I got the telephone call at approximately 8:15PM.
My father had passed away.
I had just seen him earlier in the day, in his assisted living residence, on hospice care. He had a full time care aide with him, and his facility had their folks coming in to see him frequently - more frequently than they were obliged to, he was (as I was told by more than one of them) popular with the staff.
I had left him around noon. My brother had brought his wife and youngest son over to say
…I've been having a lot of nightmares lately. Not just the waking nightmare of watching the conspiracy theorists slowing taking over the public political discourse, but actual nightmare dreams. The worst involved me rescuing Tessie, who'd been kidnapped and taken to New York City's Chinatown with a ridiculous and scary Big Trouble in Little China plot. Other events included me being sexually assaulted and having to to kill one of my torturers (a scene reminiscent of
…A few weeks ago, I noticed a story somewhere saying that Lancaster, New Hampshire would be within the zone of totality of the upcoming solar eclipse.
I was not up on my astronomical calendar and didn't know there was an upcoming eclipse. But Lancaster being a 2-3 hour drive from my house, I figured I shouldn't pass up the opportunity to see it.
Over the years, I've heard people exclaim about the amazing effect on their lives they felt when they saw a total eclipse. I've
…
:SENDING UNIT FAILURE
:UNABLE TO PROCEED WITHOUT LOCAL PERMISSIONS
What in the Friskies™ Fish Flavored Fucksticks™ does that mean? I had about a thousand hours on this piece of equipment and had never, ever seen that error message or even anything formatted that way. In fact, the popup had a button marked "PROCEED" instead of the usual "OK".
I punched backwards and got nothing. I dumped and reloaded the