Dreams and Things

It's 7:30 in the morning on Friday and I've decided to write in my diary after a small hiatus. I decided about a week ago to let go of my anger and my pain. I could no longer remember what happened that horrible night four weeks ago that caused me so much distress. I was sitting around stoned and listening to music when this thought came to me. I went in to her sitting the bedroom watching TV. I expressed my love for her and a wish that she never doubt it. After this she came out of her depression and now all is back to normal. The Hepatitis treatment is still looming on the horizon. We went to my Hepatitis doctor as an initial preparation. His assistant is now working with my insurance company to obtain authorization for the drugs I will need. The company wants recent blood work to prove that my genotype is indeed 1A. It is, of course. This is probably a delaying tactic because the medicine is pretty expensive, I guess. My doctor ordered another blood draw. He also wanted ...

I have Hepatitis C with genotype 1A. I went to see my doctor who specializes in Hepatitis today. We agreed that I should go on the therapy necessary to bring my viral count down from 67,000,000 which is very high indeed. 5,000,000 is the level most people with Hepatitis can tolerate and live normal lives. My level is dangerous and needs to be addressed. I'm leery of the treatment. The last therapy I underwent was in a clinical study. My bipolar was aggravated severely. I was in an almost constant state of mania. Worse, my psychosis ran amok to the point where I tried to commit suicide. I convinced myself at the time that I was only cutting on the underside of my arm instead of the usual forearm. It was no doubt a psychological trick I played upon myself. The physical side effect was also devastating. I loss weight and my muscle tone decreased dramatically. Because of my manic state I convinced myself that I needed to fast during the study. The lack of food and the instability...

I woke up at 5:00AM this morning very groggy from the Trazodone I take at night to fall asleep. I turned on the coffee with the notion that I would stay up and start working on my art at 6:00AM. I fortunately dismissed that idea and returned to bed to wake up much more refreshed later at 8:00AM. This is the way of it with me. I know that I need to develop a better, possibly more excruciating, work ethic when it comes to my art. To begin with, I need to ramp up my portfolio with acrylic on canvas paintings so that I have something more conventional to submit to art shows. I probably want to get an agent and I'll need something for them, too. I want to get six paintings done before all of this. I feel a bit of anxiety of getting it all done. I'm working on my second painting now and I am still worried that it will come out to something worthwhile. I'll have a better notion when I have reached the halfway point. It consists of little squares more or less radiating out from...

I'm writing this as a diary entry and have titled it thus. If I care to write other diary entries I will number them accordingly to not confuse the blog. My day started off peacefully enough. I woke up at 8:00AM after twelve hours of sleep. I guess I must have been very tired the night before when I hit the sack and that's why I slept so long. She was already awake and had made coffee and, as usual, brought my first cup to me while I was still in bed. That's a nice thing she does still. She was depressed again today. But I think she's getting better. Or at least that's how it seemed at the beginning of the day. She got out of bed and dressed and announced that she was going to drive and get cigarettes. I needed cartons, too, so I tagged along. We cashed in our spare change that we have been saving and it came to over $80. We also went into the Indian market at the Safeway plaza and bought frozen samosas and ice cream. We then headed home. I guess the morning...

I went to see my Endocrinologist today. But first a few words about her. She was in her depressing funk again this morning. I told her that I had started a group on meetup.com and that I was enthusiastic that already 14 people have joined in three days. She smiled and said that was great. But I could tell from the look in her eyes that I would be hearing more about it later. Sure enough. I went in later this morning to check up on her. She had tears in her eyes and that sad self-pitying look on her face. She said I was moving on with my life and she wasn't (true enough) and that our relationship was breaking up. I asked her if this had anything to do with meetup.com . I told her that I was trying to make new friends for us. That it might be nice to have more people at a party here besides our relatives. I explained that although my group is San Francisco MUNI Riders we will not only enjoy riding on MUNI but also make some new friendships. I asked her if she wanted to come...

I just got back from my analysis session. Towards the end I admitted to having an eating disorder. My analyst thinks that coffee consumption and smoking may be responsible, at least in part, for my disorder. Both are appetite suppressants. She also thinks that cigarettes affect my taste buds so that food tastes less appetizing. I think she may have something of a point. I think the problem is a little more complex than that, however. I've almost always worn a size 34 pants most of my adult life. At times this has increased a little. I found that with some minor dieting I could bring my size back down to a 34. Similarly my weight has fluctuated but I've almost always hovered between 165 and 170. The ability to control these measurements was relatively easy for me during my young adult life. When I first went on Hepatitis treatment my weight and size dropped precipitously. I ate more during this therapy to keep my weight up around 160 and my pants size no smaller than 32 ...

I woke up at a normal time around 6:30AM. I fell asleep last night at around 10:30PM so I got a restful night's sleep. I did mundane chores. I emptied the trash from all around the apartment and started a load of dishes.  I also put gesso one my three test canvas boards. I'm waiting for them to dry as I write. I also cut out the little square stencil I plan to use for my next painting. My concept is crystallizing. I plan to use little squares throughout. The ones in the corners will be a dark color. As they approach the center they will become increasingly lighter. The colors will be pastels. This is new for me. I'll have to mix my own paints. The background will be a very light pastel. Just a bit lighter than the center squares as they meet. I'm not sure now if I want to place a gold raised cross in the center of the painting. It won't go on until the rest of the painting is finished. I'll take a look at the painting and decide whether I want to place the g...

[The names have been changed. Doris is my wife's mother and Lana is her daughter.] Dear Doris and Lana, I would like to dispel this myth that I am going to leave my wife in March. I think the general reasoning is that in March I will pay her $18,000 credit debt and thereby have no reason to keep her because the apartment will be mine. That's absurd. To begin with, if I wanted to dump her she would already be gone and all of the hassle this has caused me would be a thing of the past. I don't need to spend a nickel, much less than $18,000, to accomplish that. Everyone seems to have forgotten this: After she and I concluded that we could not afford both a new kitchen and all of the other remodeling we decided to settle for wood floors. I didn't have the credit or cash available to pay for them by myself. I had spent my cash on Lana's legal costs and her other expenditures. But she had the credit we needed. So the two of us decided that she wou...

I had a manic attack last Saturday. I always have difficulty determining exactly when an attack occurs. I think I became aware of it by 6:00PM. It was very intense. I had taken two Percacets that day, one in the morning to address back pain and one in the evening for pure pleasure. I also ended up taking the last of my Vicodin, three and a half tablets. I got a pretty buzz going so that also contributed to my vagueness about when the attack occurred. At some time in the evening I woke up my wife to ask her if she had any marijuana. She groggily replied that she did not and that she didn't even know where her pipe had gotten to. We don't smoke marijuana but I really wanted to get a buzz on. This was no doubt due in part to the events of Saturday's morning and afternoon when we went with my brother and his wife to the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass festival in Golden Gate park (see my earlier post). I needed to unwind. I needed to get high. I miss Quaaludes. I remember when th...

We went to the park for the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival with my brother and his wife. The whole thing began with my brother calling me and emailing about it earlier in the week. Or was it last week? I don't remember. My brother loves to plan things down to the most minute detail. My job was to order a cab for 9:30AM. He made it clear that I Was To Do This. I told him we could call for a cab when they arrived but he wouldn't hear of it. His plan was for us to arrive at Golden Gate Park at 10:00AM sharp so that we could lay out our picnic blanket as close to the stage as possible. Unbeknownst to me the previous night is that there were actually seven stages. But I guess he had researched it and decided on which stage we were to plop ourselves down in front of. At his insistence I looked up the web site for the festival a couple of nights ago. It sounded more or less interesting. I haven't listened to bluegrass since the days I spent my late teenage years in the Sh...