October 2022 Monthly Entry
It seems summer has been hanging on a lot longer than usual. We are getting day temperatures anywhere from 20-24C on average and better yet - almost no rain. The temperatures do drop sharply at night and I even have to put the heat on low setting in my car when I drive home at night. The dry weather has led to forest fires still going on near the Lower Mainland and getting haze almost every day, but not enough to cover the sky in grey much.
I will be returning to Palm Springs Leather Pride on October 28-31. Because of my major US trip in August and all the funds it drained, I've decided to stay with Daddy Bradford at his place this year. Daddy Rick from Seattle cannot join this year as he cannot get the time off. My entry on the weekend will appear in early November.
Nothing really new has happened at work. Thanks to the dry weather, sweeping the floors is easier with the lack of dirt, but I know it'll soon won't last as the rains will come and make my job harder. Besides the continued graffiti in the girls washroom and yucky stuff in the boys washroom I've mentioned before, I had a minor rant from last month's Pro-D day. Rosser had theirs on a Friday while Montecito had it the following Monday. Rosser wasn't a problem given it is the least of my run. Montecito obviously was another matter. On that Friday, which was a normal shift with the usual mess from kids and staff, I decided to do the usual cleaning to prep up for the extra stuff on Monday since Monday is staff-only and the mess very small as there are no kids in that day. I come in Friday after Rosser and find a lot of extra garbage and mess to deal with. The kids got Domino's Pizza and juice boxes that day. Jay got some of the excess small pizza boxes and empty juice boxes, but a lot of my garbage cans and food scrap bins were filled. And of course, there were some drips and minor spills of juice on the floors. I had to spend extra time taking out all the extra garbage. I managed to clean the staff washroom, empty all the garbage and food scraps in my run, sweep everything, wipe down every desk, restock all paper towels and toilet paper as needed, and vacuum all rugs. The only two things I didn't do and defer to do on Monday was the boys and girls washroom -which I wanted to detail clean as I always do on a Pro-D day- and mop all the floors. I knew the floors had a lot of juice-mess on them, but I thought it wouldn't be a big deal and the teachers would figure out they would be done on Monday night. Before leaving for the weekend, I left a note for Jay in the day book that I had taken care of all the garbage and prioritized the floors/rugs and wiping things down, but I would mop all floors and detail clean the washrooms on Monday. Come Monday and after Rosser was done, I walk in and get the talk from Jay. The teachers complained to the principal about the unmopped floors in my run, which in turn had Jay trying to defend me and thankfully, didn't include my foreman! But Jay was then forced to mop all the floors in my run! I was obviously pissed off at the teachers for all this. Should I have spot-mopped the floors that Friday to keep them off my back? Possibly. But it wasn't much of a health issue and more just unsightly than anything. Seriously... the teachers complained about a custodian... on a Pro-D day! There are no kids in class on those days, just staff, and custodians can pretty much determine their own cleaning protocol. To make up for Jay being forced to mop the majority of the floors in my run upstairs, he gave me options that he planned to do that day. I could either: wet mop the entire gymnasium, clean his washrooms downstairs, or go up on the roof and clean up the drains. In my guilt, I chose the roof even though I have a fear using tall ladders. I thought that since this was part of my job, I had to learn it as I may one day become a sub-foreman. It took over two hours of my time as I was biting off more than I could chew. There was a lot of dead pine needles and various other debris on the two-level roofs that I didn't have time to sweep it all. I mainly had to concentrate on the drains. Any debris I collected in the container could be thrown over at the front side of the building, provided no one was around to be pelted by it LOL! It is dangerous trying to use the ladder to get on the roof from the outside, trying to get my footing on and off the ladder and roof. Once I get to the first level, I have to pull the ladder up to set it to get to the highest level. Despite my fears, I fulfilled my obligation to Jay. For the rest of the Pro-D day, I tried to scrape off some stained tree sap on the floors in the kindergarten portable that appeared earlier in September. That was largely unsuccessful and I may have to use a swinger machine to scrub them out come the winter break in December. I detailed cleaned the upstairs and boys and girls washrooms, and buffed out the harder stains on the students' desks. There was a large scratch on the floor from one classroom to the other (what the hell did they drag?) that looks almost like pencil lead, but I refused to buff it out because of the complaint leveled against me earlier in the day. Had these privileged teachers not whined to the principal, I would have had time to include getting that scratch out. They'll have to wait until this Friday's Pro-D day for me to try and attempt buffing out that scratch.
Right after Thanksgiving last week, I saw my doctor and discussed about my high glucose levels from my blood test last summer. I was already fasting because I wanted to do another test, so I went to the nearby Life Labs on Burrard Street to give my blood and also this time, a urine sample too. I needed a refill on Truvada so an HIV test was ordered with it. The next day, my doctor leaves a voice message on my phone telling me my blood glucose levels are very high and I needed to come in -even be late for work- and get a diabetic medication from him and prescribe a second for me to pick up at my local pharmacist. I didn't go in as it would take me too long to get from Langley to downtown Vancouver in rush hour traffic by car, and it would take me over an hour to transit to and from downtown from Burnaby. I couldn't be too late so decided that I would go back to my doctor the following day as it was too late to do anything, besides the fact that my doctor's office closes at 5pm. When I got home that night, I checked my test results online... devastated to find that my sugar levels were higher than the test done back in July! I thought they would be lower given I was putting more fiber in my diet and not as much sugars. On the plus side, my cholesterol levels have gone significantly down thanks to the Rosuvastatin I was taking for almost a few months. Returning to my doctor around noon last Thursday with no appointment, but with priority visiting, he spent 20 minutes with me. For medication, he gave me 60 sample pills of Empagliflozin and prescribed Metformin. The Empagliflozin causes my sugars to be urinated out of me to lower the levels. But my doctor issued a caveat with a question: was I uncircumcised? Yes, of course. He then warned me that every time I urinated, I needed to try and empty out as much urine at the end and clean trapped urine under my foreskin as much as possible as the sugars can lead to easier infection if left for too long. While I don't pull my foreskin back when I piss because it is a little tight when the head of my penis is unmoist, I do pull it back when showering each day and clean under it. I learned this lesson when I got my first foreskin infection in early November of 2005 and again about a year later that I needed to pull my foreskin back and wash underneath almost every time I bathed, especially if I got a blowjob and/or cummed. Because of my consistency, infections have been rare and when they flare up on occasion, I give my foreskin extra cleaning. As to why my doctor got me 60 pills as sample packs, the government doesn't subsidize them so when they run out, I will have to pay for future refills on my own and my doctor was trying to save me money. As for Metformin, it is what a lot of type-2 diabetics take to help regulate blood sugars. I hate that I need to take it twice a day and with food as taking it on an empty stomach (I think) damages your stomach lining and (more likely) will give you diarrhea. So in the span of three months, I went from no daily medication in my life to three prescribed medications! This has been both angry and depressing to me because the only person to blame was myself. I honestly hate myself for the bad habits I allowed for years and didn't think would bite me this hard. If I changed my habits a few years ago, could I have avoided this? I honestly do not know. I don't think I can truly reverse back to pre-diabetes and even no diabetes. I know this means I am a trapped duck to other health problems that will slowly kill me... which is why I am fearful and bitter right now. Despite what I said on my 40th birthday earlier this year, I now feel my future of living a long life is impossible. I don't even know if I'll reach 50 or 60 at the least.
The last I'll say on this for now is that my doctor wants me to go on a monitoring system from FreeStyle Libre so we can find out what is causing my blood sugars to spike. This avoids having to do the finger-pricking blood tests for now. I will see a endocrinologist someday, likely after I see my doctor again just before my Palm Springs trip. For now, I am taking all my medication and trying to be a little more mindful as to what I eat. Trying to get more sleep is still difficult though.
On a better note, I finally passed my Class 5 novice driver's road test and now have a full license! After failing on my first attempt in Burnaby last June, I checked online regularly for any cancellations in Langley for road tests that weren't going to force me to wait until 2023. One showed up for just a mere few days away so I took a chance and booked it for October 1st at 2pm. I had my father get insurance for me on his van as I would be using it again for the road test. I wanted Langley/Willowbrook as I practiced there last late-spring and it is considered easier than Burnaby's testing route. Since it was on a Saturday, the ICBC office was packed when I arrived in my father's van. The reason I mention this is because the road test itself ended up lasting just under half an hour when they typically go well over that. Also, I didn't have to do parallel parking! I did get demerits for not doing a good 360 degree check in one situation, parking in front a driveway behind a car that I didn't notice and not turn my wheels as we were technically on a hill (it was barely a hill, but...), and some minor steering problems. A couple were kind of dumb: one was hazard perception as examiners typically have you pull over and park the car and you give the list of hazards to them verbally; but my examiner wanted me to tell her this while I was driving! I got nervous and slowed the car down as I didn't expect it that way so I got demerited for driving well under the speed limit. The other was at the very end when backing into a parking spot when we returned to the ICBC Centre - I shifted gears twice for reverse as the indicator on the dashboard didn't light up to let me know it was in reverse! Her reasoning was that I should know regardless by position of the gear shift! Who cares? I was trying to correct it and it's not my fault the dashboard decided to not let me know that the transmission was in reverse! But by the end, there wasn't enough demerits to fail me and I passed. Besides the $50 for the test, it was only $17 for the full driver's license when we got back inside to take my picture. I should get the license this week in the mail. It took 22 years to get to this point. I had my learner's license off and on from 2000 to 2012 and my novice license since then until now. The final restrictions are off of me. I can drive with as many people -family and friends- that my car can take instead of just family or one friend, and I can use GPS systems. The only restriction is that I still am required to wear my glasses when driving, unless I get future laser eye surgery in which they will take that restriction off provided I pass their vision test. And of course, no more magnetic green "N" slapped on the back of my car or rearview window! Yay!
Saturday night I watched The Batman film streamed on CraveTV. I didn't go and watch it in theatres earlier this year given I was skeptical of it. The film sees Batman, who has been fighting crime in Gotham City for two years, uncover corruption while pursuing the Riddler, a serial killer who targets Gotham's elite. It stars Robert Pattinson as Batman/Bruce Wayne and while he isn't bad as Batman, I don't care for his Bruce Wayne portrayal, which I view as Emo and brooding. The highlight for me was Colin Farrell as the Penguin, which I thought was a good portrayal of the character and was quite sexy to boot. I found some of the other characters forgettable. While the Riddler was more creepy in this movie than other portrayals, Catwoman was totally forgettable and was nothing more than SJW fodder for the film. Seriously, the film is a little anti-white racist and anti-male as virtually all bad/corrupt characters are white males and even Catwoman makes a blatant racist/sexist remark. All non-white characters are portrayed as good in the film and even James Gordon is race-swapped though I didn't much care about it as Jeffrey Wright is a good actor. While the cinematography was pretty good, the film is constantly dark and should have taken a page from the Christopher Nolan trilogy in the colour/dark ratio. I agree with everyone that the film is much too long - cutting 45 minutes at most would have made the film more digestible. Unlike commentator Ben Shapiro, I wasn't quite as negative to the film though I agree with some of his criticisms. You can see his review here.
I'm almost done my first playthrough of Bloostained: Curse of the Moon and I plan to beat the game about a couple more times before deciding to do harder difficulties or stop and review the game. I hope to review the game before my Palm Springs trip. I've made very little progress with Star Trek: Enterprise, but I'm getting to halfway through season 4.
Last Movie: Spider-Man: No Way Home (Theatrical), The Batman (CraveTV)
Last Book: The C.S. Lewis Signature Classics - The Screwtape Letters
Last Game: Uncharted 4: A Thief's End (PS4)
Current Book: The C.S. Lewis Signature Classics - Miracles
Current Games: Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon (PS4 - PSN) & Mega Man V (3DS Virtual Console - GB)