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I attended a retirement party for a good friend yesterday and oddly being one of two other retired people at the luncheon it seemed I was the only one who had a schedule to keep. I had to pick up my buddy Elwood to get his new glasses.
I also had a SOM draft but I assumed my auto draft would take charge. FAIL.
I get to my car and see I have a TIME VIOLATION and did not get my 5th round pick in. So I get to his place at the Full House Intersection (51 and 151) on The Wash. I leap out of my car and sprint with vigor to his apartment. At the last moment as I'm sprinting (I also had to pee) I see water/ice and my right foot puts on the breaks. The problems started when that right foot hit the ice.
The next thing I know is I'm flat on my back.
As we all do the first thing I think about is making sure nobody saw me fall. However, for the first time in my life that thought takes a back seat as I experience a rapid and violent bought of intense electric pain.
I don't give a rats ass who saw me fall as I lay there not moving trying to assess the damage. WOW! that was a big one. I roll over, stand up a little unstable and get to his apartment, ring the bell and lean against the building.
Moving an hour forward once I get home and crawl out of my car I can tell I hit both elbows on the ground first as the pointy ends are like daggers. My back will heal as it feels like someone took a baseball bat hit me HARD. Ice and Ibu for the weekend . . .maybe a beer.
I now walk like a 100 year old. No disc golf for me this weekend it seems.
I was in a State sponsored Cohort sleep study of State Employees. I WAS in year 21 of the study. Every year I would get a few hundred questions to answer and they would give me $20. One question always on the study was "How many times have you fallen this year".
I asked why that question and what if my fall was not my fault. Did not matter who's fault they said. The more times you fall the more you need to work on your muscles and balance. The older you get the more you fall. Well, I was averaging 1 fall a year, almost always because if ice. But since retiring and working out 3 times a week I had not really taken a spill for a long long while. Until yesterday. I'm normally a very good faller (I wanted to be a stunt man when I grew up).
The study was canceled by Walker as we don't need to learn about sleep. Too much science stuff I guess. I wish I could see my answers for the last 20 years.
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Speaking of retirement - when you retire your income tax withholdings get totally screwed up. remember that. Everything changes.
I went most of my life getting a small amount back but since I retired I pay every year. The first year I owed like $2000. Then I got it to $1200 and then $600. Now it's only $300 as Social Security it seems takes nothing out so I have to adjust for that.
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39% of all colleges in the US has seen applications from international students drop.
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My old car (250,000 miles) went to Wise Guys (me and my car are feeling bad). The muffler is a $50 fix and what I thought was a wheel that needed bearings was actually a broken wheel axle.
As I was driving back to Columbus yesterday with my bad back the car started shaking and I was forced to pull over. Once stopped I spent 5 minutes getting out of the car so I could literally kick the tires to see if that would fall off. Then drove slowly to Wiseguys. Just found out broken wheel axle.
I have no idea how it broke. Not as expensive as I thought it would be. "The average cost of repairing a broken axle is anywhere from $75 to $150 per axle and can increase to $150 to $300 per axle if the work is done by a professional mechanic".
Wait, what? I can do this myself? Do they come with step by step instructions. Will I need to use my back in anyway? Maybe DJ could do it while I read the instructions to her? Will she need a Phillips head screwdriver and pliers?
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This is what they need to do with Trumpcare and the failed budget - erase it. I took this shot last year at the National Sculpture Museum in DC while I was being a lobbiest for Water & Light (not at their expense, WPPI footed the bill. I did not go this year as being in DC would just make me angry all the time
Trumps popularity continues to plunge as the people that voted for him are seeing his promises were just a con job, Trumpcare is going nowhere and will cost his supporters more in the long run. His wall will never be build as one estimate has it at one trillion dollars CONSERVATIVELY.
The military will get a boost at the cost of getting rid of NPR, the Endowment for the Arts.
In most communities the Fed give money to utilities for home energy aid that help pay low income housing if they cannot pay their bills. I know Columbus helps a good number of families each month.
The new Trump budget does away with this help. So either those families will go cold in the winter (which I THINK is against the law) or the other citizens in the community will have to pay for their heat. I have not gottin an update from W&L but am thinking out loud.
Fed money for after school and summer programs for public schools will be cut. Also cut backs in financing for international peacekeeping missions, humanitarian assistance, cultural exchanges, refugee assistance and third world development, but who cares about the rest of the world and world peace right? It's all about ME!! America first ME first! Who cares if I hurt others in the process right?
Another promise being ignored is helping the inner cities with $3 billion the Community Development Block Grant program that helps provide affordable housing going bye bye. Sadly it was working very well on helping the poor in inner cities. In fact inner cities are at an alltime low in poverty (Chicago does not count as that is a different problem) But the poor do not spend money to help the economy so screw the poor.
The Trump, Ryan budgets will kill more Americans per year than all Muslim extremist attacks combined.
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