First things first, I started writing this on September 30 but got a migraine halfway through the day and left it unfinished. I'm now coming back and completing it on October 1.
Health
Physical health is going fine. My insurance is getting a bit weird though. I have a 'case manager' nurse that's calling me and going over my healthcare with me. I don't mind it, but I believe I have good healthcare and am managing it well myself. For now, it's not hurting anything so we'll see how it goes.
I've also had a strange issue from the insurance company regarding an "in-home health assessment". This would be a video call with a doctor. This is something I am NOT interested in. It feels like a complete waste of time since I like my doctor and have this case management on top of that. I ignored the flyer asking if I was interested. I then got a call about it, asking if I was interested. I told them no, that I was fine without it. Then I got another call... to schedule the in-home health assessment. Oh no... fuck you. This was an AGRESSIVE push to schedule it, pushing past any questions I asked with constant requests of "is this a good day for you? are mornings better than afternoons?". Nope nope nope. Fuck that. I had to end up hanging up on them.
Later that same day my case manager called and I told him about it. He seemed concerned and said he'd look into it.
The irony of all of this is that I'll be changing healthcare again soon, back to the State plan.
10/01 update: They called yesterday afternoon and again tried to aggressively schedule me for this in home healthcare assessment.
Mental health wise, I'm okay. I'm very anxious about this whole job situation. I feel like it should be moving faster. Or maybe I just want it to move faster. Regardless, waiting is NOT my specialty and its grating on me.
I'm also feeling less social lately. I really just don't want to interact with people. I think I'm going to write a whole post up about that.
Finances
Still going well here.
Social Security finally came through and sent me a check for just over $32,000. While the administrative judge claimed I was disabled between the dates of September 2023 and May 2025, social security took that to mean I was owed money between March 2024 and March 2025... plus two 'extra' months, taking me to May 2025.
Fine. I don't care.
But they did hint that I'd need to pay taxes on this. Okay, 25% taxes means roughly $8,000.
I tell my long term disability company about the disbursement from social security since my agreement with them, the long term disability company, states that I'd owe it back to them. Their initial assessment was that I'd owe the entire amount plus more 'for taxes'. I argued against that, but finally relented as she said I'd get specific information from the 'overpayment' department.
I finally got that paperwork and it says I owe them just UNDER $32,000. Evidently I don't have to pay for the taxes (reversing what the first rep said), but they only took about $1000 out for taxes.
Fuck. Fine. Whatever. I just want this done.
The paperwork is sitting on my desk. One day when I get the gumption I'll look at it closely and see what it takes to specifically pay them. Hopefully I can do it online or over the phone. I really don't want to have to write out a check and send it in the mail.
I'll deal with the taxes next year. It's going to be fucked anyway with me taking money out of my 401K.
Family/Friends
As I said above, I haven't been feeling very social lately. I'd normally be pining for a vacation around now. A drive down to Dallas, even if it were just for a weekend. And I still might do that, if for no other reason that if I start working it will mean having to schedule trips again. But for now, I just don't want to do it.
My older brother R and I moved in with Mom just before Dad passed away. We stayed to help her out for awhile, and to be honest, we needed help too. I went to school to become a nurse, R went about finding steady work.
Fast forward to a couple years ago. I was working as a nurse and paying mom a bit of money each month. R was working as a maintenance man for a housing project. I quit because of my migraines. R quit because of personal reasons. Mom's health continued to decline. R basically picked up everything since I couldn't really be a reliable source of help any longer. R became mom's health advocate, going to all of her doctor's appointments and keeping track of her treatments. He does the house cleaning. He helps manage the shopping. He does her laundry.
Fast forward to now. It's a known fact that I'm going to go back to work. I'll be making 'good' money doing so. R, on the other hand, has burned through almost all of his money that he saved when he quit. He doesn't have a lot of bills, but he does have some. And of course he has his pride. For the past few months he's been looking in to see if Mom could qualify for 'home health care' or 'home chore assistance' that he could get paid for. Sadly, no. Unless mom was on Medicaid since neither Medicare nor Tricare (mom's military health insurance form dad's retirement) pay for those services.
That basically leaves R in the position where he might have to return to work. Two years ago mom was left alone for about six hours a day, but she could manage. Now? Now, I'd rather her not be alone. Sure, she doesn't need someone by her side all the time. She can do her ADLs. No stairs. No heavy lifting. No continuous activity. She can get by. BUT she also has terrible balance. She may not have fallen in the past year, but she's been close on so many occasions that it's just assumed she WILL fall sooner rather than later. And if she were alone? She'd be fucked. And if she were alone, without R or me here to help, she'd try doing more and therefore put herself at more risk of falling.
So, I told R that once I started working I'd pay him to stay and take care of mom. His 'job' wouldn't change at all. I wouldn't be his 'boss'. I wouldn't dictate what he does. He wouldn't be doing any chores for me. But he also wouldn't need to go back to work and could remain here while I return to work. Mom, R, and I all liked the idea.
Then mom suggested a change. I pay mom each month for rent, a portion of the cable bill, and for the Netflix subscription. It's about $375 a month. It's honestly a pittance compared to what she gets for her retirement. She doesn't even budget for it, just puts it into her savings and leaves it there. It's always been more about 'me' than 'her'. Well, her idea was that I divert that money from her to R. Instead of paying for rent, Xfinity, and Netflix each month, I pay for 'MomCare'.
So starting tomorrow today, I'll be paying R $400 a month to care for mom. That amount will change once I get back to work, but at least we can start paying R now. We sat down and talked about it, making sure to lay out that this is simply a continuance of what R has been doing and nothing more. No new tasks. And that the money is coming from Mom and me, not just me.
Entertainment
I finished The Institute and it was good. Not great. I wouldn't recommend it highly to non Stephen King fans, but it's good enough to watch and really good for SK fans. After that I just played a little 'eeny meeny miney moe' and picked DareDevil Reborn to watch next. I'm about halfway through and it's good. As good as the Netflix series.
I did also take a break from it these past few days to re-watch both Tron and The Matrix movies. Tron, because the new Tron: Ares movie coming out and Matrix because... well, it's just a damned good series. And you know what? The Matrix, specifically the first movie, stands up so well to time. It really is a classic. The fight scenes, the action, the acting, and of course the whole story... it just works great. The two sequels are good popcorn movies, but the fights get over the top with the CGI (just too far ahead of its time) and the car chase scene is ALMOST epic... just too much CGI. I'm halfway through Resurrections again and it's better than my initial impression. I think it can stand shoulder to shoulder with the two sequels.
Oh, and I looked into the whole 'Get Paramount+ from Xfinity' thing. Yeah, no. You get some of Paramount+ through the cable box or the Xfinity app. That doesn't help me when I'm sitting here at my computer AND it doesn't include ALL of Paramount+. So, that's done and I paid for my next year of Paramount+.
New Tech
I should get my new phone next week. Yay! My current phone is just getting under my skin with little annoyances. If I'd only had it for a year and didn't already have a replacement coming I'd do a whole factory reset and start over, but that's just a waste of time since I'm getting a new phone next week anyway.
I've also that two new things are coming out that I'll be interested in. The Logitech MX Master 4 Mouse and the Amazon Kindle Scribe Color. The mouse is definitely coming out as there have already been leaks of it and it's box. I've had my MX Master 3s for awhile now and absolutely love it. I'll be very interested in seeing what they've added to make it better.
The Kindle Scribe color is 'rumored' to be coming out today. While I do still love my tablet that I use for a Kindle (the Boox Note Air 3 C)
***This is as far as I got on 09/30***
Instead of editing the above, I thought I'd leave it for the irony.
The Logitech MX Master 4 is now out. I watched a review of it and I'm on the fence as to whether I should upgrade to it. It's an iterative upgrade. No change in sensor, buttons, or wheels. The 'Gesture' button changed location and they added a 'Haptic' button.
The Gesture button, which currently sits just under the thumb, is used to slip between different desktops on Windows. I use the different desktops to have a 'Caitlyn' space and a 'Anybody can look at what I'm doing here' space. For instance, right now I have this desktop with my Google Chrome window open but it's logged into my Caitlyn account and is highlighted in pink. I have my Caitlyn discord logged in and it's all purples and pinks. I then have my apple music playing but it's nothing different or special. My other or main desktop has Whatsapp, Google Messages (a mirror to the text messages on my phone), a Google Chrome window that's logged into my 'main' account (highlighted in grey) and showing an article on The Athletic, and my VPN control window. If someone were to just walk into my room I have just a second or so to click my mouse's Gesture button and slide my mouse to the left and my desktop will be showing something that I won't mind anybody seeing. So, it's something I use often. Them moving that button might be a problem as it's muscle memory. It's moved up next to the forward/back buttons that the thumb uses. I can see easily mistaking the gesture button for the forward button and vice/versa.
The 'Haptic' button looks interesting. It's now where the 'Gesture' button was, under the thumb. When you press it, a small circle of options comes up on the screen that you can program into anything. Volume adjustment, open a program, open a file location... stuff like that. That same circle of options changes when in different programs like Adobe Photoshop. I can see the possibilities, but it's just that... possibilities. I'm not sure that I'd find usefulness there.
And that's about it. It costs $120, moved an often used button, and added something that I might not use. Probably not worth upgrading to. Instead, just wait until my current mouse inevitably breaks down and then replace it with the Master 4 instead of another Master 3s.
As for the Kindle Scribe color... yeah, it was announced yesterday. There isn't too much out about it and it's not even available for pre-order. They just say it will be available 'later this year'. But I'm going to get one as soon as it's available.
As I was saying above before I so rudely interrupted myself, my e-ink tablet is perfect except for one thing. That one thing though is a deal killer. The tablet will only warn me when the battery gets down to 20%. Not 21%, not 19%. 20. As it's constantly drawing power, it almost always passed that 20% mark when I'm not using it. So I get no warning that the battery is getting low. My first warning is when I try to start reading and it's dead. A dedicated Kindle will give you good warings when you turn it on to read, saying it's below a certain level and then keep reminding you every time you turn it on until you charge it.
Yes, the tablet is FAR more useful than a Kindle. But after more than a year of using the tablet, I have yet to do anything other than use it as a Kindle. I love the size. I love the fact that it's color. And now they have a Kindle in that size and in color. It's an easy purchase even at the $680 they're asking. It can do quite a bit as it's designed to take notes as much as read books... but honestly, it'll just be a book reader for me. I doubt I'll even keep the stylus with it.
Writing
Writing has been going surprisingly well. I've added 14 chapters to You're Not The Boss Of Me, and most days I simply can't wait to get back into writing. It killed me that I couldn't write yesterday because of the migraine.
Just to compare, I started YNTBOM on August 26th and wrote the last chapter on September 28th. Just over a month. In that time I put out 36 chapters. Just over one a day. Or to be precise it took me 33 days to write 36 chapters. In Gamer Gurl Part II it took me 54 days to get 36 chapters. It's a Man's World took 70 days and Gamer Gurl Part I took 66 days (and was almost the entire story!).
Now that I think about it, I imagine a lot of this is just the fact that I don't have constant migraines. It was different for Gamer Gurl Part II at the end because the story was so complex. It took longer to get my head around what Sadie and Sarah and everybody was doing/thinking. This is far easier.
Anyway, I'll keep plugging away. I'm maybe 1/3 the way through the 2nd act. I may write a post about the story and the writing later as well.
Michigan Football
Michigan played well against Nebraska. It was good to see Bryce Underwood perform well against a far better defense. The final score was closer than what the game was as I believe Michigan was in control of the game from beginning to end. Now Michigan just has to keep winning. I think Michigan matches up well against their next few opponents. Wisconsin this weekend, USC next weekend, Washington the next, MSU on the 25th. Purdue should be an easy one on the 1st as well as Northwestern on the 15th with a bye in between. Another good matchup with Maryland, though Maryland tends to nosedive later in the season. Then finally Ohio State on the 29th.
Michigan is currently ranked 20 on the AP Poll but should climb steadily and be in the top ten if they keep winning. If they only have the one loss when they face Ohio State they have a very good chance of getting into the playoff, regardless of if they beat OSU or not. If they beat OSU in that circumstance, they'd be undefeated in the B1G and going to the B1G championship and likely automatically be in the CFP.
Possible problem games: USC isn't a cupcake and that game is in L.A. It's not easy to fly out to the west coast and get a win. Washington isn't a pushover and MSU is a rival so that's always a mystery. Wisconsin, Purdue, Northwestern, and Maryland should be dubs.
It'll definitely be good football viewing for the next few weeks.
Computer Issues
The computer is humming along fine. A couple more 'updates' with this and I'll take this section out of the every update update.
Job Search
I had the interview at 'my' prison a week ago on September 24th. I hope to hear something back this week. I honestly don't know what to expect and it's creating a lot of anxiety. For now, since there isn't anything to do until I hear back, I'm just pushing off and waiting.
On the recruiter front, I did finally hear back from her. She said she passed my information on to the central HR office. That's it. No talk of the interview that didn't happen, no talk of the one prison that might be a good fit... I might just have to consider her a dead end at this point. It's another reason I'm anxious about my interview... maybe there's something in my record that goes against me. I don't know and focusing on it is useless so again... I'm just waiting.
Car Shopping
B's new car is still running fine. He contacted the local dealership about getting it inspected and they scheduled him an appointment in early November. It sucks that it will take so long, but it doesn't really matter. The engine is at least under warranty for a year and the car should pass an inspection no problem. Once it's passed, we buy the warranty which still shows for the same price. Then we'll finally be done with that car purchase.
Keyboard
I wish I could just be happy.
I absolutely love typing on this keyboard. I feel that I type so much better on it than I did the Razer. It's hard to compare against the Logitech as that was a long time ago now, but I believe it's as good if not outright better typing. The sound is far and above better. It's just this smooth silky chonk chonk chonk. I love it.
The keypad now lives where I put it last, in it's rough normal position but pushed up and away from the keyboard which gives my mouse room to sweep and not tap it. When I have a lot of number writing to do, like this morning when I did my budgeting, I simply pull it down to it's 'home' position so that the muscle memory from the number pad to the arrow keys works perfectly.
I plugged both of them in and obviously that solved the lighting and sleeping problems.
It should all be good, right? But for some reason, I don't like it. I can't put my finger on exactly what it is. There are few small things, but they shouldn't bring discontent. There's the keycaps. I have all the letters and numbers from a specific set online that lets the light shine through. Even in pitch black I can see all the letters and numbers. The tilde, tab, capslock, shift, control, windows, alt, space bar, arrows, Fkeys, escape, and control keys above the arrows (delete, end, page up/down...) don't have the shine through lights but I only very rarely need to find one of those keys. Once my fingers are on the home keys (F and J) my fingers know where almost everything else is. The arrows, control keys, space bar, alrt/control/windows/enter/shift... they're known quantities and not mixed up with others. The same goes with the num pad. When I want to use it, I just put my middle finger on the 5 key and everything else lines up.
But the keycaps are now different. They're styled different. I have the original Grey keycaps on the number pad as those keys are unique. It's a circle, triangle, square, and X above the keypad and five Mkeys on the left. The dial on the num pad is a unique blue aluminum. Then there's the Royal keycaps. They're Blue and a very very dark grey (almost black, but NOT black). The numpad keys (except those listed above) are blue. The arrows are blue. The space bar is blue. The F1-4 and F9-12 are blue. F5-8 are the almost black. Tilde, tab, capslock, and the other keys that aren't lit up are that almost black. The enter key is a highlighted key and it's yellow. The escape key is an aluminum special key. And then the letters and numbers are black with a different font and different placement.
I certainly don't mind the keycaps being different. But being different and not matching are two different things and I have both.
But there isn't a good option otherwise. If I went with the Logitech I'm taking a step back in they sound department. Plus I either have to keep the num pad as I have it or I have to use the full Logitech keyboard and that then includes the damned Mkeys on the left which I hated.
Fuck. I'm just going to stay with this for now but I doubt this will last for two years.
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