In Chicago for work. Love Chicago - would prefer it be recreation, but it ain't. I am going to plan a major visit to Chi in August so I can finally see my peeps. I have been flaking out left and right on visiting them, and that needs to stop.

Anyway, here is some bric-a-brac crossing my transom:

- As always - whether I write about it or not - the #1 issue in life is pain and medication. Grief and Dope. Grief and Dope. I am finding myself being worn down again by the good fight. I have gained a certain level of mastery over my body, and I decided to try again to drop my dose because the high dose of pain meds I have been on is, again, making it very difficult to hold my life together. Naturally, if I didn't work or do anything, the meds would be fine. Were I independently wealthy, I could sleep the 14 hours a day the dope calls me to. I could just lay there in a sweat watching the world go by under heavy anesthetic. This I have decided not to give into just yet (though I am nagged by a certain aura of inevitability around that prospect - it is really just a matter of time barring a miracle.)

Long story short, I am now at half the med strength I was 2 years ago. The withdrawal is a bitch, no doubt about it. Yet, I feel like I am now getting the hang of it. The bad part is what it does to my moods and brain. I find myself utterly despondent in the middle of the drop. It takes over like some coarse filter on everything. Minutiae become epic struggle. And unfortunately for me, I am now at a level of meds just below what my pain threshold requires. I need a tiny bit more meds to really have a handle on things. I tried getting that little extra, but the evil ghouls at Illinois Blue Cross won't allow me to have 2 patch sizes (a big and small so I can be inbetween big and bigger - as evil as Blue Cross is, I still wouldn't wish them upon themselves if they were in my shoes.) I will not long endure with untreated pain of the type that has surfaced under the current meds. The solution reached by my Dr. is to put me back on Cymbalta, which really is an anti-depressant with some pain relieving qualities. So far, it has been in the neighborhood of what I need. Gonna be a tough call. I hate the idea of being a zombie on the happy pills again, but if I am honest with myself, I need them if I am going to make it through this stretch.

My only real hope is to get back into an active routine. This is easier said than done. I have some long-term house guests. I have work travel. I have real work to do. I have no car of my own. I am going to have to undertake a major heave-ho if I am going to get into the kind of routine where I can get out and try to take my corpus a little further along towards being healthy outside of the areas in which I am a permanent dented can. If I can get the rest of my body to shape up, that should help me get over the hump with this pain level. It isn't guaranteed mind you, but it is my only real option. To go back up in meds strength is the path to oblivion. From there, the trip to the parent's basement becomes significantly shorter. I have to keep the hot breath of that hound off my neck. We shall see if I can pull it off. It has now been more than a decade of this shit. I don't ever want to actually feel any pride at simply withstanding pain, but when you get old and bent, I think you will understand what I am now trying to communicate to you. Heed my words chums - enjoy your health if you have it, while you have it.

- My nephews are visiting my sister who is stationed in Japan. That is BIG! Even BIGGER is the fact that my sis in Japan is about to give birth to another nephew! I am already the Unk With Tha Funk to 3 excellent specimen's, and now, #4 is upon us. Very exciting. While I hope sis has a normal delivery (and a quick painless one), it wouldn't be a problem for me if the baby came a little early so that our away team could witness the arrival of the new bundle of joy. Will nephew #4 come in time to visit with #1 and #2 and #3 at the same time?!? Who can tell! Oh the intrigue! I can't wait in any event and am glad the fam gets to hang together even when we find ourselves at far-flung points on the planet.

- Now that I am 40, I decided to visit the doc to get a bit of a diagnosis done. A "Check Engine" light of sorts has been going off of late (I will spare you), and I admit to being a little nervous about seeing what, if anything, is wrong. I had some blood work done and get the results this week. I hope it is just a passing thing. If it isn't, oddly enough, I feel pretty well equipped to pile more medical misery on top of the load already being pulled. Details to follow, or maybe not.

- I have mentioned many times that I wish I had had children (who knows if I ever will? - I keep the ends out for the tie that binds.) In lieu of my own spawn, I have pets. I might well be crazy or just too damn soft, but I miss my pets! BoomBoom and I literally do everything together. I am used to him being around, and when he isn't, it just doesn't feel right. I gotta do what I gotta do, but going forward, I gotta avoid travel sans pets. I just flat out prefer to have them around. Without them, I am lonesome.

- Writing for this weblog has become difficult, in part because people I know read it! If no one looked, I would feel much more comfortable writing about normal life stuff. It is very unsatisfying having someone recognize passages in which they are the subject because it is almost never something they like or are glad to be a part of. I think I now understand why fiction writing became as big as it is. One must endless encode things if they are to survive. I am not sure I like that. It makes it very difficult to get any better at this or to do any REAL writing. I suppose I could start a totally new weblog somewhere that is anonymous, but that would be no fun for me. I have basically stopped writing about anything other than my pets. There are limits to what can be done with the subject matter - not for me, of course, but for ye. No idea what to do about this. Writing fiction isn't what I got into this for. Nor is angering all within my orbit.

- I just ate some Lou Malnati's pizza for lunch. It was very good - as many Chicago-style pies are, but my body just isn't used to eating like this anymore. I just don't eat food this dense and laden with all the stuff that is in the Chicago diet. I am sitting here feeling as if I have eaten a cinder block. I feel like I would need to walk to Comiskey Park and back to recover my equilibrium. This is why flights to the Midwest are packed with fatties! This is why I left the upper Midwest weighing 285lbs! If I move back to Chicago - which I hope to do within the next year or so - I have to find a way to not get back into this cycle of eating like an anaconda does once a week, only doing so daily. I need to find a bowl of sprouts for dinner or I will surely die!