If Tennessee Floated Away, Would The Other 49 States Notice? (Bizarro World Weather, Nashville Waterworld, and the Tennessee Complex)

We interrupt this (really mostly unplanned) posting moratorium ‘cos I just wanna say, WTF?

Having survived Hurricane Elvis, the Great Ice Storm of 1994, and – even more up close and personal than I like to think about very often – the 2003 tornado that tried to eradicate Jackson from the planet, there’s not much about natural disasters that comes as a surprise anymore. I’ve seen lots of crazy whacked out weather down here.

But this weekend was like Bizarro World Weather down here. In almost 22 years of living in the same house (and a hop, skip and jump from the same tornado siren at the fairgrounds), I am pretty certain I have never heard that thing go off five (at least five, it might have been six) times in a 24-hour period. And I’m absolutely certain I’ve never heard it blare for TWO HOURS (could have been three, definitely two). Having really only fairly recently gotten to where I’m not practically hyperventilating and paralyzed anymore when the thing goes off, it was better than it would have been a year or so ago, but still – decidedly on edge for a very long period of time.

At the time of that two or more hour siren, they were also evacuating the thousands of folks down at the Beale Street Music Festival (i.e., MudFest) on Saturday night. And then last night, people in the crowd were acting like jerks and booing when headliner Three Doors Down had to be canceled and couldn’t make it down here because they were having trouble getting from Nashville to Memphis, because of the flooded mess this state is right now. Nashvillians John Hiatt and Alison Krauss’ BSMF sets were also canceled due to the flood situation, as was a Dierks Bentley show in Knoxville on Sunday night, seeing as how Bentley was in his flooded basement with a bucket just like most everyone else in Nashville. (Why the Beale Street Music Festival hasn’t yet been moved to a different weekend in May after all these years is beyond me, since it almost always rains and storms that weekend, and either doesn’t rain at all or hardly rains the rest of the weekends in May. Seriously.)

And while things are fine right here where I am in the center of the city, they definitely are NOT around the whole region in general. It was kinda bad enough in Memphis and Arkansas and North Mississippi, with all the flooding (in places I’ve never seen flood before) and storm damages and, sadly, several deaths. The tornadoes that did come through (mostly hitting the more rural areas) were terrible with horrific damage – but the rain itself just gutted the entire Mid-South. It just kept on coming down, and coming back again and again, and it wouldn’t go away.

And Nashville, poor Nashville, is practically totally under water and now the Cumberland, which was 19 feet on Friday, has a flood stage of 40 feet, and was currently 55 feet last I looked at the news – the river’s on the verge of completely swallowing up downtown Nashville. I spent most of Sunday reading friends mentioning that co-workers had had to abandon their homes, neighbors had totally lost their homes, just about everyone I know up there has water in their basement (and rising in many places), and many of my friends discovered on Sunday that they now own lakefront property all of a sudden.

I saw a photo snapped not far from where an ex-BF used to live used to be (officially I never lived there but technically I did), and at first I thought well, we’d have been all right probably because the living space was actually on the second floor. Then I remembered how small the building was and how low those ceilings were. If this had happened 23 years ago, we’d have been like those other people clinging to their roofs or the top of their vehicles waiting to be rescued. (Consequently, that same ex moved back to Nashville a few years ago and texted me last night, lamenting the thousands of dollars in musical instruments, equipment and other gear currently swimming around his basement – according to his neighbor, that is. He was in Chicago this weekend, so he hasn’t yet seen it for himself.)

And it’s not just Nashville. One of my two little hometowns an hour to the west is being besieged by an overflowing Big Sandy River (and though I haven’t seen photos, I’m sure the Tennessee River is flooding the other end of county at the beach and beyond), and judging from the conditions in this photo that was sent to me in e-mail last night:

… if I was still in high school, I would have had to had a boat to get there on Monday morning. That building in the photo is NOT “out in the sticks” out in the county – it’s very much inside the city limits – and really isn’t all THAT close to the river in question, so presumably nearly every business on that side of town was fighting the same watery madness.

Most things south of Nashville in Middle Tennessee are apparently a wreck as well, including this house. She was supposed to leave for NYC in three weeks, they have no renter’s insurance, and they’ve lost everything.

Levees are leaking and breaking all over, sinkholes are developing everywhere (including still in West Tennessee as well as Middle Tennessee), people and animals are stranded, drowning. So many roads closed and it’s bad all over, but Nashville itself has kinda turned into one gigantic lake with thousands of little islands around.

I am old enough that I vaguely remember the major flood Nashville had in the 1970s, but that was nothing compared to this. There are places up there that have never been under water in my lifetime – or probably for hundreds of years, or ever. It’s just stunning.

All of this coupled with the fact that three members of my family were in Nashville on Saturday – and had already planned to stay in a hotel overnight (good thing) – but trying to get them out of there Sunday was a bit daunting, especially when – after hearing road after road after road was closed or closing, and downtown was closed in all kinds of places and flooding, and most especially when authorities up there were practically begging people not to drive, all of which I was texting with every new closure or warning I read about – after encouraging them to stay put, they left anyway. They couldn’t go what would be the usual route back on I-40 West (we already knew the main highway off the interstate was marked as flooded by the Highway Patrol, and knew most of the other alternatives were probably little better.)

It took them a while to get through downtown, but once they made it to I-65 North, things were okay to Clarksville and beyond. But I pretty much held my breath until I knew they’d gotten out of Nashville, and still until I knew they’d made it home.

And Nashville, poor Nashville – later Sunday morning, friends and others were Tweeting that the waters in their basement were starting to recede. And then around noonish – just like the weather and news folks had said it would – the rain and sirens and everything else started up again.

People are going to need serious help to put Nashville and Middle Tennessee back together again. It’s such a mess, but you probably heard that already.

Or maybe you didn’t – because apparently much of the national news has mostly ignored what’s happening in Nashville and Middle Tennessee, as well as the rest of the damage in West Tennessee and our neighboring states. Little blips here and there, but you know, it’s not like when some other cities have gotten decimated by Mother Nature and you can’t get away from it on the news and in your newspaper, no matter where you are.

And it’s kinda doubly puzzling because some of those cities I can think of that have had their disasters plastered on TV and other media for days at a time – the hurricanes and floods and such that have happened in those places, they happen fairly often. What’s happening in Nashville right now has never happened in my lifetime (and I’m getting kinda old, you know) – we have some rural flood zones with relatively small area dotting the state, but a national emergency-type flood of this proportion is just unheard of.

It’s kinda like the (cough) “straight line wind” storm dubbed Hurricane Elvis that paralyzed Memphis for weeks in 2003 – I recall one of our city officials commenting at the time that a hurricane that wound up not even materializing and hitting one coastal city got more national coverage than Hurricane Elvis did. People died, the city was in pieces (including parts of the city that had never or rarely seen such kinds of damage), the whole city was mostly without power in 90+ degree weather for weeks – yet unless you lived fairly close by, you probably had no idea what was going on down here.

What, do we (Tennessee in general) need to switch deodorants or something? At this point – and after this many crises that have gone mostly ignored – it’s enough to give an entire state a complex.

Aunt B. writes about the current situation and similarly puzzling lack of interest here and here, and the fine folks at The Nashvillest have done a stand-up job gathering and providing information during this awful time up there. Honestly, The Nashvillest and Twitter, as well as the Internet in general, have become invaluable resources for sure time and time again, and kept a lot of folks in the loop and informed that would have otherwise not been.

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And finally – yes, there was supposed to be an Alex Chilton post in March and no, you weren’t imagining things. As I kinda said the day I posted the last one (about Doug Fieger), the Alex post was nagging at me so much it was going to make me sick if I didn’t post it that day – and then I never posted it. Because I haven’t finished it. Because for some reason, I can’t. There’s a personal piece to that post that I’m struggling with – maybe it’s because I’ve told the story many times before, but this will probably be the last time I ever tell it. Maybe I’ll finish it and post it soon. Stay tuned.

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EDITED TO ADD: What a beautiful and horrific photo at the same time @brittneyg‘s place:

Nashville Submerged

About This Insane Weather

I’m so cold.

That is all.

Music Education 101: Open Letter to NBC Universal

(NOTE: Not the usual case, but this post is being posted on both blogs since the series that is the subject of this post resides on both blogs…)

So, based on a glance at my Tweets on Twitter that night, I noted that I spent approximately nine hours replacing YouTube videos that have been removed since the last time I looked at my (so far) four-part Music Education 101 series of posts. If you missed that before (or just want to check them out again), all the video links except maybe one are working now, although I’ve had to replace several with “alternate” versions (some I’m not too thrilled about), but also added some extras that weren’t there before.

The series lives in my Music Education 101 category on both blogs, or here are the links:

• Lynnster’s Musical Education in Three (Now Four) Posts – The Beginning
• Coming Into My Own – Lynnster’s Musical Education in Three (Now Four) Posts
• No Turning Back Now – Lynnster’s Musical Education in Three (Now Four) Posts
• Postscript – Lynnster’s Musical Education, Now In Four Posts

I can’t even begin to illustrate what a painfully tedious process it was, searching for and updating all those video links – made even worse by the fact this series is on both my blogs, since it was begun before I added the music blog, so that doubled the work. But of all the posts on either of my blogs – spanning back nearly 13 years on the main blog – those four are probably the most important to me, so whatever.

What pains me, really, is the number of them removed because so-and-so company/organization has declared their ownership/copyright. Fine.

Do these people not understand the power of YouTube these days and the potential for financial gain in a YouTube partnership? When there are everyday people uploading their own videos – be it comedy, commentary, their own music, or what amounts to the video version of a traditional blog (i.e., vlogs) – and making better money doing that than they would with the salary of many very good full time jobs – is the potential financial gain of allowing music and video to be heard and seen on YouTube completely beyond the comprehension of the music and visual media companies?

If Joe Blow next door is able to make a living wage off of YouTube these days, just think how much cash these record companies and other media companies could be raking in by putting up their own partnered YouTube channel. Some have, yes (mainly individual artists/bands though) – but not nearly enough.

There’s one case in particular that gripes me the most – some of what are undeniably the most important performances – American debut and otherwise – of many artists’ careers are their first appearances on Saturday Night Live. These are almost impossible to find – if they get uploaded, it doesn’t take long before they get pulled. Replacing some of those (like Elvis Costello’s famous show-stopping appearance from 1977) is what took me so darned long the other night, and it just irritated the crap out of me.

So here’s my open letter to NBC Universal:

Get your heads out of your collective asses and put up your own YouTube partner channel with these fantastic performances so that they’ll be back in public view where they SHOULD be, for people to enjoy these fabulous pieces of music history – instead of repeatedly blocking them and keeping them hidden from public view.

In this day and age when almost anything can be instantly viewed on the Internet in all kinds of different venues, it’s a doggoned shame that some of the finest musical performances in rock & roll history are being withheld like this. You have the potential to make far, far more profit on those clips as a YouTube partner than you likely ever will recoup in DVD or video sales.

I guess there’s a DVD or music video out there on the market already – point being, I don’t care, and they probably don’t contain the clips I want to see most anyway. How many DVDs have I bought in the past three or four years? Less than ten, and virtually all are feature films.

That said, I’m your target audience with those SNL music clips, NBC Universal – listen to me. Do the right thing and get those clips up on YouTube under your own account so those precious pieces of musical performance history are out there for the public to enjoy (and for those young musically-minded kids, like I once was myself, to learn from) – and make money off of me and everyone else who will watch, rate, and favorite those clips time and time again.

You have nothing to lose – except for the profit you’re not making by withholding them for DVD or whatever purposes, in which case you’re never likely going to profit nearly as much as you would have as a YouTube partner – and instead, the whole world is losing out by not being able to easily access and view these like you now can most anything else on YouTube. I know a big music fan – and Elvis Costello fan – in his twenties who has never even seen that priceless infamous clip. It’s a danged shame.

C’mon, NBC Universal. The solution’s so simple, and everybody wins. You line your pockets probably a lot more than you would have counting on DVD sales – and that music’s back out there where it belongs, for folks to dig. Simple.

Stuff You Just Wish You Could Take Back Sometimes

I’m sure there’s lots (LOTS) more than just this one, but I was thinking the other day about an unfortunate and awkward incident that’s been bugging me for a few years now, among the many other things I wish I could just hit a “restart” button on sometimes.

Prince Charming (the boyfriend) and I have this acquaintance who is a musician in a VERY famous band. In all actuality, I am only acquainted with this person via e-mail (as in the unfortunate and awkward incident mentioned above), but these two used to be very good friends. They grew up in the same neighborhood, went to school together, hung out in the same bunch as teenagers – etc. As time went on and as people do, they fell out of touch, though PC would sometimes hear stuff about his friend through the grapevine, as it were. Well, that and the fact you can pick up pretty much any music magazine or website and there’s this person – the band’s been around a long time at this point, but still hugely, hugely popular.

About, oh, I don’t know, six or so years ago when PC was going through a tough spell, I took it upon myself to get in touch with this person, with no other intention other than hoping maybe this person would be willing to send along a surprise postcard or something like that to PC – at that point, anything that might be a cheerer-upper of sorts. Things were pretty bleak and grim and I was just really grasping at straws for anything that might help and pull PC out of that depression a little.

The personal e-mail address for this person had just kinda landed in my lap, so I just thought I’d give it a shot. Since I’ve been acquainted over my years bumming around the music scene with various folks both famous and semi-famous, I knew how probably most contact from unknown people often comes across and didn’t really want to, you know, come across like some crazed fan – which I’m not really of this band anyway, I like ‘em just fine but they’re not one of my big favorites – I think I might have told this person that to begin with (heh), just for the sake of not appearing like some lunatic.

And the response was perfectly pleasant in the beginning. This person was, like, “hey, good to hear from you, what’s going on with (PC), if there’s something I can do to help, just let me know”.  So I did. Even though PC’s folks had moved out of the neighborhood where they all grew up and down the road a little ways, this person’s mom had remained friendly with PC’s mom, they’d run into each other at the grocery and such lots of times over the years, yada yada yada, so I knew this person wasn’t completely oblivious to some of the struggles there’d been over the years for PC, so I was pretty upfront about it all and was just like, you know, “any little thing, even just a postcard or something would be a big pick-me-up here”, and thanked this person, and left it at that.

Then nothing. I know people get busy, I know people mean to do something or other and then time just passes and passes and they never get around to doing whatever it is – I’m one of the world’s worst when it comes to things like that – but it was something small that would have meant so much at the time, and it just bugged me, still does. I didn’t tell PC what I’d done for about three years, and when I finally did, he wasn’t really bothered about the fact that this person had never responded past the first time, said I was sweet to have done what I did but to not let it bother me that there’d been no further response.

But it still does – bug me, that is. And maybe dude just got busy and forgot about it, or maybe I did come off looking like some crazed lunatic after all. I dunno.

Thing is I know one of these days, we’ll run into this person somewhere or another, and I’m sure it will be fine and all that. And PC will introduce us and I just hope dude doesn’t say something like, “Oh… YOU’RE the one who…”, ‘cos then I’ll have to bite my tongue to keep from saying “Yeah, and YOU never…”

Or maybe I’ll just say, “Yeah. Yep, I did,” and leave it at that. I just wish I had never done or said anything in the first place. How awkward.

And in truth, he probably had good intentions at the time and just forgot, but that one stupid moment really just broke my heart a little and shook up my faith in humanity a bit.

Good, Bad, More Bad, and Even More Good

So now that I’ve got all the other out of the way, a little post about things good and bad, but neither of which have anything to do with how poor I am or Michael Jackson.

Bad - the heat. My car registered 107 degrees the other day. I think it got down to 105 by the time I got from Kroger back to the house. The heat index was 113 that same day. It’s been like this for about a week and is not supposed to break at all until after Tuesday – there’s two spots of rain in the forecast between then and now, but I don’t have much hope it’s really going to happen (it’s rained in Nashville and Knoxville a couple of times the past week or so, but not a drop here). I have been in discussions online on and off with friends from all over the country (and the world, for that matter) this past week and I don’t care how cold you are or how sick of rain you are – I’ll trade. Immediately.

More Bad – Little has had another bout of old age vestibular disease this week, which some may recall this time last year I was dealing with that with both her and Dobie at almost the same time. Dobie’s was much more pronounced and took a much longer time for recovery; with her, once again by the next day she was better and is continuing to do better. She’s a 17 or 18 year old cat (I can never remember which year she arrived as a baby) so these things are to be expected, but it’s like a stroke and it’s so frightening and unnerving – I think even more so with cats, since they like to get in higher places and the first couple of days she flatly tossed herself off her perch and scared me to death. But she is much better now. I am starting to wonder if this is heat-related, though I read a pretty voluminous amount of information on the syndrome last year (both canine and feline related) and don’t recall any mention of that.

Good - my Rite Aid box fan. I’d forgotten about that thing. I bought it a few years ago when the AC went out and was having to be replaced. After several days of the above heat already come this past Tuesday, and then reading that it wasn’t going to break at all until maybe next Wednesday, I thought I was probably going to be suicidal come the weekend. I have air, but my window unit that usually does a pretty decent job in the summertime just can’t handle this kind of heat and for this extended a period.

Then I remembered the box fan. I would have NEVER guessed it would make the difference it has, but it has. Granted, really over here in my one little corner in the room with the computer and Internet, but that’s where I am almost all the time anyway. In the afternoon after noon or 1:00 or so, it’s still getting a little stuffy in here – but NOTHING like the completely intolerable horrific awful heat it was before I got the fan out. Much, MUCH better. And I’ve even been COLD sometimes in the early mornings or middle of the night this week and had to turn it off. Rock!!!

Even More Good – In their old age, and especially as Dobie’s health went into the serious decline it did the last year or so of his life, Dobie and Lulu both developed some incontinence problems – especially Dobie. Though it’s still very hard to believe he’s gone and makes me sad, one kind of unexpected plus has popped up since his passing – even though they turned five years old last month, I really had no idea that the young’ns are as well house trained as they apparently are! They’re not perfect – with me living alone and my sleeping schedule being all out of whack and not really a schedule, on the off chance I actually do sleep a whole lot and probably more than I should instead of my usual three or four hour catnaps here and there, occasionally there’s an accident, but rarely. They are, for all practical purposes, beautifully housetrained! Daisy doesn’t surprise me because she’s perfect anyway (heh), but it is kind of shocking to me just how well her brothers are.

On the one hand, it’s a pleasant surprise to discover just how really well trained that way they are when, with them, I never really did even try all that hard when they were very young because I was still working out of the house and not here a lot.  On the other hand, that makes Dobie’s frequent accidents (even long before he ever got sick) a little frustrating seeing as how I DID make an effort with him when he was young. Go figure.

In any case, hope everyone has a great weekend! I have been so pitifully socially deprived working around the clock so much, I’m really looking forward to meeting up with KathyT and Melissa on Sunday, so more on that later in the weekend or Monday, I’m sure.

I’m As Tired of This Woe Is Me Stuff As You Probably Are, But Bear With Me Another Sec

So one of the things I’d been meaning to write about this week was sort of a little clarification to what my situation is/has been. I know (especially after talking with KathyT this morning, and talking with her and Aunt B. and Kat Coble in recent weeks, though I can kind of tell from what Kathy said today that I probably don’t really understand the full scope of all this just yet) – anyway, I know there’s been some stuff going on on my behalf, more or less, and I really don’t have words to express the gratitude and appreciation I feel about that, no matter what Kathy is bringing to me Sunday. When it comes to things like that I pretty much just dissolve into tears and sniffles, I’m worthless that way.

Anyway, that said – even though I know anyone and everyone involved would probably insist I don’t owe anyone any explanations – I feel like I still need to sort of clarify some things and attempt to explain a little, or at least some of what I possibly can publicly, about how and why things got this bad. Unfortunately there’s not a whole lot I can really go into here on the blog, for several reasons.

As many of you will remember, things were already kind of bad and shaky prior to last fall, though looking back NOW, those struggles look like a piece of cake compared to what I’ve been dealing with the last many months.

The best way I really know how to explain what’s happened now is for those of you that have traditional jobs, or have had them up until recently, to imagine not getting paid since, say, October or November. Or imagine only getting paid enough every month to pay your rent or house payment.

That’s pretty much exactly what I’ve been dealing with, more or less. I can’t really say more publicly – not because of anything illegal, or anything of that sort – just out of respect for other people’s feelings due to the circumstances, I am choosing not to talk about it at length publicly. I have shared more of the details with a few, and if I know you, I’m happy to forward a copy of the e-mail I sent in those cases, or they can, or whatever, or we’ll talk about it over a meal sometime if I ever get to Nashville again or whatever. I don’t mind my friends knowing more about the situation, I’m just not going to blog about it on that public level.

But that’s pretty much what happened, and I’ve been scrambling ever since trying not to drown under what’s been a flood of never-ending stress and anxiety and I suppose terror, even, because of all the behind-ness that situation has wrought. All that behind-ness usually made even worse because, for a while there, every month would roll around and something still wouldn’t have been taken care of, so now there was an urgent need to get this paid or that paid – which has meant ongoing late fees and, on several occasions, overdraft fees trying to keep something or another from getting canceled or cut off. I’ve probably paid another year’s worth or more of car payments alone just in late fees all these months, but there was nothing else that could be done about it.

In all the cutting back and cutting out, somewhat fortunately I guess there were a few things that weren’t an issue when things grew so dire. I actually cut out cable a few years ago, when I still had a regular paycheck coming in, because I was spending so much more time online anyway and everything I watched much was available online, I just really couldn’t justify shelling out that kind of money every month anymore.

Same thing with my cell service. I’ve never been a big cell phone user and mainly carry mine for emergency purposes more than anything else. I couldn’t justify all that contract money anymore so I went to cheap and prepaid ages ago, and not only have been all the better for it but have more coverage than I did with my previous provider anyway and rarely any of the problems I had before with dropped calls and such. My mom has used the same prepaid service for years so now that’s just part of my birthday present every year, air time, and I never use a whole year’s worth in a year anyway.

So those were not issues – everything else has been, in any case. My mom wasn’t going to let me starve or anything, and has gone far and beyond the call of duty again and again and again all these months trying to help save me from disaster, to the point where she really has no extra to keep sparing. What I hate the most is that, for months and months, she believed everything was going to be okay the next month because I thought it was going to be – only for that month to come around and nope, and there we’d be scrambling to keep my utilities from getting turned off or this paid or that paid. She didn’t go on her usual vacation last year because of me, and if it weren’t for Social Security kicking in this year, I’d probably already be homeless and she would not be on vacation right now. Then there’s the boyfriend who is unable to work right now and wants nothing more than to be able to provide for me/us, and maybe in a couple of years we will be a two-income family and all of this current stuff will just be a bad memory – but that’s then, and this is now, and now sucks.

Anyway, as I wrote before, after this many months of struggling like this, it had gotten to be end of the rope time, there was nothing left. Have sold almost everything I had left to sell other than the one thing(s) that are the only “family heirloom” type thing that is just mine, no one else’s, that I have left, stuff I mentioned in a recent post – and that may well still go, and is not worth all that much anyway. Well, there is one other thing, but I’ve got to get up home to be able to do that and haven’t really been looking forward to dealing with that anyway (i.e., potentially shipping some things that are very, very breakable) and am actually probably going to make a blog post about it next week – this is something that is not only a pain to think about selling and shipping via eBay or something, but is also something really only a small percentage of people would be interested in owning. I’m thinking with the power of the Internet, I might find that person between now and Christmas and solve this problem; otherwise, it’ll be going up on eBay probably about the time people start Christmas shopping.

But yeah, really, like I said – think about your job, if you have one. And then think about not getting paid or only getting paid one bill’s worth every month since last fall, and that’s pretty much right where I am, and have been.

Other possibilities – there’s so many people going for every job that comes up, and a friend of mine here in town who is in charge of hiring where she is told me lately it’s nothing like it has ever been. Instead of 25 or 50 resumes coming in for every job she posts, she’s getting 200. Then there’s the other ones – the ones I’m way overqualified for and so is most everyone else – someone I know who hires for a place like that put it this way: why would he hire anyone that’s likely to leave as soon as the economy gets better or something else comes up? He, too, is seeing hundreds of applications for every position that opens, and in the case of his business, he says about 90% of them are overqualified, or maybe qualified to have HIS job – but not the position that’s open.

But the other thing is – and I think maybe there are some others out there that missed this, because Kathy didn’t realize it, though I know not everyone missed it because several, including The Awesomest Squirrel Queen in the World, commented on it when I mentioned it before – I actually AM working, besides what I have not been paid for. I actually really like my new gig doing QA work, it doesn’t pay much but it’s steady, but at least it does pay SOMETHING. I also do some other freelance work to bring in a little, and then there’s my other venture, which many of you have been aware of for a while, which is still continuing to steadily grow, though penny by penny, and that’s pretty much literally. It is growing, however, and I’ve built a foundation of what should (unless the whole industry hoses) continue to be residual income that grows. As it is, what started out as a little venture with big plans brought in over a year’s time what would have been nice “extra” money… if it hadn’t almost been my ONLY money.

I really do almost nothing BUT work to bring in what little I do – if I’m not working on one thing, it’s something else, or something else, or doing QA work, all day every day. Sleep for three or four hours, get up and scramble to bring in some money some more. Just been a constant ongoing thing and probably needless to say, I stay exhausted.

But I am, much like I said before, finally at a point where if I can just get a grip on the backlog, getting by month to month again is within my reach. It may require 80 hours a week of doing QA reviews, but I’m finally to a point where being able to get by every month, even if it’s just barely squeaking by, is possible.

But that’s what’s so frustrating about all this backlog that has just been stacking up and stacking up all these months struggling through this and staying perpetually behind – two months behind on this bill, a month behind on that bill, every once in a while three months behind and barely saving myself before cutoff/cancellations or losing everything. That much stress and anxiety is not good for anyone and it’s just consumed me daily for months and been downright frightening plenty – I probably need to be on medication at this point but much like my glasses that have needed to be replaced for a couple of years now, teeth that need to be fixed, my stupid broken windshield that got broken while sitting in my driveway during a storm (yep, that’s my luck) and some other stuff that I have just had to put on hold (including stuff people normally absolutely do not NOT pay every year – read into that what you want and you’re probably right) – well, anything extraneous is just out of the question completely right now. My glasses may be all scratched up and my prescription’s probably long since changed again, but as long as I can see out of them, whatever, and I still have a partial supply of contacts left from a few years ago that probably also need a prescription change, but for going out of the house purposes, they’ll do just fine until I can actually do something about it all again.

Anyway, so there you have it, what I can say publicly anyway, and I don’t want to keep going on about it here but it’s sort of my understanding that several people have been involved in trying to help and even though I really don’t know the full scope of it all yet, I just wanted to clarify and better outline a little more than I did before, maybe. Especially in trying to give an example of what it really is I’ve been dealing with, and also – especially after realizing that Kathy didn’t realize I am working at all – to clarify that I am doing work, and doing other things to try and fix all this. It’s just not much money, but at least it’s a little.

I’m also going to do something that I never intended to do, but it was suggested to me by someone else that maybe I ought to put a donation button on the blog in case there were those that wanted to help but didn’t want to take a chance on embarrassing me by asking, or whatever. Believe me, at this point with things as bad as they’ve gotten and after months and months of struggling and dealing with this stuff, I’m beyond any embarrassment or anything of the sort about accepting any help and stuff. I know some have already done plenty and they’ve done enough, and I’m not going to think anything negative about anyone who doesn’t, but for anyone else who just happens along and wants to, or has, I’m humbled and beyond words when it comes to appreciation and gratitude of those who do or have. So there it is and I’ll be putting it in the sidebar to stay, I guess.

I just can’t really put into words how not only depressing but just plain frightening it’s all been. My anxiety and stress levels have been so high and so constantly for so long, and with a pretty huge family history of both stroke and heart disease, even all the more frightening to be that stressed out all the time. There was a very scary couple or three days in December that I really don’t ever want to relive again, and I’d like to think I’m handling all that anxiety and depression a little better than I was at that particular time, but then there’s weeks like last week, when ’round about Wednesday evening, it occurred to me that the reason I was feeling sick and dizzy was probably because I hadn’t really realized it, but I had spent most of the last three days holding my breath repeatedly because I was so worried about how I was going to take care of what needed to be paid that week. That kind of anxiety.

I just want to be able to breathe again, and not be in a constant state like that almost 24/7 for weeks and months at a time. And be able to sleep more than a fitful three or four hours waking up worrying some more. And maybe only spend, say, 18 hours a day desperately trying to make some income instead of 20 or 22. That would be an improvement.

I do know this. I may not have much else left at this point, but my family and loved ones, and friends blogger and non-blogger alike, and an awful lot of acquaintances as well – you’re all just treasures. I wish I had the right words to fully express how grateful I am and how much I appreciate and heart all of you, but as I said above, times like that, words just start failing me and I just start getting teary-eyed and sniffly instead. So please just know I do. If you’re reading this, then you are most likely one of those treasures and you’re just so fabulous I have no words left to say but that I’m proud to know you and that you crossed my path, wherever and however you did. Thank you all from the bottom of my heart.

Twitter Twisters

So, here I sit on the western side of the state, where there hasn’t been a raindrop all day, once yet again witnessing on Twitter while all my friends in Nashville are Tweeting about the tornadoes/storms/whatever coming through there once yet again. Deja vu.

Of course, we just had our own little dance with straight line winds last Friday that took out a good bit of Memphis greenery, and again on Sunday. I had not gotten out of the house since before the weekend, and was quite shocked yesterday to discover a tree about the size of my house fully uprooted and laying in the yard of someone’s home around the corner from me and about six or seven houses down, not to mention the landscape dotted with trees through roofs of various houses on my route to the grocery store. There wasn’t, like, this massive and constant scene of destruction like with Hurricane Elvis or the infamous ice storm of ’94, but there was at least one house on every street between my house and Kroger that had (or had had) a tree stuck in its roof.

As for Middle Tennessee, the wrath of Mother Nature is still winding its way through and I’m watching various friends Tweeting and checking in either to say everything’s okay, or they’re headed for cover, or it’s passed and look at this poor demolished tree in Aunt B.’s yard. (She’s more upset about the power being out, though, as would I be – it’s frickin’ hot down here for June right now.)

I don’t know what’s worse – being smack in the middle of one, or watching like this from afar when people you care about could be in danger. Well, I do know what’s worse, but they’re both pretty bad. My mom can probably relate to the latter – I’m sure the 15-20 minutes or so between the first call and my second call to her wasn’t fun the night I got stuck in one of Tennessee’s most severe tornadoes of all time. First I called her from the interstate to ask if they were saying on TV there was a tornado warning; 20 minutes or so later, I was calling back to report I was okay, save for my tornado-pummeled and totaled car with the completely cracked windshield.

I did agree with a commenter somewhere or another on one of the Memphis media sites that it was rather laughable how the tornado sirens in the center city went off AFTER the storm had passed through on Friday.

Glancing at Twitter again. Aunt B. reporting that her neighbor’s car is under a tree. Fun, fun.

Quote that made me giggle of the day: @jimreams (the entity formerly known as the Nashville Knucklehead): I’m glad I live in South Nashville. Tornadoes don’t speak Spanish.

I Might Be Typing This in My Sleep, But Probably Not

Thursday was an odd day. First and foremost, it would have been my father’s 67th birthday, if he were alive.

The annual big Relay for Life event was in my hometown over the weekend, and the paper has been publishing the list of donations for luminarias as they come in for about the past month – donations made in memory of those who died from cancer or related illnesses, in honor of cancer survivors, and this year, in honor of caretakers. Well, Thursday was also the day that my father’s name appeared as one of those donated in memory of (by a relative of mine). Not so surprising, though somewhat ironic as far as what day it was.

The paper also publishes snippets of news from bygone days frequently – 25 years ago, 50 years ago, 75 years ago, and sometimes earlier. What was really kind of odd was that 50 years ago, on that same day, the paper showed him and a group of other young men from the county preparing to leave for Castle Heights Military Academy in Lebanon to attend that year’s Boys State session.

I don’t know. It was just kind of an odd day all around.

I want to thank everyone for the kind notes they’ve been leaving; I could never put into words how very much they are appreciated. There are several of you I have been meaning to e-mail personally for days now, but the kinds of hours I’ve been keeping, and time I’ve been spending lately scrambling around as I have trying to slow down this impending disaster – I sleep at weird times, and when I’m not asleep I’m usually snowed under, and my actual working schedule is usually overnights, so I’m usually awake when everyone else is not and vice versa. Except I also will just (when I’m not doing shift work) go for several hours, pass out for two or three or four hours, get up and go some more trying to get stuff done. But many of you will hear from me personally soon, I promise (and KathyT, I did e-mail you and hope you got it, sorry it took five days before I heard the voice mail, oops).

And thanks to many especially for the kind words about Dobie. He was here for so long, and still my “baby puppy” even when he was old and his health failing, and it’s still very hard to believe that he’s really gone. I have a very nice picture to share that my mom took at Christmas when I had to take him with me because of his failing condition, which has wound up being the last taken of so very many that were taken of him over fifteen years. But I can’t really look at it much yet, so I’ll save it for a day when I can.

I probably need to write some more about all the horrible stuff that’s going on and why things have disintegrated to the disastrous point they have, but I’m not really sure how to put it into words here because there’s really only so much I can say publicly – and for good reasons. But it sucks, because for those same reasons, I’ve sort of been stuck fighting this battle on my own almost, and with no one I could really be open with about the details other than my very closest family and friends.

But I will do all of that soon. Unfortunately a good bit of this week is going to be focused on probably selling what little I have left that is worth anything at all (not much, but a little) that is truly just mine – a few things that would have been, I guess you’d say, family heirloom-type stuff if I were leaving anything behind one day. Not that I’m likely going to have children or anything like that at this point, but you know – stuff I never dreamed I’d ever be forced to part with, not like this. I guess if I outlive my mom (doubtful), there’s still a houseful of family things – but nothing that’s just mine, except these few things it looks like I’m going to have to part with.

It’s not much – I guess that’s the worst joke of all about all this stuff, I’m not dealing with thousands upon thousands here and it’d probably be a whole lot easier to swallow if that were the case – but no, there’s only about a grand or two standing between me and complete disaster. Much less than 2K, really, more like about 1.5. That’s the part that really stinks, that in the grand scheme of things, it’s not really all that much. But the problem is now I’ve run out of time is all.

In trying to think things through – and coming to the conclusion there were really no more options anymore but the one thing I have tried for over a year now NOT to have to do – it’s occurred to me that no matter how tough things might be right now, that really doesn’t bother me nearly as much as thinking about how I’m going to feel about it all a year from now, or two years from now, or five or ten years from now – when presumably things will probably be better, but stuff that meant something to me – things bought with me in mind and given to me for very specific reasons – will be gone. And I just can’t even let myself think about all that right now.

Anyway, this week will be busy busy – and I need to get going now as it is, much to do and much to finish – but I’m going to try and keep at the blog again, even if it’s just stupid stuff. Aside from all the awfulness of late, there’s also some really funny stuff I’ve been saving up to share. And I’ll be trying to get some personal e-mailing done this week and next too, some of you I’d been meaning to touch base with anyway and either the constant need-to-do-this or constant passing out cold from exhaustion kept waylaying. So will speak to many of you soon, and will definitely be back here shortly, as soon as I wrap up one big project that has tied me up for months. ’til then…

…

Well, I hemmed and hawed and sighed a while over it, and then I decided I really couldn’t go posting over there without posting over here, too, so… here I am. Just saying hi.

Things are… well, as bad as ever, to be honest. Worse, really. I’m sort of at the end of my rope phase, though I don’t really know what that means because, you know, what’s next? Been drowning a while, just not underwater completely yet, I guess.

I haven’t been writing for a while, really, because (A) there really hasn’t been that much interesting to write about; (B) I’m depressed enough as it is without having to read the hows and whys in black & white; and (C) out of respect for some of the members of my family who do occasionally visit here, I just don’t really want to hash out the gory details of it all on the blog. No parent really wants to know their child (no matter how old they are) is hungry, or frightened, or a lot of other things that are really much worse and it’s really just all better left in the unknown. As unpleasant as the last year and a half has been for me, it’s probably been a lot harder on those who care about me, especially one.

I’ve learned that I can eat on about a dollar a day, or less – that’s just luck, though, since I’ve never been much of an eater and rarely eat more than one meal a day anyway. I’m very tired of repeatedly being in the position of having absolutely no idea how anything’s getting paid this month – where I am again right now – other than rent, which is the one thing I do manage to make every month. For now.

It’s sort of a sick twist that I’m actually in a position where I could at least regain control of monthly living expenses again – if I wasn’t already so very far behind. I got bumped up to QA reviewer for one of the services I’ve been working for for a while now, which is a little more like a “real” job and is steady work, better pay, and something I can possibly eke out a living on – maybe not a great one, but enough – along with the little bits I bring here and there from this or that.

But again, unfortunately I’m so horrifically behind (and have probably paid for a couple of years’ worth of car payments and insurance payments in late fees, overdrafts, etc. just trying to get everything paid but never able to make it on time for months and months) – yeah, that’s still good news, the new work. But it really doesn’t make much of a difference right now when I’m so behind to begin with. If I could just get ahead, or on top of it all at least, for just one month – that would probably make all the difference in the world and I would actually be able to breathe again month to month, maybe. But that’s not likely going to happen, so I just struggle on.

I’m eligible for nothing, for this reason or that reason, whatever. I’ve appreciated well-meant suggestions from well-meaning folks about this or that over the last many months, but one thing I’ve learned in all this is I think there’s some that just don’t get it, it’s beyond a lot of people’s comprehension that one might have nothing.

Like this one suggestion I got about something that was “only $25 or so a week”. Well, that’s nice and all… if you have $25 a week to spare.

Cut off the Internet? Sure, for most that’s an “extra”. For me, it would mean zero income as opposed to the little I do bring in. Though I’ve come dangerously close a few times to losing that, too.

So yeah, I wish I could say things are better, but they’re not, and now you see why I don’t write much lately. It’s crappy enough living it, much less reading about it. I kind have avoided writing much about it (here or elsewhere) too because I’ve seen more of my friends losing jobs, or already bad situations getting worse, lately – and I don’t want to be more of a downer. But most of them will be fine. Especially one – I just know whatever’s next on the horizon there is gonna be great.

Me, I’m just here. That’s about all I know to say for now. See ya again soon.

P.S. Dobie, my 15 year old dog, left us on Good Friday. Not really ready to write about that yet, either, but probably will before too long.

Merry Merry

I think this is the first time in my life I have ever been alone on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.  It won’t last – my sister couldn’t leave Nebraska until after work Wednesday, so Christmas for us is pushed back a day, my Christmas Eve will technically be tonight and Christmas Day tomorrow.  In fact, I’m on my way out of town shortly today to get that ball rolling.

Several days ago, I wrote about my frustration and sadness about not really being able to “participate” in Christmas for the second year in a row.  After I’d posted that, my godmother, who I love dearly, commented that it didn’t matter how many presents we had or did not have and that we would all still have a good Christmas and enjoy being with each other and laughing and having fun like usual, and well, she’s right, that’s all true.  But I still can’t help but be frustrated and sad that I couldn’t do much, and what Newscoma wrote the other day about her own Christmas pretty much hit the nail on the head for me too when it comes to Christmas:

This year is a lean, mean Christmas but I’ve gotten into the spirit to a degree. No, there isn’t any big ticket items. People are getting small gifts that I tried to put some meaning into. I’m a gifty person. I like seeing people’s faces when they open their presents. I’m weird.

That’s always been the fun for me as well, at least ever since I was old enough to do my own Christmas shopping.  You won’t find socks and underwear under the tree in our family – well, you will, but they’re the least important – we do gifts that others would probably think silly and certainly unconventional, but everybody gets stuff they really wanted (and some stuff they didn’t but are resigned to getting every year, like my brother-in-law getting sheep in various forms – a family in-joke) and we have a blast.  I like getting just the perfect things for people and seeing their faces when they open their presents, that’s the big thing for me.

And ever since my parents got divorced, my main priority has always been making sure my Mom gets the stuff she wanted.  And I couldn’t do much of either this year, and it depressed me.

As it turned out, I actually was a little better off than I thought I was.  I thought I only had one thing to give one person, and as I was getting things together getting ready to go out of town and kept finding things I’d forgotten about – including something my mother was supposed to have gotten for Christmas probably two or three years ago – I actually wound up with one gift for each person that will be at our family Christmas.  So I guess that’s better, but I’m still pretty frustrated and depressed about it all.

Really when it comes down to it, I’m about at the end of my rope in general.  Last week I spent three days in such depression, fear, and panic about just everything in general that when things improved just a little bit and I felt a little bit better, it was really concerning to me just how bad it had gotten.  It’s a little bit scary to get that far down.  A lot of those things that people will say things like, “I don’t know how he/she could have done that”, things I used to be able to say – I know why people do those things now.  I can tell you for a fact that if you get knocked down and desperate enough, things that may cross your mind, if only for a fleeting moment, are the kinds of things you never would have thought would do so.

But I don’t know, for some reason I’m still here, although sometimes I wonder if the only reason I haven’t just thrown up my hands and given up yet is because somebody’s got to take care of the pets, and if I weren’t here… well, the cats would probably be taken care of, but I know what would happen to my dogs, and it wouldn’t be what I would want.

So I just keep going, but I’m so tired of all the panic and anxiety and not knowing anything every month – how is this going to get paid, how is that going to get paid, how am I going to be able to eat next week, etc.  The car insurance and phone/Internet miraculously got paid this month – which the latter, you know, I’d probably do without too, but without Internet, then there’s NO income at all.

I still don’t know how the car payment’s getting made this month or catching up on the utility bill, and then January will come and all the panic just starts all over again.  Right now I only have one for sure, every month, monthly check coming in and it will only cover either rent, car insurance, or car payment, so that’s what I consider my rent check.  The rest is pretty much all up in the air every month right now, which is just… yeah, panic-inducing, frustrating, and depressing.

But for a couple of days anyway, I’m just going to attempt to enjoy what there is of Christmas this year and put the rest behind me for a little while.  There will be plenty of time after Saturday for the panic and worrying again, so I’m going to see what little bit of Christmas spirit I can muster up and go with it.

Dobie is not doing very well at all and just had a bath today – which just made him all the more furious with me – my Mom doesn’t know it yet, but he’s coming to visit for Christmas too (thus the bath).  I’m hoping hanging out in a warm house with carpet and a bed to sleep in all by himself with me for a couple of nights, and some turkey and who knows what all else there will be, will perk him up a little bit, or at least make what I am fairly certain now are his last days a little nicer.  He hasn’t shown much interest in food lately, but I kind of expect he will be thrilled about the turkey and whatever scraps.  Sure, table scraps aren’t really good for dogs, but he’s old and he’s dying, as far as I’m concerned he can eat whatever he wants (and whatever he WILL eat).

It seems like this year has just been a never-ending cycle of bad news.  Times have been so tough lately and not just for me, seems like half of nearly everyone I know has been going through something or other – friends losing jobs recently, another recently finding out hers will be terminated at the end of the year, others losing family members here right at Christmas.  It’s just all got to get better sometime, doesn’t it?

Anyway, I hope everyone who stops by here had a really super nice Christmas.  Some of you I miss so much and hope to see in the coming months.  In the meantime, I am on my way in a couple of hours for my own Christmasing, scanty though it is this year.  See you again soon.