February 29

I went on a lunch date yesterday. It was ... underwhelming. I was particularly disappointed because the woman I went out with and I had a lovely, easy conversation over the phone beforehand. I She is just divorced and dating for the first time in a long time, so I get the nervousness (I have been there too) but I felt like I was carrying the conversation, asking all the questions, feathering in references she clearly did not get. I'm just tired of doing that. It's not fun. It's not funny. I beat myself up about the whole thing on the drive back to the office and felt despondent about how every lousy date I go on just reinforces my belief I will never find anyone. 

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February 28

Lost in all the melodrama was the call I got from my accountant yesterday with the good news on my tax refund this year. It is basically the equivalent of another paycheck, which is nice.

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February 27

I have somehow been up since 3:30 AM (cats/bladder) and not had time to write until now. Maybe there is just not that much to say? I don't know. I am meeting a date for lunch tomorrow. We had a great conversation over the weekend but her communication (text) leading up to tomorrow has been a bit sporadic. It is so hard to read intent or interpret what any of it means, likely that she is out there living her life and is excited (but maybe a little nervous) about meeting tomorrow. My assumption of course is that she has already lost interest and is going into things expecting it to be terrible. 

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February 25

High Noon was canceled. Staring at ESPN talking heads babble is one of my guilty pleasures. I have been a PTI viewer since it started and dip into Highly Questionable more days than not (don't get me started on the dreck that is Around the Horn). I never loved High Noon or, as Tony Kornheiser suggested it should be called: Pablo and Bomani Talk Down To You. It was never that bad but it is clear the pair is ill matched. Bomani is a world-class talker and if you did a word count, I suspect on an average day he outdoes Pablo 3:1. Pablo rarely gets out of first gear. He is often pinched and his "takes" are swatted down by his more cocksure partner. 

You could tell the show was struggling. They tweaked the format (this is after it was cut down from an hour to a half-hour), the various blocks, and it just never clicked. Tony also suggested Bomani and Pablo would be the natural heirs apparent to he and Wilbon but the difference between the older duo and the younger one is that the former are actually friends, had been, in fact for two decades before they started on PTI and it shows, every day. They are like an old married couple who bicker. The latter were two people who kinda knew each other and were put on TV to see if they clicked. They don't.

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February 24

Yesterday, I met a woman for coffee in downtown Princeton. It was a nice day (about 60 degrees) and there was nowhere to park so I hustled down to the side street my ex-in-laws used to live on to park there. They do not live there anymore, but it is weird every time I walk past that house to think of my personal history that lives there. I got engaged in that house. I mourned my father-in-law’s passing in that house. I pushed my nieces and nephews on the swing in the backyard (which does not appear to be there anymore) and sorted their Christmas presents before they arrived to open them each holiday season. I lived there for a month after my ex-wife and I moved here all those years ago. And yet, I felt nothing walking past it. No pangs of nostalgia. No reminiscing of those times. It is like all of that happened to a different person. To look at it now, it is just a house.

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February 23

My accountant suggested I am now ~ of an age ~ where I need to consider purchasing long-term care insurance. What is that, you ask? Basically, insurance in case you need to spend your final years in a nursing home (which runs about $100K a year) and want to have a little dignity by living in a decent one, not one that maybe they roll you over once a day, maybe they don't. Yes, getting older is AWESOME.

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February 22

In addition to seeing my accountant, I have added a lunch with a lady friend, a trip to the gym, and a late afternoon coffee "date" with a woman I met online. This is more social engagement than I usually have in a month. 

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February 21

I do not have much to say today. Tomorrow, I am meeting with my accountant to do my taxes. It used to be a day I looked forward to, now, eh, I do not feel much about anything, so it is just another chore to attend to. 

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February 20

Another day, another doctor. I went to my cardiologist yesterday searching for answers to this lingering chest/congestion thing - maybe it's my heart? Who knows, but hey, for the $15 co pay I have to give him, why not see if that's the problem. I've had this illness for more than a month and it's just exhausting and frustrating and debilitating. Chest x-ray? Negative. Antibiotics? Didn't work. Steroids? Didn't work. So, who knows. Maybe this is just the new normal. Maybe I have COPD or lung cancer or asthma that skipped the first 49 years of my life.

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February 18

I am having lunch with a couple of my co-workers today. I am dreading it. I hate these stupid social outings but I am too polite to say no. It is the story of my life. I constantly give in to other people and do not speak up for myself, which just makes me angrier and resentful.

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February 17

I bailed (for now) on a new (new) car. I just could not justify it even though I can afford it. It is the curse of being a responsible adult (TM). Do I take the $10,000 I would have to pay out of pocket and put it toward a new (new) car or drive the perfectly good (new) car I've had for 11 months and has less than 6,000 miles on it and divert that $10,000 toward paying down even more of my mortgage. The responsible adult (TM) wins again ....

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February 16

I had an anxious moment today. I was driving home from the gym when a driver who clearly did not know how to drive around a traffic circle veered across the double yellow line and almost hit me head on. The PTS from my accident kicked in immediately and I leaned on my horn for like 10 seconds. I was so enraged I actually thought about following the driver and reaming them (her) out. It took me like 30 minutes to calm down I was shaking so badly. 

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February 15

I switched it up a little today. I ditched the diner and the incredibly unhealthy breakfast I treat myself to and instead had my regular healthy breakfast at home and went to the 10 AM total body conditioning class at my gym. It was intense, but I felt good afterwards.

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February 14

Valentine's Day. No valentine. No prospect of valentine on horizon. Assume dating will never happen for the rest of my life.

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February 13

Do any of you have that one friend at work who just loves dishing gossip? My day started TERRIBLY. This person had the dirt on a job I applied for in house and how it's basically been promised to someone else totally unaware of how crushing it is to hear this news. She then went on to complain about something I did not care about and told her as much before summarily kicking her out of my office because I had to prep for a meeting. I was in a sour mood the rest of the day.

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February 12

I know it sounds crazy, but I am considering buying (another) new car. I bought an Impreza last year and it's ... fine. A little on the small side and maybe some of it is lingering PTS from my accident or just getting old, but I want a BIGGER vehicle. I'm looking at the Forester or the Toyota RAV4. 

And the thing is, I can afford it - in cash. Like, I don't even have to borrow money to do any of this. I don't say it to be a braggart, just that I can do something like this in the same way I can buy the fancy cat food for Pumpkin and Ghost. It's the same thing.

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February 11

A dispatch from dating in 2020: Yesterday, I matched with a woman on Tinder. She works in my building (which is large) and is tall, 6 foot 1. Her profile noted that she preferred men 6 feet or taller (which is fine because women are allowed to make demands on men's appearance but not the other way around, those are just the rules) but otherwise she has a cat and likes New York (same and same).

After we matched, I sent a message, prefaced up front that I did not meet the height requirement for the ride and also noted that I thought she looked familiar and was pretty sure we worked in the same building.

Her response was to thank me for my honesty but because we worked in the same building (not the height thing, which would have been totally reasonable and which I flagged for that purpose!), we should probably not proceed. Apparently, being in close physical proximity to someone is a bad thing if you want to, you know DATE THEM and now I am like, maybe I WILL adopt that third cat .... I swear to fucking God.

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February 10

I ended up doing some house work yesterday. Nothing like hoovering up an enormous amount of dust and cat hair to focus the mind ...

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February 9

Just another lather-rinse-repeat Sunday. Boxing and hours on the couch staring at TV, quietly dreading the week to come.

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February 8

Politics have exhausted me this week. I know there is an ebb and flow to the insanity in DC but this is as low as I have felt since Kavanaugh got confirmed. We all know the fix is in, but to see it happen in real time, to see elected officials make a mockery of the oath they swear all in blind allegiance to Trump makes me sick to my stomach.

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February 6

It has been a stressful week. Tuesday, my car was in the shop. Yesterday, I went to see my doctor (again). Today, I had to get x-rays done before work. It taxes my energy and I am just ready for it to be the weekend when I can crawl under a blanket and hide from the world.

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February 5

I took my car in for servicing yesterday. It is one of those chores that being single is made more complicated. You have to rely on a "shuttle" to the office, then you wait for the call that your car is ready. They send another "shuttle" to pick you up and it is all very anxiety-creating even though typing it out makes it seem like no big deal.

Today, I am going back to the doctor. The antibiotics he prescribed for my chest congestion did not clear it up so I am just going under the assumption it's lung cancer and I have like three months to live because that's the way my brain works.

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February 3

The Super Bowl was played last night. I did not watch much of the game. Things like this used to be must see TV for me, but aside from dipping in and out a few times, I was in bed before the fourth quarter started. AMC was re-running Breaking Bad, which I found far more compelling.

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February 2

What I was trying to say yesterday about The Good Place is I found it so affecting because I have been ready to go, for some time, if I am being totally honest. The only things I live for are my two cats. I do not talk to anyone in my family anymore, the few friends I do have would be sad if I was gone but they would get over it, and I have spent the last decade trying to find someone to love (and who would love me) and instead have had a succession of emotionally unavailable and highly manipulative women come through the door whose prime interest in me has been money and not affection. I hate my dead-end job but I cannot afford to quit it. I go through the motions of life every day without actually living. To borrow from Eleanor Shellstrop, THIS is the Bad Place.

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February 1

I watched the series finale for The Good Place last night. It was lovely. In a way, how could it not. If the premise for the after life is that even if you did not initially earn entry into an eternal paradise, you would receive limitless mulligans after your death where you prove your worthiness instead of being subjected to endless penis flattening or bees with teeth, we can all get behind such a construction. And once there, you can idle away eternity learning how to whittle wood or pave driveways or read all the books you want while also having portals that take you back to any point in your mortal life where you could relive those experiences. And once you have checked off everything on your bucket list, you have sucked the marrow out of the after life, you have played your perfect game of Madden or received the validation from your parents you constantly sought but never received, you can walk through a meditative forest, walk through a door, and peace out. 

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