First day of class

 Or first evening of class really, this evening. 

2nd night sleeping without gabapentin and I slept pretty well. I'd taken literally a dozen things apart last night, things we can't give away but have some neat chips and parts inside. 

I slept in until 10, which is good because sleep is good. 

I listened to more of "The Rise And Fall Of The Third Reich" by William L. Shirer, on audiobook on YouTube while taking the stuff apart. I had the book decades ago, and must have skimmed a lot of it because there's a tone of fine-grained detail there that I don't remember paying attention to, yet little phrases I do remember pop out. 

And in 2024 we've got the same thing going on. Donnie Dumpo paid someone else to take all his tests, Ceaucescu had something like an 8th grade education if that, it's not all that certain Stalin had much formal education at all. 

I packed things to ship, took them to the post office and FedEx, gathered a little shipping stuff, and got back here. I left here at a bit past 4, went over to Whole foods to use the loo and eat a little food, and rode over to the light rail. By now it was about 5 or a bit past and dark. 

I got off at the Winchester station OK and rode down Winchester to Lark and turned in there, at Oka Road, and there I was. The class was in the adult lounge upstairs and since I was plenty early, I had a nice little lie-down on the floor for a bit. 

We books! 2 on learning to read Hebrew, a bencher, a Tanakh, one on mitzvot, one on holidays, and one on Judaism in general. Quite a stack, and they're ours to keep, as part of the $180 class fee I guess. A fair number of them from good old Behrman House. 

There are a lot of people in the class, something like 30, and it was pretty educational and fun. The building closes at 9 so we had to get out of there on time, and for the ride back I really bundled up and was plenty warm riding back. 

I got back onto the green line light rail and that took me to Diridon in no time, and I had time to go into Whole Foods and get some rather woody chicken wings that I just finished eating, and a bottle of cold black coffee to swallow a Tylenol 500 down with. 

The ride back here from there was quiet and really nice. So I did it; I got through my first class session with flying colors. 

 

 

Routine, if painful, routine

 My first night sleeping without gabapentin was last night and sleep was not great. Adequate, maybe. I got up, had my Tylenol and coffee, went back to bed to wait for it to take some effect, got up, zapped our facial hairs (ouch) then read some Torah, and photo'd and listed the 10 things I'd made ready to list on Ebay. 

Then I packed 13 things  I think, small ones, and took those to the post office and did some shopping in Sprouts. Cold weather is here. I was able to gather some bubble wrap, and was glad my Thinsulate gloves are still with me and in good shape, and in fact I'd washed them last Spring so they even smell nice. 

Another small increment

 I woke up around 9:30 which is great because sleep is good. Had my Tylenol 500 pill,  1/2 a blood pressure pill, and some good good strong coffee. Went back to bed for 1/2 hour maybe 45 minutes for it to kick in, then got up, washed head/hair and tried out my new toy from Best Buy. 

Said new toy is something called an "epilator". It pulls out hair. I honestly believe I've got some Central Asian thing going on, where I can grow a mustache and chin beard, but the rest of my face is these sparse, coarse, hairs. Shaving those buggers is a pain, and they have a habit of dodging the razor somehow anyway so I always find strays. I can't hunt them all down with tweezers, I've tried. So an "epilator" was the answer and after looking in Walgreens, Target, and Sally Beauty, all of which were supposed to stock them, I hit Best Buy and went and picked the thing up yesterday. 

I used it a bit today and it seems to work pretty well. Noisy, and a bit painful, but effective. And it was only $50-odd, I was prepared to spend more. 

Each day I seem to be a small increment better, pain-wise. If I can get over this, I'm going to be very big on exercise. Due to bike riding my legs don't need much work, just strength/flexibility exercises like what I call "side to sides". But my upper body, I can tell now, is going to need a decent program to build strength and keep flexibility. 

I packed a biggish thing, then a medium-sized thing  I made larger by putting some accessories in with it, then another biggish thing sold so I packed that. So I had a nice load for FedEx. I took the things up there to FedEx then rode up to 99 Ranch for a couple of tea eggs and a can of Mr. Brown then went back in for a couple packages of TP because they have the best price on it by a couple of dollars. 

Then I rode back, picking up a box or two behind the gym, where a crazy homeless guy was going on and on about covid-19 and all kinds of crazy stuff. He didn't bother me though. 

I rode over to Tom's because he's back, but only James was there and said Tom was headed down to Gilroy to pick up his truck and to do something with some tiles he's ga-ga over. Dealing in tiles and 2nd hand wood makes no sense compared to busking but that's what Tom's gonna do. 

I left there for here when it started to drizzle. 

 

Interesting medical experimentation

 The mornings have been the worst. I've slept and the drugs have had 6-8 hours to wear off. But last night  I did some reading on the synergistic effects of Tylenol and caffeine. The big ol' bars of Tylenol 500s I got at the hospital are probably that big because there's 100mg of caffeine in them too. The Tylenol 500s I got from Walgreens are bitty things. Easier to swallow I guess, but I'm guessing they're missing the caffeine. 

I got onto this line of thinking because I noticed I felt better after having my breakfast of a good spoon and a half of that good old Israeli product, Elite instant coffee, mixed with a bit of vanilla extract into water and heavy cream and ice. It can't be the calories, I thought. 

So today I got up to take my pills which I'd set out last night, the last big Tylenol bar and a half a blood pressure pill, and chased it with a spoonful of the instant coffee, which helped chase the pills down too. And 45 minutes later or so, I feel OK enough to be up typing this. 

I don't want to take caffeine in the evening, but for these mornings I think I'm onto something. Dr. Carter is in! Wait'll I get with Valley Medical I guess, to see about my general health and the blood pressure thing and I tell them I'd been having side effects from the blood pressure medication so I'm cutting the pills in half. 2.5mg instead of 5mg. 

The way I see my future right now is to complete my conversion and: 

(1) End up staying here. Repeatedly on Reddit I've seen the question, Which old-age homes are not hellish? And the answer is always: The Jewish ones. 

(2) Move back to Hawaii to be a bit of a 2nd class citizen because of my skin color or lack thereof, but at least I'll be able to say I went to high school Here and worked Here and Here and Here, and grew up fishing Here, etc. And I'll have what Jewish community is there as my "tribe". 

(3) The big banana. Retire in Israel. 

Now let's say I wanted to retire in New Orleans, which I certainly don't. But let's say I wanted to. I'd already determined that there's basically one streetcar that would take me everywhere I need to go from markets to the VA and the Social Security office. It's pretty great for those who don't have a car and can keep a bike running. New me, I'd probably have a blog and use something like "Tee Spring" to print up shirts I'd ling to on said blog. 

After all say my stated goal was to attain fame, perhaps by playing guitar and singing about my preferred mule and other New Orleans things. I'd have T-shirts, stickers, maybe go on Reddit and do an AMA (Ask Me Anything) because frankly, millions in the US dream of running off to a place like New Orleans and living off of their guitar and vocals about draft animals and other New Orleans things. 

So I'm typing away on this thing and I realize the first of a very important set of classes is this Tuesday evening. "The Talk" with the rabbi is the next day, Wednesday. It had been last Wednesday, when I figured I'd get a chance to ask where to show up for my first class. But now I had no idea where to report to, the office at the temple is closed on Mondays, and I could not guarantee someone who knows what's up would be there on Tuesday. 

I was pretty sure the first meeting would be at my home temple but was not certain. I had no idea why I wasn't emailed some instructions. But I knew today was a bat mitzvah, and thus the rabbi would be there. It was about 10:15 in the morning and the thing would start at 10:30. Time to crash that bat mitzvah. 

I got dressed and rode over to the temple, and went in and sat in the last row and joined in the singing. It was pretty long, but it was great. I sat there thinking, This is 180 degrees opposite the mainstream culture here. The gal who it was, who's probably destined to become a cantor at least, read from the Torah with cantillation, gave a speech about her personal world view, was complimented and lauded on her promise and the good things she's done, and encouraged to do more through her whole life. 

I'm not even sure I *had* a 13th birthday. There wasn't even much concern on anyone else's part whether I had enough to eat or not. 

When the service was over it was out to the courtyard for kiddush and ha motzi, and I ran into one of my favorite people, Phil Hankin. I was able to ask him about at least where to be for the first class, and he got right on his phone and dug up the syllabus and emailed it to me. Salt of the Earth, that guy. 

I got to talk to Rabbi a bit and told him Phil Hankin had "saved my life" and he said that if I miss any classes, he'll work with me to make up those classes. 

Then were was the oneg and it was great. Bagels with cream cheese and lox and tomatoes and cucumber slices and red onion and capers, plus other goodies like mushrooms with cheese baked inside, and some tuna salad, and a knish. Something else that was the same basic pastry and potato combination at the knish, but the knish was amazing. 

I sat with a couple other people to eat, and eventually Philip showed up. It turns out he's going to sing at Carnegie Hall in New York. He's really involved with theater stuff. Now I know why he's so careful with his money. He saves it so he can go do things like that. That's really great that he's able to do things like that. 

I left the temple into a clear, and cold, day. I rode over to Whole Foods to lock the bike, and walked over to Diridon Station to get on the light rail to the Convention Center bus stop, then took the #23 bus to Santana Row to pick up something I'd ordered from Best Buy. Since Best Buy is based in Minnesota, this had caused my card to be deactivated, but the company had called me - during the service no less - and I'd re-activated my card. 

I picked up the thing then walked to Big-5 and bought a pair of gloves that might be good for cold weather, since I'm not sure if I still have my Thinsulate ones or what kind of condition they're in. 

Then I took the bus further down, to Guitar Center where I bought a mandolin strap and the repair guys gave me one of those buttons used on the bottom of a guitar to hold a strap. They have banjo ukes but they're the Goodtime clear plastic ones, which are not really my preference. I think one of the Kala ones sold at Ukulele Source would be my choice.

Then it was back on the bus which I rode downtown and stopped in at the Starbucks for some water to swallow some pills, which they gave me but I put a $1 in the tip box anyway. Downtown is so dead but the Starbucks was doing fine.

Then walked to the bus stop on Santa Clara and got on a #522 bus to the SAP Center which is about 3 minutes' walk back to Whole Foods. I got a big bag of popcorn because I felt like it, and rode home. I had popcorn and some of the zero alcohol Japanese "beer" I'd wasted money on at Nijiya yesterday. Eh, it's wet and fizzy. 

Pain

 Funny thing, night before last sucked because I had my sleep prevented/interrupted by pain. Last night was pretty good. The night before the night before last I slept like a baby because I think I mis-counted and went to bed on two gabapentin capsules. That was nice! 

But the morning before this one, the pain upon getting up wasn't as bad but it was a bitch today. Also it's getting really cold overnight, down into the mid-30s so I'm not going to services tonight. 

The alcohol-free wine I got turns out to have a shitton of shit in it like turkey tail mushroom and all kinds'a weird shit. I guess as long as it tastes ... wine-y? 

I still think the purest thing for me to drink is to get that good old Osem kosher grape juice from my little Walmart, that's made in Israel. I even checked the OU web site etc., and grape juice is fine if alcohol is detrimental to one. Which is my case it certainly is. 

In fact, I'm thinking for Passover I'm going to get a bunch of it to bring by, for anyone who wants it - they sell it kosher for Passover at that time of year. 

It's funny though, I also got some senna leaf capsules, essentially the "Swiss Kriss" laxative Louis Armtrong used to enthuse about, and pretty soon after getting home, had a good poop. Well! That's effective all right. I didn't even have to open the bottle. Good value for the money, I'd say. 

Ken did indeed come by last night, thought he's left his check book at home, then it magically appeared so I got my check. So now I'm caught up. The idea today is to go out mid-day when it's warmed up into the 50s anyway, then get back in and find some things to list on Ebay, then it's Shabbat. 

It sucks that I had so much pain upon waking up today, as last night I'd actually managed to give myself a proper hair wash / head scrub out in the 30-something degree air out front of the shop here and I'd also made some nice cole slaw and put that into the fridge. And packed a few small things. 

No checkee

 Haha Ken came by last night with a burger for me, and we talked things to death, and it wasn't until he'd left and it was 1:30AM that I realized he'd not written me my pay check. So I called him and he said he's forgotten too, and that it was funny because he had his check book with him. 

So he's supposed to come by today/tonight with it. 

Want to distract an American? Bring a burger into the scene. 

This is actually pretty good because if  I get a check tonight, I should be able to deposit it tomorrow, drop things off at the post office, and go to the Friday night service. I'm willing to put up with a bit of pain to get my singing in. 

More on my plans once I get this pain to a controllable level. I've mentioned getting a ukulele and working on my singing. The kind of uke  I gravitate to is the good old banjo-uke, of which Ukulele Source has a couple at reasonable prices. Actually they have, besides the cheap "Diamond" one, two by Kala that are essentially the same uke but one's $200 more because it's got brass hardware. Whooptie-doo. I like the cheaper one which is only a couple hundred bucks. 

This area is a hotbed of ukulele activity. Clubs, groups, etc. But they all require you to have a car. Can't have the unwashed masses riding the bus to the meetings and get-togethers. So, their loss. 

The thing with the banjo-uke is, though, besides their being cute and loud and cool, is in the past I was able to teach myself the George Formby stroke. So I can pick that up again. Because I'll want to be able to play some instrumental pieces or just strings of chords that sound good, to give my voice rest periods between songs. 

Years ago, way before covid, there was a Black kid who showed up downtown, possibly kicked out by his parents I dunno, but he was a suburban kid who'd really gotten into Radiohead and could sing all their stuff, and he sounded good. But he pushed too much, didn't give himself breaks, and within a week had "blown out" his voice. I hope he recovered and is doing well, but this is exactly what I want to avoid. 

I packed one large 30-lb box for (hopefully) Ken to pick up tonight, and two small things. I really wanted to go out, to do Shabbat shopping (mainly some roast beef and check out the alcohol-free wine at Sprouts) and just buying things in general. 

So I took the two packages to the post office, got tea eggs and coffee at 99 Ranch, then went to H Mart and parked the bike, walked over to Home Goods and Ross and Sprouts, did my shopping including a bottle of alcohol-free wine, got a couple of things at H Mart most notable some albacore sashimi which I really like and which is usually too expensive. I ate that at one of the tables by Starbucks, out in the cold. 

I rode home and put things away, and lay in bed for a while. 

In the news it's more of the same. Sex traffickers with drug problems, anti-science weirdos, conspiracy theorists, etc all being installed in high positions of power. Kind of like Germany 1933-45 where if you were a chicken farmer who dabbled in the occult (Himmler) or a washed-up WWII pilot with a serious heroin addiction (Goering) or a small-time pimp/human trafficker (Horst Wessel) you got a high position of power or were lionized and songs sung about you. 

 

 

Cautiously proud of myself

 Yesterday not only did I do all that shipping, and getting a few groceries and that plate lunch, but I finished the load of laundry I had soaking, T-shirts, sox, and a big bulky pair of sweat pants. 

I actually fell on the friggin' stairs to the loft. It was the next to the last step so it was a sort of halfway fall, I fell, making a big noise of course, but it was more like falling onto a 45-degree plane, and I was able to catch myself on my knees and right side, so amazingly it hasn't made me feel less sore this morning. 

I got all things packed last night so today, in theory, all I'd have to do is a haircut and clean myself up, get out of these clothes I've been wearing since Sunday the 3rd. 

My rabbi appointment just got moved from today at 3PM to next Wednesday at 2PM. I still need to go out and do things though, the post office downtown, the bank, Whole Foods and buying more pills at the Walgreens on Santa Clara St. At least there won't be room taken up in my panniers by wine! 

I got good sleep last night, too. I waited until 2AM when my next Tylenol 500 was scheduled, took it, snuggled up in my neck brace and I was out. Woke up around 6, had some ibuprofen, then back to sleep until around 10. The pain on getting up at 10 was enough to make me yelp, but not as bad as yesterday. 

I'm still firm about trying to make myself over as a singer rather than a trumpeter. I need to keep stress off of my back, and if I am not able to make myself over as a singer, I will have to play a short, "shepherd's crook" cornet, as the shortest horn in the trumpet family and really a fine instrument. 

But the possibility of being a singer is intriguing. Yesterday I found the song "Tzena Tzena Tzena" which has been sung by everyone, and frankly I'd love to be able to put across songs like "Everything Is Broken" by Bob Dylan and "Born To Love Volcanoes" by The Dead Milkmen. It would be letting my inner little kid, who burst out with imitations of silly TV commercials and things on the Checkers And Pogo Show, out. 

I left here around 3. Dropped off trash, used the loo at Nijiya because I really needed to, stopped at Ukulele Source to look at their ukes, dropped off packages at the post office, went to the bank to deposit my check, then went to Whole Foods to buy some stuff (a little fish and rice and some seltzer water) and sat and ate upstairs, then got another couple small things and got more money out. Then went to the bike shop to see if the bike trailer part I have coming is in, but it's not. Had a nice talk with the guy, we talked about how horrible the new regime is and I said I have to hold off on buying a folding bike because I don't know how bad things will get and right now my first priority is to get my passport renewed. 

Then back to Whole Foods to lock the bike up and took a #22 bus up to the Walgreens to get more of the OTC medication I'm on. That was actually pretty quick as, to go back to Whole Foods, the #22 bus came right away. 

Now I bought grocery type things at Whole Foods and rode for home. Although traffic was heavy, places like Whole Foods and San Pedro Square were dead. Maybe people are holding back on spending, to afford to get their passports renewed? 

I stopped at Nijiya for sashimi stuff and got back here.