Fuck You, George Bailey: It’s A Miserable Life
Winter is bad enough when you suffer from depression, but when you add Seasonal Affective Disorder, PTSD, and a couple of deaths in the family, it becomes an ordeal.
My mother died in December, 32 years ago; I lost my father in February 3 years ago. When my mother died, the period between Thanksgiving and January became the longest and darkest period of the year. My father’s death merely extended the season by a month.
For years after my mother died I couldn’t get through December without increasing my antidepressants, my anti-anxiety meds, and the number of visits to my therapist. …
You Have Only 5 Followers, And I’m One of Them
One of the best things about Medium — perhaps the best thing about it — is how new members pop up daily.
I read your story this morning; I even gave it 25 claps. Then I checked your profile, mainly because I wanted to be sure I was following you and, if not, to rectify that status.
I was surprised to see that you had only 4 followers. Surprised, because the stories that appear on my daily feed are usually written by people who have been on Medium long enough to have amassed hundreds if not thousands of followers.
And there you were, with a measly 4 followers. …
An Exercise In Frustration
Last month Stacey and I finally paid off our iPhone Xs. And while many people would breathe sighs of relief, our reaction was “UPGRADE!”
So this past Wednesday we headed over to our iPhone vendor to see what our options were. ( I’m not going to name the vendor for fear of reprisal, but their name begins with “Verizon.”)
I’ve spent considerable time over the past month looking at reviews of the new iPhone 12, our needs as Serious Photographers™, and after discussing it with Stacey, we decided on the iPhone 12 Pro Max. …
Everyone has memories around this time of year. Some of them are good, and some of them are not so good. In this one respect, Christmas is no different from any other time of the year.
What is it about Christmas that makes us nostalgic? Is it really the memories? And if that’s true, are the memories accurate or, filtered through the rose-colored glasses of nostalgia, are they only what we wished Christmases of the past had actually been?
Like you, I’ve also spent a lifetime storing up memories. Now that I’m 70 years old, it’s time to start sharing those memories with my family; my friends; and you, my dear readers. …
I Bet It’s Not What You’re Thinking
It’s that time of year again, when most of the western industrialized world capitalizes on the story of a poor refugee child in order to make money.
Oops! I meant to say “remembers and marks the birth of Jesus the Christ. (And now you know His real middle name, and it’s definitely not “H.”)
He shares His middle name with other famous icons: Winnie-the-Pooh, Smokey the Bear, Billy the Kid, and many others.
But that’s not what I mean to talk about.
I mean to talk about people who assume everyone is a practicing Christian by saying “Merry Christmas” to one and all. …
It’s Great In The Great Outdoors, Too
I finally realized — while sipping my Earl Grey — that I’m spending too much money on commercial pre-mixed packages of hot chocolate mix. So I decided to make my own and use it instead.
Ingredients (per cup):
1 teaspoon (regular teaspoon, not from your standard measuring set) instant coffee grounds
1 teaspoon cocoa powder. Make sure it’s the Dutch-processed kind. I use Hershey’s, but only because it’s usually the cheapest in the store. If you have a favorite brand, use it.
2 or 3 teaspoons of sugar or an equal amount of artificial sweetener.
Instructions:
Mix all of the ingredients together in a medium mixing bowl.
Add a cup of boiling water. That’s the cup you’re going to drink it from, not a measuring cup.
Whisk the ingredients together until they’re blended.
Pour into your drinking cup and add creamer if desired. …
It’s Capitalism, Baby!
As of today, November 12, 2020, the average price per gram of medical marijuana in Colorado is between $10 and $12 per gram. As near as I can determine, the same amount of “street” marijuana here in be York State is around half of that, or roughly $6.00 per gram. And while medical marijuana is available here, the State still hasn’t worked out the logistics needed for the system to work.
Regardless (sorry, Merriam-Webster: I’m still not on board with “irregardless” as a legitimate word) of what system gets put in place for medical marijuana, it will fail for one simple reason: capitalism. …
And A Workaround
The Problem
As many of you know, I do about 75% of my writing on my iPhone. The other 25% is divided between my iPad and my PC, with the lion’s share of that going to the iPad.
This is true for all of my writing, not just here on Medium.
You also know of my frustration and dissatisfaction with the Medium mobile app. As I’ve already listed the reasons on other posts I won’t bore you by repeating them here.
But I will tell you of the latest problem: for the past week, I’ve been unable to create a new story or series on either of my mobile devices. …
The 1950s Were Only The Beginning
“The Blob.” “It: The Terror From Beyond Space.” “The Crawling Eye” (original title: “The Trollenberg Terror.”) These were only some of the movies that kept me awake at night, baseball bat next to my bed, one eye fixed on the closet door, ready to leap out and defend myself against whatever creature went bump in the night.
