11 January 2025

Happy (belated) Burfday to me

This is another post I started on one day and then didn’t finish, so have to finish the second day.

First up: probably the first photo ever taken of me, because parents didn’t get ultrasound printouts in the mid-seventies.

Yesterday having been my first birthday for which my mother is not also in this world, I have to go by what I can remember of my mother’s description of events, and my memory’s not always good — but I’m pretty sure my mother said forceps were involved, so my grumpy visage is more than earned here. I was a chonker. My paternal grandmother’s notes from my father’s phone call to her said ten pounds, two ounces. I’ve also heard ten pounds five. Either way, I was Mom’s smallest baby. And I am pretty sure my brothers and I all arrived the usual way, each in our turn. Poor Mom.

I have now completed the first year in the second half of my century. Well, I’m hoping for a century. If I’m more realistic about it I’ll probably get a good three-quarters of the way there. I guess we will just have to wait and see.

The day was quiet. Neighbor had business in Medford and L went along, so I was on lunch duty for the dogs. A person known to Neighbor has been doing odd jobs around both his and L’s houses and lately, it’s L’s, so she was there yesterday too. She offered me a “cranberry fritter” baked by someone she knows; normally I avoid gluten and sugar, but I avoid them so much I knew I’d be okay with one slip if I didn’t make it a habit. That was before I told her it was my birthday, which I probably wouldn’t have done had she not given me a treat. It was an interesting coincidence. She later asked how old I am and guessed thirty-two and did not believe me when I told her I am fifty-one. Pretended not to believe? I have my suspicions. She’s a bit… wheedly? And Neighbor already informed me she’s doing all this to pay him back for doing something “awful” to him. Something’s been weird there since this past summer. Based on some past behavior I’ve seen, I am suspicious she came on to him. It would explain why she’s doing things for L too. But that is just my suspicion. It could be an entirely unrelated thing, but also weird and random and upsetting. I will never know unless he volunteers that information, and so far he hasn’t. But I still don’t believe she thought I was in my thirties. Not with the turkey wattles I’ve got hanging off my face.

Heard from some people on Facebook for my birthday. Hearing from anyone on my birthday is good, though I was a little weirded out that three people didn’t mention it, all of whom I know face-to-face. I’m not going to read anything into it, because two of them are quite busy and two of them are absent-minded, definitely in one case and apparently in the other case. I know that adds up to four, but there’s overlap. The main takeaway I have here is that I should befriend (be-acquaintance? they may not even be proper “friends”) fewer busy people. That’ll likely take care of itself as I go on.

Talked with Carrie, my dad’s best friend and a dear friend of mine too, and she told me Dad was planning on calling for my birthday and that I should act surprised. I was skeptical. I was right to be skeptical. No phone call, no text, and I even checked to see if I was blocking his number — I am not. Now, my father takes a lot of naps, and I suspect he’s getting a mite forgetful which, given his booze-engendered brain-bleed issues of a couple years ago, he’s lucky if it’s only a mite. But what I suspect actually happened was Carrie was visiting him and asked him if he was going to call me for my birthday, and he said “yes” because he knew she expected it. I don’t think he expected her to give me a heads-up about it, though. Now, true, I didn’t contact him for his birthday. We were firmly on the outs at that time, so, fair do’s. He doesn’t have to play the Good Dad. We both know he isn’t one anyway except in the realm of material things. (Why men think that’s all they have to do to be “good,” and then turn around and cry that everyone uses them as a walking bank, is a mystery I will never solve in my lifetime.) But I did send him a Christmas card after someone, Doug probably, told me he was willing to re-establish contact. So, I mean, I dunno how far he thinks I’m going to want to take this after the way he behaved last year, but he’s in for a rude shock. He’s not likely to see me ever again, either. He’s had all the fun he’s going to have with me. I’m done.

I’ve always hated cutting people out of my life and yet it’s always been my best option, because I give people an inch and they strangle me with it. I like breathing. It is what it is.

Fucking Facebook

Look, I don’t care that the “fact-checkers” got Zucc’d. They deserve it, and for their “trans people are not mentally ill” take alone. But every now and again Facebook decides that what I need in my news feed are accounts, groups, and pages which I am not even friending, liking, or following. You have to understand that I’ve got 142 Facebook friends at last count and am following literally hundreds of pages. It’s an impulse. I admit it. It’s still a problem. And I already can’t see everything I AM following. If Facebook is going to add stuff that I’m not following, it edges out MORE stuff I want to see.

Not to mention I am continually reminded why I am not following these other pages. You could cut through the stupidity in the comments with a knife, and I wish someone would. I find myself arguing with the commenters and then realize time has passed. And it’s not going to make them any smarter. And you also come to realize that most of the posts, never mind the commenters, are deliberately stupid in order to incite extreme responses. This isn’t the Facebook algorithm. I don’t know why people blame the algorithm. It’s the people running these pages. They could be using their platforms to get actually useful and informative content out to the unwashed masses and what are they doing? Starting shit. I’m so tired of it.

I used to think America Online was ruining the internet. This is like America Online on steroids. And literally none of the other social-media platforms are any better. Even if a particular platform tends to be higher-quality, it will also be less active because most people who connect to the internet now want mindless entertainment. They don’t want to think. It fucking shows.

I have no answers. Either we get on social media or we don’t reach those few people who are reachable. There is no third option, apparently.

Meanwhile I’m trying to organize my Scotland-related stuff off of Facebook so I can stop following it ON Facebook. I need to get Facebook’s claws out of me, and I guess this is my first step. Enough.

—

L is over at Neighbor’s and left Parker here and she is on a tear and the barking is driving me mad. I already brought her in once to maybe settle her down. It didn’t work. I’m gonna find something mindless to do so the overstimulation doesn’t matter so much anymore. ‘Later.