Category Humor

The Incredible Shrinking Man

Michael 4 Comments

I got on the scale last Friday, like I have almost every day for the past I don’t know how many years, and like it has been for so many of them I read out to myself 154.8 pounds. I then hopped into the shower (ok, I gingerly eased myself over the tub wall and carefully positioned myself under the running water’s spray), shampooed, rinsed, repeated, lathered, rinsed, sang a few verses of He’s So Fine (I was having a feminine moment), then hopped back out (no, I’m not going through that again). And then walked past the scale and couldn’t remember if I had recorded that day’s weight. So I weighed myself again.

No, I’m not obsessed with my body, good or bad it may be or the weight of it. I am, like most people with late stage kidney disease, obsessed with making sure my body isn’t holding onto water unduly. The best way to do this is to weigh oneself and track that weight hoping not to find more than minor daily changes or steady increases over time. Hence the daily recording and the longish explanation I just made you suffer.

Anyway, I weighed myself again. 154.6 pounds. I went to jot that number when I saw I had indeed recorded the earlier figure of 154.8 pounds. Hmm. I was sure I had just weighed myself at that lower number. Because I have always been a bit more than a bit obsessive I decided to again step on the scale. Yep, 154.6. Hmm.

ScaleSaturday morning I went through my routine weigh-in (or weigh-in routine if you prefer) and found myself to be 154.6 pounds. Did the shower stuff, made use of the freshly laundered bath towel (love a soft towel), and glanced down at the scale. Should I? I did. And it read 154.4 pounds.

Skip to Sunday. Before shower, 154.6. After, 154.4. Monday before, 154.8. (Went out for dinner Sunday. Must have been that glass of wine). After, 154.6. Tuesday, the same 0.2 pound difference. What is happening to me? Am I shrinking?

Two-tenths of a pound does not seem like much. Indeed it isn’t. It’s about 3 and 1/2 ounces, around 100 grams. On the other hand, it’s more than just a dribble. It is, to keep my comparisons bathroom related, a bit less than a family size tube of toothpaste, a bit more shampoo than what the TSA will permit you to carry through an airport security checkpoint. Where did those ounces go?

Since I conducted my experiment, non-scientific though it was, over 5 days and came up with the identical data for each day, I am assuming valid results. I wash off two tenths of a pound with every shower. Perhaps I’m rubbing too hard and sloughing off more skin than I can regrow in the time I’m under the water. If I use a luffa instead of a sponge would I weigh even less? Maybe I’m getting too involved with my intra-shower songfest. Would the choice of a shorter song or a less energetic display of air guitar playing (don’t judge me) result in less weight loss? Could the water actually be too hot and I really am shrinking? I’m sure I’ve never been Scotch Guarded and anything is possible.

I don’t know where it’s going but I am definitely lighter on the after side of the morning wash up. I might see if I can commercialize my findings. People are always looking for a no pain weight loss program. What can be more painless than showering? If everybody experiences the same 3+ ounce loss with each shower only 5 showers a day a day makes for more than a pound off every 24 hours. In a week that could be almost 10 pounds. Providing your hot water heater can take the strain.

I’m going to look into this. After all, I have that kind of time.

Lost Luggage

Michael 10 Comments
The past couple of weeks I’ve had an issue finding something that I wanted to write about. This week was quite different. I just have said to myself, “Self, now that’s blogworthy!” at least a half dozen times. And even though I took a couple of those ideas and fleshed them out to full fledged posts, none of them are what you’re about to read. Umm, assuming you’re going to stick it out here with me and keep on reading.
Sunday afternoon I was hanging around, feet up, relaxing for all the world to see, and catching up on the day’s email, which included a few new posts from the myriad and eclectic selected blogs I follow. Among those was the newest post by Nicole Sundays. If you’ve not read her yet you should go over and see what she has to say. Nicole reminds me of the daughter I never had. Now there’s nothing wrong with the daughter I do have. In fact, I am quite fond of that daughter and I would never trade her in. But…sometime I just don’t understand how that creative, confident, successful young woman got that way from my attempts at child rearing. Fortunately she has. And fortunately I’ll be well (hopefully) taken care of in my old age. Older age. But I digress.
In this week’s post, Nicole tells how she “lost” her luggage and the resumes she carried with her saved her from having to replace a replaceable suitcase. There’s a lot more than that, a lot more, and you need to head over there to read the whole thing (https://nicolesundays.wordpress.com/2017/06/25/i-became-a-security-threat-how-was-your-weekend/) but that one little subplot reminded me of a piece of lost then found luggage. Except it wasn’t “lost” in the way she “lost” hers, it wasn’t my suitcase, and it wasn’t a resume that found it. See how similar a tale this is going to be?
To make a long story longer, let me start at the middle. I had returned from a business trip to Las Vegas. Yes, a business trip. Really. Yes. While I was there, although I always made sure to carry them but never sure why, I handed out no copies of my resume. I did however hand out many business cards. That’s how I remembered that it was a business trip. If it was a pleasure trip clearly I would have carried pleasure cards. Anyway, I had returned a day earlier when I received a phone call from the airline I returned on, one of the more than several that is no longer flying the friendly skies. The call was more confusing than it had to be, especially considering that I hadn’t had any sleep since I returned even though it was the following day because the flight I had returned on was a dreaded red eye and although the day I left was indeed the day earlier, the day I landed was the day after that. Had I gotten any sleep since the time I boarded I might not have have this story to tell.
BaggageClaim
My recollection of the exact call and subsequent events is a bit fuzzy now some 15 years later but it was fuzzy to start so I don’t feel all that bad about it. I received a call saying they were holding my suitcase at lost luggage and would I like to pick it up or have them deliver it either to my home or place of work. I might have been still a bit tired but I was certain I had not lost luggage nor filled out a claim for same. I conveyed this information to the caller and had it confirmed that indeed I had not filed a claim but just the same, they had my suitcase. But I didn’t lose a suitcase, all my suitcases (which totaled one for that trip) made the trek all the way home. Actually, all the way to my office since neither if us actually made it all the way home yet.
Here it gets even fuzzier as the gentleman on the phone who sounded like he had made many similar calls during his (hopefully) brief career as a lost luggage specialist, and sped through some details. Either that or I zoned out on his explanations and sped through them on my own. The gist was that the case had not a luggage tag (which I thought was required), and the claim check tag was rendered unreadable by the security personnel who forced the case open, but within was one of my business cards. Here I wondered if I had unknowingly been cast in a new crime scene drama for prime time TV and if so, would I be paid scale even though I didn’t (and still don’t) have an Actors Equity card.
At this point I really just wanted to get off the phone and see if I pushed the two visitor chairs across from my desk together would they be comfortable enough for a quick midmorning nap. I cut to the chase and asked, just hypothetically, since they got this thing opened, what did they find therein besides yours truly’s card. I expected to hear the litany traveler detritus that we all relegate to checked baggage but instead heard, “a pair of shoes size 11, a white necktie, two paperbacks (I don’t recall the titles if they had been mentioned) (I remember the shoe size because it wasn’t mine), and a money clip.” Apparently it was in the clip’s firm grasp that was my card along with the receipt for a restaurant where someone had lunch the previous afternoon, a folded tourist map of the Las Vegas Strip, and an unused return ticket for an airport shuttle service. None of the itemized contents interested me although I could have used a white tie and I told my caller this. Not about the tie though.
“So, for the record, you’re saying that you don’t want to reclaim your property.”
“No, I’m saying it’s not my property,” probably while stifling a yawn and continued, “but if it makes you feel better, I don’t want reclaim whoever’s property you have there.”
“Very well sir, then” the soon to be though he didn’t know it yet unemployed luggage owner tracker downer said, “have a good day.”
A couple days later I was out shopping and picked up a white tie.

Sad Sack, Seemingly

Michael 4 Comments

At first I was somewhat despondent. I have Resting Bitch Face and the only male counterpart reference is so vile sounding that I won’t even repeat it here. On sure, some people call it Bitchy Resting Face and you can consider “bitchy” to be gender neutral but let’s be honest here. Bitchy is as gender neutral as flight attendant. No matter how forward thinking you are, in your head that person is still a stewardess. Sorry. That’s just the way it is.

So now that we have that out of the way, back to my problem. I will be any number of things, even some of them unpleasant. I have been any number of things, even some of them unpleasant. But I will not be a bitch. And I certainly will not be that other vile thing! So I began my search for a more acceptable, maybe even gender neutral since that’s all the rage now term for this condition. And here’s what I decided.

There’s is no such thing! Oh sure there are some of us that in our resting state don’t smile at everybody like a demented psychopath. That’s because we are not demented psychopaths. And unless you are a demented psychopath, you are not walking around with a constant grin plastered across your face either. Nobody is. Except for maybe the occasional demented psychopath. But for the everyday any old normal person, spending some of your time, most of your time, in a state of “This is me, not doing anything,” is RBFnormal. Everyday normal.

Anyway, the Resting Bitch Face is a myth. It could be an urban myth but it is just as mythical in suburban and rural areas so I’m going to call it just a plain myth. Right up there with Scottish lakebound sea serpents, cold climate residing evolutionary missing links, and honest politicians. Of any party. Worldwide. Ever. And that includes that one not in office too. Any office. Worldwide.

The Resting Bitch Face myth has been perpetrated on the public by the publicists of celebrities caught by paparazzi in their natural facial expressions shared by the entire world when they aren’t thinking of anything in particular. A sort of normal, not much happening state of mind transitioned to the facial muscles and outwardly displayed as “Yep, this is me doing nothing just like any old normal person.” In order to make it appear that their clients are not just any old normal people, the publicists came up with Bitchy Resting Face lest you start asking hard questions in social media like “What’s wrong with her (or him)? She (or he) just made 45 bazillion dollars on that last movie that wasn’t even funny and 10 of those dollars were mine! She (or he) laughed all the way to the bank; she (or he) should still be smiling about it!” And if you should ask that question, now someone can reply, “Haven’t you heard? It’s Resting Bitch Face (or Bitchy Resting Face for the ‘or he’s’).”

The only problem with that is that, unlike designer sunglasses, monogrammed jeans, or logo-festooned cell phone accessories, the PR teams couldn’t license that face. Everybody has it. That’s what got them in this in the first place. But then, being what they are and all, the publicity cadre did it again. They knew soon the more fanatical fans (is that redundant?) would adopt Resting Bitch Faces (or Bitchy Resting Faces for the ‘or he’s’) as their own default facial expression. Not that they didn’t already but now had a name they could use in their social media accounts. The fans then could proudly claim to have the same condition as their favorite unsmiling objects of their fanaticism. The only way to differentiate the real celebrities from the celebrity wannabes was in accessories. Everybody has a face. But not everybody has $59,000 sunglasses. Nor can just anybody afford $59,000 sunglasses except for those who recently made 45 bazillion dollars. But everybody could afford (sort of) $175 knockoff sunglasses. And thus, the ultra-designer sunglasses industry was founded.

Now I already own sunglasses that I got at the dollar store. So when first I was despondent about my at rest appearance, I now no longer exhibit outward signs of unhappiness. Actually, if I had exhibited outward signs of anythingness I wouldn’t have even started this post, but once I rationalized the actual absence of any such condition marked by outward signs of nothingness falsely identified as anything, my outwardness took on a decided somethingness. One great big smile from pocketing $174 in change.  🙂

 

I Got Nothing

Michael 7 Comments

When I sat down to write this post I realized that I really didn’t have an idea for this post. Not that I had one and forgot which I’ve done and have written about. Not that I had a bad idea for a post which I’ve probably had more times than not but wrote about anyway. Not that I had an idea but had written about several times already and even I knew that one more time wasn’t going to be a good idea. No, when I say I really didn’t have an idea, I really didn’t have an idea.

It’s been a decent enough week. I’ve felt well so I used some of that energy and did some shopping. Most of the time a good shopping trip will end up with fodder for a good blog post and sometimes just the act of shopping ends up blogworthy (which I’ve also already written about fairly recently). This week’s shopping was pretty much that. I went shopping. Bought a couple of shirts, some kitchen stuff, a canister of that newfangled spray on sun-screen. But it was all fairly normal. No weird sales signs, no clueless sales clerks, no inappropriately dressed fellow customers. Well, there was that one lady in the bathing suit with a cover-up masquerading as clothes. How could I tell there was a bathing suit under what outwardly appeared to be a cover-up? Maybe the dripping water that trailed her like an ill-trained puppy. But since I’ve done more than a couple of posts on fashion rules for the real world I couldn’t see putting yet another together at the expense of the nonfashionista and her screaming need for attention.

Since the last post I’ve spent a lot of time at the pool. I’ve switched from morning walk to morning swim at least on non-dialysis days for my exercise. In fact, it’s worked out quite well for me. Last summer, actually last summer, last fall, last spring, the summer before last, and so on and so one and etc. I’ve spent most of my exercise energy on walking. Also covered in several posts. But since I’ve started on dialysis I’ve been slacking on the sidewalk shuffle. If you’ve never had dialysis I’ll add in my prayers tonight that you never have to have dialysis for one of the things they don’t tell you when they stress that you’ll only spend 7% of your week on the machine is that you spend about 40% of your week recovering from that time. Walking just a mile or two the morning after dialysis isn’t just out of the question, it’s not even a question. Period. But swimming seems to be a different animal. I’ll swim a lap or two then climb out of the pool and rest in a comfy lounge chair under the morning sun. After a few minutes rest (ok, after about 20 minutes rest), it’s back in for some water calisthenics. More rest, more laps. More rest, some wading. I get exercise and a killer tan without having to stop for a rest when I’m a quarter mile from the nearest park bench. But hardly blogworthy.

And we’ve had Father’s Day. It’s the rare holiday that goes by without a mention of it by me. I’ve even invented my own holidays just to get a post idea. Maybe not invented but certainly given more weight to National Name Tag Day than even its proponents did. But everybody knows about Father’s Day. Not much I could add to it. I could talk about my gifts but they wouldn’t hold your interest as much as mine. I could talk about dinner and the fabulous glaze we came up with for the grilled salmon but then when the cook book comes would you still buy it? Or I could talk about how we narrowly escaped the severe weather than muscled its way into the festivities just as the grill was cooling. But how many weather posts can one blog present?

No, I just have to own up to up. I got nothing. So if you were expecting to find something here to pique your interest, go to the search page and plug in your desired topic. Chances are you’ll get something back. Till then, I’ll try to work on something more substantial for Thursday.

Have a great week!

 

Unsubscription of the Day

Michael Leave a comment

Before there were jokes of the day or meditations of the day there were Dial a Laugh and Dial a Prayer.  If you were feeling down you could call for a smile or an inspirational pick me up.  Now we can enjoy inspiration in our inboxes every day by way of a joke, recipe, song, home decorating tip, deep discount air fare, fashion accessory, sports trivia, or even a prayer of the day. No need to wait until you need help dealing with life, life’s little boosts come to you. Directly. At no charge to you.

The thing about free anything, particularly something free that you can get every day of every week, is that they end up costing something. But not you. To you the subscriber the most expense you incur is the time it takes to scroll around or to read the ads that come with the daily encouragement. No, this isn’t a rant about ads. Ads are fine. I like ads. Ads will buy my old folks home space someday. Ads make the world go ‘round. And it’s because of this that I had this thought pop into my head three weeks ago.

What popped was “Really?” and what made it pop was “If you want to continue receiving this email, please click here.” The email in question is one of the ubiquitous OTDs. The question was, “Really? Well that’s a new one,” which I guess really isn’t a question but literary license and all that. What it definitely was though, it was a first. Usually you have to do almost anything you wouldn’t want to do in front of your parents to get out of an email subscription that you once actually asked for. If you are lucky enough to find among the message’s fine print a link to unsubscribe it usually takes you to a series of questions verifying your unwise selection (You are about to have your name PERMANENTLY removed. Are you sure you want to do this?) then respond to several confirming emails with links that take you to more veiled queries regarding your decision making and ultimately your sanity. Nobody lets anybody go from a subscription list. Those are the numbers that advertisers live by. They are literally the lifeblood of the OTDers.

So when I saw this email, this special email sent separate from the daily delivery of inspiration, I knew it was an experiment in the making. If anything, one would have thought that the email would have said that they needed to confirm their list and if I no longer wanted to receive it I should respond, but this was a whole new bag of beans. (Look, somebody has to make up new idioms and someday when “bag of beans” is old hat you’ll be able to say that you read it first.) Personally, I didn’t care if I got that daily gem or not so I didn’t “click here.” About a week later I got another email reminding me that I hadn’t yet responded to their previous inquiry and if I wanted to keep receiving their pearls of wisdom I should “click here.” Again I didn’t. Now two weeks after that I’m still getting my daily missives.

Well the joke is on them. I’m getting what other people have to actually go out and ask to get and I didn’t have to do anything for it. How’s that for pulling one over on them. Hehehe.

 

Hi, Confused to Meet You

Michael 8 Comments

This weekend a seminarian came to our church to start his year long spiritual internship as it were. At the end of the mass he stood on the altar and after introducing himself he said, “I’ll be at the back of the church and would like to meet all of you personally . I won’t remember all of your names but over the next year, I’ll try.” If it had been me saying that I would have made it “I won’t remember any of your names but over the next year I’ll forgot the couple that I accidentally had remembered. And it will probably at the absolute worst time.”

You see, of all the billions of data that I’ve committed to memory over all the years that I’ve been exposed to data, I can remember almost all of it, from every important work piece to the most useless of useless trivia. Except names. I tried all of the memory tricks. Use somebody’s name three times in the first 10 minutes of being introduced. Associate the name with some physical characteristic. Build a mnemonic that describes where and Forgotwhen you met that person. None of it worked. I even tried doing what I did to remember the billions of data that I did remember and is rolling around in my head. I just remembered. But it seems I’ve never been good with names. Why, it took me almost 4 years to learn my own mother’s name. And that’s most surprising since almost everybody’s mother’s name back then was Mommy.

So how did I manage to go through life with such a disconnect from the most personal of other people’s personal information? I guess I always had cheat sheets around. While in the army, everybody wore their name above their right pocket. As long as I didn’t mind to appear to be somewhat not all quite focused I could pass my eyes over their collar looking for rank, down to their pocket for surname and in one almost smooth motion would greet Captain Hook. In the hospitals and other medical facilities everyone wears name badges. Except for the few who inexplicably wore their identification cards on the hems of their shirts or jackets it was easy enough to spot the picture card and zero in on the name. At the college the entire clinical faculty was into wearing white jackets with their names stitched above the breast pocket. Except me. I didn’t care much for wearing consultation jackets while standing at the front of a lecture hall. It struck me as the same useless gesture as those who wear scrubs in a hospital yet never move from their desks in the administration wing except to go home.

When I didn’t have a visual cue to jolt me into name recognition I relied on the old standby. Everybody became “sir” or “ma’am.” Actually, that worked out quite well in my career ladder climb. People to whom I reported liked that I call to them with such politeness while everyone else junior to them tried to feign familiarity by beginning each conversation with “Well Bob,” or “If you have a minute Sue.” As I rose to have more who reported to me I continued with “sir” and “ma’am” and endeared my staff to me with my gentility while other department heads routinely referred to their crew as “the minions of 4 Central” or some similar certainly meant to be cute appellation.

So, my advice to you if you should ever become a seminarian assigned to your pastoral learning experience and don’t think you can remember everybody’s name before your year is up, do what I did. Don’t try. Make them all sirs and ma’ams. They’ll appreciate the courtesy. Or, you can just think of them all as useless trivia and you can probably commit a few billion names to memory. Just don’t let the pastor find out.

 

Look Who’s Talking

Michael Leave a comment

Use or lose it. Who hasn’t heard that at least with respect to vacation days or abdominal muscles?  I guess the same goes for voices. Since I retired there are precious few opportunities to replace the sheer amount of talking I once did. I guess it has taken its toll. Or more accurately, the non-it has.

When you stop exercising those abs you don’t notice an immediate loss of shape and tone. By eighths, maybe even sixteenths of inches you start a slow expansion from six pack to quarter keg. Someone who sees you daily or weekly may not even notice the transformation but run into somebody you haven’t seen in 3 years and you’ll probably hear, “Hey, you look great. Aw, no you don’t. You’re fat now. Just like the rest of us.” Or at least I imagine that’s what you might hear. Not ever having abs to die for I never had to worry about an unplanned belt explosion.

But not talking has resulted in somewhat similar observations. Apparently those I share my few words with hadn’t suspected an impending failure to communicate on my part. That makes some sense. Even the most common of my common conversationalists don’t hear much from me. Most of my chit chat revolves around a phone call or two to my daughter or sisters and much of my end consists of “mmm,” “uhhhh,” and “ok, talk to you soon.”

What got me thinking about any of this was the phone call equivalent of the friend who hadn’t seen you in 3 years, only this time played by the friend who you usually converse with via email or text messages but might actually speak with only once or twice a year. That call came last week and before I barely had “hello” out of my mouth I heard, “Oh my God, are you ok? If you’re sick, go back to bed or wherever you were resting and I’ll call back some other time.”

It was then that I realized I need a vocal version of the Ab Roller.

 

Food Fight

Michael 2 Comments

I was making the morning coffee the other day and took a moment to bask in the aroma wafting through the apartment. It made me appreciate the small space as just the right size that it can distribute something so aromatic to every corner of my little world. Of course there is the converse that small space dwellers must also consider. Quite fortunately, not nearly as often as the good stuff. That’s when I started thinking, I really have to remember I’m retired. I don’t have to think anymore. But then…

I like the smell of coffee. Coffee beans, coffee roasting, coffee grinding, coffee brewing. But I know that not everybody likes it. I don’t understand it, but I know it. What makes that happen? It’s the same smell. Why does one person like it and one doesn’t? Or in the case of coffee, why do 7 billion people like it and, assuming that about 500 million haven’t had the pleasure of smelling it yet, 23 don’t. And while we’re at it, what makes cilantro taste earthy and sharp to some, bright and citrus-y to others, and like soap to still more? Then I started thinking more…

I was out of cilantro. I needed cilantro because I was planning on using up some leftover chicken in a stir fry that evening and I always (ok, almost always) use cilantro in my stir fries. If you toss in some peanut butter it gives it a Thai flair. To me. I think so. I don’t know what someone from Bangkok would think of it. No need to get started thinking more. But then…

Thai has gotten very popular around here. Maybe elsewhere Thai food has always been popular, but here? Not so much. Now? Oh, yeah. You can’t swing a leftover chicken around without hitting a Thai restaurant. Before, if you wanted take-out it used to be nothing but Chinese, sandwiches, and pizza. And then I was wondering how close to real is the Thai take-out? How close is the Chinese? For that matter, how close are the sandwiches? OK, maybe too far with that one. But what about the pizza? I never doubted pizza before. I know that most of the pizza isn’t anything at all like real pizza because most of it isn’t at all close to my pizza. But then, I wouldn’t have expected it because very few of the pizza masters were of the same Neapolitan background as my mother, AKA my pizza master. You’d think I would stop there but no. Forget about the pizza palaces, I can only think of one authentic full service Italian restaurant nearby. Probably for the same reason and even there I could have stopped but I was on a roll. And I don’t mean a pepperoni roll. What was I thinking…

Pepperoni roll my eye. That’s nothing but a Stromboli. Not a calzone! A calzone is pizza dough covered with mozzarella, folded in half, baked, and if you wish lightly sauced by the lucky person who gets to eat it right out of the oven. I know. Calzones originated in Naples. The Stromboli is just a pizza with whatever toppings you want, like pepperoni, but rolled up. People always get things wrong. Look at yams and sweet potatoes. Consider all the people who think peanuts are nuts. Still, those are completely different animals. You want a couple of things just as confused as the Stromboli and calzone, see il maccherone versus le macaron, or more familiarly the macaroon and macaron. But the people who do know the difference at least know how to pronounce each of them. Unlike… (yes, more thinking)

What is it with gnocchi? Nobody who is Italian, other than Italian celebrity chefs who don’t want to alienate their celebrity clientele, says “No-Key.” It’s “nyock-ee”!  It comes from the Italian word nocca, which means knuckle. (No, not knot. Knuckle. Just what it looks like. Wrinkles and all. Trust me.) And don’t ask for a plate of gnocchis. Gnocchi is plural. If you really want just one, order a gnoccho. But I bet you can’t eat just one. Anyway, if you forget, the boys of winter don’t play Ho-Key, they play hockey! And that got me to thinking…

I have to send in my payment for next year’s tickets. I gotta go!

(In case you were wondering, yes this is the famous sticky note post. Famous to me. I’ve been staring at that hunk of paper for over a week now. Thank Heaven I can throw the note away. Or do you say throw away the note. You know, I’ve been thinking about that…)

Technical Resistance

Michael 8 Comments

I try to take responsibility for myself as much as I can in all aspects that I can reach. As long as I can reach them comfortably. Including my health. So when the good folks that bring me my delightful dialysis sessions announced an opportunity to “take control of your kidney health and experience better outcomes” I jumped at the chance. Who couldn’t resist better outcomes in anything you take on? Then they started throwing around words like “empowered” and “easy” in the same paragraph even. And they got me with, “Start managing your kidney care with your Portal today and gain more time to do the things you love. Register today and Thrive On” (Emphasis not even added. They’re good.) How can I not want to take advantage of gaining more time to do the things I love? I was hooked.

You just know this is going to go wrong somewhere, don’t you? Hmm.

Looking forward to actively participating in my care, I carefully filled out the many screens of information that they requested, chose my password, and awaited the confirmation email which would contain the additional instructions for completing the registration process. In just a few seconds it came, and in just a few minutes I did what I was supposed to do. In seconds again I received another email congratulating me on successfully registering for the patient portal and was presented with a link to “log in and start actively participating in your care!” (OK, that time I added the exclamation point, but I wasn’t excited about this. Wouldn’t you be?)

I clicked, eagerly awaiting the chance to participate in my care, and attempted my first official login. In went my email address, then went in my password, then the email address and password went in to wherever they go and the little circle thing started spinning and then, low and behold (words you just don’t hear much anymore) across the screen I was presented with the message “username or password invalid.” Oh, poo! No problem. In my excitedness I probably hit a wrong key so I re-entered the username which is my email address so I know that was correct, and then, this time more carefully, my password. Almost always when denied access it’s because I incorrectly enter the password which makes sense since they never show you your password (unless it happens to be ******* and you just have to remember how many *s). But no, again that didn’t work so I gave one more try and one more time I got the same frustrating message.

I selected the link on the page for technical support and sent them an email detailing my inability to log into the patient portal (and thus my unfortunate delay in participating in my care!) and sat back to await their response. A few minutes later I saw the little envelope icon pop up at the top of the screen and I anxiously opened my email to just as anxiously read their reply, get back on track, and start participating in my care. Well imagine my disappointment when I scrolled the inbox items and saw, “Undeliverable.” Instead of the anxiously awaited reply I had a message wherein the little emailman politely explained to me that my desperate plea for help could not be sent because the addressee “wasn’t found or doesn’t exist at the destination server” and I should check to make sure I entered the address correctly, contact the intended recipient by phone, or several other options that involved things like checking licenses and permissions and other things that normal non-computer savvy people (and probably some of them, too) have no idea what any of that means. Disappointment does not begin to describe what I was feeling. “ARRRGH!” OF COURSE THE DAMN ADDRESS EXISTS. ALL I DID WAS PUSH THEIR DANM BUTTON ON THEIR DAMN WEBSITE! DAMN MORONS!” I said to myself. Calmly.

Maybe it’s just a password problem and I actually mistyped when I was selecting it. It’s possible. If I can incorrectly enter a password when trying to log onto a site I can certainly mistyped the letters, characters, numbers, and case control when first selecting the password. Of course that would mean that I would have had to make the same mistake twice since, once on the first selection entry and once on the confirmation entry, but hey, it could happen. Yeah, right.

So I attempted to log on again, knowing it would reject the login information but also knowing I would be presented with the inevitable “Forgot your password?” link. So I did. And I was. And I clicked. And in a few seconds I received another email with another link to reenter my password. So I clicked. And I reentered. Carefully. Both times. The screen blanked taking all my information again to wherever the little electrons go when they discuss these things and in less than a second I got another email! This is getting exciting. Again anxiously (though not quite as anxiously as I had been earlier), I opened the email and read the message congratulating me on successfully changing my password with a new link to log on and “start participating in my care.” (No emphasis added. By this time I was getting emphatically worn out.) Again I clicked. And again I entered username AKA email address and password AKA, uhh, password. And again I got…”username or password invalid.”

Oy.

(If you read Monday’s post and are wondering if this was what I couldn’t remember…..well, the answer to that is no. But this one is such a great story I couldn’t wait to share it. That and if I did wait I knew I would have forgotten about it. But don’t worry. I still have the sticky note stuck right there on the monitor (see?) and I’ll be writing all about it next time. Unless something else comes up between now and then. But it’s OK. There’s lots of sticky on that note. It’s not going anywhere.)

(Oh and, do you think I use too many parentheses?)

 

But it’s not supposed to happen to me!

Michael 1 Comment

Well, it happens to the best of us. So they say. Who are these they? Are they the best of us so they would know? Or are they like me? Those who this always happens to. I don’t know what I want to write about. No, not I don’t know. More like I can’t remember. Like, since about 10 hours ago.

I should have sat down and wrote it then. It was really a great topic. And I had just the right approach for it. It was something that happens to all of us (what they say notwithstanding) and something that I know everybody out there in Blogworld wouldn’t be able to wait to read. But just what it is (was?) I can’t remember. Sigh.

I did what I always do when I can’t remember something. Retrace my mental steps of the Questionday. Most of the time it will jog the brain cells sufficient to loosen the elusive thoughts but not today. What did I do today anyway?

I think I first came up with the “Now that’s blogworthy!” moment sometime around breakfast time. Could it have been something to do with breakfast. Not likely. All I had was some breakfast sausage and scrambled eggs with an English muffin, buttered and jellied. Nothing terribly blogworthy at that meal although I did manage to turn scrambled eggs into a decent sounding post once. (While we’re in the kitchen, do they call English muffins just muffins in England? And if so, what do you call just a muffin there?) (Inquiring minds and all that.)

After breakfast I read the paper, answered some e-mails, watered the herb pots, and did a crossword puzzle. Actually, I did four crossword puzzles. Other than those, my morning probably wasn’t much different from anybody’s. And I know whatever “it” was, “it” wasn’t crosswords. Although blogworthy, those too have already been a subject of the RRSB. So, not there.

Moving on I paid a few bills, put a birthday card in the mail (real card, real mail), took a walk, watched a hockey game. Hockey’s a big thing for me. Autographed pictures, pucks, programs, banners, and towels all have found a home somewhere on my walls and shelves. License plates and bumper magnets grace my car and a season ticket pass keeps my driver’s license company in my wallet. I like hockey. I’ve even said that everything I know about being a gentleman I learned from hockey. But it wasn’t that either.

So, I don’t know what I’m going to write abou…….wait! Now I remember. I think I’m going to save that idea for Thursday and just call today a miss. Sorry, but I don’t want to go through this twice in one week. So, I’ll just jot that down on a little post-it that I can stick to the monitor right there. And, there. Thursday is all taken care of. Whew.

So. Now. For today. Well….Have a nice day?