Captivity - Day 36 I'd be a great singer if I could sing

The time we know as Weekend has started. We know because hopefully we got to sleep late. I did, which is certainly a major accomplishment. for me. Within 1 hour, Mrs lefty said I looked like my first nap was overdue; it's when see sees me looking a little green. No idea how I pull this one off, but who can argue with a free nap? Or a green person.

How do you know you're done you're done with your 1st nap?
That's a great question.

About the time it took to get to the sofa, I knew I was almost ready, but there was a small hitch: there was no one to give me permission to take the nap. Fortunately she had hidden herself well, out by the green stuff growing there. She knew that's the last place I'd look. Cheeky bugger.


We're at roughly 9 weeks since we've been in a car over for more than 5 minutes. I'd wear men's clothes again if we could go out.


I told everyone that it was only a matter of time until Gucci, Kate Spade, and Coach come out with their own coordinated masks. 1 for each day of the week. They could come to market in days. Women will snap them up, unless the Flying AIDS starts to go away.  They will help flatten the curve by giving up these $59.95 masks.


Wife runs out to 'take a ride' a lot.
Don't quote me, but I think she's actually shopping.
The 3rd time she asked me to bring in the bags was what tipped me off.


So about those hallucinations... I wouldn't recommend them.
It was a real bummer because I didn't get to see anything interesting.
I asked the doctor if he could come up with something for the weekend, or very late at night. Doctor not amused. At least he didn't say exercise. The neighbors either think I drink, or I'm Herman Munster. Let's just say I had some problems getting down the 2 steps to go out. It's not fair, if you look at it objectively. I tried drugs once and left them all behind. Now here I am, feeling like they're all coming back to pool their evil natures and turn me into a superhero. Dr Side Effects! Faster than an old candy bar keep under your seat. Because you're paying attention to your cell phone!. More disappointing than your penis not working on antidepressants! Doesn't hang out in your lip or nose hairs! It's Dr Side Effects!

So anyway, All those neato things that kept flying around me are no longer there. Either that or they're there and I can't see them during the day. Ooh, that's rather unpleasant thought.  MOMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM. So no more hallucinations. The doc recommended another pill to stop me from being so animated in my sleep. Apparently I put on quite the show. With my clothes ON. I only fall up the steps if I have to lean backwards. On the bright side, they're cheaper than Frosted Flakes, but don't taste as good.

So right now it's 3 pills that directly work on the problem, and 2 for the symptoms of the 3 pills that work on the symptoms. Next time I'm going to ask for better symptoms. I'm not sure if they're working.. Perhaps the sea lions on the ceiling can give me a better idea.


Another billion dollar idea: Start advertising yourself as a divorce lawyer. If couples haven't killed themselves yet, it's only a matter of time. Also an OB/gyn.

Captivity - Day 34 a clean colon is a happy colon

Every now and then, I remind myself of the ahhhhhhh feeling I get from bathing; usually once a month or so.  Working from home is exhilarating... so many negative things (in-person meetings, clothes, silicone toys, etc). If you're particularly eager to get out of a meeting, tell them you're not wearing anything below your shirt. Or women's underwear - adjust to taste. Or just a bra - people are fascinated by bras (unless it's a guy figuring how to take one off). Then there's the interruptions... PLEASE TELL THE DOG TO STOP BARKING, put a tit in the kid's mouth, why is it that you only become chatty when I'm in a meeting? Does the sound of talking from my phone give it away?

My stomach is getting weird (moreso). It lets me know I'm hungry before I know it. It's not the generic grumble, like normal people have; this kind actually speaks.  When you're sitting there, minding your business, you start hearing stuff. It can even impersonate some of your friends and relatives. So if you hear one of your friends knocking on the door and cursing lightly, it's more of a complaint than a standard. Just the other night I heard it say "How bout some food, doofus?, in my brother's voice. It scares the dog." Lately it has been ordering pizza, in my voice. It also tries to pick up the owner's wife  Even my stomach noises are doing better than me. Mind you, Mrs lefty wants to know why the owner's wife is always knocking at our door..


Speaking of stomach noises, they sound like they're speaking. Even Mrs lefty says so. We're just never sure what language it's speaking. They're pretty loud, especially when they speak to her.

HEY - did you just call me a fatass who couldn't ride a scooter?
Wasn't me. Talk to the stomach.
No, YOU talk to the stomach, when you want some dinner.



Chocolate covered ants
That is all.

I'm not too concerned about the hallucinations because I heard about them while growing up. At that time they were drug-induced. Doing the Science, I don't do drugs (much to the surprise of others), I barely drink and when I do, I drink like a girl. No pills other than prescription (I have my own prescription pad), and I was weaned off lead paint by the age of 22. I miss that delicate taste. Blue really did taste better than brown.

So none of them explain why those just folded towels look like a dog. Fortunately it's not moving.
However, the things that are moving are a little frightening.
Yesterday the stairs slid down and became a water slide. This needs watching, because I use the stairs.

Ya know how you stare at something for a bit and it starts moving? I don't have to wait. As I type, there's a vertical junk storage thingy on the table. Everything in it is moving, but not at the same time. It looks like it might be sending Morse code, but the laugh is on it - I don't know Morse code. The gorilla hand is holding up a car stereo, as it sometimes does. The part that's odd is that it never moves. Til tonight, I guess.  The garbage pile in my office sits next to a cleaning towel, and keeps being Mrs lefty all day. There's a perfect answer for this: even Normies could see it out of the sides of their eyes. Now that I know what it is, I keep looking at it, like it's her.

Oh yeah, I don't take LSD either.

The dog has been resting on the couch most of the night. She has the fascinating ability to disguise herself as a blanket. Even though I know this, I keep looking at her, to make sure she's ok. The radio antenna has got some motion to it, but only at the end. Last and least, soda cans have started appearing on the coffee table. Anyone, even the fashion-impaired, knows you don't put soda cans on a coffee table. Fortunately it's been cleaned. How do I know? Because I can see 1 square inch of the table top. If progress continues at its current speed, I'll see TWO square inches of table top by December!!

Meanwhile, Sir Paul is tuning up in the guitar room, He says I have more lefty guitars than he does.  Stop sucking up, Paul.


Speaking of which, I'm not getting any audio hallucinations.
The top audio hallucination, as reported by Audio Hallucination Magazine, is Taylor Swift. It's not only this maddening - you sing and dance along with it.



One of the main purposes of this blog is actually to document one weirdo's descent into madness. Apparently we just put the water on to boil.

This Death Thing Must Stop

Work is weird.

Of course work is weird - it's work.

The current employer could not be anywhere near as weird as the previous one, but it has its own particular weirditees. Everything requires a process, including getting a computer and desk. Just because the 2437 form was filled out doesn't mean there's a computer or desk waiting: no one knows where the form goes or how the process works - only that most of the time it doesn't. It was decided I had the job at the beginning of December, and my January 2nd start date came and went, with no computer and no desk. It took an additional six weeks for the computer to arrive. I discovered that it wasn't mandatory to do your job here either, when my boss saw things undone and merrily breezed past them, as if this were normal (it was). After a number of years, this still astounds me. If there's one thing the Twilight Zone<tm> taught me, it was to do your job well and communicate progress. This turned out to be laughably unnecessary. I have the problem of all newbies: I do my work and expect the same from others. My coworkers just laugh at me (most people do) and tell me the job will eventually remove my soul so I'll be just like them (shudder). If someone asks for something that can't be done immediately, I communicate progress. They laugh, shake their heads, and say, "Newbie."  I have requests that were made months ago. When I send reminders, they're promptly ignored. My employer is a parody of itself, like Congress.

• A nod to the draconian government of the UK, which just enacted the most sweeping snooping legislation in the entire world. Naturally there was barely a whimper from the Great Unwashed.
• Why do I care - I'm in the US. Because the UK is frequently a staging ground for the US. Rest assured, it's coming. -Ever vigilant.

• I'm passing this along, even though I know my people don't use iDevices. 12 iPhone security tips for iOS 12. I plan to use as many as I can. 
• The world has taken a large step toward security by using HTTPS instead of HTTP to get to websites. In case you doubt the seriousness of this, important, secure businesses like banks use HTTPS. In case you're still not convinced, PornHub uses it too. To use it yourself, install your browser's version of the HTTPS Everywhere extension, which will only allow HTTPS connections unless the site doesn't support it. You won't have to do anything after installation.

Last night we saw one of those drug commercials with a 15 minute list of possible side effects. It was a cancer drug for post-menopausal women. My favorite warning of all time is "don't take this new med if you're allergic to it." If you experience death, call 1-800-LETS-SUE. The other warning was not to give it to anyone if they may be pregnant. I'm not a doctor (although I'm interested in gynecology and specialize in psych disorders), but post-menopausal women don't get pregnant. Even the alleged Immaculate Conception occurred before the lady in question was 40. Speaking of which, how can anybody be part of a religion which refers to 'without sex' as 'immaculate'?

How can anybody take seriously a blog that starts a paragraph with drugs, migrates to the Virgin Mary, then closes with a Christian sex question?

• If you're ever bored, go through the labels list for this blog. I think anybody thinking of reading ThermionicEmissions should look at them. It's a delightfully absurd hodgepodge of words, which will excite or completely put off a prospective reader.

A new study by Yale professor Cydney Dupree suggests that white Americans who hold liberal socio-political views use language that makes them appear less competent in an effort to get along with racial minorities. Yale. Education has also become a parody of itself. Missing is the black outrage because white liberal Americans think they're stupid.

Meanwhile, every department in which I worked had absolutely no trouble interacting with 'minorities.' We were a team full of minorities, including the rarest of them: women. All that matters is that you do your job well; that's where the difficulty interacting came in. We were either way ahead of our time or woefully behind.

• I will never forget the day the hiring manager came into our office and told us he needed to see more faces of color in our department. As he was finishing, he looked directly at me, as if he was expecting a witty retort. For some reason, perhaps naked fear of job-hunting, my mouth stayed shut. Little did I know, this event foreshadowed the profound stupidity that was to follow. WE NEED DIVERSITY! Why, are minorities better at IT? WE NEED DIVERSITY! What about hiring the best person for the job, regardless of anything else? WE NEED DIVERSITY!
• That particular job made me a pretty happy employee, because I could do my job the best way possible and still pull off goofiness in a way I became known for (and accepted!). While on a late night project, the head of HR asked if we'd like a beer. I told her I didn't drink. She looked at me in horror and said, "You mean you're like this without drugs or alcohol?" It was one of my finest moments.
• I discovered one of my coworkers was a cheerleader in high school. She told me not to tell anybody. Naturally I procured pom poms and followed her down the main hallway, shaking them, right past a managerial meeting. She turned red, the managers fell off their chairs, and I smiled. They left me alone because I did my job well.
• Another Red Moment came when I was under a desk, hooking up a computer. Someone at a nearby desk started a rant about Stupid IT never fixing anything. I popped up from under the desk and she turned shades of red her department had never seen. Her coworkers were in hysterics. She apologized at regular intervals.

Whether or not you consider it valid, people line up for Past Life Regression. Let us suspend disbelief and consider it for a bit.... everybody who comes out says they were a famous person in a prior life: Joan of Arc, Pope John Paul XVIIQ - CMM, or Atilla the Hun. If this is true, who picked up the trash? Who cooked the food? Who taught New Yorkers to add an 'r' to random words (brar, sawr)? After studying this for damn near fifteen seconds, I think I have the rhythm of the method. Let me translate:

• I was Napoleon: I was Napoleon Smith, the guy who fetched hyena meat and wiped Napoleon's ass for him
• I was a highly-decorated naval seaman:  I was frightfully, obnoxiously, annoyingly gay and enjoyed seamen
• I was a famous obstetrician: I got a lot of women pregnant
• I was George Washington, the father of our nation: I got a lot of women pregnant
• I was a very early champion of women's rights: I got a lot of women pregnant and insisted on abortions
• I was JFK: I got a lot of women pregnant
• I was Thomas Crapper - inventor of the toilet: I was the guy who cleaned shit out of Rome's sewers
• I was a judge of early French cuisine: I was a vulture that only ate dead things
• I was a health pioneer, celebrated the world over with raised arms: I was a mosquito, carrying malaria

Careful what you wish for department:

Our dogs have always been small furry people. I wondered what it would be like to adopt a dog that was actually a dog. Yes, we got one. She defends the house by standing at the window and barking like a lunatic when someone is on her sidewalk. I watched her 'find' something, then dig a hole in the yard to go after it. I have only seen dogs dig in cartoons. Then I get dragged out when the door opened because there was a bird flying over her yard.

Thinking further, I prefer small furry people.




Things are going nicely in society's rapid descent to the place where the red guy with the horns is in charge. As proof, I submit this page, which describes a child being prepared for sex change surgery. Have I mentioned he's 6 and is in line for chemical castration at 8?

WTF?

Standard Disclaimer: I am not a doctor and know absolutely nothing about gender reassignment. Of course there's a however coming... However (I told you it was coming), it doesn't take a PhD (Piled High and Deep) to figure out that a 6 year old is not legally allowed to and is not capable of making this decision, Then there's another small issue: he hasn't hit puberty yet. If the mother child decided to become an alcoholic, would this be ok?

Here is where it truly devolves to Peak Stupid:

• Mom has changed his name to Luna and dresses him in female clothes
• Mom enrolled him in school as a female.
• Mom has support and financial backing
• There is a nasty custody battle
• (non-custodial) Dad, who seems relatively sane, is required to pay for this
• Dad has been accused of abuse for saying his son is male
• The 'debate' is being fought on social and religious issues.

Of course the plea is slanted (it's Dad asking for help), so we can be sure this isn't the full story. But I'm sure the main concept (sex change) is correct.

Fact: children under a certain age (16-18?) cannot have nose jobs for cosmetic reasons.

Announcement: today I identify as a 6 year old and demand to be treated as such. I'm enrolling in first grade and will sue if I am age-bullied. Hopefully I will not be the tallest kid in class - that's hard on kids. Since I'm so socially awkward, I won't bother the girls (or the boys, probably). Class Clown status is virtually assured, like the last time I was 6. If they give me a Chromebook, the class will get a presentation on security. If they give me a Macbook, I will spend the rest of the week in the principal's office. Ah, good times....

• Have you noticed the commercials for the products called "That's What I Call Music"? Inevitably it's not.

As Captain Picard Kirk said, or one of those other captains, "Keep your friends' genitals.." no.. wait.. "Keep your friends close, keep your enemies in France." No, that wasn't it either. France... maybe it was Napoleon. Remember the good old days, when people with certain disorders thought they were Napoleon? You don't see many Napoleons these days. Is this a good thing? Not if you wear your socks on your ears it isn't.

Pithy emissions aside, the last few days have been rough and I felt a strange compulsion (different from my other strange compulsions) to say something (not again), as if saying something is going to make a difference. No, they haven't changed the medicine again.

A superstitious relative says death happens in threes.

[Rod Serling voice] A perfectly ordinary couple, going about their lives.

His mother goes into the hospital and passes in short order.

Immediately after the funeral, they got a call and drove three hours to say goodbye to her father. A few days prior they went to visit their neighbor, with end stage cancer, to say goodbye. He died several hours after they left. While putting together the shiva/wake for his mother, she received news that her father died.

If this were us, I'd start calling us the Angels of Death. People could pay us not to visit their loved ones. Or to visit their loved ones, depending on how they felt about them.

How sadly lucky these people were, to be able to say goodbye. 

If they didn't get the chance, it would haunt them (sorry) for the rest of their lives. The message here is to value what you have. To never be in a position where you'll regret what you said or didn't say. Don't let friends and family be ignorant of your feelings for them. Before you leave mad, ask yourself how you'd feel if that was the last time you spoke to them.  Remember the Big Picture. The only nice thing I can relate is the couple visiting their terminal neighbor brought him joy, possibly the last joy he experienced.

Say what you will, but we treasured each day with Marshall. When he left, we weren't burdened with 'we could have done better'. Unfortunately this doesn't stop grief - it just doesn't add to it. (he's talking about his dead dog again...)

We knew one of the three people well. We had the pleasure of meeting another, with whom I shared a hobby. One passing is more than enough.... three caused a serious ripple in reality. For the couple mentioned above... can you imagine? The only comfort seemed to be friends and loved ones showing up.

We have a lot of thinking to do. Maybe you do too. Maybe you already did. 

Care to tell people what you came up with?

• Coming up next on ThermionicEmissions Television: Things I have pulled out of my foot.