick. Tried bypassing to the fan motor while I was at it, and it was fine as well. Found a replacement remote and receiver, and had it mailed, and installed it, and it's all good now. Oh, and now I've got a timer function!!!

For Thanksgiving, we went to our friends' house where they were hosting a get together pot luck. I brought pulled pork and buns and slaw, and it was a big hit. Some friend that have moved to Arizona were there, and they brought their sphinx cats!!! My wife came (the day after she got out of the hospital, after which she didn't leave the house for quite a while) and was reclined on the couch most of the time. The sphinxes are very cuddly!!!

Look at that, without all the fur, you can actually see the brain wrinkles right through their skulls!!! Also pictured is another recent shirt my wife got me, it says, “It's not easy being my wife's arm candy, but here I am nailing it!!!”

A couple more Catalina vacation notes. Since my wife doesn't get around too well on her own, we always take her wheel chair. It's about the only place we take it all the time!!! Since we were taking surrogate son, fitting it in our car would be near impossible, so we borrowed my mom's car. Brought it to our home, and after climbing the hill, it blew off it's upper radiator hose!!! Now, for some back story, near the beginning of last year, she'd had an incident where she said it was smoking. I don't know if it was the leaky transmission pan, oil pan, or a cooling system issue, but she took it to what I've long considered to be a shady mechanic, Gretchen's Automotive, near her house. They came out with a huge laundry list of things that needed to be done totaling thousands of dollars, “Or, I'll buy it off you for $2,000, I've got a son who needs a car...” and she was going to do it!!! It doesn't have many miles on it, and she recently had the transmission rebuilt. I was pissed!!! One of the things they'd said was it needs new radiator hoses, and before she was able to back out of it (the theft of her car, that is), they'd replaced them and supposedly flushed and refilled the system, and they charged her nearly $300 for just that!!! I told her she'd never authorized the repair, since she'd used her charge card call them up and dispute the charge. She wouldn't. Anyway, there you go, you to Gretchen's Automotive in Long Beach, and they'll screw you and do a crap job of tightening your radiator hose clamp!!! Gretchen's Automotive, where elder financial abuse is the name of the game!!!

This was in the window of the place across from where we were staying in Avalon. A ghost tours place. Creepy.

We gave one of the youngers' friends a plush for her birthday, Alan from Smiling Friends. As we'd hoped, she likes it a lot, and sent a picture with the message, “He will sit next to my Perry!”

Sidney is always messing with the trash can in the bathroom. Usually it's just knocking it over, or messing around with the liner. A few weeks ago, though, he pulled the liner our, and jumped into it!!! He was just laying in there, purring!!!

We got dinner from Panda Express a few weeks ago, and this was my fortune. They gave me the title of a Killers song for my fortune. I feel like I was RickRolled by a cookie!!!

The Literary Stack

A little over a year ago, I decided that I would no longer be on my phone in the bathroom, and went back to the old ways of taking a book with me instead!!!

The result, unsurprisingly, is that I've read a lot more books!!! Books I'd been given, books I'd picked up because they sounded interesting, books by favorite authors I hadn't gotten to, and in one case, a book that came with the house!!!

That book was “Storm”, published back in the 40's, and was the origin of the naming of storms. I've heard of, but never heard, the song, “They Call the Wind Maria”. It was from the high school my mom had attended, but she has no recollection of reading it.

Speaking of my mom, she loaned me one of the books from the Dean Koontz “Jane Hawk” series, the fourth in the series, “The Forbidden Door”. It was a good book, very readable, and Koontz does a good job of making it so you don't need to have read the previous books to be able to get on board.

That was a hardcover, and once I was started, I wanted to read the rest. I picked up the rest of the series in paperback, and burned through them. Then I gave them to my mom, who also likewise burned through them!!!

Speaking of burning through books, I found this in one of those little free libraries that was in my mom's neighborhood.

I'd heard of “Fahrenheit 451” since I was in school, but had never read it. It's a bit dated (a lot of the future-set Sci-Fi books are), but the idea holds up!!! It had several afterwords including some interviews with Bradbury, and he mentioned in part of it that the mechanical hound was an updating of Doyle's Hound of the Baskervilles. I have a desire to read more Ray Bradbury now.

Another dated Sci-Fi book I picked up from a free library, this time in my neighborhood, was called “Tiger Tiger”. I enjoyed them both.

I think it was at the beginning of the year I picked up Stephen King's “The Outsider”, “Fairy Tale”, and “Holly”. “The Outsider” continues the story of Holly from Bill Hodges (from the Mr. Mercedes series) detective agency and was pretty good.

“Fairy Tale” was a great story, classic King fantasy sci-fi, and I enjoyed it the most of the three.

“Holly” further continues the story of Holly, but... the Wuhan Flu and Donald Trump have destroyed the once great Stephen King. It was practically unreadable. TDS is a powerful thing.

After I'd finished the Jane Hawk series, I had a hankering to read some John Irving again. I've heard him described as the dirty old man of literature, and I find that to be an apt description.

I remember as a teen having several of my friends over when “The World According to Garp” was airing on one of the cable channels. It had Robin Williams, it has to be funny, right??? Sure enough, it had some funny, but I think that we were more traumatized than amused.

The book was much better. Who knows, maybe I just happen to have aged into it!!!

I was reading “The World According to Garp” when we were on our Catalina vacation, and while we were there, we happened on yet another little free library. As always, I had to have a look through to see if there was anything of interest.

I saw the title of this one, “Down at Flathead”, and was intrigued. Of course, the flathead Ford V-8 was an early hot rod staple, a compact V-8 engine offering much improved performance over many of the smaller and bulkier engines of the day, and were often swapped into small, lightweight cars.

I pulled it out, and the cover artwork also got my attention, and the synopsis cemented it. The author lives in Avalon, and this copy happens to have been signed. I'm only about ¼ of the way through, but so far I'm liking it quite a lot!!! They've re-stolen the Lunar Rover from Apollo 17, then stole one of the Catalina Express jet catamarans, and are currently on a large orbiting spacecraft.

A lot of the books are stacked up on the end of the kitchen table, hence the Literary Stack!!! I've got to clear out the bookshelf, and probably distribute several of the books back to the little libraries!!!

Follow Up Fashion

I'd posted previously about several of the recent additions to my wardrobe, and shortly after either added more, or remembered others that should have been included, so here they are!!!

First up is a thrift store find. It's a real thinker!!! My dad was from Michigan, and had that Yooper accent. I guess since I learned to speak while I was around him, I've got it too, and my boys both have it as well!!! Anyway, you've heard of the Upper Peninsula, but here's the much lesser known Lower Peninsula!!!

Next is a vacation purchase from Yoshi's on the Pier in Avalon from this year's vacation. Nice old school woody and a pre-worn look, as well as Catalina branding going for it (not real visible in this picture, right under the “Beach Paradise” it has “Catalina Island” in white against a fairly white background), in a color that I don't have much of in my wardrobe. In addition the the at-some-point mentioned Stinky's Fish Tacos shirt I got for surrogate son, I also got a real nice coat of many colors for my wife, and a nice Catalina fleece jacket for the younger son. Yoshi's has gotten a good amount from me.

This is one of those long forgotten ones, I think it was 2 years ago I got this one. I've got several In-N-Out Burger shirts, and they usually have a similar look, full color image on the back with nice muscle cars, and the In-N-Out logo and arrow on the front. One time when we were there, they had this one on display, and it's unique with a largely monochromatic image, with only the sign at the top and the palm trees at the bottom in green, and the exhaust in red, both rendered as if they are neon lights.

The front logo is different from the normal as well, with the “California” beneath added. Bought one for myself and one for the younger.

Here's the couple of the previously mentioned thrift store finds from our most recent anniversary trip. First is the 16-bit Rick and Morty shirt. Once again, photos added a little background flair that looks better than the original picture.

And the Lynyrd Skynyrd shirt. Had this picture taken today, as you may have picked up on if you noticed the crutch!!! I do like me some thrift store finds. When we were on Catalina we looked up the thrift store I'd seen on the map before, but had never been to because they have very limited days and hours, and we set out to be there on a day and an hour they were open. We made it, but it was no where to be seen, and checking with a local guide, they confirmed that they were no longer in business. Ah well.

And another recent addition, I have probably 30 or more black T-shirts, but almost none fit anymore. A shame, I like a lot of the designs. A replacement for one here, I like the design and sentiment!!!

And another from way back (happened on a picture of it from our '22 Catalina trip), my wife had given me this one, and once again, I like the design and sentiment!!! Bonus, it also has a nice feel to the fabric.