Hello Jack,

Look at me using fancy fonts and colours!  Nothing like blogging to make you learn useless stuff on the fly.

Wow, sounds like you are up to your knees in it.  So sorry.  I have a couple of ideas to throw your way, for what they are worth.

I am working on a big ole house up the street.  The kid (19) helped Doug Pxxxxx out quite a bit.  Doug has been using him where possible, also thinking to send him over to Steve at Kitchen Sink.  Anyway, he's a warm body at $10 an hour.  He's also a HS dropout with teenager issues.  You would probably like him.  But I digress.

Ya, we really haven't talked in a bit.  Warn your clients that one of your previous employees has papers and has just been released from the State Mental Hospital.  That she is grateful that you stood by her in her time of need, unlike her parents.  That she is unpredictable when upset and seems disturbed that you aren't getting paid.  Feel free to use my name and number.  Hell, I'd give you my green card number too, but it is still being replaced....eleven months after I filed.
 
I knew not of the duplex, but am happy to hear about it.  I guess you'll rent out the house until you find a better market?  As to your impoverished tenants, there are a couple of options.  In Philly we have something called Tenant/Landlord Action Bureau.  I suspect that you have something similar in Media.  Call them to chat.

Also, we have a friend Terry, who lost her job at one point.  Having left her slob of a husband and with two kids to support, she sprang into action.  She worked THREE jobs, all of them shitty.  Like WaWa, but with cooties.  I think it is admirable that you care for your tenants, but they need to return the favour.

They need to start paying some form of "good faith" rent to you, say half of the rent.  You'd need to draw up papers for this with your TLAB for everyone's protection.  I'd chat with the TLAB first, to see what they think, then approach your tenants.  I believe eviction takes at least two months, so you should move on this to avoid further potential losses.

Also, can they trade work on the duplex for rent?  Do they have family that your lunatic ex-employee could start harassing with a disposable phone?  Have you considered calling in the Evil One?  Margaret could have them signing away their first decade's bonus sign-on checks in under an hour.

This shit is serious.  The Big M may be your best option.  But don't take my word for it.  My father may be a banker, but I have yet to balance a check book.  Go get yourself one of those Magic 8 Balls, if yours has broken or been nicked.  It's going to tell you what you need to hear, scientifically.

Also, this is an unfailing way to know where your true heart and mind is.  First, get yourself a coin.  Second, flip it to make decisions about any of the above.  If you chose to make it Best Out Of Three, when it was only Heads Or Tails, you'll know where your gut tells you to go.

As to me, thanks to Cricket signing a loan, I am going to become a dog-trainer.  Hopefully in a year from now, the only painting I'll be doing will be in our house.  I have a show coming up on the first Friday of Feb, and I'll send you the info.  I did learn a couple of things last year:

How to retrieve a broken blade from a jig-saw.

How to drive stick-shift.

How to hack HTML.

How to change from a litter mate to a pack leader.

How to find the prison pod that I was holding an AA meeting in.

I did also make my bank crap available on-line, but still haven't figured out what I'm s'posed to type in as my ID.  So this year, starting this week, I am trying to keep track of my money.  You know, like every day and that.  Cocoa Puffs, right?

I think also I should revamp my American Sign Language and start seriously learning Spanish.  If I do end up working with service dogs, these will be useful.

Anyway, do give me a jingle.  I'll pick up for you, unless I'm driving, up a ladder, or socializing.  Hey, if you guys are super bored, Cricket and I were going to this School of Rock show on Saturday.  It's an awful program in that they encourage tone deaf kids to sing, but the music is good.  My friend Natalie's daughter, a Gory elfin, plays base.  She's in the first few sets, which means an early exit for once!  Cricket is coming because they are playing punk.  She has no idea.  One of the sick songs little Lydia is playing is by the Misfits.  They'll make Sid proud, that no-talent wonder!

I'll shut up now.  My number is 215-555-5555

Be sure and tell Michael about all this.  It'll drive him crazy that I didn't talk to him.

But only if you want to.  You can always flip the coin.

May your days be a paradise of love, light, butterflies and kisses and your nights filled with stars, passion, beauty and garden slugs.

Love, D

This title is pretty loaded with insinuations, inferences and ignominious associations.  In fact, it makes me a tad nervous to even address it.  But this year I learned to start to create boundaries.  It's a new beginning for me, spineless sycophant that I am!  Anyway, the reason why I'm writing this, is due to my friend "X".

X was my second sponsor in a 12-Step Program that I'm in.  My first was a male friend, so when X (a female) became available, I switched.  At the time X had about fourteen years or so sober, but it was her presence that drew me to her.

Within a few months, she was having a full on melt-down.  She exhibited behavior that I would never have tolerated in a "regular" friend.  It became so that I was her mental health sponsor and she was my incredibly needy sponsee.

I helped her move in with her fiance, packing up her house, carrying it into my van and bringing it into their new place.  As I unloaded my van, she sulked in a chair, angry at the man she was moving in with.  Did I mention that I'm not so great in the conflict area?

Despite being hospitalized for months at a time over the past decade, X visited me just once in lock-down.  The last time I was in.  She wanted to show me the new engagement ring she had.  Such a nice thought for a suicidal person on a locked down ward just after Christmas.

I'd given her the link to this blog some time back.  I wrote a post about her struggles with depression, which she sent to friends and family.  Heck, some of them might be reading this right now.  But I know X isn't.  How do I know?

Well, a couple of months back I got tired.  See, X only calls me when life isn't rosy in her world.  Given, X has some terrible health problems.  Like cancer.  But she wields her illness like a white flag.  Everything that has happened, or will, is under the flag.  She is above judgement, beyond reproach, excused and accounted for.  Her behavior is untouchable.

Her trump card is cancer.

The other day, she left a message on my phone, saying that she hadn't heard from me.  That she was worried.  That she was angry at me for not calling.  X said that she thought maybe I was in hospital, that maybe Cricket would call her.

It is true I haven't called her in the past four or five weeks.  Frankly I was burned out.  She was improving medically, so I wasn't so worried.  I needed to take care of myself as I crashed and burned after the death of Hello Newman.  So many of you, my virtual family, have offered support in my times of need.  When I had to put Hello Newman to sleep, I was moved by the compassionate and caring comments.

X has no idea about Hello Newman.  Although she linked my blog to family members when I wrote a couple of posts about her depression, she clearly doesn't read it.  Else, she might have a clue.

And here is the telling part.  If you are truly concerned about a friend, you let them know it.  You don't tell them that you're pissed.  That just makes the pissed on person dig in deeper, to avoid the spray.  Call me silly like a smiley, but implied threats of anger and guilt make me want to run away screaming like a little boy.

My current sponsor, with over twenty-five years of sobriety refuses to let me DTMFA (thanks             Dan Savage), saying we in the program are all each others appointed friends.  Others, like a previous sponsor, said that some are here to help you learn a skill like Patience, Compassion, Understanding  and Tolerance.  Fecking fabulous.

I just need the skills of Spine, No-fear, Up Your Bum (no, silly, it's a figure of speech)!  and emailing all the Xs out there.  Can I dump my sponsor for being so annoyingly right?  Can I DTMFA myself?  Just asking.

Well, in light of the last post, I should have followed it up with something Deep, Meaningful and Related.  Well, lucky for me and maybe you, I can at least address the latter.  So grab a mug of your favourite shot/drink, and listen closely.  This may even be a Cautionary Tale, if you work as a Waitress in a Dive Bar, or you find that you are surrounded by folks like you:  Folks who have been Abducted by Aliens.

It's a story I don't tell too often, and it happened almost twenty years ago.  I was the day bartender in a Center City taproom, with Lorrie as the Waitress.  She was large, bovine and without any wit or humour.  One day I found out why.  She had been Abducted by Aliens.

Taking a break from serving 50 cent mugs of beer, I had glommed on a magazine about Aliens lying on the bar.  It was at the end of the bar, where she and I would sit in slow times.  I perused it, chortling away, until she brought me up short.  It was Her magazine and she was reading it because she'd been Abducted by Aliens.

She was a bit pissy, saying that many people believe in Ghosts. whilst people like her had no credit.  I had to agree with her on that point, but I was still a little bothered by the details.  See, Lorrie told me that she'd been taken over by an Alien Force, that Her Body Housed It and that They were Planning To Do, mn, Stuff.

Now, I'll admit that I see and hear things.  Some might be valid visions of a reality that most will never see.  Lorrie told me that They'd Taken, Examined, Probed and Entered Her.  This may be true.  But if I were an Alien, I might set my sights for a Host higher than a Waitress in a Dive Bar.