December 31, 2008 by Hawk.

Not much is going to change this year as compared to last year… or the year before or the year before that… so on into that weird mirror-y image that all looks the same fading off into the void…

However, this year, I do resolve, I swear, I vow… this year I will NOT be the only reason we stay in touch this year.
I refuse to EVER again type; “Haven’t heard from you in a while, hope everything’s ok!” to people I know have been online and just can’t spare seconds, yes SECONDS, to reply to an email.
I am not going to pump email, blog comments, files and time into some online black hole where nothing ever returns from.
Yes, on occasion I do send out ‘mass’ (if less than a dozen can be considered ‘mass’) mailings but these are never copied and pasted copies of copied and pasted ‘funny’ stories that have been going around since I first GOT a computer (that’s twenty three years folks).
These are invitiation into my life, my writing, my photography, whatever, and I’d honestly rather hear criticism than the ringing, resounding silence I normally get.
So that’s it. If you stop getting mail from me, invitiations to check out my latest Photoshop work, Flickr photograph additions or just “Hi how are ya?” It’s you, not me. If you can’t be bothered, neither can I.

I’ve tried, I’m tired of being the only one trying.

Hawk (deep down tired)

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December 29, 2008 by Hawk.

I wake up… Did I scream? I was screaming in my dreams, I know that much. Soaked, sweat running from my hairline, my upturned eye socket a puddle, my pillow damp but not soaked through. Not as bad as some wakenings. I grope for my glasses and look for the clock. Two hours, that’s my usual, two hours of sleep sometimes less very, very rarely more. I rush, as much as I can rush with a cane and the pain I’m constantly in, to the bathroom. My bladder brooks no delay. From need to pee to pee I’ve got a minute, if that, to get to the toilet… easily as many as fifteen times a day. Done with that I hobble into the ‘den’ to see if I’ve got mail. I usually don’t and when I do it’s only from one person ‘though I mail several people quite often. I sit here, have to while I wait for the bed and pillows to dry out and cool off enough to lie back down, as long as the pain lets me. Both arms, my right more than left, are constant sources of pain. I can’t even reach over to my left shoulder any more. Brushing my hair is unpleasantly painful. Years ago a doctor told me I needed four or five different surgeries on my arms, hands and shoulders (on top of the two carpel tunnel surgeries I’ve already had on my right hand) that I can’t afford and can’t imagine suffering during the recovery time. My right knee, the one I didn’t have surgery on 20 years ago, which blew out unexpectedly several months ago will lock up and have to be ‘clicked’ back into place before I can ‘walk’. This is my day, lather, rinse, repeat. Once a week I throw in a trip to the grocery store so I can feel like I contribute something to the effort of survival. This wipes me out to the point of near collapse when I reach the checkout soaked in sweat trying to push the shopping card and use a cane at the same time. Every few weeks the library might have something for me and occasionally I make a three AM trip to Walgreens or CVS to stock up on Diet Coke… this is the sum of my days. I don’t see them every getting better, I expect they’ll slowly get worse. How long is this worth doing?

Hawk (darkness…)

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December 27, 2008 by Hawk.

I just watched a Civil Defense film from the 1950’s that proved, unequivocally, that by cleaning up your yard, painting your house regularly and not being messy in your interior design that you can have the one house on your block that doesn’t burn to the ground during a nuclear attack! Yes, that’s right! You’ll be dying of radiation sickness AND blind AND all your neighbors will have burned to death because they had leaves and debris in their yard and their houses needed a coat of paint. But you! Your house will suffer only some marginal damage… roof blown off, windows shattered, charred paint, oh and deadly radiation levels, but it’ll still be standing so the mutants that roam the planet after the world we know ends will have a safe and snug place to hole up.
The mutant you save may be related to you!

I just had to see if I could find the film and YouTube didn’t fail. Here, for your viewing pleasure and amusement is - “The House In The Middle”:

Hawk (lives in that house on the right, oh well…)

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December 26, 2008 by Hawk.

Every year TBS runs a 24-hour marathon of ‘A Christmas Story‘ and every year I somehow manage to miss seeing it! The movie will start and I’ll suddenly wake up an hour into it… I’ll start watching it and a friend will call with a flat tire needing rescue (the friend, not the tire…well, both really). YEARS now they’ve run this marathon and not once have I managed to catch one of my favorite movies…

Hawk (”you’ll shoot your eye out, kid!”)

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December 25, 2008 by Hawk.

Once a year on, oddly enough, Christmas Eve we go to this little hole in the wall Italian restaurant and get grinders… hoagies? subs? Call ‘em what you will. Mom gets an Italian Cold Cut, sort of a Dagwood mess of stuff and *I*, I get the Hot Sicilian which is super crisp pepperoni and SUPER crisp bacon with lettuce, oil & vinegar on a fresh baked roll. It’s evil but SOOOOOOOOO damn good.

Hawk (will suffer for days now)

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December 24, 2008 by Hawk.

Clicken for biggen

The above was also a contest winner at www.Worth1000.com


Hawk (aka Scrooge)

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December 23, 2008 by Hawk.

I don’t feel forty two (life, the universe, everything) some parts of me still feel like I’m in my twenties (while a few others seem to be closing in on eighty). I see movies with release dates in the late ’90s that I remember vividly and have to remind myself that was a decade ago. Just last month I’m SURE it was July! How the hell did Christmas sneak up on me like this?! Conversely (CHUCKS!) the other day I wanted to take a nap. I dreamed, semi-woke, tossed and turned and finally sat up SURE that I must have slept for hours (although I never get more than four in a row) and found that less than an hour had passed. How does time race and crawl at the exact same time?! Years blast by like minutes and seconds trod past like epochs.

Hawk (confused)

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December 22, 2008 by Hawk.

I’ve got a Sears gift card sitting here with an $8.10 balance left on it that I’m never going to use. Anyone want it?

Hawk (this space intentionally not left blank)

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December 20, 2008 by Hawk.

Stopped by the store early this AM for some missed grocery items and decided to get my mom some flowers as an early Christmas present:

Hawk (still Humbugging…)

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December 20, 2008 by Hawk.

Here’s the official NOAA weather forecast for Christmas in my neighborhood:

Hawk (Humbug!)

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