"My Life, and You're Welcomed to It"

Yeah. I know I haven't been a good boy and posted with any "regularity" here for a while. It's this "life" of mine. Gets sorta hectic.

I work a job, 9 1/2 hrs. a day. It's a strenuous job, both mentally and sometimes physically. Quite honestly, I'm usually pooped when I get off work. I get up every morning around 5:30 AM, grab a quick bite of something and drink a couple cups of java, smoke a couple cigarettes, do the daily and then out the door to work where I usually show up at least a half hour before opening just to get things in order for the day: unlocking gates, turning on lights, feeding the stray cats we have around there, making a pot of coffee and sraightening up the shelves. By that time the other workers have shown up and by 8 AM I get to open the doors and actually clock myself in for the day (after working a good 1/2 hr. OFF "the clock"), and push or drive out the various ATVs and bikes we sell for display onto the edge of the parking lot.

I work in a retail store in the tool department and my main job is ordering (that is, stocking) the tool section. I usually do this until around 1 or 2 PM, and then, if I'm fortunate, I get to take 1/2 hour to eat my lunch before starting the ordering all over again. This day (as every day) is mingled for me with the likes of selling trailers and hooking them up for customers, loading furniture or assembling samples of merchandice ,trying to repair the soft drink machines for the hundredth time, or fixing someone's mistakes on the cash register, or handing returned merchandice and general running interferance for the manager (who doesn't even work in my section of the store).

Finally, at around 4:30 PM, I feed the cats (again), and start getting the place ready to close for the night. At 5PM I have to bring in the various ATVs and motorcycles , then lock the unneeded outside gates, and finally start shutting down the place so we can, if we're fortunate, get out of that place by closing time at 5:30 PM, granted there's no stragglers that are unable for some reason to read the signs which plainly state our closing time, or just really don't give a damn.

I usually stop somewhere along the way home, grab a pack of smokes, then when I pull in the drive around 5:50 PM, I check my mail, curse people that I bought something off of an on-line auction a good month before that's yet to mail the stuff to me, check my phone messages, then get on the computer to check any bids I've made, and look at my email. I usually read a couple of different blogs I enjoy, check on my fellow Boarders on one of the eBay chat boards(where when I post I usually make a total jackass of myself), and answer email.

'Course I have to feed and clean up after my own cat, fix me a bite of dinner and my lunch for the next day at work. By that time it's time for me to clean up, and finally around 9PM I get to sit down and "relax" a little before hitting the sack between 10-10:30 PM so I can get up early and start the whole routine over again.

At home this routine varies some if my wife isn't working that particular night, as she works afternoon to late night shift and I, the day, so if we're both working, we usually see one another about an hour or so per day. If she's off, we eat dinner together, catch up on things and try to watch a little t.v..

Sometimes if I'm there by myself, I read or work on a little artwork or listen to music. Every blue moon I actually rent a video. This whole schedule also depends on my parent's health. My father is in his 80's and my mother will be 80 this month. Mom's health is pretty good, but dad's is not, so sometimes I end up at the hospital where he's been taken in for tests or observation. Thus is most of our lives (and you know what that's like) if you have elderly parents.

So just finding the extra time to do a blog gets scarce. I usually do one when I've got everything else caught up a bit and on a weekend off (which is every other weekend, depending on whether or not my wife has a craft show set up and I have to go with her to help set it up). I don't like this hectic existence, but it's the one I've got and some of it simply can't be helped, so I do the best I can and try to get the most out of whatever "free" time I can snag.

Let's see..."other" things...I've noticed I've had a run of bad-type luck buying from on-line auctions in the past month or so. It began when I bidded on a copy of Larry Ive's Monsters & Heroes magazine #6 (1969). There was some confusion when I went to check out as the seller had two different names as well as two different addresses listed. Naturally, I sent it to the wrong one, and after a month of waiting I emailed her, and she said she'd never received payment. Well, this went on for a couple fo weeks until finally the payment got forwarded from her OLD address and she sent the book. Then I won a copy of the Charlton Comics' Space Adventures #13 (1953) in FN/VFN condition. I'd never owned a copy of this comic before and always wanted one as it was probably the first super-hero series Charlton had ever done, and I won this book for $13. (worth a good $75. in that shape). Well, although the seller claimed to have sent it, it never arrived. Finally, the dealer was kind enough to refund the $13., but I'd MUCH rather had that particular comic as I'll never find another in that good a shape for that sort of price. Then I won two different lots of some 80's DC comics: Blue Beetle & Blue Devil. The dealer got my payment by money order only a week or less after I sent it, then waited a good 2 weeks before mailing it. I really hate it when they do that, but they as well finally arrived a good month after I won the auction.

Finally, I won a copy of the DC silver-age PHANTOM STRANGER No.2. I really didn't mean to bid on this book; the dealer was in Canada and I usually never bid on foriegn listings because it takes so blasted long to get them, but I screwed up and placed the bid before I noticed it wasn't in the U.S.A.. That auction closed the 8th. of Oct., and I sent my payment the same day and he got it at least a couple weeks back and says he mailied it right off, but here it is the 30th. and it's a "no show". Maybe in today's mail...maybe not. (UPDATE: It was not.)

I've held off on bidding on anything else until all my items have finally arrived, and I think I still have two that are outstanding at this time. I DID however decide to try a little joke of an experiment on SELLING on-line. Back months ago I found a really dirty old baseball in my front yard when I was mowing. Not only was it filty, but banged-up as well. Don't know is some neighbor's kid lost it there or a dog dropped it in the yard, or it was left by "baseball-playing leprechauns", but I certainly didn't want to mow over the thing so I sat it inside the house and forgot about it. Then, after not having much luck trying to sell with auctions on eBay, I thought I'd list that silly thing just to see if it would sell. There's been so very many times I've put really nice things up for auction, less that what they were worth; less that what I gave for them even, and either they got just the minimum opening bid or none at all, that I've wondered if someone would buy just "junk". I took a photo of that dirty ol' baseball, and listed it, making sure in my description that there wasn't a single thing "special" about the ball, I didn't know where it came from and there was NO return policy. Someone was silly enough to buy the thing for 99 cents and even pay me $5. to mail it to them! (Go figure??)

One item I did get in the mail that was VERY nice was a re-drawn "Daily Planet" strip by Fred Hembeck which features those wacky DC Comics' characters, "The Bizarros". Great piece; I'm hanging it here in my computer/collections room along with other original comic book/strip art I have. Fred's a great guy, and does very interesting blogs. (Click the "Beatles & Bizarros" link I have to the right column, then on Fred's page on the right column of the B&B blog.)

An update on my dad's health. He was taken to the local hospital yesterday. He's had some bladder problems and his right hand had swelled considerably due to it. A 24 hr. bladder test was given to him and now the swelling's down and he'll be released later on today. The doctor said his tests were very good! Great news for a 84 year old man, who sometimes seems to be in better health that I am at 53!

Well, tomorrow is Halloween. I don't have a thing special planned to do except maybe stay home and give out candy to whatever vermin...ehh...children come by "trick or treatin'' this year. Didn't have but a dozen or so last year; probably be about the same this year, especially since rain's predicted, and the town's locals have scheduled such for only 2 hrs. ,between 5PM-7PM. Things aren't the same when I was a kid trick or treatin'. There'd be a couple hundred kids out at least that night and me and my late brother, or my cousin, would walk literaly all over the town and come back with just sacks full of tooth-rotting sugar delights. Was invited to a costume party tomorrow night, but I'm just not much of a party goer these days, so...

And that's pretty much an update on my life.

(Sad, isn't it?)

Regards,
~D.Puck'.