On the way out (and taking out some garbage)

[Vandiablo]

So, how to say it? I haven't even told my family, except one son. I've been given a diagnosis, and the internet says my 50% prognosis is four years. That kind of stung at first. I wanted to live forever, so that maybe I could see the universe, or multiverse, explained better. I am also curious whether my progeny will ever have any of their own.

It's not like I would not have been going at any moment through some other means, like a heart attack or stroke or annoyed spouse. This is just more visible, less surprise involved. And that does make a difference; for instance, the bucket list is now a real thing.

My spouse will be fine; she's wanted to be on her own for a while now. My kids, well, that pains me. I think they genuinely like my company and will miss me. My youngest, especially, will need guidance, but he just cannot bear dealing with his mom. My mother is still living, and I hope she goes right before I do, so my passing won't harm her.

So, I've decided I will be positive. I have a rough deadline (hah!) so I need to prioritize. What do I want the time left to be? Unfortunately, my kids still require $$$ to get going on their own, two of my kids just started college this year. So I will need to keep working another 4 years, or as long as I can. So my "me" experiences will just be during vacations and weekends. I may ponder those in a later post.

For now, though, I wish to thank everyone for all the discussion and reading. There are too many of you to single out. However, I wish to thank Bolty yet again for enabling a (better) version of the good ol' DSF to continue. There were other places but they've sputtered out. I want to thank all the members of AoH, wish I could have met more of you. (I only ever met Puff.) Thanks everyone who encouraged my silly jests and also put up with my various soapboxes. Also thanks to those of you who challenged me, making me re-examine or better understand my views. (... but you're still wrong! ... well, except that medical guy from ?Germany? his name started with an R i think -- I think he was in AoH too -- anyway, he was right!)

Why am I posting this here? One thing is, I eschew FB and tweets and all those things like that. I never trusted Mark Z. from the beginning. Yes, I am an old crank. Yet I need an outlet, so here I am. Another thing, I really think people here should have the courtesy to tell everyone they Going Out, don't just disappear! Three, there's hardly anyone here these days, so I can tell myself that I'm not seeking attention, because it's a very small group here.
 
So, if anyone is here -- what would you put on a 4-year bucket list??

[LavCat]

So, how to say it? I haven't even told my family, except one son. I've been given a diagnosis, and the internet says my 50% prognosis is four years. That kind of stung at first. I wanted to live forever, so that maybe I could see the universe, or multiverse, explained better. I am also curious whether my progeny will ever have any of their own.

It's not like I would not have been going at any moment through some other means, like a heart attack or stroke or annoyed spouse. This is just more visible, less surprise involved. And that does make a difference; for instance, the bucket list is now a real thing.

My spouse will be fine; she's wanted to be on her own for a while now. My kids, well, that pains me. I think they genuinely like my company and will miss me. My youngest, especially, will need guidance, but he just cannot bear dealing with his mom. My mother is still living, and I hope she goes right before I do, so my passing won't harm her.

So, I've decided I will be positive. I have a rough deadline (hah!) so I need to prioritize. What do I want the time left to be? Unfortunately, my kids still require $$$ to get going on their own, two of my kids just started college this year. So I will need to keep working another 4 years, or as long as I can. So my "me" experiences will just be during vacations and weekends. I may ponder those in a later post.

For now, though, I wish to thank everyone for all the discussion and reading. There are too many of you to single out. However, I wish to thank Bolty yet again for enabling a (better) version of the good ol' DSF to continue. There were other places but they've sputtered out. I want to thank all the members of AoH, wish I could have met more of you. (I only ever met Puff.) Thanks everyone who encouraged my silly jests and also put up with my various soapboxes. Also thanks to those of you who challenged me, making me re-examine or better understand my views. (... but you're still wrong! ... well, except that medical guy from ?Germany? his name started with an R i think -- I think he was in AoH too -- anyway, he was right!)

Why am I posting this here? One thing is, I eschew FB and tweets and all those things like that. I never trusted Mark Z. from the beginning. Yes, I am an old crank. Yet I need an outlet, so here I am. Another thing, I really think people here should have the courtesy to tell everyone they Going Out, don't just disappear! Three, there's hardly anyone here these days, so I can tell myself that I'm not seeking attention, because it's a very small group here.
 
So, if anyone is here -- what would you put on a 4-year bucket list??

I am so very, very sorry.  If I had a bucket list it would be travel to Svalbard and an OLED monitor.

[LennyLen]

So sorry to hear this.

One thing I'd definitely like to have on a bucket list is doing a solo sky dive.

[Bolty]

Hey, Van. Really sorry to hear this. As you said, there are undoubtedly Lurkers who have just stopped coming here and we never find out why, and there are others who had acknowledgements of their passing. Any website running long enough with a userbase sticking around so long (seriously, why are some of you still here?) will start hearing of these things. Also, you'd be surprised at how many users still lurk - pun intended - here regularly, as they do let me know with great haste when a spam post comes along to get cleaned up.

I'll ask that you do check in from time to time and let us know you're still around. Maybe you'll beat the odds; many often do, and live far longer than expected. Someday I'll punch out and this thing will go poof when the domain/hosting doesn't get paid. Like much of the Internet, it'll live on at least partially thanks to the Internet Archive and posts people have saved over the now 20+ years of operation. At least this is a website you can point to and say "hey kids, this is what the Internet was like before all those newfangled Facebooks and Reddits and Discords and things came along" and they'll look at you funny.

Maybe if you're bored one night, Van, you could pull up a listing of all of your posts here and pick out your favorite for posterity. It might take a while.

[Kevin]

That's an unfortunately result from the universes RNG. Wishing you the best.

I of course have to put some of the obvious stuff on the list. Grand Canyon, Yellowstone. I did a cruise from Seattle to Alaska once that was really awesome even if it wasn't a "fun in the sun" that most people think about with cruises. If you've never been to another country I'd suggest that too just soak up parts of humanity you haven't had the chance to. Who knows maybe atoms have memory in an alternate universe so when yours end up as part of some other sentient collection of molecules it will configure in a way to inspire someone else because of your experiences, even at the end. OK yeah that's weird but I recently had a scare and was pretty darn close to not being here anymore either and it's something my brain kinda latched onto.

Mostly just keep trying to do the things that bring you joy.

[Kevin]

Maybe if you're bored one night, Van, you could pull up a listing of all of your posts here and pick out your favorite for posterity.  It might take a while. 

Because this is the Lounge and tangents are almost required in threads. ;-) Never suggest that to me. I think I broke the 5K barrier on posts and well I'd never get through the task!

[Lissa]

That's pretty rough. I would probably try to spend as much time as possible with friends and family as possible. Better to get everything out there than leave something back that those around you will dread never getting a chance to talk about. I've seen too many situations happen where regrets are left and the pain that it leaves.

[Selby]

Very sorry to hear this. I was given one of those diagnoses 3.5 years ago and managed to be one of the lucky ones, so things can improve but I definitely planned on what I'd do. Mine was more sudden so it was more "make sure the kiddos don't grow up to be awful people" rather than bucket list, because I still had to work to maintain health insurance and try to provide for the rest of the family. Just know that some of us who lurk and have read your posts for going on multiple decades are thinking about you.

[Vandiablo]

I don't know what the proper response to "sorry to hear that" is, but mine is "Thanks" which is short for "thanks for caring and letting me know" and I mean it because it does make me feel better. Also, it melds with "Thanks for the memories" a song I often abuse.

LavCat - Thanks! I hope you get a great OLED monitor!

LennyLen - Thanks! If I exited a flying plane, my arteries and veins would not be able to keep up with my heart and I'd explode. 

Kevin - Thanks! I may return later to your thoughts about lingering molecules (right now I'm breathing my maternal grandfather.) Universe RNG?? No way! This is all a big simulation so the best it can do is pseudo-random. Besides, all possible things happen, from what I hear (not sure I believe it), so I just happen to exist in a part of the continuum that has the diagnosis. Other Vans either live on, or were already hit by a bus, etc. "Keep trying to do the things that bring you joy." Okay, but I'll probably get more restraining orders HAW HAW *snort* Durnit, you made me snort myself.

Kevin, part II -- "soak up parts of humanity you haven't had the chance to" -- yes!! great idea! I was thinking the same thing! *picks up Bucket List, adds "Visit Massage Parlor"* Seriously, though, there's not much I want to travel to see or do, except go see some redwoods. Oh, and be at a warm beach with clear warmish water without much current and a beautiful reef near the surface.

Lissa - yes, family, primarily trying to spend time with my now-adult kids who are starting to separate. I am trying to connect more but have not been very successful so far, unfortunately. But I think I'll get there.

Selby - Thanks! Sorry to hear that you have had to have your own fight. Yes about trying to beat the odds. I'll talk more about that later, but I will share that I told one of my brothers about my diagnosis/prognosis a few nights ago. He frickin' chewed my ass out. You gotta FIGHT, he said. He actually has a similar fight going on but not as far along as mine. Anyway more later.  I hear ya about having to keep working, and influencing the character of your kids. Oh, and my kids too. You actually read my posts??? Tsk. Not healthy. 

Kevin, Bolty -- "might take a while" is an understatement. I went back to 2003, the oldest I could find (is there an archive of the older stuff?) and it took a whole evening just to get through about three months worth, because I would read everything Pete said, most of what Doc said, 10% of Occhi's stuff (still a lot), and various other stuff. It's amazing to look back at 2003 and see what people were concerned about then.

But I see what you're doing, Bolty! You know at some point I'd be bringing up old posts, and you are trying to limit it to just one!! HA! You'll be lucky if I keep it to one per year! So here's the first installment.

The Long & Dreary History of Vandegeezer, Part One of Toomany 
(as recorded on a double roll of bathroom tissue)

Oh, these young punks these days with their Tweeters and TicTacs and Instagraph! No thoughts just reactions! Worse than Ogden's I'd say, and eugene could at least write more than two sentences at a time!

I think probably my best post was early on, and it was probably in 1997 on the DSF. It was titled "Rouge Tips" and the author listed was "Mary Kay". Perhaps someone remembers it. It was one of the few fictional pieces that made it into Varaya's Strategy Guide. I'll have to dig it up unless someone has VSG handy. (That post actually received some private compliments from female DSFers, who would then remark that I must be well-familiar with women's magazines. "Busted!" I'd say. "Busted! I only look at ones that are well Busted!" You might guess that actually I bit my tongue and only thought the second part; you'd probably be right.)

There are also the contributions to Diablonomy. I made two minor contributions in the pre-Jarulf days, but this post is already too long, so, another time.

As for 2003, I think it was Occhi had the funniest line, but I'll have to go through 2003 again to remember it. Sorry.

2003: There was a post (not mine) that mentioned some pagan rock band requested that their venue have an area reserved for "quiet fornication." The poster said that sounded like a joke that starts "Why do pagans like quiet fornication?" and asked people to supply the answer. Of my answers, my fave was "Who doesn't?" Of my answers, the best reaction was to "Because quiet castration wasn't attracting new members."

2003: On a thread about extended LOTR DVDs (remember those?), someone said "more singing!" and I replied "you asked for it!" and made a mega-post with four parody songs. My fave was "Southron Man", to the tune of Neil Young's "Southern Man" (right title?) but the best reaction was to the simple "SAM SAM SAM SAM SAM SAM SAM SAM SAM SAM SAM SAM SAM SAM SAM SAM Lovely SAM! Wonderful SAM!" Anyone who's seen the LOTR movies will know how appropriate that is. By the way, today it occurred to me that if I watched the movies again I would keep a running count on Sam's Frodometer.

Also 2003, regarding song parodies: "People just don't appreciate how much effort it takes to deface someone else's work properly." Maybe not all that funny, but it fits me well.

(Hmm, this paraphrasing old posts doesn't do well for attempted humor. I think it's because it's not spontaneous, and the narcissism blasts through and overpowers the delicate phrasings of humble self-deprecation. Maybe next time I will just provide brief setups and links. It's also hard to pick a post for posteriority because almost all my posts are reactions to someone else.)

-V

[Bolty]

Kevin, Bolty -- "might take a while" is an understatement. I went back to 2003, the oldest I could find (is there an archive of the older stuff?)

Are you suuuuuuuure you want an answer to that question?
http://www.lurkerlounge.com/cgi-bin/forum/forum.cgi
https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/thelurkerlounge - the olllllllld Network54 forum, now owned by Tapatalk.

[eppie]

 
So, if anyone is here -- what would you put on a 4-year bucket list??

That sucks Van. I'm sorry to hear this news.

It seems you have some serious things to do with your kids being in college and so on. This is hard work but will also be fulfilling I think.
Assuming your bucket list doesn't include going 'breaking bad'' there might be some interesting things:
-take part in a pepper eating contest
-build a pizza oven in your back garden

.....just make sure you enjoy things the best you can and ask your kids want they want to do with you as bucket list items.
Take care man.

[Vandiablo]

So my "me" experiences will just be during vacations and weekends. I may ponder those in a later post.

Checking in ... I don't want to make hundreds of posts, so I'm just lumping everything together.

Bolty -- damn you! Those links are horrible, horrible! I didn't go through all of it (yet?) but there are only a very small number of tiny good things buried and sparse lost in a huge crock-crypt of ... words fail me here. 

eppie - Thanks for the post! I do love pepper. I have to watch out for jalapeno-laden stuff though -- if I have too much, my digestive system expands to double size while it burns and expels tens times my body weight. And it hurts. Oddly enough I have very little issue with red pepper. I've read that there's not really much chemical difference between them, yet here I am being easy with the J but can guzzle the R. And pizza, yes no better food. There is wide variety and most is wonderful: NY style -- great crust is essential because it has to fold and it's the first thing on your tongue; Chicago style -- here you are savoring the interplay of the filling (not just a layer of topping); frozen -- yes, frozen! -- oh this one takes too long to explain, but I will say I mean certain ones, most frozen pizza is just passable; and then there's the local Italian-over pizza kitchen which has great stuff that scoffs at NY and Chicago. (Not really a fan of Detroit yet.) I've been tempted to become a pizza-making wizard, but why take the time when there's so much good stuff out there? Now, it's moot, pizza should only be a treat (except possibly cauliflower crust margherita) because of lifestyle changes necessary to prolong my existence. 

Everyone - I must apologize to everyone who has had or had a loved one that had chemical or radiation treatment. I am spared all that. The only possible medical treatment for me is an organ transplant, which I'm thinking will never happen. My fight can only be to stop progression (DAMMIT VAN SAY WHAT IT IS) by treating my diabetes better. Diabetes interacts with another condition I have to cause a fatal condition, but it takes some time. My doctor says if I treat my diabetes very strictly I can slow, or maybe even stop the progression. So my treatment is eat better and exercise. Not bad, eh? The downside is that I can never undo the progression that's here, I can only get worse. The cancer treatments, they have the possibility of putting you back to 0%. But I would not want that tradeoff, not at this point anyway. The apology to those that had such a horrible fight is because my fight is so easy in comparison.

I had a slightly younger cousin who had breast cancer, had chemo, and beat it back. I don't know how long she was in remission, but eventually it came back. She elected this time to just let it kill her rather than go through treatment again. (She was mid-50s, had one daughter.) She died earlier this year. It was a shock to me, because I'd never heard about her first round. She was always smiling and friendly, I wish I had known her better; we had always lived in different states. So cancer treatment is hell; I am fortunate that I don't have to choose whether to have it. Another aspect of her death is that it shows me that, yes, it is real, my generation of the family is starting to die.

Back to happy things... Bucket List, Travel Edition! - ideas that involve travel. (Order is unimportant.) 

#1: Bigass Plants - I want to go see the redwoods, or at least one big one. For this, I don't mind being a dumb tourist in a group, I don't need to commune with nature, I just need to stand at the bottom and say "Damn that's big." Then walk back a bit and say it again. Then walk back some more and say it once more. Then I can go home. The other BAP is the Corpse Flower. I'd like not only to see the bloom but experience the stench. I'd like to go to the D.C. Arboretum when the corpse flower there blooms, but it's not predictable, it's a kinda It's Happening Now Go Now type of thing.

#2: Europe - not for me, but I'd like to accompany my kids, two of whom have never been there. Which parts of Europe would be up to them. If up to me, I'd just sit at a pub with a garden, and go get fish-n-chips for meals.

#3: A few nights in a southwestern desert, for the night sky. Then again, my vision has degraded and maybe a dark quiet place in nearby Appalachia would be as good... though it could rain, then I'm just camping.

-V

[eppie]

Back to happy things... Bucket List, Travel Edition! - ideas that involve travel. (Order is unimportant.) 



-V

So what about this   https://www.visitsherwood.co.uk/explore-...major-oak/

BAP, Europe (well at least it was) and lots of options drink beer in  a beer garden and eating fish and chips.

[Vandiablo]

Checking in. I'm still in denial, still not being hard-core about life-prolonging measures, oh well

eppie and BigAssPlants -- no, I guess I meant Tall trees. We do have a few hundreds-years-old oaks around here, so I don't feel that I have need in the Wide category. Robin Hood neither. Thanks anyway! But... I think sitting in any real forest, without machine noise or human noise, is great. Maybe not in winter, unless there's still birds. And it turns out, I have already been to see the corpse flower! But I don't remember it because I don't remember any bad smell. We must have gone late in its blooming or something.

Bucket list-- some Winter elements in the bucket list. I'm thinking I'll be reading, and I want to laugh as much as possible. So I think I am going to re-read and read the entire Discworld series (that's Terry Pratchett, but I think you all know that). There's a couple I haven't read, but I haven't read any for a while so I want to read them in a good reading order. The last one I read, I found I wasn't really an Igor fan.) I think I will also re-read Catch-22. I don't know if there's much else worth re-reading. I toyed with reading LotR again, but, no, I've read it enough. Maybe The Hobbit. Currently I'm reading Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke, which is entertaining and I may read another book by her. I thought of Hitchhiker's but I think I remember everything well enough that it wouldn't be worth it. As for non-fiction, I need to finish the Twain/Clemons autobiography.

Distraction -- I am majorly annoyed when people vilify Huckleberry Finn by saying that Twain "used" the n-word four hundred eleventy fourteen times. His characters used the n-word; I don't think the narrator does (except Huck.) If the characters didn't use it, their language would not have been authentic for that place and time. Sheesh. Huck is the narrator of the book, and he is no exception. Anyway, people think of it as an adventures book (like Tom Sawyer) but ultimately it is an anti-slavery book. Maybe I'll re-read this and argue this some more. Maybe not. While I think the n-word is reason that HF should not be assigned when it will be discussed aloud, there should not be any reason to remove it from libraries. But modern censorship is such a huge issue these days, I probably should just not do it.

Back to winter bucket -- Last winter I meant to do genealogy but I didn't do much. By this I mean online research, I'm not going to courthouses and archives and whatnot. No one else in the family is much interested, so I don't have much incentive.

I also think about playing CD and D2, and it'd be fun. But CD would be just to find ObZod, which is both not guaranteed and a big so what. I'll have to think more about later versions of D. Have I already said this? Sorry.

-V

[roguebanshee]

#2: Europe - not for me, but I'd like to accompany my kids, two of whom have never been there. Which parts of Europe would be up to them. If up to me, I'd just sit at a pub with a garden, and go get fish-n-chips for meals.

A lot of places to just sit in a pub with a garden especially in any decently sized city, where you can drink beer/wine/whatever while eating something good.

If you like beer Austria, Germany, Czechia, Slovakia, and Hungary are all good places to go (and there's a bit of a rivalry between those nations as to who makes the best beer). As an alternative to a basic pub there's also many of the monestaries and castles which have what can be loosely translated as "beer restaurants" where they serve whatever the local brewery makes, many of them using the original recipes from whenever the monestary was founded. They also (usually) serve a decent meal. And most of them have a great view. Should you decide to go to Germany, I highly recommend trying both currywurst and schnitzel.

If you lean more towards wine you should add (not replace) France and Italy to the list of countries. You can find many local wineries if you tour the countryside and most of the owners of those smaller places tend to be quite open to anyone showing an interest in their wines. But if you want something to eat with the local wine and don't want to cook yourself, your best bet is to find a local restaurant and order both food and wine there.

[Lissa]

My suggestion on have a beer or two in Europe is to do the big one (I got there myself back in 2015): Octoberfest in Munich.

The city is great and there's a lot of things to see in Bavarian Germany.