And it just keeps coming

[aadler]

 
The details are under the cut.

Yesterday I had to be driven to a clinic at a different part of the base here to get blood drawn. (I’m on cholesterol medication, and they like to check periodically to be sure it isn’t damaging liver function.) Once that was done, I tried to call to have someone come to retrieve me … but we mostly use a particular type of secured phone, and apparently everyone else uses DSN lines, so I had no way of making contact. I tried to walk back … but the layout is by the design of Saddam’s engineers, all curves and bridges and walls that keep you from seeing where you’re going or picking out landmarks, and I spent an hour getting nowhere. I waited at a bus stop … and it took three bus lines (Red to take me back to the central station, White because I was told wrong about which line to take from there, Gray to actually do it right) to get me back to my own operating area.

And, after I’d been back on the job barely an hour, I had to get some sensitive material to the burn pit for disposal, and — after following someone who knew the way — got lost again on the way back. The difference being, this time I had a truck, and could wander aimlessly in greater speed and comfort. I did, eventually, make it back.

We have a big new push in duty coming at precisely the wrong time. For about a week, almost twice as much work will be required just when I have one subordinate on leave and the other co-opted by a field team. It’s doable, IF my higher-ups supply the necessary material, but for awhile there I’ll be a juggling monkey.

I’ve been looking in now and again at my kids’ Facebook pages, because lately they update more often there than on LiveJournal. Purely by chance, I spotted something this week that I had missed before: video of my son playing and singing a song that he had written. I was stunned: it was good. I mean, good at the level you might hear on the radio. (He could use some voice training, but his vocal sense is superb.) The date on the video was almost two years ago. I had no idea, and I’m still trying to absorb it. And I keep listening to it, at odd moments, because it really is that good.

After being under the weather for a week with the chest-and-sinus stuff that was keeping me down, I finally got over it to the point that I could resume exercise. That part was good; not-good came when I stepped on the gym scales for the first time in weeks. (I just got back from leave, remember.) In the interim, I had picked up another ten pounds. On top of the ten pounds I was already past the Army’s maximum weight allowance for my age group. Which was itself ten pounds more than the most I should allow myself to weigh … and that level is at least ten pounds over my optimum weight. With one thing and another, I’m almost fifty pounds overweight, and even if only twenty of that counts against me officially, it was still enough to rock me backward. I haven’t weighed this much since my son was born; even eight months ago, I weighed twenty-five pounds less than now. Good Lord, how can so much extra just creep up that way?

My daughter is getting married at the end of July. I want to attend in my dress uniform. That will require at least thirty pounds’ weight loss. Again, doable … but it’s going to take some work.

Oh, and I want to finish my current Buffyfic and try to crank out a couple more during this deployment. So, no, my schedule isn’t at all overcrowded. Not at all. Nuh-uh. Not one bit.

Comments

[ozma914.livejournal.com]

Things must be better over there, if getting lost is your biggest worry!

That's so great, what your son did. There's a lot of talent out there. I've heard the good news about your daughter, too -- wish I could attend the wedding!

The weight, not so good -- I'd be having that problem too if I was in the military, and it's almost impossible for me to lose weight during the winter. But it's just two weeks until *my* next cholesterol test, so I'm working hard at the proper diet thing. No meds -- yet.

So, how are we doing with that growing older thing?

[aadler]

Let’s just say that getting lost is something that I should be able to control, and it annoys me when I can’t. Not a lot I can do to prevent hostile metal from falling in my vicinity, so I don’t worry about it except when it’s actually happening.

I spoke to my son over the weekend about that video. He acknowledged that he attended an open-mike night while he was in Shanghai, and one of the people there offered to represent him if he should return to China. He further said that he plays in the same spirit that I write: for his own pleasure, not trying to pursue any kind of career. Which is something of a relief, since writing, acting, and the music business are just about the three fastest ways to heartbreak.

The ‘growing older thing’, I have that down cold. And every day I get better at it.

[ozma914.livejournal.com]

Thank goodness we don't have to practice for that getting old gig.

I'm with you on the control thing, although I'm also a typical guy in that I don't like to ask directions; I usually go to great lengths to confirm my directions before I even get into the car, so I don't have to ask. However, I suspect they don't have MapQuest or Google Maps where you are ...

While I agree with what you're saying about the entertainment industry, I remain committed to someday writing for a living. Probably, at this rate, it'll be my after-retirement job. I encourage my kids to follow their dreams, but when my youngest decided not to make her dream a music gig I was secretly relieved.