Gainesville Bound
The one thing I always enjoy when arriving in Florida is the amazing change in the whole flora and fauna thing. The palm trees sing out to me in their lazy southern voices with elephant sized leaves fluttering in the gentle tropical breezes and welcome me once again to paradise. It looks different. It feels different. It is different. I understand the attraction that this state and its environs hold for writers, derelicts, and people who just want to go someplace where they can lose themselves in themselves. Maybe it's a combination of the change in vegetation and a change in climate. Not sure exactly but it's good to be back all of those things notwithstanding.
I've noticed as well that the women down here tend to wear perfume more so than their counterparts in the North. Just call me Mr. Sensitivity. I find this to be ever so slightly annoying. A fella can't have a decent cup of coffee without catching a whiff of some highly toxic perfume. I love the aroma of coffee and that may well be part of the overall experience so adding a virulent stench of perfume is not my idea of a good time.
But, I digress. Seems that Ev's blood sugars have not been right and have not been right for quite some time. How does that boy expect to function when he's in denial about this whole GD business. It just isn't happening. According to Weinstein, his denying this business has been part of the problem and not part of the solution. It has everything to do with the other peripheral issues that we've seen in Ev over the last several months. It is a good thing as well that he has purged himself of the poisons that he was taking thinking all along that these were good for him and would put him on the path to wellness. We know better now but it took a while to sort it all out. And now, it is all coming full circle. Even Weinstein had to start at the beginning with the diagrams, the explanations, the encouragements, and the sit-downs.
That may well explain too the business about creating an environment where his requirements never exceeded that which his body was capable of meeting or exceeding. If your blood sugars are never in check, then you are likely to feel less energetic, less likely to want to engage with the world around you so you go into a self imposed hibernation. And then you limit yourself even further by wanting no part of certain things that could do you harm in your weakened condition. That is not an easy task when these are things that offer you a sometimes pleasant and sometimes destructive distraction. Taking it one step further, you start to put up walls with people who were once friends when you discover that the distractions you shared were ones that you are now trying to avoid.
Weinstein called our cell at some point during the first day and wanted to tell us the good news. He thinks that Evan is doing great. He thinks that the problems we've seen to date are related to the blood sugar issue and that all of his interactions with Evan suggest that none of the other peripheral issues come even close to being true or otherwise contributing to his present day problems. It is something Evan needs to stop denying and that appears to be a large part of the overall game plan. None of his friends have ever known and that has been of his choosing and not for us to question.
His business is his business however he chooses to conduct it and we as his parents have never questioned that aspect of his life. When he hides it, he invites disaster and that has to stop. He has to tell his friends that he can no longer do things that they once did to excess because his body will not tolerate it. These are destructive things that he can no longer indulge in to excess as he once did. It is true that he has come to this realization on his own but now there are even bigger issues for him to address and perhaps bigger than we realized when we stepped on to that plane just two days ago. We'll know more in the days to come but are hopeful that he and we can get back on track so he can have a normal life. Maybe what they say is true. Today is the first day of the rest of his life.
I have to say that I'm a few days now into my vacation which I didn't expect to be much of a vacation because I was not going to be doing something of my choosing. I was a reluctant passenger on a trip that I had no interest in and actually resisted but thought better of it given what we were needing to accomplish. I thought the end result would be the same. His work-ups would be better than normal and the Dr. would give him a few tips on avoiding things that weren't good for him and we would be on our way. We are taking greater comfort in his assessment and determination that this is something that Evan can fix so we are wanting to share his enthusiasm and we now have renewed hope so I'm glad to have made the trip. I think the translation had I not come might not have worked and that would have been a mistake. It is perhaps now more important than ever that Evan has our support and that we both understand as his parents the peril that he faces if he fails to do what he needs to do.
But I am enjoying the other things that I was not prepared to enjoy in coming down here. I love the climes here in Florida and there is just something very alluring about this state that keeps calling me back. We had a terrific dinner last night, just Nancy and I, at the Bonefish Grill here in Gainesville. I ordered the arctic char and Nancy had a chicken dish. That surprised me since she enjoys fish and will order it over chicken in most cases. My meal was served with a spinach fettuccine strewn with peas and string beans. I could have passed on the beans but enjoyed the pasta although it was a bit too buttery. A little parmesan cheese might have been nice. What kind of restaurant serves pasta without parmesan cheese? I ordered some tuna sushi as well and that was equally as delightful although they never give you enough pickled ginger when serving up that dish and it is just something you can't re-request. Even though I never order dessert anywhere I ordered some key lime pie which Nancy and I shared and found to be unbelievably good.
It was a sultry night in Gainesville last evening and you could see heat lightning flashing across the southern sky on the horizon where storm clouds had been gathering the better part of the day. It was not so threatening that we didn't feel like taking a quick walk before calling it a night so that is precisely what we did. The malls line up here on Archer Road back to back for as far as the eye can see and they offer a variety of routes and distractions for those interested in one or both. The night was warm enough where we lingered in doorways of stores and shops along the route just long enough to feel the air conditioning touch our skin and we were on our way once again. We walked in and out of stores and up and down aisles to walk off our dinner and take in the sights and sounds of a Gainesville that could have just as easily been anywhere USA. A Target store is a Target store whether you are in a New Hampshire or Gainesville, Florida. But these stores were cool and offered a pleasant respite to a couple of otherwise weary travelers who were looking to pass away the time before letting another day go into the night.
Remind me not to stay in a Lodge Hotel again. It was drab from the get go. The hallways leading to our room were indicative of the room we were about to occupy for the better part of two days and the only difference was that the rooms were far cooler than the hallways. The drabness was an insidious drabness infiltrating every nook of the hotel that we could see. Nancy wondered aloud at one point if the hotel clerk didn't put us into a room that was less than desirable because of our racial profile. It would come as no surprise in the wake of the Ferguson, Baltimore, and other incidents across our nation where hordes of rioting blacks push back against what they would have you believe to be racially motivated attacks against blacks and other minority groups. That will never excuse or explain the actions of these so called protesters as they assemble in the thousands chanting, "What do we want"? "Dead cops" "When do we want it"? "Now!" So, to think that we are not now or ever targeted however they do this is just plain silliness. And tonight, we will move to another hotel and trust that decisions made are made not on the basis of race but rather on the basis of what is or what is not available.
This vacation is also a chance to think a little bit about what I may want to do come fall. I'll need to find something new and interesting to occupy my free time. I find that even while on vacation that with each passing day I have a little more energy and a little more oomph. It is kind of a mental energy that is otherwise reserved for work related matters that I ignore when I'm not working and tap without reservation when I find it too much to ignore. Maybe that is why the two week vacation thing is so desirable for those who have the time and resources to pursue. You get to think about things that you wouldn't otherwise think about; do things that you wouldn't otherwise do; and pursue things that you wouldn't otherwise pursue. Maybe as I get older too I have less tolerance for spending time on things that are of lesser value or perhaps put differently extracting the maximum value out of the time put in to whatever it is that I turn my attention to. I'm not sure about traveling. Is it something I would like? Not like? I do enjoy a change of scenery from time to time and it helps to break the monotony however one defines that. Just having the freedom to consider a life of leisure is a good thing. Maybe it's a great thing. Maybe one day I'll look back and wonder why I spent as many years as I did doing something that in retrospect was not time well spent. Truth be told, I am not one to ever look in the rear view mirror so would probably not go there in any meaningful way. To reminisce, perhaps. To regret, never.
We are a year and a half away from the 2016 presidential election and there must be a dozen or more candidates lining up on the republican side of the aisle while there is only Hillary Clinton on the democratic side. With issues mounting left and right by press corps following both camps, it is clear that there are far more serious questions about Hillary Clinton and her influence buying schemes while she was Secretary of State than any candidates on either side. The tenor of those relationships is incestuous as best and the beneficiaries of the foundation at the center of all these questions is none other than Bill and Hillary Clinton. She has been campaigning now for 30 days and has not taken any questions from the press. We're talking about the leftist press that makes no bones about which party they favor and which political philosophy they favor for the country. It is a socialistic philosophy they favor where the government holds all the power and the people have less and less say in what and how government operates. The press wants to be on the right side when one party government rules the day and the constitution is nothing more than a document to interpret in order to serve the greater cause of liberalism. My guess is that Ms. Clinton will not be the nominee as time goes on and her candidacy will collapse under the sheer weight of the evidence mounting against her. I'm just waiting for the other high heel to drop.
Thursday, May 21 2015
Maybe it will just be the same old same old. Ev stayed one night and not two and that was his choice. The only reason to stay two was to reinforce key pieces of the message that was communicated to Evan while he was there in the hospital. He wasn't out of the place two minutes when he seemed to lapse into his old ways. It was like he forgot everything he had been told and was now resorting to his old ways. Let's be clear. He wasn't there for an attitude shift so we shouldn't be surprised that we didn't see a shift in his attitude. Where is dad? Why is he in Starbucks? When they finally caught up with me Evan didn't come into the store but rather stood outside looking in while Nancy and I did what we did. Now that he is on his new regimen we'll see if that produces any positive effects. We're hopeful but not overly optimistic so we'll just have to let things play out for a while and see.
I'm rather liking the heat down here in Florida and am not finding it overly oppressive. It may be too early in the season for the suffocating humidity that one finds during the summer months here so I'm just as happy to be ahead of that schedule by a month or two. Evan didn't want to join us for dinner last night so Nancy and I went to the Dragonfly Sake restaurant in downtown Gainesville without him. We would not have gone there had he been with us so it was just as well that he chose to stay behind since I was very interested in having a bite to eat there. It was a shi-shi kind of place and we had to wait a bit to get seated but not too long. One of these days I'm going to learn to use chopsticks so I can go to these places and not feel out of place asking for utensils. I wondered for a brief moment whether the people who appeared to be using them so effortlessly were really as adept as they looked when using them. I guess the true test is that you can move food from your plate to your mouth without dropping anything and I can honestly say that I didn't detect any slippage when observing those I observed.
The serving style seemed to be somewhere between tapas and dim sum and our waitress may have alluded to that when she arrived at our table. I love both dim sum and tapas but didn't quite honestly see how that applied to the items we were planing on ordering from the menu. We had tables on either side of us where the parties dining had either multiple items on their table served all at once or a constant flow of dishes served one after the other all quite delicious looking and I wondered which items on the menu I was seeing. I was also quite astounded as well at the amount of food they were consuming and I thought that maybe that the real art to eating raw fish and the like was not how much you could eat but the order in which you ate them that allowed you to consume large quantities of food without gorging yourself like an ugly American.
It goes without saying that the dishes were artistically and strategically paced and placed by the chefs working at their craft behind the open counter. The colors, the serving dishes, the ambiance, nothing was left to chance. In hindsight, I should have left the selection of dishes not to chance but to the waitress who waited on our table. I had a "chef's choice" dish where one or two of the selections were something that I would not order again. At the end of the day, I don't care how good it looks. If it doesn't tastes good then it doesn't pass the test. I'll be more careful next time. That may mean leaving the selection of dishes up to the person serving our dinner. I also ordered a rather exquisite tequila cocktail that was served in a small glass with a disproportionately large ice cube plunked into the center of the glass. It was the proverbial square peg placed in a round hole and the fit was perfect. I'm not a big fan of alcohol but the drink brought about the desired effect so that was good. Nancy is not a fan of raw fish so found an item on the menu to her liking which I ended up eating instead. She was not all that hungry to begin with so that worked out fine. 
This is our last full day here in Florida and we'll be driving to Orlando this afternoon where we'll spend our last day before catching our plane tomorrow morning at 11. Nancy wondered aloud here and there about whether or not she had been caught on camera going through a yellow light and fretted just a bit about getting a ticket in the mail after we arrive home. The lights do change rather quickly and there was something on the news here about having to reimburse motorists for lights that had been tweaked too tightly creating a situation where you couldn't avoid going through it no matter how hard you tried. Since seeing that piece on the television we see cameras everywhere. At every intersection; at every corner;and at every stop light in any stretch of highway here in Gainesville. Is there no end to the intrusion of big government? Will they stop at nothing when it comes to monitoring and penalizing citizens and motorists alike? You may want to ask Rand Paul. He was filibustering as only he can to make sure that certain aspects of the Patriot Act, that of collecting cell phone data from American citizens, is not renewed when the Patriot Act is renewed. One more example of the difference between democrats and republicans where the democrats almost to a person voted to keep the Act intact while the republicans sought to dismantle the most odious aspects of it, i.e. the spying and collecting of data. That can't hurt his chances in his run for president. Makes me wonder how the millennials feel about this sort of thing.
Friday, May 22nd, 2015
Buenos dias! Kuhner is talking up Ted Cruz this morning on WRKO. He has been my candidate from day one so glad someone is finally taking notice. What do you think his chances are of getting the latino vote? Well, maybe not all of it but I'll bet you dollars to donuts that he gets 50%. How can he not get 50% with a name like Cruz? But, it's not all about having just the right name, is it. He has a different message for the latin community and one that offers a stark contrast to that offered by the Liberal establishment. It says that is you want to be successful, we will help you be successful. We will not enable and suppress you with government programs and handouts that tear down your communities and ruin your families and the hopes and desires of your generations to come. We will work with you to sustain your communities with independent thought and action that will embolden your leaders, strengthen your individual capabilities, and in the immortal words of Ronald Reagan, help you to pull yourself up by your bootstraps. It is a message of hope, not fear. It is a message of inclusion, not exclusion. It is a message of independence, not dependence. 
And you know that when the liberal press asks questions Mr. Cruz why he hates gays, that he will turn on them and put them in their place. He will expose them for the frauds that they are. It will not be an easy task. The media will assault Mr. Cruz with the full force of the liberal establishment behind them but they will not be successful. He will stand his ground as the righteous lion that he is in believing as he does in god, the constitution, and everything that is right. He will not go into office offering to his supporters the message of fundamentally transforming our country. Rather, he will no doubt offer to restore the greatness of our country that has so frayed and torn asunder under the miserable so-called leadership of Barack Obama. The policemen and women that keep order on the streets of our cities will regain the respect of their communities under President Cruz; He will work with the Congress to implement a health plan that benefits all americans and not just those under a certain income threshold; he will work to consolidate the love and trust of the many disparate communities that have been working at odds under Obama; and he will restore the concept of American exceptionalism that Obama watered down at every turn. Obama wanted us to be no better and no worse than the most miserable of banana republics and that will not be the battle cry of the American people once President Cruz takes office.
Sunday, May 24th 2015
It's good to be back on terra firm. Good to be back in the hood. Not so good that there is now lots on my plate. Things to do that I ignored while away but now they are front and center. What is with this cool weather? I think it's been in the sixties since we got back and it has definitely been sweater weather. Maybe even hat weather. Nana's mom spoke about having to bring in her plants at night because of the threat of frost. That might be pushing it a little bit but you know how older people fret about things from time to time that may make little or no sense to someone else. We were hoping to see more of Ev after his time in Gainesville but that does not seem to be the case. He is less annoyed perhaps when we do see him and that is due in no small measure to his new regimen. I thought maybe he was taking just as much CS but he is actually taking it not only more frequently but he is also taking more of it when he does take it. Not that it matters. He seems to take it without a problem so for that we should be grateful. Now we just need to get him motivated and into some other regimen where he and we feel better about the direction he is taking.
Nancy too seems to be having some difficulty getting back into the groove. Not that she misses Florida or anything because I think she doesn't. Both she and the Ev man commented that they didn't like Florida when we were down there. I was thinking to myself that they were being a bit sort sighted in making their comments and wondered if they would feel the same had we landed in the middle of February from New England to 80 degree temperatures, a full sun, and palm trees on every corner. Me thinks not. I was perfectly happy once there in taking walks, taking in the sights, and doing whatever I damn well felt like doing. I could see myself going there for periods at a time. Not so much in the summer, mind you, but once the weather turns cold I could see going there with some frequency. This is where having a private jet might come in handy. I'm glad we decided not to drive to Florida. We just would have been too tuckered once we arrived to do much of anything. As much as I might have missed driving through all of those lovely southern states with their peculiar offerings, pecan pies and fresh peaches in Georgia for example, that will have to wait for another day and time.
It will be back to work soon for another few months and then that is all she wrote. I will turn my attention elsewhere and that will be a good thing. Best not to get too ingrained in anything lest you make it the focal point of your life and then you wonder what will become of you when that focal point disappears. Like the drill press operator who does when he does for 45 years and then just stops working his drill press. Or, whatever drill press operators do. Not to sell them short or anything. I'm sure it's a perfectly wonderful occupation. I suppose if you were a writer that would be different. You wouldn't stop writing, would you? Or even a teacher. You might stop teaching or going into the classroom but you would always be teacher one way or another. I wouldn't even call what I do a discipline so do not have any habits bad or otherwise to break when I just stop doing what I do. And I think back to the early part of my life when I did a lot of different things and enjoyed the variety for many years before settling into my current profession. Reverting to the days when I made it up as I went along will be the order of the day going forward and I am comfortable with that charge. It is times like this when I'm off and away from my job that makes it easy to envision a day when I no longer go to the office every day. I'll keep practicing and thinking forward about other things. Other things that I only dream about now. Dreaming is where I'll go.