You Guys Are Like a Shot of Adrenaline to My Heart. In the Best Way Possible.

On Sunday a hacker stole $1,200 out of my bank account to buy - get this - a home security system on Ebay.

This was the best thing that happened to me all weekend.

Seriously, if you read my last post, you know I ain't lyin'.

Indeed, Mr. President. Testify on my behalf.

Let me stop right here and say THANK YOU. All of you who commented and tweeted and texted your love and support when I was feeling lower than a snake's belly...thank you. You honestly don't know how touched and gobsmacked your messages made me feel. I don't know why you keep coming here and letting me fill up your screens with my rants. But you all rock.

And I didn't mean what I said about your belly, little guy.
It's quite fetching.

Today I'm better. But yesterday I felt I had driven away the two most important people in my life - my Precocious Daughter and my darling Drummer Boy - with my weaknesses and flaws and insecurities, and, you know, the disproportionate amount of free time I spend systematically brining my brain with spirits. I wasn't just feeling sorry for myself. I mean, yeah, I was feeling sorry for myself. But I wasn't just feeling sorry for myself. I was locked in a battle for supremacy with my worst demons, and the victor was going to take the tacky, cheap prize that was my soul.

Mine is the 50-ticket level of souls.

Pretty dramatic, right? I'm treading fairly lightly on the events of this weekend only because I know how many of you understand. Yes, even those of you do a far better job than I of pretending the world is snark and roses and clever things you've pinned...I wouldn't dare expose your pain. But we understand each other, yeah?

Yeah.

Drummer Boy knows I am not my demons, and he's waiting for me to come to the same conclusion. Always waiting, no matter how low I sink or how loudly I roar. Because he loves me.

This morning PDaughter sent me a text that made me cry, right there at my desk. At the end of it, she wrote, "You are...my role model for the kind of parent I want to be some day. I love you!"

Best kid ever.

That was today. But yesterday...

So there I was, feeling forsaken and alone, when I had a thought. Did I mention that my email got hacked on Saturday?

My email got hacked on Saturday. I've been using the same Yahoo email account for almost 20 years and -

Laugh it up, furball.

- and for last couple of years I've been getting more spam than actual legit mail. But I'm a creature of habit, and I had A LOT of online stuff linked to that account. Lazy, all right, I'm lazy and didn't want to mess with it.

But on Saturday I discovered that someone using my email address had signed up for about 500 different newsletters, websites, etc. All those confirmation messages were clogging up my inbox.

And there were about 6,000 more in my spam box.

I know, right?

So I finally decided it was time to chuck the leaking sieve that is Yahoo's account security and switch everything over to Gmail. I'd spent quite a bit of time on Saturday - in between bouts of self-pity and ennui - changing account IDs, changing passwords, exporting years of messages and contacts.

But on Sunday, as I was idly wondering how my current mental state could deteriorate further, it occurred to me that I should check my bank account. My email had been hacked before, but never had I actually experienced monetary loss. Still, this breach was an order of magnitude higher than anything I'd previously seen. So I logged into my bank account.

I don't really know what $1,200 means to each of you in terms of financial impact. Maybe it's a good night's poker winnings. Maybe it's your entire safety net against disaster and then some. To me, it's a not insignificant sum of money. Let's just leave it at that.

But seeing that amount deducted from my balance - when I know damn well I hadn't spent it - launched me into action. With far more energy and sense of purpose than I had displayed in several days, I quickly determined that my Ebay account had been compromised. The idiot thieves had already sent $1,200 to a seller's PayPal account, and they had another $1,200 worth of stuff in my cart, ready to check out.

I say idiot thieves, because fortunately they were thieves who were idiots. They had changed the shipping address on my account to their address in El Paso. They had also changed the email address associated with the account to their personal email, which triggered an alert to my email, conveniently including the IP address of their computer.

These are not the criminal masterminds you're looking for.

So I quickly called my bank and had the transfer of funds (fortunately, still in pending stage) halted and my debit card shut down. Then I called Ebay and had the transactions canceled and my account frozen.

I'll get my money back (I haven't yet, which is a tiny bit worrisome, but I'll get it back). I'll put all my accounts on lockdown and stop linking debit cards to them wherever possible. I'll shut down that Yahoo account (snif, goodbye dear companion...although, as my friend SuzyQ pointed out, since the name on that account was strongly linked to my marriage, it's probably a symbolically healthy transition).

The point is, being the victim of hackers and thieves (and stupid ones at that) distracted me from my overweaning sense of loss and hopelessness. By the time I had the situation somewhat under control Sunday night, I realized it had been several hours since I'd had the opportunity to brood over my emotional burdens. And I felt...better. Not completely better. But you know in Pulp Fiction where Uma Thuman ODs and then gets the shot of adrenaline to her chest and sits up and screams? She probably didn't feel better, but she was much closer to being alive than she had been a few moments earlier.

I for one am glad that "better" is a relative term.

Today I'm still down $1,200, I'm still wobbling back from the brink of a depressive episode, and I'm still pondering how I'm going to tame that 80-proof monster who has me by the short hairs.

But I got this.

And I got my Drunkards, and my kid, and my Drummer Boy.

And I'm feeling pretty rich right now.

Beans: A Metaphor

The last few days have been rough.

I said and did some dumb things, and I hurt someone I love. And I think we're on a break.

Not nearly as funny and charming as it was on "Friends."

Early Monday morning, a hellacious storm ripped through my town. Trees downed, roads flooded. We lost power for more than six hours. And when it came back on, I was afraid that the power surges we experienced might have fried many of our electronic doodads, including our microwave, our TV, and Precocious Daughter's new XBox. None of them worked once the lights came on. After a few stressful hours of troubleshooting mixed with general freaking out, I discovered that the wiring in my apartment building is...touchy. I mean, I already knew that, since our elevators go on the fritz almost every time is rains. Long story short, I've learned that just because a circuit breaker isn't tripped doesn't mean it doesn't need to be reset (twice) to bring the circuit back online. In the end, the only thing that actually got zapped was the $15 charger for my laptop. Everything else is fine.

Aside: I'm typing quickly because my replacement charger doesn't arrive until tomorrow, so I'm blogging on battery power.

This morning, I went out to my garage and found that Benedict Cumberhatch had a flat tire. And I couldn't find the damn lug wrench to put on the spare.

Roadside Assistance to the rescue, but again, not the best start to the day. (Although I did learn where Ford hides its lug wrench...inside the jack handle. Really, Ford?)

So where does a bean update fit in to all this?

Well, the fierce storm knocked over my pot o'beans. I found them waterlogged, partially crushed under their own container, and looking decidedly worse for wear.

I didn't take pictures of them in that state. It seemed disrespectful.

So I set them upright, straightened their bent stalks the best I could, and hoped for the best.

I'm happy to report that the sproutlings weathered another storm overnight and are bouncing back.

This has definitely been a setback, but they're already pushing out new leaves to replace those battered by wind and rain.

I'll pinch off those yellowed and dead leaves you see, to make room for the new growth.

Texas summers are hard on beans, you guys.

But they weathered the storm, because they're alive and resilient and determined to thrive.

Oh, that would be the metaphor.

Je suis haricot.

Nous somme des haricots.

Right on.

Ta Ta Tabitha

Sad news, Drunkards.

My page admin, Tabitha Roxanne Renee Louise Brown, has met her demise.

It seems she fell off a bridge and landed on the road below,

and was hit by an oncoming car,

which threw her into a nearby river,

on which she was carried for several miles in snapping turtle-infested waters,

ultimately being deposited on a muddy bank

that ran through a meadow full of wild pigs,

which found her quite tasty.

They'll eat anything.

I'd like to say I'm sorry she's gone, but I'm not. I would like to apologize to any wild pigs that suffered indigestion from snacking on her rancid meat.

Tabitha has been undermining my attempts at sobriety for a long time now. She's been undermining me for a long time, period.

She is (was) schadenfreude personified, and she hated me.

Well, she's dead now, and I'm glad.

Considering all she'd done, she really went in the most merciful way possible that didn't actually involve a wood-chipper and/or rabid coyotes.

I made damn sure of that.

Anyway, farewell, Tabby. You were kind of fun but mostly a bitch. I don't need you any more.

But I do need a new page admin.

I'll let you know who I find.

Lessons Learned. Can I Get On with My Life Now?

As I may have mentioned earlier, I finally sold my house. It was a clusterfuck from start to finish. I attribute the fact that we couldn't unload the house in the hottest real estate market in years to bad karma, bad decisions, and a few unscrupulous assholes (more on that below).

But the bottom line is, that chapter of my life is finally over, and I can move on (and buy furniture). And, you know, every bad experience is a learning experience. The worse the experience is, the more you learn.

By that standard, I am now a super genius.

Just like Wile E. Coyote.
We even have the same motto.

Here are some things I learned from selling my stupid house.

1. I need to get a new ringtone. For three solid months, I got phone call after phone call bringing bad news, stress, and fear. I came to dread the appearance of any number in my caller ID that wasn't Precocious Daughter's. And now that the stress and fear are finally over, my Pavlovian response to my phone's ringtone is heart palpitations and flop sweat. Not only that, but I've started to think I hear my ringtone everywhere - in the backgrounds of songs on the radio, in random noises my car makes - and it makes me jump every time. Sorry, ringtone, I'm breaking up with you.

2. I had too much stuff. I still have too much stuff. But holy mother of Kermit, I had a lot of stuff. I'm not a materialistic person, but I am sentimental, so once an object is in my possession, I have a hard time letting go. Over the years, that adds up to keeping a shit-ton of things for no particularly good reason. Fortunately (I've decided to go with fortunately on this one), there's nothing like an impending divorce to drastically discount the sentimental value of a lot of items. "But we got this on our anniversary one year" becomes a reason to trash it rather than stash it. It was still hard to part with certain things. But hey, you can't start a new journey without unpacking your baggage from the last one. Right?

3. Home inspectors are lying sacks of shit. The very first contract on the house fell through because the home inspector the buyers hired flat-out told them lies. Like that the location of the water heater was going to cause the house to explode. Yes, really. He also reported that the HVAC system didn't work, even though the air conditioner was running during the inspection. My guess is that his brother-in-law had a plumbing/HVAC company to which he happily would have referred them to make the repairs, had he not scared them off entirely. Another contract fell through because the inspector said we had termites. I don't know what he thought termites look like, but we had Terminix come out and do an inspection, and even to drum up business for themselves they couldn't find any signs of termites or termite damage. Again, I'm sure he ran a pest-control company on the side. Dumbasses.

Mr. Inspector, I'm sure you saw several of these
in my house, but they are not termites.

4. I have terrible communication skills. For someone who writes so much - both professionally and out of love - I'm really not very good at communicating face-to-face with people. Even my almost-ex. Especially my almost-ex. That became glaringly apparent during the long, drawn-out process of selling the house. On the rare occasions that we had open, honest discussions about what we needed to do, shit got done. The rest of the time, we were never on the same page and shooting ourselves in the foot (feet?). I also didn't communicate effectively with realtors, contractors, or bank people. Probably the biggest lesson learned during this debacle is how important it is to say what needs to be said, good or bad, and accept the consequences, good or bad.

5. I'm never buying another house. I don't want to maintain a house, or the land it sits on, or the fence that surrounds it. It's difficult, it's time-consuming, it's expensive, and I don't enjoy it. I know there are all kinds of advantages to home ownership, and lots of ways it's superior to living in an apartment. I was a  homeowner for almost 20 years. It's great to have space and privacy, to have your trash picked up, to be able to paint a wall without asking permission or make a ruckus without disturbing the neighbors. But to me it's no longer worth it. Until you guys make me rich enough to afford a full staff, I'm done with taking care of a place.

6. I survived this. I can probably survive anything. Unless a meteorite lands on me. But you know, other than that, I can probably survive anything. Hey, karma...you could have just sent that lesson in a fortune cookie. But thanks.

Pity the Fool...But Not Too Much

I'm not sure if I've ever mentioned this, but two of the biggest days of my life fell on April Fool's Day.

The first was the day I got engaged to be married.

And the second was the day I found out I was pregnant with Precocious Daughter.

Neither of these events seemed particularly funny at the time. Granted, my marriage turned out to be something of a joke, and I'm trying really hard to move past the punchline; and although I cried tears of genuine despair when my pregnancy test came back positive, it turns out I'm deadly serious in my love and devotion toward my beautiful PDaughter.

But it is, I suppose, a bit chuckleworthy that today the fates delivered to me a fitting bookend for the last quarter century.

Also, I dreamed about a library last night.
Should I be reading anything into that?

Without going into too much detail (it will all be in the book, of course), my engagement to my future ex was the direct result of an arrest warrant being issued because he blew off a minor traffic ticket.

And today, he received notice of an arrest warrant being issued because he blew off a minor traffic ticket.

It's a few days past April 1st, sure, but it's pretty damn close.

And this time I'm not bailing him out. Because after 26 years, I've realized that's not my job.

It's just kind of funny how the universe creates bookends, isn't it?

Joint credit goes to the universe and
Simon & Garfunkel, of course.

Two weeks ago I finally realized that I am strong beyond anything I've ever believed.

And I will only continue to get stronger, because I see patterns in the universe where previously I saw only chaos and luck.

We are all strong beyond our beliefs. Join me.

We kick ass.