A little better?

 I woke up around 9 which is good. I have a 9AM meeting with the rabbi tomorrow so it's good to have my time schedule shifted earlier. 

After Ken was gone I pretty much just worked on getting sleepy and probably went to bed at about 1:20AM. I drank some wine, 4-1/2 or maybe 3-1/2 of the small bottles. 

I played with my new laptop just a tiny bit more; it has a card reader right in the side that reads the memory card I use so I don't need to use the little USB card reader I've been using. That's neat. 

One reason I joined CostCo is I could buy a new laptop through them, they sell a new Dell Latitude for about $500 but then Best Buy and Central Computers probably have deals too. If I'm not "feelin' it" with CostCo I'm gonna cancel the card and get my money back haha. 

I mean, $3 for two hot dogs or $4 for two tea eggs from 99 Ranch? Sure I save a dollar at CostCo but then I have to go to CostCo. The rubbing alcohol I bought yesterday was just Walmart's price. 

CostCo's T-shirts do not beat Ross, even looking online. 

Three somewhat worrisome things: 

(1) Ken's signature on my pay checks has gotten small - like 2/3rds the size it was for years. This is supposed to be a sign of ... declining mental health. 

(2) Also we discussed Social Security and he said, "My Social Security pays the rent on this place". Great just great. Me, I'd drop this place like a hot potato if that were the case. What with buying laptops and all I've been very spendy but I'm trying to keep enough in the bank to survive on for a while, find a small office to rent or a room or something, continue with my conversion and work towards my move to Israel. 

(3) I told Ken about the process I'm following, the completion of the class, the 4 essays I'll have to write, the judgement by a beit din (tribunal of rabbis) the dip in the mikveh, the year after this of being active in my synagogue before I'm considered suitable to move to Israel. So, we're talking two more years. That might coincide with the ending of the lease here and Ken might decide Fuck it, I'm selling this business off. Toward the end I might also decide Fuck it and find a room or a small office and not have to work here any more. 

The only thing that makes this last "concerning" is that Ken now knows my time scale. When I was planning to simply bugger off back to Hawaii, I'd actually planned to leave on my birthday, late-ish in last year, and not tell Ken until I was off the plane in Honolulu. I was going to move my money into the Navy credit union (the banks are all different in Hawaii) and planned on spending a few thou hotel'ing it for a while until I found a cheap room. 

If there's one place I could land on my feet it's Hawaii. But it comes with conditions, the main one being that while I'm "a little something" here on the mainland, in Hawaii I'm a haole plain and simple and hated for it. As a poor person, I'd not be able to isolate myself in an expensive house in an area the poors don't go. I'd be out riding the bus and walking the sketchier streets and picking shells on the beach. This means have a solid shuck and jive. 

Shucking and jiving is this: Shucking is keeping a "humble" or "aw, shucks" body language. Jiving is using language, especially joking, being self-depreciating, to fend off possible (or probable) violence. And one has to be very careful with the jiving, because anti-intellectualism is practically the official religion in Hawaii so clever jokes are out. You have to be smart local-style, or 'akamai, with at least a touch of pidgin. 

In any case, what a way to live! Plus it's still part of the US so there's the violence, the lack of health care, the Christianity, the crazy politics, etc. I'd be better off working out a way to stay here in San Jose than to go back there and be a 2nd class citizen. 

I packed a couple of things, headed out of here around noon to put my pay check in the bank, had some chicken wings and seltzer water at Whole Foods, then rode down to Walmart for a bunch of things, not least Kosher for Passover matzos and K for P grape juice for my own use as well as to take to the seder on Sunday. 

I stopped by Nijiya on the way back for a can of coffee to take to my 9AM meeting tomorrow morning, and a nice slab of seared fish for tomorrow night's dinner. 

I got back here, put things away, and around 5:30 set out again with one thing that had sold to drop off at the post office, and first went to 99 Ranch and got some fish and noodles, ate those, and got into an interesting conversation with a guy sitting there in his BMW, an E36 except it's a 3-door convertible so I'm not sure if it's the same number or an E36 variant. Anyway, since I'd once had an E36 and his was really well maintained we got talking about used cars and things. 

That led to talking about the tariffs, and how used cars are going to be worth more because the prices will rise for everything. I mentioned having just got a "new used" laptop because yep, used laptops will be more too. 

Anyway he eventually told me how "all the media" are saying the IRS will be gotten rid of and anyone making less than $175k (or something like that) won't have to pay taxes any more. I said when the income tax was set up, anyone making less than $4k didn't have to pay, and back then that was a solid middle-class income, equivalent to at least $80k now. 

This was a Vietnamese guy, who I'm gonna guess came here as a child or maybe as a teen. About my same age. And I'd never heard anything about this little theory. But then, to me, "the media" isn't The Epoch Times, Faux News, right-wing fringe podcasts, etc. So we parted on friendly terms but wow, some of the stuff some people actually believe... 

I took the one package to the post office, then, fortified by fish and noodles, braved going into CostCo again and canceled my membership. I told the guy I'd shopped around until almost closing last night and really, there's just not that much that I can use. I think they're "no questions asked" about that anyway and the full $65 was credited back to my card. 

I went over to the Baguette for a study session, then after studying a bit realized Woops, I wanted to go to Sprouts and Ross. So  I did so. I spent almost $50 at Ross on sox, t-shirts, some hangers, etc., and got coffee creamer and some yogurt at Sprouts and got back here.