Here and There

Okay, I have a few things rattling around this head and I flatter myself that you might be interested. Just kinda where I am and to reassure anyone who cares that I'm okay.

• I'm a little worried about the Steelers this fall. First, Ben. Which we will get to in a minute. And now our #1 draft pick has been arrested...for the second time? We don't have this problem on our team!!! Well, okay, we shouldn't. We like to think of our team, our owners as a special case in this time of well-remunerated boorishness in professional sports. But, apparently, we are not as special as we think. He will not do well here with the public if this is his MO. He has obviously not yet spent enough time in Pittsburgh. It will be very clear to him very quickly that being a #1 pick doesn't give him carte blanche in this city. He should just ask around. Just talk to Plax. And he didn't come in with this many strikes.
• Ben is a big, arrogant, young idiot. I said this a year ago when his motorcycle riding, especially without a helmet, first became an issue. I hope he has been well and truly chastened by his accident and is grateful for his incredible luck in getting through it with the relatively minor result of a broken jaw and orbital bone. I was against this change in PA law when they did it. I don't give a fuck about the idiots who ride motorcycles and scream irrationally about their individual freedoms and how not being forced to wear a helmet is some sort of great symbol of that. Fuck you. If you want to kill or maim yourself or think life as a vegetable is somehow preferable, do it in the privacy of your own home. Don't make me or anyone be witness to your stupidity, don't endanger us by your arrogance, and don't increase the costs borne by those smart enough to ride as safely as possible.
• I don't usually bring politics here because I prefer argument to pontification and I have plenty of creative outlets for that elsewhere. But I just have to say that I thought I had reached an age and maturity level where I had moderated my most fiery beliefs and was cynical enough to not be much outraged by almost anything perpetrated by those who purport to represent us. However, I can now say that I have never before been more politically outraged or energized that I am today. And that's the one thing for which I must, however grudgingly, thank Bush, Cheney, their henchmen large and small, the Republican majority, and the religious righteous. They've found the hidden idealist in this jaded old Dem.
• I got a nice feeling yesterday about my whole somewhat scary weight loss. I've stopped losing and actually regained a few pounds, taking me from that gaunt look to merely skinny and leveling out at about 115 (from 142). I'm looking pretty good in a bathing suit. I had thought so, mainly because I was forced to buy a new one this year and found that bikinis fit and looked the most flattering...at least in my mind. And it was confirmed yesterday. Went on the boat with Paul and Karen, tieing off in the Ohio with whole string of boats filled with all the people from our (well, not mine anymore!) boat club. They hadn't really seen much of me since last September. Every single one of the males mentioned how great I looked and my female friends all asked about how I'd lost the weight (as if I tried!) and said what a great suit it was. I got a small bit of revenge-type satisfaction in the fact that this will be discussed when asshole and his fat ass whore are around. I know exactly how that kind of information just happens to come up "casually" in that group. I hope he eats his heart out and that she looks at her big butt in the mirror and hates herself every day.
• This was just a small skirmish in my battle to take my life back into my own hands and out of his. Now that I am sure I'll never be involved with him again and that I am equally sure that he is still not clear that he doesn't control me any more, I am doing little things to show that I intend to move on regardless of him or what he does. The boating thing will be slow because I have to depend on my boating friends, who are all members of the same club. I'll only go with them when he is sure to not be there. But I am only doing that for their sakes. I couldn't care less about his feelings or hers, for that matter. I joined that club with him in 1989 and I was a part of every boat and boating memory he has. I chose the interior of and decorated the new boat. Most of the people there are still my friends and have told me so. And I realize Tom and Dawn's resentment of me is all about their guilt about their own actions. But what they'll never get is that I don't care any more. Why they do is beyond me. But they won't stop me from boating through manipulation or deception. And, so, the last incident at the Corner Grill will definitely not stop me from going there. The sensibilities of the people there are not as complicated. It's a public establishment. I am better known and more well-liked than Tom there. A lot my friends there are males who have decided he's an idiot and who would defend me to the death. And I have decided that the fact that he thinks he can bully me into staying out of the place by taking his ugly fat whore girlfriends there despite his initial agreement to not do that is not a good enough reason for me to stay out. I'm going to keep that as "my bar" and I can guarantee you that they will feel uncomfortable there long before I ever will again. I stopped there for a quick bite Friday and for a couple of nightcaps Saturday and found that I had been missed. It was quite touching and infinitely affirming. And this just points out the special magic to me of these charming old river towns here with their blue collar ethics, very evident in that local institution, the neighborhood bar.
• I may have been just a bit extra glowing on the boat yesterday. That really young guy that some of you have read about? He hunted me down, even though I've been avoiding dating or anything with a hint of the sexual like the plague. The great thing about a young lover is he can go all night and, after a few hours of sleep, again in the morning. The bad thing about a young lover is he wants to go all night and, after a few hours of sleep, again in the morning. But I'm not complaining.