Tag: Me Myself I

Personal stuff

That Collecting Thing

Guy Stuff, Toys

Other than guns and maybe knives, I don’t know that I’ve ever been much of a “collector” of anything.  Oh sure, I’ve thought of collecting stuff before — watches, for example, if I were ever in a position to afford such a collection — but perhaps it’s a factor of growing older that the desire to own stuff of any one particular kind is no longer as attractive to me as it once was.

A good example is that of the aforementioned watches.  I’ve long had a list of watches I’d like to own, simply because I love the workmanship and craft involved in the creation of such creatures.  Then my list began to shrink, and a few criteria started to assert themselves:  no battery-powered — or “quartz” — movements, and even automatic movements began to lose their desirability because, frankly, they keep shitty time, almost regardless of their cost.  So:  manual-wind watches.  And then when I acquired my plain-Jane Tissot as a gift (thankee thankee, you-know-who):


…my earlier desire for other watches just evaporated.  (I have a couple others which I wear, very occasionally, for specific occasions, but this Tissot works wonderfully well for me, 99% of the time.)

Shocking as it may be to some, this “shrinkage” has started to manifest itself in my most long-time passion, guns.  (You may administer smelling salts at any point, now.)

Seriously.  I have a few guns that I judge as essential for self-, home- and social defense needs, and a very few sentimental favorites — the Browning High Wall 1885 in .45-70, the Winchester 94 in .30-30 and of course the Mauser K98 in 8x57mm, to name but some, and then the plinking equipment (which don’t count because, of course, .22 guns are household appliances and not guns, as I’ve stated ad nauseam  in the past).

Unlike many of my acquaintance, I have absolutely no interest — none whatsoever — of chasing after the latest whizzbang offering from SIG or Canik or whoever, so forget newly-manufactured guns, in toto.

But as I cast my eyes upon the contents of Ye Olde Gunne Sayfe on occasion, I sometimes wonder whether I should perhaps just get rid of a few outliers not because of financial reasons*, but simply because I cannot see myself shooting them ever again.  And having reached that realization, what point is ownership?

In one of my occasional Lottery Dreams (see the post above), I often wonder what car or cars I’d get to replace the Tiguan, and what’s interesting is that I’m having precisely the same feelings that I have with guns and watches:  nothing of recent manufacture at all — especially given that they’re all without exception loaded with electronic gizmos I don’t care for, or else gizmos that spy on you and/or could possibly be used to control your driving.  In fact, the more I think about it, I’d probably have to go back to pre-1970s cars — fully resto-modded of course — to find a car that has not a single computer chip in its driving operation.  And yes I know, modern cars are so much more efficient and economical than their forebears, but frankly, I’m prepared to put up with all the hassles involved with a stick shift and carburetors, for example, just as I’m prepared to have to manually wind my wristwatch every day or work the bolt of my rifle.  (If push came to shove, I could even go with a wheelgun, much as I love me my 1911s, as any fule kno.)

Hell, I’ve even tossed out the kitchen knife block in favor of just two or three basic knives hanging on the magnetic strip on the side of the fridge.  (I haven’t reached this stage with my other knives, however:  I’m sentimentally attached to pretty much all of them for one reason or another, but I don’t know if I’m ever going to buy another one.)

It’s an interesting thing, this change that is coming over me:  the desire to cut back, to simplify, to accept less in favor of plenty.

Anyone else out there feeling this way?

*Loyal Readers may recall that I had to hock all of them a while back, but I am pleased to report that the status quo has since been restored.

Health News

Health

Feeling shit:  yesterday I suddenly got a sore throat, sinus drainage/blockage (I don’t know how they can coexist, either), and the beginning of a hacking cough.

Same as I had a few months ago.  Anyway, when I called my GP yesterday  to see if he could just send a Zithromycin Rx to CVS, he insisted that I come in to see him.  Couldn’t fit me in yesterday — it was after 5pm, to be honest — but I do have an 8.30 appointment this morning.

My Brit Readers (and anyone else living under a nationalized healthcare system) are allowed to feel envious.

Anyway…

Till later.

Update:  Just got back from the above.  No big deal, not a bronchial issue, no Covid, just a nasty upper-respiratory tract infection.  Z-pack, and I’ll be better by Thursday.

To be honest, I felt a little foolish at having wasted his time for so trivial a thing.  Still, his N.P. is a total doll, so it wasn’t a complete waste of my time.

Connectivity Anxiety

Communication

Once more via Insty, I see this little exposition:

Confession: I’m really bad at replying to messages. Sometimes it takes me days, even weeks, to get back to people. I constantly find myself typing out some variation of the words sorry for not getting back to you sooner, oops sorry I completely missed this, hey sorry I thought I replied! It’s an endless cycle: feel pressured to reply, feel guilty for not doing it, procrastinate, feel worse the longer I wait, finally apologise, they respond—and then I do it all over again. 

I’ve tried to be better. I’ve made countless New Year’s Resolutions to respond quicker, set myself strict rules to always reply the same day, even added texting people back to my to-do list. Nothing works. But lately I’ve been wondering if that’s because there’s a problem with me, or if it’s this expectation to always be available, to be instantly accessible, that’s the problem. 

Because it turns out I’m not alone in this.

You bet you aren’t.  I’m in the same camp, albeit for slightly different reasons.  I get a ton of email messages each day, mostly junk / spam / phishing but also a lot from Readers.  The latter are all welcome, always;  but as for the former, may they and their entire families suffer the fate of Julius Caesar and be killed by their associates.

I’m worse on the phone — unless it’s from immediate family, either actual calls, or else text / WhatsApp.  Here again, I love this Caller ID thing, because if it’s not a number I recognize, or doesn’t appear on my phone book,  it’s utterly ignored.  (Some people miss the old days when the phone — landline, Princess — rang and you answered it.  I don’t.  Even back then, if I didn’t feel like answering the call, I wouldn’t.  I figured that if the news was that urgent, they’d call me again immediately;  and if not, well, c’est la vie.)

I think I’ve mentioned before that back when I was flying out of Chicago at least once a week, I loved that “alone” time, whether at the airport or on the plane itself.  It gave me a chance to think, to plan, to dream… you know, what men did before some fucking intrusive electronic thing screamed in your ear 24/7, demanding IMMEDIATE ATTENTION!

Somehow, businesses survived without being in constant contact with bosses and subordinates.  When I was a manager with staff, I would tell them that if I was unreachable but a decision had to be made, to make the best decision they could, and I’d back them.  Or they could talk to my boss and ask him, if the decision was that important.  (90% of the time, it wasn’t, as I would discover later that day when I’d call in from my hotel room or from the client’s office.)  Not only did I tell them to make a decision, I’d encourage it, to help with their personal growth in the company.  I think that in over 20 years, they made maybe one questionable decision, and the fact that I cannot remember any details now just goes to show that it wasn’t that important.  No matter how much companies think that such things are life-and-death matters, they pretty much aren’t;  and as one of my bosses once remarked, “There’s no business decision that can’t be made tomorrow,” and in fact most times it’s even better to sleep on it before deciding.

So I often disconnect from the world.  Unless I’m expecting a critical call from New Wife or my kids, I don’t freak out if I’m at the grocery store and discover I’ve forgotten my phone at home (which I often do).  If I’m in bed and the phone rings, I won’t get up to answer it — once again, if it’s that important, my family knows to call again immediately to get a response from me.  (Corollary:  I never take the phone to bed with me;  it stays in the living room next to my laptop.  The only time I fetch it is on Saturday mornings — when I spend most of the day in bed with New Wife — just in case one of the kids or my sister wants to chat.  And that’s after I wake up and made the morning coffee.)

Yeah, I’m mostly disconnected from the world when I don’t feel like “interacting”.  When I’m at my desk and on the laptop, however, an email message from an acquaintance will often be answered immediately, unless I’m working through the backlog from the night before.

I value my privacy, and I’m at the stage of my life when I’m at the beck and call of nobody except of those I choose to be:  a number that is frighteningly small.

I have learned that the world, such as it is, is best kept at arm’s length.

What’s In A Name?

Communication, The Worst

It’s small wonder that I tend towards the irascible, having the name that I do.  Because, quite frankly, it’s a fucking pain in the ass.

Let’s start with the first (Christian) name.  Kim.  Easy to spell, easy to say, mostly it’s pronounced as written.  (There’s the occasional “Kym”, but that’s — I think — an affectation, like Tyffynny instead of Tiffany.)  My parents named me thus because they wanted a single, easy-to-pronounce, easy-to-spell appellation and in that, they were largely successful.  However:

“But that’s a girl’s name!”

This is the first of the many crosses I have had to bear, and my personal history is replete with stories of me taking a swing at people — okay, boys — who taunted me thus.

In fact, “Kim” is one of those gender-free names, in that it’s not a name, but a title.  In most versions of the early Anglo-Saxon language, “kim” means “chief” or “chieftain”, and as those ancient Anglo-Saxons didn’t care whether their ruler was male or female, the title bears no gender.  (Boudicca, she of the anti-Roman rebellion, was actually “Kim Boudicca” because the tribes of those days had no monarchy:  chiefs were elected leaders, not always hereditary ones.  (Mostly, but let’s try to avoid wandering down that branch line.)

And that’s just my first name.  (Also, in traditional English parlance, it’s my Christian name, but gawd forbid Americans are so intolerant as to use that when there are Muslims etc. in the populace who might take offense.  In addition, there’s no established church, so despite the “Under God” and “So help me God”, anything Christian is doubleplusungood, government-wise.)

Also, because my parents saw no need to give me one, I have no middle name, which causes endless issues with U.S. officialdom.  When I fill in the foul ATF 4473 form, for example, I have to put the idiotic “NMN” (no middle name) acronym, because to leave it blank or put in a “–” might screw things up totally.

And on we go.

My surname (“last” name in Murkin) is Du Toit.  So my full name is “Kim du Toit”, because if the name is preceded by a name or “Mr.”, the “d” is not capitalized.  But that’s only the beginning, because now we get to the Space Issue.

You see, there’s a space between the “du” and “Toit”.  (However, in modern-day France, it’s mostly spelled “Dutoit”;  go figure.)  But there has to be a space, as you will see.

An aside:  “toit” in French means “roof”, so my name literally means “of the roof” — perhaps because back in the mists of time, there was a Pierre who was a roofer, and so the family name might have become “Pierre of the Roof” (e.g. the Carter, Smith, Mason or Wainwright surnames).  However, as far as I can make out, the family originated in the south of France near the Pyrenees mountains, so “toit” could also mean “high place”, and the “de/du” has an alternative meaning of “from”.
The family motto, by the way, is “Dios y El Rey”, a Spanish term meaning “God and the King”, making the Pyrenees origin still more plausible.

Back to the pesky last name.  All my South African documents (birth certificate, passport, I.D. etc. are spelled “du [space] Toit” or if capitalized “DU [space] TOIT” (see the family crest).  So when I came Over Here in the Great Wetback Episode of ’86, that’s how I continued to spell my name.

Which is where the problems began.

You see, a great number of databases don’t like a space appearing in a name field — and by “don’t like” I mean they fall over or reject the spelling.  Worse still, it depends on which entity’s database we’re talking about.  The DMVs of Illinois, New Jersey and Texas will not accept the space — so my name always becomes DUTOIT on my driver’s license, except in Illinois where it’s DU_TOIT (!) — but the State Department has no problem with the space, probably because they have to deal with all sorts of strange names, so in my naturalization certificate and passport it’s spelled correctly:  DU [space] TOIT.  Ditto the IRS and SocSec, thank gawd.

Another aside:  some time ago I had occasion to visit the friendly folks at the local Social Security office (no kidding, they are totally unlike other government apparatchiks) and just for the hell of it, I asked to see my personal details.  Imagine mu surprise when the SocSec screen showed my birthplace as “Johannesburg, Saudi Arabia“.  I shared a merry laugh with the person on the other side of the counter, and luckily (for no reason I can explain) happened to have my passport with me, which showed my birthplace as Johannesburg, South Africa.  The guy laughed, and said, “So which one is it?” whereupon I offered him $10,000 if he could find in any atlas a town named Johannesburg in Saudi Arabia.  Then I asked to see the data input screen, and lo! “South Africa” appeared just below “Saudi Arabia” in the “check appropriate box” section.  He changed it on the spot.

Now let’s talk about other entities, e.g. banks.  You guessed it:  on a couple of bank cards, the space is elided, and on others, the space appears without any issue.  The problem comes, however, when I’m buying something online and have to enter my name As It Appears On The Card — because woe betide me should I add the space where there is none, or leave out the space when I shouldn’t.  So every online purchase necessitates me asking (usually out loud, with only a few Bad Words) “Now which [insert Bad Word here]  card am I using now?”

Finally, there’s the matter of its pronunciation.  Oh FFS. In South Africa, it’s pronounced “doo toy” because over time it’s become an Afrikaans name, and the Dutchies never found a French name they couldn’t fuck up.  Seriously:  “François” (“frahns swah”) becomes “”Franche Wah” and “Labuschagne” (pronounced like champagne) becomes the awful “Laboo-Skachni” — the -ch pronounced like the Scottish “loch”.

When I came over to the U.S. I decided to revert back to the (correct) French pronunciation because nobody could spell it anyway, and I happened to prefer the French manner because it sounds kinda classy and it’s all about branding, folks.  Also, the chicks thought it was super-sexy, and that’s all that counts, really.

On the day I was sworn in as a proud U.S. citizen, the clerk at the federal court asked me, before printing out my certificate, whether I wanted to change my last name.  Clearly, this would be popular with someone named, oh, “Krmczyl” or “Psmith” — or “du Toit”/”Dutoit”, for that matter.  Had I known this was possible ahead of time, I might have considered it quite seriously:  Dutton?  Dawson?  but that would have created problems should I ever have to get access to any South African documents (as I did, much later).  For continuity’s sake, therefore I said, “No, let me keep it just the way it is.”

So here we are.

And people wonder why I swear so much and am perpetually irritable.

Update:  a couple of folks have asked for a phonetic pronunciation of “Du Toit”.

Doo Twah (with a short “ah”)

RFI: Powdered Wig Stuff

Legal Stuff

I know that there are more than a few [sigh]  members of the legal persuasion among my Readers, so if I may ask, could those who qualify drop me a quick note ([email protected]) when you have a free moment?

The matter is not criminal, not financial, and nor has it anything to do with New Wife’s immigration issue.  It’s more of a “What the hell do I do now?” situation, and it involves me vs. Global MegaCorp Inc.

Many thanks.

Same Story, Different People

Health

Here’s an Ozempic story.

I know that I seem to be talking about this topic a lot, because my own results have been pretty pleasing.  But as Nadine Dorries describes her own journey towards going this route, I’m pretty sure that a large number of my Readers are in a similar situation to hers — I know that my own symptoms were pretty much parallel to hers — and maybe this will help you.  Here’s Mrs. Dorries in a pre- and post pic:

Just as a reminder:  I went from 277lbs peak to just over 220lbs, although it’s taken me a while longer — about six months — but there have been other benefits.

After a quarter-century of taking blood-pressure meds, I may not have to take them for much longer.  (According to the last doctor I saw a couple weeks ago, my BP of 113/90 was better than hers — and because I’d been feeling so rotten, I’d forgotten to take my BP meds for two days beforehand.)  Here’s hoping.

I have had absolutely no side-effects from Ozempic.  I was briefly concerned that (please pardon the graphic description) that I’d gone from an everyday, set-your-watch bowel movement to very occasional visits to the toilet.  But as my doctor explained, my daily food intake had been reduced by two-thirds (maybe more, even), so that wasn’t unexpected.

Which leads to this point:  my relationship with food hasn’t changed.  I still have cravings for a particular taste or type of food;  but when it comes to actually eating it, I eat far less of it — sometimes as little as 25% of it in terms of quantity.  (Four cheese sticks becomes one, two fried eggs become one egg, half-finished, and so on.  Daily bread has turned into once a week, and one slice of toast instead of two per sitting withal.)

But all those other horror stories that people have ascribed to Ozempic?  Not one.

I will admit, as I’ve said before, that my muscle mass seems to have gone down along with the saddlebags of fat, but I’ve always been muscular — even over-muscled, perhaps — so that hasn’t bothered me at all.  My ass seems to have, shall we say, slackened somewhat.  But FFS, I’ll be turning 70 in November (!) so “old-man-flabby-ass” was always going to be in my future anyway.

I’ve been told to exercise, but that’s not going to happen.  My sole “exercise” is a 100-yard daily walk (uphill both ways, uh huh) to the mailbox to check the mail, and a similar uphill distance to our garage to get the car.  The new apartment is actually walking distance from a bakery (I know, bread ungood shuddup), so I’m planning on walking there whenever I need to get more bread;  the only problem is that north Texas is not, as we say, pedestrian friendly, so it seems that the health benefits of that quarter-mile walk may be somewhat offset by becoming some F-150’s hood ornament.  But I’ll give it a shot anyway.

The biggest bummer is that insurance does not pay for Ozempic and the other drugs of that ilk even though, as in my case, its original purpose is absolutely medical:  to address pre-diabetic or Type 2 diabetes conditions.  I have no idea why this is so.  But as New Wife puts it, it’s better than dying from diabetes-induced problems (heart attack, organ failure etc.).

So there ya have it.  It’s all food (or, less food) for thought.  Hope this helped.