Thirteen years and one year

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This is not, objectively speaking, that great of a picture. Bek has pretty clearly just emerged from the shower, I don’t even look like I have showered– my beard is an utter Goddamned abomination– and none of us are looking at the camera for some reason, which is odd because I seem to be holding it, so you’d think I’d know where to look. I like it anyway.

Roughly thirteen years ago, I got married to that lady on the right there. Why roughly? Our anniversary is February 29, meaning that for three out of every four years I correctly celebrate our anniversary on the 28th of February and my wife incorrectly insists that our anniversary is March 1st. I finally won this argument free and clear this year, when she fucked up and accidentally advocated my position for a few minutes, forgetting that she has always been the March person. I will never, ever allow her to forget it, either.

At any rate, asking her to marry me remains the best decision I’ve ever made, as I Married Up in every conceivable fashion. The jury may still be out on her decision to marry me, but I’d like to think it’s worked out okay.

We aren’t doing anything for our anniversary this year. Last year we went to C2E2 on our anniversary. Covid-19 was a concern already, but at the time there were less than 60 cases nationwide and we figured it was as safe as it ever was. I tried my damnedest to keep my hands in my pockets as much as I possibly could and we washed our hands whenever we had a chance to. We had dinner with a friend at a Potbellies in Hyde Park and then came home.

And then I was sick for a month anyway, not quite “as sick as I’ve ever been” levels but I literally was trashed for the entire month of March, and by the time that was done we were in lockdown. That Potbellies dinner was the last time I had dinner in a restaurant. That dinner was the last time we made plans with anybody to do anything fun. And 500,000 people are dead in the United States alone, with another two million gone worldwide.

So, yeah, this year we’re staying home. We’re having Hamburger Helper for dinner. Why? Because Bek used to make it all the time and has stopped in the last couple of years for some reason, and I’m so Goddamn starved for novelty that having Hamburger Helper for the first time in probably seven or eight months seemed like something worth getting excited about. None of us have had shots yet; we’re too young to qualify yet, and Indiana is explicitly hoping at least a few more teachers die of this thing before they vaccinate any of us.

Maybe next year, if we’re able to, we’ll celebrate on the 28th and the 1st.

On seven years, and other stuff

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I keep almost writing a post about cops, and about police departments, and about protests, but I’m not sure what else I could say that I didn’t say here. Ain’t a damn thing changed except it’s gotten worse, and six years after Ferguson (6!!) I am more than a bit less willing to grant the idea that cops can be good people now than I was before. We are at the point where the institution itself is so rotten that it’s impossible to participate in it without getting the stink on you.

Fuck the police, is what I’m saying.

Hm. Maybe this is why I can’t do WordAds:

I dunno if it’s something I can appeal or not, and I don’t really know if I want to, but after seven years of writing at this place and putting, at this point, a decent chunk over a million words into it, I’m not entirely averse to the idea of making a buck or two off of it here and there. I don’t know that I agree that I “serve mature content,” though. Sure, I don’t censor my language most of the time, but that’s just profanity. It’s not like I’m sharing porn around here.

Nut the fuck up, WordAds, is what I’m saying here.

So, yeah– we’re now two full years past the point where my first long-term blog died; the final post over at Xanga just happened to be on the site’s fifth birthday, and it had been months at that point since I’d been posting regularly. My slowest year on Infinitefreetime was 2017, which featured 247 posts and over 82,000 words. By comparison, this is 2020’s 150th post. It is also 2020’s 158th day. And at an average of 414 words per post, I’m writing longer this year than I have in any year since 2013. I don’t know if that will stick as the year drags on, of course, but who knows.

Still have not successfully ridden the bike, by the way. I’ll try again tonight. I went shoe shopping yesterday, and was in the mood to buy something lighter and brighter than the can-wear-them-to-work shoes that have been my primary pair for a while, and I took a long look at a pair that was a lovely burgundy red before realizing that they matched the bike. I liked the idea for all of a minute or two and then came to my senses and bought these, in navy blue. I only mention the specific pair because a day later they might be the most comfortable shoes I’ve ever purchased. I am lazy enough that I generally just try to shove my feet inside my shoes without unlacing them anyway, so buying a pair of laceless shoes seemed like a natural step to take. Right now, it definitely feels like the right move.

What’s going on in your neck of the woods, other than the world ending?

6:07 PM, Saturday, June 6th: 1,909,077 confirmed cases and 109,497 Americans dead.

In which I’m planning my nerdery and also I’m stupid

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We’re heading to Chicago for C2E2 tomorrow; we only bought tickets for the Saturday part of the show, but we’re going to stay with my brother on Friday night so that we don’t have as long or complicated a drive to deal with on Saturday morning. I spent some time tonight looking around at who was planning on being there and trying to wargame out who I wanted to see and how much standing in lines I thought my eight-year-old might be willing to tolerate. Which is … probably not too much, honestly.

I have a handful of people on my list: two comics writers, Gail Simone and Al Ewing, both of whom should be easy enough to find at their Artist’s Alley tables, Noelle Stevenson, who my wife also wants to meet and who is responsible for the excellent Netflix She-Ra program, and a few science fiction authors: John Scalzi, Sam Sykes, Robert Jackson Bennett and S.L. Huang. I have absolutely no idea whatsoever how difficult it will be to get autographs from these people, and I’m not about to subject my kid to lengthy lines, but is Sam Sykes gonna have a long line? I mean, probably not, right? Who the hell knows. There’s also the minor decision needed about whether I’m gonna bring stuff with me for autographing, which takes up space and requires me to carry said stuff around, or if I’m going to plan on buying things for signatures, which, okay, it’s our anniversary so I’m gonna splurge a bit, but I don’t know how many extra books I need just for signatory purposes. I mostly want to just meet these folks; the signatures are frankly all sorts of secondary to that purpose.

Now, take all that, whip up a bunch of unnecessary COVID-19 related paranoia, and pour said paranoia all over my plans like some sort of infection-based gravy. There have been sixty damn cases of the novel coronavirus in America, and I know how to wash my damn hands, which is the best way to avoid it. I’m just not super eager to be northern Indiana’s patient zero when I contract this shit and then spread it all over a damn middle school. Am I going to let this change my plans? Hell no, although I’m probably going to spend a smidge more time with my hands in my pockets than I might otherwise, and there’s definitely going to be more hand-washing than usual. But it’s in the back of my brain anyway, because stupid, and because oh right I have an actual anxiety disorder and anxiety disorders love this shit. Like, there’s nothing an anxiety disorder loves more than going to a 100,000-person-strong nerd convention during the opening weeks of a pandemic. Loves it.

Unrelated to anything: I am listening to a Kesha album right now, on purpose, and I’m rather enjoying it.

Anyway, I’ll post tons of pictures– pretty sure I can’t be infected with anything through my camera– and the usual end-of-month posts will be happening as usual. Whee!

It is decided

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For our 12th anniversary, my wife and son and I will be attending C2E2, which is a huge show that I attended once as a vendor several years ago. This will be the first nerd convention that I have been to in years where I will actually get to be a fan and an attendee and not trying to hawk books, so it ought to be a lot of fun, although I’ll probably need all of Sunday to recover afterwards. I have important decisions to make during next week now, mostly along the lines of how much money am I going to allow myself to blow at this thing and when I find a giant sword that I want, should I consider buying it, or am I past the point where I should be buying giant swords?

I mean, realistically I know the answer to that, but still.

There will be tons of pictures of cosplayers, of course, and there may be pictures of me taken with a handful of my favorite authors, as John Scalzi, Sam Sykes, and Gail Simone are all going to be in attendance. I will absolutely go meet Gail; Scalzi and Sykes will depend on the length of lines, as we’ll have the boy with us and I feel like C2E2 is not an optimal place to “meet” people who I might want to talk to for more than ten seconds. We’ll see, though.

Finally! A plan!

Eleven years

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For ELEVEN YEARS this woman has been putting up with me. And I love her very much for it. My God, have I gone downhill since 2008.

Eleven years and a day, actually. We were married on Feb. 29, 2008, which is the last day of February in 2008, meaning that our anniversary is properly celebrated on the last day of February and not on the first day of March. We didn’t get married in March, so our anniversary can’t be in March. It would be nonsense to suggest otherwise.

Like I said. Putting up with me for eleven years. 🙂